Trapped History

We've spent so long asking our guests who they'd like to see in the Trapped History Hall of Fame, that for our 30th episode we thought we'd do something a bit different.And so Carla, MK and Oswin have each brought along someone they'd like to see honoured. Tune in for a whistle-stop tour through the lives of a First World War heroine, a couple who fought for freedom in South Africa and a union leader who was a conscientious objector.Three different stories, four hidden and forgotten people, but we hope you will agree, they led some of the fullest and most compelling lives you will hear of.We want to hear your own nominations for the Hall of Fame, so be inspired and head over to trappedhistory.com to send us your own nominees.

Roll up, roll up for the Season Four closer — as we take a trip to the circus!At Trapped History, we look at lives and stories which have been forgotten or ignored, and there is one community in Britain which is still shrouded in mystery even in the 21st century: that of the circus people. So who better to lift the curtain than the King of the Ring himself, Zippo the Clown — or just plain Martin Burton to us.Not only does Martin shine a light on the lure of the circus but he also joins us on a journey back in time, when America was in thrall to the greatest showman of all — Frank Bostock, the Animal King from Darlington. Frank's is an astonishing story and an amazing life, which tells us so much about the glory years at the turn of the 20th century when technology, travel and theatre collided to create the magical potion of 'Spectacle'.

Join Oswin and Carla for this moving Hall of Fame from historian Clare Mulley as she remembers wartime nurses, Dorothy Field and Mollie Evershed. They are the only women among over 22,000 men to be remembered on the Normandy Memorial in Bayeux.It is a story of courage and selflessness. Prepare to have your heart broken.

She is one of the most important women of the Second World War — a fighter, a secret agent, a government envoy and a commando. But have we heard of her? Can we sing her name? If not, you've come to the right place.Tune in to hear the astounding story of Elżbieta Zawacka, AKA Agent Zo. It's a tale which takes us from Warsaw and Berlin to Paris and London, a tale of hope and fear, of courage and terror. Above all else, it is the tale of a young woman who won't take no for an answer when the call comes.Oswin and Carla are joined today by the historian Clare Mulley, whose excellent new book tells the legend that is Zo. It is a wonderful story and a wonderful life. We're honoured to be able to help tell it.

Tune in to a fascinating Hall of Fame as Professor Chris French nominates Ellizabeth Loftus, a psychologist famed for her work on false, recovered and repressed memory.It's not just Elizabeth's life story here — Chris fills us in on the theory of false memory (remember getting lost in a supermarket?) and the controversies around recovered and repressed childhood memories which she researched and challenged.It makes for a powerful nomination and we believe this longer format justifies Elizabeth's inclusion in the Hall of Fame.

We might have heard of Amelia Earhart or even Amy Johnson, but who remembers Richarda Morrow-Tait, the first woman to fly around the world?Well, someone does because on 19th August this year, a blue plaque was unveiled at Cambridge Airport to mark the 75th anniversary of her truly momentous achievement.We featured Dikki in our first ever season and we couldn't pass up the chance to celebrate her once more. So Oswin travelled to Cambridge to see the blue plaque, catch up with old friends and meet some of Dikki's family to try to find out more about the woman behind the record.This all-new ‘director's cut' of our original episode tells Dikki's story alongside the incomparable Polly Vacher, herself a record-breaker. But we've also got new interviews with Polly as well as with Amanda Harrison, another female pilot inspired by her forebears, and we get to hear from Dikki's relatives about what drove her.It's a fascinating story so please join us for this wonderful repeat.

Welcome back after our mid-season break! And what a return – with (drum roll) the mysteries, magic and mayhem of The Amazing Randi. He had everything a conjuror should have – the baffling genius, the cape, the beard, the mortal enemies – but more than anything, he had a mission: to uncover and expose cheats and frauds.Join Carla and Oswin as Goldsmith's Professor Chris French takes us on a rollercoaster journey of psychics and charlatans, secrecy and snake-oil salesmen – and above all else, of doubt and belief. Hold onto your hats – there might be a rabbit in it . . .

Every episode, we ask our guest to nominate someone for the Trapped History Hall of Fame. Usually, it's someone we've never heard of but really should have. But sometimes, just sometimes, it's someone we think we know all about. In the historian Kim Wagner's nominee, prepare to find out something new about someone you thought you knew.

It's October 1961. The Beatles are in Hamburg, JFK in the White House, Yuri Gagarin has just shot into space. And a state-sponsored killing spree is going down on the streets of a capital city. But this isn't Rio, Washington or Johannesburg. This isn't Moscow or Port-au-Prince or Saigon. This is Paris, the City of LIght, and by the month's end, over 200 north Africans will have been murdered by the city police.Rewind a further 60 years and the same thing is playing out in the hills and forests of the Philippines, as the Moro resistance is being wiped out by the American army in the infamous Bud Dajo massacre.Does history teach us anything? Looking around the world today, can we say that we have learnt from the past? This is a tough and harrowing episode of Trapped History, but it is an important one too.So join Oswin and Carla as we try to make sense of atrocity in the company of one of the great historians of our times, Kim Wagner.

In this special bonus episode of the Trapped History podcast, historian Kim Wagner talks statues with Oswin, Carla and MK. How do we critically and sensitively challenge outdated readings of the past? How do we write history again for the modern age? And is there a 'right' way of doing this? We think you'll be surprised by our conclusions.Listen out for the full episode later this week.

Join Oswin and Carla as we go back – way back – to a time before podcasts and instagram, before radio and photographs. Join us as we journey back to the 18th century and meet the people who made monarchy work.And they're not the people you might expect to meet. At a time when Britain's kings and queens barely spoke the language, please let us introduce you to Mehmet and Mustapha, two Turkish men who ran the life of George I. And what about Abdullah, who brought a caracal from India all the way to the King's Menagerie at the Tower of London? Or Bridget Holmes, Frances Talbot and Grace Tosier – without whom, life would have been just a bit less tolerable for the Stuart and Georgian rulers.So tune in to Dr Mishka Sinha, co-curator of Kensington Palace's wonderful exhibition 'Untold Lives', as we lift the curtain and peer into the machinery of monarchy.

With its long tufted ears – sometimes mistaken for horns – the caracal is a precious animal. So precious in fact, that one particular animal was gifted to George II in 1759.Ahead of next week's episode, Mishka Sinha, curator of the Untold Lives exhibition at Kensington Palace, gives Oswin and Carla an exclusive insight into the powers behind the throne. So listen to this special bonus all about that very cat – confusingly named 'The Shah Goest' – and its keeper, Abdullah. And find out how the seemingly simple act of 'gifting' can have deep and far-reaching meanings.

We ask all our guests to nominate someone for the Trapped History Hall of Fame. Someone we've not heard of but should have.In this Season Four opener, please meet Mishal Husain's nominee: Fatima Jinnah, known as Madr-e-Millat or 'Mother of the Nation', a woman who broke the rules and the barriers as Pakistan emerged from the chaos of Partition. She became the conscience of Pakistan, who as opposition leader and presidential candidate, constantly reminded people about the founding principles of the new nation.It's a great introduction to our new season.

In an exclusive bonus, Mishal Husain tells us about the chance discovery of her grandfather Shahid's passport.It may seem a small, insignificant thing, a old irrelevant document from another age. But Shahid's passport tells us so much more – about the past but also about the present and perhaps even the future. Because it declared this man born in Lucknow who had lived all his life in British India to be a 'British Subject By Birth'. So when he travelled to England in the 1930s, it was not as a tourist. Not as a foreigner. Not as an immigrant. But as a British man.This was also the route taken by so many from the Caribbean in the 1940s and 1950s. They were coming 'home' as part of the so-called Windrush Generation and had no more need to prove their status than someone who lived in Tunbridge Wells or Greenock.It's a fascinating listen – and if you've not had the chance to hear the full episode, head over to trappedhistory.com for more.

Mishal Husain joins Oswin and Carla for a truly special Season 4 opener, telling the tale of her family's journey through the stormy waters of Indian and Pakistani independence. It's a story of joy and freedom, but also one of fear, loss and terror.Shahid, Tahirah, Mumtaz and Mary live through Empire, world war, independence and partition. They meet the people who will shape their future, men like Mountbatten and Jinnah - but they also find themselves unable to meet the people who really matter to them, the friends and family they grew up with but who end up on the other side of an embattled border.It is a truly powerful episode, reminding us that we all have 'history' big and small within our grasp, within our family.

With Jeremy Corbyn announcing that he's standing as an independent in the upcoming general election, we thought we should revisit his time in the Trapped History studio.This all-new ‘director's cut' contains golden nuggets on the French and American Revolutions and on Charlotte's campaigning for animal rights. It's a real treat! On top of that, the former leader of the Labour Party was really excited to be part of this episode – Charlotte is one of his all-time greats – and he tells us a thing or two about finding and losing tribes, how injustice can move people to great deeds, and how we all need a Charlotte to inspire us.It's a fascinating story so please join us for this wonderful repeat.

Guitars, light shows, psychedelia . . . Any idea who might unexpectedly be making their way into the Hall of Fame?Tune in to hear Martin Gutmann's nominee. We guarantee you'll have heard of them before but not necessarily for Martin's reasons. It's a truly fascinating listen which might change the way you think about bands, friends and music.

He's the greatest explorer the world has ever known – the first to navigate the fabled North-West Passage, the first to reach the South Pole, the first to the impossible North. But how much do we really know about Roald Amundsen?More precisely, how much do we want to know? Surely, the tangled heroics of Scott of the Antarctic and of Ernest Shackleton make for more exciting reading than the careful, boring tales of Amundsen? They faced crises with fortitude, didn't they – while he simply, well, succeeded?That is, perhaps, the point. So join Oswin and Carla on our enthralling season finale as we dissect 'The Hero's Journey' and the 'Action Fallacy' in the company of Professor Martin Gutmann – and find out why we all deserve to know more about Amundsen and his unseen leadership.

Didn't think we'd need to introduce you to Winston Churchill on Trapped History, but if you want to understand the hidden traits of leadership, he's actually quite important. Though not necessarily for the reasons you might think . . .Tune in to hear Professor Martin Gutmann discuss the ‘Action Fallacy' in this exclusive bonus episode. It's not just about Churchill but it's key to understanding not only how we so often get leadership all wrong but also the enduring significance of this week's subject – the greatest explorer the world has ever known: Roald Amundsen.

The Hero's Journey is an ancient human phenomenon. We see it, hear it, read it in stories all the way from the Odyssey to Harry Potter. It is a gripping tale of triumph over adversity, of crisis and fulfillment.But sometimes we need more than heroes. Tune in to hear Professor Martin Gutmann challenge the way the Hero's Journey has been used to teach people about leadership. In this exclusive extract from our latest episode, Martin compares the heroics of Ernest Shackleton, Robert Scott and Roald Amundsen and reaches some unexpected conclusions.It's a fascinating taster for the full episode, dropping on 22nd February 2024.

We ask all our guests to nominate someone for the Trapped History Hall of Fame. Someone we've not heard of but should have.Most of our nominees are long gone – but Dee Jarrett-Macauley follows in the footsteps of Pete Paphides and nominates someone who is well and truly alive and kicking: the great publisher and writer Margaret Busby, whose Daughters Of Africa anthologies changed the way poetry was published in Britain.

Poet, playwright, publisher. Campaigner, broadcaster, journalist. Six people in one, but if we've heard of Una Marson, it's usually because of her brief shining moment during the Second World War when she became the voice and face of the Caribbean through her pioneering work at the BBC.Tune in to hear about the six lives of Una Marson as Oswin and Carla are joined by her biographer and Orwell Prize winner, Dee Jarrett-Macauley. It's a tale of a young woman who came to represent a whole region, a whole continent even – and who sometimes found that burden too heavy to shake off.It's an inspirational story, it's a sad one too. But it's a story of our times – when the personal and the political become one.

Una Marson's politics and poetry come together so powerfully in her famed 'Kinky Hair Blues' from 1937. Life-affirming but ultimately heartbreaking, the poem sets out the internal battles a young Black woman goes through as she tries to fit into a world which doesn't fit around her.It's one of Una's greatest poems, alongside 'Cinema Eyes' tackling racism and colourism both in Britain and her Jamaican homeland – and in this exclusive Trapped History bonus, it's read today by the wonderful Aisha Ricketts, a Jamaican singer and voice actor.Tune in on 8th February for the full episode about Una Marson, in the company of her biographer and Orwell Prize winner, Dee Jarrett-Macauley.

As we limber up for next week's new episode about the great Una Marson, join us for this exclusive bonus about her international work. We know Una now as the voice and face of the BBC's wartime 'Caribbean Voices' but she was so much more, representing women of colour at major international conferences and working with world leaders like Haile Selassie and Ataturk.Next week, there's more exclusive material about Una's time in Jamaica in the 1930s before we launch the full episode on Thursday.

We ask all our guests to nominate someone for the Trapped History Hall of Fame. Someone we've not heard of but should have.Most guests nominate someone who's, well, dead. But Pete Paphides joins Polly Vacher in nominating a living legend. In this case, the mesmeric Paolo Conte, Italy's answer to Tom Waits.Listen to Pete's nomination exclusively here.

See if you can join the dots – Elvis Presley, Bob Dylan, Simon and Garfunkel, Nick Drake, Sandy Denny, The Beatles. Well, there's one man who sits at the centre of it all, and it's more than likely that you won't have heard of him: Jackson C Frank. A damaged, wounded singer-songwriter who wowed the British folk scene and presaged psychedelia and punk, Jackson only produced one album – but its influence can still be heard today in the work of artists like Laura Marling, Counting Crows, even Daft Punk.Oswin and Carla are delighted to be joined by the music journalist Pete Paphides to discuss Blues Run The Game, how hurt and pain can drive creativity and the transformative power of music.

Here's another exclusive bonus as we wait to drop Jackson's episode later this week. Listen to Pete Paphides dissect three of Jackson's key tracks (you'll have to wait for the main episode for his thoughts on Blues Run The Game).Main episode out on 18th January.

We've got a taster for you today to whet your appetite for next week's episode on the lost and forgotten singer, Jackson C Frank. The music journalist Pete Paphides joins us to join the dots between Jackson, Paul Simon, Bob Dylan, Elvis and even The Beatles. It's a fascinating story so here's a few bonus moments as Pete paints the picture of Jackson, the man and the music.Full episode drops Thursday 18th January.

Every episode, we ask our guest to nominate someone for the Trapped History Hall of Fame: someone we haven't heard of but really should have.Today, it's the turn of @that.spitfire.bird, instagram's very own Jo Rogers. We take a quick detour into Tilly Shilling's orifice – no, really! – before finding out what a Messerschmitt 108 turned up when it taxied into Jo's life. Find all about the magnificent Elly Beinhorn, a German aviatrix who rivalled Amy Johnson, fell in love with a dashing racing driver and turned her nose up at the Nazis who tried to control her life.

The Battle of Britain is at its height. Spitfires and Hurricanes urgently need to get from the factories to the airfields and into the hands of ‘the Few'. Step forward Pauline Gower, a pioneering pilot of the 1930s, who alongside the 168 women who she brought into the Air Transport Auxiliary, would help ferry over 300,000 planes from where they were built to where they were needed. Tune in to hear Pauline's story as Oswin and Carla are joined – buckled up inside a Dakota troop carrier – by Jo Rogers, AKA instagram's magnificent @that.spitfire.bird. It's a tale of bravery, tragedy, grit and sheer bloody-minded determination in the face of slack-jawed armchair generals. There are appearances from the great Amy Johnson and Jacqueline Cochran, so strap in and prepare to be inspired.

Every episode, we ask our guest to nominate someone for the Trapped History Hall of Fame: someone we haven't heard of but really should have.As it's the holiday season, today we have a twofer for you: first, there's Peter's light-hearted nomination of the explorer Richard Burton, in all his magnificent messiness. And then, hear about the courageous Father Stanley Rother, a missionary among the Tz'utujil people of Guatemala in the 1970s, who famously wrote, "The shepherd cannot run at the first sign of danger" and was murdered by paramilitary forces in 1981.It's a moving tale which deserves a full listen.

In 1880, the SS Jeddah was steaming across the Indian Ocean when her captain abandoned ship. He told his rescuers the 1,000 passengers had mutinied and that the ship had sunk. But this was a lie and the case became a cause celebre of British disregard – because the Jeddah's passengers weren't any ordinary passengers. They were Indonesian and Malaysian pilgrims – Muslims on their way to Mecca to perform the Hajj. Join Oswin and Carla and the great writer on religion, Peter Stanford, as we try to understand the mechanics, the money-making and the magic of pilgrimage.It's a tale of technology, of power, of disease and migration. It truly is a tale of our times.

Every episode, we ask our guest to nominate someone for the Trapped History Hall of Fame: someone we haven't heard of but really should have.Tune in this week to hear Jeremy Corbyn's nomination – the quite brilliant Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz, a Mexican writer, poet and philosopher from four centuries ago, variously known as The Phoenix of America and The Tenth Muse. Her's was an astonishing life and this is a great nominee.

She was a super-rich romantic novelist, sister to one of the most famous men in late-Victorian England. And then, out of nowhere, Charlotte Despard suddenly finds her true calling. Over the next 40 years, she is a suffragette, a socialist, a peace campaigner, an animal rights activist and an Irish nationalist. So who better to help Oswin and Carla tell her story than the Charlotte Despard of the 21st century – Jeremy Corbyn. The former leader of the Labour Party was so excited to be part of this episode – Charlotte is one of his all-time greats – and he tells us a thing or two about finding and losing tribes, how injustice can move people to great deeds, and how we all need a Charlotte to inspire us.Hers is a fascinating story so please join us for this wonderful episode.

Evelyn Dunbar was the only full-time female war artist in World War II. She recorded an almost exclusively female experience of war, painting Land Girls and members of the Women's Auxiliary Air Force going about their work. Meticulously, quietly and with an air of supreme concentration.Join Oswin, Carla and the art historian Frances Spalding as we delve into Evelyn's life and art, understand life in the 1930s and what being a woman artist means today.You can find the paintings we're talking about on the Trapped History website, trappedhistory.com, and on our instagram page @trappedhistory

He was a war hero but never felt that he was. Ben Ferencz was sickened to the core by his experience of battling through Europe in 1945 – and of uncovering horrific evidence of war crimes, atrocities and genocide. And so he decided to do something about it.Tune in to hear the compelling story of the last of the Nuremberg prosecutors in the company of the great historian of our post-war world, Keith Lowe. History is fascinating and exciting but it can also be complex, murky and compromised. Ben's story is the story of our times.

John La Rose is one of the most important – and most overlooked – cultural icons of the last 60 years. Helping to forge a Black British identity, he set up dozens of political, cultural and community organisations and campaigned for justice for the victims of police brutality and of the New Cross Fire. So earlier this year, it seemed obvious – and right – to name a street in his honour. But the furore over the renaming of Black Boy Lane threw John and everything he stood for back into the cultural and political spotlight.Join Oswin, Carla and our very special guest the cultural commentator Joris Lechene as we celebrate John's life and try to understand how a simple street renaming can ignite racism and intolerance.Tune it too to hear Joris' brilliant nomination for the Trapped History Hall of Fame.

You're falling through the sky above Belgium after your bomber has been hit. It's August 1941 and you're an RAF front gunner. Who will save you when you land? Who will look after you, hide you, keep you safe? Who will get you home?Meet the women of the Resistance, Dédée, Tante Go and countless others – the women of the Comet Line. Join Carla, Oswin and our special guest the historian Anne Sebba who last year made the journey which hundreds of downed aircrew took, over the Pyrenees and into neutral Spain. Hear about her crossing and about the fear and the danger which Dédée had to conquer.

Meet Cornelia Sorabji, an Indian woman who broke through barriers – the first woman at an Indian university, the first woman to study law anywhere, the first woman to plead a criminal case in a British-run court. And yet, Cornelia was also an arch-imperialist, extolling the British Empire, castigating Gandhi and dismissing the Indian independence movement.Join Oswin, Carla and our very special guest Sathnam Sanghera as we try to understand what drove someone like Cornelia – and why 'empire' still resonates more than 75 years after India gained its independence.

With Eurovision upon us, join Oswin and Carla in a special episode of Trapped History as we take a look back at the song contest's history and lift the Iron Curtain on Eurovision's big brother: Intervision and the incredible Sopot Song Festival.Tune in to hear the Northern Soul Legend Sam Jones tell us all about the time she won Sopot – and what John Lennon, Frank Sinatra and others thought about her. It's a great listen!

Thrill to the story of the boys and girls who took on the richest men in America: and won. It's 1899, we're in New York and the 'newsies' – the boys and girls who sell papers on the city's streets – have had enough.Join Oswin, Carla and six young people from today as we time travel 125 years to find out about Kid Blink, Joseph Pulitzer and how news has changed – or remained the same . . .And listen in to hear who Shane, Dillon, Dalani, Elijah, Marley and Maya agree on for their Hall of Fame nominee.

Tune in to hear Clare Mulley's nomination for the Trapped History Hall of Fame.

In earlier episodes, we have featured women who have flown the world and men who have flown for freedom. But what about the courageous, pioneering women who powered the Nazi war machine?Join Oswin and Carla as we learn about the troubled and troubling lives of Hanna Reitsch and Melitta von Stauffenberg. The acclaimed historian, Clare Mulley, guides us through this knotty moral, ethical and historical challenge – a story which will open your eyes and your ears to the very nature of history, memory and truth.

It's Hall of Fame time! Tune in to hear an extended nomination from Sums of Anarchy's wonderful Dominique Miranda. This has everything: revolution, freedom and poetry, with a smattering of maths thrown in . . .

Trapped History reveals the hidden stories of unsung heroes. In this episode, we find out about Emmy Noether, the greatest mathematician of the 20th century.Emmy fought multiple prejudices all her life – she was a woman, she was Jewish and she came from a left-wing family. And this was Germany before the Nazis, already one of the most conservative places on earth. And yet, her pioneering work in abstract algebra and her proofs of Einstein's theory of relativity still stand today and are the basis of so much of our modern world.Join Oswin and Carla as we explore Emmy's world and try to understand a bit about the barriers she dealt with every day. And if you're lucky, you might pick up some of the maths too from Sums Of Anarchy's brilliant Dominique Miranda – with a side order of Einstein!Tune in also to hear the fascinating story of Dominique's nominee for the Trapped History Hall of Fame.

Polly Vacher's nomination for the Trapped History Hall of Fame is a true hero of our time.

Trapped History reveals the hidden stories of unsung heroes. In this episode, we find out about Richarda Morrow-Tait, the first woman to fly around the world.Richarda was a bored and lonely young woman in post-war Britain. But she had a dream and she knew that she was the only person who could make it happen.Join Oswin and Carla and the legendary circumnavigator Polly Vacher MBE as we try to understand what drives someone to climb into a cockpit and set off on a year-long journey. Just like Richarda, Polly did it too – as the first woman to fly solo around the world via the polar regions – and she shares her secrets of success.Tune in also to hear the fascinating story of Polly's nominee for the Trapped History Hall of Fame.

This Friday, tune in to Trapped History as we tell the story of Richarda Morrow-Tait, the first woman to fly around the world. Join Oswin, Carla and the legendary circumnavigator Polly Vacher as we find out about the fear, the boredom and the bravery behind this remarkable feat.Listen, stream and download the first six episodes of Trapped History today.

Join Oswin and Carla on a cold day in London for this exclusive bonus episode on the 'one that got away', the supposed hero who maybe shouldn't have got a plaque on the Memorial to Heroic Self-Sacrifice . . .

It's bonus time! If you enjoyed our episode on Adelaide Hall, tune in to the second of two specials about her life which we couldn't include in the main edit. Hear about Adelaide's renaissance when The Cotton Club movie came out and listen in to find out how Barbara Windsor remembered 'my Addie'.

It's bonus time! If you enjoyed our episode about the great Adelaide Hall, here's the first of two extra shorts which we couldn't include in the main edit. Tune in to hear how Adelaide and other African-Americans tried to escape the racism and restrictions they faced in America by travelling to Europe and to Paris, Berlin and London in particular . . .