What We Did Before | A History of Everyday Life

Send us Fan Mail 💬 Firefighting hasn’t always meant red engines and professional crews. For centuries, fighting fires was much more chaotic. Even by the outbreak of the Second World War, Britain still had more than a thousand separate local authority fire brigades. ⚡In this episode, curator of Fireground Museum in Rochdale, Bob Bonner, takes us on a tour through the history of firefighting, explaining how it evolved into the service we know today. From insurance fire brigades, to legendary fi...

Send us Fan Mail 💬 Before World of Warcraft, RuneScape or even the internet as we know it, there was MUD - the world’s first multiplayer virtual world. Created in 1978 by Richard Bartle and Roy Trubshaw, it would help lay the foundations for an entirely new generation of gaming. Early online games were very different from the enormous commercial worlds we know today. There were no battle passes, cash shops or daily login rewards. Instead, their creators were experimenting with what a virtual ...

Send us Fan Mail 💬 Visit the site of a brutal moment in Guernsey history. At Tower Hill Steps three women faced religious persecution - and were burned alive at the stake. One of the women, Perotine Massey, was pregnant and gave birth in the flames. What happened next was horrific. This dark chapter of Guernsey’s history shows the grim realities of past religious conflicts. ⚡With Guernsey tour guide Korinne Le Page, we discuss why these “Guernsey martyrs” died and how societal beliefs have sh...

Send us Fan Mail 💬 At this ancient monolithic burial chamber, witches were said to convene with the devil to conduct The Black Mass. This imposing Dolmen came up time and time again in the brutal witch trials of the 16th and 17th centuries. ⚡ This was a time when witchcraft was truely a force to be feared. But why did we believe so strongly that our neighbours were placing curses on us? And why were people burned for a crime that didn’t exist? In this episode we visit Le Trépied in Guernsey a...

Send us Fan Mail 💬 Long before radar, armies relied on people with enormous metal trumpets strapped to their heads to listen for approaching aircraft. Aircraft listeners had the bizarre but vital job of detecting the sound of enemy planes, working in exposed positions and often in difficult conditions to give early warning of an incoming attack. ⚡Before radar transformed air defence, these acoustic listening devices were used to track aircraft by sound. Operators would work together to determ...