The Woman Who Wrote Mary Poppins
Writer PL Travers created a children's classic when she invented the magical English nanny. But was the character built around her own personality? Vincent Dowd has been speaking to PL Travers' granddaughter.Photo: Emily Blunt is Mary Poppins in Disney's original musical MARY POPPINS RETURNS, a sequel to the 1964 MARY POPPINS (credit: Walt Disney)
20 Dec 20189min
Hacking The First Computer Password
Scientists at MIT in the 1960s had to share computer time. They were given passwords to access the computer and could not use more than their allowance. But one man, Allan Scherr, hacked the system by working out the master password. He has been talking to Ashley Byrne.Photo: Allan Scherr at his workstation connected to the MIT central system in 1963. Courtesy of Allan Scherr
19 Dec 20189min
Theatre in the Sahara
Theatre director Peter Brook led a troupe of actors on a three-month-long journey across the Sahara Desert starting in December 1972. They performed improvised pieces to local villagers. Louise Hidalgo has been speaking to author and journalist John Heilpern who went with them.Photo: Peter Brook in the 1990s. (Credit: Jean Pimentel/Kipa/Sygma via Getty Images)
18 Dec 20189min
China and Japan at War
Japanese troops reached the Chinese city of Nanjing in December 1937. The violence that followed marked one of the darkest moments in a struggle that continued throughout WW2. Rebecca Kesby has been speaking to former General Huang Shih Chung, who survived the slaughter in Nanjing as a boy and then fought in China's war of resistance against the Japanese.Photo: Huang Shih-Chung as a young soldier.
17 Dec 20189min
The US Apologises for Wartime Internment
In 1988 President Ronald Reagan signed the Civil Liberties Act which gave a presidential apology and compensation to Japanese Americans interned during World War II. Farhana Haider has been speaking to Norman Mineta a former congressman who was instrumental in pushing through the landmark legislation and was himself incarcerated as a child.Image: Japanese-American child waits with luggage to be transported to internment camps for the duration of WWII 01/07/1942 Copyright Getty Images
17 Dec 20189min
Englandspiel: The Deadly WW2 Spy Game
In 1942, a Dutch secret agent was captured by German military intelligence in the Netherlands. The agent's name was Haub Lauwers and he worked for the Special Operations Executive, a secret organisation set up by the British to wage a guerrilla war against the Nazis in Europe. So began, the Englandspiel, the England Game, a German counter-intelligence operation that led to the capture and deaths of dozens of Dutch agents. Photo: Haub Lauwers identity card when he joined the Dutch army in exile.
13 Dec 201811min
Cicely Saunders And The Modern Hospice Movement
In 1967, Dame Cicely Saunders opened the first modern hospice in South London. St Christopher's inspired the creation of thousands of similar hospices around the world and its scientific research helped establish the modern discipline of palliative medicine. Simon Watts introduces archive interviews with Dame Cicely, who died in 2005.PHOTO: Dame Cicely Saunders (BBC)
12 Dec 20188min
Apollo 8
The biggest audience in TV history watched NASA's Apollo 8 mission beam back the first pictures from an orbit around the moon at Christmas 1968. The broadcast captured the world's imagination and put the Americans ahead of the Soviet Union in the Cold War battle to make the first lunar landing. Simon Watts talks to Apollo 8 commander, Frank Borman.Picture: The Earth as seen from the Moon, photographed by the Apollo 8 crew (NASA)
12 Dec 20188min
