Surviving the "Death Railway"
During World War Two the Japanese forced prisoners of war to build a 400 kilometre railway from Thailand to Burma. Tens of thousands died during the construction and it became known as the "death rail...
31 Aug 20189min
The Mine Disaster That Devastated Post-War Italy
In August 1956, a fire at a coal mine in Belgium killed 262 people. The tragedy caused grief across Europe, but particularly in Italy because more than half the dead were Italian migrants. Simon Watts...
30 Aug 20188min
The Lake Nyos Disaster
On 21 August 1986 villagers in the north-west of Cameroon awoke to find that many of their friends and neighbours had died in their sleep. More than 1,700 people and much of their livestock are though...
29 Aug 20188min
Hitler's League Of German Girls
The League of German Girls was the girl's wing of the Nazi party's youth movement, Hitler Youth. Open to girls aged ten years upwards, it was a key part of the Nazi plans to shape a new generation of ...
28 Aug 20188min
Benidorm
The Spanish town of Benidorm is now one of the world's most popular holiday resorts - receiving more than 10 million visitors a year. The hotels and skyscrapers are the vision of Benidorm's mayor in t...
27 Aug 20188min
Hitler's Architect
Among the leading Nazi inmates in Berlin’s Spandau prison, which was closed in August 1987, was Hitler's architect and minister of war, Albert Speer. He was the only top Nazi who later apologised for ...
24 Aug 201810min
Baba of Karo
The story behind the groundbreaking autobiography of a woman who grew up in 19th century pre-colonial Nigeria. The book is the story of Baba a Hausa woman, who lived in the farming hamlet of Karo, whe...
23 Aug 201810min
USSR Wages War on Alcohol
Sales of alcohol in the USSR were severely limited in 1985 in a bid to fight drunkenness. But the anti-alcohol campaign was abandoned three years later when the Soviet economy was in trouble, and the ...
22 Aug 20188min
