The History Hour10 Maj 2025

Rescuing Palmyra’s treasures and 80 years since VE Day

Max Pearson presents a collection of the week's Witness History interviews from the BBC World Service. Our guest is Rubina Raja, professor of classical archaeology and art at Aarhus University in Denmark.

First, we go back to May 2015, when the ancient city of Palmyra in Syria was about to fall to Jihadist fighters and how of a group of men risked their lives to preserve the world-famous archaeology.

Plus, the entrepreneur and engineer Yoshitada Minami and his wife Fumiko Minami who came up with a way to liberate women from two to three hours of housework a day through the invention of the rice cooker in 1955.

Then the story of the sinking of the Lusitania, the British ocean liner sunk by a German submarine off the coast of Ireland during the First World War.

Also, celebrating 80 years since the end of the Second World War in Europe we dive into the BBC archives to listen to correspondents capturing the scenes of joy across London on VE day in 1945.

Finally, how in 2000, keen cricketer Paul Hawkins wanted to turn his passion into innovation when he created the technology we now known as ‘HawkEye’.

Contributors:

Khalil Hariri - archaeology expert who worked at Palmyra’s museum Rubina Raja - professor of classical archaeology and art at Aarhus University in Denmark Aiji Minami - son of Yoshitada and Fumiko Minami Margaret Hague Thomas – passenger on the Lusitania Leslie Morton – merchant seaman on the Lusitania Paul Hawkins – founder of ‘Hawkeye’

(Photo: Palmyra. Credit: PHAS / Universal Images Group via Getty Images)

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