BBC Radio Shetland

Time Travels

Factual: History

Susan Morrison explores the rich and sometimes murky depths of Scotland's past.

Time Travels: Executioners, Egypt and The Family Home

Executioners, Egypt and The Family Home

BBC Radio Scotland - Time Travels, Executioners, Egypt and The Family Home

Susan Morrison finds out about The Family Home and goes on the trail of two executioners.

Glasgow wanted to lead the world in social improvement in Victorian and Edwardian times and came up with a new approach in the shape of the Family Home, a special purpose-built lodging house for single parent families where the single parent was the father. Dr Valerie Wright of Glasgow University tells Susan how the city fathers felt they couldn't possibly expect men to do housework and cook and clean so they provided them with, basically, an institution to do all that while they went out to work! Taking us back to the dark days of the 17th century, Dr Mark Jardine and resident historian Dr Louise Yeoman are on the trail of not one but two executioners in Irvine and Ayr. Getting prisoners hanged and beheaded could be a real headache when the hangman wouldn't play along. Finally what's a Scots archaeologist to do if he gets TB and digging in northern climes is severely bad for his already precarious health? Alexander Henry Rhind (b.1833)  gave up his native Caithness for the Valley of the Kings and because of his scientific approach, his finds are still telling us new stories today. Dr Margaret Maitland of National Museums of Scotland brings us up to date with the latest discoveries from Rhind’s work.

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