Black Gold by Jeremy Paxman

Original version

BBC Radio 4 FM

BBC Radio 4 is a radio channel that started transmitting on the 30th September 1967. It replaced BBC Home Service.

BBC Radio 4

Radio 4

Radio 4 (FM)

BBC Radio 4 LW

Black Gold by Jeremy Paxman: Episode 3

Episode 3

BBC Radio 4 - Black Gold by Jeremy Paxman, Episode 3

Jeremy Paxman’s social history of how coal 'made' Britain vividly told.

Broadcaster and bestselling author Jeremy Paxman’s history of how coal shaped Britain and became the nation’s powerhouse. Read by Adrian Scarborough. Today, the power of steam.

Writer and broadcaster Jeremy Paxman’s vivid and compelling social history of how coal 'made' Britain read by Adrian Scarborough.

Episode Three: The Power of Steam

In today’s episode coal is now the powerhouse that drives the nation. ‘Steam made speed paramount’ and ‘engineers were the new heroes of the age’. The first mainline railway opened in Britain and revolutionised transport. Even Queen Victoria made the train commute from Slough to London in record time. Steam also radically changed the navy as engines replaced sail. It was unparalleled as a fast and formidable force. But feeding the engines with their appetite for coal required a vast network of coaling stations around the world. 

In Black Gold Paxman explores the stories of the engineers and inventors, landowners, entrepreneurs and industrialists who saw the potential for innovation and wealth. For centuries it was the driving force behind our economy and trade and the preoccupation of politicians. It fuelled the industrial revolution producing everything from carriage wheels to needles, it warmed and lit the nation’s homes and powered our steam trains and ships.

Underpinning all of this and central to Paxman’s book is the history of the miners themselves who toiled in appalling conditions to hack the coal from the underground seams and the mining communities that formed around the pitheads. He also explores the terrible human cost of coal with the filthy, polluting air it produced as it burned and the inevitable and multiple accidents that happened to those working underground.

Abridged by Richard Hamilton and produced by Julian Wilkinson.

Intelligent speech, the most insightful journalism, the wittiest comedy, the most fascinating features and the most compelling drama and readings anywhere in UK radio.

Audiobooks

Podcasts

Factual

Jeremy Paxman's social history of coal mining in Britain.

Book of the Week. Jeremy Paxman's social history of coal mining in Britain tells the stories of engineers and industrialists, but focuses particularly on the miners themselves.

Accessibility links

Programme Index

Black Gold by Jeremy Paxman

Episode 3

Genres

Series

BBC Radio 4 FM

About BBC Radio 4