Past Forward: A Century of Sound

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Greg Jenner dives deep into the BBC archive to explore what it says about who we are now.

Greg Jenner takes a deep dive into the BBC archive to explore what it can tell us about who we are now.

Marking the Centenary, Past Forward uses a random date generator to alight somewhere in the BBC's vast archive over the past 100 years. Historian Greg Jenner hears an archive clip for the first time at the top of the programme, and uses it as a starting point in a journey towards the present day. The archive captures a century of British life in a unique way -  a history of ordinary people's lives, as well as news of the great events.  Greg uncovers connections through people, places and ideas that link the archive fragment to Britain in 2022, pulling in help from experts and those who remember the time - and sometimes the speakers themselves, decades later - along the way. What he discovers are stories, big and small, that reveal how the people we were have shaped the people we have become.

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Past Forward: A Century of Sound: Omnibus 1 - from Lambeth Walk to Porton Down

Omnibus 1 - from Lambeth Walk to Porton Down

BBC Radio 4 - Past Forward: A Century of Sound, Omnibus 1 - from Lambeth Walk to Porton Down

Greg Jenner dives into the BBC archive to explore changes over the past century.

Greg Jenner dives into the BBC archive, hearing five clips from the past century, and explores the changes between then and now.

Marking the centenary of the BBC, Past Forward uses a random date generator to alight somewhere in the BBC's vast archive over the past 100 years. Presenter Greg Jenner hears an archive clip for the first time at the top of the programme, and explores the changes between then and now.  

In this omnibus edition, Greg is presented with five fragments of archive.  The first is from 1939 about a dance craze - The Lambeth Walk.  Greg turns to Stephen Fry for help in finding out what it was and how it brought happiness to a world in crisis, and talks to choreographer Dannielle 'Rhimes' Lecointe about the freedom of collective dance.  A fragment of a BBC sitcom from 1984, Comrade Dad, sparks a discussion with historian Taylor Downing and author Naomi Alderman about Cold War panic, Thatcher’s Britain and what fictional dystopias reveal about the concerns of our time.  Then Greg hears an interview from 24th December 1945 with people in East London about their plans for Christmas after years of war, and talks to historian Martin Johnes, and Bethnal Green residents Vi Davis, Gloria Lacey and Juliet Middleton at the Sundial Centre about celebrations past and present.  A clip of the veteran campaigner Mary Whitehouse from 1982 leads Greg to delve into the history of privacy with historian David Vincent, and ask to what extent private space and intimate relationships can be preserved in the digital age with writer and digital journalist Sophia Smith Galer.  Finally, he questions whether a 1962 clip of the government laboratory Porton Down tells the whole story, talking to Guardian journalist Rob Evans and Agnes Arnold-Forster about the medical ethics of the cold war era.

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Past Forward: A Century of Sound

Omnibus 1 - from Lambeth Walk to Porton Down

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