The Race to the Future by Kassia St Clair

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The Race to the Future: The Adventure that Accelerated the Twentieth Century by Kassia St Clair: Episode 5

The Race to the Future: The Adventure that Accelerated the Twentieth Century by Kassia St Clair

Episode 5

BBC Radio 4 - The Race to the Future: The Adventure that Accelerated the Twentieth Century by Kassia St Clair, Episode 5

In the 1907 Peking to Paris car race, the frontrunner Itala is 30 miles from Paris.

In the 1907 Peking to Paris car race, the frontrunner Itala is 30 miles from Paris. But will they be the first to cross the line?

Ostensibly about the world’s first car race, but really about the world at this decisive turning point at the beginning of the 20th century, this amazing tale is packed with fascinating characters while charting pan-continental technological progress. 
 
More than its many adventures, the Peking to Paris race provided the impetus for profound change. The world of 1907 is poised between the old and the new: communist regimes will replace imperial ones in China and Russia; the telegraph is transforming modern communication and the car will soon displace the horse. 

Author Kassia St Clair traces the fascinating stories of two interlocking races - setting the derring-do (and sometimes cheating) of one of the world's first car races against the backdrop of a larger geopolitical and technological rush to the future, as the rivalry grows between countries and empires, building up to the cataclysmic event that changed everything - the First World War.

Written by Kassia St Clair
Abridged by Polly Coles
Read by Adjoa Andoh

Produced by Clive Brill
A Brill production for BBC Radio 4

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How an epic car race from Peking to Paris in 1907 inspired a new era of modernisation.

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