Witness History

Usually it is the names of astronauts that people remember about the space race. But less celebrated are the teams of people working on how to put a rocket into orbit. Only in recent years have stories come to light of the contributions of the black women involved. Many were recruited as 'computers', meaning that they carried out complex mathematical calculations by hand, before machines were invented that could do the job. Christine Darden started her career in the computer pool, helping the engineers work out the trajectories needed to bring the Apollo Capsule back to Earth. Finally, she broke through the hidden barriers facing women at the time, gaining a promotion to engineer. (Photo: Dr Christine Darden at a desk in Nasa's Langley Research Center, 1973. Credit: Bob Nye/Nasa/Getty Images)

In 2005, South Africa set up the Missing Persons Task Team to trace and locate the remains of the hundreds, possibly thousands, who disappeared in "political circumstances" during the brutal years of white minority rule. Many were victims of the state security services. Some were victims of secret death squads which abducted and murdered opponents of the regime. Alex Last talks to the leader of the team, Madeleine Fullard, about her work and how the cases reveal the dark and complicated history of apartheid rule. Photo: Madeleine Fullard, head of the National Prosecuting Authority's Missing Persons Task Team, at a gravesite in Red Hill on November 15, 2012 in Durban, South Africa. (Getty Images)

In April 1955, more than 100,000 children in America were inoculated with a defective batch of the brand-new polio vaccine. Because of a manufacturing mistake at a small company called Cutter Laboratories, the children were given live polio virus; around 160 were permanently paralysed and 10 died in the worst disaster in US pharmaceutical history. Simon Watts talks to Anne Gottsdanker, one of the victims of what became known as the Cutter Incident.PHOTO: Anne Gottsdanker with her father Bob Gottsdanker in 1956 (personal archive)

The working class woman who shook up the British theatre establishment in the 1950s and 60s. Joan Littlewood introduced improvisation and helped break down class barriers. She set up a theatre in a working class area in the east end of London which put on plays written by amateur writers and actors, many without classical training. She delighted in the fact that the laziest person in the company might be working class and the poshest the one scrubbing the stage. She went on to create successes such as 'Oh! What a Lovely War' and 'A Taste of Honey'. Claire Bowes has been talking to her friend and biographer, Peter Rankin.Photo: Joan Littlewood outside the Theatre Royal Stratford in 1974 (Press Association)

In the grip of a drugs crisis, the country took a radical approach in 2001 and became the first country in the world to decriminalise all drugs for personal use. Drug abuse and addiction began to be seen as a public health issue, not a criminal offence. Initial resistance to the policy faded after statistics proved that treatment, rather than punishment, was reducing the number of deaths caused by drugs in Portugal. Dr João Castel-Branco Goulão was one of the chief architects of the shift in policy. He's been explaining to Rebecca Kesby why Portugal had such a pronounced drug problem to begin with and how the shift in strategy helped to reduce it. Image: Staffers interview a new patient in Lisbon, Portugal (Credit: Horacio Villalobos - Corbis/Corbis via Getty Images)

In 1980 the Iraqi strongman, Saddam Hussein, tried to launch his country's entry into the world of movie making. He spent millions of dollars on an epic movie called Clash of Loyalties, filmed almost entirely on location in Iraq, and staring some of Britain's leading actors , including Oliver Reed, Helen Ryan and James Bolam. But soon after shooting of the film began, war erupted between Iraq and neighbouring Iran. Mike Lanchin speaks to the film's Iraqi-born British producer Lateif Jorephani and the Iraqi actor, Fatima al Rubai, about the ambitious project. Photo Credit: Jorephani Productions

Although African Americans were guaranteed the right to vote by the constitution, many in the south were being denied that right. During the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 60s black voting rights activists had been beaten and killed but it was events in Selma Alabama in 1965 that outraged many Americans. In March 1965 hundreds of peaceful protesters were brutally beaten by Alabama state troops as they tried to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge. The bloodshed in Selma prompted President Lyndon B Johnson to push for the Voting Rights Act of 1965, one of the most significant pieces of legislation ever passed by Congress. The landmark Act was brought in to tackle racial discrimination during elections and to guarantee the rights of African Americans to vote. Farhana Haider has been listening to the archive.Photo President Lyndon Johnson hands a souvenir pen to the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr after signing the Voting Rights Bill at the US Capital, Washington DC, August 1965. Credit Getty Images.

Many of the nomadic herders in Kazakhstan left the USSR and moved to China in the 1920s. They feared being forced into collective farms by the Soviet state. Then in the 1950s many of them moved back again. Monica Whitlock has been listening to the story of Nazylkhan, a Kazakh herder and matriarch of a huge extended family, who lived through those epic journeys and who died in 2018.Photo: members of Nazylkhan's extended family, and friends. Credit: BBC.

On October 13th 1990, the Syrian airforce pushed their most outspoken opponent in Lebanon, General Michel Aoun, to take refuge in the French embassy in Beirut, ending the last chapter of Lebanon's bitter 15-year civil war. Veteran Lebanese journalist Hanna Anbar told Louise Hidalgo about that day for Witness History.This programme is a rebroadcast.Photo: Syrian soldiers celebrate in front of the presidential palace in east Beirut after capturing it from troops loyal to General Michel Aoun, October 13th 1990 (Credit: Nabil Ismail/AFP/Getty Images)

In June 1980, US media mogul Ted Turner launched the first TV station dedicated to 24 hour news, Cable News Network or CNN. Some were sceptical that there would be enough news to stay on air, others warned that the public wouldn't be interested in news 24 hours a day. But it marked a shift in broadcast journalism and paved the way for many more rolling news stations across the world. Rebecca Kesby has been speaking to Senior Executive at CNN, Rick Davis, about how 24 hour news has influenced politics and what role it has to play in holding those in power to account. Rick also takes us back behind the scenes to when he was an output producer on launch day, June 1st 1980.(PHOTO: Ted Turner attends official CNN Launch event at CNN Techwood Drive World Headquarters in Atlanta Georgia, June 01, 1980 (Photo by Rick Diamond/Getty Images)

In August 1977, the racist National Front organisation planned to stage a march into Lewisham in South London at a time of high racial tension in the area. The National Front activists were met by a huge counter-demonstration organised by anti-racist campaigners – in the clashes that followed, hundreds of people were arrested and injured before the National Front were forced to withdraw. The so-called Battle of Lewisham is now seen as having halted the rise of the far-right in British politics. Nacheal Catnott talks to Lez Henry, who grew up in Lewisham and witnessed the unrest. Produced by Eleanor Biggs.PHOTO: A police officer attempts to restore order in Lewisham in 1977 (Getty Images)

Desmond's was the most successful black sitcom in British TV history. It ran on Channel 4 for over five years, attracting millions of viewers. Trix Worrell, the man who wrote it, believes that Desmond's changed attitudes to race in the UK. Trix has been speaking to Sharon Hemans about the show, and the people who inspired it for Witness History.Image: Ram John Holder, Norman Beaton and Gyearbuor Asante (Credit: Channel 4)

New laws were used to stop nightclubs and discos from banning black and ethnic minority customers in 1978. The first club to be taken to court was a disco called Pollyanna's in the city of Birmingham. The Commission for Racial Equality ruled their entry policy racist. David Hinds, vocalist for the reggae band, Steel Pulse, spoke to Farhana Haider for Witness History in 2015 about the racism in Birmingham's club scene in the 1970s.This programme is a rebroadcast (Photo: Reggae Band, Steel Pulse performing on Top of the Pops 1978. Credit:BBC)

Yvonne Conolly was made headteacher of Ringcross Primary school in North London in 1969. She had moved to the UK from Jamaica just a few years earlier and quickly worked her way up the teaching profession. She faced racist threats when she first took up the post but refused to allow them to define her relationship with the children she taught. She spoke to Jonathan Coates about her life.Photo: Yvonne Conolly in a classroom. Copyright: Pathe.

Hundreds of pioneering migrants travelled from the Caribbean to the UK on board the SS Empire Windrush in 1948. The passage cost £28,10 shillings. Passenger Sam King described to Alan Johnston the conditions on board and the concerns people had about finding a job in England. He also talked about what life was like in their adopted country once they arrived.This programme is a rebroadcastPhoto: The SS Empire Windrush. Credit:Press Association.

A summer house built by a lake outside Berlin in the 1920s reflects much of Germany's 20th century history. Its first owners fled the Nazis. The Berlin Wall was built through its garden. Then after the reunification of Germany it was recognised as a historic monument and made into an education and reconciliation centre. Alex Stanger has been speaking to Thomas Harding whose great grandfather built the house, and who has written a children's book about its changing place in the world.Photo: The Alexander Haus today. Credit: André Wagner

Three Californian gray whales got caught in ice off Alaska in October 1988. Indigenous people, environmentalists, oil companies and even the Soviet Navy joined forces to try to free them. Rich Preston has been hearing from Cindy Lowri who was working for Greenpeace and who joined the battle to save the whales.Photo: Local indigenous children watch a gray whale nosing up through the ice. (Credit: Taro Yamasaki/The LIFE Images Collection via Getty Images)

The world's most popular search engine was launched in September 1998 by two PHD students from Stanford University in California. Larry Page and Sergey Brin had an idea that would revolutionise the internet and create one of the world's most valuable companies. Farhana Haider has been speaking to Tamara Munzner a computer scientist who was at Stanford with the two founders of Google.Photo Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, 2003. Credit Getty.

Prosecutor Gian Carlo Caselli explains how leading Italian politician Giulio Andreotti was put on trial in Sicily in September 1995, accused of collusion with the Mafia. Andreotti had been prime minister seven times and journalists dubbed it the trial of the century. Bob Howard has been hearing from Gian Carlo Caselli about compelling evidence that Andreotti had met the Mafia kingpin Stefano Bontade and even knew in advance of the planned assassination of the president of the Sicilian regional government, Piersanti Matarella.Photo: Giulio Andreotti in 1983. Credit: Mondadori Portfolio/Getty Images

The charismatic Egyptian president dominated Arab politics for almost two decades up until his death on September 28th 1970. His funeral was attended by millions of grief-stricken Egyptians. In 2010 Mike Gallagher spoke to an ordinary Egyptian who remembered his death, and its aftermath. This programme is a rebroadcast.Photo: Crowds in Cairo mourning Nasser on October 1st 1970. Credit: Fred Ihrt/LightRocket via Getty Images.

The US presidential election of 2000 was one of the closest and most contested in history. It was more than a month before the result was decided after a Supreme Court decision. It all came down to the vote in Florida, a 'swing-state', where irregularities and technical problems added to the confusion. In the end it's thought there were just a few hundred votes in it, but years later, the result, and the handling of the election in the state, divides opinion. Callie Shell was the official photographer for Al Gore's presidential campaign and documented the dramatic events behind closed doors in pictures. She's been telling Rebecca Kesby what it was like to be there.

On 16 September 2007 private security guards employed by the American firm Blackwater opened fire on civilians in Baghdad's Nisour Square. Seventeen Iraqis were killed, and another 20 injured. The Blackwater guards, who were escorting a convoy from the American embassy, claimed that they had come under attack from insurgents, but eye-witnesses and Iraqi offficials quickly dismissed that version of events. Mike Lanchin has been speaking to Mohammed Kinani who was driving through the area at the time, and whose 9-year-old son Ali, was shot dead by the Americans.Photo: An Iraqi looks at a burnt car on the site where Blackwater guards opened fire on civilians in Baghdad on 16 September 2007 (Credit ALI YUSSEF/AFP via Getty Images)

Just months after his release from prison in 1990 the South African freedom fighter Nelson Mandela toured the USA. One of the eight cities he went to visit was Detroit. Benita Barden has been speaking to Reverend Wendell Anthony who was one of the people who welcomed him to the city.Photo: Nelson Mandela and Rev Wendell Anthony in 1990. Courtesy of Rev Wendell Anthony.

How the Liberian president Ellen Johnson Sirleaf was negotiated to write off billions of dollars of debt, accumulated over two decades of civil war. Coming to power in 2006, Johnson Sirleaf had to govern the West African country with little tax revenue and owing large sums to countries and institutions it could never hope to pay back. Over four years, with intensive negotiations with multiple parties and even support from the Irish rock star Bono, in 2010 the World Bank and International Monetary Fund announced they would forgive 4.6 billion dollars of the country’s debt.Bob Howard speaks to former president Johnson Sirleaf about the long road to debt forgiveness. Photo: Ellen John Sirleaf Credit: Olivier Polet/Getty Images

The Galileo mission to examine the planet Jupiter had its beginnings in the 1970s. It finally came to an end on 21st September 2003. Professor Fred Taylor is one of the few scientists who worked on it from start to finish and he has been telling Dan Whitworth about some of the highs and lows of the project.Photo: The Galileo Jupiter probe being tested before launch. Credit:Roger Ressmeyer/Corbis/VCG/Getty Images

In April 1977 a group of women in Argentina held the first ever public demonstration to demand the release of thousands of opponents of the military regime. It was the start of a long campaign by the women, who became known as the Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo. In 2017 Mike Lanchin spoke to Mirta Baravalle who has spent decades searching for her missing daughter and son-in-law, and for the grandchild she has never met.(Photo: Mirta Baravalle, with the photograph of her daughter, Ana Maria. Credit: BBC)

A photo of a man confronting a tank in Tiananmen Square in Beijing caught the world's imagination. Carrying two plastic shopping bags, unarmed and alone, he seemed to embody the protest movement crushed by the Chinese authorities in 1989. Stuart Franklin was one of the photographers who captured the image of Tank Man - he has been speaking to David Edmonds for Witness History.Photo: Tank Man on Tiananmen Square, June 4th 1989. Credit: Stuart Franklin/Magnum.

During the 1950s in Kenya, armed rebels known as the Mau Mau fought against British rule. Thousands were taken captive and interned in camps by the British authorities. In 2011 Gitu wa Kahangeri, a Mau Mau veteran, spoke to Louise Hidalgo about his experiences.Photo: Gitu wa Kahangeri speaking to the BBC in 2016. Credit: BBC

For more than 20 years, people in Belarus have been protesting against the authoritarian rule of President Alexander Lukashenko - who's been dubbed Europe's last dictator. Lukashenko came to power in a landslide election victory in 1994 but he soon changed the constitution to give himself sweeping new powers. He has remained in office ever since, winning elections which observers say are rigged. Opponents of the regime have faced harassment, violence and arrest. Some are believed to have been kidnapped and murdered by the state. Alex Last has been speaking to the exiled dissident and co-founder of the Belarus Free Theatre, Nikolai Khalezin, about the origins of the protest movement in Belarus.Photo: A banner compares Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko to Stalin and Hitler, during a protest march in Minsk, Belarus, March 15, 2000 (Getty Images)

The USA is the only rich democracy not to provide universal healthcare. After WW2 US President Harry Truman was horrified that only a fifth of all Americans could afford proper healthcare. Most middle class Americans had no private health insurance and many found medical fees unaffordable. He calculated that more than 300,000 people died every year because they couldn't pay for proper treatment. In 1945 he tried to persuade Congress to push through legislation for an insurance programme meaning all workers would pay for their healthcare through a monthly fee or tax. But the American Medical Association - representing doctors - employed a public relations firm to lobby against the move. Claire Bowes has been listening to archive material of Harry Truman and speaking to Jonathan Oberlander a Professor at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill. Photo: President Harry Truman in 1947 (courtesy of US National Archives) Archive material: courtesy of the Harry S Truman Library

Punyavathi Sunkara recalls how she campaigned to stop the sale of alcohol in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh to protect women from domestic violence and safeguard family finances. Pressure from women like Punyavathi helped persuade the state's chief minister, NT Rama Rao, to pass the prohibition law in 1995.

Steve Huffman had been programming software since he was eight-years-old. At the University of Virginia, he met his future business partner, Alexis Ohanian. The pair went on to found Reddit, a discussion website where anyone can post links, photos, videos or questions on all kinds of different topics. The website now has an online following of over 430 million users, who contribute to over 138,000 different communities. Robbie Wojciechowski has been speaking to Steve Huffman about how it all began.Photo: The Reddit logo (Credit: Reddit)

Barbara Mensch recalls how she was hijacked and held in Jordan by the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine in September 1970. Barbara’s plane was forced to fly to a disused British airbase in Jordan, whilst on the final leg of a flight from Tel Aviv to New York. She was imprisoned on board the TWA plane for almost a week and then held hostage in the Jordanian capital Amman for a further fortnight, as the so called Black September conflict erupted between militant Palestinian groups and the Jordanian Army.

In October 2010, Haiti was hit by an outbreak of cholera, the first in recent history of the impoverished Caribbean nation. Nepalese peacekeepers belonging to the international MINUSTAH mission were blamed for introducing the deadly disease, but for many years the UN refused to accept any responsability. More than 10,000 Haitians have died from cholera, and thousands more were infected. The UN finally apologised to the Haitian people in December 2016. Mike Lanchin speaks to the French specialist in tropical medicine and infectious diseases, Dr Renaud Piarroux, whose investigation helped force the UN's hand.Photo: Haitians wait for medical treatment for cholera, Oct 22 2010 (REUTERS/St-Felix Evens)

In the 1990s Britain closed down many of its long-stay hospitals and asylums and their patients were sent to new lives in the community. But the transition wasn't always easy. Some people had suffered abuse and found it hard to adjust to life outside. Lucy Burns has been speaking to "Michael" who has a learning disability, about his experiences both inside and outside of institutions.Photo: A now derelict asylum in Colchester, England. Credit: Simon Webster/Alamy Stock Photo

Between the late 1990s and 2002 there were more than 150 bomb attacks in the South African city of Cape Town. The authorities blamed them on a group known as Pagad - People Against Gangsterism And Drugs. But no one was ever convicted of the bombings. Darin Graham has been speaking to Elana Newman whose daughter Olivia lost a leg in a blast at the pizza restaurant where she was working in 1999.Photo: Olivia (l) and Elana Newman (r). Copyright: Elana Newman.

The portable cassette player that brought music-on-the-move to millions of people was launched in 1979. By the time production of the Walkman came to an end 30 years later, Sony had sold more than 220 million machines worldwide. In 2019 Farhana Haider spoke to Tim Jarman, who purchased one of the original blue-and-silver Walkmans.This programme is a rebroadcast.(Photo by YOSHIKAZU TSUNO/Gamma-Rapho via Getty Images)

When a British Airways flight carrying 248 passengers took off one evening in 1982 heading from Kuala Lampur to Australia, everything seemed fine. But two hours later all of the jumbo jet’s engines shut down and no one knew why. The plane had flown into the ash cloud of the erupting volcano, Mount Galunggung, without realising it. Darin Graham speaks to retired Captain Eric Moody, who flew the plane that night.

The author Ian Fleming created the fictional super-spy, James Bond, in the 1950s. Fleming, a former journalist and stockbroker, had served in British naval intelligence during the Second World War. Using interviews with Fleming and his friends from the BBC archive, Alex Last explores how elements of James Bond were drawn from Ian Fleming's own adventurous life. Photo: Ian Lancaster Fleming, British author and creator of the James Bond character, in 1958. (Getty Images)

The Voting Rights Act of 1965, a landmark civil rights-era electoral law was designed to protect African-American and other minority voters. It was introduced to remove the many obstacles that were in place to prevent African-Americans from being able to vote. Many states, particularly in the south, used intimidation, local laws and so-called literacy tests to prevent black people from being able to register to vote. In 2010 Shelby County in Alabama attempted to overturn a key part of the law. In 2013 the US Supreme Court upheld their challenge. Now voters who are discriminated against bear the burden of proving they are disenfranchised. Farhana Haider hears from civil rights attorney Kristen Clarke who fought to protect the Voting Rights Act.Photo Washington DC June 25. Supporters of the Voting Rights Act outside the U.S. Supreme Court. Credit Getty Images

In August 1930 the last inhabitants left their homes on the remote Scottish islands of St Kilda. It was the end of a traditional Gaelic-speaking community who were once believed to live at the end of the world. Simon Watts has been listening to some of their stories, as recorded in the BBC archives.PHOTO: The men of St Kilda pictured in the late 19th century (Getty Images)

In 2011, the Occupy movement staged demonstrations against financial inequality across the world. The biggest was in New York, where a retired police officer called Ray Lewis became one of the best-known protestors when he was arrested in his old dress uniform. He talks to Robbie Wojciechowski.PHOTO: Ray Lewis at the Occupy Wall Street protest (Getty Images)

In 1993, Jeannie Leavitt became the first woman to fly a US Air Force fighter plane after the Pentagon lifted its ban on female pilots engaging in combat. After hundreds of F15 missions over Iraq and Afghanistan, Leavitt went on to become the first woman to command a fighter unit. She talks to May Cameron.PHOTO: Major-General Jeannie Leavitt in a recent picture (US Department of Defence)

One of the leading figures in Nigeria's fight for democracy was Margaret Ekpo, a feminist politician and trades union leader. After Nigerian independence in 1960, Ekpo became an MP and a hero to a generation of Nigerians - men and women. Rebecca Kesby tells the story of her life.PHOTO: Margaret Ekpo in London in August 1953 (ANL/Shutterstock)

Randy Weaver was a white separatist in Idaho in the north-west United States who was wanted by the government on firearms charges. When government agents approached his remote cabin on Ruby Ridge in August 1992, it was the start of an eleven day siege involving hundreds of police officers – which ended with the deaths of Weaver’s wife and teenage son, along with a US marshal. The incident would become a touchstone for the far right and a rallying cry for the American militia movement. Lucy Burns speaks to journalist Bill Morlin, who covered the siege for the Spokesman-Review newspaper. Picture: Randy Weaver (C) shows a model of his Ruby Ridge, Idaho cabin to US Senator Arlen Specter, R-PA, during Senate hearings investigating the events surrounding the 1992 standoff with federal agents (PAMELA PRICE/AFP via Getty Images).

In November 1946, Emperor Hirohito proclaimed a new post-war constitution for Japan which contained clauses establishing women's rights for the first time. They were the brainchild of Beate Sirota Gordon, a young American woman working for the Allied occupying forces. Simon Watts tells her story using interviews from the BBC archives.PHOTO: Beate Sirota Gordon in Japan in 1946 (Family Collection)

A team of American doctors, led by the distinguished physician Dr John Cutler, carried out secretive STD tests in Guatemala from 1946 to 1948. The doctors experimented on more than one thousand prisoners, sex workers, mental institution inmates and soldiers, injecting them without their consent with syphilis and gonorrhea. In some cases the victims were provided with penicillin to combat the diseases; in many others they weren't given anything. Mike Lanchin speaks to Susan Reverby, a medical historian, who discovered the original documents from the greusome experiments and helped get a public apology for the victims from the Obama administration in October 2010.Photo: A doctor examines the injection site of a female psychiatric patient in Guatemala who was exposed to syphilis, cerca 1948 (from the papers of John Cutler/the National Archives and Records Administration)

Asthma affects more children than any other non-communicable disease - and it was a teenager who first asked her father "why can't they put my asthma medication in a spray can like hairspray?". Luckily her father ran a pharmaceutical company and got a team of scientists to work on the idea. Charlie Thiel is the one surviving member of the team. The chemist helped create a drug formulation of fine spray that reached further into the lungs than any previous treatment. Claire Bowes hears from him and his colleague Stephen Stein who has helped him document his story.Photo: Girl using metered dose inhaler 2001 (BBC)

In 2012, archaeologists from the University of Leicester discovered the lost grave of Richard III under a car park in Leicester. Richard was the King of England more than 500 years ago and for centuries was portrayed as one of the great villains of English history. He was killed in 1485 leading his army in battle against a rival claimant to the throne, Henry Tudor. After the battle, Richard III corpse was stripped naked, paraded around down, before being hastily buried in a church within a friary in Leicester, which was later demolished. Alex Last spoke to Dr Richard Buckley who led the archaeological project to find the remains.Photo: Remains of King Richard III being studied at The University of Leicester (BBC)

Zainab Salbi grew up in the inner social circle of the Iraqi dictator, Saddam Hussein, in the 1980s because her father worked as Saddam’s personal pilot. It was a world of apparently glamorous parties on the River Tigris, but where the slightest falling-out with the dictator could lead to execution. After years of psychological pressure, Zainab’s family got her out of Saddam’s Iraq by setting up an arranged marriage for her in the US. She tells her story to Susan Hulme.PHOTO: Zainab Salbi as a teenager with Saddam Hussein (private collection)