Histories of the Unexpected

Like a well-spring of historical facts, bubbling over with unexpected links, Dr Sam Willis, the maitre’d of museums, and Professor James Daybell, the inspector of eons, take you on another intoxicating ride through history. From Oliver Cromwell’s Navigation Act of 1651, the American Boys Handy Book and the culture of childhood, South American colonies, and early cancer cures, (and with a little help from Lady Luck) they’ll make the links for the history of the bubble.

How did the need to halt deforestation in the early seventeenth-century spur new technological developments which allowed the British to enjoy their cider fizzy? What does the price of tulip bulbs, which in the mid-1600s reached the equivalent of a modest house, and England’s war debt in the 1700s, have to do with the bubble?

If you have a sore throat listen carefully – for we may have a cure for that! ‘Fire burn and cauldron bubble…’

Dr Sam Willis - @DrSamWillis Professor James Daybell - @JamesDaybell Follow the show's new Twitter: @UnexpectedPod Producer - Dan Morelle