George Stephenson drove Britain’s first-ever steam-powered passenger train, the Locomotion Number One, on 27th September, 1825, from Darlington to Stockton on Tees.
The Cambridge Chronicle and Journal reported, with breathless excitement: “in the presence of great crowds of spectators, including many scientific gentlemen… 60 waggons were attached, containing ... Show More
Yesterday
I Name This Ship Brittania
Queen Elizabeth II stood before 30,000 spectators at Clydebank to launch HMY Britannia on 16th April, 1953. The yacht’s name had been kept secret, and when the Queen finally declared it “Britannia”, the crowd responded with a surge of cheering applause. Commissioned shortly befor ... Show More
12 m
Aug 2025
America’s high-speed rail fail
The US is well behind much of the world in building passenger rail, especially high-speed trains. But we do have one major advantage. This episode was produced by Devan Schwartz, edited by Naureen Khan, fact-checked by Melissa Hirsch, engineered by Patrick Boyd with help from And ... Show More
29m 35s
Feb 2024
Jake Berman, "The Lost Subways of North America: A Cartographic Guide to the Past, Present, and What Might Have Been" (U Chicago Press, 2023)
Every driver in North America shares one miserable, soul-sucking universal experience—being stuck in traffic. But things weren’t always like this. Why is it that the mass transit systems of most cities in the United States and Canada are now utterly inadequate?
The Lost Subways o ... Show More
29m 56s