Tickling tigers one day, and cracking jokes to expectant crowds the next, Bob Carlisle was a circus showman, agent, clown and big cat tamer. In the third episode of our new series on this larger-than-life character of the Victorian age, David Musgrove speaks to historian John Woolf to consider Carlisle’s hair-raising life in the travelling circus, and how it ... Show More
Oct 12
The pioneering surgeon who stood up to Rasputin
She pioneered lifesaving battlefield surgery, challenged the medical establishment, stood up to Rasputin, and became the world's first female professor of surgery – yet today, few people have heard of Vera Gedroits. In today's episode, acclaimed biographer Miranda Seymour tells E ... Show More
48m 26s
Nov 2024
Magic, illusion and tigers
Max Pearson presents a collection of the week's Witness History episodes.For nearly 40 years, Siegfried and Roy wowed audiences in Las Vegas with death-defying tricks involving white lions and tigers. But in 2003, their magic show came to a dramatic end when a tiger attacked Roy ... Show More
51m 12s
Oct 2024
The Horrible Truth of the Big Cat and Animal World
James may be known as Lion Dad, but he has raised a whole assortment of wild animals. Wolves, Tigers, Dingos, you name it! Tiger King raised many questions about the conditions and well being of these types of animals in captivity, and James is more than welcome to shed some ligh ... Show More
1h 19m
Apr 2025
The Real Greatest Showman
PT Barnum may be better known as the loose subject of the movie The Greatest Showman, but his life was so much more than that work of fiction. A master of entertainment, an entrepreneur, and a genius of publicity, he built a career on feeding public curiosity with his grand illus ... Show More
1h 1m