51 min listen
Presidential diamonds and Tupperware parties
FromThe History Hour
ratings:
Length:
51 minutes
Released:
Aug 11, 2023
Format:
Podcast episode
Description
Max Pearson presents a collection of this week’s Witness History stories from the BBC World Service.
Journalist Claude Angeli discovered French President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing received diamonds from a depraved African emperor, which contributed to him losing the presidential election in 1981.
How Bosnia’s small Jewish community helped people from all sides of the conflict, during the siege of Sarajevo in the early 1990s.
The story of the gang of thieves, who held up a British Royal Mail train on its journey from Glasgow to London in August 1963.
Plus Jean-Michel Basquiat, a young black graffiti artist in the 1980s took the New York art world by storm. His paintings were selling for huge sums of money, but he died before the end of the decade.
And the rise and fall of self-made businesswoman Brownie Wise, who inspired an army of US housewives to sell Tupperware at parties.
Contributors:
Journalist Claude Angeli
Journalist Pauline Bock
Former vice president of the Jewish community Jakob Finci
Author Bob Kealing
Journalist Reginald Abbiss
Patti Astor, friend of Jean-Michel Basquiat
(Photo: French President Valery Giscard d'Estaing and Jean-Bédel Bokassa in Bangui, March 1975. Credit: Getty Images)
Journalist Claude Angeli discovered French President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing received diamonds from a depraved African emperor, which contributed to him losing the presidential election in 1981.
How Bosnia’s small Jewish community helped people from all sides of the conflict, during the siege of Sarajevo in the early 1990s.
The story of the gang of thieves, who held up a British Royal Mail train on its journey from Glasgow to London in August 1963.
Plus Jean-Michel Basquiat, a young black graffiti artist in the 1980s took the New York art world by storm. His paintings were selling for huge sums of money, but he died before the end of the decade.
And the rise and fall of self-made businesswoman Brownie Wise, who inspired an army of US housewives to sell Tupperware at parties.
Contributors:
Journalist Claude Angeli
Journalist Pauline Bock
Former vice president of the Jewish community Jakob Finci
Author Bob Kealing
Journalist Reginald Abbiss
Patti Astor, friend of Jean-Michel Basquiat
(Photo: French President Valery Giscard d'Estaing and Jean-Bédel Bokassa in Bangui, March 1975. Credit: Getty Images)
Released:
Aug 11, 2023
Format:
Podcast episode
Titles in the series (100)
May 1968 Paris Riots: A riot policeman's view of the violence that swept through France in May 1968 by The History Hour