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Witness History Episodes

  1.

    Uprising in East Germany

    On 16 June 1953 East German workers went on strike in protest at Soviet rule

  2. Ming Smith makes history at MoMA

    MoMA bought photos from an African-American woman for the first time in 1979.

  3. Sir Don McCullin’s photo of a US marine

    In 1968, British photographer travelled to Vietnam for his second ever war assignment

  4. Malick Sidibé: Mali’s star photographer

    Malick Sidibé photographed life in Mali after its independence from France in 1960.

  5. A Great Day in Harlem: The story behind the iconic jazz photo

    In 1958, aspiring photographer Art Kane captured 57 jazz legends in one immortal image

  6. Lee Miller in Hitler's bath

    In 1945 the war correspondent Lee Miller was photographed in Adolf Hitler's bath

  7. 1955 Le Mans disaster

    In June 1955, more than 80 people were killed and 100 injured at the Le Mans 24-hour race

  8. Last communist march before Hitler

    On 25 January 1933 the last legal communist march was held in Berlin

  9. Fighting slavery in Niger

    In 2005, Ilguilas Weila organised a ceremony to free 7,000 enslaved people in Niger

  10. Facial reconstruction: From mummy to murder

    In 1975, Richard Neave invented a method to rebuild the face of an Egyptian mummy

  11. Inuit children taken from families

    In 1960s, the Canadian government took academically gifted Inuit children from the homes

  12. The first Indian woman to conquer Everest

    In May 1984, Bachendri Pal became the first Indian woman to stand on top of the world

  13. Tragedy on Everest

    Michael Groom is one of the survivors of a tragic climbing expedition to Mount Everest

  14. Tenzing Norgay conquers Everest

    In 1953, Tenzing Norgay reached the summit of Mount Everest

  15. Edmund Hillary conquers Everest

    In 1953 Edmund Hillary became the first human to reach the top of Mount Everest

  16. The deadliest glacial avalanche in the world

    On 31 May 1970, the Huascarán avalanche destroyed the town of Yungay, in Peru

  17. Trying to unite Africa

    On 25 May 1963, leaders of 32 newly-independent African nations came together

  18. Chasing the world’s biggest tornado

    In May 2013, the widest tornado ever recorded hit the US state of Oklahoma

  19. Fikret Alić

    In 1992, a photograph of a starving man in a Bosnian concentration camp stunned the world

  20. The sergeants' coup in Suriname

    Sixteen army sergeants seized power in the South American country in 1980

  21. Pippi Longstocking

    In Stockholm in 1941, Astrid Lindgren made up a story for her daughter about a young girl

  22. Creating New Zealand's national walking trail

    Geoff Chapple's vision was to create New Zealand's national walking trail

  23. The Dambusters

    Eighty years ago a daring raid destroyed dams in Germany's Ruhr Valley

  24. German child evacuees of World War Two

    Thousands of German children during World War Two were sent to camps in the countryside

  25. Singapore executes Filipina maid

    The execution of Flor Contemplacion caused a crisis between the Philippines and Singapore

  26. World War II victory in North Africa

    It is 80 years since the Allies in World War II declared victory in North Africa

  27. Warsaw Ghetto uprising

    In May 1943, the uprising in the Jewish Ghetto in Warsaw in Poland came to an end

  28. The last commercial flight out of Kai Tak

    In 1998, the last commercial flight left Hong Kong's Kai Tak airport

  29. The sinking of the SS Tilawa: the ‘Indian Titanic’

    Hundreds died when an passenger ship was hit by Japanese torpedoes in 1942

  30. United States bomb the Chinese embassy in Belgrade

    On 7 May 1999, US bombs damaged the embassy and relations between China and the West

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