When Lord Byron’s 17 year-old daughter, Ada Lovelace, attended a soirée at the home of academic Charles Babbage on 5th June, 1833, the pair hit it off immediately. He invited her to see his ‘Difference Engine’ - an early mechanical calculator - kicking off a correspondence that lasted throughout her life.

Their lively, intellectual correspondence, and Ada's deep understanding of mathematics and science, lead to her championing of Babbage’s ‘Analytical Engine’, a groundbreaking proto personal computer for which Ada even wrote an algorithm.

In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly debate whether Ada deserves her 21st century acclaim as the godmother of computer programming; expose her extramarital affairs and gambling habit; and consider whether Babbage himself even fully understood the applications for what he had invented…

Further Reading:

• ‘Charles Babbage’s Difference Engines and the Science Museum’ (Science Museum, 2023): https://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/objects-and-stories/charles-babbages-difference-engines-and-science-museum

• ‘How Ada Lovelace and Charles Babbage Invented the World’s First Computer: An Illustrated Adventure in Footnotes and Friendship’ (The Marginalian, 2015): https://www.themarginalian.org/2015/06/15/the-thrilling-adventures-of-lovelace-and-babbage-sydney-padua/

• ‘Ada Lovelace in “Victoria” (ITV, 2019): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOoCOUDdoeA

We'll be back on Monday - unless you join CLUB RETROSPECTORS, where we give you ad-free listening AND a full-length Sunday episode every week!
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The Retrospectors are Olly Mann, Rebecca Messina & Arion McNicoll, with Matt Hill.
Theme Music: Pass The Peas. Announcer: Bob Ravelli. Graphic Design: Terry Saunders. Edit Producer: Ollie Peart.
Copyright: Rethink Audio / Olly Mann 2026.

This episode originally aired in 2024.

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‘The Annoying Thing’ is how the begenitaled amphibian animated by Erik Wernquist was first described; but by the time he released his first single ‘Axel F’ he was universally known as The Crazy Frog, and beat Coldplay’s ‘Speed of Sound’ to UK #1 on 4th June, 2005.

The tale of how this possibly could have happened is unique to the early days of the internet - a teenager messing about imitating motorbike noises emailed the sound to some friends, Wernquist stumbled across it and put it in his portfolio, and then it was adopted for sale by mobile ringtone company Jamster.

In this episode, Olly, Arion and Rebecca consider the value of Crazy Frog’s musical legacy, reveal that he’s not even a frog, and applaud the UK’s Advertising Standards Authority for standing up to protest, and permitting us to witness his visible scrotum… 

Further Reading:

• Crazy Frog - Axel F (2005): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k85mRPqvMbE

• ‘Find out how the world’s most annoying noise came about’ - The Sun commemorates Crazy Frog’s 20th birthday (2017): https://www.thesun.co.uk/living/2974489/crazy-frog-just-turned-20-relive-his-hellish-magic-here/

• Not So Crazy Frog (Documentary, 2017): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8vVz1KoU2s

There is SEVEN MINUTES of bonus material from our discussion about Crazy Frog. We had a lot to discuss. To hear it, visit Patreon.com/Retrospectors and support the show.

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The Retrospectors are Olly Mann, Rebecca Messina & Arion McNicoll, with Matt Hill.

Theme Music: Pass The Peas. Announcer: Bob Ravelli. Graphic Design: Terry Saunders. Edit Producer: Ollie Peart.

Copyright: Rethink Audio / Olly Mann 2026.

This episode originally aired in 2021.

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Los Angeles erupted in racist violence on 3rd June, 1943 in a week of riots that exposed deep tensions in wartime America.

California’s Mexican-American “Pachuco” youth had adopted the zoot suit style from African-American jazz culture. But to many white Americans the fashion appeared rebellious, unpatriotic and even threatening at a time when wartime rationing had placed strict controls on fabric use.

Groups of sailors started targeting zoot suit-wearing youths in downtown Los Angeles, and mob violence - egged on by the LAPD and the state’s newspapers - ensued.

In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly consider the photographs of bruised and half-dressed Mexican American youths, published under approving headlines; discover how the disorder quickly became an international embarrassment for Roosevelt’s administration; and reveal how the event became a turning point for many young Latinos who went on to reclaim the zoot suit as a symbol of cultural pride…

CONTENT WARNING: racist violence.

Further Reading:

• ‘History of The Los Angeles Zoot Suit Riots’ (Latinitas Magazine, 2023): https://latinitasmagazine.org/history-of-the-los-angeles-zoot-suit-riots/

• ‘A Brief History of the Zoot Suit’ (Smithsonian Magazine, 2016): https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/brief-history-zoot-suit-180958507/

• ‘How did the Zoot Suit Riots begin? | American Experience’ (PBS, 2022): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SisGQx5loKk&list=PLmh4YIWteoGiaCpzImPBkosURu6yBN03f

#Latino #Fashion #WW2 #Racism #US

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The Retrospectors are Olly Mann, Rebecca Messina & Arion McNicoll, with Matt Hill.

Theme Music: Pass The Peas. Announcer: Bob Ravelli. Graphic Design: Terry Saunders. Edit Producer: Ollie Peart.

Copyright: Rethink Audio / Olly Mann 2026.

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Alexander Graham Bell and Thomas Watson made an important discovery, by accident, on June 2, 1875. While working on their ‘harmonic telegraph’. Watson inadvertently plucked a reed that had been tightly wound around the pole of its electromagnet, producing a twang that Bell heard on a second device next door.

Meanwhile, Elisha Gray, co-founder of Western Electric Company, was working on, as his patent put it, “Transmitting Vocal Sounds Telegraphically.” Gray had been using liquid transmitters in his telephone experiments for more than two years; an innovation which mysteriously turned up in Bell’s technology after Gray filed his patent...

In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly uncover how Bell’s deaf wife and mother inspired his interest in the human voice; reveal Queen Victoria’s thoughts on being presented with the new technology; and declare which of the two men was the ‘Tesla’ of the race to invent the telephone…

Further Reading:

• ‘Ahoy! Alexander Graham Bell and the first telephone call’ (Science Museum): https://www.sciencemuseum.org.uk/objects-and-stories/ahoy-alexander-graham-bell-and-first-telephone-call

• The Invention and Evolution of the Telephone (ThoughtCo, 2021): https://www.thoughtco.com/history-of-the-telephone-alexander-graham-bell-1991380

• ‘The life and work of Alexander Graham Bell (dramatisation)’ (BBC Teach, 2017): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9n_5jG_9fAE

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The Retrospectors are Olly Mann, Rebecca Messina & Arion McNicoll, with Matt Hill.

Theme Music: Pass The Peas. Announcer: Bob Ravelli. Graphic Design: Terry Saunders. Edit Producer: Ollie Peart.

Copyright: Rethink Audio / Olly Mann 2026.

This episode originally aired in 2023.

#Victorian #Inventions #Technology

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Crown Prince Dipendra opened fire on his whole family at a family dinner at Kathmandu’s Narayanhiti Palace on 1st June, 2001. He killed nine royals, including his father, King Birendra, his mother, Queen Aishwarya, and his siblings; then reportedly turned the gun on himself.

In a bizarre twist of constitutional formality, Dipendra — though in a coma — was then declared King of Nepal for three days. When he died on June 4th, his uncle Gyanendra, who hadn’t been at the dinner, was crowned king. This convenient absence — and his immediate ascension — instantly fuelled public suspicion and conspiracy theories.

In this episode, Arion, Olly and Rebecca explore the commonly-accepted motive for the massacre: Dipendra’s forbidden romance with Devyani Rana, from a rival aristocratic family; ask how Dipendra was able to sneak in multiple weapons into a palace laden with security; and consider how Nepal moved on — politically fractured and spiritually shaken…

Content warning: mass murder, suicide

Further Reading:

• ‘Mystery of a love divided’ (The Irish Times, 2002): https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/mystery-of-a-love-divided-1.1057937

• ‘A royal massacre: 20 years ago, a lovesick Nepalese prince murdered his family’ (ABC News, 2021): https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-05-01/how-a-lovesick-prince-wiped-out-nepals-royal-family/100056562

• ‘Crown Prince Dipendra’ (BBC, 2002):

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E93ijn7h2s0

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The Retrospectors are Olly Mann, Rebecca Messina & Arion McNicoll, with Matt Hill.

Theme Music: Pass The Peas. Announcer: Bob Ravelli. Graphic Design: Terry Saunders. Edit Producer: Ollie Peart.

Copyright: Rethink Audio / Olly Mann 2026.

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Bing Crosby recorded the biggest-selling single of all time, ‘White Christmas’, on 29th May, 1942. The session took just 18 minutes, and the song was not considered the standout from the album: everyone thought the Valentine’s-themed ballad ‘Be Careful, It's My Heart’ had a better chance of chart success.

The songwriter, Irving Berlin, was perhaps not an obvious person to pen the quintessential American Christmas song, given that he was a Russian-born Jew, who had never celebrated the holiday until his arrival in the United States. But the record’s airplay on US Army overseas radio stations during World War II struck a chord with homesick soldiers, and helped embed the tune deeply into the American psyche.

In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly reveal why the version you’re almost certainly thinking of is NOT the version with which Bing initally topped the charts; unpick the confusing Russian Doll stack of genres into which the song has been repurposed; and explain why Berlin’s Oscar win became a pivotal moment in the Academy Awards ceremony… 

Further Reading:

• ‘'White Christmas' at 75: A Snapshot of the Most Successful Song In Music History’ (Billboard, 2017): https://www.billboard.com/culture/lifestyle/white-christmas-bing-crosby-history-8071111/#!

• ‘Is White Christmas the Best Popular Song Ever Written?’ (Smithsonian Magazine, 2012): https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smithsonian-institution/is-white-christmas-the-best-popular-song-ever-written-165989545/

• ‘Holiday Inn | Bing Crosby Sings "White Christmas"’ (Universal Pictures, 1942): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GJ36gbGlm8Y

We'll be back on Monday - unless you join CLUB RETROSPECTORS, where we give you ad-free listening AND a full-length Sunday episode every week!
Plus, weekly bonus content, unlock over 70 bonus bits, and support our independent podcast.Join now via Apple Podcasts or Patreon. Thanks!
The Retrospectors are Olly Mann, Rebecca Messina & Arion McNicoll, with Matt Hill.
Theme Music: Pass The Peas. Announcer: Bob Ravelli. Graphic Design: Terry Saunders. Edit Producer: Ollie Peart.
Copyright: Rethink Audio / Olly Mann 2026.

This episode originally aired in 2024.

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Before ‘Tomb Raider’, before ‘Mortal Kombat’, before ‘Street Fighter’, there was something even WORSE. ‘Super Mario Bros’ - which opened in the United States on 28th May, 1993 - was such a critical and commercial failure that for years afterwards Nintendo kept their franchises out of Hollywood hands.

Relocating the action to ‘Dinohattan’, the film inexplicably disregarded most of what had made the videogame such a smash-hit and replaced these elements with allusions to Blade Runner and Tim Burton’s Batman.

In this episode, Arion, Olly and Rebecca reveal Bob Hoskins’ drinking and accident-prone habits on-set, consider the relative strength of today’s spinoffs such as The Lego Movie, and analyse the secret sauce that keeps the Mario brand strong in the face of such adversity… 

Further Reading:

• CinemaSins presents: ‘Everything Wrong with Super Mario Bros in 21 Minutes or Less’: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PYQHnPOYc5Q

• ‘The Stench of it Stays With Everybody’, The Guardian (2018): 

https://www.theguardian.com/games/2018/mar/22/super-mario-bros-movie-killing-fields-chariots-fire-video-game

• ‘Plumbing a Videogame To Its Depths’ - the New York Times reviews the film in 1993: 

https://www.nytimes.com/1993/05/29/movies/review-film-plumbing-a-video-game-to-its-depths.html

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The Retrospectors are Olly Mann, Rebecca Messina & Arion McNicoll, with Matt Hill.

Theme Music: Pass The Peas. Announcer: Bob Ravelli. Graphic Design: Terry Saunders. Edit Producer: Ollie Peart.

Copyright: Rethink Audio / Olly Mann 2026.

This episode originally aired in 2021.

#90s #Film #Games #Inventions #US

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William Pitt the Younger was Prime Minister when he and opposition MP George Tierney fought a duel on Sunday, 27th May 1798 on London’s Putney Heath. 

Standing twelve paces apart, the two politicians prepared to exchange gunfire. Both men missed with their first shots. On the second round, Pitt deliberately fired away from his opponent, signalling that he considered honour satisfied without bloodshed. The seconds intervened, and the duel ended peacefully.

The fight had escalated from an argument in the House of Commons during a debate over naval recruitment. Tierney had questioned Pitt’s rush to expand the Royal Navy, while Pitt accused him of obstructing the defence of the country - a serious slight at a time when fears of French sympathies ran high. When Pitt refused to withdraw the remark, Tierney challenged him to a duel.

Even by the standards of the late eighteenth century, the affair felt faintly antiquated. Duelling still lingered among aristocrats and politicians as a ritual of honour, yet many Britons increasingly regarded it as incompatible with parliamentary government and the rule of law. Critics were appalled that the head of government would risk his life over a Commons dispute, particularly during wartime. Pitt’s ally William Wilberforce was horrified, while King George III reportedly reprimanded Pitt for putting personal honour ahead of duty to the country. Satirists, meanwhile, had a marvellous time portraying the pair as awkward amateurs more likely to wound their dignity than each other.

In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly attempt to unpick impenetrable eighteenth century cartoons of the incident; compare British duelling etiquette with the more theatrical “walk ten paces and turn” style popular on the Continent; and discover how, incredibly, Parliamentary duelling did not end with Pitt and Tierney…

Further Reading:

• ‘History of William Pitt 'The Younger' (GOV.UK): https://www.gov.uk/government/history/past-prime-ministers/william-pitt

• ‘William Pitt and the Great War - J. Holland Rose’ (DigiCat, 2022): https://www.google.co.uk/books/edition/William_Pitt_and_the_Great_War/IcmIEAAAQBAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=pitt+tierney+duel&pg=PT205&printsec=frontcover

• ‘A Brief Introduction to the Rules of Historical Pistol Duels’ (Skallagrim, 2016): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Toi3JY3LLUM

#UK #Politics #Strange #1700s

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The Retrospectors are Olly Mann, Rebecca Messina & Arion McNicoll, with Matt Hill.

Theme Music: Pass The Peas. Announcer: Bob Ravelli. Graphic Design: Terry Saunders. Edit Producer: Ollie Peart.

Copyright: Rethink Audio / Olly Mann 2026.

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A coalition of Australian community groups came together on May 26th, 1998 for the country’s first “National Sorry Day”, an annual day of atonement for the social-engineering policy that ripped an estimated 50,000 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children from their families between 1910 and the 1970s.

The first Sorry Day was marked with 300 events around the nation, and more than 1,000 people attended a ceremony in Parliament House, Canberra, but it took Australia’s government another decade to utter an official apology.

In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly explain how in the Year 2000, skywriters turned the heavens into the biggest billboard of apology ever; speculate on whether Australia Day will be abolished due to its colonial associations; and discover that there is in fact one word that is harder to say than “sorry”… 

Content warning: This episode contains discussion of the Stolen Generations, which may be distressing to some listeners. Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people should be aware that the episode also contains mentions of deceased people.

Further Reading:

• ‘From the Archives, 1998: Thousands say sorry, but not PM’ (The Age, 1998): https://www.theage.com.au/national/from-the-archives-1998-thousands-say-sorry-but-not-pm-20210521-p57tyr.html 

• ‘Peter Dutton says it was a 'mistake' walking out on the apology to the Stolen Generations’ (The Daily Mail, 2022): https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10866871/Peter-Dutton-admits-mistake-boycotted-national-apology-Stolen-Generations.html 

• ‘This Is Why Australia Has “National Sorry Day”’ (Time, 2015): https://time.com/3890518/national-sorry-day/ 

• ‘Australia's first “Sorry Day” (1998)’ (ABC Australia, 2021): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0OKsoqqXttE 

Thanks so much for supporting the show! We massively appreciate it.

The Retrospectors are Olly Mann, Rebecca Messina & Arion McNicoll, with Matt Hill.

Edit producer: Ollie Peart.

Theme Music: Pass The Peas. Announcer: Bob Ravelli. Graphic Design: Terry Saunders.

Copyright: Rethink Audio / Olly Mann 2026.

This episode originally aired in 2023.

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Hands Across America, a human chain from New York to California was formed on 25th May, 1986, in an attempt to raise awareness and funds for domestic poverty.

The brainchild of advertising executive Jeffrey Nightingale and We Are the World producer Ken Kragen, the kooky concept gained traction once corporate sponsors Coca-Cola and Citibank jumped on board, McDonald’s turned placemats into promotion tools, and popstar Prince sponsored a mile of the chain. The event got a Super Bowl promo starring Lily Tomlin and Bill Cosby, but, in the end, raised less money than expected.

In this episode, Arion, Olly and Rebecca sample the official Hands Across America anthem (but can’t bear to endure it all); consider the Regan’s involvement in the chain from the White House lawn; and explain why the event wasn’t truly as original as many people were led to believe…

Further Reading:

• ‘Hands Across America might have been the most Eighties thing to happen in the 1980s’ (The Washington Post, 2016): https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/arts-and-entertainment/wp/2016/05/25/hands-across-america-might-have-been-the-most-eighties-thing-to-happen-in-the-1980s/

• ’Us: What Was Hands Across America, the Creepy Event That Inspired Jordan Peele?’ (Vanity Fair, 2019): https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2019/03/us-movie-hands-across-america

• ‘Bill Cosby for Hands Across America’ (1986): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-llI2voCn2Y

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The Retrospectors are Olly Mann, Rebecca Messina & Arion McNicoll, with Matt Hill.

Theme Music: Pass The Peas. Announcer: Bob Ravelli. Graphic Design: Terry Saunders. Edit Producer: Ollie Peart.

Copyright: Rethink Audio / Olly Mann 2026.

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When Jerry Lee Lewis landed at Heathrow Airport for his first UK tour on 22nd May, 1958, he was met with a flurry of journalists eager for a scoop. Yet just one question brought everything to a halt: "Who are you?". 

A wide-eyed girl in Lewis's entourage answered: Myra Gale Brown, his wife. But she was only 13 years old. As if this wasn’t scandal enough… she was also his cousin, and their marriage was bigamous. The press exploded with these revelations, turning what was meant to be a triumphant tour into a public relations disaster.

In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly pore over the disturbing details of Lewis’s tumultuous private life; consider whether he was on the path to equalling Elvis’s stardom in the UK, had this matter not come to light; and fruitlessly search the singer’s interviews for a later sense of contrition… 

Further Reading:

• ‘Myra Williams talks about marriage at age 13 to Jerry Lee Lewis’ (Los Angeles Times, 2022): https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/music/story/2022-10-29/jerry-lee-lewis-myra-brown-williams-marriage-13-cousin

• ‘Inside The Disturbing Marriage Of Jerry Lee Lewis To His 13-Year-Old Cousin’ (All That’s Interesting, 2022): https://allthatsinteresting.com/myra-gale-brown-jerry-lee-lewis

• ’Jerry Lee Lewis Interview with 13 year old wife’ (1958): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwbty1kRCG0

CONTENT WARNING: domestic abuse, violence, child sexual abuse.

We'll be back on Monday - unless you join CLUB RETROSPECTORS, where we give you ad-free listening AND a full-length Sunday episode every week!
Plus, weekly bonus content, unlock over 70 bonus bits, and support our independent podcast.Join now via Apple Podcasts or Patreon. Thanks!
The Retrospectors are Olly Mann, Rebecca Messina & Arion McNicoll, with Matt Hill.
Theme Music: Pass The Peas. Announcer: Bob Ravelli. Graphic Design: Terry Saunders. Edit Producer: Ollie Peart.
Copyright: Rethink Audio / Olly Mann 2026.

This episode originally aired in 2024.

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