Max Pearson presents a collection of this week’s Witness History episodes from the BBC World Service.
We hear about the Juliet Club in Verona, Italy. The club has been replying to mail addressed to Shakespeare’s tragic heroine, Juliet since the early 1990s.
Professor Lisa Bitel talks about the traditions of Valentine’s Day.
Plus, how the small Irish town of Gort became known as ‘Little Brazil’ because it's home to so many Brazilians. The World War Two escape line that fooled the Nazis and the stadium disaster that shocked Egypt.
And the story of the food supplement used by soldiers during the Nigerian civil war that became a drink enjoyed in more than 70 countries around the world.
Contributors: Giovanna Tamassia - daughter of Giulio Tamassia, one of the founders of the Juliet Club. Professor Lisa Bitel - Professor of History & Religion at the University of Southern California, USA. Lucimeire Trindade – resident of Gort, Ireland. Keith Janes – son of captured a British soldier. Christine Lepers – daughter of a French resistance fighter. Mahmoud Al-Khawaga – former footballer with Zamalek. Peter Rasmussen – creator of the drink Supermalt.
(Photo: Giovanna Tamassia from the Juliet Club. Credit: Leonello Bertolucci/Getty Images)
Hong Kong: 25 years since the handover from British to Chinese rule
Egypt's first democratic Presidential election
Cambodian genocide trials
How Sri Lanka's president survived a suicide bombing
The Syrian civil war
Artists who made history
The Marcos regime in the Philippines
The war in Transnistria
Fighting for Uyghur rights in China
Algeria's War of Independence
The Falkands War
Protesting against Putin
Ukrainian history special
Women who made history
Russia under Putin
LGBT history special
The Ukraine crisis: an eyewitness history
Kazakhstan's new capital
Fifty years since Northern Ireland's Bloody Sunday
The rise of Boko Haram
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