The Profumo Affair

Fifty years ago, a sex scandal threatened to engulf the British government.

• 9 mins

Living in Ceausescu's Romania

The communist dictator ran one of the most feared secret police forces in Eastern Europe.

• 9 mins

Unearthing the Terracotta Army

Discovered by chance by farmers digging a well, the secrets of the Qin Dynasty in China.

• 9 mins

American prisoners in Vietnam

After their release in 1973, former US prisoners of war began to talk about torture.

• 9 mins

The killing of Archbishop Romero

On 24 March 1980, Archbishop Oscar Romero was shot dead while saying mass in San Salvador.

• 9 mins

Women and the law in Britain

Over 175 years ago, Caroline Norton began to fight for the rights of married women.

• 9 mins

The real Peter Pan

A family of real boys inspired JM Barrie to write the story of Peter Pan.

• 9 mins

Operation Babylift

As the Vietnam war ended the US tried to fly thousands of orphans out of the country.

• 9 mins

Howard Hughes

The reclusive American billionaire remembered by one of the few journalists to meet him.

• 9 mins

James Brown Concert at the Boston Garden

Held 24 hours after the death of Martin Luther King, the gig went ahead peacefully

• 9 mins

Matabeleland Massacres

In the early 1980s, thousands of civilians were killed in Zimbabwe by the security forces.

• 9 mins

The Great Famine in China

When Mao Zedong tried to force an industrial revolution in China millions starved to death

• 9 mins

The Guinea Pig Club

How severely burnt Second World War airmen learnt to overcome their terrible injuries.

• 9 mins

Black Golfer at the US Masters

How Lee Elder broke one of the last colour barriers in US sport in 1975

• 9 mins

Mickey Mouse goes to Europe

When Disney opened a theme park in Europe, just outside Paris it was beset with problems.

• 9 mins

The First War in the Air

The story of a young British pilot who survived the world's first war in the air

• 9 mins

The discovery of LSD

It is 70 years since a Swiss chemist stumbled on the controversial hallucinogenic drug.

• 9 mins

The funeral of Sir Winston Churchill

In January 1965 Britain held a state funeral for the man who led it through World War Two.

• 9 mins

The Khmer Rouge take power

In April 1975 the four-year rule of the brutal Khmer Rouge began in Cambodia.

• 9 mins

The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising

Jewish fighters in the Polish capital rose up against the German army in 1943

• 9 mins

Haile Selassie in Jamaica

Ethiopia's emperor visited Jamaica - the birthplace of the Rastafarian movement - in 1966

• 9 mins

Pau Casals

The acclaimed musician who became a symbol of Catalan resistance to General Franco

• 9 mins

The Hitler Diaries Hoax

Thirty years ago newspapers spent millions on what they thought were Hitler's diaries

• 9 mins

Muhammad Ali and the Draft

How the boxing champion's refusal to go to Vietnam made him a hero to 1960s radicals

• 9 mins

The Ballerina and the Coup

In April 1959 Dame Margot Fonteyn was part of a bizarre plot against Panama's government.

• 9 mins

The Shooting of Rudi Dutschke

In 1968 German students called for a revolution when their leader Rudi Dutschke was shot

• 9 mins

The death of Hitler

On April 30th 1945 Adolf Hitler killed himself in a bunker beneath Berlin.

• 9 mins

Australia's Aboriginal Referendum

In May 1967 campaigning began across Australia to consolidate Aboriginal rights

• 9 mins

The Children's Crusade

Thousands of black American children protest against segregation in Birmingham, Alabama

• 9 mins

The White Collar Art Collectors

In 1992 an ex-postal worker and his wife donated a priceless art collection to a gallery

• 9 mins