Zoomers challenge Boomer office culture
Gen-Z is challenging the Boomer office culture of the 1980s and they might have a point.
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Plane hijacked by samurai wielding terrorists
Imagine your plane being hijacked by nine fanatical ninjas wielding Samurai swords. That was the nasty surprise that lay in store for passengers on Japan Airlines Flight 351 in March, 1970. Members of the Japanese Red Army Faction suddenly leaped from their seats wielding the deadly swords and demanding control of the plane. You may…
Investigating the Amityville Horror – new truths!
It was a multiple murder within a family that shocked America. In November 1974, Ronald DeFeo Jr drugged his parents, two brothers and two sisters and killed them one by one with a rifle. A year later, the house was bought by a newly married couple who then experienced a series of horrific incidents they…
Short Sharp Shock abolished by Thatcher
When the Tories came to power in 1979, fighting crime was high on the agenda. There was even a flirtation with the idea of restoring capital punishment, which Thatcher was understood to favour. But the landmark policy was the introduction of the so-called Short Sharp Shock regime with special detention centres imposing military-style discipline on…
Lester Maddox and the politics of segregation
American chat show host Jimmy Kimmel has just been taken off air by ABC/Disney after pressure from the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) – which is supposed to be an independent media regulator, but has acted in a very partisan manner. However, this is nothing new. Back in 1970, the pro-segregation ex-Governor of Alabama, Lester Maddox,…
The Unsolved Murder of Dian Fossey
There’s an astonishing number of unsolved murders from the 1980s and it’s very striking how varied these cases are. Mobsters, members of cults, victims of homophobia, and racist homicides. Some of the stories are truly sinister so let’s investigate. The People’s Temple and a cult defector In 1980, Jeannie Mills, her husband Al, and daughter…
Summerland fire disaster – a forgotten tragedy
The 1970s was the decade that gave us the disaster movie, The Towering Inferno. The world’s tallest skyscraper catches fire and its height proves to be an insurmountable obstacle to rescuing the wealthy folk inside. This was a cautionary tale about the decade’s unshakable belief in modernity as well as the hubris and greed of…
Iran – the overthrow of the Shah in 1979
With Iran back in the news, it’s an opportune moment to ask how did this country come to be ruled by a theocratic caste combined with a parliamentary democracy? Up until 1979, Iran was under the thumb of a monarch – the Shah – who was pro-western and effectively policed the Middle East on behalf…
Attitudes to sex in the 1980s
Attitudes to sex in the 1980s were more liberal than is sometimes assumed. But the decade was very different from the liberated 1960s and rebellious 1970s. The AIDS pandemic and rise of political conservatism impacted how young people viewed sex. Despite a climate of fear and repression, a survey in 1986 had very surprising results….
How did social media begin in Britain in the 1990s?
It may seem incredible but Britain beat Facebook by four years to create a social media website that reunited old friends across the globe – and became an early online sensation. But, as is so often the case with Great British inventions, other countries took the idea, improved on it, and ultimately dominated. So let’s…