No One Saw It Coming

A Changi prisoner of war. A fridge full of urine. A handful of dead guinea pigs. And one of the most important medical breakthroughs of the 20th century.

Greg de Moore, Associate Professor of Psychiatry based at Sydney's Westmead Hospital, tells Marc Fennell (Stuff The British Stole) about the story of Australian doctor John Cade and his pioneering work in bipolar treatment. 

From the horrors of a Changi prison camp to a backyard shed experiment with lithium, this is the story of how science, serendipity, and sheer human determination transformed modern psychiatry.

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One of the most important scientific discoveries of the last century was the first immortal human cell line, known as “HeLa”. It enabled significant medical breakthroughs, including the development of the polio vaccine, genetic mapping and even COVID-19 vaccines.

But for decades no one knew that the name 'HeLa' stood for Henrietta Lacks, an African American mother who died of an aggressive cervical cancer. It was thanks to Henrietta Lacks that science had been given these miracle cells, and yet, the samples had been taken from her without her knowledge and without her consent. 

Bioethics expert and the James B.Duke Professor of English & African American Studies at Duke University Karla FC Holloway tells Marc Fennell (Stuff the British Stole) about the woman behind the famous cells, a life that has obscured. And she discusses the role that race and gender played in Henrietta Lacks' story and the injustices that persist in medicine even today.  

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He soared into the sky in a balloon to prove a scientific theory and landed in the world of espionage. 

This is a story about a man with a fabulous moustache who called himself Professor, who was accused of being the devil in the American Civil War and ended up becoming a spy in a big balloon, triggering the creation of the US Air Force. Yes, really. 

Matt Bevan from ABC's If You’re Listening tells Marc Fennell (Stuff The British Stole) about the early days of aerial espionage, and how he stumbled down a rabbit hole to find this story in the first place. 

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It’s one of the greatest museum heists in Australian history - a theft whose repercussions are still being felt today. And yet, no one really knows about it.

Journalist and author Walter Marsh sits down with Marc Fennell (Stuff The British Stole) and shares the story of a mysterious British gentleman who duped Australian museums and stole thousands of butterflies right under their noses. 

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Yes, Adolf Hitler - the guy who was apparently so 'pure' that he never even drank coffee - was secretly a drug addict. 

Norman Ohler, author of the bestselling book Blitzed, tells Marc Fennell (Stuff the British Stole) how a strange celebrity wellness doctor named Theodor Morell became Hitler's personal physician and used Hitler as a guinea pig for his experimental drugs. By the end of WW2, the Nazi leader was on opioids, cocaine, perhaps even methamphetamine. 

After listening to this wild tale, you'll never see the Second World War in quite the same way. 

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This is the story of a gadget lover from Australia who wanted to pirate music and instead created one of the greatest life saving devices in the history of air travel. 

Janice Witham, journalist and author, tells Marc Fennell (Stuff The British Stole) about the creation of the black box. It’s now ubiquitous in aviation but at the time, its creator David Warren fought against scepticism and bureaucracy to realise his vision. 

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28 June 1969 was a regular Saturday night at the Stonewall Inn. Until it wasn’t. 

“The bar lights blinked on and off. I'd never seen that happen before so I asked my friend what's going on, and my friend said, oh, just another raid. Well, it turned out not to be just the kind of raid that they were used to.”

While Mark Segal had spent many nights at the unlicensed gay bar, none were like the one that started the Stonewall Riots. The veteran activist and journalist, one of the last living eyewitnesses to the Stonewall uprising, tells host Marc Fennell (Stuff the British Stole) about what really happened that night and how it sparked the first Pride march and launched the gay rights movement not just in America but around the world.

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If you had a premature baby in America in the 1900s, chances were they would not survive. That is, until Martin Couney came along...

In a bizarre attraction in Coney Island, 'Dr Couney' took the children that medicine deemed 'not worth saving' and displayed them to the public in rows of cutting-edge incubators. Over the years, he saved thousands of babies' lives. But the strangest thing was, Martin Couney wasn't a real doctor... 

Journalist Claire Prentice tells Marc Fennell (Stuff the British Stole) the incredible true story she unearthed while covering a presidential election, and the miracle babies she eventually met in real life. 

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It's the event that's seen as the trigger for World War One, but it didn't happen quite the way the history books let on... 

Australian author Paul Ham tells Marc Fennell (Stuff the British Stole, Mastermind) what really happened on the 28th of June 1914, when the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne Archduke Franz Ferdinand visited the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Sarajevo. 

Far from a meticulously planned and executed assassination, the murder of Archduke Franz Ferdinand might not have happened at all, were it not for one fateful wrong turn that put him right in the path of the man who would murder him. And the deaths of millions could have been avoided altogether without the desperate need for colonial powers to defend their empires. 

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When you picture someone wearing high heels, what do you imagine? I'm guessing it's not horseriding archers on a Persian battlefield... 

But it turns out the high heel was indeed invented for men, as a brutally effective tool of war. And it was only because of colonialism, and later capitalism, that this iconic footwear made it to Europe and became embedded in women's fashion. 

Shoe historian Elizabeth Semmelhack tells Marc Fennell (Stuff the British Stole, Mastermind) how high heels have been at the centre of power struggles - both male and female - for centuries. It's an epic saga that will forever change the way you think about fashion, gender and your shoes.

Binge all the episodes of No One Saw It Coming now on the ABC listen app (Australia) or wherever you get your podcasts.

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Got a story for us? We'd love to hear from you! Email us at [email protected]