Tag Archives: scandinavia

I hear with my little ear: Podcasts 24-31 May 2025

The Human Subject (BBC) The Woman Who Resisted Mind Control Hiding in plain sight was a renowned psychiatrist, working at the Allan Institute under the aegis of McGill University. As a 16 year old in 1958 Lana Ponting was taken to the Allan Institute where Dr Ewan Cameron subjected her, and other patients, to a regime of LSD, shock therapy at 20-40 times the usual voltage and ‘depatterning’ and ‘positive affirmation’ to wipe clean their memories. It left her unable to form coherent memories, and she even forgot that she had had a child in the hospital who was adopted out. Dr Cameron’s methods soon attracted the attention of the CIA and their mind control efforts. And it all looked so respectable and upfront.

The Rest is History Ep 522 The Last Viking: Harald Hardrada Tom Holland was driving the previous four episodes about the lead-up to 1066 (having written Millenium ), but in this episode Dominic takes the reins, having himself written The Fury of the Vikings as part of his Adventures In Time series for children. To be honest, I had never heard of Harald Hardrada and I still don’t know what the connection with 1066 is. I guess I’ll have to wait for the next episode. From the shownotes:

In the 1066 game of thrones for the crown of England, the most extraordinary of the three contenders is arguably Harald Hardrada: viking warrior, daring explorer, emperor’s bodyguard, serpent slayer, alleged lover to an empress, King of Norway, and legend of Norse mythology. How did this titan of a man come to cross the North Sea with his army, and take on Harold Godwinson, in the titanic showdown of Stamford Bridge? His story before this point is so colourful that it may be one the most exciting lives in all history. Fighting from the age of twelve, Harald was born to a petty regional king of Norway, in a Scandinavia of competing religions and kingships. As a teenager, he would then join his fearsome brother Olaf, the man who united Norway but later fell foul of King Cnut, and subsequently sailed the seas and mysterious waterways of Russia, in a mighty battle to take back Norway. Their defeat was terrible and absolute, leaving the young Harald wounded and on the run. A journey of horrors and hardship would then lead him at last to the awe inspiring city of Kyiv, where he would serve as mercenary for the Grand Prince. But still hungry for wealth and glory he then travelled on to the most remarkable city in the world: Constantinople, where his life would take an even more dramatic turn

Half Life (BBC) Episode 3 Lost From 1935 onwards, Ammendorf, south of Berlin was the main manufacturing industry town for mustard gas. It was not used during WE2, but was instead stockpiled and burned after the war, leading to environmental contamination. Our narrator Joe intended to apologize for his great-grandfather’s role in manufacturing chemicals, but it took him some time to find the opportunity to do so. In 1935 the family left for Ankara, so his grandfather no longer oversaw the factory, even though he continued to receive half-pay from the company. In Episode 4 Young Republic Joe travels to Ankara Turkey, where he believed that his grandfather had worked distributing gas masks for a company now known as MKE that still makes gas marks. . Ataturk’s modernization movement welcomed Jewish intellectuals, and Hitler was friendly towards Ataturk. Joe’s grandfather was in fact working at the chemical factory beside the gasmask factory, and he smoothed the way for the Turkish purchase of German chemicals which were used in the 1938 Dersim massacre of 13,000 Kurds (maybe 3 or 4 times more).