💬 The birth of the chemical industry - one which has reshaped the course of human history - happened in a small town in England. In the 19th century, Widnes was transformed into a major centre of the chemical industry.

This era saw the rise of the bleach packers - workers who shovelled toxic chemicals to earn a living, wearing bandages to protect themselves from burns and muzzles to avoid passing out.

⚡Catalyst is the UK’s only museum dedicated to the chemical industry. And in this episode Judith Wilde, Heritage Manager at the museum, introduces us to the museum’s extensive archive of historical artefacts.

Now, more than 30 years since it was curated, Catalyst is getting a complete makeover - so this is a last chance to see the museum before it changes for good.

Don't miss an episode - subscribe now:

https://podfollow.com/what-we-did-before

🎧 Stay tuned to learn about:

➡ The ancient origins of humanity’s obsession with chemicals

➡ Why Widnes was chosen to house these chemical factories

➡ What life would’ve been like in such a heavily polluted industrial town

➡ The bleach packers - and why it was one of the worst jobs of the 19th century

➡ How soap first emerged - to clean floors, not bodies

➡ The rise of anaesthetics and antibiotics

Visit Catalyst Museum: https://www.catalyst.org.uk/

About the podcast:

What We Did Before is a podcast exploring the history of everyday life, from how we kept food fresh before fridges, to how we survived without shoes and what came before AI.

About your host:

Ollie Guillou is an award-winning podcast producer and broadcaster. He's co-founder of OG Podcasts, working with the likes of New Scientist, Dr Karan and Lessons From Our Mothers.

Connect with Ollie:

Website: www.ogpodcasts.co.uk

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ollie-guillou

Email: hello@ogpodcasts.co.uk

💬 For thousands of years, humans believed the heart controlled the body - your thoughts, your emotions…everything. The brain was just a radiator - something to discard when preparing the dead.

But why did our ancestors think this for so long? Were there no tell-tale signs? It’s only in the last few hundred years that the brain has received the attention it deserves. And even once it did, we believed a lot of strange things about how it works.

⚡In this episode Matthew Cobb, author of The Idea of the Brain, explains why throughout history we believed the heart was the seat of thought and emotion. And he explores the many bizarre and surprising ways we’ve tried to grapple with how our brain actually works.

Don't miss an episode - subscribe now:

https://podfollow.com/what-we-did-before

🎧 Stay tuned to learn about:

➡ Why Ancient Egyptians literally threw away the brain during mummification

➡ The clues present in the heart that led ancient people to believe it was in control

➡ How skull size and the nonsense practise of “phrenology” became mainstream

➡ The gruesome story of Phineas Gage - and what he taught us about the brain

➡ Why ancient brain experiments gave us one of the most famous novels ever written

➡ How our modern understanding of the brain as “like a computer” is just as strange

Grab Matthew’s book here:

https://amzn.eu/d/049Th1r2

About the podcast:

What We Did Before is a podcast exploring the history of everyday life, from how we kept food fresh before fridges, to how we survived without shoes and what came before AI.

About your host:

Ollie Guillou is an award-winning podcast producer and broadcaster. He's co-founder of OG Podcasts, working with the likes of New Scientist, Dr Karan and Lessons From Our Mothers.

Connect with Ollie:

Website: www.ogpodcasts.co.uk

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ollie-guillou

Email: hello@ogpodcasts.co.uk

Image Credit: SimplisticReps, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Raffaele pagani, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0 via Wikimedia Commons

💬 When Barry Molloy’s team started digging up an ancient Bronze Age settlement - they never expected to uncover quite so many human bones. And they weren’t found in one place - they were everywhere.

Archaeologists uncovered over 100 fortified Late Bronze Age sites, and their findings tell us something unusual about the way we dealt with the dead throughout history. At this time in history - there really was no single way people would bury their dead. Sometimes bodies would be pulled apart, and a loved one’s bones would be brought into the home.

⚡In this episode we find out why ancient people collected the bones of their dead, what they might have been doing with them and whether these practices helped them deal with the grief of loss better.

Don't miss an episode - subscribe now:

https://podfollow.com/what-we-did-before

🎧 Stay tuned to learn about:

➡ How Barry found bones everywhere in a Bronze Age megafort in Europe

➡ The many ways the dead were treated in history - from inhumation to excarnation

➡ Why some skulls seem to have been placed on pikes around borders to the site

➡ How the bones of family members may have been chewed by pets

➡ Why collecting bones could be about respecting and disrespecting the dead

➡ How Bronze Age people would collect the bones of ancient heroes

Read Barry’s paper here:

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00934690.2026.2641968#abstract

About the podcast:

What We Did Before is a podcast exploring the history of everyday life, from how we kept food fresh before fridges, to how we survived without shoes and what came before AI.

About your hosts:

Ollie Guillou is an award-winning podcast producer and broadcaster. He's co-founder of OG Podcasts, working with the likes of New Scientist, Dr Karan and Lessons From Our Mothers.

Connect with Ollie:

Website: www.ogpodcasts.co.uk

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ollie-guillou

Email: hello@ogpodcasts.co.uk

Image Credits:

Interfase, CC BY-SA 4.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0, via Wikimedia Commons

Jan Kameníček, CC BY-SA 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0, via Wikimedia Commons