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00:04June 1897 Queen Victoria now near the end of her life takes a carriage ride through the streets of
00:13London to celebrate her diamond jubilee captured in the brand-new medium of film these images
00:21suggest order and stability but the forces of invention and progress that have powered
00:29Victoria's reign are entering a new phase the modern world is erupting the 1890s are the decade
00:42that electrifies Britain this is when science entertainment morality and art collide to create
00:50some very 21st century anxieties about where technology is leading us and just who is in
01:00control now in three films Philippa Perry Paul McGann and I are time-traveling to an era when
01:11anything seems possible electricity flies through the air and x-rays race through our bodies as science
01:19gives the Victorians superpowers when culture and convention become a battleground fear of the
01:28generation and imperial decline sent shockwaves to art and society and when radio waves promised
01:36communication between this world and the next an obsession with spirits and psychic phenomena fuels
01:44a new mass-media age drawing on newly restored footage from the archives of the British Film Institute and
01:53the technical wonders of the 1890s we'll find out how it felt to be part of this anarchic terrifying and
02:02thrilling moment
02:03very impressive welcome to the decade the future landed
02:16it's February the 3rd 1892 in the hallowed lecture hall of the royal institution the world's finest scientific minds take
02:27their seats
02:30the air is ablaze with excitement at what they are about to witness
02:39the audience are here to see a demonstration by a maverick electrical scientist and it's standing room
02:46only anyone who is anyone in British science is in this room and at the front is Nikola Tesla
02:54he's part visionary part showman and he's here to prove that the power of electricity has limitless potential
03:04Tesla has created the Tesla coil an electrical device made with wound copper and iron his invention enables
03:14him to control and manipulate electricity in entirely new ways he switches on the machine and as the crowd
03:24applauds he begins to demonstrate how electrical energy can be transmitted without wires Tesla's display
03:34completely wows his audience he's really pushing the boundaries here of what his peers thought was
03:40as possible and it's not just electrical sparks that are flying intellectual sparks are too
03:50Tesla channels thousands of volts of electricity through his own body illuminates bulbs in his
03:57bare hands and draws sparks through the air his lecture is a superhuman display a theatrical performance
04:06design to excite and tantalize about the possibilities of electricity no one leaves with a clear idea of
04:15how Tesla's ideas will change the world but they're quite sure they will the 1890s are a decade of such
04:24rapid
04:24discovery that the innovations are constantly outpacing understanding the victorians are playing catch-up
04:32trying to get to grips with what these discoveries mean and the impact that they're going to have
04:37on society Tesla's ecstatic crowds know that a new stage in human history the electric age has dawned
04:47unlike steam and gas which have driven the 19th century up until now electricity promises clean power for
04:54all and progress on an unprecedented scale electricity courses through the collective imagination
05:10already cities are being physically transformed ready for the nation to plug in
05:17and when the first horseless taxis hit london in the 1890s they aren't petrol but electric motor cars
05:26the new energy is connecting all areas of life from the streets to the home
05:33this is the decade when the modern house is born electric power is the ultimate modcon if you can afford
05:43it
05:51in 1892 the beale family begin work on one of the very first homes in britain designed specifically
05:59around electricity their architect is darling of the arts and crafts movement philip webb planning the
06:08interior with webb is family matriarch margaret beale it's women like her that are driving the
06:15take-up of electric power is this one of the original lights that mrs bill had installed absolutely
06:23it shows us one how it was worked into a whole room setting so we've got a sunflower theme in
06:28here we've
06:29got the morris wallpaper all brought into a scheme that is about nature but then when we look at the
06:36light itself what we see here is the way that webb has designed it it's using the materials
06:42and the design to celebrate the new energy the new lighting form for example the metals chosen is a
06:50brilliant metal for reflecting light into the room oh not only does this hang down it celebrates the
06:57process of hanging down so even to the point of the way that the design emphasizes wires i quite like
07:04the way that the the sort of petals around the light there reflect it back to you it's very pretty
07:09it's a
07:10type of classical vaseline glass and actually the effect on the light is it in the dark is sort of
07:15almost flickers and so it almost replicates the light of a candle
07:24very beautiful in here and very good taste what we're seeing in the period is women much more involved
07:31in formal decision making about how you decorate the home and really controlling this domestic sphere and
07:39being encouraged that it's their moral duty to provide the best possible home for their husband
07:45who's out working but not everyone is as excited about electricity as mrs beale for many many years
07:54women and men have been lit by candlelight and you put a candle next to your face and we all
07:58look lovely
07:58that's why we have romantic meals in front of a candle suddenly when you turn on the electricity light
08:03it's shining down upon you and women were the first who were horrified by the fact that they'll
08:07suddenly everybody could see all their lines and wrinkles you know there's no hiding i mean we have
08:14a lot of wonderful cartoons from magazines like punch of women literally using umbrellas and parasols
08:20you know protecting themselves and we have these wonderful letters where women are talking about
08:25the horror of these they describe as bullseyes of light shining upon them i mean as i say if
08:32you go into a bathroom in the morning and you shine like your face you're this and that was it
08:37was the
08:37first time they'd seen themselves like that i think we've all experienced that at some point another
08:41being slightly disappointed of what we look like in electric light absolutely and what's really
08:45interesting in these spaces is you start to see designers and house owners start to reflect the way that
08:51they designed interiors because of this new lighting form because of course electricity
08:55literally shined a light in the corners so where there was dust suddenly you could see it all everyone
09:00has a dirty everyone has a dirty and however much your housemaid will clean it up you could start
09:05see so we started to see a much more open design to the space and in the bills selecting this
09:12new
09:12technology into the house we see a whole set of ideas around progression about modernism about new roles for
09:19women in the home and about a new idea about what design does and why it matters
09:27in the future homes will be brighter and cleaner at standen electricity is transforming daily life
09:35through careful design and planning but in other respects this new electric age is an unregulated free
09:43for all where enthusiasm still exceeds understanding many imagine that this same energy that lights a lamp
09:53or powers a tram naturally courses through their own body and this presents the canny 1890s entrepreneur
10:03with a great opportunity to cash in on the victorian obsession with health
10:09the theory is that you have a limited amount of nervous energy which you can recharge like a battery
10:18which means that with the right treatment electricity should be a wonder cure where you can walk off the street
10:25and plug yourself in
10:30the king of the electric health market is a man called cornelius b harness the founder of the medical battery
10:39company harness is a bit less doctor and a bit more dell boy but he has got a flair for
10:46sales and a keen eye
10:47for a business opportunity and in the entrepreneurial spirit of the day he calls himself a consulting
10:53medical electrician and his range of electropathic remedies are flying off the shelves
11:05harnesses hq is the electropathic institute on oxford street it's part surgery part theater
11:16what kind of an impression was a place like this designed to give the customers that walk through
11:20the door they're not walking into a doctor's surgery they're not walking into a hospital
11:26they're walking into a place that looks like a plush comfortable luxurious middle-class drawing room
11:34is a way of telling them that you deserve the very best so you deserve harnesses electropathic belts
11:41i mean i think that's comfortingly expensive yes i think that's that's the basic idea what kind of
11:45things were people coming here complaining about it what sort of study they want to be cured with
11:50electricity they claim to be able to cure a range of diseases ailments conditions around and about
11:59nervousness there's a culture of nervousness if you like and it's a culture that's associated with
12:05the busy industrial overworked middle classes and being nervous in a certain sense is a sign of class
12:13well you and actually i don't like to talk about this very often but i've got a terrible case of
12:18debility um so i'd like to inquire about one of these treatments could you could you show me how they
12:24work if you care to step over to the consulting area okay let me introduce you to harnesses electropathic
12:33belt this is a very simple piece of technology on the inside of the belt here you can see a
12:39number
12:39of zinc and copper discs your sweat not to put too fine a point in it when it's in contact
12:46with
12:47these discs is meant to produce a small current of electricity that will then course through your body
12:53and you know revitalize you will kind of hit all those parts that that other treatments can't quite reach
13:00so if this belt is meant to just generally restore your vitality are people coming here
13:05with ailments that they wouldn't normally go to their their doctors about electropathic belts are
13:11meant for example to be a cure for impotence and that's certainly something that the middle class
13:17gent wouldn't necessarily want to discuss with their usual practitioner really why not because impotence
13:25is associated with practices that you might not necessarily want to admit to in public excessive
13:32masturbation for example imagine the impropriety you've lost your energy because you've been
13:39overdoing it and overdoing it in improper ways i'm quite keen to have my own electropathic belts
13:45they're one i can try on yes in fact there's an electropathic corset they can try on for size
13:49even better well yeah i don't know about you but i'm feeling extremely electropathically charged right
13:57now looks good on you they're quite dashing aren't they apart from looking quite good though do they
14:03actually work these things no harness is a charlatan he's a quack he's a fraud there is nothing electrical
14:11going on with the electropathic belts he's surfing the electrical zeitgeist if you like of the end of
14:18the 19th century he's preying on their desire to be the sorts of sophisticated educated knowledgeable
14:26people who know about electricity and the body and the future he's raking in the cash and he's making a
14:37killing but harness has underestimated the public and he's heading for a fall in one of the biggest
14:46disgraces of the decade for all of his showmanship harness is not pulling the wool over everyone's eyes
14:56his shady practices are earning him enemies as increasing numbers of people realize that this
15:03electropathic belt they've spent up to 100 shillings on is basically worthless and one of his disgruntled
15:11customers mr jeffries refuses to pay and so harness takes him to court big mistake
15:24once in court harnesses methods come under close scrutiny
15:31the engineering profession has been closely following harnesses claims for a number of years
15:36but now they have the chance to test the electropathic belt in front of an open court
15:44it's proven that harnesses employees aren't medically qualified and the belt simply doesn't
15:50work the judge rules against him having lost in court it was open season on cornelius b harness
16:01exposing bad science becomes front page news harness is finished what with all the legal costs and the
16:10lost business the medical electricity empire that he spent years taking to the top of the market
16:16goes into liquidation the art of quackery is losing out to science and the british are becoming tech savvy
16:28electrical technology is still in its wild west phase with quacks like harness who think they're
16:34untouchable but enlightened forces have begun to reign them in
16:39power
16:42there's a nagging anxiety around this invisible energy being piped into people's homes and bodies
16:50rumors swirl amongst the working class of domestic staff being killed by dodgy victorian wiring
16:59in 1819 news arrived from across the atlantic that confirms electricity's dark side
17:09in new york a murderer called william kemler becomes the first man to be executed by electric
17:17chair but rather than a quick modern death it was a botched and bloody affair a few years later
17:26the electric chair arrives in britain dr walford bodie supervises a young woman as she's strapped
17:35into the device at the flick of a switch thousands of volts of electricity will pass through her body
17:43but don't worry dr walford bodie is a magician and the electric chair is his latest stage act
17:56bodie's shocking routine makes him one of the biggest entertainers of the age performing to
18:02crowds of thousands bodie is one of the very first people to use electricity as entertainment for
18:10which he becomes known as the electrical wizard of the north to keep particularly easily offended
18:16people from complaining he says that the reason why he's doing this electrical chair act is to
18:22demonstrate his own distaste for the barbaric method of american execution
18:41in the 1890s science becomes box office with star acts like bodie performing in the musicals that the
18:49victorians love dearly tim cockerel has replicated bodie's stage act
18:57bodie is doing something similar to tesla they were both showmen they were both demonstrating these
19:04brand new modern pieces of technology and they of course were using those ingredients of showmanship
19:09how to whip up an audience into a frenzy and how to really sell what they were doing
19:14this is basically a miniature version of the kind of equipment that walford bodie might have used
19:19when we turn this machine on there's actually so much electricity in that plate that it's going
19:24to jump out so we're going to see a spark and it'll illuminate this tube is this version slightly uh
19:30more akin to modern health and safety than body might have had it's a bit more compatible with
19:35that it basically is a bit less likely to kill anybody okay right flick the switch
19:42mini lightning that's not something you want to put your finger in exactly not this is not static
19:47electricity it's this is basically the stuff that's coming out of the mains but the general rules that
19:51one centimeter of spark roughly equals about ten thousand volts and you've got what a couple of
20:05performers would as long as they're insulated from the air they would be able to stand on top of an
20:11electrified plate like this and have all of that electricity casting through their body it can still
20:16be very painful do you do this trick then i do i perform this you know i'm going to ask
20:20you now i bet
20:21you're right okay of course you can try it okay cool let's do it
20:26what's going to happen is i'll stand on top of this plate we'll flick the switch i'll have about 20
20:30000
20:31volts of electricity going through my body i'm holding this thing here which is a fire torch with
20:35some fuel on the end so the electricity is going to go through me through my arm all the way
20:39down
20:40the fire torch and then over there we've got a glass of water now the electricity is looking for a
20:44place
20:44to go so i'm hoping it will jump from the end of the torch to the glass of water we'll
20:49see a spark
20:50and it should set the fire torch on fire amazing okay i've got my shoes off so that i'm not
20:56insulated so
20:56i'm directly in contact with the electricity right 20 000 volts in your body that's it go on then
21:01right flick the switch
21:10very impressive and of course the grand finale
21:18very good i mean why not why not finish it in that way amazing
21:25in his own way bode is just as influential as tesla in spreading the gospel of electricity
21:32through stage acts like his even if you can't afford a light bulb you can still be part of the
21:38new
21:38electric age but just as the victorians are starting to wrap their heads around electricity
21:46through lighting quackery and showmanship a miraculous discovery arrives that takes everyone
21:53by surprise and gives us a real superhuman power
22:01at his laboratory in germany physicist wilhelm runken is obsessed with a mysterious type of light ray
22:14there's something strange about his work he's been locking himself away inside his laboratory for weeks
22:21behind those closed doors rogan realizes that his rays will pass through all but the densest of materials
22:31he doesn't realize he doesn't realize it yet but he's about to change the world
22:39ronkin places his wife anna's hand on a photographic plate positioned under his electrical device
22:47when he develops the glass plate his wife gets a shock
22:55what anna sees no one has ever seen before because captured on that glass plate is an image
23:03of her skeletal hand complete with a wedding ring and anna's quite disturbed by this image she's heard
23:10to exclaim i have seen my own death wilhelm rogan has discovered the x-ray
23:21within days word spreads across the globe with the revelatory development
23:28the image of anna's hand lodges firmly in the popular imagination
23:33this is a technological breakthrough that came from nowhere it's making the invisible visible it's
23:40revealing the inner workings of things through these ghostly echoes
23:52x-rays are a victorian sensation popular with everyone from amateur enthusiasts to stage performers
24:02typically their entertainment value is spotted as quickly as their medical one
24:11it's the whole theater of the equipment the x-ray apparatus and the act of having an x-ray taken
24:17so the machines would have sparked and smelt of ozone and so it would have been a really sort of
24:23dramatic
24:24event it was an absolute culture shock and a you know a break in the way people could sort of
24:30see the world and understand themselves this is in an age where the victorian world is very demure
24:37and lots of people are sort of covering their bodies and really sort of ornate fabrics and then
24:43this photography that comes out of nowhere she can show you know your most sort of inner private areas
24:49it really sort of echoed those ideas of death in the body as well there was a young woman who
24:54wanted to
24:54check how healthy the innards of her her new fiance were and before she married him so um she wanted
25:00to find out if he could have an x-ray without him knowing so so she could check him out
25:04it's quite a
25:05difficult thing to do presumably absolutely very difficult but it's interesting to see like how
25:09people are sort of trying to use x-rays for these new purposes and tell me about this x-ray
25:15kit that we
25:15have here this is one of the world's oldest x-ray kits and and it was built just a few
25:20months after
25:20those first images were published by russell reynolds who was 15 years old at the time and his father
25:26john and which is a 15 year old did it actually work then home built kit by a 15 year
25:32old yeah and
25:33they put it together with a an acid battery the transformer and glass vacuum tube and hey presto
25:38producing x-rays imaging people's bodies and hands well i can tell you for sure that i was doing stuff
25:43like
25:44this when i was when i was 15. what what became of this man what became of russell what did
25:48he go on
25:49to be i think he was just so inspired by this new way of seeing he became one of the
25:53kind of first
25:54radiologists who sort of grew up with x-rays and became a professional x-ray user you know a job
26:00that
26:01hadn't exists you know a few years prior to him
26:06the invisible light causes a medical revolution just a few weeks after romkin's discovery is
26:14publicized birmingham gp dr john hall edwards makes the world's first clinical x-ray producing an image
26:23of a sterilized needle placed under a colleague skin the very next day he has a real patient
26:32sent to him by a local hospital a woman has had a needle break off in her hand and it's
26:39causing her
26:40incredible pain and although she knows where the needle went in it now can't be found so hall edwards
26:47uses his x-ray to locate the needle so that a surgeon can remove it and it's thought to be
26:53the
26:53very first time in history that x-ray has guided an operation but an opportunity soon comes for x-rays
27:05to be tested on an altogether bigger scale in 1899 war breaks out in south africa the boer war sees
27:14hundreds of thousands of thousands of troops mobilized
27:22now if you want to try and find a bullet in a gunshot wound you have to poke around inside
27:28the hole
27:29with a probe thus massively increasing the risk of an untreatable infection but with x-rays all of that
27:38changes paul edwards sees his calling and volunteers for the war he's got his work cut out to keep delicate
27:47equipment going in a war zone and there are more human difficulties his colleagues report that patients
27:55quite understandably jump when shells land near the hospitals ruining the picture
28:02but the x-ray is an unqualified success in one case a major had been shot in the spine and
28:11left
28:11paralyzed but hall edwards managed to locate the bullets and a little piece of bone that had been
28:17pressing against the spinal cord and the soldier was able to walk again and there were lots of cases like
28:23this finding bullets in the head in the chest in the neck in amongst all of the carnage that was
28:29going
28:30on in those moments of despair these invisible rays were bringing hope
28:38but just as x-rays were transforming the possibilities of victorian medicine
28:43a darker side to the invisible light began to emerge
28:49more and more pioneers started to develop what they called x-ray dermatitis the first symptoms
28:59resemble sunburn but then progressed to the skin blistering and falling off warts and open sores
29:06form and to their horror many x-ray operators find the symptoms don't go away
29:13as john hall edwards returns from the war he realizes that something is very wrong that constant
29:21exposure to radiation has really taken its toll and now his hands are showing signs of cancer
29:28as the condition gets worse he starts to describe it as though there are rats gnawing at his bones
29:36now eventually he will have to have his entire left arm amputated as well as all of the fingers on
29:42his
29:42right hand but this is the man who has dedicated his life to improving medicine and now he's being
29:50slowly killed by the very technology that he's done so much to establish despite his personal sacrifice
29:59hall edwards was right to put his faith in x-rays in the century that followed they went on to
30:05revolutionize not just medicine but industry archaeology and our very understanding of the universe
30:14but for the victorians the progress promised by x-rays is accompanied by social anxieties
30:22for all of their popular appeal there is also something deeply unsettling about rogan's rays
30:28a hint of scandal a feeling of being exposed in fact within a couple of months of their discovery
30:35a particularly enterprising london company starts manufacturing x-ray proof underwear sure x-rays
30:43can reveal your bones can reveal your bones but what else can they reveal can they reveal your soul
30:58x-ray technology lays the victorians most deeply held fears bare they worry that those cheeky forces of
31:06physics are an assault on privacy worse still that they might expose some dirty little secrets and
31:14thoughts as seen in this 1897 film
31:22x-rays get underneath the victorian skin revealing not just their bones and the odd unwanted bullet but
31:29their fear of their fear of losing control over technology
31:36despite their impact x-ray machines are in the hands of a small number of people but just like
31:43the smartphone revolution of the 21st century new technologies have the greatest impact when they're adopted
31:50on mass and in the 1890s it isn't an electrical device but a simple mechanical machine
31:58that seems to threaten the whole social order
32:06the safety bicycle was a technological bombshell it's a relatively simple self-propelled machine
32:14but not since the horse had transport been so personal and so immediate you don't have to wait around
32:21anymore for taxis or trams or trains you had the power to go wherever you wanted
32:26at your fingertips and with that power came a whole new level of mental and physical freedom
32:41the most popular models of the cycling boom are known as safety bicycles because it's safer to
32:47fall off one of these than the old-style penny farming their lower risk design gives cycling mass appeal for
32:55women the cycling boom sees thousands hitch up their long skirts and give it a go
33:10like all new technology the new machine threatened to challenge the social order bicycles were an extension
33:19of the body and women's bodies well they were particularly troubling
33:28some men find the very movement of cycling to be disgracefully sexual to be known as a scorcher implies
33:36that you are a fast rider and a fast woman and what was all that speed doing to women's brains
33:44there were a number
33:45of health concerns that society was worried about when it came to cycling these range from problems with
33:51childbirth and fertility to the dreaded bicycle face now bicycle face was diagnosed as an intense stare
34:00a reddened complexion a hard clenched jaw and bulging eyes it could be temporary or it could be permanent
34:08but of course women were more susceptible than men but it isn't concerns about health that are the main
34:17objection to women's cycling it's what they wear that makes the critics blood boil
34:24it quite quickly becomes clear that long skirts are not exactly the ideal attire for riding a bike
34:31the alternative is to wear bloomers tightly wrapped at the ankle and teams with a nice short jacket but
34:40those women who choose to dress to make cycling easier are committing the most transgressive act of all
34:48daring to dress like a man but clever victorian inventors come up with ways to avoid causing moral outrage
35:01it hasn't escaped my notice that you are dressed in full victorian regalia but would you actually be
35:08able to cycle while wearing that i'm wearing a victorian convertible cycling garment that was
35:15patented by a woman called um alice louisa bygrave she was um from brixton a dressmaker from south london
35:23so she clearly thought you know here i am wearing an a-line you know long floor-length skirt
35:27um but i really want to cycle and this is kind of difficult so she um decided that what her
35:33skirt
35:33needed was a dual pulley system so into the infrastructure of this you wouldn't know about
35:39this that i was a cyclist until i got close to my bicycle and then i would reach to the
35:43waistband
35:43and i would pull out some cords that are here and i would just rush the front of it up
35:49kind of like
35:51look at that like a curtain oh my goodness this is so clever very cleverly so it reveals a little
35:57bit of your bloomers but kind of not too much okay but then we can deal with that the back
36:00she's
36:01threaded through the front so you're not flapping around um and then you would do the same at the
36:06back rooting it up very clearly out of the way of the wheels but it created what she called a
36:12festooning effect which was still quite aesthetic so when you're on your bicycle not too much is revealed
36:18but it clearly is much safer well from the side perspective if you were zooming past me i you
36:23know i barely know that you you had it all tucked up it sort of just looks like you've got
36:27your skirt
36:28kind of folded and then you would um get to the other end and then drop it um very cleverly
36:34and then
36:35tuck these all back in again and nobody would know so what was the objection to cycling specifically
36:41i mean why did people look down on it as an activity for women the fact that women were
36:47suddenly kind of looking like they weren't um abiding by the kind of victorian roles uh norms and codes
36:54that were expected of them and this is a really kind of fiercely uh gendered um society and if you
37:01stepped outside that then there was kind of fierce repercussions and how did this manifest itself how did
37:07people react there's so many reports um of women who um were had sticks and stones thrown at them
37:15they uh had incredibly nasty remarks yelled while they're riding in the street by passers-by
37:21um they were denied entry into places and they were terribly gossiped about and yet people still
37:28did choose to cycle what was it that these women were gaining from it the bicycle became this kind
37:33of emblem of women not only challenging but potentially um rejecting what was considered their natural role
37:40you know in victorian society with the home and the family and bearing and caring of children
37:46cycling provided for women so many vast and exciting freedoms in the form of social and independent
37:53mobility and new connections so they had new adventures they had new experiences they made new
37:59friendships and for some probably they had for the first time um personal private lives
38:09by shaking off the social shackles and the chaperone cyclists can explore what they
38:15can get away with not least when it comes to romance
38:22bicycles themselves can provide an excellent opportunity for a spot of flirting this could be
38:29chatting to other riders on the road or something more serendipitous because some women draw the line
38:37at learning how to repair a puncture themselves in the hope that a chivalrous man will offer to do it
38:44for
38:44them thus providing all kinds of opportunities
38:51hg wells who is a keen cyclist writes a short story around this phenomenon a chase tale called a perfect
38:59gentleman on wheels
39:01she had a charmingly cut costume and her hair was a pleasant brown and her ear as one came riding
39:10up behind her was noticeably pretty she had punctured the tire of her hind wheel it ran flat and flaccid
39:20now this is the secret desire of all lone men who go down into the country on wheels the prophet
39:28help the
39:29charming talk the idyllic incident who knows what delightful developments on the face of it cycling might
39:38seem like an odd subject for hg wells writer of war of the worlds but wells is fascinated by how
39:45an
39:45invention as simple as the safety bicycle can foster new freedoms while simultaneously disrupting the old
39:53british order if something so benign can make such an impact what about more dangerous technology
40:08in the 1890s wells becomes fascinated by the invisible world of disease
40:20the spectre of deadly contagious illnesses stalks victorian cities thriving on the cramps and dirty conditions
40:31the study of the relationship between bacteria and disease
40:35bacteriology is a relatively new science little understood by the general public
40:41yet researchers have already made a cholera vaccine and will shortly create one for typhoid
40:49but britain also has a very vocal anti-vaccination movement you think that messing with any of this bacteria in
40:58the first place is something that outrages nature
41:03bacteriology might be turning the tide against disease but they're losing the battle with the public
41:11for some this kind of science is going too far and wells understands their fears
41:17sure bacteriology might be able to cure us but is there a price to be paid
41:24in 1894 wells writes a short story that captures people's fears
41:36in the stolen bacillus wells rails against the era's cult of progress this assumption that science and
41:44technology will inevitably lead us towards an amazing utopia he argues that unless you're careful the very
41:52same discoveries that can be used to help society can also be used against it and this story is about
42:00a new and totally terrifying threat bioterrorism
42:10it begins in the laboratory of a bacteriologist demonstrating his work to a visitor a man described as
42:17a pale stranger the conversation turns to a vial of deadly cholera only break such a little tube as
42:27this into a supply of drinking water and death mysterious untraceable death death swift and terrible
42:35death full of pain and indignity would be released upon this city as he leaves the laboratory the pale
42:43stranger slips a vial of cholera into his pocket it turns out he's an anarchist hell-bent on infecting
42:51london's water supply now this story it perfectly plays into the country's fears at the time
43:00britain had been bombarded by story after story about extremists waiting to launch a lone wolf attack
43:08and bombing campaigns by irish nationalists had really put the population on edge the pale stranger
43:15is the perfect bogeyman when the scientist realizes what's happened a chase across london ensues in
43:25horse-drawn taxis in the chase the stranger realizes that the vial has broken and the deadly liquid is
43:34leaking all over his skin so he decides to drink the rest of it turning his body into a weapon
43:41of mass
43:42destruction
43:49the stranger runs through the streets touching as many members of the public as he can
43:55to spread the disease before escaping into the night
44:04at the end of the story there's a twist it turns out that the anarchist hadn't swallowed a vial of
44:10cholera at all but a disease that turns your skin blue and on one level this is a bit of
44:17a cop-out
44:17london is spared but for wells the point was that there's very little difference between a reckless
44:24scientist and a murderous stranger both compose a very real danger to the public wells is in the
44:33vanguard of an 1890s explosion in popular fiction that asks questions about where science is leading us
44:40drawing on deep fears in the victorian psyche as with today it's not just about what the technology
44:48does but who owns it who controls it and whether it might be used against us and wells isn't alone
44:56in his
44:57fears
45:01one aspect of the technological future particularly haunts the victorians imagination although they have
45:09conquered the seas and land the skies remain tantalizingly out of reach but flying machines are a
45:16deeply troubling idea
45:20to some writers the implication of powered flight is clear whichever country gets there first will have
45:28terrifying military superiority the victorians used to war being something which happens abroad fear that
45:37maybe one day even london at the very heart of the empire could be attacked
45:45in 1893 george griffith writes a story called the angel of the revolution that brings the idea of
45:53pax aeronautica to the british public
45:58griffith paints an apocalyptic vision of flying machines as military weapons that are so far above
46:05everything else that nothing can stand in their way he tells the story of a brilliant but embittered
46:11scientist who teams up with a secret brotherhood of anarchists to create flying machines that conquer the world
46:22a blaze of intense light shone for an instant upon the earth then this burst into a thousand fragments
46:29which leapt into the air and spread themselves far and wide in all directions burning with inextinguishable
46:36fury for several minutes driving men and horses mad with agony and terror in the new warfare people will
46:44not merely be killed they will be annihilated
46:49griffith's follow-up outlaws of the air takes the possibility of air power to its chilling conclusion
46:55this time it isn't just military forces facing annihilation but the civilian population as aerial
47:02warfare is used to devastate british cities westminster itself is obliterated in a firestorm
47:12for now the concept of mass death from the air brought about by flying machines is just a fantasy
47:20but it's one that rubbed shoulders with reality because inventors are now trying to make the dream of
47:27flight come true you can see the strange reality of victorian flying machines at the shuttleworth collection
47:34in bedfordshire
47:39this is a flying machine called the hawk it was designed in 1890s and gliders like this one were the
47:47first tentative steps towards the big ambition for the age to create powered flight
47:56it's made of a light but strong and flexible bamboo frame the wings are covered in 170 feet
48:04of canvas supported by delicate looking wires so eric you restored this yes have you been in it have you
48:12flown it no never no i just uh just did the reconstruction how do you actually get in this
48:18perhaps the easiest way might be to walk around the back and step over the lines okay look under
48:23these mind that case one yeah slide your arms through these leather sockets and hold the handles
48:35like that yeah okay so uh now you have to step forward in front of the shoulder rest shoulder
48:40rests yes if the glider went into a stall the front of the aircraft comes up and you need to
48:46get
48:46your body weight forwards and that's why those shoulder stands are there to stop you sliding too
48:51far back and if you could get your head behind these wires you need to be a gymnast this is
48:58like a
48:58torture device it is so how do you get it down the hill then well basically you you've got to
49:05run with it oh yeah it's quite it is heavy once you get some lift the glider will take your
49:11weight
49:11and then you can rest your whole body weight on your forearm you need to be very very strong
49:17yeah to be able to control it from that position in fact you wouldn't be able to fly for very
49:21long for
49:21those reasons how do you actually control it when you're in the air you you basically fling your legs
49:27around um to try to control the center of gravity of the aircraft it's it's not easy you haven't got
49:35very many safety mechanisms there's no in-flight entertainment you would have to have nerves of
49:46steel to go up in the air in one of these things but one man did
49:53his name was percy pilcher and with his hawk he became one of the world's leading aviators now today
50:02most people have never heard of him but to the victorians he was the man that they thought
50:07stood the greatest chance of making a breakthrough in flying technology
50:16percy pilcher was part of an international scene of adventurers reaching for the skies
50:26victorian aviation is a hair-raising mix of educated guesses trial and error and the failures far
50:34outweigh the successes the ultimate goal of this very small but committed bunch of pioneers is a
50:42motorized flying machine something capable of sustained flight but the risks involved are clear to
50:49everyone and many people think of them as a group of madmen pilcher is convinced that heavier than air
51:00flight is possible and despite being well aware of the dangers dedicates himself to finding the answer
51:11his mentor is the world's leading flying expert otto lilienthal in 1891 he'd been the first person ever
51:20to repeatedly fly a glider and he's making hundreds of flights a year pilcher visits him and strikes up a
51:30close working relationship he'll just studies lilienthal's ideas closely his work shows that shaping a
51:38glider's wings like a bird could create greater lift
51:46back home pilcher experiments with different designs towed by a cable and eventually gets off the ground
51:54but just as he gets going there's an ominous development
52:01in august pilcher receives some bad news his mentor otto lilienthal has been killed in a glider accident
52:11during a demonstration a sudden gust of wind caused the glider to stall and lilienthal broke his back in the
52:19resulting crash and in some ways lilienthal was the flying world's first martyr but his death really
52:28brought home just how dangerous pilcher's quest was going to be pilcher's work with lilienthal is fruitful
52:38he'd plowed everything he'd learned from the master and his own experiments into a new design
52:43he called it the hawk and it was his best flying machine yet on the 20th of june in 1897
52:52pilcher gave
52:54the first public demonstration of his hawk in front of a crowd of onlookers and a journalist from the
53:01pall mall devette here is what they had to say mr pilcher started the machine directly towards the wind
53:11which was blowing gently up the hill after a preliminary hop skip and a jump the man and machine
53:19rose gracefully into the air from the side of the hill
53:25until a height of full 70 feet in altitude had been reached when they described a gradually descending curve
53:34towards the valley given a few more enthusiasts like mr pilcher we ought to be able to fly
53:44before the dawn of the 20th century but pilchers moment of triumph isn't solely his own
53:57when you have a look through these photos there's one face that keeps cropping up and this
54:03is ella percy's sister and she's with him every step of the way but she's not just there for moral
54:10support she was helping to build these gliders she was cutting and hand stitching the canvas
54:17and that means that percy's successes were also hers
54:26but ella didn't just help to build these machines she's also known to have flown them we can't be
54:33sure for certain but it's likely that she was the first ever woman to pilot a heavier than air machine
54:41with the success of the hawk it's time to attempt a motorized flying machine so they build a triplane
54:49design complete with engine and if this one worked they would go down in history
55:03in september 1899 hilcher arrives here at stanford hall to show his triplane for the first time
55:11in front of a select audience working with engines is expensive and he needs investors
55:19but just a few days before the big launch and part of the engine has broken his moment of triumph
55:27is slipping away
55:32anxious not to disappoint pilcher decides to demonstrate the hawk instead the weather is stormy
55:40and wet and his first tries fail pilcher complains the glider is too heavy from the rain but then on
55:49his third and final attempt he climbs to around 40 feet in the sky and just as it looks as
55:57though it's
55:57going to be another awe-inspiring flight disaster strikes
56:06witnesses see the tail section break and the wings snap in half there's nothing that pilcher can do
56:14the hawk drops out of the sky and hits the ground with a sickening thud
56:22pilcher is taken back to the house but never regains consciousness two days later britain's best hope
56:30for achieving powered flight dies aged just 32
56:38for the victorians the motorized flying machine isn't to be the triplane that carried pilchers dreams
56:44of being the first to conquer the skies will never be flown pilchers triplane remains this tantalizing
56:53what if we'll never know for sure whether it could have flown that day but even if it couldn't
56:59he still would have had years to develop it before the wright brothers came along
57:06for me the great tragedy is that pilcher never knew he was part of a revolution in transport
57:13that would eventually allow people to travel around the world in a matter of hours
57:18from x-rays to the humble bicycle technology transformed britain in the 1890s dragging
57:27it into the modern age but sometimes at great personal cost pilcher knew the risks that he was
57:35taking but for him and his fellow pioneers progress was worth it they believed that the future would be
57:43shaped by science and technology and that nothing was off limits even the most fantastical of dreams
57:58next time paul mcgan sees how fears of moral degeneration and imperial decline rock late victorian
58:06art and society and then if you look across the bottom here you can see the candlesticks are all quite
58:13clearly indecent little penises well i'm shocked think how shocked they were in the 1890s
58:21so