A funny, fascinating and personal look at 100 years of history in the BBC archives.

Historian Greg Jenner uses a random date generator to visit somewhere in the BBC's vast archives of remarkable sound clips from the last 100 years. Using that clip as a jumping-off point to explore what has changed between then and now, Greg talks to experts and those connected to the archived people, places, and ideas, including Stephen Fry, writer Naomi Alderman, playwright Nell Leyshon, social historian Carol Dyhouse, author and disability campaigner Dr Amit Patel, food historian Annie Gray, and inveterate tennis fan Geoff Dyer.

From dance crazes, post-war Christmases and communist sitcoms to pub evolution, life on the waterways and women's political activism, Past Forward provides a rich and thought-provoking look at the oral histories, personal stories, big moments and small joys of the past and the present, and how our history has shaped the people we have become.

First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 on the following dates:

"The Lambeth Walk" - 03 January 2022

"1984 - Comrade Dad" - 04 January 2022

"Christmas 1945" - 05 January 2022

"Mary Whitehouse" - 06 January 2022

"Porton Down" - 07 January 2022

"Match Point" - 10 January 2022

"Kitty Hart-Moxon" - 11 January 2022

"If People Can't Let Slip..." - 12 January 2022

"Traffic" - 13 January 2022

"England v Argentina 1998" - 14 January 2022

"Dinner Is Served" - 21 March 2022

"Get Out of My Pub" - 22 March 2022

"Talking Technology" - 23 March 2022

"The Teen Age" - 24 March 2022

"Louie Hooper sings Lord Rendall" - 25 March 2022

"Listen with Mother" - 28 March 2022

"Rebuilding Britain" - 29 March 2022

"The Corncrake and the Croft" - 30 March 2022

"Life on the Canals" - 31 March 2022

"Save our Steelworks" - 01 April 2022

Production credits:

Produced by Dan Potts, Amelia Parker, Martin Williams, Megan Jones, and Eliane Glaser, for BBC Wales

Cover credits:

Photographer: James Gifford-Mead (jamesgiffordmead-photography.co.uk)

Image adapted by Rabia Ali