Episodes

  • 5: The Ballad of Reading Services

    5: The Ballad of Reading Services
    Dec 23 2022
    Christmas Day, 2021. I stop at Reading motorway services and find graffiti on the wall of a toilet cubicle: two locals, Gavin and Chelsea, are hacking brains using their iPhones. This Christmas special episode of Other Edens is the story of Reading motorway services, toilet graffiti, and the strange native poetry that binds them together.

    Written and presented by Nick Hilton.
    Sound design by Ewan Cameron.
    Theme music by George Jennings.
    This episode features a song by Laura Christy. Find more about Laura's music: https://twitter.com/laura_christy_
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    17 mins
  • 4: A History of the English Village

    4: A History of the English Village
    Nov 29 2022
    What makes the quintessential English village? A church? A pub? A post office? A cricket pitch?

    Everyone knows the English village, whether it's from real life or via The Vicar of Dibley or Midsomer Murders. But what is the real history – from archaeological ruins to the present day – of this settlement? On today's Other Edens, we speak to Dr Ben Robinson (aka The Flying Archaeologist) about his book England’s Villages: An Extraordinary Journey Through to get the full story of how the great English settlement developed.

    Presented by Nick Hilton.
    With Dr Ben Robinson.
    Theme music by George Jennings.
    Please email nick@podotpods.com for sales and advertising.
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    32 mins
  • 3: The Maunsell Sea Forts: Iron islands in the Thames

    3: The Maunsell Sea Forts: Iron islands in the Thames
    Nov 21 2022
    In 1942, an engineer named Guy Maunsell constructed a series of audacious defensive towers out where the Thames estuary meets the North Sea. These structures – known now as the Maunsell Sea Forts – remain to this day, rusting and abandoned. But they also had a strange, eerie afterlife, from pirate radio to the micronation of Sealand.

    On today's episode of Other Edens, we look at the history of the Maunsell Sea Forts, and speak to some of the people inspired but their mysterious presence off the Kentish coast.

    Written and presented by Nick Hilton.
    Sound design by Ewan Cameron.
    Theme music by George Jennings.
    Find out more at podotpods.com and contact us for sales and advertising details.
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    27 mins
  • 2: Lewes: a town of smoke and flame

    2: Lewes: a town of smoke and flame
    Nov 4 2022
    Remember, remember the fifth of November. Gunpowder, treason and plot. I see no reason why gunpowder treason should ever be forgot.

    Well, in the East Sussex town of Lewes, that 1605 assassination attempt on the Protestant head of state has not been forgot. Each year, the Lewesians swam out on the streets of their little town, clad in the garb of the different bonfire societies, firing cannons, shooting fireworks, bearing flaming crosses and torches, and burning huge effigies. This is an ancient ritual, played out on the streets of a quaint British town which, for one night a year, becomes the centre of the universe.

    Written and presented by Nick Hilton.
    Sound design by Ewan Cameron.
    Theme music by George Jennings.

    For sales and advertising please visit podotpods.com
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    24 mins
  • 1: Pluckley: England's most haunted village

    1: Pluckley: England's most haunted village
    Oct 31 2022
    Nestled away in Kent is the small village of Pluckley. It looks charming and chocolate boxy: a pub, a butcher, a post office and a churchyard. But scratch that veneer and you find a place that has become famous over the past century as England's most haunted place. Ghosts and apparitions, strange sights and noises. Murder, mysteries and the macabre, all haunt this Kentish village.

    What is it that makes Pluckley so singularly spooky? And what will we find in the Screaming Woods, said to be the most terrifying woodland in Britain?

    Written and presented by Nick Hilton.
    Sound design by Ewan Cameron.
    Theme music by George Jennings.
    Go to podotpods.com for sales and advertising.
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    21 mins
  • Coming on Halloween... Other Edens

    Coming on Halloween... Other Edens
    Oct 28 2022
    All things must change. As surely as winter bursts into spring life, spring into bountiful summer, summer into the falling leaves of autumn and autumn back into the denuded branches of winter, so too does my podcast change. Since I started making documentaries about England’s towns and villages, we’ve had three cycles through these seasons, three spins around the sun, and three Prime Ministers. Everything changes.
    I’ve spent the past year travelling around the country, collecting stories from its towns and villages. History, folklore, mysticism. This England is full of extraordinary people, doing extraordinary things, extraordinarily.
    In the coming days, a change will come over this feed. It will be come Other Edens – a series of documentaries about strange corners of this nation, and why they matter. Don’t be alarmed – if you’ve listened to my podcasts previously, you can expect more of the same. Just more of it. Forever and ever until you get bored of me (or I get bored of you) Other Edens will tell these stories.
    Stay subscribed. Encourage others to subscribe. Tweet or Instagram your enthusiasm using @thetownpod (I was too late to get @otheredens, sorry). On Halloween, the stories start.

    Written and presented by Nick Hilton.
    Visit podotpods.com for more information.
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    3 mins
  • The Town That Knew Too Much: The Doughnut

    The Town That Knew Too Much: The Doughnut
    Sep 1 2021
    The Doughnut. A giant circular low-rise office block in west Cheltenham; it is, jokingly I'm sure, said to look from above like a giant bullseye.

    Here, the men and women of GCHQ go to work every day. Here they listen to the world. Here they keep tabs. And here, in 2013, their secrets spilled out to the world. This is the story of Edward Snowden and the GCHQ/NSA leaks, and how the secret world of surveillance was blown wide open almost a decade ago. What happened? And have things really changed?

    Contributors to this episode: Geoff Dyer, Alan Rusbridger, Ewen MacAskill, James Ball, Michael S. Kinch, Sam Kean.

    You also heard GCHQ by Markee Ledge, reproduced with permission, and voice acting by Scott Westwood.

    This is the seventh, and final, episode of The Town That Knew Too Much, written, produced and presented by Nick Hilton.
    The music is by George Jennings, based on The Planets by Gustav Holst. The entire score for the series is available to stream on Spotify.
    This is the seventh part of a 7-part series available on all good podcast platforms. You can find out more about the show on Twitter, Instagram or Facebook – just go to @thetownpod – or visit www.thetownpod.com for episode notes and more information. If you’ve enjoyed the show, please go to your podcast provider and leave a rating and review.
    The Town That Knew Too Much is a Podot podcast, for more information visit podotpods.com.
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    44 mins
  • The Town That Knew Too Much: The Black Abbot

    The Town That Knew Too Much: The Black Abbot
    Aug 25 2021
    Where do the dead go when they die? Do we file them away in obituaries? Or celebrate them at a memorial service and slowly forget their day-to-day existence?

    This is a story of death. It is a story of spirits lingering on. It is a story of how lives become stories and how stories define places. From the ghosts of Prestbury to the dead GCHQ mathematician Gareth Williams – via, of course, the singing mice of the Tailor of Gloucester – The Black Abbot is about the imprints we make on the world and how they outlive us.

    Contributors to this episode: Ian Jelf, Philip Ingram, Catherine Curzon, Colin Towns, Iggy Ostanin.

    This is the sixth episode of The Town That Knew Too Much, written, produced and presented by Nick Hilton.
    The music is by George Jennings, based on The Planets by Gustav Holst. The entire score for the series is available to stream on Spotify.
    This is the sixth part of a 7-part series available on all good podcast platforms. You can find out more about the show on Twitter, Instagram or Facebook – just go to @thetownpod – or visit www.thetownpod.com for episode notes and more information. If you’ve enjoyed the show, please go to your podcast provider and leave a rating and review.
    The Town That Knew Too Much is a Podot podcast, for more information visit podotpods.com.
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    33 mins