Josiah Wedgwood
Great Lives
BBC
4.2 • 1.3K Ratings
🗓️ 1 September 2021
⏱️ 28 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
When Josiah Wedgwood had part of an injured leg amputed, he encouraged his workers to celebrate the anniversary as St Amputation Day.
This remarkable man from Stoke on Trent built a pottery empire that made him famous round the world.
He's nominated here, on location, by the former MP for Stoke Central, Tristram Hunt, now head of the Victoria and Albert museum in London.
Featuring an interview with the head of Royal Staffordshire, Norman Tempest.
Plus readings from Brian Dolan's biography, The First Tycoon.
Presented by Matthew Parris
Produced for BBC audio in Bristol by ex-Stoke resident Miles Warde
First broadcast on BBC Radio 4 in August 2021.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Before you listen to this BBC podcast, I'd like to tell you why I love podcasting. |
| 0:04.5 | I'm Sasha Johansson, I'm an Assistant Commissioner for the BBC and I work on making podcasts. |
| 0:11.1 | My real passion is discovering unbelievable unheard stories and working with the biggest |
| 0:16.9 | stars who can really bring those stories to life. |
| 0:20.1 | I love the whole process of making podcasts from the spark of an idea to hearing the final |
| 0:26.0 | edit. |
| 0:27.0 | There's nothing like it. |
| 0:28.0 | What makes BBC podcast special is that we're working for you, so whatever we commission |
| 0:32.6 | has to reflect the things that you care about and love, wherever you are in the UK. |
| 0:37.0 | So if you like this BBC podcast, there's so much more to discover. |
| 0:40.6 | Have a listen on BBC Sounds. |
| 0:42.1 | BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcasts. |
| 0:50.1 | I shall astonish the world all at once, wrote our great life today, for I hate piddling, |
| 0:56.5 | you know. |
| 0:57.5 | And he did astonish the world. |
| 0:59.3 | The man who said that is our great life and the big news is that we're out of the studio |
| 1:04.0 | today and we're meeting our guest outside a brick-built, grand-ish-looking house in |
| 1:09.0 | Stoke-on-Trent, Staffordshire. |
| 1:11.7 | This is a trueria hall. |
| 1:14.0 | Once the home of Josiah Wedgewood, the royal potter, or as he put it himself, vars make |
| 1:19.6 | a general to the universe. |
| 1:22.0 | And who has just joined us, but another giant figure, Tristram Hunt, former MP for Stoke |
... |
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