The American Freedom Train and the invention of text messaging
The History Hour
BBC
4.4 • 913 Ratings
🗓️ 3 January 2026
⏱️ 61 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Max Pearson presents a collection of the week's Witness History interviews from the BBC World Service.
Our guest is Professor Barbara Keys, a specialist in US history at Durham University.
We start with a celebration of the American Freedom Train, as the US prepares to mark 250 years of independence.
Then, the South African railway enthusiast who created one of the most luxurious train services in the world.
We hear about the invention of text messaging and how it changed the way we communicate.
Plus, 75 years of Radio Free Europe broadcasting news to audiences behind the Iron Curtain.
The thousand-year-long musical composition that's due to end in 2999.
And our Sporting Witness looks at how a British teenager won a six-month contract to play for Italian champions Inter Milan.
Contributors:
Lou Nelson - former security guard on the American Freedom Train 1975-76.
Rohan Vos - founder and CEO of Rovos Rail.
Friedhelm "Fred" Hillebrand - inventor of SMS and text messaging.
Arch Puddington - former deputy director Radio Free Europe.
Jem Finer - musician and composer of Longplayer.
Ben Greenhalgh - Margate player-manager and winner of reality show "Football's Next Star".
(Photo: American Freedom Train, 1976. Credit: NARA/DVIDS)
Transcript
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