Shows / Forgotten Australia
Forgotten Australia
Bloody crimes, unsolved mysteries, eccentric celebrities, dark events and bizarre happenings: it's all here – the stuff you wish they'd taught you in school!
Dive into our strange-but-true history via never-before-told stories, author interviews, weekly flashbacks and the weekly trivia quiz.
Forgotten Australia is created and hosted by Michael Adams, author of the acclaimed true crime books The Murder Squad, Hanging Ned Kelly and They'll Never Hold Me.
He's also a regular history and true crime…
Episodes
Forgotten AustraliaThe Guyra Ghost – Part Two: Portal for a Poltergeist?
The investigation into the mystery of Minnie introduces a hard-charging cop and a spiritually minded scribe. Our quest for answers takes us from northern NSW…
Forgotten AustraliaThe Guyra Ghost – Part One: Things That Go Bump in the Night
Halloween Special! Just over 100 years ago, Australia was spooked by strange happenings at a farmhouse in northern NSW. Showers of stones! Bumps in the night!…
Forgotten AustraliaThe Runaway Plane – Part Two: “Shoot It Down!"
With the Auster Archer over Sydney, and everyone freaking out, the RAAF scrambles to do something… anything… but their responses are 100% inept and 0%…
Forgotten AustraliaThe Runaway Plane – Part One: “There’s No Pilot!”
In August 1955, Sydney was suddenly under threat from a rogue plane. Had it really taken off by itself? Would it crash into the city? What were the RAAF doing…
Forgotten AustraliaIntroducing Australia Murder
I'm launching a new true crime podcast called Australian Murder. Here's the lowdown. Check out Australian Murder wherever you get your podcasts. Follow to get…
Forgotten AustraliaTalking History – Musquito: The Real Story of a Legendary Colonial Warrior
Who was Musquito, the Aboriginal warrior feared by colonists in Sydney and Tasmania? Historian Naomi Parry Duncan's new book takes us behind the myths for a…
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Australian Frankenstein – Part Two: The Infernal Machine
Having successfully toured Australian cities with Frankenstein, Professor Hornburg invents a new machine man that uses a new energy source. But he and his…
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Australian Frankenstein – Part One: The Steam Man
Just as the Iron Outlaw Ned Kelly is going to the gallows, Australians are astonished by a walking automaton called ‘Frankenstein - The Steam Man’. Professor…
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Mysteries of the Sea – Part Three: Beyond Human Knowledge
In March 1912, Australia was stunned to learn that Koombana was missing in nearly identical circumstances to Yongala. In this final episode, we look at how…
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Mysteries of the Sea – Part Two: Dead Unlucky
Alongside Yongala, the Adelaide Steamship Company prided itself on its luxury vessel Koombana, designed especially to work the Western Australian coast. But…
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Mysteries of the Sea – Part One: More Haste, Less Speed
In March 1911, with the loss of the ship Waratah still fresh in memory, a big passenger liner went missing in a cyclone off northern Queensland. As a massive…
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Short – The Mystery of the Waratah
I’m re-releasing this short as background for the new miniseries, Mysteries of the Sea. In July 1909, the world wondered what had become of the SS Waratah…
Forgotten AustraliaShort – Good Evening and Welcome to Television: The Real Story Behind An AI Slop Promo
This week marks the 70th anniversary of regular television broadcasting in Australia. Channel Nine recently 'recreated' the 'Good Evening and Welcome to…
Forgotten AustraliaTalking History – Blackbirding: A Reckoning With the Australian Slave Trade
Blackbirding – A Reckoning with the Australian Slave Trade. We talk about the practices and policies that led to a staggering death toll – and how we don’t…
Forgotten AustraliaAustralia’s Slave Ship Massacre – Part Three: Confessions of Mass Murderers
Dr James Patrick Murray kidnaps and kills more people, and goes mad and is nearly murdered himself, before returning to Australia to be acclaimed as a saviour…
Forgotten AustraliaAustralia’s Slave Ship Massacre – Part Two: Shoot Them All
Dr James Patrick Murray takes the brig Carl to the sunny South Seas and into a heart of darkness beyond the imagination of even Joseph Conrad. In this…
Forgotten AustraliaAustralia’s Slave Ship Massacre – Part One: Doctor Evil
Dr James Patrick Murray ranks as one of the most evil characters in Australian history. In September 1871, he ordered the massacre of 70 men that his slavers…
Forgotten AustraliaThe Last Gasp: Stubbing Out Ciggie Commercials – Part Two
From 1972, Paul Hogan was the Australian tobacco industry’s most formidable marketing weapon, the Winfield warrior in a new era of mandatory health warnings…
Forgotten AustraliaThe Last Gasp: Stubbing Out Ciggie Commercials – Part One
Fifty years ago this week – 1 September 1976 – tobacco commercials were banned on Australian television. So, it was goodbye to Paul Hogan, Stuart Wagstaff…
Forgotten AustraliaShort - Our Forgotten Crime Fiction Mastermind
Aussie writer Charles Shaw came from the school of hard knocks to create a true-blue noir antihero in a series of novels that were internationally popular and…
Forgotten AustraliaShort – Bravery & Barbarism: The Wave Hill Walk-Off
Sixty years ago this week, Gurindji elder Vincent Lingiari led 200 Aboriginal stockmen and their families in the Wave Hill Walk-Off. They were protesting…
Forgotten AustraliaThe Small Town ‘Teacher’s Pet’ Murder
Nearly 100 years ago, the village of Wolumla on the far south coast of NSW was shocked by its first murder. The motive for this crime was so scandalous that a…
Forgotten AustraliaAussie History Trivia Quiz #4 – Cops, Crims, Kooks, Censors & Singers
How well do you know your murderers, mobsters, armed robbers and bent coppers? How good is your memory for Aussie rock hits of the 1970s and 1980s? Test…
Forgotten AustraliaDead Men Don’t Fill Out Census Forms – Part Two: A Forgotten Serial Killer?
Digging into the murderer’s past and future is to find two more cold-blooded killings. Forgotten Australia is created and hosted by Michael Adams, author of…
Forgotten AustraliaDead Men Don’t Fill Out Census Forms – Part One: Murder at Scrubby Creek
A shocking early result of our first national census was... murder! In 1911, a Cloncurry census collector's investigations into an unreturned form turned up a…
Forgotten AustraliaTalking History – Abe Saffron: Mr Sin as Man and Myth
Did Abe Saffron kill Juanita Nielsen? Order the Luna Park fire? Or was so-called Mr Sin exerting a more subtle yet no less more sinister force on Australian…
Forgotten AustraliaTrue Crime Classic Miniseries: Bloody Murder in the Blue Mountains – Part Three
Even when the verdict is delivered in the Katoomba murder trial, the story is far from over – especially after the convicted man makes a startling allegation…
Forgotten AustraliaTrue Crime Classic Miniseries: Bloody Murder in the Blue Mountains – Part Two
In the wake of the gory outrage at the California, the accused faces an inquest and then his trial for murder. If he's found guilty, he'll be sentenced to…
Forgotten AustraliaTrue Crime Classic Miniseries: Bloody Murder in the Blue Mountains – Part One
A Katoomba hotel. A locked room. Screams in the night and a body in the morning. The mystery of what happened in Australia’s favourite resort town in autumn…
Forgotten AustraliaThe Bunbury Bombing
Fifty years ago this month – 19 July 1976 – Australia’s first act of environmental terrorism was directed at the Bunnings-owned wood chip export facility in…
Forgotten AustraliaTalking History – White Death: The American Legend Behind Australia’s Best-Worst Movie
In 1936, western author Zane Grey came Down Under to catch giant sharks and film his adventures. The result was White Death, a so-bad-it’s-good monster movie…
Forgotten AustraliaTrue Crime Classic – Sydney’s Wildest Woman
While 1950s eccentrics Bea Miles and Rosaleen Norton are well remembered, Luba Shishova was twice as wild yet she's all but forgotten. Dubbed ‘Olga from the…
Forgotten AustraliaA Murder of Note – Part Four: Cursed From Birth
Having bent justice to their will successfully once, Kenneth Brown and his supporters tried a new defence tactic: arguing that he’d been cursed from birth as a…
Forgotten AustraliaA Murder of Note – Part Three: The Villain as Victim
With Mary Ann Brown dead, and no doubt that Kenneth killed her, his April 1876 murder trial appeared to be an open-and-shut case. But he had the best defence…
Forgotten AustraliaA Murder of Note – Part Two: Shotgun Marriage
In part one, we heard about Kenneth Brown. In this episode, we look at Mary Ann Tindall and how she became his wife and victim. If you’re in danger from…
Forgotten AustraliaNew Miniseries: A Murder of Note – Part One: A Man of the Killing Times
We all know Edith Cowan – first woman elected to an Australian parliament – graces out $50 note. But did you know she was shaped by a traumatic childhood? In…
Forgotten AustraliaAustralia's Forgotten Serial Maniacs
In 1837, three cold-blooded killers committed a series of bloody outrages that left nine people dead. Two of these murderers were to face their own gruesome…
Forgotten AustraliaTalking History - Australia’s Real-Life Jack Sparrow
Ahoy, me hearties! William Swallow became the pirate captain of the convict ship Cyprus after he seized the vessel in Tasmania in 1829. From there, it was a…
Forgotten AustraliaTrue Crime Classic – The Botanic Gardens Massacre
A True Crime Classic from the Forgotten Australia archives: Just over 100 years ago, Australia suffered one of the world's first random mass shootings when a…
Forgotten AustraliaAustralia’s First Sporting All-Nighters
This week, when we stay up (or get up) to cheer the Socceroos, we’ll be doing what Aussies first did one winter nearly a century ago. In 1930, the Ashes test…
Forgotten AustraliaAussie History Pod Trivia Quiz #3 – Sexy Sinema, Ghostly Figures and a PM Minus His Pants
Who named Australia? Which former Prime Minister lost his pants in public? Which celebrity came chasing ghosts Down Under? What were the weirdest names…
Forgotten AustraliaAussie History Pod Trivia Quiz #2 – Failing film stars! Flailing Frenchmen! Falling space junk!
Failing film stars! Flailing Frenchmen! Falling space junk! They’re all here, the true and the false, the serious and the deeply stupid. Three rounds. 30…
Forgotten AustraliaAussie History Trivia Quiz #1 – Serial killers! Chocolate animals! Robot chaos!
Serial killers! Chocolate animals! Robot chaos! They’re all part of the first-ever Aussie History Pod Trivia Quiz. Three rounds. 30 questions. Just like pub…
Forgotten AustraliaShoot to Kill – How an Aussie Won the Worst 'Olympic' Event Ever Held
Donald Mackintosh was the world’s best shooter and in 1900 in Paris he won what is still the most shocking sporting event ever associated with the Olympic…
Forgotten AustraliaA Cannibal Convict & Other Grave Tales
This week in 1826 was a bad time to be a cannibal bushranger. Plus: Bold Ben Hall bites the dust; the first Brit buried Down Under; and the making of a…
Forgotten AustraliaAussie Insults: Where Did 'Boofhead' Come From?
Who was Boofhead and where did he come from? We say happy 85th birthday to an iconic yet idiotic Aussie bloke who appeared in our midst when we needed him…
Forgotten AustraliaTalking History – The Wildest Showman
Author and music journalist Jeff Apter joins us to discuss his recent book, Lee Gordon Presents: How One Man Changed Australian Life Forever, the first…
Forgotten AustraliaBlue Murder On The Golden Mile — Part Five
In this final instalment, the jury delivers its verdict in the marathon trial of Phillip Treffene and William Coulter for the murders of Detective-Inspector…
Forgotten AustraliaBlue Murder On The Golden Mile — Part Four
On Monday 16 August 1926, a large crowd gathered outside Perth's Supreme Court, hoping to get access to what promised to be the most sensational criminal trial…
Forgotten AustraliaBlue Murder On The Golden Mile — Part Three
After police swoop on their suspects, Evan 'Teddy' Clarke, Phil Treffene and William Coulter are charged with the murder. But one of these men will turn…
Forgotten AustraliaBlue Murder On The Golden Mile — Part Two
Re-released to commemorate the 100th anniversary of the crime that shocked a nation. On 12 May 1926, south of Kalgoorlie, at an abandoned mine known as…
Forgotten AustraliaMiniseries – Blue Murder on the Golden Mile – Part One
A special re-release to commemorate the 100th anniversary. On 28 April 1926, Detective-Inspector John Walsh and Detective-Sergeant Alexander Pitman disappeared…
Forgotten AustraliaHidden History: The First Anzac Day Took Place Before Gallipoli Was Over!
While history tells us Anzac Day started on 25 April 1916, the first such event took place six months earlier in South Australia. The name 'Anzac Day' was…
Forgotten AustraliaTalking History – The Aussie Legend Beloved By Diggers During WWI
In this interview episode, Dr Daniel Reynaud, author of The Man The Anzacs Revered, tells us about the colourful and incredibly brave AIF chaplain William…
Forgotten AustraliaThe First Aussie Olympic Hero – Part Two
Having already won two events at Athens in 1896, young Aussie athlete Teddy Flack throws himself at a third victory by entering the Marathon – and he’ll reckon…
Forgotten AustraliaThe First Aussie Olympic Hero – Part One
Teddy Flack becoming our first Olympic champion is the prototypical tale of the Aussie have-a-go sporting hero. But in 1896, when Teddy was undertaking his…
Forgotten AustraliaShort – The Mystery of Mr Eternity
Arthur Stace is an Australian legend. But for decades the identity of ‘Mr Eternity’ was a Sydney mystery. Who was this man? Why was he writing this message…
Forgotten AustraliaShort – Boots on the Ground
‘Boots on the ground’: it rolls off the tongue all too easily. But America – and Australia – learned that in Vietnam they didn’t have boots on the ground. They…
Forgotten AustraliaMiniseries Finale – Death-Defying Destiny Deciders – Part Ten: Nature & Nurture
I'm adopted and – while I come from colourful characters who roamed from Ireland and England to Western Australia, Lord Howe Island and Sydney, via South…
Forgotten AustraliaDeath-Defying Destiny Deciders – Part Nine: Rumtough to the Rescue!
After tragedy strikes, Emma Murtough begins the colourful third act of her life – as "Mrs Rumtough", fearless travelling housekeeper of the Western Australian…