Questions, Questions: Last in the series
QQ Team
In the last programme of the series Stewart Henderson got more than a little peckish when listener Edward Giles asked why bacon is the only thing to come in rashers and not slices. Food Historian Ivan Day cooked up some answers.
Having had his fill of meaty morsels, Stewart was feeling like something a little lighter so he set about digging up some answers to a listener's question about allotments. Melanie Hughes-Jones wanted to know whether her dream of owning an allotment was to be shattered by roadside pollutants. Dr Gillian MacKinnon from the University of Glasgow and Emma Hockridge, Head of Policy for the Soil Association, joined Stewart to offer expert insight.
And from land to sea, Stewart was in his element as he trod the boards at Cornwall's coastal theatre, the Minack, a fitting location to answer the question of why the Ancient Greeks placed their theatres in some of the most beautiful locations by the sea. Director Phil Jackson and Classics Professor Edith Hall lent us their theatrical expertise.
Always a man to go out on a high, Dave Dodd took flight in a wind tunnel to answer Jane Brittain-Long's question: can a man become airborne if he holds onto the back of a speeding car? Definitely not one to try at home but it certainly made for an entertaining ride.
But for an altogether safer journey, why not try a mechanical elephant? Never heard of one? Well, our twitter follower KingLear had heard tales of these beasts from his mother. He got in touch with Questions Questions to ask whether these machines had been a mere mirage or did they really exist. We tracked down some of their past owners and heard your nostalgic stories of witnessing these mechanical wonders.
That's it, Goodbye.
The Questions Questions team- The picture shows a giant mechanical elephant parading around Horse Guard Parade in an outdoor performance of 'The Sultan's Elephant' by the French theatrical group, Royal de Luxe, in London, Friday, May 5, 2006. The story tells of a Sultan who dreamt about a little girl and travelled in his elephant time-machine in search of her.
- Listen to earlier episodes from this series of Questions, Questions on the Radio 4 website.