My grandmother grew up brushing her teeth with radioactive toothpaste

The Herald Scotland

07-06-2025

Yes, I did listen to a bit of radio. Even a spot of Radio 4 comedy. Brave, I know, but I do like policeman turned comedian Alfie Moore's It's a Fair Cop (currently broadcast on Monday nights in the 6.30pm slot).
But nothing serious. Nothing with any gravitas. Or nearly nothing. I did stumble on the latest series on Radio 4's The History Podcast. Well, I say, stumble but, actually, I was given a nudge by its producer.
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I'd rather slept on Joe Dunthorne's current series Half-Life. I think I'd read the words 'Nazi Germany' in the blurb and decided it wasn't for me. How much Nazi Germany do you need, after all? But that really wasn't what Half-Life was about, as the arresting opening line testified: 'My grandmother,' Dunthorne began, 'grew up brushing her teeth with radioactive toothpaste.'
Strong opener. Better still was the information that it was his grandmother's father who had made said toothpaste.
Half-Life is a family biography that - like all family biographies - weaves into the flow of history. Dunthorne's great grandfather was a Jewish chemist working in a poison gas lab with the Nazis. And that is just the start of it.
All episodes are available on BBC Sounds and The Road Through the Mountains, the episode that aired on Radio 4 this week (on Wednesday) was a particularly tough listen.
At the heart of it was a telling of the story of the Dersim Massacre in Turkey in 1937 and 1938, when the Turkish government killed thousands of civilians during a Kurdish rebellion; 14,000 is the government figure. Others suggest the death toll was three or four times that number.
'That's why most people say the river was flowing blood,' Dunthorne's guide told him. 'It was not water, it was just blood.'
To escape the Nazis, Dunthorne's family had fled to Turkey. His great grandfather may have helped the Turkish government buy chemical weapons from the Germans. Poison gas was then used to kill those who had fled into the mountains. History, Dunthorne is telling us here, leaves a stain on those who come afterwards. In Half-Lifee you can hear it in his voice.
Over on 6 Music Tom Robinson was celebrating his 75th birthday on his Now Playing show on Sunday evening. The BBC's present was to take the slot away from him. Mary Anne Hobbs is taking over this weekend.
Tom Robinson celebrated his 75th birthday (Image: BBC)
Robinson, who has been occupying Sunday night on 6 Music for the last 14 years - in fact he's been a regular on the station for 23 years, all told - drolly opened proceedings by playing Here's Where the Story Ends by The Sundays.
What followed was an understandably slightly self-indulgent two hours in which he played quite a few of his own songs - as requested by his listeners - and, for the most part, displayed a commendably stiff upper lip.
He did admit that the whole thing was a little bittersweet, though he encouraged his listeners to tune in to Hobbs's show when it started.
At least there were plenty of birthday/farewell messages from his fellow 6 Music DJs and the odd musician - Lauren Laverne, Nithin Sawhney, Jason from Sleaford Mods and Peter Gabriel most notably.
Tony Blackburn - still going strong at 82 - also offered his congratulations, as did The Blue Nile's Paul Buchanan. The latter was presumably prompted by that old social media meme of Robinson dancing around the studio to Tinseltown in the Rain. Understandably. That tune is one of 20th-century Scotland's greatest gifts to the world.
I was at best an irregular listener to Now Playing, but rather like the late Annie Nightingale, it was always clear Robinson had built up a real rapport with his audience.
We're promised a 'borderless spectrum of music' on the new Mary Anne Hobbs show. That's her USP, of course. But is that what listeners want at teatime on Sunday? Time will tell.
Listen Out For: Bill Dare: Comedy Alchemist, Radio 4, Thursday, June 12, 6.30pm
Talking of Radio 4 comedy … This tribute programme celebrates the career of the late radio and TV comedy producer Bill Dare, creator of The Mary Whitehouse Experience and Dead Ringers. Dare was killed in a motor accident earlier this year.