:00:30. > :00:36.Hello and welcome to Witness, with me, Tania Beckett. I'm back at the
:00:37. > :00:42.British library in London for our first programme of 2016. Throughout
:00:43. > :00:46.the year, we will be bringing you remarkable personal stories from
:00:47. > :00:52.history. This month we will hear from a Cuban who saw the Dell Castro
:00:53. > :00:57.arrived triumphant in Havana. A museum director whose treasures were
:00:58. > :01:00.destroyed by the Taliban. And the Hungarian who invented the
:01:01. > :01:05.bestselling puzzle in history. But first it is 50 years this month
:01:06. > :01:14.since tragedy struck the US space agency NASA. In 1986, the spatial
:01:15. > :01:21.Challenger exploded shortly after launch. Six astronauts and a teacher
:01:22. > :01:25.were killed. Our first Witness, Barbara Morgan, was another teacher
:01:26. > :01:29.who trained alongside the Cure orange team. My husband and I were
:01:30. > :01:33.sitting on the sofa watching the news and President Reagan came on
:01:34. > :01:40.and made the announcement, it quite remarkable. Today I'm directing NASA
:01:41. > :01:44.to begin a search and to Jews as the first Citizen passenger in the
:01:45. > :01:51.history of our space programme one of America's finest, a teacher -- to
:01:52. > :01:54.choose. My husband, a writer, I will always remember jumped up
:01:55. > :01:59.immediately and said, why teacher, why not a writer? I laughed and I
:02:00. > :02:03.said I thought the teacher would be the perfect choice. Kristin was
:02:04. > :02:08.chosen as the teacher in space, I was lucky to be able to be her back
:02:09. > :02:12.up. Crystal was like the girl next door, she had an effervescent smile,
:02:13. > :02:17.she was very intelligent and just soaking it all in. We spent six
:02:18. > :02:21.months of training at the Johnson space centre with the Challenger
:02:22. > :02:25.crew. Some of our favourite training was in the simulators to learn what
:02:26. > :02:29.it was like to be weightless. We didn't stop laughing that entire
:02:30. > :02:36.flight. Launch day was January the 28th. We had been at the Kennedy
:02:37. > :02:39.Space centre for a few days and the crew had been spending their time in
:02:40. > :02:44.crew quarters going through the last minute work on preparations for the
:02:45. > :02:49.flight. That morning it was a very cold morning. Of course we had
:02:50. > :02:55.school children all over the country watching. There were 100 kids from
:02:56. > :03:01.her son's School. All of the families and friends. I remember I
:03:02. > :03:07.was so excited, I so wanted to be with them. I was waving and I'm sure
:03:08. > :03:11.I was jumping up and down. I was cheering them on, so happy for them
:03:12. > :03:19.and wanted to be with them. We have main engine start. Four, three, two,
:03:20. > :03:25.one and lift off. Liftoff of the 25th space shuttle mission and it
:03:26. > :03:33.has cleared of the tower. Very soon into the launch, things didn't look
:03:34. > :03:37.right. There wasn't one trail going up, all of a sudden there were a
:03:38. > :03:41.couple, that looked very different from the launch that Christa and I
:03:42. > :03:44.had watched a couple of months earlier. Then at some point you
:03:45. > :03:50.realise that something has gone terribly wrong. Flight controllers
:03:51. > :03:59.here looking very carefully at the situation. Obviously a major
:04:00. > :04:03.malfunction. We all went to crew quarters, where we were awaiting
:04:04. > :04:16.word and helping the families. It was a really tough situation.
:04:17. > :04:26.In September I went back to the classroom and I taught for many more
:04:27. > :04:30.years. In 1998, many, many years later, NASA asked me to apply for
:04:31. > :04:35.the astronaut office, the astronaut programme. At that point I left
:04:36. > :04:42.teaching and went and served as an astronaut for ten years. One of the
:04:43. > :04:46.wonderful legacies of the Challenger is the educational programme that
:04:47. > :04:55.the families of the Challenger crew members got together and created,
:04:56. > :05:00.where young people for themselves experienced the joy and wonder of
:05:01. > :05:04.spaceflight and space exploration. It's called the Challenger centre
:05:05. > :05:09.for space science education. That's why the Challenger crew were going
:05:10. > :05:13.into space, they were going to explore and discover and experience
:05:14. > :05:17.for all of us and to keep that future wide open for all other. The
:05:18. > :05:24.American astronaut Barbara Morgan there. Now to the discovery of a
:05:25. > :05:31.disease which affects millions around the world. Our next Witnees,
:05:32. > :05:37.looks at the story of the first patient to be diagnosed with
:05:38. > :05:44.Alzheimer's disease. Alzheimer's was a doctor, a physician in the
:05:45. > :05:50.psychiatric hospital in Frankfurt in 1888. He was a test from the idea
:05:51. > :05:59.that psychiatric diseases are like other diseases, diseases of the
:06:00. > :06:07.body, in this case of the brain. I have to find a place where I can
:06:08. > :06:14.prove this. The first case actually was produced Dita, she was 51, she
:06:15. > :06:23.lived here in Frankfurt. -- Augusto Dita. She was a normal housewife.
:06:24. > :06:36.Suddenly in 1901 she got jealous and then she got forgetful and was also
:06:37. > :06:37.very loud and cried. Alois Alzheimer said, that is my case. He wrote a
:06:38. > :06:48.very detailed case history of how time, but this file had been and
:06:49. > :06:58.nobody knew exactly where it could be. I am the former director of the
:06:59. > :07:03.same psychiatric hospital in Frankfurt. We went into the archives
:07:04. > :07:11.and suddenly we found this file laying somewhere, and that was the
:07:12. > :07:16.file of Auguste Deter. The file must have laid there for about 70 years
:07:17. > :07:25.or even more. And nobody detected it. It was a wonderful feeling to
:07:26. > :07:34.have these files in our hands. All these questions are documented by
:07:35. > :07:39.himself within this file, with his handwriting. She sits on the bed
:07:40. > :07:47.with a helpless expression. " What is your name? Auguste. What is your
:07:48. > :07:51.husband's name? Auguste, I think. She looked as if she didn't
:07:52. > :07:57.understand the question. I showed her a pencil, a pen, a purse, key,
:07:58. > :08:03.diary and cigar, all identified correctly. When she has to write Mrs
:08:04. > :08:08.Auguste D, she writes Mrs, and we must repeat the other words because
:08:09. > :08:10.she forgets them. The patient is not able to progress in writing and
:08:11. > :08:22.repeats," I have lost myself". She lived very long, about five
:08:23. > :08:26.years or even more. Was kept very well in the hospital and when she
:08:27. > :08:34.died, the brain had been examined immediately after her death.
:08:35. > :08:38.Consignment did many slices and we can still look through the
:08:39. > :08:45.microscope and see, and that is the most important sign of what he found
:08:46. > :08:54.within the brain of Auguste. -- outside. The reason of this disease,
:08:55. > :08:59.of this dementia, is the position of flags and new of eyes. We still
:09:00. > :09:06.think this is the reason for the disease. Unfortunately we have many,
:09:07. > :09:13.many affected persons worldwide. And we did not yet find the
:09:14. > :09:21.corresponding therapy, but we hope in the following years this will
:09:22. > :09:27.take place. Doctor Conrad Murray there. Next to the invention of the
:09:28. > :09:33.bestselling puzzle in history. The fiendishly difficult Rubiks cube. We
:09:34. > :09:34.have been to Budapest to meet the man responsible for a global craze
:09:35. > :09:55.in the nineteen eighties. The cute is a very special object.
:09:56. > :10:00.It's a toy, it's a puzzle. I prefer to call it a piece of art -- the
:10:01. > :10:08.cube. It's a construction. It's an educational tool. It is many
:10:09. > :10:11.things. I was lecturing architecture and
:10:12. > :10:16.construction. And for the students, the best way to teach them is to
:10:17. > :10:23.show them what to do. I was interested about to create something
:10:24. > :10:33.what is mobile, simple and contains some kind of task. And finally I
:10:34. > :10:34.fell in love with the cube is a form because it has very special
:10:35. > :10:47.qualities. After I did it and it was working
:10:48. > :10:53.nicely, my prototypes, I think if I like something then somebody else
:10:54. > :11:02.will like it as well. I thought," If we can produce it cheaply then it is
:11:03. > :11:05.possible for something to happen". I wasn't dreaming about success, I
:11:06. > :11:12.wasn't dreaming about numbers or figures. I had a feeling I could
:11:13. > :11:23.share what I have done. It will be good. Firstly we started to sell in
:11:24. > :11:30.Hungary. The big boom or change started in the 80s when we step into
:11:31. > :11:41.the world market, at first in New York but all of the other tradeshows
:11:42. > :11:48.and toy shows. And in three years, that was the golden age of the cube,
:11:49. > :11:56.the first big boom, and in that time, we sold more than 100 million
:11:57. > :12:01.cubes. We generated some income for me, but I was not expecting such
:12:02. > :12:06.figures -- it's generated. I felt it was some kind of... When you win a
:12:07. > :12:14.lottery, or you find money on the street.
:12:15. > :12:21.Competitions... I can say it is some kind of side-effect. It wasn't
:12:22. > :12:27.something he was targeting. My average time was one minute. I was
:12:28. > :12:36.over 30 already and the best age to do it successfully is under 20. It
:12:37. > :12:45.helps to understand the 3-dimensional movements, to exercise
:12:46. > :12:49.our mind, to imagine something, to understand that if I change the
:12:50. > :12:55.elements of the movements the result will not be the same. The progress
:12:56. > :13:01.is not a continuous line, but we go further and then a little bit back
:13:02. > :13:03.and forward again. We need many times to destroy something to
:13:04. > :13:21.achieve progress. Happy cubing. I was always a very
:13:22. > :13:27.happy cuber, just not always gave very successful one. You can watch
:13:28. > :13:32.Witness every month on the BBC News Channel or you can catch up with
:13:33. > :13:39.over 1000 radio programmes on our online archive. Just go to the
:13:40. > :13:41.website. In January 1959, Cuban revolutionaries led by Fidel Castro
:13:42. > :13:47.marched triumphantly into the streets of Havana. Carlos has never
:13:48. > :13:48.forgotten the moment that changed the history of Cuba and the whole of
:13:49. > :14:00.Latin America. On January the eighth, 1959, I was
:14:01. > :14:06.standing on this corner as hundreds of Cubans were welcoming Fidel
:14:07. > :14:10.Castro. And I was very excited, very optimistic. I thought these guys
:14:11. > :14:23.were going to change Cuba in a positive way. But Easter dominated
:14:24. > :14:27.Cuban politics until 1958. He was considered a guy who really enforce
:14:28. > :14:33.the law for the benefit of American companies -- Batista. He and his
:14:34. > :14:38.cabinet got $200,000 a month from the mafia to let them do whatever
:14:39. > :14:47.they wanted to do about casinos, prostitution. My father was a
:14:48. > :14:51.well-known politician who had opposed Batista from the beginning,
:14:52. > :14:57.and I was a young high school student influenced by my father's
:14:58. > :15:01.ideas. At that time, the Batista police could ease the chill you for
:15:02. > :15:10.something as simple as participating in a strike -- could kill you. In
:15:11. > :15:11.1958, I remember following the advance of the revolutionary forces
:15:12. > :15:27.on shortwave radio. At the end of 1958, the
:15:28. > :15:33.revolutionary movement called for some sort of strike, so it was a
:15:34. > :15:37.very bad Christmas in Cuba. Because there were no celebrations, nobody
:15:38. > :15:44.was going out, there were no parties. So on December 31, we went
:15:45. > :15:49.to bed early. We didn't even wait for the New Year. And sometime
:15:50. > :15:54.around three o'clock or four o'clock in the morning, I heard the phone
:15:55. > :16:01.ring. My father woke up, and he said, he spoke obviously, and then
:16:02. > :16:07.turned to all of us who had woken up and said, Batista has left. With
:16:08. > :16:19.Batista in-flight to the Dominican Republic, this celebration turns to
:16:20. > :16:25.rebel acts. Martial law is imposed. Most of the military installation
:16:26. > :16:39.facilities in Havana were taken away. The guy surrendered. Fidel
:16:40. > :16:48.Castro took eight days to arrive in Havana. He arrived in Havana in
:16:49. > :16:52.January that eighth. Some of my friends started to criticise the
:16:53. > :16:59.revolution, that it was too radical. They started to criticise the
:17:00. > :17:09.presence of the commonest is. Between 1959 and 1961, all my
:17:10. > :17:16.friends at school, all my cousins, all my uncles and aunts, left. My
:17:17. > :17:20.sense in those years when the revolutionaries took over,
:17:21. > :17:25.initially, I expected things to go well. I didn't expect the United
:17:26. > :17:31.States to take such a hard line in Cuba. I knew there was going to be a
:17:32. > :17:33.negative reaction. But I didn't expect things to turn around so
:17:34. > :17:45.badly. Carlos Cuba. And finally to Afghanistan, a
:17:46. > :17:49.country that many now associate with war. But it is also one that has
:17:50. > :17:54.produced great civilisations, and great art. However, these treasures
:17:55. > :18:01.where and anything to the Taliban regime. -- another. Annex guest was
:18:02. > :18:05.working at the National Museum in trouble in 2001 when the Taliban
:18:06. > :22:04.came to visit -- Kabul. The museum director still proudly
:22:05. > :22:08.working at the Kabul Museum. That is all from Witness this month. We will
:22:09. > :22:12.be back in February with more stories of our times told the people
:22:13. > :22:14.who were there. But for now, from me and the rest of the Obama team,
:22:15. > :22:36.goodbye. -- Witness team. Weather warnings are being
:22:37. > :22:40.kept under close review. They may well be escalated through
:22:41. > :22:44.Saturday morning,