#25 A Bearded Sea Swimmer & A Man Who Filled The Sky With Colour Artwork

Mostly Unsung

The weekly comedy history podcast that brings you bitesize biographies of the extraordinary, eccentric, outrageous and occasionally ordinary lives that until now have gone mostly unsung... mostly. Join your hosts Annie and Andrea as they bring you stories that your history teacher never taught you!

If you like stuffy lectures then you're not going to be a fan, sorry! But if you are looking to hang out with two old friends who love story telling, a good laugh and forgotten figures from history then welcome!

Covering everything from scientists to Grandmothers, survivors of wars to eccentric millionaires, all via ghost stories, anecdotes and terrible impressions of Hollywood legend Tim Curry. Come and hang out, have a giggle and join us every Friday.

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Mostly Unsung

#25 A Bearded Sea Swimmer & A Man Who Filled The Sky With Colour

October 03, 2025 • Mostly Unsung • Season 1 • Episode 25

Welcome back to your new favourite weekly podcast! Every Friday join two old friends as they share a forgotten story from world history. All the things you never learnt about in school, with a big helping of warmth and laughter, the perfect commute pod!

This week Andrea tells the story of a Kent man who led a very ordinary and sensible life indeed. Until he retired and discovered the joys of sea swimming. All year swimming might be fashionable now but for a retired MP in the late 1700s it was a very unusual sight!

Then come along with Annie as she tells the story of one of the inter-war period bright young things. A multi talented artist himself, he was surrounded by the stars of the day from authors, to painters to musicians. Throw in a penchant for silly jokes, an LGBTQ polycule room mate and the invitation to join a horse for afternoon tea and you have one of the UKs most interesting eccentrics.

For this episode Andrea used these sources:

https://kids.kiddle.co/Matthew_Robinson,_2nd_Baron_Rokeby

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthew_Robinson,_2nd_Baron_Rokeby#:~:text=Matthew%20Robinson%2C%202nd%20Baron%20Rokeby%20(Baptised%2C%20York%2012%20April,stipple%20engraving%2C%20with%20tricorn%20hat.

https://medium.com/@DigitalTiger/great-british-eccentrics-1-2c3d275768ed

For this episode Annie used these sources:

https://www.faringdon.org/berners-more-information.html

https://www.classical-music.com/features/composers/lord-berners-2

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