Pete Jackson launches Mole’s podcast

Historian Peter Jackson is adding another arrow to his bow and has become a podcaster.

Mr Jackson is currently one of the team members working for Wright Tech in the World War II Tunnels at Hay’s Level.

He is known locally and abroad for his restoration work, his knowledge on military history and his tunnel or cave tours.

His assistance in newly refurbished World War II tunnels was seen as invaluable to the team he works with and also to his wife, Lesley, who was very pleased that many items that he had stored are now on display.

While he still works up at Hay’s Level where he talks to the tourists if he is not restoring or researching.

He is now taking to divulging his knowledge on the ‘airwaves’ in his new podcast ‘La Hora Del Te, Con El Topo’, which translates to Tea time with the Mole.

Mr Jackson’s nickname is the Mole after the many years he has spent in the vast tunnels in the Rock. He is also known for his love of a cup of tea.

“Well, I was given the nickname The Mole years ago because of the time I spent in the caves and tunnels,” he said.

“I thought I was being insulted. It was a Spanish group that first said it. A group of bikers from Ronda.”

“I'd met these lads, and I brought them down to Gib, and we did the World War II tunnel tour. We did lower St Michael's Cave, different things.”

On a trip to Ronda he saw them again and one of them called him “El Topo,” which he mistakenly thought was an insult.

He avoided joining the table, quickly drank his coffee, and left.

Later, after Googling the term, he discovered that “El Topo” actually means “the mole” and he was touched by this.

The podcast came about following as suggestion by his daughter, Rachael, who he credits with the creation of the podcast.

“I was in hospital when Rachael decided it would be a good idea to do the podcast,” he said.

“What it was is I'd just done one with Gail Francis [Tiron], for a Canadian company, called The Story Behind The Stone’ which wondered ‘Why did we have this in the tunnels? What was it all about?’ And it went down really well.”

“Rachel listened to it and said, Why are you doing these? You should be doing your own. So she started doing this.”

The podcast launched on November 11.

“I'd like to get at least 10 podcasts out, just audio, and see how it goes, see how many people are actually interested in it,” he said.

“If there's any level of interest, then we could maybe get the technology to enhance it, and get video in there or still clips, because there's so much to see that it'd be mega interesting for people to see and know about.”

“I know we had a lot of urban explorers going around Gib and finding their way into places.”

“They put it online, but there's no explanation of what it is. It's just a hole in the ground that they've managed to gain access to.”

“But having the explanations as to what it was and what it was used for, even down to who dug it, and the names of the tunnels are very important, so we're doing one on tunnel names as well.”

“We can't fit it all into one podcast, because I'm trying to keep them to 15 minutes or 20 minutes, because a lot of people just don't have the time.”

“I don't have the time to sit and listen to a podcast for an hour. So you know, keeping this up 15 minutes-ish is enough for enough for an episode, I think.”

The next one is going to be on the 9.2 inch gun at O'Hara's Battery, followed by one on tunnel names, and one on timelines which is very special to him.

“My daughter, again Rachael, bless her, when we first started talking about this she came in to see me in the hospital, she brought a game called Timeline, which is like the old cigarette cards,” Mr Jackson said.

“I once had a picture, say it's a Great Fire of London and on the back is the date it occurred. You take the cards out to start with, and you lay one in the centre with a with a date on it. And you have to look at the picture on your card and say, well, I think it's there either side of the cards. The more you do it, the more you've got to be accurate. If you get it wrong, you've got to pick up another card.”

“She calls ‘Croknowledgy’, it's got an odd spelling, as it's knowledge.”

“And it's Gibraltar history, and the timeline that things happened here. So she's in the throes putting that together. We’ll give it a trial run on a podcast.”

The next podcast will come out on Tuesday and is available on Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/65kAcIy1PBUEcRnH7Qza5A