Empires to Ashes

At its peak, the East India Company commanded a private army twice the size of Britain's, ruled 260 million people and generated half of Britain's trade. The story of how a trading company became an empire, looted a subcontinent, caused famines that killed millions and ultimately collapsed under its own brutal ambitions.

In 1720, the South Sea Company promised untold riches from trade with South America. Isaac Newton, the king and thousands of others invested everything. When the bubble burst, it destroyed fortunes, toppled the government and gave birth to modern financial regulation. The template for every market crash that followed.

Pan American World Airways pioneered international aviation, flew the Beatles and made air travel glamorous. Its blue globe logo symbolized American power. Then deregulation, terrorism and massive debts brought down the airline that had once seemed as permanent as America itself.

John DeLorean left General Motors to build his dream car in Northern Ireland with British government money. The gull-winged DMC-12 became a cultural icon thanks to Back to the Future, but not before DeLorean was caught in an FBI cocaine sting trying to save his collapsing company. Ambition, desperation and one very shiny car.

Kodak invented the digital camera in 1975, then buried it to protect film sales. For over a century, 'Kodak moments' defined how the world captured memories. By the time they accepted digital photography, smartphones had already killed their business. A perfect parable of disruption and corporate blindness.

Geoffrey the Giraffe welcomed generations of children to toy paradise. Then private equity firms loaded Toys 'R' Us with $5 billion in debt, extracted fees and left it unable to compete with Amazon. The story of how financial engineering destroyed an iconic brand and left millions of kids without their favorite store.

Sears invented mail-order retail, sold houses from catalogs and built America's tallest building. It was Amazon before the internet existed. Then a hedge fund manager bought it, sold its real estate, gutted investments and managed it into bankruptcy. The original everything store, destroyed by financial engineering.

For 99 years, Woolworths was where Britain bought everything from pick'n'mix sweets to pop records. 'Woolies' was part of British life. Then came the 2008 financial crisis, crushing debt and the inability to compete with supermarkets and online retail. The day it closed, Britain lost part of its soul.