July 31st "2024" Daily Prep
Welcome to day 213 of the year! Known as Jump for Jelly Beans Day, National Avocado Day, Shredded Wheat Day. If you were born today you were likely conceived the week of November 7th in the previous year. Your star sign is Leo and your birthstone is Ruby.
1970 – The last day of the officially sanctioned rum ration in the Royal Navy. The centuries-old tradition of issuing alcohol to the sailors of British warships came to the end with the final tots of rum being handed out that morning in ships and establishments around the world.
Todays birthdays
1960 – Pete Tong (64), English DJ (Essential Mix and Essential Selection on BBC Radio 1), born in Dartford, Kent.
1962 – Wesley Snipes (62), American actor (Blade, Demolition Man, Passenger 57), born in Orlando, Florida., United States.
1963 – Norman Cook / Fatboy Slim (61), British musician and record producer (“Praise You”, “The Rockafeller Skank”), born in Bromley, London.
1965 – J.K. Rowling (59), British author (Harry Potter novels) and philanthropist, born in Yate, Gloucestershire.
1974 – Emilia Fox (50), English actress (The Pianist, Silent Witness, Dorian Gray), born in Hammersmith, London.
Famous deaths
2007 – Mike Reid (b. 1940), English comedian, actor (as Frank Butcher in Eastenders), and author.
The day today
1968 – The first episode (entitled The Man and the Hour) of Dad’s Army, a British comedy about the Home Guard in the Second World War. The TV series regularly gained audiences of 18 million viewers during the 1970s and is still repeated today.
1969 – The pre-decimal half penny ceased being legal tender. It had been a regular feature of British coinage since the 13th century.
1990 – In the England v India Test Match at Lords, a total of 1603 runs were scored, in exactly 1603 minutes.
1999 – NASA intentionally crashes the Lunar Prospector into the Moon, ending its mission to detect frozen water on the moon’s surface.
2012 – The world’s longest running music show Top of the Pops was broadcast for the last time on BBC Two. The show had aired for 42 years. 2213 episodes were screened, the first being broadcast on New Year’s Day 1964.
Today in music
1959 – Cliff Richard was at No.1 on the UK singles chart with ‘Living Doll.’ The singers first of 14 UK No.1’s. The song was one of three from the film, Serious Charge.
1982 – Survivor’s ‘Eye Of The Tiger’ was at No.1 on the US chart. The song, which was commissioned by actor Sylvester Stallone for the theme for the movie Rocky III, received an Academy Award nomination for Best Original Song and go on to sell over five million copies.
1992 – Michael Jackson made an unscheduled appearance on his hotel balcony in London after a man had threatened to jump from an apartment building across the street. 28 year-old Eric Herminie told police he would leap to his death if he didn’t see Jackson, who was in Britain for a series of concerts.
1999 – Christina Aguilera scored her first US No.1 single with ‘Genie In A Bottle’, also No.1 in the UK. The song spent 5 weeks at No.1 on the US chart and won Aguilera the Best New Artist Grammy for the year.
2006 – Former Culture Club singer Boy George (O’Dowd) was ordered to do community service by picking up trash on New York City streets after pleading guilty last March to false reporting of an incident. He called police with a bogus report of a burglary at his lower Manhattan apartment in October and the responding officers found cocaine inside.
Today in history
1423 – The Battle of Cravant, during the Hundred Years War between English and French forces. The French army contained a large number of Scots under Sir John Stewart. When the French began to withdraw, the Scots refused to flee. Over 3,000 of them fell and over 2,000 were taken prisoners, including John Stewart, leading to a victory for the English and their Burgundian allies.
1498 – Christopher Columbus discovered Trinidad on his third voyage. He entered the Gulf of Paria in Venezuela and planted the Spanish flag in South America on August 1.
1703 – English novelist Daniel Defoe was made to stand in the pillory as punishment for offending the government and church with his satire ‘The Shortest Way With Dissenters’. Bystanders pelted him with flowers instead of the customary harmful and noxious objects and drank to his health.
1786 – “Poems, Chiefly in the Scottish dialect” by Robert Burns is published.
1856 – Christchurch became a City by Royal Charter making it officially the oldest established city in New Zealand.