View todays celebrity birthdays and find out what happened in history today.
1937 – The first play written for British television, The Underground Murder Mystery by J. Bissell Thomas, was broadcast by the BBC.
1937 – The 18 year old English ballet dancer Margot Fonteyn made her debut in ‘Giselle’ at Sadler’s Wells in London.
1973 – The Statesman, an unarmed ocean going tug, was sent to protect British trawlers from Icelandic patrol boats as the dispute over cod fishing rights intensified.
1988 – Christopher Nolan, a 22-year-old Irish writer, won the £20,000 Whitbread Book of the Year Award for his autobiography, Under the Eye of the Clock. Completely paralysed, Nolan used a ‘unicorn’ attachment on his forehead to write the novel at a painfully slow speed.
1990 – Police in Johannesburg, armed with batons and dogs, broke up a demonstration against English cricketers who had defied a ban on playing in segregated South Africa.
1988 – Disabled writer Christopher Nolan, who cannot move or speak, wins the Whitbread Book of the Year prize for his autobiography Under The Clock. On the same day, Bon Jovi and Mötley Crüe manager Doc McGhee pleads guilty to importing more than 40,000lb of marijuana into the US from Colombia via a shrimp boat.
2004 – Prime Minister Tony Blair said that he would survive his toughest week as he faced the university top-up fees vote and the Hutton enquiry into the death of David Kelly, former UN weapons inspector in Iraq and… he was right!
2013 – A piece of music that was composed by waiting for bird droppings to fall onto giant sheets of manuscript paper received its premiere at the Tate Liverpool art gallery. Artist Kerry Morrison said that the music represented the role that birds play in the environment.
2014 – The death of former British athlete Sir Chris Chataway, at the age of 82. Chataway, who broke the 5,000m world record in 1954, is also remembered as the man who helped pace Sir Roger Bannister to break the four-minute mile barrier in the same year. Chataway was named the first-ever BBC Sports Personality of the Year in 1954.
2015 – The death of Anne Kirkbride, known for her long-running role as Deirdre Barlow in the ITV soap Coronation Street, which she played for 42 years from 1972 to 2014.
2017 – Alanis Morissette’s former business manager, Jonathan Schwartz, admits stealing over £5.7m from the singer and other celebrities. On the same day, Adama Barrow is sworn in as President of Gambia. Also, Mexican drug lord Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán is extradited to the US to face trial for his leadership of the Sinaloa drug cartel.
“Hey, I just met you, and this is crazy, but here’s my number, so call me, maybe!” #songlyrics
‘Lived’ and ‘Died’ mean the same thing.
Cromulent – the Simpsons – meaning totally acceptable. “It is perfectly cromulent to use embiggens in a sentence”.
A group of Lice is called a Flock.
Chester Gould’s friend, Al Gross invented the walkie-talkie, and that was the inspiration for Dick Tracey’s wrist radio in January 1946.
“Maybe the poets are right. Maybe love is the only answer.” – Mickey in Hannah and Her Sisters #moviequotes
The car wash in “Car Wash” was named The Dee Luxe Car Wash.
There are 6 American Flags Planted on the Moon. They are probably all white now, bleached by the Sun’s rays.
Never erase items on your To-Do List. Always strike-through, so at the end of the day, you can see all that you accomplished. #LifeProTip
Sade – Real Name: Helen Adu
TV Quotes… “Aaay!” (Fonzie) on “Happy Days”
A group of Gnus is called an Implausibility.
I became insane, with long intervals of horrible sanity. – Edgar Allen Poe
You can’t help getting older, but you don’t have to get old. – George Burns
There is no end. There is no beginning. There is only the infinite passion of life. – Frederico Fellini
The truth is this: The march of Providence is so slow, and our desires so impatient; the work of progress is so immense and our means of aiding it so feeble; the life of humanity is so long, that of the individual so brief, that we often see only the ebb of the advancing wave and are thus discouraged. It is history that teaches us to hope. – Robert E. Lee
Don’t compromise yourself. You are all you’ve got. – Janis Joplin
Find out who you are and do it on purpose. – Dolly Parton
Painting from nature is not copying the object; it is realizing one’s sensations. – Paul Cézanne
Being an intellectual creates a lot of questions and no answers. – Janis Joplin
1993 – The Holbeck Hall Hotel in Scarborough, North Yorkshire, fell into the sea following a landslide, making news around the world.
1805 – The first Trooping of the Colour took place on Horse Guards Parade. It was Edward VII who moved Trooping the Colour to its June date, because of the vagaries of British weather.
2012 – The Thames Diamond Jubilee Pageant took place on the Tideway of the River Thames, as part of the celebrations of the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II.