1943 – The birth of Tony Blackburn, English disc jockey. He broadcast on the “pirate” stations Radio Caroline and Radio London in the 1960s and was the first disc jockey to broadcast on BBC Radio 1, in 1967.

1963 – A French veto stopped Britain joining the European Common Market.

1966 – A bill was published by the government, permitting random breath tests.

1985 – Oxford University snubbed Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher by refusing her an honorary degree. Academics led a campaign against honouring Mrs. Thatcher in protest against the government’s cuts in funding for education.

1989 – The artificial leg that had belonged to Sir Douglas Bader was catalogued for sale. His widow was selling memorabilia to raise money to buy her own house, instead of renting.

2003 – Solicitor Sally Clark was cleared by the Court of Appeal of murdering her two sons after serving more than three years of a life sentence. Sadly, she never fully recovered from the effects of the appalling miscarriage of justice and was found dead at her home on 16th March 2007.

2015 – Lt. Danielle Welch was presented with her ‘wings’ by The Duke of York. She was the first and also the last woman to become a Royal Navy Lynx helicopter pilot, as the aircraft is due to be replaced in 2017.

2015 – There were tears of joy for widower Stan Beaton as he heard again the answerphone message of his late wife Ruby. The message had been accidentally deleted during an upgrade by Virgin Media, but engineers searched through thousands of recordings and eventually managed to restore the message, which he had kept on his phone for 14 years.

2016 – The Land Rover Defender ceased production at 9:30am GMT (and at 8:30pm on the same day for the East Coast of Australia). Over 2 million Land Rover Series and Defender vehicles were produced since 1948. To mark the Defender’s passing, the Sunshine Coast Land Rover Owners’ Club held a gathering at the exact time that production ceased, to hold a wake and to remember the Defender.