1848 – London’s Waterloo Station was officially opened. With over 91 million passenger entries and exits between April 2010 and March 2011, it is Britain’s busiest railway station.

1859 – Big Ben, in the clock tower of the Houses of Parliament, tolled for the first time. In September it cracked under the hammer, a mere two months after it officially went into service. According to the foundry’s manager, a hammer more than twice the maximum weight specified had been used and for three years Big Ben was taken out of commission.

1884 – Old Trafford (Manchester) became England’s 2nd official Test Match cricket ground (after the Kennington Oval in London).

1930 – Australian cricketer Don Bradman scored a world record 309 runs in one day in a Test match against England, held at Headingley.

1950 – Puppets Andy Pandy, Teddy and Looby Loo first appeared on BBC TV. The episodes were repeated for more than 25 years, until the film wore out.

1974 – The World Football League played its first games.

1977 – In Britain, Gay News was fined £1,000 for publishing a poem that portrayed Jesus as homosexual.

1987 – War veterans returned to the scene of the bloodiest battle of World War I to commemorate its 70th anniversary. The fields of Passchendaele in Belgium claimed the lives of 250,000 troops of the British Commonwealth between July and November 1917.

1989 – Laurence Olivier, English actor and director died.

1991 – Labour MP Terry Fields was sentenced to 60 days in prison for refusing to pay his poll tax.

2000 – The World Aids Conference in South Africa announced that trials for a new HIV vaccine would begin in Britain.

2013 – Greenpeace protesters climbed to the summit of London’s Shard, the tallest building in western Europe at 1,016 ft and then unfurled a blue flag with ‘Save the Arctic’ written on it.

2021 – 8:00pm BST. The EUFA Euro 2020 final, between England and Italy at Wembley. The ongoing Coronavirus pandemic capped attendance at 60,000, with a maximum of 1,000 Italian supporters. Euro 2020 is England’s first major football final in 55 years and their first ever European Championship final.