View todays celebrity birthdays and find out what happened in history today.
What : day is it
1940 – The George Cross and the George Medal for civilian acts of courage were instituted.
1951 – Crowds gathered outside Buckingham Palace for news of King George VI following an operation to remove part of his lung.
1952 – The star of the silent movies, Charlie Chaplin, returned to his native England after 21 years in the US.
1955 – Quizmaster Michael Miles first invited contestants to ‘Open the box’ in the long running show Take Your Pick.
1961 – The Shadows debut album ‘Shadows’ started a four week run at No.1 on the UK charts.
1974 – The world’s first Ceefax teletext service was begun by the BBC.
1976 – A fire on one of the Royal Navy’s latest guided missile destroyers (HMS Glasgow) killed eight men.
1986 – England and Yorkshire batsman Geoff Boycott was controversially sacked from Yorkshire Cricket Club after playing for the county side for 24 years.
1987 – An Australian court lifted the ban on the publication of Peter Wright’s autobiography, Spycatcher.
1987 – Britain ended arms sales to Iran.
1996 – London police raided several suspected IRA hideouts across the city, seizing around 10 tons of homemade explosives and killing one suspected IRA member.
2019 – The collapse of the travel firm Thomas Cook triggered the biggest ever peacetime repatriation, codenamed Operation Matterhorn. 600,000 Thomas Cook customers were on holiday at the time, of which 150,000 were British. The company was the first travel agency and was founded by Thomas Cook, a Baptist cabinet maker, on 5th July 1841. The first official ‘Cook’s Tour’ involved almost 600 teetotallers taking the train from Leicester to Loughborough to attend a temperance meeting.
Freddie Mercury – Real Name: Frederick Bulsara
“Today we’re answering a cry for help from the scariest place in the universe. A child’s bedroom.” – The Doctor
There was a time when the word ‘newfangled’ was newfangled.
Useless Pronunciation: X as in Xerxes
Bronze’s golden age was the Bronze Age
“Schwing!” – Mike Myers and Dana Carvey as Wayne and Garth (Saturday Night Live)
‘Peggy’ in the Discover Card ads is played by Romanian-American actor Tudor Petrut.
“I do a great impression of a hot dog.” – Daniel Hillard in Mrs. Doubtfire #moviequotes
“Die Hard” came from the original script of “Commando 2”.
A group of Thrush is called a Mutation.
All of Disney’s Aladdin was a story told by the merchant to get us to buy a worthless lamp.
“So I feel like success is opportunity plus preparation, so work begets work, and as long as you’re prepared it’s going to continue to come your way.” – Anthony Mackie
“Talk about a dream, try to make it real.” – Bruce Springsteen
“I don’t regret anything I’ve ever done. I only wish I could have done more.” – Mickey Rooney
“It specifically says in the Torah that you can eat shrimp and bacon in a Chinese restaurant.” – Jason Alexander
“There are no such things as happy endings. Never. They’re totally manufactured by fiction writers who choose to end the story on a high point.” – Peter David
2018 – Xi’an, China, introduced a pedestrian lane for people who walk while looking at their phones.
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.