Famous deaths
2018 – Chas Hodges (b. 1943), English musician and singer. He was the lead vocalist, pianist and guitarist of the musical duo Chas & Dave.
On This Day 2025
Hello, … Welcome to day 348 of the year.

Sunday, December 14th Daily Prep.

Today is Roast Chestnuts Day and Monkey Day. Your star sign is Sagittarius and your birthstone is Blue Topaz.
1984 – Miners’ leader Arthur Scargill was found guilty of obstruction during a picket at a Yorkshire coal works earlier in the year. He was fined £250 and ordered to pay £750 in costs.
Miners’ leader Arthur Scargill was found guilty of obstruction during a picket at a Yorkshire coal works earlier in the year. He was fined £250 and ordered to pay £750 in costs.
Today’s birthdays
1950 – Vicki Michelle (75), English actress and former model best known for her role as Yvette in the BBC television comedy series ‘Allo ‘Allo!, born in Chigwell, Essex.

1958 – Mike Scott (67), Scottish singer, songwriter and founder of rock band The Waterboys (“The Whole of the Moon”), born in Edinburgh, Scotland.

1970 – Toby Anstis (55), English radio (Heart and Heart Dance) and television presenter (Celebrity Fear Factor UK), born in Northampton, East Midlands.
1972 – Miranda Hart (53), English actress, comedian and writer (Call the Midwife, Miranda, Not Going Out), born in Torquay, Devon.
1979 – Michael Owen (46), English former professional footballer (Liverpool, Newcastle, Real Madrid, England national team), born in Chester.
1988 – Vanessa Hudgens (37), American actress (High School Musical, Bad Boys: Ride or Die, Sucker Punch) and singer (“Say OK”), born in Salinas, California, United States.
Famous deaths
1861 – Prince Albert (b. 1816), The husband of Queen Victoria. As such, he was consort of the British monarch from their marriage on 10 February 1840 until his death in 1861. Victoria granted him the title Prince Consort in 1857.

2013 – Peter O’Toole (b. 1932), English actor known for his leading roles (Lawrence of Arabia, The Lion in Winter).

The day today
1911 – Norwegian explorer Roald Amundsen, leading a team of five men (Helmer Hanssen, Olav Bjaaland, Sverre Hassel, Oscar Wisting, and himself) and their dogs, became the first person to reach the South Pole beating Captain Robert Falcon Scott’s British expedition by over a month, raising the Norwegian flag at the flat, icy location they named Polheim.

1918 – The first woman elected to Parliament was Constance, the Countess Markievicz who won for Sinn Fein, contesting a Dublin seat. She was unable to take her seat as she was in Holloway Prison, London. The 1918 General Election was also the first time that women in Britain had the vote.

1920 – The first scheduled airliner disaster in aviation history occurred when an airliner with six passengers and two crew took off from Cricklewood Airport, London, for a flight to Paris. Barely airborne, the plane crashed into a house in neighbouring Golders Green, killing the crew and two passengers. The others escaped from the wreckage.
1932 – Leeds and Wigan competed in the first floodlit rugby league match, at White City Stadium, in London. Leeds won 18–9 in front of a crowd of over 10,000 spectators.
1974 – The iconic disaster film The Towering Inferno, starring Paul Newman as an architect and Steve McQueen as a fire chief, was released featuring an all-star cast and thrilling tales of survival in a skyscraper fire.
1984 – Miners’ leader Arthur Scargill was found guilty of obstruction during a picket at a Yorkshire coal works earlier in the year. He was fined £250 and ordered to pay £750 in costs.
2011 – Thomas Cook, the world’s oldest travel agency announced that it would close 200 UK branches over the next two years as part of its UK business turnaround plan, 125 more than previously announced.
2011 – The UK jobless total reached a 17-year high in the three months to October, hitting 2.64 million. Youth unemployment, which covers 16-24 year olds, hit its highest level since records began in 1992.
2012 – Yorkshire, beat off the challenge of bids from Florence and Edinburgh with Leeds set to host the prestigious start of the Tour de France cycle race in 2014. Yorkshire took the Grand Depart to its heart. Day 1 started in Leeds on 5th July 2014 and took in the town of Skipton. The day’s stage continued through the Yorkshire Dales National Park and Ripon, before ending the day in Harrogate.
2013 – The death of the 81 year old actor Peter O’Toole, who starred in Sir David Lean’s 1962 film classic Lawrence of Arabia. The film earned him the first of eight Oscar nominations, with others coming for such films as Becket, The Lion in Winter and Goodbye, Mr Chips.
2017 – A British surgeon admitted to branding his initials on patients’ livers. Simon Bramhall, an accomplished surgeon, confessed to using an argon beam to etch his initials onto the livers of two transplant receivers. Fortunately, this did not damage either liver; however, he was charged for assault and fined £10,000.
Today in music
1962 – Bill Wyman made his live debut with The Rolling Stones at the Ricky Tick Club, Star and Garter Hotel in Windsor. The group were known as The Rollin’ Stones during this period.
1979 – The Clash released their third studio album London Calling. The double album received widespread acclaim and was ranked at number eight on Rolling Stone’s list of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time in 2003 and was ranked as the sixth-greatest album of the 1970s by NME.
1980 – Yoko Ono called on fans to observe ten minutes of silence in memory of John Lennon. 30,000 gathered outside St George’s Hall in Liverpool, while nearly 100,000 attend a memorial in New York’s Central Park.

1985 – Whitney Houston scored her first UK No.1 single with ‘Saving All My Love For You’. The song which was written by Michael Masser and Gerry Goffin, had been a minor hit for Marilyn McCoo and Billy Davis Jr. in 1978 and was also a US No.1 for Houston.

1991 – Michael Jackson started a four-week run at No.1 on the US album chart with his eighth studio album ‘Dangerous’. The album has sold over 32 million copies worldwide making it one of the best selling albums of all time. Nine singles were released from the album spanning two years (1991–1993).
2003 – Ozzy & Kelly Osbourne went to No.1 on the UK singles chart with ‘Changes’ a remake of a track first sung by Ozzy on the Black Sabbath album Volume IV in 1972. It was the first father and daughter chart topper since Frank & Nancy Sinatra in 1967.
2015 – Adele was at No.1 on both the UK and US chart with her third album 25. The album was a massive commercial success, debuting at No.1 in more than 25 markets and broke first-week sales records in many countries, including the UK and US. 25 eventually became the world’s best-selling album of 2015 with 17.4 million copies sold within the year, and has sold 20 million copies as of June 2016, making it one of the best selling albums worldwide.
2019 – Sir Rod Stewart became the oldest male solo artist to have a No.1 album in the UK when the singer’s 10th chart topper You’re In My Heart went to the top of the charts. Sir Rod, who was 74 years and 11 months old, took the accolade which was previously held by American singer Paul Simon.
Today in history
1287 – Northern Germany and the Netherlands were struck by St. Lucia’s flood, killing more than 50,000 people. One of the most significant floods in history, this catastrophe was caused by a great storm that broke the barriers between the North Sea and what is now the Southern Sea. The loss of life and property was so significant because much of the region was below sea level.
1542 – Princess Mary Stuart succeeded her father James V and became Queen Mary I of Scotland at just six days old. She was queen of Scotland until 24th July 1567 and was queen consort of France from 10th July 1559 to 5th December 1560.
1703 – The Forty-seven Ronin, led by Oishi Kuranosuke, famously avenged their lord, Asano Naganori, by attacking and killing the corrupt official Kira Yoshinaka in his Edo mansion.
1861 – Prince Albert, consort of Queen Victoria died, at the early age of 42 of typhoid fever. His death plunged the Queen into a deep mourning that lasted for the rest of her life. The Prince laid the foundation stone of the Royal Dock at Grimsby which once had the largest fishing fleet in the world.
1895 – The birth of King George VI, the second son of George V and Mary. He succeeded Edward VIII when Edward abdicated and ruled Britain during the war years.
1896 – The Glasgow Underground Railway was opened by the Glasgow District Subway Company.