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 341 of the year.

Sunday, December 7th Daily Prep.

Today is Pearl Harbour Remembrance Day, International Civil Aviation Day and Hanukkah (Festival of Lights). Your star sign is Sagittarius and your birthstone is Blue Topaz.
1941 – Pearl Harbor was attacked. The Imperial Japanese Navy used 353 planes to attack the US fleet at Hawaii’s Pearl Harbor Naval Base. The attack killed 2,403 people.
Pearl Harbor was attacked. The Imperial Japanese Navy used 353 planes to attack the US fleet at Hawaii’s Pearl Harbor Naval Base. The attack killed 2,403 people.
Today’s birthdays

1954 – Mike Nolan (71), Irish singer (“The Land of Make Believe”) and one of the four original founding members of Bucks Fizz (“Making Your Mind Up”), born in Dublin, Ireland.

1974 – Nicole Appleton (51), Canadian-British singer, a member of girl group All Saints (“I Know Where It’s At”) and television presenter, born in Hamilton, Canada.
1977 – Luke Donald (47), English professional golfer and former world number one playing mainly on the US PGA Tour, born in Hemel Hempstead, Hertfordshire.
1980 – John Terry (45), English professional football coach and former player (Chelsea, Aston Villa), born in Barking, East London.
1988 – Emily Browning (37), Australian actress (Ghost Ship, Legend, Sleeping Beauty), born in Melbourne, Australia.
1989 – Nicholas Hoult (36), English actor (Mad Max: Fury Road, Jack the Giant Slayer, About a Boy), born in Wokingham, Berkshire.
Famous deaths
2016 – Greg Lake (b. 1947), English musician, singer, and songwriter gaining prominence as a founding member of the progressive rock bands King Crimson and Emerson, Lake & Palmer.
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The day today
1955 – Clement Atlee resigned as leader of the opposition Labour Party, following months of speculation. Hours later he was made an Earl by the Queen; the first Labour leader to accept a hereditary peerage. Mr Attlee led his party for 20 years and had a seat in the House of Commons for 33 years.
1972 – Apollo 17 launched the final manned lunar landing mission, during which the crew took the famous “blue marble” photo of the entire Earth.
1979 – The final version of the MG Midget saw production end with 73,899 of the last model built and the final 500 produced for the home market being painted black. The last car rolled off the assembly line on this day, marking the end of the iconic sports car’s run.
1983 – A cat climbed to a height of 160ft up an industrial chimney, holding up the work of Lancashire’s chief steeplejack and chimney demolisher Fred Dibnah.
1993 – Protesters lost a 20 year fight to save a 250 year old chestnut tree in east London. Twenty protesters were arrested after they clashed with 200 police officers sent to ensure a court order to cut down the tree was enforced and that the planned motorway extension could go ahead.
2012 – Jacintha Saldhana, a nurse at King Edward VII hospital in London, who took a hoax call about the Duchess of Cambridge from two Australian radio presenters posing as the Queen, was found dead at her home after committing suicide.
2014 – The Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, stated that the sight of UK families relying on food banks was more shocking to him than the suffering in African refugee camps. He explained this was because the hunger in the UK was unexpected in a country perceived as wealthy, whereas he had a preconceived understanding of hardship in refugee camps. His comments accompanied a report on food poverty in Britain and highlighted issues such as “astonishing” levels of food waste alongside hunger.
2017 – Real Madrid forward Cristiano Ronaldo wins his fifth and second consecutive Ballon d’Or award to equal Lionel Messi’s record.
2020 – Coca-Cola was named the world’s largest plastic polluter by the charity “Break Free From Plastic.”
2022 – The death of the last surviving Dambuster, George Leonard “Johnny” Johnson, aged 101. He was a bomb-aimer in the 617 squadron which destroyed vital dams in Germany’s industrial Ruhr valley during the second world war.
2024 – Notre-Dame de Paris, the medieval Catholic cathedral in Paris, France, was reopened following completion of the restoration work five years after the fire that destroyed the cathedral’s spire and roof and caused extensive damage to its interior on 15 April 2019.
Today in music
1967 – Otis Redding recorded ‘(Sittin’ On) The Dock Of The Bay’. The song went on to be his biggest hit. Redding didn’t see its release; he was killed three days later in a plane crash. His familiar whistling, heard before the song’s fade was the singer fooling around, he had intended to return to the studio at a later date to add words in place of the whistling.

1974 – Barry White was at No.1 on the UK singles chart with ‘You’re The First, The Last, My Everything’, the singers first UK No.1. Originally written in the 1950s as a country song with the title ‘You’re My First, You’re My Last, My In-Between.’

1974 – Carl Douglas started a two-week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with ‘Kung Fu Fighting’. The song was recorded in 10 minutes and had started out as a B-side and went on to sell over 10 million and became one of the Best Selling Singles of all time.
1979 – The Police had their second UK No.1 single with ‘Walking on the Moon’, taken from their second album ‘Reggatta De Blanc’. The video for the song was filmed at Kennedy Space Center interspersed with NASA footage.
1985 – Mr. Mister began a two-week run at No.1 on the US Billboard Hot 100 on December 7, 1985, with “Broken Wings”. The song also reached No.4 on the UK charts.
1991 – George Michael and Elton John were at No.1 in the UK with a live version of ‘Don’t Let The Sun Go down On Me’, (a hit for Elton in 1974). All proceeds from the hit went to aids charities.
2003 – Britney Spears was at No.1 on the US album chart with ‘In The Zone’ the singer’s fourth US No.1 album. The singer broke her own record from being the first female artist to have three albums enter the US chart at No.1 to being the first female artist to have 4 albums enter at No.1 consecutively.
2005 – The MBE medal that John Lennon returned to the Queen was found in a royal vault at St James’ Palace. Lennon returned his medal in November 1969 with a letter accompanying saying, “Your Majesty, I am returning my MBE as a protest against Britain’s involvement in the Nigeria-Biafra thing, against our support of America in Vietnam and against Cold Turkey slipping down the charts. With Love, John Lennon.” Historians were calling for the medal to be put on public display.
2008 – Leona Lewis went to No.1 on the UK singles chart with ‘Run’ which became the fastest-selling digital-only track. Take That went to No.1 on the UK album after selling over 432,000 copies of their new album The Circus. Britney Spears album Circus, released on the same day as Take That’s album entered the chart at number four.
2015 – David Bowie made his last public appearance when he attended the opening night of the Lazarus production at the New York Theatre Workshop in Manhattan. Tickets to the entire run of the musical (which ran until 20th Jan 2016), sold out within hours of being made available.
2016 – Greg Lake, who fronted both King Crimson and Emerson, Lake and Palmer, died aged 69 after a battle with cancer. One of the founding fathers of progressive rock, the band combined heavy rock riffs with a classical influence. They scored hit albums with Pictures at an Exhibition, Trilogy and Brain Salad Surgery and Lake had his solo hit ‘I Believe in Father Christmas’. Jimi Hendrix considered joining ELP in their earliest incarnation, and if this had happened, the band would’ve been known as HELP.
2021 – Scottish singer-songwriter Steve Bronski died from smoke inhalation in a fire at his home in Soho, London age 61. He was a co-founder and keyboard player of the group Bronski Beat, known for the singles ‘Smalltown Boy’ and ‘Why?’. He was also well known as an LGBTQ activist and was openly gay himself from an early age.
Today in history
521 AD – The birth of Saint Columba, the Irish Christian who made his missionary trip to Scotland in 563. Columba is credited as bringing a revival of Christianity to Western Europe after the fall of the Roman Empire. He died on the Scottish island of Iona and was buried in 597 AD by his monks in the abbey he had created there.
1642 – The Battle of Tadcaster took place during the First English Civil War when the Earl of Newport’s Royalist force attacked Lord Fairfax’s Parliamentarian garrison at Tadcaster, in Yorkshire. After the town had been vacated by the Parliamentarians, Newcastle advanced his forces, subsequently garrisoning Pontefract Castle and a number of other towns in the area, cutting Fairfax off from the West Riding of Yorkshire.
1703 – The Great Storm of 1703 struck southern Great Britain and caused a high number of deaths, with estimates around 9,000-15,000. The storm was one of the deadliest natural disasters in British history, destroying buildings, sinking ships, and killing thousands of people, both on land and at sea.
1732 – The first Covent Garden Opera House, then called the Theatre Royal, opened in London to an elite crowd, for a performance of John Gay’s The Beggar’s Opera, a tribute to Gay, who had died three days previously.
1817 – The death of William Bligh, rear-Admiral who was captain of the HMS Bounty at the time of the mutiny.
1889 – The first performance at the Savoy, London, of Gilbert and Sullivan’s ‘The Gondoliers’, their last real success. It ran for a very successful 554 performances.