July 11th "2024" Daily Prep
Welcome to day 193 of the year! Known as National Mojito Day and World Population Day. If you were born today you were likely conceived the week of October 18th in the previous year. Your star sign is Cancer and your birthstone is Ruby.
1900 – Charlotte Cooper from Ealing in Middlesex won a gold medal in the women’s tennis singles tournament in the 1900 Summer Olympics in Paris. She also won a gold medal in the mixed doubles, making her the first individual female Olympic champion.
Todays birthdays
1960 – Caroline Quentin (64), English actress (Men Behaving Badly, Jonathan Creek, Life of Riley), broadcaster and television presenter, born in Reigate, Surrey.
1962 – Pauline McLynn (62), Irish actress (Mrs Doyle – Father Ted, Libby Croker – Shameless) and author, born in Sligo, Ireland.
1964 – Craig Charles (60), English actor (Red Dwarf), comedian, television (Robot Wars, Takeshi’s Castle, Moneybags) and radio presenter, born in Liverpool.
1965 – Tony Cottee (59), former professional football player (West Ham United, Everton and Leicester City), born in Forest Gate, London.
1990 – Caroline Wozniacki (34), Danish professional tennis player (was ranked world No. 1 in singles for a total of 71 weeks), born in Odense, Denmark.
Famous deaths
2020 – Jack Charlton (b. 1935), English footballer (Leeds United) and manager (Sheffield Wednesday, Newcastle United, Republic of Ireland) and part of the England national team that won the 1966 World Cup.
The day today
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.
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.
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 and unfurled a blue flag with ‘Save the Arctic’ written on it.
2021 – Italy won their second EUFA Euro football title after defeating England in penalty shootouts.
Today in music
1981 – The Specials had their second and final UK No.1 single with ‘Ghost Town’. Despite being a song about Coventry, the band chose to film the video of themselves driving a Vauxhall Cresta around some empty London streets.
1982 – Phil Collen replaced Pete Willis in Def Leppard who was fired due to excessive alcohol consumption on the job.
1998 – Billie went to No.1 on the UK singles chart with ‘Because We Want To’. The 15 year old made chart history by becoming the second youngest female to score a No.1; Helen Shapiro was the youngest at 14 with the 1961 No.1 single ‘You Don’t Know’.
1999 – Ricky Martin started a three week run at No.1 on the UK singles chart with ‘Livin’ La Vida Loca’. A US No.1 for 5 weeks. The song was the first No.1 song to be recorded, edited, and mixed totally on a DAW (digital audio workstation).
2004 – UK band McFly went to No.1 on the UK album chart with ‘Room On The 3rd Floor.’ They broke the record set by The Beatles as the youngest group ever to debut at No.1 on the album charts.
Today in history
1576 – Yorkshire born explorer Martin Frobisher sighted Greenland. In all he made three voyages to the New World to look for the Northwest Passage. He was later knighted for his service in repelling the Spanish Armada.
1656 – Ann Austin and Mary Fisher, two Englishwomen, become the first Quakers to immigrate to the American colonies when the ship carrying them lands at Boston in the Massachusetts Bay Colony. The pair came from Barbados, where Quakers had established a center for missionary work. Shortly after arriving to Massachusetts, Austin and Fisher, whose liberal teachings enraged the Puritan colonial government, were arrested and jailed. After five years in prison, they were deported back to Barbados.
1776 – Captain Cook sailed from Plymouth in the Resolution, accompanied by the Discovery, on his last expedition. He was killed in Hawaii in a fight with Hawaiians in 1779. He left a legacy of scientific and geographical knowledge which was to influence his successors well into the 20th century and numerous memorials worldwide have been dedicated to him, including one at Whitby in North Yorkshire, where Cook served as a merchant navy apprentice.
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).