June 1st "2024" Daily Prep

Welcome to day 153, known as National Olive Day, National Barefoot Day. If you were born on this day, you were likely conceived the week of September 8th in the previous year. Your star sign is Gemini and your birthstone is Pearl.
Gordon Richards became the first jockey to be knighted. Six days later he won the Derby at his 28th attempt. On This Day in 1977 and 1983, Lester Piggott won his eighth and ninth Derbys.
1953 – Gordon Richards became the first jockey to be knighted. Six days later he won the Derby at his 28th attempt. On This Day in 1977 and 1983, Lester Piggott won his eighth and ninth Derbys.
Todays birthdays
1937 – Morgan Freeman (87), American actor (The Shawshank Redemption, Seven, Invictus, Wanted), born in Memphis, Tennessee, United States.
1946 – Brian Cox (78), Scottish actor (Braveheart, Troy, Prisoner’s Daughter, The Bourne Identity, Churchill), born in Dundee, Scotland.
1968 – Jason Donovan (56), Australian actor (Neighbours) and singer (“Too Many Broken Hearts”), born in Melbourne, Australia.
1974 – Alanis Morissette (50), Canadian singer/songwriter (“Hand in My Pocket”, “Ironic”, “You Oughta Know”), born in Ottawa, Canada.
1996 – Tom Holland (28), English actor (Uncharted, Spide-Man: Homecoming, Spider-Man: No Way Home, The Impossible), born in Kingston upon Thames.
Famous deaths
1999 – Christopher Cockerell (b. 1910), English engineer, inventer of the hovercraft.
2008 – Yves Saint Laurent (b. 1936), French fashion designer, founded Saint Laurent Paris.
The day today
1938 – The Bren gun was issued to the armed forces service. The name was derived from Brno, the Czech town where it was first made, and Enfield, where it was made in Britain.
1939 – The sinking, during sea trials, of HMS Thetis, in Liverpool Bay. It was the Royal Navy’s worst ever submarine disaster and 99 men lost their lives when the torpedo officer opened the test cocks on the torpedo tubes to add weight to the submarine as it was having difficulty diving. In the confusion, the inner door was then also opened and the inrush of water caused the submarine to sink to the seabed. Oxygen on board was quickly running out, levels of carbon dioxide became dangerously high and after 50 hours trapped inside their metal tomb, 99 died of carbon dioxide poisoning. Rescuers could have saved the crew by cutting air holes through the hull when it was resurfaced, but the Admiralty refused, because the submarine would have been permanently weakened.
1968 – Britain and Iceland signed a formal end to the ‘Cod War’ over fishing rights in the North Sea.
1974 – The Heimlich Maneuver was published in an informal article “Pop Goes the Cafe Coronary”, for the first time. The life-saving maneuver to rescue choking victims was invented by Henry Heimlich, the technique’s namesake.
2020 – The meteorological office announced that 2020 had been the sunniest spring on record for the UK and the driest May on record in England for 150 years. Wales reported its driest May since 1896, although Scotland saw near average rainfall.
Today in music
1959 – The first edition of Juke Box Jury aired on the BBC. The shows host, David Jacobs, lead a revolving panel of guests in critiquing the week’s top record releases. Although the songs were never played in their entirety, the four judges gave a verdict on whether each would be a “hit” or a “miss”.
1961 – Elvis Presley was at No.1 on the UK singles chart with ‘Surrender’, his eighth UK No.1. The song was based on the 1911 Italian song, ‘Return To Sorrento.’
2005 – Crazy Frog was at No.1 on the UK singles chart with ‘Axel F’. It started as a mobile phone ring tone, the single is based on Harold Faltermeyer’s film theme, which reached No.2 in 1985.
2006 – The 1994 debut album by Oasis, Definitely Maybe was voted the greatest album of all time in a survey to mark 50 years of the Official UK Albums Chart. The Beatles came in second and third place with Sgt Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band and Revolver, OK Computer by Radiohead was fourth and (What’s the Story) Morning Glory by Oasis was voted fifth.
2016 – Ed Sheeran was revealed as the most-played pop act in the UK in 2015. The singer topped the music royalty body Phonographic Performance Ltd’s (PPL) chart, which is based on TV and radio airplay, adverts and plays in venues like pubs and clubs. Mark Ronson’s ‘Uptown Funk’ was the most-played song of the year, ahead of Ellie Goulding’s ‘Love Me Like You Do’ and James Bay’s’Hold Back The River’.
Today in history
1495 – Friar John Cor recorded the first known batch of Scotch whisky in Lindores Abbey, Fife.
1533 – Anne Boleyn, Henry VIII’s new queen, was crowned at Westminster Abbey.
1648 – The Roundheads defeated the Cavaliers at the Battle of Maidstone in the Second English Civil War.
1670 – Charles II of England and Louis XIV of France signed the Secret Treaty of Dover. As a part of the treaty’s terms, Charles II was to convert to the Roman Catholic Church and send troops and ships to France’s aid in its war against the Dutch Republic. In return, Charles II received a yearly pension from France and a promise of aid if he was faced with a rebellion.
1879 – The death of Napoléon, Prince Imperial (also known as Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte), the last dynastic Bonaparte. After his father was dethroned in 1870, he relocated with his family to England and served with British forces in the Anglo-Zulu War. He was killed in a skirmish with a group of Zulus and is buried in Farnborough, Hampshire. His death destroyed the hope for the restoration of the House of Bonaparte to the throne of France.