Welcome to day 247 of the year! Known as Macadamia Nut Day, Eat An Extra Dessert Day, National Wildlife Day and Newspaper Carrier Day. If you were born on this day, you were likely conceived the week of December 12th 2022 and your star sign is “Virgo”.
1965 – The Who’s van containing £5,000 worth of equipment is stolen from outside Battersea Dogs Home while the band are inside buying a guard dog.
Todays birthdays
1941 – Joanna Van Gyseghem (82), British actress (Rumpole of the Bailey, Duty Free). Born in Royal Tunbridge Wells.
1974 – Carmit Bachar (49), American dancer, choreographer and singer (Pussycat Dolls). Born in Los Angeles, California, United States.
1975 – Mark Ronson (48), a British musician, DJ, record producer, songwriter and remixer. He is best known for his collaborations with artists such as Amy Winehouse, Lady Gaga, Adele, Lily Allen, Duran Duran, Robbie Williams, Miley Cyrus, Queens of the Stone Age, and Bruno Mars. Born in St John’s Wood, London.
1981 – Beyoncé (42), American singer (Halo, Beautiful Liar, Single Ladies), songwriter, and businesswoman. Born in Houston, Texas, United States.
1990 – James Bay (33), English singer-songwriter and guitarist. In 2014, he released his single “Hold Back the River”, which was certified platinum, before releasing his debut studio album Chaos and the Calm. Born in Hitchin, Hertfordshire.
The day today
1909 – The first Boy Scout rally was held at Crystal Palace, near London.
1955 – British TV newsreaders were seen in vision for the first time. The first was the BBC’s Kenneth Kendall.
1981 – The start of the Greenham Common peace protest outside the US Air Force base in Berkshire. The protest lasted for 19 years.
1998 – Google is incorporated by Stanford University students Larry Page and Sergey Brin.On the same day, the quiz show ‘Who Wants To Be A Millionaire’ begins on ITV.
2006 – Australian naturalist and TV personality Steve Irwin is killed aged 44 by a stingray while filming.
Today in music
1976 – The Bee Gees went to No.1 on the US singles chart with ‘You Should Be Dancing’, the group’s third US No.1, a No.5 hit n the UK. It was this song that launched the trio into Disco stardom and is the first chart-topper in which Barry Gibb used his now-trademark falsetto.
1982 – Survivor were at No.1 on the UK singles chart with the theme from the film Rocky III ‘Eye Of The Tiger’, their only chart topper. Survivor won the Grammy Award for Best Rock Performance for the song.
1995 – Blur, Oasis, Radiohead, Paul Weller, Manic St Preachers and The Stone Roses all recorded tracks for the ‘War Child’ charity album, which was released five days later. All profits went to children caught up in the current war in former Yugoslavia.
2007 – The Police played the first UK date on their Reunion tour when they played two nights at the National Indoor Arena in Birmingham, England.
2022 – A US judge dismissed a man’s lawsuit against Nirvana over the band’s iconic 1991 album cover which showed him naked as a baby. Spencer Elden, 31, said his appearance on the front of the Nevermind record constituted child sexual abuse. But the judge said he had left it too late to claim he had been exploited. The lawsuit focused on a photograph of Mr Elden, which depicted him swimming naked in a pool towards a dollar bill pierced with a fish hook.
Today in history
1666 – The most destructive damage from the Great Fire London occurs.
1874 – New Caledonia is first sighted by Europeans, during the second voyage of Captain James Cook.
1781 – Los Angeles is founded as El Pueblo de Nuestra Señora La Reina de los Ángeles (The Village of Our Lady, the Queen of the Angels) by 44 Spanish settlers.
1867 – Sheffield Wednesday Football Club are founded at the Adelphi Hotel in Sheffield becoming one of the first football clubs in the world.
1884 – Britain ends its policy of penal transportation to New South Wales, Australia.