August 2nd "2024" Daily Prep

Welcome to day 215 of the year! Known as International Beer Day, Ice Cream Sandwich Day. If you were born today you were likely conceived the week of November 8th in the previous year. Your star sign is Leo and your birthstone is Peridot.
49 year old Stuart Kettell completed his challenge to push a Brussels sprout up Snowdon using his nose. It took him 3 days and he raised more than £6000 for Macmillan Cancer Support.
2014 – 49 year old Stuart Kettell completed his challenge to push a Brussels sprout up Snowdon using his nose. It took him 3 days and he raised more than £6000 for Macmillan Cancer Support.
Todays birthdays
1962 – Lee Mavers (62), English singer (The La’s – “There she goes”), songwriter and guitarist, born in Liverpool.
1976 – Sam Worthington (48), English actor (Terminator Salvation, Avatar, Clash of the Titans) born in Surrey.
1977 – Edward Furlong (47), American actor, (Terminator 2: Judgment Day, American History X) born in Glendale, California, United States.
1979 – Donna Air (45), English actress, television presenter (Byker Grove, The Big Breakfast) and media personality born in Newcastle upon Tyne.
1992 – Charli XCX (32), English singer-songwriter (“Boom Clap” – The Fault In Our Stars Soundtrack), born in Cambridge.
Famous deaths
2015 – Cilla Black, born Priscilla Maria Veronica White (b. 1943), English singer (“Anyone Who Had a Heart”, “You’re My World”) and television presenter (Blind Date).
The day today
1955 – The Space Race began between the two Cold War rivals, the USA and the USSR. Four days previously, the United States declared that it would send artificial satellites into Earth’s orbit. This prompted the USSR to announce that it would do the same, and the race began. The space race ended just shy of twenty years later when the Soviet Union collapsed. The newly-formed Russian Federation agreed to peacefully work on future space ventures with the United States and its allies.
1957 – The official Elvis Presley Fan Club was launched in the UK.
1973 – 51 people were killed when fire swept through the Summerland Amusement Centre at Douglas on the Isle of Man. It was one of the worst British peacetime disasters involving a fire since 1929 when the Glen Cinema in Paisley, Scotland caught fire. It killed 69 children and injured 40 others.
1989 – Trade restrictions between Britain and Argentina were lifted for the first time since the 1982 Falklands war.
2014 – 49 year old Stuart Kettell completed his challenge to push a Brussels sprout up Snowdon using his nose. It took him 3 days and he raised more than £6000 for Macmillan Cancer Support.
Today in music
1975 – The Eagles went to No.1 on the US singles chart with ‘One Of These Nights’, the group’s second US No.1 single and the first to chart in the UK where it peaked at No.23.
1986 – Peter Cetera started a two-week run at No.1 on the US charts with the theme from the film ‘Karate Kid II’, ‘The Glory Of Love’, it made No. 3 in the UK.
1986 – Chris de burgh was at No.1 in the UK with ‘The Lady In Red’, it was his first No.1 after twenty-four single releases, staying at the top of the charts for three weeks.
2000 – Liverpool music store Rushworth and Dreaper closed down after 150 years of trading. The store had become famous after supplying The Beatles and other Liverpool groups with musical instruments.
2019 – Ed Sheeran broke U2’s tour record when his Divide tour became the biggest, most attended and highest grossing tour of all time. By the time the tour ended he would have spent 893 days on the road, compared to the 760 days U2 toured.
Today in history
924 AD – The death, at Oxford, of Ælfweard of Wessex, who was briefly King of the Anglo-Saxons. Ælfweard died only 16 days after his father and was buried at the New Minster, Winchester.
1100 – King William II of England, (often known as William Rufus) son of William the Conqueror, was killed by an arrow while hunting in the New Forest after allegedly being mistaken for a deer. A stone known as the ‘Rufus Stone’, close to the A31 near the village of Minstead is claimed to mark the spot where William II fell was killed.
1610 – English explorer Henry Hudson sailed into what is now known as Hudson Bay in north eastern Canada, thinking that he had made it through the Northwest Passage and reached the Pacific Ocean.
1776 – The signing of the United States Declaration of Independence took place. On 4th July earlier that year the thirteen American colonies, then at war with Great Britain, regarded themselves as independent states, and no longer a part of the British Empire.
1865 – Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland by Lewis Carroll was published but was soon withdrawn because of bad printing. Only 21 copies of the first edition survived, making it one of the rarest 19th century books.