December 27th "2024" Daily Prep
Welcome to day 362 of the “leap” year! Known as National Fruitcake Day, Visit a Zoo Day. Your star sign is Capricorn and your birthstone is Blue Topaz.
1977 – Thousands of people flocked to UK cinemas to watch the long-awaited blockbuster, Star Wars. Sadly, Carrie Fisher also died on this day in 2016 of a sudden cardiac arrest.
Todays birthdays
1946 – Janet Street-Porter (78), English broadcaster (Loose Women, The F-Word), journalist (Daily Mail) and writer, born in Brentford, West London.
1952 – David Knopfler (72), British musician and co-founder of rock band, Dire Straits (“Sultans of Swing”, “Money for Nothing”), born in Glasgow, Scotland.
1960 – Maryam D’Abo (64), British actress (Helen of Troy), best known as Bond girl Kara Milovy in the 1987 James Bond film The Living Daylights, born in Hammersmith, London.
1981 – Javine [Dionne Hylton] (43), English singer, songwriter and represented the UK at the 2005 Eurovision Song Contest in Kyiv with “Touch My Fire”, born in Kensington, London.
1987 – Lily Cole (37), British model (Chanel, Cacharel) and actress (St. Trinian’s, Snow White and the Huntsman), born in Torquay, Devon.
Famous deaths
1994 – Fanny Cradock (b. 1909), English restaurant critic, television cook and writer.
2016 – Carrie Fisher (b. 1956), American actress (Princess Leia in the original Star Wars films), screenwriter, author, producer and speaker.
The day today
1904 – The original stage production of Peter Pan took place in London, England. Originally, Peter Pan was a play, not a novel. The novel adaptation came out later, in 1911.
1945 – The World Bank and International Monetary Fund were created with the signing of an agreement by 29 nations.
1978 – The Amundsen – Scott South Pole Station recorded a temperature of −13.6 °C (7.5 °F), making it the highest temperature ever recorded at the South Pole.
1984 – Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher was voted Woman of the Year, on Radio 4’s Today programme. According to a Gallup Poll she was the woman most admired by the American people; the third consecutive year that the ‘Iron Lady’ had received that honour.
1997 – Windsor Castle was reopened to the public following restoration work. 100 rooms of the palace were damaged in a fire in 1992.
Today in music
1986 – Jackie Wilson had the UK Christmas No.1 single with ‘Reet Petite’ two years after Wilson’s death, following its use in a commercial for Levi’s. Written in 1957 by Berry Gordy and Tyran Carlo, the success of the song helped Gordy fund the launch of Motown Records.
1997 – The Spice Girls went to No.1 on the UK singles chart with ‘Too Much’. The group set another new world record as their first six singles all made No.1.
2005 – It was announced that ‘Crazy Frog’ by Axel F was the best selling UK ringtone of 2005. ‘Tweet Tweet’ by Sweetie Chick was the second and ‘(Is This The Way To) Amarillo’ by Tony Christie and Peter Kay was the third biggest seller. The UK ringtone market was now worth more than double the value of the CD singles sales.
2008 – Taylor Swift started a seven-week run at No.1 on the US album charts with Fearless. The album was the best-selling album of 2009, making Swift, 18 at the time of the album’s release, the youngest artist to have the best-selling album of a calendar year. The album is certified diamond by RIAA and has sold over 7.18 million copies.
2021 – Adele was at No.1 on the album chart with her fourth studio album, 30. Its lead single, ‘Easy on Me’, topped the charts in over 20 countries and was the world’s best-selling album of 2021, selling a total of 5.5 million copies in less than two months of its release.
Today in history
1703 – Portugal and England sign the Methuen Treaty which allows Portugal to export wines to England on favorable trade terms.
1773 – The birth of Sir George Cayley, English pioneer of the study of aerodynamics. In 1853 he built the first successful glider to be flown by a man, his reluctant coachman! One of his later inventions was the caterpillar tractor.
1831 – English naturalist Charles Darwin sailed from Plymouth on board his ship, HMS Beagle. His scientific voyage of discovery lasted five years and led to the publication (in 1859) of his highly controversial book The Origin of Species which fuelled the ‘creation versus evolution’ debate. In recognition of Darwin’s outstanding work, he was buried in Westminster Abbey, next to his friend and eminent scientist John Herschel and close to Isaac Newton.
1836 – The worst ever avalanche in England occurs at Lewes, Sussex, killing eight people. A huge build-up of snow on a chalk cliff overlooking the town collapsed into the settlement 100 metres (330 ft) below, destroying a row of cottages.
1845 – Anesthesia is used for the first time in childbirth. Dr. Crawford W. Long, an American physician, gave ether to his wife during the birth of their second child. The event revolutionalised the use of anesthesia in medicine and surgery.