On This Day

[Altobelli]

06 DECEMBER

The Feast day of Nicholas, popularly known as Santa Claus. He is the patron saint of children. The name Santa Claus is a phonetic alteration from the German Sankt Niklaus and the Dutch Sinterklaas.

1240 Mongols under Batu Khan occupy & destroy Kiev

1421 Henry VI, youngest King of England to accede the throne (at 296 days), was born.

1732 The birth of Warren Hastings, first Governor General of Bengal who established the foundations of British administration in India. He was impeached for corruption on his return to England in 1785, but was later acquitted.

1745 Charles Edward Stewart (commonly known as Bonnie Prince Charlie or The Young Pretender) and his army began their retreat from Derby during the second Jacobite Rising.

1768 The first edition of the Encyclopædia Britannica was published, in Edinburgh.

1865 13th Amendment of the United States Constitution is ratified, abolishing slavery

1888 The birth of William Thomson Hay (known as 'Will' Hay); English comedian, actor, film director and amateur astronomer. His half hour weekly Will Hay Programme began in August 1944, and was broadcast live from the Paris Cinema, which still exists in a basement just off Piccadilly Circus.

1897 The world's first fleet of motorised taxi cabs started operating in London.

1916 David Lloyd George became Prime Minister. He was born in Chorlton-on-Medlock, near Manchester, to Welsh parents, but the tiny village of Llanystumdwy was his childhood home. This building, in Llanystumdwy, is one of the very few museums in Britain which celebrates the life of a former Prime Minister.

1921 Irish independence was granted for the 26 southern states that became known as the Irish Free State. Six counties which formed Ulster (Northern Ireland) remained as part of the UK.

1963 English call-girl Christine Keeler, one of the models named in the scandal involving British Secretary of State for War John Profumo, was jailed for 9 months for perjury arising from the trial of an ex-boyfriend.

1975 The Balcombe Street siege in Central London was watched by millions on television. It ended when the four IRA gunmen, who had taken a couple hostage following a gun battle and chase, finally gave themselves up without a shot being fired.

1977 The birth of Andrew Flintoff, English and Lancashire cricketer. His nickname 'Freddie' or 'Fred' comes from the similarity between his surname and that of Fred Flintstone. He developed deep vein thrombosis after surgery to his knee and announced his retirement from all cricket on 16th September 2010.

1982 The 'Droppin Well' bombing: The Irish National Liberation Army detonated a bomb in Ballykelly, Northern Ireland, killing eleven British soldiers and six civilians.

1983 Surgeons successfully completed the first heart and lung transplant operation to be performed in Britain. Swedish journalist, Lars Ljungberg underwent the transplant, receiving the organs of a woman from the south of England who had died the previous day.

1994 The Queen gave the go ahead for oil drilling to take place in the grounds of Windsor Castle. The move came after studies showed there could be up to £1bn of oil lying beneath the castle.

1998 Hugo Chávez is elected President of Venezuela

2005 David Cameron beat David Davis to the leadership of the Conservative Party.

2006 NASA reveals photographs taken by Mars Global Surveyor suggesting the presence of liquid water on Mars

2012 The SA Agulhas set off from London on the start of the world’s first ever attempt to cross the Antarctic in winter. On 25th February 2013, Sir Ranulph Fiennes had to pull out of the expedition due to frostbite. On 18th June 2013, after encountering a crevasse field extending up to 60 miles, with temperatures close to -90c and operating in near permanent darkness the team officially halted its mission and decided to focus only on scientific experiments.

2013 Communities on the east coast of England began assessing the damage caused by the previous night's worst tidal surge for 60 years. Thousands had abandoned their homes, 1,400 properties were flooded and seven cliff-top homes collapsed into the sea at Hemsby - Norfolk. It was the start of a winter of severe floods and storms that affected many parts of Britain. These show severe cliff erosion at Skipsea Sands in East Yorkshire.

2015 Exactly two years later, communities in Cumbria and the Scottish Borders began assessing the damage caused by the previous night's rain storms that broke river banks and flooded properties in towns and villages, including Appleby, Cockermouth, Keswick and Hawick. Residents were evacuated from their homes and all trains between England and Scotland were cancelled. This new addition to the garden wall at a house in Appleby, on the banks of the River Eden, gives an indication as to river level.

Famous Birthday's

Jean Eugène Robert-Houdin
(1805 - 1861)

John Singleton Mosby
(1833 - 1916)

Agnes Moorehead
(1900 - 1974)

Famous Deaths

Jefferson Davis
(1808 - 1889)



Werner von Siemens
(1816 - 1892)

Honus Wagner
(1874 - 1955)

Tunku Abdul Rahman
(1903 - 1990)



Roy Orbison
(1936 - 1988)

Famous Weddings

1491 King Charles VIII of France marries Anna of Bretagne

1930 Pablo Neruda marries Marie A Hagenaar Vogelzang in Batavia

1941 King Leopold of Belgium marries Lilian Baels

1962 Actor Sean Connery (32) weds actress Diane Cilento on Gibraltar

1975 US Senator Bob Dole (52) weds former senator Elizabeth Hanford (39)

Famous Divorces

1938 Actress Bette Davis (30) divorces musician Harmon Nelson (31) due to cruel and inhuman manner after more than 6 years of marriage

1982 US Senator Ted & Joan Kennedy divorce

1988 Actor and comedian Robin Williams (37) divorces Valerie Velardi after 10 years of marriage

[Altobelli]

09 DECEMBER

536 Byzantine General Belisarius enters Rome while the Ostrogothic garrison peacefully leaves the city, returning the old capital to its empire.

1212 Frederick II (later also Holy Roman Emperor) crowned King of Germany in Mainz

1608 The birthday of John Milton, English poet, in Cheapside, London. His works included Paradise Lost, Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes.

1783 The first executions took place at Newgate Prison.(now the site of the Central Criminal Court aka the Old Bailey), Prior to this, public executions were carried out at Tyburn gallows, which involved carting the prisoners from Newgate Prison through the crowded streets.

1854 Lord Tennyson's poem, Charge of the Light Brigade was published. The Charge of the Light Brigade had been led by Lord Cardigan against Russian forces during the Battle of Balaclava on 25th October 1854 in the Crimean War. The poem emphasized the valour of the cavalry in carrying out their orders, even though they knew that blunders had been made by those in command. Quote from the poem - 'Theirs not to make reply, Theirs not to reason why, Theirs but to do and die: Into the valley of Death Rode the six hundred.'

1868 The first traffic lights are installed outside the Palace of Westminster in London. Resembling railway signals, they use semaphore arms and are illuminated at night by red and green gas lamps.

1902 The birth of Richard Austen (‘Rab’) Butler, progressive British Conservative politician born in India who was Minister of Education, Chancellor of the Exchequer, Home Secretary and Foreign Secretary but never the role he was most tipped for, that of Prime Minister. Instead he served no less than four Prime Ministers.

1934 Dame Judi Dench, actress, was born.


1936 Australia all out 58 v England, Bradman out for a duck

1941 China declares war on Japan, Germany & Italy

1941 Hitler orders US ships are to be torpedoed

1953 General Electric announces all Communist employees will be fired

1960 The first episode of Coronation Street was screened on ITV. It is the world's longest-running television soap opera. A closing date for conducted tours of 31st December 2015 has been confirmed as the site has been sold for redevelopment.

1967 Jim Morrison arrested on stage for disturbing the peace

1967 Nicolae Ceaușescu becomes President of Romania (overthrown 1989)

1968 NLS (a system for which hypertext and the computer mouse were developed) is publicly demonstrated for the first time in San Francisco.

1973 Talks on Northern Ireland ended in an historic agreement to set up a Council of Ireland. British Prime Minister Edward Heath, Irish premier Liam Cosgrave, and representatives of the Ulster Unionist Party, the Social Democratic and Labour Party and the Alliance Party of Northern Ireland, signed the agreement, at Sunningdale, in Berkshire.

1974 Johnson Grigsby freed after 66 years in jail in Indiana

1987 England's cricket tour in Pakistan hung in the balance as a row erupted between captain Mike Gatting and the umpire Shakoor Rana who accused Gatting of cheating.

1990 Lech Wałęsa wins Poland's 1st direct presidential election in Poland

1992 Operation Restore Hope - US Marines land in Somalia

1992 The separation was announced of the Prince and Princess of Wales (Prince Charles and Princess Diana). They married in 1981.

1995 British soldier, Sgt. Timothy Cowley, was freed by police, 119 days after being kidnapped by Colombian bandits.

1996 Horrett Campbell, 33, a paranoid schizophrenic who attacked three children and four women with a machete at an infant school teddy bears' picnic in July was found guilty of seven counts of attempted murder. The court was told that Campbell had imagined he heard the children at St Luke's infants school, in Blakenhall, Wolverhampton, taunting him when he walked past the playground.

1997 There were problems for Richard Branson in his attempt to fly around the world in a hot-air balloon when the envelope ( the balloon section) of his Virgin Global Challenger broke loose from the gondola and flew off on its own from Marrakech, Morocco.

2010 A car containing Prince Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall was attacked amid violence after MPs voted to raise university tuition fees in England. A window was cracked and their car hit by paint, but the couple were unharmed. In angry scenes, protesters battled with police in Parliament Square and were contained on Westminster Bridge for a time by officers.

2011 Prime Minister David Cameron insisted he put Britain's interests first by vetoing a new European Economic Treaty.

2012 The death of the British astronomer and broadcaster Sir Patrick Moore, aged 89. He was the presenter of the BBC's Sky At Night for over 50 years, from its first airing on 24th April 1957, making him the longest-running host ever of the same television show.

2014 A notebook which showed the early work of Welsh poet Dylan Thomas, was bought by Swansea University for £104,500. He had a long affinity with Laugharne, (Carmarthenshire) spending the last four years of his life in the Boathouse.

2014 A classic Winnie the Pooh illustration by EH Shepard, first published in 1928, sold at Sotherby's for £314,500.

Famous Birthday's

John Milton
(1608 - 1674)

Margaret Hamilton
(1902 - 1985)



Douglas Fairbanks Jr
(1909 - 2000)


Broderick Crawford
(1911 - 1986)

Grace Hopper
(1906 - 1992)

Kirk Douglas
100th Birthday

Judi Dench
83rd Birthday

Beau Bridges
73rd Birthday

Joan Armatrading
66th Birthday

John Malkovich
63rd Birthday

Donny Osmond
60th Birthday

Jermaine Beckford
34th Birthday

Famous Deaths

Ralph Bunche
(1904 - 1971)

1993 Danny Blanchflower, North Ireland footballer, coach, dies at 67

Archie Moore
(1913 - 1998)

Jenni Rivera
(1969 - 2012)

2012 Sir Patrick Moore, English amateur astronomer and author, dies from an infection at 89

Famous Weddings

1883 Poet Rabindranath Tagore (22) weds Mrinalini Devi in an arranged marriage

1956 NBA player Bill Russell (22) weds college sweetheart Rose Swisher

1956 Prime Minister of Australia Malcolm Fraser (26) weds Tamie Beggs (20)

1967 Lyndon B. Johnson's daughter Lynda marries in the White House

1983 Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany Willy Brandt weds Brigitte Seebacher

Famous Divorces

1929 Businessman Howard Hughes divorces 1st wife Ella Rice after 4 years of marriage

1937 Writer Walter Lippmann (48) divorces first wife Faye Albertson after 20 years of marriage

1982 Mary-Beth & William Hurt divorce

[Altobelli]

16 DECEMBER

755 An Lushan revolts against Chancellor Yang Guozhong at Fanyang, initiating the An Shi Rebellion during Chinese Tang Dynasty

1431 King Henry VI of England crowned king of France

1485 The birth of Catherine of Aragon, the first of Henry VIII’s wives. At the age of three, Catherine was betrothed to Prince Arthur, heir to the English throne, and they married in 1501, but Arthur died five months later. Catherine subsequently married Arthur's younger brother, the recently-succeeded Henry VIII, in 1509.She bore him six children but only one survived (Mary I), and Henry divorced her against the Pope’s wishes, in his pursuit for a male heir.

1598 Seven Year War: Battle of Noryang Point - in the final battle of the war Korean navy decisively defeats the Japanese

1653 Following the execution of Charles I, Oliver Cromwell failed to get the Parliament he wanted and became Lord Protector, turning himself into an uncrowned king for the next four years. He was buried in Westminster Abbey but after the Royalists returned to power, they had his corpse dug up, hung in chains, and beheaded.

1773 Taxes by Britain on tea and other commodities led Samuel Adams and 150 ‘Sons of Liberty’ disguised as Mohawk Indians to hold what became known as the Boston Tea Party. 342 tea chests worth £18,000 were tossed off Griffin’s Wharf into Boston Harbour. The War of Independence had begun.

1784 The birth at this house in Llanfihangel-y-pennant, near Dolgellau, of Mary Jones. At the age of 15 she walked twenty-six miles barefoot across the countryside to buy a copy of the Welsh Bible from Thomas Charles because she did not have one of her own. The walk inspired the founding of the British and Foreign Bible Society.

1775 The birth of Jane Austen, English novelist whose works of romantic fiction made her one of the most widely read writers in English literature. She was enthralled by Lyme Regis and collated material for her last novel Persuasion which was published posthumously and is said to be the most autobiographical of all her novels. Lyme Regis was probably less busy than this when she visited in 1804!

1882 Sir Jack Hobbs, renowned cricketer and the first of his sport to be knighted, was born. He played for Surrey from 1905 to 1934 and for England in 61 Test matches from 1908 to 1930. Hobbs is widely regarded as cricket's greatest-ever opening batsman and holds world records in first-class cricket for scoring the most runs and the most centuries.

1913 Charlie Chaplin began his film career at Keystone for $150 a week

1914 German warships attacked the seaside resort of Scarborough, believing it to be a major British port. Hartlepool and Whitby were also targeted. It was the first successful bombing on British shores for 250 years. Over five hundred shells of varying calibres were fired into Scarborough and on to the Grand Hotel. The attacks resulted in a total of 592 casualties, many of them civilians, of whom 137 died. There was public outrage towards the German navy for an attack against civilians and against the Royal Navy for its failure to prevent the raid.

1916, A public display of Baden Powell's new book 'The Wolf Cub's Handbook' was held at Caxton Hall, Westminster, nine years after the foundation of his Boy Scouts Association.

1920 8.5 earthquake rocks the Gansu province in China, killing an estimated 200,000

1927 Cricket 1st-class debut of Don Bradman, NSW v South Australia

1929 Barnes Wallis saw his R100 airship carry out its first test flight. After departing from Howden in Yorkshire, she flew slowly to York then set course for the Government Airship Establishment at Cardington, Bedfordshire, cruising at around 50 mph on four engines.

1944 The Battle of the Bulge began in the Ardennes. By 21st January, the Germans had been pushed back to their original line, having lost some 120,000 men in the offensive.

1946 French fashion designer Christian Dior and his backer Marcel Boussac found fashion house Christian Dior

1966 Jimi Hendrix Experience releases its 1st single, "Hey Joe," in the UK

1969 MPs voted by a big majority for the permanent abolition of the death penalty for murder.

1969 "War is Over! If You Want It, Happy Christmas from John & Yoko" posters begin appearing

1971 Don McLean's 8+ minute version of "American Pie" released

1973 US kidnap victim John Paul Getty III freed after ransom paid by grandfather John Paul Getty

1977 The Queen unveiled the new underground link from central London to Heathrow; the first from a capital city to its major airport.

1979 4 British Army soldiers are killed by a PIRA landmine near Dungannon, County Tyrone. Another British Army soldier was killed by a PIRA landmine near Forkill, County Armagh

1985 John Gotti assumes leadership of New York's Gambino crime family after ordering the executions of Paul Castellano and Thomas Bilotti

1988 Junior Health minister Edwina Currie resigned after her earlier comments (3rd December) when she said that most of Britain's egg production was infected with the salmonella bacteria.

1994 Davy Jones (Monkees), charged with DWI

1995 The official adoption of the name "Euro"

1998 Iraq disarmament crisis: Operation Desert Fox - the United States and United Kingdom bomb targets in Iraq

1991 Britain named Stella Rimington as the first woman to head its security service, MI5.

1998 USA & Britain combined bombing attacks on Iraq after UN weapons inspectors were expelled from the country, contrary to assurances given by Saddam Hussein.

2001 Thousands of campaigners took to the streets of Edinburgh to protest against a bill to end hunting with dogs, the uncertain future of rural schools and the handling of the foot and mouth crisis. It was the largest demonstration of its kind ever witnessed in Scotland.

2012 Tour de France and Olympic time trial champion Bradley Wiggins was voted the 2012 BBC Sports Personality of the Year. At the same event Lord Coe, the Olympics 2012 chief, was awarded the BBC Lifetime Achievement Award.

2013 Figures showed that the UK paid more than £27m in aid to China last year. China, which has poured billions into its flagship space programme, has a GDP of £5.2 trillion compared with Britain’s £1.5 trillion.

2013 A Hillsborough pre-inquest hearing was told that a police video of the tragedy had an 'unexplained 10-minute gap in the middle'. New inquests into 96 fans’ deaths would commence in March 2014 and consider the emergency services' response for the first time.

2013 Lloyd’s of London appointed its first female Chief Executive, Inga Beale, who had three decades of international insurance and reinsurance experience.

2014 Bernard Manning, son of the controversial late comedian of the same name, said that he would put the 'World Famous Embassy Club' in Harpurhey, Manchester up for sale. The club was said to have inspired Peter Kay's TV show Phoenix Nights. The club features a mosaic of Mr. Manning senior, in which his ashes are mixed with the grouting.

Famous Birthday's

Catherine of Aragon
(1485 - 1536)

Ludwig van Beethoven
(1770 - 1827)


Jane Austen
(1775 - 1817)

Steven Bochco, (Producer Hill St Blues)
74th Birthday

Bobby George
72nd Birthday

Christopher Biggins
69th Birthday



Joel Garner
65th Birthday

Dennis Wise
51st Birthday

Famous Deaths



Wilhelm Grimm
(1786 - 1859)

Colonel Sanders
(1890 - 1980)

1976 George, a goose that lived to 49 years 8 months, dies



Lee Van Cleef
(1925 - 1989)

Famous Weddings

1944 Gen Eisenhower's clerk Rickey marries corporal Pearlie

1991 NBA center David Robinson (26) weds Valerie Hoggatt at a Baptist church ceremony in San Antonio, Texas

2000 Tennis player Todd Martin (30) weds Amy Martin in New Jersey

Famous Divorces

1809 Napoleon Bonaparte divorces Empress Joséphine by French Senate

1999 Actress Linda Hamilton (43) divorces director James Cameron (45) due to irreconcilable differences after 2 years of marriage

2005 American singer-songwriter and TV personality Jessica Simpson (25) divorces singer-songwriter Nick Lachey (31) due to irreconcilable differences

[Altobelli]

27 DECEMBER

1512 Spanish Crown issues the Laws of Burgos, governing the conduct of settlers with regards to native Indians in the New World

1657 Flushing Remonstrance petition signed in the Dutch colony of New Netherland protesting ban on Quaker worship

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. Darwin was born in Shrewsbury -

1836 At least 8 people were killed at Lewes, Sus***, in Britain's worst avalanche disaster.

1904 The first performance in London of James Barrie’s most famous work, Peter Pan. A Broadway production was mounted in 1905 and the play has since seen adaptation as a pantomime, a stage musical, a television special, and several films, including a 1924 silent film, a 1953 animated Disney full-length feature, and a 2003 live action production with state of the art special effects.

1918 A British sovereign welcomed an American President to Britain for the first time when King George V and Queen Mary met President and Mrs. Wilson at Charing Cross Railway Station and then escorted them to Buckingham Palace. A state banquet was held at the palace and President Wilson visited Carlisle, his mother’s home.

1927 Stalin's faction wins All-Union Congress in USSR, Trotsky expelled

1937 Mae West performs Adam & Eve skit that gets her banned from NBC radio

1939 Between 20,000 & 40,000 die in magnitude 8 quake in Erzincam, Turkey

1945 The World Bank and International Monetary Fund were created with the signing of an agreement by 29 nations.

1949 Queen Juliana of the Netherlands grants independence to Indonesia

1965 Thirteen people were killed when Britain's first North Sea drilling rig (Sea Gem) capsized.



1967 Leonard Cohen releases his debut album "Songs of Leonard Cohen" on Columbia Records

1975 The *** Discrimination and Equal Pay Acts came into effect in Britain.

1977 Thousands of people flocked to UK cinemas to watch the long-awaited blockbuster, Star Wars.

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.

1979 Soviet troops invade Afghanistan, President Hafizullah Amin overthrown

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.

1997 A leading protestant paramilitary, Billy Wright, was shot dead at the maximum security Maze prison in Northern Ireland. Wright was the leader of a dissident paramilitary group, the Loyalist Volunteer Force, one of several Protestant militias that wanted Northern Ireland to remain in British hands.

2003 The death of actor Alan Bates. He appeared in almost 70 films including the children’s story Whistle Down the Wind, the drama A Kind of Loving, Far From the Madding Crowd, Women In Love, Spartacus and The Fixer, which gave him an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.



2007 Former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto is assassinated by a suicide bomber.

2012 The death, at the age of 83, of Gerry Anderson, the creator of hit TV shows including Thunderbirds, Stingray and Joe 90. His other creations included UFO, Space: 1999, Supercar and Fireball XL5.

Famous Birthday's

Johannes Kepler
(1571 - 1630)

Louis Pasteur
(1822 - 1895)



Marlene Dietrich
(1901 - 1992)

1952 David Knopfler, British singer-songwriter (Dire Straits), born in Glasgow, Scotland
65th Birthday

Famous Deaths

Gustave Eiffel
(1832 - 1923)

Benazir Bhutto
(1953 - 2007)



2003 Alan Bates, English actor (b. 1934)

2007 Benazir Bhutto, former Prime Minister of Pakistan is assassinated at 54

Carrie Fisher
(1956 - 2016)

Famous Weddings

1925 Inventor George Gallup (24) weds Ophelia Smith Miller

1950 Actor Henry Fonda (45) weds socialite and third wife Susan Blanchard (22) in New York City

1953 Broadcasting pioneer Roone Arledge (22) weds Joan Heise at St. Frances de Chantal Parish in Wantagh, New York

1972 Actor Billy Dee Williams (35) weds Teruko Nakagami

2006 Supermodel Niki Taylor (31) weds NASCAR driver Burney Lamar (26) at The Grande Colonial Hotel in La Jolla, California

Famous Divorces

2011 "New Girl" actress Zooey Deschanel (31) divorces "Death Cab for Cutie" singer Ben Gibbard (35) due to irreconcilable differences

[Altobelli]

08 JANUARY

1800 London opened its first soup ******** for the poor.

1815 Britain lost the last battle it ever fought against the US in the War of 1812 when General Sir Edward Pakenham and his men were defeated at New Orleans.

1877 Crazy Horse and his warriors fight their last battle with the United States Cavalry at Wolf Mountain (Montana Territory).

1942 The birth of Stephen Hawking, possibly the most brilliant theoretical physicist since Albert Einstein. He wrote A Brief History of Time, which stayed on the British Sunday Times bestseller list for a record-breaking 237 weeks. His book sold at least 25,000,000 copies, was no doubt read by many thousands but maybe understood by only hundreds! In 2014 the film 'The Theory of Everything' was released. It dealt with his former wife's relationship with her ex-husband, his diagnosis of motor neuron disease, and his success in physics.

1966 The Who & the Kinks perform on the last "Shindig" TV show on ABC

1979 512 die as oil tanker Bantry Bay blows up

1982 Spain reopened the frontier of the British colony of Gibraltar. In return, Britain agreed to open negotiations on Gibraltar’s future, and ended its opposition to Spain joining the EEC.

1989 47 people were killed and over 80 injured when a British Midland 737-400 jet crashed on the M1 motorway. Remarkably nobody travelling on the motorway was hurt. The plane had developed a problem in its left engine shortly after it took off from Heathrow. The pilots mistakenly believed that the fault was in the right hand engine which they shut down, leading to the crash, just yards from the runway of East Midlands Airport.

2001 The High Court ruled that the identities and whereabouts of Robert Thompson and Jon Venables, who murdered toddler James Bulger in 1993 would be kept secret for the rest of their lives. Venables was subsequently returned to prison in March 2010 for other offences and it was decided that he would stay in prison 'for the foreseeable future', as he would be likely to reveal his identity if released. A mere 18 months later it was reported that the Parole Board for England and Wales had approved the release of Venables, who was subsequently released from prison on 3rd September 2013.

2015 Oldham Athletic abandoned a controversial attempt to sign the convicted rapist Ched Evans, claiming that a backlash from sponsors and death threats caused it to withdraw the offer.

Famous Birthday's

Elvis Presley
(1935 - 1977)

1941 Graham Chapman, English comedian (Monty Python's Flying Circus), born in Leicester, England (d. 1989)

Shirley Bassey
80th Birthday

Stephen Hawking
76th Birthday

Kim Jong-in
35th Birthday

David Bowie
(1947 - 2016)

Famous Deaths



Marco Polo
(1254 - 1324)



Galileo Galilei
(1564 - 1642)

Eli Whitney
(1765 - 1825)

1941 Robert Baden-Powell, British founder of the Boy Scout movement, dies at 83



2017 Peter Sarstedt, British musician (Where do you go to my lovely), dies at 75

Famous Weddings

1811 US Vice President John C. Calhoun (28) weds Floride Bonneau (19)

1930 Belgium Princess Marie-Jose marries Italian's crown prince Umberto

1951 Actor Burgess Meredith (43) weds ballerina Kaja Sundsten



1973 Actor Michael Caine (40) weds model Shakira Baksh (25) at Candlelight Wedding Chapel in Las Vegas, Nevada

2005 Rapper and actor Nas (32) weds R&B singer Kelis (25) at Morningside Baptist Church in Atlanta, Georgia

Famous Divorces

1499 Louis XII of France after papal divorce marries Anne, Duchess of Brittany to keep duchy for the crown

1998 Roseanne files for divorce from 3rd husband Ben Thomas

[Altobelli]

Nice Find 59_60

[Altobelli]

05 FEBRUARY

1782 The Spanish defeated British forces and captured the island of Minorca.

1788 The birth, in Bury, Lancashire, of Sir Robert Peel, the first commoner to become British Prime Minister, although he was hardly from humble beginnings, as his father was a cotton millionaire. This statue of Robert Peel (see ©BB picture) is in Bury. Peel was the founder of the Metropolitan Police, first nicknamed ‘Peelers’, then ‘Bobbies’, after his name.

1811 The Regency Act was passed in Britain, allowing Prince George of Wales to rule because his father, King George III, was considered insane. He later became George IV.

1840 The birth of Scottish vet. John Boyd Dunlop, inventor of the pneumatic bicycle tyre which he tested on his son's tricycle and patented in 1888. Two years after he was granted the patent, Dunlop was officially informed that it was invalid, as Scottish inventor Robert William Thomson had patented the idea in France in 1846 and in the US in 1847.

1852 The embankment of the Bilberry reservoir in West Yorkshire collapsed, releasing 86 million gallons of water down the River Holme and into Holmfirth, the location for the BBC's Last of the Summer Wine. It caused 81 deaths and is recorded as the 23rd most serious, worldwide, in terms of loss of life from floods and landslides.

1881 The death of Thomas Carlyle, Scottish philosopher and a satirical writer who was considered one of the most important social commentators of his time. He was born in Ecclefechan, Dumfriesshire.

1918 The SS Tuscania was torpedoed off the coast of Ireland by the German U-boat UB-77. She sank with the loss of 210 lives and was the first ship carrying American troops to Europe to be torpedoed and sunk.

1920 Founding of the RAF Training College at Cranwell, in Lincolnshire.

1924 The BBC time signals, ('pips' from Greenwich Observatory) broadcast on the hour, were heard for the first time.

1953 Sweets were taken 'off ration' in Britain, 8 years after the 2nd World War had ended.

1954 Britain opened its first atomic power station, at Harwell.

1958 Parking meters first appeared on the streets, in London's exclusive Mayfair district. The meters were first used in America in 1935.

1967 A ban by the Musicians' Union, 'in the cause of decency', stopped The Rolling Stones' latest record Let's Spend the Night Together, from being performed on television.

1968 Another trawler from Hull sank off the coast of Iceland. Over a period of three weeks 60 fishermen lost their lives in Iceland's worst storms since 1925.

1982 The small, independent Laker Airlines, created by former British pilot Sir Freddy Laker to cut prices and make air travel more accessible, collapsed with debts of £270m.

1993 In the Antarctic, British explorers Sir Ranulph Fiennes and Dr Michael Stroud broke the record for longest unsupported polar march.

1996 Two British supermarket chains (Safeway and Sainsbury) became the first to stock genetically modified food when they sold GM tomato puree.

1998 Prime Minister Tony Blair, announced that veteran US entertainer Bob Hope, who was born in England, would receive an honorary knighthood.

2004 Twenty-three Chinese people drowned when a group of 35 cockle-pickers were trapped by rising tides in Morecambe Bay, Lancashire.

2014 Overnight storms caused the loss of the sea wall and railway line at Dawlish, between Exeter and Cornwall. Around 30 residents had to be evacuated from their homes in the seaside town, while beach huts that once stood on the sea wall were destroyed. The line reopened on 4th April 2014, in time for the Easter holidays.

2016 The general release of "Dad's Army", based on the BBC television sitcom Dad's Army. Much of it was filmed in Bridlington Old Town and at North Landing, Flamborough.

2017 Heavy metal band Black Sabbath play their last concert in their home town Birmingham, England

Famous Birthday's

1920 Frank Muir, British comedian (d. 1998)

Sven-Göran Eriksson, Swedish football manager
70th Birthday

Cristiano Ronaldo
33rd Birthday

Neymar
26th Birthday

Famous Weddings

1826 Future US President Millard Fillmore (26) weds Abigail Powers (27)

1971 Actress Judi Dench (36) weds actor Michael Williams (35) at St Mary's Catholic Church in Hampstead, London

1990 Actor Rowan Atkinson (35) weds Sunetra Sastry in New York

2007 "Rudo y Cursi" Mexican actor Diego Luna (28) weds actress and model Camila Sodi (21) in Mexico City

Famous Deaths



Thomas Carlyle
(1795 - 1881)



George Arliss
(1868 - 1946)

Gnassingbé Eyadéma
(1935 - 2005)



2010 Ian Carmichael, British actor (Private's Progress, I'm All Right Jack), dies at 89