The Saturday briefing
IS THERE anything you are desperately yearning to know? Are there any pressing factual disputes you would like us to help resolve? This is the page where we shall do our best to answer any questions you throw at us, whatever the subject.
CAN you tell me what happened to Lieutenant Colonel Henry Blake, Corporal Radar O’Reilly and Major Frank Burns after they left M*A*S*H*? Why did they leave?
June Thompson, Newcastle-upon-Tyne I PRESUME you are asking what happened to the actors who portrayed those characters. One can only speculate about what the characters may have got up to after the series ended 35 years ago.
McLean Stevenson, who played Lt Col Blake, left M*A*S*H in 1975 to work on his own McLean Stevenson Show. It wasn’t a great success and he took part in a variety of series of which Hello Larry was the most successful. He died of a heart attack in 1996.
Gary Burghoff, who played Radar, left M*A*S*H in 1979. He appeared in a number of guest roles, a few films and a touring production of Neil Simon’s Last Of The Red Hot Lovers which visited more than 100 cities in 1999-2000.
In 2009, he published an autobiography with the title Gary Burghoff: To M*A*S*H And Back, My Life In Poems And Songs (That Nobody Ever Wanted To Publish!). He celebrated his 75th birthday this year.
Larry Linville, who played Frank Burns, left M*A*S*H in 1977 and went on to have a busy career in films, TV sitcoms and soap operas. He died aged 60 in 2000 after battling cancer for several years.
The TV series of M*A*S*H ran from 1972 until 1983, more than three times as long as the Korean War in which it was set.
MANY Remainers keep saying that the 2016 referendum to leave the EU was won by only four per cent. So what was the percentage by which Britain voted to go into the Common Market, as it then was, in 1975?
Sylvia Chapman, Swaffham, Norfolk IN 1975 we didn’t vote to go in but to stay in. We joined the European Economic Community under Edward Heath without a vote in 1973. Harold Wilson called a referendum two years later to see if we wanted to stay in.
The question asked was: “Do you think the United Kingdom should stay in the European Community (the Common Market)?” and more than 67 per cent voted yes, with almost 33 per cent saying no. The turnout was 64.6 per cent compared with 72.2 per cent in the recent referendum.
WITH rising surface temperatures resulting from global warming, is there a danger of the Earth’s tectonic plates expanding and increasing volcanic and earthquake activity at the more vulnerable places around the boundaries?
Allen Breeds, by email THERE is little doubt that a connection exists between the climate and movement of the tectonic plates that make up the Earth’s crust, but the motion of the plates seems to have a much stronger influence on climate than changes in climate have on the motion of the plates.
In the distant past, the tectonic plates grinding and slipping against one another caused huge releases of heat and energy and resulted in the formation of our mountain ranges.
The resulting changes had a massive effect on the climate in many regions of the world.
Volcanic eruptions and earthquakes caused by plate movement have also resulted in the release of vast amounts of carbon dioxide and other gases that lead to global warming.
On the other hand, there is evidence that the melting of glaciers at the end of the last ice age removed the weight of vast quantities of ice that had been keeping the tectonic plates in place, enabling them to move more freely again, bringing an increase in earthquakes and volcanic activity. Whether that is a danger in the current period of climate change is an open question. by SOME of the old black-andwhite films shown on TV are described as film noir. Can you explain what that means? Edmund Perks, Ivybridge, Devon THE term film noir, literally meaning black film but more accurately referring to the darkness of the plot, was first used in the mid-1940s to describe the genre of crime films in an understated, melodramatic style, usually accentuated by the use of black-and-white film.
The term was first applied to French and German film-making styles and it took a long time before Hollywood described some of their productions as film noir but from the 1970s onwards, the expression was backdated to some classic crime movies made in the US after the Second World War. WHY do archaeologists have to dig up the past? Where does the soil they dig through come from? John Rice, Bucknell, Shropshire ALL that soil comes from a variety of sources. Here are three that contribute to the burying of the past.
Civilisation and decay: towns and cities are built on firm, flat foundations. Buildings crumble, plants die, rubbish accumulates, and it all goes on top of what was there before. Eventually a new city is built, leaving the detritus below.
Weather: sand and dust is carried by the rain and wind and deposited on top of what is there already. Saharan sand is blown as far as northern Europe and even America.
Space: around 10,000 tons of meteorite dust falls on the Earth every year.
All this results in the Earth growing thicker. It’s a very slow process, but it all adds up and in 1,000 years or more, the dirt, dust and detritus preserves our past and hides it from all but the most determined archaeologists.
CAN you tell me how a fortnight got its name?
C Pope, Isle of Wight BACK in the 11th century or earlier, the speakers of Old English called it “féowertýne niht” meaning fourteen nights. Over time, the “n” of “fourteen” blended with the “n” of night, and we were eventually left with “fortnight”.
Over the same period, we also lost the word “sennight” (seven nights), which was an alternative way of saying a week.
DOES the Sun rotate about its axis?
A Unthank, Burnley, Lancashire THE short answer it that it does but the rotation is not nearly as uniform as that of the Earth. A point on the Sun’s equator takes between 24 and 25 days to move round the Sun and return to its original position but near the pole the rotation period, amazingly enough, is about 38 days.