ON THIS DAY
November 23, 2021
FROM THE DAILY MAIL ARCHIVE NOVEMBER 23, 1977
THe collection of gifts and greetings given to the Queen during Jubilee Year are to go on show to the public next month. The collection — on view at St James’s Palace — is a fascinating insight into how nations pay tribute to royalty. There are two human skulls and bird skulls from the Government and people of Papua, New Guinea.
NOVEMBER 23, 1990
BETRAYED and rejected by her party, Margaret Thatcher (right) gave up her power yesterday. She did so with the class that she alone of British politicians can produce. She announced her resignation as Prime Minister and then went to the Commons and defended her record with the speech of a lifetime.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
SUE NICHOLLS, 78. The actress from the West Midlands has played hairdresser Audrey roberts in Coronation Street for more than 40 years. She started out playing a waitress in Crossroads in the 1960s. Nicholls was married to actor Mark eden, who played Corrie villain Alan Bradley, until his death in January. KIRSTY YOUNG, 53. The Scottish journalist stood down as host of Desert Island Discs after 12 years in 2019, having taken a break due to fibromyalgia, a condition that causes pain all over the body. Young was one of Channel 5’s first newsreaders and said she met a producer at the launch party who asked: ‘Will you do it in that accent?’ I said, “It’s the only one I have.” ’
BORN ON THIS DAY
JOHN WALLIS (1616-1703). The ‘most influential english mathematician before the rise of Isaac Newton’ — according to Oxford university, where he was Savilian Professor of Geometry — introduced the infinity symbol. Wallis, who was ordained as a Church of england priest, published his last great work in his 70th year.
MARY SEACOLE (1805-1881). The nurse, born to a Scottish father and Jamaican mother in Kingston, tended soldiers alongside Florence Nightingale in the Crimean War, funding her own trip after being turned down by the War Office. She visited the battlefield to nurse the wounded, becoming known as ‘Mother Seacole’. She was voted the greatest black Briton in 2004.
ON NOVEMBER 23…
IN 1852, the first British pillar boxes opened for public use on Jersey.
IN 1975, rock band Queen (right) started nine weeks at number one with Bohemian rhapsody.
WORD WIZARDRY
GUESS THE DEFINITION: Hauberk (c. late 13th century) A) A crossbow. B) A lance. C) A piece of armour. Answer below. PHRASE EXPLAINED Give the seal of approval: refers to an action or statement that grants approval or an official acceptance; it derives from an advertising gimmick in ‘Good Housekeeping Magazine’, giving its so-called ‘seal of approval’ within the products’ packaging as an emblem to endorse it.
QUOTE FOR TODAY
How does a person feel when looking at the sky? He thinks that he doesn’t have enough tongues to describe what he sees. Umberto Eco, Italian writer (1932-2016)
JOKE OF THE DAY
MY PARENTS raised me as an only child. Which really upset my younger brother. Guess The Definition answer: C
OLD Etonian explorer Sir Ranulph Fiennes once lopped off two of his frostbitten fingers using a set of fretsaw blades to save himself a £6,000 surgery bill following a trip to the North Pole in 2000. And he’s showing similar determination to stay in shape as he approaches his ninth decade. ‘Now, aged 77, I have to do daily squats twice a day, and press-ups — 25 at a time.’ he says.