ON THIS DAY

IT’S DAY 238 . . .

SEAN Shannon, a Canadian businessman, holds the record for performing Hamlet’s ‘To be or not to be’ soliloquy in the fastest time — 23.8 seconds. An MRI scan showed his ability may be due to him using more areas of his brain than the average person. BEAU BRUMMELL — trendsetter, friend of the Prince Regent and the man credited with inventing long trousers — was born 238 years ago. until the early 19th century, breeches, which extended to just below the knee, were the standard garment for gentlemen. The fad for longer trousers was not welcomed by all. Trinity College Cambridge said that any student wearing them would be regarded as absent, while the clergy of Sheffield were warned: ‘under no circumstances whatsoever shall any preacher who wears trousers be allowed to occupy a pulpit.’

THERE ARE 128 DAYS LEFT

THE first driver’s licence was issued 128 years ago. engineer Karl Benz (right), who set up Mercedes-Benz, had received complaints from residents in Mannheim about the noise and smell from his ‘Motorwagen’, so he wrote to the authorities to request written permission to use public highways, which was granted in 1888.

AN ADVENTUROUS cat travelled 128 miles from Conwy valley in Wales to Brighouse, West Yorkshire. It transpired that 18-yearold George had gone to a nearby caravan park and secretly hitched a ride.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

SEAN CONNERY, 86. The James Bond actor posed nude for a life drawing class at edinburgh College of Art in 1951 — a fact only revealed in 2010 when one of the students’ paintings came to light. The onetime bodybuilder was a milkman, a lorry driver, a labourer and a coffin polisher before getting his break as a chorus boy in a production of South Pacific.

Rev star Tom Hollander, 49 (pictured). He shares a birthday with Simon McBurney, the actor who played his sharp-tongued Archdeacon in the sitcom. A stage manager once had to go to Hollander’s house, five miles from the theatre, when he didn’t turn up. He climbed a drainpipe to get in and shook him awake, saying: ‘Mr Hollander, this is your five-minute call.’

BORN ON THIS DAY

IVAN the Terrible (1530-1584). Russia’s first tsar once dressed an archbishop in bear skins and had him hunted to death by dogs, The tsar also killed his own son after they argued over Ivan’s daughter-in-law dressing immodestly.

JOHN BARDON (1939-2014). The actor, who played Dot Cotton’s husband Jim Branning in eastenders, was a driver shuttling tourists from Heathrow to their hotels when he got the role. He had a stroke in 2007, which was written into the script, and his last scenes were filmed in a care home. He didn’t regard himself as a soap star: ‘There’s no such bleedin’ thing,’ he said. ‘They all think they’re stars but they ain’t when they leave.’

ON AUGUST 25

IN 1944, Parisians cheered as Allied troops marched down the Champs elysee, ending four years of German occupation.

IN 1974, a Bristol woman failed for the second time to break the english record for travelling the longest distance fired from a cannon. Mary Connors, 21, said she hadn’t taken out insurance for the attempts, but had just ‘a few swimming lessons’.

QUOTE FOR TODAY

One never notices what has been done; one can only see what remains to be done.

Marie Curie, scientist (1867-1934)

JOKE OF THE DAY

WHAT do you call a man lying on your doorstep? Matt.