ON THIS DAY

FROM THE DAILY MAIL ARCHIVE

AUGUST 6, 1966 THE Beatles’ manager, Mr Brian Epstein, is to ask for special protection for the group when they begin their 14-city tour of America. He said the present campaign against them might provoke someone to take a shot at the pop stars. DJs burned Beatles records after John Lennon was quoted as saying: ‘We’re more popular than Jesus now.’ AUGUST 6, 1968 CASH from the £2.6 million Great Train Robbery in 1963 has financed the purchase of blocks of luxury flats in London and pubs in the Home Counties. Detectives were given details of the investments by an underworld informant — and they are now examining deeds of the contracts.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

GERI HORNER (nee Halliwell), 46. The Watfordborn former Spice Girl was long thought to have pinched the Prince of Wales on the bottom in 1997 when she told him he was ‘very sexy’. However, Geri (pictured) recently claimed she only ‘patted it’, adding: ‘It was against royal protocol.’ When she left the band, Charles sent a letter saying: ‘What will I do without your wonderfully friendly greeting?’ DAME BARBARA WINDSOR, 81. The 4ft 10in Carry On and EastEnders actress, whose Alzheimer’s diagnosis was revealed in May, was born Barbara Ann Deeks, but adopted her stage name in 1953 after being inspired by the Queen’s coronation. In her memoir, All Of Me, she revealed she’d had five abortions, three in her 20s and the last when she was 42. She has said she never regretted not having children. ‘I consider myself to be a warm and lovely person, but I never had any maternal feelings.’

BORN ON THIS DAY

LUCILLE BALL (19111989). The U.S. actress, comedian and producer (pictured), once known in Hollywood circles as the ‘queen of the Bs’ for her starring roles in Forties B-movies, became a household name in the Fifties with her self-produced TV sitcom, I Love Lucy, alongside husband Desi Arnaz. The day after they filmed their last episode together, she filed for divorce, saying married life with Desi was ‘a nightmare’ and nothing at all as it appeared on I Love Lucy.

ON AUGUST 6…

IN 1945, the U.S. dropped the first atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima.

IN 1964, while studying to determine its age, Donald Rusk Currey felled a tree that turned out to be the oldest ever discovered at that time. The Great Basin bristlecone pine, in Nevada, was at least 4,862 years old.

WORD WIZARDRY

GUESS THE DEFINITION: Zograscope (1784) A) An hour-glass. B) A magnifying glass. C) A lens and mirror on a wooden stand. Answer below

PHRASE EXPLAINED

Across the board: Meaning everyone within an organisation. From a racing term to denote a bet in which equal amounts are staked on the same horse to come in first, second or third in a race; the board was a blackboard on which bookies chalked up their odds.

QUOTE FOR TODAY

If yoU are always trying to be normal, you will never know how amazing you can be. Maya Angelou, poet and civil rights activist (1928-2014)

JOKE OF THE DAY

I USED to be addicted to the hokey-cokey. But I’ve turned myself around — and that’s what it’s all about! Guess The Definition answer: C