All hands on deck for fun
In May 1939, the Mediterranean Fleet was based in alexandria, Egypt. Prices ashore were high for food and drink, beds at reasonable prices could only be found in rather doubtful parts of the city and entertainment for ratings was nonexistent. The Fleet Club was established to satisfy these requirements.
The British admiralty bought the dilapidated Greek hospital near nabi Daniel Street. It was here that the cholera virus was first isolated by the German physician Robert Koch, with the help of alexandrian Greek doctors, during the epidemic of 1883.
The Rev alan Spender, chaplain of Destroyer Fleets, and Richard Dines MBE were given the task of running the club.
Volunteers helped to clear the building and establish bunks. When the fleet moved away during the winter of 1939, the club almost closed. But, just before Italy joined the war, in June 1940, the fleet returned in far greater numbers.
For the next three years, the club thrived: a 100-table restaurant was built, along with cafes, lounges, a general store, barber’s, shoe shop, shoe shine, billiard room, ballroom and garrison theatre.
The club struck deals with local hotels for cheap boarding and a 350-bed annexe was built at Rue Sesostris. The crowning glory was the summer and winter beer garden, which could hold 2,000 people.
The theatre and beer garden played host to famous entertainers of the day, including Wee Georgie Wood, George Formby, alice Delysia, Judy Shirley, Hazel Hughes, Geraldo and His Orchestra and the Palestine Symphony Orchestra.
The most memorable occasion was a visit by noel Coward days after the Italian surrender in September 1943.
He performed in the beer garden, singing Don’t Let’s Be Beastly To The Germans and raunchy variations on Cole Porter’s Let’s Do It, before leaping off the stage to be submerged under a sea of boisterous sailors. Winning the war would spell the decline of the club, however. By June 1944, the main fleet was stationed between algiers and Taranto and, by 1947, the club had closed. Stephen Yeats, Newcastle-upon-Tyne.
QUESTION I was surprised to learn that the hole in a Biro pen lid is a safety feature, not to prevent the ink drying out. What other items have a purpose of which we are not generally aware?
In THE Eighties, when my children were small, our cat liked to play with Bic pen tops, so they could often be found on the floor of our house.
as an engineer in risk assessment and safety, I felt that these would present a choking hazard to a small child, so I sawed off the ends to make them safer.
I discovered that Bic and other pen manufacturers were actually doing this themselves many years later.
a friend commented that he couldn’t find a steel tape measure without a loose hook at the end, thinking it was shoddy manufacturing. In fact, the hook is designed to move by an amount equal to its own thickness, so is accurate regardless of whether it is an inside or outside measurement.
Robert Wood, Belper, Derbys. OnLy the other day, I noticed the small arrow next to the fuel pump symbol on the instrument panel on my Honda CR-V. It indicates the side of the car where you fill up.
Tracy Gallier, Telford, Shrops. aS WELL as replacement buttons, some clothes come with a small piece of cloth. This is not designed for repairs, but so you can test that your detergent won’t damage the fabric.
Edna Small, Chorley, Lancs. MOST measuring tapes feature a small slot on the end hook.
If you’re measuring a flat surface and don’t have anyone to hold the other end of the tape, just hammer in a nail or insert a screw and hook the end of the tape on to it to get an accurate measurement.
If you’re measuring something and don’t have a pencil handy, you can use the serrated edge on the hook to make a mark by rubbing it back and forth.
Bob Simmons, Fareham, Hants. a STanDaRD railway platform has an overhanging lip, below which is a safety space where a person could shelter if they fell on the line in front of an approaching train.
But not all platforms have this safety feature. at Manchester’s Victoria station, for example, the new platforms for the Metrolink trams have vertical faces.
Brian M. Russell, Chadderton, Gtr Manchester. THE ridges on the edges of coins were the idea of Isaac newton, who spent 30 years as warden of the Royal Mint.
He recalled the plain-edged coins and re-issued them with milled edges to stop people shaving off bits to make new ones.
Today’s 5p and 10p coins continue to have these ridged edges.
Peter Cutter, London W4.
QUESTION Did Agatha Christie’s Hercule Poirot and Jane Marple ever meet?
FuRTHER to the previous answer, explaining why these characters never met in a novel, the only film featuring both Hercule Poirot and Jane Marple is The alphabet Murders, a version of Christie’s novel The aBC Murders.
Margaret Rutherford and Stringer Davis, her real-life husband and co-star in the Miss Marple films, make a cameo appearance when they bumble into Tony Randall’s Poirot while in the midst of one of their investigations.
Miss Marple and Poirot briefly stop to stare at each other, but carry on without acknowledging one another.
Ralph Ford, Axminster, Devon.
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