ON THIS DAY
September 10, 2020
FROM THE DAILY MAIL ARCHIVE
SEPTEMBER 10, 1979 FILM stuntman Stan Barrett yesterday claimed the unofficial world land-speed record by driving his rocket-shaped car at 638mph. The 40ft-long 48,000hp threewheeler hurtled across Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah, U.S., just before 8am. Now the aim of Barrett, 36, is to break the sound barrier — 740-750 mph — on land. [He did, later that year, at an estimated 739.666mph.] SEPTEMBER 10, 1982 THE Prime Minister’s revelation that she needs to sleep only four or five hours a night was no surprise to sleep expert Jim Horne. He told the British Association for the Advancement of Science in Liverpool yesterday that Mrs Thatcher is right, unlike the rest of us who doze more due to habit.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
GUY RITCHIE, 52. The Hertfordshire-born director of Lock, Stock And Two Smoking Barrels, right, was married to Madonna from 2000 to 2008 and inspired Robbie Williams’ song She’s Madonna. When he bought a London pub locals feared it would change too much, but one said: ‘The whispers about the new landlord mean we could be drinking next to the Beckhams, which is enough for us.’ CHRIS COLUMBUS, 62. The U.S. filmmaker, who directed Home Alone and the first two Harry Potter films named his dog Gizmo after a creature in 1984’s Gremlins, for which he wrote the screenplay. A miner’s son, he wrote his first script while working in a factory, ‘writing between giant rolls of aluminium, hiding from my foreman. It was pure incentive to get the hell out of there.’
BORN ON THIS DAY
ADELE ASTAIRE (18961981). The American dancer, right, starred in 11 musicals with younger brother and dance partner, Fred (before he found fame with Ginger Rogers). Early on, a theatre manager said: ‘The girl seems to have talent, but the boy can do nothing.’ She quit Hollywood in 1932 to marry first husband Lord Cavendish. During World War II, Astaire worked at the Rainbow Corner Red Cross club in London, where she would sometimes dance with GIs. ELSA SCHIAPARELLI (1890-1973). The Rome-born fashion designer dressed everyone from Greta Garbo to Mae West and designed gowns and accessories with surrealist Salvador Dali. As a child, angry she could not join her parent’s dinner party, she opened a jar of fleas under the table. yves Saint Laurent said Schiaparelli ‘trampled down everything that was commonplace... Her imagination was boundless.’
ON SEPTEMBER 10 . . .
IN 1967, Gibraltar voted to remain a British territory rather than become part of Spain. IN 1973, the BBC banned Rolling Stones’ song Star Star — from album Goats Head Soup, reissued last week — for obscenity.
WORD WIZARDRY
GUESS THE DEFINITION: Mote (c1000)
A) Speck, often of dust.
B) Windward side of a hedge.
C) A cavity.
Answer below
PHRASE EXPLAINED
There’s more than one way to skin a cat: Meaning many paths can be taken to reach the same end; coined in the 1800s.
QUOTE FOR TODAY
The first symptom of true love in a young man is timidity; in a young woman, it is boldness.
French author Victor Hugo (1802-1885)
JOKE OF THE DAY
DID you hear about two radio engineers who got married? The reception was fantastic.
Guess The Definition answer: A.