ON THIS DAY
FROM THE DAILY MAIL ARCHIVE MARCH 11, 1974
A PSYCHIATRIC clinic should be opened to treat filmgoers disturbed by The Exorcist and its distributors, Warner Brothers, should finance it from their ‘massive profits’, says the Festival of Light religious organisation. The film, about a girl possessed by the Devil, opens in London this week.
MARCH 11, 1988
THE Prince of Wales battled to rescue two friends after an avalanche in the Swiss Alps engulfed his skiing party yesterday. He dug with his bare hands at the snow, then wept on realising Major Hugh Lindsay, an ex-equerry to the Queen, was dead. He then led the successful rescue of Mrs Patti Palmer-Tomkinson [mother of late socialite Tara], who suffered serious leg injuries.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
JODIE COMER, 28. The Liverpool actress began her career at 13 in a radio play, later winning a Bafta as psychopathic Russian assassin Villanelle in the BBC’s Killing Eve. She attracted abuse online last year due to rumours that her American boyfriend was a Republican. Comer says her good skin is down to always washing her face at night ‘no matter how intoxicated you may be’.
RUPERT MURDOCH, 90. The Australianborn media mogul inherited his first newspapers age 22 from his journalist father and built up a $100billion business, including film, TV, cable and satellite services, plus book publishing. Lord Sugar said: ‘Who would I look up to? Certainly Rupert Murdoch comes top of the tree, simply because of his swashbuckling ways of doing things.’ The father of six, worth £17billion, is married to fourth wife, model Jerry Hall.
BORN ON THIS DAY
SIR MALCOLM CAMPBELL (1885-1948). The racing driver from Kent first broke the land speed record in 1924 at 146.16mph. His ninth and final land speed record saw him become the first to top 300mph. Between them, Campbell and his son Donald set ten speed records on land and 11 on water.
HELEN ROLLASON (19561999). The first woman to anchor BBC flagship sports show Grandstand started out as a PE teacher. Since her death from cancer, an annual Sports Personality of the Year Award is given in her honour for ‘outstanding achievement in the face of adversity’. Rollason said: ‘If ever you get cynical, look back and remember how people cared. I’ve seen how much my friends love me. I’m very lucky because most women don’t know that in all their lives, do they?’
ON MARCH 11 . . .
IN 1302, Romeo and Juliet married, according to the Shakespeare play. IN 1864, the Great Sheffield Flood killed at least 240 people and left more than 5,000 buildings under water after a dam burst.
WORD WIZARDRY
GUESS THE DEFINITION: Ha-ha (1710) A) Touch and go. B) A sunken fence or trench. C) Ill-balanced. Answer below
PHRASE EXPLAINED Clash of Titans:
A confrontation between two powerful adversaries; in Greek myth the Titans were giants who fought the Olympian gods but lost.
QUOTE FOR TODAY
All things truly wicked start from an innocence. Ernest Hemingway, U.S. writer (1899-1961)
JOKE OF THE DAY
HOW do you move a piece of furniture at the weather station? With four casters.
Guess The Definition answer: B.