ON THIS DAY

■■1880: The distinctive Salvation Army ladies’ bonnets were worn for the first time in a procession in Hackney, in the East End of London.

■■1890: Stan Laurel, of the Laurel and Hardy comedy duo, was born in Ulverston, Lancashire (now Cumbria), as Arthur Stanley Jefferson.

■■1904: The novel Ulysses by James Joyce is set on this day, now celebrated in Dublin - where the novel is based - as Bloomsday, after the leading character Leopold Bloom.

■■1930: Mixed bathing was first allowed in the Serpentine in London’s Hyde Park.

■■1948: The Cathay Pacific Airways Catalina flying boat Miss Macao, on a flight to Hong Kong, was the first aeroplane to be hijacked, by a gang of Chinese bandits.

■■1958: The notorious yellow no-waiting lines were introduced to British streets.

■■1961: Soviet ballet dancer Rudolf Nureyev defected to the West at Paris airport.

■■1963: The first-ever woman astronaut, Valentina Tereshkova, blasted off in the Soviet spacecraft Vostok 6.

■■1976: The people of the black township of Soweto near Johannesburg rebelled against enforced teaching of Afrikaans in their schools. More than 1,000 people died before security forces crushed the uprising.

■■1989: The 16th century Rose Theatre in south-west London was covered with protective sand ready for a 10-storey office block to be built above it.

■■ON THIS DAY LAST YEAR: Scientists revealed they’d developed a hair-sized probe to help measure tissue damage deep in the lung.

■■BIRTHDAYS: Eileen Atkins, actress, 86; Joyce Carol Oates, novelist, 82; James Bolam, actor, 85; Simon Williams, actor, 74; Ian Buchanan, actor, 63; Simon Khan, golfer, 48; Eddie Cibrian, actor, 47; Joe McElderry, singer/former X Factor winner, 29.