ON THIS DAY
1824: Work on John Rennie’s London Bridge began.
1909: “The world’s most beautiful store” opened in London’s Oxford Street. It was named after its American owner, Harry Gordon Selfridge.
1929: In Chicago, boogie-woogie pioneer Clarence ‘Pinetop’ Smith was killed as he sat at his piano, by a gunman’s bullet not intended for him. He was 24.
1932: The New BBC Dance Orchestra made its radio debut under the direction of Henry Hall.
1933: Hitler proclaimed the Third Reich, which he said would endure for a thousand years.
1937: America’s first central blood bank was set up.
1945: Album charts were first published in America, by Billboard, with the King Cole Trio number one.
1956: My Fair Lady opened on Broadway starring Julie Andrews and Rex Harrison. The title was adapted from the Cockney pronunciation of “Mayfair”.
1974: A federal grand jury concluded that President Nixon was involved in a conspiracy to cover up White House involvement in the burglary at the Democratic Party headquarters in 1972.
1984: Only 21 of Britain’s 174 coal mines were working as strikes against the Coal Board’s 5.2% pay offer and its pit-closure programme became official.
1990: Mikhail Gorbachev was elected executive president of the USSR.
ON THIS DAY LAST YEAR:
British food retailers began urging customers to shop responsibly as panic-buying ramped up.
BIRTHDAYS:
Judd Hirsch, actor, 86; Mike Love, singer (Beach Boys), 80; David Cronenberg, film director, 78; Sly Stone, musician, 78; Ry Cooder, rock singer, 74; John Duttine, actor, 72; Ben Okri, novelist, 62; Eva Amurri, actress, 36.