ON THIS DAY

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

● 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.

● 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-waitinglineswereintroduced to British streets – along with fines for those flaunting them.

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

● 1963: The first 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.

● 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; James Bolam, actor, 85; Joyce Carol Oates, novelist, 82; Simon Williams, actor, 74; Ian Buchanan, actor, 63; Eddie Cibrian, actor, 47; Joe McElderry, singer/former X Factor winner, 29.