Why everyone’s talking about...
June 21
THERE are 113 days to go until we are due – if not hopefully earlier – to be released from the final restrictions of lockdown. But what else is special about June 21?
IT’S the summer solstice – the longest day of the year – so maximum daylight to enjoy our restored freedoms.
And who’ll celebrate the most?
Maybe the birthday boys and girls including Prince William (39), Kinks frontman Ray Davies (77), novelist Ian McEwan (73), Margaret Thatcher’s press secretary Bernard Ingham (89), French football hero Michel Platini (66), singer Lana Del Rey (36), former Defence Secretary Malcolm Rifkind (75), and St Paul’s Cathedral (346, counting from the day its first foundation stone was laid).
Did any other significant events happen on previous June 21s?
Evita, with Elaine Paige, opened on June 21, 1978; the first 12-inch LP record was launched in 1948 (a Mendelssohn concerto); and Wimbledon was first televised in 1937. On
June 21, 1919, the Germans deliberately sank their captured fleet at Scapa Flow in the Orkneys. The nine German sailors who died in the scuttling were the last casualties of the First World War. And, in 1377, Edward III died of a stroke in Sheen, aged 64, and was succeeded by his ten-year-old grandson, Richard II.
Any other causes to celebrate?
It’s International Surfing Day, dude, International Yoga Day ( on this matter, the gurus are not flexible) and Martyrs’ Day in Togo. If campaigners have their way, it will be a one- off UK bank holiday, too. A petition to declare Monday, June 21 Merriweather Day to make it easier to meet friends and family has 38,000 signatures on the Parliament website – if it gets more than 100,000, the Government will respond. In what might be a better idea, one leading PR firm is to close its offices on Tuesday, June 22, so staff don’t have to worry about work after partying the night before.
If I’m feeling devout instead?
Celebrate the feast day of St Aloysius of Gonzaga, an Italian aristocrat who died on June 21, 1591… of the plague he contracted after breaking ‘lockdown’ orders to visit the sick.