LOSE YOURSELF IN 1988

OUT FOR THE POUND

The Bank of England one pound note ceased to be legal tender in March 1988, although no new ones had been printed since December 1984. There had been one pound notes around since 1797 albeit with a break between 1826 and 1914, but the decision was taken in 1981 to introduce a one pound coin instead (which came out in 1983). Thanks to inflation, it had become too expensive to print a low value currency that only had a lifespan of around nine months, plus the growth in automatic vending machines had also led to calls for coinage more substantial than 50p. The last notes, known as the Series D, had debuted in February 1978 with HM the Queen on the front and Sir Isaac Newton on the reverse. The Bank of England will still exchange one pound notes for their face value, but you’d make far more by selling them privately these days.

COMIC TRAGEDIES

Britain lost two of its best-loved comedy actors during 1988. 62-year-old Carry On star, Kenneth Williams, was found dead of an overdose of barbiturates in April; it was unclear if this was intentional or accidental although people have long since elected to draw their own conclusions from the last entry in his diary, which read: ‘Oh, what’s the bloody point?’ Then Roy Kinnear also passed away in September, aged just 54. He was filming Richard Lester’s The Return of the Musketeers in Spain, reprising his role as Planchet from previous Musketeer movies, when he fell from his horse and suffered a broken pelvis and internal bleeding. He died the following day from a heart attack attributed to his injuries. A stand-in took his role on, was filmed from behind and his lines dubbed by a voice artist. His family received a payout of £650,000 in 1991 after it was ruled that safety corners had in fact been cut on set in order to save money and time.