ON THIS DAY
FROM THE DAILY MAIL ARCHIVE
JULY 4, 1941 SOME public houses in London, owing to a shortage of beer, closed for all or part of yesterday for the first time in their history. In parts of the country they are closing from one to four days a week, or earlier at night.
JULY 4, 1958
ROGER BECKER, Britain’s No 2 tennis player, has withdrawn from the Davis Cup team to meet France because his fiancée — she will be his wife then — has been barred from staying in the same hotel during the match. He said: ‘I told the team captain I didn’t feel I could concentrate 100 per cent on the match if Shirley was staying in a different hotel.’ His fiancée, former air stewardess Miss Shirley Malkin, said: ‘Marriage is more important than tennis.’
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
JO WHILEY, 52. The Radio 2 DJ and Glastonbury presenter (pictured) had her own garden at this year’s Chelsea Flower Show. She says she prunes in a bra and shorts and that horticulture is ‘in my top three things I need to stay sane’. PAM SHRIVER, 55. The U.S. five-time Wimbledon doubles champion, who started playing tennis at age three, was married to former James Bond actor George Lazenby for six years. In divorce court documents in 2008, she claimed he was an abusive alcoholic and had threatened to kill her. He said she was addicted to a ‘nightly cocktail’ of painkillers and had driven their three children while high on drugs.
BORN ON THIS DAY
GERTRUDE LAWRENCE (1898-1952). The English actress was the first to play the lead role in Noel Coward’s Private Lives. Described as ‘Hollywood’s first man-eater’, her affairs included one with Yul Brynner, her co-star in Broadway musical The King And I. Her daughter said: ‘It makes me laugh when I keep hearing stories about my mother supposedly being a lesbian. She was the complete reverse.’ GLORIA STUART (1910-2010). The American actress starred in The Invisible Man in 1933 but is best remembered by modern filmgoers for her 1997 role in Titanic. She played the 101-year- old version of Kate Winslet’s character, Rose (pictured), becoming the oldest Oscar nominee for Best Supporting Actress.
ON JULY 4...
In 1865, Lewis Carroll’s Alice’s Adventures In Wonderland was first published.
In 1966, U.S. President Lyndon B Johnson signed the Freedom of Information Act into law. The UK would have to wait another 34 years for similar legislation.
In 1985, age 13, Ruth Lawrence became the youngest British person to gain a first-class degree and Oxford’s youngest graduate. WORD WIZARDRY NEW PHRASE OF THE DAY Witches’ knickers: Evocative term, first used in Ireland, for shopping bags caught in tree branches and flapping in the wind. GUESS THE DEFINITION Antigropelos (coined 1848) A) Waterproof leggings. B) Cloth covering the head of a corpse. C) Suicide by starvation. Answer below PHRASE EXPLAINED Ace in the hole: A hidden advantage kept in reserve until needed; from the game of stud poker, in which one or more cards are turned face down or ‘in the hole’ as bets are placed.