ON THIS DAY
JUNE 19, 1928
MRS F. E. Guest, the American wife of a former British Air Minister, flew from Southampton to Burry Port, Carmarthen, to welcome Miss Amelia Earhart, the 30-year-old Boston airwoman who yesterday landed in seaplane Friendship at the Welsh port — the first woman to fly the Atlantic. Miss Earhart told our correspondent the crossing was ‘ beastly’, but the behaviour of the seaplane was ‘dandy’. She was tired but happy.
JUNE 19, 1985
HIJACk hostage Demis Roussos, the Greek pop singer, has been released by Shia Muslims in Beirut. The entertainer, looking dishevelled, revealed he sang for his captors after they hijacked a TWA flight from Athens to Rome. He described them as ‘very nice’ and ‘kind and polite’, and said they gave him a cake to celebrate his 39th birthday.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
kATHLEEn TuRnER, 66. The Golden Globe-winning, husky- voiced Hollywood actress starred in Body Heat and voiced Jessica Rabbit in Who Framed Roger Rabbit. The sex symbol, dubbed ‘cinematic Viagra in her day’, was offered the lead in Basic Instinct but turned it down because she thought it tacky. Turner has lived with chronic rheumatoid arthritis since her late 30s. BORIS JOHnSOn, 56. The new York-born PM and former London mayor has been awarded the Plain English Campaign’s ‘Foot in Mouth award’ three times. In 2004, he won for saying ‘I could not fail to disagree with you less’ on TV. In 2016, it was due to: ‘Brexit means Brexit and we’re going to make a Titanic success of it.’ Last year, it was for saying ‘I’d rather be dead in a ditch’ before he asked for an extension to Brexit . . . then asking the Eu for an extension to Brexit.
BORN ON THIS DAY
MOE HOWARD (1897-1975). The u.S. actor and leader of the Three Stooges was instantly recognisable thanks to his pudding bowl haircut and slapstick violence towards his comedy partners. The trio, hailed by the new York Times as ‘three of the frowziest numbskulls ever assembled’, produced 200 shorts and films from the 1930s to the 1950s. nICk DRAkE (1948-1974). The Burmese-born English singer- songwriter and guitarist inspired a cult following his suicide at 26. He never gave an interview and sold only 10,000 records in his lifetime. But he has sold several million posthumously, and is in Rolling Stone magazine’s list of the ‘greatest LPs of all time’. His actress sister Gabrielle appeared in the TV soap Crossroads.
ON JUNE 19…
IN 1910, the first Father’s Day was celebrated in the u.S. IN 1991, Pablo Escobar, Colombian drug lord and one of the most wanted men in the world, surrendered to police.
WORD WIZARDRY
GUESS THE DEFINITION: Nival (1600s)
A) A small cavity in a rock. B) Of or growing in snow. C) Belonging to the kitchen garden.
Answer below
PHRASE EXPLAINED
The green-eyed monster — Refers to jealousy; the metaphor is commonly reduced to the phrase ‘to be green with envy’. It comes from Shakespeare’s Othello.
QUOTE FOR TODAY
Eat food, not too much, mostly plants.
Michael Pollan, U.S. food writer
JOKE OF THE DAY
HOW long did Cain hate his brother?
As long as he was Abel.
Guess The Definition answer: B.