ON THIS DAY
FROM THE DAILY MAIL ARCHIVE
MAY 15, 1945
FISH queues should be things of the past. Today ample fish supplies are being brought to the ports. By June, it is estimated, there will be a surplus. Many boats are now fishing the North Sea, as area after area is cleared of mines, for the first time since the war started. The long-unfished breeding grounds are teeming with large fish.
MAY 15, 1997
THE Spice Girls have become the first British group to top the American charts with a debut album. The five have leapfrogged over Oasis and other top British acts with Spice, which has sold 12 million copies worldwide.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
ZARA TINDALL, 42. The 20th in line to the throne won the Eventing World Championship in 2006 — the same year she was named BBC Sports Personality of the Year (35 years after her mother Princess
Anne received the honour). last year, her husband, former England rugby player Mike Tindall, revealed their first date was ‘quite a boozy one’. he added: ‘We figured out that we both quite like getting smashed. It was a good start.’
BEN WALLACE, 53. The Kent-born former Scots Guards captain has been Defence Secretary since 2019 — under three prime ministers. he was named Minister of the Year by the Conservative home website last year. As a young officer in Northern Ireland, he was mentioned in dispatches for foiling an IRA plot after finding a bomb in a bag.
BORN ON THIS DAY
MADELEINE ALBRIGHT (1937-2022). The diplomat, born Marie Jana Korbelova in Prague, was the first female U.S. Secretary of State, serving under President Bill Clinton. Describing her approach as ‘pragmatic idealism’, she was pivotal in Nato’s intervention to stop ethnic cleansing in Kosovo. Raised a Roman Catholic, she did not learn until the 1990s that three of her grandparents had been murdered by the Nazis for being Jewish.
MIREILLE DARC (1938-2017). The French model, actress and sex symbol, an ‘icon of the New Wave’, starred in Jean- luc Godard’s 1967 classic Weekend and 1972’s The Tall Blond Man With One Black Shoe. The black backless dress she wore in the latter is now in a Paris museum. Nicknamed ‘the grasshopper’ for her long legs, she was the long-time partner of actor Alain Delon.
ON MAY 15 . . .
IN 1932, the BBC’s Broadcasting house opened in london.
IN 2006, Saddam hussein refused to plead at his trial in Iraq for crimes against humanity, declaring he was still president and thus constitutionally protected.
WORD WIZARDRY
GUESS THE DEFINITION:
Jarg (20th century)
A) A giant. B) Fake.
C) A blockhead, a fool.
Answer below. PHRASE EXPLAINED
Like a lamb to the slaughter: Refers to a helpless victim. This phrase comes from the Bible, Isaiah 53:7.
QUOTE FOR TODAY
Good wine lights the candelabra of the brain
George Meredith, English novelist (1828-1909)
JOKE OF THE DAY
I’M NEVER donating to anyone collecting for a marathon again … They just take the money and run.
Guess The Definition answer: B.