ON THIS DAY
1823: The first pleasure pier, The Chain Pier at Brighton, opened. It closed in 1896 and was destroyed in a storm the same year. 1882: To beat copyright pirates, Iolanthe by Gilbert and Sullivan was premiered in London and America, the first show to open simultaneously in both countries. 1952: Agatha Christie’s play The Mousetrap opened in London, at the Ambassador’s Theatre. Richard Attenborough played the detective, and notices said the play had a “fair degree of success”. 1969: John Lennon returned his MBE in protest at British involvement in Biafra and support of US action in Vietnam. 1984: Britain’s top rock stars, responding to a call by Bob Geldof, gathered together under the name Band Aid to record Do They Know It’s Christmas, in aid of the Ethiopian famine appeal. 2005: Soccer legend George Best, a former Manchester United, Fulham and Northern Ireland star, who was a long-term alcoholic, died, aged 59. 2010: Bernard Matthews died at the age of 80. The farmer and businessman became a household name after he amassed a multimillion-pound fortune through his vast poultry empire.
ON THIS DAY LAST YEAR: A “world first” trial assessing a cannabisbased drug to treat an aggressive form of brain cancer was given the go-ahead, a charity announced.