ON THIS DAY
IT’S DAY 1 OF 2016
BRITAIN’s 1st income tax levied directly on an individual according to their earnings was introduced in 1799 by William Pitt the Younger. The rate was 2d (two old pence) in the pound on incomes over £60 a year (equivalent to £5,640 now). It was supposed to be a temporary measure to cover the cost of the Napoleonic Wars.
FORMER Prime minister sir John major has only 1 kneecap. He lost the other in the late sixties in a car crash he was lucky to survive in Nigeria, where he was working for the bank standard Chartered.
THERE ARE 365 DAYS LEFT
THE Grand Hotel in scarborough, a Grade II*-listed building, was built in 1867 on a calendar theme. It originally had 12 floors, 365 bedrooms, 52 chimneys and four towers, one for each season. The hotel was also V-shaped, in honour of Queen Victoria.
CHINA has the biggest population of any country in the world — nearly 1.4 billion — but there are still only around 365 people for every square mile of land. In the UK there are 650 people for every square mile.
IT Cost 365 French francs in 1919 to fly with the world’s first regular international airline, Lignes Aériennes Farman, between Paris and Brussels. Flights took two hours and 50 minutes to cover the 164-mile distance, compared with just 20 minutes today.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
Merlin and Humans star Colin morgan, 30. The Armagh-born actor once took a note into school to apologise for being late — his family had been evacuated from their home after a pipe bomb was found next door.
Youtube co-founder Jawed Karim, 37. He was the first person to upload a film onto the video-sharing website, entitled me At The Zoo, in April 2005, which has been seen 28 million times. Karim is worth £94 million.
TV presenter Fiona Phillips, 55. In the UK version of the film shark Tale, starring Will smith, Robert De Niro, Angelina Jolie and Jack Black, she plays the role of Katie Current, the local reporter of Reef City.
BORN ON THIS DAY
Pocahontas (1595-1617). Daughter of the chief of the Powhatan Indians in Virginia, she saved the life of english settler John smith, and later married and had a child with another settler, John Rolfe. she died on a visit to england and is buried in Gravesend.
KIM PHILBY (1912-1988). The former mI6 officer and soviet agent became known as the ‘Third man’ after it emerged he had warned fellow spies Guy Burgess and Donald maclean that British intelligence was on their trail. It enabled them to flee to moscow, where he later joined them.
Joe Orton (1933-1967). The writer of Loot and What The Butler saw was killed with a hammer by his lover Kenneth Halliwell in their North London bedsit. In 1962 orton had been sentenced to six months in jail for defacing library books with comedy collages — some are now kept in Islington museum.
ON JANUARY 1 . . .
In 1772, the first travellers’ cheques were issued, by Robert Herries of the London exchange Banking Company. They could be used in 90 cities across europe.
In 1781, the world’s first arch bridge made of iron opened to traffic, over the river severn in shropshire. The imaginatively named Iron Bridge is now a UNESCO heritage site.
IN 1889, New York adopted the electric chair as a more humane method of execution than hanging.
QUOTE FOR TODAY
Though no one can go back and make a brand new start, anyone can start from now and make a brand new ending.
Anon
JOKE OF THE DAY
I GOT a New Year’s Day card from my lawyer this morning. All it said was: We wish you, but in no way can guarantee, a happy new year.