ON THIS DAY
IT’S DAY 25 OF 2016
IN 1820, a husband in Canterbury auctioned his wife at the local cattle market for 25p (five shillings). Before marriage laws were reformed in 1857, ‘selling’ a spouse was technically legal, and an easier route than divorce out of an unhappy union. AS A toddler, Sir William Schwenck Gilbert, of Gilbert & Sullivan fame, was kidnapped by bandits in Naples during a family holiday in 1839. The men convinced the child’s nurse they’d come to take him to his parents. He was returned after they paid a £25 ransom. SWANS have the most feathers of all birds, with the Arctic-breeding tundra variety kept warm by more than 25,000. Typical garden birds have about 3,000 feathers.
THERE ARE 341 DAYS LEFT
THE Queen, who will be 90 in April, undertook 341 engagements last year — more than the combined total of Prince Harry and the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge. IN 2009, Glaswegian Carol Ann Duffy became the first woman to be appointed Poet Laureate in the 341-year history of the post. The job comes with an annual payment of £5,750, plus a ‘butt of sack’ — in modern terms, about 600 bottles of sherry. THE first Christian hermit, St Paul of Thebes, died in the Egyptian desert in 341 AD, and was buried in a grave supposedly dug by two lions.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
ALICIA KEyS, 35 (right), whose debut album Songs In A Minor went platinum five times over, got into Columbia University at the same time as she signed a recording contract with Columbia Records. A month later she left college to focus on her musical career. CHARLENE, Princess of Monaco, 38. The Olympic silver medal-winning swimmer cried ‘tears of happiness’ during her 2011 wedding to Monaco’s ruler Prince Albert II — and later described as ‘categorical lies’ claims that she tried to flee the Principality beforehand. She gave birth to twins, Jacques and Gabriella, in 2014. JOHN COOPER CLARKE, 67. The Salfordborn poet is famous for I Married A Monster From Outer Space, Beasley Street, Ten years In An Open-Necked Shirt and Hanging Gardens Of Basildon. He recently narrated a poem about chips, which was used by McCain oven chips in its TV ads.
BORN ON THIS DAY
ROBERT BURNS (17591796). The Bard of Ayrshire was voted Greatest Ever Scot in 2009. Among his verse, the words for Auld Lang Syne are known the world over. He died aged 37, following a dental extraction, and was buried with full civil and military honours on the day his son Maxwell — his 12th child — was born. VIRGINIA WOOLF (1882-1941). Known for her novels To The Lighthouse and Orlando, Woolf took part in the Dreadnought Hoax of 1910. Disguised as a bearded man, she and a group of students dressed up as Abyssinian royalty and tricked the Royal Navy into giving them a reception and tour around one of Britain’s great ships, HMS Dreadnought.
ON JANUARY 25...
IN 1533, Henry VIII secretly wed his second wife, Anne Boleyn. Three years later, he had her executed at the Tower of London. IN 1924, the first Winter Olympic Games was held in Chamonix, France, with 16 nations taking part. The host country failed to win any gold medals.
QUOTE FOR TODAY
If you want creative workers, give them enough time to play.
John Cleese
JOKE OF THE DAY
I MAy be middle-class, but I’m hard. Al dente, you might say.
Comedian Jimmy Carr