ON THIS DAY
November 8, 2016
IT’S DAY 313...
THE 1956 sunburst Fender Stratocaster guitar played by Eric Clapton on rock anthem Layla went for £313,000 at a New York auction in 1999. It also set the world record for most expensive guitar ever sold.
THE fastest lift in the world travels at 3,313ft per minute (37mph) — taking 40 seconds from the ground floor of the Taipei 101 building in Taiwan to its 89th floor.
MOUNT St Helens volcano in Washington State in the U.S. lost 1,313ft in height when it erupted in 1980. The eruptions lasted nine hours, leaving a one-mile-wide crater where its peak had been.
THERE ARE 53 DAYS LEFT
MORE than £53 million in Premium Bond prizes have not been claimed, it was revealed last week. In all, 1.3million prizes are still sitting in the bank account of National Savings and Investments — including five £100,000 prizes.
A SURVEY found that 53 per cent of youngsters aged 16 to 22 would give up their sense of smell if it meant they could keep hold of their laptop or mobile phone.
THE Beatles released their first album, Please Please Me, 53 years ago. It was Number one for 30 weeks — before being knocked off the top spot by the band’s second album, With The Beatles.
THE world’s smallest hotel is in Amberg, Germany. The Eh’hausl has a floorspace of just 53 sq m (570sq ft) and can accommodate only two guests at a time.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
GORDON RAMSAY, 50. The multi-millionaire celebrity chef was once threatened with a lawsuit by an American customer for ‘loss of enjoyment’ after ramsay threw him out of his restaurant for asking for ketchup with red mullet. ramsay has the legal threat framed on his wall.
KEN DODD, 89. The comedian (right) — famous for his buck teeth and tickling stick — had the third biggest-selling single of the Sixties with Tears, which sold two million copies. His hit rate of jokes is seven a minute and he keeps a ‘giggle map’ of Britain to record which jokes go down best in which parts of the country.
BORN ON THIS DAY
MARGARET MITCHELL (1900-1949). The American author of Gone With The Wind, her only novel, is thought by many to have based the lead character Scarlett o’Hara on herself. The book won her the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction and a legion of fans including, reportedly, Hitler’s mistress, Eva Braun. She died after being struck by a car while walking.
ABRAHAM ‘BRAM’ STOKER (1847-1912). The Irish author of Dracula was the manager of London’s Lyceum theatre. It has been estimated his novel has inspired more than 1,000 films.
ON NOVEMBER 8 . . .
IN 1923, Adolf Hitler launched a failed coup in Munich, which became known as the Beer Hall Putsch.
IN 1965, the death penalty was formally abolished in Britain — it remained in Northern Ireland until 1973.
IN 1973, an Italian newspaper received an envelope containing the right ear of 16-yearold John Paul Getty III, who had been kidnapped three months earlier. The grandson of oil tycoon Jean Paul Getty was released after his father and grandfather stumped up a $3 million ransom.
QUOTE FOR TODAY
Facebook is for people who can’t face books Madeleine Beard, writer
JOKE OF THE DAY
WHAT do you get if you walk under a cow? a pat on the head.