ON THIS DAY
February 11, 2017
FROM THE DAILY MAIL ARCHIVE
FEBRUARY 11, 1937 THERE is no knowing to what, in the course of time, the television public may grow. It is quite possible to visualise the time when radio fans will no more listen in to a dance band they cannot see than present-day cinemagoers would visit a silent film. But, for a variety of reasons, including the price factor, that cannot be for a considerable time yet. FEBRUARY 11, 1957 TWO big American companies are about to invade Britain to prove that rock ’n’ roll methods can shake, massage and electrify those extra inches away. A gadget called a Relax-A-Cizor, they say, ‘affords selective exercise by electronic impulse. It restores the tone and firm, lithe lines you see in a young person’.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
SHERYL CROW, 55. The U.S. singer-songwriter and actress (right) was a backing singer for Michael Jackson and there were rumours they were an item. But Crow said he didn’t even know her name: ‘He knew some names, but he wasn’t sure which name went with which person.’ An ex-girlfriend of actor Owen Wilson and cycling cheat Lance Armstrong, she survived breast cancer and a brain tumour. MALCOLM WALKER, 71. The Yorkshireborn co-founder of Iceland Foods set up the firm in 1970 while still working at Woolworths. As a schoolboy, he put on dances and says: ‘I once got an offer from a guy in Sheffield wanting to come in on events with me. His name was Peter Stringfellow. Life could have been a lot more interesting.’
BORN ON THIS DAY
GERRY GOFFIN (1939-2014). The U.S. lyricist was most famous for his songwriting partnership with Carole King, penning (You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman, The Loco-Motion and Will You Love Me Tomorrow. They married when he was 20 and she was 17 and pregnant. Married for ten years, the relationship is immortalised in the West End musical Beautiful. ARNE JACOBSEN (1902-1971). The Danish architect and designer, famous for the Egg chair (right) and Swan sofa, was also responsible for modernist buildings, including St Catherine’s College, Oxford. At home, he insisted on cups being put in neat rows and toys being put away before he returned from work.
ON FEBRUARY 11...
IN 1852, the first flushing public toilet for women opened near the Strand in London. IN 1975, Margaret Thatcher beat four male candidates to become the first woman to lead a major political party in Britain. IN 2012, Whitney Houston was found dead aged 48 in an LA hotel bath tub.
WORD WIZARDRY
NEW WORD OF THE DAY Dumbwalking — walking slowly, without paying attention when using a smartphone. GUESS THE DEFINITION Pysmatic (coined 1652) A) Interrogatory, questioning. B) Tired from complaining. C) Having a jutting jaw. (Answer below) PHRASE EXPLAINED Shake a leg — in the 19th century, sailors’ wives were allowed to sleep aboard in hammocks while a ship was in port. In the mornings, the bosun would rouse reluctant risers, shouting ‘shake a leg or a purser’s stocking’; if the limb was a woman’s, she could stay put.
QUOTE FOR TODAY
I COULD not, even for a couple of months, live in a country so miserable as to possess no castles. John Ruskin, English art critic on America (1819-1900)
JOKE OF THE DAY
WHY did the girl keep a loaf of bread in her comic? She liked crummy jokes. Guess The Definition answer: A.