ON THIS DAY
FROM THE DAILY MAIL ARCHIVE
MARCH 23, 1959 THE restaurants call it the Green Revolution — the new eating habits of business girls, who can’t get enough of salads. Jack Walton, who runs two of the biggest vegetarian restaurants in London, said: ‘Four times the number of business girls are eating salads now. Men do it, too. I go as far as to say that the day will come when Britons will forget about fish and chips.’ MARCH 23, 1960 THIS is one of the first pictures of the Queen with new baby, Prince Andrew. The Prince’s four names — Andrew Albert Christian Edward — were recorded yesterday as entry No. 194 in the register of births for Westminster South. The only difference between No. 194 and No. 193 is in the column headed ‘Occupation of Father’. For little Lawrence Farrell, No. 193, it is ‘Builder’s labourer’. For Andrew, it is left blank.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
PRINCESS EUGENIE, 28. The first royal to have a public christening was also the first on Instagram. She got engaged in January — and will marry cocktail bar manager Jack Brooksbank in the autumn. The eighth in line to the throne described her parents as ‘the best divorced couple I know’. She says her name should be pronounced ‘You-genny’, but friends call her either ‘Youj’ or ‘Bouj’. RUSSELL HOWARD, 38. The comedian from Bristol says the funniest person he knows is his mother, adding: ‘Her mind should be donated to science.’ In 2013, he was voted ‘weird crush of the year’ by readers of Heat magazine and once broke his hand while attempting a press-up on a chair while being filmed for a BBC show.
BORN ON THIS DAY
SIR ROGER BANNISTER (1929-2018). The neurologist was the first person to run a mile in under four minutes, in 1954, despite his training regime usually consisting of no more than 35 minutes at lunchtime. He once declared: ‘You don’t have to make the rest of your life boring to be a good runner.’ A car crash in 1975 left him unable to run again. MARGARET OF ANJOU (1430-1482). The daughter of the King of Naples became Queen of England as wife of King Henry VI. A leader of the Lancastrians in the Wars of the Roses, her husband and son were killed in 1471 and she was imprisoned until French king Louis XI paid a ransom for her release in 1475. She died in poverty in France.
ON MARCH 23 . . .
IN 1839, the first use of the word OK was recorded, in The Boston Morning Post. IN 1998, the film Titanic tied with Ben-Hur in winning a record 11 Oscars.
WORD WIZARDRY
GUESS THE DEFINITION: Finjan (coined 1609) A) Upside down. B) A small porcelain coffee cup. C) Inside out. Answer below
PHRASE EXPLAINED
What the dickens: A 16th-century euphemism for the devil: Shakespeare’s Merry Wives Of Windsor has the line: ‘I cannot tell what the dickens his name is.’
QUOTE FOR TODAY
WE CHERisH our friends not for their ability to amuse us, but for ours to amuse them. Evelyn Waugh, novelist (1903-1966)
JOKE OF THE DAY
I HAVE the heart of a lion — and a lifetime ban from London Zoo. Guess The Definition answer: B.