Harry and the potty platforms
Apart from Harry Potter’s platform 9 ¾ at London’s King’s Cross station, are there any real fractional train platform numbers?
DUE to modifications to station layouts, there are lots of unusual platform numbering schemes. Edinburgh’s Haymarket, Stockport and Cardiff Central each have a platform zero (as, indeed, has King’s Cross).
Shrewsbury Station has platforms numbered three to seven, plus 4A and 4B. A, B, C etc. is the standard form when splitting platforms, but Stockport’s 3A is separate from platform 3.
For Sheffield’s platform 2C, you must walk to the end of platform 2 and take a left. Many a traveller has missed their train waiting on the wrong platform.
It’s common not to re-number if platforms are removed or retired: Huddersfield is missing platforms 3 and 7, and Waverley does not have 5 and 6.
Waterloo East and New Cross in London don’t have platform numbers. They are A, B, C and D to distinguish them from the numbered platforms at nearby Waterloo and New Cross Gate. Alan Gower, Malvern, Worcs. THE success of the Harry Potter books has made the Platform 9¾ sign a popular photo opportunity at King’s Cross Station.
As a tribute to the fictional magic platform, half a luggage trolley sticks out of the wall between platforms eight and nine because there isn’t a wall between platforms nine and ten. Thomas Gunn, Tebworth, Beds.
Why is it not possible to score a goal in field hockey from outside the circle (The D)?
A GAME similar to hockey is depicted in 6,000-year-old drawings in the ancient Egyptian tombs of the Nile Valley. These show men holding curved sticks and playing with a round object.
The modern game evolved in Britain in the mid-19th century. But there is debate as to which is the first hockey club. Blackheath, founded in 1861, had a game that used a rubber cube and featured catching, marking and scrimmaging as it was based on rugby.
In 1871, Teddington cricket club, which was looking for a winter activity, experimented with a stick game, old cricket balls and rules based on soccer.
Teddington introduced the idea of the striking circle (The D). Its rules were incorporated into those sanctioned by the Hockey Association in London in 1886.
The use of a striking circle profoundly altered the game because it did not allow for wild pot-shots on goal, meaning skill and tactics were required to win.
A great element of the game is to work the ball into The D to facilitate a shot on goal.
As Francis Prevost commented in The English Illustrated Magazine: ‘The inventor’s name is unknown to the present writer, but it deserves to be duly honoured, for without the striking circle there would be no science in the game and very little skill.’ Francis Gill, Bedford.
Is it true that men are six times more likely to be struck by lightning than women?
THIS question could be rephrased: ‘Why are more farmers than marketing consultants killed by lightning strikes?’ Lightning is more likely to kill people who spend most of their time outdoors. Farming, forestry and construction are male-dominated fields, so it is statistically more likely that men will be struck by lightning than women.
This gender imbalance also applies to outdoor sports and leisure activities. In the case of golf, where a number of players are killed by lightning every year, male dominance is stark.
In Britain, only 14 per cent of golfers are women. In the U.S., 85 golfers are killed by lightning each year and 275 injured, of which the vast majority are male.
Lightning strikes somewhere on Earth 100 times per second. Up to 24,000 people are killed worldwide by lightning each year and another 240,000 are injured.
By comparison, 399 people died as a result of aircraft accidents during 2017, making flying statistically far safer than working outdoors — especially for men.
Bob Dillon, Edinburgh.
What was the Black Friday Scandal of 1869?
FUrTHEr to the earlier answer, a similar scandal to that faced by the Ulysses S. Grant administration occurred in the Seventies.
Nelson Bunker Hunt and his brothers were Texan oil billionaires. The hoarding of gold had been illegal since 1933, so they started buying silver when it was $1.50 an ounce.
By 1979, the word was that the Bunker Hunts were trying to corner the market in silver and the price rose rapidly. By January 1980, the price peaked at $50 an ounce, causing panic buying and then the suspension of silver trading. Speculators tried to sell to realise their gains and the price plummeted as fast as it had risen.
The Bunker Hunts had speculated by using borrowed money, with the oil business as security, and it seemed that due to the price collapse they would not be able to honour their commitments.
They were bailed out by a bank consortium to prevent a collapse of the banking system. After lawsuits on charges of attempting to fix the commodities market, the oil firm was forced to file for bankruptcy in 1988. Phil Alexander, Farnborough, Hants.