ON THIS DAY FROM THE DAILY MAIL ARCHIVE QUOTE FOR TODAY
SEPTEMBER 11, 1911
SOME day, many years hence, when letters are regularly carried by aeroplane, there will be people alive who will be able to say: ‘I saw the first air-postman flying from London to Windsor, with the first bag of letters entrusted by the Post Office to an airman.’ The experiment has touched the popular imagination. It suggests the inevitable development of a mode of travel which is still in the infancy stage.
SEPTEMBER 11, 2008
IT WORKS. And not a black hole to be seen. No explosions, no end of the world, just a lot of very happy scientists. The £5 billion Large Hadron Collider, aka The God Machine, the biggest and most expensive scientific instrument ever built, was turned on in Switzerland yesterday and everything worked like a dream.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
JuLIE COvINGTON, 74. The singer and actress from London was the first person to sing Evita’s Don’t Cry For Me Argentina (on a 1976 concept album). It became the first song from a musical to top the uK charts and has sold more than a million copies. But she turned down the role in the musical, with Elaine Paige stepping in.
BRIAN DE PALMA, 80. The U.S. filmmaker directed Carrie, Scarface and The untouchables. When Tom Cruise asked him to make the sequel to Mission: Impossible, he refused, and has said: ‘The reason they make another one is to make money. That’s the corruption of Hollywood.’ The eighth film in the series is now in development
BORN ON THIS DAY
BETSY DRAKE (19232015). The Paris-born American actress found fame in 1948’s Every Girl Should Be Married opposite Cary Grant — and became his third wife (both pictured) when they married the following year. She responded to rumours that he was gay by saying they had been too busy making love for her to ask.
D.H. LAWRENCE (1885-1930). The writer from Nottinghamshire penned Women In Love and Sons And Lovers. After the failed 1960 public prosecution, under the Obscene Publications Act, of Penguin for publishing Lawrence’s Lady Chatterley’s Lover, the novel went on to sell two million copies in two years.
ON SEPTEMBER 11...
IN 1968, The Beatles’ Hey Jude went to No1, knocking the Bee Gees’ I’ve Gotta Get A Message To You off the top spot.
IN 2001, almost 3,000 people were killed and 25,000 injured in the 9/11 Trade Centre attacks in New York.
WORD WIZARDRY
GUESS THE DEFINITION: Sarcenet (mid-15th century)
A) The container which holds the wafer used in Holy Communion. B) A fine, soft fabric, often silk. C) The socket of a precious jewel.
Answer below.
PHRASE EXPLAINED
One foot in the grave: being very close to death; coined in the 16th century, it alludes to someone very old or sick.
California is a fine place to live — if you happen to be an orange.
Fred Allen, American comedian (1894-1956)
JOKE OF THE DAY
What did one snowman say to the other snowman? ‘Can you smell carrots?’
Guess The Definition answer: B