ON THIS DAY
FROM THE DAILY MAIL ARCHIVE
OCTOBER 31, 1923
WE DEEPLY regret to announce the death of ex-Prime Minister Andrew Bonar law, which occurred early yesterday morning at his london residence. He died peacefully at 3am, following an acute attack of septic pneumonia. His Majesty the King expressed the deep condolences of himself and the Queen with the members of the family.
OCTOBER 31, 2005
ANNA FORD, one of the women who changed the face of TV news, has called time on her long career. She will read her final bulletin for BBC1 on the One O’Clock News next April. In 1978, she became the first primetime female newsreader on ITN, as News At Ten’s rival to BBC1’s Angela rippon.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY
MARCUS RASHFORD, 25. The Manchester United and England star last year became the youngest person ever to receive an honorary degree from the University of Manchester and the youngest to top The Sunday Times Giving list. He campaigned to help feed children missing out on free school meals during the pandemic. His work elicited an estimated £20million of additional donations to the food poverty charity FareShare. This summer, he guest-edited The Beano.
MICHAEL KITCHEN, 74. Over 13 years, the leicesterborn actor played DCS Christopher Foyle in ITV’s Foyle’s War — voted the 21stcentury show viewers would most like to return to our screens. The series’ creator Anthony Horowitz said: ‘[Michael] argues with me, fights with me, makes my life difficult, but always to make it better... He’ll look at five lines and say, “Anthony, I don’t need to say any of those lines. I can just do it with a look . . .” And it’s so irritating that he’s right.’’
BORN ON THIS DAY
DAPHNE OXENFORD (1919-2012). The actress from london was, as Esther Hayes, an original cast member of Coronation Street and, for 20 years, the voice of BBC radio’s listen With Mother. She opened the programme by asking children: ‘Are you sitting comfortably? Then I’ll begin’ — a phrase that made it into the Oxford Dictionary of Quotations.
HELMUT NEWTON (1920-2004). The Berlin-born fashion photographer, hailed as the ‘master of the perverse image’, became one of the highest-paid snappers in the world thanks to his work for Vogue and Playboy. He died after suffering a heart attack while driving his Cadillac limousine and crashing into a wall near the Hollywood celebrity hotspot Chateau Marmont.
ON OCTOBER 31…
IN 1984, Indian prime minister Indira Gandhi was assassinated by her own bodyguards. IN 2007, leona lewis was enjoying the first of seven weeks at No 1 with her single Bleeding love.
WORD WIZARDRY
GUESS THE DEFINITION: Natant (c 1400s) A) A song written for someone’s birthday. B) Swimming; floating. C) remaining. answer below
PHRASE EXPLAINED
Square deal — meaning a fair bargain or just treatment. ‘Square’ has the sense of ‘honest’, which was an adjective associated with honourable play at cards.
QUOTE FOR TODAY
you campaign in poetry. you govern in prose. Mario Cuomo, U.S. politician (1932-2015)
JOKE OF THE DAY
WHY do demons hate going to the gym? Because everyone is exorcising.
Guess The Definition answer: B.