On this day

1875: Dr Albert Schweitzer, missionary surgeon, organist and Nobel Prize winner (1952), was born Alsace.

1878: Queen Victoria was given a demonstration of Alexander Graham Bell’s new invention, the telephone.

1898: Lewis Carroll,

Wonderland, died.

1900: Puccini’s opera Tosca was premiered in Rome, despite a bomb scare by the composer’s envious contemporaries.

1904: Photographer and stage

Beaton was born in London.

1953: Marshal Tito was elected Yugoslavia. author of Alice’s Adventures designer Sir president Cecil of in In 1957: Actor Humphrey Bogart died. His wife Lauren Bacall placed a gold whistle in his coffin with the inscription: “If you need anything, just whistle” – a line from their first film together, To Have And Have Not.

1989: British Muslims held public burnings Salman Rushdie’s The Satanic Verses.

1997: The trial began of footballers John Fashanu, Bruce Grobbelaar and Hans Segers for allegedly being bribed by a Far Eastern gambling ring to throw matches. All three were later acquitted.

ON THIS DAY LAST YEAR: Surfers are three times more likely to have antibiotic-resistant E coli in their guts than non-surfers, a study revealed. of