NOW & THEN
24 MAY
1738: John Wesley first attended evensong at St Paul’s Cathedral, then went on to a meeting at Aldersgate where he experienced his conversion – the start of Wesley’s Methodism.
1809: Dartmoor Prison was opened to house French prisoners of war – from 1850 it was used for convicts.
1830: The first passenger railroad was opened in America – the Baltimore and Ohio.
1844: The first telegraphic message in Morse code, “What hath God wrought”, was sent from Washington to Baltimore by its inventor, Samuel Morse.
1862: Westminster Bridge, London, was opened.
1883: New York’s Brooklyn Bridge was opened.
1895: Sir Henry Irving became the first theatrical knight.
1916: Conscription began in First World War Britain.
1930: Amy Johnson became the first woman to fly solo from London to Australia.
1941: Battle cruiser HMS Hood was sunk by the Bismarck near Greenland. Only three of her 1,421 crew survived.
1956: The first Eurovision Song Contest was won by host country Switzerland.
1962: London conference of Barbados, Windward and Leeward Islands ended with proposals of “Little Eight” to form new West Indies federation.
1964: A riot broke out when the referee disallowed a goal by Peru against Argentina in Lima and 301 spectators died in panic when police used tear gas.
1969: The Black And White Minstrel Show, at London’s Victoria Palace, closed after 4,354 performances in seven years, to become the longestrunning musical show in Britain.
1972: Spaghetti Junction, the most complex interchange on the British road system, was opened at Birmingham.
1972: Rangers won European Cup-winners’ Cup, beating Moscow Dynamo 3-2 in Barcelona.
1974: Giscard d’estaing became president of France.
1976: Concorde began regular supersonic flights from London and Paris to Dulles International Airport near Washington.
1978: Princess Margaret’s 18-year marriage to Lord Snowdon was ended.
1990: Flotilla of 76 boats sailed to Dunkirk to commemorate 50th anniversary of the British evacuation.
1993: IRA bomb caused £5 million damage to the centre of Magherafelt, Co Londonderry.
1994: Four men convicted of bombing the World Trade Centre in New York in 1993 were each jailed for 240 years.
2000: Israeli troops withdrew from southern Lebanon after 22 years of occupation.
2001: Fifteen-year-old Sherpa Temba Tsheri became the youngest person to climb to the top of Mount Everest.
2004: North Korea banned mobile phones.
2014: Six university studetns were killed and seven others injured when a drive-by gunman went on the rampage in Santa Barbara, California.
2014: Former BBC broadcaster Stuart Hall was sentenced to a further two years and six months in jail after being found guilty of two counts of indecent assault on a girl. The term was to be served on completion of a 30-month sentence for similar offences.