QUEEN CELEBRATES 70 YEARS ON THRONE
With columns of Scots and Irish guards, throngs of Union Jack-clad admirers and waves of aircraft roaring overhead, Queen Elizabeth II celebrated 70 years on the throne Thursday, earning tributes from world leaders and ordinary people for one of history’s great acts of constancy.
Shortly before 1 p.m., she stepped out onto the balcony of Buckingham
Palace to greet a sea of wellwishers, stretching down the Mall toward Trafalgar Square. She stood at the helm of four generations of the royal family, a vivid tableau that captured both the monarchy’s timeless durability and a modern family’s internal stresses.
Three heirs to the throne stood alongside her: her eldest son, Prince Charles; his eldest son, Prince William; and William’s eldest son, Prince George. But William’s younger brother, Prince Harry, was missing, having withdrawn from royal duties and moved to Southern California with his wife, Meghan.
Also missing was the queen’s second son, Prince Andrew, all but banished from public life because of his association with Jeffrey Epstein, the deceased financier and convicted sex offender.
Still, on Thursday, the dysfunction of the royal family was pushed temporarily offstage by a joyful celebration of its 96-yearold matriarch — a queen whose reign has been an anchor for her storm-tossed country and whose recent health troubles seem only to have deepened her people’s affection for her. The palace announced she would not attend a church service today after experiencing “discomfort” at events Thursday.
It was only the first of four days of festivities, known collectively as the queen’s Platinum Jubilee. But it was perhaps the grandest, featuring a military parade with 1,200 officers and soldiers from the Household Division, hundreds of Army musicians, 240 horses, a 41-gun salute and a 70-aircraft flyover.