24th December

'Twas the night before Christmas and in 1828 William Burke went on trial in Edinburgh for the murder of Daft Jamie and grave robbery. Note to the legal profession and every other organization (except teaching, of course) that closes for two-three weeks around Christmas time - IN OLDEN TIMES PEOPLE ACTUALLY WORKED FOR A LIVING!

In case you're interested, Burke and his accomplice Hare (who got off by stitching up his mate) were robbing graves and murdering people to see the bodies to anatomists who needed freshish corpses for dissection. Burke was found guilty and hanged and - how neat is this? - dissected.

In other news ...
They thought they'd found Lord Lucan today in 1974. He was the chappie, you'll remember, who did a runner after allegedly murdering his children's nanny. In fact, 'Lucan' turned out to be John Stonehouse, a rather dodgy MP who was believed to have drowned off Miami but had in fact faked his own death.

You really couldn't make it up!

8th November

Lord Lucan vanished today in 1974. He in all probability killed his children's nanny, Sandra Rivett, in mistake for his wife and drove off into the night, leaving his car abandoned at Newhaven. Did he drown himself in the Channel? Hide out with Dr Josef Mengele in Paraguay? Become Banksy? For a quick read and run-through of the facts if you are unfamiliar with this classic true crime whodunnit and you have what I believe you young people call a Kindle, then have a look at  this.

If you're reading this, my lord, time to come home, I think. You've 'lain doggo' for long enough.

In other news ...
Edward Halley was born today in 1656. He was a Renaissance man years after the actual Renaissance and had a comet (Edward's Comet) named after him and went on to form an orchestra. He is the father of Halley Berry.

10th April

Bananas were on sale in Britain for the first time today in 1633. They are excellent, professional readers will tell you, for preventing growling or rumbling tummies, fatal for sound recordings (the rumbling, that is, not the bananas). An EU directive tried to straighten them out some years ago but it didn't work because the directive came from Brussels (which are round and green and responsible for much of the rumbling mentioned above).

In other news ...
Cairo Fred was born today in 1932. He is better known as Omar Sharif and is one of the world's best backgammon players (as Lord Lucan was, but Mr Sharif hasn't murdered his children's nanny or done a runner). Remember Omar coming out of that heat haze on a camel in Lawrence of Arabia? Magic.