25th May

Oh, for heaven's sake - global warming again? On this day in 1990 (yes, just two years after snow fell in Syria etc etc) Margaret Thatcher was warning of the dreaded phenomenon and pledging that Britain would cut its emission of carbon dioxide by 30%. A UN report immediately responded that the reduction needed to be at least 60% to have any effect. The report warns of a 2 degree rise in temperature in the next 35 years (in other words, chaps, 13 years from now) and 6 degrees by the end of the 21st century. For all of us who have just shivered through the coldest April and May on record, that somehow seems less scary than Mrs T made it sound in 1990.

This day in history has been one of the busy ones so 'in other news' will just list a few of the absolutely stonking stories which began, ended or took place on this day.

• In 1935 Jesse Owens set five new world records and equalled a sixth all in one afternoon, limbering up for seriously p***ing off Hitler at the Berlin Olympics the next year.
• In 1969, Thor Heyerdahl set sail in a reed boat named Ra, hoping to relive the success of his Kon-Tiki expedition. I am assuming all went well, but I'm blowed if I remember what happened. I hate sequels, don't you? 
• In 1925 the Scopes 'Monkey Trial' began in Dayton, Tennessee. Scopes was accused of teaching the theory of evolution, against the state law. A fascinating case, but a much better film, Inherit the Wind starring the wonderful Spencer Tracy and Frederic March. They really do not make them that way any more.
• In 1916, Henry Ford spoke one of the most misquoted lines ever - he actually said 'History is more or less bunk.' Still not acceptable, of course, but better than the usual version of 'History is bunk.' And that, of course, is better than the version I often hear muttered by Nine Eye You.
• And finally, in 1768, Captain Cook set off to explore the Antipodes. And we all know how that turned out!

5th April

Three Hollywood legends were born on this day, albeit a few years apart. Spencer Tracy was the first, in 1900, who lent his gravitas to a brilliant version of Jekyll and Hyde and Northwest Passage. He could also play a hard man - Bad Day at Black Rock - as well as high comedy - It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World. Movie Trivia - Tracy's first job on screen was as a non-speaking robot, alongside his lifelong friend, Pat O'Brien.

Bette Davis followed in 1908, playing femmes fatales from The Letter to Whatever Happened to Baby Jane. Movie Trivia - she was famously taken off by Liz Taylor in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? - 'What a dump!'

Last comes the baby of the bunch, dear old Gregory Peck, he of the raised eyebrow. He was outstanding as Atticus Finch in To Kill a Mockingbird and I liked him (but nobody else did) as Captain Ahab in Moby Dick. But then I am one of the few people living who has read the book - although I had to have a good long lie down afterwards.
Movie Trivia - Atticus Finch was voted the greatest screen hero of all time in 2003, beating Indiana Jones and James Bond into 2nd and 3rd places respectively - and quite right too!

In other news ...
Poor old Oscar Wilde went on trial today in 1895. He brought his misfortunes on himself by bringing libel charges against the appalling Marquess of Queensbury, whose son Alfred ('Bosie') was one of Wilde's lovers. The whole thing backfired disastrously and Wilde, previously the darling of the West End theatre-going public, ended up in Reading Gaol with two years' hard labour.
The love that dare not speak its name was criminalized by Henry Labouchere MP in his Criminal Law Amendment Act of 1884 and was the famous occasion when Queen Victoria used the royal veto because she thought lesbians were the natives of Lesbos!
Aren't our royal family wonderful?