29th February

Make the most of this one - any History that happens today won't happen again for another four years (except the repeats on the Discovery and History channels). As Disraeli once described the 1867 Reform Act, it was 'a leap year in the dark' (don't worry - nobody knew what he was talking about at the time, either).

So, on this day in 1960, Hugh Hefner opened the Playboy Club in Chicago and introduced the w0rld to gorgeous, scantily clad waitresses posing as rabbits. Strictly no hanky-panky however - you can look, but you can't touch. Hefner was brought up a strict Methodist and started his career on a shoestring with Playboy magazine (about as racy as Hello is today, but mind-bogglingly naughty in its day). So could we say that Hughie is a porn-again Christian?
No.

In other news ...

A birthday back in 1792 on this day has prompted an idea for a brilliant TV show. Gioacchino Rossini, composer and chef, was born on 29 February (so, of course, he was four on his first birthday - see Gilbert and  Sullivan's Pirates of Penzance for a mathematical explanation). One of the excellent pieces Rossini composed was the William Tell Overture, you know, the one the Lone Ranger used to gallop to on Saturday evening tv back in the '50s - duddle dum, duddle dum, duddle dum dum dum - you know the one. For my younger follower, it is the Dove for Men advert.

Well, combining Rossini's talents, how about a cookery programme (now, there's a novelty) in which a series of terrified, gormless hopefuls have to rustle up, say, Tournedos Rossini at the speed of the Overture? That way, all cookery programmes would last only a few minutes and we can watch something worthwhile.

28th February

On this day in 1874 Arthur Orton was found guilty of perjury in a trial that had lasted for 260 days (the longest in legal history after that of Warren Hastings, Governor General of India). Orton swore he was the rightful claimant to a small fortune belonging to the Tichborne family and that he was himself Roger Tichborne, the missing heir. The only problem was that Roger was eight stone wringing wet and Arthur had a far more realistic claim to be the fattest man in England.
Don't tell me they were all playing the anti-plump card as early as 1874!

In other news ...
Today in 1973 members of the Lakota nation - that's Sioux if you, like me, were brought up on Western B movies - occupied the village of Wounded Knee in South Dakota in a gesture against the continuing bad treatment of native Americans - that's Indians if you're a Western fan or Christopher Columbus. In the original 'battle' of Wounded Knee in 1890, the 7th Cavalry, still smarting over the thrashing they got on the Big Horn fourteen years earlier, opened their Gatling guns on unarmed men, women and children led by their chief Big Foot. This was described in the American press as a battle; the defeat of an arrogant idiot called George Custer was described as a massacre,
Go, as modern Americans say, figure.

27th February

Henry Wadsworth, he Longfellow,
Born this day in Eighteen Seven,
Wrote a poem, mighty catchy,
Even if the rhymes were patchy
Wrote it longhand, this Longfellow
Because they had yet to invent a personal computer.

In other news ...
On this day in 1933 a serious fire gutted the Reichstag, Berlin's parliament building. 'God grant,' said the new chancellor, Adolf Hitler, 'that this is the work of the Communists.' (actually, it was the work of the Nazis). 'You [a foreign correspondent to whom he was to speak] are witnessing the beginning of a great new epoch in German history. This fire is the beginning.'
It was - the Nazis followed up burning books, then people.

26th February

Today in 1791 the Bank of England issued the first ever pound note. It was nearly four feet square and didn't fold up very well into anybody's purse or wallet. So, two centuries later, they came up with a £1 coin instead. A number of points to consider here before we put our proposals to the IMF.

• Paper money was so new in the 1790s that use of it led to a run on the banks. Imagine - bankers being beaten up in the streets; oh, the joy of it!
• The 'gold' coin that replaced it was briefly called a Thatcher, because it was 'bold, brassy and thinks it's a sovereign'.
• The £1 coin was too small for anybody to write on it 'I promise to pay the bearer the sum of £1' or to carry the all-important signature of the Governor of the Bank of England.
• The current economic crisis has now been going on for so long that 48% (that's over half) of Eight Zed Pee have never seen a £1 coin, although they tell each other stories when they gather round the family dog for warmth of an evening about that great Eldorado that used to exist down the back of the sofa, long since mined out and used to buy essentials like a warmer dog and stamps to go on the begging letters.

Golden days.

In other news ...

Fats Domino was born today in 1928. What were Mr and Mrs Domino thinking, calling their enormously talented little boy Fats? that would be child abuse today, which is why I find it so odd that people who call their kids Bucket, Playstation and Chunnel get away with it.

25th February

The French Impressionist painter Pierre-Auguste Renoir was born today in 1841. He is quoted as saying, 'I never think I have finished a nude until I think I could pinch it.'
Other people of course have been trying to pinch Renoirs for years.

In other news ...
432 years ago today Pope Pius V got his chasuble in a twist and excommunicated Elizabeth I. Calling her 'the Jezebel of England', he effectively put out a contract on the queen, saying it was perfectly understandable if good Catholics decided to kill her. Can I just remind you, Seven Queue Gee that Pius (the name means holy) was the head of a Christian church that believed in love, charity, forgiveness and generally being nice.
What had Elizabeth done to upset his Munificence? She'd been born out of wedlock - that's a place in Shropshire, Seven Oh Jay - what are the Geography Department teaching you these days?

24th February

You know it's the fashion nowadays for some parents to name their kids after the place they were conceived - Brooklyn Beckham, Chelsea United, Washington Irving for example. Well, on this day in 1920, Nancy Astor went one further. This was the day that a woman (other than Victoria) spoke for the first time in the Houses of Parliament. I'm not commemorating the day here, but her husband's name - Waldorf Astor - conceived, no doubt, in the hotel (or salad) of the same name. I can only assume that this is the origin of the name of my bete noire in Year Nine, Premier Travelodge Johnson.

In other news ...
Five hundred and thirty years ago today (give or take eleven days) Pope Gregory XIII introduced the Gregorian calendar to replace the Julian one. All very confusing, in which days are lost or gained based on a book (the Old Testament) that makes no chronological sense at all. Logic? 365 days a year ... er ... okay. Christmas? Let's make it 25 December, because that's the Roman Feast of Saturnalia. Easter? The first Sunday after the full moon following the vernal equinox (March 21 or thereabouts). Add in the fact that the full moon doesn't necessarily have to be full and the other fact that Easter eggs are in the shops on Boxing Day and a dog's breakfast is the only possible outcome.
Someone should really have said to His Holiness back in 1582, 'Chill out, you've got a Counter-Reformation to sort out. Prioritize, Greg!'
But at least teachers - always known for some reason in this context as 'bloody teachers' - get a few weeks holiday, so don't let's knock it.

23rd February

It's one of those great photographs that have become legend - GIs erecting the stars and stripes on battle-torn Iwo-Jima on this day in 1945. Dear old Clint Eastwood in his recent film has blown the gaffe on this incident. and if you've seen the sequence of stills taken just before and after that one, they're very average, In the first one, the GIs are having difficulty lifting the flag in the high wind. In the later ones, job done, they're standing around having a fag! Eastwood revealed that the actual scene took place when there were no cameras around so it had to be re-staged for the Press later.
Darn!

In other news ...
Next time you're in the West End, find a quiet little Mews near Hyde Park called Cato Street. At one end of it, there's a house which was once a stable. It was here, on this day in 1820 that the revolutionary Arthur Thistlewood and his co-conspirators were caught making grenades before going to Lord Harrowby's house in nearby Grosvenor Square to blow up the entire Cabinet who were having dinner there.
The whole plot had been rumbled weeks earlier and the conspirators were arrested in the hayloft by the Bow Street Runners (precursors of Mrs Carpenter-Maxwell's profession) in which one of them was killed.
Had it come off, it would have been the boldest and most devastating political coup in British history. Except that Arthur Thistlewood was probably mad as a tree and seems to have had no real plan as to what to do had the plot worked.
If you fancy finding out more about this least known English revolution - although possibly Home Rule for Leighford, an early attempt by Mrs Troubridge to kickstart her attempt on world domination is even less well known - visit the mighty Amazon and search Cato Street in books to find the only modern retelling of the sorry tale by redoubtable author MJ Trow. I'm sure more confident men would put what is apparently known as a 'link' but surely you know me better than that!