COUNTDOWN!!......

23

On 14th July....

1789 French Revolution: Citizens of Paris storm the Bastille and free seven prisoners.

1867 Dynamite was demonstrated for the first time by Alfred Noble, at a quarry in Redhill, Surrey.

1881 Billy the Kid is shot and killed by Pat Garrett outside Fort Sumner.

1961 Russian cosmonaut and the first man in space Yuri Gagarin arrived in London to a film-star welcome.

1965 The American space probe Mariner Four flew by Mars, sending back photographs of the planet. The pictures revealed rock formations on the surface that resembled a human face.

1972 Gary Glitter and the Glittermen made their live debut at Melksham in Wiltshire.

1977 Elvis Costello and the Attractions played their first gig together at Penzance, where they supported sex-change punk star Wayne County.

22

On 15th July....

July 15, 1099 Jerusalem falls to the Crusaders after a siege of just over one month The streets of the city run with blood as the Crusaders slaughter 40,000 and set fire to mosques and synagogues, and the First Crusade comes to an end

July 15, 1799 Rosetta Stone is found in the Egyptian village of Rosetta, by French Captain Pierre-Franois Bouchard.

21
3 weeks

On 16th July....

1377 The coronation of King Richard II took place.

1943 Batman made his screen debut in part one of Columbia's 15 part 'Batman' serial at American cinemas. Lewis Wilson starred as the caped crusader who fought the evil Doctor Deka in the first episode, entitled 'The Electrical Brain'.

1945 The first atomic bomb was detonated at Almogordo Air Base in New Mexico.

1946 20th Century Fox signed unknown model Norma Jean Baker to a contract worth 75 dollars a week. On the advice of her agent, Norma Jean fixed her jaw, bob-tipped her nose and changed her name to Marilyn Monroe.

1988 Michael Jackson played to a packed Wembley Stadium.

20

On 17th July......

1674 Isaac Watts was born.

1841 The first edition of English magazine Punch was published in London.

1899 James Cagney was born.

1917 King George V of the United Kingdom issues a Proclamation stating that the male line descendants of the British royal family will bear the surname Windsor.

1955 Disneyland televises its grand opening in Anaheim, California.

1965 'Thank Your Lucky Stars' celebrated its 200th show with appearances from Billy Fury, Helen Shapiro, Dusty Springfield and The Searchers.

1975 An Apollo spaceship docked with a Soyuz spacecraft in orbit in the first superpower link-up of its kind as 3 American and 2 Soviet spacemen exchanged handshakes 140 miles above the Earth.

1995 Juan Fangio died.

1997 Almost a week after his mystery disappearance, Humphrey the Downing Street cat was returned to No.10 by the woman who had taken him home, thinking he was a stray.

19

On 18th July.....

1848 W.G.Grace was born.

1955 Disneyland opened at Anaheim in California, covering 60 acres of land.

1961 Alan Pardew was born.

1973 Jack Hawkins died.

1976 Nadia Comăneci became the first person in Olympic Games history to score a perfect 10 in gymnastics at the 1976 Summer Olympics.

1988 Spanish player Severiano Ballesteros won his 3rd open championship at Royal Lytham and St. Annes with a last round of 65.

1995 The oldest known musical instrument in the world was found in the Indrijca River Valley in Slovenia. The 45,000 year old relic, a crude wind instument, was constructed from a bear bone with four holes drilled along its length.

1995 Stella Marie Thompson, the prostitute arrested with Hugh Grant, pleaded not guilty to lewd behaviour with the actor in a public place, in a Hollywood courtroom.

1997 Camilla Parker Bowles' 50th birthday was marked with a lavish party organised by Prince Charles at his Highgrove Estate in Gloucestershire.

18

On 19th July.....

1333 Wars of Scottish Independence: Battle of Halidon Hill – The English win a decisive victory over the Scots.

1545 The Tudor warship Mary Rose sinks off Portsmouth.

1832 The British Medical Association was founded as the Provincial Medical and Surgical Association by Sir Charles Hastings at a meeting in the Board Room of the Worcester Infirmary.

1843 Brunel's steamship the SS Great Britain is launched, becoming the first ocean-going craft with an iron hull or screw propeller and also becoming the largest vessel afloat in the world.

1941 The 2 finger 'V' for Victory hand signal was introduced by Sir Winston Churchill.

1992 50 members of the Bruce Forsyth Fan Club wore their club uniform, carpets on their head, at an annual meeting and procession at Bigbury, Devon.

1992 Chelsea striker Kerry Dixon joined Southampton for £750,000.

1994 Southampton Football Club were given the go-ahead to build a 25,000 all-seat stadium next to the M27 motorway at Stoneham in Eastleigh.

17

On 20th July.....

1885 The Football Association legalises professionalism in football under pressure from the British Football Association.

1903 Ford Motor Company shipped its first car.

1917 In order to recruit in WW1, the US 'draft lottery' went into operation. 258 was the first number drawn.

1933 In London, 500,000 march against anti-Semitism.

1976 The Viking 1 lander successfully lands on Mars.

1979 22 year old Spanish player Seve Ballesteros became only the second golfer from continental Europe to win the British Open Championship.

1982 Hyde Park and Regents Park bombings: The Provisional IRA detonates two bombs in Hyde Park and Regents Park in central London, killing eight soldiers, wounding forty-seven people, and leading to the deaths of seven horses.

1989 Harry Worth dies.

1993 According to a MORI survey, 8 out of 10 men did not mind their wives or girlfriends being a little fat and were fed up with their constant dieting.

1993 Pub landlady Donna Swinburn from Roker, Sunderland, lifted a ban on smoking after takings fell by £14,000 in 4 months.

2001 The London Stock Exchange goes public.

16

On 21st July.....

365 - Alexandria hit by Earthquake; about 50,000 die

1542 - Pope Paul III begins inquisition against Protestants (Sactum Officium)

1588 - English fleet defeats Spanish armada

1831 - Belgium gains independence from Netherlands, Leopold I made king

1866 - Cholera-epidemic kills hundreds in London

1873 - Jesse James & James Younger gang's 1st train robbery (Adair Iowa)

1884 - 1st Test Cricket match played at Lord's

1897 - Tate Gallery opens in England

1928 - 1st woman to win an olympic gold medal - Halina Knonpacka of Poland

1960 - In Sri Lanka (then Ceylon) Sirima Bandaranaike is world's 1st woman PM

1960 - Francis Chichester arrive in NY aboard Gypsy Moth II, setting record of 40 days for a solo Atlantic crossing

1964 - Arnold Long takes 11 catches in the match for Surrey v Sussex

1969 - Neil Armstrong steps on Moon at 2:56:15 AM (GMT)

1972 - Bloody Friday: 22 IRA-bombs explode in Belfast

1972 - In NY, 57 murders occur in 24 hours

1978 - World's strongest dog, 80-kg St Bernard, pulls 2909-kg load 27 m

15

On 22nd July....

1989 A massive Bronze Age rock-cut tomb in the Orkneys was discovered when a lorry dislodged it in a sand quarry. The manager of archaelogical operations for Historic Buildings and Monuments in Scotland, John Barber claimed that it was one of the most important sites found this century.

1992 Ian Botham received his OBE at Buckingham Palace, where he told the Queen that his greatest wish was to play for England again.

1994 Police sealed off the M5 in Gloucestershire after a member of the public spotted an arsenal of guns in a van. But armed police found they had ambushed a travelling theatre company and seized their armoury of props, including swords, replica machine-guns and a bazooka.


1994 The Home Secretary announced that the young killers of James Bulger were to be kept in custody for at least 15 years- much longer than recommended by the trial judge.

14

2 weeks

On 23rd July......

1903 The Ford Motor Company sells its first car.

1989 Former Welsh guardsman Simon Weston, who was badly burnt during the Falklands War, wing-walked on a Boeing Super Stearman at the International Air Tatto in an attempt to raise money for the Weston Spirit charity.

1995 The Shadow Home Secretary, Jack Straw, wanted persistent young offenders to spend a weekend in jail in an aim to stop them embarking on a lifetime of crime.

1997 It was announced that a 4th jail was being planned for the Isle of Wight. he prison service was predicting the number of inmates to rise from 62,000 to 70,000 within the following year.

13

On 24th July.......

1567 Mary Queen of Scots is deposed and replaced by her 1 year old son James VI.

1725 John Newton was born.

1936 The Speaking Clock was introduced by the GPO.

1961 Kerry Dixon was born.

1969 Apollo program: Apollo 11 splashes down safely in the Pacific Ocean.

1980 Peter Sellers died.

1989 Maldive diplomat Amin Didi Cetain was arrested in Portugal attempting to smuggle 3 suitcases of cocaine worth £45 million into Britain.

1994 Violent clashes broke out in London between demonstrators and police during a march against the Criminal Justice Bill. Mounted police charged 3 times to prevent the Downing Street gates being breached.

1995 Under new government proposals, criminals could have their property confiscated to help compensate their victims.

1997 Myra Hindley's hopes of an early release were boosted after a House of Lords decision that Home Secretary Michael Howard had exceeded his powers when he increased the minimum period that a double murderer must spend in prison from 15 to 20 years.

12

On 25th July.....

1917 : The exotic dancer Mata Hari is sentenced to execution by firing squad by a French court for spying on Germany's behalf during World War I.

1939 : A bomb planted in a baggage room on a London Railway station has injured 14 people many seriously , the bomb is believed to have been planted by the IRA.

1943 : Benito Mussolini, the prime minister and dictator of Italy for 21 years, was forced from office .

1969 : Senator Edward Kennedy pleads guilty to leaving the scene of a crime (Car accident on the island of Chappaquiddick where Mary Jo Kopechne drowned) and has been sentenced to a two-month suspended jail sentence.

1973 : The Soviet Union launched Mars 5, its second unmanned Mars probe on a six-month journey to the red planet.

1978 : Lesley Brown gave birth to the world's first test tube baby (in-vitro fertilization) delivered by caesarean section in Oldham, England.

1978 : A new scheme in Britain (Motability scheme) to provide cars for disabled people is launched in Earl's Court, London.

1992 : After 20 years of Boycotts of the Olympic games the Barcelona Olympic Games becomes the first games with no major boycotts and a record number of 169 nations taking part in the opening parade.

2000 : An Air France Concorde jet bound for New York crashes upon takeoff in Paris killing everyone onboard as well as four people on the ground.

2009 : Britain’s last living World War I veteran died on this day. Harry Patch, a 111-year-old former plumber refused to talk about his war experiences until he reached the age of 100. For eleven years before his death he traveled around and received honors while speaking on his life experiences in the first world war.

11

On 26th July.....

1788 New York became the 11the state of the United States of America.

1908 The Federal Bureau of Investigation was established in Washington DC.

1936 King Edward VIII, in one of his few official duties before he abdicated the throne, officially unveiled the Canadian National Vimy Memorial.

1945 The Labour Party wins the United Kingdom general election by a landslide, removing Winston Churchill from power.

1971 100's of topless women on the French Riviera were orderd by riot police to put their bikini tops back on .

1995 Bob Monkhouse was offering a reward of £10,000 for the return of 2 joke books stolen from the BBC television centre. The books contained gags and scripts jotted down over 25 years.

You're going great Mike.

10

On 27th July....

1586 Sir Walter Raleigh brought the first tobacco to England from Virginia.

1694 The Bank of England was founded.

1900 The H.J.Heinz Company, maker of ketchup with 57 varieties of tomatoes, was incorporated.

1940 Bugs Bunny first appeared.

1962 Martin Luther King was arrested in Albany, Alabama, for holding a prayer meeting on the steps of the city hall .

1967 Britain's pirate radio stations were declared illegal, and BBC Radio One was launched.

9

On 28th July.....

1586 Britain's first potatos arrived in Plymouth, brought from Columbia by Sir Thomas Harriot.

1858 Fingerprints were first used as a means of identification.

1890 THe Hamburger was created by Louis Lassing in New Haven, Connecticut.

1914 World War I began when Austria-Hungary declared was on Serbia.

1945 An American Air Force bomber flying in dense fog crashed into the 78th floor of the Empire State building killing 11 people and the 3 crew members on board.

1951 Walt Disney's 'Alice In Wonderland' animated movie was released in cinemas across the US.

8

On 29th July......

1565 Mary Queen of Scots married her cousin Lord Darnley.

1588 Sir Francis Drake while playing bowls on Plymouth Hoe, was informed that the Spanish Armada had been sighted, but proceeded to finish his game before putting out to sea with the British fleet and defeating the 125-strong Spanish fleet.

1871 Rasputin was born,

1890 Vincent Van Gogh died.

1907 Robert Baden-Powell formed the boy scouts.

1949 The first regular weather forecast was televised by the BBC.

1976 John Lennon received a green card from US immigration allowing him permanent residence in the US.

1981 Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer were married at Westminster Abbey, watched live by a television audience of over 700 million people.

1993 60 year old golfer Jean Bevan scored her second hole-in-one on the 13th green at Redditch, exactly a year after her first on the same spot.

1995 Police found 51 illegal immigrants the biggest group caught entering Britain, hidden in the back of a lorry at Dover.

7

1 week

On 30th July.......

1898 Corn Flakes were invented by William Kellogg.

1928 The first colour motion pictures in the US were exhibited by George Eastman at Rochester, New York. Images included goldfish, peacocks, butterflies and pretty girls in pretty dresses.

1935 The first Penguin book was published, starting the paperback revolution. The idea came from Sir Allen Lane who wanted to provide a whole book for the price of 10 cigarettes. The first one issued was 'Ariel' by Andre Maurois.

1938 The first Beano comic went on sale.

1966 England beat West Germany in the final of the World Cup.

1989 Professor Baruch Ehrensberg from Tel Aviv announced that an ancient jawbone discovered in northern Irsael showed that man could speak 60,000 years ago.

1989 It was revealed that the Duke of Edinburgh was disqualified from a Cowes Week race after a collision with another yacht during a race in the Solent.

1997 German genetic engineers unveiled the 'megaspud', big enough to feed an average sized family. Unfortunately according to Mike Storey, a chip expert with the British potato council, the new potatoes contained too much water and made very greasy chips.

6

On 31st July.....


1878 Northamptonshire County Cricket Club was founded.

1942 Oxfam was founded, with the first meeting under its original name, the Oxford Committee for Famine Relief, at the Friend's Meeting House in Oxford. The charity was formed to help the growing numbers of European refugees.

1970 The Rolling Stones contract with Decca Records expired

1989 Under Secretary of State for the Environment Virginia Bottomley announced that Britain was to spend £10 million on research in an attempt to understand weather and climatic change.

1992 Russia announced that it was suffering a condom shortage due to condom factories running out of rubber.

1997 The government announced plans for a new Data Protection Bill which would enable people inundated with junk mail to raise objections free of charge if they object to their personal data being used for marketing purposes.

1997 BT angered the City by announcing cuts of up to 5,000 jobs. The announcement came only days after the company announced it had been making profits of £100 a second over the previous 3 months.

5

On 1st August.....

1498 Christopher Columbus landed on 'Isla Santa' (later called Venezuela).

1944 13 year old Anne Frank made tha last entry in her diary. 3 days later the Grune Polizei raided the secret annex in Amsterdam, Holand, where the Jewish family was hiding.

1969 The first pictures of Mars were beamed back to earth by satellite

1984 The Committee on Safety of Medecines rejected claims by Professor Gordon Stewart that whooping cough vaccinations are as likely to cause brain damage, death or disability as the disease itself.

1986 Actress Tatum O'Neal married former Wimbledon champion John McEnroe.

1987 MTV the music based television station was launched in Britain.

1989 The fund set up for victims of the Hillsborough disaster reached more than £9 million, making it the largest civilian disaster fund.

1992 Steve Redgrave and Matt Pinsett won gold in the coxless rowing pairs at the Olympic Games.

1997 A senior surgeon at Mayday Hospital in Croydon was suspended after it was revealed he had allowed a 16 year old schoolboy on work experience to assist in an operation.

4

On 2nd August....

47BC Julius Caesar defeated Pharnaces III of Pontus and said the famous words 'Veni Vidi Vici'.

1100 King William II died.

1776 Declaration of Independence is signed United States

1889 San Francisco was struck by a mysterious plague of millions of locusts .

1917 SaintMike's dad was born.

1934 Adolf Hitler declared himself Fuehrer after the death of President Hindenberg .

1964 The Kinks supported The Beatles at the Gaumont cinema in Bournemouth, where they were billed as 'new and unknown London group' .

1984 Charles M Scultz received a commission to publish his new cartoon strip 'Peanuts' starring Charlie Brown, Snoopy and friends, in the Daily Times in Portsmouth, Ohio .

1987 The 50 year old Walt Disney movie 'Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs' was re-released in the US and grossed almost $20 million in its first 2 weeks of release .

1993 An English farmer was arrested after his illegal collection of World War II shells and grenades exploded .

3

On 3rd August.....

1492 Christopher Columbus set sail from Palos de la Frontera, a port in south west spain, on te voyage that was to lead him to the Americas

1610 Captain Henry Hudson discovered the bay that now bears his name.

1914 Germany declared war on France.

1926 Britain's first traffic lights were installed at Piccadilly Circus in London

1936 Black US athlete Jesse Owens won the first of his 4 Olympic gold medals in Berlin, denting Adolf Hitler's hopes of using the Games to prove Aryan superiority.

1963 The Beatles played at The Cavern Club for the 294th and last time

1971 Paul McCartney announced the formation of his new band Wings

1988 A giant planet was discovered , 30,000 times bigger than the earth, orbiting a star outside our solar system

2004 In New York, the Statue of Liberty was reopened to the public, having been closed since the terrorist attacks on the USA on 11th Sept 2001.

2

On 4th August.....

1693 Champagne was invented by Frenchman Dom Perignon.

1875 Hans Christian Andersen died.

1900 H.M. Queen Elizabeth Queen Mother was born.

1944 Nazi police raided the secret annexe of a building in Amsterdam and arrested 8 people including 14 year old Anne Frank, whose diary became a famous account of the Holocaust.

1958 Billboard published ifs first 'Hot 100'. Topping the chart was Ricky Nelson's first No.1 'Poor Little Fool'.

1984 South African athlete Zola Budd accidentally tripped US champion and gold medal favourite Mary Decker during the 3,000 metres in the Los Angeles Olympics .

1985 Steve Cram set a new world record for the 2,000 metres of 4 mins,51.39 seconds in Hungary.

1990 A train driver was killed and 35 passengers injured when an empty train ran into the back of a Manchester to Penzance express at Stafford.

1993 According to a survey, Britons were the most moderate drinkers in Europe.

1997 As the controversy of alcopops continued, the JD Whetherspoon chain of pubs banned their sale at all 194 of their outlets Pressure groups afraid of the lure of alcohol to children were reported to be pleased with the decision which followed the Safeway supermarket's decision not to promote the products at their stores.

2000 Celebrations took place all over the UK to mark the 100th birthday of Queen Elizabeth- the Queen Mother is the first of the Royal Family to reach her centenary.

And finally.......

1

On 5th August.......

1962 ANC leader Nelson Mandela was sentenced to life imprisonment for attempting to overthrow the South African government.

1962 Marilyn Monroe died.

1965 Sonny and Cher made their UK debut at London's 100 club.

1970 Penalty kicks were used as a tiebreaker in a first-class English football match for the first time during the game between Hull City and Manchester United.

1980 The Osmonds disbanded.

1981 Olivia Newton-John received her own star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

1984 Richard Burton died.

1986 Princess Anne recorded her first victory in her 13th ride as an amateur jockey, riding Gulfland at Redcar.

1992 Sally Gunnell won an Olympic gold in the hurdles at Barcelona.

1993 57 students had to retake their exams for banking qualifications at Sutton Coldfield of FE, West Midlands after the Royal Mail's Parcelforce lost their papers.

1994 Former dental nurse Julie Kelly accused of abducting baby Abbie Humphries, was freed on bail to a secret location on condition she did not try to contact the baby's parents.

1995 A new invention developed by Southampton University picks up offending sounds and bounces them back in the same direction.

1996 A new hotline was introduced to allow neighbours to report anyone they know to be making fraudulent benefit claims.

1997 A survey for The Times by Opinion Leader Research showed that the general public were overwhelmingly behind Prince Charles over whether he should be free to marry after his divorce from Diana, Princess of Wales.

2001 Sir Alec Guiness died.

A hurculean effort Mike, you can take a break now.