November 3rd "2024" Daily Prep
(DEMO FILE)
Welcome to day 308 of the “leap” year! Known as National Sandwich Day, National Stress Awareness Day, National Housewife’s Day. Your star sign is Scorpio and your birthstone is Topaz.
Todays birthdays
1948 – Lulu (76), Scottish singer (“Shout”, “Relight my Fire” with Take That), born in Lennoxtown, Stirlingshire, Scotland.
1954 – Adam Ant (70), English singer and musician (Adam and the Ants – “Prince Charming”, “Stand and Deliver”, “Goody Two Shoes), born in Marylebone, London.
1957 – Dolph Lundgren (67), Swedish actor (Rocky IV, Universal Soldier, The Expendables) and martial artisit, born in Stockholm, Sweden.
1963 – Ian Wright (61), English television and radio personality and former professional footballer (Arsenal FC, West Ham United), born in Woolwich, London.
1973 – Ben Fogle (51), English broadcaster (Cash in the Attic), writer and adventurer (Ben Fogle’s Lost Worlds), born in Westminster, London.
The day today
1906 – International Radiotelegraph Conference in Berlin selects “SOS” (· · · – – – · · ·) distress signal as the worldwide standard for help. The SOS code was implemented internationally on July 1, 1908.
1941 – English broadcaster Roy Plomley conceived the idea for ‘Desert Island Discs’. The programme was first broadcast on BBC Radio in January 1942.
1975 – Queen Elizabeth II opened the North Sea pipeline, the first to be built underwater bringing ashore 400,000 barrels a day to Grangemouth Refinery on the Firth of Forth in Scotland.
1985 – Two French agents in New Zealand pleaded guilty to sinking the Greenpeace ship, Rainbow Warrior and to the manslaughter of a photographer on board. They were sentenced to ten years’ imprisonment.
2014 – Will Cornick, aged 16, who murdered Ann Maguire while she was teaching a Spanish lesson at Corpus Christi Catholic College in Leeds, showed no emotion as he was handed a minimum of 20 years in custody. Ahead of the killing in April 2014, he had also planned to murder two other teachers, including one who was pregnant.
Today in music
1960 – Elvis Presley had his fifth UK No.1 single with ‘It’s Now Or Never’, it stayed at No.1 for eight weeks. The song which was based on the Italian song, ‘O Sole Mio’, gave Presley his first post-army No.1.
1990 – 25 years after their version was recorded, The Righteous Brothers went to No.1 on the UK singles chart with ‘Unchained Melody’. The track had been featured in the Patrick Swayze film ‘Ghost.’ Written by Alex North and Hy Zaret, ‘Unchained Melody is one of the most recorded songs of the 20th century, with over 500 versions in hundreds of different languages.
1992 – Bon Jovi released their fifth studio album, Keep The Faith, which spent a total of 49 weeks on the US chart. The album produced three Top 40 hits: ‘Keep The Faith’, ‘Bed of Roses’ and ‘In These Arms’.
2013 – The first ever YouTube awards were held in New York City. The event featured Eminem, Lady Gaga and M.I.A making live music videos directed by the awards’ creator, Spike Jonze, and others. Eminem won Artist of the Year, while Taylor Swift’s ‘I Knew You Were Trouble’ took the YouTube Phenomenon award.
2019 – Iron Maiden frontman Bruce Dickinson, left his wife of 29 years to move in with a ‘superfan’ 15 years his junior. It was reported that the singer was now living with fitness instructor Leana Dolci at her Paris home.
Today in history
1534 – England’s Parliament met and passed an Act of Supremacy which made King Henry VIII head of the English church, a role formerly held by the Pope. Many refused to accept the decision and between May 1535 and August 1540 eighteen Carthusian monks were executed for refusing to acknowledge the king as the head of the Church of England. Nine were starved to death in Newgate Prison, seven were hung, drawn and quartered at Tyburn and two were executed in York.
1718 – The birth of John Montague, fourth Earl of Sandwich who gave his name to the Sandwich Islands, and (allegedly) to the ‘sandwich’ as a result of his reluctance to leave the gaming tables but requiring a quick and easy to eat snack.
1728 – The explorer James Cook was baptised in the parish church of St. Cuthbert at Marton, near Middlesborough. Cook was also a Captain in the British Navy and a cartographer. He made detailed maps of Newfoundland prior to making three voyages to the Pacific Ocean, during which he achieved the first recorded European contact with the eastern coastline of Australia and the Hawaiian Islands, and the first recorded circumnavigation of New Zealand.
1783 – The highwayman John Austin was the last person to be publicly hanged at London’s Tyburn gallows.