Random Ad - British Rail (1950's)

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'Cheap' and 'Railway' in the same advert! Must be from way back when. They don't run many Ramblers' Excursions these days.

Random Cutting - Sunday Opening (1986)

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This 1986 attempt by the Margaret Thatcher's Government to greatly relaxed the Sunday Trading restrictions of the 1950 Shops Act failed and it wasn't until 1994 that large shops such as Supermarkets could open on a Sunday. 

Prince George Wedding

Daily Mirror dated Friday November 30^th 1934

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Prince George Edward Alexander Edmund, Duke of Kent was the younger brother of Edward who became Edward VIII, Albert who became George VI and Prince Henry, Duke of Gloucester.

His bride was Princess Marina of Greece and Denmark who was a first cousin to the future Duke of Edinburgh. Her father was cousin to Czar Nicholas II of Russia. “Why Greece and Denmark?” I hear you ask. ‘Twas because her Grandfather George I of Greece was actually Danish and was elected to the position of King of Greece by the Greek National Assembly.

The marriage lasted until George was killed in a RAF Short Sunderland flying boat on it’s way to Iceland in 1942. Marina died in 1968 of a brain tumour.

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Prince George was the black sheep of George V’s Royal Family. He was bi-sexual and addicted to cocaine. Before and after his marriage he had a string of affairs that included novelist Barbara Cartland, musical actress Jessie Mathews, the son of the Argentine ambassador, future Russian spy Anthony Blunt and, it is rumoured, Noel Coward. He was blackmailed by a male prostitute and had at least one illegitimate son.

George's interest in Jazz music was portrayed in the recent Stephen Poliakoff TV production ‘Dancing on the Edge’.

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Wedding or no wedding, life goes on then as now - tobacco smugglers, rail crossing deaths, hand-bag snatching, a bus crash, factory blaze, a Judge who could face the afternoon session and a gas leak.

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This piece about the son of Sir Hector Murray Macneal certainly doesn’t tell the whole story. The boy, Carroll Livingstone Wainwright Jr, was in fact Sir Hector’s stepson and had been born in America. His mother married Sir Hector in America and for the first two years the family, including Carroll’s older brother and sister, travelled America and Canada. In November 1934 they left the eldest boy in school in New York and moved to Bermuda. This was when Carroll stowed away on the ship Queen of Bermuda on route for New York where he was reunited with his real father and his grandparents.

I don’t know what happened after that but in 1981 the United States Trust Company of New York elected to their board a Carroll Livingston Wainwright Jr who was a partner in the law firm of Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy who apparently was in the Havard Law School Class of 1951.

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On December 8^th 1934, a regular London to Brisbane Air-Mail service began using the Imperial Airways’ C Class Empire Flying Boats from the UK to Karachi then Indian Trans-Continental aircraft to Singapore and finally Qantas planes to Australia. The journey of 12,700 miles was the world’s longest air route and took around 12 days.

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The Jane’s Journal comic strip was started in 1932 by Norman Pett in the Daily Mirror and lasted, although renamed 'Jane' until 1959.

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Although proposed 10 years earlier in the Cadogan Report, corporal punishment in UK prisons as part of a criminal’s sentence was not abolished until September 1948. It continued to be used as punishment for prisoners who injured prison officers up until 1962 and was officially abolished in 1967.

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In just less than 5 years Britain’s efforts to re-arm against German re-arming turned out to be prudent but inadequate. By 1950 we were indeed into another and probably more deadly arms race as the Cold War saw the West stockpiling nuclear weapons against the threat of Soviet nuclear attack. 

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This was not the infamous anti-Semitic 1940 German version of the 'Jew Suss' but a more sympathetic treatment filmed in England. It was known as 'Power' in the USA.

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No television - just good old fashioned steam radio. The BBC, broadcasting National and Regional programmes, was obviously under the strict dictatorship of John Reith. Classical recitals, light orchestral music and informative talks were the order of the day. You would have had to tune into Warsaw to find any of that scandalous Jazz music. 

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Records? Big round things that revolved at 78 rpm with a hole in the middle. It can’t be a co-incidence that this advert appears on the Radio page with the tag line “Hear what you like – when you like”. I have Rex 8252 Primo Scala’s ‘Isle of Capri’ in a cupboard somewhere. I must dig it out. 

Random Ad - Parkinsons' Pills (1940's)

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The Rolling Stones wrote the soundtrack to this 1940’s advert for Parkinsons’ Pills -

I hear every mother say

Mother needs something today to calm her down

And though she’s not really ill there’s a little yellow pill

She goes running for the shelter of a mother’s little helper

And it helps her on her way, gets her through her busy day 

(Mother’s Little Helper 1965)

Random Cutting - M.P.'s Food Hoard (1918)

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“By Gad, Sir! A member of the bally House of Commons up to no good – whatever next? The bounders’ll be fiddling their expenses next. Pass the crate of brandy, what!”

James Bulger Trial Verdict

The Independent dated Thursday November 24^th 1993

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The 20^th anniversary of the murder of toddler James Bulger by 10-year-olds Jon Venables and Robert Thompson passed recently and the more serious newspapers marked it by re-opening the great Nature Vs Nurture debate – were these two children born evil or were they products of their environment?

They were both released in 2001 after a parole board decided they were no longer a threat to the Public. In 2010 Venables was sent back to prison after being convicted for possession of child pornography.

The Ulster Volunteer Force was created in 1966 by a former British Soldier with the aim of combating Republican attempts to free Northern Ireland from British rule. 

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When I worked in central London I spent a lot of time on the Tube and dreaded those times when the packed rush hour train slowed to a halt and the lights dimmed. The heat and the body-odour were nothing compared to the uncertainty as to whether the train would ever start again.

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Definitely a case of she who sups with the Devil should have a long spoon. Or, at least, have more sense than to voluntarily spent time alone with a convicted murderer.

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Packard Bell Legend Elite with 170Mb of hard disk space! That’s 0.17 Gb! At the moment I have 48 mpegs on my system, each one larger than that. It may well be a case of rubbish expanding to fill the space provided for it. And don't get me started on the 16MHz processor on the Apple Macintosh. 

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Silvio Berlusconi was born in Milan in 1936 and by 1993 had amassed a fortune as the head of a business empire owning newspapers, publishing, cinema, finance, banking, insurance, sports and more than half of Italy’s TV output.

In 1993 he decided to enter politics and formed the anti-communist Forza Italia Party and by 1994 started his first of three stints as Prime Minister. He has been accused of corruption, neo-fascist sympathies, lying to the Electorate, possible criminal dealings with Vladimir Putin, false accounting, tax evasion, corruption and bribery of police officers and judges, witness bribery, soliciting minors for sex, abuse of Political office and Mafia connections. He also has the diplomatic tact of the Duke of Edinburgh at a meeting of the Ethnic Minorities League.

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Hip-hop artist (whatever that means) Tupak Shakur and others were charged with sexually assaulting a woman in a hotel room. At the trial Shakur was convicted of sexual abuse and sentenced to 1½–4½ years in prison. After serving part of his sentence he was released on bail pending appeal. In April 1996 he was sentenced to serve 120 days in jail for violating terms of his bail. On September 13^th 1996 he was murdered in a drive-by shooting.

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If the Anti-gun ownership lobby in the USA want proof that they are right and that strict gun control works, they should look at Japan. They have very strict gun ownership laws and, despite what you might see in Japanese crime films, on average about 12 homicides by shooting a year. 

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‘Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat’ was the first of a long list of musicals written by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice, Richard Stilgoe, Ben Elton etc that I have never seen nor would want to. Oh! – except  ‘Jesus Christ Superstar’ as filmed by Norman Jewison.

Random Ad - George Best's Football Boots (1970's)

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George Best (Northern Island and Hong Kong Rangers) endorses Stylo Matchmakers Soccer Shoes. Used to be called football boots when I were a lad.