Random Ad - Brylcreem (1950's)

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It wouldn't be the 1950's with Brylcreem - playboy, businessman or Teddy Boy you had to have your hair glued in place with smooth, white and non-sticky Brylcreem. You can add Canadian film and TV actor to that list. Robert Beatty (for it is he) is probably best remembered, by those of a certain age, for the London based TV cop drama 'Dial 999'

Lindbergh Baby Murder Hunt

Daily Mirror dated Saturday May 14th 1932

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Since his historic solo flight of the Atlantic in May 1927, Charles A Lindbergh had become a national hero in the USA and a celebrity around the World. In 1929 he married Anne Morrow and their first child, Charles Jr. was born a year later. On March 1^st 1932 Charles Jr. was kidnapped from the Lindbergh home in New Jersey. Ransom notes followed and money paid, but the child was not returned. Then on May 12^th the child’s body was found just a few miles from the house. The Police, the FBI and even Lindbergh-hired Private Detectives were now hunting for one or more murderers, but it wasn’t until September 1934 that a German illegal immigrant and petty criminal, Bruno Hauptmann, was arrested and charged with the killing. His trial was a media circus that ended with a guilty verdict. Hauptmann was executed in 1936.

The case resulted in the Lindbergh Law which made kidnapping a Federal offence which gave the FBI automatic jurisdiction.

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The Dartmoor Prison Mutiny had occurred on January 24 1932, but had been quickly suppressed by police reinforcements from Plymouth. 32, of the 150 convicts involved, were tried for their part in the disturbances.

Amazon.com have a jigsaw depicting an aerial photo of the prison admin block on fire during the Mutiny!

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Russian born Paul Gouguloff assassinated M. Doumer, the President of the French Republic and admitted at his trail that he had wanted to kill the President of Germany, Paul Von Hindenberg and Russian Soviet leader Lenin as well.

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The fledgling BBC (then the British Broadcasting Company rather than Corporation) opened studios at Savoy Hill in the Strand, London, in the headquarters of the Institute of Electrical Engineers in May 1923. It broadcast from there until it moved to the purpose-built Broadcasting House in Portland Place in May 1932.

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Lou Reichers' trans-Atlantic flight failed when he ditched about 50 miles off the west coast of Ireland. When the crew of the American liner ‘President Roosevelt’ picked him up from the rough sea he had a broken nose, cuts and bruises. Despite his Germanic sounding name, he was an American and flew for the USAAF during WWII and died in 1962.

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That’s the spirit that made Britain what it was. Aviation pioneers but lousy at making undercarriages.

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The third largest of the cat family, Jaguars, have been around since the Pleistocene epoch (a heck of a long time ago) and will be around for a while yet, despite this later-day Robin Hood trying to wipe them out.

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Untypically for the Mirror in the 1930's this is a confusing and badly written item. I have found a much clearer account online in the Singapore Strait Times, which explains that Mr Baldock and Mr Philpott conspired with jeweller’s shop manager Mr Tom to stage a robbery outside the shop. Baldcock and Philpott would snatch an empty bag supposedly holding gems worth £12300 and Tom would then claim the ‘loss’ on insurance. The 2 ‘robbers’ got 3 years a piece and Mr Tom was tried in 1933 for attempted insurance fraud.

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Modern greyhound racing with an artificial hare was introduced to the UK in 1926 and became very popular with the public, reaching its peak attendances just after World War II.

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I blame the passing of the Locomotives on the Highway Act of 1896, which raised the speed limit from 4 mph to 14 mph and abolished the requirement for these vehicles to be preceded by a man on foot.

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Wet weather on a Bank Holiday weekend? Whatever next?

Harrow and Wealdstone Train Crash 1952

Bournemouth Daily Echo dated Friday October 10th 1952

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This 3 train pile-up happened on 8^th October 1952 at Harrow and Wealdstone station when a stationery train waiting in the station was hit by a through express. The resultant wreckage was then hit by another express travelling in the opposite direction. The final death toll was 112 with 340 people injured,

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19 year-old trainee footman Harold Winstanley bought an ex-World War II 9mm Schmeisser machine pistol and some ammo from a friend to hunt rabbits, but instead walked into his employer’s house, Knowsley Hall, and murdered 2 people and wounded 2 others including Lady Derby. He then had a pint at the local before giving himself up to the police. He was found guilty but insane and sent to Broadmoor Hospital for the Criminally Insane.

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Pianist Leslie ‘Hutch’ Hutchinson was one of the World’s biggest cabaret stars during the 1920s and 30s. Finding fame in New York he moved to Paris and then London where he became notorious as the black man who had affairs with various white actresses and even, it was rumoured, Royalty. He died in comparative obscurity in 1969 and only a handful of people attended his funeral.

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You have to remember it was a different age – innocent but cruel.

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Those were the days when throwing an iron bar into a tree and having it land on your head didn’t lead to your parents suing the Local Council for letting a tree grow there in the first place; just a wiser kid.

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“By Gad, Sir! Bopping and jiving in Bournemouth! Whatever next? What’s wrong with the Black Bottom? Never did me and the memsahib any harm. Pass the hip-flask!”

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And what would Wernher Von Braun know about rockets? Well he did design and oversee the building of the V1 and V2 German rockets that killed so many people in London during World War II. Luckily for the US Space Program he was whisked off to America by the OSS before British Military Intelligence could get hold of him and wring his neck.

By the way his prediction was 8 years and about $23billion out.

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The joy! The tears! The spectacle! Who can forget the 1952 version of that agricultural blockbuster (loud fanfare) ‘Soil Fertility’?

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This was before the great boom in TV sales brought on by the Coronation in 1953, so the TV salesmen really had to work at it. But what could they show potential customers to lure them into parting with the equivalent of 6 months’ wages?

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Not a lot! 1 channel, black and white and broadcasting for less than 5 hours a day.

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And only this to watch it on.

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As Francis Urquhart often said, "I couldn't possibly comment."

Oliver Reed Dies in Pub

The Sun dated Monday May 3rd 1999

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What a shame that the star of ‘The Devils’, Ken Russell’s ‘Debussy’, ‘Women in Love’, ‘The Three Musketeers’, ‘I'll Never Forget What's'isname’, ‘The Trap’ and ‘Oliver!’ and so many others, should be remembered this way – Oliver Reed, the drunken buffoon in a silly hat. 

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I offer no apology for including this more fitting tribute, not from The Sun but a cutting from The Independent – Oliver Reed, the professional film actor.

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Continued from the top of the front page.

On 3 weekends in April homemade nail bombs had exploded in London, they were aimed at Black, Bangladeshi and Gay targets and killed 3 people as well as seriously injuring 139, some permanently. The arrested man, David Copeland, had been a member of both the BNP and the National Socialist Movement but was not acting on their behalf. He was later found guilty of multiple murders and sentenced to at least 50 years behind bars.

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On the 28^th April 1999 the journalist, TV presenter and newsreader Jill Dando was shot on the doorstep of her London home. A year after the murder a local man, Barry George, was arrested, charged and tried for the murder. He was convicted but, at a third appeal in 2007, he was allowed a re-trial and was acquitted for lack of evidence. No one else has ever been arrested for the murder.

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Why, oh why, oh why do papers have to use headlines like ‘Ross: Our snake hell’?  I’m sure it was frightening and upsetting for the Ross household at the time, but his daughter didn’t fall into a bottomless pit of serpents for all Eternity. It devalues the word ‘hell’. What is the copywriter to use when trying to describe something truly ‘hellish’ like a war or a famine?

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Call me Phil E Stein but this sketch by Pierre-Auguste Renoir doesn’t look anything special to me. Any traditional art student worth their student loan could do better.

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An edition of The Sun wouldn’t be complete without a picture of Posh and Becks. This was before they were married, moved to America and had 3 more embarrassingly named children.  

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Perfect Icon of the 1990’s? Johnny Vaughan? Paul Gascoigne? Melinda Messenger? Has The Sun never heard of Homer Simpson?

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As usual I include Sport for those strange people out there who actually enjoy it and might find this bit about the 1999 San Marino Grand Prix… what’s the word?.. oh yes… interesting.

Apollo 8

Christmas Mirror dated Tuesday December 24th 1968

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Apollo 8 was the first crewed space flight to orbit the Moon. The 6-day mission was primarily to reconnoitre landing sites for the Apollo 11 Moon Landing due the following year.  The crew were Frank Borman, William Anders and James Lovell who was to go on to head the Apollo 13 flight, which nearly ended in disaster.

By the way: If you ever decide to save newspapers then the condition of this front page will tell you that you should always store them flat and not folded in half.

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The spy-ship USS Pueblo was attacked on January 23^rd 1968 by the North Koreans and the 83-man crew were taken prisoner and held for 11 months. After much puffing and blowing by the US Government they were finally released on December 22^nd when President Lyndon Johnson agreed to publish both an admittance that the ship was spying and an apology. 

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In these politically correct times he would be called ‘gravitationally challenged’. Arthur Armstrong pictured here at 37 stone was down to 26 stone by 1970 according to a local newspaper, but I’ve no idea what happened to him after that.

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It seems that Michael Jackson wasn't the first pop star to go out in public looking like a sexual deviant.

Engelbert Humperdinck (formally Arnold Dorsey) was in the news recently as the UK’s entry for the 2012 Eurovision Song Contest, but back in 1968 he was known for his hits – ‘Release Me’, ‘There Goes My Everything’ and ‘The Last Waltz’. He has had at least one single released in almost every year since, including the oddly titled ditty ‘Lesbian Seagull’ in 1996.

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Nigeria was ravaged by Civil War from 1967 when part of the country split away to become Biafra, and 1970 when the Government forces defeated the breakaway Biafra. Britain and the USSR supported the Government while France and Israel supported the Biafra rebels. 

Lord Fenner Brockway was born in 1888, was an anti-war activist in WWI and was imprisoned, campaigned for Indian independence as early as 1919, became a Labour MP, put aside his anti-war stance for the duration of the Spanish Civil War, was a Conscientious Objector in WWII, founded the charity War on Want, was a founding member of the anti-nuclear CND, campaigned for peace in Vietnam, wrote 24 books and died at the age of 99 in 1988.

I saw him speak at a CND meeting at the age of 94. His age not mine.

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Not the best publicity for an about-to-start West End production, despite which ‘Mame’ ran for 14 months and Ginger Rogers was the highest paid performer in the West End up to that time.

She was best known for her ten musical films with Fred Astaire that included ‘Top Hat’ and ‘Flying Down to Rio’ and the possibly apocryphal claim that she “not only did what Astaire did but did it backwards and in high heels”.

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I don’t understand this at all. Why would H M Customs have to have half the cost of the goods for 6 months? It sounds like a scam. They’d get the interest on the money during the 6 months and do nothing for it. No wonder the country’s going to the dogs. 

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Christmas Day TV and it looks like ITV just gave up when it came to the prime 8pm-10pm slot – a second rate 18 year-old Western film up against Morcambe and Wise followed by Ken Dodd. Talking about political correctness (see above) what ever happened to ‘The Black and White Minstrel Show’?

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Before the Lottery, the Football Pools were the only way to win a life-changing amount of money. £16,000 in 1968 would have the equivalent spending power of about £170,000 now. Not quite your lottery millions but better than a poke in the eye with a wet lettuce.

Japanese Emperor's Funeral

The Daily Mirror dated Tuesday October 1st 1912

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This is the funeral of the Mikado or Emperor of Japan Mutsuhito – known after his death as Emperor Meiji. He'd been born in 1852 and had been Emperor since 1867, ruling Japan during a period of immense political, economic and cultural change from isolated feudal farming country to industrialised World power. Just a year before his death, by natural causes, 12 anarchists were executed for plotting to assassinate him.

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A handy map to tell you where the trouble is and hours of fun for the kids cutting out the pictures of the leaders and sticking them on the right country.

Seriously though this was just one of a series of Balkan crises that culminated in the First World War.

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A nice concise explanation of what was going on. Sort of. If you know which side to believe.

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The Dutch Baroness Charlotte Van Coehoorn had fallen in love with her chauffeur and in August 1912 had tried to elope with him, but she was intercepted at Ostend a few days later and returned to her family who immediately had her sent to an insane asylum (as you do). The family’s action was very unpopular and with the help of sympathisers she escaped and joined her lover who was waiting outside in a car. Unfortunately I can’t find anything about what happened next. A 1922 newspaper article found online mentions a Baroness Van Coehoorn on a World tour, but whether this is the same person or not, I don’t know.

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Florence Alice Bernadette Stiles who went by the stage name of Florence Dudley was shot three times in a taxicab as it pulled up in Farringdon Street. She died later in hospital. Her assailant was her married boyfriend Edward Hopwood and after shooting at a policeman he shot himself. He survived and was arrested for murder. His defence was that Florence was shot accidentally while trying to stop him committing suicide over the end of their affair. He was found guilty and hanged on 1^st February 1913.

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There must be a moral here but I can’t see it. ‘You can’t take it with you so why not have it destroyed by an earthquake’?  ‘A relative in need is a money grabbing good for nothing’?

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These pictures of a deer hunt remind me of Oscar Wilde’s take on fox-hunting – if I may miss-quote ‘The unspeakable chasing the rather quite tasty.’ Leave the deer alone and go and get a MacDonalds. 

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Electric socks!! 

I don’t have rheumatism but I must have a pair of damp-defying electric socks for Christmas.

‘Do not fill up boots’ – with what? Electricity? Uric Acid? Sockiness?

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It’s all lies I tell you! The headline says ‘McGrath's New Hammer Record’; the text says ‘it will not be recognized as a record’.  It’s a pity for the headline writer that the ironic suffix ‘Not!’ had yet to be invented. There is a photo of Matt McGrath here

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For a 1912/13 Arsenal team picture scroll down this page and for Chelsea this page
Arsenal ended the 1912/13 season bottom of the First Division and Chelsea were third from bottom. 

This article manages to make a game of football actually sound exciting. I might even watch a game one day. Are Arsenal and Chelsea still around?