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It was 150 years ago, on 1st May 1873, that David Livingstone, the Scottish missionary and explorer, died. He was best known for his search for the sources of the Nile, and for going missing (and being found by the American journalist Henry Morton Stanley) in the wilds of Africa. Livingstone was born in Blantyre,...

Sixty years ago, on 27th May 1963, the folk/blues album The Freewheelin’ Bob Dylan was released. It included the hit song Blowin’ in the Wind and marked the start of an amazing singing-songwriting career. It was in fact Bob Dylan’s second album, but the first to contain all his own songs. He came to prominence...

Just 75 years ago, on 14th-15th May 1948, Israel was declared an independent state as the British mandate in Palestine came to an end, and the Arab-Israeli War began with the invasion of Israel by Egypt, Transjordan, Lebanon, Syria and Iraq. The war had been preceded by considerable unrest, with Zionist gangs committing atrocities and...

All in the month of APRIL strong>Happy Birthday, Cadbury Crème Egg Easter eggs galore!s trong>First flight over Everest Remembering the Royal Yacht Britannia Remembering Corrie ten Boom Who is eating the plastic at sea? Why the stars are fading Why is it getting harder to see your GP ** Editor:  We continue our column that...

It was: 150 years ago, on 4th April 1873 that the Kennel Club was founded in London. It oversees dog shows and dog agility competitions and operates Britain’s national register of pedigree dogs. The Kennel Club licenses dog shows throughout the UK, but the only dog show that it actually runs is Crufts. The Kennel Club...

Cadbury Crème Eggs celebrate their 60th birthday this Spring. They have a lot to celebrate: the Creme Egg is the best-selling confectionery item between New Year’s Day and Easter in the UK, with annual sales of more than 200 million eggs, worth about £55 million. Cadbury Crème Eggs were first created by the British chocolatier...

Easter eggs. We like them. So much so, that about 80 million are sold in the UK each year. They go on sale early: major supermarkets like Tesco, Sainsbury’s, Morrisons, and Waitrose launched Easter-themed confectionery ranges as early as January. Tesco had them on the shelves by 30th December 2022. On average, children in the...

It was 90 years ago, on 3rd April 1933, that the first flight over Mount Everest took place. British pilots the Marquis of Clydesdale and Donald McIntyre flew two biplanes over the summit. The two Scots were financed by the striking and rather eccentric Lady Houston, who started life as a chorus girl but through...

Seventy years ago, on 16th April 1953, Queen Elizabeth II launched the Royal Yacht Britannia. It was decommissioned in 1997. The Royal Family no longer owns a royal yacht. Britannia was the 83rd such vessel since King Charles II acceded to the throne in 1660, but the first Royal Yacht to be built with complete...

It was 40 years ago, on 15th April 1983, that Corrie ten Boom, a Dutch writer, watchmaker, and Holocaust survivor, died. She wrote about her experiences in Christian books that became best-sellers. Corrie’s family were Calvinist Christians in the Dutch Reformed Church, and served their neighbourhood by offering shelter, food and money to the needy....

Scientists believe they may have discovered what happens to a great deal of the plastic that is dumped in the ocean. The mystery has been that while about 14 million tonnes end up in marine environments each year, only about one per cent of that is ever found in sampling surveys. While much of the...

By the time a child born today becomes an adult, they may be able to see fewer than half the stars that are currently visible. This is not because the stars are fading, but because of ever increasing ‘skyglow’, or light pollution, which is brightening the night sky by 9.6pc on average each year. So...