Today is Christmas Day, Merry Christmas everyone!! Your star sign is Capricorn and your birthstone is Blue Topaz.
1932 – King George V made the first Royal Christmas broadcast to the British Empire via radio from Sandringham House, an event initiated by BBC founder Lord Reith and written by Rudyard Kipling.
Today’s Birthdays
1949 – Sissy Spacek (76), American actress (The Help), better known for role as Carrie in the Stephen King Horror of the same name, born in Quitman, Texas, United States.
1954 – Annie Lennox (71), Scottish singer-songwriter with the new wave band, Eurythmics (“Sweet Dreams”, “Walking on Broken Glass”), born in Aberdeen, Scotland.
1954 – Robin Campbell (71), English musician, singer and founder of the reggae band, UB40 (“Kingston Town”, “Red Red Wine”), born in Birmingham, West Midlands.
1957 – Chris Kamara (68), English former professional football player (Leeds United, Sheffield United) and football analyst at Sky Sports (1992 to 2022), born in Middlesbrough.
1958 – Alannah Myles (67), Canadian singer-songwriter (“Black Velvet”), born in Toronto, Canada.
1971 – Dido (54), English singer and songwriter (“Thank You”, “White Flag”, “Here With Me”), born in Kensington, London.
1975 – Marcus Trescothick (50), English former cricketer (England – 76 Test matches and 123 One Day Internationals, Somerset), born in Keynsham, Somerset.
Famous Deaths
1977 – Charlie Chaplin (b. 1889), English comic actor, filmmaker, and composer who rose to fame in the era of silent film.
1995 – Dean Martin (b. 1917), American singer (“Ain’t That a Kick in the Head”), actor (Rio Bravo, Oceans 11) and comedian.
2006 – James Brown (b. 1933), American singer, songwriter and musician (“Papa’s Got a Brand New Bag”).
2016 – George Michael (b. 1963), British singer and songwriter (“Careless Whisper”, “Last Christmas”) who formed Wham! (“”Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go”) with Andrew Ridgeley.
The Day Today
1914 – The Christmas truce between British and German troops continued. At 2 a.m. a German band went along the trenches playing Home Sweet Home and God Save the King.
1932 – King George V made the first Royal Christmas broadcast to the British Empire via radio from Sandringham House, an event initiated by BBC founder Lord Reith and written by Rudyard Kipling, connecting millions across the vast Empire and establishing a beloved tradition.
1952 – Queen Elizabeth II’s first Christmas Day broadcast was delivered by radio from Sandringham House, following her accession earlier that year, where she pledged to continue her father’s work; her first televised message, appearing in vision, was in 1957.
1950 – The Stone of Scone, the Scottish coronation stone which had been in Westminster Abbey for 650 years was stolen by Scottish nationalists. The Stone, weighing 458lb (208kg) was said to have been taken from Scotland by Edward I.
1989 – The show trial of Romanian Communist dictator Nicolae Ceaușescu occurred. Along with his wife Elena, they were tried on charges of genocide and personal enrichment. The trial lasted for just one hour before the couple was found guilty. They were executed by firing squad just a few minutes after the trial ended.
1989 – Leonard Bernstein conducts Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 in East Berlin’s Schauspielhaus (“play-house” or “theatre”) to celebrate fall of the Berlin Wall which was broadcast worldwide to an audience of 100 million.
1991 – Mikhail Gorbachev formally resigned as President of the USSR in a televised speech a day before the Soviet Union was formally dissolved.
2003 – Scientists failed to make contact with the British built Mars probe Beagle 2, which should have landed on the Red Planet ‘on this day’. Beagle 2 was named after HMS Beagle, which twice carried Charles Darwin during expeditions which would later lead to the theory of natural selection. Beagle 2 was officially declared lost on 6th February 2004.
2010 – The body of landscape architect Joanna Yeates was found, covered with leaves in Failand, North Somerset. A post-mortem examination determined that she had been strangled. The police initially suspected and arrested Christopher Jefferies, Yeates’ landlord, who lived in a flat in the same building. The nature of press reporting on aspects of the case led to ‘substantial, undisclosed libel damages’ from eight newspapers being awarded to Mr. Jefferies. ITV commissioned a drama about Jefferies’ arrest entitled ‘The Lost Honour of Christopher Jefferies’ which was aired on 10th and 11th December 2014.
2013 – Earlier storms across southern England, stretching through Dorset, Hampshire, Surrey and Kent, led to extensive power cuts, with around 50,000 homes remaining without power through the Christmas period. Southern Electric said that it would guarantee a £75 payment for any customer who was without electricity for any time on Christmas Day.
2013 – The Wolf of Wall Street, directed by Martin Scorsese and starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Margot Robbie and Jonah Hill, was released (January 17, 2014 in the UK).
2021 – The James Webb Space Telescope was launched from the Guiana Space Center. Jointly developed by NASA, the European Space Agency, and the Canadian Space Agency, the telescope is the most advanced infrared telescope ever built. The first image captured by the telescope was released on July 11, 2022.
1954 – Bing Crosby’s ‘White Christmas’ entered the Billboard Pop chart for the eleventh time. Bing’s rendition has sold over 100 million copies around the world, with at least 50 million sales as singles. It was the largest selling single in music history until it was surpassed by Elton John’s ‘Candle in the Wind 1997’.
1981 – Michael Jackson phoned Paul McCartney and suggested they write and record together, the first result being ‘The Girl is Mine’. The song was a US No.2 & UK No.8 in 1982.
1982 – David Bowie had a No.3 UK hit with a duet with Bing Crosby, ‘Peace On Earth – Little Drummer Boy.’ The single became one of Bowie’s best selling in his career, with total estimated sales over 400,000 in the UK alone. The Christmas song was written in 1941, while the ‘Peace on Earth’ tune and lyrics, written by Ian Fraser, Larry Grossman, and Alan Kohan, were added to the song specially for Bowie and Crosby’s recording.
1995 – American singer, actor and TV host Dean Martin died. Had the 1956 UK & US No.1 single ‘Memories Are Made Of This’ plus over 15 other UK Top 40 singles including ‘That’s Amore’, ‘Everybody Loves Somebody’, ‘Mambo Italiano’. In 1965, Martin launched his weekly NBC comedy-variety series, The Dean Martin Show.
2006 – James Brown the ‘Godfather of Soul’, died at the age of 73 after being diagnosed with severe pneumonia. Brown went to his dentist in Atlanta the previous day who told him something was wrong, and sent him to a doctor immediately. His hits included ‘Papa’s Got a Brand New Bag’, ‘I Got You (I Feel Good)’, and ‘Get Up (I Feel Like Being A) Sex Machine.
2014 – Ed Sheeran was at No.1 on the UK album chart with x, (pronounced “multiply”). In 2015, x won the Brit Award for British Album of the Year, and at the 57th Grammy Awards it was nominated for Best Pop Vocal Album and Album of the Year. Spotify named x the most-streamed album in the world for 2014, racking up more than 430 million streams for the year.
2016 – George Michael died at his home aged 53. Thames Valley Police said South Central Ambulance Service attended a property in Goring in Oxfordshire at 13:42 GMT. The singer who launched his career with Wham in the 1980s and later continued his success as a solo performer, was said to have “passed away peacefully at home”. Up to the time of his death, Michael sold more than 115 million records worldwide, making him one of the best-selling music artists of all time. Michael’s sister Melanie Panayiotou died suddenly age 59 on the third anniversary of the singer’s death (2019).
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