Friday, April 05, 2013

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The first official silk (King's Counsel/Queen's Counsel/Senior Counsel/Silk) was Francis Bacon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queen%2...
Wednesday, June 20, 2007

By One Vote . . .

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Cardinal Pole , the last Roman-Catholic Archbishop of Canterbury, was beaten to Pope by one vote by Julius III in 1549 and by two votes by P...
2 comments:
Sunday, June 17, 2007

The World's Longest River

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We have known for some time that the Amazon is the world's biggest river by volume of water, but now scientists think that it is even l...
Thursday, June 07, 2007

Are Charles and Camilla married?

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Since members of the royal family are exempt from the Marriages Act (1949) it would seem that their marriage was valid only if, (since they...
Wednesday, June 06, 2007

George IV

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George IV also took part in a putative marriage ceremony that was null and void: in 1785, aged 23, he married the Roman-Catholic widow Mari...
2 comments:
Tuesday, June 05, 2007

First Divorced Bishop in Britain

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Anthony Crockett, the Bishop of Bangor, is the first divorced (and remarried) bishop in Britain .

First Personal Genome Map

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James Watson has become the first person to receive his own personal genome map .

First Person to be executed for Heresy

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Priscillian has the dubious distinction of being the first person in the history of Christianity to be executed for heresy.

First King to have a marriage annulled?

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Perhaps the first English monarch to have a marriage annulled was Ethelbald , whose marriage to his widowed stepmother Judith was annulled ...

First English monarch with annulled marriage

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It would appear that the first English monarch to have a marriage annulled (it wasn't a divorce) would be King John , with Isabel of Gl...
Monday, June 04, 2007

Law

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The Scotsman tells us that: One law every three hours has been created during Tony Blair's decade in power: over the past ten years, cl...

Henry VIII

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Contrary to popular belief, Henry VIII was never divorced. On the contrary, his failed marriages were annulled. So, how many marriages did h...

Edward VIII and Mrs Simpson

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Wikipedia , referring to the official documents, tells us that, letters patent dated 27 May 1937 , which re-conferred upon the Duke of Win...

Divorced monarchs

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It is unclear to me whether Prince Charles is divorced, since his former spouse is dead. But he would by no means be the first divorced mona...

Prince Philip

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Prince Philip is not Prince Consort. Wikipedia tells us that his official title is: His Royal Highness The Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh...

Camilla

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Camilla's full style, Wikipedia tells us, is: Her Royal Highness The Princess Charles Philip Arthur George, Princess of Wales and Cou...
Wednesday, May 23, 2007

Everton Football Club

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Everton Football Club was founded in 1878 by Rev B. S. Chambers, Minister of St. Domingo Methodist Church, a church of the Methodist den...
Tuesday, May 22, 2007

record for league goals in a single season

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In 1925 Everton signed Dixie Dean , who, in 1927-1928, set the record for league goals in a single season (60 goals in 39 league games, a ...

record first-class score

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The record first-class batting score is 501 no by Brian Lara for Warwickshire v Durham at Edgbaston in 1994.

Highest-Ever Telephone Call

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The world's highest-ever telephone call has been made from the summit of Mt Everest.

Second footballer to score 1,000 goals

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The former Brazilian striker Romario scored what he says is the 1,000th goal of his career in a match in Rio de Janeiro on Sunday. The onl...

shortest job as football manager

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Leroy Rosenior has broken the record for English football's shortest managerial reign : Rosenior lost his job at Torquay only 10 minutes...
Sunday, May 20, 2007

record first-class opening stand

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The first-class record for an opening stand is 561, by Waheed Mirza (324) and Mansoor Akhtar (224 not out) for Karachi Whites against Quett...
Friday, May 18, 2007

W. G. Grace

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Some facts about W. G. Grace from John Major's new book More than a Game : In seven days in 1876 he scored 839 runs in three innings (34...
Friday, August 11, 2006

world's shortest scheduled flight

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The world's shortest scheduled flight is operated by Loganair between Westray and Papa Westray . It lasts about two minutes.
Monday, July 10, 2006

First captain to be sent off in a World-Cup Final

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Zinedine Zidane , ex-captain of France, became on 09/07/06 the first team captain ever to be sent off in a World-Cup Final . He was the four...
Sunday, July 02, 2006

One Thousand Miles in One Thousand Hours

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According to this site : On June 1, 1809 Captain Robert Barclay Allardice undertook what was then the greatest sporting feat ever ...

One-legged cricketers beat one-armed cricketers

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According to the BBC : On the 9th and 10th of August 1796, a cricket match took place between a team of one-legged pensioners and a team of ...

Footballing nations

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How many FIFA-member nations are not sovereign states? England, Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland, obviously. But which others? The Far...
1 comment:

Red Cards

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The BBC tells us in its report on the match on Friday 30th June 2006 between Germany and Argentina that: The dismissal of unused Argentine ...
Friday, June 30, 2006

Death Penalty

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According to Wikipedia the death penalty at the height of the 'Bloody Code' was in force for some 220 different crimes.
Thursday, June 29, 2006

Professional fouls

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Does anyone know of a case in which a footballer has committed a blatant 'professional foul', such as picking up the ball illegally ...

Trial by Combat

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You can read here an interesting story from 2002: A court has rejected a 60-year-old man’s attempt to invoke the ancient right to trial by ...
Tuesday, June 27, 2006

Tribe Members Wanted!

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This site has this unusual story: Mark James and Ben Keene, both 26, have set up www.tribewanted.com to invite people to join a tribe by r...

Vexillology

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If you are interested in vexillology , you may want to check out the Web site of the Flag Institute .

Permanent Link to Making History

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Here is a permanent link for listening to the edition of Making History featuring my question concerning the last heir to the English thro...
Thursday, June 22, 2006

Football teams with unique suffixes

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Tom Ward alerted me to these interesting questions, posted by Rurkah_Blurk at the Sunderland AFC Forum : 1. that have an individual ...
1 comment:
Saturday, June 17, 2006

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BBC Radio 4's Making History will be addressing the question of the last heir to the throne to die in battle on Tuesday 20 June 2006. A...
Monday, June 05, 2006

Coronation Oath

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I have taken from this Web page part of the coronation oath: Archbishop . Will you solemnly promise and swear to govern the Peoples of the...
Sunday, June 04, 2006

An enclave in England

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My friend David Ward also informed me about an interesting enclave in Britain: Shipston-on-Stour is a town in the Stratford-on-Avon distri...

Derby Line

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My good friend David Ward of The Guardian reminded me of the bizarre town of Derby Line, which straddles the Canada-US border, with the dem...

Do you want to be a king?

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A very interesting article in The Times for Saturday June 3rd 2006 detailed the vacancy regarding the title of 'King of Piel'. Thi...
Monday, May 22, 2006

long-lived musicians

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Further to the posts on long-lived bands, the chief contender for the title of the Longest Operatic Career is Danshi Toyotake of Hyogo, J...
3 comments:
Sunday, May 21, 2006

an exclave of Cambridgeshire in London

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Last weekend I visited a former exclave of Cambridgeshire in London: Ely Place. Well into the 20th century Ely Place was still like an indep...

Santa Claus, Indiana, and its crazy time zones

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This article describes the crazy world of Santa Claus, Indiana, which operates on three time zones. The post office runs on Central time, o...
2 comments:

longest-lived band again

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This page , dated '5 August 2003', says that the longest-lived band in music history is The Light Crust Doughboys. The Light Crust D...

Who was the last heir to the throne to die in battle?

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The question of the title was asked of me by a friend recently. Richard III was certainly the last English monarch to be killed on the batt...

world's oldest surviving band

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I discovered recently that in April of 1996, the Guiness Book of World Records awarded Les Brown with the distinction of being the leader ...

playing 3 consecutive football games in different divisions

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The late Roy Clarke 'enjoyed the unusual distinction of playing three consecutive games [of football] in three different divisions'...