Today In History with The Retrospectors

India’s Hijra community - who for centuries held a significant cultural, political and spiritual role in Indian society - were officially recognised on 9th March, 2005, when a new option appeared on passport forms, allowing applicants to select M for Male, F for Female, or ‘write E for Eunuch’. Although being labelled as a ‘third sex’ was considered by some to be stigmatising, it also reflected an...

Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier’s ‘Fight of the Century’ at Madison Square Garden on 8th March, 1971 had the attention of the world - including multiple celebrities. But the photographer LIFE magazine had hired for the event was, nevertheless, a coup: Frank Sinatra.  “I'm so mad I could chew nails and spit tax”, wrote former LIFE staff photographer Robert W. Kelley. “I've been a professional news pho...

Why is Sunday the Christian day of rest? Because Jesus said so? No! It was Roman emperor Constantine The Great who decreed on 7th March, 320 that “on the venerable day of the sun, let the magistrate and the people residing in cities rest and let all workshops be closed”. It was a departure from the tradition of commemorating Sabbath on a Saturday, which had been in line with Jewish teachings - and...

When Andrew Jackson was inaugurated on 4th March, 1829, large crowds of recently emancipated, enthusiastic voters turned up to the Capitol to watch the former Army commander become President. But the event soon spiraled out of control, descending into, at best, chaos; and, at worst, a brawl.  Eyewitness Margaret Bayard Smith wrote: “No arrangements had been made no police officers placed on duty a...

Russell Athletic, the company that created the sweatshirt, began life as The Russell Manufacturing Company on 3rd March, 1902 in Alexander City, Alabama. Its founder was entrepreneurial polymath Benjamin Russell, and they specialized in women’s undershirts. It wasn’t until decades later - when Russell’s son returned from college with a concept for college-based sportswear - that the brand embarked...

The Victory of Adwa on 2nd March, 1896 marked a milestone in the so-called ‘Scramble for Africa’ - because, whilst so much of the continent had been colonised by European nations, Abysinnia successfully defended their country from the invading Italians. Rome had underestimated the Ethiopians’ weaponry, motivation and strategy, and turned up with bad maps, demoralized troops - and orders to march o...

Eva Tanguay, vaudeville megastar, was arrested in Louisville, Kentucky on 1st March, 1910 after stabbing a stagehand three times with a hat pin. At the police station, she reportedly produced a roll of bills and cried, “take it all. And let me go, for it's now my dinner time.” It was neither the first violent incident of her career, nor the first time she had piqued the curiosity of the press - in...

Webster’s New International Dictionary (Second Edition) was the largest book to be mass produced, but - as was revealed on 28th February, 1939 - it contained an embarrassing error: on page 771, between the entries for Dorcopsis (a type of small kangaroo) and doré (golden in colour), was the word ‘dord’. Which doesn’t exist.  The mistake had arisen from a note submitted by the dictionary’s Chemistr...

Henri Landru, known as ‘Bluebeard’ to the French public, was executed by guillotine on 25th February, 1922, having murdered at least ten women he dated during the First World War. He continued to protest his innocence throughout his sensational trial - despite having drawn a detailed doodle of the oven he had used to burn his victims’ bodies. In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly unpick Landru’...

The ‘Last Invasion’ of Britain was not, as most people assume, The Battle of Hastings - but actually a farcical French attempt to conquer the Pembrokeshire town of Fishguard on 24th February, 1797.  Windy weather had already scuppered the first two prongs of this failed three-pronged attack, which was ultimately overthrown by a rag-bag militia of volunteers, a shipload of discarded booze, and a We...

When Jennifer Lopez turned up on the Grammys’ red carpet wearing a green Versace dress on February 23rd, 2000, there was such a rush from the public to see the image that it became the most searched-for term in Google’s history.  As a result - Eric Schmidt later confessed - Google Images was developed and launched, and a whole new way of searching the web was created. In this episode, Arion, Rebec...

Dolly The Sheep, the first ever successfully cloned mammal, was introduced to the world’s press at the Roslin Institute in Scotland on 22nd February, 1997. Born seven months earlier, with the comparatively unremarkable name ‘Lamb Number 6LL3’, news of her birth had been leaked by The Observer before the scientific paper about her genesis could be published, sparking an international frenzy.  In th...

Pan-Am pilot Byron Rickards was surrounded by soldiers and told he had become the prisoner of a revolutionary organisation shortly after landing in Arequipa, Peru on 21 February 1931 - the first recorded aircraft hijack in history. Rickards refused to drop pro-rebel propaganda, leading to a stand-off - although, astonishingly, it wasn’t the only time in his career that his plane would be hijacked…...

Sentenced to death for treason against his brother King Edward IV, George, Duke of Clarence was executed on 18th February, 1478 - and, according to legend, chose to be drowned in a butt of his favorite tipple: malmsey wine.  It was apt punishment for years of plotting against his brother alongside his father-in-law, the Earl of Warwick - most notably by claiming that the King’s two children were i...

The 1870 Education Act was the first to deal specifically with the provision of British schools. Speaking in the House of Commons, William Edward Forster MP proposed: "I believe that the country demands from us that we should… cover the country with good schools, and get parents to send their children to those schools.” But there was opposition: from Christians concerned about the religious noncon...

Why do we say ‘God Bless You’ when we sneeze? Some historians trace it back to 16th February, 600 - and a decree supposedly issued by the pun-loving, God-fearing Pope Gregory to ward off the effects of the plague that had killed his predecessor. (Sadly, Gregory’s other idea to fight off the disease wasn’t quite so successful - he organized a parade through Rome, and 80 people in the crowd spread t...

TV chef Delia Smith built a stellar career on the success spawned from her first book, ‘How To Cheat At Cooking’ in 1971. So, when she published a reboot on 15th February, 2008, it seemed a shoo-in to sell bucketloads (which it did) - but not, perhaps, attract controversy (which it REALLY did). By seemingly encouraging the chattering classes to buy ready-mixed and frozen food, she was accused of h...

The Rockettes kicked off a celebrity line-up including Elizabeth Taylor, Liza Minelli, Jimmy Stewart, Al Pacino and Miss Piggy at ‘The Night of 100 Stars’, a benefit for the Actors Fund of America recorded on 14th February, 1982 at Radio City Music Hall, New York.  A night of sheer glitz and excess, the true tally of stars on-stage totalled 206 - but perhaps that’s what you’d expect for $1000 per...

The first women’s public toilets in London opened on Bedford St on 11th February, 1852 - attempting to capitalize on the success of George Jennings’ ‘monkey closets’, used by over 800,000 visitors to the 1851 Great Exhibition. Unfortunately, even though the facility had been fought for by campaigning women’s sanitary organizations, middle and upper class Victorian ladies were not yet prepared to p...

Violent ‘town versus gown’ confrontations have been part of Oxford life ever since the University was founded - but reached an ignominious peak on 10th February, 1355, when almost 100 people were massacred in what became known as the ‘St Scholastica’s Day Riot’. The killing spree began as a brawl in a bar. When a pair of students at the Swindlestock Tavern complained about the quality of the wine,...

Chester Racecourse hosted Britain’s first ever recorded horse-racing meet on 9th February, 1539. The winner received a set of silver bells to hang from their bridal. Mayor Henry Gee had come up with the idea as a replacement for the traditional Shrove Tuesday football match - which he’d banned for being too riotous and violent. In this episode, Arion, Rebecca and Olly debate the folk etymology of...

Diners Club, the world’s first credit card, was used for the first time at Major’s Cabin Grill in New York City on February 8th, 1950. Perhaps at odds with the debonair image the company went on to cultivate, the first iteration was made of cardboard, and required three signatories.  Frank X McNamara claimed to have invented the product after previously dining at Major’s and realizing to his horro...

Inventing the internet and pioneering satellite navigation, U.S. government agency DARPA has had an illustrious history since being founded by President Eisenhower (as the Advanced Research Projects Agency) on February 7th, 1958.  Created in response to the Soviets launching Sputnik, the world's first artificial satellite, its mission, which continues to this day, is ‘to prevent technological surp...

Disguised variously as a baseball umpire, NFL referee, pro golfer, and even Dallas Cowboys cheerleader, Barry Bremen earned his reputation as America’s greatest pitch invader - a career that kicked off on 4th February, 1979. Dressed as a player for the Kansas City Kings, the 32 year-old insurance salesman crashed the court of an NBA All-Star basketball game - much to the delight of fellow players...

The women of the Wild West mostly spent their lives laundering men’s clothes, bringing up children, and avoiding getting caught in the crossfire - but that didn’t stop a legend forming around them; not least dime novel heroine and ‘Bandit Queen’ Belle Starr, who was murdered on 3rd February, 1889. The ‘outlaw’ was riding home, two days before her 41st birthday, eating a piece of cornbread, when sh...