This Day in History 23 - 29 December

• 23 December 1834 - Joseph Hansom of London receives patent for Hansom cab. The "cab" bit is short for cabriolet. They were popular until the 1920's, when the affordable motor car was coming into its own.

• 24 December 1922 - The London Coliseum came into being as a variety theatre. It was unusual for the time in that it didn't have a pit - not the orchestral type, but the type which housed the rowdy working classes.

• 25 December 1066 - William the Conqueror crowned King of England.

• 26 December 1198 - French bishop Odo van Sully condemns Zottenfeest. If anyone knows what this means, please let me know. I can't find a thing about it!

• 27 December 1871 - The world's first cat show - the National Cat Club Show - is staged at the Crystal Palace in London.

• 28 December 1895 - The world's first moving picture theatre opens in Paris, run by Antoine Lumière - father of Louis and Auguste, who invented the cinematograph. 30 people watched films on ordinary French life and some ran out at a film showing a train moving head on towards them.

• 29 December 1940 - The first devastating incendiary bomb raid hits London.

Brought to you by http://www.quirkytravel.com. Events/births etc for today in history (a whole week's worth) are generally London or Paris based, but only if I can find interesting ones to report!

This Day in History 9 - 15 December

* 9 December 1886 - Clarence Birdseye, king of frozen consumables born.

* 10 December 1868 - the world's first set of traffic lights are installed in Westminster near the House of Commons.

* 11 December 1894 - The world's first Motor Show held in Paris - with a total of 9 exhibitors. Or it may have been in Tunbridge Wells in the same year...

* 12 December 1988 - Train crash at Clapham Junction, just outside London, kills 35 people and injures another 100.

* 13 December 1913 - The Mona Lisa, having been stolen 2 years previously by an Italian employee of the Louvre, was returned.

* 14 December 1901 - The world's first open table tennis tournament is held at the London Royal Aquarium. The men’s event was won by R. Ayling and the women’s by Miss V Eames.

* 15 December 1906 - the formal opening of the Piccadily tube line on London's Underground. It ran from Finsbury Park to Hammersmith.


Brought to you by http://www.quirkytravel.com. Events/births etc for today in history (a whole week's worth) are generally London or Paris based, but only if I can find interesting ones to report!

This Day in History 2 - 8 December

Brought to you by www.quirkytravel.com. Events/ births etc for today in history (a whole week's worth) are generally London or Paris based, but only if I can find interesting ones to report!

• 2 December 1966 - The mini skirt is banned from the Houses of Parliament.


• 3 December 1930 - French Director Jean Luc Godard born.


• 4 December 1791 - The world's first Sunday newspaper, The Observer, is published.


• 5 December 1952 - The Great Smog (London) begins and lasts for 4 days - estimates of up to 12000 die as a result.


• 6 December 1963 - Christine Keeler is jailed for 9 months for perjury related to a trial involving a boyfriend Aloysius 'Lucky' Gordon


• 7 December 1783 - Theatre Royal opens in Covent Garden, London.


• 8 December 1967 - The Beatles "Magical Mystery Tour" album is released in the UK.
  

Go to http://www.quirkytravel.com for more fascinating facts...


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The Origin Of The Christmas Cracker

Not surprisingly, it was aVictorian who invented the Christmas Cracker. Tom Smith to be precise. He was a baker from Clerkenwell London, who in 1840 discovered the individually wrapped bon bon (sugared almond in waxed paper) while on holiday in Paris.

He marketed these sweets around Christmas and found them to be very successful as love tokens from young men to their sweethearts.

Now - this is where it gets a bit confusing. It may be that, inspired by fortune cookies, he started to include little messages of love in the wrapping of the sweet, but it appears that fortune cookies were actually invented in California in the early part of the nineteenth century. Perhaps his inspiration was the moon cake, originating in China an awfully long time ago. On the top are imprinted the Chinese characters for "longevity" or "harmony". Or perhaps his idea came from Chinese fire crackers, and the motto part had nothing to do with China at all? If anyone could enlighten me on this, I would be extremely grateful. However it happened his new prettily wrapped sweets with words of love included were a great success - again over the Christmas period.

The final piece of marketing genius fell into place when he was kicking around the house, desperately trying to think of a new gimmick. A dormant spark from the fire crackled into life when he kicked it (or in an alternative story he was watching the sparks from a log in the fire) et voila - the idea for a sparking suprise came to him. After some time developing a system whereby the paper wouldn't ignite, he launched his "Bangs of Expectation" or "Cosaques" (named after the crack of a Cossack's whip) in 1860. They became known as crackers in the following decade.

By the 1880s, Tom Smith's company had produced over 100 cracker designs and by 1900 a staggering 13,000,000 of them had been sold. The brand still exists but has no connection with the original family - it's been bought over a couple of times in recent years.