Saturday 31 August 1963
Great Train Robbery. Detectives are looking for Bruce Reynolds, his wife Frances, and Barbara and John Daly. Frances and Barbara are sisters. Reports suggest that Mrs Daly, who is pregnant, and her husband stayed at a seaside hotel. They arrived in a racing green Jaguar and paid their bill, £99 18s, all in fivers.
The Daily Mirror asked its readers where they would hide £250,000 in fivers. The most popular answers: in Steptoes’ junk yard; under wallpaper; in a churchyard; under concrete; in the deep freeze; in dustbins; up the chimney.
In the near future, Britain will have its own “switchboard” in Space. Communication satellites should be launched by 1970. The satellite plan will cost £200,000,000. Post Office experts believe that the number of transatlantic calls, now about 1,800,000 a year, will increase fourfold by 1970 and elevenfold by 1980.
Bristol Council wants to install 2,500 parking meters in the city. The Motorists’ Protection Association described the plan as an example of the “increasing persecution of motorists”.
The Mods – the really with-it teenagers – are ditching the Twist for a hip-swinging dance called the Blues. Marie Cartmell, professional dance demonstrator, said, “You relax all over, put on a deadpan face and drift into a blues beat. No touching your partner. Then you swing your hips and start twitching – hands, feet and head. You could call it the St Vitus dance.”
Cricket: Yorkshire have won the County Championship. Glamorgan, Somerset, Sussex and Warwickshire are in the top five with one round of matches left.
Television highlights: Sir Francis Drake. Grandstand. Juke Box Jury.
Radio highlights: The Future of Spain. The Music Men.
Weather: rain, windy and cool. Outlook – little change. 17c, 63f.
Sunday 1 September 1963
Great Train Robbery. Scotland Yard are tracking down clues found at Leatherslade Farm. In particular, they are keen to trace the origins of six lots of curtains. Detectives are also looking for seven people – four men and three women, including Roy John James, aka The Weasel.
Violence at the latest Rangers v Celtic football match has led to calls for automatic jail sentences of at least six months, possibly a year. Police were showered with cans and beer bottles. Fighting, swearing, drunken soccer fans are becoming a blight on the game.
The decline in the Co-op is due to drabness and mediocrity, an article in the Socialist Commentary said. Too many societies are ignoring the increasing affluence and sophistication of members, and the fact that not only capitalists buy and drive cars.
The Bow Group of Young Tories recommends that the retirement age should be abolished. Employment Exchanges should have jobs specifically for the elderly because work is the best occupational therapy for old people, the Young Tories insist.
Over 50,000,000 ties are sold in Britain each year. The majority are bought for men by women.
Football: Match of the Day – Leicester 7 Arsenal 2. Other results – Liverpool 1 Blackpool 2, Manchester United 5 Everton 1, Spurs 4 Nottingham Forest 1. Top three after three games – Leicester, Manchester United, Spurs. No team has a 100% record.
Television highlights: The Frank Ifield Show. Deaf Sunday – a service of dedication. Play – Plain Jane.
Radio highlights: Race Horse Doping Feature. Guitar Recital.
Weather: sunny spells, showers and thunder.
Monday 2 September 1963
Great Train Robbery. In their search for John Daly and Bruce Reynolds, detectives have switched their attention to Scotland. Reports suggest that the men have been seen with their wives. An underworld tip-off revealed that Daly and Reynolds would leave their wives, if necessary. Daly’s wife has an eighteen month old daughter, and is expecting another child this month.
French riot police were called in at Calais last night when hundreds of angry British holidaymakers hammered at the quayside gates demanding space for their cars on cross-Channel ferries. The chaos was caused by “chance it” motorists who hoped to find space on the ferries – which were already fully booked. The AA said bad weather on the Continent was to blame.
Two hundred and fifty tourists were “sealed off” in a Hungarian hotel yesterday because of a smallpox scare. The Hungarian authorities are not releasing any details about the scare. Two Britons are believed to be at the hotel.
Fashionable women will adopt the Glistening Look this autumn. They will wear anything as long as it sparkles. If you are planning to be a femme fatale go for gold thread woven into a low-cut black camisole dress.
New Zealand is doubling its charges to British migrants. The fare for a single man is £50 instead of £25, and for families £100 instead of £50. Single women, who previously went free, will pay £50.
Personal Advertisement: Ladies and Gentlemen’s Wigs. For transformations, toupees and scalpettes, contact the Midland Hair Manufacturing Co, Ltd, Nottingham.
Television highlights: Pit Your Wits – quiz. Outlook Europe – Italy. William Tell.
Radio highlights: Poetry Reading. Music for Dancing.
Weather: showers and bright intervals. Outlook – similar. 18c, 64f.
Tuesday 3 September 1963
Great Train Robbery. Detectives are doing fingerprint checks on two Burgundy wine bottles served at a pub party. A police spokesman said, “This could be one of our strongest leads. We are making extensive investigations.” The landlord’s wife, Mrs Allard, said, “It was a very odd dinner party. The men sat apart from the women. Every time a waiter approached, the men stopped talking. One of the men – I think it was Reynolds – hid his face in his hands. He kept changing his spectacles, from horn-rimmed to rimless ones. They left a child in a car – they arrived in three cars. They talked about motor racing. They were very polite and grateful. They spent £5 on a meal and another £35 on gin and tonics at the bar.”
Four Britons are to spend the next fortnight “jailed” in Budapest’s Hotel Royal – with all expenses paid. They must not leave the hotel, not even for a minute, until smallpox quarantine regulations are lifted. Over 350 guests are also at the hotel. Austria has declared Hungary an “infectious area”.
Police are hunting “The Stockbroker” a gunman in a bowler hat who threatened a jeweller in Stepney and escaped with thirty diamond rings worth £3,000.
Doctors, scientists and policemen flit across our television screens in haloes of glory. Engineers never do. There should be a tv series on Dr Livewire, a consulting engineer, as an antidote to Dr Kildare.
Football: in the Wolverhampton Wanderers v Stoke City match, Wolves kicked-off at the start of the game and again after half-time. Wolves won 2 – 1. Stoke said they are unlikely to lodge a complaint.
Television highlights: Swallows and Amazons – serial. A Sort of Paradise – Guatemala with Alan Whicker. Here and Now – extra-sensory perception.
Radio highlights: In Our Time – recorded memories of the Second World War. Manx Grand Prix.
Weather: cloudy with showers. Outlook – more showers. 18c, 64f.
Wednesday 4 September 1963
Great Train Robbery. Detectives have established that the people who attended a pub party, reported yesterday, were not members of the mail gang. Inquires have also revealed that mail bags recently found were not from the train robbery.
Mankind may be facing a deadly silent terror – chemicals from pesticides sprayed to increase crop yields. Biologists and wild life specialists have discovered that these pesticides are harming birds and fish. Britain is now using 100 different types of pesticides, even though not a lot is known about them.
The Government was warned that if they keep on harrying motorists they will grab “a tiger by the tail”. A spokesman for the RAC said, “It should be evident by now that the motor car is vital to our social and economic life, yet the Government implement more and more restrictions.” He added that the idea of fitting road-pricing meters to cars, charging motorists by the mile, will force people to abandon driving in despair.
Disc sales in Britain top 77 million a year. However, to prevent the “saucer effect”, you must store them properly. Records should be placed in racks, upright, away from heat. Many secondhand shops are rejecting records because they are “dished”.
The last London Transport petrol-engine bus was taken out of service in November 1950. Since then the fleet has been 100% diesel.
Football results: First Division – Ipswich 2 Manchester United 7. Nottingham Forest 0 Liverpool 0.
Television highlights: Chipperfield’s Circus with Shaw Taylor and Noele Gordon. Citizen 63 – the life of a police inspector. Scarlet Pimpernel.
Radio highlights: Ancient Civilisations – Mexico and Peru. Parade of the Pops.
Weather: sunny spells, rain later. Outlook – unsettled with rain. 20c, 68f.
Thursday 5 September 1963
Singing stars Lonnie Donegan, Max Bygraves and David Whitfield were puzzled last night over the case of the mixed-up beauty queen result. The three stars who judged the Miss United Kingdom final in Blackpool say that the girl who was awarded the title was not voted for by them. According to them, the winner should have been Maureen Gay, a showroom assistant from Bristol. However, organiser Eric Morley declared Diane Westbury the winner and awarded her the 1,000 guineas first prize.
Britain’s mothers are going to get Government help to trim their waistlines. Scientists in Aberdeen have discovered that the average woman had an 8Ib spare tyre after pregnancy. The scientists are trying to discover an ideal diet to avoid the unwanted fat.
Tourist officials estimate that 19,000,000 holidaymakers – two for every three Spaniards – will be flooding into Spain by 1967. This year 10,000,000 tourists are expected to visit the country, one and a half million more than in 1962.
Mrs Veronica Yates fancied a steak and kidney pudding. So she opened a tin bought at a supermarket and discovered that it contained dog food. It appears that the label had come loose and a wrong label had been stuck on the tin. The supermarket was fined £5. Mrs Yates said, “It really put me off. I don’t fancy steak and kidney pie anymore.”
Football: Match of the Day – Tottenham 4 Wolverhampton 3. Other results – WBA 4 Arsenal 0; Bolton 1 Everton 3; Blackburn 2 Sheffield United 2; Birmingham 2 Leicester 0.
Television highlights: Summer in Salzburg. Barn Dance – new series. Compact – serial.
Radio highlights: Frankly Speaking – racing driver Jim Clark talks about his life. Listeners Answer Back.
Weather: sunshine and showers. Outlook – similar. 18c, 64f.
Friday 6 September 1963
Christine Keeler was arrested by Scotland Yard detectives last night and taken to a London police station. Christine, wearing a green suede jacket over a grey skirt, tripped down the stairs and got into a waiting police car. The arrest was apparently in connection with the “Lucky” Gordon assault case.
Builder Ronald Biggs, 34, accused of taking part in last month’s Great Train Robbery, allegedly told the police, “Get on with it. You’ll have to prove it all the way. I’m admitting nothing to you people.” Biggs is the ninth person to be charged over the robbery. He told the court, “It’s all lies.”
Two hundred married women under forty who have already had one or two children are needed to try out a new pill to stop them becoming pregnant. The new-type pill will be the eighth to be officially tested by the Family Planning Association.
British scientists have made a new drug to fight smallpox. In Madras, India 1,100 people who had intimate contact with the disease were given the new drug, and only three developed – mild – symptoms of smallpox.
Five years ago there were only a handful of liquid detergents on the market. Today, there are over 100, and they account for twenty percent of the whole detergent market. In future, expect more liquid detergents to replace packet powder.
Today’s Thought: While we are asleep, we are all equal – Cervantes.
Television highlights: Adventure – Kon-Tiki, a voyage across the Pacific on a raft. The Marriage Lines – domestic comedy. Germany, Fathers and Sons – the barrier of silence between Germans who lived under Hitler.
Radio highlights: Records You’ll Remember. Medieval History and the Romantic Imagination.
Weather: mainly dry with sunny periods. Outlook – similar. 19c, 66f.
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