Saturday 19 October 1963
A man without a face has been smuggled into 10 Downing Street and made premier-designate of Great Britain. The long-suffering public has been invited to go into battle led by a cipher – a man existing solely in the imaginations of the posher members of the Tory hierarchy and a handful of knicker-bockered, pheasant-shooting cronies. The arbitrary elevation of Lord Home to prime minister is designed to hide the cracks in the Tory Party. Lord Home is smiling tonight. But the man in Great Britain with the biggest grin is Labour leader Harold Wilson.
Ronald “Buster” Edwards and his wife June, sought by Scotland Yard in connection with the Great Train Robbery, are believed to be in Norway where employees at a hotel recognised them. The employees noticed June because she changed her hair colour from jet-black to vivid red.
Beauty specialist Micheline Lugeon wanted racehorses to boost her business, she told a doping-plot trial jury yesterday. The idea was to name racehorses after her beauty creams, she claimed. Miss Lugeon denied having anything to do with the doping of racehorses. The case continues.
Meat prices are easier this week, but fish prices are high because of the bad weather. There are very few plumbs about and those available are not nice enough for dessert. Vegetables are rather dreary this week, but leeks are good value at 8d. Cucumbers are up to their highest price yet – 2s 6d.
Mexico City will stage the 1968 Olympics, the International Olympic Committee announced today. It will be the first time the Olympics will be held in Latin America. The committee will vote today to exclude South Africa from the Olympics because of racial discrimination.
Television highlights: Juke Box Jury with Susan Hampshire and Dusty Springfield. The Avengers – The Nutshell. Robin Hood – The Truce.
Radio highlights: Old Time Music. Pop Track.
Weather: sunny spells. Outlook – rain at times. 18c, 64f.
Sunday 20 October 1963
Lights low, excitement high, and 500 youngsters standing toe to toe, shaking in a delirium of rhythm. Nothing special, really, just another jump night on Eel Pie Island. Eelpiland – as the kids have shortened it – an island on the Thames near Twickenham – is the place for the with its. It’s further out than far. It’s the living end.
Beauty Queen Maureen Gay lifts the lid on the beauty queen business. “In a contest in the north, a judge said to me, ‘You have a smashing chance tonight. I think I could guarantee it if we had lunch, just the two of us…’ I thanked him sweetly and said no. If you want the big money, you’ve got to go along with them, or you don’t stand a chance. Some of the contests are rigged. It’s a fact, and all the girls know it.”
A queue nearly a mile long was waiting when doors opened for the Motor Show at Earl’s Court yesterday. Some local residents complained that they could not get out of their houses. By noon, 117,501 people had paid for admission. A final attendance figure of over 500,000 is anticipated, reflecting the enthusiasm and optimism of the car industry.
Britain is experiencing its biggest ever boom in home movies, a fast-growing world of zoom lenses, pistol grips, blower coolers and projectors. Sales of cine-cameras have zoomed from 10,000 in 1959 to 150,000 last year. And this year they will top the 200,000 mark.
Football Results: First Division – Aston Villa 2 Arsenal 1, Chelsea 1 Sheffield Wednesday 2, Liverpool 1 WBA 0, Nottingham Forest 1 Manchester United 2, Sheffield United 3 Birmingham 0, West Ham 4 Everton 2. Top three – Manchester United, Spurs, Sheffield United. The top ten teams are still within two points of each other.
Television highlights: Keeping Fit. Auto-Mechanics – carburettors. Play – Funny Noises With Their Mouths featuring Michael Caine.
Radio highlights: Salute to Nelson. Concert – Beethoven.
Weather: cloudy at first, brighter later.
Monday 21 October 1963
Other countries have industrial riots and army revolts. Britain has Beatle drives. This crowd gathered outside the TV studios in Birmingham where the Beatles were recording next Saturday’s Thank Your Lucky Stars. The crowd, mostly girls, chanted, “We want the Beatles!” They screamed every time a face appeared at an upstairs window.
The Tory Party’s joint-chairman, Mr Iain Macleod, has refused a seat in Prime Minister Lord Home’s new Cabinet. So has Mr Enoch Powell. The refusal of Mr Macleod in particular has thrown the Tory Party into complete disarray. Both men felt that it was wrong to select a prime minister from the House of Lords.
Postman John Smith rang the church bell at Llangendeirne yesterday to raise the alarm about an invading army of officials, and the villagers duly rushed to their stations, barricading the main road. This “war” is over a plan to build a reservoir above the village. On this occasion, with old farm machinery and bales of hay, the villagers blocked the land surveyors, and they vowed to “resist to the end”.
Communist East Germany went to the polls yesterday to select a new People’s Chamber of 434 deputies. There were no opposition candidates.
Personal Advertisements: Margs come home, all forgiven – Bri’s. Sheila Crall – please write, Ken and Vic.
Television highlights: The Sound of Brass – National Brass Band Festival. Play of the Week – The Funambulists with Judi Dench and Francis Matthews. The Plane Makers starring Patrick Wymark and Patrick Magee.
Radio highlights: Paul Temple and the Jonathan Mystery. Men of Brass.
Weather: sunny spells, rain, windy, rather warm. Outlook – similar. 18c, 64f.
Tuesday 22 October 1963
The big beat of the Beatles, Merseyside’s top pop group, has been blamed by a college headmaster for a slump in homework standards. Mr Alfred Stevenson of Adelaide Private College, Ilfracombe has appealed to all parents to switch off the pop music programmes on Radio Luxembourg so children can do their homework in silence.
Thirteen people were injured when two cars collided at Middleton Dale, Derbyshire yesterday.
It has taken two years, a musical sex-change and the emotional impact of Miss Shirley Bassey to get it into Britain’s top ten disc bestsellers – a doleful, soulful song called I (Who Have Nothing). Many have recorded the song, but it’s Miss Bassey, the stormy songstress from Tiger Bay, who has “got inside it” and with the assistance of Mr George Martin, a slim and talented music man, produced the definitive version.
Three out of every four homes in Britain now receive ITV programmes. Of 17,017,000 homes 12,814,000 now have two-channel televisions. And 83% of British homes now have a television set.
From the supermarket shelves: bread without holes – manufacturers say that the holes let the air in and the flavour out. Instant milk – just stir white powder into cold water (like wartime rations). Quick-frozen crepe suzettes – two plastic bags containing the crepes and their sauce are plunged into boiling water for ten minutes.
Television highlights: Badger’s Bend. World in Action – housing. University Challenge.
Radio highlights: Let’s Take a Spin. Dancing Party.
Weather: rain at times. Outlook – changeable. 15c, 59f.
Wednesday 23 October 1963
Labour MP Michael Foot is seriously ill in hospital after a car accident. Doctors and nurses are fighting to save his life. Mr Foot’s wife, Jill Craigie, who was driving the car when it crashed at a notorious black-spot, is said to be in a satisfactory condition.
London County Council will spend £2,000 on teaching machines for experimental use in schools.
Agony Aunt: “Cautious” from Liverpool writes, “About a year ago, I had a very big win on the Pools. I told no one, except my immediate family. I kept my job, and apart from a new home and car, we live modestly. Now, my teenage children are pressing me for all sorts of expensive things. I believe that they should continue with their jobs and not let the money make any difference to their way of life. Since the Pools win, our family has been at loggerheads.” Jane Adams’ advice, “Seek expert advice, and give your children a chance to develop their personalities, broaden their minds, and learn the value of money.”
Agony Aunt: “Young Husband” writes from Croydon, “I’m fond of my wife, but she drives me wild at mealtimes with her constant chit-chat. I wish she’d shut up.” Jane Adams’ reply, “Mealtime chit-chat is a part of family life. It sounds as if you need a landlady, not a wife.”
An unknown comedian has been invited to appear on Sunday Night at the London Palladium. He is Jimmy Tarbuck, who sports a Beatles-style haircut. From Liverpool, Mr Tarbuck went to school with George Harrison and John Lennon of the Beatles.
Television highlights: Attenborough and Animals. Home and Away – FA Centenary Film. Talent of Tomorrow – the Robbins Report on Higher Education.
Radio highlights: Round Britain Quiz. Aspects of the Renaissance.
Weather: rain or drizzle. Outlook – changeable. 16c, 61f.
Thursday 24 October 1963
British women will go on wearing stiletto heels – because they have short legs. Colonel Geoffrey Noakes, president of the National Association of Shoe Repair Factories, made this comment at the International Shoe Repairers’ Congress in Blackpool. He added, “Women want to be propped up in the air. The good news is, new materials have the ability to stand up to the strain of buxom females.”
The condition of Mr Michael Foot MP, seriously injured in a car crash, remains unchanged.
Seven cases of typhoid were confirmed in the Bedford area yesterday. Four families are affected. A health spokesman said, “There is no cause for alarm.”
Sheep rustlers have stolen about 2,500 sheep from North Riding farms over the past year.
A West Berliner, who climbed over the Wall into East Berlin after a quarrel with his wife, was sent back by the Communists the next day.
The Beatles have left for a five-day tour of Sweden, which means a well-earned respite for our police forces because wherever the Beatles go screaming teenagers and police officers are sure to follow. Meanwhile, a tv programme featuring the Beatles, The Mersey Sound, will be repeated to all regions on Wednesday, November 13, at 7.40pm.
Television highlights: Amateur Boxing – Scotland v Bulgaria. The British Association Granada Lectures. Crackerjack.
Radio highlights: Top of the Form. International Concert for United Nations Day.
Weather: warm and sunny, mist and fog early and late. Outlook – mainly dry. 18c, 63f.
Friday 25 October 1963
The Ancient Britons used Stonehenge as a “robot brain”, an American scientist has claimed. Professor Gerald Hawkins of Boston University said that Stonehenge enabled Ancient Britons to predict the seasons and the eclipses of the Sun and the Moon. Furthermore, for this purpose Stonehenge was extremely accurate.
Chemists are about to abandon their scruples, for the centuries-old method of weighing medicines by scruples, grains, drams and ounces is to be abolished and replaced by metric units.
The price of sugar hit a new post-war record yesterday – £102 10s a ton. Shop prices are expected to rise to around 2s per 2lb bag. Storms in Cuba are responsible for the sugar crisis.
Mr Michael Foot, Labour MP for Ebbw Vale, who was badly injured in a car crash on Monday, was said to have “slightly improved” in hospital at Hereford.
Guests at today’s oyster feast in Colchester will eat turkey, ham, beef and pork because oysters are in short supply at the moment.
Ten town criers will roam towns in the West Country for three weeks shouting out the night’s programmes for Westward television.
Juke Box Jury is losing viewers. In October, 3,222,000 homes tuned into the programme compared with 4,314,000 homes in January this year.
Television highlights: The Rare Ones – the last strongholds of the great mammals. Richard the Lionheart. Supercar.
Radio highlights: El Alamein Reunion. Pick of the Week.
Weather: dry, cloudy. Outlook – no change. 14c, 57f.
Available for order and pre-order, my Swinging Sixties Mystery Series
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Hannah Howe 