Saturday 5 October 1963
Giving evidence at Christine Keeler’s perjury trial, her former business manager Robin Drury said that he had a tape recording in which she talked of her life experiences. On the tape, Christine said that she was being blackmailed by a man named “Watt”, also known as Fenton. She also said that Lucky Gordon had not hit her, despite her previous claim that he did. Instead, a woman hit her after five people were involved in “some sort of sex orgy”. The case continues.
One of the Great Train Robbers told train driver Jack Mills, “When this is over, I’ll send you a few quid. You should keep your mouth shut. They are right bastards here.” Mr Mills, an engine driver for twenty-two years, was giving evidence at Aylesbury, Bucks where twelve men and three women faced charges arising from the robbery. Mr Mills, who was assaulted during the robbery, is still too ill to return to work.
Flying Officer Anthony Northmore, who broke his neck in a flying accident in Honolulu, was transported back to Britain yesterday in a special RAF flight over the North Pole. It was the first time that a mercy flight had been made over the North Pole, which cuts the journey by 3,000 miles.
It’s nearly bedtime for Britain’s thousands of pet tortoises. To protect your tortoise it’s important to tuck them up before the first winter frost appears. Ideally, they should be placed in a cold room or cupboard, in a bed of hay or dry leaves. Warm weather might disturb your tortoise, so check on him to see if he needs food or water.
The controversial BBC show That Was The Week That Was took a knock last weekend. ITV’s thriller series The Avengers starring Honor Blackman came out on top in the fight for viewers in the London area. The viewing figures: The Avengers 1,163,000 homes, TW3 905,000 homes.
Television highlights: The Telegoons – new puppet series. The Avengers – The Undertakers. Comedy Playhouse – Underworld Knights.
Radio highlights: Florence Nightingale. Play – She Shall Have Murder.
Weather: Drizzle. Outlook – cloudy with bright periods. 14c, 56f.
Sunday 6 October 1963
Old diseases, thought banished forever in Britain, are making a comeback, and nutrition is largely responsible. Cases of rickets, polyneuritis and scurvy are increasing. People, especially the elderly, are relying on tea, biscuits and tinned food instead of fruit and vegetables.
Colin Jordon, Britain’s number one Nazi, married Francoise Dior yesterday. Jordan and his bride greeted onlookers with Hitler salutes. The onlookers responded by showering the couple with stink bombs, rotten fruit, eggs and pieces of turf. To boos and jeers the couple, unhurt, hurriedly drove away in a taxi.
Jack “Spot” Comer, one-time “king” of London’s underworld, claims that the Mafia are controlling crime in Britain. “I know their identities,” he said. “I know I’m sticking my neck out by revealing the truth, but if hired thugs beat me up, the Mafia will be admitting their guilt.” Comer added that fruit machines – one-armed bandits – are the racketeers big source of income. The Mafia also control betting shops, amusement arcades, casinos and some race-course bookmakers. However, a Scotland Yard spokesman disputed Comer’s claims.
You can now buy a coloured bath for the same price as a white one. The new vitreous-enamelled steel baths cost under £20. They won’t lose their initial gloss and are harder to chip. Also, laboratory tests have scotched the theory that steel baths cause burnt or chilled bottoms.
Football Results: First Division – Arsenal 6 Ipswich 0, Birmingham 0 Everton 2, Chelsea 3 Stoke 3, Liverpool 5 Aston Villa 2, Sheffield United 3 Spurs 3. Top three – Manchester United, Spurs, Sheffield United.
Television highlights: Fireball XL5 – The Ghosts of Space. Home Dressmaking. Dig This Rhubarb.
Radio highlights: Pick of the Pops. The DJ Show.
Weather: cloudy with drizzle, sunny spells later.
Monday 7 October 1963
Former club boss Ronald “Buster” Edwards and his wife June Rose, both wanted for questioning about the Great Train Robbery, might be hiding in London. It is thought that they have altered their appearances with dyed hair and glasses. Scotland Yard reminded the public that there is a reward for Great Train Robbery convictions.
Max Mosley, son of fascist leader Sir Oswald Mosley, is to appear before his Territorial Army commanding officer this week. So are six fellow fascists in the Independent Parachute Brigade. Army regulations forbid any political activity.
Nottingham fire brigade want to put an end to back garden bonfires on Guy Fawkes night. Instead, they want organised displays on selected sites. A fire service official said, “We hope to educate people into realising that fires and fireworks in careless hands are a real danger.”
A power station explosion caused electric burglar alarms to ring all over Liverpool yesterday.
A £350 guitar belonging to George Harrison, one of the Beatles pop-song group, was recovered by detectives yesterday after it vanished from a car in Glasgow. Two youths will appear in court today.
Britain’s top guitarist Jet Harris has quit. He said, “Tell them I’m out of show-business for good.” His girlfriend, Billie Davis said, “Jet can’t take it any longer. He’s just been pushed too hard.” Jet caused a sensation on Friday when he walked out of a recording of Ready, Steady, Go!
Television highlights: World in Action – 21st birthday of Oxfam. The Plane Makers – factory series. Naked City – police series.
Radio highlights: Play – Women Beware Women. Good Points of Husbandry.
Weather: drizzle then brighter. Outlook – rain at times, bright intervals. 14c, 57f.
Tuesday 8 October 1963
Gerry and the Pacemakers have been banned from Glasgow’s concert hall because of what happened when the Beatles appeared there on the weekend. While the Beatles punched out their pop music, a teenaged girl punched her fist through a wall. The balcony swayed alarmingly as beat fans stamped to the rhythm. Council member Dick Buchanan said, “The audience members were semi-savages. We’re not taking any chances with this other lot.” A spokesman for Gerry and the Pacemakers said, “We’ll get another hall.”
The Space Age got a foot in the pub door yesterday. An “electronic barmaid” was demonstrated at the Casino Hotel, Hampton Court, Middlesex. It can fill six half-pint glasses in 25 seconds without spilling a drop. Cost – £150.
The gas cooker of tomorrow might not have an oven. With frozen foods and dehydrated meals becoming more popular, and the trend towards packaged meals, in twenty-five years time we might no longer use an oven.
Railway bosses are meeting this week to decide if they should ban all Football Specials from Liverpool. This is because Everton fans wrecked ten out of eleven coaches on Saturday. A British Railways spokesman said, “We have had enough. We are fed up with these vandals wrecking the trains. We’ve warned them, but they take no notice.”
Football Results: First Division – Aston Villa 0 Everton 1, West Ham 1 Burnley 1.
Television highlights: Kindly Leave the Stage – variety with the Mitchell Minstrels. The Rag Trade. The Five O’Clock Club with the Dave Clark Five.
Radio highlights: Folk Songs of Australia. Come Up the Hard Way.
Weather: mostly cloudy with drizzle. Outlook – changeable. 15c, 59f.
Wednesday 9 October 1963
At their party conference in Blackpool, the Tories will debate hanging and flogging. Despite liberal-minded speeches in recent years, the subject has come up again by special ballot motion. The conference will also discuss allowing votes to be cast by post.
After thirteen years of existence, the Tomato and Cucumber Marketing Board is set to end. The Board sought extra powers to regulate trade, but a poll of 5,000 producers failed to sanction those powers.
Christopher Hall admitted breaking into a butcher’s shop where he stole two white coats, a stitching skewer, a knife, an air bed and three frozen chickens. He told Leicester Magistrates, “When I realised I was going to be caught, I threw most of the stuff away and ate the chickens – it wasn’t much fun.” Hall was fined £15.
Hurricane Flora has destroyed a quarter of Cuba’s sugar crop. On the London market the price of sugar jumped from 30s to £78 then £80 a ton. The price is expected to rise further.
Miss Ellen Dart, believed to be England’s oldest inhabitant, died yesterday. She would have been 109 on 1 November.
Discussing the disbanded pop group The Springfields, blonde songstress Dusty Springfield said, “Sorting out our souvenirs, I’ve kept all our press cuttings while my brother Tom has settled for the memory of the money we made.”
Television highlights: The Mersey Sound – documentary. Football Special – Real Madrid v Glasgow Rangers, highlights. The Troubles – the story of the Irish rebellion.
Radio highlights: Parade of the Pops with Matt Munro. Book at Bedtime.
Weather: dry with sunny periods. Outlook – mainly dry with sunny periods. 16c, 61f.
Thursday 10 October 1963
Detectives are investigating a case of a man who had a two-inch nail driven into the top of his head. The man had a headache and the nail was driven into his head as a cure at a Black Magic party. Surgeons later operated on the man, 40 year old seaman Michael Fish. Mr Fish told doctors, “I don’t want to talk about what happened.”
In private, top Tories are saying that, for health reasons, prime minister Harold Macmillan should resign within a month. Lord Hailsham’s supporters were very active lobbying at the Tory Party conference. Lord Hailsham has been described as “ebullient, erudite and erratic.”
Scientist Dr Linus Pauling won the 1962 Nobel Peace Prize yesterday. The 1963 prize went to the international and Swiss Red Cross organisations.
Vicars in Berkshire have been told to keep a careful eye on their church organs because someone is stealing parts. So far, 87 pipes have been stolen. Police are working on the theory that the thief is trying to build his own organ.
Agony Aunt: New Town Wife writes, “My husband does not drink, smoke or gamble, and never swears. He gives me his wage packet to divide between us. He’s considerate and kind. But he’s so dull.” Jane Adams’ reply, “Quit moaning. You don’t deserve the husband you’ve got.”
Football Results: First Division – Blackburn 3 Bolton 0, Liverpool 3 Sheffield Wednesday 1, Sheffield United 3 Ipswich 1, Stoke 1 Arsenal 2. Top three – Manchester United, Tottenham, Blackburn.
Television highlights: Crackerjack – with Mr Pastry. Champions on Ice – international ice cabaret. Space Patrol.
Radio highlights: The Million Sellers. Integration – a Slow Process.
Weather: dry and sunny after early morning fog. Outlook – mainly dry and sunny. 17c, 63f.
Friday 11 October 1963
Britain will have a new prime minister in a matter of days. This became clear after the sensational announcement that Harold Macmillan is to resign. Rab Butler is the favourite to replace him, although Reginald Maudling, Lord Hailsham and Lord Home are also in the running.
Gas that cannot kill will be fed into people’s homes next week, making Tamworth the safest town in England as far as gas is concerned. The gas is called Lurgi gas. The extraction process, removing the poisonous qualities from Lurgi gas, leaves it without the characteristic smell of town gas, so a chemical is added to give it the normal gas smell.
We are eating more bacon than ever – 94,000 tons more in the past eight years, an average increase of 1,800 tons a week. We are also becoming more adventurous with bacon. We glaze and garnish our bacon with treacle, cloves, honey, sugar, cranberries, mustard, prunes and ginger. Despite this, the traditional British breakfast is giving way to a bowlful of cereal and a cup of coffee.
Two dozen copies of What About Us by Liverpool beat group the Undertakers have been ordered by a jukebox operator in Iceland.
Welsh girls wearing their national costume can now show a leg – hemlines on their skirts can rise by four inches! And they can throw away their woollen stockings and wear black nylons instead! The changes were agreed by the Welsh Tourist Board. However, the tall black hats and flannel petticoats will stay. And a plea for plunging necklines, made by Councillor Harry Parry, was rejected.
Television highlights: The Marriage Lines – domestic comedy. The Story of a Jazz Musician. The Rare Ones – the land of the antelopes.
Radio highlights: In Your Garden. Play – Under Milk Wood.
Weather: generally dry. Outlook – continuing dry. 17c, 63f.
Available for order and pre-order, my Swinging Sixties Mystery Series
https://books2read.com/u/bMqNPG
Hannah Howe 