Sunday 17 March 1963
Christine Keeler, the 21-year-old red-haired model whose name made headlines this week as the missing witness in an Old Bailey shooting trial, knew a number of distinguished men in public life. What is she like? Few know her better than Mr Stephen Ward (pictured), a leading society osteopath and artist. Exclusively, he tells the Sunday Pictorial of his friendship with Christine, a friendship which led to meetings with a Russian diplomat, and questions by MI5.
Stephen Ward: “Christine arrived in London filled with all sorts of wild ambitions. I thought she was a gay, brave sort of person, and extremely likeable. She was high-spirited and, at times, reckless. She wanted too much, too quickly, too easily. I asked nothing from her. I was only too pleased to listen and, when possible, help.”
Stephen Ward: “I took Christine to a psychiatrist to help sort out her problems. The social round is remorseless and unending, but Christine loved it all. She met many of my friends and was soon involved in romances. I became friends with a Soviet naval attaché, Captain Yevgenie Ivanov, a charming person. I introduced Ivanov to Christine.”
Stephen Ward: “I was questioned by MI5 concerning Christine and my friendship with Ivanov, and the authorities were completely happy about it. All sorts of rumours have been circulating about my friendship with Christine. Friendship can sometimes be a dirty word, it seems.”
Fashion model Marilyn (Mandy) Davies: “I don’t know where Christine is now or what will happen next, but it’s been tremendous fun.”
Television highlights: With a Fiddle and a Flute. Farming Diary. Saudi Arabia – A Land Awakening.
Radio highlights: Discussion on Broken Marriages. Spin Beat.
Weather: bright, sunny, warm with occasional showers.
Monday 18 March 1963
Britain and the Space Age. Research is ongoing for a manned space plane capable of going into orbit. A long series of wind-tunnel tests on models are being made at the Royal Aircraft Establishment. Also under consideration, the likely shape of planes to come.
Eight Britains who have been on holiday at the ski-resort of Zermatt, Switzerland during the past month have returned home with typhoid. Swiss health officials said that the infection had come from abroad, but they were unwilling to name the country.
How to get the Glad Look by Felicity Green. Wear a dress – the neckline can plunge to any depth you like. Shorten your hemlines to 34 inches from the floor. Buy one of the new Shift dresses in a size too small. Wear the latest Green-Light eye make-up. The Glad Look is swinging, zingy, far-out.
A woman locked in the “ladies” for 45 minutes at Hinckley, Leicester, was rescued on the weekend by PC Chambers.
Five television shows scheduled to close:
Dixon of Dock Green – after seven years of “non-pulse-raising low-powered drama”
Dancing Club – the BBC’s longest-running television ballroom dancing programme
Tales of Mystery with John Laurie
No Hiding Place – lasted forty-four episodes
It Happened Like This – a sapper series
Television highlights: Panorama – the hijacking of lorries. The Scarlet Pimpernel. Look to Tomorrow – machines and man.
Radio highlights: Music for Dancing. Count Basie.
Weather: bright intervals with thundery showers. Outlook – changeable. 10c, 50f.
Tuesday 19 March 1963
The BBC consults its crystal ball tonight and takes a peep into the future in Time On Our Hands. Viewers will be asked to imagine it’s 1988 and that they are watching events from the past twenty-five years.
Some of the ‘facts’ from Time On Our Hands: the first Russian and American landings on the Moon in 1967. A traffic jam in London, also in 1967, which takes a week to clear, and leads to a car ban in central London. Factories controlled by robots. A 24-hour working week. Universal university education. For recreation, people take drugs instead of drinking alcohol.
Two new cases of typhoid fever have been confirmed in Wales. This brings the total number of confirmed cases in Britain to ten, with three suspected cases. All thirteen recently returned from a holiday in the Swiss skiing resort of Zermatt.
A new range of trucks for the Motorway Age will be announced today by the British Motor Corporation. The trucks will have as many as ten forward gears and a top speed of 50mph, fully laden. The trucks will be powered by diesel engines and the cabs are comfortable and roomy enough for three people.
The man Scotland Yard call ‘Diamond Jim’ was being hunted last night after a gang carried out another daring jewel raid. On Brompton Road, the gang cut open a safe with oxy-acetylene equipment and stole jewellery valued at £25,000. Police are certain that the haul has been taken to ‘Diamond Jim’, a fence who pays 20% instead of the usual 10%. He’s believed to have handled more than £250,000 worth of stolen jewellery this year.
Television highlights: Bookstand – the influence of Joyce. Emergency Ward 10 – Linda Stanley performs her first emergency operation. Play of the Week – Dangerous Corner starring Julie Christie.
Radio highlights: Listen to the Band. String Beat.
Weather: sunny, then rain. Outlook – changeable. 12c, 54f.
NB: Christine Keeler featured in the newspapers again today. But, because I’m covering that story on a different thread, to avoid repetition, I will not include her items in the daily reports.
Wednesday 20 March 1963
A revolutionary research plane will make its first test flight from the Royal Aircraft Establishment field at Bedford today, if the weather is good. The plane is the Hunting 126, built on a new principle called jet flap, which will enable a short take-off.
Britain’s total of typhoid cases jumped to twenty-four yesterday when fourteen new cases were confirmed. The Health Ministry said, “There is no cause for public concern. All the patients have been isolated in hospital, or their homes.”
A new range of satellites are being planned by scientists. These satellites will collect information about wave heights, air and sea temperatures, track icebergs, and aid weather forecasting.
The number of people using cars and motor cycles instead of public transport more than doubled between 1951 and 1961. The number of people travelling by train remained about the same.
Castrol, who supply about half the oil used by British motorists, are to increase their prices on April 1. The firm said their oils would cost 2s 3 1/2d a pint, an extra halfpenny.
Electronic ticket collectors may be introduced on London Transport’s Underground railways to cut costs. It is one of the ideas being studied for London Transport by electronics experts.
Television highlights: Z-Cars with Brian Blessed. Your Life in Their Hands – Caesarian Section. The Sky at Night – Venus revealed.
Radio highlights: Ella Fitzgerald. Disc Club.
Weather: dull with rain, then brighter. Outlook – mainly dry, sunny spells. 6c, 43f.
Thursday 21 March 1963
Human life may be threatened by the growing use of chemicals in food production and domestic insecticides, a peer said last night. Lord Douglas of Barloch was particularly concerned about DDT. Lord Hailsham, Minister of Science, said, “I do not believe that there is any call for concern about the effects of these chemicals on human health.”
January’s bad weather caused a five percent drop in British industrial production. The Production Index (taking 1958 as 100) was 105, compared with 110 in December.
Sixteen clerks who staged Britain’s first bank strike on Monday were sacked yesterday. The clerks walked out of a bank in Finsbury Circus, London, after two union members were dismissed.
A clinic has been opened at the Ministry of Health headquarters at the Elephant and Castle, London, to advise staff who want to give up smoking.
Television highlights: Floodlit Football – England v Yugoslavia, under 23 international. This Week – is horse racing dying? Speed Skating.
Radio highlights: Your Date with Val. Lord Boothby Plays Records.
An Elvis Presley platter normally flies to the top of the pop perch. But his latest disc, One Broken Heart for Sale, limps up the sales ladder only one place this week, from 13 to 12. What’s gone wrong? One theory – not enough Elvis on this one and too much chorus.
Lonnie Donegan is bang in form with Losing by a Hair, while Mr Acker Bilk, with his jazzmen this time, breaks into welcome song with the gay Manana Pasado Manana, and the Springfields keep up the good work with Say I Won’t Be There.
Weather: mainly dry with sunny intervals. Outlook – little change. 10c, 50f.
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