Area of doubt Hillary Clinton has said that if she is elected she will open files on the US military facility in Nevada known as Area 51. Some rumours which will almost certainly not be confirmed: — According to a physicist who claims to have worked there, nine captured alien spacecraft have been examined there.
Bottling out Does any country have experience of a sugary drinks tax? — Denmark introduced a tax on sweetened soft drinks in the 1930s which by 2013 was being levied at a rate of €0.22 a litre and brought in €60m a year. — However, the Danish government also estimated that it was losing €38.9m
Name that town The representative of Slough in the UK Youth Parliament called for the town’s name to be changed to rid it of negative connotations. Other towns with an image problem which have done a Stalingrad (now Volgograd) and changed their identity: STAINES Now Staines upon Thames KILIWHIMIN, HIGHLANDS Now Fort Augustus ALLIGATOR VILLAGE,
Lonely fortress Weoley Castle in Birmingham was revealed to be the least-visited tourist attraction in England, with 5,205 visitors last year. What is there to see? — It is described as the ruins of a fortified manor house built by the Lords of Dudley as a hunting lodge in the 1270s. Visitors can view the ruins from a
You can’t do that there ’ere Some of the things which have been banned under Public Spaces Protection Orders, according to a report by the Manifesto Club: Kettering More than four people standing within vicinity of a motor vehicle. Guildford Shouting. Hillingdon Gathering in groups of more than two unless waiting for a bus. Blackpool Engaging
Vote no, vote often David Cameron scorned Boris Johnson’s idea that voting to leave the EU might result in further reforms followed by another referendum. History, though, would side with Boris. — In June 1992 Denmark rejected the Maastrict Treaty, with 50.7 per cent voting against in a referendum. Denmark was granted four opt-outs, including
Selling with honesty An Essex estate agent sold a flat in Westcliff-on-Sea for £22,500 over the £125,000 asking price after advertising it with the words: ‘Wipe your feet on the way out…this property is full of rubbish, there is mould on the walls and I think there may even be fleas.’ The original honest estate
Matters of life and death Lord Lucan is now officially presumed dead. How do you have someone declared dead? In England and Wales, under the Presumption of Death Act 2013… — Anyone can apply to have anyone else declared dead, but if the applicant is not a spouse, civil partner, parent, child or sibling of
Ballots drawn Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders tossed a coin to decide which of them was the winner in some precincts of Iowa. What would we do if we had a tied election? — The closest British election in modern times was the council election in Bury, Greater Manchester, in 2011. With Labour needing one
So near and yet so far Henry Worsley died in a Chilean hospital of peritonitis after being airlifted from Antartica, 30 miles short of what would have been the first solo unaided crossing of the continent. How does this compare with Britain’s other heroic failures? — Scott and his two surviving companions died 11 miles short
Roll out the barrel The price of crude oil dropped below $30 a barrel. Why do we measure it in barrels? — A standard barrel for the purposes of measuring oil is 42 US gallons or 35 imperial gallons. This was the size of a ‘tierce’, a unit for measuring wine in medieval England. —
The outsiders Did the seven members of Harold Wilson’s cabinet who campaigned to leave the Common Market in the 1975 referendum damage their careers? Michael Foot, Employment Secretary. Made deputy leader by Jim Callaghan in 1976. Elected leader in 1980. Tony Benn, Industry Secretary. Challenged Denis Healey unsuccessfully for Labour deputy leadership in 1981. Barbara
In with the new How the new year is being celebrated around the world. From 1 January… BRITAIN: Annual Investment Allowance for businesses cut from £500,000 to £200,000. Deposit Guarantee Limit for savers — the sum which the government will refund to savers after a bank collapse — is cut from £85,000 to £75,000. Drink
Christmas birthday Next year has a claim to be the 400th birthday of Father Christmas. Ben Jonson wrote a short play for James I, called Christmas: his masque, performed at court in December 1616. The central character, named as ‘Old Christmas’ and ‘Captaine Christmas’, encouraged everyone to merriment. He had ten children, with names ranging
The first warmist The first attempt to quantify the link between CO2 in the atmosphere and global temperatures was attributed to Swedish chemist Svante Arrhenius, in a paper in the Philosophical Magazine and Journal of Science in 1896. He was working on a theory to explain the oscillation between ice ages and interglacial periods. He
Amen corner Digital Cinema Media, a company which distributes adverts to cinemas, refused to allow an advert which involves the recitation of the Lord’s Prayer by, among others, the Archbishop of Canterbury. Some other battles over the prayer: — Campaigners want Alberta to follow other Canadian states, where recitation of the Lord’s Prayer in state
Friendly words England football fans sang ‘La Marseillaise’ in a friendly match at Wembley. The anthem has not always been so popular. In 1992 a Committee for a Marseillaise of Fraternity was founded to campaign for a change to the words, written as a war hymn by an army captain while French troops were besieged
A marathon of cheats Russian athletes may be stripped of the medals they won at the 2012 Olympics, but what of the earliest-known drug-taker in the modern Olympics? Thomas Hicks won the 1904 marathon in St Louis after taking two doses of brandy laced with strychnine. —Hicks collapsed on the finishing line and had to
Family business Justin Trudeau, son of Pierre Trudeau, was elected to his father’s old job as Prime Minister of Canada. Other descendants of former leaders currently in power: — The maternal grandfather of Shinzo Abe, Prime Minister of Japan, held the same job between 1957 and 1960. — Park Geun-hye, president of South Korea, is
Killer facts The World Health Organisation added processed meats to its list of ‘known’ carcinogens. A few of the other things which have been claimed to be linked to cancer in the past fortnight: — Make-up in Halloween outfits (blamed by a laser surgery centre in New York) — Chocolate (blamed by a colorectal surgeon