Month:

It was a credit to Bruno Ganz’s range that in his two most famous roles he played an angel and Hitler, respectively. Born during World War II in Switzerland, he originally found a home on the stage: indeed, little of his filmed CV comes before his 35th birthday, and he was awarded the Iffland-Ring in […]

Andrea Levy worked as a costume assistant until the death of her father in her mid-30s forced her to confront her racial heritage. Her debut novel, Every Light in the House Burnin’, was published when she was 38. As with much of her work, it was a semi-autobiographical novel about the children of the Windrush […]

Everyone loves a micronation, and after the prince of Sealand Paddy Roy Bates graduated from the DDP in 2012, attentions turned to Prince Leonard Casley of Hutt River. Casley was a wheat farmer who “seceded” from Australia in an argument about grain quotas. The “nation”, which encompassed Casley’s 75-square-km farm, was actually bigger than five […]

Operation Escape 200, later immortalised on-screen as The Great Escape was a plot by Allied prisoners of war to escape from the Stalag Luft III camp in 1944. A trio of tunnels – Tom, Dick and Harry – were dug, in the belief that Germany guards wouldn’t spot all three of them. Upon the completion of Harry, […]

As many online have noticed, Lyndon LaRouche managed to travel from the far-left to the far-right of politics, all without the help of Twitter. Born into a Quaker family, LaRouche was a conscientious objector during World War II and later became involved in the Trotskyite Socialist Workers Party. He first achieved a sizeable following during […]

The great forgotten ace in the history of the WWF/WWE, Pedro Morales held the WWWF World Heavyweight Title between 1971 (beating Ivan Koloff) and 1973 (losing it to Stan Stasiak). Puerto Rican by birth, he was a major draw with Latinos in the New York area and to this day has the fifth longest WWF […]

Like Gordon Banks, “RIP” only has one “I”… Gordon Banks made his debut for Yorkshire League outfit Rawmarsh Welfare at the age of 15. However, after letting in 12 goals in that match (against Stocksbridge Works), he was promptly let go and took up work as a hod carrier. He was picked up by Chesterfield […]

A little something for our Icelandic readers now, as we bid a fond farewell to the former manager of Valur, KR Reykjavík and Keflavík. Ian Ross was a utility player, usually found in defence, who made his debut for Liverpool at the age of 20. Moving down south to Aston Villa in 1972, he became […]

More proof that politicians never keep their promises… John Dingell was the longest-serving Congressman in US political history, representing the state of Michigan from 1955 to 2015. He was the final serving Congressman elected in the 1950s, the last to have been a Congressman while John F. Kennedy was president, and joint-last Congressman to have […]

The angriest of the angry young men has calmed down for good. The son of a London bookmaker, Albert Finney studied at Rada and made his screen debut in 1960’s The Entertainer. The same year he starred in the landmark Saturday Night and Sunday Morning as the hard-drinking, harder-fucking Arthur. His name made, Finney became a true leading man, with […]