1542Princess Mary Stuart becomes Mary, Queen of Scots. She was queen of Scotland until 24th July 1567 and was queen consort of France from 10th July 1559 to 5th December 1560.

1861Prince Albert, consort of Queen Victoria died, at the early age of 42 of typhoid fever. His death plunged the Queen into a deep mourning that lasted for the rest of her life. The Prince (see statue) laid the foundation stone of the Royal Dock at Grimsby which once had the largest fishing fleet in the world.

1895The birth of King George VI, the second son of George V and Mary. He succeeded Edward VIII when Edward abdicated and ruled Britain during the war years.

1896The Glasgow Underground Railway was opened by the Glasgow District Subway Company.

1918The first woman elected to Parliament was Constance, the Countess Markievicz who won for Sinn Fein, contesting a Dublin seat. She was unable to take her seat as she was in Holloway Prison, London. The 1918 General Election was also the first time that women in Britain had the vote.

1920The first scheduled airliner disaster in aviation history occurred when an airliner with six passengers and two crew took off from Cricklewood Airport, London, for a flight to Paris. Barely airborne, the plane crashed into a house in neighbouring Golders Green, killing the crew and two passengers. The others escaped from the wreckage.

1922The man who would play a significant part in the history of British broadcasting, John Reith, was appointed General Manager of the fledgling BBC.

1932Leeds and Wigan competed in the first floodlit rugby league match, at London’s White City Stadium.

1947Stanley Baldwin, three times Conservative Prime Minister, died.

1955Hugh Gaitskell was elected leader of the Labour Party, following the resignation of Clement Attlee.

1959The shortest murder trial in British legal history. In 30 seconds, at Winchester Assizes, Brian Cawley pleaded guilty to the murder of Rupert Steed and was later sentenced to life imprisonment.

1984Miners' leader Arthur Scargill was found guilty of obstruction during a picket at a Yorkshire coal works earlier in the year. He was fined £250 and ordered to pay £750 in costs.

2011Thomas Cook, the world's oldest travel agency announced that it would close 200 UK branches over the next two years as part of its UK business turnaround plan, 125 more than previously announced. This statue of Thomas Cook (see picture) is outside Leicester Railway Station where Cook began his pioneering tour business in 1841.

2011The UK jobless total reached a 17-year high in the three months to October, hitting 2.64 million. Youth unemployment, which covers 16-24 year olds, hit its highest level since records began in 1992.

2011Buckingham Palace announced that the Queen (aged 85) and Duke of Edinburgh (aged 90) would mark their 2012 Diamond Jubilee with a five-month 'four corners' tour of the UK.

2012Yorkshire, beat off the challenge of bids from Florence and Edinburgh with Leeds set to host the prestigious start of the Tour de France cycle race in 2014. Yorkshire took the Grand Depart to its heart. Day 1 started in Leeds on 5th July 2014 and took in the town of Skipton, (see the race leaders as they passed through Skipton and Skipton's spectator hub. The day's stage continued through the Yorkshire Dales National Park and Ripon, before ending the day in Harrogate.

2013The death of the 81 year old actor Peter O’Toole, who starred in Sir David Lean’s 1962 film classic Lawrence of Arabia. The film earned him the first of eight Oscar nominations, with others coming for such films as Becket, The Lion in Winter and Goodbye, Mr Chips.

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