Besides the Cricket World Cup to be held in Australia and New Zealand starting on 15 February, in September and October we have the Rugby World Cup in England to look forward to.
There are also a number of important anniversaries this year. We have already had 50 years since the death of Sir Winston Churchill on January 24 and 80 years since Elvis Presley’s birth on 8 January which seemed to go by largely unnoticed. It was also the 750th anniversary on 20 January of the first English Parliament – the so-called “mother of all parliaments”.
Some others coming up:
- 25 years since Nelson Mandela’s release (Feb 11)
- 20 years since collapse of 233 year old Barings Bank thanks to rogue trader Nick Leeson (Feb 26)
- 40 years since the fall of Saigon, Vietnam (April 30)
- 70 years since the end of World War 2 in Europe – VE day (May 8)
- 75 years since the evacuation of Dunkirk (May 27 – June 11)
- 200 years since the Battle of Waterloo (June 18)
- 800 years since Magna Carta (June 19)
- 150 years since Lewis Carroll’s “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” (July 4)
- 75 years since The Battle of Britain during WW2 (July 10 – Oct 31)
- 70 years since the US dropped atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki (Aug 6 & 9)
- 70 years since Japanese surrender in World War 2 – VJ Day ( Sept 9)
- 40 years since first episode of Fawlty Towers (Sept 19)
- 90 years since John Logie Baird’s first test on a working TV system (Oct 2)
- 600 years since Battle of Agincourt (Oct 15)
- 25 years since German reunification (Oct 3)
- 100 years since Frank Sinatra’s birth (Dec 12)