The Grampound Times

• Parish Council
• Location & Maps
• For the Visitor
• History
• Heritage Project
• Trades & Services
• Home

The Grampound Times
-recent editions

Edition 50

More Links

Just occasionally Betty produces a list of her weird and wonderful facts  -  some incredible – some amusing – but always extremely interesting.   It’s an item  that appeals to me and when it is available   -   I print……….

A FEW MORE FACTS….

1. The first T.V advert in colour on British TV was for Birds Eye Frozen Peas in 1969.

2. Although Franz Schubert died at the early age of 31 he had by hen written over 600 songs plus piano and chamber music, numerous string quartets and9 symphonies!

3. Scientists have now discovered that an apple a day can really keep the Doctor away.

4. Australia Day is celebrated on the 26th January, the day the first consignment of 736 convicts arrived at Sydney Bay.

5. The executioner who beheaded  King Charles I received £30 in payment.

6. The earliest known Valentine Card was sent to a Mr. John Paston in Norfolk in 1477.

7. It was in 1706 that William Kellogg marketed the cornflake   breakfast food which his brother John had invented as therapy for mental patients.

8. England’s first police force ‘The Bow Street Runners’ was formed in 1754But in 1829 the first uniformed police were set  up in London by Sir Rober Peel and called ‘Bobbies’ after his name.

9. Only one oyster in a thousand contains a pearl.   The largest pearl ever foundWeighed 14lbs 1oz and was found in the Phillipines inside a giant clam.

10. Mayan priests accurately calculated the 365 day solar year more than 1500 years ago by studying the stars.

11. The use of paper money started in China between the 7th and 9th centuries AD to overcome the shortage of coins but it was King Crocsus of Lydie (Turkey) about 550 BC who issued the first coins with fixed values.  The first ever pound note was issued in 1797 by the Bank of England to deal with a financial crisis and a run on the banks.

12. The first  tanks saw action in 1916 World War I having been developed in great secrecy in Lincoln under the auspices of the Navy Department  - experiments were initially carried out using huge empty  water  tanks associated with ship design of that time.   The project was code named ‘tank’ and the name has remained.

BETTY MURDOCH