Terry-Thomas (1911–90) was an English comedian and character actor, known to a world-wide audience through his portrayals of upper class cads, toffs and bounders. His dress sense and style were striking, as was the gap of a third of an inch between his two front teeth. He worked his way through uncredited film parts in the 1930s before wartime service with Entertainments National Service Association and Stars in Battledress led to a post-war career on stage and then into How Do You View? (1949), the first comedy series on British television. He appeared in British films such as Private's Progress (1956), Blue Murder at St Trinian's (1957), and Carlton-Browne of the F.O. (1959). During the early 1960s he worked extensively in Hollywood, providing a coarser version of his screen persona in films such as Bachelor Flat (1962), It's a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1963) and How to Murder Your Wife (1965). After being diagnosed with Parkinson's disease in 1971, he spent much of his fortune on medical treatments. He lived in poverty towards the end of his life, existing on charitable hand-outs, before a 1989 charity gala in his honour brought him financial comfort for the remaining months before his death.
Read more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terry-Thomas
_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:
1824:
Mexico enacted its first constitution, defining the nation as a federal republic. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1824_Constitution_of_Mexico
1957:
Soviet spacecraft Sputnik 1, the first artificial satellite to orbit the Earth, was launched by an R-7 rocket from the Baikonur Cosmodrome near Tyuratam, Kazakh SSR. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sputnik_1
1963:
Flora (radar image pictured), one of the wettest and deadliest hurricanes in history, made landfall in Cuba, after having previously struck Tobago and Hispaniola. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hurricane_Flora
1993:
Russian Constitutional Crisis: Tanks bombarded the White House in Moscow while demonstrators against President Boris Yeltsin rallied outside. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1993_Russian_constitutional_crisis
2003:
A suicide bomber killed 21 people and injured more than 50 others inside the Maxim restaurant in Haifa, Israel. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maxim_restaurant_suicide_bombing
_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:
catloaf: The loaflike form of a domestic cat sitting with paws tucked underneath the body. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/catloaf
___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:
General education is the best preventive of the evils now most dreaded. In the civilized countries of the world, the question is how to distribute most generally and equally the property of the world. As a rule, where education is most general the distribution of property is most general.... As knowledge spreads, wealth spreads. To diffuse knowledge is to diffuse wealth. To give all an equal chance to acquire knowledge is the best and surest way to give all an equal chance to acquire property. --Rutherford B. Hayes https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Rutherford_B._Hayes