Westcott railway station served the village of Westcott, Buckinghamshire, near Baron Ferdinand de Rothschild's estate at Waddesdon Manor. It was built by the Duke of Buckingham in 1871 as part of a short horse-drawn tramway that met the Aylesbury and Buckingham Railway at Quainton Road. The next year, it was converted for passenger use, extended to Brill railway station, and renamed the Brill Tramway. The poor quality locomotives running on the cheaply built and ungraded line were very slow, initially limited to 5 miles per hour (8 km/h). The line was taken over by the Metropolitan Railway in 1899, and transferred to public ownership in 1933. Westcott station became part of the London Underground, despite being over 40 miles (60 km) from central London, until the closure of the line in 1935. The station building and its associated house (pictured) are the only significant buildings from the Brill Tramway to survive other than the former junction station at Quainton Road.

Read more: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westcott_railway_station

_______________________________ Today's selected anniversaries:

1607:

Italian composer Claudio Monteverdi's L'Orfeo, considered the first fully developed opera, was first performed in Mantua, Duchy of Mantua (now in Italy). https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%27Orfeo

1803:

The U.S. Supreme Court, in Marbury v. Madison, declared an act of Congress unconstitutional for the first time, forming the basis of judicial review. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marbury_v._Madison

1875:

The steamship SS Gothenburg hit a section of the Great Barrier Reef at low tide and sank northwest of Holbourne Island, Queensland, Australia, with over 98 deaths. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Gothenburg

1946:

Colonel Juan Perón, founder of the political movement that became known as Peronism, was elected to his first term as President of Argentina. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Juan_Per%C3%B3n

1989:

United Airlines Flight 811 experienced an uncontrolled decompression after leaving Honolulu International Airport, Hawaii, killing nine passengers when their seats were sucked out of the plane. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Airlines_Flight_811

_____________________________ Wiktionary's word of the day:

logrolling: 1. (US) The rolling of logs from one place to another; an occasion when people meet to help each other roll logs. 2. (US, lumberjacking) The act of balancing on a log floating on a river to guide it downstream, often involving rolling it using one's feet; birling. 3. (US, sports) A sport in which two people balance on a log floating in a body of water, each one aiming to cause the opponent to fall off by rolling or kicking the log. 4. (US, politics, figuratively) A concerted effort to push forward mutually advantageous legislative agendas by combining two items, either or both of which might fail on its own, into a single bill that is more likely to pass. 5. (US, figuratively) Mutual recommendation of friends' or colleagues' services or products, such as book recommendations in literary reviews. https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/logrolling

___________________________ Wikiquote quote of the day:

It's really hard to design products by focus groups. A lot of times, people don't know what they want until you show it to them.   --Steve Jobs https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Steve_Jobs