Mark Mason

The debate over whether Big Ben should bong to mark Brexit isn’t the first time the famous bell has caused consternation. Listeners to a BBC radio news bulletin in 1949 were horrified when the chimes failed to sound. They had to wait until a later bulletin for an explanation: the clock was running four minutes slow because a swarm of starlings had gathered on the minute hand. In fact, right from the start there were problems with the Great Bell. (That’s its official name — ‘Big Ben’ is a nickname honouring, depending on who you believe, either Sir Benjamin Hall, who oversaw its installation, or Benjamin Caunt, a heavyweight boxer.) The original bell, cast in Stockton-on-Tees, cracked during tests in New Palace Yard.

Don’t worry, this isn’t a piece about fishing quotas. It’s about the word ‘mackerel’ itself. Specifically, the fact that St John’s Wood is the only London Underground station to share no letters with it. Really? Half a page in The Spectator, just about that? Well, yes. The fact has gathered a life all of its own. It’s been doing the rounds in pub quizzes for ages. At least 20 years: in a trailer for his 1999 TV chat show, Jeremy Clarkson promised to reveal the answer (and then didn’t). No less an authority than Only Connect host Victoria Coren Mitchell calls it her favourite quiz question ever. ‘It’s the comic juxtaposition,’ she explains.

In 1966, just as he was becoming famous, Michael Caine met John Wayne. The Holly-wood veteran offered him some advice: ‘Never wear suede shoes.’ The explanation? ‘One day, you’ll be taking a pee, and the guy next to you will say “Michael Caine!” and he’ll turn and piss all over your shoes.’ Urinals are tricky places. Women seem to think they’re temples of laddishness, all footy banter and lewd jokes. A few men are like that, the sort who stand with their free palm planted high on the wall (God knows why). But most of us find the whole thing rather awkward. The broadcaster Mark Chapman once stood next to his hero Bryan Robson.

The first one was too straight. In the absence of a speed limit, early motorists on the M1 used the long sections without bends as racetracks. The record was set in April 1964 by two drivers testing their AC Cobra for Le Mans: they reached 185 mph. The following year new express trains appeared on the track next to the motorway, and some drivers tried to keep up with them. So the 70 mph limit was introduced. Subsequent motorways were built with curves even where they didn’t need them, purely to discourage speeding. As if driving itself wasn’t risky enough, some users of the new M1 stopped for picnics on the hard shoulder, with one family even doing so on the central reservation.

God save us from committees. They’re an increasingly outdated way of getting things done. But there’s a certain sort of person who loves them. What’s worse, they want you to love them too. Anyone who has spent more than 15 minutes as the parent of a school-age child will be familiar with the emails. ‘Joyce has now served as treasurer of the committee for seven consecutive years, and really does want a break. Please can someone volunteer to take over? It’ll only take a few hours of your time each month — and it can be great fun!’ Yeah, right. Then comes the emotional blackmail. ‘I’m sure your child loves attending the club every week, and all the great activities they get up to there. Now’s your chance to give a little back!

Talking to someone in her mid-twenties recently, I mentioned someone else of the same age. ‘She’s a really talented girl,’ I said. Then I checked myself. ‘Sorry… er… woman.’ Sara smiled. ‘It’s OK,’ she replied. ‘That’s what I call myself. I’m a self-identifying “girl”.’ Fair enough. But the exchange stayed with me. It brought back the episode of Have I Got News For You which featured the ‘Michael Fallon touched Julia Hartley--Brewer’s knee’ story. Quentin Letts offered the opinion that Fallon had been brave, on the grounds that Hartley-Brewer is a ‘big strong girl’. ‘She’s not a girl,’ responded the presenter Jo Brand.

St Martin’s really did once stand in the fields, just as nearby Haymarket was a market selling hay. But the church has moved with the times. In 1924 it hosted the first ever religious service to be broadcast live. You might have expected Westminster Abbey or St Paul’s to get the nod, but neither wanted it — many in the religious establishment thought it would be wrong to transmit divine worship over the airwaves, as people might listen in pubs. Dick Sheppard, St Martin’s vicar at the time, was delighted to receive a letter saying that people in one south London pub had tuned in. Not only had they sung hymns for the first time since childhood, they’d discussed his sermon over their beer. Sheppard also got the better of George Bernard Shaw.

It’s a very fitting place for a magic shop. Hidden away in the maze of pedestrian tunnels that lead from Covent Garden to Charing Cross station, Davenports certainly takes some finding. But that’s to the good — a complete absence of passing trade means they no longer have to stock stink bombs and novelties, as they did in their old location opposite the British Museum. These days Davenports concentrate solely on the proper stuff. The shelves boast Svengali decks and thumb tips, gimmicks like the Raven (it’s a beauty), and instructional DVDs and books by everyone from David Devant to Roy Walton. If those names are familiar to you, you’re probably a pro.

Who was the second prime minister? Everyone knows Robert Walpole was the first. Firsts get all the fame and glory. But what about the poor seconds, elbowed into the shadows of history? Isn’t it time they were given some love? Step forward, the Earl of Wilmington, PM from 1742 to 1743. Let us celebrate the fact that his country house in Warwickshire appeared as a monastery in Carry On Camping — and was the inspiration for Croft Manor, Lara’s childhood home in the Tomb Raider games. Likewise, no one knows very much about James Garfield, the second US president to be assassinated. I certainly didn’t until I researched him for my new book, The Book of Seconds. I didn’t know that he could write in Latin with one hand and, simultaneously, in Greek with the other.

‘Safe as the Bank of England.’ So goes the old phrase. And yes, with walls 8ft thick, the Old Lady is pretty impregnable. Even the keys to her vaults are more than a foot long (the locks also now incorporate voice-activated software). Until 1973 the building was guarded at night by soldiers from the Brigade of Guards, who received a pint of beer with their dinner there. With all this security, how can you hope to get in? One answer came in 1836, when the directors received an anonymous letter inviting them to meet the letter writer in the bullion room late one night. At the agreed hour they heard some floorboards being dislodged, and looked down to see a man’s head appearing. He worked in the sewers, and had calculated that a drain ran directly underneath the vault.

‘Safe as the Bank of England.’ So goes the old phrase. And yes, with walls 8ft thick, the Old Lady is pretty impregnable. Even the keys to her vaults are more than a foot long (the locks also now incorporate voice-activated software). Until 1973 the building was guarded at night by soldiers from the Brigade of Guards, who received a pint of beer with their dinner there. With all this security, how can you hope to get in? One answer came in 1836, when the directors received an anonymous letter inviting them to meet the letter writer in the bullion room late one night. At the agreed hour they heard some floorboards being dislodged, and looked down to see a man’s head appearing. He worked in the sewers, and had calculated that a drain ran directly underneath the vault.