Happy Anniversary: Le Pique piqued by duel-controlled flight

HERE are some useful dates to remember for the coming week, historically a good period for cars, idiotic statements in Parliament and innovative methods of execution.

3 May:

1808: Monsieur Le Pique is killed above Paris in the first duel conducted from two hot-air balloons.

1949: High Court Judges are given their first pay rise since 1872.

4 May:

1904: Charles Rolls and Henry Royce sign an agreement to build cars.

1935: The world's longest escalator opens at Leicester Square tube station.

1976: 'Waltzing Matilda' is adopted as Australia's national anthem. Ten years later it is replaced by 'Advance Australia Fair'.

1980: Nine worshippers are trampled to death in Kinshasa as they try to see the Pope.

5 May:

1760: First use of the hangman's drop for the execution of Earl Ferrers at Tyburn.

1988: Japanese TV transmits the first live broadcast from the summit of Everest.

6 May:

1851: Linus Yale patents a new type of lock.

1954: The Home Secretary says that the problem of 'Edwardians' or 'Teddy Boys' is not widespread.

1990: Introduction of 071 and 081 phone codes in London.

7 May:

1956: Minister of Health refuses to sanction a campaign against smoking because he is not convinced it does any harm.

1980: Paul Geidel is released from Fishkill Correctional Facility, New York, after serving a record 68 years and 8 months.

1988: First gathering of alien spaceship abductees in Boston.

8 May:

1906: Sir W Anson MP calls the Education Bill 'a tyrannical imposition of knowledge'.

1933: First use of gas chamber for execution, in Nevada.

1962: Last trolleybuses in London.

9 May:

1785: Joseph Bramah patents the beer pump handle.

1938: Scotland Yard announces that it is to start using police dogs.

1949: Britain's first launderette is opened in Queensway.