1951 in the United Kingdom
Events from the year 1951 in the United Kingdom. This is the year of the Festival of Britain and a general election returning Winston Churchill to power.
| 1951 in the United Kingdom |
| Other years |
| 1949 | 1950 | 1951 | 1952 | 1953 |
| Constituent countries of the United Kingdom |
| Northern Ireland | Scotland | Wales |
| Popular culture |
Incumbents
- Monarch – George VI
- Prime Minister
- Clement Attlee (Labour) (until 26 October)
- Winston Churchill (Conservative) (starting 26 October)
- Parliament
Events
- January
- British Board of Film Censors introduces X rating for films "Suitable for those aged 16 and over".
- Ford Consul car introduced.
- 1 January – production run of the series The Archers begins on the BBC Light Programme. It will still be on the air 65 years later.[1]
- 9 January – the government announces abandonment of the Tanganyika groundnut scheme, writing off £36,500,000.[2]
- February – Ferranti deliver their first Mark 1 computer to the University of Manchester, the world's first commercially available general-purpose electronic computer.[3]
- 21 February – an English Electric Canberra (with Rolls-Royce Avon engines) becomes the first jet to make an unrefuelled Transatlantic flight, taking 4 hours 37 minutes from RAF Aldergrove in Northern Ireland to Gander in Newfoundland.[4]
- 26 February – film noir Pool of London is released, the first British film with a major role for a black actor, Bermuda-born Earl Cameron.
- 13 March – Pineapple Poll, a Gilbert and Sullivan-inspired comic ballet, created by choreographer John Cranko with arranger Sir Charles Mackerras, is premiered at Sadler's Wells Theatre by the Sadler's Wells Ballet.[5]
- March – the character Dennis the Menace first appears in The Beano comic.[6]
- 11 April – the Stone of Scone is located in Forfar, having been stolen by Scottish nationalists.[7]
- 17 April
- The submarine HMS Affray sinks, killing all 75 crew members.[8]
- Seven unofficial dockers' leaders are acquitted of offences under a wartime regulation intended to prevent industrial disputes.[6][9]
- The Peak District is established as the first of the national parks of England and Wales. The Lake District is designated so in May,[10] and designations of Snowdonia and Dartmoor come into effect on 20 November.
- 22–25 April – Korean War: Battle of the Imjin River: the 29th Infantry Brigade of the British Army serving with the United Nations put up brave but ultimately unsuccessful resistance to the Chinese advance, with 141 UN troops killed. The last stand of the 1st Battalion, The Gloucestershire Regiment (the "Glorious Glosters") at Hill 235 rapidly becomes part of modern military tradition.[11][12][13][14]
- 23 April – Aneurin Bevan, recently appointed as Minister of Labour and National Service, together with John Freeman and Harold Wilson, resign from the government in protest at Hugh Gaitskell's announcement in the Budget of 10 April to introduce prescription charges for dental care and spectacles (in order to meet the financial demands imposed by the Korean War).[6][15]
Stamps marking the Festival of Britain, with Festival icon on the 4d issue - 28 April – Newcastle United win the FA Cup for the fourth time with a 2–0 win over Blackpool at Wembley Stadium. Jackie Milburn scores both goals in front of a crowd of 100,000 spectators.[16]
- 3 May – George VI opens the Festival of Britain in London, including the Royal Festival Hall, Dome of Discovery and Skylon.[17] This will be last major public event attended by the King and Queen together.[18] Festival Gardens and a fun fair are opened in Battersea Park, and the Lansbury Estate in Poplar is begun this year as a housing showcase.
- 4 May–6 October – Festival Ship Campania cruises the seaports.
- 28 May
- First broadcast of The Goon Show radio series.[7]
- Princess Elizabeth opens the Exhibition of Industrial Power – the latest part of the Festival of Britain – in Glasgow.[19]
- 29 May
- the Easington Colliery explosion leaves 83 people dead.[6]
- Guy Burgess and Donald Maclean defect to the Soviet Union.
- 2 June – Workington F.C. are elected to the Football League in place of New Brighton A.F.C., and will compete in the Football League Third Division North for the 1951-52 season.[20]
- 26 June – Ealing comedy film The Lavender Hill Mob released.[21]
- 10 July – boxer Randy Turpin beats the American Sugar Ray Robinson in a fight in London to become world middleweight champion.
- 17 July – new Port Talbot Steelworks opened at Margam, South Wales.[22]
- 15 August – the first Miss World beauty pageant is held as part of the Festival of Britain.[23]
- 14 September – Clement Attlee opens the largest oil refinery in Europe at Fawley on Southampton Water.[24]
- 23 September – George VI has an operation to remove part of his lung.[25]
- 26 September – Rock and Ice Club formed by a group of climbers in Manchester.
- 30 September – Festival of Britain ends.[26]
- October – Exercise Surprise Packet, the largest British peacetime military exercise.
- 5 October – with three weeks to go before the second general election in less than two years, opinion polls suggest that the Conservative Party will oust Clement Attlee's Labour government from power after six years, with a majority of 75 to 100 seats and a share of the vote of up to 50%.[27]
- 17 October – Austin A30 car introduced.
- 26 October – The Conservative Party led by Winston Churchill wins the general election, regaining (a month before his seventy-seventh birthday) the position of Prime Minister that he lost six years previously, with a majority of seventeen seats,[28] though with slightly fewer votes than the Labour Party which wins the most votes of any party in any British election until 1992 and highest percentage vote share[29] but will not return to power until 1964. The Liberal Party receives its lowest-ever share of the popular vote. Four Ulster Unionist candidates are returned unopposed in Northern Ireland, the last general election in which any candidate is so returned.[30] This is also the last election in which the Conservatives do better in Scotland than in England.
- 31 October
- Zebra crossings, a type of pedestrian crossing, introduced for the first time.[7]
- Egypt unilaterally abrogates the Anglo-Egyptian treaty of 1936.
- 2 November – 6,000 British troops are sent to Egypt to deal with anti-British disturbances at Fayid in the Suez Canal Zone.[31]
- 3 November – Express Dairies, owned by 28-year-old Patrick Galvani, open Britain's first full-size supermarket in Streatham Hill, London.[32] This year also, Fine Fare opens its first supermarket, in Welwyn Garden City.
- 7 November – UK bank rate, maintained at 2% since 26 October 1939, is raised.[33]
- 20 November
- More than 1,000 families of British servicemen begin to move out of the Suez Canal Zone of Egypt after a shooting, which claimed the lives of five British soldiers as well as nine Egyptian civilians.[34]
- The Prime Minister's Resignation Honours are announced, to mark the resignation of Prime Minister Clement Attlee.[35]
- 24 November – Beinn Eighe in Scotland becomes Britain's first national nature reserve.
- 29 November – LEO becomes the world's first computer to run a full commercial business application, for the bakers J. Lyons and Co.[36]
- 1 December – Benjamin Britten’s opera Billy Budd is premiered at the Royal Opera House, Covent Garden.[37]
- 10 December – John Cockcroft wins the Nobel Prize in Physics jointly with Ernest Walton "for their pioneer work on the transmutation of atomic nuclei by artificially accelerated atomic particles".[38]
- 25 December – King George VI makes the Christmas Speech to the Commonwealth, but it has been pre-recorded as he is still struggling to recover from his operation three months ago.
- 31 December – Prime Minister Winston Churchill sets off to the United States for talks with President Harry S. Truman.[39]
Undated
- Trade union membership reaches an all-time peak, with 9,300,000 members.[6]
- GCE Ordinary Level examinations introduced,[6] together with Advanced Levels replacing the Higher School Certificate.
- First residential tower block in Britain, a 10-storey point block, The Lawn, in Harlow New Town in Essex, is constructed to the design of Sir Frederick Gibberd.[40][41][42]
- Performance of medieval mystery plays revived at York and Chester.
- George Perry-Smith opens the innovative Hole in the Wall restaurant in Bath.
Publications
- Agatha Christie's novel They Came to Baghdad.
- Graham Greene's novel The End of the Affair.
- C. S. Lewis' novel Prince Caspian.
- Nicholas Monsarrat's novel The Cruel Sea.
- Iona and Peter Opie's reference work The Oxford Dictionary of Nursery Rhymes.
- Nikolaus Pevsner's guidebooks Cornwall, Nottinghamshire and Middlesex, first in the Buildings of England series.
- Anthony Powell's novel A Question of Upbringing, first in the 12-volume cycle A Dance to the Music of Time.
- Ronald Ridout's First English Workbook, a textbook which sells five million copies.[43]
- John Wyndham's post-apocalyptic novel The Day of the Triffids.
- First edition of The Good Food Guide edited by Raymond Postgate.[6]
Births
- 2 January – Piers Merchant, politician (died 2009)
- 5 January – Steve Arnold, footballer
- 7 January – Helen Worth, soap actress
- 19 January
- Graham James, bishop
- Arthur Taxier, Scottish-American actor
- 26 January – Anne Mills, English economist and academic
- 30 January – Phil Collins, musician and producer
- 1 February – Andrew Smith, politician, former Secretary of State for Work and Pensions
- 12 February – Howard Davies, economist
- 14 February – Kevin Keegan, footballer and football manager
- 15 February – Jane Seymour, actress
- 20 February – Gordon Brown, Prime Minister
- 27 February – Steve Harley, glam rock musician (Cockney Rebel)
- 1 March – Mike Read, television presenter and radio disc jockey
- 4 March
- Kenny Dalglish, footballer and manager
- Chris Rea, singer and musician
- 1 April – Kay Davies, geneticist, anatomist and academic
- 13 April – Peter Davison, actor
- 14 April
- Julian Lloyd Webber, cellist and composer
- Greg Winter, biochemist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry
- 16 April – David Nutt, psychiatrist and academic
- 20 April – Louise Jameson, actress
- 25 April – Ian McCartney, politician
- 11 May
- Kay Mellor, née Daniel, television scriptwriter
- Mike Slemen, English rugby player and educator
- 27 May – John Conteh, light heavyweight boxer
- 1 June – Lola Young, Baroness Young of Hornsey, actress and author
- 7 June – Ralph Palmer, 12th Baron Lucas, accountant and politician
- 8 June – Bonnie Tyler, singer
- 14 June – Paul Boateng, politician
- 28 June – Lalla Ward, actress
- 1 July – Joanna Korner, judge
- 24 July – Chris Smith, politician
- 28 July – Barbara Stocking, civil servant and academic
- 15 August – Dave Needham, boxer (died 2008)
- 17 August
- Alan Minter, middleweight boxer (died 2020)
- Jonathan Ruffer, investor and philanthropist
- 19 August – John Deacon, rock bassist (Queen)
- 28 August – Colin White, military historian (died 2008)
- 14 September – Duncan Haldane, English-born condensed-matter physicist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physics
- 22 September – David Coverdale, singer
- 26 September – Stuart Tosh, musician
- 27 September – Paul Craig, professor of law
- 30 September – John Lloyd, comedy producer
- 2 October – Sting, rock musician
- 15 November – Alamgir Hashmi, poet
- 19 November – Lord Falconer of Thoroton, politician
- 8 December – Bill Bryson, American-born British non-fiction author
- 10 December – Doug Allder, footballer
- 20 December
- Denise Deegan, author and playwright
- Lynne Featherstone, blogger and politician
- Christopher Le Brun, painter and sculptor
- Peter May, novelist and television dramatist
- Nuala O'Loan, Baroness O'Loan, lawyer
- 21 December – Nick Gilder, English-Canadian singer-songwriter
Deaths
- 2 January – Edith New, suffragette (born 1877)
- 25 February – Percy Malcolm Stewart, industrialist (born 1872)
- 6 March – Ivor Novello, actor, musician and composer (born 1893)
- 6 April – Robert Broom, paleontologist (born 1866)
- 14 April – Ernest Bevin, labour leader, politician and statesman (born 1881)
- 22 April – Horace Donisthorpe, myrmecologist (born 1870)
- 24 April – Joseph Paton Maclay, 1st Baron Maclay, Glasgow shipowner and Minister of Shipping, 1916-1921 (born 1857)
- 11 June – W. C. Sellar, humourist (born 1898)
- 3 July – Gwendoline Davies, philanthropist (born 1882)
- 21 August – Constant Lambert, composer (born 1905)
- 27 September – Robert Thomas, politician (born 1873)
- 29 September – Evan Roberts, preacher (born 1878)
- 11 December – Christopher Addison, anatomist and politician (born 1869)
References
- Donovan, Paul (1991). The Radio Companion. London: Grafton. p. 8.
- "Groundnuts Plan Modified". The Times (51895). London. 10 January 1951. p. 6.
- Lavington, Simon (1998). A History of Manchester Computers (2nd ed.). Swindon: British Computer Society. ISBN 978-0-902505-01-8.
- Hutchinson, John (September 2016). "Can-do Canberra". The Magazine. Rolls-Royce (150): 62–4.
- The Hutchinson Factfinder. Helicon. 1999. ISBN 1-85986-000-1.
- Kynaston, David (2007). Austerity Britain 1945–1951. London: Bloomsbury. ISBN 978-0-7475-7985-4.
- Penguin Pocket On This Day. Penguin Reference Library. 2006. ISBN 0-14-102715-0.
- "Fears for crew of lost British submarine". BBC News. 17 April 1951. Archived from the original on 7 March 2008. Retrieved 3 February 2008.
- Dash, Jack (1969). Good Morning, Brothers!. London: Lawrence & Wishart. ISBN 0-85315-193-8.
- "National Park In Lake District". The Times (51998). 11 May 1951. p. 4.
- Marr, Andrew (2007). A History of Modern Britain. London: Macmillan. p. 102. ISBN 978-1-4050-0538-8.
- Salmon, Andrew (2009). To the Last Round: the Epic British Stand on the Imjin River. London: Aurum Press. ISBN 978-1-84513-408-2.
- Hastings, Max (1987). The Korean War. London: Michael Joseph. p. 250. ISBN 0-7181-2068-X.
- Fehrenbach, T. R. (2001). This Kind of War: the classic Korean War history. Brassey's. p. 304. ISBN 1-57488-334-8.
- Laugharne, Peter J., ed. (2000). Aneurin Bevan – A Parliamentary Odyssey: Volume II, Speeches at Westminster 1945–1960. Liverpool: Manutius Press. ISBN 1-873534-16-7.
- "1951". www.fa-cupfinals.co.uk. Archived from the original on 23 May 2008. Retrieved 1 January 2011.
- "King George opens Festival of Britain". BBC News. 3 May 1951. Archived from the original on 7 March 2008. Retrieved 3 February 2008.
- "Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother – Activities as Queen". The official website of The British Monarchy. The Royal Household. Retrieved 17 April 2013.
- "Glasgow powers up for the Festival". BBC News. 28 May 1951. Retrieved 17 April 2013.
- "Soccer moguls drop one team". Leader-Post. Regina. 2 June 1951. p. 17. Retrieved 17 April 2013.
- Vermilye, Jerry (1978). The Great British Films. Citadel Press. pp. 147–149. ISBN 0-8065-0661-X.
- Port Talbot Historical Society. "Time Line 20th C". Archived from the original on 20 July 2011. Retrieved 2010-08-18.
- "The Lost Decade Timeline, BBC". Archived from the original on 21 August 2006. Retrieved 3 February 2008.
- "Refinery opens as oil row continues". BBC News. 14 September 1951. Archived from the original on 7 March 2008. Retrieved 3 February 2008.
- "King has lung operation". BBC News. 23 September 1951. Archived from the original on 7 March 2008. Retrieved 3 February 2008.
- "Festival closes to applause". BBC News. 30 September 1951. Archived from the original on 7 March 2008. Retrieved 3 February 2008.
- "Polls Give Churchill Big Lead". The Vancouver Sun. 5 October 1951. p. 3. Retrieved 17 April 2013.
- "Churchill wins general election". BBC News. 26 October 1951. Archived from the original on 7 March 2008. Retrieved 3 February 2008.
- "1951 General election results summary". UK Political Info. Retrieved 19 April 2011.
- "General Election Results 1885–1979". election.demon.co.uk. Archived from the original on 8 October 2020. Retrieved 26 November 2020 – via Wayback Machine.
- "6,000 British troops flown into Egypt". BBC News. 2 November 1951. Retrieved 6 January 2008.
- Gregory, Helen (3 November 2001). "It's a super anniversary". The Grocer. Retrieved 19 April 2011.
- The Guinness Book of Answers (3rd ed.). Enfield: Guinness Superlatives. 1980. p. 259. ISBN 0-85112-202-7.
- "1951: British families leave Egypt's Canal Zone". BBC News. 20 November 1951. Archived from the original on 7 March 2008. Retrieved 3 February 2008.
- "The Resignation Honours: Earldom For Lord Jowitt". The Times (52172). 30 November 1951. p. 6.
- Ferry, Georgina (2004). "4". A Computer Called LEO: Lyons Tea Shops and the World's First Office Computer. London: Harper Perennial. ISBN 1-84115-186-6.
- Kennedy, Michael (2001). "Benjamin Britten". In Holden, Amanda (ed.). The New Penguin Opera Guide. London: Penguin. ISBN 0-14-029312-4.
- "The Nobel Prize in Physics 1951". Retrieved 3 February 2008.
- "Churchill sets sail for talks with Truman". BBC News. 31 December 1951. Retrieved 17 April 2013.
- Historic England. "The Lawn (1271496)". National Heritage List for England. Retrieved 20 June 2010.
- "The Lawn, Harlow, Essex". Heritage Explorer. English Heritage. Retrieved 12 November 2012.
- "Redeveloping Essex's fallen utopia". BBC News. 16 January 2007. Retrieved 20 June 2010.
- Parsons, Nicholas (1985). The Book of Literary Lists. London: Sidgwick & Jackson. ISBN 0-283-99171-2.
External links
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