10 weird and wonderful things which happened on 28 April:
Two people who defied the Nazis during the second world war were born on this date. In 1908, Oscar Schindler, the German businessman credited with saving about 1,200 Jews during the Holocaust, and in 1912, Odette Hallowes, who worked with the French underground. Using the code name Lise, she acted as a courier. She was arrested in April 1943 and condemned to death in June 1943. She was sent to Ravensbrück concentration camp, but survived the war and testified against the prison guards at a 1946 war crimes trial.
This date in 1948 saw the birth of Terry Pratchett, author best known for his popular and long-running Discworld series of comic fantasy novels. Quotes: "In the bathtub of history the truth is harder to hold than the soap, and much more difficult to find." "Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set fire to him and he's warm for the rest of his life." and a personal favourite of mine, "90% of most magic merely consists of knowing one extra fact."
In 1770, English navigator Captain James Cook and the crew of the Endeavour, including botanist Joseph Banks and a Goat which had already circumnavigated the world once with Captain Wallis on board the Dolphin, landed in Australia, at the place which was later named Botany Bay.
More nautical events took place on this date in 1789, when the crew of the Bounty, led by Fletcher Christian, mutinied against Captain Bligh. They were on the return journey from Tahiti where they'd spent six months gathering breadfruit trees. Bligh and 17 others were cast adrift in a small boat. The mutineers eventually colonised Pitcairn Island. Bligh managed to sail his small boat to Timor, near Java, arriving there on 14 June.
In 1987, it was announced that 3,000 toads had used a special toad tunnel at Henley-on-Thames during its first six weeks. This crossing between two woods was built so the toads didn't have to hop across a busy highway to get from one to the other. It reduced the toad road death toll by 95%.
In 1947, Thor Heyerdahl set sail from Callao, Peru on a 101-day journey to Polynesia aboard a balsa-wood raft named Kon-Tiki. His aim was to prove that early man could have emigrated from South America to Polynesia.
In 2001, a Soyuz rocket launched in Kazakhstan with American businessman Dennis Tito on board, the first paying tourist in an International Space Station. He paid $20m for a 6 day stay on the ISS. NASA had at first objected on safety grounds, but later withdrew their objection. No doubt $20 million went a long way towards changing their minds.
The first FA Cup final at Wembley Stadium took place on this date in 1923. Before the game started, the huge crowd spilled out on to the pitch, but a single policeman on a white horse managed to get the crowd off the playing area. Bolton Wanderers won 2-1 against West Ham in front of a crowd of 126,000 people and another 75,000 who'd scaled the walls.
In 1220, construction of Salisbury Cathedral began.
In 1985, the largest sand castle in the world was built near St. Petersburg, FL. The castle was four stories tall and contained hidden treasure for kids who came in and demolished the work of art, with permission, a week later.
The Power of Love
Willow believes in crystal healing, cosmic ordering and the significance of chance encounters. She believes there's a spiritual explanation for everything. Except she struggles to find a reason why she can turn herself into mist and create a wave of energy which can slam a would-be mugger into a wall. Or why the love of her life left her for a mysterious woman in sunglasses, who then disappeared without trace.
A chance encounter with Firebolt, leader of the Freedom League superhero team, in a Glastonbury coffee shop, does turn out to be significant. He offers her a new start and the chance to use her powers for good.
Servant is a Christian who has joined the Freedom League in order to use his teleporting power to serve God. He and Willow clash from the start, yet they are drawn inexorably to one another.
When Willow leaves the team abruptly for reasons unknown, Servant knows he must put her out of his mind and find a nice Christian girl to settle down with. He is about to propose to devout and straight-laced Ruth, when Willow returns and turns his entire world upside down.
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