The lesser-known anniversaries of 2025

Root cause

As in every year since 1947, a spruce tree given by the people of Oslo adorns Trafalgar Square. Yet the tradition actually began in 1942 in the middle of the second world war when a Norwegian commando and resistance fighter, Mons Urangsvag, conducted a raid on the island of Hisoy, off Bergen. He felled and brought back two trees to Britain, one of which was given to the Norwegian king in exile and the other erected in Trafalgar Square. The adventure was said to have been inspired by Ian Fleming during a dinner at the Savoy.

Year we go

2025 will be the 50th anniversary of Margaret Thatcher becoming leader of the Tory party and the 200th anniversary of public railways, following the opening of the Stockton and Darlington Railway. Some lesser-known anniversaries in 2025:

50th: The Rubik’s Cube; first professional female jockey; first woman (Junko Tabei) and first UK nationals to summit Everest; first drink sold in an aluminium can (Tizer).

100th: In-flight movie (The Lost World, on an Imperial Airways flight); dipped car headlights; pylons (in New South Wales).

200th: Tinned salmon (sold in Scotland).

400th: First laxatives to be marketed (sold in Germany).

Crystal balls

What the psychics predicted for 2024:

– Charles III to be ‘driven out by force’ and replaced by Prince Harry; Pope Francis to die and be replaced with a much younger man – Nostradamus, as interpreted by Australian Channel 7.

– Russia to face a coup, ‘potentially leading to a female president succeeding Putin’; Argentina to win the World Cup (which isn’t actually scheduled to take place until 2026) – Craig Hamilton-Parker.

– Japan will change its name; Prince [sic] Charles will find out he has another son; ‘hot air balloons will collide worldwide’; ‘a disease around pineapples’ – Nikki, ‘psychic to the stars’.

Double or nothing

– Some things which doubled in 2024: the share price of Rolls-Royce; number of crypto millionaires; digital attacks in Europe; council tax on second homes in 29 of 32 Scottish districts; growth in global trade; production of sustainable airline fuel.