This story begins at Gillingham Library. <Click> Gillingham Library is in the High Street <Click> This is the library in 1959 <Click> Here it is in 2009
The world was a very different place in 1959 <Click> Harold Macmillan was Prime Minister of England. <Click> Robert Menzies was Australian PM <Click> In Cuba, Fidel Castro established a Communist Regime <Click>
1959 was the year that the world first saw the dark side of the moon, when the USSR Luna 3 space probe sent this photograph (which took 11 days to reach Earth) <Click> The first section of the M1 motorway was opened (between the present junctions 5 and 18) <Click> Alaska and Hawaii became the 49 th and 50 th states of the USA
The County Cricket Championship was won by Yorkshire <Click> England toured Australia in the summer of 1958/59 and lost the series 4-0 to Richie Benaud’s Australian team <Click> Nottingham Forest won the FA Cup <Click> In VFL, Melbourne won the Grand Final
The movie Ben Hur was released, and later won the Academy Award for Best Film Charlton Heston won Best Actor <Click> Cliff Richard was Top of the Pops for 6 weeks with “Livin’ Doll” <Click> February 3 rd 1959 was the day the music died when a plane carrying Buddy Holly, Rickie Valens and “The Big Bopper” crashed <Click> The original Mini was released <Click> And a new toy was born. Now sit back, relax, and join us in watching some of the highlights of the last 50 years for the Ramsden family