On 2 September 1666 in the early hours of that Sunday morning The Great Fire of London started in Pudding Lane. Strong easterly winds spread the fire, by the time it died out 5 days later, at least 13,000 houses; 94 places of worship had been destroyed; and 6 had died. The London mayor expressed a lack of concern that the fire would become dangerous, saying that “a woman might piss it out,” before going back to sleep.

On 2 September 1826 Bartholomew’s Fair opened with a woman sword swallower, a dwarf lady and crocodiles as well as food and beverages

In 1952 a Nigerian visitor was fined £50 for committing an indecent act with a pigeon in Trafalgar Square and £10 for having it for tea

In September 2015 the Royal Vauxhall Tavern was given Grade II listing, the first location in the UK to be listed for LGBT significance

Into computing? Half of Charles Babbage’s brain is preserved at the Science Museum, the other half is at the Hunterian Museum

Peter Piaktow aka Peter The Painter was the anarchist gang leader responsible for the murder of 3 policemen at the Siege of Sidney Street in 1911

The Marianne North Gallery at Kew Gardens holds the record for the longest exhibition by a single female artist in the world

Brick Lane Music Hall, North Woolwich Road in a converted church is the world’s only permanent music hall showing daily Cockney Singsongs

The public reaction to the £400.000 Zion logo for London 2012 Olympics was that it resembles the Simpsons cartoon character, Lisa Simpson performing fellatio

If you say Finsbury Park backwards you get a Krapy Rubsnif and Balham is the only Underground station that doesn’t have any of the letters of the word ‘underground’ in it

Harrod’s has 11,500 bulbs on its façade. To keep its nightly appearance 300 have to be changed every week. But how many men does it take?

Zoological Society of London found that 83 per cent of Londoners when asked to name something commonly found in the Thames declared a shopping trolley

Trivial Matter: London in 140 characters is taken from the daily Twitter feed @cabbieblog.
A guide to the symbols used here and source material can be found on the Trivial Matter page.

On 26 August 2014 Kate Bush made her stage comeback at London’s Hammersmith Apollo, her first live concert for 35 years. Bush received a standing ovation as she closed the show with Cloudbusting, from her 1985 hit album The Hounds of Love. The 22 shows had completely sold out in less than fifteen minutes, after tickets were released in March of that year. She later introduced one of the backing chorus as her teenage son Bertie.

On 26 August 1974 two cars on Battersea funfair’s big dipper jammed 40ft above ground. After 2 hours 24 people, mostly children were rescued

Winston Churchill attended the scene of the Siege of Sidney Street and narrowly escaped death when a stray bullet was fired through his hat

The first revolving public door in Europe was installed at the Midland Grand Hotel St Pancras in 1873 with 3 compartments to allow for dresses

Steve Mars a BMW fanatic, was buried beneath a life-sized replica M3 convertible in Manor Park Cemetery and a parking ticket was affixed

Above Quo Vadis-Dean Street is the bedsit Carl Marx described an old hovel so dirty that to sit down becomes a thoroughly dangerous business

Bizarrely, the film The Siege of Sidney Street (1960) was filmed in Dublin instead of Sidney Street as Dublin was more like Sidney Street

Regent Street was the location of one of the first late-night shopping events in 1850. Shopkeepers let their stores stay open until 7pm!

Bad weather meant the final two events in the London 1948 London Olympics were held at dusk, with athletes illuminated by car headlights

Waterloo Station is the largest Boris bike docking station. In 2015 bike number 16191 was the most ridden, 2nd was 15901; and 3rd 14630

Pure-finders got 8d a bucket (of dog faeces) from Bermondsey tanners But collecting a bucket may take 2 days so you would guard it all night

Rocky outcrops in St. James’s Park for pelicans to alight are artificial Pulhamite created by James Pulham who took secret recipe the grave

Trivial Matter: London in 140 characters is taken from the daily Twitter feed @cabbieblog.
A guide to the symbols used here and source material can be found on the Trivial Matter page.

On 19 August 1897 the first electric taxi hit London’s streets. The Bersey taxis were the first self-propelled taxis and were nicknamed ‘Hummingbirds’ because of their low engine noise. Built by the Great Horseless Carriage Company, powered by 3½ horse power Lundell type motors with a range of 30 miles, and a top speed of 9 mph. Breakdowns and the high cost of batteries and tyres made their use unprofitable.

On 19 August 1842 saw the last suicide from the top of the Monument-the sixth before railings were put up. Curiously many victims were bakers

More people were executed at Tower of London in the 20th century than in all other centuries combined 15thC-1; 16thC-5; 17thC-1; 18thC-3; 19thC-0; 20thC-11

According to one estimate, there are a staggering 8.3 million trees in London with 47 per cent of Greater London physically green

At 9 Curzon Place where Cass Elliot of Mamas and Papas died in 1974; Who drummer Keith Moon also died from drugs in the same flat – both aged 32

When Lenin was in London reading Marx’s work some believe they first met in the Crown Tavern, Clerkenwell Green

Gerry Rafferty’s Baker Street famous sax riff was played by Raphael Ravenscroft and was reportedly paid £27.50 for the work – the cheque bounced

Elephant & Castle Shopping Centre dubbed ‘Piccadilly Circus of South London’, Europe’s first covered mall was voted London’s biggest eyesore

Plucky minnows Walthamstow Avenue FC famously held both Arsenal and Manchester United to draws in the FA Cup during the 1950s, lasting 88 years before merging into non-existence

At Whitechapel station something ludicrous happens: the London Overground passes underneath the London Underground

Before Roy Hudd went into comedy he studied art and design – one of his teachers was Harry Beck, creator of the London Tube map

In 2003 the Environmental Agency ship the Thames Guardian had dropped onto its deck a red-bellied piranha no doubt by a very stunned seagull

Trivial Matter: London in 140 characters is taken from the daily Twitter feed @cabbieblog.
A guide to the symbols used here and source material can be found on the Trivial Matter page.

On 12 August 1827 poet and engraver William Blake died. Born at 28 Broad Street, now Broadwick Street he would write what many regard as England’s national anthem – Jerusalem – in his rooms in South Molton Street. He lived for most of his life in London dying a poor man at 3 Fountain Court off the Strand. Buried in Bunhill Fields, damaged during World War II the precise location of Blake’s remains have been forgotten.

On 12 August 1707 Henry Chamberlain wrote that ‘the epidemic was so prodigious that the people’s feet made as full an impression them [flies] as upon thick snow’

The heads of executed traitors were displayed on spikes on London Bridge is now commemorated by a giant white spike on the current crossing

Unusual street names: Ha Ha Road Greenwich; Hooker’s Road Walthamstow; Quaggy Walk Blackheath; Cyclops Mews & Uamvar Street Limehouse

St George’s, University of London was founded near Hyde Park Corner in 1733 and was the second establishment in England to formally train doctors

Stalin, Lenin, and Trotsky met at the Brotherhood Church, Islington for the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party it’s now a Tesco Metro

The Beatles played their last gig on the roof of Apple Corps at 3 Saville Row. It’s now an Abercrombie & Fitch, after 42 minutes the police asked them to turn down the volume

When war broke out in 1939, BBC TV shut down half way through Mickey Mouse cartoon. In 1945 the cartoon resumed with apology for the break

The Rom Skate Park in Hornchurch was built in 1978, and was the first skatepark in Europe to be given protected Listed status

All 22 stations on the Metropolitan Line from Amersham to Liverpool Street have an ‘R’ in their name, only Aldgate hasn’t on the whole line

The plinth supporting the South Bank Lion on the south side of Westminster Bridge has a room for security guards to have a cup of tea

You could fit either the Great Pyramid at Giza or the Statue of Liberty inside the O₂ Arena, the largest structure of its kind in the world

Trivial Matter: London in 140 characters is taken from the daily Twitter feed @cabbieblog.
A guide to the symbols used here and source material can be found on the Trivial Matter page.