Unlike the Queen mother, you either love Marmite or you hate it. However, as the Queen mum seems to have pushed through the 100 year barrier with ease, perhaps we should take the time to congratulate Marmite on achieving the same magnificent anniversary. [Note: this article was written before the Queen mother passed away - Ed]
Marmite has been delivered to us in a little black pot that has remained virtually unchanged since it was first created in 1902, so to mark the centenary, Unilever, the makers of Marmite, will produce limited edition glass jars, reproducing those used when the spread was first launched and jars from 1940 and 1970.
Just to put it into perspective, Marmite was created in the same year as the coronation of Edward VII. The Queen mum was two.
The Spanish-American War had finished four years earlier, the Great War was 12 years in the future, the Boer War ended just after Marmite was born. The Wright brothers were still building gliders.
This was the year that a riot between Scottish & English football supporters killed 25, the first motion picture theatre opened in Los Angeles, in cricket, Australia were all out 36 v England at Edgbaston (hurrah!), a patent for the window envelope was granted to H F Callahan, Leopold II, King of Belgium was almost assassinated by Italian anarchist, Brooklyn toymaker Morris Michton named the teddy bear after Teddy Roosevelt and Marie & Pierre Curie isolated the radioactive element radium.
Other notable births were John Steinbeck (author), Sal Gliatto (baseball player), Richard Allen (field hockey goal tender for India. Olympic gold 1928), Howard Engstrom (Computer designer - Univac), Margaret Hamilton (wicked witch of the west - Wizard of Oz), Eduard Franz, Milwaukee Wisc (actor - Zorro) and Jacques-Philippe Leclerc (French WW II hero - liberator of Paris).
