July

Dundee-based DC Thomson published the first ever issue of The Beano in July 1938. It would go on to become one of the most popular comics in Britain, regularly selling more than two million copies every week. Its most famous character, Dennis the Menace, didn’t arrive until the early 1950s, and his dog, Gnasher, almost two decades later, in 1968. The two have been inseparable ever since.

July was also the month in which author Sir Arthur Conan Doyle died. He had found fame as the creator of the detective, Sherlock Holmes, but had tired of the character during his lifetime. Famously, he had attempted to kill him off at one point but been forced to bring him back. In one of his last interviews, given weeks before his death, he had lamented being remembered as Holmes’ creator, rather than for any of his other works.

Brewer William McEwan and distiller John Walker, the latter now better known as Johnnie, were born in July, Queen Mary was forced to abdicate, Piper Alpha was destroyed by fire, and facts emerged of a trial that would lead, eventually, to Glasgow’s last ever public execution.