80 Fun Facts About Margaret Thatcher

In which Lincolnshire town was Margaret Roberts born in October 1925?

Grantham: a statue of her put up there in May 2022 was pelted with eggs within two hours.

What kind of business did Margaret Thatcher's father, Alfred Roberts, run?

A grocery shop: he rose to be the town's mayor in 1945, only to lose his alderman's seat in 1952 after Labour won control of the council.

Which subject did Margaret Thatcher study at Oxford?

Chemistry: she was said to be prouder of being the first prime minister with a science degree than of being the first woman in the job.

Which Oxford women's college educated both Margaret Thatcher and Indira Gandhi?

Somerville: as prime minister Thatcher lobbied to keep it women-only, but the college admitted its first men in 1994.

Which X-ray crystallographer and future Nobel laureate was Margaret Thatcher's tutor at Oxford?

Dorothy Hodgkin: though she came to criticise her former pupil's politics, Thatcher kept a portrait of her in Number 10.

Which 1944 book by Friedrich Hayek shaped Margaret Thatcher's politics while she was at Oxford?

The Road to Serfdom: its warning that state economic planning leads towards tyranny made it an immediate bestseller in wartime Britain and America.

Which company rejected the future Margaret Thatcher in 1948 as 'headstrong, obstinate and dangerously self-opinionated'?

ICI: within two years of that verdict she was standing for Parliament, as the youngest woman candidate at the 1950 election.

While standing for Parliament, Thatcher worked in the laboratories of which food firm, reportedly on ice cream?

J. Lyons and Co.: she found the research 'more satisfying' than her earlier job in plastics, though its link to ice cream is no more than a possibility.

Which Thatcher policy, launched in 1980, let council tenants purchase their homes at a discount?

Right to Buy: about 1.5 million council homes had been sold to their tenants by the end of the 1980s.

The Vermin Club that the young Thatcher joined mocked which Labour health minister's jibe that Tories were 'lower than vermin'?

Aneurin Bevan: young Tories wore his 1948 insult as a badge, literally, a chrome rat marked VERMIN, and Thatcher rose to be a 'Chief Rat'.

Which Labour-held Kent seat did Margaret Roberts fight and lose in both 1950 and 1951?

Dartford: she lost twice but cut Labour's majority, and it was there that she met the businessman she went on to marry.

Whom did Margaret Roberts describe in 1949 as 'not a very attractive creature – very reserved but quite nice'?

Her future husband: she wrote that to her sister after first meeting Denis Thatcher, yet married the wealthy businessman in December 1951 and stayed with him until his death in 2003.

In which profession did Margaret Thatcher qualify in the 1950s, specialising in taxation?

Barrister: her wealthy husband paid for the training, which she combined with the arrival of twins in 1953.

What are the names of Margaret Thatcher's twins, born in 1953?

Carol and Mark: Mark went missing in the Sahara during a 1982 car rally, and it took an air search to find him.

Which north London seat did Margaret Thatcher represent in the Commons from 1959 to 1992?

Finchley: she won the safe Tory seat in 1959, having failed to be picked for Orpington and sat out the 1955 election while her twins were small.

Thatcher's maiden speech backed her own private member's bill, which required local authorities to do what?

Hold council meetings in public: she won a place in the backbench ballot for bills, so her first Commons speech, unusually, introduced a law of her own.

What nickname did Thatcher's camp give to Conservative moderates who opposed her tough economic policies?

Wets: 'wet' was slang for feeble, her own allies became the 'dries', and a reshuffle in September 1981 tipped the cabinet their way.

Thatcher sat in the 1970–74 Conservative cabinet as Secretary of State for what?

Education and Science: though she fought to save grammar schools, more comprehensive schools were created on her watch than under any other education minister.

Which free school provision did Thatcher end for pupils aged seven to eleven in 1971, earning a lasting nickname?

Milk: the cut made her 'Thatcher, Milk Snatcher', yet she had argued against it in cabinet and was pushed into it by the Treasury.

Which sitting party leader did Thatcher beat on the first ballot of the 1975 Conservative leadership contest?

Edward Heath: he quit as leader after the first ballot, never served under her and never made his peace with her.

Which rival did Thatcher beat on the second ballot in 1975 and then make her deputy?

William Whitelaw: the beaten rival became her loyal number two, as the party's deputy leader until 1991 and de facto deputy prime minister until 1988.

Which actor arranged for Thatcher to take lessons with the National Theatre's voice coach?

Laurence Olivier: her image adviser bumped into him on a train and raised the problem of her voice, and the coaching softened her hectoring tone.

In The Observer, Clive James compared Thatcher's 1973 speaking voice to what?

A cat sliding down a blackboard: James was the paper's television critic, and coaching from a National Theatre voice teacher later softened the sound he mocked.

The 'Iron Lady' nickname came from a 1976 headline in which Soviet Army newspaper?

Red Star: its writer Yuri Gavrilov coined 'Iron Lady' in a hostile headline, and within days she was using it of herself, likening it to Wellington's 'Iron Duke'.

Which of Thatcher's accessories gave British English a humorous verb for verbally attacking an opponent?

Handbag: she produced hers at meetings as a prop to show she meant business, pulling out the crucial document, and 'to handbag' someone entered the language.

Which Saatchi & Saatchi poster slogan became the emblem of Thatcher's winning 1979 election campaign?

Labour Isn't Working: the poster's long dole queue was really about 20 Young Conservatives from Hendon, photographed again and again and pasted into one line.

Which Labour prime minister did Thatcher replace when she took office in 1979?

James Callaghan: he surprised almost everyone by not calling an election in autumn 1978, then lost a confidence vote by a single vote the following March.

Which wave of strikes in 1978–79 helped sweep Thatcher's Conservatives to power?

The Winter of Discontent: rubbish piled up in the streets and, in some places, the dead went unburied when gravediggers walked out.

On the steps of Downing Street in 1979, Thatcher quoted a prayer attributed to which saint?

St Francis: 'Where there is discord, may we bring harmony,' she quoted, though the prayer is absent from his writings and first appeared in a French magazine in 1912.

Which line did playwright Ronald Millar write for Thatcher's 1980 conference speech, punning on a Christopher Fry play?

The lady's not for turning: with unemployment at two million, it told those urging a U-turn she would not change course; Fry's play was The Lady's Not for Burning.

The Falklands War ended in June 1982 when British troops retook which island capital?

Port Stanley: Argentina's garrison surrendered there after 74 days of war, and General Galtieri, who had ordered the invasion, was removed from power that same month.

Which Royal Navy submarine torpedoed and sank the Argentine cruiser General Belgrano?

HMS Conqueror: the submarine returned to base flying a Jolly Roger, Royal Navy submariners' traditional signal of a kill.

Which republican prisoner began the 1981 Maze hunger strike and was the first of ten to die?

Bobby Sands: weeks before his death he was elected to Parliament in a by-election, yet Thatcher still refused the prisoners political status.

Which organisation bombed the Grand Hotel in Brighton in October 1984 in an attempt to kill Thatcher?

The Provisional IRA: the bomb went off before 3 am, yet she insisted the party conference open on time at 9.30 that morning.

Which Irish Taoiseach signed the 1985 Anglo-Irish Agreement with Thatcher at Hillsborough?

Garret FitzGerald: the deal gave Dublin a consultative role in Northern Ireland, and the province's unionist MPs resigned their seats in protest.

Who led the National Union of Mineworkers during the 1984–85 strike?

Arthur Scargill: he took the miners out without a national ballot, which kept many pits working and let the High Court rule the strike unlawful.

Which industrialist did Thatcher bring in to chair the National Coal Board before the miners' strike?

Ian MacGregor: fresh from sweeping job cuts at British Steel, he announced plans to shut 20 pits in March 1984, and the miners walked out.

During the miners' strike, thousands of pickets and police clashed in June 1984 at which South Yorkshire coking plant?

Orgreave: 95 pickets were prosecuted for riot and similar offences, but the trials collapsed and South Yorkshire Police later paid compensation.

The 1986 'Big Bang' removed many restrictions on which institution?

The London Stock Exchange: fixed commissions were abolished and trading moved from the floor to screens, a shake-up credited with fuelling the City's boom.

Which state-owned industry did Thatcher refuse to sell, reportedly calling its privatisation 'the Waterloo of this government'?

The railways: she is said to have told her transport secretary never to mention them again, and British Rail was sold off only under her successor, from 1994.

Which Chinese leader did Thatcher meet in Beijing in 1982 to open talks on Hong Kong's future?

Deng Xiaoping: he told her bluntly that China could simply take the territory, and two years later the Joint Declaration fixed Hong Kong's return to China for 1997.

Ronald Reagan angered Thatcher in 1983 by invading which Commonwealth island nation without consulting her?

Grenada: the Queen was its head of state, yet Thatcher was given almost no notice and told the White House she was furious.

US cruise missiles stationed from November 1983 at which RAF base triggered mass protests by CND?

RAF Greenham Common: a women's peace camp was set up outside in 1981, and in December 1982 some 30,000 women joined hands around the base.

In April 1986 Thatcher let US F-111 bombers fly from British bases to strike which country?

Libya: France and Spain refused to let the bombers cross their airspace, and her decision drew heavy criticism at home, even inside her own party.

Which minister resigned over the 1986 Westland affair and challenged Thatcher for the leadership in 1990?

Michael Heseltine: he walked out of a cabinet meeting in January 1986 and announced his resignation to the reporters waiting in Downing Street.

In which magazine's 1987 interview did Thatcher say 'there is no such thing as society'?

Woman's Own: her point was that people 'casting their problems on society' should look to themselves first, and then to their neighbour.

In which city did Thatcher warn in 1988 against 'a European super-state exercising a new dominance from Brussels'?

Bruges: the speech, given at the College of Europe, became a rallying cry for Eurosceptics, and the Bruges Group founded in 1989 took its name from it.

What was the official name of the flat-rate local tax popularly known as the poll tax?

Community Charge: it replaced property-based rates with a flat charge per adult, sparked riots, and was scrapped for Council Tax in 1993.

The poll tax was introduced in 1989 in which part of the UK, a year ahead of England and Wales?

Scotland: anti-poll-tax unions there called for mass non-payment, a tactic that spread south before the London riot of March 1990.

Which US president did Thatcher warn not to 'go wobbly' after Iraq invaded Kuwait?

George H. W. Bush: she was pressing him to enforce the embargo on Iraq, yet she had been forced from office by the time the Gulf War began in January 1991.

Which little-known backbencher challenged Thatcher for the Conservative leadership in 1989 as a 'stalking horse'?

Anthony Meyer: he won just 33 votes, but 60 Tory MPs in all failed to back her, a warning that a heavyweight challenger acted on a year later.

Whose 13 November 1990 resignation speech, with its broken-bats image, was instrumental in Thatcher's downfall?

Geoffrey Howe: he ended by urging others 'to consider their own response', and a leadership challenge was launched the very next day.

In which city was Thatcher attending a summit when she failed to win the 1990 leadership ballot outright?

Paris: she came straight out to tell reporters she would fight on, but two days later, warned by her cabinet that she would lose, she resigned.

Which member of Thatcher's cabinet succeeded her as prime minister in November 1990?

John Major: she lobbied for her chancellor to stop a rival taking her crown, and he won when both opponents withdrew after the second ballot.

Which Labour leader did Thatcher defeat to win her third straight general election in 1987?

Neil Kinnock: his campaign opened with a glossy broadcast by the director of Chariots of Fire, dubbed 'Kinnock: The Movie', yet Thatcher won by about 100 seats.

Thatcher's eleven and a half years in office were the longest total by any prime minister since which 19th-century figure?

Lord Salisbury: his 13 years came in three spells, so her unbroken run was the longest since Lord Liverpool's, and it was her own MPs, not the voters, who ended it.

Which company hired Thatcher as a 'geopolitical consultant' in 1992, two years after she left office?

Philip Morris: the tobacco giant wanted the non-smoking ex-premier's advice on breaking into Eastern Europe and resisting a European ban on tobacco advertising.

Which was the first volume of Margaret Thatcher's memoirs, published in 1993?

The Downing Street Years: she told the story out of order, covering her premiership first and her childhood and rise only in 1995, in The Path to Power.

Margaret Thatcher's 1992 life peerage made her Baroness Thatcher of which place?

Kesteven: she passed over her London seat and took her title from the part of Lincolnshire where she grew up.

From 1993 to 2000 Thatcher was honorary chancellor of which American college?

William & Mary: chartered in 1693 by the English monarchs it is named for, it cut its ties with Britain at independence and made George Washington its next chancellor.

In 1998 Thatcher called for the release of which arrested former dictator, citing his help in the Falklands War?

Augusto Pinochet: held near London on a Spanish warrant, he received a visit from Thatcher in 1999 and was sent home on medical grounds in 2000.

How did Thatcher deliver her eulogy at Ronald Reagan's funeral in 2004?

By pre-recorded videotape: after several small strokes her doctors had told her to give up public speaking, so she taped it months ahead, then attended in person.

Unveiling her statue in Parliament in 2007, Thatcher said she 'might have preferred iron' but which metal 'will do'?

Bronze: 'It won't rust,' she added, 'and, this time I hope, the head will stay on': an earlier marble statue of her had been decapitated in 2002.

Where was Margaret Thatcher staying when she died of a stroke in April 2013?

The Ritz Hotel: its owners, long-time supporters, had given her a suite the previous December because the stairs at her Belgravia home had become too much.

Where were Margaret Thatcher's ashes interred, beside those of her husband?

The Royal Hospital Chelsea: after a ceremonial funeral at St Paul's with the Queen present, the burial itself was private and unpublicised, five months later.

Which actress played Margaret Thatcher in the 2011 film The Iron Lady?

Meryl Streep: the American star won her third Oscar for the role, 29 years after her second.

Which actress played Margaret Thatcher in the fourth season of The Crown?

Gillian Anderson: the X-Files star won an Emmy and a Golden Globe for the role, in a season that swept the major drama Emmys.

Which BBC sitcom did Thatcher admire so much that she performed a sketch with its stars in 1984?

Yes Minister: it was her favourite programme, and at an awards ceremony she acted a short scene opposite its stars Paul Eddington and Nigel Hawthorne.

Which cabinet minister was filmed being carried on a stretcher from the rubble of Brighton's Grand Hotel in 1984?

Norman Tebbit: his wife Margaret was left permanently disabled by the blast, and he left the cabinet in 1987 to care for her.

Which chain opened early so bombed-out Brighton delegates could buy clothes before 9 am?

Marks & Spencer: many guests had lost their clothes in the wrecked hotel, so the party treasurer had the store opened at 8 am and the party paid the bill.

Under which peace deal was Brighton bomber Patrick Magee freed in 1999 after 14 years in prison?

The Good Friday Agreement: its early-release terms freed him, and a year later he met Jo Berry, daughter of an MP his bomb killed, to seek reconciliation.

Which new party, allied with the Liberals, split the opposition vote in Thatcher's 1983 landslide?

Social Democratic Party: its Alliance with the Liberals took 25.4% of the vote, close behind Labour, yet won only 23 seats to Labour's 209.

The only government bill Thatcher lost in a Commons vote, in 1986, would have allowed what?

Sunday shopping: 72 Conservative MPs rebelled against the Shops Bill, and the restrictions lasted until the Sunday Trading Act 1994.

Which 1986 privatisation was sold to the public with the advertising slogan 'If you see Sid... tell him'?

British Gas: the 'Tell Sid' adverts urged ordinary savers to buy in, part of a sell-off that tripled the number of individual shareholders in a decade.

At which 1984 summit did Thatcher win an annual EEC budget rebate for the United Kingdom?

Fontainebleau: five years after she demanded 'our own money back' in Dublin, the EEC agreed to refund about 66% of Britain's net contribution.

Which media owner moved his newspapers to a fortified plant at Wapping in 1986, defeating the print unions?

Rupert Murdoch: he moved his papers to the new computerised plant in January 1986, the striking printers were all dismissed, and their year-long dispute failed.

What did Thatcher's government begin designating in 1981 to tackle inner-city stagnation?

Enterprise zones: firms inside were spared some taxes and regulations, and Canary Wharf rose inside the Isle of Dogs zone designated in 1982.

Which French president agreed the Channel Tunnel project with Thatcher?

Mitterrand: the two leaders announced the scheme in January 1986, and Thatcher insisted that it be built with private money, not the taxpayer's.

Which 1988 measure banned councils from 'promoting homosexuality'?

Section 28: it was repealed across Britain by 2003, and in 2009 David Cameron, then Conservative leader, apologised for his party's law.

In her last Commons speech as prime minister, in November 1990, which line did Thatcher throw out mid-debate?

I am enjoying this: she said it while batting away hecklers in a no-confidence debate, hours after announcing that she would resign.