Happy Birthday, Lilibet

From the Tronto Star, by Lynda Hurst

Did you know that Philip (and only Philip) calls her 'Lilibet'? That her `dorgis' are the result of a corgi's tryst with her sister's dachshund? Here are 54 facts about the Queen, one for each year of her reign.

1) Elizabeth Alexandra Mary was born in London on April 21, 1926, at 17 Bruton St., in a house that no longer exists. She was regarded as a peripheral princess at the time because her Uncle David was slated to become the next monarch.

2) When Elizabeth was 2, Winston Churchill noted: "She has an air of authority and reflectiveness astonishing in an infant."

3) In December 1936, the cozy, quiet life of the Duke and Duchess of York came to an end when Uncle David, the uncrowned Edward VIII, upped and abdicated. Elizabeth learned from a servant that she was now heir to the throne.

4) In 1939, the 13-year-old Elizabeth reportedly took one look at 18-year-old Philip Mountbatten (ne Schleiswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Glucksburg) and fell irretrievably in love. The tall, blond, strikingly self-confident nephew of the exiled King of Greece was technically a prince but in reality a penniless naval lieutenant. A cousin of sorts, however, he is also descended from Queen Victoria.

5) Lilibet, as she was called in the family — though today only by Philip — spent the war years with her sister, Princess Margaret, at Windsor Castle. At 19, she joined the army's Auxiliary Territorial Service, becoming No. 230873 Second Subaltern Windsor.

6) As a child, her first governess later wrote, "she was the one with the temper, but it was always under control."
"Dash it!" was, and is, the Queen's version of an expletive.

7) "Peggy," her first horse — well, Shetland pony — sparked what became a lifelong passion for horse breeding and racing. The Queen reads the Racing Post over breakfast.

8) On Nov. 20, 1947, in Westminster Abbey, Elizabeth married Philip, newly created Duke of Edinburgh by her father, King George VI. Charles was born a year later, on Nov. 14, 1948.

9) The 18 months "the Edinburghs" spent at a navy base on Malta in the early 1950s are said to have been the happiest of their lives. Like the other young wives, Lilibet could go shopping, get her hair done, eat out. When the couple returned to England, her cousin Pamela Hicks bleakly remarked: "They're putting the bird back in its cage."

10) She and Philip were at a safari lodge in Kenya on Feb. 6, 1952, when word came that her father had died and Elizabeth, at 25, was now Queen.
According to a former private secretary: "She was wearing blue jeans that day, with windblown hair, looking wonderful." She was never seen in blue jeans again.

11) Elizabeth II was crowned June 2, 1953, in a solemn, centuries-old ceremony in Westminster Abbey. The Toronto Daily Star likened the spectacle to "some gorgeous tableau torn out of the pages of history. Through it all moved a small slender figure, surrounded by so many, yet so very much alone."

12) Elizabeth took swiftly and surely to the job. Over the years, she has met weekly with 10 prime ministers — from Winston Churchill, who had an old man's crush on her, to Tony Blair, who was only a month old when she was crowned.

13) When his wife first became Queen, the strong-willed Philip went through a painful period of adjustment. "I'm just an amoeba, a bloody amoeba," he famously said on one occasion. "I'm just a lodger," on another.
14) The Queen has never had the easy, effervescent charm of her mother and apparently is used to overhearing people mutter, "Isn't she looking cross?" Then again, when she was young and a member of the family was caught smiling in a photo, her grandmother, Queen Mary, was known to say, "Too awful! Smiling!"

15) Elizabeth II is England's 40th monarch since William the Conqueror. She is Canada's head of state, officially titled: "Elizabeth the Second, by the Grace of God, of the United Kingdom, Canada and Her other Realms and Territories Queen, Head of the Commonwealth, Defender of the Faith."

16) She has visited Canada 23 times. We once presented her with two live beavers, but Brazil one-upped us with a jaguar and a pair of sloths.

17) She sat for the first of 139 official portraits at age 7. The latest is by Australian singer Rolf Harris, now a TV star in Britain, but best known for his 1950s hit tune, "Tie Me Kangaroo Down, Sport."

18) She regards her clothes as costumes, props for the royal show, requiring only that they're brightly coloured so she can be seen. Weights sewn into her hems keep skirts from flying up. Only in private does she, occasionally, wear trousers.

19) Her never-changing hairstyle results from the need for continuity of appearance on currency and stamps. She feels it works with hats and tiaras and, of course, crowns, of which she has umpteen.

20) The Queen is believed to possess the world's most valuable private collection of jewels, not including the Crown Jewels, which belong to the state.

21) She is an excellent mimic; pompous or nerve-wracked dignitaries are a favourite target.

22) The making of a 1969 BBC documentary on the family's day-to-day life was constantly interrupted by Philip shouting, "Keep those bloody cameras away from the Queen."
Some analysts think the rot of media intrusion into the private lives of the royals commenced with its airing.

23) The first royal walkabout — to allow ordinary folk, not just officials, to meet and greet her — took place in 1970 in Australia.

24) She has owned more than 30 corgis, most of them descendants of Susan, an 18th-birthday gift (which she took on her honeymoon). The current five are Monty, Emma, Linnet, Holly and Willow. She also has four "dorgis," descendants of a brief liaison between one of the corgis and Princess Margaret's dachshund, Pipkin.

25) A former lady-in-waiting to the Queen Mother told biographer Sarah Bradford that, with Elizabeth, "it really is hard work to sustain a conversation if you have no views about vets and flea collars."

26) Cecil Beaton, who photographed the royals on numerous occasions, found Elizabeth stiff and unsympathetic, Philip downright rude. But then, the delicate Beaton was easily offended.

27) "It's too early yet for tea" — what the Queen said to a man she thought was her footman early on a summer morning in 1982. Instead, it was a barefoot intruder, Michael Fagan, who'd snuck into the palace during the night. All hell broke loose when the story leaked out and palace security was tightened.

28) Or so they thought. We know, however, that for breakfast the Queen serves herself cornflakes or oats from Tupperware containers because in 2003, a Daily Mirror reporter worked undercover as a footman at Buck House (a.k.a. Buckingham Palace) for two months and gleefully reported all in the paper.

29) Queen Mary — whose stern Hanoverian facial features Elizabeth inherited and whom she has come to resemble even more in old age — once wrote approvingly to a friend: "She will always know her own mind. There is something very steadfast and determined in her."

30) "The world admires her at arm's length," noted biographer Robert Lacey. "That does not displease her because that is where she wants the world."

31) "I wonder if I might have a second glass of wine?" she once asked when lunching with her mother. "Is that wise?" the Queen Mum smilingly replied. "You know you have to reign all afternoon."

32) Cellphones are banned from state banquets since some luckless functionary's starting ringing in the middle of one.

33) Elizabeth survived 1992, her "annus horribilis," with enigmatic faculties intact. No mean feat. It featured:
The leaked "Squidgy" tapes in which Princess Diana was heard growling to a passing fancy named James Hewitt: "The things I've done for that f---ing family."
Andrew Morton's book, Diana: Her True Story in Her Own Words, which spilled the royal beans.
The "Camillagate" phone calls in which Charles was heard wishing he was, heaven help us, his mistress's tampon.
A topless Duchess of York's toe-sucking holiday snapshots with her American "financial adviser."
The official separation of Charles and Diana.
And, to cap it all off, a fire at Windsor Castle.

34) Shortly after, a former private secretary told biographer Bradford: "If the Queen had taken half as much trouble about the rearing of her children as she has about the breeding of her horses, the royal family wouldn't be in such a mess." (She also breeds racing pigeons, one of which, Sandringham Lightning, was a champion cross-channel racer.)

35) At year's end, the Queen made an uncharacteristic appeal for sympathy:
"I am quite sure that most people try to do their jobs as best they can, even if the result is not always entirely successful. There can be no doubt that criticism is good for people, but scrutiny can be just as effective if it is made with a touch of gentleness, good humour and understanding."

36) She never gives interviews but launched a Buck House website (http://www.royal.gov.uk/) in 1997.

37) Philip has been described by biographers as "more loyal than faithful." But persistent rumours of his dalliances have never yielded evidence, let alone proof. (And, boy, has Fleet Street tried.)

38) The Queen did not have to pay income tax until 1993.

39) Elizabeth is head of the royal family, but Philip has run the private family. Neither was regarded as an ideal parent. His favourite child is said to be Anne. For her, it's said to be Andrew, once known as "Randy Andy," now the Duke of York.

40) When Philip pays her a compliment, Lilibet's face "lights up like a child's, like she's been given the world," says Bradford. A courtier confided: "They're like Darby and Joan now. It's very sweet really."

41) As well as 88 swans on the Thames, the Queen technically owns all the whales, sturgeon and dolphins within a three-mile radius of Britain. They're known as "Fishes Royal."

42) "Isn't it marvellous?" she mouthed to Prince Philip in April 1982, during the rain-soaked repatriation ceremony for Canada's constitution.

43) "No, we haven't seen her Miss Piggy Face once" — the royal press secretary, agreeing with a reporter that Elizabeth looked extremely happy the entire Constitution weekend.

44) Big trouble. What that press secretary got into back home for revealing the family's phrase for the Queen's expression when she's royally ticked off.

45) Three of the four royal children have divorced. Prince Edward has been married to Sophie Rhys Jones since 1999.
The Queen appears to have taken a liking to this daughter-in-law, after a rough patch in the early years, when Sophie insisted on working outside "the firm."

46) After the shocking death of Princess Diana in August 1997, the Queen resented being pressured to return from Balmoral Castle in Scotland to London.
She did so reluctantly, but firmly refused to let the palace flag fly at half-mast. A rare mistake. After a huge public outcry, she finally went on TV and paid insightful tribute to her former daughter-in-law: "I, for one, think there are lessons to be drawn from Diana's life and from the extraordinary and moving reaction to her death."

47) The following spring, as part of a new common-touch charm offensive, she visited a pub for the first time. Then, as Queen Mary presumably rolled over in her grave, she turned up at a McDonald's (no, not to eat).

48) "She does look rather used" — the Queen's only known comment on Camilla Parker Bowles during the long years of the latter's mistress-hood. The relationship has markedly improved since Camilla and Charles finally wed last April.

49) The "Party at the Palace" celebrating her 2002 Golden Jubilee came complete with laser lights and Brian May of the rock group Queen playing on the Buck House roof. It remains a mystery how they got the actual Queen to agree to the event, but she did and gamely attended it. "Her Majesty's a pretty nice girl, but she doesn't have a lot to say," sang Paul McCartney that night. Maybe not in public, Paul.

50) She talked daily on the phone to "darling mummy" and sister Margaret throughout their lives. Both died in the Golden Jubilee year.

51) Diligent as ever, the Queen still reads all cabinet papers and committee reports contained in the famous red boxes, sees Parliament's agenda in advance, and gets copies of all foreign and Commonwealth memoranda.

52) In a rare public comment about her life, Elizabeth once said: "In a way, I didn't have an apprenticeship. My father died much too young. It was all very sudden, taking and making the best job you can. It was a question of just maturing into what you are doing and accepting that here you are, and it's your fate."

53) She is the only "Majesty" in the House of Windsor; the rest are Royal Highnesses.

54) She will never abdicate, as the Prince of Wales knows.