Margaret Thatcher

EARLY LIFE

Margaret Thatcher was born on Friday, October 13, 1925 in Grantham, Lincolnshire, to Alfred Roberts, who was a grocer, Methodist lay preacher and local mayor and Beatrice Ethel (née Stephenson).

By work provided by Chris Collins of the Margaret Thatcher Foundation 

Margaret spent her childhood in Grantham, where her father owned two grocery shops.

As a child Margaret was fond of the music of Gilbert and Sullivan and enjoyed reading Rudyard Kipling.

Margaret Roberts attended Huntingtower Road Primary School and won a scholarship to Kesteven and Grantham Girls' School, a grammar school. She was head girl there in 1942–43.

Portrait of Margaret Roberts aged 12 or 13

EARLY CAREER

She developed an early interest in politics and, when studying chemistry at University of Oxford's Somerville College, Thatcher became president of the Oxford Conservative Association. 

In her final year at Oxford, Thatcher studied X-ray crystallography under Dorothy Hodgkin, who later won the Nobel Prize.

She graduated in 1946 and worked for as a research chemist for BX Plastics and food manufacturer J. Lyons and Co.

Tasked with whipping more air into ice cream by J. Lyons and Co, Thatcher produced a type of 'soft-scoop' cream which could be pumped through a machine. It heralded Mr Whippy vans and the '99' cone.

Thatcher studied law when not in work and she qualified as a barrister in 1953 specializing in taxation. 

MP AND MINISTER

Margaret Thatcher first stood for Parliament in 1950 as the Conservative candidate for the safe Labour seat of Dartford.
Thatcher won her first election campaign in October 1959, when she was elected as MP to represent the North London constituency of Finchley, which she held until she retired in 1992.

Edward Heath appointed Thatcher Secretary of State for Education and Science in his Conservative government in 1970.

Margaret Thatcher said in 1973 that she didn't think there would be a female Prime Minister in her lifetime. 

On February 11, 1975, Margaret Thatcher beat four male candidates to become the first woman to lead a major political party in Britain. It was only because Keith Joseph was ruled out of the contest for party leadership over a controversial speech suggesting that mothers in social classes 4 and 5 have too many children, that Mrs Thatcher stepped into his shoes.

After being elected Conservative leader, a chance meeting with Laurence Olivier led to Thatcher using his voice coach to lower her pitch to its famous authoritative tone.

PRIME MINISTER 

Margaret Thatcher became UK Prime Minister on May 4, 1979 following the defeat of James Callaghan's incumbent Labour government in the previous day's general election. 

Margaret Thatcher was Great Britain's first female prime minister and served longer than any other British prime minister in the 20th century. 

Margaret Thatcher in 1983

While in office, she initiated what became known as the "Thatcher Revolution," a series of social and economic changes that dismantled many aspects of Britain's postwar welfare state. Mrs Thstcher succeeded in bringing down inflation but not unemployment.

A Soviet journalist dubbed Thatcher the Iron Lady, a nickname that became associated with her uncompromising politics and leadership style. 

In 1979, Japan offered new British prime minister Margaret Thatcher 20 "karate ladies" for protection at an economic summit. She declined.

Margaret Thatcher famously declared in a speech at the Conservative Party conference on October 10, 1980: "To those waiting with bated breath for that favorite media catchphrase, the u-turn, I have only one thing to say: You turn if you want to. The lady's not for turning."

After Argentinian forces occupied the Falkland Islands in April 1982. Thatcher directed British troops in 1982 to get back the British Crown Colony. British administration was restored two months later at the end of the Falklands War.

Argentine magazines presented Mrs Thatcher to their readers as total evil during the Falklands War. She appeared in Tal Cual magazine as a pirate, a vampire and a Nazi with a Hitler mustache, with the cover headline: "La Thatcher Worse Than Hitler." One issue claimed that "even Denis has discovered she’s a monster."

On October 12, 1984, Margaret Thatcher narrowly escaped injury from an IRA bomb at the conservative party conference in Brighton, which killed five people and injured 34. Thatcher's response to the attempt on her life helped to bolster her popularity halfway through a year-long miners' strike, which had split the nation.

The Brighton Grand Hotel after the IRA bomb. 

Margaret Thatcher became the first Prime Minister to win a third successive term on June 12, 1987 since Robert Jenkinson in 1820

The only medical problems the seemingly indestructible Margaret Thatcher suffered as Prime Minister were varicose veins and a sore hand that required a minor operation. 

Margaret Thatcher made do with four hours sleep a night as PM. 

On November 28 1990, a tearful Margaret Thatcher left Downing Street for the last time as Prime Minister. She was the longest-serving prime minister of the 20th century, having been in the job for 138 months.

BELIEFS 

Brought up as a staunch Methodist, Margaret Thatcher retained her Christian faith throughout her political career and won the approval of the local Chequers (her country residence) vicar because of her diligent attendance at church.

On one occasion Thatcher gave an address to the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland in which she gave a theological justification for her political philosophy quoting St. Paul in 2 Thessalonians 3v10 "If a man will not work, he shall not eat."

The tiny Methodist chapel in which Alf Roberts had preached in Grantham was moved stone by stone to Baker University, Kansas and Mrs Thatcher went there in 1996 to speak about the role of Methodism in her life.

PERSONAL LIFE 

She first met Denis Thatcher, a director of the family paint and preservatives business, Atlas Preservatives,  in February 1949, at a Paint Trades Federation function in Dartford, Kent. They married on December 13, 1951, at Wesley's Chapel in City Road, London.

Denis & Margaret Thatcher in 1984

They had two children, the twins Carol and Mark, who were born on August 15, 1953, six weeks premature. "Typical of Margaret. She produced twins and avoided the necessity of a second pregnancy," said Denis Thatcher.

Denis Thatcher, died in 2003 from pancreatic cancer.

Margaret Thatcher used a dark red lipstick to emphasize her impressive cupid's bow. 

Whilst at Downing Street, Margaret Thatcher had a pet cat called Wilberforce whom she doted on. She even bought him back a tin of sardines after a visit to Moscow. 

Margaret Thatcher only traveled by train once in her nine years as Prime Minister.

Margaret Thatcher was offered passport no. 007, but turned it down.

Mrs Thatcher had a hatred of insects and snakes which bordered on phobia.

LAST YEARS, DEATH AND LEGACY 

Thatcher returned to the backbenches as a constituency parliamentarian after leaving the premiership. 

Thatcher touring the Kennedy Space Center in early 2001

Aged 66, she retired from the House at the 1992 general election, saying that leaving the House of Commons would allow her more freedom to speak her mind.

After retiring from the Commons in 1992, she was given a life peerage as Baroness Thatcher (of Kesteven in the County of Lincolnshire) which entitled her to sit in the House of Lords. 

Carol Thatcher first revealed that her mother had dementia in 2005. She was first struck by her mother's dementia when, in conversation, Thatcher confused the Falklands and Yugoslav conflicts.

Margaret Thatcher died from a stroke on April 8, 2013 in her suite in London's Ritz Hotel. She had been living there since December 2012 after having difficulty with stairs at her Chester Square home in Belgravia. 

In line with Margaret Thatcher's wishes she received a ceremonial funeral, including full military honors, with a church service at St Paul's Cathedral on April 17, 2013. Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Phillip attended the ceremony, the second time in the Queen's reign that she had attended the funeral of a former prime minister.

Thatcher's coffin being carried up the steps of St Paul's Cathedra By Österreichische Außenministerium

The "Make 'Ding Dong the Witch is Dead' #1 the week Thatcher dies" Facebook campaign was originally set up in 2007 as a mocking memorial to the British prime minister. Following Baroness Thatcher's death the campaign kicked into gear and Judy Garland's Wizard of Oz song "Ding dong! The witch is dead!" reached #2 in the UK charts.

Every year, Margaret Thatcher Day is celebrated in the Falkland Islands on January 10, the anniversary of her first visit in 1983.

Sources Europeanhistory, Daily Mail