How Margaret Thatcher Got To The Top From Her Humble Beginning

Timeline on the life of former British prime minister, ‘the Iron Lady’, who died at the age of 87 after suffering a stroke.

1925 – October 13: Margaret Hilda Roberts is born in Grantham, Lincolnshire, the second child of Beatrice Stephenson Roberts and grocer and Alderman Alfred Roberts.

1946: Elected as the first female president of the Oxford University Conservative Association.

1947- June: Completes her degree, graduating with second-class honours.

1951- December: Marries divorcee Denis Thatcher.

1952: Begins legal training and resigns as a candidate for Dartford.

1953- August 15: Twins Carol and Mark Thatcher are born.

1958- July: Selected as the Conservative candidate for Finchley.

1959- October 8: Elected as MP for outlawed in 1948.

1970- June: Conservatives win the general election and Thatcher is appointed secretary of state for education and Science.

1971 – June: Introduced legislation to abolish free milk for primary schoolchildren, earning her the moniker ‘Margaret Thatcher the milk snatcher’ .

1975- February 11: Thatcher is elected as the Conservative leader.

1979- May 4: Thatcher becomes the country’s first ever female Prime Minister after winning the general election with a majority of 44 seats.

1982- January: Unemployment in the UK hits 3 million as Thatcher’s economic policies of cuts and austerity makes her and her party very unpopular in the opinion polls.

1982- April 2: Argentina invades the British Falkland Islands. Thatcher responds with swift and decisive force, sending a naval force and in just over two months the islands are taken back. Two hundred and fifty-five British servicemen lose their lives along with three islanders.

1983 June: Returned to power with a landslide majority bolstered by the Falklands war and the economic recovery.

1984- March: Takes on the miners in a bitter industrial dispute over the proposal to close pits, strikes last for a year with violent clashes between the miners and the police.

1984- October 12: An IRA bomb goes off at the Grand Hotel in Brighton during the Conservative Party conference. Five are killed and thirty left injured but Thatcher is unharmed.

1987- June 11: Thatcher is re-elected for an historic third term and becomes the longest continuously serving prime minister since 1812.

1990- March 31: Community charge, or ‘poll tax’ riot in Trafalgar Square causes deep unpopularity for Margaret Thatcher and the Conservative Party

1990- November: In November 1990, after her controversial policies, Thatcher loses her support from her party as she is “asked” to resign after not securing enough votes to defeat a leadership challenge. Thatcher resigns as prime minister and is replaced by John Major.

1992- June: Thatcher enters the House of Lords as Baroness Thatcher.

1997: Thatcher backs William Hague who wins the Conservative party leadership. Labour goes on to win in a landslide election.

2003- June 26: Denis Thatcher dies at the age of 88. The Conservative central office decides to lower their union flag as a mark of respect.

2004- June 11: Thatcher attends the former US President Ronald Reagan’s funeral. Reagan was seen as Thatcher’s political soulmate. Thatcher prerecords a eulogy and tribute for Reagan, despite having being advised by her doctors to give up public speaking.

2005- October: Celebrates her 80th birthday with a dinner in a London Hotel, attended by 650.

2010– October: Misses her 85th birthday party, hosted in Downing Street by Conservative Prime Minister David Cameron, because of poor health.

2013- April 8: Margaret Thatcher dies at the age of 87 after suffering a stroke.