Friday the 13th. Alfred Hitchcock was born on one. So was Fidel Castro. The same date, August 13, though not the same year.

In an effort to debunk the day’s superstitions, the Civil War veteran Captain William Fowler founded the Thirteen Club in New York in the early 1880s. Its members met at Knickerbocker Cottage on the 13th of the month, sat thirteen to a table, walked under ladders, spilled salt and broke mirrors, daring the universe to do its worst.

Chester A. Arthur, president at the time, and Theodore Roosevelt were club members. No record survives of anything significantly terrible happening to any of them as a consequence. Still, and I’m sure this says more about the current political moment than about Captain Fowler, the whole thing sounds like a front for the Child Sacrifice League.

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I used to live round the corner from Leytonstone Underground station, in Hitchcock’s birthplace, where the subways are lined with 17 mosaics of his life and films. Not 13, which would have justified this addendum rather more neatly, but the maestro did what he could. His first attempt at directing was a silent film called Number 13, also known as Mrs Peabody. It ran out of money after only a few scenes, was abandoned and is now lost. Bad luck, apparently.