During the summer of 1981, the nation's spirits were raised by the wedding of Prince Charles and Lady Diana Spencer. The ceremony reached a global TV audience of 750 million people. It restored the royal family to the headlines where they would become a permanent fixture in tabloids and celebrity gossip publications, as well as a major tourist attraction. Diana became what Tony Blair later called the "People's Princess", an iconic national figure, rivalling or surpassing the Queen, until her divorce. Her accidental death brought an unprecedented spasm of grief and mourning. Her brother, the 9th Earl Spencer, captured her role:Diana was the very essence of compassion, of duty, of style, of beauty. All over the world she was a symbol of selfless humanity. All over the world, a standard bearer for the rights of the truly downtrodden, a very British girl who transcended nationality. Someone with a natural nobility who was classless and who proved in the last year that she needed no royal title to continue to generate her particular brand of magic.