Today in History - September 8
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394 Sep 8,
Arbogast, French general, committed suicide.
(MC, 9/8/01)
701 Sep 8, Sergius I, Syrian and
Italian Pope (687-701), died.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1141 Sep 8, Battle of Samarkand:
Yelutashi defeated Islams.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1157 Sep 8, Richard I, [Richard
the Lion Hearted], King of England (1189-99), was born.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1207 Sep 8, Sancho II, king of
Portugal, was born.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1303 Sep 8, Anagni: French king
Philip IV captured Pope Boniface VIII.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1380 Sep 8, Bernardinus of Siena,
Italian saint, was born.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1380 Sep 8, Prince Dmitrii of
Moscow defeated the Mongols at Kulikovo Field. This marked the
beginning of the decline of Mongol control over Russian lands.
(DVD, Criterion,
1998)(http://fanaticus.org/dba/battles/Kulikovo/index.html)
1474 Sep 8, Ludovico Ariosto,
Italy, poet (Orlando Furioso), was born.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1504 Sep 8, Michelangelo’s 13-foot
marble statue of David was unveiled in Florence, Italy.
(HN, 9/8/00)
1522 Sep 8, Spanish navigator Juan
de Elcano returned to Spain. He completed the 1st circumnavigation of
globe, expedition begun under Ferdinand Magellan. [see Sep 6]
(MC, 9/8/01)
1529 Sep 8, The Ottoman Sultan
Suleiman re-entered Buda and established John Zapolyai as the puppet
king of Hungary.
(HN, 9/8/98)
1555 Sep 8, Thomas Villanova,
Spanish saint and archbishop of Valencia, died.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1565 Sep 8, A Spanish expedition
under Pedro Menendez de Aviles established the first permanent European
colony in the present day St. Augustine, Fla. Aviles founded St.
Augustine on the site of the Timucuan Indian village of Seloy, 42 years
before the English settled at Jamestown and 55 years before the
Pilgrims landed at Plymouth Rock. St. Augustine, Florida is the oldest
permanent European settlement in the US. Castillo de San Marco fortress
was built by the Spanish to defend St. Augustine.
(AP, 9/8/97)(NG, March 1990, p.117)(WSJ, 8/3/95,
p.A-8)(WSJ, 5/21/98, p.A1)
1565 Sep 8, The siege of Malta was
broken. The Turkish army of 40,000 men of Suleyman the Magnificent
besieged the Knights of Malta, led by Jean de la Valette, at their
garrison, St. Elmo. The defenders numbered 540 knights, 400 Spanish
troops, and Maltese gentry. In the initial attack 200 of 260 defenders
lay dead at the end of the day but the garrison held out. The Turks
continued their efforts for four months when reinforcements arrived and
saved them. St. Elmo was later transformed into Valletta, the capital
of Malta. The Order of St. John continues to thrive to today. From a
Review of The Knights of Malta by H.J.A. Sire.
(HFA, '96, p.38)(WSJ, 12/30/94, p.A-6)(AM, Jul/Aug
‘97 p.40)
1613 Sep 8, Don Carlo Gesauldo
(b.1560), Italian composer and murderer, died.
(WUD, 1994 p.594)(MC, 9/8/01)
1628 Sep 8, John Endecott arrived
with colonists at Salem, Massachusetts, where he would become the
governor.
(HN, 9/8/98)
1636 Sep 8, Harvard College, the
first college in America, was founded as Cambridge College. It changed
its name two years later in honor of the Reverend John Harvard, who
gave the institution three hundred books and a large sum of money for
the day. [see Oct 28]
(MC, 9/8/01)
1664 Sep 8, The Dutch formally
surrendered New Amsterdam to 300 English soldiers. The British soon
renamed it New York.
(AP, 9/8/97)(ON, 4/00, p.3)
1755 Sep 8, British forces under
William Johnson and 250 Indians defeated the French and their allied
Indians at the Battle of Lake George, NY.
(HN, 9/8/98)(SSFC, 4/23/06, p.G6)
1760 Sep 8, The French surrendered
the city of Montreal to British Gen. Jeffrey Amherst. [see Sep 18, 1759]
(HN, 9/8/98)(MC, 9/8/01)
1771 Sep 8, Mission San Gabriel
Archangel formed in California.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1781 Sep 8, Gen. Nathanael Greene
engaged British forces at Eutaw Springs, South Carolina and was forced
to retreat.
(ON, 12/01, p.10)
1803 Sep 8, A high pressure steam
boiler, made by Richard Trevithick, exploded at a corn mill in
Greenwich, England, and 3 men were killed. A worker had left a heavy
wrench on the safety valve and gone fishing.
(ON, 4/04, p.5)
1815 Sep 8, Alexander Ramsey
(d.1903), territorial governor of Minnesota (1849-1853), was born near
Harrisburg, Pa.
(www.bioguide.congress.gov)
1828 Sep 8, Joshua Lawrence
Chamberlain, Bvt. Major General (Union volunteers), hero of Little
Round Top at Gettysburg, was born.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1829 Sep 8, George Crook (d.1890),
Major General (Union volunteers), was born.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1833 Sep 8, Charles Darwin
departed to Buenos Aires.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1841 Sep 8, Antonin Dvorak
(d.1904), Czech composer and violinist, was born in Nelahozeves. His
work included the “New World Symphony.”
(WUD, 1994 p.444)(HN, 9/8/00)(MC, 9/8/01)
1845 Sep 8, A French column
surrendered at Sidi Brahim in the Algerian War.
(HN, 9/8/98)
1847 Sep 8, The US under Gen.
Scott defeated Mexicans at Battle of Molino del Rey.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1858 Sep 8, Lincoln made a speech
about when you can fool people.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1863 Sep 8, Federal troops
reconquered the Cumberland Gap, Tennessee.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1863 Sep 8, Battle of Telford's
Depot, Ten.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1863 Sep 8, Confederate Lieutenant
Dick Dowling thwarted a Union naval landing at Sabine Pass, northeast
of Galveston, Texas.
(HN, 9/8/98)
1866 Sep 8, Siegfried Sassoon,
British author and poet famous for his anti-war writing about World War
I, was born. His work included “Counterattack.”
(HN, 9/8/98)(MC, 9/8/01)
1868 Sep 8, The NY Athletic Club
formed.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1875 Sep 8, An explosion destroyed
the Newark, NJ, factory of the Celluloid Manufacturing Co. The Hyatt
brothers rebuilt the factory and it turned profitable in 1877.
(ON, 11/03, p.4)
1883 Sep 8, The Northern Pacific
Railway celebrated the completion of its east-west line with a Gold
Spike at Gold Creek in central Montana. Guests included Frederick
Billings, Ulysses S. Grant, and the family of abolitionist William
Lloyd Garrison.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Pacific_Railway)
1889 Sep 8, Robert A. Taft, U.S.
Republican Senator from Ohio, was born. He unsuccessfully sought the
presidential nomination in 1952 and helped pass the 1947 Taft-Hartley
Act. He was the son of the 27th president of the U.S. William Howard
Taft. Robert was known as “Mr. Republican” because of his steadfast
espousal of traditional conservative values. Taft was a candidate for
the Republican presidential nomination three times and served in the
Senate from 1938 until his death in 1953. Taft consistently opposed the
New Deal program, led the Congressional isolationist bloc and fought
the Lend-Lease bill.
(HN, 9/8/98)(HNQ, 7/8/99)(MC, 9/8/01)
1899 Sep 8, The British government
sent an additional 10,000 troops to Natal South Africa.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1892 Sep 8, An early version of
"The Pledge of Allegiance" appeared in "The Youth’s Companion,"
published in Boston and edited by Francis Bellamy, a Christian
socialist, and cousin of writer Edward Bellamy. James Upham (d.1906),
Bellamy’s supervisor, collaborated on the pledge. Frank E. Bellamy
(1876-1915) of Cherryvale High School in Kansas had authored a 500-word
patriotic essay which included the words of the Pledge of Allegiance
and instructions on saluting the American Flag. His teacher entered the
"Salute to the Flag" in a contest sponsored by the popular scholastic
publication The Youth's Companion. His essay won first place in this
national school contest. [see Oct 12]
(AP, 9/8/97)(SSFC, 6/30/02,
p.A3)(www.leatherockhotel.com/FrankBellamy.htm)(WSJ, 7/6/04, p.A23)
1895 Sep 8, Adam Opel (58), German
manufacturer of sewing machines and bicycles, died. In 1899 the firm
acquired a car factory.
(MC, 9/8/01)(www.histomobile.com)
1900 Sep 8, Claude Pepper,
Democratic senator and congressman from Florida, champion of senior
citizens rights, was born.
(HN, 9/8/98)
1900 Sep 8, Some 6,000-8,000
people were killed in Galveston by flying debris, collapsing buildings
and drowning. The storm let up around midnight, leaving in its wake $30
million in damage and thousands of bodies. Many of the dead had to be
hastily dumped in the ocean for fear of spreading disease. Bishop's
Palace in Galveston, Texas, remained standing amid piles of rubble
after the island city suffered the greatest natural disaster in U.S.
history. By nightfall, winds reached 125 mph and the city was under 15
feet of water. The storm battered Galveston for 18 hours and some 3,600
buildings were destroyed. Reports of the storm failed to reach
Galveston because the US Weather Service had temporarily banned the
cable transmission of Cuban weather reports. In 1999 Erik Larson
published "Isaac's Storm."
(AP, 9/8/97)(HNPD, 9/8/98)(SFC, 11/30/98, p.A2)(WSJ,
9/3/99, p.W8)(SFC, 9/22/05, p.A17)
1903 Sep 8, Between 30,000 and
50,000 Bulgarian men, women and children were massacred in Monastir by
Turkish troops seeking to check a threatened Macedonian uprising.
(HN, 9/8/98)
1906 Sep 8, Robert Turner invented
the automatic typewriter return carriage.
(HN, 9/8/98)
1907 Sep 8, Pius X published his
anti-modernism encyclical Pasceni dominici gregis.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1910 Sep 8, Jean-Louis Barrault,
director and actor (Les Enfants du Paradis), was born in Vesinet,
France.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1914 Sep 8, Pvt. Thomas Highgate
(18) was the first British soldier in the war to be shot for desertion.
He had become separated from his unit, but said he was trying to rejoin
it when he was detained. In 2006 the British government prepared to
pardon 305 men who were hauled before firing squads in World War I for
desertion or cowardice after summary trials.
(AP, 8/16/06)
1915 Sep 8, Germany began a new
offensive in Argonne on the Western Front.
(HN, 9/8/98)
1917 Sep 8, Eugene Bullard,
aviator, was born in Columbus, Georgia. He emigrated to France and
became the first African-American combat aviator when he flew a
reconnaissance mission over the city of Metz, France. He was credited
with one confirmed "kill," a German Pfalz he shot down over Verdun.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1920 Sep 8, New York-to-San
Francisco air mail service was inaugurated. US postal planes began
flying across the country, but these flights took place only in
daylight because pilots relied on visual landmarks to navigate.
(www.centennialofflight.gov/essay/Government_Role/1918-1924/POL3.htm)(AP,
9/8/00)
1921 Sep 8, Margaret Gorman of
Washington, D.C., was crowned the first Miss America in Atlantic City,
N.J.
(AP, 9/8/97)(HN, 9/8/98)
1922 Sep 8, Sid Caesar, comedian
and television star, best known for "Your Show of Shows," and "The Sid
Caesar Show,” was born in Yonkers, NY.
(HN, 9/8/98)(MC, 9/8/01)
1923 Sep 8, Seven of the 15 ships
of Destroyer Squadron 11 were wrecked on a rocky point on the
California Santa Barbara County coast. 23 sailors were killed.
(SFC, 9/9/98, p.D2)
1925 Sep 8, Peter Sellers, English
comic actor, was born in Southsea, Hampshire, England. He became famous
for his role as Inspector Clouseau.
(HN, 9/8/00)
1925 Sep 8, Germany was admitted
into the League of Nations. Joseph Avenol, secretary-general of the
League of Nations, sold out the organization he had sworn to uphold.
(HN, 9/8/98)
1926 Sep 8, The League of Nations
Assembly voted unanimously to admit Germany.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1927 Sep 8, A woman arrived in SF
from China and claimed to be Gen. Chiang Kai-shek’s wife, who declared
that he had divorced his legal wife in 1921 and freed 2 concubines this
year.
(SFC, 9/20/02, p.E6)
1929 Sep 8, Christoph von
Dohnanyi, conductor and pianist (Cleve Orchestra), was born in Berlin,
Germany.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1930 Sep 8, Cartoonist Murat
"Chic" Young (d.1973) introduced the cartoon strip "Blondie." In 2005
it was written seven days a week by his son, Dean, who took over when
his father died, and artist Denis Lebrun.
(AP, 9/8/99)(AP, 7/17/05)
1930 Sep 8, NYC public schools
began teaching Hebrew.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1930 Sep 8, Richard Drew created
Scotch tape.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1932 Sep 8, Patsy Cline (d.1963),
country singer, was born in Winchester, Va. Her hits included “Crazy”
and “I Fall to Pieces.”
(HN, 9/8/00)(MC, 9/8/01)
1933 Sep 8, Michael Frayn,
playwright, was born. His work included “A Very Private Life” and
“Noises Off.”
(HN, 9/8/00)
1934 Sep 8, Peter Maxwell Davies,
composer (Prolation, Taverner), was born in Manchester, England.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1934 Sep 8, 134 people lost their
lives in a fire aboard the liner Morro Castle off the New Jersey coast.
The crew of the cruise ship let a small blaze get out of control and
commandeered most of the spots in the lifeboats. Only 15 passengers
survived as compared to 119 crew. 124 people died. The event was part
of a 1999 TV documentary "Escape, Because Accident Happen" for a NOVA
miniseries. [see Sep 7]
(AP, 9/8/97)(WSJ, 2/8/99, p.A21)
1935 Sep 8, The Hoboken Four,
featuring Frank Sinatra as lead singer, appeared on "Major Bowes
Amateur Hour" on WOR radio.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1935 Sep 8, Sen. Huey P. Long,
"The Kingfish" of Louisiana politics, was shot and mortally wounded in
Baton Rouge allegedly by Dr. Carl Austin Weiss, Jr.; he died two days
later ending what might have been a prominent national career. It was
suspected that Dr. Weiss was acting in revenge against Long's public
slandering of his father. The 1996 documentary film “Huey Long” by Ken
Burns was about the Louisiana politician who wanted to redistribute
wealth and make every man a king.
(TMC, 1994, p.1935)(AP, 9/8/97)(SFEC, 3/8/98, DB
p.47)(HN, 9/8/98)
1935 Sep 8, Carl Austin Weiss,
murderer of Sen Huey Long, was shot down.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1937 Sep 8, The Pan Arab
conference about Palestine opened.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1939 Sep 8, President Franklin D.
Roosevelt declared a "limited national emergency" in response to the
outbreak of war in Europe.
(AP, 9/8/99)
1939 Sep 8, Gen. Von Reichenau's
panzer division reached the suburbs of Warsaw.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1941 Sep 8, The 900-day Siege of
Leningrad by German forces began during World War II. The Siege of
Leningrad, 400 miles northwest of Moscow, took place with Germany
spread along a 2,000 mile front. It led to the death of at least one
million Russians from starvation and disease. Leningrad has since been
renamed to St. Petersburg.
(WSJ, 2/21/96, p.A-15)(AP, 9/8/06)
1941 Sep 8, The entire Jewish
community of Meretsch, Lithuania, was exterminated.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1943 Sep 8, Italy surrendered to
the Allies in WW II.
(www.naval-history.net/WW2CampaignsItaly.htm)
1944 Sep 8, Germany's V-2
offensive against England began. The 1st V-2 rockets landed in London
& Antwerp.
(HN, 9/8/98)(MC, 9/8/01)
1944 Sep 8, Erwin von Witzleben
(62), German field marshal, was hanged.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1945 Sep 8, Jose Feliciano, blind
singer, was born in Lares, Puerto Rico.
(www.fact-index.com)
1945 Sep 8, Bess Myerson of New
York was crowned Miss America, the first Jewish contestant to win the
title.
(AP, 9/8/99)
1945 Sep 8, Hideki Tojo, Japanese
PM during most of WW II, failed in his attempted suicide rather than
face war crimes tribunal attempt. He was later hanged.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1945 Sep 8, Korea was partitioned
by the Soviet Union and the United States. The US invaded Japanese-held
Korea.
(HN, 9/8/98)(MC, 9/8/01)
1946 Sep 8, In San Francisco four
boys playing near the Paramount Theater found a package containing body
parts of Ramon Lopez (52), a flower dealer from San Leandro. Police
found 14 pairs of nylons at his room in the Mint Hotel. His skull was
found 18 years later at Hunters Point.
(SFC, 2/17/09, p.A11)
1946 Sep 8, Bulgaria ended its
monarchy. The monarchy was abolished in a referendum called by
communists installed by the Soviet Army. Georgi Dimitrov became the 1st
premier of communist Bulgaria. In 2003 Ivo Banac edited "The Diary of
Georgi Dimitrov."
(SFC, 2/29/00, p.A19)(MC, 9/8/01)(WSJ, 6/6/03, p.W9)
1947 Sep 8, Ann Beattie, writer,
was born. Her work included “Chilly Scenes of Winter” and “Picturing
Will.”
(HN, 9/8/00)
1947 Sep 8, British government
sailed the "Exodus" with fugitives from Nazis.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1949 Sep 8, Richard Strauss,
German composer (Also Sprach Zarathustra), died at 85.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1951 Sep 8, A formal Treaty of
Peace was signed by 48 nations of the United Nations and Japan at the
War Memorial Opera House in San Francisco. On the same day the US and
Japan signed a Joint Security Pact at the Presidio. The Soviet
delegation refused to sign and said the deal provided for the exclusive
existence of American military bases in Japan.
(Park, Spring/95, p.2)(AP, 9/8/97)(Ind, 9/8/01, 5A)
1951 Sep 8, Jurgen Stroop, Nazi
exterminator of Warsaw Ghetto, was hanged on site of the ghetto.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1952 Sep 8, The Ernest Hemingway
novel "The Old Man and the Sea" was published. Hemingway won the
Pulitzer Prize for the work in 1953.
(TL, 1988, p.114)(SFEC, 7/18/99, p.D5) (AP, 9/8/99)
1954 Sep 8, SEATO (Southeast Asia
Treaty Organization), a sister organization to NATO, was created under
the Manila Pact by the Southeast Asia Collective Defense Treaty, to
stop communist spread in Southeast Asia (Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos).
The United States, Australia, France, Great Britain, New Zealand, the
Philippines, Pakistan, and Thailand signed the mutual defense treaty.
SEATO dissolved in 1977.
(HNQ, 4/2/01)(http://tinyurl.com/hpawj)
1955 Sep 8, The Brooklyn Dodgers
won the National League pennant, the earliest a team had achieved this.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1956 Sep 8, Harry Belafonte's
album "Calypso," went to #1 and stayed #1 for 31 weeks.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1957 Sep 8, Pope Pius XII posted
his encyclical On motion pictures, radio, TV.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1960 Sep 8, NASA’s Marshall Space
Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., was dedicated by President Dwight D.
Eisenhower. This followed the activation of the facility in July of
that year, when a key element of the U.S. Army’s Ballistic Missile
Agency was transferred from the Department of Defense to NASA.
The Marshall Center is named in honor of General George C. Marshall,
who was the Army Chief of Staff during World War II, U.S. Secretary of
State, and a Nobel Prize winner for his post-World War II “Marshall
Plan.”
(NASA PR, 8/22/00)
1960 Sep 8, Penguin Books in
Britain was charged with obscenity for trying to publish the D.H.
Lawrence novel “Lady Chatterly’s Lover.”
(HN, 9/8/00)
1960 Sep 8, German DR limited
access to East-Berlin for West Berliners.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1960 Sep 8, Jussi Bjorling,
Swedish epic tenor (Manrico, Cavaradossi, Faust, Rodolfo, Riccardo,
Romeo), died of heart failure at 49.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1961 Sep 8, Frank Rosenthal
(1929-2008), friend of Chicago mobsters, appeared before a Senate
hearing on gambling and organized crime. He invoked the Fifth Amendment
38 times.
(SFC, 10/17/08, p.B8)
1965 Sep 8, An AFL-CIO affiliated
Agricultural Workers Organizing Committee (AWOC), a union of mostly
Filipino workers, voted to go on strike in Delano, Ca. They were joined
after eleven days by Cesar Chavez and the National Farm Workers Assoc.
In 1967 John Gregory Dunne (1932-2003) authored "Delano," an account of
the California grape strike.
(SFEC,10/19/97, p.C3)(SFC, 1/1/04, p.A23)
1965 Sep 8, Dorothy Danridge,
actress (Island in the Sun), died at 41 in Hollywood.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1966 Sep 8, The television series
“Star Trek” premiered on NBC with the episode "The Man Trap".
(AP, 9/8/01)
1966 Sep 8, The situation comedy
"That Girl" starring Marlo Thomas premiered on ABC-TV.
(AP, 9/8/06)
1971 Sep 8, The Kennedy Center,
begun in 1964, officially opened in Washington, DC. A performance of
Leonard Bernstein’s Mass was held there three days earlier. The $71
million structure was designed by Edward Durell. The cultural center
was promoted at Kennedy’s request by Roger L. Stevens (1910-1998).
Congress had designated it a national monument to Pres. Kennedy
following his assassination.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kennedy_Center_for_the_Performing_Arts)(SFC,
8/27/01, p.E4)
1971 Sep 8, Pres. Nixon told John
Ehrlichman to investigate the tax returns of rich Jews contributing to
the democratic campaigns of Humphrey and Muskie.
(SFEC, 12/8/96, p.A14)
1972 Sep 8, The Int’l. Olympic
Committee banned Vince Matthews and Wayne Collett from further
competition for talking to each other on the victory stand in Munich
during the playing of the "Star-Spangled Banner" after winning the gold
and silver medals in the 400-meter run.
(AP, 9/8/02)
1973 Sep 8, The first Whitbread
Round the World Race for yachts began at Portsmouth, England.
(WSJ, 9/19/97,
p.A20)(www.solarnavigator.net/history/whitbread_round_the_world_race.htm)
1974 Sep 8, President Gerald Ford
pardoned former President Richard M. Nixon for any crimes arising from
the Watergate scandal he may have committed while in office.
(AP, 9/8/97)(HN, 9/8/98)
1974 Sep 8, Evel Knievel (b.1938)
attempted to jump the Snake River Canyon in Idaho on his rocket-powered
motorcycle. He failed and parachuted down.
(WSJ, 8/22/01, p.A1)(www.evelknievel.com/bio.html)
1974 Sep 8, In Italy Renato Curcio
and another Red Brigades leader were arrested.
(WSJ, 12/13/07, p.A18)
1975 Sep 8, Leonard Matlovich
(b.1943) appeared in his Air Force uniform on the cover of Time
magazine. He challenged the ban against homosexuals in the US military
and was given a "general" discharge by the Air Force after publicly
declaring his homosexuality. NBC subsequently made a TV movie of his
story. His suit dragged on until 1980 when a federal judge ordered
Matlovich reinstated. Instead of re-entering the Air Force, Matlovich
accepted a settlement of $160,000. Matlovich became a gay rights
activist and dies of AIDS in 1988."
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leonard_Matlovich)(www.glinn.com/news/tline5.htm)
1975 Sep 8, Boston's public
schools began their court-ordered citywide busing program amid
scattered incidents of violence.
(AP, 9/8/97)
1976 Sep 8, Joaquin Zamacois Soler
(b,1894), Spanish composer, died.
(http://ca.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joaquim_Zamacois_i_Soler)
1977 Sep 8, Zero Mostel (b.1915),
Brooklyn-born stage and film comedian, died of a heart attack.
(SFC, 12/30/99,
p.E3)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero_Mostel)
1978 Sep 8, The Shah's troops
opened fire on protesters in Tehran, killing several hundred
demonstrators.
(http://tinyurl.com/hc3fc)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iranian_Revolution)
1979 Sep 8, Jean Seberg (b.1939),
actress (Breathless, Airport), committed suicide at 40.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Seberg)
1981 Sep 8, Civil rights activist
Roy Wilkins (80), former head of the NAACP, died in NYC.
(AP, 9/8/01)
1985 Sep 8, Pete Rose of the
Cincinnati Reds tied Ty Cobb's career record for hits with a single for
No. 4,191 during a game against the Cubs in Chicago.
(AP, 9/8/99)
1986 Sep 8, Westinghouse sold
Muzak.
(http://tinyurl.com/y3thhl)
1987 Sep 8, Former Democratic
presidential candidate Gary Hart admitted during an interview on ABC's
"Nightline" that he had committed adultery and said he had no plans to
resume his White House bid.
(AP, 9/8/97)
1988 Sep 8, A. Bartlett Giamatti,
the National League president, was named to succeed Peter Ueberroth as
baseball’s 7th commissioner.
(AP, 9/8/98)
1988 Sep 8, Two nuclear-missile
rocket motors were destroyed at an army ammunition plant in Karnack,
Texas; they were the first US weapons to be eliminated under an arms
reduction treaty with the Soviet Union.
(AP, 9/8/08)
1989 Sep 8, Former President
Reagan underwent surgery at the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota to relieve
fluid build-up on his brain after a horse-riding accident.
(AP, 9/8/99)
1990 Sep 8, Gabriela Sabatini won
the US Open women’s championship and her first grand slam title as she
defeated Steffi Graf.
(AP, 9/8/00)
1990 Sep 8, Marjorie Judith
Vincent of Illinois was crowned Miss America.
(AP, 9/8/00)
1990 Sep 8, President Bush and
Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev arrived in Helsinki, Finland, for
a one-day summit sparked by the Persian Gulf crisis.
(AP, 9/8/00)
1991 Sep 8, Stefan Edberg won the
U.S. Open in New York, defeating Jim Courier in straight sets, 6-2,
6-4, 6-0.
(AP, 9/8/01)
1991 Sep 8, A 55 ton concrete beam
fell in Montreal's Olympic Stadium.
(http://experts.about.com/e/s/st/Stade_Olympique.htm)
1991 Sep 8, More than 40 people
were reported killed in factional fighting around Johannesburg, South
Africa.
(AP, 9/8/01)
1992 Sep 8, President Bush asked
Congress to provide more than $7.6 billion to help Hurricane Andrew
recovery efforts.
(AP, 9/8/97)
1992 Sep 8, Sen. Quentin Burdick,
D-N.D., died at age 84.
(AP, 9/8/97)
1992 Sep 8, In a case that
prompted federal laws against carjacking, Pam Basu of Savage, Md., was
dragged to her death after being forced from her car.
(AP, 9/8/97)
1993 Sep 8, German tourist
Uwe-Wilhelm Rakebrand was killed by a woman firing from a van as he and
his wife drove away from the Miami airport. The gunwoman and an
accomplice received life prison sentences; the van's driver received 87
years.
(AP, 9/8/98)
1993 Sep 8, Christopher Simmons
(17), a Missouri high school student, kidnapped, bound and killed
Shirley Crooks by throwing her into a river from a railroad trestle. He
was arrested the next day, confessed and 9 months later was sentenced
to death. In 2003 the Missouri supreme Court changed the sentence to
life in prison due to Simmons’ age. In 2005 the Supreme Court ruled
against the execution of minors.
(SFC, 11/4/04, p.B3)(Econ, 3/5/05, p.31)
1993 Sep 8, Black gunmen in South
Africa launched a series of attacks on black commuters, claiming two
dozen lives.
(AP, 9/8/98)
1994 Sep 8, A US Air Boeing 737
from Chicago crashed near Pittsburgh Int’l. Airport and killed all 132
people onboard. USAir Flight 427 crashed 6 minutes before it was due to
land. In 2002 Bill Adair authored “The Mystery of Flight 427.”
(SFC, 5/12/96, p.A-14)(AP, 9/8/97)(SFC, 11/13/01,
p.A12)(WSJ, 5/23/02, p.D7)
1994 Sep 8, The last US, British
& French troops left West-Berlin.
(MC, 9/8/01)
1995 Sep 8, It was reported that a
lifeless zone in the Gulf of Mexico has grown to more than 7,000 sq.
miles, nearly the size of New Jersey. It was caused by chemical and
fertilizer runoff from US agriculture into the Mississippi River. "An
analysis of data from six major farm states showed a significant
correlation between (farm) subsidies and increased chemical and
fertilizer use." The subsidies encouraged farmers to increase yield on
less acreage.
(WSJ, 9/8/95, p.A-10)
1995 Sep 8, Bosnia’s warring sides
reached a compromise in Geneva, agreeing to divide the nation into two
states: one for the rebel Serbs and another for the Muslims and Croats.
(AP, 9/8/00)
1996 Sep 8, NBC's "Frasier" won
its third consecutive Emmy for best TV comedy; "ER" was named best
drama. In the 48th Emmy Awards the winners included Dennis Franz &
Kathy Baker.
(AP, 9/8/97)(MC, 9/8/01)
1996 Sep 8, At the U.S. Open, Pete
Sampras defeated Michael Chang and Steffi Graf beat Monica Seles to win
the top prizes.
(AP, 9/8/97)
1996 Sep 8, Okinawans voted more
than 10-to-1 in favor of a reduction of U.S. military bases on their
islands, in a referendum aimed at pressuring Washington to pull out its
troops.
(AP, 9/8/97)
1996 Sep 8, In Tanzania bandits
ambushed, clubbed and robbed 25 tourists in the Serengeti National Park.
(SFC, 9/13/96, p.A14)
1997 Sep 8, The TV series “Ally
McBeal” starred Calista Flockhart as a working girl who was part
successful attorney and part angst-ridden woman. The show continued to
2002.
(LSA, Spring, 2009,
p.45)(www.imdb.com/title/tt0118254/)
1997 Sep 8, Lawyers in the Paula
Jones case against Pres. Clinton decided to quit the suit after Jones
refused to accept a financial settlement.
(SFC, 9/9/97, p.A3)
1997 Sep 8, Monday commuters in
and around San Francisco faced huge traffic jams a day after workers
for the Bay Area's commuter rail system went on strike. An agreement
ending the walkout was reached five days later.
(AP, 9/8/98)
1997 Sep 8, Forbes Mag. listed
Steven Spielberg as the best paid figure, $313 Mil, in the
entertainment business in 1997.
(SFC, 9/9/97, p.E2)
1997 Sep 8, It was announced the
America Online Inc. (AOL) would take over Compuserve in a 3-way deal
that involved WorldCom.
(SFC, 9/8/97, p.A3)(AP, 9/8/98)
1997 Sep 8, John Liebeskind (62)
died in LA. He was a leading researcher in the study of pain and found
that the brain controls pain by creating a chemical now known as an
endorphin.
(SFC, 9/22/97, p.A10)
1997 Sep 8, In France a passenger
train collided with a gasoline truck in Perigord town and killed at
least 12 people and injured 39.
(WSJ, 9/9/97, p.A1)
1997 Sep 8, From Guatemala it was
reported that a new rebel group emerged in the Chajul region calling
itself the Guerrilla Command Force ‘97.
(SFC, 9/8/97, p.A8)
1997 Sep 8, In Haiti the ferry,
Pride of Gonave, sank in the Saint Marc Channel off Montrouis. The
60-foot vessel was chartered for only 80 passengers. The recovered
bodies numbered 170. A Haitian ferry, the Pride of Gonave, capsized,
killing about three-quarters of the 200 people aboard.
(SFC, 9/9/97, p.A10)(SFC, 9/10/97, p.A10)(WSJ,
9/17/97, p.A1)(AP, 9/8/98)
1997 Sep 8, In Japan Prime
Minister Hashimoto won re-election as head of the Liberal Democrats.
(WSJ, 9/9/97, p.A1)
1997 Sep 8, In Liberia some
200,000 refugees from Sierra Leone had spilled over from escalating
violence.
(WSJ, 9/9/97, p.A1)
1997 Sep 8, In Mexico the Fox and
Jaguar SWAT police in Mexico City engaged in a gun fight with a
neighborhood gang. One young man and one police officer died. Police
seized 6 youths and 3 were found dead the next day with gunshot wounds
to the head. Three more were found dead on Sep 29. On Oct 3 nineteen
members of the police force were arraigned for the executions. Three
ranking officers were later arrested due to contradictory and
misleading statements.
(SFC, 10/4/97, p.A8)(SFC,11/19/97, p.A14)
1998 Sep 8, Mark McGwire his 62nd
home run off Chicago Cubs pitcher Steve Trachsel in St. Louis and broke
the 1961 record set by Roger Maris.
(SFC, 9/9/98, p.A1)(AP, 9/8/99)
1998 Sep 8, In Fayetteville, North
Carolina 2 women’s clinics that performed abortions were attacked with
firebombs.
(SFC, 9/9/98, p.A2)
1998 Sep 8, In Brazil 110 miles
northwest of Sao Paulo at least 53 people were killed when a truck
carrying flammable liquid exploded on a highway and engulfed 2
chartered buses. 38 people were hospitalized.
(WSJ, 9/9/98, p.A1)
1998 Sep 8, In Phnom Penh,
Cambodia, police scattered demonstrators and ended a 2-week protest
against alleged fraud in the national elections. Protestors called
their tent city Democracy Square and thousands participated with hopes
of launching a people-power revolution.
(SFC, 9/9/98, p.A8)
1998 Sep 8, The Congo rebel
delegation stormed out of the peace talks in Zimbabwe.
(SFC, 9/9/98, p.A9)
1998 Sep 8, In Malaysia the market
index fell a record 21.5%, 95.5 points to 349.56. A regulatory reprieve
gave foreigners their first chance to sell since capital controls were
imposed on Sep 1.
(WSJ, 9/8/98, p.A14)
1998 Sep 8, In Mexico a flood in
Chiapas left 25 people dead and Gov. Roberto Albores Guillen declared a
disaster zone along the Pacific Coast. 6 other people were confirmed
dead from flooding in Veracruz and Jalisco.
(SFC, 9/9/98, p.A9)
1998 Sep 8, Serb forces opened an
offensive on Kosovo’s border with Albania and 2 people were reported
killed in Prilep.
(WSJ, 9/9/98, p.A1)
1999 Sep 8, Former New Jersey
Senator Bill Bradley officially kicked off his campaign for the
Democratic presidential nomination with a rally in his hometown of
Crystal City, Missouri.
(AP, 9/8/00)
1999 Sep 8, Economist Herbert
Stein, who served as chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers in
the Nixon administration, died in Washington DC at age 83.
(AP, 9/8/00)
1999 Sep 8, The Bank of England
raised short-term interest rates to 5.25%.
(WSJ, 9/9/99, p.A18)
1999 Sep 8, In East Timor the UN
delayed a pull out over concern for some 2,000 people gathered in its
compound in Dili. Officials estimated that some 200,000 people had fled
East Timor.
(SFC, 9/9/99, p.A1)(WSJ, 9/9/99, p.A1)
1999 Sep 8, In Israel the
parliament approved the amended Wye River accord.
(WSJ, 9/9/99, p.A1)
1999 Sep 8, In Serbia mortar
rounds in eastern Kosovo left 2 Serbs dead and 4 wounded.
(WSJ, 9/9/99, p.A1)
2000 Sep 8, The US Bureau of
Indian Affairs marked its 175th birthday and Kevin Grover, head of the
bureau, offered a formal apology to American Indians for the misdeeds
of the agency that included massacres, forced relocations of tribes and
attempts to wipe out Indian cultures.
(SFC, 9/9/00, p.A3)(AP, 9/8/01)
2000 Sep 8, The space shuttle
Atlantis blasted into orbit to deliver supplies to the new int’l. space
station.
(SFC, 9/9/00, p.A3)
2000 Sep 8, In China the
government of Shaanxi province appropriated 123 Zhong Gong properties
and land worth $36.5 million.
(SFC, 9/9/00, p.A12)
2000 Sep 8, In China a truck
carrying explosives blew up in Urumqi. 100 casualties were reported.
(SFC, 9/9/00, p.A12)
2000 Sep 8, In Ecuador the dollar
became the official currency for business transactions. Sucres would
still be exchangeable at banks for 6 months. Inflation for the year was
projected to be at least 85.4%.
(SFC, 9/8/00, p.D2)
2000 Sep 8, In the Philippines Abu
Sayyaf rebels freed 4 more hostages held since April 23. Libya paid a
reported $1 million per hostage. The hostages later reported that
rebels had raped female hostages.
(SFC, 9/9/00, p.A10)(SFEC, 9/10/00, p.C15)(SFC,
9/11/00, p.A14)
2000 Sep 8, In Russia Defense
Minister Igor Sergeyev confirmed that a troop reduction of
350,000 was to be completed by 2003.
(SFC, 9/9/00, p.A10)
2000 Sep 8, In Russia alleged
crime boss Gocha Tsagarenshvili was gunned down in St. Petersburg.
(SFC, 9/9/00, p.A12)
2000 Sep 8, In Rwanda 51 civilians
were killed by government troops retreating from Dongo. Ugandan-backed
Congolese rebels later discovered the bodies.
(SFC, 9/16/00, p.A12)
2000 Sep 8, Tuvalu was reported to
have become the 189th member of the United Nations. The country
consisted of 10 square miles on 9 atolls with a population of 9,000.
(SFC, 9/8/00, p.A12)
2000 Sep 8, The UN Millennium
Summit ended in NYC with the adoption of an 8-page plan, the Millennium
Development Goals (MDGs) to cure the world’s direst problems. Pledges
were made to halve the proportion of people in poverty, to reverse the
spread of AIDS, and to strengthen the UN’s ability to keep peace. The
plan under Jeffrey Sachs proposed 7 basic reforms to improve lives and
provide livelihoods.
(SFC, 9/9/00, p.A1)(AP, 9/8/01)(Econ, 1/22/05,
p.69)(Econ, 4/29/06, p.52)
2001 Sep 8, Venus Williams won her
second consecutive U.S. Open title by beating her sister Serena 6-2,
6-4 in the first prime-time women's Grand Slam final.
(AP, 9/8/02)
2001 Sep 8, In San Francisco a
ceremony marked the 50th anniversary of the Treaty of Peace with Japan.
(SSFC, 9/9/01, p.A1)
2001 Sep 8, In Afghanistan 8
foreigners arrested for preaching Christianity appeared in an Islamic
court for the 1st time.
(SSFC, 9/9/01, p.A14)
2001 Sep 8, In Colombia police
arrested 4 FARC guerrillas who allegedly planned to kill presidential
candidate Alvaro Uribe.
(SSFC, 9/9/01, p.A17)
2001 Sep 8, In Kanpur, India, some
6,000 Dalits, converted to Buddhism.
(SFC, 9/10/01, p.B2)
2001 Sep 8, In Indonesia Pres.
Megawati Sukarnoputri visited Banda Aceh and apologized for past
government mistakes. She urged residents to welcome new laws granting
the region its own legal system and a greater share of the oil income.
(SSFC, 9/9/01, p.A14)
2001 Sep 8, Israeli helicopters
fired missiles at offices of the Fatah in Ramallah. Palestinian police
said a 13-year-old boy was killed by Israeli gunfire n Rafah.
(SSFC, 9/9/01, p.A18)
2001 Sep 8, In Serbia 26
unidentified bodies were exhumed from a site near Lake Perucac. They
were believed to be bodies of ethnic Albanians from the 1999 crackdown
in Kosovo.
(SFC, 9/10/01, p.B2)
2001 Sep 8, In South Africa the UN
World Conference on Racism ended and agreed to condemn the “barbarism”
of the slave trade, proposed an aid package for Africa, recognized
Palestinian rights and Israeli security concerns, opposed bias against
ethnic minorities, refugees, indigenous peoples and women.
(SSFC, 9/9/01, p.A1)
2001 Sep 8, In Zimbabwe militants
seized the Logan Lee farm in Beatrice.
(SSFC, 9/9/01, p.A18)
2002 Sep 8, Pete Sampras beat
Andre Agassi (news) 6-3, 6-4, 5-7, 6-4 to win his 14th Grand Slam title
and the U.S. Open for the fifth time.
(AP, 9/8/03)
2002 Sep 8, The US government
reported that violent crime rate had dropped by 10 percent the previous
year, reaching lowest level since 1973.
(AP, 9/8/03)
2002 Sep 8, In San Francisco Ray
D. Jimmerson Jr. (25), a key witness in a case against the Big Block
gang, was shot to death on Buchanon St. In 2005 Dennis Cyrus Jr., a
leader of the Page Street Mob, was indicted for the slaying. In 2009
Cyrus was convicted of murdering 3 men and sentenced to life in prison
without parole.
(SFC, 9/10/02, p.A1)(SFC, 5/27/05, p.B4)(SFC,
6/27/09, p.B1)
2002 Sep 8, Authorities closed
Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET) indefinitely
following weeks of student unrest.
(Reuters, 9/8/02)
2002 Sep 8, In southeast China
typhoon Sinlaku was weakening as it churned inland after triggering
fierce winds and heavy rain that killed 23 people, toppled homes and
uprooted trees.
(Reuters, 9/8/02)
2002 Sep 8, In Guatemala local
media reported that anthropologists digging under a school in Rabinal,
in Guatemala's northern highlands, had unearthed the remains of 47
people killed during the country's 1960-1996 civil war.
(AP, 9/8/02)
2002 Sep 8, The leaders of the two
main Kurdish factions, KDP and PUK, that control northern Iraq signed a
reconciliation agreement as the United States tries to forge a united
front against Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.
(AP, 9/9/02)
2002 Sep 8, In eastern Pakistan 4
suspected militants, including two linked to a bloody attack on a
church last year, were killed in a shootout with the police.
(Reuters, 9/8/02)
2002 Sep 8, Philippine troops
shelled retreating Muslim guerrillas after capturing two rebel camps in
fighting on southern Jolo island that left at least 22 dead.
(Reuters, 9/8/02)
2002 Sep 8, A Russian prosecutor
said that the bodies of seven Chechen residents who disappeared several
months ago were found in a common grave near Goragorsk.
(AP, 9/8/02)
2002 Sep 8, Georges-Andre
Chevallaz (87), a former Swiss president (1980) and member of the
ruling cabinet for 10 years, died in Lausanne.
(AP, 9/9/02)
2003 Sep 8, The Recording Industry
Association of America (RIAA), the music industry's largest trade
group, filed 261 copyright lawsuits across the country against Internet
users for trading songs online.
(SFC, 9/9/03, p.A1)(AP, 9/8/08)
2003 Sep 8, In NYC Harvey Milk
High School for gay, bisexual and transgender kids opened in Greenwich
Village. It was named after the San Francisco supervisor killed
in 1978.
(SFC, 9/9/03, p.A1)
2003 Sep 8, NASA presented a
"return to flight" plan for the shuttle fleet.
(WSJ, 9/8/03, p.A1)
2003 Sep 8, In Afghanistan
suspected Taliban rebels stopped a car carrying Afghans working for a
Danish aid organization, tied them up, then shot four of them to death.
(AP, 9/10/03)
2003 Sep 8, In Ecuador spokesman
Marcelo Cevallos said Pres. Lucio Gutierrez will set a national example
and start showing up on time for meetings and appointments in an effort
to combat a national lack of punctuality. Cevallos apologized to the
audience for showing up late for the interview.
(AP, 9/9/03)
2003 Sep 8, Leni Riefenstahl
(101), filmmaker, died in Bavaria. Her depiction of Hitler's Nuremberg
rally, "Triumph of the Will," was renowned and despised as the best
propaganda film ever made. In 2007 Steven Bach authored “Leni: The Life
and Work of Leni Riefenstahl” and Jurgen Trimborn authored “Leni
Riefenstahl: A Life.”
(AP, 9/9/03)(SFC, 9/10/03, p.A19)(Econ, 3/10/07,
p.82)
2003 Sep 8, Ariel Sharon flew to
New Delhi for the first-ever visit to India by an Israeli prime
minister, hoping to cement blossoming defense and trade ties.
(AP, 9/8/03)
2003 Sep 8, In eastern India
suspected communist rebels detonated a land mine under a passing police
vehicle, killing 12 officers.
(AP, 9/8/03)
2003 Sep 8, In Mali
authorities said torrential rains have killed scores and caused heavy
property damage, warning of worse to come if the Niger River spills its
banks.
(AP, 9/8/03)
2003 Sep 8, In central Nigeria 3
buses and a truck collided, killing more than 100 people in the impact
and the fiery explosion that followed.
(AP, 9/8/03)
2003 Sep 8, Palestinian parliament
speaker Ahmed Qureia said he will accept the prime minister's job only
if Washington guarantees Israeli compliance with a US-backed peace
plan, including a halt to military strikes.
(AP, 9/8/03)
2003 Sep 8, Singapore health
officials confirmed that a local patient tested positive for severe
acute respiratory syndrome, or SARS, the 1st new case of the disease in
over 5 months.
(AP, 9/8/03)(WSJ, 9/10/03, p.A1)
2004 Sep 8, Dan Rather featured a
story on 60 Minutes with documents that raised questions on Pres.
Bush’s National Guard Service in 1972-73. On Sep 20 Dan Rather and CBS
apologized for using what appeared to be forged documents.
(SFC, 9/21/04, p.A1)
2004 Sep 8, Delta Air Lines said
it will cut up to 7,000 jobs, reduce wages and pull back at its
Dallas-Fort Worth airport hub as part of a sweeping restructuring plan
that could still leave it vulnerable to bankruptcy.
(AP, 9/8/04)
2004 Sep 8, NASA’s $260 million
Genesis space capsule crashed in the Utah desert after its parachute
failed to open. It carried a cargo of solar wind particles.
(SFC, 9/9/04, p.A1)
2004 Sep 8, Richard G. Butler
(86), founder of the Aryan Nations, was found dead in his bed in
Hayden, Idaho.
(AP, 9/8/05)
2004 Sep 8, Hurricane Ivan made a
direct hit on Grenada, killing at least three people. The most powerful
storm to hit the Caribbean in 10 years also damaged homes in Barbados,
St. Lucia and St. Vincent, just days after Hurricane Frances rampaged
through.
(AP, 9/8/04)
2004 Sep 8, India and Pakistan
opened up their countries to cross-border group tourism for the first
time and announced a series of high-level contacts to push forward the
peace process.
(AP, 9/8/04)
2004 Sep 8, US warplanes launched
strikes in the insurgent-held city of Fallujah, hitting at suspected
militant hideouts used to plan attacks on American forces. At least 2
people were killed.
(AP, 9/8/04)
2004 Sep 8, Insurgents kidnapped
the family of an Iraqi National Guard officer and set fire to his home
northeast of the capital.
(AP, 9/11/04)
2004 Sep 8, Japan's coast guard
found five more bodies from an Indonesian cargo ship that ran aground
during a powerful typhoon that has hammered Japan, raising the death
toll from the storm to at least 28.
(AP, 9/8/04)
2004 Sep 8, Police in Suriname
arrested six people and seized a large stash of weapons, uncovering
what they said was an arms-for-cocaine smuggling operation.
(AP, 9/9/04)
2004 Sep 8, In Thailand a young
man died from bird flu and increased fears of a avian influenza
pandemic. Asian deaths from bird flu for the year totaled 28.
(WSJ, 9/10/04, p.A2)
2004 Sep 8, In Turkey rescue
workers started to evacuate dozens of workers trapped inside a copper
mine engulfed in fire. Eight miners were rescued so far. Between 25 and
30 miners were trapped inside the mine in the town of Kure in Kastamonu
province, some 185 miles north of the capital, Ankara.
(AP, 9/8/04)
2004 Sep 8, It was reported that
some 60 hippos had died of unknown causes over the last 2 months in
Uganda’s Queen Elizabeth National Park.
(SFC, 9/8/04, p.A6)
2005 Sep 8, US Congress hastened
to provide an additional $51.8 billion for relief and recovery from
Hurricane Katrina; President Bush pledged to make it "easy and simple
as possible" for uncounted, uprooted storm victims to collect food
stamps and other government benefits. Tropical Storm Ophelia
strengthened into a hurricane as it stalled 70 miles off the northeast
Florida coast. New Orleans was still 60% flooded.
(AP, 9/8/06) (WSJ, 9/9/05, p.A1)
2005 Sep 8, A German military
plane carrying 15 tons of military rations for survivors of Hurricane
Katrina was sent back by US authorities because it did not have the
required authorization.
(AP, 9/10/05)
2005 Sep 8, US grain prices were
reported down as grain elevators along the Mississippi filled to
capacity and grain handling due to Katrina fell to 63%. Early harvests
from Arkansas were particularly hit.
(WSJ, 9/8/05, p.A10)(WSJ, 9/9/05, p.A1)
2005 Sep 8, A symposium at Western
Kentucky University in Bowling Green, Ky., brought together scholars
from 17 states and three countries to discuss bluegrass music.
(AP, 9/9/05)
2005 Sep 8, News Corp. said it has
signed a $650 million deal to buy IGN Entertainment, a Brisbane, Ca.,
network of Web sites for video gaming and other digital entertainment.
(SFC, 9/9/05, p.C1)
2005 Sep 8, Lewis Platt (b.1941),
former CEO of Hewlett-Packard (1992-1999) and director at Boeing Corp.,
died.
(SFC, 9/10/05, p.C1)
2005 Sep 8, Bangladesh police
seized about 200 small bombs, some explosives, dozens of detonators and
leaflets on jihad, or holy war, during a raid on a house in Dhaka.
(AP, 9/9/05)
2005 Sep 8, Chinese President Hu
Jintao arrived in Canada for his first state visit, celebrating 35
years of diplomatic ties and rapidly expanding trade and energy
agreements with Canada.
(AP, 9/8/05)
2005 Sep 8, El Salvador said that
“Operation International” simultaneous raids this week in El Salvador,
the US, Honduras, Guatemala, and Mexico netted 660 dangerous gang
members.
(AP, 9/9/05)
2005 Sep 8, In Egypt President
Hosni Mubarak took an overwhelming early lead in his country's
first-ever contested presidential race in a ballot marred by low
turnout and widespread reports of voter intimidation.
(AP, 9/8/05)
2005 Sep 8, German Chancellor
Gerhard Schroeder and Russian President Vladimir Putin sealed an
agreement to build a Baltic Sea gas pipeline aimed at boosting Russia's
gas sales to Europe and securing uninterrupted energy supplies for
Germany.
(AP, 9/8/05)
2005 Sep 8, Indonesian militant
Abdul Fatah, alias Heri Segu, received a seven-year prison sentence for
his role in plotting last year's suicide bombing at the Australian
Embassy, blamed on a regional terror group linked to al-Qaida.
(AP, 9/8/05)
2005 Sep 8, In Iraq US jets
dropped 500-pound J-Dam bombs on the insurgent-controlled neighborhood
of Sarai in Tal Afar, where most of the 200,000 population had fled.
Iraqi police reported finding 17 bullet-riddled bodies near Baghdad.
(SFC, 9/9/05, p.A3)
2005 Sep 8, A suicide car bomber
detonated his explosives-laden BMW in the center of Baghdad targeting a
passing convoy of private American security agents.
(AP, 9/8/05)
2005 Sep 8, The UN raised the
alarm about mounting violence in Iraq blamed on pro-government militias
and urged the authorities to look into reports of systematic torture in
police stations.
(Reuters, 9/8/05)
2005 Sep 8, Wyeth Co. officially
opened a $2 billion Irish production facility, a move that will make
the US company the biggest pharmaceutical employer in Ireland.
(AP, 9/8/05)
2005 Sep 8, A Mexican army convoy
began crossing into the US to bring aid to victims of Hurricane Katrina.
(AP, 9/8/05)
2005 Sep 8, A UN agency said a
plague of rats caused by snake hunting is threatening thousands of
Miskito Indians with famine in a remote corner of Nicaragua's jungle,
while vampire bats are raising concerns about rabies. The rat
population has boomed in Miskito territories as people hunt more
snakes, the rats' natural predator, for food and for their skins.
(AP, 9/8/05)
2005 Sep 8, In Pakistan Mufti
Mohammed Sabir, a suspected Islamic militant, was arrested in Karachi
after a shootout. He was wanted in connection with making a car bomb
used in a suicide attack May 8, 2002, that killed 15 people, including
11 French engineers.
(AP, 9/8/05)
2005 Sep 8, The Saudi Interior
Ministry said security forces killed five of Saudi Arabia's most-wanted
al-Qaida militants in a three-day battle in an eastern city earlier
this week and arrested 11 other suspects.
(AP, 9/8/05)
2005 Sep 8, Sri Lanka's Tamil
Tiger guerrillas ambushed a police patrol in the island's restive
northeast, killing two constables and wounding six.
(AFP, 9/8/05)
2005 Sep 8, In northeastern Syria
security forces clashed with Islamic militants, killing one and
arresting three others in the country's latest move against a group
accused of planning bomb attacks.
(AP, 9/8/05)
2005 Sep 8, Ukraine President
Viktor Yushchenko dismissed his Cabinet amid swirling allegations of
corruption, saying members of the fragile coalition formed after last
year's Orange Revolution had turned on one another.
(AP, 9/8/05)
2005 Sep 8, In the Virgin Islands
Elena Lin Yee was arrested and charged with impersonating a US
government official and misuse of official documents. Yee used fake
credentials to pose as a US ambassador to Grenada, the wife of a former
US ambassador to the UN and a US ambassador-at-large.
(AP, 9/9/05)
2006 Sep 8, The Bush
administration said it has blocked access to the US financial system by
Iran’s Bank Saderat. The bank was alleged to have helped transfer
hundreds of millions of dollars to terrorist organizations including
Hezbollah and Hamas.
(WSJ, 9/9/06, p.A4)
2006 Sep 8, The United States
Naval Air Station Keflavik (NASKEF) closed at Iceland’s Keflavik Int’l.
Airport.
(Econ, 10/11/08,
p.70)(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Naval_Air_Station_Keflavik)
2006 Sep 8, A Senate report
faulted intelligence gathering in the lead-up to the 2003 US invasion
of Iraq, and said Saddam Hussein regarded al-Qaida as a threat rather
than a possible ally, contradicting assertions President Bush had used
to build support for the war.
(AP, 9/8/07)
2006 Sep 8, Walter C. Anderson
(52), US telecom mogul, pleaded guilty to evading over $200 million in
federal and local taxes in an offshore scheme from the sale of
Mid-Atlantic Telecom. His plea agreement only covered transactions from
1998-1999.
(WSJ, 9/9/06, p.A3)
2006 Sep 8, The Miami Herald
reported that 10 South Florida journalists, including three with the
Herald's Spanish-language sister paper, received thousands of dollars
from the federal government for their work on radio and TV programming
aimed at undermining Fidel Castro's communist regime. The Herald fired
3 of the journalists.
(AP, 9/9/06)
2006 Sep 8, SF Mayor Gavin Newsom
said 50 new security cameras will be installed in public housing
projects around San Francisco over the next 18 months.
(SFC, 9/9/06, p.B1)
2006 Sep 8, In Minneapolis ground
was broken for the new Masjid An-Nur mosque, the 1st mosque in
Minnesota.
(Econ, 9/23/06, p.32)
2006 Sep 8, The Day fire in
California’s Los Padres National Forest burned out of control for a 5th
day and blackened over 11,500 acres (18 square miles).
(SFC, 9/9/06, p.B2)
2006 Sep 8, In Florida Melinda
Duckett (21) shot herself to death one day after taping a TV interview
with Nancy Grace for CNN. Duckett had reported that her 2-year-old son
had been kidnapped on Aug 27.
(SFC, 9/14/06, p.A13)
2006 Sep 8, A suicide car bomber
struck a convoy of US military vehicles in downtown Kabul, killing at
least 16 people, including two American soldiers, and wounding 29
others. It was the Afghan capital's deadliest suicide attack since the
Taliban's 2001 ouster.
(AP, 9/8/06)
2006 Sep 8, Opponents of President
Evo Morales stayed home from work and blocked key streets in four
cities to protest the governing party's handling of an assembly that is
rewriting the Bolivian constitution.
(AP, 9/9/06)
2006 Sep 8, The Toronto
International Film Festival got off to a multi-cultural start night
with the premiere of "The Journals of Knud Rasmussen," a drama about
Canada's Inuit people being stripped of their traditions by
Christianity.
(Reuters, 9/8/06)
2006 Sep 8, In southern China
crowds angered by alleged police mishandling of a school teacher's
death attacked government offices in Rui'an City, sparking arrests and
beatings by riot troops. Students and local residents claimed police
falsified a report and colluded with the wealthy husband of high school
English teacher Dai Haijing, 30, to have her Aug 18 death classified as
a suicide.
(AP, 9/11/06)
2006 Sep 8, The UN's humanitarian
chief called for an end to the rapes plaguing women in war-battered
Congo and said the perpetrators, including those wearing military
uniforms, must be severely punished.
(AP, 9/8/06)
2006 Sep 8, In western India 2
bombs rigged to bicycles struck in the crowded streets of the city of
Malegaon, Maharashtra state, as Muslim worshippers were returning from
afternoon prayers At least 37 people were killed and 100 wounded. 8
suspects later arrested for allegedly planting the bombs were all
members of the Students' Islamic Movement of India, or SIMI.
(AP, 9/8/06)(AP, 11/27/06)(SFC, 11/28/08, p.A6)
2006 Sep 8, A roadside bomb in
Baghdad and a mortar attack on Shiite pilgrims south of the capital
killed five people. A roadside bomb also struck an Iraqi army convoy in
a village near Karmah, 50 miles west of Baghdad, killing four Iraqi
soldiers. An American soldier died after being wounded in a roadside
bomb explosion south of Baghdad. 3 mortar rounds landed on a procession
of pilgrims heading to Karbala for a ceremony, killing at least three
and wounding 22. A roadside bomb targeting a police patrol In Baghdad
killed two people and wounded six.
(AP, 9/8/06)
2006 Sep 8, Israel lifted its
nearly two-month naval blockade of Lebanon after European warships
began patrolling to keep out weapons shipments for Hezbollah guerrillas.
(AP, 9/8/06)
2006 Sep 8, In Mexico a small
plane crash near Ensenada on the US-Mexico border killed three American
medical volunteers.
(AP, 9/10/06)
2006 Sep 8, In Pakistan a bomb
killed at least five people in restive Baluchistan province. 21 other
people were wounded in the explosion near a bus station in the town of
Barkhan.
(AP, 9/8/06)
2006 Sep 8, Engineers covered in
head-to-toe protective gear inserted a neutralizing solution into bombs
filled with a nerve agent, officially starting the work of Russia's
first plant for destroying the deadly chemicals.
(AP, 9/9/06)
2006 Sep 8, It was reported that
Saudi Arabia’s religious police have issued a decree in Jiddah and
Mecca banning the sale of the pets, seen as a sign of Western influence.
(AP, 9/8/06)
2006 Sep 8, In South Africa Hilda
Bernstein (b.1915), a London-born anti-apartheid activist and author,
died. Her husband was tried for treason alongside Nelson Mandela in
1964. Rusty Bernstein (d.2002) was the only defendant acquitted and
freed. Police harassment made life afterward so difficult for the
Bernsteins that the couple was forced into exile, leaving their
children behind. They crossed the border to Botswana on foot, a journey
described in Hilda Bernstein's book "The World That Was Ours."
(AP, 9/11/06)
2006 Sep 8, Sudan's President Omar
al-Bashir agreed to release American journalist Paul Salopek and his
Chadian assistants after meeting with New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson.
(AP, 9/9/06)
2006 Sep 8, The UN General
Assembly adopted a long-awaited strategy to combat terrorism, though
many nations lamented that it does not include a definition or say
anything about states that commit terrorist acts.
(AP, 9/8/06)
2007 Sep 8, In SF “The Singularity
Summit: AI and the Future of Humanity” opened at the Palace of Fine
Arts. The singularity term was used to describe the day when machines
become smart enough to reprogram themselves. Peter Thiel, founder of
PayPal, was the principal backer.
(SFC, 9/7/07, p.A16)
2007 Sep 8, In Nevada Darrin Tuck
(26) handed in a videotape to Nevada authorities. The graphic video
depicted a 2003 sexual assault on a 2-year-old girl. Chester Arthur
Stiles was tracked down following a nationwide manhunt. In 2009 Stiles
was sentenced to 21 terms of life in prison.
(SFC, 5/30/09,
p.A4)(www.amw.com/fugitives/case.cfm?id=49286)
2007 Sep 8, In Odessa, Texas, 2
police officers responding to a domestic disturbance were killed and a
third was critically wounded by a gunman who led authorities on an
hours-long standoff. Gunman Larry White (58) was shot in the abdomen
but was in stable condition.
(AP, 9/9/07)
2007 Sep 8, Deputies in Big Creek,
West Virginia, found Megan Williams (20), who was sexually abused,
beaten and stabbed while held captive for at least a week. She was
repeatedly called a racial slur during the attacks in Big Creek, about
35 miles southwest of Charleston. Six people, all white, including a
mother and son and a mother and daughter, were arrested in connection
with the alleged abduction of the black woman.
(AP, 9/11/07)(SFC, 9/12/07, p.A9)
2007 Sep 8, In Washington state 5
members of the Makah tribe killed a California gray whale with harpoons
and a rifle without tribal approval. In October a federal grand jury
charged the 5 Makah men with misdemeanor counts.
(SFC, 9/10/07, p.A4)(SFC, 10/5/07, p.A4)
2007 Sep 8, The Afghan defense
ministry said at least 50 Taliban rebels have been killed in two days
of operations by Afghan and US-led troops across southern Afghanistan.
In southern Afghanistan 2 British soldiers were killed in a Taliban
attack and a number of other troops were wounded.
(AP, 9/8/07)
2007 Sep 8, A booby-trapped car
exploded at a barracks housing coast guard officials, killing 30
officers in Algeria's second terror attack this week. Al-Qaida in
Islamic North Africa claimed responsibility. The suicide bomber was
reported to be a 15-year-old student.
(AP, 9/8/07)(AP, 9/9/07)(AP, 9/10/07)
2007 Sep 8, Asia Pacific leaders
overcame differences on climate change to agree to take action against
greenhouse gases at a key summit protected by the tightest security in
Australian history.
(AP, 9/8/07)
2007 Sep 8, In Austria Pope
Benedict XVI blasted Europeans for being selfish and not having enough
children, in a sermon at the 850-year-old pilgrimage site of Mariazell.
(AP, 9/8/07)
2007 Sep 8, Hundreds of colleges
reopened in Bangladesh, two weeks after the country's military-backed
government shut them down to quell nationwide student unrest.
(AP, 9/8/07)
2007 Sep 8, It was reported that
China has 126 airports, 57 of which can handle private planes. This was
compared to 500 airports in the US that can handle big commercial
airliners, and some 10,000 that handle smaller planes.
(Econ, 9/8/07, p.69)
2007 Sep 8, In Colombia the Red
Cross said it has recovered all 11 bodies presumed to be lawmakers who
were killed in a shootout while held hostage by leftist rebels.
(AP, 9/8/07)
2007 Sep 8, Congo and Uganda
signed an agreement to immediately move refugee camps 93 miles from
their shared border to improve security.
(AP, 9/13/07)
2007 Sep 8, A small Sunni Arab
bloc ended its parliamentary boycott, returning to the legislature as
it considers key benchmark legislation demanded by Washington amid
increasing pressure to end the political deadlock. A suicide bomber
drove through a checkpoint and blew up his car in Baghdad's Shiite
district of Sadr City, killing at least 15 people in an attack
apparently aimed at a nearby market. A bomb went off midday at a
crowded market in the Shiite city of Kufa, 100 miles south of Baghdad,
killing four and injuring five. Gunmen in Najaf killed Mohammed
al-Qarawi, director of tribal affairs in anti-American cleric Muqtada
al-Sadr's office. A mortar shell hit a house in the predominantly
Shiite neighborhood of Baladiyat in eastern Baghdad, killing two people
and wounding three.
(AP, 9/8/07)
2007 Sep 8, Taiwan-born Ang Lee's
erotic spy thriller "Lust, Caution" won the Venice Film Festival's top
award, two years after he captured the same prize here with "Brokeback
Mountain."
(AP, 9/9/07)
2007 Sep 8, A late night riot
broke out in Malaysia’s northeastern state of Terengganu after a group
of opposition parties, including the main Islamist party, held an
illegal rally. Malaysian police fired live rounds to quell the riot
wounding two men.
(Reuters, 9/9/07)
2007 Sep 8, The Rev. Ian Paisley
said he is stepping down as leader of the hard-line Protestant church
he founded 56 years ago, a decision his opponents say was inevitable
after he angered many by cooperating with Sinn Fein to form a Northern
Ireland government.
(AP, 9/9/07)
2007 Sep 8, In the Netherlands
Carlos Hartmann (41), of Tecumseh, Mich., killed Thijs Geers (22), a
Dutch student, on a train platform in the southern city of Roosendaal.
Hartmann hoped to punish the Netherlands for its government's support
of the war in Iraq and confessed to axing the student to death after
failing to find a soldier to kill.
(AP, 9/11/07)
2007 Sep 8, Saudi Arabia and an
influential Lebanese politician joined calls by Pakistan for former
prime minister Nawaz Sharif to scrap plans to return to the country
next week.
(AP, 9/8/07)
2007 Sep 8, Voting began in Sierra
Leone's presidential runoff, a ballot to choose the West African
nation's first new leader since UN peacekeepers withdrew two years ago.
(AP, 9/8/07)
2007 Sep 8, In Sri Lanka military
officials said at least 21 people were killed in fresh violence in the
embattled northern and eastern regions over the last 24 hours.
(AFP, 9/8/07)
2008 Sep 8, The US stock of Lehman
Brothers, led by Dick Fuld, began to get pummeled. By Sep 10 shares
were down by almost half their value.
(Econ, 9/13/08, p.77)
2008 Sep 8, In Berkeley, Ca.,
university officials cut off the food and water supply to 4 protesters
who continued a 21-month-old protest in a lone redwood.
(SFC, 9/9/08, p.B1)
2008 Sep 8, In Oakland, Ca.,
authorities said 3 school district custodians had been arrested for
stealing electronic equipment from the district.
(SFC, 9/9/08, p.B3)
2008 Sep 8, A roadside blast in
southern Afghanistan killed six civilians.
(AP, 9/8/08)
2008 Sep 8, Australian Trade
Minister Simon Crean said Australia will not sell uranium to India
unless it signs a key non-proliferation pact, despite a decision by
nuclear supplier nations to end a ban on trading with New Delhi.
(AFP, 9/8/08)
2008 Sep 8, In London 3 of 8
British Muslims with ties to Pakistan were found guilty of conspiracy
to murder in a terrorist bombing campaign, but jurors failed to reach a
verdict on whether they plotted to blow up multiple trans-Atlantic
airliners with liquid explosives disguised as soft drinks. Abdullah
Ahmed Ali, Assad Sarwar and Tanvir Hussain were convicted of trying to
make a bomb out of hydrogen peroxide, .
(AP, 9/8/08)(SFC, 9/9/08, p.A8)(Econ, 9/13/08, p.63)
2008 Sep 8, In northern China a
landslide triggered by heavy rain killed at least 277 people, with 10
missing and presumed dead in Shanxi province's Xiangfen county. In 2009
a Chinese court jailed 12 officials for the collapse of an illegal
mining dump that triggered the landslide.
(AP, 9/8/08)(AP, 9/18/08)(AP, 6/28/09)
2008 Sep 8, Deadly Hurricane Ike
roared across Cuba, blowing buildings to rubble and sending waves
surging over homes. Some 900,000 Cubans evacuated from its path, which
forecasters said could take it to Louisiana or Texas later this week.
(AP, 9/8/08)
2008 Sep 8, French President
Nicolas Sarkozy pressed Moscow to honor its pledge to withdraw troops
from Georgia, while Russian soldiers prevented international aid
convoys from visiting Georgian villages in a tense zone around the
breakaway province of South Ossetia. Pres. Medvedev and Sarkozy revised
the EU-brokered deal to end the fighting between Russia and Georgia.
Medvedev said 200 EU monitors would deploy to regions surrounding South
Ossetia and Abkhazia by next month. After that, Russian troops would
pull out of those regions by Oct. 11 to a line that preceded last
month's fighting.
(AP, 9/8/08)(AP, 9/9/08)
2008 Sep 8, Legal sources said the
Church of Scientology is to be tried for fraud, and seven of its
members for illegally prescribing drugs, in the latest clash between
French officials and the controversial religion.
(AP, 9/8/08)
2008 Sep 8, In Lebanon rival
groups signed an agreement to end sectarian violence that has killed
and wounded scores in the past three months in the northern city of
Tripoli.
(AP, 9/9/08)
2008 Sep 8, Miners in the southern
African kingdom of Lesotho found one of the world's largest diamonds, a
near-flawless white gem weighing nearly 500 carats.
(Reuters, 9/21/08)
2008 Sep 8, Nepal's Maoist-led
government vowed to end slave-like conditions for around 150,000 bonded
laborers in the far west of the country who have been paying off debt
for generations. Nepal officially abolished all forms of slavery in
2001, but the Haliya system, which traps people in a cycle of debt,
lived on in remote areas.
(AFP, 9/8/08)
2008 Sep 8, In Pakistan missiles
fired from 2 US drone aircraft hit a seminary and houses associated
with a Taliban commander in North Waziristan, killing at least 21
people, including both militants, women and children. Neither
Jalaluddin Haqqani nor his son, Sirajuddin, were present, but four
mid-level Al-Qaeda operatives were among the dead.
(AP, 9/8/08)(SFC, 9/9/08, p.A9)(WSJ, 9/9/08,
p.A16)(AFP, 9/10/08)
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