September 8

September 8 is the 251st day of the year (252nd in leap years). There are 114 days remaining.

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Events

• 1331 – Stefan Dusan declares himself king of Serbia
• 1380 – Battle of Kulikovo – Russian forces under Grand Prince Dmitrii Ivanovich defeat a mixed army of Tatars and Mongols, stopping their advance.
• 1449 – Battle of Tumu Fortress – Mongolians capture the Chinese emperor.
• 1514 – Battle of Orsha – In one of the biggest battles of the century Belarusians and Poles defeat Russian army.
• 1522 – Captain Sebastian del Cano sails into port in Spain, completing the round-the-world voyage begun by Ferdinand Magellan. With him is tourist Antonio Pigafetta, whose journals provide most of what is known about the voyage.
• 1565 – The Knights of Malta lift the Turkish siege of Malta (siege started on May 18).
• 1636 – A vote of the Great and General Court of the Massachusetts Bay Colony establishes New College as the first college founded in the Americas.
• 1771 – In California, Fathers Pedro Cambon and Angel Somera founds Mission San Gabriel Arcangel in what is now San Gabriel, California.
• 1796 – Napoleonic Wars: Battle of Bassano – French forces defeat Austrian troops at Bassano.
• 1810 – The Tonquin sets sail from New York Harbor with 33 employees of John Jacob Astor's newly created Pacific Fur Company on board. After a six month journey around the tip of South America, the ship will arrive at the mouth of the Columbia River and Astor's men will establish fur-trading town of Astoria.
• 1863 – American Civil War: Second Battle of Sabine Pass – On the Texas-Louisiana border at the mouth of the Sabine River, a small Confederate force thwarts a Union invasion of Texas.
• 1888 – In London, the body of Jack the Ripper's second murder victim, Annie Chapman is found.
• 1888 – In England the first 6 Football League matches ever were played.
• 1900 – Galveston Hurricane of 1900: a powerful hurricane hits Galveston, Texas killing about 8,000 people.
• 1923 – Honda Point Disaster: Seven US Navy destroyers ran aground off the California coast.
• 1930 – 3M begins marketing Scotch transparent tape.
• 1934 – Off the New Jersey coast, a fire aboard the passenger liner SS_Morro_Castle kills 135 people.
• 1935 – US Senator from Louisiana, Huey Long, nicknamed "Kingfish", is fatally shot in the Louisiana capitol building.
• 1941 – World War II: Siege of Leningrad begins – German forces begin a siege against the Soviet Union's second-largest city, Leningrad. Stalin orders the Volga Deutsche deported to Siberia.
• 1943 – World War II: United States General Dwight D. Eisenhower publicly announces the surrender of Italy to the Allies.
• 1943  – World War II: Julius Fucik is executed by the Nazis.
• 1944 – World War II: London is hit by a V2 rocket for the first time.
• 1944 – World War II: Menton is liberated from Germany.
• 1945 – Cold War: United States troops arrive to partition the southern part of Korea in response to Soviet troops occupying the northern part of the peninsula a month earlier.
• 1951 – Treaty of San Francisco: In San Francisco, California, 48 nations sign Sign a peace treaty with Japan in formal recognition of the end of the Pacific War.
• 1954 – The Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) is established.
• 1960 – In Huntsville, Alabama, US President Dwight D. Eisenhower formally dedicates the Marshall Space Flight Center (NASA had already activated the facility on July 1).
• 1966 – The first episode of the science fiction television series Star Trek airs.
• 1971 – In Washington, DC, the John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts is inaugurated, with the opening feature being the premiere of Leonard Bernstein's Mass.
• 1974 – Watergate Scandal: US President Gerald Ford pardons former President Richard Nixon for any crimes Nixon may have committed while in office.
• 1986 – General Augusto Pinochet, President of Chile, escapes attempted assassination.
• 1991 – Republic of Macedonia becomes independent.
• 1994 – A Boeing 737 operating USAir Flight 427 carrying 132 people on board, crashes on approach to Pittsburgh International Airport. There are no survivors.
• 1995 – Timon and Pumbaa launches on all major television networks
• 1998 – At Busch Stadium in St. Louis, Missouri, Mark McGwire breaks Roger Maris' 1961 record of 61 home runs hit in a single season.
• 1999 – US Attorney General Janet Reno names former US Senator John Danforth to head an independent investigation of the 1993 fire at the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas.
• 1999 – Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, the third book in J.K. Rowling's hugely popular Harry Potter series, is published.
• 2004 – The NASA unmanned spacecraft Genesis crash-lands when its parachute fails to open.

Births

• 551 BC – Confucius, Chinese philosopher (d.479 BC)
• 828 – Ali al-Hadi, Shia Imam (d. 868)
• 1157 – King Richard I of England (d. 1199)
• 1207 – King Sancho II of Portugal
• 1474 – Ludovico Ariosto, Italian poet (d. 1533)
• 1588 – Marin Mersenne, mathematician (d. 1648)
• 1621 – Louis II de Bourbon, Prince de Condé, French general (d. 1686)
• 1778 – Clemens Brentano, German poet (d. 1842)
• 1804 – Eduard Mörike, German poet (d. 1875)
• 1841 – Antonin Dvorak, Czech composer (d. 1904)
• 1873 – David O. McKay, president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (d. 1970)
• 1881 – Harry Hillman, American athlete
• 1886 – Siegfried Sassoon, poet (d. 1967)
• 1889 – Robert Alphonso Taft, U.S. Senator from Ohio (d. 1953)
• 1897 – Jimmie Rodgers, American country music singer and composer (d. 1933)
• 1910 – Jean-Louis Barrault, actor, director (d. 1994)
• 1914 – Sir Denys Lasdun, architect (d. 2001)
• 1922 – Sid Caesar, comedian
• 1925 – Peter Sellers, actor (d. 1980)
• 1929 – Christoph von Dohnanyi, German conductor
• 1930 – Nguyen Cao Ky, Premier of South Vietnam
• 1932 – Patsy Cline, country music singer
• 1934 – Peter Maxwell Davies, composer
• 1938 – Sam Nunn, U.S. Senator from Georgia
• 1945 – Jose Feliciano, singer
• 1945  – Ron Pigpen McKernan, musician (the Grateful Dead)
• 1947 – Ann Beattie, writer
• 1960 – Aimee Mann, musician
• 1964 – Michael Johns, business executive and White House speechwriter
• 1970 – Neko Case, musician
• 1970  – Latrell Sprewell, basketball player
• 1970  – Yuji Nishizawa, Japanese hijacker
• 1971 – Brooke Burke, model
• 1972 – Lisa Kennedy, television personality
• 1979 – Pink, singer
• 1981 – Jonathan Taylor Thomas, actor

Deaths

• 701 – Pope Sergius I
• 780 – Leo IV, Byzantine Emperor
• 1613 – Carlo Gesualdo, Italian composer (b. 1566)
• 1637 – Robert Fludd, English mystic (b. 1574)
• 1780 – Enoch Poor, General in the American Continental Army (b. 1736)
• 1784 – Ann Lee, American religious leader
• 1811 – Peter Simon Pallas, German zoologist (b. 1741)
• 1933 – King Faysal I of Iraq
• 1943 – Julius Fucik, Czech communist and journalist (executed)
• 1949 – Richard Strauss, German composer (b. 1864)
• 1965 – Dorothy Dandridge, actress
• 1969 – Bud Collyer, American television game show host
• 1969  – Alexandra David-Néel, French explorer and writer
• 1977 – Zero Mostel, actor
• 1979 – Jean Seberg, actress
• 1981 – Bill Shankly, football manager
• 1981 – Roy Wilkins, American civil rights activist
• 1981  – Hideki Yukawa, physicist
• 2003 – Jaclyn Linetsky, Canadian voice actress
• 2003 – Leni Riefenstahl, film maker
• 2004 – Frank Thomas, American animator (b. 1913)

Holidays

• Mare de Deu de Meritxell – National day of Andorra
• Bahá'í Faith – Feast of 'Izzat (Might) – First day of the tenth month of the Bahá'í Calendar
• Catholicism – Feast of the Birth of Mary

External links

• BBC: On This Day

September 7 – September 9 – August 8 – October 8 – more historical anniversaries