Sunday, September 18

This Day In History

• 1759   The French formally surrendered Quebec to the British.
  
• 1793   President George Washington laid the cornerstone of the U.S. Capitol.
  
• 1810   Chile declared its independence from Spain.
  
• 1850   Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Act, which allowed slaveowners to reclaim slaves who had escaped to other states.
  
• 1851   "The New York Times" began publishing “All the News That’s Fit to Print.” I wonder when they stopped
  
• 1891   Harriet Maxwell Converse (her Indian name was Ga-is-wa-noh: the Watcher) became the first white woman to be named chief of an Indian tribe. Converse became chief of the Six Nations tribe at Tonawanda reservation in New York. She had been adopted by the Seneca tribe 7 years earlier because of her efforts on behalf of the tribe.
  
• 1927   The Columbia Phonograph Broadcasting System (later CBS) debuted with a network of 16 radio stations.
  
• 1940   ''You Can't Go Home Again'' by Thomas Wolfe was published by Harper and Bros.
  
• 1947   The U.S. Air Force, an independent military service, was established by the National Security Act. Originally, U.S. military aviation began as part of the U.S. Army in 1907.
  
• 1961   United Nations Secretary-General Dag Hammarskjold was killed in a plane crash in northern Rhodesia.
  
• 1970   Rock musician Jimi Hendrix died in London at age 27.
  
• 1975   Newspaper heiress Patricia Hearst was captured by the FBI in San Francisco, 19 months after being kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army.
  
• 1994   Tennis player Vitas Gerulaitis, 40, was found dead of accidental carbon monoxide poisoning.
  
• 1997   Coopers & Lybrand and Price Waterhouse agreed to merge to create the world's biggest accounting firm.
  
• 1997   Media mogul Ted Turner pledged $1 billion to the United Nations.
  
• 1998   The House Judiciary Committee voted to release a videotape of President Bill Clinton's Aug. 17 grand jury testimony.
  
• 1999   Sammy Sosa of the Chicago Cubs became the first player in major league baseball history to hit 60 home runs in a season twice.
  
• 2003   Hurricane Isabel plowed into North Carolina's Outer Banks with 100-mph winds and pushed its way up the Eastern Seaboard; the storm was later blamed for 40 deaths.
  

Happy Birthday To

• 1709   Samuel Johnson (writer: created the first true dictionary of the English language in 1755; poet; essayist; novelist: Rasselas: Prince of Abyssinia; died Dec 13, 1784)
  
• 1905   Greta (Lovisa) Garbo (Gustafsson) (actress)
  
• 1933   Robert Blake (Michael James Vijencio Gubitosi) (Emmy Award-winning actor: Baretta [1974-75]), Little Beaver & Red Ryder series)
  
• 1940   Frankie (Frances) Avalon (Avellone) (singer)