TODAY’S HISTORY LESSON: SEPT 23
1553 The Sadians defeat the last of their enemies and establish themselves as rulers of Morocco.
1667 Slaves in Virginia are banned from obtaining their freedom by converting to Christianity.
1779 The American navy under John Paul Jones, commanding from Bonhomme Richard, defeats and captures the British man-of-war Serapis.
1780 John Andre, a British spy, was captured with papers revealing that Benedict Arnold was going to surrender West Point, NY, to the British.
1805 Lieutenant Zebulon Pike pays $2,000 to buy from the Sioux a 9-square-mile tract at the mouth of the Minnesota River that will be used to establish a military post, Fort Snelling.
1806 The Lewis and Clark Expedition arrives back in St. Louis just over three years after its departure.
1821 Fall of Tripolitsa, Greek forces massacre 30,000 Turks during Greek War of Independence
1846 German astronomer Johann Gottfried Galle discovered the planet Neptune.
1884 American Herman Hollerith patents his mechanical tabulating machine, the beginning of data processing
1912 Mack Sennett’s first “Keystone Cop” film debuts, Cohen Collects a Debt.
1932 Kingdom of Hejaz & Nejd renamed Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
1938 Time capsule, to be opened in 6939, buried at World’s Fair in NYC (capsule contained a woman’s hat, man’s pipe & 1,100′ of microfilm)
1952 Richard Nixon responds to charges of a secret slush fund during his ‘Checkers Speech.’
1954 East German police arrest 400 citizens as U.S. spies.
1957 President Dwight D. Eisenhower orders US troops to support integration of nine black students at Little Rock Central High School in Arkansas
1962 ABC’s 1st color TV series-The Jetsons
1965 The Indo-Pakistani War comes to an end after a UN-mandated ceasefire
1973 Juan Peron is re-elected president of Argentina after being overthrown in 1955.
1981 The Reagan administration announced its plans for what became known as Radio Marti.
1986 Japanese newspapers quoted Prime Minister Yasuhiro Nakasone as saying that minorities lowered the “intelligence level” of America.
1992 Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) detonates 3,700-lb. bomb in Belfast, completely destroying the Northern Ireland forensic laboratory, injuring 20 people and damaging 700 houses.
1999 A 17-month-old girl fell 230 feet from the Capilano Suspension Bridge in North Vancouver, British Columbia. The girl had bruises but no broken limbs from the fall onto a rocky ledge.
2011 Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas officially requests a bid for statehood at the UN Security Council.
REFERENCE: HISTORY.NET, ONTHISDAY.COM, TIMEANDDATE.COM, INFOPLEASE.COM, FACTMONSTER.COM, SCOPESYS.COM, ON-THIS-DAY.COM, THEPEOPLEHISTORY.COM
