TODAY IN HISTORY: World unites on ozone layer

In 70 AD, following a six-month siege, Jerusalem surrendered to the 60,000 troops of Titus’ Roman army. Over one million Jewish citizens perished in the siege and, following the city’s capture, another 97,000 were sold into slavery.

In 1565, a Spanish expedition established the first permanent European settlement in North America at St. Augustine, Fla.

In 1619, the first Lutheran service in Canada was held by the Jens Munk expedition to Hudson Bay.

In 1636, Harvard University was founded as a college at Cambridge, Mass. Funded by a grant from the Massachusetts Bay Colony and named for a benefactor, John Harvard, the school was initially intended as a training ground for Puritan ministers.

In 1664, the Dutch surrendered New Amsterdam to the British, who renamed it New York, after the Duke of York.

In 1720, a plague hit Marseilles, France, killing more than 175,000 people.

In 1760, New France passed from French to British control. A force of 20,000 British soldiers surrounded Montreal the day before. Governor Pierre de Rigaud de Vaudreuil surrendered after being assured the laws, property and religion of French-Canadians would be protected. Montreal fell almost a year to the day after British troops captured Quebec City.

In 1860, about 400 people died when the steamship “Lady Elgin” collided with the schooner “Augusta” on Lake Michigan.

In 1900, a hurricane with winds up to 190 km/h killed about 8,000 people in Galveston, Texas. Most of the people were drowned when a tidal wave swept in from the Gulf of Mexico.

In 1910, the first Canadian aircraft engine was tested when William Gibson of Victoria made a short test flight in an aircraft powered with an engine of his own design.

In 1930, the comic strip “Blondie,” created by Chic Young, was first published.

In 1930, 3M sent out the first trial shipment of “Scotch” cellulose tape.

In 1941, the 900-day Siege of Leningrad by German forces began during the Second World War.

In 1943, Italy surrendered during the Second World War.

In 1951, in San Francisco, representatives of 49 countries signed a treaty making Japan a sovereign country again.

In 1952, Ernest Hemingway’s novel “The Old Man and the Sea” was first published.

In 1952, The Boyd Gang, charged with murder and armed robbery, escaped from Toronto’s Don Jail and sparked one of Canada’s biggest manhunts.

In 1968, the first of 10,000 Czech refugees arrived in Ontario. They were fleeing their homeland after the Soviet Union and other Warsaw Pact countries invaded on Aug. 20.

In 1974, U.S. President Gerald Ford granted an unconditional pardon to former president Richard Nixon for any federal crimes committed during the Nixon presidency. Nixon was forced to resign in August 1974 after his involvement in covering up the Watergate scandal became known.

In 1982, Quebec Chief Justice Jules Deschenes ruled that provincial language law sections restricting access to English schools by Anglophone Canadians were unconstitutional.

In 1987, Canadian scientists confirmed that a large hole in the ozone layer had formed above the Arctic in the previous year. On Sept. 15, diplomats from around the world reached an agreement in Montreal on a pact to protect the ozone layer. The treaty called for industrialized countries to reduce their use of chloro-fluorocarbons (CFCs) by 50 per cent over a 10-year period.

In 1996, CP Rail completed a nine-month move of its headquarters from Montreal to Calgary, celebrating with a street party in the Alberta city. The move saw 900 employees relocate while more than 1,400 jobs were cut.