Today in History

1382 – Louis the Great’s daughter, Mary, is crowned ‘‘king’’ of Hungary.

1787 – The United States Constitution is signed by a majority of delegates attending the constitutional convention in Philadelphia.

1862 – The Civil War battle of Antietam Creek, in Maryland, leaves 22,000 dead, wounded or missing. It remains the bloodiest single day in American military history.

1900 – The Commonwealth of Australia is proclaimed.

1908 – The Wright Flyer, flown by Orville Wright, with Lieutenant Thomas Selfridge as passenger, crashes, killing Selfridge, who becomes the first plane fatality.

1925 – Frida Kahlo, left, suffers near-fatal injuries in a bus accident in Mexico. She then abandons plans to study medicine and pursues art.

1939 – The Soviet Union invades Poland, two weeks after Nazi Germany launched its assault.

1941 – Punishment by flogging and whipping is abolished in New Zealand. The death penalty is also abolished but is reinstated nine years later.

1954 – The novel Lord of the Flies, by William Golding, is published.

1980 – Polish workers under the leadership of Lech Walesa found the Solidarity movement at the Gdansk shipyard.

1991 – The first version of the Linux kernel is released to the internet.

2009 – The Geographic Board rules Whanganui should be spelled with an ‘‘h’’. Birthdays Hank Williams, US musician

(1923-53); Stirling Moss, UK racing driver (1929-); Anne Bancroft, US actress (1931-2005); Ken Kesey, US author (1935-2001); Reinhold Messner, Italian mountaineer

(1944-); Narendra Modi, Indian PM

(1950-); Damon Hill, UK racing driver (1960-); Baz Luhrmann, Australian film-maker (1962-); Greg King, NZ lawyer (1969-2012); Neill Blomkamp, South African filmmaker (1979-); Ravichandran Ashwin, Indian cricketer (1986-).