TODAY IN HISTORY
TODAY IS TUESDAY, SEPT. 5, the 248th day of 2017. There are 117 days left in the year.
TODAY’S HIGHLIGHTS IN HISTORY: On this date in 1997, breaking the royal reticence over the death of Princess Diana, Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II delivered a televised address in which she called her former daughter-in-law “a remarkable person.” Mother Teresa died in Calcutta, India, at age 87.
In 1836, Sam Houston was elected president of the Republic of Texas.
In 1882, a parade in New York celebrated the nation’s first Labor Day.
In 1914, the First Battle of the Marne, resulting in a French-British victory over Germany, began in World War I.
In 1939, four days after war had broken out in Europe, President Franklin D. Roosevelt issued a proclamation declaring U.S. neutrality in the conflict.
In 1945, Japanese-American Iva Toguri D’Aquino, suspected of being wartime broadcaster “Tokyo Rose,” was arrested in Yokohama. (She was later convicted of treason and served six years in prison; she was pardoned in 1977 by President Gerald R. Ford.)
In 1972, the Palestinian group Black September attacked Israeli Olympic athletes at the Munich Games; 11 Israelis, five guerrillas and a police officer were killed in the resulting siege.
In 1975, President Ford escaped an attempt on his life by Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme, a disciple of Charles Manson, in Sacramento, Calif.
In 1977, the U.S. launched the Voyager 1 spacecraft two weeks after launching its twin, Voyager 2.
In 1986, four hijackers who had seized a Pan Am jumbo jet on the ground in Karachi, Pakistan, opened fire when the lights inside the plane failed; a total of 20 people were killed before Pakistani commandos stormed the jetliner.
In 2005, President George W. Bush nominated John Roberts to succeed the late William Rehnquist as chief justice of the United States. An Indonesian jetliner crashed, killing 149 people, including 49 on the ground; 17 passengers survived.
TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS: Comedianactor Bob Newhart is 88. Actresssinger Carol Lawrence is 85. Actress Raquel Welch is 77. Movie director Werner Herzog is 75. Singer Al Stewart is 72. Actor-director Dennis Dugan and singer Loudon Wainwright III are 71. “Cathy” cartoonist Cathy Guisewite is 67. Actor Michael Keaton and country musician Jamie Oldaker (The Tractors) are 66. Actress Debbie Turner-Larson (Marta in “The Sound of Music”) is 61.