history at a glance
TODAY is Sunday August 9 the 221th day of the year. There are 144 day left in the year. Highlights in history on this date:
1942 – World War II: Battle of Savo Island – Allied naval forces protecting their amphibious forces during the initial
stages of the Battle of Guadalcanal are surprised and defeated by an Imperial Japanese Navy cruiser force. 1944 – The United States Forest Service and the Wartime Advertising Council release posters featuring Smokey Bear for
the first time. 1944 – Continuation War: The Vyborg–Petrozavodsk Offensive, the largest offensive launched by Soviet Union against Finland during the Second World War, ends to a strategic stalemate. Both Finnish and Soviet troops at the Finnish front dug to defensive positions, and the front remains stable until the end of the war. 1945 – World War II: Nagasaki is devastated when an atomic bomb, Fat Man, is dropped by the United States B-29 Bockscar. 35,000 people are killed outright, including 23,200-28,200 Japanese war workers, 2,000 Korean forced workers, and 150 Japanese soldiers. 1945 – The Red Army invades Japanese-occupied Manchuria. 1965 – Singapore is expelled from Malaysia and becomes the only country to date to gain independence unwillingly. 1969 – Followers led by Charles Manson murder pregnant actress Sharon Tate (wife of Roman Polanski), coffee heiress Abigail Folger, Polish actor Wojciech Frykowski, men’s hairstylist Jay Sebring and recent high-school graduate Steven Parent. 1971 – The Troubles: The British Army in Northern Ireland launches Operation Demetrius. Hundreds of people are arrested and interned, thousands are displaced, and twenty are killed in the violence that followed. 1974 – As a direct result of the Watergate scandal, Richard Nixon becomes the first President of the United States to
resign from office. His Vice President, Gerald Ford, becomes president. 1993 – The Liberal Democratic Party of Japan loses a 38-year hold on national leadership. 1999 – Russian President Boris Yeltsin fires his Prime Minister, Sergei Stepashin, and for the fourth time fires his entire
cabinet. 2006 – At least 21 suspected terrorists were arrested in the 2006 transatlantic aircraft plot that happened in the United
Kingdom. The arrests were made in London, Birmingham, and High Wycombe in an overnight operation. 2014 – Michael Brown, an unarmed 18-year-old African American male in Ferguson, Missouri, was shot and killed by a
Ferguson police officer, sparking protests and unrest in the city.