Today in history
Today is Saturday, September 23, the 266th day of 2017. There are 99 days left in the year. Highlights in history on this date:
1779 — United States admiral John Paul Jones captures the British warship HMS Serapis off Flamborough Head, England.
1817 — Spain signs a treaty with Britain to end the slave trade.
1846 — The planet Neptune is discovered by German astronomer Johann Gottfried Galle.
1876 — The first iron is produced from ironsand at New Plymouth.
1887 — Te Heuheu Tukino IV agrees to the mountaintops of Tongariro, Ngauruhoe and Ruapehu being used as part of New Zealand’s first national park.
1912 — Silent film director Mack Sennett’s first
Keystone Cops film, Cohen Collects a Debt ,is released.
1918 — New Zealand mounted troops help capture Es Salt and Amman in Jordan.
1932 — Hejaz and Nejd and other districts are merged to form the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
1940 — The George Cross, the highest British civilian award for acts of courage, is instituted.
1952 — Rocky Marciano becomes world heavyweight boxing champion when he knocks out Jersey Joe Walcott in 13 rounds in Philadelphia.
1954 — The premises of Eadie Bros Ltd, Stewart Bell Ltd and Modern Millinery Ltd in Cumberland St are all destroyed by fire.
1955 — At Kiwi, Nelson, Ruth Page leads a sitin on the railway line to prevent its demolition. The protest continues until the women are arrested the following week.
1967 — Commonly referred to as the
six o’clock swill, a referendum favours ending 6pm closing in hotels and bars that had been in force for 50 years, starting during World War 1 as a temporary measure. Voting was in favour of 10pm closing instead. The Central Otago town of St Bathans was one of three areas in New Zealand to record a 100% turnout and a 100% vote in favour of 10pm closing. A second referendum held in association rejected fouryear parliaments in favour of threeyear terms.
1969 — An extension to Auckland Harbour Bridge is officially opened by GovernorGeneral Sir
Arthur Porritt. It extends the bridge’s capacity from four lanes to eight.
1973 — Juan Peron and his wife, Isabel, are elected president and vicepresident of Argentina.
1976 — The CER Agreement, a limited freetrade agreement with Australia, is extended until the end of 1985, despite Australia selling almost three times as much to New Zealand as it buys; South Africa decides to allow multiracial teams to represent the country in international sport.
1978 — Egypt’s President Anwar Sadat returns home to a hero’s welcome after the Camp David summit that results in agreement on a framework for peace with Israel.
1982 — Amin Gemayel is sworn in as Lebanon’s president to replace his brother, Bashir, who was killed in a bomb explosion.
1993 — The South African Parliament votes to allow blacks a role in governing.
2001 — President George W. Bush returns the American flag to full staff at Camp David, symbolically ending a period of national mourning after the Twin Towers attacks. Thousands gather at New York’s Yankee Stadium to offer prayers for the victims of terrorism; New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani pledges ‘‘our skyline will rise again.’’
2003 — New Zealand radio and television personality Paul Holmes attracts widespread criticism when he refers to United Nations secretarygeneral Kofi Annan as a ‘‘very cheeky darkie’’.
2006 — A hightech train that floats on powerful magnetic fields smashes into a maintenance car on an elevated test track in Germany, killing 23 people, the first deaths on a maglev train.
2007 — Former president Alberto Fujimori returns to Peru to face charges of corruption and sanctioning deathsquad killings, seven years after he fled the country amid a scandal.
Today’s birthdays:
Augustus Caesar, first Roman emperor (63BCAD14); Baroness
Orczy, British novelist (18651947); Raymond Chandler, US writer (18881959); Ray Charles, US singer (19302004); Julio Iglesias, Spanish singer (1943); Bruce Springsteen, US rock singer (1949); Jason Alexander, US actor (1959); Ani DiFranco, US folk singer (1970).
Thought for today:
Each generation imagines itself to be more intelligent than the one that went before it, and wiser than the one that comes after it. — George Orwell (Eric Blair), British author (190350).