Today in history

Today is Tuesday, Aug. 30, the 243rd day of 2016. There are 123 days left in the year.

Highlight in history

On Aug. 30, 1861, Union Gen. John C. Fremont instituted martial law in Missouri and declared slaves there to be free. (However, Fremont’s emancipation order was countermanded by President Abraham Lincoln).

On this date

In 1862, Confederate forces won victories against the Union at the Second Battle of Bull Run in Manassas, Virginia, and the Battle of Richmond in Kentucky.

In 1905, Ty Cobb made his major-league debut as a player for the Detroit Tigers, hitting a double in his first at-bat in a game against the New York Highlanders. (The Tigers won, 5-3.)

In 1935, the film “Anna Karenina,” MGM’s version of the Tolstoy novel starring Greta Garbo, opened in New York.

In 1945, U.S. Gen. Douglas MacArthur arrived in Japan to set up Allied occupation headquarters.

In 1954, President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed the Atomic Energy Act of 1954, which was intended to promote private development of nuclear energy.

In 1963, the “Hot Line” communications link between Washington and Moscow went into operation.

In 1967, the Senate confirmed the appointment of Thurgood Marshall as the first black justice on the U.S. Supreme Court.

In 1983, Guion S. Bluford Jr. became the first black American astronaut to travel in space as he blasted off aboard the Challenger.

In 1984, the space shuttle Discovery was launched on its inaugural flight.

In 1986, Soviet authorities arrested Nicholas Daniloff, a correspondent for U.S. News and World Report, as a spy a week after American officials arrested Gennadiy Zakharov, a Soviet employee of the United Nations, on espionage charges in New York. (Both men were later released.)

In 1989, a federal jury in New York found “hotel queen” Leona Helmsley guilty of income tax evasion, but acquitted her of extortion. (Helmsley ended up serving 18 months behind bars, a month at a halfway house and two months under house arrest.)

In 1991, Azerbaijan (ahzur-by-JAHN’) declared its independence, joining the stampede of republics seeking to secede from the Soviet Union.

Ten years ago: Hurricane John lashed tourist resorts with heavy winds and rain as the dangerous Category 4 storm marched up Mexico’s Pacific coast. Actor Glenn Ford died in Beverly Hills, California, at age 90. Naguib Mahfouz (nuhGEEB’ mah-FOOS’), the first Arab writer to win the Nobel Prize in literature, died in Cairo, Egypt, at age 94.

Five years ago: National Guard helicopters rushed food and water to a dozen cut-off Vermont towns after the rainy remnants of Hurricane Irene washed out roads and bridges in a deluge that had taken many people in the landlocked New England state by surprise. Libyan rebels said they were closing in on Moammar Gadhafi and issued an ultimatum to loyalists in his hometown of Sirte (surt), his main remaining bastion: Surrender, or face attack.

Thought for Today: “If you board the wrong train, it is no use running along the corridor in the other direction.” — Dietrich Bonhoeffer, German theologian (1906-1945).