17 Sep History: This Date

<< Sep 16| HISTORY “4” “2”DAY |Sep 18 >>
Events, deaths, births, of 17 SEP
[For Sep 17 Julian go to Gregorian date: 1583~1699: Sep 27 — 1700s: Sep 28 — 1800s: Sep 29 — 1900~2099: Sep 30]

ALTERNATE SITES ALL FOR 030917 ANY DAY OF THE YEAR IN HISTORY ART “4” SEP 17

On a 17 September:
2002 On the New York Stock Exchange the stock of AmeriCredit Corp. (ACF) drops from its previous close of $13.62 to an intraday low of $8.40 and closes at $8.46. It had traded as high as 46.93 on 23 April 2002 and $63.63 ot 30 July 2001, but as low as $7.06 on 05 October 1998. [5~year price chart >]
2002 US District Court for the District of Columbia Judge Royce Lamberth holds in contempt of court Interior Secretary Gale Norton and Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs Neal A. McCaleb, for lies and failure to fix the mismanagement of the Individual Indian Mony trust. [Civil Action Number 96-1285 (RCL): Elouise Pepion Cobell et al., Plaintiffs, v. Gale A. Norton, Secretary of the Interior et al., Defendants: the 267-page Memorandum Opinion and the 5-page Order, both PDF]. The trust, which now handles funds for about 300'000 Amerindians, began in 1887 when Congress took 36 million hectares from Indian tribes and gave the land to White homesteaders. The Amerindians were left with allotments ranging from 16 hectares (40 acres) to 130 hectares (320 acres), with the Interior Department assigned to manage grazing, timber and oil and gas drilling on the land, and ensure that Amerindians received royalties. For more than a century, an untold amount of money was lost, stolen or never collected. Amerindians sued in 1996, claiming the mismanagement cost them between $10 billion and $40 billion. In 1999 Lamberth ordered the department to fix the system and piece together what the Indians are owed. — MORE
2002 At UN Headquarters in New York, representatives of “the Quartet” (the United Nations, the United States, the Russian Federation and the European Union) agree on a “Road Map” to a solution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. That does nothing to change the minds of Israelis and Palestinians who are bent on an endless cycle of bloody vengeance. This Road Map would be revised into a new version of 01 May 2003.

^ 2002 North Korea confesses abductions of Japanese.
Kim, right, greets Koizumi, left

During talks in Pyongyang with Japan's Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi, aimed at normalizing relations, North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il, desperate to get economic aid from Japan, confesses that North Korean secret services have abducted 11 Japanese in past years (number later increased to 13), supposedly so as to have them as Japanese language instructors and/or to assume their identities. Kim states that those responsible have been punished, and that such abductions will never happen again.
[photo: Kim, right, greets Koizumi, left >]
The abductees include:

Megumi Yokota, was 13 when she was kidnapped as she walked on a beach in Niigata Prefecture on the way home from school in 1977; reported to be now dead; to have married in North Korea, to have had a daughter who is now living in Pyongyang.

Yasushi Chimura and Fukie Hamamoto, who married in 1979 and are the parents of three children, have been found alive. On 07 July 1978, he was 23 and Fukie, a clothing shop employee, was 22. They were engaged. After dining at a seaside restaurant in Fukui Prefecture, they went to see the stars, strolling along a secluded Japanese beach in a nearby park, when they were grabbed from behind by four men, wrapped in bags and whisked away in North Korean boats.

also alive are a couple -- Kaoru Hasuike and Yukiko Okudo -- who were taken aboard a spy boat from a beach in Niigata Prefecture in 1978. They married in 1980.

alive: Hitomi Soga, who married US serviceman defector Charles Robert Jenkins; they have two daughters.

Keiko Arimoto, kidnapped in Europe in 1983, is now dead. Earlier in 2002, Megumi Yao, the former wife of one of the Red Army fugitives wanted over the hijacking of a Japan Airlines jet in 1970, testified to having played a key role in Arimoto's abduction, together with a North Korean agent. Arimoto married Ishioka [next] on 27 December 1985.

dead: Toru Ishioka and Kaoru Matsuki, Japanese students staying in Spain, “induced” about 1980 by North Korean agents to go to North Korea.

dead also: Shuiichi Ichikawa and Rumiko Masumoto, who were abducted from a beach in the city of Miyazaki (Kagoshima Prefecture) on 29 June 1978.

dead: Yaeko Taguchi, who is known by her Korean name Lee Un Hye, who was kidnapped in 1978. Her case came to light when Kim Hyung Hee, a terrorist responsible for the bombing of a Korean Airlines plane in 1987, testified that she was taught Japanese by a Japanese woman called Lee Un Hye who was abducted from Japan. Japanese police believe this woman was Taguchi.

dead: Tadaaki Hara, who was abducted by North Korean agent Shin Kwang Su in 1980. Shin re-entered Japan posing as Hara, but was arrested in 1985 by South Korean authorities for using a forged passport and was convicted of abducting Hara.

fate unknown: Yutaka Kume, who was taken by a North Korean permanent resident of Japan to a coastline in Ishikawa Prefecture in 1977, where he was handed over to North Korean agents aboard a spy ship. North Korea states that it has not confirmed whether Kume ever entered the country.
5 abductees arrive in Tokyo

On 03 October 2002 a Japanese commission would release a North Korean Foreign Ministry account of the 8 dead abductees, which the public, and above all their relatives, find hard to believe: premature death of 8 of the 13 abductees due to accidents or disease, disappearance of the graves of 5 of the 8 due to floods [rather than evidence of torture having been removed by cremation, for example], 5 of the 13 not being abductees but having gone willingly though perhaps later retained against their will.

On 15 October 2002 the five survivors [< arrival at Tokyo's airport; front left is Kyoko Nakayama, a special adviser at the Cabinet Secretariat], Fukie Hamamoto, 47 [photo at Tokyo airport >], Yasushi Chimura, 47 [at Fukie's left on bottom step in group photo], Yukiko Okudo, 46 [behind Kyoko],Kaoru Hasuike, 45 [at Yukiko's left], and Hitomi Soga, 43 [behind Yukiko], would fly to Japan for a visit limited to no more than two weeks by the North Korean government, which holds their children hostage. They cannot speak freely, for fear of reprisals.

2001 (Monday) At 07:30 EDT, before the 09:30 reopening of the New York stock markets (closed since the terrorist attacks of 11 September), the Federal Reserve Board, having just conferred for 25 minutes by telephone, lowers the Federal funds rate from 3.5% to 3%. The European Central Bank also has cut interest rates by 0.5%. Nevertheless, at 16:00, the stock market closes sharply lower, as expected (DJI down 685, NASDAQ down 116). Airline and travel-related stocks are particularly hard hit, some down nearly 50%.
2001 The European Central Bank cuts its main interest rate, the refinancing rate, from 4.25% to 3.75%.

2000 Mexicans beaten to within an inch of their lives.
Christopher Slavin, 28, and Robert Wagner, 18, lure undocumented Mexican day laborers Israel Perez and Magdaleno Estrada Escamilla to an abandoned Long Island warehouse with the promise of work. There they take the Mexicans to a basement where, attacking them with a shovel, a post-hole digger, and a knife, they nearly kill them..
On 16 August 2001, Slavin is found guilty of two counts of attempted murder and two counts of assault. Wagner is to be tried later on the same charges later.

1997 Jobs' job reinstated
      Apple cofounder Steven Jobs is named interim CEO of Apple Computers, returning to power after being deposed from power in 1985. The company had gone through several CEOs, most recently Gilbert Amelio, who was ousted in July after less than two years on the job.
      Jobs, Apple's controversial cofounder, started out selling his friend Stephen Wozniak's Apple computers door-to-door at electronic hobbyist shops. By 1979, Apple Computers had become the fastest growing company in history, worth more than $1 billion. In 1979, Jobs led a team of several Apple developers, working on a new project called Lisa, on a visit to Xerox Palo Alto Research Center. There, the team saw the Alto, an early computer with a graphical user interface, a mouse, and built-in networking capacity. Both the Lisa and the Macintosh adopted key elements of the Alto.
     Jobs, whose impulsive personal style irritated some of Apple's key managers, was forced to leave Apple in 1985. He formed NeXT Inc., became president of Pixar animation studies, and returned to Apple as an adviser in December 1996, when NeXT was purchased by Apple.

1996 Landmark Ford — UAW contract
Executives for the Ford Motor Company and the United Auto Workers (UAW) sign a three-year contract that promised to retain 95 percent of Ford's hourly wage jobs for union workers, regardless of retirements or departures. UAW made some concessions to management, including a "two-tier" wage scale for parts and assembly-line workers, but the resulting contract, which also increased workers' pension pay, was a victory for the union, especially in an era when competition-conscious corporations were either cutting jobs or shipping them overseas. The deal was so friendly to labor that it elicited quiet grumbles from Ford's fellow Big Three automakers. The Ford-UAW agreement hindered the rest of the industry's ability to push through planned job cuts. General Motors, for one, was gearing up to shrink its work force by 50'000 to 70'000 jobs. Not surprisingly, trouble came a few years later, as union workers at the GM plant in Flint, Michigan, hit the picket line to protest the company's plans to downsize.

1996 Video game-maker Sega of America said it will produce a device, NetLink, that will allow users to browse the Web and send and receive e-mail using a Sega machine and a television set.
1995 Primeras elecciones municipales democráticas en la historia de Guinea Ecuatorial. Victoria de la Plataforma de Oposición Conjunta (POC)

1993 David Packard, 81, Hewlett-Packard founder, retires
David Packard, cofounder and chairman of the board of Hewlett-Packard, announces his retirement. Packard and his partner William Hewlett set up their electronics company in Packard's garage in 1939, just as Steve Wozniak and Steve Jobs would do in the 1970s. The new company, Hewlett-Packard, became the world's largest producer of electrical testing and measurement equipment. Later, the company became an important manufacturer of high-end calculators and then computers and printers.
President Richard Nixon appointed Packard deputy defense secretary in 1968. Packard resigned in 1971 and returned to Hewlett-Packard as chairman of the board, a position he held until his retirement more than twenty years later. He continued to advise the White House on defense procurement and management issues throughout the 1970s and 1980s.

1992 Se devalúa la peseta española en un 5% por acuerdo del Comité Monetario de la CE. 1991
The U.N. General Assembly opened its 46th session, welcoming new members Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, North and South Korea, the Marshall Islands and Micronesia. — La 46 Asamblea General de la ONU admite como nuevos miembros a Corea del Norte y del Sur, los estados bálticos de Estonia, Letonia y Lituania, y las dos naciones isleñas del Pacífico, Micronesia e Islas Marshall.
1990 Soviet Union & Saudi Arabia restore diplomatic ties

1987 Veinticuatro naciones firman en Canadá el protocolo por el que se adoptarán medidas para evitar el deterioro de la capa de ozono.
1986 US Senate confirms William Rehnquist as 16th chief justice
1984 Brian Mulroney sworn in as Canada's 18th PM succeeding John Turner.
1980 Solidarity labor union in Poland forms

1978 Camp David agreement between Israel and Egypt         ^top^
     At the White House in Washington DC, Egyptian President Anwar el-Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin sign the Camp David Accords, laying the groundwork for a permanent peace agreement between Egypt and Israel after three decades of hostilities. The accords were negotiated during 12 days of intensive talks at President Jimmy Carter's Camp David retreat in the Catoctin Mountains of Maryland. The final peace agreement — the first between Israel and one of its Arab neighbors — was signed in March 1979. Sadat and Begin were jointly awarded the 1978 Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts.
     A state of war had existed between Egypt and the State of Israel since the establishment of Israel in 1948. In the first three Arab-Israeli wars, Israel decisively defeated Egypt. As a result of the 1967 war, Israel occupied Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, the 61000-square-kilometer peninsula that links Africa with Asia. When Anwar el-Sadat became Egyptian president in 1970, he found himself leader of an economically troubled nation that could ill afford to continue its endless crusade against Israel. He wanted to make peace and thereby achieve stability and recovery of the Sinai, but after Israel's stunning victory in the 1967 war it was unlikely that Israel's peace terms would be favorable to Egypt. So Sadat conceived of a daring plan to attack Israel again, which, even if unsuccessful, might convince the Israelis that peace with Egypt was necessary.
     In 1972, Sadat expelled 20'000 Soviet advisers from Egypt and opened new diplomatic channels with Washington, which, as Israel's key ally, would be an essential mediator in any future peace talks. Then, on 06 October 1973, Egyptian and Syrian forces launched a joint attack against Israel. It was Yom Kippur, the holiest day of the year for Jews, and Israeli forces were taken entirely by surprise. It took more than a week for Israel to beat back the impressive Arab advances. A US airlift of arms aided Israel's cause, but President Richard Nixon delayed the emergency military aid for seven days as a tacit signal of US sympathy for Egypt. In November, an Egyptian-Israeli cease-fire was secured by the United States.
     Although Egypt had again suffered military defeat against its Jewish neighbor, the initial Egyptian successes greatly enhanced Sadat's prestige in the Middle East and provided him with an opportunity to seek peace. In 1974, the first of two Egyptian-Israeli disengagement agreements providing for the return of portions of the Sinai to Egypt were signed, and in 1975 Sadat traveled to the United States to discuss his peace efforts and seek American aid and investment.
     When talks with Israel stalled, Sadat made a dramatic journey to Jerusalem in November 1977 and spoke before the Israeli Knesset (Parliament). In September 1978, President Jimmy Carter invited Sadat and Israeli Prime Minister Begin to the presidential retreat at Camp David, Maryland, where dual peace accords were hammered out under the direction of Carter. Signed on 17 September the historic agreements provided for complete Israeli evacuation from the Sinai, laid the groundwork for the signing of a final peace agreement, and outlined a broader framework for achieving peace in the Middle East.
     Sadat and Begin received the Nobel Peace Prize, and on 29 March 1979, a permanent peace agreement was signed that closely resembled the Camp David Accords. The treaty ended the state of war between the two countries and provided for the establishment of full diplomatic and commercial relations.
     Although Sadat was greatly praised in the West, he was widely condemned in the Arab world. In 1979, Egypt was expelled from the Arab League, and internal opposition to his policies led to domestic crises. On 06 October 1981, Sadat was assassinated by Muslim extremists in Cairo while viewing a military parade commemorating the Yom Kippur War. Despite Sadat's death, the peace process continued under Egypt's new president, Hosni Mubarak. In 1982, Israel fulfilled the 1979 peace treaty by returning the last segment of the Sinai Peninsula to Egypt. Egyptian-Israeli peace would continue into the next century.

1976 NASA publicly unveiled the space shuttle Enterprise at ceremonies in Palmdale, Calif.
1972 BART begins passenger service in SF

1972 Vietnam: Three US pilots POW released. ^top^
They are the first POWs released since 1969. North Vietnamese officials cautions the United States not to force the freed men to “slander” Hanoi, claiming that “distortions” about Hanoi’s treatment of POWs from a previous release of prisoners in 1969 caused Hanoi to temporarily suspend the release of POWs. The conditions for their release stipulated that they would not do anything to further the US war effort in Indochina. The rest of the POWs would be released in March 1973 as part of the agreement that led to the Paris Peace Accords.

1970 Vietnam: New peace plan at Paris talks. ^top^
The People’s Revolutionary Government (PRG) for South Vietnam presents a new peace plan at the Paris talks. Nguyen Thi Binh, foreign minister of the PRG, attending the peace talks for the first time in three months, outlines the eight-point program, which is similar to another program first presented in May 1969. In exchange for the withdrawal of all US and Allied forces by 30 June 1971, communist forces would refrain from attacking the departing troops and would begin immediate negotiations on the release of POWs once the withdrawal is agreed to. The PRG statement demands the purge of South Vietnam’s top three leaders: President Nguyen Van Thieu, Vice President Nguyen Cao Ky, and Premier Tran Thien Khiem. This demand was a major inhibitor to any meaningful peace negotiations, since the United States refused to abandon Thieu. .

1962 The first federal suit to end public school segregation is filed by the US Justice Department.
1959 The X-15 rocket plane makes its first flight.
1959 El pintor catalán Modest Cuixart, recibe el Premio Internacional de pintura, de la V Bienal de São Paulo. — a painting by Cuixart: Nemesius Hals
1957 The Thai army seizes power in Bangkok.
1956 Black students enter Clay, Kentucky elementary school
1953 1st successful separation of Siamese twins
1947 James V. Forrestal was sworn in as the first US Secretary of Defense as a new National Military Establishment unified America's armed forces. .
1946 Estalla la Guerra Civil en Grecia.
1946 The residence of Dr. Stepinac, Archbishop of Agram, is surrounded this night and he is arrested by Tito's Communists in the morning. A stirring trial follows. He had refused to flee although 243 priests were killed.

1944 Airborne invasion of German-occupied Holland begins ^top^
During World War II, combined British and American force under British General Bernard L. Montgomery begin Operation Market-Garden, a disastrous airborne invasion of German-occupied Holland. Airborne units landed near Nijmegen and Arnhem in an attempt to seize several key bridges, but were met with unexpected resistance. Casualties were heavy, and relief forces were unable to meet up with the airborne troops, who were forced to surrender to the Germans or begin a difficult evacuation out of enemy territory on their own.

1942 British Prime Minister Winston Churchill meets with Soviet Premier Josef Stalin in Moscow as the German Army rams into Stalingrad.

1939 Treacherous Soviet Union invades Poland, already agonizing under Nazi onslaught, during WW II.         ^top^
      — L'armée rouge envahit la Pologne.
     Soviet Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov declares that the Polish government has ceased to exist, as the USS.R. exercises the "fine print" of the Hitler-Stalin Non-aggression pact—the invasion and occupation of eastern Poland. Hitler's troops were already wreaking havoc in Poland, having invaded on the first of the month. The Polish army began retreating and regrouping east, near Lvov, in eastern Galicia, attempting to escape relentless German land and air offensives.
      But Polish troops had jumped from the frying pan into the fire—as Soviet troops began occupying eastern Poland. The Ribbentrop-Molotov Non-aggression Pact, signed in August, had eliminated any hope Poland had of a Russian ally in a war against Germany. Little did Poles know that a secret clause of that pact, the details of which would not become public until 1990, gave the USS.R. the right to mark off for itself a chunk of Poland's eastern region. The "reason" given was that Russia had to come to the aid of its "blood brothers," the Ukrainians and Byelorussians, who were trapped in territory that had been illegally annexed by Poland. Now Poland was squeezed from West and East—trapped between two behemoths. Its forces overwhelmed by the mechanized modern German army, Poland had nothing left with which to fight the Soviets.
      As Soviet troops broke into Poland, they unexpectedly met up with German troops who had fought their way that far east in a little more than two weeks. The Germans receded when confronted by the Soviets, handing over their Polish prisoners of war. 217'000 Polish soldiers were taken into captivity; some Poles simply surrendered to the Soviets to avoid being captured by the Germans. The Soviet Union would wind up with about three-fifths of Poland and 13 million of its people as a result of the invasion.

1934 1st 33 1/3 rpm recording released (Beethoven's 5th)
1934 La URSS ingresa en la Sociedad de Naciones.

1930 Work begins on Boulder (later Hoover) Dam ^top^
Construction of Hoover Dam, originally called Boulder Dam, began at Black Canyon, near Las Vegas, Nevada. Built during the Depression, thousands of men and their families came to Black Canyon to tame the mighty Colorado River, working under dangerous conditions in a harsh environment. Completed in less than five years, the largest dam of its era was a world-renowned engineering feat, and an endlessly renewable source of power for the growing Southwest.

1923 Disolución de las Cortes en España. Se constituye el Directorio Militar, en sustitución del provisional formado tras el golpe de Estado del general Primo de Rivera.
1922 highest air temperature ever observed on Earth: 58ºC at Azizia, near Tripoli, Libya.
1922 Radio Moscow begins transmitting (12 KWs-most powerful station)
1917 The German Army recaptures the Russian Port of Riga from Russian forces.
1911 1st transcontinental airplane flight, NY-Pasadena in 82 hrs 4 min
1903 International coast-to-coast drive. Lester L. Whitman and Eugene I. Hammond complete their coast-to-coast drive, the third trans-US automobile trip in history, with a section from Windsor to Niagara Falls in Ontario, Canada, in order to make the trip "international.”
1902 US troops are sent to Panama to keep train lines open over the isthmus as Panamanian nationals struggle for independence from Colombia.
1873 19 students attend opening class at Ohio State University
1864 John C. Frémont withdraws as third-party candidate for US President
1863 Pope Pius IX encyclical On persecution in New Grenada
1862 Union forces evacuate Cumberland Gap, Tennessee/Kentucky
1862 Munfordville, Kentucky surrenders
1861 Siege of Lexington, Missouri continues
1854 Publicación del Manifiesto de la Unión Liberal, fundada por Leopoldo O'Donnell, como escisión del Partido Moderado.

1820 John Keats leaves for Italy         ^top^
      With less than six months to live, 24-year-old John Keats sets off for Italy on this day in 1820, hoping the climate will improve his tuberculosis.
      Keats had produced an outpouring of brilliant poetry in 1819, including classics like "Ode on a Grecian Urn," "Ode to a Nightingale," and "La Belle Dame Sans Merci.” His productivity and talent are still astonishing today considering that he came from a lower-class family, lacked the educational and financial advantages of other writers of his age, and did not try his hand at poetry until he turned 18.
      Keats’ parents ran a London stable, earning enough to send John, the eldest of five children, to private school. Keats was boisterous and high-spirited, but his schoolmasters discovered a keen interest in reading and introduced him to poetry and theater. When John was eight, his father died, launching a long economic struggle that would keep Keats in poverty throughout his life, despite a large inheritance that was owed him. Eventually, Keats’ unscrupulous guardian, who kept the money from him, apprenticed Keats to a surgeon. Keats worked with the surgeon from 1811 until 1814, then went to work for a hospital in London as a junior apothecary and surgeon in charge of dressing wounds.
      In London, Keats pursued his interest in literature while working at the hospital. He became friends with the editor of the Examiner, Leigh Hunt, a successful poet and author who introduced him to other literary figures, including Percy Bysshe Shelley. Although Keats did not write his first poem until age 18, he quickly showed tremendous promise, encouraged by Hunt and his circle. Keats’ work first appeared in the Examiner in 1816, followed by his first book, Poems (1817). After 1817, Keats devoted himself entirely to poetry, becoming a master of the Romantic sonnet and trying his hand at epic poems like Hyperion.
      In 1818, Keats’ financial struggles deepened when his brother Tom fell ill with tuberculosis and another brother’s poor investments left him penniless. Meanwhile, a strenuous walking tour of England’s Lake District damaged Keats’ health. The one bright spot in his life was Fanny Brawne, his fiancee. Sadly, Keats’ poverty did not allow them to marry. He developed tuberculosis in 1820, traveled to Italy hoping to improve his condition, and died there in February 1821
KEATS ONLINE:
The Eve of St. Agnes, Lamia, The Poetical Works of John Keats.

1809 Treaty of Fredrikshamm ends the Russo-Swedish war, ceding Finland to Russia.
1808 Napoléon confie à Fontanes la direction de l'université impériale. Il la veut laïque et il lui confère le monopole de l'enseignement. Néanmoins, Fontanes laisse se créer des institutions privées et introduit dans l'université même un grand nombre de prêtres.
1796 President George Washington delivers his "Farewell Address" to Congress before concluding his second term in office. When George Washington announced that he would retire from office he set the stage for the nation's first two party presidential campaign.
1793 Revolución francesa: el Comité de Salvación Pública inicia la represión sanguinaria conocida como "el Terror".
1789 William Herschel discovers Mimas, satellite of Saturn
1787 The Constitution of the United States was completed and signed by a majority of delegates attending the constitutional convention in Philadelphia.
1776 Along the western coast of North America, a party of 247 Spanish colonists consecrate their newly-founded mission, known as San Francisco.
1717 The first synod of the Presbyterian Church in America met in Philadelphia.
1656 Massachusetts enacts severe laws against Quakers. (At the time, government and religion were intricately interwoven; the line between blasphemy and treason was virtually nonexistent; and non-sacramental Quakerism gave the impression that the denomination was anti-government.)

1618 Last day of 11th baktun in Mayan calendar. ^top^
The 11th baktun started on 08 June 1224 (Julian, of course. It would have been 15 June if the Gregorian calendar had been invented and in effect). Now the Mayan date is:

11 baktun / 19 katun / 19 tun / 17 winal / 19 k'in // 04 - kawak // 12 - zodz / g2

1577 Peace of Bergerac ends the 7th Catholic-Huguenot war in France.
1519 Sale de Sanlúcar de Barrameda (Cádiz) una expedición de cinco naves y 237 hombres capitaneados por Fernando de Magallanes para dar la vuelta al mundo.
1516 Bartolomé de Las Casas is named priest “procurator of the Indies” while in Madrid, giving him status as protector of Indians.
1497 Conquista e incorporación de Melilla a España.
1480 Se ordena el establecimiento del Tribunal de la Inquisición en España, en una cédula expedida por los Reyes Católicos.
1394 Jews are expelled from France by order of King Charles VI — Par ordre du roi, tous les Juifs de France perdent l'autorisation de résider dans le royaume, et surtout il s'approprie leurs fortunes.

TO THE TOP

Deaths which occurred on a 17 September: ^top^
2003 Holly Patterson, 18, of Livermore, a suburb of San Francisco, California.
2003 Harold Kilpatrick Jr., 26, at 22:00 shot by police who are rescuing the dozen hostages Kilpatrick had been holding since 13:00 in a classroom at Dyersburg State Community College, Tennessee, after leaving at home a note saying "I want to kill some people and die today." Two hostages are injured. Kilpatrick was a mental patient, not taking his medication, and was due to appear in court on previous charges of assault and kidnapping.
2003:: 45 Maoist rebels and 6 government soldiers, in fighting near Bhawang village, Nepal. A 7-month cease-fire ended in August 2003 with the break-down ofpeace talks between the government and the rebels, who have been fighting since 1996 to abolish Nepal's constitutional monarchy and set up a Communist state.
2002 David Buhbut, 67, Israeli from the Ma'aleh Adumim enclave settlement, shot in the head after being beaten, by three Palestinian acquaintances who had lured him to a meeting in al-Azana, adjacent to Ma'aleh Adumim in Area B of the West Bank (under Israeli control), in the evening. The Palestinians are later arrested by Israeli police and confess.
2002 Tay-lah Armstrong, 2, at the Gold Coast Hospital in Brisbane, Australia, from health problems she had from birth and not related to her surgical separation at age 6 months, in October 2000, from Monique Armstrong to which she was born conjoined at the back of the head by a piece of bone the size of a 50 cent piece. Monique was discharged from the hospital one month after the operation.
2002 Jesse Patrick, a White, by lethal injection in Texas for the 1989 robbery, assault, and murder Nina Rutherford Redd, 80, of Dallas, on a night of which Patrick, a chronic drunk and drug-addict, claimed to have no recollection.
2001 Abdul Salam Elayyan, 35, mentally ill Palestinian, shot by Israeli soldiers as he approaches the Egyptian border near Rafah.
2001 Muhammad Ramadan, 21, Palestinian, from wounds suffered from Israeli gunfire during Isreaeli incursion into Beit Hanoon on 15 September 2001
2001 Muhammad Shawani, 37, Palestinian security officer, from wounds suffered on 13 September during Israeli incursion in Jericho.
2000 Mensah Kpognon, UN refugee worker, killed and a second UN refugee worker, Sapeu Laurence Djeya, kidnapped in a raid in Guinea (he is later released).
2000 Cruz Martínez Esteruelas, político y abogado español.
1999 Leonard Carlitz, mathematician
1996. Spiro T. Agnew, 77, died in Berlin, Md., disgraced former US Vice President under later disgraced President Nixon.
1995 Georges Canguilhelm, filósofo francés.
1994 Karl Popper, filósofo británico de origen austríaco.
1980 Anastasio Somoza Former Nicaraguan President, assassinated in Paraguay
1974 André Albert Marie Dunoyer de Segonzac, French painter and etcher born on 06 July 1884. — MORE ON DE SEGONZAC AT ART “4” SEPTEMBER — LINKS — La Ferme dans la terre — La Route de Grimaud — Le Gros Chêne à Chaville (etching) — Préparation d'Artillerie — Nature morte au chou
1965 Alejandro Casona, dramaturgo español.
1961 Adnan Menderes, 62, PM of Turkey (1950-60)
1959 Some 2000 by typhoon in Japan and Korea.
1948 Count Folke Bernadotte UN mediator for Palestine, assassinated in Jerusalem by Jewish extremists — Le comte Folke Bernadotte est tué à Jérusalem, alors qu'il tentait de ramener la paix entre les israéliens et les arabes, en sa qualité de médiateur des Nations Unies.
1928 Some 2000 drowned as hurricane hits Lake Okeechobee, Florida.
1917 Anton Stadler von Toni, Austrian artist born on 09 July 1850.

1908 Thomas Selfridge, first aircraft accident fatality ^top^
During an airplane demonstration at Fort Myer in Arlington Heights, Virginia, a propeller blade came loose on a plane piloted by Orville Wright, plunging the aircraft 50 meters to the ground. Lieutenant Selfridge of the US Signal Corps, a passenger on the plane, died of a skull fracture, while Orville suffered multiple hip and leg fractures. Selfridge was the first fatality in an airplane accident.

1903 Some 10'000 civilians in Kastoria, Bulgaria, as Turks destroy the town.
1891 Petzval, mathematician
1885 Lucas Schaeffels, Belgian artist born on 06 April 1824.
1879 Eugène Emmanuel Viollet Le Duc, arquitecto y crítico de arte francés.
1877 Talbot, mathematician

1868 Chief Roman Nose, many Cheyenne and Sioux braves, and a few of the US volunteers they attack         ^top^
     The Battle of Beecher's Island begins, in which Major George "Sandy" Forsyth and 50 volunteers hold off 500 Sioux and Cheyenne in eastern Colorado.
      Early in the morning, a large band of Cheyenne and Sioux stage a surprise attack on Major George A. Forsyth and a volunteer force of 50 frontiersmen in Colorado. Retreating to a small sandbar in the Arikaree River that thereafter became known as Beecher's Island, Forsyth and his men succeeded in repulsing three massed Indian charges. Thanks to the rapid fire capability of their seven-shot Spencer rifles, Forsyth's volunteers were able to kill or wound many of the Indian attackers, including the war chief Roman Nose.
      But as evening came and the fighting temporarily halted, Forsyth found he had 22 men either dead or wounded, and he estimated the survivors were surrounded by a force of 600 Amerndians. The Whites faced certain annihilation unless they could somehow bring help. Two men—Jack Stilwell and Pierre Trudeau—volunteered to attempt a daring escape through the Indian lines and silently melted into the night.
      The battle raged for five more days. Forsyth's effective fighting force was reduced to ten men before the Indians finally withdrew, perhaps reasoning that they had inflicted enough damage. Far from help and lacking wagons and horses, Forsyth knew that many of his wounded would soon be dead if they didn't get help. Fortunately, on September 25, the 10th Cavalry—one of the Army's two African-American units nicknamed the "Buffalo Soldiers"—came riding to their rescue with a field ambulance and medical supplies. Miraculously, Stilwell and Trudeau had managed to make it through the Sioux and Cheyenne and bring help. Thanks to their bravery and the timely arrival of the Buffalo Soldiers, the lives of many men were saved.

1863 baron Alfred-Victor de Vigny, French poet, dramatist and novelist born on 27 March 1797. — DE VIGNY ONLINE: (images de pages): Poëmes ; Héléna ; le Somnanbule ; la Fille de Jephté ; la Femme adultère ; le Bal ; la Prison, etc. — Théâtre. — Les destinées : poèmes philosophiques — Poésies — Les consultations du docteur Noir : première consultation : Stello — Servitude et grandeur militaire — Cinq-Mars ou Une conjuration sous Louis XIII — (texte): Les consultations du docteur Noir ; Stello : première consultation ; Daphné : seconde consultation du docteur Noir ; ...

1862: 3654 soldiers at the Battle of Antietam         ^top^
      In the bloodiest single day of fighting in the American Civil War, 26,293 men were killed, wounded, or missing in action at the Battle of Antietam, near Sharpsburg, in western Maryland. Fighting in the corn field, Bloody Lane and Burnside's Bridge rages all day. Union General George McClellan repulses the forces of Confederate General Robert E. Lee, ending the Southerners' advance into Northern territory. The next day, Lee's crippled army waited in its retreated position for the final Union assault. McClellan, general in chief of all Union forces, never ordered the expected attack, and, after a day of waiting, Lee led his forces out of Maryland and into the safety of Virginia. McClellan, consistently cautious on the battlefield, was relieved of his duties by President Abraham Lincoln for his failure to crush Lee.
      New York Tribune reporter George Smalley scooped the world with his vivid account of the Battle of Antietam.
      Confederate General Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia and Union General George B. McClellan's Army of the Potomac fight to a standstill along a Maryland creek on the bloodiest day in American history. Although the battle was a tactical draw, it forced Lee to end his invasion of the North and retreat back to Virginia.
      After Lee's decisive victory at the Second Battle of Bull Run on 30 August 1862, the Confederate general had steered his army north into Maryland. Lee and Confederate President Jefferson Davis believed that another Rebel victory might bring recognition and aid from Great Britain and France. Lee also sought to relieve pressure on Virginia by carrying the conflict to the North. His ragtag army was in dire need of supplies, which Lee hoped to obtain from Maryland farms that were untouched by the war.
      Lee split his army as he moved into Maryland. One corps marched to capture Harpers Ferry, Virginia, while the other two searched for provisions. Although a copy of Lee's orders ended up in the hands of McClellan, the Union general failed to act quickly, allowing Lee time to gather his army along Antietam Creek at Sharpsburg, Maryland. McClellan arrived on 16 September and prepared to attack.
      The Battle of Antietam actually consisted of three battles. Beginning at dawn on 17 September Union General Joseph Hooker's men stormed Confederate General Thomas J. "Stonewall" Jackson's troops around the Dunker Church, the West Woods, and David Miller's cornfield. The Federals made repeated attacks, but furious Rebel counterattacks kept the Yankees in check. By early afternoon, the fighting moved south to the middle of the battlefield. Union troops under General Edwin Sumner inflicted appalling casualties on the Confederates along a sunken road that became known as "Bloody Lane" before the Southerners retreated. McClellan refused to apply reserves to exploit the opening in the Confederate center because he believed Lee's force to be much larger than it actually was. In the late afternoon, Union General Ambrose Burnside attacked General James Longstreet's troops across a stone bridge that came to bear Burnside's name. The Yankees crossed the creek, but a Confederate counterattack brought any further advance to a halt.
      The fighting ended by early evening, and the two armies remained in place throughout the following day. After dark on 18 September, Lee began pulling his troops out of their defenses for a retreat to Virginia. The losses for the one-day battle were staggering. McClellan lost a total of 12'401 men, including 2108 dead, 9540 wounded, and 753 missing. Lee lost 10' 406, including 1546 dead, 7752 wounded, and 1108 missing.
      Although the Union army drove Lee's force back to Virginia, the battle was a lost opportunity for the Yankees. McClellan had an overwhelming numerical advantage, but he did not know it. Another attack on 18 September may well have scattered the Confederates and cut off Lee's line of retreat. A week later, President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation and changed the Northern goal from a war for reunification into a crusade for the end of slavery.

1839 Jerónimo Gutiérrez de Mendoza, político colombiano.
1838 Michel Joseph Speckaert, Belgian artist born on 10 December 1748.
1791 Tomás de Iriarte y Nieves Ravelo, poeta, fabulista y filólogo español.
1784 Giuseppe Bottani, Italian artist born in 1717.
1776 George Smith of Chichester, English landscape painter born in 1714. — more
1772 Louis-Gabriel Blanchet, French artist born in 1705. — LINKS — Portrait of a Gentleman
1771 Tobias Smollett, author. SMOLLETT ONLINE: The Expedition of Humphry Clinker, The Expedition of Humphry Clinker, Travels Through France and Italy
before 1688 Johannes Leemans, Dutch artist born in 1633.
1675 Jacob-Adriaensz Bellevois, Dutch artist born in 1621.
1575 Heinrich Bullinger, Swiss reformer. Next to John Calvin, Bullinger was probably the most influential of the second-generation Reformers.
1574 Pedro Menéndez de Avilés, español, conquistador de La Florida.
1549 Paulo III, Papa.
1542 Lucas Fernández, dramaturgo y músico español.

1179 Hildegarde of Birgen, 82.         ^top^
      They called her "Sybil of the Rhine.” By any measure she was an extraordinary woman, one of the few who transcended the limitations imposed by the Middle Ages to alter the events of her own time and imprint her personality on the future.
      At five Hildegarde of Birgen began to see visions; at eight, she joined her aunt Jutta, a recluse (one who led a solitary life for religious purposes). When fourteen she became a nun herself. Much of her life she was abbess of a Benedictine convent.
      Somehow she acquired an education. Not until she was 42 did she begin to write the books which made her famous. Then her output was prodigious and varied. She compiled an encyclopedia of natural science and clinical medicine. Her medical works included exorcisms along with much medieval lore. She wrote the first known morality play and a song cycle. Of Christ, it contained these words: "It is very hard to resist what tastes of the apple. Set us upright Saviour, Christ.... O most beautiful form! O most sweet savour of desirable delight! We ever sigh after you in fearful exile, when will we see you and dwell with you?"
      Hildegarde's hundreds of letters of advice and rebuke went out to kings and commoners alike. She wrote biographies of two saints. This output, coming from the pen of a woman, was extraordinary in an age when women seldom learned to read. She was considered a prophetess. St. Bernard of Clairvaux and popes endorsed her visions. All listened to her.
      Her book of visions, Scivias, took her ten years to complete. She incorporated 26 drawings of things she had seen in her strange waking visions. Modern medicine suggests that these shimmering lines of light were actually the auras associated with migraines. Her own account suggests more. “...when I was forty-two years and seven months old, heaven was opened and a fiery light of exceeding brilliance came and permeated my whole brain, and inflamed my whole heart and my whole breast, not like a burning but a warming flame, as the sun warms anything its rays touch.” Immediately she understood the meaning of the scriptures.
      At the age of 60, Hildegarde began to make preaching tours. The theme of her sermons was that the church was corrupt and needed cleansing. She scathed easy-going, fat clergymen and those who were "lukewarm and sluggish" in serving God's justice, negligent in expounding the depths of scripture.
      Although largely forgotten for many generations, awareness of her life enjoyed a new surge in the mid 1990s with television programs, books and music releases devoted to her. And not without cause, for she was one of the most talented and original women ever to live.

Births which occurred on a 17 September:

1976 The Space Shuttle         ^top^
      During a ceremony in Palmdale, California, NASA publicly unveiled the world's first reusable spacecraft — the space shuttle Enterprise. Development of the aircraft-like spacecraft cost almost ten billion dollars and took nearly a decade. In 1977, the space shuttle Enterprise enjoyed the distinction of the first free atmospheric flight by a space shuttle when it was lifted to a height of twenty-five thousand feet by a Boeing 747 airplane, and then released, gliding back to Edwards Air Force Base on its own accord.
      Regular flights of the space shuttle began on 12 April 1981, with the launching of the Columbia into space on a fifty-four-hour mission. Piloted by astronauts Robert L. Crippen and John W. Young, the Columbia undertook thirty-six orbits before successfully touching down at Edwards Air Force Base on 14 April 1981. Launched by two solid-rocket boosters and an external tank, only the aircraft-like shuttle entered into orbit around Earth. When the two-day mission was completed, the shuttle fired engines to reduce speed and, after descending through the atmosphere, landed like a glider at California's Edwards Air Force Base.
      Early shuttles took satellite equipment into space and carried out various scientific experiments. On 28 January 1986, NASA and the space shuttle program suffered a major setback when the Challenger exploded 74 seconds after takeoff and all seven people aboard were killed.
      In September 1988, space shuttle flights resumed with the successful launching of the Discovery. Since then, the space shuttle has carried out numerous important missions, such as the repair and maintenance of the Hubble Space Telescope and the construction and manning of the International Space Station. By 2001, there have been more than 100 space shuttle flights.

1939 David Souter, Weir NH, attorney, Supreme Court Justice (1990- )
1935 Ken Kesey author (One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, Sometimes a Great Notion).
1921 Virgilio Barco Vargas president of Colombia (1986-90) — Virgilio Barco, diplomático y político colombiano.
1918 Chaim Herzog, político israelí, ex presidente de Israel.
1910 Marshall Hall Jr., mathematician
1909 Pedro Grases González, escritor, historiador y abogado español.
1907 Warren E Burger Minn, Supreme Court chief justice (1969-86)
1883 William Carlos Williams, poet, playwright, essayist and writer who won a Pulitzer prize for Pictures from Brueghel and Other Poems. — WILLIAM ONLINE: Sour Grapes — Bruegel's Landscape with the Fall of Icarus (1558)
1883 Henri Valensi, French artist who died in 1969.
1871 Edgar Maxence, French painter who died in 1954. — MORE ON MAXENCE AT ART “4” SEPTEMBER — LINKS — Profil au Paon (ZOOM) — Le Livre de Paix (ZOOM) — L'Âme du Glacier (ZOOM) — L'Âme de la Forêt (ZOOM) — La Famille Roy (ZOOM) — Bernadette Soubirou (ZOOM) — Bretonne en Prière (ZOOM) — Le Missel (ZOOM) — Tête Divine (ZOOM) — Au Dimanche
1871 Le tunnel du Mont-Cenis est inauguré. Long de 13'656 km dont 6907 en France, ce tunnel que l'on nomme encore de Fréjus et le plus long des tunnel de l'époque
1869 Christian Lange Norway, pacifist/internationalist (Nobel 1921)
1858 Robert William Vonnoh, US Impressionist painter who died on 28 December 1933. — MORE ON VONNOH AT ART “4” SEPTEMBER — LINKS — Apple Bloom (ZOOM) — Coquelicots (In Flanders Field—Where Soldiers Sleep and Poppies Grow is a later title inspired by McCraes' poem) — Birch Trees
1857 Harry Wilson Watrous, US artist who died in 1940.
1857 Konstantin Eduardovich Tsiolkovsky, Russian physicist who would pioneer development of Soviet rockets, space science and aeronautical research

1850 Abílio Manuel Guerra Junqueiro, Portuguese poet. ^top^
A revolutionary, he wrote violent satiric poems attacking conservatism, romanticism, and the Church. Typical are A morte de Dom Jõao (1874) and A velhice do Padre Eterno (1885). He later turned to writing simple, touching lyrics of rural life, as in Os simples (1892). — Abílio Manuel Guerra Junqueiro nasceu, em Freixo de Espada à Cinta, Trás os Montes, a 17 de Setembro de 1850, filho do lavrador José António Junqueiro e Ana Maria Guerra, formando-se em Direito na Universidade de Coimbra. Foi funcionário público e deputado, aderindo em 1891, com o Ultimatum inglês, aos ideais republicanos. Influenciado por Baudelaire, Proudhon, Victor Hugo e Michelet, iniciou uma intensa escrita poética com o fim último de, pela crítica, renovar a sociedade portuguesa. Retirou-se para uma quinta no Douro, regressando à política com a implantação da República, tendo sido nomeado Ministro de Portugal em Berna. Obras: A Morte de D. João (1874), A Musa em Férias (1879), A Velhice do Padre Eterno (1885), Finis Patriae (1890), Os Simples (1892), Pátria (1896), Oração ao Pão (1903), Oração à Luz (1904), Poesias Dispersas (1920). Em colaboração com Guilherme de Azevedo, escreveu Viagem à Roda da Parvónia. Faleceu em 7 de Julho de 1923, em Lisboa.
— Junqueiro, um espaço na Modernidade
— JUNQUEIRO ONLINE: Obras integrais de Guerra Junqueiro — A Velhice do Padre Eterno — A Morte de D. João — Pátria — Finis Patriae — Os Simples — A Musa em Férias — Poesias Dispersas — Prosas Dispersas — Horas de Luta — Horas de Combate — Vária.

1826 Bernhard Riemann, mathematician
1819 Thomas Andrews Hendricks (D) 21st US VP; died in office.

1787 US Constitution is signed         ^top^
      The Constitution of the United States of America is signed by 38 of 41 delegates present at the conclusion of the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia. Supporters of the document waged a hard-won battle to win ratification by the necessary nine out of 13 US states.
     The Articles of Confederation, ratified several months before the British surrender at Yorktown in 1781, provided for a loose confederation of US states, which were sovereign in most of their affairs. On paper, Congress — the central authority — had the power to govern foreign affairs, conduct war, and regulate currency, but in practice these powers were sharply limited because Congress was given no authority to enforce its requests to the states for money or troops. By 1786, it was apparent that the Union would soon break up if the Articles of Confederation were not amended or replaced. Five states met in Annapolis, Maryland, to discuss the issue, and all the states were invited to send delegates to a new constitutional convention to be held in Philadelphia.
     On 25 May 1787, delegates representing every state except Rhode Island convened at Philadelphia's Pennsylvania State House for the Constitutional Convention. The building, which is now known as Independence Hall, had earlier seen the drafting of the Declaration of Independence and the signing of the Articles of Confederation. The assembly immediately discarded the idea of amending the Articles of Confederation and set about drawing up a new scheme of government. Revolutionary War hero George Washington, a delegate from Virginia, was elected convention president.
     During an intensive debate, the delegates devised a brilliant federal organization characterized by an intricate system of checks and balances. The convention was divided over the issue of state representation in Congress, as more-populated states sought proportional legislation, and smaller states wanted equal representation. The problem was resolved by the Connecticut Compromise, which proposed a bicameral legislature with proportional representation in the lower house (House of Representatives) and equal representation of the states in the upper house (Senate).
     On 17 September 1787, the Constitution is signed. As dictated by Article VII, the document would not become binding until it was ratified by nine of the 13 states. Beginning on 07 December five states — Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Georgia, and Connecticut — ratified it in quick succession. However, other states, especially Massachusetts, opposed the document, as it failed to reserve undelegated powers to the states and lacked constitutional protection of basic political rights, such as freedom of speech, religion, and the press. In February 1788, a compromise was reached under which Massachusetts and other states would agree to ratify the document with the assurance that amendments would be immediately proposed. The Constitution was thus narrowly ratified in Massachusetts, followed by Maryland and South Carolina. On 21 June 1788, New Hampshire became the ninth state to ratify the document, and it was subsequently agreed that government under the US Constitution would begin on 04 March 1789. In June, Virginia ratified the Constitution, followed by New York in July.
     On 25 September 1789, the first Congress of the United States adopted 12 amendments to the US Constitution — the Bill of Rights — and sent them to the states for ratification. Ten of these amendments were ratified in 1791. In November 1789, North Carolina became the 12th state to ratify the US Constitution. Rhode Island, which opposed federal control of currency and was critical of compromise on the issue of slavery, resisted ratifying the Constitution until the US government threatened to sever commercial relations with the state. On 29 May 1790, Rhode Island voted by two votes to ratify the document, and the last of the original 13 colonies joined the United States. Today, the US Constitution is the oldest written constitution in operation in the world.

La Constitution des États-Unis d'Amérique est publiée le 17 septembre 1787, soit 4 ans après l'indépendance. C'est le temps qu'il a fallu aux treize Etats issus des anciennes colonies anglaises pour sentir le besoin de liens fédéraux solides. Les délégués des Etats se réunissent en Congrès (en anglais «Convention») à Philadelphie le 25 mai 1787. Leurs débats aboutissent à un compromis assez souple pour avoir donné satisfaction jusqu'à nos jours. La Constitution américaine est la plus ancienne de toutes celles qui existent aujourd'hui. Elle s'inspire des thèses du philosophe français Montesquieu sur la séparation des trois pouvoirs (pouvoir judiciaire, pouvoir législatif, pouvoir exécutif). La justice est supervisée par une Cour Suprême. La rédaction des lois est confiée à un Congrès composé de deux Chambres: le Sénat, qui représente les Etats, et la Chambre des Représentants, qui représente les citoyens. Enfin, pour la première fois au monde est institué un Président de la République, en charge d'exécuter les lois. Désireux de garder la mainmise sur le choix du futur Président, les Conventionnels imaginent une élection à deux niveaux: les citoyens élisent dans chaque Etat des Grands Electeurs et c'est à ces derniers que revient l'élection du Président. Si aucune majorité absolue ne se dessine autour d'un candidat, il est prévu que la Chambre des Représentants choisira le Président parmi les cinq candidats les mieux placés... Les Conventionnels espèrent protéger ainsi la Présidence des aléas du suffrage universel! Dans les faits, ce cas de figure ne se produira qu'une fois, en 1824. Très vite, en effet, l'élection présidentielle va aboutir à l'invention d'un animal jusque-là inconnu, le parti politique. Les candidats en appelleront directement aux électeurs de base par le biais d'un cercle de partisans dévoués et... généreux.

1785 Francisco Diego García y Moreno, in Lagos, Jalisco, Mexico, Franciscan first bishop of California, who died on 30 April 1846, in Santa Barbara.
1775 François-Marius Granet, French painter and sculptor who died on 21 November 1849. — MORE ON GRANET AT ART “4” SEPTEMBER — LINKS — The Choir in the Capuchin Church on the Piazza Barberini, Rome (ZOOM) — La Trinità dei Monti et la Villa Médicis à Rome — L'Usurier.
1774 Joseph Caspar Mezzofanti Cardinal / linguist (understood 70 languages)

1743 Marie-Jean-Antoine-Nicolas de Caritat, marquis de Condorcet.        ^top^
     Condorcet was a French philosopher of the Enlightenment, advocate of educational reform, and mathematician whose most important work was on probability and the philosophy of mathematics. He was one of the major Revolutionary formulators of the ideas of progress, or the indefinite perfectibility of mankind. He died during the Terror on 9 germinal an II (29 March 1794) "while in custody" of the Jacobins, for being a Girondin
     Condorcet was a zealous propagator of the progressive views then current among French men of letters. A protégé of the French philosopher and mathematician Jean Le Rond d'Alembert, he took an active part in the preparation of the Encyclopédie. He was elected to the permanent secretaryship of the Academy of Sciences in 1777 and to the French Academy in 1782 and was a member of other European academies.
      Condorcet published his Vie de M. Turgot in 1786 and his Vie de Voltaire in 1789. These biographies of his friends reveal his sympathy with Turgot's economic theories about mitigating the suffering of the French populace before the French Revolution and with Voltaire's opposition to the church.
      During the French Revolution Condorcet was elected to represent Paris in the Legislative Assembly and became its secretary; was active in the reform of the educational system; was chief author of the address to the European powers in 1791; and in 1792 he presented a scheme for a system of state education, which was the basis of that ultimately adopted. Condorcet was one of the first to declare for a republic, and in August 1792 he drew up the declaration justifying the suspension of the king and the summoning of the National Convention.
      In the convention he represented the département of Aisne and was a member of the committee on the constitution. His draft of a new constitution, representative of the Girondins, the more moderate political group during the Revolution, was rejected, however, in favor of that of the Jacobins, a more radical political group whose dominating figure was Robespierre. In the trial of Louis XVI he voted against the death penalty. But his independent attitude became dangerous in the wake of the Revolution when Robespierre's radical measures triumphed, and his opposition to the arrest of the Girondins led to his being outlawed. To occupy his mind while he was in hiding, some of his friends prevailed on him to engage in the work by which he is best known, the Esquisse d'un tableau historique des progrès de l'esprit humain (1795).
     In March 1794 “Caritat, ci-devant marquis de Condorcet” fled from Paris and after three days he was arrested and imprisoned in Bourg-Egalité (ci-devant Bourg-la-Reine) on 7 germinal an II (27 March 1794). Two days later, 9 germinal an II, he is found dead in his prison cell and it is not known whether he died from natural causes, was murdered, or took his own life.
CONDORCET ONLINE:
Esquisse d'un tableau historique des progrès de l'esprit humain — Esquisse d'un tableau historique des progrès de l'esprit humain — Esquisse d'un Tableau historique des Progrès de l'Esprit humain

1734 Jean-Baptiste Le Prince, French painter, draftsman, and printmaker, who died on 30 17 September81. — MORE ON LE PRINCE AT ART “4” SEPTEMBER — LINKS — A Russian Baptism. .— The Tartar Camp — The Necromancer . — The Four Seasons: Autumn, Winter, Spring, Summer
1730 Baron Frederick von Steuben Germany, made Continental Army winners
1630 The town of Boston is founded by John Winthrop as an extension of the colony at Salem. It is named after the town of the same name in Lincolnshire, England.
1271 Wenceslas II king of Bohemia & Poland (1278-1305)
0879 Charles III [The Simple], king of France (893-923)

Holidays / Brundi : Victory of Uprona / US : Baron Frederick von Steuben Day (1730) / US : Citizenship Day (replaces Constitution Day) (1952)

Religious Observances Anglican: St Lambert's Day / RC: Stigmata of St Francis / RC: Robert Bellarmine, bishop and doctor (opt) / Santos Roberto Belarmino, Elías, Esteban, Narciso, Sócrates y Valeriano; santas Teodora e Hildegarda. / Saint Renaud, moine d'origine picarde, a vécu au XIe siècle, période qui vit la chrétienté occidentale sortir des ténèbres. Il rejoignit Robert d'Arbrissel, fondateur de la célèbre abbaye de Fontevrault, entre Chinon et Saumur. (il n'est le saint patron d'aucune marque d'automobiles).

Puzzling question of the day: What is the common name of polyhexamethyleneadipamide?

Thoughts for the day :
“The love of money is the root of all evil, and twisted sayings are some of its branches.”
“Thought is the root of all evil.”
“Thoughtlessness is the root of all evil.”
“Pride is the root of all evil.”
“Selfishness is the root of all evil.”
“Evil has many roots, that's why it is so difficult to root it out.”
“Whatever ideology I oppose is the root of all evil.”
“Other people's money is the root of all evil.”
“Ginseng is the root of all evil.”
“The forbidden fruit is the root of all evil.”
“The last straw is the root of all evil.”
“Nothing is the root of all evil.”
“Nothingness is the root of all evil.”
“Reverse evil! Spell it backwards!”
“The forbidden fruit is sour grapes.”
“One of these days is none of these days.”
“One of those days is never one of these days.”.

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