Today September 30th 2009 this day in history Read more below to view events, deaths, births, Holidays observances and video clips. Last database updated: Jan 17th, 2009
Events
1399 – Henry IV is proclaimed King of England.
1744 – France and Spain defeat the Kingdom of Sardinia at the Battle of Madonna dell Olmo.
1791 – The Magic Flute, the last opera composed by Mozart receives its premiere performance at Freihaus-Theater auf der Wieden in Vienna, Austria.
1791 – The National Constituent Assembly in Paris is dissolved; Parisians hail Maximilien Robespierre and Jérôme Pétion as incorruptible patriots.
1813 – Battle of Bárbula: Simón Bolívar defeats Santiago Bobadilla.
1860 – Britain s first tram service begins in Birkenhead, Merseyside.
1882 – The world s first commercial hydroelectric power plant (later known as Appleton Edison Light Company) begins operation on the Fox River in Appleton, Wisconsin, United States.
1888 – Jack the Ripper kills his third and fourth victims, Elizabeth Stride and Catherine Eddowes.
1895 – Madagascar becomes a French protectorate.
1901 – Hubert Cecil Booth patents the vacuum cleaner.
1903 – The new Gresham s School is officially opened by Field Marshal Sir Evelyn Wood.
1906 – Real Academia Galega, Galician language biggest linguistic authority starts working in Havana.
1927 – Babe Ruth becomes the first baseball player to hit 60 home runs in a season
1931 – Start of Die Voortrekkers youth movement for Afrikaners in Bloemfontein, South Africa.
1935 – The Hoover Dam, astride the border between the U.S. states of Arizona and Nevada, is dedicated.
1938 – At 2:00 am, Britain, France, Germany and Italy sign the Munich Agreement, allowing Germany to occupy the Sudetenland region of Czechoslovakia.
1938 – The League of Nations unanimously outlaws intentional bombings of civilian populations.
1939 – General Wladyslaw Sikorski becomes commander-in-chief of the Polish Government in exile.
1945 – Bourne End rail crash, Hertfordshire, England killed 43
1947 – The Islamic Republic of Pakistan joins the United Nations.
1947 – The World Series, featuring the New York Yankees and the Brooklyn Dodgers, is televised for the first time.
1949 – The Berlin Airlift ends.
1954 – The U.S. Navy submarine USS Nautilus is commissioned as the world s first nuclear reactor powered vessel.
1955 – Film icon James Dean dies in a road accident at age 24.
1962 – Mexican-American labor leader César Chávez founds the United Farm Workers.
1962 – James Meredith enters the University of Mississippi, defying segregation.
1965 – General Suharto rises to power after an alleged coup by the Communist Party of Indonesia. In response, Suharto and his army massacre over a million Indonesians suspected of being communists.
1966 – The British protectorate of Bechuanaland declares its independence, and becomes the Republic of Botswana. Seretse Khama takes office as the first President.
1967 – BBC Radio 1 is launched and Tony Blackburn presents its first show; the BBC s other national radio stations also adopt numeric names.
1968 – The Boeing 747 is rolled out and shown to the public for the first time at the Boeing Everett Factory.
1970 – Jordan makes a deal with the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) for the release of the remaining hostages from the Dawson s Field hijackings.
1975 – The Hughes (later McDonnell-Douglas, now Boeing) AH-64 Apache makes its first flight.
1977 – Due to US budget cuts and dwindling power reserves, the Apollo program s ALSEP experiment packages left on the Moon are shut down.
1977 – Philippine political prisoners, Eugenio Lopez, Jr. and Sergio Osmeña III successfully escapes from Fort Bonifacio Maximum Security Prison in the Philippines.
1979 – The Hong Kong MTR commences service with the opening of its Modified Initial System (aka. Kwun Tong Line).
1980 – Ethernet specifications are published by Xerox working with Intel and Digital Equipment Corporation.
1982 – Cyanide-laced Tylenol kills six people in the Chicago area. Seven were killed in all. The incident is known as the Tylenol murders.
1986 – Mordechai Vanunu, who revealed details of Israel covert nuclear program to British media, was kidnapped in Rome, Italy.
1989 – Foreign Minister of West Germany Hans-Dietrich Genscher s speech from the balcony of the German embassy in Prague.
1990 – The Dalai Lama unveils the Canadian Tribute to Human Rights in Canada s capital city of Ottawa.
1991 – President Jean-Bertrand Aristide of Haiti is forced from office.
1993 – An earthquake hits India s Latur and Osmanabad district of Marathwada (Aurangabad division) in Maharashtra state leaving tens of thousands of people dead and many more homeless.
1994 – Aldwych tube station (originally Strand Station) of the London Underground closed upon September 30th, after eighty-eight years of service.
1999 – Japan s worst nuclear accident at a uranium reprocessing facility in Tokai-mura, northeast of Tokyo.
2004 – The first images of a live giant squid in its natural habitat are taken 600 miles south of Tokyo.
2004 – The AIM-54 Phoenix, the primary missile for the F-14 Tomcat, is retired from service. Almost two years later, the Tomcat is retired.
2005 – The Parliament of Catalonia passes with 120 plus votes and 15 against, the Project of New Catalan Statute of Autonomy, proclaiming in its article 1, Catalonia is a nation.
2005 – The controversial drawings of Muhammad are printed in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten.
2006 – the National Assembly of the Republic of Serbia adopted the Constitutional Act that proclaimed the new Constitution of Serbia.
Births
1207 – Jalal al-Din Muhammad Rumi, Persian mystic and poet (d. 1273)
1227 – Pope Nicholas IV (d. 1292)
1530 – Geronimo Mercuriali, Italian philologist and physician (d. 1606)
1550 – Michael Maestlin, German mathematician (d. 1631)
1631 – William Stoughton, American judge at the Salem witch trials (d. 1701)
1700 – Stanislaw Konarski, Polish writer (d. 1773)
1710 – John Russell, 4th Duke of Bedford, British statesman (d. 1771)
1715 – Étienne Bonnot de Condillac, French philosopher (d. 1780)
1732 – Jacques Necker, French finance minister of Louis XVI (d. 1804)
1765 – José María Morelos, Mexican revolutionary (d. 1815)
1800 – Decimus Burton, British architect (d. 1881)
1811 – Augusta of Saxe-Weimar, Queen of Prussia and German Empress (d. 1890)
1827 – Ellis H. Roberts, American politician (d. 1918)
1852 – Charles Villiers Stanford, Irish composer, resident in England (d. 1924)
1861 – William Wrigley Jr., American industrialist (Wm. Wrigley Jr. Company) (d. 1932)
1870 – Jean Baptiste Perrin, French physicist, Nobel laureate (d. 1942)
1870 – Thomas W. Lamont, American banker; father of Corliss Lamont; great-grandfather of Ned Lamont (d. 1948)
1882 – Hans Geiger, German physicist (d. 1945)
1883 – Bernhard Rust, Nazi education minister (d. 1945)
1887 – Lil Dagover, Dutch-born German actress (d. 1980)
1893 – Lansdale Sasscer, American politician (d. 1964)
1895 – Lewis Milestone, Russian-born film director (d. 1980)
1898 – Renée Adorée, French actress (d. 1933)
1898 – Princess Charlotte of Monaco (d. 1977)
1904 – Waldo Williams, Welsh poet (d. 1971)
1905 – Nevill Francis Mott, English physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1996)
1908 – David Oistrakh, Ukrainian violinist (d. 1974)
1912 – Kenny Baker, American singer and actor (d. 1985)
1913 – Bill Walsh, American film producer and writer (d. 1975)
1915 – Lester Maddox, American businessman, one-time segregationist and Governor of Georgia (d. 2003)
1917 – Park Chunghee, President of South Korea (d. 1979)
1917 – Buddy Rich, American big band drummer (d. 1987)
1918 – Lewis Nixon, WWII Veteran (d. 1996)
1919 – Roberto Bonomi, Argentine racing driver (d. 1992)
1919 – Patricia Neway, American soprano
1920 – Aldo Parisot, Brazilian-American musician and cellist
1921 – Deborah Kerr, Scottish actress (d. 2007)
1922 – Alan Stretton, Australian general
1924 – Truman Capote, American author (d. 1984)
1926 – Robin Roberts, American baseball player
1927 – W. S. Merwin, American poet
1928 – Elie Wiesel, Romanian Holocaust survivor, author, and lecturer, recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize
1931 – Angie Dickinson, American actress
1932 – Shintaro Ishihara, Japanese author and politician (Governor of Tokyo)
1932 – Johnny Podres, American baseball player (d. 2008)
1933 – Cissy Houston, American gospel/r&b singer
1933 – Barbara Knox, English actress
1934 – Udo Jürgens, Austrian singer
1934 – Anna Kashfi, Welsh actress
1935 – Johnny Mathis, American singer
1935 – Z. Z. Hill, American blues singer (d. 1984)
1937 – Valentin Silvestrov, Ukrainian composer
1939 – Jean-Marie Lehn, French chemist, Nobel Prize laureate
1942 – Frankie Lymon, American singer (d. 1968)
1943 – Johann Deisenhofer, German chemist, Nobel Prize laureate
1943 – Marilyn McCoo, American singer (The Fifth Dimension)
1943 – Ian Ogilvy, British Actor
1944 – Diane Dufresne, French Canadian singer
1945 – Ehud Olmert, twelfth Prime Minister of Israel
1945 – Bob Lassiter, American radio personality
1946 – Paul Sheahan, Australian Test Cricketer 1967-1974
1946 – Héctor Lavoe, Puerto Rican singer (d. 1993)
1946 – Claude Vorilhon, founder of Raelism, a ufo religion
1947 – Marc Bolan, British musician (d. 1977)
1947 – Dave Arneson, American game designer
1947 – Rula Lenska,English Actress
1948 – Craig Kusick, former Major League Baseball Player
1950 – Renato Zero, Italian musician
1951 – Barry Marshall, Australian physician, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
1952 – Jack Wild, British actor (d. 2006)
1953 – Deborah Allen, American singer
1953 – S.M. Stirling, Canadian-born author
1954 – Basia Trzetrzelewska, Polish-born singer and songwriter
1954 – Barry Williams, American actor
1954 – Patrice Rushen, American musician
1957 – Fran Drescher, American actress
1958 – Marty Stuart, American musician
1959 – Ettore Messina, Italian basketball coach
1960 – Blanche Lincoln, American politician
1961 – Eric Stoltz, American actor
1961 – Crystal Bernard, American actress
1961 – Eric van de Poele, Belgian racing driver
1961 – Sally Yeh, Hong Kong singer and actress
1962 – Frank Rijkaard, Dutch football player and manager
1962 – Shaan, Indian singer
1963 – David Barbe, American musician (Mercyland) / (Sugar)
1964 – Monica Bellucci, Italian actress
1964 – Trey Anastasio, American musician (Phish)
1964 – Robby Takac, American singer and bassist (Goo Goo Dolls)
1965 – Kathleen Madigan, American comedian
1966 – Kerry G. Johnson, African American graphic designer and caricaturist
1969 – Chris Von Erich, American professional wrestler (d. 1991)
1970 – Mark Smith, English body builder, former Gladiators player
1971 – Jenna Elfman, American actress
1972 – Ari Behn, Norwegian author
1972 – Jamal Anderson, American football player
1974 – Jeremy Giambi, American baseball player
1975 – Marion Cotillard, French actress
1975 – Carlos Guillén, Venezuelan baseball player
1977 – Maia Brewton, American actress
1977 – Roy Carroll, Northern Irish footballer
1977 – Sun Jihai, Chinese footballer
1978 – Candice Michelle, American female wrestler
1978 – Róbinson Zapata, Columbian footballer (goalkeeper)
1979 – Andy van der Meyde, Dutch footballer
1979 – Clio-Danae Othoneou, Greek actress, musician and pianist
1979 – Vince Chong, Malaysian singer-songwriter
1979 – Cameron Bruce, AFL player
1980 – Camilla D’Errico, Canadian comic book artist and painter
1980 – Martina Hingis, Swiss tennis player
1981 – Cecilia Ahern, Irish author
1981 – Dominique Moceanu, American gymnast
1981 – Brandon Watson, American baseball
1982 – Lacey Chabert, American actress
1982 – Kieran Culkin, American actor
1982 – Tory Lane, American nude model, exotic dancer, and pornographic actress
1982 – Michelle Marsh, British model
1982 – Teal Redmann, American actress
1982 – Yan Stastny, Canadian ice hockey player
1982 – Ryan Stout, American comedian
1983 – Andreea Raducan, Romanian gymnast
1983 – Adam Jones, American football player
1984 – T-Pain, American rapper/singer
1985 – Adam Cooney, AFL player
1987 – Denise Laurel, Filipino actress and singer
Deaths
420 – Saint Jerome, translator of the Vulgate Bible
653 – Saint Honorius, Archbishop of Canterbury
1101 – Anselm IV, Archbishop of Milan
1246 – Yaroslav II of Russia (b. 1191)
1440 – Reginald Grey, 3rd Baron Grey de Ruthyn, English soldier and politician
1487 – John Sutton, 1st Baron Dudley, Lord Lieutenant of Ireland (b. 1400)
1551 – Ouchi Yoshitaka, Japanese warlord (b. 1507)
1560 – Melchior Cano, Spanish theologian (b. 1525)
1572 – St. Francis Borgia, Jesuit priest (b. 1510)
1581 – Hubert Languet, French diplomat and reformer (b. 1518)
1626 – Nurhaci, Manchurian chief (b. 1559)
1628 – Fulke Greville, 1st Baron Brooke, English poet (b. 1554)
1770 – Thomas Robinson, 1st Baron Grantham, English politician and diplomat
1770 – George Whitefield, English-born Methodist leader (b. 1714)
1772 – James Brindley, English engineer (b. 1716)
1865 – Samuel David Luzzatto, Italian-Jewish scholar (b. 1800)
1888 – Elizabeth Stride, widely believed to be the third victim of Jack the Ripper (b. 1843)
1888 – Catherine Eddowes, widely believed to be the fourth victim of Jack the Ripper (b. 1842)
1891 – Georges Boulanger, French general and politician (b. 1837)
1897 – St Therese of Lisieux, Roman Catholic saint and mystic (b. 1873)
1910 – Maurice Lévy, French engineer (b. 1838)
1913 – Rudolf Diesel, German inventor (b. 1858)
1942 – Hans-Joachim Marseille, German fighter pilot (b. 1919)
1943 – Franz Oppenheimer, German sociologist (b. 1864)
1955 – James Dean, American actor (automobile accident) (b. 1931)
1961 – Onésime Gagnon, French Canadian politician, lieutenant-governor of Québec (b. 1888)
1973 – Peter Pitseolak, Inuit photographer and author (b. 1902)
1974 – Carlos Prats, Chilean Constitutionalist General, assassinated in the frame of Operation Condor
1977 – Mary Ford, American singer (Les Paul and Mary Ford) (b. 1924)
1978 – Edgar Bergen, American actor and ventriloquist (b. 1903)
1985 – Simone Signoret, French actress (b. 1921)
1985 – Charles Richter, American seismologist (b. 1900)
1988 – Al Holbert, American race car driver and team owner (b. 1946)
1989 – Virgil Thompson, American composer (b. 1896)
1990 – Patrick White, Australian writer, Nobel laureate (b. 1912)
1990 – Alice Parizeau, Quebec writer and journalist (b. 1930)
1994 – Andre Michael Lwoff, French microbiologist, Nobel laureate (b. 1902)
1998 – Dan Quisenberry, American baseball player (b. 1953)
2002 – Hans-Peter Tschudi, Swiss Federal Councilor (b. 1913)
2002 – Göran Kropp, Swedish adventurer and mountaineer (b. 1966)
2003 – Robert Kardashian, Armenian-American lawyer (b. 1944)
2003 – Yusuf Bey, Black Muslim leader (b. 1935)
2004 – Gamini Fonseka, Sri Lankan actor (b. 1936)
2004 – Michael Relph, British film producer and director (b. 1915)
2008 – Joshua Benjamin Jeyaretnam, Singapore Opposition Leader & former Secretary-General of Singapore s Worker s Party (b. 1926)
Holidays and observances
RC Saints – Saint Jerome
Botswana – Independence Day (1966)
São Tomé and Príncipe – Agricultural Reform (Nationalization) Day
French Republican Calendar – Panais (Parsnip) Day, ninth day in the Month of Vendémiaire
International Translation Day, introduced in 1991 by International Federation of Translators
September 30 (Eastern Orthodox liturgics)
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