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September 2 is the 245th day of the year (246th in leap
years). There are 120 days remaining.
Events
- 31 BC - Roman Civil War: Battle of Actium - Off
the western coast of Greece, forces of Octavian defeat troops under Mark Antony and Cleopatra.
- 1666 - Great Fire of
London: A large fire breaks out in London in the house of Charles II's baker on Pudding Lane near London Bridge. The fire burns for three days destroying 10,000 buildings
including St. Paul's Cathedral, but only 16 people are
known to have died.
- 1752 - The United Kingdom
adopts the Gregorian Calendar, nearly two centuries later than
most of Western Europe.
- 1789 - United States Department of the Treasury was founded.
- 1862 - American Civil
War: President Abraham Lincoln reluctantly restores Union General George
McClellan to full command after General John Pope's disastrous defeat at the
Battle of Second Bull Run.
- 1864 - American Civil War: Union forces under General William T.
Sherman enter Atlanta, Georgia a day after the Confederate defenders fled the city.
- 1870 - Franco-Prussian
War: Battle of Sedan - Prussian forces defeat the French armies and take emperor Napoleon III and 100,000 of his soldiers prisoner at Sedan.
- 1885 - In Rock
Springs, Wyoming, 150 white miners attack their Chinese
coworkers, killing 28, wounding 15, and forcing several hundred more out of town.
- 1898 - Battle of
Omdurman - British and Egyptian troops led by Horatio
Kitchener defeat Sudanese tribesmen led by Khalifa Abdullah al-Taashi, thus establishing British dominance in the Sudan.
- 1935 - Labor Day Hurricane of 1935: A large hurricane
hit the Florida Keys killing 423.
- 1939 - Following the invasion of Poland, Freie Stadt Danzig ruled by Nazi leader Forster is annexed to Nazi Germany.
- 1944 - Holocaust: Diarist Anne Frank and her family are placed on the last transport train from Westerbork to Auschwitz. They arrive
three days later.
- 1945 - World War II ends: The
final official surrender of Japan was accepted by General Douglas MacArthur and Admiral Chester Nimitz from a delegation led by Mamoru
Shigemitsu, aboard the battleship Missouri in Tokyo
Bay. But in Japan August 14 is well recognized as the final day of the Pacific War.
- 1945 - Vietnam declares its independence forming the Democratic Republic of
Vietnam (North Vietnam).
- 1963 - CBS Evening
News becomes network television's first half-hour weeknight news broadcast, when the show is lengthened from 15 to 30 minutes.
- 1967 - The microstate Principality of Sealand unilaterally declared its independence.
- 1987 - In Moscow, the trial of 19-year-old
pilot Mathias Rust, who flew his Cessna airplane into Red Square in May 1987, begins.
- 1995 - Rock and Roll Hall of Fame opens in Cleveland, Ohio.
- 1998 - In Canada, pilots for Air Canada launch the first strike in company's history.
- 1998 - A McDonnell Douglas MD-11 airliner
carrying Swissair Flight 111 crashes near Peggy's Cove,
Nova Scotia after taking off from New York City en-route to Geneva. All 229 people on board are killed.
- 1998 - A United Nations court finds Jean-Paul Akayesu, the former
mayor of a small town in Rwanda, guilty of nine counts of genocide, marking the first time that the 1948 law banning genocide is
enforced.
Births
- 1850 - Albert Spalding,
American baseball player and sporting goods
manufacturer
- 1853 - Wilhelm Ostwald,
German chemist
- 1866 - Hiram Johnson, former
Governor of California and political activist
- 1877 - Frederick Soddy,
British chemist
- 1884 - Dr. Frank C. Laubach,
Christian missionary and
founder of Laubach Literacy
- 1917 - Cleveland Amory, author
- 1923 - Rene Thom, French mathematician
- 1929 - Hal Ashby, film director
- 1934 - Dominic Chianese,
actor
- 1936 - Andrew Grove, co-founder
and chairman of Intel
- 1948 - Christa
McAuliffe, American teacher, astronaut
- 1948 - Terry Bradshaw,
American football player
- 1951 - Mark Harmon, actor
- 1952 - Jimmy Connors, American tennis player
- 1961 - Carlos
Valderrama, Colombian football player
- 1964 - Keanu Reeves, American actor
- 1965 - Lennox Lewis, Canadian/British boxer
- 1968 - Salma Hayek, Mexican actress
Deaths
- 421 - Constantius III,
Roman Emperor
- 1764 - Revd Nathaniel
Bliss, Astronomer Royal
- 1832 - Franz Xaver, Baron Von Zach, Scientific Editor, Astronomer
- 1834 - Thomas Telford,
British civil engineer
- 1934 - Alcide Nunez, jazz musician (b. 1884)
- 1937 - Pierre de
Coubertin, French founder of the modern Olympic Games
- 1953 - US General Jonathan Wainwright, Medal of Honor recipient
- 1964 - Alvin York, most decorated
American soldier of World War I
- 1969 - Ho Chi Minh, president of
North Vietnam
- 1981 - Andrija Maurovic,
Croatian illustrator
- 1973 - J. R. R. Tolkien,
British writer
- 1992 - Barbara
McClintock, American geneticist
- 1998 - Allen Drury, author
- 2000 - Curt Siodmak, science fiction author
- 2001 - Christiaan
Barnard, South African heart surgeon
- 2001 - Troy Donahue, actor
September 1 - September
3 - August 2 - October 2 - more
historical anniversaries
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