Today in History for Sept. 8:
On this date:
In 70 AD, following a six-month siege, Jerusalem surrendered to the 60,000 troops of Titus’ Roman army. Over one million Jewish citizens perished in the siege and, following the city’s capture, another 97,000 were sold into slavery.
In 1157, Richard I, King of England, known as Coeur de Lion (the Lion Heart) was born.
In 1565, a Spanish expedition established the first permanent European settlement in North America at St. Augustine, Fla.
In 1619, the first Lutheran service in Canada was held by the Jens Munk expedition to Hudson Bay.
In 1636, Harvard University was founded as a college at Cambridge, Mass. Funded by a grant from the Massachusetts Bay Colony and named for a benefactor, John Harvard, the school was initially intended as a training ground for Puritan ministers. A more generalized program of education was developed, however, and during the late 19th century Harvard became one of world's great universities.
In 1664, the Dutch surrendered New Amsterdam to the British, who renamed it New York, after the Duke of York.
In 1720, a plague hit Marseilles, France, killing more than 175,000 people.
In 1760, New France passed from French to British control. A force of 20,000 British soldiers surrounded Montreal the day before. Governor Pierre de Rigaud de Vaudreuil surrendered after being assured the laws, property and religion of French-Canadians would be protected. Montreal fell almost a year to the day after British troops captured Quebec City.
In 1860, about 400 people died when the steamship "Lady Elgin" collided with the schooner "Augusta" on Lake Michigan.
In 1900, a hurricane with winds up to 190 km/h killed about 8,000 people in Galveston, Texas. Most of the people were drowned when a tidal wave swept in from the Gulf of Mexico.
In 1910, the first Canadian aircraft engine was tested when William Gibson of Victoria made a short test flight in an aircraft powered with an engine of his own design.
In 1930, the comic strip "Blondie," created by Chic Young, was first published.
In 1930, 3M sent out the first trial shipment of "Scotch" cellulose tape.
In 1941, the 900-day Siege of Leningrad by German forces began during the Second World War.
In 1943, Italy surrendered during the Second World War.
In 1949, German composer Richard Strauss died.
In 1949, construction began in Toronto on Canada's first subway line.
In 1951, in San Francisco, representatives of 49 countries signed a treaty making Japan a sovereign country again.
In 1952, Ernest Hemingway's novel "The Old Man and the Sea" was first published.
In 1952, "The Boyd Gang," charged with murder and armed robbery, escaped from Toronto's Don Jail and sparked one of Canada's biggest manhunts. They were captured days later in a barn just north of Toronto.
In 1952, CBC launched Canada's first regular English-language television service, CBLT in Toronto. It hit the airwaves two days after the network's Montreal station began operations.
In 1968, the first of 10,000 Czech refugees arrived in Ontario. They were fleeing their homeland after the Soviet Union and other Warsaw Pact countries invaded on Aug. 20.
In 1974, U.S. President Gerald Ford granted an unconditional pardon to former president Richard Nixon for any federal crimes committed during the Nixon presidency. Nixon was forced to resign in August 1974 after his involvement in covering up the Watergate scandal became known.
In 1982, Quebec Chief Justice Jules Deschenes ruled that provincial language law sections restricting access to English schools by Anglophone Canadians were unconstitutional.
In 1987, Canadian scientists with the federal government confirmed that a large hole in the ozone layer had formed above the Arctic in the previous year. On Sept. 15, diplomats from around the world reached an agreement in Montreal on a pact to protect the ozone layer. The treaty called for industrialized countries to reduce their use of chloro-fluorocarbons (CFCs) by 50 per cent over a 10-year period.
In 1994, a USAir Boeing 737 crashed into a field while trying to land at Pittsburgh airport, killing all 132 people on board.
In 1996, CP Rail completed a nine-month move of its headquarters from Montreal to Calgary, celebrating with a street party in the Alberta city. The move saw 900 employees relocate while more than 1,400 jobs were cut.
In 1997, a severely overloaded ferry capsized as it was arriving at Montrouis, Haiti, killing as many as 400 people.
In 1999, journalist and author Adrienne Clarkson was appointed Canada's 26th Governor General, the first member of a visible minority to hold the post.
In 2004, hurricane Ivan with winds of 230 km/h, left 37 people dead, 90 per cent of buildings flattened or damaged in Grenada, as it intensified and moved toward Jamaica and Florida. The death toll rose to 68 in the next few days across the Caribbean.
In 2005, Gary Robichaud, former leader of P.E.I.’s New Democratic Party, died at age 42.
In 2005, Chinese leader Hu Jintao arrived in Canada on his first state visit.
In 2005, former Eron Mortgage vice-president Frank Biller was sentenced to three years in prison on one theft and four fraud counts in the 1997 collapse of Eron that cost investors millions of dollars.
In 2010, Indian Affairs Minister John Duncan issued the official public apology to the town of Resolute for those who were uprooted from their homeland in northern Quebec and moved to desolate spots in the High Arctic during the 1950s. His remarks were delivered at the unveiling of a stone carving near the site of the 1953 landing.
In 2014, Ray Rice was let go by the Baltimore Ravens and the NFL upgraded his suspension from two games to indefinite after a second video was released showing the star running back striking his then-fiancee in February. Rice appealed the suspension and won reinstatement to the NFL on Nov. 28, but remains a free agent.
In 2015, Stephen Colbert began his tenure as host of "The Late Show" on CBS, taking over for the retired David Letterman. Colbert previously portrayed a political talk-show host character on Comedy Central's "The Colbert Report" for nine years.
In 2018, a 2006 letter from a top Vatican official confirmed that the Holy See received information in 2000 about the sexual misconduct of a now-resigned U.S. cardinal, lending credibility to bombshell accusations of a coverup at the highest echelons of the Roman Catholic Church.
In 2018, twenty-year-old Naomi Osaka of Japan grabbed her first Grand Slam title by defeating Serena Williams in a controversial U.S. Open final. Williams was handed a code violation, a point penalty and then a game penalty for verbal abuse after she called umpire Carlos Ramos a thief. Williams later accused Ramos of sexism, saying he would never have taken a game from a male player for such remarks.
In 2019, Rafael Nadal won his 19th Grand Slam title. Nadal beat Daniil Medvedev 7-5, 6-3, 5-7, 4-6, 6-4 in the U-S Open final. Nadal said it was among his special victories. The 33-year-old Nadal played in his 27th major final, while the 23-year-old Medvedev was is in his first.
In 2019, Tenille Townes won female artist of the year at the Canadian Country Music Association Awards in Calgary. The 25-year-old from Grande Prairie, Alberta also won for single of the year for her song ''Somebody's Daughter.'' Dallas Smith, from Langley, B-C, co-hosted the awards show with Billy Ray Cyrus and was named male artist of the year. He credited his mother for getting this far and convincing his father to lend him money to make his earliest recordings.
In 2020, hundreds of thousands of children and teenagers across Canada re-entered classrooms for the first time in six months. Alberta and Quebec were among the first to report new cases of COVID-19 related to the reopening of schools. Experts said returning to class is important for social and academic development.
In 2021, the Canadian Museum of History in Gatineau, Que., hosted five federal party leaders as they verbally duked it out over health care, vaccines and the environment in an election debate. Much of the back-and-forth revolved around health care and how to pay for it.
In 2022, Queen Elizabeth died after 70 years on the throne. Buckingham Palace announced that the Queen died at Balmoral Castle, her summer residence in Scotland. She was 96. Her 73-year-old son automatically became King and became known as King Charles III. His wife, Camilla, became the Queen Consort.
In 2022, Ontario's legislature passed a bill to give the leaders of Toronto and Ottawa so-called strong mayor powers to reject bylaws conflicting with provincial priorities, such as building housing. Opposition parties said the legislation amounted to Premier Doug Ford interfering in municipal politics right before the October municipal elections. The legislation also gave the mayors responsibility for preparing and tabling their city's budget, appointing a chief administrative officer, and hiring and firing department heads, except for statutory appointments such as an auditor general or police chief.
In 2023, Hockey Canada's Beyond The Boards Summit opened in Calgary, tackling issues such as toxic masculinity, sexism, racism and homophobia.
In 2023, the death toll from a powerful earthquake that hit Morocco rose to more than 2,000 people.
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The Canadian Press