1716 – 1st lighthouse in American colonies lit at Boston Harbor.
1814 – Francis Scott Key pens the poem “Defence of Fort M’Henry”, later known as “The Star-Spangled Banner” while witnessing the bombardment of Fort McHenry from a ship in Baltimore harbor.
1872 – Britain pays US $15 1/2m for damages during Civil War.
1901 – Theodore Roosevelt is sworn in as the youngest man to serve as US President, after William McKinley finally dies after an anarchist shoots him in Buffalo.
1930 – Detroit Lions (as Portsmouth Spartans) play 1st NFL game, win 13-6.
1933 – 2 billion board feet of lumber destroyed in Tillamook Oregon fire.
1937 – President Franklin D. Roosevelt bans US ships from trading arms with China or Japan.
1939 – World’s 1st practical helicopter, the VS-300 designed by Igor Sikorsky takes (tethered) flight in Stratford, Connecticut.
1948 – Milton Berle starts his TV career on Texaco Star Theater.
1956 – IBM introduces the RAMAC 305, 1st commercial computer with a hard drive that uses magnetic disk storage, weighs over a ton.
1963 – Mary Ann Fischer of Aberdeen, South Dakota, gives birth to America’s 1st surviving quintuplets, 4 girls & a boy.
1964 – Walt Disney & Walter Lippmann awarded Medal of Freedom at White House.
1972 – “The Waltons” TV program premieres on CBS starring Richard Thomas and Ralph White.
1981 – Entertainment Tonight premieres on TV.
1985 – “The Golden Girls”, starring Bea Arthur, Betty White, Rue McClanahan, and Estelle Getty, debuts on NBC.
1991 – San Diego State freshman running back Marshall Faulk rushes for NCAA record 386 yards and scores 7 touchdowns as the Aztecs beat Pacific, 55-34.
1994 – MLB team owners vote to cancel remainder of 1994 season, as well as the World Series for only the second time in history; continuing labor dispute with Players Association.
1998 – Telecommunications companies MCI Communications and WorldCom complete their $37 billion merger to form MCI WorldCom.
2001 – Historic National Prayer Service held at Washington National Cathedral for victims of the September 11 attacks. A similar service is held in Canada on Parliament Hill, the largest vigil ever held in the nation’s capital.
2011 – Elizabeth Warren announces she intends to run for Democratic nomination for the 2012 Massachusetts Senatorial election.
2018 – Hurricane Florence makes landfall near Wrightsville Beach, North Carolina, as a category 1 hurricane.
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