Today in History for Sept. 18:
On this date:
In 52, Marcus Trajan, emperor of Rome from 98-117, was born. He was the third Roman emperor to rule, after Nero (54-68) and Domitian (81-96), who persecuted the early Church. During Trajan’s reign, the apostolic Father Ignatius of Antioch was martyred, in 117.
In 1759, the French formally surrendered Quebec to the British following the Battle of the Plains of Abraham.
In 1762, the French garrison at St. John's, Nfld., surrendered to the British in the last battle between the French and English in Canada.
In 1810, Chile declared independence from Spain.
In 1839, Nova Scotia politician Joseph Howe published his famous letters to Lord John Russell on the subject of responsible government.
In 1841, an act was passed to establish and maintain public schools in Canada.
In 1851, the New York Times was published for the first time.
In 1875, the Supreme Court of Canada was organized under Chief Justice William Buell Richards. The court held its first session the following year, but did not become Canada's final court of appeal until 1949.
In 1885, compulsory vaccination caused riots in Montreal.
In 1888, the writer-conservationist known as Grey Owl was born Archibald Stansfield Belaney in Hastings, England. After an unhappy childhood during which he dreamed of becoming a North American native, Belaney moved to Canada at age 17 and claimed to be the son of a Scot and an Apache. Using the name Grey Owl, Belaney became a popular author and lecturer on the need for wilderness conservation. His true identity was not discovered until after his death in Prince Albert, Sask., on April 13, 1938. Grey Owl was the subject of a 1999 movie starring Pierce Brosnan.
In 1893, Stanley Thompson, considered Canada's finest golf course architect, was born. His world-renowned designs include Jasper Park Lodge and Banff Springs in Alberta, Capilano in Vancouver, and St. George's in Toronto. He died in 1953.
In 1895, John Diefenbaker, Tory prime minister from 1957-63, was born in Neustadt, Ont. He died Aug. 16, 1979.
In 1899, built at a cost of $2.5 million, the original Toronto City Hall was formally opened by Mayor John Shaw.
In 1928, the "Graf Zeppelin," considered the finest airship ever built, had its first flight. It flew more miles than any airship had done to that time or would in the future.
In 1931, the Japanese army invaded Manchuria in northern China.
In 1934, the Soviet Union was admitted to the League of Nations.
In 1949, actor Frank Morgan died at the age of 59. He's probably best known for playing the wizard in "The Wizard of Oz."
In 1959, Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev proposed at the United Nations that all nations disarm within four years.
In 1961, UN Secretary General Dag Hammarskjold and 12 others died in a plane crash near the border between Congo and Rhodesia. He was 56.
In 1975, American newspaper heiress Patricia Hearst was captured by the FBI in San Francisco, 19 months after she was kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army.
In 1984, Team Canada defeated Sweden 6-5 in Edmonton to sweep the Canada Cup hockey tournament final in two games. Canada had knocked off the Soviet Union in a thrilling semifinal on an overtime goal by Mike Bossy.
In 1984, thousands of aboriginal Canadians were disappointed when heavy fog prevented Pope John Paul from visiting them at Fort Simpson, N.W.T. The Pope kept a promise to visit them when he held mass in Fort Simpson on Sept. 20, 1987.
In 1987, the United States and the Soviet Union agreed to eliminate intermediate-range nuclear weapons from their arsenals.
In 1989, Ontario NDP Premier Bob Rae was among 15 people arrested during an anti-logging protest near a stand of old-growth pines at Temagami in northern Ontario.
In 1992, nine miners were killed in a violent explosion inside the strike-torn Giant gold mine in Yellowknife, N.W.T. RCMP believed the explosion was deliberately set. A miner, Roger Warren, was later convicted of first-degree murder.
In 1997, voters in Wales voted 50.3 per cent in favour of setting up their own parliament, after four centuries of direct rule from London.
In 2000, former Manitoba premier Gary Filmon resigned his seat in the legislature, formally ending a 25-year political career.
In 2001, Ernie Coombs, CBC television’s beloved "Mr. Dressup" who retired in 1996 after 31 years on the air, died at age 73.
In 2004, John Tory was elected leader of the Ontario Progressive Conservative party, succeeding Ernie Eves at the party’s convention in Toronto.
In 2005, parliamentary elections were held in Afghanistan for the first time in four decades amid reports of violence.
In 2006, a suicide bomber on a bicycle killed four Canadian soldiers and injured dozens of civilians while the soldiers were on foot patrol in the Panjwaii district in Afghanistan. Pte. David Byers, Cpl. Shane Keating and Cpl. Keith Morley were based in Shilo, Man., and Cpl. Glen Arnold was based in Petawawa, Ont.
In 2006, a public inquiry exonerated Syrian-born Canadian engineer Maher Arar, who was deported from the U.S. to Syria in 2002, where he was tortured as a terrorist suspect. Justice Dennis O'Connor said inexperienced RCMP investigators wrongly provided Americans with inaccurate evidence about Arar. It said there was no evidence Arar had committed any offence or was a threat to Canadian security.
In 2006, Bernard Lord's two-term Conservative government was ousted by the Liberals in the New Brunswick election. Shawn Graham led the Liberals to 29 seats. The Conservatives won 26.
In 2007, a storm in Minnesota knocked Saskatchewan’s power system off-line, leaving more than 60 per cent of the province in the dark.
In 2008, Ron Lancaster, a CFL Hall of Famer known during his playing days as "The Little General," died at age 69. His illustrious CFL career began in 1960 in Ottawa where he won a Grey Cup in his rookie year. After the 1962 season, the Rough Riders dealt him to Saskatchewan where he spent 16 years, leading the Roughriders to their first-ever Grey Cup title in 1966. He finished his 19-year playing career with 3,384 passes for 50,535 yards and 333 touchdowns.
In 2008, O.J. Simpson was charged with seven felonies, including kidnapping, in the alleged armed robbery of sports memorabilia collectors in a Las Vegas casino-hotel room. He was convicted in October and was later sentenced to 33 years in prison with eligibility for parole after nine years. (He was granted parole effective October 2017).
In 2009, CBS aired the final episode of the soap opera "Guiding Light" after a 72-year run that predated television. The Guinness Book of World Records had cited it as the longest-running television drama. It began as a 15-minute serial on NBC Radio on Jan. 25, 1937, and debuted on CBS TV on June 30, 1952, focusing on the fictional town of Springfield and the Spaulding, Lewis and Cooper families.
In 2010, Inderjit Singh Reyat, the only man convicted in the bombings of Air India Flight 182 and at Japan's Narita Airport in 1985, was found guilty of perjury during the trial of two other men acquitted of mass murder and conspiracy charges. (He was handed a nine-year sentence, and lost his appeal in 2013. In 2017, the Parole Board of Canada allowed him to leave a halfway house where he was required to stay following his release from prison in 2016.)
In 2011, thousands of homeless villagers in the Himalayas spent a miserable night outdoors in heavy rains after a 6.9-magnitude earthquake flattened houses and rescuers struggled to reach victims in the mountains of India, Nepal and Tibet. The quake killed 104 people and damaged more than 100,000 homes.
In 2013, a double-decker Ottawa city bus rolled through a flashing level crossing and plowed into the side of a passing Via rail train. The collision sheared off the front of the bus and knocked the locomotive and the first of four passenger cars off the tracks. Six people on the bus died, including the driver, while 30 others were injured.
In 2013, Boxing Hall-of-Famer Ken Norton, forever linked to Muhammad Ali for their trio of fights, died at age 70.
In 2014, in a historic referendum that saw an unprecedented turnout, Scottish voters rejected independence 55 to 45 per cent, preventing the rupture of a 307-year union with England. Britain promised Scotland new powers on taxes, spending and welfare.
In 2016, the Paralympics wrapped up in Rio de Janeiro and Canada finished with 29 medals (eight golds, 10 silvers and 11 bronzes), good for 14th overall. China led all nations with 239 medals.
In 2017, Hurricane Maria swept over the small Caribbean island of Dominica with catastrophic Category 5 winds, causing widespread devastation and leaving it virtually incommunicado. Two days later, Maria, now a Category 4, ravaged the island of Puerto Rico, knocking out power across the entire U.S. territory and triggering landslides and floods.
In 2018, Nova Scotia introduced legislation to make the funeral home industry more accountable after a woman's remains were mistakenly cremated when a home in the Annapolis Valley mixed up the bodies of two women who died a day apart.
In 2018, a judge ruled a Quebec trucker's prolonged inattentiveness triggered a horrific crash on an Ontario highway that left four people dead and several others injured. Mohinder Saini was convicted of four counts of dangerous driving causing death after his transport truck plowed into 20 vehicles that were slowed and stopped in a construction zone on Oct. 2, 2015.
In 2018, the U.S.-China trade war escalated with China announcing retaliatory tax increases on $60 billion worth of U.S. imports, including coffee, honey and industrial chemicals.
In 2018, a Russian reconnaissance aircraft was shot down by Syrian forces responding to an Israeli airstrike, killing all 15 people aboard. The incident threatened previously close security ties between Russia and Israel, further destabilizing the region.
In 2018, Japanese billionaire Yusaku Maezawa announced he planned to blast off on the first-ever private commercial trip around the moon and would invite six to eight artists, architects, designers and other creative people to join him. The SpaceX Big Falcon Rocket was scheduled to make the trip in 2023.
In 2019, Canadian author Graeme Gibson died at 85. A co-founder of the Writers' Trust of Canada and the Writers' Union of Canada, Gibson also served as president of PEN Canada. He was the author of novels including "Five Legs," "Perpetual Motion" and "Gentleman Death," and a member of the Order of Canada. For the past several decades, Gibson lived in Toronto with his partner, author Margaret Atwood. Atwood said in a statement he was suffering from dementia.
In 2019, health officials in London, Ont. reported a high-school-aged youth was on life support after smoking e-cigarettes, but had since recovered. The Middlesex-London Health Unit said the youth was in the intensive care unit with a severe pulmonary illness. The vaping-related illness was believed to be the first confirmed case in Canada. An article, published November 21st in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, was written by six doctors who treated the 17-year-old boy during a 47-day hospital stay. They said he went from being in perfect health to being on life support after just five months of regularly using e-cigarettes. The article outlined his hospitalization in early 2019, during which he spent time on life support and narrowly averted a double-lung transplant.
In 2019, the Liberals launched into damage control mode after a photo was published by Time magazine showing party leader Justin Trudeau in “brownface” makeup at a 2001 costume party. The picture was taken at an “Arabian Nights” party at a B-C private school. Another two photos and then a video soon emerged showing Trudeau also in "blackface." That left Trudeau apologizing for what he called a terrible mistake and that he was angry with himself for being so dumb. Time magazine posted the photo, which was published in the yearbook from the West Point Grey Academy, a private school in Vancouver where Trudeau worked as a teacher before entering politics. Trudeau says when he sought public office he never told anyone that he had worn "blackface" years earlier because he was too embarrassed. He says he acted as a person raised with privilege that blinded him from the realities of racism.
In 2020, confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus topped 30 million worldwide, with more than half of them from just three countries — the U.S., India and Brazil.
In 2020, Bloc Quebecois leader Yves-Francois Blanchet tested positive for COVID-19, but said he felt fine. Blanchet's wife, Nancy, tested positive for the illness earlier in the week. The Bloc leader was already in self-isolation, along with much of his caucus and other aides, after a staff member contracted COVID-19. Hours later, Conservative Leader Erin O'Toole also tested positive for COVID-19. Quebec Premier Francois said he would get tested because he had met with O'Toole earlier in the week.
In 2020, the president of the Public Health Agency of Canada announced her intention to step down. As the country headed into a second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic, Tina Namiesniowski said in a letter to staff that after six months responding to the crisis, she needed a break. She thanked Canada's chief public health officer, Dr. Theresa Tam, for her support and said they'd made "an exceptional team."
In 2020, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died at 87. The diminutive yet towering women's rights champion, who became the court's second female justice, died at her home in Washington of complications from metastatic pancreatic cancer. Ginsburg announced in July that she was undergoing chemotherapy treatment for lesions on her liver, the latest of her several battles with cancer.
In 2021, a Canadian-led study finds the area of the globe covered by coral reefs has been cut in half since 1950. Fishers along reefs have to spend more than twice as much time and effort to land the same catch they did 50-years-ago. And reefs around the world have lost almost two-thirds of their biodiversity. Study author Tyler Eddy of Newfoundland's Memorial University says the culprits range from overfishing to pollution to climate change.
In 2021, Conservative Leader Erin O'Toole insisted he was running a safe campaign. But O'Toole, during a campaign stop in Dundas, Ont., wouldn't say just how many of his candidates were fully vaccinated against COVID-19. Instead, he turned the focus to Justin Trudeau, condemning the Liberal leader for calling an election during a pandemic.
In 2021, ''Belfast'' was the big winner at the Toronto International Film Festival. The Northern Ireland-set family drama from writer-director Kenneth Branagh won the People's Choice prize.
---
The Canadian Press