This Week in History
by Dianne Hermann
“The secret to happiness is freedom.
The secret to freedom is courage.” Carrie Jones
Sept. 1-7, 2025
September 1
1752 – The Liberty Bell arrives in Philadelphia from France. The Pennsylvania Assembly ordered the Bell in 1751 to commemorate the 50-year anniversary of William Penn’s 1701 Charter of Privileges, Pennsylvania’s original Constitution. The cause of the bell’s famous crack is unknown.
1807 – Former Vice President Aaron Burr is found innocent of treason. He was accused of leading a cabal whose goal was to create an independent country in present day Texas. President Thomas Jefferson, then in his second term, ordered Burr arrested. In the election of 1800, Jefferson and Burr tied in the number of electoral votes. The tie was broken by a vote in the House of Representatives due to the influence of Alexander Hamilton. Burr served as Jefferson’s vice president. Vice President Burr killed Hamilton in a duel in 1804.
1914 – The passenger pigeon becomes extinct when a female pigeon named Martha dies in captivity in the Cincinnati Zoo. The passenger pigeon was once the most common bird in the U.S., numbering in the billions. Its demise is the result of overhunting, habitat loss, and disease. A Smithsonian taxidermist mounts Martha’s skin and she is on display at the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History.
1942 – A Federal judge upholds the detention of Japanese-Americans during World War II.
1985 – A U.S.-French expedition led by Robert Ballard locates the wreckage of the Titanic off the coast of Newfoundland. On this date in 1998, the movie “Titanic” went on sale in the U.S.
1995 – The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame building, designed by I. M. Pei, opens in Cleveland, Ohio. The foundation was established in 1983. Cleveland is the home of Alan Freed, the disc jockey credited with coining the term “rock and roll.” Take a virtual tour of the museum.
2005 – Seven members and former members of the AFL-CIO form a new trade unions organization called the Change to Win Federation as an alternative to the AFL-CIO. Its president is James P. Hoffa, son of the late Jimmy Hoffa.
September 2
1789 – Congress establishes the U.S. Treasury Department.
1919 – The Communist Party of America organizes in Chicago, Illinois, as a result of a split in the Socialist Party of America. In 1954, President Eisenhower signed legislation outlawing the Communist Party in the U.S. Its current membership is estimated to be around 5,000 people.
1945 – V-J Day (Victory in Japan) is when World War II ends after the formal surrender of Japan aboard the battleship USS Missouri.
1963 – Gov. George C. Wallace (D-AL) prevents the integration of Tuskegee High School by shutting down the school. In June 1963, Governor Wallace blocked the entrance to the University of Alabama as a symbolic attempt to keep his campaign promise, “Segregation now, segregation tomorrow, segregation forever.” Watch his speech.
1969 – The first automatic teller machine (ATM) in the U.S. is installed in Rockville Center, New York.
1987 – Donald Trump spends almost $100,000 on a full page New York Times ad criticizing the U.S. trade policies with countries like Japan.
1992 – The U.S. and Russia agree to a joint venture to build a space station. The first module was launched in 1998. The first crew arrived in 2000. By 2011, 159 components had been added. The ISS has an estimated cost of $150 billion.
September 3
1752 – The United Kingdom and its American colonies (now the U.S.) adopt the Gregorian calendar and September 3rd becomes September 14th. Pope Gregory XIII replaced the Julian calendar with the Gregorian calendar in 1582 and the change took effect in most Catholic states.
1783 – The Treaty of Paris is signed, ending the U.S. Revolutionary War of Independence.
1895 – The first professional football game is played. Quarterback John Brallier was paid $10 per game plus expenses. His team Latrobe won that first game 12-0 over Jeannette in Indiana.
1925 – The dirigible “USS Shenandoah” crashes during a storm near Caldwell Ohio, killing all 14 passengers and crew on board. It was its 57th flight. Watch the crash (no sound).
1929 – The Dow Jones Industrial Average reaches its all-time high of 381.17 shortly before the Crash of 1929.
1954 – The Espionage and sabotage Act of 1954 is signed, broadening what constitutes “war material” and “national defense material,” in response to growing tensions during the Cold War.
1995 – eBay is founded by Pierre Omidyar, the French-born, American-educated son of Iranian immigrants. eBay was originally called “Auction Web.”
2019 – Walmart announces it will stop selling handguns and certain kinds of ammunition in response to the shooting in El Paso, Texas, that killed 23 people and wounded 23 others. They also asked customers not to carry weapons into their stores. Walmart now sells guns and ammunition in about half of 4,700 stores.
September 4
1813 – The “Religious Remembrancer Christian Observer” is the first religious newspaper published in the U.S. It was started at the Presbyterian Publishing Center of Philadelphia.
1886 – Apache Chief Geronimo surrenders, ending last major U.S.-Indian war. He died at Fort Sill, Oklahoma, in 1909 at the age of 79.
1950 – For the first time a helicopter is used to rescue an American soldier behind enemy lines. Captain Robert E. Wayne was rescued after his aircraft was shot down over Korea. H-5 helicopter pilot First Lieutenant Paul van Boven was awarded the Silver Star for gallantry in action. Wayne, a West Point graduate, died in 1998 at age 72 and van Boven, a former WWII POW, died in 2003 at age 80.
1957 – The Arkansas National Guard is ordered by Democrat Governor Orval Faubus to keep nine black students from going into Little Rock’s Central High School. President Eisenhower subsequently issued an executive order federalizing the Arkansas National Guard and ordering them to protect the students.
1966 – The first Muscular Dystrophy telethon hosted by Jerry Lewis is held over this Labor Day weekend. Jerry Lewis started local and regional MD events in 1952. The first telethon raises $15,000. The telethons have raised over $2 billion in 50 years. Lewis last hosted the telethon in 2011 and died in 2017 at age 91. The last telethon aired in 2014. Watch an early telethon clip.
1967 – Michigan Gov. George Romney, who was a presidential candidate for the 1968 republican nomination, said during a TV interview that he had undergone “brainwashing” by U.S. officials while visiting Vietnam in 1965. Romney dropped out of the presidential race in February 1968.
1998 – Google is incorporated by founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, students at Stanford University in California. The domain name was registered on September 15, 1997.
2018 – Nike announces that Colin Kaepernick will be the face of their 30th anniversary “Just Do It” advertising campaign. Kaepernick knelt during the National Anthem before football games. He announced his free agency in March 2017, but still has not been picked up by any football team. He has worked out for football teams, but he is currently unemployed.
2019 – YouTube is fined $170 million by the Federal Trade Commission for illegally collecting data on the viewing habits of children.
September 5
1774 – The Continental Congress assembles for the first time in Carpenter’s Hall in Philadelphia with 56 delegates from 12 colonies (Georgia is not represented).
1906 – Saint Louis University football player Bradbury Robinson makes the first legal forward pass in football to teammate Jack Schneider.
1945 – Iva Toguri D’Aquino is arrested for being the wartime radio propagandist “Tokyo Rose.” She served six years in prison and is later pardoned by President Gerald Ford. D’Aquino died in 2006 at age 90.
1960 – Wilma Rudolph, called the world’s fastest woman, wins her second of three gold medals in track and field at the Olympic Games in Rome, Italy. Wilma suffered from polio as a child and overcame numerous childhood health issues and racial barriers to compete in the Olympics. After the 1960 Olympics, she became a teacher and track coach. Wilma died of brain cancer in November 1994 at age 54. Watch her run.
1975 – Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme attempts to assassinate President Gerald Ford in Sacramento, California. Fromme was sentenced to life in prison, but was released on parole in 2009. She is now 76 years old.
1978 – Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin, and U.S. President Jimmy Carter start a peace conference at Camp David, Maryland. Sadat and Begin shared the 1978 Nobel Peace Prize.
2018 – An anonymous senior White House official published the opinion article in the New York Times “I am part of the resistance inside the Trump administration.”
September 6
1716 – The first lighthouse in the U.S., The Boston Light, is built in Boston, Massachusetts. The lighthouse is still operational and staffed full time.
1899 – Carnation evaporated milk (called Carnation Sterilized Cream) is processed for the first time at a plant in Kent, Washington. The company later changed its name to Carnation Milk Company.
1901 – President William McKinley is shot by anarchist Leon Czolgosz at the Pan American Exposition in Buffalo, New York. When he died 8 days later, Vice President Teddy Roosevelt became president.
1909 – Word reaches civilization that Admiral Robert Peary successfully traveled to the North Pole 5 months earlier. The New York Times printed the story on the 7th, but Dr. Frederick A. Cook claimed to have reached the pole in April 1908, one year before Peary.
1954 – The Alan Freed Show premiers at WINS radio in New York City and he begins playing what he calls “Rock ‘n Roll” music. In 1962, Freed plead guilty during the “payola” scandal to two charges of commercial bribery, was fined, and received a suspended sentence. Freed, who died in 1965 at the age of 43, was inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 1986. In 2014, Freed’s ashes were removed from the Hall of Fame and placed in a Cleveland cemetery.
1995 – Cal Ripken Jr. of the Baltimore Orioles breaks Lou Gehrig’s consecutive game record when he plays in 2,131 consecutive baseball games. Ripken stretches the record to 2,632 consecutive games over his 16-year career. Watch him homer in the game.
2000 – The U.N. Millennium Summit begins in New York. It was the largest gathering of world leaders in history with more than 150 dignitaries attending.
2002 – Congress convenes at Federal Hall in New York City for a rare special session to express the nation’s mourning for the loss on September 11, 2001, and express unity in the war against terrorism.
September 7
1813 – “Uncle Sam” is first used to refer to the United States. The nickname is attributed to meatpacker Samuel Wilson of Troy, New York, who supplied barrels of meat to American troops during the War of 1812. The barrels are stamped with “U.S.” and the meat is soon referred to as Uncle Sam’s.
1876 – An attempted robbery by the James/ Younger gang of the First National Bank of Northfield, Minnesota, fails and a resident is killed as the gang escapes. Frank and Jesse James get away, but Cole, Bob, and Jim Younger were arrested weeks later, tried, convicted of murder, and sentenced to 25 years in prison. Bob died in prison in 1889. Jim is pardoned in 1901 but committed suicide the next year. Cole is also pardoned in 1901 and died in 1916. Jesse James was murdered in 1882 and Frank James died in 1915 at the age of 72.
1956 – Air Force Capt. Iven Kincheloe, Jr., sets an unofficial manned aircraft altitude record when he flies his Bell X-2 more than 126,000 feet above the earth. The U.S. Air Force and Department of Defense refused to confirm the record and have never changed their decision.
1979 – The Entertainment and Sports Programming Network (ESPN) makes its television debut.
1981 – Judge Wapner and the People’s Court premiers on TV and aired until 1993. The judges for the second version were former NYC Mayor Ed Koch (1997-1999), then Jerry Sheindlin, husband of Judge Judy (1999-2001), and finally Marilyn Milian (2001-2023). Judge Joseph Wapner died in 2017 at age 97. Watch the Judge Wapner discuss his most memorable case.
2008 – The U.S. Government takes control of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the two largest mortgage / financing companies in the U.S.
Image from: nps.gov