September in Pop Culture Trivia

September Facts, Fun Trivia and History

September History Highlights

  • September Gemstone: Sapphire
  • September Flower:: Morning Glory
  • The Autumn Equinox is September 22
  • More people are born in September than any other month!

Traditional September Information

According to the Georgian calendar, September is the ninth month. But, on the Roman calendar, it was the seventh month. September has had 29 days, and 31 days; but, since the time of the emperor Augustus, it has had only 30 days.

September is one of the warmest months in the Southern United States. Northern states have warm September days, but the nights get much cooler. It is also harvest time for crops. And, in Switzerland, it’s called Harvest Month.

June is often considered a “summer month”, whereas September is not. This is even though September has twice as many summer days as June.

September is…

Baby Safety Month
Better Breakfast Month
Blueberry Popsicle Month
Chicken Month
Classical Music Month
Gynecologic Cancer Awareness Month
National Hispanic Heritage Month
Honey Month
Leukemia and Lymphoma Awareness Month
Mushroom Month
National Ovarian Cancer Month
National Prostate Cancer Awareness Month
Papaya Month
National Piano Month
Potato Month
Rice Month
Self Improvement Month
Thyroid Cancer Awareness Month
Libra is the seventh astrological sign in the Zodiac, represented by the Scales. It is associated with the element of air, and is considered a cardinal sign. Those born under this sign are said to be balanced, diplomatic, and charming. Libra is ruled by the planet Venus, and its corresponding astrological period is typically considered to be from September 23 to October 22. Libra is known for being balanced, diplomatic and charming. They are also known for their love of beauty and harmony. They can be indecisive and have a hard time making decisions. They are also known for their strong sense of justice and fairness.

What is the Moon Festival?

Every year on the fifteenth day of the eighth month of the lunar calendar, when the moon is at its maximum brightness for the entire year, the Chinese celebrate “zhong qui jie.” Children are told the story of the moon fairy living in a crystal palace, who comes out to dance on the moon’s shadowed surface.

The legend surrounding the “lady living in the moon” dates back to ancient times, to a day when ten suns appeared at once in the sky. The Emperor ordered a famous archer, Hou Yi, to shoot down the nine extra suns. Once the task was accomplished, the Goddess of the Western Heaven rewarded the archer with a pill that would make him immortal. However, his wife, Chang Er, found the pill, took it, because Hou Yi was a tyrant, and was banished to the moon as a result.

Legend says that her beauty is greatest on the Moon festival day. Today, Chinese people celebrate the Mid-Autumn festival with dances, feasting and moon gazing. Not to mention mooncakes. While baked goods are common at most Chinese celebrations, mooncakes are inextricably linked with the Moon festival. Roughly the size of a human palm, these mooncakes are quite filling, meant to be cut diagonally in quarters and passed around.

The Month of September

To many ancient people, the waning of the light signaled death. For example, in Welsh mythology, this is the day of the year when the God of Darkness, Goronwy, defeats the God of Light, Llew, and takes his place as King of the world.

To this day in Japan, the equinox is celebrated by visits to the graves of family members, at which time offerings of flowers and food are made and incense is burned. The three days preceding and following the equinox are called “higan,” or the “Other side of the River of Death.
– Folklore

The definition of a Harvest Moon is the full moon closest to the fall equinox. The Harvest Moon was thus named because it rises within a half-hour of when the sunsets. In the early days, when farmers had no tractors, it was essential that they work by the light of the moon to bring in the harvest.

This moon is the fullest moon of the year. When you gaze at it, it looks very large and gives a lot of light throughout the entire night. No other lunar spectacle is as awesome as the Harvest Moon.

“The tale of Mabon of Modron, the Welsh God, (the “great son of the great mother”), also known as the Son of Light, the Young Son, or Divine Youth, is celebrated. The Equinox is also the birth of Mabon, from his mother Modron, the Guardian of the Outerworld, the Healer, the Protector, the Earth.

Mabon was taken after he is a mere three nights old (some variations of the legend say he is taken after three years). Through the wisdom of the living animals — the Stag, Blackbird, Owl, Eagle, and Salmon — Mabon is freed from his mysterious captivity. All the while Mabon had rested within his mother’s womb; a place of nurturing and challenge.

With strength and lessons gained within the magickal Outerworld (Modron’s womb), Mabon is soon reborn as his mother’s Champion, the Son of Light, wielding the strength and wisdom acquired during his captivity.”
– Joyous Mabon

September Quotes

“By all these lovely tokens September days are here
With summer’s best of weather And autumn’s best of cheer.”
-unknown

“Try to remember the kind of September
When life was slow and oh so mellow
Try to remember the kind of September
When grass was green and grain so yellow
Try to remember the kind of September
When you were a young and a callow fellow
Try to remember and if you remember
Then follow–follow, oh-oh.”
– Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt in Try to Remember

“Happy we who can bask in this warm September sun, which illumines all creatures, as well when they rest as when they toil, not without a feeling of gratitude; whose life is as blameless, how blameworthy soever it may be, on the Lord’s Mona-day as on his Suna-day.”
– Henry David Thoreau

“September’s Baccalaureate
A combination is Of Crickets – Crows – and Retrospects
And a dissembling Breeze
that hints without assuming –
An Innuendo sear that makes the Heart put up its Fun
And turn Philosopher.”
– Emily Dickinson

“Do you remember the 21st night of September?
Love was changing the minds of pretenders
While chasing the clouds away
Our hearts were ringing
In the key that our souls were singing.
As we danced in the night,
Remember how the stars stole the night away.”
– Maurice White, Charles Stepney and Verdine White (Earth Wind and Fire) in September

“September morn,
Do you remember how we danced that night away
Two lovers playing scenes from some romantic play
September morning still can make me feel this way.”
– Neil Diamond and Gilbert Becaud in September Morn’

September History

September 1
1651 – Robinson Crusoe, a fictional character, began on his first sea voyage, from Hull to London.
1661 – In the first official well-known Yacht Race, England’s King Charles lost to his brother, James.
1752 – “Proclaim LIBERTY throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof” The Liberty Bell was officially placed in the Pennsylvania State House (now Independence Hall) in Philadelphia.
1799 – The Bank of Manhattan Company (now Chase Manhattan) opened in New York City.
1859 – The Carrington Event, a large solar flare (a coronal mass ejection – CME, solar superstorm) affected many of the (relatively few) electronics and telegraph lines on Earth.
1872 – Linda Ann Judson Richards graduated from the Training School of the New England Hospital for Women and Children and became America’s first Nurse.
1894 – Juno, one of the four largest asteroids in the Main Belt, was discovered by the German astronomer Karl Ludwig Harding.
1894 – Great Hinckley Fire, Minnesota
1897 – Boston’s Tremont Street Subway opened.
1902 – A Trip to the Moon, considered one of the first science fiction films, was released in France.
1923 (Volcano Eruption & Earthquake) Kanto, Japan
1935 – Labor Day Hurricane, Florida
1939 – Adolf Hitler signed an order to begin the systematic euthanasia of mentally ill and disabled people.
1939 – World War II began with Germany’s invasion of Poland.
1948 – The United Nation’s World Health Organization was founded.
1952 – The Old Man and the Sea, the Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Ernest Hemingway, was first published.
1968 – Irvin Feld opened the Clown College, in Venice, Florida.
1969 – Muammar el-Qaddafi overthrew King Idris, and founded the Libyan Arab Republic.
1972 – Bobby Fischer defeated Boris Spassky of the USSR. He was the first American to compete in the tournament.
1972 – Mark Spitz won his 4th and 5th Olympic Medals (he won 7 in total in the ’72 Olympics)
1977 – The first TRS-80 Model I computer was sold at Radio Shack.1978 – Battle of the Planets premiered in syndication.
1979 – An LA Court ordered Clayton Moore to stop wearing the Lone Ranger mask. The copyright owners did not want any association with him, although he used his fame as the Television face as the Lone Ranger as a positive example of what the Ranger (and Tonto) represented. He began wearing wrap-around shades instead.
1979 – Pioneer 2 flew past Saturn discovering an eleventh moon and two new rings.
1982 – The United States Air Force Space Command was founded.
1983 – Korean Airlines Boeing 747, flight 007 was shot down by Soviets in Russian airspace.
1985 – The remains of the Titanic, sunk by an iceberg in 1912, were discovered in the North Atlantic.
1986 – CBS Evening News anchorman Dan Rather initiated the use of the word “Courage” as a slogan at the end of his broadcast. He stopped about a week later.
1991- E! News had its first live broadcast
1994- The Independent Film Channel made its debut
1997 – Disney Channel ended their 14 year run of being a subscription TV channel. They continued the channel free of charge.
2004 – Chechen terrorists took over 1,000 schoolchildren and others, hostage, in Beslan, Russia.
September 2
44 BC – Cicero started the first of his Philippics (oratorical attacks) on Mark Antony.
1192 – The Treaty of Jaffa was signed between Richard I of England and Saladin, leading to the end of the Third Crusade.
1666 – The Great Fire of London destroyed more than 13,000 homes along with St. Paul’s Church.
1752 (Julian year) – Great Britain adopted the Gregorian calendar, making the next day September 14, 1752. There was no September 3-13 in the British Empire, including the American colonies.
1754 (Earthquake) Cairo, Egypt
1789 – The United States Treasury Department was established.
1837 – General Sherman took Atlanta, after four weeks of fighting.
1837 – Samuel F.B. Morse patented his telegraph for sending messages. Ben Franklin was the first to send an electrical signal through a wire in 1750.
1897 – McCall Magazine began publication.
1901 – Vice President of the US, Theodore Roosevelt, used the famous phrase, “Speak softly and carry a big stick” at the Minnesota State Fair.
1912 – Arthur Rose Eldred was awarded the first Eagle Scout award of the Boy Scouts of America.
1944 – Future President George H.W. Bush ejected from his damaged plane in WW II.
1945 – Japan formally surrendered World War II.
1963 – CBS Evening News expanded from 15 minutes to 30 minutes, the first network to do so. NBC followed on September 9.
1969- Chemical Bank installed the first United States ATM in the U.S. at its branch in Rockville Centre, New York.
1985 – NBC began broadcasting in stereo.
1992 (EArthquake) Nicaragua killing at least 116 people.
2005 – On NBC’s Concert for Hurricane Relief, Kanye West stated that”George Bush doesn’t care about black people”
September 3
1189 – Richard The Lion-Hearted was crowned King of England at Westminster Abbey.
1192 – King Richard settled a peace with Muslim general Saladin, allowing Christian pilgrims and merchants access to Muslim-held Jerusalem.
1752 – September 3-13 never happened for many, thanks to Great Britain adopting the Gregorian calendar. People rioted, believing that the government had stolen 11 days of their lives
1777 – At Cooch’s Bridge, in Newark Delaware, an early skirmish of American Revolutionary war took place, where the Flag of the United States was flown in battle for the first time.
1783 – The Treaty of Paris officially ended the Revolutionary War.
1813 – Uncle Sam was seen for the first time, in Troy, New York.
1833 – The first issue of the New York Sun, New York’s first penny paper, was published.
1838 – Future abolitionist Frederick Douglass escaped from slavery.
1928 – Baseball Hall of Famer Ty Cobb got his 4,191th and last career hit.
1935 – 1st automobile to exceed 300 mph, Sir Malcolm Campbell (301.337 mph)
1944 – Anne Frank and her family were placed on the last transport train from the Westerbork transit camp to the Auschwitz concentration camp, and arrived three days later.
1950 – The Beetle Bailey, the comic strip, debuted.
1951 – Search for Tomorrow premiered on CBS.
1976 – The American Viking 2 spacecraft landed at Utopia Planitia on Mars.
1978 – John Paul I was elected as the 264th Pope. He died 33 days later.
1992 – Australia’s Naughtiest Home Videos was canceled 34 minutes into the program. Just about everyone involved was fired.
1995 – eBay was founded.
1996 – Viking II landed on Mars.
2004 – The Beslan school hostage crisis ended on its third day with the deaths of over 300 people, more than half of whom are children.
2008 – Sons of Anarchy premiered on FX
September 4
1682 – English astronomer Edmund Halley discovered the comet now named after him.
1781 – The city of Los Angeles was founded.
1833 – Barney Flaherty (age 10) was hired by the New York Sun as America’s first newsboy.
1888 – George Eastman patented his 1st roll-film camera and registers the “Kodak” name.
1893 – Beatrix Potter created Peter Rabbit when writing a letter to a friend dated today.
1900 – “Typhoid Mary” Mallon was a cook who was ‘patient zero’ for a series of Typhoid Fever outbreaks in the early 1900s. She claimed to have never been sick herself.
1951 – President Truman’s address at the signing of the Japanese Peace Treaty (WW II) was broadcast.
1957 – Nine black students attempted to enter Little Rock Central High School but were blocked by the Arkansas National Guard. The next day, President Dwight D. Eisenhower ordered the 1,200-man 101st Airborne Battle Group of the U.S. Army’s 101st Airborne Division from Fort Campbell, Kentucky, to escort the nine students into the school.
1957 – Ford introduced “The Edsel” automobile – one of the biggest business flops in history.
1964 – NASA launches its 1st Orbital Geophysical Observatory (OGO-1). It is still in orbit.
1972 – Mark Spitz won his seventh gold medal in the 1972 Munich Olympics.
1995- The series Xena: Warrior Princess which starred Lucy Lawless made its debut
2000 – Caillou & Clifford the Big Red Dog debuted on PBS
2002 – Kelly Clarkson won the first season of American Idol on FOX
2012 – Live! with Kelly became Live! with Kelly and Michael, when Michael Strahan became the (for the time) permanent co-host
September 5
1666 – Great Fire of London ended, 10,000 buildings, including St Paul’s Cathedral, were destroyed, but only six people are known to have died.
1698 – Peter the Great decreed a tax on beards. When a citizen had more than 2 weeks worth of growth, a tax had to be paid, and that citizen was granted a two-sided token stating: “the beard tax has been taken” and “the beard is a superfluous burden.”
1774 – Peyton Randolph was elected as the first president of the Continental Congress, in Philadelphia.
1836 – Sam Houston was elected as the first president of the Republic of Texas.
1881 – Thumb Fire, Michigan
1882 – 10,000 workers marched in the first Labor Day parade in New York City.
1906 – The first legal forward pass in American football was thrown by Bradbury Robinson of St. Louis University to teammate Jack Schneider in a 22 – 0 victory over Carroll College (Wisconsin).
1921 – Roscoe “Fatty” Arbuckle party in San Francisco ended with the accidental death of actress Virginia Rappe, in what became the first sex scandal in the Hollywood community.
1939 – President FDR declared US neutrality at start of WW II in Europe.
1949 – Willard Frank Libby announced his discovery of Radiocarbon dating.
1960 – Muhammad Ali (then Cassius Clay) won the gold medal in the light heavyweight boxing competition at the Rome Olympics.
1966 – The first Jerry Lewis MDA Labor Day Telethon raised $1,002,114. The tote board was only six digits, so Jerry Lewis painted the “1” million spot.
1967 – ABC’s The Fugitive finale (part 2) was one of the most-watched episodes of the decade.”Tuesday, September 5th: The day the running stopped.”
1972 – Eleven Israeli athletes were killed by Palestinian terrorists at that 1972 Munich Olympics.
1975 – Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme attempted to assassinate US President Gerald Ford.
1977 – Voyager 1 was launched.
1987 – Dick Clark’s American Bandstand was broadcast for the 2,751st and last time by ABC, after 30 years on the network. It continued, in syndication, until October 7, 1989.
1989 – Deborah Norville became news anchor of Today Show. Ratings slowly declined and by June of 1990, she was replaced by Katie Couric.
1997 – Mother Teresa died in Calcutta, India, at age 87.
1997 – Ally McBeal premiered on FOX
2001 – The Amazing Race premiered on CBS
2007 – Torchwood premiered on BBC America
September 6
1620 – The Pilgrims sailed from Plymouth, England, on the Mayflower to settle in North America.
1837 – Oberlin Collegiate Institute became the first college to grant women equal status.
1866 – Frederick Douglass was the first US black delegate to a national political convention.
1901 – Leon Czolgosz shot and killed US President William McKinley at the Pan-American Exposition in Buffalo, New York.
1943 – A Pennsylvania Railroad train derailed at Frankford Junction in Philadelphia, killing 79 people and injuring 117 others.
1954 – WINS (New York City) began playing rock and roll music with the Alan Freed Show.
1963 – Baseball Historian Lee Allen says Indians-Senators game is 100,000th in professional baseball history.
1972 – A German policeman and nine Israeli athletes were taken hostage and killed at the Munich Olympic Games by the Palestinian “Black September” terrorist group.
1976 – Dean Martin appeared on Jerry Lewis’ 11th Muscular Dystrophy telethon. The pair had not spoken since the 1950s.
1979 – National Grandparents Day was proclaimed by President Jimmy Carter to be celebrated on the Sunday following Labor Day.
1983 – The Soviet Union admits to shooting down Korean Air Lines Flight 007, claiming that it did not know it was a civilian aircraft when it violated Soviet airspace.
1991 – The Soviet Union recognized the independence of the Baltic states: Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania.
1991 – The name Saint Petersburg is restored to Russia’s second-largest city, which had been known as Leningrad since 1924.
1995 – Cal Ripken, Jr. of the Baltimore Orioles plays in his 2,131st consecutive game, breaking a record that stood for 56 years.
1997 – The funeral for Princess Diana was broadcast across several networks and around the world An estimated 2 billion people watched all or part of the funeral on television.
September 7
1251 BC – A solar eclipse marked the birth of legendary man-god Hercules.
1800 – The Zion AME Church was founded.
1895 – The first game of rugby league football was played, in England.
1901 – The Boxer Rebellion in Qing dynasty China officially ended with the signing of the Boxer Protocol.
1921 – The first Miss America Pageant is held. It was won by 15-year-old Margaret Gorman.
1923 – Interpol was founded in Vienna.
1927 – The first fully electronic television system was completed by Philo Farnsworth.
1943 – A fire at the Gulf Hotel in Houston, Texas killed 55 people.
1963 – The Pro Football Hall of Fame opened in Canton, Ohio.
1968 – Starring Bingo, Drooper, Fleegle, and Snorky, the Banana Splits Adventure Hour debuted on NBC. It only lasted 31 episodes, but lives in our hearts forever.
1979 – The Entertainment and Sports Programming Network (ESPN) debuted.
1979 – The Chrysler Corporation asked the United States government for $1.5 billion to avoid bankruptcy. It was granted, but was a very unusual step for the government at the time, as was $1,500,00,00.
1981 – The People’s Court debuted with Judge Joseph Wapner
1985 – Star Wars: Ewoks and Star Wars: Droids premiered on ABC.
1986 – Desmond Tutu became the first black man to lead the Anglican Church in South Africa.
1993 – The Chevy Chase Show debuted on Fox. Canceled six weeks later.
1998 – Google was founded by Stanford University students Larry Page and Sergey Brin.
2004 – Hurricane Ivan, a Category 5 hurricane hit Grenada, killing 39 people.
2008 – True Blood premiered on HBO
September 8
1504 – Michelangelo’s David was unveiled in Piazza Della Signoria in Florence.
1860 – The steamship Lady Elgin sank in Lake Michigan, killing nearly 300.
1888 – The body of Jack the Ripper’s second murder victim, Annie Chapman, was found in London.
1892 – The Pledge of Allegiance was first published by the Youth’s Companion Magazine – “I pledge allegiance to my Flag and the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”
1900 – The Galveston Hurricane killed 8,000 people in Texas.
1921 – 16-year-old Margaret Gorman won the Atlantic City Pageant’s Golden Mermaid trophy. Pageant officials later called her the first Miss America.
1930 – “Blondie” newspaper comic strip debuted.
1930 – 3M (formerly the Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing Company) began marketing Scotch transparent tape.
1935 – US Senator from Louisiana, Huey Long was fatally shot in the Louisiana State Capitol building by Carl Austin Weiss, Jr.
1954 – The Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) was established.
1956 – Harry Belafonte’s album “Calypso” featuring “The Banana Boat Song” is the #1 album, according to Billboard, and stayed #1 for 31 weeks, become the first documented million-seller album.
1966 – Tarzan and Star Trek both debuted on NBC. That Girl debuted on ABC.
1973 – Star Trek: The Animated Series debuted on ABC.
1974 – US President Gerald Ford pardoned former President Richard Nixon for any crimes that then-President Nixon may have committed while in office.
1975 – US Air Force Tech Sergeant Leonard Matlovich, a decorated veteran of the Vietnam War, appeared in his Air Force uniform on the cover of Time magazine with the headline “I Am A Homosexual”. He was given a general discharge, which was later upgraded to honorable.
1986 – Oprah Winfrey’s show became nationally syndicated.
1988 – Yellowstone National Park was closed due to non-stop summer fires.
1990 – America’s Funniest Videos debuted on ABC.
1996 – Blue’s Clues premiered on Nickelodeon
1998 – Mark McGuire hit Home Run # 62, breaking Roger Maris’s record of 61 (1961)
2004 – The NASA unmanned spacecraft Genesis crash-landed on Mars when its parachute failed to open.
September 9
1543 – Mary Stuart, nine months old, was crowned “Queen of Scots” in the central Scottish town of Stirling.
1776 – The Continental Congress officially named its new union of sovereign states ‘The United States.’
1789 – The Bill of Rights was approved by the United States House of Representatives.
1791 – Washington, DC (District of Columbia), the capital of the United States, was named after President George Washington.
1839 – John Herschel took the first glass plate photograph. He also named seven moons of Saturn and four moons of Uranus, among other achievements.
1850 – California became the 31st state.
1926 – The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) was founded by the Radio Corporation of America
1947 – The first case of a computer bug being found… a moth lodged in a relay of a Harvard Mark II computer at Harvard University.
1950 – The first American television show to incorporate a laugh track was the sitcom The Hank McCune Show, although the technique started in radio in the 1940s.
1956 – Elvis Presley appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show for the first time.
1965 – The United States Department of Housing and Urban Development was established.
1966 – The National Traffic and Motor Vehicle Safety Act was signed into law by US President Lyndon B. Johnson.
1967 – George of the Jungle cartoon debuted on ABC.
1969 – In Canada, the Official Languages Act was enacted, making French equal to English throughout the Federal government.
1971 – The Attica prison riot occurred – 1200 inmates revolted, resulting in the deaths of 10 hostages and 29 inmates.
1972 – Fat Albert and the Cosby Kids premiered on CBS.
1993 – The Palestine Liberation Organization officially recognized Israel as a legitimate state.
1999 – Sega released the first 128-bit video game console, the Dreamcast.
2006 – Bleach premiered on Adult Swim
September 10
1608 – James Smith was elected President of Jamestown colony (in Virginia)
1913 – The Lincoln Highway opened as the first coast-to-coast paved U.S. Highway.
1919 – Florida Keys Hurricane
1945 – Mike the Headless chicken survived his pre-meal beheading, living another year and a half without a head. (True story!)
1955 – Gunsmoke debuted on CBS-TV and ran until 1975. The radio version played from 1952 to 1961.
1965 – The first National Geographic Special, the 1963 US expedition to Mount Everest, aired on CBS.
1967 – The Who destroyed their instruments during a performance on The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour
1990 – The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air premiered on NBC
1990 – New York’s Ellis Island reopened as a museum.
2009 – The Vampire Diaries premiered on The CW
September 11
1950 – Dick Tracy debuted on ABC.
1954 – The Miss America contest was aired for the first time on television, hosted by Bob Russell. Lee Meriwether, was crowned Miss America 1955.
1959 – Congress passed a bill authorizing food stamps for Americans in need.
1961 – World Wildlife Fund was founded.
1962 – The Beatles recorded their first single Love Me Do.
1966 – The Rolling Stones made another appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show
1995 – Sailor Moon made its debut in the US for the first time
2001 – Terrorist crashed two planes into the twin towers of the World Trade Center in New York City. A third aicraft was crashed into the Pentagon and a fourth plane crashed in Somerset County, Pennsylvania.
September 12
1609 – Henry Hudson began his exploration of the Hudson River.
1910 – Alice Stebbins Wells was hired as America’s first actual police officer, in Los Angeles.
1940 – The Lascaux Cave Paintings, about 17,300 year old, were found in southwestern France.
1952 – The Flatwoods Monster was described by several children in Flatwoods, West Virginia. Their mother, Kathleen may also reported seeing a ten foot creature.
1954 – Lassie premiered on CBS
1959 – The Soviet Union’s Lunik 2 was launched, (purposefully) crash-landing on the moon two days later.
1965 – The Beatles appeared on The Ed Sullivan Show, for the fourth time.
1966 – The Monkees debuted on NBC.
1970 – Josie and the Pussycats premiered on CBS Saturday morning
1970 – LSD advocate, Dr. Timothy Leary, escaped from a California prison and fled to Algeria.
1970 – The unmanned Soviet Luna 16 was launched – it landed on the moon, scooped up 101 grams of teh lunar surface, and returned to Earth.
1972 – Maude premiered on CBS.
1977 – South African black civil rights leader Steven Biko died while in police custody.
1978 – Taxi premiered on ABC
1983 – The animated G.I. Joe mini-series based on the toys of the same name debuted, in syndication
1983 – Inspector Gadget debuted on ABC
1992- NBC canceled all of their Saturday morning cartoons and opted to air Saved By The Bell, California Dreams, NBA Inside Stuff, Name Your Adventure and a weekend version of Today. It marked the end of all children’s programming entirely on the network.
1993 – Famous Perry Mason actor Raymond Burr died after a battle with liver cancer
1994 – Former Family Feud host Richard Dawson returned to host the game show
2007 (Volcano Eruption) Southern Sumatra, Indonesia
2012 – Apple unveiled the iPhone 5 and iOS 6.
September 13
1928 – Okeechobee Hurricane, east coast USA
1961 – Car 54 – Where are You? premiered on NBC.
1963 – The Outer Limits premiered on ABC.
1965 – The Today Show (NBC) broadcasted in all-color for the first time.
1969 – Scooby-Doo, Where Are You! premiered on TV.
1970 – The first New York City Marathon was won by Gary Muhrcke.
1972 – The Waltons premiered on CBS.
1977 – SOAP premiered on ABC
1979 – Benson, a spin-off from Soap, debuted on ABC.
1986 – Pee-wee’s Playhouse premiered on CBS
1990 – Law and Order premiered on NBC
1993 – Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and PLO Chairman Yasir Arafat signed a historic peace agreement (true), ending centuries of discord in the middle east (not true).
2005 – Supernatural premiered on the WB
2005 – Bones premiered on FOX
September 14
1752 – Yesterday was September 2nd, in Great Britain and the American Colonies, but with the switchover from the Julian to Gregorian calendar, it became September 14 in all of western civilization.
1814 – Francis Scott Key wrote The Star-Spangled Banner which later became the United State’s national anthem.
1868 – Tom Morris, at Prestwick’s 8th hole, was credited with Golf’s 1st recorded hole-in-one.
1901 – The first bodybuilding contest was held in Royal Albert Hall, London.
1940 – Congress passed the Selective Service Act, providing for the first peacetime draft in United States’ history. Unofficially, they were prepping for joining WW II.
1965 – My Mother The Car debuted on NBC. It was the first universally panned “bad” TV show.
1975 – Mother Elizabeth Ann Bayley Seton (1774-1821) was canonized by Pope Paul VI. The first American saint, she founded the U.S. branch of the Sisters of Charity in 1809.
1977 – A tube top-clad woman named Yolanda Bowsley was called into Contestant’s Row on The Price is Right, and while running down her breast popped out of her shirt.
1978 – Mork and Mindy premiered on ABC
1981- Entertainment Tonight debuted.
1984 – Bette Midler & Dan Aykroyd hosted the first VMAs (Video Music Awards) on MTV. Younger visitors may be interested to know that at one time, MTV was a 24-hour music video channel.s
1985 – The Golden Girls premiered on NBC
1985 – The Care Bears premiered, in syndication
1987 – Cal Ripken’s streak of playing MLB Baseball for 8,243 consecutive innings (over 900 games) ended. The record still stands today.
1994 – MLB Acting commissioner Bud Selig announced the cancellation of the 1994 baseball season on the 34th day of a strike by players. Some say Baseball still hasn’t recovered from this lost season.
September 15
1949 – The Lone Ranger premiered on ABC-TV, starring Clayton Moore.
1959 – Soviet Premier Khrushchev arrived in the U.S. for an unprecedented visit.
1963 – A church bombing in Birmingham, Alabama, killed four young black girls. After decades of delay, Robert Chambliss, Herman Cash, Thomas Blanton and Bobby Cherry were said to have been responsible for the crime.
1965 – The Big Valley debuts on ABC while Lost in Space debuted on CBS.
1965 – Lost in Space and Green Acres premiered on CBS.
1965 – Gidget and The Big Valley premiered on ABC
1965 – I Spy debuted on NBC
1971 – Columbo, starring Peter Falk, debuted on NBC.
1980 – Shogun, a TV miniseries, starring Richard Chamberlain, began airing on NBC.
1981 – Pope John Paul II published his encyclical “Laborem exercens” criticizing both Marxism and Capitalism.
1982 – The first issue of USA Today, published by Gannett, hits the newsstands and TV-shaped vending machines.
1984 – The Muppet Babies premiered on CBS.
1990 – The Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN) renamed itself The Family Channel
1990 – Captain Planet and the Planeteers debuted on TBS
2004 – The National Hockey League lockout began, canceling the 2004-2005 season.
September 16
1620 – The Mayflower set sail from Plymouth, England with 102 Pilgrims.
1630 – The Massachusetts village of Shawmut changed its name to Boston.
1908 – William C. Durant. founded General Motors.
1953 – 20th Century-Fox released The Robe, using its new wide-screen stereophonic film process.
1964 – Shindig (a pop music show) premiered on ABC.
1972 – The Bob Newhart show debuted on CBS
1974 – President Ford announced conditional amnesty for Vietnam War deserters and draft evaders.
1977 – Marc Bolan (of T. Rex fame) died in an auto crash
1984 – Miami Vice premiered on NBC
1984 – E/R premiered on CBS
1992 – FCC voted to allow competition for local phone service.
1996- The jackpot wedge appeared for the first time on Wheel Of Fortune
September 17
1303 (Earthquake) China
1849 – Harriet Tubman escaped from slavery in Maryland.
1859 – Joshua Norton declared himself “Emperor of these United States” and subsequently “Protector of Mexico”, renaming himself Norton !
1895 – The second U.S. battleship, but first named after a state, the USS Maine was commissioned.
1908 – Thomas Selfridge, a passenger in a plane piloted by Orville Wright, became the first airplane fatality when the craft crashed.
1947 – Jackie Robinson was named Rookie of Year by The Sporting News.
1964 – Bewitched premiered on ABC.
1965 – The Wild, Wild West and Hogan;s Heroes premiered on CBS.
1967 – Mission Impossible premiered on CBS.
1967 – The Doors appear on The Ed Sullivan Show and perform “Light My Fire”. Sullivan had requested that the line “Girl we couldn’t get much higher” be changed for the show, but Jim Morrison performed it the way it was written. The Doors never appeared on the Ed Sullivan Show again.
1972 – The first episode of M.A.S.H. aired on CBS.
1976 – NASA publicly unveiled the space shuttle Enterprise in Palmdale, California.
1978 – Battlestar Galactica premiered on ABC
1983 – Vanessa Williams was crowned Miss America 1984.
1996- The O.J. Simpson civil trial began
2009 – Archer premiered on FX
2009 – Community premiered on NBC
2011 – The Occupy Wall Street movement began in Zuccotti Park, New York City
September 18
844 (Earthquake) Damasus, Syria
1793 – George Washington laid the cornerstone for the Capitol building in Washington D.C.
1848 – Baseball ruled that a 1st baseman can tag base for out instead of the runner
1850 – Congress passed the Fugitive Slave Act, which required the return of escaped slaves to their owners.
1851 – The first edition of The New York Daily Times (now The New York Times) was published.
1927 – With 18 stations in the US, The Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) went on the air.
1964 – The Addams Family debuted on ABC.
1965 – Get Smart and I Dream of Jeannie premiered on NBC
1970 – Jimi Hendrix (age 27) died in London.
1975 – Patty Hearst was captured by FBI agents and indicted.
1978 – WKRP in Cincinnati premiered on CBS
1987 – DuckTales premiered, in syndication
September 19
1876 – Melville Bissell patented the first carpet sweeper.
1928 – Mickey Mouse’s first screen appearance – Steamboat Willie at the Colony Theater NYC.
1934 – Bruno Hauptmann was arrested for kidnapping Charles Lindbergh’s baby.
1952 – The Adventures of Superman premiered, in syndication
1961 – Betty and Barney Hill claimed to be abducted by aliens in New Hampshire
1970 – The Mary Tyler Moore show premiered on CBS.
1975 – The alligator was removed from the endangered species list in parts of Louisiana.
1976 – A UFO was reportedly seen over Tehran, Iran. Two F-4 Phantom II jets lost power during a chase.
1977 – The chairs on which Archie and Edith Bunker sat through 8 seasons of All in the Family were given to the Smithsonian Institution
1981 – Paul Simon & Art Garfunkel perform a reunion concert in New York’s Central Park.
1983 – Kiss performed on MTV without make-up for the first time.
1983 – The nighttime (syndicated) edition of the NBC daytime game show Wheel of Fortune premiered
1983 – Welcome To Pooh Corner premiered on The Disney Channel
1984 – Highway To Heaven premiered on NBC
1986 – Captain EO with Michael Jackson premiered in Disney theme parks.
1994- ER made its debut on NBC
2005 – How I Met Your Mother premiered on CBS
2007 – Kitchen Nightmares premiered on FOX
September 20
1498 (Earthquake & Tsunami) Nankaido, Japan
1960 – The Flintstones debuted on ABC
1973 – An estimated 90 million people watched ‘The Battle of the Sexes.’ Billie Jean King defeated Bobby Riggs in a televised tennis match at the Astrodome in Houston, Texas.
1977 – The Fonz jumped a shark on Happy Days, forever immortalizing the phrase “jumping the shark” as a metaphor for when something has passed its peak.
1979 – Buck Rogers in the 25th Century premiered on NBC
1984 – The Cosby Show premiered on NBC
1984 – Who’s The Boss debuted on ABC.
1984 – The Cosby Show debuted on NBC.
1990 – The Flash premiered on CBS
1993 – Vicki Van Meter took off from Maine, landing in San Diego three days later, becoming the youngest female pilot to fly across the U.S.
1998 – The Iron Man Rested – Baltimore Orioles shortstop Cal Ripken, Jr. sat out a game, ending his consecutive MLB game playing streak. Cal “Irom Man’ Ripken played 2,632 consecutive games over 16 seasons.
1999- Law & Order: SVU debuted on NBC
2006 – Top Gear co-host Richard Hammond was seriously injured after crashing a car at 280 mph
2009 – Barack Obama appeared on five Sunday news/talk shows on the same day: CBS’s Face the Nation, ABC’s This Week, CNN’s State of the Union with John King, NBC/MSNBC’s Meet The Press and on Univision.
September 21
1776 – Nathan Hale was captured by the British and accused of spying.
1897 – The New York Sun published it’s editorial – Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus.
1937 – J. R. R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit was published
1938 – Great Hurricane of 1938, New England Coast
1948 – Texaco Star Theater with Milton ‘Uncle Miltie’ Berle premieres on NBC.
1957 – Perry Mason, starring Raymond Burr premiered on CBS.
1969 – Steve O’Neal of the New York Jets kicked the first 98-yard punt against the Denver Broncos.
1970 – The first game of NFL Monday Night Football was played between the Cleveland Browns and the New York Jets. Cleveland won 31-21.
1996 – John F. Kennedy, Jr. married Carolyn Bessette.
September 22
1776 – Nathan Hale was hanged by the British as a spy for the colonies during the Revolutionary War. In fairness to the British, this war hero was spying on them.
1789 – The U.S. Post Office was established by congress.
1911 – Pitcher Cy Young beat Pittsburgh 1-0 for his final career victory – number 511.
1920 – A Chicago Grand Jury convened to investigate charges that 8 White Sox players conspired to fix the 1919 World Series. They did.
1964- Fiddler on the Roof opened on Broadway.
1964 – The Man from U.N.C.L.E. premiered on NBC.
1982 – tales of the Gold Monkey premiered on ABC
1985 – Farm Aid wast first broadcast, on TNN and in syndication
1986 – ALF debuted on NBC
1987 – Full House premiered on ABC
1989 – ABC debuted TGIF (Thank Goodness It’s Friday) from 8:00pm to 10:00pm, a new programming block for Friday Nights with four shows (Full House, Family Matters, Perfect Strangers, and Just the Ten of Us)
1994 – Friends premiered on NBC
2002 – Oceanic Flight 815 crashed on a mysterious island, beginning the six-season series of LOST.
2004 – Lost premiered on ABC
2009 – The Good Wife premiered on CBS
2011 – CERN scientists announced their discovery of neutrinos breaking the speed of light. There were reasonably sure that the experimant would not cause a black hole that would suck up the entire planet. So far, so good.
September 23
1551 (Tornado) Grand Harbour at Valletta, Malta
1642 – Harvard College in Cambridge, Massachusettes, had its first graduating class.
1846 – German astronomer Johann Gottfried Galle discovered the planet Neptune.
1913 – Mark Sennet presented the first Keystone Cops film, although some say it was Hoffmeyer’s Legacy, in 1912.
1938 – A time capsule, to be opened in 6939, was buried at World’s Fair in NYC.
1957 – The first movie (1953) to become a TV series was How to Marry a Millionaire. It was syndicated and not on a regular network.
1962- The Jetsons cartoon debuted on ABC – ABC’s first full-color program.
1979 – Archie Bunker’s Place debuted on CBS
1986 – The U.S. Congress voted the rose the official flower of the US..
1988 – Jose Canseco became baseball’s first player to steal 40 bases & hit 40 Home Runs in a season. He later admitted to using steroids.
1992- Mad About You premiered on NBC.
2003 – NCIS premiered on CBS
2003 – One Tree Hill debuted on The WB
2009 – Modern Family premiered on ABC
September 24
1789 – The United State’s Post Office was formed.
1869 – Stock market panic due to crashing gold prices caused by an attempt to corner the market by Gould and Fisk.
1948 – The Honda Motor Company was founded in Japan.
1954 – Tonight Show premiered on NBC, hosted by Steve Allan.
1957 – MLB’s Brooklyn Dodgers played their last game at Ebbets Field.
1964 – The Munsters premiered on CBS.
1968 – 60 Minutes debuted on CBS.
1977 – The Love Boat premiered on ABC
1992 – The Sci-Fi Channel (now SyFy) debuted with Star Wars
2007 – The Big Bang Theory premiered on CBS
September 25
1957 – United States Troops were called to escort nine Black students to the all-white Little Rock Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas.
1970 – The Partridge Family & The Odd Couple debuted on ABC
1980 – Led Zeppelin drummer John Bonham died from alcohol-induced asphyxiation. (Chocked on his own vomit)
1981 – Sandra Day O’Connor was sworn in as the first woman to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court.
1997 – NBC’s hospital drama ER was performed live on TV
2006 – Heroes premiered on NBC
September 26
1957 – West Side Story opened on Broadway.
1960 – Longest speech in UN history at 4 hours and 29 minutes, was given by Cuba’s Fidel Castro.
1960 – American presidential candidates John F. Kennedy and Richard M. Nixon debate on live television and radio. Radio listeners said that Nixon won, and television viewers gave the win the Kennedy. Look good, people!
1962 – Hillbilly comedy series Beverly Hillbillies premiered on CBS.
1964 – Gilligan’s Island premiered on CBS. Although scheduled for a fourth season, CBS changed the hour-long Gunsmoke to Mondays, displacing the 7 castaways.
1968 – Broadcast premiere of Hawaii Five-O on CBS
1969- The last Beatles album, Abbey Road, was released in the US.
1969 – The Brady Bunch debuted on ABC.
1982 – Knight Rider premiered on NBC
1982 – At the Movies with Gene Siskel and Roger Ebert premiered, in syndication
1990 – Cop Rock debuted on ABC
1990 – The Motion Picture Association of America announced a new rating of NC-17 to apply to adult films, replacing the “X” rating.
1992 – Roseanne Barr got her star on Hollywood’s Walk of Fame.
1995 – George magazine premiered, published by John F Kennedy Jr.
2001 – Star Tek”Enterprise premiered on UPN
2010 (Volcano Eruption) Baroarbunga
2011 – History International was rebranded as H2 on cable television
September 27
1290 (Earthquake) Chihli, China
1540 – Pope Paul III approved the charter for the Society of Jesus (Jesuits).
1650 (Volcano Eruption) Kolumbo
1903 – Wreck of the Old 97, traveling from Monroe, Virginia, to Spencer, North Carolina, the train derailed at Stillhouse Trestle near Danville, Virginia.
1905 – Albert Einstein’s paper “Does the Inertia of a Body Depend Upon Its Energy Content?”, introducing the equation E=mc² was published.
1908 – Model T #0001 came out of Henry Ford’s car factory today.
1912 – W C Handy published The Memphis Blues 1st Blues Song, 1912
1937- The first Santa Claus training school opened in Albion, New York.
1954 – The Tonight Show began broadcasting coast to coast on NBC
1963 – Lee Harvey Oswald visited the Cuban Consulate in Mexico. More on him later.
1964 – The Warren Commission Report was given to President Johnson today, and the general public on September 27. It concluded that Lee Harvey Oswald acted alone in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, settling the issue. (it was not really settled)
1998 Google launched its Lil’ Search Engine.
1998 – Mark McGwire hit his record-setting 69th and 70th home runs in the last game of the (regular) season.
2009 – The Cleveland Show premiered on FOX
September 28
1850 – Flogging (whipping) in the Navy and Merchant Marines was abolished by the US.
1889 – The first General Conference on Weights and Measures (CGPM) defined the length of a ‘meter’ (‘metre’) as the distance between two lines on a standard bar of an alloy of platinum with ten percent iridium, measured at the melting point of ice. Since 1983, it has been defined as “the length of the path traveled by light in vacuum during a time interval of 1/299,792,458 of a second,” about 39.370 inches.
1920 – Eight Chicago White Sox players were indicted for fixing the 1919 World Series in the “Black Sox scandal.”
1941 – Ted Williams finished the MLB baseball season with a .406 average.
1951 – The science-fiction classic film, The Day the Earth Stood Still, was released.
1955 – First MLB World Series color TV was broadcast on NBC. Yankees beat the Dodgers.
1963 – Tennessee Tuxedo cartoon debuted on CBS.
1967 – Walter Washington became the first mayor of the District of Columbia (DC).
1980 – Carl Sagan’s 13 part Cosmos premiered on PBS.
1984 – Miami Vice premiered on NBC
1987 – Star Tek: The Next Generation premiered, in syndication
September 29
480 BC – Battle of Salamis: The Greek fleet under Themistocles defeats the Persian fleet under Xerxes I. This was a few weeks after the famous Battle of Thermopylae (with King Leonidas and the 300 Spartans).
1829 -Scotland Yard went on patrol for the first time.
1938 – The Treaty of Munich was signed by Hitler, Benito Mussolini, Daladier & Chamberlain. Contrary to some overly optimistic high hopes, it did not prevent World War II.
1957 – Kyshtym Disaster at Plutonium Production Plant, USSR
1960 – My Three Sons debuted on ABC.
1963 – The Judy Garland Show debuted on CBS
1963 – Rolling Stones 1st tour, opening for Bo Diddley and The Everly Brothers.
1966 – The Chevrolet Camaro was introduced.
1969 – Love American Style premiered on ABC.
1975 – Singer Jackie Wilson had a heart attack on stage, resulting in a 9-year coma. (He died in 1984)
1977 – Star Wars Theme/Cantina Band by Meco was the number one song.
1979 – Gold hit $400/ounce for the first time.
1982 – Cheers premiered on NBC.
1985 – MacGyver debuted on ABC.
1985 – The first of seven cyanide-laced Tylenol victims died. This event is what made manufacturers begin using tamper-proof packaging.
1988- The space shuttle Discovery was launched- the first since the Challenger disaster.
1989 – Zsa Zsa Gabor was convicted of slapping a police officer in Beverly Hills. The assault occurred on June 14, 1989.
1990 – Millie’s Book, written by 1st Lady Barbara Bush, about the president’s dog, a best-selling non-fiction book, was released.
1992 – Magic Johnson came out of retirement to play for the Los Angeles Lakers after retiring less than a year earlier. He retired again in 1996.
1994 – The 304 jurors and alternate jurors were chosen for O.J. Simpson’s murder trial.
1996 – Nintendo 64 video game system debuted in America. It came about in Japan a few months earlier.
2001- Yu-Gi-Oh! premiered on Kid’s WB
2008 – The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 777.68 points, the largest single-day point loss by that time in history.
September 30
587 (Earthquake) Antioch (now Turkey)
1452 – Johann Guttenberg’s Bible was published.
1659 – Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe was shipwrecked.
1888 – “Jack the Ripper” killed two women, Liz Stride & Kate Eddowes.
1911 – The first movie stuntman was hired as a stand-in for ‘The Military Scout’.
1946 – 22 Nazi leaders were found guilty of war crimes at the Nuremberg Trials.
1947 – The first World Series game was watched by an estimated 3.9 million people, television’s first mass audience event.
1949 – The Berlin Airlift came to an end.
1951 – The Red Skelton Show debuted on NBC.
1954 – The Nautilus, the first atomic-powered submarine, was commissioned by the US Navy.
1960- The Flintstones debuted on ABC during primetime.
1961 – The bill for Boston Tea Party (December 16, 1773) was paid by Mayor Snyder of Portland who wrote a check (to ‘Great Britain’) for $196, the total cost of all tea lost, but with no interest. This factoid has been seen on several online websites, but we have been unable to verify it.
1965 – Thunderbirds premiered on ITV, in the UK.
1975 – The Muhammad Ali vs Joe Frazier title fight from the Philippines (“Thrilla in Manila”) was sent via satellite to the U. S. and shown on HBO
1982 – Cheers premiered on NBC
1984 – Murder She Wrote debuted on CBS
1985 – MacGyver debuted on ABC
1997 – Microsoft released Internet Explorer 4.0.

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