Today in history

30 th August 1916

Shackleton,escape from elephant island:
Ernest Shackleton completes the rescue of all of his men stranded on Elephant Island in Antarctica.

Elephant Island: The Incredible Survival Story of Ernest Shackleton and the Crew of HMS Endurance

When British explorer Ernest Shackleton and the crew of HMS Endurance lost their ship to crushing pack ice in the Weddell Sea in 1915, their chances of survival seemed dim. The 28 men spent months drifting on ice floes and traversing the Southern Ocean in small lifeboats until they finally spotted land. The hunk of rock and ice was not the welcoming refuge they hoped for, but it was enough.
Shackleton and the crew of the Imperial Trans-Antarctic expedition landed on the mountainous, ice-covered island today known as Elephant Island. Some say Elephant Island got its name from the sighting of elephant seals along its shores; others suggest it comes from its appearance as an elephant head. But Shackleton’s captain claimed it was a nickname given by the crew: “Hell-of-an-Island.”
Shackleton realized their chances of getting rescued from Elephant Island by passing ships were low, so he and five crewmates took a lifeboat to look for help, leaving Wild in charge. The image below shows the crew waving goodbye on April 24, 1916.

The remaining crew built makeshift huts by resting their two remaining lifeboats upside down on rocks. To combat the perpetual darkness, they made lamps out of sardine tins, used surgical bandages for wicks, and burned seal blubber oil. Four and a half months later, Shackleton and crew returned with a ship and rescued all 22 men. King George V recognized Wild’s leadership as “instrumental in maintaining their courage and hope.”

Today, the island hosts one small research station occupied during the summer. At Point Wild, a monument of several plaques and a bust of Wild was erected to honor the crew and their experience on the island.

31 st August 1997

Princess Diana car crash:
Diana, Princess of Wales, her partner, Dodi Fayed, and driver Henri Paul die in a car crash in Paris.

Shortly after midnight on August 31, 1997, Diana, Princess of Wales—affectionately known as "the People’s Princess"—dies in a car crash in Paris. She was 36. Her boyfriend, the Egyptian-born socialite Dodi Fayed, and the driver of the car, Henri Paul, died as well.

Princess Diana was one of the most popular public figures in the world. Her death was met with a massive outpouring of grief. Mourners began visiting Kensington Palace immediately, leaving bouquets at the home where the princess, also known as Lady Di, would never return. Piles of flowers reached some 30 feet from the palace's gate.

Diana and Dodi—who had been vacationing in the French Riviera—arrived in Paris earlier the previous day. They left the Ritz Paris just after midnight, intending to go to Dodi’s apartment on the Rue Arsène Houssaye. As soon as they departed the hotel, a swarm of paparazzi on motorcycles began aggressively tailing their car. About three minutes later, the driver lost control and crashed into a pillar at the entrance of the Pont de l'Alma tunnel.

Dodi and the driver were pronounced dead at the scene. Diana was taken to the Pitié-Salpêtrière hospital and declared dead at 6:00 am. (A fourth passenger, Diana’s bodyguard Trevor Rees-Jones, was seriously injured but survived.) Diana's former husband Prince Charles, as well as her sisters and other members of the Royal Family, arrived in Paris that morning. Diana’s body was then taken back to London.

Like much of her life, her death was a full-blown media sensation, and the subject of many conspiracy theories. At first, the paparazzi hounding the car were blamed for the crash, but later it was revealed that the driver was under the influence of alcohol and prescription drugs. A formal investigation concluded the paparazzi did not cause the collision.

Diana’s funeral in London, on September 6, was watched by over 2 billion people. She was survived by her two sons, Prince William, who was 15 at the time, and Prince Harry, who was 12.

1 st September 1878.

First female telephone operator:

Emma Nutt becomes the world's first female telephone operator when she is recruited by Alexander Graham Bell to the Boston Telephone Dispatch Company.

Emma Nutt, The World’s 1st Woman Telephone Operator
She loved the job, too.
When Emma Nutt reported for work at the Edwin Holmes Telephone Dispatch Company in Boston on Sept. 1, 1878, she became the world’s first woman telephone operator.

Hours later, her sister Stella became the world’s second female telephone operator.

Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor of the first practical telephone, hired Emma away from a telegraph office. She earned $10 per month for a 54-hour workweek, though she did get an hour for lunch. She supposedly remembered every number in the New England Telephone Company directory.

Teenage boys worked as telephone operators – after all, they’d worked as telegraph operators from the beginning. But they didn’t do well actually talking to real people. They were impatient, they liked to play jokes and they swore. Customers complained they spoke too gruffly to them.

Emma Nutt
Emma Nutt, on the other hand, had patience and a cultured, soothing voice. Her success led women to rapidly replace boys as operators.

By the end of the 1880s, nearly all telephone operators were women.
To get a job as an operator, women had to be unmarried and between 17 and 26. They had to be tall enough to reach to top of the telephone switchboard. African American and Jewish women couldn’t get jobs as operators.
Emma loved her job and stayed at it for at least 33 (possibly 37) years. Her sister left after a few years to get married.

By the time Emma retired, the Edwin Holmes Telephone Dispatch Company consolidated with other small exchanges into the New England Telephone & Telegraph Company. Its service connected the nation.
Strikes
By the early 1900s, the phone companies ramped up the pressure on the operators.

They forced the women to work two shifts in one day separated by an unpaid, three-hour break. The operators worked under strict discipline at an intense pace while sitting in straight-backed chairs. Supervisors watched them closely, punishing minor mistakes with detention.
When World War I broke out, the telephone operators took advantage of the resulting labor shortage. They went on strike for higher wages and better hours — and they won. After the war, employers tried to take back those gains.

At 7 a.m. on April 15, 1919, New England’s night shift operators walked off the job. That began a five-state telephone operator strike in New England. It involved thousands of women with strong community support. Five days later, management acquiesced, granting wage increases and union recognition.

In an unintended consequence of their victory, the telephone company then decided to stop relying so much on human operators. Soon, it introduced the automatic dial phone, which didn’t require an operator for a local call.

1 st September 1878.
                       
                        First female telephone operator:

                            Emma Nutt becomes the world's first female telephone operator when she is recruited by Alexander Graham Bell to the Boston Telephone Dispatch Company.

                             Emma Nutt, The World’s 1st Woman Telephone Operator
She loved the job, too.
When Emma Nutt reported for work at the Edwin Holmes Telephone Dispatch Company in Boston on Sept. 1, 1878, she became the world’s first woman telephone operator.

             Hours later, her sister Stella became the world’s second female telephone operator.

Alexander Graham Bell, the inventor of the first practical telephone, hired Emma away from a telegraph office. She earned $10 per month for a 54-hour workweek, though she did get an hour for lunch. She supposedly remembered every number in the New England Telephone Company directory.

Teenage boys worked as telephone operators – after all, they’d worked as telegraph operators from the beginning. But they didn’t do well actually talking to real people. They were impatient, they liked to play jokes and they swore. Customers complained they spoke too gruffly to them.

Emma Nutt
Emma Nutt, on the other hand, had patience and a cultured, soothing voice. Her success led women to rapidly replace boys as operators.

By the end of the 1880s, nearly all telephone operators were women.
          To get a job as an operator, women had to be unmarried and between 17 and 26. They had to be tall enough to reach to top of the telephone switchboard. African American and Jewish women couldn’t get jobs as operators.
               Emma loved her job and stayed at it for at least 33 (possibly 37) years. Her sister left after a few years to get married.

By the time Emma retired, the Edwin Holmes Telephone Dispatch Company consolidated with other small exchanges into the New England Telephone & Telegraph Company. Its service connected the nation.
            Strikes
By the early 1900s, the phone companies ramped up the pressure on the operators.

They forced the women to work two shifts in one day separated by an unpaid, three-hour break. The operators worked under strict discipline at an intense pace while sitting in straight-backed chairs. Supervisors watched them closely, punishing minor mistakes with detention.
           When World War I broke out, the telephone operators took advantage of the resulting labor shortage. They went on strike for higher wages and better hours — and they won. After the war, employers tried to take back those gains.

At 7 a.m. on April 15, 1919, New England’s night shift operators walked off the job. That began a five-state telephone operator strike in New England. It involved thousands of women with strong community support. Five days later, management acquiesced, granting wage increases and union recognition.

In an unintended consequence of their victory, the telephone company then decided to stop relying so much on human operators. Soon, it introduced the automatic dial phone, which didn’t require an operator for a local call.

2 September 1666

Great fire of London:
The Great Fire of London breaks out and burns for three days, destroying 10,000 buildings, including Old St Paul's Cathedral.

In the early morning hours of September 2, 1666, the Great Fire of London breaks out in the house of King Charles II’s baker on Pudding Lane near London Bridge. It soon spread to Thames Street, where warehouses filled with combustibles and a strong easterly wind transformed the blaze into an inferno. When the Great Fire finally was extinguished on September 6, more than four-fifths of London was destroyed. Miraculously, only 16 people were known to have died.

The Great Fire of London was a disaster waiting to happen. London of 1666 was a city of medieval houses made mostly of oak timber. Some of the poorer houses had walls covered with tar, which kept out the rain but made the structures more vulnerable to fire. Streets were narrow, houses were crowded together, and the firefighting methods of the day consisted of neighborhood bucket brigades armed with pails of water and primitive hand pumps. Citizens were instructed to check their homes for possible dangers, but there were many instances of carelessness.

So it was on the evening of September 1, 1666, when Thomas Farrinor, the king’s baker, failed to properly extinguish his oven. He went to bed, and sometime around midnight sparks from the smoldering embers ignited firewood lying beside the oven. Before long, his house was in flames. Farrinor managed to escape with his family and a servant out an upstairs window, but a bakery assistant died in the flames–the first victim.
Sparks from Farrinor’s bakery leapt across the street and set fire to straw and fodder in the stables of the Star Inn. From the Inn, the fire spread to Thames Street, where riverfront warehouses were packed full with flammable materials such as tallow for candles, lamp oil, spirits, and coal. These stores lit aflame or exploded, transforming the fire into an uncontrollable blaze. Bucket-bearing locals abandoned their futile efforts at firefighting and rushed home to evacuate their families and save their valuables.
It had been a hot, dry summer, and a strong wind further encouraged the flames. As the conflagration grew, city authorities struggled to tear down buildings and create a firebreak, but the flames repeatedly overtook them before they could complete their work. People fled into the Thames River dragging their possessions, and the homeless took refuge in the hills on the outskirts of London. Light from the Great Fire could be seen 30 miles away. On September 5, the fire slackened, and on September 6 it was brought under control. That evening, flames again burst forth in the Temple (the legal district), but the explosion of buildings with gunpowder extinguished the flames.
The Great Fire of London engulfed 13,000 houses, nearly 90 churches, and scores of public buildings. The old St. Paul’s Cathedral was destroyed, as were many other historic landmarks. As estimated 100,000 people were left homeless. Within days, King Charles II set about rebuilding his capital. The great architect Sir Christopher Wren designed a new St. Paul’s Cathedral with dozens of smaller new churches ranged around it like satellites. To prevent future fires, most new houses were built of brick or stone and separated by thicker walls. Narrow alleyways were forbidden and streets were made wider. Permanent fire departments, however, did not become a fixture in London until well into the 18th century.
In the 1670s, a monument column commemorating the Great Fire of London was erected near the source of the calamity. Known as the Monument, it was probably designed by the architect Robert Hooke, though some sources credit Christopher Wren. The column stands 202 feet above the pavement and features sculpture and engravings that tell the story of the conflagration. Even though an official inquiry into the Great Fire concluded that “the hand of God, a great wind, and a very dry season” caused it, an inscription on the Monument (removed in 1830) blamed the disaster on the “treachery and malice of the Popish faction.”

In 1986, London’s bakers finally apologized to the lord mayor for setting fire to the city. Members of the Worshipful Company of Bakers gathered on Pudding Lane and unveiled a plaque acknowledging that one of their own, Thomas Farrinor, was guilty of causing the Great Fire of 1666.

3 rd September 1935

Land speed milestones:
Sir Malcolm Campbell reaches a speed of 304.331 miles per hour on the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah, becoming the first person to drive an automobile over 300 mph.

Campbell Shatters 300 MPH Barrier at Bonneville
The 1930s is a time for pushing limits and behind the wheel of a car nobody does it better than Malcolm Campbell.

1935: Malcolm Campbell, at the wheel of his last customized "Bluebird" car, becomes the first driver to travel over 300 mph, breaking his own land-speed record for the ninth time in the process.

Campbell set his first record 11 years before at Pendine Sands in Wales, where he topped out at 146.6 mph. From there he inched upwards, breaking the 200 mph barrier in 1928, topping 250 in 1932 and getting past 275 on March 7, 1935, only six months before his historic ride at Utah's Bonneville Salt Flats.

The Depression years meant tough times for automobile racing as well as everything else, so the exploits of this dashing Englishman were magnified and followed closely. Campbell used a succession of specially designed cars, all christened "Bluebird," to set his records. The design of these exotically streamlined machines helped capture the public's imagination, as much as they cut the aerodynamic drag for Campbell.
Campbell's final version hit 301.331 mph along the Flats on that September morning.

While Campbell (who was knighted to become Sir Malcolm) was known primarily for his feats on land, he was no slouch on the water, either. He set four water-speed records, topping out at just under 142 mph.

His son, Donald, followed the old man into high-speed racing and became the first driver to crack the 400 mph barrier. He was killed in an accident in 1967. Trying to break the water speed record.

4 th September 1972


7 golds at one olympics:
Mark Spitz becomes the first competitor to win seven gold medals at a single Olympic Games.

Mark Spitz: Remembering 7 Olympic Gold medals

On this day in 1972, Mark Spitz became the first man to win seven Olympic Gold medals at a single Olympic Games. Spitz, now a Laureus Academy Member, looks back on the achievement to tell us about what that meant to him.
"My accomplishments have been documented as anything from remarkable to maybe just luck.
“But I think about my performance in 1972 and it was really the journey that got me there that to me was the most important thing. I had competed for about 14 or 15 years and swam 26,000 miles training.
“I was the world record holder before I went in to the Olympic Games and I felt with a fair amount of confidence that I would have success if I could just stay healthy and I’m thankful that I did and I’m thankful that I was able to win those events.
“In the process the competition drove me to swim very fast times and they were all world records. But I think more people will remember the fact that I won seven gold medals than the world records.”

5 th September 1887.
Theatre Royal fire:

A fire at the Theatre Royal, Exeter kills 186, making it the UK's deadliest ever building fire.

Exeter Theatre Royal Fire


Exeter, Devon The 5th of September 1887 AD

In spite of the previous Exeter Theatre Royal having burned down just two years previously, lessons had not been learned when it came to fire precautions and design for its replacement. Additionally, though the architect Charles Phipps was a specialist in the construction of theatres who had contracted to include the latest safety measures in his plans, he seems to have skimped when it came to the building stage.
The design produced by Phipps was deeply flawed in various ways - a crazy lack of exits; spiral staircases partly blocking corridors; no fire escapes for those on upper floors. For all this the eventual coroner's jury verdict on the disaster was accidental death.
On the night of September 5 1887 the theatre was hosting a performance of Romany Rye, a romantic drama that required many scene changes, thus many curtain backdrops were crowding the flies. To make matters worse, there were backdrops in place ready for the forthcoming panto season. When the gas lighting in the area set one of these backdrops alight a terrible and rapid fire began.
There were between 800 and 900 in the theatre that night. Some 186 people died: many were crushed in the rush to the few exits; some died jumping from high balconies to the streets below; and most horrifically of all those at the rear of the jammed mass fighting to get out of the gallery were burned to death.
The West of England Insurance Company fire engine Little West attended the fire, but water was ineffective against the inferno. A local hero emerged from the tragedy, Robert Pople, who was the landlord of a pub nearby, the New London Inn. Pople brought ladders to the scene and rescued many who were stuck on the roof of a high portico.
Most of the victims were buried in a mass grave at Higher Cemetery in Exeter , but only 68 bodies could be recovered of the 186 known to have perished.
This disaster was one of the events that led to drastic changes in fire regulations and the design of public buildings, and it was also notable for the reaction of the British public, who donated more than £20,000 to support the injured and the families of those who died.

6 th September 1997

Princess Diana funeral:
The funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales takes place in London. Well over a million people line the streets and two and a half billion watch around the world on television.


Funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales.

The funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales, started on Saturday 6 September 1997 at 9:08 am in London, when the tenor bell of Westminster Abbey started tolling to signal the departure of the cortège from Kensington Palace. The coffin was carried from the palace on a gun carriage by riders of the King's Troop and escorted by mounted police along Hyde Park to St James's Palace, where Diana's body had remained for five days before being taken to Kensington Palace. The Union Flag on top of the palace was lowered to half mast. The official ceremony was held at Westminster Abbey in London and finished at the resting place in Althorp.
Two thousand people attended the ceremony in Westminster Abbey while the British television audience was 32.10 million on average, one of the United Kingdom's highest viewing figures ever. An estimated 2 to 2.5 billion people watched the event worldwide, making it one of the biggest televised events in history.

7 th September 1940

World War 11, the blitz:
World War II: The German Luftwaffe begins the Blitz, bombing London and other British cities for over 50 consecutive nights.

On September 7, 1940, 300 German bombers raid London, in the first of 57 consecutive nights of bombing. This bombing “blitzkrieg” (lightning war) would continue until May 1941.

After the successful occupation of France, it was only a matter of time before the Germans turned their sights across the Channel to England. Hitler wanted a submissive, neutralized Britain so that he could concentrate on his plans for the East, namely the land invasion of the Soviet Union, without interference. Since June, English vessels in the Channel had been attacked and aerial battles had been fought over Britain, as Germany attempted to wear down the Royal Air Force in anticipation of a land invasion. But with Germany failing to cripple Britain’s air power, especially in the Battle of Britain, Hitler changed strategies. A land invasion was now ruled out as unrealistic; instead Hitler chose sheer terror as his weapon of choice.
British intelligence had had an inkling of the coming bombardment. Evidence of the large-scale movement of German barges in the Channel and the interrogation of German spies had led them to the correct conclusion-unfortunately, it was just as the London docks were suffering the onslaught of Day One of the Blitz. By the end of the day, German planes had dropped 337 tons of bombs on London. Even though civilian populations were not the primary target that day, the poorest of London slum areas-the East End–felt the fallout literally, from direct hits of errant bombs as well as the fires that broke out and spread throughout the vicinity. Four hundred and forty-eight civilians were killed that afternoon and evening.
A little past 8 p.m., British military units were alerted with the code name “Cromwell,” meaning the German invasion had begun. A state of emergency broke out in England; even home defense units were put to the ready. One of Hitler’s key strategic blunders of the war was to consistently underestimate the will and courage of the British people. They would not run or be cowed into submission. They would fight.

8 th September 2022
             
                      Death of Queen Elizabeth 11:
                                                                Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom dies at Balmoral Castle in Scotland after reigning for 70 years. Her son Charles, Prince of Wales, ascends the throne upon her death as Charles III.

                                            Queen Elizabeth dies at 96, ending an era for Britain.

                            BALMORAL, Scotland, Sept 8  Queen Elizabeth, Britain's longest-reigning monarch, the nation's figurehead and a towering presence on the world stage for seven decades, died peacefully at her home in Scotland on Thursday aged 96.
"The death of my beloved Mother, Her Majesty The Queen, is a moment of the greatest sadness for me and all members of my family," the new king, her eldest son Charles, said.
"I know her loss will be deeply felt throughout the country, the Realms and the Commonwealth, and by countless people around the world," the 73-year-old said in a statement.
                                        News that the queen's health was deteriorating emerged shortly after midday on Thursday when her doctors said she was under medical supervision, prompting her family to rush to Balmoral Castle in Scotland to be by her side.
Thousands gathered outside Buckingham Palace, in central London, and there was a stunned silence when the flag was lowered to half-mast. The crowd surged to the gates as the notice announcing the death of the only monarch most Britons have ever known was attached to the black iron gates.
                              Royal officials said King Charles III and his wife Camilla, the Queen Consort, would remain at Balmoral before returning to London on Friday, when Charles is expected to address the nation and meet Prime Minister Liz Truss.
On Elizabeth's death, Charles automatically became monarch, opens new tab of the United Kingdom and the head of state of 14 other realms including Australia, Canada and New Zealand.

9 th September 1543

Youngest ever Monarch:
Mary Stuart, at nine months old, is crowned "Queen of Scots" in the central Scottish town of Stirling.

On This Day 1543: Mary Queen of Scots crowned aged just nine months old.

She was born at Linlithgow Palace just nine months earlier - and now she was Queen of Scots.
Mary I was crowned at Stirling Castle on this day in 1543 in a solemn ceremony driven by the machinations and manipulations of the Tudor period.

The ceremony was conducted in the Chapel Royal of Stirling Castle by Cardinal David Beaton, Archbishop of St Andrews, Scotland’s most senior Catholic cleric.

Few details of the occasion exists, but accounts of the coronation record it as a hastily arranged affair, with little of the usual lavishness afforded on such a day.
Mary I of Scotland was born in Linlithgow Palace on 8 December 1542 - just six days before the death of her father, James V, who was likely struck down by cholera.

From the day she was born, Scotland's pro-English and pro-French forces moved to take control of her.

The business of Mary - as the youngest of monarchs - was controlled by her Regent, James Hamilton, 2nd Earl of Arran, for the first 12 years of her life.

At six-months old, Henry VIII - her great uncle - drew up the Treaties of Greenwich which mapped out her future wedding to the King's son, Edward VI.
The Earl of Arran signed the documents, but her mother remained strongly opposed to the union.

The Scottish Parliament also refused to support the treaties with Henry VIII launching the Rough Wooing in a show of force against Scotland.

As a result, the young queen hid out at Stirling Castle and spent the first five years moving around Scotland for her safety

Mary was sent to France in 1548 to be the bride of the Dauphin, the young French prince, in order to secure a Catholic alliance against Protestant England.

In 1561, after the Dauphin, still in his teens, died, Mary reluctantly returned to Scotland, a young and vulnerable widow.

10 th September 1547

Battle of Pinkie Cleugh:
The Battle of Pinkie, the last full-scale military confrontation between England and Scotland, resulting in a decisive victory for the forces of Edward VI.


Battle of Pinkie Cleugh – 10 September 1547

The Battle of Pinkie Cleugh, also known as the Battle of Pinkie, took place near Musselburgh, in Scotland, on the banks of the River Esk, on 10th September 1547. It was a battle of the "War of the Rough Wooing", so called because it started when Henry VIII tried to force Scotland to agree to a marriage between his son Edward and the infant Mary, Queen of Scots. The war began in December 1543 and it went on into Edward VI's reign, with Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset and Lord Protector, continuing Henry VIII's policy of a forcible alliance with the Scots. The war was brought to an end by the Treaty of Boulogne in March 1550.

The Battle of Pinkie Cleugh is regarded as the last pitched battle between England and Scotland, i.e. a battle where both sides chose to fight at a scheduled time and location. The English forces, led by Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset, defeated the Scots, led by the Earl of Arran. Somewhere between 6,000 and 15,000 Scots were killed at the battle, compared to 500-600 Englishmen.

September 11 th 2001

The 9/11 terror attacks:
The September 11 attacks, a series of coordinated terrorist attacks killing 2,977 people using four aircraft hijacked by 19 members of al-Qaeda. Two aircraft crash into the World Trade Center in New York City, a third crashes into The Pentagon in Arlington County, Virginia, and a fourth into a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania.


September 11 attacks – four coordinated suicide attacks upon the United States in New York City and the Washington, D.C., area on September 11, 2001. On that Tuesday morning, 19 terrorists from the Islamist militant group al-Qaeda hijacked four passenger jets. The hijackers intentionally crashed two planes, American Airlines Flight 11 and United Airlines Flight 175, into the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York City; both towers collapsed within two hours. Hijackers crashed American Airlines Flight 77 into the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia. The fourth jet, United Airlines Flight 93, crashed into a field near Shanksville, Pennsylvania, after passengers attempted to take control before it could reach the hijacker's intended target in Washington, D.C. Nearly 3,000 died in the attacks, and the September 11 attacks have had broad and lasting consequences to military policy, politics, and foreign relations.

12 th September 1959

Bonanza and the first colour t.v. series.


Bonanza, the first regularly scheduled TV program presented in colour, is launched in the United States.

‘Bonanza’ Was the First TV Show to Do This & More Trivia on Anniversary of Premiere.

The Cartwrights first rode through Virginia City, Nev., in the Western TV drama series Bonanza on Saturday, Sept. 12, 1959, on NBC, and it was the first Western to be televised entirely in color. Bonanza lasted 14 seasons, making it the second-longest-running TV Western behind Gunsmoke. In honor of the occasion, we ponder some bullet points from the Ponderosa Ranch:

Bonanza’s unmistakable theme song was written by Jay Livingston and Ray Evans, and dozens of renditions have been recorded over the years. The song originally had lyrics (“I’ve got a flair for women everywhere, bonanza!”), but they were never sung on the show. In 1962, Johnny Cash recorded a version with his own words (“The claim we hold is as good as gold, bonanza!”).

The Cartwrights weren’t lucky with the ladies. Ben (Lorne Greene) was a three times a widower, and his sons didn’t fare much better — their wives or fiancées tragically died or ran off. Joe (Michael Landon) proposed to 11 women, four of whom died.

An intrepid viewer watched the entire series and kept track of the Cartwrights’ body count, estimating that Ben and his three sons killed 170 people over the show’s run. Joe led the pack with roughly 67 solo kills (and he had help with four more).

Landon was cast as Little Joe Cartwright at the age of 22. The show took off, and by its sixth season, Bonanza was No. 1 in the ratings and stayed there for three years. It was then Landon also began working behind the camera, writing and directing episodes.

When actor Pernell Roberts left the series after Season 6, it was explained that his Adam character simply moved away. Dan Blocker, who played Hoss, died unexpectedly in 1972 before the final season’s filming began. The show subtly revealed that Hoss died, but the cause of death — drowning in an act of heroism — wasn’t revealed until the 1988 TV movie Bonanza: The Next Generation.

13 th September 1848

Phineas Gage's incredible story:
Vermont railroad worker Phineas Gage survives an iron rod 1+1⁄4 inches (3.2 cm) in diameter being driven through his brain; the reported effects on his behavior and personality stimulate discussion of the nature of the brain and its functions.

The Shocking Story Of Phineas Gage, The Railroad Worker Who Survived A Spike Through His Skull.

After Phineas P. Gage took an iron tamping rod through his skull in 1848, his personality changed drastically in a baffling case that helped give birth to modern neuroscience.

On September 13, 1848, Phineas Gage was working on the side of a railroad, outside Cavendish, Vermont.

He was part of a crew blasting rock out of the way for new tracks to be laid down. His job, specifically, was to pack the rock full of blasting powder and then use a tamping iron, a three-foot-long, 1 1/4 inch wide iron bar, to tamp it down.
Around 4:30 PM, Gage’s attention was momentarily pulled from his work by the men working behind him. As he leaned forward and looked over his left shoulder to speak to them, the tamping iron sparked against the rock, exploding the powder in the hole.

The tamping iron flew out of the hole, into Gage’s left cheek, through the roof of his mouth, into his brain, and out through the top of his head.

Gage was thrown to the ground, twitching.

After a few minutes though, miraculously, Gage started speaking. Then, he started walking and eventually was able to sit upright in his oxcart for the three-quarter mile journey back to his hotel.
The doctor who was called about 30 minutes after the accident, Edward H. Williams, was slow to believe the tale of Gage’s incredulous mishap.

However, when he found Gage sitting upright in a chair outside of his hotel, talking to those around him while his brain was visibly pulsing through the open wound in his head.

Upon being examined by Williams, Gage stood up too quickly and vomited. The effort pushed “half of a teacup” of brain matter out through the wound and onto the floor.

Williams found he no longer needed much convincing.
He and an assistant got right to work, removing bone fragments and cleaning the wound before binding it shut with adhesive straps. The entrance wound in Gage’s cheek was also closed, and his entire head was wrapped in bandages. By the end of the ordeal, Gage had lost almost six ounces of brain matter.

Phineas Gage was finally released from the doctor’s care after 10 weeks of recovery time, a moderately short one compared to other similar injuries.

During his recovery, he had lost his left eye due to swelling, had spent a few days in a comatose state, and had to have fungi removed that had started sprouting from the top of his open brain.
However, the doctors who worked on the Phineas Gage case were all continuously shocked by how well he was doing given what had happened to him.

After his release, Gage went to stay with his parents, traveling there alone. His parents reported hew as “improving both mentally and physically” and was even able to work outside in the barns with his parent’s horses and plow the field.

Hospital checkups revealed that he had no pain in his head, despite the fact that the pulsing movements of his brain were visible through the thin skin that covered the exit wound.
Though he was physically able to return to work on the railroad, Gage never did, as he had become somewhat of a marvel in the medical community. Doctors would bring him along to seminars and classes, showing him off to their colleagues and students as a miracle of modern medicine. He also spent a short period of time as a living experiment in P.T. Barnum’s American Museum in New York.

He began to have epileptic seizures, and his mother reported that he was acting strangely, and not like himself. After a short stay with his mother, Phineas Gage died at the age of 36, from epilepsy resulting from his injury.

September 14 th 1402


Battle of Homildon Hill:
Battle of Homildon Hill results in an English victory over Scotland.

A Scottish raiding army returning home was intercepted and defeated by Henry 'Hotspur' Percy and George Dunbar. Arguably the greatest victory for the longbow in battle.

Following the battle of Otterburn in 1388 the relationship between England and Scotland continued to be fragile and volatile with frequent raids, in both directions, across the border. The Scots were always quick to capitalise on political unrest in England which diverted the attention of the English Crown to other parts of the country. In 1402 such an opportunity occurred. The newly crowned King Henry IV did not have the support of all the powerful English noble families, nor the respect of the Scottish king Robert III who insisted on referring to him as ‘Duke of Lancaster’. In the spring of 1402 a revolt led by Owen Glendower, begun the previous year in Wales, increased in intensity. Henry was forced to turn his attention and resources to Wales. Unsurprisingly the Scots chose this time for a concerted attack into England.
In August 1402 a Scottish army some 10,000 strong under Archibald, Earl Douglas advanced into England looting as they came, reaching as far as Newcastle before turning for home. Although many of the militias mustered in the north had been diverted to Wales, the northern marches were by no means unprotected. The powerful Percy family aided by the defecting Scottish Earl of March, George Dunbar, mustered a force drawn from the Marches, Lincolnshire and Cheshire, and including many nobles.

As the Scots, hampered by booty, made their slow progress to the border the English forces moved to intercept their path on the road leading north-west from Wooler to Millfield and on to the border crossing at Coldstream.

The English victory at the battle of Homildon Hill was a triumph for the English archer. According to the sources other troops took very little part in the action. The capture of several Scottish nobles was also of singular significance; not least because dispute over their fate led to a further breach in the already fragile relationship between the Percys and the King. The following year the Percys were in open revolt against the King.

The area of the battlefield is agricultural with only minor development around isolated farms and hamlets. The plain between Wooler and the River Glen is fully enclosed, as are the lower slopes of both Homildon Hill and Harehope Hill. The upper slopes of the hills remain as upland pasture. There are public footpaths across both hills allowing access to Scottish and English archers positions.

15 th September 1830

Opening of the Liverpool to Manchester railway:
The Liverpool to Manchester railway line opens; British MP William Huskisson becomes the first widely reported railway passenger fatality when he is struck and killed by the locomotive Rocket.

Manchester Railway
The opening of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway on 15 September 1830 was a momentous event in the history of travel and transport.

Opening day
On 17 September the Mercury carried a full history and report on the opening and informed readers that nothing could be more of benefit “to the welfare and prosperity of a nation…than a facility of intercourse between the towns and provinces of which it is composed.”

Fanny Kemble, an actress working in Liverpool at the time had become friendly with George Stephenson and had accompanied him on the footplate. She recorded on the opening day “how strange it is to be journeying on thus, with no visible cause of progress other than the magical machine, with its flying white breath and rhythmical unvarying pace.”

As well as travelling inside the first and second class carriages, passengers could travel in their own [horse drawn] carriages upon carriage trucks if so required and this was referred to by one commentator as “platforms with railway wheels upon which you may drive your carriage... stand still, and be transported as upon a fairy carpet for thirty miles.”

William Huskisson
However successful the railway became its opening day will always be remembered for the death of William Huskisson. Huskisson was a local MP and avid supporter of the railway. He broke the opposition to the railway with his passionate speech to parliament, declaring the railway to be the transport of the future.

Eight carriages set off along the route towards Manchester with crowds cheering and waving flags. Not everyone was happy and some spectators jeered and threw stones at the passing carriages. However for those on board nothing was going to spoil the excitement of this historic day and at a refuelling stop many of the passengers got out of their carriages and mingled on the track.

Huskisson alighted to talk to the Duke of Wellington and in confusion, as Rocket sped towards him, he fell on to the track. His injuries proved fatal .

16 th September 1620.

The Mayflower:
Pilgrims set sail for Virginia from Plymouth, England in the Mayflower.

On September 16, 1620, the Mayflower sails from Plymouth, England, bound for the Americas with 102 passengers. The ship was headed for Virginia, where the colonists—half religious dissenters and half entrepreneurs—had been authorized to settle by the British crown. However, stormy weather and navigational errors forced the Mayflower off course, and on November 21 the “Pilgrims” reached Massachusetts, where they founded the first permanent European settlement in New England in late December.

Thirty-five of the Pilgrims were members of the radical English Separatist Church, who traveled to America to escape the jurisdiction of the Church of England, which they found corrupt. Ten years earlier, English persecution had led a group of Separatists to flee to Holland in search of religious freedom. However, many were dissatisfied with economic opportunities in the Netherlands, and under the direction of William Bradford they decided to immigrate to Virginia, where an English colony had been founded at Jamestown in 1607.

The Separatists won financial backing from a group of investors called the London Adventurers, who were promised a sizable share of the colony’s profits. Three dozen church members made their way back to England, where they were joined by about 70 entrepreneurs–enlisted by the London stock company to ensure the success of the enterprise. In August 1620, the Mayflower left Southampton with a smaller vessel–the Speedwell–but the latter proved unseaworthy and twice was forced to return to port. On September 16, the Mayflower left for America alone from Plymouth.

In a difficult Atlantic crossing, the 90-foot Mayflower encountered rough seas and storms and was blown more than 500 miles off course. Along the way, the settlers formulated and signed the Mayflower Compact, an agreement that bound the signatories into a “civil body politic.” Because it established constitutional law and the rule of the majority, the compact is regarded as an important precursor to American democracy. After a 66-day voyage, the ship landed on November 21 on the tip of Cape Cod at what is now Provincetown, Massachusetts.
After coming to anchor in Provincetown harbor, a party of armed men under the command of Captain Myles Standish was sent out to explore the area and find a location suitable for settlement. While they were gone, Susanna White gave birth to a son, Peregrine, aboard the Mayflower. He was the first English child born in New England. In mid-December, the explorers went ashore at a location across Cape Cod Bay where they found cleared fields and plentiful running water and named the site Plymouth.

The expedition returned to Provincetown, and on December 21 the Mayflower came to anchor in Plymouth harbor. Just after Christmas, the pilgrims began work on dwellings that would shelter them through their difficult first winter in America.
In the first year of settlement, half the colonists died of disease. In 1621, the health and economic condition of the colonists improved, and that autumn Governor William Bradford invited neighboring Indians to Plymouth to celebrate the bounty of that year’s harvest season. Plymouth soon secured treaties with most local Indian tribes, and the economy steadily grew, and more colonists were attracted to the settlement. By the mid 1640s, Plymouth’s population numbered 3,000 people, but by then the settlement had been overshadowed by the larger Massachusetts Bay Colony to the north, settled by Puritans in 1629.

The term “Pilgrim” was not used to describe the Plymouth colonists until the early 19th century and was derived from a manuscript in which Governor Bradford spoke of the “saints” who left Holland as “pilgrimes.” The orator Daniel Webster spoke of “Pilgrim Fathers” at a bicentennial celebration of Plymouth’s founding in 1820, and thereafter the term entered common usage.

17 th September 1908

the first airplane fatality:
The Wright Flyer flown by Orville Wright, with Lieutenant Thomas Selfridge as passenger, crashes, killing Selfridge, who becomes the first airplane fatality.

Sept. 17, 1908: First Airplane Passenger Death
During flight trials to win a contract from the U.S. Army Signal Corps, pilot Orville Wright and passenger Lt. Thomas Selfridge crash in a Wright Flyer at Fort Myer, Virginia. Wright is injured, and Selfridge becomes the first passenger to die in an airplane accident.

On Sept. 17 Orville was flying Selfridge on a test test flight. Three or four minutes into the flight, a blade on one of the two wooden propellers split and caused the engine to shake violently. Orville shut down the engine but was unable to control the airplane.

The propeller had hit a bracing wire and pulled a rear rudder from the vertical position to a horizontal position. This caused the airplane to pitch nose-down, and it could not be countered by the pilot.

The Wright Flyer hit the ground hard, and both men were injured. Orville suffered a fractured leg and several broken ribs. Selfridge suffered a fractured skull and died in the hospital a few hours later.

Despite the crash, and the first passenger death in an airplane, the Army was significantly impressed with the Wright Flyer and allowed the brothers to complete the trials the following year. They were awarded the contract. Along with success in France, the Wright brothers were well on their way to establishing what would become one of the most successful aviation companies during the early days of flying.

19 th September 2012.

                 Murders of W.P.C.s Nicola Hughes and Fiona Bone :

                Greater Manchester Police officers PC Nicola Hughes and PC Fiona Bone are murdered in a gun and grenade ambush attack in Greater Manchester, England.

                                         On 18 September 2012, two Greater Manchester Police officers, Nicola Hughes and Fiona Bone, were killed by Dale Cregan in a gun and grenade ambush while responding to a report of a burglary in Tameside, Greater Manchester, England.

The incident was the first in England in which two female police officers were killed on duty. Greater Manchester's chief constable Peter Fahy called the attack "cold-blooded murder" and Prime Minister David Cameron described it as a "despicable act...of pure evil".

On 12 February 2013, Cregan changed his plea to guilty in relation to the murder of the two police officers. Three months later he admitted to carrying out two separate murders in 2012, which were linked to a gangland feud in Manchester. Cregan was sentenced to a whole life tariff at Preston Crown Court on 13 June 2013.

                                        Fiona Bone, 32, and Nicola Hughes, 23, were on routine patrol on 18 September 2012 when they were sent to Abbey Gardens in the village of Mottram in Longdendale in Greater Manchester, at about 11 am, following a report of a burglary. This was the result of a 999 emergency telephone call from a member of the public, which was later found to be made by Dale Cregan, who had led the officers into a trap. After arriving at the house where the burglary had been reported the officers came under attack, with 32 gunshots being fired from a Glock pistol within 31 seconds, and one M75 hand grenade being used. Fiona Bone died at the scene while Nicola Hughes was badly wounded and died later in hospital

19 th September 1991

Otzi the iceman:
Who Was Ötzi the Iceman?
Ötzi the Iceman is the oldest mummy ever found. Learn what scientists now know about the famous ancient human.

In 1991, two German tourists were hiking in the Ötztal Alps — a mountain range shared by Austria and Italy — when they stumbled upon the frozen remains of a dead man. The ice preserved the man so well that his body, clothes and tools never decomposed.

Scientists dubbed him Ötzi the Iceman and began studying the naturally-preserved mummy. They’ve determined he lived more than 5,000 years ago, which makes Ötzi the Iceman the oldest mummy ever found.

Researchers are still studying the mountain mummy, and Ötzi the Iceman continues to unlock answers about what daily life was like thousands of years ago.
How Old Is Ötzi the Iceman?
The hikers who found Ötzi the Iceman contacted authorities immediately. Austrian police took note of his grass overcoat — a garment typically worn by locals up until the late nineteenth century. They assumed Ötzi the Iceman died sometime in the past two centuries.

But when scientists began studying the mummy, they realized he was much older than first thought. Ötzi the Iceman lived around 5,300 years ago during the Neolithic Copper Age.

In a 2003 study in Science, an international team of scientists revealed how they analyzed his teeth and bones and determined he lived his entire life in a 60-kilometer range in the Alps.

How Old Was Otzi When He Died?
Scientists conducted whole-genome sequencing on Ötzi the Iceman and published their results in a 2012 study in Nature.

Ötzi the Iceman likely had brown eyes, was lactose intolerant and was predisposed to coronary heart disease. He had type O blood and was likely between 40 and 50 years old when he died.

How Was Ötzi the Iceman’s Health?
Scientists now know a lot about his health at the time of his passing because his organs were in good condition. Scientists found he has blackened lungs. They think that may be due to a lifetime of warming next to open fires.

In his life, Ötzi the Iceman suffered eight broken ribs. Several were healed at the time of his death, but others were still healing. He also had a lot of health problems. His tooth enamel had decayed, and he had gum disease.

He had a parasitic roundworm in his intestines, gallstones and degenerative joint disease in his hip. The cartilage had worn in his cervical and lumbar spine, and he had atherosclerosis, a plaque buildup in his artery walls.

How Did Ötzi the Iceman Die?
Scientists disagree on how Ötzi the Iceman died. He had two fresh wounds on his body, and some researchers say he was murdered. Others believe he was caught in a snowstorm and died of exposure.

Based on an analysis of his stomach contents, researchers do have an understanding of how Ötzi the Iceman spent his last days. Before he died, he moved from higher up in the Alps to a lower altitude. He returned to the glacier altitude. The area the hikers discovered him was once a mountain pass.

Fascinating story, gassey. I will look out for a documentary about this...cheers....

Here you are Fred

Thanks for that, Lolly. I couldn't find it on Youtube on my tv but I did find another version plus about four others on Otzi which I did find fascinating. I'll watch this one on my pc over the next few days. The life back then was described really well. This chap had an interesting life and had various maladies and not much in the way of medicine back then. They described him as a warrior or shepherd or both...very interesting...