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September 21

Artur Phleps (29 November 1881 – 21 September 1944) was an Austro-Hungarian, Romanian and Nazi officer who was an SS-Obergruppenführer und General der Waffen-SS in the Waffen-SS during World War II. He was an Austro-Hungarian Army officer before and during World War I. During the interwar period, he joined the Romanian Army and became an adviser to King Carol. After he spoke out against the government, he was made to leave the army. In 1941 he joined the Waffen-SS. He saw action on the Eastern Front before raising two Waffen-SS mountain divisions and one corps in occupied Yugoslavia. Units under his command committed many crimes against the civilian population of the Independent State of Croatia. This became controversial when his onetime translator, Kurt Waldheim, successfully ran for the Austrian presidency in the 1980s. In addition to the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross, Phleps was awarded the German Cross in Gold, and, posthumously, was awarded the Oak Leaves to his Knight's Cross. (Full article...)

September 21: International Day of Peace

• 1170 – Norman invasion of Ireland: English and Irish forces conquered Dublin, forcing Ascall mac Ragnaill, the last Norse–Gaelic king of Dublin, into exile.
• 1776 – American Revolutionary War: The Great Fire of New York (depicted) broke out during the British occupation of New York City, destroying up to 1,000 buildings.
• 1918 – World War I: The Battle of Nazareth ended with the British Empire victorious over the Ottomans.
• 1958 – The first section of Interstate 80 in Iowa opened in the Des Moines metropolitan area.
• 2001 – Several British Muslim youths in Peterborough, England, murdered 17-year-old Ross Parker, leading to debate over whether the British media failed to cover racially motivated crimes with white victims.

September 21

September 22

Qalaherriaq (c. 1834 – 1856) was an Inughuit hunter from Cape York in northwestern Greenland. Born around 1834 and baptized Erasmus Augustine Kallihirua, he was taken aboard the British barque HMS Assistance in 1850 as an interpreter during the search for Franklin's lost expedition. He guided the ship to Wolstenholme Fjord to investigate rumors of a massacre of Franklin's crew, but found the corpses of local Inughuit and crew from an unrelated British vessel. Poor sea conditions prevented the Assistance from returning to Qalaherriaq's family, and he was instead taken to England and placed in the custody of the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge. He was enrolled in St Augustine's College at Canterbury and studied English and Christianity. In 1855, he was tasked by Edward Feild, Bishop of Newfoundland, to join him on a mission to the Labrador Inuit. Qalaherriaq's health problems, which he had developed during his service as an interpreter, worsened after his arrival in Newfoundland, and he died at St. John's in 1856 around 22 years old. (Full article...)

September 22

• 1236 – Livonian Crusade: The Livonian Brothers of the Sword were soundly defeated by pagan Samogitian and Semigallian troops at the Battle of Saule.
• 1789 – The office of United States Postmaster General was formally established.
• 1957 – François Duvalier (pictured), nicknamed Papa Doc, was elected President of Haiti as a populist before consolidating power and ruling as a dictator for the rest of his life.
• 2003 – Dolphin, the first emulator for the GameCube that could run commercial video games, was released.
• 2013 – Insurgency in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa: All Saints Church in Peshawar, Pakistan, was attacked by two suicide bombers who killed 127 people.

September 22

September 23

Arthur Oswin Austin (1879–1964) was an American electrical engineer and inventor. He is best known as the inventor of the Austin transformer, used to supply power for lighting circuits on radio towers. Austin's work included improvements to radio transmission equipment and the effects of lightning on high-voltage transmission lines and aircraft. He was a fellow of the American Institute of Electrical Engineers and of the Institute of Radio Engineers, and was known as an expert in high-voltage insulators and fittings. His work on transmitting antennas included both military and civilian projects. Born in California, Austin graduated from Stanford University with a degree in electrical engineering. He spent most of his adult life in Ohio where he worked for the Ohio Brass Company and founded the Austin Insulator Company. He bought a large estate in Barberton, Ohio, lived in the mansion, and built an extensive outdoor electrical laboratory on the grounds. (Full article...)

September 23: Celebrate Bisexuality Day

• 1122 – Pope Callixtus II and Holy Roman emperor Henry V agreed to the Concordat of Worms (pictured), ending the Investiture Controversy.
• 1642 – First English Civil War: The Battle of Powick Bridge, the first engagement between the primary field armies of the Royalists and the Parliamentarians, ended in a Royalist victory.
• 1884 – The French steamship Arctique ran aground on the northern coast of Cape Virgenes in Argentina; gold was discovered during the rescue effort, triggering the Tierra del Fuego gold rush.
• 1920 – The Louisiana hurricane dissipated over Kansas after forcing around 4,500 people to evacuate and causing $1.45 million in damages.
• 2010 – Teresa Lewis became the first woman to be executed by the U.S. state of Virginia since 1912, and the first woman in the state to be executed by lethal injection.

September 23

Emmanuel Adebayor scored 32 international goals during his career as a forward for the Togo national football team, making him the country's all-time top scorer. Born in the capital city of Lomé, Adebayor represented Togo in 87 FIFA-recognised matches between 2000 and 2019. He made his international debut against Zambia in July 2000 and scored his first goal over two years later against Mauritania at the Stade de Kégué. Adebayor's only international hat-trick came against Swaziland (now Eswatini) in October 2008 where he scored four goals during a match in Accra, Ghana. Adebayor represented Togo at the 2006 FIFA World Cup in Germany, the country's only appearance in the tournament as of 2024, and he played in several African Cup of Nations tournaments. He scored his last goal for Togo during his final appearance in a 2–1 defeat against neighbouring Benin on 24 March 2019. Adebayor is revered as a Togolese sporting legend and is often regarded as one of the best African players of his generation. (Full list...)

September 23

September 24

Pinkerton is the second studio album by the American rock band Weezer, released on September 24, 1996, by DGC Records. To better capture their live sound, the band self-produced Pinkerton, creating a darker, more abrasive album than their 1994 debut Weezer. The lyrics express loneliness and disillusionment with the rock lifestyle, and reference Japanese culture. Pinkerton produced the singles "El Scorcho" and "The Good Life". It debuted at number 19 on the Billboard 200, failing to match sales of Weezer's debut, and received mixed reviews; Rolling Stone readers voted it the third-worst album of 1996. For subsequent albums, Weezer returned to more traditional pop songwriting and less personal lyrics. In subsequent years, Pinkerton was reassessed; several publications named it one of the best albums of the 1990s, and it was certified platinum in 2016. (Full article...)

September 24: Heritage Day in South Africa; Independence Day in Guinea-Bissau (1973)

• 1645 – English Civil War: Royalists commanded by King Charles I suffered a significant defeat at the Battle of Rowton Heath.
• 1869 – Jay Gould, James Fisk, and other speculators plotted but failed to control the United States gold market, causing prices to plummet.
• 1890 – Wilford Woodruff, the president of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, wrote the first draft of a manifesto that officially disavowed the future practice of plural marriage.
• 1941 – Operation Barbarossa: A Wehrmacht training event known as the Mogilev Conference began, marking an increase in violence against Jews and other civilians in the areas under General Max von Schenckendorff's command.
• 1993 – Norodom Sihanouk (pictured) became King of Cambodia with the restoration of the monarchy after a 23-year interregnum.

September 24

September 25

SMS Helgoland (pictured) was a dreadnought battleship of the German Imperial Navy. Her design improved from the Nassau class, including an increase in the bore diameter of the main guns. Her keel was laid down at the Howaldtswerke shipyards in Kiel, launched on 25 September 1909, and commissioned on 23 August 1911. During World War I the ship participated in several sweeps into the North Sea as the covering force for the battlecruisers of the I Scouting Group. She saw limited duty in the Baltic Sea against the Russian Navy, including serving as part of a support force during the Battle of the Gulf of Riga in August 1915. Helgoland was present at the Battle of Jutland on 31 May – 1 June 1916, though she was located in the center of the German line of battle and not as heavily engaged as the ships in the lead. She was ceded to Great Britain after the war and broken up for scrap in the early 1920s. Her coat of arms is preserved in the Bundeswehr Military History Museum in Dresden. (Full article...)

September 25

• 844 – Viking expansion: A Viking fleet arrived near Seville, then part of the Emirate of Córdoba, and began a raid of the city that was eventually repelled by Muslim defenders.
• 1790 – Peking opera was born with the introduction of Hui opera to Beijing by the "Four Great Anhui Troupes" in honour of the Qianlong Emperor's 80th birthday.
• 1890 – Sequoia National Park (pictured) was established to conserve giant sequoia trees in an area affected by logging in the southern Sierra Nevada in California.
• 1983 – In one of the largest prison escapes in British history, 38 Provisional Irish Republican Army prisoners hijacked a prison meals lorry and broke out of HM Prison Maze in County Antrim, Northern Ireland.
• 2005 – Typhoon Longwang, the deadliest tropical cyclone to hit China in that year, formed just north of the Mariana Islands.

September 25

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September 26

The 2023 World Snooker Championship took place from 15 April to 1 May 2023 at the Crucible Theatre in Sheffield, England. The qualifying rounds produced a 115 break by Ng On-yee, the highest by a woman in the tournament's history. The defending champion Ronnie O'Sullivan made a record 31st appearance at the tournament's main stage, surpassing the 30 appearances by Steve Davis, but he lost 10–13 in the quarter-finals to Belgian player Luca Brecel. Si Jiahui became the first Crucible debutant to reach the semi-finals since Andy Hicks at the 1995 event. Brecel came from 5–14 behind to defeat Si 17–15, the first player to win a match at the Crucible after trailing by nine frames. Brecel went on to defeat Mark Selby 18–15 in the final, becoming the sport's first world champion from mainland Europe. Two maximum breaks were made at the main stage, one by Kyren Wilson in the first round and the other by Selby, who became the first player to make a 147 in a world final. (Full article...)

September 26

• 46 BC – Julius Caesar dedicated the Temple of Venus Genetrix in Rome to Venus, the mythical ancestor of his family.
• 1580 – English explorer Francis Drake's galleon the Golden Hind (replica pictured) sailed into Plymouth, completing his circumnavigation of the globe.
• 1928 – The Nationalist government of China adopted Gwoyeu Romatzyh as the official system for the romanization of Mandarin Chinese.
• 1983 – Cold War: Soviet lieutenant colonel Stanislav Petrov averted a potential nuclear war by identifying as a false alarm signals that appeared to indicate an impending U.S. missile attack.
• 2010 – Scottish aid worker Linda Norgrove and three Afghan colleagues were kidnapped by members of the Taliban in Kunar Province, Afghanistan.

September 26

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September 27

September 27

• 1822 – In a letter to the Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres in Paris, Jean-François Champollion announced his initial successes in deciphering Egyptian hieroglyphs on the Rosetta Stone (pictured).
• 1851 – The British East India Company inaugurated the Horsburgh Lighthouse on the rocky outcrop of Pedra Branca, Singapore, which later became the subject of a territorial dispute.
• 1917 – The Broadhurst Theatre opened in New York City with a performance of Misalliance by George Bernard Shaw.
• 1975 – Two members of ETA political-military and three members of the Revolutionary Antifascist Patriotic Front, sentenced to death for murder, became the last people to be executed in Spain.
• 1983 – American software developer Richard Stallman announced plans for the Unix-like operating system GNU, the first free software developed by the GNU Project.

September 27

No Time to Die, a 2021 spy film based on the Ian Fleming character James Bond, won 24 awards from 64 nominations, with particular recognition for its visual and sound effects, and acting. It received three nominations at the 94th Academy Awards, including Best Visual Effects. The film won Best Original Song ("No Time to Die", composed by Billie Eilish – pictured – and Finneas O'Connell), becoming the third consecutive theme song from a film starring Craig as Bond to do so after "Skyfall" (from the 2012 film of the same name) and "Writing's on the Wall" (from 2015's Spectre). At the 75th British Academy Film Awards, No Time to Die was nominated for Outstanding British Film, Best Cinematography, Best Sound, and Best Special Visual Effects; and won Best Editing. (Full list...)

September 27

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September 28

Igor Stravinsky (1882–1971) was a Russian composer and conductor, considered one of the most important and influential composers of the 20th century and a pivotal figure in modernist music. He studied music under Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov until the latter's death in 1908. Soon after, Stravinsky met the impresario Sergei Diaghilev, who commissioned the composer to write three ballets for the Ballets Russes's Paris seasons: The Firebird (1910), Petrushka (1911), and The Rite of Spring (1913), the last of which caused a near-riot at the premiere due to its avant-garde nature. His compositional style varied greatly, being influenced at different points by Russian folklore, neoclassicism, and serialism. His ideas influenced the composers Aaron Copland, Philip Glass, Béla Bartók, and Pierre Boulez, who were all challenged to innovate beyond traditional tonality, rhythm, and form. Stravinsky died in 1971, leaving six memoirs, an earlier autobiography, and a series of lectures. (Full article...)

September 28: Meskel in Ethiopia and Eritrea (2024)

• 235 – Pope Pontian resigned after being exiled to Sardinia, becoming the first pope to relinquish the position; he was reportedly beaten to death with sticks weeks later.
• 1066 – William the Conqueror and his fleet of around 600 ships landed at Pevensey, Sussex, beginning the Norman conquest of England.
• 1901 – Philippine–American War: Filipino guerrillas killed more than forty American soldiers in a surprise attack on the town of Balangiga on the island of Samar.
• 1928 – Scottish biologist and pharmacologist Alexander Fleming (pictured) discovered penicillin when he noticed a bacteria-killing mould growing in his laboratory.
• 1975 – An attempted robbery of Spaghetti House, a restaurant in Knightsbridge, London, turned into a six-day hostage situation.

September 28

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