March 9
March 9 is the 68th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (69th in Leap years ). There are 297 days remaining.
Events
1276 - Augsburg becomes an Imperial Free City
1765 - After a public campaign by the writer Voltaire , judges in Paris posthumously exonerate Jean Calas of murdering his son. Calas had been tortured and executed in 1762 on the charge, though his son had actually committed suicide.
1796 - Napoléon Bonaparte marries his first wife, Joséphine de Beauharnais .
1841 - The Supreme Court of the United States rules in the Amistad case, concerning captive Africans who seized control of the slave-trading ship carrying them: the court rules that they had been taken into slavery illegally.
1847 - Mexican-American War : United States forces under General Winfield Scott invade Mexico near Vera Cruz .
1862 - American Civil War : The first battle between two ironclad warships - In a five-hour battle near Hampton Roads , Virginia the USS Monitor fights the CSS Virginia to a draw.
1916 - Pancho Villa leads 1,500 Mexican raiders in an attack against Columbus, New Mexico , killing 17.
1924 - Italy annexes Fiume .
1933 - Great Depression : The U.S. Congress begins its first 100 days of enacting New Deal legislation. President Franklin D. Roosevelt submits the Emergency Banking Act to Congress.
1945 - World War II : Bombing of Tokyo - American B-29 bombers attack Tokyo , Japan with incendiary bombs . The resulting fire storm kills over 100,000 people.
1954 - McCarthyism : CBS television broadcasts the See It Now Joseph McCarthy ," produced by Edward R. Murrow .
1957 - Aleutian Islands register a 9.1 magnitude earthquake
1959 - The Barbie doll debuts.
1964 - The first Ford Mustang rolls off the assembly line at Ford Motor Company .
1967 - Josef Stalin 's daughter Svetlana Alliluyeva defects to the United States .
1975 - Construction of the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System begins.
1977 - Approximately a dozen armed Hanafi Muslims take over three buildings in Washington, DC , killing one person and taking more than 130 hostages. The hostage situation ends two days later.
1986 - United States Navy divers find the largely intact but heavily-damaged crew compartment of the Space Shuttle Challenger . The bodies of all seven astronauts were still inside.
1987 - Rock band U2 release the album The Joshua Tree 1989 - A strike forces financially-troubled Eastern Airlines into bankruptcy .
1990 - Dr. Antonia Novello is sworn in as Surgeon General of the United States , becoming the first female and Hispanic American to serve in that position.
1990 - Newfoundland and Labrador Premier Clyde Wells confirms he will rescind Newfoundland's approval of the Meech Lake Accord , effectively killing the Accord.
1991 - Massive demonstrations are held against Slobodan Milosevic in Belgrade . Two people are killed and tanks are in the streets.
1993 - Rodney King testifies at the federal trial of four Los Angeles, California police officers accused of violating King's civil rights when they beat him during an arrest.
2004 - John Allen Muhammad is sentenced to death for his part in the Beltway sniper attacks of October 2002 . Lee Boyd Malvo is sentenced to life in prison.
2004 - A terrorist attack on a restaurant in Istanbul kills one and injures 5.
2005 - Dan Rather presents his final broadcast of the CBS Evening News .
Births
1213 - Hugh IV , Duke of Burgundy
1454 - Amerigo Vespucci , explorer and cartographer (d. 1512 )
1697 - Friederike Caroline Neuber , actress (d. 1760 )
1749 - Honore Mirabeau , politician (d. 1791 )
1763 - William Cobbett , journalist and author (d. 1835 )
1856 - Eddie Foy , singer, dancer, vaudeville performer (d. 1928 )
1887 - Phil Mead , English cricketeer and left-handed batsman (d. 1958 )
1890 - Vyacheslav Molotov , Soviet politician (d. 1986 )
1892 - Vita Sackville-West , writer, gardener (d. 1962 )
1900 - Howard Aiken , computing pioneer (d. 1973 )
1902 - Will Geer , actor (d. 1978 )
1910 - Samuel Barber , American composer (d. 1981 )
1918 - Mickey Spillane , mystery writer
1918 - George Lincoln Rockwell , American Nazi leader (d. 1967 )
1921 - Carl Betz , American actor (d. 1978 )
1923 - Walter Kohn , physicist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry (1998 )
1924 - Peter Scholl-Latour , journalist
1932 - Keely Smith , American singer
1933 - Mel Lastman , Canadian politician
1934 - Yuri Gagarin , cosmonaut , first human in space (d. 1968 )
1936 - Tom Sestak , American football player (d. 1987 )
1937 - Mickey Gilley , country music performer
1940 - John Cale , composer, musician
1940 - Raúl Juliá , actor (d. 1994 )
1941 - Ernesto Miranda , litigant in Miranda v. Arizona 1976 )
1942 - Mark Lindsay , American musician (Paul Revere & the Raiders )
1943 - Bobby Fischer , chess player
1943 - Charles Gibson , television journalist
1945 - Trish Van Devere , American actress
1947 - Keri Hulme , New Zealand writer
1948 - Jeffrey Osborne , singer
1950 - Doug Ault , Major League Baseball player (d. 2004 )
1950 - Danny Sullivan , automobile racer
1951 - Michael Kinsley , journalist, editor, founder of Slate magazine
1954 - Bobby Sands , Irish republican (d. 1981 )
1960 - Linda Fiorentino , actress
1964 - Juliette Binoche , actress
1965 - Benito Santiago , baseball player
1971 - Emmanuel Lewis , American actor
1972 - Kerr Smith , American soap opera actor
1973 - Aaron Boone , Major League Baseball All-Star
1980 - Chingy , American rapper
1981 - Antonio Bryant , American football wide receiver
1987 - Bow Wow , rap musician , actor
Deaths
1661 - Jules Cardinal Mazarin , French cardinal and statesman (b. 1602 )
1808 - Joseph Bonomi the Elder , architect (b. 1739 )
1954 - Eva Ahnert-Rohlfs , astronomer, (b. 1912 )
1964 - Paul Erich von Lettow-Vorbeck , German general (b. 1870 )
1983 - Faye Emerson , American actress
1981 - Max Delbrück , biologist , (b. 1906 )
1989 - Robert Mapplethorpe , artist, (b. 1946 )
1989 - Sam Melville , American actor
1992 - Menachem Begin , Prime Minister of Israel , (b. 1913 )
1993 - C. Northcote Parkinson , historian and writer (b. 1909 )
1994 - Charles Bukowski , poet, writer, (b.1920 )
1996 - George Burns , actor, singer, (b. 1896 )
1997 - The Notorious B.I.G. , rap musician , (b. 1972 as Christopher Wallace)
2000 - Ivo Robić , singer and songwriter - Croatia , Mister Morgen , (b 1923 )
2003 - Stan Brakhage , filmmaker, (b. 1933 )
2003 - Bernard Dowiyogo , former president of Nauru , (b. 1946 )
2004 - Albert Mol , actor (b.1917 )
2004 - Robert Pastorelli , actor (b. 1954 )
Holidays and observances
External links
March 8 - March 10 - February 9 - April 9 -- Listing of all days
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