On this day:

BarnBuster

Virtually Unknown Member


"September 2, 1945 Aboard the USS Missouri in Tokyo Bay, Japan formally surrenders to the Allies, bringing an end to World War II.

By the summer of 1945, the defeat of Japan was a foregone conclusion. The Japanese navy and air force were destroyed. The Allied naval blockade of Japan and intensive bombing of Japanese cities had left the country and its economy devastated. At the end of June, the Americans captured Okinawa, a Japanese island from which the Allies could launch an invasion of the main Japanese home islands. U.S. General Douglas MacArthur was put in charge of the invasion, which was code-named “Operation Olympic” and set for November 1945.

The invasion of Japan promised to be the bloodiest seaborne attack of all time, conceivably 10 times as costly as the Normandy invasion in terms of Allied casualties. On July 16, a new option became available when the United States secretly detonated the world’s first atomic bomb in the New Mexico desert. Ten days later, the Allies issued the Potsdam Declaration, demanding the “unconditional surrender of all the Japanese armed forces.” Failure to comply would mean “the inevitable and complete destruction of the Japanese armed forces and just as inevitable the utter devastation of the Japanese homeland.” On July 28, Japanese Prime Minister Kantaro Suzuki responded by telling the press that his government was “paying no attention” to the Allied ultimatum. U.S. President Harry Truman ordered the devastation to proceed, and on August 6, the U.S. B-29 bomber Enola Gay dropped an atomic bomb on the Japanese city of Hiroshima, killing an estimated 80,000 people and fatally wounding thousands more.

After the Hiroshima attack, a faction of Japan’s supreme war council favored acceptance of the Potsdam Declaration, but the majority resisted unconditional surrender. On August 8, Japan’s desperate situation took another turn for the worse when the USSR declared war against Japan. The next day, Soviet forces attacked in Manchuria, rapidly overwhelming Japanese positions there, and a second U.S. atomic bomb was dropped on the Japanese coastal city of Nagasaki.

Just before midnight on August 9, Japanese Emperor Hirohito convened the supreme war council. After a long, emotional debate, he backed a proposal by Prime Minister Suzuki in which Japan would accept the Potsdam Declaration “with the understanding that said Declaration does not compromise any demand that prejudices the prerogatives of His Majesty as the sovereign ruler.” The council obeyed Hirohito’s acceptance of peace, and on August 10 the message was relayed to the United States.

Early on August 12, the United States answered that “the authority of the emperor and the Japanese government to rule the state shall be subject to the Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers.” After two days of debate about what this statement implied, Emperor Hirohito brushed the nuances in the text aside and declared that peace was preferable to destruction. He ordered the Japanese government to prepare a text accepting surrender.

In the early hours of August 15, a military coup was attempted by a faction led by Major Kenji Hatanaka. The rebels seized control of the imperial palace and burned Prime Minister Suzuki’s residence, but shortly after dawn the coup was crushed. At noon that day, Emperor Hirohito went on national radio for the first time to announce the Japanese surrender. In his unfamiliar court language, he told his subjects, “we have resolved to pave the way for a grand peace for all the generations to come by enduring the unendurable and suffering what is insufferable.” The United States immediately accepted Japan’s surrender.

President Truman appointed MacArthur to head the Allied occupation of Japan as Supreme Commander of the Allied Powers. For the site of Japan’s formal surrender, Truman chose the USS Missouri, a battleship that had seen considerable action in the Pacific and was named after Truman’s native state. MacArthur, instructed to preside over the surrender, held off the ceremony until September 2 in order to allow time for representatives of all the major Allied powers to arrive.

On Sunday, September 2, more than 250 Allied warships lay at anchor in Tokyo Bay. The flags of the United States, Britain, the Soviet Union, and China fluttered above the deck of the Missouri. Just after 9 a.m. Tokyo time, Japanese Foreign Minister Mamoru Shigemitsu signed on behalf of the Japanese government. General Yoshijiro Umezu then signed for the Japanese armed forces, and his aides wept as he made his signature.

Supreme Commander MacArthur next signed on behalf of the United Nations, declaring, “It is my earnest hope and indeed the hope of all mankind that from this solemn occasion a better world shall emerge out of the blood and carnage of the past.” Ten more signatures were made, by the United States, China, Britain, the USSR, Australia, Canada, France, the Netherlands, and New Zealand, respectively. Admiral Chester W. Nimitz signed for the United States. As the 20-minute ceremony ended, the sun burst through low-hanging clouds. The most devastating war in human history was over."
 

BarnBuster

Virtually Unknown Member

"The American Revolution officially comes to an end when representatives of the United States, Great Britain, Spain and France sign the Treaty of Paris on September 3, 1783. The signing signified America’s status as a free nation, as Britain formally recognized the independence of its 13 former American colonies, and the boundaries of the new republic were agreed upon: Florida north to the Great Lakes and the Atlantic coast west to the Mississippi River.

The events leading up to the treaty stretched back to April 1775, on a common green in Lexington, Massachusetts, when American colonists answered King George III’s refusal to grant them political and economic reform with armed revolution. On July 4, 1776, more than a year after the first volleys of the war were fired, the Second Continental Congress officially adopted the Declaration of Independence. Five difficult years later, in October 1781, British General Charles Lord Cornwallis surrendered to American and French forces at Yorktown, Virginia, bringing to an end the last major battle of the Revolution.

In September 1782, Benjamin Franklin, along with John Adams and John Jay, began official peace negotiations with the British. The Continental Congress had originally named a five-person committee–including Franklin, Adams and Jay, along with Thomas Jefferson and Henry Laurens to handle the talks. However, both Jefferson and Laurens missed the sessions–Jefferson had travel delays and Laurens had been captured by the British and was being held in the Tower of London. The U.S. delegation, which was distrustful of the French, opted to negotiate separately with the British.

During the talks Franklin demanded that Britain hand over Canada to the United States. This did not come to pass, but America did gain enough new territory south of the Canadian border to double its size. The United States also successfully negotiated for important fishing rights in Canadian waters and agreed, among other things, not to prevent British creditors from attempting to recover debts owed to them. Two months later, the key details had been hammered out and on November 30, 1782, the United States and Britain signed the preliminary articles of the treaty. France signed its own preliminary peace agreement with Britain on January 20, 1783, and then in September of that year, the final treaty was signed by all three nations and Spain. The Treaty of Paris was ratified by the Continental Congress on January 14, 1784."
 

too larry

Well-Known Member
The College of Rock and Roll Knowledge
12 hrs ·
Led Zeppelin didn't release their debut LP until Jan of 1969, yet, 53 years ago today, on Sept. 3, 1966, Jimmy Page and John Paul Jones had the #1 record in the US. Kinda…..

On Sept. 3, 1966, Donovan's song "Sunshine Superman" became the #1 song in the US. It knocked " The Lovin' Spoonfuln's "Summer In The City" out of the spot it had held for the previous 3 weeks. It would be the only time that Donovan would have a #1 song in the US. The song wasn't released in the UK until Dec of 66.

Page and Jones…. They were session musicians on the record.

That's why we're here, to let you know these things…

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9zxj4RE0O8

 

BarnBuster

Virtually Unknown Member

"September 4, 1957, Arkansas governor Orval Faubus enlists the National Guard to prevent nine African American students from entering Central High School in Little Rock. The armed Arkansas militia troops surrounded the school while an angry crowd of some 400 whites jeered, booed, and threatened to lynch the frightened African American teenagers, who fled shortly after arriving.

Faubus took the action in violation of a federal order to integrate the school. The conflict set the stage for the first major test of the U.S. Supreme Court’s unanimous 1954 decision in Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka that racial segregation in educational facilities is unconstitutional.

The historic decision, which brought an end to federal tolerance of racial segregation, specifically dealt with Linda Brown, a young African American girl who had been denied admission to her local elementary school in Topeka, Kansas, because of the color of her skin.

In 1896, the Supreme Court ruled in Plessy v. Ferguson that “separate but equal” accommodations in railroad cars conformed to the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of equal protection. That ruling was used to justify segregating all public facilities, including elementary schools. However, in the case of Linda Brown, the white school she attempted to attend was far superior to her black alternative and miles closer to her home. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) took up Linda’s cause, and in 1954 Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka reached the Supreme Court. African American lawyer (and future Supreme Court justice) Thurgood Marshall led Brown’s legal team, and on May 17, 1954, the high court handed down its decision.

In an opinion written by Chief Justice Earl Warren, the nation’s highest court ruled that not only was the “separate but equal” doctrine unconstitutional in Linda’s case, it was unconstitutional in all cases because educational segregation stamped an inherent badge of inferiority on African American students. A year later, after hearing arguments on the implementation of their ruling, the Supreme Court published guidelines requiring public school systems to integrate “with all deliberate speed.”

In 1957, the first major confrontation over this decision came when African American students attempted to integrate Central High School in Little Rock. After Governor Faubus surrounded the school with Arkansas National Guard troops, a showdown with federal officials ensued. On September 24, President Dwight Eisenhower sent 1,000 U.S. troops to Little Rock. The next day, the African American students entered under heavily armed guard. The episode served as a catalyst for the integration of other segregated schools in the United States."
 

BarnBuster

Virtually Unknown Member


Pan Am flight 73 hijacking


"Pan Am flight 73 hijacking, takeover of a Pan American World Airways jet on September 5, 1986, by hijackers linked to the Abū Niḍāl Organization. A 16-hour standoff at Jinnah International Airport in Karāchi ended with 22 hostages dead and some 150 injured.

On September 5, 1986, Pan Am flight 73, a Boeing 747, departed Mumbai for New York with scheduled stops in Karāchi and Frankfurt. At around 6:00 AM passengers were boarding in Karāchi when four heavily armed men dressed as security personnel stormed the plane, firing shots in the air. Acting quickly, flight attendants alerted the bridge, and the flight deck crew escaped through an emergency exit in the cockpit. The 379 passengers and crew aboard were held hostage as the hijackers demanded a pilot to fly them to Cyprus, in order to free “friends” in prison there. To enforce the demand, the men selected and executed an American citizen, Rajesh Kumar. Efforts by the hijackers to identify other Americans were frustrated by flight attendants who hid the passports of the remaining American passengers. The hijackers also threatened to blow up the aircraft with all passengers on board.

The deadlines set by the hijackers went unheeded as they pursued discussions with a local Pan Am representative and Pakistani police. By about 9:00 PM, the plane’s onboard power supply had been exhausted. The lights dimmed, and the hijackers forced the hostages to gather in the center of the plane. Shortly thereafter, the plane went completely dark as the emergency power ran out, and the hijackers, thinking that the plane was being assaulted by security forces, fired on the hostages with machine guns and grenades. Twenty-one hostages were killed, and scores were injured. Some of the hostages were able to force open a number of escape doors, and flight attendants helped the surviving passengers flee the aircraft. The assault ended only when the gunmen ran out of ammunition, and members of the flight crew reentered the aircraft to aid the wounded as three of the four hijackers fled. All four hijackers were eventually apprehended by Pakistani police and imprisoned.

The crew of Pan Am flight 73 saved countless lives by demonstrating remarkable bravery and composure in the face of mortal danger. Senior flight attendant Neerja Bhanot, who was fatally wounded in the hijackers’ final assault, was posthumously recognized by the Indian government with the Ashoka Chakra, its highest peacetime award for gallantry. Bhanot’s life and the events of the hijacking were dramatized in the film Neerja (2016).


On July 6, 1988, five Palestinian men were convicted in Pakistan for their roles in the hijacking and murders and sentenced to death: Zayd Hassan Abd al-Latif Safarini, Wadoud Muhammad Hafiz al-Turki, Jamal Saeed Abdul Rahim, Muhammad Abdullah Khalil Hussain ar-Rahayyal, and Muhammad Ahmed al-Munawar. The sentences were later commuted to life in prison.

According to a CNN report, Safarini was handed over to the FBI from a prison in Pakistan in September 2001; however, other sources claim he was released by the Pakistanis and later captured by the FBI. He was taken to the United States where on May 13, 2005 he was sentenced to a 160-year prison term. At the plea proceeding, Safarini admitted that he and his fellow hijackers committed the offenses as members of the Abu Nidal Organization, also called the ANO, a designated terrorist organization.

The other four prisoners either escaped or were released from Adiala jail in Rawalpindi, reportedly in January 2008

On December 3, 2009, the FBI, in coordination with the State Department, announced a $5M reward for information that leads to the capture of each of the four remaining hijackers of Pan Am 73, who were reported to have been released from prison in Pakistan in 2008.

One of the four, Jamal Saeed Abdul Rahim, was reported killed in a drone strike on January 9, 2010, in Pakistan.His death was never confirmed and he remains on the FBI's Most Wanted Terrorists list and the State Department's Rewards for Justice list

In hopes of generating new leads for the alleged hijackers the FBI released new age-progressed images on January 11, 2018. The case is still under investigation by the Washington Field Office of the Bureau.

 

too larry

Well-Known Member
The College of Rock and Roll Knowledge
10 hrs ·
"Whiskey bottles and brand new cars, oak tree you're in my way"

On Sept. 5, 1976, Lynyrd Skynyrd's Gary Rossington crashed his new Ford Torino into a tree. His injuries forced the band to cancel an upcoming tour. The band even fined Gary $5000.00 because of it.

While Gary was recovering, the band wrote a song about it.

43 years ago today. "….can't ya smell that smell……"



 

too larry

Well-Known Member
The College of Rock and Roll Knowledge
11 hrs ·
Did you ever wonder how people came up with their 'signature' look? Here's a good example…

On Sept. 5, 1966, John Lennon went to Germany to begin filming his first and only major movie role, appearing as "Pvt. Gripweed" in director Richard Lester's latest movie, the WWII satire "How I Won the War."

As part of his costume for the film, they had him wear round "granny glasses". John must have like the look as they then became part of his 'signature look' and with him wearing them, he set a new fashion trend.

So now be honest, how many of you got a pair of the round 'granny glasses'? And for an extra credit question, did you think they were cooler than Roger McGuinn's glasses?



 

too larry

Well-Known Member
The College of Rock and Roll Knowledge
12 hrs ·
On Sept. 5, 1964, Manfred Mann released the single "Do Wah Diddy Diddy" in the US. You do know he didn't write it right?

The song was released in the UK on June 11 and had spent two weeks as the #1 song there in July.

The song would become the #1 song in the US in Oct. of 64.

The song was written by Jeff Barry and Ellie Greenwich and originally recorded in 1963, as "Do-Wah-Diddy", by the American vocal group The Exciters.

We know you all know Manfred Mann's version, so how many of you have heard The Exciters version?

"Do Wah Diddy Diddy", 55 years ago today in the states. There she was…..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wn6ho_R4soA

 
Top