TODAY IN HISTORY

August 23

1244		Turks expel the crusaders under Frederick II from Jerusalem.
1305		Scottish patriot William Wallace is hanged, drawn, beheaded, and quartered in London.
1541		Jacques Cartier lands near Quebec on his third voyage to North America.
1711		A British attempt to invade Canada by sea fails.
1775		King George III of England refuses the American colonies' offer of peace and declares them in open rebellion.
1821		After 11 years of war, Spain grants Mexican independence as a constitutional monarchy.
1863		Union batteries cease their first bombardment of Fort Sumter, leaving it a mass of rubble but still unconquered by the Northern besiegers.
1900		Booker T. Washington forms the National Negro Business League in Boston, Massachusetts.
1902		Fanny Farmer, among the first to emphasize the relationship of diet to health, opens her School of Cookery in Boston.
1914		The Emperor of Japan declares war on Germany.
1926		American film star Rudolph Valentino dies, causing world-wide hysteria and a number of suicides.
1927		Immigrant laborers Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti are executed for a robbery they did not commit. Fifty years later, in 1977, Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis establishes a memorial in the victims' honor.
1939		Joseph Stalin and German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop sign a non-aggression pact between the Soviet Union and Germany, freeing Hitler to invade Poland and Stalin to invade Finland.
1942		German forces begin an assault on the major Soviet industrial city of Stalingrad.
1944		German SS engineers begin placing explosive charges around the Eiffel Tower in Paris.
1950		Up to 77,000 members of the U.S. Army Organized Reserve Corps are called involuntarily to active duty to fight the Korean War.
1952		Arab League security pact linking seven Arab States in a military, political and economic alliance goes into effect.
1954		First flight of the C-130 Hercules transport aircraft.
1958		The Second Taiwan Strait crisis begins: People's Liberation Army bombards island of Quemoy during Chinese Civil War.
1961		Belgium sends troops to Rwanda-Urundi during bloody Tutsi-Hutu conflict.
1966		Lunar Orbiter 1 takes first photograph of Earth from the moon.
1975		Pathet Lao communists occupy Vientiane, Laos.
1977		Bryan Allen, piloting the Gossamer Condor, wins the Kremer prize for the first human-powered aircraft to fly a one-mile, figure-eight course.
1979		Iranian army opens offensive against Kurds.
1979		Bolshoi Ballet dancer Alexander Godunov defects in New York City.
1990		Armenia declares independence from USSR.
1990		East and West Germany announce they will unite on Oct 3.
1996		Osama bin Laden issues message entitled "A declaration of war against the Americans occupying the land of the two holy places."
2006		Natascha Kampusch,  was abducted at the age of 10 in Austria, escapes from her captor, Wolfgang Priklopil, after 8 years of captivity.
2011		Libyan leader Muammar al-Gaddafi is overthrown after National Transitional Council forces take control of Bab al-Azizia compound during the 2011 Libyan Civil War.
2011		A 5.8 earthquake centered at Mineral, Virginia, damages the Washington Monument, forcing the landmark to close for repairs.