August 28, 1842: The British convict ship *Waterloo * is destroyed by violent weather near the tip of South Africa. 189 die.
August 28, 1963: The Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr. gives his I Have a Dream speech
August 29, 1792: The HMS Royal George capsizes during routine maintenance near Portsmouth. Over 800 are killed
August 29, 2005: Hurricane Katrina devastates much of the U.S. Gulf Coast from Louisiana to the Florida Panhandle, killing an estimated 1,836 people and causing over $108 billion in damage.
August 30, 1967: Thurgood Marshall is confirmed as the first African American Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.
**August 30, 1974 **: The Zagreb train wreckkills 153 and again highlights the danger of overworked employees in critical situations.
August 31, 1886: The Great Charleston, South Carolina Earthquakekills somewhere between 60 and 110 people. Estimated as a 7.3 on the Richter scale, this earthquake is the strongest ever known to have occurred in the Eastern United States. The quake was felt as far away as Boston, Milwaukee, New Orleans, and the island of Bermuda. 90% of the buildings in Charleston were damaged.
1980 August 31
Polish government signs accord with Gdansk shipyard workers
August 31, 1997: Diana, Princess of Wales, her companion Dodi Fayed and driver Henri Paul die in a car crash in Paris.
**September 1, 1923 **: The Great Kanto Earthquake and resulting tsunamis kill over 140,000 in Japan.
September 1, 1914: The last known passenger pigeon, a female named Martha, dies in captivity in the Cincinnati Zoo.
September 2, 1666: The Great Fire of London starts in a baker’s shop. Over the next few days this fire would destroy 80% of the city.
September 2, 1901: At the Minnesota State Fair, Vice President of the United States Theodore Roosevelt utters the famous phrase, “Speak softly and carry a big stick”.
September 3, 1991: 25:workers are killed and another 55 are injured in the Hamlet Chicken Processing Fire in North Carolina. Many of the workers were trapped inside because the owners of the plant were concerned about employee theft of chickens and had padlocked the exit doors. An investigation afterwards revealed the plant had never had a safety inspection in 11 years of operation.
September 4, 1941: The Greer Incident occurs when a German submarine fires torpedoes at the USS *Greer *. These are the first shots fired at an American ship in World War II.
September 4, 1882: Thomas Edison flips the switch to the first commercial electrical power plant in history, lighting one square mile of lower Manhattan. This is considered by many as the day that began the electrical age.
September 5, 1887: The Theatre Royal, Exeter firekills nearly 200. It remains the deadliest theater fire ever in England.
September 6, 1943: The Frankford Junction train wreck kills 79 and injures over 100 more when The Congressional Limited crashes in Philadelphia.
September 7, 1936: The last thylacine (AKA the Tasmanian tiger) dies in the Hobart Zoo in Australia. Thylacines had been on Earth for 4 million years.
September 8, 1860: In the early morning hours on Lake Michigan, the PS *Lady Elgin *is rammed by the steamship *Augusta *during a storm. The *Lady Elgin *sinks and at least 297 passengers and crew die. There were no exact records of the number aboard and the death toll may have been quite a bit higher. In any case, this is known to be the second deadliest shipwreck ever on the Great Lakes. Many who survived rode pieces of wreckage to shore. But some others, including Captain John Wilson, died when the pieces of wreckage on which they rode were dashed on the rocks of the shoreline.