Today is Wednesday, Sept. 25, the 269th day of 2024. There are 97 days left in the year.
Today in history:
On Sept. 25, 1957, nine Black students who had been forced to withdraw from Central High School in Little Rock, Arkansas, because of unruly white crowds were escorted to class by members of the U.S. Army’s 101st Airborne Division and the National Guard.
Also on this date:
In 1513, Spanish explorer Vasco Nunez de Balboa crossed the Isthmus of Panama and sighted the Pacific Ocean.
In 1789, the first United States Congress adopted 12 amendments to the Constitution and sent them to the states for ratification. (Ten of the amendments became the Bill of Rights.)
In 1956, the first trans-Atlantic telephone cable officially went into service with a three-way ceremonial call between New York, Ottawa and London.
In 1978, 144 people were killed when a Pacific Southwest Airlines Boeing 727 and a private plane collided over San Diego.
In 2005, in the presence of disarmament observers, the Irish Republican Army decommissioned its arsenal of weapons, officially ending a 36-year armed campaign for a unified Irish state.
In 2012, President Barack Obama, speaking to the U.N. General Assembly, pledged U.S. support for Syrians trying to oust President Bashar Assad, calling him “a dictator who massacres his own people.”
In 2013, skipper Jimmy Spithill and Oracle Team USA won the America’s Cup with one of the greatest comebacks in sports history, speeding past Dean Barker and Emirates Team New Zealand in the winner-take-all Race 19 on San Francisco Bay.
In 2018, Bill Cosby was sentenced to three-to-10 years in prison for drugging and molesting a woman at his suburban Philadelphia home. (After serving nearly three years, Cosby went free in June 2021 after the Pennsylvania Supreme Court overturned his conviction.)
Today’s Birthdays: Basketball Hall of Famer Hubie Brown is 91. Former Defense Secretary Robert Gates is 81. Actor-producer Michael Douglas is 80. Model Cheryl Tiegs is 77. Actor Mimi Kennedy is 76. Film director Pedro Almodovar is 75. Actor-director Anson Williams is 75. Actor Mark Hamill is 73. Basketball Hall of Famer Bob McAdoo is 73. Actor Michael Madsen is 66. Actor Heather Locklear is 63. Actor Aida Turturro is 62. Actor Tate Donovan is 61. Actor Maria Doyle Kennedy is 60. Basketball Hall of Famer Scottie Pippen is 59. Actor Will Smith is 56. Actor Catherine Zeta-Jones is 55. Football Hall of Famer John Lynch is 53. Basketball Hall of Famer Chauncey Billups is 48. Actor Clea DuVall is 47. Rapper T.I. is 44. Actor-rapper Donald Glover (Childish Gambino) is 41. Actor Zach Woods is 40. Actor Jordan Gavaris is 35. Actor Leah Jeffries is 15.