September 8
This Day in History
Gerald R. Ford.
Courtesy Gerald R. Ford Library 1974: Richard M. Nixon pardoned by President Gerald Ford
The Watergate Scandal was first brought to public attention by the arrest of five men who, on June 17, 1972, broke into the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee at the Watergate, an office-apartment-hotel complex in Washington, D.C. It culminated in the resignation on August 8, 1974, of President Richard M. Nixon, whose administration was implicated in the burglary and its subsequent cover-up and who was ordered by the U.S. Supreme Court to turn over the transcripts of taped conversations that clearly implicated him in the cover-up. On this day Nixon was granted an unconditional pardon by his successor, Gerald R. Ford.
More events on this day
1998: Mark McGwire of the St. Louis Cardinals broke Roger Maris's 1961 record for most home runs in a regular professional baseball season by hitting his 62nd of the season (he finished the season with 70 home runs).
1945: At the end of World War II, the first U.S. troops entered the Korean peninsula south of the 38th parallel to receive Japanese surrender; north of the parallel, Japanese troops surrendered to Soviet forces.
1781: American troops commanded by General Nathanael Greene defeated British forces under Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Stewart in the Battle of Eutaw Springs during the American Revolution.
1664: As part of the Anglo-Dutch Wars, the duke of York (later James II) took the city of New Amsterdam, whose name was changed to New York.
1429: Joan of Arc attempted to oust the duke of Burgundy and take Paris for the newly crowned king Charles VII. |
