GOOD MORNING – TODAY IS SUNDAY, August 31, the 243rd day of 2014 with
122 to follow. Sunrise in the Boston area is @ 6:07 and sunset is @
7:21. The moon is waxing. The morning stars are stars are Jupiter,
Uranus & Venus. The evening stars are Mars, Mercury, Neptune & Saturn.
ON THIS DAY IN: 1521 – Cortes captured the city of Tenochtitlan,
Mexico, and set it on fire.
1887 – Thomas Edison patented the Kinetoscope, the forerunner of the
motion picture camera.
1888 – The body of Mary Ann “Polly” Nichols, the first victim of Jack
the Ripper, was found mutilated in Buck’s Row, London.
1903 – A Packard auto completed the first transcontinental road trip.
1939 – Nazi leader Adolf Hitler signed an order to attack Poland, and
German forces moved to the frontier.
1961 – A concrete wall replaced the barbed wire fence that separated
East Germany and West Germany — the Berlin Wall.
1962 – The Caribbean nation of Trinidad and Tobago became independent
within the British Commonwealth.
1980 – The Polish trade union Solidarity was formed in Gdansk.
1990 – East Germany and West Germany signed a reunification treaty.
1991 – Kyrgyzstan declares its independence from the Soviet Union.
1998 – North Korea reportedly launches Kwangmyongsong, its first satellite.
1999 – A LAPA Boeing 737-200 crashes during takeoff from Jorge Newbury
Airport in Buenos Aires, killing 65, including 2 on the ground.
2006 – Stolen on August 22, 2004, Edvard Munch’s famous painting The
Scream was recovered in a raid by Norwegian police.