Born on This Day Sunglasses-wearing German fashion designer best known for the modern revival of the Chanel fashion empire. Pulitzer-winning American poet noted for her plainspoken language and interest in the natural world. Dancer who brecame the first African American female principal dancer with the prestigious American Ballet Theatre. F. Scott Fitzgerald publishes his first short story collection, Flappers and Philosophers . In a copy he sends critic H.L. Mencken, Fitzgerald labels four stories “worth reading,” one “amusing” and remaining three “trash.” Also on This Day in History Discover more of the major events, famous births, notable deaths and everything else history-making that happened on September 10th John Smith elected to lead Jamestown English adventurer John Smith is elected council president of Jamestown, Virginia—the first permanent English settlement in North America. Smith, a colorful figure, had won popularity in the colony because of his organizational abilities and effectiveness in dealing with local Native American groups. In May 1607, about 100 English colonists settled along the James River in […] The Battle of Lake Erie In the first unqualified defeat of a British naval squadron in history, U.S. Captain Oliver Hazard Perry leads a fleet of nine American ships to victory over a squadron of six British warships at the Battle of Lake Erie during the War of 1812. The battle was closely contested for hours, and Perry’s flagship Lawrence […] The struggling Donner Party sends ahead to California for food Weeks behind schedule and the massive Sierra Nevada mountains still to be crossed, on what was likely September 10, 1846, the members of the ill-fated Donner Party realize they are running short of supplies and send two men ahead to California to bring back food. The group of 89 emigrants had begun their western trek […] New York City parade honors World War I veterans

On September 10, 1919, almost one year after an armistice officially ended the First World War, New York City holds a parade to welcome home General John J. Pershing, commander in chief of the American Expeditionary Force (AEF), and some 25,000 soldiers who had served in the AEF’s 1st Division on the Western Front. The […] Silent film star Fatty Arbuckle arrested for murder On September 10, 1921, silent film star Fatty Arbuckle is arrested in San Francisco for the rape and murder of aspiring actor Virginia Rappe. He is later acquitted. British War Cabinet reacts to the Blitz in kind In light of the destruction and terror inflicted on Londoners by a succession of German bombing raids, called “the Blitz,” the British War Cabinet seeks retaliation, instructing British bombers over Germany to drop their bombs “anywhere” if unable to reach their targets. The prior two nights of bombing had wrought extraordinary damage, especially in the […] Hurricane Donna batters the Florida Keys On September 10, 1960, Hurricane Donna hits the Florida Keys as a Category 4 storm. Having formed near Cape Verde off the African coast, it would go on to cause 150 deaths from Puerto Rico to New England over the course of two weeks. Donna first attained hurricane status on August 31 and headed west […] The guillotine falls silent On September 10, 1977, at Baumetes Prison in Marseille, France, Hamida Djandoubi, a Tunisian immigrant convicted of murder, becomes the last person executed by guillotine. The guillotine first gained fame during the French Revolution when physician and revolutionary Joseph-Ignace Guillotin won passage of a law requiring all death sentences to be carried out by “means […] Picasso’s “Guernica” is returned to Spain Spanish artist Pablo Picasso’s monumental anti-war mural Guernica is received by Spain after four decades of refugee existence on September 10, 1981. One of Picasso’s most important works, the painting was inspired by the destruction of the Basque town of Guernica by the Nazi air force during the Spanish Civil War. In 1939, Picasso gave the […] Nirvana’s “Smells Like Teen Spirit” is released as a single On September 10, 1991, Seattle rock band Nirvana releases its breakout single, “Smells Like Teen Spirit.” In just a few short months, a group that was a complete nonentity to the mainstream music-buying public would become one of the most important rock bands on earth. You either had to be part of a fairly small […] CERN Large Hadron Collider is powered up On September 10, 2008, scientists successfully flip the switch for the first time on the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) at the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) lab in Geneva, kicking off what many called history’s biggest science experiment. Testing particle physics theories, the $8 billion LHC is the largest particle accelerator in the world, […]