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“No battle is ever won... They are not even fought. The field only reveals to man his own folly and despair, and victory is an illusion of philosophers and fools.”
~ William Faulkner
Wikiquote (William Faulkner (born Falkner, September 25, 1897 – July 6, 1962) an American writer and Nobel Prize laureate from Oxford, Mississippi. Faulkner worked in a variety of written media, including novels, short stories, a play, poetry, essays and screenplays - primarily known and acclaimed for his novels and short stories.)
September 25th, 275
Marcus Claudius Tacitus proclaimed Roman emperor after the assassination of Aurelian.
Wikipedia Image: Relief from a 3rd-century sarcophagus depicting a battle between Romans and Germanic warriors; the central figure is perhaps the emperor Hostilian / Depiction of the Menorah on the Arch of Titus in Rome.
September 25th, 303
On a voyage preaching the gospel, Saint Fermin of Pamplona is beheaded in Amiens, France.
Wikipedia Painting: Saint Fermin of Pamplona
September 25th, 1066
Battle of Stamford Bridge: marks the end of the Viking invasions of England.
Wikipedia Image: Alfred the Great; Alfred the Great's granddaughter, Eadgyth - a Saxon Queen and one of the oldest members of the English royal family were unearthed in a tomb in Germany.
British archaeologists looking for evidence of prehistoric activity in the English county of Dorset discovered instead a mass grave holding 54 male skeletons. Smithsonian, Hurstwic.org.
September 25th, 1513
Spanish explorer Vasco Núñez de Balboa reaches what would become known as the Pacific Ocean.
Wikipedia Painting / Map: The Voyages of Vasco Nunez de Balboa.
September 25th, 1775
American Revolutionary War:
1775 - Battle of Longue-Pointe; Ethan Allen surrenders to British forces after attempting to capture Montreal.
1775 - Invasion of Quebec
1775 - At the same time, Benedict Arnold and his expeditionary company set off from Fort Western, bound for Quebec City.
Wikipedia Painting: Death of General Montgomery in the Attack on Quebec (John Trumbull, 1786)
September 25th, 1789
United States Congress passes twelve amendments to the United States Constitution: ten that are known as the Bill of Rights.
Wikipedia Image: United States Bill of Rights / Second Continental Congress
September 25th, 1846
United States forces led by Zachary Taylor capture the Mexican city of Monterrey.
Wikipedia Painting: General Taylor's forces crossed the Rio Grande, entering Mexico, Library of Congress.
September 25th, 1890
United States Congress establishes Sequoia National Park.
Wikipedia Photo: General Sherman Tree, the largest tree in the world.
September 25th, 1906
Leonardo Torres Quevedo, in the presence of the king and before a great crowd, successfully demonstrates the invention of the Telekino in the port of Bilbao, guiding a boat from the shore, in what is considered the birth of the remote control.
Wikipedia Photo: Spanish mathematician Leonardo Torres Quevedo built what he called the “Telekino”. A remote control similar in mechanical function to Tesla’s, the Telekino employed its own telegraphic code to signal commands.
September 25th, 1929
Jimmy Doolittle performs the first blind flight from Mitchel Field proving that full instrument flying from take off to landing is possible.
Wikipedia Photo: In 1929 aviation pioneer Jimmy Doolittle demonstrates that instrument flying, "flying blind" is possible from takeoff to landing. Lieutenant Jimmy Doolittle, a U.S. Army pilot awarded a Medal of Honor during WWII. credit Bettman / Corbis
September 25th, 1942
World War II: Swiss Police Instruction of September 25, 1942 – this instruction denied entry into Switzerland to Jewish refugees.
Wikipedia Photo: Austrian Jewish refugee in Prague, Holocaust Education Archive Research Team (HEART).
September 25th, 1944
World War II: Operation Berlin (Arnhem rescue); Surviving elements of the British 1st Airborne Division withdraw from Arnhem in the Netherlands, thus ending the Battle of Arnhem and Operation Market Garden.
Wikipedia Photo: Operation Market Garden; Waves of paratroopers land in the Netherlands during Operation Market Garden in September 1944.
September 25th, 1981
Sandra Day O'Connor becomes the 102nd person sworn in as an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States and the first woman to hold the office.
Wikipedia Photo: Ronald Reagan nominated Sandra Day O'Connor as the first female justice of the Supreme Court of the United States
September 25th, 1992
NASA launched a $511 million probe to Mars in the first United States mission to the planet in 17 years. Eleven months later, the probe would fail.
Wikipedia Image: NASA Mars Rover, 2012.