On this date...

Battle of Brandywine

In 1777, British forces led by General William Howe defeated the Americans at the Battle of the Brandywine during the American Revolution.

In 1783, Benjamin Franklin writes "There never was a good war or bad peace".

In 1789, Alexander Hamilton was appointed the first secretary of the treasury.

In 1814, U.S. naval forces under Thomas Macdonough defeated a larger British force at the Battle of Lake Champlain during the War of 1812.

In 1841, John Goffe Rand, an American portrait painter, receives a patent for the first collapsible tin paint tube. Up until then, artists had to mix their own oil paints and store whatever was left over in animal bladders.

In 1851, In Christiana, Pennsylvania, a group of African Americans and white abolitionists skirmish with a Maryland posse intent on capturing four fugitive enslaved people hidden in the town. The violence came one year after the second fugitive slave law was passed by Congress, requiring the return of all escapees to their owners in the South.

In 1853, First electric telegraph used between Merchant's Exchange, San Francisco, and Point Lobos, California

In 1857, Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (also known as Mormons), stoked by religious zeal and a deep resentment of decades of public abuse and federal interference, murder 120 emigrants at Mountain Meadows, Utah.

In 1941, Construction began on the Pentagon, in Arlington county, Virginia; one of the largest office buildings in the world, it is the headquarters of the U.S. Department of Defense, including the Army, Navy, and Air Force.

In 1941, Franklin D. Roosevelt orders the US Navy that any Axis ship found in American waters be shot on sight

In 1941, Charles A. Lindbergh sparked charges of anti-Semitism with a speech in which he blamed "the British, the Jewish and the Roosevelt administration" for trying to draw the United States into World War II.

In 1967, The Carol Burnett Show debuted on CBS, and the variety and sketch comedy program, which featured Carol Burnett and her comedy troupe, became a Saturday-night staple.

In 1970, American rock guitar legend Jimi Hendrix gives what becomes his final interview with NME's Keith Altham in England

In 1985, Pete Rose breaks baseball’s all-time hits record. He performed his 4,192nd career hit, breaking the record set by Ty Cobb.

In 1998, Congress released Kenneth Starr's report, which offered graphic details of President Bill Clinton's alleged sexual misconduct and leveled accusations of perjury and obstruction of justice.

In 2001, The Untied States was attacked by terrorist who struck New York City, the Pentagon and crashed in Shanksville, PA killing over 3,000 people and changing life as we knew it in the United States. Approximately 6,000 people were injured that day and many more have died since then due to illness related issues.