Important Events From Today in History – 10 September

Today in History

• 2014 First Invictus Games Held

  The international games unite wounded service members and veterans to compete in athletic events. The Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park in London, England, hosted the 2014 Invictus Games. The games drew 300 competitors from 13 different countries. The next games will be held in 2016.

• 2008 Large Hadron Collider Goes Live

  The European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) built the largest particle collider, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). It is a 27-kilometer-long experimental machine that runs along the French-Swiss border. The Collider was built to search for the Higgs Boson particle, a fundamental particle in physics.

• 1977 Last Person to be Executed in France

  Hamida Djandoubi was also the last person to be executed by a guillotine. Djandoubi was convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of 21-year-old Elisabeth Bousquet.

• 1960 Baghdad Conference Begins

  The 5-day conference in Iraq’s capital city culminated in the formation of the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), an intergovernmental organization of oil-producing nations. The group’s founding members were Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Venezuela. The organization has 13 members as of today. OPEC is in charge of coordinating and unifying oil and gas policies in member countries, as well as developing an efficient and equitable system of petroleum production, sale, and investment.

• 1846 Patent For Sewing Machine Awarded

  Elias Howe of Spencer, Massachusetts, was granted a patent by the United States Patent and Trademark Office for the first sewing machine with a lockstitch design. While he had little success marketing his machine in the United States, machines similar to his design became extremely popular, particularly among women. The similarity between Isaac Singer’s, founder of the Singer Sewing Machine Company, and Howe’s machine prompted Howe to sue Singer. He was victorious in the case.