Sorry to be a day late with this one; I somehow overlooked my daily email from history.com amid the other 98 that were on my screen in the morning. But there was a lot to commemorate on September 1st — and one that is particularly meaningful to me — so I think it’s worth doing retroactively.

Let’s begin with the good things:

1972: Bobby Fischer becomes the first American to win the World Chess Championship. In what was billed as the Cold War’s “Match of the Century,” Fischer defeated Russian chess master Boris Spassky at Reykjavik, Iceland. Unfortunately, Fischer spiraled downward into some very strange behavior over the years, disappearing from the chess scene for some time. He finally reemerged to break a few laws in the U.S. and Japan, causing him to emigrate to Iceland, where he died in 2008 at age 64. A sad end for a chess prodigy who, for a short time, had it all.

Did I say this was the good news? Sorry.

1985: Wreck of the Titanic found. After 73 years, the remains of the RMS Titanic was finally found, answering so many long-buried questions, and allowing James Cameron, more than a decade later, to make his hugely successful movie.

And now that theme song is stuck in my head.

1850: P.T. Barnum brings European opera star Jenny Lind to New York. She was then considered the greatest opera singer in the world, and on this date in 1850, she arrived in New York City for what was to become a triumphant national tour, setting box office records and sparking an American opera craze throughout the 1850s.

Why a celebrated opera star such as Lind would have agreed to work with a circus huckster like Barnum is a mystery to me. But apparently, America was glad she did.

1807: Aaron Burr acquitted of treason. Well, good news for him, at least. Not so sure about the rest of the country.

1964: First Japanese player makes MLB debut. Pitcher Masanori Murakami became the first Japanese man to play in the U.S. major leagues when he pitched a scoreless inning for the San Francisco Giants — though his team lost the game to the New York Mets anyway.

So did that mean World War II was finally over? About time!

1966: French president Charles de Gaulle urges the United States to get out of Vietnam.

Fat lot of good that did! Nice try, though.

*. *. *

But there was a whole lot of really bad history made on this date as well. Shall we start with:

1864: Confederate forces abandon Atlanta. If you’re a southerner, then this was definitely bad news, because then Sherman lit a match and burned down much of the city. But if you’re a northerner, the end of that Civil War might justify the means.

But does it ever . . . really?

1939: Germany invades Poland. And thus started six years of hell for the people of Europe, and much of the rest of the world. They called it World War II.

There is no justification for this one.

1983: Korean Airlines flight shot down by Soviet Union. This is the one that is personal, and still makes my heart ache to think about it.

I was in the office when the call came from the Dean of Columbia University Law School, telling me that John Oldham had been on that Korean Air Flight 007 to Seoul, en route to China for his summer of study and teaching. “No! Not the one the Soviets shot down!”

Tragically, yes.

John was an amazing young man — smart, hard-working, decent, with a bright future. Just having graduated from law school, he was scheduled to join our firm; but first he had been offered an internship in Beijing for a year of study, with a side job of teaching English. He had been scheduled to leave a day earlier, but had changed his reservations in order to accommodate a friend who needed help with something. That was John.

And now he was gone.

It fell to me to tell everyone — but first of all, Walter. That was my immediate boss, Walter Surrey — a prominent international attorney with clients doing business throughout the world, including China and the Soviet Union. But he was at a dental appointment that morning, so I had to tell him by phone, before he might hear it somewhere else.

When I called him at the dentist’s office and broke the news, he said nothing for a moment. Then: “Call Tregub. I want him in my office at noon. No excuses.” And he hung up.

Valeriy Tregub was our commercial contact in the Soviet Embassy. When I reached him by phone, there were none of the usual niceties. I told him bluntly, “One of our people was on that plane. Walter wants to see you here at noon.” And he didn’t argue.

When Tregub arrived, he looked as though he’d already been through hell; and his meeting with Walter didn’t help. I learned later from Walter that he had told Tregub what he thought his government should do — accept responsibility for a terrible, accidental tragedy, and offer restitution — but of course, that never happened.

And to this day, there has been no justice for the 269 passengers and crew members on that flight . . . John Oldham included. He would have been around 65 now, and probably looking forward to retirement from a highly successful career, and possibly marriage and fatherhood. But it never happened.

And 40 years later, it still hurts.

2004: Chechen separatists storm Russian school. It was an Islamic terrorist attack on a school in Beslan, Russia, that started on September 1st and lasted three days. More than 1,100 people were taken hostage, including 777 school children. When it was over, 334 people were dead, 186 of them children. It was the deadliest school shooting in history.

And it was all about a tiny piece of the globe known as Chechnya — a predominantly Muslim region that wanted its independence from Russia. So the Chechen warlord Shamil Basayev sent his murdering horde to Beslan in the North Ossetia region of the North Caucasus, having somehow decided that slaughtering innocent children would convince the Kremlin to let him have his way.

The Russians reacted as they usually do: they stormed the school to save what hostages they could. And when the smoke cleared . . . well, I’ve already given you the numbers. But what was really left in Beslan was an unspeakable agony that will not go away.

And for 20 years, Vladimir Putin — allegedly the president of the people — never set foot in Beslan. Finally, on August 20th of this year, he deigned to visit the City of Angels memorial cemetery there, laying flowers, kneeling, and crossing himself in a show of sympathy.

Too little, too late.

* For some strange reason, someone has scratched above the entry, in English, “NYPD,” and in Russian, “We’re with you!!!” That’s nice to know.

That’s quite enough for one day. If tomorrow isn’t cheerier, let’s simply ignore it.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
9/2/24