TITLE: September 25: Vikings, Oceans, Rights, and Firsts
September 25 has seen the end of an era, a first look at the world's largest ocean, the start of a free press and of American constitutional rights, and several milestones in civil rights. Here are seven of the most remarkable events from this date.
1. 1066 – The Battle of Stamford Bridge
In September 1066, King Harald Hardrada of Norway, the most feared warrior-king of his time, landed in northern England with around 300 ships. He was joined by Tostig Godwinson, the exiled and bitter brother of England's new king, Harold II. They had already beaten a northern English army at Fulford and thought the hard fighting was over. Harold then did something remarkable: he marched his army about 185 miles north from London in roughly four days and surprised the invaders at Stamford Bridge, near York, on September 25. The Norwegians had left much of their armor with their ships because they weren't expecting a battle. They were destroyed. Harald Hardrada took an arrow to the throat and Tostig was also killed. According to legend, one enormous Norseman held the narrow bridge alone against the whole English army until a soldier floated under it in a barrel and speared him from below. Of the roughly 300 ships the invaders brought, only about 24 were needed to carry the survivors home. Historians often treat Stamford Bridge as the end of the Viking Age. But three days later, William of Normandy landed on England's south coast. Harold's tired army had to march back south, and on October 14 he was killed at the Battle of Hastings. It was one of the greatest victories in English history, and it may have cost England the kingdom within three weeks.
2. 1513 – Balboa Sees the Pacific
Vasco Núñez de Balboa was an unlikely hero. He had reached the Spanish settlement in Darién by hiding from his creditors in a barrel aboard a supply ship. After local peoples told him about a great sea and a land rich in gold to the south, he led an expedition across the thick jungle and mountains of the Isthmus of Panama. On September 25, 1513, according to tradition, he went ahead of his men, climbed a peak alone, and became the first European to see the Pacific Ocean from the Americas. A few days later Balboa waded into the water in full armor, holding a banner, and claimed the "South Sea" and all the lands it touched for the Spanish crown. His discovery confirmed that the Americas were a separate landmass, not part of Asia, and that another huge ocean lay beyond them. Balboa's story ended badly. His rival Pedrarias Dávila, the new governor, had him arrested on questionable charges of treason, and he was beheaded in 1519. Within a decade, though, Magellan crossed the ocean Balboa had seen and named it the "Pacific," and the world map changed for good.
3. 1690 – America's First Newspaper Lasts One Day
On September 25, 1690, the Boston printer Benjamin Harris published Publick Occurrences Both Forreign and Domestick, the first multi-page newspaper in the American colonies. It was small: three printed pages, with the fourth left blank so readers could add their own news before passing it on. It reported on local events such as a smallpox outbreak, fires, and the progress of King William's War. The paper did not last. Four days later, the Massachusetts colonial government suppressed it because Harris had printed without a license. Officials were also unhappy with some of the content, including criticism of Britain's Mohawk allies and a rumor about the French king's personal life. All copies were ordered destroyed. Only one original is known to survive, in the British Library. It was 14 years before another regular newspaper, the Boston News-Letter, appeared in the colonies, and that one printed "Published by Authority." Publick Occurrences is still remembered as the start of American journalism, and its suppression is an early example of the conflict between the press and government that the First Amendment would later address.
4. 1789 – Congress Sends the Bill of Rights to the States
When the Constitution was ratified, several states agreed only because they were promised that amendments protecting individual liberties would follow. James Madison, who had first doubted that such a list was needed, took on the job himself. He went through more than 200 proposals from the state ratifying conventions and reduced them to a manageable set. On September 25, 1789, Congress approved twelve amendments and sent them to the states. By December 1791, three-fourths of the states had ratified ten of them. Those ten became the Bill of Rights, protecting freedom of speech, religion, press, and assembly, the right to a fair trial, and protection against unreasonable searches, among other rights. The other two amendments have their own story. One, which would have set the size of the House of Representatives, was never ratified. The other, which bars congressional pay raises from taking effect until after the next election, was largely forgotten until 1982. That year, a University of Texas student named Gregory Watson wrote a paper about it, received a C, and started a campaign to revive it. It was ratified in 1992 as the 27th Amendment, 202 years after Congress sent it to the states.
5. 1890 – Sequoia National Park Is Created
In the late 1800s, loggers were cutting down some of the oldest living things on Earth in California's Sierra Nevada. Giant sequoias, some more than 2,000 years old, were felled even though their brittle wood often shattered when they hit the ground. Local newspaper editor George W. Stewart and other conservationists campaigned for their protection. On September 25, 1890, President Benjamin Harrison signed the law creating Sequoia National Park, one of the first national parks in the United States. The park contains the General Sherman Tree, the largest single-stem tree on Earth by volume. It is about 275 feet tall, more than 36 feet wide at the base, and estimated to be 2,200 years old. The park also includes Mount Whitney, the tallest peak in the contiguous United States. A week later, Congress created Yosemite National Park, so 1890 was a key year for American conservation. The history also includes displacement. The land had long been home to the Mono and Yokuts peoples, and a utopian socialist colony called Kaweah had been working on the land nearby. The colonists lost their claims when the park was created. Today the park faces new threats: wildfires in 2020 and 2021 killed an estimated 13 to 19 percent of the world's mature giant sequoias.
6. 1957 – The Little Rock Nine Enter Central High
Three years after Brown v. Board of Education ruled segregated schools unconstitutional, nine Black teenagers enrolled at Little Rock Central High School in Arkansas. On September 4, 1957, Governor Orval Faubus ordered the Arkansas National Guard to block them from entering, and angry white mobs gathered outside the school. Fifteen-year-old Elizabeth Eckford arrived alone that day and was surrounded by jeering crowds. Photographs of the scene shocked people around the world. President Dwight D. Eisenhower eventually concluded that federal authority itself was being challenged. He federalized the Arkansas National Guard and sent in the 101st Airborne Division. On September 25, 1957, the nine students — Minnijean Brown, Elizabeth Eckford, Ernest Green, Thelma Mothershed, Melba Pattillo, Gloria Ray, Terrence Roberts, Jefferson Thomas, and Carlotta Walls — walked into Central High under armed escort. Their ordeal did not end at the door. They faced harassment, threats, and violence throughout the school year. In May 1958, Ernest Green became the first Black student to graduate from Central High, with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. quietly attending the ceremony. The Little Rock Nine showed that court rulings mean little unless someone enforces them, and that ordinary teenagers could change the country.
7. 1981 – Sandra Day O'Connor Joins the Supreme Court
When Sandra Day O'Connor graduated near the top of her Stanford Law School class in 1952, law firms would only offer her work as a legal secretary. She built her career anyway, working as a deputy county attorney, an Arizona assistant attorney general, and a state senator. She became the first woman in the country to serve as a state senate majority leader, and later became a state judge. During his 1980 campaign, Ronald Reagan promised to appoint the first woman to the Supreme Court, and he chose her. The Senate confirmed her 99–0, and she was sworn in on September 25, 1981. It was the first time in the Court's 191-year history that a woman had served on it. Letters poured in, so many that she said she could hardly keep up. O'Connor became one of the most influential justices of her time. As a pragmatic centrist, she was often the deciding vote in major cases on abortion, affirmative action, and federalism. She retired in 2006 to care for her husband, who had Alzheimer's disease, and in her later years she promoted civics education through iCivics. She died in 2023. Her career opened a door that many women have since walked through.
Reflection: The Threads That Bind Us
These seven events span more than 900 years, but they share some common threads. Harold's march to Stamford Bridge and Balboa's climb through the jungle both show how much one decision can change history. The printer in Boston and the lawmakers in New York were both working out a question that is still with us: how free should people be to speak, publish, and be protected from their own government? The Little Rock Nine and Sandra Day O'Connor both walked through doors that had been closed to them, and the country was different afterward. Even the sequoias connect these stories. Some of the trees in that park were already centuries old when Harald Hardrada fell, and they are still standing. Looking back at a single date like September 25 is a reminder that we are part of a much longer story, and that ordinary days can turn out to matter a great deal.