Today in History - History - August 30th

1945Gen MacArthur lands in Japan

1979Wildest US Tennis Open match, McEnroe defeats Ilie Nastase 6-4, 4-6, 6-3, 6-2. Nastase was defaulted by the umpire then reinstated

1905Tiger Ty Cobb makes his debut, doubling off Yank Jack Chesbro

1937Joe Louis beats Tommy Farr in 15 for heavyweight boxing title

1979US President Jimmy Carter attacked by a rabbit on a canoe trip in Plains, Ga

1972John Lennon & Yoko Ono perform at Madison Square Garden

1751George Frederic Handel completes oratorio "Jephtha"

192741st US Women's Tennis: Helen Wills Moody beats Betty Nuthall (61 64)

1890President Benjamin Harrison signed the first U.S. law requiring inspection of meat products

1979Ian Botham makes 1000 runs/100 wkts in Tests in his 21st match

1943Robert Crumb, US, cartoonist (Father Time, Fritz Cat)

1871Ernest Rutherford, 1st Baron Rutherford of Nelson, New Zealand physicist and father of nuclear physics (Nobel 1908), (d. 1937)

1797Mary Shelley, London England, author (Frankenstein)

1923Elias Victor Seixas, Philadelphia Pennsylvania, American tennis player (Wimbeldon and U.S. Open champion)

1918Ted Williams, American baseball player, last player in MLB to bat over .400 in a single season (Red Sox, AL MVP '46, '49; Trip Crown '42, '47)

1334Pedro, the Cruel, Burgos, Spanish King of Castilia & Leon

1982Andy Roddick, Austin Texas, American tennis player (2003 US Open champion)

1972Cameron Diaz, Long Beach, California, American actress (Mask, My Best Friend's Wedding)

2008"The Sopranos" actor James Gandolfini (46) weds former model Deborah Lin (40) at Central Union Church in Honolulu, Hawaii

2006Billionaire Warren Buffett (76) weds longtime companion Astrid Menks (60) in Omaha

1940CBS news correspondent Mike Wallace (22) weds Norma Kaphan in Brookline, Massachusetts

2009Singer Davy Jones (63) weds Jessica Pacheco

2003Charles Bronson, American actor, dies at 81

2013Seamus Heaney, Irish poet and playwright (Nobel Prize in Literature)

1981Vera-Ellen, actress (Big Leaguer, On the Town), dies of cancer at 60

1940J. J. Thomson, English physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1856)