January 1 » New York, New York annexes land from surrounding counties, creating the City of Greater New York. The four initial boroughs, Manhattan, Brooklyn, Queens, and The Bronx, are joined on January 25 by Staten Island to create the modern city of five boroughs.
February 15 » The battleship USSMaine explodes and sinks in Havana harbor in Cuba, killing 274. This event leads the United States to declare war on Spain.
April 25 » Spanish–American War: The United States declares war on Spain.
July 3 » A Spanish squadron, led by Pascual Cervera y Topete, is defeated by an American squadron under William T. Sampson in the Battle of Santiago de Cuba.
July 4 » En route from New York to Le Havre, the SS La Bourgogne collides with another ship and sinks off the coast of Sable Island, with the loss of 549 lives.
November 10 » Beginning of the Wilmington insurrection of 1898, the only instance of a municipal government being overthrown in United States history.
Day of death September 20, 1979
The temperature on September 20, 1979 was between 9.0 °C and 17.2 °C and averaged 14.2 °C. There was 0.3 mm of rain during 0.3 hours. There was 4.2 hours of sunshine (34%). The partly clouded was. The average windspeed was 3 Bft (moderate breeze) and was prevailing from the southwest. Source: KNMI
In The Netherlands , there was from Monday, December 19, 1977 to Friday, September 11, 1981 the cabinet Van Agt I, with Mr. A.A.M. van Agt (CDA/KVP) as prime minister.
March 5 » Soviet probes Venera 11, Venera 12 and the German-American solar satellite Helios II all are hit by "off the scale" gamma rays leading to the discovery of soft gamma repeaters.
March 30 » Airey Neave, a British Member of Parliament, is killed by a car bomb as he exits the Palace of Westminster. The Irish National Liberation Army claims responsibility.
June 3 » A blowout at the Ixtoc I oil well in the southern Gulf of Mexico causes at least 3,000,000 barrels (480,000m) of oil to be spilled into the waters, the second-worst accidental oil spill ever recorded.
June 4 » Flight Lieutenant Jerry Rawlings takes power in Ghana after a military coup in which General Fred Akuffo is overthrown.
July 17 » Nicaraguan dictator General Anastasio Somoza Debayle resigns and flees to Miami, Florida, United States.
November 9 » Cold War: Nuclear false alarm: The NORAD computers and the Alternate National Military Command Center in Fort Ritchie, Maryland detected purported massive Soviet nuclear strike. After reviewing the raw data from satellites and checking the early-warning radars, the alert is cancelled.
When copying data from this family tree, please include a reference to the origin: Wesley Brown, "The Brown Tree", database, Genealogy Online (https://www.genealogieonline.nl/the-brown-tree/P143.php : accessed January 24, 2026), "Frank DARLING (1898-1979)".
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