TODAY IN HISTORY - September 2

Reuters

Following are some of the major events to have occurred on September 2:

1910 - The French painter Henri Rousseau died in Paris.

1930 - The French aviators Dieudonne Coste and Maurice Bellonte completed the first non-stop flight from Europe to the United States.

1945 - Japanese leaders aboard the U.S. battleship Missouri signed an unconditional surrender, ending World War Two.

1945 - The Democratic Republic of Vietnam was proclaimed with Ho Chi Minh as president.

1973 - J.R.R. Tolkien, South African-born English author, died in Bournemouth, England. He is best known for the fantasy epic "The Lord of the Rings".

1990 - Canadian soldiers seized control of an outpost of Mohawk Indians near Montreal, ending a 53-day armed stand-off.

1996 - Muslim rebels and the Philippine government signed a pact ending 24 years of conflict in which 125,000 people died.

1998 - A Swissair plane crashed into the sea off Nova Scotia, Canada; 229 people were killed.

2001 - The South African heart surgeon Christiaan Barnard died aged 78. He rocketed to world fame in December 1967 when he performed the first human heart transplant.

2002 - Some 103 world leaders gathered in Johannesburg for a formal U.N. meeting about a plan to help the poor and the environment at the Earth Summit.

2017 - German sets world record for carrying beer steins.