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John Rolph (1793–1870) was a physician, lawyer, and political figure. He immigrated to Upper Canada in 1813 and practised law and medicine concurrently. In 1824, Rolph was elected to the Parliament of Upper Canada. He was elected as an alderman to Toronto's first city council but resigned after his council colleagues did not select him as the city's mayor. When the Upper Canada Rebellion began in 1837, Rolph did not join the rebels even though he agreed to support them. Instead, the Lieutenant Governor appointed him as his emissary to deliver the government's truce offer. After the rebellion, Rolph fled to the US and focused on his medical career. The Canadian government granted him amnesty and he returned to Canada in 1843, later creating a new medical institution in Toronto called the Rolph School. In 1851 he was elected to the Legislative Assembly of the Province of Canada, but resigned three years later. He retired in 1870 and died later that year. (Full article...)

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The Austin J. Tobin Plaza

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On this day

September 11: National Day of Catalonia

United Airlines Flight 175 striking the World Trade Center's South Tower

1297 – First War of Scottish Independence: Scottish forces under Andrew Moray and William Wallace defeated English troops at the Battle of Stirling Bridge on the River Forth.
1945 – The Japanese-run camp at Batu Lintang in Borneo was liberated by the Australian 9th Division, averting the planned massacre of its 2,000-plus Allied POWs and civilian internees by four days.
1978 – British medical photographer Janet Parker became the last recorded person to die from smallpox, leading to a debate on whether the virus should be preserved.
1995 – Mir EO-19, the first expedition to the Russian space station Mir launched on an American Space Shuttle, returned to Earth after approximately 75 days in space.
2001 – al-Qaeda hijacked four passenger airliners to carry out a series of terrorist attacks (one pictured) against targets in New York City and the area of Washington, D.C., killing 2,977 people.

Stephen Hagiochristophorites (d. 1185)
Paul Nahaolelua (b. 1806)
Mary Watson Whitney (b. 1847)
Issy Smith (d. 1940)

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Today's featured picture

Widtsoe is a ghost town in Garfield County, Utah, United States. It is located in John's Valley, northeast of Bryce Canyon and along the Sevier River at the mouth of Sweetwater Creek. A small number of settlers arrived in the area in 1876 and it became a town around 1908 after farmer Jedediah Adair was followed by a more significant population. Initially known as Adairville, after Adair, the town later became Houston and Winder, before attaining its final name after John A. Widtsoe, the president of and an agricultural scientist at the University of Utah. The population declined significantly from 1920 following droughts, and the town emptied in 1936. Most buildings were demolished shortly afterwards. This photograph by Dorothea Lange shows Widtsoe's Emery Valley Mercantile Co. grocery store in 1936.

Photograph credit: Dorothea Lange; restored by Yann Forget

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