September 8, 1157: Richard I (Lion-Heart) of England, leader of the Third Crusade, is born.
September 8, 1565: Settlers form the first Roman Catholic Parish in America in St. Augustine, Florida.
September 8, 1636: Massachusetts Puritans found Harvard College, America's first higher education institution, a mere six years after arriving from England. They founded the college to train future ministers.
September 8, 1845: English clergyman John Henry Newman converts to Roman Catholicism. Newman had been a leading member of the Oxford Movement, which aimed to reform the Church of England, but he became convinced that the Anglicans had lost their episcopal moorings and had wrongly severed themselves from apostolic succession.