May 31st

1433 - Sigismund was crowned emperor of Rome.

1854 - The Kansas-Nebraska Act passed by the U.S. Congress.

1859 - The Philadelphia Athletics were formally organized to play the game of Town Ball.

1870 - E.J. DeSemdt patented asphalt.

1879 - New York's Madison Square Garden opened.

1880 - The first U.S. national bicycle society was formed in Newport, RI. It was known as the League of American Wheelman.

1884 - Dr. John Harvey Kellogg patented "flaked cereal."

1889 - In Johnstown, PA, more than 2,200 people died after the South Fork Dam collapsed.

1900 - U.S. troops arrived in Peking to help put down the Boxer Rebellion.

1902 - The Boer War ended between the Boers of South Africa and Great Britain with the Treaty of Vereeniging.

1907 - The first taxis arrived in New York City. They were the first in the United States.

1909 - The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) held its first conference.

1910 - The Union of South Africa was founded.

1913 - The 17th Amendment went into effect. It provided for popular election of U.S. senators.

1915 - A German zeppelin made an air raid on London.

1926 - Frank Lockhart won the 14th Indy 500. He averaged 95.9 mph.

1927 - Ford Motor Company produced the last "Tin Lizzie" in order to begin production of the Model A.

1929 - In Beverly, MA, the first U.S. born reindeer were born.

1941 - The first issue of the still popular "Parade: The Weekly Picture Newspaper" went on sale.

1943 - "Archie" was aired on the Mutual Broadcasting System for the first time.

1947 - Communists seized control of Hungary.

1955 - The U.S. Supreme Court ordered that all states must end racial segregation "with all deliberate speed."

1961 - South Africa became an independent republic.

1962 - Adolf Eichmann was hanged in Israel. Eichmann was a Gestapo official and was executed for his actions in the Nazi Holocaust.

1970 - An earthquake in Peru killed tens of thousands of people.

1974 - Israel and Syria signed an agreement on the Golan Heights.

1977 - The trans-Alaska oil pipeline was finished after 3 years of construction.

1979 - Zimbabwe proclaimed its independence.

1988 - U.S. President Ronald Reagan arrived in Moscow in an effort to relieve Cold War tensions. He was the first president to do so in 14 years.

1994 - The U.S. announced it was no longer aiming long-range nuclear missiles at targets in the former Soviet Union.

1995 - Bob Dole singled out Time Warner for "the marketing of evil" in movies and music. Dole later admitted that he had not seen or heard much of what he had been criticizing.

2003 - In North Carolina, Eric Robert Rudolph was captured. He had been on the FBI's 10 Most Wanted list for five years for several bombings including the 1996 Olympic bombing.

Wow! There for a moment I thought your plan to live forever had been cut short. Glad to see this post.

Thanks, Nick. The plan is still my intended plan. 'Tis good to see your post as well.

June 1st

0193 - The Roman Emperor, Marcus Didius, was murdered in his palace.

1533 - Anne Boleyn, Henry VIII’s new queen, was crowned.

1774 - The British government ordered the Port of Boston closed.

1789 - The first U.S. congressional act on administering oaths became law.

1792 - Kentucky became the 15th state of the U.S.

1796 - Tennessee became the 16th state of the U.S.

1861 - The first skirmish of the U.S. Civil War took place at the Fairfax Court House, Virginia.

1869 - Thomas Edison received a patent for his electric voting machine.

1877 - U.S. troops were authorized to pursue bandits into Mexico.

1915 - Germany conducted the first zeppelin air raid over England.

1916 - The National Defense Act increased the strength of the U.S. National Guard by 450,000 men.

1921 - A race riot erupted in Tulsa, Oklahoma. 85 people were killed.

1935 - The Ingersoll-Waterbury Company reported that it had produced 2.5 million Mickey Mouse watches during its 2-year association with Disney.

1938 - Baseball helmets were worn for the first time.

1938 - Superman, the world's first super hero, appeared in the first issue of Action Comics.

1939 - The Douglas DC-4 made its first passenger flight from Chicago to New York.

1941 - The German Army completed the capture of Crete as the Allied evacuation ended.

1942 - The U.S. began sending Lend-Lease materials to the Soviet Union.

1943 - During World War II, Germans shot down a civilian flight from Lisbon to London.

1944 - The French resistance was warned by a coded message from the British that the D-Day invasion was imminent.

1944 - Siesta was abolished by the government of Mexico.

1953 - Raymond Burr mad his network-TV acting debut. It was in "The Mask of Medusa" on ABC-TV's "Twilight Theater."

1954 - In the Peanuts comic strip, Linus' security blanket made its debut.

1958 - Charles de Gaulle became the premier of France.

1961 - Radio listeners in New York, California, and Illinois were introduced to FM multiplex stereo broadcasting. A year later the FCC made this a standard.

1963 - Governor George Wallace vowed to defy an injunction that ordered the integration of the University of Alabama.

1968 - Helen Keller died. She had been deaf and blind since the age of 18 months. During her life she learned to speak, ride horses, and the waltz. She also graduated from Radcliffe cum laude.

1970 - Zimbabwe came into existence. It was formerly known as Rhodesia.

1973 - The James Bond movie "Live and Let Die" opened.

1977 - The Soviet Union formally charged Jewish human rights activist Anatoly Shcharansky with treason. He was imprisoned until 1986.

1978 - The U.S. reported the finding of wiretaps in the American embassy in Moscow.

1980 - Cable News Network (CNN) made its debut as the first all-news station.

1989 - Disney World's "Typhoon Lagoon" opened.

1995 - At Disneyland Paris, the attraction "Space Mountain: From The Earth to the Moon" opened.

1998 - In the U.S., the FDA approved a urine-only test for the AIDS virus.

1998 - A $124 million suit was brought against Goodyear Tire & Rubber that alleged discrimination towards black workers.

June 2nd

1537 - Pope Paul III banned the enslavement of Indians.

1774 - The Quartering Act, which required American colonists to allow British soldiers into their houses, was reenacted.

1793 - Maximillian Robespierre initiated the "Reign of Terror". It was an effort to purge those suspected of treason against the French Republic.

1818 - The British army defeated the Maratha alliance in Bombay, India.

1851 - Maine became the first U.S. state to enact a law prohibiting alcohol.

1883 - The first baseball game under electric lights was played in Fort Wayne, Indiana.

1886 - Grover Cleveland became the first U.S. president to get married while in office.

1896 - Guglieimo Marconi's radio was patented in the U.S.

1897 - Mark Twain, at age 61, was quoted by the New York Journal as saying "the report of my death was an exaggeration." He was responding to the rumors that he had died.

1910 - Charles Stewart Roll became the first person to fly across the English Channel.

1924 - All American Indians were granted U.S. citizenship by the U.S. Congress.

1928 - Nationalist Chiang Kai-shek captured Peking, China.

1930 - Mrs. M. Niezes of Panama gave birth to the first baby to be born on a ship while passing through the Panama Canal.

1933 - U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt accepted the first swimming pool to be built inside the White House.

1935 - George Herman "Babe" Ruth announced that he was retiring from baseball.

1937 - "The Fabulous Dr. Tweedy" was broadcast on NBC radio for the first time.

1941 - Lou Gehrig died in New York of the degenerative disease amyotrophic lateral sclerosis.

1946 - Italians voted by referendum to form a republic instead of of a monarchy.

1953 - Elizabeth was crowned queen of England at Westminster Abbey.

1954 - U.S. Senator Joseph McCarthy charged that there were communists working in the CIA and atomic weapons plants.

1957 - Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev was interviewed by CBS-TV.

1966 - Surveyor 1, the U.S. space probe, landed on the moon and started sending photographs back to Earth of the Moon's surface. It was the first soft landing on the Moon.

1969 - The National Arts Center in Canada opened its doors to the public.

1969 - Australian aircraft carrier Melbourne sliced the destroyer USS Frank E. Evans in half off the shore of South Vietnam.

1979 - Pope John Paul II arrived in his native Poland on the first visit by a pope to a Communist country.

1985 - The R.J. Reynolds Company proposed a major merger with Nabisco that would create a $4.9 billion conglomerate.

1985 - Tommy Sandt was ejected from a major-league baseball game before the national anthem was played. He had complained to the umpire about a call against his team the night before.

1995 - Captain Scott F. O'Grady's U.S. Air Force F-16C was shot down by Bosnian Serbs. He was rescued six days later.

1997 - Timothy McVeigh was found guilty of the bombing of a federal building in Oklahoma City in which 168 people were killed.

1998 - Royal Caribbean Cruises agreed to pay $9 million to settle charges of dumping waste at sea.

1998 - Voters in California passed Proposition 227. The act abolished the state's 30-year-old bilingual education program by requiring that all children be taught in English.

1999 - In South Africa, the African National Congress (ANC) won a major victory. ANC leader Thabo Mbeki was to succeed Nelson Mandela as the nation's president.

2003 - In the U.S., federal regulators voted to allow companies to buy more television stations and newspaper-broadcasting combinations in the same city. The previous ownership restrictions had not been altered since 1975.

2003 - In Seville, Spain, a chest containing the supposed remains of Christopher Columbus were exhumed for DNA tests to determine whether the bones were really those of the explorer. The tests were aimed at determining if Colombus was currently buried in Spain's Seville Cathedral or in Santo Domingo in the Dominican Republic.

2003 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that companies could not be sued under a trademark law for using information in the public domain without giving credit to the originator. The case had originated with 20th Century Fox against suing Dastar Corp. over their use of World War II footage.

2003 - William Baily was reunited with two paintings he had left on a subway platform. One of the works was an original Picasso rendering of two male figures and a recreation of Picasso's "Guernica" by Sophie Matisse. Sophie Matisse was the great-granddaughter of Henri Matisse.

June 3rd

1098 - Christian Crusaders of the First Crusade seized Antioch, Turkey.

1539 - Hernando De Soto claimed Florida for Spain.

1621 - The Dutch West India Company received a charter for New Netherlands (now known as New York).

1800 - John Adams moved to Washington, DC. He was the first President to live in what later became the capital of the United States.

1851 - The New York Knickerbockers became the first baseball team to wear uniforms.

1856 - Cullen Whipple patented the screw machine.

1864 - About 7,000 Union troops were killed within 30 minutes during the Battle of Cold Harbor in Virginia during the U.S. Civil War.

1871 - Jesse James, then 24, and his gang robbed the Obocock bank in Corydon, Iowa. They stole $15,000.

1888 - "Casey at the Bat" the poem by Ernest Lawrence Thayer was first published.

1918 - The Finnish Parliament ratified its treaty with Germany.

1923 - In Italy, Benito Mussolini granted women the right to vote.

1928 - Manchurian warlord Chian Tso-Lin died as a result of a bomb blast set off by the Japanese.

1932 - Lou Gehrig set a major league baseball record when he hit four consecutive home runs.

1937 - The Duke of Windsor, who had abdicated the British throne, married Wallis Warfield Simpson.

1938 - The German Reich voted to confiscate so-called "degenerate art."

1940 - German bombed Paris, killing 254 people. Most of the people killed were civilians and school children.

1952 - A rebellion by North Korean prisoners in the Koje prison camp in South Korea was put down by American troops.

1959 - The first class to graduated from the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs, CO.

1965 - Edward White became the first American astronaut to do a "space walk" when he left the Gemini 4 capsule.

1968 - Andy Warhol was shot and critically wounded in his New York film studio by Valerie Solanas.

1970 - Har Gobind Khorana and colleagues announced the first synthesis of a gene from chemical components.

1974 - Charles Colson, an aide to U.S. President Richard Nixon, pled guilty to obstruction of justice.

1983 - Gordon Kahl was killed in a gun battle with law enforcement officials near Smithville, AR. Kahl was wanted for the slayings of two U.S. marshals in North Dakota.

1985 - After five years, the characters of Nancy and Chris Hughes returned to CBS-TV's "As the World Turns."

1989 - Iran's Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini died.

1989 - Chinese army troops positioned themselves to began a sweep of Beijing to crush student-led pro-democracy demonstrations in Tiananmen Square.

1991 - Mount Unzen in southern Japan erupted killing 40 people.

1998 - In Germany, a train veered off its tracks and hit a road bridge. 101 people were killed and 80 were injured.

1999 - Slobodan Milosevic's government accepted an international peace plan concerning Kosovo. NATO announced that airstrikes would continue until 40,000 Serb forces were withdrawn from Kosovo.

1999 - Dennis Muren received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

2003 - Sammy Sosa (Chicago Cubs) broke a bat when he grounded out against the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. The bat he was using was a corked bat.

2003 - Toys "R" Us, Inc. announced that it had signed a multi-year agreement with Albertson to become the exclusive toy provider for all of all of Albertson's food and drug stores.

June 4th

(It's nice to be back in civilization again...!)



780 BC - The first historic solar eclipse was recorded in China.

1039 - Henry III became King of Germany.

1615 - Forces under the shogun Tokugawa Ieyasu took Osaka Castle in Japan.

1760 - Great Upheaval: New England planters arrived to claim land in Nova Scotia (situated in present day Canada) taken from the Acadians.

1769 - A transit of Venus was followed within 5 hours by a total solar eclipse, the shortest such interval in history.

1792 - Captain George Vancouver claimed Puget Sound (in present day Washington State) for Great Britain.

1794 - British troops captured Port-au-Prince in Haiti.

1812 - Following Louisiana's admittance as a U.S. state, the territory by that name was renamed the Missouri Territory.

1859 - Italian Independence wars: At "The Battle of Magenta" the French army, under Louis-Napoleon, defeated an Austrian army.

1862 - American Civil War: Confederate troops evacuated Fort Pillow on the Mississippi River, leaving the way clear for Union troops to take Memphis, Tennessee.

1876 - An express train called the "Transcontinental Express" arrived in San Francisco, California via the First Transcontinental Railroad only 83 hours and 39 minutes after having left New York City.

1878 - Cyprus Convention: The Ottoman Empire ceded Cyprus to the United Kingdom but retained nominal title.

1896 - Henry Ford test drove the first automobile he designed, the "Quadricycle". It was also the first automobile he ever drove.

1913 - Emily Davison, a suffragette, ran out in front of the king's horse (Anmer) at "The Epsom Derby". She was trampled and died a few days later, never having regained consciousness.

1917 - The very first Pulitzer Prizes were awarded: Laura E. Richards, Maude H. Elliott, and Florence Hall received the first Pulitzer for a biography (for Julia Ward Howe). Jean Jules Jusserand received the first Pulitzer for history for his work "With Americans of Past and Present Days". Herbert B. Swope received the first Pulitzer for journalism for his work for the New York World.

1917 - "The Order of the British Empire" was introduced.

1919 - Women's rights: The U.S. Congress approved the 19th Amendment to the United States Constitution, which would guarantee suffrage to women, and sent it to the U.S. states for ratification.

1920 - Hungary lost 71% of its territory and 63% of its population when "The Treaty of Trianon" was signed in Paris.

1926 - Robert Earl Hughes set the current record for worlds heaviest human.

1936 - Léon Blum became Prime Minister of France. (Aw, what the hell...it's worth a laugh!)

1939 - Holocaust: The SS St. Louis, a ship carrying a cargo of 963 Jewish refugees, was denied permission to land in Florida after already having been turned away from Cuba. Forced to return to Europe, most of its passengers later died in Nazi concentration camps.

1940 - "The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter" by Carson McCullers was published.

1940 - World War II: The evacuation of Allied forces, principally the BEF, was completed. British forces, aided by a flotilla of private pleasurecraft, fishing amd small riverboats completed evacuating 300,000 troops from Dunkirk in France.

1942 - World War II: "The Battle of Midway" began. Japanese Admiral Chuichi Nagumo commanded an attempted invasion on Midway Island with a task force led by four heavy carriers of the Imperial Japanese navy. But the US Navy had already learned of their plans through deciphering of the now broken Japanese code "J-25" and set up an ambush for the unsuspecting invaders.

1943 - A military coup in Argentina ousted Ramón Castillo.

1944 - World War II: A hunter-killer group of the United States Navy captured the German submarine U-505, marking the first time a U.S. Navy vessel had captured an enemy vessel at sea since the 19th century.

1944 - World War II: Rome fell to the Allies. It was the first capital of an Axis nation to fall.

1960 - The "Lake Bodom Murders" took place.

1970 - Tonga gained independence from Great Britain.

1973 - A patent for the ATM was granted to Don Wetzel, Tom Barnes and George Chastain.

1974 - The Cleveland Indians host "Ten Cent Beer Night", but have to forfeit the game to the Texas Rangers due to drunken and unruly fans.

1986 - Jonathan Pollard plead guilty to espionage for selling top secret United States military intelligence to Israel.

1989 - The Tiananmen Square protests were suppressed (read: crushed) in Beijing while being covered live on television.

1989 - Solidarity's victory in the first partly free parliamentary elections in post-war Poland sparked off a succession of peaceful anti-communist revolutions in Eastern Europe.

1989 - "The Ufa Train Disaster" - A natural gas explosion near Ufa, Russia killed 645 when two trains passing each other threw sparks near a leaking pipeline.

1998 - Terry Nichols was sentenced to life in prison for his role in the Oklahoma City bombing.

2003 - Martha Stewart and her broker were indicted for using privileged investment information and then obstructing a federal investigation. Stewart also resigned as chairperson and chief executive officer of "Martha Stewart Living".

2004 - "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban" was released in cinemas.

Born this day:

470 BC - Socrates, Greek philosopher (d. 399 BC)

1489 - Anthony II of Lorraine, 'Il Buono', Duke of Lorraine (d. 1544)

1738 - King George III of Great Britain (d. 1820)

1754 - Franz Xaver, Baron Von Zach, Austrian scientific editor, astronomer (d. 1832)

1801 - Sir James Pennethorne, English architect (d. 1871)

1867 - C.G.E. Mannerheim, Commander-in-Chief of Finland during the Civil War in Finland (1918) and World War II, later President of Finland (d. 1951)

1877 - Heinrich Wieland, German biochemist (d. 1957)

1882 - Karl Valentin, comedian and author (d. 1948)

1887 - Tom Longboat, marathon runner and World War I despatch runner (d. 1949)

1907 (or 1908) - Rosalind Russell, American actress (d. 1976)

1915 - Heinrich Tenhumberg, theologian, bishop of Münster (d. 1979)

919 - Robert Merrill, American baritone (d. 2004)

1924 - Dennis Weaver, American actor

1928 - Dr. Ruth Westheimer, German-American sex therapist, author

1932 - John Drew Barrymore, American actor (d. 2004)

1932 - Maurice Shadbolt, New Zealand writer

1936 - Bruce Dern, American actor

1937 - Freddy Fender, American country musician

1937 - Robert Fulghum, American author

2945 - Gordon Waller, musician ("Peter and Gordon")

1947 - Viktor Klima, Austrian Chancellor

1956 - Keith David, American actor

1956 - John Hockenberry, journalist

1966 - Cecilia Bartoli, Italian opera singer

1966 - Vladimir Voevodsky, mathematician

1971 - Noah Wyle, American actor

Died this day:

1039 - Conrad II, Holy Roman Emperor (b. circa 990)

1257 - Duke Przemysl I of Poland (b. circa 1220)

1663 - William Juxon, Archbishop of Canterbury (b. 1582)

1798 - Giacomo Casanova, Famous Italian lover and romancer (b. 1725)

1801 - Frederick Muhlenberg, first speaker of the United States House of Representatives (b. 1750)

1872 - Johan Rudolf Thorbecke, Dutch politician (d. 1798)

1875 - Eduard Mörike, German poet (b. 1804)

1928 - Chang Tso-lin, Chinese warlord (b. 1873)

1939 - Tommy Ladnier, American jazz musician (b. 1900)

1941 - Kaiser Wilhelm II, last German emperor (b. 1859)

1951 - Serge Koussevitsky, Russian conductor (b. 1874)

1968 - Dorothy Gish, American actress (b. 1898)

1973 - Maurice René Fréchet, French mathematician (b. 1878)

1990 - Stiv Bators, American musician ("The Dead Boys") (b. 1949)

2001 - King Dipendra of Nepal (b. 1971)

2001 - John Hartford, American musician, composer (b. 1937)

2002 - Fernando Belaunde Terry, Peruvian politician, president of Peru (b. 1912)

2004 - Steve Lacy, American saxophonist (b. 1934)

June 5th



1305 - Clement V was elected pope.

1783 - The Montgolfier brothers publicly demonstrate their "Montgolfière", a hot air balloon.

1798 - "The Battle of New Ross". An attempt to spread United Irish Rebellion into Munster was defeated.

1817 - The first great lakes steamer, "The Frontenac", was launched.

1829 - HMS Pickle captured the armed slave ship "Voladora" off the coast of Cuba.

1837 - Houston, Texas was granted a city charter.

1849 - Denmark became a constitutional monarchy with the signing of a new constitution.

1851 - Harriet Beecher Stowe's anti-slavery serial "Uncle Tom's Cabin" (or, Life Among the Lowly) started a ten-month run in the National Era abolitionist newspaper.

1864 - American Civil War: At "The Battle of Piedmont" Union forces under General David Hunter defeated a Confederate army at Piedmont, Virginia and took nearly 1,000 prisoners.

1900 - Boer War: British soldiers took Pretoria, South Africa.

1916 - Stein's Dixie Jazz Band played its first gig under its new name, "The Original Dixieland Jazz Band".

1916 - Louis Brandeis was sworn in as a Justice of the United States Supreme Court.

1917 - World War I: Conscription began in the United States as "Army registration day."

1924 - Ernst Alexanderson sent the world's first facsimile (fax) across the Atlantic (to his father in Sweden).

1933 - The U.S. Congress abrogated the United States' use of the gold standard by enacting a joint resolution (48 Stat. 112) nullifying the right of creditors to demand payment in gold.

1944 - World War II: A strike force of more than 1000 British bombers dropped a combined 5000 ton bombload on German gun batteries situated at the five Normandy beaches in preparation for the D-Day invasions.

1945 - Allied Control Council, the military occupation governing body of Germany, formally took power.

1946 - A fire in Chicago's LaSalle Hotel killed 61 people.

1947 - The Marshall Plan: While giving a speech at Harvard University, United States Secretary of State George Marshall called for economic aid to war-torn Europe.

1954 - The last new episode of the comic variety program "Your Show of Shows" aired.

1956 - Elvis Presley introduced his new single "Hound Dog" on The Milton Berle Show, scandalizing the audience with his suggestive hip movements.

1959 - The first government of the State of Singapore was sworn in.

1963 - British Secretary of State for War, John Profumo, resigned amidst a sex scandal.

1967 - Six-Day War begins: The Israeli air force launched simultaneous attacks on the air forces of Egypt, Jordan, and Syria.

1968 - U.S. presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy was shot at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, California. He died on June 6.

1970 - Chile became a member of the Berne Convention copyright treaty.

1975 - The Suez Canal re-opened for the first time since the Six-Day War.

1975 - Great Britain held its first and only UK-wide referendum, on remaining in the EEC

1976 - The collapse of the Teton Dam in Idaho took place.

1977 - A coup took place in Seychelles.

1977 - The Apple II, the first practical personal computer, went on sale.

1981 - The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported that five homosexual men in Los Angeles, California have a rare form of pneumonia seen only in patients with weakened immune systems. These were the first recognized cases of AIDS.

1984 - Prime Minister of India Indira Gandhi ordered an attack on the Golden Temple, the Sikh holy spot.

1986 - A 52-year old man in Auburn, Washington died after taking an Excedrin capsule laced with cyanide; this was the first of two Excedrin deaths.

1987 - Ted Koppel hosted a "National Town Meeting on AIDS", a special 4-hour long live broadcast of Nightline.

1989 - As the world watched on satellite television link "The Unknown Rebel" halted the progress of a column of advancing tanks for over half an hour after the Tiananmen Square protests.

1991 - Colo-Colo became the first Chilean soccer team to win the "Copa Libertadores de América".

1992 - The blockbuster movie "Patriot Games", starring Harrison Ford opened in theaters.

1995 - Bose-Einstein condensate was first created.

1998 - A strike began at the General Motors parts factory in Flint, Michigan. It quickly spread to five other assembly plants and lasted for seven weeks.

1998 - Both Reuters and ABC news erroneously report the death of comedian Bob Hope after Arizona congressman Bob Stump announced the demise of Hope on the floor of the US Congress.

2001 - Senator Jim Jeffords left the Republican party, an act which changed control of the United States Senate from the Republicans to the Democratics.

2002 - Elizabeth Smart was kidnapped from her Salt Lake City, Utah home.

2002 - Mozilla 1.0, the first "official" version, was released.

2004 - Smarty Jones lost at the Belmont Stakes to Birdstone and failed to win the Triple Crown.


Born this day:

1341 - Edmund of Langley, a younger son of King Edward III of England (d. 1402)

1718 - Thomas Chippendale, English furniture maker (d. 1779)

1723 - Adam Smith, Scottish economist (d. 1790)

1757 - Pierre Jean George Cabanis, French physiologist (d. 1808)

1771 - King Ernest I of Hanover (d. 1851)

1781 - Christian August Lobeck, German classical scholar (d. 1860)

1819 - John Couch Adams, English mathematician and astronomer (d. 1892)

1850 - Pat Garrett, lawman of the American West (d. 1908)

1879 - Robert Mayer, philanthropist (d. 1985)

1883 - John Maynard Keynes, English economist and father of "Keynesian Economics (d. 1946)

1884 - Ralph Benatzky, composer (d. 1957)

1887 - Pancho Villa, Mexican revolutionary (d. 1923)

1894 - Roy Thomson, Lord Thomson of Fleet, English publisher(d. 1976)

1898 - Federico García Lorca, Spanish lyricist and dramatist (d. 1936)

1912 - Josef Neckermann, entrepreneur and dressage equestrian (d. 1992)

1919 - Richard Scarry, children's author (d. 1994)

1931 - Jacques Demy, French playwright

1932 - Christy Brown, author (d. 1981)

1934 - Bill Moyers, American journalist

1939 - Joe Clark, sixteenth Prime Minister of Canada

1939 - Margaret Drabble, English novelist

1941 - Martha Argerich, Argentine pianist

1941 - Spalding Gray, American actor, screenwriter, and monologue artist (d. 2004)

1949 - Ken Follett, Welsh author

1962 - Princess Astrid of Belgium

1990 - Ian Shortman, Creator of PythonMOO


Died this day:

535 - Epiphanius of Constantinople, patriarch of Constantinople

1118 - Robert de Beaumont, 1st Earl of Leicester

1296 - Edmund Crouchback, 1st Earl of Lancaster (b. 1245)

1316 - King Louis X of France (b. 1289)

1625 - Orlando Gibbons, English composer (b. 1583)

1900 - Stephen Crane, American author (b. 1871)

1910 - O. Henry, American author (b. 1862)

1916 - Horatio Kitchener, Lord Kitchener, British field marshal (b. 1850)

1920 - Rhoda Broughton, Welsh author (b. 1840)

1930 - Pascin, Bulgarian painter (b. 1885)

1942 - Samuel Adams, American naval officer (b. 1912)

1975 - Paul Keres, Estonian chess player (b. 1916)

1979 - Heinz Erhardt, German comedian (b. 1909)

1993 - Conway Twitty, American country musician (b. 1933)

1998 - Sam Yorty, Mayor of Los Angeles (b.1909)

2003 - Jürgen Möllemann, German politician (b. 1945)

2004 - Ronald Reagan, President of the United States (b. 1911)

June 6th

1944 - This was D-Day, the day thousands of Allied troops invaded the beaches of Normandy, France. Their objective: to open a second major European front in the battle against the Nazis. General Dwight D. Eisenhower, commander of these united forces (and, who later became President of the United States) said, “This landing is but the opening phase of the campaign in Western Europe. Great battles lie ahead. I call upon all who love freedom to stand with us."

June 6th


1508 - The army of Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor, was defeated in Friulia by Venetian forces; he was forced to sign a three-year truce and cede several territories to Venice.

1513 - Italian Wars: At "The Battle of Novara" Swiss troops defeated the French under Louis de la Tremoille, forcing the French to abandon Milan. Duke Massimiliano Sforza was restored to power.

1523 - Gustav Vasa was elected King of Sweden, marking the end of the Kalmar Union.

1654 - Christina, the reigning queen of the Protestant nation Sweden, abdicated the throne and secretly converted to Catholicism. Charles X succeeded his abdicated cousin to the Swedish throne.

1683 - The Ashmolean Museum opened as the world's first university museum.

1752 - A devastating fire destroyed one-third of Moscow, including 18,000 homes.

1809 - Sweden promulgated a new Constitution, which restored political power to the Riksdag of the Estates after 20 years of Enlightened absolutism.

1813 - War of 1812: At "The Battle of Stoney Creek" a British force of 700, under John Vincent, defeated an American force three times its size under the command of William Winder and John Chandler.

1833 - U.S. President Andrew Jackson became the first President to ride in a train.

1844 - The Young Men's Christian Association (YMCA) was founded in London.

1857 - Sophia of Nassau married the future King Oscar II of Sweden-Norway.

1859 - Queen Victoria signed "Letters Patent" transforming Queensland into a separate colony.

1862 - American Civil War: At "The Battle of Memphis" Union forces captured Memphis, Tennessee from the Confederates.

1882 - More than 100,000 inhabitants of Bombay were killed when a cyclone in the Arabian Sea pushed huge waves into the harbour.

1912 - "Eruption of Novarupta" in Alaska began. This was the second largest volcanic eruption in recorded history after the Krakatoa eruption of 1888.

1925 - The Chrysler Corporation was founded by Walter Percy Chrysler.

1932 - The Revenue Act of 1932 was enacted, creating the first gas tax in the United States. The rate was 1 cent per gallon sold.

1933 - The first drive-in theater opened. It was located in Camden, New Jersey.

1934 - U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Securities Act of 1933 into law, establishing the Securities and Exchange Commission.

1946 - The Basketball Association of America was formed in New York City.

1956 - David Marshall, Singapore's first Chief Minister, resigned.

1962 - The Beatles auditioned for EMI Records. The onhand producer claimed, "They may have some potential."

1964 - Under a temporary order, the rocket launches at Cuxhaven, Germany were terminated. They were never to resume.

1966 - James Meredith, civil rights activist, was shot while trying to march across Mississippi.

1971 - Soyuz program: Soyuz 11 was launched.

1971 - The Ed Sullivan Show went off the air.

1972 - David Bowie released the classic album "The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars".

1974 - A new "Instrument of Government" is promulgated making Sweden a parliamentary monarchy.

1981 - A passenger train travelling between Mansi and Saharsa, India jumped the tracks at a bridge crossing the Bagmati river. The government placed the official death toll at 268 plus another 300 missing; however, it is generally believed that the actual figure is closer to 1,000 killed.

1982 - The '82 Lebanon War began: Forces under Israeli Defense Minister Ariel Sharon invaded southern Lebanon in their "Operation Peace for the Galilee," eventually reaching as far north as the capital Beirut.

1984 - Troops of the Indian Army attacked the Golden Temple in Amritsar in an effort to flush out terrorists, this following an order from Indira Gandhi. Official casualities were 576 combatants killed and 335 wounded; independent observers estimate that thousands of unarmed Sikh civilians were also killed in the crossfire.

1985 - The grave of "Wolfgang Gerhard" was exhumed in Embu, Brazil; the remains found were later proven to be those of Josef Mengele, Auschwitz' "Angel of Death". Mengele is thought to have drowned while swimming in February 1979.

1990 - U.S. District court judge Jose Gonzales ruled that the rap album "As Nasty As They Wanna Be" by the 2 Live Crew violated Florida's obscenity law; he declared that the predominant subject matter of the record was "directed to the 'dirty' thoughts and the loins, not to the intellect and the mind." (Woo! Were we in a pissy mood or what!)

1991 - George and Barbara Loeb, members of the Church of the Creator, were arrested and charged with murder.

1991 - Former "Diff'rent Strokes" child star Dana Plato was given a six-year suspended sentence for robbing a Las Vegas video store five weeks earlier.

1993 - Mongolia held its first direct presidential elections.

1996 - The sons of Darlie Routier, Damon and Devon, were stabbed to death in their Rowlett, Texas home. Their mother was later convicted of the murder.

1997 - New Jersey teenager Melissa Drexler gave birth to a healthy baby in a bathroom stall during her senior prom, then strangled the child with a plastic bag and stashed the corpse in the trash. (Hope ya' fry, COW!)

1999 - At the Putim maximum security prison in Brazil, 345 prisoners ran from the main gate in the largest jailbreak in Brazilian history, marking the 10th escape for the 3-year old facility. In the ensuing manhunt, two fugitives were killed and five innocent bystanders were accidentally jailed.

2002 - The United States House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee announced that it was probing Martha Stewart's "ImClone" stock sales.

2002 - A near-Earth asteroid estimated at 10 metres in diameter exploded over the Mediterranean Sea. The explosion was estimated to have a force of 26 kilotons, slightly more powerful than the Nagasaki atomic bomb.


Born this day:

1502 - King John III of Portugal (d. 1557)

1553 - Bernardino Baldi, Italian mathematician (d. 1617)

1599 - Diego Velázquez, Spanish painter (d. 1660)

1606 - Pierre Corneille, French dramatist (d. 1684)

1622 - Claude-Jean Allouez, French Jesuit missionary and explorer (d.1857)

1755 - Nathan Hale, American writer, patriot (d. 1776)

1756 - John Trumbull, American painter (d. 1843)

1799 - Alexander Pushkin Russian poet (d. 1837)

1810 - Friedrich Wilhelm Schneidewin, German classical scholar (d. 1856)

1843 - Friedrich Hölderlin, German poet (b. 1770)

1850 - Karl Ferdinand Braun, German physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1918)

1857 - Aleksandr Lyapunov, Russian mathematician (d. 1918)

1862 - Henry John Newbolt, English author (d. 1938)

1868 - Robert Falcon Scott, English explorer (d. 1912)

1872 - Tsarina Alexandra of Russia (d. 1918)

1875 - Thomas Mann, German novelist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in literature (d. 1955)

1890 - Ted Lewis, American bandleader (d. 1971)

1901 - Sukarno, first President of Indonesia (d. 1970)

1903 - Aram Khachaturian, Armenian composer (d. 1978)

1906 - Max August Zorn, mathematician (d. 1993)

1916 - Henriette Roosenburg, Dutch journalist (d. 1972)

1926 - Klaus Tennstedt, German conductor (d. 1998)

1934 - King Albert II of Belgium

1934 - Gilbert Cates, producer, director

1939 - Louis Andriessen, Dutch composer

1939 - Gary U.S. Bonds, musician

1947 - David Blunkett, politician

1954 - Cynthia Rylant, author

1956 - Björn Borg, Swedish tennis player

1963 - Wolfgang Drechsler, German social scientist


Died this day:

68 - Nero, Emperor of Rome, by suicide (b. 37)

1557 - John III of Portugal (b. 1502)

1799 - Patrick Henry, American revolutionary (b. 1736)

1829 - Shanawdithit, last known Beothuk Indian of Newfoundland

1832 - Jeremy Bentham, English philosopher (b. 1748)

1843 - Friedrich Hölderlin, German poet, novelist, and dramatist (b. 1770)

1865 - William Quantrill, Confederate raider (b. 1837) (Good riddance to bad garbage.)

1878 - Robert Stirling, Scottish inventor (b. 1790)

1881 - Henri Vieuxtemps, Belgian composer (b. 1820)

1891 - Sir John A. Macdonald, first Prime Minister of Canada (b. 1815)

1916 - Yuan Shikai, Chinese military official and politician (b. 1859)

1941 - Louis Chevrolet, American automotive pioneer, race car driver (b. 1878)

1946 - Gerhart Hauptmann, Silesian dramatist (b. 1862)

1961 - Carl Jung, Swiss psychologist (b. 1875)

1968 - Robert F. Kennedy, former United States Attorney General and Senator from New York (b. 1925)

1976 - J. Paul Getty, American industrialist (b. 1892)

1981 - Carleton S. Coon, American anthropologist (b. 1904)

1984 - A. Bertram Chandler, Australian author (b. 1912)

1991 - Stan Getz, American musician, composer (b. 1927)

2002 - Hans Janmaat, controversial far-right politician in the Netherlands

June 7th


1494 - Spain and Portugal divided the new lands they had discovered between themselves.

1498 - Christopher Columbus left on his third voyage of exploration.

1546 - Peace of Ardes ended the war between France and England.

1654 - Louis XIV was crowned king of France.

1712 - The Pennsylvania Assembly banned the importation of slaves.

1775 - The United Colonies changed their name to the United States.

1776 - Richard Henry Lee of Virginia proposed to the Continental Congress a resolution calling for a Declaration of Independence.

1860 - The book, "Malaeska, the Indian Wife of the White Hunter" by Mrs. Ann Stevens, was offered for sale for a dime. It was the first "dime novel."

1863 - Mexico City was captured by French troops.

1892 - J.F. Palmer patented the cord bicycle tire.

1892 - John Joseph Doyle became the first pinch-hitter in baseball when he was used in a game.

1900 - Boxer rebels cut the rail links between Peking and Tientsin in China.

1903 - Professor Pierre Curie revealed the discovery of Polonium.

1909 - Mary Pickford made her motion picture debut in "The Violin Maker of Cremona."

1929 - The sovereign state of Vatican City came into existence as copies of the Lateran Treaty were exchanged in Rome.

1932 - Over 7,000 war veterans marched on Washington, DC, demanding their bonuses.

1935 - Pierre Laval received emergency powers to save the franc.

1937 - The cover of "LIFE" magazine showed the latest in campus fashions of the times, which included saddle shoes.

1939 - King George VI and his wife, Queen Elizabeth, arrived in the U.S. It was the first visit to the U.S. by a reigning British monarch.

1942 - The Battle of Midway ended. The sea and air battle lasted 4 days. Japan lost four carriers, a cruiser, and 292 aircraft, and suffered 2,500 casualties. The U.S. lost the Yorktown, the destroyer USS Hammann, 145 aircraft, and suffered 307 casualties.

1942 - Japan landed troops on the islands of Attu and Kiska in the Aleutians. The U.S. invaded and recaptured the Alutians one year later.

1944 - Off of the coast of Normandy, France, the Susan B. Anthony sank. All 2,689 people aboard survived.

1948 - The Communists completed their takeover of Czechoslovakia.

1955 - "The $64,000 Question" premiered.

1965 - Sony Corporation unveiled its brand new consumer home videotape recorder. The black and white only unit sold for $995.

1965 - In the U.S., the Gemini 4 mission was completed. The mission featured the first spacewalk by an American.

1968 - In Operation Swift Saber, U.S. Marines swept an area 10 miles northwest of Danang in South Vietnam.

1976 - "The NBC Nightly News", with John Chancellor and David Brinkley, aired for the first time.

1981 - Israeli F-16 fighter-bombers destroyed Iraq’s only nuclear reactor.

1993 - Woody Allen lost his custody battle against Mia Farrow.

1994 - The United States District Court for the Eastern District of Virginia declared the RMS Titanic, Inc. (RMST) salvor-in-possession of the wreck and the wreck site of the RMS Titanic.

1998 - James Byrd Jr., at age 49, was murdered in Jasper, TX. Byrd had been dragged to death behind a pickup truck. On February 25, 1999 William King was sentenced to the death penalty for the racial crime while two other men charged awaited trial.

2000 - U.S. Federal Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson ordered the breakup of Microsoft Corporation.

2002 - Michael Skakel was convicted of beating his neighbor Martha Moxley to death in 1975. The two were 15 years old at the time.

Birthdays

Beau Brummel 1778
Paul Gauguin 1848
Jessica Tandy 1909
Virginia Apgar 1909
Dean Martin 1917
Gwendolyn Brooks 1917
Ray Sherer 1919
Charles Strouse 1928
Randolph Turpin 1928
Dolores Gray 1930
Virginia McKenna 1931
Wynn Stewart 1934
Tom Jones 1940
Ken Osmond 1943
Nikki Giovanni 1943
Jenny Jones 1946
Anne Twomey 1951
Liam Neeson 1952
William Forsythe 1955
Prince Rogers Nelson 1958
Gordon Gano (The Violent Femmes) 1963
Ecstacy (Whodini) 1964
Eric Kretz (Stone Temple Pilots) 1966
Helen Baxendale 1970
Mike Madano (NHL) 1970
Larisa Oleynik 1981
Anna Kournikova 1981

June 8th


One year ago today, Word Distillery was born.

Happy Birthday old gal!!!!

June 8th



36 - St. Silverius became Pope.

793 - The first Viking raid on British soil, where a set date for the raid is known, took place at Lindisfarne.

1776 - American Revolutionary War: At "The Battle of Trois-Rivières" the American invaders were driven back at Trois-Rivières, Quebec.

1783 - The volcano "Laki", in Iceland, began an eight-month eruption which killed over 9,000 people and started a seven-year famine.

1861 - American Civil War: Tennessee seceded from the Union.

1862 - American Civil War: At "The Battle of Cross Keys" Confederate forces under General Stonewall Jackson saved the Army of Northern Virginia from a Union assault on the James Peninsula led by General George McClellan.

1866 - The Canadian Parliament met for the first time in Ottawa.

1887 - Herman Hollerith received a patent for his punch card calculator.

1912 - Carl Laemmle incorporated Universal Pictures.

1941 - World War II: The Allies invaded Syria and Lebanon denying the German war machine access to the oilfields of the Middle East.

1948 - Milton Berle hosted the debut of Texaco Star Theater.

1949 - The prophetic novel "1984" by George Orwell was published.

1949 - Red Scare: Celebrities such as Helen Keller, Dorothy Parker, Danny Kaye, Fredric March, John Garfield, Paul Muni and Edward G. Robinson were named in an FBI report as Communist Party members. No proof of these accusations was ever supplied by the bureau.

1950 - Sir Thomas Blamey became the only Field Marshal in Australian history.

1953 - Flint-Worcester Tornadoes: A tornado hit Flint, Michigan and killed 115. This was the last tornado to claim more than 100 lives.

1953 - The United States Supreme Court ruled that Washington, D.C. restaurants could not refuse to serve black patrons.

1959 - The first (and only) delivery of "Missile Mail" took place.

1967 - 6-Day War: The "USS Liberty Incident" occured, killing 34 and wounding 171.

1968 - The murderer of Doctor Martin Luther King Jr. was arrested.

1968 - The body of assassinated U.S. Senator Robert F. Kennedy was laid to rest at Arlington National Cemetery.

1969 - After the Columbia Broadcasting System (CBS) cancelled the program, the last Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour aired.

1984 - Homosexuality was decriminalised in the state of New South Wales, Australia.

1986 - Former United Nations Secretary-General Kurt Waldheim was elected president of Austria.

1992 - The first World Ocean Day was celebrated, coinciding with the Earth Summit held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

1995 - Downed U.S. Air Force pilot Captain Scott O'Grady was rescued by U.S. Marines in Bosnia.

1996 - Panama became a member of the Berne Convention copyright treaty.

1998 - Charlton Heston assumed the presidency of the National Rifle Association.

1999 - The government of Colombia announced that it will include the estimated value of the country's illegal drug crops, exceeding half a billion US dollars, in its gross national product.

2001 - The popular editorial site "suck.com", one of the first original content sites on the internet, published its final article, "Gone Fishin'."

2004 - The first Transit of Venus in this millennium took place.


Born this day:

1625 - Giovanni Domenico Cassini, scientist (d. 1712)

1724 - John Smeaton, civil engineer (d. 1794)

1743 - Alessandro Cagliostro, adventurer (d. 1795)

1810 - Robert Schumann, composer (d. 1856)

1847 - Ida McKinley, former First Lady of the United States (d. 1907)

1867 - Frank Lloyd Wright, architect (d. 1959)

1903 - Marguerite Yourcenar, author (d. 1987)

1903 - Ralph Yarborough, U.S. Senator and Texas politician (d. 1996)

1910 - John W. Campbell Jr., science fiction writer, publisher, editor (d. 1971)

1916 - Francis Crick, scientist, Nobel laureate, helped discover the molecular structure of DNA (d. 2004)

1917 - Byron White, Associate Justice of the United States Supreme Court (d. 2002)

1921 - Suharto, former President of Indonesia. (First class JERK!!!)

1924 - Lyn Nofziger, political operative

1925 - Barbara Bush, former First Lady of the United States (to 41st President, George Bush, mother to 43rd President George W. Bush)

1927 - LeRoy Neiman, painter

1933 - Joan Rivers, comedienne, author

1944 - Boz Scaggs, singer, songwriter

1948 - Jürgen von der Lippe, German show master

1951 - Bonnie Tyler, singer, guitarist

1955 - Sir Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web

1958 - Keenen Ivory Wayans, comedian, actor, director

1969 - Marcos Siega, American director


Died this day:

218 - Macrinus, Roman Emperor (b. c. 165)

632 - Muhammad, prophet of Islam (b. c. 570)

1042 - Harthacanute, King of England (b. 1018)

1795 - King Louis XVII of France (b. 1785)

1809 - Thomas Paine, American revolutionary and writer: Common Sense (b. 1737)

1845 - Andrew Jackson, 7th President of the United States (b. 1767)

1857 - Douglas William Jerrold, British dramatic playwright and political satirist (b. 1803)

1874 - Cochise, Apache leader (b. 1812)

1876 - George Sand, author (b. 1804)

1924 - George Leigh Mallory (b. 1886) and Andrew Irvine (b. 1902), mountaineers

1929 - Bliss Carman, poet (b. 1861)

1966 - Anton Melik, Slovene geographer (b. 1890)

1970 - Abraham Maslow, psychologist (b. 1908)

1979 - Herb Polesie, playwright

1998 - Sani Abacha, then President of Nigeria (b. 1904)

2000 - Jeff MacNelly, political cartoonist

June 9th

68 A.D. - Roman Emperor Nero committed suicide.

1064 - Coimbra, Portugal fell to Ferdinand, the King of Castile.

1534 - Jacques Cartier became the first to sail into the river he named Saint Lawrence.

1790 - John Barry copyrighted "Philadelphia Spelling Book." It was the first American book to be copyrighted.

1790 - Civil war broke out in Martinique.

1860 - The book, "Malaeska, the Indian Wife of the White Hunter" by Mrs. Ann Stevens, was offered for sale for a dime. It was the first published "dime novel."

1861 - Mary Ann "Mother" Bickerdyke began working in Union hospitals.

1923 - Bulgaria’s government was overthrown by the military.

1931 - Robert H. Goddard patented a rocket-fueled aircraft design.

1934 - Donald Duck made his debut in the Silly Symphonies cartoon "The Wise Little Hen."

1940 - Norway surrendered to the Nazis during World War II.

1943 - The withholding tax on payrolls was authorized by the U.S. Congress.

1945 - Japanese Premier Kantaro Suzuki declared that Japan would fight to the last rather than accept unconditional surrender.

1946 - Mel Ott (with the New York Giants) became the first manager to be ejected from a doubleheader (both games).

1953 - A tornado struck Worcester, Massachusetts, killing about 100 people.

1959 - The first ballistic missile carrying submarine, the USS George Washington, was launched.

1965 - Michel Jazy ran the mile in 3 minutes, 53.6 seconds. He broke the record set by Peter Snell in 1964.

1972 - American advisor John Paul Vann was killed in a helicopter accident in Vietnam.

1978 - Leaders of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints struck down a 148-year-old policy of excluding black men from the Mormon priesthood.

1980 - Richard Pryor was severely burned by a "free-base" mixture that exploded. He was hospitalized more than two months.

1985 - Thomas Sutherland, an American educator, was kidnapped in Lebanon. He was not released until November 1991.

1985 - The Los Angeles Lakers won the NBA title by defeating the Boston Celtics.

1986 - The Rogers Commission released a report on the Challenger disaster. The report explained that the spacecraft blew up as a result of a failure in a solid rocket booster joint.

1998 - In Jasper, TX, three white men were charged in the dragging death of African-American James Byrd Jr.

1999 - NATO and Yugoslavia signed a peace agreement over Kosovo.

2000 - The U.S. Justice Department announced that it had not uncovered reliable evidence of conspiracy behind 1968 assi