June 17th



1497 - At "Battle of Deptford Bridge" forces under King Henry VII crushed an army led by Michael An Gof.

1565 - The 13th Ashikaga Shogun, Ashikaga Yoshiteru, is assassinated.

1579 - Sir Francis Drake claimed a land he called "Nova Albion" (present day California) for England.

1631 - Mumtaz Mahal died during childbirth. Her husband, Mughal emperor Shah Jahan I, then spent more than 20 years to build her tomb, the Taj Mahal.

1775 - American Revolutionary War: At "The Battle of Bunker Hill" the British forces took Bunker Hill outside of Boston.

1789 - In France, the Third Estate declared itself as a national assembly.

1839 - In the Kingdom of Hawaii, Kamehameha III issued the "Edict of Toleration" which gave Roman Catholics the freedom to worship in the Hawaiian Islands. The Hawaii Catholic Church and the Cathedral of Our Lady of Peace was later established as a result.

1863 - "The Battle of Aldie" in the Gettysburg Campaign of the American Civil War took place.

1876 - Indian Wars: At "The Battle of the Rosebud" 1,500 Sioux and Cheyenne led by Crazy Horse beat back General George Crook's forces at Rosebud Creek in Montana Territory. This was the lead up to "Little Bighorn".

1885 - The Statue of Liberty arrived in New York Harbor.

1898 - The Navy Hospital Corps were established.

1928 - Aviator Amelia Earhart began her attempt to become the first woman to fly in an aircraft across the Atlantic Ocean. She was a passenger, Wilmer Stutz was pilot and Lou Gordon, mechanic.

1930 - U.S. President Herbert Hoover signed the "Smoot-Hawley Tariff" into law.

1930 - Bonus Army: Approximately 1000 World War I veterans massed at the United States Capitol as the U.S. Senate considered a bill that would give them certain benefits.

1940 - World War II: "Operation Ariel" begins - Allied troops start to evacuate France, following Germany's takeover of Paris and most of the nation.

1940 - World War II: "RMS Lancastria" is sunk by the Luftwaffe near Saint-Nazaire, France.

1940 - The three Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania fall under the occupation of the Soviet Union.

1944 - Iceland became independent from Denmark and formed a republic.

1948 - A Douglas DC-6 carrying United Air Lines Flight 624 crashed near Mount Carmel, Pennsylvania, killing all 43 people on board.

1953 - Workers Uprising: In East Germany, the Soviet Union ordered a division of troops into East Berlin to quell a rebellion.

1961 - The New Democratic Party of Canada was founded with the merger of the Cooperative Commonwealth Federation (CCF) and the Canadian Labour Congress.

1963 - The United States Supreme Court ruled 8 to 1 in "Abington School District v. Schempp" against allowing the reciting of Bible verses and the Lord's Prayer in public schools.

1971 - Representatives of Japan and the United States signed the "Okinawa Reversion Agreement", setting out a plan where the U.S. would return control of Okinawa.

1972 - Watergate scandal: Five White House operatives were arrested for burglarizing the offices of the Democratic National Committee, in an attempt by the Republican party to illegally wiretap the opposition.

1982 - The body of "God's Banker", Roberto Calvi was found hanging beneath Blackfriars Bridge in London.

1991 - Apartheid: The South African Parliament repealed " The Population Registration Act", which had required racial classification of all South Africans at birth.

1992 - A 'Joint Understanding' agreement on arms reduction was signed by U.S. President George H. W. Bush and Russian President Boris Yeltsin (this was be later codified in START II).

1994 - Following a televised highway chase and a failed attempt at suicide, O. J. Simpson wis arrested for the murders of his wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend Ronald Goldman.


Born this day:

1239 - King Edward I of England (d. 1307)

1682 - King Charles XII of Sweden (d. 1718)

1703 - John Wesley, English theologian, founder of Methodism (d. 1791)

1808 - Henrik Wergeland, Norwegian author

1818 - Charles Gounod, French composer (d. 1893)

1832 - Sir William Crookes, physicist, chemist (d. 1919)

1881 - Tommy Burns, boxer (d. 1955)

1882 - Igor Stravinsky, Russian composer (d. 1971)

1898 - M. C. Escher, Dutch artist (d. 1972)

1907 - Charles Eames, American designer and architect (d. 1978)

1909 - Elmer Lee Andersen, American politician and governor of Minnesota (d. 2004).

1914 - John Hersey, author (d. 1993)

1915 - Karl Targownik, psychiatrist (d. 1996)

1917 - Dean Martin, American singer, actor (d. 1995)

1917 - Atle Selberg, Norwegian mathematician

1929 - Tigran Petrosian, chess player (d. 1984).

1940 - George Akerlof, American economist

1942 - Mohamed ElBaradei, IAEA Director

1943 - Newt Gingrich, American politician

1945 - Ken Livingstone, Mayor of London

1946 - Peter Rosei, writer

1958 - Jello Biafra, musician, politician

1967 - Ed Murnaghan, Generalist


Died this day:

1565 - Ashikaga Yoshiteru, Ashikaga shogun (b. 1536)

1696 - John III Sobieski, king of Poland (b. 1629)

1719 - Joseph Addison, English politician and writer (b. 1672)

1734 - Claude-Louis-Hector de Villars, Marshal of France (b. 1653)

1797 - Agha Muhammad Khan, Persian Shah of Qajar dynasty (b. 1742)

1898 - Edward Burne-Jones, English artist (b. 1833)

1939 - Eugen Weidmann, last public guillotine execution in France

1940 - Arthur Harden, English chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1865)

1956 - Paul Rostock, German doctor (b. 1892)

1957 - Dorothy Richardson, English feminist writer (b. 1873)

1982 - Roberto Calvi, banker

1996 - Thomas Kuhn, American philosopher of science

2004 - Sara Lidman, Swedish writer (b. 1923)

June 18th



1178 - Five Canterbury monks saw what was possibly the Giordano Bruno crater being formed. It is believed that the current oscillations of the moon's distance (on the order of metres) are a result of this collision.

1264 - The Parliament of Ireland met at Castledermot in County Kildare, the first definitively known meeting of this Irish legislature.

1429 - The French, under the leadership of Joan of Arc, crushed the English under Sir John Fastolf at "The Battle of Patay". It came to be recognized as the war's turning point.

1685 - The Monmouth Rebellion: James Scott, 1st Duke of Monmouth, declared himself King of England at Taunton, Somerset.

1778 - American Revolutionary War: British troops abandoned Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

1812 - War of 1812: The U.S. Congress declared war on Great Britain.

1815 - Napoleonic Wars: Perhaps the most famous military engagement in history, "The Battle of Waterloo", ending in a definitive French defeat, lead to Napoleon Bonaparte abdicating the throne of France for a second and final time.

1858 - Charles Darwin received a paper from Alfred Russel Wallace that included nearly identical conclusions about evolution as Darwin's own. This prompted Darwin to publish his theory.

1873 - Susan B. Anthony was fined $100 for attempting to vote in the 1872 presidential election.

1887 - "The Reinsurance Treaty" was closed between Germany and Russia.

1900 - Empress Dowager of China ordered all foreigners killed, including foreign diplomats and their families. (Bit of a PMS day there, Dow?)

1923 - Checker Cab put its first taxi on the streets.

1928 - Aviator Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly in an aircraft across the Atlantic Ocean.

1930 - Groundbreaking ceremonies for the Franklin Institute were held.

1940 - "The Appeal of June 18" by Charles de Gaulle was given. (It's hard to leave this one alone...)

1945 - William Joyce (Lord Haw-Haw) was charged with treason.

1946 - Dr. Ram Manohar, a Gandhian, called for a "Direct Action Day" against the Portuguese in Goa. A road is named after this date in Panjim.

1953 - The Republic of Egypt was declared and the monarchy was abolished.

1953 - A United States Air Force C-124 crashed and burned near Tokyo, Japan killing 129.

1954 - Pierre Mendès-France became Prime Minister of France.

1959 - Governor of Louisiana, Earl K. Long, was committed to a state mental hospital; he responded by having the hospital's director fired and replaced with a crony who immediately proclaimed him perfectly sane.

1965 - Vietnam War: The United States used B-52 bombers to attack National Liberation Front guerrilla fighters in South Vietnam.

1967 - Jimi Hendrix burnt his guitar on stage at the Monterey Pop Festival. (And the reason for this was what, Jimi?)

1979 - SALT II was signed by the United States and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

1983 - Sally Ride became the first American woman in space.

1984 - A major clash between about 5,000 Police and a similar number of Miners at Orgreave, South Yorkshire took place. This during the 1984-1985 Miners Strike.

1996 - Ted Kaczynski, suspected of being the Unabomber, was indicted on ten criminals counts.

2001 - Protests occurred in Manipur over the extension of the ceasefire between Naga insurgents and the government of India. (How dare they not kill each other!)


Born this day:

1757 - Gervasio Antonio de Posadas, Argentine leader (d. 1833)

1812 - Ivan Goncharov, Russian author (d. 1891)

1824 - Ferdinand III, Grand Duke of Tuscany (b. 1769)

1854 - E.W. Scripps, journalist, publisher (d. 1926)

1868 - Miklós Horthy, Hungarian admiral and regent (d. 1957)

1877 - James Montgomery Flagg, illustrator (d. 1960)

1886 - Alexander Wetmore, ornithologist (d. 1978)

1901 - Grand Duchess Anastasia Nicolaievna Romanova (d. 1918)

1903 - Jeanette MacDonald, American actress and singer (d. 1965)

1903 - Raymond Radiguet, French author (d. 1923)

1907 - Frithjof Schuon, metaphysician, poet, and painter (d. 1998)

1909 - Willi Kramp, writer (d. 1986)

1913 - Sammy Cahn, composer (d. 1993)

1915 - Red Adair, American "Wildcat" firefighter (d. 2004)

1918 - Jerome Karle, Nobel Prize-winning crystallographer

1918 - Franco Modigliani, economist (d. 2003)

1929 - Jürgen Habermas, sociologist and philosopher

1931 - Fernando Henrique Cardoso, President of Brazil

1932 - Geoffrey Hill, English poet

1937 - Gail Godwin, author

1937 - John D. Rockefeller IV, US Senator

1937 - Vitali Zholobov, cosmonaut

1942 - Roger Ebert, film reviewer

1942 - Sir Paul McCartney, singer, songwriter, classical composer and social activist

1942 - Hans Vonk, conductor (d. 2004)

1949 - Chris Van Allsburg, author and illustrator

1966 - Kurt Browning, figure skater


Died this day:

1250 - Teresa of Portugal (b. 1181)

1291 - King Alfonso III of Aragon (b. 1265)

1629 - Piet Hein (Netherlands), naval commander and folk hero (b. 1577)

1704 - Tom Brown, English satirist (b. 1662)

1794 - François Nicolas Leonard Buzot, French Revolutionary leader (b. 1760)

1835 - William Cobbett, journalist and author (b. 1763)

1901 - Josip Murn - Aleksandrov, Slovenian poet (b. 1879)

1902 - Samuel Butler, English writer (b. 1835)

1922 - Jacobus Kapteyn, Dutch astronomer (b. 1851)

1928 - Roald Amundsen, explorer (b. 1872)

1959 - Ethel Barrymore, actress (b. 1879)

1971 - Paul Karrer, Swiss chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1889)

1982 - John Cheever, author (b. 1912)

1984 - Alan Berg, radio talk show host (murdered)

June 19th



1269 - King Louis IX of France ordered all Jews found in public without an identifying yellow badge to be fined ten livres of silver.

1306 - The Earl of Pembroke's forces defeated Bruce's Scottish army at "The Battle of Methven".

1846 - The first baseball game under recognizable modern rules was played in Hoboken, New Jersey, United States.

1848 - Elizabeth Stanton and Lucretia Mott opened the first Women's Rights Convention in Seneca Falls, New York, United States.

1860 - Louise of Orange-Nassau married King Charles XV of Sweden-Norway.

1862 - Slavery was banned in U.S territories.

1865 - Over two years after the Emancipation Proclamation slaves in Galveston, Texas were finally informed of their freedom. The anniversary is henceforth unofficially celebrated as Juneteenth.

1867 - Maximilian I of the Mexican Empire was executed by a firing squad in Querétaro, Querétaro.

1870 - After all of the Southern States were formally readmitted to the United States of America, the Confederate States of America (aka the CSA) ceased to exist.

1893 - Lizzie Borden was acquitted of the axe murder of her parents.

1912 - The eight-hour work day was established in the United States.

1934 - The U.S. Federal Communications Commission (FCC) was established. The FCC regulates radio and television broadcasts.

1943 - Race riots occurred in Beaumont, Texas.

1949 - NASCAR sanctioned the first "strictly stock" race, which evolved into the modern Nextel Cup. Jim Roper won the event.

1950 - The first commercial drag races, "The Santa Ana Drags", began at Orange County Airport (now John Wayne Airport) in Santa Ana, California. Admission was 50 cents – or 75 cents if the ticket holder wanted to watch the mechanics work (the equivalency of today's pitt pass).

1953 - Ethel and Julius Rosenberg were executed as spies.

1954 - The last regular-service streetcar operated by Twin City Rapid Transit ran in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

1954 - The animated Bugs Bunny short "Devil May Hare" debuted in theaters, introducing The Tasmanian Devil.

1961 - Kuwait declared its independence from the United Kingdom.

1976 - King Carl XVI Gustaf of Sweden married Silvia Sommerlath.

1999 - Turin, Italy, was picked as the host city of the 2006 Winter Olympics.

2000 - Datapoint, the company that commissioned the Intel 8008 microprocessor, sold its European operations and changed its name to Dynacore.


Born this day:

1301 - Prince Morikuni, 9th Kamakura shogun of Japan (d. 1333)

1566 - King James I of England and VI of Scotland (d. 1625)

1623 - Blaise Pascal, mathematician (d. 1662)

1764 - José Gervasio Artigas, father of Uruguay (d. 1850)

1792 - Gustav Schwab, author (d. 1850)

1834 - Charles Spurgeon, preacher and evangelist (d. 1892)

1838 - Friedrich von Hessing, engineer (d. 1918)

1861 - Douglas Haig, British soldier and senior commander during World War I, 1st Earl Haig

1861 - José Rizal, poet, Filipino national hero

1865 - Dame May Whitty, entertainer (d. 1948)

1882 - Guenter von Kluge, German field marshal, (d. 1944)

1896 - Wallis Warfield (Simpson), Duchess of Windsor (d. 1986)

1897 - Moe Howard, actor, comedian; member of "The Three Stooges" (d. 1975)

1898 - James Joseph Sweeney, Roman Catholic prelate

1902 - Guy Lombardo, bandleader (d. 1977)

1903 - Lou Gehrig, United States baseball player (d. 1941)

1914 - Alan Cranston, United States politician (d. 2000)

915 - Julius Schwartz, United States editor and agent

1924 - Anneliese Rothenberger, soprano

1928 - Barry Took, British comedy writer and broadcaster (d. 2002)

1945 - Aung San Suu Kyi, politician and recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize (1991)

1947 - Salman Rushdie, author

1955 - Timothy-Allen Albertson, National Security Expert on Islamic Terrorism

1957 - Anna Lindh, Swedish politician and minister of foreign affairs (d. 2003)

1964 - Boris Johnson, British politician and journalist

1978 - Garfield, lazy, lasagna eating cat


Died this day:

1692 - Rebecca Nurse, accused American witch (hanged)

1747 - Giovanni Bononcini Italian composer

1820 - Joseph Banks, naturalist and botanist

1902 - Frederick Augustus Albert, King of Saxony

1937 - J. M. Barrie, author

1939 - Grace Abbott, social worker, activist

1966 - Ed Wynn, entertainer

1968 - James Joseph Sweeney, Roman Catholic prelate

1977 - Ali Shariati, sociologist

1977 - Lady Olave Baden-Powell, Chief Girl Guide

1993 - William Golding, English novelist (b. 1911)

1996 - G. David Schine, investigator and businessman

June 20th



451- At "The Battle of Chalons" Flavius Aetius achieved a decisive victory over Attila the Hun.

1214 - The University of Oxford received its charter.

1631 - The sacking of Baltimore: the Irish village of Baltimore was attacked by Algerian pirates.

1685 - Monmouth Rebellion: The Duke of Monmouth declared himself King of England at Bridgwater.

1756 - A British garrison was imprisoned in the Black Hole of Calcutta.

1782 - The U.S. Congress adopted "The Great Seal of the United States".

1791 - The Flight to Varennes began.

1819 - The US vessel "Savannah" arrives at Liverpool, United Kingdom. She is the first steam-propelled vessel to cross the Atlantic, most of the journey was made under sail.

1837 - Queen Victoria succeeded to the British throne.

1862 - Barbu Catargiu was assassinated.

1863 - West Virginia was admitted as the 35th U.S. state.

1877 - Alexander Graham Bell installed the world's first commercial telephone service in Hamilton, Ontario.

1919 - 150 died at the Teatro Yaguez fire, Mayagüez, Puerto Rico.

1939 - Benny Goodman's "Song School" ended its radio series.

1948 - "Toast of the Town", later The Ed Sullivan Show, debuted.

1956 - A Venezuelan "Commir" (Lockheed Super-Constellation) crashed into the Atlantic Ocean off Ashbury Park, New Jersey killing 74 people.

1960 - Independence is granted to Mali and Senegal.

1963 - The so-called "red telephone" was established between Soviet Union and United States following the Cuban Missile Crisis.

1966 - Canada sold 336 million bushels of wheat to Soviet Union in the first of what would prove to be ongoing annual sales that still take place.

1969 - Jacques Chaban-Delmas became Prime Minister of France.

1977 - Oil began to flow through the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System (TAPS).

1980 - Roberto Duran started his classic boxing trilogy with Sugar Ray Leonard by defeating him in a 15 round decision, to gain the WBC world Welterweight championship.

1981 - Iran is taken over by what is now known as the Islamic Republic of Iran.

1983 - The LZW patent was filed in USA.

1990 - The asteroid "Eureka" was discovered.

1991 - The German parliament decided to move the capital from Bonn back to Berlin.

2001 - Pervez Musharraf became the president of Pakistan.

2003 - The LZW patent expired in the US.

2003 - Bounce premiered at the Goodman Theatre.

2003 - The formation of "Wikimedia Foundation" is announced.


Born this day:

1561 - Sigismund, king of Sweden and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth (d. 1632)

1634 - Charles Emmanuel II of Savoy (d. 1675)

1756 - Joseph Martin Kraus, composer

1763 - Wolfe Tone, Irish patriot

1771 - Thomas Douglas, 5th Earl of Selkirk, philanthropist, entrepreneur (d. 1820)

1797 - Sophie (Frémiet) Rude, French artist (d. 1867)

1808 - Samson Raphael Hirsch, rabbi (d. 1888)

1819 - Jacques Offenbach, composer (d. 1880)

1887 - Kurt Schwitters, painter (Dadaist), writer (d. 1948)

1899 - Jean Moulin, leader of the French Resistance in WW II.

1905 - Lillian Hellman, playwright (d. 1984)

1909 - Errol Flynn, actor (d. 1959)

1912 - Anthony Buckeridge, author (d. 2004)

1937 - Donald Sullivan, priest

1940 - Eugen Drewermann, theologian

1941 - Ulf Merbold, physicist and astronaut

1942 - Brian Wilson, bass player and singer for The Beach Boys

1945 - Shekhar Mehta, racer, winner of the Safari Rally

1946 - Bob Vila, television home improvement/renovation personality

1952 - John Goodman, U.S. actor

1970 - Prince Moulay Rachid, prince of Morocco


Died this day:

451 - Theodorid, King of the Visigoths

840 - Louis the Pious, King of the Franks, Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire (b. 778)

1597 - Willem Barentsz, navigator

1787 - Karl Friedrich Abel, German composer

1820 - Manuel Belgrano, Argentine lawyer and politician

1837 - King William IV of Britain

1866 - Bernhard Riemann, mathematician (b. 1826)

1945 - Bruno Frank, author

1947 - Bugsy Siegel, U.S. gangster (from lead poisoning)

1958 - Kurt Alder, German chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1902)

1993 - Vince Foster, Deputy White House Counsel (apparent suicide)

1995 - Emil Cioran, Romanian-born French philosopher and essayist

1998 - Conrad Schumann, East German borderguard, the most famous escapee from East Germany.

1999 - Clifton Fadiman, author

2002 - Erwin Chargaff, biochemist

2003 - Bob Stump, U.S. Congressman from Arizona

June 21st


524 - At "The Battle of Vezerone" Burgundy triumphed over the French.

1665 - The first soldiers of "Le Régiment de Carignan-Salières" arrived at Quebec to invade Iroquois territories.

1734 - In Montreal in New France (today primarily Quebec), a black slave known by the French name of Marie-Joseph Angélique, was tortured then hanged by the French authorities in a public ceremony that involved her disgrace and the amputation of a hand. (The French were such benevolent overseers.)

1749 - Halifax, Nova Scotia, was founded.

1788 - New Hampshire ratified the Constitution and was admitted as the 9th state in the United States.

1798 - Irish Rebellion of 1798: The British Army defeated Irish rebels at "The Battle of Vinegar Hill".

1813 - During the Peninsular War "The Battle of Vitoria" took place.

1813 - Laura Secord set out to warn British forces of an impending U.S. attack on Queenston, Ontario.

1824 - During the Greek War of Independence, Egyptian forces captured Psara in the Aegean Sea.

1859 - Franco-Austrian War: "The Battle of Solférino" was fought. Witnessed by Henri Dunant, the result was both the Geneva Conventions and the Red Cross.

1864 - Maori Wars: The "Tauranga Campaign" ended.

1877 - "The Molly Maguires", ten Irish immigrants who were labor activists, were hanged in the Carbon County, Pennsylvania Prison.

1887 - Queen Victoria's golden jubilee took place.

1898 - Guam became a U.S. territory.

1915 - The U.S. Supreme Court handed down its decision in "Guinn v. United States" (238 US 347 1915), striking down an Oklahoma law denying the right to vote to some citizens.

1919 - In one of Canada's darker moments The Royal Canadian Mounted Police fired a volley into a crowd of unemployed war veterans, killing two, during the Winnipeg General Strike.

1919 - Admiral Ludvig von Reuter scuttled the German fleet in Scapa Flow, Orkney. The nine sailors killed were the last casualties of the First World War.

1939 - The New York Yankees baseball team announced Lou Gehrig's retirement.

1940 - World War II: France surrendered unconditionally to Germany.

1940 - The first successful west-to-east navigation of Northwest Passage began at Vancouver British Columbia.

1942 - World War II: Tobruk fell to Rommel's "Afrika Korps".

1942 - World War II: A Japanese submarine surfaced near the Columbia River in Oregon, firing 17 shells at nearby Fort Stevens in one of only a handful of attacks by the Japanese against the U.S. mainland.

1945 - World War II: "The Battle of Okinawa" ended.

1947 - A seaman named Harold Dahl claimed to have seen six UFOs near Maury Island, United States. The next morning Dahl reported the first modern MIB encounter. (MIB...Men In Black?)

1957 - Ellen Louks Fairclough was sworn in as Canada's first woman Cabinet Minister.

1964 - Three civil rights workers, Andrew Goodman, James Chaney and Mickey Schwerner were murdered in Neshoba County, Mississippi, by members of the Ku Klux Klan.

1965 - Folk rock band "The Byrds" release their highly influencial debut album Mr. Tambourine Man.

1973 - In handing down the decision in "Miller v. California" (413 US 15), the Supreme Court of the United States established the Miller Test, which now governs obscenity in U.S. law.

1982 - John Hinckley was found not guilty by reason of insanity for the attempted assassination of U.S. President Ronald Reagan.

1982 - The "Fête de la Musique" street music festival was inaugurated in France by Jack Lang.

1989 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in "Texas v. Johnson" that flag burning is free speech, protected under the United States Constitution.

2000 - "Section 28" was repealed in Scotland with a 99 to 17 vote.

2003 - Deputy Justice Fazel Ahmed Manawi of the Afghan Supreme Court announced that "Aftab" editor Sayed Madawi and his deputy Ali Payam Sestani would be tried for "libelling Islam". (Obviously NOT protected under free speech in Afghanistan...)

2003 - "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix", the fifth book in J.K. Rowling's hugely popular Harry Potter series was published.

2004 - "SpaceShipOne" became the first privately funded spaceplane to achieve spaceflight.


Born this day:

1002 - Pope Leo IX (d. 1054)

1639 - Increase Mather, New England Puritan minister (d. 1723)

1646 - Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz, polymath

1676 - Anthony Collins, philosopher

1781 - Siméon-Denis Poisson, mathematician, physicist (d. 1840)

1736 - Enoch Poor, Brigadier General in the Continental Army (d. 1780)

1763 - Pierre Paul Royer-Collard, philosopher

1774 - Daniel D. Tompkins, entrepreneur, jurist, Congressman, Governor of New York, and the sixth Vice President of the United States

1805 - Charles Jackson, physician, chemist, pioneer geologist and mineralogist

1811 - Carlo Matteucci, physicist

1823 - Jean Chacornac, astronomer (d. 1873)

1839 - Machado de Assis, Brazilian writer (d. 1908)

1862 - Damrong Rajanubhab, Thai prince, administrator and historian (d. 1943)

1863 - Albert Sauveur, metallurgist (one of the founders of physical metallurgy)

1863 - Max Wolf, astronomer

1864 - Heinrich Wölfflin, art historian

1876 - William H. Keesom, physicist (pioneer in cryogenics)

1880 - Arnold Gesell, psychologist, pediatrician

1883 - Lluís Companys i Jover, President of Catalonia (d. 1940)

1884 - Claude Auchinleck, British Field Marshal (d. 1981)

1887 - Norman L. Bowen, petrologist (d. 1956)

1891 - Pier Luigi Nervi, architect (d. 1979)

1891 - Hermann Scherchen, German conductor (d. 1966)

1892 - Reinhold Niebuhr, Protestant theologian

1893 - Alois Hába, composer

1896 - Charles B. Momsen, inventor

1898 - Donald C. Peattie, botanist, writer

1903 - Al Hirschfeld, cartoonist (d. 2003)

1911 - Ralph Wendell Burhoe, theologian and scientist, first American to win the Templeton Prize for Progress in Religion

1912 - Mary McCarthy, writer (d. 1989)

1914 - Ralf Parland, writer

1914 - William Vickrey, economist, awarded the Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel

1916 - Herbert Friedman, astronomer

1916 - Joseph Cyril Bamford, inventor and industrialist

1919 - Gérard Pelletier, French journalist, politician and diplomat (d. 1997)

1919 - Vladimir Simagin, Chess International Grandmaster & Master, International Correspondence Chess Master, trainer

1921 - Helmut Heissenbüttel, German avant-garde novelist and poet

1927 - Carl Stokes, mayor of Cleveland, Ohio, USA (d. 1996)

1934 - Wulf Kristen, writer and recipient of the 1989 Heinrich Mann Prize

1935 - Françoise Sagan, French writer

1939 - Ruben Berrios, politician

1941 - Eduardo Matarazzo Suplicy, Brazillian politician

1942 - Henry Taylor, Pulitzer-Prize winning poet

1948 - Ian McEwan, writer

1948 - Andrzej Sapkowski, Polish fantasy writer

1950 - Anne Carson, poet

1953 - Benazir Bhutto, Prime Minister of Pakistan (twice), first female Muslim head of government

1954 - Robert Menasse, Austrian writer

1955 - Tim Bray, pioneer computer programmer

1959 - Marcella Detroit, Singer, Musician & Song-writer (Shakespear's Sister)

1966 - Rudi Bakhtiar, journalist

1982 - Prince William of Wales (son to Charles, Prince of Wales and his wife, Diana)


Died this day:

1305 - King Wenceslaus II of Bohemia and Poland (b. 1271)

1377 - King Edward III of England

1527 - Niccolò Machiavelli, Italian historian and political author (b. 1469)

1582 - Oda Nobunaga, Japanese warlord (b. 1534)

1652 - Inigo Jones, architect (b. 1573)

1824 - Étienne Aignan, translator, political writer, librettist, playwright, and member of the Académie française (b. 1773)

1908 - Nikolai Rimsky-Korsakov, Russian composer (b. 1844)

1914 - Bertha von Suttner, winner of 1905 Nobel Peace Prize (b. 1843)

1934 - Thorne Smith, author

1951 - Charles Dillon Perrine, astronomer (b. 1867)

1952 - Wilfrid 'Wop' May, aviation pioneer

1964 - Andrew Goodman, civil rights activist (murdered by the Ku Klux Klan)

1964 - James Cheney, civil rights activist (murdered by the Ku Klux Klan)

1964 - Mickey Schwerner, civil rights activist (murdered by the Ku Klux Klan)

1970 - Sukarno, President of Indonesia (no comment)

1976 - Margaret Herrick, librarian and director of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (b. 1902)

1980 - Bert Kaempfert, German orchestra leader and songwriter

1985 - Tage Erlander, Swedish Prime Minister

1990 - Ross Munro, journalist, editor, and publisher

1992 - Yoshiko Uchida, Japanese-American writer (b. 1921)

1997 - Fidel Velázquez Sánchez, Mexican union leader (b. 1900)

2000 - Alan Hovhaness, American composer (b. 1911)

2001 - Carroll O'Connor, American actor, All in the Family, In the Heat of the Night

2001 - John Lee Hooker, blues musician

2004 - Leonel Brizola, Brazillian politician

2005 - Jaime Cardinal Sin, Roman Catholic archbishop of Manila, Philippines 1976-2003

June 22nd

1558 - The French take the French town of Thioville from the English.

1611 - English explorer Henry Hudson, his son and several other people were set adrift in present-day Hudson Bay by mutineers.

1772 - Slavery was outlawed in England.

1807 - British seamen board the USS Chesapeake, a provocation leading to the War of 1812.

1815 - Napoleon Bonaparte abdicated a second time.

1832 - J.I. Howe patented the pin machine.

1868 - Arkansas was re-admitted to the Union.

1870 - The U.S. Congress created the Department of Justice.

1874 - Dr. Andrew Taylor Still began the first known practice of osteopathy.

1909 - The first transcontinental auto race ended in Seattle, WA.

1911 - King George V of England was crowned.

1915 - Austro-German forces occupied Lemberg on the Eastern Front as the Russians retreat.

1925 - France and Spain agreed to join forces against Abd el Krim in Morocco.

1933 - Germany became a one political party country when Hitler banned parties other than the Nazis.

1939 - The first U.S. water-ski tournament was held at Jones Beach, on Long Island, New York.

1940 - France and Germany signed an armistice at Compiegne, on terms dictated by the Nazis.

1941 - Under the codename Barbarossa, Germany invaded the Soviet Union.

1942 - A Japanese submarine shelled Fort Stevens at the mouth of the Columbia River.

1942 - In France, Pierre Laval declared "I wish for a German vitory".

1942 - V-Mail, or Victory-Mail, was sent for the first time.

1944 - U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt signed the "GI Bill of Rights" to provide broad benefits for veterans of the war.

1945 - During World War II, the battle for Okinawa officially ended after 81 days.

1946 - Jet airplanes were used to transport mail for the first time.

1956 - The battle for Algiers began as three buildings in Casbah were blown up.

1959 - Eddie Lubanski rolled 24 consecutive strikes in a bowling tournament in Miami, FL.

1964 - The U.S. Supreme Court voted that Henry Miller’s book, "Tropic of Cancer", could not be banned.

1969 - Judy Garland died from an accidental overdose of prescription sleeping aids. She was 47.

1970 - U.S. President Richard Nixon signed 26th amendment, lowering the voting age to 18.

1973 - Skylab astronauts splashed down safely in the Pacific after a record 28 days in space.

1977 - John N. Mitchell became the first former U.S. Attorney General to go to prison as he began serving a sentence for his role in the Watergate cover-up. He served 19 months.

1978 - James W. Christy and Robert S. Harrington discovered the only known moon of Pluto. The moon is named Charon.

1980 - The Soviet Union announceed a partial withdrawal of its forces from Afghanistan.

1981 - Mark David Chapman pled guilty to killing John Lennon.

1989 - The government of Angola and the anti-Communist rebels of the UNITA movement agreed to a formal truce in their 14-year-old civil war.

1992 - The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled that hate-crime laws that ban cross-burning and similar expressions of racial bias violated free-speech rights.

1998 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that evidence illegally obtained by authorities could be used at revocation hearings for a convicted criminal's parole.

1998 - The 75th National Marbles Tournament begins in Wildwood, NJ.

1999 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that persons with remediable handicaps cannot claim discrimination in employment under the Americans with Disability Act.

Birthdays


George Vancouver 1757
Erich Maria Remarque 1898
Carl Hubbell 1903
Billy Wilder 1906
Michael Todd 1907
Ann Morrow Lindbergh 1907
Mary Livingstone 1909
Joseph Papp 1921
Gower Champion 1921
Bill Blass 1922
Ralph Waite 1928
Roy Drusky 1930
Kris Kristofferson 1936
Ed Bradley 1941
Barry Serafin 1941
Michael Lerner 1941
Klaus Maria Brandauer 1944
Peter Asher (Peter and Gordon) 1944
Andrew Rubin 1946
David L. Lander 1947
Howard Kaylan (The Turtles) 1947
Todd Rungren 1948
Meryl Streep 1949
Allen Osmond 1949
Lindsay Wagner 1949
Graham Greene 1952
Chris Lemmon 1954
Freddie Prinze 1954
Green Gartside (Scritti Politti) 1956
Gary (INXS) Beers 1957
Bruce Campbell 1958
Alan Anton (Cowboy Junkies) 1959
Tracy Pollan 1960
Jimi Somerville 1961
Jimmy Sommerville (Bronski Beat, Communards) 1961
Amy Brenneman 1964
Mike Edwards (Jesus Jones) 1964
Tom Cunningham (Wet Wet Wet) 1965
Paula Irvine 1968
Stephen Page (Barenaked Ladies) 1970
Lindsay Ridgeway 1985

June 23rd

1683 - William Penn signed a friendship treaty with Lenni Lenape Indians in Pennsylvania.

1700 - Russia gave up its Black Sea fleet as part of a truce with the Ottoman Empire.

1758 - British and Hanoverian armies defeated the French at Krefeld in Germany.

1760 - The Austrians defeated the Prussians at Landshut, Germany.

1757 - Robert Clive defeated the Indians at Plassey and won control of Bengal.

1836 - The U.S. Congress approved the Deposit Act, which contained a provision for turning over surplus federal revenue to the states.

1848 - A bloody insurrection of workers in Paris erupted.

1860 - The U.S. Secret Service was created to arrest counterfeiters.

1865 - Confederate General Stand Watie, who was also a Cherokee chief, surrendered the last sizable Confederate army at Fort Towson, in the Oklahoma Territory.

1868 - Christopher Latham Sholes received a patent for an invention that he called a "Type-Writer."

1884 - A Chinese Army defeated the French at Bacle, Indochina.

1902 - Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Italy renewed the Triple Alliance for a 12 year duration.

1904 - The first American motorboat race got underway on the Hudson River in New York.

1926 - The first lip reading tournament in America was held in Philadelphia, PA.

1931 - Wiley Post and Harold Gatty took off from New York on the first round-the-world flight in a single-engine plane.

1934 - Italy gained the right to colonize Albania after defeating the country.

1938 - The Civil Aeronautics Authority was established.

1938 - Marineland opened near St. Augustine, Florida.

1947 - The U.S. Senate joined the House in overriding President Truman's veto of the Taft-Hartley Act.

1951 - Soviet U.N. delegate Jacob Malik proposed cease-fire discussions in the Korean War.

1952 - The U.S. Air Force bombed power plants on Yalu River, Korea.

1956 - Gamal Abdel Nasser was elected president of Egypt.

1964 - Henry Cabot Lodge resigned as the U.S. envoy to Vietnam and was succeeded by Maxwell Taylor.

1964 - The burned car of three civil rights workers was found prompting the FBI to begin a search. The men had been missing since June 21, 1964. Their bodies were found on August 4, 1964.

1966 - Civil Rights marchers in Mississippi were dispersed by tear gas.

1972 - U.S. President Nixon and White House chief of staff H.R. Haldeman discussed a plan to use the CIA to obstruct the FBI's Watergate investigation.

1985 - All 329 people aboard an Air-India Boeing 747 were killed when the plane crashed into the Atlantic Ocean near Ireland. The cause was thought to be a bomb.

1989 - The movie "Batman" was released nationwide.

1992 - John Gotti was sentenced in New York to life in prison after being convicted of racketeering charges.

1993 - Lorena Bobbitt of Prince William County, VA, sexually mutilated her husband, John, after he allegedly raped her.

1997 - Betty Shabazz, the widow of Malcolm X, died in New York of burns suffered in a fire set by her 12-year old grandson. She was 61.

2003 - Apple Computer Inc. unveiled the new Power Mac desktop computer.

2004 - The U.S. proposed that North Korea agree to a series of nuclear disarmament measures over a three-month period in exchange for economic benefits.

Birthdays

Josephine Marinique 1763
Adolphe Sax 1848
Irvin Cobb 1876
Alfred Kinsey 1894
Edward Patrick David 1894
Edward P. Morgan 1910
Jean Marie Anouilh 1910
David Ogilvy 1911
Alan Turing 1912
Irene Worth 1916
Larry Blyden 1925
Bob Fosse 1927
June Carter Cash 1929
Adam Faith 1940
Diana Trask 1940
Wilma Rudolph 1940
James Levine 1943
Rosetta Hightower (The Orlons) 1944
Ted Shackelford 1946
Bryan Brown 1947
Clarence Thomas 1948
Jim Metzler 1954
Frances McDormand 1957
Karin Gustafson 1959
Paul La Greca 1962
Richard Coles (Communards) 1962
Steve Shelley (Sonic Youth) 1962M
Chico DeBarge 1970
Selma Blair 1972
Virgo Williams (Ghostowns DJs) 1975

June 24th

1314 - Scottish forces led by Robert the Bruce won over Edward II of England at the Battle of Bannockburn in Scotland.

1340 - The English fleet defeated the French fleet at Sluys, off the Flemish coast.

1664 - New Jersey, named after the Isle of Jersey, was founded.

1509 - Henry VIII was crowned King of England.

1497 - Italian explorer John Cabot, sailing in the service of England, landed in North America on what is now Newfoundland.

1675 - King Philip's War began when Indians massacre colonists at Swansee, Plymouth colony.

1793 - The first republican constitution in France was adopted.

1812 - Napoleon crossed the Nieman River and invaded Russia.

1844 - Charles Goodyear was granted patent #3,633 for vulcanized rubber.

1859 - At the Battle of Solferino, also known as the Battle of the Three Sovereigns, the French army led by Napoleon III defeated the Austrian army under Franz Joseph I in northern Italy.

1861 - Federal gunboats attacked Confederate batteries at Mathias Point, Virginia.

1862 - U.S. intervention saved the British and French at the Dagu forts in China.

1869 - Mary Ellen "Mammy" Pleasant officially became the Vodoo Queen in San Francisco, CA.

1896 - Booker T. Washington became the first African American to receive an honorary MA degree from Howard University.

1910 - The Japanese army invaded Korea.

1913 - Greece and Serbia annulled their alliance with Bulgaria following border disputes over Macedonia and Thrace.

1922 - The American Professional Football Association took the name of The National Football League.

1931 - The Soviet Union and Afghanistan signed a treaty of neutrality.

1940 - France signed an armistice with Italy.

1940 - TV cameras were used for the first time in a political convention as the Republicans convened in Philadelphia, PA.

1941 - U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt pledged all possible support to the Soviet Union.

1947 - Kenneth Arnold reported seeing flying saucers over Mt. Rainier, Washington.

1948 - The Soviet Union began the Berlin Blockade.

1953 - John F. Kennedy and Jacqueline Bouvier announced their engagement.

1955 - Soviet MIG's down a U.S. Navy patrol plane over the Bering Strait.

1962 - The New York Yankees beat the Detroit Tigers, 9-7, after 22 innings.

1964 - The Federal Trade Commission announced that starting in 1965, cigarette manufactures would be required to include warnings on their packaging about the harmful effects of smoking.

1968 - "Resurrection City," a shantytown constructed as part of the Poor People's March on Washington D.C., was closed down by authorities.

1970 - The U.S. Senate voted overwhelmingly to repeal the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution.

1970 - The movie "Myra Breckinridge" premiered.

1971 - The National Basketball Association modified its four-year eligibility rule to allow for collegiate hardship cases.

1975 - 113 people were killed when an Eastern Airlines Boeing 727 crashed while attempting to land during a thunderstorm at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport.

1985 - Natalia Solzhenitsyn the wife of exiled, Soviet author Alexander Solzhenitsyn, became a U.S. citizen.

1997 - 18-year-old Melissa Drexler was charged with murder in the death of her baby. Drexler had given birth during her prom.

1997 - The U.S. Air Force released a report on the "Roswell Incident," suggesting the alien bodies witnesses reported seeing in 1947 were actually life-sized dummies.

1998 - AT&T Corp. struck a deal to buy cable TV giant Tele-Communications Inc. for $31.7 billion.

1998 - Walt Disney World Resort admitted its 600-millionth guest.

2002 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that juries, not judges, must make the decision to give a convicted killer the death penalty.

2002 - A painting from Monet's Waterlilies series sold for $20.2 million.

2003 - In Paris, France, manuscripts by novelist Georges Simenon brought in $325,579. The original manuscript of "La Mort de Belle" raised $81,705.

Birthdays
Mick Fleetwood (Fleetwood Mac) 1942
John ‘Charlie’ Whitney (Family) 1944
Jeff Cease (The Black Crowes) 1967
John Illsley (Dire Straits) 1949
Derrick Simpson (Black Uhuru) 1950
Manny Albam 1922
Arthur Brown 1944
Colin Blunstone 1945
Glenn Medeiros 1970
Jeff Beck (Yardbirds) 1944
Astro (UB40) 1957
Andrew McCluskey (OMD) 1959
Curt Smith (Tears For Fears) 1961
Michele Lee 1942
Chief Dan George 1899
Jack Dempsey 1895
Ambrose Bierce 1842
E.I. Du Pont 1771
Norman Cousins 1912
Irving Kaufman 1910
John Ciardi 1916
Al Molinaro 1919
Peter Hamill 1935
Georg Stanford Brown 1943
Ellison S. Onizuka 1946
Phyllis George 1949
Nancy Allen 1950
Danielle Spencer 1965
Sherry Stringfield 1967
Billy Casper 1931

June 25th

0841 - Charles the Bald and Louis the German defeated Lothar at Fontenay.

1080 - At Brixen, a council of bishops declared Pope Gregory to be deposed and Archbishop Guibert as antipope Clement III.

1580 - The Book of Concord was first published. The book is a collection of doctrinal standards of the Lutheran Church.

1658 - Aurangzeb proclaimed himself emperor of the Moghuls in India.

1767 - Mexican Indians rioted as Jesuit priests were ordered home.

1788 - Virginia ratified the U.S. Constitution and became the 10th state of the United States.

1844 - John Tyler took Julia Gardiner as his bride, thus becoming the first U.S. President to marry while in office.

1864 - Union troops surrounding Petersburg, VA, began building a mine tunnel underneath the Confederate lines.

1867 - Lucien B. Smith patented the first barbed wire.

1868 - The U.S. Congress enacted legislation granting an eight-hour day to workers employed by the Federal government.

1868 - Florida, Alabama, Louisiana, Georgia, North Carolina and South Carolina were readmitted to the Union.

1870 - In Spain, Queen Isabella abdicated in favor of Alfonso XII.

1876 - Lt. Col. Custer and the U.S. 7th Cavalry were wiped out by Sioux and Cheyenne Indians at Little Big Horn in Montana. The event is known as "Custer's Last Stand."

1877 - In Philadelphia, PA, Alexander Graham Bell demonstated the telephone for Sir William Thomson (Baron Kelvin) and Emperor Pedro II of Brazil at the Centennial Exhibition.

1906 - Pittsburgh millionaire Harry Kendall Thaw, the son of coal and railroad baron William Thaw, shot and killed Stanford White. White, a prominent architect, had a tryst with Florence Evelyn Nesbit before she married Thaw. The shooting took place at the premeire of Mamzelle Champagne in New York.

1910 - The U.S. Congress authorized the use of postal savings stamps.

1917 - The first American fighting troops landed in France.

1920 - The Greeks took 8,000 Turkish prisoners in Smyrna.

1921 - Samuel Gompers was elected head of the AFL for the 40th time.

1938 - Gaelic scholar Douglas Hyde was inaugurated as the first president of the Irish Republic.

1941 - Finland declared war on the Soviet Union.

1946 - Ho Chi Minh traveled to France for talks on Vietnamese independence.

1948 - The Soviet Union tightened its blockade of Berlin by intercepting river barges heading for the city.

1950 - North Korea invaded South Korea initiating the Korean War.

1951 - In New York, the first regular commercial color TV transmissions were presented on CBS using the FCC-approved CBS Color System. The public did not own color TV's at the time.

1952 - John Christie, the British murderer of 10 Rillington Place, was sentenced to death for killing six women.

1959 - The Cuban government seized 2.35 million acres under a new agrarian reform law.

1959 - Eamon De Valera became president of Ireland at the age of 76.

1962 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the use of unofficial non-denominational prayer in public schools was unconstitutional.

1964 - U.S. President Lyndon Johnson ordered 200 naval personnel to Mississippi to assist in finding three missing civil rights workers.

1966 - "Dark Shadows" began running on ABC-TV.

1968 - Bobby Bonds (San Francisco Giants) hit a grand-slam home run in his first game with the Giants. He was the first player to debut with a grand-slam.

1970 - The U.S. Federal Communications Commission handed down a ruling (35 FR 7732), making it illegal for radio stations to put telephone calls on the air without the permission of the person being called.

1973 - Erskine Childers Jr. became president of Ireland after the retirement of Eamon De Valera.

1973 - White House Counsel John Dean admitted that U.S. President Nixon took part in the Watergate cover-up.

1975 - Mozambique became independent. Samora Machel was sworn in as president after 477 years of Portuguese rule.

1981 - The U.S. Supreme Court decided that male-only draft registration was constitutional.

1985 - ABC’s "Monday Night Football" began with a new line-up. The trio was Frank Gifford, Joe Namath and O.J. Simpson.

1985 - New York Yankees officials enacted the rule that mandated that the team’s bat boys were to wear protective helmets during all games.

1986 - The U.S. Congress approved $100 million in aid to the Contras fighting in Nicaragua.

1987 - Austrian President Kurt Waldheim visited Pope John Paul II at the Vatican. The meeting was controversial due to allegations that Waldheim had hidden his Nazi past.

1990 - The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the right of an individual, whose wishes are clearly made, to refuse life-sustaining medical treatment. "The right to die" decision was made in the Curzan vs. Missouri case.

1991 - The last Soviet troops left Czechoslovakia 23 years after the Warsaw Pact invasion.

1991 - The Yugoslav republics of Slovenia and Croatia declared their independence from Yugoslavia.

1993 - Kim Campbell took office as Canada's first woman prime minister. She assumed power upon the resignation of Brian Mulroney.

1996 - Outside the Khobar Towers near Dhahran, Saudi Arabia a truck bomb exploded. The bomb killed 19 Americans and injured over 500 Saudis and Americans.

1997 - The Russian space station Mir was hit by an unmanned cargo vessel. Much of the power supply was knocked out and the station's Spektr module was severely damaged.

1997 - U.S. air pollution standards were significantly tightened by U.S. President Clinton.

1998 - The U.S. Supreme Court rejected the line-item veto thereby striking down presidential power to cancel specific items in tax and spending legislation.

1998 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that those infected with HIV are protected by the Americans With Disabilities Act.

1998 - Microsoft's "Windows 98" was released to the public.

1999 - Germany's parliament approved a national Holocaust memorial to be built in Berlin.

2000 - U.S. and British researchers announced that they had completed a rough draft of a map of the genetic makeup of human beings. The project was 10 years old at the time of the announcement.

2000 - A Florida judge approved a class-action lawsuit to be filed against American Online (AOL) on behalf of hourly subscribers who were forced to view "pop-up" advertisements.


Birthdays....

Rosie O'Neill 1874
Henry "Hap" Arnold 1886
George Abbott 1887
Lord Louis Mountbatten (Burma) 1900
Anne Revere 1903
George Orwell 1903
Peter Lind Hayes 1915
Johnny Smith 1922
Dorothy Gilman 1923
Sidney Lumet 1924
June Lockhart 1925
Eddie Floyd (Falcons) 1935
Barbara Montgomery 1939
Clint Warwick (The Moody Blues) 1940
Willis Reed 1942
Carly Simon 1945
Ian McDonald (Foreigner) 1946
Allen Lanier (Blue Oyster Cult) 1946
Jimmy Walker 1947
Michael Lembeck 1948
Phyllis George 1949
Tim Finn (Split Enz) 1952
David Paich (Toto) 1954
George Michael 1963
Dikembe Mutombo 1966
Richie Rich 1967
Candyman 1968
Sean Kelly (Sixpence None the Richer) 1971
Carlos Delgado 1972
Mario Calire (Wallflowers) 1974
Albert Costa 1975
Linda Cardellini 1975

June 26th


1096 - Peter the Hermit's crusaders forced their way across Sava, Hungary.

1243 - The Seljuk Turkish army in Asia Minor was wiped out by the Mongols.

1483 - Richard III usurped himself to the English throne.

1541 - Francisco Pizarro, the Spanish Conqueror of Peru, was murdered by his former followers.

1794 - The French defeated an Austrian army at the Battle of Fleurus.

1804 - The Lewis and Clark Expedition reached the mouth of the Kansas River after completing a westward trek of nearly 400 river miles.

1819 - The bicycle was patented by W.K. Clarkson, Jr.

1870 - The first section of the boardwalk in Atlantic City, NJ, was opened to the public.

1894 - The American Railway Union called a general strike in sympathy with Pullman workers.

1900 - The United States announced that it would send troops to fight against the Boxer rebellion in China.

1900 - A commission that included Dr. Walter Reed began the fight against the deadly disease yellow fever.

1907 - Russia's nobility demanded drastic measures to be taken against revolutionaries.

1908 - Shah Muhammad Ali's forces squelched the reform elements of Parliament in Persia.

1917 - General John "Black Jack" Pershing arrived in France with the American Expeditionary Force.

1925 - Charlie Chaplin's comedy, "The Gold Rush," premiered in Hollywood.

1926 - A memorial to the first U.S. troops in France was unveiled at St. Nazaire.

1924 - After eight years of occupation, American troops left the Dominican Republic.

1942 - The Grumman F6F Hellcat fighter was flown for the first time.

1945 - The U.N. Charter was signed by 50 nations in San Francisco, CA.

1948 - The Berlin Airlift began as the U.S., Britain and France started ferrying supplies to the isolated western sector of Berlin.

1951 - The Soviet Union proposed a cease-fire in the Korean War.

1959 - CBS journalist Edward R. Murrow interviewed Lee Remick. It was his 500th and final guest on "Person to Person."

1959 - U.S. President Eisenhower joined Britain's Queen Elizabeth II in ceremonies officially opening the St. Lawrence Seaway.

1961 - A Kuwaiti vote opposed Iraq's annexation plans.

1963 - U.S. President John Kennedy announced "Ich bin ein Berliner" (I am a Berliner) at the Berlin Wall.

1971 - The U.S. Justice Department issued a warrant for Daniel Ellsberg, accusing him of giving away the Pentagon Papers.

1975 - Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi declared a state of emergency due to "deep and widespread conspiracy."

1976 - The CN (Canadian National) Tower in Toronto, Canada, opened.

1979 - Muhammad Ali, at 37 years old, announced that he was retiring as world heavyweight boxing champion.

1981 - In Mountain Home, Idaho, Virginia Campbell took her coupons and rebates and bought $26,460 worth of groceries. She only paid 67 cents after all the discounts.

1985 - Wilbur Snapp was ejected after playing "Three Blind Mice" during a baseball game. The incident followed a call made by umpire Keith O'Connor.

1987 - The movie "Dragnet" opened in the U.S.

1996 - The U.S. Supreme Court ordered the Virginia Military Institute to admit women or forgo state support.

1997 - The U.S. Supreme Court struck down the Communications Decency Act of 1996 that made it illegal to distribute indecent material on the Internet.

1997 - The U.S. Supreme Court upheld state laws that allow for a ban on doctor-assisted suicides.

1998 - The U.S. and Peru open school to train commandos to patrol Peru's rivers for drug traffickers.

1998 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that employers are always potentially liable for supervisor's sexual misconduct toward an employee.

2000 - The Human Genome Project and Celera Genomics Corp. jointly announced that they had created a working draft of the human genome.

2000 - Indonesia's President Abdurrahman Wahid declared a state of emergency in the Moluccas due to the escalation of fighting between Christians and Muslims.

2001 - Ray Bourque (Colorado Avalanche) announced his retirement just 17 days after winning his first Stanley Cup. Bouque retired after 22 years and held the NHL record for highest-scoring defenseman and playing in 19 consecutive All-Star games.

2002 - David Hasseloff checked into The Betty Ford Center for treatment of alcoholism.

2002 - WorldCom Inc. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.


Birthdays

Abner Doubleday 1819
Sidney Howard 1891
Pearl S. Buck 1892
William P. Lear 1902
Peter Lorre 1904
Col. Tom Parker 1909
Roy Plunkett 1910
Richard Maltby 1914
Babe Didrikson Zaharias 1914
Charlotte Zolotow 1915
Eleanor Parker 1922
Frances Rafferty 1922
Dave Grusin 1934
Billy Davis ( The 5th Dimension) 1940
Larry Taylor (Canned Heat) 1942
Pamela Bellwood 1943
Georgie Fame (Clive Powell) 1943
Mick Jones (Clash, Big Audio Dynomite) 1955
Chris Isaak 1956
Patty Smyth 1957
Greg LeMond 1961
Terri Nunn (Berlin) 1961
Harriet Wheeler (The Sundays) 1963
Colin Greenwood (Radiohead) 1969
Chris O'Donnell 1970
Jason Schwartzman 1980
Kaitlin Cullum 1986

June 27th

0363 - The death of Roman Emperor Julian brought an end to the Pagan Revival.

1693 - "The Ladies' Mercury" was published by John Dunton in London. It was the first women's magazine and contained a "question and answer" column that became known as a "problem page."

1743 - King George II of England defeated the French at Dettingen, Bavaria, in the War of the Austrian Succession.

1787 - Edward Gibbon completed "The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire." It was published the following May.

1801 - British forces defeated the French and took control of Cairo, Egypt.

1844 - Joseph Smith and his brother Hyrum were killed by mob in Carthage, IL.

1847 - New York and Boston were linked by telegraph wires.

1871 - The yen became the new form of currency in Japan.

1885 - Chichester Bell and Charles S. Tainter applied for a patent for the gramophone. It was granted on May 4, 1886.

1893 - The New York stock market crashed. By the end of the year 600 banks and 74 railroads had gone out of business.

1905 - The battleship Potemkin succumbed to a mutiny on the Black Sea.

1918 - Two German pilots were saved by parachutes for the first time.

1923 - Yugoslav Premier Nikola Pachitch was wounded by Serb attackers in Belgrade.

1924 - Democrats offered Mrs. Leroy Springs for vice presidential nomination. She was the first woman considered for the job.

1927 - The U.S. Marines adopted the English bulldog as their mascot.

1929 - Scientists at Bell Laboratories in New York revealed a system for transmitting television pictures.

1931 - Igor Sikorsky filed U.S. Patent 1,994,488, which marked the breakthrough in helicopter technology.

1940 - Robert Pershing Wadlow was measured by Dr. Cyril MacBryde and Dr. C. M. Charles. They recorded his height at 8' 11.1." He was only 22 at the time of his death on July 15, 1940.

1942 - The FBI announced the capture of eight Nazi saboteurs who had been put ashore from a submarine on New York's Long Island.

1944 - During World War II, American forces completed their capture of the French port of Cherbourg from the German army.

1949 - "Captain Video and His Video Rangers" premiered on the Dumont Television Network.

1950 - Two days after North Korea invaded South Korea, U.S. President Truman ordered the Air Force and Navy into the Korean conflict. The United Nations Security Council had asked for member nations to help South Korea repel an invasion from the North.

1954 - The world's first atomic power station opened at Obninsk, near Moscow.

1955 - The first "Wide Wide World" was broadcast on NBC-TV.

1955 - The state of Illinois enacted the first automobile seat belt legislation.

1957 - More than 500 people were killed when Hurricane Audrey hit the coastal area of Louisiana and Texas.

1958 - NBC's "Matinee Theatre" was seen for the final time.

1959 - The play, "West Side Story," with music by Leonard Bernstein, closed after 734 performances on Broadway.

1961 - Arthur Michael Ramsey was enthroned as the 100th Archbishop of Canterbury.

1964 - Ernest Borgnine and Ethel Merman were married. It only lasted 38 days.

1967 - The world's first cash dispenser was installed at Barclays Bank in Enfield, England. The device was invented by John Sheppard-Barron. The machine operated on a voucher system and the maximum withdrawal was $28.

1967 - Two hundred people were arrested during a race riot in Buffalo, NY.

1969 - Patrons at the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar in New York City's Greenwich Village, clashed with police. This incident is considered to be the birth of the homosexual rights movement.

1972 - Bobby Hull signed a 10-year hockey contract for $2,500,000. He became a player and coach of the Winnipeg Jets of the World Hockey Association.

1973 - Former White House counsel John W. Dean told the Senate Watergate Committee about an "enemies list" that was kept by the Nixon White House.

1973 - Nixon vetoed a Senate ban on bombing Cambodia.

1976 - Palestinian extremists hijacked an Air France plane in Greece. There were 246 passengers and 12 crew onboard. The plane eventually was taken to Entebbe, Uganda where Israeli comm