Today in history

[KAJUN]

What Happened On This Day – June 1
2009 Air France flight 447 crashes into the Atlantic
All 228 people on board died in the crash. It took two years to find and recover the wreckage from the ocean floor.
1979 Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) ends 90 years of white rule
In 1980, the Republic of Zimbabwe achieved sovereignty from the United Kingdom.
1945 The first group of Berlin women start clearing the rubble of World War II
In Germany, the Trümmerfrauen are a well-known symbol for a new beginning after the total desolation in the aftermath of the war, and for the Wirtschaftswunder, the rapid reconstruction of Germany's economy through hard labor.
1874 The Heimlich maneuver is published
Henry Heimlich is credited with developing the technique using abdominal thrusts to stop choking.
1831 The British explorer James Clark Ross discovers the North Magnetic Pole
It is the location where the Earth's magnetic field points directly downwards. It lies in the vicinity of the Geographic North Pole.


Births On This Day – June 1
1982 Justine Henin
Belgian tennis player
1974 Alanis Morissette
Canadian/American singer-songwriter, guitarist, producer, actress
1937 Morgan Freeman
American actor, producer
1926 Marilyn Monroe
American model, actress, singer
1907 Frank Whittle
English engineer, inventor, developed the jet engine


Deaths On This Day – June 1
2008 Yves Saint Laurent
French fashion designer
1971 Reinhold Niebuhr
American theologian
1952 John Dewey
American philosopher, psychologist
1868 James Buchanan
American politician, 15th President of the United States
1830 Swaminarayan
Indian religious leader

Today in History June 1
193 The Roman emperor, Marcus Didius, is murdered in his palace.
1533 Anne Boleyn, Henry VIII's new queen, is crowned.
1774 The British government orders the port of Boston closed.
1789 The first U.S. congressional act on administering oaths becomes law.
1812 American navy captain James Lawrence, mortally wounded in a naval engagement with the British, exhorts to the crew of his vessel, the Chesapeake, "Don't give up the ship!"
1862 General Robert E. Lee assumes command of the Confederate army outside Richmond after General Joe Johnston is injured at Seven Pines.
1864 The Battle of Cold Harbor, Virginia, begins as Confederate general Robert E. Lee tries to turn Union general Ulysses S. Grant's flank.
1868 James Buchanan, the 15th president of the United States, dies.
1877 U.S. troops are authorized to pursue bandits into Mexico.
1915 Germany conducts the first zeppelin air raid over England.
1916 The National Defense Act increases the strength of the U.S. National Guard by 450,000 men.
1921 A race riot erupts in Tulsa, Oklahoma, killing 85 people.
1939 The Douglas DC-4 makes its first passenger flight from Chicago to New York.
1941 The German Army completes the capture of Crete as the Allied evacuation ends.
1942 America begins sending Lend-Lease materials to the Soviet Union.
1958 Charles de Gaulle becomes premier of France.
1963 Governor George Wallace vows to defy an injunction ordering integration of the University of Alabama.
1978 The U.S. reports finding wiretaps in the American embassy in Moscow.


Born on June 1
1563 Robert Cecil, Earl of Salisbury.
1801 Brigham Young, American religious leader.
1814 Philip Kearney, Union general.
1831 John B. Hood, Confederate general.
1878 John Masefield, English poet.
1898 Molly Picon, comic actress and singer.
1901 John van Druten, English playwright (I am a Camera).
1926 Marilyn Monroe (born Norma Jean Mortenson, later Norma Jean Baker), film actress and icon.
1932 Christopher Lasch, American social critic and writer.


Disaster
1965
Coal mine explosion kills 236 in Japan

A coal mine explosion kills 236 workers at the Yamano mine near Fukuoka, Japan, on this day in 1965. The tragic disaster might have been avoided if the operators of the mine had taken even the most basic safety precautions.

Only six years before, seven miners lost their lives and another 24 were seriously injured at the same mine. In that case, lapses in safety measures were cited as contributing to the deaths. Still, on June 1, 1965, 559 workers entered a mine that had no methanometers—used for maintaining safe levels of methane—nor any colorimetric detectors, which measure trace amounts of chemicals in the air, both of which are essential to coal-mine safety.

The sudden explosion, probably brought about by the ignition of a gas pocket, led to the collapse of many of the mine shafts and caused boulders to block the escape routes. Fortunately, some of the elevators were unaffected and 279 miners—37 of whom had sustained substantial injuries—were able to take them safely to the surface. The remaining 236 workers were left underground. For the next two days, thousands of relatives and friends waited outside the mine as the rescue effort got underway. But the wait was futile; no survivors were found.

Yoshio Sakarauchi, the trade and industries minister of Japan, resigned in the aftermath of the disaster.

[KAJUN]

Today in History
June 2

1537 Pope Paul III bans the enslavement of Indians in the New World.
1774 The Quartering Act, requiring American colonists to allow British soldiers into their houses, is reenacted.
1793 Maximilien Robespierre, a member of France’s Committee on Public Safety, initiates the “Reign of Terror.”
1818 The British army defeats the Maratha alliance in Bombay, India.
1859 French forces cross the Ticino River.
1865 At Galveston, Texas, Confederate general Edmund Kirby Smith surrenders the Trans-Mississippi Department to Union forces.
1883 The first baseball game under electric lights is played in Fort Wayne, Indiana.
1886 Grover Cleveland becomes the first American president to wed while in office.
1910 Charles Stewart Rolls, one of the founders of Rolls-Royce, becomes the first man to fly an airplane nonstop across the English Channel both ways. Tragically, he becomes Britain’s first aircraft fatality the following month when his biplane breaks up in midair.
1924 The United States grants full citizenship to American Indians.
1928 Nationalist Chiang Kai-shek captures Peking, China, in a bloodless takeover.
1942 The American aircraft carriers Enterprise, Hornet and Yorktown move into their battle positions for the Battle of Midway.
1944 Allied “shuttle bombing” of Germany begins, with bombers departing from Italy and landing in the Soviet Union.
1946 Italian citizens vote by referendum for a republic.
1948 Jamaican-born track star Herb McKenley sets a new world record for the 400 yard dash.
1953 Elizabeth II is crowned queen of England at Westminster Abbey.
1954 Senator Joseph McCarthy charges that there are communists working in the CIA and atomic weapons plants.
1969 The Australian aircraft carrier Melbourne slices the destroyer USS Frank E. Evans in half off the shore of South Vietnam.


Born on June 2
1731 Martha Dandridge, the first First Lady of the United States. Widow of Daniel Park Custis, she married George Washington in 1759.
1740 Donatien Alphonse Francois, the Marquis de Sade.
1840 Thomas Hardy, English poet and novelist (Far From the Madding Crowd, Tess of the D’Urbervilles).
1903 Robert Morris Page, physicist, inventor of pulse radar.
1904 Johnny Weissmuller, American gold-winning Olympic swimmer who portrayed Tarzan in films.
1913 Barbara Pym (Mary Crampton), English novelist (Less Than Angels, Quartet in Autumn).



Lead Story
1935
Babe Ruth retires

On this day in 1935, Babe Ruth, one of the greatest players in the history of baseball, ends his Major League playing career after 22 seasons, 10 World Series and 714 home runs. The following year, Ruth, a larger-than-life figure whose name became synonymous with baseball, was one of the first five players inducted into the sport’s hall of fame.

George Herman Ruth was born February 6, 1895, into a poor family in Baltimore. As a child, he was sent to St. Mary’s Industrial School for Boys, a school run by Roman Catholic brothers, where he learned to play baseball and was a standout athlete. At 19, Ruth was signed by the Baltimore Orioles, then a Boston Red Sox minor league team. Ruth’s fellow teammates and the media began referring to him as team owner Jack Dunn’s newest “babe,” a nickname that stuck. Ruth would later acquire other nicknames, including “The Sultan of Swat” and “The Bambino.”

Ruth made his Major League debut as a left-handed pitcher with the Red Sox in July 1914 and pitched 89 winning games for the team before 1920, when he was traded to the New York Yankees. After Ruth left Boston, in what became known as “the curse of the Bambino,” the Red Sox didn’t win another World Series until 2004. In New York, Ruth’s primary position changed to outfielder and he led the Yankees to seven American League pennants and four World Series victories. Ruth was a huge star in New York and attracted so many fans that the team was able to open a new stadium in 1923, Yankee Stadium, dubbed “The House That Ruth Built.”

The southpaw slugger’s final season, in 1935, was with the Boston Braves. He had joined the Braves with the hope that he’d become the team’s manager the next season. However, this dream never came to pass for a disappointed Ruth, who had a reputation for excessive drinking, gambling and womanizing.

Many of the records Ruth set remained in place for decades. His career homerun record stood until 1974, when it was broken by Hank Aaron. Ruth’s record of 60 homeruns in a single season (1927) of 154 games wasn’t bested until 1961, when Roger Maris knocked out 61 homers in an extended season of 162 games. The Sultan of Swat’s career slugging percentage of .690 remains the highest in Major League history.

Ruth died of throat cancer at age 53 on August 16, 1948, in New York City. His body lay in state at Yankee Stadium for two days and was visited by over 100,000 fans.

[Suzuki Johnny]

Today in History
June 3

1098 Christian Crusaders of the First Crusade seize Antioch, Turkey.
1539 Hernando De Soto claims Florida for Spain.
1861 Union troops defeat Confederate forces at Philippi, in western Virginia
1864 Some 7,000 Union troops are killed within 30 minutes during the Battle of Cold Harbor in Virginia.
1888 The classic baseball poem “Casey at the Bat,” written by Ernest L. Thayer, is published in the San Francisco Examiner.
1918 The Finnish Parliament ratifies a treaty with Germany.
1923 In Italy, dictator Benito Mussolini grants women the right to vote.
1928 Manchurian warlord Zhang Zuolin dies as a result of a bomb blast set off by the Japanese.
1938 The German Third Reich votes to confiscate so-called “degenerate art.”
1940 The German Luftwaffe hits Paris with 1,100 bombs.
1942 Japanese carrier-based planes strafe Dutch Harbor in the Aleutian Islands as a diversion of the attack on Midway Island.
1952 A rebellion by North Korean prisoners in the Koje prison camp in South Korea is put down by American troops.
1965 Astronaut Edward White becomes the first American to walk in space when he exits the Gemini 4 space capsule.
1969 74 American sailors die when the destroyer USS Frank E. Evans was cut in two by an Australian aircraft carrier in the South China Sea.
1974 Charles Colson, an aide to President Richard Nixon, pleads guilty to obstruction of justice.
1989 The Chinese government begins its crackdown on pro-democracy activists in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square. Hundreds are killed and thousands are arrested.


Born on June 3
1726 James Hutton, Scottish scientist, pioneer in the field of geology.
1804 Richard Cobden, English economist and politician.
1808 Jefferson Davis, President of Confederate States of America.
1904 Charles R. Drew, American physician, researcher of blood plasma.
1906 Josephine Baker, dancer and singer.
1922 Alain Resnais, French film director.
1926 Allen Ginsberg, American poet (Howl).
1936 Larry McMurtry, novelist (The Last Picture Show, Terms of Endearment).








Lead Story
1989
Crackdown at Tiananmen begins

With protests for democratic reforms entering their seventh week, the Chinese government authorizes its soldiers and tanks to reclaim Beijing’s Tiananmen Square at all costs. By nightfall on June 4, Chinese troops had forcibly cleared the square, killing hundreds and arresting thousands of demonstrators and suspected dissidents.

On April 15, the death of Hu Yaobang, a former Communist Party head who supported democratic reforms, roused some 100,000 students to gather at Beijing’s Tiananmen Square to commemorate the leader and voice their discontent with China’s authoritative government. On April 22, an official memorial service for Hu Yaobang was held in Tiananmen’s Great Hall of the People, and student representatives carried a petition to the steps of the Great Hall, demanding to meet with Premier Li Peng. The Chinese government refused the meeting, leading to a general boycott of Chinese universities across the country and widespread calls for democratic reforms.

Ignoring government warnings of suppression of any mass demonstration, students from more than 40 universities began a march to Tiananmen on April 27. The students were joined by workers, intellectuals, and civil servants, and by mid-May more than a million people filled the square, the site of Mao Zedong’s proclamation of the People’s Republic of China in 1949.

On May 20, the government formally declared martial law in Beijing, and troops and tanks were called in to disperse the dissidents. However, large numbers of students and citizens blocked the army’s advance, and by May 23 government forces had pulled back to the outskirts of Beijing. On June 3, with negotiations to end the protests stalled and calls for democratic reforms escalating, the troops received orders from the Chinese government to seize control of Tiananmen Square and the streets of Beijing. Hundreds were killed and thousands arrested.

In the weeks after the government crackdown, an unknown number of dissidents were executed, and hard-liners in the government took firm control of the country. The international community was outraged by the incident, and economic sanctions imposed by the United States and other countries sent China’s economy into decline. By late 1990, however, international trade had resumed, thanks in part to China’s release of several hundred imprisoned dissidents.

[Suzuki Johnny]

Today in History
June 4

1615 The fortress at Osaka, Japan, falls to Shogun Leyasu after a six-month siege.
1647 Parliamentary forces capture King Charles I and hold him prisoner.
1717 The Freemasons are founded in London.
1792 Captain George Vancouver claims Puget Sound for Britain.
1794 British troops capture Port-au-Prince, Haiti.
1805 Tripoli is forced to conclude peace with the United States after a conflict over tribute.
1859 The French army, under Napoleon III, takes Magenta from the Austrian army.
1864 Confederates under General Joseph Johnston retreat to the mountains in Georgia.
1911 Gold is discovered in Alaska’s Indian Creek.
1918 French and American troops halt Germany’s offensive at Chateau-Thierry, France.
1919 The U.S. Senate passes the Women’s Suffrage bill.
1940 The British complete the evacuation of 300,000 troops at Dunkirk.
1943 In Argentina, Juan Peron takes part in the military coup that overthrows Ramon S. Castillo.
1944 The U-505 becomes the first enemy submarine captured by the U.S. Navy.
1944 Allied troops liberate Rome.
1946 Juan Peron is installed as Argentina’s president.
1953 North Korea accepts the United Nations proposals in all major respects.
1960 The Taiwan island of Quemoy is hit by 500 artillery shells fired from the coast of Communist China.
1972 Black activist Angela Davis is found not guilty of murder, kidnapping, and criminal conspiracy.


Born on June 4
1738 George III, English king (1760-1820).
1843 Charles C. Abbott, American naturalist (Days Out of Doors).
1889 Beno Gutenberg, seismologist.
1895 Dino Conte Grandi, Italy’s delegate to theLeague of Nations.
1904 Alvah Bessie, screenwriter and novelist.
1937 Robert Fulghum, American author (All I Really Need to Know I learned in Kindergarten).
1945 Anthony Braxton, jazz composer and saxaphonist.
1966 Vladimir Voevodsky, Russian mathematician.


Of all the major battles of WW II..this naval engagement turned the tide in favor of America, denying the Japanese complete control of the pacific ocean......There were many quirks to this sea battle....none more important than the electronic surveillance of the Japanese radio signals intercepted by the intelligence force located at Pearl Harbor...Check out the meaning of the term "AF"..

Lead Story
1942
Battle of Midway begins

On this day in 1942, the Battle of Midway–one of the most decisive U.S. victories against Japan during World War II–begins. During the four-day sea-and-air battle, the outnumbered U.S. Pacific Fleet succeeded in destroying four Japanese aircraft carriers while losing only one of its own, the Yorktown, to the previously invincible Japanese navy.

In six months of offensives prior to Midway, the Japanese had triumphed in lands throughout the Pacific, including Malaysia, Singapore, the Dutch East Indies, the Philippines and numerous island groups. The United States, however, was a growing threat, and Japanese Admiral Isoruku Yamamoto sought to destroy the U.S. Pacific Fleet before it was large enough to outmatch his own.

A thousand miles northwest of Honolulu, the strategic island of Midway became the focus of his scheme to smash U.S. resistance to Japan’s imperial designs. Yamamoto’s plan consisted of a feint toward Alaska followed by an invasion of Midway by a Japanese strike force. When the U.S. Pacific Fleet arrived at Midway to respond to the invasion, it would be destroyed by the superior Japanese fleet waiting unseen to the west. If successful, the plan would eliminate the U.S. Pacific Fleet and provide a forward outpost from which the Japanese could eliminate any future American threat in the Central Pacific. U.S. intelligence broke the Japanese naval code, however, and the Americans anticipated the surprise attack.

In the meantime, 200 miles to the northeast, two U.S. attack fleets caught the Japanese force entirely by surprise and destroyed three heavy Japanese carriers and one heavy cruiser. The only Japanese carrier that initially escaped destruction, the Hiryu, loosed all its aircraft against the American task force and managed to seriously damage the U.S. carrier Yorktown, forcing its abandonment. At about 5:00 p.m., dive-bombers from the U.S. carrier Enterprise returned the favor, mortally damaging the Hiryu. It was scuttled the next morning.

When the Battle of Midway ended, Japan had lost four carriers, a cruiser and 292 aircraft, and suffered an estimated 2,500 casualties. The U.S. lost the Yorktown, the destroyer USS Hammann, 145 aircraft and suffered approximately 300 casualties.

Japan’s losses hobbled its naval might–bringing Japanese and American sea power to approximate parity–and marked the turning point in the Pacific theater of World War II. In August 1942, the great U.S. counteroffensive began at Guadalcanal and did not cease until Japan’s surrender three years later.

[KAJUN]

Today in History
June 5

1099 Members of the First Crusade witness an eclipse of the moon and interpret it as a sign they will recapture Jerusalem.
1568 Ferdinand, the Duke of Alba, crushes the Calvinist insurrection in Ghent.
1595 Henry IV’s army defeats the Spanish at the Battle of Fontaine-Francaise.
1637 American settlers in New England massacre a Pequot Indian village.
1783 Joseph and Jacques Montgolfier make the first public balloon flight.
1794 The U.S. Congress prohibits citizens from serving in any foreign armed forces.
1827 Athens falls to Ottoman forces.
1851 Harriet Beecher Stowe publishes the first installment of Uncle Tom’s Cabin in The National Era.
1856 U.S. Army troops in the Four creeks region of California, head back to quarters, officially ending the Tule River War. Fighting, however, will continue for a few more years.
1863 The Confederate raider CSS Alabama captures the Talisman in the Mid-Atlantic.
1872 The Republican National Convention, the first major political party convention to include blacks, commences.
1880 Wild woman of the west Myra Maybelle Shirley marries Sam Starr even though records show she was already married to Bruce Younger.
1900 British troops under Lord Roberts seize Pretoria from the Boers.
1940 The German army begins its offensive in Southern France.
1944 The first B-29 bombing raid strikes the Japanese rail line in Bangkok, Thailand.
1947 Secretary of State George C. Marshall outlines “The Marshall Plan,” a program intended to assist European nations, including former enemies, to rebuild their economies.
1956 Premier Nikita Khrushchev denounces Josef Stalin to the Soviet Communist Party Congress.
1967 The Six-Day War between Israel and Egypt, Syria and Jordan begins.
1968 Sirhan Sirhan shoots Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy after Kennedy’s victory in the pivotal California primary election.
1973 Doris A. Davis becomes the first African-American woman to govern a city in a major metropolitan area when she is elected mayor of Compton, California.
2004 Former U.S. President Ronald Reagan dies at age 93. Reagan was the 40th president of the United States.


Born on June 5
1723 Adam Smith, Scottish philosopher and economist.
1878 Francisco “Pancho” Villa, Mexican revolutionary and guerrilla leader.
1883 John Maynard Keynes, economist.
1884 Dame Ivy Compton-Burnett, British author.
1898 Federico Garcia Lorca, Spanish poet and dramatist.
1915 Alfred Kazin, critic and editor (A Walker in the City).
1919 Richard Scarry, Children’s author and illustrator.
1926 David Wagoner, poet and novelist (The Escape Artist).
1932 Christy Brown, Irish novelist and poet (My Left Foot).
1939 Margaret Drabble, English novelist (The Millstone, The Realms of Gold).
1947 David Hare, British playwright and director (A Map of the World, Slag).
1949 Ken Follett, novelist (Eye of the Needle, On The Wings of Eagles).



Lead Story
1933
FDR takes United States off gold standard

On June 5, 1933, the United States went off the gold standard, a monetary system in which currency is backed by gold, when Congress enacted a joint resolution nullifying the right of creditors to demand payment in gold. The United States had been on a gold standard since 1879, except for an embargo on gold exports during World War I, but bank failures during the Great Depression of the 1930s frightened the public into hoarding gold, making the policy untenable.

Soon after taking office in March 1933, Roosevelt declared a nationwide bank moratorium in order to prevent a run on the banks by consumers lacking confidence in the economy. He also forbade banks to pay out gold or to export it. According to Keynesian economic theory, one of the best ways to fight off an economic downturn is to inflate the money supply. And increasing the amount of gold held by the Federal Reserve would in turn increase its power to inflate the money supply. Facing similar pressures, Britain had dropped the gold standard in 1931, and Roosevelt had taken note.

On April 5, 1933, Roosevelt ordered all gold coins and gold certificates in denominations of more than $100 turned in for other money. It required all persons to deliver all gold coin, gold bullion and gold certificates owned by them to the Federal Reserve by May 1 for the set price of $20.67 per ounce. By May 10, the government had taken in $300 million of gold coin and $470 million of gold certificates. Two months later, a joint resolution of Congress abrogated the gold clauses in many public and private obligations that required the debtor to repay the creditor in gold dollars of the same weight and fineness as those borrowed. In 1934, the government price of gold was increased to $35 per ounce, effectively increasing the gold on the Federal Reserve’s balance sheets by 69 percent. This increase in assets allowed the Federal Reserve to further inflate the money supply.

The government held the $35 per ounce price until August 15, 1971, when President Richard Nixon announced that the United States would no longer convert dollars to gold at a fixed value, thus completely abandoning the gold standard. In 1974, President Gerald Ford signed legislation that permitted Americans again to own gold bullion.

[KAJUN]

Today in History
June 6

1523 Gustav Vasa becomes king of Sweden.
1641 Spain loses Portugal.
1674 Sivaji crowns himself King of India.
1813 The United States invasion of Canada is halted at Stony Creek, Ontario.
1862 The city of Memphis surrenders to the Union navy after an intense naval engagement on the Mississippi River.
1865 Confederate raider William Quantrill dies from a wound received while escaping a Union patrol near Taylorsville, Kentucky.
1918 U.S. Marines enter combat at the Battle of Belleau Wood.
1924 The German Reichstag accepts the Dawes Plan, an American plan to help Germany pay off its war debts.
1930 Frozen foods are sold commercially for the first time.
1934 President Franklin Roosevelt signs the Securities Exchange Act, establishing the Securities and Exchange Commission.
1941 The U.S. government authorizes the seizure of foreign ships in U.S. ports.
1944 D-Day: Operation Overlord lands 400,000 Allied American, British, and Canadian troops on the beaches of Normandy in German-occupied France.
1961 Swiss psychiatrist Carl Gustav Jung, one of the founders of modern psychiatry, dies.
1966 African American James Meredith is shot and wounded while on a solo march in Mississippi to promote voter registration among blacks.
1982 Israel invades southern Lebanon.
1985 The body of Nazi war criminal Dr. Josef Mengele is located and exhumed near Sao Paolo, Brazil.


Born on June 6
1606 Pierre Corneille, French author.
1755 Nathan Hale, American revolutionary.
1756 John Trumbull, American painter.
1799 Alexander Pushkin, Russian writer (Boris Godunov, The Queen of Spades).
1868 Robert F. Scott, British explorer.
1872 Alexandra, the last Russian Czarina.
1875 Thomas Mann, German novelist and essayist, forced into exile by the Nazis.
1902 Jimmie Lunceford, bandleader.
1907 Bill Dickey, professional baseball player.
1925 Maxine Kumin, poet novelist and children’s author.
1934 Bill Moyers, American broadcast journalist, press secretary to President Lyndon Johnson.
1939 Marian Wright Edelman, first African-American woman to be admitted to the Mississippi Bar, founder of the Children’s Defense Fund.





Lead Story
1944
D-Day

Although the term D-Day is used routinely as military lingo for the day an operation or event will take place, for many it is also synonymous with June 6, 1944, the day the Allied powers crossed the English Channel and landed on the beaches of Normandy, France, beginning the liberation of Western Europe from Nazi control during World War II. Within three months, the northern part of France would be freed and the invasion force would be preparing to enter Germany, where they would meet up with Soviet forces moving in from the east.

With Hitler’s armies in control of most of mainland Europe, the Allies knew that a successful invasion of the continent was central to winning the war. Hitler knew this too, and was expecting an assault on northwestern Europe in the spring of 1944. He hoped to repel the Allies from the coast with a strong counterattack that would delay future invasion attempts, giving him time to throw the majority of his forces into defeating the Soviet Union in the east. Once that was accomplished, he believed an all-out victory would soon be his.

On the morning of June 5, 1944, U.S. General Dwight D. Eisenhower, the supreme commander of Allied forces in Europe gave the go-ahead for Operation Overlord, the largest amphibious military operation in history. On his orders, 6,000 landing craft, ships and other vessels carrying 176,000 troops began to leave England for the trip to France. That night, 822 aircraft filled with parachutists headed for drop zones in Normandy. An additional 13,000 aircraft were mobilized to provide air cover and support for the invasion.

By dawn on June 6, 18,000 parachutists were already on the ground; the land invasions began at 6:30 a.m. The British and Canadians overcame light opposition to capture Gold, Juno and Sword beaches; so did the Americans at Utah. The task was much tougher at Omaha beach, however, where 2,000 troops were lost and it was only through the tenacity and quick-wittedness of troops on the ground that the objective was achieved. By day’s end, 155,000 Allied troops–Americans, British and Canadians–had successfully stormed Normandy’s beaches.

For their part, the Germans suffered from confusion in the ranks and the absence of celebrated commander Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, who was away on leave. At first, Hitler, believing that the invasion was a feint designed to distract the Germans from a coming attack north of the Seine River, refused to release nearby divisions to join the counterattack and reinforcements had to be called from further afield, causing delays. He also hesitated in calling for armored divisions to help in the defense. In addition, the Germans were hampered by effective Allied air support, which took out many key bridges and forced the Germans to take long detours, as well as efficient Allied naval support, which helped protect advancing Allied troops.

Though it did not go off exactly as planned, as later claimed by British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery–for example, the Allies were able to land only fractions of the supplies and vehicles they had intended in France–D-Day was a decided success. By the end of June, the Allies had 850,000 men and 150,000 vehicles in Normandy and were poised to continue their march across Europe.

The heroism and bravery displayed by troops from the Allied countries on D-Day has served as inspiration for several films, most famously The Longest Day (1962) and Saving Private Ryan (1998). It was also depicted in the HBO mini-series Band of Brothers (2001).

[KAJUN]

Today in History
June 7

1498 Christopher Columbus leaves on his third voyage of exploration.
1546 The Peace of Ardes ends the war between France and England.
1654 Louis XIV is crowned king of France.
1712 The Pennsylvania Assembly bans the importation of slaves.
1767 Daniel Boone sights present-day Kentucky.
1775 The United Colonies change their name to the United States.
1863 Mexico City is captured by French troops.
1900 The Boxer rebels cut the rail links between Peking and Tientsin in China.
1903 Professor Pierre Curie reveals the discovery of Polonium.
1914 The first vessel passes through the Panama Canal.
1932 Over 7,000 war veterans march on Washington, D.C., demanding their bonus pay for service in World War I.
1942 The Japanese invade Attu and Kiska in the Aleutian Islands.
1968 In Operation Swift Saber, U.S. Marines sweep an area 10 miles northwest of Da Nang in South Vietnam.
1981 Israeli F-16 fighter-bombers destroy Iraq’s only nuclear reactor.
1994 The Organization of African Unity formally admits South Africa as its fifty-third member.


Born on June 7
1502 Gregory XIII, Roman Catholic pope.
1778 George Bryan “Beau” Brummell, English wit.
1848 Paul Gaugin, French post-impressionist painter.
1899 Elizabeth Bowen, British novelist and short story writer (The Death of the Heart).
1909 Virginia Apgar, American physician and medical researcher.
1909 Peter Rodino, U.S. congressman, chairman of the Watergate hearings.
1917 Gwendolyn Brooks, African-American poet.
1954 Louise Erdrich, American author.



>
Lead Story
1913
First successful ascent of Mt. McKinley

On this day in 1913, Hudson Stuck, an Alaskan missionary, leads the first successful ascent of Mt. McKinley, the highest point on the American continent at 20,320 feet.

Stuck, an accomplished amateur mountaineer, was born in London in 1863. After moving to the United States, in 1905 he became archdeacon of the Episcopal Church in Yukon, Alaska, where he was an admirer of Native Indian culture and traveled Alaska’s difficult terrain to preach to villagers and establish schools.

In March 1913, the adventure-seeking Stuck set out from Fairbanks for Mt. McKinley with three companions, Harry Karstens, co-leader of the expedition, Walter Harper, whose mother was a Native Indian, and Robert Tatum, a theology student. Their arduous journey was made more challenging by difficult weather and a fire at one of their camps, which destroyed food and supplies. However, the group persevered and on June 7, Harper, followed by the rest of the party, was the first person to set foot on McKinley’s south peak, considered the mountain’s true summit. (In 1910, a group of climbers had reached the lower north peak.)

Stuck referred to the mountain by its Athabascan Indian name, Denali, meaning “The High One.” In 1889, the mountain, over half of which is covered with permanent snowfields, was dubbed Densmores Peak, after a prospector named Frank Densmore. In 1896, it was renamed in honor of Senator William McKinley, who became president that year.

Mount McKinley National Park was established as a wildlife refuge in 1917. Harry Karstens served as the park’s first superintendent. In 1980, the park was expanded and renamed Denali National Park and Preserve. Encompassing 6 million acres, the park is larger than Massachusetts.

Hudson Stuck died in Alaska on October 10, 1920. Today, over 1,000 hopeful climbers attempt to scale Mt. McKinley each year, with about half of them successfully reaching their goal.

[SuzyRidr2]

This one from yesterday deserves to be singled out. Still the largest amphibious invasion in history. Still the greatest generation.

1944 D-Day: Operation Overlord lands 400,000 Allied American, British, and Canadian troops on the beaches of Normandy in German-occupied France.

[KAJUN]

Today in History
June 8

452 Attila the Hun invades Italy.
632 Muhammad, the founder of Islam and unifier of Arabia, dies.
793 The Vikings raid the Northumbrian coast of England.
1861 Tennessee votes to secede from the Union and join the Confederacy.
1862 The Army of the Potomac defeats Confederate forces at Battle of Cross Keys, Virginia.
1863 Residents of Vicksburg flee into caves as General Ulysses S. Grant‘s army begins shelling the town.
1866 Prussia annexes the region of Holstein.
1904 U.S. Marines land in Tangiers, Morocco, to protect U.S. citizens.
1908 King Edward VII of England visits Czar Nicholas II of Russia in an effort to improve relations between the two countries.
1915 William Jennings Bryan quits as Secretary of State under President Woodrow Wilson.
1953 The Supreme Court forbids segregated lunch counters in Washington, D.C.
1965 President Lyndon Johnson authorizes commanders in Vietnam to commit U.S. ground forces to combat.
1966 Gemini astronaut Gene Cernan attempts to become the first man to orbit the Earth untethered to a space capsule, but is unable to when he exhausts himself fitting into his rocket pack.
1967 Israeli airplanes attack the USS Liberty, a surveillance ship, in the Mediterranean, killing 34 Navy crewmen.
1968 James Earl Ray, the alleged assassin of Martin Luther King, Jr., is captured at the London Airport.
1969 President Richard Nixon meets with President Thieu of South Vietnam to tell him 25,000 U.S. troops will pull out by August.
1995 U.S. Air Force pilot Captain Scott O’Grady is rescued by U.S. Marines in Bosnia.


Born on June 8
1625 Giovanni Domenico Cassini, astronomer.
1724 John Smeaton, English engineer.
1810 Robert Schumann, German composer.
1813 David D. Porter, Union admiral during the American Civil War.
1867 Frank Lloyd Wright, influential American architect.
1916 Francis Crick, British scientist who co-discovered of the structure of DNA.
1918 Robert Preston, actor (The Music Man).
1925 Barbara Pierce Bush, First Lady to 41st President, George H. W. Bush.
1939 Herb Adderley, American football player.
1942 Andrew Weil, physician and author (Spontaneous Healing).
1947 Sara Paretsky, detective novelist.



Disaster
2001
Tropical Storm Allison wreaks havoc

On this day in 2001, Tropical Storm Allison hits Houston, Texas, for the second time in three days. Although Allison never even approached hurricane status, by the time it dissipated in New England a week later, it had killed about 50 people and caused $5 billion in damages.

Allison originated off the coast of Africa on May 21. For the next two weeks it moved across the Atlantic, into the Caribbean and then along the Mexican coast. By the morning of June 6, the storm had winds as high as 60 miles per hour as it hit the Texas coast at Galveston. It battered the region with rain, with Houston getting as much as eight inches. Allison was unusual in that it hovered over the region for several days.

Louisiana and southern Texas were inundated with rain. Baton Rouge received 18 inches over just a couple of days. Some portions of Texas racked up 36 inches by June 11. It was at this time that a weather system moving east from the Rocky Mountains collided with Allison and pushed it to the northeast. By the time Allison moved on, 22 people in Texas and Louisiana had lost their lives.

For the next week, Allison moved slowly up the Atlantic coast, continuing to dump rain in prodigious amounts. Florida attributed nine deaths to the storm as did North Carolina–all as a result of traffic accidents. In Virginia Beach, Virginia, a tree fell on a woman and killed her. Pennsylvania received up to 10 inches of rain and had serious flooding problems. The flood conditions caused a natural gas explosion in an apartment complex in Hatboro, Pennsylvania, killing six people.

Tropical Storm Allison proved that storms need not be particularly strong or fast-moving to be deadly and destructive.

[JFL Live]

1966 Gemini astronaut Gene Cernan attempts to become the first man to orbit the Earth untethered to a space capsule, but is unable to when he exhausts himself fitting into his rocket pack.

Gene Cernan's space walk and newtons 3rd law of motion

Gene Cerna was the last person to walk on the moon

[KAJUN]

Today in History
June 9

1064 Coimbra, Portugal falls to Ferdinand, king of Castile.
1534 Jacques Cartier sails into the mouth of the St. Lawrence River in Canada.
1790 Civil war breaks out in Martinique.
1861 Mary Ann “Mother” Bickerdyke begins working in Union hospitals.
1863 At the Battle of Brandy Station in Virginia, Union and Confederate cavalries clash in the largest cavalry battle of the Civil War.
1923 Bulgaria’s government is overthrown by the military.
1931 Robert H. Goddard patents a rocket-fueled aircraft design.
1942 The Japanese high command announces that “The Midway Occupation operations have been temporarily postponed.”
1945 Japanese Premier Kantaro Suzuki declares that Japan will fight to the last rather than accept unconditional surrender.
1951 After several unsuccessful attacks on French colonial troops, North Vietnam’s General Vo Nguyen Giap orders Viet Minh to withdraw from the Red River Delta.
1954 At the Army-McCarthy hearings, attorney Joseph Welch asks Senator Joseph McCarthy “Have you no sense of decency?”
1959 The first ballistic missile-carrying submarine, the USS George Washington, is launched.
1972 American advisor John Paul Vann is killed in a helicopter accident in Vietnam.
1986 NASA publishes a report on the Challenger accident.


Born on June 9
1640 Leopold I, Holy Roman Emperor.
1672 Peter I, Russian Czar (1682-1725).
1781 George Stephenson, English engineer, built the first public inter-city railway line in the world to use steam locomotives.
1791 John Howard Payne, American playwright and actor.
1865 Carl Nielsen, Danish composer.
1877 Meta Vaux Warrick, sculptor.
1891 Cole Porter, American composer and lyricist.
1901 George Price, cartoonist.
1915 Les Paul, American guitarist and electric guitar innovator.
1916 Robert S. McNamara, U.S. Secretary of Defense under presidents John Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson.



Lead Story
1973
Secretariat wins Triple Crown

With a spectacular victory at the Belmont Stakes, Secretariat becomes the first horse since Citation in 1948 to win America’s coveted Triple Crown–the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness, and the Belmont Stakes. In one of the finest performances in racing history, Secretariat, ridden by Ron Turcotte, completed the 1.5-mile race in 2 minutes and 24 seconds, a dirt-track record for that distance.

Secretariat was born at Meadow Stables in Doswell, Virginia, on March 30, 1970. He was sired by Bold Ruler, the 1957 Preakness winner, and foaled by Somethingroyal, which came from a Thoroughbred line known for its stamina. An attractive chestnut colt, he grew to over 16 hands high and was at two years the size of a three-year-old. He ran his first race as a two-year-old on July 4, 1972, a 5 1/2-furlong race at Aqueduct in New York City. He came from behind to finish fourth; it was the only time in his career that he finished a race and did not place. Eleven days later, he won a six-furlong race at Saratoga in Saratoga Springs, New York, and soon after, another race. His trainer, Lucien Laurin, moved him up to class in August, entering him in the Sanford Stakes at Saratoga, which he won by three lengths. By the end of 1972, he had won seven of nine races.

With easy victories in his first two starts of 1973, Secretariat seemed on his way to the Triple Crown. Just two weeks before the Kentucky Derby, however, he stumbled at the Wood Memorial Stakes at Aqueduct, coming in third behind Angle Light and Sham. On May 5, he met Sham and Angle Light again at the Churchill Downs track in Louisville for the Kentucky Derby. Secretariat, a 3-to-2 favorite, broke from near the back of the pack to win the 2 1/4-mile race in a record 1 minute and 59 seconds. He was the first to run the Derby in less than two minutes and his record still stands. Two weeks later, at Pimlico Race Course in Baltimore, Maryland, Secretariat won the second event of the Triple Crown: the Preakness Stakes. The official clock malfunctioned, but hand-recorded timers had him running the 1 1/16-mile race in record time.

On June 9, 1973, almost 100,000 people came to Belmont Park near New York City to see if “Big Red” would become the first horse in 25 years to win the Triple Crown. Secretariat gave the finest performance of his career in the Belmont Stakes, completing the 1.5-mile race in a record 2 minutes and 24 seconds, knocking nearly three seconds off the track record set by Gallant Man in 1957. He also won by a record 31 lengths. Ron Turcotte, who jockeyed Secretariat in all but three of his races, claimed that at Belmont he lost control of Secretariat and that the horse sprinted into history on his own accord.

Secretariat would race six more times, winning four and finishing second twice. In November 1973, the “horse of the century” was retired and put to stud at Claiborne Farm in Paris, Kentucky. Among his notable offspring is the 1988 Preakness and Belmont winner, Risen Star. Secretariat was euthanized in 1989 after falling ill. An autopsy showed that his heart was two and a half times larger than that of the average horse, which may have contributed to his extraordinary racing abilities. In 1999, ESPN ranked Secretariat No. 35 in its list of the Top 50 North American athletes of the 20th century, the only non-human on the list.

[KAJUN]

Today in History
June 10

1190 Frederick Barbarossa drowns in a river while leading an army of the Third Crusade.
1692 Bridget Bishop is hanged in Salem, Mass., for witchcraft.
1776 The Continental Congress appoints a committee to write a Declaration of Independence.
1801 Tripoli declares war on the U.S. for refusing to pay tribute.
1854 The U.S. Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland, holds its first graduation.
1861 Dorothea Dix is appointed superintendent of female nurses for the Union army.
1864 At the Battle of Brice’s Crossroads in Mississippi, Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest defeats the numerically superior Union troops.
1898 U.S. Marines land in Cuba.
1905 Japan and Russia agree to peace talks brokered by President Theodore Roosevelt.
1909 An SOS signal is transmitted for the first time in an emergency when the Cunard liner SS Slavonia is wrecked off the Azores.
1916 Mecca, under control of the Turks, falls to the Arabs during the Great Arab Revolt.
1920 The Republican convention in Chicago endorses women’s suffrage.
1924 The Italian socialist leader Giacomo Matteotti is kidnapped and assassinated by Fascists in Rome.
1925 Tennessee adopts a new biology text book denying the theory of evolution.
1940 The Norwegian army capitulates to the Germans.
1942 Germany razes the town of Lidice, Czechoslovakia and kills more than 1,300 citizens in retribution of the murder of Reinhard Heydrich.
1943 The Allies begin bombing Germany around the clock.
1944 The U.S. VII and V corps, advancing from Normandy’s beaches, link up and begin moving inland.
1948 The news that the sound barrier has been broken is finally released to the public by the U.S. Air Force. Chuck Yeager, piloting the rocket airplane X-1, exceeded the speed of sound on October 14, 1947.
1963 Buddhist monk Ngo Quang Duc dies by self immolation in Saigon to protest persecution by the Diem government.
1970 A 15-man group of special forces troops begin training for Operation Kingpin, a POW rescue mission in North Vietnam.
1985 The Israeli army pulls out of Lebanon after 1,099 days of occupation.
1999 Serb forces begin their withdrawal from Kosovo after signing an agreement with the NATO powers.orn on June 10
1735 John Morgan, physician-in-chief of the American Continental Army.
1895 Hattie McDaniel, African-American actress.
1901 Frederick Loewe, songwriter.
1915 Saul Bellow, American novelist (Herzog, Humboldt’s Gift).
1922 Judy Garland (Frances Ethel Gumm), American actress and singer (The Wizard of Oz, Easter Parade).
1925 Nat Hentoff, journalist.
1928 Maurice Sendak, children’s author and illustrator (Where the Wild Things Are).
1933 F. Lee Bailey, American defense attorney.


American Revolution
1775
John Adams proposes a Continental Army

On this day in 1775, John Adams proposes to Congress, meeting in Philadelphia, that the men laying siege to Boston should be considered a Continental Army led by a general.

The men who had armed themselves and rushed to surround British forces in Boston following the Battle of Lexington and Concord were overwhelmingly from New England. However, John Adams, representing Massachusetts, realized that the military effort would only succeed if the British thought the colonies were united. To this end, Adams suggested the appointment of a Virginian, George Washington, to command the Continental forces, despite the fact that New Englanders were used to fighting in local militias under officers elected from among their own ranks.

On June 15, Adams formally nominated George Washington as commander in chief of the Continental Army; Washington accepted the post the next day. On June 17, the newly named army fought the Battle of Bunker Hill, as John Adam’s wife, Abigail, and son, John Quincy, watched from their hometown of Braintree.

Just as the British had discovered the difficulties of waging war with obstreperous Yankees for soldiers during the Seven Years’ War, Washington, the Virginia planter-cum-soldier, was unimpressed upon meeting his supposed army. Just as the British had, he saw “stupidity” among the enlisted men, who were used to the easy familiarity of being commanded by neighbors. Washington promptly insisted that the officers behave with decorum and the enlisted men with deference. Although he enjoyed some success with this original army, the New Englanders went home to their farms at the end of 1775, and General Washington had to start fresh with new recruits in 1776.

[KAJUN]

Today in History

June 11

1346 Charles IV of Luxembourg is elected Holy Roman Emperor.
1509 Henry VIII of England marries Catherine of Aragon.
1770 Captain James Cook runs aground on the Great Barrier Reef.
1798 Napoleon Bonaparte takes the island of Malta.
1861 Union forces under General George B. McClellan repulse a Confederate force at Rich Mountain in western Virginia.
1865 Major General Henry W. Halleck finds documents and archives of the Confederate government in Richmond, Virginia. This discovery will lead to the publication of the official war records.
1895 Charles E. Duryea receives the first U.S. patent granted to an American inventor for a gasoline-driven automobile.
1903 King Alexander and Queen Draga of Belgrade are assassinated by members of the Serbia army.
1915 British troops take Cameroon in Africa.
1927 Charles Lindbergh, a captain in the US Army Air Corps Reserve, receives the first Distinguished Flying Cross ever awarded, for his solo trans-Atlantic flight.
1930 William Beebe, of the New York Zoological Society, dives to a record-setting depth of 1,426 feet off the coast of Bermuda, in a diving chamber called a bathysphere.
1934 The Disarmament Conference in Geneva ends in failure.
1940 The Italian Air Force bombs the British fortress at Malta in the Mediterranean.
1943 The Italian island of Pantelleria surrenders after a heavy air bombardment.
1944 U.S. carrier-based planes attack Japanese airfields on Guam , Rota, Saipan and Tinian islands, preparing for the invasion of Saipan.
1963 Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. is arrested in Florida for trying to integrate restaurants.
1967 Israel and Syria accept a U. N. cease-fire.
1987 Margaret Thatcher wins her third consecutive term as Prime Minister.


Born on June 11
1572 Ben Jonson, English playwright and poet.
1769 Anne Newport Royall, American newspaper reporter.
1823 James L. Kemper, Confederate general during the American Civil War.
1880 Jeannette Rankin, U.S. Representative from Montana, the first woman in Congress.
1888 Bartolomeo Vanzetti, anarchist, executed with Nicola Sacco.
1895 Nikolai A. Bulganin, premier of the Soviet Union from 1955 to 1958.
1910 Jacques-Yves Cousteau, French oceanic explorer, filmmaker, author and inventor of the aqualung.
1913 Vince Lombardi, American football coach.
1925 William Styron, American novelist (The Confessions of Nat Turner, Sophie’s Choice).
1932 Athol Fugard, South African playwright, director and actor (The Blood Knot, “Master Harold” . . . and the Boys).










Lead Story
1979
John Wayne dies

On this day in 1979, John Wayne, an iconic American film actor famous for starring in countless westerns, dies at age 72 after battling cancer for more than a decade.

The actor was born Marion Morrison on May 26, 1907, in Winterset, Iowa, and moved as a child to Glendale, California. A football star at Glendale High School, he attended the University of Southern California on a scholarship but dropped out after two years. After finding work as a movie studio laborer, Wayne befriended director John Ford, then a rising talent. His first acting jobs were bit parts in which he was credited as Duke Morrison, a childhood nickname derived from the name of his beloved pet dog.
Wayne’s first starring role came in 1930 with The Big Trail, a film directed by his college buddy Raoul Walsh. It was during this time that Marion Morrison became “John Wayne,” when director Walsh didn’t think Marion was a good name for an actor playing a tough western hero. Despite the lead actor’s new name, however, the movie flopped. Throughout the 1930s, Wayne made dozens of mediocre westerns, sometimes churning out two movies a week. In them, he played various rough-and-tumble characters and occasionally appeared as “Singing Sandy,” a musical cowpoke a la Roy Rogers.
In 1939, Wayne finally had his breakthrough when his old friend John Ford cast him as Ringo Kid in the Oscar-winning Stagecoach. Wayne went on to play larger-than-life heroes in dozens of movies and came to symbolize a type of rugged, strong, straight-shooting American man. John Ford directed Wayne in some of his best-known films, including Fort Apache (1948), She Wore a Yellow Ribbon (1949), Rio Grande (1950), The Quiet Man (1952) and The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence (1962).
Off-screen, Wayne came to be known for his conservative political views. He produced, directed and starred in The Alamo (1960) and The Green Berets (1968), both of which reflected his patriotic, conservative leanings. In 1969, he won an Oscar for his role as a drunken, one-eyed federal marshal named Rooster Cogburn in True Grit. Wayne’s last film was The Shootist (1976), in which he played a legendary gunslinger dying of cancer. The role had particular meaning, as the actor was fighting the disease in real life.

During four decades of acting, Wayne, with his trademark drawl and good looks, appeared in over 250 films. He was married three times and had seven children.

[KAJUN]

Today in History
June 12

1442 Alfonso V of Aragon is crowned King of Naples.
1812 Napoleon Bonaparte and his army invade Russia.
1849 The gas mask is patented by Lewis P. Haslett.
1862 Confederate General J. E. B. Stuart begins his ride around the Union Army outside of Richmond, Virginia.
1901 Cuba agrees to become an American protectorate by accepting the Platt Amendment.
1918 The first airplane bombing raid by an American unit occurs in France.
1920 Republicans nominate Warren G. Harding for president and Calvin Coolidge for vice president.
1921 President Warren Harding urges every young man to attend military training camp.
1926 Brazil quits the League of Nations in protest over plans to admit Germany.
1931 Gangster Al Capone and 68 of his henchmen are indicted for violating Prohibition laws.
1937 Eight of Stalin’s generals are sentenced to death during purges in the Soviet Union.
1942 American bombers strike the oil refineries of Ploesti, Romania for the first time.
1963 Black civil rights leader Medgar Evers is assassinated by a gunman outside his home in Jackson, Mississippi.
1967 The Supreme Court rules that states cannot ban interracial marriages.
1972 At a hearing in front the of a U.S. House of Representatives committee, Air Force General John Lavalle defends his orders on engagement in Vietnam.
1977 David Berkowitz gets 25 years to life for the Son of Sam murders in New York.
1985 The U.S. House of Representatives approves $27 million in aid to the Nicaraguan Contras.
1991 Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines begins erupting for the first time in 600 years.


Born on June 12
1806 John Roebling, civil engineer, pioneer in designing suspension bridges.
1829 Johanna Spyri, Swiss author (Heidi).
1897 Anthony Eden, British Prime Minister (1955-1957).
1915 David Rockefeller, international banker.
1924 George H. W. Bush, 41st President of the United States (1989-1993).
1929 Anne Frank, German diarist, victim of the Holocaust.


World War II
1940
Paris on the verge of invasion

On this day in 1940, 54,000 British and French troops surrender to German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel at St. Valery-en-Caux, on the northern Channel border, as the Germans continue their gains in France.

Even after the evacuation of Dunkirk by the British Expeditionary Force, tens of thousands of British and Allied troops remained in France. Overwhelmed by the German invaders, over 3,000 Allied troops attempted to escape by sea but were stopped by German artillery fire. Surrender was the order of the day; among those taken prisoner were 12 Allied generals.

But all was not lost, as Britain refused to leave France to German occupation. Prime Minister Winston Churchill had already ordered more British troops back into France, and British bombers were also attacking German lines of communication. British and Allied troops were still active in other parts of France-some 50 British fighters and 70 bombers were moving on German forces.

But despite the British reinforcements and encouragement (Churchill flew to France himself to encourage the French leaders), General Maxime Weygand ordered the French military governor of Paris to ensure that the French capital remained an open city-that is, there was to be no armed resistance to the Germans. In short, he was pushing for an armistice, in effect, capitulation. The enemy would be allowed to pass through unchallenged. Weygand addressed his cabinet with his assessment of the situation: “A cessation of hostilities is compulsory.” He bitterly blamed Britain for France’s defeat, unwilling to take responsibility for his own inept strategies and failed offensives. Paris was poised for occupation.

[KAJUN]

Today in History
June 13

1777 The Marquis de Lafayette arrives in the American colonies to help in their rebellion against Britain.
1800 The French Army of First Consul Napoleon Bonaparte defeats Austrian forces at the Battle of Marengo in Northern Italy and reconquers Italy. [From MHQ—The Quarterly Journal of Military History]
1863 Confederate forces on their way to Gettysburg clash with Union troops at the Second Battle of Winchester, Virginia.
1920 The U.S. Post Office Department rules that children may not be sent by parcel post.
1923 The French set a trade barrier between occupied Ruhr and the rest of Germany.
1940 Paris is evacuated as the Germans advance on the city.
1943 German spies land on Long Island, New York, and are soon captured.
1944 The first German V-1 buzz-bomb hits London.
1949 Installed by the French, Bao Dai enters Saigon to rule Vietnam.
1971 The New York Times begins publishing the Pentagon Papers.
1978 Israelis withdraw the last of their invading forces from Lebanon.
1979 Sioux Indians are awarded $105 million in compensation for the 1877 U.S. seizure of the Black Hills in South Dakota.
1983 Pioneer 10, already in space for 11 years, leaves the solar system.


Born on June 13
40 Gnaeus Julius Agricola, Roman general.
1752 Fanny Burney, English writer.
1786 Winfield Scott, U.S. Army general.
1831 James C. Maxwell, scientist.
1865 William Butler Yeats, Irish poet and dramatist.
1893 Dorothy Leigh Sayers, English detective writer, creator of Lord Peter Wimsey.
1894 Mark Van Doren, American poet, writer and educator.
1903 Harold “Red” Grange, American football player.




Lead Story
1966
The Miranda rights are established

On this day in 1966, the Supreme Court hands down its decision in Miranda v. Arizona, establishing the principle that all criminal suspects must be advised of their rights before interrogation. Now considered standard police procedure, “You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can, and will, be used against you in court of law. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford one, one will be appointed to you,” has been heard so many times in television and film dramas that it has become almost cliche.

The roots of the Miranda decision go back to March 2, 1963, when an 18-year-old Phoenix woman told police that she had been abducted, driven to the desert and raped. Detectives questioning her story gave her a polygraph test, but the results were inconclusive. However, tracking the license plate number of a car that resembled that of her attacker’s brought police to Ernesto Miranda, who had a prior record as a peeping tom. Although the victim did not identify Miranda in a line-up, he was brought into police custody and interrogated. What happened next is disputed, but officers left the interrogation with a confession that Miranda later recanted, unaware that he didn’t have to say anything at all.

The confession was extremely brief and differed in certain respects from the victim’s account of the crime. However, Miranda’s appointed defense attorney (who was paid a grand total of $100) didn’t call any witnesses at the ensuing trial, and Miranda was convicted. While Miranda was in Arizona state prison, the American Civil Liberties Union took up his appeal, claiming that the confession was false and coerced.

The Supreme Court overturned his conviction, but Miranda was retried and convicted in October 1966 anyway, despite the relative lack of evidence against him. Remaining in prison until 1972, Ernesto Miranda was later stabbed to death in the men’s room of a bar after a poker game in January 1976.

As a result of the case against Miranda, each and every person must now be informed of his or her rights when arrested.

[KAJUN]

Today in History
June 14

1381 The Peasants’ Revolt, led by Wat Tyler, climaxes when rebels plunder and burn the Tower of London and kill the Archbishop of Canterbury.
1642 Massachusetts passes the first compulsory education law in the colonies.
1645 Oliver Cromwell‘s army routs the king’s army at Naseby.
1775 The U.S. Army is founded when the Continental Congress authorizes the muster of troops.
1777 The Continental Congress authorizes the “stars and stripes” flag for the new United States.
1789 Captain William Bligh of the HMS Bounty arrives in Timor in a small boat. He had been forced to leave his ship when his crew mutinied.
1846 A group of settlers declare California to be a republic.
1864 At the Battle of Pine Mountain, Georgia, Confederate General Leonidas Polk is killed by a Union shell.
1893 The city of Philadelphia observes the first Flag Day.
1907 Women in Norway win the right to vote.
1919 John William Alcott and Arthur Whitten Brown take off from St. John’s, Newfoundland, for Clifden, Ireland, on the first nonstop transatlantic flight.
1922 President Warren G. Harding becomes the first president to speak on the radio.
1927 Nicaraguan President Porfirio Diaz signs a treaty with the U.S. allowing American intervention in his country.
1932 Representative Edward Eslick dies on the floor of the House of Representatives while pleading for the passage of the bonus bill.
1940 German forces occupy Paris.
1942 The Supreme Court rules that requiring students to salute the American flag is unconstitutional.
1944 Boeing B-29 bombers conduct their first raid against mainland Japan.
1945 Burma is liberated by the British.
1949 The State of Vietnam is formed.
1951 UNIVAC, the first computer built for commercial purposes, is demonstrated in Philadelphia by Dr. John W. Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert, Jr.
1954 Americans take part in the first nation-wide civil defense test against atomic attack.
1965 A military triumvirate takes control in Saigon, South Vietnam.
1982 Argentina surrenders to the United Kingdom ending the Falkland Islands War.
1985 Gunmen hijack a passenger jet over the Middle East.
1989 Congressman William Gray, an African American, is elected Democratic Whip of the House of Representatives.
1995 Chechen rebels take 2,000 people hostage in a hospital in Russia.


Born on June 14
1811 Harriet Beecher Stowe, American author (Uncle Tom’s Cabin).
1820 John Bartlett, editor, compiler of Barlett’s Familiar Quotations.
1855 Robert Marion “Fighting Bob” La Follette, reform movement leader, Governor of Wisconsin, U.S. Senator and Progressive Party presidential candidate.
1906 Margaret Bourke-White, American photojournalist.
1925 Pierre Salinger, press secretary for John F. Kennedy.
1933 Jerzy Kosinski, Polish-American novelist (The Painted Bird, Being There).
1946 Donald Trump, New York real estate mogul.


Thought for the day :
" No man's religion ever survives his morals. "

[JFL Live]

Today in History
June 14

1951 UNIVAC, the first computer built for commercial purposes, is demonstrated in Philadelphia by Dr. John W. Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert, Jr.

[KAJUN]

Today in History
June 15

1184 King Magnus of Norway is defeated by his rival, Sverre.
1215 King John signs the Magna Carta.
1381 The English peasant revolt is crushed in London.
1389 Ottoman Turks crush Serbia in the Battle of Kosovo.
1607 Colonists in North America complete James Fort in Jamestown.
1752 Benjamin Franklin and his son test the relationship between electricity and lightning by flying a kite in a thunder storm.
1775 George Washington is appointed commander-in-chief of the Continental Army. [From MHQ—The Quarterly Journal of Military History]
1779 American General Anthony Wayne captures Stony Point, New York.
1836 Arkansas is admitted into the Union as the 25th state.
1846 Great Britain and the United States agree on a joint occupation of Oregon Territory.
1849 James K. Polk, the 11th president of the United States, dies.
1862 General J.E.B. Stuart completes his “ride around McClellan.”
1864 The Battle for Petersburg begins.
1866 Prussia attacks Austria.
1877 Henry O. Flipper becomes the first African American to graduate from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point.
1898 The U.S. House of representatives approves the annexation of Hawaii.
1904 Fire aboard the paddle steamer General Slocum on New York’s East River kills 1,021, mostly German-Americans.
1916 President Woodrow Wilson signs a bill incorporating the Boy Scouts of America.
1917 Great Britain pledges the release of all Irish captured during the Easter Rebellion of 1916.
1920 Three African Americans are lynched in Duluth, Minnesota, by a white mob of 5,000.
1928 Republicans, convening in Kansas City, name Herbert Hoover their candidate for President.
1932 Gaston Means is sentenced to 15 years for fraud in the Lindbergh baby kidnapping.
1940 The French fortress of Verdun is captured by Germans.
1944 U.S. Marines begin the invasion of Saipan in the Pacific.
1947 The All India Congress accepts a British plan for the partition of India.
1958 Greece severs military ties to Turkey because of the Cyprus issue.
1964 The last French troops leave Algeria.
1977 The first general election in Spain since 1936 results in victory for the UCD (Union of Democratic Centre).


Born on June 15
1330 Edward the Black Prince, the eldest son of Edward III.
1767 Rachel Robards Jackson, first lady to President Andrew Jackson.
1843 Edvard Grieg, Norwegian composer.
1902 Erik H. Erikson, psychologist (Childhood and Society).
1914 Saul Steinberg, American cartoonist.
1922 Morris “Mo” Udall, U.S. Congressman.




Lead Story
1215
Magna Carta sealed

Following a revolt by the English nobility against his rule, King John puts his royal seal on the Magna Carta, or “Great Charter.” The document, essentially a peace treaty between John and his barons, guaranteed that the king would respect feudal rights and privileges, uphold the freedom of the church, and maintain the nation’s laws. Although more a reactionary than a progressive document in its day, the Magna Carta was seen as a cornerstone in the development of democratic England by later generations.

John was enthroned as king of England following the death of his brother, King Richard the Lion-Hearted, in 1199. King John’s reign was characterized by failure. He lost the duchy of Normandy to the French king and taxed the English nobility heavily to pay for his foreign misadventures. He quarreled with Pope Innocent III and sold church offices to build up the depleted royal coffers. Following the defeat of a campaign to regain Normandy in 1214, Stephen Langton, the archbishop of Canterbury, called on the disgruntled barons to demand a charter of liberties from the king.

In 1215, the barons rose up in rebellion against the king’s abuse of feudal law and custom. John, faced with a superior force, had no choice but to give in to their demands. Earlier kings of England had granted concessions to their feudal barons, but these charters were vaguely worded and issued voluntarily. The document drawn up for John in June 1215, however, forced the king to make specific guarantees of the rights and privileges of his barons and the freedom of the church. On June 15, 1215, John met the barons at Runnymede on the Thames and set his seal to the Articles of the Barons, which after minor revision was formally issued as the Magna Carta.

The charter consisted of a preamble and 63 clauses and dealt mainly with feudal concerns that had little impact outside 13th century England. However, the document was remarkable in that it implied there were laws the king was bound to observe, thus precluding any future claim to absolutism by the English monarch. Of greatest interest to later generations was clause 39, which stated that “no free man shall be arrested or imprisoned or disseised [dispossessed] or outlawed or exiled or in any way victimised…except by the lawful judgment of his peers or by the law of the land.” This clause has been celebrated as an early guarantee of trial by jury and of habeas corpus and inspired England’s Petition of Right (1628) and the Habeas Corpus Act (1679).

In immediate terms, the Magna Carta was a failure–civil war broke out the same year, and John ignored his obligations under the charter. Upon his death in 1216, however, the Magna Carta was reissued with some changes by his son, King Henry III, and then reissued again in 1217. That year, the rebellious barons were defeated by the king’s forces. In 1225, Henry III voluntarily reissued the Magna Carta a third time, and it formally entered English statute law.

The Magna Carta has been subject to a great deal of historical exaggeration; it did not establish Parliament, as some have claimed, nor more than vaguely allude to the liberal democratic ideals of later centuries. However, as a symbol of the sovereignty of the rule of law, it was of fundamental importance to the constitutional development of England. Four original copies of the Magna Carta of 1215 exist today: one in Lincoln Cathedral, one in Salisbury Cathedral, and two in the British Museum.

[KAJUN]

Today in History
June 14

1951 UNIVAC, the first computer built for commercial purposes, is demonstrated in Philadelphia by Dr. John W. Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert, Jr.

Big difference from today's micro chips...


1777
Congress adopts the Stars and Stripes

During the American Revolution, the Continental Congress adopts a resolution stating that “the flag of the United States be thirteen alternate stripes red and white” and that “the Union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing a new Constellation.” The national flag, which became known as the “Stars and Stripes,” was based on the “Grand Union” flag, a banner carried by the Continental Army in 1776 that also consisted of 13 red and white stripes. According to legend, Philadelphia seamstress Betsy Ross designed the new canton for the Stars and Stripes, which consisted of a circle of 13 stars and a blue background, at the request of General George Washington. Historians have been unable to conclusively prove or disprove this legend.

With the entrance of new states into the United States after independence, new stripes and stars were added to represent new additions to the Union. In 1818, however, Congress enacted a law stipulating that the 13 original stripes be restored and that only stars be added to represent new states.

On June 14, 1877, the first Flag Day observance was held on the 100th anniversary of the adoption of the Stars and Stripes. As instructed by Congress, the U.S. flag was flown from all public buildings across the country. In the years after the first Flag Day, several states continued to observe the anniversary, and in 1949 Congress officially designated June 14 as Flag Day, a national day of observance.

[Suzuki Johnny]

Today in History
June 16
455 Rome is sacked by the Vandal army.
1815 Napoleon defeats the Prussians at the Battle of Ligny.
1858 Abraham Lincoln, in accepting the Republican nomination for the U.S. Senate in Illinois, declares that, “A house divided against itself cannot stand.”
1864 The siege of Petersburg and Richmond begins after a moonlight skirmish.
1907 The Russian czar dissolves the Duma in St. Petersburg.
1910 The first Father’s Day is celebrated in Spokane, Washington.
1925 France accepts a German proposal for a security pact.
1932 The ban on Nazi storm troopers is lifted by the von Papen government in Germany.
1935 President Franklin Roosevelt‘s New Deal legislation is passed by the House of Representatives.
1940 French Chief of State, Henri Petain asks for an armistice with Germany.
1952 Anne Frank: Diary of a Young Girl is published in the United States.
1955 The U.S. House of Representatives votes to extend Selective Service until 1959.
1961 Ballet star Rudolf Nureyev defects from the Soviet Union while in Paris.
1971 An El Greco sketch, “The Immaculate Conception,” stolen in Spain 35 years earlier, is recovered in New York City by the FBI.
1977 Leonid Brezhnev is named president of the Soviet Union.


Born on June 16
1888 Bobby Clark, comedian and actor.
1890 Stan Laurel, British-born entertainer, partner of Oliver Hardy.
1902 Barbara McClintock, geneticist.
1902 George Gaylord Simpson, paleontologist.
1917 Katharine Graham, publisher of the Washington Post.
1917 Irving Penn, fashion photographer, brother of film director Arthur Penn.
1920 John Howard Griffin, writer (Black Like Me).
1935 Jim Dine, American artist.
1938 Torgny Lindgren, Swedish writer.
1938 Joyce Carol Oates, American writer and university professor (Them, Garden of Earthly Delights).

What Happened On This Day – June 16
2010 The world's first country-wide total tobacco ban goes into effect
Bhutan banned the cultivation, harvesting, production, and sale of tobacco and tobacco products. It is still legal in the South Asian country to smoke in a private setting, but obtaining tobacco products legally is close to impossible.
1976 South African police kill hundreds of protesting school children
An estimated 20,000 youth were protesting against the introduction of Afrikaans as the languages of instruction in their schools when police officers started firing into the crowd. The “Soweto uprising” is today commemorated on Youth Day each year.
1967 The Monterey Pop Festival opens
The three-day concert event featured historic performances by Jimi Hendrix, The Who, Ravi Shankar, and Janis Joplin.
1963 Valentina Tereshkova becomes the first woman in space
The Soviet cosmonaut completed 48 orbits on board the spaceship “Vostok 6” before returning safely to Earth. The former textile worker was declared “Hero of the Soviet Union” and received the United Nations Gold Medal of Peace.
1960 Alfred Hitchcock's film Psycho is premiered
The horror-thriller starring Anthony Perkins and Vera Miles has become one of the classics of the genre. The shower scene is one of the best-known murder scenes in the history of film.


Births On This Day – June 16
1912 Enoch Powell
British politician
1890 Stan Laurel
English actor, comedian
1882 Mohammad Mosaddegh
Iranian politician, 60th Prime Minister of Iran
1723 Adam Smith
Scottish philosopher, economist


Deaths On This Day – June 16
2014 Tony Gwynn
American baseball player, coach
1993 Lindsay Hassett
Australian cricketer
1977 Wernher von Braun
German physicist, engineer
1969 Harold Alexander, 1st Earl Alexander of Tunis
English field marshal, 17th Governor General of Canada
1722 John Churchill, 1st Duke of Marlborough
English general, politician