This Month in History, June

1184 BC	June 11	Trojan War: Troy falls to the Achaeans (Greeks).
323 BC	June 10	Died: Alexander the Great (born: 356 BC).
168 BC	June 22	Battle of Pydna: Romans under Lucius Aemilius Paullus defeat and capture Macedonian King Perseus, ending the Third Macedonian War
68 AD	June 9	The Roman Emperor Nero (Nero Claudius Caesar Augustus Germanicus) who had once played his lyre while Rome burned, commits suicide.
452	June 8	Attila the Hun invades Italy.
455	June 2	The Vandals enter Rome and plunder the city for two weeks. They depart with countless valuables, including spoils of the Temple in Jerusalem brought to Rome by Titus. They also take the Empress Eudoxia and her daughters Eudocia and Placidia.
570	June 8	Islam is founded in Makkah (Mecca).
632	June 8	Died: The prophet Mohammed (Muhammed)(Abu al-Qasim Muhammad Ibn Abd Allah Ibn Abd al-Muttalib Ibn Hashim). [Ibn meaning "son of"].
684	June 26	Benedict II becomes Pope.
823	June 13	Born: Charles the Bald, Holy Roman Emperor and king of the West Franks (died: 877).
1070	June 4	Roquefort cheese is created in a cave near Roquefort, France.
1098	June 3	A Christian army finally recaptures Antioch, Turkey, from Muslim occupiers. Islamic Crusaders had conquered the city in 636. (American historians love to twist this fact around by saying that "Christian Crusaders captured Antioch from Muslims." Go figure!)
1214	June 20	University of Oxford receives its charter.
1215	June 15	England's King John put his seal to a draft of Magna Carta ("the Great Charter") at Runnymede. (The draft, known as "Articles of the barons" was soon lost. Four days later, on June 19, John put his seal to Magna Carta, version 1.)
1239	June 17	Born: King Edward I of England (died: 1307).
1243	June 28	Innocent IV becomes pope.
1306	June 19	In the war for Scotland's independence, forces of Earl of Pembroke surprise and defeat Robert the Bruce's (Robert I) Scottish rebels at the Battle of Methven.
1314	June 24	Battle of Bannockburn: Scottish forces led by Robert the Bruce beat Edward II of England. Scotland regains its independence.
1389	June 28	Ottoman forces crush the Christian armies in Kosovo, opening the way for Islamic conquest of Southeastern Europe (see Vidovdan).
1441	June 24	Eton College was founded.
1483	June 26	Richard III becomes king of England.
1487	June 16	Battle of Stoke Field: dying breath of the Wars of the Roses.
1494	June 7	Spain and Portugal sign the Treaty of Tordesillas which divides the New World between the two countries.
1495	June 1	Friar John Cor records the first known batch of scotch whisky.
1497	June 24	John Cabot (Italian: Giovanni Caboto) lands on North America, either at Newfoundland or Cape Breton; first European discovery of the region since the Vikings. Cornish traitors Michael An Gof and Thomas Flamank executed at Tyburn, London.
1509	June 11	Henry, second son of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York, marries Katherine of Aragon.
	June 24	Henry, second son of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York, is coronated: King Henry VIII.
1519	June 28	Charles V elected emperor of the Holy Roman Empire.
1520	June 15	Pope Leo X threatened to excommunicate Martin Luther if he did not recant his religious views.
1534	June 9	Jacques Cartier becomes the first European to discover the St. Lawrence River.
1579	June 17	Sir Francis Drake claims California for England.
1586	June 16	Mary Queen of Scots recognizes Philip II of Spain as her heir.
	June 19	English colonists are rescued from Roanoke Island, N.C., after failing to establish England's first permanent settlement in America. (15 crew members were left behind and never heard of again, making them the FIRST Lost Colony.)
1606	June 15	Born: Rembrandt (Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn), artist.
1608	June 3	Samuel de Champlain completes his third voyage to New France at Tadoussac, Quebec.
1610	June 10	The first Dutch colonists settle on Manhattan Island.
1611	June 22	English explorer Henry Hudson, his son and several other people were set adrift in present-day Hudson Bay by mutineers.
1621	June 3	The Dutch West India Company receives a charter for New Netherlands.
1647	June 24	Margaret Brent, a niece of Lord Baltimore, was ejected from the Maryland Assembly after demanding a place and vote in that governing body.
1654	June 7	Louis XIV is crowned King of France.
1664	June 24	The colony of New Jersey is founded.
1672	June 9	Born: Peter the Great, Tsar of Russia (died: 1725).
1692	June 10	Salem witch trials: Bridget Bishop is hanged as a witch.
1709	June 27	Peter the Great defeats Charles XII of Sweden at the battle of Poltava.
1713	June 23	French residents of Acadia given one year to declare allegiance to Britain or leave Nova Scotia, Canada.
1732	June 9	James Oglethorpe is granted a royal charter for the colony of Georgia.
1738	June 4	Born: King George III of Great Britain: provoked the American colonies into a revolution (died in despair, 1820).
1741	June 5	Vitus Bering departs Kamchatka, Russia, to explore Alaska. The Bering Strait, the Bering Sea, Bering Island and the Bering Land Bridge bear the Russian explorer's name.
1746	June 16	War of Austrian Succession: Austria and Sardinia defeat a Franco-Spanish army at the Battle of Piacenza.
1752	June 5	Benjamin Franklin proves that lightning is electricity (kite + key + lightning).
1755	June 16	French and Indian War: French surrender Fort Beauséjour to the British, leading to the expulsion of the Acadians.
1759	June 27	General James Wolfe starts siege of Quebec.
1767	June 29	The British Parliament approved the Townshend Revenue Acts, which imposed import duties on certain goods shipped to America. Colonists bitterly protested the Acts, which were repealed in 1770.
1769	June 7	Frontiersman Daniel Boone first began to explore Kentucky.
1770	June 11	Captain James Cook runs aground on the Great Barrier Reef.
1774	June 1	American Revolutionary War: The government of Great Britain orders the port of Boston, Massachusetts closed.
1775	June 14	American Revolutionary War: The U.S. Army is established by the Continental Congress.
	June 15	American Revolutionary War: The Continental Congress voted unanimously to appoint George Washington head of the newly authorized Continental Army.
	June 17	American Revolutionary War: The Battle of Bunker Hill is fought. (Most of the battle took place on nearby Breed's Hill.)
1776	June 7	Richard Henry Lee of Virginia presents the "Lee Resolution" to the Continental Congress calling for a U.S. Declaration of Independence. U.S. invaders skirmish with British forces at Trois-Rivieres, Quebec.
	June 11	The Continental Congress formed a committee to draft a Declaration of Independence from Britain.
	June 12	Virginia's colonial legislature became the first to adopt a Bill of Rights.
	June 29	The Virginia state constitution was adopted, and Patrick Henry selected as governor.
1777	June 13	American Revolutionary War: Marquis de Lafayette lands near Charleston, South Carolina in order to help the Continental Congress to train its army.
	June 14	Stars and Stripes adopted by Congress as the Flag of the U.S.
1778	June 18	American Revolutionary War: British troops abandon Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
	June 28	Molly Pitcher (Mary Ludwig Hays) carried water to American soldiers at the Revolutionary War Battle of Monmouth, N.J.
1779	June 1	American Revolutionary War: Benedict Arnold is court-martialed for malfeasance in his treatment of government property.
	June 16	Spain declares war on Britain and the siege of Gibraltar begins.
1783	June 5	The Montgolfier brothers publicly demonstrate their "montgolfire" (hot air balloon).
	June 8	The volcano Laki, in Iceland, begins an eight-month eruption which kills over 9,000 people and starts a seven-year famine.
1788	June 21	New Hampshire ratifies the Constitution and becomes the 9th state of the Union. (In fact, this created the Union as only nine states were required to establish the United States.)
	June 25	Virginia ratifies the Constitution and becomes the 10th state of the Union.
1789	June 14	Mutiny on the Bounty: HMS Bounty mutiny survivors including Captain William Bligh and 18 others reach Timor after a nearly 4,000 mile journey in an open boat.
	June 15	Marquis de la Fayette, by acclamation, named colonel-general of the new National Guard of Paris.
1792	June 1	Kentucky becomes the 15th state in the United States.
	June 4	Captain George Vancouver claims Puget Sound for Great Britain.
1794	June 5	Congress passed a Neutrality Act, which prohibited Americans from enlisting in the service of a foreign power. Born: Sylvester Graham, inventor of Graham crackers.
1796	June 1	Tennessee becomes the 16th state in the United States.
1799	June 15	In the Egyptian village of Rosette, French Captain Pierre Bouchard finds the Rosetta Stone.
1800	June 2	First smallpox vaccination in North America: Trinity, Newfoundland.
	June 3	President John Adams takes up residence in Washington, D.C. (in a tavern -- the White House was not yet completed).
1801	June 1	Mormon leader Brigham Young was born in Whitingham, Vt.
	June 10	The north African state of Tripoli declared war on the U.S. in a dispute over safe passage of merchant vessels through the Mediterranean.
1806	June 15	Pike expedition: Near St. Louis, Missouri, U.S. Army Lieutenant Zebulon Pike begins an expedition from Fort Belle Fountaine to explore the west.
1808	June 3	Born: Jefferson Davis, President of the Confederate States of America (died: 1889).
1812	June 1	War of 1812: President James Madison asks the U.S. Congress to declare war on the United Kingdom.
	June 4	The Louisiana Territory is renamed the Mississippi Territory.
	June 18	Congress grants Madison's request and declares war on the U.K. and Ireland.
	June 23	Napoleonic Wars: Napoleon's invasion of Russia begins.
1813	June 1	The commander of the frigate U.S.S. Chesapeake, Captain James Lawrence, said, "Don't give up the ship" during a losing battle with the British frigate, H.M.S. Shannon.
	June 21	War of 1812: Canadian heroine Laura Secord sets out to warn British forces of impending American attack at Queenston, Ontario.
1815	June 15	Napoléon Bonaparte surrenders from aboard HMS Bellerophon.
	June 18	Napoleonic Wars: Battle of Waterloo leads to Napoleon Bonaparte abdicating the throne of France for a second time.
1822	June 14	Charles Babbage proposes a Difference engine in a paper to the Royal Astronomical Society entitled "Note on the application of machinery to the computation of astronomical and mathematical tables."
1825	June 22	The British Parliament abolishes feudalism and the seigneurial system in British North America.
1829	June 16	Born: Geronimo, leader of the Apache nation (died: 1909).
1831	June 1	James Clark Ross discovers the position of the North Magnetic Pole on the Boothia Peninsula.
1833	June 5	Ada Lovelace meets Charles Babbage. (Was she REALLY the first computer programmer?)
1834	June 21	Cyrus Hall McCormick received a patent for his reaping machine (invented in 1831).
1836	June 15	Arkansas became the 25th state of the Union.
	June 28	Died: James Madison, Founding Father and 4th U.S. president.
1837	June 20	Queen Victoria ascends to the throne and rules for the next 63 years, the longest reign in British history. (However, Elizabeth II, born in 1926 and ruling since 1952, could break Victoria's record by surviving to age 89 in 2015.)
1840	June 1	Samuel Cunard completes passage of a 700 ton wooden paddlewheel steamer from Liverpool, England to Halifax, Nova Scotia.
1844	June 27	Joseph Smith, Jr., founder of Mormonism, was murdered with his brother Hyrum in the Carthage jail, Carthage, Illinois.
1846	June 10	Mexican-American War: The California Republic declares independence from Mexico on June 10. By June 14, the rebellion was underway.
	June 19	First baseball game under recognizable modern rules is played in Hoboken, New Jersey.
	June 22	The saxophone is patented by Adolphe Sax.
1849	June 15	Died: In Nashville, Tennessee, James K. Polk, 11th president of the U.S.
1854	June 10	The first class is graduated from the U.S. Naval Academy at Annapolis, Maryland.
1855	June 1	American adventurer William Walker conquers Nicaragua and reinstates slavery.
1856	June 9	500 Mormons leave Iowa City, Iowa, and head west for Utah carrying all their possessions in two-wheeled handcarts.
	June 17	The U.S. Republican Party holds its first convention in Philadelphia and nominates John C. Fremont for U.S. president.
1858	June 16	Candidate Abraham Lincoln spoke out against slavery in a speech: "A house divided against itself cannot stand."
	June 23	Six year-old Edgardo Mortara, a Jew, is kidnapped by Vatican authorities to be raised by the Catholic church.
1859	June 30	French acrobat Blondin (Jean Francois Gravelet) crossed Niagara Falls on a tightrope as 5,000 spectators watched.
1861	June 3	Died: Stephen A. Douglas, politician from Illinois. (Candidate for president opposing Abraham Lincoln.)
	June 8	American Civil War: Tennessee voters approve secession from the Union.
1862	June 4	American Civil War: Confederate troops evacuate Fort Pillow on the Mississippi River, leaving the way clear for Union troops to take Memphis, Tennessee on June 6th.
	June 7	The U.S. and U.K. agree to suppress the slave trade.
	June 19	Slavery was outlawed in all U.S. territories.
1863	June 9	American Civil War: -- Battle of Brandy Station, Virginia.
	June 14	American Civil War: -- 2nd Battle of Winchester, Virginia.
	June 20	West Virginia becomes the 35th state admitted to the Union.
1864	June 5	American Civil War: -- Battle of Piedmont, Virginia.
	June 12	American Civil War: -- Cold Harbor, Virginia: General Ulysses S. Grant pulls his troops from their positions and moves south.
	June 15	American Civil War: -- Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton signed an order establishing a military burial ground, which became Arlington National Cemetery.
	June 30	President Lincoln signs an order granting Yosemite Valley to California for "public use, resort and recreation."
1865	June 3	Born: King George V of the United Kingdom (died: 1936).
1868	June 23	Christopher Latham Sholes received a patent for his "Type-Writer."
1870	June 9	Died: author Charles Dickens, in Godshill, England.
	June 15	Reconstruction: Georgia becomes the last of the former Confederate states to be readmitted to the Union.
	June 22	The U.S. Congress created the Department of Justice.
	June 26	The first section of Atlantic City, New Jersey's Boardwalk was opened to the public.
1873	June 18	Susan B. Anthony is fined $100 for attempting to vote in the 1872 presidential election.
1874	June 8	Died: Cochise, Apache leader.
1876	June 4	Establishing a record for travel, an express train arrives in San Francisco, Calif., only 83 hours after departing New York City.
	June 25	Battle of the Little Big Horn and the death of Colonel George Armstrong Custer.
1884	June 16	The first roller coaster in the U.S. begins operation at Coney Island, NY.
1885	June 17	The Statue of Liberty arrives in New York Harbor aboard the French ship Isere.
	June 23	Banff National Park, Canada's first, created in Alberta.
1886	June 2	President Cleveland married Frances Folsom in a White House ceremony. (He is the only president ever married in the White House.)
1887	June 8	Herman Hollerith receives a patent for his "punched card" calculator. (Hollerith's invention evolved into the International Business Machines (IBM punched card) business, and later provided the basis for the ASCII/EBCDIIC coding schemes used with modern computers.)
1888	June 3	The poem Casey at the Bat, by Ernest Lawrence Thayer, is published in the San Francisco Examiner.
1889	June 3	The Canadian Pacific Railway is completed from coast to coast.
1890	June 1	The U.S. Census Bureau begins using Herman Hollerith's tabulating machines (punched cards) to count census returns.
1893	June 27	Crash of the New York stock market.
1894	June 23	International Olympic Committee is founded at the Sorbonne in Paris, at the initiative of Baron Pierre de Coubertin.
	June 28	Labor Day becomes an official U.S. holiday.
1896	June 4	Henry Ford made a successful pre-dawn test run of his horseless carriage, called a "quadricycle," through the streets of Detroit.
1897	June 2	Mark Twain, 61, was quoted by the New York Journal as saying from London that "the report of my death was an exaggeration."
	June 12	Carl Elsener gained a patent for his penknife that later became known as the Swiss army knife.
	June 16	The U.S. signed a treaty of annexation with Hawaii.
1898	June 1	The Trans-Mississippi Exposition world's fair opens in Omaha, Nebraska.
	June 10	Spanish-American War: U.S. Marines land in Guantánamo, Cuba.
	June 22	Spanish-American War: U.S. General Shafter's troops land at Daiquirí, Cuba.
1900	June 14	Hawaii becomes a U.S. territory.
	June 26	A commission that included Dr. Walter Reed began the fight against the deadly disease yellow fever.
1904	June 15	More than 1,000 people died when fire erupted aboard the steamship General Slocum in New York's East River.
	June 28	Blind-deaf student Helen Keller graduated with honors from Radcliffe College. (A fiery socialist-communist, she was a member of the IWW (or the Wobblies) and a co-founder of the ACLU.)
1906	June 30	Prompted by Upton Sinclair's book, The Jungle, President Teddy Roosevelt signed The Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection Act into law.
1908	June 24	Died: Grover Cleveland, 22nd and 24th president of the U.S.
	June 30	Tunguska impact event occurs in Siberia, Russia.
1909	June 1	The Alaska-Yukon-Pacific Exposition world's fair opens in Seattle.
1910	June 19	Father's Day was celebrated for the first time, in Spokane, Washington.
1911	June 22	Britain's King George V was crowned at Westminster Abbey.
1912	June 19	The 8-hour work day is established in the United States.
1913	June 4	Emily Davison, a suffragette, runs out in front of the king's horse, Anmer, at the Epsom Derby. She is trampled and dies a few days later, never having regained consciousness.
1914	June 7	The first vessel passes through the locks of the Panama Canal.
	June 28	Francis Ferdinand (Franz Ferdinand), Archduke of Austria and his wife Sophia are killed in Sarajevo by a Serb nationalist -- the event which triggered World War I.
1916	June 5	Louis Brandeis becomes Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.
1917	June 4	The very first Pulitzer Prizes are awarded.
	June 19	During WW I, King George V ordered the British royal family to dispense with German titles and surnames. The family took the name "Windsor."
	June 26	WW I: The first troops of the American Expeditionary Force arrived in France.
1918	June 12	World War I: The first airplane bombing raid by an American unit occurs on the Western Front in France.
	June 15	World War I: -- Second Battle of the Marne -- The battle begins near the River Marne with a German attack.
1919	June 11	Sir Barton won the Belmont Stakes, becoming horse racing's first Triple Crown winner.
	June 21	Admiral Ludvig von Reuter ordered the scuttling of the German fleet at the internment base, Scapa Flow, Scotland, to keep the ships out of the hands of the British. Nine German sailors killed scuttling the 51 ships were the last casualties of WW I.
	June 28	The Treaty of Versailles is signed, ending WW I.
1920	June 4	The Treaty of Trianon is signed in Paris (Kingdom of Hungary).
	June 13	The United States Postal Service rules that children may not be sent via parcel post.
1921	June 30	President Harding appointed former President Taft chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.
1923	June 18	Checker Cab puts its first taxi on the streets.
1924	June 2	Congress voted to grant U.S. citizenship to all American Indians. ... (Duh, Uh! ...).
	June 12	Born: George H.W. Bush, 41st President of the United States.
1928	June 17	Amelia Earhart embarked on a trans-Atlantic flight from Newfoundland to Wales -- the first by a woman.
1931	June 23	Aviators Wiley Post and Harold Gatty took off from New York on the first round-the-world flight in a single-engine plane.
1933	June 1	The Century of Progress world's fair opens in Chicago, Illinois.
1934	June 9	Donald Duck debuts in The Wise Little Hen.
	June 13	Adolf Hitler and Mussolini meet in Venice, Italy; Mussolini later describes the German dictator as "a silly little monkey".
	June 19	The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is established in the U.S. to regulate broadcasts through the airways. It replaced the Federal Radio Commission.
	June 30	Night of the Long Knives, as Adolf Hitler began his "blood purge" of political and military leaders in Germany.
1935	June 9	Ho-Umezu Agreement: China under KMT (The Kuomintang; literally the National People's Party of China) administration recognized Japanese occupations in Northeast China.
1936	June 30	Gone with the Wind by Margaret Mitchell is published.
1937	June 3	The Duke of Windsor, who had abdicated the British throne, married Wallis Warfield Simpson in Monts, France.
1938	June 1	The first Superman comic is published.
1939	June 12	The Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum is dedicated in Cooperstown, New York, exactly one hundred years to the day on which the game was supposedly invented by Abner Doubleday.
1940	June 4	World War II: The Dunkirk evacuation is completed. German forces enter Paris.
	June 9	World War II: Norway surrenders to the Germans.
	June 10	World War II: Italy declares war on France and the U.K. -- Canada declares war on Italy.
	June 12	World War II: 54,000 British and French troops surrender to Field Marshal Erwin Rommel at St. Valery-en-Caux.
	June 14	World War II: Paris falls under German occupation. Holocaust: A group of 728 Polish political prisoners from Tarnow become the first residents of the Auschwitz concentration camp.
	June 16	A Communist government is installed in Lithuania.
	June 17	World War II: France asked Germany for terms of surrender, surrendered June 21 and signed an armistice on June 22.
	June 18	World War II: Winston Churchill urged his countrymen to conduct themselves in a manner that would prompt future generations to say: "This was their finest hour."
1941	June 2	Baseball's "Iron Horse," Lou Gehrig, died in New York of a degenerative disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). The condition is now often referred to as "Lou Gehrig's Disease."
	June 8	World War II: Allies invade Syria and Lebanon.
	June 22	World War II: Nazi Germany stuns the world by invading the Soviet Union.
1942	June 4	World War II: The Battle of Midway begins.
	June 7	World War II: Japanese troops land on the Aleutian Islands of Attu and Kiska: a diversion from their main target of Midway. The Battle of Midway ends: a major victory for the U.S.
	June 9	World War II: The U.S. Philippine Department surrenders to Japan.
	June 10	World War II: The Gestapo massacred 173 male residents of Lidice, Czechoslovakia, in retaliation for the killing of a Nazi official.
	June 11	World War II: The U.S. and Soviet Union signed a lend-lease agreement to aid the Soviet war effort.
	June 21	World War II: Tobruk falls to German forces.
	June 25	World War II: Some 1,000 British Royal Air Force bombers raided Bremen, Germany.
1943	June 1	During World War II, a civilian flight from Lisbon to London was shot down by the Germans killing all on board, including actor Leslie Howard.
1944	June 1	The BBC aired a coded message intended to warn the French resistance that the D-Day invasion was imminent.
	June 5	World War II: Rome falls to the Allies. It is the first capital of an Axis nation to fall. More than 1000 British bombers drop 5000 tons of bombs on German gun batteries on the Normandy coast of France in preparation for D-Day.
	June 6	D-Day in Europe as the Allies launch the invasion of the mainland at Normandy, France.
	June 7	Nazi Panzer SS troops execute 23 Canadian prisoners of war in Normandy.
	June 10	Oradour-sur-Glane, France, massacre: 642 men, women and children murdered by German forces.
	June 15	American forces began a successful invasion of Saipan. B-29 Superfortresses made their first raids on Japan.
	June 17	Iceland becomes independent from Denmark and forms a republic.
	June 22	President Roosevelt signed the Re-adjustment Act of 1944, more popularly know as the GI Bill of Rights.
1945	June 18	William Joyce (Lord Haw-Haw) is charged with treason.
	June 22	WW II: The Battle of Okinawa ended; 12,520 Americans and 110,000 Japanese were killed in the 81-day campaign.
	June 26	The charter for the United Nations is signed in San Francisco.
1946	June 2	The Italian monarchy was abolished in favor of a republic.
1947	June 5	Marshall Plan: U.S. Secretary of State George Marshall calls for economic aid to war-torn Europe.
	June 11	The government announced that effective the next day, sugar rationing in the U.S. would end. (Rationing had been implemented to support the war effort.)
	June 23	The Senate joined the House in overriding President Truman's veto of the Taft-Hartley Act.
1948	June 3	The 200-inch reflecting telescope at the Palomar Mountain Observatory in California was dedicated.
	June 7	Edvard Benes steps down as President of Czechoslovakia rather than sign a Constitution making his nation a Communist state.
	June 16	The storming of the cockpit of the Miss Macao passenger seaplane, operated by the Cathay Pacific airline, marks the first skyjacking of a commercial plane.
	June 24	Start of the Berlin Blockade: The Soviet Union makes overland travel between the West with West Berlin impossible. On June 26 the Western allies start an airlift to supply the residents of West Berlin.
1949	June 8	Such celebrities as Helen Keller, Dorothy Parker, Danny Kaye, Fredric March, John Garfield, Paul Muni and Edward G. Robinson are named in an FBI report as Communist Party members.
	June 19	NASCAR sanctions the first strictly "stock" car race.
1950	June 25	The Korean War erupts as North Korea invaders head south.
	June 28	Korean War: Seoul captured by North Korean forces.
1951	June 14	UNIVAC I computer is dedicated by U.S. Census Bureau.
	June 25	The first commercial color telecast took place as CBS in New York transmitted a one-hour special to four other cities.
1952	June 14	The keel is laid for the nuclear submarine USS Nautilus.
1953	June 2	Queen Elizabeth II of Britain was crowned at Westminster Abby, 16 months after the death of her father; King George VI.
	June 15	In England, John Reginald Christie is executed but another man had already been executed for some of the same crimes. (This case played a role in abolishing the death penalty in England.)
	June 19	Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, convicted of conspiring to pass U.S. atomic secrets to the Soviet Union, were executed at Sing Sing Prison in Ossining, N.Y.
1954	June 9	Joseph Welch, special counsel for the U.S. Army, lashes out at Senator Joseph McCarthy during hearings on whether Communism has infiltrated the Army.
	June 14	President Eisenhower signed an order adding the words "under God" to the U.S. Pledge of Allegiance.
	June 27	World's first nuclear power generating station opens in Obninsk, USSR (near Moscow).
1956	June 30	A TWA Super Constellation and a United Airlines DC-7 collided above Grand Canyon, Arizona, killing 128.
1957	June 27	Hurricane Audrey kills 500 people in Louisiana and Texas.
1958	June 1	Canada-wide television broadcasting began. Charles De Gaulle was brought from retirement to lead France by decree for six months.
	June 15	5,000 U.S. Marines land in Beirut, Lebanon, to protect the pro-Western government.
1959	June 8	The first (and only) delivery of Missile Mail.
	June 26	President Eisenhower joined Britain's Queen Elizabeth II in ceremonies officially opening the St. Lawrence Seaway.
1960	June 28	U.S.-owned oil refineries in Cuba confiscated and nationalized by Fidel Castro.
1962	June 25	The U.S.S.C. ruled that a non-denominational prayer in N.Y. State public schools was unconstitutional.
	June 27	Construction begins on the St. Louis Gateway Arch.
1963	June 12	Civil rights leader Medgar Evers is fatally shot in front of his home in Jackson, Mississippi. (In 1994, Byron De La Beckwith was convicted of murdering Evers and sentenced to life in prison; he died in 2001.)
	June 16	Valentina Tereshkova becomes the first woman in space.
	June 20	To add another layer of safety during the Cold war, a "hotline" between the U.S. and Soviet Union is installed.
1964	June 12	South Africa sentences Nelson Mandela to life in prison.
	June 19	The Civil Rights Act of 1964 was approved by the Senate, 73-27, after surviving a lengthy filibuster.
1965	June 3	Astronaut Edward White became the first American to "walk" in space, during the flight of Gemini 4.
1966	June 1	First Canadian color television broadcast.
	June 2	The U.S. space probe Surveyor I landed on the moon and began transmitting detailed photographs of the lunar surface.
	June 13	The U.S. Supreme Court rules in Miranda v. Arizona that police must inform suspects of their rights before questioning them.
1967	June 5	Six-Day War: In a defensive move against unprovoked attacks, the Israeli air force launched simultaneous counter-attacks on the air forces of Egypt, Jordan, and Syria.
	June 8	Israeli forces attacked the USS Liberty, killing 34 American servicemen. (Israel later called the attack a tragic mistake.)
	June 12	The U.S. Supreme Court struck down state laws prohibiting interracial marriages.
	June 13	President Lyndon Johnson nominated Thurgood Marshall as the first African American justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.
	June 17	China tests its first hydrogen bomb.
	June 27	World's first ATM was installed in Enfield, London.
	June 29	Jerusalem was reunified as Israel removed barricades separating the Old City from the Israeli sector.
1968	June 5	After claiming victory in California's Democrat presidential primary, Robert F. Kennedy is assassinated at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles by Sirhan Bishara Sirhan.
	June 8	James Earl Ray is arrested for the murder of Martin Luther King Jr.
1969	June 9	The U.S. Senate confirmed Warren Burger to be the new chief justice of the Supreme Court, succeeding Earl Warren.
1971	June 17	The U.S. and Japan signed a treaty under which the U.S. would relinquish post-WW II control of the island of Okinawa.
	June 30	The 26th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, lowering the voting age to 18, is ratified when Ohio became the 38th state to approve it. The crew of Soyuz 11 spacecraft is killed during reentry and landing when their air supply escapes through a faulty valve.
1972	June 16	Burglars are caught breaking into the U.S. Democratic Party headquarters in the Watergate building in Washington, D.C. (The break-in was during the night of 16-17.)
	June 17	Watergate scandal: Five White House operatives are arrested for burglarizing the offices of the DNC. The arrest led to the eventual resignation of President Richard Nixon.
	June 23	Watergate scandal: 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.
	June 29	The U.S.S.C. ruled the death penalty, as it was being meted out, could constitute "cruel and unusual punishment."
1973	June 9	Secretariat becomes the first Triple Crown winner in 25 years.
1974	June 24	The Universal Product Code (UPC) label is used for the first time to ring up purchases at a supermarket.
1975	June 5	The Suez Canal opens for the first time since the Six-Day War.
1976	June 22	The Canadian House of Commons abolishes the death penalty.
1977	June 1	The Soviet Union charges civil rights leader Anatoly Sharansky with treason. (Sharansky was imprisoned, then released in 1986.)
	June 5	A coup takes place in the Republic of Seychelles. The Apple II personal computer goes on sale.
	June 11	Seattle Slew won the Belmont Stakes, capturing horse racing's Triple Crown.
	June 16	Leonid Brezhnev becomes president of the USSR.
1978	June 8	A jury in Clark County, Nevada, ruled the so-called "Mormon will," purportedly written by the late Howard Hughes, was a forgery.
	June 10	Affirmed won the Belmont Stakes and with it, horse racing's Triple Crown.
1979	June 1	Ninety years of white minority rule ends in Rhodesia; to be known as Zimbabwe-Rhodesia.
	June 3	A blowout at the Ixtoc oil well in the southern Gulf of Mexico causes at least 600,000 tons (176,400,000 gallons) of oil to be spilled into the waters. The worst oil spill to date. (Some estimate the spill to be 428 million gallons.)
	June 18	SALT II is signed by the U.S. and the Soviet Union.
1980	June 1	The Cable News Network (CNN) begins broadcasting.
1981	June 7	The Israeli Air Force destroys Iraq's Osiraq nuclear reactor.
	June 16	Canadian ambassador Ken Taylor honored for helping six Americans escape from Iran during hostage crisis.
1982	June 8	President Ronald Reagan became the first American chief executive to address a joint session of the British Parliament.
	June 14	Falklands War: War between United Kingdom and Argentina over the Falkland/Malvinas Islands ends.
1983	June 16	Yuri Andropov becomes president of the USSR.
	June 18	Sally Ride becomes the first American woman in space.
1985	June 14	TWA Flight 847 is hijacked by Hezbollah and 39 Americans are held captive until June 30. (The world said, "ho hum".)
1986	June 2	For the first time, the public could watch proceedings of the U.S. Senate on television as a six-week experiment of televised sessions began.
	June 4	Jonathan Pollard pleads guilty to espionage for selling top secret U.S. military intelligence to Israel.
1987	June 2	President Reagan announced he was nominating economist Alan Greenspan to succeed Paul Volcker as chairman of the Federal Reserve Board.
	June 12	In a speech from Berlin, President Ronald Reagan publicly challenged Mikhail Gorbachev by saying: "Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!"
1989	June 4	The Tiananmen Square protests are suppressed in Beijing and are covered live on television. Solidarity's victory in the first partly free parliamentary elections in post-war Poland spark off a succession of peaceful anti-communist revolutions in Eastern Europe.
1990	June 10	Yielding to international pressure, South Africa releases Nelson Mandela from prison.
	June 12	The parliament of the Russian Federation formally declares its sovereignty (from the Soviet Union).
1991	June 25	Croatia and Slovenia declare independence from Yugoslavia.
1995	June 13	French president Jacques Chirac announces the resumption of nuclear testing in French Polynesia.
1995	June 23	Died: Jonas Salk, inventor of polio vaccine. (Born: 1914.)
1996	June 13	A group calling themselves the Freemen surrender to FBI agents after an 81-day standoff in Montana.
	June 25	19 U.S. soldiers are killed as terrorist car-bomb the Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia
1997	June 13	A federal jury in Colorado sentences Timothy McVeigh to death for his part in the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing.
1999	June 9	Kosovo War: Federal Republic of Yugoslavia and NATO sign a peace treaty.
2001	June 1	Nobel Prize-winning mathematician John Forbes Nash (A Beautiful Mind) remarries ex-wife Alicia; she divorced him in 1963.
2002	June 15	So-called "American Taliban" John Walker Lindh pleads guilty to supplying aid to the enemy and for the possession of explosives during the commission of a felony. He is sentenced to a total of 20 years for both crimes.
2003	June 1	China began filling the reservoir behind the massive Three Gorges Dam, raising the water level near the dam to over 100 meters.
2004	June 5	Died: President Ronald Reagan becoming the oldest president at death at 93.3 years of age, surpassing Herbert Hoover at 90.2 years and John Adams at 90.7 years.
2004	June 12	In Ellerslie, New Zealand, a 2.9 lbs. meteorite hit the house of Phil and Brenda Archer, destroying the roof and a couch.

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