Wednesday, June 22

This Day In History

• 1611   English explorer Henry Hudson, his son and several other people were set adrift in present-day Hudson Bay by mutineers.
• 1815   Napoleon Bonaparte abdicated for the second time.
• 1868   Arkansas was re-admitted to the Union.
• 1870   Congress created the Department of Justice.
• 1874   Dr. Andrew Taylor Still began the first known practice of osteopathy.
• 1911   Britain's King George V was crowned at Westminster Abbey.
• 1938   Heavyweight boxing champion Joe Louis knocked out Max Schmeling of Germany in the first round of their rematch in New York City's Yankee Stadium.
• 1941   Germany invaded the Soviet Union during World War II.
• 1944   President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the GI Bill of Rights, authorizing a broad package of benefits for World War II veterans.
• 1945   The World War II battle for Okinawa ended; 12,520 Americans and 110,000 Japanese were killed in the 81-day campaign.
• 1969   Singer-actress Judy Garland died at age 47.
• 1970   President Richard Nixon signed a measure lowering the voting age to 18.
• 1977   Former Attorney General John N. Mitchell began serving a sentence for his role in the Watergate cover-up.
• 1981   Mark David Chapman pleaded guilty to killing rock star John Lennon.
• 1987   Actor-dancer Fred Astaire died at age 88.
• 1989   The government of Angola and the anti-Communist rebels of the UNITA movement agreed to a formal truce in their 14-year-old civil war.
• 1992   The Supreme Court unanimously ruled that hate-crime laws that ban cross-burning and similar expressions of racial bias violate free-speech rights.

Happy Birthday To

• 1906   Billy (Samuel) Wilder (Academy Award-winning director: The Apartment [1960], The Lost Weekend [1945]; Sunset Boulevard, Stalag 17, Witness for the Prosecution, The Seven Year Itch, Some Like it Hot, Sabrina, Irma La Douce, The Front Page, Buddy, Buddy; died Mar 27, 2002)
• 1907   Anne Morrow Lindbergh (aviator, author: Gift from the Sea; married to Charles; mother of kidnapped Charles Jr.; died Feb 7, 2001)
• 1909   Michael Todd (Avrom Hirsch Goldbogen) (producer: Oklahoma!, Around the World in 80 Days; developed [w/American Optical Company] Todd-AO system using 65mm cine cameras at 30 fps and wide angle photgraphy [approx 150 degrees]; husband of Elizabeth Taylor; killed in plane crash [1958]; died Mar 22, 1958)
• 1922   Bill Blass (fashion designer)
• 1933   Diane Feinstein (Goldman) (politician: U.S. Senator from California)
• 1936   Kris Kristofferson (songwriter)
• 1941   Ed Bradley (news correspondent: 60 Minutes; host: Street Stories)
• 1954   Freddie Prinze (Preutzel) (comedian, actor: Chico and the Man; died Jan 29, 1977)
• 1964   Amy Brenneman (actress: Judging Amy)