history at a glance

TODAY is Sunday June 18 the 169th day of the year. There are 196 days left in the year. Highlights in history on this date: 1812 – War of 1812: The US Congress declares war on Great Britain, Canada, and Ireland. 1815 – Napoleonic Wars: The Battle of Waterloo results in the defeat of Napoleon Bonaparte by the Duke of Wellington and Gebhard Leberecht von Blücher forcing him to abdicate the throne of France for the second and last time. 1830 – French invasion of Algeria. 1858 – Charles Darwin receives a paper from Alfred Russel Wallace that includes nearly identical conclusions about evolution as Darwin’s own, prompting Darwin to publish his theory. 1887 – The Reinsurance Treaty between Germany and Russia is signed. 1900 – Empress Dowager Longyu of China orders all foreigners killed, including foreign

diplomats and their families. 1908 – Japanese immigration to Brazil begins when 781 people arrive in Santos aboard the

ship Kasato-Maru. 1928 – Aviator Amelia Earhart becomes the first woman to fly in an aircraft across the Atlantic

Ocean (she is a passenger; Wilmer Stultz is the pilot and Lou Gordon the mechanic). 1940 – “Finest Hour” speech by Winston Churchill. 1945 – William Joyce (“Lord Haw-Haw”) is charged with treason for his pro-German

propaganda broadcasting during World War II. 1946 – Dr. Ram Manohar Lohia, a Socialist, calls for a Direct Action Day against the

Portuguese in Goa. A road is named after this date in Panjim. 1948 – Columbia Records introduces the long-playing record album in a public demonstration

at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in New York, New York. 1953 – The Egyptian Revolution of 1952 ends with the overthrow of the Muhammad Ali

dynasty and the declaration of the Republic of Egypt. 1953 – A United States Air Force C-124 crashes and burns near Tachikawa, Japan, killing

129. 1954 – Pierre Mendès France becomes Prime Minister of France. 1965 – Vietnam War: The United States uses B-52 bombers to attack National Liberation

Front guerrilla fighters in South Vietnam. 1971 – President Richard Nixon declares that illegal drugs are “public enemy number one”,

which becomes popularized as the “War on Drugs”. 1972 – Staines air disaster: One hundred eighteen are killed when a BEA H.S. Trident crashes

two minutes after take off from London Heathrow Airport. 1979 – SALT II is signed by the United States and the Soviet Union. 1981 – The Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk, the first operational aircraft initially designed around

stealth technology, makes its first flight. 1981 – The Treaty of Basseterre is signed, creating the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean

States 1983 – Space Shuttle program: STS-7, Astronaut Sally Ride becomes the first American

woman in space. 1983 – Mona Mahmudnizhad together with nine other Bahá’í women, is sentenced to death

and hanged in Shiraz, Iran because of her Bahá’í Faith. 1994 – The Troubles: Members of the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) attack a crowded pub with assault rifles in Loughinisland, Northern Ireland. Six Catholic civilians are killed and five wounded. It was crowded with people watching the 1994 FIFA World Cup. 2006 – The first Kazakh space satellite, KazSat is launched. 2009 – The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), a NASA robotic spacecraft is launched.