Today In History

Today is Wednesday, June 7, the 158th day of 2017. There are 207 days left in the year.

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT

› 1942: The Battle of Midway ended in a decisive victory for American naval forces over Imperial Japan, marking a turning point in the Pacific War.

ON THIS DATE

› 1776: Richard Henry Lee of Virginia offered a resolution to the Continental Congress stating “That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States.”

› 1892: Homer Plessy, a “Creole of color,” was arrested for refusing to leave a whites-only car of the East Louisiana Railroad. (Ruling on his case, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld “separate but equal” racial segregation, a concept it renounced in 1954.)

› 1917: The Lions Clubs service organization was founded in Chicago.

› 1929: The sovereign state of Vatican City came into existence as copies of the Lateran Treaty were exchanged in Rome.

› 1965: The U.S. Supreme Court, in Griswold v. Connecticut, struck down, 7-2, a Connecticut law used to prosecute a Planned Parenthood clinic in New Haven for providing contraceptives to married couples.

› 1977: Britons thronged London to celebrate the silver jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II, who was marking the 25th year of her reign.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS

Movie director James Ivory is 89. Former Canadian Prime Minister John Turner is 88. Singer Tom Jones is 77. Actor Ronald Pickup is 77. Poet Nikki Giovanni is 74. Actor Ken Osmond (TV: “Leave It to Beaver”) is 74. Former talk show host Jenny Jones is 71. Americana singer-songwriter Willie Nile is 69. Actor William Forsythe is 62. Record producer L.A. Reid is 61. Latin pop singer Juan Luis Guerra is 60. Vice President Mike Pence is

58. Rock singer-musician Gordon Gano (The Violent Femmes) is 54. Rapper Ecstasy (Whodini) is

53. Actor Karl Urban is 45. TV personality Bear Grylls is 43. Rock musician Eric Johnson (The Shins) is 41. Actress Adrienne Frantz is 39. Actor-comedian Bill Hader is 39. Actress Anna Torv is 38. Actress Larisa Oleynik is

36. Tennis player Anna Kournikova is 36. Actor Michael Cera is 29. Actress Shelley Buckner is

28. Rapper Iggy Azalea is

27. Rapper Fetty Wap is 26.