HIGHLIGHTS IN HISTORY
Today’s highlight:
On June 21, 1788, the United States Constitution went into effect as New Hampshire became the ninth state to ratify it.
On this date:
1377: King Edward III died after ruling England for 50 years; he was succeeded by his grandson, Richard II.
1834: Cyrus Hall McCormick reaping machine.
received a patent for his
1932: Heavyweight Max Schmeling lost a title fight rematch in New York by decision to Jack Sharkey, prompting Schmeling’s manager Joe Jacobs to exclaim: “We was robbed!”
1942: German forces led by Generaloberst (Colonel General) Erwin Rommel captured the Libyan city of Tobruk during World War II. Rommel was promoted to the rank of Field Marshal; Tobruk was retaken by the Allies in November 1942. 1943: Army nurse Lt. Edith
Greenwood became the first woman to receive the Soldier’s Medal for showing heroism during a fire at a military hospital in Yuma, Arizona.
1948: The Republican national convention opened in Philadelphia. The delegates ended up choosing Thomas E. Dewey to be their presidential nominee.
1963: Cardinal Giovanni Battista Montini was chosen during a conclave of his fellow cardinals to succeed the late Pope John XXIII; the new pope took the name Paul VI.
1964: Civil rights workers Michael H. Schwerner, Andrew Goodman and James E. Chaney were slain in Philadelphia, Mississippi; their bodies were found buried in an earthen dam six weeks later. Forty-one years later on this date in 2005, Edgar Ray Killen, an 80-year-old former Ku Klux Klansman, was found guilty of manslaughter; he was sentenced to 60 years in prison, where he died in January 2018.
1977: Menachem Begin of the Likud bloc became Israel’s sixth prime minister.
1982: A jury in Washington, D.C. found John Hinckley Jr. not guilty by reason of insanity in the shootings of President Ronald Reagan and three other men.
1988: “Who Framed Roger Rabbit,” a comedy fantasy starring Bob Hoskins that combined live action and legendary animated cartoon characters, premiered in New York.
1989: A sharply divided Supreme Court ruled that burning the American flag as a form of political protest was protected by the First Amendment.
Ten years ago:
The ferry Princess of the Stars, carrying more than 800 people, capsized as Typhoon Fengshen battered the Philippines; only some four dozen people survived.
Five years ago:
A one-page criminal complaint unsealed in federal court accused former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden of espionage and theft of government property in the NSA surveillance case.
One year ago:
A man armed with a knife wounded a police officer at Flint International Airport in Michigan; a Tunisian-born Canadian resident has been charged in the attack.