Today in history
Today is Thursday, June 1, the 152nd day of 2017. There are 213 days left in the year.
Today’s Highlights in History
It was 50 years ago today — June 1, 1967 — that the Beatles album “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” was released, as was David Bowie’s debut album, eponymously titled “David Bowie.”
On this date
In 1792, Kentucky became the 15th state.
In 1796, Tennessee became the 16th state.
In 1813, the mortally wounded commander of the USS Chesapeake, Capt. James Lawrence, gave the order, “Don’t give up the ship” during a losing battle with the British frigate HMS Shannon in the War of 1812.
In 1868, James Buchanan, the 15th president of the United States, died near Lancaster, Pennsylvania, at age 77.
In 1917, the song “Over There” by George M. Cohan was published by William Jerome Publishing Corp. of New York.
In 1927, Lizzie Borden, accused but acquitted of the 1892 ax murders of her father, Andrew, and her stepmother, Abby, died in Fall River, Massachusetts, at age 66.
In 1943, a civilian flight from Portugal to England was shot down by Germany during World War II, killing all 17 people aboard, including actor Leslie Howard.
In 1957, Don Bowden, a student at the University of California at Berkeley, became the first American to break the four-minute mile during a meet in Stockton, California, in a time of 3:58.7.
In 1977, the Soviet Union formally charged Jewish human rights activist Anatoly Shcharansky with treason. (Shcharansky was imprisoned, then released in 1986; he’s now known by the name Natan Sharansky.)
In 1980, Cable News Network made its debut.
In 1997, Betty Shabazz, the widow of Malcolm X, was severely burned in a fire set by her 12-year-old grandson in her Yonkers, New York, apartment (she died three weeks later). The Chicago Tribune published a make-believe commencement speech by columnist Mary Schmich (shmeech) which urged graduates to, among other things, “wear sunscreen” (the essay ended up being wrongly attributed online to author Kurt Vonnegut).
In 2009, Air France Flight 447, an Airbus A330 carrying 228 people from Rio de Janeiro to Paris, crashed into the Atlantic Ocean with the loss of everyone on board.
Ten years ago: The FDA warned consumers to avoid using toothpaste made in China because it might contain a poisonous chemical used in antifreeze. Kidnapped British journalist Alan Johnston appeared in a videotape posted on an Islamic website, the first time he was seen since being abducted nearly three months earlier in Gaza. (Johnston was freed July 4, 2007.) Assisted suicide advocate Jack Kevorkian walked out of a Michigan prison, where he’d spent eight years for ending the life of a man suffering from Lou Gehrig’s disease.
Five years ago: A judge in Sanford, Florida, revoked the bond of the neighborhood watch volunteer charged with murdering Trayvon Martin and ordered him returned to jail within 48 hours, saying George Zimmerman and his wife had misled the court about how much money they had available when his bond was set at $150,000.