Today in history
On June 14, 1940, German troops entered Paris during World War II; the same day, the Nazis began transporting prisoners to the Auschwitz concentration camp in German-occupied Poland.
In 1775, the Continental Army, forerunner of the United States Army, was created.
In 1777, the Second Continental Congress approved the design of the original American flag.
In 1811, Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” was born in Litchfield, Conn.
In 1846, a group of U.S. settlers in Sonoma proclaimed the Republic of California.
In 1919, John Alcock and Arthur Whitten Brown embarked on the first non-stop flight across the Atlantic Ocean. (Flying a Vickers Vimy biplane bomber, they took off from St. Johns, Newfoundland, Canada and arrived 16
1/2 hours later in Clifden, Ireland.)
In 1943, the U.S. Supreme Court, in West Virginia State Board of Education v. Barnette, ruled 6-3 that public school students could not be forced to salute the flag of the United States.
In 1954, President Dwight D. Eisenhower signed a measure adding the phrase “under God” to the Pledge of Allegiance.
In 1982, Argentine forces surrendered to British troops on the disputed Falkland Islands.
In 1985, the 17-day hijack ordeal of TWA Flight 847 began as a pair of Lebanese Shiite Muslim extremists seized the jetliner shortly after takeoff from Athens, Greece.
In 1990, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld,
6-3, police checkpoints that examined drivers for signs of intoxication.
In 1993, President Bill Clinton nominated Judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg to serve on the
U.S. Supreme Court.
In 2017, a rifle-wielding gunman opened fire on Republican lawmakers at a congressional baseball practice in Alexandria, Virginia, wounding House Whip Steve Scalise and several others; the assailant died in a battle with police. Fire ripped through the
24-story Grenfell Tower in West London, killing 71 people.
Ten years ago: During his latest visit to the Gulf Coast, President Barack Obama promised that “things are going to return to normal” and that the region’s fouled waters would be in even better shape than before the catastrophic BP oil spill. A judge in Stockton, California, sentenced Sunday school teacher Melissa Huckaby to life in prison without the possibility of parole for kidnapping and murdering 8-year-old Sandra Cantu.
Five years ago: Thousands of Syrians cut through a border fence and crossed over into Turkey, fleeing intense fighting in northern Syria between Kurdish fighters and jihadis. Inbee Park shot a final round
68 and finished at 19-under par to win the KPMG Women’s PGA Championship for the third consecutive year and retake the No. 1 ranking in women’s golf.
One year ago: Workers at Volkswagen’s plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee, voted against forming a factory-wide union in a setback to the United Auto Workers’ efforts to gain a foothold among foreign auto facilities in the South. Stepping back from comments two days earlier, President Donald Trump told “Fox and Friends” that if a foreign power offered him dirt about an opponent, then “of course” he would report that to the FBI or the attorney general, but he still said he would look at the information being offered to see whether it was “incorrect.”