This day in history
Today is Thursday, June 8, the 159th day of 2023. There are 206 days left in the year.
Birthdays: Actor Millicent Martin is 89. Actor James Darren is 87. Singer Nancy Sinatra is 83. Singer Chuck Negron is 81. Musician Boz Scaggs is 79. Author Sara Paretsky is 76. Actor Sonia Braga is 73. Actor Kathy Baker is
73. Rock singer Bonnie Tyler is
72. Actor Griffin Dunne is 68. “Dilbert” creator Scott Adams is
66. Actor-director Keenen Ivory Wayans is 65. Simply Red Singer Mick Hucknall is 63. Musician Nick Rhodes (Duran Duran) is
61. Actor Julianna Margulies is
56. Actor Dan Futterman is 56. Actor Kelli Williams is 53. Former representative Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona is 53. Rapper Ye is 46. TV personality-actress Maria Menounos is 45. Country singer-songwriter Sturgill Simpson is 45. Blues-guitarist musician Derek Trucks is 44. The Calling singer Alex Band is 42. Folkbluegrass singer-musician Sara Watkins (Nickel Creek, I’m With Her) is 42. Olympic track gold medalist Athing Mu is 21.
► In 632, the prophet Muhammad died in Medina.
► In 1864, Abraham Lincoln was nominated for another term as president during the National Union (Republican) Party’s convention in Baltimore.
► In 1953, the US Supreme Court ruled unanimously that restaurants in the District of Columbia could not refuse to serve Blacks.
► In 1966, a merger was announced between the National and American Football Leagues, to take effect in 1970.
► In 1967, during the six-day Middle East war, 34 American servicemen were killed when Israel attacked the USS Liberty, a Navy intelligence-gathering ship in the Mediterranean Sea. (Israel later said the Liberty had been mistaken for an Egyptian vessel.)
► In 1968, authorities announced the capture in London of James Earl Ray, the suspected assassin of civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
► In 2008, the average price of regular gas crept up to $4 a gallon.
► In 2013, Paul Cellucci, 69th governor of Massachusetts, died from amyotrophic lateral sclerosis at 65.
► In 2015, siding with the White House in a foreign-policy power struggle with Congress, the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that Americans born in the disputed city of Jerusalem could not list Israel as their birthplace on passports.
► In 2018, celebrity chef, author and CNN host Anthony Bourdain was found dead in his hotel room in eastern France in what authorities determined was a suicide. The Golden State Warriors beat the Cleveland Cavaliers in Game 4 of the NBA finals to complete a sweep; it was their second straight title and third in four years.
► In 2020, thousands of mourners gathered at a church in Houston for a service for George Floyd, as his death during an arrest in Minneapolis stoked protests in America and beyond over racial injustice.
► Last year, an 11-year-old girl who survived the mass shooting at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, told members of Congress how she covered herself in her dead classmate’s blood and played dead to avoid being shot. Her account came on the second day of testimony from families of the victims and survivors of mass shootings weeks earlier in Buffalo and Uvalde. Olympian Simone Biles and dozens of other women who say they were sexually assaulted by Larry Nassar filed a lawsuit seeking more than $1 billion from the FBI for failing to stop the sports doctor when the agency received allegations against him.