DAILY ALMANAC
Today is Tuesday, June 15, the 166th day of 2021. There are 199 days left in the year.
On this date:
1215: England’s King John put his seal to Magna Carta (“the Great Charter”) at Runnymede.
1775: The Second Continental Congress voted unanimously to appoint George Washington head of the Continental Army.
1864: Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton signed an order establishing a military burial ground which became Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia.
1902: The 20th Century Limited, an express passenger train between New York and Chicago, began service. (The Limited made its last run in December 1967.)
1904: More than 1,000 people died when fire erupted aboard the steamboat
General Slocum in New York’s East River.
1934: President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed an act making the National Guard part of the U.S. Army in the event of war or national emergency.
1944: American forces began their successful invasion of Saipan during World War II. B-29 Superfortresses carried out their first raids on Japan.
1955: The United States and Britain signed a cooperation agreement concerning atomic information for “mutual defence purposes.”
1985: The Shiite Muslim hijackers of a TWA Boeing 727 beat and shot one of their hostages, U.S. Navy diver Robert Stethem, 23, throwing him out of the plane to die on the tarmac at Beirut airport.
1988: The baseball romantic comedy “Bull Durham,” starring Kevin Costner and Susan Sarandon, was released by
Orion Pictures.
1991: Mount Pinatubo in the northern Philippines exploded in one of the biggest volcanic eruptions of the 20th century, killing about 800 people.
1996: Ella Fitzgerald, the “first lady of song,” died in Beverly Hills, California, at age 79.
2003: With a deadline passed for Iraqis to hand in heavy weapons, U.S. forces fanned out across Iraq to seize arms and put down potential foes.
Ten years ago: Pushing back against congressional criticism, the White House said that President Barack Obama had the authority to continue U.S. military action in Libya even without authorization from lawmakers on Capitol Hill. Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was released from a Houston hospital, five months after being shot in the head during a Tucson political event.
Singer Ruby Nash Garnett of Ruby and the Romantics is 87. Guitarist Leo Nocentelli of The Meters is 75. Actor Simon Callow (“Amadeus,” “Shakespeare in Love”) is 72. Singer Russell Hitchcock of Air Supply is 72. Singer Steve Walsh
(Kansas) is 70. Country singer Terri Gibbs is 67. Actor Jim Belushi is 67. Actor Julie Hagerty
(“Airplane”) is 66. Actor Polly Draper (“thirtysomething”) is 66. Guitarist Brad Gillis of Night Ranger is 64. Actor Eileen Davidson
(“The Young and the Restless,” “Days of Our Lives”) is 62. Drummer Scott Rockenfield of Queensryche is 58. Actor Helen Hunt is 58. Actor Courteney Cox
(“Friends”) is 57. Guitarist Tony Ardoin
of River Road is 57.