GMT

Today in History: July 1

0069 Vespasian, a Roman army leader, is hailed as a Roman emperor by the Egyptian legions.

1838 Charles Darwin presents a paper on his theory of evolution to the Linnean Society in London.

1863 In the first day's fighting at Gettysburg, Federal forces retreat through the town and dig in at Cemetery Ridge and Cemetery Hill.

1898 American troops take San Juan Hill and El Caney, Cuba, from the Spaniards.

1916 The Battle of the Somme begins. Approximately 30,000 men are killed on the first day, two-thirds of them British.

1950 American ground troops arrive in South Korea to halt the advancing North Korean army.

1961 British troops land in Kuwait to aid against Iraqi threats.

1963 The U.S. postmaster introduces the ZIP code.

1966 The U.S. Marines launch Operation Holt in an attempt to finish off a Vietcong battalion in Thua Thien Province in Vietnam.


Born on July 1

1915 Sydney Pollack, film director (Tootsie, Out of Africa).

1961 Diana Frances Spencer, Princess of Wales.


JOTD

I thought getting a vasectomy would prevent my wife from getting pregnant...

But apparently it just changes the color of the baby.