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Today in History.


0362
Emperor Julian issues an edict banning Christians from teaching in Syria.
1155
German-born Frederick I, Barbarossa, is crowned emperor of Rome.
1579
Sir Francis Drake claims San Francisco Bay for England.
1667
The Dutch fleet sails up the Thames River and threatens London.
1775
The British take Bunker Hill outside of Boston, after a costly battle.
1778
British troops evacuate Philadelphia.
1799
Napoleon Bonaparte incorporates Italy into his empire.
1812
The War of 1812 begins when the United States declares war against Great Britain.
1815
At the Battle of Waterloo, Napoleon Bonaparte is defeated by an international army under the Duke of Wellington.
1848
Austrian General Alfred Windisch-Gratz crushes a Czech uprising in Prague.
1854
The Red Turban revolt breaks out in Guangdong, China.
1856
The Republican Party opens its first national convention in Philadelphia.
1861
President Abraham Lincoln witnesses Dr. Thaddeus Lowe demonstrate the use of a hot-air balloon.
1863
On the way to Gettysburg, Union and Confederate forces skirmish at Point of Rocks, Maryland.
1863
After repeated acts of insubordination, General Ulysses S. Grant relieves General John McClernand during the Siege of Vicksburg.
1864
At Petersburg, Union General Ulysses S. Grant realizes the town can no longer be taken by assault and settles into a siege.
1872
George M. Hoover begins selling whiskey in Dodge City, Kansas--a town which had previously been "dry."
1873
Susan B. Anthony is fined $100 for attempting to vote for president.
1876
General George Crook's command is attacked and bested on the Rosebud River by 1,500 Sioux and Cheyenne under the leadership of Crazy Horse.
1912
The German Zeppelin SZ 111 burns in its hangar in Friedrichshafen.
1913
U.S. Marines set sail from San Diego to protect American interests in Mexico.
1917
The Russian Duma meets in secret session in Petrograd and votes for an immediate Russian offensive against the German Army.
1918
Allied forces on the Western Front begin their largest counterattack yet against the German army.
1924
The Fascist militia marches into Rome.
1926
Spain threatens to quit the League of Nations if Germany is allowed to join.
1928
Amelia Earhart becomes the first woman to cross the Atlantic by airplane.
1930
The Smoot-Hawley Tariff Bill becomes law, placing the highest tariff on imports to the United States.
1931
British authorities in China arrest Indochinese Communist leader Ho Chi Minh.
1932
The U.S. Senate defeats the Bonus Bill as 10,000 veterans mass around the Capitol.
1936
Mobster Charles 'Lucky' Luciano is found guilty on 62 counts of compulsory prostitution.
1940
The Soviet Union occupies Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia.
1942
The U.S. Navy commissions its first black officer, Harvard University medical student Bernard Whitfield Robinson.
1942
Yank a weekly magazine for the U.S. armed services, begins publication.
1944
French troops land on the island of Elba in the Mediterranean.
1944
The U.S. First Army breaks through the German lines on the Cotentin Peninsula and cuts off the German-held port of Cherbourg.

1945
Organized Japanese resistance ends on the island of Mindanao.
1950
Surgeon Richard Lawler performs the first kidney transplant operation in Chicago.
1951
General Vo Nguyen Giap ends his Red River Campaign against the French in Indochina.
1953
Soviet tanks fight thousands of Berlin workers rioting against the East German government.
1953
South Korean President Syngman Rhee releases Korean non-repatriate POWs against the will of the United Nations.

1959
A Federal Court annuls the Arkansas law allowing school closings to prevent integration.
1963
The U.S. Supreme Court bans the required reading of the Lord's prayer and Bible in public schools.
1965
27 B-52s hit Viet Cong outposts, but lose two planes in South Vietnam.
1966
Samuel Nabrit becomes the first African American to serve on the Atomic Energy Commission.
1970
North Vietnamese troops cut the last operating rail line in Cambodia.

1972
Five men are arrested for burglarizing Democratic Party headquarters at the Watergate complex in Washington, D.C.
1979
President Jimmy Carter and Leonid Brezhnev sign the Salt II pact to limit nuclear arms.
1983
Sally Ride becomes the first American woman in space.
1994
Millions of Americans watch former football player O.J. Simpson--facing murder charges--drive his Ford Bronco through Los Angeles, followed by police.



Joke of the Day.


Three boys were discussing their fathers' favorite foods. The first kid said his father loves to eat burgers. The second boy said his father loves KFC. The third boy said his father loves to eat light. The other two boys questioned how his father does that. The third boy replied, "Every night I hear my daddy tell mommy to turn off the light so he can eat it."