GOOD MORNING – TODAY IS SUNDAY, June 04, the 153rd day of 2017 with 212 to follow. Sunrise in the Boston area is @ 5:07 and sunset is @ 8:16. The moon is waxing. The morning stars are stars are Jupiter, Saturn & Mercury. The evening stars are Mars, Neptune, Uranus & Venus.

ON THIS DAY IN: 1615 – The fortress of Osaka, Japan, fell to shogun Ieyasu after a six month siege. 

1647 – The British army seized King Charles I and held him as a hostage. 

1674 – Horse racing was prohibited in Massachusetts. 

1783 – A hot-air balloon was demonstrated by Joseph and Jacques Montgolfier. It reached a height of 1,500 feet. 

1784 – Marie Thible became the first woman to fly in a hot-air balloon. The flight was 45 minutes long and reached a height of 8,500 feet. 

1792 – Captain George Vancouver claimed Puget Sound for Britain. 

1794 – British troops captured Port-au-Prince, Haiti. 

1805 – Tripoli was forced to conclude peace with U.S. after conflicts over tribute. 

1812 – The Louisiana Territory had its name changed to the Missouri Territory. 

1816 – The Washington was launched at Wheeling, WV. It was the first stately, double-decker steamboat. 

1878 – Turkey turned Cyprus over to Britain. 

1892 – The Sierra Club was incorporated in San Francisco. 

1896 – Henry Ford made a successful test drive of his new car in Detroit, MI. He called the vehicle was called a “Quadricycle.” 

1911 – Gold was discovered in Alaska’s Indian Creek. 

1918 – French and American troops halted Germany’s offensive at Chateau-Thierry, France. 

1919 – The U.S. Senate passed the Women’s Suffrage bill. 

1924 – An eternal light was dedicated at Madison Square in New York City in memory of all New York soldiers who died in World War I. 

1931 – The first rocket-glider flight was made by William Swan in Atlantic City, NJ. 

1935 – “Invisible” glass was patented by Gerald Brown and Edward Pollard. 

1939 – The first shopping cart was introduced by Sylvan Goldman in Oklahoma City, OK. It was actually a folding chair that had been mounted on wheels. 

1940 – The British completed the evacuation of 300,000 troops at Dunkirk, France. 

1942 – The Battle of Midway began. It was the first major victory for America over Japan during World War II. The battle ended on June 6 and ended Japanese expansion in the Pacific. 

1943 – In Argentina, Juan Peron took part in the military coup that overthrew Ramon S. Castillo. 

1944 – The U-505 became the first enemy submarine captured by the U.S. Navy. 

1944 – During World War II, the U.S. Fifth Army entered Rome, which began the liberation of the Italian capital.

1944 – “Leonidas Witherall” was first broadcast on the Mutual Broadcasting System. 

1946 – Juan Peron was installed as Argentina’s president. 

1947 – The House of Representatives approved the Taft-Hartley Act. The legislation allowed the President of the United States to intervene in labor disputes. 

1954 – French Premier Joseph Laniel and Vietnamese Premier Buu Loc initialed treaties in Paris giving “complete independence” to Vietnam. 

1960 – The Taiwan island of Quemoy was hit by 500 artillery shells fired from the coast of Communist China. 

1974 – The Cleveland Indians had “Ten Cent Beer Night”. Due to the drunken and unruly fans the Indians forfeited to the Texas Rangers. 

1974 – Sally Murphy became the first woman to qualify as an aviator with the U.S. Army. 

1984 – For the first time in 32 years, Arnold Palmer failed to make the cut for the U.S. Open golf tournament. 

1985 – The U.S. Supreme Court upheld a lower court ruling striking down an Alabama law that provided for a daily minute of silence in public schools. 

1986 – Jonathan Jay Pollard, a former Navy intelligence analyst, pled guilty in Washington to spying for Israel. He was sentenced to life in prison. 

1986 – The California Supreme Court approved a law that limited the liability of manufacturers and other wealthy defendants. It was known as the “deep pockets law.” 

1989 – In Beijing, Chinese army troops stormed Tiananmen Square to crush the pro-democracy movement. It is believed that hundreds, possibly thousands, of demonstrators were killed. 

1992 – The U.S. Postal Service announced that people preferred the “younger Elvis” stamp design in a nationwide vote. 

1998 – George and Ira Gershwin received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. 

2003 – The U.S. House of Representatives passed a bill that would ban “partial birth” abortions with a 282-139 vote. 

2003 – Amazon.com announced that it had received more than 1 million orders for the book “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.” The released date was planned for June 21. 

2008 – The United Kingdom and Canada became the first countries to be able to buy and rent films at the iTunes Store.