GOOD MORNING – TODAY IS SUNDAY, June 17, the 168th day of 2018 with 197 to follow. Sunrise in the Boston area is @ 5:05 and sunset is @ 8:23. The moon is waxing. The morning stars are stars are Jupiter, Mars, Mercury & Saturn. The evening stars are Neptune, Uranus & Venus.
ON THIS DAY IN: 0362 – Emperor Julian issued an edict banning Christians from teaching in Syria.
1579 – Sir Francis Drake claimed San Francisco Bay for England. (California)
1775 – The British took Bunker Hill outside of Boston.
1789 – The Third Estate in France declared itself a national assembly, and began to frame a constitution.
1799 – Napoleon Bonaparte incorporated Italy into his empire.
1837 – Charles Goodyear received his first patent. The patent was for a process that made rubber easier to work with.
1848 – Austrian General Alfred Windischgratz crushed a Czech uprising in Prague.
1854 – The Red Turban revolt broke out in Guangdong, China.
1856 – The Republican Party opened its first national convention in Philadelphia.
1861 – U.S. President Abraham Lincoln witnessed Dr. Thaddeus Lowe demonstrate the use of a hydrogen balloon.
1872 – George M. Hoover began selling whiskey in Dodge City, Kansas. The town had been dry up until this point.
1876 – General George Crook’s command was attacked and defeated on the Rosebud River by 1,500 Sioux and Cheyenne under the leadership of Crazy Horse.
1879 – Thomas Edison received an honorary degree of Doctor of Philosophy from the trustees of Rutgers College in New Brunswick, NJ.
1885 – The Statue of Liberty arrived in New York City aboard the French ship Isere.
1912 – The German Zeppelin SZ 111 burned in its hanger in Friedrichshafen.
1913 – U.S. Marines set sail from San Diego to protect American interests in Mexico.
1917 – The Russian Duma met in a secret session in Petrograd and voted for an immediate Russian offensive against the German Army. (World War I)
1924 – The Fascist militia marched into Rome.
1926 – Spain threatened to quit the League of Nations if Germany was allowed to join.
1928 – Amelia Earhart began the flight that made her the first woman to successfully fly across the Atlantic Ocean.
1930 – The Smoot-Hawley Tariff Bill became law. It placed the highest tariff on imports to the U.S.
1931 – British authorities in China arrested Indochinese Communist leader Ho Chi Minh.
1932 – The U.S. Senate defeated the bonus bill as 10,000 veterans massed around the Capitol.
1940 – The Soviet Union occupied Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia.
1940 – France asked Germany for terms of surrender in World War II.
1941 – WNBT-TV in New York City, NY, was granted the first construction permit to operate a commercial TV station in the U.S.
1942 – Yank, a weekly magazine for the U.S. armed services, began publication. The term “G.I. Joe” was first used in a comic strip by Dave Breger.
1942 – “Suspense” debuted on CBS Radio.
1944 – French troops landed on the island of Elba in the Mediterranean.
1944 – The republic of Iceland was established.
1950 – Dr. Richard H. Lawler performed the first kidney transplant in a 45-minute operation in Chicago, IL.
1953 – Soviet tanks fought thousands of Berlin workers that were rioting against the East German government.
1963 – The U.S. Supreme Court banned the required reading of the Lord’s prayer and Bible in public schools.
1965 – Twenty-seven B-52’s hit Viet Cong outposts but lost two planes in South Vietnam.
1969 – Boris Spasky became chess champion of the world after checkmating former champion Tigran Petrosian in Moscow.
1970 – North Vietnamese troops cut the last operating rail line in Cambodia.
1982 – Former U.S. President Richard M. Nixon was interviewed by Diane Sawyer on “The CBS Morning News.”
1985 – Judy Norton-Taylor was photographed for “Playboy” magazine.
1991 – The Parliament of South Africa repealed the Population Registration Act. The act had required that all South Africans for classified by race at birth.