Today’s Highlight in History:
On June 25, 1876, Lt. Col. Colonel George A. Custer and his 7th Cavalry were wiped out by Sioux and Cheyenne Indians in the Battle of the Little Bighorn in Montana.
On this date:
In 1938, the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 was enacted.
In 1942, Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower was designated Commanding General of the European Theater of Operations during World War II. Some 1,000 British Royal Air Force bombers raided Bremen, Germany.
In 1947, “The Diary of a Young Girl,” the personal journal of Anne Frank, a German-born Jewish girl hiding with her family from the Nazis in Amsterdam during World War II, was first published.
In 1950, war broke out in Korea as forces from the communist North invaded the South.
In 1962, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that recitation of a state-sponsored prayer in New York State public schools was unconstitutional.
In 1973, former White House Counsel John W. Dean began testifying before the Senate Watergate Committee, implicating top administration officials, including President Richard Nixon as well as himself, in the Watergate scandal and cover-up.
In 1982, 40 years ago, the film “Bladerunner” was released in theaters.
In 1990, the U.S. Supreme Court, in its first “right-to-die” decision, ruled that family members could be barred from ending the lives of persistently comatose relatives who had not made their wishes known conclusively.
In 1993, Kim Campbell was sworn in as Canada’s 19th prime minister, the first woman to hold the post.
In 1996, a truck bomb killed 19 Americans and injured hundreds at a U.S. military housing complex in Saudi Arabia.
In 2009, death claimed Michael Jackson, the “King of Pop,” in Los Angeles at age 50 and actor Farrah Fawcett in Santa Monica, California, at age 62.
In 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld nationwide tax subsidies under President Barack Obama’s health care overhaul in a 6-3 ruling that preserved health insurance for millions of Americans.
In 2016, Pope Francis visited Armenia, where he recognized the Ottoman-era slaughter of Armenians as a genocide, prompting a harsh rebuttal from Turkey.
Ten years ago: A divided U.S. Supreme Court threw out major parts of Arizona’s tough crackdown on people living in the U.S. without legal permission, while unanimously upholding the law’s most-discussed provision: requiring police to check the immigration status of those they stop for other reasons, but limiting the legal consequences.
Five years ago: In eastern Pakistan, an overturned oil tanker burst into flames, killing at least 150 people who had rushed to the scene to gather leaking fuel.
One year ago: Former Minneapolis police Officer Derek Chauvin was sentenced to 22 1/2 years in prison for the murder of George Floyd, whose dying gasps under Chauvin’s knee led to the biggest outcry against racial injustice in the U.S. in generations. Searchers used big machines and their hands to comb through a twisted, shifting heap of concrete and metal, a day after an oceanside condominium building near Miami collapsed into a smoldering pile of rubble, killing 98 people. The Justice Department sued Georgia over the state’s new election law, saying it was intended to deny Black voters equal access to the ballot. (The lawsuit is pending.)
Today’s Birthdays: Actor June Lockhart is 97. Civil rights activist James Meredith is 89. R&B singer Eddie Floyd is 85. Actor Barbara Montgomery is 83. Actor Mary Beth Peil (peel) is 82. Basketball Hall of Famer Willis Reed is 80. Singer Carly Simon is 77. Actor-comedian Jimmie Walker is 75. Actor-director Michael Lembeck is 74.
Rock singer Tim Finn is 70. Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor is 68. Rock musician David Paich (Toto) is 68. Actor Michael Sabatino is 67. Actor-writer-director Ricky Gervais (jer-VAYZ’) is 61. Actor John Benjamin Hickey is 59. Actor Erica Gimpel is 58. Basketball Hall of Famer Dikembe Mutombo (dih-KEHM’-bay moo-TAHM’-boh) is 56. Rapper-producer Richie Rich is 55. Actor Angela Kinsey is 51. Rock musician Mike Kroeger (KROO’-gur) (Nickelback) is 50. Rock musician Mario Calire is 48. Actor Linda Cardellini is 47. Actor Busy Philipps is 43. Jazz musician Joey Alexander is 19.
