June 6
June 6 is the 157th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (158th in leap years ), with 208 days remaining.
Events
1508 - Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor is defeated in Friulia by Venetian forces ; he is forced to sign a three-year truce and cede several territories to Venice
1513 - Italian Wars : Battle of Novara - Swiss troops defeat the French under Louis de la Tremoille , forcing the French to abandon Milan . Duke Massimiliano Sforza is restored.
1523 - Gustav Vasa is elected King of Sweden , marking the end of the Kalmar Union .
1654 - Christina , reigning queen of the Protestant nation Sweden , abdicates the throne and secretly converts to Catholicism . Charles X succeedes his abdicated cousin Queen Christina to the Swedish throne.
1683 - The Ashmolean Museum opens as the world's first university museum .
1752 - A devastating fire destroys one-third of Moscow , including 18,000 homes.
1809 - Sweden promulgates a new Constitution , which restores political power to the Riksdag of the Estates after 20 years of Enlightened absolutism .
1813 - War of 1812 : Battle of Stoney Creek - A British force of 700 under John Vincent defeat an American force three times its size under William Winder and John Chandler .
1833 - U.S. President Andrew Jackson becomes the first President to ride a train .
1844 - The Young Men's Christian Association (YMCA) is founded in London .
1857 - Sophia of Nassau marries the future King Oscar II of Sweden-Norway .
1859 - Queen Victoria signs Letters Patent making Queensland into a separate colony .
1862 - American Civil War : Battle of Memphis - Union forces capture Memphis, Tennessee from the Confederates .
1882 - More than 100,000 inhabitants of Bombay are killed as a cyclone in the Arabian Sea pushes huge waves into the harbour.
1912 - Eruption of Novarupta in Alaska begins. Second largest volcanic eruption in historic time.
1925 - The Chrysler Corporation is founded by Walter Percy Chrysler .
1932 - The Revenue Act of 1932 is enacted, creating the first gas tax in the United States , at a rate of 1 cent per gallon sold.
1933 - The first drive-in theater opens, in Camden, New Jersey .
1934 - New Deal : U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs the Securities Act of 1933 into law, establishing the Securities and Exchange Commission .
1944 - World War II : Battle of Normandy begins - Operation Overlord , code named D-Day , commences with the landing of 155,000 Allied troops on the beaches of Normandy in France . The allied soldiers quickly break through the Atlantic Wall and push inland in the largest amphibious military operation in history.
1946 - The Basketball Association of America is formed in New York City .
1956 - David Marshall , Singapore 's first Chief Minister, resigns.
1962 - The Beatles audition for EMI Records .
1964 - Under a temporary order, the rocket launches at Cuxhaven , Germany are terminated, though they never resume.
1966 - James Meredith , civil rights activist, is shot while trying to march across Mississippi .
1971 - Soyuz program : Soyuz 11 launches.
1971 - The Ed Sullivan Show 1972 - David Bowie releases the classic album The Rise and Fall of Ziggy Stardust and the Spiders from Mars 1974 - A new Instrument of Government is promulgated making Sweden a parliamentary monarchy .
1981 - A passenger train travelling between Mansi and Saharsa , India , jumps the tracks at a bridge crossing the Bagmati river . The government places the official death toll at 268 plus another 300 missing; however, it is generally believed that the actual figure is closer to 1,000 killed.
1982 - 1982 Lebanon War begins: Forces under Israeli Defense Minister Ariel Sharon invade southern Lebanon in their "Operation Peace for the Galilee," eventually reaching as far north as the capital Beirut .
1983 - Bradley Jay is born
1984 - The Indian Army attacks the Golden Temple in Amritsar in an effort to flush out terrorists, following an order from Indira Gandhi . Official casualities are 576 combatants killed and 335 wounded; independent observers estimate that thousands of unarmed Sikh civilians are also killed in the crossfire.
1985 - The grave of "Wolfgang Gerhard" is exhumed in Embu , Brazil ; the remains found are later proven to be those of Josef Mengele , Auschwitz ' "Angel of Death". Mengele is thought to have drowned while swimming in February 1979 .
1990 - U.S. District court judge Jose Gonzales rules that the rap album As Nasty As They Wanna Be 2 Live Crew violates Florida 's obscenity law; he declares that the predominant subject matter of the record is "directed to the 'dirty' thoughts and the loins, not to the intellect and the mind."
1991 - George and Barbara Loeb , members of the Church of the Creator , are arrested and charged with murder.
1991 - Former Diff'rent Strokes Dana Plato is given a six-year suspended sentence for robbing a Las Vegas video store five weeks earlier.
1993 - Mongolia holds its first direct presidential elections .
1996 - The sons of Darlie Routier , Damon and Devon, are stabbed to death in their Rowlett, Texas home. Their mother was later convicted of the murder .
1997 - New Jersey teenager Melissa Drexler gives birth to a healthy baby in a bathroom stall during her senior prom, then strangles the child with a plastic bag and stashes the corpse in the trash.
1999 - At the Putim maximum security prison in Brazil , 345 prisoners run from the main gate in the largest jailbreak in Brazilian history, marking the 10th escape for the 3-year old facility. In the ensuing manhunt, two fugitives are killed and five innocent bystanders are accidentally jailed.
2002 - The United States House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee announces it is probing Martha Stewart 's ImClone stock sales.
2002 - Internet cartoon "Weebl and Bob" debuts.
2002 - A near-Earth asteroid estimated at 10 metres diameter explodes over the Mediterranean Sea . The resulting explosion is estimated to have a force of 26 kilotons , slightly more powerful than the Nagasaki atomic bomb .
Births
1502 - King John III of Portugal (d. 1557 )
1553 - Bernardino Baldi , Italian mathematician (d. 1617 )
1599 - Diego Velázquez , Spanish painter (d. 1660 )
1606 - Pierre Corneille , French dramatist (d. 1648 )
1622 - Claude-Jean Allouez , French Jesuit missionary and explorer (d.1857 )
1755 - Nathan Hale , American writer, patriot (d. 1776 )
1756 - John Trumbull , American painter (d. 1843 )
1799 - Alexander Pushkin Russian poet (d. 1837 )
1810 - Friedrich Wilhelm Schneidewin , German classical scholar (d. 1856 )
1829 - Shusaku Honinbo , Japanese Go player (d. 1862 )
1843 - Friedrich Hölderlin , German poet (b. 1770 )
1850 - Karl Ferdinand Braun , German physicist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in physics 1909 (d. 1918 )
1857 - Aleksandr Lyapunov , Russian mathematician (d. 1918 )
1862 - Henry John Newbolt , English author (d. 1938 )
1868 - Robert Falcon Scott , English explorer (d. 1912 )
1872 - Tsarina Alexandra of Russia (d. 1918 )
1875 - Thomas Mann , German novelist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in literature 1929 (d. 1955 )
1890 - Ted Lewis , American bandleader (d. 1971 )
1898 - Ninette de Valois , Irish dancer (d. 2001 )
1901 - Sukarno , first President of independent Indonesia (d. 1970 )
1903 - Aram Khachaturian , Armenian composer (d. 1978 )
1906 - Max August Zorn , mathematician (d. 1993 )
1907 - Bill Dickey , baseball star, coach, manager, scout (d. 1993 )
1916 - Henriette Roosenburg , Dutch journalist (d. 1972 )
1926 - Klaus Tennstedt , German conductor (d. 1998 )
1934 - King Albert II of Belgium
1934 - Gilbert Cates , producer, director
1936 - Levi Stubbs , American musician (The Four Tops )
1939 - Louis Andriessen , Dutch composer
1939 - Gary U.S. Bonds , musician
1940 - Larry Lujack , American disc jockey
1945 - David Dukes , American actor (d. 2000 )
1947 - David Blunkett , British Labour Party politician
1954 - Harvey Fierstein , American actor
1956 - Björn Borg , Swedish tennis player
1960 - Gary Graham , American actor
1960 - Steve Vai , American musician
1961 - Tom Araya , Chilean musician (Slayer )
1963 - Wolfgang Drechsler , German social scientist
1978 - Carl Barat , singer/guitarist (The Libertines )
1978 - Judith Barsi , Child actress (d. 1988 )
Deaths
68 - Nero , Emperor of Rome (suicide ) (b. 37 )
1557 - John III of Portugal (b. 1502 )
1799 - Patrick Henry , American revolutionary (b. 1736 )
1829 - Shanawdithit , last known Beothuk Indian of Newfoundland
1832 - Jeremy Bentham , English philosopher (b. 1748 )
1843 - Friedrich Hölderlin , German poet, novelist, and dramatist (b. 1770 )
1865 - William Quantrill , Confederate raider (b. 1837 )
1878 - Robert Stirling , Scottish inventor (b. 1790 )
1881 - Henri Vieuxtemps , Belgian composer (b. 1820 )
1891 - Sir John A. Macdonald , first Prime Minister of Canada (b. 1815 )
1916 - Yuan Shikai , Chinese military official and politician (b. 1859 )
1922 - Lillian Russell , American actress
1941 - Louis Chevrolet , American automotive pioneer, race car driver (b. 1878 )
1946 - Gerhart Hauptmann , Silesian dramatist (b. 1862 )
1961 - Carl Jung , Swiss psychologist (b. 1875 )
1968 - Robert F. Kennedy , former United States Attorney General and Senator from New York (b. 1925 )
1976 - J. Paul Getty , American industrialist (b. 1892 )
1979 - Jack Haley , American actor (b. 1898 )
1981 - Carleton S. Coon , American anthropologist (b. 1904 )
1984 - A. Bertram Chandler , Australian author (b. 1912 )
1991 - Stan Getz , American musician, composer (b. 1927 )
1996 - Damon and Devon Routier , sons of Darlie Routier
1999 - Anne Haddy , Australian actress (b. 1930 )
2002 - Hans Janmaat , controversial far-right politician in the Netherlands
Holidays and observances
External links
June 5 - June 7 - May 6 - July 6 -- listing of all days
Top Encyclopedia Articles
