The Almanac
Today is Monday, June 15, the 166th day of 2015 with 199 to follow. The
moon is waning. Morning stars are Mercury, Neptune and Uranus. Evening
stars Jupiter, Mars, Saturn and Venus. Those born on this date are
under the sign of Gemini. They include Prince Edward of England, son of
Edward III and known as the Black Prince, in 1330; Norwegian composer
Edvard Grieg in 1843; composer/orchestra leader David Rose in 1910;
artist Saul Steinberg in 1914; pianist Erroll Garner in 1921; U.S. Rep.
Morris Udall, D-Ariz., in 1922; New York Gov. Mario Cuomo in 1932;
country singer Waylon Jennings in 1937; baseball Hall of Fame member
Billy Williams in 1938 (age 77); singer/songwriter Harry Nilsson in
1941; Indian businessman Lakshmi Mittal in 1950 (age 65); actor Jim
Varney in 1949; actor Jim Belushi in 1954 (age 61); actor Julie Hagerty
in 1955 (age 60); baseball Hall of Fame member Wade Boggs in 1958 (age
57); actor Helen Hunt in 1963 (age 52); actor Courteney Cox in 1964
(age 51); actor Neil Patrick Harris in 1973 (age 43). On this date in
history: In 1215, under pressure from rebellious barons, England's King
John signed the Magna Carta, a crucial first step toward creating
Britain's constitutional monarchy. In 1752, Benjamin Franklin, in a
dangerous experiment, demonstrated the relationship between lightning
and electricity by flying a kite during a storm in Philadelphia. An
iron key suspended from the kite string attracted a lightning bolt. In
1785, two Frenchmen attempting to cross the English Channel in a
hot-air balloon were killed when their balloon caught fire and crashed.
It was the first fatal aviation accident. In 1846, the U.S. -Canadian
border was established. In 1877, Henry Ossian Flipper, born a slave in
Thomasville, Ga., became the first African-American cadet to graduate
from West Point. In 1904, the excursion steamboat General Slocum caught
fire on the East River in New York, killing 1,121 people. In 1944, U.S.
forces invaded the Japanese-oc'cup'ied Mariana Islands in World War II.
By day's end, a beachhead had been established on the island of Saipan.
In 1987, Richard Norton of Philadelphia and Calin Rosetti of West
Germany completed the first polar circumnavigation of Earth in a
single-engine propeller aircraft, landing in Paris after a 38,000-mile
flight. In 2007, a Mississippi jury convicted a reputed Ku Klux
Klansman, James Ford Seale, in the abductions and killings of two black
teenagers 43 years earlier. (Seale was sentenced to life in prison and
died in 2011.) In 2011, U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., shot in
the head in a Jan. 8 assassination attempt at a Tucson political
meeting, was released from a Houston rehabilitation hospital. In 2012,
the U.S. government announced an executive order by President Barack
Obama would allow hundreds of thousands of undocumented immigrants who
came to the United States as children to legally seek work permits and
obtain documents such as driver's licenses. Obama called it a temporary
stopgap measure that lifted the shadow of deportation from these young
people. In 2014, longtime radio host Casey Kasem ( American Top 40,
Casey's Top 40 ) died at a hospital in Gig Harbor, Wash. He was 82. In
sports, Germany's Martin Kaymer won the U.S. Open golf championship in
Pinehurst, N.C., by eight strokes and the San Antonio Spurs won their
fifth NBA championship, routing the Miami Heat 104-87, A thought for
the day: We must get the American public to look past the glitter,
beyond the showmanship, to the reality, the hard substance of things.
-- Mario Cuomo .
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