This is the weekend of Saturday, June 22, and Sunday, June 23, the 174th and 175th day of 2024. There are 191 days left in the year as of Sunday.
Saturday's Highlight in History:
On June 22, 1941, Nazi Germany launched Operation Barbarossa, a massive and ultimately ill-fated invasion of the Soviet Union that would prove pivotal to the Allied victory over the Axis Powers.
In 1940, during World War II, Adolf Hitler gained a stunning victory as France was forced to sign an armistice eight days after German forces overran Paris.
On this date:
In 1815, Napoleon Bonaparte abdicated for a second time as Emperor of the French.
In 1870, the United States Department of Justice was created.
In 1937, Joe Louis began his reign as world heavyweight boxing champion by knocking out Jim Braddock in the eighth round of their fight in Chicago.
In 1944, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, more popularly known as the "GI Bill of Rights."
In 1945, the World War II battle for Okinawa ended with an Allied victory.
In 1965, movie producer David O. Selznick ("Gone with the Wind") died in Los Angeles at age 63.
In 1970, President Richard Nixon signed an extension of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that lowered the minimum voting age to 18.
In 1977, John N. Mitchell became the first former U.S. Attorney General to go to prison as he began serving a sentence for his role in the Watergate cover-up.
In 1981, Mark David Chapman pleaded guilty to killing rock star John Lennon. Abolhassan Bani-Sadr was deposed as president of Iran.
In 1992, the U.S. Supreme Court, in R.A.V. v. City of St. Paul, unanimously ruled that "hate crime" laws that banned cross burning and similar expressions of racial bias violated free-speech rights.
In 1999, in a major upset at Wimbledon, top-ranked Martina Hingis lost in the opening round to Jelena Dokic, a 16-year-old qualifier ranked 129th.
In 2012, ex-Penn State assistant coach Jerry Sandusky was convicted by a jury in Bellefonte, Pennsylvania, on 45 counts of sexually assaulting 10 boys over 15 years.
In 2022, a powerful earthquake struck a rugged, mountainous region of eastern Afghanistan, flattening stone and mud-brick homes and killing at least 1,000 people.
Today's Birthdays: Actor Prunella Scales (TV: "Fawlty Towers") is 92. Singer-actor Kris Kristofferson is 88. Actor Klaus Maria Brandauer is 81. Fox News analyst Brit Hume is 81. Singer/producer Peter Asher (Peter and Gordon) is 80. Singer Howard "Eddie" Kaylan is 77. Singer-musician Todd Rundgren is 76. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., is 75. Actor Meryl Streep is 75. Actor Lindsay Wagner is 75. Singer Alan Osmond is 75. Actor Graham Greene is 72. Pop singer Cyndi Lauper is 71. Actor Chris Lemmon is 70. Rock musician Derek Forbes is 68. Rock musician Garry Beers (INXS) is 67. Rock musician Alan Anton (Cowboy Junkies) is 65. Actor Tracy Pollan is 64. Environmental activist Erin Brockovich is 64. Rock singer-musician Jimmy Somerville is 63. Basketball Hall of Famer Clyde Drexler is 62. Author Dan Brown is 60. Rock singer-musician Mike Edwards (Jesus Jones) is 60. Rock singer Steven Page is 54. Actor Alicia Goranson is 50. Actor-comedian Mike O'Brien (TV: "Saturday Night Live") is 48. TV personality/actor Jai Rodriguez is 45. Americana singer-songwriter John Moreland is 39. Pop singer Dinah Jane (Fifth Harmony) (TV: "The X Factor") is 27.
Sunday' Highlight in History: On June 23, 1972, President Richard Nixon signed into law Title IX, barring discrimination on the basis of sex for "any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance."
Also on this date:
In 1860, a congressional resolution authorized creation of the United States Government Printing Office, which opened the following year.
In 1888, abolitionist Frederick Douglass received one vote from the Kentucky delegation at the Republican convention in Chicago, effectively making him the first Black candidate to have his name placed in nomination for U.S. president.
In 1931, aviators Wiley Post and Harold Gatty took off from New York on a round-the-world flight that lasted eight days and 15 hours.
In 1947, the Senate joined the House in overriding President Harry S. Truman's veto of the Taft-Hartley Act, designed to limit the power of organized labor.
In 1956, Gamal Abdel Nasser was elected president of Egypt.
In 1967, President Lyndon B. Johnson, Soviet Premier Alexei Kosygin (ah-LEK'-say koh-SEE'-gihn) opened a three-day summit at Glassboro State College in New Jersey.
In 1969, Warren E. Burger was sworn in as chief justice of the United States by the man he was succeeding, Earl Warren.
In 1985, all 329 people aboard an Air India Boeing 747 were killed when the plane crashed into the Atlantic Ocean near Ireland because of a bomb authorities believe was planted by Sikh separatists.
In 1994, the movie "Forrest Gump," starring Tom Hanks as a simple yet kindhearted soul who had serendipitous brushes with greatness, was released by Paramount Pictures.
In 1995, Dr. Jonas Salk, the medical pioneer who developed the first vaccine to halt the crippling rampage of polio, died in La Jolla (HOY'-ah), California, at age 80.
In 2016, Britain voted to leave the European Union after a bitterly divisive referendum campaign, toppling Prime Minister David Cameron, who had led the campaign to keep Britain in the EU.
In 2020, the Louisville police department fired an officer involved in the fatal shooting of Breonna Taylor more than three months earlier, saying Brett Hankison had shown "extreme indifference to the value of human life" when he fired ten rounds into Taylor's apartment.
In 2021, after 13 years of near silence in the conservatorship that controlled her life and money, pop star Britney Spears told a judge in Los Angeles that the conservatorship controlled by her father and others had made her feel demoralized and enslaved, and that it should come to an end. (The judge would agree to that request in November 2021.)
In 2022, in a major expansion of gun rights, the Supreme Court said Americans have a right to carry firearms in public for self-defense.
Today's Birthdays: Author Richard Bach is 88. Singer Diana Trask is 84. Actor Ted Shackelford is 78. Actor Bryan Brown is 77. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas is 76. Musician Glenn Danzig is 69. "American Idol" ex-judge Randy Jackson is 68. Actor Frances McDormand is 67. Rock musician Steve Shelley (Sonic Youth) is 62. Golfer Colin Montgomerie is 61. Writer-director Joss Whedon is 60. R&B singer Chico DeBarge is 54. Actor Selma Blair is 52. French soccer manager and former player Zinedine Zidane is 52. Actor Joel Edgerton is 50. Rock singer KT Tunstall is 49. Singer-songwriter Jason Mraz is 47. Rapper Memphis Bleek is 46. NFL Hall of Famer LaDainian Tomlinson is 45. Actor Melissa Rauch ("The Big Bang Theory") is 43. Rock singer Duffy is 40.
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