History Thread...

[romad1]

So today was our final rec game for the season.  Its Virginia so its a goddamn oven and the field (in Mclean, VA of all places) does not have dugouts.  And the fence is so high you can't put a canopy over the benches.  So, as my girls are warming up I tell them to remember D-Day and remember that not because of the history but that it was in Normandy where its a nice misty cool summer and to think of the cool sea breezes.  

[gehringer_2]

3 hours ago, romad1 said:

So today was our final rec game for the season.  Its Virginia so its a goddamn oven and the field (in Mclean, VA of all places) does not have dugouts.  And the fence is so high you can't put a canopy over the benches.  So, as my girls are warming up I tell them to remember D-Day and remember that not because of the history but that it was in Normandy where its a nice misty cool summer and to think of the cool sea breezes.  

they must think you are straight out of central casting.....

[CMRivdogs]

 

[CMRivdogs]

June 7

https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/june-7?cmpid=email-hist-tdih-2026-0607-06072026&om_rid=&~campaign=hist-tdih-2026-0607

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On June 7, 1913, Hudson Stuck, an Alaskan missionary, leads the first successful ascent of Denali (formerly known as Mt. McKinley), the highest point on the North American continent at 20,320 feet.

Stuck, an accomplished amateur mountaineer, was born in London in 1863. After moving to the United States, in 1905 he became archdeacon of the Episcopal Church in Yukon, Alaska. Stuck traveled Alaska’s difficult terrain to preach to villagers and establish schools.

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On June 7, 1776, Richard Henry Lee of Virginia introduces a resolution for independence to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia; John Adams seconds the motion.

Lee’s resolution declared: “That these United Colonies are, and of right out to be, free and independent States, that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved; that measures should be immediately taken for procuring the assistance of foreign powers, and a Confederation be formed to bind the colonies more closely together.”

 

[CMRivdogs]

June 8

From Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Flint–Beecher_tornado

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At about 8:30 pm, on Monday evening, June 8, 1953, a tornado touched down near the intersection of W. Coldwater and North Linden roads, just north of Flint. Before the storm left Genesee County, 116 people died in the Beecher district. A one half mile wide track of destruction was left.

Most people living in the area were at home with the children in bed. By the time people heard the storm’s roar their houses were being torn apart.

The slow moving tornado wrecked 340 houses, severely damaged many others and injured 844 persons. The major damage was concentrated between Clio Road & N. Dort Hwy. This area contained mostly small homes with some businesses and a high school.

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On June 8, 1948, a hand-built aluminum prototype labeled “No. 1″ becomes the first vehicle to bear the name of one of the world’s leading luxury car manufacturers: Porsche.

The Austrian automotive engineer Ferdinand Porsche debuted his first design at the World’s Fair in Paris in 1900. The electric vehicle set several Austrian land-speed records, reaching more than 35 mph and earning international acclaim for the young engineer. He became general director of the Austro-Daimler Company (an outpost of the German automaker) in 1916 and later moved to Daimler headquarters in Stuttgart. Daimler merged with the Benz firm in the 1920s, and Porsche was chiefly responsible for designing some of the great Mercedes racing cars of that decade.

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1949 

Hollywood figures, including film stars Fredric March, John Garfield, Paul Muni, and Edward G. Robinson, are named in a FBI report as Communist Party members. Such reports helped to fuel the anticommunist hysteriain the United States during the late-1940s and 1950s.

The FBI report relied largely on accusations made by “confidential informants,” supplemented with some highly dubious analysis. It began by arguing that the Communist Party in the United States claimed to have “been successful in using well-known Hollywood personalities to further Communist Party aims.” The report particularly pointed to the actions of the Academy Award-winning actor Frederic March. Suspicions about March were raised by his activities in a group that was critical of America’s growing nuclear arsenal (the group included other well-known figures such as Helen Keller and Danny Kaye). March had also campaigned for efforts to provide relief to war-devastated Russia. The report went on to name several others who shared March’s political leanings: actor Edward G. Robinson; activist, actor and musician Paul Robeson; the writer Dorothy Parker; and a host of Hollywood actors, writers and directors.

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On June 8, 1966, the rival National Football League (NFL) and American Football League (AFL) announce that they will merge. The first “Super Bowl” between the two leagues took place at the end of the 1966 season, though it took until the 1970 season for the leagues to unite their operations and integrate their regular-season schedules.

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During the Six-Day War, Israeli aircraft and torpedo boats attack the USS Liberty in international waters off Egypt’s Gaza Strip. The intelligence ship, well-marked as an American vessel and only lightly armed, was attacked first by Israeli aircraft that fired napalm and rockets at the ship. The Liberty attempted to radio for assistance, but the Israeli aircraft blocked the transmissions. Eventually, the ship was able to make contact with the U.S. carrier Saratoga, and 12 fighter jets and four tanker planes were dispatched to defend the Liberty. When word of their deployment reached Washington, however, Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara ordered them recalled to the carrier, and they never reached the Liberty. The reason for the recall remains unclear.

Israel later apologized for the attack and offered $6.9 million in compensation, claiming that it had mistaken the Liberty for an Egyptian ship. However, Liberty survivors, and some former U.S. officials, believe that the attack was deliberate, staged to conceal Israel’s pending seizure of Syria’s Golan Heights, which occurred the next day. The ship’s listening devices would likely have overheard Israeli military communications planning this controversial operation. Captain McGonagle was later awarded the Medal of Honor for his heroic command of the Liberty during and after the attack.

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[romad1]

35 minutes ago, CMRivdogs said:

June 8

From Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Flint–Beecher_tornado

 

Fredrik March's performance in "The Best Years of Our Lives" is really under appreciated. 

 

[CMRivdogs]

The Pennsylvanians in Congress are also urged to concur with other delegates in seeking foreign assistance, in a swift pivot from the Assembly's previous stance. It meets on the second floor of Independence Hall, while one floor below them Congress is debating this very issue. 2/2

[CMRivdogs]

June 9

https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/june-9?cmpid=email-hist-tdih-2026-0609-06092026&om_rid=&~campaign=hist-tdih-2026-0609

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1973 

With a spectacular victory at the Belmont Stakes, Secretariat becomes the first horse since Citation in 1948 to win America’s coveted Triple Crown: the Kentucky Derby, the Preakness and the Belmont Stakes. In one of the finest performances in racing history, Secretariat, ridden by Ron Turcotte, completed the 1.5-mile race in 2 minutes and 24 seconds, a dirt-track record for that distance.

Secretariat was born at Meadow Stables in Doswell, Virginia, on March 30, 1970. He was sired by Bold Ruler, the 1957 Preakness winner, and foaled by Somethingroyal, which came from a Thoroughbred line known for its stamina. An attractive chestnut colt, he grew to over 16 hands high and was at two years the size of a three-year-old.

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1856 

In an extraordinary demonstration of resolve and fortitude, nearly 500 members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (often informally known as Mormons) leave Iowa City and head west for Salt Lake City carrying all their goods and supplies in two-wheeled handcarts. Of all the thousands of pioneer journeys to the West in the 19th century, few were more arduous than those undertaken by the so-called Handcart Companiesfrom 1856 to 1860.

The secular and religious leader of the religious sect, Brigham Young, had established Salt Lake City as the center of a new Utah sanctuary for the Latter-day Saints in 1847. In subsequent years, Young worked diligently to encourage and aid members who made the difficult overland trek to the Great Salt Lake. In 1856, however, a series of poor harvests left the church with only a meager fund to help immigrants buy wagons and oxen. Young suggested a cheaper mode of travel: “Let them come on foot with handcarts or wheelbarrows; let them gird up their loins and walk through and nothing shall hinder or stay them.”

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1954 

In a dramatic confrontation, Joseph Welch, special counsel for the U.S. Army, lashes out at Senator Joseph McCarthyduring hearings on whether communism has infiltrated the U.S. armed forces. Welch’s verbal assault—including the enduring question "Have you no sense of decency?"—marked the end of McCarthy’s power during the anticommunist hysteria of the Red Scare in America.

Senator McCarthy (R-Wisconsin) experienced a meteoric rise to fame and power in the U.S. Senate when he charged in February 1950 that “hundreds” of “known communists” were in the Department of State. In the years that followed, McCarthy became the acknowledged leader of the so-called Red Scare, a time when millions of Americans became convinced that communists had infiltrated every aspect of American life. Behind closed-door hearings, McCarthy bullied, lied, and smeared his way to power, destroying many careers and lives in the process. Prior to 1953, the Republican Party tolerated his antics because his attacks were directed against the Democratic administration of Harry S. Truman.

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On June 9, 1915, United States Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan resigns due to his concerns over President Woodrow Wilson’s handling of the crisis generated by a German submarine’s sinking of the British passenger liner Lusitania the previous month, in which 1,201 people—including 128 Americans—died.

Germany’s announcement in early 1915 that its navy was adopting a policy of unrestricted submarine warfare concerned many within the government and civilian population of the United States—which maintained a policy of strict neutrality during the first two years of World War I. The sinking of the Lusitania on May 7, 1915, caused an immediate uproar, as many believed Germany had sunk the British cruiser deliberately as a provocation to Wilson and the U.S.

 

[CMRivdogs]

June 10

https://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/june-10?cmpid=email-hist-tdih-2026-0610-06102026&om_rid=&~campaign=hist-tdih-2026-0610

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I1692 In Salem Village in the Massachusetts Bay Colony, Bridget Bishop, the first colonist to be tried in the Salem witch trials, is hanged after being found guilty of the practice of witchcraft.

Trouble in the small Puritan community began in February 1692, when nine-year-old Elizabeth Parris and 11-year-old Abigail Williams, the daughter and niece, respectively, of the Reverend Samuel Parris, began experiencing fits and other mysterious maladies. A doctor concluded that the children were suffering from the effects of witchcraft, and the young girls corroborated the doctor’s diagnosis. Under compulsion from the doctor and their parents, the girls named those allegedly responsible for their suffering.

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In the summer of 1752—possibly on the 10th of June—Benjamin Franklin flies a kite during a thunderstorm to collect ambient electrical charge in a Leyden jar, enabling him to demonstrate the connection between lightning and electricity. (Scholars debate the June 10 date, but agree it likely happened sometime in June of that year.) It is one of his most famous—and mythologized—experiments.

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On June 10, 1775, John Adams proposes to Congress, meeting in Philadelphia, that the men laying siege to Boston should be considered a Continental Army led by a general.

The men who had armed themselves and rushed to surround British forces in Boston following the Battle of Lexington and Concord were overwhelmingly from New England. However, John Adams, representing Massachusetts, realized that the military effort would only succeed if the British thought the colonies were united. To this end, Adams suggested the appointment of a Virginian, George Washington, to command the Continental forces, despite the fact that New Englanders were used to fighting in local militias under officers elected from among their own ranks.

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1967 The Six-Day War between Israel and its Arab neighbors ends with a United Nations-brokered cease-fire. The outnumbered Israel Defense Forces achieved a swift victory in the brief war, rolling over the Arab coalition and more than doubling the amount of territory under Israel’s control. The greatest fruit of victory lay in seizing the Old City of Jerusalem from Jordan; thousands of Jews wept while bent in prayer at the Second Temple’s Western Wall.

 

Edited 1 hour ago by CMRivdogs

[romad1]

Today is a bad day for massacres.   The movie Anthropoid is quite good if a bit friendly to the history on the first one.   The second one in Oradour-sur-Glane is like something out of a Mel Gibson movie (The Patriot) but this actually happened. 

1942: The Lidice Massacre

In a brutal act of retaliation for the assassination of top SS official Reinhard Heydrich, the Nazis destroyed the Czechoslovakian village of Lidice. All 173 men and boys over 16 were executed, while the women and children were deported to concentration camps. The tragedy is documented by the The History Place. [1, 2]

 

1944: The Oradour-sur-Glane Massacre

Four days after D-Day in France, soldiers from the Nazi SS Das Reich Division committed one of the worst single-day atrocities in Western Europe. They massacred 642 civilians—including 207 children and 245 women—in the French village of Oradour-sur-Glane. The village was never rebuilt and stands as a permanent memorial. You can read about the grim details on The History Place. [1, 2, 3]