Today is Tuesday, June 27, the 178th day of 2006. There are 187 days left in the year.
Today’s Highlight in History:
On June 27, 1950, President Truman ordered the Air Force and Navy into the Korean conflict following a call from the U.N. Security Council for member nations to help South Korea repel an invasion from the North.
On this date:
In 1844, Mormon leader Joseph Smith and his brother, Hyrum, were killed by a mob in Carthage, Ill.
In 1847, New York and Boston were linked by telegraph wires.
In 1893, the New York stock market crashed.
In 1944, during World War II, American forces completed their capture of the French port of Cherbourg from the Germans.
In 1957, more than 500 people were killed when Hurricane Audrey slammed through coastal Louisiana and Texas.
In 1969, patrons at the Stonewall Inn, a gay bar in New York’s Greenwich Village, clashed with police in an incident considered the birth of the gay rights movement.
In 1973, former White House counsel John W. Dean told the Senate Watergate Committee about an “enemies list” kept by the Nixon White House.
In 1980, President Carter signed legislation reviving draft registration.
In 1986, the International Court of Justice at The Hague ruled that the United States had broken international law and violated the sovereignty of Nicaragua by aiding the contras.
In 1991, Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall, the first black to sit on the nation’s highest court, announced his retirement.
Ten years ago: President Clinton and other Group of Seven leaders meeting in Lyon, France, pledged solidarity against terrorism following a truck bombing in Saudi Arabia that killed 19 Americans. A Dallas police officer was charged with trying to hire a hit man to kill football star Michael Irvin. (Johnnie Hernandez later pleaded guilty to solicitation of capital murder. He was sentenced to serve two concurrent six-year prison terms, and was paroled in 1998.)
Five years ago: The United Nations concluded a three-day summit on HIV/AIDS after adopting a blueprint which set tough targets for reducing infection rates and called for protecting the rights of infected people. Actor Jack Lemmon died in Los Angeles at age 76.
One year ago: The Supreme Court ruled, in a pair of 5-4 decisions, that displaying the Ten Commandments on government property is constitutionally permissible in some cases but not in others. BTK serial killer Dennis Rader pleaded guilty to 10 murders that spread fear across Wichita, Kan., beginning in the 1970s. (Rader later received multiple life sentences.) Wal-Mart heir John Walton died in a plane crash; he was 58. Civil War historian Shelby Foote died in Memphis, Tenn., at age 88.
Today’s Birthdays: Business executive Ross Perot is 76. The former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, retired Army General John Shalikashvili, is 70. Former Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt is 68. Singer-musician Bruce Johnston (The Beach Boys) is 64. Actress Julia Duffy is 55. Actress Isabelle Adjani is 51. Country singer Lorrie Morgan is 47. Actor Brian Drillinger is 46. Actor Yancey Arias is 35. Actor Tobey Maguire is 31. Gospel singer Leigh Nash is 30. Actress Madylin Sweeten is 15.
Thought for Today: “It is no simple matter to pause in the midst of one’s maturity, when life is full of function, to examine what are the principles which control that functioning.” — Pearl S. Buck, American author (1892-1973).