TODAY’S HISTORY LESSON – JUNE 5
1099 Members of the First Crusade witness an eclipse of the moon and interpret it as a sign they will recapture Jerusalem.
1637 American settlers in New England massacre a Pequot Indian village.
1794 The U.S. Congress prohibits citizens from serving in any foreign armed forces.
1851 Harriet Beecher Stowe publishes the first installment of Uncle Tom’s Cabin in The National Era.
1872 The Republican National Convention, the first major political party convention to include blacks, commences.
1884 Civil War hero Gen. William T. Sherman refused the Republican nomination for president with the words, “I will not accept if nominated and will not serve if elected.”
1922 The Supreme Court decides that Union organizations are liable for damage or injury caused during strikes. The decision was regarded as one of the biggest blows to labor unions.
1933 The United States went off the gold standard.
1947 Secretary of State George C. Marshall outlines “The Marshall Plan,” a program intended to assist European nations, including former enemies, to rebuild their economies.
1956 Premier Nikita Khrushchev denounces Josef Stalin to the Soviet Communist Party Congress.
1956 Elvis Presley first performs “Hound Dog” live on TV
1967 The Six-Day War between Israel and Egypt, Syria and Jordan begins.
1968 Sirhan Sirhan shoots Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. Kennedy after Kennedy’s victory in the pivotal California primary election.
1973 Doris A. Davis becomes the first African-American woman to govern a city in a major metropolitan area when she is elected mayor of Compton, California.
1975 Egypt reopened the Suez Canal to international shipping, eight years after it was closed because of the 1967 war with Israel.
1981 The first cases of AIDS are reported
The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention described five cases of a rare form of pneumonia, a deadly immune deficiency disease which later became known as AIDS. In 2000, more than 40 million people worldwide were affected by it.
1986 A federal jury in Baltimore convicted Ronald W. Pelton of selling secrets to the Soviet Union. Pelton was sentenced to three life prison terms plus 10 years.
** history.net, onthisday.com, infoplease.com, timeanddate.com, thepeoplehistory.com, on-this-day.com **
