TODAY’S HISTORY LESSON: JUNE 14
1381 The Peasants’ Revolt, led by Wat Tyler, climaxes when rebels plunder and burn the Tower of London and kill the Archbishop of Canterbury.
1642 Massachusetts passes the first compulsory education law in the colonies.
1775 The Continental Army was founded by the Second Continental Congress for purposes of common defense. This event is considered to be the birth of the United States Army. On June 15, George Washington was appointed commander-in-chief.
1777 The Continental Congress in Philadelphia adopted the “Stars and Stripes” as the national flag of the United States. The Flag Resolution stated “Resolved: that the flag of the United States be made of thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; that the union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing a new Constellation.” On May 20, 1916, President Woodrow Wilson officially proclaimed June 14 “Flag Day” as a commemoration of the “Stars and Stripes.”
1789 Captain William Bligh of the HMS Bounty arrives in Timor in a small boat. He had been forced to leave his ship when his crew mutinied.
1846 A group of settlers declare California to be a republic.
1893 The city of Philadelphia observes the first Flag Day.
1922 Warren G. Harding became the first U.S. president to be heard on radio. The event was the dedication of the Francis Scott Key memorial at Fort McHenry.
1927 Nicaraguan President Porfirio Diaz signs a treaty with the U.S. allowing American intervention in his country.
1932 Representative Edward Eslick dies on the floor of the House of Representatives while pleading for the passage of the bonus bill.
1940 Auschwitz concentration camp opens in Nazi controlled Poland with Polish POWs (approx. 3 million would die within its walls)
1943 The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that schoolchildren could not be made to salute the U.S. flag if doing so conflicted with their religious beliefs.
1951 UNIVAC, the first computer built for commercial purposes, is demonstrated in Philadelphia by Dr. John W. Mauchly and J. Presper Eckert, Jr.
1954 Americans take part in the first nation-wide civil defense test against atomic attack.
1954 President Eisenhower signed the order inserting the words “under God” into the Pledge of Allegiance.
1982 Argentina surrenders to Great Britain, ending the 74-day Falklands Islands conflict
1985 Lebanese Shiite Moslem gunmen hijack TWA 847 after Athens’ takeoff
1990 The U.S. Supreme Court upheld police checkpoints that are used to examine drivers for signs of intoxication.
1995 Chechen rebels take 2,000 people hostage in a hospital in Russia.
2002 A large asteroid just misses the Earth. 2002 MN, a 73-meter lump, was three times closer to Earth than the Moon. It was first discovered three days after its closest approach.
REFERENCE: history.net, onthisday.com, thepeopleshistory.com, timeanddate.com, scopesys.com, on-this-day.com
