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.
1645 Oliver Cromwell’s army routs the king’s army at Naseby.
1775 The U.S. Army is founded when the Continental Congress authorizes the muster of troops.
1777 The Continental Congress authorizes the “stars and stripes” flag for the new United States.
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.
1834 Cyrus Hall McCormick received a patent for his reaping machine.
1834 Isaac Fischer Jr. patented sandpaper.
1846 A group of settlers declare California to be a republic.
1907 Women in Norway win the right to vote.
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 German forces occupy Paris.
1943 In the case of West Virginia Board of Education v. Barnette, the United States Supreme Court decided that schoolchildren cannot be forced to give a salute to the United States flag.
1949 The State of Vietnam is formed.
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 a bill to add the words “under God” to the United States Pledge of Allegiance.
1967 The Mariner 5 spacecraft raced a heavier Soviet probe toward Venus to penetrate with electronic fingers the planet’s mysterious veil of clouds and help scientists see if Venus is a fit place to live, In the end the glory did go the Soviet Probe which did reach Venus 1 day ahead of Mariner 5.
1973 Dr. Benjamin Spock (famous author of The Common Sense Book of Baby and Child Care) and three others, including Yale University Chaplain William Sloane Coffin, Jr., are convicted of conspiring to aid, abet, and counsel draft registrants to violate the Selective Service Act.
1989 Former U.S. President Reagan received an honorary knighthood from Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II.
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.
** history.net, onthisday.com, infoplease.com, timeanddate.com, thepeoplehistory.com, on-this-day.com **
