Monthly Archives: June 2012

1864 – Colorado Governor John Evans warned all Native Americans in the region to report to the Sand Creek Reservation or risk attack.  The announcement preceded the “Sand Creek Massacre.”

1916 – Actress Mary Pickford became the first cinematic performer to receive a million dollar contract, when she signed a deal that guaranteed her $250,000 per film.

1922 – The American Professional Football Association changed its name to name the National Football League.

1940 – TV cameras were used for the first time in a political convention as the Republicans convened in Philadelphia, PA.

1972 – Bernice Gera became first woman to umpire a baseball game when the Auburn Phillies and Geneva Rangers played.  She resigned just a few hours after the game, however, because male umpires refused to work with her.

1997 – The U.S. Air Force released a 231-page report officially dismissing claims of an alien spacecraft crash in Roswell, NM, nearly 50 years earlier.

1868 – Christopher L. Sholes of Wisconsin patented his “type-writer.”

1894 – Dr. Alfred Kinsey (The Kinsey Report, The Sexual Behavior in the Human Male) was born in Hoboken, NJ.

1910 – Playwright Jean Anouilh (Becket, Antigone) was born in Bordeaux, France.

1929 – Singer – songwriter June Carter Cash (Jackson, If I were a Carpenter, Ring of Fire) was born in Maces Spring, VA.

1931 – Wiley Post and Harold Gatty took off on a global airplane flight aboard the Winnie Mae.

Wiley Post (L) and Harold Gatty with the Winnie Mae.

1961 – The Antarctic Treaty, signed by twelve nations in 1959, took effect.  The treaty guaranteed that the continent of Antarctica would be used for peaceful, scientific purposes only. The twelve original signers of the treaty were Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Chile, France, Japan, New Zealand, Norway, South Africa, the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom and the United States.  Since that time, 28 other nations have signed the pact.

Flags of the Antarctic Treaty signatories

1972 – Title IX of the 1972 education amendments is enacted into law, prohibiting federally funded educational institutions from discriminating against students or employees based on gender.

1874 – Dr. Andrew Taylor Still began the first known practice of osteopathy.

1898 – Author Erich Maria Remarque (All Quiet on the Western Front) was born in Osnabruck, Germany.

1906 – Film director Billy Wilder (The Apartment, The Lost Weekend, Sunset Boulevard, Stalag 17, Witness for the Prosecution, The Seven Year Itch, Some Like it Hot, Sabrina, Irma La Douce, The Front Page) was born in Sucha, Austria – Hungary.

1942 – V-Mail, or Victory-Mail, was sent for the first time.  Used a special paper for letter writing during WWII, V-Mail was designed to reduce cargo space taken up by mail sent to and from members of the armed services.  The letters written on this special paper were opened at the post office, censored and reduced in size by photography.  One roll of film contained 1,500 letters.

1944 – President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the G.I. Bill into law, legislation designed to compensate returning members of the armed services for their efforts in World War II.

1964 – The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Henry Miller’s controversial book, Tropic of Cancer, could not be banned.