Today is Friday, June 1, the 152nd day of 2018.
Today’s Highlights in History:
On June 1, 1968, the cult British television series “The Prisoner,” starring Patrick McGoohan as an ex-secret agent who finds himself trapped in a sinister, Orwellian village, had its American premiere on CBS. Author-lecturer Helen Keller, who earned a college degree despite being blind and deaf almost her entire life, died in Westport, Connecticut, at age 87.
On this date:
In 1533, Anne Boleyn, the second wife of King Henry VIII, was crowned as Queen Consort of England.
In 1792, Kentucky became the 15th state.
In 1796, Tennessee became the 16th state.
In 1813, the mortally wounded commander of the USS Chesapeake, Capt. James Lawrence, gave the order, “Don’t give up the ship” during a losing battle with the British frigate HMS Shannon in the War of 1812.
In 1868, James Buchanan, the 15th president of the United States, died near Lancaster, Pennsylvania, at age 77.
In 1927, Lizzie Borden, accused but acquitted of the 1892 ax murders of her father, Andrew, and her stepmother, Abby, died in Fall River, Massachusetts, at age 66.
In 1943, a civilian flight from Portugal to England was shot down by Germany during World War II, killing all 17 people aboard, including actor Leslie Howard.
In 1958, Charles de Gaulle became premier of France, marking the beginning of the end of the Fourth Republic.
In 1977, the Soviet Union formally charged Jewish human rights activist Anatoly Shcharansky with treason. (Shcharansky was imprisoned, then released in 1986; he’s now known as Natan Sharansky.)
In 1980, Cable News Network made its debut.
In 1997, Betty Shabazz, the widow of Malcolm X, was severely burned in a fire set by her 12-year-old grandson in her Yonkers, New York, apartment (she died three weeks later). The Chicago Tribune published a pretend commencement speech by columnist Mary Schmich (shmeech) which urged graduates to, among other things, “wear sunscreen” (the essay ended up being wrongly attributed online to author Kurt Vonnegut).
In 2009, Air France Flight 447, an Airbus A330 carrying 228 people from Rio de Janeiro to Paris, crashed into the Atlantic Ocean with the loss of everyone on board.
