Today is Friday, July 1, the 183rd day of 2016. There are 183 days left in the year. This is Canada Day.
Today's Highlight in History:
On July 1, 1966, the Medicare federal insurance program went into effect.
On this date:
In 1535, Sir Thomas More went on trial in England, charged with high treason for rejecting the Oath of Supremacy. (More was convicted, and executed.)
In 1863, the pivotal, three-day Civil War Battle of Gettysburg, resulting in a Union victory, began in Pennsylvania.
In 1867, Canada became a self-governing dominion of Great Britain as the British North America Act took effect.
In 1916, during World War I, France and Britain launched the Somme Offensive against the German army; the 4 1/2-month battle resulted in heavy casualties and produced no clear winner. Dwight D. Eisenhower married Mary ("Mamie") Geneva Doud in Denver.
In 1934, Hollywood began enforcing its Production Code subjecting motion pictures to censorship review.
In 1946, the United States exploded a 20-kiloton atomic bomb near Bikini Atoll in the Pacific.
In 1961, Diana, the princess of Wales, was born in Sandringham, England. (She died in a 1997 car crash in Paris at age 36.)
In 1974, the president of Argentina, Juan Peron, died; he was succeeded by his wife, Isabel Martinez de Peron.
In 1980, "O Canada" was proclaimed the national anthem of Canada.
In 1991, President George H.W. Bush nominated federal appeals court judge Clarence Thomas to the Supreme Court, beginning an ultimately successful confirmation process marked by allegations of sexual harassment. The Warsaw Pact formally disbanded. Actor Michael Landon, 54, died in Malibu, California.
In 1996, actress Margaux Hemingway was found dead in her Santa Monica, California, apartment; she was 42.
In 2004, actor Marlon Brando died in Los Angeles at age 80.
Ten years ago: Thunderstorms forced NASA to call off the launch of Discovery, delaying the first space shuttle flight in a year. (Discovery was launched three days later, on the Fourth of July.) A huge car bomb exploded at a bustling outdoor market in a Shiite (SHEE'-eyet) district of Baghdad, killing more than 60 people.
Five years ago: Leon Panetta took over as U.S. secretary of defense after 2½ years as director of the CIA. Six weeks after ex-California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger revealed that he'd fathered a child with a member of his household staff, Maria Shriver filed divorce papers seeking to end their 25-year marriage. The Minnesota state government shut down after legislators could not agree on a budget; the shutdown lasted nearly three weeks. The NBA locked out its players, a long-expected move that put the 2011-12 season in jeopardy. (The lockout ended in Dec. 2011 with the adoption of a new collective bargaining agreement.)
One year ago: After more than a half-century of hostility, the United States and Cuba declared they would reopen embassies in each other's capitals, marking a historic full restoration of diplomatic relations between the Cold War foes. Episcopalians voted overwhelmingly at their General Convention in Salt Lake City to allow religious weddings for same-sex couples. San Francisco resident Kate Steinle, 32, was fatally shot in the back while walking along the city's popular waterfront; shooting suspect Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez, a Mexican national who was in the U.S. illegally, pleaded not guilty to second-degree murder in a case that rekindled the national debate over illegal immigration.
