Today in History for June 20:
On this date:
In 1529, Clement VII and Holy Roman Emperor Charles V signed the "Peace of Barcelona," which ended attacks on Rome by the Lutheran armies.
In 1599, the "Synod of Diamper" reunited a church in India with Rome. Discovered in 1498 by Portuguese explorers, the isolated pocket of worshippers traced their Christian origins back to the missionary efforts of the Apostle Thomas.
In 1756, a group of British soldiers in India were captured and imprisoned in a suffocating cell that became known as the "Black Hole of Calcutta." Most of the men died.
In 1837, Queen Victoria ascended to the British throne following the death of her uncle, King William IV. During her 64-year reign, the British Empire reached the height of its power.
In 1872, the Public Archives of Canada were created.
In 1877, more than two-thirds of Saint John, N.B., was destroyed by fire.
In 1882, the Conservatives under Sir John A. Macdonald won a federal election.
In 1893, a New Bedford, Mass., jury found Lizzie Borden, an unmarried Sunday school teacher, not guilty of the axe murders of her father and stepmother.
In 1923, Mexican revolutionary Pancho Villa was assassinated on his farm.
In 1940, the Canadian government passed a conscription law.
In 1942, a Japanese submarine fired 25 to 30 shells at the lighthouse at Estevan Point, B.C. Thanks to poor aim, there were no casualties and little damage from the first shelling of Canadian territory since 1812.
In 1943, the New Quebec Crater was sighted in Ungava. At 403 metres deep and nearly 11 kilometres wide, it is one of the world's largest craters.
In 1945, the Canadian government issued its first family allowance cheques.
In 1946, Montreal communist MP Fred Rose was sentenced to six years in prison and barred from the House of Commons for spying for the Soviet Union.
In 1947, Benjamin "Bugsy" Siegel was shot dead at the Beverly Hills mansion of his girlfriend, Virginia Hill, apparently at the order of mob associates.
In 1948, Ed Sullivan's TV variety show, "Talk of the Town," premiered on CBS. Among the guests on the first show was the comedy team of Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis. It was later renamed "The Ed Sullivan Show" and ran until 1971.
In 1955, the longest eclipse of the Sun ever recorded lasted seven minutes and eight seconds, as seen from the Philippines. The maximum time an eclipse can take is seven minutes, 31 seconds.
In 1959, 35 fishermen died in a storm in the Northumberland Strait between New Brunswick and P.E.I.
In 1960, Floyd Patterson won a rematch with Sweden's Ingemar Johansson to become the first two-time winner of the world heavyweight boxing title.
In 1963, the U.S. and the Soviet Union agreed to set up a superpower hotline.
In 1964, "Northern Dancer" won the Queen's Plate in Toronto. He's the only horse to win both the Plate and the Kentucky Derby.
In 1966, Canada and the Soviet Union signed what was then the world's biggest wheat deal. It involved 336 million bushels of wheat and flour.
In 1967, boxer Cassius Clay, later Muhammad Ali, was convicted of refusing induction into the U.S. army. He was sentenced to five years in prison and fined $10,000. The verdict was eventually overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court, but Ali was kept out of the ring until 1970.
In 1985, Rene Levesque announced his resignation as Quebec premier and leader of the Parti Quebecois after nearly nine years in office and two election wins.
In 1988, Lucien Bouchard won a byelection for the federal Tories in Lac St. Jean. Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, Bouchard's close friend at the time, had made more than $1 billion worth of promises in the Quebec riding. Bouchard left the Conservative party following the 1990 failure of the Meech Lake constitutional accord and formed the Bloc Quebecois. It became the Official Opposition following the 1993 general election. Bouchard left federal politics in 1995 to become premier of Quebec. He left politics entirely in 2001.
In 1991, German legislators voted to return the seat of the national government to Berlin.
In 1992, Czech and Slovak leaders agreed to prepare for the split of Czechoslovakia into two countries. The Czech Republic and Slovakia came into being on Jan. 1st, 1993.
In 1996, Canadian astronaut Bob Thirsk began an 18-day mission aboard the space shuttle "Columbia." Thirsk, a doctor and engineer, did experiments on life and microgravity sciences. (In June 2009, he began a six-month stay on the International Space Station.)
In 1997, Reform leader Preston Manning announced he would move into Stornaway, the 34-room mansion of the official Opposition leader. During the campaign for the June 2nd election, Manning suggested the official residence be turned into a bowling alley or a bingo parlour.
In 1999, Golfer Payne Stewart won his second U.S. Open title, by one stroke over Phil Mickelson. (A few months later, Stewart died when a Learjet he was travelling in lost cabin pressure and all aboard died from lack of oxygen. The plane eventually ran out of fuel and crashed in South Dakota.)
In 2000, the French conglomerate Vivendi announced it would buy Montreal-based Seagram for US$33.6 billion.
In 2007, three Canadian soldiers were killed when their open-top all-terrain military vehicle hit a roadside bomb near a forward operating base, bringing the Canadian military death toll in Afghanistan to 60. The soldiers were Frederick Bouzane, Joel Wiebe, and Christos Karigiannis.
In 2008, Montreal philosopher Charles Taylor and Toronto molecular biologist Anthony Pawson became the first two Canadians to win Japan's prestigious $460,000 Kyoto Prize for lifetime achievements in their academic fields.
In 2009, George Gillett confirmed he had reached an agreement in principle to sell the Montreal Canadiens to the Molson brewing family, which would take control of the illustrious franchise for the third time in its history.
In 2011, the Bank of Canada unveiled its new polymer bank notes to replace the paper-cotton bills. In November, the first bill to go plastic was the $100 note. The $50 and $20 notes followed in early 2012, while the rest of the plastic money went into circulation by early 2013.
In 2011, the Consumer Product Safety Act, which gives the federal government the power to remove unsafe products from store shelves, took effect after years of hold-ups.
In 2013, rain-swollen rivers burst their banks across southern Alberta, prompting more than a dozen towns to declare states of emergency. The province estimated more than 100,000 people in 30 communities were affected by what Premier Allison Redford later called the worst natural disaster in Alberta's history, with damage pegged at more than $6 billion.
In 2013, the Miami Heat won their second straight title, defeating the San Antonio Spurs 95-88 in Game 7 of the NBA Finals.
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(The Canadian Press)
The Canadian Press
