ED DANAHUE

On this day in 1974, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled that President Nixon had to turn over subpoenaed White House tape recordings to the Watergate special prosecutor.

It was on this day in 1959.

On this day in 1847, Mormon leader Brigham Young and his followers arrived in the valley of the Great Salt Lake in present-day Utah.

Brigham Young
(June 1, 1801 – August 29, 1877)

    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
    
 
  The Apollo 11 astronauts splashed down safely in the Pacific Ocean 
  on this day in 1969.

United States President Richard Nixon was in the central Pacific
recovery area to welcome the Apollo 11 astronauts aboard the USS Hornet, prime recovery ship for the historic Apollo 11 lunar landing mission, on July 24, 1969. The Apollo 11 astronauts are, from left,
Neil Armstrong, Michael Collins and Buzz Aldrin. The crew was
quarantined after splashdown to ensure they did not bring back
any contamination from the moon.

CAMILLE BOHANNON

On this   day in 1972, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the death
penalty could constitute "cruel and unusual punishment." The
ruling prompted states to revise their capital punishment laws.

Israel removed barricades, re-unifying Jerusalem on this day in 1967.

On this day in 1995, the shuttle Atlantis and the Russian space
station Mir docked, forming the largest man-made satellite ever
to orbit the Earth.

Rosemary Clooney (May 23, 1928 – June 29, 2002)

Singer and actress Rosemary Clooney came to prominence
in the early 1950s with the song "Come On-a My House",
which was followed by other pop numbers such as "Botch-
a-Me", "Mambo Italiano", "Tenderly", "Half as Much", "Hey
There" and "This Ole House".

A long-time smoker, Clooney was diagnosed with lung cancer
at the end of 2001. Around this time, she gave one of her last
concerts in Hawaii, backed by the Honolulu Symphony Pops;
her last song was "God Bless America". Her final show was
at Red Bank New Jersey’s Count Basie Theater in December
2001. Despite surgery, she died six months later on June 29,
2002, at her Beverly Hills home. Her nephew, actor George
Clooney, was a pallbearer at her funeral, which was attended
by numerous stars.

Pallbearers carry the casket of Rosemary Clooney out of St. Patrick’s Church after funeral services in Maysville, Ky. Actor George Clooney,
at center.

Recorded live on November 16, 2001, Released on
November 19, 2001.

Katharine Houghton Hepburn (May 12, 1907 – June 29, 2003)

Actress Katharine Hepburn was a leading lady in Hollywood for more than
60 years. She appeared in a range of genres, from comedy to literary drama,
and she received four Academy Awards—a record for any performer—for
Best Actress. In 1999, Hepburn was named by the American Film Institute
as the greatest female star of Classic Hollywood Cinema.

In 1997, Katharine Hepburn had become very weak, was speaking and eating
very little, and it was feared she would die. She showed signs of dementia in
her final years. In May 2003, an aggressive tumor was found in Hepburn’s
neck. The decision was made not to medically intervene, and she died from
a cardiac arrest on June 29, 2003, a month after her 96th birthday at the
Hepburn family home in Fenwick, Connecticut.

1981

On this day in 1997, U.S. Air Force officials released a 231-page report
dismissing long-standing claims of an alien spacecraft crash in Roswell,
New Mexico, almost exactly 50 years earlier.

Public interest in Unidentified Flying Objects, or UFOs, began to flourish
in the 1940s, when developments in space travel and the dawn of the
atomic age caused many Americans to turn their attention to the skies.

The town of Roswell, located near the Pecos River in southeastern New
Mexico, became a magnet for UFO believers due to the strange events
of early July 1947, when ranch foreman W.W. Brazel found a strange,
shiny material scattered over some of his land. He turned the material
over to the sheriff, who passed it on to authorities at the nearby Air Force
base.

On July 8, Air Force officials announced they had recovered the wreckage
of a “flying disk.” A local newspaper (below) put the story on its front page,
launching Roswell into the spotlight of the public’s UFO fascination.

TIM MAGUIRE

The New York Times began publishing the "Pentagon Papers" on
this day in 1971. The articles were a secret study of America’s involvement in Vietnam.

On this day in 1967, Solicitor General Thurgood Marshall (left) was
nominated by President Lyndon B. Johnson (right) to become the
first black justice on the U.S. Supreme Court.

The landmark "Miranda v. Arizona" decision was issued by the U.S. Supreme Court on this day in 1966 . The decision ruled that criminal suspects had to be informed of their constitutional rights before
being questioned by police.

China’s Boxer Rebellion against foreigners and Chinese Christians erupted into violence on this day in 1900.

The unmanned U.S. space probe Pioneer 10 became the first
spacecraft to leave the solar system on this day in 1983. It was
launched in March 1972. The first up-close images of the planet
Jupiter were provided by Pioneer 10.

Benjamin David "Benny" Goodman
(May 30, 1909 – June 13, 1986)

Benny Goodman was a jazz clarinetist and bandleader
known as the "King of Swing”. He led some of the most
“popular musical groups in the mid-1930s. These bands
launched the careers of many major  jazz artists. Despite 

increasing health problems, he continued to play until his
death from a heart attack in New York City in 1986, at the
age of 77,

.

DAVID MELENDY

On this day in 1961, approximately 1,400 U.S.-supported Cuban
exiles invaded Cuba at the Bay of Pigs in an attempt to overthrow
Fidel Castro. It was an unsuccessful attack.

On this day in 1970, Apollo 13 returned to Earth safely after an on- 
board accident with an oxygen tank.

The crew members of Apollo 13—Fred Haise (left), Jim Lovell
(center), and Jack Swigert—step aboard the “USS Iwo Jima”
following splashdown and recovery operations in the south
Pacific Ocean.

Benjamin Franklin (January 17, 1706 – April 17, 1790)

Benjamin Franklin was one of the Founding Fathers of the United States. He
was a leading author, printer, political theorist, politician, freemason,
postmaster, scientist, inventor, humorist, civic activist, statesman, and
diplomat.

Franklin suffered from obesity throughout his middle-aged and later years,
which resulted in multiple health problems, particularly gout, which became
worse as he aged. In poor health during the signing of the US Constitution
in 1787, he was rarely seen in public from then until his death. Franklin
died from pleuritic attack  at his home in Philadelphia on April 17, 1790,
at age 84.

An Illustration of Benjamin Franklin on His Death Bed.

John Pierpont Morgan Sr. (April 17, 1837 – March 31, 1913)

J.P. Morgan was an American financier and banker who dominated
corporate finance and industrial consolidation in the United States
of America in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

The Ford Motor Company unveiled its new Mustang model on this
day in 1964 at the New York World’s Fair. Ford anticipated they
would sell around 100,000 units a year, and were somewhat
unprepared when they received 22,000 orders in the first day
alone!