History of 25 June
1906 – Pittsburgh millionaire Harry Kendall Thaw, the son of coal and railroad baron William Thaw, shot and killed Stanford White. White, a prominent architect, had a tryst with Florence Evelyn Nesbit before she married Thaw. The shooting took place at the premiere of Mamzelle Champagne in New York.
1910 – The U.S. Congress authorized the use of postal savings stamps.
1917 – The first American fighting troops landed in France.
1920 – The Greeks took 8,000 Turkish prisoners in Smyrna.
1921 – Samuel Gompers was elected head of the AFL for the 40th time.
1938 – Gaelic scholar Douglas Hyde was inaugurated as the first president of the Irish Republic.
1941 – Finland declared war on the Soviet Union.
1946 – Ho Chi Minh traveled to France for talks on Vietnamese independence.
1948 – The Soviet Union tightened its blockade of Berlin by intercepting river barges heading for the city.
1950 – North Korea invaded South Korea initiating the Korean War.
1951 – In New York, the first regular commercial color TV transmissions were presented on CBS using the FCC-approved CBS Color System. The public did not own color TV at the time.
1959 – The Cuban government seized 2.35 million acres under a new agrarian reform law.
1959 – Eamon De Valera became president of Ireland at the age of 76.
1962 – The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the use of unofficial non-denominational prayer in public schools was unconstitutional.
1964 – U.S. President Lyndon Johnson ordered 200 naval personnel to Mississippi to assist in finding three missing civil rights workers.
1968 – Bobby Bonds (San Francisco Giants) hit a grand-slam home run in his first game with the Giants. He was the first player to debut with a grand slam.
1970 – The U.S. Federal Communications Commission handed down a ruling (35 FR 7732), making it illegal for radio stations to put telephone calls on the air without the permission of the person being called.
1973 – Erskine Childers Jr. became president of Ireland after the retirement of Eamon De Valera.
1973 – White House Counsel John Dean admitted that U.S. President Nixon took part in the Watergate cover-up.
1975 – Mozambique became independent. Samora Machel was sworn in as president after 477 years of Portuguese rule.
1981 – The U.S. Supreme Court decided that male-only draft registration was constitutional.
1985 – ABC’s “Monday Night Football” began with a new line-up. The trio was Frank Gifford, Joe Namath, and O.J. Simpson.
1985 – New York Yankees officials enacted the rule that mandated that the team’s bat boys were to wear protective helmets during all games.
1986 – The U.S. Congress approved $100 million in aid to the Contras fighting in Nicaragua.
1987 – Austrian President Kurt Waldheim visited Pope John Paul II at the Vatican. The meeting was controversial due to allegations that Waldheim had hidden his Nazi past.
1990 – The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the right of an individual, whose wishes are clearly made, to refuse life-sustaining medical treatment. “The right to die” decision was made in the Curzan vs. Missouri case.
1991 – The last Soviet troops left Czechoslovakia 23 years after the Warsaw Pact invasion.
1991 – The Yugoslav republics of Slovenia and Croatia declared their independence from Yugoslavia.
1993 – Kim Campbell took office as Canada’s first woman prime minister. She assumed power upon the resignation of Brian Mulroney.
1997 – The Russian space station Mir was hit by an unmanned cargo vessel. Much of the power supply was knocked out and the station’s Spektr module was severely damaged.
1997 – U.S. air pollution standards were significantly tightened by U.S. President Clinton.
1998 – The U.S. Supreme Court rejected the line-item veto thereby striking down presidential power to cancel specific items in tax and spending legislation.
1998 – The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that those infected with HIV are protected by the Americans With Disabilities Act.
1998 – Microsoft’s “Windows 98” was released to the public.
1999 – Germany’s parliament approved a national Holocaust memorial to be built in Berlin.
2000 – U.S. and British researchers announced that they had completed a rough draft of a map of the genetic makeup of human beings. The project was 10 years old at the time of the announcement.
2000 – A Florida judge approved a class-action lawsuit to be filed against America Online (AOL) on behalf of hourly subscribers who were forced to view “pop-up” advertisements.
2017 – The World Health Organization estimates that Yemen has over 200,000 cases of cholera.
Celebrating Birthday Today
- 1981 – Simon Ammann, Swiss ski jumper
- 1982 – Rain, South Korean singer, and actor
- 1982 – Mikhail Youzhny, a Russian tennis player
- 1983 – Todd Cooper, English swimmer
- 1983 – Marc Janko, Austrian footballer
- 1984 – Lauren Bush, American model, and fashion designer
- 1985 – Karim Matmour, Algerian footballer
- 1986 – Aya Matsuura, Japanese singer, and actress
- 1986 – Seda Tokatlıoglu, Turkish volleyball player
- 1988 – Jhonas Enroth, Swedish ice hockey player
- 1988 – Miguel Layun, Mexican footballer
- 1988 – Therese Johaug, Norwegian cross-country skier
- 1989 – Jack Cork, English footballer
- 1989 – Edgar Morais, Portuguese actor, director, producer, and screenwriter
- 1989 – Rafael Morais, Portuguese actor, director, and screenwriter
- 1990 – Andi Eigenmann, Filipino actress
- 1991 – Liisi Rist, Estonian cyclist
- 1991 – Anna Zaja, a German tennis player
- 1996 – Pietro Fittipaldi, Brazilian-American race car driver
- 1996 – Sione Matautia, Australian rugby league player
- 1996 – Lele Pons, Latina-American Internet personality
- 1998 – Kyle Chalmers, Australian swimmer
- 2006 – Mckenna Grace, American actress