D-DAY AND OTHER JUNE SIXTHS IN HISTORY

As we all observe the June 6th anniversary of the 1944 Allied landing at Normandy during World War II, Balladeer’s Blog takes a look at the events from other June 6ths in history.

1775 – In New York City, 100 Sons of Liberty rebels attacked British soldiers who were escorting five wagonloads of arms and other supplies. The Sons of Liberty won and seized the supplies. Lt. Col Marinus Willett led the Americans.

1780 – Hessian General Wilhelm Von Knyphausen’s 6,000 British-allied troops boarded boats in preparation for the next day’s attack on American forces in New Jersey for the indecisive Battle of Connecticut Farms.

1782 – In the Ohio Country, American Rebel Colonel William Crawford’s 500 men were defeated in the wilderness by 750 British, Shawnee, Ojibwe and Potawatomi troops as the Revolutionary War continued despite Cornwallis’ surrender the previous October.  

1787 – Franklin College, now part of Franklin & Marshall College, was founded in Lancaster, PA.

1813 – As the War of 1812 continued, British forces learned the password for the American troops at Stoney Creek, Ontario, Canada. That password, “Wil-Hen-Har”, as in the name of General (and later President) William Henry Harrison, enabled the British to take the Americans by surprise and win the battle in a rout.

1816 – The eruption of Indonesia’s Mount Tambora volcano earlier in the year spread so much ash and smoke into the atmosphere that this became known as “the year without a summer.” On June 6th, TEN INCHES OF SNOW fell in New England.

1822 – American surgeon William Beaumont began treating the bullet wound in the stomach of one Alexis St. Martin on Mackinac Island, MI. This was the springboard for the questionably ethical studies of that wound which made Beaumont the Father of Gastric Physiology. 

1831 – In Philadelphia, the 2nd U.S. National Black Convention was held.

1832 – The Philadelphia, Germantown and Norristown Railroad opened its “suburban railway hub” which linked the cities in their corporate name.  

1833 – Andrew Jackson became the very first American president to ride in a train.

1843 – The Fruitlands Agrarian Commune had just been established in Harvard, MA.

1844 – In Missouri, the heavy rains causing the Great Flood of 1844 were still falling.

1848 – The schooner Carnelia won the New York Yacht Club’s First Annual Regatta.

1849 – Fort Worth, TX was founded.

1856 – At the Democratic National Convention the party decided against renominating incumbent President Franklin Pierce, instead going with James Buchanan, who went on to win the election.

1861 – President Abraham Lincoln’s administration announced that the Union government would finance the armies of volunteers being organized throughout the north.

1862 – On the Mississippi River, the Battle of Memphis saw Union forces defeat the Confederate fleet, leading to the city’s surrender.

1864 – The Union Army defeated Confederate troops in the Battle of Old River Lake in Arkansas.

1882 – New York inventor Henry W. Seely patented his “electric iron” process, which resisted heat buildup. 

1889 – Fire destroyed twenty-five blocks in downtown Seattle. 

1890 – The United States Polo Association was formed in New York City.

1892 – Chicago’s South Side Elevated Railroad opened.

1896 – Frank Samuelsen and George Harbo began rowing from New York Harbor across the Atlantic and made it in a record fifty-five days.

1900 – Congress finally passed a civil code for the Territory of Alaska in response to the violence and other lawlessness that had raged over its Gold Rush in the past four years.

1904 – In Atlantic City, NJ the National Tuberculosis Association was founded.

1912 – The Novarupta Volcano on the Alaskan Peninsula erupted, lasting two and a half days and sending forth THIRTY TIMES the amount of magma of the much later Mount. St. Helens eruption.

1916 – East Cleveland, OH granted women the right to vote.

1918 – The Allied Nations won the Battle of Belleau Wood in World War One action.

1920 – Amid the now legendary “smoke filled room” power plays, the Republican National Convention nominated Warren G. Harding as their stooge candidate for president. Harding was notoriously the pawn of “the Ohio Gang” and presided over one of the most corrupt and scandal-plagued administrations in U.S. history. 

1921 – Negro League pitcher Bill Gatewood of the Detroit Stars threw for the first No-Hitter in the league’s history, defeating the Cuban Stars 4-0.   

1925 – Chrysler Corporation was founded in Detroit by Walter Chrysler. Also, American inventor Cyrus Avery put forth a plan for a highway system throughout the U.S.

1932 – The Revenue Act of 1932 created the first gasoline tax in the U.S. 

1933 – The first drive-in movie theater opened in Pennsauken, NJ.

1934 – The Securities and Exchange Act was signed into law by Democrat President Franklin Roosevelt to curb Wall Street abuses. 

1944 – Appropriately enough, Congress passed the G.I. Bill.

1958 – Ozzie Virgil became the Detroit Tigers’ first black player.

1966 – James Meredith became the first African American student to graduate from the University of Mississippi.

1968 – Courageous “loose cannon” Robert F. Kennedy, one of the most outspoken critics of America’s corrupt political establishment, died from an assassination attack in Los Angeles while campaigning for the Democrat nomination for president.

1971 – Willie Mays hit his record 22nd Extra Innings Home Run.

1974 – Julie Ann Junkin won the 47th Annual Spelling Bee. The winning word: hydrophyte.

1984 – America’s Space Shuttle Discovery was launched on its maiden flight.

2018 – De facto Third Party President Donald Trump pardoned African American Alice Marie Johnson, whom he later named his Pardon Czar in February of 2025 to help administrate pardons for deserving prisoners.