June 17th is

Apple Strudel Day

Dollars Against Diabetes Day *

Eat Your Vegetables Day

World Juggling Day *

World Tessellation Day *

World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought *

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MORE! Charles Gounod, Susan B. Anthony and M.C. Escher, click

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WORLD FESTIVALS AND NATIONAL HOLIDAYS

Argentina – Paso a la Inmortalidad del Gral de Güemes
(immortal General Don Martín Miguel de Güemes)

British Commonwealth – 
Queen Elizabeth II’s Birthday/Trooping of the Colours

El Salvador – Día de la Padre

Finland – Sodankylä:
Midnight Sun Film Festival

Iceland – Independence Day

Spain – Barcelona:
Sónar Music, Creativity & Technology

Switzerland – Basel:
Art Basel on the Münsterplatz

United Kingdom – Liverpool:
Africa Oyé Music Festival

United States – Bunker Hill Day

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On This Day in HISTORY

1244 – After the Disputation of Paris, a commission of Christian theologians condemns the Talmud to be burned; twenty-four carriage loads of Jewish religious manuscripts are set on fire in the streets of Paris

1462 – After the Ottoman Sultan Mehmed II (the Conqueror) invades Wallachia to put a stop to Vlad III the Impaler’s attacks on the Turks, Vlad launches a surprise night attack in an attempt to kill the Sultan

1579 – Sir Francis Drake claims a land he calls Nova Albion (northern California) for Queen Elizabeth I of England

1631 – Mumtaz Mahal dies during childbirth. Her husband, Mughal emperor Shah Jahan I, will spend the next 17 years building her mausoleum, the Taj Mahal

1775 – The Battle of Bunker Hill (actually mostly on nearby Breed’s Hill), in Charlestown, Massachusetts, part of the Siege of Boston by British troops, who were planning to take the heights surrounding Boston to gain control of the city and its harbor. The Americans discovered their plan, and set up redoubts on Bunker Hill and Breed’s Hill during the night, and fortified lines across Charlestown Peninsula; the British attacked the next morning, their first two assaults were repulsed, but the Americans ran out of ammunition, and were forced to retreat to Cambridge. Though it was a tactical victory for the British, they had 1,054 dead and wounded, including 19 officers killed and 62 wounded, while the smaller American force suffered 115 killed, and 305 wounded, and it also proved that colonial militiamen would stand up to the British regulars in battle

1789 – The Third Estate in France declares itself a national assembly and undertakes the framing of a constitution

1818 – Charles Gounod born, French composer

1821 – E. G. Squier born, American newspaper editor and archeologist; co-author of Ancient Monuments of the Mississippi Valley (1848), a landmark study of the Mound Builders of North America, in which they employed systematic analysis, accurate mapping, and documentation of the surveyed sites, now standard in the field

1856 – The Republican Party opens its first convention, in Philadelphia

1865 – Susan La Flesche Picotte born, of the Omaha tribe, first Native American physician (1889), fought tuberculosis and alcoholism on the reservation, campaigned for land rights and a reservation hospital (1913), later named for her

1867 – John Robert Gregg born in Ireland, American inventor of short-hand

1873 – Susan B. Anthony’s trial starts for illegally voting in Rochester, New York on November 5, 1872

1882 – Igor Stravinsky born, innovative Russian composer

1885 – The Statue of Liberty arrives in New York City aboard the French ship Isere

1888 – Aleksandr Friedmann born, Russian mathematician and physical scientist, provided early evidence that the universe is expanding, later confirmed by Edwin Hubble’s observations

1898 – Maurits Escher born, known as M.C. Escher, Dutch artist and printmaker

Lizards, by M.C Escher

1902 – Sammy Fain born, American composer of popular songs, collaborated with lyricist Irving Kahal on “Let a Smile Be Your Umbrella” and “I’ll Be Seeing You”; composed scores and songs for movies and television; won Best Original Song Oscars for  “Secret Love”(1954)  and “Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing” (1955)

1903 – Ruth Graves Wakefield born, inventor of the Toll House Cookie, the first chocolate chip cookie, at the Toll House Inn near Whitman MA in the 1930s

1907 – Charles Eames born, American designer and architect; with his wife Ray, made significant contributions to modern architecture, furniture and graphic design

1908 – Trude Weiss-Rosmarin born, editor, writer, co-founder of the School of the Jewish Woman (1933), publisher of the “Jewish Spectator” (1936)

1914 – John Hersey born, American novelist, journalist and war correspondent; won the 1945 Pulitzer Prize for his novel A Bell for Adano; his factual account of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima has been continuously in print since its publication in 1946

1919 – Kingman Brewster, Jr. born, Yale University President (1963-1977), U.S. Ambassador to Great Britain (1977-1981); Master of University College at Oxford (1986-1988)

1928 – Amelia Earhart embarks on the first trans-Atlantic flight by a woman

1940 – Vichy French government asks Germany for terms of surrender in World War II

1947 – International Jugglers’ Association founded, sponsors of World Juggling Day *

1953 – The Soviet Union orders a division of troops with tanks into East Berlin to quell a strike by construction workers that turned into a widespread uprising. Workers, farmers and the public protest heavy military expenditures and shortages of consumer goods, an increase in “work norms” by 10% which meant more work for the same money, combined with raised taxes and higher prices – a ‘perfect storm’ of bad policy decisions

1957 – Danny & the Juniors release “At the Hop”

1963 – U.S. Supreme Court rules 8-1 against requiring the recitation of the Lord’s Prayer or the reading of Biblical verses in public schools in Abington School District v Schempp

1964 – The Supremes’ “Where Did Our Love Go” is their first song to reach #1 on the pop singles chart

1975 – An American Apollo and a Soviet Soyuz spacecraft dock with each other in orbit, the first link-up between spacecraft from the two nations

1986 – The first Dollars Against Diabetes Day * is coordinated by the Diabetes Research Institute and the Building and Construction Trades Department (BCTD) of the AFL-CIO; over $45 million has been raised by BCTD volunteers since then

1989 – First flight of the B-2 Spirit, known as the Stealth Bomber

1994 – The UN General Assembly designates June 17 as the World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought *

2008 – Hundreds of same-sex couples got married across California on the first full day that gay marriage became legal by order of the state’s highest court. (However, California voters banned gay marriage in November.)

2015 – Loretta Lynch is sworn in as U.S. Attorney General, by Supreme Court Justice Sonia Sotomayor, using a Bible which once belonged to Frederick Douglass

2016 – World Tessellation Day * is launched by Emily Grosvenor, author of Tessalation!, a children’s book about tesselations (patterns) in nature; she chose June 17 because it is the birthday of M.C. Escher, famous for the complicated patterns in his prints and drawings

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