Paradise Driver

-------------------

Today is Monday, June 21st.

The 173rd day of 2004.

There are 193 days left in the year.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



Today's Highlight in History:



On June 21, 1964, civil rights workers Michael H. Schwerner, Andrew Goodman and James E. Chaney disappeared in Philadelphia, Miss.; their bodies were found buried in an earthen dam six weeks later. (Seven Ku Klux Klansmen were later convicted of federal civil rights violations in the deaths and sentenced to prison terms ranging from three to ten years; none served more than six years.)



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



On this date:



In 1684, The Massachusetts Bay Colony charter is revoked by King Charles II of England.



In 1784, Spain closes the lower Mississippi River and the port of New Orleans to use by Americans.



In 1788, The United States Constitution went into effect as New Hampshire became the ninth state to ratify it.



In 1805, Great Stoneface Mountain is found in New Hampshire.



In 1834, Cyrus Hall McCormick received a patent for his reaping machine.



In 1877, Ten members of the "Molly Maguires", a secret society of Irish immigrant coal miners, are executed for their roles in a violent coal strike in Pennsylvania.



In 1879, F. W. Woolworth opened his first 5 and 10 cent store in Lancaster, PA. He sold items for no more than a dime and went broke. He opened another store in a better location and went on to become one of the America's richest men.



In 1907, United Press was founded by E.W. Scripps as a privately owned wire service, transmitting 12,000 words of Morse code over leased telegraph lines to 369 afternoon newspapers.



In 1913, Over Los Angeles CA, Georgia "Tiny" Broadwick became the first woman to parachute jump from an airplane.



In 1932, Heavyweight Max Schmeling lost a title fight by decision to Jack Sharkey, prompting Schmeling's manager, Joe Jacobs, to exclaim: "We was robbed!"



In 1945, During World War II, American soldiers on Okinawa found the body of the Japanese commander, Lt. Gen. Mitsuru Ushijima, who had committed suicide.



In 1963, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Montini was chosen to succeed the late Pope John XXIII; the new pope took the name Paul VI.



In 1964, Future baseball Hall-of-Famer and U.S. senator Jim Bunning pitches a perfect game for the Philadelphia Phillies, the first perfect game in the National League in 84 years.



In 1964, The Haitian National Assembly adopts a new constitution that proclaims François "Papa Doc" Duvalier president for life. He remains dictator of the country until his death in 1971.



In 1973, The Supreme Court ruled that states may ban materials found to be obscene according to local standards.



In 1977, Menachem Begin became Israel's sixth prime minister.



In 1978, "Evita", a musical written by Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice based on the life of Argentine political figure Eva Perón, opens in London.



In 1981, "Raiders of the Lost Ark" opened.



In 1982, A jury in Washington, D.C. found John Hinckley Jr. innocent by reason of insanity in the shootings of President Reagan and three other men.



In 1985, Scientists announced that skeletal remains exhumed in Brazil were those of Nazi war criminal Josef Mengele.



In 1989, The Supreme Court ruled that burning the American flag as a form of political protest is protected by the First Amendment.



In 1997, The New York Liberty defeats the Los Angeles Sparks 67-57 in the inaugural game of the Women's National Basketball Association.



Ten years ago (1994):



President Clinton, addressing members of the Business Roundtable, made an impassioned call for action on health-care reform.



American teenager Michael Fay was released from a Singapore prison, where he'd been flogged for vandalism.



Five years ago (1999):



President Clinton visited Slovenia, formerly part of Yugoslavia, where he publicly urged Serbs to reject Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milosevic. NATO and the Kosovo Liberation Army, meanwhile, signed an accord providing for the demilitarization of the KLA.



One year ago (2003):



The fifth Harry Potter book, "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix," was published by J.K. Rowling. Amazon.com shipped out more than one million copies on this day making the day the largest distribution day of a single item in e-commerce history. The book set sales records around the world with an estimated 5 million copies were sold on the first day.



Ten weeks after the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime, President Bush offered a broadly positive status report on the U.S. mission in Iraq in his weekly radio address.



Lennox Lewis retained his heavyweight title after a cut stopped Vitali Klitschko after six brawling rounds in Los Angeles.



Author Leon Uris died in New York at age 78; playwright George Axelrod died in Los Angeles at age 81.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



Today's Birthdays:



Actress Jane Russell is 83.



Actress Maureen Stapleton is 79.



Actor Bernie Kopell is 71.



Actor Monte Markham is 69.



Actor Ron Ely is 66.



Actress Mariette Hartley is 64.



Comedian Joe Flaherty is 63.



Rock singer-musician Ray Davies (The Kinks) is 60.



Singer Brenda Holloway is 58.



Actress Meredith Baxter is 57.



Actor Michael Gross is 57.



Rock musician Joe Molland (Badfinger) is 57.



Rock musician Don Airey (Deep Purple) is 56.



Country singer Leon Everette is 56.



Rock musician Joey Kramer (Aerosmith) is 54.



Rock musician Nils Lofgren is 53.



Actress Robyn Douglass is 51.



Actor Leigh McCloskey is 49.



Cartoonist Berke Breathed is 47.



Country singer Kathy Mattea is 45.



Actor Marc Copage is 42.



Actress Sammi Davis-Voss is 40.



Actor Doug Savant is 40.



Country musician Porter Howell is 40.



Actor Michael Dolan is 39.



Country singer Allison Moorer is 32.



Actress Juliette Lewis is 31.



Musician Justin Cary is 29.



Rock musician Mike Einziger (Incubus) is 28.



Britain's Prince William of Wales is 22.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



Thought for Today:

"He, who will not reason, is a bigot;

he, who cannot, is a fool;

and he, who dares not, is a slave." -

- William Drummond, Scottish writer (1585-1649).

---------------------