Historical Events on 26 Jun

Historical Events on 26 Jun

1284 - According to legend, the Pied Piper lures 130 children away from Hamelin.
1409 - Western Schism: the Roman Catholic church is led into a double schism as Petros Philargos is crowned Pope Alexander V after the Council of Pisa, joining Pope Gregory XII in Rome and Pope Benedict XII in Avignon.
1483 - Richard III is crowned king of England.
1541 - Francisco Pizarro is assassinated in Lima by the son of his former companion and later antagonist, Diego Almagro the younger. Almagro is later caught and executed.
1718 - Tsarevich Alexei Petrovich of Russia, Peter the Great's son, mysteriously dies after being sentenced to death by his father for plotting against him.
1723 - After a lasting siege and bombardment by cannons, Baku surrenders to the Russians.
1848 - End of the June Days Uprising in Paris.
1857 - The first investiture of the Victoria Cross in Hyde Park, London.
1870 - The Christian holiday of Christmas is declared a federal holiday in the United States.
1917 - the first U.S. troops arrive in France to fight alongside Britain, France, Italy, and Russia against Germany, and Austria-Hungary in World War I.
1918 - World War I, Western Front: Battle for Belleau Wood - Allied Forces under John J. Pershing and James Harbord defeat Imperial German Forces under Wilhelm, German Crown Prince.
1924 - American occupying forces leave the Dominican Republic.
1927 - The Cyclone roller coaster opens on Coney Island
1934 - President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs the Federal Credit Union Act, which establishes credit unions.
1936 - Initial flight of the Focke-Wulf Fw 61, the first practical helicopter.
1940 - World War II: under the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, the Soviet Union presents an ultimatum to Romania requiring it to cede Bessarabia and the northern part of Bukovina.
1945 - The United Nations Charter is signed in San Francisco.
1948 - William Shockley filed the original patent for the grown junction transistor, the first bipolar junction transistor.
1948 - The Western allies begin an airlift to Berlin after the Soviet Union blockades West Berlin.
1959 - The Saint Lawrence Seaway opens, opening North America's Great Lakes to ocean-going ships.
1960 - The former British Protectorate of Somaliland British Somaliland gains its independence.
1963 - John F. Kennedy speaks the famous words "Ich bin ein Berliner" on a visit to West Berlin.
1973 - On Plesetsk Cosmodrome 9 people are killed in an explosion of a Cosmos 3-M rocket.
1974 - The Universal Product Code is scanned for the first time to sell a package of Wrigley's chewing gum at the Marsh Supermarket in Troy, Ohio
1975 - Two FBI agents and a member of the American Indian Movement are killed in a shootout on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation in South Dakota; Leonard Peltier is later convicted of the murders in a controversial trial.
1975 - Indira Gandhi establishes emergency rule in India.
1976 - The CN Tower, the world's tallest free-standing structure on land, is opened.
1977 - The Yorkshire Ripper kills 16 year old shop assistant Jayne MacDonald in Leeds, changing public perception of the killer as she was the first victim who was not a prostitute.
1978 - Air Canada Flight 189 to Toronto overruns the runway and crashes into the Etobicoke Creek ravine. Two of 107 passengers on board perish.
1991 - Ten-Day War- the Yugoslav people's army begins the Ten-Day War in Slovenia.
1993 - The U.S. launches a missile attack targeting Baghdad intelligence headquarters in retaliation for a thwarted assassination attempt against former President George H.W. Bush in April in Kuwait.
1995 - Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani deposes his father Khalifa bin Hamad al-Thani, the Emir of Qatar, in a bloodless coup.
1996 - Irish Journalist Veronica Guerin is shot in her car while in traffic in the outskirts of Dublin
1997 - The U.S. Supreme Court rules that the Communications Decency Act violates the First Amendment
2003 - The U.S. Supreme Court rules in Lawrence v. Texas that gender-based sodomy laws are unconstitutional.
2008 - The U.S. Supreme Court rules in District of Columbia v. Heller that the ban on handguns in the District of Columbia is unconstitutional.
363 - Roman Emperor Julian is killed during the retreat from the Sassanid Empire. General Jovian is proclaimed Emperor by the troops on the battlefield.