June 19th in History
A Juneteenth celebration in Texas, 1900. Courtesy Austin Public Library.
Today in History
- The US Congress prohibits slavery in the US (1862)
- Juneteenth: Slaves in Galveston, Texas, are finally informed of their freedom under the Emancipation Proclamation (1865)
- The first Father’s Day is celebrated in the US (1910)
- The Civil Rights Act of 1964 is approved by Congress after an 83-day filibuster (1964)
- Garfield debuts (1978)
- WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange requests asylum in London’s Ecuadorian Embassy (2012)
Birthdays
- Blaise Pascal, mathematician (1623)
- Dame May Whitty, actress (1865)
- Wallis Simpson, duchess of Windsor (1896)
- Moe Howard, leader of the Three Stooges (1897)
- Guy Lombardo, bandleader (1902)
- Lou Gehrig, baseball player (190)
- Abe Fortas, Supreme Court justice (1910)
- Lester Flatt, bluegrass musician (1914)
- Julius Schwartz, comics editor, publisher, and agent (1915)
- Pauline Kael, critic (1919)
- Louis Jordan, actor (1921)
- Gena Rowlands, actress (1930)
- Wahoo McDaniel, football player and wrestler (1938)
- Aung San Suu Kyi, politician and Nobel laureate (1945)
- Salman Rushdie, author (1947)
- Phylicia Rashad, actress (1948)
- Ann Wilson, member of Heart (1950)
- Kathleen Turner, actress (1954)
- Paula Abdul, singer and dancer (1962)
- Laura Ingraham, radio host (1964)
- Macklemore, rapper (1983)
Deaths
- J. M. Barrie, author of Peter Pan (1937)
- Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, convicted spies (1953)
- Thomas J. Watson, CEO of IBM (1956)
- Ed Wynn, actor (1966)
- Sam Giancana, mobster (1975)
- Len Bias, basketball player (1986)
- William Golding, author (1993)
- Manute Bol, basketball player (2010)
- Slim Whitman, country singer and yodeler (2013)
Holidays and Celebrations
- Day of the Independent Hungary (Hungary)
- Feast of Forest (Palawan)
- Garfield Day
- Juneteenth (US)
- Labour Day (Trinidad and Tobago)
- Laguna Day (Laguna)
- Never Again Day (Uruguay)
- Surigao del Norte Day (Surigao del Norte)
- Surigao del Sur Day (Surigao del Sur)
- World Sauntering Day (international)
- World Sickle Cell Day (International)
June 19 is the 170th day of the year (171st in leap years). There are 195 days remaining until the end of the year.