On This Day:
Tuesday June 17, 2014 This is the 168th day of the year, with 197 days remaining in 2014. Fact of the Day: arachnids Few animals are more feared and less understood than spiders and scorpions. They belong to the group called arachnids (from Greek arachne, "spider"), along with ticks and mites. They have eight legs - unlike insects, which have six - and no wings or antennae. There are about 35,000 different kinds of spiders and 1,200 types of scorpion; all are carnivores (meat eaters) and belong to the class Arthropoda. The arachnidium is the apparatus by which the spider spins its web in order to capture insects for food. Scorpions live mainly in warm regions and mostly feed at night, killing their prey with pincers or the sting in their tails. Ticks are feared as much as spiders and scorpions now, mainly because they are parasitic and known to carry serious human and animal diseases.
Holidays Feast day of St. Moling, St. Adulf, St. Nectan, St. Botulf, St. Alban, St. Avitus, St. Bessarion, St. Hypatius, St. Rainerius of Pisa, St. Emily de Vialai, St. Hervé, Saints Nicander and Marcian, and Saints Teresa and Sanchia of Portugal.
Iceland: Independence Day (from Denmark, 1944).
Boston, Massachusetts: Bunker Hill Day.
Events 1579 - During his circumnavigation of the world, English seaman Francis Drake anchored in a harbor just north of present-day San Francisco, California, and claimed the territory for Queen Elizabeth I.
1775 - The Revolutionary War's Battle of Bunker Hill took place, near Boston. The British won, but it was a moral victory for the Americans who had far fewer casualties.
1789 - The Third Estate in France declared itself a national assembly and started work on a constitution.
1856 - The Republican Party opened its first convention, in Philadelphia.
1928 - Amelia Earhart embarked on a trans-Atlantic flight (from Newfoundland to Wales) -- the first for a woman.
1940 - France asked Germany for terms of surrender in World War II. Pétain announced that France was negotiating an armistice with Germany; General Charles de Gaulle fled from Paris to Britain.
1944 - The republic of Iceland was established.
1950 - Dr. Richard H. Lawler performed the first kidney transplant, in Chicago.
1954 - The Army-McCarthy televised hearings ended.
1963 - The Supreme Court struck down rules requiring the recitation of the Lord's Prayer or reading of Biblical verses in public schools.
1972 - President Richard Nixon's eventual downfall began with the arrest of five burglars inside Democratic National Committee headquarters in Washington, D.C.'s Watergate complex.
1994 - After a dramatic flight from justice witnessed by millions on live television, former football star and actor O.J. Simpson surrendered to Los Angeles police. The police charged him with the June 12 double-murder of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald L. Goldman. Simpson was later acquitted in a criminal trial, but held liable in a civil trial.
2005 - Dennis Kozlowski, former CEO of Tyco International, was convicted of misappropriating more than $400 million of the company's funds.
Births 1703 - John Wesley, English evangelist.
1871 - James Weldon Johnson, American poet, diplomat, songwriter, anthologist of black culture.
1882 - Igor Fedorovich Stravinsky, Russian-born composer.
1898 - M.C. Escher, Dutch graphic artist.
1903 - Ruth Wakefield, inventor of the Toll House Cookie.
1919 - Kingman Brewster, Jr., American educator, diplomat; president of Yale University (1963-77).
1943 - Barry Manilow (born Barry Alan Pincus), American singer-songwriter.
1980 - Venus Williams, American tennis player who has won 13 Grand Slam titles.
Deaths 1942 - Charles Fitzpatrick, Canadian politician.
1981 - Zerna Sharp, American writer and educator.
1986 - Kate Smith, American singer, best known for her rendition of Irving Berlin's "God Bless America."
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