On This Day July 1

Commercial television was authorized by the FCC on July 1, 1941 and NBC television begun commercial operation by its affiliate WNBT New York using channel 1 the same day. The world's first legal television commercial advertisement, for Bulova watches, was aired at 2:29 PM on July 1, 1941 before a baseball game between the Brooklyn Dodgers and Philadelphia Phillies.

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On This Day June 30

On June 30, 1859 French tightrope walker Charles Blondin successfully crossed Niagara Gorge on a tightrope, 160 ft (49 m) above the water, near the location of the current Rainbow Bridge.
He repeated the feat a number of times thereafter, always with different theatrical variations: blindfolded, in a sack, trundling a wheelbarrow, on stilts, sitting down midway while he cooked and ate an omelette and standing on a chair with only one chair leg on the rope.

Charles Blondin crossing the Niagara River in 1859

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On This Day June 29

Charlotte Brontë married her father's curate, the Reverend Arthur Nicholls, on June 29, 1854.
Charlotte wore a white muslin wedding dress with delicate green embroidery and a lace trimmed bonnet. It was said she looked like a "snowdrop". Arthur was faithful, pleasant and indomitable and Charlotte at first merely admired but later grew to love her husband. They had nine months of an increasingly happy marriage as Charlotte found joy in domestic love until her death in March 1855.

Charlotte Brontë portrait by J. H. Thompson

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On This Day June 28

Queen Victoria's coronation took place on June 28, 1838 at Westminster Abbey. Over 400,000 visitors came to London for the celebrations. As Queen Victoria was being crowned, the Archbishop of Canterbury forced the Coronation Ring on to the wrong finger. She didn't complain, but had to ice her bruised finger later. Victoria endeared herself to the public when she sprung from her throne to help an elderly noble man who had stumbled on approaching her to pay his respects.

Coronation portrait by George Hayter

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On This Day June 27

A Scot, John Shepherd-Barron, invented the ATM. Managing director of a security printing firm, De La Rue Instruments; he was lying in the bath when the idea of a cash dispenser occurred to him. Barclays Bank were impressed with Shepherd-Barron’s idea and the first DACS (De La Rue Automatic Cash System) was fitted outside the bank's branch in Enfield, north London on June 27, 1967. Comic actor Reg Varney was the first person to use the cash machine (see below).

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On This Day June 26

The sport of mountaineering originated on June 26, 1492 when an expedition set out to climb Mont Aiguille, in the Vercors near Grenoble, led by Antoine De Ville, Lord of Domjulien and Beaupré. De Ville and his team scaled the near-vertical Alpine peak Mont Aiguille on King Charles VIII orders. They reached the summit by means of ropes and siege ladders, remaining there for just under a week. It was the first ever recorded climb of any technical difficulty.

Picture of a mountaineer by Josef Feid Anastasius Grün

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On This Day June 25

The phrase burying the hatchet, meaning, to end an argument or conflict, is derived from a Native American custom where a hatchet or tomahawk was buried in the ground to mark a declaration of peace. The Burying the Hatchet ceremony happened in Nova Scotia on June 25, 1761. It ended more than seventy-five years of war between the British and the Mi'kmaq.

Old hatchet

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On This Day June 24

Dancing mania was a phenomenon seen primarily in mainland Europe between the 14th and 17th centuries. During such outbreaks, groups of up to thousands of people would dance uncontrollably, screaming, shouting, and claiming to have visions until they collapsed from exhaustion. One of the first major outbreaks of dancing mania took place in Aachen (present-day Germany) on June 24, 1374, before spreading to other cities and countries.

A painting by Pieter Brueghel the Younger, after drawings by his father.

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On This Day June 23

The Pawtucket Red Sox and the Rochester Red Wings, two teams from the Triple-A International League played the longest ever professional baseball game. The game begun at McCoy Stadium, Pawtucket, Rhode Island on April 18, 1981. It lasted for 33 innings, with eleven hours and 25 minutes of playing time. 32 innings were played, before the game was suspended at 4:00 the next morning. The final 33rd inning was played June 23, 1981. Pawtucket won the game, 3–2.

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On This Day June 22

George V and Mary of Teck were crowned King and Queen of the United Kingdom and the British Dominions at Westminster Abbey in London on June 22, 1911. During World War 1 George V and Queen Mary set an example of quiet determination. After the war, his reign saw the rise of socialism, communism, fascism and Irish republicanism, all of which radically changed the political landscape. King George's policy of reconciliation helped to unify the British people.

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On This Day June 21

The Australian radio-astronomer Dr John O'Sullivan and his team are credited with inventing Wi-Fi during a failed experiment to detect tiny black holes. The first major use of Wi-Fi came when Apple Inc. adopted the wireless network for their iBook series of laptops which was unveiled by Steve Jobs on June 21, 1999. It was the first mainstream computer designed and sold with integrated wireless networking. The Wi-Fi network connectivity was branded at the time by Apple as AirPort.

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On This Day June 20

1837 Queen Victoria wrote wrote in her diary on June 20, 1837, "I was awoke at 6 o'clock by Mamma, who told me the Archbishop of Canterbury and Lord Conyngham were here and wished to see me. I got out of bed and went into my sitting-room (only in my dressing gown) and alone, and saw them. Lord Conyngham then acquainted me that my poor Uncle, the King, was no more, and had expired at 12 minutes past 2 this morning, and consequently that I am Queen."

Victoria receives the news of her accession

1887 The Golden Jubilee of Queen Victoria was celebrated on June 20 and 21, 1887. She began the first day with breakfast under the trees at Frogmore, the resting place of her husband, Prince Albert, near Windsor Castle, before a banquet at Buckingham Palace. On the second day, she led a procession and, in the evening, put on a gown embroidered with silver roses, thistles and shamrocks for a banquet and was then wheeled into the garden to watch the fireworks.

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On This Day June 19

The ceremonial "first stone" of the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, a facility established to preserve a wide variety of plant seeds from locations worldwide in an underground cavern in Spitsbergen, Norway, was laid on June 19, 2006. There arctic vault stores over 860,000 different varieties of food crop seeds as an insurance policy for the world’s food supply.

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On This Day June 18

Columbia Records introduced the 33 1/3 LP ("long playing") record at New York's Waldorf-Astoria Hotel on June 18, 1948. The new format allowed listeners to enjoy an unprecedented 25 minutes of music per side, compared to the four minutes per side of the standard 78 rpm record. The first LPs were 10 inches in diameter, but 12 inches became the standard size, with 16-inch discs used for transcriptions. The first twelve-inch LP was Felix Mendelssohn's "Concerto in E Minor."

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On This Day June 17

Nicole Brown Simpson and her waiter friend Ron Goldman were found stabbed to death outside Nicole's Los Angeles condominium. Nicole's ex husband O.J. Simpson was a person of interest in their murders and five days later on June 17, 1994 he became the object of a low-speed pursuit in a white Ford Bronco SUV; TV stations interrupted coverage of the 1994 NBA Finals to broadcast the incident live. Following the low-speed highway chase, O. J. Simpson was arrested.

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