What happened on June 21 ?

524 - Godomar, King of the Burgundians defeats the Franks at the Battle of Vezerone.

1621 - an execution of 27 Czech lords on the Old Town Square in Prague as a consequence of the battle on the "White Mountain".

1665 - First soldiers of Le Régiment de Carignan-Salières arrive at Quebec to invade Iroquois territories.

1734 - In Montreal in New France (today primarily Quebec), a black slave known by the French name of Marie-Joseph Angélique, having been convicted of the arson that destroyed much of the city, was tortured and hanged by the French authorities in a public ceremony that involved her disgrace and the amputation of a hand.

1749 - Halifax, Nova Scotia, founded.

1788 - New Hampshire ratifies the Constitution and is thus admitted as the 9th state in the United States.

1798 - Irish Rebellion of 1798: The British Army defeats Irish rebels at Battle of Vinegar Hill

1813 - Peninsular War: Battle of Vitoria

1813 - Laura Secord sets out to warn British forces of an impending U.S. attack on Queenston, Ontario during the War of 1812.

1824 - Greek War of Independence: Egyptian forces capture Psara in the Aegean Sea.

1826 - Maniots defeat Egyptians under Ibrahim Pasha in the Battle of Vergas

1854 - First Victoria Cross won during bombardment of Bomarsund in the Aland Islands.

1864 - Maori Wars: The Tauranga Campaign ends.

1877 - The Molly Maguires, ten Irish immigrants who were labor activists, are hanged in the Carbon County, Pennsylvania Prison.

1887 - Queen Victoria's golden jubilee.

1898 - Guam becomes a U.S. territory.

1915 - The U.S. Supreme Court hands down its decision in Guinn v. United States 238 US 347 1915, striking down an Oklahoma law denying the right to vote to some citizens.

1919 - Royal Canadian Mounted Police fire a volley into a crowd of unemployed war veterans, killing two, during the Winnipeg General Strike.

1919 - Admiral Ludwig von Reuter scuttles the German fleet in Scapa Flow, Orkney. The nine sailors killed were the last casualties of the First World War.

1939 - The New York Yankees announce Lou Gehrig's retirement.

1940 - World War II: France surrenders to Germany.

1940 - First successful west-to-east navigation of Northwest Passage begins at Vancouver, British Columbia.

1942 - World War II: Tobruk falls to German forces.

1942 - World War II: A Japanese submarine surfaces near the Columbia River in Oregon, firing 17 shells at nearby Fort Stevens in one of only a handful of attacks by the Japanese against the U.S. mainland.

1945 - World War II: Battle of Okinawa ends.

1947 - A seaman named Harold Dahl claims to have seen six UFOs near Maury Island, United States. The next morning Dahl reported the first modern Men in Black encounter.

1957 - Ellen Louks Fairclough sworn in as Canada's first woman Cabinet Minister

1964 - Three civil rights workers, Andrew Goodman, James Chaney and Mickey Schwerner, are murdered in Neshoba County, Mississippi, United States, by members of the Ku Klux Klan.

1965 - Folk rock band The Byrds release their highly influential debut album Mr. Tambourine Man.

1973 - In handing down the decision in Miller v. California 413 US 15, the Supreme Court of the United States establishes the Miller Test, which now governs obscenity in U.S. law.

1982 - John Hinckley is found not guilty by reason of insanity for the attempted assassination of U.S. President Ronald Reagan.

1982 - Fête de la Musique street music festival inaugurated in France by Jack Lang.

1989 - The U.S. Supreme Court rules in Texas v. Johnson that flag burning is protected speech under the United States Constitution.

1997 - French musician Jean Michel Jarre's "Oxygene Tour" concert in Spodek (Katowice, Poland) for deaf and poorly hearing children of Europe.

1997 Estonian man, Mait Lepik won the country's first banana-eating contest. He ate ten bananas in three minutes, including the skins.

1999 - First iBook introduced by Apple Computer.

2000 - Section 28 (outlawing the 'promotion' of homosexuality in the UK) repealed in Scotland with a 99 to 17 vote.

2000 - England-based footballer Shaun Goater is given the freedom of his home country of Bermuda and the day is declared Shaun Goater day (N.B. Contrary to popular belief this day was just a one-off and has *not* subsequently been officially annually marked by the Bermudian authorities.)

2003 - Deputy Justice Fazel Ahmed Manawi of the Afghan Supreme Court announces that Aftab editor Sayed Madawi and his deputy Ali Payam Sestani will be tried for "libeling Islam."

2004 - SpaceShipOne becomes the first privately funded spaceplane to achieve spaceflight.

2005 - Donald Tsang Yam Kuen is appointed by the People's Republic of China to take over from Tung Chee Hwa as the Chief Executive of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region.