Today is Saturday, June 21, the 172nd day of 2025 with 193 to follow.
Today is the first day of summer.
The moon is waning. Morning stars are Mars, Neptune, Saturn and Venus. Evening stars are Jupiter and Mars.
Those born on this date are under the sign of Cancer. They include Saint/Pope Leo IX in 1002; Boy Scouts of America founder Daniel Carter Beard in 1850; philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre in 1905; actor Jane Russell in 1921; actor Bernie Kopell in 1933 (age 92); actor Monte Markham in 1935 (age 90); actor Ron Ely in 1938; actor/TV personality Mariette Hartley in 1940 (age 85); actor Joe Flaherty in 1941; musician Ray Davies (Kinks) in 1944 (age 81); actor Michael Gross in 1947 (age 78); actor Meredith Baxter in 1947 (age 78); Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi in 1947 (age 78); musician Joey Molland (Badfinger) in 1947; musician Don Airey (Deep Purple) in 1948 (age 77); writer Ian McEwan in 1948 (age 77); musician Joey Kramer (Aerosmith) in 1950 (age 75); musician Nils Lofgren (E Street Band/Ringo Starr & His All-Starr Band) in 1951 (age 74); actor Robert Pastorelli in 1954; actor Josh Pais in 1958 (age 67); musician Kathy Mattea in 1959 (age 66); sportscaster Kevin Harlan in 1960 (age 65); actor David Morrissey in 1964 (age 61); filmmaker Lana Wachowski in 1965 (age 60); actor Carrie Preston in 1967 (age 58); actor Juliette Lewis in 1973 (age 52); musician Justin Cary (Sixpence None The Richer) in 1975 (age 50); musician Mike Einziger (Incubus) in 1976 (age 49); actor Chris Pratt in 1979 (age 46); musician Brandon Flowers (Killers) in 1981 (age 44); Britain's Prince William in 1982 (age 43); actor Benjamin Walker in 1982 (age 43); actor Jussie Smollett in 1983 (age 42); whistleblower Edward Snowden in 1983 (age 42); actor Michael Malarkey in 1983 (age 42); musician Lana Del Rey in 1985 (age 40); actor Natalie Alyn Lind in 1999 (age 26).
On this date in history:
In 1788, the U.S. Constitution became effective when it was ratified by a ninth state, New Hampshire.
In 1942, German forces, led by Gen. Erwin Rommel, took control of Tobruk, Libya, in an assault on British forces. The North African city was a key port on the Mediterranean Sea.
In 1945, Japanese defenders of Okinawa surrendered to U.S. troops.
In 1964, Ku Klux Klan members killed three civil rights activists -- James Chaney, Andrew Goodman and Michael Schwerner -- and hid their bodies in unmarked graves. An informer led the FBI to the three men's graves 44 days later.
In 1982, John Hinckley Jr. was found not guilty by reason of insanity in the March 1981 shootings of U.S. President Ronald Reagan and three other people who were also wounded. Hinckley has been in a hospital in Washington, with permission in recent years to spend time outside the institution with his family.
In 1985, international experts in Sao Paulo, Brazil, conclusively identified the bones of a 1979 drowning victim as the remains of Dr. Josef Mengele, a Nazi war criminal, ending a 40-year search for the "angel of death" of the Auschwitz concentration camp.
In 1990, an earthquake measuring 7.7 on the Richter scale struck northwestern Iran, killing up to 50,000 people.
In 1997, Cambodia announced the capture of former Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot.
In 2005, a Mississippi jury convicted 80-year-old former Ku Klux Klan leader Edgar Ray Killen of manslaughter in the 1964 killings of three civil rights workers. He was sentenced to 60 years in prison and died in 2018.
In 2008, nearly 1,400 people, most of them on a ferry that capsized, were killed in Typhoon Fengshen in the Philippines.
In 2011, a RusAir passenger plane flying from Moscow to Petrozavodsk in rain and fog crashed on a highway near an airport and broke apart in flames. Forty-four people died, eight survived.
In 2020, the acoustic guitar Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain used during the band's 1993 MTV Unplugged special sold for more than $6 million. It set a new record for highest auction price for a guitar in history.
In 2021, Laurel Hubbard made history as the first openly transgender athlete to be selected to compete in an Olympic Games, qualifying for a spot on New Zealand's weightlifting team.
In 2021, Las Vegas Raiders defensive lineman Carl Nassib became the first active NFL player in league history to come out as gay.
In 2023, the Food and Drug Administration granted approval for GOOD Meat, the meat division of Eat Just, and UPSIDE Foods, to sell cultivated poultry in the United States. It was the first approval by the regulatory body for companies to produce meat by growing cells extracted from an animal's body.
A thought for the day: "When the rich wage war, it's the poor who die." -- French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre
