Today is June 8. On this date in:
A.D. 632
The prophet Muhammad died in Medina.
1789
James Madison introduced a proposed Bill of Rights in the House of Representatives.
1845
Andrew Jackson, seventh president of the United States, died in Nashville, Tennessee.
1920
The Cincinnati Reds’ Edd Roush fell asleep in centerfield during a long infield argument and was ejected by the umpire for delay of game.
1939
Britain’s King George VI and his consort, Queen Elizabeth, arrived in Washington, where they were received at the White House by President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
1953
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled restaurants in Washington, D.C., could not refuse to serve blacks.
1966
A merger was announced between the National Football League and the American Football League, to take effect in 1970.
1967
During the six-day Middle East war, 34 U.S. servicemen were killed when Israel attacked a Navy intelligence-gathering ship in the Mediterranean. (Israel said it had been mistaken for an Egyptian vessel.)
1968
Authorities announced the capture in London of James Earl Ray, the suspected assassin of civil rights leader the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
1978
A jury in Clark County, Nevada, ruled the so-called “Mormon will,” purportedly written by the late billionaire Howard Hughes, was a forgery.
1984
The film “Ghostbusters,” starring Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd and Harold Ramis, was released.
1987
Fawn Hall began testifying at the Iran-Contra hearings, describing how, as secretary to National Security aide Oliver L. North, she had helped shred some documents and spirit away others.
1995
U.S. Marines rescued Capt. Scott O’Grady, whose F-16C fighter jet had been shot down by Bosnian Serbs on June 2. Mickey Mantle received a liver transplant at a Dallas hospital; however, the baseball great died two months later.
1998
The National Rifle Association elected actor Charlton Heston to be its president.
2003
Frustrated and angry over delays, a coalition of the nation’s mayors meeting in Denver asked federal officials to bypass state governments and give them the money they needed to beef up homeland security.