This day in history

[June 21, 2010]  (AP)  Today is Monday, June 21, the 172nd day of 2010. There are 193 days left in the year. Day. Summer arrives at 7:28 a.m. Eastern time.

Today's highlight in history:

On June 21, 1788, the United States Constitution went into effect as New Hampshire became the ninth state to ratify it.

On this date:

In 1834, Cyrus Hall McCormick received a patent for his reaping machine.

In 1932, heavyweight Max Schmeling lost a title fight rematch in New York by decision to Jack Sharkey, prompting Schmeling's manager, Joe Jacobs, to exclaim: "We was robbed!"

In 1948, the Republican national convention opened in Philadelphia. (The delegates ended up choosing Thomas E. Dewey to be their presidential nominee.)

In 1963, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Montini was chosen to succeed the late Pope John XXIII; the new pope took the name Paul VI.

In 1964, civil rights workers Michael H. Schwerner, Andrew Goodman and James E. Chaney disappeared in Philadelphia, Miss.; their bodies were found buried in an earthen dam six weeks later.

In 1970, former Indonesian President Sukarno died at 69.

In 1982, a jury in Washington D.C. found John Hinckley Jr. not guilty by reason of insanity in the shootings of President Ronald Reagan and three other men.

In 1985, scientists announced that skeletal remains exhumed in Brazil were those of Nazi war criminal Josef Mengele (MEN'-guh-luh).

In 1989, a sharply divided Supreme Court ruled that burning the American flag as a form of political protest is protected by the First Amendment.

In 1990, an estimated 50,000 Iranians were killed by an earthquake.

Ten years ago: North Korea promised to refrain from long-range missile tests after the United States lifted some economic sanctions against it. Some 55 years after World War II ended, 22 Asian-American veterans received the Medal of Honor for bravery on the battlefield during a White House ceremony.

Five years ago: Forty-one years to the day after three civil rights workers were beaten and shot to death, Edgar Ray Killen, an 80-year-old former Ku Klux Klansman, was found guilty of manslaughter. (Killen was sentenced to 60 years in prison.) President George W. Bush met with Vietnamese Prime Minister Phan Van Khai, the highest ranking Vietnamese official to visit the White House since the end of the war. George Hawi, an anti-Syrian politician, was killed in Beirut by a bomb placed under his car seat. Cardinal Jaime Sin (HY'-may SEEN), one of Asia's top religious leaders, died at age 76.

One year ago: Newsweek reporter Maziar Bahari was among hundreds of people arrested during the Tehran government's crackdown on nationwide protests over Iran's disputed presidential election. (Bahari was released nearly four months later.)

Today's birthdays: Actress Jane Russell is 89. Actor Bernie Kopell is 77. Actor Monte Markham is 75. Songwriter Don Black is 72. Actress Mariette Hartley is 70. Comedian Joe Flaherty is 69. Rock singer-musician Ray Davies (The Kinks) is 66. Actress Meredith Baxter is 63. Actor Michael Gross is 63. Rock musician Joe Molland (Badfinger) is 63. Rock musician Don Airey (Deep Purple) is 62. Country singer Leon Everette is 62. Rock musician Joey Kramer (Aerosmith) is 60. Rock musician Nils Lofgren is 59. Actress Robyn Douglass is 57. Actor Leigh McCloskey is 55. Cartoonist Berke Breathed is 53. Country singer Kathy Mattea is 51. Actor Marc Copage is 48. Actress Sammi Davis is 46. Actor Doug Savant is 46. Country musician Porter Howell is 46. Actor Michael Dolan is 45. Writer-director Larry Wachowski is 45. Actress Paula Irvine is 42. Rapper/producer Pete Rock is 40. Country singer Allison Moorer is 38. Actress Juliette Lewis is 37. Musician Justin Cary is 35. Rock musician Mike Einziger (Incubus) is 34. Actor Chris Pratt is 31. Rock singer Brandon Flowers is 29. Britain's Prince William of Wales is 28. Pop singer Kris Allen ("American Idol") is 25. Actor Jascha Washington is 21.

Thought for today: "It is only on paper that one moralizes -- just where one shouldn't." -- Richard Le Gallienne, English poet and essayist (1866-1947)

[Associated Press]

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