June 3

2024 Calendar

June 3 is the 154th day of the year (155th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 211 days remaining until the end of the year.

Events

Up to 1950

350 - Roman usurper Nepotianus, of the Constantinian dynasty, proclaims himself Roman Emperor, ending Rome, leading a group of gladiators.
1326 – The Treaty of Novgorod determines the border between Russia and the Finnmark region of northern Norway.
1539 – Hernando de Soto claims Florida for Spain.
1608 – Samuel de Champlain completes his 3rd voyage to New France at Tadoussac, Quebec.
1621 – The Dutch West India Company receives a charter for the New Netherlands.
1665 - Future-King James II of England/James VII of Scotland defeats the Dutch fleet off Lowestoft, Suffolk, England.
1769 – At Tahiti, James Cook observes the transit of Venus.
1781 - American Revolutionary War: Jack Jouett makes a midnight ride to warn Thomas Jefferson and the Virginia Legislature of coming British cavalry who had been sent to capture them.
1789 – From Fort Chipewyan, a Alexander MacKenzie-led expedition, to find a river link to the Pacific Ocean coast of Canada, sets off.
1839 - In Humen, China, Lin Tse-hsu destroys 1.2 million kilograms of opium taken from British merchants, providing the United Kingdom with the "casus belli" to begin hostilities, resulting in the First Opium War.
1858 – Francis Thomas Gregory climbs the world's biggest monolith (single piece of rock), Mount Augustus in Western Australia. He names the rock after his brother, Augustus Gregory.
1861 – American Civil War: Union troops defeat Confederate forces in the Battle of Philippi in Virginia.
1864 – American Civil War: Battle of Cold Harbor - Union forces attack Confederate troops in Hanover County, Virginia.
1885 - Last military engagement on Canadian soil - Cree leader Big Bear escapes from the North-West Mounted Police.
1889 – The Transcontinental Canadian Pacific Railway is completed.
1889 – The first long-distance electric power transmission line in the United States is completed, 14 miles (23 kilometres) from a Generator at Willamette Falls in Oregon to Portland, Oregon.
1916 - The National Defense Act is signed into law, increasing the size of the United States National Guard.
1937 – Almost 6 months after his abdication as King, Edward VIII of the United Kingdom marries Wallis Simpson.
1940 – World War II: The Battle of Dunkirk ends, as Allied forces retreat.
1940 – World War II: The Luftwaffe bombs Paris.
1940 - Franz Redemacher proposes Madagascar as the "Jewish Homeland".
1941 – World War II: The Wehrmacht razes the village of Kandanos, Greece, to the ground, killing 180 of its residents.
1942 – World War II: Japan begins its Aleutian Islands campaign by attacking Unalaska Island.
1947 - Viceroy Louis Mountbatten, 1st Earl Mountbatten of Burma announces the planned Partition of India.
1950 – Maurice Herzog and Louis Lachenal climb Annapurna in the Himalayas. It is the first successful ascent of a mountain higher than 8000 metres.

From 1951

1959 - Singapore is declared a self-governing state, though remaining within the British Empire.
1961 - US President John F. Kennedy and Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev meet in Vienna, Austria, for talks.
1962 – A Boeing 707 plane crashes near Paris, killing 130 people.
1963 – A Northwest Airlines DC-7 crashes into the Pacific Ocean off British Columbia, Canada, killing 101 people.
1965 – NASA Gemini 4 mission: Crew member Edward Higgins White becomes the first American to perform a spacewalk.
1968 - Valerie Solanas attempts to kill artist Andy Warhol.
1969 – Off South Vietnam, Australian aircraft carrier HMAS Melbourne cuts United States Navy destroyer USS Frank E. Evans in half.
1973 – The Supersonic Tupolev Tu-144 plane crashes in France, killing 14 people.
1979 – The Ixtoc I oil well explodes in the Gulf of Mexico, leading to one of the worst-ever oil spills.
1980 – Seven tornadoes hit Grand Island, Nebraska, killing 5 people and destroying many homes.
1982 - Shlomo Argov, Israel's Ambassador to the United Kingdom, is shot and seriously injured in an assassination attempt in London.
1984 – The Indian government's Operation Blue Star military offensive begins at the Golden Temple in Amritsar.
1989 – The crushing of protests at Tiananmen Square in Beijing begins. Hundreds of people are killed.
1989 – Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khomeini dies.
1991 – Mount Unzen on Kyushu, Japan, erupts, killing 43 people, all of them researchers or journalists.
1992 - Aboriginal land rights are granted in Australia.
1993 - France and Spain recognize the independence of Andorra.
1998 – A major train derailment occurs in Eschede, Germany, killing 101 people.
2003 - A train crash in Chinchilla, Castile-La Mancha, Spain, kills 19 people and injures around 50.
2006 – Montenegro becomes independent.
2008 – Barack Obama secures the Democratic Party nomination for President of the United States, over Hillary Clinton.
2010 – The name of the Queen Charlotte Islands, British Columbia, Canada, is officially changed back to Haida Gwaii.
2012 – Dana Air Flight 997 crashes into a building in Lagos, Nigeria, killing all 153 people on board and more than 40 on the ground.
2017 - The June 2017 London attack is carried out, killing 8 people in a car-ramming and stabbing attack.
2018 - The Volcan de Fuego volcano in Guatemala erupts, killing at least 69 people.

Births

Deaths

Up to 1975

628 - Liang Shidu, Chinese rebel leader
800 - Staurakios, Byzantine general
1395 - Ivan Shishman of Bulgaria (b. 1350)
1397 - William de Montacute, 2nd Earl of Salisbury, English commander (b. 1328)
1411 – Leopold IV, Regent of Tyrol and Further Austria
1615 - Sanada Yukimura, Japanese samurai (b. 1567)
1649 - Manuel de Faria e Sousa, Portuguese historian and poet (b. 1590)
1657 – William Harvey, English physician (b. 1578)
1780 – Thomas Hutchinson, colonial Governor of Massachusetts (b. 1711)
1826 – Nikolai Karamzin, Russian writer (b. 1766)
1858 – Julius Reubke, German composer (b. 1834)
1861 – Stephen A. Douglas, American politician (b. 1813)
1875 – Georges Bizet, French composer (b. 1838)
1882 - Christian Wiberg, German painter (b. 1839)
1894 – Karl Eduard Zachariae, expert on Byzantine Law (b. 1812)
1899 – Johann Strauss II, Austrian composer (b. 1825)
1900 – Mary Kingsley, English explorer (b. 1862)
1906 - John Maxwell, American golfer (b. 1871)
1918 - Ramon Maximiliano Valdes, 7th President of Panama (b. 1867)
1924 – Franz Kafka, Austrian novelist (b. 1883)
1928 – Li Yüan-hung, Chinese general and political figure (b. 1864)
1946 – Mikhail Kalinin, Soviet-Russian politician (b. 1875)
1963 – Nazim Hikmet (b. 1902)
1963 – Pope John XXIII (b. 1881)
1964 – Frans Eemil Sillanpaa, Finnish writer (b. 1888)
1969 - George Edwin Cooke, American soccer player (b. 1883)
1970 – Hjalmar Schacht, Minister of Economics and President of the Reichsbank under Adolf Hitler (b. 1877)
1971 – Heinz Hopf, German mathematician (b. 1894)
1975 - Eisaku Sato, Prime Minister of Japan (b. 1901)
1975 – Ozzie Nelson, American band leader, producer, director, and actor (b. 1906)

1976 – 2010

1977 – Roberto Rossellini, Italian movie director, father of Isabella Rossellini, husband of Ingrid Bergman (b. 1906)
1977 – Archibald Hill, English mathematician, won the 1922 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1886)
1986 - Anna Neagle, English actress (b. 1904)
1987 - Will Sampson, American actor and artist (b. 1933)
1989 – Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, Iranian Shi'ite Islamic leader (b. 1900)
1990 – Stiv Bators, American musician, punk rock singer with The Dead Boys (b. October 22, 1949)
1990 – Robert Noyce, American inventor (b. 1927)
1991 – Katia Krafft, French volcanologist (b. 1942)
1991 – Maurice Krafft, French volcanologist (b. 1946)
1991 – Takeshi Nagata, Japanese geophysicist (b. 1913)
1992 – Robert Morley, English actor (b. 1908)
1994 - Puig Aubert, French rugby player (b. 1925)
1997 - Dennis James, American actor and game show host (b. 1917)
2000 - Merton Miller, American economist (b. 1923)
2001 – Anthony Quinn, Mexican-American actor (b. 1915)
2002 - Lew Wasserman, American talent agent and studio executive (b. 1913)
2003 – Felix de Weldon, Austrian sculptor (b. 1907)
2004 – Frances Shand Kydd, mother of Diana, Princess of Wales (b. 1936)
2005 – Harold Cardinal, Cree political leader, writer and lawyer (b. 1945)
2006 - Johnny Grande, American singer (b. 1932)
2009 – Koko Taylor, American musician (b. 1928)
2009 – David Carradine, American actor (b. 1936)
2010 – Vladimir Arnold, Russian mathematician (b. 1937)
2010 – Rue McClanahan, American actress (b. 1934)

From 2011

2011 – Jack Kevorkian, American physician and assisted suicide activist (b. 1928)
2011 – James Arness, American actor (b. 1923)
2012 – Roy Salvadori, British racing driver (b. 1922)
2013 - Frank Lautenberg, United States Senator for New Jersey (b. 1924)
2013 - Jiah Khan, American-born British-Indian actress (b. 1988)
2013 - Atul Chitnis, German-Indian technician (b. 1962)
2014 - Gopinath Munde, Indian politician (b. 1949)
2014 - James Alan Shelton, Australian bluegrass guitarist (b. 1960)
2014 - Karl Harris, British motorcycle racer (b. 1979)
2014 - Svyatoslav Belza, Russian scholar, critic and essayist (b. 1942)
2014 - Virginia Luque, Argentine actress (b. 1927)
2015 - Avi Beker, Israeli academic (b. 1951)
2015 - Margaret Juntwait, American radio host (b. 1957)
2016 - Muhammad Ali, American boxer (b. 1942)
2016 - Jocelyn Lovell, Canadian cyclist (b. 1950)
2016 - Sten Lundin, Swedish motocross racer (b. 1931)
2016 - Luis Salom, Spanish motorcycle racer (b. 1991)
2016 - Dave Swarbrick, English musician and singer-songwriter (b. 1941)
2016 - Adolph Cornelis van Bruggen, Dutch malacologist (b. 1929)
2017 - David Choby, American Roman Catholic prelate (b. 1947)
2017 - Niels Helveg Petersen, Danish politician (b. 1939)
2017 - Jimmy Piersall, American baseball player (b. 1929)
2017 - John K. Watts, Australian footballer and broadcaster (b. 1937)
2017 - Vincent Tshabalala, South African golfer (b. 1942)
2018 - Robert Brylewski, Polish singer-songwriter (b. 1961)
2018 - Frank Carlucci, American politician (b. 1930)
2018 - Jerry Hopkins, American journalist and blogger (b. 1935)
2018 - Miguel Obando y Bravo, Nicaraguan cardinal (b. 1926)
2018 - Mario Toros, Italian politician (b. 1922)
2018 - Georg von Tiesenhausen, German-American rocket scientist (b. 1914)

Observances

World Bicycle Day
European Bicycle Day
Montenegro Independence Day
Confederate Memorial Day (Kentucky, Louisiana, Tennessee)

Events

Up to 1950

From 1951

Births

Up to 1900

1901 – 1950

1951 – 1975

From 1976

Deaths

Up to 1975

1976 – 2010

From 2011

Observances