- 171st Day of 2012 / 195 Remaining
- 1 Days Until Summer Begins
- Sunrise:5:48
- Sunset:8:35
- 14 Hours 47 Minutes of Daylight
- Moon Rise:5:57am
- Moon Set:8:45pm
- Moon’s Phase: New Moon
- The Next Full Moon
- July 3 @ 11:51am
- Full Buck Moon
- Full Thunder Moon
- Full Hay Moon
July is normally the month when the new antlers of buck deer push out of their foreheads in coatings of velvety fur. It was also often called the Full Thunder Moon, for the reason that thunderstorms are most frequent during this time. Another name for this month’s Moon was the Full Hay Moon.
- Tides
- High:12:49am/11:06pm
- Low:5:42am/5:24pm
- Rainfall (measured July 1 – June 30)
- This Year:15.80
- Last Year:28.51
- Normal To Date:28.30
- Annual Seasonal Average: 23.80
- Holidays
- National Martini Day
- Family Awareness Day
- Husband Caregiver Day
- Juneteenth
- Emancipation Day-Texas
- Butterfly Day
- World Sauntering Day
- Artigas Day-Uruguay
- Independence Day-Kuwait
- Labour Day-Trinidad & Tobago
- Righting Day-Algeria
- On This Day In …
- 1846 --- The first organized baseball game was played on this day. The location was Hoboken, New Jersey. The New York Baseball Club defeated the Knickerbocker Club, 23 to 1. This first game was only four innings long. The New York Nine, as the winners were known, must have really studied the rules to have twenty-three runs batted in. The rules had been formulated just one year earlier by a Mr. Alexander Cartwright, Jr.
- 1865 --- It took more than two-and-a-half years after Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation Proclamation went into effect for Union troops to land in Galveston, Texas. They carried the message of freedom, the resolution of the Civil War between the States, to the many slaves throughout Texas. Union Major General Gordon Granger read General Order #3: “The people of Texas are informed that, in accordance with a proclamation from the Executive of the United States, all slaves are free. This involves an absolute equality of personal rights and rights of property between former masters and slaves, and the connection heretofore existing between them becomes that between employer and hired labor. The freedmen are advised to remain quietly at their present homes and work for wages. They are informed that they will not be allowed to collect at military posts and that they will not be supported in idleness either there or elsewhere.” The slaves rejoiced with cheers and tears as they learned of their liberation, calling their “day of deliverance,” Juneteenth, a day still celebrated by black families and communities throughout the world.
- 1910 --- Father's Day was celebrated for the first time, in Spokane, Wash.
- 1912 --- The United States government adopted an 8-hour work day.
- 1917 --- During World War I, King George V ordered the British royal family to dispense with German titles and surnames. On July 17, 1917, the family took the name "Windsor".
- 1934 --- The U.S. Congress established the Federal Communications Commission (FCC). The commission was to regulate radio and TV broadcasting (later).
- 1941 --- General Mills in Minneapolis created a new dry breakfast cereal called Cheerie Oats. Later in 1945 the name was later shortened to Cheerios.
- 1943 --- The National Football League approved the merger of the Philadelphia Eagles and the Pittsburgh Steelers (the Steagles), a team that lasted one 5-4-1 season; but turned down approval of a similar merger of the Chicago Cardinals and the Bears. The following year the Steelers merged with the Cardinals, another one season combo. The reason teams were merging in the 1940s: so many men were in the armed forces due to WWII, football players were at a premium.
- 1952 --- CBS-TV debuted one of television’s most popular hits, I’ve Got a Secret. Garry Moore was the first host, from 1952 to 1964. Steve Allen was next (1964 to 1967) and moderated a syndicated version in the 1972-1973 season. Bill Cullen hosted the attempted comeback of the show in 1976. Panelists included Allen’s wife, Jayne Meadows; Bill Cullen, Henry Morgan, Betsy Palmer, Faye Emerson, Melville Cooper and Orson Bean.
- 1953 --- Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, a married couple convicted of conspiracy to commit espionage in 1951, are put to death in the electric chair. The execution marked the dramatic finale of the most controversial espionage case of the Cold War.
- 1958 --- In Washington, DC, nine entertainers refused to answer a congressional committee's questions on communism.
- 1964 --- The U.S. Civil Rights Act of 1964 was approved by the Senate, 73-27, after surviving a lengthy filibuster.
- 1972 --- U.S. Supreme Court rules against Curt Flood in Flood v. Kuhn, denying Flood free agency as a baseball player. Flood was trying to break the reserve clause that had tied baseball players to one franchise since the establishment of professional baseball. Curt Flood was traded from the St. Louis Cardinals to the Philadelphia Phillies following the 1969 season. The Cardinals were among the premiere franchises in baseball, and they had won the World Series in 1964 and 1967 with Flood patrolling centerfield. A career .293 hitter, Flood hit .300 six times in his 10 seasons with the Cardinals (1959-1969), and won a Gold Glove Award for fielding seven consecutive years (1963-1969). He was a star player, and he was loath to leave St. Louis for Philadelphia to play for a second-rate team with a reputation for racism among the home fans. Flood consulted Marvin Miller, executive director of the Player’s Union and a savvy negotiator and labor expert who had already successfully introduced collective bargaining to the major leagues. Miller was convinced that Flood would lose his battle in court in addition to his baseball career. Still, Flood decided to move forward, and in a December 1969 letter to baseball commissioner Bowie Kuhn, he stated his desire to become a free agent, which would give him the power to decide for which team he would play. Kuhn ignored the letter. Flood v. Kuhn was argued in May and June 1970 in the southern district of New York. Flood was represented by Arthur Goldberg, a legendary labor lawyer who later became a U.S. Supreme Court justice, but a heavyweight attorney was not enough. After losing in U.S. District Court and then the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals, the case was argued in front of the Supreme Court beginning in March 1972. The opinion, delivered by Justice Harry Blackmun, affirmed the 1922 Federal Baseball Club v. National League opinion of Oliver Wendell Holmes that baseball is a sport and not a business, and therefore exempt from anti-trust law. The blistering dissent by Justices Thurgood Marshall, William Brennan and William O. Douglas maintained that the ruling was incorrect because baseball was and is a business, and a big business, packaged with liquor sales, broadcasting and many other industries. As Miller predicted, Curt Flood never played baseball again. Three years later, in 1975, an independent arbitrator ruled in a similar case brought by Andy Messersmith and Dave McNally that the men were free of their contractual obligations and could file for free agency. Today, free agency is as much a part of baseball as Cracker Jack and hot dogs.
- 1985 --- Take heart, duffers! Angelo Spagnolo shot an incredible 257 -- that’s two-hundred, fifty-seven strokes -- to win the Worst Avid Golfer’s Tournament held at Ponte Vedra, FL. He earned the title of America’s Worst Recreational Hacker for the effort. He lost 60 golf balls, got a 66 on the 17th hold, and hit 27 balls into the water!
- 1987 --- Ben & Jerry Ice Cream introduced a new Ice Cream flavor, Cherry Garcia.
- 1998 --- A study published in the British medical journal Lancet said smoking more than doubled the riskof developing dementia and Alzheimer's disease
- Birthdays
- Aung San Suu Kyi
- Salman Rushdie
- Ann Wilson
- Wallis Warfield Windsor
- Lou Gehrig
- Moe Howard
- Kathleen Turner
- Phylicia Rashad
- Paula Abdul
- Garfield
- Gena Rowlands
- Guy Lombardo
- Abe Fortas
- Blaise Pascal
- Lester Flatt
- Louis Jourdan
- Pauline Kael
- Spanky McFarlane