- 129th Day of 2012 / 237 Remaining
- 43 Days Until Summer Begins
- Sunrise:6:06
- Sunset:8:08
- 14 Hours 2 Minutes of Daylight
- Moon Rise:11:21pm
- Moon Set:8:23am
- Moon’s Phase: 90 %
- The Next Full Moon
- June 4 @ 4:11am
- Full Strawberry Moon
- Full Rose Moon
- Full Milk Moon
This name was universal to every Algonquin tribe. However, in Europe they called it the Rose Moon. Also because the relatively short season for harvesting strawberries comes each year during the month of June, so the full Moon that occurs during that month was christened for the strawberry!
- Tides
- High:12:19am/2:20pm
- Low:7:16am/7:15pm
- Rainfall
- This Year:15.67
- Last Year:26.17
- Normal To Date:23.18
- Annual Seasonal Average: 23.80
- Holidays
- No Socks Day
- Stay up All Night
- V-E Day
- National Coconut Cream Pie Day
- Childhood Depression Awareness Day
- National Teacher Day
- World Red Cross Day
- UN Time of Remembrance and Reconciliation For Those Who Lost Their Lives During the Second World War
- Liberation Day-Czech Republic
- Liberation Day-Slovakia
- Victory Day-France
- Yom Ha'Zikkaron-Israel
- Parent's Day-South Korea
- On This Day In …
- 1794 --- Antoine Lavoisier, the father of modern chemistry, was executed on the guillotine during France's Reign of Terror. He was the French chemist that discovered oxygen
- 1794 --- The United States Post Office was established.
- 1847 --- Robert W. Thomson of England patented the rubber tire.
- 1886 --- Dr. John S. Pemberton first sold his secret elixir. It was originally used for medicinal purposes. So Dr. Pemberton went to the right place to sell his new product: Jacob’s Pharmacy in Atlanta, GA. Three years later, Dr. Pemberton figured that his secret formula had been enough of a success for him to sell out. He did just that, for $2,300. Even in 1889 dollars, $2,300 was a mere drop in the bucket for what the still very classified, secret formula would be worth. That formula is now used in a product that sells about 350 million cans and bottles a day in nearly 200 countries. That’s enough secret elixir for every man, woman and child on earth to consume -- 25 times a year.
- 1914 --- The U.S. Congress passed a Joint Resolution that designated the second Sunday in May as Mother's Day.
- 1921 --- Sweden abolished capital punishment.
- 1945 --- Great Britain and the United States celebrate Victory in Europe Day. Cities in both nations, as well as formerly occupied cities in Western Europe, put out flags and banners, rejoicing in the defeat of the Nazi war machine. The eighth of May spelled the day when German troops throughout Europe finally laid down their arms: In Prague, Germans surrendered to their Soviet antagonists, after the latter had lost more than 8,000 soldiers, and the Germans considerably more; in Copenhagen and Oslo; at Karlshorst, near Berlin; in northern Latvia; on the Channel Island of Sark--the German surrender was realized in a final cease-fire. More surrender documents were signed in Berlin and in eastern Germany. The main concern of many German soldiers was to elude the grasp of Soviet forces, to keep from being taken prisoner. About 1 million Germans attempted a mass exodus to the West when the fighting in Czechoslovakia ended, but were stopped by the Russians and taken captive. The Russians took approximately 2 million prisoners in the period just before and after the German surrender. Meanwhile, more than 13,000 British POWs were released and sent back to Great Britain. Pockets of German-Soviet confrontation would continue into the next day. On May 9, the Soviets would lose 600 more soldiers in Silesia before the Germans finally surrendered. Consequently, V-E Day was not celebrated until the ninth in Moscow, with a radio broadcast salute from Stalin himself: "The age-long struggle of the Slav nations...has ended in victory. Your courage has defeated the Nazis. The war is over."
- 1956 --- Alfred E. Neuman first appeared on the cover of Mad magazine. His slogan: "What, me worry?"
- 1958 --- U.S. President Eisenhower ordered the National Guard out of Little Rock as Ernest Green became the first black to graduate from an Arkansas public school.
- 1962 --- Zero Mostel starred in one of his most famous roles, in the Broadway production of A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum. The comedy opened at the Alvin Theatre in New York City. Audiences laughed through the entertaining show for a total of 964 performances.
- 1963 --- With the release of Dr. No, moviegoers get their first look--down the barrel of a gun--at the super-spy James Bond (codename: 007), the immortal character created by Ian Fleming in his now-famous series of novels and portrayed onscreen by the relatively unknown Scottish actor Sean Connery. Connery had acted in repertory theater and television and scored some bit parts in films before landing his first significant role, opposite Lana Turner in Another Time, Another Place (1958). Bigger roles followed, notably in Tarzan’s Greatest Adventure (1959). Harold Saltzman and Albert “Cubby” Broccoli, the producers of Dr. No, had other actors in mind to play Bond, including Cary Grant and James Mason; Fleming himself preferred another leading candidate, David Niven. After winning the role, however, Connery swiftly made it his own.
- 1968 --- Catfish Hunter was pitching for Oakland in an American League baseball game against Minnesota. By the end of the game, with a score of 4-0, Catfish made history. He pitched what turned out to be the ninth perfect game in major-league baseball history. Hunter also had 3 hits (including a double) and 3 RBI of his own in the game. 6,300 fans were in attendance that night in Oakland.
- 1970 --- President Nixon, at a news conference, defends the U.S. troop movement into Cambodia, saying the operation would provide six to eight months of time for training South Vietnamese forces and thus would shorten the war for Americans. Nixon reaffirmed his promise to withdraw 150,000 American soldiers by the following spring. The announcement that U.S. and South Vietnamese troops had invaded Cambodia resulted in a firestorm of protests and gave the antiwar movement a new rallying point. College students across the nation intensified their antiwar protests with marches, rallies, and scattered incidents of violence. About 400 schools were affected by strikes and more than 200 colleges and universities closed completely. The protests resulted in deaths at Kent State University and later at Jackson State in Mississippi. Dissent was not limited to campus confrontations. More than 250 State Department and foreign aid employees signed a letter to Secretary of State William Rogers criticizing U.S. military involvement in Cambodia. In addition, there were a series of congressional resolutions and legislative initiatives that attempted to limit severely the executive war-making powers of the president. Senators John Sherman Cooper (R-Kentucky) and Frank Church (D-Idaho) proposed an amendment to the foreign military sales portion of a Defense Department appropriations bill that would have barred funds for future military operations in Cambodia. The bill passed in the Senate by a vote of 58 to 37, but was defeated 237 to 153 in the House. On December 29, 1970, Congress passed a modified version of the Cooper-Church Amendment barring the introduction of U.S. ground troops in Laos or Thailand.
- 1985 --- "New Coke" was released to the public on the 99th anniversary of Coca-Cola.
- 1990 --- Tom Waits won $2.5 million when a Los Angeles court ruled that Frito-Lay unlawfully used a Waits sound alike in its Doritos ads.
- Birthdays
- President Harry S. Truman
- Don Rickles
- Toni Tennille
- Enrique Iglesias
- Ronnie Lott
- David Attenborough
- Gary Glitter
- Philip Bailey
- Chris Frantz
- Sonny Liston
- Oscar Hammerstein
- Peter Benchley