June 1950

June 1, 1950 (Thursday)

• Guam was given the status of a United States Territory, and all of its residents were granted U.S. citizenship.
• The French government sent a 24-hour ultimatum to the British government, to either accept the proposal for joining what would become the European Coal and Steel Community, or miss out on the negotiations set to start the next day.
• The Welsh Air Service, the world's first scheduled helicopter service, began operating between Cardiff, Wrexham and Liverpool.
• At 9:30 pm near Hilo, Mauna Loa in Hawaii started erupting.
• Born: Gennadi Manakov, Soviet cosmonaut, in Yefimovka, Orenburg Oblast

  June 2, 1950 (Friday)

• At a meeting presided over by Deputy Prime Minister Herbert Morrison in the absence of Prime Minister Clement Attlee, the British cabinet ministers elected not to participate in the talks to create the European Coal and Steel Community.
• The United States and Canada became associate members of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.

  June 3, 1950 (Saturday)

• The European Coal and Steel Community was formed in Paris by France, West Germany, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg.
• The first "World Series" in the 15-year history of the Roller Derby began at New York's Madison Square Garden, with five teams competing against each other, "headed by the pennant-winning Philadelphia Panthers". The series was a six-night round-robin tournament that also featured the Jersey Jolters, the Brooklyn Red Devils, the Chicago Westerners and the New York Chiefs.
• The racehorse Citation set a new record for running the mile, with a mark of 1 minute, 33.6 seconds to win the Golden Gate Mile in Albany, California. Citation also set a new record for earnings as the $20,000 prize set his total earnings to $924,630.
• Annapurna, at feet the tenth highest mountain in the world, was first ascended by the French Annapurna expedition to become the highest peak climbed up to that time. The flag of France was planted on the summit by Maurice Herzog and Louis Lachenal. Both Herzog and Lachenal, who made the climb without bottled oxygen and refused to turn back in spite of the onset of frostbite, lost all of their toes, and Herzog lost all of his fingers as well.
• Born:
• *Deniece Williams, American pop singer, songwriter and four time Grammy Award winner, as June Deniece Chandler in Gary, Indiana
• *Suzi Quatro, American rock musician, singer, bass player and four time Grammy Award winner, as Susan Quatrocchio in Detroit

  June 4, 1950 (Sunday)

• Nationwide elections for the House of Councillors in Japan, with the majority Liberal Democratic Party, headed by Prime Minister Shigeru Yoshida, increased its share, winning 52 of the 132 seats.
• Voters in Belgium voted for Parliament, determining the fate of King Leopold III if he should return from exile to rule the nation. The Social Christian Party, which favored the King, won 107 seats, while the "anti-Leopold" coalition of Socialists, Liberals and Communists combined for 105 seats.
• Nazim al-Kudsi formed a government as the new Prime Minister of Syria.
• Died:
• *Ahmad Tajuddin, 36, Sultan of Brunei since 1924. The Sultan was succeeded by his younger brother, Omar Ali Saifuddien III.
• *Kazys Grinius, 83, President of Lithuania in 1926
• *George Cecil Ives, 82, British gay rights activist and poet

  June 5, 1950 (Monday)

• The U.S. Supreme Court ruled in the case of Sweatt v. Painter and a companion case, McLaurin v. Oklahoma State Regents, that the doctrine of "separate but equal" was invalid unless a state was able to provide equal opportunities to each race.
• The Allied High Commission returned control to West Germany of that nation's chemical industry, on the condition that the chemicals manufactured would be limited to those used in peacetime.
• A chartered C-46 airplane operated by Westair had to ditch in the Atlantic Ocean after losing power during a flight from San Juan, Puerto Rico, to Wilmington, Delaware, with the loss of 37 of the 65 people on board.
• Born: Abraham Sarmiento, Jr., Philippine editor who defied the Marcos government; in Manila

  June 6, 1950 (Tuesday)

• The "Red Purge", a political action by the Tokyo government against officials of the Japanese Communist Party, reached its peak. Over the next seven months, the purge was extended to party members and sympathizers, and 20,997 public and private employees were fired from their jobs, leftist newspapers were put out of business, and leftist student organizations were raided.
• Died: Charles S. Howard, 73, millionaire car dealer and owner of the famous racehorse Seabiscuit

  June 7, 1950 (Wednesday)

• The Communist governments of Poland and East Germany agreed to set the border between their two nations as the Oder River and the Neisse River, with the Germans relinquishing claims to the territory lost in World War II.
• Born: Howard Finkel, American pro wrestling ring announcer, in Newark, New Jersey

  June 8, 1950 (Thursday)

• The New Jersey Jolters defeated the Brooklyn Red Devils, 24 to 22, to win the first ever "World Series of Roller Derby", before a crown of 16,877 people at New York City's Madison Square Garden.
• Newspapers in Pyongyang, the capital of Communist North Korea, published the manifesto of the "Central Committee of the United Democratic Patriotic Front", adopted the day before, announcing the goal of reunification of North Korea and South Korea starting with meetings on August 15. Seventeen days later, North Korean troops would invade South Korea.
• Sir Thomas Blamey became the first, and only Field Marshal in Australian history, less than a year before his death on May 27, 1951.
• Born:
• *Kathy Baker, American TV and film actress, in Midland, Texas
• *Sônia Braga, Brazilian TV and film actress, in Maringá

  June 9, 1950 (Friday)

• In Budapest, 322 priests and monks, and more than 600 nuns, were arrested and transported to various camps within Hungary. Vatican Radio reported the news more than two weeks later, on June 26.
• Screenwriters Dalton Trumbo and John Howard Lawson were hauled to jail, handcuffed together, after being convicted of contempt of Congress.
• A landslide buried 70 construction employees at the Japanese village of Kumanodiara while they were working on repair of a railway track, with only 24 people rescued.

  June 10, 1950 (Saturday)

• An official of the United Nations Commission on Korea crossed into North Korea and received the text of that nation's proposal for unification with South Korea, bringing back three "peace representatives" from the North.

  June 11, 1950 (Sunday)

• NASCAR racer John Edward "Skimp" Hersey, 37, was fatally injured when he lost control of his car during a race at Atlanta's Lakewood Speedway. At the time, it was common for racers to keep a can of extra gasoline in their vehicles in case they ran out far from the pit, and Hersey's car was engulfed in flames. A photographer from the Atlanta Constitution newspaper was the first to reach the scene, and as he took pictures of the burning car, Hersey crawled out of the wreckage on fire. The newsman kept taking photos without making any effort to assist Hersey, and by the time another person was able to douse the flames, the burns were fatal. The remainder of the race was cancelled, and Jack Smith, who had been leading at the time of the accident, was declared the winner. The next day, Hersey died, while the photos of his crash ran on the front page of the Constitution.
• Houston businessman Stanford B. Twente chose the telecast of a minor league baseball game as his opportunity to commit suicide in front of a TV audience. Twente walked into the broadcast booth, where Dick Gottlieb was narrating the action, sat down, and then shot himself in the head. Viewers heard the shot, and then saw Gottlieb sitting next to Mr. Twente's corpse.
• Died: Sane Guruji, 50, Indian children's author, novelist and social reformer

  June 12, 1950 (Monday)

• The Bank of Korea began operations as the central bank for South Korea, one week after the enabling legislation had been passed, and two weeks before North Korean troops invaded Seoul to start the Korean War.
• The Philippine province of Mindoro, located on the island of the same name, was divided into Occidental Mindoro and Oriental Mindoro.

  June 13, 1950 (Tuesday)

• An Air France DC-4 airplane, with 52 people on board, ditched in the sea near Bahrain after developing engine trouble en route from Karachi to Cairo. Only four people survived. Blame was placed upon the pilot for failing to keep track of his rate of descent during the final approach, and crashing into the sea. Two days later, another Air France DC-4 on the same route crashed into the sea during its approach to Bahrain.
• Vladimir Houdek, formerly the representative from Czechoslovakia to the United Nations, was given asylum in the United States, nearly a month after resigning his post on May 16. Houdek was admitted despite refusing to renounce his support of Communism.
• Soviet Finance Minister Arseny Zverev told a joint meeting of the Supreme Soviet that the nation's defense budget for 1950–1951 would be cut by 18.5%.
• All programs of the CBS Television Network were halted when 400 technicians went on strike in New York and in Hollywood.
• The three North Korean "peace representatives", who had crossed into South Korea on Saturday, were arrested.

  June 14, 1950 (Wednesday)

• U.S. Army General Douglas MacArthur, Commander in Chief Far East, submitted his "Memorandum on Formosa" to the Joint Chiefs of Staff in order to persuade the Truman Administration not to abandon the Republic of China on the island of Taiwan. MacArthur wrote that "Formosa in the hands of the Communists can be compared to an unsinkable aircraft carrier and submarine tender ideally located to accomplish Soviet offensive strategy and at the same time checkmate counteroffensive operations by the United States Forces based on Okinawa and the Philippines."
• Born: Rowan Williams, 104th Archbishop of Canterbury, in Swansea, Wales