Today is Wednesday, June 22, the 173rd day of 2011. There are 192 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History

On June 22, 1911, Britain’s King George V was crowned at Westminster Abbey.

On this date

In 1611, English explorer Henry Hudson, his son and several other people were set adrift in present-day Hudson Bay by mutineers aboard the Discovery; their fate remains unknown.

In 1870, the U.S. Department of Justice was created.

In 1940, during World War II, Adolf Hitler gained a stunning victory as France was forced to sign an armistice eight days after German forces overran Paris.

In 1941, Germany launched Operation Barbarossa as it invades the Soviet Union.

In 1944, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act of 1944, more popularly known as the GI Bill of Rights.

In 1945, the World War II battle for Okinawa ended with an Allied victory.

In 1969, singer-actress Judy Garland died in London at age 47.

In 1977, John Mitchell became the first former U.S. attorney general to go to prison as he began serving a sentence for his role in the Watergate cover-up. (He was released 19 months later.)

In 1981, Mark David Chapman pleaded guilty to killing rock star John Lennon. Abolhassan Bani-Sadr was deposed as president of Iran.

In 1993, former first lady Pat Nixon died in Park Ridge, N.J., at age 81.

Today’s Birthdays

Singer-actor Kris Kristofferson is 75. Actress Meryl Streep is 62. Pop singer Cyndi Lauper is 58. Actor-producer-writer Bruce Campbell is 53. Author Dan Brown (“The Da Vinci Code”) is 47. Actress Mary Lynn Rajskub is 40. TV personality Carson Daly is 38. Rock musician Chris Traynor is 38. Country musician Jimmy Wallace is 38. Actor Donald Faison is 37. Actress Alicia Goranson is 37. TV personality/actor Jai Rodriguez is 32. Actress Lindsay Ridgeway is 26.

Thought for Today

“If you look at life one way, there is always cause for alarm.”

— Elizabeth Bowen,

Irish author (1899-1973)