08 June History
- 452 - Attila the Hun invades Italy.
- 632 - Mohammed, the founder of Islam and unifier of Arabia, dies.
- 793 - The Vikings raid the Northumbrian coast of England.
- 1861 - Tennessee votes to secede from the Union and join the Confederacy.
- 1862 - The Army of the Potomac defeats Confederate forces at Battle of Cross Keys, Virginia.
- 1863 - Residents of Vicksburg flee into caves as General Ulysses S. Grant's army begins shelling the town.
- 1866 - Prussia annexes the region of Holstein.
- 1904 - U.S. Marines land in Tangiers, Morocco, to protect U.S. citizen.
- 1908 - King Edward VII of England visits Czar Nicholas II of Russia in an effort to improve relations between the two countries.
- 1915 - William Jennings Bryan quits as Secretary of State under President Wilson.
- 1953 - The Supreme Court forbids segregated lunch counters in Washington, D.C.
- 1965 - President Johnson authorizes commanders in Vietnam to commit U.S. ground forces to combat.
- 1966 - Gemini astronaut Gene Cernan attempts to become the first man to orbit the Earth untethered to a space capsule, but is unable to when he exhausts himself fitting into his rocket pack.
- 1967 - Israel airplanes attack the USS Liberty, a surveillance ship, in the Mediterranean, killing 34 Navy crewmen.
- 1968 - James Earl Ray, the alleged assassin of Martin Luther King, Jr., is captured at the London Airport.
- 1969 - President Richard Nixon meets with President Thieu of South Vietnam to tell him 25,000 U.S. troops will pull out by August.
- 1995 - U.S. Air Force pilot Captain Scott O'Grady is rescued by U.S. Marines in Bosnia.
08 June Birthdays
- 1625 - Giovanni Domenico Cassini, astronomer.
- 1724 - John Smeaton, English engineer.
- 1810 - Robert Schumann, German composer.
- 1813 - David D. Porter, Union admiral during the American Civil War.
- 1867 - Frank Lloyd Wright, influential American architect.
- 1916 - Francis Crick, British scientist who co-discoverered of the structure of DNA.
- 1918 - Robert Preston, actor (The Music Man).
- 1925 - Barbara Pierce Bush, First Lady to 41st President, George Bush.
- 1939 - Herb Adderley, American football player.
- 1942 - Andrew Weil, physician and author (Spontaneous Healing).
- 1947 - Sara Paretsky, detective novelist.