June 11th

June 11 is the 163rd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. If the ancient Mayans were correct, there are 193 days remaining until the end of time.

1184BCE Troy sacked and burned according to calculations of Eratosthenes. For those of us who are alumni of the University of Southern California, this is a very sad day. Fucla!

1742 Benjamin Franklin invents his Franklin stove

1770 Captain James Cook runs his ship aground when he discovers these gay boys and the Great Barrier Reef off Australia

1859 Comstock’s load [sic] is discovered near Virginia City, Nevada, and some silver, too

1959 Postmaster General bans D H Lawrence's book, Lady Chatterley's Lover (overruled by U.S. Court of Appeals in Mar 1960), because he wants Nicholas Clay all to himself, the greedy, selfish bastard.

1962 Frank Morris, John Anglin and Clarence Anglin allegedly become the only prisoners to escape from the prison on Alcatraz Island.

1963 Alabama Governor George Wallace stands at the door of Foster Auditorium at the University of Alabama to block two black students, Vivian Malone and James Hood, from enrolling. Later in the day, accompanied by federalized National Guard troops, they are able to register.

1964 Queen Elizabeth commands the Beatles to attend her birthday party upon pain of death

1966 "Sloop John B" by The Beach Boys hit #1 in U.K.. Here’s a John B I’d like to slurp, but alas, he is taken.

1966 "I Am A Rock" by Simon and Garfunkel peaks at #3. It has a better ring to it that "I Am A Dwayne"

1996 Bob Dole, Sen-R-KS, resigns from US senate to hawk a boner pill

2008 Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper makes an historic official apology to Canada's First Nations in regard to a residential school abuse in which children are isolated from their homes, families and cultures for a century.  Mighty white of him.

1888 Bartolomeo Vanzetti, maybe gay Italian-born US anarchist/martyr, with Ferdinando Nicoloa Sacco, wrongfully executed for robbery/murder with murky evidence

1912 James Algar, maybe gay US Disney animator/director

1933 Gene Wilder, US actor/director/Dr Frank-uhn-steeen

1936 Chad Everett, US actor 

1941 Richard Locke, legendary gay US pornographic actor/AIDS victim 

1948 Michael Swan, maybe gay US actor 

1956 Joe Montana, US football quarterback extrordinaire 

1959 Hugh Laurie, English comedian/actor 

1964 Jean Alesi, French race car driver 

1965 Johnny Rahm, gay US pornographic actor 

1969 Mark Kroner, gay US pornographic actor 

1971 Jason Gardiner, gay Australian choreographer/singer/theatre producer/ice judge/Culture Vulture on Queer Eye UK 

1975 Steve Bell, English boxer/actor/Like It Is 

1977 Ryan Dunn, late US Jackass 

1978 Joshua Jackson, Canadian actor 

1981 Ramirez Allender, Brazilian soccer player/model/actor

1986 Shia Laboeuf, US actor 

1985 Karen Ann Quinlan, comatose US patient, exercises her right to die

1996 Ulysses Dove, gay US dancer/choreographer, succumbs to AIDS at 49

2001 Timothy McVeigh, heterosexual US terrorist who's not even cute,  is euthanized for the 1995 Oklahoma City bombing that killed at least 168

2004 Prince Egon von Furstenberg [Eduard Egon Peter Paul Giovanni Prinz zu Fürstenberg], bisexual German royal/fashion designer, succumbs to AIDS at 57 according to rumors