#Middlebury
- On June 30, 1859, Emile Blondin becomes the first daredevil to walk across Niagara Falls on a tightrope. The feat was witnessed by some 5,000 spectators. Blondin wore pink tights and a yellow tunic, and carried a balancing pole.
- On June 26, 1917, during World War I, the first 14,000 U.S. infantry troops land in France. By the war’s end on Nov. 11, 1918, more than 2 million American soldiers had served on the battlefields of Western Europe, and more than 50,000 lost their lives.
- On June 25, 1950, in one of the greatest soccer upsets of all time, an American team composed largely of amateurs defeats its more polished English opponents, 1-0, at the World Cup in Brazil. Assembled just days before the match, the U.S. team included a dishwasher, two mailmen, a teacher and a mill worker.
- On June 29, 1964, two dozen New Zealand Army engineers arrive in Saigon as a token of that country’s support for the American effort in South Vietnam.
- On June 28, 1972, President Richard Nixon announces that no more draftees will be sent to Vietnam unless they volunteer for such duty. He also announced that a force of 10,000 troops would be withdrawn by Sept. 1, which would leave a total of 39,000 in Vietnam.
- On June 27, 1988, heavyweight champion Mike Tyson knocks out challenger Michael Spinks with a left hook in the first round. The match lasted just 91 seconds.
- On June 24, 1997, Air Force officials release a 231-page report dismissing long-standing claims of an alien spacecraft crash 50 years earlier in Roswell, N.M. The UFO rumors began in 1947 when a rancher found shiny material scattered on his land. The Air Force said it was a downed weather balloon.
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