Events on June 15 53
Year 923
Battle of Soissons: King Robert I of France is killed and King Charles the Simple is arrested by the supporters of Duke Rudolph of Burgundy.
Year 1219
Northern Crusades: Danish victory at the Battle of Lyndanisse (modern-day Tallinn) establishes the Danish Duchy of Estonia.
Year 1246
With the death of Frederick II, Duke of Austria, the Babenberg dynasty ends in Austria.
Year 1312
At the Battle of Rozgony, King Charles I of Hungary wins a decisive victory over the family of Palatine Amade Aba.
Year 1410
In a decisive battle at Onon River, the Mongol forces of Oljei Temur were decimated by the Chinese armies of the Yongle Emperor.
Year 1648
Margaret Jones is hanged in Boston for witchcraft in the first such execution for the Massachusetts Bay Colony.
Year 1752
Benjamin Franklin proves that lightning is electricity (traditional date, the exact date is unknown).
Year 1776
Delaware Separation Day: Delaware votes to suspend government under the British Crown and separate officially from Pennsylvania.
Year 1804
New Hampshire approves the Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution, ratifying the document.
Year 1844
Charles Goodyear receives a patent for vulcanization, a process to strengthen rubber.
Year 1846
The Oregon Treaty establishes the 49th parallel as the border between the United States and Canada, from the Rocky Mountains to the Strait of Juan de Fuca.
Year 1859
Pig War: Ambiguity in the Oregon Treaty leads to the "Northwestern Boundary Dispute" between United States and British/Canadian settlers.
Year 1864
Arlington National Cemetery is established when 200 acres (0.81 km2) around Arlington Mansion (formerly owned by Confederate General Robert E. Lee) are officially set aside as a military cemetery by U.S. Secretary of War Edwin M. Stanton.
Year 1877
Henry Ossian Flipper becomes the first African American cadet to graduate from the United States Military Academy.
Year 1878
Eadweard Muybridge takes a series of photographs to prove that all four feet of a horse leave the ground when it runs; the study becomes the basis of motion pictures.
Year 1888
Crown Prince Wilhelm becomes Kaiser Wilhelm II; he will be the last Emperor of the German Empire. Due to the death of his predecessors Wilhelm I and Frederick III, 1888 is the Year of the Three Emperors.
Year 1904
A fire aboard the steamboat SS General Slocum in New York City's East River kills 1,000.
Year 1916
United States President Woodrow Wilson signs a bill incorporating the Boy Scouts of America, making them the only American youth organization with a federal charter.
Year 1919
John Alcock and Arthur Brown complete the first nonstop transatlantic flight when they reach Clifden, County Galway, Ireland.
Year 1920
A new border treaty between Germany and Denmark gives northern Schleswig to Denmark.
Year 1921
Bessie Coleman earns her pilot's license, becoming the first female pilot of African-American descent.
Year 1937
A German expedition led by Karl Wien loses sixteen members in an avalanche on Nanga Parbat. It is the worst single disaster to occur on an 8000m peak.
Year 1940
World War II: Operation Ariel begins: Allied troops start to evacuate France, following Germany's takeover of Paris and most of the nation.
Year 1944
World War II: Battle of Saipan: The United States invade Japanese-occupied Saipan.
Year 1944
In the Saskatchewan general election, the CCF, led by Tommy Douglas, is elected and forms the first socialist government in North America.
Year 1972
Red Army Faction co-founder Ulrike Meinhof is captured by police in Langenhagen.
Year 1977
After the death of dictator (in 1975) Francisco Franco, the first democratic elections took place in Spain on this day.
Year 1978
King Hussein of Jordan marries American Lisa Halaby, who takes the name Queen Noor.
Year 1985
Rembrandt's painting Danaë is attacked by a man (later judged insane) who throws sulfuric acid on the canvas and cuts it twice with a knife.
Year 1991
In the Philippines, Mount Pinatubo erupts in the second largest volcanic eruption of the 20th Century. In the end, over 800 people die.
Year 1992
The United States Supreme Court rules in United States v. Álvarez-Machaín that it is permissible for the United States to forcibly extradite suspects in foreign countries and bring them to the United States for trial, without approval from those other countries.
Year 1996
The Troubles: The Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) detonates a powerful truck bomb in the middle of Manchester, England, devastating the city centre and injuring 200 people.
Year 2001
Leaders of the People's Republic of China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan formed the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation.
Year 2012
Nik Wallenda becomes the first person to successfully tightrope walk directly over Niagara Falls.
Year 2013
A bomb explodes on a bus in the Pakistani city of Quetta, killing at least 25 people and wounding 22 others.
Year ?
Assyrians record a solar eclipse that is later used to fix the chronology of Mesopotamian history.