June 18

Events
Up to 1900
618 Tang Dynasty rule begins in China, with the accession of Emperor Gaozu of Tang (Li Yuan).
1053 Battle of Civitate: 3,000 horsemen of Norman Count Humphrey of Hauteville heavily defeat the troops of Pope Leo IX.
1264 The Parliament of Ireland meets at Castledermot in County Kildare, as the first known meeting of an Irish legislature.
1429 French forces under the leadership of Joan of Arc defeat the English army under John Fastolf at the Battle of Patay, helping to turn the tide in the Hundred Years' War.
1633 Charles I is crowned King of Scots at Saint Giles Cathedral in Edinburgh.
1757 Battle of Polin: Between the Prussians under Frederick the Great and the Austrians in the Seven Years' War.
1767 English captain Samuel Wallis sights Tahiti, possibly being the first European to sight the island in present-day French Polynesia.
1778 American Revolutionary War: British troops abandon Philadelphia.
1812 The United States declares war on the United Kingdom, starting the War of 1812.
1815 Battle of Waterloo: British, Russian and Prussian forces defeat a French army led by Napoleon Bonaparte.
1830 The French colonisation of Algeria begins.
1858 Charles Darwin receives a paper from Alfred Russel Wallace with almost-identical conclusions about Evolution.
1859 First successful climb of the Aletschhorn mountain in the Swiss Alps.
1873 Susan B. Anthony is fined for her attempt to vote in the 1872 US Presidential Election.
1897 Kyoto University is founded.
1900 Empress Dowager Longyu of China orders that all foreigners be killed.
1901 2000
1908 Japanese immigration to Brazil begins.
1908 The University of the Philippines is founded.
1928 As a passenger, Amelia Earhart becomes the first woman to fly across the Atlantic Ocean, from Newfoundland to Wales. Her pilot was Wilmer Shutz and Lou Gordon was her mechanic.
1928 Norwegian polar explorer Roald Amundsen goes missing on a rescue mission in the Arctic Ocean. His plane is most likely to have crashed near Svalbard.
1932 FIBA, the world's governing authority on basketball, is founded in Geneva, Switzerland.
1940 Charles de Gaulle makes the appeal of June 18th, calling on the French to resist the Nazis.
1940 Winston Churchill makes his famous "Finest Hour" speech, to raise the spirits of the British people during World War II.
1945 William Joyce is charged with treason for his pro-German propaganda during World War II.
1946 Italy is formally proclaimed a Republic after a referendum on June 2 when a majority of voters chose not to have the monarchy.
1953 Egypt becomes a Republic.
1953 A US Air Force C-124 plane crashes and burns in Tokyo, Japan, killing 129 people.
1954 Pierre Mendes-France becomes Prime Minister of France.
1965 The US uses B-52 bombers to attack National Liberation Front guerrillas in South Vietnam.
1972 The Staines Air Disaster occurs near London Heathrow Airport.
1979 US President Jimmy Carter and Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev sign the SALT II arms reduction treaty in Vienna.
1981 The Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk, the first operational aircraft initially designed around stealth technology, makes its first flight.
1981 The Treaty of Basseterre is signed, creating the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States.
1982 After defeat in the Falklands War, Argentine military leader Leopoldo Gualtieri resigns from office.
1983 Sally Ride became the first American woman in space.
1983 Iranian teenager Mona Mahmudnizhad and 9 other women are executed for their membership of the Baha'i faith.
1994 The Troubles: Members of the Ulster Volunteer Force attack a crowded bar in Loughinisland, Northern Ireland with assault rifles, killing 6 people.
1996 Ted Kaczynski, the suspected Unabomber, is indicted on ten criminal counts.
2000 Ethiopia and Eritrea sign an agreement to end their border war.
From 2001
2006 Kazakhstan launches its first space satellite, KazSat.
2007 The Charleston Sofa Super Store fire in Charleston, South Carolina kills 9 firefighters.
2009 The Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, a NASA robotic spacecraft, is launched.
2010 The US' first execution by firing squad in 14 years occurs in the state of Utah.
2014 2014 FIFA World Cup: The Spain national football team, defending champion, is knocked out at the group stage by the Chile national football team. Four years earlier, then-defending champion, the Italy national football team, also got knocked out at this stage.
Births
Up to 1900
1269 Eleanor of England, Countess of Bar (d. 1298)
1318 Princess Eleanor of Woodstock (d. 1355)
1466 Ottaviano Petrucci, Italian printer (d. 1539)
1511 Bartolomeo Ammanati, Italian architect and sculptor (d. 1892)
1517 Emperor Ogimachi of Japan (d. 1593)
1667 Ivan Trubetskoy, Russian field marshal (d. 1750)
1673 Antonio de Libres, Spanish composer (d. 1747)
1677 Antonio Maria Bononcini, Italian cellist and composer (d. 1726)
1757 Gervasio Antonio de Posadas, Argentine political leader (d. 1833)
1757 Ignaz Pleyel, Austrian-French composer and piano manufacturer (d. 1831)
1769 Robert Stewart, Viscount Castlereagh, Anglo-Irish politician (d. 1822
1799 William Lassell, English astronomer (d. 1880)
1799 Prosper Meniere, French physician (d. 1862)
1812 Ivan Goncharov, Russian writer (d. 1891)
1816 Helene Napoleone Bonaparte, daughter of Napoleon (d. 1907)
1816 Jung Bahadur Rana, Nepali ruler (d. 1877)
1839 William H. Seward Jr., Union Brigadier General in the American Civil War (d. 1920)
1845 Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran, French doctor, won the 1907 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1922)
1845 Gustav Storm, Norwegian historian, writer and professor (d. 1903)
1850 Richard Heuberger, Austrian composer and critic (d. 1914)
1857 Henry Clay Folger, American businessman and philanthropist (d. 1930)
1868 Miklos Horthy, Hungarian regent (d. 1957)
1870 Edouard Le Roy, French philosopher and mathematician (d. 1954)
1874 George Tupou II, King of Tonga (d. 1918)
1877 James Montgomery Flagg, American painter and illustrator (d. 1960)
1882 Georgi Dimitrov, Bulgarian Communist leader (d. 1949)
1883 Mary Alden, American actress (d. 1946)
1884 Edouard Daladier, French politician (d. 1970)
1886 George Mallory, English mountaineer (d. 1924)
1886 Alexander Wetmore, American ornithologist and paleontologist (d. 1978)
1891 Mae Busch, Australian-American actress (d. 1946)
1896 Blanche Sweet, American actress (d. 1986)
1897 Martti Marttelin, Finnish long-distance runner (d. 1940)
1901 1950
1901 Grand Duchess Anastasia Nikolaevna of Russia (d. 1918)
1902 Boris Barnet, Soviet movie director, actor and boxer (d. 1965)
1903 Jeanette McDonald, American actress and singer (d. 1965)
1903 Raymond Radiguet, French novelist and poet (d. 1923)
1904 Manuel Rosenthal, French conductor and composer (d. 2003)
1907 Frithjof Schuon, Swiss-American metaphysicist, philosopher and author (d. 1998)
1910 Ray McKinley, American musician (d. 1995)
1912 Glenn Morris, American decathlete and actor (d. 1974)
1913 Robert Mondavi, American winemaker (d. 2008)
1915 Red Adair, American firefighter (d. 2004)
1916 Julio Cesar Turbay Ayala, 25th President of Colombia (d. 2005)
1917 Erik Ortvad, Danish painter (d. 2008)
1917 Richard Boone, American actor (d. 1981)
1918 Jerome Karle, American chemist (d. 2013)
1918 Franco Modigliani, Italian economist (d. 2003)
1920 Lode van den Bergh, Belgian writer
1922 Claude Helffer, French pianist (d. 2004)
1922 Donald Keene, Japanese and American scholor and expert of Japan studies (d. 2019)
1923 Veronica Carstens, First Lady of Germany (d. 2012)
1923 Szymon Szurmiej, Polish actor and director (d. 2014)
1924 George Mikan, American basketball player (d. 2005)
1925 Robert Arthur, American actor (d. 2008)
1927 Eva Bartok, Hungarian-American actress (d. 1998)
1929 Jurgen Habermas, German sociologist and philosopher
1929 Ann Mara, American businesswoman (d. 2015)
1929 Tibor Rubin, Hungarian-American soldier (d. 2015)
1931 Fernando Henrique Cardoso, 34th President of Brazil, 1995-2003
1932 Dudley R. Herschbach, American chemist
1932 Geoffrey Hill, English poet (d. 2016)
1936 Denny Hulme, New Zealand racing driver (d. 1992)
1936 Barack Obama, Sr. (d. 1982), Kenyan father of Barack Obama
1936 Norodom Monineath, Cambodian Queen Mother
1936 Ronald Venetiaan, former President of Suriname
1937 Vitaly Zholobov, Soviet cosmonaut
1937 Jay Rockefeller, American politician
1939 Jack Herer, American writer and activist (d. 2010)
1940 Mirjam Pressler, German writer (d. 2019)
1941 Delia Smith, British cookery writer
1941 Roger Lemerre, French footballer and manager
1942 Thabo Mbeki, former President of South Africa
1942 Roger Ebert, American movie critic (d. 2013)
1942 Sir Paul McCartney, English singer-songwriter and musician (The Beatles)
1942 Hans Vonk, Dutch conductor (d. 2004)
1942 Carl Radle, American bass player and producer
1943 Raffaella Carra, Italian singer, dancer and actress
1944 Salvador Sanchez Ceren, President of El Salvador
1946 Maria Bethania, Brazilian singer
1946 Fabio Capello, Italian football manager
1947 Bernard Giraudeau, French actor, director and writer (d. 2010)
1949 Jaroslaw Kaczynski, former Prime Minister of Poland
1949 Lech Kaczynski, President of Poland (d. 2010)
1949 Lincoln Thompson, Jamaican singer, songwriter and musician (d. 1999)
1950 Annelie Ehrhardt, German athlete
1950 Rod de'Ath, Welsh drummer (d. 2014)
1950 Mike Johanns, 38th Governor of Nebraska
1951 1975
1951 Jerry McNerney, American politician
1951 Gyula Sax, Hungarian chess player (d. 2014)
1952 John Carl Buechler, American visual effects artist and film director (d. 2019)
1952 Isabella Rossellini, Italian actress
1952 Marcella Bella, Italian singer
1952 Denis Herron, Canadian ice hockey player
1952 Lee Soo-man, South Korean businessman
1953 Sandy Allen, American, world's tallest woman (d. 2008)
1953 Vladislav Terzyul, Ukrainian mountaineer (d. 2004)
1954 Tinna Gunnlaugsdottir, Icelandic actress
1955 Misia, Portuguese singer
1957 Andrea Evans, American actress
1957 Miguel Angel Lotina, Spanish footballer
1957 Irene Epple, German skier
1958 Peter Altmaier, German politician
1961 Alison Moyet, British singer
1962 Mitsuharu Misawa, Japanese wrestler (d. 2009)
1964 Uday Hussein, son of Saddam Hussein (d. 2003)
1965 Robin Christopher, American actress
1970 Ivan Kozak, Slovakian footballer
1970 Katie Derham, English broadcaster
1971 Nigel Owens, Welsh rugby referee
1971 Jason McAteer, English-Irish footballer and manager
1971 Gaute Kivistik, Estonian journalist and author
1972 Anu Tali, Estonian pianist and conductor
1973 Julie Depardieu, French actress
1973 Ray LaMontagne, American singer-songwriter and musician
1973 Alexandros Papadimitriou, Greek hammer thrower
1974 Vincenzo Montella, Italian footballer
1974 Sergey Sharikov, Russian fencer
1975 Jem, Welsh singer-songwriter and producer
1975 Jamel Debbouze, French-Moroccan actor and producer
From 1976
1976 Alana de la Garza, American actress
1976 Blake Shelton, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
1978 Wang Liqin, Chinese table tennis player
1978 Lilia Kopylova, Russian-English professional dancer
1979 Yumiko Kobayashi, Japanese voice actress
1980 Kevin Bishop, English actor and comedian
1981 Marco Streller, Swiss footballer
1982 Nadir Belhadj, Algerian footballer
1982 Marco Borriello, Italian footballer
1984 Janne Happonen, Finnish ski jumper
1986 Richard Gasquet, French tennis player
1986 Richard Madden, Scottish actor
1987 Omar Arellano, Mexican footballer
1987 Melanie Iglesias, American model and actress
1987 Marcelo Martins Moreno, Bolivian footballer
1988 Elini Dimoutsos, Greek footballer
1988 Islam Slimani, Algerian footballer
1988 Josh Dun, American musician (Twenty One Pilots)
1989 Renee Olstead, American actress and singer
1989 Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Gabonese footballer
1990 Luke Adam, Canadian ice hockey player
1990 Sandra Izbasa, Romanian gymnast
1991 Rei Okamoto, Japanese model and actress
1997 Max Records, American actor
2006 Countess Zaria of Orange-Nassau, Jonkrouwe van Amsberg, Dutch royal
Deaths
Up to 1950
741 Leo III the Issaurian, Byzantine Emperor (b. 685)
1234 Emperor Chukyo of Japan (b. 1218)
1291 King Alfonso III of Aragon (b. 1265)
1464 Rogier van der Weyden, Flemish painter (b. 1400)
1629 Piet Hein, Dutch naval commander (b. 1577)
1650 Christoph Scheiner, German astronomer (b. 1575)
1673 Jeanne Mance, French settler in New France, present-day Quebec (b. 1606)
1680 Samuel Butler, English poet (b. 1612)
1726 Michel Richard Delalande, French organist and composer (b. 1657)
1742 John Aislabie, English politician (b. 1670)
1749 Ambrose Philips, English poet (b. 1674)
1772 Johann Ulrich von Cramer, German jurist and philosopher (b. 1706)
1794 Francois Nicolas Leonard Buzet, French revolutionary figure (b. 1760)
1815 Thomas Picton, British general (b. 1758)
1886 Prince Sigismund of Prussia (b. 1864)
1902 Samuel Butler, English writer (b. 1835)
1905 Carmine Crocco, Italian soldier (b. 1830)
1915 Eufemio Zapata, brother of Emiliano Zapata (b. 1873)
1916 Max Immelmann, German flying ace (b. 1890)
1917 Tito Maiorescu, Romanian Prime Minister (b. 1840)
1922 Jacobus Kapteyn, Dutch astronomer (b. 1851)
1928 Roald Amundsen, Norwegian explorer (b. 1872)
1929 Carlo Airoldi, Italian marathon runner (b. 1869)
1936 Maxim Gorky, Russian writer (b. 1868)
1937 Gaston Doumergue, French politician (b. 1863)
1942 Arthur Pryor, American trombonist and bandleader (b. 1870)
1945 Simon Bolivar Buckner Jr., American general (b. 1886)
1947 Shigematsu Sakaibara, Japanese admiral (b. 1898)
1951 2010
1959 Ethel Barrymore, American actress (b. 1879)
1963 Pedro Armendariz, Mexican actor (b. 1912)
1967 Beat Fehr, Swiss racing driver (b. 1942)
1967 Geki, Italian racing driver (b. 1942)
1971 Paul Karrer, Swiss chemist (b. 1889)
1974 Georgy Zhukov, Marshal of the Soviet Union (b. 1896)
1978 Walter C. Alvarez, American physician (b. 1884)
1980 Andre Leducq, French cyclist (b. 1904)
1982 Djuna Barnes, American writer (b. 1892)
1983 Mona Mahmudnizhad, Iranian Baha'i
1986 Frances Scott Fitzgerald, American writer (b. 1921)
1989 I. F. Stone, American journalist (b. 1907)
1992 Mordecai Ardon, Israeli painter (b. 1896)
1997 Lev Kopelev, Russian writer and dissident (b. 1912)
2006 Vincent Sherman, American actor and director (b. 1906)
2007 Bernard Manning, English comedian (b. 1930)
2007 Hank Medress, American singer (The Tokens) (b. 1938)
2008 Jean Delannoy, French movie director and producer (b. 1908)
2010 Jose Saramago, Portuguese writer (b. 1922)
2010 Marcel Bigeard, French military officer (b. 1916)
From 2011
2011 Frederick Chiluba, 2nd President of Zambia (b. 1943)
2011 Yelena Bonner, Russian human rights activist (b. 1923)
2011 Ulrich Biesinger, German footballer (b. 1934)
2011 Clarence Clemons, American musician and actor (b. 1942)
2012 Luis Edgardo Mercado Jarrin, 109th Prime Minister of Peru (b. 1919)
2013 Michael Hastings, American journalist (b. 1980)
2014 Claire Martin, Canadian author (b. 1914)
2014 Vladimir Popovkin, Russian general, Director of the Russian Federal Space Agency (b. 1957)
2014 Horace Silver, American jazz musician and composer (b. 1928)
2014 Stephanie Kwolek, American chemist, invented Kevlar (b. 1923)
2014 Johnny Mann, American musician, composer, conductor and entertainer (b. 1928)
2015 Ralph J. Roberts, American businessman (b. 1920)
2015 Jack Rollins, American movie producer (b. 1915)
2015 Allen Weinstein, American historian (b. 1937)
2015 Patrick Eisdell Moore, New Zealand surgeon (b. 1928)
2016 Vittorio Merloni, Italian entrepreneur (b. 1933)
2016 Paul Cox, Dutch-Australian film director (b. 1940)
2016 Sverre Kjelsberg, Norwegian musician (b. 1946)
2016 William J. Livsey, American army general (b. 1931)
2016 Wu Jianmin, Chinese diplomat (b. 1939)
2017 Pierluigi Chicca, Italian fencer (b. 1937)
2017 Tim Hague, Canadian mixed martial artist (b. 1983)
2017 Tony Liscio, American football player (b. 1940)
2017 Shih Chun-jen, Taiwanese neurosurgeon (b. 1923)
2017 Hans Breder, German-American artist (b. 1935)
2017 Keith Farnham, American politician (b. 1947)
2018 Walter Bahr, American soccer player (b. 1927)
2018 Kostas Politis, Greek basketball player (b. 1942)
2018 XXXTentacion, American rapper (b. 1998)
2018 Big Van Vader, American professional wrestler (b. 1955)
2018 Bertha Sanseverino, Uruguayan politician (b. 1946)
2018 Nathan Shaham, Israeli writer (b. 1925)
2019 Stephen Blaire, American bishop (b. 1941)
2020 Tibor Benedek, Hungarian water polo player (b. 1972)
2020 John Bredenkamp, Zimbabwean rugby union player and businessman (b. 1940)
2020 Dame Vera Lynn, British singer and actress (b. 1917)
Observances
Autistic Pride Day
Evacuation Day (Egypt)
International Sushi Day
National Day (Seychelles)
Days of the year