Today In History – June 30

1908 – A giant fireball, most likely caused by the air burst of a large meteoroid or comet flattens 80 million trees near the Stony Tunguska River in Yeniseysk Governorate, Russia, in the largest impact event in recorded history.

1934 – On this date in 1934 occurred the “Night of the Long Knives,” in which German dictator Adolf Hitler had his elite SS guards summarily execute many leading officials of the SA, a Nazi paramilitary group.

1937 – The world’s first emergency telephone number (999) was launched in London.

1938 – Superman 1st appears in DC Comics’ Action Comics Series issue #1

1960 – Zaire, formerly Belgian Congo and now the Democratic Republic of the Congo, declared its independence from Belgium.

1985 – American swimmer Michael Phelps, the most-decorated Olympic athlete with 28 medals, was born.

1992 – South African ANC President Nelson Mandela meets with UN Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali at Dakar

1997 – British lease on the New Territories in Hong Kong, established by the Second Convention of Peking, expires

2019 – While at the DMZ, President Donald Trump walked into North Korea to greet its leader, Kim Jong-Un, thus becoming the first sitting U.S. president to visit that country.