June 1
On June 1, 1880, at Collier's Station in Brooke County, Paddy Ryan defeated Joe Goss to win the
heavyweight bare-knuckle championship of the United States.
June 2
On June 2, 1951, Sergeant Cornelius H. Charlton, a native of East Gulf in Raleigh County, was
mortally wounded in Korea. He was posthumously awarded the Congressional Medal of Honor.
June 3
On June 3, 1861, the first land battle of the Civil War was fought at Philippi.
June 4
On June 4, 1750, Thomas Lord Fairfax conveyed 400 acres on Lost River in present-day Capon
District, Hardy County, to William Warden, on which he later erected Fort Warden.
June 5
On June 5, 1915, the Old Mill at Rock Springs Park in Chester burned, killing four young people.
June 6
On June 6, 1944, Allied forces, including a substantial number of West Virginians, launched the
Normandy invasion.
June 7
On June 7, 1895, Elizabeth Kee, the first woman to be elected to the United States Congress from West Virginia,
was born.
June 8
On June 8, 1909, Judge Samuel Burdett of the Kanawha County Circuit Court ruled that the
two-cent per mile maximum railroad passenger fare, mandated by legislation passed in 1907,
could not
be enforced against the Coal and Coke Railway Company.
On June 8, 1924, former United States congressman Samuel B. Avis and R. G. Altizer were killed by lightning at the Edgewood County Club in Charleston.
June 9
On June 9, 1925, a group of women picketed the Owings mine of Consolidation Coal Company
after the company and miners reached an agreement independent of the UMWA.
June 10
On June 10, 1983, Don Cohen, founder of the National Track and Field Hall of Fame, held a
press conference in Charleston at which he criticized Governor Jay Rockefeller and the
Charleston Gazette for their failure to support the construction of the Hall in West
Virginia.
On June 10, 1924, Lewis Collins, a prominent businessman in Litwar, McDowell County, was murdered.
June 11
On June 11, 1873, a Wetzel County lynch mob shot and killed John Jennings, suspected leader of
a gang of criminals, at his home at New Martinsville.
June 12
On June 12, 1968, renowned African American scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr. graduated as valedictorian of his
Piedmont High School class.
June 13
On June 13, 1861, at the first session of the Second Wheeling Convention, John Carlile presented
"A Declaration of the People of Virginia" - a document that called for the reorganization of the
government of Virginia on the grounds that due to Virginia's decision to secede from the United
States,
all state government offices had been vacated.
June 14
On June 14, 1902, the West Virginia Osteopathic Society was formed in Parkersburg.
June 15
On June 15, 1876, noted civil rights activist, political leader and attorney Thomas G. Nutter was born.
June 16
On June 16, 1971, more than two thousand people, including George Romney and actor Jimmy Stewart, attended a
"Salute to Gov. Moore Dinner" at the Charleston Civic Center.
June 17
On June 17, 1813, Thomas Maley Harris, a physician and military leader, was born in present-day Ritchie County.
June 18
On June 18, 1950, the 42nd annual Governors Conference began at The Greenbrier in White
Sulphur Springs.
June 19
On June 19, 1905, Rush Dew Holt, who served as United States senator from West Virginia from 1935 to 1941, was
born in Weston.
On June 19, 1984, Governor Jay Rockefeller broke ground for the Blennerhassett Mansion Reconstruction project.
June 20
On June 20, 1863, West Virginia became the 35th state in the Union.
On June 20, 1963, President John F. Kennedy spoke at the State Capitol as part of the West Virginia centennial celebration.
June 21
On June 21, 1781, the Virginia General Assembly passed a joint resolution offering pardons to
individuals who had participated in Claypool's Rebellion.
June 22
On June 22, 1984, the Sixth Annual Conference on Women Miners began its three-day meeting in
Charleston.
On June 22, 1886, J. P. Thatcher, Town Sergeant of Moundsville and noted local minister, was murdered while attempting to make an arrest.
June 23
On June 23, 1944, a powerful tornado struck north central West Virginia, killing more than 100 people.
On June 23, 1935, a AAA-sanctioned auto race was held at the 4H track near Dunbar.
June 24
On June 24, 1934, Granville Davisson Hall, former editor of the Wheeling Intelligencer
and
West Virginia's second secretary of state, died in Glencoe, Illinois.
June 25
On June 24 and June 25, 1950, flash flooding in a six-county area of central West Virginia killed
almost three dozen people.
June 26
On June 26, 1909, a riot erupted in Grafton in which several traveling horsemen, mistaken for
B&O
Railroad employees working during a strike of machinists against the company, were attacked.
June 27
On June 27, 1898, Henry Jefferson Samuels, who served as the first adjutant general for the Reorganized
Government of Virginia during the Civil War, died in Barboursville.
On June 27, 1924, noted women's rights activist Izetta Jewell Brown seconded the nomination of Democrat John W. Davis as President of the United States.
June 28
On June 28, 1943, Dr. Harriet B. Jones, women's rights and political leader, and the first woman to be a licensed physician in West Virginia, died.
June 29
On June 29, 1899, a prize fight held at Fries Park, Parkersburg, between Kid Wanko of
Parkersburg
and Felix Carr of St. Albans led to Carr's death.
June 30
On June 30, 1854, the Committee on Military Affairs of the United States House of
Representatives
reported a bill to compensate the heirs of the late James Greer of Harpers Ferry for his invention
in the
1790s of a labor-saving nut-boring bit, which subsequently was used at the armories at
Springfield and
Harpers Ferry.