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June takes its name from the Roman goddess Juno known to the
Greeks as Hera, protector of women and their sexuality and marriage--hence,
June is the month of weddings. A competitive festival to Hera,
held every four years, was the forerunner of the Olympics.
- June 9 Rice transplanting
festivals in Japan. Women honor the Shinto rice deity with special
songs and prayers as they plant.
- June 10, 1833 Birth
of Pauline Cushing, actor and Union spy during the Civil
War.
- June 14, 1811
Birth of Harriet Beecher Stowe, author of "Uncle
Tom's Cabin," which caused an uproar over slavery.
- June 16 Birth of
geneticist Barbara McClintock, whose research in genetic
transformation was dismissed for decades by other, mostly male,
geneticists, who called her work "crazy." At the age
of 81, McClintock won the Nobel Prize for her work in physiology
and medicine.
- June 18, 1983 Sally
Ride becomes America's first woman astronaut.
- June 19, 1945 Birth
of Aung San Suu Kyi, Burmese opposition leader, human rights
activist, and winner of the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize.
- June 23, 1940
Birth of Wilma Rudolph, who overcame childhood polio
to win three gold medals in track in the 1960 Olympics.
- June 25, 1881 Birth
of suffragist and pacifist Crystal Eastman, cofounder of
the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) in 1920.
- June 27, 1880 Birth
of Helen Keller, who overcame blindness and deafness to
graduate from Radcliffe College, speak three languages, and
become a speaker, an author and advocate for people with disabilities.
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