Today in History: June 3, the Zoot Suit Riots begin in Los Angeles
These youths, one stripped of all his clothes, the others badly beaten, fell victim to ranging bands of policemen who scoured the streets in Los Angeles June 7, 1943, ferreting out and beating zoot-suited youths they blame for the numerous recent unprovoked assaults. Fifty or more zoot suiters had their clothing torn from them, police reported. (AP Photo/Harold P. Matosian)
Today in history:
On June 3, 1943, an altercation between U.S. Navy sailors and young Mexican Americans on the streets of Los Angeles led to several days of clashes known as the Zoot Suit Riots, during which white mobs attacked Mexican Americans across the city, injuring more than 150.
Also on this date:
In 1844, the last confirmed specimens of the great auk were killed on Eldey island, near Iceland.
In 1888, the poem “Casey at the Bat” by Ernest Lawrence Thayer was first published in the San Francisco Daily Examiner.
In 1935, the French liner SS Normandie set a record on its maiden voyage, arriving in New York after crossing the Atlantic in just four days.
In 1937, Edward, The Duke of Windsor, who had abdicated the British throne, married Wallis Simpson in a private ceremony in Monts, France.
In 1965, during the Gemini 4, spaceflight, astronaut Edward H. White became the first American to “walk” in space.
In 1989, Chinese army troops entered Beijing’s Tiananmen Square to begin a crackdown on student-led pro-democracy demonstrations.
In 2016, former heavyweight boxing champion Muhammad Ali, whose athletic feats and activism placed him among the most revered athletes of all time, died in Scottsdale, Arizona, at age 74.
In 2017, elite rock climber Alex Honnold became the first to climb solo to the top of the massive granite wall known as El Capitan in Yosemite National Park without ropes or safety gear.
