June 15
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Featured Event
Wellcome Collection, London; Photo Illustration Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
On this day in 1667, Jean-Baptiste Denis, the personal physician of King Louis XIV, attempted something no one had ever done before: performed and fully documented a blood transfusion and its signs and symptoms. The patient, a teenage boy suffering from a severe fever, received blood from a sheep and survived (it’s generally believed the sheep did too). [Read today’s edition of Today in History > >]
Featured Biography
Featured Biography
Norsk Teknisk Museum, Oslo, Norway
Composer Edvard Grieg, a founder of the Norwegian nationalist school of music whose work is rooted in the country’s national folk tradition and is noted for its refined lyrical sense, was born this day in 1843.
Famous Birthdays
More on June 15
PRNewsFoto/Fleetwood Enterprises, Inc./AP Images
2007
After more than 30 years, American game show host Bob Barker stepped down as host of The Price Is Right. [Sort fact from fiction in our pop culture quiz.]
© David Redferns—Redferns/Getty Images
1996
American singer Ella Fitzgerald—who was known for her enormous vocal range and inventive interpretations, in both ballads and jazz improvisations known as scat—died at age 79. [How much do you know about female jazz singers?]
U.S. Department of Defense
1944
During World War II, U.S. Marines attacked Saipan in the Mariana Islands. [Test your knowledge of World War II.]
© Photos.com/Jupiterimages/Getty Images
1864
Arlington National Cemetery was established when 200 acres (81 hectares) of Confederate General Robert E. Lee’s estate in Virginia—which had been seized by the U.S. government—was authorized for a national cemetery. [Read about nine notable cemeteries.]
Courtesy of the Metropolitan Opera Association Archives
1861
Austrian contralto Ernestine Schumann-Heink, one of the principal interpreters of the operas of Richard Wagner and Richard Strauss before the outbreak of World War I, was born. [Take our opera quiz.]
Image: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
1846
The United States and Britain signed the Oregon Treaty, establishing the border between Canada and the United States at latitude 49° N.
Hulton Archive/Getty Images
1844
Charles Goodyear received a patent for the process of rubber vulcanization. [Sort fact from fiction in our quiz about inventions and their inventors.]
Scala/Art Resource, New York
1775
George Washington was named commander in chief of the colonies by the Continental Congress. [How much do you know about the American Revolution?]
Image: Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
1389
The Battle of Kosovo, fought between the armies of the Serbian prince Lazar and the forces of the Ottoman sultan Murad I, concluded with an Ottoman victory. [Test your knowledge of the Ottoman Empire.]
© Photos.com/Getty Images
1215
Magna Carta—a charter of English liberties that occupies a unique place in the popular imagination as a symbol and a battle cry against oppression—was sealed this day, under threat of civil war, by King John in 1215. [Take our quiz about famous documents.]