China and France sign the Treaty of Tientsin, and the birthday club includes Cole Porter, Robert McNamara, and Jackie Wilson - with a reading from Porter's "Let's Fall In Love."

James Madison proposes 12 Constitutional amendments, Theodore Roosevelt signs the Antiquity Act into law, and George Orwell's novel "1984" is published - with a reading from "1984."

Spain and Portugal carve up the wholly inaccurate map of the new world, England drafts the Petition of Right, and an American colonist proposes becoming an independent nation. Happy birthdays to Gwendolyn Brooks and Louise Erdrich - with a reading from Brooks' "Maud Martha."

The first, patented drive-in theater opens, and it's an important day for the WWII battle of Midway and the invasion of D-Day. The birthday club includes Alexander Pushkin, Angelo Moriondo, and Thomas Mann - with a reading from Mann's "Death in Venice."

"Uncle Tom's Cabin" is published, Robert F. Kennedy is assassinated, and "Tank Man" stops a tank column in Beijing. And happy birthday to Federico Garcia Lorca - with a reading of "Sonnet of the Sweet Complaint."

The U.S. Congress approves the 19th Amendment, the U.S. denies refuge to Jewish Germans fleeing the Nazis, the British evacuate their own troops from Dunkirk, and California legalizes labor unions for farm workers. It's the birthday of King George III - with a reading from Winston Churchill's speech titled, "We Will Fight on the Beaches."

Hernando de Soto claims Florida for Spain and the Dutch Parliament creates the West India Company. The birthday club includes Memphis Minnie, Allen Ginsberg, and Curtis Mayfield - with a reading from Larry McMurtry's "Lonesome Dove."

The Pope bans enslaving native Americans, the second (and even more infuriating) version of the Quartering Act is passed, and indigenous people in the U.S. are granted citizenship. The birthday club includes Thomas Hardy, Dorothy West, and Norton Juster - with a reading from West's "Fond Memories of a Black Childhood."

Scotch Whisky first appears in print, Charles Baudelaire's "Les fleur du mal" is published, and Margaret Chase Smith delivers her speech "The Declaration of Conscience." The birthday club includes Charles Kay Ogden and Colleen McCullough - with a reading from Baudelaire's "Flower's of Evil."

The birthday club includes Walt Whitman, Fred Allen, Al Young, and Svetlana Alexievich - with a reading from Whitman's "I Sing the Body Electric."