June 22:

A Date That Will Live In Mediocrity...

Yes, June 22 is a boring day in history. Sure, Joe Lewis won the title from Jim Braddock on this date in 1937, but ever since seeing Cinderella Man, I made a promise to myself never to speak of Jim Braddock's short comings. Not because of the inspirational nature of the story, but because he was married to a woman like Renée Zellweger. Honestly, that man must have taken one to many blows to the head if he settled for that.

But, enough unfounded attacks on Renée Zellweger. Russell Crowe probably threw a phone or two at her anyway...

So, aside from that, not a whole lot happened.

FDR signed the GI Bill in 1944. If I recall, this lead to the successful BM legislature of 1945.

Germany launched Operation Barbarossa in 1941, thus invading Russia. There is a film adaptation of this historic event that was released in 1968 starring Jane Fonda. The story passed through the hands of a number or writers, each taking their own liberties with the historic account. In the end the title had changed to Barbarella and was less about Germans marching into Russia and more about a woman taking sex into space. But, it did give us Duran Duran!

"Girls on Film!"

Lets see, what else. 1864: General Lee strikes back at Petersburg. While this is turning out to be a bad day for Russia, it's good to see the "Good Ol' Boys" were doing their part to fight communism!

HUAC File Photo

1934: Porsche builds a prototype automobile. Although, this Porsche would ultimately become a Volkswagon. Talk about depreciation!

And finally, in 1775, the Continental currency hits the streets. The first paper printed money in the US, backed by Spanish Dollar. More commonly known as the peso or (in buccaneer-lingo) the infamous "pieces of eight" (GYAR!). Surprisingly, this paper money was prone to counterfeiting and rapidly lost its value. Which is suprising since its value was backed by a peso. Even more interesting is that now, 231 years later, American businesses actually prefer to pay their workers in pesos, by relocating jobs to Mexico (most recently, Lego) and not dollars. This is the driving force behind moving jobs to Mexico, but not allowing Mexicans into America. It's the way the Founding Fathers wanted it to be!