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“If you just set out to be liked, you would be prepared to compromise on anything, wouldn't you, at any time? And you would achieve nothing!”
“The lady's not for turning.”
~ Margaret Thatcher
Wikiquote (Margaret Thatcher (LG OM PC FRS (née Roberts, October 13, 1925 – April 8, 2013) was a British politician who was the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1979 to 1990 and the Leader of the Conservative Party from 1975 to 1990. She was the longest-serving British Prime Minister of the 20th century and is the only woman to have held the office. A Soviet journalist called her the "Iron Lady", a nickname that became associated with her uncompromising politics and leadership style. As Prime Minister, she implemented policies that have come to be known as Thatcherism.)
June 11th, 1184 BC
Trojan War: Troy is sacked and burned, according to calculations by Eratosthenes.
Wikipedia Image: The Trojan War was the beginning of a series of wars which ultimately led to the destruction of the Persian empire at the hands of Alexander; Persian war chariot; The story of the Trojan Horse, whether true or mythical, profoundly influenced Western civilization and inspired many artists.
June 11th, 173
Roman Empire:
173 - Marcomannic Wars: The Roman army in Moravia is encircled by the Quadi, who have broken the peace treaty (171). In a violent thunderstorm emperor Marcus Aurelius defeats and subdues them in the so-called "miracle of the rain".
Wikipedia Image: The Equestrian Statue of Marcus Aurelius, 176;
Relief from a 3rd-century sarcophagus depicting a battle between Romans and Germanic warriors; the central figure is perhaps the emperor Hostilian / Depiction of the Menorah on the Arch of Titus in Rome.
June 11th, 631
China:
631 - Emperor Taizong of Tang, the Emperor of China, sends envoys to the Xueyantuo bearing gold and silk in order to seek the release of enslaved Chinese prisoners captured during the transition from Sui to Tang from the northern frontier; this embassy succeeded in freeing 80,000 Chinese men and women who were then returned to China.
Wikipedia Photo: China from NASA Wordwind Satellite; © Great Wall of China, credit National Geographic; LongJi Terrace, credit National Geographic; Great Bear Rainforest, credit Paul Nicklen, National Geographic; Platoons of clay soldiers were buried with China's first emperor, Qin Shi Huang Di, (required a labor force of 700,000 to build), credit O. Louis Mazzatenta, National Geographic.
June 11th, 1345
Byzantine Empire (East Roman Empire):
1345 - The megas doux Alexios Apokaukos, chief minister of the Byzantine Empire, is lynched by political prisoners.
Wikipedia Image: The Baptism of Constantine painted by Raphael's pupils (1520–1524, fresco, Vatican City, Apostolic Palace); Mural of Saints Cyril and Methodius, 19th century, Troyan Monastery, Bulgaria; Justinian I depicted on one of the famous mosaics of the Basilica of San Vitale, Ravenna; The Greek fire was first used by the Byzantine Navy during the Byzantine-Arab Wars (from the Madrid Skylitzes, Biblioteca Nacional de España, Madrid); Alexios I, founder of the Komnenos dynasty.
June 11th, 1429
Hundred Years' War:
1419 - Battle of Jargeau; It was Joan of Arc's first offensive battle.
Wikipedia Painting: "Morning of the Battle of Agincourt, 25th October 1415", painted by Sir John Gilbert; Joan of Arc's Death at the Stake, by Hermann Stilke (1843); King Henry V at the Battle of Agincourt, 1415, by Sir John Gilbert; Joan of Arc enters Orléans (painting by J.J. Sherer, 1887); Joan interrogated in her prison cell by Cardinal Winchester. By Hippolyte Delaroche, 1824, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Rouen, France.
June 11th, 1509
Henry VIII of England married his first wife, Katharine of Aragon.
Wikipedia Painting: Henry VIII Coat of Arms and Seal of Henry VIII of England; Catherine of Aragon as a young widow, by court painter Michael Sittow, 1502; Anne Boleyn, Henry's second queen; a later copy of an original painted 1534; Jane Seymour, Henry's third wife; Anne of Cleves, Henry's forth wife by Hans Holbein the Younger, 1539; Catherine Howard, Henry's fifth wife, by Hans Holbein the Younger, 1540; Catherine Parr, Henry's sixth and last wife.
June 11th, 1770
British Captain James Cook runs aground on the Great Barrier Reef.
Wikipedia Painting: James Cook, portrait by Nathaniel Dance-Holland, c. 1775, National Maritime Museum, Greenwich; British explorer James Cook's ship was named the HMS Endeavour; Captain James Cook, Sir Joseph Banks, Lord Sandwich, Dr Daniel Solander and Dr John Hawkesworth, credit National Library of Australia (NLA) digital collections; Captain James Cook (1728-1779) is shown meeting Nootka leader Muquinna (died 1798) at Nootka Sound on what is now Vancouver Island, in 1778, during his explorations of Canada’s northwest coast, credit Canadian Military History.
June 11th, 1775
American Revolutionary War:
1775 - Battle of Machias; First naval engagement, results in the capture of a small British naval vessel.
1776 - Continental Congress appoints Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Roger Sherman, and Robert R. Livingston to the Committee of Five to draft a declaration of independence.
Wikipedia Paintings: Washington Crossing the Delaware, by Emanuel Leutz; Battle of the Chesapeake, French (left) and British (right) lines; Battle of Bunker Hill, The Death of General Warren at the Battle of Bunker Hill by John Trumbull; The Defeat of the Floating Batteries at Gibraltar, September 13, 1782, by John Singleton Copley; Washington and the Comte de Rochambeau at Yorktown, 1781; "The surrender at Saratoga" shows General Daniel Morgan in front of a French de Vallière 4-pounder; Surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown by (John Trumbull, 1797).
● Declaration of Independence; Committee of Five - Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Roger Sherman, and Robert R. Livingston.
June 11th, 1788
Russian explorer Gerasim Izmailov reaches Alaska.
Wikipedia Photo: Alaska; the largest state in the United States by area, is situated in the northwest extremity of the North American continent, with Canada to the east, the Arctic Ocean to the north, and the Pacific Ocean to the west and south, with Russia further west across the Bering Strait.
● Alexei Chirikov, during an expedition, spotted the Alaskan coast ● Digital Map, University of Washington.edu.
June 11th, 1898
Spanish-American War: United States war ships set sail for Cuba.
Wikipedi Image: Satellite image Cuba, credit: Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Rapid Response Team, NASA / GSFC; A Catalan satirical drawing published in La Campana de Gràcia (1896), criticizing U.S. behavior regarding Cuba; W. A. Rogers. "The Battle of Desmayo - The Cuban Balaklava" In: Harper's Pictorial History of the War with Spain. Vol. 1. New York: Harper & Brothers Publishers, 1899. NYPL, United States History, Local History and Genealogy Division.
June 11th, 1919
Sir Barton wins the Belmont Stakes, becoming the first horse to win the Triple Crown of Thoroughbred Racing.
Wikipedia Image: Sir Barton and jockey Johnny Loftus, 1919.
June 11th, 1935
Inventor Edwin Armstrong gives the first public demonstration of FM broadcasting in the United States at Alpine, New Jersey.
Wikipedia Image: Frequency modulation (A signal may be carried by an AM or FM radio wave).
June 11th, 1937
World War II:
1937 - Great Purge; Case of Trotskyist Anti-Soviet Military Organization - The Soviet Union under Joseph Stalin executes eight army leaders.
1938 - Second Sino-Japanese War; Battle of Wuhan begins.
1938 - Second Sino-Japanese War; Yellow River flood (1938) - The Chinese Nationalist government creates a massive flood to halt Japanese forces - 500,000 to 900,000 civilians are killed.
1942 - The United States agrees to send Lend-Lease aid to the Soviet Union.
1944 - The USS Missouri (BB-63) the last battleship built by the United States Navy and future site of the signing of the Japanese Instrument of Surrender is commissioned.
Wikipedia Photo: Bombing of Dresden in World War II; August Schreitmüller's sculpture 'Goodness' surveys Dresden after a firestorm started by Allied bombers in 1945.
USS Bunker Hill was hit by kamikazes piloted by Ensign Kiyoshi Ogawa and another airman on 11 May 1945. 389 personnel were killed or missing from a crew of 2,600; Ensign Kiyoshi Ogawa, who flew his aircraft into the USS Bunker Hill during a Kamikaze mission on 11 May 1945; Kamikaze Missions - Lt Yoshinori Yamaguchi's Yokosuka D4Y3 (Type 33 Suisei) "Judy" in a suicide dive against USS Essex. The dive brakes are extended and the non-self-sealing port wing tank is trailing fuel vapor and/or smoke 25 November 1944.
German V1 flying-bomb and V2 Rockets - Preparations for a Salvo Launch of V-2 Rockets in the Heidelager near Blizna (Poland) (1944), credit German History in Documents and Images GHDI.
Eastern Front (World War II); Germans race towards Stalingrad. August 1942; Soviet children during a German air raid in the first days of the war, June 1941, by RIA Novosti archive; Soviet sniper Roza Shanina in 1944. About 400,000 Soviet women served in front-line duty units Caucasus Mountains, winter 1942/43; Finnish ski patrol: the invisible enemy of the Soviet Army with an unlimited supply of skis; Men of the German Engineers Corps cross a river which is swollen after the first autumn rains, to strengthen bridges linking the German positions on the central front in Russia. by Keystone / Getty Images. October 1942; Russian snipers fighting on the Leningrad front during a blizzard. Photo by Hulton Archive / Getty Images, 1943; German soldiers surrendering to the Russians in Stalingrad, the soldier holding the white flag of surrender is dressed in white so that there could be no doubt of his intentions, a Russian soldier is on the right of the photograph. by Keystone / Getty Images, January 1943.
June 11th, 1963
American Civil Rights Movement:
1963 - Alabama Governor George Wallace stands at the door of Foster Auditorium at the University of Alabama in an attempt to block two black students, Vivian Malone and James Hood, from attending that school. Later in the day, accompanied by federalized National Guard troops, they are able to register.
1963 - John F. Kennedy addresses Americans from the Oval Office proposing the Civil Rights Act of 1964 that would revolutionise American society. Proposing equal access to public facilities, end segragation in education and guarantee federal protection for voting rights.
Wikipedia Photo: Vivian Malone and James Hood successfully enrolle at the University of Alabama following Governor George Wallace’s famous 'stand in the schoolhouse door'.
June 11th, 1977
Seattle Slew wins the Belmont Stakes, capturing the Triple Crown of Thoroughbred Racing.
Wikipedia Photo: Seattle Slew ● 1977 Belmont Stakes - Seattle Slew, Youtube 
June 11th, 2001
Oklahoma City bombing:
2001 - Timothy McVeigh is executed for his role in the Oklahoma City bombing.
Wikipedia Photo: Oklahoma City bombing; was a terrorist bomb attack on the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Downtown Oklahoma City on April 19, 1995. ● McVeigh and Nichols cited the federal government's actions against the Branch Davidian compound in the 1993 Waco Siege (shown above) as a reason they perpetrated the Oklahoma City bombing ● The Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building two days after the bombing. ● Charles Porter's photograph of firefighter Chris Fields holding the dying infant Baylee Almon won the Pulitzer Prize for Spot News Photography in 1996. A similar photo was taken by Lester LaRue.
June 11th, 2012
Earthquake:
2012 - Afghanistan earthquakes (2012); strike northern Afghanistan, causing a large landslide, which buried the town of Sayi Hazara, trapping 71 people. (After four days of digging, only five bodies were recovered and the search was called off.)
1981 - A 6.9 magnitude earthquake at Golbaf, Iran, kills at least 2,000.
Wikipedia Image: Preliminary Determination of Epicenters / Aleppo Syria; Anchorage, Alaska - March 28, 1964 Prince William Sound USA earthquake and tsunami; 8.9 Mega Earthquake Strikes Japan; Tsunami Swirls Japan's Ibaraki Prefecture March 12 2011. credit NOAA / NGDC, NOAA National Geophysical Data Center, USGS, National Geographics.