Good morning, Whitewater.
Monday in town will bring an afternoon thunderstorm and a high of seventy-six. Sunrise is 5:16 AM and sunset 8:30 PM, for 15h 14m 22s of daytime. The moon is a waxing crescent with 2.4% of its visible disk illuminated.
Today is the anniversary, from 6.6.1944, of Allied landings at Normandy:
By dawn on June 6, 18,000 parachutists were already on the ground; the land invasions began at 6:30 a.m. The British and Canadians overcame light opposition to capture Gold, Juno and Sword beaches; so did the Americans at Utah. The task was much tougher at Omaha beach, however, where 2,000 troops were lost and it was only through the tenacity and quick-wittedness of troops on the ground that the objective was achieved. By day’s end, 155,000 Allied troops–Americans, British and Canadians–had successfully stormed Normandy’s beaches.
For their part, the Germans suffered from confusion in the ranks and the absence of celebrated commander Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, who was away on leave. At first, Hitler, believing that the invasion was a feint designed to distract the Germans from a coming attack north of the Seine River, refused to release nearby divisions to join the counterattack and reinforcements had to be called from further afield, causing delays. He also hesitated in calling for armored divisions to help in the defense. In addition, the Germans were hampered by effective Allied air support, which took out many key bridges and forced the Germans to take long detours, as well as efficient Allied naval support, which helped protect advancing Allied troops.
On this day in 1622, a missionary and explorer is born:
On this date Jean Claude Allouez was born. As a Jesuit missionary, Allouez founded several missions in the Green Bay area and left a journal describing his travels as well as the peoples and wildlife of Wisconsin in the mid 1600s. [Source: Dictionary of Wisconsin Biography, SHSW 1960]
A Google a Day ask about numbers: “There are approximately 1 million ants for every how many people on the planet?”