Today in History: Aug. 6, U.S. drops atom bomb on Hiroshima

Today in History Today is Saturday, Aug. 6, the 218th day of 2022. There are 147 days left in the year. Today’s Highlight in History: On Aug. 6, 1945, during World War II, the U.S. B-29 Superfortress Enola Gay dropped an atomic bomb code-named ‘œLittle Boy’� on Hiroshima, Japan, resulting in an estimated 140,000 deaths. (Three days later, the United States exploded a nuclear device over Nagasaki; five days after that, Imperial Japan surrendered.) On this date: In 1806, the Holy Roman Empire went out of existence as Emperor Francis II abdicated. In 1825, Upper Peru became the autonomous republic of Bolivia. In 1942, Queen Wilhemina of the Netherlands became the first reigning queen to address a joint session of Congress, telling lawmakers that despite Nazi occupation, her people’s motto remained, ‘œNo surrender.’� In 1965, President Lyndon B. Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act. In 1973, entertainer Stevie Wonder was seriously injured in a car accident in North Carolina. In 1978, Pope Paul VI died at Castel Gandolfo at age 80. In 1991, the World Wide Web made its public debut as a means of accessing webpages over the Internet. TV newsman Harry Reasoner died in Norwalk, Connecticut, at age 68. In 1993, Louis Freeh won Senate confirmation to be FBI director. In 2003, actor Arnold Schwarzenegger used an appearance on NBC’s ‘œThe Tonight Show with Jay Leno’� to announce his successful bid to replace California Gov. Gray Davis. In 2009, Sonia Sotomayor was confirmed as the first Hispanic Supreme Court justice by a Senate vote of 68-31. John Hughes, 59, Hollywood’s youth movie director of the 1980s and ’90s, died in New York City. In 2011 insurgents shot down a U.S. military helicopter during fighting in eastern Afghanistan, killing 30 Americans, most of them belonging to the same elite Navy commando unit that had slain Osama bin Laden; seven Afghan commandos also died. In 2013, U.S. Army Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan went on trial at Fort Hood, Texas, charged with killing 13 people and wounding 32 others in a 2009 attack. (Hasan, who admitted carrying out the attack, was convicted and sentenced to death.) Ten years ago: Syria’s prime minister, Riad Hijab, defected two months after being forced into the position by President Bashar Assad. Marvin Hamlisch, 68, who composed or arranged the scores for dozens of movies including ‘œThe Sting’� and the Broadway smash ‘œA Chorus Line,’� died in Los Angeles. Five years ago: Vice President Mike Pence, in a statement released by the White House, described as ‘œdisgraceful and offensive’� a New York Times report suggesting that he was laying the groundwork for a possible presidential bid in 2020 if President Donald Trump were not to run. One year ago: A New Jersey gym owner, Scott Fairlamb, and a Washington state man, Devlyn Thompson, became the first people charged in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot to plead guilty to assaulting a law enforcement officer. (Fairlamb was sentenced to 41 months in prison; Thompson received nearly four years.) American Allyson Felix won her record 10th Olympic track medal at the Tokyo Games with a bronze in the 400 meters, the most medals won by any woman in Olympic history. (She would win an 11th the following day.) The U.S. team of April Ross and Alix Klineman won gold in beach volleyball.