1. June 15, 1785 – Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier attempted the first manned crossing of the English Channel in a balloon but tragically crashed.
2. June 25, 1905 – Wilbur and Orville Wright made their first flight of 1905 in Huffman Prairie, Ohio, in their new “Flyer III,” the first practical airplane in history. 
3. June 26, 1909 – The first commercial sale of an airplane in the United States was made as Glenn H. Curtiss sold one of his planes to the Aeronautic Society of New York for $7,500. This action spurred the Wright brothers to begin a patent suit to prevent him from selling airplanes without a license. 
4. June 14, 1919 – Alcock and Brown completed the first nonstop transatlantic flight in a Vickers Vimy aircraft from Newfoundland to Ireland.  Most people think Lindbergh was the first to complete a transatlantic flight in 1927, but Alcock and Brown were first.  Lindbergh was the first person to complete such a flight solo, and first to fly from York to Paris nonstop.
5. June 17, 1928 – Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly across the Atlantic Ocean as a passenger.
6. June 4, 1942 – Battle of Midway begins (see article below)
7. June 6, 1944 – A huge airborne armada, nine planes wide and 200 miles long, carries American and British troops across the British Channel for the D-Day invasion of Europe.
8. June 26, 1948 – The Berlin Airlift began, where Western Allies supplied West Berlin by air during the Soviet blockade.
9. June 18, 1983 – Sally Ride became the first American woman to travel to space aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger.
10. June 1, 2011 – Lufthansa introduced the Boeing 747-8 Intercontinental (747-8I), marking a milestone in commercial aviation.

 

Featured article this month – Battle of Midway

Battle of Midway: A Turning Point in World War II

At the outset of World War II in 1942, the United States and its British ally found themselves in a precarious position, facing a two-front conflict. After the loss of Singapore and Tobruk in North Africa, Winston Churchill aptly described 1942 as one of the darkest years in British history. The United States military, while formidable, remained a mere fraction of the combined and combat-experienced forces of Germany and Japan. Furthermore, the United States had suffered significant losses at Pearl Harbor in December 1941, resulting in the destruction of numerous capital ships.

For the Japanese, Pearl Harbor represented a tactical success, albeit a strategic disaster that awakened a sleeping giant. A military response was devised to both surprise the Japanese and bolster the morale of the American citizenry. Among the few individuals in America possessing the vision, leadership, and flying prowess to execute an early counter-strike on Japan was Jimmy Doolittle, a renowned aviator. Despite the overwhelming numerical superiority of the Japanese forces, Doolittle risked a portion of the U.S. aircraft carrier force to plan, train the crews, and personally lead an attack.

On April 18, 1942, U.S. Army medium bombers launched from the USS Hornet I, bombarding several Japanese cities. Subsequently, most of the aircraft crash-landed in China. While the damage inflicted upon Japan by the 16 North American B-25s was relatively minor, it provoked the Japanese leadership into a precipitous attack on the U.S. Midway Islands.   

Leveraging information obtained from the decipherment of the Japanese code, approximately two months later on June 4, 1942, three outnumbered American aircraft carriers—the Enterprise, Hornet, and Yorktown—launched an ambush against the Japanese fleet in the vicinity of Midway Island. Notably, four of the six Japanese aircraft carriers that had participated in the attack on Pearl Harbor were subsequently sunk. The United States Navy suffered the loss of the USS Yorktown during the Battle of Midway, and in October of 1942, the USS Hornet was sunk off the Santa Cruz Islands. Despite these setbacks, the Doolittle Raid in April, the successful decipherment of the Japanese code, and the unwavering courage displayed by the American forces ultimately marked the turning point of World War II in the Pacific, occurring just seven months after the devastating attack on Pearl Harbor.

 

Above is an abbreviated list of a few of the aviation events and milestones that occurred in June.  For a more complete list see this Wikipedia page.