On This Day

April 1, 2016

0527 - Justinianus became the emperor of Byzantium.

1572 - The Sea Beggars under Guillaume de la Marck landed in Holland and captured the small town of Briel.

1578 - William Harvey of England discovered blood circulation.

1621 - The Plymouth, MA, colonists created the first treaty with Native Americans.

1724 - Jonathan Swift published Drapier's letters.

1748 - The ruins of Pompeii were found.

1778 - Oliver Pollock, a New Orleans businessman, created the "$" symbol.

1789 - The U.S. House of Representatives held its first full meeting in New York City. Frederick Muhlenberg of Pennsylvania was elected the first House Speaker.

1793 - In Japan, the volcano Unsen erupted killing about 53,000.

1826 - Samuel Mory patented the internal combustion engine.

1853 - Cincinnati became the first U.S. city to pay fire fighters a regular salary.

1863 - The first wartime conscription law went into effect in the U.S.

1864 - The first travel accident policy was issued to James Batterson by the Travelers Insurance Company.

1865 - At the Battle of Five Forks in Petersburg, VA, Gen. Robert E. Lee began his final offensive.

1867 - Blacks voted in the municipal election in Tuscumbia, AL.

1867 - The International Exhibition opened in Paris.

1867 - Singapore, Penang & Malakka became British crown colonies.

1868 - In Virginia, The Hampton Institute was established.

1872 - The first edition of "The Standard" was published.

1873 - The British White Star steamship Atlantic sank off Nova Scotia killing 547.

1873 - Mehmed Kemals play "Vatan" premiered in Constantinople.

1881 - Anti-Jewish riots took place in Jerusalem.

1881 - Kingdom post office in Netherlands opened.

1889 - The first dishwashing machine was marketed (in Chicago).

1891 - The London-Paris telephone connection opened.

1891 - The William Wrigley Jr. Company was founded in Chicago, IL. The company is most known for its Juicy Fruit gum.

1905 - The British East African Protectorate became the colony of Kenya.

1905 - Paris and Berlin were linked by telephone.

1916 - The first U.S. national women's swimming championships were held.

1918 - England's Royal Flying Corps was replaced by the Royal Air Force.

1924 - Adolf Hitler was sentenced to five years in prison for high treason in relation to the "Beer Hall Putsch."

1924 - Imperial Airways was formed in Britain.

1927 - The first automatic record changer was introduced by His Master's Voice.

1928 - China's Chiang Kai-shek began attacking communists.

1929 - Louie Marx introduced the Yo-Yo.

1930 - Leo Hartnett of the Chicago Cubs broke the altitude record for a catch by catching a baseball dropped from the Goodyear blimp 800 feet over Los Angeles, CA.

1931 - An Earthquake devastated Managua Nicaragua killing 2,000.

1931 - Jackie Mitchell became the first female in professional baseball when she signed with the Chattanooga Baseball Club.

1933 - Nazi Germany began the persecution of Jews by boycotting Jewish businesses.

1935 - The first radio tube to be made of metal was announced.

1937 - Aden became a British colony.

1938 - The first commercially successful fluorescent lamps were introduced.

1938 - The Baseball Hall of Fame opened in Cooperstown, NY.

1939 - The U.S. recognized the Franco government in Spain at end of Spanish civil war.

1941 - The first contract for advertising on a commercial FM radio station began on W71NY in New York City.

1945 - U.S. forces invaded Okinawa during World War II. It was the last campaign of World War II.

1946 - Weight Watchers was formed.

1946 - A tidal wave (tsunami) struck the Hawaiian Islands killing more than 170 people.

1948 - The Berlin Airlift began.

1949 - "Happy Pappy" premiered. It was the first all-black-cast variety show.

1950 - Italian Somalia became a United Nations trust territory under Italian administration.

1952 - The Big Bang theory was proposed in "Physical Review" by Alpher, Bethe & Gamow.

1953 - The U.S. Congress created the Department of Health Education and Welfare.

1954 - The U.S. Air Force Academy was formed in Colorado.

1955 - "One Man's Family" was seen on TV for the final time after a six-year run on NBC-TV.

1960 - France exploded 2 atom bombs in the Sahara Desert.

1960 - The U.S. launched TIROS-1. It was the first weather satellite.

1963 - Workers of the International Typographical Union ended their strike that had closed nine New York City newspapers. The strike ended 114 days after it began on December 8, 1962.

1963 - The Soap operas "General Hospital" and "Doctors" premiered on television.

1970 - The U.S. Army charged Captain Ernest Medina in the My Lai massacre.

1970 - U.S. President Nixon signed the bill, the Public Health Cigarette Smoking Act, that banned cigarette advertisements to be effective on January 1, 1971.

1971 - The United Kingdom lifted all restrictions on gold ownership.

1972 - North Vietnamese and Viet Cong troops renewed their offensive in South Vietnam.

1973 - Japan allowed its citizens to own gold.

1976 - Apple Computer began operations.

1979 - Iran was proclaimed to be an Islamic Republic by Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini after the fall of the Shah.

1980 - A failed assassination attempt against Iraqi vice-premier Tariq Aziz occurred.

1982 - The U.S. transferred the Canal Zone to Panama.

1983 - New York Islander Mike Bossy became the first National Hockey League (NHL) player to score 60 goals in 3 consecutive seasons.

1985 - World oil prices dropped below $10 a barrel.

1986 - The U.S. submarine Nathaniel Green ran aground in the Irish Sea.

1987 - Steve Newman became the first man to walk around the world. The walk was 22,000 miles and took 4 years.

1987 - U.S. President Reagan told doctors in Philadelphia, "We've declared AIDS public health enemy No. 1."

1991 - Iran released British hostage Roger Cooper after 5 years.

1991 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that jurors could not be barred from serving due to their race.

1991 - The Warsaw Pact was officially dissolved.

1992 - Players began the first strike in the 75-year history of the National Hockey League (NHL).

1996 - U.S. President Bill Clinton threw out the first ball preceding a game between the Kansas City Royals and the Baltimore Orioles.

1997 - David Carradine received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

1998 - A federal judge dismissed the Paula Jones' sexual harassment lawsuit against U.S. President Clinton saying that the claims fell "far short" of being worthy of a trial.

1999 - In Zhytomyr, Ukraine, Anatoliy Onoprienko was sentenced to death for the deaths of 52 men, women and children. 43 of the killings occurred in a 6-month period.

1999 - The Canadian territory of Nunavut was created. It was carved from the eastern part of the Northwest Territories and covered about 772,000 square miles.

2001 - China began holding 24 crewmembers of a U.S. surveillance plane. The EP-3E U.S. Navy crew had made an emergency landing after an in-flight collision with a Chinese fighter jet. The Chinese pilot was missing and presumed dead. The U.S. crew was released on April 11, 2001.

2001 - Former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic was arrested on corruption charges after a 26-hour standoff with the police at his Belgrade villa.

2003 - North Korea test-fired an anti-ship missile off its west coast.

2003 - Jason Mewes was ordered to complete drug rehabilitation or face five years in jail stemming from a drug conviction in 1999.

2004 - U.S. President George W. Bush signed the Unborn Victims of Violence Act. The bill made it a crime to harm a fetus during an assault on a pregnant woman.

2004 - Gateway Inc. announced that it would be closing all of its 188 stores on April 9.

2009 - Albania and Croatia joined the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).

2010 - The U.S. Congress cut Medicare reimbursements to physicians by 21%.

April 2, 2016

1513 - Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de Leon sighted Florida. The next day he went ashore.

1792 - The U.S. Congress passed the Coinage Act to regulate the coins of the United States. The act authorized $10 Eagles, $5 Half Eagles, $2.50 Quarter Eagle gold coins, silver dollars, dollars, quarters, dimes and half-dimes to be minted.

1801 - During the Napoleonic Wars, the Danish fleet was destroyed by the British at the Battle of Copenhagen.

1860 - The first Italian Parliament met in Turin.

1865 - Confederate President Davis and most of his Cabinet fled the Confederate capital of Richmond, VA.

1872 - G.B. Brayton received a patent for the gas-powered streetcar.

1877 - The first Egg Roll was held on the grounds of the White House in Washington, DC.

1889 - Charles Hall patented aluminum.

1902 - The first motion picture theatre opened in Los Angeles with the name Electric Theatre.

1905 - The Simplon rail tunnel officially opened. The tunnel went under the Alps and linked Switzerland and Italy.

1910 - Karl Harris perfected the process for the artificial synthesis of rubber.

1914 - The U.S. Federal Reserve Board announced plans to divide the country into 12 districts.

1917 - U.S. President Woodrow Wilson presented a declaration of war against Germany to the U.S. Congress.

1932 - A $50,000 ransom was paid for the infant son of Charles and Anna Lindbergh. He child was not returned and was found dead the next month.

1935 - Sir Watson-Watt was granted a patent for RADAR.

1944 - The Soviet Union announced that its troops had crossed the Prut River and entered Romania.

1947 - "The Big Story" debuted on NBC radio. It was on the air for eight years.

1947 - The U.N. Security Council voted to appoint the U.S. as trustee for former Japanese-held Pacific Islands.

1951 - U.S. General Dwight Eisenhower assumed command of all allied forces in the Western Mediterranean area and Europe.

1956 - "The Edge of Night" and "As the World Turns" debuted on CBS-TV.

1958 - The National Advisory Council on Aeronautics was renamed NASA.

1960 - France signed an agreement with Madagascar that proclaimed the country an independent state within the French community.

1963 - Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King began the first non-violent campaign in Birmingham, AL.

1966 - South Vietnamese troops joined in demonstrations at Hue and Da Nang for an end to military rule.

1967 - In Peking, hundreds of thousands demonstrated against Mao foe Liu Shao-chi.

1972 - Burt Reynolds appeared nude in "Cosmopolitan" magazine.

1978 - The first episode of "Dallas" aired on CBS.

1981 - In Lebanon, thirty-seven people were reported killed during fighting in the cities of Beirut and Zahle. It was the worst violence since the 1976 cease fire.

1982 - Argentina invaded the British-owned Falkland Islands. The following June Britain took the islands back.

1983 - The New Jersey Transit strike that began on March 1 came to an end.

1984 - John Thompson became the first black coach to lead his team to the NCAA college basketball championship.

1984 - In Jerusalem, three Arab gunmen wounded 48 people when they opened fire into a crowd of shoppers.

1985 - The NCAA Rules Committee adopted the 45-second shot clock for men’s basketball to begin in the 1986 season.

1986 - On a TWA airliner flying from Rome to Athens a bomb exploded under a seat killing four Americans.

1987 - The speed limit on U.S. interstate highways was increased to 65 miles per hour in limited areas.

1988 - U.S. Special Prosecutor James McKay declined to indict Attorney General Edwin Meese for criminal wrongdoing.

1989 - An editorial in the "New York Times" declared that the Cold War was over.

1989 - General Prosper Avril, Haiti's military leader, survived a coup attempt. The attempt was apparently provoked by Avril's U.S.-backed efforts to fight drug trafficking.

1990 - Iraqi President Saddam Hussein threatened to incinerate half of Israel with chemical weapons if Israel joined a conspiracy against Iraq.

1992 - Mob boss John Gotti was convicted in New York of murder and racketeering. He was later sentenced to life in prison.

1995 - The costliest strike in professional sports history ended when baseball owners agreed to let players play without a contract.

1996 - Russia and Belarus signed a treaty that created a political and economic alliance in an effort to reunite the two former Soviet republics.

1996 - Lech Walesa resumed his old job as an electrician at the Gdansk shipyard. He was the former Solidarity union leader who became Poland's first post-war democratic president.

2002 - Israeli troops surrounded the Church of the Nativity. More than 200 Palestinians had taken refuge at the church when Israel invaded Bethlehem.

2013 - The United Nations General Assembly adopted the Arms Trade Treaty to regulate the international trade of conventional weapons.

2014 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that limits on the total amount of money individuals can give political candidates and political action committees were unconstitutional.

April 4, 2016

0896 - Formosus ended his reign as pope.

1541 - Ignatius of Loyola became the first superior-general of the Jesuits.

1581 - Francis Drake completed the circumnavigation of the world.

1687 - King James II ordered that his declaration of indulgence be read in church.

1812 - The territory of Orleans became the 18th U.S. state and will become known as Louisiana.

1818 - A plan was passsed by the U.S. Congress that the U.S. flag would have 13 red and white stripes and 20 stars and that a new star would be added for the each new state.

1841 - U.S. President William Henry Harrison, at the age of 68, became the first president to die in office. He had been sworn in only a month before he died of pneumonia.

1848 - Thomas Douglas became the first San Francisco public teacher.

1850 - The city of Los Angeles was incorporated.

1862 - In the U.S., the Battle of Yorktown began as Union General George B. McClellan closed in on Richmond, VA.

1887 - Susanna M. Salter became mayor of Argonia, KS, making her the first woman mayor in the U.S.

1902 - British Financier Cecil Rhodes left $10 million in his will that would provide scholarships for Americans to Oxford University in England.

1905 - In Kangra, India, an earthquake killed 370,000 people.

1914 - The first known serialized moving picture opened in New York City, NY. It was "The Perils of Pauline".

1917 - The U.S. Senate voted 90-6 to enter World War I on the Allied side.

1918 - The Battle of Somme, an offensive by the British against the German Army ended.

1932 - After five years of research, professor C.G. King, of the University of Pittsburgh, isolated vitamin C.

1945 - Hungary was liberated from Nazi occupation.

1945 - During World War II, U.S. forces liberated the Nazi death camp Ohrdruf in Germany.

1949 - Twelve nations signed a treaty to create The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).

1953 - Fifteen doctors were released by Soviet leaders. The doctors had been arrested before Stalin had died and were accused of plotting against him.

1967 - The U.S. lost its 500th plane over Vietnam.

1967 - Johnny Carson quit "The Tonight Show." He returned three weeks later after getting a raise of $30,000 a week.

1968 - Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated at the age of 39.

1969 - Dr. Denton Cooley implanted the first temporary artificial heart.

1971 - Veterans stadium in Philadelphia, PA, was dedicated this day.

1973 - In New York, the original World Trade Center twin towers opened. At the time they were the tallest building in the world.

1974 - Hank Aaron tied Babe Ruth's major league baseball home-run record with 714.

1975 - More than 130 people, most of them children, were killed when a U.S. Air Force transport plane evacuating Vietnamese orphans crashed just after takeoff from Saigon.

1979 - Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, the president of Pakistan, was executed. He had been convicted of conspiring to murder a political opponent.

1981 - Henry Cisneros became the first Mexican-American elected mayor of a major U.S. city, which was San Antonio, TX.

1983 - At Cape Canaveral, the space shuttle Challenger took off on its first flight. It was the sixth flight overall for the shuttle program.

1984 - U.S. President Reagan proposed an international ban on chemical weapons.

1985 - In Sudan, a coup ousted President Nimeiry and replaced him with General Dahab.

1986 - Wayne Gretzky set an NHL record with his 213th point of the season.

1987 - The U.S. charged the Soviet Union with wiretapping a U.S. Embassy.

1988 - Arizona Governor Evan Mecham was voted out of office by the Arizona Senate. Mecham was found guilty of diverting state funds to his auto business and of trying to impede an investigation into a death threat to a grand jury witness.

1990 - In the U.S., securities law violator Ivan Boesky was released from federal custody.

1991 - Pennsylvanian Senator John Heinz and six others were killed when a helicopter collided with Heinz's plane over a schoolyard in Merion, PA.

1992 - Sali Berisha became the first non-Marxist president of Albania since World War II.

1994 - Netscape Communications (Mosaic Communications) was founded.

April 5, 2016

1242 - Russian troops repelled an invasion attempt by the Teutonic Knights.

1614 - American Indian Pocahontas married English colonist John Rolfe in Virginia.

1621 - The Mayflower sailed from Plymouth, MA, on a return trip to England.

1792 - U.S. President George Washington cast the first presidential veto. The measure was for apportioning representatives among the states.

1806 - Isaac Quintard patented the cider mill.

1827 - James H. Hackett became the first American actor to appear abroad as he performed at Covent Garden in London, England.

1843 - Queen Victoria proclaimed Hong Kong to be a British crown colony.

1869 - Daniel Bakeman, the last surviving soldier of the U.S. Revolutionary War, died at the age of 109.

1887 - Anne Sullivan taught Helen Keller the meaning of the word "water" as spelled out in the manual alphabet.

1892 - Walter H. Coe patented gold leaf in rolls.

1892 - In New York, the Ithaca Daily Journal published an ad introducing a new 10 cent Ice Cream Specialty called a Cherry Sunday.

1895 - Playwright Oscar Wilde lost his criminal libel case against the Marquess of Queensberry. Wilde had been accused of homosexual practices.

1908 - The Japanese Army reached the Yalu River as the Russians retreated.

1919 - Eamon de Valera became president of Ireland.

1923 - Firestone Tire and Rubber Company began the first regular production of balloon tires.

1930 - Mahatma Ghandi defied British law by making salt in India.

1933 - The first operation to remove a lung was performed at Barnes Hospital in St. Louis, MO.

1941 - German commandos secured docks along the Danube River in preparation for Germany’s invasion of the Balkans.

1951 - Americans Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were sentenced to death for committing espionage for the Soviet Union.

1953 - Jomo Kenyatta was convicted and sentenced to 7 years in prison for orchestrating the Mau-Mau rebellion in Kenya.

1955 - Winston Churchill resigned as British prime minister.

1984 - Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (Los Angeles Lakers) became the all-time NBA regular season scoring leader when he broke Wilt Chamberlain's record of 31,419 career points.

1985 - John McEnroe said "any man can beat any woman at any sport, especially tennis."

1986 - A discotheque in Berlin was bombed by Libyan terrorists. The U.S. attacked Libya with warplanes in retaliation on April 15, 1986.

1987 - FOX Broadcasting Company launched "Married....With Children" and "The Tracey Ullman Show". The two shows were the beginning of the FOX lineup.

1989 - In Poland, accords were signed between Solidarity and the government that set free elections for June 1989. The eight-year ban on Solidarity was also set to be lifted.

1998 - The Akashi Kaikyo Bridge in Japan opened becoming the largest suspension bridge in the world. It links Shikoku and Honshu. The bridge cost about $3.8 billion.

1999 - Two Libyans suspected of bombing a Pan Am jet in 1988 were handed over so they could be flown to the Netherlands for trial. 270 people were killed in the bombing.

1999 - In Laramie, WY, Russell Henderson pled guilty to kidnapping and felony murder in the death of Matthew Shepard.

2004 - Near Mexico City's international airport, lightning struck the jet Mexican President Vicente Fox was on.

2009 - North Korea launched the Kwangmyongsong-2 rocket, prompting an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council.

April 6, 2016

1199 - English King Richard I was killed by an arrow at the siege of the castle of Chaluz in France.

1607 - An expedition led by Captain Christopher Newport arrived at the Spanish colony of Puerto Rico for supplies before continuing on their journey. On May 14, they went ashore and founded Jamestown, Virginia, as the first permanent English colony in America.

1652 - Jan van Riebeeck established a settlement at Cape Town, South Africa.

1789 - The first U.S. Congress began regular sessions at the Federal Hall in New York City.

1814 - Granted sovereignty in the island of Elba and a pension from the French government, Napoleon Bonaparte abdicates at Fountainebleau. He was allowed to keep the title of emperor.

1830 - Joseph Smith and five others organized the Mormon Church in western New York.

1830 - Relations between the Texans and Mexico reached a new low when Mexico would not allow further emigration into Texas by settlers from the U.S.

1862 - The American Civil War Battle of Shiloh began in Tennessee.

1865 - At the Battle of Sayler's Creek, a third of Lee's army was cut off by Union troops pursuing him to Appomattox.

1875 - Alexander Graham Bell was granted a patent for the multiple telegraph, which sent two signals at the same time.

1896 - The first modern Olympic Games began in Athens, Greece.

1903 - French Army Nationalists were revealed for forging documents to guarantee a conviction for Alfred Dryfus.

1909 - Americans Robert Peary and Matthew Henson claimed to be the first men to reach the North Pole.

1916 - Charlie Chaplin became the highest-paid film star in the world when he signed a contract with Mutual Film Corporation for $675,000 a year. He was 26 years old.

1917 - The U.S. Congress approved a declaration of war on Germany and entered World War I on the Allied side.

1924 - Four planes left Seattle on the first successful flight around the world.

1927 - William P. MacCracken, Jr. earned license number ‘1’ when the Department of Commerce issued the first aviator’s license.

1931 - "Little Orphan Annie" debuted on the NBC Blue network.

1938 - The United States recognized the German conquest of Austria.

1941 - German forces invaded Greece and Yugoslavia.

1945 - "This is Your FBI" debuted on ABC radio.

1953 - Iranian Premier Mossadegh demanded that the shah's power be reduced.

1957 - Trolley cars in New York City completed their final runs.

1959 - Hal Holbrook opened in the off-Broadway presentation of "Mark Twain Tonight."

1965 - U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson authorized the use of ground troops in combat operations in Vietnam.

1967 - In South Vietnam, 1,500 Viet Cong attacked Quangtri and freed 200 prisoners.

1981 - A Yugoslav Communist Party official confirmed reports of intense ethnic riots in Kosovo.

1983 - The U.S. Veteran's Administration announced it would give free medical care for conditions traceable to radiation exposure to more than 220,000 veterans who participated in nuclear tests from 1945 to 1962.

1985 - William J. Schroeder became the first artificial heart recipient to be discharged from the hospital.

1987 - Dennis Levine began a two-year jail term for insider trading.

1987 - The Dow Jones industrial average closed above 2,400 for the first time.

1987 - Sugar Ray Leonard took the middleweight title from Marvin Hagler.

1988 - Mathew Henson was awarded honors in Arlington National Cemetery. Henson had discovered the North Pole with Robert Peary.

1997 - Mario Lemieux (Pittsburgh Penguins) announced that he would retire from the National Hockey League (NHL) following the playoffs of the current season.

1998 - Citicorp and Travelers Group announced that they would be merging. The new creation was the largest financial-services conglomerate in the world. The name would become Citigroup.

1998 - The Dow Jones industrial average closed above 9,000 points for the first time.

1998 - Federal researchers in the U.S. announced that daily tamoxifen pills could cut breast cancer risk among high-risk women.

1998 - Pakistan successfully tested medium-range missiles capable of attacking neighboring India.

April 7, 2016

1712 - A slave revolt broke out in New York City.

1798 - The territory of Mississippi was organized.

1862 - Union General Ulysses S. Grant defeated Confederates at the Battle of Shiloh, TN.

1864 - The first camel race in America was held in Sacramento, California.

1888 - P.F. Collier published a weekly periodical for the first time under the name "Collier’s."

1922 - U.S. Secretary of Interior leased Teapot Dome naval oil reserves in Wyoming.

1927 - The first long-distance TV transmission was sent from Washington, DC, to New York City. The audience saw an image of Commerce Secretary Herbert Hoover.

1930 - The first steel columns were set for the Empire State Building.

1933 - Prohibition ended in the United States.

1940 - Booker T. Washington became the first black to be pictured on a U.S. postage stamp.

1943 - British and American armies linked up between Wadi Akarit and El Guettar in North Africa to form a solid line against the German army.

1945 - The Japanese battleship Yamato, the world’s largest battleship, was sunk during the battle for Okinawa. The fleet was headed for a suicide mission.

1948 - The musical "South Pacific" by Rogers and Hammerstein debuted on Broadway.

1948 - The United Nations' World Health Organization began operations.

1953 - The Big Four met for the first time in 2 years to seek an end to their air conflicts.

1953 - IBM unveiled the IBM 701 Electronic Data Processing Machine. It was IBM's first commercially available scientific computer.

1957 - The last of New York City's electric trolleys completed its final run from Queens to Manhattan.

1963 - At the age of 23, jack Nicklaus became the youngest golfer to win the Green Jacket at the Masters Tournament.

1963 - Yugoslavia proclaimed itself a Socialist republic.

1963 - Josip Broz Tito was proclaimed to be the leader of Yugoslavia for life.

1966 - The U.S. recovered a hydrogen bomb it had lost off the coast of Spain.

1967 - Israel reported that they had shot down six Syrian MIGs.

1969 - The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously struck down laws prohibiting private possession of obscene material.

1970 - John Wayne won his first and only Oscar for his role in "True Grit." He had been in over 200 films.

1971 - U.S. President Nixon pledged to withdraw 100,000 more men from Vietnam by December.

1980 - The U.S. broke diplomatic relations with Iran and imposed economic sanctions in response to the taking of hostages on November 4, 1979.

1983 - Specialist Story Musgrave and Don Peterson made the first Space Shuttle spacewalk.

1983 - The Chinese government canceled all remaining sports and cultural exchanges with the U.S. for 1983.

1985 - In Goteborg, Sweden, China swept all of the world table tennis titles except for men's doubles.

1985 - In Sudan, Gen. Swar el-Dahab took over the Presidency while President Gaafar el-Nimeiry was visiting the U.S. and Egypt.

1985 - The Soviet Union announced a unilateral freeze on medium-range nuclear missiles.

1987 - In Oklahoma a 16-month-old baby was killed by a pit bull. On the same day a 67-year-old man was killed by another pit bull in Dayton, OH.

1988 - Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev agreed to final terms of a Soviet withdrawal from Afghanistan. Soviet troops began leaving on May 16, 1988.

1988 - In Fort Smith, AR, 13 white supremacists were acquitted on charges for plotting to overthrow the U.S. federal government.

1989 - A Soviet submarine carrying nuclear weapons sank in the Norwegian Sea.

1990 - In the U.S., John Poindexter was found guilty of five counts at his Iran-Contra trial. The convictions were later reversed on appeal.

1990 - At Cincinnati's Contemporary Arts Center a display of Robert Mapplethorpe's photographs went on display. On the same day the center and its director were indicted on obscenity charges. The charges resulted in acquittal.

1994 - Civil war erupted in Rwanda between the Patriotic Front rebel group and government soldiers. Hundreds of thousands were slaughtered in the months that followed.

1998 - Mary Bono, the widow of Sonny Bono, won a special election to serve out the remainder of her husband's congressional term.

1999 - Yugoslav authorities sealed off Kosovo's main border crossings to prevent ethnic Albanians from leaving.

2000 - U.S. President Clinton signed the Senior Citizens Freedom to Work Act of 2000. The bill reversed a Depression-era law and allows senior citizens to earn money without losing Social Security retirement benefits.

2002 - The Roman Catholic archdiocese announced that six priests from the Archdiocese of New York were suspended over allegations of sexual misconduct.

2006 - The Boeing X-37 conducted its first flight as a test drop at Edwards Air Force Base, CA.

2009 - Former Peruvian President Alberto Fujimori was sentenced to 25 years in prison for ordering killings and kidnappings by security forces.

April 8, 2016

1513 - Explorer Juan Ponce de Leon claimed Florida for Spain.

1525 - Albert von Brandenburg, the leader of the Teutonic Order, assumes the title "Duke of Prussia" and passed the first laws of the Protestant church, making Prussia a Protestant state.

1789 - The U.S. House of Representatives held its first meeting.

1832 - About 300 American troops of the 6th Infantry left Jefferson Barracks, St. Louis, to confront the Sauk Indians in the Black Hawk War.

1834 - In New York City, Cornelius Lawrence became the first mayor to be elected by popular vote in a city election.

1839 - The first Intercollegiate Rodeo was held at the Godshall Ranch, Apple Valley, CA.

1864 - The U.S. Senate passed the 13th Amendment (S.J. Res. 16) by a vote of 38 to 6.

1873 - Alfred Paraf patented the first successful oleomargarine.

1911 - The first squash tournament was played at the Harvard Club in New York City.

1913 - The Seventeenth amendment was ratified, requiring direct election of senators.

1935 - The Works Progress Administration was approved by the U.S. Congress.

1939 - Italy invaded Albania.

1942 - The Soviets opened a rail link to the besieged city of Leningrad.

1943 - Wendell Wilkie’s "One World" was published for the first time.

1946 - The League of Nations assembled in Geneva for the last time.

1947 - The first illustrated insurance policy was issued by the Allstate Insurance Company.

1952 - U.S. President Truman seized steel mills to prevent a nationwide strike.

1953 - The bones of Sitting Bull were moved from North Dakota to South Dakota.

1962 - Bay of Pigs invaders got thirty years imprisonment in Cuba.

1974 - Hank Aaron hits 715th home run breaking Babe Ruth's record.

1975 - Frank Robinson of the Cleveland Indians became first black manager of a major league baseball team.

1985 - India filed suit against Union Carbide for the Bhopal disaster.

1985 - Phyllis Diller underwent a surgical procedure for permanent eyeliner to eliminate the need for eyelid makeup.

1986 - Clint Eastwood was elected mayor of Carmel, CA.

1987 - Los Angeles Dodgers executive Al Campanis resigned over remarks he had made. While on ABC's "Nightline" Campanis said that blacks "may not have some of the necessities" to hold managerial jobs in major-league baseball.

1988 - Former U.S. President Reagan aid Lyn Nofzinger was sentenced to prison for illegal lobbying for Wedtech Corp.

1990 - In Nepal, King Birendra lifted the 30-year ban on political parties.

1992 - In Britain, the last issue of "Punch Magazine" was published.

1994 - Smoking was banned in the Pentagon and all U.S. military bases.

1998 - The widow of Martin Luther King Jr. presented new evidence in an appeal for new federal investigation of the assassination of her husband.

2000 - 19 U.S. troops were killed when a Marine V22 Osprey crashed during a training mission in Arizona.

2001 - Microsoft Corp. released Internet Explorer 6.0.

2002 - Ed McMahon filed a $20 million lawsuit against his insurance company, two insurance adjusters, and several environmental cleanup contractors. The suit alleged breach of contract, negligence and intentional infliction of emotional distress concerning a toxic mold that had spread through McMahon's Beverly Hills home.

2002 - Suzan-Lori Parks became the first African-American woman to win a Pulitzer Prize for drama for her play "Topdog/Underdog."

April 9, 2016

0193 - In the Balkans, the distinguished soldier Septimius Seversus was proclaimed emperor by the army in Illyricum.

0715 - Constantine ended his reign as Catholic Pope.

1241 - In the Battle of Liegnitz, Mongol armies defeated the Poles and the Germans.

1454 - The city states of Venice, Milan and Florence signed a peace agreement at Lodi, Italy.

1667 - In Paris, The first public art exhibition was held at the Palais-Royale.

1682 - Robert La Salle claimed the lower Mississippi River and all lands that touch it for France.

1770 - Captain James Cook discovered Botany Bay on the Australian continent.

1833 - Peterborough, NH, opened the first municipally supported public library in the United States.

1838 - The National Galley opened in London.

1865 - At Appomattox Court House, Virginia, General Robert E. Lee surrendered his Confederate Army to Union General Ulysses S. Grant in the parlor of Wilmer McClean's home. Grant allowed Rebel officers to keep their sidearms and permitted soldiers to keep their horses and mules. Though there were still Confederate armies in the field, the war was officially over. The four years of fighting had killed 360,000 Union troops and 260,000 Confederate troops.

1866 - The Civil Rights Bill passed over U.S. President Andrew Johnson's veto.

1867 - The U.S. Senate ratified the treaty with Russia that purchased the territory of Alaska by one vote.

1869 - The Hudson Bay Company ceded its territory to Canada.

1870 - The American Anti-Slavery Society was dissolved.

1872 - S.R. Percy received a patent for dried milk.

1900 - British forces routed the Boers at Kroonstadt, South Africa.

1905 - The first aerial ferry bridge went into operation in Duluth, MN.

1912 - The first exhibition baseball game was held at Fenway Park in Boston. The game was between Red Sox and Harvard.

1913 - The Brooklyn Dodgers' Ebbets Field opened.

1914 - In London, the first full-color film, "The World, The Flesh & the Devil," was shown.

1916 - The German army launched it’s third offensive during the Battle of Verdun.

1917 - The Battle of Arras began as Canadian troops began a massive assault on Vimy Ridge.

1918 - Latvia proclaimed its independence.

1921 - The Russo-Polish conflict ended with signing of Riga Treaty.

1928 - Mae West made her debut on Broadway in the production of "Diamond Lil."

1940 - Germany invaded Norway and Denmark.

1942 - In the Battle of Bataan, American and Filipino forces were overwhelmed by the Japanese Army.

1945 - National Football League officials decreed that it was mandatory for football players to wear socks in all league games.

1945 - At Bari, Italy, the Liberty exploded and killed 360 people. The ship was carrying aerial bombs.

1947 - 169 people were killed and 1,300 were injured by a series of tornadoes in Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas.

1950 - Bob Hope made his first television appearance on "Star-Spangled Review" on NBC-TV.

1957 - The Suez Canal was cleared for all shipping.

1959 - NASA announced the selection of America's first seven astronauts.

1963 - Winston Churchill became the first honorary U.S. citizen.

1965 - "TIME" magazine featured a cover with the entire "Peanuts" comic gang.

1965 - The Houston Astrodome held its first baseball game.

1967 - The first Boeing 737 was rolled out for use.

1968 - Murdered civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., was buried.

1976 - The U.S. and Russia agreed on the size of nuclear tests for peaceful use.

1981 - The U.S. Submarine George Washington struck and sunk a small Japanese freighter in the East China Sea. The Nissho Maru's captain and first mate died.

1983 - The space shuttle Challenger concluded it first flight.

1984 - Nicaragua asked the World Court to declare U.S. support for guerilla raids illegal.

1985 - Japanese Premier Nakasone urged Japanese people to buy foreign products.

1986 - It was announced that Patrick Duffy's character on the TV show Dallas would be returning after being killed off.

1987 - Dikye Baggett became the first person to undergo corrective surgery for Parkinson’s disease.

1988 - The U.S. imposed economic sanctions on Panama.

1989 - 16 civilians were killed during rioting in Soviet Georgia.

1989 - Hundreds of thousands marched past the White House in support of the right to abortion.

1991 - Georgia voted to secede from the U.S.S.R.

1992 - Former Panamanian ruler Manuel Noriega was convicted in Miami, FL, of eight drug and racketeering charges.

1998 - The National Prisoner of War Museum opened in Andersonville, GA, at the site of an infamous Civil War camp.

1998 - More than 150 Muslims died in stampede in Mecca, Saudi Arabia, on last day of the haj pilgrimage.

1999 - In Djibouti, Ismail Omar Guelleh of the ruling Popular Rally for Progress and the Front for the Restoration of Unity and Democracy was elected president.

1999 - In Niger, President Ibrahim Baré Maïnassara was assassinated. Daouda Malam ****e was designated president two days later.

2000 - CBS-TV aired "Failsafe." It was the first live full-length show to by aired by CBS in 39 years.

April 10, 2016

1741 - Frederick II of Prussia defeated Maria Theresa's forces at Mollwitz and conquered Silesia.

1790 - The U.S. patent system was established when U.S. President George Washington signed the Patent Act of 1790 into law.

1809 - Austria declared war on France and its forces entered Bavaria.

1814 - Napoleon was defeated at the Battle of Toulouse by the British and the Spanish. The defeat led to his abdication and exile to Elba.

1825 - The first hotel opened in Hawaii.

1849 - Walter Hunt patented the safety pin. He sold the rights for $100.

1854 - The constitution of the Orange Free State in south Africa was proclaimed.

1862 - Union forces began the bombardment of Fort Pulaski in Georgia along the Tybee River.

1865 - During the American Civil War, at Appomattox, General Robert E. Lee issued his last order.

1866 - The American Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA) was incorporated.

1902 - South African Boers accepted British terms of surrender.

1912 - The Titanic set sail from Southampton, England.

1916 - The Professional Golfers Association (PGA) held its first championship tournament.

1919 - In Mexico, revolutionary leader Emiliano Zapata was killed by government troops.

1922 - The Genoa Conference opened. The meeting was used to discuss the reconstruction of Europe after World War I.

1925 - F. Scott Fitzgerald published "The Great Gatsby" for the first time.

1930 - The first synthetic rubber was produced.

1932 - Paul von Hindenburg was elected president of Germany with 19 million votes. Adolf Hitler came in second with 13 million votes.

1938 - Germany annexed Austria after Austrians had voted in a referundum to merge with Germany.

1941 - In World War II, U.S. troops occupied Greenland to prevent !Removed! infiltration.

1941 - Ford Motor Co. became the last major automaker to recognize the United Auto Workers as the representative for its workers.

1944 - Russian troops recaptured Odessa from the Germans.

1945 - German Me 262 jet fighters shot down ten U.S. bombers near Berlin.

1953 - Warner Bros. released "House of Wax." It was the first 3-D movie to be released by a major Hollywood studio.

1953 - Actress Hedy Lamarr became a U.S. citizen.

1959 - Japan's Crown Prince Akihito married commoner Michiko Shoda.

1960 - The U.S. Senate passed the Civil Rights Bill.

1961 - Gary Player of South Africa became the first foreign golfer to win the Masters Golf Tournament in Augusta, Georgia.

1963 - 129 people died when the nuclear-powered submarine USS Thresher failed to surface off Cape Cod, MA.

1967 - The 13-day strike by the American Federation of Radio-TV Artists (AFTRA) came to an end less than two hours before the 39th Academy Awards presentation went on the air.

1968 - U.S. President Johnson replaced General Westmoreland with General Creighton Abrams in Vietnam.

1971 - The American table tennis team arrived in China. They were the first group of Americans officially allowed into China since the founding of the People Republic in 1949. The team had recieved the surprise invitation while in Japan for the 31st World Table Tennis Championship.

1972 - An earthquake in southern Iran killed more than 5,000 people.

1972 - The U.S. and the Soviet Union joined with 70 other nations in signing an agreement banning biological warfare.

1973 - In Switzerland, 108 people died when a plane crashed while attempting to land at Basel.

1974 - Yitzhak Rabin replaced resigning Israeli Prime Minister, Golda Meir. Meir resigned over differences within her Labor Party.

1980 - Spain and Britain agreed to reopen the border between Gibraltar and Spain. It had been closed since 1969.

1981 - Imprisoned IRA hunger striker Bobby Sands was elected to the British Parliament.

1981 - The maiden launch of the space shuttle Columbia was cancelled because of a computer malfunction.

1984 - The U.S. Senate condemned the CIA mining of Nicaraguan harbors.

1988 - On Wall Street, 48 million shares of Navistar International stock changed hands in a single-block trade. It was the largest transaction ever executed on the New York Stock Exchange.

1990 - Three European hostages kidnapped at sea in 1987 by Palestinian extremists were released in Beirut.

1992 - A bomb exploded in London's financial district. The bomb, set off by the Irish Republican Army, killed three people and injured 91.

1992 - Outside Needles, CA, comedian Sam Kinison was killed when a pickup truck slammed into his car on a desert road between Los Angeles and Las Vegas.

1992 - In Los Angeles, financier Charles Keating Jr. was sentenced to nine years in prison for swindling investors when his Lincoln Savings and Loan collapsed. The convictions were later overturned.

1993 - South African Communist Party leader Chris Hani was assassinated.

1994 - NATO warplanes launched air strikes for the first time on Serb forces that were advancing on the Bosnian Muslim town of Gordazde. The area had been declared a U.N. safe area.

1996 - U.S. President Clinton vetoed a bill that would have outlawed a technique used to end pregnancies in their late stages.

1997 - Rod Steiger received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

1998 - Negotiators reached a peace accord on governing British ruled Northern Ireland. Britain's direct rule was ended.

1999 - The www.June4.org web site was launched by Chinese dissidents and human rights activists to promote their campaign for democracy in China.

2000 - Monitors from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) reported irregularities in the voting in Georgia's presidential election on April 9. President Eduard Shevardnadze was reelected to a new five-year term.

2000 - Ken Griffey Jr. became the youngest player in baseball history to reach 400 home runs. He was 30 years, 141 days old.

2001 - Jane Swift took office as the first female governor of Massachusetts. She succeeded Paul Cellucci, who had resigned to become the U.S. ambassador to Canada.

2001 - The Netherlands legalized mercy killings and assisted suicide for patients with unbearable, terminal illness.

2002 - Former Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke before the U.S. Senate as a representative of the Israeli government. He warned that suicide bombers would spread to the U.S. if Israel was not allowed to finish its military offensive in the West Bank. Netanyaho also cited the goals of dismantling the terror regime and expelling Arafat from the region, ridding the Palestinian territories of terrorist weapons and establishing "physical barriers" to protect Israelis from future Palestinian attacks.

2009 - In Fiji, President Josefa Iloilo suspended the nation's Constitution, dismissed all judges and constitutional appointees and assumed all governance in the country.

April 11, 2016

1512 - The forces of the Holy League were heavily defeated by the French at the Battle of Ravenna.

1689 - William III and Mary II were crowned as joint sovereigns of Britain.

1713 - The Treaty of Utrecht was signed, ending the War of Spanish Succession.

1783 - After receiving a copy of the provisional treaty on March 13, the U.S. Congress proclaimed a formal end to hostilities with Great Britain.

1803 - A twin-screw propeller steamboat was patented by John Stevens.

1814 - Napoleon was forced to abdicate his throne. The allied European nations had marched into Paris on March 30, 1814. He was banished to the island of Elba.

1876 - The stenotype was patented by John C. Zachos.

1876 - The Benevolent and Protective Order of Elks was organized.

1895 - Anaheim, CA, completed its new electric light system.

1898 - U.S. President William McKinley asked Congress for a declaration of war with Spain.

1899 - The treaty ending the Spanish-American War was declared in effect.

1921 - Iowa became the first state to impose a cigarette tax.

1921 - The first live sports event on radio took place this day on KDKA Radio. The event was a boxing match between Johnny Ray and Johnny Dundee.

1901 - Construction on the Empire State Building was completed. The building was dedicated and opened on May 1, 1931.

1940 - Andrew Ponzi set a world's record in a New York pocket billiards tournament when he ran 127 balls straight.

1941 - Germany bombers blitzed Conventry, England.

1945 - U.S. troops reached the Elbe River in Germany.

1945 - During World War II, American soldiers liberated the !Removed! concentration camp of Buchenwald in Germany.

1947 - Jackie Robinson became the first black player in major-league history. He played in an exhibition game for the Brooklyn Dodgers.

1951 - U.S. President Truman fired General Douglas MacArthur as head of United Nations forces in Korea.

1961 - Israel began the trial of Adolf Eichman, accused of World War II war crimes.

1968 - U.S. President Johnson signed the 1968 Civil Rights Act.

1970 - Apollo 13 blasted off on a mission to the moon that was disrupted when an explosion crippled the spacecraft. The astronauts did return safely.

1974 - The Judiciary committee subpoenas U.S. President Richard Nixon to produce tapes for impeachment inquiry.

1979 - Idi Amin was deposed as president of Uganda as rebels and exiles backed by Tanzanian forces seized control.

1980 - The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission issued regulations specifically prohibiting sexual harassment of workers by supervisors.

1981 - U.S. President Ronald Reagan returned to the White House from the hospital after recovering from an assassination attempt on March 30.

1981 - In the Brixton area of London, a race riot erupted that resulted in the injury of more than 300 people.

1984 - China invaded Vietnam.

1984 - General Secretary Konstantin U. Cherenkov was named president of the Soviet Union.

1985 - Scientists in Hawaii measured the distance between the earth and moon within one inch.

1985 - The White House announced that President Reagan would visit the !Removed! cemetery at Bitburg.

1986 - Dodge Morgan sailed solo nonstop around the world in 150 days.

1986 - In Groton, CT, the submarine Nautilus exhibit opened to the public.

1986 - Kellogg's stopped giving tours of its breakfast-food plant. The reason for the end of the 80-year tradition was said to be that company secrets were at risk due to spies from other cereal companies.

1991 - U.N. Security Council issued a formal cease-fire with Iraq.

1996 - Forty-three African nations signed the African Nuclear Weapons Free Zone Treaty.

1996 - Seven-year-old Jessica Dubroff was killed with her father and flight instructor when her plane crashed after takeoff from Cheyenne, Wyoming. Jessica had hoped to become the youngest person to fly cross-country.

1998 - Northern Ireland's biggest political party, the Ulster Unionists, announced its backing of the historic peace deal.

1999 - Daouda Malam ****e was designated president of Niger. President Ibrahim Baré Maïnassara had been assassinated on April 9.

2001 - China agreed to release 24 crewmembers of a U.S. surveillance plane. The EP-3E Navy crew had been held since April 1 on Hainon, where the plane had made an emergency landing after an in-flight collision with a Chinese fighter jet. The Chinese pilot was missing and presumed dead.

April 12, 2016

1096 - Peter the Hermit gathered his army in Cologne.

1204 - The Fourth Crusade sacked Constantinople.

1606 - England adopted the original Union jack as its flag.

1770 - The British Parliament repealed the Townsend Acts.

1782 - The British navy won its only naval engagement against the colonists in the American Revolution at the Battle of Saints, off Dominica.

1799 - Phineas Pratt patented the comb cutting machine.

1811 - The first colonists arrived at Cape Disappointment, Washington.

1833 - Charles Gaylor patented the fireproof safe.

1861 - Fort Sumter was shelled by Confederacy, starting America's Civil War.

1864 - Confederate Gen. Nathan Bedford Forrest captured Fort Pillow, in Tennessee and slaughters the black Union troops there.

1877 - A catcher's mask was used in a baseball game for the first time by James Alexander Tyng.

1892 - Voters in Lockport, New York, became the first in the U.S. to use voting machines.

1905 - The Hippodrome opened in New York City.

1911 - Pierre Prier completed the first non-stop London-Paris flight in three hours and 56 minutes.

1916 - American cavalrymen and Mexican bandit troops clashed at Parrel, Mexico.

1927 - The British Cabinet came out in favor of women voting rights.

1934 - F. Scott Fitzgerald novel "Tender Is the Night" was first published.

1938 - The first U.S. law requiring a medical test for a marriage license was enacted in New York.

1944 - The U.S. Twentieth Air Force was activated to begin the strategic bombing of Japan.

1945 - In New York, the organization of the first eye bank, the Eye Bank for Sight Restoration, was announced.

1945 - U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt died in Warm Spring, GA. He died of a cerebral hemorrhage at the age of 63. Harry S Truman became president.

1955 - The University of Michigan Polio Vaccine Evaluation Center announced that the polio vaccine of Dr. Jonas Salk was "safe, effective and potent."

1961 - Soviet Yuri Alexeyevich Gagarin became first man to orbit the Earth.

1963 - Police used dogs and cattle prods on peaceful civil rights demonstrators in Birmingham, AL.

1966 - Emmett Ashford became the first African-American major league umpire.

1969 - Lucy and Snoopy of the comic strip "Peanuts" made the cover of "Saturday Review."

1981 - The space shuttle Columbia blasted off from Cape Canaveral, FL, on its first test flight.

1982 - The British Navy began enforcing a blockade around the Falkland Islands.

1982 - Three CBS employees were shot to death in a New York City parking lot.

1983 - Harold Washington was elected the first black mayor of Chicago.

1984 - Astronauts aboard the space shuttle Challenger made the first satellite repair in orbit by returning the Solar Max satellite to space.

1984 - Israeli troops stormed a bus that had been hijacked the previous evening by four Arab terrorists. All the passengers were rescued and 2 of the hijackers were killed.

1985 - U.S. Senator Jake Garn of Utah became the first senator to fly in space as the shuttle Discovery lifted off from Cape Canaveral, FL.

1985 - In Spain, an explosion in a restaurant near a U.S. base killed 17 people.

1985 - Federal inspectors declared that four animals of the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus were not unicorns. They were goats with horns that had been surgically implanted.

1987 - Texaco filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy after it failed to settle a legal dispute with Pennzoil Co.

1988 - Harvard University won a patent for a genetically altered mouse. It was the first patent for a life form.

1988 - The Chinese government named a new array of younger leaders to ensure economic reform.

1989 - In the U.S.S.R, ration cards were issued for the first time since World War II. The ration was prompted by a sugar shortage.

1992 - Disneyland Paris opened in Marne-La-Vallee, France.

1993 - NATO began enforcing a no-fly zone over Bosnia and Herzegovina.

2000 - More than 1,500 anti-drug agents raided four cities in Colombia and arrested 46 members of the "most powerful" heroin ring.

2000 - Robert Cleaves, 71, was convicted of second degree murder and was sentenced to 16 years in prison. Cleaves had repeatedly run over Arnold Guerreiro on September 30, 1998 with his car after the two had an argument.

2000 - Israel's High Court ordered the release of eight Lebanese detainees that had been held for years without a trial.

2002 - A first edition version of Beatrix Potter's "Peter Rabbit" sold for $64,780 at Sotheby's. A signed first edition of J.R.R. Tolkien's "The Hobbit" sold for $66,630. A copy of "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone," signed by J.K. Rowling sold for $16,660. A 250-piece collection of rare works by Charles Dickens sold for $512,650.

2002 - It was announced that the South African version of "Sesame Street" would be introducing a character that was HIV-positive.

2002 - JCPenney Chairman Allen Questrom rang the opening bell to start the business day at the New York Stock Exchange as part of the company's centennial celebrations. James Cash (J.C.) Penney opened his first retail store on April 14, 1902.

April 13, 2016

1598 - King Henry IV of France signed the Edict of Nantes which granted political rights to French Protestant Huguenots.

1759 - The French defeated the European allies in Battle of Bergen.

1775 - Lord North extended the New England Restraining Act to South, Carolina, Virginia, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Maryland. The act prohibited trade with any country other than Britain and Ireland.

1782 - Washington, NC, was incorporated as the first town to be named for George Washington.

1796 - The first known elephant to arrive in the United States from Bengal, India.

1808 - William "Juda" Henry Lane perfected the tap dance.

1829 - The English Parliament granted freedom of religion to Catholics.

1849 - The Hungarian Republic was proclaimed.

1860 - The first mail was delivered via Pony Express when a westbound rider arrived in Sacremento, CA from St. Joseph, MO.

1861 - After 34 hours of bombardment, the Union-held Fort Sumter surrenders to Confederates.

1870 - The Metropolitan Museum of Art was founded in New York City.

1916 - The first hybrid, seed corn was purchased for 15-cents a bushel by Samuel Ramsay.

1933 - The first flight over Mount Everest was completed by Lord Clydesdale.

1941 - German troops captured Belgrade, Yugoslavia.

1943 - U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt dedicated the Jefferson Memorial.

1945 - Vienna fell to Soviet troops.

1949 - Philip S. Hench and associates announced that cortizone was an effective treatment for rheumatoid arthritis.

1954 - Hank Aaron debuted with the Milwaukee Braves.

1959 - A Vatican edict prohibited Roman Catholics from voting for Communists.

1960 - The first navigational satellite was launched into Earth's orbit.

1961 - The U.N. General Assembly condemned South Africa due to apartheid.

1962 - In the U.S., major steel companies rescinded announced price increases. The John F. Kennedy administration had been applying pressure against the price increases.

1963 - Pete Rose of the Cincinnati Reds got his first hit in the major leagues.

1964 - Sidney Poitier became the first black to win an Oscar for best actor. It was for his role in the movie "Lilies of the Field."

1970 - An oxygen tank exploded on Apollo 13, preventing a planned moon landing.

1972 - The first strike in the history of major league baseball ended. Players had walked off the field 13 days earlier.

1976 - The U.S. Federal Reserve introduced $2 bicentennial notes.

1979 - The world's longest doubles ping-pong match ended after 101 hours.

1981 - Washington Post reporter Janet Cooke received a Pulitzer Prize for her feature about an 8-year-old heroin addict named "Jimmy." Cooke relinquished the prize two days later after admitting she had fabricated the story.

1984 - U.S. President Reagan sent emergency military aid to El Salvador without congressional approval.

1984 - Christopher Walker was killed in a fight with police in New Hampshire. Walker was wanted as a suspect in the kidnappings of 11 young women in several states.

1990 - The Soviet Union accepted responsibility for the World War II murders of thousands of imprisoned Polish officers in the Katyn Forest. The Soviets had previously blamed the massacre on the !Removed!.

1997 - Tiger Woods became the youngest person to win the Masters Tournament at the age of 21. He also set a record when he finished at 18 under par.

1998 - NationsBank and BankAmerica announced a $62.5 billion merger, creating the country's first coast-to-coast bank.

1998 - Dolly, the world's first cloned sheep, gave natural birth to a healthy baby lamb.

1999 - jack Kervorkian was sentenced in Pontiac, MI, to 10 to 25 years in prison for the second-degree murder of Thomas Youk. Youk's assisted suicide was videotaped and shown on "60 Minutes" in 1998.

2000 - Richard Gordon was charged with trying to extort $250,000 from Louie Anderson in exchange for not telling the tabloid media about Anderson once asking him for s*x. Gordon was held without bail pending a court hearing.

2000 - It was announced that 69 people had died when the Arlahada, a Philippine ferry, capsized. 70 people were rescued.

2002 - Twenty-five Hindus were killed and about 30 were wounded when grenades were thrown by suspected Islamic guerrillas near Jammu-Kashir.

2002 - Venezuela's interim president, Pedro Carmona, resigned a day after taking office. Thousands of protesters had supported over the ousting of president Hugo Chavez.

2007 - Google announced that it had acquired the advertising service company DoubleClick for $3.1 billion.

April 14, 2016

1775 - The first abolitionist society in U.S. was organized in Philadelphia with Ben Franklin as president.

1793 - A royalist rebellion in Santo Domingo was crushed by French republican troops.

1828 - The first edition of Noah Webster's dictionary was published under the name "American Dictionary of the English Language."

1860 - The first Pony Express rider arrived in San Francisco with mail originating in St. Joseph, MO.

1865 - U.S. President Abraham Lincoln was assassinated in Ford's Theater by John Wilkes Booth. He actually died early the next morning.

1889 - The first international Conference of American States began in Washington, DC.

1894 - First public showing of Thomas Edison's kinetoscope took place.

1902 - James Cash (J.C.) Penney opened his first retail store in Kemmerer, WY. It was called the Golden Rule Store.

1910 - U.S. President William Howard Taft threw out the first ball for the Washington Senators and the Philadelphia Athletics.

1912 - The Atlantic passenger liner Titanic, on its maiden voyage hit an iceberg and began to sink. 1,517 people lost their lives and more than 700 survived.

1918 - The U.S. First Aero Squadron engaged in America's first aerial dogfight with enemy aircraft over Toul, France.

1925 - WGN became the first radio station to broadcast a regular season major league baseball game. The Cubs beat the Pirates 8-2.

1931 - King Alfonso XIII of Spain went into exile and the Spanish Republic was proclaimed.

1939 - The John Steinbeck novel "The Grapes of Wrath" was first published.

1946 - The civil war between Communists and nationalist resumed in China.

1953 - Viet Minh invaded Laos with 40,00 troops.

1956 - Ampex Corporation of Redwood City, CA, demonstrated the first commercial magnetic tape recorder for sound and picture.

1959 - The Taft Memorial Bell Tower was dedicated in Washington, DC.

1969 - For the first time, a major league baseball game was played in Montreal, Canada.

1981 - America's first space shuttle, Columbia, returned to Earth after a three-day test flight. The shuttle orbited the Earth 36 times during the mission.

1984 - The Texas Board of Education began requiring that the state's public school textbooks describe the evolution of human beings as "theory rather than fact".

1985 - The Russian paper "Pravda" called U.S. President Reagan's planned visit to Bitburg to visit the !Removed! cemetery an "act of blasphemy".

1986 - U.S. President Reagan announced the U.S. air raid on military and terrorist related targets in Libya.

1987 - Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev proposed banning all missiles from Europe.

1988 - Representatives from the U.S.S.R., Pakistan, Afghanistan and the U.S. signed an agreement that called for the withdrawal of Soviet forces from Afghanistan starting on May 15. The last Soviet troop left Afghanistan on February 15, 1989.

1988 - In New York, real estate tycoons Harry and Leona Helmsley were indicted for income tax evasion.

1990 - Cal Ripken of the Baltimore Orioles began a streak of 95 errorless games and 431 total chances by a shortstop.

1994 - Two American F-15 warplanes inadvertently shot down two U.S. helicopters over northern Iraq. 26 people were killed including 15 Americans.

1998 - The state of Virginia ignored the requests from the World Court and executed a Paraguayan for the murder of a U.S. woman.

1999 - Pakistan test-fired a ballistic missile that was capable of carrying a nuclear warhead and reaching its rival neighbor India.

2000 - After five years of deadlock, Russia approved the START II treaty that calls for the scrapping of U.S. and Russian nuclear warheads. The Russian government warned it would abandon all arms-control pacts if Washington continued with an anti-missile system.

2002 - U.S. President George W. Bush sent a letter of congratulations to JCPenny's associates for being in business for 100 years. James Cash (J.C.) Penney had opened his first retail store on April 14, 1902.

2002 - Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez returned to office two days after being arrested by his country's military.

2008 - Delta Air Lines and Northwest Airlines announced they were combining.

April 15, 2016

1784 - The first balloon was flown in Ireland.

1794 - "Courrier Francais" became the first French daily newspaper to be published in the U.S.

1813 - U.S. troops under James Wilkinson attacked the Spanish-held city of Mobile that would be in the future state of Alabama.

1817 - The first American school for the deaf was opened in Hartford, CT.

1850 - The city of San Francisco was incorporated.

1858 - At the Battle of Azimghur, the Mexicans defeated Spanish loyalists.

1861 - U.S. President Lincoln mobilized the Federal army.

1865 - U.S. President Abraham Lincoln died from injuries inflicted by John Wilkes Booth.

1871 - "Wild Bill" Hickok became the marshal of Abilene, Kansas.

1880 - William Gladstone became Prime Minister of England.

1892 - The General Electric Company was organized.

1899 - Thomas Edison organized the Edison Portland Cement Company.

1912 - The ocean liner Titanic sank in the North Atlantic after hitting an iceberg the evening before. 1,517 people died and more than 700 people survived.

1917 - The British defeated the Germans at the battle of Arras.

1923 - Insulin became generally available for people suffering with diabetes.

1934 - In the comic strip "Blondie," Dagwood and Blondie Bumstead welcomed a baby boy, Alexander. The child would be nicknamed, Baby Dumpling.

1940 - French and British troops landed at Narvik, Norway.

1945 - During World War II, British and Canadian troops liberated the !Removed! concentration camp Bergen-Belsen.

1947 - Jackie Robinson played his first major league baseball game for the Brooklyn Dodgers. Previously he had only appeared in exhibition games.

1948 - The Arabs were defeated in the first Jewish-Arab battle.

1951 - The first episode of the "Adventures of Wild Bill Hickok" radio show aired.

1952 - U.S. President Harry Truman signed the official Japanese peace treaty.

1952 - The first B-52 prototype was tested in the air.

1953 - In Buenos Aires, six people were killed by a bomb at a rally addressed by President Peron.

1953 - Pope Pius XII gave his approval of psychoanalysis but warned of possible abuses.

1953 - Charlie Chaplin surrendered his U.S. re-entry permit rather than face proceedings by the U.S. Justice Department. Chaplin was accused of sympathizing with Communist groups.

1956 - The worlds’ first, all-color TV station was dedicated. It was WNBQ-TV in Chicago and is now WMAQ-TV.

1956 - General Motors announced that the first free piston automobile had been developed.

1959 - Cuban leader Fidel Castro began a U.S. goodwill tour.

1960 - The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) was organized at Shaw University.

1967 - Richard Speck was found guilty of murdering eight student nurses.

1983 - In Urayasu, Chiba, Japan, the Tokyo Disneyland themepark opened.

1984 - Ten members of a family were found murdered in their home in New York City. An infant was found crawling among the corpses.

1986 - U.S. F-111 warplanes attacked Libya in response to the bombing of a discotheque in Berlin on April 5, 1986.

1987 - In Northhampton, MA, Amy Carter, Abbie Hoffman and 13 others were acquitted on civil disobedience charges related with a CIA protest.

1987 - In New York City, Mbongeni Ngema's "Asinamali!" opened as the first South African play on Broadway.

1989 - Students in Beijing launched a series of pro democracy protests upon the death of former Communist Party leader Hu Yaobang. The protests led to the Tienanmen Square massacre.

1989 - In Sheffield, England, 96 people were killed and hundreds were injured at a soccer game at Hillsborough Stadium when a crowd surged into an overcrowded standing area. Ninety-four died on the day of the incident and two more later died from their injuries.

1994 - The World Trade Organization was established.

1997 - Christopher Reeve received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

1998 - Pol Pot died at the age of 73. The leader of the Khmer Rouge regime thereby evaded prosecution for the deaths of 2 million Cambodians.

1999 - In Algeria, former Foreign Minister Abdelaziz Bouteflika was elected president. All of the opposition candidates claimed that the vote was fraudulent and withdrew from the election.

1999 - In Rawalpindi, Pakistan, a panel of two Lahore High Court judges convicted former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto and her husband, Asif Ali Zardari, of corruption.

2000 - 600 anti-IMF (International Monetary Fund) protesters were arrested in Washington, DC, for demonstrating without a permit.

2010 - In Prospect Harbor, ME, the Stinson Seafood plant stopped sardine processing after 135 years in operation.

April 16, 2016

0069 - Otho committed suicide after being defeated by Vitellius' troops at Bedriacum.

0556 - Pelagius I began his reign as Catholic Pope.

1065 - The Norman Robert Guiscard took Bari. Five centuries of Byzantine rule in southern Italy ended.

1175 - Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor, signed the Treaty of Montebello with the Lombard League.

1705 - Queen Anne of England knighted Isaac Newton.

1746 - The Duke of Cumberland defeated Bonnie Prince Charlie (and his Jacobites) at the battle of Culloden.

1818 - The U.S. Senate ratified Rush-Bagot amendment to form an unarmed U.S.-Canada border.

1851 - A lighthouse was swept away in a gale at Minot’s Ledge, MA.

1854 - San Salvador was destroyed by an earthquake.

1862 - Confederate President Jefferson Davis approved conscription act for white males between 18 and 35.

1862 - In the U.S., slavery was abolished by law in the District of Columbia.

1883 - Paul Kruger became president of the South African Republic.

1900 - The first book of postage stamps was issued. The two-cent stamps were available in books of 12, 24 and 48 stamps.

1905 - Andrew Carnegie donated $10,000,000 of personal money to set up the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching.

1912 - Harriet Quimby became the first woman to fly across the English Channel.

1917 - Vladimir Ilyich Lenin returned to Russia to start Bolshevik Revolution after years of exile.

1922 - Annie Oakley shot 100 clay targets in a row, to set a women's record.

1922 - The Soviet Union and Germany signed the Treaty of Rapallo under which Germany recognized the Soviet Union and diplomatic and trade relations were restored.

1935 - "Fibber McGee and Molly" premiered.

1940 - The first no-hit, no-run game to be thrown on an opening day of the major league baseball season was earned by Bob Feller. The Cleveland Indians beat the Chicago White Sox 1-0.

1942 - The Island of Malta was awarded the George Cross in recognition for heroism under constant German air attack.

1943 - In Basel, Switzerland, chemist Albert Hoffman accidently discovered the the hallucinogenic effects of LSD-25 while working on the medicinal value of lysergic acid.

1944 - The destroyer USS Laffey survived immense damage from attacks by 22 Japanese aircraft off Okinawa.

1945 - American troops entered Nuremberg, Germany.

1947 - The Zoomar lens, invented by Dr. Frank Back, was demonstrated in New York City. It was the first lens to exhibit zooming effects.

1947 - In Texas City, TX, the French ship Grandcamp, carrying ammonium nitrate fertilizer, caught fire and blew up. The explosions and resulting fires killed 576 people.

1948 - In Paris, the Organization for European Economic Co-operation was set up.

1951 - 75 people were killed when the British submarine Affray sank in the English Channel.

1953 - The British royal yacht Britannia was launched.

1962 - Walter Cronkite began anchoring "The CBS Evening News".

1968 - The Pentagon announced that troops would begin coming home from Vietnam.

1968 - Major league baseball's longest night game was played when the Houston Astros defeated the New York Mets 1-0. The 24 innings took six hours, six minutes to play.

1972 - Apollo 16 blasted off on a voyage to the moon. It was the fifth manned moon landing.

1972 - Two giants pandas arrived in the U.S. from China.

1975 - The Khmer Rouge Rebels won control of Cambodia after a five years of civil war. They renamed the country Kampuchea and began a reign of terror.

1978 - In Orissa, India, 180 people died when a tornado hit.

1982 - Queen Elizabeth proclaimed Canada's new constitution in effect. The act severed the last colonial links with Britain.

1983 - China shelled the Vietnam border in retaliation for raids.

1983 - Brazil detained four Libyan planes en route to Nicaragua after finding weapons, explosives and ammunition on the planes.

1985 - Mickey Mantle was reinstated after being banned from baseball for several years.

1987 - The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) sternly warned U.S. radio stations to watch the use of indecent language on the airwaves.

1987 - The U.S. Patent Office began allowing the patenting of new animals created by genetic engineering.

1992 - Italian financier Carlo de Benedetti and 32 others were convicted of fraud in connection with the 1982 collapse of Banco Ambrosiano.

1992 - The House ethics committee listed 303 current and former lawmakers who had overdrawn their House bank accounts.

1995 - The European Union and Canada agreed to protect threatened fish stocks in the north Atlantic.

1996 - Britain's Prince Andrew and his wife, Sarah, the Duchess of York, announced that they were in the process of getting a divorce.

1996 - An Italian court found former Prime Minister Bettino Craxi guilty on charges of corruption. He was sentenced to eight years and three months in prison.

1999 - Wayne Gretzky announced his retirement from the National Hockey League (NHL).

2002 - The U.S. Supreme Court overturned major parts of a 1996 child pornography law based on rights to free speech.

2007 - In Blacksburg, VA, a student killed 33 people at Virginia Tech before killing himself.

April 18, 2016

1521 - Martin Luther confronted the emperor Charles V in the Diet of Worms and refused to retract his views that led to his excommunication.

1676 - Sudbury, Massachusetts, was attacked by Indians.

1775 - American revolutionaries Paul Revere, William Dawes and Samuel Prescott rode though the towns of Massachusetts giving the warning that the Regulars were coming out. Later, the phrase "the British are coming" was attributed to Revere even though it is unlikely he used that wording.

1791 - National Guardsmen prevented Louis XVI and his family from leaving Paris.

1818 - A regiment of Indians and blacks were defeated at the Battle of Suwann, in Florida, ending the first Seminole War.

1834 - William Lamb became prime minister of England.

1838 - The Wilkes' expedition to the South Pole set sail.

1846 - The telegraph ticker was patented by R.E. House

1847 - U.S. troops defeated almost 17,000 Mexican soldiers commanded by Santa Anna at Cerro Gordo. (Mexican-American War)

1853 - The first train in Asia began running from Bombay to Tanna.

1861 - Colonel Robert E. Lee turned down an offer to command the Union armies during the U.S. Civil War.

1877 - Charles Cros wrote a paper that described the process of recording and reproducing sound. In France, Cros is regarded as the inventor of the phonograph. In the U.S., Thomas Edison gets the credit.

1895 - New York State passed an act that established free public baths.

1906 - San Francisco, CA, was hit with an earthquake. The original death toll was cited at about 700. Later information indicated that the death toll may have been 3 to 4 times the original estimate.

1910 - Walter R. Brookins made the first airplane flight at night.

1923 - Yankee Stadium opened in the Bronx, NY. The Yankees beat the Boston Red Sox 4-1. John Phillip Sousa's band played the National Anthem.

1924 - Simon and Schuster, Inc. published the first "Crossword Puzzle Book."

1934 - The first Laundromat opened in Fort Worth, TX.

1937 - Leon Trotsky called for the overthrow of Soviet leader Josef Stalin.

1938 - Superman made his debut when he appeared in the first issue of Action Comics. (Cover date June 1938)

1938 - U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt threw out the first ball preceding the season opener between the Washington Senators and the Philadelphia Athletics.

1942 - James H. Doolittle and his squadron, from the USS Hornet, raided Tokyo and other Japanese cities.

1942 - The Vichy government capitulated to Adolf Hitler and invited Pierre Laval to form a new government in France.

1943 - Traveling in a bomber, Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, was shot down by American P-38 fighters.

1945 - American war correspondent Ernie Pyle was killed by Japanese gunfire on the Pacific island of Ie Shima, off Okinawa. He was 44 years old.

1946 - The League of Nations was dissolved.

1949 - The Republic of Ireland was established.

1950 - The first transatlantic jet passenger trip was completed.

1954 - Colonel Gamal Abdel Nasser seized power in Egypt.

1956 - Actress Grace Kelly and Prince Rainier of Monaco were married. The religious ceremony took place April 19.

1960 - The Mutual Broadcasting System was sold to the 3M Company of Minnesota for $1.25 million.

1978 - The U.S. Senate approved the transfer of the Panama Canal to Panama on December 31, 1999.

1979 - The TV show "Real People" premiered.

1980 - Rhodesia became in independent nation of Zimbabwe.

1983 - The U.S. Embassy in Beirut was blown up by a suicide car-bomber. 63 people were killed including 17 Americans.

1984 - Daredevils Mike MacCarthy and Amanda Tucker made a sky dive from the Eiffel Tower. The jump ended safely.

1985 - Ted Turner filed for a hostile takeover of CBS.

1985 - Tulane University abolished its 72-year-old basketball program. The reason was charges of fixed games, drug abuse, and payments to players.

1989 - Thousands of Chinese students demanding democracy tried to storm Communist Party headquarters in Beijing.

1999 - Wayne Gretzky (New York Rangers) played his final game in the NHL. He retired as the NHL's all-time leading scorer and holder of 61 individual records.

2000 - The Nasdaq had the biggest one-day point gain in its history.

2000 - Joan Lunden and Jeff Konigsberg were married.

2002 - Actor Robert Blake and his bodyguard were arrested in connection with the shooting death of Blake's wife about a year before.

2002 - The Amtrack Auto Train derailed in a remote area of north Florida. Four people were killed and 133 were injured.

2002 - The city legislature of Berlin decided to make Marlene Dietrich an honorary citizen. Dietrich had gone to the United States in 1930. She refused to return to Germany after Adolf Hitler came to power.

April 21, 2016

753 BC - Today is the traditional date of the foundation of Rome.

43 BC - Marcus Antonius was defeated by Octavian near Modena, Italy.

1526 - Mongol Emperor Babur annihilated the Indian Army of Ibrahim Lodi.

1649 - The Maryland Toleration Act was passed, allowing all freedom of worship.

1689 - William III and Mary II were crowned joint king and queen of England, Scotland and Ireland.

1789 - John Adams was sworn in as the first U.S. Vice President.

1836 - General Sam Houston defeated Santa Anna at the Battle of San Jacinto. This battle decided the independence of Texas.

1856 - The Mississippi River was crossed by a rail train for the first time (between Davenport, IA, and Rock Island, IL).

1862 - The U.S. Congress established the U.S. Mint in Denver, CO.

1865 - U.S. President Abraham Lincoln's funeral train left Washington.

1892 - The first Buffalo was born in Golden Gate Park.

1895 - Woodville Latham and his sons demonstrated their Panopticon. It was the first movie projector developed in the United States.

1898 - The Spanish-American War began.

1914 - U.S. Marines occupied Vera Cruz, Mexico. The troops stayed for six months.

1916 - Bill Carlisle, the infamous ‘last train robber,’ robbed a train in Hanna, WY.

1918 - German fighter ace Manfred von Richthofen, "The Red Baron," was shot down and killed during World War I.

1940 - "Take It or Leave It" premiered on CBS Radio.

1943 - U.S. President Franklin Roosevelt announced that several Doolittle pilots had been executed by the Japanese.

1953 - In New York, the Sidney Janis Gallery held the Dada exhibition.

1956 - Leonard Ross, age 10, became the youngest prizewinner on the "The Big Surprise". He won $100,000.

1959 - Alf Dean caught a 16-foot, 10-inch white shark that weighed 2,664 pounds. At the time it was the largest catch with a rod and reel.

1960 - Brasilia became the capital of Brazil.

1961 - The French army revolted in Algeria.

1967 - Svetlana Alliluyeva (Svetlana Stalina) defected in New York City. She was the daughter of Joseph Stalin.

1967 - In Athens, Army colonels took over the government and installed Constantine Kollias as premier.

1972 - Apollo 16 astronauts John Young and Charles Duke explored the surface of the moon.

1975 - South Vietnam president, Nguyen Van Thieu, resigned, condemning the United States.

1977 - "Annie" opened on Broadway.

1984 - In France, it was announced that doctors had found virus believed to cause AIDS.

1985 - Manuel Ortega proposed a cease-fire for Nicaragua.

1986 - Geraldo Rivera opened a vault that belonged to Al Capone at the Lexington Hotel in Chicago. Nothing of interest was found inside.

1987 - Special occasion stamps were offered for the first time by the U.S. Postal Service. "Happy Birthday" and "Get Well" were among the first to be offered.

1989 - The Game Boy handheld video game device was released in Japan.

1992 - Robert Alton Harris became the first person executed by the state of California in 25 years. He was put to death for the 1978 murder of two teen-age boys.

1994 - Jackie Parker became the first woman to qualify to fly an F-16 combat plane.

1998 - Astronomers announced in Washington that they had discovered possible signs of a new family of planets orbiting a star 220 light-years away.

2000 - In Sinking Spring, PA, a man chased his estranged girlfriend through town and then forced her car into the path of an oncoming train. The woman and her 3 passengers were killed.

2000 - North Carolina researchers announced that the heart of a 66 million-year-old dinosaur was more like a mammal or bird than that of a reptile.

2000 - The 1998 Children's Online Privacy Protection Act went into effect.

2002 - In the city of General Santos, 14 people were killed and 69 were injured in a bomb attack on a department store. The attack was blamed on Muslim extremists.

2003 - North and South Korea agreed to hold Cabinet-level talks the following week.

2009 - UNESCO launched The World Digital Library. The World Digital Library (WDL) is an international digital library operated by UNESCO and the United States Library of Congress.

April 22, 2016

1500 - Portuguese navigator Pedro Alvares Cabral discovered Brazil.

1509 - Henry VIII ascended to the throne of England upon the death of his father Henry VII.

1529 - Spain and Portugal divided the eastern hemisphere in the Treaty of Saragosa.

1745 - The Peace of Fussen was signed, restoring the status quo of Germany.

1792 - U.S. President George Washington proclaimed American neutrality in the war in Europe.

1861 - Robert E. Lee was named commander of Virginia forces.

1864 - The U.S. Congress passed legislation that allowed the inscription "In God We Trust" to be included on one-cent and two-cent coins.

1876 - The first official National League (NL) baseball game took place. Boston beat Philadelphia 6-5.

1889 - At noon, the Oklahoma land rush officially started as thousands of Americans raced for new, unclaimed land.

1898 - The first shot of the Spanish-American war occurred when the USS Nashville captured a Spanish merchant ship.

1914 - Babe Ruth made his pitching debut with the Baltimore Orioles.

1915 - At the Second Battle Ypres the Germans became the first country to use poison gas.

1915 - The New York Yankees wore pinstripes and the hat-in-the-ring logo for the first time.

1918 - British naval forces attempted to sink block-ships in the German U-boat bases at the Battle of Zeeburgge.

1930 - The U.S., Britain and Japan signed the London Naval Treaty, which regulated submarine warfare and limited shipbuilding.

1931 - Egypt signed the treaty of friendship with Iraq.

1931 - James G. Ray landed an autogyro on the lawn of the White House.

1944 - During World War II, the Allies launched a major attack against the Japanese in Hollandia, New Guinea.

1952 - An atomic test conducted in Nevada was the first nuclear explosion shown on live network television.

1954 - The U.S. Senate Army-McCarthy televised hearings began.

1967 - Randy Matson set a new world record with a shot put toss of 71 feet, and 5 1/2 inches in College Station, TX.

1970 - The first "Earth Day" was observed by millions of Americans.

1976 - Barbara Walters became first female nightly network news anchor.

1987 - The American Physical Society said that the "Star Wars" missile system was "highly questionable" and would take ten years to research.

1993 - The U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum was dedicated in Washington, DC.

1997 - In Lima, Peru government commandos storm and capture the residence of the Japanese ambassador ending a 126-day hostage crisis. In the rescue 71 hostages were saved. Those killed: one hostage (of a heart attack), two soldiers, and all 14 rebels.

1999 - The Watson Family received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

2000 - Elian Gonzalez was reunited with his father. He had to be taken from his Miami relatives by U.S. agents in a predawn raid.

2000 - ABC-TV aired a small portion of the Clinton-DiCaprio interview.

2002 - Filippino President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo ordered a state of emergency in the city of General Santos in response to a series of bombing attacks the day before. The attacks were blamed on Muslim extremists.

2010 - The Boeing X-37 began its first orbital mission. It successfully returned to Earth on December 3, 2010.

April 25, 2016

1590 - The Sultan of Morocco launched his successful attack to capture Timbuktu.

1644 - The Ming Chongzhen emperor committed suicide by hanging himself.

1684 - A patent was granted for the thimble.

1707 - At the Battle of Almansa, Franco-Spanish forces defeated the Anglo-Portugese.

1792 - The guillotine was first used to execute highwayman Nicolas J. Pelletier.

1831 - The New York and Harlem Railway was incorporated in New York City.

1846 - The Mexican-American War ignited as a result of disputes over claims to Texas boundaries. The outcome of the war fixed Texas' southern boundary at the Rio Grande River.

1859 - Work began on the Suez Canal in Egypt.

1860 - The first Japanese diplomats to visit a foreign power reached Washington, DC. They remained in the U.S. capital for several weeks while discussing expansion of trade with the United States.

1862 - Union Admiral Farragut occupied New Orleans, LA.

1864 - After facing defeat in the Red River Campaign, Union General Nathaniel Bank returned to Alexandria, LA.

1867 - Tokyo was opened for foreign trade.

1882 - French commander Henri Riviere seized the citadel of Hanoi in Indochina.

1898 - The U.S. declared war on Spain. Spain had declared war on the U.S. the day before.

1901 - New York became the first state to require license plates for cars. The fee was $1.

1915 - During World War I, Australian and New Zealand troops landed at Gallipoli in Turkey in hopes of attacking the Central Powers from below. The attack was unsuccessful.

1925 - General Paul von Hindenburg took office as president of Germany.

1926 - In Iran, Reza Kahn was crowned Shah and choose the name "Pehlevi."

1928 - A seeing eye dog was used for the first time.

1938 - "Your Family and Mine," a radio serial, was first broadcast.

1940 - W2XBS (now WCBS-TV) in New York City presented the first circus on TV.

1945 - U.S. and Soviet forces met at Torgau, Germany on Elbe River.

1945 - Delegates from about 50 countries met in San Francisco to organize the United Nations.

1952 - After a three-day fight against Chinese Communist Forces, the Gloucestershire Regiment was annihilated on "Gloucester Hill," in Korea.

1953 - U.S. Senator Wayne Morse ended the longest speech in U.S. Senate history. The speech on the Offshore Oil Bill lasted 22 hours and 26 minutes.

1953 - Dr. James D. Watson and Dr. Francis H.C. Crick suggested the double helix structure of DNA.

1954 - The prototype manufacture of the first solar Battery was announced by the Bell Laboratories in New York City.

1957 - Operations began at the first experimental sodium nuclear reactor.

1959 - St. Lawrence Seaway opened to shipping. The water way connects the Great Lakes and the Atlantic Ocean.

1961 - Robert Noyce was granted a patent for the integrated circuit.

1962 - The U.S. spacecraft, Ranger, crashed on the Moon.

1967 - Colorado Governor John Love signed the first law legalizing abortion in the U.S. The law was limited to therapeutic abortions when agreed to, unanimously, by a panel of three physicians.

1971 - The country of Bangladesh was established.

1974 - Portuguese dictator Antonio Salazar was overthrown in a military coup.

1976 - Portugal ratified a constitution. It was first revised on October 30, 1982.

1980 - In Iran, a commando mission to rescue hostages was aborted after mechanical problems disabled three of the eight helicopters involved. During the evacuation, a helicopter and a transport plan collided and exploded. Eight U.S. servicemen were killed. The mission was aimed at freeing American hostages that had been taken at the U.S. embassy in theran on November 4, 1979. The event took place April 24th Washington, DC, time.

1982 - In accordance with Camp David agreements, Israel completed its Sinai withdrawal.

1983 - Soviet leader Yuri V. Andropov invited Samantha Smith to visit his country after receiving a letter in which the U.S. schoolgirl expressed fears about nuclear war.

1983 - The Pioneer 10 spacecraft crossed Pluto's orbit, speeding on its endless voyage through the Milky Way.

1984 - In France, over one million people demonstrated to show they favored the decentralization of education.

1984 - David Anthony Kennedy, the son of Robert F. Kennedy, was found dead of a drug overdose in a hotel room.

1985 - "Big River (The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn)" opened at the Eugene O’Neill Theatre on Broadway in New York City.

1987 - In Washington, DC, 100,000 people protested the U.S. policy in Central America.

1987 - Peter O'Toole opened in "Pygmalion" on Broadway.

1988 - In Israel, John "Ivan the Terrible" Demjanuk was sentenced to death as a !Removed! war criminal.

1990 - Sandinista rule ended in Nicaragua.

1990 - The U.S. Hubble Space Telescope was placed into Earth's orbit. It was released by the space shuttle Discovery.

1992 - Islamic forces in Afghanistan took control of most of the capital of Kabul following the collapse of the Communist government.

1996 - The main assembly of the Palestine Liberation Organization voted to revoke clauses in its charter that called for an armed struggle to destroy Israel.

1998 - U.S. first lady Hillary Rodham Clinton on was questioned by Whitewater prosecutors on videotape about her work as a private lawyer for the failed savings and loan at the center of the investigation.

2003 - Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, the anti-apartheid leader and ex-wife of former President Nelson Mandela, was sentenced to four years in prison for her conviction on fraud and theft charges. She was convicted of 43 counts of fraud and 25 of theft of money from a women's political league.

2007 - The Dow Jones industrial average closed above 13,000 for the first time.

April 26, 2016

1478 - Pazzi conspirators attacked Lorenzo and killed Giuliano de'Medici.

1514 - Copernicus made his first observations of Saturn.

1607 - The British established an American colony at Cape Henry, Virginia. It was the first permanent English establishment in the Western Hemisphere.

1819 - The first Odd Fellows lodge in the U.S. was established in Baltimore, MD.

1865 - Joseph E. Johnston surrendered the Army of Tennessee to Sherman during the American Civil War.

1865 - John Wilkes Booth was killed by the U.S. Federal Cavalry.

1906 - In Hawaii, motion pictures were shown for the first time.

1921 - Weather broadcasts were heard for the first time on radio in St. Louis, MO.

1929 - First non-stop flight from England to India was completed.

1931 - New York Yankee Lou Gehrig hit a home run but was called out for passing a runner.

1931 - NBC premiered "Lum and Abner." It was on the air for 24 years.

1937 - German planes attacked Guernica, Spain, during the Spanish Civil War for the Spanish nationalist government. This raid is considered one of the first to be attacks on a civilian population by a modern air force.

1937 - "LIFE" magazine was printed without the word "LIFE" on the cover.

1937 - "Lorenzo Jones" premiered on NBC radio.

1941 - An organ was played at a baseball stadium for the first time in Chicago, IL.

1945 - Marshal Henri Philippe Petain, the head of France's Vichy government during World War II, was arrested.

1952 - Patty Berg set a new record for major women’s golf competition when she shot a 64 over 18 holes in a tournament in Richmond, CA.

1954 - Grace Kelly was on the cover of "LIFE" magazine.

1964 - The African nations of Tanganyika and Zanzibar merged to form Tanzania.

1964 - The Boston Celtics won their sixth consecutive NBA title. They won two more before the streak came to an end.

1968 - Students seized the administration building at Ohio State University.

1982 - The British announced that Argentina had surrendered on South Georgia.

1983 - Dow Jones Industrial Average broke 1,200 for first time.

1985 - In Argentina, a fire at a mental hospital killed 79 people and injured 247.

1986 - The world’s worst nuclear disaster to date occurred at Chernobyl, in Kiev. Thirty-one people died in the incident and thousands more were exposed to radioactive material.

1998 - Auxiliary Bishop Juan Gerardi Conedera was bludgeoned to death two days after a report he'd compiled on atrocities during Guatemala's 36-year civil war was made public.

2000 - Charles Wang and Sanjay Kumar purchased the NHL's New York Islanders.

2002 - In Erfurt, Germany, an expelled student killed 17 people at his former school. The student then killed himself.

April 27, 2016

1296 - The Scots were defeated by Edward I at the Battle of Dunbar.

1509 - Pope Julius II excommunicated the Italian state of Venice.

1521 - Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan was killed by natives in the Philippines.

1565 - The first Spanish settlement in Philippines was established in Cebu City.

1805 - A force led by U.S. Marines captured the city of Derna, on the shores of Tripoli.

1813 - Americans under Gen. Pike capture York (present day Toronto) the seat of government in Ontario.

1861 - U.S. President Lincoln suspended the writ of habeas corpus.

1861 - West Virginia seceded from Virginia after Virginia seceded from the Union during the American Civil War.

1863 - The Army of the Potomac began marching on Chancellorsville.

1865 - In the U.S. the Sultana exploded while carrying 2,300 Union POWs. Between 1,400 - 2,000 were killed.

1880 - Francis Clarke and M.G. Foster patented the electrical hearing aid.

1897 - Grant's Tomb was dedicated.

1899 - The Western Golf Association was founded in Chicago, IL.

1903 - Jamaica Race Track opened in Long Island, NY.

1909 - The sultan of Turkey, Abdul Hamid II, was overthrown.

1938 - Geraldine Apponyi married King Zog of Albania. She was the first American woman to become a queen.

1938 - A colored baseball was used for the first time in any baseball game. The ball was yellow and was used between Columbia and Fordham Universities in New York City.

1945 - The Second Republic was founded in Austria.

1946 - The SS African Star was placed in service. It was the first commercial ship to be equipped with radar.

1947 - "Babe Ruth Day" was celebrated at Yankee Stadium.

1950 - South Africa passed the Group Areas Act, which formally segregated races.

1953 - The U.S. offered $50,000 and political asylum to any Communist pilot that delivered a MIG jet.

1953 - Five people were killed and 60 injured when Mt. Aso erupted on the island of Kyushu.

1960 - The submarine Tullibee was launched from Groton, CT. It was the first sub to be equipped with closed-circuit television.

1961 - The United Kingdom granted Sierra Leone independence.

1965 - "Pampers" were patented by R.C. Duncan.

1967 - In Montreal, Prime Minister Lester Pearson lighted a flame to open Expo 67.

1975 - Saigon was encircled by North Vietnamese troops.

1978 - Pro-Soviet Marxists seized control of Afghanistan.

1982 - The trial of John W. Hinckley Jr. began in Washington. Hinckley was later acquitted by reason of insanity for the shooting of U.S. President Reagan and three others.

1982 - China proposed a new constitution that would radically alter the structure of the national government.

1983 - Nolan Ryan (Houston Astros) broke a 55-year-old major league baseball record when he struck out his 3,509th batter of his career.

1984 - In London, Libyan gunmen left the Libyan Embassy 11 days after killing a policewoman and wounding 10 others.

1986 - Captain Midnight (John R. MacDougall) interrupted HBO.

1989 - Student protestors took over Tiananmen Square in Beijing.

1987 - The U.S. Justice Department barred Austrian President Kurt Waldheim from entering the U.S. He claimed that he had aided in the deportation and execution of thousands of Jews and others as a German Army officer during World War II.

1992 - The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was proclaimed in Belgrade by the Republic of Serbia and its ally Montenegro.

1992 - Russia and 12 other former Soviet republics won entry into the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.

2005 - The A380, the world's largest jetliner, completed its maiden flight. The passenger capability was 840.

2005 - Russian President Vladimir Putin became the first Kremlin leader to visit Israel.

2006 - In New York, NY, construction began on the 1,776-foot One World Trade Center on the site of former World Trade Center.

April 28, 2016

0357 - Constantius II visited Rome for the first time.

1282 - Villagers in Palermo led a revolt against French rule in Sicily.

1635 - Virginia Governor John Harvey was accused of treason and removed from office.

1686 - The first volume of Isaac Newton's "Principia Mathamatic" was published.

1788 - Maryland became the seventh state to ratify the U.S. constitution.

1789 - A mutiny on the British ship Bounty took place when a rebel crew took the ship and set sail to Pitcairn Island. The mutineers left Captain W. Bligh and 18 sailors adrift.

1818 - U.S. President James Monroe proclaimed naval disarmament on the Great Lakes and Lake Champlain.

1896 - The Addressograph was patented by J.S. Duncan.

1902 - A revolution broke out in the Dominican Republic.

1910 - First night air flight was performed by Claude Grahame-White in England.

1914 - W.H. Carrier patented the design of his air conditioner.

1916 - The British declared martial law throughout Ireland.

1919 - The League of Nations was founded.

1920 - Azerbaijan joined the USSR.

1923 - The British Empire Exhibition Stadium (or Empire Stadium) opened to the public.

1930 - The first organized night baseball game was played in Independence, Kansas.

1932 - The yellow fever vaccine for humans was announced.

1937 - The first animated-cartoon electric sign was displayed on a building on Broadway in New York City. It was created by Douglas Leight.

1945 - Benito Mussolini and his mistress Clara Petacci were executed by Italian partisans as they attempted to flee the country.

1946 - The Allies indicted Tojo with 55 counts of war crimes.

1947 - Norwegian anthropologist Thor Heyerdahl and five others set out in a balsa wood craft known as Kon Tiki to prove that Peruvian Indians could have settled in Polynesia. The trip began in Peru and took 101 days to complete the crossing of the Pacific Ocean.

1952 - The U.S. occupation of Japan officially ended when a treaty with the U.S. and 47 other countries went into effect.

1953 - French troops evacuated northern Laos.

1957 - Mike Wallace was seen on TV for the first time. He was the host of "Mike Wallace Interviews."

1959 - Arthur Godfrey was seen for the last time in the final broadcast of "Arthur Godfrey and His Friends" on CBS-TV.

1962 - In the Sahara Desert of Algeria, a team led by Red Adair used explosives to put out the well fire known as the Devil's Cigarette Lighter. The fire was caused by a pipe rupture on November 6, 1961.

1965 - The U.S. Army and Marines invaded the Dominican Republic to evacuate Americans.

1967 - Muhammad Ali refused induction into the U.S. Army and was stripped of boxing title. He cited religious grounds for his refusal.

1969 - Charles de Gaulle resigned as president of France.

1969 - In Santa Rosa, CA, Charles M. Schulz's Redwood Empire Ice Arena opened.

1977 - Christopher Boyce was convicted of selling U.S. secrets.

1985 - The largest sand castle in the world was completed near St. Petersburg, FL. It was four stories tall.

1988 - In Maui, HI, one flight attendant was killed when the fuselage of a Boeing 737 ripped open in mid-flight.

1989 - Mobil announced that they were divesting from South Africa because congressional restrictions were too costly.

1992 - The U.S. Agriculture Department unveiled a pyramid-shaped recommended-diet chart.

1994 - Former CIA official Aldrich Ames, who had given U.S. secrets to the Soviet Union and then Russia, pled guilty to espionage and tax evasion. He was sentenced to life in prison without parole.

1996 - U.S. President Clinton gave a 4 1/2 hour videotaped testimony as a defense witness in the criminal trial of his former Whitewater business partners.

1997 - A worldwide treaty to ban chemical weapons took effect. Russia and other countries such as Iraq and North Korea did not sign.

1999 - The U.S. House of Representatives rejected (on a tie vote of 213-213) a measure expressing support for NATO's five-week-old air campaign in Yugoslavia. The House also voted to limit the president's authority to use ground forces in Yugoslavia.

2000 - Jay Leno received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

2001 - A Russian rocket launched from Central Asia with the first space tourist aboard. The crew consisted of California businessman Dennis Tito and two cosmonauts. The destination was the international space station.

2008 - India set a world record when it sent 10 satellites into orbit from a single launch.

April 29, 2016

1289 - Qala'un, the Sultan of Egypt, captured Tripoli.

1429 - Joan of Arc led Orleans, France, to victory over Britain.

1661 - The Chinese Ming dynasty occupied Taiwan.

1672 - King Louis XIV of France invaded the Netherlands.

1813 - Rubber was patented by J.F. Hummel.

1852 - The first edition of Peter Roget's Thesaurus was published.

1856 - A peace treaty was signed between England and Russia.

1858 - Austrian troops invaded Piedmont.

1861 - The Maryland House of Delegates voted against seceding from Union.

1862 - New Orleans fell to Union forces during the Civil War.

1864 - Theta Xi was founded in Troy, New York.

1879 - In Cleveland, OH, electric arc lights were used for the first time.

1913 - Gideon Sundback patented an all-purpose zipper.

1916 - Irish nationalists surrendered to British authorities in Dublin.

1918 - Germany's Western Front offensive ended in World War I.

1924 - An open revolt broke out in Santa Clara, Cuba.

1927 - Construction of the Spirit of St. Louis was completed for Lindbergh.

1941 - The Boston Bees agreed to change their name to the Braves.

1945 - The German Army in Italy surrendered unconditionally to the Allies.

1945 - In a bunker in Berlin, Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun were married. Hitler designated Admiral Karl Doenitz his successor.

1945 - The !Removed! death camp, Dachau, was liberated.

1946 - Twenty-eight former Japanese leaders were indicted in Tokyo as war criminals.

1952 - IBM President Thomas J. Watson, Jr., informed his company's stockholders that IBM was building "the most advanced, most flexible high-speed computer in the world." The computer was unveiled April 7, 1953, as the IBM 701 Electronic Data Processing Machine.

1954 - Ernest Borgnine made his network television debut in "Night Visitor" on NBC-TV.

1961 - ABC’s "Wide World of Sports" premiered.

1974 - Phil Donahue’s TV show, "Donahue" moved to Chicago, IL.

1974 - U.S. President Nixon announced he was releasing edited transcripts of secretly made White House tape recordings related to the Watergate scandal.

1975 - The U.S. embassy in Vietnam was evacuated as North Vietnamese forces fought their way into Saigon.

1981 - Steve Carlton, of the Philadelphia Phillies, became the first left-handed pitcher in the major leagues to get 3,000 career strikeouts.

1984 - In California, the Diablo Canyon nuclear reactor went online after a long delay due to protests.

1985 - Billy Martin was brought back, for the fourth time, to the position of manager for the New York Yankees.

1986 - Roger Clemens of the Boston Red Sox set a major-league baseball record by striking out 20 Seattle Mariner batters.

1988 - The Baltimore Orioles set a new major league baseball record by losing their first 21 games of the season.

1988 - Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev promised more religious freedom.

1990 - The destruction of the Berlin Wall began.

1992 - Exxon executive Sidney Reso was kidnapped outside his Morris Township, NJ, home by Arthur Seale. Seale was a former Exxon security official. Reso died while in captivity.

1992 - Rioting began after a jury decision to acquit four Los Angeles policemen in the Rodney King beating trial. 54 people were killed in 3 days.

1994 - Israel and the PLO signed an agreement in Paris which granted Palestinians broad authority to set taxes, control trade and regulate banks under self-rule in the Gaza Strip and Jericho.

1996 - Former CIA Director William Colby was missing and presumed drowned after an apparent boating accident in Maryland. Colby's body was later recovered.

1997 - Staff Sgt. Delmar Simpson, a drill instructor at Aberdeen Proving Ground in Maryland, was convicted of raping six female trainees. He was sentenced to 25 years in prison and was dishonorably discharged.

May 3, 2016

1568 - French forces in Florida slaughtered hundreds of Spanish.

1802 - Washington, DC, was incorporated as a city.

1855 - Macon B. Allen became the first African American to be admitted to the Bar in Massachusetts.

1859 - France declared war on Austria.

1888 - Thomas Edison organized the Edison Phonograph Works.

1916 - Irish nationalist Padraic Peubik and two others were executed by the British for their roles in the Easter Rising.

1921 - West Virginia imposed the first state sales tax.

1926 - The revival of Wilde's "The Importance of Being Earnest" opened in New York.

1926 - U.S. Marines landed in Nicaragua and stayed until 1933.

1926 - In Britain, trade unions began a general strike.

1927 - Francis E.J. Wilde of Meadowmere Park, NY, patented the electric sign flasher.

1933 - The U.S. Mint was under the direction of a woman for the first time when Nellie Ross took the position.

1937 - Margaret Mitchell won a Pulitzer Prize for "Gone With The Wind."

1944 - Wartime rationing of most grades of meats ended in the U.S.

1944 - Dr. Robert Woodward and Dr. William Doering produced the first synthetic quinine at Harvard University.

1945 - Indian forces captured Rangoon, Burma, from the Japanese.

1948 - The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that covenants prohibiting the sale of real estate to blacks and other minorities were legally unenforceable.

1952 - The first airplane landed at the geographic North Pole.

1966 - The game "Twister" was featured on the "Tonight Show" with Johnny Carson.

1968 - After three days of battle, the U.S. Marines retook Dai Do complex in Vietnam. They found that the North Vietnamese had evacuated the area.

1971 - Anti-war protesters began four days of demonstrations in Washington, DC.

1971 - National Public Radio broadcast for the first time.

1971 - James Earl Ray, Martin Luther King's assassin, was caught in a jailbreak attempt.

1986 - In NASA's first post-Challenger launch, an unmanned Delta rocket lost power in its main engine shortly after liftoff. Safety officers destroyed it by remote control.

1988 - The White House acknowledged that first lady Nancy Reagan had used astrological advice to help schedule her husband's activities.

1992 - Five days of rioting and looting ended in Los Angeles, CA. The riots, that killed 53 people, began after the acquittal of police officers in the beating of Rodney King.

1997 - The "Republic of Texas" surrendered to authorities ending an armed standoff where two people were held hostage. The group asserts the independence of Texas from the U.S.

1998 - "The Sevres Road," by 18-century landscape painter Camille Corot, stolen from the Louvre in France.

1999 - Mark Manes, at age 22, was arrested for supplying a gun to Eric Harris and Dylan Kleibold, who later killed 13 people at Columbine High School in Colorado.

1999 - Hasbro released the first collection of toys for the Star Wars movie "Episode I: The Phantom Menace."
Today in Star Wars History

1999 - The Dow Jones Industrial Average closed above 11,000 for the first time.

2000 - The trial of two Libyans accused of killing 270 people in the bombing of Pan Am flight 103 (over Lockerbie) opened.

2006 - In Alexandria, VA, Al-Quaida conspirator Zacarias Moussaoui was given a sentence of life in prison for his role in the terrorist attack on the U.S. on September 11, 2001.

May 4, 2016

1471 - In England, the Yorkists defeated the Landcastrians at the battle of Tewkesbury in the War of the Roses.

1493 - Alexander VI divided non-Christian world between Spain and Portugal.

1626 - Dutch explorer Peter Minuit landed on Manhattan Island. Native Americans later sold the island (20,000 acres) for $24 in cloth and buttons.

1715 - A French manufacturer debuted the first folding umbrella.

1776 - Rhode Island declared its freedom from England two months before the Declaration of Independence was adopted.

1814 - Napoleon Bonaparte disembarked at Portoferraio on the island of Elba in the Mediterranean.

1863 - The Battle of Chancellorsville ended when the Union Army retreated.

1886 - A bomb exploded on the fourth day of a workers' strike in Chicago, IL. Eight people died in the violence during violence that day.

1886 - Chichester Bell and Charles S. Tainter patented the gramophone. It was the first practical phonograph.

1904 - The U.S. formally took control of the property for construction of the Panama Canal.

1905 - Belmont Park opened in suburban Long Island. It opened as the largest race track in the world.

1916 - Germany agreed to limit its submarine warfare after a demand from U.S. President Wilson.

1942 - The Battle of the Coral Sea commenced as American and Japanese carriers launched their attacks at each other.

1942 - The United States began food rationing.

1954 - The first intercollegiate court tennis match was played in the U.S. It was between Yale and Princeton.

1961 - Thirteen civil rights activists, dubbed "Freedom Riders," began a bus trip through the South.

1964 - "Another World" premiered on NBC-TV.

1970 - The Ohio National Guardsmen opened fire on students during an anti-Vietnam war protest at Kent State University. Four students were killed and nine others were wounded.

1979 - Margaret Thatcher became Britain's first woman prime minister.

1981 - The Federal Reserve Board raised its discount rate to 14%.

1987 - Live models were used for the first time in Playtex bra ads.

1987 - The First Bank of the United States was listed as a National Historic Landmark.

1994 - Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and PLO leader Yasser Arafat signed a historic accord on Palestinian autonomy that granted self-rule in the Gaza Strip and Jericho.

2000 - The citizens of London elected their mayor for the first time.

2003 - Idaho Gem was born. He was the first member of the horse family to be cloned.

2010 - Pablo Picasso's "Nude, Green Leaves and Bust" sold for $106.5 million.

2012 - In Las Vegas, NV, Google received the first self-driving vehicle testing license.

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