Wikipedia:Selected anniversaries/April
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| << | Selected anniversaries for April | >> | ||||
| Su | Mo | Tu | We | Th | Fr | Sa |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 |
| 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 |
| 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 |
| 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 |
| 29 | 30 | |||||
| An archive of historical anniversaries that appeared on the Main Page 2007 day arrangement |
||||||
April 1: Palm Sunday in Christianity (2007); Independence Day in San Serriffe (1967); April Fools' Day; Assyrian New Year.
- 1318 - The Scottish re-took Berwick upon Tweed from the English.
- 1957 - Eight million viewers watched the television programme Panorama, prompting several of them to contact the BBC the following day and ask for instructions on how to grow spaghetti trees.
- 1970 - U.S. President Richard Nixon (pictured) signed a law putting "the Surgeon General" on cigarette packages.
- 1997 - Cartoonists of popularly syndicated comic strips swapped cartoons for the day.
Recent days: March 31 – March 30 – March 29
April 2: Passover begins at sunset (Judaism, 2007); Malvinas Day in Argentina.
- 1792 - By the Coinage Act, the United States Mint was founded and the U.S. currency was decimalized.
- 1801 - British forces led by Horatio Nelson defeated the Dano-Norwegian fleet in the Battle of Copenhagen.
- 1956 - As the World Turns premiered on U.S. television as the first half-hour serial drama.
- 1982 - Argentine special forces invaded the Falkland Islands, sparking the Falklands War.
- 1992 - John Gotti (pictured), the crime boss of the Gambino crime family, was convicted of racketeering, murder, conspiracy to commit murder, loansharking, obstruction of justice, illegal gambling and tax evasion.
Recent days: April 1 – March 31 – March 30
- 1882 - Jesse James (pictured), an outlaw in the American Old West, was shot in the back and killed for a bounty of 5,000 United States dollars.
- 1895 - The libel trial instigated by Oscar Wilde began, eventually resulting in Wilde's arrest, trial and imprisonment on charges of homosexuality.
- 1948 - The Marshall Plan, an economic recovery program established by U.S. Secretary of State George Marshall to assist the post-World War II re-building of Europe, was signed into law.
- 1971 - Japanese tokusatsu television series Kamen Rider premiered, marking the beginning of the long-running Kamen Rider franchise.
- 1974 - The Super Outbreak of 148 tornadoes began, killing at least 315 people and injuring 5,484 in 13 U.S. states at the end of a very strong La Niña event.
Recent days: April 2 – April 1 – March 31
April 4: Children's Day in Taiwan
- 1581 - Francis Drake completed a circumnavigation of the globe, the first Englishman to do so.
- 1721 - Robert Walpole took office as First Lord of the Treasury, Chancellor of the Exchequer and Leader of the House of Commons, becoming the first Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, though the term "Prime Minister" was not used at the time.
- 1949 - Twelve nations signed the North Atlantic Treaty, creating NATO.
- 1968 - Martin Luther King, Jr. (pictured) was assassinated on the balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tennessee.
- 1976 - Norodom Sihanouk abdicated from the role of leader of Cambodia and was arrested by the Khmer Rouge.
Recent days: April 3 – April 2 – April 1
April 5: Mawlid in Shi'a Islam, Maundy Thursday in Christianity (2007); Qingming Festival in the Chinese calendar; Hansik in South Korea.
- 1242 - In the Battle of the Ice, Novgorod forces led by Alexander Nevsky rebuffed an invasion attempt by the Teutonic Knights at Lake Peipus.
- 1614 - Native American Pocahontas (pictured) married English colonist John Rolfe in Virginia, and was christened Lady Rebecca.
- 1847 - The world's first civic public park, Birkenhead Park in Birkenhead, Merseyside, England, opened.
- 1955 - British Prime Minister Winston Churchill resigned, stating his advancing age.
- 1998 - Japan's Akashi-Kaikyo Bridge, linking Awaji Island and Kobe, opened to traffic, becoming the longest suspension bridge in the world to date.
Recent days: April 4 – April 3 – April 2
April 6: Good Friday in Christianity (2007); Tartan Day
- 1652 - Dutch sailor Jan van Riebeeck (pictured) established the first permanent European settlement in sub-Saharan Africa on what eventually became known as Cape Town.
- 1782 - Rama I succeeded King Taksin of Thailand, founding the Chakri Dynasty.
- 1830 - Joseph Smith, Jr., Oliver Cowdery, David Whitmer and others formally organized the Church of Christ, starting the Latter Day Saint movement.
- 1896 - The first modern Olympic Games opened in Athens.
Recent days: April 5 – April 4 – April 3
April 7: Holy Saturday in Christianity (2007); World Health Day
- 529 - Byzantine Emperor Justinian I (pictured) issued the first draft of the Corpus Juris Civilis, a first attempt to codify Roman law.
- 1868 - D'Arcy McGee, a Canadian Father Of Confederation, was assassinated — the only Canadian political assassination at the federal level.
- 1945 - World War II: The Yamato of the Imperial Japanese Navy was sunk 200 miles north of Okinawa during Operation Ten-Go.
- 1948 - The United Nations established the World Health Organization.
- 1969 - With publication of RFC 1, the Internet was symbolically born.
Recent days: April 6 – April 5 – April 4
April 8: Easter in Christianity (2007); Hanamatsuri in Japan.
- 217 - Roman Emperor Caracalla (bust pictured) was assassinated at a roadside near Harran.
- 1904 - France and the United Kingdom signed the Entente Cordiale.
- 1929 - Indian independence movement: In response to the British Empire's Defense of India Act which gave more power to the police, Indian revolutionary Bhagat Singh with the help of Batukeshwar Dutt bombed the Central Assembly in Delhi.
- 1953 - Jomo Kenyatta was convicted of being a Mau Mau leader.
Recent days: April 7 – April 6 – April 5
April 9: Easter Monday in Christianity (2007); Day of Valor in the Philippines.
- 193 - Septimius Severus (statue pictured) was proclaimed Roman Emperor.
- 1865 - Battle of Appomattox Courthouse: Confederate forces under Robert E. Lee surrendered to Union commander Ulysses S. Grant, effectively ending the American Civil War.
- 1940 - Operation Weserübung: Germany invaded Denmark and Norway; Occupation of Denmark began.
- 1959 - NASA announced the selection of the Mercury Seven, the first astronauts in Project Mercury.
- 1989 - April 9 tragedy: An anti-Soviet demonstration in Tbilisi, Georgia was quashed by the Soviet army, resulting in 20 deaths and thousands of injured.
Recent days: April 8 – April 7 – April 6
- 1815 - Mount Tambora in Indonesia began the most violent volcanic eruption in recorded history.
- 1919 - Mexican Revolutionary leader Emiliano Zapata (pictured) was shot to his death near Ciudad Ayala, Morelos.
- 1941 - World War II: The Independent State of Croatia was established, with Ustaše leader Ante Pavelić as head of the puppet government.
- 1959 - Crown Prince Akihito, the future Emperor of Japan, wedded Michiko, the first commoner to marry into the Japanese imperial family.
- 1998 - The Good Friday Agreement, a major step in the Northern Ireland peace process, was signed.
Recent days: April 9 – April 8 – April 7
- 1241 - Mongols led by Batu Khan and Subutai crushed the Hungarian army of King Béla IV in the Battle of Mohi.
- 1945 - World War II: The Buchenwald concentration camp was liberated.
- 1951 - Korean War: General Douglas MacArthur was relieved of overall command in Korea.
- 1965 - Fifty-one tornadoes struck six states in the Midwestern United States during the Palm Sunday tornado outbreak.
- 1970 - Launch of Apollo 13 at 13:13 (1:30)
- 2002 - President Hugo Chávez (pictured) was forced to resign during a military coup attempt in Venezuela.
Recent days: April 10 – April 9 – April 8
- 467 - Anthemius became Emperor of the Western Roman Empire.
- 1633 - The formal interrogation of Galileo Galilei by the Inquisition began.
- 1961 - Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first man to enter outer space.
- 1980 - Terry Fox dipped his artificial leg in the Atlantic Ocean and began running his Marathon of Hope towards the Pacific Ocean to raise funds across Canada for cancer research.
- 1981 - Columbia, the first space shuttle, was launched for its first flight (pictured).
Recent days: April 11 – April 10 – April 9
April 13: Thai New Year's Day, Vaisakhi in India.
- 1204 - Fourth Crusade: Forces under Boniface the Marquess of Montferrat and Enrico Dandolo the Doge of Venice captured Constantinople, capital of the Byzantine Empire.
- 1598 - King Henry IV of France (pictured) issued the Edict of Nantes, allowing freedom of religion to the Huguenots.
- 1860 - The Pony Express, the first mail service across the North American continent from the Missouri River to the Pacific coast, was successfully completed for the first time.
- 1919 - British and Gurkha troops opened fire on a peaceful political gathering in Amritsar, Punjab in India, killing hundreds of Sikhs, Hindus and Muslims.
- 1943 - World War II: Germany announced the discovery of a mass grave of Polish prisoners-of-war executed by Soviet forces in the Katyn Forest Massacre.
Recent days: April 12 – April 11 – April 10
April 14: Pohela Baishakh in Bengal.
- 1865 - John Wilkes Booth (pictured) shot Abraham Lincoln with a Deringer pistol at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C.
- 1912 - The passenger liner RMS Titanic struck an iceberg at 11:40 p.m. ship's time.
- 1931 - King Alfonso XIII left Spain. The Second Spanish Republic was proclaimed by a provisional government led by Niceto Alcalá-Zamora.
- 1956 - The use of the 2" Quadruplex videotape was first demonstrated in public.
- 1970 - An oxygen tank aboard the NASA spacecraft Apollo 13 exploded.
- 2003 - The completion of the Human Genome Project was announced.
Recent days: April 13 – April 12 – April 11
April 15: Holocaust Remembrance Day in Israel (2007); Father Damien Day in Hawaii; Birthday of the Great Leader in North Korea; 300th birthday of Leonhard Euler
- 1755 - A Dictionary of the English Language by Samuel Johnson (pictured) was first published.
- 1912 - The passenger liner RMS Titanic sank two hours and forty minutes after colliding with an iceberg.
- 1947 - Jackie Robinson, the first African American to break the baseball color line, played his first game in Major League Baseball.
- 1986 - U.S. armed forces launched Operation El Dorado Canyon against Libya.
- 1989 - The Hillsborough disaster, one of the biggest tragedies of European football, occurred.
Recent days: April 14 – April 13 – April 12
- 1746 - The Battle of Culloden, the final battle of the Jacobite Rising, was fought in Culloden, Scotland.
- 1853 - Indian Railways launched its first passenger train service.
- 1917 - Vladimir Lenin (pictured) returned to Petrograd from Switzerland, and joined the Bolshevik movement in Russia.
- 1943 - Dr. Albert Hofmann discovered the psychedelic effects of LSD.
- 1947 - Texas City Disaster: Thousands of tons of ammonium nitrate in Texas City's port exploded.
Recent days: April 15 – April 14 – April 13
- 1895 - The Empire of Japan and the Qing Empire signed the Treaty of Maguan, an 'unequal' treaty that ended the First Sino-Japanese War.
- 1942 - World War II: Captured French General Henri Giraud (pictured) escaped from German captivity in the Königstein Castle.
- 1961 - The CIA-backed Bay of Pigs Invasion of Cuba began.
- 1975 - The Khmer Rouge captured Phnom Penh, ending the Cambodian Civil War.
- 1982 - A new "patriated" Constitution of Canada, including the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms, was signed into law.
Recent days: April 16 – April 15 – April 14
- 1025 - Bolesław I the Brave was crowned in Gniezno and became the first King of Poland.
- 1906 - A major earthquake (pictured) and subsequent fires devastated San Francisco, California.
- 1942 - World War II: Sixteen B-25 Mitchell bombers from the aircraft carrier USS Hornet carried out the Doolittle Raid on Tokyo.
- 1980 - Rhodesia became the Republic of Zimbabwe, with Canaan Banana as the country's first President.
- 1996 - Israel Defense Forces shelled Qana, Lebanon during Operation Grapes of Wrath, killing over 100 civilians at a UN compound.
Recent days: April 17 – April 16 – April 15
- 1713 - Emperor Charles VI issued the Pragmatic Sanction to ensure his daughter Maria Theresa would inherit the Habsburg monarchy.
- 1775 - The American Revolutionary War began with the Battles of Lexington and Concord.
- 1839 - The signing of the Treaty of London formally recognised Belgian independence from the United Kingdom of the Netherlands.
- 1971 - The first space station, Salyut 1, was launched.
- 1995 - Oklahoma City bombing: A car bomb was detonated in front of the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building (pictured) in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, killing 168 people.
Recent days: April 18 – April 17 – April 16
April 20: Ridván begins at sunset in the Bahá'í Faith.
- 1653 - Oliver Cromwell dissolved the Rump Parliament of the Commonwealth of England.
- 1862 - Louis Pasteur (pictured) and Claude Bernard completed the first test on pasteurization.
- 1914 - A fire and a gun battle between the National Guard and striking coal miners in Colorado led to 17 deaths in the Ludlow massacre.
- 1968 - Pierre Trudeau succeeded Lester B. Pearson as Prime Minister of Canada.
- 1999 - Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold murdered 13 people in the Columbine High School massacre.
Recent days: April 19 – April 18 – April 17
April 21: First day of Festival of Ridván in the Bahá'í Faith, Tiradentes Day in Brazil.
- 753 BC - Romulus and Remus founded Rome, according to the calculations by Varro Reatinus.
- 1836 - Texan forces led by Sam Houston (pictured) defeated General Antonio López de Santa Anna and his Mexican troops in the Battle of San Jacinto, the decisive battle in the Texas Revolution.
- 1960 - Brasília, a planned city based on principles of Le Corbusier, was officially inaugurated as the capital of Brazil.
- 1966 - Emperor Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia visited Jamaica and was greeted by more than a hundred thousand Rastafarians.
- 1970 - The Hutt River Province Principality "seceded" from Australia.
Recent days: April 20 – April 19 – April 18
April 22: Yom Hazikaron in Israel (2007); Earth Day in the United States.
- 1500 - Portuguese explorer Pedro Álvares Cabral (pictured) and his crew became the first Europeans to sight Brazil.
- 1864 - The U.S. Congress authorized the minting of a two-cent coin, the first U.S. coin to bear the words "In God We Trust".
- 1913 - The Bolshevik newspaper Pravda was first published in Saint Petersburg, Russia.
- 1914 - Babe Ruth played his first professional baseball game as a pitcher for the Baltimore Orioles.
- 1915 - Chlorine gas was released as a chemical weapon in the Second Battle of Ypres, the first large-scale use of poison gas in World War I.
Recent days: April 21 – April 20 – April 19
April 23: World Book Day; National Sovereignty and Children's Day in Turkey; St George's Day in various countries.
- 1014 - Irish forces led by Brian Boru (pictured) clashed with the Vikings in the Battle of Clontarf.
- 1827 - Irish mathematician and physicist Rowan Hamilton presented his Theory of Systems of Rays.
- 1923 - Gdynia was inaugurated as a Polish seaport on the south coast of the Baltic Sea.
- 1954 - Batting against Vic Raschi of the St. Louis Cardinals, Hank Aaron of the Milwaukee Braves hit the first of his 755 home runs in Major League Baseball.
- 1982 - The Conch Republic facetiously declared independence from the United States.
Recent days: April 22 – April 21 – April 20
April 24: Genocide Remembrance Day in Armenia, Republic Day in the Gambia.
- 1800 - The U.S. Library of Congress was founded.
- 1916 - Easter Rising, a rebellion led by the Irish Republican Brotherhood, broke out in Ireland.
- 1967 - The Soyuz 1 spacecraft crashed in Siberia, killing cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov.
- 1980 - Eight U.S. servicemen died in Operation Eagle Claw, a failed attempt to rescue the hostages in the Iran hostage crisis.
- 1990 - The Hubble Space Telescope (pictured) was launched by the Space Shuttle Discovery in mission STS-31.
Recent days: April 23 – April 22 – April 21
April 25: Yom Ha'atzmaut in Israel and Administrative Professionals' Day in Canada and the United States (2007); ANZAC Day in Australia and New Zealand; Liberation Day in Italy; Flag Day in the Faroe Islands; Red Hat Society Day.
- 1719 - Robinson Crusoe, a novel by Daniel Defoe, was first published.
- 1792 - Claude Joseph Rouget de Lisle composed La Marseillaise, now the national anthem of France.
- 1953 - Molecular structure of Nucleic Acids: A Structure for Deoxyribose Nucleic Acid by James Watson (pictured) and Francis Crick was published in the scientific journal Nature.
- 1974 - The song Grândola Vila Morena by Zeca Afonso was broadcast on radio, signalling the start of the Carnation Revolution, a bloodless coup against the Estado Novo regime in Portugal.
- 1986 - Mswati III was crowned King of Swaziland, succeeding his father Sobhuza II.
Recent days: April 24 – April 23 – April 22
April 26: World Intellectual Property Day.
- 1478 - The Pazzi Conspiracy: Lorenzo and Giuliano of the Medici family were attacked in Florence.
- 1865 - Boston Corbett (pictured) shot and killed John Wilkes Booth, the assassin of U.S. President Abraham Lincoln.
- 1937 - Spanish Civil War: The bombing of Gernika in Spain by the Condor Legion of the German Luftwaffe resulted in a devastating firestorm.
- 1964 - Tanganyika and Zanzibar merged to form Tanzania.
- 1986 - Chernobyl disaster: A nuclear reactor in Chernobyl, Ukraine suffered a steam explosion, resulting in a fire and a nuclear meltdown.
Recent days: April 25 – April 24 – April 23
April 27: Independence Day in Togo (1960) and Sierra Leone (1961), Freedom Day in South Africa.
- 1521 - Filipino natives led by Lapu-Lapu killed Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan in the Battle of Mactan.
- 1565 - Conquistador Miguel López de Legazpi and 500 armed soldiers arrived at Cebu and established the first Spanish settlement in the Philippines.
- 1667 - John Milton (pictured), blind and impoverished, sold the copyright of Paradise Lost for £10.
- 1865 - An explosion destroyed the steamboat Sultana on the Mississippi River, killing 1,700 passengers.
- 1994 - Apartheid in South Africa: The African National Congress had a landslide victory in the first non-racial elections in the history of South Africa.
Recent days: April 26 – April 25 – April 24
- 1192 - Third Crusade: Conrad of Montferrat, the elected King of Jerusalem, was assassinated by the Hashshashin.
- 1789 - Fletcher Christian led a mutiny aboard HMAV Bounty against Commander William Bligh (pictured).
- 1952 - Occupied Japan: Japan was once again an independent state, when the Treaty of San Francisco entered into force.
- 1996 - A spree shooter in the Port Arthur Massacre killed 35 people, and seriously injured 37 in Tasmania, Australia.
- 2001 - Dennis Tito became the world's first fee-paying space tourist, riding the Soyuz TM-32 spacecraft to the International Space Station.
Recent days: April 27 – April 26 – April 25
April 29: Greenery Day in Japan, International Dance Day.
- 1770 - James Cook and the crew of HM Bark Endeavour made their first landfall on Australia.
- 1882 - Ernst Werner von Siemens (pictured) began operating his "Elektromote", the world's first trolleybus.
- 1916 - Khalil Pasha of the Ottoman 7th Army accepts the surrender of the British Mesopotamian Expeditionary Force ending the battle and Siege of Kut in World War I.
- 1945 - Adolf Hitler dictated his last will and testament to his secretary in the Führerbunker, and then married Eva Braun in a brief ceremony.
- 1992 - The acquittal of policemen who had beaten Rodney King sparked civil unrest in Los Angeles.
Recent days: April 28 – April 27 – April 26
April 30: Queen's Day in the Netherlands; Walpurgis Night in various European countries; Victory Day in Vietnam.
- 711 - Umayyad troops led by Tariq ibn-Ziyad landed at Gibraltar, beginning the Moorish invasion of Iberia.
- 1789 - George Washington (pictured) took office as the first President of the United States.
- 1945 - Martin Bormann and Heinz Linge found Adolf Hitler dead in the Führerbunker.
- 1948 - The Organization of American States was established in Bogotá, Colombia.
- 1975 - North Vietnamese troops captured Saigon, ending the Vietnam War.
- 1980 - Iranian terrorist siege the Iranian Embassy in London, United Kingdom.
- 1991 - A powerful tropical cyclone struck Chittagong, killing at least 138,000 people and leaving as many as 10 million homeless in Bangladesh.
Recent days: April 29 – April 28 – April 27
