1924 – Istanbul’s Ottoman Topkapi Palace is converted into a museum on orders of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk
1933 – 1st airplane flight over Mt Everest
1941 – British Prime Minister Winston Churchill warns Soviet leader Joseph Stalin that a German invasion is imminent
1955 – The American Civil Liberties Union announces it will defend Allen Ginsberg’s book “Howl” against obscenity charges
1965 – 1st atomic powered spacecraft (snap) launched
1984 – Bombay beat Delhi on 1st innings to win Ranji Trophy
1996 – Cricketer Rahul Dravid makes his international debut for India in an ODI against Sri Lanka
2016 – ICC Women’s Cricket T20 World Cup, Eden Gardens, Kolkata: Hayley Matthews with 66 from 45 balls leads West Indies to 149/2; beat Australia 148/5 by 4 wickets with 2 balls to spare
2017 – 79th NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship: North Carolina defeats Gonzaga, 71–65; Tar Heels point guard Joel DeWayne Berry II, 22 points
2022 – The Taliban government bans cultivation of opium in Afghanistan, with consequences for world supply as it produces 80%
Author: gil7
Today in History for 3rd April 2025
Historical Events
1834 – The generals in the Greek War of Independence stand trial for treason.
1860 – Start of the Pony Express, delivers mail by horse and rider relay teams between St Joseph, Missouri and Sacramento, California
1965 – 1st atomic powered spacecraft (snap) launched
1976 – 130th Grand National: John Burke wins aboard Rag Trade; equal record 4th winner trained by Fred Rimell and 2nd winner owned by Pierre Raymond Bessone
2000 – 62nd NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship: Michigan State beats Florida, 89-76; Spartans only top-4 seed to advance to the Final Four
2004 – Islamic terrorists involved in the 11 March 2004 Madrid attacks are trapped by the police in their apartment and kill themselves
Famous Birthdays
1485 – Lieven van der Maude [Livius Ammonius], South Netherland poet and Carthusian monk, born in Ghent, Habsburg Netherlands (d. 1556)
1918 – Sixten Ehrling, Swedish pianist, conductor (Royal Opera of Stockholm, 1953-60; Detroit Symphony, 1963-73), and educator (Juilliard, 1973-87), born in Malmö, Sweden (d. 2005)
1926 – Andrew Keir, Scottish character actor (Rob Roy, Absolution, Blood Hunt, Catholics), born in Shotts, Lanarkshire, Scotland (d. 1997)
1963 – Tsuyoshi Sekito, Japanese video game composer, born in Osaka, Japan
1988 – Peter Hartley, English footballer (Motherwell), born in Hartlepool, England
2003 – Elsie Fisher, American actress (Eighth Grade), born in Riverside, California
Famous Deaths
1990 – Sarah Vaughan, American jazz and pop singer (“Body and Soul; “Broken Hearted Melody”), often known as “Sassy” and “The Divine One”, dies of lung cancer at 66
1990 – Katharine Balfour, American actress (Love Story), dies of ALS at 69
2007 – Marion Eames, Welsh novelist, dies at 86
2007 – Eddie Robinson, American College Football Hall of Fame coach (Grambling 408 wins), dies of Alzheimer’s disease at 88
2015 – Andrew Porter, British organist, opera director, music critic, and librettist, dies at 86
2020 – Tom Dempsey, American NFL kicker (Pro Bowl, First-team All-Pro 1969; New Orleans Saints; longest winning field goal, 63 yards), dies of COVID-19 complications at 73
Famous Deaths for 2nd April 2025
1791 – Honoré Gabriel Riqueti, comte de Mirabeau, French revolutionary (influential member of the National Constituent Assembly), dies of natural causes at 42
1910 – Boyd Alexander, English explorer and ornithologist (Niger to the Nile), murdered in a dispute with locals in Africa at 37
1923 – Michel Théato, Luxembourgian athlete (Olympic gold representing France, marathon 1900), dies at 45
1938 – Alice Berend, writer, dies
1979 – Ivan Barrow, Jamaican cricket wicketkeeper (11 Tests; first West Indian Test century-maker in England), dies at 68
1992 – Juanito, Spanish soccer forward (34 caps; Real Madrid 284 games, 85 goals), dies in car crash at 37
2009 – Peter Anderson, English footballer (Plymouth Argyle), dies at 72
2009 – Clifford “Bud” Shank, American jazz saxophonist and flute player, dies of a pulmonary embolism at 82
2013 – Chuck Fairbanks, American football coach (New England Patriots 1973-78; University of Oklahoma 1967-72, University of Colorado 1979-81), dies from brain cancer at 79
2018 – Winnie Mandela [Winnie Madikizela-Mandela], South African anti-apartheid activist and ANC politician, dies of a long illness at 81
Historical Events for 2nd April 2025
1884 – London prison for debtors closed
1921 – Albert Einstein lectures in New York City on his new “Theory of Relativity”
1963 – USSR launches Luna 4; missed Moon by 8,500 km
1972 – Tennessee Williams’ “Small Craft Warnings” premieres in NYC
1973 – CBS radio begins on the hour news, 24 hours a day
1986 – Paul Coffey of the Edmonton Oilers scores his 47th and 48th goals of the season in an 8-4 win over the Vancouver Canucks to break Bobby Orr’s NHL record for most goals by a defenseman
1995 – NY Police Department and NY Transit Police merge into one organization
2000 – Atlanta center Ray Ferraro scores a goal and added 2 assists as the Thrashers end an NHL record 17-game home winless streak (0-15-2) with a 5-4 win against the visiting New York Islanders
2001 – New York Yankees pitcher Roger Clemens becomes American League all-time strikeout leader, recording his 3,509th K in a 7-3 victory over the Kansas City Royals; Walter Johnson previous record 3,508 Ks
2022 – Ukraine liberates the entire Kyiv region from retreating Russian forces
Today in History for 2nd April 2025
Historical Events
1845 – H L Fizeau and Leon Foucault take 1st photo of the Sun
1930 – 1st NY-Bermuda airplane flight lands in Bermuda
1958 – Wind speed reaches a record 450 kph in tornado, Wichita Falls, Texas
1968 – “2001 A Space Odyssey” directed by Stanley Kubrick and starring Keir Dullea and Gary Lockwood, premieres at the Uptown Theater in Washington, D.C.
1995 – North and Western Colorado begins using new area code 970
1995 – Longest strike in American major league sports history (232 days) ends as MLB owners accept players’ offer to return to work without a contract; MLB is first major pro sports league to lose an entire postseason due to labor struggles
Famous Birthdays
1878 – Émilie Charmy, French avant-garde artist, born in Saint-Etienne, France (d. 1974)
1930 – Girolamo Arriego, Italian composer, born in Palermo, Italy
1947 – Paquita la del Barrio [Francisca Viveros Barradas], Mexican traditional ranchera, bolero, and contemporary singer, born in Alto Lucero, Veracruz, Mexico (d. 2025)
1970 – Tammi Reiss, American actress and former WNBA guard (Utah Starzz), born in New York
1971 – ZEEBRA [Hideyuki Yokoi], Japanese hip hop artist, born in Tokyo, Japan
1975 – Deedee Magno Hall, Filipino-American rocker (Party-Rodeo, That’s Why), born in Portsmouth, Virginia
Famous Deaths
1932 – Bill Pickett, American rodeo performer (invented bulldogging), dies after being kicked in the head by a bronco at 61
1937 – Nathan Birnbaum, Austrian writer (Gottes Volk;; Der Ruf), and philosopher (early Zionist, later anti-Zionist), dies at 72
1953 – Jean Epstein, French director (Vive la Vie), dies at 56
1973 – Jascha Horenstein, Russian-born American conductor, dies at 74
1994 – Richard Davies, actor (Pvt Buckaroo), dies of a heart attack at 79
2018 – Susan Anspach, American actress (Grace-Yellow Rose, Hair, Five Easy Pieces, Play It Again Sam), dies at 75
Famous Deaths for 1st April 2025
1580 – Alonso Mudarra, Spanish composer, composed the first music for the guitar, dies at about 70
1865 – Giuditta Pasta, Italian soprano, dies at 67
1872 – Frederick Maurice, English theologian (Church of England), dies at 66
1901 – François-Marie Raoult, French physicist and chemist (Law of Raoult), dies at 70
1987 – Henri Cochet, French tennis player (French Open 1926, 28, 30, 32; Wimbledon 1927, 29; US Open 1928), dies at 85
1993 – Juan of Borbon y Battemberg, father of king Juan Carlos I, dies
2007 – Herb Carneal, American sports broadcaster (Minnesota Twins 1962-2006; Ford C. Frick Award 1996), dies of congestive heart failure at 83
2013 – Basia Johnson (née Barbara Piasecka), Polish-American domestic servant, philanthropist, humanitarian, art collector, and heir to Johnson and Johnson fortune, dies at 76
2014 – Joe “Speedo” Frazier, American doo-wop vocalist (Impalas – “Sorry (I Ran All the Way Home)”), dies at 70
2024 – Vontae Davis, American football cornerback (Pro Bowl 2014, 15; Indianapolis Colts), dies at 35
Historical Events for 1st April 2025
1724 – Jonathan Swift publishes “Drapier’s Letters” a series of seven pamphlets against a privately minted copper coinage Swift saw as inferior and corrupt
1900 – 1st edition of Dutch newspaper “The People”
1941 – Pro-German Rashid Ali al-Ghailani grabs power in Iraq
1966 – “Hold On, I’m Comin'” single released by Sam and Dave
1973 – Despite a final round, 5-3 loss to Montreal, Boston Bruins center Phil Esposito wins his third consecutive NHL scoring title with 130 points from 55 goals and 75 assists in the 78-game season
1976 – Conrail takes over operations from six bankrupt railroads in the northeastern U.S..
1978 – Philippine College of Commerce becomes the Polytechnic University of the Philippines by presidential decree
1982 – Quebec center Peter Šťastný scores 4th career hat trick and 4 assists, and his brother Marián adds 5 assists to lead the Nordiques to an 8-5 win at Boston
2007 – Kraft Nabisco Championship Women’s Golf, Mission Hills CC: Morgan Pressel wins by 1 from Brittany Lincicome, Catriona Matthew and Suzann Pettersen; youngest-ever winner of an LPGA major at 18 years, 313 days
2019 – Major archaeological site announced discovered on a reef in the middle of Lake Titicaca, in Andes, dated 8th and 10th centuries AD from Tiwanaku state
Today in History for 1st April 2025
Historical Events
1857 – Herman Melville publishes the novel “The Confidence-Man: His Masquerade” on April Fool’s Day in New York
1946 – Tsunamis generated by a quake in Aleutian Trench strike Hilo, Hawaii
1946 – Van Acker forms Belgian government (without CVP)
1947 – 1st Jewish immigrants to Israel disembark at Port of Eilat
1948 – Fast bowler Hines Johnson has match figures of 10-96 on debut in West Indies 4th cricket Test win v England in Kingston, Jamaica; first fast bowler to take 10 wickets in a single Test for West Indies
1986 – Ranji Trophy Men’s Cricket, Feroz Shah Kotla, Delhi: Delhi beats Haryana by innings and 141; Manoj Prabhakar 113, Kirti Azad 107, Mohinder Amarnath 194, Ajay Sharma 110
Famous Birthdays
1643 – Christian Demelius, German composer and kapellmeister, born in Schlettau, Electorate of Saxony, Holy Roman Empire (d. 1711)
1917 – Leon Janney (Ramon), American actor (Charly, Stolen Paradise, Hawk), born in Ogden, Utah (d. 1980)
1946 – Manfred Stengl, Austrian luger (Olympic gold men’s doubles 1964), born in Salzburg, Austria (d. 1992)
1964 – John Morris, English cricket batsman (3 Tests, 8 x ODIs; Derbyshire CCC, Durham CCC, Nottinghamshire CCC), born in Crewe, England
1974 – Hugo Ibarra, Argentine soccer right back (11 caps; Colón, Boca Juniors), born in El Colorado, Formosa, Argentina
1982 – Taran Killam, American comedian, actor, and writer (Saturday Night Live, 2010-16; Single Parents), born in Culver City, California
Famous Deaths
1993 – Wayne Mack, American sportscaster (New Orleans Saints, Tulane University) and actor (Storyville), dies of cancer at 68
2000 – Alexander Mackenzie Stuart, Baron Mackenzie-Stuart, Scottish jurist, dies at 75
2001 – Olivia Barclay, British astrologer (revival of traditional forms of astrology in the late 20th century), dies at 81
2007 – Hans Filbinger, German politician (CDU), dies at 93
2018 – Steven Bochco, American TV producer and co-creator of Hill Street Blues, LA Law and NYPD Blue, dies at 74
2024 – Joe Flaherty, American-Canadian Emmy Award-winning screenwriter and actor (SCTV; Freaks and Geeks), dies at 82
Famous Deaths for 31st March 2025
1837 – John Constable, English landscape painter (Hay Wain), dies at 60
1869 – Allan Kardec, French author and founder of Spiritism, dies at 64
1886 – Giovanni Rossi, Italian composer, dies at 57
1915 – Wyndham Halswelle, British athlete (Olympic gold 400m 1908), dies in WWI action at 32
1938 – Willem Kloos, Dutch poet and critic (New Guide), dies at 78
1959 – Peter Suhrkamp, German publisher (Suhrkamp Verlag), dies at 68
1980 – Vladimír Holan, Czech poet, dies at 74
1996 – Julius Young, fast food entrepreneur, dies at 73
1998 – Bella Abzug “Battling Bella”, American politician, feminist and activist (Rep-D-NY, 1970-74), dies at 77
2021 – Jane Manning, British concert and operatic soprano, educator, and promoter of contemporary classical music, dies at 82
Historical Events for 31st March 2025
1796 – Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s dramatic play “Egmont” premieres in Weimar
1865 – General Pickett moves to 5 Forks, abandoning the defense of Petersburg
1883 – 1st performance of Caesar Franck’s symphonic poem for orchestra “Le Chasseur Maudit” (The Accursed Huntsman) at the Salle Érard in Paris
1885 – Great Britain declares Bechuanaland a protectorate
1917 – The Danish West Indies are officially ceded to the US for $25 million and renamed the Virgin Islands
1923 – Occupying French soldiers fire on workers when surrounded at Krupp auto factory in Essen, Germany; 6 die, dozens wounded
1966 – USSR launches Luna 10, 1st lunar orbiter
1972 – Final day of the rum ration in the Royal Canadian Navy
1985 – WrestleMania I, Madison Square Garden, NYC: Hulk Hogan and Mr T beat Roddy Piper and Paul Orndorf
1987 – 49th NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship: Indiana beats Syracuse, 74-73; Hoosiers’ guard Keith Smart hits game-winner in final seconds, intercepts full court pass at the last second