1619 – Theatrum Anatomicum opens in Amsterdam
1775 – New England militiamen begin the siege of Boston, hemming in the British army garrison
1919 – French assembly decides on 8 hour work day
1943 – Jews refuse to surrender the Warsaw Ghetto to SS officer Jürgen Stroop, who then orders its destruction, beginning the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising
1959 – Uprising in La Paz Bolivia, fails
1964 – Rightist coup in Laos, Suvanna Phuma remains premier
1968 – Belgian construction workers strike
1982 – Sally Ride is named the 1st American woman astronaut
1999 – The German Bundestag returns to Berlin.
2013 – Boston bombing suspects killed and captured in Boston after 4 days
Category: Historical Events
Historical Events for 18th April 2023
1907 – Fairmont Hotel opens in San Francisco
1912 – Tripolitan War: in continuing hostilities, Turkey closes the Dardanelles Straits after an Italian naval bombardment of the coastline
1935 – Netherlands election (Musserts NSB wins 8% of vote)
1953 – Revival of Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart’s musical “Pal Joey”, starring Harold Lang and Vivienne Segal, closes at Broadhurst Theater, NYC, after 540 performances, winning 3 Tony Awards
1968 – San Francisco’s Old Hall of Justice demolished
1983 – A lone suicide bomber kills 63, at US Embassy in Lebanon
1994 – 98th Boston Marathon: Cosmas Ndeti of Kenya wins 2nd straight title in 2:07:15; Uta Pippig of Germany claims women’s race in 2:21:45
2016 – Laureus World Sports Awards, Palais am Funkturm, Berlin, Germany: Sportsman: Novak Đoković; Sportswoman: Sernea Williams; Team: New Zealand Men’s National Rugby Union team
2017 – British Prime Minister Teresa May announces she will seek a “snap” election
2021 – 12-team European Super League is announced to widespread condemnation amongst governments, non-involved clubs, press and fans; amidst the furore all 6 EPL clubs withdraw within 3 days
Historical Events for 17th April 2023
1387 – Geoffrey Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales” characters begin their pilgrimage to Canterbury (according to scholars)
1492 – Christopher Columbus signs a contract with the Spanish monarchs to find the “Indies” with the stated goal of converting people to Catholicism. This promises him 10% of all riches found, and the governorship of any lands encountered.
1711 – Charles VI becomes Holy Roman Emperor after the death of his brother Joseph I
1797 – Sir Ralph Abercromby attacks San Juan, Puerto Rico, one of the largest invasions of Spanish territories in America
1853 – Johan Rudolf Thorbecke’s government in the Netherlands resigns
1860 – Champion of England Tom Sayers and American John Heenan fight out brutal 2 hour, 27 minute draw near Farnborough, England; police stop fight acknowledged as first world title bout
1961 – 33rd Academy Awards: “Apartment” wins best film, Burt Lancaster and Elizabeth Taylor win best actor, actress
1964 – Jerrie Mock becomes 1st woman to fly solo around the world
1987 – USSR performs nuclear test at Eastern Kazakh/Semipalitinsk USSR
2015 – Jazz composer and musician John Coltrane is awarded a posthumous Special Citation by the Pulitzer Prize board
Historical Events for 16th April 2023
1917 – 21st Boston Marathon won by Bill Kennedy in 2:28:37.2
1918 – The British House of Commons passes a new Military Service Bill, taking men up to 55 years old and extending to Ireland
1923 – 27th Boston Marathon won by Clarence DeMar in 2:23:37.4 for second straight year; 3rd race victory
1953 – Stanley Cup Final, Montreal Forum, Montreal, Quebec: Montreal Canadiens beat Boston Bruins, 1-0 for a 4-1 series win
1970 – Protestant Unionist Ian Paisley wins seat formerly held by Terence O’Neill in the Stormont (North Ireland Parliament)
1974 – USSR performs nuclear test at Eastern Kazakh/Semipalitinsk USSR
1983 – Steve Garvey sets NL record by playing in 1,118 consecutive games
1984 – 88th Boston Marathon: Englishman Geoff Smith wins men’s event in 2:10:34; Lorraine Moller of New Zealand women’s champion in 2:29:28
1993 – David Lee Roth arrested in NYC for purchasing marijuana for $10
2007 – Virginia Tech massacre: The deadliest mass shooting in modern American history. The gunman, Seung-Hui Cho, kills 32 people and injures 23 others before committing suicide.
Historical Events for 15th April 2023
1895 – Josephine Blatt (US) makes hip-and-harness lift of 3564 lb (record)
1906 – The Armenian organization AGBU is established.
1939 – Albert Lebrun elected president of France
1948 – Indian territory of Himachal Pradesh created
1960 – Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), organizes at Shaw U
1968 – Houston Astros beat NY Mets, 1-0, in 24 innings at the Astrodome; starting pitchers Tom Seaver and Don Wilson pitch 10 and 9 innings respectively in game that lasts over 6 hours
1970 – WMGZ TV channel 16 in Mayaguez, PR ([M]) begins broadcasting
1992 – William Shatner, Leonard Nimoy and DeForest Kelley inducted into National Association of Broadcasters Hall of Fame
1992 – The National Assembly of Vietnam adopts the 1992 Constitution of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam.
2019 – Paris cathedral Notre Dame catches fire, toppling its spire and destroying its roof
Historical Events for 14th April 2023
1953 – WHYN (now WGGB) TV channel 40 in Springfield-Holyoke, MA (ABC) begins
1956 – Cole Porter’s final Broadway musical “Silk Stockings”, loosely based on the Melchior Lengyel’s “Ninotchka”, closes at the Imperial Theatre, NYC, after 478 performances
1961 – 1st live television broadcast from Soviet Union
1962 – Georges Pompidou becomes Prime Minister of France after the resignation of Michel Debré
1969 – First regular-season MLB game played outside the United States; Montreal Expos beat St. Louis Cardinals, 8-7 at Parc Jarry, Montreal
1971 – US President Richard Nixon ends blockade against People’s Republic of China
1996 – 60th US Masters Tournament, Augusta National GC: Englishman Nick Faldo wins his 3rd Masters and 6th and final major title, 5 strokes ahead of Greg Norman of Australia
1999 – NATO mistakenly bombs a convoy of ethnic Albanian refugees – Yugoslav officials say 75 people are killed
2012 – J. K. Rowling, author of the Harry Potter novels, launches her website “Pottermore”
2018 – US, UK and French forces carry out airstrikes on sites associated with Syria’s chemical weapons program, in response to Douma gas attack
Historical Events for 13th April 2023
1560 – Giovanni, son of Italian mathematician Girolamo Cardano is executed for poisoning his wife, despite his father’s efforts to save him
1741 – Dutch people protest poor quality of bread
1769 – British ship Endeavour captained by James Cook, arrives in Matavia Bay, Tahiti, with botanist Joseph Banks on board
1924 – Greek plebiscite for a republic
1944 – South Carolina rejects black suffrage
1964 – 36th Academy Awards: “Tom Jones” (Best Film), Patricia Neal (Hud) and Sidney Poitier (Lilies Of The Field) win; Poitier first Black actor in a leading role to win a competitive Oscar
1969 – Closure of the Brisbane tramway network.
1970 – Apollo 13 announces “Okay, Houston, we’ve had a problem here”, as Beech-built oxygen tank explodes en route to Moon
1980 – US and its allies boycott the Summer Olympics in Moscow in protest against Russia’s invasion of Afghanistan
1991 – BPAA US Open by Pete Weber
Historical Events for 12th April 2023
1204 – 4th Crusade occupies and plunders Constantinople
1787 – Philadelphia’s Free African Society forms
1864 – Confederate General Nathan Bedford Forrest captures Fort Pillow, Tennessee
1909 – Philadelphia’s Shibe Park (later Connie Mack Stadium), baseball’s first steel and concrete stadium, opens; Athletics win 8-1 against Boston Red Sox
1935 – First flight of the Bristol Blenheim
1938 – 1st US law requiring medical tests for marriage licenses (NY)
1955 – 1st game in KC, KC A’s beat Detroit Tigers, 6-2
1966 – 1st B-52 bombing on North Vietnam
1990 – Anime TV series “Moomin”, based on Moomin children’s books by Tove Jansson 1st appears on Tokyo TV
2022 – UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson apologies and is fined for attending parties during COVID-19 lockdown – first premier to be sanctioned for breaking the law
Historical Events for 11th April 2023
1689 – King William III and Queen Mary II crowned as joint rulers of England, Scotland and Ireland
1909 – Establishment of Tel Aviv by Jewish settlers (named 1910)
1941 – Jewish Weekly newspaper taken control by Nazis
1941 – Germany blitzes Coventry, England
1953 – Oveta Culp Hobby becomes 1st at Health, Education, and Welfare
1959 – Dutch Prince Bernhard visits Lockheed factory
1983 – 3rd Golden Raspberry Awards: “Inchon!” wins
1991 – Space Shuttle STS 37 (Atlantis 8) lands at Edwards Air Force Base, California
2001 – Detained crew of a United States EP-3E aircraft that landed in Hainan, People’s Republic of China after a collision with an J-8 fighter are released
2019 – Israel’s Beresheet spacecraft, the first privately-funded mission to the moon, crashes on the moon
Historical Events for 10th April 2023
1877 – Federal troops withdrawn from Columbia, SC
1896 – High jumper Ellery Clark leads an American sweep of the placings with a leap of 1.81m at the Athens Olympics; his 2nd victory of the Games after taking out the long jump
1940 – Vidkun Quisling forms Norwegian “national government”
1945 – German troops attack Ijsselbrug
1974 – American Boccaccio Association forms
1981 – France performs nuclear test
1991 – LA King Wayne Gretzky scores NHL record 93rd playoff goal
1994 – “Les Miserables” opens at Hiten Theatre, Osaka
2021 – China orders Alibaba pay a record fine of 18.2 billion yuan ($2.8 billion) after anti-trust regulations say it has been acting as a monopoly
2022 – 86th US Masters Tournament, Augusta National GC: World #1 golfer Scottie Scheffler wins first career major title; beats Irishman Rory McIlroy by 3 strokes for record $2.7m payout