1861 – Robert E. Lee named commander of Virginia Confederate forces (US Civil War)
1925 – Pastor LH Perquin forms Union of Catholic Dutch Radio (KRO) forms
1932 – 153-year old De Adriaan Windmill in Haarlem, the Netherlands, burns down
1939 – Boston Red Sox Ted Williams hits his 1st HR
1961 – “Tenderloin” closes at 46th St Theater NYC after 216 performances
1964 – New York State Theater opens
1969 – LA Laker Jerry West scores 53 points
1991 – Gordon Greenidge scores 223 v Aus, his last Test Cricket knock at home
1996 – 42nd British Academy Television Awards: “Father Ted” Best Comedy, “Cracker” Best Drama
2009 – Gamma ray burst (GRB) 090423 is observed for 10 seconds, the most distant object of any kind and also the oldest known object in the universe
Category: Historical Events
Historical Events for 22nd April 2019
1145 – 19th recorded perihelion passage of Halley’s Comet
1659 – Lord Protector Richard Cromwell disbands English parliament
1677 – Battle at Catania: between French and Dutch fleet
1961 – Uprising of French parachutist of General Salan and Challe in Algeria
1964 – World’s Fair at Flushing Meadow, Corona Park, NY opens
1966 – USSR performs underground nuclear test
1978 – Firestone World Bowling Tournament of Champions won by Earl Anthony
1987 – Sri Lanka Air Force bomb Tamil, 100s killed
1990 – “Truly Blessed” opens at Longacre Theater NYC for 33 performances
2016 – Paris Agreement on climate change signed in New York binding 195 nations to an increase in the global average temperature to less than 2°C above pre-industrial levels and to pursue efforts to limit the increase to 1.5°C
Historical Events for 21st April 2019
1892 – Black longshoremen strike for higher wages in St Louis, Missouri
1930 – “All Quiet on the Western Front” based on the novel by Erich Maria Remarque, directed by Lewis Milestone and starring Louis Wolheim and Lew Ayres premieres in Los Angeles (Academy Awards Outstanding Production 1930)
1975 – Last South Vietnam President Nguyen Van Thieu resigns after 10 years
1975 – 79th Boston Marathon: American Bill Rodgers wins men’s section in race record 2:09:55; Liane Winter of West Germany women’s champion in 2:42:24 (female world record)
1976 – Swine Flu vaccine, for non-epidemic, enters testing
1979 – “Carmelina” closes at St James Theater NYC after 17 performances
1991 – NFL Draft: University of Miami defensive tackle Russell Maryland first pick by Dallas Cowboys
1991 – Greatest extra-inning comeback, Pitts scores 6 in bottom of 11th erasing 5 run Cub lead, Pirates also trailed 7-2 in bottom of 9th
1994 – Eddie Murray sets record for switch hit HRs in a games (11 times)
1995 – FBI arrests Timothy McVeigh and charge him with the Oklahoma City bombing
Historical Events for 20th April 2019
1657 – Battle in Santa Cruz Bay, Tenerife: English fleet under Robert Blake sinks Spanish silver fleet
1818 – Napoleon Bonaparte bids emotional farewell to his old guard at Palace of Fontainebleau
1862 – First pasteurization test completed by Frenchmen Louis Pasteur and Claude Bernard
1894 – 136,000 mine workers strike in Ohio for pay increase
1919 – King Nicholas of Montenegro abdicates under duress
1945 – US 7th army captured German city of Nuremberg
1958 – Buses replace Key System trains at 3 AM
1962 – New Orleans Citizens Co gives free 1-way ride to blacks to move North
1981 – Final performance of TV show “Soap” airs
1992 – Expo ’92 opens in Seville Spain
Historical Events for 19th April 2019
1926 – 30th Boston Marathon won by Canadian Johnny Miles in 2:25:40.4
1928 – The 125th and final fascicle of the Oxford English Dictionary is published.
1943 – Bicycle Day – Swiss chemist Dr. Albert Hofmann deliberately takes LSD for the first time.
1951 – “Tree Grows in Brooklyn” opens at Alvin Theater NYC for 267 performances
1954 – 7-time winner of Boston Marathon, 65-year-old Clarence Demar, runs his last race at Boston finishing 78th
1976 – 80th Boston Marathon: US double; Jack Fultz is men’s winner in 2:20:19; Kim Merritt takes women’s section in 2:47:10
1993 – South Dakota governor George Mickelson and seven others are killed when a state-owned aircraft crashed lands in Iowa.
1997 – NFL Draft: Ohio State offensive tackle Orlando Pace first pick by St. Louis Rams
2015 – Boat carrying approx. 850 migrants is shipwrecked in the Mediterranean between Italian and Libya, with only 27 migrants rescued.
2018 – Miguel Diaz-Canel is elected Cuba’s new president after former president Raúl Castro steps down
Historical Events for 18th April 2019
1874 – David Livingstone, African explorer, buried in Westminster Abbey
1906 – Calvinist Reformed Union in Neth Church forms in Utrecht
1936 – Pan-Am Clipper begins regular passenger flights from San Francisco to Honolulu
1949 – Republic of Ireland withdraws from British Commonwealth
1968 – 1st ABA basketball championship began
1977 – 81st Boston Marathon: Canadian Jerome Drayton wins men’s race in 2:14:46; American Miki Gorman takes her 2nd women’s event in 2:48:33
1981 – Longest game in Professional Baseball: Pawtucket Red Sox tie Rochester Red Wings 2-2 in 32 innings (game resumed 23rd June)
1990 – Supreme Court rules states could make it a crime to possess or look at child pornography, even in one’s home
2005 – 109th Boston Marathon: Hailu Negussie of Ethiopia claims men’s section in 2:11:44; Catherine Ndereba of Kenya wins back-to-back races and 4th overall women’s title in 2:25:12
2007 – The Supreme Court of the United States upholds the Partial-Birth Abortion Ban Act in a 5-4 decision
Historical Events for 17th April 2019
1534 – Sir Thomas More confined in the Tower of London
1824 – Russia abandons all North American claims south of 54° 40’N
1925 – NY Yankee Babe Ruth has ulcer surgery
1941 – US Office of Price Administration forms (handled rationing)
1956 – Willie Mosconi sinks 150 consecutive balls in a billiard tournament
1961 – 33rd Academy Awards: “Apartment” wins best film, Burt Lancaster and Elizabeth Taylor win best actor, actress
1961 – Jimmy Stewart accepts an honorary Oscar on behalf of his friend Gary Cooper, who is too ill to attend
1964 – “Cafe Crown” opens at Martin Beck Theater NYC for 3 performances
1978 – 82nd Boston Marathon: US double; Bill Rodgers wins his 2nd men’s title in 2:10:13; Gayle Barron women’s champion in 2:44:52
1979 – Four Royal Ulster Constabulary officers are killed by a Provisional Irish Republican Army van bomb in Bessbrook, County Armagh; the bomb is believed to be the largest PIRA bomb used up to that point
Historical Events for 16th April 2019
1906 – 10th Boston Marathon won by 18-year old Tim Ford in 2:45:45; youngest race winner
1942 – Japanese occupying army on Java installs film censorship
1945 – German troops in Groningen surrender
1951 – British submarine Affray sank in English Channel, killing 75
1956 – 60th Boston Marathon won by Antti Viskari of Finland in race record 2:14:14
1964 – 9 men sentenced 25-30 years for Britain’s 1963 “Great Train Robbery”
1984 – Oakland A’s Dave Kingman hits 3 HRs including a grand slam
1989 – Berendrechtsluis opens in Antwerp, biggest flood lock in world
2014 – South Korean ferry MV Sewol sinks on route Incheon to Jeju, 304 drown, mostly students. National controversy erupts over rescue efforts and actions of crew and owner.
2017 – World record for gathering of Charlie Chaplin lookalikes – 662 at Manoir de Ban, Chaplin museum in Vevey, Switzerland
Historical Events for 15th April 2019
1850 – City of San Francisco incorporated
1949 – Pope Pius XII publishes encyclical Redemptoris nostri
1954 – WHO TV channel 13 in Des Moines, IA (NBC) begins broadcasting
1958 – 1st baseball game in California, SF Giants beat LA Dodgers, 8-0
1963 – “Sophie” opens at Winter Garden Theater NYC for 8 performances
1970 – “Cry for Us All” closes at Broadhurst Theater NYC after 8 performances
1986 – US air raids Libya, responding to La Belle disco, Berlin bombing
1990 – Greenidge and Haynes make 298 opening stand (v England), combination best
1992 – Jay Leno’s final appearance as permanent guest host of Tonight
2013 – Boston Marathon bombings: 3 people are killed and 183 injured after two explosions near the finish line
Historical Events for 14th April 2019
1536 – English King Henry VIII expropriates minor monasteries
1570 – Polish Calvinists, Lutherians and Hernhutters unify against Jesuits
1865 – Mobile, Alabama is captured
1930 – Philip Barry’s “Hotel Universe” premieres in NYC
1944 – 1st Jews transported from Athens arrive at Auschwitz
1965 – US performs nuclear test at Nevada Test Site
1968 – 32nd US Masters Tournament, Augusta National GC: Bob Goalby shoots a final round 66 (-6) to win his only major title, 1 stroke ahead of Roberto De Vicenzo who has his card famously marked incorrectly
1978 – Thousands of Georgians demonstrate in the captial Tbilisi against Soviet attempts to change the constitutional status of the Georgian language
1985 – Alan Garcia wins elections in Peru
2008 – 42nd CMT Music Awards: Taylor Swift and Trace Adkins wins