1478 - Pazzi conspirators attack Lorenzo but kill Giuliano de'Medici
1514 - Copernicus makes his 1st observations of Saturn
1532 - Sultan Suleiman through Hungary on away to Vienna
1564 - William Shakespeare baptized
1607 - An expedition of English colonists, including Capt. John Smith, went ashore at Cape Henry, Va., to establish the first permanent English settlement in the Western Hemisphere.
1654 - Jews are expelled from Brazil
1655 - Dutch West Indies Co denies Peter Stuyvesant's desire to exclude Jews from New Amsterdam
1721 - Smallpox vaccination 1st administrated
1777 - Sybil Ludington, 16, rode from NY to Ct rallying her fathers militia
1814 - King Louis XVIII lands on Calais, from England
1828 - Russia declares war on Turkey to support Greece's independence
1835 - Frederic Chopins "Grand Polonaise Brillante," premieres in Paris
1855 - Composer Gioacchino Rossini leaves Italy
1865 - Battle of Durham Station, NC (Greensboro)
1865 - Battle of Ft Tobacco, VA
1865 - Confederate General Joseph E. Johnston surrenders Army of Tenn, to General William T. Sherman at Durham Station, North Carolina
1865, John Wilkes Booth, the assassin of President Lincoln, was surrounded by federal troops in the Garrett Barn, Port Royal, Virginia, and killed.
1887 - Huntsville Electric Co forms to sell electricity
1907 - Jamestown, Va Tercentenary Exposition opens
1913 - Sun Yet San calls for revolt against pres Yuan Shikai in China
1923 - English prince Albert (George VI) marries lady Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon
1928 - Madame Tussaud's waxwork exhibition opens in London
1933 - Jewish students are barred from school in Germany
1937 - During the Spanish Civil War, German-made planes destroyed the Basque town of Guernica, Spain.
[H]
1938 - Austrian Jews required to register property above 5,000 Reichsmarks
1942 - Luftwaffe bombs Bath
1944 - 1st B-29 attacked by Japanese fighters, one fighter shot down
1945 - Marshal Henri Philippe Petain, leader of France's Vichy collaborationist regime during WW II, arrested for treason
1952 - US minesweeper "Hobson" rams aircraft carrier "Wasp," kills 176
1954 - Nationwide test of Salk anti-polio vaccine begins
1957 - Jamestown, Va., 350th Anniversary Festival opens
1959 - Cuba invades Panama
1961 - French paratroopers' revolt suppressed in Algeria
1961 - Roger Maris of the New York Yankees hit the first of a record 61 home runs in a single season.
1962 - The United Kingdom launched its first satellite.
1964 - The African nations of Tanganyika and Zanzibar merged to form Tanzania.
1968 - Students seize administration building at Ohio State
1968 - The United States exploded beneath the Nevada desert a one-megaton nuclear device called "Boxcar."
1970 - The Broadway musical "Company" opened at the Alvin Theatre in New York.
1973 - "2 Gentlemen of Verona," musical opens in London
1976 - Pan Am begins non-stop flights NYC-Tokyo
1977 - NY's famed disco Studio 54 opens
1980 - Following an unsuccessful attempt by the United States to rescue the U.S. Embassy hostages in Iran, the Tehran government announced the captives were being scattered to thwart any future rescue effort.
1981 - Largest US bank robbery (Tucson Ariz), more than $33 million stolen
1982 - Rod Stewart is mugged, gunman steals his $50,000 Porsche
1984 - Pres Reagan visits China
1986 - The world's worst nuclear accident occurred at the Chernobyl plant north of Kiev
in the Soviet Union. An explosion and fire killed at least 31 people and sent radioactivity into the atmosphere.
[H]
1988 - The Pennsylvania primary vote assured George Bush of the Republican presidential nomination.
1990 - Nolan Ryan ties Bob Feller's record of pitching 12 1-hitters
1990 - New York's highest court awarded the America's Cup to the United States, ruling the San Diego Yacht Club did not cheat by racing a catamaran against an inherently slower New Zealand monohull boat.
1991 - Twenty-three people were killed as four dozen tornadoes raked Kansas and Oklahoma.
1991 - The government reported the nation had sunk deeper into recession in the first quarter of 1991 as the gross national product shrank at an annual rate of 2.8 percent.
1992 - "Grand Hotel" closes at Martin Beck Theater NYC after 1,018 performances
1992 - Finance officials from the Group of Seven nations, meeting in Washington, endorsed the broad outlines of an economic assistance package for the former Soviet Union.
1992 - Worshippers celebrated the first Russian Orthodox Easter in Moscow in 74 years.
1992 - Ozzie Smith steals his 500th base
1992 - Powerful aftershocks rattled Northern California following a 6.9 earthquake that injured at least 65 people.
1993 - A domestic Indian airliner slammed into parked truck during takeoff and crashed near the western city of Aurangabad, killing at least 55 of the 118 people aboard.
1993 - Gunmen seized the Costa Rica Supreme Court, holding 17 judges and five other people hostage. The standoff ended three days later when the assailants freed their
hostages and were captured en route to the airport.
1993 - The U.S. Holocaust Museum opened in Washington, D.C.
1994 - First free elections in South Africa
1994 - Taiwan Airbus A-300 crashes at Nagoya Japan, 262 killed
1996 - Sotherby ends 4 day auction of Jackie O stuff-take in $34.5 million, about seven times what Sotheby's auction house had estimated.
1996 After 16 days of bloodshed, Israel and Hezbollah guerrillas pledged to end the worst fighting in the Mideast in three years, agreeing to a U.S. brokered truce.
1997 - In his Saturday radio address, President Clinton prepared for the opening of a community service summit by asking Congress to pay for a drive to ensure that every third-grader can read.
2000 - Vermont Gov. Howard Dean signed the nation's first bill allowing same-sex couples to form civil unions.
2001 - Ukraine's communist-dominated parliament dismissed reform-oriented Prime Minister Viktor Yushchenko and his government, plunging the nation into political chaos.
Birthdays
Today
0121 - Antonius Marcus Aurelius, [Marcus A Verus], Emperor of Rome (161-180)
1319 - Jean II, the Good, king of France (1350-64)
1538 - Giovanni P Lomazzo, Italian writer/poet (Trattato)
1573 - Marie de'Medici, Queen of France
1711 - David Hume, English empiricist/philosopher (Treatise of Human Nature)
1726 - Pasquale Paoli, Corsican freedom fighter
1776 - Joan M Kemper, Dutch lawyer (designed civil code law book)
1785 - John James Audubon, Haiti, (ornithologist, artist: the original Birdman)
1798 -
James Beckwourth, one of only a handful of early mountain men to emerge from
the system of slavery, is born in Fredericksburg, Virginia. [H]
1812 - Alfred Krupp, German arms merchant
1822 - Frederick Law Olmsted, architect/writer (designed Central Park)
1827 - Charles Edward Hovey, Bvt Major General (Union volunteers)
1834 - Artemus Ward, (Charles Farrar Browne), humorist
1868 - Robert Herrick, US writer (Common lot)
1875 - Syngman Rhee, South Korea, pres of South Korea (1948-60)
1880 - Mikhail Fokine, Russia, choreographer/founder of modern dance
1886 - Ma Rainey, [Gertrude Pridgett], "Mother of the Blues", US blues singer
1888 - Aleksandr Mikhailov, USSR, astronomer
1889 - Ludwig Wittgenstein, Austria, philosopher (Tractatus)
1893 - Anita Loos (author, playwright: Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, I Married an Angel, San Francisco, Saratoga, The Women)
1894 - Rudolf Hess, Hitler's Deputy Fuhrer, last prisoner to die at Spandau
1900 - Charles Richter (seismologist: invented the Richter scale for measuring the magnitude of earthquakes)
1904 - William "Count" Basie, jazz pianist (Policy Man, Blazing Saddles)
1906 - Gracie Allen, Mrs George Burns, comedienne (George Burns Show)
1914 - Bernard Malamud, US, novelist (Fixer, Natural, Pulitizer 1967)
1914 - James William Rouse, US builder (shopping malls/Columbia, Maryland)
1916 - Morris L West, Australia, novelist (Shoes of the Fisherman)
1917 - I[eoh] M[ing] Pei, Canton, China, architect (1961 Brunner Prize)
1917 - Sal Maglie (baseball)
1924 - Teddy Edwards (jazz musician: tenor sax: Me and My Lover)
1926 - Bambi Linn (Linnemier) (dancer, actress)
1927 - John Ralston (football)
1934 - Alan Arkin (actor: Doomsday Gun, Edward Scissorhands, Havana, The Heart is a Lonely Hunter)
1936 - Carol Burnett (Emmy Award-winning entertainer, comedienne: The Carol Burnett Show, Carol Burnett & Friends, The Garry Moore Show, Julie and Carol at Carnegie Hall, Carol and Company)
1937 - Robert Boozer (basketball)
1938 - Duane Eddy (guitarist: Rebel-'rouser, Forty Miles of Bad Road, Because They're Young, Theme from Peter Gunn; actor: Because They're Young, A Thunder of Drums, The Wild Westerners, The Savage Seven, Kona Coast)
1938 - Maurice Williams (singer, songwriter: group: Zodiacs: Stay)
1938 - Nino Benenuti (boxer)
1941 - Bruce MacGregor (hockey)
1941 - Claudine Clark (singer: Party Lights)
1941 - Gary Cuozzo (football: Minnesota Vikings punter: Super Bowl IV)
1942 - Bobby Rydell (Ridarelli) (singer: Wild One, We Got Love, Swingin' School, Kissin' Time, Volare, Forget Him; actor: Bye Bye Birdie, That Lady From Peking)
1947 - Amos Otis (baseball)
1947 - Donna De Varona (Olympic Hall of Famer: 400-meter individual swimming medley [1964]; International Swimming Hall of Famer; International Women's Sports Hall of Famer; sportscaster; founder of Women's Sports Foundation)
Famous
deaths
1478 - Giuliano de' Medici, Medeheerser of Florence, murdered at about 24
1558 - Jean Francois Fernel, French physician, dies
1703 - Georg Christoph Leuttner, composer, dies at 58
1731 - Daniel Defoe, English author (Robinson Crusoe), dies at about 70
1865 - John Wilkes Booth, assassin, is shot dead near Bowling Green VA at 27
1970 - Gypsy Rose Lee, stripper/actress (Pruitts of S Hampton), dies at 56
1984 - William "Count" Basie, jazz piano great, dies on 80th birthday
1986 - [William] Broderick Crawford, actor (Highway Patrol), dies at 74
1989 - Lucille Ball, comedienne (I Love Lucy), dies of heart attack at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles at age 77.
1991 - Carmine Coppola, composer/father of Francis Ford Coppola, dies
