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April 28th
1788 ~ Maryland became the 7th state to ratify the U.S. Constitution.
1906 ~ Birthday of Kurt Gödel, mathematician. 1908 ~ Birthday of Oskar Schindler, Businessman. 1937 ~ Birthday of Saddam Hussein, former leader of Iraq. 1945 ~ Benito Mussolini and his mistress Clara Petacci are killed by members of the Italian resistance movement while trying to flee Italy. 1947 ~ Thor Heyerdahl and five crewmates set out from Peru on the Kon-Tiki to prove that Peruvian natives could have settled Polynesia. 1952 ~ The U.S. occupation of Japan ended. 1969 ~ Charles de Gaulle resigned as President of France. 2001 ~ Dennis Tito became the world's first space tourist. 2003 ~ Apple Computer's iTunes Music Store launched. |
April 29th
1770 ~ James Cook arrived at and named Botany Bay, Australia.
1863 ~ Birthday of William Randolph Hearst, American publisher. 1893 ~ Birthday of Harold Urey, American chemist, awarded the 1934 Nobel Prize for Chemistry. 1936 ~ Birthday of Zubin Mehta, Indian-born American conductor. 1945 ~ Start of Operation Manna. 1945 ~ American soldiers liberated the Dachau concentration camp in Germany. 1958 ~ The Broadway musical, My Fair Lady, opened in London. 1980 ~ Death of Alfred Hitchcock, director. 1992 ~ Rioting broke out in Los Angeles following the acquittal of four white police officers accused of beating black motorist Rodney King. 1997 ~ A worldwide treaty to ban chemical weapons went into effect. |
April 30th
1777 ~ Birthday of Carl Friedrich Gauss, Mathematician, Astronomer & Physicist.
1803 ~ The U.S. purchased the Louisiana Territory from France. 1877 ~ Birthday of Alice B. Toklas, Muse and Brownie Chef. 1883 ~ Death of Édouard Manet, Impressionist Painter. 1916 ~ Birthday of Claude Shannon, the "father of information theory” 1938 ~ Birthday of Larry Niven, Science Fiction author. 1945 ~ Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun committed suicide after being married for one day. 1948 ~ The Land Rover was introduced. 1975 ~ The South Vietnamese government in Saigon announced its unconditional surrender to the Vietcong. 1993 ~ CERN announced that the World Wide Web would be free to everyone. |
May 1st
1786 ~ Opening night of Mozart’s opera, The Marriage of Figaro.
1840 ~ The Penny Black postage stamp put on sale in the UK. 1869 ~ The Folies Bergères opened in Paris. 1904 ~ Death of Antonín Dvořák, Czech Composer. 1939 ~ Birthday of Judy Collins, American folk singer. 1941 ~ Orson Welles's Citizen Kane premiered in New York City. 1944 ~ Birthday of Rita Coolidge, Singer. 1960 ~ Gary Powers, in a U-2 spy plane, was shot down over the Soviet Union. 1978 ~ Death of Aram Khachaturian, Armenian composer. 1982 ~ RAF aircraft attack two airstrips near Port Stanley in the Falkland Islands. |
May 2nd
1519 ~ Death of Leonardo da Vinci, inventor, painter.
1660 ~ Birthday of Alessandro Scarlatti, Italian Composer. 1729 ~ Birthday of Empress Catherine II of Russia. 1892 ~ Birthday of "The Red Baron", Manfred von Richthofen. 1933 ~ The first modern sighting of the Loch Ness monster was reported. 1945 ~ The Soviet Union announced the capture of Berlin. 1952 ~ The world's first jet airliner, the De Havilland Comet 1, launched the jet age. 1955 ~ Tennessee Williams won the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for Cat on a Hot Tin Roof. 1982 ~ The British submarine HMS Conqueror sank the Argentine cruiser ARA General Belgrano. 1997 ~ The Labour Party's Tony Blair became Prime Minister of the UK, ending 18 years of Conservative Party rule. |
May 3rd
1469 ~ Birthday of Niccolò Machiavelli, Italian Historian & Political Author.
1616 ~ Death of William Shakespeare Playwright & Poet. 1810 ~ Lord Byron swam the Hellespont. 1844 ~ Birthday of Richard D'Oyly Carte, English Impresario. 1898 ~ Birthday of Golda Meir, Prime Minister of Israel. 1937 ~ Gone With the Wind, a novel by Margaret Mitchell, won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. 1945 ~ Indian forces captured Rangoon, Burma, from the Japanese. 1946 ~ The International Military Tribunal for the Far East began in Tokyo against Japanese military and government officials accused of war crimes and crimes against humanity. 1991 ~ The last episode of the soap opera “Dallas” aired. 2005 ~ The first democratically elected government in the history of Iraq was sworn in. |
May 4th
1825 ~ Birthday of Thomas Henry Huxley, English Scientist.
1852 ~ Birthday of Alice Liddell, for whom Lewis Carroll wrote Alice in Wonderland. 1928 ~ Birthday of Hosni Mubarak, President of Egypt. 1942 ~ The Battle of the Coral Sea, the first naval clash fought entirely with carrier aircraft, began during World War II. 1970 ~ The Ohio National Guard, sent to Kent State University after the ROTC building was burnt down, opened fire on students protesting at the U.S. invasion of Cambodia. 1975 ~ Death of Moe Howard, actor, comedian; member of the Three Stooges. 1979 ~ Margaret Thatcher became the UK’s first female Prime Minister. 1980 ~ Death of Josip Tito, President of Yugoslavia. 1982 ~ Falklands War: The HMS Sheffield is sunk by an Exocet missile. 1990 ~ Latvia proclaims independence. |
May 5th
1807 ~ Death of P. D. Q. Bach, fictitious Composer.
1813 ~ Birthday of Søren Kierkegaard, Philosopher. 1818 ~ Birthday of Karl Marx, Political Philosopher. 1821 ~ Death of Napoleon Bonaparte, Ruler of France. 1891 ~ NYC’s Carnegie Hall had its grand opening and first public performance, with Pyotr Tchaikovsky as the guest conductor. 1925 ~ Biology teacher John Scopes was arrested for teaching Charles Darwin's Theory of Evolution in Dayton, Tennessee. 1961 ~ Alan Shepard became the first American to travel into space. 1980 ~ Great Britain’s SAS stormed the Iranian embassy in London after a six day siege. 1992 ~ Wolfenstein 3D was released, the first-ever first-person shooter computer game. 1995 ~ Death of Mikhail Botvinnik, world chess champion. |
May 6th
1758 ~ Birthday of Maximilien Robespierre, Revolutionary.
1856 ~ Birthday of Sigmund Freud, psychiatrist, founder of Psychoanalysis. 1889 ~ The Eiffel Tower was officially opened to the public at the Universal Exposition in Paris. 1915 ~ Birthday of T.H. White, Writer. 1915 ~ Birthday of Orson Welles, Director. 1937 ~ The German zeppelin Hindenburg caught fire and was destroyed while attempting to dock at Lakehurst, New Jersey. 1940 ~ John Steinbeck was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for his novel The Grapes of Wrath. 1953 ~ Birthday of Tony Blair, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. 1954 ~ Roger Bannister becomes the first man to run the mile in under four minutes. 1994 ~ Queen Elizabeth and French President François Mitterrand inaugurate the opening of the Chunnel. |
May 7th
1824 ~ Premiere of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony in Vienna.
1825 ~ Death of Antonio Salieri, Composer. 1833 ~ Birthday of Johannes Brahms, Composer. 1840 ~ Birthday of Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky, Composer. 1915 ~ World War I: A German U-boat sank the RMS Lusitania, killing 1,198 people. 1919 ~ Birthday of Eva Peron, wife of Argentine President Juan Peron. 1933 ~ Birthday of Johnny Unitas, American football star. 1945 ~ World War II: General Alfred Jodl signed unconditional surrender terms at Reims, France, ending Germany's participation in the war. 1954 ~ Indochina War: The Battle of Dien Bien Phu ended in a French defeat (the battle began on March 13). 1999 ~ Kosovo War: Three Chinese embassy workers were killed and 20 wounded when a NATO aircraft “mistakenly” bombed the Chinese embassy in Belgrade. |
May 8th
1541 ~ Hernando de Soto reached the Mississippi River, naming it Río de Espíritu Santo.
1794 ~ French chemist Antoine Lavoisier was tried, convicted, and guillotined all on one day in Paris. 1828 ~ Birthday of Jean Henri Dunant, founder of the Red Cross, awarded the 1901 Nobel Peace Prize. 1873 ~ Death of John Stuart Mill, Empiricist Philosopher. 1895 ~ Birthday of Fulton J. Sheen, bishop and television personality. 1902 ~ Mount Pelée erupted in Martinique, destroying the town of St. Pierre and killing over 30,000 people. 1984 ~ The Soviet Union announced that it would boycott the 1984 Summer Olympics. 1985 ~ Death of Theodore Sturgeon, Science Fiction writer. 1988 ~ Death of Robert A. Heinlein, Science Fiction writer. 1999 ~ Nancy Mace became the first female cadet to graduate from The Citadel military college. |
May 9th
1837 ~ Birthday of Adam Opel, German engineer and industrialist.
1860 ~ Birthday of J.M. Barrie, Author, creator of Peter Pan. 1874 ~ Birthday of Howard Carter, British archaeologist. 1901 ~ Australia opened its first parliament in Melbourne. (PDF) 1903 ~ Death of Paul Gauguin, French Post-Impressionist painter. 1972 ~ Israeli commandos liberated a hijacked Sabena airliner at Lod airport in Tel Aviv. 1974 ~ The U.S. Congress’s House Judiciary Committee opened hearings on whether to recommend the impeachment of President Richard Nixon. 1986 ~ Death of Tenzing Norgay, Mountaineer. 1994 ~ Nelson Mandela was inaugurated as South Africa's first black president. 2002 ~ A bomb exploded during a holiday parade in Kaspiysk, Russia, killing 43 and injuring 130. |
May 10th
1818 ~ Death of Paul Revere, engraver, American Patriot.
1838 ~ Birthday of John Wilkes Booth, Actor, assassin of Abraham Lincoln. 1857 ~ The Indian Mutiny began when the Sepoys revolted against the British Army. 1869 ~ The first transcontinental railroad in the U.S. was completed at Promontory, Utah. 1872 ~ Victoria Woodhull became the first woman nominated for U.S. President. 1899 ~ Birthday of Fred Astaire, Singer, Dancer & Actor. 1924 ~ J. Edgar Hoover became director of the FBI. 1933 ~ The Nazis staged massive public book burnings. 1954 ~ Bill Haley and the Comets released Rock Around the Clock, the first rock and roll record to reach number one on the charts. 2002 ~ FBI agent Robert Hanssen was given a life sentence without the possibility of parole for selling American secrets to Russia. |
May 11th
1904 ~ Birthday of Salvador Dalí, Spanish painter.
1918 ~ Birthday of Richard Feynman, American Physicist. 1930 ~ Birthday of Edsger Dijkstra, Dutch computer scientist. 1949 ~ Israel was admitted to the UN. 1981 ~ Reggae musician Bob Marley died of cancer. 1987 ~ The first heart-lung transplant took place in Baltimore, Maryland. 1988 ~ Death of Kim Philby, Spy. 1997 ~ IBM's Deep Blue chess-playing supercomputer defeated Garry Kasparov in the last game of the rematch, becoming the first computer to beat a world-champion chess player. 1998 ~ India announced that it has tested a group of nuclear weapons. 2001 ~ Death of Douglas Adams, Science Fiction author. |
May 12th
1820 ~ Birthday of Florence Nightingale, Nurse.
1845 ~ Birthday of Gabriel Fauré, Composer. 1884 ~ Death of Bedřich Smetana, Composer. 1889 ~ Death of John Cadbury, Chocolate Entrepreneur. 1918 ~ Birthday of Julius Rosenberg, Spy. 1943 ~ Axis forces in North Africa surrendered. 1962 ~ Douglas MacArthur delivered his famous "Duty, Honor, Country" valedictory speech at West Point. 1971 ~ Mick Jagger married Bianca Perez Morena de Macias in St Tropez. 1972 ~ The Rolling Stones released their ''Exile on Main St.'' album. 2000 ~ The Tate Modern art gallery opened in London. |
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