April 19th
 

1775 ~ American Revolutionary War began with the Battle of Lexington and Concord.

1861 ~ The first bloodshed of the American Civil War. A pro-Secession mob in Baltimore, Maryland attacked Federal Army troops marching through the city.

1881 ~ Death of Benjamin Disraeli, former Prime Minister of the U.K.

1882 ~ Death of Charles Darwin, Biologist & Author.

1912 ~ Birthday of Glenn Seaborg, Chemist and Nobel Prize winner.

1956 ~ Actress Grace Kelly married Rainier III of Monaco.

1989 ~ Death of Daphne du Maurier, Author.

1993 ~ A siege at the Branch Davidian compound near Waco, Texas, ended when fire destroyed the structure after federal agents smashed their way in.

1995 ~ Oklahoma City bombing: The Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma was bombed, killing 168.

2005 ~ Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger of Germany was elected pope; he took the name Benedict XVI.

2003 - At their Montreal concert, Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band are joined by Max Weinberg’s daughter Allie on keyboards.

2001 - David Lee Roth reveals that he briefly reunited with Van Halen in July and wrote some “astonishing” music. They haven’t called back since.

2000 - Madonna denies tabloid reports that a routine scan shows she is expecting a baby boy. “I don’t know the sex of my baby,” she says in a statement.

1989 - No. 1 Chart Toppers Pop Hit: “Like a Prayer,” Madonna.

1970 - No. 1 Chart Toppers Pop Hit: “ABC,” The Jackson 5. The song is the group’s second consecutive No. 1 single.

1960 - No. 1 Chart Toppers Pop Hit: “Stuck on You,” Elvis Presley. The song is Presley’s first to be released in stereo and his first since being released from the Army.

April 20th
 

1657 ~ The Jews of New York City (then New Amsterdam) were granted freedom of religion.

1862 ~ The first pasteurization test completed by Louis Pasteur.

1889 ~ Birthday of Adolf Hitler, German dictator, "Der Führer".

1912 ~ Death of Bram Stoker, Author (Dracula).

1918 ~ Manfred von Richthofen shot down his 79th and 80th victims - his final victories.

1968 ~ Pierre Trudeau first became Prime Minister of Canada.

1968 ~ English politician Enoch Powell made his controversial Rivers of Blood speech.

1971 ~ The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the use of busing to achieve racial desegregation in schools.

1979 ~ U.S. President Carter was attacked by a Swamp Rabbit.

1999 ~ Columbine High School Massacre

1999 - The “No Security” tour, the Rolling Stones’ first arena outing in 20 years wraps with a make-up date at the San Jose Arena in California. The tour grosses more than.

1996 - Tickets ranging in price from $27.50 - $85.00 go on sale for the KISS reunion tour. This marks the first time in 15 years that all four original members of the ’70’s rock group join together in original costume and face paint.

1991 - Credence Clearwater Revival founder John Fogerty marries Julie Lebiedzinksi in Bristol, Ind.

1988 - No. 1 Chart Toppers Pop Hit: “Where Do Broken Hearts Go,” Whitney Houston.

1968 - Deep Purple makes its live debut in Denmark. The group’s three top 10 albums are “Machine Head,” “Made in Japan” and “Burn.”

1964 - The Elvis Presley movie “Viva Las Vegas” premieres.

1961 - No. 1 Chart Toppers Pop Hit: “Runaway,” Del Shannon. Shannon is the first artist to take a song written by John Lennon and Paul McCartney onto the U.S. pop charts. His version of “From Me to You” hits the Hot 100 on June 29, 1963, before the release of the Beatles debut American single, “I Want to Hold Your Hand.”

April 21st
 

1649 ~ The Maryland Toleration Act, which provided for freedom of worship for all Christians, was passed by the Maryland assembly.

1816 ~ Birthday of Charlotte Brontë, Author.

1836 ~ Republic of Texas forces under Sam Houston defeat Mexican troops under General Santa Anna at the Battle of San Jacinto.

1838 ~ Birthday of John Muir, Environmentalist.

1910 ~ Death of Mark Twain, author.

1912 ~ The New York Giants and New York Yankees played an exhibition game to benefit survivors of the RMS Titanic.

1926 ~ Birthday of Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom.

1944 ~ Women in France were enfranchised.

1960 ~ Brazil inaugurated its new capital, Brasilia, transferring the seat of national government from Rio de Janeiro.

1992 ~ The first extrasolar planets were announced by astronomer Alexander Wolszczan.

2005 - Onstage in Asbury Park, N.J., Bruce Springsteen takes a stand against hunger by donating all of the proceeds from a tour rehearsal show to World Hunger Year (WHY), which was co-founded in 1975 by late singer/songwriter Harry Chapin and Bill Ayres.

2001 - R.E.M. guitarist Peter Buck is arrested at London’s Heathrow Airport for allegedly assaulting two crew members on an overnight flight from Seattle to London. Buck is charged with two counts of common assault, a public order offense, criminal damage, disobeying an aircraft commander and being drunk on an aircraft.

1999 - Universal Denmark’s single to benefit Kosovar refugees, “Selv En Drabe” (Even A Drop), breaks the territory’s first-day sales record, moving 66,000 units, according to the label.

1999 - Brooks & Dunn debut their newest video, “South of Santa Fe,” while internet site country.com simultaneously streams the video using Microsoft Windows Media technology. It is the first time that a country video debuts simultaneously on TV and the Internet.

1975 - No. 1 Chart Toppers Pop Hit: “(Hey Won’t You Play) Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song,” B.J. Thomas. The song has the longest title of any No. 1 single.

1969 - Janis Joplin and the Kozmic Blues Band play London’s Royal Albert Hall.

1962 - Elvis Presley: Good Luck Charm US 45 is no. 1 chart topper this day in ROCK History.

1961 - The Beatles debut at the Cavern Club in Liverpool, England.

1956 - Elvis Presley: Heartbreak Hotel US 45 is no. 1 chart topper this day in rock.

April 22nd
 

1724 ~ Birthday of Immanuel Kant, Philosopher.

1870 ~ Birthday of Vladimir Lenin, Russian revolutionary.

1889 ~ The Oklahoma Land Rush began.

1904 ~ Birthday of Robert Oppenheimer, American physicist.

1943 ~ Albert Hofmann wrote his first report about the hallucinogenic properties of LSD.

1970 ~ First Earth Day celebrated.

1984 ~ Death of Ansel Adams, Photographer.

1997 ~ A four-month siege of the Japanese embassy in Peru ended when commandos stormed and captured the building, rescuing 71 hostages. Interestingly, all 14 rebels died.

2000 ~ In a pre-dawn raid, armed immigration agents seized Elian Gonzalez from his relatives' home in Miami; the 6-year-old boy was reunited with his father.

2002 ~ Death of Linda Lovelace, Porn Star.


Feastdays & Holidays

Earth Day : Canada, U.S.

April 23rd
 

1564 ~ Birthday of William Shakespeare, Playwright.

1858 ~ Birthday of Max Planck, Physicist. Awarded the Nobel Prize in physics 1918.

1891 ~ Birthday of Sergei Prokofiev, Soviet Composer.

1954 ~ Hank Aaron hit his first major league home run.

1968 ~ Birthday of Timothy McVeigh, American Terrorist.

1969 ~ Sirhan Sirhan was sentenced to death for assassinating Sen. Robert Kennedy.

1984 ~ American announcement of the isolation of the AIDS virus.

1998 ~ Death of James Earl Ray, Assassin.

2004 ~ President Bush eased Reagan-era sanctions against Libya in return for Moammar Gadhafi's giving up weapons of mass destruction.

2007 ~ Death of Boris Yeltsin, Soviet strongman and the architect of the dismantling of the USSR.

April 24th
 

1731 ~ Death of Daniel Defoe, English Writer.

1898 ~ Spain declared war on the U.S. over Cuba.

1905 ~ Birthday of Robert Penn Warren, Writer, Pulitzer Prize winner, first American Poet Laureate.

1916 ~ The Easter uprising began when some 1,600 Irish nationalists seized several key sites in Dublin.

1942 ~ Birthday of Barbra Streisand, American Singer & Actress.

1967 ~ Cosmonaut Vladimir Komarov died in Soyuz 1.

1986 ~ Death of Wallis Simpson, Mistress & Wife of The Duke of Windsor.

1990 ~ The Hubble Space Telescope was launched by Space Shuttle Discovery.

1996 ~ The main assembly of the Palestine Liberation Organization voted to revoke clauses in its charter that called for an armed struggle to destroy Israel.

2004 ~ Death of Estée Lauder, Cosmetics pioneer.

April 25th
 

1719 ~ Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe was published.

1792 ~ The French national anthem, “La Marseillaise” was composed.

1840 ~ Birthday of Pyotr Tchaikovsky, Composer.

1900 ~ Birthday of Wolfgang Pauli, Physicist. Awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics 1945.

1906 ~ Birthday of William J. Brennan, U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justice.

1915 ~ Allied soldiers invaded the Gallipoli Peninsula in an unsuccessful attempt to remove the Ottoman Turkish Empire from WWI.

1917 ~ Birthday of Ella Fitzgerald, Jazz Singer.

1945 ~ The United Nations was organized in San Francisco, California, by 50 nations.

1953 ~ Francis Crick and James Watson published MOLECULAR STRUCTURE OF NUCLEIC ACIDS: A Structure for Deoxyribose Nucleic Acid describing the double helix structure of DNA.

1980 ~ Tehran hostage rescue mission failed.

Feastdays & Holidays

Australia, New Zealand ~ ANZAC Day

April 26th
 

1711 ~ Birthday of David Hume, Philosopher & Historian.

1785 ~ Birthday of John Audubon, Naturalist & Illustrator.

1935 ~ Birthday of Carol Burnett, Singer, Actress & Comedienne.

1937 ~ Planes from the Condor Legion, an adjunct of the Luftwaffe, bombed the Basque town of Guernica during the Spanish Civil War.

1945 ~ The Battle of Bautzen: The last successful German armoured offensive of WWII.

1964 ~ Tanganyika and Zanzibar merged to form Tanzania.

1986 ~ The world's worst nuclear accident occurred at the Chernobyl plant in the Soviet Union.

1989 ~ Death of Lucille Ball, Actress & Comedienne.

1994 ~ South Africa held its first multiracial elections.

2005 ~ Syria's 29-year military presence in Lebanon ended.

April 27th
 

1521 ~ Portuguese explorer Ferdinand Magellan was killed in the Philippines.

1667 ~ John Milton sold the copyright of Paradise Lost for £10.

1791 ~ Birthday of Samuel Morse, inventor of Morse code.

1813 ~ U.S. troops captured York (present day Toronto), the capital of Ontario.

1822 ~ Birthday of Ulysses S. Grant, 18th U.S. President.

1891 ~ Birthdayof Sergei Prokofiev, Soviet composer.

1904 ~ The Australian Labor Party became the first such party to gain national government, under Chris Watson.

1945 ~ Soviet and American armies link up at the Elbe.

1999 ~ Death of Al Hirt, Musician.

2007 ~ Death of Mstislav Rostropovich, Russian cellist and conductor.

I bet Milton's pissed off when he thinks of the number of copies he could have had royalties on.

April 28th
 

1789 ~ Mutiny on the HMS Bounty. Captain William Bligh and 18 sailors are set adrift.

1906 ~ Birthday of Kurt Gödel, mathematician.

1937 ~ Birthday of Saddam Hussein, former leader of Iraq.

1941 ~ Birthday of Ann-Margret, Swedish-born actress.

1945 ~ Benito Mussolini and his mistress Clara Petacci were 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.

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
 

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.

1951 ~ Death of Ludwig Wittgenstein, Austrian-born philosopher.

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 police officers accused of beating Rodney King.

1997 ~ The Chemical Weapons Convention, a worldwide treaty to ban chemical weapons, went into effect.

April 30th
 

1777 ~ Birthday of Carl Friedrich Gauss, Mathematician, Astronomer & Physicist.

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.

1973 ~ President Nixon took responsibility for the Watergate scandal.

1975 ~ The South Vietnamese government in Saigon fell to Communist forces.

1993 ~ CERN announced that the World Wide Web would be free to everyone.

Happy birthday to you

Happy birthday to you,

Happy birthday dear Larry,

Happy birthday to you.

May 1st
 

1840 ~ The Penny Black postage stamp put on sale in the UK.

1869 ~ The Folies Bergères opened in Paris. Edouard Manet’s “A Bar at the Folies-Bergère” recalls the lot of one of the employees.

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 was shot down in a U-2 spy plane over the Soviet Union.

1978 ~ Death of Aram Khachaturian, Armenian composer.

1982 ~ RAF aircraft attack two airstrips near Port Stanley in the Falkland Islands.

2004 ~ Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovakia, and Slovenia join the European Union.

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 De Havilland Comet 1, the world's first jet airliner, 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 Tony Blair became Prime Minister of the UK.

May 3rd
 

1469 ~ Birthday of Niccolò Machiavelli, Italian Historian & Political Author.

1616 ~ Death of William Shakespeare Playwright & Poet.

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.

1971 ~ Anti-war protesters began four days of demonstrations intended to shutting down Washington, D.C.

1990 ~ The Latvian parliament met to declare independence from the USSR.

2006 ~ Zacarias Moussaoui was sentenced to life in prison.

May 4th
 

1825 ~ Birthday of Thomas Henry Huxley, "Darwin's Bulldog", English Scientist.

1852 ~ Birthday of Alice Liddell, for whom Lewis Carroll wrote Alice in Wonderland.

1929 ~ Birthday of Audrey Hepburn, Film and Stage Actress Extraordinaire.

1942 ~ The Battle of the Coral Sea, the first naval clash fought entirely with carrier aircraft, began during World War II.

1953 ~ Ernest Hemingway was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for "The Old Man and the Sea".

1970 ~ The Ohio National Guard opened fire on Kent State University students protesting 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 ~ The HMS Sheffield was sunk by an Exocet missile during the Falklands War.

May 5th
 

1807 ~ Death of P.D.Q. Bach, fictitious Composer.

1818 ~ Birthday of Karl Marx, Political Philosopher.

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 Darwin's Theory of Evolution in Dayton, Tennessee.

1944 ~ Birthday of John Rhys-Davies, Welsh actor (Gimli).

1948 ~ Birthday of Bill Ward, British Musician (Black Sabbath).

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
 

1856 ~ Birthday of Sigmund Freud, psychiatrist, founder of Psychoanalysis.

1862 ~ Death of Henry David Thoreau, American author and philosopher.

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 became the first man to run the mile in under four minutes.

1994 ~ Queen Elizabeth and French President François Mitterrand opened the Chunnel.

1994 ~ Paula Jones filed suit against President Clinton, alleging he'd sexually harassed her in 1991.

Title: May 7th
 

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 ~ General Alfred Jodl signed unconditional surrender terms at Reims, France, ending Germany's participation in World War II.

1954 ~ 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. President Clinton called the attack a “tragic mistake”.

2007 ~ The tomb of Herod the Great was discovered.

I noticed the History Channel was running a docu-drama on the sinking of the Lusitania. Rather nicely done.

Dien Bien Phu, thought to be the last great bayonet charge (if you don't count the Brits at Goose Green).

May 8th
 

1794 ~ French chemist Antoine Lavoisier was tried, convicted, and guillotined all on one day in Paris.

1873 ~ Death of John Stuart Mill, Empiricist Philosopher.

1895 ~ Birthday of Fulton J. Sheen, bishop and television personality.

1968 ~ Birthday of Jamie Summers, American porn star.

1973 ~ The Second Battle of Wounded Knee ended.

1978 ~ David Berkowitz pleaded guilty to the ''Son of Sam'' killings.

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 ~ The Citadel, South Carolina's formerly all-male military school, graduated its first female cadet.

May 9th
 

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.

1903 ~ Death of Paul Gauguin, French Post-Impressionist painter.

1949 ~ Birthday of Billy Joel, American musician.

1961 ~ Jim Gentile of the Baltimore Orioles became the first player in baseball history to hit grand slams in consecutive innings.

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.

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.

1940 ~ British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain resigned, and Winston Churchill formed a new government.

1981 ~ François Mitterrand became the first Socialist President of France..

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.

1973 ~ Charges against Daniel Ellsberg for his role in the Pentagon Papers case were dismissed.

1981 ~ Death of Bob Marley, Reggae musician.

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 had 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 Bedrich 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.

2000 ~ The Tate Modern art gallery opened in London.

2003 ~ Al Qaeda killed 26 people in the Riyadh compound bombings.

May 13th
 

1787 ~ Captain Arthur Phillip left Portsmouth, England with eleven ships of convicts to establish a penal colony in Australia.

1842 ~ Birthday of Sir Arthur Sullivan of Gilbert & Sullivan, Composer.

1861 ~ Queen Victoria issued a "proclamation of neutrality" which recognized the breakaway Confederate states as having belligerent rights.

1865 ~ More than a month after the surrender of the Northern Army of Virginia by General Lee, the last land battle of the Civil War ended with a Confederate victory in Texas at the Battle of Palmito Ranch.

1888 ~ Brazil abolished slavery.

1912 ~ The Royal Flying Corps (now the Royal Air Force) was established in the U.K.

1937 ~ Birthday of Roger Zelazny, Science Fiction author.

1940 ~ Winston Churchill made his "blood, tears, toil and sweat" speech to the House of Commons.

1981 ~ Mehmet Ali Agca attempted to assassinate Pope John Paul II at St. Peter's Square in Rome.

1995 ~ Alison Hargreaves became the first woman to climb Everest without oxygen or the help of sherpas.


Tomorrow, jseal will return to posting Strange Days. :wave:

May 14th
 

1787 ~ Delegates began gathering in Philadelphia for a convention to draw up the U.S. Constitution.

1925 ~ Death of H. Rider Haggard, Author.

1944 ~ Birthday of George Lucas, film Director & Producer.

1948 ~ The independent state of Israel was proclaimed.

1955 ~ The USSR and seven other communist bloc countries signed a mutual defense treaty called the Warsaw Pact.

1969 ~ Birthday of Cate Blanchett, Australian actress (Galadriel).

1973 ~ Skylab 1, the first American space station, was launched.

1978 ~ Death of Robert Menzies, twelfth Prime Minister of Australia.

1998 ~ Death of Frank Sinatra, Singer & Actor.

2004 ~ Piers Morgan was fired as editor of the Daily Mirror for publishing photographs of alleged abuse of Iraqi prisoners by British soldiers that were shown to be fake.

Good to have you back, jseal! :thumbs:

(Best Foghorn Leghorn impression) Yaisss!

May 15th
 

1869 ~ Susan B. Anthony and Elizabeth Cady Stanton formed the National Woman Suffrage Association in New York city.

1886 ~ Death of Emily Dickinson, Poet.

1911 ~ The U.S. Supreme Court ruled against the Standard Oil Company, requiring its break up under the Sherman Anti-Trust act.

1919 ~ The Winnipeg General Strike began.

1930 ~ Ellen Church became the first airline stewardess, on a flight from Oakland, California to Chicago, Illinois.

1953 ~ Birthday of Mike Oldfield, English composer (Tubular Bells).

1957 ~ Britain tested its first hydrogen bomb in Operation Grapple.

1972 ~ George C. Wallace was shot and left paralyzed while campaigning for the U.S. Democratic presidential nomination.

1988 ~ The Soviet Union began withdrawing its troops from Afghanistan.

1991 ~ Edith Cresson became France's first female Prime Minister.

May 16th
 

1868 ~ The U.S. Senate failed to convict President Andrew Johnson of the articles of impeachment against him.

1905 ~ Birthday of Henry Fonda, Actor.

1919 ~ Birthday of Liberace, American pianist.

1943 ~ The Jewish Warsaw ghetto uprising ended.

1955 ~ Birthday of Olga Korbut, gymnast.

1966 ~ Birthday of Janet Jackson, Super Bowl Half Time Flasher.

1966 ~ The Chinese Cultural Revolution started when The Communist Party issued the "May 16 Notice".

1969 ~ The Soviet space probe Venera 5 landed on Venus.

2002 ~ Star Wars: Episode II - Attack of the Clones opened in theaters.

2005 ~ Newsweek magazine retracted its Koran abuse story that started protests in Afghanistan.

May 18th
 

1872 ~ Birthday of Bertrand Russell, Logician & Philosopher, awarded The Nobel Prize in Literature 1950.

1910 ~ The Earth passed through the tail of Halley’s Comet.

1911 ~ Death of Gustav Mahler, Austrian Composer.

1919 ~ Birthday of Dame Margot Fonteyn, Ballet dancer.

1937 ~ Birthday of Brooks Robinson, Baseball Hall of Famer.

1944 ~ Monte Cassino fell to the Allies.

1974 ~ India became the sixth nuclear nation by successfully detonated its first nuclear weapon.

1975 ~ Death of Leroy Anderson, American Composer.

1980 ~ Mount St. Helens in Washington state exploded, leaving 57 people dead or missing.

2004 ~ Massachusetts became the first state to legalize same-sex marriage.

May 19th
 

1536 ~ Anne Boleyn, the second wife of Henry VIII of England was beheaded for adultery.

1795 ~ Birthday of Johns Hopkins, Philanthropist.

1890 ~ Birthday of Ho Chi Minh, Vietnamese leader.

1915 ~ Death of John Simpson Kirkpatrick, ANZAC stretcher bearer at Gallipoli.

1921 ~ The U.S. Congress passed the Emergency Quota Act, which established national quotas for immigrants.

1925 ~ Birthday of Pol Pot, Khmer Rouge leader.

1935 ~ Death of T. E. Lawrence, English soldier ("Lawrence of Arabia").

1965 ~ Tui Malila, the longest living animal known, died in Tonga at the age of either 188 or 192.

2001 ~ Sun Zhonghua was killed by People's Republic of China government officials because she refused to be sterilized under the "One child" policy.

2004 ~ PM Blair hit with a purple flour filled condom.

May 20th
 

1772 ~ Birthday of Sir William Congreve, English inventor (“By the rockets’ red glare”).

1806 ~ Birthday of John Stuart Mill, English philosopher.

1873 ~ Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis received a U.S. patent for blue jeans with copper rivets.

1883 ~ The eruption of Krakatoa began, leading ultimately to the volcano's destruction three months later.

1896 ~ Death of Clara Schumann, German Pianist and Composer.

1901 ~ Birthday of Max Euwe, Dutch world chess champion.

1927 ~ Charles Lindbergh took off from Long Island, New York, on the first solo nonstop flight across the Atlantic Ocean, arriving in Paris the next day.

1940 ~ The first prisoners arrive at the Auschwitz concentration camp.

1961 ~ U.S. marshals were sent to restore order in Montgomery, Alabama.

2000 ~ Death of Jean Pierre Rampal, French flutist.