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04/01/1933 - Nazi Germany began persecuting Jews with a boycott of Jewish-owned businesses.

04/01/1960 - The 1^st weather satellite, TIROS I, was launched from Cape Canaveral.

04/01/1970 - President Nixon signed a measure banning cigarette advertising on radio and television.

04/01/2014 - April Fools’ Day

04/02/1513 - Spanish explorer Ponce de Leon landed in Florida.

04/02/1792 - Congress passed the Coinage Act, which authorized establishment of the US Mint.

04/02/1846 - President James Polk appointed Nathaniel Hawthorne surveyor of the Custom House, a position that provided the fodder for his irreverent preface to The Scarlet Letter.

04/02/1917 - President Wilson asked Congress to declare war on Germany, saying, "The world must be made safe for democracy."

04/02/1982 - Several thousand troops in Argentina seized the disputed Falkland Islands, located in the south Atlantic, from Britain.

04/02/2005 - Pope John Paul II died.

04/03/1860 - The Pony Express began service between St. Joseph MO and Sacramento CA.

04/03/1882 - Jesse James was shot to death in St. Joseph MO.

04/03/1948 - President Truman signed The Marshall Plan, which allocated more than $5 billion in aid for 16 European countries.

04/03/1968 - The day before he was assassinated, civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his famous "mountain" speech to a rally of striking sanitation workers.

04/03/1996 - Unabomber Ted Kaczynski was arrested.

04/04/1818 - Congress decided the flag of the US would consist of 13 red and white stripes and 20 stars, with a new star added for every new state of the Union.

04/04/1850 - The city of Los Angeles was incorporated.

04/04/1949 - Twelve nations, including the US, signed the North Atlantic Treaty.

04/04/1968 - Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated in Memphis. There had already been two attempts on King's life and, just the day before he had said, "Like anybody, I would like to live a long life, but I'm not concerned about that now."

04/04/1969 - The original Star Trek was cancelled. It lives for eternity, however, in reruns.

04/05/1614 - Pocahontas married English colonist John Rolfe in Virginia.

04/05/1621 - The Mayflower sailed from Plymouth MA on a return trip to England.

04/05/1792 - President Washington cast the 1^st presidential veto.

04/05/1887 - British historian Lord Acton wrote, "Power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts absolutely."

04/06/1830 - Joseph Smith organized the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints in Fayette NY.

04/06/1896 - The 1^st modern Olympic Games formally opened in Athens.

04/06/1909 - Robert Peary and Matthew Henson became the 1^st men to reach the North Pole.

04/06/1917 - Congress approved a declaration of war against Germany.

04/07/1862 - The Battle of Shiloh ended.

04/07/1948 - The World Health Organization was founded.

04/07/1966 - The US recovered a hydrogen bomb it had lost off the coast of Spain.

04/07/1969 - The Supreme Court unanimously struck down laws prohibiting private possession of obscene material.

04/08/1513 - Explorer Juan Ponce de Leon claimed Florida for Spain.

04/08/1946 - The League of Nations assembled in Geneva for the last time.

04/08/2014 - Equal Pay Day ... This is the day when women's wages catch up to men's wages from the year before.

04/08/2014 - Ramanavami - Hindu

04/09/1682 - French explorer Robert La Salle reached the Mississippi River.

04/09/1895 - Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered his army to Union General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House in Virginia.

04/09/1963 - British statesman Winston Churchill became an honorary US citizen.

04/09/1996 - President Clinton signed a line-item veto bill into law.

04/10/1866 - The American SPCA (Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals) was incorporated.

04/10/1912 - The RMS Titanic Set sail from Southampton, England, on its ill-fated maiden voyage.

04/10/1925 - F. Scott Fitzgerald's The Great Gatsby was 1^st published.

04/10/1974 - Golda Meir announced her resignation as prime minister of Israel.

04/11/1846 - Smith County was founded as a county in Texas.

04/11/1921 - Iowa became the 1^st state to impose a cigarette tax.

04/11/1945 - During WWII, American soldiers liberated the notorious Nazi concentration camp Buchenwald in Germany.

04/11/1968 - President Johnson signed into law the Civil Rights Act of 1968, one week after the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.

04/12/1606 - England adopted as its flag the original version of the Union Jack.

04/12/1861 - The American Civil War began as Confederate forces fired on Fort Sumter in South Carolina.

04/12/1961 - Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the 1^st man to fly in space, orbiting the earth once before making a safe landing.

04/12/1992 - Euro Disneyland opened in France.

04/13/1598 - King Henry IV of France endorsed the Edict of Nantes, which granted rights to the Protestant Huguenots. The edict was abrogated in 1685 by King Louis XIV who declared France entirely Catholic again.

04/13/1742 - Handel's Messiah was 1^st performed publicly in Dublin.

04/13/1943 - President Roosevelt dedicated the Jefferson Memorial.

04/13/1964 - Sidney Poitier became the 1^st black performer in a leading role to win an Academy Award for Lilies of the Field.

04/13/2014 - Thomas Jefferson’s birthday

04/13/2014 - Palm Sunday - Christian

04/14/1828 - The 1^st edition of Noah Webster's American Dictionary of the English Language was published.

04/14/1865 - John Wilkes Booth shot and mortally wounded President Lincoln while attending a play at Ford's Theater.

04/14/1939 - John Steinbeck's novel The Grapes of Wrath was 1^st published.

04/14/2014 – Baisakhi (New Year) – Sikh

04/15/1865 - President Lincoln died several hours after the shooting by John Wilkes Booth.

04/15/1912 - The Titanic sank in the North Atlantic less than three hours after striking an iceberg. About 1500 people died.

04/15/2014 - Rubber Eraser Day

04/15/2014 - National Theft Day (Income taxes are due.)

04/15/2014 - Hanuman Jayanti – Hindu

04/15/2014 - Pesach / Passover begins – Judaism

04/16/1862 - A bill ending slavery in the District of Columbia became law.

04/16/2001 - Israel launched an air strike against a strategic Syrian radar station in Lebanon.

04/17/1492 - Spain's King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella gave Columbus a commission to seek a westward passage to Asia.

04/17/1521 - Martin Luther went before the Diet of Worms to face charges stemming from his religious writings.

04/17/1961 - About 1500 CIA-trained Cuban exiles launched the disastrous Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba in a failed attempt to overthrow the government of Fidel Castro.

04/17/1975 - Phnom Penh fell to communist insurgents, ending Cambodia's five-year war.

04/18/1775 - Paul Revere began his famous ride from Charlestown to Lexington, Massachusetts, warning American colonists that the British were coming.

04/18/1946 - The League of Nations went out of business.

04/18/1978 - The US Senate voted 68 to 32 to turn the Panama Canal over to Panamanian control on December 31st, 1999.

04/18/2014 - Paul Revere Day

04/18/2014 - Good Friday - Christian

04/19/1775 - The American Revolutionary War began with the battles of Lexington and Concord.

04/19/1933 - The US went off the Gold Standard.

04/19/1993 - The 51-day siege at the Branch Davidian compound near Waco TX ended as a fire destroyed the structure after federal agents began smashing their way in.

04/19/1995 - A truck bomb destroyed the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City.

04/20/1971 - The Supreme Court upheld the use of busing to achieve racial desegregation in schools.

04/20/1999 - The Columbine High School massacre took place in Littleton CO.

04/20/2014 - Easter - Christian

04/21/1836 - An army of Texans led by Sam Houston defeated the Mexicans at San Jacinto, assuring Texas independence.

04/21/1910 - At the age of 75, Mark Twain died in Redding, Connecticut, on the reappearance of Haley's Comet ... which had last appeared in the year he was born.

04/21/2014 - San Jacinto Day

04/21/2014 - Tax Freedom Day … the day on which Americans have earned enough money to pay this year's tax obligations at the federal, state & local levels. (And it’s three days later than last year.)

04/21/2014 - The Annual Aggie Muster (The Aggie Muster began on June 26, 1883. By 1902, it had evolved into a celebration of Texas’ Independence on San Jacinto Day and the two became officially linked in 1922.)

04/21/2014 - Feast of Ridvan - Baha'i

04/22/1590 - Henry VIII took over the throne of England after the death of his father, Henry VII.

04/22/1864 - Congress authorized the use of the phrase "In God We Trust" on US coins.

04/22/1952 - An atomic test conducted in Nevada became the 1^st nuclear explosion shown on live network TV.

04/22/2014 - Earth Day

04/23/1564 - The supposed birthday and, 52 years later, the date of death for William Shakespeare.

04/23/1985 - Coca-Cola announced it was changing the secret formula for Coke.

04/23/1992 - McDonald's opened its 1^st fast food restaurant in Beijing.

04/23/2014 - St. George's Day

04/24/1800 - Congress approved a bill establishing the Library of Congress.

04/24/1877 - Federal troops left New Orleans, ending the North's post-Civil War rule in the South.

04/24/1898 - Spain declared war on the US after rejecting America's ultimatum to withdraw from Cuba.

04/24/1970 - China launched its 1^st satellite, which kept transmitting a song, The East is Red.

04/24/1980 - The US launched an abortive attempt to free the American hostages in Iran, a mission that resulted in the deaths of 8 US servicemen.

04/25/1859 - Ground was broken for the Suez Canal.

04/25/1945 - Delegates from some 50 countries met in San Francisco to organize the United Nations.

04/25/1990 - The space shuttle Discovery deployed the Hubble Space Telescope.

04/25/2014 - Arbor Day

04/26/1607 - An expedition of English colonists, including Captain John Smith, went ashore at Cape Henry, Virginia, to establish the 1^st permanent English settlement in the Western Hemisphere.

04/26/1964 - The African nations of Tanganyika and Zanzibar merged to form Tanzania.

04/26/1986 - The world's worst nuclear accident occurred at the Chernobyl plant in the Soviet Union.

04/27/1805 - A force led by US Marines captured the North African city of Derna on the shores of Tripoli.

04/27/1937 - The nation's 1^st Social Security checks were distributed. And, we've been increasingly more dependent since then!

04/27/2014 - Yom HaSho’ah / Holocaust Memorial Day - Judaism

04/28/1789 - There was a mutiny on the HMS Bounty as the crew of the British ship set Captain William Bligh and 18 sailors adrift in a launch in the South Pacific.

04/28/1926 - Harper Lee was born in Monroeville AL. She would soon befriend Truman Capote, her model for Dill in her Pulitzer Prize-winning novel, To Kill a Mockingbird.

04/28/1945 - Italian partisans executed Dictator Benito Mussolini and his mistress, Clara Petacci, as they attempted to flee the country.

04/28/1952 - War with Japan officially ended as a treaty signed by the US and 47 other nations took effect.

04/29/1429 - Joan of Arc entered the city of Orleans to lead a victory over the English.

04/29/1862 - New Orleans fell to Union forces during the Civil War.

04/29/1945 - Adolf Hitler married Eva Braun.

04/29/2014 - Cassé Canari ou Wèt mô nan d'lo - Voudon

04/29/2014 - Ninth day of Ridvan - Baha'i

04/30/1789 - George Washington took office in NY as the 1^st president of the US.

04/30/1803 - The US purchased the Louisiana Territory from France for about $15 million.

04/30/1975 - The South Vietnamese capital of Saigon fell to Communist forces.

04/30/2014 - Administrative Professionals Day