Apr. 24- 1184 BCE: Greek soldiers enter the fortified city of Troy by hiding inside the “Trojan Horse” (traditional date). 1898: Spain declared war against the US, marking the beginning of the Spanish-American War. 1962: MIT scientists send the first television signal via an orbiting satellite, from California to Massachusetts. 2023: India surpasses China as the world’s most populous nation.
Apr. 25- 1507: A German cartographer is the first to use the term “America” on a world map, the “Universalis Cosmographia.” 1792: The guillotine is first used in France to execute convicted highwayman Nicolas Pelletier. 1846: Mexican cavalry troops attack US soldiers and lay siege to Fort Texas in a border dispute that would lead to the Mexican-American War. 1990: The Hubble Space Telescope is placed into orbit from the Space Shuttle Discovery.
Hubble views a Star-Studded Cosmic Cloud, 2022. science.nasa.gov
Apr. 26- 1859: A US congressman is acquitted of a murder charge due to “temporary insanity,” the first recorded successful use of this somewhat questionable legal defense. 1954: Field trials of Dr. Jonas Salk’s polio vaccine begin in McLean, VA. 1986: Chernobyl nuclear reactor #4 explodes just north of Kiev, Ukraine, killing 31 and spreading radioactivity across much of Europe. 1989: Beloved American entertainer Lucille Ball dies in Los Angeles, CA at the age of 77.
Apr. 27- 1865: The steamboat SS Sultana explodes on the Mississippi River, killing more than 1,800 of the 2,400 passengers on board (mostly Union soldier POWs heading home). It remains the deadliest maratime disaster in US history. 1956: Heavyweight boxing champion Rocky Marciano announces his retirement from the ring. He never lost a single fight in his professional career, finishing with a record of 49-0. 1994: First multi-racial election in South African history results in landslide victory for the ANC Party and its leader Nelson Mandela. 2009: General Motors announces plans to stop production of Pontiacs; a white 2010 G6 4-door sedan rolls off the assembly line in early January.
Apr. 28- 1770: The HMS Endeavour, captained by James Cook, becomes the first European ship to land in Australia when it arrives in Botany Bay. 1789: Fletcher Christian leads a successful mutiny against Captain William Bligh aboard the HMS Bounty. 1918: Gavrilo Princip, convicted of assassinating Archduke Franz Ferdinand, which sparked the start of World War I in 1914, dies in prison in the modern-day Czech Republic. He had tuberculosis. 1970: President Richard Nixon approves sending US military troops into Cambodia to fight alongside South Vietnamese troops, expanding the already unpopular war and intensifying protests.
Apr. 29- 1852: British doctor and mathematician Peter Mark Roget has the first edition of his “Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases” published (broadcast, disseminated, distributed, printed, produced, etc.). 1945: US Army 45th Infantry liberates more than 30,000 from the Dachau concentration camp outside Munich, Germany. 1968: The American Tribal Love-Rock Musical “Hair” premieres on Broadway. 1990: Construction cranes are brought in to help tear down the Berlin Wall.
Apr. 30- 1789: George Washington takes the oath of office at Federal Hall in New York City, becoming the first US president. 1904: The first ice cream cone debuts at the St. Louis World’s Fair. 1927: The first Federal prison for women opens its doors in Alderson, WV. 1952: The first television advertisement for a toy is broadcast, touting Hasbro’s Mr. Potato Head. And the rest, as they say, is history…
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