http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history
Apr 13, 1861: Fort Sumter surrenders
After a 33-hour bombardment by Confederate cannons, Union forces surrender Fort Sumter in South Carolina's Charleston Harbor. The first engagement of the war ended in Rebel victory.
The surrender concluded a standoff that began with South Carolina's secession from the Union on December 20, 1860. When President Abraham Lincoln sent word to Charleston in early April that he planned to send food to the beleaguered garrison, the Confederates took action. They opened fire on Sumter in the predawn of April 12. Over the next day, nearly 4,000 rounds were hurled toward the black silhouette of Fort Sumter.
Inside Sumter was its commander, Major Robert Anderson, 9 officers, 68 enlisted men, 8 musicians, and 43 construction workers who were still putting the finishing touches on the fort. Union Captain Abner Doubleday, the man often inaccurately credited with inventing the game of baseball, returned fire nearly two hours after the barrage began. By the morning of April 13, the garrison in Sumter was in dire straits. The soldiers had sustained only minor injuries, but they could not hold out much longer. The fort was badly damaged, and the Confederate's shots were becoming more precise. Around noon, the flagstaff was shot away. Louis Wigfall, a former U.S. senator from Texas, rowed out without permission to see if the garrison was trying to surrender. Anderson decided that further resistance was futile, and he ran a white flag up a makeshift flagpole.
The first engagement of the war was over, and the only casualty had been a Confederate horse. The Union force was allowed to leave for the north; before leaving, the soldiers fired a 100-gun salute. During the salute, one soldier was killed and another mortally wounded by a prematurely exploding cartridge. The Civil War had officially begun.
Apr 13, 1919: The Amritsar Massacre
In Amritsar, India's holy city of the Sikh religion, British and Gurkha troops massacre at least 379 unarmed demonstrators meeting at the Jallianwala Bagh, a city park. Most of those killed were Indian nationalists meeting to protest the British government's forced conscription of Indian soldiers and the heavy war tax imposed against the Indian people.
A few days earlier, in reaction to a recent escalation in protests, Amritsar was placed under martial law and handed over to British Brigadier General Reginald Dyer, who banned all meetings and gatherings in the city. On April 13, the day of the Sikh Baisakhi festival, tens of thousands of people came to Amritsar from surrounding villages to attend the city's traditional fairs. Thousands of these people, many unaware of Dyer's recent ban on public assemblies, convened at Jallianwala Bagh, where a nationalist demonstration was being held. Dyer's troops surrounded the park and without warning opened fire on the crowd, killing several hundred and wounding more than a thousand. Dyer, who in a subsequent investigation admitted to ordering the attack for its "moral effect" on the people of the region, had his troops continue the murderous barrage until all their artillery was exhausted. British authorities later removed him from his post.
The massacre stirred nationalist feelings across India and had a profound effect on one of the movement's leaders, Mohandas Gandhi. During World War I, Gandhi had actively supported the British in the hope of winning partial autonomy for India, but after the Amritsar Massacre he became convinced that India should accept nothing less than full independence. To achieve this end, Gandhi began organizing his first campaign of mass civil disobedience against Britain's oppressive rule.
Apr 13, 1777: British attack at Bound Brook, New Jersey
In the early morning hours of April 13, 1777, General Lord Charles Cornwallis leads 4,000 British troops and Hessian mercenaries in a surprise attack on a small garrison of American troops in the village of Bound Brook in central New Jersey.
Cornwallis' decision to launch the four-column attack at daybreak caught American Major General Benjamin Lincoln and the Continental Army completely by surprise; they were unable to launch a counterattack. Surprised and outnumbered, Lincoln ordered his men to retreat and was able to escape along with most of his 500 troops; his losses totaled 60 men killed or taken prisoner. The British also captured several cannons and nearly all of Lincoln's artillery detachment, which they took with them, returning to their camp at New Brunswick.
Hessian mercenaries were critical to the British victory. Hessian Johann Ewald, captain of the elite Lieb Jaeger Korps, developed the successful four-column strategy at Cornwallis' request; his diary is the major source of information regarding the ensuing battle. Ewald was so respected by his colonial counterparts that General Henry Knox invited Ewald to West Point after Cornwallis' surrender at Yorktown. Ewald would eventually publish eight books on military strategy, including a Treatise on Partisan Warfare, published in 1785, which earned the praise of Prussia's Frederick the Great.
Since the British chose not to stay in Bound Brook, the Continental Army re-occupied the village under Major General Nathanael Greene. Ultimately, though, General George Washington decided that it would be easier to defend Bound Brook from a loftier vantage point, moving troops to the Watchung Mountains of north-central New Jersey.
Apr 13, 1990: Soviets admit to Katyn Massacre
The Soviet government officially accepts blame for the Katyn Massacre of World War II, when nearly 5,000 Polish military officers were murdered and buried in mass graves in the Katyn Forest. The admission was part of Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev's promise to be more forthcoming and candid concerning Soviet history.
In 1939, Poland had been invaded from the west by Nazi forces and from the east by Soviet troops. Sometime in the spring of 1940, thousands of Polish military officers were rounded up by Soviet secret police forces, taken to the Katyn Forest outside of Smolensk, massacred, and buried in a mass grave. In 1941, Germany attacked the Soviet Union and pushed into the Polish territory once held by the Russians. In 1943, with the war against Russia going badly, the Germans announced that they had unearthed thousands of corpses in the Katyn Forest. Representatives from the Polish government-in-exile (situated in London) visited the site and decided that the Soviets, not the Nazis, were responsible for the killings. These representatives, however, were pressured by U.S. and British officials to keep their report secret for the time being, since they did not want to risk a diplomatic rupture with the Soviets. As World War II came to an end, German propaganda lashed out at the Soviets, using the Katyn Massacre as an example of Russian atrocities. Soviet leader Joseph Stalin flatly denied the charges and claimed that the Nazis were responsible for the slaughter. The matter was not revisited for 40 years.
By 1990, however, two factors pushed the Soviets to admit their culpability. First was Gorbachev's much publicized policy of "openness" in Soviet politics. This included a more candid appraisal of Soviet history, particularly concerning the Stalin period. Second was the state of Polish-Soviet relations in 1990. The Soviet Union was losing much of its power to hold onto its satellites in Eastern Europe, but the Russians hoped to retain as much influence as possible. In Poland, Lech Walesa's Solidarity movement was steadily eroding the power of the communist regime. The Katyn Massacre issue had been a sore spot in relations with Poland for over four decades, and it is possible that Soviet officials believed that a frank admission and apology would help ease the increasing diplomatic tensions. The Soviet government issued the following statement: "The Soviet side expresses deep regret over the tragedy, and assesses it as one of the worst Stalinist outrages."
Whether the Soviet admission had any impact is difficult to ascertain. The communist regime in Poland crumbled by the end of 1990, and Lech Walesa was elected president of Poland in December of that year. Gorbachev resigned in December 1991, which brought an effective end to the Soviet Union.
Apr 13, 1945: Hitler bluffs from bunker as Russians advance and atrocities continue
On this day in 1945, Adolf Hitler proclaims from his underground bunker that deliverance was at hand from encroaching Russian troops--Berlin would remain German. A "mighty artillery is waiting to greet the enemy," proclaims Der Fuhrer. This as Germans loyal to the Nazi creed continue the mass slaughter of Jews.
As Hitler attempted to inflate his troops' morale, German soldiers, Hitler Youth, and local police chased 5,000 to 6,000 Jewish prisoners into a large barn, setting it on fire, in hopes of concealing the evidence of their monstrous war crimes as the end of the Reich quickly became a reality. As the Jewish victims attempted to burrow their way out of the blazing barn, Germans surrounding the conflagration shot them. "Several thousand people were burned alive," reported one survivor. The tragic irony is that President Roosevelt, had he lived, intended to give an address at the annual Jefferson Day dinner in Washington, D.C., on that very day, proclaiming his desire for "an end to the beginnings of all wars--yes, an end to this brutal, inhuman, and thoroughly impractical method of settling the differences between governments."
Here's a more detailed look at events that transpired on this date throughout history:
837 - Best view of Halley's Comet in 2000 years
989 - Battle at Abydos: Byzantine emperor Basilius II beats
Bardas Phocas
1055 - Bishop Gebhard van Eichstattt named Pope Victor II
1111 - Pope Paschalis II crowns Roman catholics-German king
Hendrik II
1180 - Republic day of Gelnhausen
1204 - Crusaders occupy Constantinople
1241 - Battle at Theiss: Mongols beat Hungarian King Béla IV
1250 - The Seventh Crusade is defeated in Egypt, Louis IX of
France is captured.
1256 - The Grand Union of the Augustinian order formed when
Pope Alexander IV issues a papal bull Licet ecclesiae catholicae.
1346 - Pope Clemens VI declares German emperor Louis of
Bavaria, envoy
1367 - Battle at Nájera Spain: Castile & England beat
Aragon & France
1517 - Osmaanse army occupies Cairo
1556 - Portuguese Marranos who revert back to Judaism burned
by order of Pope
1598 - Edict of Nantes grants political rights to French
Huguenots
1640 - English Short Parliament forms (- May 5)
1668 - John Dryden (36) becomes 1st English poet laureate
1741 - Dutch people protest bad quality of bread
1741 - Royal Military Academy forms at Woolwich
1742 - George Frideric Handel's oratorio "Messiah"
performed for the 1st time at New Music Hall in Dublin
Composer George Friedrich HandelComposer George Friedrich
Handel 1759 - French beat European Allies in Battle of Bergen
1796 - 1st elephant arrives in US from India
1796 - Battle at Millesimo Italy: Napoleon beats Austrians
1808 - William Henry Lane ("Juda") perfects tap
dance
1829 - English Emancipation Act grants freedom of religion
to Catholics
1834 - HMS Beagle anchors at river mouth of Rio Santa Cruz,
Patagonia
1842 - Lord Rosse successfully casts 72" (183-cm)
mirror for a telescope
1849 - Hungarian Republic proclaimed
1860 - 1st Pony Express reaches Sacramento Calif
1861 - After 34 hours of bombardment, Ft Sumter surrenders
to Confederates
1863 - Battle of Irish Bend, LA (Ft Bisland)
1863 - Hospital for Ruptured & Crippled in NY is 1st
orthopedic hospital
1865 - Battle of Raleigh, NC
1865 - Sherman's march through Georgia begins
1868 - Abyssinian War ends as British and Indian troops
capture Magdala and Ethiopian Emperor commits suicide
Entrepreneur and Engineer George WestinghouseEntrepreneur
and Engineer George Westinghouse 1869 - Steam power brake patented (George
Westinghouse)
1870 - Metropolitan Museum of Art forms in NYC
1873 - Colfax Massacre in Grant Parish Louisiana (60 blacks
killed)
1882 - Anti-Semitic League forms in Prussia
1883 - US prospecter Alfred Packer convicted of manslaughter
though accused of cannibalism
1895 - Start of Sherlock Holmes "Adventure of Solitary
Cyclist" (BG)
1902 - J C Penney opens his 1st store in Kemmerer, Wyo
1904 - Battle at Oviumbo Africa: Herero's chase away German
army
1904 - Congress authorizes Lewis & Clark Expo $1 gold
coin
1906 - Mutiny on Portuguese battleships Dom Carlos &
Vasco da Gama
1908 - Groundbreaking on Philadelphia's Shibe Park (home of
A's & Phillies)
1911 - Polo Grounds grandstand & left field bleachers go
up in flames
1912 - Royal Flying Corps forms (later RAF)
1914 - 1st Federal League Game: Balt Terrapins beat Buffalo
3-2
1918 - Electrical fire kills 38 mental patients at Oklahoma
State Hospital
Department Store Founder James Cash PenneyDepartment Store
Founder James Cash Penney 1919 - Amritsar Massacre-British Army fires on
nationalist rioters in India
1919 - British forces kill 100s of Indian Nationalists
(Amritsar Massacre)
1919 - The Establishment of the Provisional Government of
the Republic of Korea.
1920 - 1st woman US Civil Service Commissioner, Helen
Hamilton appointed
1921 - Foundation of the Spanish Communist Workers' Party.
1923 - Army wins 1st college three-weapon fencing
championships
1924 - Greek plebiscite for a republic
1925 - Virginia Theater (ANTA, Guild) opens at 245 W 52nd St
NYC
1926 - At 41, Walter Johnson pitches his 7th opening day
shutout
1926 - Bicyclists without bicycle-tax-stamp rounded up in
Amsterdam
1927 - Stanley Cup: Ottawa Senators beat Boston Bruins, in 2
games & 2 ties
1928 - 1st trans atlantic flight Europe-US (Fitzmaurice-von
Hunefeld-Köhl)
1932 - Kozakken Boys soccer team forms in Werkendam forms
1933 - 1st flight over Mount Everest (Lord Clydesdale)
1933 - Stanley Cup: NY Rangers beat Toronto Maple Leafs, 3
games to 1
1934 - 4.7 million US families report receiving welfare
payments
1934 - US Congress passes Johnson Debt Default Act
1936 - Metaxas proclaims himself dictator of Greece
1938 - Clifford Goldsmith' "What a Life,"
premieres in NYC
1939 - W Saroyan's "My Heart's in the Highlands,"
premieres in NYC
1939 - In India, the Hindustani Lal Sena (Indian Red Army)
is formed and vows to engage in armed struggle against the British.
1940 - 2nd battle of Narvik-8 German destroyers, destroyed
1940 - Cornelious Warmerdam became 1st man to pole vault 15
ft
1940 - Stanley Cup: NY Rangers beat Toronto Maple Leafs, 4
games to 2
1941 - Heavy German assault on Tobruk
1941 - Russian-Japan no-attack treaty goes into effect
1941 - Pact of neutrality between the USSR and Japan is
signed.
1943 - Catholic University Nijegen closes
32nd US President Franklin D. Roosevelt32nd US President
Franklin D. Roosevelt 1943 - FDR dedicates Jefferson Memorial
1943 - Nazi's discover mass grave of Polish officers near
Katyn
1944 - SC rejects black suffrage
1944 - Stanley Cup: Montreal Canadiens sweep Chicago
Blackhawks in 4 games
1944 - Transport nr 71 departs with French Jews to
nazi-Germany
1944 - The diplomatic relations between New Zealand and the
Soviet Union are established.
1945 - Canadian army liberates Teuge & Assen Neth from
Nazis
1945 - Red Army occupy Wien (Vienna)
1945 - US marines conquer Minna Shima off Okinawa
1946 - Belgian premier Acker proclaims wage & price
freeze over
1946 - Eddie Klepp, a white pitcher signed by defending
Negro League champ Cleveland Buckeyes, is barred from field in Birmingham
Alabama
1948 - 75 scientists ambushed on way to Mount Scopus
1949 - 3rd NBA Championship: Minn Lakers beat Wash Capitols,
4 games to 2
1953 - 1st game of Milwaukee Braves, they beat Cin Reds 2-0
1954 - Balt Orioles 1st game, loses to Tigers in Detroit 3-0
Baseball Player Hank AaronBaseball Player Hank Aaron 1954 -
Milwaukee Braves' Hank Aaron's 1st game
1954 - Robert Oppenheimer accused of being a communist
1955 - 20.33" (51.64 cm) of rainfall, Axis, Alabama
(state record)
1956 - KETA TV channel 13 in Oklahoma City, OK (PBS) begins
broadcasting
1957 - "Shinbone Alley" opens at Broadway Theater
NYC for 49 performances
1957 - 11th NBA Championship: Bost Celtics beat St Louis
Hawks, 4 games to 3
1957 - 11th Tony Awards: Long Days Journey into the Night
& My Fair Lady win
1957 - Due to lack of funds, Saturday mail delivery in US is
temp halted
1958 - 12th Tony Awards: Sunrise at Campobello & Music
Man win
1958 - Van Cliburn is the first American to win the
Chaikovsky Compettion in Moscow.
1959 - USAF launches Discoverer II into polar orbit
1959 - Vanguard SLV-5 launched for Earth orbit (failed)
1959 - Vatican edict forbids Roman Catholics for voting for
communists
1960 - France becomes 4th nuclear nation exploding an A-Bomb
in Sahara
1960 - Transit 1B, 1st navigational satellite, placed in
Earth orbit
1961 - "Carnival!" opens at Imperial Theater NYC
for 719 performances
1961 - UN General Assembly condemns South-Africa's apartheid
1962 - Stan Musial scores his 1,869th run, a new NL record
1962 - US steel industry forced to give up price increases
1963 - Pete Rose triples for his 1st major league base hit
1963 - Pirate's Bob Friend balks 4 times in a game
Singer Tom JonesSinger Tom Jones 1964 - 36th Academy Awards
- "Tom Jones," Best Film, Sidney Poitier & Patricia Neal win Best
Actor/Actress
1964 - Ian D Smith becomes premier of Rhodesia
1964 - New Zealand Colin Bosher shears a record 565 sheep in
1 work day
1965 - Beatles record "Help"
1965 - 1st US Senate black page, Lawrence W Bradford Jr, 16,
appointed by NY Sen Jacob Javits
1965 - 7th Grammy Awards: The Girl From Ipanema, The Beatles
wins
1966 - Pan Am places $525,000,000 order for 25 Boeing 747s
1969 - 33rd Golf Masters Championship: George Archer wins,
shooting a 281
1969 - Closure of the Brisbane tramway network.
1970 - 34th Golf Masters Championship: Billy Casper wins,
shooting a 279
1970 - Greek composer Mikis Theordorakis freed
1970 - Apollo 13 announces "Houston, we've got a
problem!" as Beech-built oxygen tank explodes en route to Moon
1970 - Oakland uses gold-colored bases during the club's
home opener Rules Committee subsequently bans this innovation
1972 - 1st baseball players' strike ends after 13 days
1975 - 39th Golf Masters Championship: Jack Nicklaus wins,
shooting a 276
1975 - Chad military coup by General Odingar
1975 - Christian Falange kills 27 Palestinians, begins
Lebanese civil war
1975 - Penguins 5-Isles 4-Quarterfinals-Penguins hold 1-0
lead
1976 - $2 bill re-introduced as US currency
1976 - 1st NBA playoff game for Cleve Cavliers, they lose
100-95 to Wash
1976 - Federal Reserve begins issuing $2 bicentennial notes
1978 - Jackson slugs a 3-run HR in the 1st inning, & the
field is showered
1978 - NY Yanks defeat White Sox 4-2 in home opener on
Reggie Candy Bar Day
1979 - Christian Turks occupy St Jansbasiliek
1979 - Longest doubles ping-pong match ends after 101 hours
1979 - Yusuf Lule becomes premier of Uganda
1980 - "Grease" closes at Broadhurst Theater NYC
after 3,388 performances
1980 - "Reggae" closes at Biltmore Theater NYC
after 21 performances
1980 - 44th Golf Masters Championship: Seve Ballesteros
wins, shooting a 275
1980 - Amy Alcott wins LPGA American Defender/WRAL Golf
Classic
1980 - Emmy News & Documentaries Award presentation
1980 - US boycotts Summer Olympics in Moscow
1981 - Pulitzer prize awarded to Beth Henley for
"Crimes of the Heart"
1981 - Wash Post Janet Cooke wins Pulitzer Prize (later
admits story a hoax)
1982 - Penguins 3-Isles 4 (OT)-Preliminary-Isles win series
(3-2)
1983 - US performs nuclear test at Nevada Test Site
1983 - Undefeated middleweight boxer Tony Ayala gets 35
years on sex assault
1984 - 11th Space Shuttle Mission (41C)-Challenger 5-returns
to Earth
1984 - India beat Pak by 58 runs to win 1st Asia Cricket Cup
in Sharjah
1984 - Pete Rose becomes 1st NL to get get 4,000 hits in a
career
1985 - "TASS" denounced US boycott of Moscow
Olympics
1985 - Atlantis ferried to Kennedy Space Center via
Ellington AFB, Texas
1985 - Caps 1-Isles 2-Patrick Div Semifinals- Caps hold 2-1
lead
1985 - Katrin Dörre wins 1st female World Cup marathon
(2:33:30)
1985 - Ramiz Alia succeeds Enver Hoxha as party leader of
Albania
1986 - 50th Golf Masters Championship: Jack Nicklaus wins,
shooting a 279
1986 - Boston Celtics end season with a 40-1 home win record
1986 - Patty Sheehan wins LPGA Kyocera Inamori Golf Classic
264th Pope John Paul II264th Pope John Paul II 1986 - Pope
John Paul II met Rome's Chief Rabbi Elio Toaff at Rome synagogue
1986 - Spanish Grand Prix decided by 0.014 of a second
1987 - 1st 3 SD Padres hit HRs off SF starter Roger Mason
1987 - Portugal signs agreement to return Macau to China (in
1999)
1988 - Italy government of De Mita forms
1989 - "Welcome to the Club" opens at Music Box
Theater NYC for 12 perfs
1990 - 4th largest NBA crowd (45,458) see Orlando play at
Minneapolis
1990 - Final episode of Pat Sajak's late night TV show on
CBS
1990 - NY Rangers beat NY Islanders 6-5, Rangers win
preliminary, 4-1
1991 - BPAA US Open by Pete Weber
1992 - "2 Trains Running" opens at Walter Kerr
Theater NYC for 160 perfs
1992 - 5.5 earthquake hits Netherlands
1992 - American Airlines reduce its 1st-class fares 20%-50%
1992 - Crystal Pepsi begins test marketing in Providence,
Denver & Dallas
1992 - Great Chicago Flood - Chicago's underground tunnels
flood
1992 - Lou Conaseca retires as coach of St John's basketball
team
1992 - Longest 2 undefeated baseball teams to meet (NY Yanks
5-0 vs Toronto Blue Jays 6-0); Yanks score 3 in top of 9th to win 5-2
1993 - "3 Men on a Horse" opens at Lyceum Theater
NYC for 40 performances
1993 - 14th Emmy Sports Award presentation
Playwright Tom StoppardPlaywright Tom Stoppard 1993 - Tom
Stoppard's "Arcadia," premieres in London
1994 - President guard at Kigali Rwanda, chops 1,200 church
members to death
1994 - Target date for Israeli complete withdrawal, doesn't
occur
1994 - United Arab Emirates' 1st official ODI, losing to
India
1995 - Yankees beat the Mets 2-0
1996 - En route to NHL record 62 victories Detroit Red Wings
win #61
1996 - Ottawa Senators eliminate Stanley Cup Champs NJ
Devils from playoff
1997 - "American Daughter" opens at Cort Theater
NYC for 88 performances
1997 - 48th time opposing pitchers hit HRS, Carlos Perez
(Mon)/Darren Holmes
1997 - 61st Golf Masters Championship: Tiger Woods at 21
(270 18 under par)
1997 - Hartford Whalers last NHL game
1997 - NHL Pitts Penguin Mario Lemieux's last NHL regular
game
1997 - Travis Fryman homers off R Hernandez in both games of
double header 1st time since 1961 that 2 doubleheaders are played in the same
city Giants vs Mets & Oakland A's vs Yankees in NY
2002 - Pedro Carmona, interim president of Venezuela,
resigns one day after taking office.
2003 - 67th Golf Masters Championship: Mike Weir wins,
shooting a 281
Golfer Tiger WoodsGolfer Tiger Woods 2006 - Powerful
tornadoes rip through Iowa City, Iowa.
2008 - 72nd Golf Masters Championship: Trevor Immelman wins,
shooting a 280
2012 - North Korean long range rocket testing ends in
failure after the rocket broke up after launch
2013 - 8 people are killed after a bomb explodes on a bus in
Peshawar, Pakistan
2013 - 20 civilians are killed by the government bombing of
Saraqib, Idlib
1598 - King Henry IV of France signed the Edict of Nantes which granted political rights to French Protestant Huguenots. 1759 - The French defeated the European allies in Battle of Bergen. 1775 - Lord North extended the New England Restraining Act to South, Carolina, Virginia, Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Maryland. The act prohibited trade with any country other than Britain and Ireland. 1782 - Washington, NC, was incorporated as the first town to be named for George Washington. 1796 - The first known elephant to arrive in the United States from Bengal, India. 1808 - William "Juda" Henry Lane perfected the tap dance. 1829 - The English Parliament granted freedom of religion to Catholics. 1849 - The Hungarian Republic was proclaimed. 1860 - The first mail was delivered via Pony Express when a westbound rider arrived in Sacremento, CA from St. Joseph, MO. 1861 - After 34 hours of bombardment, the Union-held Fort Sumter surrenders to Confederates. 1870 - The Metropolitan Museum of Art was founded in New York City. 1916 - The first hybrid, seed corn was purchased for 15-cents a bushel by Samuel Ramsay. 1919 - British forces killed hundreds of Indian nationalists in the Amritsar Massacre. 1933 - The first flight over Mount Everest was completed by Lord Clydesdale. 1941 - German troops captured Belgrade, Yugoslavia. 1943 - U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt dedicated the Jefferson Memorial. 1945 - Vienna fell to Soviet troops. 1949 - Philip S. Hench and associates announced that cortizone was an effective treatment for rheumatoid arthritis. 1954 - Hank Aaron debuted with the Milwaukee Braves. 1959 - A Vatican edict prohibited Roman Catholics from voting for Communists. 1960 - The first navigational satellite was launched into Earth's orbit. 1961 - The U.N. General Assembly condemned South Africa due to apartheid. 1962 - In the U.S., major steel companies rescinded announced price increases. The John F. Kennedy administration had been applying pressure against the price increases. 1963 - Pete Rose of the Cincinnati Reds got his first hit in the major leagues. 1964 - Sidney Poitier became the first black to win an Oscar for best actor. It was for his role in the movie "Lilies of the Field." 1970 - An oxygen tank exploded on Apollo 13, preventing a planned moon landing. 1972 - The first strike in the history of major league baseball ended. Players had walked off the field 13 days earlier. 1976 - The U.S. Federal Reserve introduced $2 bicentennial notes. 1979 - The world's longest doubles ping-pong match ended after 101 hours. 1981 - Washington Post reporter Janet Cooke received a Pulitzer Prize for her feature about an 8-year-old heroin addict named "Jimmy." Cooke relinquished the prize two days later after admitting she had fabricated the story. 1984 - U.S. President Reagan sent emergency military aid to El Salvador without congressional approval. 1984 - Christopher Walker was killed in a fight with police in New Hampshire. Walker was wanted as a suspect in the kidnappings of 11 young women in several states. 1990 - The Soviet Union accepted responsibility for the World War II murders of thousands of imprisoned Polish officers in the Katyn Forest. The Soviets had previously blamed the massacre on the Nazis. 1997 - Tiger Woods became the youngest person to win the Masters Tournament at the age of 21. He also set a record when he finished at 18 under par. 1998 - NationsBank and BankAmerica announced a $62.5 billion merger, creating the country's first coast-to-coast bank. 1998 - Dolly, the world's first cloned sheep, gave natural birth to a healthy baby lamb. 1999 - Jack Kervorkian was sentenced in Pontiac, MI, to 10 to 25 years in prison for the second-degree murder of Thomas Youk. Youk's assisted suicide was videotaped and shown on "60 Minutes" in 1998. 2000 - Richard Gordon was charged with trying to extort $250,000 from Louie Anderson in exchange for not telling the tabloid media about Anderson once asking him for sex. Gordon was held without bail pending a court hearing. 2000 - It was announced that 69 people had died when the Arlahada, a Philippine ferry, capsized. 70 people were rescued. 2002 - Twenty-five Hindus were killed and about 30 were wounded when grenades were thrown by suspected Islamic guerrillas near Jammu-Kashir. 2002 - Venezuela's interim president, Pedro Carmona, resigned a day after taking office. Thousands of protesters had supported over the ousting of president Hugo Chavez.
1598 The Edict of Nantes gave religious tolerance to the Huguenots in France. 1742 Handel’s Messiah was first publicly performed in Dublin, Ireland. 1964 Sidney Poitier became the first African American to win the Academy Award for best actor. 1970 Apollo 13 announced "Houston, we've got a problem," when an oxygen tank burst on the way to the Moon. 1975 Civil War began in Lebanon when gunmen killed 4 Christian Phalangists who retaliated by killing 27 Palestinians. 1997 Tiger Woods became the youngest person to win the Masters Tournament and the first of African descent to win a major golf title. 2004 Barry Bonds hit his 661st homer, passing Willie Mays to take third place on the lifetime list. 2012 Kwangmyŏngsŏng-3, a North Korean Earth observation satellite, exploded shortly after its launch. The U.S. and other countries called the launch a violation of United Nations Security Council rules.
The following links are to web sites that were used to complete this blog entry:
http://www.historyorb.com/today/events.php
http://on-this-day.com/onthisday/thedays/alldays/apr13.htm
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history
http://www.infoplease.com/dayinhistory
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