April 26......

April 26 is the 116th (117th in leap years) day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There are 249 days remaining in the year on this date. It is the first day following the spring equinox that cannot be Easter Sunday in Western Christianity.

Best Liberal Quote of the Day: On Death Penalty "Until the infallibility of human judgment shall have been proved to me, I shall persist in demanding the abolition of the death penalty." — Marquis de Lafayette

Stupidest Quote from the Right for the Day: On Hypocrisy "The Congress didn't vote themselves a pay raise....We just simply did not deny ourselves that normal increase in our cost of living that every other worker in America not only expects, but insists upon." — Dick Armey, House Republican majority leader {Of course he failed to mention the fact that this same Congress failed to raise the minimum wage for years.}

{Disclaimer: I have attempted to give credit to the many different sources that I get entries. Any failure to do so is unintentional. Any statement enclosed by brackets like these are the opinion of the blogger, A Proud Liberal.}

EVENTS

● 757 - Paolo Orsini replaces his brother Pope Stephen II, as Paul I

● 1220 - German king Frederick II grants bishops sovereign rights {If there was ever a political miscalculation this ranks pretty high.}

● 1478 - The Pazzi attack Lorenzo de' Medici and kill his brother Giuliano during High Mass in the Duomo of Florence.

● 1478 - Easter is celebrated for the first time

● 1514 - Copernicus makes his 1st observations of Saturn

● 1518 - German reformer Martin Luther stated in his Disputation at Heidelberg: 'Grace is given to heal the spiritually sick, not to decorate spiritual heroes.'

● 1532 - Sultan Suleiman through Hungary on away to Vienna

● 1564 - Shakespeare was christened (this is not his birthdate).

● 1607 - English colonists of the Jamestown settlement make landfall at Cape Henry, Virginia.

● 1654 - Jews are expelled from Brazil

● 1655 - Dutch West Indies Company denies Peter Stuyvesant's desire to exclude Jews from New Amsterdam {This was the old name for New York City, I can't imagine a NYC without its Jewish population.}

● 1677 - Emperor Leopold I forms University of Innsbruck

● 1721 - Smallpox vaccination 1st administrated

● 1785 - John James Audubon, artist and environmentalist, born in Haiti.

● 1802 - Napoleon Bonaparte signs a general amnesty to allow all but about one thousand of the most notorious émigrés of the French Revolution to return to France, as part of a reconciliary gesture with the factions of the Ancien Regime and to eventually consolidate his own rule.

● 1803 - Meteorites fall in L'Aigle, France

● 1805 - United States Marines captured Derne, Tripoli under the command of First Lieutenant Presley O'Bannon.

● 1814 - King Louis XVIII lands on Calais, from England

● 1828 - Russia declares war on Turkey to support Greece's independence

● 1834 - Birth of Horatio R. Palmer, American Congregational clergyman. From his books of religious verse came two hymns which are still sung today: "Jesus, Thou Joy of Loving Hearts" and "My Faith Looks Up to Thee."

● 1845 - A fire in a Canton, China theatre killed 1,670.

● 1853 - Dutch King William III disbands 2nd Chamber

● 1858 - The California legislature passed a bill prohibiting Chinese or "other Mongolians" from landing at any port in the state unless the boat on which they were passengers was driven ashore by storm or unavoidable accident. {Of course this was only after the railroad connecting eastern and western America.}

● 1865 - Battle of Fort Tobacco VA

● 1865 - American Civil War: Confederate General Joseph Johnston surrenders his army to General William Tecumseh Sherman at the Bennett Place near Durham, North Carolina.

● 1865 - Union cavalry troopers corner and shoot dead John Wilkes Booth, President Lincoln's assassin near Bowling Green, Virginia.

● 1877 - The residents of Minnesota observed a statewide day of prayer, asking for deliverance from a plague of grasshoppers that had been ravishing their farm crops this year. (The plague ended soon after, in the summer.)

● 1890 - Henry Morton Stanley inaugurated in London

● 1906 - 1st motion pictures shown in Hawaii

● 1913 - Sun Yet San calls for revolt against President Yuan Shikai in China

● 1914 - Bernard Malamud, the Pulitzer Prize-winning American author, was born.

● 1915 - Italy secretly signs Pact of London with Britain, France & Russia

● 1920 - H Shapley & H D Curtis hold "great debate" on nature of nebulae

● 1921 - Weather broadcasts were heard for the first time on radio in St. Louis, MO. {They were just as accurate as today's forecasts.}

● 1925 - Paul von Hindenburg defeats Wilhelm Marx in the second round of the German presidential election to become the first directly elected head of state of the Weimar Republic.

● 1926 - Karachai Autonomous Region is established in RSFSR (until 1943)

● 1926 - Germany & Russia sign neutrality/peace treaty

● 1929 - 1st non-stop England to India flight lands

● 1933 - Jewish students are barred from school in Germany

● 1933 - The Gestapo, the official secret police force of Nazi Germany, is established.

● 1937 - Guernica Massacre, Spanish Civil War. Anti-fascist Basque city of Guernica, Spain is destroyed by German Nazi dive bombing.

● 1938 - Austrian Jews required to register property above 5,000 Reichsmarks

● 1941 - Potatoes rationed in Holland

● 1942 - Luftwaffe bombs Bath

● 1942 - The worst-ever mining accident in history kills 1,549 miners in an explosion at the Honkeiko Colliery, Manchuria.

● 1944 - U.S. Government takes over Chicago headquarters of Montgomery Ward and Co. after it defies National Labor Relations Board (NLRB).

● 1944 - 1st B-29 attacked by Japanese fighters, one fighter shot down

● 1944 - Papandreou government in Greece forms

● 1945 - Marshal Henri Philippe Petain, leader of France's Vichy collaborationist regime during WWII, arrested for treason

● 1945 - World War II: Battle of Bautzen - last successful German tank-offensive of the war.

● 1948 - The XP-86 prototype for the Sabre Jet first "officially" breaks the sound barrier. The first operational F-86A Sabres entered service in May of the same year

● 1952 - US minesweeper "Hobson" rams aircraft carrier "Wasp", kills 176

● 1953 - Radioactive rain fell on Troy, New York. (Resulting from testing in Nevada.)

● 1954 - Nationwide test of Salk anti-polio vaccine begins

● 1954 - The Geneva Conference, an effort to restore peace in Indochina and Korea, begins.

● 1955 - The Roman Catholic religious program "Life is Worth Living" aired for the last time over Dumont television. Premiering in 1952, it was hosted by Bishop Fulton J. Sheen, who won an Emmy during its first year of broadcast for being "the most outstanding personality" on television.

● 1956 - English apologist C.S. Lewis wrote in "Letters to an American Lady": 'One of the many reasons for wishing to be a better Christian is that, if one were, one's prayers for others might be more effectual.'

● 1956 - First container ship left Port Newark, New Jersey for Houston, Texas

● 1959 - Cuba invades Panamá

● 1961 - French paratroopers' revolt suppressed in Algeria

● 1961 - Actress Vanessa Redgrave is among 826 British anti-nuclear protesters arrested during a London sit-down.

● 1962 - Death of A. Ruth Fry, recorder of pacifism in action, Britain.

● 1962 - 1st Lockheed A-12 flies

● 1962 - US/UK launch Ariel; 1st international payload

● 1962 - First US rocket lands on Moon; The American Moon rocket Ranger IV lands on the far side of the Moon but fails to send back pictures due a technical fault. {Bad planning, there was no way to get signals from backside to Earth!}

● 1963 - in Libya Amendments to the constitution transform Libya (United Kingdom of Libya) into one national unity (Kingdom of Libya) and allows for female participation in elections.

● 1964 - Tanganyika and Zanzibar merge to form Tanzania.

● 1966 - An eruption of Mt. Kelud, in Java, killed 1,000 people.

● 1967 - San Marco 2 Launch (1st Equatorial Launch)

● 1968 - National student strike against the war enlists as many as one million high school and college students across U.S.; two thousand boycott classes at Univ. of Washington.

● 1968 - Students seize administration building at Ohio State

● 1968 - US underground nuclear test, "Boxcar", 1 megaton device

● 1968 - US performs nuclear test at Nevada Test Site

● 1970 - The state capitol of Louisiana, in Baton Rouge, was damaged by a dynamite explosion.

● 1971 - Heaviest rains ever in Bahia district of Brazil, 15" in 24 hours

● 1971 - San Francisco lightship replaced by automatic buoy

● 1971 - Turkey state of siege proclaimed

● 1973 - US performs nuclear test at Nevada Test Site

● 1974 - Landslide in Huancavelica Province Peru creates a natural dam

● 1974 - Malta adopts constitution

● 1975 - Labour votes to leave the EEC; Party members vote by almost 2-1 to leave the EEC, underlining the deep divisions over the issue of Europe.

● 1976 - Pan Am begins non-stop flights New York-Tokyo

● 1978 - NASA launches space vehicle S-201

● 1978 - France sends troops to Chad

● 1980 - Iran begins scattering US hostages from the US Embassy

● 1980 - Great Britain performs nuclear test at Nevada Test Site

● 1981 - Largest US bank robbery (Tucson AZ), more than $33 million stolen

● 1982 - Argentina surrenders to Britain on South Georgia near Falkland Island

● 1984 - Reagan arrives in China; US President Ronald Reagan lands in China at the start of a six-day state visit, the first by an American president since 1972, when Nixon went there.

● 1985 - In Argentina, a fire at a mental hospital killed 79 people and injured 247.

● 1986 - France performs nuclear test

● 1986 - Worst known nuclear disaster in history occurs at Chernobyl, U.S.S.R. (now Ukraine). Explosion kills at least 200 and irradiates much of Eastern Europe and Scandanavia. Subsequent death toll from radiation exposure is now estimated in the hundreds of thousands.

● 1989 - Actress-comedian Lucille Ball died at age 77.

● 1990 - 126 die in a (6.9) earthquake in China

● 1991 - Seventy tornadoes break out in the central United States. 23 are killed in Kansas & Oklahoma. Before its end, Andover, Kansas, would record the year's only F5 tornado.

● 1993 - Recession over - it's official; The British government announces the recession is over after new figures show growth in the economy for the first time in over two years.

● 1993 - Boeing 737 crashes at Aurangabad, kills 56

● 1993 - STS-55 (Columbia) launches into orbit

● 1994 - 1st multi-racial election in South Africa begins [3 days] Dr Nomaza Paintin in New Zealand is 1st black South African to vote

● 1994 - 26.9ºC in Prestebakke Norway (Norwegian April high temp record)

● 1994 - A China Airlines Airbus A-300-600R crashes at Nagoya Airport, Japan killing 264.

● 1998 - Guatemalan Bishop Juan Gerardi Conedera is assassinated, two days after release of a report blaming U.S.-backed Guatemalan military governments for hundreds of thousands of deaths in the 1980s.

● 2000 - Vermont Gov. Howard Dean signed the nation's first bill allowing same-sex couples to form civil unions.

● 2001 - Junichiro Koizumi was elected prime minister of Japan by the lower house of Japan's parliament.

● 2002 - An expelled student, 19-year-old Robert Steinhäuser, went on a shooting rampage at a school in Erfurt, Germany, killing 13 teachers, two students and a police officer before taking his own life.

● 2004 - The government unveiled the new colorized $50 bill.

● 2005 - Under international pressure and Lebanese street protests, Syria withdraws the last of its 14,000 troop military garrison in Lebanon, ending its 29-year military domination of that country.

BIRTHS

● 121 - Marcus Aurelius, Roman Emperor (d. 180)

● 570 - Muhammed, founder of Islam, according to the Shi'a sect. Other sources suggest April 20. {I wonder if this was before or after the 20th became famous as Hitler's birthday.}

● 1538 - Gian Paolo Lomazzo, Italian painter (d. 1600)

● 1573 - Marie de' Medici, wife of Henry IV of France (d. 1642)

● 1564 (baptized) - William Shakespeare, English writer (d. 1616)

● 1648 - King Peter II of Portugal (d. 1706)

● 1710 - Thomas Reid, Scottish philosopher (d. 1796)

● 1711 - David Hume, Scottish philosopher and historian (d. 1776)

● 1718 - Esek Hopkins, American Revolutionary War admiral (d. 1802)

● 1765 - Emma, Lady Hamilton, English mistress of Horatio Nelson (d. 1815)

● 1774 - Christian Leopold von Buch, German geologist (d. 1853)

● 1785 - John James Audubon, French-American naturalist and illustrator (d. 1851)

● 1787 - Ludwig Uhland, German poet (d. 1862)

● 1798 - James Beckwourth, American explorer (d. 1867)

● 1798 - Eugène Delacroix, French painter (d. 1863)

● 1801 - Ambrose Dudley Mann, American diplomat (d. 1889)

● 1812 - Friedrich Flotow, German-born French composer (d. 1883)

● 1812 - Alfred Krupp, German industrialist (d. 1887)

● 1822 - Frederick Law Olmsted, American landscape architect (d. 1903)

● 1826 - George Hull Ward, American general (d. 1863)

● 1826 - Ambrose R. Wright, American Civil War General (d. 1872

● 1856 - Sir Joseph Ward, 17th Prime Minister of New Zealand (d. 1930)

● 1868 - Harold Rothermere, English newspaperman; built a journalistic empire in England (d. 1940)

● 1878 - Bishop Rafael Guizar Valencia, Mexican Catholic bishop

● 1879 - Owen Willans Richardson, British physicist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1959)

● 1886 - Ma Rainey, American singer (d. 1939)

● 1886 - Ğabdulla Tuqay, Tatar poet (d. 1913)

● 1888 - Anita Loos, American writer (d. 1981)

● 1889 - Ludwig Wittgenstein, Austrian-born philosopher (d. 1951)

● 1893 - Draza Mihajlovic, Serbian WW2 Hero and war criminal (d. 1946)

● 1894 - Rudolf Hess, Nazi official (d. 1987)

● 1896 - Ernst Udet, WWI pilot and film actor, Luftwaffe officer (d. 1941)

● 1897 - Eddie Eagan, American sportsman (d. 1967)

● 1897 - Cass Canfield, American publisher and editor (d. 1986)

● 1897 - Douglas Sirk, German-born film director (d. 1987)

● 1898 - Vicente Aleixandre, Spanish writer, Nobel laureate (d. 1984)

● 1898 - John Grierson, Scottish filmmaker (d. 1972)

● 1900 - Charles Richter, American geophysicist (d. 1985)

● 1910 - Tomoyuki Tanaka, Japanese movie producer and creator of Godzilla (d. 1997)

● 1911 - Marianne Hoppe, German actress (d. 2002)

● 1912 - A. E. van Vogt, Canadian writer (d. 2000)

● 1914 - Bernard Malamud, American author (d. 1986)

● 1914 - James W. Rouse, American investor (d. 1996)

● 1916 - Morris West, Australian writer (d. 1999)

● 1917 - I.M. Pei, Chinese-born architect

● 1917 - Sal Maglie, baseball player (d. 1992)

● 1918 - Fanny Blankers-Koen, Dutch athlete (d. 2004)

● 1918 - Stafford Repp, American actor (d. 1974)

● 1925 - Jørgen Ingmann, Danish musician

● 1926 - Michael Mathias Prechtl, German illustrator (d. 2003)

● 1932 - Michael Smith, English-born chemist, Nobel laureate (d. 2000)

● 1933 - Filiberto Ojeda Ríos, Puerto Rican activist (d. 2005)

● 1933 - Carol Burnett, American comedian

● 1933 - Arno Allan Penzias, German-born physicist, Nobel laureate

● 1938 - Maurice Williams, R&B singer

● 1938 - Duane Eddy, American musician

● 1940 - Giorgio Moroder, Italian composer

● 1940 - Cliff Watson, English rugby league player

● 1941 - John Mitchell, American composer

● 1942 - Claudine Auger, French actress

● 1942 - Michael Kergin, Canadian diplomat

● 1942 - Bobby Rydell, American singer

● 1943 - Gary Wright, American singer

● 1943 - Peter Zumthor, Swiss architect

● 1944 - Amien Rais, Indonesian politician

● 1948 - Giancarlo Esposito, Actor

● 1949 - Carlos Bianchi, Argetinian football player

● 1949 - Jerry Blackwell, wrestler (d. 1995)

● 1955 - Mike Scott, American baseball player

● 1956 - Koo Stark, American actress

● 1958 - Jeffrey Guterman, American mental health counselor

● 1959 - Thanassis Papakonstantinou, Greek singer and songwriter

● 1960 - Roger Taylor, English musician (Duran Duran)

● 1960 - Steve Lombardozzi, American baseball player

● 1961 - Joan Chen, Chinese-born actress

● 1961 - Anthony Cumia, American radio personality (The Opie and Anthony Show)

● 1961 - Chris Mars, American rock drummer (The Replacements)

● 1962 - Colin Anderson, English footballer

● 1962 - Michael Damian, Actor, singer

● 1962 - Debra Wilson, American actress and comedian

● 1963 - Jet Li, Chinese martial artist

● 1963 - Colin Scotts, Australian-born NFL football player

● 1964 - Jimmy Stafford, Rock musician (Train)

● 1965 - Kevin James, American comedian ("King of Queens")

● 1966 - Yoshihiro Togashi, Mangaka who created YuYu Hakusho

● 1967 - Marianne Jean-Baptiste, Actress ("Without a Trace")

● 1967 - Glen Jacobs, American professional wrestler

● 1968 - Joe Caverlee, Country musician (Yankee Grey)

● 1970 - Melania Trump, Slovenian model

● 1970 - Tionne Watkins (T-Boz), American singer (TLC)

● 1971 - Jay DeMarcus, Country musician (Rascal Flats)

● 1972 - Michael Jeffers, Country musician (Pinmonkey)

● 1973 - Chris Perry, English footballer

● 1974 - Adil Ray, British Asian presenter on the BBC Asian Network

● 1975 - Nathan "Joey" Jordison, American musician (Slipknot)

● 1975 - Nerina Pallot, British singer

● 1976 - Jose Pasillas, American musician (Incubus)

● 1977 - Tom Welling, American actor ("Smallville")

● 1977 - Jason Earles, American actor

● 1978 - Avant, American R&B singer

● 1979 - Janne Wirman, Finnish musician (Children of Bodom)

● 1980 - Jordana Brewster, American actress

● 1980 - Marnette Patterson, Actress

● 1980 - Anna Mucha, Polish actress

● 1980 - Channing Tatum, American actor

● 1981 - Matthieu Delpierre, French footballer

● 1982 - Joanne Gobure, Nauruan poet

● 1983 - Jessica Lynch, American P.O.W.

● 1983 - José María López, Argentine racing driver

● 1984 - Mija Martina, Bosnian singer

● 1986 - Aaron Meeks, Actor

● 1988 - Anna Svidersky, American murder victim

DEATHS

● 1192 - Emperor Go-Shirakawa of Japan (b. 1127)

● 1444 - Robert Campin, Flemish painter (b. 1378)

● 1476 - Simonetta Vespucci, inspiration of Botticelli (b.1453)

● 1478 - Giuliano di Piero de' Medici, ruler of Florence (assassinated) (b. 1453)

● 1489 - Ashikaga Yoshihisa, Japanese shogun (b. 1465)

● 1716 - John Somers, 1st Baron Somers, Lord Chancellor of England (b. 1651)

● 1784 - Nano Nagle, Irish convent founder (b. 1718)

● 1789 - Count Petr Ivanovich Panin, Russian soldier (b. 1721)

● 1865 - John Wilkes Booth, American actor and assassin (shot) (b. 1838)

● 1881 - Ludwig Freiherr von und zu der Tann-Rathsamhausen, German general (b. 1815)

● 1892 - Sir Provo Wallis, British Admiral and naval hero (b. 1791)

● 1910 - Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, Norwegian author, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1832)

● 1920 - Srinivasa Ramanujan, Indian mathematician (b. 1887)

● 1932 - Hart Crane, American poet (suicide) (b. 1899)

● 1932 - William Lockwood, English cricketer (b. 1868)

● 1938 - Edmund Husserl, Austrian philosopher (b. 1859)

● 1940 - Carl Bosch, German chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1874)

● 1944 - Violette Morris, French athlete (b. 1893)

● 1945 - Pavlo Skoropadsky, Ukrainian politician and general (b. 1871)

● 1951 - Arnold Sommerfeld, German physicist (b. 1868)

● 1956 - Edward Arnold, American actor (b. 1890)

● 1957 - Gichin Funakoshi, Father of Japanese Shotokan Karatedo (b. 1868)

● 1964 - E. J. Pratt, Canadian poet born Newfoundland (b. 1882)

● 1969 - Morihei Ueshiba, Japanese martial artist and founder of aikido (b. 1883)

● 1970 - Gypsy Rose Lee, American actress (b. 1911)

● 1973 - Irene Ryan, American actress (b. 1902)

● 1976 - Sid James, British comedian (b. 1913)

● 1981 - Jim Davis, American actor (b. 1909)

● 1984 - Count Basie, American musician and composer (b. 1904)

● 1986 - Broderick Crawford, American actor (stroke) (b. 1911)

● 1986 - Dechko Uzunov, Bulgarian painter (b. 1899)

● 1987 - John Ernest Silkin, British politician (b. 1923)

● 1989 - Lucille Ball, American actress and comedian (b. 1911)

● 1991 - Carmine Coppola, American composer and conductor (b. 1910)

● 1991 - Emily McLaughlin, American actress (b. 1930)

● 1996 - Stirling Silliphant, American writer and producer (b. 1918)

● 1999 - Jill Dando, British television presenter (b. 1961)

● 2003 - Rosemary Brown, Canadian politician (b. 1930)

● 2003 - Max Nicholson, Irish environmentalist (b. 1904)

● 2003 - Peter Stone, American writer (b. 1930)

● 2004 - Hubert Selby Jr., American author (b. 1928)

● 2005 - Mason Adams, American actor (b. 1919)

● 2005 - Blade Icewood, American rapper (b. 1977)

● 2005 - Maria Schell, Austrian-born actress (b. 1926)

● 2005 - Augusto Roa Bastos, Paraguayan author (b. 1917)

HOLIDAYS AND OBSERVANCES

● Roman Catholic:
● St. Alda (d. 1309)
● St. Basileus
● Sts. Cletus (Pope Anacletus) (Pope 76-88) and Marcellinus (Pope 296-304), Popes and martyrs
● St. Exuperantia
● St. Franca Visalta
● St. Lucidius (4th century)
● St. Paschasius Radbertus (d. 865)
● St. Peter of Braga
● St. Richarius or Riquier (d. 643)
● St. Trudpert (Irish monk martyred in Germany in 607).

● Russian Orthodox Christian Menaion Calendar for April 13 (Civil Date: April 26)
● Hieromartyr Artemon, prebyter of Laodicea in Syria.
● Martyr Crescens of Myra in Lycia.
● Woman Martyr Thomais of Alexandria.
● Martyr Eleutherius of Persia.
● Martyr Zoilus of Rome.
● New-Martyr Demetrius of the Peloponnesus who suffered at Tripoli.
● St. Martius, abbot of Clermon (Gaul).
● New Hieromartyr Stephen (1933).

● Greek Calendar:
● Martyr Theodosius.

● World Intellectual Property Day (since 2001).

● Georgia : Confederate Memorial Day (1868)

● Guinea-Bissau : Municipal Holiday

● Tanzania : Union Day (1964)

● Virginia : Cape Henry Day

● These Holidays are only applicable on a given "day of the week"
● Alabama, Florida, Mississippi: Confederate Memorial Day (1868) - (Monday)
● US-Utah: Arbor Day-plant a tree (1872) - (Friday)


Click on this LINK to see original Wikipedia list with many having links with details.

Additional facts taken from:

On this day in the New York Times

The BBC’s Take on the day

On This Day Website

Geov Parrish's this Day in Radical History, things that happened on this day that you never had to memorize in school.

Scope Systems Any Day Website

Roman Catholic Saint of the Day

Russian Orthodox Christian Menaion Calendar

Quotes of the Day taken from The Best Liberal Quotes Ever: Why the Left Is Right Compiled by William P. Martin ©2004

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