It was a good day in 1970...see below.
Today is Tuesday, April 17, 2018, the 107th day of the year with 258 days remaining.
- Sunrise: 6:32am
- Sunset: 7:47pm
...giving us 13 hours and 16 minutes of daylight. None of the still new moon will be visible, rising in the days ahead.
Tides at the Golden Gate
- High: 12:50am/1:56pm
- Low: 7:06am/7:05pm
Special international celebrations today…
- FAO Day - Iraq
- Independence Day - Cambodia, Syria
- World Hemophilia Day
- World Malbec Day
It’s also…
- Bat Appreciation Day
- Blah! Blah! Blah! Day
- Ellis Island Family History Day
- Ford Mustang Day
- Herbalist Day
- International Haiku Poetry Day
- National Cheeseball Day
- Nothing Like A Dame Day
On this day in…
1492 - Christopher Columbus signed a contract with Spain to find a passage to Asia and the Indies.
1521 - Martin Luther was excommunicated from the Roman Catholic Church.
1524 - New York Harbor was discovered by Giovanni Verrazano.
1535 - Antonio Mendoza was appointed first viceroy of New Spain.
1629 - Horses were first imported into the colonies by the American Massachusetts Bay Colony.
1704 - John Campbell published what would eventually become the first successful American newspaper. It was known as the Boston "News-Letter."
1758 - Frances Williams published a collection of Latin poems. He was the first African-American to graduate from a college in the western hemisphere.
1808 - Bayonne Decree by Napoleon I of France ordered the seizure of U.S. ships.
1810 - Pineapple cheese was patented by Lewis M. Norton.
1824 - Russia abandoned all North American claims south of 54' 40'.
1860 - New Yorkers learned of a new law that required fire escapes to be provided for tenement houses.
1861 - Virginia became the eighth state to secede from the Union.
1864 - U.S. Civil War General Grant banned the trading of prisoners.
1865 - Mary Surratt was arrested as a conspirator in the Lincoln assassination.
1875 - The game "snooker" was invented by Sir Neville Chamberlain.
1895 - China and Japan signed the Treaty of Shimonoseki. It was the end of the first Sino-Japanese War. In the treaty China ceded Taiwan to Japan.
1916 - The American Academy of Arts and Letters obtained a charter from the U.S. Congress.
1917 - A bill in Congress to establish Daylight Saving Time was defeated. It was passed a couple of months later.
1935 - "Lights Out" debuted on NBC Radio. It ran until 1952.
1941 - Igor Sikorsky accomplished the first successful helicopter lift-off from water near Stratford, CT.
1941 - The office of Price Administration was established in the U.S. to handle rationing.
1946 - The last French troops left Syria.
1947 - Jackie Robinson (Brooklyn Dodgers) performed a bunt for his first major league hit.
1961 - About 1,400 U.S.-supported Cuban exiles invaded Cuba at the Bay of Pigs in an attempt to overthrow Fidel Castro. It was an unsuccessful attack.
1964 - Jerrie Mock became first woman to fly an airplane solo around the world.
1964 - The Ford Motor Company unveiled its new Mustang model.
1967 - "The Joey Bishop Show" debuted on ABC-TV.
1967 - The U.S. Supreme Court barred Muhammad Ali's request to be blocked from induction into the U.S. Army.
1969 - In Los Angeles, Sirhan Sirhan was convicted of assassinating U.S. Senator Robert F. Kennedy.
1969 - Czechoslovak Communist Party chairman Alexander Dubcek was deposed.
1970 - Apollo 13 returned to Earth safely after an on-board accident with an oxygen tank.
1975 - Khmer Rouge forces capture the capital of Cambodia, Phnom Penh. It was the end of the five-year war.
1983 - In Warsaw, police routed 1,000 Solidarity supporters.
1983 - In New York, a transit strike that began on March 7 ended.
19840 - In London, demonstrators outside the Libyan Embassy were fired upon from someone inside. Eleven people were injured and an English Police woman was killed.
1985 - The U.S. Postal Service unveiled its new 22-cent, "LOVE" stamp.
1985 - In Lebanon, the cabinet resigned as Shiites took W. Beirut.
1987 - In Sri Lanka, Tamil guerrillas killed 122 people in a road ambush.
1989 - In Poland, courts gave Solidarity legal status.
1993 - A federal jury in Los Angeles convicted two former police officers of violating the civil rights of beaten motorist Rodney King. Two other officers were acquitted.
1996 - Erik and Lyle Menendez were sentenced to life in prison without parole for killing their parents.
1999 - In India, the government of Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee collapsed after losing a vote of confidence.
2002 - At the National Maritime Museum in London, the exhibit "Skin Deep - A History of Tattooing" opened
Today’s birthday celebrants include (or included)...
- Henry Vaughan 1622 - Author, physician, poet
- Mifflin Gibbs 1823 - Abolitionist, judge
- J.P. (John Pierpoint) Morgan 1837 - Financier
- Thornton Wilder 1897 - Novelist, playwright
- Gregor Piatigorsky 1903 - Cellist
- Arthur Lake 1905 - Actor ("Blondie" series)
- Sirimavo Bandaranaike 1916 - Ceylon Prime Minister, the world's first woman prime minister
- William Holden (Beedle Jr.) 1918 - Actor ("Stalag 17 [1953]", "The Bridge on the River Kwai", "The Towering Inferno")
- Harry Reasoner 1923 - Newsman ("Sixty Minutes")
- Lon McCallister 1923
- Solly (Solomon Joseph) Hemus 1923 - Baseball player
- Lindsay Anderson 1923 - Director
- Roy Gallant 1924 - Author
- Chris Barber 1930 - Musician, bandleader
- Don Kirshner 1934 - Music publisher, created The Monkees
- Warren Chiasson 1934 - Jazz musician (Warren Chiasson Duo)
- Lamar Lundy 1935 - Football player
- Dennis Hextall 1943 - Hockey player
- Bobby Curtola 1944 - Singer
- Jan Hammer 1948 - Composer, musician
- Pedro (Modesto Delfi) Garcia 1950 - Baseball player
- Olivia Hussey 1951 - Actress ("Ice Cream Man", "Psycho 4: The Beginning")
- Pete Shelley (Peter Campbell McNeish) 1955 - Musician (The Buzzcocks)
- Sean Bean 1958 - Actor ("Goldeneye", "The Lord of the Rings" series)
- Teri Austin 1959
- Stephen Singleton 1959 - Musician (ABC)
- Boomer (Norman) Esiason 1961 - Football player, TV commentator
- Lela Rochon 1964
- William Mapother 1965 - Actor ("Lost)
- Henry Cusick 1967 - Actor ("Lost") -Lost Merchandise
- Marquis Grissom 1967 - Baseball player
- Liz Phair 1967 - Singer, songwriter
- Redman 1970 - Rapper, actor
- Jennifer Anne Garner 1972 - Actress ("Daredevil", "Electra", "Alias")
- Victoria Beckham (Victoria Caroline Adams) 1974 - Singer (Posh Spice of theSpice Girls)
