| April 9 is the 99th day of the year in the Gregorian
calendar (100th in leap years). There are 266 days remaining.
Events
- 193 - Septimius Severus
is proclaimed Roman Emperor by the army in Illyricum (in the Balkans).
- 1241 - Battle of
Liegnitz: Mongol forces defeats the Polish and German armies.
- 1682 - Robert de LaSalle discovers the mouth of the Mississippi River, claims it for France and names it Louisiana.
- 1865 - American Civil
War: Robert E. Lee surrenders the Army of Northern Virginia (26,765 troops) to Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Courthouse, Virginia, effectively ending the war.
- 1867 - Alaska purchase: By
a single vote, the United States Senate ratifies a treaty with Russia for the purchase of Alaska.
- 1909 - The U.S. Congress passes the Payne-Aldrich Tariff
Act.
- 1913 - The Brooklyn
Dodgers' Ebbets Field opens.
- 1916 - World War I: Battle of Verdun - German
forces launch their third offensive of the battle.
- 1917 - World War I: Battle of Arras - The battle begins with Canadian forces executing a massive assault on the Vimy Ridge.
- 1939 - Marian Anderson
sings at the Lincoln Memorial, after having been refused the right
to sing at the Daughters of the
American Revolution's Constitution Hall.
- 1940 - World War II: Germany invades Denmark and Norway.
- 1942 - World War II: Battle
of Bataan/Bataan Death March - United States forces surrender on the Bataan Peninsula.
- 1947 - The Glazier-Higgins-Woodward Tornadoes kill 181 and injure 970 in Texas, Oklahoma, and Kansas.
- 1947 - The Journey of Reconciliation, the first interracial Freedom Ride of 16 black and white men traveling through the upper South in violation of Jim Crow laws begins. The riders, sponsored by
CORE and the Fellowship of Reconciliation, are seeking to force southern states to enforce the Supreme Court's 1946 Irene Morgan decision that banned segregation in interstate travel.
- 1948 - Jorge
Eliécer Gaitán's assassination provokes a violent riot in Bogotá (the
Bogotazo), and a further ten years of violence in all of Colombia (La
violencia).
- 1948 - Massacre at Deir Yassin.
- 1953 - Warner Brothers
premieres the first 3-D film, entitled House of Wax
- 1959 - Mercury program:
NASA announces the selection of the United States' first seven astronauts which the news media
quickly dub the "Mercury Seven".
- 1967 - The first Boeing 737 (a 100
series) takes its maiden flight.
- 1969 - The "Chicago Eight"
plead not guilty on federal charges of conspiracy to incite a riot at the 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago, Illinois.
- 1986 - The government
of France rules against the privatization of French automaker Renault.
- 1987 - Dikye Baggett becomes the first person to undergo corrective surgery for Parkinson's disease.
- 1991 - Georgia
declares its independence from the Soviet Union.
- 1992 - Manuel Noriega is
convicted of eight crimes.
- 1992 - John Major wins the UK general election.
- 1998 - The National Prisoner of War Museum is dedicated in Andersonville, Georgia, on the site of an American Civil War POW camp.
- 1999 - Ismail Omar
Guelleh is elected president of Djibouti.
- 1999 - Nigerian President Ibrahim Baré Maïnassara is assassinated.
- 2002 - The funeral of HM Queen Elizabeth, the Queen Mother of the United Kingdom is held at Westminster
Abbey.
- 2003 - 2003
invasion of Iraq: The Ba'ath regime headed by Saddam Hussein in
Iraq is deposed.
Births
- 1773 - Étienne Aignan,
translator, political writer, librettist, playwright, member of the Académie française (d. 1824)
- 1794 - Theobald Boehm,
inventor of the modern flute.
- 1806 - Isambard
Kingdom Brunel, engineer (d. 1859)
- 1821 - Charles
Baudelaire, lyricist (d. 1867)
- 1830 - Eadweard
Muybridge, photographer, motion picture pioneer (d. 1904)
- 1835 - King Leopold
II of Belgium (d. 1909)
- 1848 - Helene Lange, teacher (d. 1930)
- 1867 - Chris Watson, third
Prime Minister of Australia (d. 1941)
- 1897 - John B. Gambling,
radio talk-show host (d. 1974)
- 1898 - Paul Robeson, singer,
political activist (d. 1976)
- 1903 - Ward Bond, actor (d. 1960)
- 1904 - Sharkey Bonano,
jazz musician (d. 1972)
- 1905 - J. William
Fulbright, former Senator from Arkansas (d. 1995)
- 1906 - Antal Dorati, Hungarian
conductor (d. 1988)
- 1908 - Victor Vasarely,
painter (d. 1997)
- 1912 - Lew Kopelew (Lev Kopelev),
author (d. 1997)
- 1919 - J. Presper
Eckert, inventor of the ENIAC computer
- 1925 - Heinz Nixdorf, industrialist (d. 1985)
- 1926 - Hugh Hefner, editor,
publisher
- 1928 - Tom Lehrer, musician and
satirist
- 1932 - Carl Perkins, country and rockabilly musician
(d. 1998)
- 1933 - Jean-Paul
Belmondo, actor
- 1935 - Avery Schreiber,
actor (d. 2002)
- 1945 - Peter Gammons, baseball sportswriter,
journalist
- 1954 - Dennis Quaid, actor
(The Right Stuff, Any Given Sunday, Traffic)
- 1954 - Iain Duncan
Smith, United Kingdom MP
- 1957 - Seve
Ballesteros, Spanish golfer
- 1965 - Jeff Zucker, American
television executive
- 1972 - Emir Delalic Zeko, Bosnian designer
- 1974 - Jenna Jameson, Porn
Star
- 1975 - Robbie Fowler, football
(soccer) striker
- 1978 - Jorge Andrade, football player
- 1978 - Rachel Stevens,
singer
- 1979 - Keshia
Knight Pulliam, actress (Rudy Huxtable, The Cosby Show)
- 1981 - Eric Harris, one of the
Columbine High School massacre gunmen
(d. 1999)
- 1987 - Jessie McCartney, member of boy band Dreamstreet and actor WB11's Summerland
Deaths
- 491 - Zeno, Byzantine emperor
- 1024 - Pope Benedict
VIII
- 1137 - William X,
Duke of Aquitaine (b. 1099)
- 1553 - François
Rabelais, writer (b. c. 1493)
- 1557 - Mikael Agricola,
de facto founder of written Finnish (b. 1510)
- 1626 - Sir Francis Bacon,
philosopher, statesman, essayist (b. 1561)
- 1804 - Jacques Necker, French
statesman, finance minister of Louis XVI (b. 1732)
- 1889 - Michel
Eugène Chevreul, French chemist (b. 1786)
- 1940 - Mrs. Patrick
Campbell, actress (b. 1865)
- 1944 - Evgeniya Rudneva,
Soviet World War II heroine, killed by Nazis
- 1945 - Wilhelm Canaris,
chief of the Abwehr (b. 1887)
- 1945 - Dietrich
Bonhoeffer, theologian and martyr, hanged at Flossenburg concentration camp (b. 1906)
- 1948 - Jorge
Eliécer Gaitán, Colombian politician (b. 1903).
- 1959 - Frank Lloyd
Wright, architect (b. 1867)
- 1963 - Eddie Edwards, jazz musician (b. 1891)
- 1976 - Phil Ochs, singer (b. 1940)
- 1991 - Martin Hannett,
record producer (b. 1948)
- 2002 - Leopold Vietoris,
Austrian mathematician (b. 1891)
Holidays and observances
External links
April 8 - April 10 - March 9 - May 9 -- listing of all days
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