Also on this day
American Revolution
1738
On this day in 1738, Henry Clinton, the future commander in chief of British forces charged with suppressing the rebellion in North America, is born in Newfoundland, Canada.
Henry Clinton’s father, George, was the royal governor of Newfoundland at the time of his birth. He was made the royal governor...
Automotive
1946
On this day in 1946, Arthur Chevrolet, an auto racer and the brother of Chevrolet auto namesake Louis Chevrolet, commits suicide in Slidell, Louisiana.
Louis Chevrolet was born in Switzerland in 1878, while Arthur’s birth year has been listed as 1884 and 1886. By the early 1900s, Louis and Arthur, along...
Civil War
1863
Union Admiral David Dixon Porter leads 12 ships past the heavy barrage of Confederate artillery at Vicksburg, Mississippi. He lost only one ship, and the operation speeded General Ulysses S. Grant’s movement against Vicksburg.
Grant had been trying to capture Vicksburg for six months. A first attempt failed when General William...
Cold War
1947
Multimillionaire and financier Bernard Baruch, in a speech given during the unveiling of his portrait in the South Carolina House of Representatives, coins the term “Cold War” to describe relations between the United States and the Soviet Union. The phrase stuck, and for over 40 years it was a mainstay...
Crime
2007
In one of the deadliest mass shootings in U.S. history, 32 people died after being gunned down on the campus of Virginia Tech by Seung Hui Cho, a student at the college who later committed suicide.
The Virginia Tech shooting began around 7:15 a.m., when Cho, a 23-year-old senior and English...
Disaster
1947
A giant explosion occurs during the loading of fertilizer onto the freighter Grandcamp at a pier in Texas City, Texas, on this day in 1947. Nearly 600 people lost their lives and thousands were injured when the ship was literally blown to bits. Ammonium nitrate was used as an...
General Interest
1917
On April 16, 1917, Vladimir Lenin, leader of the revolutionary Bolshevik Party, returns to Petrograd after a decade of exile to take the reins of the Russian Revolution. One month before, Czar Nicholas II had been forced from power when Russian army troops joined a workers’ revolt in Petrograd, the...
1947
At 9:12 a.m. in Texas City’s port on Galveston Bay, a fire aboard the French freighter Grandcamp ignites ammonium nitrate and other explosive materials in the ship’s hold, causing a massive blast that destroys much of the city and takes nearly 600 lives.The port of Texas City, a small industrial...
1972
From Cape Canaveral, Florida, Apollo 16, the fifth of six U.S. lunar landing missions, is successfully launched on its 238,000-mile journey to the moon. On April 20, astronauts John W. Young and Charles M. Duke descended to the lunar surface from Apollo 16, which remained in orbit around the moon...
Hollywood
1889
On April 16, 1889, future Hollywood legend Charlie Chaplin is born Charles Spencer Chaplin in London, England.
Chaplin, one of the most financially successful stars of early Hollywood, was introduced to the stage when he was five. The son of London music hall entertainers, young Chaplin was watching a show starring...
Literary
1922
British author Kingsley Amis is born to a lower-middle-class clerk and his wife.
Amis’ mother encouraged him to write at an early age, and he later attended Oxford, where he was known as an outspoken radical. In World War II, he served with the Royal Corps of Signals and later joined...
Music
1977
On April 16, 1977, David Soul’s smash-hit single “Don’t Give Up On Us Baby” reaches the top of the U.S. pop charts. But the story of a tough-but-sensitive TV detective’s journey to crossover success began a full 10 years earlier.
Ironside, Cannon, and The Rookies. But long before Starsky & Hutch...
Old West
1881
On the streets of Dodge City, famous western lawman and gunfighter Bat Masterson fights the last gun battle of his life.
Bartholomew “Bat” Masterson had made a living with his gun from a young age. In his early 20s, Masterson worked as a buffalo hunter, operating out of the wild...
Presidential
1789
On this day in 1789, newly elected President George Washington leaves his Mount Vernon, Virginia, home and heads for New York, where he is sworn in as the first American president.
Before leaving, Washington addressed a group of citizens in nearby Alexandria, Virginia, to whom he expressed his inner conflict at...
Sports
1940
On April 16, 1940, the Cleveland Indians’ Bob Feller pitches his first no-hitter. He went on to throw two more no-hitters in his career; only two other pitchers in baseball history have recorded more no-hitters.
Feller, who grew up playing catch with his father on his family’s farm in Iowa, made...
Vietnam War
1968
At a series of meetings in Honolulu, President Johnson discusses recent Allied and enemy troop deployments with U.S. military leaders. He also conferred with South Korean President Park Chung Hee to reaffirm U.S. military commitments to Seoul and assure Park that his country’s interests would not be compromised by any...
1972
In an effort to help blunt the ongoing North Vietnamese Nguyen Hue Offensive, the United States resumes bombing of Hanoi and Haiphong after a four-year lull.
In the first use of B-52s against both Hanoi and Haiphong, and the first attacks against both cities since November 1968, 18 B-52s and about...
World War I
1917
On April 16, 1917, Vladimir Lenin, leader of the revolutionary Bolshevik Party, returns to Petrograd after a decade of exile to take the reins of the Russian Revolution.
Born Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov in 1870, Lenin was drawn to the revolutionary cause after his brother was executed in 1887 for plotting to...
World War II
1897
Winterbotham, a British secret service official who would play a decisive role in the World War II Ultra code-breaking project, is born on this day in 1897.
A graduate of Oxford and trained in law, Winterbotham had been a pilot with the Royal Flying Corps in World War II before joining...
