Today is Thursday, April 14, the 104th day of 2005. There are 261 days left in the year.
Today’s Highlight in History:
On April 14, 1865, President Lincoln was shot and mortally wounded by John Wilkes Booth while attending the comedy “Our American Cousin” at Ford’s Theater in Washington. (Lincoln died the following morning.)
On this date:
In 1759, composer George Frideric Handel died in London.
In 1775, the first American society for the abolition of slavery was organized by Benjamin Franklin and Benjamin Rush.
In 1828, the first edition of Noah Webster’s “American Dictionary of the English Language” was published.
In 1902, James Cash Penney opened his first store, called “The Golden Rule,” in Kemmerer, Wyo.
In 1912, the British liner Titanic collided with an iceberg in the North Atlantic and began sinking.
In 1931, King Alfonso XIII of Spain went into exile, and the Spanish Republic was proclaimed.
In 1939, the John Steinbeck novel “The Grapes of Wrath” was first published.
In 1981, the first test flight of America’s first operational space shuttle, the Columbia, ended successfully with a landing at Edwards Air Force Base in California.
In 1986, Americans got first word of a U.S. air raid on Libya (because of the time difference, it was the early morning of April 15 when the attack occurred.)
In 1994, two American F-15 warplanes inadvertently shot down two U.S. helicopters over northern Iraq, killing 26 people, including 15 Americans.
Ten years ago: The U.N. Security Council gave permission to Iraq, still under sanctions for its invasion of Kuwait, to sell $2 billion worth of oil to buy food, medicine and other supplies (however, Iraq rejected the offer). Actor-singer Burl Ives died in Anacortes, Wash., at age 85.
Five years ago: On Wall Street, stocks plummeted in heavy trading, with the Dow industrials down 617 points and the Nasdaq composite index falling 355 points, capping one of the worst weeks ever for U.S. stocks. In Washington, protesters dumped manure on Pennsylvania Avenue, seeking to disrupt meetings of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund.
One year ago: In a historic policy shift, President Bush endorsed Israel’s plan to hold on to part of the West Bank in any final peace settlement with the Palestinians; he also ruled out Palestinian refugees returning to Israel, bringing strong criticism from the Palestinians.
Today’s Birthdays: Actor Bradford Dillman is 75. Actor Jay Robinson is 75. Country singer Loretta Lynn is 70. Actress Julie Christie is 65. Former baseball player Pete Rose is 64. Rock musician Ritchie Blackmore is 60. Actor John Shea is 56. Actor Brad Garrett is 45. Actor Robert Carlyle is 44. Rock singer-musician John Bell (Widespread Panic) is 43. Rock musician Barrett Martin is 38. Actor Anthony Michael Hall is 37. Actor Adrien Brody is 32. Rapper DaBrat is 31. Actress Sarah Michelle Gellar is 28. Actress Vivien Cardone is 12.
Thought for Today: “’History repeats itself’ and ’History never repeats itself’ are about equally true ... We never know enough about the infinitely complex circumstances of any past event to prophesy the future by analogy.” — George Macaulay Trevelyan, English historian (1876-1962).