Important Events From This day in History April 20th

 

1999 Columbine High School Shooting

1999: Two students (Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold) wearing balaclavas go through Columbine High School in Denver, Colorado, firing automatic weapons and throwing homemade bombs killing 13 people and wounded 24 others before the two students committed suicide. They had originally planted two home made bombs in the cafeteria and were planning on murdering the students as they ran from the building, when the bombs failed to go off they went into the school and began the massacre.

1957 UK Mayflower Replica Sets Sail

1957: A replica of the original Mayflower which transported Pilgrims to the New World Mayflower II recreating the original voyage sets sail from from Brixton, England, across the Atlantic arriving in Plymouth, Massachusetts on 13th June 1957. The Mayflower II was an exact copy of the original with no engine which took 55 days to complete the journey, The Mayflower II is currently at Plimoth Plantation Museum at Plymouth, Massachusetts. Find More What happened in 1957

1961 Texas Sales Tax Introduced

1961: The House Members in Texas approved a bill for a general retail sales tax of $2 on all sales in Texas but all foods, medicines and Farm Machinery will be exempt.

1871 Third Force Act also known as the "Ku Klux Act" Passed

1871: Congress authorizes President Ulysses S. Grant to declare martial law, impose heavy penalties against terrorist organizations, and use military force to suppress the Ku Klux Klan (KKK).

1906 San Francisco Earthquake and Fires

1906: Firefighters finally end the spread of flames in San Francisco after the earthquake two days earlier on April 18th. The earthquake caused large parts of the city to burn and it had taken 2 days of constant fire fighting to stop the spread and bring the fires under control. Nearly 700 people lost their lives from the earthquake and fires and 200,000 were left homeless.

1914 USA Striking Miners

1914: Men, women and children were killed today when violence broke out between militiamen and striking coal miners in Ludlow, Colorado.

1916 United States Wrigley Field

1916: First game at Weeghman Park (renamed Wrigley Field 1926 after William Wrigley bought controlling interest in the Cubs) home of the Chicago Cubs between Chicago Cubs and the Cincinnati Reds.

1929 US World's Tallest Building Planned

1929: Plans were announced to build the tallest building in the world in New York for the bank of Manhattan which will be 63 stories high.

1934 USA Robbery at Iredell State Bank

1934: Local Texas Newspaper reports a robber identified as the notorious south western outlaw Clyde Barrow robbed the Iredell State Bank, it was not known if he had an accomplice with him in the getaway car a red Plymouth Convertible.
A visitor to The People History Dave Mitchell, the grandson of the bank owner, has taken the time to contact me with the true facts of the case:
"Clyde Barrow did not hold up the Iredell Texas Bank on that date. It was a former associate of Raymond Hamilton (who once ran with Barrow) named George Henry Ward. There was a lone occupant of the bank at the time of the robbery, my father Roi C. Mitchell, who was 20 years old at the time. His father, my grandfather, owned the bank. While the younger Mitchell was attempting to open the safe for Ward, a local resident (a distant relative of mine) entered the bank's back door, and Ward panicked and fled (in a pickup truck, not a red convertible) without getting any money. He was later arrested in Fort Worth. Although I was born 13 years after the incident, it was related to me on many occasions by my father. I have a copy of Ward's mugshots if you are interested."
I think what this shows as much as anything is that even back more than 80 years ago newspaper reporting was sensationalist much as it can be today.

1945 USA "Your Lucky Hit Parade"

1945: For the first time on radio, the show "Your Lucky Hit Parade" is broadcast in homes all over the country. It last for nearly 25 years before television led to its downfall in popularity.

1945 Germany World War II

1945: The German Army in Leipzig surrendered and U.S. troops now control Leipzig and now continue the march to Munich.

1953 North Korea Prison Camps

1953: More information is coming out as the continued exchange of prisoners held in North Korea continue of semi-starvation, calculated brutality and forced marches in communist prison camps.

1968 England Enoch Powell

1968: The Conservative right winger, Enoch Powell (MP for Wolverhampton South West), makes a hard-hitting speech saying Britain had to be mad to allow in 50,000 dependents of immigrants each year and calling for an immediate reduction in immigration attacking the government's immigration policy at a Conservative association meeting in Birmingham. Enoch Powell's "Rivers of Blood" speech led to him being sacked from the shadow cabinet, but made him very popular with tabloids and thousands of workers who staged strikes and marches in support of his views and touched a nerve ending for many who thought the current Immigration laws should be tightened up.

1968 Canada Pierre Elliott Trudeau

1968: Pierre Elliott Trudeau becomes the fifteenth Prime Minister of Canada serving from This Day 1968 to 4 June 1979, and later from 3 March 1980 to 30 June 1984.

1971 US Supreme Court Upholds Busing for Schools

1971: The U.S. Supreme Court upheld the use of busing, the practice of attempting to integrate schools by assigning students to schools based primarily on race, to achieve racial desegregation in schools.

1974 Northern Ireland 1000th Victim

1974: The continuing violence between the two para-military organizations in Northern Ireland claims its 1,000th victim with the death earlier today of a petrol station owner James Murphy in County Fermanagh.

1975 Vietnam Communist Final Push

1975: Communists have amassed 100,000 troops and Armour on the outskirts of Saigon for a final push and President Thieu has resigned saying the US promised aid which has not been forthcoming.

1983 Iraq Car Bombs

1983: 2 cars packed with high explosives blew up in Baghdad today killing and injuring a large number of people, the bombings have been blamed on Iran by Saddam Hussein the Iraq President.

1990 USSR Economy Worsens

1990: The economy in USSR continues to worsen with more food and other items becoming scarcer and more rationing put in place.

2005 USA New Bankruptcy Law

2005: President George W. Bush signed the "New Bankruptcy Law" making it harder for debt-ridden people to wipe clean their financial slates by declaring bankruptcy. The Act of Congress attempts to make it more difficult for consumers to discharge debt (under which most debts are forgiven or discharged) under Chapter 7 (Chapter 7 which was the most common form of bankruptcy in the United States). The second most popular form of Bankruptcy Chapter 13 was "reorganization," or debt adjustment. **** Personal Opinion *** It appears from reading that due to some means test associated with the new laws approximately 85% of debtors are not subject to its "means test" and a large percentage of the rest are able to "pass" the means test. And although Chapter 7 is slightly more complicated it appears it is still in wide spread use.

2006 President Hu shouted at in the White House

2006: A speech by President Hu Jintao at the White House has been disrupted by a protester from the Falun Gong religious sect. President Bush has said he regretted the "unfortunate" incident. The female protester has been identified as a Wenyi Wang, who is an accredited journalist with the Epoch Times newspaper. She shouted from the media gallery during Mr Hu's speech: "President Hu, your days are numbered. President Bush, make him stop persecuting Falun Gong." The Falun Gong is outlawed in China. Dr. Wang Wenyi was later charged with harassing, intimidating and threatening a foreign official.

2008 Paraguay Fernando Lugo

2008: Fernando Lugo and the centre-left Patriotic Alliance for Change has won Paraguay's presidential election, ending more than sixty years of rule by the right wing Colorado Party.

2008 The Pope visits Ground Zero

2008: Benedict XVI has visited Ground Zero in New York, the scene of the 11 September 2001 attacks on Twin Towers, at the end of his six-day tour of the United States. He has greeted survivors, fire and police workers, and relatives of some of the 2,749 people who died there. The Pope prayed for the rescuers and victims, as well as "those whose hearts and minds are consumed with hatred". He then celebrated Mass at New York's Yankee stadium.

2009 Oracle Agrees to Buy Sun Microsystems

2009: The database giant Oracle has agreed to buy Sun Microsystems for $7.4 billion in cash. The unexpected move follows I.B.M.'s walkout of an earlier attempt to purchase it. Oracle has said that the boards of both firms have approved the transaction, and it is expected to take place over the summer of 2009. It is still subject to shareholder approval, as well as regulatory requirements.

2010 US Supreme Court Allows Animal Cruelty Videos

2010: The Supreme Court has ruled that a law which makes it illegal to sell videos of animals being tortured violates the right to free speech. Chief Justice John Roberts said that the law was too broad and invalid to be used under the First Amendment. The ruling is a victory for Robert Stevens, who was sentenced in 2005 to three years for making and selling videos of dog fights. The 1999 law that was used to convict him was intended to prevent depictions of animal cruelty. It was adopted by Congress and originally aimed at limiting internet sales of "crush" videos which show women crushing small animals with high-heeled shoes. Stevens has argued that the videos were intended to educate people about the pit bull breed and that he was not trying to promote illegal dog-fighting.

2010 US Deepwater Horizon Explodes

2010: The Transocean / BP Deepwater Horizon semi-submersible offshore oil drilling rig explodes and is followed by a fire that engulfed the platform, the platform is located 40 miles southeast of the Louisiana coast in the Gulf of Mexico, killing 11 workers and injured 17 others. Following the explosion a sea-floor oil gusher began pumping oil directly into the water, by the time the gusher was capped in mid July more than 200 million gallons of crude oil were released into the environment, causing an environmental disaster including extensive damage to marine and wildlife habitats as well as the Gulf's fishing and tourism industries. Investigations are still ongoing to define who is exactly to blame with the guilty parties including Transocean, BP, Halliburton Energy Service. Questions are also asked over the cozy relationship between Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement. BOEMRE and the oil and gas industry.

2011 Japan Legally Enforces Evacuation Zone

2011: Japan declared it illegal to enter the twelve mile evacuation zone around the Fukushima nuclear plant. The evacuation had originally been voluntary but because of an increased danger risk due to radiation leaks the country decided to ban entry into the area with either a fine or jail time as punishment for defying the ban. Police had stated that around sixty families were still living in the area before the ban.

2012 Mexico's Popocatepetl Volcano Spews Rock and Ash

2012: Mexico's Popocatepetl volcano, the second highest peak in the country, had been spewing rock fragments down its slopes and spewing columns of ash from openings in the crust. The volcano had its last major eruption in 2000. The assistant mayor of a nearby town warned people to take the activity seriously and the National Disaster Prevention Center of the country raised the alert level around the volcano.

2013 Iraq Holds First Election Since US Troops

2013: Provincial elections were held for the first time in Iraq since US troops left the country in 2011. The election also marked the first time Iraqi forces were in charge of security during an election since the 2003 US invasion.

2014 Iranian President Calls For Women's Rights

2014: Iranian President Hassan Rouhani makes a speech about the importance of equal rights and opportunities for women in Iran. Iran has come under foreign scrutiny before for having laws that are perceived to discriminate against women in the country. Iran's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei showed disagreement by stating that equality is not always the correct path and that women's freedoms should not conflict with their roles in a family.

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