April 18

April 18 is the 108th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (109th in leap years). There are 257 days remaining.

Events

• 1025 - Bolesław I Chrobry is crowned as the first king of Poland.
• 1042 - Michael V attempts to remain sole ruler of the Byzantine Empire by sending his adoptive mother and co-ruler Zoë of Byzantium to a monastery.
• 1518 - Bona Sforza d´Aragona is crowned as queen of Poland and married to Zygmunt I Stary of Poland.
• 1775 - Two lanterns were hung from the steeple of the Old North Church in Boston. Paul Revere, William Dawes and Samuel Prescott ride to warn of impending arrests of Samuel Adams and John Hancock and seizure of weapons. Only Prescott finishes the ride.
• 1797 - Battle of Neuwied resulted in the victory of French under General Louis Lazare Hoche against Austrians under General Wermecek.
• 1906 - An earthquake with an estimated magnitude of 7.8, destroys much of San Francisco, California. (See 1906 San Francisco earthquake)
• 1906 - The Los Angeles Times ran a front page story on the Azusa Street Revival, launching Pentecostalism as a worldwide movement.
• 1915 - Early French aviator and a fighter aircraft pilot Roland Garros was shot down and glided to a landing on the German side of the lines during World War I.
• 1923 - Yankee Stadium, "The House that Ruth Built", opened.
• 1934 - The first "washateria" opens in Fort Worth, Texas.
• 1942 - World War II: The Doolittle Raid on Tokyo occurs.
• 1942 - Pierre Laval becomes Prime Minister of Vichy France.
• 1945 - A thousand-bomber raid on the small island of Heligoland leaves nothing standing; 128 people, mostly anti-aircraft crew, are killed.
• 1946 - The League of Nations is dissolved.
• 1949 - The Republic of Ireland Act comes into force.
• 1954 - Gamal Abdal Nasser seizes power in Egypt.
• 1955 - Albert Einstein dies in his sleep in Princeton, New Jersey.
• 1958 - A U.S. federal court rules that poet Ezra Pound be released from an insane asylum.
• 1972 - The Roland Corporation is founded in Osaka, Japan.
• 1974 - Italian prosecutor Mario Sossi is kidnapped by the Red Brigades.
• 1980 - The Republic of Zimbabwe (formerly Rhodesia) comes into being, with Canaan Banana as the country's first President.
• 1983 - A suicide bomber destroys the United States embassy in Beirut, Lebanon.
• 1988 - U.S. launches Operation Praying Mantis against Iranian naval forces in retaliation for the April 14 mining of the USS Samuel B. Roberts (FFG-58) in the Persian Gulf during Operation Earnest Will. The one-day action is the world's largest naval battle since World War II.
• 1992 - General Abdul Rashid Dostum revolted against President Mohammad Najibullah of the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan and allied with Ahmed Shah Massoud to capture Kabul.
• 1994 - Brian Lara scores 375 in one inning of a test cricket match, beating Garfield Sobers's previous record of 365.
• 1996 - In Lebanon, 102 Lebanese civilians are killed when the Israel Defense Forces shell the UN compound at Qana (see Qana Massacre).
• 2002 - A new order of insects, Mantophasmatodea, is announced.
• 2005 - Papal conclave begins at the Sistine Chapel after death of Pope John Paul II

  Births

• 1480 - Lucrezia Borgia, Renaissance ruler and daughter of Pope Alexander VI (d. 1519)
• 1590 - Ahmed I, Ottoman Emperor (d. 1617)
• 1605 - Giacomo Carissimi, Baroque era composer
• 1772 - David Ricardo, economist (d. 1823)
• 1797 - Adolphe Thiers, French statesman (d. 1877)
• 1819 - Franz von Suppé, Croatian–Austrian composer (d. 1895)
• 1838 - Paul Emile Lecoq de Boisbaudran, French scientist (d. 1912)
• 1857 - Clarence Darrow, attorney (d. 1938)
• 1864 - Richard Harding Davis, author (d. 1916)
• 1874 - Ivana Brlic-Mazuranic, Croat writer (d. 1938)
• 1880 - Sam Crawford, Baseball Hall of Famer (d. 1968)
• 1882 - Leopold Stokowski, English conductor (d. 1977)
• 1888 - Duffy Lewis, Major League Baseball player (d. 1979)
• 1893 - Jo Swerling, writer (d. 1964)
• 1897 - Ardito Desio, Italian topographer and mountaineer (d. 2001)
• 1901 - László Németh, author (d. 1975)
• 1902 - Giuseppe Pella, former Prime Minister of Italy (d. 1981)
• 1904 - Pigmeat Markham, comedian (d. 1981)
• 1921 - Jean Richard, actor (d. 2001)
• 1921 - Barbara Hale, actress
• 1927 - Samuel P. Huntington, political scientist
• 1928 - Otto Piene, painter
• 1940 - Robert N. Kucey, Canadian author
• 1946 - Hayley Mills, actress
• 1947 - James Woods, actor, poker player
• 1947 - Kathy Acker, author (d. 1997)
• 1949 - Geoff Bodine, automobile racer
• 1954 - Rick Moranis, Canadian comedian
• 1956 - Anna Kathryn Holbrook, soap opera actress
• 1956 - Melody Thomas Scott, soap opera actress
• 1961 - Jane Leeves, British actress
• 1963 - Conan O'Brien, American comedian
• 1964 - Niall Ferguson, British historian
• 1966 - Trine Hattestad, Norwegian javelin thrower
• 1969 - Princess Sayako of Japan's Imperial Family
• 1973 - Haile Gebrselassie, Ethiopian athlete
• 1976 - Melissa Joan Hart, actress
• 1979 - Michael Bradley, NBA basketball player
  

  Deaths

• 186 - Saint Apollonius, Roman statesman and Christian apologist
• 1161 - Theobald of Bec, Archbishop of Canterbury
• 1674 - John Graunt, statistician
• 1689 - George Jeffreys, British Chief Justice, presided over the Bloody Assizes (b. 1648)
• 1802 - Erasmus Darwin, English physician and botanist, grand-father of Charles Darwin (b. 1731)
• 1873 - Justus von Liebig, German chemist (b. 1803)
• 1943 - Isoroku Yamamoto, Japanese admiral.
• 1945 - Ernie Pyle, American journalist (b. 1900)
• 1945 - John Ambrose Fleming, physicist and electrical engineer (b. 1849)
• 1947 - Josef Tiso, Czech priest (b. 1887)
• 1955 - Albert Einstein, scientist (b. 1879)
• 1964 - Ben Hecht, playwright, screenwriter (b. 1894)
• 1996 - Piet Hein, Danish mathematician, inventor (b. 1905)
• 2002 - Thor Heyerdahl, Norwegian explorer on the Kon-Tiki expedition (b. 1914)
• 2002 - Wahoo McDaniel, American football player, wrestler (b. 1938)
• 2003 - Edgar F. Codd, Founder of theory of relational databases (b. 1923)
• 2003 - Daijiro Kato, Japanese motorcycle racer (b. 1976)
• 2004 - Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara, first Prime Minister and later President of Fiji (b. 1920)
  Adriana Bertino was born April 18, 1991
  

  Holidays and observances

• Feast days of
• * Saint Apollonius (d. 186)
• * Saint Perfecto (d. 850)
• * Saint Galdino (d. 1176)
• * Eusebius (d. 526)
• * Saint Agia (d. 707
• * Marie de L'incarnation (1566 – 1618)
• Good Friday (2003)
• Easter (1976)
• Zimbabwe – Independence Day
• Massachusetts – Patriots Day (2005)
  

  External links

• BBC: On This Day

April 17 - April 19 - March 18 - May 18 – listing of all days