Also on this day
American Revolution
1776
In a letter to Reverend Samuel Cooper dated April 30, 1776, Samuel Adams writes of his hopes for another battle between British and American troops, stating his belief that, ” One battle would do more towards a Declaration of Independence than a long chain of conclusive arguments in a provincial...
Automotive
1948
The Land Rover, a British-made all-terrain vehicle that will earn a reputation for its use in exotic locales, debuts at an auto show in Amsterdam on April 30, 1948.
The first Land Rover, known as the Series 1, was the brainchild of Maurice Wilks, the head designer for the British car...
Civil War
1864
At the Battle of Jenkins’ Ferry in Arkansas, Union troops under General Frederick Steele fight off a Confederate army under General Edmund Kirby Smith as the Yankees retreat towards Little Rock, Arkansas.
Jenkins’ Ferry came at the end of a major Union offensive in Arkansas. While a Federal force under General...
Cold War
1948
The United States and 20 Latin American nations sign the charter establishing the Organization of American States (OAS). The new institution was designed to facilitate better political relations between the member states and, at least for the United States, to serve as a bulwark against communist penetration of the Western...
Crime
1927
The Federal Industrial Institution for Women, the first women’s federal prison, opens in Alderson, West Virginia. All women serving federal sentences of more than a year were to be brought here.
Run by Dr. Mary B. Harris, the prison’s buildings, each named after social reformers, sat atop 500 acres. One judge...
Disaster
1888
A hail storm devastates the farming town of Moradabad, India, killing 230 people and many more farm animals on this day in 1888. Sixteen others died in nearby Bareilly. In the Central Plains region of Uttar Pradesh, March and April are the prime seasons for hail. However, the...
General Interest
1789
In New York City, George Washington, the great military leader of the American Revolution, is inaugurated as the first president of the United States.In February 1789, all 69 presidential electors unanimously chose Washington to be the first U.S. president. In March, the new U.S. constitution officially took effect, and in...
1803
On April 30, 1803, representatives of the United States and Napoleonic France conclude negotiations for the Louisiana Purchase, a massive land sale that doubles the size of the young American republic. What was known as Louisiana Territory comprised most of modern-day United States between the Mississippi and the Rocky Mountains,...
1939
On April 30, 1939, the New York World’s Fair opens in New York City. The opening ceremony, which featured speeches by President Franklin D. Roosevelt and New York Governor Herbert Lehman, ushered in the first day of television broadcasting in New York.Spanning 1,200 acres at Flushing Meadow Park in Queens,...
Hollywood
1997
On this day in 1997, in a widely publicized episode of the ABC sitcom Ellen, TV character Ellen Morgan (played by Ellen DeGeneres) announces that she is gay.
DeGeneres, a former stand-up comedian who was born on January 26, 1958, became part of the ensemble cast of the ABC series These...
Literary
1945
Poet, essayist, and novelist Annie Dillard is born on this day in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, in 1945.
At age 28, Dillard became the youngest American woman to win the Pulitzer Prize, which she was awarded for her collection of essays Pilgrim at Tinker Creek (1974). The book, often compared with Henry David...
Music
1933
Willie Nelson’s sound and his look revolutionized country music, making him one of that genre’s most recognizable faces, and if his winning personality weren’t enough reason to like him, then his good-natured struggles with the IRS would be. But before Willie Nelson became a legend or an icon, he was...
Old West
1867
Burton C. Mossman, a rancher turned lawman, is born in Aurora, Illinois.
Little is known about Mossman’s childhood in Illinois, though he apparently learned to be self-reliant and resourceful at a young age. When he was 21, Mossman left home and moved to Mexico, where he quickly began proving himself...
Presidential
1789
On this day in 1789, George Washington is sworn in as the first American president and delivers the first inaugural speech at Federal Hall in New York City. Elements of the ceremony set tradition; presidential inaugurations have deviated little in the two centuries since Washington’s inauguration.
In front of 10,000 spectators,...
Sports
1993
Top women’s tennis player Monica Seles is stabbed by a deranged German man during a match in Hamburg. The assailant, a fan of German tennis star Steffi Graf, apparently hoped that by injuring Seles his idol Graf would be able to regain her No. 1 ranking.
Seles became the youngest woman...
Vietnam War
1975
By dawn, communist forces move into Saigon, where they meet only sporadic resistance. The South Vietnamese forces had collapsed under the rapid advancement of the North Vietnamese. The most recent fighting had begun in December 1974, when the North Vietnamese had launched a major attack against the lightly defended province...
World War I
1917
On this day in 1917, the so-called Battle of the Boot marks the end of the British army’s Samarra Offensive, launched the previous month by Anglo-Indian forces under the regional commander in chief, Sir Frederick Stanley Maude, against the important Turkish railroad at Samarra, some 130 kilometers north of Baghdad,...
World War II
1945
Der Fuhrer, Adolf Hitler, dictator of Germany, burrowed away in a refurbished air-raid shelter, consumes a cyanide capsule, then shoots himself with a pistol, on this day in 1945, as his “1,000-year” Reich collapses above him.
Hitler had repaired to his bunker on January 16, after deciding to remain in Berlin...