Today:
1471 – In the Wars of the Roses, the Battle of Barnet was fought in England; Yorkist forces led by Edward IV defeated the Lancastrians and killed Richard Neville, Earl of Warwick.
1775 – The first abolition society in North America, the Society for the Relief of Free Negroes Unlawfully Held in Bondage, was organized in Philadelphia.
1828 – The first edition of Noah Webster’s “American Dictionary of the English Language” was published.
1860 – The first Pony Express rider reached Sacramento, California, completing the westbound leg of the inaugural journey.
1865 – U.S. President Abraham Lincoln was shot by John Wilkes Booth at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C.; he died the following morning.
1894 – Thomas Edison demonstrated the kinetoscope, a device for viewing moving pictures, to the public.
1912 – The RMS Titanic struck an iceberg in the North Atlantic at 11:40 p.m. ship’s time.
1935 – The worst sandstorm of the Dust Bowl swept across the U.S. Midwest, known as Black Sunday.
1981 – The first operational launch of the Space Shuttle program took place when Columbia returned to space from its maiden voyage.
2003 – The Human Genome Project was completed with 99% of the human genome sequenced to 99.99% accuracy.