Today:
1755 – Samuel Johnson’s A Dictionary of the English Language was published in London, becoming one of the most influential dictionaries in the history of the English language.
1817 – The first American school for the deaf, the American School for the Deaf, opened in Hartford, Connecticut.
1865 – President Abraham Lincoln died after being shot the previous evening by John Wilkes Booth at Ford’s Theatre.
1912 – The RMS Titanic sank in the North Atlantic Ocean after hitting an iceberg, resulting in the deaths of over 1,500 people.
1923 – Insulin became widely available for use by diabetics after being developed in Canada in 1921.
1945 – British and Canadian troops liberated the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in Germany during World War II.
1955 – Ray Kroc opened the first McDonald’s restaurant franchise in Des Plaines, Illinois.
1989 – The Hillsborough disaster occurred at a football match in Sheffield, England, killing 96 Liverpool fans due to overcrowding.
2013 – Two bombs exploded near the finish line of the Boston Marathon, killing 3 people and injuring over 260 others.
2019 – The Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris caught fire, causing significant damage to the historic structure.