April 6

April 6 is the 96th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (97th in leap years). There are 269 days remaining.

Events

• 648 BC – Earliest solar eclipse recorded by the Ancient Greeks.
• 402 – Stilicho stymies the Visigoths under Alaric in the Battle of Pollentia
• 1320 – The Scots reaffirm their independence by signing the Declaration of Arbroath.
• 1327 – The poet Petrarch first saw his idealized love Laura in the church of St. Claire in Avignon.
• 1652 – Dutch sailor Jan van Riebeeck establishes a resupply camp at the Cape of Good Hope, which will eventually develop into Cape Town.
• 1782 – Rama I succeeds King Taksin of Thailand, who was overthrown in a coup d'état.
• 1808 – John Jacob Astor incorporates the American Fur Company.
• 1830 – The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is formed by Joseph Smith, Jr. at Fayette, New York.
• 1832 – Indian Wars: Black Hawk War begins – The Sauk warrior Black Hawk enters into war with the United States.
• 1841 – John Tyler is inaugurated as the 10th President of the United States.
• 1862 – American Civil War: Battle of Shiloh begins – In Tennessee, forces under Union General Ulysses S. Grant meet Confederate troops led by General Albert Sidney Johnston at Shiloh.
• 1865 – American Civil War: Battle of Sayler's Creek – Confederate General Robert E. Lee's Army of Northern Virginia fights its last major battle while in retreat from Richmond, Virginia.
• 1869 – Celluloid is patented.
• 1886 – Vancouver, British Columbia is incorporated as a city.
• 1895 – Oscar Wilde is arrested after losing a libel case against the John Sholto Douglas, 9th Marquess of Queensberry.
• 1896 – In Athens, the opening of the first modern Olympic Games after 1,500 years after being banned by Roman Emperor Theodosius I.
• 1893 – Salt Lake Temple of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints dedicated by Wilford Woodruff.
• 1903 – The Kishinev pogrom in Kishinev (Bessarabia) began, forcing tens of thousands of Jews to later seek refuge in Israel and the west.
• 1909 – Robert Peary allegedly reaches the North Pole.
• 1917 – World War I: United States declares war on Germany (see Wilson's address to Congress (Wikisource)).
• 1926 – Walter Varney Airlines makes first commercial flight from Pasco, WA to Elko, NV. Varney is the root company of United Airlines.
• 1930 – Gandhi raised a lump of mud and salt (some say just a pinch, some say just a grain) and declared, "With this, I am shaking the foundations of the British Empire." Thus he started Salt Satyagraha.
• 1930 – Hostess Twinkies are invented.
• 1930  – Will Rogers starts broadcasting The Will Rogers Program on radio.
• 1931 – Little Orphan Annie debuts on the Blue Network of NBC.
• 1936 – Tupelo-Gainesville Outbreak: Another tornado from the same storm system as the Tupelo tornado hits Gainesville, Georgia killing 203.
• 1941 – World War II: Operation Castigo begins – Germany invades Kingdom of Yugoslavia and Greece.
• 1968 – In London, United Kingdom, Massiel wins the thirteenth Eurovision Song Contest for Spain singing "La, la, la".
• 1972 – Vietnam War: Easter Offensive – The first day of clear weather in three days allows American forces to start sustained air strikes and naval bombardments.
• 1973 – Launch of Pioneer 11 spacecraft.
• 1974 – The California Jam Rock concert begins.
• 1974 – In Brighton, United Kingdom, ABBA wins the nineteenth Eurovision Song Contest for Sweden singing "Waterloo".
• 1985 – King and Queen Whalnutshia, Derwent Daw and Shannon Winser, forming the first monarchy of the island since 1679.
• 1987 – Sugar Ray Leonard takes the middleweight boxing title from Marvin Hagler.
• 1993 – Russian nuclear accident at Tomsk 7.
• 1994 – The Rwandan Genocide begins when the aircraft carrying Rwandan president Juvénal Habyarimana and Burundian president Cyprien Ntaryamira is shot down by extremists.
• 1998 – Pakistan tests medium-range missiles capable of hitting India.

Births

• 1483 – Raphael, Italian painter and architect (d. 1520)
• 1815 – Robert Volkmann, composer (d. 1883)
• 1823 – Joseph Medill, Mayor of Chicago (d. 1899)
• 1826 – Gustave Moreau, French painter (d. 1898)
• 1866 – Butch Cassidy, outlaw (d. 1909)
• 1878 – Erich Mühsam, German author (d. 1934)
• 1884 – Walter Huston, Academy Award winning actor (d. 1950)
• 1890 – Anthony Fokker, Dutch designer of aircraft (d. 1939)
• 1892 – Donald Wills Douglas, Sr., American industrialist (d. 1981)
• 1892  – Lowell Thomas, travel writer (d. 1981)
• 1903 – Mickey Cochrane, Baseball Hall of Famer (d. 1962)
• 1903 – Doc Edgerton, American electrical engineering (d. 1990)
• 1926 – Gil Kane, cartoonist (d. 2000)
• 1926 – Ian Paisley, United Kingdom politician
• 1926 – Sergio Franchi, singer, actor (d. 1990)
• 1927 – Gerry Mulligan, musician (d. 1996)
• 1928 – James D. Watson, geneticist
• 1929 – André Previn, composer, conductor
• 1931 – Ivan Dixon, American actor, director
• 1933 – Roy Goode, legal academic
• 1937 – Merle Haggard, country musician
• 1937 – Billy Dee Williams, actor
• 1938 – Paul Daniels, magician
• 1938 – Roy Thinnes, American actor
• 1941 – Phil Austin, comedian
• 1941 – Hans W. Geissendörfer, German film director
• 1941 – Zamfir, Romanian musician
• 1942 – Barry Levinson, producer, director
• 1944 – Felicity Palmer, English soprano
• 1947 – John Ratzenberger, actor (Cheers)
• 1951 – Bert Blyleven, baseball pitcher
• 1952 – Marilu Henner, actress
• 1954 – Thom Bray, actor and filmographer
• 1955 – Michael Rooker, actor
• 1965 – Frank Black, a.k.a Charles Thompson, singer, songwriter (Pixies)
• 1969 – Bret Boone, Major League Baseball All-Star
• 1969 – Ari Meyers, actress
• 1969 – Bison Dele, American basketball player (disappeared 2002)
• 1970 – Olaf Kölzig, NHL goalie
• 1975 – Zach Braff, American actor
• 1976 – Candace Cameron, actress

Deaths

• 1199 – King Richard I of England (b. 1157)
• 1520 – Raphael, Italian painter and architect (b. 1483)
• 1528 – Albrecht Dürer, German artist (b. 1471)
• 1862 – Albert Sidney Johnston, American Confederate general (b. 1803)
• 1883 – Benjamin Raymond, Mayor of Chicago (b. 1801)
• 1906 – Alexander Kielland, Norwegian author
• 1935 – Edwin Arlington Robinson, Pulitzer Prize-winning poet (b. 1869)
• 1961 – Jules Bordet, Belgian immunologist and microbiologist
• 1963 – Otto Struve, astronomer, (b. 1897)
• 1970 – Sam Sheppard, American accused murderer
• 1971 – Igor Stravinsky, Russian composer (b. 1882)
• 1992 – Isaac Asimov, American author (b. 1920)
• 1994 – Juvénal Habyarimana, President of Rwanda (b. 1937)
• 1994 – Cyprien Ntaryamira, President of Burundi (b. 1956)
• 1996 – Greer Garson, actress (b. 1904)
• 1998 – Tammy Wynette, country musician (b. 1942)
• 1998 – Wendy O. Williams, American musician (Plasmatics)
• 2000 – Habib Bourguiba, President of Tunisia (b. 1903)
• 2003 – David Bloom, American journalist (pulmonary embolism) (b. 1963)
• 2003 – Babatunde Olatunji, jazz musician (b. 1927)
• 2004 – Marjorie Pay Hinckley, wife of Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints President Gordon B. Hinckley (b. 1911)
• 2005 – Rainier III, Prince of Monaco (b. 1923)

Holidays and observances

• Feast day of Marcellinus of Carthage in the Roman Catholic Church.
• The start of the tax year in the United Kingdom (arising from the 11 day correction to March 25 at the adoption of the Gregorian calendar in 1752).
• Tartan Day, a day set aside for the celebration of the Scottish influence on America.

External links

• BBC: On This Day

April 5 – April 7 – March 6 – May 6 — listing of all days