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 Today's
highlight in history:
On April 9, 1865, Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee surrendered his army to Union Gen. Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House in Virginia.
On this date:
In 1682, French explorer Robert de La Salle claimed the Mississippi River Basin for France.
In 1939, singer Marian Anderson performed a concert at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington after she was denied the use of Constitution Hall by the Daughters of the American Revolution.
In 1940, during World War II, Germany invaded Denmark and Norway.
In 1942, American and Philippine defenders on Bataan capitulated to Japanese forces; the surrender was followed by the notorious Bataan Death March which claimed thousands of lives.
In 1947, a series of tornadoes in Texas, Oklahoma and Kansas claimed 181 lives.
In 1959, NASA announced the selection of America's first seven astronauts: Scott Carpenter, Gordon Cooper, John Glenn, Gus Grissom, Wally Schirra, Alan Shepard and Donald Slayton.
In 1965, the newly built Astrodome in Houston featured its first baseball game, an exhibition between the Astros and the New York Yankees. (The Astros won, 2-1, in 12 innings.)
In 1983, the space shuttle Challenger ended its first mission with a safe landing at Edwards Air Force Base in California.
In 1988, pro-Iranian Shiite Muslim hijackers who had seized a Kuwait Airways jetliner on April 5 killed one of their hostages as the plane sat on the ground in Larnaca, Cyprus.
In 2005, Britain's Prince Charles married longtime love Camilla Parker Bowles, who took the title Duchess of Cornwall.
Ten years ago: The National Prisoner of War Museum opened in Andersonville, Ga., the site of the infamous Civil War prison camp. More than 150 Muslims died in a stampede which occurred on the last day of the annual pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca, Saudi Arabia.
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Five years ago: Jubilant Iraqis celebrated the collapse of Saddam Hussein's regime, beheading a toppled statue of their longtime ruler in downtown Baghdad and embracing American troops as liberators. In Afghanistan, a U.S. warplane called in to support allied Afghans under fire mistakenly bombed a house, killing 11 civilians.
One year ago: Tens of thousands of Shiites marched in Iraq to demand that U.S. forces leave their country; some ripped apart American flags and tromped across a Stars and Stripes rug. President Bush visited the U.S.-Mexico border to tout a guest worker program for immigrants.
Today's birthdays: Playboy magazine founder Hugh Hefner is 82. Naturalist Jim Fowler is 76. Actor Jean-Paul Belmondo is 75. Actress Michael Learned is 69. Country singer Margo Smith is 66. Country singer Hal Ketchum is 55. Actor Dennis Quaid is 54. Humorist Jimmy Tingle is 53. Golfer Severiano Ballesteros is 51. Country musician Dave Innis (Restless Heart) is 49. Actress-sports reporter Lisa Guerrero is 44. Actress-model Paulina Porizkova is 43. Actress Cynthia Nixon is 42. Rock singer Kevin Martin (Candlebox) is 39. Rock singer Gerard Way (My Chemical Romance) is 31. Actress Keshia Knight Pulliam is 29. Rock musician Albert Hammond Jr. (The Strokes) is 28. Actor Ryan Northcott is 28. Actor-singer Jesse McCartney is 21. Actress Kristen Stewart is 18. Actress Elle Fanning is 10.
Thought for today: "It is indeed difficult to define just who the 'modern man' is, and what views he has to hold in order to be modern."
-- Josiah Royce, American philosopher (1855-1916)
[Associated Press]
Copyright 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This
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