April 2

But I will sing of thy power; yea, I will sing aloud of thy mercy in the morning: for thou hast been my defense and refuge in the day of my trouble.             

Psalm   59:16

 April is:

• Child Abuse Prevention Month - Educates people about how to prevent child abuse. Sponsor: National Committee to Prevent Child Abuse.
  
  
• Confederate Heritage Month - Activities take place each week in April in Vicksburg, Mississippi.
  
  
• Dog Appreciation Month - April was declared Dog Appreciation Month in a 1994 Outlast comic strip.

Today is:

• International Children's Book Day - On the birthday of Hans Christian Andersen, author of many fairy tales and children's stories, we celebrate children's literature. Anderson was born in 1805 in Odense, Denmark. Sponsor: International Reading Association
  
  
• National Ferret Day - Take your ferret for a walk today.
  
  
• Pascua Florida Day - In 1512, Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de Leon landed near what is now Saint Augustine, Florida.
  
  
• Saint Francis of Paola Feast Day - Patron saint of seafarers, because many of his miracles involved the sea.
  
  
• Velcro's Birthday - Velcro was introduced in 1978.

Born on this Day

• 0742: Charlemagne, founder of the Holy Roman Empire
  

• 1725: Giacomo Girolamo Casanova, celebrated Italian writer and philanderer, was born Venice, Italy.
  

• 1805: Storyteller Hans Christian Andersen was born Odense, Denmark. Andersen is well remembered for his fairy tales (he wrote over 150); many of them regarded as classics of children's literature.
  

• 1834: Frederic Auguste Bartholdi, the sculptor who created the Statue of Liberty, was born Colmar, France. The sculptor is also remembered for the Lion of Belfort Belfort, France.
  

• 1840: French novelist Emile Zola
  

• 1875: Walter Chrysler, founded a car company.
  

• 1908: Actor Buddy Ebsen
  

• 1914: Actor Sir Alec Guinness
  

• 1917: Actor Dabbs Greer
  

• 1920: Jack Webb
  

• 1928: The Archbishop of Chicago, Cardinal Joseph Bernardin
  

• 1935: Actress Sharon Acker
  

• 1938: Singer-songwriter Warner Mack
  

• 1939: Soul singer Marvin Gaye
  

• 1941: Singer Leon Russell
  

• 1943: Jazz musician Larry Coryell
  

• 1943: Singer-musician (The Fortunes) Glen Dale (Richard Garforth)
  

• 1945: Actress Linda Hunt
  

• 1947: Singer Emmylou Harris
  

• 1949: Actress Pamela Reed
  

• 1952: Rock musician Leon Wilkerson (Lynyrd Skynyrd)
  

• 1953: Actress Debralee Scott
  

• 1954: Actor Ron Palillo
  

• 1955: Actor-comedian Dana Carvey
  

• 1956: Singer-songwriter Gregory Abbott
  

• 1961: Singer (Bananarama) Keren Woodward
  

• 1962: Country singer Billy Dean
  

• 1976: Actor Jeremy Garrett ("Legacy")               
     

Events in History on this day
  

• 0999: Election of Pope Sylvester II
  

• 1118: Death of BaldwI, King of Jerusalem; BaldwII becomes King
  

• 1250: The 7th Crusade surrenders to the Muslims
  

• 1272: Death of Richard, King of the Romans
  

• 1416: Death of Ferdinand I, King of Aragon
  

• 1501: Death of St. Francis of Paola
  

• 1502: Death of Arthur, Prince of Wales, elder brother of Henry VIII of England
  

• 1512: Holy Roman Emperor Maximillian I and Swiss joined the Holy League against France.
  

• 1513: Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de Leon landed Florida. He landed at the site that became the city of St. Augustine and claimed the land for the King of Spain.
  

• 1536: Malmo, Sweden surrendered to Denmark's King Christian II.
  

• 1559: Marriage of Philip II, King of Spain, to Isabella of France
  

• 1559: A peace treaty was signed at Cateau-Cambresis between England and France.
  

• 1566: Two hundred noblemen petition Margaret of Parma to abolish the Inquisition the Netherlands, and aquire the nickname "Les Gueux"
  

• 1595: Spain's King Philip II attempted to aid Earl of Tyrone's rebellion Ireland.
  

• 1699: British Admiral Benbow was sent to West Indies to gain reparations from Spain for the destruction of British ships at Darien.
  

• 1595: Cornelius van Houtman and a Dutch fleet sets sail for the East Indies
  

• 1792: Congress passed the Coinage Act, which authorized establishment of the first U.S. Mint Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
  

• 1814: Musicologist Charles Burney died.
  

• 1842: Classical music gained a stronger foothold the Western Hemisphere when Urieli Hill founded the Philharmonic Society of New York. The New York Philharmonic would give its first concert later the year.
  

• 1860: The first Italian Parliament met at Turin.
  

• 1865: Confederate President Davis and most of his Cabinet fled the Confederate capital of Richmond, Virginia.
  

• 1872: Samuel F.B. Morse, developer of the electric telegraph, died New York.
  

• 1872: G.B. Brayton of Boston, Massachusetts, received a patent for the gas-powered street car.
  

• 1877: The first White House Easter Egg Roll took place during the administration of Rutherford B. Hayes.
  

• 1889: Charles Hall patented aluminum.
  

• 1902: The first motion picture theater opened Los Angeles. The Electric Theater charged a dime to see an hour's entertainment, including the films "The Capture of the Biddle Brothers" and "New York a Blizzard."
  

• 1917: President Woodrow Wilson asked Congress for a declaration of war against Germany.
  

• 1932: Aviator Charles A. Lindbergh and Dr. John F. Condon turned over $50,000 ransom to an unidentified man a Bronx, New York, cemetery exchange for Lindbergh's kidnapped son. (The infant, however, was not returned, and was found dead the following month.)
  

• 1935: Watson Watt granted a patent for RADAR.
  

• 1942: Glenn Miller and his orchestra recorded "American Patrol" at the RCA Victor studios Hollywood.
  

• 1947: The U.N. Security Council appointed the United States as trustee for the Pacific Islands formerly under Japanese mandate, Britareferred the Palestine question to the United Nations.
  

• 1974: French president Georges Pompidou died Paris.
  

• 1982: Argentine troops stormed the Falkland Islands, overwhelming the small British Royal Marine unit stationed there.
  

• 1984: John Thompson became the first black coach to lead his team to the NCAA college basketball championship. His Georgetown Hoyas defeated Houston 84-75 Seattle for the win.
  

• 1985: The NCAA Rules Committee adopted the 45-second shot clock for men's basketball beginning the '86 season. It was an effort to end game stalls that kept opposing teams from further scoring close contests.
  

• 1986: Four American passengers were killed when a bomb exploded aboard a TWA jetliner en route from Rome to Athens, Greece.
  

• 1986: Alabama Gov. George C. Wallace announced he was retiring from public life.
  

• 1987: The US Senate, rejecting a plea from President Reagan, overrode his veto of an $88 billion highway and mass transit bill that the president had denounced as containing "pork-barrel" items.
  

• 1988: Secretary of State George P. Shultz briefed Pope John Paul the Second on his Middle East peace proposals during a private audience the papal library at the Vatican.
  

• 1988: Iraq claimed its forces killed thousands of Iranian troops and overran bases of Kurdish rebels mountainous northeast.
  

• 1989: Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev began a visit to Cuba amid differences with President Fidel Castro over the type of reforms Gorbachev was instituting in the Soviet Union.
  

• 1990: Iraqi president Saddam Hussesaid he would use binary nerve gas weapons - outlawed since 1925 - against Israel if his country was attacked.
  

• 1990: A conciliatory gesture the president of Lithuania invited Kremlin officials to discuss the republic's secession drive.
  

• 1990: The University of Nevada at Las Vegas won the NCAA college basketball championship, defeating Duke 103-73.
  

• 1991: Consumer goods prices increased by as much as 1,000 percent the Soviet Union.
  

• 1991: Iraq state media reported that only a few more days were needed to stamp out fighting with Kurdish rebels, who reported renewed skirmishes around the strategic oil center of Kirkuk.
  

• 1992: Mob boss John Gotti was convicted New York of murder and racketeering; he was later sentenced to life prison.
  

• 1992: French Premier Edith Cresson, who had served ten turbulent months as France's first woman prime minister, resigned after election setbacks for the ruling Socialists.
  

• 1992: The space shuttle Atlantis returned from a nine-day mission.
  

• 1992: government organized demonstrators attacked the embassies of countries that imposed sanctions against Libya.
  

• 1993: Soprano Barbara Hendricks lectured at Dartmouth. Hendricks is a crossover star, known not just to opera fans but also to jazz lovers who checked out her performance with Wynton Marsalis.
  

• 1993: The Bosnian Serb parliament rejected a peace plan drafted by UN and European mediators and already approved by Bosnian Muslims and Croats.
  

• 1993: President Clinton presided at a daylong conference Portland, Oregon, on how much logging should be allowed on federal land.
  

• 1994: President Clinton warned Americans against "demagogues of division" his weekly radio address, while calling for greater personal responsibility and cooperation to overcome the nation's problems.
  

• 1994: Consumer reporter Betty Furness died Hartsdale, New York, at age 78.
  

• 1995: Baseball owners accepted the players' union offer to play without a contract, ending the longest and costliest strike the history of professional sports.
  

• 1995: Members of the extremist group Hamas accidentally set off a bomb that tore through their hideout the Gaza Strip, killing six people.
  

• 1996: A federal appeals court rejected New York state laws banning doctor-assisted suicide, saying it would be discriminatory to let people disconnect life support systems while refusing to let others end their lives with medication.
  

• 1997: The White House released documents showing how eager it had been to exploit the money-drawing powers of President Clinton and Vice President Gore during the 1996 campaign while coordinating with the Democratic Party's fund-raising machine.
  

• 1998: Shaking their fists in rage, thousands of mourners marched in a funeral procession in the West Bank for a top Hamas bombmaker (Mohiyedine Sharif) hailed by Palestinians as a martyr and condemned by Israel as a terrorist.
  

• 1999: The Labor Department reported that the nation's unemployment rate fell to a 29-year low of four-point-two percent in March 1999.
  

• 2000: More than 600 people set out on a five-day, 120-mile protest march to Columbia, South Carolina, to urge state lawmakers to move the Confederate flag from the Statehouse dome.
  

• 2000: Japanese Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi suffered a debilitating stroke (he died less than two months later). 
  

• 2000: Connecticut won its second women's NCAA national championship with a 71-to-52 victory over Tennessee. 
  

• 2001: President Bush  demanded that China promptly return a U.S. spy plane and its crew members. (The plane had made an emergency landing in China after colliding with a Chinese fighter.) 
  

• 2001: Duke won its third national men's basketball championship with an 82-to-72 victory over Arizona.
  
   
  

Today's Daily Miscellany

Send Mail to pbower@neo.rr.com

Looking for more quotations?
Past quotes from the Daily Miscellany can be found here!