History of 3 April
1922 – Joseph Stalin becomes the first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.
1933 – First flight over Mount Everest, by the British Houston-Mount Everest Flight Expedition, led by the Marquis of Clydesdale, and funded by Lucy, Lady Houston.
1936 – Bruno Richard Hauptmann is executed for the kidnapping and death of Charles Augustus Lindbergh, Jr., the baby son of pilot Charles Lindbergh.
1942 – World War II: Japanese forces begin an assault on the United States and Filipino troops on the Bataan Peninsula.
1946 – Japanese Lt. General Masaharu Homma is executed in the Philippines for leading the Bataan Death March.
1948 – Cold War: U.S. President Harry S. Truman signs the Marshall Plan, authorizing $5 billion in aid for 16 countries.
1948 – In Jeju Province, South Korea, a civil-war-like period of violence and human rights abuses begins, known as the Jeju uprising.
1955 – The American Civil Liberties Union announces it will defend Allen Ginsberg’s book Howl against obscenity charges.
1956 – Hudsonville–Standale tornado: The western half of the Lower Peninsula of Michigan is struck by a deadly F5 tornado.
1967 – The U.S. State Department said that Hanoi might be brainwashing American prisoners.
1968 – Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his “mountaintop” speech just 24 hours before he was assassinated.
1968 – North Vietnam agreed to meet with U.S. representatives to set up preliminary peace talks.
1972 – Charlie Chaplin returned to the U.S. after a twenty-year absence.
1979 – Jane Byrne became the first female mayor in Chicago.
1982 – John Chancellor stepped down as anchor of the “The NBC Nightly News.” Roger Mudd and Tom Brokaw became the co-anchors of the show.
1983 – It was reported that Vietnamese occupation forces had overrun a key insurgent base in western Cambodia.
1984 – Sikh terrorists killed a member of the Indian Parliament in his home.
1984 – Col. Lansana Conte became the new president of Guinea when the armed forces seized power after the death of Sekou Toure.
1985 – The U.S. charged that Israel violated the Geneva Convention by deporting Shiite prisoners.
1986 – The U.S. national debt hit $2 trillion.
1987 – Riots disrupted mass during the Pope’s visit to Santiago, Chili.
1993 – The Norman Rockwell Museum opened in Stockbridge, MA.
1996 – An Air Force jetliner carrying Commerce Secretary Ron Brown crashed in Croatia, killing all 35 people aboard.
1996 – Unabomber suspect Theodore Kaczynski was arrested. He pled guilty in January 1998 to five Unabomber attacks in exchange for a life sentence without a chance for parole.
1998 – The Dow Jones industrial average climbed above 9,000 for the first time.
2000 – A U.S. federal judge ruled that Microsoft had violated U.S. antitrust laws by keeping “an oppressive thumb” on its competitors. Microsoft said that they would appeal the ruling.
2000 – The Nasdaq set a one-day record when it lost 349.15 points to close at 4,233.68.
2010 – The first Apple iPad was released.
2013 – More than 50 people die in floods resulting from record-breaking rainfall in La Plata and Buenos Aires, Argentina.
2016 – The Panama Papers, a leak of legal documents, reveals information on 214,488 offshore companies.
2017 – A bomb explodes in the St Petersburg metro system, killing 14 and injuring several more people.
2018 – YouTube headquarters shooting.
Celebrating Birthday Today
- 1981 – Aaron Bertram, American trumpet player
- 1981 – DeShawn Stevenson, American basketball player
- 1982 – Jared Allen, American football player
- 1982 – Iain Fyfe, Australian footballer
- 1982 – Cobie Smulders, Canadian actress
- 1983 – Ben Foster, English footballer
- 1983 – Stephen Weiss, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1984 – Jonathan Blondel, Belgian footballer
- 1984 – Maxi López, the Argentinian footballer
- 1985 – Jari-Matti Latvala, Finnish race car driver
- 1985 – Leona Lewis, English singer-songwriter and producer
- 1986 – Amanda Bynes, American actress
- 1986 – Stephanie Cox, American soccer player
- 1986 – Annalisa Cucinotta, Italian cyclist
- 1986 – Sergio Sánchez Ortega, Spanish footballer
- 1987 – Rachel Bloom, American actress, writer, and producer
- 1987 – Jay Bruce, American baseball player
- 1987 – Yileen Gordon, Australian rugby league player
- 1987 – Jason Kipnis, American baseball player
- 1987 – Martyn Rooney, English sprinter
- 1987 – Julie Sokolow, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
- 1988 – Kam Chancellor, American football player
- 1988 – Brandon Graham, American football player
- 1988 – Peter Hartley, English footballer
- 1988 – Tim Krul, Dutch footballer
- 1989 – Romain Alessandrini, French footballer
- 1989 – Israel Folau, Australian rugby player and footballer
- 1989 – Joel Romelo, Australian rugby league player
- 1989 – Thisara Perera, Sri Lankan cricketer
- 1990 – Karim Ansarifard, Iranian footballer
- 1990 – Madison Brengle, an American tennis player
- 1990 – Sotiris Ninis, Greek footballer
- 1990 – Natasha Negovanlis, Canadian actress and singer
- 1991 – Stanislav Engovatov, Russian footballer
- 1991 – Hayley Kiyoko, American actress, and singer
- 1992 – Simone Benedetti, Italian footballer
- 1992 – Yuliya Yefimova, Russian swimmer
- 1993 – Pape Moussa Konaté, Senegalese footballer
- 1994 – Kodi Nikorima, New Zealand rugby league player
- 1996 – Mayo Hibi, a Japanese tennis player
- 1997 – Gabriel Jesus, Brazilian footballer
- 1998 – Paris Jackson, American actress, model, and singer