On this day in History - Apr. 18

• 1025 - Boleslaw I Chrobry is crowned as the first king of Poland.
• 1161 - Theobald of Bec, dies. Archbishop of Canterbury.
• 1480 - Lucrezia Borgia, was born. Renaissance ruler and daughter of Pope Alexander VI (d. 1519) .
• 1518 - Bona Sforza is crowned as queen of Poland and married to Sigismund I of Poland.
• 1590 - Ahmed I,was born. Ottoman Emperor (d. 1617) .
• 1605 - Giacomo Carissimi, was born. Baroque era composer .
• 1674 - John Graunt, dies. Statistician .
• 1689 - George Jeffreys, dies. British Chief Justice, presided over the Bloody Assizes (b. 1648) .
• 1757 - Nascimento em Santarém de João Diogo de Barros Leitão de Carvalhosa (m. 12 Jan 1818). 1º Visconde de Santarém -Portugal.
• 1768 - Jean-Baptiste Debret, was born (d. 11 Jun 1848). French painter and draftsman, active in Brazil.
• 1775- Paul Revere, William Dawes and Samuel Prescott ride to warn of impending arrests of Samuel Adams and John Hancock and seizure of weapons. Only Prescott finishes the ride.
• 1792 - O poeta Tomás António Gonzaga foi condenado ao degredo para Moçambique.
• 1797 - France & Austria sign cease fire .
• 1802 - Erasmus Darwin, dies. English physician and botanist, grand-father of Charles Darwin (b. 1731)
• 1819 - Carlos Manuel de Cespedes . Revolutionist .
• 1819 - Franz von Suppé, was born. Croatian - Austrian composer (d. 1895) .
• 1838 - Paul-Émile Lecoq de Boisbaudran was born (d. 28 May 1912). French chemist who developed improved spectroscopic methods which had recently been developed by Kirchhoff.
• 1842 - Nascimento de Antero de Quental, em Ponta Delgada. Escritor português.
• 1857 - Clarence Darrow, was born. Attorney (d. 1938) .
• 1862 - Frederik Hansen Södring, dies (b. 31 May 1809). Danish artist.
• 1864 - Richard Harding Davis,was born. Author (d. 1916) .
• 1872 - Bernard Ogilvie Dodge was born (d. 9 Aug 1960). American botanist and pioneer researcher on heredity in fungi.
• 1873 - Justus von Liebig, dies. German chemist (b. 1803 ).
• 1874 - Ivana Brlic-Mazuranic, was born . Croat writer (d. 1938) .
• 1880 - Sam Crawford, was born. Baseball Hall of Famer (d. 1968) .
• 1882 - Leopold Stokowski, English conductor (d. 1977) .
• 1882 - Nasce Jose Bento Monteiro Lobato na cidade de Taubaté. Escritor brasileiro (m. 4 Jul 1948).
• 1884 - Ludwig Meidner, was born (d. 14 May 1966). German Expressionist painter, draftsman, graphic artist, writer, and teacher.
• 1888 - Duffy Lewis, was born. Major League Baseball player (d. 1979) .
• 1893- Jo Swerling, was born. Writer (d. 1964) .
• 1897 - Ardito Desio, was born. Italian topographer and mountaineer (d. 2001) .
• 1898 - Gustave Moreau, dies (b. 06 Apr 1826). French Symbolist painter. He was a strongly individual artist whose highly wrought interpretations of mythical and religious scenes were widely admired during his lifetime.
• 1901 - László Németh, was born. Author (d. 1975) .
• 1901 - Nasceu em Vila Viçosa o professor, matemático, escritor e político português Bento de Jesus Caraça (m. 25 Jun 1948) .
• 1902 - Giuseppe Pella, was born. Former Prime Minister of Italy (d. 1981) .
• 1904 - Pigmeat Markham, was born . Comedian (d. 1981) .
• 1906 - An earthquake with an estimated magnitude of 7.8, destroys much of San Francisco, California.It was responsible for some 3.000 deaths and catastrophic damage (See 1906 San Francisco earthquake) .
• 1905 - George Herbert Hitchings was born (d. 27 Feb 1998). American pharmacologist who, along with Gertrude B. Elion and Sir James W. Black, received the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1988 for their development of drugs that became essential in the treatment of several major diseases.
• 1907 -Lars Valerian Ahlfors was born (d. 11 Oct 1996). Finnish mathematician who was awarded one of the first two Fields Medals in 1936 for his work with Riemann surfaces. He also won the Wolf Prize in 1981.
• 1911 -Maurice Goldhaber was born. U.S. physicist whose contributions to nuclear physics include the discovery that the nucleus of the deuterium atom consists of a proton and a neutron.
• 1921- Jean Richard, was born. Actor (d. 2001) .
• 1921 - Barbara Hale, was born. Actress.
• 1925 - Tentativa de golpe militar, contra o regime republicano, que incluía monárquicos e nacionalistas.
• 1928 - Otto Piene, was born. Painter .
• 1928 - José Vicente de Freitas assume o cargo de primeiro-ministro de Portugal
• 1934- The first "washateria" opens in Fort Worth, Texas.
• 1940 - Robert N. Kucey, was born. Canadian author .
• 1940 - Joseph L. Goldstein was born. American molecular geneticist who, along with Michael S. Brown, was awarded the 1985 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for their elucidation of the process of cholesterol metabolism in the human body.
• 1942 - World War II: The Doolittle Raid on Tokyo occurs.
• 1942 - Pierre Laval becomes Prime Minister of France.
• 1943 - Isoroku Yamamoto, dies. Japanese admiral.
• 1944 - 48th Boston Marathon won by Gerard Coté of Canada in 2:31:50.4
• 1945 - A thousand-bomber raid on the small island of Heligoland leaves - nothing standing; 128 people, mostly anti-aircraft crew, are killed.
• 1945 - Ernie Pyle, dies. American journalist (b. 1900) .
• 1946 - The League of Nations dissolves. (3 months after the UN starts) .
• 1946 - Hayley Mills, was born. Actress .
• 1947 - James Woods, was born. Actor ( The Onion Field, Holocaust, The Way We Were, Night Moves, Against All Odds, Salvador, Casino, Nixon)
• 1947 - Kathy Acker, was born. Author .
• 1947 - While destroying German naval installations on Heligoland, the British Royal Navy detonate 6800 tons of explosive in an attempt to demolish the island.
• 1949 - The Republic of Ireland Act comes into force. (withdraws from British Commonwealth).
• 1949 - Charles Louis Fefferman was born. American mathematician who was awarded the Fields Medal in 1978 for his work in classical analysis .
• 1949 - Geoff Bodine, was born. Automobile racer .
• 1951 - Morreu o ex-presidente da República portuguesa, Marechal Óscar Carmona [António Óscar de Fragoso Carmona].
• 1954 - Gamal Abdal Nasser seizes power in Egypt.
• 1954 - Rick Moranis, was born. Canadian comedian .
• 1955 - Iniciou-se a Conferência Afro-Asiática de Bandung .
• 1955 - Albert Einstein, dies (b. 14 Mar 1879). (E=MC²),German-American physicist who developed the special and general theories of relativity and won the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1921 for his explanation of the photoelectric effect dies .
• 1956 - Anna Kathryn Holbrook, was born. Soap opera actress .
• 1956 - Melody Thomas Scott, was born. Soap opera actress .
• 1956 - Casamento do príncipe Rainier III do Mónaco com Grace Patricia Kelly
• 1958 - A federal court rules that poet Ezra Pound should be released from an insane asylum.
• 1958 - William Joscelyn Arkell dies (b. 9 Jun 1904). English paleontologist, an authority on Jurassic fossils .
• 1961 - Jane Leeves, was born. British actress .
• 1963 - Conan O'Brien, was born. American comedian .
• 1964 - Niall Ferguson, was born. British historian.
• 1964 - Ben Hecht, dies. Playwright, screenwriter (b. 1894) .
• 1966 - Trine Hattestad, was born. Norwegian javelin thrower .
• 1966 - 38th Annual Academy Awards celebration at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium in Los Angeles. Bob Hop the host received a gold medal, the Honorary Award for unique and distinguished service to the film industry and the Academy. Other award recipients included Shelley Winters for her Best Supporting Actress role in "A Patch of Blue"; Martin Balsam, Best Supporting Actor for his performance in "A Thousand Clowns". The Best Actor Oscar went to Lee Marvin ("Cat Ballou"); and Julie Christie picked up the Best Actress Oscar ("Darling"). The Oscar for the Best Music/Song from a 1965 movie was "The Shadow of Your Smile" from "The Sandpiper" (Johnny Mandel-music, Paul Francis Webster-lyrics).The Best Director and Best Picture winner was "The Sound of Music" (Robert Wise, producer and director).
• 1969 - Princess Sayako of Japan's Imperial Family , was born.
• 1972 - The Roland Corporation is founded in Osaka, Japan.
• 1974 - Italian prosecutor Mario Sossi is kidnapped by the Red Brigades.
• 1976 - Melissa Joan Hart, was born in Sayville NY. Actress (Clarissa, Sabrina) .
• 1977 - 6th Boston Women's Marathon won by Miki Gorman of California in 2:48:33 .
• 1977 - 81st Boston Marathon won by Jerome Drayton of Canada in 2:14:46 .
• 1977 - Alex Haley, author of "Roots", awarded Pulitzer Prize.
• 1979 - Michael Bradley, was vborn. NBA basketball player.
• 1980 - The Republic of Zimbabwe (formerly Rhodesia) comes into being.
• 1983 - A suicide bomber destroys the United States embassy in Beirut, Lebanon.
• 1983 - Miguel Cabrera, was born. Major League Baseball player.
• 1983 - 12th Boston Women's Marathon won by Joan Benoit Samuelson in 2:22:43 .
• 1983 - 87th Boston Marathon won by Greg Meyer of Massachusetts in 2:09:00
• 1983 - Pulitzer prize awarded to Alice Walker for "The Color Purple" .
• 1988 - U.S. launches Operation Praying Mantis against Iranian naval forces in retaliation for the April 14 mining of the USS Samuel B. Roberts (FFG-58) in the Persian Gulf during Operation Earnest Will. The one-day action is the world's largest naval battle since World War II.
• 1988 - 17th Boston Women's Marathon won by Rosa Mota of Portugal in 2:24:30
• 1988 - 92nd Boston Marathon won by Ibrahim Hussein of Kenya in 2:08:43 .
• 1993 54th PGA Seniors Golf Championship Tom Wargo .
• 1994 - Brian Lara scores 375 in one inning of a test cricket match, beating Garfield Sobers's previous record of 365.
• 1994 - 23rd Boston Women's Marathon won by Uta Pippig of Germany in 2:21:45
• 1994 - 98th Boston Marathon won by Cosmas Ndeti of Kenya in 2:07:15 .
• 1994 - Former President Richard Nixon suffers a stroke and dies 4 days later .
• 1995 - Morte de Arturo Frondizi. Presidente da Argentina (1958-1962)
• 1996 - Piet Hein, dies. Danish poet and scientist (b. 1905) .
• 1996 - In Lebanon, 102 Lebanese civilians are killed when the Israel Defense Forces shell the UN compound at Qana (see Qana Massacre).
• 1997 - Inder Kumar Gujral é nomeado primeiro-ministro da Índia.
• 1999 - Ordenação episcopal de D. António Maria Bessa Taipa na Sé do Porto.
• 1999 - Povo suíço aceita uma nova Constituição (Bundesverfassung)
• 2002 - A new order of insects, Mantophasmatodea, is announced.
• 2002 - Thor Heyerdahl, dies. Norwegian explorer on the Kon-Tiki (1947) and Ra (1969-70) expeditions (b. 1914)
• 2002 - Wahoo McDaniel, dies. American football player, wrestler (b. 1938)
• 2003 - Edgar F. Codd, dies. Founder of theory of relational databases (b. 1923)
• 2003 - Daijiro Kato, dies. Japanese motorcycle racer (b. 1976) .
• 2004 - Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara, dies. First Prime Minister and later President of Fiji (b. 1920).
• 2004 - O primeiro-ministro José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero ordena a retirada das tropas espanholas no Iraque.