This Week In History
April 29, 1968
1968: Hair, the first rock musical, opened on Broadway. A product of hippy counterculture, its use of profanity and nudity was hugely controversial 1913: Swedish-American engineer Gideon Sundback patented an improved version of the zip fastener, calling it a “separable fastener” 1993: South Africa’s President F.W. de Klerk apologised for the nation’s 45-year apartheid regime
2003: Apple’s iTunes Music Store opened on the internet 2015: Chinese scientists announced the discovery of the first known dinosaur with membranous wings
April 30, 2013
Crown Prince Willem-Alexander became King of the Netherlands following the abdication of Queen Beatrix. He was the country’s first king since 1890 1803: The U.S. and France signed the Louisiana Purchase Treaty, doubling the size of the United States 1973: U.S. President Richard Nixon accepted responsibility for bugging the Watergate complex in 1972
2003: Libya accepted responsibility for the 1998 bombing of Pan Am Flight 103 over Lockerbie, Scotland 2017: NASA’s Cassini spacecraft began a series of dives between Saturn’s rings before plunging into the planet
May 1, 1928
The Flying Scotsman made its first non-stop journey from London to Edinburgh, at that time the longest non-stop service by any locomotive in the world 1753: Botanist Carolus Linnaeus first named plants systematically according to their genera and species 1978: Japanese explorer Naomi Uemura became the first man to reach the North Pole solo 1993: President Ali Abdullah Saleh’s ruling party won the most seats in united Yemen’s first general elections 2003: President Bush announced the end of combat operations in Iraq from the deck of an aircraft carrier
May 2, 1953
King Hussein of Jordan succeeded to the throne. He ruled until his death in 1999, and was the second Arab head of state to recognise Israel 1988: Seven Solidarity leaders were detained as thousands of shipyard workers went on strike in Poland 2000: A computer worm disguised as an email message with the subject ILOVEYOU spread worldwide
2011: Al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden was killed by U.S. special forces in a covert operation in Pakistan 2015: American Floyd Mayweather beat the Philippines’ Manny Pacquiao in the most lucrative boxing match in history
May 3, 1968
Students and police clashed violently at the start of a month of riots and strikes in Paris which brought the entire economy of France to a virtual halt 1808: The first duel fought from hot air balloons took place above Paris 1913: The Indian film industry was born when the silent full-length feature film Raja Harishchandra was first shown in Mumbai, drawing vast crowds
1998: The European Central Bank was founded and it was agreed the Euro currency would be introduced in 1999 2016: A massive wildfire in Canada forced the evacuation of all 88,000 residents of Fort McMurray
May 4, 1493
Pope Alexander VI, the Spaniard Rodrigo Borgia, reconfirmed the rights of the Spanish crown in the New World following the finds of Christopher Columbus in 1492 1863: The Maori uprising against the British began in New Zealand after 23 years of running conflict 2006: Zacarias Moussaoui, a French citizen of Moroccan descent, was sentenced for his part in the 9/11 attacks
2007: A boat laden with Haitian migrants capsized in shark-infested waters off the Turks and Caicos Islands 2016: Around 300 people were killed in Aleppo, under attack from Syrian government planes and rebel forces
May 5, 1963
U.S. physician Thomas Starzl carried out the world’s first human liver transplant in Denver. The patient, a 48-year-old man, survived for 22 days 1260: Kublai Khan became ruler of the Mongol Empire. He conquered China and founded the Yuan Dynasty 1818: Karl Marx, Prussian-German philosopher often called the father of communism, was born 2003: FARC guerrillas executed 10 hostages during a rescue attempt by Colombian troops 2010: Over 100,000 Greeks took part in a general strike to protest against stringent austerity measures