TODAY IN HISTORY
Today is Tuesday, April 13, the 103rd day of 2021. There are 262 days left in the year.
Today's Highlight in History: On April 13, 1970, Apollo 13, four-fifths of the way to the moon, was crippled when a tank containing liquid oxygen burst. (The astronauts managed to return safely.)
On this date:
In 1613, Pocahontas, daughter of Chief Powhatan, was captured by English Capt. Samuel Argall in the Virginia Colony. (During a yearlong captivity, Pocahontas converted to Christianity and ultimately opted to stay with the English.)
In 1742, "Messiah," the oratorio by George Frideric Handel featuring the "Hallelujah" chorus, had its first public performance in Dublin, Ireland.
In 1861, at the start of the Civil War, Fort Sumter in South Carolina fell to Confederate forces.
In 1870, the Metropolitan Museum of Art was incorporated in New York. (The original museum opened in 1872.)
In 1943, President Franklin D. Roosevelt dedicated the Jefferson Memorial in Washington, D.C. on the 200th anniversary of the third American president's birth.
In 1964, Sidney Poitier became the first Black performer in a leading role to win an Academy Award for his performance in "Lilies of the Field."
In 1992, the Great Chicago Flood took place as the city's century-old tunnel system and adjacent basements filled with water from the Chicago River.
In 1997, Tiger Woods became the youngest person to win the Masters Tournament and the first player of partly African heritage to claim a major golf title.
In 1999, right-todie advocate Dr. Jack Kevorkian was sentenced in Pontiac, Michigan, to 10 to 25 years in prison for second-degree murder in the lethal injection of a Lou Gehrig's disease patient. (Kevorkian ended up serving eight years.)
In 2005, a defiant Eric Rudolph pleaded guilty to carrying out the deadly bombing at the 1996 Atlanta Olympics and three other attacks in back-to-back court appearances in Birmingham, Alabama, and Atlanta.
In 2015, a federal judge in Washington sentenced former Blackwater security guard Nicholas Slatten to life in prison and three others to 30-year terms for their roles in a 2007 shooting in Baghdad's Nisoor Square that killed 14 Iraqi civilians and wounded 17 others.
Ten years ago: A federal jury in San Francisco convicted baseball slugger Barry Bonds of a single charge of obstruction of justice, but failed to reach a verdict on the three counts at the heart of allegations that he'd knowingly used steroids and human growth hormone and lied to a grand jury about it. (Bonds' conviction for obstruction was ultimately overturned.)