TODAY IN HISTORY

Today is Sunday, April 26, the 117th day of 2020. There are 249 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History:

On April 26, 1994, voting began in South Africa’s first all-race elections, resulting in victory for the African National Congress and the inauguration of Nelson Mandela as president.

On this date:

■ In 1607, English colonists went ashore at present-day Cape Henry, Virginia, on an expedition to establish the first permanent English settlement in the Western Hemisphere.

■ In 1785, American naturalist, hunter and artist John James Audubon was born in present-day Haiti.

■ In 1865, John Wilkes Booth, the assassin of President Abraham Lincoln, was surrounded by federal troops near Port Royal, Virginia, and killed.

■ In 1933, Nazi Germany’s infamous secret police, the Gestapo, was created.

■ In 1945, Marshal Henri Philippe Petain (ahn-REE’ feeLEEP’ pay-TAN’), the head of France’s Vichy government during World War II, was arrested.

■ In 1961, Roger Maris of the New York Yankees hit the first of his 61 home runs during a 162-game season (compared to Babe Ruth’s 60 home runs during a 154-game season) as he hit a roundtripper off Paul Foytack at Tiger Stadium.

■ In 1968, the United States exploded beneath the Nevada desert a 1.3 megaton nuclear device called “Boxcar.”

■ In 1989, actress-comedian Lucille Ball died at Cedars Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles at age 77.

Thought for Today: “A good scapegoat is nearly as welcome as a solution to the problem.” — Author unknown.