TODAY IN HISTORY

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT April 26, 1937

German and Italian warplanes raided the Basque town of Guernica during the Spanish Civil War; estimates of the number of people killed vary from the hundreds to the thousands.

ON THIS DATE 1865

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

1968

The United States exploded beneath the Nevada desert a 1.3 megaton nuclear device called “Boxcar.”

1977

The legendary nightclub Studio 54 had its opening night in New York.

1986

An explosion and fire at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Ukraine caused radioactive fallout to begin spewing into the atmosphere. (Dozens of people were killed in the immediate aftermath of the disaster while the long-term death toll from radiation poisoning is believed to number in the thousands.)

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS

Actress-comedian Carol Burnett is 85. Singer Bobby Rydell is 76. Rock musician Roger Taylor (Duran Duran) is 58. Actress Joan Chen is 57. Actor Jet Li is 55. Actorcomedian Kevin James is 53. First lady Melania Trump is 48. Actor Channing Tatum is 38.