This day in history
Today is Sunday, April 9, the 99th day of 2023. There are 266 days left in the year.
▶ Birthdays: Satirical songwriter and mathematician Tom Lehrer is 95. Actor Michael Learned is 84. Country singer Margo Smith is 81. Actor Dennis Quaid is 69. Comedian Jimmy Tingle is 68. Country musician Dave Innis (Restless Heart) is 64. Talk show host Joe Scarborough is 60. Actor-sports reporter Lisa Guerrero is 59. Arizona Governor Doug Ducey is 59. Actor Mark Pellegrino is 58. Actormodel Paulina Porizkova is 58. Actor Cynthia Nixon is 57. Rock singer Gerard Way (My Chemical Romance) is 46. Rock musician Albert Hammond Jr. (The Strokes) is 43. Actor-singer Jesse McCartney is 36. Actor Kristen Stewart is 33. Actor Elle Fanning is 25. Rapper Lil Nas X is 24.
▶ In 1413, the coronation of England’s King Henry V took place in Westminster Abbey. ºIn 1865, Confederate General Robert E. Lee surrendered his army to Union Lieutenant General Ulysses S. Grant at Appomattox Court House in Virginia.
▶ In 1939, Marian Anderson performed a concert at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C., after the Black singer was denied the use of Constitution Hall by the Daughters of the American Revolution.
▶ In 1940, during World War II, Germany invaded Denmark and Norway.
▶ In 1942, during World War II, some 75,000 Philippine and American defenders on Bataan surrendered to Japanese troops, who forced the prisoners into what became known as the Bataan Death March; thousands died or were killed en route.
▶ In 1959, NASA presented its first seven astronauts: Scott Carpenter, Gordon Cooper, John Glenn, Gus Grissom, Wally Schirra, Alan Shepard, and Donald Slayton. Architect Frank Lloyd Wright, 91, died in Phoenix.
▶ In 1968, funeral services, private and public, were held for Martin Luther King Jr. at the Ebenezer Baptist Church and Morehouse College in Atlanta, five days after the civil rights leader was assassinated in Memphis.
▶ In 1979, officials declared an end to the crisis involving the Three Mile Island Unit 2 nuclear reactor in Pennsylvania, 12 days after a partial core meltdown.
▶ In 1996, in a dramatic shift of purse-string power, President Bill Clinton signed a line-item veto bill into law. (However, the US Supreme Court struck down the veto in 1998.)
▶ In 2003, jubilant Iraqis celebrated the collapse of Saddam Hussein’s regime, beheading a toppled statue of their longtime ruler in downtown Baghdad and embracing American troops as liberators.
▶ In 2005, Britain’s Prince Charles married longtime love Camilla Parker Bowles, who took the title Duchess of Cornwall.
▶ In 2010, Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens announced his retirement. (His vacancy was filled by Elena Kagan.)
▶ In 2013, Connecticut’s women’s basketball team won its eighth NCAA championship with a 93-60 rout of Louisville at New Orleans Arena.
▶ In 2021, Britain’s Prince Philip, husband of Queen Elizabeth II, died at the age of 99; he was Britain’s longest-serving consort.