On this day

1881 - Natural History Museum of South Kensington England opens

1881 - Billy the Kid escapes from the Lincoln County jail in Mesilla, New Mexico.

1902 - Denmark is 1st country to adopt fingerprinting to identify criminals

1980 - Zimbabwe (formerly Southern Rhodesia) declares independence from UK

Birthdays.

Hayden Christensen-29
Kate Hudson-31
Ashley Judd-42
Tim Curry-64
Dudley Moore-75

1927-Mae West is sentenced to 10 days in jail for obscenity for her play"sex".

1928-The 125th and final part of the Oxford English Dictionary is published.

1587 - The English naval commander Sir Francis Drake sailed a small number of ships into Cadiz Harbour and sank most of the Spanish fleet. The incident became known as 'singeing the King of Spain's beard'.

1770 - Capt James Cook 1st sees Australia

1775 - The start of the American War of Independence against Britain when fighting began at Lexington and Concord.

April 20th.

1836 - Territory of Wisconsin created

1920 - 7th modern Olympic games opens in Antwerp Belgium

1920 - Tornadoes kill 219 in Alabama & Mississippi

1993 - Uranus passes Neptune (once every 171 years)

1653 - Oliver Cromwell dissolved the Rump Parliament. It had followed the Long Parliament that had governed during the Civil War.

1657 - The Spanish Fleet was destroyed in the Battle at Santa Cruz by an English Fleet commanded by Admiral Blake.

1770 - Captain James Cook discovered New South Wales in Australia.

1989 - Scientists said that the Earth had narrowly missed being struck by a passing asteroid weighing 400 million tons.

1972-The Apollo 16 manned mission to the moon lands after a seven hour crisis which nearly aborts the mission.

1974-The conflict in Northern Ireland claimed its 1,000th victim,a petrol station owner from County Fermanagh.

1999-A shooting spree by two US high school students in denver left 25 people dead.

Birthdays.

Carmen Electra-38
Ryan O'Neal-69
George Takei-73

Birthdays

Robert Smith-51
Andie MacDowell-52
James Morrison-56
Iggy Pop-63
Elizabeth II-84

1816-Charlotte Bronte.
1729-Catherine the great.

1509 - Henry VIII became King of England following the death of his father, Henry VII.

1689 - William III and Mary II were crowned joint king and queen of England, Scotland and Ireland.

1918 - Baron Manfred von Richthofen, the legendary German ace pilot who had destroyed 80 Allied aircraft, was shot down by an RAF fighter and died from the crash behind British lines. He was known as the ‘Red Baron’ because of his distinctive red Fokker tri-plane.

1926 - Queen Elizabeth II was born.