On This Day in History

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On March 30, 1965, a bomb explodes in a car parked in front of the U.S. Embassy in Saigon, virtually destroying the building and killing 19 Vietnamese, 2 Americans, and 1 Filipino; 183 others were injured. Congress quickly appropriated $1 million to reconstruct the embassy. Although some U.S. military leaders advocated special retaliatory raids on North Vietnam, President Lyndon B. Johnson refused.

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March 30th In Music

1963 - The Chiffons started a four week run at No. 1 on the US singles chart with ‘He’s So Fine’. In 1971 George Harrison was taken to court accused of copying the song on his 1970 ‘My Sweet Lord’ and ordered to pay $587,000 to the writers.

1963 - 16 year-old Lesley Gore recorded her breakthrough hit, 'It's My Party' at Bell Studios in New York. That night, her producer Quincy Jones finds out that Phil Spector has recorded the song with his group The Crystals, so Jones rush-releases it to get Gore's version to radio stations first. The song produced by Quincy Jones went on to be a US No. 1.

Birthdays:

1942 - Graeme Edge. Drummer with English rock band The Moody Blues who had the 1965 US No. 10 single 'Go Now' and other hits singles including, 'Nights in White Satin' and 'Question'. Born in Staffordshire, England. Died on 11.11.2021, age 80.

1945 - Eric Clapton. Guitarist, singer, songwriter who has been a member of The Roosters, Casey Jones and the Engineers, John Mayall's Bluesbreakers, Yardbirds and Cream who had the 1967 UK No. 11 single 'I Feel Free'. He was a member of Blind Faith, and later formed Derek and the Dominoes who had the 1972 UK No. 7 single 'Layla'. As a solo artist Clapton scored the 1974 US No. 1 single 'I Shot The Sheriff' and the 1992 UK No. 5 & US No. 25 single 'Tears in Heaven'. Born in Ripley, England.

1950 - Dave Ball. Procol Harum, 1967 US No. 5 single 'A Whiter Shade Of Pale' (one of the few singles to have sold over 10 million copies) and scored the hits 'Homburg', 'Conquistador'.

1955 - Randy VanWarmer. American singer-songwriter and guitarist who had the 1979 US No. 4 single 'Just When I Needed You Most'. Born in Indian Hills, Colorado. He died on 1.12.2004.

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On March 31,1492, King Ferdinand II of Aragon and Queen Isabella I of Castille issued the Alhambra Decree, mandating that all Jews be expelled from Spain after conquering the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada, finally freeing Spain from Muslim rule after nearly 800 years. The monarchs marriage and conquests cemented Spain as a unified kingdom.
In 1478, Ferdinand and Isabella had instituted the Inquisition, an effort by Spanish clergy rid to the country of heretics. Pogroms, individual acts of violence against Jews, and anti-Semitic laws had been features of Catholic Spain for over a century before the Alhambra Order, causing deaths and conversions that greatly reduced Spain’s Jewish population. Having already forced much of Spain’s Jewish population to convert, the Church now set about rooting out those suspected of practicing Judaism in secret, oftentimes by extremely violent methods. Tomas de Torquemada, the Grand Inquisitor, is said to have petitioned the monarchs to expel all Jews for years before they finally issued the order on March 31, 1492.
The results were catastrophic. Jews were given until the end of July to leave the country, resulting in the hasty selling of much of their land and possessions to Catholics at artificially low prices. Many converted in order to remain in Spain, with some continuing to practice their religion in secret and others assimilating into Catholicism. Estimation is difficult, but modern historians now believe around 40,000 Jews emigrated, with older estimates putting the number at several hundred thousand. Many died trying to reach safety, and in some cases it is reported that refugees paid for passage to other countries only to be thrown overboard by Spanish captains. While the Ottoman Empire welcomed the influx of Spanish Jews, many other nations in Europe treated them as cruelly as the Spaniards, though Portugal was a popular destination, its rulers issued a similar decree five years later.
Communities established by Spanish Jews, known as Sephardim in Hebrew, formed the foundation of the Sephardic communities that now make up a significant percentage of the world’s Jewish population. The year of the Alhambra Decree was also the year that Christopher Columbus, sailing for Spain, “discovered” the Americas, and thus it marks the beginning of two centuries of Spanish efforts to force its Catholicism on its substantial colonial holdings. Spain has never had a significant Jewish population since; current estimates put the Jewish population of Spain at lower than .2 percent. Spain formally revoked the Alhambra decree in 1968, and in the early 2000s both Spain and Portugal granted Sephardic Jews the right to claim citizenship of the countries that expelled their ancestors 500 years before.

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On March 31, 1991, after 36 years in existence, the Warsaw Pact, the military alliance between the Soviet Union and its eastern European satellites, comes to an end. The action was yet another sign that the Soviet Union was losing control over its former allies and that the Cold War was falling apart.
The Warsaw Pact was formed in 1955, primarily as a response to the decision by the United States and its western European allies to include a rearmed West Germany in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO). NATO had begun in 1949 as a defensive military alliance between the United States, Canada, and several European nations to thwart possible Soviet expansion into Western Europe. In 1954, NATO nations voted to allow a rearmed West Germany into the organization. The Soviets responded with the establishment of the Warsaw Pact. The original members included the Soviet Union, East Germany, Poland, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, and Albania. Although the Soviets claimed that the organization was a defensive alliance, it soon became clear that the primary purpose of the pact was to reinforce communist dominance in Eastern Europe. In Hungary in 1956, and then again in Czechoslovakia in 1968, the Soviets invoked the pact to legitimize its interventions in squelching anticommunist revolutions.
By the late-1980s, however, anti-Soviet and anticommunist movements throughout Eastern Europe began to crack the Warsaw Pact. In 1990, East Germany left the Warsaw Pact in preparation for its reunification with West Germany. Poland and Czechoslovakia also indicated their strong desire to withdraw. Faced with these protests, and suffering from a faltering economy and unstable political situation, the Soviet Union bowed to the inevitable. In March 1991, Soviet military commanders relinquished their control of Warsaw Pact forces. A few months later, the pact’s Political Consultative Committee met for one final time and formally recognized what had already effectively occurred, the Warsaw Pact was no more.

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On March 31, 1889, the Eiffel Tower is dedicated in Paris in a ceremony presided over by Gustave Eiffel, the tower’s designer, and attended by French Prime Minister Pierre Tirard, a handful of other dignitaries, and 200 construction workers.
In 1889, to honor of the centenary of the French Revolution, the French government planned an international exposition and announced a design competition for a monument to be built on the Champ-de-Mars in central Paris. Out of more than 100 designs submitted, the Centennial Committee chose Eiffel’s plan of an open-lattice wrought-iron tower that would reach almost 1,000 feet above Paris and be the world’s tallest man-made structure. Eiffel, a noted bridge builder, was a master of metal construction and designed the framework of the Statue of Liberty that had recently been erected in New York Harbor.
Eiffel’s tower was greeted with skepticism from critics who argued that it would be structurally unsound, and indignation from others who thought it would be an eyesore in the heart of Paris. Unperturbed, Eiffel completed his great tower under budget in just two years. Only one worker lost his life during construction, which at the time was a remarkably low casualty number for a project of that magnitude. The light, airy structure was by all accounts a technological wonder and within a few decades came to be regarded as an architectural masterpiece.
The Eiffel Tower is 984 feet tall and consists of an iron framework supported on four masonry piers, from which rise four columns that unite to form a single vertical tower. Platforms, each with an observation deck, are at three levels. Elevators ascend the piers on a curve, and Eiffel contracted the Otis Elevator Company of the United States to design the tower’s famous glass-cage elevators.
The elevators were not completed by March 31, 1889, however, so Gustave Eiffel ascended the tower’s stairs with a few hardy companions and raised an enormous French tricolor on the structure’s flagpole. Fireworks were then set off from the second platform. Eiffel and his party descended, and the architect addressed the guests and about 200 workers. In early May, the Paris International Exposition opened, and the tower served as the entrance gateway to the giant fair.
The Eiffel Tower remained the world’s tallest man-made structure until the completion of the Chrysler Building in New York in 1930. Incredibly, the Eiffel Tower was almost demolished when the International Exposition’s 20-year lease on the land expired in 1909, but its value as an antenna for radio transmission saved it. It remains largely unchanged today and is one of the world’s premier tourist attractions.

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March 31st In Music

1949 - RCA Victor introduced the 45 rpm single record, which had been in development since 1940. The 7-inch disc was designed to compete with the Long Playing record introduced by Columbia a year earlier. Both formats offered better fidelity and longer playing time than the 78 rpm record that was currently in use. Advertisements for new record players boasted that with 45 rpm records, the listener could hear up to ten records with speedy, silent, hardly noticeable changes.

1972 - America's self-titled debut album hits No. 1 in, yes, America.

1976 - Led Zeppelin released Presence, their seventh studio album, on their own Swan Song Records in the UK. Presence has now been certified 3 times Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) for US sales in excess of 3 million copies.

1982 - The Doobie Brothers announce their breakup. After a summer goodbye tour, lead singer Michael McDonald launches a successful solo career. The band regroups in 1987.

Birthdays:

1944 - Mick Ralphs. Guitarist for Mott the Hoople and Bad Company. Born in Herefordshire, England.

1946 - Al Nichol. From the American rock band, The Turtles who had the US 1967 No. 1 single 'Happy Together' and the 1967 hit 'She'd Rather Be with Me'. Born in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.

1953 - Sean Hopper. Keyboards with Huey Lewis and the News who had the 1985 US No. 1 single 'The Power Of Love'. Their third, and best-selling, album was the 1983 Sports. Born in San Francisco, California.

1955 - Angus Young. Scottish-born Australian guitarist with AC/DC, known for his energetic performances and stage outfits. After moving to Australia, he forms AC/DC with his brother Malcolm. AC/DC are the fifth-best-selling band in US history with over 70 million albums sold. Born in Glasgow, Scotland.

1958 - Pat McGlynn. Rhythm guitarist for Bay City Rollers. Born in Edinburgh, Scotland.

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On April 1, 1918, the Royal Air Force (RAF) is formed with the amalgamation of the Royal Flying Corps (RFC) and the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS). The RAF took its place beside the British navy and army as a separate military service with its own ministry.
In April 1911, eight years after Americans Wilbur and Orville Wright made the first flight of a self-propelled, heavier-than-air aircraft, an air battalion of the British army’s Royal Engineers was formed at Larkhill in Wiltshire. The battalion consisted of aircraft, airship, balloon, and man-carrying kite companies. In December 1911, the British navy formed the Royal Naval Flying School at Eastchurch, Kent. In May 1912, both were absorbed into the newly created Royal Flying Corps, which established a new flying school at Upavon, Wiltshire, and formed new airplane squadrons. In July 1914, the specialized requirements of the navy led to the creation of RNAS.
One month later, on August 4, Britain declared war on Germany and entered World War I. At the time, the RFC had 84 aircraft, and the RNAS had 71 aircraft and seven airships. Later that month, four RFC squadrons were deployed to France to support the British Expeditionary Force. During the next two years, Germany took the lead in air strategy with technologies like the manual machine gun, and England suffered bombing raids and frustration in the skies against German flying aces such as Manfred von Richthofen, “The Red Baron.” Repeated German air raids led British military planners to push for the creation of a separate air ministry, which would carry out strategic bombing against Germany. On April 1, 1918, the RAF was formed along with a female branch of the service, the Women’s Royal Air Force. That day, Bristol F.2B fighters of the 22nd Squadron carried out the first official missions of the RAF.
By the war’s end, in November 1918, the RAF had gained air superiority along the western front. The strength of the RAF in November 1918 was nearly 300,000 officers and airmen, and more than 22,000 aircraft. At the outbreak of World War II, in September 1939, the operational strength of the RAF in Europe had diminished to about 2,000 aircraft.
In June 1940, the Western democracies of continental Europe fell to Germany one by one, leaving Britain alone in its resistance to Nazi Germany. Nazi leader Adolf Hitler planned an invasion of Britain and in July 1940 ordered his powerful air force, the Luftwaffe, to destroy British ports along the coast in preparation. The outnumbered RAF fliers put up a fierce resistance in the opening weeks of the Battle of Britain, leading the Luftwaffe commanders to place destruction of the British air fleet at the forefront of the German offensive. If the Germans succeeded in wiping out the RAF, they could begin their invasion as scheduled in the fall.
During the next three months, however, the RAF successfully resisted the massive German air invasion, relying on radar technology, more maneuverable aircraft, and exceptional bravery. For every British plane shot down, two Luftwaffe warplanes were destroyed. In October, Hitler delayed the German invasion indefinitely, and in May 1941 the Battle of Britain came to an end. British Prime Minister Winston Churchill said of the RAF pilots, “Never in the field of human conflict was so much owed by so many to so few.”
By the war’s end in 1945, the strength of the RAF was nearly one million personnel. Later, this number was reduced and stabilized at about 150,000 men and women.

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On April 1, 1945, after suffering the loss of 116 planes and damage to three aircraft carriers, 50,000 U.S. combat troops, under the command of Lieutenant General Simon B. Buckner Jr., land on the southwest coast of the Japanese island of Okinawa, 350 miles south of Kyushu, the southern main island of Japan.
Determined to seize Okinawa as a base of operations for the army ground and air forces for a later assault on mainland Japan, more than 1,300 ships converged on the island, finally putting ashore 50,000 combat troops on April 1. The Americans quickly seized two airfields and advanced inland to cut the island’s waist. They battled nearly 120,000 Japanese army, militia and labor troops under the command of Lieutenant General Mitsuru Ushijima.
The Japanese surprised the American forces with a change in strategy, drawing them into the mainland rather than confronting them at the water’s edge. While Americans landed without loss of men, they would suffer more than 50,000 casualties, including more than 12,000 deaths, as the Japanese staged a desperate defense of the island, a defense that included waves of kamikaze (“divine wind”) air attacks. Eventually, these suicide raids proved counterproductive, as the Japanese finally ran out of planes and resolve, with some 4,000 finally surrendering. Japanese casualties numbered some 117,000.
Lieutenant General Buckner, son of a Civil War general, was among the casualties, killed by enemy artillery fire just three days before the Japanese surrender. Japanese General Ushijima committed ritual suicide upon defeat of his forces.

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On April 1, 1789, the first U.S. House of Representatives, meeting in New York City, reaches quorum and elects Pennsylvania Representative Frederick Augustus Conrad Muhlenberg as its first speaker.
Muhlenberg, a Lutheran minister and the former president of the Pennsylvania convention to ratify the U.S. Constitution, was the son of Henry Augustus Muhlenberg and grandson of Johann Conrad Weiser, two of the leading Germans in colonial Pennsylvania. His brother, Major General John Peter Gabriel Muhlenberg, also served in the first House of Representatives.
Like his father, Frederick Muhlenberg studied theology at Germany’s University of Halle. He returned to Pennsylvania to be ordained in 1770 at the age of 20 and preached in Stouchsburg and Lebanon until 1774. Muhlenberg began preaching in New York City later that year, but returned to Pennsylvania upon the British invasion of New York in 1776. For three years, he served as pastor to congregations in New Hanover, Oley and New Goshenhoppen before embarking on a political career.
Muhlenberg was a member of the Continental Congress from 1779 to 1780 and speaker of Pennsylvania’s House of Representatives from 1780 to 1783. He presided over the Pennsylvania ratifying convention of 1787, and then served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 1789 to 1797. He was speaker during the first and third Congresses.
Frederick did not enter into military service during the American Revolution. His brother, John Peter, however, earned renown for removing his pastoral robes to reveal a military uniform underneath while proclaiming his support for the war from his pulpit in Virginia.

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April 1st In Music

1966 - The Troggs recorded 'Wild Thing' at Regent Sound Studio in London. The song went on to be a No. 1 US hit in June the following year.

1971 - Jimi Hendrix's The Cry Of Love is certified Gold, six months after his death.

Birthdays:

1945 - John Barbata. American drummer, The Turtles who had the US No. 1 single 'Happy Together', and with Jefferson Starship the 1987 US No. 1 single 'Nothing's Gonna Stop Us'. Barbata also worked with Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young. Born in Passaic, New Jersey.

1954 - Jeff Porcaro. American drummer, songwriter, and record producer, best known for his work with Toto, Jefferson Airplane, Jefferson Starship. Porcaro is one of the most recorded session musicians in history. He came to prominence in the United States as the drummer on the Steely Dan album Katy Lied. He also worked with Paul McCartney, Dire Straits, Pink Floyd, Michael Jackson, Joe Walsh, Miles Davis, Bruce Springsteen, Elton John and many other acts. Born in South Windsor, Connecticut. Porcaro died on 8.5.1992.

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On April 2, 1917, Jeannette Pickering Rankin, the first woman ever elected to Congress, takes her seat in the U.S. Capitol as a Republican representative from Montana.
Born on a ranch near Missoula, Montana Territory, in 1880, Rankin was a social worker in the states of Montana and Washington before joining the women’s suffrage movement in 1910. Working with various suffrage groups, she campaigned for the women’s vote on a national level and in 1914 was instrumental in the passage of suffrage legislation in Montana. Two years later, she successfully ran for Congress in Montana on a progressive Republican platform calling for total women’s suffrage, legislation protecting children, and U.S. neutrality in the European war. Following her election as a representative, Rankin’s entrance into Congress was delayed for a month as congressmen discussed whether a woman should be admitted into the House of Representatives.
Finally, on April 2, 1917, she was introduced in Congress as its first female member. The same day, President Woodrow Wilson addressed a joint session of Congress and urged a declaration of war against Germany. On April 4, the Senate voted for war by a wide majority, and on April 6 the vote went to the House. Citing public opinion in Montana and her own pacifist beliefs, Jeannette Rankin was one of only 50 representatives who voted against the American declaration of war. For the remainder of her first term in Congress, she sponsored legislation to aid women and children, and advocated the passage of a federal suffrage amendment.
In 1918, Rankin unsuccessfully ran for a Senate seat, and in 1919 she left Congress to become an important figure in a number of suffrage and pacifist organizations. In 1940, with the U.S. entrance into another world war imminent, she was again elected as a pacifist representative from Montana and, after assuming office, argued vehemently against President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s war preparations. On December 7, 1941, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, and the next day, at Roosevelt’s urging, Congress passed a formal declaration of war against Japan. Representative Rankin cast the sole dissenting vote. This action created a furor and Rankin declined to seek reelection. After leaving office in 1943, Rankin continued to be an important spokesperson for pacifism and social reform. In 1967, she organized the Jeannette Rankin Brigade, an organization that staged a number of highly publicized protests against the Vietnam War. She died in 1973 at the age of 93.

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On April 2, 1513, near present-day St. Augustine, Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de Leon comes ashore on the Florida coast, and claims the territory for the Spanish crown.
Although other European navigators may have sighted the Florida peninsula before, Ponce de Leon is credited with the first recorded landing and the first detailed exploration of the Florida coast. The Spanish explorer was searching for the “Fountain of Youth,” a fabled water source that was said to bring eternal youth. Ponce de Leon named the peninsula he believed to be an island “La Florida” because his discovery came during the time of the Easter feast, or Pascua Florida.
In 1521, he returned to Florida in an effort to establish a Spanish colony on the island. However, hostile Native Americans attacked his expedition soon after landing, and the party retreated to Cuba, where Ponce de Leon died from a mortal wound suffered during the battle. Successful Spanish colonization of the peninsula finally began at St. Augustine in 1565, and in 1819 the territory passed into U.S. control under the terms of the Florida Purchase Treaty between Spain and the United States.

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On April 2, 1917, President Woodrow Wilson asks Congress to send U.S. troops into battle against Germany in World War I. In his address to Congress that day, Wilson lamented it is a fearful thing to lead this great peaceful people into war. Four days later, Congress obliged and declared war on Germany.
In February and March 1917, Germany, embroiled in war with Britain, France and Russia, increased its attacks on neutral shipping in the Atlantic and offered, in the form of the so-called Zimmermann Telegram, to help Mexico regain Texas, New Mexico and Arizona if it would join Germany in a war against the United States. The public outcry against Germany buoyed President Wilson in asking Congress to abandon America’s neutrality to make the world safe for democracy.
Wilson went on to lead what was at the time the largest war-mobilization effort in the country’s history. At first, Wilson asked only for volunteer soldiers, but soon realized voluntary enlistment would not raise a sufficient number of troops and signed the Selective Service Act in May 1917. The Selective Service Act required men between 21 and 35 years of age to register for the draft, increasing the size of the army from 200,000 troops to 4 million by the end of the war. One of the infantrymen who volunteered for active duty was future President Harry S. Truman.
In addition to raising troop strength, Wilson authorized a variety of programs in 1917 to mobilize the domestic war effort. He appointed an official propaganda group called the Committee on Public Information (CPI) to give speeches, publish pamphlets and create films that explained America’s role in the war and drummed up support for Wilson’s war-time policies. For example, the CPI’s representatives, known as four-minute men, traveled throughout the U.S. urging Americans to buy war bonds and conserve food. Wilson appointed future President Herbert Hoover to lead the Food Administration, which cleverly changed German terms, like hamburger and sauerkraut, to more American-sounding monikers, like liberty sandwich or liberty cabbage.
Wilson hoped to convince Americans to voluntarily support the war effort, but was not averse to passing legislation to suppress dissent. After entering the war, Wilson ordered the federal government to take over the strike-plagued railroad industry to eliminate the possibility of work stoppages and passed the Espionage Act aimed at silencing anti-war protestors and union organizers.
The influx of American troops, foodstuffs and financial support into the Great War contributed significantly to Germany’s surrender in November 1918. President Wilson led the American delegation to Paris for the negotiation of the Treaty of Versailles in June 1919, a controversial treaty, which was never ratified by Congress, that some historians claim successfully dismantled Germany’s war machine but contributed to the rise of German fascism and the outbreak of World War II. Wilson’s most enduring wartime policy remains his plan for a League of Nations, which, though unsuccessful, laid the foundation for the United Nations.

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April 2nd In Music

1956 - Johnny Cash records "I Walk The Line" at Sun Studio in Memphis. His label boss, Sam Phillips, has him speed up the tempo, which is a good call: The song becomes Cash's first No. 1 Country hit.

1964 - Beach Boys recorded their next single 'I Get Around', which became their first US No. 1 in the summer of this year.

1975 - The Bay City Rollers were at No. 1 on the UK singles chart with their version of The Four Seasons song 'Bye Bye Baby.' It gave the Scottish group the best selling single of 1975.

1977 - ABBA were at No. 1 on the UK singles chart with their fifth No. 1 'Knowing Me, Knowing You.' The song was also a Top 10 hit in over 15 countries.

1977 - Fleetwood Mac went to No. 1 on the US album chart with Rumours. The album is Fleetwood Mac's most successful release; along with winning the Grammy Award for Album of the Year in 1978, it spends an astonishing 31 (non-consecutive) weeks at the top spot. The album has sold over 45 million copies worldwide.

Birthdays:

1939 - Marvin Gaye. Singer, songwriter who had a 1968 US No. 1 & 1969 UK No. 1 single with ‘I Heard It Through The Grapevine’ and a 1982 US No. 3 with ‘Sexual Healing’. Gaye was a member of the doo-wop group The Moonglows in the late 1950s, and then signed with Motown Records subsidiary, Tamla. He started off as a session drummer, but later ranked as the label's top-selling solo artist during the 1960s. He was crowned "The Prince of Motown" and "The Prince of Soul". He died on 4.1.1984.

1952 - Leon Wilkeson. Bassist with southern rock band Lynyrd Skynyrd who had the 1974 US No. 8 single 'Sweet Home Alabama' the 1977 US No. 5 album Street Survivors and the 1982 UK No. 21 single 'Freebird'. Born in Newport, Rhode Island. Wilkeson died on 7.27.2001 at 49 years old.

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On April 3, 1860, the first Pony Express mail, traveling by horse and rider relay teams, simultaneously leaves St. Joseph, Missouri, and Sacramento, California. Ten days later, on April 13, the westbound rider and mail packet completed the approximately 1,800 mile journey and arrived in Sacramento, beating the eastbound packet’s arrival in St. Joseph by two days and setting a new standard for speedy mail delivery. Although ultimately short-lived and unprofitable, the Pony Express captivated America’s imagination and helped win federal aid for a more economical overland postal system. It also contributed to the economy of the towns on its route and served the mail service needs of the American West in the days before the telegraph or an efficient transcontinental railroad.
The Pony Express debuted at a time before radios and telephones, when California, which achieved statehood in 1850, was still largely cut off from the eastern part of the country. Letters sent from New York to the West Coast traveled by ship, which typically took at least a month, or by stagecoach on the recently established Butterfield Express overland route, which could take from three weeks to many months to arrive. Compared to the snail’s pace of the existing delivery methods, the Pony Express’ average delivery time of 10 days seemed like lightning speed.
The Pony Express Company, the brainchild of William H. Russell, William Bradford Waddell and Alexander Majors, owners of a freight business, was set up over 150 relay stations along a pioneer trail across the present-day states of Missouri, Kansas, Nebraska, Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, Nevada and California. Riders, who were paid approximately $25 per week and carried loads estimated at up to 20 pounds of mail, were changed every 75 to 100 miles, with horses switched out every 10 to 15 miles. Among the riders was the legendary frontiersman and showman William “Buffalo Bill” Cody (1846-1917), who reportedly signed on with the Pony Express at age 14. The company’s riders set their fastest time with Lincoln’s inaugural address, which was delivered in just less than eight days.
The initial cost of Pony Express delivery was $5 for every half-ounce of mail. The company began as a private enterprise and its owners hoped to gain a profitable delivery contract from the U.S. government, but that never happened. With the advent of the first transcontinental telegraph line in October 1861, the Pony Express ceased operations. However, the legend of the lone Pony Express rider galloping across the Old West frontier to deliver the mail lives on today.

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On April 3, 1776, because it lacked sufficient funds to build a strong navy, the Continental Congress gives privateers permission to attack any and all British ships.
In a bill signed by John Hancock, its president, and dated April 3, 1776, the Continental Congress issued "INSTRUCTIONS to the COMMANDERS of Private Ships or vessels of War, which shall have Commissions of Letters of Marque and Reprisal, authorizing them to make Captures of British Vessels and Cargoes."
Letters of Marque and Reprisal were the official documents by which 18th-century governments commissioned private commercial ships, known as privateers, to act on their behalf, attacking ships carrying the flags of enemy nations. Any goods captured by the privateer were divided between the ship’s owner and the government that had issued the letter.
Congress informed American privateers on this day that "YOU may, by Force of Arms, attack, subdue, and take all Ships and other Vessels belonging to the Inhabitants of Great Britain, on the high seas, or between high-water and low-water Marks, except Ships and Vessels bringing Persons who intend to settle and reside in the United Colonies, or bringing Arms, Ammunition or Warlike Stores to the said Colonies, for the Use of such Inhabitants thereof as are Friends to the American Cause, which you shall suffer to pass unmolested, the Commanders thereof permitting a peaceable Search, and giving satisfactory Information of the Contents of the Ladings, and Destinations of the Voyages."
The distinction between pirates and privateers was non-existent to those who faced them on the high seas. They behaved in an identical manner, boarding and capturing ships using force if necessary. However, privateers holding Letters of Marque were not subject to prosecution by their home nation and, if captured, were treated as prisoners of war instead of criminals by foreign nations.

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April 3rd In Music

1961 - The Marcels started a three week run at No. 1 on the US singles chart with the Rodgers and Heart song 'Blue Moon'.

1971 - The Temptations scored their second US No. 1 with 'Just My Imagination (Running Away With Me)' for two weeks. The track is considered one of the Temptations' signature songs, and is notable for recalling the sound of the group's 1960s recordings. It is also the final Temptations single to feature founding members Eddie Kendricks and Paul Williams.

Birthdays:

1943 - Richard Manuel. Canadian composer, singer, and multi-instrumentalist, best known as a pianist, lead singer, and occasional drummer of the Band. He joined Ronnie Hawkins's backing group, the Hawks when he was 18. The Band had the 1969 US No. 25 single 'Up On Cripple Creek’. Born in Stratford, Ontario, Canada. Manuel died on 3.4.1986.

1944 - Tony Orlando. Singer from American pop music group Dawn who were popular in the 1970s. Their signature hits include 'Candida', 'Knock Three Times', and 'Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree'. Born in Hell's Kitchen New York City.

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On April 4, 1949, the United States and 11 other nations establish the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), a mutual defense pact aimed at containing possible Soviet aggression against Western Europe. NATO stood as the main U.S. led military alliance against the Soviet Union throughout the duration of the Cold War.
Relations between the United States and the Soviet Union began to deteriorate rapidly in 1948. There were heated disagreements over the postwar status of Germany, with the Americans insisting on German recovery and eventual rearmament and the Soviets steadfastly opposing such actions. In June 1948, the Soviets blocked all ground travel to the American occupation zone in West Berlin, and only a massive U.S. airlift of food and other necessities sustained the population of the zone until the Soviets relented and lifted the blockade in May 1949. In January 1949, President Harry S. Truman warned in his State of the Union Address that the forces of democracy and communism were locked in a dangerous struggle, and he called for a defensive alliance of nations in the North Atlantic, U.S military in Korea. NATO was the result. In April 1949, representatives from Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Great Britain, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, and Portugal joined the United States in signing the NATO agreement. The signatories agreed, “An armed attack against one or more of them… shall be considered an attack against them all.” President Truman welcomed the organization as “a shield against aggression.”
Not all Americans embraced NATO. Isolationists such as Senator Robert A. Taft declared that NATO was “not a peace program; it is a war program.” Most, however, saw the organization as a necessary response to the communist threat. The U. S. Senate ratified the treaty by a wide margin in June 1949. During the next few years, Greece, Turkey, and West Germany also joined. The Soviet Union condemned NATO as a warmongering alliance and responded by setting up the Warsaw Pact (a military alliance between the Soviet Union and its Eastern Europe satellites) in 1955.
NATO lasted throughout the course of the Cold War, and continues to play an important role in post-Cold War Europe. In recent years, for example, NATO forces were active in trying to bring an end to the civil war in Bosnia.

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On April 4, 1884, Isoroku Yamamoto, perhaps Japan’s greatest strategist and the officer who would contrive the surprise air attack on U.S. naval forces at Pearl Harbor, is born.
A graduate of the Japanese naval academy in 1904, Yamamoto worked as a naval attaché for the Japanese embassy in Washington, D.C., from 1926 to 1927. During the next 15 years, he saw several promotions, from vice minister of the Japanese navy to commander in chief of Japan’s Combined Fleet in August 1941. Despite worsening Japanese-American relations (especially in light of Japan’s alliance with Germany and Italy), Yamamoto initially opposed war with the U.S., mostly out of fear that a prolonged conflict would go badly for Japan. But once the government of Prime Minister Tojo Hideki decided on war, Yamamoto argued that only a surprise attack aimed at crippling U.S. naval forces in the Pacific had any hope of victory. He also predicted that if war with America lasted more than one year, Japan would lose.
Yamamoto meticulously planned and carried out the Japanese air strike on the U.S. naval base at Pearl Harbor on Oahu Island, Hawaii, December 7, 1941. Waves of dive bombers, torpedo planes, and fighters descended on U.S. battleships, capsizing, destroying or immobilizing several U.S. battleships within the first 30 minutes of the raid. The attack was a decided success, especially in catching the United States off guard, and resulted in the destruction of 180 U.S. aircraft and more than 3,400 American casualties.
U.S. forces finally caught up with Yamamoto, though, when they ambushed his plane and shot him down over Bougainville Island in 1943. Yamamoto died having been right about two things: the effectiveness of aircraft carriers in long-range naval attacks and that Japan would lose a drawn-out struggle with the United States.

[Schmidt Meister]

On April 4, 1918, during World War I, the Second Battle of the Somme, the first major German offensive in more than a year, ends on the western front.
On March 21, 1918, a major offensive against Allied positions in the Somme River region of France began with five hours of bombardment from more than 9,000 pieces of German artillery. The poorly prepared British Fifth Army was rapidly overwhelmed and forced into retreat. For a week, the Germans pushed toward Paris, shelling the city from a distance of 80 miles with their “Big Bertha” cannons. However, the poorly supplied German troops soon became exhausted, and the Allies halted the German advance as French artillery knocked out the German guns besieging Paris. On April 2, U.S. General John J. Pershing sent American troops down into the trenches to help defend Paris and repulse the German offensive. It was the first major deployment of U.S. troops in World War I. Several thousand American troops fought alongside the British and French in the Second Battle of Somme.
By the time the Somme offensive ended on April 4, the Germans had advanced almost 40 miles, inflicted some 200,000 casualties, and captured 70,000 prisoners and more than 1,000 Allied guns. However, the Germans suffered nearly as many casualties as their enemies and lacked the fresh reserves and supply boost the Allies enjoyed following the American entrance into the fighting.

[Schmidt Meister]

April 4th In Music

1969 - CBS cancels the highly rated but controversial Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour. Artists to appear on the show include The Who, The Doors and Jefferson Airplane.

1981 - Styx hit No. 1 in the US with Paradise Theatre, a concept album based on the rise and fall of a theatre in Chicago.

Birthdays:

1913 - Muddy Waters. American blues musician. In the early 1950s, Muddy Waters and his band recorded several blues classics, 'Hoochie Coochie Man', 'I'm Ready' and 'I Just Want to Make Love to You'. The Rolling Stones named themselves after his 1950 song 'Rollin' Stone', his music influenced Eric Clapton's career, Led Zeppelin's 'Whole Lotta Love', is lyrically based on the Muddy Waters hit 'You Need Love'. Born in Rolling Fork, Mississippi. Waters died on 4.30.1983 aged 70.

1952 - Gary Moore. Irish guitarist and singer, who was a member of Skid Row and Thin Lizzy. His 1990 album Still Got the Blues featured contributions from Albert King, Albert Collins, and George Harrison. Born in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Moore died on 2.6.2011.

[Schmidt Meister]

On April 5, 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt establishes the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), an innovative federally funded organization that put tens of thousands of Americans to work during the Great Depression on projects with environmental benefits.
In 1932, FDR took America’s political helm during the country’s worst economic crisis, declaring a “government worthy of its name must make a fitting response” to the suffering of the unemployed. He implemented the CCC a little over one month into his presidency as part of his administration’s “New Deal” plan for social and economic progress. The CCC reflected FDR’s deep commitment to environmental conservation. He waxed poetic when lobbying for the its passage, declaring “the forests are the lungs of our land [which] purify our air and give fresh strength to our people.”
The CCC, also known as “Roosevelt’s Tree Army,” was open to unemployed, unmarried U.S. male citizens between the ages of 18 and 26. All recruits had to be healthy and were expected to perform hard physical labor. Blacks were placed in de-facto segregated camps, although administrators denied the practice of discrimination. Enlistment in the program was for a minimum of 6 months; many re-enlisted after their first term. Participants were paid $30 a month and often given supplemental basic and vocational education while they served. Under the guidance of the Departments of the Interior and Agriculture, CCC employees fought forest fires, planted trees, cleared and maintained access roads, re-seeded grazing lands and implemented soil-erosion controls. They built wildlife refuges, fish-rearing facilities, water storage basins and animal shelters. To encourage citizens to get out and enjoy America’s natural resources, FDR authorized the CCC to build bridges and campground facilities. From 1933 to 1942, the CCC employed over 3 million men.
Of Roosevelt’s many New Deal policies, the CCC is considered by many to be one of the few enduring and successful. It provided the model for future state and federal conservation programs. In 1942, Congress discontinued appropriations for the CCC, diverting the desperately needed funds to the effort to win World War II.

[Schmidt Meister]

On April 5, 1792, George Washington exercises the first presidential veto of a Congressional bill on April 5, 1792. The bill introduced a new plan for dividing seats in the House of Representatives that would have increased the amount of seats for northern states. After consulting with his politically divided and contentious cabinet, Washington, who came from the southern state of Virginia, ultimately decided that the plan was unconstitutional because, in providing for additional representatives for some states, it would have introduced a number of representatives higher than that proscribed by the Constitution.
After a discussion with the president, Thomas Jefferson wrote in a letter that votes for or against the bill were divided along perfectly geographical lines between the North and South. Jefferson observed that Washington feared that a veto would incorrectly portray him as biased toward the South.
In the end, Jefferson was able to convince the president to veto the bill on the grounds that it was unconstitutional and introduced principles that were liable to be abused in the future. Jefferson suggested apportionment instead be derived from arithmetical operation, about which no two men can ever possibly differ.” Washington’s veto sent the bill back to Congress. Though representatives could have attempted to overrule the veto with a two-thirds vote, Congress instead threw out the original bill and instituted a new one that apportioned representatives at “the ratio of one for every thirty-three thousand persons in the respective States.”
Washington exercised his veto power only one other time during his two terms in office. In February 1797, the former commanding general of the Continental Army vetoed an act that would have reduced the number of cavalry units in the army.

[Schmidt Meister]

On April 5, 1955, Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill, the British leader who guided Great Britain and the Allies through the crisis of World War II, retires as prime minister of Great Britain.
Born at Blenheim Palace in 1874, Churchill joined the British Fourth Hussars upon his father’s death in 1895. During the next five years, he enjoyed an illustrious military career, serving in India, the Sudan, and South Africa, and distinguishing himself several times in battle. In 1899, he resigned his commission to concentrate on his literary and political career and in 1900 was elected to Parliament as a Conservative MP from Oldham. In 1904, he joined the Liberals, serving a number of important posts before being appointed Britain’s First Lord of the Admiralty in 1911, where he worked to bring the British navy to a readiness for the war he foresaw.
In 1915, in the second year of World War I, Churchill was held responsible for the disastrous Dardanelles and Gallipoli campaigns and was thus excluded from the war coalition government. However, in 1917, he returned to politics as a cabinet member in the Liberal government of Lloyd George. From 1919 to 1921, he was secretary of state for war and in 1924 returned to the Conservative Party, where two years later he played a leading role in the defeat of the General Strike of 1926. Out of office from 1929 to 1939, Churchill issued unheeded warnings of the threat of Nazi and Japanese aggression.
After the outbreak of World War II in Europe, Churchill returned to his post as First Lord of the Admiralty and eight months later replaced Neville Chamberlain as prime minister of a new coalition government. In the first year of his administration, Britain stood alone against Nazi Germany, but Churchill promised his country and the world that Britain would “never surrender.” He rallied the British people to a resolute resistance and expertly orchestrated Franklin D. Roosevelt and Joseph Stalin into an alliance that eventually crushed the Axis.
After a postwar Labor Party victory in 1945, he became leader of the opposition and in 1951 was again elected prime minister. In 1953, he was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II and awarded the Nobel Prize in literature. After his retirement as prime minister, he remained in Parliament until 1964, the year before his death.

[Schmidt Meister]

On April 5, 1951, the climax of the most sensational spy trial in American history is reached when a federal judge sentences Julius and Ethel Rosenberg to death for their roles in passing atomic secrets to the Soviets. Although the couple proclaimed their innocence, they were executed in June 1953.
The Rosenbergs were convicted of playing a central role in a spy ring that passed secret data concerning the atomic bomb to the Soviet Union during and immediately after World War II. Their part in the espionage came to light when British physicist Klaus Fuchs was arrested in Great Britain in early 1950. Under questioning, Fuchs admitted that he stole secret documents while he was working on the Manhattan Project, the top-secret U.S. program to build an atomic bomb during World War II. He implicated Harry Gold as a courier who delivered the documents to Soviet agents. Gold was arrested a short time later and informed on David Greenglass, who then pointed the finger at his sister and brother-in-law, Ethel and Julius Rosenberg. Julius was arrested in July and Ethel in August 1950. After a brief trial in March 1951, the Rosenbergs were found guilty of conspiracy to commit espionage. At their sentencing hearing in April, Federal Judge Irving R. Kaufman described their crime as “worse than murder” and charged, “By your betrayal you undoubtedly have altered the course of history to the disadvantage of our country.” He sentenced them to death.
The Rosenbergs and their attorneys continued to plead their innocence, arguing that they were “victims of political hysteria.” Humanitarian organizations in the United States and around the world pleaded for leniency, particularly since the Rosenbergs were the parents of two young children. The pleas for special consideration were ignored, and Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were executed on June 19, 1953.