TODAY’S HISTORY LESSON – APRIL 19
1539 Emperor Charles V reaches a truce with German Protestants at Frankfurt, Germany.
1764 The English Parliament bans the American colonies from printing paper money.
1775 American Revolution begins in Lexington, Massachusetts. The “Shot Heard Round the World” took place in Concord later that day
1802 The Spanish reopen New Orleans port to American merchants.
1861 President Abraham Lincoln orders a blockade of Confederate ports.
1932 President Herbert Hoover suggests 5 day work week
1933 The United States went off the gold standard.
1938 General Francisco Franco declares victory in the Spanish Civil War.
1939 Connecticut finally approves the Bill of Rights.
1948 ABC-TV network begins
1951 General Douglas MacArthur ends his military career
1982 NASA names Sally Ride to be the first woman astronaut.
1989 The battleship USS Iowa’s number 2 turret explodes, killing sailors.
1993 The FBI ends a 51-day siege by storming the Branch Davidian religious cult headquarters in Waco, Texas.
1995 A truck bomb explodes in front of the federal building in Oklahoma City, killing 168 people.
2005 Germany’s Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger became Pope Benedict XVI.
2011 Fidel Castro resigns from the Communist Party of Cuba’s central committee after 45 years of holding the title.
** history.net, onthisday.com, infoplease.com, timeanddate.com, thepeoplehistory.com, on-this-day.com **
