POPnews - April 23rd

[Originally opened in May 1779, the Molen De Adriaan had already been damaged by a storm in 1930 when it burnt to the ground on this day in 1932; the cause of the fire remains a mystery, but the reason it took as long as it did to rebuild is an all-too familiar tale. Bureaucratic wrangling and a lack of funds stalled the project until 1999, when reconstruction began; it was reopened in 2002, 70 years to the day after its fiery demise.]
1014 - At the Battle of Clontarf near Dublin the King of Munster Brian Boru and the King of Leinster, Máel Mórda mac Murchada, defeated Viking invaders; both, however, were killed in battle, as was Boru's son Machad.

1343 - During the St. George's Night Uprising Estonian peasants revolted against their German-dominated aristocracy, killing (by some reports) as many as 1,800; although it began on this night, the uprising lasted for two years. Long considered an attack against all Christianity by the still-pagan Estonians, it's now thought that most of their grievances were with the Livonian Order alone.

1348 - The founding of the Order of the Garter by England's King Edward III was announced on St George's Day.

1597 - The first recorded performance of William Shakespeare's The Merry Wives of Windsor was given at Windsor Castle, with Queen Elizabeth I in attendance, during that year's Garter Feast.

1635 - Boston Latin School, the first public school in the United States, was founded - predictably enough, in Boston.

1660 - The Treaty of Oliwa settled peace between Sweden and Poland - ending the so-called Deluge, or the Swedish invasion of Poland-Lithuania - when it was signed by Holy Roman Emperor Leopold I, Elector Frederick William of Brandenburg-Prussia, King Charles X of Sweden, and King John II Casimir of Poland.

1661 - England's Charles II was crowned amidst even greater pomp than usual at Westminster Abbey.

1815 - The Second Serbian Uprising - the second phase of a revolution by the Serbs against their occupiers - erupted shortly after the annexation of the country to the Ottoman Empire.

1920 - The Grand National Assembly of Turkey was founded in Ankara.

1932 - A 153-year old windmill known as De Adriaan, located in the Dutch town of Haarlem, burnt down.

1935 - The Polish Constitution of 1935 was adopted.

1940 - The Rhythm Night Club fire at a dance hall in Natchez, Mississippi, killed 198 people, including bandleader Walter Barnes.

1941 - The Greek government of Ioannis Metaxas and the family of King George II evacuated Athens shortly before the invading Wehrmacht arrived, occupying the city by April 27th and shortly thereafter all of Greece.

1942 - During the so-called Baedeker Blitz German bombers hit Exeter, Bath and York in retaliation for the British raid on Lübeck; the point of the raid wasn't to interfere with Britain's industrial output but to weaken morale by attacking its loveliest and most historically significant locales.

1955 - The Canadian Labour Congress was formed by the merger of the Trades and Labour Congress of Canada and the Canadian Congress of Labour.

1979 - Fighting in London between the Anti-Nazi League and the Metropolitan Police's Special Patrol Group resulted in the death of anti-fascist activist protester Blair Peach.

1982 - The Conch Republic was established when Key West jokingly seceded from the United States.

1985 - Coca-Cola changed its formula and released New Coke; the response was overwhelmingly negative, and the original formula was back on the market in less than 3 months, cleverly marketed as Coke Classic.

1992 - The divorce of The Princess Royal and Capt. Mark Phillips became final, marking the first event in Elizabeth II's famed 'annus horribilis'.
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POPnews - April 7th

[On this day in 1805 the Lewis and Clark Expedition's intrepid Corps of Discovery broke camp at Fort Mandan - so named for its having been raised in the midst of the Mandan Nation of North Dakota in November 1804 - and resumed their journey West to the Pacific Ocean along the Missouri River. Upon their return voyage in August 1806 they found the fort burnt down; in subsequent years the advancing riverbank has swallowed up much of the historic ruin. This replica was built at the North Dakota Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center, two and a half miles up-river.]
1348 - Prague's Charles University was founded by Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV, who made the city his imperial capital.

1521 - Ferdinand Magellan arrived at Cebu during his ill-fated circumnavigation of the world; just three weeks later he would meet his fate in the Philippines, at the Battle of Mactan...

1541 - Francis Xavier left Lisbon on a mission to serve as Apostolic Nuncio in Goa.

1776 - Captain John Barry and the USS Lexington captured the British sloop Edward, a tender to the frigate Liverpool; although a good start at naval warfare for the would-be United States, the Lexington under Henry Johnson would herself be surrendered to Britain's John Bazely a-helm the 10-gun cutter Alert in September 1777.

1798 - The Mississippi Territory was organized from land ceded by Georgia and South Carolina; it would later be twice expanded to include disputed territory claimed by both the US and Spain.

1805 - The first public performance of Ludwig van Beethoven's Third Symphony - now known as Eroica but almost entitled Bonaparte - was conducted by the maestro himself at the Theater an der Wien in Vienna.

1868 - Thomas D'Arcy McGee, one of Canada's Fathers of Confederation, was assassinated - apparently by Patrick J. Whelan, a Fenian sympathizer who was anyway hanged for the crime; one of only two political assassinations in Canadian history (and the only one of a federal politician) it can be said to remain unsolved, as Whelan's supposed guilt looks more and more like a frame-up with each passing year.

1906 - The Algeciras Conference gave France and Spain control over Morocco.

1940 - Booker T. Washington became the first African-American to be depicted on a United States postage stamp; his cautious approach to civil rights contrasted with the more radical methods favoured by W.E.B. DuBois in a similar - albeit more muted - contrast to that between Dr. King and Malcolm X two generations later.

1948 - The World Health Organization was established, by the United Nations.

1954 - US President Dwight D. Eisenhower gave his Domino Theory speech during a news conference, outlining his own particular paranoia about the geopolitical threat posed by communism.

1956 - Spain relinquished its protectorate over Morocco - France having already done so in March - marking the independence of Morocco, during the reign of King Mohammed V.

1963 - The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia adopted a new constitution, making Josip Broz Tito its President for Life.

1964 - IBM announced System/360; I have no idea what it was or what it did, but I bet it made ugly computers run shitty software badly...

1969 - The publication of RFC 1 marked the symbolic birth date of the Internet.

1977 - West German Federal Prosecutor Siegfried Buback and his driver were shot and killed by two Red Army Faction members while waiting at a red light in Karlsruhe en route from Buback's home to the Bundesgerichtshof, the country's highest appeal court, where he worked. The shooter is thought to have been Stefan Wisniewski.

1983 - During STS-6, astronauts Story Musgrave and Don Peterson performed the first spacewalk from a Space Shuttle.

1989 - The Soviet submarine Komsomolets sank in the Barents Sea off the coast of Norway, killing 42 sailors.

2001 - The Mars Odyssey space probe was launched to scout for water and volcanic activity there.
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