April 26
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Featured Event
Anne S.K. Brown Military Collection/Library of Congress, Washington, D.C.
On this day in 1777, as the American Revolution entered its third year, Sybil Ludington climbed onto a horse and rode through a stormy night in southeastern New York to spread the alert that British troops were on their way. Those troops had just attacked nearby Danbury, Connecticut, where the region’s militia stored its munitions, and Ludington’s father, a militia officer, needed his men. So the 16-year-old sped over unfamiliar roads, helping the American rebels to organize and drive the British back. (Her story didn’t appear in print until after she had died, but that was no different from Paul Revere.) [Read today’s edition of Today in History > >]
Featured Biography
Featured Biography
© Sergey Goryachev/Shutterstock.com
Well I couldn’t say she was a good looking woman, and she was stout, but she was one of the loveliest people I ever worked for or with.
The first great African American professional blues vocalist, Ma Rainey, was born this day in 1886 in Georgia and contributed greatly to the evolution and popularity of the blues form in the early 20th century.
Famous Birthdays
More on April 26
James Hill/John F. Kennedy Presidential Library
2007
Jack Valenti—the longtime president of the Motion Picture Association of America who created the film-rating system that assigns labels for audience suitability in the United States—died at age 85. [Test your knowledge of film.]
Photofest
1989
Lucille Ball—an actress and longtime comedy star of American television, best remembered for starring (alongside her husband, Desi Arnaz) in her classic comedy series I Love Lucy—died at the age of 77. [Sort fact from fiction in our quiz about actors.]
© Viktor Yatsuk/Dreamstime.com
1986
An explosion and fire at a Soviet nuclear power station near Chornobyl, Ukraine, released large amounts of radioactive material, which was carried by the wind as far west as France and Italy. Millions of acres of forest and farmland were contaminated, and hundreds of thousands of people were relocated as a result of the disaster. [What tourists see today at the site of the Chernobyl disaster.]
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
1964
With the merger of Tanganyika and Zanzibar, the United Republic of Tanzania was founded. Julius Nyerere served as its first president. [How much do you know about African leaders?]
© Toho Pictures
1954
Kurosawa Akira’s Seven Samurai was released in Japan. It is widely considered one of the greatest and most influential films ever made. [Take our movie quiz.]
Bruce Bennett—Getty Image News/Thinkstock
1937
During the Spanish Civil War, the Condor Legion of the German air force, supporting the Nationalists, devastated the Basque city of Guernica, killing or wounding a third of its population and destroying much of the city. Three weeks later, Pablo Picasso completed his painting commemorating the horror of the attack. [Sort fact from fiction in our quiz about European history.]
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
1933
Hermann Göring formed the Gestapo, the Nazi Party’s political police, which ruthlessly eliminated political opposition and was responsible for sending Jews throughout Europe to their deaths at Nazi extermination camps during the Holocaust.
Copyright © 2008 by Dover Publications, Inc. Electronic image © 2008 Dover Publications, Inc. All rights reserved.
1865
Twelve days after assassinating U.S. President Abraham Lincoln, John Wilkes Booth died at a Virginia farm, shot either by a Federal soldier or by his own hand. [Learn more about John Wilkes Booth and other infamous assassins.]
© Everett Historical/Shutterstock.com
1785
John James Audubon, an ornithologist whose name is best known today through the conservationist National Audubon Society, was born in what is today Haiti. [Test your knowledge of birds.]
Royal Academy of Arts, London
1768
The prestigious English Royal Academy of Arts, led by its first president, Joshua Reynolds, hosted its first art opening. [Take our ultimate art quiz.]
© Sean Pavone—iStock Editorial/Getty Images
1607
The first permanent English settlers in North America landed at Cape Henry, Chesapeake Bay, and they later established the colony Jamestown. [Test your knowledge of early American history.]
Courtesy National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C., Samuel H. Kress Collection, 1943.4.92
1478
The Pazzi family of Florence led an unsuccessful plot to overthrow the ruling Medici family. [Explore a Medici family tree.]