April 12th

American cargo ship captain Richard Phillips was rescued from Somali pirates by U.S. Navy snipers who shot and killed three of the hostage-takers.

Barry Bonds hit his 660th home run to tie Willie Mays for third on baseball's career list. (Bonds is now the career leader in home runs.).

Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez resigned under pressure from the country's divided military. (He was returned to office two days later.).

U.S. District Judge Susan Webber Wright found President Bill Clinton in contempt of court for giving "intentionally false" testimony in a lawsuit filed by Paula Jones about his relationship with former White House intern Monica Lewinsky.

The Last Emperor receives nine Academy Awards. Bernardo Bertolucci's biopic about Puyi, the last Emperor of China, was the first film to be awarded all the Oscars it was nominated for.

Harold Washington was elected Chicago’s first African-American mayor.

The space shuttle Columbia blasted off from Cape Canaveral, Fla., on its first test flight.

US Olympic Committee endorses a boycott of the Moscow Olympic games.

Soviet cosmonaut Yuri A. Gagarin became the first human in space and also the first human to orbit the earth in a spacecraft.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt died of a cerebral hemorrhage in Warm Springs, Ga., at age 63.

The first aircraft jet engine is successfully tested. Sir Frank Whittle invented and tested the engine, only a few months before German engineer Hans von Ohain ran his jet engine, which was to power the first ever all-jet aircraft.

Kuomintang leader Chiang Kai-shek begins counter revolution in Shanghai.

The catcher for Harvard's baseball team, James Tyng, wore a modified fencing mask behind the plate. It is believed to be the first time a catcher's mask was used during a game.

The American Civil War begins. The bombardment of Fort Sumter near Charleston, South Carolina marked the beginning of hostilities. The conflict was sparked by deepening economic, social and political differences between the southern and northern states, which was most palpably embodied by the dispute about the legitimacy of slavery. The southern (pro-slavery) states, surrendered in 1865, ending the war.

1st US colonists on Pacific coast arrive at Cape Disappointment (Washington).

England's King James I decreed the design of the original Union Flag, which combined the flags of England and Scotland.

4th Crusade occupies & plunders Constantinople.