April 15th

Two bombs exploded at the Boston Marathon in Boston, Massachusetts, killing 3 and injuring at least 170 others.

Retired Supreme Court Justice Byron R. White died at age 84.

Cal Ripken Jr. of the Baltimore Orioles became the 24th major league player to reach 3,000 hits.

Pol Pot, leader of the Camobodia's brutal Khmer Rouge regime, died at age 73.

The 100th Boston Marathon was won by Moses Tanui of Kenya.

The World Trade Organization is founded. The WTO coordinates and strives to liberalize international trade. It has been criticized for ignoring and escalating the negative social and environmental side-effects of globalization.

Students in Beijing launched pro-democracy protests upon the death of former Communist Party leader Hu Yaobang.

The United States launched an air raid against Libya in response to the bombing of a discotheque in Berlin on April 5; Libya said 37 people, mostly civilians, were killed.

Existentialist philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre died in Paris at age 74.

Ray Kroc acquired McDonald's and opened his first restaurant in Des Plaines, Ill., today the official McDonald’s Corporate Museum.

Jackie Robinson made his Brooklyn Dodger debut and scored the game-winning run. On April 15, 1997, his number, 42, was retired.

Nazi concentration camp Bergen-Belsen was liberated by Canadian and British forces.

The Eastman Kodak Company launches Kodachrome. The photographic film was one of the most popular media used by professional and hobby photographers around the world. The product was discontinued in 2009 because of the advent of digital photography.

A paymaster and guard were murdered in Braintree, Mass. Sacco and Vanzetti were accused of the crime.

Titanic sank off the coast of Newfoundland on its maiden voyage after it struck an iceberg.

First modern Olympic games close in Athens, Greece.

1st telephone installed: Boston-Somerville in Massachusetts.

President Abraham Lincoln died nine hours after being shot by John Wilkes Booth at Ford's Theater in Washington. Andrew Johnson became the 17th president.

President Abraham Lincoln declared a state of insurrection and called out Union troops three days after the Confederate attack on Fort Sumter in South Carolina.

The city of San Francisco was incorporated.

Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet opened the first free American school for the deaf in Hartford, Conn.

Samuel Johnson's "A Dictionary of the English Language" published in London.