April 12 is the 102nd day of the year in the Gregorian calendar (103rd in leap years). There are 263 days remaining.

Events

• 467 - Anthemius is elevated to Emperor of the Western Roman Empire
• 1606 - The Union Flag is adopted as the national flag of Great Britain.
• 1633 - The formal interrogation by the Inquisition of Galileo Galilei begins.
• 1861 - American Civil War: The war begins with Confederate forces firing on Fort Sumter, in the harbor of Charleston, South Carolina
• 1864 - American Civil War: Fort Pillow massacre: Confederate forces under General Nathan Bedford Forrest kill most of the African American soldiers who had surrendered at Fort Pillow, Tennessee
• 1865 - American Civil War: Mobile, Alabama falls to the Union Army
• 1877 - The United Kingdom annexes the Transvaal.
• 1926 - By a vote of 45 to 41, the United States Senate unseats Iowa Senator Smith W. Brookhart and seats Daniel F. Steck, after Brookhart had already served for over one year.
• 1937 - Sir Frank Whittle ground-tests the first jet engine designed to power an aircraft, at the British Thomson-Houston factory in Rugby, England
• 1945 - Harry S. Truman is inaugurated as the 33rd President of the United States.
• 1946 - Syria gains independence from France
• 1954 - Bill Haley and His Comets record "Rock Around the Clock" in New York City. Initially unsuccessful, the recording would help launch the Rock and Roll revolution a year later.
• 1961 - Yuri Gagarin becomes the first man to fly in space.
• 1968 - Nerve gas accident at Skull Valley, Utah
• 1975 - Khmer Rouge troops capture Phnom Penh, Cambodia
• 1980 - Terry Fox began his trans-Canada marathon to raise money for cancer research (Marathon of Hope) by dipping his artificial leg in the Atlantic Ocean at St. John's, Newfoundland, aiming to dip it again in the Pacific Ocean at Vancouver, British Columbia.
• 1981 - The first launch of a Space Shuttle: Columbia launches on the STS-1 mission.
• 1990 - Christian Bernard, F.R.C., becomes Imperator of AMORC
• 1992 - EuroDisney opens in Marne-la-Vallee, France.
• 1994 - Canter & Siegel post the first commercial mass Usenet spam.
• 2002 - Coup d'Etat against Hugo Chávez in Venezuela

Births

• 599 BC - Mahavira, founder of Jainism (d. 527 BC)
• 812 - Muhammad at-Taqi, Shia Imam (d. 835)
• 1748 - Antoine Laurent de Jussieu (d. 1836)
• 1777 - Henry Clay, American statesman and orator (d. 1852)
• 1799 - Henri Druey, member of the Swiss Federal Council (d. 1855)
• 1832 - Hugo Adolph Steinheil , optician (d. 1893)
• 1856 - William Martin Conway, English art critic and mountaineer (d. 1937)
• 1867- Sindo Garay , Cuban singer and musician (d. 1968)
• 1884 - Otto Meyerhof, biochemist, winner of Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (1922) (d. 1951)
• 1888 - Cecil Kimber , founder of MG
• 1892 - Johnny Dodds, jazz musician (d. 1940)
• 1895 - Lily Pons, opera soprano (d. 1976)
• 1902 - Louis Beel, Prime Minister of the Netherlands (d. 1977)
• 1903 - Sally Rand, fan dancer (d. 1979)
• 1904 - Paul Dahlke , actor (d. 1984)
• 1907 - Felix de Weldon, sculptor (d. 2003)
• 1908 - Lionel Hampton, musician (d. 2002)
• 1916 - Beverly Cleary, writer
• 1922 - Tiny Tim, American musician (d. 1996)
• 1928 - Jean-François Paillard, French conductor
• 1933 - Montserrat Caballé, Catalan soprano
• 1939 - Alan Ayckbourn, writer
• 1940 - Herbie Hancock, musician
• 1941 - Bobby Moore, English national football team captain (d. 1993)
• 1944 - John Kay, of Steppenwolf
• 1946 - Ed O'Neill, actor
• 1947 - Tom Clancy, author
• 1947 - David Letterman, talk show host
• 1948 - Joschka Fischer, foreign minister of Germany
• 1948 - Sandra "Lois" Reeves, singer, member of Martha & the Vandellas
• 1949 - Scott Turow, writer
• 1950 - David Cassidy, singer, actor
• 1952 - Ralph Wiley, sports journalist (d. 2004)
• 1956 - Andy Garcia, actor
• 1956 - Herbert Grönemeyer, singer, pianist and actor
• 1957 - Vince Gill, country musician
• 1961 - Lisa Gerrard, singer, film composer
• 1971 - Shannen Doherty, actress
• 1971 - Nicholas Brendon, actor
• 1979 - Claire Danes, actress
• 1982 - Deen, Bosnian singer

Deaths

• 65 - Lucius Annaeus Seneca, philosopher, dramatist, statesman (b. c. 3 BC)
• 238 - Roman emperor Gordian I (suicide)
• 238 - Roman emperor Gordian II (killed in battle)
• 1443 - Henry Chichele, Archbishop of Canterbury
• 1782 - Metastasio, pseudonym of Pietro Armando Dominico Trapassi, Italian poet and librettist (b. 1698)
• 1850 - Adoniram Judson, pioneer Baptist missionary to India and Burma (b. 1788)
• 1912 - Clara Barton, nurse and Red Cross advocate (b. 1821)
• 1938 - Feodor Chaliapin, operatic bass (b. 1873)
• 1945 - Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States (b. 1882)
• 1962 - Sir Mokshagundam Visvesvaraya, Indian politician and engineer, dies at 101
• 1975 - Josephine Baker, dancer (b. 1906)
• 1980 - Clark McConachy, billiards and snooker player (b. 1895)
• 1981 - Joe Louis, boxer (b. 1914)
• 1988 - Alan Paton, novelist (b. 1903)
• 1989 - Sugar Ray Robinson, multiple time world champion boxer (b. 1921)
• 1989 - Abbie Hoffman, radical leader (b. 1936)
• 2001 - Harvey Ball, inventor of the Smiley (b. 1921)
• 2003 - Cecil H. Green, Texas Instruments Founder (b. 1900)

Holidays and observances

• The Roman holiday of Cerealia begins.
• Yuri's Night, an international celebration of the first human in space, Yuri Gagarin.

External links

• BBC: On This Day

From "Lines in Praise of a Date Made Praiseworthy Solely by Something Very Nice That Happened to It", by Ogden Nash:

"As through the calendar I delve

I pause to rejoice in April twelve.

Yea, be I in sickness or be I in health

My favorite date is April twealth.

..."

April 11 - April 13 - March 12 - May 12 -- listing of all days