When I got over the shock and surprise over the shootings at Virginia Tech, I started thinking about that week. So many strange and devastating things have happened in that week, especially in recent years. I remember Waco, Oklahoma City bombing, Columbine, and now Virginia Tech. Since my nephew was born on April 15 and I was married on April 20, some of the happiest moments of my life have happened in that week, too. I decided I wanted to look into the strange, sometimes tragic events of these days, along with the wonderful happenings in my life, stretching from April 12 - April 22.
April 12
1861 -
American Civil War: The
war begins with
Confederate forces firing on
Fort Sumter, in the harbor of
Charleston, South Carolina.
1931 - The strongest wind in the world measured at 231 mph was recorded on the summit of
Mount Washington1945 -
President Franklin D. Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States, dies while in office; vice-president
Harry S. Truman is sworn in as the 33rd
President of the United States.
2007 - Veteran talk radio personality
Don Imus is fired by
CBS Radio, eight days after making racially inflammatory on-air remarks about the
Rutgers University women's basketball team.
April 131743 -
Thomas Jefferson is born, 3rd
President of the United States (New style date) (d.
1826)
Aerosmith Day is celebrated in Massachusetts
Friday the 13th is observed on this day in the year
2007(a rather quiet day, comparatively...)
April 14
1846 - The Donner Party of pioneers departs Springfield, Illinois, for California, on what will become a year-long journey of hardship, cannibalism, and survival.
1865 - U.S. President Abraham Lincoln is shot in Ford's Theatre by John Wilkes Booth.
1912 - The British ocean liner RMS Titanic strikes an iceberg in the North Atlantic on its maiden voyage at 11:40 P.M., plunging beneath the waves and taking with it over 1,500 lives at about 2:20 a.m. the following morning.
1935 - "Black Sunday", the worst dust storm of the Dust Bowl.
1964 - A Delta rocket's third-stage motor prematurely ignites in an assembly room at Cape Canaveral, killing 3.
1986 - 2.2 pounds (1 kg) of hailstones fall on the Gopalganj district of Bangladesh, killing 92. These are the heaviest hailstones ever recorded.
April 15
WONDERFUL EVENT: My nephew is born in 2004! He shares his birthday with Leonardo da Vinci, Italian Renaissance Roman Catholic polymath born in 1452.
1955 - Ray Kroc opens his first franchise of McDonald's restaurant in Des Plaines, Illinois.
1989 - Hillsborough disaster: A human crush occurs at Hillsborough Stadium, a football stadium in Sheffield, resulting in 96 deaths.
1989 - Upon Hu Yaobang's death, the Tiananmen Square protests of 1989 begin in the People's Republic of China.
April 15 is the official deadline for filing tax return in most areas of the United States.
April 16
1178 BC - A solar eclipse may have marked the return of Odysseus, legendary King of Ithaca, to his kingdom after the Trojan War.
73 - Masada, a Jewish fortress, falls to the Romans after several months of siege, ending the Jewish Revolt.
1867 - Wilbur Wright, American aviation pioneer, is born (d. 1912)
1889 - Charles Chaplin, English actor, writer, and film producer, is born (d. 1977)
1924 - Henry Mancini, American composer, is born (d. 1994)
1927 - Pope Benedict XVI is born
1945 - German ship Goya, overfilled with refugees, sinks after being torpedoed by a Soviet submarine, killing more than 7,000 people.
1947 - Texas City Disaster: An explosion on board a freighter in port causes the city of Texas City, Texas, to catch fire, killing almost 600.
1971 - Selena, American singer, is born. She died in 1995, shot by a fan.
1998 - The Nashville Tornado of 1998, one of the most serious urban tornadoes causes one death and significantly damages downtown Nashville, Tennessee.
2007 - Virginia Tech massacre, the deadliest mass shooting in modern American history, leaves 33 dead.
April 16 is also Holocaust Remembrance day
April 17
1397 - Geoffrey Chaucer tells the Canterbury Tales for the first time at the court of Richard II. Chaucer scholars have also identified this date (in 1387) as when the book's pilgrimage to Canterbury starts.
1492 - Spain and Christopher Columbus sign a contract for him to sail to Asia to get spices.
1521 - Martin Luther speaks to the assembly at the Diet of Worms, refusing to recant his teachings.
1790 - Benjamin Franklin, American inventor, diplomat, and printer, dies (b. 1706)
1961 - Bay of Pigs Invasion: A group of CIA financed and trained Cuban refugees lands at the Bay of Pigs in Cuba with the aim of ousting Fidel Castro.
1970 - Apollo program: The ill-fated Apollo 13 spacecraft returns to Earth safely.
1989 - Followers of cult leader Jeffrey Lundgren murder the Avery family
April 18
1775 - American Revolution: Two lanterns were hung in the steeple of the Old North Church in Boston, Massachusetts, indicating British advancement by sea; Paul Revere, William Dawes and Samuel Prescott ride to warn of impending arrests of Samuel Adams and John Hancock.
1880 - A F4 tornado strikes Marshfield, Missouri, killing 99 people and injuring 100.
1906 - An earthquake with an estimated magnitude of 7.9, destroys much of San Francisco, California.
1955 - Albert Einstein, Nobel Prize laureate dies (b. 1879)
1983 - A suicide bomber destroys the United States embassy in Beirut, Lebanon, killing 63 people.
1994 - Richard Nixon, former President of the United States suffers a stroke and dies four days later.
April 19
1775 - American Revolutionary War: The Battle of Lexington and Concord which began the American Revolutionary War.
1882 - Charles Darwin, English biologist, dies (b. 1809)
1989 - A gun turret explodes on the USS Iowa, killing 47 sailors.
1903 - Eliot Ness, American lawman, is born (d. 1957)
1993 - The 51-day siege of the Branch Davidian building outside Waco, Texas, USA, ends when a fire breaks out. Eighty-one people die.
1995 - Oklahoma City bombing: The Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, USA, is bombed, killing 168. That same day convicted murder Richard Wayne Snell, who had ties to bombing suspect Timothy McVeigh, was executed in Arkansas.
April 20
WONDERFUL EVENT: My wedding in 1996!
570 - Prophet Muhammed, founder of Islam, is born (d. 632) (date disputed)
1889 - Birth of Adolf Hitler, Austrian-born First World War veteran and leader of Nazi Germany from 1933 until his death (d. 1945)
1912 - Bram Stoker, Irish author, dies (b. 1847)
1999 - 15 students (including the two gunmen) and a teacher die in the Columbine High School massacre.
2004 - My nephew is rushed to the hospital when he stops breathing at 5 days old. After a few days in the hospital, he's sentd home with a breathing monitor and has grown fine ever since.
2007 - Johnson Space Center Shooting: A man with a hand gun barricades himself in NASA's Johnson Space Center before killing a male hostage and himself.
4/20 in cannabis culture.
April 211910 -
Mark Twain, American author and humorist, dies (b.
1835)
1926 -
Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom is born
1930 - A fire at a penitentiary in
Columbus, Ohio, kills 320 people.
1989 -
Tiananmen Square Protests of 1989: In
Beijing, around 100,000 students gather in
Tiananmen Square to commemorate Chinese reform leader
Hu Yaobang.
2007 - A
Blue Angels jet crashes during an air show in South Carolina
April 22
1889 - At high noon, thousands rush to claim land in the
Land Run of 1889. Within hours the cities of
Oklahoma City and
Guthrie are formed with populations of at least 10,000.
1954 -
Red Scare:
Army-McCarthy Hearings begin.
1984 -
Ansel Adams, American photographer, dies (b.
1902)
1994 -
Richard Nixon,
President of the United States, dies (b.
1913)
2000 - In a predawn raid, federal agents seize six-year-old
Elián González from his relatives' home in
Miami, Florida.
Earth DayCan you believe all these things, often historical and world-changing, have happened in a span of 10 days? It makes me wonder if there are some sort of cosmic allignments during these days. The Titanic, President Lincoln gets shot, the Civil War begins, Roosevelt dies, Tiananmen Square, Nixon dies, Bay of Pigs Invasion, the great San Francisco Earthquake, the American Revolution begins, McCarthy Hearings AND Virginia Tech, Waco, Oklahoma City, and Columbine? Seems like something more than coincidence.
Whoever does the marketing for pharmaceutical companies is brilliant! I've never taken Lunesta, but that Lunesta moth (I recently learned it's supposed to be a Luna moth, get it?) that flies around the sleepy town and gently hovers over people sleeping so soundly makes me not only WANT 
Lunesta, it makes me want to have that moth, even BE that moth! I think it's funny that one of the side effects they list is "drowsiness!" I would hope so, isn't that the point? I also learned that Lunesta is in the same class of drugs as Rohypnol, also known as the "date rape drug." Like Rohypnol, Lunesta can cause memory loss. I guess that would make some people not want to take it, but memory loss sounds kinda nice to me at times. So, if I take Lunesta, do you think the Lunesta moth will come?
I actually do take Zoloft, and I just adore the little Zoloft egg. It's so cute and so sad and alone in the commercials and print material, and then, with the magic and beauty of the medication, the egg is able to enjoy life again.
Another one I'm particularly fond of is the "Your Dreams Miss You" ads from Rozerem, the ones with the beaver and Abraham Lincoln. These ads get a bit annoying, but if you go to their website, http://www.rozerem.com/, you may gain a newfound appreciation for their marketing campaign, as I have. At the website, you can play chess with the beaver, and click on anything in the kitchen and it will take you to healthy sleep practices, a dream dictionary, and even Podcasts of relaxing music to help you sleep.
