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April 12, 2012

Today in history

Today is the 103rd day of 2012 and the 24th day of spring.

 

TODAY'S HISTORY: In 1861, Confederate forces fired on Fort Sumter in the harbor of Charleston, S.C., in an engagement that marked the beginning of the Civil War.

In 1945, President Franklin D. Roosevelt died in Warm Springs, Ga.

In 1961, Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin became the first man in space and the first to orbit the Earth.

In 1983, Harold Washington became the first black man to be elected mayor of Chicago.

 

TODAY'S BIRTHDAYS: Henry Clay (1777-1852), politician/statesman; Herbie Hancock (1940- ), musician; Tom Clancy (1947- ), writer; David Letterman (1947- ), TV personality; Andy Garcia (1956- ), actor; Vince Gill (1957- ), singer; Claire Danes (1979- ), actress.

 

TODAY'S SPORTS: In 1981, the New York Giants drafted linebacker Lawrence Taylor in the first round of the NFL draft.

 

TODAY'S FACT: Franklin D. Roosevelt was selected in a Zogby poll as the greatest president of the 20th century, but his wife, Eleanor Roosevelt, consistently outranked him in approval polls during his lifetime.

 

TODAY'S QUOTE: "An oppressed people are authorized, whenever they can, to rise and break their fetters." -- Henry Clay

 

TODAY'S NUMBER: 108 -- length (in minutes) of the first orbital human spaceflight, by Yuri Gagarin on this day in 1961.

 

TODAY'S MOON: Between full moon (April 6) and last quarter (April 13).

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