- 90th Day of 2016 276 Remaining
- Summer Begins in 82 Days
- Sunrise: 6:55
- Sunset: 7:31
- 12 Hours 36 Minutes
- Moon Rise: 1;15am
- Moon Set: 11:38am
- Phase: 60% 22 Days
- Next Full Moon April 21 @ 10:25pm
- Full Pink Moon, this name came from the herb moss pink, or wild ground phlox, which is one of the earliest widespread flowers of the spring. Other names for this month’s celestial body include the Full Sprouting Grass Moon, the Egg Moon, and among coastal tribes the Full Fish Moon, because this was the time that the shad swam upstream to spawn.
- Tides
- High: 3:36am/5:56am
- Low: 10:40am/10:48pm
- Holidays
- Manatee Appreciation Day
- National Doctor’s Day
- National I Am In Control Day
- Pencil Day
- Take A Walk In The Park Day
- Turkey Neck Soup Day
- Grass Is Always Browner On The Other Side Of the Fence Day
- National Dining Car Day
- Whole Grain Sampling Day
- On This Day
- 1533 --- Henry VIII divorced his first wife, Catherine of Aragon.
- 1814 --- European forces allied against Napoleonic France march triumphantly into Paris, formally ending a decade of French domination on the Continent. Napoleon, one of the greatest military strategists in history, seized control of the French state in 1800, and in 1804 was crowned emperor. By 1807, he controlled an empire that stretched across Europe. In 1812, however, he began to encounter the first significant defeats of his military career, suffering through a disastrous invasion of Russia, losing Spain to the Duke of Wellington, and enduring total defeat against an allied force in 1814. Exiled to the island of Elba, he escaped to France in early 1815 and raised a new Grand Army that enjoyed temporary success before its crushing defeat at Waterloo. He was then exiled to the island of St. Helena, where he died six years later.
- 1867 --- The U.S. agreed to purchase Alaska from Russia for $7.2 million (about 2 cents an acre). The Treaty with Russia was negotiated and signed by Secretary of State William Seward and Russian Minister to the United States Edouard de Stoeckl. Critics at the time called it"Seward’s Folly.”
- 1868 --- The Pullman Palace Car Company introduced the first railroad dining car.
- 1870 --- Following its ratification by the requisite three-fourths of the states, the 15th Amendment, granting African-American men the right to vote, is formally adopted into the U.S. Constitution. Passed by Congress the year before, the amendment reads, “the right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude.” One day after it was adopted, Thomas Peterson-Mundy of Perth Amboy, New Jersey, became the first African American to vote under the authority of the 15th Amendment.
- 1909 --- The Queensboro Bridge, in New York, opened linking Manhattan and Queens. It was the first double decker bridge.
- 1939 --- The comic book "Detective Comics #27" appeared on newstands. This comic introduced Batman.
- 1964 --- The TV game show "Jeopardy!" premiered on NBC. The Original hose of the show, produced and created by Merv Griffin, was Art Fleming. Today the show, seen weekday evenings at 7pm, is hosted by Alex Trebek.
- 1965 --- Princeton forward Bill Bradley sets an NCAA men’s basketball record with 58 points in a game against Wichita State. Bradley was the dominant player in college basketball that year and won the tournament’s Most Outstanding Player award.
- 1967 --- The cover of the Beatles' "Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" was staged and photographed.
- 1972 --- A major coordinated communist offensive opens with the heaviest military action since the sieges of Allied bases at Con Thien and Khe Sanh in 1968. Committing almost their entire army to the offensive, the North Vietnamese launched a massive three-pronged attack into South Vietnam. Four North Vietnamese divisions attacked directly across the Demilitarized Zone in Quang Tri province. Thirty-five South Vietnamese soldiers died in the initial attack and hundreds of civilians and soldiers were wounded.
- 1974 --- Of his many enormous hits in the 1970s, none captured the essence of John Denver better than his first #1 song, “Sunshine On My Shoulders,” which reached the top of the pop charts. “Sunshine On My Shoulders” was John Denver’s attempt to write a sad song, which is really all one needs to know in order to understand what made Denver so appealing to so many. “I was so down I wanted to write a feeling-blue song,” he told Seventeen magazine in 1974, “[but] this is what came out.” Originally released on his 1971 album Poems, Prayers and Promises, Denver’s lovely ode to the restorative powers of sunlight only became a smash hit when re-released on his John Denver‘s Greatest Hits album in late 1973—an album that went on to sell more than 10 million copies worldwide.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HrI_VXLUcFk
- 1980 --- A floating apartment for oil workers in the North Sea collapses, killing 123 people. The Alexander Kielland platform housed 208 men who worked on the nearby Edda oil rig in the Ekofisk field, 235 miles east of Dundee, Scotland. Most of the Phillips Petroleum workers were from Norway, although a few were American and British. The platform, held up by two large pontoons, had bedrooms, kitchens and lounges and provided a place for workers to spend their time when not working. At about 6:30 p.m. on March 30, most of the residents were in the platform’s small theater watching a movie. Although there were gale conditions in the North Sea that evening, no one was expecting that a large wave would collapse and capsize the platform.
- 1981 --- President Ronald Reagan is shot in the chest outside a Washington, D.C., hotel by a deranged drifter named John Hinckley Jr. The president had just finished addressing a labor meeting at the Washington Hilton Hotel and was walking with his entourage to his limousine when Hinckley, standing among a group of reporters, fired six shots at the president, hitting Reagan and three of his attendants. White House Press Secretary James Brady was shot in the head and critically wounded, Secret Service agent Timothy McCarthy was shot in the side, and District of Columbia policeman Thomas Delahaney was shot in the neck. After firing the shots, Hinckley was overpowered and pinned against a wall, and President Reagan, apparently unaware that he’d been shot, was shoved into his limousine by a Secret Service agent and rushed to the hospital. Of the victims of the assassination attempt, Secret Service agent Timothy McCarthy and D.C. policeman Thomas Delahaney eventually recovered. James Brady, who nearly died after being shot in the eye, suffered permanent brain damage. He later became an advocate of gun control, and in 1993 Congress passed the “Brady Bill,” which established a five-day waiting period and background checks for prospective gun buyers. President Bill Clinton signed the bill into law.
- 1987 --- 'Sunflowers' by Vincent Van Gogh is sold to a Japanese buyer for $39.9 million. There has been some controversy on whether it is possibly a fake. During the 1990s more than 2 dozen Van Gogh's have been labeled as fakes or copies. Vincent Van Gogh was also born on this day in 1853.
- 1933 --- In the Peanuts comic strip, Charlie Brown hit his first home run.
- 2009 --- President Barack Obama issues an ultimatum to struggling American automakers General Motors (GM) and Chrysler: In order to receive additional bailout loans from the government, he says, the companies need to make dramatic changes in the way they run their businesses. The president also announced a set of initiatives intended to assist the struggling U.S. auto industry and boost consumer confidence, including government backing of GM and Chrysler warranties, even if both automakers went out of business. In December 2008, GM (the world’s largest automaker from the early 1930s to 2008) and Chrysler (then America’s third-biggest car company) accepted $17.4 billion in federal aid in order to stay afloat. At that time, the two companies had been hit hard by the global economic crisis and slumping auto sales; however, critics charged that their problems had begun several decades earlier and included failures to innovate in the face of foreign competition and issues with labor unions, among other factors.
- Birthdays
- Eric Clapton
- Tracy Chapman
- MC Hammer
- Sean O’Casey
- Francisco De Goya
- Anna Sewell
- Vincent Van Gogh
- McGeorge Bundy
- Frankie Laine
- Warren Beatty
- Astrud Gilberto
- Norah Jones
- Robbie Coltrane
- Paul Reiser
- Celine Dion
Manatee Appreciation Day-KALW Almanac-3/30/2016
