- 120th Day of 2016 246 Remaining
- Summer Begins in 52 Days
- Sunrise: 6:14
- Sunset: 7:59
- 13 Hours 45 Minutes
- Moon Rise: 1:36am
- Moon Set: 12:16pm
- Phase: Last Quarter
- Next Full Moon May 21 @ 2:16pm
- In most areas, flowers are abundant everywhere during this time. Thus, the name Full Flower Moon. Other names include the Full Corn Planting Moon, or the Milk Moon.
- Tides
- High: 3:58am/6:20pm
- Low: 10:59am/11:46pm
- Holidays
- National Arbor Day
- National Peace Rose Day
- National Shrimp Scampi Day
- Viral Video Day
- Zipper Day
- Childcare Professionals Day
- Hairball Awareness Day
- International Dance Day
- World Wish Day
- Showa Day-Japan
- 9th Day of Ridvan-Baha’i
- On This Day
- 1429 --- During the Hundred Years’ War, the 17-year-old French peasant Joan of Arc leads a French force in relieving the city of Orleans, besieged by the English since October. At the age of 16, “voices” of Christian saints told Joan to aid Charles, the French dauphin, in gaining the French throne and expelling the English from France. Convinced of the validity of her divine mission, Charles furnished Joan with a small force of troops. She led her troops to Orleans, and on April 29, as a French sortie distracted the English troops on the west side of the city, Joan entered unopposed by its eastern gate. Bringing needed supplies and troops into the besieged city, she also inspired the French to a passionate resistance and through the next week led the charge during a number of skirmishes and battles.
- 1852 --- The first edition of Peter Roget's Thesaurus was published.
- 1854 --- By an act of the Pennsylvania legislature, Ashmun Institute, the first college founded solely for African-American students, is officially chartered. Established in the rolling farmlands of southern Chester County, Pennsylvania, Ashmun Institute was named after Jehudi Ashmun, the U.S. agent who helped reorganize and preserve the struggling African-American colony in Africa that later grew into the independent nation of Liberia. The Ashmun Institute, chartered to give theological, classical, and scientific training to African Americans, opened on January 1, 1857, and John Pym Carter served as the college’s first president. In 1866, the institution was renamed Lincoln University.
- 1875 --- American writer Henry James’ collection of travel pieces, Transatlantic Sketches, is published. The same year, James publishes a collection of stories, A Passionate Pilgrim, and a novel,Roderick Hudson. These three works herald the beginning of James’ long and influential writing career.
- 1913 --- Gideon Sundback patented an all-purpose zipper.
- 1945 --- The U.S. Seventh Army’s 45th Infantry Division liberates Dachau, the first concentration camp established by Germany’s Nazi regime. A major Dachau subcamp was liberated the same day by the 42nd Rainbow Division. With the advance of Allied forces against Germany in April 1945, the Germans transferred prisoners from concentration camps near the front to Dachau, leading to a general deterioration of conditions and typhus epidemics. On April 27, 1945, approximately 7,000 prisoners, mostly Jews, were forced to begin a death march from Dachau to Tegernsee, far to the south. The next day, many of the SS guards abandoned the camp. On April 29, the Dachau main camp was liberated by units of the 45th Infantry after a brief battle with the camp’s remaining guards. As they neared the camp, the Americans found more than 30 railroad cars filled with bodies in various states of decomposition. Inside the camp there were more bodies and 30,000 survivors, most severely emaciated. Some of the American troops who liberated Dachau were so appalled by conditions at the camp that they machine-gunned at least two groups of captured German guards. It is officially reported that 30 SS guards were killed in this fashion, but conspiracy theorists have alleged that more than 10 times that number were executed by the American liberators. The German citizens of the town of Dachau were later forced to bury the 9,000 dead inmates found at the camp.
- 1946 --- Tojo Hideki, wartime premier of Japan, is indicted by the International Military Tribunal for the Far East of war crimes. In September 1945, he tried to commit suicide by shooting himself but was saved by an American physician who gave him a transfusion of American blood. He was eventually hanged by the Americans in 1948 after having been found guilty of war crimes.
- 1952 --- IBM President Thomas J. Watson, Jr., informed his company's stockholders that IBM was building "the most advanced, most flexible high-speed computer in the world." The computer was unveiled April 7, 1953, as the IBM 701 Electronic Data Processing Machine.
- 1968 --- “Hair” premiered on Broadway. In a year marked by as much social and cultural upheaval as 1968, it was understandable that the New York Times review of a controversial musical newly arrived on Broadway would describe the show in political terms. “You probably don’t have to be a supporter of Eugene McCarthy to love it,” wrote critic Clive Barnes, “but I wouldn’t give it much chance among the adherents of Governor Reagan.” The show in question was Hair, the now-famous “tribal love-rock musical” that introduced the era-defining song “Aquarius” and gave New York theatergoers a full-frontal glimpse of the burgeoning 60s-counterculture esthetic.
- 1974 --- President Richard Nixon announces to the public that he will release transcripts of 46 taped White House conversations in response to a Watergate trial subpoena issued in July 1973. The House Judiciary committee accepted 1,200 pages of transcripts the next day, but insisted that the tapes themselves be turned over as well. In June 1972, five men connected with Nixon’s Committee to Re-Elect the President (CREEP) had been caught breaking into the Democratic National Committee Headquarters in the Watergate Hotel in Washington D.C. A subsequent investigation exposed other illegal activities perpetrated by CREEP and authorized by senior members of Nixon’s administration. It also raised questions about what the president knew about those activities. Nixon vigorously denied involvement in the burglary cover-up, infamously proclaiming “I am not a crook.” In May 1973, the Senate convened an investigation into the Watergate scandal amid public cries for Nixon’s impeachment. In July 1974, the Supreme Court rejected Nixon’s claim of executive privilege and ordered him to turn over the remaining tapes. On one of them, the president could be heard ordering the FBI to end its investigation of the Watergate break-in; this came to be known as the “smoking gun” that proved Nixon’s guilt.
- 1975 --- Operation Frequent Wind, the largest helicopter evacuation on record, begins removing the last Americans from Saigon. In 19 hours, 81 helicopters carried more than 1,000 Americans and almost 6,000 Vietnamese to aircraft carriers offshore. Cpl. Charles McMahon, Jr. and Lance Cpl. Darwin Judge, USMC, were the last U.S. military personnel killed in action in Vietnam, when shrapnel from a North Vietnamese rocket struck them as they were guarding Tan Son Nhut Airbase during the evacuation. At 7:53 a.m. on April 30, the last helicopter lifted off the rook of the embassy and headed out to sea. Later that morning, North Vietnamese tanks crashed through the gates of the Presidential Palace. North Vietnamese Col. Bui Tin accepted the surrender from Gen. Duong Van Minh, who had taken over from Tran Van Huong (who only spent one day in power after President Nguyen Van Thieu fled). The Vietnam War was over.
- 1985 --- Billy Martin was brought back, for the fourth time, to the position of manager for the New York Yankees.
- 1986 --- In a game against the Seattle Mariners at Fenway Park, Roger Clemens of the Boston Red Sox becomes the first pitcher in Major League Baseball to strike out 20 batters in a nine-inning game. Ten years later, Clemens repeats the feat, the only player in baseball history to do so.
- 1991 --- A devastating cyclone hits Bangladesh, killing more than 135,000 people. Even though there had been ample warning of the coming storm and shelter provisions had been built in the aftermath of a deadly 1970 storm, this disaster was one of the worst of the 20th century. “Cyclone” is the name given to hurricane-type storms that arise in the Indian Ocean. “Typhoons” are those that start in the Pacific Ocean and “hurricanes” are those found in the Atlantic. Cyclone 2B, as this storm was known, had been tracked for a week as it made its way north through the Bay of Bengal.
- 1992 --- A jury of 10 whites, one Hispanic, and one Filipina in the Los Angeles suburb of Simi Valley acquits four police officers who had been charged with using excessive force in arresting black motorist Rodney King a year earlier. The announcement of the verdict, which enraged the black community, prompted widespread rioting throughout much of the sprawling city. It wasn’t until three days later that the arson and looting finally ended. Immediately after the verdict was announced that afternoon, protestors took to the streets, engaging in random acts of violence. At the corner of Florence and Normandie streets, Reginald Denny, a white truck driver, was dragged from his truck and severely beaten by several angry rioters. A helicopter crew caught the incident on camera and broadcast it live on local television. Viewers saw first-hand that the police, woefully unprepared, were unwilling—or unable—to enforce the law in certain neighborhoods of the city. As it became evident that breaking the law in much of South Central Los Angeles would yield little, if any, consequences, opportunistic rioters came out in full force on the night of April 29, burning retail establishments all over the area. Police still had no control of the situation the following day. Thousands of people packed the streets and began looting stores. Korean-owned businesses were targeted in particular. For most, the looting was simply a crime of opportunity rather than any political expression.
- 1996 --- The musical "Rent" opened on Broadway.
- 2004 --- The National World War II Memorial opens in Washington, D.C., to thousands of visitors, providing overdue recognition for the 16 million U.S. men and women who served in the war. The memorial is located on 7.4 acres on the former site of the Rainbow Pool at the National Mall between the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial. The Capitol dome is seen to the east, and Arlington Cemetery is just across the Potomac River to the west.
- 2004 --- The last Oldsmobile comes off the assembly line at the Lansing Car Assembly plant in Michigan, signaling the end of the 106-year-old automotive brand, America’s oldest. Factory workers signed the last Oldsmobile, an Alero sedan, before the vehicle was moved to Lansing’s R.E. Olds Transportation Museum, where it went on display. The last 500 Aleros ever manufactured featured “Final 500″ emblems and were painted dark metallic cherry red.
- 2015 --- The White Sox beat the Baltimore Orioles 8-2 at Camden Yards. The game was played without a crowd present due to the ongoing riots and protests in Baltimore. This was the first time a Major League Baseball game was played in front of an empty house.
- Birthdays
- Willie Nelson
- Duke Ellington
- William Randolph Hearst
- Donald Mills
- Otis Rush
- Lonnie Donnegan
- Luis Aparicio
- Zubin Mehta
- Kate Mulgrew
- Eve Plumb
- Daniel Day Lewis
- Carnie Wilson
- Uma Thurman
- Andre Agassi
- Emperor Hirohito
National Arbor Day-KALW Almanac-4/29/2016
