1536 Anne Boleyn knew that her failure to produce a male heir for Henry VIII had placed her in a tricky position. On April 26, 1536, Anne met with her chaplain, the Protestant reformer Matthew Parker, and asked him to watch over her daughter, Princess Elizabeth, if anything happened to her.
1564 William Shakespeare was born in a half-timbered house in Henley Street, Stratford-Upon-Avon, England. (His birth date is unknown). He was baptized in the town's Holy Trinity Church on April 26, 1564. Little is known about Shakespeare’s early life. As the son of a prominent town official, William attended the local Stratford educational establishment, Kings New Grammar School, which may have provided an intensive education in Latin, grammar and literature.
1765 Emma, Lady Hamilton was born Amy Lyon, at Ness, near Neston in Cheshire, England on April 26, 1765. She was the daughter of Henry Lyon, a blacksmith who died when she was two months old. Emma is best remembered for being the mistress of Lord Nelson and as the muse of the portrait painter George Romney.
1803 Thousands of meteor fragments fell from the skies of L'Aigle, France on April 26, 1803, an event that convinced European scientists that meteors exist. Prior to that, they were seen in the West as an atmospheric phenomenon, like lightning, and were not connected with strange stories of rocks falling from the sky.
1859 British textile designer William Morris married Jane Burden in a low-key ceremony held at St Michael's Church, Ship Street, Oxford on April 26, 1859. They honeymooned in Bruges, Belgium, and settled temporarily at 41 Great Ormond Street, London. Jane Burden's shock of hair, palely severe features and Cupid's bow of a mouth featured in dozens of paintings by the poet and artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti. Their relationship caused problems in her marriage to Morris.
1865 After shooting Abraham Lincoln, John Wilkes Booth, jumped from the balcony onto the stage. He broke his leg during the jump, but escaped out the back door and onto his horse. Booth got a Dr Mudd to set his leg, thus allowing the assassin to escape to Virginia with an accomplice on horseback. An army troop caught up with him on April 26, 1865 in a Virginia barn. His accomplice surrendered but Booth refused. He died from shots fired during his capture.
1898 The Netherlands introduced vehicle registration plates on April 26, 1898. The first plate was issued to J. van Dam, who purchased the first Dutch-built motorcar, which was manufactured at his own Groninger Motor-Rijtuigen Fabriek.
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| Anne Boleyn and Princess Elizabeth |
1564 William Shakespeare was born in a half-timbered house in Henley Street, Stratford-Upon-Avon, England. (His birth date is unknown). He was baptized in the town's Holy Trinity Church on April 26, 1564. Little is known about Shakespeare’s early life. As the son of a prominent town official, William attended the local Stratford educational establishment, Kings New Grammar School, which may have provided an intensive education in Latin, grammar and literature.
1765 Emma, Lady Hamilton was born Amy Lyon, at Ness, near Neston in Cheshire, England on April 26, 1765. She was the daughter of Henry Lyon, a blacksmith who died when she was two months old. Emma is best remembered for being the mistress of Lord Nelson and as the muse of the portrait painter George Romney.
1803 Thousands of meteor fragments fell from the skies of L'Aigle, France on April 26, 1803, an event that convinced European scientists that meteors exist. Prior to that, they were seen in the West as an atmospheric phenomenon, like lightning, and were not connected with strange stories of rocks falling from the sky.
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| L'Aigle metorite |
1859 British textile designer William Morris married Jane Burden in a low-key ceremony held at St Michael's Church, Ship Street, Oxford on April 26, 1859. They honeymooned in Bruges, Belgium, and settled temporarily at 41 Great Ormond Street, London. Jane Burden's shock of hair, palely severe features and Cupid's bow of a mouth featured in dozens of paintings by the poet and artist Dante Gabriel Rossetti. Their relationship caused problems in her marriage to Morris.
1865 After shooting Abraham Lincoln, John Wilkes Booth, jumped from the balcony onto the stage. He broke his leg during the jump, but escaped out the back door and onto his horse. Booth got a Dr Mudd to set his leg, thus allowing the assassin to escape to Virginia with an accomplice on horseback. An army troop caught up with him on April 26, 1865 in a Virginia barn. His accomplice surrendered but Booth refused. He died from shots fired during his capture.
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| Booth's escape route |
1898 The Netherlands introduced vehicle registration plates on April 26, 1898. The first plate was issued to J. van Dam, who purchased the first Dutch-built motorcar, which was manufactured at his own Groninger Motor-Rijtuigen Fabriek.
1921 On April 26, 1921, the London Metropolitan Police introduced motorcycle patrols for the first time. The motorcycles allowed police officers to cover a greater area of the city and respond more quickly to incidents, improving their ability to maintain law and order. The motorcycles were also more cost-effective than traditional horse-mounted patrols and soon became a common sight on the streets of London.
1923 Prince Albert, the Duke of York (the future King George VI) married Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, the youngest daughter of Scottish aristocrat Claude Bowes-Lyon at Westminster Abbey on April 26, 1923. It was the first royal wedding at Westminster Abbey since 1383. Albert's marriage to someone not of royal birth was considered a modernizing gesture. They Duke and Duchess of York had two children, Elizabeth II and Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon.
1924 The first ever cocktail party in England was hosted by noted war artist Christopher R.W. Nevinson on April 26, 1924. Within two years, cocktail parties had changed the English cultural landscape becoming a byword for everything the old disapproved of and the young aspired to.
1926 Giacomo Puccini composed 12 operas. The final one, Turandot, was unfinished and its last two scenes were completed posthumously by Franco Alfano after Puccini's death. Turandot was first performed at La Scala in Milan on April 26, 1926. Turandot features Puccini's best known work "Nessun Dorma," which was sung by Luciano Pavarotti for the BBC’s television coverage of the Football World Cup that was held in Italy in 1990.
1923 Prince Albert, the Duke of York (the future King George VI) married Elizabeth Bowes-Lyon, the youngest daughter of Scottish aristocrat Claude Bowes-Lyon at Westminster Abbey on April 26, 1923. It was the first royal wedding at Westminster Abbey since 1383. Albert's marriage to someone not of royal birth was considered a modernizing gesture. They Duke and Duchess of York had two children, Elizabeth II and Princess Margaret, Countess of Snowdon.
1924 The first ever cocktail party in England was hosted by noted war artist Christopher R.W. Nevinson on April 26, 1924. Within two years, cocktail parties had changed the English cultural landscape becoming a byword for everything the old disapproved of and the young aspired to.
1926 Giacomo Puccini composed 12 operas. The final one, Turandot, was unfinished and its last two scenes were completed posthumously by Franco Alfano after Puccini's death. Turandot was first performed at La Scala in Milan on April 26, 1926. Turandot features Puccini's best known work "Nessun Dorma," which was sung by Luciano Pavarotti for the BBC’s television coverage of the Football World Cup that was held in Italy in 1990.
1933 Hermann Göring the Prime Minister of Prussia, established the Gestapo on April 26, 1933. The Gestapo was the secret police of Nazi Germany and was responsible for suppressing dissent and enforcing Nazi ideology. He originally wanted to name it the Secret Police Office (German: Geheimes Polizeiamt), but discovered the German initials "GPA" looked and sounded too much like those of the Russian GPU.
1942 On April 26, 1942, shortly after her 16th birthday, Princess Elizabeth, the future Queen Elizabeth II, registered for war service and joined the Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS) as a mechanic. She was the first female member of the British royal family to join the armed forces and one of the few female members of the royal family to have served in the military.
1942 On April 26, 1942, shortly after her 16th birthday, Princess Elizabeth, the future Queen Elizabeth II, registered for war service and joined the Auxiliary Territorial Service (ATS) as a mechanic. She was the first female member of the British royal family to join the armed forces and one of the few female members of the royal family to have served in the military.
1956 The converted World War II T-2 oil tanker, SS Ideal X, was the world's first commercially successful container ship. She left Port Newark, New Jersey on her first voyage in her new configuration, on April 26, 1956. The Ideal X carried 58 containers from Port Newark to Port of Houston, Texas, where 58 trucks were waiting to be loaded with the containers.
1975 On April 26, 1975, test pilot Tim Ferguson landed a Jaguar fighter jet aircraft on the M55 motorway in Lancashire England, shortly before it was opened to the public. The landing was part of a series of trials to demonstrate the aircraft's ability to take off and land on short, unprepared runways. The trials were conducted in preparation for the possibility of a conflict with the Soviet Union, in which major airfields might be damaged or destroyed.
1986 On April 26, 1986, Arnold Schwarzenegger married television journalist Maria Shriver, niece of President John F. Kennedy, in Hyannis, Massachusetts. They have four children: Katherine, Christina, Patrick and Christopher. On May 9, 2011, Shriver and Schwarzenegger ended their relationship after 25 years of marriage, with Shriver moving out of the couple's Brentwood mansion.
1986 The Chernobyl nuclear disaster occurred on April 26, 1986 at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant in Pripyat, Ukraine. The accident occurred when the fourth reactor suffered a huge power increase. This led to the core of the reactor exploding. Due to this explosion, large amounts of radioactive particles were released into the atmosphere. Because there was no containment building to trap the radiation, large areas of Ukraine, Belarus, and Russia were badly contaminated.
1989 In My 1988, I Love Lucy star Lucille Ball was hospitalized after suffering a mild heart attack. Her last public appearance, just one month before her death, was at the 1989 Academy Awards telecast in which she and fellow presenter, Bob Hope, were given a standing ovation. Ball died at 05:47 PDT on April 26, 1989 of an aortic rupture in the abdominal area.
1989 The deadliest tornado in world history struck the Manikganj district in Central Bangladesh on April 26, 1989, killing upwards of 1,300, injuring 12,000, and leaving as many as 80,000 homeless. The tornado was estimated to be an EF-5 on the Enhanced Fujita scale, with winds of up to 200 mph (322 km/h.
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