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8 March 1937 – Spanish Civil War: The Battle of Guadalajara begins

Battle of Guadalajara

1937 battle of the Spanish Civil War

The Battle of Guadalajara (March 8–23, 1937) saw the victory of the People's Republican Army (Ejército Popular Republicano, or EPR) and of the International Brigades over the Italian and Nationalist forces attempting to encircle Madrid during the Spanish Civil War. The Nationalist forces involved in the Battle of Guadalajara were primarily the Italian Corps of Volunteer Troops (Corpo Truppe Volontarie, or CTV).

The battle opened with an Italian offensive on 8 March. This offensive was halted by 11 March. Between 12 March and 14 March, renewed Italian attacks were supported by Spanish Nationalist units. These were halted too. On 15 March, a Republican counter-offensive was prepared. The Republicans successfully launched their counter-offensive from 18 March to 23 March.

1. ^ ^{a b c} Thomas, Hugh.The Spanish Civil War. Penguin Books. London. 2001. p.579
2. ^ ^{a b c d e f g h i j k} COVERDALE, J. F. (1975). Italian Intervention in the Spanish Civil War. Princeton University Press. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt13x112j
3. ^ ^{a b} Knighton, A. (2016, January 24). An Italian Civil War in Spain: Guadalajara, 1937. Retrieved from https://www.warhistoryonline.com/history/italian-civil-war-spain-guadalajara-1937.html
4. ^ ^{a b c d e f g} Thomas, Hugh.The Spanish Civil War. Penguin Books. London. 2001. p.585

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9 March 1967 – Trans World Airlines Flight 553 crashes in a field in Concord Township, Ohio following a mid-air collision with a Beechcraft Baron, killing 26 people.

TWA Flight 553

1967 aviation disaster in Concord Township, Ohio, USA

Trans World Airlines (TWA) Flight 553 was a McDonnell Douglas DC-9-15 jet airliner, registration N1063T, operated by Trans World Airlines on March 9, 1967 between Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and Dayton, Ohio. While descending toward Dayton about 29 miles (25 nmi; 47 km) from the airport, the flight collided in midair with a Beechcraft Baron, a small, general-aviation airplane, near Urbana, Ohio. All 25 aboard the DC-9 and the sole occupant of the Beechcraft were killed.^[1]

1. ^ "AIRCRAFT ACCIDENT REPORT. TRANS WORLD AIRLINES INC., DOUGLAS DC-9, TANN COMPANY BEECHCRAFT BARON B-55 IN-FLIGHT COLLISION NEAR URBANA, OHIO, MARCH 9, 1967" (PDF). National Transportation Safety Board. June 19, 1968. Retrieved September 11, 2019.

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10 March 2000 – The Dot-com bubble peaks with the NASDAQ Composite stock market index reaching 5,048.62.

Dot-com bubble

Tech stock speculative craze, c. 1997–2003

The NASDAQ Composite index spiked in the late 1990s and then fell sharply as a result of the dot-com bubble.

Quarterly U.S. venture capital investments, 1995–2017

The dot-com bubble (or dot-com boom) was a stock market bubble in the late 1990s. The period coincided with massive growth in Internet adoption, a proliferation of available venture capital, and the rapid growth of valuations in new dot-com startups.

Between 1995 and its peak in March 2000, the Nasdaq Composite stock market index rose 800%, only to fall 740% from its peak by October 2002, giving up all its gains during the bubble.

During the dot-com crash, many online shopping companies, notably Pets.com, Webvan, and Boo.com, as well as several communication companies, such as Worldcom, NorthPoint Communications, and Global Crossing, failed and shut down.^[1][2] Others, like Lastminute.com, MP3.com and PeopleSound, survived the burst but were acquired. Larger companies like Amazon and Cisco Systems lost large portions of their market capitalization, with Cisco losing 80% of its stock value.^[3][4]

1. ^ "The greatest defunct Web sites and dotcom disasters". CNET. June 5, 2008. Archived from the original on August 28, 2019. Retrieved February 10, 2020.
2. ^ Kumar, Rajesh (December 5, 2015). Valuation: Theories and Concepts. Elsevier. p. 25.
3. ^ Kumar, Rajesh (December 5, 2015). Valuation: Theories and Concepts. Elsevier. p. 25.
4. ^ Powell, Jamie (2021-03-08). "Investors should not dismiss Cisco's dot com collapse as a historical anomaly". Financial Times. Archived from the original on 2022-12-10. Retrieved 2022-04-06.

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11 March 1872 – Construction of the Seven Sisters Colliery, South Wales, begins; it is located on one of the richest coal sources in Britain.

Seven Sisters, Neath Port Talbot

For other uses, see Seven Sisters (disambiguation).

Human settlement in Wales

Seven Sisters (Welsh: Blaendulais: source of the (river) Dulais) is a village and community in the Dulais Valley, Wales, UK. It lies 10 miles (16 km) north-east of Neath. Seven Sisters falls within the Seven Sisters ward of Neath Port Talbot county borough.

1. ^ "Ward population 2011". Retrieved 12 April 2015.

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12 March 1928 – In California, the St. Francis Dam fails; the resulting floods kill 431 people.

St. Francis Dam

Former dam in Los Angeles County, California, US

Dam in California, U.S.

The St. Francis Dam was a concrete gravity dam located in San Francisquito Canyon in northern Los Angeles County, California that was built between 1924 and 1926 to serve the city of Los Angeles's growing water needs. It failed catastrophically in 1928 due to a defective soil foundation and design flaws, unleashing a flood that claimed the lives of at least 431 people.^[2][3] The collapse of the dam is considered to have been one of the worst American civil engineering disasters of the 20th Century, and remains the 2nd-greatest loss of life in California's history, exceeded only by the 1906 San Francisco earthquake and fire.^[4]

The St. Francis Dam was built to create a large regulating and storage reservoir that was an integral part of the Los Angeles Aqueduct. It was located in San Francisquito Canyon of the Sierra Pelona Mountains, about 40 miles (64 km) northwest of downtown Los Angeles, and approximately 10 miles (16 km) north of the present day city of Santa Clarita, California.

The dam was designed and built by the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power, then named the Bureau of Water Works and Supply. The department was under the direction of its general manager and chief engineer, William Mulholland. The disaster effectively ended Mulholland's career.^[5]

1. ^ Cite error: The named reference CHL was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
2. ^ Stansell, Ann (August 2014). Memorialization and Memory of Southern California's St. Francis Dam Disaster of 1928. California State University, Northridge (Thesis).
3. ^ Stansell, Ann C. (February 2014). "Roster of St. Francis Dam Disaster Victims". Santa Clarita Valley History In Pictures.
4. ^ "California's Worst Disasters Remembered" seecalifornia.com. Quote: "600 people in 1928 died in the St. Francis Dam flood in Santa Clarita. It was around midnight that Southern California suffered one of the worst disasters in the state's history, second only to the earthquake and fire that devastated San Francisco in 1906."
5. ^ Cite error: The named reference William Mulholland was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

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13 March Apollo 9 returns safely to Earth after testing the Lunar Module.

Apollo 9

3rd crewed mission of the Apollo space program

For the single by Adam Ant, see Vive Le Rock.

Apollo 9 (March 3–13, 1969) was the third human spaceflight in NASA's Apollo program. Flown in low Earth orbit, it was the second crewed Apollo mission that the United States launched via a Saturn V rocket, and was the first flight of the full Apollo spacecraft: the command and service module (CSM) with the Lunar Module (LM). The mission was flown to qualify the LM for lunar orbit operations in preparation for the first Moon landing by demonstrating its descent and ascent propulsion systems, showing that its crew could fly it independently, then rendezvous and dock with the CSM again, as would be required for the first crewed lunar landing. Other objectives of the flight included firing the LM descent engine to propel the spacecraft stack as a backup mode (as would be required on the Apollo 13 mission), and use of the portable life support system backpack outside the LM cabin.

The three-man crew consisted of Commander James McDivitt, Command Module Pilot David Scott, and Lunar Module Pilot Rusty Schweickart. During the ten-day mission, they tested systems and procedures critical to landing on the Moon, including the LM engines, backpack life support systems, navigation systems and docking maneuvers.

After launching on March 3, 1969, the crew performed the first crewed flight of a lunar module, the first docking and extraction of the same, one two-person spacewalk (EVA), and the second docking of two crewed spacecraft—two months after the Soviets performed a spacewalk crew transfer between Soyuz 4 and Soyuz 5. The mission concluded on March 13 and was a complete success. It proved the LM worthy of crewed spaceflight, setting the stage for the dress rehearsal for the lunar landing, Apollo 10, before the ultimate goal, landing on the Moon.

1. ^ ^{a b c} Orloff & Harland, p. 227.
2. ^ Cite error: The named reference nasa nine was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
3. ^ Orloff & Harland, p. 230.
4. ^ Ezell 1988, Table 2-37: "Apollo 9 Characteristics".
5. ^ McDowell, Jonathan. "SATCAT". Jonathan's Space Pages. Retrieved March 23, 2014.

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14 March 1900 – The Gold Standard Act is ratified, placing the United States currency on the gold standard.

Gold Standard Act

1900 U.S. legislation which established gold as the standard for the U.S. dollar

The Gold Standard Act was an Act of the United States Congress, signed by President William McKinley and effective on March 14, 1900, defining the United States dollar by gold weight and requiring the United States Treasury to redeem, on demand and in gold coin only, paper currency the Act specified.^[1]

The Act formalized the American gold standard that the Coinage Act of 1873, which demonetized silver, had established by default. Before and after the Act, silver currency including silver certificates and the silver dollar circulated at face value as fiat currency not redeemable for gold.^[2]

The Act fixed the value of one dollar at 25.8 grains of 90% pure gold, equivalent to about $20.67 per troy ounce, very near its historic value. American circulating gold coins of the period comprised an alloy of 90% gold and 10% copper for durability.

After the realigning election of 1932 following the onset of the Great Depression, from March 1933 the gold standard was abandoned, and the Act abrogated, by a coordinated series of policy changes including executive orders by President Franklin D. Roosevelt,^[3] new laws,^[4] and controversial Supreme Court rulings.

After World War II international agreements comprising the Bretton Woods system formally restored foreign central banks' ability to exchange United States dollars for gold at a fixed price. World trade growth increasingly stressed this system, which was abandoned in the Nixon shock of 1971.^[5] Attempts to reform the Bretton Woods system quickly proved unworkable and failed. All modern currencies thus became fiat currencies freely floating and subject to market forces despite capital controls imposed by some central banks, with gold as a commodity.

1. ^ Including gold certificates, United States notes, Treasury notes, and later Federal Reserve notes, but excluding silver certificates and National Bank notes which were secured by government bonds issuing national banks had deposited with the Treasury. Though the Act did not require national banks to redeem their issued National Bank notes in gold coin, ordinarily they would, as might other banks.
2. ^ Johnson, Joseph French (1900). "The Currency Act of March 14, 1900". Political Science Quarterly. 15 (3): 482–507. doi:10.2307/2140799. ISSN 0032-3195. JSTOR 2140799.
3. ^ Federal Reserve. "Roosevelt's Gold Program".
4. ^ Wikisource. "Joint Resolution of June 5, 1933".
5. ^ James Stuart Olson. Historical Dictionary of the Great Depression, 1929-1940. p. 131.

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15 March 1918 – Finnish Civil War: The battle of Tampere begins

Battle of Tampere

Major battle of the Finnish Civil War

Fallen Red Guard fighters

The Battle of Tampere was a 1918 Finnish Civil War battle, fought in Tampere, Finland from 15 March to 6 April between the Whites and the Reds. It is the most famous and the heaviest of all the Finnish Civil War battles.^[2][3] Today it is particularly remembered for its bloody aftermath as the Whites executed hundreds of capitulated Reds and took 11,000 prisoners placed in the Kalevankangas camp.^[4]

1. ^ ^{a b} Jaques, Tony (2007). Dictionary of Battles and Sieges: P-Z. Greenwood Publishing Group. p. 993. ISBN 978-0-313-33539-6.
2. ^ YLE: Suomalaiset kuvaavat sotien jälkiä kaupungeissa – katso kuvat ja tarinat tutuilta kulmilta (in Finnish)
3. ^ Cite error: The named reference pesonen was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
4. ^ Jalonen, Jussi (8 October 2014). "Battle of Tampere". International Encyclopedia of the First World War. Retrieved 17 December 2016.

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16 March 1898 – In Melbourne, the representatives of five colonies adopt a constitution, which would become the basis of the Commonwealth of Australia.

Constitution of Australia

Federal constitution of 1900

The Constitution of Australia (or Australian Constitution) is a constitutional document that is supreme law in Australia. It establishes Australia as a federation under a constitutional monarchy and outlines the structure and powers of the Australian government's three constituent parts, the executive, legislature, and judiciary.

The constitution was drafted between 1891 and 1898 through a series of conventions conducted by representatives of the six self-governing British colonies in Australia. The final draft was then approved in a set of referendums from 1898 to 1900. The British government objected to some elements of the final draft, but a slightly modified form was enacted as section 9 of the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act 1900, an act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. The act was given royal assent on 9 July 1900, was proclaimed on 17 September 1900, and entered into force on 1 January 1901.^[1][2] The constitution gave the six colonies the status of states within the new federation.

Australian constitutional law has developed through the interpretation of the constitution by the High Court. As well as its textual provisions, the constitution is understood to incorporate various unwritten constitutional conventions and ideas derived from the Westminster system, one of which is responsible government. Although the 1900 act initially derived its legal authority from the UK Parliament, the present understanding of the High Court and some academics is that it now derives its legal authority from the Australian people.^[3] Other documents of constitutional significance to Australia include the Statute of Westminster and the Australia Act 1986.

The document may only be amended by referendum, through the procedure set out in section 128. Amendments require a "double majority" – a nationwide majority as well as a majority of voters in a majority of states. This has contributed to the low number of successful amendments; forty-four referendums have been held but only eight amendments have been passed, most recently in 1977. Ongoing debates exist regarding further proposals for amendment, notably including the inclusion of a preamble, the replacement of the monarchy with a republic, and the addition of an Indigenous voice to government.

1. ^ "Constitution of Australia Act 1900". legislation.gov.uk. Retrieved 11 July 2020. The original text, as of 1900—still official in the UK.
2. ^ "Constitution of Australia Act 1900". Federal Register of Legislation. Retrieved 11 July 2020. The current text.
3. ^ Lindell, G. J. (1986). "Why is Australia's Constitution Binding? - The Reason in 1900 and Now, and the Effect of Independence". Federal Law Review. 16: 29. doi:10.1177/0067205X8601600102. S2CID 159157171.

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17 March 1969 – Golda Meir becomes the first female Prime Minister of Israel.

Golda Meir

Prime Minister of Israel from 1969 to 1974

Golda Meir^{[nb 1]} (born Golda Mabovitch; 3 May 1898 – 8 December 1978) was an Israeli politician who served as the fourth Prime Minister of Israel from 1969 to 1974. She was Israel's first and only female head of government, the first female head of government in the Middle East, and the fourth elected female head of government or state in the world.^[5] She has been described as the "Iron Lady" of Israeli politics,^[6] with a reputation for being down-to-earth and a persuasive speaker.

Born in Kyiv in the Russian Empire, Meir immigrated to Wisconsin, United States as a child with her family in 1906. She graduated from the Milwaukee State Normal School and found work as a teacher. While in Milwaukee, she embraced the Labor Zionist movement. In 1921, Meir and her husband emigrated to Mandatory Palestine, settling in kibbutz Merhavia. She later became the kibbutz's representative to the Histadrut, and in 1934 she was elevated to the executive committee of the trade union. She held several key roles in the Jewish Agency during the Second World War. In 1946, after British authorities arrested Moshe Sharett and other leaders of the Yishuv, Meir became the acting head of the Political Department of the Jewish Agency. She was a signatory of the Israeli Declaration of Independence in 1948. Meir was elected to the Knesset in 1949 and served as Labor Minister until 1956, when she was appointed Foreign Minister by Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion. She retired from the ministry in 1966 due to ill health.

In 1969, Meir assumed the role of prime minister following the death of Levi Eshkol. Early in her tenure, she made multiple diplmatic ventures in order to promote peace in the Middle East. The outbreak of the Yom Kippur War in 1973 caught the nation off guard and inflicted severe early losses on the Israelis. The resulting public anger damaged Meir's reputation and led to an inquiry into the failings of the Israel Defense Forces. Her Alignment coalition was denied a majority in the subsequent legislative election; she resigned the following year and was succeeded as prime minister by Yitzhak Rabin. Meir died in 1978 of lymphoma and was buried on Mount Herzl.

1. ^ "Meir". Collins English Dictionary. HarperCollins. Retrieved June 26, 2019.
2. ^ "Meir, Golda". Lexico UK English Dictionary. Oxford University Press. Archived from the original on February 25, 2021.
3. ^ "Meir". Merriam-Webster Dictionary. Retrieved June 26, 2019.
4. ^ "Golda Meir: An Outline of a Unique Life: A Chronological Survey of Gola Meir's Life and Legacy". The Golda Meir Center for Political Leadership (Metropolitan State University of Denver). Retrieved February 20, 2014. Reference on name pronunciation (see "1956").
5. ^ Kort, Michael (2002). The Handbook of the Middle East. Lerner Publishing Group. p. 76. ISBN 9781315170688.
6. ^ Golda Meir, a BBC News profile.

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12 March 1913 – King George I of Greece is assassinated in the recently liberated city of Thessaloniki.

George I of Greece

King of Greece from 1863 to 1913

George I (Greek: Γεώργιος Α΄, Geórgios I; 24 December 1845 – 18 March 1913) was King of Greece from 30 March 1863 until his assassination in 1913.

Originally a Danish prince, he was born in Copenhagen, and seemed destined for a career in the Royal Danish Navy. He was only 17 years old when he was elected king by the Greek National Assembly, which had deposed the unpopular Otto. His nomination was both suggested and supported by the Great Powers: the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, the Second French Empire and the Russian Empire. He married Grand Duchess Olga Constantinovna of Russia in 1867, and became the first monarch of a new Greek dynasty. Two of his sisters, Alexandra and Dagmar, married into the British and Russian royal families. Edward VII of the United Kingdom and Alexander III of Russia were his brothers-in-law, and George V of the United Kingdom, Christian X of Denmark, Haakon VII of Norway, and Nicholas II of Russia were his nephews.

George's reign of almost 50 years (the longest in modern Greek history) was characterized by territorial gains as Greece established its place in pre–World War I Europe. Britain ceded the Ionian Islands peacefully in 1864, while Thessaly was annexed from the Ottoman Empire after the Russo-Turkish War (1877–1878). Greece was not always successful in its territorial ambitions; it was defeated in the Greco-Turkish War (1897). During the First Balkan War, after Greek troops had captured much of Greek Macedonia, George was assassinated in Thessaloniki. Compared with his own long tenure, the reigns of his successors Constantine I, Alexander, and George II proved short and insecure.
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19 March 1861 – The First Taranaki War ends in New Zealand.

First Taranaki War

1860s war between Māori and the New Zealand government

The First Taranaki War (also known as the North Taranaki War) was an armed conflict over land ownership and sovereignty that took place between Māori and the New Zealand government in the Taranaki district of New Zealand's North Island from March 1860 to March 1861.

The war was sparked by a dispute between the government and Māori landowners over the sale of a property at Waitara, but spread throughout the region. It was fought by more than 3,500 imperial troops brought in from Australia, as well as volunteer soldiers and militia, against Māori forces that fluctuated between a few hundred and about 1,500.^[1] Total losses among the imperial, volunteer and militia troops are estimated to have been 238, while Māori casualties totalled about 200, although the proportion of Māori casualties was higher.

The war ended in a ceasefire, with neither side explicitly accepting the peace terms of the other. Although there were claims by the British that they had won the war, there were widely held views at the time they had suffered an unfavourable and humiliating result. Historians have also been divided on the result.^[2] Historian James Belich has claimed that the Māori succeeded in thwarting the British bid to impose sovereignty over them, and had therefore been victorious. But he said the Māori victory was a hollow one, leading to the invasion of the Waikato.

In its 1996 report to the Government on Taranaki land claims, the Waitangi Tribunal observed that the war was begun by the Government, which had been the aggressor and unlawful in its actions in launching an attack by its armed forces. An opinion sought by the tribunal from a senior constitutional lawyer stated that the Governor, Thomas Gore Browne, and certain officers were liable for criminal and civil charges for their actions.^[3] The term "First Taranaki War" is opposed by some historians, who refer only to the Taranaki Wars, rejecting suggestions that post-1861 conflict was a second war.^[4] The 1927 Royal Commission on Confiscated Land also referred to the hostilities between 1864 and 1866 as a continuation of the initial Taranaki war.^[5]

1. ^ Michael King (2003). The Penguin History of New Zealand. Penguin Books. ISBN 0-14-301867-1.
2. ^ Belich, James (1986). The New Zealand Wars and the Victorian Interpretation of Racial Conflict (1st ed.). Auckland: Penguin. pp. 115–116. ISBN 0-14-011162-X.
3. ^ "The Taranaki Report: Kaupapa Tuatahi by the Waitangi Tribunal, chapter 3" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 27 September 2007. Retrieved 27 September 2007.
4. ^ James Belich, in "The New Zealand Wars" (1986) dismisses as "inappropriate" the description of later conflict as a second Taranaki war (pp. 120).
5. ^ "The Taranaki Report: Kaupapa Tuatahi by the Waitangi Tribunal, chapter 4" (PDF). Archived from the original (PDF) on 27 September 2007. Retrieved 27 September 2007.

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20 March 1852 – Harriet Beecher Stowe's Uncle Tom's Cabin is published.

Uncle Tom's Cabin

1852 novel by Harriet Beecher Stowe

This article is about the mid-19th-century novel. For other uses, see Uncle Tom's Cabin (disambiguation).

Uncle Tom's Cabin; or, Life Among the Lowly is an anti-slavery novel by American author Harriet Beecher Stowe. Published in two volumes in 1852, the novel had a profound effect on attitudes toward African Americans and slavery in the U.S., and is said to have "helped lay the groundwork for the [American] Civil War".^[1][2][3]

Stowe, a Connecticut-born woman of English descent, was part of the religious Beecher family and an active abolitionist. She wrote the sentimental novel to depict the reality of slavery while also asserting that Christian love could overcome slavery.^[4][5][6] The novel focuses on the character of Uncle Tom, a long-suffering black slave around whom the stories of the other characters revolve.

In the United States, Uncle Tom's Cabin was the best-selling novel and the second best-selling book of the 19th century, following the Bible.^[7][8] It is credited with helping fuel the abolitionist cause in the 1850s.^[9] The influence attributed to the book was so great that a likely apocryphal story arose of Abraham Lincoln meeting Stowe at the start of the Civil War and declaring, "So this is the little lady who started this great war."^[10][11]

The book and the plays it inspired helped popularize a number of negative stereotypes about black people,^[12][13][3] including that of the namesake character "Uncle Tom". The term came to be associated with an excessively subservient person.^[14] These later associations with Uncle Tom's Cabin have, to an extent, overshadowed the historical effects of the book as a "vital antislavery tool".^[15] Nonetheless, the novel remains a "landmark" in protest literature,^[16] with later books such as The Jungle by Upton Sinclair and Silent Spring by Rachel Carson owing a large debt to it.^[17]

1. ^ Kaufman 2006, p. 18.
2. ^ Painter 2000, p. 245.
3. ^ ^{a b} DeLombard 2012.
4. ^ Kurian 2010, p. 580.
5. ^ de Rosa 2003, On p. 122, de Rosa quotes Tompkins 1985, p. 145 that Stowe's strategy was to destroy slavery through the "saving power of Christian love"..
6. ^ Tompkins 1985, On p. 141, Tompkins writes "Stowe conceived her book as an instrument for bringing about the day when the world would be ruled not by force, but by Christian love.".
7. ^ DiMaggio 2014, p. 15.
8. ^ Smith 2001, p. 221.
9. ^ Goldner 2001, p. 82.
10. ^ Stowe 1911, p. 203.
11. ^ Vollaro 2009.
12. ^ Hulser 2003.
13. ^ Jamieson 2018, p. ??.
14. ^ Jones 2019, pp. 1465–1467.
15. ^ Appiah & Gates 2005, p. 544.
16. ^ Smith 2008, p. 161.
17. ^ Weinstein 2004, p. 13.

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21 March 1918 – World War I: The first phase of the German Spring Offensive, Operation Michael, begins.

Operation Michael

See also: Allied Troop Movements During Operation Michael

1918 German offensive during World War I

Operation Michael (German: Unternehmen Michael) was a major German military offensive during the First World War that began the German Spring Offensive on 21 March 1918. It was launched from the Hindenburg Line, in the vicinity of Saint-Quentin, France. Its goal was to break through the Allied (Entente) lines and advance in a north-westerly direction to seize the Channel Ports, which supplied the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) and to drive the BEF into the sea. Two days later General Erich Ludendorff, the chief of the German General Staff, adjusted his plan and pushed for an offensive due west, along the whole of the British front north of the River Somme. This was designed to first separate the French and British Armies before continuing with the original concept of pushing the BEF into the sea. The offensive ended at Villers-Bretonneux, to the east of the Allied communications centre at Amiens, where the Allies managed to halt the German advance; the German Army had suffered many casualties and was unable to maintain supplies to the advancing troops.

Much of the ground fought over was the wilderness left by the Battle of the Somme in 1916. The action was therefore officially named by the British Battles Nomenclature Committee as The First Battles of the Somme, 1918, whilst the French call it the Second Battle of Picardy (2ème Bataille de Picardie). The failure of the offensive marked the beginning of the end of the First World War for Germany. The arrival in France of large reinforcements from the United States replaced Entente casualties but the German Army was unable to recover from its losses before these reinforcements took the field. Operation Michael failed to achieve its objectives and the German advance was reversed during the Second Battle of the Somme, 1918 (21 August – 3 September) in the Allied Hundred Days Offensive.^[a]

1. ^ James 1924, pp. 26–31.

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22 March 1945 – The Arab League is founded when a charter is adopted in Cairo, Egypt.

Arab League

Regional organization

The Arab League (Arabic: الجامعة العربية, al-Jāmiʿa al-ʻArabiyya Arabic pronunciation: [al.d͡ʒaː.mi.ʕa al.ʕa.ra.bij.ja] (listen)), formally the League of Arab States (Arabic: جامعة الدول العربية, Jāmiʿat ad-Duwal al-ʿArabiyya), is a regional organization in the Arab world, which is located in Northern Africa, Western Africa, Eastern Africa, and Western Asia. The Arab League was formed in Cairo on 22 March 1945, initially with six members: Egypt, Iraq, Transjordan, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and Syria.^[3] Yemen joined as a member on 5 May 1945. Currently, the League has 22 members.

The League's main goal is to "draw closer the relations between member states and co-ordinate collaboration between them, to safeguard their independence and sovereignty, and to consider in a general way the affairs and interests of the Arab countries".^[4] The organization has received a relatively low level of cooperation throughout its history.^[5]

Through institutions, notably the Arab League Educational, Cultural and Scientific Organization (ALECSO) and the Economic and Social Council of its Council of Arab Economic Unity (CAEU), the League facilitates political, economic, cultural, scientific, and social programmes designed to promote the interests of the Arab world.^[6][7] It has served as a forum for the member states to coordinate policy, arrange studies of and committees as to matters of common concern, settle inter-state disputes and limit conflicts such as the 1958 Lebanon crisis. The League has served as a platform for the drafting and conclusion of many landmark documents promoting economic integration. One example is the Joint Arab Economic Action Charter, which outlines the principles for economic activities in the region.

Arab League of states establishment memorial stamp. Showing flags of the 8 establishing countries: Kingdom of Egypt, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, the Mutawakkilite Kingdom of Yemen (North Yemen), Syrian Republic, Hashemite Kingdom of Iraq, Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan, Lebanese Republic and Palestine

Each member state has one vote in the Council of the Arab League, and decisions are binding only for those states that have voted for them. The aims of the league in 1945 were to strengthen and coordinate the political, cultural, economic and social programs of its members and to mediate disputes among them or between them and third parties. Furthermore, the signing of an agreement on Joint Defence and Economic Cooperation on 13 April 1950 committed the signatories to coordination of military defence measures. In March 2015, the Arab League General Secretary announced the establishment of a Joint Arab Force with the aim of counteracting extremism and other threats to the Arab States. The decision was reached while Operation Decisive Storm was intensifying in Yemen. Participation in the project is voluntary, and the army intervenes only at the request of one of the member states. Heightened military arsenal in many member states and, in a small minority, civil wars as well as terrorist movements were the impetuts for the JAF, financed by the rich Gulf countries.^[8]

In the early 1970s, the Economic Council put forward a proposal to create the Joint Arab Chambers of Commerce across European states. That led, under its decree K1175/D52/G to the setting up of the Arab British Chamber of Commerce, mandated to promote, encourage and facilitate bilateral trade between the Arab world and significant trading partner, the United Kingdom.

1. ^ "World Population Prospects – Population Division – United Nations". population.un.org.
2. ^ "Report for Selected Countries and Subjects". IMF.
3. ^ "Arab League". The Columbia Encyclopedia. 2013.
4. ^ "Pact of the League of Arab States, 22 March 1945". The Avalon Project. Yale Law School. 1998. Archived from the original on 25 July 2008. Retrieved 15 July 2012.
5. ^ Barnett, Michael; Solingen, Etel (2007), Johnston, Alastair Iain; Acharya, Amitav (eds.), "Designed to fail or failure of design? The origins and legacy of the Arab League", Crafting Cooperation: Regional International Institutions in Comparative Perspective, Cambridge University Press, pp. 180–220, doi:10.1017/cbo9780511491436.006, ISBN 978-0-521-69942-6
6. ^ "The Arab League Educational, Cultural and Scientific Organization (ALESCO)".
7. ^ Ashish K. Vaidya, Globalization (ABC-CLIO: 2006), p. 525.
8. ^ Fanack. "The Joint Arab Force – Will It Ever Work?". Fanack.com. Archived from the original on 13 July 2015. Retrieved 13 July 2015.

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23 March 2021 – A container ship runs aground and obstructs the Suez Canal for six days.

2021 Suez Canal obstruction

Maritime incident caused by grounded vessel

In March 2021, the Suez Canal was blocked for six days by the Ever Given, a container ship that had run aground in the canal.^[4] The 400-metre-long (1,300 ft), 20,000 TEU vessel was buffeted by strong winds on the morning of 23 March, and ended up wedged across the waterway with its bow and stern stuck in the canal banks, blocking all traffic until it could be freed.^[5] Egyptian authorities said that "technical or human errors" may have also been involved. The obstruction occurred south of the section of the canal that had two channels, so there was no way for other ships to bypass Ever Given. The Suez Canal Authority (SCA) engaged Boskalis through its subsidiary Smit International to manage marine salvage operations.^[6][7] As one of the world's busiest trade routes,^[8] the canal obstruction had a significant negative impact on trade between Europe, Asia and the Middle East.

On 28 March, at least 369 ships were queuing to pass through the canal. This prevented an estimated US$9.6 billion worth of trade.^[9][10][11] On 29 March, Ever Given was partially re-floated and moved by about 80 percent in the correct direction,^[12] although the bow remained stuck^[13] until the ship was finally freed by Egyptian, Dutch, and Italian tugs at 15:05 EGY (13:05 UTC)^[6][14] and started moving, under tow, towards the Great Bitter Lake, for technical inspection.^[15][16][17] The canal was checked for damage, and after being found to be sound,^[14] the SCA allowed shipping to resume from 19:00 EGY (17:00 UTC) on 29 March.^[18] The vessel was subsequently impounded by the Egyptian government on 13 April 2021 for refusing to pay compensations demanded by the government, a claim deemed to be unjustified by the ship's insurers. After the incident, the Egyptian government announced that they will be widening the narrower parts of the canal.^[19]

A formal settlement between the owners and insurers of the ship, and the canal authority, was finally reached in July. The ship set sail again on 7 July 2021 after having been legally stuck in the canal since it had been dislodged, stopping for inspections at Port Said before continuing on its journey to the port of Rotterdam.

1. ^ "Ever Given: Container Ship, IMO 9811000". Vessel Finder. Archived 25 March 2021.
2. ^ Cite error: The named reference BBC was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
3. ^ Ankel, Sophia. "One person reportedly died while helping free the Ever Given ship, the Suez Canal Authority says". Business Insider. Retrieved 20 November 2022.
4. ^ Cite error: The named reference :4 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
5. ^ "Container ship facts: Egypt's Suez Canal blocked by massive boat". Newsround. BBC. 25 March 2021. Archived from the original on 26 March 2021. Retrieved 25 March 2021.
6. ^ ^{a b} "Suez Canal unblocked: "We pulled it off!"". Royal Boskalis Westminster N.V. 29 March 2021. Archived from the original on 30 March 2021. Retrieved 31 March 2021.
7. ^ Henley, Jon (30 March 2021). "How a full moon and a 'huge lever' helped free Ever Given from Suez canal". the Guardian. Archived from the original on 31 March 2021. Retrieved 31 March 2021.
8. ^ "Suez Canal blockage: 4 of the biggest trade chokepoints | DW | 27.03.2021". Deutsche Welle. Archived from the original on 30 March 2021. Retrieved 30 March 2021.
9. ^ Harper, Justin (26 March 2021). "Suez blockage is holding up $9.6bn of goods a day". BBC News. Archived from the original on 26 March 2021. Retrieved 31 March 2021.
10. ^ "The cost of the Suez Canal blockage". BBC News. 29 March 2021. Archived from the original on 29 March 2021. Retrieved 29 March 2021.
11. ^ Michael, Safi; Farrer, Martin (29 March 2021). "Suez canal: Ever Given ship partially refloated but bow still stuck". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 29 March 2021. Retrieved 29 March 2021.
12. ^ "Suez Canal: Ever Given container ship shifted from shoreline". BBC World News. 29 March 2021. Archived from the original on 29 March 2021. Retrieved 29 March 2021.
13. ^ "'Challenge still ahead' to free ship in Suez Canal". Al jazeera (live news). 29 March 2021. Archived from the original on 29 March 2021. Retrieved 29 March 2021.
14. ^ ^{a b} Safi, Michael (29 March 2021). "Suez canal: Ever Given container ship freed after a week". The Guardian. Archived from the original on 29 March 2021. Retrieved 29 March 2021. [Boskalis] announce that our team of experts, working in close collaboration with the Suez Canal Authority, successfully refloated the Ever Given on 29 March at 15:05 hrs local time, thereby making free passage through the Suez canal possible again
15. ^ Stevens, Pippa (29 March 2021). "Suez Canal traffic resumes after cargo ship Ever Given is moving again". CNBC. Archived from the original on 29 March 2021. Retrieved 29 March 2021.
16. ^ Debre, Isabel; Magdy, Samy (29 March 2021). "Canal service provider says container ship in Suez set free". Washington Post. Archived from the original on 29 March 2021. Retrieved 29 March 2021. unclear when traffic through the canal would return to normal
17. ^ "Canal service provider says container ship in Suez set free". AP News. 29 March 2021. Archived from the original on 29 March 2021. Retrieved 29 March 2021.
18. ^ "Traffic in Suez Canal resumes after stranded ship refloated - Business and Economy News". Al Jazeera. 29 March 2021. Archived from the original on 29 March 2021. Retrieved 29 March 2021. The ship came out intact and it has no problems. We've just searched the bottom and soil of the Suez Canal and thankfully it is sound and has no issues, and ships will pass through it today
19. ^ "Plans for Suez Canal to be widened after Ever Given cargo ship drama". ABC News. 12 May 2021. Archived from the original on 14 May 2021. Retrieved 22 May 2021.

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24 March 1921 – The 1921 Women's Olympiad began in Monte Carlo, becoming the first international women's sports event.

1921 Women's Olympiad

First international women's sports event

Mary Lines

Lucie Bréard

Germaine Delapierre

Frédérique Kussel

Violette Morris

The 1921 Women's Olympiad Olympiades Féminines and Jeux Olympiques Féminins^[2] was the first international women's sports event, a 5-day multi-sport event organised by Alice Milliat and held on 24–31 March^[3] 1921 in Monte Carlo^[4] at the International Sporting Club of Monaco.^[5] The tournament was formally called 1er Meeting International d'Education Physique Féminine de Sports Athlétiques.^[6] It was the first of three Women's Olympiads or "Monte Carlo Games" held annually at the venue, and the forerunner of the quadrennial Women's World Games, organised in 1922–34 by the International Women's Sports Federation founded by Milliat later in 1921.^[7]

1. ^ "Athletics in the First Half of the 20th Century" (PDF). IAAF. 2018. p. 27. Retrieved 23 March 2021.
2. ^ Cite error: The named reference iaaf2008 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
3. ^ Sources:
   • "Les Olympiades Féminines de Monte Carlo" (in French). L'Éclaireur de Nice, 31 March 1921, page 3. Archived from the original on 13 February 2017. Retrieved 4 January 2017.
   • "Les Olympiades Féminines de Monte Carlo" (in French). Le Petit Niçois, 31 March 1921, page 3. Archived from the original on 13 February 2017. Retrieved 4 January 2017.
   • "Jeux Mondiaux Féminins" (in French). Commission Documentation et Histoire, cdm.athle.com, chapter 7. Retrieved 4 January 2017.
4. ^ Sources:
   • "The Women's Olympic Games". Comité Olympique Monégasque.
   • "Le parcours d'obstacles de l'athlétisme féminin". Granville Athletic Club.
5. ^ Sources:
   • Pfister, Gertrude; IOC Medical Commission; International Federation of Sports Medicine (15 April 2008). "Women and the Olympic Games". In Barbara L. Drinkwater (ed.). Women in Sport. The Encyclopaedia of Sports Medicine. Vol. VIII. Blackwell Science. pp. 5–6. ISBN 9780470756850. Retrieved 24 November 2016.
   • Bernett, Hajo (1988). "Die ersten olympischen Wettbewerbe in internationalen Frauensport (1988)". Sozial- und Zeitgeschichte des Sports (in German). Sozial- und Zeitgeschichte des Sports, Heft 2/1988 (Jg 2). 2 (2): 66–86. ISSN 0931-7031. Retrieved 4 January 2017.
6. ^ Sources:
   • Martin, Paul (10 May 2011). "Hace 90 años: los inicios del atletismo femenino". Atletismo e Historia (Athletics in History) (in Spanish). Retrieved 24 November 2016.
   • "Beatrice Look Papers". University of Greenwich. Retrieved 4 January 2017.
7. ^ Sources:
   • "Plaque commemorating first Women's Olympics unveiled in Monte Carlo" (Press release). IAAF. 23 November 2008. Retrieved 24 November 2016.
   • Prudhomme-Poncet, Laurence (1 June 2003). "3-3 Les Olympiades féminines". Histoire du football féminin au XXème siècle (in French). Editions L'Harmattan. pp. 96–100. ISBN 9782296327481. Retrieved 24 November 2016.
   • Miragaya, Ana; DaCosta, Lamartine. "Olympic entrepreneurs – Alice Milliat: the 1st woman Olympic entrepreneur" (PDF) (in Portuguese). Autonomous University of Barcelona Centre for Olympic Studies: 105. Retrieved 24 November 2016. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)^{[permanent dead link]}
   • Watman, Mel (January 2013). "Women athletes between the world wars (act. 1919–1939)". Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/103699. (Subscription or UK public library membership required.)
   • Charlet, Sylvain (3 November 2008). "L'athlétisme féminin". Féchain Athlétique Club (in French). Nordnet. Retrieved 24 November 2016.
   • "Women and sports at The Polytechnic". University of Westminster. Retrieved 24 November 2016.
   • Charlet, Sylvain. "Rétrospective de l'athlétisme féminin" (PDF). Amicale des Entraineurs d'Ile de France d'Athlétisme. p. 10. Archived from the original (PDF) on 10 December 2013. Retrieved 24 November 2016.

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25 March 1655 – Saturn's largest moon, Titan, is discovered by Christiaan Huygens.

Titan (moon)

Largest moon of Saturn

Not to be confused with Titania (moon) or Triton (moon).

Titan is the largest moon of Saturn, the second-largest in the Solar System and larger than any of the dwarf planets of the Solar System. It is the only moon known to have a dense atmosphere, and is the only known object in space other than Earth on which clear evidence of stable bodies of surface liquid has been found.^[15]

Titan is one of the seven gravitationally rounded moons in orbit around Saturn, and the second most distant from Saturn of those seven. Frequently described as a planet-like moon, Titan is 50% larger (in diameter) than Earth's Moon and 80% more massive. It is the second-largest moon in the Solar System after Jupiter's moon Ganymede, and is larger than the planet Mercury, but only 40% as massive.

Discovered in 1655 by the Dutch astronomer Christiaan Huygens, Titan was the first known moon of Saturn, and the sixth known planetary satellite (after Earth's moon and the four Galilean moons of Jupiter). Titan orbits Saturn at 20 Saturn radii. From Titan's surface, Saturn subtends an arc of 5.09 degrees, and if it were visible through the moon's thick atmosphere, it would appear 11.4 times larger in the sky, in diameter, than the Moon from Earth, which subtends 0.48° of arc.

Titan is primarily composed of ice and rocky material, which is likely differentiated into a rocky core surrounded by various layers of ice, including a crust of ice I_h and a subsurface layer of ammonia-rich liquid water.^[16] Much as with Venus before the Space Age, the dense opaque atmosphere prevented understanding of Titan's surface until the Cassini–Huygens mission in 2004 provided new information, including the discovery of liquid hydrocarbon lakes in Titan's polar regions. The geologically young surface is generally smooth, with few impact craters, although mountains and several possible cryovolcanoes have been found.

The atmosphere of Titan is largely nitrogen; minor components lead to the formation of methane and ethane clouds and heavy organonitrogen haze. The climate—including wind and rain—creates surface features similar to those of Earth, such as dunes, rivers, lakes, seas (probably of liquid methane and ethane), and deltas, and is dominated by seasonal weather patterns as on Earth. With its liquids (both surface and subsurface) and robust nitrogen atmosphere, Titan's methane cycle bears a striking similarity to Earth's water cycle, albeit at the much lower temperature of about 94 K (−179 °C; −290 °F).

1. ^ "Titan". Oxford English Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. (Subscription or participating institution membership required.)
2. ^ "Cassini Equinox Mission: Huygens Landed with a Splat". JPL. January 18, 2005. Archived from the original on June 20, 2010. Retrieved May 26, 2010.
3. ^ Luz; et al. (2003). "Latitudinal transport by barotropic waves in Titan's stratosphere". Icarus. 166 (2): 343–358. doi:10.1016/j.icarus.2003.08.014.
4. ^ "Titanian". Oxford English Dictionary (Online ed.). Oxford University Press. (Subscription or participating institution membership required.)
5. ^ "Titanian" is the written adjectival form of both Titan and Uranus's moon Titania. However, Uranus's moon has a Shakespearean pronunciation with a short "i" vowel and the "a" of spa: /tɪˈtɑːniən/, while either spelling for Titan is pronounced with those two vowels long: /taɪˈteɪniən/.
6. ^ Cite error: The named reference horizons was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
7. ^ Zebker, Howard A.; Stiles, Bryan; Hensley, Scott; Lorenz, Ralph; Kirk, Randolph L.; Lunine, Jonathan I. (May 15, 2009). "Size and Shape of Saturn's Moon Titan" (PDF). Science. 324 (5929): 921–923. Bibcode:2009Sci...324..921Z. doi:10.1126/science.1168905. PMID 19342551. S2CID 23911201. Archived from the original (PDF) on February 12, 2020.
8. ^ ^{a b} Jacobson, R. A.; Antreasian, P. G.; Bordi, J. J.; Criddle, K. E.; Ionasescu, R.; Jones, J. B.; Mackenzie, R. A.; Meek, M. C.; Parcher, D.; Pelletier, F. J.; Owen, Jr., W. M.; Roth, D. C.; Roundhill, I. M.; Stauch, J. R. (December 2006). "The Gravity Field of the Saturnian System from Satellite Observations and Spacecraft Tracking Data". The Astronomical Journal. 132 (6): 2520–2526. Bibcode:2006AJ....132.2520J. doi:10.1086/508812.
9. ^ Iess, L.; Rappaport, N. J.; Jacobson, R. A.; Racioppa, P.; Stevenson, D. J.; Tortora, P.; Armstrong, J. W.; Asmar, S. W. (March 12, 2010). "Gravity Field, Shape, and Moment of Inertia of Titan". Science. 327 (5971): 1367–1369. Bibcode:2010Sci...327.1367I. doi:10.1126/science.1182583. PMID 20223984. S2CID 44496742. Archived from the original on February 12, 2021. Retrieved December 7, 2019.
10. ^ Williams, D. R. (February 22, 2011). "Saturnian Satellite Fact Sheet". NASA. Archived from the original on April 30, 2010. Retrieved April 22, 2015.
11. ^ Mitri, G.; Showman, Adam P.; Lunine, Jonathan I.; Lorenz, Ralph D. (2007). "Hydrocarbon Lakes on Titan" (PDF). Icarus. 186 (2): 385–394. Bibcode:2007Icar..186..385M. doi:10.1016/j.icarus.2006.09.004. Archived (PDF) from the original on February 27, 2008.
12. ^ Cite error: The named reference arval was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
13. ^ Cite error: The named reference Niemann was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
14. ^ Coustenis & Taylor (2008), pp. 154–155.
15. ^ Overbye, Dennis (December 3, 2019). "Go Ahead, Take a Spin on Titan – Saturn's biggest moon has gasoline for rain, soot for snow, and a subsurface ocean of ammonia. Now there's a map to help guide the search for possible life there". The New York Times. Archived from the original on December 5, 2019. Retrieved December 5, 2019.
16. ^ Robert Brown; Jean Pierre Lebreton; Hunter Waite, eds. (2009). Titan from Cassini-Huygens. Springer Science & Business Media. p. 69. ISBN 978-1-4020-9215-2.

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26 March 1997 – Thirty-nine bodies are found in the Heaven's Gate mass suicides.

Heaven's Gate (religious group)

American UFO religion (1974–1997)

For the 1980 film, see Heaven's Gate (film).

Heaven's Gate was an American new religious movement (often described as a cult) whose members committed mass suicide in 1997. It was founded in 1974 and led by Bonnie Nettles (1927–1985) and Marshall Applewhite (1931–1997), known within the movement as Ti and Do, respectively.^[2] Nettles and Applewhite first met in 1972 and went on a journey of spiritual discovery, identifying themselves as the two witnesses of Revelation, attracting a following of several hundred people in the mid-1970s. In 1976, a core group of a few dozen members stopped recruiting and instituted a monastic lifestyle.

Scholars have described the theology of Heaven's Gate as a mixture of Christian millenarianism, New Age, and ufology, and as such it has been characterized as a UFO religion.^[1] The central belief of the group was that followers could transform themselves into immortal extraterrestrial beings by rejecting their human nature, and they would ascend to heaven, referred to as the "Next Level" or "The Evolutionary Level Above Human". The death of Nettles from cancer in 1985 challenged the group's views on ascension; where they originally believed that they would ascend to heaven while alive aboard a UFO, they later came to believe that the body was merely a "container" or "vehicle" for the soul, and that their consciousness would be transferred to new "Next Level bodies" upon death.

On March 26, 1997, deputies of the San Diego County Sheriff's Department discovered the bodies of the 39 active members of the group, including that of Applewhite, in a house in the San Diego suburb of Rancho Santa Fe. They had participated in a coordinated series of ritual suicides, coinciding with the closest approach of Comet Hale–Bopp.^[3][4] Just before the mass suicide, the group's website was updated with the message: "Hale–Bopp brings closure to Heaven's Gate ...our 22 years of classroom here on planet Earth is finally coming to conclusion—'graduation' from the Human Evolutionary Level. We are happily prepared to leave 'this world' and go with Ti's crew."^[5]

The name "Heaven's Gate" was only used for the final few years of the group's existence, and they had previously been known under the names Human Individual Metamorphosis and Total Overcomers Anonymous.

1. ^ ^{a b c} Chryssides 2021, pp. 369–374.
2. ^ Hexham, Irving; Poewe, Karla (7 May 1997). "UFO Religion—Making Sense of the Heaven's Gate Suicides". Christian Century. pp. 439–440. Retrieved 2007-10-06.
3. ^ "Mass suicide involved sedatives, vodka and careful planning". CNN. Retrieved 2010-05-04.
4. ^ Ayres, B. Drummond Jr. (March 29, 1997). "Families Learning of 39 Cultists Who Died Willingly". New York Times. Retrieved 2008-11-09. According to material the group posted on its Internet site, the timing of the suicides were probably related to the arrival of the Hale–Bopp comet, which members seemed to regard as a cosmic emissary beckoning them to another world.
5. ^ "Heaven's Gate". Retrieved 2018-07-31.

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27 March 1871 – The first international rugby football match, when Scotland defeats England in Edinburgh at Raeburn Place.

Rugby football

Rugby union and rugby league team sports

Football match on the 1846 Shrove Tuesday in Kingston upon Thames, England

Rugby football is the collective name for the team sports of rugby union and rugby league.

Canadian football and, to a lesser extent, American football were once considered forms of rugby football, but are seldom now referred to as such. The governing body of Canadian football, Football Canada, was known as the Canadian Rugby Union as late as 1967, more than fifty years after the sport parted ways with rugby rules.^[1][2][3]

Rugby football started about 1845 at Rugby School in Rugby, Warwickshire, England, although forms of football in which the ball was carried and tossed date to the Middle Ages (see medieval football).^[4] Rugby football spread to other English public schools in the 19th century and across the British Empire as former pupils continued to play it.

Rugby football split into two codes in 1895, when twenty-one clubs from the North of England left the Rugby Football Union to form the Northern Rugby Football Union (renamed the Rugby Football League in 1922) at the George Hotel, Huddersfield, over payments to players who took time off work to play ("broken-time payments"), thus making rugby league the first code to turn professional and pay players.^[5] Rugby union turned professional one hundred years later, following the 1995 Rugby World Cup in South Africa.^[6][7] The respective world governing bodies are World Rugby (rugby union) and the Rugby League International Federation (rugby league).^[8]

1. ^ "The Rugby World Cup: Second Only to the Soccer World Cup in Attendance [Infographic]". Forbes. 18 September 2015. Archived from the original on 14 April 2019. Retrieved 14 April 2019.
2. ^ "Rugby League World Cup:Will World Cup joy finally come for Sam Burgess?". BBC Sport. 30 November 2017. Archived from the original on 14 April 2019. Retrieved 14 April 2019.
3. ^ "The Other (and Less Popular) Rugby World Cup Gets Underway". The New York Times. 27 October 2017. Archived from the original on 14 April 2019. Retrieved 14 April 2019.
4. ^ "Rugby Football History". rugbyfootballhistory.com. Archived from the original on 15 April 2020. Retrieved 19 June 2013.
5. ^ "Rugby Football History". rugbyfootballhistory.com. Archived from the original on 1 December 2014. Retrieved 30 November 2018.
6. ^ "Broken Time -review". The Guardian. 2 October 2011. Archived from the original on 14 April 2019. Retrieved 14 April 2019.
7. ^ "27 August 1995:Rugby Union turns professional". MoneyWeek. 27 August 2015. Archived from the original on 14 April 2019. Retrieved 14 April 2019.
8. ^ Williams, Richard (15 January 2019). "Jonathan Davies: 30 years on from the day he switched to Rugby league". BBC Sport.

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28 March 1965 – An Mw  7.4 earthquake in Chile sets off a series of tailings dam failures, burying the town of El Cobre and killing at least 500 people.

1965 Valparaíso earthquake and the El Cobre dam failures

Earthquake and mining disaster in Chile

The 1965 Valparaíso earthquake (also known as the La Ligua earthquake) struck near La Ligua in Valparaíso Region, Chile, about 140 km (87 mi) from the capital Santiago on Sunday, March 28 at 12:33 local time. The moment magnitude (M_w ) 7.4–7.6 earthquake killed 400–500 people and inflicted US$1 billion (adjusted for inflation) in damage.^[1][2] Many deaths were from El Cobre, a mining location that was wiped out after a series of dam failures caused by the earthquake spilled mineral waste onto the area, burying hundreds of residents. The shock was felt throughout the country and along the Atlantic coast of Argentina.^[3]

1. ^ "Significant Earthquake CHILE: CENTRAL". NGCD. Retrieved 6 Dec 2020.
2. ^ Reuters Staff (28 Feb 2010). "Factbox: Chile has history of big earthquakes". Reuters. Retrieved 6 Dec 2020. {{cite news}}: |last= has generic name (help)
3. ^ "Earthquake Toll Heavy in Chile; Village Buried". The Desert Sun. Vol. 38, no. 202. 29 March 1965. Retrieved 5 Dec 2020.{{cite news}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)

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29 March 1871 – Royal Albert Hall is opened by Queen Victoria.

Royal Albert Hall

Concert hall in South Kensington, London

This article is about the London concert hall. For other uses, see Albert Hall (disambiguation).

The Royal Albert Hall is a concert hall on the northern edge of South Kensington, London. One of the UK's most treasured and distinctive buildings, it is held in trust for the nation and managed by a registered charity which receives no government funding.^[2] It has a seating capacity of 5,272 people.^[1]

Since the hall's opening by Queen Victoria in 1871, the world's leading artists from many performance genres have appeared on its stage. It is the venue for the BBC Proms concerts, which have been held there every summer since 1941. It is host to more than 390 shows in the main auditorium annually, including classical, rock and pop concerts, ballet, opera, film screenings with live orchestral accompaniment, sports, awards ceremonies, school and community events, and charity performances and banquets. A further 400 events are held each year in the non-auditorium spaces. Over its 151 year history the hall has hosted people from various fields, including meetings held by suffragettes, speeches from Winston Churchill and Albert Einstein, fights by Lennox Lewis, exhibition bouts by Muhammad Ali, and concerts from regular performers at the venue such as Eric Clapton and Shirley Bassey.^[3][4][5]

The hall was originally supposed to have been called the Central Hall of Arts and Sciences, but the name was changed to the Royal Albert Hall of Arts and Sciences by Queen Victoria upon laying the Hall's foundation stone in 1867, in memory of her husband, Prince Albert, who had died six years earlier. It forms the practical part of a memorial to the Prince Consort; the decorative part is the Albert Memorial directly to the north in Kensington Gardens, now separated from the Hall by Kensington Gore.

1. ^ ^{a b} Colson, Thomas. "A 12-seat Grand Tier box at the Royal Albert Hall is on sale for £2.5 million". Business Insider. Retrieved 24 October 2019.
2. ^ Hope, Jasper (18 June 2013). "It's Hall to do with the experience". Metro.
3. ^ Cite error: The named reference History was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
4. ^ "Exclusive photos: boxing makes historic return to the Royal Albert Hall". Royal Albert Hall. Retrieved 20 June 2022.
5. ^ "Shirley Bassey". Royal Albert Hall. Retrieved 20 June 2022.

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30 March 1856 – The Treaty of Paris is signed, ending the Crimean War.

Treaty of Paris (1856)

1856 treaty which made the Black Sea neutral territory, thereby ending the Crimean War

For other treaties of Paris, see Treaty of Paris (disambiguation).

The Treaty of Paris of 1856 brought an end to the Crimean War between the Russian Empire and an alliance of the Ottoman Empire, the United Kingdom, the Second French Empire and the Kingdom of Sardinia.^[1][2]

The treaty, signed on 30 March 1856 at the Congress of Paris, made the Black Sea neutral territory, closing it to all warships and prohibiting fortifications and the presence of armaments on its shores.

The treaty diminished Russian influence in the region. Conditions for the return of Sevastopol and other towns and cities in the south of Crimea to Russia were severe since no naval or military arsenal could be established by Russia on the coast of the Black Sea.

1. ^ ^{a b} Hertslet, Edward (1875). "General treaty between Great Britain, Austria, France, Prussia, Russia, Sardinia and Turkey, signed at Paris on 30th March 1856". The Map of Europe by Treaty showing the various political and territorial changes which have taken place since the general peace of 1814, with numerous maps and notes. Vol. 2. London: Butterworth. pp. 1250–1265.
2. ^ ^{a b} Albin, Pierre (1912). "Acte General Du Congres de Paris, 30 Mars 1856". Les Grands Traités Politiques: Recueil des Principaux Textes Diplomatiques Depuis 1815 Jusqu'à nos Jours avec des Notices Historiques et des Notes. Paris: Librairie Félix Alcan. pp. 170–180.

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31 March 1921 – The Royal Australian Air Force is formed.

Royal Australian Air Force

Air warfare branch of Australia's armed forces

"RAAF" redirects here. For the British auxiliary air force, see Royal Auxiliary Air Force. For other uses, see RAAF (disambiguation).

Military unit

The Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF) is the principal air and space force of Australia, a part of the Australian Defence Force (ADF) along with the Royal Australian Navy and the Australian Army.^[4] Constitutionally, the Governor-General of Australia, is the de jure Commander-in-Chief of the Australian Defence Force. The Royal Australian Air Force is commanded by the Chief of Air Force (CAF), who is subordinate to the Chief of the Defence Force (CDF). The CAF is also directly responsible to the Minister for Defence, with the Department of Defence administering the ADF and the Air Force.^[5]

Formed in March 1921, as the Australian Air Force, through the separation of the Australian Air Corps from the Army in January 1920, which in turn amalgamated the separate aerial services of both the Army and Navy. It directly continues the traditions of the Australian Flying Corps (AFC), the aviation corps of the Army that fought in the First World War and that was formed on 22 October 1912.^[6]

During its history, the Royal Australian Air Force has fought in a number of major wars, including the Second World War in Europe and the Pacific, participated in the Berlin Airlift, Korean War, Malayan Emergency, Indonesia–Malaysia Confrontation, Vietnam War, and more recently, operations in East Timor, the Iraq War and subsequent intervention, and the War in Afghanistan.

It operates the majority of the ADF's fixed wing aircraft, although both the Australian Army and Royal Australian Navy also operate aircraft in various roles.^[7][8] The RAAF provides support across a spectrum of operations such as air superiority, precision strikes, intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance, air mobility, space surveillance, and humanitarian support. The RAAF has 252 aircraft, of which 84 are combat aircraft.

1. ^ "Air Force 2021 centenary". RAAF. Retrieved 28 March 2021.
2. ^ "Defence Annual Reports". Department of Defence (Australia). Retrieved 26 January 2022.
3. ^ "Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act – Section 68: Command of naval and military forces". Austlii. Retrieved 25 March 2021.
4. ^ "Vision". Royal Australian Air Force. 3 November 2017. Retrieved 6 November 2021.
5. ^ "Defence Act (1903) – SECT 9 Command of Defence Force and arms of Defence Force". Australasian Legal Information Institute. Retrieved 19 October 2010.
6. ^ "Australian Military Aviation and World War One". Royal Australian Air Force. Archived from the original on 30 September 2009. Retrieved 23 April 2010.
7. ^ "Current aircraft". Royal Australian Navy. Archived from the original on 27 April 2018. Retrieved 27 April 2018.
8. ^ "Aviation projects". Australian Army. Archived from the original on 10 April 2018. Retrieved 27 April 2018.

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1 April 1976 – Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak found Apple Computer, Inc.

Apple Inc.

American multinational technology corporation

"Apple (company)" redirects here. For other companies of the same name, see Apple (disambiguation) § Businesses and organisations.

Apple Inc. is an American multinational technology company headquartered in Cupertino, California. Apple is the world's largest technology company by revenue, with US$394.3 billion in 2022 revenue.^[6] As of March 2023^[update], Apple is the world's biggest company by market capitalization.^[7] As of June 2022, Apple is the fourth-largest personal computer vendor by unit sales and the second-largest mobile phone manufacturer in the world. It is one of the Big Five American information technology companies, alongside Alphabet, Amazon, Meta Platforms, and Microsoft.

Apple was founded as Apple Computer Company on April 1, 1976, by Steve Wozniak, Steve Jobs and Ronald Wayne to develop and sell Wozniak's Apple I personal computer. It was incorporated by Jobs and Wozniak as Apple Computer, Inc. in 1977. The company's second computer, the Apple II, became a best seller and one of the first mass-produced microcomputers. Apple went public in 1980 to instant financial success. The company developed computers featuring innovative graphical user interfaces, including the 1984 original Macintosh, announced that year in a critically acclaimed advertisement called "1984". By 1985, the high cost of its products, and power struggles between executives, caused problems. Wozniak stepped back from Apple and pursued other ventures, while Jobs resigned and founded NeXT, taking some Apple employees with him.

As the market for personal computers expanded and evolved throughout the 1990s, Apple lost considerable market share to the lower-priced duopoly of the Microsoft Windows operating system on Intel-powered PC clones (also known as "Wintel"). In 1997, weeks away from bankruptcy, the company bought NeXT to resolve Apple's unsuccessful operating system strategy and entice Jobs back to the company. Over the next decade, Jobs guided Apple back to profitability through a number of tactics including introducing the iMac, iPod, iPhone and iPad to critical acclaim, launching the "Think different" campaign and other memorable advertising campaigns, opening the Apple Store retail chain, and acquiring numerous companies to broaden the company's product portfolio. When Jobs resigned in 2011 for health reasons, and died two months later, he was succeeded as CEO by Tim Cook.

Apple became the first publicly traded U.S. company to be valued at over $1 trillion in August 2018, then at $2 trillion in August 2020, and at $3 trillion in January 2022. As of April 2023^[update], it was valued at around $2.6 trillion. The company receives criticism regarding the labor practices of its contractors, its environmental practices, and its business ethics, including anti-competitive practices and materials sourcing. Nevertheless, the company has a large following and enjoys a high level of brand loyalty. It has also been consistently ranked as one of the world's most valuable brands.

1. ^ "Apple 10-K Report FY2021" (PDF). September 25, 2021. Retrieved January 23, 2022.
2. ^ "Apple Inc. Fiscal 2022 Annual Report (Form 10-K)". U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. October 28, 2022.
3. ^ "Apple Retail Store – Store List". Apple. Retrieved June 3, 2020.
4. ^ Certificate of Amendment of Articles of Incorporation, November 17, 1977. California Secretary of State
5. ^ Certificate of Ownership, January 9, 2007. California Secretary of State.
6. ^ "Apple Reports Fourth Quarter Results". Apple Newsroom. Retrieved March 22, 2023.
7. ^ "Companies ranked by Market Cap - CompaniesMarketCap.com". companiesmarketcap.com. Retrieved March 22, 2023.

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2 April 1982 – Falklands War: Argentina invades the Falkland Islands.

Falklands War

Undeclared war between Argentina and the United Kingdom in 1982

Not to be confused with the Falkland Crisis of 1770, the South Atlantic conflict or the Battle of the Falkland Islands.

The Falklands War (Spanish: Guerra de las Malvinas) was a ten-week undeclared war between Argentina and the United Kingdom in 1982 over two British dependent territories in the South Atlantic: the Falkland Islands and its territorial dependency, South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands. The conflict began on 2 April, when Argentina invaded and occupied the Falkland Islands, followed by the invasion of South Georgia the next day. On 5 April, the British government dispatched a naval task force to engage the Argentine Navy and Air Force before making an amphibious assault on the islands. The conflict lasted 74 days and ended with an Argentine surrender on 14 June, returning the islands to British control. In total, 649 Argentine military personnel, 255 British military personnel, and three Falkland Islanders were killed during the hostilities.

The conflict was a major episode in the protracted dispute over the territories' sovereignty. Argentina asserted (and maintains) that the islands are Argentine territory,^[4] and the Argentine government thus characterised its military action as the reclamation of its own territory. The British government regarded the action as an invasion of a territory that had been a Crown colony since 1841. Falkland Islanders, who have inhabited the islands since the early 19th century, are predominantly descendants of British settlers, and strongly favour British sovereignty. Neither state officially declared war, although both governments declared the islands a war zone.

The conflict had a strong effect in both countries and has been the subject of various books, articles, films, and songs. Patriotic sentiment ran high in Argentina, but the unfavourable outcome prompted large protests against the ruling military government, hastening its downfall and the democratisation of the country. In the United Kingdom, the Conservative government, bolstered by the successful outcome, was re-elected with an increased majority the following year. The cultural and political effect of the conflict has been less in the UK than in Argentina, where it has remained a common topic for discussion.^[5]

Diplomatic relations between the United Kingdom and Argentina were restored in 1989 following a meeting in Madrid, at which the two governments issued a joint statement.^[6] No change in either country's position regarding the sovereignty of the Falkland Islands was made explicit. In 1994, Argentina adopted a new constitution,^[7] which declared the Falkland Islands as part of one of its provinces by law.^[8] However, the islands continue to operate as a self-governing British Overseas Territory.^[9]

1. ^ "Falkland Islands profile". BBC News. 5 November 2013. Archived from the original on 19 June 2014. Retrieved 19 June 2014.
2. ^ Burns, John F. (5 January 2013). "Vitriol Over Falklands Resurfaces, as Do Old Arguments". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 2 January 2022. Retrieved 8 August 2019.
3. ^ ^{a b} Historia Marítima Argentina, Volume 10, p. 137. Departamento de Estudios Históricos Navales, Cuántica Editora, Argentina: 1993.
4. ^ "Argentine to reaffirm Sovereignty Rights over The Falkland Islands". National Turk. 4 January 2012. Archived from the original on 7 July 2019. Retrieved 7 January 2012.
5. ^ "Cómo evitar que Londres convierta a las Malvinas en un Estado independiente". Clarin. 1 April 2007. Archived from the original on 1 May 2010. Retrieved 7 February 2010.
6. ^ "Joint statement of 19 October 1989: Re-establishing Consular Relations Between Britain and Argentina, and Agreeing a Framework on Sovereignty Which Would Allow Further Talks". Falklands info. Archived from the original on 17 May 2012. Retrieved 4 January 2013.
7. ^ "Constitución Nacional". Argentine Senate (in Spanish). Archived from the original on 17 June 2004. La Nación Argentina ratifica su legítima e imprescriptible soberanía sobre las Islas Malvinas, Georgias del Sur y Sandwich del Sur y los espacios marítimos e insulares correspondientes, por ser parte integrante del territorio nacional.
8. ^ "Argentina: Constitución de 1994". pdba.georgetown.edu. Archived from the original on 14 November 2020. Retrieved 3 August 2020.
9. ^ Cahill 2010, "Falkland Islands".

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3 April 1981 – The Osborne 1, the first successful portable computer, is unveiled at the West Coast Computer Faire in San Francisco.

Osborne 1

Early portable microcomputer

The Osborne 1 is the first commercially successful portable computer, released on April 3, 1981 by Osborne Computer Corporation.^[1] It weighs 24.5 lb (11.1 kg), cost US$1,795, and runs the CP/M 2.2 operating system. It is powered from a wall socket, as it has no on-board battery, but it is still classed as a portable device since it can be hand-carried when the keyboard is closed.

The computer shipped with a large bundle of software that was almost equivalent in value to the machine itself, a practice adopted by other CP/M computer vendors. Competitors quickly appeared, such as the Kaypro II.

1. ^ Spector, Lincoln (May 31, 2010). "A History of Portable Computing". PC World. Retrieved April 3, 2019.

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4 April 1963 – Bye Bye Birdie, a musical romantic comedy film directed by George Sidney, was released.

Bye Bye Birdie (1963 film)

1963 film by George Sidney

Bye Bye Birdie is a 1963 American musical romantic comedy film directed by George Sidney from a screenplay by Irving Brecher, based on Michael Stewart's book of the 1960 musical of the same name. It also features songs by composer Charles Strouse and lyricist Lee Adams, and a score by Johnny Green. Produced by Fred Kohlmar, the film stars Janet Leigh, Dick Van Dyke, Ann-Margret, Maureen Stapleton, Bobby Rydell, Jesse Pearson, and Ed Sullivan. Van Dyke and featured player Paul Lynde reprised their roles from the original Broadway production.

The story was inspired by Elvis Presley being drafted into the United States Army in 1957. Jesse Pearson plays the role of teen idol Conrad Birdie, whose character name is a word play on country singer Conway Twitty, who was, at that time, a teen idol pop artist.^[2] Presley was the first choice for the role of Birdie, but his manager, Colonel Tom Parker, did not want Presley appearing in roles that parodied his persona or career. Ed Sullivan, host of the popular long-running CBS variety show, appears as himself.

The film was Van Dyke's feature film debut and helped make Ann-Margret a superstar during the mid-1960s. Her performance earned a Golden Globe nomination for Best Actress and her next role was with Presley in Viva Las Vegas.

In 2006, the film was ranked number 38 on Entertainment Weekly's list of the 50 Best High School Movies.^[3]

1. ^ "Columbia Pictures' Volume Indefinite". Variety. 23 May 1962. p. 6.
2. ^ Conway Twitty website biography Archived 2007-06-30 at the Wayback Machine
3. ^ AMC Filmsite - 50 Best High School Movies Archived 2008-12-29 at the Wayback Machine, filmsite.org; accessed October 18, 2016.

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5 April 1976 – In China, the April Fifth Movement leads to the Tiananmen Incident.

1976 Tiananmen Incident

1976 protest in Beijing, China

This article is about the protest in 1976. For other uses, see Tiananmen Square Incident (disambiguation).

The Tiananmen Incident or the April 5 Tiananmen Incident (Chinese: 四五天安门事件) was a mass gathering and protest that took place on April 4–5 , 1976, at Tiananmen Square in Beijing, China. The incident occurred on the traditional day of mourning, the Qingming Festival, after the Nanjing Incident, and was triggered by the death of Premier Zhou Enlai earlier that year. Some people strongly disapproved of the removal of the displays of mourning, and began gathering in the Square to protest against the central authorities, then largely under the auspices of the Gang of Four, who ordered the Square to be cleared.

The event was labeled "counterrevolutionary" immediately after its occurrence by the Communist Party's Central Committee and served as a gateway to the dismissal and house arrest of then–Vice Premier Deng Xiaoping, who was accused of planning the event, while he insisted that he was only nearby for a haircut.^[1] The Central Committee's decision on the event was reversed after the Cultural Revolution ended, as it would later be officially hailed as a display of patriotism.

1. ^ Teiwes, Frederick C.; Sun, Warren (2007). The end of the Maoist era : Chinese politics during the twilight of the Cultural Revolution, 1972–1976. Armonk, N.Y.: M.E. Sharpe. p. 490. ISBN 978-0765621993. OCLC 568038301.

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6 April 1973 – Launch of Pioneer 11 spacecraft.

Pioneer 11

Robotic space probe launched by NASA in 1973 to study the outer solar system

Pioneer 11 (also known as Pioneer G) is a NASA robotic space probe launched on April 5, 1973, to study the asteroid belt, the environment around Jupiter and Saturn, solar winds, and cosmic rays.^[2] It was the first probe to encounter Saturn, the second to fly through the asteroid belt, and the second to fly by Jupiter. Later, Pioneer 11 became the second of five artificial objects to achieve an escape velocity allowing it to leave the Solar System. Due to power constraints and the vast distance to the probe, the last routine contact with the spacecraft was on September 30, 1995, and the last good engineering data was received on November 24, 1995.^[3][4]

1. ^ ^{a b} "Pioneer 11". NASA's Solar System Exploration website. Retrieved December 1, 2022.
2. ^ Cite error: The named reference PionOdys was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
3. ^ "The Pioneer Missions". Nasa.gov. March 3, 2015.
4. ^ "Pioneer 11: In Depth". Retrieved December 10, 2017.

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7 April 1954 – United States President Dwight D. Eisenhower gives his "domino theory" speech during a news conference.

Domino theory

Cold War-era geopolitical theory on the spread of communism

This article is about the theory involving communist countries. For the Weather Report album, see Domino Theory (album). For the Steve Wariner song, see The Domino Theory.

An illustration of the domino theory as it had been predicted

The domino theory is a geopolitical theory which posits that increases or decreases in democracy in one country tend to spread to neighboring countries in a domino effect.^[1] It was prominent in the United States from the 1950s to the 1980s in the context of the Cold War, suggesting that if one country in a region came under the influence of communism, then the surrounding countries would follow. It was used by successive United States administrations during the Cold War as justification for American intervention (destabilising target countries/regions by fomenting political unrest, deposing leaders, staging coup d'état, assassinations, bombings, invasions, etc.) around the world. Former U.S. President Dwight D. Eisenhower described the theory during a news conference on 7 April 1954, when referring to communism in Indochina as follows:

Finally, you have broader considerations that might follow what you would call the "falling domino" principle. You have a row of dominoes set up, you knock over the first one, and what will happen to the last one is the certainty that it will go over very quickly. So you could have a beginning of a disintegration that would have the most profound influences.^[2]

Moreover, Eisenhower’s deep belief in the domino theory in Asia heightened the "perceived costs for the United States of pursuing multilateralism"^[3] because of multifaceted events including the "1949 victory of the Chinese Communist Party, the June 1950 North Korean invasion, the 1954 Quemoy offshore island crisis, and the conflict in Indochina constituted a broad-based challenge not only for one or two countries, but for the entire Asian continent and Pacific."^[3] This connotes a strong magnetic force to give in to communist control, and aligns with the comment by General Douglas MacArthur that "victory is a strong magnet in the East."^[4]

1. ^ Leeson, Peter T.; Dean, Andrea (2009). "The Democratic Domino Theory". American Journal of Political Science. 53 (3): 533–551. doi:10.1111/j.1540-5907.2009.00385.x.
2. ^ "The Quotable Quotes of Dwight D. Eisenhower". National Park Service. December 5, 2013. Archived from the original on March 28, 2013. Retrieved December 5, 2013.
3. ^ ^{a b} Cha, Victor (2016). Powerplay: The Origins of the American Alliance System in Asia. p. 158.
4. ^ Extracts of Memorandum of Conversation by Mr. W. Averell Harriman, Special Assistant to the President, with General MacArthur in Tokyo, August 6 and 8, 1950, Top Secret, August 20, 1950, in FRUS, 1950, Vol. 7: Korea, p. 544.

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8 April 1911 – Dutch physicist Heike Kamerlingh Onnes discovers superconductivity.

Superconductivity

Electrical conductivity with exactly zero resistance

A magnet levitating above a high-temperature superconductor, cooled with liquid nitrogen. Persistent electric current flows on the surface of the superconductor, acting to exclude the magnetic field of the magnet (Faraday's law of induction). This current effectively forms an electromagnet that repels the magnet.

Video of the Meissner effect in a high-temperature superconductor (black pellet) with a NdFeB magnet (metallic)

A high-temperature superconductor levitating above a magnet

Superconductivity is a set of physical properties observed in certain materials where electrical resistance vanishes and magnetic flux fields are expelled from the material. Any material exhibiting these properties is a superconductor. Unlike an ordinary metallic conductor, whose resistance decreases gradually as its temperature is lowered, even down to near absolute zero, a superconductor has a characteristic critical temperature below which the resistance drops abruptly to zero.^{[1] [2]} An electric current through a loop of superconducting wire can persist indefinitely with no power source.^[3][4][5][6]

The superconductivity phenomenon was discovered in 1911 by Dutch physicist Heike Kamerlingh Onnes. Like ferromagnetism and atomic spectral lines, superconductivity is a phenomenon which can only be explained by quantum mechanics. It is characterized by the Meissner effect, the complete ejection of magnetic field lines from the interior of the superconductor during its transitions into the superconducting state. The occurrence of the Meissner effect indicates that superconductivity cannot be understood simply as the idealization of perfect conductivity in classical physics.

In 1986, it was discovered that some cuprate-perovskite ceramic materials have a critical temperature above 90 K (−183 °C).^[7] Such a high transition temperature is theoretically impossible for a conventional superconductor, leading the materials to be termed high-temperature superconductors. The cheaply available coolant liquid nitrogen boils at 77 K, and thus the existence of superconductivity at higher temperatures than this facilitates many experiments and applications that are less practical at lower temperatures.

1. ^ Combescot, Roland (2022). Superconductivity. Cambridge University Press. pp. 1–2. ISBN 9781108428415.
2. ^ Fossheim, Kristian; Sudboe, Asle (2005). Superconductivity: Physics and Applications. John Wiley and Sons. p. 7. ISBN 9780470026434.
3. ^ John Bardeen; Leon Cooper; J. R. Schriffer (December 1, 1957). Theory of Superconductivity. Physical Review. Vol. 108. p. 1175. Bibcode:1957PhRv..108.1175B. doi:10.1103/physrev.108.1175. ISBN 978-0-677-00080-0. S2CID 73661301. Retrieved June 6, 2014. reprinted in Nikolaĭ Nikolaevich Bogoliubov (1963) The Theory of Superconductivity, Vol. 4, CRC Press, ISBN 0677000804, p. 73
4. ^ John Daintith (2009). The Facts on File Dictionary of Physics (4th ed.). Infobase Publishing. p. 238. ISBN 978-1-4381-0949-7.
5. ^ John C. Gallop (1990). SQUIDS, the Josephson Effects and Superconducting Electronics. CRC Press. pp. 1, 20. ISBN 978-0-7503-0051-3.
6. ^ Durrant, Alan (2000). Quantum Physics of Matter. CRC Press. pp. 102–103. ISBN 978-0-7503-0721-5.
7. ^ J. G. Bednorz & K. A. Müller (1986). "Possible high T_c superconductivity in the Ba−La−Cu−O system". Z. Phys. B. 64 (1): 189–193. Bibcode:1986ZPhyB..64..189B. doi:10.1007/BF01303701. S2CID 118314311.

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9 April 1957 – The Suez Canal in Egypt is cleared and opens to shipping following the Suez Crisis.

Suez Canal

Artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt

The Suez Canal (Egyptian Arabic: قَنَاةُ ٱلسُّوَيْسِ, Qanāt es-Suwais) is an artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt, connecting the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea through the Isthmus of Suez and dividing Africa and Asia. The 193.30 km (120.11 mi) long canal is a popular trade route between Europe and Asia.

In 1858, Ferdinand de Lesseps formed the Suez Canal Company for the express purpose of building the canal. Construction of the canal lasted from 1859 to 1869. The canal officially opened on 17 November 1869. It offers vessels a direct route between the North Atlantic and northern Indian oceans via the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea, avoiding the South Atlantic and southern Indian oceans and reducing the journey distance from the Arabian Sea to London by approximately 8,900 kilometres (5,500 mi), to 10 days at 20 knots (37 km/h; 23 mph) or 8 days at 24 knots (44 km/h; 28 mph).^[1] The canal extends from the northern terminus of Port Said to the southern terminus of Port Tewfik at the city of Suez. In 2021, more than 20,600 vessels traversed the canal (an average of 56 per day).^[2]

The original canal featured a single-lane waterway with passing locations in the Ballah Bypass and the Great Bitter Lake.^[3] It contained, according to Alois Negrelli's plans, no locks, with seawater flowing freely through it. In general, the water in the canal north of the Bitter Lakes flows north in winter and south in summer. South of the lakes, the current changes with the tide at Suez.^[4]

The canal was the property of the Egyptian government, but European shareholders, mostly British and French, owned the concessionary company which operated it until July 1956, when President Gamal Abdel Nasser nationalised it—an event which led to the Suez Crisis of October–November 1956.^[5] The canal is operated and maintained by the state-owned Suez Canal Authority^[6] (SCA) of Egypt. Under the Convention of Constantinople, it may be used "in time of war as in time of peace, by every vessel of commerce or of war, without distinction of flag."^[7] Nevertheless, the canal has played an important military strategic role as a naval short-cut and choke point. Navies with coastlines and bases on both the Mediterranean Sea and the Red Sea (Egypt and Israel) have a particular interest in the Suez Canal. After Egypt closed the Suez Canal at the beginning of the Six-Day War on 5 June 1967, the canal remained closed for precisely eight years, reopening on 5 June 1975.^[8]

The Egyptian government launched construction in 2014 to expand and widen the Ballah Bypass for 35 km (22 mi) to speed up the canal's transit time. The expansion intended to nearly double the capacity of the Suez Canal, from 49 to 97 ships per day.^[9] At a cost of LE 59.4 billion (US$9 billion), this project was funded with interest bearing investment certificates issued exclusively to Egyptian entities and individuals.

The Suez Canal Authority officially opened the new side channel in 2016. This side channel, at the northern side of the east extension of the Suez Canal, serves the East Terminal for berthing and unberthing vessels from the terminal. As the East Container Terminal is located on the Canal itself, before the construction of the new side channel it was not possible to berth or unberth vessels at the terminal while a convoy was running.^[10]

Aerial view of the Suez Canal at Suez

1. ^ "The Suez Canal – A vital shortcut for global commerce" (PDF). World Shipping Council. Archived (PDF) from the original on 22 April 2018. Retrieved 15 March 2019.
2. ^ "Number of ships passing through the Suez Canal from 1976 to 2021". Statista. 31 March 2022.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link)
3. ^ "Suez Canal Authority". Archived from the original on 13 June 2014. Retrieved 2 May 2010.
4. ^ Elaine Morgan; Stephen Davies (1995). The Red Sea Pilot. Imray Laurie Norie & Wilson. p. 266. ISBN 9780852885543.
5. ^ "Suez Crisis". History.com. A&E Television Networks. 9 November 2009. Archived from the original on 30 March 2019. Retrieved 17 April 2019.
6. ^ "SCA Overview". Suez Canal Authority. Archived from the original on 25 June 2019. Retrieved 25 July 2019.
7. ^ Constantinople Convention of the Suez Canal of 2 March 1888 still in force and specifically maintained in Nasser's Nationalization Act.
8. ^ Feyrer, James. "Distance, Trade, and Income – The 1967 to 1975 Closing of the Suez Canal as a Natural Experiment" (PDF). National Bureau of Economic Research. Archived (PDF) from the original on 11 February 2021. Retrieved 27 March 2021.
9. ^ "New Suez Canal project proposed by Egypt to boost trade". caironews.net. Archived from the original on 29 November 2014. Retrieved 7 August 2014.
10. ^ "Egypt opens East Port Said side channel for navigation". Xinhua. Archived from the original on 25 February 2016. Retrieved 12 March 2016.

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10 April 837 – Halley's Comet makes its closest approach to Earth at a distance equal to 0.0342 AU (5.1 million kilometres/3.2 million miles)

Halley's Comet

Short-period comet visible every 75–76 years

For other uses, see Halley's Comet (disambiguation).

Halley's Comet, Comet Halley, or sometimes simply Halley, officially designated 1P/Halley, is a short-period comet visible from Earth every 75–79 years.^[1] Halley is the only known short-period comet that is regularly visible to the naked eye from Earth, and thus the only naked-eye comet that can appear twice in a human lifetime.^[13] It last appeared in the inner parts of the Solar System in 1986 and will next appear in mid-2061.

Halley's periodic returns to the inner Solar System have been observed and recorded by astronomers around the world since at least 240 BC. But it was not until 1705 that the English astronomer Edmond Halley understood that these appearances were re-appearances of the same comet. As a result of this discovery, the comet is named after Edmond Halley.^[14]

During its 1986 visit to the inner Solar System, Halley's Comet became the first comet to be observed in detail by spacecraft, providing the first observational data on the structure of a comet nucleus and the mechanism of coma and tail formation.^[15][16] These observations supported a number of longstanding hypotheses about comet construction, particularly Fred Whipple's "dirty snowball" model, which correctly predicted that Halley would be composed of a mixture of volatile ices—such as water, carbon dioxide, ammonia, and dust. The missions also provided data that substantially reformed and reconfigured these ideas; for instance, it is now understood that the surface of Halley is largely composed of dusty, non-volatile materials, and that only a small portion of it is icy.

1. ^ ^{a b} Cite error: The named reference MPC was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
2. ^ ^{a b} Cite error: The named reference Horizons2023 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
3. ^ Cite error: The named reference seeker2013 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
4. ^ ^{a b c} Cite error: The named reference Horizons2061 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
5. ^ ^{a b} Cite error: The named reference jpldata was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
6. ^ Cite error: The named reference Learn was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
7. ^ Cite error: The named reference mass was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
8. ^ Cite error: The named reference density was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
9. ^ Cite error: The named reference Peale1989November was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
10. ^ Cite error: The named reference Peale1989 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
11. ^ Cite error: The named reference dark was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
12. ^ Cite error: The named reference ESO2003 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
13. ^ Cite error: The named reference Delehanty was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
14. ^ Halley, Edmund (1705). A synopsis of the astronomy of comets. Oxford: John Senex. Retrieved 16 June 2020 – via Internet Archive.
15. ^ Cite error: The named reference post was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
16. ^ Cite error: The named reference situ was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

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11 April 2002 – The Ghriba synagogue bombing by al-Qaeda kills 21 in Tunisia.

Ghriba synagogue bombing

2002 Islamist suicide bombing of a synagogue in Tunisia

The Ghriba synagogue bombing was carried out by Niser bin Muhammad Nasr Nawar on the El Ghriba synagogue in Tunisia in 2002.

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12 April 1955 – The polio vaccine, developed by Dr. Jonas Salk, is declared safe and effective.

Polio vaccine

Vaccine to prevent poliomyelitis

Polio vaccines are vaccines used to prevent poliomyelitis (polio).^[2][3] Two types are used: an inactivated poliovirus given by injection (IPV) and a weakened poliovirus given by mouth (OPV).^[2] The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends all children be fully vaccinated against polio.^[2] The two vaccines have eliminated polio from most of the world,^[4][5] and reduced the number of cases reported each year from an estimated 350,000 in 1988 to 33 in 2018.^[6][7]

The inactivated polio vaccines are very safe.^[2] Mild redness or pain may occur at the site of injection.^[2] Oral polio vaccines cause about three cases of vaccine-associated paralytic poliomyelitis per million doses given.^[2] This compares with 5,000 cases per million who are paralysed following a polio infection.^[8] Both types of vaccine are generally safe to give during pregnancy and in those who have HIV/AIDS but are otherwise well.^[2] However, the emergence of circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus (cVDPV), a form of the vaccine virus that has reverted to causing poliomyelitis, has led to the development of novel oral polio vaccine type 2 (nOPV2) which aims to make the vaccine safer and thus stop further outbreaks of cVDPV2.^[9]

The first successful demonstration of a polio vaccine was by Hilary Koprowski in 1950, with a live attenuated virus which people drank.^[10] The vaccine was not approved for use in the United States, but was used successfully elsewhere.^[10] The success of an inactivated (killed) polio vaccine, developed by Jonas Salk, was announced in 1955.^[2][11] Another attenuated live oral polio vaccine was developed by Albert Sabin and came into commercial use in 1961.^[2][12]

Polio vaccine is on the World Health Organization's List of Essential Medicines.^[13][14]

1. ^ Use During Pregnancy and Breastfeeding
2. ^ ^{a b c d e f g h i} World Health Organization (2016). "Polio vaccines: WHO position paper – March, 2016". Weekly Epidemiological Record. 91 (12): 145–68. hdl:10665/254399. PMID 27039410.
3. ^ World Health Organization (2022). "Polio vaccines: WHO position paper – June 2022". Weekly Epidemiological Record. 97 (25): 277–300. hdl:10665/357168.
4. ^ Aylward RB (2006). "Eradicating polio: today's challenges and tomorrow's legacy". Annals of Tropical Medicine and Parasitology. 100 (5–6): 401–413. doi:10.1179/136485906X97354. PMID 16899145. S2CID 25327986.
5. ^ Schonberger LB, Kaplan J, Kim-Farley R, Moore M, Eddins DL, Hatch M (1984). "Control of paralytic poliomyelitis in the United States". Reviews of Infectious Diseases. 6 (Suppl 2): S424–S426. doi:10.1093/clinids/6.Supplement_2.S424. PMID 6740085.
6. ^ "Global Wild Poliovirus 2014–2019" (PDF). Retrieved 3 February 2019.
7. ^ "Does polio still exist? Is it curable?". World Health Organization (WHO). Retrieved 21 May 2018.
8. ^ "Poliomyelitis". World Health Organization (WHO). Archived from the original on 18 April 2017. Retrieved 25 April 2017.
9. ^ "GPEI-nOPV2". Retrieved 1 August 2021.
10. ^ ^{a b} Fox M (20 April 2013). "Hilary Koprowski, Who Developed First Live-Virus Polio Vaccine, Dies at 96". The New York Times.
11. ^ Bazin H (2011). Vaccination: A History. John Libbey Eurotext. p. 395. ISBN 978-2742007752. Archived from the original on 8 September 2017.
12. ^ Smith DR, Leggat PA (2005). "Pioneering figures in medicine: Albert Bruce Sabin – inventor of the oral polio vaccine". The Kurume Medical Journal. 52 (3): 111–116. doi:10.2739/kurumemedj.52.111. PMID 16422178.
13. ^ World Health Organization (2019). World Health Organization model list of essential medicines: 21st list 2019. Geneva: World Health Organization. hdl:10665/325771. WHO/MVP/EMP/IAU/2019.06. License: CC BY-NC-SA 3.0 IGO.
14. ^ World Health Organization (2021). World Health Organization model list of essential medicines: 22nd list (2021). Geneva: World Health Organization. hdl:10665/345533. WHO/MHP/HPS/EML/2021.02.

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13 April 1941 – A pact of neutrality between the USSR and Japan is signed.

Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact

1941 non-aggression agreement between the USSR and Imperial Japan

Soviet-Japanese Neutrality Pact, April 13, 1941

The Soviet–Japanese Neutrality Pact (日ソ中立条約, Nisso Chūritsu Jōyaku), also known as the Japanese–Soviet Non-aggression Pact (日ソ不可侵条約, Nisso Fukashin Jōyaku), was a non-aggression pact between the Soviet Union and the Empire of Japan signed on April 13, 1941, two years after the conclusion of the Soviet-Japanese Border War. The agreement meant that for most of World War II, the two nations fought against each other's allies but not against each other. In 1945, late in the war, the Soviets scrapped the pact and joined the Allied campaign against Japan.

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14 April 1986 – The heaviest hailstones ever recorded, each weighing 1 kilogram (2.2 lb), fall on the Gopalganj district of Bangladesh, killing 92.

Hail

Form of solid precipitation

"Hailstone" and "Hailstorm" redirect here. For other uses, see Hail (disambiguation), Hailstone (disambiguation), and Hailstorm (disambiguation).

A large hailstone, about 6 cm (2.4 in) in diameter

Hail is a form of solid precipitation.^[1] It is distinct from ice pellets (American English "sleet"), though the two are often confused.^[2] It consists of balls or irregular lumps of ice, each of which is called a hailstone.^[3] Ice pellets generally fall in cold weather, while hail growth is greatly inhibited during low surface temperatures.

Unlike other forms of water ice precipitation, such as graupel (which is made of rime ice), ice pellets (which are smaller and translucent), and snow (which consists of tiny, delicately crystalline flakes or needles), hailstones usually measure between 5 mm (0.2 in) and 15 cm (6 in) in diameter.^[1] The METAR reporting code for hail 5 mm (0.20 in) or greater is GR, while smaller hailstones and graupel are coded GS.

Hail is possible within most thunderstorms (as it is produced by cumulonimbus),^[4] as well as within 2 nmi (3.7 km) of the parent storm. Hail formation requires environments of strong, upward motion of air within the parent thunderstorm (similar to tornadoes) and lowered heights of the freezing level. In the mid-latitudes, hail forms near the interiors of continents, while, in the tropics, it tends to be confined to high elevations.

There are methods available to detect hail-producing thunderstorms using weather satellites and weather radar imagery. Hailstones generally fall at higher speeds as they grow in size, though complicating factors such as melting, friction with air, wind, and interaction with rain and other hailstones can slow their descent through Earth's atmosphere. Severe weather warnings are issued for hail when the stones reach a damaging size, as it can cause serious damage to human-made structures, and, most commonly, farmers' crops.

1. ^ ^{a b} "hail". nationalgeographic.org. National Geographic Society. 21 January 2011. Archived from the original on 22 February 2021. Retrieved 14 January 2021.
2. ^ "What's the difference between hail, sleet, and freezing rain?". The Straight Dope. 1999-08-06. Archived from the original on 2014-02-02. Retrieved 2016-07-23.
3. ^ "hailstone". Merriam-Webster. Archived from the original on 2013-01-16. Retrieved 2013-01-23.
4. ^ Cite error: The named reference gloss was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

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15 April 1896 – Closing ceremony of the Games of the I Olympiad in Athens, Greece

1896 Summer Olympics

Multi-sport event in Athens, Greece

"Athens 1896" redirects here. For the 2004 Summer Olympics, see Athens 2004.

The 1896 Summer Olympics (Greek: Θερινοί Ολυμπιακοί Αγώνες 1896, romanized: Therinoí Olympiakoí Agónes 1896), officially known as the Games of the I Olympiad (Greek: Αγώνες της 1ης Ολυμπιάδας, romanized: Agónes tis 1is Olympiádas) and commonly known as Athens 1896 (Greek: Αθήνα 1896), was the first international Olympic Games held in modern history. Organised by the International Olympic Committee (IOC), which had been created by French aristocrat Pierre de Coubertin, it was held in Athens, Greece, from 6 to 15 April 1896.^[2]

Fourteen nations (according to the IOC, though the number is subject to interpretation) and 241 athletes (all males; this number is also disputed) took part in the games.^[3][2] Participants were all European, or living in Europe, with the exception of the United States team. Over 65% of the competing athletes were Greek. Winners were given a silver medal, while runners-up received a copper medal. Retroactively, the IOC has converted these to gold and silver, and awarded bronze medals to third placed athletes. Ten of the 14 participating nations earned medals. The United States won the most gold medals, 11, while host nation Greece won the most medals overall, 47. The highlight for the Greeks was the marathon victory by their compatriot Spyridon Louis. The most successful competitor was German wrestler and gymnast Carl Schuhmann, who won four events.

Athens had been unanimously chosen to stage the inaugural modern Games during a congress organised by Coubertin in Paris on 23 June 1894, during which the IOC was also created, because Greece was the birthplace of the Ancient Olympic Games. The main venue was the Panathenaic Stadium, where athletics and wrestling took place; other venues included the Neo Phaliron Velodrome for cycling, and the Zappeion for fencing. The opening ceremony was held in the Panathenaic Stadium on 6 April, during which most of the competing athletes were aligned on the infield, grouped by nation. After a speech by the president of the organising committee, Crown Prince Constantine, his father officially opened the Games. Afterwards, nine bands and 150 choir singers performed an Olympic Hymn, composed by Spyridon Samaras, with words by poet Kostis Palamas.

The 1896 Olympics were regarded as a great success. The Games had the largest international participation of any sporting event to that date. The Panathenaic Stadium overflowed with the largest crowd ever to watch a sporting event.^[4] After the Games, Coubertin and the IOC were petitioned by several prominent figures, including Greece's King George and some of the American competitors in Athens, to hold all the following Games in Athens. However, the 1900 Summer Olympics were already planned for Paris and, except for the Intercalated Games of 1906, the Olympics did not return to Greece until the 2004 Summer Olympics, 108 years later.

1. ^ "Factsheet – Opening Ceremony of the Games of the Olympiad" (PDF) (Press release). International Olympic Committee. 13 September 2013. Archived (PDF) from the original on 14 August 2016. Retrieved 22 December 2018.
2. ^ ^{a b} "First modern Olympic Games". HISTORY. Retrieved 6 April 2021.
3. ^ "Athens 1896 Summer Olympics". International Olympic Committee. Retrieved 6 April 2021.
4. ^ Young (1996), 153

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16 April 1972 – Apollo program: The launch of Apollo 16 from Cape Canaveral, Florida.

Apollo 16

Fifth crewed Moon landing

Apollo 16 (April 16–27, 1972) was the tenth crewed mission in the United States Apollo space program, administered by NASA, and the fifth and penultimate to land on the Moon. It was the second of Apollo's "J missions", with an extended stay on the lunar surface, a focus on science, and the use of the Lunar Roving Vehicle (LRV). The landing and exploration were in the Descartes Highlands, a site chosen because some scientists expected it to be an area formed by volcanic action, though this proved not to be the case.

The mission was crewed by Commander John Young, Lunar Module Pilot Charles Duke and Command Module Pilot Ken Mattingly. Launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on April 16, 1972, Apollo 16 experienced a number of minor glitches en route to the Moon. These culminated with a problem with the spaceship's main engine that resulted in a six-hour delay in the Moon landing as NASA managers contemplated having the astronauts abort the mission and return to Earth, before deciding the problem could be overcome. Although they permitted the lunar landing, NASA had the astronauts return from the mission one day earlier than planned.

After flying the lunar module to the Moon's surface on April 21, Young and Duke spent 71 hours—just under three days—on the lunar surface, during which they conducted three extravehicular activities or moonwalks, totaling 20 hours and 14 minutes. The pair drove the lunar rover, the second used on the Moon, for 26.7 kilometers (16.6 mi). On the surface, Young and Duke collected 95.8 kilograms (211 lb) of lunar samples for return to Earth, including Big Muley, the largest Moon rock collected during the Apollo missions. During this time Mattingly orbited the Moon in the command and service module (CSM), taking photos and operating scientific instruments. Mattingly, in the command module, spent 126 hours and 64 revolutions in lunar orbit.^[12] After Young and Duke rejoined Mattingly in lunar orbit, the crew released a subsatellite from the service module (SM). During the return trip to Earth, Mattingly performed a one-hour spacewalk to retrieve several film cassettes from the exterior of the service module. Apollo 16 returned safely to Earth on April 27, 1972.

1. ^ Orloff & Harland 2006, p. 547.
2. ^ ^{a b} Orloff & Harland 2006, p. 473.
3. ^ Orloff & Harland 2006, p. 476.
4. ^ ^{a b} Orloff & Harland 2006, p. 573.
5. ^ ^{a b c d} Orloff & Harland 2006, p. 482.
6. ^ Orloff & Harland 2006, p. 472.
7. ^ Orloff & Harland 2006, p. 20.
8. ^ Orloff & Harland 2006, p. 26.
9. ^ Orloff & Harland 2006, p. 585.
10. ^ ^{a b} Orloff & Harland 2006, p. 499.
11. ^ ^{a b c} Orloff & Harland 2006, p. 503.
12. ^ ^{a b} Orloff & Harland 2006, p. 480.
13. ^ "Apollo 16". NASA. July 8, 2009. Retrieved October 18, 2021.
14. ^ Orloff & Harland 2006, p. 500.
15. ^ Orloff & Harland 2006, p. 502.
16. ^ ^{a b} Orloff & Harland 2006, p. 478.
17. ^ ^{a b c d} Orloff & Harland 2006, p. 479.
18. ^ Orloff & Harland 2006, p. 498.

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