Today in History April 20

1453 – Three Genoese galleys and a Byzantine blockade runner fight their way through an Ottoman blockading fleet a few weeks before the fall of Constantinople.

1534 – Jacques Cartier begins his first voyage to what is today the east coast of Canada, Newfoundland and Labrador.

1657 – Freedom of religion is granted to the Jews of New Amsterdam(later New York City).

1775 – American Revolutionary War: The Siege of Boston begins, following the battles at Lexington and Concord.

1789 – George Washington arrives at Grays Ferry, Philadelphia while en route to Manhattan for his inauguration.

1861 – American Civil War: Robert E. Lee resigns his commission in the United States Army in order to command the forces of the state of Virginia.

	Louis Pasteur

1862 – Louis Pasteur and Claude Bernardcomplete the experiment falsifying the theory of spontaneous generation.

1902 – Pierre and Marie Curie refine radium chloride.

1918 – Manfred von Richthofen, a.k.a. The Red Baron, shoots down his 79th and 80th victims, his final victories before his death the following day.

1961 – Cold War: Failure of the Bay of Pigs Invasion of US-backed Cuban exiles against Cuba.

1972 – Apollo program: Apollo 16, commanded by John Young, lands on the moon.

1999 – Columbine High School massacre:Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold killed 13 people and injured 24 others before committing suicide at Columbine High School in Columbine, Colorado.

2008 – Danica Patrick wins the Indy Japan 300 becoming the first female driver in history to win an Indy car race.

2010 – The Deepwater Horizon drilling rig explodes in the Gulf of Mexico, killing eleven workers and beginning an oil spill that would last six months.

1748 – Georg Michael Telemann, composer and theologian (d. 1831)

1889 – Adolf Hitler,(d. 1945)

1893 – Harold Lloyd, American actor, comedian, and producer (d. 1971)

1893 – Joan Miro, Spanish painter and sculptor (d. 1983)

1908 – Lionel Hampton vibraphone player, pianist, bandleader, (d. 2002)

1923 – Tito Puente, American drummer and producer (d. 2000)

1927 – Phil Hill, American race car driver (d. 2008)

1945 – Alistair Cooke, Baron Lexden, English historian and author

1164 – Antipope Victor IV

1314 – Pope Clement V (b. 1264)

1769 – Chief Pontiac, American tribal leader (b. 1720)

1831 – John Abernethy, English surgeon and anatomist (b. 1764)