April 4

• 1581 - Francis Drake completes a circumnavigation of the world and is knighted by Elizabeth I.
• 1812 - U.S. President James Madison enacted a ninety-day embargo on trade with the United Kingdom.
• 1814 - Napoleon abdicates for the first time.
• 1818 - The United States Congress adopts the flag of the United States as having 13 red and white stripes and one star for each state (20 stars) with additional stars to be added whenever a new state is added to the Union.
• 1841 - President William Henry Harrison dies of pneumonia becoming the first President of the United States to die in office and at one month, the elected president with the shortest term served.
• 1850 - Los Angeles, California is incorporated as a city.
• 1865 - American Civil War: A day after Union forces captured Richmond, Virginia, U.S. President Abraham Lincoln visits the Confederate capital.
• 1887 - Argonia, Kansas elects Susanna Medora Salter as the first female mayor in the United States.
• 1905 - In India, an earthquake near Kangra kills 370,000.
• 1918 - World War I: Second Battle of the Somme ends.
• 1939 - Faisal II becomes King of Iraq.
• 1945 - World War II: American troops liberate Ohrdruf death camp in Germany.
• 1949 - Twelve nations sign The North Atlantic Treaty creating the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
• 1964 - The Beatles occupy all of the top five positions on the Billboard singles chart in the United States.
• 1968 - Martin Luther King Jr. assassinated.
• 1968 - Apollo program: NASA launches Apollo 6.
• 1969 - Dr. Denton Cooley implants the first temporary artificial heart.
• 1969 - The Smothers Brothers Comedy Hour is cancelled after the brothers failed to submit an episode before its broadcast date.
• 1973 - The World Trade Center in New York is officially dedicated.
• 1975 - Vietnam War: Operation Baby Lift - A United States Air Force C-5A Galaxy crashes near Saigon, South Vietnam shortly after takeoff, transporting orphans. 172 people are killed.
• 1976 - Prince Norodom Sihanouk resigns as leader of Cambodia and is placed under house arrest.
• 1979 - President Zulfikar Ali Bhutto of Pakistan is executed.
• 1983 - Space Shuttle Challenger makes its maiden voyage into space.
• 1984 - Winston Smith, the main character of George Orwell's book Nineteen Eighty-Four, begins writing in his secret diary.
• 1984 - President Ronald Reagan calls for an international ban on chemical weapons.
• 1991 - Senator John Heinz of Pennsylvania and six others are killed when a helicopter collides with their plane over Merion, Pennsylvania.
• 1994 - Netscape Communications Corporation is founded (under the name "Mosaic Communications Corporation") by Marc Andreessen and Jim Clark.

• 186 - Caracalla, Roman emperor (d. 217)
• 1648 - Grinling Gibbons master wood-worker (d. 1721)
• 1785 - Bettina von Arnim, lyricist (d. 1859)
• 1843 - William Jackson, photographer
• 1884 - Yamamoto Isoroku, war strategist (d. 1943)
• 1875 - Pierre Monteux, conductor (d. 1964)
• 1876 - Maurice de Vlaminck, painter (d. 1958)
• 1884 - Isoroku Yamamoto, naval commander (d. 1943)
• 1885 - Arthur Murray, dancer (d. 1991)
• 1888 - Tris Speaker, Baseball Hall of Famer (d. 1958)
• 1902 - Louise Leveque de Vilmorin, actress (d. 1969)
• 1906 - John Cameron Swayze, journalist, television host (d. 1995)
• 1906 - Bea Benaderet, actress (d. 1968)
• 1910 - Juri Pawlowitsch German, writer (d. 1967)
• 1914 - Marguerite Duras, writer (d. 1996)
• 1915 - Muddy Waters, blues musician (d. 1983)
• 1922 - Elmer Bernstein, composer
• 1928 - Maya Angelou, poet, novelist
• 1932 - Andrei Tarkovsky, film director (d. 1986)
• 1932 - Anthony Perkins, actor (d. 1992)
• 1938 - A. Bartlett Giamatti, president of Yale Univ. and baseball commissioner who banned Pete Rose. (d. 1989).
• 1939 - Hugh Masekela, musician
• 1945 - Daniel Cohn-Bendit, political activist
• 1946 - Craig T. Nelson, actor "Coach" "The District"
• 1947 - Stephen Kerton, banking wizard, wide-screen tv patron
• 1948 - Dan Simmons, writer
• 1950 - Christine Lahti, actress
• 1952 - Rosemarie Ackermann, German high jumper
• 1956 - David E. Kelley, writer, television producer
• 1957 - Aki Kaurismäki, Finnish film-director
• 1960 - Hugo Weaving, actor
• 1963 - Graham Norton, talk show host
• 1965 - Robert Downey Jr., actor
• 1970 - Barry Pepper, actor
• 1973 - David Blaine, illusionist
• 1974 - Dave Mirra, extreme sports champion
• 1979 - Heath Ledger, actor
• 1991 - Jamie Spears, television show host

• 397 - St. Ambrose, bishop of Milan (b. c. 340)
• 1292 - Pope Nicholas IV (b. 1227)
• 1774 - Oliver Goldsmith, playwright (b. 1728)
• 1807 - Joseph Jérôme Lefrançais de Lalande French astronomer
• 1841 - William Henry Harrison, 9th President of the United States (b. 1773)
• 1884 - Marie Bashkirtseff, artist (b. 1860)
• 1919 - Sir William Crookes, chemist and physicist (b. 1832)
• 1951 - Al Christie, early Hollywood director/producer (b. 1881)
• 1968 - Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., civil rights activist, minister (b. 1929)
• 1972 - Stefan Wolpe, composer (b. 1902)
• 1972 - Adam Clayton Powell Jr., American politician
• 1979 - Ali Bhutto, President and Prime Minister of Pakistan (b. 1928)
• 1980 - Red Sovine, country music entertainer
• 1983 - Gloria Swanson, actress (b. 1897)
• 1987 - C.L. Moore, science fiction writer (b. 1911)
• 1991 - H. John Heinz III, Member of the U.S. Senate in a plane crash (b. 1938)
• 1991 - Forrest Towns, American hurdler (b. 1914)
• 1996 - Larry LaPrise, songwriter (b. 1913)
• 1999 - Early Wynn, Baseball Hall of Famer (b. 1920)
• 2002 - Harry L. O'Connor, film stuntman, died while filming XXX

• Zip Day in Newton Falls, Ohio