Events, Births and Deaths Happening on this Date
Thursday, April 2, 2026
Today is the 92nd day of 2026. There are 273 days left in this year.
Notable Events
1513
Spanish explorer Juan Ponce de Leon landed in Florida.
1792
Congress passed the Coinage Act, which authorized establishment of the U.S. Mint.
1860
The first Italian Parliament met at Turin.
1865
Confederate President Davis and most of his Cabinet fled the Confederate capital of Richmond, Va.
1917
President Woodrow Wilson asked Congress to declare war against Germany, saying, "The world must be made safe for democracy."
1932
Aviator Charles Lindbergh paid $50,000 ransom in a New York cemetery to a man who promised to return his kidnapped son. (The infant was found dead the following month.)
1982
Argentina seized the disputed Falkland Islands from Britain. Britain took the islands back the following June. British Foreign Secretary Lord Carrington announces the invasion.
1986
Four Americans were killed when a bomb exploded on a TWA jetliner en route from Rome to Athens, Greece.
1992
Mob boss John Gotti was convicted in New York of murder and racketeering; he was later sentenced to life in prison.
1995
Baseball owners accepted the players' union offer to play without a contract, ending the longest and costliest strike in professional sports history.
1997
Word that more than a million pounds of frozen strawberries shipped to school lunch programs might contain hepatitis A started a scramble to inoculate children.
1997
Russia and Belarus signed a treaty in a first step toward reuniting the two former Soviet republics.
2000
Japanese Prime Minister Keizo Obuchi suffered a debilitating stroke. He died more than a month later.
Notable Births
1805
Storyteller Hans Christian Andersen was born in Odense, Denmark.
Notable Deaths
1872
Samuel F.B. Morse, developer of the electric telegraph, died in New York.
1974
French President Georges Pompidou died in Paris.