Famous People, Events, Places & Dates in History

Thursday, April 24 is the 114^th day of 2025.

There are 251 days until the end of the year, and the day's zodiac sign is Taurus.

April: Famous People, Events and Dates in History

This Month's Historical Events

4th April 1975: American Billionaire philanthropist Bill Gates and Paul Allen founded Microsoft (short for micro-computer software), the leading PC operating system manufacturer that is famous for their Microsoft Windows Operating system. Gates was the CEO of the new company. He and Allen were childhood friends who had skills in computer programming.

4th April 1968: Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., the famous American minister and civil rights activist, was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee, United States by James Earl Ray. King was standing on a balcony outside his room at the Lorraine Motel.

5th April 1955: Sir Winston Churchill resigned as prime minister of Britain due to his increasing health problems. But Churchill continued to serve as MP for Woodford in east London until 1964 when he retired from politics. He was the British PM twice, from 1940 to 1945 and from 1951 to 1955.

5th April 1879: Chile declared war on Bolivia and Peru, the War of the Pacific or the Saltpeter War that was fought until 1883. The war resulted in Chile annexing the mineral-rich territories of Tarapacá in Peru and the Department of the Litoral in Bolivia, and Bolivia became a landlocked country.

6th April 1994: Presidents Juvenal Habyarimana of Rwanda and Cyprien Ntaryamira of neighboring Burundi were killed when a rocket downed their plane over the capital of Rwanda, Kigali. About 800,000 people, mostly Tutsis, were killed during the ensuing Rwandan genocide that lasted about 100 days.

6th April 1917: The United States, under President Thomas Woodrow Wilson, officially entered World War I after declaring war on Germany. This was after Germany sunk several U.S. and British passenger and merchant ships. The war ended with victory for the Allies (France, Great Britain, Russia, Japan, Italy, and the United States) on November 11, 1918.

7th April 1948: The World Health Organization was established by the United Nations. It's mission is to promote global good health and thereby keep the world safe. The WHO also directs and coordinates global response to health emergencies caused by wars and diseases such as Ebola and the COVID-19 pandemic.

7th April 1933: The Cullen-Harrison Act was enacted after being signed into law, 2 weeks earlier, by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The new legislation allowed the manufacturing and selling of low-alcohol beer in the U.S. As a result, April 7 is celebrated every year in the U.S where it is known as The National Beer Day.

8th April 1953: Kenya's founding president Jomo Kenyatta was sentenced to seven years with hard labor, together with five associates, for being associated with the Mau Mau rebellion. The Mau Mau movement was formed to free the East African country from domination by the British colonialists who had seized land in the fertile regions of the country.

8th April 1986: American actor, movie producer and director Clinton Eastwood Jr. became the mayor of Carmel, a city in Monterey County in California. He won by a landslide, defeating Charlotte Townsend who was seeking a third term. Clint served as mayor for a single two-year term.