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    Kelly O'Mara

    Kelly O'Mara

  • Blood Moon: Flickr photo of the day

    Down in the Caribbean’s Republic of Trinidad and Tobago (T&T to the locals), sweet aromas of tropical plants waft on northeast trade winds, the temperature is mild, and the living is mostly easy. But on the night of April 14, there may have been a touch of apprehension in the air. The Moon turned an eerie shade of red.

  • April 24, 1907: Hershey opens leisure park for chocolate factory employees

    In 1907, Milton S. Hershey opened Hershey Park for workers in his Pennsylvania chocolate company. On April 24, the park marked its grand opening with a baseball game.

  • April 22, 1906: First intercalated (unofficial) modern Olympics kick off in Greece

    The International Olympic Committee no longer recognizes the little-mentioned and now often-ignored Olympic Games of 1906, and no records achieved at them count in official Olympic history. But those games likely helped save the modern Olympic movement.

  • April 17, 1970: Apollo 13 module lands in the Pacific Ocean after tense flight

    After a harrowing four days, the ill-fated Apollo 13 shuttle safely landed in the Pacific Ocean on April 17, 1970. Mission personnel had to rig emergency procedures and create and a number of ingenious – and never before tested – fixes to bring the crew home.

  • April 15, 1924: Rand McNally publishes first road atlas

    Before there were smart phones and Google Maps, people relied on road atlases and paper maps stored in their glove boxes. The most ubiquitous of these was the always-handy Rand McNally Road Atlas, the first version of which was published on April 15, 1924.

  • April 10, 1912: Titanic begins fateful voyage

    The Titanic set out on its maiden (and only) voyage on April 10, 1912 from Southampton in the UK. Though the 1997 movie runs three hours, the trip itself was less than five days long. At 2 a.m. on April 15, it sunk into the Atlantic Ocean – 400 miles south of Newfoundland.

  • April 8, 1904: Times Square gets its name

    On April 8, 1904, Longacre Square in New York City became what is now the well-known “crossroads of the world”: Times Square.

  • April 3, 1860: First Pony Express takes off

    On April 3, 1860, horse and rider relay teams set out on the first journey of the Pony Express.

  • April 1, 1973: Project Tiger starts preservation in India

    April Fools’ Day may seem like an odd day to launch a serious effort aimed at preserving Bengal tigers, but that’s exactly what happened in 1973 when India initiated Project Tiger.

  • March 27, 1851: First non-natives discover Yosemite Valley

    Today, nearly 3.5 million people visit Yosemite National Park annually. But it wasn’t until March 27, 1851 that the first non-natives are believed to have entered Yosemite Valley.

  • March 25, 421: City of Venice believed to be founded

    Legend has it that on March 25, 421 AD at the stroke of noon, the city of Venice was founded.

  • March 20, 1985: Riddles is first woman to win Iditarod

    The annual Iditarod Trail Race from Anchorage to Nome, Alaska, gained widespread attention when Libby Riddles became the first woman to win the grueling event on March 20, 1985.

  • March 18, 1944: Mount Vesuvius makes most recent eruption

    On March 18, 1944, smoke and lava flows appeared over the edge of Mount Vesuvius in Italy, beginning a two-week eruption of the volcano. It was the most recent time Vesuvius erupted.

  • March 13, 1988: Longest rail tunnel opens in Japan

    The longest and deepest operational railway tunnel in the world was opened in Japan on March 13, 1988. The Seikan Tunnel, which is 33.46 miles long with 14.5 miles of that under the seabed, connects the island of Honshu with the island of Hokkaido.

  • March 6, 1521: Magellan makes historic landing on Guam

    During his fateful trip around the world, Ferdinand Magellan landed on Guam on March 6, 1521. It was the first contact Europeans had with the islands and an important stop during the expedition that had begun in Spain in 1519.

  • March 4, 1837: Chicago becomes a city

    On March 4, 1837, the Windy City officially became a city. The town of Chicago had been organized four years earlier with a population of about 200 after a treaty was reached with local Native American tribes, but it wasn’t until 1837 that the city incorporated.

  • Feb. 27, 1827: First Mardi Gras in New Orleans

    Feb. 27, 1827 is considered the first Mardi Gras celebration in New Orleans when a group of masked students danced through the streets.

  • Feb. 20, 1872: The Met opens in New York

    The Metropolitan Museum of Art (known as The Met), which hosts around 6 million visitors each year, first opened on Fifth Avenue on Feb. 20, 1872 after being founded in 1870 by a number of industrialists and financiers. Railroad executive John Taylor Johnston donated much of his personal collections to get the art museum up and running.

  • Feb. 18, 1930: Pluto is discovered and named ninth planet (for a while)

    The solar system’s smallest planet – which isn’t even really a planet at all – was discovered today 84 years ago. On Feb. 18, 1930, Clyde W. Tombaugh, an assistant at the Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Ariz., discovered Pluto while looking at a set of photographs taken by the telescope a few weeks earlier.

  • Feb. 13, 1931: New Delhi becomes capital of India

    New Delhi wasn’t always the capital of India. While it had long served as a center of finances and politics, it wasn’t until Feb. 13, 1931 that the capital officially moved from Calcutta and New Delhi was inaugurated by the Viceroy Lord Irwin.