On This Day 2026
Hello, … and welcome to day 102 of the year.

Sunday, April 12th

Today is World Hamster Day, National Licorice Day, Grilled Cheese Sandwich Day and International Day for Street Children. Your star sign is Aries and your birthstone is Diamond.
Did you know: All Fools’ Day, also known as April Fools’ Day is a day for practical jokes and hoaxes, but only until 12 noon. The earliest recorded association between 1st April and foolishness can be found in Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales (1392).
Today’s birthdays
1941 – 1993 – Bobby Moore, English footballer (West Ham United) and captain of the England national team that won the 1966 FIFA World Cup.

1946 – Ed O’Neill (80), American comedian and actor (Married with Children, Modern Family, Dutch), born in Youngstown, Ohio, United States.

1947 – David Letterman (79), American comedian and talk show host (The late Show), born in Indianapolis, Indiana, United States.

1947 – 2013 – Tom Clancy, American novelist (The Sum of All Fears, Patriot Games, Rainbow 6, Splinter Cell), more than 100 million copies of his books have been sold.
1948 – 2008 – Jeremy Beadle, English television and radio presenter (Beadle’s About, Game for a Laugh, Youv’e Been Framed, Chain Letters).
1956 – Andy Garcia (70), American actor (The Godfather, The Untouchables, Mamma Mia!, Ocean’s Eleven, Father of the Bride), born in Havana, Cuba.
1958 – Will Sergeant (68), English rock guitarist with Echo & the Bunnymen (“The Killing Moon”, “Lips Like Sugar”, “The Cutter”), born in Liverpool.
1962 – Carlos Sainz Sr. (64), Spanish rally driver (World Rally Championship drivers’ title with Toyota in 1990 and 1992), born in Madrid, Spain.
1967 – Sarah Cracknell (58), English singer-songwriter and lead singer of the electronic music band Saint Etienne (“He’s on the Phone”), born in Chelmsford, Essex.
1971 – 2024 – Shannen Doherty, American actress (Charmed, Beverly Hills 90210, Little House on the Prairie, Mallrats).
1979 – Paul Nicholls (47), English actor (Law & Order: UK, Ackley Bridge), best known for his role as Joe Wicks in the BBC soap EastEnders, born in Bolton, Greater Manchester.
1980 – Bryan McFadden (46), Irish pop singer and former member of boy band Westlife (“Flying Without Wings”), born in Dublin, Ireland.
1980 – Brian McFadden (46), Irish pop singer and former member of boy band Westlife (“Flying Without Wings”), born in Dublin, Ireland.
1994 – Saoirse Ronan (32), pronounced ‘Seer-sha’, American-born Irish actress (Mary Queen of Scots, The Outrun), born in The Bronx, New York, United States.
Famous deaths
1945 – Franklin D. Roosevelt (b. 1882), The 32nd president of the United States who led the nation through the Great Depression and World War II.

2020 – Stirling Moss (b. 1929), British racing driver and broadcaster, who competed in Formula One from 1951 to 1961.

2016 – David Gest (b. 1953), American producer (Michael Jackson: The Life of an Icon 2011) and television personality (I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here!, Celebrity Big Brother 17).

2024 – Roberto Cavalli (b. 1940), Italian luxury fashion designer and inventor. He was known for exotic prints and for creating the sand-blasted look for jeans.

2025 – Roy Thomas Baker (b. 1946), English record producer best known for producing five out of the first seven albums by British rock band Queen.
The day today
1927 – The British Cabinet, led by Prime Minister Stanley Baldwin, officially decided to move forward with legislation that would grant women voting rights on the same terms as men.

1935 – The first flight of the Bristol Blenheim, a British light bomber aircraft designed and built by the Bristol Aeroplane Company that was used extensively in the early days of the Second World War. BAC went on to become a founding component of the nationalised British Aerospace, now BAE Systems.

1937 – British engineer, Frank Whittle, tested the first jet engine at the Thomson-Houston factory in Rugby. The first jet flight was achieved by the German Heinkel, but it was Whittle’s engine that was used as the prototype.
1939 – The birth of Sir Alan Ayckbourn, prolific English playwright. His plays have been translated into over 35 languages and are performed on stage and television throughout the world. Ten of them have been staged on Broadway, attracting two Tony nominations, and one Tony award. He was the Artistic Director of the Stephen Joseph Theatre, Scarborough, where the majority of his work has been premiered.
1941 – Bobby Moore, English footballer was born. He captained West Ham for more than ten years and was captain of the England team that won the 1966 World Cup. He is widely regarded as one of the all-time greats of world football, and was cited by Pelé as the greatest defender that he had ever played against. Bobby died on 24 February 1993 (aged 51).
1953 – The leading icefall party of the 1953 British Mount Everest expedition reached Base Camp (17,900 ft). Led by Colonel John Hunt, the team immediately began navigating and establishing a route through the dangerous Khumbu Icefall, pioneering a path for the successful summit attempt by Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay on May 29.
1961 – Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin becomes the first human to travel into space and orbit Earth, aboard the Vostok 1 spacecraft.
1979 – Mad Max, a seminal Australian dystopian action film starring Mel Gibson was released in Australia. The film spawned a major franchise, including Mad Max 2 (1981), Beyond Thunderdome (1985), Fury Road (2015), and Furiosa (2024).
1980 – The United States Olympic Committee (USOC) officially endorsed a boycott of the 1980 Moscow Summer Olympics. This decision, aimed at protesting the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, led to over 60 nations skipping the games, although many athletes and countries opposed the move. The Soviet Union later led a retaliatory boycott of the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles
1984 – Arthur Scargill, leader of the miners’ union the NUM, would not allow a national ballot to take place on whether to stop the miners’ strike.
1989 – Andrew Lloyd Webber’s ‘Cats’ was performed for the 3,358th time at the New London Theatre, Drury Lane, making it Britain’s longest running musical. Steven Wain who played one of the cats, was the only member of the original cast still in the show after eight years. Seats were booked to the end of 1999.
1992 – Disneyland Paris (originally Euro Disney) officially opened in Marne-la-Vallée, France. Located 32km from Paris, it is Europe’s top tourist destination, featuring two theme parks, hotels, and dining. The park, which faces a massive expansion as of 2026, has welcomed over 445 million visitors.
2000 – Queen Elizabeth II presented the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) with the George Cross at Hillsborough Castle, Northern Ireland. The award recognised the force’s collective bravery, dedication, and sacrifice, having lost 302 officers during 30 years of terrorism, with the medal received by injured Constable Paul Slaine.
2013 – Five members of the same family, including a baby, were killed in a crash on the A18 near Grimsby. The family, from Ouston, Chester-le-Street in County Durham, were travelling to a dance competition at Butlins in Skegness when their Nissan Primera was involved in a head-on collision with a lorry at Laceby. A nationwide survey conducted by the Road Safety Foundation in 2010 deemed the Grimsby section the UK’s highest-risk stretch of road for car drivers, reportedly 25 times more dangerous than the average British motorway.
2016 – Scientists and internet entrepreneurs, including Yuri Milner, Stephen Hawking and Mark Zuckerberg, announce an interstellar project to send robotic probes to Alpha Centauri. The goal is to propel these tiny robotic probes to 20% of the speed of light (about 134 million miles per hour or 60,000 km/s). At that speed, the probes could reach Alpha Centauri in just over 20 years, with another 4 years for the data to return to Earth.
2020 – The death (aged 90) of the British motor racing legend Sir Stirling Moss. Described as ‘A mighty racer and a true gentleman’, Stirling Moss was widely regarded as one of the greatest Formula 1 drivers of all time, even though he never won the World Championship. He won 16 of the 66 Formula 1 races he competed in (between 1951 and 1961) and in 1955, at Aintree, he became the first British driver to win a home grand prix.
2021 – Great Britain loosens its COVID-19 restrictions, opening pubs and shops after 175 days of restrictions. However, outdoor gatherings would still be limited to 6 people or 2 households, and you must not socialise indoors with anyone you do not live with or have not formed a support bubble with.

2022 – UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson apologized for hosting a party during the height of Covid-19 lockdowns. Johnson rejected calls for him to resign and instead became the first British prime minister to receive a fine for breaking the law.

2023 – US President Joe Biden pays a visit to Northern Ireland to mark the 25th anniversary of the Good Friday Agreement.
2023 – Ghana became the first country to approve the R21/Matrix-M malaria vaccine developed by Oxford University. The approval specifically covers children aged 5 to 36 months, who are at the highest risk of death from the disease.
2025 – The MacLean brothers, Ewan (32), Jamie (31), and Lachlan (27) of Scotland departed from Lima, Peru to row across the Pacific Ocean to perform the first non-stop, unsupported row from South America to Australia, covering approximately 14,000 km (9,000 miles) to raise £1 million for clean water projects in Madagascar. The brothers arrived in Cairns, Australia, on August 30, 2025, after 139 days, 5 hours, and 52 minutes at sea, setting a new world record.
Today in music
1954 – American, Bill Haley recorded ‘Rock Around The Clock’. It was first record to sell a million copies in Britain.
1957 – The ‘King of Skiffle’ Lonnie Donegan was at No.1 on the UK singles chart with ‘Cumberland Gap.’ The Scottish musician was a former member of Chris Barber’s Jazz Band.
1975 – During an interview with Playboy Magazine David Bowie announced his second career retirement, saying, ‘I’ve rocked my roll. It’s a boring dead end, there will be no more rock ‘n’ roll records from me. The last thing I want to be is some useless f***ing rock singer.’ Despite the announcement, Bowie continued his prolific career, immediately releasing the critically acclaimed album Station to Station in 1976.
1997 – R Kelly started a three-week run at No.1 on the UK singles chart with his Grammy award winning song ‘I Believe I Can Fly.’ A No.2 hit in the US, the track was featured in the film ‘Space Jam’.
2005 – Mariah Carey released The Emancipation of Mimi, the album entered the US chart at number one, going six times platinum in less than a year, and subsequently became the most successful album of 2005.
2010 – The Vatican’s official newspaper L’Osservatore Ramano published a story praising The Beatles and saying that it forgave John Lennon for his 1966 comment that the group was ‘bigger than Jesus.’ Lennon told a British newspaper in 1966 – at the height of Beatlemania – that he did not know which would die out first, Christianity or rock and roll.
2014 – The Pulp hit ‘Common People’ was voted the top Britpop anthem by listeners of BBC Radio 6 Music in the UK, beating Oasis, Blur and Suede to take the title. More than 30,000 people voted, with The Verve’s ‘Bittersweet Symphony’ second and Oasis tracks ‘Don’t Look Back in Anger’ and ‘Wonderwall’ in third and fourth.
2016 – A report showed that British artists including Sam Smith, Ed Sheeran and Adele had helped the music industry return to meaningful growth for the first time in almost 20 years. British artists accounted for five of the top 10 selling albums during 2015.
2024 – Coachella 2024 kicks off its two-weekend run (April 12–14 and April 19–21) at the Empire Polo Club in Indio, California, headlined by Lana Del Rey, Tyler, the Creator, Doja Cat, and a reunited No Doubt. The festival features a diverse lineup including Peso Pluma, Blur, and Ice Spice, with Lana Del Rey opening as the Friday headliner.
2025 – English record producer, songwriter and arranger Roy Thomas Baker, died at the age of 78. He is best known for producing five out of the first seven albums by Queen and the first four albums by The Cars. He also recorded artists including The Rolling Stones, David Bowie The Who, Santana, The Mothers of Invention, Free, and T Rex.
Today in history
1204 – The Crusaders of the Fourth Crusade breach the walls of Constantinople and enter the city, which they completely occupy the following day.
1567 – The Earl of Bothwell was found not guilty of the murder of Lord Darnley, the husband of Mary Queen of Scots. Bothwell and Mary then married.
1633 – Cardinal Bellarmine warned Galileo to abandon the Copernican theory that the Earth revolves around the sun, which the Church deemed heretical. Galileo was tried for violating the 1616 injunction and for asserting heliocentrism as truth in his book Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems. Galileo was sentenced to formal imprisonment, which was immediately commuted to house arrest for the remainder of his life.
1709 – Richard Steele’s British literary and society journal “The Tatler” is first published establishing a new type of journalism featuring essays on contemporary manners.
1782 – Battle at Les Saintes: British fleet under Admiral George Rodney defeats the French fleet under Comte de Grasse off Dominica in the West Indies.
1831 – Soldiers marching on the Broughton Suspension Bridge in Manchester caused it to collapse, reportedly owing to a mechanical resonance induced by troops marching over the bridge in step. Forty of the soldiers were thrown into the river. As a result of the incident the British Military issued an order that troops should ‘break step’ when crossing a bridge.
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