** March 31, 1943** OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOklahoma opens on Broadway.
March 31, 1914: The SS *Southern Cross * disappears in a snowstorm with a loss of 174 lives.
April 1, 1873: The SS *Atlantic * luxury ocean liner sinks off the coast of Nova Scotia. At least 562 are killed, including all women aboard and all children but 1. This was the deadliest ocean liner disaster in the North Atlantic prior to the Titanic.
April 2, 2006: 60+ confirmed tornadoes in the United States touch down killing 29, mostly in Tennessee.
April 2, 1800: Ludwig van Beethoven conducts the premiere of his First Symphony, in Vienna.
April 3, 1956: The Hudsonville-Standale tornado kills 17 in Michigan. This was an F5 tornado and part of an outbreak of tornadoes in the Upper Midwest that killed over 40. No F5 tornado has occurred in Michigan since.
April 3, 1860: The first successful Pony Express run from St. Joseph, Missouri, to Sacramento, California, begins.
April 5, 1972: An F3 tornado strikes Portland, Oregon and Vancouver, Washington. 6 are killed and 300 are injured. This is the deadliest tornado ever in the Pacific Northwest, and the strongest in the area since 1894.
April 6, 1968: Explosions in downtown Richmond, Indiana kill 41 and injure 150. More than 20 buildings are heavily damaged or destroyed. The cause is a natural gas leak.
April 6, 1973: The American League of Major League Baseball begins using the designated hitter.
April 7, 1943: In Terebovlia, Ukraine, Germans order 1,100 Jews to undress and march through the city to the nearby village of Plebanivka, where they are shot and buried in ditches.
**April 9, 1945 **: The SS *Charles Henderson * ammunition ship explodes while being unloaded of aircraft bombs at Bari, Italy. 542 are killed and almost 2000 are injured.
April 10, 1979: The “Terrible Tuesday” tornadoes in Texas and Oklahoma kill at least 45. Many of them die in cars while trying to escape.
April 11, 1954: The most boring day in history.
April 12, 1927: An F5 tornado destroys Rocksprings, Texas, killing 72 and injuring over 200. 95% of the buildings in the Town are wiped out.
April 13, 1873: The Colfax Massacre
Somewhere between 60 and 150 black southerners are murdered by a group of armed white southerners in Alabama. The exact number of dead is unknown as many of the bodies were dumped in a river or buried in a mass grave. No one is held accountable for the murders.
April 14, 1886: The Sauk Rapids tornado in Minnesota kills 72 and injures over 200. This is the deadliest tornado in Minnesota history.
April 15, 1989: The Hillsborough Soccer Stadium Disaster occurs in Sheffield, England. 96 people die and over 700 are injured in a human crush at a football match. This is Britain’s deadliest sports accident.
April 15, 1970: During the Cambodian Civil War, massacre of the Vietnamese minority results in 800 bodies flowing down the Mekong river into South Vietnam.