On April 15, 1947, Jackie Robinson, at age 28, became the first
African American player in Major League Baseball’s modern
era when he steps onto Ebbets Field in Brooklyn to compete
for the Brooklyn Dodgers. Robinson broke the color barrier
in a sport that had been segregated for more than 50 years.

Exactly 50 years later, in 1997, Robinson’s groundbreaking
career was honored and his uniform number, 42, was retired
from Major League Baseball by Commissioner Bud Selig in
a ceremony attended by over 50,000 fans at New York City’s
Shea Stadium. Robinson’s was the first-ever number retired
by all teams in the league.

Jack Roosevelt Robinson
(January 31, 1919 – October 24, 1972)

At 2:20 a.m. on April 15, 1912, the British ocean liner Titanic
sank into the North Atlantic Ocean about 400 miles south of
Newfoundland, Canada. The massive ship, which carried
2,200 passengers and crew, had struck an iceberg two and
half hours before.

The iceberg thought to have been hit by Titanic, it was          
reported to have a streak of red paint from a ships hull
along it s waterline on one side.
 

Opening Day welcomes the new spring baseball season each
year, a uniquely American tradition steeped in history and
fanfare.       

On this day in history, April 14, 1910, President William Howard 
Taft (above) became the first U.S. president to throw out the 
first pitch at a Major League Baseball game.       

William Howard Taft (1857 – 1930)

President Abraham Lincoln was shot in the head at Ford’s
Theatre in Washington, D.C. on April 14, 1865. The assassin,
actor John Wilkes Booth, shouted, “Sic semper tyrannis!
(Ever thus to tyrants!) The South is avenged,” as he jumped
onto the stage and fled on horseback. Lincoln died the next
morning.

The Presidential Box today at Ford’s Theatre, Washington DC.

_{Thomas Jefferson (April 13, 1743 – July 4, 1826)}

Founding Father Thomas Jefferson served as the third president
of the United States from 1801 to 1809 was the primary author of
the Declaration of Independence.

Benjamin Franklin, John Adams and Thomas
Jefferson reviewing the Declaration of
Independence in 1776.