This Week in History

APRIL 30

Rose Love Resker was born.

Margaret O’Hanlon was born.

Donna Hickey Graves was born.

1803 – France sold Louisiana and adjoining lands to the United States as part of the Louisiana Purchase.

1945 – Adolf Hitler and Eva Braun committed suicide.

MAY 1

John O’Connor was born.

1931 – The Empire State Building opened in New York City. At 102 stories, it would be the World’s tallest building for the next 41 years.

1960 – The Soviet Union shot down an American U-2 reconnaissance plane over Soviet territory.

MAY 2

Mary Kilgallen was born.

1939 – Lou Gehrig set a major-league baseball record when he played his 2,130th consecutive game. Cal Ripken, Jr., broke it 57 years later.

2011 – U.S. troops and CIA operatives shot and killed Osama bin Laden in Abbottabad,

Pakistan.

MAY 3

Marian Scannell Slakman was born.

Claudine Larson was born.

Jennifer Roberts was born.

Jen Corning Egan was born.

1937 – Margaret Mitchell won the Pulitzer Prize in fiction for “Gone With the Wind.”

MAY 4 

Steven Greenberg was born.

Tracey Benison Mullen was born.

Nancy Koulouris-Erigo was born.

1932 – Public Enemy Number One, Al Capone, was jailed for tax evasion.

1970 – Four Kent State University students were shot down by National Guard members during an anti-Vietnam War demonstration.

MAY 5

Seibert Ward was born.

1891 – Carnegie Hall (then known as Music Hall) opened in New York City. Peter Tchaikovsky was the guest conductor.

1961 – Alan Shepard became the first American in space.

MAY 6

Linda Santoro was born.

Kitty Kelly was born.

Coleen Mimnagh was born.

Marissa Shannon was born.

1941 – Dictator Joseph Stalin became the premier of Russia.

1994 – “The Chunnel” between England and France officially opened.