May 4: What Happened on This Day in History (High_school Level)?

(Page last edited 10/12/2017)

1. 1776 - Rhode Island becomes the first American colony to renounce allegiance to KingGeorge III.
2. 1871 - The National Association, the first professional baseball league, opens its first season in Fort Wayne, Indiana.
3. 1904 - The United States begins construction of the Panama Canal.
4. 1953 - Ernest Hemingway wins the Pulitzer Prize for The Old Man and the Sea.
5. 1961 - American civil rights movement: The "Freedom Riders" begin a bus trip through the South.
6. 1970 - Vietnam War: Kent State shootings: the Ohio National Guard, sent to Kent State University after disturbances in the city of Kent the weekend before, opens fire killing four unarmed students and wounding nine others. The students were protesting the United States' invasion of Cambodia.
7. 1972 - The Don't Make A Wave Committee, a fledgling environmental organization founded in Canada in 1971, officially changes its name to "Greenpeace Foundation".
8. 1974 - An all-female Japanese team reaches the summit of Manaslu, becoming the first women to climb an 8,000-meter peak.
9. 1979 - Margaret Thatcher becomes the first female Prime Minister of the United Kingdom.
10. 2007 - Greensburg, Kansas is almost completely destroyed by a 1.7 mi wide EF5 tornado-the first-ever tornado to be rated as such with the new Enhanced Fujita Scale.
11. Famous Birthdays: Bartolomeo Cristofori (Italian instrument maker, invented the piano), Jean-Charles de Borda (French mathematician, physicist, and sailor), William H. Prescott (American historian), Audrey Hepburn (Belgian-English actress and singer), Michael L. Gernhardt (American astronaut and engineer)

For famous birthdays and other daily events in history, visit our Daily Dose Activities.

Click Here for Yesterday in History: May 3

Click Here for Tomorrow in History: May 5

For more history resources on Internet 4 Classrooms, visit our Social Studies and History index. For Pre K-8th Grade Level History and Social Studies Resources, visit our Grade Level Index.