MONDAY, APRIL 2, 2012

Today is Monday, April 2, the 93rd day of 2012. There are 273 days left in the year.

1595 ― Cornelis de Houtman's ships depart to Asia through Cape of Good Hope

1800 ― First performance of Ludwig von Beethoven's first Symphony in C

1827 ― Joseph Dixon begins manufacturing lead pencils

1845 ― H. L. Fizeau and J. Leon Foucault take first photo of Sun

1902 ― First motion picture theater opens (Los Angeles, Calif.)

1908 ― Mills Committee declares baseball was invented by Abner Doubleday

1912 ― Sun Yet Sen forms Guomindang Party in China

1917 ― President Woodrow Wilson asks Congress to declare war against Germany

1931 ― Teenage girl strikes out Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig in an exhibition game in Chattanooga, Tenn.

1966 ― Soviet Union's Luna 10 becomes first spacecraft to orbit Moon