Today is Thursday, April 24, the 115th day of 2008. There are 251 days left in the year.
1792 _ ``La Marseillaise" composed by Claude-Joseph Rouget de Lisle
1871 _ Giuseppe Verdi's opera ``Aida" is produced (Cairo)
1916 _ Easter rebellion of Irish against British occupation begins
1950 _ President Harry Truman denies there are communists in U.S. government
1953 _ Winston Churchill knighted by Queen Elizabeth II
1955 _ Gaullists lose elections in France
1961 _ JFK accepts ``sole responsibility" following Bay of Pigs
1969 _ General Lin Piao succeeds Mao, is seriously wounded
1980 _ U.S. military operation to save 52 hostages in Iran, fails, eight die
1981 _ U.S. ends grain embargo against USSR