April 16: Facts & Historical Events On This Day

Chess grandmaster Ju Wenjun won her fifth Women’s World Chess Championship title in a row.

The victory also made Ju Wenjun the first Chinese player to win the title five times, which is an even more impressive feat considering all of them were consecutive wins.

Kendrick Lamar became the first rapper to win Pulitzer Prize.

The award was given for the works in his album "Damn."

A total of 662 Charlie Chaplin lookalikes gathered at the Chaplin Museum in Vevey, Switzerland.

Michael Jordan played in his final NBA game.

The Apollo 16 mission launched from Cape Canaveral in Florida.

With a duration of just over eleven days, the Apollo 16 mission was the fifth crewed mission to the moon, and just the tenth crewed mission within the Apollo program. The purpose of the mission was primarily scientific, with two of the astronauts spending 71 hours on the moon's surface collecting samples, moonwalking, and driving the moon buggy.

The Texas City industrial incident occurred, killing 536 people.

Known as the Texas City disaster, the event was caused by an ammonium nitrate explosion.

The last major battle of WWII took place.

The Battle of Berlin began on this day in the capital of Nazi Germany.

Harriet Quimby became the first woman to fly across the English Channel in an airplane.

Quimby was the first woman in the US to receive a pilot's license and quickly gained much fame in the aviation world. However, her channel crossing was largely unreported by the media, as it happened the day after the sinking of the Titanic.

Abraham Lincoln outlawed business with the Confederate States during the Civil War.

An earthquake destroyed the city of San Salvador.

George Washington started his 220-mile journey to become the first President of the United States.

Washington departed Mount Vernon, Virginia at 10 am for New York City by horse and carriage along many miles of poorly paved roads. The journey took seven days, but he was greeted with luxury dinners and festivities being celebrated in towns en route.

Queen Anne knighted Isaac Newton at Trinity College, Cambridge, England.

The Holy Roman Empire appointed a new supreme military commander, Albrecht von Wallenstein.

The Argentinian city of Salta was founded as an outpost between Buenos Aires, Peru, and Lima.

The settlement was founded by the Spanish conquistador Hernando de Lerma. The city itself played a significant role during the following Argentine War of Independence, functioning as an important military and commercial hub connecting the rest of Argentina to Perú.

Martin Luther arrived at the Diet of Worms in Worms, Germany.

A "Diet" was an important governmental meeting in the Holy Roman Empire. Luther's hearings over his writings and their heresy were set at 4 pm the next day.