March 31
(Redirected from
31 March )
March 31 is the 90th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (91st in Leap years ), with 275 days remaining, as the final day of March.
Events
307 - After divorcing his wife Minerva , Constantine marries Fausta, the daughter of the retired Roman Emperor Maximian .
1717 - A sermon on "The Nature of the Kingdom of Christ" by Benjamin Hoadly , the Bishop of Bangor , provoked the Bangorian Controversy .
1774 - American Revolutionary War : The Kingdom of Great Britain orders the port of Boston, Massachusetts closed in the Boston Port Act .
1854 - Commodore Matthew Perry signs the Treaty of Kanagawa with the Japanese government, opening the ports of Shimoda and Hakodate to American trade.
1866 - Spanish Navy bombs the harbour of Valparaíso, Chile
1885 - The United Kingdom establishes a protectorate over Bechuanaland .
1889 - The Eiffel Tower is inaugurated.
1903 - Richard Pearse reportedly flies a heavier-than-air machine in powered flight near Pleasant Point , South Canterbury, New Zealand ; some claim 1902
1906 - The Intercollegiate Athletic Association of the United States (later National Collegiate Athletic Association ) is established to set rules for amateur sports in the United States.
1909 - Serbia accepts Austrian control over Bosnia-Herzegovina .
1917 - The United States takes possession of the U.S. Virgin Islands after paying $25 million to Denmark .
1918 - Daylight Savings Time goes into effect in the United States for the first time.
1930 - The Motion Pictures Production Code is instituted, imposing strict guidelines on the treatment of sex, crime, religion and violence in motion pictures for the next forty years.
1931 - An earthquake destroys Managua Nicaragua , killing 2,000.
1933 - The Civilian Conservation Corps is established with the mission to relieve rampant unemployment.
1949 - Newfoundland and Labrador joins Confederation and becomes the 10th Province of Canada .
1959 - The 14th Dalai Lama , Tenzin Gyatso , crosses the border into India and is granted political asylum .
1964 - The Dictatorship in Brazil , under the aegis of general Castello Branco , begins.
1966 - The Soviet Union launches Luna 10 which later becomes the first spaceprobe to enter orbit around the Moon .
1967 - Jimi Hendrix burns his guitar for the first time at London 's Astoria Theatre. He is sent to the hospital afterwards for burns on his hands.
1968 - President Lyndon Johnson announces he will not run for re-election.
1970 - Explorer 1 re-enters the Earth 's atmosphere (after 12 years in orbit).
1970 - Eight terrorists from the Japanese Red Army hijacked a Japan Airlines Boeing 727 at Tokyo International Airport , wielding samurai swords and carrying a bomb .
1979 - In Jerusalem , Israel , Gali Atari & Milk and Honey win the twenth-fourth Eurovision Song Contest for Israel singing "Hallelujah".
1979 - The last Bristish soldier leaves the Maltese Islands. Malta is no longer a military base.
1985 - The first ever WrestleMania is held in New York City 's Madison Square Garden .
1986 - A Mexicana Boeing 727 enroute to Puerto Vallarta erupts in flames and crashes in the mountains northwest of Mexico City , killing 166
1986 - Six metropolitan county councils are abolished in England
1990 - Boxer Julio César Chávez defeats Meldrick Taylor to unify the boxing 's world junior welterweight title in a very controversial fight known as "Thunder Meets Lightning ".
1991 - The Warsaw Pact comes to an end.
1992 - The television news program Dateline NBC 1993 - Actor Brandon Lee is accidentally killed during the filming of The Crow 1994 - The journal Nature Ethiopia of the first complete Australopithecus afarensis Human evolution ).
1995 - Popular Tex-Mex singer Selena Quintanilla is murdered by her assistant Yolanda Saldivar in a Corpus Christi , Texas motel after a heated discussion where the latter was accused of ripping off the artist's fan club.
1998 - Netscape gives the code base of its browser under an open-source license agreement, thus creating Mozilla Foundation , a not-for-profit corporation to oversee the development of Mozilla .
2004 - Google announces Gmail , the first web-based mail service to offer 1 gigabyte of storage.
2004 - In Fallujah , Iraq , 4 American private military contractors working for Blackwater USA , are killed and their bodies mutilated after being ambushed.
2004 - Sandton Square in Johannesburg , South Africa , is renamed Nelson Mandela Square .
Births
250 - Constantius Chlorus , Roman Emperor (d. 306 )
1499 - Pope Pius IV (d. 1565 )
1504 - Guru Angad Dev , Second Guru of the Sikhs (d. 1552 )
1519 - Henry II of France (d. 1559 )
1536 - Ashikaga Yoshiteru , Ashikaga shogun (d. 1565 )
1596 - René Descartes , mathematician (d. 1650 )
1621 - Andrew Marvell , English poet (d. 1678 )
1675 - Pope Benedict XIV (d. 1758 )
1732 - Franz Joseph Haydn , composer (d. 1809 )
1809 - Nikolai Gogol , Russian writer (d. 1852 )
1809 - Edward FitzGerald , poet (d. 1883 )
1811 - Robert Wilhelm Bunsen , chemist, inventor: Bunsen burner (d. 1899 )
1878 - Jack Johnson , African-American boxer (d. 1946 )
1885 - Pascin , the "Prince of Montparnasse" (d. 1930 )
1900 - Richard Alexander Walter Windsor , Duke of Gloucester
1911 - Elisabeth Grümmer , Alsatian soprano (d. 1986 )
1912 - Hermann Höcherl , German politician (d. 1989 )
1914 - Octavio Paz , Mexican writer, diplomat, and nobel laureate (d. 1998 )
1915 - Albert Hourani , historian (d. 1993 )
1922 - Richard Kiley , actor, singer (d. 1999 )
1924 - Leo Buscaglia , American author (d. 1998 )
1926 - John Fowles , author
1927 - César Chávez , labor activist (d. 1993 )
1927 - William Daniels , actor
1928 - Gordie Howe , ice hockey player
1928 - Lefty Frizzell , country music performer
1929 - Lucille Bliss , voice actress
1929 - Liz Claiborne , Belgian fashion designer
1934 - Shirley Jones , singer, actress
1934 - Richard Chamberlain , actor
1935 - Herb Alpert , musician
1935 - Judith Rossner , American author
1939 - Zviad Gamsakhurdia , scientist and writer, first President of the Republic of Georgia (d. 1993 )
1939 - Volker Schlöndorff , German film director
1940 - Patrick Leahy , United States Senator from Vermont
1943 - Christopher Walken , actor
1945 - Gabe Kaplan , American actor, comedian, poker player
1946 - Gonzalo Márquez , Major League Baseball player (d. 1984 )
1948 - Al Gore , Former Vice President of the United States
1948 - Rhea Perlman , actress
1949 - Bethel Enproe Adam , second Angam Baby
1050 - Ed Marinaro , American football player, actor
1955 - Angus Young , British-Australian musician (AC/DC )
1957 - Marc McClure , American actor
1965 - William McNamara , American actor
1966 - Roger Black , British athlete
1971 - Ewan McGregor , Scottish actor
1971 - Pavel Bure , ice hockey player
1973 - Bold Forbes , thoroughbred race horse (d. 2000 )
1976 - Josh Saviano , actor (The Wonder Years Deaths
1204 - Eleanor of Aquitaine , Queen of France and England (b. 1121 )
1783 - Nikita Ivanovich Panin , Russian statesman (b. 1718 )
1837 - John Constable , painter (b. 1776 )
1855 - Charlotte Brontë , author (b. 1816 )
1880 - Henryk Wieniawski , composer
1913 - John Pierpont Morgan , American financier and banker (b. 1837 )
1917 - Emil Adolf von Behring , winner of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 1901 (b. 1854 )
1915 - Wyndham Halswelle , British runner
1931 - Knute Rockne , American football coach (b. 1888 )
1945 - Anne Frank , diarist (b. 1929 )
1952 - Wallace H. White, Jr. , U.S. Senator from Maine (b. 1877 )
1954 - Edwin Armstrong , electrical engineer
1956 - Ralph DePalma , race car driver (b. 1884 )
1975 - Spider Sabich , American skier
1978 - Charles Best , medical scientist (b. 1899 )
1980 - Jesse Owens , athlete (b. 1913 )
1981 - Enid Bagnold , British author, playwright
1985 - The Singing Nun , nun, singer
1986 - Jerry Paris , American actor
1988 - William McMahon , twentieth Prime Minister of Australia (b. 1908 )
1993 - Brandon Lee , actor (b. 1965 )
1995 - Selena , Tejano singer (b. 1971 )
1998 - Bella Abzug , American politician (b. 1920 )
2002 - Barry Took , British comedian and writer
2003 - H.S.M. Coxeter , geometer and author
2003 - Anne Gwynne , American actress
2005 - Terri Schiavo , right-to-die and right-to-live symbol
2005 - Frank Perdue , poultry farmer (b. 1920 )
Holidays and observances
External links
March 30 - April 1 - February 28 (February 29 ) - April 30 -- listing of all days
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