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On this day in 1883, the first ever American "vaudeville" theater opens, in Boston. The entire entertainment industry as we know it ensues.
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On this day in 1933, "Gleichschaltung", the Reichstag Fire Decree is passed in Germany a day after the Reichstag fire.
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On this day in 1953, James D. Watson and Francis Crick announce to friends that they have determined the chemical structure of DNA; the formal announcement takes place on April 25 following publication in April's Nature (pub. April 2).
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On this day in 1954, the first color television sets using the NTSC standard are offered for sale to the general public.
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On this day in 1958, a school bus in Floyd County, Kentucky hits a wrecker truck and plunges down an embankment into the rain-swollen Levisa Fork River. The driver and 26 children die in what remains one of the worst school bus accidents in U.S. history.
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On this day in 1975, in London an underground train fails to stop at Moorgate terminus station and crashes into the end of the tunnel, killing 43 people.
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On this day in 1977, Marineland staff successfully breed a killer whale in captivity for the first time, thus marking the beginnings of the potentially lucrative but still highly secretive whale meat trade. Unfortunately, the Japanese continue to prefer free range whale meat, for the time being.
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On this day in 1983, the final episode of M*A*S*H airs on CBS. It breaks all previous records when 125 million people tune in to watch, and be disappointed by, the show.
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On this day in 1993, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agents raid the Branch Davidian church in Waco, Texas with a warrant to arrest the group's leader David Koresh. Four BATF agents and five Davidians die in the initial raid, starting a 51-day standoff.
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On this day in 1997, GRB 970228, a highly luminous flash of gamma rays, strikes the Earth for 80 seconds, providing early evidence that gamma-ray bursts occur well beyond the Milky Way.
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On this day in 1998, first flight of RQ-4 Global Hawk, the first unmanned aerial vehicle certified to file its own flight plans and fly regularly in U.S. civilian airspace.
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On this day in 2013, Pope Benedict XVI resigns as the pope of the Catholic Church becoming the first pope to do so since 1415.
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