April 22nd

National Day

• Earth Day
• April Showers Day
• National Jelly Bean Day

Birthdays

• 1937 – Jack Nicholson, American retired actor (Batman, The Shining, A Few Good Men), born in
• Neptune City, New Jersey, United States.
• 1950 – Peter Frampton, English guitarist, singer and songwriter (“Show Me the Way”), born in Bromley, Greater London.
• 1969 – Craig Logan, Scottish musician and songwriter who began his career with Bros (“I Owe You Nothing”), born in Kirkcaldy, Fife, Scotland.
• 1984 – Amelle Berrabah, English singer and former member of the Sugababes (“Round Round”) replacing founding member Mutya Buena in 2005, born in Aldershot, Hampshire.
• 1984 – Michelle Ryan (41), English actress, best known for portraying the role of Zoe Slater in Eastenders, born in Enfield, North London.
• 1986 – Amber Heard), American actress (London Fields, Aquaman, Justice League, Drive Angry), born in Austin, Texas, United States.

On This Day

• 1972 – Sylvia Cook and John Fairfax became the first people to row across the Pacific Ocean (the world’s largest ocean). The journey took 363 days at sea from San Francisco to Australia.
• 1996 – Diana, Princess of Wales personally attended a five-hour heart transplant operation on a young boy at Harefield Hospital in Middlesex.
• 2000 – The Big Number Change took place. It was an update of telephone dialling codes in Britain in response to the rapid growth of telecommunications and the impending exhaustion of numbers.

Music

• 1965 – The Beatles were at No.1 on the UK singles chart with ‘Ticket To Ride.’ Taken from the film Help! it was the group’s seventh UK No.1.
• 1989 – Madonna started a three week run at No.1 on the US singles chart with ‘Like A Prayer’, the singers seventh US No.1, also a No.1 in the UK.
• 2001 – Destiny’s Child went to No.1 on the UK singles chart with ‘Survivor.’ Their second chart topper, they were the first US female band to have more than one UK No.1. The song won the trio a Grammy Award for Best R&B Performance by a Group.
• 2007 – Beyoncé & Shakira were at No.1 on the UK singles chart with ‘Beautiful Liar’. The track won the Most Earth-Shattering Collaboration award at the 2007 MTV Video Music Awards and the song won an Ivor Novello Award for Best-Selling British Song.

History

• 1662 – King Charles II granted a charter to the Royal Society of London, which became an important centre of scientific activity in England.
• 1721 – HMS Seahorse infected with smallpox arrives in Boston harbor, causing the first outbreak in two decades. Half of the population catch it, causing 850 deaths.
• 1778 – James Hargreaves, the English inventor of the spinning jenny died. After he had begun to sell the machines to help support his large family. Hand spinners, fearing unemployment, broke into his house and destroyed a number of jennies, causing Hargreaves to move from Blackburn to Nottingham in 1768.
• 1834 – The South Atlantic island of St Helena was declared a British crown colony.
• 1838 – The British steamer Sirius became the first steamship to cross the Atlantic Ocean from England to New York. The voyage took 18 days and 10 hours.
• 1884 – Englishman and General Laborer, Thomas Stevens started his first bicycle trip around the world on a Penny Farthing. The journey took two years and nine months.