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“Start by doing what’s necessary; then do what’s possible; and suddenly you are doing the impossible.”
~ Saint Francis of Assisi
Wikiquote (Saint Francis of Assisi (Italian: San Francesco d'Assisi, born Giovanni di Pietro di Bernardone, but nicknamed Francesco ("the Frenchman") by his father, 1181 / 1182 – October 3, 1226) an Italian Catholic friar and preacher. He founded the men's Order of Friars Minor, the women’s Order of Saint Clare, and the Third Order of Saint Francis for men and women not able to live the lives of itinerant preachers followed by the early members of the Order of Friars Minor or the monastic lives of the Poor Clares. Though he was never ordained to the Catholic priesthood, Francis is one of the most venerated religious figures in history.)
April 11th, 491
Byzantine Empire (East Roman Empire):
491 - Flavius Anastasius becomes Byzantine Emperor, with the name of Anastasius I.
Wikipedia Image: The Baptism of Constantine painted by Raphael's pupils (1520–1524, fresco, Vatican City, Apostolic Palace); Mural of Saints Cyril and Methodius, 19th century, Troyan Monastery, Bulgaria; Justinian I depicted on one of the famous mosaics of the Basilica of San Vitale, Ravenna; The Greek fire was first used by the Byzantine Navy during the Byzantine-Arab Wars (from the Madrid Skylitzes, Biblioteca Nacional de España, Madrid); Alexios I, founder of the Komnenos dynasty.
Photo: Byzantine Empire is the great church of Hagia Sophia (Church of the Holy Wisdom) in Constantinople (562).
April 11th, 1079
Bishop Stanislaus of Kraków is executed by order of Bolesław II of Poland.
Wikipedia Image: Stanislaus of Kraków; 1) Saint Stanislaus being ordained as bishop. 2) Saint Stanislaus resurrects Peter. 3) King Bolesław murders Saint Stanislaus. 4) Stanislaus' body is cut in pieces. (From the Hungarian Kings' Anjou Legendarium of the XIV century)
April 11th, 1241
Mongol Empire:
1241 - Battle of Muhi; Batu Khan defeats Béla IV of Hungary.
Wikipedia Image: Map of Mongol Empire at its height; Genghis Khan, credit The Field Museum in Chicago; Genghis Khan various Mongolian tribes joined together in 1206; Mongol warriors was created for an Islamic history book, Rashid al-Din's History of the World of 1307, courtesy of the Edinburgh University Library, Scotland.
April 11th, 1512
War of the League of Cambrai: Battle of Ravenna French forces led by Gaston de Foix win.
Wikipedia Painting: The death of Gaston de Foix during the Battle of Ravenna heralded a long period of defeats for France.
April 11th, 1689
William III and Mary II are crowned as joint sovereigns of Britain.
Wikipedia Painting: Detail of William and Mary from the ceiling of the Painted Hall; Anthony van Dyck painting of Mary Stuart and William of Orange. (He was 14 and she was 10); The Old Royal Naval College, on the south bank of the river Thames in Greenwich, London viewed from the north side. The Queen's House in the middle of the picture. The Royal Observatory visible in the background.
April 11th, 1713
French and Indian War - Queen Anne's War:
1713 - War of the Spanish Succession (Queen Anne's War) - Treaty of Utrecht.
Wikipedia Painting: Major Washington and a wounded General Braddock at the Battle of Monongahela. Lemercier, 1854; Portrait of Washington was painted in 1772 by Charles Willson Peale, and shows Washington in uniform as a colonel of the Virginia Regiment. The original hangs in Lee Chapel at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Virginia. It is the earliest known depiction of Washington; British troops under Edward Braddock near Fort Duquesne, Pa., during the French and Indian War. Credit: MPI / Hulton Archive / Getty Images; Indian from Death of General Wolfe painting By Benjamin West in 1770; Death of General James Wolfe by stray cannon shot at Battle of Quebec in 1759 Painted by Benjamin West in 1770.
Anne, Queen of Great Britain; ascended the thrones of England, Scotland and Ireland on March 8th, 1702. On May 1st 1707, under the Act of Union, two of her realms, the kingdoms of England and Scotland, were united as a single sovereign state, the Kingdom of Great Britain.
April 11th, 1775
The last execution for witchcraft in Germany takes place.
Wikipedia Drawings: Samlesbury witches, Pendle Witches, UK
April 11th, 1809
French Revolutionary Wars / Napoleonic Wars:
1809 - Battle of the Basque Roads; Naval battle fought between France and the United Kingdom.
1814 - Treaty of Fontainebleau; ends the War of the Sixth Coalition against Napoleon, and forces him to abdicate unconditionally for the first time.
Wikipedia Painting: Battle of Trafalgar: The British HMS Sandwich fires to the French flagship Bucentaure (completely dismasted) in the battle of Trafalgar;
Napoleon in Berlin (Meynier). After defeating Prussian forces at Jena, the French Army entered Berlin on 27 October 1806;
Battle of the Bridge of Arcole Napoleon Bonaparte leading his troops over the bridge of Arcole, by Horace Vernet;
Napoleon as King of Italy (Appiani);
Napoleon Crossing the Alps (David). In 1800 Bonaparte took the French Army across the Alps, eventually defeating the Austrians at Marengo;
Charge of the Russian Imperial Guard cavalry against French cuirassiers at the Battle of Friedland, 14 June 1807;
Battle of Borodino as depicted by Louis Lejeune. The battle was the largest and bloodiest single-day action of the Napoleonic Wars;
Napoleon's withdrawal from Russia, a painting by Adolph Northen;
Wellington at Waterloo by Robert Alexander Hillingford;
Napoleon is often represented in his green colonel uniform of the Chasseur à Cheval, with a large bicorne and a hand-in-waistcoat gesture.
Battle of the Nile (Battle of Aboukir Bay).
April 11th, 1945
World War II: Holocaust;
1945 - American forces liberate the Buchenwald concentration camp.
1961 - The trial of Adolf Eichmann begins in Jerusalem.
Wikipedia Photo: World War II, The Holocaust. Sources: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum USHMM, History 1900s, Internet Masters of Education Technology IMET, Techno Friends, Veterans Today, Concern.
April 11th, 1951
Korean War:
1951 - United States President Harry Truman relieves General of the Army, Douglas MacArthur of overall command in Korea.
Wikipedia Photo: Korean War Collage credit, The Big Picture, Boston Globe - (Associated Press; U.S. Department of Defense / SGT. F.C. Kerr; AP Photo; U.S. Department of Defense / TSGT. Charles B. Tyler; U.S. Department of Defense / TSGT. Charles B. Tyler; U.S. Department of Defense / TSGT. Robert H. Mosier; AP Photo / Max Desfor; U.S. Department of Defense / CPL. P. McDonald; AP Photo / Max Desfor; AP Photo/George Sweers; U.S. Navy / Maj. R.V. Spencer, UAF; AP Photo / Max Desfor).
April 11th, 1951
The Stone of Scone, the stone upon which Scottish monarchs were traditionally crowned, is found on the site of the altar of Arbroath Abbey. (It had been taken by Scottish nationalist students from its place in Westminster Abbey.
Wikipedia Photo: Replica of the Stone of Scone at Scone Palace, Scone Abbey, Scotland.
April 11th, 1952
Chinese Civil War:
1952 - Battle of Nanri Island; (The Republic of China Army ROCA later abandones this island and retreated, with all its captured prizes and POWs, to Taiwan.)
Wikipedia Photo: In 1934, Mao Zedong headed the Long March. The Long March was when the Chinese Nationalists, led by Chiang Kai-shek, forced the Chinese Communists, led by Mao Zedong, on a march to the caves of Shaanxi. (colorized); Government soldiers train with modern machine guns; People's Liberation Army attacking government defensive positions in Shangtang; US diplomat Patrick J. Hurley, Chiang Ching-kuo, Chiang Kai-shek, Chang Ch'ün, Wang Shi Jie (王世杰), Mao Zedong; A Communist leader addressing Long March survivors; The PLA enters Beijing in the Pingjin Campaign and control the later capital of PRC.
April 11th, 1965
Tornadoes:
1965 - Palm Sunday tornado outbreak of 1965; Fifty-one tornadoes hit in six Midwestern states, killing 256 people.
Wikipedia Photo: Weather Front System; Tornado near Anadarko, Oklahoma; North Dakota Tornado; F3 Category Tornado Swirls Across A South Dakota Prairie by Carsten Peter; A waterspout parallels a lightning strike over Lake Okeechobee in Florida, by Fred K. Smith, National Geographics, Extream Instability.
April 11th, 1970
Apollo Program: NASA launches Apollo 13.
Wikipedia Photo: Apollo Program: Apollo 11 first manned Moon landing and the first walk on the surface on the moon. Astronaut Buzz Aldrin walks on the surface of the moon near the leg of the lunar module Eagle. Apollo 11 Commander Neil Armstrong took this photograph with a 70mm lunar surface camera. Armstrong and Aldrin explored the Sea of Tranquility for two and a half hours while crewmate Michael Collins orbited above in the command module Columbia.
The Blue Marble is a famous photograph of the Earth, taken on December 7, 1972, by the crew of the Apollo 17 spacecraft, at a distance of about 45,000 kilometres (28,000 mi).
April 11th, 1976
The Apple I is created.
Wikipedia Picture: Apple is incorporated.
Steve Jobs Apple II ● IPad.
April 11th, 1989
Ron Hextall becomes the first goaltender in National Hockey League (NHL) history to score a goal in the playoffs.
Wikipedia Photo: National Hockey League Logos; The Pittsburgh Penguins' Sidney Crosby hoists the Stanley Cup after the Penguins beat the Detroit Red Wings 2-1 to win Game 7 of the NHL hockey Stanley Cup Finals in Detroit June 12. (AP Photo: Gunn, The Canadian PressFrank).
April 11th, 2001
Hainan Island incident: The detained crew of a United States EP-3E aircraft that landed in Hainan, China after a collision with a Shenyang J-8 fighter is released.
Wikipedia Photo: EP-3A/B Orion EP-3E ARIES / ARIES II (U.S. Navy EP-3E of VQ-1) ● a Soviet MiG23 is seen banking away from the left wing of an EP-3E ARIES (This is how it must have looked like when the Chinese fighter made its first two passes alongside the EP-3E). ● Senior military officials greet the crew of the EP-3 aircraft as they depart from a C-17 at Hickam Air Force Base, Hawaii. The EP-3 collided with a Chinese F-8 fighter over the South China Sea. The crew spent 10 days detained by the Chinese following the incident. (TSgt. Paul Holcomb, USAF).
April 11th, 2006
Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad announces that Iran has successfully enriched uranium.
Wikipedia Photo: Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, inspects the Natanz nuclear plant in central Iran. Photograph: Iran's Presidency Office Handout / EPA.
April 11th, 2011
Modern conflicts in the Middle East and terrorist attacks:
2011 - Minsk Metro bombing (2011); 15 people are killed and more than two hundred injured in an explosion on the Minsk Metro, Belarus.
2007 - Algiers bombings (2007); Two bombings in the Algerian city of Algiers kills 33 people and wounds a further 222 others.
2002 - Ghriba synagogue bombing; Al Qaeda kills 21 in Tunisia.
Wikipedia Photo: Middle East satellite image, NASA. ● Camels are seen early morning on a beach in the Marina area of Dubai October 16, 2008. (Steve Crisp, Reuters) ● A portrait of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad burns during clashes between rebels and Syrian troops in Selehattin, near Aleppo, on July 23, 2012. (Bulent Kilic, AFP / GettyImages) ● Egyptians gather in their thousands in Tahrir Square to mark the one year anniversary of the revolution on Jan. 25, 2012 in Cairo Egypt. Tens of thousands have gathered in the square on the first anniversary of the Arab uprising which toppled President Hosni Mubarak. (Jeff J Mitchell, Getty Images) ● Black smoke rises above the Tehran skyline as supporters of Mir Hossein Mousavi burn tires and other material in the streets as they fight running battles with police to protest the declared results of the Iranian presidential election in Tehran, Iran, Saturday, June 13, 2009. (Ben Curtis, AP) ● The Iron Dome defense system fires to interecpt incoming missiles from Gaza in the port town of Ashdod, Thursday, Nov. 15, 2012. (Tsafrir Abayov, AP)
April 11th, 2012
Earthquake:
2012 - Indian Ocean earthquakes; A pair of great earthquakes occur in the Wharton Basin west of Sumatra in Indonesia. Ten killed, and a non-destructive tsunami was observed on the island of Nias.
Wikipedia Image: Preliminary Determination of Epicenters / Aleppo Syria; Anchorage, Alaska - March 28, 1964 Prince William Sound USA earthquake and tsunami; 8.9 Mega Earthquake Strikes Japan; Tsunami Swirls Japan's Ibaraki Prefecture March 12 2011. credit NOAA / NGDC, NOAA National Geophysical Data Center, USGS, National Geographics.