What Happened On This Day ? April 13
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1997
Tiger Woods becomes the youngest ever golfer to win the Masters Tournament
The then 21-year old sportsman was also the first person of African heritage to win a major golf title. Tiger Woods is considered one of the most successful golfers of all time.
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1970
An oxygen tank explodes on Apollo 13, leaving the spacecraft crippled
The emergency prompted Jack Swigert's famous quote “Houston, we've had a problem”. The crew managed to return to Earth safely.
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1970
Mikis Theodorakis is freed
The Greek composer and politician was interned in the concentration camp of Oropos by the right-wing military junta. The solidarity movement demanding his release included Dmitri Shostakovich, Leonard Bernstein, and Harry Belafonte.
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1960
The world's first satellite navigation system is launched
Transit 1B was primarily used by the U.S. Navy to update the navigation systems aboard their Polaris submarines.
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1919
British troops massacre around 400 unarmed civilians in India
Brigadier-General Reginald Dyer ordered his men to shoot into the crowd, in his own words “to punish the Indians for disobedience.” The Indian independence movement grew considerably after the Amritsar massacre.
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1963
Garry Kasparov
Russian chess player
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1949
Christopher Hitchens
English/American journalist, author
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1924
Stanley Donen
American director, choreographer
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1906
Samuel Beckett
Irish/French author, playwright, director, Nobel Prize laureate
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1743
Thomas Jefferson
American politician, 3rd President of the United States
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2009
Harry Kalas
American sportscaster
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1954
Angus Lewis Macdonald
Canadian politician
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1938
Grey Owl
English/Canadian environmentalist, author
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1882
Bruno Bauer
German historian, philosopher
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1868
Tewodros II
of Ethiopia