March 18
1584
Russian czar Ivan IV, or Ivan “The Terrible,” died at age 53.
1766
After months of American protests, Britain repealed the Stamp Act.
1925
The most violent single tornado in U.S. history, the “Tri-State Tornado,” hit Missouri, Indiana, and Illinois, killing 689 people and injuring 13,000 others.
1963
The Supreme Court held in Gideon v. Wainwright that public defenders must be provided for indigent defendants in felony cases.
1965
Soviet cosmonaut Aleksei Leonov made the first spacewalk.
1967
The oil tanker Torrey Canyon was wrecked off the Cornish coast of England, spilling 919,000 barrels of oil into the sea.
1990
The biggest art theft in U.S. history occurs at the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum in Boston. The works, including pieces by Vermeer and Rembrandt, were never recovered.
2004
A small asteroid made the closest approach to Earth ever recorded, only about 26,500 miles away.
2005
After a long legal battle, Terry Schiavo’s feeding tube was removed. She died 13 days later.
Birthdays
Grover Cleveland
1837–1908, American President, born in Caldwell, NJ.
Rudolf Diesel
engineer and inventor (1858)
Neville Chamberlain
statesman (1869)
George Plimpton
writer, editor, actor (1927)
John Updike
writer (1932)
F.W. de Klerk
political leader (1936)
Bonnie Blair
speed skater (1964)
Queen Latifah
rap musician, actress (1970)