History for April 6 - On-This-Day.com

History for April 6 - On-This-Day.com:
Walter Huston (Houghston) 1884 - Actor (Treasure of the Sierra Madre [1948]), Lowell Thomas 1892 - Broadcaster, journalist, Merle Haggard 1937 - Country musician, songwriter 


Billy Dee (December) Williams 1937 - Actor ("Brian's Song", "The Return of the Jedi", "Batman"), John Ratzenberger 1947 - Actor ("Cheers"), Vince Flynn 1966 - Author 


1830 - Joseph Smith and five others organized the Mormon Church in western New York. 


1862 - The American Civil War Battle of Shiloh began in Tennessee. 


1896 - The first modern Olympic Games began in Athens, Greece. 


1903 - French Army Nationalists were revealed for forging documents to guarantee a conviction for Alfred Dryfus. 


1909 - Americans Robert Peary and Matthew Henson claimed to be the first men to reach the North Pole. 


1916 - Charlie Chaplin became the highest-paid film star in the world when he signed a contract with Mutual Film Corporation for $675,000 a year. He was 26 years old. 


1917 - The U.S. Congress approved a declaration of war on Germany and entered World War I on the Allied side. 


1965 - U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson authorized the use of ground troops in combat operations in Vietnam. 


1987 - The Dow Jones industrial average closed above 2,400 for the first time. 

1987 - Sugar Ray Leonard took the middleweight title from Marvin Hagler. 


1998 - The Dow Jones industrial average closed above 9,000 points for the first time. 


1998 - Pakistan successfully tested medium-range missiles capable of attacking neighboring India.