Today’s Motto: ‘Before taking a firm stand, make sure you are standing on solid ground’

As Every Day makes a new beginning in life, it brings new opportunities, opens new avenues, to perform and make a mark, to write a Page in History Book.

By Editor's Desk Last updated Apr 15, 2025

This is Your Day-TODAY: Take a Determined Step Forward and Make History!

On this day, Apr. 15….. ….

1561 – Ambroise Paré published a book on surgery for first time in French language, to make the knowledge accessible for study by surgeon-barbers. Paré’s contribution also included reintroducing the midwifery technique of podalic version.

1658 – Raja Jaswant Singh of Jodhpur, was defeated at Dharmat. He was sent by Shahjahan and Dara Shukoh to resist Aurangzeb’s advance towards Agra. (photo credit-X.com and Brig. MS Jodha)

1726 – Writer William Stukeley held a conversation with Isaac Newton during which Newton recalled “when formerly, the notion of gravitation came into his mind.” Later, Stukeley writing in his Memoirs of Sir Isaac Newton’s Life, recorded that Newton said, “It was occasioned by the fall of an apple, as he sat in contemplative mood. Why should that apple always descend perpendicularly to the ground, thought he to himself. Why should it not go sideways or upwards, but constantly to the earth’s centre.”

1770 – Dr. Joseph Priestley made the first mention in English that a piece of a rubber substance could erase marks from black-lead pencils.

1877 – A steam-engine driven helicopter model built by Enrico Forlanini (Italy) rose 40 ft. Its coaxial rotors were powered by a steam engine. Just before takeoff the spherical steam accumulator was charged with 10 atmospheres of pressure, enabling the craft to rise and remain aloft for 20 seconds.

1878 – Harley Procter developed Ivory Soap, which when marketed later, made Procter and Gamble a multi-million dollar business.

1896 – 1st Olympic games close at Athens, Greece. (Winners were given a silver medal, while runners-up received a copper medal. Retroactively, the IOC has converted these to gold and silver, and awarded bronze medals to third placed athletes).

1910 – Taft is 1st President to throw out a 1st ball at a baseball game. (The ceremonial first ball is a longstanding ritual of baseball in which a guest of honour throws a ball to mark the end of pregame festivities and the start of the game).

1912 – The fourth dimension was spoken of by Albert Einstein as time.

1923 -Insulin became generally available for diabetics’.

1941 – Igor Ivor Sikorsky made the first helicopter flight over one-hour duration in his Vought-Sikorsky VS-300. It used a three-bladed main propeller 28-feet in diameter, and stayed in the air for 65 minutes and 14.5 seconds.

1946 – The original memorial was erected in Kohima, from local stone. (It is a memorial dedicated to soldiers of the 2nd British Division of the Allied Forces who died in the Second World War at Kohima, the capital of Nagaland in April 1944. The soldiers died on the battleground of Garrison Hill in the tennis court area of the Deputy Commissioner’s residence. There are 1,420 Commonwealth burials of the Second World War at this cemetery, and a memorial to an additional 917 Hindu and Sikh soldiers who were cremated. The memorial is maintained by the Commonwealth War graves Commission).

1948 – Territory of Himachal Pradesh created. (The name was coined from Sanskrit him ‘snow’ and achal ‘mountain’, by Acharya Diwakar Datt Sharma, one of the State’s most eminent Sanskrit scholars).

1950 – Acharya Vinoba Bhave requested the villagers of Panchampalli Telangana, Andhra Pradesh to give 80 acres of land, and with this he had started his ‘Bhudan Andolan’.