Wikipedia:Selected anniversaries/April 18

This is a list of selected April 18 anniversaries that appear in the "On this day" section of the Main Page. To suggest a new item, in most cases, you can be bold and edit this page. Please read the selected anniversaries guidelines before making your edit. However, if your addition might be controversial or on a day that is or will soon be on the Main Page, please post your suggestion on the talk page instead.

Please note that the events listed on the Main Page are chosen based more on relative article quality and to maintain a mix of topics, not based solely on how important or significant their subjects are. Only four to five events are posted at a time and thus not everything that is "most important and significant" can be listed. In addition, an event is generally not posted this year if it is also the subject of the scheduled featured article, featured list or picture of the day.

To report an error when this appears on the Main Page, see Main Page errors. Please remember that this list defers to the supporting articles, so it is best to achieve consensus and make any necessary changes there first.

← April 17	April 19 →

Staging area

Images

Use only ONE image at a time

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  Damage from the 1906 San Francisco earthquake
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  Damage from the 1906 San Francisco earthquake
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  St. Peter's Basilica in 2004
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  A B-25 launching from the USS Hornet during Col. Doolittle's Raid
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  Boleslaus I of Poland

Ineligible

Blurb	Reason
Independence Day in Zimbabwe (1980)	outdated
1025 – Bolesław I Chrobry became the first King of Poland.	refimprove section, unreferenced section
1775 – American Revolutionary War: Colonists Paul Revere, William Dawes, and Samuel Prescott began a "midnight ride" from Boston to Lexington to warn residents about the impending arrival of British troops.	Dawes tagged refimprove and it seems unfair to exclude him
1942 – World War II: Sixteen B-25 Mitchell bombers from the aircraft carrier USS Hornet carried out the Doolittle Raid, the first Allied attack on the Japanese home islands.	refimprove section
1961 – The Soviet Pluton planetary radar performed the world's first successful radiolocation of the planet Venus.	stub
1983 – A suicide bomber destroyed the United States Embassy in Beirut, Lebanon, killing over 60 people with a car bomb.	needs more footnotes
1988 – Iran–Iraq War: U.S. naval forces attacked Iranian forces in retaliation for the Iranian mining of the Persian Gulf and the subsequent damage to the American frigate USS Samuel B. Roberts.	refimprove section
1992 – General Abdul Rashid Dostum revolted against the Democratic Republic of Afghanistan and allied with Ahmad Shah Massoud to capture Kabul.	Need to verify date – Dostum's article says 18 Apr, but Civil war in Afghanistan (1989–1992) makes it seem like he defected earlier

Eligible

• 1906 – A major earthquake and resulting fires devastated San Francisco, killing at least 3,000 people and leaving more than half of the city's population homeless.
• 1958 – Controversial American poet Ezra Pound was released from St. Elizabeths Hospital in Washington. D.C., where had been incarcerated for twelve years.

Notes

• Battles of Lexington and Concord appears on April 19; the midnight ride and the battles should not both appear in the same year

April 18

• 1506 – Construction of the current St. Peter's Basilica (interior pictured) in Vatican City, to replace the old basilica built in the 4th century, began.
• 1689 – Provincial militia and citizens gathered in Boston, and arrested officials of the Dominion of New England.
• 1923 – The New York Yankees of Major League Baseball began playing their games in the newly constructed Yankee Stadium.
• 1938 – Superman, created by Jerry Siegel and Joe Shuster, made his debut in Action Comics #1, the first true superhero comic book.
• 1947 – In one of the largest non-nuclear single explosive detonations in history, the Royal Navy set off 4,000 tonnes of surplus ammunition in an unsuccessful attempt to destroy the island of Heligoland, Germany.
• 1949 – Ireland officially left the British Commonwealth and became a republic.
• 1996 – Israeli forces shelled Qana, Lebanon, during Operation Grapes of Wrath, killing over 100 civilians and injuring over 110 others at a UN compound.

More anniversaries:

• April 17
• April 18
• April 19