TODAY IN HISTORY - APRIL 3RD

1860 – The first successful United States Pony Express run from St. Joseph, Missouri, to Sacramento, California, begins.

1865 – American Civil War: Union forces capture Richmond, Virginia, the capital of the Confederate States of America.

1882 – American Old West: Jesse James is killed by Robert Ford.

1888 – The first of eleven unsolved brutal murders of women committed in or near the impoverished Whitechapel district in the East End of London, occurs.

1895 – The trial in the libel case brought by Oscar Wilde begins, eventually resulting in his imprisonment on charges of homosexuality.

1898 – Henry Luce, American publisher, co-founded Time Magazine (d. 1967) is born.

1922 – Joseph Stalin becomes the first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.

1926 – Gus Grissom, American colonel, pilot, and astronaut (d. 1967) is born.

1933 – First flight over Mount Everest, a British expedition, led by the Marquis of Clydesdale, and funded by Lucy, Lady Houston.

1948 – United States President Harry S. Truman signs the Marshall Plan, authorizing $5 billion in aid for 16 countries.

1958 – Alec Baldwin, American actor and producer is born.

1961 – Eddie Murphy, American actor, director, and screenwriter is born.

1968 – Martin Luther King Jr. delivers his "I've Been to the Mountaintop" speech.

1969 – Vietnam War: United States Secretary of Defense Melvin Laird announces that the United States will start to "Vietnamize" the war effort.

1973 – Martin Cooper of Motorola makes the first handheld mobile phone call to Joel S. Engel of Bell Labs, though it took ten years for the DynaTAC 8000X to become the first such phone to be commercially released.

1974 – The 1974 Super Outbreak occurs, the second biggest tornado outbreak in recorded history (after the 2011 Super Outbreak). The death toll is 315, with nearly 5,500 injured.

1975 – Bobby Fischer refuses to play in a chess match against Anatoly Karpov, giving Karpov the title of World Champion by default.

1996 – Suspected "Unabomber" Theodore Kaczynski is captured at his cabin in Montana, United States.

1996 – A United States Air Force airplane carrying United States Secretary of Commerce Ron Brown crashes in Croatia, killing all 35 on board.

2000 – United States v. Microsoft Corp.: Microsoft is ruled to have violated United States antitrust law by keeping "an oppressive thumb" on its competitors.

2008 – ATA Airlines, once one of the ten largest U.S. passenger airlines and largest charter airline, files for bankruptcy for the second time in five years and ceases all operations.

2008 – Texas law enforcement cordons off the FLDS's YFZ Ranch. Eventually 533 women and children will be removed and taken into state custody.

2009 – Jiverly Antares Wong opens fire at an American Civic Association immigration center in Binghamton, New York, killing thirteen and wounding four before committing suicide.

2010 – Apple Inc. released the first generation iPad, a tablet computer.