Historical Events On April 4

Today is Friday, April 4, the 94th day of 2014. There are 271 days left in the year. On April 4, 1968, civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr., 39, was shot and killed while standing on a balcony
 of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tenn.

In 1960, Hugo Weaving Nigerian-born English-Australian actor was born.

In 1818, Congress decided the flag of the United States would consist of 13 red and white stripes and 20 stars, with a new star to be added for every new state of the Union.

In 1841, President William Henry Harrison succumbed to pneumonia one month after his inaugural, becoming the first U.S. chief executive to die in office.

In 1850, the city of Los Angeles was incorporated.

In 1864, in a letter to Kentucky newspaper editor Albert G. Hodges, President Abraham Lincoln wrote, "I claim not to have controlled events, but confess plainly that events have controlled me."

In 1933, the Navy airship USS Akron crashed in severe weather off the New Jersey coast with the loss of 73 lives.

In 1949, 12 nations, including the United States, signed the North Atlantic Treaty in Washington, D.C.

Ten years ago: Supporters of Muqtada al-Sadr (mook-TAH'-duh ehl SAH'-dur), an anti-American cleric, rioted in four Iraqi cities, killing dozens of Iraqis, eight U.S. troops and a Salvadoran soldier.

Five years ago: NATO leaders appointed Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen the alliance's new secretary-general during a two-day, 60th-anniversary summit in Strasbourg, France.