Good Morning Brooklyn: April 15

April 15, 2021 Brooklyn Eagle Staff

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GOOD MORNING BROOKLYN, Thursday, April 15, 2021.

United States Information Agency via Wikimedia Commons

CONGRATULATIONS JACKIE ROBINSON on this day in 1947 you became the first African American to play in the Major Leagues. You played against the Boston Braves. Maybe it was nerves, but you had no hits at-bat that day. However, getting on base with a walk, your brilliant base stealing set you up to score the deciding run, as the Dodgers prevailed 5-3 over Boston. Indeed, you were later named 1947’s Rookie of the year. Ironically, the report in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle prior to the game underplayed your appearance as the first Major League African American, as if no one (except perhaps Branch Rickey, the Dodger General manager who had made history by hiring you) really know what you would bring to the game, and to the changing tide of history. See More on how the Eagle reported on that impending game
in 1947 here.

AS IF HEEDING THE warning of Ben Franklin, it was on this day in 1912 that the “unsinkable” luxury liner Titanic finally sank. On its maiden voyage from Southhampton, England to New York, it struck an iceberg just before midnight April 14, and sank at 2:27 a.m. April 15. Of 2,224 people on board, more than 1,500 were lost. About 700 people were rescued from the icy waters off Newfoundland by the liner Carpathia, which reached the survivors about two hours after the Titanic went down.THIS IS TAX-RECKONING DAY — In the late 18th century, founding father Ben Franklin said, “Our new Constitution is now established, everything seems to promise it will be durable; but, in this world, nothing is certain except death and taxes.” Death seems to come all days of the year, but for taxes, it’s TODAY: April 15. This is the day all Americans cough up their share of the cost of government services.

EMPRESS OF THE BLUES, the great Bessie Smith was born on this day in 1894 in Chattanooga, Tennessee. She died in 1937 of injuries suffered in an automobile accident in Clarksdale, MS.

ISRAELI INDEPENDENCE from mandatory British rule in Palestinian territory was proclaimed on this day, April 15, 1948, after more than a year of brutal conflict. Just a month later the State of Israel and the Provisional Government were established on May 14.

SEEDS OF A DIFFERENT KIND OF WAR were sewn on this day in 1955: The first McDonald’s opened in Des Plaines, Illinois. The first Burger
King had just opened the year before in 1954 in Jacksonville, Florida.

(For news items featured on this day in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle in former years — and even former centuries — click here.)