Today is the 107th day of 2014 and the 29th day of spring.

TODAY'S HISTORY: In 1861, Virginia became the eighth state to secede from the Union.

In 1961, a group of CIA-trained Cuban exiles launched an unsuccessful invasion of Cuba at the Bay of Pigs.

In 1964, the Ford Mustang debuted at the World's Fair in Flushing Meadows, N.Y.

In 1970, the crippled Apollo 13 spacecraft landed safely in the Pacific Ocean.

TODAY'S BIRTHDAYS: J.P. Morgan (1837-1913), financier/banker; Senor Wences (1896-1999), ventriloquist; Thornton Wilder, (1897-1975), playwright/novelist; William Holden (1918-1981), actor; Nick Hornby (1957- ), author/screenwriter; Boomer Esiason (1961- ), football player/sportscaster; Henry Ian Cusick (1967- ), actor; Redman (1970- ), rapper/actor; Jennifer Garner (1972- ), actress; Rooney Mara (1985- ), actress.

TODAY'S FACT: More Civil War battles were fought in Virginia than any other state.

TODAY'S SPORTS: In 1951, 19-year-old Mickey Mantle made his major league debut with the New York Yankees.

TODAY'S QUOTE: "The highest tribute to the dead is not grief but gratitude." -- Thornton Wilder

TODAY'S NUMBER: 11,747 -- immigrants processed at the Ellis Island immigration center on this day in 1907, the most ever in a single day.

TODAY'S MOON: Between full moon (April 15) and last quarter moon (April 22).

Today is the 106th day of 2014 and the 28th day of spring.

TODAY'S HISTORY: In 1917, Vladimir Lenin returned to Russia in a sealed train after years in exile.

In 1943, Swiss chemist Albert Hoffman discovered the hallucinogenic effects of LSD.

In 1947, a fertilizer explosion during the loading of the freighter Grandcamp at a pier in Texas City, Texas, left more than 500 dead.

In 1963, civil rights leader Martin Luther King Jr. penned his famous "Letter from Birmingham City Jail."

In 2007, a gunman killed 32 people and injured 23 in a shooting spree on the Virginia Tech campus in Blacksburg, Va.

TODAY'S BIRTHDAYS: Anatole France (1844-1924), writer; Wilbur Wright (1867-1912), pilot/engineer; Charlie Chaplin (1889-1977), actor/director; Peter Ustinov (1921-2004), actor; Pope Benedict XVI (1927- ); Kareem Abdul-Jabbar (1947- ), basketball player; Bill Belichick (1952- ), football coach; Ellen Barkin (1954- ), actress; Jon Cryer (1965- ), actor; Martin Lawrence (1965- ), actor; Selena (1971-1995), singer-songwriter; Gina Carano (1982- ), model/actress; Jonathan Vilma (1982- ), football player.

TODAY'S FACT: Charlie Chaplin did not use dialogue in his movies until making "The Great Dictator" in 1940, 13 years after the first "talkie" appeared in theaters.

TODAY'S SPORTS: In 2003, Michael Jordan of the Washington Wizards played the final NBA game of his career, a season-ending 107-87 loss to the Philadelphia 76ers.

TODAY'S QUOTE: "All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another." -- Anatole France

TODAY'S NUMBER: 0 -- hits allowed by Cleveland Indians pitcher Bob Feller on this day in 1940. Feller's performance remains the only Opening Day no-hitter in Major League Baseball history.

TODAY'S MOON: Between full moon (April 15) and last quarter moon (April 22).

Today is the 105th day of 2014 and the 27th day of spring.

TODAY'S HISTORY: In 1912, the R.M.S. Titanic sank in the North Atlantic after hitting an iceberg.

In 1924, Rand McNally published its first road atlas.

In 1959, the new Cuban leader, Fidel Castro, arrived in Washington, D.C., for an 11-day tour of the United States.

In 2008, Pope Benedict XVI visited the United States for the first time since becoming the leader of the Roman Catholic Church.

In 2013, two bombs exploded near the finish line at the Boston Marathon, killing three people and injuring 264.

TODAY'S BIRTHDAYS: Leonardo da Vinci (1452-1519), artist/scientist; Henry James (1843-1916), author; A. Philip Randolph (1889-1979), activist; Bessie Smith (1894-1937), blues singer; Elizabeth Montgomery (1933-1995), actress; Michael Kamen (1948-2003), composer; Evelyn Ashford (1957- ), runner; Emma Thompson (1959- ), actress; Arturo Gatti (1972-2009), boxer; Seth Rogen (1982- ), actor; Emma Watson (1990- ), actress.

TODAY'S FACT: After hitting the iceberg, the R.M.S. Titanic stayed partially afloat for 2 hours and 40 minutes before sinking completely beneath the surface.

TODAY'S SPORTS: In 1947, Jackie Robinson took the field with the Brooklyn Dodgers, becoming Major League Baseball's first African-American player.

TODAY'S QUOTE: "Summer afternoon, summer afternoon; to me those have always been the two most beautiful words in the English language." -- Henry James

TODAY'S NUMBER: 24 -- hours after Germany's 1939 invasion of Poland that U.S. stores were completely sold out of Rand McNally maps of Europe.

TODAY'S MOON: Full moon (April 15).