Today in History, 4/17

1397: Geoffrey Chaucer tells the Canterbury Tales for the first time at the court of Richard II.
1492: Spain and Christopher Columbus sign a contract for him to sail to Asia to get spices.
1521: Martin Luther speaks to the assembly at the Diet of Worms and refuses to recant his teachings.
1524: Giovanni de Verrazano reaches New York Harbor.
1837: J.P. Morgan, financeer and Gong Show panelist is born.
1861: Virginia secedes from the Union.
1894: Nikita Khrushchev is born.1896: Senor Wences is born.

1897: Thornton Wilder is born. He wrote Our Town, which generations of high school students had had inflicted on them. Who knew the dead were so whiny?1905: Arthur Lake is born. He played Dagwood Bumstead in the old Blondie movies.
1907: Ellis Island immigration center processes a record 11,747 people in one day.
1918: William Holden is born.1924: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios is formed from a merger of Metro Pictures, Goldwyn Pictures and the Louis B. Mayer Company.
1937: Daffy Duck makes his debut in the short Porky's Duck Hunt.

1945: In Stassfurt, Germany, US Lt. Colonel Boris T. Pash seizes a lot of uranium to prevent it from falling into Soviet hands. Wikipedia says a 1000 pounds and The History Channel says 1,000 tons, so I guess it's somewhere in between. In any event, it was a lot.
1948: Jan Hammer is born. He did the theme to Miami Vice.
1951: Olivia Hussey is born. She played Juliet in the Zeffirelli version of Romeo & Juliet and also played the wicked queen in the MST3K episode Quest of the Delta Knights.1951: Mickey Mantle makes his major league debut with the New York Yankees.1961: A group of CIA trained Cuban refugees lands in Cuba to attempt to overthrow Castro, kicking off the Bay of Pigs fiasco.
1963: Joel Murray is born. He is Bill and Brian Doyle's brother and he played the milk man to whom Julie Brown says, "Leave me alone, milk man scum!" in the classic Shakes the Clown.
1964: The Ford Motor Company unveils the Mustang at the New York World's Fair.
1969: Sirhan Sirhan is found guilty of assassinating Robert Kennedy.1970: Apollo 13 returns to Earth safely.
1972: Jennifer Garner is born. She was in the terrible Daredevil/Electra movies.1973: Federal Express delivers its first package.
1975: The Cambodian Civil War ends when the Khmer Rouge captures Phnomh Penh and the Cambodian government surrenders.

Today in History elements mostly cribbed from The History Channel, Wikipedia, The New York Times, The Jewish World Review, The Writer's Almanac and anything else I can dig up.