Apr. 22. 1500: Portugese sailors find westward progress obstructed by Brazil. Centuries of genocide, with the survivors forced to use an obscure and pointless language, follow. Why can't they speak Spanish like the rest of us? 1526: First American slave revolt. 1944: Sit-in by 200 blacks results in desegregation of restaurants in Washington, D.C. 1970: First observance of Earth Day (tm). 1970: Foreshadowing Grenada in 1983, U.S. sends war ships to Caribbean island of Trinidad to "protect American citizens" during unrest against the U.S.-backed government. 1996: ETS! readers & all-around wonderful people Tom & Donna Howard-Hastings cut down three of the poles supporting the U.S. Navy's nuclear submarine radio "trigger" at Clam Lake, Wisconsin, leaving the Navy unable to launch a first strike for days.

Apr. 23: 1993: Death of Cesar Chavez.

Apr. 24. 1916: Easter Monday declaration of Irish independence from Britain. 1954: Birth of political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal, still on death row in Pennsylvania. 1965: 20,000 U.S. Marines invade Dominican Republic.

Apr. 25. 1968: 80 Olympic Community College students are arrested at an anti-war protest on their Bremerton, Wash. campus. 1969: The Rev. Ralph Abernathy and 100 others are arrested while picketing a Charleston, SC hospital to support unionization. 1983: 175 women arrested for marching to mourn the rape of women in war, Sydney & Melbourne, Australia. 1993: Over one million join Washington, D.C. march for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and (despite organizer wishes) transgender rights.

Apr. 26: 1937: Guernica, Spain, is destroyed by German Nazi bombing in support of Franco's troops, Spanish Civil War. 1986: Worst known nuclear disaster in history, Chernobyl, Ukraine. Explosion kills at least 200 and irradiates much of Eastern Europe and Scandanavia; subsequent death toll from radiation exposure is estimated in the hundreds of thousands.

Apr. 27. 1521: Philippines natives, alarmed at what might happen if they are "discovered," ambush and kill European explorer Ferdinand Magellan. 1977: Soweto protest starts demonstration against South African educational system. 1987: CIA headquarters in Langley, VA blockaded by protestors of U.S. policies in Central America and southern Africa. 700 arrested. 1994: In South Africa's first all-race elections, Nelson Mandela and the African National Congress are swept into office. 1996: 27 arrested at Watts Bar nuclear power plant, Spring City, Tennessee.

Apr. 28: 1953: After overthrow of democratically elected government, CIA installs Shah of Iran, beginning a 25-year dictatorship there. 1987: Benjamin Linder, a volunteer engineer from Seattle working on a hydroelectric project in rural Nicaragua, is murdered by U.S.-sponsored Contras (characterized accurately by then-Pres. Reagan as "the moral equivalent of our founding fathers").