Births on April 23

Granville Woods

Born on April 23, 1856

Granville Woods, American inventor and engineer (d. 1910)

Granville Tailer Woods (April 23, 1856 – January 30, 1910) was an inventor who held more than 50 patents in the U.S. He was the first African American mechanical and electrical engineer after the Civil War. Self-taught, he concentrated most of his work on trains and streetcars. One of his notable inventions was a device he called the Synchronous Multiplex Railway Telegraph, a variation of induction telegraph which relied on ambient static electricity from existing telegraph lines to send messages between train stations and moving trains. His work assured a safer and better public transportation system for the cities of the United States.

References

Granville Woods

Choose Another Date

Events on 1856

11 Feb

Wajid Ali Shah
The Kingdom of Awadh is annexed by the British East India Company and Wajid Ali Shah, the king of Awadh, is imprisoned and later exiled to Calcutta.
1 May

Isabela II
The Province of Isabela was created in the Philippines in honor of Queen Isabela II.
22 May

Preston Brooks
Congressman Preston Brooks of South Carolina severely beats Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts with a cane in the hall of the United States Senate for a speech Sumner had made regarding Southerners and slavery.
8 Jun

HMS Bounty
A group of 194 Pitcairn Islanders, descendants of the mutineers of HMS Bounty, arrives at Norfolk Island, commencing the Third Settlement of the Island.
17 Nov

Gadsden Purchase
American Old West: On the Sonoita River in present-day southern Arizona, the United States Army establishes Fort Buchanan in order to help control new land acquired in the Gadsden Purchase.

Births on April 23

Granville Woods

Born on April 23, 1856

References

Choose Another Date

Events on 1856

Wajid Ali Shah

Isabela II

Preston Brooks

HMS Bounty

Gadsden Purchase