April 21

April 21 is the 112th day of the year, and the American record for it runs from 1789 to 2014 — a span of 225 years. The entry that anchors it: Spanish–American War, 1898.

The revolutionary generation left its own mark on the date. In 1789, John Adams sworn in as first US Vice President (nine days before George Washington) The same year, the Ladies of Trenton social club hosted a reception for President-elect George Washington as he journeyed to New York City for his first inauguration.

Reconstruction and the years that followed added their own entries. In 1898, Spanish–American War — the United States Navy begins a blockade of Cuban ports. When the U.S. Congress issued a declaration of war on April 25, it declared that a state of war had existed from this date.

After 1945 the date reflects a country operating at global scale. In 1958, United Airlines Flight 736 collided with a U.S. Air Force fighter jet over southern Nevada, resulting in the deaths of all 49 people on board both aircraft. Four years on, in 1962, the Century 21 Exposition, the first world's fair in the United States since World War II, opened in Seattle. Five years on, in 1967, a tornado outbreak in Illinois, United States, kills over 50 and injures over 1,000. Belvidere sustains over 500 casualties as a violent tornado strikes the high school. Another tornado near Chicago causes another 500 casualties, devastating Oak Lawn. Five years on, in 1972, astronauts John Young and Charles Duke fly Apollo 16's Apollo Lunar Module to the Moon's surface, the fifth NASA Apollo Program crewed lunar landing.

The most recent entries fall within living memory. In 2014, the city of Flint, Michigan, U.S., changed its water source to the Flint River, which exposed residents to lead poisoning.a.

The date is also a birthday. Among the Americans born on April 21: Alexander Anderson (1775), Scottish-American illustrator and engraver; John Putnam Chapin (1810), American politician, 10th Mayor of Chicago; Alson Sherman (1811), American merchant and politician, 8th Mayor of Chicago; John Muir (1838), Scottish-American environmentalist and author; and William Stang (1854), German-American bishop.

April 21 is also a date of endings. Among the Americans who died on it: Joseph Winston (1815), American soldier and politician; Mark Twain (1910), American novelist, humorist, and critic; Aldo Leopold (1948), American ecologist and author; and Leslie Banks (1952), American actor, director and producer.

The record for April 21 runs 225 years deep across 8 entries. Read in sequence, the date stops being a coincidence and starts being a through-line.