Wikipedia:Selected anniversaries/March 31
This is a list of selected March 31 anniversaries that appear in the "On this day" section of the Main Page. To suggest a new item, in most cases, you can be bold and edit this page. Please read the selected anniversaries guidelines before making your edit. However, if your addition might be controversial or on a day that is or will soon be on the Main Page, please post your suggestion on the talk page instead.
Please note that the events listed on the Main Page are chosen based more on relative article quality and to maintain a mix of topics, not based solely on how important or significant their subjects are. Only four to five events are posted at a time and thus not everything that is "most important and significant" can be listed. In addition, an event is generally not posted this year if it is also the subject of the scheduled featured article, featured list or picture of the day.
To report an error when this appears on the Main Page, see Main Page errors. Please remember that this list defers to the supporting articles, so it is best to achieve consensus and make any necessary changes there first.
March 31: César Chávez Day in various U.S. states; Freedom Day in Malta
- 1778 – English explorer James Cook landed on Vancouver Island and claimed it for Great Britain.
- 1854 – Commodore Matthew C. Perry of the U.S. Navy signed the Treaty of Kanagawa, forcing the opening of Japanese ports to American trade.
- 1903 – New Zealand inventor Richard Pearse reportedly flew in one of the first powered flying machines (replica pictured) for a distance of several hundred metres, about nine months before the Wright brothers flew their Wright Flyer.
- 1917 – The Danish West Indies became the U.S. Virgin Islands after the United States paid Denmark US$25 million for the Caribbean islands.
- 1995 – American singer Selena, known as "The Queen of Tejano music", was shot and killed in Corpus Christi, Texas, by the president of her fan club, Yolanda Saldívar.
- 2004 – Iraq War: Iraqi insurgents in Fallujah ambushed a convoy containing four American contractors from the private security company Blackwater USA.