april 12 london, april 5(reuters) - following are some of the major events to have occurred on april 12 since 1900: 1914 - george bernard shaw's play "pygmalion" opened in london with mrs patrick campbell as eliza doolittle and sir herbert tree as professor higgins. 1938 - fedor chaliapin,foremost russian operatic bass singer and one of opera's greatest performers, died. 1945 - franklin d. roosevelt, u.s. president for a record four terms, died in office. vice president harry s. truman took over and completed his term of office. 1954 -bill haley and the comets recorded the song "rock around the clock". it sold an estimated 25 million copies worldwide, at the time the second-biggest-selling single behind bing crosby's "white christmas". 1961 - the soviet union put the first man into space. cosmonaut yuri gagarin was launched in the spacecraft vostok i for a single orbit of the earth in an 108-minute flight. 1980 - liberian president william tolbert was assassinated in a military coup. samuel k. doe was installed as the new head of state. 1981 - joe louis, heavyweight boxing champion, died at 66. he held the world title for a record 12 years and won 68 of his 71 professional fights. 1981 - the world's first re-usablespace shuttle, "columbia", was launched at cape canaveral. 1989- u.s. boxer sugar ray robinson, five-time winner of the world middleweight crown and unbeaten welterweight champion, died. 1994 - the entire rwandan cabinet fled kigali as the radio urged civilians to support the armed forces in repelling advancing rebels. 1996 - kuala lumpur's petronas towers were declared the world's tallest buildings by a committee of experts meeting in the shadow of the previous title-holder, chicago's sears tower. 1997 - albania's king leka i returned home after 58 years in exile.

1999 - Fourteen people were killed when a NATO missile hit a train on a bridge over the Grdelica Ravine in southeast Serbia, during the conflict over Kosovo.

1999 - Boxcar Willie, country singing star, who blended a mellow voice with a rough-hewn hobo persona, died at 67.

2001 - China released all 24 crew of a U.S. spy plane after Washington said it was "very sorry" for the aircraft's entry into Chinese airspace and for the death of a Chinese pilot.