April 26, 1981 (Sunday)
- The first successful fetal surgery was performed by Dr. Michael R. Harrison at the University of California at San Francisco hospital. The patient was born at the UCSF Hospital two weeks later, on May 10, 1981, and named Michael.
- French presidential election: With ten candidates on the ballot for the President of France, no office-seeker had a majority. The top two finishers, incumbent President Valéry Giscard d'Estaing and Socialist challenger François Mitterrand. won 28.3% and 25.8% of the vote respectively, and qualified for the May 10 election. Paris Mayor Jacques Chirac (17.9%) and Communist Party leader Georges Marchais (15.3%) were the next highest vote getters. The other candidates were Huguette Bouchardeau, Michel Crepeau, Michel Debre, Marie-France Garaud, Arlette Laguiller and Brice Lalonde.
- The first nationwide voting in Vietnam, since the 1976 forced unification of the North and South republics, was conducted for the National Assembly. Although all of the candidates had been chosen by the Communist Party's "Fatherland Front", there were 614 candidates for the 496 seats.
- Died: Jim Davis, 71, American TV actor who had been portraying Jock Ewing on Dallas
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Famous quotes containing the word april:
“Such comfort as do lusty young men feel
When well-apparelled April on the heel
Of limping winter treads.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)