On this day: February 15

Holidays

United States: Susan B. Anthony Day.

United States: USS Maine Memorial Day.

Canada: Flag Day

Events

1758 - The first mustard, made by Benjamin Franklin, went on sale in America.

1804 - New Jersey became the last northern state to abolish slavery.

1842 - In New York City, adhesive postage stamps were used for the first time.

1879 - President Rutherford Hayes signed a bill allowing female attorneys to argue cases before the Supreme Court.

1898 - The USS Maine, sent to Cuba on a friendly visit, exploded and sank in Havana harbor, killing 260 crew members. The origin of the explosion is unknown. This incident led to the Spanish-American War.

1933 - An assassin aiming at President-elect Franklin D. Roosevelt had his aim deflected and instead killed Anton J. Cermak, mayor of Chicago.

1942 - British forces in Singapore surrendered to Japanese, after their worst defeat of World War II.

1965 - The new Canadian Maple Leaf national flag was raised above Parliament Hill in Ottawa.

1969 - R. G. Edwards of the Cambridge Physiological Laboratory, Cambridge, England, made the first in vitro fertilization of human egg cells.

1971 - Great Britain and Ireland switched to decimal-based currency.

1978 - Boxer Leon Spinks defeated Muhammad Ali to win the heavyweight boxing crown.

2004 - Dale Earnhardt Jr. wins the Daytona 500 six years to the day after his father won his only Daytona 500.

2005 - YouTube, a popular video-sharing Web site, is started.

Births

1564 - Galileo Galilei, Italian astronomer.

1797 - Henry Steinway, American piano maker.

1820 - Susan B. Anthony, American suffragist.

1929 - Graham Hill, British two-time Formula One World Champion.

1935 - Roger Chaffee, a U.S. Navy pilot who became an American astronaut in the Apollo program.

1951 - Jane Seymour, an English actress

1954 - Matt Groening, American cartoonist; Simpsons creator.

1964 - Chris Farley, American actor and comedian.

On This Day: February 14

Holidays Happy St. Valentine's Day! Bulgaria: Viticulturists' Day / Trifon Zarezan. International Book Giving Day Events 1849 - The first photograph of a U.S. President, James Polk, was taken by Matthew Brady, in New York City. 1859 - Oregon was admitted to the Union as the 33rd state. 1870 - Esther Morris became the world's first female justice of the peace. 1876 - Rival inventors Elisha Gray and Alexander Graham Bell both applied for patents for the telephone. 1899 - President William McKinley signed legislation authorizing states to use voting machines for federal elections. 1912 - Arizona became the 48th state of the Union. 1912 - The first diesel engine submarine was commissioned, in Groton, Connecticut. 1920 - The League of Women Voters was founded in Chicago; its first president was Maude Wood Park. 1924 - Thomas Watson founded International Business Machines Corporation (IBM). 1929 - The St. Valentine's Day Massacre took place in a Chicago garage when Al Capone's employees gunned down seven members of the George "Bugs" Moran North Siders gang. 1945 - Peru, Paraguay, Chile, and Ecuador joined the United Nations. 1946 - The world's first all-electronic computer was unveiled at the University of Pennsylvania, ENIAC. 1966 - Rick Mount of Lebanon, Indiana became the first high school male athlete to be pictured on the cover of "Sports Illustrated." 2003 - Dolly the sheep, the first cloned mammal, was euthanized by veterinarians after being found to be suffering from progressive lung disease. Births 1819 - Christopher Sholes, American, typewriter inventor. 1847 - Anna Howard Shaw, American, influential leader of the women's suffrage movement. 1859 - George Ferris, American engineer, inventor of the Ferris wheel. 1894 - Jack Benny (Benjamin Kubelsky), American comedian of vaudeville, radio, and television. 1913 - Jimmy Hoffa, American labor leader. 1921 - Hugh Downs, American TV host. 1948 - Teller, (born Raymond Joseph Teller), American magician, best known as the smaller, silent half of the comedy magic duo Penn & Teller.

On This Day: February 13

 

Fact of the Day: potato chips

Potato chips were invented in 1853 at Saratoga Springs, New York, where chef George Crum of Moon's Lake House shaved potatoes paper thin and sent them out to a patron who had complained that his French fries were too thick. The customers were delighted, ordered more, and encouraged Crum to open up his own restaurant. Crum's new restaurant had people standing in line to get potato chips. Wise potato chips were introduced in 1921 by grocer Earl V. Wise as a way of dealing with overstocked and old potatoes. He sold them in brown paper bags the then in cellophane starting in the 1930s.

Events

1633 - Galileo was detained by the Italian Inquisition in Rome.

1635 - The oldest public school in the United States, the Boston Public Latin School, was founded.

1689 - Following the Glorious Revolution in Britain, Mary II, the daughter of the deposed king, James II, and William III prince of Orange, her husband, were proclaimed joint sovereigns.

1741 - "The American Magazine" was published in Philadelphia, and became the first U.S. magazine, beating Benjamin Franklin's "General Magazine" off the presses by three days.

1795 - The first U.S. state university opened, the University of North Carolina.

1914 - The American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers (ASCAP) was founded.

1920 - The League of Nations recognized the perpetual neutrality of Switzerland.

1945 - Allied planes began the controversial and devastating bombing the German city of Dresden.

1974 - Russian novelist Alexander Solzhenitsyn was expelled from the USSR.

2001 - A 6.6 magnitude earthquake hit El Salvador, killing at least 402 people just one month after another quake killed more than 800 people.

Births

1728 - John Hunter, English surgeon and founder of pathological anatomy

1849 - Lord Randolph Churchill, English politician and father of Winston Churchill

1891  - Grant Wood, American painter

1910 - William Shockley, American Nobel Prize-winning physicist whose work led to the miniaturization of radio, TV, and computer circuits.

1950 - Peter Gabriel, English musician.

1956 - Princess Alia bint Al Hussein, Jordanian Royal Family member.

1974 - Robbie Williams, an English singer-songwriter and occasional actor.

1979 - Mena Suvari, an American actress, fashion designer, and model.

On this day: February 7

On this day: February 7

Events

1795 - The 11th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified.

1818 - "Academician" began publication in New York City.

1877 - The first Guernsey Cattle Club was organized in New York City.

1882 - The last bareknuckle fight for the heavyweight boxing championship took place in Mississippi City.

1893 - Elisha Gray patented a machine called the telautograph. It automatically signed autographs to documents.

1913 - The Turks lost 5,000 men in a battle with the Bulgarian army in Gallipoli.

1922 - DeWitt and Lila Acheson Wallace offered 5,000 copies of "Reader's Digest" magazine for the first time.

1931 - The American opera, "Peter Ibbetson," by Deems Taylor premiered in New York City.

1936 - The U.S. Vice President’s flag was established by executive order.

1940 - "Pinocchio" world premiered at the Center Theatre in Manhattan.

1941 - The Tommy Dorsey Orchestra and Frank Sinatra recorded "Everything Happens to Me".

1943 - The U.S. government announced that shoe rationing would go into effect in two days.

1944 - During World War II, the Germans launched a counteroffensive at Anzio, Italy.

1959 - The play, "The Rivalry," opened in New York City.

1962 - The U.S. government banned all Cuban imports and re-export of U.S. products to Cuba from other countries.

1966 - "Crawdaddy" magazine was published by Paul Williams for the first time.

1974 - The nation of Grenada gained independence from Britain.

1977 - Russia launched Soyuz 24.

1984 - Space shuttle astronauts Bruce McCandless II and Robert L. Stewart made the first untethered space walk.

1985 - "Sports Illustrated" released its annual swimsuit edition. It was the largest regular edition in the magazine’s history at 218 pages.

1985 - "New York, New York" became the official anthem of the Big Apple.

1986 - Haitian President-for-Life Jean-Claude Duvalier fled his country. 28 years of family rule ended.

1991 - The Rev. Jean-Bertrand Aristide was sworn in as Haiti's first democratically elected president.

1999 - King Hussein of Jordan died. His son was sworn in as king four hours after the announcement that his father had died.

2000 - California's legislature declared that February 13 would be "Charels M. Schulz Day."

2001 - Robert Pickett, 47, fired several shots at the White House near the South Lawn. He was subdued after being shot in the knee. No one else was hurt in the incident.

2003 - Nootka Sound, Sandra Bohn was cited for petting a killer whale under the federal Fisheries Act. She was later fined $74.

Births:

1932	Gay Talese, Author
1935	Herb Kohl, U.S. senator, D-Wis.
1952	John Hickenlooper, Governor of Colorado
1955	Miguel Ferrer, Actor
1960	James Spader, Actor ("Boston Legal")
1962	Garth Brooks, Country singer
1962	Eddie Izzard, Actor, comedian
1974	Steve Nash, Basketball player
1985	Tina Majorino, Actress

On this day: February 6

On This Day: February 6

Holidays

New Zealand: Waitangi Day.

Feast day of St. Paul Miki and his Companions, St. Vedast or Vaast, St. Hidegund, St. Amand, Saints Mel and Melchu, and St. Guarinus of Palestrina.

United States: Arbor Day. 

Events

1508 - Maximilian I assumed the title of Holy Roman Emperor.

1693 - College of William and Mary was chartered -- the first college charter -- in Williamsburg, Virginia.

1778 - During the Revolutionary War, representatives from the United States and France signed the Treaty of Amity and Commerce and the Treaty of Alliance in Paris. The Treaty of Amity and Commerce recognized the United States as an independent nation and promoted trade between France and the United States. The Treaty of Alliance created a military alliance against Great Britain, stipulating American independence as a condition of peace.

1788 - Massachusetts became the sixth state to ratify the Constitution of the United States of America.

1952 - Elizabeth II acceded to the British throne upon the death of her father, King George VI. The coronation took place June 2, 1953.

1958 - The Munich air disaster took place when British European Airways Flight 609 crashed on its third attempt to take off from a slush-covered runway at the Munich-Riem Airport in Munich, West Germany.

1959 - The United States successfully test-fired for the first time a Titan intercontinental ballistic missile from Cape Canaveral.

1998 - President Bill Clinton signed a bill changing the name of Washington National Airport to Ronald Reagan Washington National Airport.

2004 - An explosion ripped through a Moscow subway killing 41 people and injuring 129 others in an attack blamed on Chechen separatists. 

Births

1564 - Christopher Marlowe, English poet, dramatist.

1665 - Queen Anne, Queen of England.

1895 - George Herman "Babe" Ruth, American baseball great.

1911 - Ronald Reagan, 40th President of the United States of America (1981-89), actor.

1913 - Mary Douglas Leakey, British archaeologist, paleoanthropologist.

1945 - Bob Marley, Jamaican reggae musician.

1961 - Bill Lester, American NASCAR racer.

1962 - Axl Rose (born William Bruce Rose, Jr.), American musician. 

Deaths

1989 - Chris Gueffroy, the last person killed escaping over the Berlin Wall.

1991 - Danny Thomas (born Amos Alphonsus Muzyad Yakhoob), American nightclub comedian, television and film actor.

1993 - Arthur Ashe, American tennis player.

1994 - Jack Kirby (born Jacob Kurtzberg), American comic book writer and editor.

1998 - Carl Wilson, founding member of Beach Boys rock group.

2007 - Frankie Laine (born Francesco Paolo LoVecchio), American singer.