|
|||||||
|
|
|
|||||
|
|
|||||||
|
|||||||
|
|
|
|||||
|
|
|||||||
Today in History ~ February 18
Events1129 - Jerusalem taken by Emperor Frederik II
1503 - Henry Tudor created Prince of Wales (later Henry VIII)
1563 - Huguenot Jean Poltrot de Merde shoots Gen Francois De Guise
1634 - Ferdinand II orders General Albrecht von Wallenstein's execution
1678 - John Bunyan's "Pilgrim's Progress" is published
1688 - Quakers conduct 1st formal protest of slavery in Germantown, Pa
1735 - 1st opera performed in America, "Flora," in Charleston, SC
1745 - Bonnie Prince Charlie's troops occupy Inverness, Scotland
1787 - Austrian emperor Josef II bans children under 8 from labor
1828 - More than 100 vessels destroyed in a storm, Gibraltar
1841 - 1st continuous filibuster in US Senate began, lasting until March 11
1856 - The American Party, also known as the "Know-Nothing Party," nominated its first presidential candidate, former President Millard Fillmore. But, he carried only Maryland and the party soon vanished.
1861 - Jefferson Davis was sworn in as Provisional president of the Confederate States of America, in Montgomery Ala
1861 - King Victor Emmanuel II of Sardinia becomes 1st king of Italy
1865 - Battle of Ft Moultrie, SC occupied by Federals
1865 - Evacuation of Charleston, SC; Sherman's troops burn city
1865 - Union troops force Confederates to abandon Ft Anderson, NC
1876 - Direct telegraph link established between Britain & NZ
1878 - Long simmering tensions in Lincoln County, New Mexico, explode into a bloody shooting war when gunmen murder the English rancher John Tunstall. [H]
1884 - General Charles Gordon arrives in Khartoum to battle the Mahdi and his terrorists
1884 - Police seize all copies of Tolstoy's "What I Believe In"
1885 - Mark Twain's "Adventures of Huckleberry Finn," published
1900 - Battle at Paardeberg, 1,270 British killed/injured
1901 - H Cecil Booth patented a dust removing suction cleaner
1902 - Opera "Hunchback of Notre Dame," premieres in Monte Carlo
1908 - 1st US postage stamps in rolls issued
1913 - French painting "Nude Descending a Staircase" displayed in NYC
1915 - Germany begins a blockade of England
1921 - British troops occupy Dublin
1930 - Pluto, the outermost planet of the solar system, was discovered by astronomer Clyde Tombaugh.
1930 - Cow flown & milked, milk sealed in paper containers & parachuted
1930 - Luigi Pirandello's "Come Tu Mi Vuoi," premieres in Milan
1930 - Richard Rodgers' & Lorenz Hart's "Simple Simon," premieres in NYC
1932 - Japan declares Manchuria Independent
1932 - Sonja Henie wins her 6th straight World Women's figure skating title
1942 - Japanese troop land on Bali
1943 - Augusto Pinochet Ugarte (Chilean gen/dictator) marries Lucia Hiriart
1943 - Munich resistance group "White Rose" captured by Nazis [H]
1947 - Gian Carlo Menotti's opera "Telephone," premieres in NYC
1953 - "Bwana Devil," the 1st 3-D movie, opened in New York
1962 - France & Algerian Moslems negotiate truce to end 7 year war
1964 - Muriel Resnik's "Any Wednesday," premieres in NYC
1968 - 10,000 demonstrators against US in Vietnam War in West Berlin
1968 - British adopts year-round daylight savings time
1969 - PLO attack El-Al plane in Zurich Switzerland
1970 - Chicago 7 defendants found innocent of inciting to riot
1970 - US president Nixon launches "Nixon doctrine"
1972 - Calif Supreme Court abolishes death penalty
1975 - Italy broadens abortion law
1979 - Miniseries "Roots: Next Generations" premieres on ABC TV
1979 - Snow falls in Sahara Desert
1985 - After 18 weeks of testimony, Gen. William Westmoreland dropped a $120 million libel suit against CBS.
1980 - Pierre Elliott Trudeau's Liberal Party wins Canada's elections
1988 - Anthony M Kennedy, sworn in as Supreme Court Justice
1991 - One person was killed and 40 more injured when the IRA bombed two railroad stations in central London.
1992 - In the New Hampshire primary, Pat Buchanan cut deeply into President Bush's margin of victory on the Republican side; Paul Tsongas was the Democratic winner.
1993 - A ferry carrying more than 800 people capsized off Haiti's western coast, killing at least 150 people and leaving several hundred more missing and presumed drowned.
1993 - A plane used by missionaries with 13 people aboard was commandeered at gunpoint in Haiti and flown to Miami, where the alleged hijacker surrendered.
1993 - Euthanasia advocate "Dr. Death" Jack Kevorkian assisted in the suicides of two cancer patients, just three days after he helped a suburban Detroit man take his own life.
1994 - U.S. skater Dan Jansen ended his Olympic drought with a win in the men's 1,000-meter speed-skating event at the 17th Olympic Winter Games in Norway.
1995 - Myrlie Evers-Williams, widow of assassinated civil rights leader Medgar Evers, was elected chairwoman of the NAACP.
1996 - A second IRA bomb exploded, on a bus in London, killing one and injuring nine.
2001 - 25-year veteran of the FBI, Robert Hanssen, was arrested at a park near his suburban Washington home and charged with spying for the Russians.
Birthdays Today
1404 - Leon B Alberti, Italian humanist/architect (Della Pittura)
1516 - Mary I Tudor, [Bloody Mary], Greenwich, queen of England (1553-58)
1632 - Giovanni Battista Vitali, composer
1745 - Count Alessandro Giuseppe Antonio Anastasio Volta, inventor (battery)
1795 - George Peabody, South Danvers, Mass, merchant/philanthropist
1805 - Louis Malesherbes Goldsborough, Rear Admiral (Union Navy)
1817 - Lewis Addison Armistead, Brig General (Confederate Army), died in 1863 on final day of Gettysburg battle
1817 - Walter Page Lane, Brig General (Confederate Army), dies in 1892
1836 - Swami Ramakrishna [Gadadhar Chatterji], Indian mystic/hindu leader
1848 - Louis Comfort Tiffany, glassmaker (stained glass windows)
1857 - Max Klinger, German graphic artist/painter/sculptor
1859 - Sholem Aleichem, [Solomon Rabinowitz], author (Fiddler on the Roof)
1882 - Wendell Wilkie (lawyer, politician: U.S. presidential nominee: Republican Party [1940]; author: One World)
1887 - Nikos Kasandsakis, writer
1890 - Boris L Pasternak, Russian poet/writer (Dr Zhivago)
1894 - Andres Segovia, guitarist, Linares, Spain
1895 - Semjon Timoshenko, Russ marshal/inspector-general (WW II)
1896 - Andre Breton, France, surrealist poet/writer (founder of surrealism)
1898 - Enzo Ferrari, racing car manufacturer, Modena
1907 - Billy deWolfe (William Jones) (actor: The Perils of Pauline, Lullaby of Broadway, Tea for Two)
1913 - Artur Axmann, Nazi youth leader
1920 - Bill Cullen (TV host: I've Got a Secret, The Price is Right, The Joker's Wild, Name that Tune)
1920 - Jack Palance (Vladimir Palahnuik) (Oscar-winning Best Supporting actor: City Slickers; Requiem for a Heavyweight, Batman, Cyborg 2, Cops and Robbersons, Shane)
1922 - Helen Gurley Brown (feminist; publisher: Cosmopolitan; author: Sex and the Office)
1925 - George Kennedy (Oscar winning Best Supporting actor: Cool Hand Luke [1967]; The Blue Knight, Earthquake!, Naked Gun, Airplane, Dallas, Delta Force, The Dirty Dozen)
1928 - Jim McElreath (auto racer)
1929 - Leonard Cyril Deighton, English author (Ipcress File, Fighter)
1931 - Toni Morrison, Ohio, novelist (Tar Baby, Beloved, Song of Solomon)
1932 - Milos Forman, Czech/US director (Cuckoos Nest, Amadeus)
1933 - Yoko Ono Lennon (singer: Walking on Thin Ice; artist; John Lennon's widow)
1934 - Aldo Ceccato, Milan Italy, conductor (Detroit Symph Orch 1973-77)
1939 - Dal (Dallan) Maxvill (baseball)
1945 - Judy Rankin (Torluemke) (golf champion: Nabisco Dinah Shore [1976], Du Maurier Classic [1977])
1949 - Jerry Morales (baseball)
1950 - Bruce Kison (baseball)
1950 - Cybill Shepherd (actress: Cybill, Moonlighting, The Last Picture Show, The Long Hot Summer)
1950 - John Mayberry (baseball: Los Angeles Dodgers catcher)
1951 - Dick Stockton (tennis)
1953 - Robbie Bachman (drummer: group: Bachman-Turner Overdrive: Let It Ride, Takin' Care of Business, You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet, Roll on Down the Highway)
1954 - John Travolta (actor: Welcome Back Kotter, Saturday Night Fever, Grease, Urban Cowboy, Pulp Fiction, Get Shorty, Broken Arrow)
1954 - Marty Howe (hockey)
Famous deaths
0999 - Gregory V, [Bruno] 1st German Pope, dies
1217 - Alexander Neckum de Sancto Albano, Engl encyclopedist, dies at 59
1455 - Fra Angelico, Italian monk/painter, dies
1478 - George, Duke of Clarence, forced drowning in a wine barrel ("A butt of Malmsey")
1546 - Rev. Dr. Martin Luther, biblical scholar/religious reformer, dies at 62
1564 - Michelangelo Buonarroti, Italian sculptor/painter (David), dies at 88
1587 - Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots (1560-87), beheaded at 44
1878 - John Tunstall, rancher in Lincoln County, New Mexico, murdered.
1956 - Gustave Charpentier, French opera composer (Louise), dies at 95
1967 - J. Robert Oppenheimer, the "father of the atomic bomb," died in Princeton, N.J., at the age of 62.
1973 - Frank Costello, US gangster, dies at 82
1982 - Edith Ngaio Marsh, NZ detective writer/producer, dies at 82
1998 - Bob Merrill, songwriter (Funny Girl), commits suicide at 76
2001 - Dale Earnhardt Sr., stock-car racing's top driver, was killed in a crash in the final turn of the final lap of the Daytona 500. He was 49.
If you have other Birthdays or events to add for this day please E-mail me
Yesterday Tomorrow
