Event-a-Day

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1649 – The Second Battle of Guararapes takes place, effectively ending Dutch colonization efforts in Brazil.

1674 – England and the Netherlands sign the Treaty of Westminster, ending the Third Anglo-Dutch War. A provision of the agreement transfers the Dutch colony of New Amsterdam to England, and it is renamed New York.

1726 – The Supreme Privy Council is established in Russia.

1807 – Former Vice President of the United States Aaron Burr is arrested for treason in Wakefield, Alabama and confined to Fort Stoddert.

1819 – British explorer William Smith discovers the South Shetland Islands and claims them in the name of King George III.

1847 – The first group of rescuers reaches the Donner Party.

1859 – Daniel E. Sickles, a New York Congressman, is acquitted of murder on grounds of temporary insanity. This is the first time this defense is successfully used in the United States.

1878 – Thomas Edison patents the phonograph.

1942 – World War II: United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs executive order 9066, allowing the United States military to relocate Japanese Americans to internment camps.

1945 – World War II: Battle of Iwo Jima: About 30,000 United States Marines land on the island of Iwo Jima.

1976 – Executive Order 9066, which led to the relocation of Japanese Americans to internment camps, is rescinded by President Gerald Ford's Proclamation 4417.

2002 – NASA's Mars Odyssey space probe begins to map the surface of Mars using its thermal emission imaging system.

1547 – Edward VI of England is crowned King of England at Westminster Abbey.

1798 – Louis-Alexandre Berthier removes Pope Pius VI from power.

1810 – Andreas Hofer, Tirolean patriot and leader of rebellion against Napoleon's forces, is executed.

1872 – The Metropolitan Museum of Art opens in New York City.

1931 – The Congress of the United States approves the construction of the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge by the state of California.

1933 – The Congress of the United States proposes the Twenty-first Amendment to the United States Constitution that will end Prohibition in the United States. Adolf Hitler secretly meets with German industrialists to arrange for financing
of the Nazi Party's upcoming election campaign.

1935 – Caroline Mikkelsen becomes the first woman to set foot in Antarctica.

1942 – Lieutenant Edward O'Hare becomes America's first World War II flying ace.

1943 – American movie studio executives agree to allow the Office of War Information to censor movies. The Saturday Evening Post publishes the first of Norman Rockwell's Four Freedoms in support of United States President Franklin Roosevelt's 1941 State of the Union address theme of Four Freedoms.

1956 – The United States Merchant Marine Academy becomes a permanent Service Academy.

1962 – Mercury program: While aboard Friendship 7, John Glenn becomes the first American to orbit the earth, making three orbits in four hours, 55 minutes.

1965 – Ranger 8 crashes into the Moon after a successful mission of photographing possible landing sites for the Apollo program astronauts.

1986 – The Soviet Union launches its Mir spacecraft. Remaining in orbit for 15 years, it is occupied for ten of those years.

1437 – James I of Scotland is assassinated.

1808 – Without a previous declaration of war, Russian troops cross the border to Sweden at Abborfors in eastern Finland, thus beginning the Finnish War, in which Sweden will lose the eastern half of the country (i.e. Finland) to Russia.

1874 – The Oakland Daily Tribune publishes its first edition.

1878 – The first telephone directory is issued in New Haven, Connecticut.

1885 – The newly completed Washington Monument is dedicated.

1896 – An Englishman raised in Australia, Bob Fitzsimmons, fought an Irishman, Peter Maher, in an American promoted event which technically took place in Mexico, winning the 1896 World Heavyweight Championship in boxing.

1918 – The last Carolina parakeet dies in captivity at the Cincinnati Zoo.

1919 – German socialist Kurt Eisner is assassinated. His death results in the establishment of the Bavarian Soviet Republic and parliament and government fleeing Munich, Germany.

1925 – The New Yorker publishes its first issue.

1937 – The League of Nations bans foreign national "volunteers" in the Spanish Civil War.

1945 – World War II: During the Battle of Iwo Jima, Japanese kamikaze planes sink the escort carrier USS Bismarck Sea and damage the USS Saratoga.

1947 – In New York City, Edwin Land demonstrates the first "instant camera", the Polaroid Land Camera, to a meeting of the Optical Society of America.

1948 – NASCAR is incorporated.

1952 – The British government, under Winston Churchill, abolishes identity cards in the UK to "set the people free".

1965 – Malcolm X is assassinated at the Audubon Ballroom in New York City.

1972 – United States President Richard Nixon visits the People's Republic of China to normalize Sino-American relations. The Soviet unmanned spaceship Luna 20 lands on the Moon.

1975 – Watergate scandal: Former United States Attorney General John N. Mitchell and former White House aides H. R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman are sentenced to prison.

1995 – Steve Fossett lands in Leader, Saskatchewan, Canada becoming the first person to make a solo flight across the Pacific Ocean in a balloon.

February 22:

1371 – Robert II becomes King of Scotland, beginning the Stuart dynasty.
1495 – King Charles VIII of France enters Naples to claim the city's throne.

1797 – The last Invasion of Britain begins near Fishguard, Wales.

1819 – By the Adams–Onís Treaty, Spain sells Florida to the United States for five million U.S. dollars.

1821 – Greek War of Independence: Alexander Ypsilantis crosses the Prut river at Sculeni into the Danubian Principalities.

1847 – Mexican–American War: The Battle of Buena Vista: Five thousand American troops defeat 15,000 Mexicans troops.

1848 – The French Revolution of 1848, which would lead to the establishment of the French Second Republic, begins.

1862 – Jefferson Davis is officially inaugurated for a six-year term as the President of the Confederate States of America in Richmond, Virginia. He was previously inaugurated as a provisional president on February 18, 1861.

1872 – The Prohibition Party holds its first national convention in Columbus, Ohio, nominating James Black as its presidential nominee.

1980 – Miracle on Ice: In Lake Placid, New York, the United States hockey team defeats the Soviet Union hockey team 4–3.

February 23:

1778 – American Revolutionary War: Baron von Steuben arrives at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania to help to train the Continental Army.

1870 – Reconstruction Era: Post-U.S. Civil War military control of Mississippi ends and it is readmitted to the Union.

1927 – U.S. President Calvin Coolidge signs a bill by Congress establishing the Federal Radio Commission (later replaced by the Federal Communications Commission) which was to regulate the use of radio frequencies in the United States.

1945 – World War II: During the Battle of Iwo Jima, a group of United States Marines and a U.S. Navy hospital corpsman reach the top of Mount Suribachi on the island and are photographed raising the American flag.

1863 – Arizona is organized as a United States territory.

1868 – Andrew Johnson becomes the first President of the United States to be impeached by the United States House of Representatives. He is later acquitted in the Senate by one vote.

1917 – World War I: The U.S. ambassador Walter Hines Page to the United Kingdom is given the Zimmermann Telegram, in which Germany pledges to ensure the return of New Mexico, Texas, and Arizona to Mexico if Mexico declares war on the United States.

1920 – The Nazi Party is founded. Nancy Astor became the first woman to speak in the House of Commons of the United Kingdom following her election as a Member of Parliament (MP) three months earlier.

1942 – The Battle of Los Angeles: A false alarm led to an anti-aircraft barrage that lasted into the early hours of February 25.

1968 – Vietnam War: The Tet Offensive is halted; South Vietnam recaptures Hué.

1980 – The United States Olympic hockey team completes its Miracle on Ice by defeating Finland 4–2 to win the gold medal.

1983 – A special commission of the United States Congress condemns the Japanese American internment during World War II.

1984 – Tyrone Mitchell perpetrates the 49th Street Elementary School shooting in Los Angeles, killing two children and injuring 12 more.

2007 – Japan launches its fourth spy satellite, stepping up its ability to monitor potential threats such as North Korea.

2008 – Fidel Castro retires as the President of Cuba and the Council of Ministers after 32 years. He remains as head of the Communist Party for another 3 years.

1797 – Colonel William Tate and his force of 1000–1500 soldiers surrender after the Last invasion of Britain.

1870 – Hiram Rhodes Revels, a Republican from Mississippi, is sworn into the United States Senate, becoming the first African American ever to sit in the U.S. Congress.

1901 – J. P. Morgan incorporates the United States Steel Corporation.

1919 – Oregon places a one cent per U.S. gallon tax on gasoline, becoming the first U.S. state to levy a gasoline tax.

1928 – Charles Jenkins Laboratories of Washington, D.C. becomes the first holder of a broadcast license for television from the Federal Radio Commission.

1932 – Adolf Hitler obtains German citizenship by naturalization, which allows him to run in the 1932 election for Reichspräsident.

1933 – The USS Ranger is launched. It is the first US Navy ship to be designed from the start of construction as an aircraft carrier.

1945 – World War II: After remaining neutral for most of the war, Turkey declares war on Germany.

1947 – The formal abolition of Prussia is proclaimed by the Allied Control Council. The Prussian government had already been abolished in 1934 by the Law for the Reconstruction of the Reich.

1951 – The first Pan American Games were officially opened in Buenos Aires, Argentina by President Juan Perón.

1956 – In his speech On the Cult of Personality and Its Consequences, Nikita Khrushchev, leader of the Soviet Union denounces the cult of personality of Joseph Stalin.

1616 – Galileo Galilei is formally banned by the Roman Catholic Church from teaching or defending the view that the earth orbits the sun.

1815 – Napoleon Bonaparte escapes from Elba.

1876 – Japan and Korea sign a treaty granting Japanese citizens extraterritoriality rights, opening three ports to Japanese trade, and ending Korea's status as a tributary state of Qing dynasty China.

1909 – Kinemacolor, the first successful color motion picture process, is first shown to the general public at the Palace Theatre in London.

1914 – HMHS Britannic, sister to the RMS Titanic, is launched at Harland and Wolff shipyard in Belfast.

1919 – President Woodrow Wilson signs an act of Congress establishing the Grand Canyon National Park.

1929 – President Calvin Coolidge signs an executive order establishing the 96,000 acre Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming.

1935 – Adolf Hitler orders the Luftwaffe to be re-formed, violating the provisions of the Treaty of Versailles.

1966 – Apollo program: Launch of AS-201, the first flight of the Saturn IB rocket.

1980 – Egypt and Israel establish full diplomatic relations.

1560 – The Treaty of Berwick, which would expel the French from Scotland, is signed by England and the Lords of the Congregation of Scotland.

1594 – Henry IV is crowned King of France.

1617 – Sweden and Russia sign the Treaty of Stolbovo, ending the Ingrian War and shutting Russia out of the Baltic Sea.

1782 – American Revolutionary War: The House of Commons of Great Britain votes against further war in America.

1801 – Pursuant to the District of Columbia Organic Act of 1801, Washington, D.C. is placed under the jurisdiction of the U.S. Congress.

1860 – Abraham Lincoln makes a speech at Cooper Union in the city of New York that is largely responsible for his election to the Presidency.

1870 – The current flag of Japan is first adopted as the national flag for Japanese merchant ships.

1922 – A challenge to the Nineteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, allowing women the right to vote, is rebuffed by the Supreme Court of the United States in Leser v. Garnett.

1933 – Reichstag fire: Germany's parliament building in Berlin, the Reichstag, is set on fire; Marinus van der Lubbe, a young Dutch Communist claims responsibility. The Nazis used the fire to solidify their power and eliminate the communists as political rivals.

1951 – The Twenty-second Amendment to the United States Constitution, limiting Presidents to two terms, is ratified.

1964 – The Government of Italy asks for help to keep the Leaning Tower of Pisa from toppling over.

2007 – The Chinese Correction: The Shanghai Stock Exchange falls 9%, the largest drop in ten years.

February 28:

1827 – The Baltimore and Ohio Railroad is incorporated, becoming the first railroad in America offering commercial transportation of both people and freight.

1940 – Basketball is televised for the first time (Fordham University vs. the University of Pittsburgh in Madison Square Garden).

1954 – The first color television sets using the NTSC standard are offered for sale to the general public.

1959 – Discoverer 1, an American spy satellite that is the first object intended to achieve a polar orbit, is launched but fails to achieve orbit.

1983 – The final episode of M*A*S*H airs, with almost 106 million viewers. It still holds the record for the highest viewership of a season finale.

1991 – The first Gulf War ends.

February 29:

1504 – Christopher Columbus uses his knowledge of a lunar eclipse that night to convince Native Americans to provide him with supplies.

1712 – February 29 is followed by February 30 in Sweden, in a move to abolish the Swedish calendar for a return to the Julian calendar.

1940 – For her performance as "Mammy" in Gone with the Wind, Hattie McDaniel becomes the first African American to win an Academy Award.

1980 – Gordie Howe of the then Hartford Whalers makes NHL history as he scores his 800th goal.

1988 – Svend Robinson becomes the first member of the Canadian House of Commons to come out as gay.

1562 – Sixty-three Huguenots are massacred in Wassy, France, marking the start of the French Wars of Religion.

1565 – The city of Rio de Janeiro is founded.

1628 – Writs issued in February by Charles I of England mandate that every county in England (not just seaport towns) pay ship tax by this date.

1642 – Georgeana, Massachusetts (now known as York, Maine), becomes the first incorporated city in the United States.

1692 – Sarah Good, Sarah Osborne and Tituba are brought before local magistrates in Salem Village, Massachusetts, beginning what would become known as the Salem witch trials.

1781 – The Continental Congress adopts the Articles of Confederation.

1790 – The first United States census is authorized.

1815 – Napoleon returns to France from his banishment on Elba, start of the Hundred Days.

1836 – A convention of delegates from 57 Texas communities convenes in Washington-on-the-Brazos, Texas, to deliberate independence from Mexico.

1845 – United States President John Tyler signs a bill authorizing the United States to annex the Republic of Texas.

1867 – Nebraska becomes the 37th U.S. state; Lancaster, Nebraska is renamed Lincoln and becomes the state capital.

1872 – Yellowstone National Park is established as the world's first national park.

1893 – Electrical engineer Nikola Tesla gives the first public demonstration of radio in St. Louis, Missouri.

1910 – The worst avalanche in United States history buries a Great Northern Railway train in northeastern King County, Washington, killing 96 people.

1914 – The Republic of China joins the Universal Postal Union.

1917 – The U.S. government releases the unencrypted text of the Zimmermann Telegram to the public.

1919 – March 1st Movement begins in Korea under Japanese rule.

1936 – The Hoover Dam is completed.

1953 – Soviet Premier Joseph Stalin suffers a stroke and collapses; he dies four days later.

1966 – Venera 3 Soviet space probe crashes on Venus becoming the first spacecraft to land on another planet's surface.

1974 – Watergate scandal: Seven are indicted for their role in the Watergate break-in and charged with conspiracy to obstruct justice.

1995 – Yahoo! is incorporated.

1998 – Titanic became the first film to gross over $1 billion worldwide.

1484 – The College of Arms is formally incorporated by Royal Charter signed by King Richard III of England.

1791 – Long-distance communication speeds up with the unveiling of a semaphore machine in Paris.

1797 – The Bank of England issues the first one-pound and two-pound banknotes.

1807 – The U.S. Congress passes the Act Prohibiting Importation of Slaves, disallowing the importation of new slaves into the country.

1825 – Roberto Cofresí, one of the last successful Caribbean pirates, is defeated in combat and captured by authorities.

1836 – Texas Revolution: Declaration of independence of the Republic of Texas from Mexico.

1855 – Alexander II becomes Tsar of Russia.

1867 – The U.S. Congress passes the first Reconstruction Act.

1877 – U.S. presidential election, 1876: Just two days before inauguration, the U.S. Congress declares Rutherford B. Hayes the winner of the election even though Samuel J. Tilden had won the popular vote on November 7, 1876.

1882 – Queen Victoria narrowly escapes an assassination attempt by Roderick McLean in Windsor.

1901 – United States Steel Corporation is founded as a result of a merger between Carnegie Steel Company and Federal Steel Company which became the first corporation in the world with a market capital over $1 billion. The U.S. Congress passes the Platt Amendment limiting the autonomy of Cuba, as a condition of the withdrawal of American troops.

1933 – The film King Kong opens at New York's Radio City Music Hall.

1949 – Captain James Gallagher lands his B-50 Superfortress Lucky Lady II in Fort Worth, Texas after completing the first non-stop around-the-world airplane flight in 94 hours and one minute.

1961 – John F. Kennedy announces the creation of the Peace Corps in a nationally televised broadcast.

1962 – Wilt Chamberlain sets the single-game scoring record in the National Basketball Association by scoring 100 points.

1972 – The Pioneer 10 space probe is launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida with a mission to explore the outer planets.


1983 – Compact discs and players are released for the first time in the United States and other markets. They had previously been available only in Japan.

1990 – Nelson Mandela is elected deputy President of the African National Congress.

1991 – Battle at Rumaila oil field brings an end to the 1991 Gulf War.

1998 – Data sent from the Galileo spacecraft indicates that Jupiter's moon Europa has a liquid ocean under a thick crust of ice.

1776 – American Revolutionary War: The first amphibious landing of the United States Marine Corps begins the Battle of Nassau.

1820 – The U.S. Congress passes the Missouri Compromise.

1845 – Florida is admitted as the 27th U.S. state.

1861 – Alexander II of Russia signs the Emancipation Manifesto, freeing serfs.

1873 – Censorship in the United States: The U.S. Congress enacts the Comstock Law, making it illegal to send any 'obscene, lewd, or lascivious' books through the mail.

1875 – The first ever organized indoor game of ice hockey is played in Montreal, Quebec, Canada as recorded in the Montreal Gazette.

1878 – The Russo-Turkish War ends with Bulgaria regaining its independence from the Ottoman Empire according to the Treaty of San Stefano; a few months afterwards the Congress of Berlin stripped its status to a vassal principality of the Ottoman Empire.

1885 – The American Telephone & Telegraph Company is incorporated in New York.

1904 – Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany becomes the first person to make a sound recording of a political document, using Thomas Edison's phonograph cylinder.

1910 – Rockefeller Foundation: John D. Rockefeller Jr. announces his retirement from managing his businesses so that he can devote all his time to philanthropy.

1913 – Thousands of women march in a suffrage parade in Washington, D.C.

1918 – Germany, Austria and Russia sign the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk ending Russia's involvement in World War I, and leading to the independence of Finland, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland.

1923 – TIME magazine is published for the first time.

1931 – The United States adopts The Star-Spangled Banner as its national anthem.

1939 – In Bombay, Mohandas Gandhi begins a hunger strike in protest at the autocratic rule in British India.

1969 – Apollo program: NASA launches Apollo 9 to test the lunar module.

1991 – An amateur video captures the beating of Rodney King by Los Angeles police officers.

2005 – Steve Fossett becomes the first person to fly an airplane non-stop around the world solo without refueling.

1461 – Wars of the Roses in England: Lancastrian King Henry VI is deposed by his House of York cousin, who then becomes King Edward IV.

1493 – Explorer Christopher Columbus arrives back in Lisbon, Portugal, aboard his ship Niña from his voyage to what is now The Bahamas and other islands in the Caribbean.

1519 – Hernán Cortés arrives in Mexico in search of the Aztec civilization and its wealth.

1628 – The Massachusetts Bay Colony is granted a Royal charter.

1665 – English King Charles II declares war on the Netherlands marking the start of the Second Anglo-Dutch War.

1789 – In New York City, the first Congress of the United States meets, putting the United States Constitution into effect. The United States Bill of Rights is written and proposed to Congress.

1790 – France is divided into 83 départements, cutting across the former provinces in an attempt to dislodge regional loyalties based on ownership of land by the nobility.

1791 – The Constitutional Act of 1791 is introduced by the British House of Commons in London which envisages the separation of Canada into Lower Canada (Quebec) and Upper Canada (Ontario). Vermont is admitted to the United States as the fourteenth state.

1794 – The 11th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution is passed by the U.S. Congress.

1797 – John Adams is inaugurated as the 2nd President of the United States of America, becoming the first President to
begin his presidency on March 4.

1837 – The city of Chicago is incorporated.

1882 – Britain's first electric trams run in east London.

1913 – The United States Department of Labor is formed.

1933 – Frances Perkins becomes United States Secretary of Labor, the first female member of the United States Cabinet.

1974 – People magazine is published for the first time in the United States as People Weekly.

1986 – The Soviet Vega 1 begins returning images of Halley's Comet and the first images of its nucleus.

1998 – Gay rights: Oncale v. Sundowner Offshore Services, Inc.: The Supreme Court of the United States rules that federal laws banning on-the-job sexual harassment also apply when both parties are the same sex.

1496 – King Henry VII of England issues letters patent to John Cabot and his sons, authorising them to explore unknown lands.

1770 – Boston Massacre: Five Americans, including Crispus Attucks, are fatally shot by British troops in an event that would contribute to the outbreak of the American Revolutionary War five years later.

1933 – Great Depression: President Franklin D. Roosevelt declares a "bank holiday", closing all U.S. banks and freezing all financial transactions. Adolf Hitler's Nazi Party receives 43.9% at the Reichstag elections, which allows the Nazis to later pass the Enabling Act and establish a dictatorship.

1978 – The Landsat 3 is launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California.

1979 – Soviet probes Venera 11, Venera 12 and the German-American solar satellite Helios II all are hit by "off the scale" gamma rays leading to the discovery of soft gamma repeaters.

1981 – The ZX81, a pioneering British home computer, is launched by Sinclair Research and would go on to sell over 1.5 million units around the world.

1982 – Soviet probe Venera 14 landed on Venus.

1521 – Ferdinand Magellan arrives at Guam.

1820 – The Missouri Compromise is signed into law by President James Monroe. The compromise allows Missouri to enter the Union as a slave state, brings Maine into the Union as a free state, and makes the rest of the northern part of the Louisiana Purchase territory slavery-free.

1834 – York, Upper Canada, is incorporated as Toronto.

1836 – Texas Revolution: Battle of the Alamo – After a thirteen-day siege by an army of 3,000 Mexican troops, the 187 Texas volunteers, including frontiersman Davy Crockett and colonel Jim Bowie, defending the Alamo are killed and the fort is captured.

1857 – The Supreme Court of the United States rules in the Dred Scott v. Sandford case.

1912 – Italo-Turkish War: Italian forces become the first to use airships in war, as two dirigibles drop bombs on Turkish troops encamped at Janzur, from an altitude of 6,000 feet.

1967 – Joseph Stalin's daughter Svetlana Alliluyeva defects to the United States.

1981 – After 19 years of presenting the CBS Evening News, Walter Cronkite signs off for the last time.

1983 – The first United States Football League games is played.

1799 – Napoleon Bonaparte captures Jaffa in Palestine and his troops proceed to kill more than 2,000 Albanian captives.

1814 – Emperor Napoleon I of France wins the Battle of Craonne.

1850 – Senator Daniel Webster gives his "Seventh of March" speech endorsing the Compromise of 1850 in order to prevent a possible civil war.

1876 – Alexander Graham Bell is granted a patent for an invention he calls the "telephone".

1900 – The German liner SS Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse becomes the first ship to send wireless signals to shore.

1936 – In violation of the Locarno Pact and the Treaty of Versailles, Germany reoccupies the Rhineland.

1965 – Bloody Sunday: a group of 600 civil rights marchers is brutally attacked by state and local police in Selma, Alabama.

1985 – The song "We Are the World" receives its international release.

1986 – Challenger Disaster: Divers from the USS Preserver locate the crew cabin of Challenger on the ocean floor.