Today in History

1865
U.S. Congress passes 13th Amendment,abolishing slavery in America 121-24
1923
The 1st penalty-free hockey game in NHL history happened with Montreal Candiens defeated Hamilton Tiger Cats in Montreal, 5-4
1928
3 M Company 1st to market "Scotch Tape'
1961
movie' The Misfits' directed by John Huston is released with all star cast, Marilyn Monroe, Clark Gable,Montgomery Clift, Thelma Ritter,Eli Wallach,Kevin McCarthy. The story of a divorcee{Monroe} and her brooding cowboy friends. This was the last movie for both Monroe&Gable made.He died days after completing the movie, she died in '62
2006
U.S. Supreme Court justice, Sandra Day O'Connor retires, was replaced by Samuel Alito
 

Jan 31st Birthdays:
1797
Franz Schubert- Austrian classical composer
1865
Henri Derange- French cyclist,founder of' Tour de France' bile race
1915
Thomas Merton- Catholic writer/Trappist monk "7 Story Mountain'
1931
Ernie Banks' U.S. baseball player/Hall of Famer known as 'Mr Cub' spent his entire 19 yrs with Chicago Cubs
1937
Suzanne Pleshette- actress best known for playing Bob Newhart's wife' Emily' in CBS sitcom'Bob Newhart Show
Deaths:
1945
Edwin Armstrong- U.S radio inventor{FM} 56
1956
AA Milne -British novelist'Winne The Pooh' books 74
1974
Samuel Goldwyn, Hollywood mogul{MGM} 91
1985
Barbara Cowsill-singer/mother in family singing group'The Cowsills' 56
1995
George Abbott- theatre producer/film director "Damn Yankees, Pajama Game' 107
 
This day in History February 1st

2003 Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrates on its way back to Earth
All 7 astronauts were killed in the disaster.

1979 Ayatollah Khomeini returns to Iran after 15 years in exile
His triumphant return marked the beginning of the Iranian Revolution.

1968 Eddie Adams takes one of the Vietnam War's best-known pictures
The image of the execution of a Vietcong officer in Saigon helped build opposition to the war.

1960 Four black students start the Greensboro sit-ins
Their refusal to leave a “whites only” lunch counter was a milestone in the fight against racial segregation in the United States.

1884 The first fascicle of the “Oxford English Dictionary” is published
 

Births On This Day, February 1st 🎂

1946 Elisabeth Sladen
English actress

1931 Boris Yeltsin
Russian politician, 1st President of Russia

1901 Clark Gable
American actor

1894 John Ford
American director

1552 Edward Coke
English judge, politician

Deaths On This Day, February 1st 🪦

2002 Hildegard Knef
German actress

1981 Geirr Tveitt
Norwegian composer

1976 Werner Heisenberg
German physicist, Nobel Prize laureate

1966 Buster Keaton
American actor, director, producer

1851 Mary Shelley
English author
 
1sst February

1327 Fourteen year old Edward III was crowned King of England, but the country was ruled by his mother Queen Isabella and her lover Roger Mortimer.

1587 Under pressure from her Council, Queen Elizabeth I of England signed the warrant authorising the execution of Mary Queen of Scots.

1709 Scotsman Alexander Selkirk was rescued from an uninhabited desert island (Mas à Tierra, off the coast of Chile), inspiring the book Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe.

1884 The first volume (A to Ant) of the Oxford English Dictionary was published. James Murray was its most famous editor but he had only reached the letter T after working 44 hours per week for 35 years, so hundreds of people sent in their own contributions.

1974 Escaped Great Train Robber Ronald Biggs was arrested by Brazilian police in Rio. He escaped extradition because he was the father of a child by his Brazilian girlfriend.
 
1843
oldest continous writer of insurance in America,Mutual life Insurance Company of NY{MONY} opens
1893
Thomas Edison completes world's 1st movie studio in West Orange, NJ
1959
RCA releases 1st 45 rpm single record
1972
the 1st scientific hand held calculator by Hewitt-Packard debuts, cost $395
1978
abolitionist, Harriet Tubman is 1st African American woman to be honored on a U.S. postage stamp
 
Feb 1st Birthdays:
1895
John Ford- film director 'Stagecoach,Quiet Man'
1901
Clark Gable- film actor, 'It Happened One Night, Gone with the Wind'. His only Oscar,Best Actor in 'It Happened One Night'
1937
Don Everly,guiartist/singer with his brother,Phil 'The Everly Brothers'
1954
Bill Mumy- actor,he played' Will Robinson' in TV show 'Lost In Space"
1969
Joshua Redman, jazz saxophonist/composer
Deaths:
1851
Mary Shelley- British novelist' Frankenstein' 53
1944
Piet Mondrian- Dutch abstract painter 71
1966
Buster Keaton- actor/comedian 70
2007
Gian Carlo Menotti- Italian pianist/composer 'Amahl&The Night Visitors' 95
2014
Maximillan Schell - Swiss/Austrian film actor 83
2018
Dennis Edwards- lead singer of r&b group 'The Temptations' 74
 
This day in History February 2nd

1990 The South African Apartheid system of racial segregation begins to disintegrate
President de Klerk announced the unbanning of the African Nation Congress (ANC) and his intentions to release Nelson Mandela.

1943 The Battle of Stalingrad comes to an end as the Axis Powers surrender
Germany's defeat marked a turning point in World War II.

1925 20 mushers embark on a journey to transport medicine to Nome, Alaska, inspiring the Iditarod Race
The Iditarod is the world's longest and most challenging dog sled race.

1922 “Ulysses” by James Joyce is published
The novel is considered one of the most important works of modernist literature.

1852 The first public flushing toilet is opened in London
Using the “Public Waiting Room” at 95 Fleet Street cost 2 pence.
 
Births On This Day, February 2nd 🎂

1977 Shakira
Colombian singer-songwriter, producer, actress

1963 Eva Cassidy
American singer, guitarist

1926 Valéry Giscard d'Estaing
French politician, 20th President of France

1905 Ayn Rand
Russian/American author, philosopher

1882 James Joyce
Irish author

Deaths On This Day, February 2nd 🪦

1996 Gene Kelly
American dancer, actor

1979 Sid Vicious
English singer, bass player

1972 Natalie Clifford Barney
American poet, playwright

1970 Bertrand Russell, 3rd Earl Russell
English mathematician, historian, philosopher, Nobel Prize laureate

1945 Carl Friedrich Goerdeler
German politician
 
1709
British sailor, Alexander Selkirk who had been stranded on desert island for 5 yrs was recused by William Damper. His story was inspiration for' Robinson Crusoe'
1848
The Treaty of Guadlaupe Hidalgo ended Mexican-American War. U. S. acquires Texas, Calif, New Mexico, Arizona for $15 mil
1892
the bottle cap patent by William Painter
1940
Frank Sinatra makes his singing debut with Tommy Dorsey Orchestra in Indianopolis
1974
Barbra Striesand's 1st single' The Way We Were' from the soundtrack of the movie is released. The song co-written by Alan&Marilyn Bergman, Marvin Hamlisch
2019
more than 40 mummies from 323-30 BC were found at an archeologist burial site at Tuna el-Gebel south of Cairo, Egypt
 
Feb 2 Birthdays:
1882
James Joyce- Scottish poet/novelist 'Dubliners, Ulysess,Finnigan"s Wake'
1895
George 'Papa Bear' Halas,NFL football coach/owner of Chicago Bears
1905
Ayn Rand- Russian/American novelist "Atlas Shrugged, The Fountainhead"
1923
James Dickey- novelist "Deliverance'
1942
Graham Nash-British singer, "The Hollies,"Crosby, Stills, Nash &Young'
1954
Christie Brinkley- model /actress ex wife #2 of singer Billy Joel
Deaths:
1969
Boris Karloff- British actor "The Mummy,Frankenstein" 81
1987
Alistar McLean-Scottish novelist' Guns of Navarone' 54
1992
Bert Parks-,original host of 'Miss America Pageant" 77
1995
Fred Perry- British tennis player who won 8 Grand Slam titles, 6 doubles titles 85
1996
Gene Kelly- actor/ singer/dancer 'An American In Paris,On The Town' 83
2014
Phillip Seymour Hoffman- actor "Twister,Capote,Moneyball' 46
 
This day in History February 3rd

1998 20 people die in the Cavalese cable car disaster
The wings of a low-flying U.S. military aircraft cut the aerial tramway's cables, causing the cabin to plunge 80 meters.

1989 Paraguay's dictator, Alfredo Stroessner, is overthrown
Stroessner had come to power in 1954 with a military coup.

1972 The deadliest snowstorm in history kills 4000
The Iran Blizzard lasted a week and left whole villages without survivors.

1969 Yasser Arafat becomes the leader of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO)
Even after his death in 2011, Arafat remained a highly controversial figure, many Arabs praising him as a freedom fighter while many Israelis denouncing him as a terrorist.

1966 Luna 9 touches down on the Moon
The unmanned Soviet spacecraft was the first to achieve a soft landing there.
 
Births On This Day, February 3rd 🎂

1935 Johnny "Guitar" Watson
American singer, guitarist

1927 Kenneth Anger
American actor, director, author

1874 Gertrude Stein
American poet, art collector

1830 Robert Gascoyne-Cecil, 3rd Marquess of Salisbury
English politician, Prime Minister of the United Kingdom

1809 Felix Mendelssohn
German pianist, composer, conductor

Deaths On This Day, February 3rd 🪦
1985 Frank Oppenheimer
American physicist

1961 Anna May Wong
American actress

1924 Woodrow Wilson
American politician, 28th President of the United States, Nobel Prize laureate

1820 Gia Long
Vietnamese Emperor

1468 Johannes Gutenberg
German publisher invented the Printing press
 
moviequeen1 said:
1972
the 1st scientific hand held calculator by Hewitt-Packard debuts, cost $395
Click to expand...
I bought one of those, an HP-35 I think. It was my first extravagant purchase. An amazing device, it did more than add and subtract, but not a lot. It was however banned from use in class.
moviequeen1 said:
1848
The Treaty of Guadlaupe Hidalgo ended Mexican-American War. U. S. acquires Texas, Calif, New Mexico, Arizona for $15 mil
Click to expand...
Actually it did not include Texas, that happened earlier, but it did set the Rio Grande as the Texas/Mexico border. The Republic of Texas declared its independence from Mexico in 1836 and was annexed by the US as a state in 1846. Texas got its independence from Mexico after defeating the Mexican Army at San Jacinto in 1836. However the 1836 treaty between Texas and Mexico was never ratified by the Mexican government. The Republic of Texas was recognized as independent of Mexico by the US, the UK and a few other European countries before the Mexican-American war.

California also declared its independence earlier, in 1846 but it was not settled until this treaty. Also a part of southern Arizona and a small part of New Mexico did not become part of the US until 1854.

All in all there is a reasonable argument that the whole Mexican-America war and the treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo were pretty unfair to Mexico. But that's ancient history now...
 
Last edited:
Feb 3rd
1876
Albert Spaulding invests $800 to start sports company which manufactured the 1st offical, baseball,golf ball, tennis ball & football
1959
a plane crash near Clear Lake, Iowa takes the lives of musicians, Buddy Holley, Ritchie Valens, JP Richardson and the pilot. Its known as 'The Day The Music Died"
1986
Pixar Animation Studios is spun off from Lucasfilm,Ltd as an independent film production studio. They release 'Toy Story,The Incredibles' film franchises
 
Feb 3rd Birthdays:
1480
Ferdinad Magellan- Portuguese explorer
1809
Felix Mendelsson- German classical composer
1894
Norman Rockwell- U. S. artist/illustrator who did the covers of magazine Saturday Evening Post
1945
Bob Greise- retired NFL QB of the Miami Dolphins
1956
Nathan Lane- Broadway/movie actor, 'The Producers','The Lion King'
Deaths:
1468
Johannes Gutenberg- German inventor of movable printing press 70
1975
William D. Coolidge- U.S. physicist/inventor of modern day Xray tube 101
1991
Nancy Kulp- actress, best known TV role' Jane Hathaway' in CBS sitcom'The Beverly Hillbillies' '62-'71 69
1996
Audrey Meadows-actress ,best known TV role'Alice Krameden' in 'The Honeymooners '56-'71 69
 
This day in History February 4th

2004 Facebook is founded
The social networking service currently has over 1 billion active users.

1948 Ceylon (Sri Lanka) proclaims independence within the British Commonwealth
Since the 16th century, the island had been colonized by Portugal, the Netherlands, and Great Britain.

1861 The Confederate States of America are established
6 slave states met in Montgomery, Alabama to form the Confederacy, which lasted only until 1865.

1859 German archeologist Constantin von Tischendorf discovers the Codex Sinaiticus
The “Sinai Bible”, a handwritten copy of the Greek Bible, is considered a great historical treasure.

1789 George Washington is elected as first President of the United States
Washington took office on April 30, 1789.
 
Births On This Day, February 4th 🎂

1948 Alice Cooper
American singer-songwriter, actor

1913 Rosa Parks
American activist

1906 Dietrich Bonhoeffer
German pastor, theologian

1902 Charles Lindbergh
American pilot, activist

1746 Tadeusz Kościuszko
Polish/American general

Deaths On This Day, February 4th 🪦

2006 Betty Friedan
American author, activist

2001 Iannis Xenakis
Greek/French composer, engineer, theorist

1987 Liberace
American singer, pianist, actor

1987 Meena Keshwar Kamal
Afghan activist founded the Revolutionary Association of the Women of Afghanistan

1894 Adolphe Sax
Belgian musician invented the saxophone
 
1824
JW Goodrich introduces rubber galoshes to public
1932
The III Winter Olympic Games is held in Lake Placid, NY. The next time the town hosts the Winter Olympic games was in 1980
1941
United Service Organization{USO} is founded,nation's leading org to serve men&women in the military&their families
1970
movie' Patton' directed by Franklin Schaffer is released,screen bio of WWII General,George Patton.His temper often interfered with his command during WWII. George C. Scott in lead role, Karl Malden as Gen Omar Bradley. The movie won 7 Oscars inc best picture,actor{Scott refused the award},screenplay{Francis Ford Coppola& Edmund North}
1980
Studio 54, iconic Manhattan disco club, has its last party with over 2,000 people in attendance.Diana Ross, Liza Minnelli gave performances. The co-founders Steve Rubell& Ian Schrager went to prison the next day for tax evasion
2004
Mark Zuckerberg founded social platform'Facebook' in his Harvard Univ dorm room
 
Feb 4th Birthdays:
1895
Nigel Bruce- British actor 'Rebecca,Sherlock Holmes"
1902
Charles Lindberg- U.S aviator, 1st to fly across Atlantic Ocean
1913
Rosa Parks- civil rights activist,who refused to give up her seat on a bus to a white passenger
1923
Conrad Bain- actor best known TV role' Philip Drummond" NBC sitcom 'Different Strokes" '78-'86
1948
Alice Cooper- singer/songwriter "School's Out"
Deaths:
1966
Gilbert H. Grosvenor, geologist, 1st editor at National Geographic Society 90
1983
Karen Carpenter- pop singer/drummer 'Rainy Days&Mondays',We've Only Just Begun" 32
1987
Liberace- pianist 67
2005
Ossie Davis- actor/ civil rights activist 'Purlie,Do The Right Thing' 87
2016
Maurice White- singer/ songwriter, of r&b group 'Earth,Wind&Fire' 74
 
This day in History February 5th

1924 The Greenwich Time Signal is broadcast for the first time
The “BBC pips” are 5 short and 1 long tone that is broadcast by many BBC radio stations to mark the precise start of the hour.

1919 United Artists is founded
Charlie Chaplin was one of the film studio's founders.

1909 The world's first synthetic plastic is developed
Belgian chemist Leo Baekeland announced his invention of Bakelite at a meeting of the American Chemical Society that day.

1869 The biggest gold nugget in history is found
The “Welcome Stranger” was found at Moliagul in Australia and had a calculated refined weight of 71.081 kg.

1852 The Hermitage Museum in Saint Petersburg opens to the public
It is one of the world's largest and oldest museums and was originally founded in 1764.
 
Births On This Day, February 5th 🎂

1985 Cristiano Ronaldo
Portuguese footballer

1969 Michael Sheen
Welsh actor

1900 Adlai Stevenson
American politician, 31st Governor of Illinois

1878 André Citroën
French engineer, businessman, founded Citroën

1840 John Boyd Dunlop
Scottish businessman, co-founded Dunlop Rubber

Deaths On This Day, February 5th 🪦

2010 Harry Schwarz
German/South African lawyer, politician, diplomat, 13th South African Ambassador to the United States

2008 Maharishi Mahesh Yogi
Indian guru

1993 Joseph L. Mankiewicz
American director, screenwriter, producer

1938 Hans Litten
German jurist

1881 Thomas Carlyle
Scottish historian
 
1803
English explorer George Bass & crew set sail from Sydney,Australia to Tahiti-Chile never seen again
1900
United States and Great Britian sign treaty for the Panama Canal
1919
Hollywood film studio, United Artists is founded by actors, Charlie Chaplin,Douglas Fairbanks, actress Mary Pickford, film director, DW Griffith
1948
18 yr old, Dick Button becomes the 1st U.S men's skater to win gold medal at St Mortiz Olympic games, 1st to complete a double axel in competiton. He would retain his title in 1952
1971
Apollo 14,3rd manned moon expedition with astronauts, Alan Shepard, Edward Mitchell. They spent 4hrs walking on the moon
 
Feb 5th Birthdays:
1878
Andre Citroen-French automobile pioneer
1906
John Carradine- actor 'Grapes of Wrath,Stagecoach"
1919
Red Buttons- actor/comedian/singer He won best supp actor Oscar for his role in movie'Sayonara '57
1934
Hank Aaron- Hall of Fame baseball player who played right field for Milwaukee Brewers, Atlanta Braves, hit 755 home runs
1943
Nolan Busnell-businessman/founder of Atari games
1964
Laura Linney- actress on stage/movies "The Truman Show,Mystic River'
Deaths:
1969
Thelma Ritter- actress 'All About Eve, Pillow Talk" 63
1981
Ella Grasso, Governor of Conn '75-'80 61
1989
Joe Raposa- composer/ songwriter for PBS show' Sesame Street'' Sing, Being Green' 51
1993
Joseph Mankiewicz- writer/film director 'All About Eve' 50,won Oscar for directing 83
2021
Christopher Plummer- actor 'Sound of Music, Beginners, Knives Out' In 2012 he became the oldest actor to win Best Supporting Oscar for 'Beginners at age 82 91
 
This day in History February 6th

1996 The crash of a Boeing 757 aircraft leaves no survivors
Birgenair Flight 301 was the worst accident involving this type of aircraft.

1989 The Round Table Talks start in Poland
The negotiations between the Polish government and the trade union Solidarność, or Solidarity in English, marked the beginning of the end of communism in Eastern Europe.

1959 The first microchip is patented
For his invention of the integrated circuit, Jack Kilby was awarded the 2000 Nobel Prize in Physics.

1952 Elizabeth II becomes Queen of the United Kingdom
She succeeded her father, George VI, who died that day.

1840 New Zealand becomes a British colony
While the Treaty of Waitangi is generally celebrated as the country's founding document, many Māori claims they were deceived and unwittingly stripped of their right to govern the country.
 

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