TODAY’S HISTORY LESSON – FEB 19
1674 The Netherlands and England signed the Peace of Westminster, by which New Amsterdam passed to the English (and was renamed New York).
1803 US Congress accepts Ohio’s constitution, statehood not ratified till 1953
1807 US Vice President Aaron Burr arrested in Alabama for treason; later acquitted
1846 The formal transfer of government between Texas and the United States took place. Texas had officially become a state on December 29, 1845.
1847 Rescuers finally reach the ill-fated Donner Party in the Sierras.
1861 Russian Tsar Alexander II abolishes serfdom.
1878 Thomas Edison is granted a patent for his gramophone (phonograph)
1906 Will Keith Kellogg and Charles D. Bolin found the Battle Creek Toasted Corn Flake Company, now the multinational food manufacturer Kellogg’s
1910 Typhoid Mary [Mary Mallon] is freed from her first periods of forced isolation and goes on to cause several further outbreaks of typhoid in the New York area
1917 American troops are recalled from the Mexican border.
1925 President Calvin Coolidge proposes the phasing out of inheritance tax.
1942 FDR orders detention & internment of all west-coast Japanese-Americans
1953 The State of Georgia approved the first literature censorship board in the U.S. Newspapers were excluded from the new legislation.
1965 Fourteen Vietnam War protesters are arrested for blocking the United Nations’ doors in New York.
1968 The first nationwide broadcast of Mr. Roger’s Neighborhood aired on PBS.
1981 The U.S. State Department calls El Salvador a “textbook case” of a Communist plot
1985 Canned & bottled Cherry Coke introduced by Coca-Cola
1987 Reagan lifts trade boycott against Poland
1998 US hockey team destroys their rooms at Olympics village in Japan
2004 Former Enron Corp. chief executive Jeffrey Skilling was charged with fraud, insider trading and other crimes in connection with the energy trader’s collapse. Skilling was later convicted and sentenced to more than 24 years in prison.
2008 Fidel Castro resigned as President of Cuba after 49 years in power. Raúl Castro, Fidel’s brother, succeeded him as president.
** history.net, onthisday.com, infoplease.com, timeanddate.com, thepeoplehistory.com, on-this-day.com **
