TODAY HISTORY LESSON: FEBRUARY 17
1568 Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian II agrees to pay tribute to the Ottoman Empire for peace
1600 Italian philospher, alchemist, and Copernican theory advocate Giordano Bruno was burned at the stake for heresy by the Inquisition.
1720 Spain signs the Treaty of the Hague with the Quadruple Alliance ending a war that was begun in 1718.
1801 The U.S. House of Representatives broke an electoral tie between Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr. Jefferson was elected president and Burr became vice president.
1863 A precursor of the Red Cross and Red Crescent is founded. The “Committee for Relief to the Wounded” was created by a group of citizens in Geneva, Switzerland.
1864 The Confederate submarine Hunley, equipped with an explosive at the end of a protruding spar, rammed and sank the Union’s ship Housatonic off the coast of Charleston, S.C.
1865 The South Carolina capital city, Columbia, is destroyed by fire as Major General William Tecumseh Sherman marches through.
1870 Mississippi becomes 9th state re-admitted to US after Civil War
1897 National Congress of Parents & Teachers (PTA) organizes (Washington DC)
1909 Apache chief Geronimo dies of pneumonia at age 80, while still in captivity at Fort Sill, Oklahoma.
1913 1st minimum wage law in US takes effect (Oregon)
1925 The first issue of Harold Ross’ magazine, The New Yorker, hits the stands, selling for 15 cents a copy.
1933 The League of Nations censures Japan in a worldwide broadcast.
1933 1st issue of “Newsweek” magazine published
1934 The first high school automobile driver’s education course was introduced in State College, PA.
1951 Packard introduces its “250” Chassis Convertible.
1959 The United States launches its first weather station in space, Vanguard II.
1960 Martin Luther King Jr. is arrested in the Alabama bus boycott.
1964 The U.S. Supreme Court ruled that congressional districts within each state had to be approximately equal in population. (Westberry v. Sanders)
1981 Chrysler Corp reports largest corporate losses in US history
1992 In Milwaukee, serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer was sentenced to life in prison. In November of 1994, he was beaten to death in prison.
1995 Federal judge allows lawsuit claiming US tobacco makers knew nicotine was addictive & manipulated its levels to keep customers hooked
1997 Pepperdine University announced that Kenneth Starr was leaving the Whitewater probe to take a full-time job at the school. Starr reversed the announcement four days later.
2008 Kosovo declares its independence
2017 Discovery of a new mostly underwater continent Zealandia in the South Pacific announced in research journal “GSA Today”
REFERENCE: history.net, onthisday.com, thepeopleshistory.com, timeanddate.com, scopesys.com, on-this-day.com
