TODAY’S HISTORY LESSON – FEB 1
1327 Edward III is coronated King of England.
1587 Elizabeth I, Queen of England, signs the Warrant of Execution for Mary Queen of Scots.
1633 The tobacco laws of Virginia are codified, limiting tobacco production to reduce dependence on a single-crop economy.
1669 French King Louis XIV limits freedom of religion
1709 British sailor Alexander Selkirk is rescued after being marooned on a desert island (Fernandez Island) for 5 years, his story is the inspiration for Daniel Defoe’s “Robinson Crusoe”
1790 The Supreme Court of the United States convened for the first time, in New York City.
1843 Oldest continuous writer of insurance in America – The Mutual Life Insurance Company of New York (MONY) opens
1861 A furious Governor Sam Houston storms out of a legislative session upon learning that Texas has voted 167-7 to secede from the Union.
1862 Julia Ward Howe’s poem “Battle Hymn of the Republic” was published in the Atlantic Monthly.
1902 U.S. Secretary of State John Hay protests Russian privileges in China as a violation of the “open door policy.”
1909 U.S. troops leave Cuba after installing Jose Miguel Gomez as president.
1945 U.S. Rangers and Filipino guerrillas rescue 513 American survivors of the Bataan Death March.
1960 Four black students stage a sit-in at a segregated Greensboro, N.C. lunch counter.
1964 Indiana Governor Mathew Walsh tries to ban “Louie Louie” for obscenity
1965 Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. and 770 others are arrested in protest against voter discrimination in Alabama.
1968 Saigon police chief Nguyễn Ngọc Loan executes Viet Cong officer Nguyễn Văn Lém with a pistol shot to head. The execution is captured by photographer Eddie Adams and becomes an anti-war icon.
1978 Director Roman Polanski skips bail & fled to France after pleading guilty to charges of engaging in sex with a 13-year-old girl
1979 Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini returns to Iran after 15 years in exile
1991 President F W de Klerk, says he would repeal all apartheid laws
1992 George W Bush and Russian Leader Boris Yeltsin proclaim an end to the cold war in a joint statement following new arms limitations agreements.
2003 Space Shuttle Columbia disintegrates during reentry into the Earth’s atmosphere, killing all seven astronauts aboard.
2004 During the annual Hajj pilgrimage to the city of Mecca in Saudi Arabia 251 people are trampled to death during a stampede.
** history.net, onthisday.com, infoplease.com, timeanddate.com, thepeoplehistory.com, on-this-day.com **
