1940 – Tom & Jerry created by Hanna & Barbera debut by MGM
1098 – Crusaders defeat Prince Redwan of Aleppo at Antioch
1355 – The St. Scholastica’s Day riot breaks out in Oxford, England, leaving 63 scholars and perhaps 30 locals dead in two days.
1535 – 12 nude Anabaptists run through Amsterdam streets
1542 – Queen Catherine Howard of England is confined in the Tower of London to be executed three days later for treason (adultery).
1567 – An explosion destroys the Kirk o’ Field house in Edinburgh, Scotland. The second husband of Mary Queen of Scots, Lord Darnley is found strangled, in what many believe to be an assassination.
1676 – King Philip’s War: a force of 1,500 Wampanoag, Nipmuc, and Narragansett Indians killing over 30 men and destroying buildings in Lancaster, Massachusetts
1716 – Scottish pretender to the throne James III Edward returns to France
1746 – The Pelham brothers resign from the British government, but resume office when King George II backs down.
1763 – The French and Indian War ends with signing of the Treaty of Paris. As part of the treaty, Canada is ceded to England by the French
1798 – Louis Alexandre Berthier invaded Rome, on February 15 proclaimed a Roman Republic and then on February 20 take Pope Pius VI as a prisoner
1846 – Members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints began their exodus to the west from Illinois.
1855 – US citizenship laws amended all children of US parents born abroad granted US citizenship
1863 – In New York City, two of the world’s most famous midgets, General Tom Thumb and Lavinia Warren were married.
1870 – The YWCA was founded in New York City.
1897 – “The New York Times” began printing “All the news that’s fit to print” on their front page.
1899 – US-Spain peace treaty signed by President McKinley; US gets Puerto Rico & Guam
1906 – British battleship HMS Dreadnought launches after only 100 days, renders all other capital ships obsolete with its revolutionary design
1915 – US President Woodrow Wilson protests to Britain on the use of US flags on British merchant ships to deceive the Germans
1918 – In Finland, General Carl Gustaf Emil Von Mannerheim gathers an army known as the ‘White Guard’ to mount a counter revolution against the Bolshevik ‘Red Guard’
1920 – Major league baseball representatives outlawed pitches that involve tampering with the ball.
1933 – Primo Carnera knocked out Ernie Schaaf in round 13 at Madison Square Garden in New York City. Schaaf died as a result of the knockout punch.
1934 – First Jewish immigrant ship to break the English blockade in Palestine
1935 – The Pennsylvania Railroad began passenger service with its electric locomotive. The engine was 79-1/2 feet long and weighed 230 tons.
1940 – Tom & Jerry created by Hanna & Barbera debut by MGM
1942 – The Normandie, the former French liner, capsized in New York Harbor. The day before the ship had caught fire while it was being fitted for the U.S. Navy.
1944 – Belgium resistance fighter/author Kamiel van Baelen arrested
1946 – Liner Mauritania docks in Halifax carrying 943 war brides and children from England.
1948 – Greek General Markos’ guerrilla army bombs Saloniki
1951 – Shah of Persia marries 19 year old Soraja Esfandiara Bakhtiari
1954 – President Dwight Eisenhower warns against United States intervention in Vietnam.
1961 – Niagara Falls hydroelectric project begins producing power
1962 – The Soviet Union exchanged capture American U2 pilot Francis Gary Powers for the Soviet spy Rudolph Ivanovich Abel being held by the U.S.
1967 – The 25th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified. The amendment required the appointment of a vice-president when that office became vacant and instituted new measures in the event of presidential disability.
1974 – Iran/Iraqi border fight breaks out
1977 – Jonathan Netanyahu Lane in the Bronx, New York, named in honor of the Bronx-born Israeli soldier who died freeing hostages in Entebbe Raid in Uganda in 1976
1983 – Canada signs agreement allowing US testing of military equipment in Canada, including cruise missiles
1988 – 3-judge panel of 9th US Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco strikes down Army’s ban on homosexuals (later overturned by appeal)
1989 – Ron Brown became the first African American to head a major U.S. political party when he was elected chairman of the Democratic National Committee.
1990 – South African President F.W. de Klerk announced that black activist Nelson Mandela would be released the next day after 27 years in captivity.
1997 – The U.S. Army suspended its top-ranking enlisted soldier, Army Sgt. Major Gene McKinney following allegations of sexual misconduct. McKinney was convicted of obstruction of justice and acquitted of 18 counts alleging sexual harassment of six military women.
1998 – A man became the first to be convicted of committing a hate crime in cyberspace. The college dropout had e-mailed threats to Asian students.
1998 – Voters in Maine repealed a 1997 gay rights law. Maine was the first state to abandone such legislation.
1999 – A federal judge orders American Airlines pilots back to work after their sickout grounds 2500 flights, stranding 200,000 travelers and crippling cargo carriers.
2005 – North Korea publicly announced for the first time that it had nuclear arms. The country also rejected attempts to restart disarmament talks in the near future saying that it needed the weapons as protection against an increasingly hostile United States.
2009 – A Russian and an American satellite collide over Siberia.
2013 – 36 people are killed and 39 are injured in a stampede at a train station in Allahabad, India
2016 – Venezuelan government orders more than 100 malls to close early to save electricity, due to drought caused by El Niño
2019 – Insect populations are collapsing worldwide threatening a“catastrophic collapse of nature’s ecosystems” according to a global review saying 40% declining, 30% endangered
2021 – Astronomers confirm the planetoid named Farfarout as the most distant orbiting the Sun, almost four times more distant than Pluto
REFERENCE: history.net, onthisday.com, thepeopleshistory.com, timeanddate.com, scopesys.com, on-this-day.com
