TODAY’S HISTORY LESSON – FEB 14
1014 Pope Benedict VIII crowns Henry II Holy Roman Emperor
1076 Pope Gregory VII excommunicates Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV (for the 1st time)
1349 2,000 Jews are burned at the stake in Strasbourg, Germany.
1400 The deposed Richard II is murdered in Pontefract Castle in Yorkshire.
1794 1st US textile machinery patent granted, to James Davenport, Philadelphia PA
1803 Apple parer patented by Moses Coats, Downington PA
1848 James Polk becomes the first U.S. President to be photographed in office by Matthew Brady.
1859 Oregon is admitted as the thirty-third state.
1870 Esther Morris becomes the world’s first female justice of the peace.
1876 A G Bell & Elisha Gray apply separately for telephone patents; Supreme Court eventually rules Bell rightful inventor
1904 The “Missouri Kid” is captured in Kansas.
1912 Arizona becomes the 48th state in the Union.
1920 The League of Women Voters was founded.
1924 Thomas Watson founds International Business Machines Corp.
1929 Chicago gang war between Al Capone and George “Bugs” Moran culminates with several Moran confederates being gunned down in the St. Valentine’s Day Massacre.
1949 The United States charges the Soviet Union with interning up to 14 million in labor camps.
1957 The Georgia state senate outlaws interracial athletics.
1962 1st lady Jacqueline Kennedy conducts White House tour on TV
1963 US launches communications satellite Syncom 1
1965 Malcolm X’s home is firebombed. No injuries are reported.
1971 Richard Nixon installs secret taping system in the White House
1973 The United States and Hanoi set up a group to channel reconstruction aid directly to Hanoi.
1978 1st “micro on a chip” patented by Texas Instruments
1985 Hostage CNN reporter Jeremy Levin is released in Beirut
1989 Iranian leader Ayatollah Ruholla Khomeini charges that Salman Rushdie’s novel, The Satanic Verses, is blasphemous and issues an edict (fatwa) calling on Muslims to kill Rushdie.
2001 The Kansas Board of Education reversed its 1999 ruling and restored evolution to the state’s science curriculum.
2003 Dolly the sheep is put to death
Dolly, the first mammal to be cloned from an adult, had shown signs of premature aging and contracted various diseases.
** history.net, onthisday.com, infoplease.com, timeanddate.com, thepeoplehistory.com, on-this-day.com **
