February 4 is the 35th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There are 330 days remaining until the end of the year (331 in leap years).
Holidays
- Christian feast day:
- Day of the Armed Struggle (Angola)
- Earliest day on which Ash Wednesday can fall, while March 10 is the latest; celebrated on the first day of Lent (Christianity)
- Independence Day (Sri Lanka)
- Rosa Parks Day (California and Missouri, United States)
- World Cancer Day
In 211, Roman Emperor Septimius Severus dies at Eboracum (modern York, England) while preparing to lead a campaign against the Caledonians. He leaves the empire in the control of his two quarrelling sons.
In 634, Battle of Dathin: Rashidun forces under Yazid ibn Abi Sufyan defeat the Christian Arabs around Gaza (Palestine).
In 960, The coronation of Zhao Kuangyin as Emperor Taizu of Song, initiating the Song Dynasty period of China that would last more than three centuries.
In 1169, A strong earthquake struck the Ionian coast of Sicily, causing tens of thousands of injuries and deaths, especially in Catania.
In 1454, In the Thirteen Years’ War, the Secret Council of the Prussian Confederation sends a formal act of disobedience to the Grand Master.
In 1555, John Rogers is burned at the stake, becoming the first English Protestant martyr under Mary I of England.
In 1703, In Edo (now Tokyo), 46 of the Forty-seven Ronin commit seppuku (ritual suicide) as recompense for avenging their master’s death.
In 1789, George Washington is unanimously elected as the first President of the United States by the U.S. Electoral College.
In 1794, The French legislature abolishes slavery throughout all territories of the French Republic. It will be reestablished in the French West Indies in 1802.
In 1797, The Riobamba earthquake strikes Ecuador, causing up to 40,000 casualties.
In 1801, John Marshall is sworn in as Chief Justice of the United States.
In 1810, The Royal Navy seizes Guadeloupe.
In 1820, The Chilean Navy under the command of Lord Cochrane completes the 2-day long Capture of Valdivia with just 300 men and 2 ships.
In 1825, The Ohio Legislature authorizes the construction of the Ohio and Erie Canal and the Miami and Erie Canal.
In 1846, The first Mormon pioneers make their exodus from Nauvoo, Illinois, westward towards Utah Territory.
In 1859, The Codex Sinaiticus is discovered in Egypt.
In 1861, American Civil War: In Montgomery, Alabama, delegates from six break-away U.S. states meet and form the Confederate States of America.
In 1899, The Philippine–American War begins with the Battle of Manila.
In 1915, Birth of Roy Mills Neudecker, in Jackson Tennessee on Rose Street. Dr. Neudecker was a graduate of South Side High School in Memphis, University of Tennessee at Knoxville B. S. in zoology, earned his Medical Degree from U. T. at Memphis and his Masters in Public Health at John Hopkins. After his residency, he enlisted in the Army Air Corp and achieved the rank of Captain. He served as the Madison County Public Health Director and later the 1st Regional Director of Western Tennessee for the State of Tennessee. He married Frances Brien Neudecker of Jackson, Tennessee, a nurse, and had four children, Charles Raymond, Jocelyn, Fred and Frank.
In 1932, Second Sino-Japanese War: Harbin, Manchuria, falls to Japan.
In 1936, Radium becomes the first radioactive element to be made synthetically.
In 1941, The United Service Organization (USO) is created to entertain American troops.
In 1945, World War II: Santo Tomas Internment Camp is liberated from Japanese authority
In 1945, World War II: The Yalta Conference between the “Big Three” (Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin) opens at the Livadia Palace in the Crimea.
In 1945, World War II: The British Indian Army and Imperial Japanese Army begin a series of battles known as the Battle of Pokoku and Irrawaddy River operations.
In 1948, Ceylon (later renamed Sri Lanka) becomes independent within the British Commonwealth.
In 1966, All Nippon Airways Flight 60 plunges into Tokyo Bay, killing 133.
In 1967, Lunar Orbiter program: Lunar Orbiter 3 lifts off from Cape Canaveral’s Launch Complex 13 on its mission to identify possible landing sites for the Surveyor and Apollo spacecraft.
In 1969, Yasser Arafat takes over as chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization.
In 1974, The Symbionese Liberation Army kidnaps Patty Hearst in Berkeley, California.
In 1974, M62 coach bombing: The Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) explodes a bomb on a bus carrying off-duty British Armed Forces personnel in Yorkshire, England. Nine soldiers and three civilians are killed.
In 1975, Haicheng earthquake (magnitude 7.3 on the Richter scale) occurs in Haicheng, Liaoning, China.
In 1976, In Guatemala and Honduras an earthquake kills more than 22,000.
In 1977, A Chicago Transit Authority elevated train rear-ends another and derails, killing 11 and injuring 180, the worst accident in the agency’s history.
In 1980, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini names Abolhassan Banisadr as president of Iran.
In 1983, Karen Carpenter, American singer and drummer (The Carpenters) (b. 1950) dies. She was an American singer and drummer. She and her brother, Richard, formed the 1970s duo, the Carpenters. Although her skills as a drummer earned admiration from drumming luminaries and peers, she is best known for her vocal performances. She had a contralto vocal range. Carpenter suffered from anorexia nervosa, an eating disorder which was little known at the time. She died at age 32 from heart failure caused by complications related to her illness. Carpenter’s death led to increased visibility and awareness of eating disorders.
In 1992, A coup d’état is led by Hugo Chávez against Venezuelan President Carlos Andrés Pérez.
In 1996, Major snowstorm paralyzes Midwestern United States, Milwaukee, Wisconsin and ties all-time record low temperature at -26 °F (-32.2 °C)
In 1997, En route to Lebanon, two Israeli Sikorsky CH-53 troop-transport helicopters collide in mid-air over northern Galilee, Israel killing 73.
In 1997, After at first contesting the results, Serbian President Slobodan Milošević recognizes opposition victories in the November 1996 elections.
In 1998, An earthquake measuring 6.1 on the Richter Scale in northeast Afghanistan kills more than 5,000.
In 1999, Unarmed West African immigrant Amadou Diallo is shot dead by four plainclothes New York City police officers on an unrelated stake-out, inflaming race-relations in the city.
In 2003, The Bengali Hindus declares the independence of the Republic of Bangabhumi from Bangladesh.
In 2003, The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia is officially renamed Serbia and Montenegro and adopts a new constitution.
In 2004, Facebook, a mainstream online social networking site, is founded by Mark Zuckerberg.
In 2006, A stampede occurs in the ULTRA Stadium near Manila killing 71.
In 2007, Barbara McNair, American singer and actress (b. 1934) dies. Born Barbara Jean McNair in Chicago, Illinois and raised in Racine, Wisconsin, McNair studied music at the American Conservatory of Music in Chicago. Her big break came with a win on Arthur Godfrey‘s TV show Talent Scouts, which led to bookings at The Purple Onion and the Cocoanut Grove. She soon became one of the country’s most popular headliners and a guest on such television variety shows as The Steve Allen Show, Hullabaloo, The Bell Telephone Hour, and The Hollywood Palace, while recording for the Coral, Signature, Motown, and TEC Recording Studios labels. Among her hits were “You’re Gonna Love My Baby” and “Bobby”. In the early 1960s, McNair made several musical shorts for Scopitone, a franchise of coin-operated machines that showed what were the forerunners of today’s music videos.
In 2012, Florence Green, English soldier (b. 1901) dies. She was an English woman who was the last surviving veteran of the First World War from any country. She was a member of the Women’s Royal Air Force.
In 2015, A TransAsia Airways aircraft with 58 people on board, en route from the Taiwanese capital Taipei to Kinmen, crashes into the Keelung River just after take-off, killing at least 31 people.
In 2015, Tennessee Hospital Association officials wanted the state to expand Medicaid under Obamacare because, they said, they needed more revenue. But after a review of IRS statements from several THA-affiliated hospitals’ reveal some of their top officials made rather generous salaries, well over the reported national average, at least as recently as 2013. Those IRS statements are available on the Economic Research Institute’s website. West Tennessee Health Care is a leading member of THA.
In 2020, The COVID-19 pandemic causes all casinos in Macau to be closed down for 15 days
