February 28 is the 59th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There are 306 days remaining until the end of the year (307 in leap years).
Holidays
- Christian feast day:
- Kalevala Day, the day of Finnish culture. (Finland)
- National Science Day (India)
- Peace Memorial Day (Taiwan)
- Teachers’ Day (Arab states)
- The third day of Ayyám-i-Há (Bahá’í Faith)
- Rare Disease Day (last day of February)
History
In 202 BC, coronation ceremony of Liu Bang as Emperor Gaozu of Han takes place, initiating four centuries of the Han Dynasty‘s rule over China.
In 628, Khosrau II is executed by Mihr Hormozd under the orders of Kavadh II.
In 870, The Fourth Council of Constantinople closes.
In 1246, The Siege of Jaén ends in the context of the Spanish Reconquista resulting in the Castilian takeover of the city from the Taifa of Jaen.
In 1500, Spanish conquistador Vicente Yáñez Pinzón was the first documented European to sail into the Amazon river. Pinzón called the river flow Río Santa María del Mar Dulce, later shortened to Mar Dulce (literally, sweet sea, because of its fresh water pushing out into the ocean). The Amazon is so huge, so powerful, that fresh water from its mouth flows 100 miles into the Atlantic Ocean before it turns completely salty. Vicente Yáñez Pinzón ( Spain, c. 1462 – after 1514) was a Spanish navigator, explorer, and conquistador, the youngest of the Pinzón brothers. Along with his older brother, Martín Alonso Pinzón, who captained the Pinta, he sailed with Christopher Columbus on the first voyage to the New World, in 1492, as captain of the Niña.
In 1525, The Aztec king Cuauhtémoc is executed by Hernán Cortés‘s forces.
In 1610, Thomas West, Baron de La Mar, is appointed governor of Virginia.
In 1638, The Scottish National Covenant is signed in Edinburgh.
In 1643, Roger Scott is tried in Massachusetts for sleeping during the public exercise of the Lord’s Day.
In 1692, Salem witch hunt begins.
In 1704, In 1704, The town of Deerfield, Massachusetts is completely destroyed by the French and Native Americans, killing 56 and kidnapping 112.
In 1710, In the Battle of Helsingborg, 14,000 Danish invaders under Jørgen Rantzau are decisively defeated by an equally sized Swedish force under Magnus Stenbock. This is the last time Swedish and Danish troops meet on Swedish soil.
In 1749, first edition of Henry Fieldings’ “Tom Jones” published
In 1759, Pope Clement XIII allows Bible to be translated into various languages.
In 1778, Rhode Island General Assembly authorizes enlistment of slaves.
In 1784, John Wesley signed the “deed of declaration,” formalizing the establishment of the Wesleyan faith, or Methodists.
In 1810, first US fire insurance joint-stock company organized, Philadelphia.
In 1811, Cry of Asencio, beginning of the Uruguayan War of Independence
In 1825, a treaty was signed between Brita and Russia, settling the border between Canada and Alaska, then a Russian possession.
In 1827, The Baltimore & Ohio Railroad is incorporated, the first U.S. railroad chartered to carry passengers and freight.
In 1838, Robert Nelson, leader of the Patriotes, proclaims the independence of Lower Canada (today Quebec)
In 1844, Secretary of State Abel P. Upshur, Navy Secretary Thomas W. Gilmer and several other people were killed when a 12-inch gun aboard the USS Princeton exploded.
In 1847, US defeats Mexico in battle of Sacramento.
In 1849, the ship California arrived in San Francisco, carrying the first of the gold-seekers after a five-month journey from New York City.
In 1854, some 50 slavery opponents met at a schoolhouse in Ripon, Wis., to call for creation of a new political group. A second meeting was held March 20, and by July, the new group was formally known as the Republican Party. Abraham Lincoln was elected in 1860 as the first Republican president.
In 1861, The territory of Colorado was organized. At first it seemed like a mountainous wilderness. But there was silver in them thar hills. The skiing came later.
In 1867, Seventy years of Holy See-United States relations are ended by a Congressional ban on federal funding of diplomatic envoys to the Vatican and are not restored until January 10, 1984.
In 1870, The Bulgarian Exarchate is established by decree of Sultan Abd-ul-Aziz of the Ottoman Empire.
In 1874, One of the longest cases ever heard in an English court ends when the defendant is convicted of perjury for attempting to assume the identity of the heir to the Tichborne baronetcy.
In 1877, London University decided to give degrees to women.
In 1878, US congress authorizes large-size silver certificate.
In 1879, “Exodus of 1879” southern blacks flee political/economic exploitation.
In 1883, The first vaudeville theater opens in Boston
In 1885, The American Telephone and Telegraph Company is incorporated in New York State as the subsidiary of American Bell Telephone. (American Bell would later merge with its subsidiary.)
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In 1891, George Hearst, American businessman and politician (b. 1820) died, aged 70, in Washington, D.C. on February 28, 1891. The California Legislature and state courts adjourned, so officials could attend his funeral. He was a wealthy American businessman and United States Senator, and the father of newspaperman William Randolph Hearst. Hearst, of Scottish origin, was born near Sullivan, Missouri, to William G. Hearst and Elizabeth Collins.
In 1893, The USS Indiana, the lead ship of her class and the first battleship in the United States Navy comparable to foreign battleships of the time, is launched.
In 1897, Queen Ranavalona III, the last monarch of Madagascar, is deposed by a French military force.
In 1900, The Second Boer War: The 118-day “Siege of Ladysmith” is lifted.
In 1914, The Autonomous Republic of Northern Epirus is proclaimed in Gjirokastër, by the Greeks living in southern Albania.
In 1916, Henry James, American-English author (b. 1843) dies. He was an American writer who spent the bulk of his career in Britain. He is regarded as one of the key figures of 19th-century literary realism. He was the son of Henry James, Sr. and the brother of philosopher and psychologist William James and diarist Alice James. James alternated between America and Europe for the first 20 years of his life, after which he settled in England, becoming a British subject in 1915, one year before his death. He is best known for a number of novels showing Americans encountering Europe and Europeans. His method of writing from the point of view of a character within a tale allows him to explore issues related to consciousness and perception, and his style in later works has been compared to impressionist painting. James contributed significantly to literary criticism, particularly in his insistence that writers be allowed the greatest possible freedom in presenting their view of the world. James claimed that a text must first and foremost be realistic and contain a representation of life that is recognisable to its readers. Good novels, to James, show life in action and are, most importantly, interesting. His imaginative use of point of view, interior monologue and possibly unreliable narrators in his own novels and tales brought a new depth and interest to narrative fiction. An extraordinarily productive writer, in addition to his voluminous works of fiction he published articles and books of travel, biography, autobiography, and criticism, and wrote plays, some of which were performed during his lifetime, though with limited success. His theatrical work is thought to have profoundly influenced his later novels and tales.
In 1917, AP reports Mexico & Japan will ally with Germany if US enters WW I.
In 1921, Russia and Afghanistan signed a treaty of friendship providing political and financial aid for the Afghans.
In 1922, Britain formally declared Egypt’s independence, although still retaining control of the Suez Canal and the country’s defense.
In 1924, U.S. troops are sent to Honduras to protect American interests during an election conflict.
In 1928, C.V. Raman discovers the Raman effect.
In 1933, Francis Perkins was appointed Secretary of Labor by President Roosevelt. She was the first female cabinet member in U.S. history.
In 1933, A day after the Reichstag burned down, Adolf Hitler persuaded President Hindenburg to sign a decree suspending guarantees of personal liberty, freedom of speech and the press and the right of assembly.
In 1935, DuPont scientist Wallace Carothers invents nylon.
In 1939, The erroneous word “dord” is discovered in the Webster’s New International Dictionary, Second Edition, prompting an investigation.
In 1940, US population at 131,669,275 (12,865,518 blacks (9.8%)).
In 1940, Basketball is televised for the first time (Fordham University vs. the University of Pittsburgh in Madison Square Garden).
In 1941, 39 U Boats (197,000 ton) sunk this month.
In 1942, The heavy cruiser USS Houston is sunk in the Battle of Sunda Strait with 693 crew members killed, along with HMAS Perth which lost 375 men.
In 1942, Japanese forces landed in Java, the last Allied bastion in the Dutch East Indies.
In 1943, 63 U Boats (359,300 ton) sinks this month.
In 1944, Smokey The Bear, Symbol Character, born.
In 1945, U.S. tanks break the natural defense line west of the Rhine and cross the Erft River.
In 1946, The U.S. Army declares that it will use V-2 rocket to test radar as an atomic rocket defense system.
In 1947, Britain and France sign a 50-year pact to curb Germany.
In 1950, The French Assembly in Paris decides to limit the sale of Coca-Cola.
In 1951, The Senate crime investigating committee headed by Estes Kefauver, D-Tenn., issued a preliminary report saying at least two major crime syndicates were operating in the United States.
In 1953, James D. Watson and Francis Crick announce to friends that they have determined the chemical structure of DNA; the formal announcement takes place on April 25 following publication in April’s Nature (pub. April 2).
In 1954, The first color television sets using the NTSC standard are offered for sale to the general public.
In 1958, A school bus in Floyd County, Kentucky hits a wrecker truck and plunges down an embankment into the rain-swollen Levisa Fork River. The driver and 26 children die in what remains one of the worst school bus accidents in U.S. history.
In 1959, Discoverer 1, an American spy satellite that is the first object intended to achieve a polar orbit, is launched. It failed to achieve orbit.
In 1961, COVER OF LOOK President & Mrs. JOHN F. KENNEDY, and inside, “an informal visit with our new first family”
In 1962, The John Glenn for President club was formed by a group of Las Vegas republicans on this day. Not long after, America’s first orbital space hero decided that he’d rather be a Democrat.
In 1964, Record Rainfall: 53″ In 12 Hours on Reunion Island.
In 1969, A Los Angeles court refuses Robert Kennedy assassin Sirhan Sirhan’s request to be executed.
In 1970, Bicycles now permitted to cross Golden Gate Bridge.
In 1971, The male voters of Liechtenstein defeated a referendum on giving women the vote.
In 1972, U.S. President Richard Nixon wrapped up an historic week-long visit to China, convinced the trip helped to create a new “generation of peace.” The United States and People’s Republic of China sign the Shanghai Communiqué.
In 1974, the United States and Egypt re-established diplomatic relations after a seven-year break.
In 1974 – Christopher Lee Neudecker was born this day (very early in the morning) to Frank and Pattie Neudecker. Happy Birthday Chris!
In 1975, more than 40 people were killed in London’s Underground when a subway train sped past its final stop and smashed into the end of a tunnel.
In 1977, The first killer whale to be born in captivity occurs at Marineland in Los Angeles, California.
In 1982, AT&T loses record $7 BILLION for fiscal year ending on this day.
In 1983, The Prime Interest Rate went to 10.5 percent
In 1984, Gary Hart won the Democratic presidential primary in New Hampshire, upsetting front-runner Walter Mondale.
In 1986, Eric Micheal Gunn was born, rather quickly, to Micky and Susie Gunn. Happy Birthday Mick!
In 1985, ailing Soviet President Konstantin U. Chernenko made his second television appearance in four days as he was shown receiving his credentials from the Russian Republic’s parliament.
In 1986, Swedish Prime Minister Olaf Palme (1969-76, 82-86) was shot to death in central Stockholm while walking from a movie theater with his wife, Lisbeth.
In 1987, Soviet leader Mikhail S. Gorbachev announced the Kremlin was ready for a separate accord with the United States to rid Europe of medium-range nuclear missiles.
In 1988, ethnic unrest broke out between Armenians and Azerbaijanis in the city of Sumgait.
In 1989, in Chicago, Richard M. Daley, son of Richard J. Daley, defeated acting Mayor Eugene Sawyer in a Democratic primary election.
In 1990, the Soviet Parliament passed a law permitting the leasing of land to individuals for housing and farming. It was another radical change in the Stalinist scheme of a state-run economy.
In 1991, Allied and Iraqi forces suspended their attacks as Iraq pledged to accept all United Nations resolutions concerning Kuwait. Basically ending the first Gulf War.
In 1992, the U.N. Security Council warned Iraq its continued refusal to destroy its Scud missile facilities would bring “serious consequences.”
In 1992, a bomb blamed on the IRA ripped through a London railway station, injuring at least 30 people and shutting down the British capital’s entire rail and subway system.
In 1992, a judge in Rochester Hills, Mich., said euthansia advocate Jack “Dr. Death” Kevorkian must stand murder trial for helping two chronically ill women commit suicide.
In 1993, A gun battle erupted near Waco, Texas, when Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agents tried to serve warrants on David Karesh and the Branch Davidians; four agents and six Davidians were killed as a 51-day standoff began.
In 1993, three U.S. planes carried out the first mission to drop relief supplies over Bosnia-Herzegovina.
In 1994, Brady Law, imposing a wait-period to buy a hand-gun, went into effect.
In 1994, Lorena Bobbitt was released from a state mental hospital in Virginia, five weeks after she was acquitted by reason of insanity of mutilating her husband, John. We tried to reach John for comment, but he was cut off!
In 1994, Moldova’s maindependence party claimed a clear victory the country’s first post-Soviet parliamentary elections.
In 1994, the PLO broke off peace talks with Israel.
In 1994, NATO was involved in actual combat for the first time in its 45-year history when four U.S. fighter planes operating under NATO auspices shot down four Serb planes that’d violated the U.N. no-fly zone in central Bosnia.
In 1995, Denver International Airport opened after 16 months of delays and $3.2 billion dollars in budget overruns.
In 1995, U.S. Marines swept ashore Somalia to protect retreating U.N. peacekeepers. early March the Marines completed Operation United Shield.
In 1995, Raul Salinas de Gortari, brother of former Mexican President Carlos Salinas de Gortari, is arrested in connection with the September 1994 slaying of Jose Francisco Ruiz Massieu, the No. 2 man in the ruling Institutional Revolutionary Party.
In 1995, U.S. Senator Ben Nighthorse Campbell of Colorado announced that he would be officially switching from the Democratic to the Republican party. Campbell, who has long been considered the most conservative Democrat in the Senate, finally decided to make the move after Senate Democrats blocked the passage of the balanced budget amendment. Campbell is the only native-American member of the United States Senate.
In 1995, Lamar Alexander, a former governor of Tennessee and secretary of education, announced his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination in 1996.
In 1996, President Clinton and the Congress agreed on a sanctions bill aimed at driving foreign investors from Cuba.
In 1996, Britain’s Prince Charles and Princess Diana agreed to divorce after 15 years of marriage.
In 1997, Smokers must prove they are over 18 to purchase cigarettes in US.
In 1997, Brushing aside congressional calls for a tougher stance against Mexico, President Clinton recertified the country as a fully cooperating ally in the struggle against drug smuggling.
In 1997, Earthquake in Pakistan, kills 45.
In 1997, in North Hollywood, Calif., two heavily armed masked robbers bungled a bank heist and came out firing, unleashing their arsenal on police, bystanders, cars and TV choppers before they were killed.
In 1997, former FBI agent Earl Pitts pleaded guilty to spying; he was only the second FBI agent ever to be convicted of espionage.
In 1998, in their weekly radio addresses, President Clinton and the Republicans sparred over education, with Clinton describing tests showing American high school students lagging behind those of other industrial nations as a “wake-up call” while the Republicans blamed the disappointing results on a “hungry bureaucracy in Washington” that gobbles up education funds.
In 1998, President Clinton interrupted a weekend with his wife and daughter at a Utah ski resort to fly to Los Angeles where he comforted victims of California.’s deadly mudslides and headed to Beverly Hills to raise more than $500,000 for his party from a galaxy of Hollywood stars.
In 1998, About 10,000 environmental activists angered by Hungary’s decision to build a new Danube dam rallied in Budapest vowing to fight the plan. Their protest came a day after Hungary and Slovakia signed a protocol agreement on the principles of the dam to support Slovakia’s controversial Gabcikovo hydro-electric project.
In 1998, Two naked women making an anti-fur protest were led away by police minutes after they emerged to cross a busy street in Hong Kong’s central business district. The two women, members of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals pressure group, painted their nude bodies with leopard spots, drew cat-like whiskers on their whitened cheeks and carried a banner reading “Only animals should wear fur.”
In 1999, Guerrillas detonated two bombs beside a military convoy in southern Lebanon, killing a brigadier general and three other Israelis; Israel retaliated with air raids on suspected guerrilla hideouts.
In 2000, Right-wing Austrian leader Joerg Haider resigned as head of the Freedom Party in an apparent bid to end Austria’s international ostracism following his party’s rise to power.
In 2001, The Nisqually Earthquake measuring 6.8 on the Richter Scale hits the Nisqually Valley and the Seattle, Tacoma, and Olympia area of the U.S. state of Washington.
In 2001, Six passengers and four railway staff are killed and a further 82 people suffer serious injuries in the Selby rail crash.
In 2002, During the religious violence in Gujarat, the 97 people killed in the Naroda Patiya massacre and 69 in Gulbarg Society massacre.
In 2004, Over 1 million Taiwanese participating in the 228 Hand-in-Hand Rally form a 500-kilometre (310 mi) long human chain to commemorate the 228 Incident in 1947
In 2005, A suicide bombing at a police recruiting centre in Al Hillah, Iraq kills 127.
In 2008, Scott Parish testified as to the condition of property on 324 Roland in a lawsuit against the city yesterday by Paul Mundt as well as awarded retired building director Mr. Jim Campbell an award for appreciation for service for the city. The case did not conclude until about 4:00 in the afternoon.
In 2008, Legislators in Georgia claim miles of Tennessee property is rightfully theirs. Georgia seeks to shift its northern border by roughly a mile in southeast Tennessee. But the Tennessee General Assembly is drafting a resolution of its own. The reason…. Lawmakers in drought-stricken Georgia want access to the Tennessee River.
In 2008, With a little help form the state’s lieutenant governor, members of the Virginia Senate approved an amendment to the budget bill that would stop taxpayer funding of Planned Parenthood. The vote ended in a 20-20 tie and Lt. Governor Bill Bolling cast a vote in favor of the amendment. Sen. Ken Cuccinelli was behind the amendment that bars Planned Parenthood from receiving state funding in the new budget. The proposal drew strong opposition from some lawmakers. That included Senator Janet Howell, who claimed the amendment would lead to women dying from illegal abortions, and Senate Majority Leader Dick Saslaw, who warned it would lead to other controversial budget cuts.
In 2008, The European Union fined Microsoft Corp. $1.3 billion because the company charged rivals “unreasonable prices” for software information. The fine brings to nearly $2.5 billion the total fines the European Union has demanded from Microsoft during a long-running antitrust fight. That amount could grow. EU Competition Commissioner Neelie Kroes said the software giant was being investigated in two other cases. Microsoft says the issues that led to the fines have been resolved.
In 2009, Paul Harvey, American radio host (b. 1918) dies. Paul Harvey Aurandt, was a conservative American radio broadcaster for the ABC Radio Networks. He broadcast News and Comment on weekday mornings and mid-days, and at noon on Saturdays, as well as his famous The Rest of the Story segments. From the 1950s through the 1990s, Harvey’s programs reached as many as 24 million people a week. Paul Harvey News was carried on 1,200 radio stations, 400 Armed Forces Network stations and 300 newspapers. His success with sponsors stemmed from the seamlessness with which he segued from his monologue into reading commercial messages. He explained his relationship with them, saying “I am fiercely loyal to those willing to put their money where my mouth is.”
The New York Times obituary says: [He] “personalized the radio news with his right-wing opinions, but laced them with his own trademarks: a hypnotic timbre, extended pauses for effect, heart-warming tales of average Americans and folksy observations that evoked the heartland, family values and the old-fashioned plain talk one heard around the dinner table on Sunday. “‘Hello, Americans,’ he barked. ‘This is Paul Harvey! Stand byyy for Newwws!’ “He railed against welfare cheats and defended the death penalty. He worried about the national debt, big government, bureaucrats who lacked common sense, permissive parents, leftist radicals and America succumbing to moral decay. He championed rugged individualism, love of God and country, and the fundamental decency of ordinary people.”
In 2013, Pope Benedict XVI resigns as the pope of the Catholic Church becoming the first pope to do so since 1415.
In 2013, Jackson City Council Consideration of a resolution for Medicaid expansion . Without the agenda packet for March 2013, knowing the Mayor and his league of followers, this one was a political swaying toward expansion… and why not, West Tennessee Health Care wants it (quietly and behind the scenes, they made a recent trip to Nashville to push for expansion) as well as the National Chamber of Commerce. The motion passed on the motion of Councilmember Cisco, seconded by Councilmember Buchanan, a Resolution supporting Medicaid expansion in the State of Tennessee was approved 8-0-1, with Councilmember Conger abstaining. Conger was working for West Tennessee Health Care at the time.
May God Bless and Keep You This Day Till Tomorrow