This Day in History

[Gravdigr]

February 20

Today the U.S. celebrates Presidents' Day.

The entirety of The Northern Hemisphere unites and comes together today as one people to celebrate Hoodie Hoo Day. So, hoodie hoo to you!

Today is also marked as a World Day of Social Justice. Dear Social Justice Warriors, Instead of celebrating this cause, how about you take the day off, and maybe cut the world just a little fucking slack, mmkay?


Events

1472 – Orkney and Shetland are pawned by Norway to Scotland in lieu of a dowry for Margaret of Denmark.

1547 – Edward VI of England is crowned King of England at Westminster Abbey.

1685 – René-Robert Cavelier establishes Fort St. Louis at Matagorda Bay thus forming the basis for France's claim to Texas.

1792 – The Postal Service Act, establishing the United States Post Office Department, is signed by United States President George Washington.

1816 – Rossini's opera The Barber of Seville premieres at the Teatro Argentina in Rome.

1872 – The Metropolitan Museum of Art opens in New York City.

1877 – Tchaikovsky's ballet Swan Lake receives its premiere at the Bolshoi Theatre in Moscow.

1913 – King O'Malley drives in the first survey peg to mark commencement of work on the construction of Canberra, Australia.

1931 – The Congress of the United States approves the construction of the San Francisco–Oakland Bay Bridge by the state of California.

1935 – Caroline Mikkelsen becomes the first woman to set foot on Antarctica.

1942 – Lieutenant Edward "Butch" O'Hare becomes America's first World War II flying ace.

1943 – The Saturday Evening Post publishes the first of Norman Rockwell's Four Freedoms in support of United States President Franklin Roosevelt's 1941 State of the Union address theme of Four Freedoms.

1952 – Emmett Ashford becomes the first African-American umpire in organized baseball by being authorized to be a substitute umpire in the Southwestern International League.

1956 – The United States Merchant Marine Academy becomes a permanent Service Academy.

1959 - 16 year old Jimi Hendrix made his stage debut when he played a show at the Temple De Hirsch Sinai synagogue in Seattle.

1962 – Mercury program: While aboard Friendship 7, John Glenn becomes the first American to orbit the earth, making three orbits in four hours, 55 minutes.

1965 – Ranger 8 crashes into the Moon after a successful mission of photographing possible landing sites for the Apollo program.

1971 – The United States Emergency Broadcast System is accidentally activated in an erroneous national alert.

1979 – An earthquake cracks Sinila volcanic crater in Dieng Plateau, releases poisonous hydrogen sulfide gas and kills 149 villagers in Indonesian province of Central Java.

1986 – The Soviet Union launches its Mir spacecraft. Remaining in orbit for 15 years, it is occupied for ten of those years.

2003 – During a Great White concert in West Warwick, Rhode Island, a pyrotechnics display sets the Station nightclub ablaze, killing 100 and injuring over 200 others.

2016 – Six people are killed and two injured in multiple shooting incidents in Kalamazoo County, Michigan.

Births

1902 – Ansel Adams; 1906 – Gale Gordon (Lucy's boss on The Lucy Show); 1921 – Buddy Rogers; 1924 – Gloria Vanderbilt; 1925 – Robert Altman; 1927 – Roy Cohn; 1927 – Sidney Poitier; 1929 – Amanda Blake (Long Branch Saloon owner 'Kitty Russell' on Gunsmoke); 1934 – Bobby Unser; 1937 – Roger Penske:drivng:; 1937 – Nancy Wilson♪ ♫; 1946 – J. Geils; 1942 – Mitch McConnell; 1946 – Sandy Duncan; 1946 – J. Geils♪ ♫(J. Geils Band); 1947 – Peter Strauss; 1949 – Ivana Trump; 1950 – Walter Becker♪ ♫(Steely Dan); 1951 – Edward Albert; 1951 – Gordon Brown; 1951 – Randy California♪ ♫; 1954 – Patty Hearst; 1963 – Charles Barkley; 1964 – French Stewart ('Harry' on 3rd Rock From The Sun); 1966 – Cindy Crawford; 1967 – Kurt Cobain; 1967 – Lili Taylor; 1984 – Trevor Noah; 1987 – Miles Teller (Whiplash); 1988 – Rihanna♪ ♫

Deaths

1893 – P. G. T. Beauregard; 1900 – Washakie; 1920 – Robert Peary; 1936 – Max Schreck (Nosferatu (1922)); 1966 – Chester W. Nimitz (America's last Fleet Admiral, namesake of the Nimitz-class of supercarrier); 1972 – Walter Winchell; 1992 – Dick York (Bewitched); 1993 – Ferruccio Lamborghini (yeah, that Lamborghini); 1999 – Gene Siskel; 2005 – Sandra Dee; 2005 – John Raitt♪ ♫(father of Bonnie Raitt); 2005 – Hunter S. Thompson; 2006 – Curt Gowdy; 2010 – Alexander Haig ("I am in control here.")