ON THIS DAY On Feb. 9, 1943, the World War II battle of Guadalcanal in the southwest Pacific ended with an American victory over Japanese forces.
ON THIS DAY On Feb. 10, 1962, the Soviet Union exchanged the captured American U-2 pilot Francis Gary Powers for Rudolph Ivanovich Abel, a Soviet spy held by the United States.
ON THIS DAY On Feb. 11, 1945, President Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill and Soviet leader Josef Stalin signed the Yalta Agreement during World War II.
ON THIS DAY On Feb. 12, 1973, the first release of American prisoners of war from the Vietnam conflict took place.
ON THIS DAY On Feb. 13, 1935, a jury in Flemington, N.J., found Bruno Richard Hauptmann guilty of first-degree murder in the kidnap-death of the infant son of Charles and Anne Lindbergh. Hauptmann was later executed.
ON THIS DAY On Feb. 15, 1898, the U.S. battleship Maine blew up in Havana Harbor, killing 260 crew members and escalating tensions with Spain.
ON THIS DAY On Feb. 16, 1923, the burial chamber of King Tutankhamen's recently unearthed tomb was unsealed in Egypt.
On this day in 1885, Mark Twain publishes his famous--and famously controversial--novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn. Also Pluto was discovered in 1930 and classified a planet. It would lose that classification years later.
ON THIS DAY On Feb. 19, 1945, during World War II, some 30,000 United States Marines landed on the Western Pacific island of Iwo Jima, where they encountered ferocious resistance from Japanese forces. The Americans took control of the strategically important island after a month-long battle.
ON THIS DAY On Feb. 20, 1962, astronaut John Glenn became the first American to orbit Earth as he flew aboard the Friendship 7 Mercury capsule.
1792 – The Postal Service Act, establishing the United States Post Office Department, is signed by PresidentGeorge Washington. is that what you were referring to ? ---- 1339 – The Milanese army and the St. George's (San Giorgio) Mercenaries of Lodrisio Visconti clashed in the Battle of Parabiago.
ON THIS DAY On Feb. 21, 1965, Malcolm X was shot and killed by assassins as he was about to address a rally in New York City; he was 39.
ON THIS DAY On Feb. 22, 1980, in a stunning upset, the United States Olympic hockey team defeated the Soviets at Lake Placid, N.Y., 4-to-3. (The U.S. team went on to win the gold medal.) *Also known as the Miracle on Ice
I still remember that quite vividly. Skiing in Vermont with my family and friends of ours, game wasn't televised live, a friend heard the final score on the radio, I didn't believe him at first. Also, 70 years ago today, Sofie Scholl, her brother Hans and Christoph Probst, members of the "White Rose", were executed.
