19 Feb History.

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Events, deaths, births, of FEB 19
[For Feb 19 Julian go to Gregorian date: 1583~1699: Mar 01 — 1700s: Mar 02 — 1800s: Mar 03 — 1900~2099: Mar 04]

ALTERNATE SITES ALL FOR 20040219 ANY DAY OF THE YEAR IN HISTORY ART “4” FEB 19

• Marines invade Iwo Jima... • Napoléon becomes First Consul... • Finns repulse Soviets... • Communist plot in El Salvador?... • Suisse: acte de médiation... • Amy Tan is born... • Rescuers reach Donner party... • Myanmar officials die in crash... • South Vietnam coup fails... • Chicago 7 found guilty... • Detroit's newspaper strike...

^ On a February 19:
2001 Fugitives James Parker, 16, and Robert Tulloch, 17, are captured in Indiana. They are believed to be the murderers by stabbing, 21 January 2001 of Half Zantop, 62, who taught earth sciences at Dartmouth College, and Susanne Zantop, 55, who was chairwoman of the German Studies Department.
2000 El grupo francés Usinor, el luxemburgués Arbe y el español Aceralia presentan en Bruselas su proyecto de fusión para crear el líder mundial de la industria siderúrgica.
1999 US President Clinton posthumously pardons Henry O. Flipper, the first black graduate of West Point, whose military career was tarnished by a racially motivated discharge.

^ 1999 Clinton impeachment aftermath
(1) Matt Drudge Reports:
XXXXX DRUDGE REPORT XXXXX FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 19, 1999 23:58:42 ET XXXXX
BROADDRICK EXPLOSION: CALLS FOR NBC NEWS PRESIDENT TO RESIGN; LOCKHART LOSES CONTROL!
The WALL STREET JOURNAL went. Then the WASHINGTON POST went. Next, NBC News President Andy Lack may be going, going, gone.
President Lack may become Juanita Broaddrick's first victim as media outlets worldwide blared rape allegations against President Clinton — allegations that Lack suppressed when he refused to allow NBC hot shot Lisa Myers' 30-minute interview with the once Jane Doe to clear air.
NBC News President Lack was being hit with all of the blame for the Broaddrick debacle late Friday night.
"Andy Lack should resign. Resign now. We have to save our face," declared one insider Friday night as word spread throughout elite media circles that the WASHINGTON POST had frontpaged a chilling story of sexual assault and coverup.
Myers fought to get it on the air. Washington Bureau Chief Russert fought to get it on the air. Thousands of phone calls jammed NBC's phone lines after the DRUDGE REPORT revealed that NBC News put Broaddrick on ice for the second time.
"I feel so betrayed by NBC," Broaddrick told the WASHINGTON POST.
[The race is now on to secure a new Broaddrick television interview. Lewinsky hot Barbara Walters is a possible front-runner. Lewinsky hot Larry King would offer a less glamorous venue, and earned no points during Friday's Paula Jones interview when he completely failed to mention the Broaddrick story that had consumed the capital.]
It was Lack who personally blocked the interview, and continued to thwart NBC's Washington bureau going into the last week of network sweeps. Behind the scenes on Friday night, calls for Lack's resignation accelerated. And there are new signs that Lack knowingly stood by as the White House manipulated NBC owner GENERAL ELECTRIC. "The White House pressure to prevent the Broaddrick interview from reaching air worked its way to the highest levels of the parent company GE," says a senior executive at another network.
After all, it was Lack himself who allowed Myers' original NBC NIGHTLY NEWS story on Broaddrick's rape charge to run last March. Working with nothing but court records and second-hand corroboration, Lack and NBC News aired Broaddrick's story on the eve of the Paula Jones case dismissal. Now with Broaddrick herself confirming Myers' original report on camera and on the record, Lack has put on the brakes.
WASHINGTON POST media savant Howard Kurtz reported on Saturday:
"Several NBC sources said Myers and her Washington bureau chief, Tim Russert, were frustrated by their inability to get the story on the air. They and other advocates believe that each time they came up with further corroboration, NBC management raises the evidentiary bar a little higher."
It is not clear if White House Press Secretary Joe Lockhart has been in personal contact with NBC News President Lack, or to what lengths Lockhart has gone to keep the story bottled up. One thing became clear Friday night. The cork had popped and had shot around the world.
The rape charges hit front pages of the world's newspapers Saturday after the WALL STREET JOURNAL's Dorothy Rabinowitz secured Broaddrick's first on-the-record comments on NBC's interview coverup. Lockhart, operating on autopilot, tried to smear the JOURNAL. "They lost me when they accused the president of being a drug smuggler and a murderer," Lockhart sneered during his Friday briefing.
But Pete Yost at the ASSOCIATED PRESS quickly picked up the JOURNAL's cue hours later, getting his very own Broaddrick exclusive. Lockhart was forced off cruise control by the Yost.
And then word hit just as the president and first lady were reportedly again cleaning out closets. The WASHINGTON POST had prepared a front-page, in-depth, on-the-record, deeply sourced expose on Broaddrick. The impeachment threat had just ended and the next scandal had already broken. "We only had three calm days," sighed one administration insider.
The WASHINGTON POST surprised scandal watchers late week with its Broaddrick bombshell. The paper had been floundering as the NEW YORK TIMES produced exclusive after exclusive on the Clinton scandal front. The TIMES was silent on Saturday, likely preparing a catch-up story for Sunday. As the race to an unseen finish line drew a step closer.

(2) The White House denies allegations that President Bill Clinton sexually assaulted a woman more than 20 years ago, when he was attorney general of Arkansas.

Clinton's personal lawyer, David Kendall, issues a statement tonight denying the allegations. "Any allegation that the president assaulted Mrs. Broaddrick more than 20 years ago is absolutely false. Beyond that, we're not going to comment," he says.

White House officials decline to comment, referring reporters to Kendall's statement.

(3) Gennifer Flowers arrives in Oxford to tell undergraduates how she had survived America's greatest sex scandal and to advise against sleeping with a future President as a fast track to fame and fortune.

Miss Flowers addresses the Oxford Union more than 30 years after Bill Clinton had attended debates while a Rhodes scholar at University College. She is now picking up her singing career again but said the notoriety of her affair with Bill Clinton had not been what she wanted. She says: "I would never suggest to anyone that this is an easy way to become famous. It has taken a great toll."

Before making her address entitled Surviving Sex, Power and Propaganda, she says: "My advice would be to not get involved because those relationships are very destructive and seldom end in a positive way. But I was young and alone and wanted to take a chance. It was an adventure but, although there were some wonderful times, it turned out to make my life very difficult."

She claims that Clinton had survived by lying and that she had been a victim of a White House smear campaign but had emerged a strong and resilient character. Unlike Hillary Clinton, she says she would not have stood by her man. Rather she would have "scratched his face off" and, if her husband of two years ever had an affair, she would tell him to pack his bags. She says: "My husband knows exactly what I would do." And what would this former "other woman" do about her husband's mistress? "That would depend on how big she was," Miss Flowers says.

She is in demand as a chat show guest and is bringing out an updated version of her autobiography and releasing a CD of jazz and blues songs. Her demeanour suits the dark Union building. She is soberly dressed and says she is glad to see some of the Oxford sites Clinton talked about from his time there. She says: "He admitted to me he was intimidated by the place in the most part but said he enjoyed the experience and I can see why. It is mind-boggling, particularly the architecture." ^top^

1998 El nicaragüense Sergio Ramírez Mercado y el cubano, residente en México, Eliseo Alberto, ganan el Premio Alfaguara de Novela.

^ 1997 FTC shuts down Internet phone scam
Federal regulators shut down three pornographic Web sites involved in a phone scam that rerouted phone calls to Moldova. The sites required Internet visitors to download a computer program to their computer, ostensibly to view the adult material. When users dialed up the sites, the program surreptitiously rerouted the call to a Moldova number. Unsuspecting users ran up phone bills totaling as much as $3000, and the scam perpetrators evidently received a cut of the profits from the Moldova phone company. The FTC said many developing nations offered a percentage of profits to companies that brought callers to their systems.

^ 1997 Detroit’s 19-month newspaper strike ends but not the litigation.
The Detroit News and Detroit Free Press accepted an offer from six unions to end a nineteen-month strike, and announced a plan to return the former strikers to work. The agreement formally ended the tense and at times turbulent strike that had begun on July 13, 1995, when failed contract talks prompted roughly 2000 union newspaper workers to hit the picket line. However, the February 1997 deal left a few festering conflicts in its wake. For one, the newspapers didn’t necessarily guarantee that the striking workers would be able to return to their old jobs. Instead, the papers devised a four-point re-hiring plan that promised to put the strikers on a "preferential hiring list" when — and if — positions became available. That crucial caveat led the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to take legal action against the papers. However, in August of 1997, US District Judge John Corbett O'Meara rejected the NLRB’s injunction, which called for a chunk of the 1275 replacement workers hired at the outset of the walk-off to be laid off in favor of the strikers. The NRLB lodged an appeal that was ultimately denied by the 6th US Circuit Court of Appeals in 1998. The board marshaled other suits against the newspapers, one of which was shot down later that year.

1996 Pent-up demand for reliable and secure forms of Internet payment sent shares of CyberCash soaring on its first day of public trading. CyberCash planned to release an electronic credit-card system. By the end of the day, its offering price had risen 79%.
1992 Ratificado el histórico acuerdo de no agresión y desnuclearización entre las dos Coreas, oficialmente en guerra desde 1953.
1991 Russian Federation President Boris Yeltsin makes an unprecedented public appeal for Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev to resign.
1988 El Sistema Monetario Europeo propone el "ecu" (unidad de cuenta europea) como moneda habitual.
1987 Marruecos construye un sexto muro en el Sáhara para impedir el paso del Frente Polisario al Atlántico.
1987 Reagan lifts trade boycott against Poland
1987 Anti-smoking ad airs for first time on TV, featuring Yul Brynner
1986 the US Senate approves a treaty outlawing genocide, 37 years after the pact had first been submitted for ratification.
1986 Jordanian King Hussein severs ties with PLO

^ 1985 Jobs and Wozniak win Medal of Technology
President Ronald Reagan awarded the prestigious National Medal of Technology to Steven Jobs and Stephen Wozniak of Apple Computer for developing the personal computer. Wozniak had built a primitive personal computer called the Apple I to impress friends in the Homebrew Computing Club. In 1976, he developed the Apple II. Wozniak and Jobs set up the Apple Computer Company in Wozniak's garage and began selling the Apple II for $1,500. By 1979, the company was worth more than one billion dollars. In 1984, the company introduced the Macintosh, literally changing the face of personal computers by popularizing the user-friendly interface, first introduced to the public in Apple's ill-fated and expensive Lisa computer.

1985 William Schroeder is first artificial heart patient to leave hospital He spent 15 minutes outside Humana Hospital in Louisville KY

^ 1981 Communist plot in El Salvador, says US.
      The US government releases a report detailing how the "insurgency in El Salvador has been progressively transformed into a textbook case of indirect armed aggression by communist powers." The report was another step indicating that the new administration of Ronald Reagan was prepared to take strong measures against what it perceived to be the communist threat to Central America.
      When the Reagan administration took office in 1981, it faced two particularly serious problems in Central America. In Nicaragua, the Reagan administration was worried about the Sandinista regime, a leftist government that took power in 1979 after the fall of long-time dictator Anastacio Somoza. In El Salvador, the administration was concerned about a growing civil war between government forces and leftist rebels. Brutal violence on the part of the Salvadoran military — offenses that included the 1980 rape and murder of four US missionaries — had caused the Jimmy Carter administration to cut off aid to the country.
      In both nations, Reagan officials were convinced that the Soviet Union was the catalyst for the troubles. To address the situation in Nicaragua, the Reagan administration began to covertly assist the so-called Contras-rebel forces that opposed the Sandinista regime and were based primarily in Honduras and Costa Rica. For El Salvador, the February 19 report was the first volley. The State Department memorandum indicated that the "political direction, organization and arming of the Salvadoran insurgency is coordinated and heavily influenced by Cuba with the active support of the Soviet Union, East Germany, Vietnam and other communist states." It thereupon provided a "chronology" of the communist involvement in El Salvador.
      In response to this perceived threat, the United States dramatically increased its military assistance to the government of El Salvador, provided US advisors to the Salvadoran armed forces, and began a series of National Guard "training exercises" in and around El Salvador. To no one's surprise, the conflict in El Salvador escalated quickly and charges of torture, kidnapping, and assassination flew from both sides of the civil war. During the 1980s, US military assistance to El Salvador topped nearly $5 billion, but the violence and instability continued unabated. In 1992, the United Nations and President Oscar Arias of Costa Rica arbitrated an agreement between the warring factions in El Salvador. A U.N. commission also condemned US complicity in atrocities committed by the Salvadoran military. President George Bush (who served as Reagan's vice-president in the previous administration) discounted the U.N. accusations, but claimed that peace in El Salvador was the product of a vigorous US response to communist subversion in the western hemisphere.

1976 Frente Polisario forms Democratic Republic of Sahara.

^ 1970 Chicago Seven wrongfully found guilty.
      The Chicago Seven (formerly the Chicago Eight — one defendant, Bobby Seale, was being tried separately) are acquitted of riot conspiracy charges, but found guilty of inciting riot. The eight antiwar activists were charged with the responsibility for the violently repressed demonstrations at the August 1968 Democratic National Convention in Chicago (Where mayor Daley had said: “The police is not there to create disorder, the police is there to preserve disorder” and an official inquiry later found that there had been “a police riot”).
      The defendants included David Dellinger of the National Mobilization Committee (NMC); Rennie Davis and Thomas Hayden of the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS); Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin, founders of the Youth International Party ("Yippies"); Bobby Seale of the Black Panthers; and two lesser known activists, Lee Weiner and John Froines.
      The defendants were charged with conspiracy to cross state lines with intent to incite a riot. Attorneys William Kunstler and Leonard Weinglass represented all but Seale. The trial, presided over by Judge Julius Hoffman, turned into a circus as the defendants and their attorneys used the court as a platform to attack Nixon, the Vietnam War, racism, and oppression. Their tactics were so disruptive that at one point, Judge Hoffman ordered Seale gagged and strapped to his chair-Seale's behavior eventually caused the judge to try him separately.
      By the time the trial ended in February 1970, Hoffman had found the defendants and their attorneys guilty of 175 counts of contempt of court and sentenced them to terms between two to four years. Although declaring the defendants not guilty of conspiracy, the jury found all but Froines and Weiner guilty of intent to riot. The others were each sentenced to five years and fined $5000. However, none served time because in 1972, a Court of Appeal overturned the criminal convictions and eventually most of the contempt charges were also dropped.

^ 1965 Coup in South Vietnam fails
Dissident officers move several battalions of troops into Saigon with the intention of ousting Gen. Nguyen Khanh from leadership. General Khanh escaped to Dalat with the aid of Air Vice Marshal Nguyen Cao Ky, commander of the South Vietnamese Air Force, who then threatened to bomb Saigon and the Tan Son Nhut Airport unless the rebel troops were withdrawn. Ky was dissuaded from this by Gen. William Westmoreland, Commander of US Military Assistance Command Vietnam, who told Ky that more political instability might have a negative impact on continued US aid. Khanh was able to get troops to take over from the insurgents without any resistance on February 20.
Meanwhile, Ky met with the dissident officers and agreed to their demand for the dismissal of Khanh. On February 21, the Armed Forces Council dismissed Khanh as chairman and as commander of the armed forces. General Lam Van Phat replaced him. The next day, Khanh announced that he had accepted the council's decision, after which he was appointed a "roving ambassador," assigned first to go to the United Nations and present evidence that the war in South Vietnam was being directed from Hanoi by the North Vietnamese.

1963 The Soviet Union informs US President Kennedy that it will withdraw "several thousand" of an estimated 17'000 Soviet soldiers in Cuba.
1961 Albania disavows Chinese "Revisionism"
1960 Protest strike in Poznan Poland
1959 Britain, Turkey and Greece sign agreement granting Cyprus independence. — Reino Unido, Grecia y Turquía acuerdan otorgar la plena independencia a Chipre en el plazo de un año.
1959 USAF rocket-powered rail sled attains Mach 4.1 (4970 kph), New Mexico
1959 Gabon adopts its constitution (holiday)
1955 South East Asia Collective Defense Treaty goes into effect — SEATO
1952 French offensive at Hanoi
1949 Mass arrests of communists in India
1949 first Bollingen Prize for poetry awarded to Ezra Pound
1945 Los norteamericanos desembarcan en la isla de Iwo Jima, estratégica base para atacar el territorio japonés.
1944 823 British bombers attack Berlin
1944 II Guerra Mundial: La Luftwaffe desencadena los mayores ataques contra Londres desde mayo de 1941.
1943 German tanks under Brigadier General Buelowius attack Kasserine Pass Tunisia
1942 Japanese troop land on Timor

^ 1942 Ouverture du procès de Riom.
Suite à la défaite de 1940, le gouvernement de Vichy entend juger les responsables de l'impréparation de l'armée et poursuit quelques-uns des dirigeants de l'entre-deux-guerres. Léon Blum, Edouard Daladier, le général Gamelin entre autres, sont au banc des accusés. Les Allemands appuient cette initiative mais voudraient que les accusations portent sur la responsabilité de la France dans le déclenchement du conflit. La défense rappelle que le chef du nouveau gouvernement (le maréchal Pétain) avait été Ministre de la Défense et membre du Conseil supérieur de la Guerre en 1934 et avait donc une large part de responsabilités dans l'impréparation de l'armée. Le procès tourne court suite à l'intervention de Hitler, mécontent de l'allure des événements. Le 21 mars, l'ambassadeur allemand Otto Abetz exige la suspension du procès et le 15 avril, celui-ci est «temporairement» suspendu. Le lendemain, Pierre Laval est rappelé au gouvernement.

1942 About 150 Japanese warplanes attack Darwin, Australia.

^ 1942 Roosevelt signs infamous relocation order.
     Presidential Executive Order 9066 began placing 100'000 persons of Japanese ancestry (of which over 2/3 were US-born citizens) into ten "relocation centers" (with barbed-wire and armed guards) for the duration of WWII.
      During World War II, ten weeks after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, US President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs Executive Order 9066, authorizing the removal of any or all people from military areas "as deemed necessary or desirable." The military in turn defines the entire West Coast, home to the majority of US residents of Japanese ancestry or citizenship, as a military area.
      By June 1942, more than 110'000 Japanese Americans have been relocated to remote internment camps built by the US military in scattered locations around the country. For the next two-and-a-half years, many of these Japanese Americans evacuees endure difficult living conditions and poor treatment by their military guards.
      On 17 December 1944, US Major General Henry C. Pratt issues Public Proclamation No. 21, declaring that, effective on 02 January 1945, Japanese-American "evacuees" from the West Coast could return to their homes. During the course of World War II, ten Americans were convicted of spying for Japan, but not one of them was of Japanese ancestry. It would be decades before the US government would give an apology and a token financial compensation to the then aging survivors among the internees.

1941 Abatidos unos 150'000 árboles y destruidas las torres de más de 300 iglesias por un huracán en la provincia de Pontevedra.
1936 Manuel Azaña becomes Spanish premier. — Comienza el primer gobierno de la II República española, que fue presidido por Manuel Azaña Díaz tras las elecciones que dieron la victoria al Frente Popular.
1933 Prussian minister Göring bans all Catholic newspapers.

1927 General strike against British occupiers in Shanghai.— Huelga insurreccional en Shanghai contra el general-dictador de la ciudad, Sun Chuan Fang, y las fuerzas británicas de ocupación.
1926 Subastado en Nueva York, en $106'000, un ejemplar de la Biblia de Johann Gensfleisch von Sulgeloch Gutenberg, el primer libro impreso.
1925 Designado jefe del Tercio de Marruecos el coronel Francisco Franco Bahamonde.
1919 Atentado frustrado contra Georges Clemenceau, presidente del Consejo de Ministros francés.
1918 I Guerra Mundial: Incursión aérea francesa sobre Mannheim, puerto fluvial alemán en el Rin.
1915 British fleet fire on Dardanelles coast — Les forts des Dardanelles sont bombardés par les flottes française et britannique. Il s'agit de forcer le détroit des Dardanelles et le Bosphore pour créer un autre front au sud-est de l'Allemagne. Ce fut fait mais très chèrement payer en vie humaines. 1915 débute l'offensive navale des Alliés dans les Dardanelles. — La flota inglesa bombardea las fortificaciones de Gallípoli (Turquía).
1913 Mexican General V Huerta takes power with US support.
1900 British troops occupy Hlangwane Natal.
1906 W K Kellogg and Charles D Bolin incorporate Battle Creek Toasted Corn Flake Company, Battle Creek MI.
1878 Thomas Alva Edison patents the gramophone (phonograph).
1881 Kansas becomes first US state to prohibit all alcoholic beverages.
1861 Russian Tsar Alexander II abolishes serfdom.
1861 Louisiana State troops seize the US paymaster's office in New Orleans.
1859 Dan Sickles is acquitted of murder on grounds of temporary insanity first time this defense is successfully used
1858 Une loi de sûreté générale marque le durcissement du régime impérial de Napoléon III suite à l’attentat d’Orsini. contre l'empereur Napoléon III le 14 janvier 1858, qui. sert de prétexte à cette loi proposée par le général Espinasse qui stipule que l'on peut arrêter et déporter sans jugement quiconque a fait l'objet de condamnation, lors des événements de juin 1848 et de décembre 1851. Plus de 2000 français seront inquiétés par cette loi de sûreté générale appelée aussi "loi des suspects".

^ 1847 Donner party cannibal survivors found
      In the eastern foothills of California’s Sierra Nevada Mountains, a relief party reaches the Donner Party, finding that only about half of the original eighty-nine pioneers have survived one of the most infamous ordeals in the history of Western expansionism. In 1846, a group of California-bound families mostly from Illinois and Iowa set out on the long journey west. Most prominent among them were the two Donner families, led by George and Jacob Donner, and the Reed family. After passing Fort Bridger in Wyoming, George Donner suggested that the group use a lesser-traveled route through the Wasatch Mountains in Utah in order to cut time. The Donner Party’s covered wagons were severely delayed in the salt flats of Utah’s Great Salt Lake Desert, and in October of 1846, the expedition finally reached the Sierra Nevada Mountains in eastern California. However, while pausing to gather strength for their final journey over the mountains and into Sacramento Valley, an early snowfall covered the mountain passes and the pioneers were trapped. A small party led by Charles T. Stanton and his Indian guides set out for help, while the rest of the group set up camp at Alder Creek and at what is now known as Donner Lake. However, Stanton’s party returned having failed to breach the snow-choked passes and within weeks the pioneers’ limited food gave out and the cold and snow became worse. The surviving pioneers were driven to cannibalism and Stanton died attempting to break through the pass again.
      Finally, in early 1847, James Reed, who had reached California in a separate party, succeeded in organizing a relief party to save his family and the rest of the Donner Party. On February 19, 1847, a snowshoed group of settlers from the Johnson’s Ranch and Sutter’s Fort area of California broke through the mountain snowdrifts to the hunger-maddened pioneers, finding only forty-five of the original eighty-nine migrants still alive. Twenty-one of the strongest survivors were led back over the mountains while the rest were left with supplies. It would take two more months and three more relief parties before the last surviving Donner Party members were safely led out of the death encampment.
     1847 Rescuers reach Donner Party The first rescuers from Sutter's Fort reach the surviving remnants of the Donner emigrant party at their snowbound camp in the high Sierra Nevada Mountains. The events leading up to the Donner party tragedy began the summer before, when 89 emigrants from Springfield, Illinois, set out overland for California. Initially all went well, and they arrived on schedule at Fort Bridger, Wyoming, in early August. There the emigrants made the mistake of deciding to leave the usual route in favor of a supposed shortcut recently blazed by the California promoter Lansford Hastings. The so-called Hastings Cutoff proved to be anything but a shortcut, and the Donner party lost valuable time and supplies on the trip. When the emigrants finally began the difficult final push over the rugged Sierra Nevada Mountains, it was early October and uncomfortably late in the season to be attempting a high mountain passage.
      The Donner party almost made it. On October 28, they camped near a high mountain lake (later named Donner Lake) with plans to begin the final push over the pass the next day. Unfortunately, an early winter storm arrived in the mountains. By morning, a thick mantle of snow covered the ground and the pass was blocked. The Donner party was trapped.
      The panicked emigrants constructed makeshift tents out of the canvas from their wagons, hoping a thaw might still save them. Warmer weather never came, and by mid-December their food supplies were running low. All agreed that if they did not send for help the entire party would starve to death. Fifteen of the strongest emigrants set out west for Sutter's Fort on December 16. Three weeks later, having endured violent storms and been reduced to cannibalism to stay alive, seven survivors reached an Indian village, where news of the disaster was quickly dispatched to Sutter's Fort near San Francisco.
      On 31 January, seven rescuers left Sutter's Fort. When they arrived at Donner Lake 20 days later, the men saw nothing but tall white drifts of snow and ice. The men yelled out a hello, and a woman's head appeared above the snow. "Are you men from California or are you from heaven?" she asked. As the other survivors emerged from their snow-covered shelters, one writer recorded that, "It was if the rescuers' hallo had been Gabriel's horn raising the dead from their graves. Their flesh was wasted from their bodies. They wept and laughed hysterically."
      After feeding the starving emigrants as much as they safely could, the rescuers began their evacuation. Other rescue parties arrived soon after to help. The trials of the Donner Party, however, were far from over. As the rescue parties struggled to lead the survivors back to Sutter's Fort, they too began to succumb to the harsh winter conditions. Many among the main body of pioneers were also forced to resort to cannibalism to stay alive. The last survivors would not reach safety until late April. Of the 89 emigrants who had departed Fort Bridger the year before, only 45 survived to reach their destination in sunny California. ^top^

1846 Texas state government formally installed in Austin.
1834 Se autoriza la construcción del primer ferrocarril alemán, que enlazaría las ciudades de Nuremberg y Furth, distantes 20 kms.
1831 First practical US coal-burning locomotive makes first trial run, Pennsylvania.
1814 Noruega, en su resistencia a la dominación sueca, toma por regente al príncipe de Dinamarca Christian Federico.

^ 1807 Aaron Burr arrested for treason
Aaron Burr, a former US vice president, is arrested in Alabama on charges of plotting to annex Spanish territory in Louisiana and Mexico to be used toward the establishment of an independent republic. In 1801, in an election conducted before the Twelfth Amendment separated the election of president and vice president, Thomas Jefferson was narrowly elected president over his running mate, Aaron Burr. In 1804, Alexander Hamilton, head of the Federalist Party, made public his suspicions that Vice President Burr was conspiring to organize a confederacy of disgruntled Northern states that would disunite the Union. Burr challenged his old political enemy Hamilton to a duel, and on July 11, Hamilton deliberately misfired while Burr fired with intent to kill. The questionable circumstances of Hamilton’s death brought Burr’s political career to an end. He subsequently left Washington and traveled to New Orleans, where he met with US General James Wilkinson, who was an agent for the Spanish. The exact nature of what the two plotted is unknown, but speculation ranges from the establishment of an independent republic in the American Southwest to the seizure of territory in Spanish America for the same purpose. In the fall of 1806, Burr led a group of well-armed colonists toward New Orleans, prompting an immediate investigation by US authorities. General Wilkinson, in an effort to save himself, turned against Burr and sent dispatches to Washington accusing Burr of treason. On February 18, 1807, Burr was arrested in Alabama and sent to Richmond, Virginia, to be tried in a US circuit court. On September 1, 1807, he was acquitted on the grounds that, although he had conspired against the United States, he was not guilty of treason because he had not engaged in an "overt act," a requirement of treason as specified by the US Constitution. Nevertheless, public opinion condemned him as a traitor and he was forced to retire from politics.

1807 British squadron under Admiral Duckworth forces passage of Dardanelles.

^ 1803 Les Suisses adoptent l'Acte de médiation
Napoléon Bonaparte convoque les représentants de la République helvétique à Paris et leur fait signer l’Acte de médiation. Créée par les révolutionnaires français en 1798, la République helvétique "une et indivisible" s'est avérée un échec. Le Premier Consul restaure donc les cantons suisses, à l'exception de Genève et Mulhouse qui sont annexés par la France. Il crée six autres cantons. La nouvelle Confédération helvétique compte dix-neuf cantons. Elle dispose surtout d'un pouvoir fédéral plus important que l'ancienne Confédération, avec notamment une monnaie et une armée communes. Alliée de force à la France, la Suisse obtiendra la garantie internationale de sa neutralité à la chute de Napoléon, en 1814. Mais l'Acte de médiation sera aboli et avec lui les institutions fédérales. Il faudra une guerre civile en 1847 pour restaurer une autorité centrale. Le nouvel équilibre des pouvoirs entre les cantons et la Confédération donnera pleine satisfaction jusqu'à nos jours.

1803 US Congress votes to accept Ohio's borders and constitution, but Congress would not formally ratify Ohio statehood until 1953.

^ 1800 Napoléon becomes First Consul [“Le Premier Consul”, by Ingres >]
Three months after he overthrew the French Revolutionary government in a military coup, General Napoléon Bonaparte assumes the office of first consul, and with the visible support of the army, effectively becomes dictator of France. The Corsica-born Napoléon, one of the greatest military strategists in history, rapidly rose in the ranks of the French Revolutionary army during the late 1890s. By 1899, France was at war with most of Europe, and Napoléon returned home from a campaign in Egypt to take over the reigns of French government and save the nation. After becoming first consul in February of 1800, he reorganized his armies and defeated Austria. In 1802, he established the Napoléonic Code, a new system of French law, and in 1804, was crowned emperor of France in Notre Dame Cathedral. By 1807, Napoléon controlled an empire that stretched from the River Elbe in the north down through Italy in the south, and from the Pyrenees to the Dalmation coast. Beginning in 1812, Napoléon began to encounter the first significant defeats of his military career, suffering through a disastrous invasion of Russia, losing Spain to the Duke of Wellington in the Peninsula War, and enduring total defeat against an allied force by 1814. Exiled to the island of Elba, Napoléon escaped to France in early 1815, and raised a new Grand Army that enjoyed temporary success before its crushing defeat at Waterloo against an allied force under the Duke of Wellington. Napoléon was subsequently exiled to the remote island of St. Helena in the Atlantic Ocean. After six years of exile, he died, most likely of stomach cancer, and in 1840, his body was returned to Paris, where it was interred in the Hotel des Invalides.

1797 1/3 of papal domain ceded to France — 1797, Avignon et le Comtat-Venaissin sont cédés par le pape à la France.
1796 (30 pluviôse an IV), on brûle les planches à assignats en place Vendôme.

1700 Last day of the Julian calendar in Denmark
1674 Netherlands and England sign Peace of Westminster (NYC becomes English)
1634 Battle at Smolensk Polish king Wladyslaw IV beats Russians
1539 Jews of Tyrnau Hungary (then Trnava Czechoslovakia), expelled
1512 French troops under Gaston de Foix occupy Brescia.
1493 La armada portuguesa intenta apresar en las islas Azores a Cristobal Colón en su viaje de regreso, para evitar que divulgue la otra ruta hacia las Indias que cree haber descubierto.
0842 The Medieval Iconoclast Controversy ended, when a Council in Constantinople formally reinstated the veneration of images (icons) in the churches. (This debate over icons is often considered the last event which led to the Great Schism between the Eastern and Western Churches.)
0607 Boniface III is elected Pope
0356 Emperor Constantius II shuts all heathen temples — 356, par une loi qui impose la fermeture des temples païens, l'empereur romain Constance II confirme l'unification religieuse de l'empire autour du christianisme.

^ 0197 Bataille de Lyon décide qui sera empereur de Rome.
Elle s'achève par la victoire de Septime Sévère, le général de l'armée romaine du Danube, sur son rival, le gouverneur de Bretagne, Clodius Albinus. Le vainqueur pille et détruit Lyon avant d'imposer sa loi à Rome. C'est la fin du siècle des Antonins qui marqua l'apogée de l'empire romain et le début de la dynastie des Sévères. On peut dater de cette bataille le début de la décadence.

TO THE TOP

^ Deaths which occurred on a February 19:
2004 One Iraqi, and two US soldiers of Task Force All-American, by a roadside bomb in Khalidiyah, Iraq.
2003 Nasser Abu Safiyeh, 32, shot by Israeli troops in Nablus, West Bank, while he is walking home from prayers, with his father, 93.
2003 All 302 aboard an Iranian military Ilyushin-76 cargo plane used to carry passengers, which crashes at 17:40 (14:10 UT) in mountains near Shahdad, 35 km southeast of its destination, Kerman, Iran. 284 of the dead are Revolutionary Guards of the Sarallah brigade, returning from a mission in Zahedan; the other 18 are the aircrew.
2002 Three men, shot by a fourth who then commits suicide, in Munich, Germany A gunman killed three people in a rampage that started when he killed his former boss and a foreman at the home furnishings company that had recently fired him. Afterward, he traveled 20 km to a Munich suburb, entered a high school and shot the headmaster after he was unable to find the teacher he was after. He shot another teacher in the face and set off homemade bombs before committing suicide.
2002 Six Israelis, shot by Palestinian attackers, in a building close to an Israeli roadblock near the village of Ein Arik, West Bank, at about 21:00.
2002 Iyad Abu Safiyeh, 22, and Mohamed Hamdan, 25, when an Israeli helicopter gunship fired three missiles at a civilian building in the Jabalya refugee camp, Gaza Strip. Ten other Palestinians are injured, mostly children going home from school.
2002 Mariam Bahabsa, 40, her daughter Mona, 14, and Abdul Wahab Najar, 19, Palestinians, early in the day when an Israeli tank shell hit their homes, in Khan Yunis, Gaza Strip.
2002 Mohammed Al Kasser, 21, shot by Israeli troops making an incursion into Deir Al Balah, Gaza Strip.

^ 2001 Tin Oo, Thein Nyunt, and Lun Maung, Myanmar military junta officials, in helicopter crash.
     The MI-17 Russian-made army helicopter, carrying about a dozen officials, went down due to engine trouble in southeastern Myanmar. Among those killed was Lt. Gen. Tin Oo, 67, Secretary 2 in the ruling junta (State Peace and Development Council). The others killed were Col. Thein Nyunt, the minister of progress of border areas and national races and development affairs, and Brig. Gen. Lun Maung, the minister in the prime minister's office
      The aircraft crashed in Salween river near Pa-an where Tin Oo and his party had gone to inspect a new bridge. The area is about 160 km southeast of Yangon, the capital.      Tin Oo, 67, was the chief of staff of the army and the fourth-ranking general in the regime that came to power in a bloodless coup in 1988.
      Tin Oo had survived at least one assassination attempt in April 1997 when a parcel bomb airmailed from Japan exploded in his house, killing his 32-year-old daughter, Cho Lei Oo, a university lecturer. Tin Oo was in the house but escaped unhurt. The government blamed anti-government dissidents, but rebel groups denied responsibility and said the bombing was the result of a power struggle in the ruling junta.
      On Christmas Day in 1996, two bombs tore through a Yangon pagoda that Tin Oo had visited hours earlier. Five people were killed but it was not clear if Tin Oo was the target.
      Born on May 13, 1933, Tin Oo was commissioned as army officer after graduating from the military Officers Training School in 1955. After serving in various capacities Tin Oo became the army chief-of-staff in 1985 with the rank of a colonel. He was promoted to brigadier general in September 1988 and to major general in March 1990. In September 1988, Tin Oo was appointed Secretary 2. A veteran of campaigns against ethnic and communist insurgents, Lt. Gen. Tin Oo had often threatened in public to "annihilate opponents of the regime. But he rarely spoke publicly of politics and was a popular commander with the troops.
      Myanmar has been ruled by the military since 1962, and the current junta came to power in 1988 after a crackdown on a pro-democracy movement. The regime keeps a tight grip on the media in Myanmar, and the public usually knows very little about the government and its activities. The junta has faced intense Western criticism for stifling the opposition, which is led by Aung San Suu Kyi. She won the 1991 Nobel Peace Prize for her efforts to bring democracy to Myanmar.

2001 Mohammed Madiny, Hamas militant, preventively murdered by Israeli secret services. For collaborating in this murder, Palestinian Munthir Hafnaweh would be sentenced to death by a Nablus Palestinian security court on 09 August 2001.
2001 Charles Trenet, poeta, cantante y compositor francés.
2000: 17 muertos en el mayor motín de la historia carcelaria de Brasil, organizado por la agrupación Primer Comando de la Ciudad (PCC), responsable del narcotráfico en las cárceles brasileñas.
2000 Friedrich Stowasser “Hundertwasser”, Austrian painter born on 15 December 1928 — LINKS — Venice (1963) — Good Morning City — Venezia (1968) — The 30 Day Fax Picture
1997 Deng Xiaoping, the last of China's major Communist revolutionaries.
1997 The principal and a student of the Bethel, Alaska, high school, by shotgun of Evan Ramsey, 16, who would be sentenced to two 99-year terms in prison. Two other students were wounded.
1990 Eight demonstrators for multi party system in Nepal, killed by police.
1990 Neugebauer, mathematician.
1988René Char, poeta francés.
1985 Los 148 ocupantes de un Boeing 727 que se estrela en la ladera noroeste del monte Oiz (Vizcaya) al prepararse a aterrizar en el aeropuerto de Sondica.
1952 Knut Pedersen Hamsun, escritor noruego.
1951 André[-Paul-Guillaume] Gide, 81, French writer (Nobel 1947)

^ 1945 More than 550 US Marines, and some Japanese, in first day of battle of Iwo Jima.
      After three days of heavy naval and aerial bombardment, the first wave of US Marines storm onto the tiny volcanic island of Iwo Jima, a Pacific island located in bomber-range of the Japanese home islands. The Japanese garrison on the island numbered only 22'000 men, but their commander, General Tadamichi Kuribayashi, who had been expecting an Allied invasion for eight months, had used the time to construct an intricate and deadly system of underground tunnels, fortifications, and artillery that withstood the initial Allied bombardment. By the evening of the first day, the 30'000 US Marines commanded by General Holland Smith had managed to establish a beachhead. Over the next few days, the Marines advanced inch by inch under heavy fire from entrenched Japanese artillery and suffered suicidal charges from the Japanese infantry. While the Japanese kamikaze flyers slammed into the Allied naval fleet around Iwo Jima, the Marines on the island continued their bloody northern advance across the island, responding to Kuribayashi’s lethal defenses with remarkable endurance. On 23 February 1945, the Twenty-Eighth Marine Division took the crest of Mount Suribachi, the island’s only peak and most strategic position. The image of the soldiers raising the American flag on this peak, taken by photographer Joseph Rosenthal, is one of the most famous photographs of World War II. By 03 March, US forces controlled all three airfields on the island, and by March 26, the last Japanese defenders on Iwo Jima had been wiped out. Six thousand Americans died taking Iwo Jima and 17'200 were wounded. Almost all of the 22'000 Japanese defenders perished.
     Operation Detachment, the US Marines' invasion of Iwo Jima, starts. Iwo Jima was a barren Pacific island guarded by Japanese artillery, but it a good place where to build airfields to launch bombing raids against Japan, only 1060 km away. The US began applying pressure to the Japanese defense of the island in February 1944, when B-24 and B-25 bombers raided the island for 74 days. It was the longest pre-invasion bombardment of the war, necessary because of the extent to which the Japanese — 21'000 strong — fortified the island, above and below ground, including a network of caves. Underwater demolition teams ("frogmen") were dispatched by the Americans just before the actual invasion. When the Japanese fired on the frogmen, they gave away many of their "secret" gun positions.
      The amphibious landings of Marines begin in the morning of 19 February as the secretary of the navy, James Forrestal, accompanied by journalists, surveys the scene from a command ship offshore. As the Marines make their way onto the island, seven Japanese battalions open fire and obliterate them. By evening, more than 550 Marines are dead and more than 1800 are wounded. The capture of Mount Suribachi, the highest point of the island and bastion of the Japanese defense, took four more days and many more casualties. When the US flag was finally raised on Iwo Jima, the memorable image was captured in a famous photograph that later won the Pulitzer Prize.

1945 900 Japanese soldiers reportedly killed by crocodiles in 2 days. The crocodiles did that of their own accord, without any special training or incentive from the Allies.

^ 1940 Day 82 of Winter War: USSR aggression against Finland. ^top^^
More deaths due to Stalin's desire to grab Finnish territory.
Finns beat back strong enemy assault in Taipale
       Commander-in-Chief Mannerheim promotes Jaeger Major-General Erik Heinrichs to Lieutenant-General and names him as the new commander of the Army of the Isthmus.
      A new I Army Corps is established on the Isthmus under the command of Jaeger Major-General Taavetti Laatikainen.
      The commander of Group Talvela, Major-General Paavo Talvela, is appointed commander of III Army Corps. Talvela, too, is a jaeger.
      Karelian Isthmus: in Taipale, Finnish troops repulse the strongest enemy assault so far: this particular assault was concentrated on the Terenttilä strongholds. The bodies of 300 Russian soldiers are left lying in the trenches. The Finns have also suffered heavy losses: between 260 and 290 died yesterday in Kirvesmäki. The Larkko battalion which had been held in reserve, has lost 41 dead, 57 wounded and 45 missing in action.
      A new Soviet division attacks across Lake Suvanto. The defending Finnish troops repel the assault with concentrated artillery fire. The Soviet division suffers heavy losses on the Suvanto ice, which is black with the bodies of fallen Soviet troops. Between 700 and 1,000 dead enemy soldiers are strewn along the shores and the ice of the lake.
      The Finns are forced to withdraw from Revonsaari island. Further south the troops on the mainland pull back to Koivisto.
      The volunteer Danish pilot Count Erhard Frijs is killed over Heinjoki when his Fokker fighter bursts into flames during aerial combat. 100 enemy bombers pound Uuras and Antrea.
      King Gustav V of Sweden calls a meeting of the Swedish Government in response to the controversy caused by the visit of Finland's foreign minister, Väinö Tanner. King Gustav issues a statement confirming Sweden's decision not to help Finland in its struggle against the overwhelmingly superior numerical force of the Soviet invader. Despite the King's statement, schoolchildren in Linköping decide to publish an appeal for Sweden to help Finland and organize a collection to buy a fighter aircraft for Finland as a gift from the schoolchildren of Sweden.
      Hungary: leading performers give a concert in Budapest to raise money for the Finnish Red Cross.

^ Taipaleessa torjutaan siihenastisista voimakkain vihollisen hyökkäys Talvisodan 82. päivä, 19.helmikuuta.1940
      Ylipäällikkö Mannerheim nimittää Karjalan Armeijan uudeksi komentajaksi jääkärikenraalimajuri Erik Heinrichsin, joka ylennetään kenraaliluutnantiksi.
      Karjalan kannakselle perustetaan I Armeijakunta, jonka komentajaksi nimitetään jääkärikenraalimajuri Taavetti Laatikainen.
      III Armeijakunnan komentajaksi määrätään Ryhmä Talvelan komentaja, kenraalimajuri Paavo Talvela. Myös Talvela on jääkäri.
      Taipaleessa torjutaan siihenastisista voimakkain vihollisen hyökkäys, joka suuntautuu Terenttilän tukikohtiin. Ampumahaudoissa on 300 venäläissotilaan ruumiit. Myös suomalaisten tappiot ovat suuret: Kirvesmäestä löydetään eilisen taistelun jäljiltä 260-290 kaatunutta suomalaista. Reservinä olleen Larkon pataljoonan tappiot: 41 kaatunutta, 57 haavoittunutta ja 45 kadonnutta.
      Uusi neuvostodivisioona hyökkää Suvannon yli. Suomalaiset torjuvat vihollisen tehokkaalla kenttätykistön tulella.
      Neuvostodivisioona kärsii raskaita tappioita Suvannon jäällä, joka on mustanaan neuvosto-sotilaiden ruumiita.
      Suvannon rannoille ja jäälle jää 700-1000 kuollutta vihollis-sotilasta. Suomalaiset joutuvat vetäytymään Revonsaaresta. Etelämpänä vetäydytään mantereelta Koivistolle.
      Heinjoella torjuntalennolla ollut tanskalainen vapaaehtoislentäjä kreivi Erhard Frijs saa surmansa, kun hänen ohjaamansa Fokker-hävittäjä ammutaan tuleen ilmataistelun aikana.
      Vihollinen pommittaa raskaasti 100 koneen voimalla Uurasta ja Antreaa. Ruotsin kuningas Kustaa V kutsuu Tannerin matkasta aiheutuneen kohun vuoksi Ruotsin hallituksen koolle. Ruotsin kuningas antaa lausunnon, joka vahvistaa, ettei Ruotsi tuleauttamaan Suomea sen taistelussa Suomeen hyökännyttä hirvittävää vihollisylivoimaa vastaan. Kuninkaan lausunnosta piittaamatta Linköpingissä paikallinen koulunuoriso päättää kokouksessaan julkaista vetoomuksen Suomen auttamiseksi ja järjestää keräyksen hävittäjän saamiseksi Suomelle "koululaisten lahjana".
      Budapestissä järjestetään korkeatasoinen konsertti Suomen Punaisen Ristin tukemiseksi.

^ I Taipale avvärjs våldsamma fientliga attacker Vinterkrigets 82 dag, den 19 februari 1940
     Överbefälhavare Mannerheim utnämner jägargeneralmajor Erik Heinrichs till ny kommendör för den karelska armén. Heinrichs befordras till generallöjtnant.
      Den I Armékåren grundas på Näset och kommendör blir jägargeneralmajor Taavetti Laatikainen.
      Till kommendör för den III Armékåren utnämns kommendören för Grupp Talvela, generalmajor Paavo Talvela. Även Talvela är jägare.
      I Taipale avvärjs de hittills våldsammaste fientliga attackerna som riktats mot baserna i Terenttilä. I skyttegravarna finns 300 lik av ryska soldater. Även de finska förlusterna är betydande - i Kirvesmäki återfanns 260-290 stupade finska soldater efter gårdagens strider. Reservbataljonen Larkkos förluster: 41 stupade, 57 sårade och 45 saknade.
      En ny rysk division anfaller över Suvanto. Finnarna tillbakavisar fienden med hjälp av effektiv fältartillerield.
      Sovjetdivisionen tillfogas svåra nederlag på Suvantoisen som är svart av liken av ryska soldater. Kvar på stränderna och på isen blir 700-1000 stupade ryska soldater.
      Finnarna tvingas till återtåg från Revonsaari. Söderut retirerar finnarna från fastlandet till Björkö.
      Den danska frivilliga piloten, greve Erhard Frijs dödas vid Heinjoki då hans Fokker-jagare fattar eld under luftstriderna.
      Fienden bombar kraftigt Uuras och S:t Andree med 100 plan.
      Sveriges Kung Gustav V sammankallar regeringen på grund av uppståndelsen kring Tanners resa. Kungen avger ett utlåtande som bekräftar att Sverige inte kommer att hjälpa Finland i striden mot den övermäktiga inkräktaren. Trots kungens utlåtande fattar den lokala skolungdomsföreningen i Linköping på sitt möte beslutet att deklarera en vädjan för att hjälpa Finland och arrangera en insamling för att skaffa ett jaktplan åt Finland som en "gåva av skoleleverna".
      I Budapest arrangeras en högklassig konsert för att stöda Finlands Röda Kors. ^top^

1938 Edmund Landau, 60, mathematician.
1938 Leopoldo Lugones, poeta y novelista argentino.
1908 Hermann Laurent, mathematician.
1897 Karl Weierstrass, mathematician.
1894 Joseph Keppler, Austrian born US caricaturist and magazine founder born on 01 February 1838.
1884 Tornadoes in Mississippi, Alabama, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, Kentucky and Indiana kill 800 persons.
1878 Charles-François Daubigny, French Barbizon School painter specialized in landscapes, who born on 15 January 1817. — LINKS — Les Bords de L'Oise à Conflans (1859) — Le Village de Gloton — Cattle at the Pool — Valmondois — The Hamlet of Optevoz — The Flood-Gate at Optevoz — Harvest — Les Péniches — 51 prints at FAMSF
1865 Charles Wood Taylor, pintor británico.
1799 Borda, mathematician.
1750 Jan-Frans van Bredael I, Flemish artist born on 01 April 1686.
1735 Ottmar Elliger II, German artist who dies on his 69th birthday.
1666 Willem van Honthorst, Dutch painter born in 1594 — brother of Gerrit van Honthorst [04 Nov 1590 – 27 Apr 1656]
1657 Evert van Aelst, Dutch artist born in 1602.
1622 Savile, mathematician.
1414 Thomas Arundel archbishop of Canterbury/chancellor of England.
1401 William Sawtree first English religious martyr, burned in London
0197 Decimus Clodius Septimius Albinus[picture >], having been proclaimed emperor by his Roman army of Britain and advancind toward Rome through Gaul, is defeated in battle and killed near Lyon by the army of emperor Lucius Septimius Severus.

Births which occurred on a February 19: ^
1989 L A Baby orangutan at Woodland Park Zoo, Seattle WA
1983 Matthew Kechter one of the students massacred at Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado, 990420.

^ 1954 The Ford Thunderbird prototype.
It wouldn’t be released to the market on a wide scale until the fall of 1954, the beginning of the 1955 model year. The T-Bird was a scaled-down Ford built for two. It came with a removable fiberglass hard top and a convertible canvas roof for sunny days. Armed with a V-8 and sporty looks, the T-Bird was an image car. For $2,944 a driver could drop the top, turn the radio dial, and enter a more promising world. GM had created the Corvette two years earlier to meet the needs of the GI who had developed a taste for European sports cars. In keeping with Ford’s cautious tradition, the T-Bird, its response to the Corvette, still looked like a Ford and was classified as a "personal car" and not a "sports car." But it was popular. Just as it had relied heavily on one car, the Model T, in its early stages, Ford would rely heavily on the T-Bird to bolster its image as a progressive car maker capable of keeping pace with GM. A decade later the Mustang would take the torch from the T-Bird, but to remember Ford in the 1950s one only needs call to mind the stylish growl of the Thunderbird’s V-8.

^ 1952 Amy Tan, novelist.
Her parents are Chinese immigrants who came to Oakland in 1949. Tan studied English at San Jose State and Berkeley. Although she planned an academic career, she grew bored with university life and turned to technical writing, business writing, and publishing. At age 26, she learned that her mother had three daughters from a previous marriage and journeyed to China to meet them. The experience helped inspire her first novel, The Joy Luck Club (1989), a collection of stories about three generations of Chinese and Chinese-American women. The book became a bestseller and was made into a movie in 1993.
Tan's second novel, The Kitchen God's Wife (1991), was followed in 1995 by The Hundred Secret Senses, which explored ghosts, past lives, and Asian vs. American values. She also wrote two children's books and played in a band called the Rock Bottom Remainders with fellow writers Stephen King and Dave Barry.

1951 L'OTAN, Organisation du Traité de l'Atlantique Nord, alliance des forces armées des pays. Elle prend ses quartiers en France. Les pays qui la compose, se veulent libres face au pacte de Varsovie dominé par l'Union soviétique. Le Shape, ce qui veut dire Supreme Headquater of Allied Powers in Europe, quartier général en chef des forces alliées en Europe est maintenant opérationnel
1940 Saparmurat Niyasov Turkmenbashi , in Ashgabat, Turkmenistan. Orphaned by age 8 (his father died in combat during WW2, the rest of his family in the magnitude 7.3 earthquake of 05 October 1948), he would join the Communist Party and rise to be its head in Soviet Turkmenistan, turning into an absurdly extravagant kleptocratic dictator when Turkmenistan became independent on 27 October 1991.
1939 Alfredo Bryce Echenique, escritor peruano.
1934 Raymundo Joseph Peña, who would be ordained a priest of the diocese of Corpus Christi on 25 May 1957, appointed Auxiliary Bishop of San Antonio on 16 October 1976 and consecrated a bishop on 13 December 1976, appointed Bishop of El Paso on 29 April 1980, then Bishop of Brownsville on 23 May 1994.
1932 Guillermo Larco Cox, político peruano.
1931 Camillo Ruini, Italian who would be ordained a priest of the archdiocese of Rome on 08 December 1954, appointed Auxiliary Bishop of Reggio Emilia on 16 May 1983 and consecrated a bishop on 29 June 1983, appointed auxiliary bishop of Rome on 17 January 1991, made a cardinal on 28 June 1991.

^ 1917 Lula Carson Smith McCullers, in Columbus, Georgia,.novelist noted for her exploration of the dilemmas of modern US life in the context of the twentieth-century South. Her most famous novel, The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, published in 1940, delves into the "lonely hearts" of four individuals — an adolescent girl, an embittered radical, a black physician, and a widower who owns a cafe — struggling to find their way in a Southern mill town during the Great Depression. She also wrote The Member of the Wedding, Reflections in a Golden Eye. She died on 29 September 1967.
      Reflections in a Golden Eye (1941), a shorter work set in a Southern army post that chronicles the unhappy life of a captain (a latent homosexual) and his wife (a nymphomaniac), confirmed McCullers's earlier success.
      The Member of the Wedding (1946) proved her most popular work. A sensitive portrayal of a lonely adolescent whose attachment to her brother precipitates a crisis at his wedding, the story was equally successful as a play.
      McCullers's other works include The Ballad of the Sad Café (1951), the drama The Square Root of Wonderful (1958), and the novel Clock Without Hands (1961) ^top^

1911 Jesús Delgado y Valhondo, poeta español.
1906 Ernst Boris Chain, colaborador del doctor Fleming, con quien recibió el Premio Nobel de Medicina 1945.
1906 Battle Creek Toasted Corn Flake Company is incorporated by W. K. Kellogg and Charles D. Bolin, Battle Creek MI
1901 Octavio Amórtegui Rojas, escritor colombiano.
1899 Lucio Fontana, Argentine~Italian sculptor and painter who died on 07 September 1968. — MÁS SOBRE FONTANA EN ART “4” FEBRUARY — LINKS — Concepto espacial (1959, tela rasgada, 65x72cm) [>>>]
1888 José Eustasio Rivera Salas, escritor y abogado colombiano.
1885 Roberto Montenegro, Mexican artist who died on 13 October 1968. — MÁS SOBRE MONTENEGRO EN ART “4” FEBRUARY — Tehuana
1878 The gramophone is patented by Thomas Alva Edison. He accidentally invented the phonograph while attempting to improve the telegraph. The first phonograph, which operated with tinfoil cylinders and a hand crank, played "Mary Had a Little Lamb."
1878 Thomas Alva Edison patents the gramophone (phonograph)
1877 Gabriele Münter, German Expressionist painter, wife of Wassily Kandinsky. She died in 1962. — LINKS — Jawlensky and Werefkin — Marianne von Werefkin — Tombstones in Kochel — Kandinsky and Erma Bossi, After Dinner — The Russians' House
1876 (or 20 Feb) Constantin Brancusi, Romanian abstract sculptor who died on 15 or 16 March 1957, having become a French citizen a few days before. — LINKS
1877 Louis François-Marie Aubert French composer (Habanera)
1863 Augusto Bernardino Leguía y Salcedo President of Perú (1908, 1919)
1863 Thue, mathematician.
1859 Svante Arrhenius, Swedish Nobel Prize-winning physical chemist who died on 02 October 1927.
1849 Hans Dahl, Norwegian artist who died in 1937. — Relative? of Johan Christian Dahl [1788-1857]?
1843 Leonardo de Mango, Italian artist.
1833 Elie Ducommun, Swiss writer, editor and Nobel Peace Prize winner, who died on 07 December 1906.
1817 Willem III last male monarch of Netherlands (1849-90)
1815 Don Federico de Madrazo y Küntz, Spanish painter who died on 10 January 1894. — LINKS — Amalia de Llano y Dotres- The Countess of Vilches — The General Duke of San Miguel
1753 Willem van Leen, Dutch artist who died on 06 April 1825.
1743 [Ridolfo] Luigi Boccherini Italian composer, cellist (Minuet). He died on 28 May 1805.
1717 David Garrick, English actor, producer, dramatist and comanager of the Drury Lane Theatre. He died on 20 January 1779.
1683 Philip V France, King of Spain (1700-24, 24-46)
1666 Ottmar Elliger II, German artist who died on his 69th birthday.
1640 Nicolaes van Veerandael, Flemish artist who died on 11 August 1691.
1473 Nicolaus Copernicus (Mikolaj Kopernick) Torún, Poland, mathematician, astronomer (the Copernican theory: the Sun, not the Earth as previously believed, is the center of our universe). He died on 24 May 1543. — Date présumée de la naissance du moine astronome Nicolas Copernic, à Thorn (Pologne). L'autre date serait le 14 Feb. Après avoir étudié à Cracovie (Pologne), puis à Bologne et à Padoue (Italie), il rentre en Pologne et rédige en 1530 , son révolutionnaire "traité sur les révolutions des orbes célestes".

^top^ Feast of St Conrad / Santos Julián, Marcelo, Álvaro de Córdoba y Gabino. / Saint Gabin fut un sénateur romain du IIIe siècle, parent de l'empereur Dioclétien. Sa situation sociale ne l'empêcha pas d'être jeté en prison avec sa fille Suzanne. Après le martyre de celle-ci, Gabin se laissa mourir de faim.

Thoughts for the day: “In America everybody is, but some are more than others.” — Gertrude Stein, US author (1874-1946)
“Everybody is, but some are more impressed by Gertrude Stein than others.”
“It's not what you know, it's not who you know, it's what you are that matters.”
“Everybody is, but only God is He-Who-Is”
“Everybody is, but some are more numerous than others.”
“Everybody is, but not everybody does.”
“All are numerous, but each one is not.”
“Everybody is, but some try to hide what they are.”
“Everybody is, but few know what they are.”
“Everybody is, but not everybody has.”
“Everybody is, but some are only what they eat.”
“Everybody is, but what?”
“Everybody is, but some think they are better than everybody else.”
“Everybody is, and everybody thinks he is better than some others.”
“Everybody is, but not everybody counts.”
“Everybody is, but not everybody is counted in the census.”
“In the US everybody is, but not everybody is keeping up with the Joneses.”
“With whom are the Joneses keeping up?”
“Everybody is, but some are unreal.”

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