14 February
February 14 is the 45th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. There are 320 days remaining, 321 in leap years.
Events
- 1014 - Pope Benedict VIII recognizes Henry of Bavaria as King of Germany.
- 1076 - Pope Gregory VII excommunicates Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor.
- 1556 - Thomas Cranmer is declared a heretic.
- 1743 - Henry Pelham becomes British Prime Minister.
- 1779 - James Cook is killed by the natives of the Sandwich Islands.
- 1803 - Chief Justice John Marshall declares that any act of Congress which conflicts with the Constitution is void.
- 1804 - First Serbian Uprising began.
- 1849 - In New York City, James Knox Polk becomes the first President of the United States to have his photograph taken.
- 1854 - Texas is linked by telegraph with the rest of the United States, when a connection between New Orleans and Marshall, Texas is completed.
- 1859 - Oregon is admitted as the 33rd U.S. state.
- 1876 - Alexander Graham Bell applies for a patent for the telephone.
- 1879 - The War of the Pacific broke out when Chilean armed forces occupied the Bolivian port city of Antofagasta.
- 1895 - First showing of Oscar Wilde's last play The Importance of Being Earnest (St James's Theatre in London).
- 1899 - Voting machines are approved by the United States Congress for use in federal elections.
- 1900 - Russia responds to international pressure to free Finland by tightening imperial control over the country.
- 1900 - Boer War: In South Africa, 20,000 British troops invade the Orange Free State.
- 1903 - The United States Department of Commerce and Labor is established (later split into Dept. of Commerce and Dept. of Labor).
- 1912 - Arizona is admitted as the 48th U.S. state.
- 1912 - In Groton, Connecticut, the first diesel-powered submarine is commissioned.
- 1918 - The movie Tarzan of the Apes is released.
- 1918 - The Soviet Union adopts the Gregorian calendar (1 February according to the Julian calendar).
- 1920 - The League of Women Voters is founded in Chicago, Illinois.
- 1924 - IBM corporation founded.
- 1929 - St. Valentine's Day Massacre: Seven gangsters rivalling Al Capone are murdered in Chicago, Illinois.
- 1943 - World War II:Rostov, Russia is liberated.
- 1943 - World War II: The Battle of the Kasserine Pass - German General Erwin Rommel and his Afrika Korps launch an offensive against Allied defenses in Tunisia.
- 1944 - World War II: Anti-Japanese revolt on Java.
- 1945 - Chile, Ecuador, Paraguay and Peru join the United Nations.
- 1946 - The Bank of England is nationalized.
- 1946 - ENIAC (for "Electronic Numerical Integrator and Computer"), the first general-purpose electronic computer, is unveiled at the University of Pennsylvania.
- 1949 - The Knesset (Israeli parliament) first convenes.
- 1952 - 1952 Winter Olympic Games open in Oslo, Norway.
- 1961 - Discovery of the chemical elements: Element 103, Lawrencium, is first synthesized (Berkeley, California).
- 1962 - First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy takes television viewers on a tour of the White House.
- 1966 - Australian currency is decimalized.
- 1979 - In Kabul, Muslim extremists kidnap the American ambassador to Afghanistan, Adolph Dubs who is later killed during a gunfight between his kidnappers and police.
- 1980 - 1980 Winter Olympic Games open in Lake Placid, New York.
- 1980 - Walter Cronkite announces his retirement from CBS Evening News.
- 1985 - CNN reporter Jeremy Levin is freed from captivity in Lebanon.
- 1989 - Union Carbide agrees to pay USD $470 million to the Indian government for damages it caused in the 1984 Bhopal Disaster.
- 1989 - Iranian leader Ruhollah Khomeini issues a fatwa encouraging Muslims to kill the author of The Satanic Verses, Salman Rushdie.
- 1989 - The first of 24 satellites of the Global Positioning System is placed into orbit.
- 1998 - Authorities in the United States announce that Eric Robert Rudolph is a suspect in an Alabama abortion clinic bombing.
Births
- 1483 - Zahir al-Din Mohammed Babur Shah, founder of the Moghul dynasty (d. 1530)
- 1766 - Thomas Malthus, economist (d. 1834)
- 1819 - Joshua A. Norton, Emperor Norton I of the United States of America and Protector of Mexico (d. 1880)
- 1856 - Frank Harris, author and editor (d. 1931)
- 1869 - Charles Wilson, physicist
- 1890 - Nina Hamnett, artist (d. 1956)
- 1894 - Jack Benny, actor, comedian (d. 1974)
- 1895 - Max Horkheimer, philosopher and sociologist (d. 1973)
- 1898 - Fritz Zwicky, physicist and astronomer (d. 1974)
- 1905 - Thelma Ritter, actress (d. 1969)
- 1912 - Tibor Sekelj, Croatian explorer (d. 1988)
- 1913 - Jimmy Hoffa, labor union leader (d. 1975 (disappeared))
- 1913 - Mel Allen, sports reporter (d. 1996)
- 1916 - Masaki Kobayashi, director
- 1917 - Herbert A. Hauptman, biophysicist, winner of the Nobel Prize in Chemistry 1985
- 1921 - Hugh Downs, game show host, journalist
- 1929 - Vic Morrow, actor (d. 1982)
- 1932 - Alexander Kluge, actor and film director
- 1934 - Florence Henderson, actress, The Brady Bunch
- 1943 - Maceo Parker, musician (P-Funk)
- 1944 - Alan Parker, director, writer
- 1944 - Carl Bernstein, journalist
- 1946 - Bernard Dowiyogo, former president of Nauru (d. 2003)
- 1946 - Gregory Hines, dancer, actor (d. 2003)
- 1948 - Raymond Teller, magician (Penn and Teller)
- 1968 - Jules Asner, model, television personality
- 1970 - Simon Pegg, comedian, writer and actor
- 1973 - Steve McNair, American football quarterback
- 1978 - Richard Hamilton, basketball player
- 1980 - Fatima Leyva, Mexican women's soccer player
Deaths
- 1400 - King Richard II of England murdered (b. 1367)
- 1405 - Timur (aka Tamerlane), Mongol monarch and conqueror (b. 1336)
- 1779 - James Cook, British naval captain and explorer (b. 1728)
- 1831 - Vincente Guerrero, Mexican revolutionary hero (b. 1782)
- 1831 - Henry Maudslay, inventor and machine tool-maker (b. 1771)
- 1929 - Tom Burke, American runner
- 1943 - David Hilbert, mathematician (b. 1862)
- 1959 - Baby Dodds, jazz musician (b. 1898)
- 1975 - Julian Huxley, British biologist (b. 1887)
- 1975 - P. G. Wodehouse, writer (b. 1881)
- 1983 - Lina Radke, German athlete
- 1994 - Andrei Chikatilo, Russian serial killer (executed) (b. 1936)
- 1999 - John Ehrlichman, presidential advisor (b. 1925)
- 2003 - Dolly the sheep, the world's first cloned mammal (b. 1996)
- 2004 - Marco Pantani, italian bicyclist and Tour-de-France winner (b. 1970)
Holidays and observances
February 13 - February 15 - January 14 - March 14 -- historical anniversaries
