On this day in History - Feb. 9

• 0474 - Zeno crowned as co-emperor of the Byzantine Empire.
• 1199 - Minamoto no Yoritomo was born (d. 1147). Japanese shogun.
• 1404 - Constantine XI was born (d. 1453). Last Byzantine Emperor.
• 1450 - Agnès Sorel dies (b. 1421). Mistress of King Charles VII of France
• 1533 - Shimazu Yoshihisa was born (d. 1611). Japanese daimyo and samurai.
• 1540 - Se disputa la carrera de caballos más antigua, en el hipódromo Roodee, en Chester, Inglaterra.
• 1555 - Bishop of Gloucester John Hooper is burned at the stake
• 1555 - Rev. Dr. Rowland Taylor dies (b. 1510). Pastor, martyred under Bloody Mary.
• 1556 - El pirata inglés Francis Drake saquea la ciudad de Cartagena de Indias (en la actual Colombia).
• 1619 - Lucilio Vanini dies (b. 1585). Italian philosopher.
• 1621 - Gregory XV becomes Pope, the last Pope elected by acclamation.
• 1640 - Murad IV dies (b. 1612). Ottoman Sultan.
• 1666 - George Hamilton, 1st Earl of Orkney was born (d. 1737). British soldier.
• 1675 - Gerhard Douw dies (b. 1613). Dutch painter.
• 1709 - François Louis, Prince of Conti was born (d. 1664). French general.
• 1731 - Gasparo Angiolini was born (d. 6 Feb 1803). Italian choreographer and composer
• 1748 - Luther Martin was born (d. 1826). American patriot, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States.
• 1751 - Henri François d'Aguesseau dies (b. 1668). Chancellor of France.
• 1752 - Fredric Hasselquist dies (b. 1722). Swedish naturalist.
• 1769 - Susette Gontard was born (d. 1802). Girl-friend of poet Friedrich Hölderlin
• 1773 - William Henry Harrison, was born (d. 1841). 9th. President of the United States (March 4-April 4, 1841).
• 1775 - American Revolutionary War: English Parliament declares Massachusetts in rebellion.
• 1777 - Seth Pomeroy dies (b. 1706). American gunsmith and soldier.
• 1782 - Joseph Aloysius Assemani dies (b. 1710). Syrian orientalist.
• 1783 - Vasily Zhukovsky was born (d. 1852). Russian poet.
• 1788 - Austria declares war on Russia.
• 1800 - Hyrum Smith was born (d. 1844). American religious leader.
• 1803 - Jean François de Saint-Lambert dies (b. 1716). French poet.
• 1814 - Samuel Tilden was born (d. 4 Aug 1886). American lawyer and governor of New York
• 1815 - Federico Madrazo was born. Spanish painter.
• 1822 - Haiti invades the Dominican Republic / El presidente de Haití, general Jean Pierre Boyer, ocupa la ciudad de Santo Domingo.
• 1825 - After no presidential candidate received a majority of electoral votes, the United States House of Representatives elects John Quincy Adams 6th President of the United States.
• 1826 - Argentina derrota a Brasil en la batalla naval de los Corales.
• 1830 - Abd-ul-Aziz, was born in Istanbul (d. 1876). Ottoman sultan 32nd sultan of Turkey (1861-76) (d. 1876) .
• 1834 - Felix Dahn was born (d. 1912). German author.
• 1839 - El general José Miguel de Velasco se levanta en armas contra el mariscal Andrés de Santa Cruz, al que obliga a huir de Bolivia.
• 1846 - Wilhelm Maybach was born (d. 1929). German designer of engines and cars, (designer of 1st Mercedes) and industrialist.
• 1847 - Guerra entre estadounidenses y mexicanos. Los primeros desembarcan en Veracruz e inician la marcha sobre la capital mexicana.
• 1849 - Se proclama la República Romana (abolición del poder temporal de los Papas sobre los estados pontificios). Ocorre a Proclamação da República de Roma, formando um Governo Provisório composto por Giuseppe Mazzini, Carlo Armellini e Aurélio Saffi. Seus primeiros actos foram abolir o poder do Papa e escrever uma constituição para ser utilizada por uma Itália unida.
• 1854 - Aletta Henriette Jacobs was born, (d. 10 Aug 1929). Dutch physician who pioneered family planning with the world's first birth control clinic.
• 1861 - American Civil War: Jefferson Davis is elected the Provisional President of the Confederate States of America by the Confederate convention at Montgomery, Alabama.
• 1861 - Tennessee voted against secession.
• 1865 - Mrs. Patrick Campbell, nee Beatrice Stella Tanner, was born (d. 9 Apr 1940). British actress, original Eliza Doolittle/Pygmalion.
• 1867 - Nebraska becomes 37th U.S. state .
• 1874 - Amy Lowell was born (d. 1925). American Pulitzer Prize-winning poet/critic (Patterns, Sword Blades & Poppy Seed).
• 1881 - Fiódor Mikháilovitch Dostoiévski dies (b. 1821). Russian novelist (Crime & Punishment).
• 1883 - William E. Dodge, dies (b. 4 Sep 1805). American industrialist, cofounder of Phelps, Dodge & Company, which was one of the largest mining companies in the US for more than a century .
• 1885 - Alban Berg was born (d. 1935). Austrian composer.
• 1885 - The first Japanese arrive in Hawai.
• 1889 - The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) is established as a Cabinet-level agency.
• 1891 - Ronald Colman was born (d. 1958). English actor, 1947 Academy Award actor (Tale of 2 Cities).
• 1891 - Johan Jongkind dies (b. 1819). Dutch painter.
• 1892 - Peggy Wood was born (d. 1978). American actress.
• 1895 - Hermann Brill was born (d. 1959). German politician.
• 1895 - William G. Morgan invents volleyball.
• 1897 - Sir Charles Kingsford-Smith was born (d. 1935). Australian pioneering aviator.
• 1900 - Davis Cup competition is established.
• 1901 - Brian Donlevy was born (d. 1972). Irish actor.
• 1901 - James Murray was born (d. 1936). American actor.
• 1902 - Gertrud Scholtz-Klink was born (d. 1999). German women's leader during Germany's Third Reich.
• 1906 - Paul Laurence Dunbar dies (b. 1872). American poet.
• 1909 - Heather Angel was born (d. 1986). British actress.
• 1909 - Dean Rusk was born (d. 1994). United States Secretary of State (1961-69).
• 1909 - Carmen Miranda [Maria do Carmo Miranda da Cunha] was born in Marco de Canavezes, Portugal. Singer, dancer, actress. Her films include Down Argentine Way (1940) and That Night in Rio (1941) and her Broadway credits include Streets of Paris (1939). Died in 5 August 1955.
• 1910 - Jacques Monod was born (d. 31 May 1976). French biochemist, winner of Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1965 shared with François Jacob and André Lwoff.
• 1913 - Comienza en México la llamada "decena trágica", sangriento episodio de la pugna entre los generales Madero y Huerta.
• 1914 - Ernest Tubb was born (d. 1984). American country music singer.
• 1914 - Gypsy Rose Lee (Rose Louise Hovick) was born (d. 1970). American dancer and actress.
• 1914 - Bill Veeck was born (d. 1986). Baseball executive.
• 1915 - Se cierra, durante la Primera Guerra Mundial, el Canal de Suez a los barcos neutrales.
• 1916 - Alec Zino was born (d. 3 Mar 2004). Portuguese ornithologist and conservationist who gave his name to Zino's petrel, Europe's rarest breeding bird. Only perhaps 45 mating pairs of the Zino's petrel (Pterodroma madeira) remain on the island of Madeira, south-west of Portugal, where this small black and white seabird breeds.
• 1916 - Tex Hughson was born (d. 1993). Major League Baseball player.
• 1917 - Alemania desencadena la guerra submarina.
• 1919 - Francisco Adolfo Coelho dies in Carcavelos (b. in Coimbra, 15 Jan 1847). Portuguese philologist.
• 1920 - By the terms of the Svalbard Treaty, international diplomacy recognizes Norwegian sovereignty over arctic archipelago Svalbard, and designates it as demilitarized.
• 1922 - Brazil becomes a member of the Berne Convention copyright treaty.
• 1922 - Kathryn Grayson was born. American actress .
• 1923 - Brendan Behan was born (d. 1964). Irish author.
• 1923 - Soviet Aeroflot airlines forms.
• 1925 - Burkhard Heim was born (d. 2001). German physicist.
• 1925 - Apertura del Technion (Instituto israelí de tecnología) en Haifa.
• 1926 - Garret FitzGerald was born. Seventh Taoiseach of the Republic of Ireland
• 1926 - O submarino Plus Ultra, com os tripulantes Franco, Ruiz de Alda, Durán e Rada, chega a Buenos Aires, onde recebe uma homenagem.
• 1928 - Frank Frazetta was born. American illustrator.
• 1928 - Roger Mudd was born. American journalist.
• 1928 - El general nicaragüense Augusto César Sandino emprende una ofensiva militar contra las tropas estadounidenses.
• 1929 - Es ejecutado en México José León Toral, asesino del presidente electo, Álvaro Obregón.
• 1930 - Garner Ted Armstrong was born (d. 2003). American evangelist.
• 1931 - Josef Masopust was born in Most. Thekoslovakian soccer player- 87 games for National Team
• 1932 - Gerhard Richter was born. German painter and graphic artist.
• 1934 - Balkan Entente alliance forms (Yugoslavia, Greece, Turkey & Romania) .
• 1936 - León Cortés is elected President of Costa Rica.
• 1936 - Clive Swift was born. British actor.
• 1939 - Barry Mann was born. American singer and songwriter.
• 1939 - Janet Suzman was born. South African actress.
• 1940 - J. M. Coetzee was born. South African author, Nobel Prize laureate author.
• 1940 - Eugene Bleuler dies (b. 1857). Swiss psychiatrist.
• 1941 - Sheila Kuehl was born. American actress and politician.
• 1942 - Carole King was born. American singer and composer.
• 1942 - World War II: Top United States military leaders hold their first formal meeting to discuss American military strategy in the war.
• 1942 - Daylight-saving time goes into effect in the United States.
• 1942 - Um incêndio destrói em Nova York o paquete francês Normandie.
• 1943 - Joseph E. Stiglitz was born. American economist, Bank of Sweden Prize winner.
• 1946 - La Asamblea General de la ONU condena el régimen de Franco.
• 1943 - World War II, Battle of Guadalcanal: After forcing the remaining Japanese to be evacuated the night before, American authorities declared Guadalcanal secure.
• 1943 - Joe Pesci was born in Newark, NJ. American actor (Half Nelson, Goodfellas) .
• 1943 - Barbara Lewis was born. Singer
• 1944 - Alice Walker was born. American writer, Pulitzer prize winning author (The Color Purple).
• 1945 - Mia Farrow [Maria de Lourdes Villers] was born in Los Angeles. American actress (Rosemary's Baby, Purple Rose of Cairo) .
• 1946 - Séan Neeson was born. Northern Irish politician.
• 1946 - Júlio Prestes dies (b. 15 Mar 1882). Brazilian politician, elected president in 1926 he didn't take the place because there was a Revolutionary movement lead by Getúlio Vargas that took the power.
• 1947 - Carla Del Ponte was born. UN prosecutor.
• 1947 - Joe Ely was born. Singer.
• 1949 - Judith Light was born. American actress. (Who's the Boss?)
• 1949 - Jim Sheridan was born. Irish film director.
• 1949 - Hollywood actor Robert Mitchum was jailed in Los Angeles for two months for smoking marijuana.
• 1950 - Red scare: Senator Joseph McCarthy accuses the United States State Department of being filled with Communists.
• 1950 - Javier Mariscal was born. Spanish painter and designer.
• 1951 - Eddy Duchin dies (b. 1910). American musician.
• 1952 - Mookie Wilson was born. Major League Baseball, helped the New York Mets win the 1986 World Series .
• 1953 - Ciarán Hinds was born. Northern Irish actor.
• 1954 - Monique Lafond was born in Rio de Janeiro. Brazilian actress
• 1955 - JM J. Bullock was born. American actor.
• 1955 - Charles Shaughnessy was born. British actor.
• 1955 - Aires Miguel Carlos Victorica dies in Buenos Aires. Argentine painter.
• 1956 - Mónica Waldwogel was born. Brazilian journalist and commenter of economics
• 1957 - Gordon Strachan was born. Scottish soccer player and manager.
• 1957 - Miklós Horthy dies (b. 1868). Hungarian admiral and regent.
• 1960 - Joanne Woodward receives the first star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
• 1960 - Holly Johnson was born. British singer (Frankie Goes To Hollywood)
• 1960 - Alexandre Benois dies (b. 1870). Russian artist.
• 1961 - John Kruk was born. Baseball player and commentator.
• 1961 - Carlos Coimbra da Luz dies. President of Brazil (1955)
• 1962 - Jamaica signs agreement to become independent .
• 1962 - España formaliza su primera solicitud de ingreso en el Mercado Común europeo.
• 1963 - Brian Greene was born. American physicist.
• 1963 - Travis Tritt was born. American country music singer.
• 1963 - 1st flight of Boeing 727 jet .
• 1964 - 9th Winter Olympic games close at Innsbruck, Austria .
• 1964 - The Beatles make their first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show.
• 1964 - Lärs Schmidt Grael was born in São Paulo. Brazilian sailor, Snipe World Champion.
• 1964 - Ary Barroso dies (b. 7 Nov 1903). Brazilian pianist and composer
• 1965 - Vietnam War: The first United States combat troops are sent to South Vietnam.
• 1966 - Ellen van Langen was born. Dutch athlete .
• 1966 - Sophie Tucker dies (b. 1884). Russian-born actress and singer.
• 1967 - La Comunidad Europea inicia el desarrollo normativo sobre el IVA.
• 1967 - Edson Cordeiro was born in Santo André, São Paulo. Brazilian actor.
• 1968 - Alejandra Guzmán, nacimiento de, cantante mexicana de rock.
• 1969 - Manuel Plaza Reyes dies at 68. Chilean marathoner (Olympics gold medal 1928).
• 1969 - Gabby Hayes dies (b. 1885). American actor .
• 1969 - World's largest airplane, Boeing 747, makes 1st commercial flight.
• 1970 - Glenn McGrath was born. Australian cricketer.
• 1971 - Sharon Case was born. American actress.
• 1971 - The 6.4 on the Richter Scale Sylmar earthquake hits the San Fernando Valley area of California.
• 1971 - Satchel Paige becomes the first Negro League player to become voted into the Baseball Hall of Fame.
• 1971 - Apollo program: Apollo 14 returns to Earth after the third manned moon landing.
• 1973 - Biju Patnaik of the Pragati Legislature Party elected leader of opposition in the state assembly in Orissa, India.
• 1973 - Amber Valletta was born in Phoenix AZ, model (Face, House of Style, Bazaar) .
• 1975 - The Soyuz 17 Soviet spacecraft returns to Earth.
• 1976 - Vladimir Guerrero was born. Major League Baseball All-Star.
• 1976 - Percy Faith dies (b. 1908). Canadian musician and composer.
• 1978 - Carmen Conde (b. 1907 – d. 1996) is the first woman to enter into the "Real Academia de la Lengua Española"
• 1979 - Uma epidemia desconhecida causa em Nápoles a morte de 60 pessoas.
• 1979 - Mena Adrienne Suvari was born in Newport, Rhode Island. American actress.
• 1979 - David Gray was born. English snooker player.
• 1979 - Dennis Gabor dies (b. 1900). Hungarian physicist, Nobel Prize laureate.
• 1980 - Zhang Ziyi was born. Chinese actress .
• 1981 - John Walker Lindh was born. American Taliban fighter .
• 1981 - Bill Haley dies (b. 1925). American musician ("Bill Haley and the Comets").
• 1981 - El general Wojciech Jaruzelski es nombrado primer ministro de Polonia.
• 1982 - Ami Suzuki was born. Japanese singer.
• 1983 - Blecaute (Octávio Henrique de Oliveira) dies (b. 19 Nov 1919). Brazilian singer and sambist.
• 1984 - Yuri Andropov dies (b. 1914). General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union(1982-84).
• 1985 - David Gallagher was born. American actor (7th Heaven)
• 1986 - Comet Halley reaches perihelion, its closest approach to the sun, during its second visit to the solar system in the 20th century.
• 1988 - Marina Malota was born. Actress.
• 1988 - Maria Leonor dies (b. 1920). Portuguese radio personality and presenter.
• 1989 - António Ramos Rosa, poeta português, recebe o Prémio Fernando Pessoa
• 1990 - Namibia's constitution ratified .
• 1991 - Voters in Lithuania vote for independence.
• 1992 - Sérgio Murillo dies (b. 2 Aug 1941). Brazilian singer
• 1994 - Peace plan for Bosnia and Herzegovina announced (so called Vance-Owen peace plan).
• 1994 - Howard Martin Temin dies (b. 10 Dec 1934). American virologist who in 1975 shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with his former professor Renato Dulbecco and another of Dulbecco's students, David Baltimore, for his codiscovery of the enzyme reverse transcriptase.
• 1994 - Nelson Mandela became the first black president of South Africa.
• 1995 - Jordania confirma la retirada israelí del territorio jordano ocupado desde 1967 en el sur del valle de Araba.
• 1996 - The Irish Republican Army declares the end of its 18 month ceasefire shortly followed by a large bomb in London's Canary Wharf.
• 1996 - Jimmy Bennett was born. American actor
• 1997 - 11th American Comedy Award: Debbie Reynolds .
• 1997 - The Simpsons surpasses The Flintstones as the longest-running prime-time animated series. ( 167th episode is aired ).
• 1998 - Failed assassination attempt on Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze .
• 1998 - Morrem os 196 ocupantes do Airbus 300-600 da China Airlines num acidente junto ao aeroporto de Taipei.
• 1999 - Bryan Mosley dies (b. 1931). British actor.
• 2001 - American submarine USS Greeneville accidentally strikes and sinks Ehime-Maru the Japanese training vessel operated by the Uwajima Fishery High School.
• 2001 - Herbert Simon dies (b. 1916). American economist, Nobel Prize laureate.
• 2002 - Princess Margaret of the United Kingdom, HRH The Countess Snowdon, dies (b. 1930).
• 2002 - XIX Winter Olympics opens in Salt Lake City Utah/Quebec City .
• 2004 - Mozilla Firefox: Browser renamed from Firebird to Firefox .
• 2004 - Robert Colesberry died this day. Oscar nominated producer, died of complications following heart surgery at age 57. Mr. Colesberry was nominated for a Best Picture Oscar for "Mississippi Burning."