On this day in History - Feb. 21

• 0362 - Athanasius returns to Alexandria.
• 1173 - Pope Alexander III canonizes Thomas Becket Absp of Canterbury .
• 1397 - Nascimento de Isabel de Portugal, Duquesa de Borgonha was born (d. 17 Dec 1471). Princess of Portugal, daughter of King John I
• 1431 - The trial of Joan of Arc begins.
• 1437 - King James I of Scotland dies (b. 1394)
• 1440 - The Prussian Confederation was formed.
• 1471 - John of Rokycan dies. Czech Catholic archbishop
• 1484 - Elector Joachim I of Brandenburg was born (d. 1535)
• 1513 - Pope Julius II [Giuliano dellea Rovere] dies (b. 05 Dec 1443). Pope (1503-13).
• 1543 - Battle of Wayna Daga - A combined army of Ethiopian and Portuguese troops defeated a Muslim army led by Ahmed Gragn.
• 1543 - Ahmed Gragn dies. Sultan of Adal.
• 1554 - Hieronymus Bock dies. German botanist.
• 1556 - Sethus Calvisius was born (d. 1615). German calendar reformer.
• 1595 - Robert Southwell dies hanged at Tyburn for having become a Jesuit priesr against prevailing law. English poet (St. Peter's Complaint)
• 1613 - Mikhail I was elected unanimously as Tsar by a national assembly, beginning the Romanov dynasty of Imperial Russia.
• 1621 - Rebecca Nurse was born (d. 1692). American accused witch.
• 1668 - John Thurloe dies (b. 1616). English Puritan spy.
• 1675 - Franz Xaver Josef von Unertl was born (d. 1750). Bavarian politician.
• 1677 - Baruch Spinoza dies in The Hague, Netherland (b. 1632). Dutch philosopher.
• 1688 - Queen Ulrike Eleonora of Sweden was born (d. 1741) .
• 1705 - Edward Hawke, 1st Baron Hawke was born (d. 1781). British naval officer.
• 1715 - Charles Calvert, 3rd Baron Baltimore dies (b. 1637). Governor of the Province of Maryland.
• 1721 - John McKinly was born (d. 1796). American physician and President of Delaware.
• 1723 - Louis-Pierre Anquetil was born (d. 1808). French historian.
• 1728 - Peter III was born (d. 1762). Tsar of Russia, husband of Catherine the Great.
• 1743 - The premiere in London of George Frideric Handel's oratorio, Samson.
• 1764 - John Wilkes thrown out of Engl House of Commons for "Essay on Women".
• 1788 - Johann Georg Palitzsch dies (b. 1723). German astronomer.
• 1791 - John Mercer was born (d. 30 Nov 1866). English chemist and industrialist who invented the mercerisation process for treating cotton which is still in use today and was a pioneer in colour photography.
• 1791 - Carl Czerny was born (d. 1857). Austrian composer.
• 1794 - Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna was born (d. 1876). Mexican president.
• 1795 - A constituição do Diretório estabelece a liberdade de culto na França revolucionária.
• 1795 - Francisco Manuel da Silva was born in Rio de Janeiro (d. 1865). Brazilian composer.
• 1801 - John Henry Newman was born (d. 1890). English Catholic cardinal.
• 1804 - The first self-propelling steam locomotive makes its outing at the Pen-y-Darren ironworks in Wales.
• 1813 - Las fuerzas del general Manuel Belgrano vencen a las realistas del general Tristán en la batalla de Salta.
• 1817 - José Zorrilla y Moral was born (d. 23 Jan 1893). Spanish poet and dramatist.
• 1821 - Charles Scribner was born (d. 26 Aug 1871). American publisher.
• 1821 - Georg Friedrich von Martens dies (b. 1756). German diplomat.
• 1822 - Guatemala se une voluntariamente a México.
• 1824 - Eugène de Beauharnais dies (b. 1781). Son of Napoleon's wife, Josephine.
• 1831 - Senador Dantas (Manuel Pinto de Sousa Dantas) was born Fazenda Itapororocas, Inhabupê, Bahia (d. 29 Jan 1894). Brazilian politician and President of The Bank of Brazil.
• 1836 - Léo Delibes was born (d. 1891). French composer.
• 1837 - Rosália de Castro was born in Santiago de Compostela (d. 1885). Spanish writer (Canteres Gallegos, Follas Novas) .
• 1842 - John J. Greenough patents the sewing machine.
• 1844 - Charles-Marie Widor was born (d. 1937). Organist and composer.
• 1846 - Emperor Ninko of Japan dies (b. 1800).
• 1848 - Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels publish the Communist Manifesto in Brussels.
• 1852 - Joaquín Acosta dies (b. 29 Dec 1799). Colombian scientist who in 1834 attempted a scientific survey of his country between Socorro and the Magdalena River.
• 1858 - Un fuerte temblor destruye la ciudad griega de Corinto.
• 1860 - Karel Matěj Čapek-Chod was born (d. 1927). Czech journalist.
• 1862 - Justinus Kerner dies (b. 1786). German poet.
• 1863 - Carlos António Rodrigues dos Reis was born in Torres Novas (d. 1940). Portuguese painter.
• 1864 - Henrique Maximiano Coelho Neto was born in Caxias, Maranhão (d. 28 Nov. 1934). Brazilian politician, abolicionist and writer.
• 1865 - John Haden Badley was born (d. 1967). English author and school founder.
• 1866 - August von Wassermann was born (d. 16 Mar 1925). German bacteriologist whose discovery of a universal blood-serum test for syphilis helped extend the basic tenets of immunology to diagnosis.
• 1867 - Otto Hermann Kahn was born in Manheim (d. 1934). Millionaire and benefactor.
• 1872 - Pavel P Gagarin dies at 82. Russian monarch/politician.
• 1874 - The Oakland Daily Tribune publishes its first newspaper.
• 1875 - Jeanne Calment was born. She then went on to live for 122 years 164 days, the longest confirmed lifespan for any human being in history (d. 1997).
• 1876 - Constantin Brancusi was born. Romanian sculptor.
• 1876 - Pyotr Konchalovsky was born (d. 1956). Russian painter.
• 1878 - First telephone book issued in New Haven, Connecticut.
• 1880 - Waldemar Bonsels was born (d. 1952). German writer.
• 1885 - The newly completed Washington Monument is dedicated.
• 1885 - Sacha Guitry was born (d. 1957). Russian dramatist, writer, director, actor.
• 1892 - Harry Stack Sullivan was born (d. 14 Jan 1949). American psychiatrist who developed a theory of psychiatry based on interpersonal relationships.
• 1893 - Celia Lovsky was born in Vienne (d. 12. Oct. 1979). Austrian-American actress .
• 1893 - Andrés Segovia was born (d. 1987). Spanish guitarist.
• 1893 - Thomas Edison received two U.S. patents for a "Cut Out for Incandescent Electric Lamps" and for a "Stop Device" .
• 1895 - Henrik Carl Peter Dam was born (d. 1976). Danish biochemist, winner of the 1943 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
• 1896 - Guerra de Cuba: los insurrectos cubanos son derrotados en el lugar conocido por Ojo de Agua.
• 1900 - Madeleine Renaud was born (d. 1994). French theater actress.
• 1901 - La Asamblea Constituyente cubana promulga la primera Constitución del país.
• 1901 - George Francis FitzGerald dies (b. 1851). Irish mathematician.
• 1903 - Anaïs Nin was born (d. 1977). French writer (Winter of Artifice, House of Incense), Diarist, pro-sex feminist, erotic writer. Close friend of Henry Miller.
• 1903 - Fairfax M. Cone was born (d. 1977). American advertising executive.
• 1907 - W. H. Auden was born (d. 1973). English poet.
• 1907 - Fuerzas nicaragüenses se apoderan de varias poblaciones hondureñas y acorralan al presidente Manuel Bonilla.
• 1910 - Douglas Bader was born (d. 1982). British pilot.
• 1910 - Carmine Galante was born (d. 1979). Italian-born gangster.
• 1910 - Eddie Waring was born (d. 1986). British sports commentator.
• 1915 - Ann Sheridan was born (d. 1967). American actress.
• 1916 - World War I: In France the Battle of Verdun begins.
• 1917 - Luz del Fuego (Dora Vivacqua) was born in Cachoeiro do Itapemirim, Espírito Santo. Brazilian actress and naturalist.
• 1917 - Lucille Bremer was born (d. 1996). American actress.
• 1918 - The last Carolina parakeet dies in captivity at the Cincinnati Zoo.
• 1920 - Afonso de Bragança, Duque do Porto, dies in Naples (b.31 Jul 1865). Portuguese noble.
• 1924 - Robert Mugabe was born. First President of Zimbabwe
• 1925 - The New Yorker publishes its first issue.
• 1925 - Sam Peckinpah was born in Fresno California (d. 1984). American film director.
• 1926 - Heike Kamerlingh Onnes dies (b. 1853). Dutch physicist, Nobel Prize laureate.
• 1927 - Erma Bombeck was born (d. 1966). American writer, humorist.
• 1927 - Hubert de Givenchy was born in Beauvais. French fashion designer.
• 1927 - Pierre Mercure was born (d. 1966). French Canadian musician and composer.
• 1929 - Chespirito was born. Mexican writer, actor and comedian.
• 1929 - El Gobierno francés niega el asilo político a León Trotski.
• 1929 - Acuerdo fronterizo entre Chile y Perú.
• 1933 - Nina Simone [Eunice Waymon] was born (d. 2003). American singer.
• 1934 - Rue McClanahan was born in Healdton Oklahoma. American actress (Maude, Golden Girls).
• 1934 - Detención y asesinato del líder guerrillero nicaraguense Augusto César Sandino.
• 1935 - Mark McManus was born (d. 1994). Scottish actor.
• 1935 - Jean Pelletier was born. French Canadian political operative
• 1936 - Barbara Jordan was born (d. 1996). American politician.
• 1937 - King Harald V of Norway was born.
• 1937 - Gary Lockwood was born in Van Nuys, Caliofornia. American actor (2001, Survival Zone, Lieutenant).
• 1937 - Initial flight of the first successful flying car, Waldo Waterman's Arrowbile .
• 1937 - The League of Nations bans foreign national "volunteers" in the Spanish Civil War.
• 1937 - Following the failed assassination attempt (19 February) on the Italian Viceroy General, Rudolfo Graziani, two thousand Ethiopians are detained for questioning.
• 1938 - George Ellery Hale dies (b. 1868). American astronomer.
• 1940 - John Lewis was born. American politician
• 1941 - James Wong was born (d. 23 Nov 2004). Famous composer of Hong Kong.
• 1941 - Frederick Banting dies (b. 1891). Canadian physician, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.
• 1942 - Margarethe von Trotta was born in Berlin. German actor, film director andwriter.
• 1943 - David Geffen was born. American record producer (Geffin, Asylum).
• 1944 - Ferenc Szisz dies (b. 1873). Hungarian-born race car driver.
• 1945 - Eric Liddell dies. Scottish runner. Golden medal and Olimpic record 47.6 s in 400m Olympics Paris 1924 ("Charriots of Fire").
• 1945 - Conferencia, en México, de los países de la Unión Panamericana, a excepción de Argentina y El Salvador, en la que se acuerda la creación de la Liga de las Naciones Americanas.
• 1945 - World War II: Japanese Kamikaze planes sink escort carrier Bismarck Sea and damage the Saratoga.
• 1946 - Tyne Daly was born in Madison Wisconsin. American actress (Cagney & Lacey, Angel Unchained)
• 1946 - Alan Rickman was born in Hammersmith, London. English actor (Robin Hood Prince of Thieves).
• 1946 - Anthony Daniels was born. British actor.
• 1946 - Bob Ryan was born. Boston sports columnist.
• 1946 - Vito Rizzuto was born. Sicilian-born alleged mafia boss.
• 1946 - José Streel dies (b. 1911). Belgian World War II collaborator.
• 1947 - In New York City Edwin Land demonstrates the first "instant camera", the Polaroid Land Camera, to a meeting of the Optical Society of America.
• 1947 - Renata Sorrah was born in Rio de Janeiro. Brazilian actress.
• 1947 - Olympia Snowe was born. American politician.
• 1947 - Victor Sokolov was born (d. 2006). Russian journalist.
• 1948 - NASCAR is incorporated.
• 1949 - Una emisora de Quito transmite "La guerra de los mundos", de Wells, y causa el mismo pánico que en Nueva York diez años antes.
• 1949 - Jerry Harrison was born. American musician (Talking Heads).
• 1949 - Ronnie Hellström was born. Swedish footballer.
• 1951 - Vince Welnick was born. Musician (The Grateful Dead)
• 1952 - Language Martyrs' Day, marking language-revolution in the then East Pakistan (currently, the independent state of People's Republic of Bangladesh) .
• 1952 - Churchill government in the UK abolishes Identity Cards to "set the people free".
• 1952 - The government of Winston Churchill abolishes Identity Cards in the UK to "set the people free".
• 1952 - In Dhaka, East Pakistan (present Bangladesh) Police opened fire on a procession of students, who demanded to establish Bengali as the Official language, killing four people and starting a country-wide protest which led to the recognition of Bengali as one of the national languages of Pakistan. 21st February was later declared as "International Mother Language Day" by UNESCO.
• 1953 - Francis Crick and James D. Watson discovered the structure of the DNA molecule.
• 1953 - Christine Ebersole was born. American actress.
• 1953 - William Petersen was born. American actor (Return to Lonesome Dove) .
• 1955 - Sir Steven Fayburgh KCMG was born. British diplomat.
• 1955 - Kelsey Grammer was born. American actor
• 1956 - Alberto Augusto Miranda was born in Vila Real. Portuguese writer.
• 1958 - Gamal Abdel Nasser is made president of the United Arab Republic (which was formed by the joining of Egypt and Syria on 1 February 1958).
• 1958 - Jake Burns was born. Northern Ireland singer (Stiff Little Fingers)
• 1958 - Alan Trammell was born. American baseball player and manager
• 1958 - Mary Chapin Carpenter was born in Princeton, NJ. American singer (This shirt)
• 1958 - Jack Coleman was born. American actor.
• 1959 - Emmett McAuliffe was born. KMOX radio show host and lawyer
• 1960 - Cuban leader Fidel Castro nationalizes all businesses in Cuba.
• 1960 - Jacques Becker dies (b. 1906). French film director and screenwriter.
• 1961 - Gabon adopts constitution.
• 1961 - Davey Allison was born (d. 1993). American racer car driver.
• 1961 - Chuck Palahniuk was born in Pasco, Washington. American writer.
• 1961 - Martha Hackett was born. American actress.
• 1961 - Christopher Atkins was born. American actor.
• 1961 - Bertha Faye was born (d. 2001). American wrestler.
• 1962 - David Foster Wallace was born. American author.
• 1962 - Vanessa Feltz was born. British television presenter.
• 1963 - William Baldwin was born. American actor.
• 1965 - Evair (Evair Aparecido Paulino) was born in Crisólia, Ouro Fino, Minas Gerais. Brazilian soccer player
• 1965 - Malcolm X is assassinated at the Audubon Ballroom in New York City by members of the Nation of Islam (b. 1925).
• 1966 - Paul Comtois dies (b. 1895). French Canadian politician.
• 1967 - Charles Beaumont dies (b. 1929). American writer.
• 1967 - Leroy Burrell was born. American sprinter.
• 1968 - Howard Walter Florey dies (b. 24 Sep 1898). Australian-born pathologist who, with Ernst Boris Chain, isolated and purified penicillin (discovered in 1928 by Sir Alexander Fleming) for general clinical use. For this research Florey, Chain, and Fleming shared the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1945.
• 1969 - Eric Wilson was born. American musician (Sublime).
• 1969 - James Dean Bradfield was born. Welsh musician (Manic Street Preachers)
• 1970 - Swissair Flight 330: All nine crew members and 38 passengers were killed due to the explosion of a bomb in the rear of the plane when it crashed near Zurich, Switzerland.
• 1970 - Em Portugal a União Nacional decide transformar-se na Acção Nacional Popular (ANP).
• 1970 - Michael Slater was born. Australian cricketer.
• 1971 - The Convention on Psychotropic Substances is signed at Vienna.
• 1972 - Seo Taiji was born. Korean pop musician .
• 1972 - President Richard Nixon visits the People's Republic of China to normalize Sino-American relations (became the first American President to visit China) .
• 1972 - The Soviet unmanned spaceship Luna 20 lands on the Moon.
• 1972 - Bronislava Nijinska dies (b. 1891). Polish-Russian ballet dancer.
• 1972 - Eugène Tisserant dies (b. 1884). French Catholic candinal.
• 1973 - Israeli fighter aircraft shoot down a Libyan Boeing 727 airliner over the Sinai desert, killing 74 passengers and crew. Israel's Defence Minister, General Moshe Dayan, makes a public statement: "There is no reason to feel guilty".
• 1973 - Heri Joensen was born. Faroese musician (Tyr).
• 1974 - Yugoslavia adopts constitution .
• 1974 - The long-running Japanese comic strip Sazae-san published its final installment in the Asahi Shimbun.
• 1974 - The last Israeli soldiers leave the west bank of the Suez Canal in carrying out a truce with Egypt.
• 1974 - Roberto Heras was born. Spanish cyclist .
• 1974 - Ivan Campo was born. Spanish footballer.
• 1974 - Tim Horton dies (b. 1905). Canadian hockey player.
• 1975 - Affirmed was born (d. 2001). Race horse .
• 1975 - Watergate scandal: Former United States Attorney General John N. Mitchell and former White House aides H. R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman are sentenced to prison.
• 1976 - Portugal reconhece oficialmente a República Popular de Angola.
• 1976 - Ryan Smyth was born. Canadian hockey player
• 1977 - Steve Francis was born. NBA Basketball player.
• 1977 - Kevin Rose was born. American television host.
• 1977 - Chad Hutchinson was born. Baseball and football player.
• 1978 - Park Eun-hye was born. South Korean actress.
• 1979 - Jennifer Love Hewitt was born in Waco, Texas. American actress and singer.
• 1979 - Pascal Chimbonda was born. French footballer.
• 1979 - Lonnie Ford was born. Arena Football League fullback/linebacker.
• 1979 - Carly "Carlito" Colón was born. Puerto Rican professional wrestler
• 1980 - Hanni Wenzel is 1st Liechtensteiner to win Olymp gold (giant slalom).
• 1980 - Brad Fast was born. Canadian ice hockey player
• 1981 - Charles Rocket, portraying the gunshot victim in a Saturday Night Live parody of the "Who Shot J.R." plot on the program Dallas, said, "I'd like to know who the fuck did it," during the live feed of the "goodnights" segment. Afterward, everyone except Eddie Murphy and Joe Piscopo was fired.
• 1982 - Murray the K dies (b. 1922). American impresario and disc jockey.
• 1983 - Braylon Edwards was born. American football player.
• 1984 - Andrew Ellis was born. New Zealand rugby union player
• 1984 - David Odonkor was born. German footballer
• 1984 - Michail Aleksandrovich Sholokhov dies (b. 1905). Sovietic writer, Nobel Prize for Literature in 1965.
• 1984 - Fernando Remacha dies. Spanish composer .
• 1985 - Nathan Pritikin dies (b. 29 Aug 1915). Scientist and nutritionist. Pritikin believed that moderate exercise combined with a diet low in fat and high in unrefined arbohydrates reversed his own heart disease discovered in the late 1950's.
• 1985 - Louis Hayward dies (b. 1909). British actor.
• 1986 - Helen Hooven Santmyer dies (b. 1895). American writer.
• 1986 - Shigechiyo Izumi dies (b. 1865). Japanese sugarcane farmer, also the world's oldest man ever.
• 1986 - Metallica released their 3rd album Master of Puppets.
• 1986 - Nintendo releases The Legend of Zelda.
• 1986 - Charlotte Church was born. Welsh soprano singer.
• 1987 - Brasil: Evandro Cavalcanti, advogado dos trabalhadores rurais de Pernambuco é assinado. Seu enterro se torna um acto pró-reforma agrária no País.
• 1987 - Anthony Walker was born (d. 2005). British student, murder victim.
• 1987 - Ellen Page was born. Canadian actress.
• 1988 - On his own televangelism program being tapped in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Jimmy Swaggart confesses that he is guilty of an unspecified sin and will be temporarily leaving the pulpit.
• 1988 - Daniel Rose was born. English footballer.
• 1989 - Kristin Herrera was born. American actress.
• 1989 - Alex Thépot dies (b. 1906). French footballer.
• 1990 - 32nd Grammy Awards: Wind Beneath My Wings, Nick of Time wins.
• 1991 - Dame Margot Fonteyn [Peggy Hookham] dies (b. 1919). English ballet dancer .
• 1993 - Sergei Bubka pole vaults world record indoor (6.15 m).
• 1994 - Comandos paquistaneses invadem a embaixada afegã em Islamabad, matando três pistoleiros afegãos que mantinham cinco estudantes e um professor como reféns.
• 1994 - Luis Donaldo Colosio dies (b. 1948). Mexican politician.
• 1994 - Refrigerator - The Whirlpool Corporation began production of an energy efficient refrigerator that did not use freon. It had an efficiency 25% better than the U.S. law required. By removing freon, the destructive effect on ozone in the atmosphere by that chemical was eliminated.
• 1995 - Serkadji prison mutiny in Algeria; 4 guards and 96 prisoners killed in a day and a half.
• 1995 - Ibrahim Ali, a 17-year-old Comorian living in France, is murdered by three far right National Front activists.
• 1995 - Steve Fossett lands in Leader, Saskatchewan, Canada becoming the first person to make a solo flight across the Pacific Ocean in a balloon.
• 1995 - Calder Willingham dies. Writer.
• 1996 - Soyuz TM-23, launched into orbit.
• 1996 - Morton Gould dies (b. 1913). American composer.
• 1997 - Jeanne Calment, considerada a pessoa mais velha do mundo, comemora seu aniversário de 122 anos na França.
• 1997 - El atleta etíope Haile Grabieselassie bate la plusmarca de 5.000 metros en pista cubierta con 12:59.04.
• 1999 - Gertrude Belle Elion Elion dies (b. 23 Jan 1918). American biochemist and pharmacologist who (with colleague George H. Hitchings), was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1988.
• 1999 - Wilmer David Mizell dies (b. 1930). Baseball player.
• 2000 - Antonio Díaz-Miguel dies (b. 1933). Spanish basketball coach.
• 2000 - David Letterman returns to The Late Show over a month after having an emergency quintuple heart bypass surgery.
• 2002 - It was confirmed that Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl was dead, allegedly murdered by Islamic militants.
• 2002 - John Thaw dies (b. 1942). English actor.
• 2002 - Harold Furth dies (b. 1939). Austrian-born physicist.
• 2003 - Over 100 concert goers die in a fire during a performance of the rock band Great White.
• 2004 - The first European political party organization, the European Greens, is established in Rome.
• 2004 - Guido Molinari dies (b. 1933). Canadian abstract artist .
• 2004 - John Charles dies (b. 1931). Welsh football player.
• 2005 - Ara Berberian dies (b. 1930). American opera singer.
• 2005 - Guillermo Cabrera Infante dies (b. 1929). Cuban novelist.
• 2005 - Eugene Scott dies (b. 1929). American religious broadcaster.
• 2005 - Gérard Bessette dies (b. 1920). Quebec novelist and poet.
• 2006 - New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg unveils a brand new sign on the corner of West 66th Street called Peter Jennings Way in honor of the late ABC News anchor Peter Jennings.
• Language Martyrs' Day - A day celebrated by Bengali speaking people for gaining right of mother tongue.
• International Mother Language Day (UNESCO)
• Catholicism - Feast day of St Peter Damian, Saint Pepin of Landen and Saint Randoald