http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history
George Harrison Born
Yes, that's right. I try to mark the truly biggest dates in Beatle's history (can you tell that I'm a big Beatles fan?) when they come, and birthdays certainly qualify, right?
George Harrison, often referred to as the "quiet Beatle", was born on this day in 1943. Had he lived to see this day, he would have turned 71.
Harrison is best known as a member of the Beatles, and he contributed some great stuff to the famed body of work for the band, including "Think for Yourself, Taxman, Something, I Want to Tell You, Within You Without You, Here Comes the Sun, and While My Guitar Gently Weeps. He also is known for having contributed some incredible and imaginative guitar solos, and introduced a distinctive Indian influence to the band, spiritually and musically.
Following the break-up of the Beatles, George Harrison, like all of the other former members, embarked on a solo career, which included well known songs such as My Sweet Lord, Isn't It a Pity, Give Me Love (Give Me Peace on Earth). He also wrote the most iconic song of Ringo Starr's solo career, It Don't Come Easy. He also collaborated with former bandmate John Lennon after the end of the group.
George Harrison also basically invented the concept of benefit concerts to raise money for causes, by thinking up and organizing the star-studded "Concert for Bangladesh" with Ravi Shankar in 1971 at Madison Square Garden.
Harrison was also part of another legendary group, with more or less a cult following - The Travelling Wilburys.
In 1999, George Harrison was attacked and stabbed by a knife-wielding maniac in his own home. he survived, but the end for him was not long ti come.
George Harrison died in 2001, at the age of 58, from lung cancer.
Personally, I think that Harrison, if anything, is rather underrated. When I was a kid, it was a big deal when he released "Cloud Nine", and to this day, I love every song on that album, and listen to it relatively regularly. If you explore his solo works, you will see the influence that he brought to the Beatles, as well as his own unique musical (and spiritual) direction.
One interesting side note on this day is that, while traditionally February 25th was indeed the day that Harrison celebrated his birthday, he found out late in life that he had evidently, technically been born a few minutes before midnight on the 24th. So, when he found this out, he began celebrating on the 24th, even though his birthday still is usually recognized as the 25th! Strange, huh?
Here's honoring George Harrison!
Feb 25, 1964: Clay knocks out Liston
On February 25, 1964, 22-year-old Cassius Clay shocks the odds-makers by dethroning world heavyweight boxing champ Sonny Liston in a seventh-round technical knockout. The dreaded Liston, who had twice demolished former champ Floyd Patterson in one round, was an 8-to-1 favorite. However, Clay predicted victory, boasting that he would "float like a butterfly, sting like a bee" and knock out Liston in the eighth round. The fleet-footed and loquacious youngster needed less time to make good on his claim--Liston, complaining of an injured shoulder, failed to answer the seventh-round bell. A few moments later, a new heavyweight champion was proclaimed.
Cassius Marcellus Clay Jr. was born in Louisville, Kentucky, in 1942. He started boxing when he was 12 and by age 18 had amassed a record of over 100 wins in amateur competition. In 1959, he won the International Golden Gloves heavyweight title and in 1960 a gold medal in the light heavyweight category at the Summer Olympic Games in Rome. Clay turned professional after the Olympics and went undefeated in his first 19 bouts, earning him the right to challenge Sonny Liston, who had defeated Floyd Patterson in 1962 to win the heavyweight title.
On February 25, 1964, a crowd of 8,300 spectators gathered at the Convention Hall arena in Miami Beach to see if Cassius Clay, who was nicknamed the "Louisville Lip," could put his money where his mouth was. The underdog proved no bragging fraud, and he danced and backpedaled away from Liston's powerful swings while delivering quick and punishing jabs to Liston's head. Liston hurt his shoulder in the first round, injuring some muscles as he swung for and missed his elusive target. By the time he decided to discontinue the bout between the sixth and seventh rounds, he and Clay were about equal in points. A few conjectured that Liston faked the injury and threw the fight, but there was no real evidence, such as a significant change in bidding odds just before the bout, to support this claim.
To celebrate winning the world heavyweight title, Clay went to a private party at a Miami hotel that was attended by his friend Malcolm X, an outspoken leader of the African American Muslim group known as the Nation of Islam. Two days later, a markedly more restrained Clay announced he was joining the Nation of Islam and defended the organization's concept of racial segregation while speaking of the importance of the Muslim religion in his life. Later that year, Clay, who was the descendant of a runaway Kentucky slave, rejected the name originally given to his family by a slave owner and took the Muslim name of Muhammad Ali.
Muhammad Ali would go on to become one of the 20th century's greatest sporting figures, as much for his social and political influence as his prowess in his chosen sport. After successfully defending his title nine times, it was stripped from him in 1967 after he refused induction into the U.S. Army on the grounds that he was a Muslim minister and therefore a conscientious objector. That year, he was sentenced to five years in prison for violating the Selective Service Act but was allowed to remain free as he appealed the decision. His popularity plummeted, but many across the world applauded his bold stand against the Vietnam War.
In 1970, he was allowed to return to the boxing ring, and the next year the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Ali's draft evasion conviction. In 1974, he regained the heavyweight title in a match against George Foreman in Zaire and successfully defended it in a brutal 15-round contest against Joe Frazier in the Philippines in the following year. In 1978, he lost the title to Leon Spinks but later that year defeated Spinks in a rematch, making him the first boxer to win the heavyweight title three times. He retired in 1979 but returned to the ring twice in the early 1980s. In 1984, Ali was diagnosed with pugilistic Parkinson's syndrome and has suffered a slow decline of his motor functions ever since. He was inducted into the International Boxing Hall of Fame in 1990. In 1996, he lit the Olympic flame at the opening ceremonies of the Summer Games in Atlanta, Georgia. Ali's daughter, Laila, made her boxing debut in 1999.
At a White House ceremony in November 2005, Ali was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Feb 25, 1890: Molotov is born
Vlacheslav Mikhaylovich Skryabin, foreign minister for the Soviet Union who took the revolutionary name Molotov, is born in Kurkaka, Russia.
Molotov was an enthusiastic advocate of Marxist revolution in Russia from its earliest days. He was an organizer of the Bolshevik Party in 1906 and suffered arrest in 1909 and 1915 under the czarist government for his subversive political activities. In 1921, after the coup d'etat that brought Vladimir Lenin to power and overthrew the old czarist regime, he became secretary of the revolutionary government's Central Committee. After Lenin's death in 1924, Molotov supported Joseph Stalin as Lenin's successor; when Stalin did assume power, Molotov was rewarded with full membership in the Soviet Politburo, the executive policy-making body.
In 1930, he was made chairman of the Council of People's Commissars, a position roughly the equivalent of prime minister. On the eve of World War II, Molotov was also made Soviet commissar of foreign affairs--that is, the foreign minister for the USSR. It was in this position that he negotiated the infamous Molotov-Ribbentrop Nonaggression Pact (August 1939) with Nazi Germany, in which the antifascist Soviet Union and anti-Marxist Germany agreed to respect each other's spheres of influence (an agreement that angered and stunned the world, and that only lasted a short time).
When Germany invaded the Soviet Union, Molotov became a member of the State Defense Committee, a war cabinet post, and negotiated alliances with the United States and Great Britain, arguing for a "second front" that would draw the Germans westward and away from the USSR. He won a reputation as a hard and relentless advocate for Soviet interests (nicknamed "Stone Ass" by Roosevelt), and did little to hide his contempt for the Western democracies--even as he desperately needed and relied upon them.
After the war, Molotov left the foreign ministry, but took it up once again upon the accession of Nikita Krushchev to power. Disagreements with Krushchev led to his dismissal from that post, and "anti-party"--really anti-Krushchev--involvement led to his being deposed from all government posts and denounced as a "henchman" of Stalin. He was then relegated to various low-profile jobs, including ambassador to Outer Mongolia. He retired from public life in 1962 and died in 1986. Though he held many notable posts in the Soviet government, many remember him for another reason--during the war, Molotov advocated the use of throwing bottles filled with flammable liquid and stuffed with a lit rag at the enemy, and the famous "Molotov cocktail" was born.
Feb 25, 1948: Communists take power in Czechoslovakia
Under pressure from the Czechoslovakian Communist Party, President Eduard Benes allows a communist-dominated government to be organized. Although the Soviet Union did not physically intervene (as it would in 1968), Western observers decried the virtually bloodless communist coup as an example of Soviet expansion into Eastern Europe.
The political scene in Czechoslovakia following World War II was complex, to say the least. Eduard Benes was head of the London-based Czech government-in-exile during the war, and returned to his native land in 1945 to take control of a new national government following the Soviet withdrawal in July of that year. National elections in 1946 resulted in significant representation for leftist and communist parties in the new constituent assembly. Benes formed a coalition with these parties in his administration.
Although Czechoslovakia was not formally within the Soviet orbit, American officials were concerned with the Soviet communist influence in the nation. They were particularly upset when Benes' government strongly opposed any plans for the political rehabilitation and possible rearmament of Germany (the U.S. was beginning to view a rearmed Germany as a good line of defense against Soviet incursions into western Europe). In response, the United States terminated a large loan to Czechoslovakia. Moderate and conservative parties in Czechoslovakia were outraged, and declared that the U.S. action was driving their nation into the clutches of the communists. Indeed, the communists made huge electoral gains in the nation, particularly as the national economy spiraled out of control.
When moderate elements in the Czech government raised the possibility of the nation's participation in the U.S. Marshall Plan (a massive economic recovery program designed to help war torn European countries rebuild), the communists organized strikes and protests, and began clamping down on opposition parties. Benes tried desperately to hold his nation together, but by February 1948 the communists had forced the other coalition parties out of the government. On February 25, Benes gave in to communist demands and handed his cabinet over to the party. Rigged elections were held in May to validate the communist victory. Benes then resigned and his former foreign minister Jan Masaryk died under very suspicious circumstances. Czechoslovakia became a single-party state.
The response from the West was quick but hardly decisive. Both the United and Great Britain denounced the communist seizure of power in Czechoslovakia, but neither took any direct action. Perhaps having put too much faith in Czechoslovakia's democratic traditions, or possibly fearful of a Soviet reaction, neither nation offered anything beyond verbal support to the Benes government. The Communist Party, with support and aid from the Soviet Union, dominated Czechoslovakian politics until the so-called "Velvet Revolution" of 1989 brought a non-communist government to power.
Here's a more detailed look at events that transpired on this date throughout history:
138 - The Emperor Hadrian adopts Antoninus Pius, effectively
making him his successor.
1095 - Council of Rockingham: bishop Anselmus vs King
William II Rufus
1358 - Dalmatie flees Venice
1497 - Italians troops reconquer Taranto on France
1502 - Austrian emperor Maximilian I reformats government
machine
1540 - Francisco V squez de Coronado searches for 7 cities
of Cibola Mexico
1570 - Pius V excommunicates Elizabeth I, absolves her
subjects from allegiance
1605 - Portuguese garrison on Ambon surrenders to Admiral
Van der Haghen
1623 - Duke Maximilian I of Bavaria becomes monarch of Palts
1634 - Irish captain Walter Devereaux kills duke Wallenstein
1643 - Dutch US colonists kill Algonquin-indians
1667 - Abraham Crijnssens fleet reach Fort Willoughby on
Suriname River
1746 - Cumberlands troops occupy Aberdeen
1751 - 1st performing monkey exhibited in America, NYC
(admission 1 cent)
1791 - 1st Bank of US chartered
1793 - 1st cabinet meeting (At George Washington's home)
1797 - Colonel William Tate and his force of 1000-1500
soldiers surrender after the Last Invasion of Britain
1799 - 1st federal forestry legislation authorizes purchase
of timber land
1799 - Congress passes 1st federal quarantine legislation
English Monarch Queen Elizabeth IEnglish Monarch Queen
Elizabeth I 1803 - 1,800 sovereign German states unite into 60 states
1804 - Jefferson nominated for president at
Democratic-Republican caucus
1830 - Victor Hugo's "Hernani" premieres in Paris
1836 - Samuel Colt patents 1st revolving barrel multishot
firearm
1836 - US Showman Phineas Taylor Barnum exhibits African
American slave Joice Heth.
1837 - 1st US electric printing press patented by Thomas
Davenport
1838 - London pedestrian walks 20 miles backward then
forward in 8 hours
1839 - Seminoles & black allies shipped from Tampa Bay
Florida, to West
1847 - State University of Iowa is approved
1859 - 1st use of "insanity plea" to prove
innocence
1862 - Congress forms US Bureau of Engraving & Printing
1862 - Paper currency (greenbacks) introduced in US by Pres
Abraham Lincoln
1863 - Congress creates national banking system, comptroller
of currency
1870 - Hiram R. Revels, is sworn in as 1st black member of
Congress (Sen-R-MS)
1875 - Kiowa Indians under Lone Wolf (Guipago) surrender at
Ft Sill
Minister and US Senator Hiram R. RevelsMinister and US
Senator Hiram R. Revels 1879 - Congress passed 1st Timberland Protection Act
1885 - US Congress condemns barbed wire around government
grounds
1892 - James Barrie's "Walker London," premieres
in London
1896 - Italian government decides to attack governor
Baratieri of Eritrea
1901 - George Cohan's musical "Governor's Son,"
premieres in NYC
1901 - US Steel Corp organized under J P Morgan
1904 - J M Synge's "Riders to the Sea" opens at
Irish Natl Theater Society
1904 - Stanley Cup: Ottawa Silver 7 sweep Toronto
Marlboroughs in 2 games
1905 - Neth Workers van Vakverenigingen, (NVV) political
party forms
1907 - George Bernard Shaw's "Philanderer,"
premieres in London
1907 - US proclaims protectorate over Dominican Republic
1908 - 1st tunnel under Hudson River (railway tunnel) opens
1910 - Dali Lama flees Tibet from Chinese troop to
British-Indies
1911 - Victor Herbert's opera "Natoma," premieres
in Philadelphia
1912 - Marie-Adélaïde, the eldest of six daughters of
Guillaume IV, becomes the first reigning Grand Duchess of Luxembourg.
Playwright George Bernard ShawPlaywright George Bernard Shaw
1916 - German troops conquer Fort Douaumont near Verdun
1919 - League of Nations set up by Paris Treaty
1919 - Oregon is 1st state to tax gasoline (1 cent per
gallon)
1921 - Georgian SSR proclaimed
1921 - Tbilisi, capital of the Democratic Republic of
Georgia, occupied by Bolshevist Russia.
1923 - Bread in Berlin rises to 2,000 mark
1924 - Marie Boyd scores 156 points in Maryland HS
basketball game (163-3)
1925 - Glacier Bay National Monument established in Alaska
1925 - US female Figure Skating championship won by Beatrix
Loughran
1925 - US male Figure Skating championship won by Nathaniel
Niles
1925 - The diplomatic relations between Japan and the Soviet
Union were established.
1926 - Francisco Franco becomes General of Spain
1926 - Kwo-Min-Tang (Guomindang) declares war on
government/warlords
1927 - Gdanks & Polish accord concerning traffic through
Polish corridor
1930 - Check photographing device patented
Spanish Dictator Francisco FrancoSpanish Dictator Francisco
Franco 1930 - George Headley completes twin tons in Test Cricket v England (114
& 112)
1932 - Immigrant Adolf Hitler gets German citizenship
1933 - 1st genuine aircraft carrier christened, USS Ranger
1933 - Major NFL rule changes (hash mark 10 yds in, posts on
goal line)
1933 - Thomas Yawkey purchases Boston Red Sox
1938 - British Lord Halifax becomes Foreign Minister
1939 - 1st Anderson bomb shelter in Britain erected in an
Islington garden
1940 - 1st televised (W2XBS, NYC) hockey game (Rangers vs
Canadians)
1941 - Boston Bruins set NHL record of 23-game unbeaten
streak (15-0-8)
1941 - February strike against persecution of Jews, in
Amsterdam
1943 - Vietminh forms Indo Chinese Democratic Front
1944 - US 1st Army completes invasion plan
1945 - US aircraft carriers attack Tokyo
1945 - World War II: Turkey declares war on Germany.
1948 - Communists seize Czechoslovakia/C Gottwald becomes
premier
Dictator of Nazi Germany Adolf HitlerDictator of Nazi
Germany Adolf Hitler 1949 - WAC Corporal rocket achieves height of 400k (record)
1950 - "Your Show of Shows" with Sid Caesar &
Imogene Coca premieres on NBC Writers include Mel Brooks, Neil Simon &
Woody Allen
1951 - "Michael Todd's Peep Show" closes at Winter
Garden NYC after 278 perf
1951 - 1st Pan American Games opens (Buenos Aires Argentina)
1951 - Babe Didrikson-Zaharias wins Orlando Florida 2 Ball
Golf Tournament
1952 - 6th Winter Olympic games close at Oslo, Norway
1953 - "Wonderful Town" opens at Winter Garden
Theater NYC for 559 perfs
1954 - Abdul Nasser appointed Egyptian premier
1956 - Khrushchev denounces Stalin at 20th Soviet Party
Conference
1957 - Buddy Holly & Crickets record "That'll Be
the Day"
1957 - Supreme Court decides 6-3, baseball is only antitrust
exempt pro sport
1960 - John Cage's "Music for Amplified Toy
Pianos," premieres
1960 - Lillian Hellman's "Toys in the Attic,"
premieres in NYC
1961 - Niagara ends St Bonaventura's 99-game home basketball
win streak
1961 - Paul Bikle in glider climbs from 1208 m at release to
record 14,10
Singer -songwriter Buddy HollySinger -songwriter Buddy Holly
1962 - India Congress Party wins elections
1962 - Mike O'Hara completes record 97th marathon
1962 - Robert Kennedy visits Netherlands
1963 - Beatles release their 1st single in US "Please
Please Me"
1964 - Austrian chancellor Alfons Gorbach resigns
1964 - Muhammad Ali (Cassius Clay) TKOs Sonny Liston in 7
for heavyweight boxing title
1966 - Syrian military coup under Hafiz al-Assad
1968 - 430 Unification Church couples wed in Korea
1968 - Makarios re-elected president of Cyprus
1969 - Beatles begin recording Abbey Road album
1969 - Mariner 6 launched for fly-by of Mars
1969 - Pension plan for baseball is agreed to
1969 - Germany gives $5 million to an Arab terrorist as
ransom for the passengers and crew of a hijacked jumbo jet.
1971 - "Oh! Calcutta!" opens at Belasco Theater
NYC for 1,316 performances
1971 - P Zindel's "And Miss Reardon Drinks a
Little," premieres in NYC
1972 - Lopsided trade, Cards trade Steve Carlton to Phillies
for Rick Wise
1972 - Paul McCartney releases "Give Ireland back to
the Irish" single
1973 - "Little Night Music" opens at Shubert
Theater NYC for 601 performances
1973 - Juan Corona sentenced to 25 life sentences for 25
murders
1973 - Steven Sondheim's musical "Little Night
Music," premieres in NYC
1974 - Veronica & Colin Scargill (England) begin tandem
bicycle ride a record 18,020 miles around the world, completed on August 27,
1975
1975 - Ewen Chatfield flattened by Peter Lever &
seriously injured
1977 - New Orleans' Pete Maravich sets NBA record for a
guard with 68 pts
1977 - Oil tanker explosion west of Honolulu spills 31
million gallons
1977 - Soyuz 24 returns to Earth
Musician & member of the Beatles Paul McCartneyMusician
& member of the Beatles Paul McCartney 1978 - Botham scores 1st Test
Cricket century, 103 v NZ Christchurch
1979 - Jane Blalock wins LPGA Orange Blossom Golf Classic
1979 - Soyuz 32 carries 2 cosmonauts to Salyut 6 space
station is launched
1980 - Coup ousts PM Henck Arron of Suriname
1981 - 23rd Grammy Awards: Sailing, Christopher Cross, Billy
Joel wins
1981 - Calgary Flames scored 11 goals against the Islanders
1981 - Exec Board of Players' Association votes unanimously
to strike on May 29
1981 - L Calvo Sotelo elected premier of Spain
1981 - NHL most penalized game; Bruins vs Northstars, 84
penalties (392 mins)
1981 - NY Islanders give up their most goals (11) vs Calgary
Flames
1981 - Rita Jenrette (wife of Abscam congressman) appears on
Donahue
1981 - US performs nuclear test at Nevada Test Site
1981 - Exec Board of Baseball Players' Association votes
unanimously to strike on May 29 if the issue of free-agent compensation remains
unresolved
1982 - Final episode of "The Lawrence Welk Show"
airs
1982 - Record speed for a snowmobile (239 kph)
The Pianoman Billy JoelThe Pianoman Billy Joel 1984 - Oil
fire in Cubatao Brazil kills 500
1986 - 28th Grammy Awards: We Are the World, Sade, Phil
Collins wins
1986 - Corazon Aquino becomes President of the Philippines,
Marcos flees
1986 - Iran conquerors Iraq peninsula Fao
1986 - Thousands of Egyptian military police riot, destroy 2
luxury hotel
1987 - LaMarr Hoyt is banned from baseball for 1987, due to
drug abuse
1987 - US Supreme Court upholds (5-4) affirmative action
1988 - Bruce Springsteen "Tunnel of Love Tour,"
begins in Worcester Mass
1988 - South Korea adopts constitution
1989 - 1st independent blue-collar labor union in Communist
Hungary forms
1989 - Dallas Cowboys fire coach Tom Landry after a 29-year
career
1989 - Dallas Cowboys' new owner fires 29-year coach Tom
Landry
1989 - Javed Miandad scores 271 v NZ at Eden Park
1989 - Lowest baramotric pressure in Netherlands (956.7 mbar
at De Bilt)
1989 - Mike Tyson TKOs Frank Bruno in 5 for heavyweight
boxing title
Heavyweight Boxing Champion Mike TysonHeavyweight Boxing
Champion Mike Tyson 1990 - Australia beat Pakistan 2-0 to win the Cricket World
Series Cup
1990 - Nicaraguans votes out Sandinistas
1990 - On a BBC taped interview, rock star Stevie Nicks
breaks down, saying that she will never have children & no man can stand
her for long
1991 - Andrew Jones scores twin Test Cricket tons v Sri
Lanka (122 & 100*)
1991 - Bruce McNall, Wayne Gretzky & John Candy buy
CFL's Toronto Argonauts
1991 - US, barracks in Dhahran Saudi Arabia, hit by scud
missile, kills 28
1992 - 34th Grammy Awards: Unforgetable, Marc Cohn wins
1992 - Khojaly massacre: about 613 civilians killed by
Armenian armed forces during the conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh region of
Azerbaijan
1993 - "Fool Moon" opens at Richard Rodgers
Theater NYC for 207 performances
1993 - Florida Marlins introduce their mascot
"Billy"
1993 - Pakistan all out 43 v West Indies, world one-day int
record low
1994 - Israeli extremist Baruch Goldstein massacres 30
Palestinians in Hebron
1994 - Peruvian Yak-40 crashes into mountain near Tingo
Maria, kills 31
1994 - Phil Rizzuto elected to Baseball Hall of Fame
1995 - Bomb attack on train in Assam India (27 soldiers
killed)
1995 - British super middleweight Nigel Benn puts opponent
Gerard McClellan in hospital
1995 - Moslem fundamentalists shoot 20 shite mosque goers
dead
1995 - PBA National Championship Won by Scott Alexander
1996 - "Father" closes at Criterion Theater NYC
after 52 performances
1996 - Rajindra Dhanraj takes 16-167 in match Trinidad v
Leeward Is
1998 - Pamela Lee has husband Tommy Lee arrested on battery
charges
1998 - Switzerland's 1st legal brothel opens in Zurich
1998 - 40th Grammy Awards: Sunny Came Home, Paula Cole wins
2009 - BDR massacre in Pilkhana, Dhaka, Bangladesh. 74
People are being killed, including more than 50 Army officials, by Bangladeshi
Boarder Guards inside its headquarter.
2011 - In the Irish general election, the Fianna Fáil-led government
suffered the worst defeat of a sitting government since the formation of the
Irish state in 1921.
2012 - Syrian Army kills 100 civilians in artillery shelling
of Homs and Hama
2012 - Al Qaeda suicide bombing kills at least 26 people in
Mukalla, Yemen
2012 - World Health Organization removes India from the list
of polio endemic countries
2012 - Louisiana Red, American blues musician, dies from
stroke at 79
2013 - Italy Common Good, a centre left alliance, wins the
Italian general election
2013 - Cuban President Raul Castro announces he will not
seek another term in 2018
1570 - England's Queen Elizabeth I was excommunicated by Pope Pius V. 1751 - Edward Willet displayed the first trained monkey act in the U.S. 1793 - The department heads of the U.S. government met with U.S. President Washington for the first Cabinet meeting on U.S. record. 1836 - Samuel Colt received a patent for a "revolving gun". 1901 - The United States Steel Corp. was incorporated by J.P. Morgan. 1913 - The 16th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution was ratified. It authorized a graduated income tax. 1919 - The state of Oregon became the first state to place a tax on gasoline. The tax was 1 cent per gallon. 1928 - The Federal Radio Commission issued the first U.S. television license to Charles Jenkins Laboratories in Washington, DC. 1930 - The bank check photographing device was patented. 1933 - The aircraft carrier Ranger was launched. It was the first ship in the U.S. Navy to be designed and built from the keel up as an aircraft carrier. 1940 - The New York Rangers and the Montreal Canadiens played in the first hockey game to be televised in the U.S. The game was aired on W2WBS in New York with one camera in a fixed position. The Rangers beat the Canadiens 6-2. 1948 - Communists seized power in Czechoslovakia. 1950 - "Your Show of Shows" debuted on NBC. 1956 - Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev criticized the late Josef Stalin in a speech before a Communist Party congress in Moscow. 1972 - Germany gave a $5 million ransom to Arab terrorist who had hijacked a jumbo jet. 1986 - Filippino President Ferdinand E. Marcos fled the Philippines after 20 years of rule after a tainted election. 1999 - William King was sentenced to death for the racial murder of James Byrd Jr in Jasper, TX. Two other men charged were later convicted for their involvement. 1999 - In Moscow, China's Prime Minister Zhu Rongji and Russia's President Boris Yeltsin discussed trade and other issues. 2000 - In Albany, NY, a jury acquitted four New York City police officers of second-degree murder and lesser charges in the February 1999 shooting death of Amadou Diallo. 2005 - Dennis Rader was arrested for the BTK serial killings in Wichita, KS. He later pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 10 life prison terms.
1570 Elizabeth I, queen of England, was excommunicated by Pope Pius V. 1836 Samuel Colt patented the first revolving barrel multishot firearm. 1870 Hiram Revels became the first black United States senator, taking over the term of Jefferson Davis. 1901 J.P. Morgan formed U.S. Steel Corporation, the first billion-dollar corporation in the world. 1948 Communists took control of the government in Czechoslovakia. 1964 Cassius Clay (Muhammad Ali) became world heavyweight boxing champion for the first time by knocking out Sonny Liston in Miami Beach. 1983 Tennessee Williams, American playwright, died. 1986 President Ferdinand Marcos fled the Philippines; Corazon Aquino took over the office. 1990 Violeta Chamorro was elected president of Nicaragua, a victory for opponents of the Sandinistas.
The following links are to web sites that were used to complete this blog entry:
http://www.historyorb.com/today/events.php
http://on-this-day.com/onthisday/thedays/alldays/feb25.htm
http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history
http://www.infoplease.com/dayinhistory
No comments:
Post a Comment