February 28

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February 28 in recent years

2010 (Sunday)

February 28 is the 59th day of the year in the Gregorian calendar. There are 306 days remaining until the end of the year (307 in leap years).

Events

202 BC – coronation ceremony of Liu Bang as Emperor Gaozu of Han takes place, initiating four centuries of the Han Dynasty's rule over China
870 – The Fourth Council of Constantinople closes.
1638 – The Scottish National Covenant is signed in Edinburgh.
1700 – Today is followed by March 1 in Sweden, thus creating the Swedish calendar.
1710 – In the Battle of Helsingborg, 14,000 Danish invaders under Jørgen Rantzau are decisively defeated by an equally sized Swedish force under Magnus Stenbock.
1780 – An earthquake hits Iran, killing 200,000 people and causing several damages.
1784 – John Wesley charters the Methodist Church.
1787 – The charter establishing the institution now known as the University of Pittsburgh is granted.
1827 – The Baltimore & Ohio Railroad is incorporated, becoming the first railroad in America offering commercial transportation of both people and freight.
1838 – Robert Nelson, leader of the Patriotes, proclaims the independence of Lower Canada (today Quebec)
1844 – A gun on USS Princeton explodes while the boat is on a Potomac River cruise, killing eight people, including two United States Cabinet members.
1849 – Regular steamboat service from the west to the east coast of the United States begins with the arrival of the SS California in San Francisco Bay, 4 months 22 days after leaving New York Harbor.
1854 – The Republican Party of the United States is organized in Ripon, Wisconsin.
1861 – Colorado is organized as a United States territory.
1870 – The Bulgarian Exarchate is established by decree of Sultan Abd-ul-Aziz of the Ottoman Empire.
1883 – The first vaudeville theater opens in Boston, Massachusetts.
1885 – The American Telephone and Telegraph Company is incorporated in New York State as the subsidiary of American Bell Telephone. (American Bell would later merge with its subsidiary.)
1893 – The USS Indiana, the lead ship of her class and the first battleship in the United States Navy comparable to foreign battleships of the time, is launched.
1897 – Queen Ranavalona III, the last monarch of Madagascar, is deposed by a French military force.
1900 – The Second Boer War: The 118-day "Siege of Ladysmith" is lifted.
1914 – The Autonomous Republic of Northern Epirus is proclaimed in Gjirokastër, by the Greeks living in southern Albania.
1922 – The United Kingdom ends its protectorate over Egypt through a Unilateral Declaration of Independence.
1928 – C.V. Raman discovered Raman effect.
1933 – Gleichschaltung: The Reichstag Fire Decree is passed in Germany a day after the Reichstag fire.
1933 – The England cricket team led by Douglas Jardine wins the acrimonious Bodyline Test series against Australia 4–1.
1935 – DuPont scientist Wallace Carothers invents Nylon.
1939 – The first issue of Serbian weekly magazine Politikin zabavnik is published.
1939 – The erroneous word "Dord" is discovered in the Webster's New International Dictionary, Second Edition, prompting an investigation.
1940 – Basketball is televised for the first time (Fordham University vs. the University of Pittsburgh in Madison Square Garden).
1942 – The heavy cruiser USS Houston (CA-30) is sunk in the Battle of Sunda Strait with 693 crew members killed, along with HMAS Perth (D29) which lost 375 men.
1947 – 228 Incident: In Taiwan, civil disorder is put down with the loss of 30,000 civilian lives.
1953 – James D. Watson and Francis Crick announce to friends that they have determined the chemical structure of DNA; the formal announcement takes place on April 25 following publication in April Nature (pub. April 2).
1958 – A school bus in Floyd County, Kentucky hits a wrecker truck and plunges down an embankment into the rain-swollen Levisa Fork River. The driver and 26 children die in what remains the worst school bus accident in U.S. history.
1972 – Sino-American relations: The United States and People's Republic of China sign the Shanghai Communiqué.
1974 – After seven years, the United States and Egypt re-establish diplomatic relations.
1975 – A major tube train crash at Moorgate station, London kills 43 people.
1980 – Andalusia approves its statute of autonomy through a referendum.
1985 – The Provisional Irish Republican Army carries out a mortar attack on the Royal Ulster Constabulary police station at Newry, killing nine officers in the highest loss of life for the RUC on a single day.
1986 – Olof Palme, Prime Minister of Sweden, is assassinated in Stockholm.
1991 – The first Gulf War ends.
1993 – Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agents raid the Branch Davidian church in Waco, Texas with a warrant to arrest the group's leader David Koresh. Four BATF agents and five Davidians die in the initial raid, starting a 51-day standoff.
1995 – Denver International Airport officially opens in Denver, Colorado to replace Stapleton International Airport
1997 – The North Hollywood shootout takes place.
1997 – A postmodern coup takes places in Turkey.
1997 – GRB 970228, a highly luminous flash of gamma rays, strikes the Earth for 80 seconds, providing early evidence that gamma-ray bursts occur well beyond the Milky Way.
1998 – First flight of RQ-4 Global Hawk, the first unmanned aerial vehicle certified to file its own flight plans and fly regularly in U.S. civilian airspace.
1998 – Kosovo War: Serbian police begin the offensive against the Kosovo Liberation Army in Kosovo.
2001 – The Nisqually Earthquake measuring 6.8 on the Richter Scale hits the Nisqually Valley and the Seattle, Tacoma, and Olympia area of the U.S. state of Washington.
2001 – Six passengers and four railway staff are killed and a further 82 people suffer serious injuries in the Selby rail crash.
2004 – Over 1 million Taiwanese participating in the 228 Hand-in-Hand Rally form a 500-kilometre (300-mile) long human chain to commemorate the 228 Incident in 1947
2005 – Lebanon's pro-Syrian prime minister, Omar Karami, resigns amid large anti-Syria street demonstrations in Beirut.
2005 – A suicide bombing at a police recruiting centre in Al Hillah, Iraq kills 127.
2007 – Jupiter flyby of the New Horizons Pluto-observer spacecraft.

Births

1155 – Henry the Young King, son of Henry II of England (d. 1183)
1261 – Margaret of Scotland, queen of Norway (d. 1283)
1533 – Michel de Montaigne, French writer (d. 1592)
1552 – Joost Bürgi, Swiss clockmaker (d. 1632)
1573 – Elias Holl, German Architect (d. 1646)
1612 – John Pearson, English theologian (d. 1686)
1670 – Benjamin Wadsworth, American President of Harvard University (d. 1737)
1675 – Guillaume Delisle, French cartographer (d. 1726)
1683 – René Antoine Ferchault de Réaumur, French scientist (d. 1757)
1704 – Louis Godin, French astronomer (d. 1760)
1712 – Louis-Joseph de Montcalm, French military commander (d. 1759)
1724 – George Townshend, 1st Marquess Townshend, British field marshal (d. 1807)
1812 – Berthold Auerbach, German poet and author (d. 1882)
1820 – John Tenniel, English illustrator (d. 1914)
1823 – Ernest Renan, French philosopher (d. 1892)
1824 – Blondin, French tightrope walker (d. 1897)
1833 – Alfred von Schlieffen, German field marshal (d. 1913)
1838 – Maurice Lévy, French engineer (d. 1910)
1840 – Henri Duveyrier, French explorer (d. 1892)
1841 – Adrien Albert Marie de Mun, French politician (d. 1914)
1851 – Samuel W. McCall, 47^th Governor of Massachusetts (d. 1923)
1865 – Wilfred Grenfell, medical missionary (d. 1940)
1878 – Pierre Fatou, French mathematician (d. 1929)
1878 – Artur Kapp, Estonian composer (d. 1952)
1882 – Geraldine Farrar, American soprano (d. 1967)
1882 – José Vasconcelos, Mexican writer (d. 1959)
1882 – Pádraic Ó Conaire, Irish writer (d. 1928)
1894 – Ben Hecht, American playwright (d. 1964)
1895 – Marcel Pagnol, French novelist, playwright and film director (d. 1974)
1896 – Philip Showalter Hench, American physician, Nobel laureate (d. 1965)
1900 – Wolfram Hirth, German pilot (d. 1959)
1901 – Linus Pauling, American chemist and activist, Nobel laureate (d. 1994)
1903 – Vincente Minnelli, American film director (d. 1986)
1906 – Bugsy Siegel, American gangster (d. 1947)
1907 – Milton Caniff, American cartoonist (Terry and the Pirates, Steve Canyon) (d. 1988)
1908 – Billie Bird, American actress (d. 2002)
1908 – Alexander Golitzen, American art director (d. 2005)
1909 – Stephen Spender, English poet (d. 1995)
1911 – Otakar Vávra, Czech film director
1912 – Clara Petacci, Italian mistress of Benito Mussolini (d. 1945)
1915 – Ketti Frings, American Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright and screenwriter, (d. 1981)
1915 – Peter Medawar, Brazilian-born scientist, Nobel laureate (d. 1987)
1915 – Zero Mostel, American actor (d. 1977)
1916 – Cesar Climaco, Filipino politician (d. 1984)
1916 – Svend Asmussen, Danish jazz violinist
1917 – Ernesto Alonso, Mexican actor, director, cinematographer, and producer (d. 2007)
1918 – Alfred Burke, British actor
1921 – Pierre Clostermann, French World War II pilot (d. 2006)
1923 – Charles Durning, American actor
1926 – Svetlana Alliluyeva, Soviet defector, daughter of Joseph Stalin
1925 – Harry H Corbett, English actor (d. 1982)
1929 – Hayden Fry, American football coach
1929 – Frank Gehry, Canadian-American architect
1929 – John Montague, Irish poet
1929 – Joseph Rouleau, French Canadian bass opera singer
1930 – Leon Neil Cooper, American physicist, Nobel laureate
1930 – Bruce Dawe, Australian poet
1931 – Gavin MacLeod, American actor
1931 – Dean Smith, American basketball coach
1932 – Don Francks, Canadian actor
1933 – Robert Grondelaers, Belgian cyclist (d. 1989)
1933 – Miro Steržaj, Slovenian 9-pin bowler
1933 – Rein Taagepera, Estonian politician
1938 – Foge Fazio, American college football coach (d. 2009)
1939 – Chögyam Trungpa, Tibetan Buddhist meditation master (d. 1987)
1939 – Daniel C. Tsui, Chinese-born physicist, Nobel laureate
1939 – Tommy Tune, American dancer
1940 – Mario Andretti, Italian-American race car driver
1940 – Joe South, American singer
1942 – Frank Bonner, American actor
1942 – Brian Jones, English musician (The Rolling Stones) (d. 1969)
1942 – Dino Zoff, Italian footballer
1943 – Barbara Acklin, American soul singer (d. 1998)
1943 – Charles Bernstein, American composer
1944 – Win Aung, Burmese politician
1944 – Kelly Bishop, American actress
1944 – Sepp Maier, German footballer
1945 – Bubba Smith, American football player and actor
1946 – Robin Cook, British politician (d. 2005)
1947 – Stephanie Beacham, English actress
1948 – Steven Chu, American physicist, Nobel laureate, U.S. Secretary of Energy-Designate
1948 – Mike Figgis, English director
1948 – Bernadette Peters, American actress and singer
1948 – Mercedes Ruehl, American actress
1951 – Bill Cratty, American modern dancer and choreographer (d. 1998)
1952 – William Finn, American composer
1953 – Ingo Hoffmann, Brazilian racing driver
1953 – Paul Krugman, American economist, Nobel laureate
1953 – Ricky Steamboat, American professional wrestler
1954 – Brian Billick, American football coach
1955 – Gilbert Gottfried, American comedian
1956 – Adrian Dantley, American basketball player
1956 – Jimmy Nicholl, Canadian-born Northern Irish footballer
1956 – Mike Tenay, American wrestling commentator
1956 – Guy Maddin, Canadian film director
1957 – Paul Delph, American musician and producer (d. 1996)
1957 – Ainsley Harriott, British celebrity chef
1957 – John Turturro, American actor
1957 – Cindy Wilson, American singer (The B-52's)
1958 – Natalya Estemirova, Russian activist (d. 2009)
1958 – Ginette Harrison, British mountaineer (d. 1999)
1958 – Jeanne Mas, French singer and actress
1958 – David R. Ross, Scottish historian and writer (d. 2010)
1960 – Dorothy Stratten, Canadian actress (d. 1980)
1961 – Rae Dawn Chong, Canadian actress
1961 – Mark Latham, Australian politician
1961 – Barry McGuigan, Irish boxer
1961 – René Simard, French Canadian singer and TV host
1961 – Eric Bachelart, Belgian racing driver
1963 – Claudio Chiappucci, Italian cyclist
1964 – Djamolidine Abdoujaparov, Uzbekistan cyclist
1964 – Fernando del Valle, American tenor
1964 – Lotta Lotass, Swedish writer, member of the Swedish Academy
1965 – Park Gok-ji, South Korean film editor
1966 – Paulo Futre, Portuguese footballer
1967 – Colin Cooper, English footballer
1968 – Stéphan Lebeau, Canadian ice hockey player
1969 – Butch Leitzinger, American race car driver
1969 – Robert Sean Leonard, American actor
1969 – Tor Øivind Ødegaard, Norwegian track runner
1969 – Patrick Monahan, American singer (Train)
1970 – Daniel Handler, American writer, better known as Lemony Snicket
1970 – Noureddine Morceli, Algerian athlete
1971 – Maxine Bahns, American actress
1971 – Tristan Louis, American writer
1971 – Junya Nakano, Japanese composer
1971 – Peter Stebbings, Canadian actor
1972 – Rory Cochrane, American actor
1973 – Eric Lindros, Canadian ice hockey player
1973 – Nicolas Minassian, French racing driver
1973 – Masato Tanaka, Japanese professional wrestler
1974 – Lee Carsley, Irish footballer
1974 – Moana Mackey, New Zealand politician
1974 – Tangi Miller, American actress
1975 – Mike Rucker, American football player
1976 – Ali Larter, American actress and model
1976 – Adam Pine, Australian swimmer
1976 – Guillaume Lemay-Thivierge, Canadian actor
1977 – Jason Aldean, American country singer
1978 – Jeanne Cherhal, French singer-songwriter
1978 – Yasir Hameed, Pakistani cricketer
1978 – Benjamin Raich, Austrian Olympic skier
1978 – Jamaal Tinsley, American basketball player
1978 – Mariano Zabaleta, Argentine tennis player
1979 – Michael Bisping, English mixed martial artist
1979 – Sébastien Bourdais, French racing driver
1979 – Ivo Karlović, Croatian tennis player
1979 – Primož Peterka, Slovenian ski jumper
1980 – Pascal Bosschaart, Dutch footballer
1980 – Lucian Bute, Romanian-born Canadian boxer
1980 – Esquerdinha, Brazilian footballer
1980 – Piotr Giza, Polish footballer
1980 – Tayshaun Prince, American basketball player
1981 – Brian Bannister, American baseball player
1981 – Florent Serra, French tennis player
1982 – Natalia Vodianova, Russian supermodel
1984 – Ben Fagan, American musician and reality show contestant
1984 – Karolína Kurková, Czech supermodel
1985 – Fefe Dobson, Canadian singer
1985 – Jelena Janković, Serbian tennis player
1985 – Tim Bresnan, Yorkshire and England cricketer
1986 – Mark Sztyndera, German rugby player
1987 – Kerrea Gilbert, English footballer
1988 – Steeve Gerard Fankà, Cameroonian footballer
1988 – Markéta Irglová, Czech songwriter and actress
1989 – Charles Jenkins, American basketball player
1989 – Jason Pierre-Paul, American football player
1991 – Sarah Bolger, Irish actress
2007 – Princess Lalla Khadija of Morocco

Deaths

1261 – Henry III, Duke of Brabant (b. c.1230s|1230)
1326 – Duke Leopold I of Austria (b. 1290)
1453 – Isabella, Duchess of Lorraine (b. 1400)
1485 – Niclas, Graf von Abensberg, German soldier (b. 1441)
1510 – Juan de la Cosa, Spanish cartographer and explorer
1525 – Cuauhtémoc, Aztec ruler
1572 – Aegidius Tschudi, Swiss historian (b. 1505)
1621 – Cosimo II de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany (b. 1590)
1648 – King Christian IV of Denmark and Norway (b. 1577)
1746 – Hermann von der Hardt, German historian (b. 1660)
1786 – John Gwynn, English architect and engineer (b. 1713)
1788 – Thomas Cushing, American Continental Congressman (b. 1725)
1857 – André Dumont, Belgian geologist (b. 1809)
1869 – Alphonse de Lamartine, French writer and poet (b. 1790)
1891 – George Hearst, American businessman and US Senator (b. 1820)
1916 – Henry James, American writer (b. 1843)
1925 – Friedrich Ebert, Chancellor of Germany (b. 1871)
1929 – Clemens von Pirquet, Austrian physician (b. 1874)
1932 – Guillaume Bigourdan, French astronomer (b. 1851)
1935 – Chiquinha Gonzaga, Brazilian composer (b. 1847).
1936 – Charles Nicolle, French bacteriologist, recipient of the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (b. 1866)
1941 – King Alfonso XIII of Spain (b. 1886)
1942 – Karel Doorman, Dutch admiral (b. 1889)
1956 – Emile Buisson, French murderer (executed) (b. 1902)
1959 – Maxwell Anderson, American playwright and film writer (b. 1888)
1963 – Rajendra Prasad, First President of India (b. 1884)
1966 – Jonathan Hale, Canadian-born actor (b. 1891)
1967 – Henry Luce, American publisher (b. 1898)
1974 – Bobby Bloom, American singer/songwriter (b. 1946)
1977 – Eddie 'Rochester' Anderson, American actor (b. 1905)
1978 – Philip Ahn, American actor (b. 1905)
1978 – Zara Cully, American actress (b. 1892)
1978 – Eric Frank Russell, English author (b. 1905)
1979 – Paul Alverdes, German writer (b. 1897)
1985 – David Byron, English singer (Uriah Heep) (b. 1947)
1985 – Ray Ellington, English singer (b. 1916)
1986 – Olof Palme, Prime Minister of Sweden (b. 1927)
1986 – Laura Z. Hobson, American novelist (b. 1900)
1991 – Reinhard Bendix, German sociologist (b. 1916)
1991 – Wassily Hoeffding, American statistician (b. 1914)
1993 – Ishiro Honda, Japanese film director (b. 1911)
1993 – Ruby Keeler, Canadian actress and dancer (b. 1910)
1998 – Dermot Morgan, Irish actor and comedian (b. 1952)
1998 – Arkady Shevchenko, Soviet diplomat (b. 1930)
1999 – Christine Glanville, British puppeteer (b. 1924)
2002 – Mary Stuart, American actress (b. 1926)
2002 – Helmut Zacharias, German violinist (b. 1920)
2003 – Chris Brasher, English athlete (b. 1928)
2003 – Dinos Dimopoulos, Greek film director and screenwriter (b. 1921)
2003 – Fidel Sánchez Hernández, President of El Salvador (b. 1917)
2003 – Roger Michael Needham, British cryptographer (b. 1935)
2003 – Rudolf Kingslake, English optical engineer (b. 1903)
2004 – Daniel J. Boorstin, American historian, writer, and Librarian of Congress (b. 1914)
2004 – Carmen Laforet, Spanish writer (b. 1921)
2004 – Andres Nuiamäe, Estonian soldier (b. 1982)
2006 – Owen Chamberlain, American physicist, Nobel laureate (b. 1920)
2007 – Baron Charles Forte, Italian-born hotelier (b. 1908)
2007 – Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr. American historian and political commentator (b. 1917)
2007 – Billy Thorpe, Australian musician (Billy Thorpe & the Aztecs) (b. 1946)
2008 – Mike Smith, English musician (The Dave Clark Five) (b. 1943)
2009 – Paul Harvey, American radio broadcaster (b. 1918)

Holidays and observances

Christian Feast Day
Kalevala Day, the day of Finnish Culture. (Finland)
Peace Memorial Day, commemorating the 228 Incident. (Taiwan)
The third day of Ayyám-i-Há (Bahá'í Faith)

External links

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