EVENTS
- 1898 – Spanish-American War begins.
- 1903 – The first Teddy Bear is made.
- 1950 – The movie Cinderella is released by Walt Disney.
- 1965 – Canada adopts its current national flag showing a maple leaf. The leaf symbolizes the country’s forests, the middle white stripe the arctic snow, and the red stripes the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans.
- 1971 – The United Kingdom and Ireland decimalize their currencies. Before the change, a pound sterling was made up of 240 pence, or 20 shillings.
- 1989 – Soviet Russia completed its military withdrawal from Afghanistan after nine years of unsuccessful involvement in the civil war between Muslim rebel groups and the Russian-backed Afghan government. Over 15,000 Russian soldiers had been killed in the fighting.
- 1998 – Dale Earnhardt wins the Daytona 500.
- 2001 – The first draft of the human genome is published. The human genome contains the complete human genetic information.
- 2003 – The largest peace demonstration in history takes place. Up to 30 million people in 600 cities around the world protested against the Iraq War.
BIRTHDAYS
- 1564 – Galileo (Scientest)
- 1710 – Louis XV of France
- 1809 – Inventor Cyrus McCormick (1809-1884) was born in Rockbridge County, Virginia. He invented the horse-drawn mechanical reaper, a machine that freed farmers from hard labor and contributed to the development and cultivation of vast areas of the American Great Plains.
- 1820 – Susan B. Anthony (Suffragist)
- 1874 – Ernest Shackleton (Irish explorer)
- 1934 – Graham Kennedy (Australian actor)
- 1951 – Jane Seymour (Actress)
- 1954 – Matt Groening (American animator, screenwriter, producer)
- 1964 – Chris Farley (Actor)
- 1976 – Brandon Boyd (Singer)