February 19

February 19 is the 50th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar. There are 315 days remaining, 316 in leap years.

Events

• 607 – Boniface III becomes Pope.
• 1594 – Having already inherited the throne of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth through his mother Catherine Jagellonica of Poland, Sigismund III of the House of Vasa was crowned King of Sweden, succeeding his father John III of Sweden.
• 1674 – England and the Netherlands sign the Peace of Westminster, ending the Third Anglo-Dutch War. A provision of the agreement transfers the Dutch colony of New Amsterdam to England, which renamed it New York.
• 1807 – In Alabama, Former Vice President of the United States Aaron Burr is arrested for treason.
• 1819 – British explorer William Smith discovered the South Shetland Islands, and claimed them in the name of King George III.
• 1846 – In Austin, Texas the newly-formed Texas state government is officially installed.
• 1847 – The Donner Party is rescued. It is noted that some of the survivors seem to be remarkably well-fed considering their ordeal.
• 1852 – The Phi Kappa Psi fraternity is founded at Jefferson College in Canonsburg, Pennsylvania.
• 1861 – Serfdom is abolished in Russia.
• 1878 – The phonograph is patented by Thomas Edison.
• 1881 – Kansas became the first U.S. state to prohibit all alcoholic beverages.
• 1913 – Prizes are included in Cracker Jack candy boxes for the first time.
• 1915 – World War I: The Battle of Gallipoli began.
• 1941 – World War II: The Deutsches Afrikakorps, the corps-level headquarters controlling the German Panzer divisions in North Africa, was formed.
• 1942 – World War II: About 150 Japanese warplanes attack Darwin, Australia.
• 1942 – World War II: President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs the executive order 9066, allowing the United States military to relocate Japanese-Americans to Japanese internment camps.
• 1943 – World War II: Battle of the Kasserine Pass in Tunisia began.
• 1945 – World War II: Battle of Iwo Jima – about 30,000 United States Marines landed on Iwo Jima starting the battle.
• 1949 – Ezra Pound is awarded the first Bollingen Prize in poetry by the Bollingen Foundation and Yale University.
• 1953 – Censorship: Georgia approves the first literature censorship board in the United States.
• 1959 – The United Kingdom grants Cyprus its independence, which is then on formally proclaimed on August 16, 1960.
• 1964 – Paul Simon writes "The Sounds of Silence," the song which, in a year and a half, will catapult him and Art Garfunkel to stardom as Simon & Garfunkel.
• 1985 – Artificial heart patient William J. Schroeder becomes the first such patient to leave hospital.
• 1985 – A Spanish Boeing 747 crashes into Mount Oiz in Spain, killing 148.
• 1985 – EastEnders first airs on televisions across the United Kingdom, on the first night of a major ident change for BBC1.
• 1986 – The Soviet Union launches the Mir space station.
• 1986 – After waiting 37 years, the United States Senate approves a treaty outlawing genocide.
• 1999 – Dennis Franz receives a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
• 2001 – A Oklahoma City bombing museum is dedicated at the Oklahoma City National Memorial.
• 2002 – NASA's Mars Odyssey space probe begins to map the surface of Mars using its thermal emission imaging system.
• 2004 – Nazi-hunter Simon Wiesenthal was awarded an honorary knighthood in recognition of a "lifetime of service to humanity."

Births

• 1473 – Nicolaus Copernicus, astronomer (d. 1543)
• 1626 – February 18/19 – Francesco Redi, physician (d. 1697)
• 1630 – Shivaji, founder of the Maratha Empire (d. 1680)
• 1660 – Friedrich Hoffmann, physician and chemist (d. 1742)
• 1717 – David Garrick, actor (d. 1779)
• 1743 – Luigi Boccherini, Italian composer (d. 1805)
• 1802 – Wilhelm Matthias Näff, member of the Swiss Federal Council (d. 1881)
• 1804 – David Wark, Canadian politician and Senator (d. 1905)
• 1821 – August Schleicher, linguist (d. 1868)
• 1859 – Svante Arrhenius, Swedish chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (d. 1927)
• 1865 – Sven Hedin, scientist (d. 1952)
• 1876 – Constantin Brancusi, Romanian sculptor (d. 1957)
• 1877 – Gabriele Münter, painter (d. 1962)
• 1888 – José Eustasio Rivera, Colombian writer (d. 1928)
• 1898  – Enzo Ferrari, founder of Scuderia Ferrari (d. 1988)
• 1911 – Merle Oberon, actress (d. 1979)
• 1912 – Stan Kenton, American musician (d. 1979)
• 1916 – Eddie Arcaro, American jockey (d. 1997)
• 1917 – Carson McCullers, American author (d. 1967)
• 1920 – George Rose, British music hall entertainer (d. 1988)
• 1924 – David Bronstein, chess player
• 1924 – Lee Marvin, American actor (d. 1987)
• 1930 – John Frankenheimer, American film director (d. 2002_
• 1939 – Alfredo Bryce-Echenique, Peruvian novelist
• 1940 – Smokey Robinson, American musician
• 1942 – Paul Krause, American football player
• 1943 – Lou Christie, American singer
• 1945 – Michael Nader, American actor
• 1946 – Karen Silkwood, American activist (d. 1974)
• 1948 – Tony Iommi, British musician (Black Sabbath)
• 1948 – Pim Fortuyn, Dutch politician
• 1949 – Dan Bunten, software developer (d. 1998)
• 1951 – Tahir-ul-Qadri, Islamic scholar and leader
• 1952 – Amy Tan, novelist
• 1953 – Massimo Troisi, Italian actor (d. 1994)
• 1954 – Socrates, footballer
• 1955 – Jeff Daniels, actor
• 1957 – Falco, singer (d. 1998)
• 1957  – Ray Winstone, British actor
• 1960 – Prince Andrew, second son of Queen Elizabeth II
• 1962 – Hana Mandlikova, tennis player
• 1963 – Seal, singer
• 1966 – Justine Bateman, actress
• 1966 – Paul Haarhuis, tennis player
• 1967 – Benicio Del Toro, actor
• 1979 – Eva-Maria Bisschop, Belgian pop star
• 1985 – Haylie Duff, American singer, actress
• 1986 – Maria Mena, Norwegian pop star

Deaths

• 197 – Clodius Albinus, Roman governor of Britain
• 1553 – Erasmus Reinhold, German astronomer and mathematician (b. 1511)
• 1670 – King Frederick III of Denmark (b. 1609)
• 1709 – Tokugawa Tsunayoshi, fifth shogun of the Tokugawa shogunate of Japan (b. 1646)
• 1799 – Jean-Charles de Borda, French mathematician, physicist, political scientist, and sailor (b. 1733)
• 1837 – Georg Büchner, German playwright (b. 1813)
• 1897 – Karl Weierstraß, German mathematician (b. 1815)
• 1936 – Billy Mitchell, military aviation pioneer (b. 1879)
• 1942 – Frank Abbandando, Mafia hitman (executed) (b. 1910)
• 1951 – André Gide, French author (b. 1869)
• 1952 – Knut Hamsun, Norwegian author (b. 1859)
• 1969 – Madge Blake, American actress
• 1970 – Jules Munshin, American actor
• 1972 – Tedd Pierce, animator (b. 1906)
• 1972 – John Grierson, documentary filmmaker (b. 1898)
• 1973 – Joseph Szigeti, Hungarian violinist (b. 1892)
• 1975 – Luigi Dallapiccola, Italian composer (b. 1904)
• 1980 – Bon Scott, musician (AC/DC) (b. 1946)
• 1997 – Deng Xiaoping, Chinese Communist leader and revolutionary (b. 1904)
• 1997 – Leo Rosten, Yiddish writer, humorist
• 1997 – Charles O. Finley, American sports entrepreneur
• 1998 – Grandpa Jones, country music entertainer, comedian
• 1999 – Mohammad Sadeq al-Sadr, Iraqi Shiite leader, killed (b. 1943?)
• 2000 – Friedensreich Hundertwasser, Austrian artist (b. 1928)
• 2001 – Priscilla Davis, Fort Worth, Texas socialite (b. 1942)
• 2001  – Stanley Kramer, director (b. 1913)
• 2001 – Charles Trenet, French singer
• 2003 – Johnny Paycheck, country music singer
• 2004 – Clark Byers, American sign maker
• 2004  – Hermann Krings, German philosopher

Holidays and observances

• Chaoflux (Discordianism)
• Astrology: First day of sun sign Pisces

External links

• BBC: On This Day

February 18 – February 20 – January 19 – March 19 — listing of all days