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February 16: Today in History – Historical Events
Early Centuries – February 16 Historic Events – Before the 1700s
1. 16th Feb 1270: In the Karusa Ice War in Estonia, Lithuanian forces defeated Livonian Knights of the Cross.
2. 16th Feb 1559: Pope Paul IV on this day called for the overthrow of sovereigns supporting heresy.
3. 16th Feb 1568: A sentence of the Holly Office condemned all inhabitants of the Netherlands to death as heretics. Only a few persons especially named were quitted from this universal doom.
4. 16th Feb 1641: English King Charles I accepted the Triennial Act.
5. 16th Feb 1677: The Earl of Shaftesbury was on this day arrested and confined to the London Tower.
18th Century – What Happened on February 16 – The 1700s
6. 16th Feb 1741: Benjamin Franklin’s General Magazine, which was the 2nd magazine to be published in the US began publishing on this day.
7. 16th Feb 1760: Cherokee Indians who were held hostage at Fort St George were killed to avenge the attack of Indians on the Frontier settlements.
19th Century – February 16 This Day That Year – The 1800s
8. 16th Feb 1804: Lt Stephan Decatur attacked Tripoli where pirates held USS Philadelphia. While they attempted to recapture Philadelphia, it caught fire, exploded, and sank. Decatur and his crew escaped.
9. 16th Feb 1808: The peninsular war began when Napoleon under the pretext of sending reinforcement to the French Army occupying Portugal ordered a large number of French forces into Spain.
10. 16th Feb 1818: The Senate on this day ratified the Rush-Bagot amendment (unarmed US-Canada border).
11. 16th Feb 1853: The first passenger railroad opened in India, running between Bori Bundar in Bombay to Thane.
12. 16th Feb 1854: An earthquake strikes San Salvador and destroys it.
13. 16th Feb 1858: The Wernerian Natural History Society, a former Scottish learned society wound up on this day.
14. 16th Feb 1861: Business with the Confederate States was on this day outlawed by US President Abraham Lincoln.
15. 16th Feb 1862: Slavery was abolished in the District of Columbia.
16. 16th Feb 1862: The American Confederate Congress approved the conscription act for all whites in the age group of 18 and 35.
17. 16th Feb 1866: Karakozov on this day attempted to assassinate Tsar Alexander II of Russia.
18. 16th Feb 1868: Voters of Louisiana on this day approved the new constitution.
19. 16th Feb 1869: the first Negro diplomat assumes office in Haiti.
20. 16th Feb 1870: The clipper ship Cutty Sark left London on its first voyage, proceeding around Cape Hope to Shanghai. It only did eight voyages to China in the tea trade as steam ships replaced sails on the high seas.
21. 16th Feb 1871: The German Empire on this day ended all anti-Jewish civil restrictions.
22. 16th Feb 1878: The silver dollar on this day became United States legal tender.
23. 16th Feb 1883: The publication of “Ladies Home Journal” began on this day.
24. 16th Feb 1883: Paul Kruger was on this day chosen as President of Transvaal.
20th Century – Important Events On This Day February 16th – The 1900s
25. 16th Feb 1900: The first book of postage stamps was issued by the US post office on this day.
26. 16th Feb 1912: Harriet Quimby became the first woman pilot to fly across the English Channel.
27. 16th Feb 1913: Bulgarians and Turks agree to an armistice that will be accepted by other nations involved.
28. 16th Feb 1917: Vladimir Lenin returns from exile to Russia on this day to join the Russian Revolution.
29. 16th Feb 1918: The British House of Commons passes the new Military Service Bill, taking men up to the age of 55 and extending to Ireland.
30. 16th Feb 1920: The Allies on this day agreed to try war criminals of World War I in Leipzig’s Supreme Court.
31. 16th Feb 1921: The Liberal Freedom League was formed in Hague on this day.
32. 16th Feb 1922: German-Russian treaty was signed in Italy and the Soviet Union was recognized.
33. 16th Feb 1923: In Egypt, archeologist Howard Carter unsealed the recently unearthed tomb in the burial chamber of King Tutankhamun.
34. 16th Feb 1924: Child labor laws strengthened in Holland.
35. 16th Feb 1932: The first patent for a tree was issued on this day. James Markham was issued a patent for the peach tree.
36. 16th Feb 1933: David O Selznick was on this day made the Vice-President of the MGM Studios. He also played the role of producer for MGM.
37. 16th Feb 1933: Fourteen sticks of dynamite encased in a time bomb were found on top of Lyric Theater Lubbock, Texas. The setup was similar to the one found in Lindsey’s house a week ago.
38. 16th Feb 1934: At a rally in New York’s Madison Square, thousands of Socialists battled Communists.
39. 16th Feb 1936: The people’s front in Spain, “Spanish Frente Popular”, won the elections today.
40. 16th Feb 1937: Wallace H Carothers, the research scientist of Du Pont who invented nylon, got a patent for synthetic fiber on this day.
41. 16th Feb 1938: President Franklin Roosevelt on this day signed a new version of the Agricultural Adjustment Act, designed to steady agricultural prices, farmer’s earnings, and stockpiling of agricultural surpluses.
42. 16th Feb 1938: The U.S. Federal Crop Insurance program was authorized today.
43. 16th Feb 1940: The British Destroyer HMS Cossack rescued British seamen from German prison ship the Altmark in a Norwegian fjord.
44. 16th Feb 1941: The Italians today lost their last position in Sudan.
45. 16th Feb 1942: German submarines on this day attacked an Aruba oil refinery and sank the tanker Pedernales.
46. 16th Feb 1943: The withdrawing African Corps reached the Mareth line in North Africa today.
47. 16th Feb 1943: The White-Rose Student group posted the sign “Out with Hitler, Long live freedom” on a Munich façade. They were caught on 18th Feb and beheaded on 22nd Feb.
48. 16th Feb 1943: Kharkov on this day was captured by the Red Army.
49. 16th Feb 1945: During World War II, American paratroopers landed on Corregidor to liberate the Philippines.
50. 16th Feb 1946: The first commercially designed helicopter was tested today at Bridgeport.
51. 16th Feb 1947: There was a massive explosion in Texas City which killed 522 people.
52. 16th Feb 1948: The Organization for European Economic Cooperation (EEC) was on this day formed in Paris.
53. 16th Feb 1949: Chaim Weitzman was on this day elected as the first president of Israel.
54. 16th Feb 1950: President Truman on this day announced what he called a “non-political” campaign which was intended to help democrats to run for seats in Congress. Part of Truman’s plan was to wait until after the primary elections to assist any Democrat in winning any state.
55. 16th Feb 1951: British submarine Affray sank today in the English Channel killing 75 people.
56. 16th Feb 1951: New York City on this day passed a bill prohibiting racism in city-assisted housing.
57. 16th Feb 1951: Stalin contended that the U.N. was becoming a weapon of aggressive war.
58. 16th Feb 1952: Ten members of the Ku Klux Klan were on this day arrested by the FBI in Carolina.
59. 16th Feb 1953: The British Royal Yacht “Britannia” was on this day commissioned by Queen Elizabeth II.
60. 16th Feb 1956: Britain on this day abolished the death penalty.
61. 16th Feb 1956: The first solar-powered radios go on sale on this day.
62. 16th Feb 1957: U.S.S.R. on this day conducted an atmospheric nuclear test.
63. 16th Feb 1959: Fidel Castro on this day was sworn in as the Prime Minister of Cuba. He came to power by leading a guerilla campaign that resulted in the exile of Fulgencio Batista.
64. 16th Feb 1959: The U.S. House committee for un-American activities on this day charged that an “elite corps” of communist lawyers was promoting the party’s cause in courts, Congress, and government agencies. The report of the committee dealt with the activities of 39 lawyers who were among the 100 lawyers identified as communists.
65. 16th Feb 1960: The U.S. nuclear submarine USS Triton set off on this day for an underwater round-the-world trip.
66. 16th Feb 1961: The Explorer IX satellite was launched on this day by the United States.
67. 16th Feb 1962: A National anti-war rally was organized in Washington today with the help of Tod Gitlin a Harvard activist. 8000 students turned up for the rally.
68. 16th Feb 1962: Brazil on this day nationalized US businesses.
69. 16th Feb 1964: Nine men were sentenced to 25-30 years for the “Great Train Robbery” of 1963.
70. 16th Feb 1965: Four people were held in a plot to blow up the Statue of Liberty, the Liberty Bell, and the Washington Monument.
71. 16th Feb 1965: The Chairman of the British Railway Board Dr. Richard Breeching in his report, outlined the transport needs of the next quarter of a century and said a quarter of the British Railway System has to be shut down.
72. 16th Feb 1966: The World Council of Churches being held in Geneva urged immediate peace in Vietnam.
73. 16th Feb 1966: Rhodesian Prime Minister Ian Smith broke diplomatic relations with Britain.
74. 16th Feb 1968: The first 911 emergency telephone systems were inaugurated in Haleyville.
75. 16th Feb 1970: In San Francisco a homemade bomb exploded outside the Police Park Station on Waller Street. One officer died and eight other officers were injured.
76. 16th Feb 1970: Protestant Unionist Ian Paisley wins the seat formerly held by Terrence O’Neill in the Stormont (North Ireland Parliament).
77. 16th Feb 1972: Miner’s strike in England is now in its sixth week. Most parts are suffering from the loss of electricity for at least 9 hours a day. This includes local homes and businesses.
78. 16th Feb 1972: Apollo 16 was launched on this day. It is the 5th manned lunar landing.
79. 16th Feb 1972: Two British soldiers were shot dead in two separate incidents by the official Irish Republican Army.
80. 16th Feb 1974: U.S.S.R. performs nuclear test in Eastern Kazakh.
81. 16th Feb 1980: U.S. performs nuclear test at its Nevada test site.
82. 16th Feb 1982: Canada’s new constitution was on this day proclaimed by Queen Elizabeth.
83. 16th Feb 1983: A total of 24 brush fires spread across South Australia starting on this date. These fires have killed at least 75 people and injured more than 800.
84. 16th Feb 1986: Mohammad Gadhafi appeared on TV today to dispel rumors that he is dead.
85. 16th Feb 1987: Harvey Proctor, British Conservative MP appears at the Bow Street Magistrate’s court in London. He was charged with gross indecency.
86. 16th Feb 1989: Investigators in Lockerbie, Scotland, said a Semtex bomb and an electronic timer hidden inside a Toshiba radio cassette player in a case in the cargo hold brought down the plane.
87. 16th Feb 1990: Maximum unemployment benefit in New York State was raised to $ 260 per week.
21st Century – February 16 This Day In History – The 2000s
88. 16th Feb 2001: Ethnic Albanian extremists carried out a bomb attack on a bus convoy in which 250 Serbs were traveling for a religious ceremony in Kosovo.
89. 16th Feb 2003: The Treaty of Accession is signed in Athens admitting 10 new member states to the European Union.
90. 16th Feb 2004: The super liner Queen Mary 2 on this day embarked on her first transatlantic crossing, linking the golden age of ocean travel to the modern age of ocean travel.
91. 16th Feb 2005: The Kyoto Accord which aims to curb the air pollution blamed for global warming came into force 7 years after it was agreed.
92. 16th Feb 2006: UN human rights investigators have called for the closure of the US detention center at Guantanamo Bay. The report asks the US to free inmates and says certain treatment meted out to prisoners amounted to torture.
93. 16th Feb 2007: In the Virginia Tech massacre, the deadliest mass shooting in modern American history, Seung-hui Cho kills 32 people and injures 23 before killing himself.
94. 16th Feb 2010: Hillary Clinton on this day met King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia. The meeting is reported to have gone well.
95. 16th Feb 2010: In Dubai, Mohammad al-Mabhouh was assassinated today. Eleven Europeans were suspected of the Murder. It was found that their passports were fake and many have pointed the assassination to Israeli Intelligence operatives.
96. 16th Feb 2011: A United States immigration and customs agent was shot dead by people who appeared to be members of the drug gang at an unofficial checkpoint near San Luis Potosi. Another agent was injured in the shooting.
97. 16th Feb 2012: North Korea publicly celebrated the birthday of the recently deceased leader Kim Jong-il with military parades and ceremony. A giant bronze statue of the leader was unveiled a few days back to commemorate his birthday.
98. 16th Feb 2013: A 7.8 magnitude earthquake struck Khash country in Iran killing 37 people.
99. 16th Feb 2014: South Korean ferry MV Sewol sinks on route IncheonJejujeju. 304 people drowned. They were mostly students. National controversy erupted over the rescue efforts and actions of the crew and owner.
100. 16th Feb 2014: The President of Venezuela Nicolas Maduro three United States Consular officials were accused of meeting with students protesting against the government.
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