(Redirected from 21st February)
February 21 is the 52nd day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar . There are 313 days remaining, 314 in leap years .
Events
362 - Athanasius returns to Alexandria 1431 - The trial of Joan of Arc begins. 1743 - The premiere in London of George Frideric Handel 's oratorio , Samson 1804 - The first self-propelling steam locomotive makes its outing at the Pen-y-Darren ironworks in Wales . 1842 - John J. Greenough patents the sewing machine . 1848 - Karl Marx publishes the Communist Manifesto . 1874 - The Oakland Daily Tribune publishes its first newspaper . 1878 - First telephone book issued in New Haven, Connecticut . 1885 - The newly completed Washington Monument is dedicated. 1893 - Thomas Edison received two U.S. patents for a "Cut Out for Incandescent Electric Lamps" and for a "Stop Device" 1916 - World War I : In France the Battle of Verdun begins. 1925 - The New Yorker publishes its first issue. 1947 - In New York City Edwin Land demonstrates the first "instant camera", the Polaroid Land Camera , to a meeting of the Optical Society of America . 1948 - NASCAR is incorporated. 1952 - Language Martyrs' Day , marking language-revolution in the then East Pakistan (currently, the independent state of People's Republic of Bangladesh ) 1952 - Churchill government in the UK abolishes Identity Cards to "set the people free". 1953 - Francis Crick and James D. Watson discovered the structure of the DNA molecule. 1960 - Cuban leader Fidel Castro nationalizes all businesses in Cuba . 1965 - Malcolm X is assassinated at the Audubon Ballroom in New York City by members of the Nation of Islam . 1970 - Swissair Flight 330 : All nine crew members and 38 passengers were killed due to the explosion of a bomb in the rear of the plane when it crashed near Zurich, Switzerland. 1972 - President Richard Nixon visits the People's Republic of China to normalize Sino-American relations. 1972 - The Soviet unmanned spaceship Luna 20 lands on the Moon . 1973 - Over the Sinai Desert , Israeli fighter aircraft shoot down a Libyan Airlines jet killing 108. 1974 - The long-running Japanese comic strip Sazae-san published its final installment in the Asahi Shimbun . 1974 - The last Israeli soldiers leave the west bank of the Suez Canal in carrying out a truce with Egypt . 1975 - Watergate scandal : Former United States Attorney General John N. Mitchell and former White House aides H. R. Haldeman and John Ehrlichman are sentenced to prison. 1988 - On his own televangelism program being tapped in Baton Rouge, Louisiana , Jimmy Swaggart confesses that he is guilty of an unspecified sin and will be temporarily leaving the pulpit. 1995 - Steve Fossett lands in Leader, Saskatchewan, Canada becoming the first person to make a solo flight across the Pacific Ocean in a balloon . 2000 - David Letterman returns to The Late Show over a month after having an emergency quintuple heart bypass surgery. 2003 - Over 100 concert goers die in a fire during a performance of the rock band Great White . 2004 - The first European political party organization, the European Greens , is established in Rome .
Births 1688 - Reigning Queen Ulrike Eleonora of Sweden (d. 1741 ) 1728 - Peter III , Tsar of Russia , husband of Catherine the Great (d. 1762 ) 1791 - John Mercer, chemist and industrialist (d. 1866 ) 1844 - Charles-Marie Widor , organist and composer (d. 1937 ) 1867 - Otto Hermann Kahn , millionaire and benefactor (d. 1934 ) 1880 - Waldemar Bonsels , writer (d. 1952 ) 1885 - Sacha Guitry , dramatist, writer, director, actor (d. 1957 ) 1893 - Celia Lovsky, actress (d. 1979 ) 1893 - Andrés Segovia , Spanish guitarist (d. 1987 ) 1895 - Henrik Carl Peter Dam Danish biochemist, winner of the 1943 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine (d. 1976 ) 1903 - Anaïs Nin , writer (d. 1977 ) 1907 - W. H. Auden , English poet (d. 1973 ) 1925 - Sam Peckinpah , director (d. 1984 ) 1924 - Robert Mugabe First Prime Minister of Zimbabwe 1927 - Erma Bombeck , writer, humorist (d. 1996 ) 1927 - Hubert de Givenchy , fashion designer 1933 - Nina Simone , singer (d. 2003 ) 1934 - Rue McClanahan , actress 1936 - Barbara Jordan , American politician from Texas (d. 1996 ) 1937 - King Harald V of Norway 1937 - Gary Lockwood , actor 1941 - James Wong , the famous composer of Hong Kong (d. November 23 , 2004 .) 1942 - Margarethe von Trotta , actor, film director, writer 1943 - David Geffen , producer 1946 - Tyne Daly , actress 1946 - Alan Rickman , actor 1953 - William Petersen , actor 1955 - Kelsey Grammer , actor 1958 - Mary Chapin Carpenter , singer 1961 - Davey Allison , automobile racer (d. 1993 ) 1961 - Chuck Palahniuk , writer 1962 - David Foster Wallace , American author 1963 - William Baldwin , actor 1972 - Seo Taiji , Korean pop musician 1974 - Roberto Heras , Spanish cyclist 1975 - Affirmed , race horse (d. 2001 ) 1979 - Jennifer Love Hewitt , actress, singer 1986 - Charlotte Church , singer
Deaths 1513 - Pope Julius II (b. 1443 ) 1824 - Eugène de Beauharnais , son of Napoleon's wife, Josephine (b. 1781 ) 1938 - George Ellery Hale , astronomer 1945 - Eric Liddell , Scottish runner 1965 - Malcolm X , Black Muslim Movement activist (b. 1925 ) 1967 - Charles Beaumont , writer (b. 1929 ) 1991 - Dame Margot Fonteyn , ballet dancer 1994 - Luis Donaldo Colosio , Mexican politician 1995 - Calder Willingham, writer 2002 - John Thaw , actor (b. 1942 )
Holidays and observances February 20 - February 22 - January 21 - March 21 -- listing of all days