Today In History...

Today In History...

   In 1541 Santiago, Chile, is founded.

   In 1554 Lady Jane Grey, who had been queen of England for nine days, is

           beheaded after being charged with treason.

   In 1733 English colonists led by James Oglethorpe land at Savannah, GA.

   In 1870 Women in the Utah Territory are granted the right to vote.

   In 1872 The toothpick making machine is patented by Silas Noble and James P. Cooley.

           of Massachusetts.

   In 1878 A patent is issued for a baseball catcher's mask.

   In 1892 President Lincoln's birthday is declared a national holiday.

   In 1907 The steamer "Larchmont" collides with a schooner off Block Island

           in New England killing 300.

   In 1908 The first round-the-world auto race begins in New York. (It ended in

           Paris the following August.)

   In 1909 America's oldest civil rights organization, the National Association

           for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) is formed.

   In 1915 The cornerstone for the Lincoln Memorial is laid in Washington, DC.

   In 1940 The "Adventures of Superman" radio show debuts on Mutual Radio with

           Bud Collyer as the man of steel.

   In 1947 A daytime meteorite shower is seen in eastern Siberia.

   In 1951 The TV crime drama "Dick Tracy" last airs on ABC.

   In 1955 President Dwight Eisenhower sends the first troops to Vietnam.

   In 1961 USSR launches Venera 1 toward Venus.

   In 1968 "Soul on Ice," by Eldridge Cleaver is first published.

   In 1973 The first of the American prisoners from the Vietnam conflict are

           released.

   In 1980 The Winter Olympics open at Lake Placid, New York.

   In 1987 Three Wall Street executives  -- Robert Freeman, Richard B. Wigton

           and Timothy L. Tabor -- were arrested on charges of insider-trading.

   In 1988 Alexander M. Haig drops out of the race for the Republican

           presidential nomination.

   In 1990 President Bush rejects Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev's new

           initiative for troop reductions in Europe.

   In 1991 Iraqi President Saddam Hussein meets with Soviet envoy Yevgeny

           Primakov, who brought a message from President Mikhail S. Gorbachev.

   In 1991 In China, longtime democracy activists (Wang Juntao and Chen Ziming)

           are sentenced to 13 years in prison. (Both were later freed.)

   In 1991 Former New York City Mayor Robert Wagner dies at age 80.

   In 1992 President George Bush officially announces his bid for re-election.

   In 1994 The XVII Winter Olympics open in Lillehammer, Norway.

   In 1997 Hwang Jang Yop asks for asylum in Bejing, the highest-ranking

           official to flee communist North Korea.

   In 1997 The Clinton administration gives permission to ten U.S. news

           organizations to open bureaus in Cuba.

   In 1998 A federal judge declares the presidential line-item veto

           unconstitutional.

   In 2000 Cartoonist, Charles M. Schulz, 77, creator of "Peanuts" dies in his

           sleep in California.

   In 2000 Hall of Fame football coach Tom Landry, who led the Dallas Cowboys

           to five Super Bowls, dies in Irving, Texas, at age 75.

   In 2000 Michelle Kwan wins her third straight U.S. Figure Skating

           Championships crown.

   In 2001 The NEAR spacecraft touches down on Eros, completing the first

           landing on an asteroid.

   In 2001 Scientists publish their first examinations of nearly all the human

           genetic code.

   In 2002 Former Yugoslav president Slobodan Milosevic goes on trial in The

           Hague, accused of war crimes.

   In 2002 The International Skating Union said it would conduct an "internal

           assessment" of the Olympic judging that gave the Russians the pairs

           figure skating gold medal over the Canadians.

   In 2004 The city of San Francisco begins issuing marriage licenses to 

           same-sex couples in response to a directive from Mayor Gavin Newsom.

   In 2014 Sid Caesar, a legendary comic who has been responsible for bringing 

           the laughs for decades, dies at 91.