|
 Today's
highlight in history:
On Feb. 13, 1935, a jury in Flemington, N.J., found Bruno Richard Hauptmann guilty of first-degree murder in the kidnap-slaying of the son of Charles and Anne Lindbergh. (Hauptmann was later executed.)
On this date:
In 1542, the fifth wife of England's King Henry VIII, Catherine Howard, was executed for adultery.
In 1795, the University of North Carolina became the first U.S. state university to admit students with the arrival of Hinton James, who was the only student on campus for two weeks.
In 1914, the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers, known as ASCAP, was founded in New York.
In 1920, the League of Nations recognized the perpetual neutrality of Switzerland.
In 1945, during World War II, Allied planes began bombing the German city of Dresden.
In 1945, the Soviets captured Budapest, Hungary, from the Germans.
In 1960, France exploded its first atomic bomb, in the Sahara Desert.
In 1980, the 13th Winter Olympics opened in Lake Placid, N.Y.
In 1984, Konstantin Chernenko was chosen to be general secretary of the Soviet Communist Party's Central Committee, succeeding the late Yuri Andropov.
In 1988, the 15th winter Olympics opened in Calgary, Alberta, Canada.
Ten years ago: Dr. David Satcher was sworn in as surgeon general during an Oval Office ceremony. The United Auto Workers reached a tentative contract agreement with Caterpillar Inc. (Union members rejected the agreement, which was revised and later ratified, ending a bitter, 6 1/2-year dispute.)
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Five years ago: Clara Harris, who'd run down her cheating husband with her Mercedes after catching him with his mistress, was convicted by a Houston jury of murder despite her claim that she'd hit him accidentally while in a heartsick daze. (Harris was sentenced to 20 years in prison.) An investigative panel found that superheated air almost certainly seeped through a breach in space shuttle Columbia's left wing and possibly its wheel compartment during the craft's fiery descent, resulting in the deaths of all seven astronauts. A U.S. government plane carrying four Americans and a Colombian went down in rebel territory in southern Colombia; the executed bodies of an American and the Colombian were found in the wreckage. Walt W. Rostow, an adviser to Presidents Kennedy and Johnson, died in Austin, Texas, at age 86.
One year ago: Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney officially entered the 2008 presidential race in Michigan, the place of his birth. With Democrats in control, House members debated Iraq in an emotional and historic faceoff over a war that Speaker Nancy Pelosi condemned as a commitment with "no end in sight."
Today's birthdays: Former test pilot Charles E. "Chuck" Yeager is 85. Actress Kim Novak is 75. Actor George Segal is 74. Actress Carol Lynley is 66. Singer-musician Peter Tork (The Monkees) is 66. Actress Stockard Channing is 64. Talk show host Jerry Springer is 64. Actor Bo Svenson is 64. Singer Peter Gabriel is 58. Actor David Naughton is 57. Rock musician Peter Hook is 52. Actor Matt Salinger is 48. Singer Henry Rollins is 47. Actor Neal McDonough is 42. Singer Freedom Williams is 42. Actress Kelly Hu is 40. Rock musician Todd Harrell (3 Doors Down) is 36. Singer Robbie Williams is 34. Rhythm-and-blues performer Natalie Stewart (Floetry) is 29. Actress Mena Suvari is 29.
Thought for today: "An explanation of cause is not a justification by reason."
-- C.S. Lewis, English author (1898-1963)
[Associated Press]
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