History of 11 February
1541 – The city of Santiago, Chile was founded.
1554 – Lady Jane Grey was beheaded after being charged with treason. She had claimed the throne of England for only nine days.
1733 – Savannah, GA, was founded by English colonist James Oglethorpe.
1870 – In the Utah Territory, women gained the right to vote.
1878 – Frederick W. Thayer patented the baseball catcher’s mask.
1879 – The first artificial ice rink opened in North America. It was at Madison Square Garden in New York City, NY.
1880 – The National Croquet League was organized in Philadelphia, PA.
1892 – In the U.S., President Lincoln’s birthday was declared to be a national holiday.
1907 – A collision of the steamer Larchmont and a schooler resulted in the death of more than 300 people. The incident occurred off New England’s Block Island.
1909 – The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) was founded.
1912 – China’s boy emperor Hsuan T’ung announced that he was abdicating, ending the Manchu Ch’ing dynasty. Subsequently, the Republic of China was established.
1915 – The cornerstone of the Lincoln Memorial was laid in Washington, DC.
1918 – All theatres in New York City were shut down in an effort to conserve coal.
1924 – U.S. President Calvin Coolidge made the first presidential political speech on the radio.
1924 – “The Eveready Hour” became radio’s first sponsored network program. The National Carbon Company was the first sponsor of a network show.
1934 – The Export-Import Bank was incorporated.
1940 – Mutual Radio presented the first broadcast of the radio play “The Adventures of Superman.”
1968 – “Soul on Ice” by Eldridge Cleaver was published for the first time.
1971 – James Cash (J.C.) Penney died at the age of 95. The company closed for business for one-half day as a memorial to the company’s founder.
1973 – The State of Ohio went metric, becoming the first in the U.S. to post metric distance signs.
1973 – American prisoners of war were released for the first time during the Vietnam conflict.
1985 – Johnny Carson surprised his audience by shaving the beard he had been wearing on “The Tonight Show.”
1993 – In Liverpool, England, a 2-year-old boy, James Bulger, was lured away from his mother at a shopping mall and beaten to death. Two ten-year-old boys were responsible.
1998 – A U.S. federal judge declared that the presidential line-item veto was unconstitutional.
1999 – U.S. President Clinton was acquitted by the U.S. Senate on two impeachment articles. The charges were perjury and obstruction of justice.
2001 – The space probe NEAR landed on the asteroid Eros. It was the first time that any craft had landed on a small space rock.
2002 – Kenneth Lay, the former Enron CEO, exercised his constitutional rights and refused to testify to the U.S. Congress about the collapse of Enron.
2002 – The trial of former Yugoslav President Slobodan Milosevic began at the U.N. tribunal in The Hague. Milosevic was accused of war crimes during the Balkan wars of the 1990s.
2002 – Pakistan charged three men in connection with the kidnapping of Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl in Karachi.
2002 – Princess Stephanie of Monaco and Franco Knie won a defamation-of-character lawsuit against the Swiss magazine “Facts.” The case involved a photomontage created by the magazine.
2003 – The U.N. nuclear agency declared North Korea in violation of international treaties. The complaint was sent to the Security Council.
2004 – Mattel announced that “Barbie” and “Ken” were breaking up. The dolls had met on the set of their first television commercial together in 1961.
2013 – North Korea conducted its third underground nuclear test.
Celebrating Birthday Today
- 1981 – Kelly Rowland, American singer-songwriter, dancer, and actress
- 1982 – Christian Maggio, Italian footballer
- 1982 – Natalie Dormer, English actress
- 1982 – Ľubomíra Kalinová, Slovak biathlete
- 1982 – Neil Robertson, Australian snooker player
- 1983 – Rafael van der Vaart, Dutch footballer
- 1984 – Maarten Heisen, Dutch sprinter
- 1984 – Marco Marcato, Italian cyclist
- 1984 – Aubrey O’Day, American singer-songwriter, dancer, and actress
- 1984 – Maxime Talbot, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1985 – William Beckett, American singer-songwriter and guitarist
- 1985 – Mike Richards, Canadian ice hockey player
- 1985 – Šárka Strachová, Czech skier
- 1986 – Abu Omar al-Shishani, Georgian commander (d. 2016)
- 1986 – Kees Luyckx, Dutch footballer
- 1987 – Luca Antonelli, Italian footballer
- 1987 – José Callejón, Spanish footballer
- 1987 – Juanmi Callejón, Spanish footballer
- 1987 – Ebba Busch Thor, Swedish politician
- 1987 – Brian Matusz, American baseball player
- 1987 – Jan Smeekens, Dutch speed skater
- 1987 – Ellen van Dijk, Dutch cyclist
- 1988 – Vlad Moldoveanu, Romanian basketball player
- 1989 – Alexander Büttner, Dutch footballer
- 1990 – Javier Aquino, Mexican footballer
- 1990 – Hwang Chan-sung, South Korean singer, rapper, and actor
- 1990 – Q’orianka Kilcher, American actress
- 1991 – Georgia May Foote, English actress
- 1991 – Nikola Mirotic, Spanish basketball player
- 1992 – Lasse Norman Hansen, Danish track and road cyclist
- 1992 – Taylor Lautner, American actor, model, and martial artist
- 1993 – Ben McLemore, American basketball player
- 1994 – Dansby Swanson, American baseball player
- 1996 – Jonathan Tah, German footballer