×

Some facts on the month of February

Can you believe that it’s February already? The 2012 year just flew by, and now January has disappeared into oblivion.

January seems to be quite dreary because the bright lights of Christmas have disappeared, and all the parties and family visits are but a happy memory.

But a page torn from a very old copy of Good Housekeeping, and for some reason it doesn’t list the date, has a list of all that happened in February, and the list makes me tired just to read it.

February doesn’t have to be gloomy. There is lots to celebrate and commemorate, the page notes. So I am ready to celebrate just after I watch the Super Bowl, with teams I know or care little about.

It is past already but Feb. 1, 1901, was the birthday of Clark Gable in Cadiz, and there is a Gable Foundation Museum there for you to browse.

Feb. 2, 1893: Thomas Edison’s studio took the first close-up movie – and it happened to be the exciting happening of a sneeze.

Feb. 4, 1902: Charles Lindberg, flier, was born.

Feb. 6, 1895: Babe Ruth’s birthday.

Feb. 8, 1587: Mary, Queen of Scots, was beheaded. Sorry, that one wasn’t exciting.

Feb. 10, 1933: First singing telegram was delivered.

Feb. 11, 1948: Meteorite landed near Norton, Kan.

Feb. 13, 1635: First public school in America opened in Boston.

Feb. 14: Valentine’s Day observed.

Feb. 14, 1876: Elisha Gray filled for a patent on his telephone a few hours after Alexander Graham Bell filed for one on his.

Feb. 14, 1929: Gangland massacre in Chicago with seven killed.

Feb. 15, 1820: Susan B. Anthony, suffragette, born in Minnesota.

Feb. 16, 1958: Great blizzard buried New England.

Feb. 20, 1962: John Glenn made three orbits of the earth.

Feb. 21, 1851: Mary Shelley, author of “Frankenstein,” was born.

Feb. 21, 1878: First telephone directory issued in New Haven, Conn.

Feb. 23, 1954: Salk polio vaccine first used for mass inoculation.

Feb. 25, 1836: Samuel Colt got a patent on his revolver.

Feb. 27, 1807: Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, poet, born.

Feb. 27, 1932: Elizabeth Taylor born.

These facts were adapted from “The Almanac of Dates” by Linda Millgate.

(McCoy, a resident of Smithfield, is food editor and a staff columnist for the Herald-Star and The Weirton Daily Times. She can be contacted at emccoy@heraldstaronline.com.)

NEWSLETTER

Today's breaking news and more in your inbox

I'm interested in (please check all that apply)
Are you a paying subscriber to the newspaper? *

Starting at $4.73/week.

Subscribe Today