Today in History for Feb. 17:
On this date:
In 1673, French playwright Moliere died after collapsing during a performance of his play, "The Imaginary Invalid."
In 1781, Dr. Rene Laennec, inventor of the stethoscope, was born in France. He died in 1826.
In 1858, the Waldensians, considered by many to be the first "Protestants" and who lived in the Italian Alps and survived through persecution for 800 years, were finally guaranteed civil and religious rights. They trace their beginnings back to the teachings of a wealthy merchant named Pater Waldo in the late 1100's, and are considered by many scholars to be "the oldest evangelical church."
In 1867, the first ship passed through the Suez Canal.
In 1867, English chocolate maker William Cadbury was born.
In 1869, the Canadian Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals was organized.
In 1874, IBM founder Thomas J. Watson Sr. was born.
In 1876, Julius Wolff of Eastport, Maine, became the first person to can sardines.
In 1877, the first news dispatch was sent by telephone. The story about a lecture and phone demonstration by Alexander Graham Bell appeared the next day in the Boston Globe.
In 1909, Chiricahua Apache leader Geronimo (also known as Goyathlay, "One Who Yawns") died at Fort Sill, Okla., at age 79.
In 1919, former prime minister Sir Wilfrid Laurier died of a stroke in Ottawa at age 77. The first Canadian prime minister of French ancestry, Laurier spent 45 uninterrupted years in the House of Commons. He served as prime minister from 1896 to 1911, the longest unbroken tenure in Canadian history.
In 1932, following a 48-day manhunt, Albert Johnson, known as the Mad Trapper, was shot dead by the RCMP in the northern Yukon. Johnson, whose background remains a mystery, had eluded police after wounding an officer investigating a complaint about trap lines. Another Mountie was killed during the chase.
In 1959, the United States launched "Vanguard 2," a satellite carrying meteorological equipment.
In 1960, Prime Minister John Diefenbaker opened the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa.
In 1965, Prime Minister Lester Pearson announced that old-age pensions would be made payable at age 65 instead of 70, with the change to be phased in over five years.
In 1982, Gordon Kesler won a provincial byelection in Alberta to become the first elected member of the separatist Western Canada Concept party.
In 1982, the British Parliament approved in principle the proposed Canadian Constitution.
In 1983, the Newfoundland Supreme Court ruled the province owned offshore resources as far as the territorial limit, but not to the edge of the continental shelf.
In 1986, Johnson & Johnson, the maker of Tylenol, announced it would no longer sell over-the-counter medications in capsule form. The move followed the death of an American woman who had taken a cyanide-laced capsule.
In 1989, Ottawa temporarily blocked the import of Salman Rushdie's novel, "The Satanic Verses," which Muslims felt was blasphemous.
In 1992, Jeffrey Dahmer, who murdered and cannibalized young men, was sentenced in Milwaukee to 15 life terms. He was murdered in prison.
In 2000, the federal government scrapped the $1,000 bill, saying it was used mainly for money-laundering.
In 2003, Winnipeg-based Great-West Lifeco Inc. struck a deal to acquire Canada Life in a $7.3 billion transaction that would create the country's largest insurance company. The combined company would have $156 billion in assets and provide individual and group policies covering 11 million Canadians -- one-third of the population.
In 2003, at least 21 people died in a stampede at a Chicago nightclub that began when a security guard used pepper spray to break up a fight.
In 2004, Cingular Wireless agreed to pay nearly US$41 billion in cash to buy AT&T Wireless Services.
In 2008, Kosovo declared independence from Serbia.
In 2009, the trial began for Kaing Guek Eav, (also known as Duch) who headed the notorious S-21 prison in Phnom Penh during Cambodia’s former Khmer Rouge regime. It marked the country's first genocide tribunal over the deaths of an estimated 1.7 million people. (He was sentenced to life in prison).
In 2009, U.S. President Barack Obama signed into law a US$787-billion stimulus package designed to revive the U.S. economy.
In 2010, the 57-metre training vessel "SV Concordia," a Canadian-owned tall ship, went down some 500 km off the Brazilian coast. All 64 people on board, including 42 Canadian high school and university students, managed to get onto life rafts. They drifted in storm-tossed seas for 40 hours before being rescued by three passing merchant ships.
In 2014, Jimmy Fallon made his debut as host of NBC's "The Tonight Show."
In 2018, at short-track speedskating events at the Pyeongchang Winter Olympics, Samuel Girard raced to gold in the men's 1,000 metres while Kim Boutin earned bronze in the women's 1,500 metres.
In 2018, New Brunswick teenager Rebecca Schofield, who turned a terminal prognosis into a social media movement (#BeccaToldMeTo) that inspired acts of kindness across the globe, died of brain cancer at age 18.
In 2019, Lee Radziwill, the stylish jet setter and socialite who was the younger sister of Jacqueline Kennedy, died at the age of 85.
In 2019, the ecstatic sailor shown kissing a woman in Times Square celebrating the end of the Second World War died at the age of 95. His daughter says George Mendonsa fell and had a seizure at the assisted living facility in Middletown, Rhode Island, where he had lived with his wife of 70 years.
In 2020, Bombardier reached an $8.2-billion deal to sell its train division to French rail giant Alstom.
In 2020, Newfoundland and Labrador's premier announced his resignation. Dwight Ball said he asked the president of the provincial Liberal party to convene a leadership process to choose a successor at the earliest opportunity. Ball said he would stay on as premier until a new leader is chosen, and that he would continue to represent the Humber-Gros Morne district in the legislature until the next provincial election.
In 2021, conservative American radio icon Rush Limbaugh died at the age of 70 after a year-long battle with lung cancer.
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(The Canadian Press)
The Canadian Press
