February 5
Today in America's Present Past
1631 | Founding: Roger Williams arrives in the New World.
1644 | Connecticut passes the first (future) U.S. livestock “branding” law.
1723 | Founding: John Witherspoon was born.
1725 | Founding: James Ottis was born.
1744 | Meteorologist John Jeffries was born.
1777 | Georgia becomes the first U.S. territory to abolish primogeniture land and estate laws.
1778 | Founding: South Carolina becomes the second to ratify the Articles of Confederation.
1817 | The First U.S. gas company was formed in Baltimore, Maryland, to supply coal gas for street lights.
1826 | POTUS: President Fillmore weds Abigail Powers.
1837 | Mister Dwight Lyman Moody was born.
1848 | Outlaw Belle Starr was born.
1864 | Civil War: Union forces liberate Jackson, Mississippi.
1865 | Civil War: The Battle of Hatcher’s Run, Virginia.
1870 | The first theatre viewing of a motion picture film occured in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
1900 | Politican Adlai Stevenson was born.
1901 | Ed Prescot receives a patient for a loop-the-loop centrifugal roller coaster.
1904 | The U.S. concludes the occupation of Cuba.
1914 | Poet William Seward Burroughs is born.
1915 | Physicist Robert Hofstadter was born.
1917 | Congress: Democrat President Wilson’s veto curtailing Asian immigration is overturned.
1917 | The last U.S. troops under the command of John Pershing depart Mexico.
1918: WWI: Stephen Thompson becomes the first U.S. airman to down an enemy aircraft.
1919 | Film studio United Artists was formed by Charlie Chaplin, Douglas Fairbanks, and Mary Pickford.
1922 | The publication of Reader’s Digest begins.
1927 | Entrepreneur Ruth Fertel was born.
1929 | Admiral Mary Joan Nielubowicz was born.
1931 | A world land speed record is set by Malcolm Campbell piloting his famous Blue Bird car at Daytona Beach, Florida.
1934 | Baseballer Hank Aaron was born.
1936 | The National Wildlife Federation was formed.
1937 | POTUS: Democrat President Roosevelt proposes his SCOTUS “court-packing” plan.
1945 | WWII: General Douglas MacArthur leads the liberation of Manila, Philippines.
1958 | A B-47 bomber collided with an F-86 fighter over Georgia and had to jettison a Mk 15 nuclear bomb into the waters off Tybee Island; the bomb was never recovered and remains there today.
1969 | Musician Bobby Brown was brown.
1972 | U.S. airlines begin mandatory inspection of passengers and their luggage.
1976 | Escambia High School riots in Pensacola, Florida.
1994 | Civil Rights: The murderer of Medgar Evers was sentenced to 30 years after the homicide to life in prison.
1987 | Actor Darren Criss was born.
2020 | Congress: The U.S. Senate acquits President Donald Trump in his first impeachment trial.
2020 | Actor Kirk Douglas died.
2024 | Musician Toby Keith died.