Events in History
- Feb 1 Soviet Union begins new offensive against Finland
- Feb 5 General Winckelman replaces Gen Reijnders as Dutch supreme commander
- Feb 8 Lodtz, 1st large ghetto established by Nazis in Poland
- Feb 14 British merchant vessel fleet is armed
- Feb 16 British search plane finds German supply ship Altmark, used to accommodate allied sailors from vessels sunk by the Graf Spee off Norway
- Feb 17 Altmark Incident: Crew of the British destroyer "Cossack" board German "Altmark" in Jøssingfjord, Norway, releasing 299 British prisoners after hand-to-hand fighting with bayonets and the last recorded Royal Naval action with cutlass
- Feb 22 Finnish troops vacate Koivisto island
- Feb 22 German air force sinks 2 German destroyers, killing 578
- Feb 23 Russian troops conquer Lasi Island
- Feb 24 Frances Langford records "When You Wish Upon a Star"
- Feb 26 US Air Defense Command forms at Mitchel Field, LI, NY
- Feb 27 Martin Kamen and Sam Ruben discover carbon-14 (radiocarbon dating) at the University of California Radiation Laboratory in Berkeley, California
- Feb 28 Richard Wright's "Native Son" published
- Feb 28 US population at 131,669,275 (12,865,518 African American (9.8%))
- Feb 29 Finland initiates Winter War peace negotiations
- Feb 29 Frederic from G & S "Pirates of Penzance" finally released by pirate
Birthdays in History
- Feb 2 Thomas M[ichael] Disch, American sci-fi author (Genocides, 102 H-Bombs)
- Feb 4 Theodore "Ted" Stanley, American anesthesiologist and medical entrepreneur (created the fentanyl lollipop), born in Manhattan, New York (d. 2017)
- Feb 8 Averil Cameron, British historian, born in Leek, England
- Feb 9 J. M. Coetzee, South African novelist, born in Cape Town, South Africa
- Feb 10 Peter Middleton, CEO (Lloyd's)
- Feb 12 Hank Brown, American politician (Senator-R-CO 1991-97, Rep-R-CO, 1981-91), born in Denver, Colorado
- Feb 14 Porpoise, 1st born in captivity in US (Marineland, Fla)
- Feb 15 Hamzah Haz, Indonesian politician
- Feb 19 Saparmurat Niyazov, President of Turkmenistan (d. 2006)
- Feb 20 RA Weiss, director (Institute of Cancer Research)
- Feb 20 V Payne, British headmistress (Malvern Girls' College)
John Lewis (1940-2020)
Feb 21 American politician (Rep-D-Georgia) and prominent civil rights leader (Big Six), born in Troy, Alabama
- Feb 22 Billy Name [William Linich Jr.], American photographer (Andy Warhol's factory), born in Poughkeepsie, New York (d. 2016)
- Feb 22 Johnson Mlambo, South African leader (Pan-African Congress), born in Johannesburg, South Africa
- Feb 23 Jermyn P Brooks, CEO (Price Waterhouse Europe)
- Feb 24 Theo Bosch, Dutch humanist/architect (Nieuwmarkt, Amsterdam)
- Feb 25 George Paul, CEO (Norwich Union Insurance Group)
- Feb 25 Hector MacKenzie, trade unionist
- Feb 27 Dame Barbara Kelly, Scottish civic activist & former CEO (Crichton Foundation, Scottish Consumer Council), born in Dumfries and Galloway, United Kingdom
- Feb 29 Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople (1991- ), born in Zeytinliköy, Imbros, Turkey
Weddings in History
Francis Crick
Feb 18 Molecular biologist Francis Crick (23) weds Ruth Doreen Dodd; divorce 1947
Deaths in History
- Feb 1 Philip Francis Nowlan, American sci-fi writer, creator of Buck Rogers character (b. 1888)
- Feb 4 Nikolai Yezhov, Head of Soviet NKVD (b. 1895)
- Feb 11 John Buchan, Scottish politician, Governor-General of Canada (1935-40), writer (The Thirty-Nine Steps) and historian dies at 64
- Feb 25 Mary Mills Patrick, American author and 1st President of Istanbul Woman's College, dies at 89
- Feb 27 Peter Behrens, German architect, dies at 71
- Feb 28 Johan Braakensiek, Dutch political cartoonist (Green Amsterdammer), dies at 81
- Feb 29 Edward Frederic Benson, English novelist, dies at 72
Authors
Civil Rights Activists
Inventors
Kings
Revolutionaries
Scientists