Today in History

Coalition forces liberate Kuwait after seven months of occupation by the Iraqi army.

Debi Thomas becomes the first African American to win a medal at the Winter Olympics.

U.S. Supreme Court rules that a Virginia pool club can’t bar residents because of color.

Thousands of students protest President Richard Nixon‘s arrival in Rome.

The Soviet Union says that 10,000 troops will remain in Cuba.

South Vietnamese president Ngo Dinh Diem is unharmed as two planes bomb the presidential palace in Saigon.

F-84 Thunderjets raid North Korean base on Yalu River.

British Commandos raid a German radar station at Bruneval on the French coast.

The Supreme Court outlaws sit-down strikes.

Ralph Nader, consumer advocate.

The burning down of the Reichstag building in Berlin gives the Nazis the opportunity to suspend personal liberty with increased power.

Elizabeth Taylor, actress (Cleopatra, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?).

Joanne Woodward, actress (Rachel, Rachel, The Three Faces of Eve).

Glacier Bay National Monument is dedicated in Alaska.

The United States rejects a Soviet peace offer as propaganda.

John Connally, Texas Governor, wounded in the assassination of President John Kennedy.

Lawrence Durrell, novelist (The Alexandria Quartet).

Peter De Vries, writer, poetry editor (Poetry Magazine, The New Yorker).

The forty-sixth star is added to the U.S. flag, signifying Oklahoma’s admission to statehood.

The Japanese push Russians back in Manchuria and cross the Sha River.

James T. Farrell, author (Young Lonigan).

John Steinbeck, American novelist (The Grapes of Wrath, Of Mice and Men).

Marian Anderson, singer.

David Sarnoff, RCA board chairman and a pioneer of U.S. television

Lotte Lehmann, German opera singer.

Hugo Black, U.S. Supreme Court justice.

Confederate raider William Quantrill and his bushwackers attack Hickman, Kentucky, shooting women and children.

The first Union prisoners arrive at Andersonville Prison in Georgia.

The first Mardi-Gras celebration is held in New Orleans.

Napoleon‘s Marshal Nicholas Oudinot is pushed back at Barsur-Aube by the Emperor’s allied enemies shortly before his abdication.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, American poet.

The Pacific Island of New Britain is discovered.

German Protestants form the League of Schmalkalden to resist the power of the emperor.

Theodosius effectively founds a university in Constantinople.