February 23

Historic Events

2025

A snap election is held in Germany. ›

2021

Four simultaneous prison riots leave at least 62 people dead in Ecuador. ›

2020

Ahmaud Arbery, a 25-year-old African-American citizen, is shot and murdered by three white men after visiting a house under construction while jogging at a neighborhood in Satilla Shores near Brunswick in Glynn County, Georgia. ›

2019

Atlas Air Flight 3591, a Boeing 767 freighter, crashes into Trinity Bay near Anahuac, Texas, killing all three people on board. ›

2018

Parliamentary elections are held in Djibouti. ›

2017

The Turkish-backed Free Syrian Army captures Al-Bab from ISIL. ›

2012

A series of attacks across Iraq leave at least 83 killed and more than 250 injured. ›

2010

Unknown criminals pour more than 2+1⁄2 million liters of diesel oil and other hydrocarbons into the river Lambro, in northern Italy, sparking an environmental disaster. ›

2008

A United States Air Force B-2 Spirit bomber crashes on Guam, marking the first operational loss of a B-2. ›

2008

The Japanese WINDS satellite is launched. ›

2007

A train derails on an evening express service near Grayrigg, Cumbria, England, killing one person and injuring 88. This results in hundreds of points being checked over the UK after a few similar accidents. ›

2002

An Ariane 4 rocket is launched from the Guiana Space Centre carrying Intelsat 904. ›

1999

Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah Öcalan is charged with treason in Ankara, Turkey. ›

1999

An avalanche buries the town of Galtür, Austria, killing 31. ›

1998

In the United States, tornadoes in central Florida destroy or damage 2,600 structures and kill 42 people. ›

1991

In Thailand, General Sunthorn Kongsompong leads a bloodless coup d'état, deposing Prime Minister Chatichai Choonhavan. ›

1988

Saddam Hussein begins the Anfal genocide against Kurds and Assyrians in northern Iraq. ›

1987

Supernova 1987a is seen in the Large Magellanic Cloud. ›

1983

The United States Environmental Protection Agency announces its intent to buy out and evacuate the dioxin-contaminated community of Times Beach, Missouri. ›

1981

In Spain, Antonio Tejero attempts a coup d'état by capturing the Spanish Congress of Deputies. ›

1980

Iran hostage crisis: Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini states that Iran's parliament will decide the fate of the American embassy hostages. ›

1974

The Symbionese Liberation Army demands $4 million more to release kidnap victim Patty Hearst. ›

1971

Operation Lam Son 719: South Vietnamese General Do Cao Tri was killed in a helicopter crash en route to taking control of the faltering campaign. ›

1966

In Syria, Ba'ath Party member Salah Jadid leads an intra-party military coup that replaces the previous government of General Amin al-Hafiz, also a Baathist. ›

1958

Five-time Argentine Formula One champion Juan Manuel Fangio is kidnapped by rebels involved in the Cuban Revolution, on the eve of the Cuban Grand Prix. He was released the following day after the race. ›

1954

The first mass inoculation of children against polio with the Salk vaccine begins in Pittsburgh. ›

1950

General elections are held in the United Kingdom. ›

1947

International Organization for Standardization is founded. ›

1945

World War II: During the Battle of Iwo Jima, a group of United States Marines reach the top of Mount Suribachi on the island and are photographed raising the American flag. ›

1945

World War II: The 11th Airborne Division, with Filipino guerrillas, free all 2,147 captives of the Los Baños internment camp, in what General Colin Powell later would refer to as "the textbook airborne operation for all ages and all armies". ›

1945

World War II: The capital of the Philippines, Manila, is liberated by combined Filipino and American forces. ›

1945

World War II: Capitulation of German garrison in Poznań. The city is liberated by Soviet and Polish forces. ›

1945

World War II: The German town of Pforzheim is annihilated in a raid by 379 British bombers. ›

1945

American Airlines Flight 009 crashes near Rural Retreat, Virginia, killing 17. ›

1944

The Soviet Union begins the forced deportation of the Chechen and Ingush people from the North Caucasus to Central Asia. ›

1943

The Cavan Orphanage fire kills thirty-five girls and an elderly cook. ›

1943

Greek Resistance: The United Panhellenic Organization of Youth is founded in Greece. ›

1942

World War II: Japanese submarines fire artillery shells at the coastline near Santa Barbara, California. ›

1941

Plutonium is first produced and isolated by Dr. Glenn T. Seaborg. ›

1934

Leopold III becomes King of Belgium. ›

1927

U.S. President Calvin Coolidge signs a bill by Congress establishing the Federal Radio Commission (later replaced by the Federal Communications Commission) which was to regulate the use of radio frequencies in the United States. ›

1927

German theoretical physicist Werner Heisenberg writes a letter to fellow physicist Wolfgang Pauli, in which he describes his uncertainty principle for the first time. ›

1917

First demonstrations in Saint Petersburg, Russia. The beginning of the February Revolution (March 8 in the Gregorian calendar). ›

1909

The AEA Silver Dart makes the first powered flight in Canada and the British Empire. ›

1905

Chicago attorney Paul Harris and three other businessmen meet for lunch to form the Rotary Club, the world's first service club. ›

1903

Cuba leases Guantánamo Bay to the United States "in perpetuity". ›

1900

Second Boer War: During the Battle of the Tugela Heights, the first British attempt to take Hart's Hill fails. ›

1898

Émile Zola is imprisoned in France after writing J'Accuse...!, a letter accusing the French government of antisemitism and wrongfully imprisoning Captain Alfred Dreyfus. ›

1887

The French Riviera is hit by a large earthquake, killing around 2,000. ›

1886

Charles Martin Hall produced the first samples of aluminium from the electrolysis of aluminium oxide, after several years of intensive work. He was assisted in this project by his older sister, Julia Brainerd Hall. ›

1885

Sino-French War: French Army gains an important victory in the Battle of Đồng Đăng in the Tonkin region of Vietnam. ›

1883

Alabama becomes the first U.S. state to enact an anti-trust law. ›

1870

Reconstruction Era: Post-U.S. Civil War military control of Mississippi ends and it is readmitted to the Union. ›

1861

President-elect Abraham Lincoln arrives secretly in Washington, D.C., after the thwarting of an alleged assassination plot in Baltimore, Maryland. ›

1854

The official independence of the Orange Free State, South Africa is declared. ›

1847

Mexican–American War: Battle of Buena Vista: In Mexico, American troops under future president General Zachary Taylor defeat Mexican General Antonio López de Santa Anna. ›

1836

Texas Revolution: The Siege of the Alamo (prelude to the Battle of the Alamo) begins in San Antonio, Texas. ›

1820

Cato Street Conspiracy: A plot to murder all the British cabinet ministers is exposed and the conspirators arrested. ›

1778

American Revolutionary War: Baron von Steuben arrives at Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, to help train the Continental Army. ›

1763

Berbice slave uprising in Guyana: The first major slave revolt in South America. ›

1725

J. S. Bach leads his Tafel-Music Shepherd Cantata for the birthday of Christian, Duke of Saxe-Weissenfels. ›

1455

Traditionally the date of publication of the Gutenberg Bible, the first Western book printed with movable type. ›

705

Empress Wu Zetian abdicates the throne, restoring the Tang dynasty. ›

628

Khosrow II, Shahanshah of the Sasanian Empire, is overthrown. ›

532

Byzantine emperor Justinian I lays the foundation stone of a new Orthodox Christian basilica in Constantinople – the Hagia Sophia. ›

303

Roman emperor Diocletian orders the destruction of the Christian church in Nicomedia, beginning eight years of Diocletianic Persecution. ›