Today In History [16th February, 2016]

A chronological timetable of historical events that occurred on this day in history. Historical facts of the day in the areas of military, politics, science, music, sports, arts, entertainment and more. Discover what happened today in history.

February 16

1760		Cherokee Indians held hostage at Fort St. George are killed in revenge for Indian attacks on frontier settlements.
1804		US Navy lieutenant Steven Decatur leads a small group of sailors into Tripoli harbor and burns the USS Philadelphia, captured earlier by Barbary pirates.
1862		Fort Donelson, Tennessee, falls to Grant‘s Federal forces, but not before Nathan Bedford Forrest escapes.
1865		Columbia, South Carolina, surrenders to Federal troops.
1923		Bessie Smith makes her first recording “Down Hearted Blues.”
1934		Thousands of Socialists battle Communists at a rally in New York’s Madison Square Garden.
1937		Dupont patents a new thread, nylon, which will replace silk in a number of products and reduce costs.
1940		The British destroyer HMS Cossack rescues British seamen from a German prison ship, the Altmark, in a Norwegian fjord.
1942		Tojo outlines Japan’s war aims to the Diet, referring to “new order of coexistence” in East Asia.
1945		American paratroopers land on Corregidor, in a campaign to liberate the Philippines.
1951		Stalin contends the U.N. is becoming the weapon of aggressive war.
1952		The FBI arrests 10 members of the Ku Klux Klan in North Carolina.
1957		A U.S. flag flies over an outpost in Wilkes Land, Antarctica.
1959		Fidel Castro takes the oath as Cuban premier in Havana.
1965		Four persons are held in a plot to blow up the Statue of Liberty, Liberty Bell and the Washington Monument.
1966		The World Council of Churches being held in Geneva, urges immediate peace in Vietnam.
1978		China and Japan sign a $20 billion trade pact, which is the most important move since the 1972 resumption of diplomatic ties.
Born on February 16
1620		Frederick William, founder of Brandenburg-Prussia.
1838		Henry Adams, U.S. historian, son and grandson of the presidents.
1852		Charles Taze Russell, founder of the International Bible Students Association which later became the Jehovah’s Witnesses.
1845		Quinton Hogg, English philanthropist.
1886		Van Wyck Brooks, biographer, critic and literary historian.
1903		Edgar Bergen, ventriloquist and radio comedian.
1904		George Kennan, U.S. diplomat and historian.
1944		Richard Ford, Pulitzer Prize-winning novelist (The Sportswriter, Independence Day).