1735 – 1st opera performed in America, “Flora”, in Charleston, South Carolina.
1804 – 1st US land-grant college, Ohio University, Athens Ohio, chartered.
1850 – California Legislature creates nine Bay Area counties.
1885 – Mark Twain publishes the “Adventures of Huckleberry Finn” in the US.
1901 – H. Cecil Booth patented a dust removing suction cleaner.
1913 – French modernist painting “Nude Descending a Staircase” by Marcel Duchamp causes an uproar when shown in New York.
1924 – US Secretary of the Navy Edwin Denby resigns due to Teapot Dome scandal.
1930 – Richard Rogers & Lorenz Hart’s “Simple Simon” published in NYC.
1944 – Youngest baseball player, Cincinnati Reds sign 15 year old Joe Nuxhall.
1960 – 8th Winter Olympic games open in Squaw Valley, California.
1962 – 4th Daytona 500: Fireball Roberts wins (152.529 MPH)
1970 – US President Richard Nixon launches the “Nixon doctrine”
1975 – 2nd American Music Awards: Olivia Newton-John & John Denver win.
1979 – 21st Daytona 500: Richard Petty wins (143.977 MPH)
1989 – “A Better Man” single released by Clint Black (Billboard Song of the Year 1989)
1996 – 38th Daytona 500: Dale Jarrett wins (154.308 MPH)
2001 – FBI agent Robert Harrison is arrested for spying for the Soviet Union. He is ultimately convicted and sentenced to life in prison.
2001 – Crash during Daytona 500 race on last lap claims life of Dale Earnhardt.
20014 – Greg Maddux signs with the Chicago Cubs, the team he began his career with.
2016 – Pope Francis questions US Presidential hopeful Donald Trump’s Christianity over his call to build a wall on the Mexican border.