On This Day February 15th

 OTD

February 15th is the Forty-sixth day of the year in the Gregorian calendar; 319 days remain until the end of the year.

 

Events

1493 – While on board the Niña, Christopher Columbus writes an open letter (widely distributed upon his return to Portugal) describing his discoveries and the unexpected items he came across in the New World.

1764 –St. Louis is established in Spanish Louisiana (now in Missouri, USA).

1852 – The Helsinki Cathedral (known as St. Nicholas' Church at the time) is officially inaugurated in Helsinki, Finland.

1879 – Women's rights: US President Rutherford B. Hayes signs a bill allowing female attorneys to argue cases before the United States Supreme Court.

1898 – The battleship USS Maine explodes and sinks in Havana harbor in Cuba, killing about 274 of the ship's roughly 354 crew. The disaster pushed the United States to declare war on Spain.

1923 – Greece becomes the last European country to adopt the Gregorian calendar.

1946 – ENIAC, the first electronic general-purpose computer, is formally dedicated at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.

1954 – Canada and the United States agreed to construct the Distant Early Warning Line, a system of radar stations in the far northern Arctic regions of Canada and Alaska.

1972 – Sound recordings are granted U.S. federal copyright protection for the first time.

2013 – A meteor explodes over Russia, injuring 1,500 people as a shock wave blows out windows and rocks buildings. This happens unexpectedly only hours before the expected closest-ever approach of the more giant and unrelated asteroid 2012 DA14.

 

Birthdays

1564 – Galileo Galilei, Italian astronomer, physicist, and mathematician (d. 1642)

1812 – Charles Lewis Tiffany, the American businessman, founded Tiffany & Co. (d. 1902)

1820 – Susan B. Anthony, American suffragist and activist (d. 1906)

1874 – Ernest Shackleton, Anglo-Irish captain and explorer (d. 1922)

1927 – Harvey Korman, American actor and comedian (d. 2008)

1964 – Chris Farley, American comedian and actor (d. 1997)

1971 – Alex Borstein, American actress, voice artist, producer, and screenwriter

 

 

Holiday Spotlight

World Hippo Day

Hippos are thought to have originated from a group of semiaquatic animals called Whippomorpha. This group later split into two branches around 54 million years ago. The first branch, including whales and dolphins, evolved into complete aquatic cetaceans. The second branch became anthracotheres, a close ancestor of the common hippo.

During the Pliocene Epoch (over two million years ago), all branches of the anthracotheres went extinct, except those that evolved into Hipopotamidae. This group of hippo ancestors migrated to Africa around 35 million years ago, dominating the continent as one of the earliest large mammals. Between 16 and eight million years ago, the oldest known hippopotamid, Kenyapotamus, strived in Africa. But the group that later evolved into the modern hippo was the Archaeopotamus, which lived between 7.5 and 1.8 million years ago in Africa and the Middle East.

There were ancestors of the hippo in Europe and the British Isles before the last glaciation, including the European hippopotamus — Hippopotamus antiquus — Hippopotamus major, and Hippopotamus gorgops. But these species of hippos went extinct, and the exact reason is still unknown, although scientists hypothesize it might be because of man.

Ancestors of European hippos migrated to many Mediterranean islands during the Pleistocene, evolved, and later became extinct. These species of hippos include Cyprus dwarf hippopotamus, Hippopotamus pentlandi, Hippopotamus melitensis, and Hippopotamus creutzburgi. Between 50,000 and 16,000 years ago, all hippos in the supercontinent of Eurasia went extinct. In North America, there were anthracothere genera in the early Oligocene (over 23 million years ago), but no evidence of hippos has ever been found. Many attempts have been made to introduce the species into the U.S., but they have never been successful. That was until Pablo Escobar illegally imported four hippos to Columbia in the late 1980s. This population of hippos has since grown to about 100.

 

Others Include.

Angelman Syndrome Day

Annoy Squidward Day (Sponge Bob Square Pants)

International Angelman Day

International Childhood Cancer Awareness Day

Love Reset Day

Lupercalia

National Gumdrop Day

National Hippo Day

National I Want Butterscotch Day

Nirvana Day - (Buddhist)

Remember the Maine Day

St. Skeletor's Day

Susan B. Anthony Day

World Cholangiocarcinoma Day

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