Anniversaries and commemorations come and go daily. Most of us, even the best historians, miss most occasions. If we think of history as events then we are faced with a continually showering in the grains of sand. Nevertheless, we do pick out certain patterns in the remembrance of historical dates. The blog here reminds us of some dates where the local, state, national, and global perspectives entwine.
On 26, Monday February 1844, Horace Harmon Lurton, Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States, born (d. 1914)
On 26, Friday February 1869, Mahbub Ali Khan, 2½, begins a 42-year reign as Nizam of Hyderabad.
On 26, Friday February 1869, Nadezhda Konstantinovna Krupskaya, Russian Marxist revolutionary, Vladimir Lenin’s wife, born (d. 1939)
On 26, Monday February 1894, Wilhelm Bittrich, German Waffen SS general, born (d. 1979)
On 26, Monday February 1894, Ernest N. Harmon, American general, born (d. 1979)
On 26, Wednesday February 1919, Grand Canyon National Park: An act of the United States Congress establishes most of the Grand Canyon as a United States National Park.
On 26, Wednesday February 1919, Rie Mastenbroek, Dutch swimmer, born (d. 2003)
On 26, Saturday February 1944, Kurt Gerron begins shooting the Nazi propaganda film, Theresienstadt in Theresienstadt concentration camp. He and many others who featured in it are transferred to Auschwitz and gassed upon the film’s completion.
On 26, Saturday February 1944, First woman appointed to the substantive rank of captain in the United States Navy Nurse Corps, Sue S. Dauser.
On 26, Thursday February 1959, Rolando Blackman, Panamanian basketball player, born
On 26, Thursday February 1959, Princess Alexandra, 2nd Duchess of Fife, eldest grandchild of King Edward VII, died (b. 1891)
On 26, Thursday February 1959, Selig Suskin, Russian-born Israeli agronomist and early Zionist, died (b. 1873)
On 26, Wednesday February 1969, Levi Eshkol, 3rd Prime Minister of Israel, died (b. 1895)
On 26, Wednesday February 1969, Karl Jaspers, German psychiatrist and philosopher, died (b. 1883)
On 26, Monday February 1979, A total solar eclipse, the last visible from the continental United States until 2017, arcs over northern coterminous USA and southeastern Canada ending in Greenland. A partial solar eclipse is visible over almost all of North America and Central America including the eastern half of AK and the western half of UK.
On 26, Monday February 1979, The Superliner railcar enters revenue service with Amtrak.
On 26, Monday February 1979, Corinne Bailey Rae, British singer-songwriter and guitarist, born
On 26, Monday February 1979, Susana Diazayas, Mexican actress, born
On 26, Sunday February 1989, Anastassiya Bannova, Kazakh archer, born
On 26, Sunday February 1989, Roy Eldridge, American musician, died (b. 1911)
On 26, Saturday February 1994, Bill Hicks, American comedian, died (b. 1961)
On 26, Friday February 1999, José Quintero, Panamanian director, died (b. 1924)
On 26, Thursday February 2009, Former Serbian president Milan Milutinović is acquitted by the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia regarding war crimes during the Kosovo War.
On 26, Thursday February 2009, Wendy Richard, English actress, died (b. 1943)
On 26, Wednesday February 2014, Paco de Lucía, Spanish guitarist, died (b. 1947)
Other On This Day days in history
Neville Buch