Today In History: February 1st

By Tim McGuinness Ph.D. on February 1st, 2008

February 1st, 2008 Today is Friday, Feb. 1, the 32nd day of 2008. There are 334 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlight in History:

Five years ago, on Feb. 1, 2003, the NASA Space Shuttle Columbia broke up during re-entry, killing all seven of its crew members: Commander Rick Husband; pilot William McCool; Michael Anderson; Kalpana Chawla; David Brown; Laurel Clark; and Ilan Ramon, the first Israeli in space.

On this date:

In 1861, Texas voted to secede from the Union, becoming part of the Confederated States of America.

In 1908, movie producer and animator George Pal (famous for the movie The Time Machine based upon H.G. Well’s classic novel) was born in Austria-Hungary.

In 1920, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police came into existence.

In 1946, Norwegian statesman Trygve Lie was chosen to be the first secretary-general of the United Nations.

In 1958, the United Arab Republic, a union of Egypt and Syria, was established. (The union ended in 1961.)

In 1960, four black college students began a sit-in protest at a lunch counter in Greensboro, N.C., where they had been refused service.

In 1968, during the Vietnam War, South Vietnam’s police chief executed a Viet Cong officer with a pistol shot to the head in a scene captured by Associated Press photographer Eddie Adams and NBC News.

In 1968, Richard M. Nixon announced his bid for the Republican presidential nomination.

In 1979, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini received a tumultuous welcome in Tehran as he ended nearly 15 years of exile.

In 1991, 34 people were killed when a USAir jetliner crashed atop a commuter plane on a runway at Los Angeles International Airport.

In 1998, In a round of Sunday talk show appearances, Monica Lewinsky’s attorney, William Ginsburg, predicted that the controversy over whether the former White House intern had had an affair with President Bill Clinton would “go away” and that the president would survive unscathed.

In 2003, At least 50 people were killed in a Zimbabwe train collision. Former Agriculture Secretary Richard Lyng died in Modesto, Calif., at age 84.

In 2007, The departing top U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. George Casey, told the Senate Armed Services Committee that improving security in Baghdad would take fewer than half as many extra troops as President Bush had chosen to commit. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad launched anniversary celebrations for Iran’s Islamic Revolution with a defiant promise to push ahead with the country’s controversial nuclear program. Pulitzer Prize-winning opera composer Gian Carlo Menotti died in Monaco at age 95.