Advertisement

UPI Almanac for Wednesday, Feb. 21, 2018

On Feb. 21, 1934, Nicaraguan guerrilla leader Cesar Augusto Sandino was killed by members of the country's national guard.

By United Press International
On February 21, 1934, Nicaraguan guerrilla leader Cesar Augusto Sandino was killed by members of the country's national guard. File Photo courtesy of Underwood & Underwood/Wikimedia
On February 21, 1934, Nicaraguan guerrilla leader Cesar Augusto Sandino was killed by members of the country's national guard. File Photo courtesy of Underwood & Underwood/Wikimedia

Today is Wednesday, Feb. 21, the 52nd day of 2018 with 313 to follow.

The moon is waxing. Morning stars are Jupiter, Mars and Saturn. Evening stars are Neptune, Uranus and Venus.

Advertisement


Those born on this date are under the sign of Pisces. They include Mexican revolutionary and military commander Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna (conqueror of the Alamo) in 1794; Roman Catholic Cardinal John Henry Newman in 1801; classical guitarist Andres Segovia in 1893; writer Anais Nin in 1903; poet/author W.H. Auden in 1907; humorist Erma Bombeck in 1927; singer Nina Simone in 1933 ; King Harald V of Norway in 1937 (age 81); actor Rue McClanahan in 1934; actor Gary Lockwood in 1937 (age 81); film/record executive David Geffen in 1943 (age 75); actor Tyne Daly in 1946 (age 72); Tricia Nixon Cox, daughter of former U.S. President Richard Nixon, in 1946 (age 72); actor Anthony Daniels in 1946 (age 72); actor Alan Rickman in 1946; former U.S. Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, in 1947 (age 71); author Jeffrey Shaara in 1952 (age 66); actor Kelsey Grammer in 1955 (age 63); singer Mary Chapin Carpenter in 1958 (age 60); actor Christopher Atkins in 1961 (age 57); actor William Baldwin in 1963 (age 55); Chinese dissident Chen Wei in 1969 (age 49); filmmaker Jordan Peele in 1979 (age 39); actor Jennifer Love Hewitt in 1979 (age 39); singer Charlotte Church in 1986 (age 32); actor Ellen Page in 1987 (age 31); actor Ashley Greene in 1987 (age 31); actor Corbin Bleu in 1989 (age 29); actor Joe Alwyn in 1991 (age 27); actor Hayley Orrantia in 1994 (age 24); actor Sophie Turner in 1996 (age 22).

Advertisement


On this date in history:

In 1848, The Communist Manifesto was published by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels.

In 1878, the New Haven, Conn., Telephone Co. published the first phone directory. It listed 50 subscribers.

In 1885, the Washington Monument, a 555-foot-high marble obelisk built in honor of America's revolutionary hero and first president, was dedicated in Washington.

In 1916, Germans launched the Battle of Verdun. More than 1 million soldiers in the German and French armies were killed in nearly 10 months of fighting. It was the longest battle of World War I.

In 1925, the first issue of The New Yorker was published.

In 1934, Nicaraguan guerrilla leader Cesar Augusto Sandino was killed by members of the country's national guard.

In 1953, Francis Crick and James D. Watson discovered the double helix structure of the DNA molecule.

In 1965, Black Muslim leader Malcolm X was assassinated at a rally in New York.

In 1972, Richard Nixon became the first U.S. president to visit the People's Republic of China.

In 1994, longtime CIA counterintelligence officer Aldrich Ames and his wife, Maria, were arrested and charged with selling information to the Soviet Union and Russia. Ames was sentenced to life in prison; his wife got a five-year term.

Advertisement

In 1995, a Russian commission estimated as many as 24,400 civilians died in a two-month uprising in the separatist republic of Chechnya.

In 2007, nuclear neighbors India and Pakistan signed a treaty in New Delhi aimed at preventing the accidental use of atomic weapons.

In 2013, former Illinois police Sgt. Drew Peterson, 59, was sentenced to 38 years in prison for the 2004 murder of his third wife, Kathleen Savio. Peterson's fourth wife, Stacy, who disappeared in 2007, remains missing.

In 2014, U.S. President Barack Obama met the Dalai Lama, Tibet's exiled spiritual leader, at the White House after the Chinese government warned the meeting would damage U.S.-China relations. A White House statement said Obama "reiterated the U.S. position that Tibet is part of the People's Republic of China and that the United States does not support Tibet independence."

In 2017, the bodies of 84 migrants washed ashore in Libya after their boat sank while crossing the Mediterranean Sea. Since the beginning of the year, more than 13,000 migrants -- mostly from North Africa -- arrived in Europe by sea, nearly 300 reported dead or missing.

Advertisement


A thought for the day: "The worst prison would be a closed heart." -- Pope John Paul II

Latest Headlines