#TodayInHistory – February 21
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February 21 – Some important events on this day
1173 ππΌ Pope Alexander III canonizes Thomas Becket, Archbishop of Canterbury
1583 ππΌ Groningen, Netherlands, begins using Gregorian calendar
1613 ππΌ Michael Romanov, son of Patriarch of Moscow, elected first Russian Tsar of the house of Romanov
1804 ππΌ 1st locomotive, Richard Trevithick’s, runs for the 1st time, along the tramway of the Penydarren Ironworks in Merthyr Tydfil, Wales
1821 ππΌ Greek War of Independence against the Ottoman Empire begins
1828 ππΌ 1st American Indian newspaper in US, “Cherokee Phoenix”, published
1842 ππΌ 1st known sewing machine patented in US, John Greenough, Washington, D.C.
1848 ππΌ Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels publish “The Communist Manifesto” in London
1878 ππΌ World’s 1st telephone directory issued, 50 subscribers (New Harbor, Connecticut.
1916 ππΌ World War I: Battle of Verdun begins.
At 7:12 a.m. on the morning of this day, a shot from a German Krupp 38-centimeter long-barreled gunβone of over 1,200 such weapons set to bombard French forces along a 20-kilometer front stretching across the Meuse Riverβstrikes a cathedral in Verdun, France, beginning the Battle of Verdun, which would stretch on for 10 months, become the longest conflict of World War I and leads to an estimated 1 million casualties.
1922 ππΌ Britain declares Egypt a sovereign state
1972 ππΌ Richard Nixon becomes the first US President to visit China, normalizing relations between the countries in a meeting with Chinese leader Mao Zedong in Beijing
1974 ππΌ Yugoslavia adopts constitution
2018 ππΌ Laykyun Sekkya, the world’s third tallest statue at 116 meters depicting Gautama Buddha completed in Khatakan Taung, Myanmar.
