Month: February 2014

February 19: On this date in 1859, Daniel Sickles was acquitted of murder by reason of temporary insanity; he had killed the lover of his wife, Theresa Bagioli Sickles.

February 18: Glass artist Louis Comfort Tiffany (of Tiffany lamp fame) was born on this date in 1848; his father, who founded Tiffany & Co., died on this date in 1902.

February 17: On this date in 1950, Charles “Mile-A-Minute” Murphy, who in 1889 became the first person to pedal a bicycle one mile in less than one minute, died.

February 16:Stephen Whitney, one of the wealthiest men in America, locked up his checkbook in a safe and died on this date in 1860.

February 15: On this date in 1961, championship ice dancer turned skating judge Harold Hartshorne was killed in a plane crash in Europe that wiped out the entire United States Figure Skating Team.

February 14: Martha Bullock Roosevelt, mother to president-to-be Theodore Roosevelt, and Alice Hathaway Roosevelt, TR’s wife, died on this Valentine’s Day in 1884.

February 13: Frankie Ward, the son of an admiral, was born on this date in 1877; he died three years later and was memorialized with a monument by famed sculptor Daniel Chester French (of Lincoln Memorial fame).

February 12: “Lift Every Voice and Sing,” also called “The Negro National Anthem,” lyrics by James Weldon Johnson, with music by his brother, John Rosamond Johnson, made its debut on this date in 1900.

February 11: De Witt Clinton, mayor, governor, senator, and presidential candidate, as well as the promoter of the Erie Canal, which made New York City the world’s financial center, died on this date in 1828.

February 10: The Bradley Martin Ball, intended to be “the greatest party in the history of the city,” was held on this date in 1897. The police were called out to prevent demonstrators, angry at the money spent, from storming the Waldorf Hotel.