February 23 in History

The Roman emperor was the ruler of the Roman Empire, starting with the granting of the title augustus to Octavian in 27 BC. The title of imperator, originally a military honorific, was usually used alongside caesar, originally a cognomen. When a given Roman is described as becoming emperor in English, it generally reflects his accession as augustus, and later as basileus. Early emperors also used the title princeps alongside other Republican titles, notably consul and pontifex maximus.

The foundation of Constantinople in 330 AD marks the conventional start of the Byzantine Empire, which fell to the Ottoman Empire in 1453 AD. Only the emperors who were recognized as legitimate rulers and exercised sovereign authority are included, to the exclusion of junior co-emperors who never attained the status of sole or senior ruler, as well as of the various usurpers or rebels who claimed the imperial title.

Khosrow II (spelled Chosroes II in classical sources; Middle Persian: 𐭧𐭥𐭮𐭫𐭥𐭣𐭩, romanized: Xusrōγ/Xusrōw and Khosrau), commonly known as Khosrow Parviz (New Persian خسرو پرویز, "Khosrow the Victorious"), is considered to be the last great monarch of pre-Islamic Iran, ruling the Sasanian Empire from 590 to 628, including an interruption of one year. Khosrow II was the son of Hormizd IV (reigned 579–590), and the grandson of Khosrow I (reigned 531–579). He was the last emperor of Iran to have a lengthy reign before the Muslim conquest of Iran, which began five years after his execution. He lost his throne, then regained it with the help of the Eastern Roman emperor Maurice, and, a decade later, went on to emulate the feats of the Achaemenids, conquering the rich Roman provinces of the Middle East; much of his reign was spent in wars with the Eastern Roman Empire and struggling against usurpers such as Bahram Chobin and Vistahm. Khosrow II began a war against the Eastern Roman Empire in 602, allegedly to avenge the murder of his ally, Maurice. Persian forces captured much of the Roman territory, earning Khosrow II the epithet "the Victorious". The Siege of Constantinople (626) was unsuccessful, and Heraclius, now allied with Turks, started a risky but successful counterattack deep into the Persian heartland. Dissatisfied with the war, the empire's feudal families supported a coup in which Khosrow II was deposed and killed by his estranged son Sheroe, who took power as Kavad II. This led to a civil war and interregnum in the empire and the reversal of all Sasanian gains in the war against the Romans. In works of Persian literature such as Ferdowsi's Shahnameh and Nizami Ganjavi's (1141–1209) Khosrow and Shirin, a famous tragic romance and a highly elaborated fictional version of Khosrow's life made him one of the greatest heroes of the culture, as much a lover as a monarch. Khosrow and Shirin tells the story of his love for the originally Aramean princess Shirin, who becomes his queen after a lengthy courtship strewn with mishaps and difficulties.

Empress Zetian (17 February 624 – 16 December 705), personal name Wu Zhao, was the only undisputed female sovereign in the history of China. She had previously held power as the empress consort of Emperor Gaozong of the Tang dynasty from 660 to 683 and as empress dowager during the reigns of her sons, Emperors Zhongzong and Ruizong, between 683 and 690. She was the sole ruler of the self-styled Zhou dynasty from 690 to 705. In her early life, Wu served as a concubine of Emperor Taizong. After his death, she married his successor, Emperor Gaozong, becoming empress in 655. Wu exercised substantial political influence even before her elevation and gradually came to dominate court affairs. After Gaozong suffered a debilitating stroke in 660, she effectively administered the empire on his behalf until his death in 683. Breaking with precedent, Wu then consolidated power and prevented her sons from ruling. In 690, she proclaimed the Zhou dynasty in place of the Tang and crowned herself emperor. During her 45-year de facto rule over China, Wu institutionalized the use of informants and enforced stringent legal measures, purged members of the Tang royal house and veteran officials from earlier administrations, reformed the civil service system to promote merit, patronized Buddhism as well as literature and the arts, and conducted military campaigns against Turkic and Tibetan incursions. Her rule formed part of the High Tang period, a historic peak in China's political power and cultural influence. In her later years, her governance became increasingly autocratic and extravagant. She was removed from power in the Shenlong Coup, which abolished the Zhou dynasty and restored the Tang, and she died a few months later.

The Gutenberg Bible, also known as the 42-line Bible, the Mazarin Bible or the B42, is the earliest major book printed in Europe using mass-produced metal movable type. It marked the start of the "Gutenberg Revolution" and the age of printed books in the West. The book is valued and revered for its high aesthetic and artistic qualities and its historical significance. The Gutenberg Bible is an edition of the Latin Vulgate printed in the 1450s by Johannes Gutenberg in Mainz (Holy Roman Empire), in present-day Germany. Out of either 158 or 180 copies that were originally printed, 49 survive in at least substantial portion, 21 of them in entirety; of these, the copy with the earliest visible print date is marked as 15 August 1456. They are thought to be among the world's most valuable books, although no complete copy has been sold since 1978. In March 1455, the future Pope Pius II wrote that he had seen pages from the Gutenberg Bible, displayed in Frankfurt to promote the edition. The 36-line Bible, said to be the second printed Bible, is also sometimes referred to as a Gutenberg Bible, but may be the work of another printer.

Johann Sebastian Bach was a German composer and musician of the late Baroque period. He is known for his prolific output across a variety of instruments and forms, including the orchestral Brandenburg Concertos; solo instrumental works such as the Cello Suites and Sonatas and Partitas for Solo Violin; keyboard works such as the Goldberg Variations and The Well-Tempered Clavier; organ works such as the Schübler Chorales and the Toccata and Fugue in D minor; and choral works such as the St. Matthew Passion and the Mass in B minor. He is known for his mastery of counterpoint, as heard in The Musical Offering and The Art of Fugue. Felix Mendelssohn precipitated the Bach Revival with a performance of the St. Matthew Passion in 1829. Ever since, Bach has been acclaimed as one of the greatest composers in the history of Western music.

The American Revolutionary War (April 19, 1775 – September 3, 1783), also known as the Revolutionary War or American War of Independence or simply the American Revolution, was the armed conflict that comprised the final eight years of the broader American Revolution, in which American Patriot forces organized as the Continental Army and, commanded by George Washington, defeated the British Army. The conflict was fought in North America, the Caribbean, and the Atlantic Ocean. The war's outcome seemed uncertain for most of the war, but Washington and the Continental Army's decisive victory in the Siege of Yorktown in 1781 led King George III and the Kingdom of Great Britain to negotiate an end to the war. In 1783, in the Treaty of Paris, the British monarchy acknowledged the independence of the Thirteen Colonies, leading to the establishment of the United States as an independent and sovereign nation. In 1763, after the British Empire gained dominance in North America following its victory over the French in the Seven Years' War, tensions and disputes began escalating between the British and the Thirteen Colonies, especially following passage of the Stamp and Townshend Acts. The British Army responded by seeking to occupy Boston militarily, leading to the Boston Massacre on March 5, 1770. In mid-1774, with tensions escalating even further between the British Army and the colonies, the British Parliament imposed the Intolerable Acts, an attempt to disarm Americans, leading to the Battles of Lexington and Concord in April 1775, the first battles of the Revolutionary War. In June 1775, the Second Continental Congress voted to incorporate colonial-based Patriot militias into a central military, the Continental Army, and unanimously appointed Washington its commander-in-chief. Two months later, in August 1775, George III declared the colonies to be in a state of rebellion. In July 1776, the Second Continental Congress formalized the war, passing the Lee Resolution on July 2, and, two days later, unanimously adopting the Declaration of Independence, on July 4. In March 1776, in an early win for the newly-formed Continental Army under Washington's command, following a successful siege of Boston, the Continental Army successfully drove the British Army out of Boston. British commander in chief William Howe responded by launching the New York and New Jersey campaign, which resulted in Howe's capture of New York City in November. Washington responded by clandestinely crossing the Delaware River and winning small but significant victories at Trenton and Princeton. In the summer of 1777, as Howe was poised to capture Philadelphia, the Continental Congress fled to Baltimore. In October 1777, a separate northern British force under the command of John Burgoyne was forced to surrender at Saratoga in an American victory that proved crucial in convincing France and Spain that an independent United States was a viable possibility. France signed a commercial agreement with the revolutionaries, followed by a Treaty of Alliance in February 1778. In 1779, the Sullivan Expedition undertook a scorched earth campaign against British-allied factions of the Haudenosaunee Confederacy (also Iroquois). Native American raids on the American frontier, however, continued to be a problem. Also, in 1779, Spain allied with France against Great Britain in the Treaty of Aranjuez, though Spain did not formally ally with the Americans. Howe's replacement Henry Clinton intended to take the war against the Americans into the Southern Colonies. Despite some initial success, British General Cornwallis was besieged by a Franco-American army in Yorktown, Virginia, in September and October 1781. The French navy cut off Cornwallis's escape and he was forced to surrender in October. The British wars with France and Spain continued for another two years, but fighting largely ceased in North America. In the Treaty of Paris, signed on September 3, 1783, Great Britain acknowledged the sovereignty and independence of the United States, bringing the American Revolutionary War to an end. The Treaties of Versailles resolved Great Britain's conflicts with France and Spain, and forced Great Britain to cede Tobago, Senegal, and small territories in India to France, and Menorca, West Florida, and East Florida to Spain.

The Cato Street Conspiracy was a plot to murder all the British cabinet ministers and the Prime Minister Lord Liverpool in 1820. The name comes from the meeting place near Edgware Road in London. The police had an informer; the plotters fell into a police trap. Thirteen were arrested, while one policeman, Richard Smithers, was killed. Five conspirators were executed, and five others were transported to Australia. How widespread the Cato Street conspiracy was is uncertain. It was a time of unrest; rumours abounded. Malcolm Chase noted that "the London-Irish community and a number of trade societies, notably shoemakers, were prepared to lend support, while unrest and awareness of a planned rising were widespread in the industrial north and on Clydeside."

The Texas Revolution (October 2, 1835 – April 21, 1836) was a rebellion by Anglo-American immigrants as well as Hispanic Texans (known as Texians and Tejanos respectively) against the centralist government of Mexico in the Mexican state of Coahuila y Tejas. Although the uprising was part of a larger revolt that included other provinces opposed to the regime of President Miguel Barragán and General Antonio López de Santa Anna, the Mexican government believed the United States had instigated the Texas insurrection with the goal of annexation. The Mexican Congress passed the Tornel Decree, declaring that any foreigners fighting against Mexican troops "will be deemed pirates and dealt with as such, being citizens of no nation presently at war with the Republic and fighting under no recognized flag". Only the province of Texas succeeded in breaking with Mexico, establishing the Republic of Texas. It was eventually annexed by the United States about a decade later. The revolution began in October 1835, after a decade of political and cultural clashes between the Mexican government and the large and growing population of Anglo-American settlers in Texas. The Mexican government had become increasingly centralized, stripping Texas of its autonomy. The rights of its citizens had become further curtailed in turn, particularly regarding immigration from the United States, and the holding of slaves as property. Mexico had officially abolished slavery in 1829, but had made an exemption for Texas, however this exemption was not constitutionalized, which made many slave owners in Texas still feel unsatisfied. Although slavery is not mentioned explicitly in the Texas Declaration of Independence, the ownership of human beings in bondage as property was of great importance to many of the settlers. Texians and Tejanos disagreed on whether the ultimate goal was independence or a return to the Mexican Constitution of 1824. While delegates at the Consultation (provisional government) debated the war's motives, Texians and a flood of volunteers from the United States defeated the small garrisons of Mexican soldiers by mid-December 1835. The Consultation declined to declare independence and installed an interim government, whose infighting led to political paralysis and a dearth of effective governance in Texas. An ill-conceived proposal to invade Matamoros siphoned much-needed volunteers and provisions from the fledgling Texian Army. In March 1836, a second political convention declared independence and appointed leadership for the new Republic of Texas. Determined to avenge Mexico's honor, Santa Anna vowed to personally retake Texas. His Army of Operations entered Texas in mid-February 1836 and found the Texians completely unprepared. Mexican general José de Urrea led a contingent of troops on the Goliad Campaign up the Texas coast, defeating all Texian troops in his path and executing most of those who surrendered. Santa Anna led a larger force to San Antonio de Béxar (or Béxar), where his troops defeated the Texian garrison in the Battle of the Alamo, killing almost all of the defenders. A newly created Texian army under the command of Sam Houston was constantly on the move, while terrified civilians fled with the army, in a melee known as the Runaway Scrape. On March 31, Houston paused his men at Groce's Landing on the Brazos River, and for the next two weeks, the Texians received rigorous military training. Becoming complacent and underestimating the strength of his foes, Santa Anna further subdivided his troops. On April 21, Houston's army staged a surprise assault on Santa Anna and his vanguard force at the Battle of San Jacinto. The Mexican troops were quickly routed, and vengeful Texians executed many who tried to surrender. Santa Anna was taken hostage; in exchange for his life, he ordered the Mexican army to retreat south of the Rio Grande. The Texians forced Santa Anna to sign the Treaty of Velasco, which gave Texas its independence. However, Mexico refused to recognize the Republic of Texas, and intermittent conflicts between the two countries continued into the 1840s. The annexation of Texas as the 28th state of the United States in 1845 led directly to the Mexican–American War.

The Mexican–American War, also known in the United States as the Mexican War and in Mexico as the United States intervention in Mexico, was an invasion of Mexico by the United States. It followed the 1845 American annexation of Texas, which Mexico still considered its territory because it refused to recognize the Treaties of Velasco, signed by President Antonio López de Santa Anna after he was captured by the Texian Army during the 1836 Texas Revolution. The Republic of Texas was de facto an independent country, but most of its Anglo-American citizens who had moved from the United States to Texas after 1822 wanted to be annexed by the United States.

The Orange Free State was a landlocked independent Boer republic in Southern Africa during the second half of the 19th century, which ceased to exist after it was defeated and surrendered to the British Empire at the end of the Second Boer War in 1902. It is one of the three historical precursors to the present-day Free State province.

Abraham Lincoln (February 12, 1809 – April 15, 1865) was the 16th president of the United States, serving from 1861 until his assassination in 1865. He led the United States through the American Civil War, defeating the Confederacy and playing a major role in the abolition of slavery. Born in a one-room log cabin in Kentucky, Lincoln was raised on the frontier. He was self-educated and became a lawyer, Illinois state legislator, and U.S. representative. Angered by the Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854, which opened the territories to slavery, he became a leader of the new Republican Party. He reached a national audience in the 1858 Senate campaign debates against Stephen A. Douglas. Lincoln won the 1860 presidential election, becoming the first Republican president. His victory prompted a majority of the slave states to begin seceding and form the Confederate States. A month after Lincoln assumed the presidency, Confederate forces attacked Fort Sumter, starting the Civil War. As a moderate Republican, Lincoln had to navigate conflicting political opinions from contentious factions during the war effort. He closely supervised the Union's strategy and tactics, including the selection of generals and the implementation of a naval blockade of Southern ports. He suspended the writ of habeas corpus in April 1861, an action that Chief Justice Roger Taney found in Ex parte Merryman that only Congress could do, and he averted war with Britain by defusing the Trent Affair. On January 1, 1863, he issued the Emancipation Proclamation, which declared the slaves in the states "in rebellion" to be free. On November 19, 1863, he delivered the Gettysburg Address, which became one of the most famous speeches in American history. He promoted the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, which, in 1865, abolished chattel slavery. Following his re-election in 1864, he sought to heal the war-torn nation through Reconstruction. On April 14, 1865, five days after the Confederate surrender at Appomattox, Lincoln was fatally shot by John Wilkes Booth at Ford's Theatre in Washington, D.C., becoming the first U.S. president to be assassinated. Lincoln is remembered as a martyr and a national hero for his wartime leadership and for his efforts to preserve the Union and abolish slavery. He is consistently ranked in both popular and scholarly polls as among the greatest presidents in American history.

The Reconstruction era, often simply called Reconstruction, was a period in United States history that followed the American Civil War (1861–1865) and was dominated by the legal, social, and political challenges of the abolition of slavery and federal control over, and reintegration of, the former Confederate States into the United States. Three amendments were added to the United States Constitution to grant citizenship and equal civil rights to the newly freed slaves. To circumvent these, former Confederate states imposed poll taxes and literacy tests and sought to intimidate and control the Black population and discourage or prevent them from voting.

Alabama is a state in the Southeastern and Deep Southern regions of the United States. It borders Tennessee to the north, Georgia to the east, Florida and the Gulf of Mexico to the south, and Mississippi to the west. Alabama is the 30th largest by area, and the 24th-most populous of the 50 U.S. states.

The Sino-French or Franco-Chinese War, also known as the Tonkin War, was a limited conflict fought from August 1884 to April 1885 between the French Third Republic and the Qing dynasty for influence in Vietnam. There was no declaration of war. The Qing armies performed better than in their other nineteenth-century wars. Although French forces emerged victorious from most engagements, the Qing scored noteworthy successes on land, notably forcing the French to hastily withdraw from occupied Lạng Sơn in the late stages of the war, thus gaining control of the town and its surroundings. However, a lack of foreign support, French naval supremacy, and northern threats posed by Russia and Japan forced the Qing to enter negotiations. The Qing ceded to France its sphere of influence over Northern and Central Vietnam, which respectively became the protectorates of Tonkin and Annam. Both sides ratified the Treaty of Tientsin and no diplomatic gain was reaped by either nation. On another note, the war strengthened the dominance of Empress Dowager Cixi over the Qing government but France securing its strategic objective did not prevent the collapse of French Prime Minister Jules Ferry's government for whom the Tonkin Affair was ignominious.

Charles Martin Hall (December 6, 1863 – December 27, 1914) was an American inventor, businessman, and chemist. He is best known for his invention in 1886 of an inexpensive method for producing aluminium, which became the first metal to attain widespread use since the prehistoric discovery of iron. He was one of the founders of Alcoa, along with Alfred E. Hunt; Hunt's partner at the Pittsburgh Testing Laboratory, George Hubbard Clapp; Hunt's chief chemist, W. S. Sample; Howard Lash, head of the Carbon Steel Company; Millard Hunsiker, sales manager for the Carbon Steel Company; and Robert Scott, a mill superintendent for the Carnegie Steel Company. Together they raised $20,000 to launch the Pittsburgh Reduction Company, which was later renamed Aluminum Company of America and then shortened to Alcoa.

The French Riviera, known in French as the Côte d'Azur, is the Mediterranean coastline of the southeast corner of France. There is no official boundary, but it is considered to be the coastal area of the Alpes-Maritimes department, extending from the rock formation Massif de l'Esterel to Menton, at the France–Italy border, although some other sources place the western boundary further west around Saint-Tropez or Toulon. The coast is entirely within the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region of France. The Principality of Monaco is a semi-enclave within the region, surrounded on three sides by France and fronting the Mediterranean. The French Riviera contains the seaside resorts of Cap-d'Ail, Beaulieu-sur-Mer, Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat, Villefranche-sur-Mer, Antibes, Juan-les-Pins, Cannes, and Théoule-sur-Mer.

Émile Édouard Charles Antoine Zola (, also US: ; French: [emil zɔla]; 2 April 1840 – 29 September 1902) was a French novelist, journalist, playwright, the best-known practitioner of the literary school of naturalism, and an important contributor to the development of theatrical naturalism. He was a major figure in the political liberalization of France and in the exoneration of the falsely accused and convicted army officer Alfred Dreyfus, which is encapsulated in his renowned newspaper opinion headlined J'Accuse...! Zola was nominated for the first and second Nobel Prizes in Literature in 1901 and 1902.

The Second Boer War was a conflict fought between 1899 and 1902 between the British Empire and the Boer republics, triggered by the discovery of gold in the Transvaal, specifically the Witwatersrand gold fields, and the ensuing political dispute over the voting rights of British expatriates (Uitlanders).

Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is an island country in the Caribbean. It comprises the eponymous main island as well as 4,195 islands, islets, and cays. Situated at the convergence of the Caribbean Sea, Gulf of Mexico, and Atlantic Ocean, Cuba is located east of the Yucatán Peninsula, south of both Florida and the Bahamas, west of Hispaniola, and north of Jamaica and the Cayman Islands. Cuba is the largest country in the Caribbean by area and the third-largest by population, after Haiti and the Dominican Republic. Culturally, Cuba is considered to be part of Latin America. Its capital and largest city is Havana.

Paul Percy Harris (April 19, 1868 – January 27, 1947) was a Chicago, Illinois-based attorney. He founded the club that became the humanitarian organisation Rotary International in 1905.

The Silver Dart (or Aerodrome #4) was a derivative of an early aircraft built by a Canadian/U.S. team, which after many successful flights in Hammondsport, New York, earlier in 1908, was dismantled and shipped to Baddeck, Nova Scotia. It was flown from the ice of Baddeck Bay, a sub-basin of Bras d'Or Lake, on 23 February 1909, making it the first controlled powered flight in Canada. The aircraft was piloted by one of its designers, Douglas McCurdy. The original Silver Dart was designed and built by the Aerial Experiment Association (AEA), which had been formed under the guidance of Dr. Alexander Graham Bell. From 1891, Bell had begun experiments at Baddeck and Hammondsport to develop motor-powered heavier-than-air aircraft. By 1908, the success of the AEA was seen in a series of ground-breaking designs, culminating in the Silver Dart. By the time the Silver Dart was constructed in late 1908, it was the Aerial Experiment Association's fourth flying machine. One of its precursors, the June Bug, had already broken records. It won the Scientific American Trophy for making the first official one mile (1609 m) flight in North America. The frame and structure of the Silver Dart were made of steel tube, bamboo, friction tape, wire and wood. The wings were covered with rubberized, silvery balloon cloth provided by Capt. Thomas Scott Baldwin of Hammondsport; hence the name the "Silver Dart". Its Kirkham engine, supplied by Glenn Curtiss, was a reliable V-8 that developed 50 horsepower (37 kW) at 1,000 RPM. The propeller was carved from a solid block of wood. The aircraft had what is now called a canard or an "elevator in front" design. Like most aircraft of its day the Silver Dart had poor control characteristics; likewise, it had no brakes.

Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd (Петроград), and later Leningrad (Ленинград), is the second-largest city in Russia, after Moscow, the nation's capital. Situated on the Neva River at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea, its area of 1,439 square kilometers (556 sq mi) makes it the smallest administrative division of Russia by area. The city had a population of 5,601,911 residents as of 2021, with more than 6.4 million people living in the metropolitan area. Saint Petersburg is the fourth-most populous city in Europe, the most populous city on the Baltic Sea, and the world's northernmost city of more than 1 million residents. As the former capital of the Russian Empire, and a historically strategic Baltic port, it is governed as a federal city. The city was founded by Tsar Peter the Great on 27 May 1703 on the site of a captured Swedish fortress, and was named after the apostle Saint Peter. In Russia, Saint Petersburg is historically and culturally associated with the birth of the Russian Empire and Russia's entry into modern history as a European great power. It served as a capital of the Tsardom of Russia, and the subsequent Russian Empire, from 1712 to 1918 (being replaced by Moscow for a short period between 1728 and 1730). After the October Revolution in 1917, the Bolsheviks moved their government to Moscow. The city was renamed Leningrad after Lenin's death in 1924. It was the site of the siege of Leningrad during World War II, the most lethal siege in history. In June 1991, only a few months before the Belovezha Accords and the dissolution of the Soviet Union, voters in a city-wide referendum supported restoring the city's original name. As Russia's cultural centre, Saint Petersburg received over 15 million tourists in 2018. It is considered an important economic, scientific, and tourism centre of Russia and Europe. In modern times, the city has been nicknamed "the Northern Capital of Russia" and is home to notable federal government bodies such as the Constitutional Court of Russia and the Heraldic Council of the President of the Russian Federation. It is also home to the National Library of Russia and a planned location for the Supreme Court of Russia, as well as home to the headquarters of the Russian Navy, and the Leningrad Military District of the Russian Armed Forces. The Historic Centre of Saint Petersburg and Related Groups of Monuments constitute a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Saint Petersburg is home to the Hermitage (one of the largest art museums in the world), and the Lakhta Center (the tallest skyscraper in Europe), and was one of the host cities of the 2018 FIFA World Cup and the UEFA Euro 2020.

Calvin Coolidge (born John Calvin Coolidge Jr.; KOOL-ij; July 4, 1872 – January 5, 1933) was the 30th president of the United States, serving from 1923 to 1929. A Republican lawyer from Massachusetts, he served from 1921 to 1923 as the 29th vice president, under President Warren G. Harding, and from 1919 to 1921 as the 48th governor of Massachusetts. Coolidge gained a reputation as a small-government conservative, with a taciturn personality and dry sense of humor that earned him the nickname "Silent Cal". Coolidge began his career as a member of the Massachusetts State House. He rose up the ranks of Massachusetts politics and was elected governor in 1918. As governor, Coolidge ran on the record of fiscal conservatism, strong support for women's suffrage, and vague opposition to Prohibition. Despite his tardy response, Coolidge's involvement in the Boston police strike in 1919 thrust him into the national spotlight as a man of decisive action. The following year, the Republican Party nominated Coolidge as the running mate to Senator Warren G. Harding in the 1920 presidential election, which they won in a landslide. Coolidge served as vice president until Harding's death in 1923, after which he assumed the presidency. During his presidency, Coolidge restored public confidence in the White House after the Harding administration's many scandals. He signed into law the Indian Citizenship Act of 1924, which granted U.S. citizenship to all Native Americans, along with the Immigration Act of 1924, which aimed at limiting immigration from outside the Western Hemisphere and established the United States Border Patrol; and oversaw a period of rapid and expansive economic growth known as the "Roaring Twenties", leaving office with considerable popularity. Coolidge was known for his hands-off governing approach and pro-business stance; biographer Claude Fuess wrote: "He embodied the spirit and hopes of the middle class, could interpret their longings and express their opinions. That he did represent the genius of the average is the most convincing proof of his strength." Coolidge chose not to run again in 1928, remarking that ten years as president would be "longer than any other man has had it—too long!" Coolidge is widely admired for his stalwart support of racial equality during a period of heightened racial tension, and he is highly regarded by advocates of smaller government and laissez-faire economics; supporters of an active central government generally view him far less favorably. His critics argue that he failed to use the country's economic boom to help struggling farmers and workers in other flailing industries, and there is still much debate among historians about the extent to which Coolidge's economic policies contributed to the onset of the Great Depression, which began seven months after he left office. Scholars have ranked Coolidge in the lower half of U.S. presidents.

Theoretical physics is a branch of physics that uses mathematical models and abstractions of physical objects and systems to explain and predict natural phenomena. It is, in the broadest sense, the attempt to say why things happen the way they do, not merely to record that they do. This is in contrast to experimental physics, which tests and refines those explanations through direct measurement and observation. In practice, the two feed each other constantly: a theoretical prediction suggests an experiment, and an unexpected experimental result sends theorists back to the drawing board.

Leopold III (3 November 1901 – 25 September 1983) was King of the Belgians from 23 February 1934 until his abdication on 16 July 1951. At the outbreak of World War II, Leopold tried to maintain Belgian neutrality, but after the German invasion in May 1940, he surrendered his country, earning him much hostility, both at home and abroad. Leopold's act was declared unconstitutional by Prime Minister Hubert Pierlot and his cabinet, who moved to London to form a government-in-exile, while Leopold and his family were placed under house arrest by the Germans. In 1944, they were moved to Germany and then Austria, before being liberated by the Americans, but banned for some years from returning to Belgium, where his brother Prince Charles, Count of Flanders, had been declared regent. Leopold's eventual return to his homeland in 1950 nearly caused a civil war, with serious calls for a secessionist republic in Wallonia. Under pressure from the government, he abdicated in favour of his son Baudouin in July 1951. Leopold's first wife, Astrid of Sweden, died in a road accident while on a driving holiday in Switzerland in August 1935, being much mourned by the public. Leopold, who was driving the vehicle when it hit a tree, suffered minor injuries. His morganatic second marriage, to Lilian Baels in captivity in 1941, was contrary to Belgian law, which stipulates that the civil marriage has to occur before a religious marriage, and she was never permitted the title of queen. Although Lilian and Leopold had originally planned to postpone their civil marriage until the end of the war, Lilian was soon expecting their first child, necessitating a civil marriage, which took place on 6 December 1941.

Plutonium is a chemical element; it has symbol Pu and atomic number 94. It is a silvery-gray actinide metal that tarnishes when exposed to air, and forms a dull coating when oxidized. The element normally exhibits six allotropes and four oxidation states. It reacts with carbon, halogens, nitrogen, silicon and hydrogen. When exposed to moist air, it forms oxides and hydrides that can expand the sample up to 70% in volume, which in turn flake off as a powder that is pyrophoric. It is radioactive and can accumulate in bones, which makes the handling of plutonium dangerous.

World War II, or the Second World War, was a global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies and the Axis powers. Nearly all of the world's countries participated, with many engaging in total war on an unprecedented scale. World War II was the deadliest conflict in history, causing the deaths of 60 to 75 million people, a majority of whom were civilians. Millions died as a result of massacres, starvation, disease, and genocides including the Holocaust. After the Allied victory, Germany, Austria, Japan, and Korea were occupied, and German and Japanese leaders were tried for war crimes.

The Cavan Orphanage fire occurred on the night of 23 February 1943 at St Joseph's Orphanage in Cavan, Ireland. 35 children and one adult employee died as a result. All of the lay teachers and nuns survived the fire. Much of the attention after the fire surrounded the role of the Poor Clares, the order of nuns who ran the orphanage, and the local fire service.

The Greek resistance involved armed and unarmed groups from across the political spectrum that resisted the Axis occupation of Greece in the period 1941–1944, during World War II. The largest group was the Communist-dominated EAM-ELAS. The Greek Resistance is considered one of the strongest resistance movements in Nazi-occupied Europe.

The Soviet Union, officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from its formation in 1922 until its dissolution in 1991. It was the world's third-most populous country, the largest by area, and bordered twelve other countries. A diverse multinational state, it was organized as a federal union of national republics, with the largest and most populous being the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (SFSR). The world's flagship communist state, it was governed by the Communist Party under Marxism–Leninism, through soviet councils. The Soviet economy was also centrally planned. Its capital and largest city was Moscow.

The Battle of Iwo Jima was a major battle in which the United States Marine Corps (USMC), United States Navy (USN), and United States Army (USA) landed on and eventually captured the island of Iwo Jima from the Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) during World War II. The American invasion, designated Operation Detachment, had the goal of capturing the island with its two airfields: South Field and Central Field.

The 11th Airborne Division is a United States Army multirole infantry division made up of specialized light infantry and airborne infantry based in Alaska.

The Philippines, officially the Republic of the Philippines, is an archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. Located in the western Pacific Ocean, it consists of about 7,641 islands, with a total area of about 300,000 square kilometers. The islands are broadly categorized in three main geographical divisions. From north to south, the divisions are: Luzon, Visayas, and Mindanao. With a population of over 114 million, it is the world's thirteenth-most-populous country.

Nazi Germany, officially the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a totalitarian dictatorship. The Third Reich, meaning "Third Realm" or "Third Empire", was the Nazi claim that Nazi Germany was the successor to the Holy Roman Empire (800–1806) and the German Empire (1871–1918); the Nazis called it the Thousand-Year Reich, but it ended just 12 years later in May 1945, when the Allies defeated Germany and entered Berlin, ending World War II in Europe.

Pforzheim is a city of over 135,000 inhabitants in the federal state of Baden-Württemberg, in the southwest of Germany.

American Airlines Flight 009 was a flight from New York City to Los Angeles. On the morning of February 23, 1945, while flying over Rural Retreat, Virginia, on the Washington-Nashville leg, the Douglas DC-3 struck the wooded summit of Glade Mountain in the Appalachian Mountains, killing 17 of the 22 occupants on board.

The International Organization for Standardization (ISO), is an independent, non-governmental, international standard development organization composed of representatives from the national standards organizations of member countries.

Poliomyelitis, commonly shortened to polio, is a vaccine-preventable infectious disease caused by the poliovirus. Approximately 75% of cases are asymptomatic; mild symptoms which can occur include sore throat and fever; in a proportion of cases more severe symptoms develop such as headache, neck stiffness, and paresthesia. These symptoms usually pass within one or two weeks. A less common symptom is permanent paralysis, and possible death in extreme cases. Years after recovery, post-polio syndrome may occur, with a slow development of muscle weakness similar to what the person had during the initial infection.

Formula One (F1) is the highest class of worldwide racing for open-wheel, single-seater formula racing cars run by the Formula One Group and sanctioned by the Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA). The FIA Formula One World Championship has been one of the world's premier forms of motorsport since its inaugural running in 1950 and is often considered to be the pinnacle of motorsport. The word formula in the name refers to the set of rules all participant cars must follow. A Formula One season consists of a series of races, known as Grands Prix. Grands Prix take place in multiple countries and continents on either purpose-built circuits or closed roads, as street circuits.

Syria, officially the Syrian Arab Republic, is a country in West Asia located in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Levant. It borders the Mediterranean Sea to the west, Turkey to the north and northwest, Iraq to the east and southeast, Jordan to the south, and Israel and Lebanon to the southwest. It is a republic under a provisional government and comprises 14 governorates. Damascus is Syria's capital and largest city. With a population of 26 million across an area of 185,180 square kilometres (71,500 sq mi), it is the 56th-most populous and 87th-largest country.

Operation Lam Son 719 or 9th Route – Southern Laos Campaign was a limited-objective offensive campaign conducted in the southeastern portion of the Kingdom of Laos. The campaign was carried out by the armed forces of South Vietnam between 8 February and 25 March 1971, during the Vietnam War. The United States provided logistical, aerial and artillery support for the operation, but its ground forces were prohibited by law from entering Laotian territory. The objective of the campaign was the disruption of a possible future offensive by the People's Army of Vietnam (PAVN), whose logistical system within Laos was known as the Ho Chi Minh Trail.

The United Federated Forces of the Symbionese Liberation Army (SLA) was a small, American far-left militant organization active between 1973 and 1975; it claimed to be a vanguard movement. Six members died in a May 1974 shootout with police in Los Angeles. The three surviving fugitives recruited new members, but nearly all of them were apprehended in 1975 and prosecuted.

The Iran hostage crisis began on November 4, 1979, when 66 Americans, including diplomats and other civilian personnel, were taken hostage at the Embassy of the United States in Tehran, with 52 of them being held until January 20, 1981. The incident occurred after the Muslim Student Followers of the Imam's Line stormed and occupied the building in the months following the Iranian Revolution. With support from Ruhollah Khomeini, who had led the Iranian Revolution and would eventually establish the present-day Islamic Republic of Iran, the hostage-takers demanded that the United States extradite Iranian king Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, who had been granted asylum by the Carter administration for cancer treatment. Notable among the assailants were Hossein Dehghan, Mohammad Ali Jafari, and Mohammad Bagheri. The hostage crisis contributed to a dramatic decline in Iran–United States relations. After 444 days, it came to an end with the signing of the Algiers Accords between the Iranian and American governments; Pahlavi had died in Cairo, Egypt, on July 27, 1980.

Antonio Tejero Molina was a Spanish lieutenant colonel of the Guardia Civil. He was the most prominent figure in the failed coup d'état against the newly democratic Spanish government on 23 February 1981 when he stormed the Congress of Deputies with 200 armed Civil Guards. For this reason, he was sentenced to thirty years imprisonment for the crime of consummated military rebellion, with the aggravating circumstance of recidivism; he had previously been arrested for his involvement in the failed coup attempt during Operation Galaxia in 1978.

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is an independent agency of the United States government tasked with environmental protection matters. President Richard Nixon proposed the establishment of EPA on July 9, 1970; it began operation on December 2, 1970, after Nixon signed an executive order. The order establishing the EPA was sent to the House and Senate in accordance with the Reorganization Act of 1949, in which they had 60 days to pass a disapproval resolution or the order would take effect. Congress did not pass a disapproval resolution, and the order establishing the EPA went into effect.

SN 1987A was a Type II supernova in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a dwarf satellite galaxy of the Milky Way. It occurred approximately 51.4 kiloparsecs from Earth and was the closest observed supernova since Kepler's Supernova in 1604. Light and neutrinos from the explosion reached Earth on February 23, 1987, and it was designated "SN 1987A" as the first supernova discovered that year. Its brightness peaked in May of that year, with an apparent magnitude of about 3, brighter than the constellation's brightest star, Alpha Doradus.

The Anfal campaign, also known as the Kurdish genocide, was a counterinsurgency operation, described by many scholars and human rights groups as a genocide or ethnic cleansing, which was carried out by Ba'athist Iraq from February to September 1988 during the Iraqi–Kurdish conflict at the end of the Iran–Iraq War. The campaign targeted rural Kurds because its purpose was to eliminate Kurdish rebel groups and Arabize strategic parts of the Kirkuk Governorate. The Ba'athist regime committed atrocities on the local Kurdish population, mostly civilians. Although primarily targeting Kurds, other non-Arabs also fell victim to the Anfal campaign.

Thailand, officially the Kingdom of Thailand, and formerly known as Siam, is a country located in Mainland Southeast Asia. It shares land borders with Myanmar to the west and northwest, Laos to the east and northeast, Cambodia to the southeast, and Malaysia to the south. Its maritime boundaries include the Gulf of Thailand and the Andaman Sea, and it shares maritime borders with Vietnam, Indonesia, and India. Thailand has a population of nearly 66 million people and covers an area of approximately 513,115 km2. The capital and largest city is Bangkok.

On February 21–23, 1998, a devastating tornado outbreak affected portions of the Southeastern United States, primarily the U.S. state of Florida. It was the deadliest tornado event in Florida history. In all, 15 tornadoes touched down, one of which was particularly long lived and tracked for nearly 40 miles (64 km). Affecting mainly the Interstate 4 (I-4) corridor of Central Florida, including the Greater Orlando area, the tornadoes—among the strongest ever recorded in Florida—produced near-violent damage, killed 42 people, and caused 259 injuries. This outbreak is sometimes referred to as "The Night of the Tornadoes".

Kurds, or the Kurdish people, are an Iranic ethnic group from West Asia. They are indigenous to Kurdistan, which is a geographic region spanning southeastern Turkey, northwestern Iran, northern Iraq, and northeastern Syria. Consisting of 30–45 million people, the global Kurdish population is largely concentrated in Kurdistan, but significant communities of the Kurdish diaspora exist in parts of West Asia beyond Kurdistan and in parts of Europe, most notably including: Turkey's Central Anatolian Kurds, as well as Istanbul Kurds; Iran's Khorasani Kurds; the Caucasian Kurds, primarily in Azerbaijan and Armenia; and the Kurdish populations in various European countries, namely Germany, France, Sweden, and the Netherlands.

An avalanche is a rapid flow of snow down a slope, such as a hill or mountain. Avalanches can be triggered spontaneously, by factors such as increased precipitation or snowpack weakening, or by external means such as humans, other animals, and earthquakes. Primarily composed of flowing snow and air, large avalanches have the capability to capture and move ice, rocks, and trees.

The Ariane 4 was a European expendable launch vehicle, developed by the Centre national d'études spatiales (CNES), the French space agency, for the European Space Agency (ESA). It was manufactured by ArianeGroup and marketed by Arianespace. Since its first flight on 15 June 1988 until the final flight on 15 February 2003, it attained 113 successful launches out of 116 total launches.

The Grayrigg derailment was a fatal railway accident that occurred at approximately 20:15 GMT on Friday 23 February 2007, just to the south of Grayrigg, Cumbria, in the North West England region of the United Kingdom. The accident investigation concluded that the derailment was caused by a faulty set of points on the Down Main running line, controlled from Lambrigg ground frame. The scheduled inspection on 18 February 2007 had not taken place and the faults had gone undetected.

The United States Air Force (USAF) is the air service branch of the United States Armed Forces. It is a part of the United States Department of Defense (DoD) and is one of the six armed forces and one of the eight uniformed services of the United States. Tracing its origins to 1 August 1907, as a part of the United States Army Signal Corps, the Air Force was established by transfer of personnel from the Army Air Forces with the enactment of the National Security Act of 1947. It is the second youngest branch of the United States Armed Forces and the fourth in order of precedence. The United States Air Force articulates its core missions as air supremacy, global integrated intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, rapid global mobility, global strike, and command and control.

WINDS was a Japanese communication satellite.

Diesel fuel, also called diesel oil, fuel oil (historically), or simply diesel, is any liquid fuel specifically designed for use in a diesel engine, a type of internal combustion engine in which fuel ignition takes place as a result of compression of the inlet air and then injection of fuel without a spark. Therefore, diesel fuel needs good compression ignition characteristics.

The Free Syrian Army was a big-tent coalition of decentralized Syrian opposition rebel groups in the Syrian civil war founded on 29 July 2011 by Colonel Riad al-Asaad and six officers who defected from the Syrian Armed Forces. The officers announced that the immediate priority of the Free Syrian Army was to safeguard the lives of protestors and civilians from the deadly crackdown by Bashar al-Assad's security apparatus; with the ultimate goal of accomplishing the objectives of the Syrian revolution, namely, the end to the decades-long reign of the ruling al-Assad family. In late 2011, the FSA was the main Syrian military defectors group. Initially a formal military organization at its founding, its original command structure dissipated by 2016, and the FSA identity was later used by several different Syrian opposition groups.

Parliamentary elections were held in Djibouti on 23 February 2018. The election was boycotted by the main opposition parties, including some of the parties in the Union for National Salvation coalition, which had won 10 seats in the previous elections in 2013.

Atlas Air Flight 3591 was a scheduled domestic cargo flight between Miami International Airport and George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston, operated by Atlas Air on behalf of Amazon Air. On February 23, 2019, the Boeing 767 operating this flight crashed into Trinity Bay during approach into Houston, killing the two crew members and single passenger on board. The accident occurred near Anahuac, Texas, east of Houston, shortly before 12:45 CST (18:45 UTC). This was the first fatal crash of a Boeing 767 freighter, and the first fatal crash involving Amazon Air.

On February 23, 2020, Ahmaud Arbery, a 25-year-old black man, was murdered during a racially motivated hate crime while jogging in Satilla Shores, a neighborhood near Brunswick in Glynn County, Georgia. Three white men, who later claimed to police that they assumed he was a burglar, pursued Arbery in their trucks for several minutes, using the vehicles to block his path as he tried to run away. Two of the men, Travis McMichael and his father, Gregory McMichael, were armed in one vehicle. Their neighbor, William "Roddie" Bryan, was in another vehicle. After overtaking Arbery, Travis exited his truck, pointing his weapon at Arbery. Arbery approached Travis and a physical altercation ensued, resulting in Travis fatally shooting Arbery. Bryan recorded this confrontation and Arbery's murder on his cell phone.

A federal election was held in Germany on 23 February 2025 to elect the 630 members of the 21st Bundestag, down from 736 in 2021 due to reforms in seat distribution. The 2025 election took place seven months ahead of schedule due to the 2024 collapse of the Scholz governing coalition. Following the loss of his majority, the chancellor called and intentionally lost a motion of confidence, which enabled the approval of a new election by the president. The 2025 election was the fourth snap election in post-war German history.