Under Sunday, February 20, the book of history records, among other things:
1437: The Scottish King James I is assassinated by nobles in Perth.
1922: The council of the Polish-occupied city of Wilna (Vilnius), elected under a boycott of the Lithuanians, votes for the union with Poland. Kaunas becomes the provisional capital of Lithuania.
1942: Japanese troops land on the island of Bali, part of the Dutch East Indies.
1947: With its 45th law, the Allied Control Council repeals the hereditary farm laws of National Socialism.
1947: The film “Spuk im Schloß” with Margot Hielscher and Albert Matterstock premieres in Munich.
1962: As the first American to orbit John Glenn jr. Earth in his space capsule “Mercury 6” and after three orbits lands in the Bahamas.
1967: The GDR ordered the Federal Republic of Germany to abolish common German citizenship.
1987: Brazil, the world’s most indebted country with the equivalent of ATS 1,400 billion, will stop paying interest for 90 days.
1992: In Israel, ex-Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin takes over from Labor Party leader Shimon Peres and becomes opposition leader.
2002: After eight years of planning and construction, the “Vulcania Museum” near Clermont-Ferrand, designed by the Austrian architect Hans Hollein, is opened to the public.
2002: The Israeli army shells the besieged headquarters of Palestinian President Yasser Arafat in Ramallah; 16 Palestinians are killed in the occupied West Bank.
2012: After the resignation of German President Christian Wulff, Chancellor and CDU leader Angela Merkel gave up her opposition to a consensus candidacy by former GDR civil rights activist and Protestant pastor Joachim Gauck. This had already been nominated by the SPD and the Greens in 2010 and was defeated by Wulff in the Federal Assembly.
birthdays: Philipp Wilhelm Ritter von Schoeller, Austria. industrialist (1797-1877); Charles-Auguste de Bériot, Belgian violinist (1802-1870); Nicolai Hartmann, German philosopher (1882-1950); Carl Ebert, German opera director/artistic director (1887-1980); Ivan Albright, US painter (1897-1983); Pierre Boulle, French writer (1912-1994); Sidney Poitier, US actor (1927-2022); Ibrahim Ferrer, Cuban. singer (1927-2005); Hubert de Givenchy, French fashion designer (1927-2018); Robert Huber, German biochemist, Nobel Prize 1988 (1937); Nancy Wilson, US jazz musician (1937-2018); Peter Strauss, US actor (1947); Henry Hübchen, German actor (1947); Kurt Cobain, US musician (Nirvana) (1967-1994).
days of death: Balthasar Permoser, German sculptor (1651-1732); Franz Karl Franchy, Austria writer (1896-1972); Gershom Scholem, Jewish historian of religion (according to other sources February 21) (1897-1982); Maria Goeppert-Mayer, German-US physicist; Nobel Prize 1963 (1906-1972).
name days: Leo, Coron, Ulrich, Eleutherius, Amata, Eucharius, Falko, Jordan, Apollonia, Leobard, Wilfrik.