Today in history
On Feb. 7, 1497, “The Bonfire of the Vanities” took place in Florence, Italy, as followers of Dominican friar Girolama Savonarola burned a huge pile of items considered to be sinful distractions, such as books, artwork, fine clothing and cosmetics.
In 1795 the 11th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution, dealing with states’ sovereign immunity, was ratified.
In 1812 author Charles Dickens was born in Portsmouth, England.
In 1804 John Deere, the inventor and manufacturer of farming implements, was born in Rutland, Vt.
In 1857 a French court acquitted author Gustave Flaubert of obscenity for his serialized novel “Madame Bovary.”
In 1861 the general council of the Choctaw Indian nation adopted a resolution declaring allegiance with the South “in the event a permanent dissolution of the American Union takes place.”
In 1870 pioneering psychiatrist Alfred Adler was born in Austria.
In 1885 author Sinclair Lewis was born in Sauk Centre, Minn.
In 1936 President Franklin D. Roosevelt authorized a flag for the office of the vice president.
In 1943 the government announced the start of shoe rationing, limiting consumers to buying three pairs per person for the remainder of the year.
In 1944 during World War II, the Germans launched a counteroffensive at Anzio, Italy.
In 1948 Gen. Dwight Eisenhower resigned as Army chief of staff and was succeeded by Gen. Omar Bradley. In 1962 President John F. Kennedy imposed a full trade embargo on Cuba.
In 1964 the Beatles began their first American tour as they arrived at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport.
In 1971 women in Switzerland won the right to vote.
In 1983 Elizabeth Dole was sworn in as the first female secretary of transportation by the first woman to sit on the U.S. Supreme Court, Justice Sandra Day O’Connor.
In 1984 space shuttle astronauts Bruce McCandless II and Robert Stewart went on the first untethered space walk. Also in 1984 a 12year-old boy publicly identified only as David, born without immunity to disease, touched his mother for the first time after he was removed from a germfree “bubble” at Texas Children’s Hospital in Houston.
In 1986 Haitian Presidentfor-Life Jean-Claude Duvalier fled his country, ending 28 years of his family’s rule.
In 1990 the Soviet Union’s Communist Party agreed to let other political parties compete for control of the country, giving up its monopoly on power.
In 1991 Jean-Bertrand Aristide was sworn in as Haiti’s first democratically elected president.
In 1998 the Winter Olympics opened in Nagano, Japan.
In 2000, with an astonishing comeback to win the Pebble Beach National ProAm, Tiger Woods gained his sixth straight PGA Tour victory, becoming the first player since Ben Hogan in 1948 to win six in a row.
In 2001 the Senate voted to release $582 million in dues owed the United Nations. Also in 2001 singer-actress Dale Evans died in Apple Valley, Calif.; she was 88.