TODAY IN HISTORY

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT

Feb. 20, 1942

Lt. Edward “Butch” O’Hare became the U.S. Navy’s first flying ace of World War II by shooting down five Japanese bombers while defending the aircraft carrier USS Lexington in the South Pacific. (O’Hare, a recipient of the Medal of Honor, was killed in action in 1943; Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport is named for him.)

ALSO ON THIS DATE 1792

President George Washington signed an act creating the United States Post Office Department.

1862

William Wallace Lincoln, the 11-year-old son of President Abraham Lincoln and first lady Mary Todd Lincoln, died at the White House, apparently of typhoid fever.

1907

President Theodore Roosevelt signed an immigration act which excluded “idiots, imbeciles, feebleminded persons, epileptics, insane persons” from being admitted to the United States.

1962

Astronaut John Glenn became the first American to orbit the Earth as he flew aboard Project Mercury’s Friendship 7 spacecraft.