Today In History

Today is Monday, Feb. 13, the 44th day of 2023. There are 327 days left in the year.

TODAY’S HIGHLIGHT IN HISTORY

On Feb. 13, 1935, a jury in Flemington, New Jersey, found Bruno Richard Hauptmann guilty of first-degree murder in the kidnap-slaying of Charles A. Lindbergh Jr., the 20-month-old son of Charles and Anne Lindbergh. (Hauptmann was later executed.)

ON THIS DATE

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1633: Italian astronomer Galileo Galilei arrived in Rome for trial before the Inquisition, accused of defending Copernican theory that the Earth revolved around the sun instead of the other way around. (Galileo was found vehemently suspect of heresy and ended up being sentenced to a form of house arrest.)

› 1933: The Warsaw Convention, governing airlines’ liability for international carriage of persons, luggage and goods, went into effect.

› 1939: Justice Louis D. Brandeis retired from the U.S. Supreme Court. (He was succeeded by William O. Douglas.)

› 1965: During the Vietnam War, President Lyndon B. Johnson authorized Operation Rolling Thunder, an extended bombing campaign against the North Vietnamese.

› 1972: “Cabaret,” directed by Bob Fosse, based on John Kander and Fred Ebb’s musical of the same name, starring Liza Minnelli and Michael York, was released.

› 1980: The 13th Winter Olympics opened in Lake Placid, New York.

› 1991: During Operation Desert Storm, allied warplanes destroyed an underground shelter in Baghdad that had been identified as a military command center; Iraqi officials said 500 civilians were killed.

› 1996: The rock musical “Rent,” by Jonathan Larson, opened off-Broadway less than three weeks after Larson’s death.

› 2000: Charles Schulz’s final “Peanuts” strip ran in Sunday newspapers, the day after the cartoonist died in his sleep at his California home at age 77.

› 2002: John Walker Lindh pleaded not guilty in federal court in Alexandria, Virginia, to conspiring to kill Americans and supporting the Taliban and terrorist organizations. (Lindh later pleaded guilty to lesser offenses and was sentenced to 20 years in prison. He was released in September 2019 after serving 17 years of that sentence.)

› 2011: Egypt’s military leaders dissolved parliament, suspended the constitution and promised elections in moves cautiously welcomed by protesters who’d helped topple President Hosni Mubarak.

› 2016: Justice Antonin Scalia, the influential conservative and most provocative member of the U.S. Supreme Court, was found dead at a private residence in the Big Bend area of West Texas; he was 79.

TODAY’S BIRTHDAYS

Actor Kim Novak is 90. Actor Bo Svenson is 82. Actor Stockard Channing is 79. Talk show host Jerry Springer is 79. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., is 77. Singer Peter Gabriel is 73. Actor David Naughton is 72. Rock musician Peter Hook is 67. Actor Matt Salinger is 63. Singer Henry Rollins is 62. Actor Neal McDonough is 57. Singer Freedom Williams is 57. Actor Kelly Hu is 55. Rock singer Matt Berninger (The National) is 52. Country musician Scott Thomas (Parmalee) is 50. Singer Robbie Williams is 49. Singer-songwriter Feist is 47. R&B performer Natalie Stewart is 44. Actor Mena Suvari is 44. Actor Katie Volding is 34. Michael Joseph Jackson Jr. (also known as Prince Michael Jackson I) is 26.