It’s Monday, Feb. 18, the 49th day of 2019. There are 316 days left in the year.
Highlight: In 2001, auto racing star Dale Earnhardt Sr. died in a crash at the Daytona 500; he was 49.
In 1546, Martin Luther, leader of the Protestant Reformation in Germany, died in Eisleben.
In 1861, Jefferson Davis was sworn in as provisional president of the Confederate States of America in Montgomery, Alabama.
In 1913, Mexican President Francisco I. Madero and Vice President Jose Maria Pino Suarez were arrested during a military coup (both were shot to death
Feb. 22).
In 1930, photographic evidence of Pluto was discovered by Clyde Tombaugh at Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona.
In 1943, Madame Chiang Kai-shek, wife of the Chinese leader, addressed members of the Senate and then the House, becoming the first Chinese national to address both houses of the U.S. Congress.
In 1970, the “Chicago Seven” defendants were found not guilty of conspiring to incite riots at the 1968 Democratic national convention; five were convicted of violating the Anti-Riot Act of 1968 (those convictions were later reversed).
In 1977, the space shuttle prototype Enterprise, sitting atop a Boeing 747, went on its debut “flight” above Edwards Air Force Base in California.
In 1983, 13 people were shot to death at a gambling club in Seattle’s Chinatown in what became known as the Wah Mee Massacre.
In 1988, Anthony Kennedy was sworn in as an associate justice of the U.S. Supreme Court. eb. 22).
In 1997, astronauts on the space shuttle Discovery completed their tune-up of the Hubble Space Telescope after 33 hours of spacewalking.
In 2003, an arson attack involving two South Korean subway trains in the city of Daegu claimed 198 lives (the arsonist was sentenced to life in prison.)
