History for February 28

History for February 28 - On-This-Day.com:
Mary Lyon 1797 - Educator, founder of Mount Holyoke Seminary (later Mt. Holyoke College), Sir John Tenniel 1820 - Cartoonist, illustrator, Ben Hecht 1894 - Novelist, scriptwriter, playwright


Linus Pauling 1901 - Nobel prize for chemistry in 1954, Nobel peace prize winner in 1962, Earl Scheib 1907, Milton Caniff 1907 - Cartoonist


1885 - AT&T (American Telephone and Telegraph) was incorporated. The company was capitalized on only $100,000 and provided long distance service for American Bell.

1940 - The first televised basketball game was shown. The game featured Fordham University and the University of Pittsburgh from Madison Square Gardens in New York.


1951 - A Senate committee issued a report that stated that there were at least two major crime syndicates in the U.S.


1953 - In a Cambridge University laboratory, scientists James D. Watson and Francis H.C. Crick discovered the double-helix structure of DNA.


  1979 - Mr. Ed, the talking horse from the TV show "Mr. Ed", died.


1983 - "M*A*S*H" became the most watched television program in history when the final episode aired.


1993 - U.S. Federal agents raided the compound of an armed religious cult in Waco, TX. The ATF had planned to arrest the leader of the Branch Davidians, David Koresh, on federal firearms charges. Four agents and six Davidians were killed and a 51-day standoff followed.


2013 - Benedict XVI resigned as pope. He was the first pope to resign since Gregory XII in 1415 and the first to resign voluntarily since Celestine V in 1294.