On This Day - 26th February

1802 - Victor Hugo born
1829 - Levi Strauss born
1846 - William "Buffalo Bill" Cody born
1887 - William Frawley born
1906 - Madeleine Carroll born
1916 - Jackie Gleason born
1920 - Tony Randall born
1921 - Betty Hutton born
1922 - Margaret Leighton born
1928 - Fats Domino born
1932 - Johnny Cash born
1953 - Michael Bolton born
1964 - Mark Dacascos born
1968 - Twenty-one female patients die in a fire which sweeps through a wing of the Shelton Mental Hospital near Shrewsbury.
1972 - Erykah Badu born
1984 - The last of the remaining American forces occupying Beirut have pulled out of the Lebanese capital.
1987 - The Church of England's General Synod votes by a huge majority in favour of the ordination of women priests.
1991 - The Kuwaiti capital is liberated by the Gulf War Allies after 208 days of Iraqi occupation.

1993 - A suspected car bomb explodes underneath the World Trade Center in New York killing at least five people.
2000 - Former British spy David Shayler is being sued by the government for breach of confidence and contract over information leaked to a newspaper.
2011 - Former Bradford, Wolves, Southampton and Tottenham defender Dean Richards dies age 36 after a long illness.

On This Day - 25th February

1841 - Pierre Auguste Renoir born
1868 - Benjamin Disraeli becomes British Prime Miinster
1901 - Zeppo Marx born
1904 - Adelle Davis born
1931 - Hitler is granted German citizenship
1935 - Sally Jessy Raphael born
1937 - Tom Courtenay born
1943 - George Harrison born
1956 - In a sensational speech to the Communist Party, the Soviet President denounces Joseph Stalin as a brutal despot.
1964 - Cassius Clay, 22, is crowned heavyweight boxing world champion after a shock win over Sonny Liston.
1971 - Sean Astin born
1972 - Miners vote overwhelmingly in favour of a pay settlement after a seven-week strike that has seriously affected power supply.
1973 - Justin Jeffre born
1982 - The European Court of Human Rights rules corporal punishment in Britain's schools is a violation of the Human Rights Convention.
1986 - The new Philippines president Corazon Aquino is sworn in today, bringing to an end 20 years of dictatorship under Ferdinand Marcos.
1991 - After 17 years in prison, the Birmingham Six may soon be released after government law officers say their convictions cannot be considered safe.
1994 - A Jewish doctor opens fire on Palestinians praying at a mosque in Hebron, killing up to 30 people.

On This Day - 24th February

1873 - Enrico Caruso born
1885 - Chester W. Nimitz born
1921 - Abe Vigoda born
1932 - Michel Legrand born
1938 - James Farentino born
1942 - Joe Lieberman born
1947 - Edward James Olmos born
1950 - Clement Attlee returns as prime minister of Britain but with a single-figure majority.
1955 - Alain Prost and Steven Jobs born, also deep snow and freezing temperatures continue to cause havoc across much of Britain.
1956 - Eddie Murray born
1965 - Kristin Davis born
1966 - Billy Zane born
1968 - The South Vietnamese celebrate the recapture of the country's third city, Hue, after a battle lasting three weeks.
1971 - Commonwealth citizens lose their automatic right to remain in the UK under the government's new Immigration Bill.
1981 - The Prince of Wales and the Lady Diana Spencer end months of speculation by announcing they are to wed this summer.
1999 - London's police force is "institutionally racist" says a report on the murder of black teenager Stephen Lawrence.
2011 - The space shuttle Discovery, the world's most travelled spaceship, has thunders into orbit for the final time, four months behind schedule.

On This Day - 23rd February

1685 - George Frederic Handel born
1821 - Poet John Keats dies
1868 - W.E.B. DuBois born
1933 - Donna J. Stone born
1934 - Edward Elgar dies
1939 - Peter Fonda born
1944 - Johnny Winter and Sandford born
1945 - The 28th Regiment of the 5th Marines take Mount Suribachi as the battle for control of Japanese-held Iwo Jima rages on.
1951 - Patricia Richardson born
1955 - Howard Jones born
1959 - On his ten-day visit to the Soviet Union, the British Prime Minister forges cultural and trade links between East and West.
1963 - Peter Hicks, a farmer who electrified his car to ward off traffic wardens in London's Covent Garden may be able to evade the law.
1972 - Palestinian hijackers who took over a Lufthansa jet two days ago release the crew at an airfield in the Yemen.
1980 - Tommy McCarthy born
1981 - Soldiers and members of the Civil Guard storm the Spanish Parliament threatening the fledgling democracy, once ruled by dictator General Franco.

On This Day - 22nd February

1732 - George Washington born
1810 - Frederic Chopin born
1857 - Lord Baden-Powell born
1889 - Lady Baden-Powell born
1900 - Luis Buñuel born
1907 - Sheldon Leonard and Robert Young born
1908 - John Mills born
1918 - Robert Wadlow born
1932 - Edward M. Kennedy born
1946 - Dan Millman born
1950 - Julius "Dr. J" Erving born
1955 - Maureen Connolly 'Little Mo', one of America's greatest tennis players, is to retire from the sport after a horse-riding accident.
1962 - Steve Irwin born
1963 - Vijay Singh born
1968 - Brad Nowell and Jeri Ryan born
1971 - Lea Salonga born
1972 - Five women and an army priest are killed in an IRA bomb attack on army premises at the Aldershot Barracks in Hampshire and Michael Chang born
1974 - Fighting breaks out around food distribution points in California as newspaper tycoon Randolph Hearst pays a $2 million ransom for his kidnapped daughter Patty.
1975 - Drew Barrymore born
1978 - Jen Frost born
1986 - Two senior members of the government take refuge in the defence ministry building after demanding President Marcos step down following controversial elections.
1991 - The US President, George Bush, gives Iraq until 1700 GMT tomorrow to pull out of Kuwait or face the full force of the allies.
1997 - A sheep named Dolly is cloned by scientists in Edinburgh and is being hailed as one of the most significant breakthroughs of the decade.

2011 - At least 100 people are killed when an earthquake hits the city of Christchurch on New Zealand's South Island

On This Day - 21st February

1893 - Andres Segovia born
1903 - Anans Nin born
1925 - Sam Peckinpah born
1927 - Erma Bombeck born
1929 - Roberto Gomez Bolaños born
1933 - Nina Simone born
1935 - Rue McClanahan born
1936 - Barbara Jordan born
1943 - David Geffen born
1946 - Tyne Daly and Alan Rickman born
1955 - Kelsey Grammer born
1958 - Alan Trammell born

1965 - Controversial black leader Malcolm X, who once called for a "blacks-only" state in the US, has been assassinated.
1972 - US President Richard Nixon arrives in China at the start of a week-long summit aimed at ending 20 years of frosty relations between the two countries.
1979 - Jennifer Love Hewitt born
1986 - Charlotte Church born
1988 - Jimmy Swaggart, America's leading television evangelist, resigns from his ministry after revelations he had been consorting with a prostitute.
1997 - Three men jailed 18 years ago for the murder of 13-year-old paper boy Carl Bridgewater are released after their convictions are ruled unsafe.
2001 - The European Commission bans all British milk, meat and livestock exports following the UK's first outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease for two decades.

On This Day - 20th February

1902 - Ansel Adams born
1924 - Sidney Poitier and Gloria Vanderbilt born
1925 - Robert Altman born
1934 - Bobby Unser born
1937 - Nancy Wilson born
1941 - Buffy Sainte-Marie born
1946 - Sandy Duncan born
1948 - Jennifer O'Neill born
1949 - Ivana Trump born
1954 - Patty Hearst born
1958 - The government announces one the oldest naval dockyards in the UK will be shut down.
1962 - John Glenn becomes the first American astornaut to orbit the earth
1963 - Charles Barkley born
1964 - French Stewart born
1966 - Cindy Crawford born
1967 - Kurt Cobain and Andrew Shue born
1975 - Brian Littrell born
1983 - Hundreds of people are reported to have died in Assam as fierce fighting rages in the run-up to Indian elections.
1986 - The Soviets open a new phase in space exploration with the launch of the world's biggest space station, Mir.
1989 - Police are hunting two IRA bombers who attacked an army barracks at Tern Hill in Shropshire.
1993 - Two 10-year-old boys are charged with the abduction and murder of two-year-old James Bulger in Liverpool.