This Week In History: February 23 – 29

From the first impeachment trial of a U.S. president to the discovery of neutron stars, here are 15 things that happened this week in history.

Illustration of president Andrew Johnson’s impeachment trial, from the political journal “Harper’s Weekly”, April 11, 1868. The House voted to try Johnson for high crimes & misdemeanors on February 24, 1868.

By Emilee Arnold, Reporter
February 29, 2020

February 23

  • 1846: The Liberty Bell in Pennsylvania cracks down the side while being rung for George Washington’s birthday. The bell had been repaired several times before for breaks, but this break was never repaired and the bell has not been rung since.
  • 1920: Pediatrician Louise Reiss is born. Reiss would become known for uncovering high levels of radioactive material in the teeth of children born during wartime nuclear testing–fifty times the amount of Strontium-90 that kids born before the war had–which led to regulations on nuclear weapons testing in the United States.
  • 1945: The iconic Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima photo is taken. The flag was raised by U.S. soldiers on Mount Suribachi, a mountain on the strategic Pacific island of Iwo Jima, 75 years ago from last Sunday.
Raising the Flag on Iwo Jima by Joe Rosenthal, February 23, 1945.

February 24

  • 1821: Mexican rebels and royalists form the Plan of Iguala during the final stages of the Mexican War for Independence. The Plan of Iguala was a foundation for the Treaty of Córdoba, which attempted to declare independence from Spain in August of the same year. Mexico’s eventual breaking free from the Spanish crown came after a decade-long war and 300 years of Spanish colonial rule.
  • 1868: The impeachment of Andrew Johnson begins. Johnson was the first U.S. president to be impeached. Throughout U.S. history, a total of three presidents have been formally impeached.
  • 1917: The United States intercepts the “Zimmerman Telegram”, a telegram from Germany to Mexico asking for Mexico to conduct an attack on the U.S. on behalf of Germans during WWI. 

February 25

  • 1870: Hiram Rhodes Revels is the first African-American to be sworn in as a U.S. congressman.

    Hiram Rhodes Revel, first African-American congressman
  • 1964: Muhammad Ali wins the heavyweight boxing World Title against Sonny Liston.

February 26

  • 1616: Galileo is banned by the Catholic Church for promoting the idea that the earth orbits the sun.
  • 1933: Construction first begins on San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge.
Construction of the Golden Gate Bridge

February 27

  • 1940: Carbon-14 is discovered. Its long half-life has since allowed archaeologists to accurately determine the age of artifacts as old as 50,000 years old through radiocarbon dating.
  • 1951: The 22nd Amendment is ratified, limiting the presidency for any one U.S. president to two terms. Franklin D. Roosevelt was the only president in United States history to serve more than two terms.

February 28

  • 1953: Watson and Crick announce the discovery of the double-helix structure of DNA. The team received the Nobel Prize for this, but their credit for the “discovery” of the structure is debatable, as they used a number of existing resources–most notably “Photo 51”, a picture of X-ray diffraction patterns taken by a student under the supervision of Rosalind Franklin–without the permission of Franklin or other researchers.
“Photo 51”, a photo that was crucial in understanding the double-helix structure of DNA.

February 29

  • 1940: Hattie McDaniel is the first African-American to receive an Oscar for her role in Gone With the Wind.
  • 1968: Irish astrophysicist Jocelyn Burnell publicly announces the discovery of the first pulsar. Pulsars are a type of rotating neutron star that emit radiation in beams, causing astronomical equipment to register the radiation in a “pulsating” pattern. Since then, over 1,500 pulsars have been discovered in space.