On This Day:
Friday February 28, 2014 This is the 59th day of the year, with 306 days remaining in 2014. Fact of the Day: bats A bat is any member of the order Chiroptera, the only mammal to have evolved true, sustained flight. Their flying ability and system of acoustic orientation (bat sonar) have allowed the many species of bat to flourish; about 1,000 are currently recognized, belonging to some 174 genera, and a single species can number in the hundreds of millions of individuals at the very least. These nocturnal mouselike quadrupeds have fingers extended to support a thin membrane which stretches from the side of the neck to the tail, forming a kind of wing with which they fly in a peculiar quivering motion. The word may be related to Latin blatta "an insect that shuns the light." Bats live in roosts and a group of bats is called a colony. A brown bat can eat up to 1,000 mosquitoes in an hour, while the bumblebee bat of Thailand is one of the world's smallest mammals, weighing about two grams.
Holidays Feast day of St. Oswald of Worcester, St. Lupicinus, St. Hilarius, pope, St. Proterius, and St. Romanus.
Finland: Kalevala Day.
Events 1066 - Westminster Abbey, the most famous church in England, opened.
1827 - The first U.S. railroad chartered to carry passengers and freight, the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company, was incorporated.
1854 - A new political party was organized -- the Republican party -- in Wisconsin.
1861 - The Territory of Colorado was organized.
1912 - The first parachute jump was made, over Missouri.
1916 - Haiti became the first U.S. protectorate.
1940 - The first televised basketball game was shown, from Madison Square Garden in New York.
1993 - A gun battle erupted at a compound near Waco, Texas, when Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms agents tried to serve warrants on the cult called the Branch Davidians; a 51-day standoff began.
1994 - In the first military action in the 45-year history of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), U.S. fighter planes shot down four Serbian warplanes engaged in a bombing mission in violation of Bosnia's no-fly zone.
1996 - The Diana, princess of Wales consented to a divorce from Prince Charles.
2002 - At least 55 are killed in Ahmadabad, India when Hindus burn Muslim homes.
2005 - A suicide bombing at a police recruiting center in Al Hillah, Iraq kills 127.
Births 1894 - Ben Hecht, American novelist, playwright, scriptwriter.
1901 - Linus Pauling, American Nobel Peace Prize winner (1962), Nobel Prize for chemistry (1954).
1906 - Bugsy Siegel, American gangster, who was behind large-scale development of Las Vegas.
1926 - Svetlana Alliluyeva, Soviet defector, daughter of Joseph Stalin.
1940 - Mario Andretti, Italian-born American race car driver.
1942 - Brian Jones, founding member in the English rock group, The Rolling Stones.
1955 - Gilbert Gottfried, a stand-up comedian born in Brooklyn, New York.
Deaths 1963 - Rajendra Prasad, first President of India.
1967 - Henry R. Luce, American magazine publisher.
1977 - Eddie "Rochester" Anderson, American comic television actor.
1989 - Richard Armour, American poet and author.
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