February 17 in Pop Culture History

February 17th History, Trivia, and Fun Facts

February 17th History Highlights

  • 1865 – Columbia, South Carolina surrendered to General Sherman’s Union forces. Fort Sumpter was also returned to Union control.
  • 1897 – The National Parent Teacher Association was formed.
  • 1929 – The League of Latin American Citizens (LULAC) was founded.
  • February 17, 1936 – The Phantom, Comic Strip debuted.
  • If you were born on February 17th,
    You were likely conceived the week of… May 27th (prior year)

Now You Know…

Sonicare did a poll about toothbrushes in 2007. They found out that 54% of Americans would use the toothbrush after it fell on the floor.

9% said they would use it after it fell in a toilet.

February 17th is…

Café au Lait Day (Coffee with Milk Day)
Human Spirit Day
National Cabbage Day
Public Science Day
Random Acts of Kindness Day

February 17th Birthday Quotes

“Some people want it to happen, some wish it would happen, others make it happen.”
– Michael Jordan

“If you listen to the fans, you’ll be sitting up there with them.”
– Buddy Ryan

“If you’re going to put yourself above everybody else, you might end up alone.”
– Joseph Gordon-Levitt

“Whenever you have a tight situation and there’s a close pitch, the umpire gets a squawk no matter how he calls it.”
– Walter ‘Red’ Barber

“My fear was not of death itself, but a death without meaning.”
– Huey P. Newton

“I think it will be found that experience, the true source and foundation of all knowledge, invariably confirms its truth.”
– Thomas Malthus

“The way I see it, you should live every day like it’s your birthday.”
– Paris Hilton

“There are always two or three or four sides to every story.”
– Denise Richards

February 17th Birthdays

1766 – Thomas Malthus, English demographer (died in 1834)
1843 – Aaron Montgomery Ward, American businessman, founded Montgomery Ward (died in 1913)
1881 – Mary Carson Breckinridge, American nurse-midwife, founded Frontier Nursing Service (died in 1965)
1888 – Otto Stern, German-American physicist and academic, Nobel Prize laureate (died in 1969)
1908 – Walter ‘Red’ Barber, American sportscaster (died in 1992)
1908 – Buster Crabbe, American Olympian and actor (died in 1983)
1920 – Annie Glenn (Castor), American disability and communication disorder advocate
1920 – Curt Swan, comic book illustrator (died in 1996)
1922 – Tommy Edwards, American R&B singer-songwriter (died in 1969)
1925 – Hal Holbrook, American actor
1931 – (James David) Buddy Ryan, American football coach (died in 2016)
1934 – Barry Humphries (Dame Edna Everage), Australian comedic actor
1937 – Mary Ann Mobley, American model and actress, Miss America 1959 (died in 2014)
1940 – Gene Pitney, American singer-songwriter (died in 2006)
1942 – Huey P. Newton, American activist, co-founded the Black Panther Party (died in 1989)
1957 – Loreena McKennitt, Canadian singer-songwriter
1962 – Lou Diamond Phillips, American actor
1963 – Michael Jordan, American basketball player
1963 – Larry the Cable Guy (Daniel Whitney), American comedian
1965 – Michael Bay, American director and producer
1971 – Denise Richards, American model and actress
1972 – Billie Joe Armstrong, American singer-songwriter
1974 – Jerry O’Connell, American actor
1981 – Joseph Gordon-Levitt, American actor, director, and producer
1981 – Paris Hilton, American model, media personality
1983 – Kevin Rudolf, American singer-songwriter
1991 – Ed Sheeran, English singer-songwriter

February 17th History

1600 – Giordano Bruno, an early ‘Free Thinker‘ born in 1548, was burned at the stake.

1621 – Myles Standish was appointed as the first commander of the English Plymouth Colony in North America.

1859 – Dmitri Mendeleev began creating what we now call The Periodic Table.

1863 – A group of citizens of Geneva, Switzerland, founded an International Committee for Relief to the Wounded, which later became known as the International Committee of the Red Cross.

1904 – Giacomo Puccini’s opera Madame Butterfly premiered at the La Scala theatre in Milan, Italy. It was one of the first worldwide pop culture event ‘hits’.

1933 – The magazine Newsweek was published for the first time. Newsweek ceased print publication with the December 31, 2012 issue.

1933 – Blondie Boopadoop married Dagwood Bumstead in Chic Young’s popular comic strip, Blondie.

February 17, 1936 – The Phantom, Comic Strip

1953 – Bwana Devil, an early 3D movie, was released in theaters.

1958 – Pope Pius XII designated St. Clare of Assisi the patron saint of television.

1959 – Vanguard 2 – The first weather satellite, was launched to measure cloud-cover distribution.

1965 – Joan Rivers made her first guest appearances on The Tonight Show starring Johnny Carson.

1968 – The Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame opened in Springfield, MA

1972 – With the 15,007,034th Volkswagen Beetle coming off the assembly line, the VW Beetle broke the world car production record held for more than four decades by the Ford Motor Company’s Model T, which was in production from 1908 and 1927.

1979 – A Prairie Home Companion premiered on Minnesota Public Radio.

1995 – Colin Ferguson was convicted of the 1993 Long Island Rail Road shootings and received a 200+ year sentence to jail

1996 – In the final game of a six-game match, world chess champion Garry Kasparov defeated Deep Blue, IBM’s chess-playing computer, and won the match, 4-2. But in 1997, Deep Blue defeated Kasparov in a rematch.

2001 – #1 Hit February 17, 2001 – February 23, 2001: Outkast – Ms. Jackson

2009 – 368 US Television stations permanently shut off their analog transmission signals, becoming digital.

February 17, 2012 – Radio Rebel aired on The Disney Channel

Today’s Random Trivia and Shower Thoughts

Tom and Jerry were originally called Jasper And Jinx.

“The rest of you can kiss my ass” – James Allen Red Dog (said after apologizing to his family before lethal injection in Delaware) #LastWords #Delaware

The Capital of Uzbekistan is Tashkent

I just realized Miss Piggy is a plus-sized pig who craves attention. AKA a “huge ham”.

A Bible was printed with a typo in 1631, which told Christians to commit adultery… It was known as the ‘Wicked Bible’.

A group of Dolphins is called a Pod.

101 Dalmatians, Peter Pan, Lady, and the Tramp, and Mulan are among the only Disney cartoons where both parents are present and don’t die throughout the movie.

If you like to take photos for the sake of memorization, take photos of things you see every day once in a while. #SmellTheRoses

Whoopi Goldberg – Real Name: Caryn Johnson

Isaac Newton, who revolutionized mathematics and physics, spent almost as much time writing about and studying alchemy, and firmly believed in its viability as a science.

“Seize the day, boys. Make your lives extraordinary.” – John Keating (Robin Williams) #moviequotes

The lint that collects in the bottom of your pockets has a name, ‘gnurr’.

You’ve probably never heard the number 4,138,352,490 said or used in any way, as well as nearly all other numbers.

“It’s not the load that breaks you down, it’s the way you carry it.” – Lena Horne

The Internet is MUCH more powerful than the pen or the sword. AND, it’s irrational.

Phony Bologna REALLY shouldn’t rhyme.

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