This Day In History for February 15

1898, the U.S. battleship Maine mysteriously blew up in Havana Harbor, killing more than 260 crew members and bringing the United States closer to war with Spain.


On this date:

In 1710, King Louis XV of France was born.

In 1764, the city of St. Louis was established by Pierre Laclede and Auguste Chouteau.

In 1820, American suffragist Susan B. Anthony was born in Adams, Mass.

In 1879, President Rutherford B. Hayes signed a bill allowing female attorneys to argue cases before the Supreme Court.

In 1933, President-elect Franklin D. Roosevelt escaped an assassination attempt in Miami that mortally wounded Chicago Mayor Anton J. Cermak; gunman Giuseppe Zangara was executed more than four weeks later.

In 1942, the British colony Singapore surrendered to the Japanese during World War II.

In 1944, Allied bombers destroyed the monastery atop Monte Cassino (MAWN'-tay kah-SEE'-noh) in Italy.

In 1961, 73 people, including an 18-member U.S. figure skating team en route to Czechoslovakia, were killed in the crash of a Sabena Airlines Boeing 707 in Belgium.

In 1965, Canada's new maple-leaf flag was unfurled in ceremonies in Ottawa.

In 1989, the Soviet Union announced that the last of its troops had left Afghanistan, after more than nine years of military intervention.