February 9
Events
Pre-1600
- 474 - Zeno is crowned as co-emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire
- 1003 - Boleslaus III is restored to authority with armed support from Bolesław I the Brave of Poland.
- 1098 - A First Crusade army led by Bohemond of Taranto wins a major battle against the Seljuq emir Ridwan of Aleppo during the siege of Antioch.
- 1539 - The first recorded race is held on Chester Racecourse, known as the Roodee.
- 1555 - Bishop of Gloucester John Hooper is burned at the stake.
1601–1900
- 1621 - Gregory XV becomes Pope, the last Pope elected by acclamation.
- 1654 - The Capture of Fort Rocher takes place during the Anglo-Spanish War.
- 1775 - American Revolutionary War: The British Parliament declares Massachusetts in rebellion.
- 1778 - Rhode Island becomes the fourth US state to ratify the Articles of Confederation.
- 1822 - Haiti attacks the newly established Dominican Republic on the other side of the island of Hispaniola.
- 1825 - After no candidate receives a majority of electoral votes in the US presidential election of 1824, the United States House of Representatives elects John Quincy Adams as sixth President of the United States in a contingent election.
- 1849 - The new Roman Republic is declared.
- 1861 - American Civil War: Jefferson Davis is elected the Provisional President of the Confederate States of America by the Provisional Confederate Congress at Montgomery, Alabama
- 1870 - US president Ulysses S. Grant signs a joint resolution of Congress establishing the U.S. Weather Bureau.
- 1889 - US president Grover Cleveland signs a bill elevating the United States Department of Agriculture to a Cabinet-level agency.
- 1893 - Verdi's last opera, Falstaff premieres at La Scala, Milan.
- 1895 - William G. Morgan creates a game called Mintonette, which soon comes to be referred to as volleyball.
- 1900 - The Davis Cup competition is established.
1901–present
- 1904 - Russo-Japanese War: Battle of Port Arthur concludes.
- 1907 - The Mud March is the first large procession organised by the National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies.
- 1913 - A group of meteors is visible across much of the eastern seaboard of the Americas, leading astronomers to conclude the source had been a small, short-lived natural satellite of the Earth.
- 1920 - Under the terms of the Svalbard Treaty, international diplomacy recognizes Norwegian sovereignty over Arctic archipelago Svalbard, and designates it as demilitarized.
- 1922 - Brazil becomes a member of the Berne Convention copyright treaty.
- 1929 - Members of the Việt Nam Quốc Dân Đảng assassinate the labor recruiter Bazin, prompting a crackdown by French colonial authorities.
- 1932 - Prohibition law is abolished in Finland after a national referendum, where 70% voted for a repeal of the law.
- 1934 - The Balkan Entente is formed between Greece, Romania, Yugoslavia, and Turkey.
- 1941 - World War II: Bombing of Genoa: The Cathedral of San Lorenzo in Genoa, Italy, is struck by a bomb which fails to detonate.
- 1942 - Year-round Daylight saving time is reinstated in the United States as a wartime measure to help conserve energy resources.
- 1943 - World War II: Pacific War: Allied authorities declare Guadalcanal secure after Imperial Japan evacuates its remaining forces from the island, ending the Battle of Guadalcanal.
- 1945 - World War II: Battle of the Atlantic: sinks U-864 off the coast of Fedje, Norway, in a rare instance of submarine-to-submarine combat.
- 1945 - World War II: A force of Allied aircraft unsuccessfully attack a German destroyer in Førdefjorden, Norway.
- 1950 - Second Red Scare: US Senator Joseph McCarthy accuses the United States Department of State of being filled with Communists.
- 1951 - Korean War: The two-day Geochang massacre begins as a battalion of the 11th Division of the South Korean Army kills 719 unarmed citizens in Geochang, in the South Gyeongsang district of South Korea.
- 1959 - The R-7 Semyorka, the first intercontinental ballistic missile, becomes operational at Plesetsk, USSR.
- 1961 - The Beatles at the Cavern Club: Lunchtime - The Beatles perform under this name at The Cavern Club for the first time following their return to Liverpool from Hamburg.
- 1964 - The Beatles make their first appearance on The Ed Sullivan Show, performing before a record-setting audience of 73 million viewers across the United States.
- 1965 - Vietnam War: The United States Marine Corps sends a MIM-23 Hawk missile battalion to South Vietnam, the first American troops in-country without an official advisory or training mission.
- 1971 - The 6.5–6.7 Sylmar earthquake hits the Greater Los Angeles Area with a maximum Mercalli intensity of XI, killing 64 and injuring 2,000.
- 1971 - Satchel Paige becomes the first Negro league player to be voted into the USA's Baseball Hall of Fame.
- 1971 - Apollo program: Apollo 14 returns to Earth after the third human Moon landing.
- 1975 - The Soyuz 17 Soviet spacecraft returns to Earth.
- 1976 - Aeroflot Flight 3739, a Tupolev Tu-104, crashes during takeoff from Irkutsk Airport, killing 24.
- 1978 - The Budd Company unveils its first SPV-2000 self-propelled railcar in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
- 1982 - Japan Air Lines Flight 350 crashes near Haneda Airport in an attempted pilot mass murder-suicide, killing 24 of the 174 people on board.
- 1986 - Halley's Comet last appeared in the inner Solar System.
- 1987 - Civil unrest broke out across Palestine.
- 1991 - Dissolution of the Soviet Union: Voters in Lithuania vote for independence from the Soviet Union.
- 1996 - The Provisional Irish Republican Army declares the end to its 18-month ceasefire and explodes a large bomb in London's Canary Wharf, killing two people.
- 1996 - Copernicium is discovered by Sigurd Hofmann, Victor Ninov et al.
- 2001 - The Ehime Maru and USS Greeneville collision takes place, killing nine of the thirty-five people on board the Japanese fishery high-school training ship Ehime Maru, leaving the USS Greeneville with US $2 million in repairs, at Pearl Harbor.
- 2016 - Two passenger trains collide in the German town of Bad Aibling in the state of Bavaria. Twelve people die and 85 others are injured.
- 2018 - Winter Olympics: Opening ceremony is performed in Pyeongchang County in South Korea.
- 2020 - Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele has the army soldiers enter the Legislative Assembly to assist in pushing for the approval for a better government security plan, causing a brief political crisis.
- 2021 - Second impeachment trial of Donald Trump begins.
- 2025 - The Baltic states synchronize their electric power transmission infrastructure with the Continental Europe Synchronous Area, in objective to disconnect from the Russo-Belarussian agreement to use the IPS/UPS system.
Births
Pre-1600
- 1060 - Honorius II, pope of the Catholic Church
- 1274 - Louis of Toulouse, French bishop
- 1313 - Maria of Portugal, Queen of Castile, Portuguese infanta
- 1344 - Meinhard III, count of Tyrol
- 1441 - Ali-Shir Nava'i, Turkic poet, linguist, and painter
- 1533 - Shimazu Yoshihisa, Japanese daimyō
- 1579 - Johannes Meursius, Dutch classical scholar
1601–1900
- 1651 - Procopio Cutò, French entrepreneur
- 1666 - George Hamilton, 1st Earl of Orkney, Scottish field marshal
- 1711 - Luis Vicente de Velasco e Isla, Spanish sailor and commander
- 1737 - Thomas Paine, English-American philosopher, author, and activist
- 1741 - Henri-Joseph Rigel, German-French composer
- 1748 - Sir John Duckworth, 1st Baronet, English admiral and politician, Commodore Governor of Newfoundland
- 1763 - Louis I, Grand Duke of Baden
- 1769 - George W. Campbell, Scottish-American lawyer and politician, 5th United States Secretary of the Treasury
- 1773 - William Henry Harrison, American general and politician, 9th President of the United States
- 1775 - Farkas Bolyai, Hungarian mathematician and academic
- 1781 - Johann Baptist von Spix, German biologist and explorer
- 1783 - Vasily Zhukovsky, Russian poet and translator
- 1789 - Franz Xaver Gabelsberger, German engineer, invented Gabelsberger shorthand
- 1800 - Hyrum Smith, American religious leader
- 1814 - Samuel J. Tilden, American lawyer and politician, 28th Governor of New York
- 1815 - Federico de Madrazo, Spanish painter
- 1826 - Keelikōlani, Hawaiian royal and governor
- 1830 - Abdülaziz of the Ottoman Empire, Turkish emperor
- 1834 - Felix Dahn, German lawyer, historian, and author
- 1837 - José Burgos, Filipino priest and revolutionary
- 1839 - Silas Adams, American colonel, lawyer, and politician
- 1846 - Wilhelm Maybach, German engineer and businessman, founded Maybach
- 1846 - Whitaker Wright, English businessman and financier
- 1847 - Hugh Price Hughes, Welsh-English clergyman and theologian
- 1854 - Aletta Jacobs, Dutch physician and suffrage activist
- 1856 - Hara Takashi, Japanese politician, 10th Prime Minister of Japan
- 1859 - Akiyama Yoshifuru, Japanese general
- 1863 - Anthony Hope, English author and playwright
- 1864 - Miina Härma, Estonian organist, composer, and conductor
- 1865 - Mrs. Patrick Campbell, English-French actress
- 1865 - Erich von Drygalski, German geographer and geophysicist
- 1867 - Natsume Sōseki, Japanese author and poet
- 1871 - Howard Taylor Ricketts, American pathologist and physician
- 1874 - Amy Lowell, American poet, critic, and educator
- 1876 - Arthur Edward Moore, New Zealand-Australian politician, 23rd Premier of Queensland
- 1878 - Jack Kirwan, Irish international footballer
- 1880 - Lipót Fejér, Hungarian mathematician and academic
- 1883 - Jules Berry, French actor and director
- 1885 - Alban Berg, Austrian composer and educator
- 1885 - Clarence H. Haring, American historian and author
- 1889 - Larry Semon, American actor, producer, director and screenwriter
- 1891 - Ronald Colman, English-American actor
- 1891 - Kristian Krefting, Norwegian footballer and chemical engineer
- 1891 - Pietro Nenni, Italian journalist and politician, Secretary of the Italian Socialist Party
- 1892 - Peggy Wood, American actress
- 1893 - Georgios Athanasiadis-Novas, Greek lawyer and politician, 163rd Prime Minister of Greece
- 1895 - Hermann Brill, German lawyer and politician, 8th Minister-President of Thuringia
- 1896 - Alberto Vargas, Peruvian-American painter and illustrator
- 1897 - Charles Kingsford Smith, Australian captain and pilot
- 1898 - Jūkichi Yagi, Japanese poet and educator