February 1911

February 1, 1911 (Wednesday)

• Thirty people were killed in an explosion at Communipaw, New Jersey. Employees of the Central Railroad of New Jersey had been unloading cases of black powder from the freighter Katherine W, when the accident happened at one minute past noon. The blast was felt 50 miles away, rocking office buildings and breaking windows in Manhattan, on the other side of the Hudson River. Eight officials of the railroad and the Du Pont Powder Company were indicted for the disaster.
• The Governor of the Isfahan province of Persia was shot. Mutemidi Khan and his nephew were murdered by a Russian national who had formerly been the chief of police in Isfahan.
• The British super-dreadnought, HMS Thunderer, was launched.
• Ziebach County, South Dakota, was established.
• Died: U.S. Navy Admiral Charles S. Sperry, 62, commander of the Great White Fleet expedition of 1907-1909.

  February 2, 1911 (Thursday)

• The crews of the two expeditions to the South Pole confronted each other at the Bay of Whales, as Robert Falcon Scott's Terra Nova sailed alongside Roald Amundsen's ship Fram. Word of Amundsen's arrival was sent back to Britain and then reported worldwide. When informed that the Norwegian explorer was racing him to the pole, Scott is said to have replied angrily: "By Jove, what a chance we have missed! We might have taken Amundsen and sent him back to his ship!"
• Captain Bellinger of the French Army set a new record for most persons to fly in an airplane, carrying seven passengers on a short flight at Pau.
• Revolution broke out on the northern coast of Haiti.
• The Honduras city of Puerto Cortez was turned over to the control of American and British soldiers.
• Born: Richard O'Kane, Medal of Honor winner for his heroism on the submarine USS Tang; in Dover, New Hampshire.

  February 3, 1911 (Friday)

• A group of 253 ice fishermen, who had set up a "fishing village" on an ice floe in the Bjorko Sound in Finland, were killed when a gale swept the settlement out into the Baltic Sea.
• George Grey, brother of the British Foreign Secretary, Sir Edward Grey, was killed by a lion while hunting in Nairobi.

  February 4, 1911 (Saturday)

• Persia's Minister of Finance, Sani al-Dowleh, was killed in Tehran by two Armenian assassins who were Russian subjects. The Russian legation provided the men sanctuary, and refused to turn them over for prosecution by Persia.
• Died:
• *General Piet Cronjé, 74, leader of the Boer resistance against Britain.
• *Owen Kildare, 46, crusader against slum poverty in New York.

  February 5, 1911 (Sunday)

• The revolution in Haiti was suppressed after the leader, General Montreuil Guillaume, was captured by government troops and shot. General Millionard was executed two days later.
• A bolt of lightning struck the dome of the Missouri State Capitol building in Jefferson City, setting a fire that destroyed the entire structure.
• Born: Jussi Björling, Swedish operatic tenor; in Borlänge.

  February 6, 1911 (Monday)

• The Finnish ship Glenbank was wrecked off of the coast of Australia by a cyclone that killed 19 of her 22-member crew. The wreckage would be rediscovered more than 110 years later in 2022.
• The explosion of the Pluto Powder Company in Winthrop, Michigan, killed 10 workers.
• Born:
• *Ronald Reagan, 40th President of the United States, was born at 4:16 a.m. in Tampico, Illinois, to Nelle Reagan and shoe salesman Jack Reagan.
• *William C. Beall, photographer for the Washington Daily News, who won a Pulitzer Prize for his image Faith and Confidence; in Washington, D.C.

  February 7, 1911 (Tuesday)

• Seattle Mayor Hiram C. Gill was put out of office by a recall election and replaced by George Dilling. It was the first city election in which women were allowed to participate, and the female vote was believed to have contributed to the recall.
• Bonneville County, Idaho, was established from the eastern portion of Bingham County.
• Born: Cornelius L. Reid, American singer; in Jersey City, New Jersey.
• Died: Wallace Wattles, 50, American author and spiritualist, author of The Science of Getting Rich and The Science of Being Great.

  February 8, 1911 (Wednesday)

• The civil war in the Honduras ended after President Miguel R. Dávila and rebel leader General Manuel Bonilla agreed to an armistice that included free elections to be supervised by American observers. Bonilla would be elected President on October 29.
• Nasir al-Mulk assumed power as the new Regent for the 12-year-old Shah of Persia.
• Dedication of the Confederate monument in Tampa Florida at the Hillsborough County Courthouse on Franklin Street.
• Born: Elizabeth Bishop, U.S. Poet Laureate 1949–1950; in Worcester, Massachusetts.
• Died: Frederick Campbell, 3rd Earl Cawdor, 64, British politician and former First Lord of the Admiralty for 8 months in 1905.

  February 9, 1911 (Thursday)

• The U.S. House of Representatives approved the Crumpacker Bill, increasing the number of U.S. Representatives, beginning in 1913, from 391 to 435, the number that it has had ever since. No state lost representatives, but 25 of the 46 states gained seats based on the 1910 census, and, pending statehood, Arizona and New Mexico were each given one representative. In later years, the number of 435 seats remained the same, but the distribution changed after each census.
• Voters in the Arizona Territory approved the proposed state Constitution by a margin of about 12,000 to 3,500.
• The Viscount Harcourt, British Secretary of State for the Colonies, ordered that the practice of indentured servitude for Chinese workers in British Malaya was abolished, effective June 30, 1914.
• Goshen County, Hot Springs County, Platte County, and Washakie County, Wyoming were all established on the same day.
• Died: Maharana Shri Ajitsinhji, the Maharaja of Dhrangadhra since 1900.

  February 10, 1911 (Friday)

• The French Chamber of Deputies passed a law reserving the use of the term "champagne" solely for white wine produced by vignerons or sold by négociants in the province of the Marne. The act outraged winemakers in other provinces of France and led to violent strikes.
• The Senate of France passed a bill setting clocks ahead by 9 minutes and 21 seconds in order to conform with the standard time in the United Kingdom, Spain, Belgium and the Netherlands.
• Mineral County, Nevada, was established.
• Died: Zerelda Samuel, 86, mother of Jesse James and Frank James.

  February 11, 1911 (Saturday)

• The Lincoln Memorial Commission was created to find an ideal site for the proposed Lincoln Memorial. On February 3, 1912, the west end of the Washington Mall would be picked, and the building would be dedicated on February 12, 1915.
• In Grand Rapids, Michigan, former President Theodore Roosevelt came out in favor of direct voting for U.S. Senators and for the Presidency. Though not a declared candidate, members of the crowd reportedly shouted "Teddy for President in 1912".
• Musselshell County, Montana, was established.

  February 12, 1911 (Sunday)

• Galatasaray SK achieved its highest Kıtalar Arası Derbi win beating Fenerbahçe SK 7–0 with only seven players on the pitch. Four goals were scored by Celal İbrahim, two by Emin Bülent Serdaroğlu and one goal was scored by Idris.
• Born:
• *Cearbhall Ó Dálaigh, 5th President of Ireland from ; in Bray.
• *Stephen H. Sholes, American record producer; in Washington, D.C.
• Died: U.S. Army General Alexander S. Webb, 75, hero at Battle of Gettysburg, Medal of Honor recipient, and President of City College of New York.

  February 13, 1911 (Monday)

• Nicaragua's President Juan José Estrada declared martial law after an explosion in Managua destroyed a large quantity of arms and ammunition.
• Campbell County, Wyoming, was established.
• HNK Hajduk Split, winner of nine soccer football championships of the Yugoslav First League, and later six titles in the top Croatian league, was founded in the centuries-old pub U Fleků in Prague.
• Born: Jean Muir, American actress; in New York City

  February 14, 1911 (Tuesday)

• In a major turning point in the Mexican Revolution, Francisco I. Madero crossed the Rio Grande from Texas and into Mexico's Chihuahua State to take command of rebel forces. Madero had departed the United States after a warrant was issued for his arrest for violating U.S. neutrality laws.
• The House of Representatives approved the controversial reciprocal trade agreement between the United States and Canada, by a 221-92 margin.
• Niobrara County, Wyoming was established.
• Born: Willem J. Kolff, Dutch biophysicist who, in 1943, created the first machinery for kidney dialysis, and later patented the first artificial heart; at Leiden

  February 15, 1911 (Wednesday)

• Jess Willard fought his first professional boxing bout, losing in the 10th round on a foul. Four years after the debacle in Sapulpa, Oklahoma, however, he became the world heavyweight boxing champion when he knocked out Jack Johnson, and held the title from 1915 to 1919 before losing to Jack Dempsey.
• U.S. Patent 1,368,974 was granted for a medicine that purported to be a remedy for the treatment of tuberculosis. Marketed as "Savrite", the ineffective but all natural compound was made up of olive oil, squill root, almonds, nettle and red poppy petals.
• Born: Leonard Woodcock, President of United Auto Workers and later the first U.S. Ambassador to the People's Republic of China; in Providence, Rhode Island

  February 16, 1911 (Thursday)

• U.S. Representative William Stiles Bennet, a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, introduced a resolution proposing that the United States annex Canada, after unsuccessfully opposing the reciprocal trade agreement. Although the proposal had no chance of passage, it had the intended effect of upsetting people in Canada and the United Kingdom, and President Taft asked the committee to put it to a quick vote. The measure failed in committee, 9–1, with Bennet being the lone supporter.