On Feb. 19, 1473, Copernicus, founder of modern astronomy, was born in Torun, Poland.
In 1807 former Vice President Aaron Burr was arrested in Alabama and charged with treason. He was acquitted.
In 1878 Thomas Edison was granted a patent for the phonograph.
In 1881 Prohibition was adopted in Kansas.
In 1942 Japanese bombers carried out their first attack against Australia in WWII.
In 1945 U.S. Pacific forces attacked Iwo Jima.
In 1959 Britain, Greece and Turkey signed an agreement for the independence of Cyprus.
In 1976 Patricia Hearst invoked the 5th Amendment 19 times at her bank robbery trial in San Francisco.
In 1978 Cypriot troops killed 15 Egyptian commandos trying to free airliner hostages held by two Palestinian terrorists at Lanarca airport in Cyprus.
In 1986 the Senate endorsed the UN convention against genocide.
In 1987 the Tower commission, appointed by President Ronald Reagan to investigate the Iran-contra scandal, reportedly was told by former national security advisor Robert McFarlane that Reagan approved the first shipment of U.S. arms to Iran in 1985.
