February 26

747 BC – According to Roman astronomer Claudius Ptolemy in his book the Almagest, the rule of King Nabonassar of Babylon begins at noon on this date and is used by historians for dating historic events.

1616 – Galileo Galilei is formally banned by the Roman Catholic Church from teaching or defending the view that the earth orbits the sun.

1815 – After being exiled there for a year, Napoleon Bonaparte escapes from the Mediterranean island of Elba aboard the brig Inconstant, to again seize control as the Emperor of France.

1869 – The 15th Amendment to the Constitution is sent to the states for ratification.

1907 – Congress raises their own salaries to $7,500 (about $213,000 in today’s dollars)

1919 – President Woodrow Wilson signs into law an act of Congress establishing the Grand Canyon National Park in Arizona.

1929 – President Calvin Coolidge signs an executive order establishing the  Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming.

1933 – The groundbreaking ceremony for the Golden Gate Bridge is held at Crissy Field.

1935 – Adolf Hitler orders the Luftwaffe to be reformed, violating the provisions of the Treaty of Versailles.

1966 – Nasa launches mission AS-201, an unmanned, block 1, Apollo Command and Service Module aboard the first flight of the Saturn IB rocket.

1971 – U.N. Secretary-General U Thant signs a United Nations proclamation of the vernal equinox as Earth Day.

1980 – As part of the Camp David Accords, Egypt and Israel establish full diplomatic relations.

1991  – Tasked with securing a vital crossroad in the Iraqi town of Al Busayyah, defended by an armored infantry Iraqi force of Battalion strength, the U.S. 2nd Iron Brigade of the 1st Armored Division, commanded by General Frederick M. Franks with the 4th Black Lions Battalion, 70th Armor Regiment, commanded by Lieutenant Colonel William C. Feyk,  guarding the flanks, engages and destroys over a dozen Iraqi armored and twice that number of tactical support vehicles, in less that 3 hours, without suffering any casualties

Near coordinate line 73 Easting in the Iraqi desert, squadrons of the 2nd Armored Cavalry Toujour Pret Regiment, find and engage elements of the Iraqi Republican Guards Tawakalna Division’s 18th Brigade and the 12th Armored Division’s 9th Armored Brigade, destroying 55 Iraqi tanks, 45 other armored vehicles with hundreds of Iraqi infantry killed in action and thousands taken prisoner.

1993 – In New York City, a truck bomb parked in the underground garage below the North Tower of the World Trade Center explodes, fails to collapse the tower into the South Tower, but still kills 6 and injures over a 100o people. This failure and the subsequent increase in building access security cause Osama Bin Laden’s Al Qaeda moslem terrorist group to devise the plot to later crash large commercial  aircraft into the towers.

2008 – The New York Philharmonic performs in Pyongyang, North Korea; the first event of its kind to take place in North Korea.

2012 – Trayvon Martin is shot to death in self defense by George Zimmerman while assaulting the Sanford, Florida neighborhood watch coordinator