February 9

On the 9th in 1825 John Quincy Adams was elected the 6th president of the United States by the United States House of Representatives after no other candidate received enough votes in either the popular vote or the Electoral College in the hotly contested election of 1824. It seems that his opponents in the election, Henry Clay, William H. Crawford, Andrew Jackson and John C. Calhoun did not want to just play nice, and so, today, we only have to deal with two infantile candidates throwing tantrums in their bid to get free room and board in the White House. Adams is one of only two Presidents (Jimmy Carter is the other) to write and publish poetry. Adams wrote an epic poem about Henry II’s conquest of Ireland.

February 8

Quick, who was George Washington’s vice-president? O.K., who was Thomas Jefferson’s? William Henry Harrison’s? Nobody remembers the nation’s vice-presidents unless some sordid affair burns them in to our memories. Aaron Burr is but one example. Sure, Burr was guilty of treason but he is remembered principally because he was Thomas Jefferson’s vice-president when Burr killed him in a duel. Spiro Agnew is another one that we remember because he resigned in disgrace. Are you familiar with Richard Mentor Johnson? On the 8th in 1837, the Senate elected him Vice-President after he failed to win enough votes from the Electoral College. This is the only instance of the Senate electing a vice-president. Martin van Buren was the President Do you find politicians to be as creepy I do? If not, please consider this little nugget: Johnson attended Transylvania University in Louisville, Kentucky.

Februar 7

The Australian band, The Living End, on their 2006 album, State of Emergency, informed the world that Nothing Lasts Forever. Proof of this is illustrated vividly when you consider that on the 7th in 1990, the Central Committee of the Soviet Communist Party agreed to give up its monopoly of power thus paving the way for the implosion of the Union of Soviet Socialists Republics. The first to go was Estonia when on March 30, 1990 the Supreme Council declared Soviet power illegal. Latvia followed suit on May 4, 1990.

February 6

On the 6th in 1815, John Stevens was given the first railroad charter in the United States. He would use this charter to form the New Jersey Railroad Company, which operated a railroad between Camden and Amboy, New Jersey. In 1806, he built the Phoenix, a screw-driven steamer. In 1809, the Phoenix would operate between Hoboken and Philadelphia making it the first steamship to navigate in ocean waters. The company would expand to become the United New Jersey Railroad and Canal Company.

February 5

On the 5th in 1846, the Oregon Spectator began publication. This was the first newspaper published on the left coast. Printed in Oregon City, The Spectator ran four pages, and a hand press was used to print it in a tabloid format. The press got to Oregon from New York by a ship sailing around Cape Horn. Its first editor and much of the staff got to Oregon in a rather more mundane manner – wagon train. When Portland eclipsed Oregon City as a center of interest in Oregon in 1855, the Spectator folded its tent and slipped quietly into the pages of history.

The Oregon Printing Association published the paper. The association consisted of William G. T'Vault (No! That is not a typo even if my spell check insists that it is), James W. Nesmith, John P. Brooks, George Abernethy, John H. Couch, Robert Newell, and John E. Long. The paper’s first editor was T'Vault who was also the president of the group. Nesmith would go on to represent the glorious state of Oregon as a United States Senator and Abernethy would become Oregon’s first governor.

February 4

On the 4th in 1957, the American submarine USS Nautilus logged her 60,000th nautical mile, matching the endurance record of her namesake the Nautilus in Jules Verne’s novel "20,000 Leagues Under the Sea".
This Nautilus was the first nuclear-powered submarine.
A league is equal to three nautical miles.
Verne named the submarine, which he also used in his books The Mysterious Island and In Search of the Castaways, after the real submarine Nautilus that had been commissioned by Napoleon Bonaparte and was built by Robert Fulton in 1800.

February 3

The Constitution of the United States is a truly magnificent document. In it, the rights and the responsibilities of all Americans are clearly delineated; and it has served remarkably well as a model for the constitutions of innumerable nations the world over. This gift to humanity came into being, like the United States itself, only after extraordinary violence. For the nation, that violence was the revolutionary war of independence waged against Great Britain. For the document, the violence was the rebellion started by Daniel Shay in western Massachusetts. Shay’s Rebellion burst on the scene when violence erupted in August of 1786. The rebellion ended when Federal forces crushed Daniel Shay’s troops on the 3rd in 1787 prompting the negotiations that would result in the designing of the United States Constitution. In November, well after the rebellion had been put down, Thomas Jefferson wrote to a colleague and shared his thoughts on how things turned out. Jefferson was of the opinion that “[t]he tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.” I think that it is safe to assume that Jefferson was extremely confident that it was not his blood that would be used for the watering of the tree of liberty.

Daniel Shay held the rank of captain when he fought on the side of the colonists at the battles of Bunker Hill, Ticonderoga, Saratoga and Stony Point during the revolution which would lead to the United States’ independence. He was given a ceremonial sword by the Marguis de Lafayette as a token of appreciation for his service to the new nation.