February 19 Birthday
February 19, 1942: President Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066, authorizing the military to designate "exclusion zones" from which any person could be removed. The order did not mention Japanese Americans by name, but it was applied almost exclusively to them. Over 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry — two-thirds of them US citizens — were removed from their homes on the West Coast and incarcerated in camps surrounded by barbed wire. They were given a week to dispose of their property. Farms, businesses, and homes were sold at a fraction of their value. The Supreme Court upheld the internment in Korematsu v. United States (1944). In 1988, President Reagan signed a formal apology and authorized $20,000 per surviving internee. The internment was driven by racial prejudice, wartime hysteria, and a failure of political leadership. The man who oversaw it, General John DeWitt, said: "A Jap's a Jap." On this day in 1945, 30,000 US Marines landed on the beaches of Iwo Jima, a volcanic island 750 miles south of Tokyo. The island's airfields were needed for B-29 bombers that could then reach the Japanese mainland. The Japanese had dug an extensive network of tunnels and bunkers and were ordered to fight to the death. The battle lasted thirty-six days. Of 21,000 Japanese defenders, 216 surrendered. Of 70,000 Marines, 6,821 were killed and 19,217 wounded. On the fifth day, Marines raised a flag on Mount Suribachi, the island's highest point. A photographer, Joe Rosenthal, took the picture. It became the most reproduced photograph in history. The flag-raising was not the end of the battle — it was the fifth day of thirty-six. Three of the six men in the photograph were killed before the battle ended. Nicolaus Copernicus, born this day in 1473, placed the Sun at the center of the solar system. His book De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium was published in 1543, the year he died. He had worked on the theory for thirty years and delayed publication, aware of the reaction it would provoke. Legend says he received the first printed copy on his deathbed and woke briefly to see it before dying. The book was placed on the Catholic Church's Index of Forbidden Books in 1616 and not removed until 1835. Copernicus was also a physician, a translator, a diplomat, and an economist who formulated what is now called Gresham's Law: bad money drives out good. Smokey Robinson, born this day in 1940, wrote and produced dozens of hits for Motown Records. Bob Dylan called him "America's greatest living poet." Robinson wrote "My Girl" for the Temptations, "My Guy" for Mary Wells, and "The Tracks of My Tears" for his own group, the Miracles. He was a vice president of Motown at twenty-two. People born on February 19 fall under the zodiac sign of Pisces. The birthstone is Amethyst and the birth flower is Violet. Historical events on February 19 include 1942: FDR signs Executive Order 9066, authorizing Japanese-American internment, 1945: US Marines land on Iwo Jima, 1968: Mister Rogers' Neighborhood debuts nationally on PBS. Famous people born on February 19 include Nicolaus Copernicus (1473), Smokey Robinson (1940), Lee Marvin (1924).