Wikipedia:Selected anniversaries/February 18

This is a list of selected February 18 anniversaries that appear in the "On this day" section of the Main Page. To suggest a new item, in most cases, you can be bold and edit this page. Please read the selected anniversaries guidelines before making your edit. However, if your addition might be controversial or on a day that is or will soon be on the Main Page, please post your suggestion on the talk page instead.

Please note that the events listed on the Main Page are chosen based more on relative article quality and to maintain a mix of topics, not based solely on how important or significant their subjects are. Only four to five events are posted at a time and thus not everything that is "most important and significant" can be listed. In addition, an event is generally not posted this year if it is also the subject of the scheduled featured article or picture of the day.

To report an error when this appears on the Main Page, see Main Page errors. Please remember that this list defers to the supporting articles, so it is best to achieve consensus and make any necessary changes there first.

← February 17	February 19 →

Staging area

Images

Use only ONE image at a time

• 
  King Victor Emmanuel II of Italy
• 
  Victor Emanuel II of Italy. 5 silver lire
• 
  Royal Swedish Dramatic Theatre
• 
  Joseph Goebbels
• 
  Vasil Levski

Ineligible

Blurb	Reason
1268 – A coalition of Russian medieval states defeated the Livonian Brothers of the Sword at the Battle of Rakovor near present-day Rakvere, Estonia.	refimprove, needs rewrite
1861 – With Italian unification almost complete, Victor Emmanuel II of Piedmont, Savoy and Sardinia assumed the title King of Italy.	more footnotes
1908 – The Royal Dramatic Theatre in Stockholm, Sweden's national stage for "spoken drama", opened with playwright August Strindberg's play Master Olof.	no footnotes
1911 – The first official flight with airmail took place when pilot Henri Pequet carried 6,500 letters from Allahabad to Naini, British India, about 13 kilometres (8 mi) away.	refimprove
1932 – The Empire of Japan established Manchukuo, a puppet state in northeastern China during the Sino-Japanese War.	needs more footnotes
1946 - President Harry Truman signed the Rescission Act of 1946, denying veteran benefits to military forces of the Government of the Commonwealth of the Philippines and guerillas in the Philippines during the Japanese Occupation.	short
1954 – The Church of Scientology, the largest organization devoted to the practice and the promotion of the Scientology belief system, was incorporated in Los Angeles.	{{sync}}
2003 – An arsonist started a fire aboard a Daegu Metropolitan Subway train in Daegu, South Korea, killing almost two hundred passengers.	refimprove

Eligible

• 1637 – Eighty Years' War: Off the coast of Cornwall, England, a Spanish fleet intercepted an important Anglo-Dutch merchant convoy of 44 vessels escorted by 6 warships, destroying or capturing 20 of them.
• 1873 – Vasil Levski, the national hero of Bulgaria, was executed in Sofia by Ottoman authorities for his efforts to establish an independent Bulgarian republic.
• 1942 – World War II: The Imperial Japanese Army began the systematic extermination of perceived hostile elements among Chinese Singaporeans.
• 1943 – Joseph Goebbels, Hitler's propaganda minister, delivered the Sportpalast speech to motivate the German people when the tide of World War II was turning against Germany.
• 2001 – American FBI agent Robert Hanssen was arrested for having spied for the KGB and GRU over a 22-year period.
• 2001 – Inter-ethnic violence between Dayaks and Madurese broke out in Sampit, Indonesia, that would ultimately result in more than 500 deaths and 100,000 Madurese displaced from their homes.
• 2010 – Rebels attacked the presidential palace in Niamey, Niger, and replaced President Mamadou Tandja with a ruling junta, the Supreme Council for the Restoration of Democracy.

February 18: Independence Day in The Gambia (1965)

• 1766 – A mutiny by captive Malagasy began at sea on the slave ship Meermin, leading to the ship's destruction on Cape Agulhas in present-day South Africa and the recapture of the instigators.
• 1878 – Competition between two merchants in Lincoln County, New Mexico Territory, US, turned into a range war when a member of one faction was murdered by the other.
• 1957 – Kenyan independence leader Dedan Kimathi (statue pictured), who spearheaded the Mau Mau Uprising, was executed by British authorities, who saw him as a terrorist.
• 1970 – An American jury acquitted the "Chicago Seven" of conspiracy and inciting riots stemming from protests during the 1968 Democratic National Convention.
• 2007 – Terrorist bombs exploded on the Samjhauta Express train in Panipat, Haryana, India, killing 68 people.

More anniversaries:

• February 17
• February 18
• February 19