In Germany, four members of the illegal Black Reichswehr paramilitary organization were sentenced to death for politically motivated murders. State authorities had the court proceedings carried out under a veil of secrecy to "insure the safety of the state."[8][9]
Vladimir Sukhomlinov, 77, the former Minister of War for the Russian Empire from 1909 to 1915, was found frozen to death on a park bench in Berlin, where he had gone into exile after the Russian Revolution of 1917.[13]
William Wood, 68, American textile mill owner, committed suicide by shooting himself near Daytona Beach, Florida, after asking his chauffeur and his valet to take him to "a lonely spot above Flagler Beach."[14]
February 3, 1926 (Wednesday)
By a decree of the Czechoslovakia's Prime Minister Thomas Masaryk, issued in accordance with the nation's Minorities Act, the Czech language became the government's official language, and all public officials and judges— not only those who used the Slovak language, but those in regions where German or Hungarian were the most common languages— were required to pass a test showing their fluency in Czech. "As a consequence," a historian would later note, "the civil service was depleted of German and Magyar officials, and dismissals did not spare even the most menial occupation. The replacements were Czech and, rarely, Slovak."[15][16]
An explosion killed 20 coal miners at the Pittsburgh Terminal Coal Company's No. 15 mine in Horning, Pennsylvania.[17][18]
General Francisco Franco (left) with his brother Ramón
Spanish Army Colonel and future dictator of Spain Francisco Franco was promoted to the rank of Brigadier General at the age of 33, becoming the youngest general in Europe[19]
A $250 million, five-year plan to upgrade the United States Naval Air Force was submitted to the House Committee on Naval Affairs. The plan called to nearly double the number of Navy planes from 638 to 1,248 by the end of 1931.[22]
Born:Dave Sands, Australian boxer who was the Australian heavyweight champion at the time of his death, and is one of the few people inducted into the World Boxing Hall of Fame despite never having held a world title; in Kempsey, New South Wales (killed in a truck accident, 1952)
Died:Mehmed Atıf Hoca, 51, Turkish Islamic philosopher and teacher, was hanged for violating Turkey's Hat Law.[23]
February 5, 1926 (Friday)
Terrorists attacked a train that was traveling the railway from Moscow to Riga, with an ultimate destination of Berlin, specifically targeting a group of Soviet Foreign Ministry employees. After the train crossed the border out of the Soviet Union and into the Republic of Latvia, two armed men stopped the train between Ikšķile and Koknese to attack Soviet couriers L. F. Pecherskiy, Theodor Nette and his partner , with the apparent goal of stealing a diplomatic pouch. Two men, Antonijs Gabrilovich and Bronisławs Gabrilovich invaded the train compartment while carrying guns. Nette shot and wounded one gunman before being shot in the head, and Mahmastal, though wounded, stayed behind to guard the pouch while Pecherskiy escaped. The date of Nette's detah is still observed on February 5 in Ikšķile by employees of the Russian Embassy in Latvia as part of the "All-Russian Day of Remembrance of Diplomatic Couriers Who Died in the Line of Duty".[24]
A crowd of 10,000 people packed the streets of Los Angeles to watch the funeral procession of actress Barbara La Marr, who had died on January 30 at the age of 29. Numerous injuries were reported as onlookers, mostly women, rushed forward to get a view of the silver coffin.[25]
Died:Carl Hau, German lawyer and convicted murderer who published two books about his 1907 crime after his parole in 1924, shot himself in the head while awaiting an appeal of his conviction for violating his probation.[28]
February 6, 1926 (Saturday)
Pancho Villa
An unknown party raided the grave of Pancho Villa and stole the Mexican revolutionary leader's skull. The fate of the skull is a mystery and the source of multiple legends, with one holding that it is in the Skull and Bones Crypt at Yale University.[29][30]
Italy's Premier Benito Mussolini made a defiant speech to his cabinet on the issue of the Italianization of South Tyrol. Responding to protests from Germany about the oppression of Tyrolean Germans, Mussolini vowed that the policy would "not change by a centimeter" and declared, "We will make this territory Italian because it is Italian geographically and historically." He warned, "If the Germans attempt a boycott, we will answer with boycotts squared. If Germany takes reprisals, we will answer with reprisals cubed."[31]
In an intersectional match between two of the best college basketball teams in the 1925–26 NCAA men's basketball season, unbeaten (12-0) Syracuse University hosted the once-beaten (6-1) Michigan Wolverines, 36 to 33.[32] Syracuse, which finished the season with 15 wins and 1 loss, would retroactively be declared the season's national champion by the Helms Foundation, a finding recognized by the NCAA record.[33]
The Italian army seized Jaghbub, the Libyan desert oasis village and home of the Senussi Movement. The column of 2,000 troops met with no resistance.[36]
At the World Speed Skating Championship held in Canada on Lily Lake in New Brunswick, Charles Gorman broke the world record for the 220 and 440 yard events.[38]
Torrent, the first American film to star Greta Garbo, premiered at the Capitol Theatre in New York City, ahead of a general release on February 21.[42]
Prince Faisal, son of the Sultan of Nejd and King of Hejaz, Ibn Saud, took office as the Viceroy of Hejaz, the Governor-General of the recently conqueredKingdom of Hejaz, and the highest ranking resident of the King. He would continue until the 1932 unification of the dual monarchy into the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.[47]
Flooding hit London suburbs after 18 consecutive days of rain raised the level of the River Lea, "causing scenes without parallel in London."[48] Homes in Leyton, Tottenham, Chingford and Walthamstow were threatened by water as high as 14 feet (4.3m).
The Reichstag passed a declaration responding to Mussolini's speech of February 6, stating that Germany "vigorously rejects the Italian prime minister's objectively unjustifiable and insultingly phrased attacks and sneers." It went on to say, "Although the German people desire nothing more than to promote their own restoration in peaceful coöperation with other peoples, they will not permit themselves to be hindered from demanding the just treatment of German minorities under foreign sovereignty."[49]
Born:
La Norma (stage name for Norma Fox), Danish-born aerialist and trapeze artist; in Randers (living in 2025)
Germany formally applied to join the League of Nations, and a special session of the League Council was scheduled for February 12.[50][51]
The war of words between Germany and Italy continued, as Mussolini warned the League of Nations to stay out of the South Tyrol dispute and reaffirmed that Italy would "not accept any discussion of this matter by any assembly or council." Germany responded that it considered the matter closed until such time as it could be addressed by the League.[52]
Bernard Lewis, English businessman who founded the River Island fashion clothing chain of stores and one of the 100 wealthiest people in the UK; as Bernard Pokrasse in Finsbury Park (living in 2025)
Leslie Nielsen, Canadian-born American actor and comedian, known for establishing himself as a dramatic film and TV actor in 1956 with Forbidden Planet before a breakthrough role in 1980 as a comedian in Airplane!; in Regina, Saskatchewan (d. 2010)[56]<
Died:Wilhelm Kuhnert. 60, German painter and illustrator specializing in paintings of African animals[60]
February 12, 1926 (Friday)
The longest coal mine strike in U.S. history was settled after 165 days, in a contract signed at the Bellevue-Stratford hotel in Philadelphia between John L. Lewis of the United Mine Workers of America, on behalf of striking anthracite coal and Samuel D. Warriner on behalf of the anthracite coal companies.[61]
Died:Francis Richter, 72, American publisher who founded the popular weekly sports magazine Sporting Life in 1883 and served as its chief editor until it ceased publication in 1924[63]
February 13, 1926 (Saturday)
The Calles government ordered all Catholic schools in Mexico to close.[64]
The original 1926 Air Mail stamp and the 1976 commemorative stamp
The first U.S. Air Mail stamp specifically limited for air mail use was issued by the U.S. Department of the Post Office in accordance with the Air Mail Act of 1925.[66]
Germany's Nazi Party held the Bamberg Conference, where the Party approved a motion by Adolf Hitler to establish his position as the sole, absolute and unquestioned ultimate authority within the party under the doctrine of Führerprinzip, whose decisions are final and non-appealable, and to confirm the 1920 25-Punkte-Programm as immutable.[70]
Miguel Abadía Méndez was officially elected as the 12th President of Colombia with minimal opposition as the only major candidate. Abadía received 370,494 votes and all other candidates got a combined 432 votes.[72]
In the U.S., the task of delivery of air mail was contracted out to private companies after being performed for eight years by the U.S. government, and two different Contract Air Mail route flights were carried out by Ford Air Transport, a subsidiary of the Ford Motor Company. Lawrence G. Fritz made the first flight, departing in a Stout 2-AT Pullman airplane from the Ford Airport near Detroit and landed in Cleveland for the initial delivery.[77]
Mehmet Celal Bey, 62, Turkish Ottoman administrator who declined to carry out orders during the Armenian genocide, particularly defying the Ottoman deportation orders while serving as a provincial government.[80][81][82]
The two best women's tennis players in the world, Suzanne Lenglen of France and Helen Wills of the U.S., faced each other at Cannes in an event billed as "The Match of the Century". At the time, Lenglen was the reigning 1925 champion of the French Open and of Wimbledon (which she had won six times since 1919), and ranked as the number one women's player in the world, while Wills was the 1925 U.S. Open champion, her third consecutive crown. In their only match against each other during their careers, with the format of the best two of three sets, Lenglen won the first set, 6 to 3. In the second Wills had a 5 to 4 lead over Lenglen, and was even congratulated by Lenglen on a shot that appeared to have won the set and would have forced a third match. Instead, linesman Charles Hope ruled that Wills had not won, and play continued. In extra sets, Lenglen came back to win, 8 games to 6 and took both the set and the match.
The Grand National Assembly of Turkey approved the Turkish Civil Code (Türk Kanunu Medenisi), a secular set of rules to replace the Muslim Sharia code except for religious matters.[89] The new code, intended to modernize law in the same manner as the Swiss Civil Code to provide civil rights to the nation's women, acknowledging their entitlement to have the same rights as men. Among other things, women were given the right to choose any profession, civil marriage was made compulsory, and polygamy was banned, but would not be granted the right to vote until 1934.[90]
In the U.S., an avalanche in Utah's Bingham Canyon killed 79 men, women and children in the copper mining town of Highland Boy.[91][92]
In the harbor of Port of Spain in Trinidad and Tobago, the Trinidadian steamer Naparima sank after colliding with an ocean liner, the Vandyck of the Lamport and Holt Line. Eleven passengers and crew on the Naparima drowned, while the remainder were rescued by fishing boats.[93]
In Greece, PresidentTheodoros Pangalos carried out the arrest and deportation of 15 opposition leaders, including former premier Alexandros Papanastasiou and former Interior Minister Georgios Kondylis. Papanastasio and the others were deported to the island of Anafi, the most remote of the Cyclades islands in the Aegean Sea. Pangalos ordered that "all firearms, except those used for sport", such as hunting rifles, were to be delivered to police authorities by March 30 after which police would have the right to search for and confiscate firearms.[97]
At Slough in England, the French auto manufacturer Citroën opened what would become "the largest factory under one roof in Britain", with 500,000 square feet of workshops that would eventually produce 200 cars per day. Chairman Andre Citroën said in a speech that he hoped that the combination of French engineers and British workmen would work well, and that vehicles would range in price from $775 to $1,225.[99]
Bai Jinian, Chinese Communist Party official who, in 1984, became the first provincial party chief to be elected by secret ballot with multiple choices, and served as the Party Secretary of Shaanxi Province until being removed by the national chairman in 1987; in Suide, Shaanxi Province (d.2015)
February 20, 1926 (Saturday)
American Serial killer Earle Nelson commited his first of at least 22 murders, inquiring at the borarding house of wealthy landlady, 60-year-old Clara Newman, in San Francisco.[106] After entering her home on the pretext of agreeing to rent a room, Nelson strangled Miss Newman, raped her dead body and then hiding it in a vacant apartment, and departed to find another elderly woman, and continued his killing spree for more than 15 months before being arrested in Canada.[107]
Arrests and deportations continued in Greece as 14 members of the opposition, including former Justice Minister and Prime Minister Georgios Kafantaris, were picked up by police and then sent into exile to the island of Santorin.[108]
A pastoral letter read in all the Catholic churches in Austria condemned the "cult of the body" in present-day gymnastics, denouncing mixed bathing, rhythmic dancing and immodest sports attire as "un-Christian."[109]
A group of 20,000 fans packed the Fulford-Miami Speedway to witness the first race at the world's fastest speedway, won by Pete DePaolo. It was the only race ever held at the speedway, as it was destroyed in the Great Miami Hurricane later that year and never rebuilt.[114]
A letter dispatched from Pope Pius XI to the Italian government said that he would not recognize any church reform laws that it passed until an accord was reached, which could not happen as long as the Roman Question remained unsettled.[115]
In Mexico City, 7 Catholics were killed in clashes between rioters and government agents who were taking over the Church of the Holy Family.[120][121]
U.S. President Calvin Coolidge expressed opposition to ex-general Billy Mitchell's advocation of a large air force, saying it would make the United States a militaristic nation and lead to an arms race.[122]
February 24, 1926 (Wednesday)
French pilot Leon Collet was killed attempting to fly under the arch of the Eiffel Tower in a filmed stunt. The plane struck an aerial belonging to the wireless station.[123]
Leonard Linkow, American dentist and inventor known for his designing of various dental implants, and the only dentist to be nominated for the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine; in Brooklyn, New York City (d.2017)[125]
U.S. President Calvin Coolidge signed the Revenue Act of 1926 into law, reducing personal income taxes and inheritance taxes, along with eliminating the federal gift tax.[127]
The first broadcast of a sporting event on British radio was made, with the BBC covering the European flyweight boxing championship between Elky Clark of Scotland and Kid Socks of England.[129]
Henry Molaison, American sufferer from epilepsy whose experimental treatment in 1953 (a bilateral medial temporallobectomy) led to his inability to form new memories (d.2008)[132]
The island of Urta Tagay, under the Soviet Union's control since 1920, was formally transferred by the Soviets to control of the Emirate of Afghanistan, though the Urtatagai conflict did not end until August 15 when the Soviet government granted full recognition of Afghan sovereignty over the territory.[137]
Henry Simpson Lunn announced that he would turn over all his property and income except for $2,500 a year to promote unity among all churches and nations.[138]
↑ "Masaryk and the Germans", in T.G.Masaryk (1850-1937), Volume 3: Statesman and Cultural Force, ed. by Harry Hanak (Palgrave Macmillan UK, 2016) p.116
↑ Mercer, Derrik (1989). Chronicle of the 20th Century. London: Chronicle Communications Ltd. p.339. ISBN978-0-582-03919-3.
↑ "20 MEN ARE KILLED IN HORNING COAL PIT WHEN TRAPPED IN FIRE AFTER EXPLOSION— All of Entombed Dead as Rescuers Find Death Crypt", The Pittsburgh Post, February 4, 1926, p.1
↑ "Reference Dictionary of Japanese People: Medicine, Healthcare, and Welfare," Nichigai Associates , March 16, 2019. ASIN 4816927689. ISBN9784816927683. OCLC 1090072194. National Bibliography Number: 23201780
↑ Erich Schwinge), Ein Mord ohne erkennbares Motiv – Der Fall Carl Hau ( "A murder without any discernible motive – The case of Carl Hau", in Berühmte Strafprozesse – Deutschland II (Famous Criminal Trials – Germany II) (Goldmann Verlag, 1967) (in German)
↑ Avilés Farré, Juan (2006). La Izquierda burguesa y la tragedia de la II República[The Bourgeois Left and the Tragedy of the Second Republic] (in Spanish). Madrid: Comunidad de Madrid. p.37. ISBN9788445128817.
↑ Parsons, George, "Hoskins, Charles Henry (1851–1926)", Australian Dictionary of Biography, National Centre of Biography, Australian National University, retrieved 2020-05-27
↑ T. S. Pechatkin, Первые шаги советской дипломатии на аравийском направлении (1922—1926) (Bulletin of the Moscow State Regional University: History and political sciences, 2012, No. 1, p.30
↑ "Earle Nelson", Serial Murder and Media Circuses, by Dirk C. Gibson (Bloomsbury Publishing, 2006) p.33 ISBN 9780313080982
↑ "Earle Leonard Nelson 1897-1928", in The Serial Killer Files: The Who, What, Where, How, and Why of the World's Most Terrifying Murderers, by Harold Schechter (Random House Publishing, 2024) p.189 ISBN 9780345465665
↑ Meyer, Jean A. (1976). The Cristero Rebellion: The Mexican People between Church and State 1926–1929. Cambridge University Press. ISBN978-0-521-10205-6.
↑ "Report 2 Slain, 16 Hurt in Riot of Churchmen". Chicago Daily Tribune. February 24, 1926. p.5.
↑ Henning, Arthur Sears (February 24, 1926). "Coolidge Fears Mitchell Leads to Militarism". Chicago Daily Tribune. p.8.
↑ Wales, Henry (February 25, 1926). "French Airman Dead on $100 Belt for U.S. Movies". Chicago Daily Tribune. p.11.
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