February 1

February 1 is the 32nd day of the year, and the American record for it runs from 1861 to 2007 — a span of 146 years. The entry that anchors it: President Abraham Lincoln signs the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, 1865.

By the middle of the nineteenth century the date carries heavier freight. In 1861, American Civil War — Texas secedes from the United States and joins the Confederacy a week later. Four years on, in 1865, President Abraham Lincoln signs the Thirteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.

In the first half of the twentieth century the date turns technological. In 1942, Voice of America, the official external radio and television service of the United States federal government, began broadcasting to Germany during World War II. The same year, World War II — U.S. Navy conducts Marshalls–Gilberts raids, the first offensive action by the United States against Japanese forces in the Pacific Theater.

The postwar entries show a nation both expanding and contesting itself. In 1960, Civil rights movement — four African-American students staged the first of more than five months of sit-ins at an F. W. Woolworth lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina, to protest the company's policy of racial segregation.

Closer to the present, the date is still accumulating. In 1996, the Communications Decency Act is passed by the U.S. Congress. Eight years on, in 2004, during the halftime show of Super Bowl XXXVIII, Janet Jackson's breast was exposed by Justin Timberlake in what was later referred to as a "wardrobe malfunction", resulting in an immediate crackdown and widespread debate on perceived indecency in U.S. broadcasting. Three years on, in 2007, the National Weather Service in the United States switches from the Fujita scale to the new Enhanced Fujita scale to measure the intensity and strength of tornadoes.

The date is also a birthday. Among the Americans born on February 1: George Hendric Houghton (1820), American clergyman and theologian; G. Stanley Hall (1844), American psychologist and academic; Durham Stevens (1851), American lawyer and diplomat; Victor Herbert (1859), Irish-American cellist, composer, and conductor; and Jerome F. Donovan (1872), American lawyer and politician.

February 1 is also a date of endings. Among the Americans who died on it: Archibald Murphey (1832), American judge and politician; George Henry Sanderson (1893), American lawyer and politician, 22nd Mayor of San Francisco; William Desmond Taylor (1922), American actor and director; and Maurice Prendergast (1924), American painter.

The date carries formal observance as well — National Freedom Day (United States) and The start of Black History Month (United States and Canada). February 1 carries 8 entries spread across 146 years. None of the people in them knew they were sharing a date; that is a pattern only visible looking back.