February 15

February 15 is the 46th day of the year, and the American record for it runs from 1764 to 1954 — a span of 190 years. The entry that anchors it: American Civil War, 1862.

The earliest entries here predate the republic entirely. In 1764, the city of St. Louis is established in Spanish Louisiana (now in Missouri, USA)

The antebellum decades brought the date closer to the country’s central argument. In 1862, American Civil War — Confederates commanded by Brig. Gen. John B. Floyd attack General Ulysses S. Grant's Union forces besieging Fort Donelson in Tennessee. Unable to break the fort's encirclement, the Confederates surrender the following day.

Reconstruction and the years that followed added their own entries. In 1879, Women's rights — US President Rutherford B. Hayes signs a bill allowing female attorneys to argue cases before the Supreme Court of the United States. Then, in 1898, the United States Navy battleship USS Maine exploded and sank in Havana, Cuba, killing more than 260 people and precipitating the Spanish–American War. The same year, the battleship USS Maine explodes and sinks in Havana harbor in Cuba, killing about 274 of the ship's roughly 354 crew. The disaster pushes the United States to declare war on Spain.

The early twentieth century brought industry, air travel and war to the date. In 1907, Japan and the United States signed a gentleman's agreement whereby the former would not permit further emigration to the U.S., while the latter would not limit Japanese immigration. Then, in 1933, in Miami, Giuseppe Zangara attempts to assassinate US President-elect Franklin D. Roosevelt, but instead shoots Chicago mayor Anton J. Cermak, who dies of his wounds on March 6.

After 1945 the date reflects a country operating at global scale. In 1954, Canada and the United States agree to construct the Distant Early Warning Line, a system of radar stations in the far northern Arctic regions of Canada and Alaska.

The date is also a birthday. Among the Americans born on February 15: Abraham Clark (1725), American surveyor, lawyer, and politician; William Stacy (1734), American colonel; Cyrus McCormick (1809), American journalist and businessman, co-founded International Harvester; Mary S. B. Shindler (1810), American poet, writer, and editor; and Charles Lewis Tiffany (1812), American businessman, founded Tiffany & Co..

February 15 is also a date of endings. Among the Americans who died on it: Leopold Damrosch (1885), German-American composer and conductor; Lew Wallace (1905), American author, general, and politician, 11th Governor of New Mexico Territory; Minnie Maddern Fiske (1932), American actress and playwright; and Laurence Owen (1961), American figure skater.

The date carries formal observance as well — Susan B. Anthony Day (Florida, United States) and The ENIAC Day (Philadelphia, United States). The record for February 15 runs 190 years deep across 8 entries. Read in sequence, the date stops being a coincidence and starts being a through-line.