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1685 - René Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle, explorer, was born in St. Herbland parish, Rouen, France. With only a small allowance from his family, he sailed in 1666 for Canada, where his brother Jean, a priest of St. Sulpice, had gone the previous year. His imagination was fired by reports of a great river system, which he thought must flow into the Gulf of California and provide passage to China. La Salle sold his holdings in 1669 and undertook his first major exploration. The desertion of his followers forced him to turn back short of the Mississippi, leaving that discovery to the Joliet-Marquette expedition of 1673. On trips to France in 1674 and 1677, La Salle received a patent of nobility and a seigneurial grant that included the Fort Frontenac site (Kingston, Ontario), then a trade concession to the western country. He built and launched the first sailing vessel to ply the Great Lakes, then began in earnest to carry out his plan of establishing a chain of trading posts across the Illinois country and down the Mississippi. Convinced by this time that the Mississippi emptied into the Gulf of Mexico and not the South Sea (the Pacific Ocean), he envisioned a warm-water port-fortified against Spanish and English incursion-on the Gulf to serve his commercial empire.

In the winter of 1682 he sledded down the frozen Illinois River to the Mississippi and, after the river was free of ice, descended it by canoe to reach the mouth of the eastern passes on April 7, 1682. Claiming for France all the lands drained by the river, La Salle named the territory La Louisiane in honor of the French King, Louis XIV. He returned to France late in 1683 and obtained royal support for a voyage to the Mississippi through the Gulf of Mexico, there to establish a colony "a secure distance" from the river. The voyage, which sailed from La Rochelle on July 24, 1684, was attended by numerous misfortunes (see LA SALLE EXPEDITION). La Salle missed the mouth of the Mississippi and landed his colonists at Matagorda Bay on the Texas coast on February 20, 1685, believing the Mississippi near. From his Fort St. Louis, on Garcitas Creek in what is now Victoria County, he explored westward possibly as far as the Pecos River and eastward beyond the Trinity River, in an effort to establish his location. On his second eastward journey, intended to reach his post on the Illinois River, La Salle was slain by Pierre Duhaut, a disenchanted follower, on March 19, 1687, "six leagues" from the westernmost village of the Hasinai (Tejas) Indians. This description indicates a point east of the Trinity River, some distance from either the Grimes County or the Cherokee County locations most often mentioned.

Although La Salle's projects ended in failure, his explorations were landmarks. He was responsible for opening the Mississippi valley for development, and his entry into the Gulf of Mexico sparked a renewal of Spanish exploration in the entire Gulf region. His abortive colony gave the French a claim to Texas and caused the Spaniards to occupy eastern Texas and Pensacola Bay. Because of La Salle the United States was able to register a claim to Texas as part of the Louisiana purchase; the boundary question between Spain and the United States was complicated until the Adams-Onís Treaty of 1819. Yet history's judgment of the man is clouded by his ineptness as a leader; of the 200 colonists he landed in Texas in 1685, barely fifteen remained alive five years later.

1807 - James Bonham, officer of the Alamo garrison, son of James and Sophia Butler (Smith) Bonham, was born at Red Banks (present-day Saluda), Edgefield County, South Carolina, on February 20, 1807. Recent evidence indicates that he was a second cousin of William B. Travis. In 1832, during the nullification crisis, Bonham served as an aide to South Carolina governor James Hamilton, a position that brought him the rank of lieutenant colonel. At the same time he served as captain of a Charleston artillery company. By October 1834 he was practicing law in Montgomery, Alabama. On October 17, 1835, he led a rally of support for the Texan cause at the Shakespeare Theater in Mobile. Three days later he was elected by citizens of Mobile to carry their resolutions of support to Sam Houston. In another two weeks he was organizing a volunteer company, the Mobile Grays, for service in Texas.Bonham reached Texas in November 1835 and quickly involved himself in political and military affairs.

On December 1, 1835, he wrote to Sam Houston from San Felipe volunteering his services for Texas and declining all pay, lands, or rations in return. On December 20, 1835, he was commissioned a second lieutenant in the Texas cavalry, but apparently was not assigned to any specific unit. He had time to set up a law practice in Brazoria and was advertising the fact in the Telegraph and Texas Register by January 2, 1836. Bonham probably traveled to San Antonio de Béxar and the Alamo with James Bowie and arrived on January 19, 1836. He was sent by Travis to obtain aid for the garrison at Bexar on or about February 16, 1836. He returned to the Alamo on March 3, bearing through the Mexican lines a letter from Robert M. Williamson assuring Travis that help was on its way and urging him to hold out. Bonham died in the battle of the Alamo on March 6, 1836. He is believed to have died manning one of the cannons in the interior of the Alamo chapel. [ https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fbo14 ]

1814 - Daniel William Cloud, Alamo defender, son of Daniel and Nancy (Owens) Cloud, was born in Logan County, Kentucky, on February 20, 1814. He was a lawyer and, on his way to Texas, traveled through Illinois, Missouri, Arkansas, and Louisiana with Peter J. Bailey, also a lawyer from Logan County. Both men enlisted in the Volunteer Auxiliary Corps of Texas on January 14, 1836, at Nacogdoches, as did B. A. M. Thomas, William fauntleroy, and Joseph G. Washington, all of whom were also from Logan County, Kentucky. With these four men, Micajah Autry, and two others, Cloud traveled to San Antonio de Béxar and the Alamo. They arrived after February 11 and became members of the Tennessee Mounted Volunteers, commanded by William B. Harrison. Cloud died in the battle of the Alamo on March 6, 1836.

1830 - James Bowie, 34, and his friend Isaac Donoho took the oath of allegiance to Mexico. Bowie learned of an 1828 Mexican law that offered citizens grants for eleven leagues of land (4,428.4 acres) for around $200. Bowie urged Mexicans to apply for these grants which he in turn purchased from them and so doing acquired a vast amount of land holdings in Texas.

1831 - Susanna Wilkerson Dickinson (also spelled Dickerson), survivor of the Alamo, was born about 1814 in Tennessee, perhaps in Williamson County. On May 24, 1829, she married Almeron Dickinson before a justice of the peace in Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tennessee. The couple remained in the vicinity through the end of 1830. The Dickinsons arrived at Gonzales, Texas, on February 20, 1831, in company with fifty-four other settlers, after a trip by schooner from New Orleans. On May 5 Dickinson received a league of land from Green DeWitt, on the San Marcos River in what became Caldwell County. Susanna's only child, Angelina Elizabeth Dickinson, was born on December 14, 1834. Susanna and her daughter may have joined other families hiding in the timber along the Guadalupe River in early October 1835, when Mexican troops from San Antonio demanded the return of an old cannon lent to Gonzales four years earlier. The resulting skirmish, the battle of Gonzales, was the first fight of the Texas Revolution. Susanna said goodbye to her husband on October 13 as the volunteers left for San Antonio under command of Stephen F. Austin. She remained in Gonzales through November, when newly arriving troops looted her home.

She joined Dickinson in San Antonio, probably in December 1835, and lodged in Ramón Músquiz's home, where she opened her table to boarders (among them David Crockett) and did laundry. On February 23, 1836, the family moved into the Alamo. After the battle of the Alamo on March 6, Mexican soldiers found her—some accounts say in the powder magazine, others in the church—and took her and Angelina, along with the other women and children, to Músquiz's home. The women were later interviewed by Santa Anna, who gave each a blanket and two dollars in silver before releasing them. Legend says Susanna displayed her husband's Masonic apron to a Mexican general in a plea for help and that Santa Anna offered to take Angelina to Mexico. Santa Anna sent Susanna and her daughter, accompanied by Juan N. Almonte's servant Ben, to Sam Houston with a letter of warning dated March 7. On the way, the pair met Joe, William B. Travis's slave, who had been freed by Santa Anna. The party was discovered by Erastus (Deaf) Smith and Henry Wax Karnes. Smith guided them to Houston in Gonzales, where they arrived after dark about March 12.[For more on her fascinating life: https://tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fdi06 ]

1861 - The Fifth Texas Cavalry was also known as the Fifth Texas Mounted Rifles and the Fifth Texas Mounted Volunteers. On August 12, 1861, Confederate Brig. Gen. Henry H. Sibley arrived in San Antonio to organize a brigade for a campaign in New Mexico and Arizona. His ultimate goal was to capture the gold and silver mines of Colorado and California and to secure a Confederate pathway to the Pacific. The Fifth was recruited, for the most part, in Waco, San Antonio, Bonham, Weatherford, and Austin and was organized and mustered into Confederate service at San Antonio with 926 officers and men. The volunteers supplied their horses and their own weapons, the quality of which varied widely. The Fifth Texas Mounted Rifles—numbering 835 effectives by the time it left San Antonio—marched for Fort Bliss in October. From Fort Bliss the all-Texas brigade began its march up the Rio Grande toward Santa Fe. After occupying Fort Thorn, New Mexico Territory, the brigade attempted the capture of Fort Craig. Although the fort remained in Union hands, the Texans defeated a sortie attempted by the garrison on February 20–21 at the battle of Valverde. The Fifth Texas Cavalry played a conspicuous role in the Confederate victory. With General Sibley indisposed, Colonel Green commanded the troops on the field. Capt. Willis L. Lang, the commander of Company B, led what was perhaps the only charge of lancers in the Civil War.

1871 - Martial law was declared in Walker County. Lawlessness was widespread during Reconstruction, and Republican efforts often seemed to exacerbate the problem. The so-called Walker County Rebellion, which led to the declaration of martial law, followed the murder of a freedman and the attempted trial of four white suspects.

1874 - After considering a challenge from his Democratic opponents, the Texas Senate confirmed the election of Walter Moses Burton. Burton was brought to Texas as a slave from North Carolina in 1850 at the age of twenty-one. He belonged to a Fort Bend planter, Thomas Burke Burton, who taught him how to read and write, skills that served him well in later years. He became involved in politics as early as 1869, when he was elected sheriff and tax collector of Fort Bend County, and served as the president of the Fort Bend County Union League. In 1873 Burton campaigned for and won a seat in the Texas Senate, where he served for seven years. In the Senate he championed the education of blacks. Among the many bills that he helped push through was one that called for the establishment of Prairie View Normal School (now Prairie View A&M University).

1875 - Leander Randon Millican, Baptist missionary, was licensed to preach. He was born at the community of Millican, Texas, in 1853. In 1874, while he was deputy sheriff of Lampasas County, Millican was converted in a Methodist camp meeting. He joined the Baptist Church at Lampasas later that year. He attended Baylor University at Independence during the 1874-75 term. His work was with small, struggling churches on a half-time, quarter-time, or monthly basis in an area from San Angelo west to El Paso and south to Presidio. During his ministering travels on horseback he dreamed of a camp meeting to bring ranchers, cowboys, and churches together for preaching and classes. His dream was realized on July 28, 1915, when he and George W. Truett met with ranchers to begin an annual cowboy camp meeting that became known as Paisano Baptist Encampment. Millican was called "missionary to the mountains," "circuit rider of the plains," "trail-blazing minister," "sky pilot of the plains," and "Brother Lallie." He died in 1938.

1885 - On this date, John Manning caught up to Tom Greene in a stolen wagon and a team of horses heading for California, with Manning's 12 year old daughter gagged and tied to the bottom of the wagon. Greene was 8 days on the trail at the time Manning, the Sherrif, and a Texas Ranger caught up to him. In a short fight, Manning shot and killed Greene, rescuing his daughter.

1895 - Late in the afternoon, a wall of dust hundreds of feet tall, blew across the Texas Panhandle, hurdling the afternoon into immediate darkness. The choking dust left parts of the Panhandle in as much as a foot of dust while stripping other area bare.

1917 - Tarleton State University began in 1893, when the citizens of Stephenville raised $6,500 to build Stephenville College. The property was then transferred to the trustees of the newly established John Tarleton College, which had been endowed by John Tarleton. The Thirty-fifth Legislature accepted and on February 20, 1917, passed a bill establishing a branch of Texas A&M College at Stephenville to be named John Tarleton Agricultural College. The school continued to offer a two-year degree, the preparatory program, and specialized study in agriculture, home economics, and military training.

1943 - The Women Airforce Pilots flight school opened at Avenger Field in Sweetwater, Texas, during World War II.

1971 - A massive blizzard that left 6 to 26 inches of snow hit the Texas Panhandle. The blizzard lasted until February 22. Three people were killed in the storm, which also caused the disappearance of 15,000 cattle in Amarillo. Property losses and damages totaled $3.1 million