Today is the 54th day of 2015 and the 65th day of winter.

TODAY'S HISTORY: In 1778, Baron von Steuben joined the U.S. encampment at Valley Forge.� In 1942, a Japanese submarine fired artillery shells at coastal targets near Santa Barbara, California.

In 1945, American Marines raised the American flag on the island of Iwo Jima.

In 1954, the first mass vaccination of children against polio began in Pittsburgh.

In 1991, President George H.W. Bush announced the beginning of an allied ground offensive in Iraq.

TODAY'S BIRTHDAYS: W.E.B. Du Bois (1868-1963), author/activist; Tom Osborne (1937- ), football coach; Peter Fonda (1940- ), actor; Michael Dell (1965- ), businessman; Kelly Macdonald (1976- ), actress; Aziz Ansari (1983- ), actor/comedian; Emily Blunt (1983- ), actress; Skylar Grey (1986- ), singer-songwriter; Dakota Fanning (1994- ), actress.

TODAY'S FACT: A group of buzzards is called a "wake." A group of finches is called a "charm."

TODAY'S SPORTS: In 1988, the city of Chicago gave the Cubs baseball team permission to install lights at Wrigley Field and begin hosting night games.

TODAY'S QUOTE: "There is but one coward on earth, and that is the coward that dare not know." -- W.E.B. Du Bois

TODAY'S NUMBER: 6,825 -- American soldiers who died taking Iwo Jima in 1945.

TODAY'S MOON: Between new moon (Feb. 18) and first quarter moon (Feb. 25).

Today is the 53rd day of 2015 and the 64th day of winter.

TODAY'S HISTORY: In 1819, Spain signed the Adams-Onis Treaty, ceding Florida to the United States and redefining the boundary between U.S. and Spanish territories from Louisiana to the Pacific Ocean.

In 1935, new regulations outlawed aircraft flying over the White House.

In 1993, the U.N. Security Council approved the creation of a war crimes tribunal to address atrocities committed during the former Yugoslavia's civil war.

TODAY'S BIRTHDAYS: George Washington (1732-1799), soldier/first U.S. president; Arthur Schopenhauer (1788-1860), philosopher; Edna St. Vincent Millay (1892-1950), poet; Edward "Ted" Kennedy (1932-2009), U.S. senator; Julius Erving (1950- ), basketball player; Kyle MacLachlan (1959- ), actor; Steve Irwin (1962-2006), TV personality; Drew Barrymore (1975- ), actress; Rajon Rondo (1986- ), basketball player.

TODAY'S FACT: Like Mozart, Chopin was considered a musical prodigy in childhood. By age 7 he had composed two simple marches.

TODAY'S SPORTS: In 1980, the U.S. Olympic hockey team upset the Soviet Union 4-3 in Lake Placid, New York, a victory popularly known as the "Miracle on Ice."

TODAY'S QUOTE: "The discovery of truth is prevented more effectively, not by the false appearance things present and which mislead into error, not directly by weakness of the reasoning powers, but by preconceived opinion, by prejudice." -- Arthur Schopenhauer

TODAY'S NUMBER: 1 -- Broadway performance (excluding 13 previews) for Arthur Bicknell's play, "Moose Murders," which opened and closed at the Eugene O'Neill Theatre on this day in 1983. The play is widely considered the most infamous flop in Broadway history.

TODAY'S MOON: Between new moon (Feb. 18) and first quarter moon (Feb. 25).

Today is the 52nd day of 2015 and the 63rd day of winter.

TODAY'S HISTORY: In 1842, John Greenough received the first U.S. patent for a sewing machine.

In 1848, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels published "The Communist Manifesto."

In 1925, the first issue of The New Yorker was published.

In 1965, Malcolm X was assassinated in New York City.

In 1972, Richard Nixon became the first U.S. president to visit China while in office.

TODAY'S BIRTHDAYS: Leo Delibes (1836-1891), composer; Anais Nin (1903-1977), author; John Rawls (1921-2002), philosopher; Sam Peckinpah (1925-1984), film director; Erma Bombeck (1927-1996), humorist; David Geffen (1943- ), record producer; Tyne Daly (1946- ), actress; Alan Rickman (1946- ), actor; William Petersen (1953- ), actor; Kelsey Grammer (1955- ), actor; Mary Chapin Carpenter (1958- ), singer-songwriter; Chuck Palahniuk (1962- ), author; David Foster Wallace (1962-2008), author; Jennifer Love Hewitt (1979- ), actress; Ellen Page (1987- ), actress.

TODAY'S FACT: Chemnitz, East Germany, changed its name to Karl-Marx-Stadt in 1953. After East and West Germany reunited in 1990, the name was changed back following a referendum.

TODAY'S SPORTS: In 1948, race car driver Bill France and various members of the auto racing community formed the National Association for Stock Car Racing (NASCAR).

TODAY'S QUOTE: "We are like sculptors, constantly carving out of others the image we long for, need, love or desire, often against reality, against their benefit, and always, in the end, a disappointment, because it does not fit them." -- Anais Nin

TODAY'S NUMBER: 555 -- height (in feet) of the Washington Monument, dedicated on this day in 1885.

TODAY'S MOON: Between new moon (Feb. 18) and first quarter moon (Feb. 25).