February 9

Crusader forces led by Bohemond of Taranto defeat a relieving Seljuk army during the prolonged siege of Antioch.

The First Crusade's prolonged siege of the heavily fortified city of Antioch nearly collapsed the crusader army through starvation and disease before this victory over a relieving Muslim army allowed the crusaders to finally capture the city, a crucial step on their path toward Jerusalem.

With no candidate winning an Electoral College majority, the U.S. House of Representatives elects John Quincy Adams president in a contingent election.

With four candidates splitting the popular and electoral vote in the 1824 election, none achieved a majority, throwing the decision to the House of Representatives under the Twelfth Amendment. Adams's selection, aided by rival Henry Clay, was denounced by Andrew Jackson supporters as a "corrupt bargain" and fueled Jackson's successful campaign four years later.

Jefferson Davis is elected provisional president of the newly formed Confederate States of America.

Davis, a former U.S. senator and secretary of war, was chosen as a compromise candidate by delegates from the newly seceded Southern states, reflecting his military credentials and moderate reputation among secessionists. He would lead the Confederacy throughout the Civil War until its defeat in 1865.

Giuseppe Verdi's final opera, the comic masterpiece "Falstaff," premieres at Milan's La Scala to great acclaim.

Composed when Verdi was nearly 80 years old, "Falstaff" marked a striking late-career shift from the composer's earlier tragic operas toward comic brilliance, drawing on Shakespeare's Falstaff character. It's widely regarded as one of the greatest comic operas ever written.

Physical education instructor William G. Morgan invents a new game called Mintonette, soon renamed volleyball.

Morgan, a YMCA instructor, designed the game as a less physically demanding alternative to basketball for older or less athletic members. Adopted internationally within years, especially by the military during World War I, it grew into one of the most widely played team sports in the world.

The Beatles make their American television debut on The Ed Sullivan Show before a record-breaking audience of 73 million viewers.

The Beatles' Ed Sullivan Show appearance drew an estimated 73 million viewers, at the time one of the largest audiences in American television history, and is often cited as a defining moment that ignited full-blown Beatlemania across the United States.

The magnitude 6.6 Sylmar earthquake strikes greater Los Angeles, killing 64 people and prompting major reforms to California building codes.

The Sylmar earthquake struck early in the morning, collapsing hospital buildings and a dam spillway and prompting California to adopt stricter seismic building standards, particularly for hospitals, which had suffered severe structural failures during the quake.

Halley's Comet makes its closest approach to the sun during its most recent visit to the inner solar system, visible from Earth for the first time since 1910.

Halley's Comet, visible from Earth roughly every 76 years, made its closest approach on this 1986 pass, though poor viewing conditions left many observers disappointed compared to its more spectacular 1910 appearance. Several spacecraft, including Europe's Giotto probe, made close flybys to study the comet directly for the first time.

The opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics is held in Pyeongchang, South Korea, notably featuring a unified Korean delegation.

The Pyeongchang ceremony notably featured North and South Korean athletes marching together under a unified flag and fielding a joint women's ice hockey team, a symbolic diplomatic gesture amid otherwise tense relations between the two countries.

The second impeachment trial of former President Donald Trump begins in the U.S. Senate, following the January 6 Capitol attack.

The Senate trial, an unprecedented second impeachment proceeding against a president who had already left office, centered on charges that Trump incited the January 6 Capitol riot. He was acquitted after the vote to convict fell short of the required two-thirds majority.