On Feb. 8, 1693, a charter was granted for the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg in the Virginia Colony.

In 1904, Japan launched a surprise attack on the Russian navy at Port Arthur (now Dalian, China), marking the start of the Russo-Japanese War.

In 1910, the Boy Scouts of America was incorporated by William D. Boyce.

In 1915, D.W. Griffith’s controversial epic film “The Birth of a Nation” premiered in Los Angeles.

In 1936, the first NFL draft was held at the Ritz-Carlton Hotel in Philadelphia.

In 1968, three Black students were killed and 28 wounded as state troopers opened fire on student demonstrators on the campus of South Carolina State College in Orangeburg in the wake of protests over a whites-only bowling alley. The event would become known as the Orangeburg Massacre.