February 14

February 14

• Every year: Saint Valentine's Day is celebrated by lovers and those in the greeting-card, flower, and chocolate business, but not by the Roman Catholic church, which removed the feast of Saint Valentine from the ecclesiastical calendar in 1969; there were possibly two Saint Valentines in the early church, thought to be martyrs for their faith.

• 2003: The Roslyn Institute in Edinburgh, Scotland, announced that the cloned sheep Dolly had been put down at the age of 6 1/2 following the discovery that she had a lung tumor caused by a virus; Dolly was stuffed and put on display at the National Museum of Scotland, Edinburgh.

• 2002: The U.S. House of Representatives passed the Shays-Meehan campaign financing bill, banning "soft money" contributions to federal candidates.

• 2000: The NASA space probe Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous (NEAR) entered orbit around the asteroid Eros.

• 1929: The Saint Valentine's Day Massacre occurred in Chicago; in one of the bloodiest mob executions in the 20th century, members of Al Capone's gang pretty much destroyed the "Bugs" Moran gang.

• 1918: Effective on this date, the Russians adopted the Gregorian, or New Style (N.S.), calendar, skipping 13 days (the previous day was January 31) to bring their calendar into line with the Western world.

• 869: Saint Cyril, the "Apostle to the Slavs" for whom the Cyrillic alphabet is named, died; his feast day is celebrated today (with that of his older brother, Methodius) by the Western church.