1. The first Mardi Gras parade was held in Mobile on February 20, 1830. French settlers in the area brought the celebration to the city in the early 1700s, and it has since become a beloved annual event.

2. In 1863, Union troops commanded by General William T. Sherman burned the town of Vernon in Lamar County, Alabama. The destruction was part of the Union's larger effort to defeat the Confederacy in the Civil War.

3. On February 20, 1872, the Alabama state legislature convened for the first time in the newly constructed State Capitol building in Montgomery. The grand structure had been under construction for nearly a decade and would go on to become a symbol of the state government.

4. Native Alabamian and civil rights leader Rosa Parks was born on February 20, 1913. Parks famously refused to give up her bus seat to a white passenger in Montgomery in 1955, sparking the Montgomery Bus Boycott and becoming a prominent figure in the civil rights movement.

5. Alabama Governor George Wallace, known for his staunch segregationist policies, announced his candidacy for president on February 20, 1972. Though his campaign was ultimately unsuccessful, Wallace's political influence in the South during the Civil Rights era cannot be overstated.