February 14 is often listed as the birthday of Frederick Douglass, who late in life served as the Commissioner of the Haitian Republic.

Daniel Hautzinger writes in “Frederick Douglass’s Defiant Stand at Chicago’s World’s Fair” (WTTW, February 14, 2018) that “Frederick Douglass never knew the date of his own birth, or even how old he was … But the famous abolitionist and orator eventually chose to celebrate his birthday on February 14, determining that he was probably born 200 years ago, in 1818. So when Douglass served as the most prominent representative of African Americans at the 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition in Chicago, from which his race had largely been excluded despite earnest protestation and petition, he was roughly 75 years old.”

More on Douglass and the 1893 World’s Fair can be found at https://interactive.wttw.com/playlist/2018/02/14/frederick-douglass-chicago-worlds-fair.