The Almanac
Today is Sunday, March 5, the 64th day of 2017 with 301 to follow. The
moon is waxing. Morning stars are Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune and Venus.
Evening stars are Mercury, Venus, Uranus and Mars. Those born on this
date are under the sign of Pisces. They include Flemish mapmaker
Gerardus Mercator in 1512; the Rev. William Blackstone, the first
settler in what is now Boston, in 1595; Antoine Cadillac, founder of
Detroit, in 1658; poet Lucy Larcom in 1824; lithographer James Ives,
partner of Nathaniel Currier, in 1824; author Frank Norris in 1870;
water treatment pioneer Emmett J. Culligan in 1893; actor Rex Harrison
in 1908; actor Jack Cassidy in 1927; actor Paul Sand in 1935 (age 82);
actor Dean Stockwell in 1936 (age 81); actor Samantha Eggar in 1939
(age 78); actor Michael Warren in 1946 (age 71); actor Marsha Warfield
in 1954 (age 63); magician Penn Jillette of Penn and Teller in 1955
(age 62); journalist Ray Suarez in 1957 (age 60); singer Andy Gibb in
1958; televangelist Joel Osteen in 1963 (age 54); football Hall of Fame
member Michael Irvin in 1966 (age 51); actor Eva Mendes in 1974 (age
43). On this date in history: In 1770, British troops killed five
colonials in the so-called Boston Massacre, one of the events that led
to the American Revolution. In 1933, in German elections, Adolf
Hitler's Nazi Party won nearly half the seats in the Reichstag (the
Parliament). In 1946, Winston Churchill, in a famous speech in Fulton,
Mo., stated that a Soviet Union Iron Curtain had descended across
Europe. In 1953, the Soviet Union announced that dictator Joseph Stalin
had died at age 73. Stalin had been in a coma after suffering a massive
stroke four days earlier. In 1966, Staff Sgt. Barry Sadler's Ballad of
the Green Berets hit No. 1, spending five weeks on the Billboard Hot
100 charts. In 1984, the Standard Oil Co. of California, also known as
Chevron, bought Gulf Corp. for more than $13 billion in the largest
business merger in U.S. history at the time. In 1993, Canada's Ben
Johnson, once called the world's fastest human, tested positive for
performance-enhancing drugs and was banned for life from track
competition. In 2011, archaeologists renovating the Rio de Janeiro
harbor for the 2016 Olympics reported uncovering the remains of a
19th-century port where thousands of people arrived from Africa and
were sold into slavery. In 2014, the New York-based College Board
announced plans for a major overhaul of the SAT test -- the college
entrance exam -- to take effect in 2016. A thought for the day: It is
no use saying, 'We are doing our best. You have got to succeed in doing
what is necessary. -- Winston Churchill .
