The Almanac -- weekly

This is observed in the United States as Presidents' Day.

The moon is waning. The morning stars are Mars, Mercury, Saturn and Venus. The evening stars are Jupiter, Neptune and Uranus.

In 1801, the U.S. House of Representatives chose Thomas Jefferson as the third president of the United States after he and Aaron Burr tied in the Electoral College. It took 35 House ballots before Jefferson won and Burr became vice president.

In 1817, Baltimore became the first U.S. city with gas-burning street lights.

In 1867, the first ship passed through the Suez Canal.

In 1904, Giacomo Puccini's Madama Butterfly premiered in Milan, Italy.

In 1909, Apache leader Geronimo died while under military confinement at Fort Sill, Okla.

In 1933, Newsweek magazine published its first issue.

In 1968, the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame opened in Springfield, Mass.

In 1979, A Prairie Home Companion, hosted by Garrison Keillor, made its debut on National Public Radio.

In 1986, Johnson and Johnson halted production of all non-prescription drugs in capsules following the death of a Peekskill, N.Y., woman from cyanide-laced Extra-Strength Tylenol.

In 2003, after security guards used pepper spray to break up a fight at a packed Chicago social club a stampede to the exits by panicked patrons resulted in 21 deaths.

In 2005, U.S. President George W. Bush nominated John Negroponte to be the first director of national intelligence.

In 2006, more than 1,000 people were killed in a mudslide that covered a village on Leyte in the central Philippines.

In 2008, the province of Kosovo declared independence from Serbia. Thousands of ethnic Albanians celebrated in the streets but others resorted to violent protest. The United States and several other countries, including Britain, Germany, and France, recognized Kosovo as a sovereign and independent state.

In 2009, General Motors and Chrysler asked for an additional $14 billion from the government to keep from going bankrupt. That upped their total requests to $39 billion.

In 2011, the British government advised same-sex couples they can form civil partnerships in church if they wish.

In 2013, tens of thousands of people marched past the White House urging U.S. President Barack Obama to reject the controversial Keystone XL oil pipeline from Canada.

The moon is waning. The morning stars are Mars, Mercury, Saturn and Venus. The evening stars are Jupiter, Neptune and Uranus.

In 1841, the first filibuster in the U.S. Senate began. (It ended March 11.)

In 1856, The American Party, also known as the Know-Nothing Party, nominated its first presidential candidate, former U.S. President Millard Fillmore, but, he carried only Maryland and the party soon vanished.

In 1865, after a long Civil War siege, Union naval forces captured Charleston, S.C.

In 1884, Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain was published.

In 1930, the planet Pluto was discovered by astronomer Clyde Tombaugh.

In 1954, the Church of Scientology was established in Los Angeles.

In 1967, J. Robert Oppenheimer, the father of the atomic bomb, died in Princeton, N.J., at the age of 62.

In 1979, Snow fell in the Sahara Desert in southern Algeria for the first known time.

In 2001, Dale Earnhardt Sr., stock-car racing's top driver, was killed in a crash in the final turn of the final lap of the Daytona 500. He was 49.

In 2003, about 200 people died in a South Korea subway fire set by a man authorities said apparently was upset at his doctors.

In 2004, 40 chemical and fuel-laden runaway rail cars derailed in northeastern Iran, producing an explosion that killed at least 265 people.

In 2006, 16 people died in rioting in Nigeria over published cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad that enraged Muslims around the world.

In 2008, two of four masterpieces stolen from the Zurich museum a week earlier, a Monet and a van Gogh, were found in perfect condition in the back seat of an unlocked car in Zurich.

In 2010, a man crashed his light plane into an office of the Internal Revenue Service in Austin, Texas, killing himself and two others. Authorities said he apparently held a grudge against the U.S. government and its tax system.

In 2013, Jerry Buss, who owned the Los Angeles Lakers for more than 30 years, during which they won 10 NBA championships, died after a long fight against cancer. He was 80.

The moon is waning. The morning stars are Mars, Mercury, Saturn and Venus. The evening stars are Jupiter, Neptune and Uranus.

In 1473, Nicolaus Copernicus, the father of modern astronomy, was born in Torun, a city in north-central Poland.

In 1807, Aaron Burr, a former U.S. vice president, was arrested in Alabama on charges of plotting to annex Spanish territory in Louisiana and Mexico to be used toward the establishment of an independent republic.

In 1878, Thomas Edison patented the first gramophone.

In 1922, vaudeville star Ed Wynn became the first big name in show business to sign for a regular radio show.

In 1942, as a security measure during World War II, the U.S. government began relocating Japanese-Americans living in coastal Pacific areas to internment camps in remote areas of several states. (They were allowed to return to their homes in January 1945.)

In 1945, U.S. Marines landed on the island of Iwo Jima, opening one of the bloodiest battles in the Pacific during World War II.

In 1986, the Soviet Union launched the Mir space station. (It was occupied for 10 of its 15 years in orbit.)

In 1997, China's paramount leader Deng Xiaoping died at age 92.

In 2003, all 289 people aboard an Iranian military transport plane were killed when it crashed in a mountainous region of southeastern Iran.

In 2005, U.S. Roman Catholic officials said they received 1,092 charges of clergy sex abuse, most involving boys.

In 2008, Cuban President Fidel Castro, 81, who temporarily handed power to his brother, Raul, in July 2006, because of illness, stepped down permanently after 49 years in power. Raul, 76, then formally succeeded him.

In 2010, golfer Tiger Woods accepted responsibility for his reckless actions, apologizing to a global audience and telling the media to leave his family alone. Admitting his infidelity, he said, I am the only person to blame.

In 2012, 44 inmates died and 30 escaped during a prison riot in northern Mexico.

In 2013, Tunisian Prime Minister Hamadi Jebali, unable to forge a new government amid mounting citizen protests, announced his resignation.

The moon is waning. The morning stars are Mars, Mercury, Saturn and Venus. The evening stars are Jupiter, Neptune and Uranus.

In 1809, the U.S. Supreme Court, in its Marbury vs. Madison decision, ruled the power of the federal government was no greater than that of any individual state of the Union.

In 1816, The Barber of Seville by Gioachino Rossini opened in Rome.

In 1872, the Metropolitan Museum of Art opened in New York.

In 1938, Anthony Eden resigned as Britain's foreign secretary to protest the appeasement policy of Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain toward Nazi Germany.

In 1962, U.S. astronaut John Glenn became the first American to orbit Earth. He landed safely after three orbits in a Mercury spacecraft.

In 1991, U.S. troops penetrated Iraq, capturing as many as 500 Iraqi soldiers.

In 1998, Tara Lipinski, 15, of the United States became the youngest person to win an Olympic gold medal in figure skating.

In 2003, fire broke out during a rock concert at a West Warwick, R.I., nightclub, killing 100 people.

In 2006, the Danish newspaper that published controversial cartoons of Muslim Prophet Muhammad and triggered widespread, angry and often deadly protests ran a full-page apology in Saudi papers.

In 2008, a missile interceptor launched from a U.S. Navy ship knocked down a dying satellite 130 miles over the Pacific Ocean. Officials said the satellite contained 1,000 pounds of frozen toxic fuel.

In 2010, a minaret and part of the roof fell into a historic 18th-century mosque during services, killing at least 38 people and injuring 71 more in the ancient city of Meknes, Morocco.

In 2012, officials said poachers in search of ivory in northern Cameroon had slaughtered about 300 elephants for their tusks since mid-January.

In 2013, a U.S. Census Bureau report said American Indians have the highest poverty rate of any ethnic group in the country.

The moon is waning. The morning stars are Mars, Mercury, Saturn and Venus. The evening stars are Jupiter, Neptune and Uranus.

In 1828, a printing press later used to print the first newspaper for American Indians arrived at the Cherokee Council in Echota, Ga.

In 1848, The Communist Manifesto was published by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels.

In 1878, the New Haven, Conn., Telephone Co. published the first phone directory. It listed 50 subscribers.

In 1885, the Washington Monument, a 555-foot-high marble obelisk built in honor of America's revolutionary hero and first president, was dedicated in Washington.

In 1916, Germans launched the Battle of Verdun. (More than 1 million soldiers in the German and French armies were killed in nearly 10 months of fighting -- the longest battle of World War I.)

In 1925, the first issue of The New Yorker was published.

In 1934, Nicaraguan guerrilla leader Cesar Augusto Sandino was killed by members of the Nicaraguan national guard.

In 1953, Francis Crick and James D. Watson discovered the double helix structure of the DNA molecule.

In 1965, Black Muslim leader Malcolm X was assassinated at a rally in New York.

In 1972, Richard Nixon became the first U.S. president to visit the People's Republic of China.

In 1994, longtime CIA counterintelligence officer Aldrich Ames and his wife, Maria, were arrested and charged with selling information to the Soviet Union and Russia. (Ames was sentenced to life in prison; his wife got a five-year term.)

In 1995, a Russian commission estimated as many as 24,400 civilians died in the a two-month uprising in the separatist republic of Chechnya.

In 2007, nuclear neighbors India and Pakistan signed a treaty in New Delhi aimed at preventing the accidental use of atomic weapons.

In 2012, a commuter train plowed into a barrier at a Buenos Aires station, killing 49 people and injuring hundreds more.

In 2013, former Illinois police Sgt. Drew Peterson was sentenced to 38 years in prison for the 2004 murder of his third wife, Kathleen Savio. (Peterson's fourth wife, Stacy, who disappeared in 2007, remains missing.)

The moon is waning. The morning stars are Mars, Mercury, Saturn and Venus. The evening stars are Jupiter, Neptune and Uranus.

In 1819, a treaty with Spain ceded Florida to the United States.

In 1855, Pennsylvania State University was founded in State College, Pa. It was originally called the Farmers' High School of Pennsylvania.

In 1862, Jefferson Davis was inaugurated as president of the Confederate States of America.

In 1879, Woolworth, the first chain store, opened in Utica, N.Y.

In 1889, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota and Washington were admitted into the United States.

In 1959, the Daytona 500 was run for the first time. Lee Petty won the race.

In 1973, Israeli fighter planes shot down a Libyan commercial airliner, killing 108 of the 113 people aboard. The military apparently believed the airliner was a security threat in Israeli-controlled airspace. (Israel's defense minister later said there was an error in judgment by the military. Israel paid reparations to the families of the victims.)

In 1980, in one of the most dramatic upsets in Olympic history, the underdog U.S. hockey team, made up of collegians and second-tier professional players, defeated the defending champion Soviet team, regarded as the world's finest, 4-3 at the XIII Olympic Winter Games in Lake Placid, N.Y.

In 1987, artist Andy Warhol died of heart failure at age 58.

In 2004, rebels attacked a refugee camp in northern Uganda, killing at least 192 people.

In 2005, a powerful earthquake struck Iran, killing more than 500 people.

In 2010, U.S. President Barack Obama announced his plan for a healthcare reform bill.

In 2011, a 6.3-magnitude earthquake severely damaged Christchurch, New Zealand's second largest city, killing 185 people and injuring as many as 2,000.

In 2013, Paralympian Oscar Pistorius, charged in his girlfriend's shooting death, was granted bail in Pretoria, South Africa. (Pistorius' trial is scheduled for March 2014.)

The moon is waning. The morning stars are Mars, Mercury, Saturn and Venus. The evening stars are Jupiter, Neptune and Uranus.

In 1903, The United States was granted a lease in perpetuity on Guantanamo Bay by Cuban officials.

In 1942, a Japanese submarine surfaced off the coast of California and fired 25 shells at an oil refinery near Santa Barbara.

In 1945, members of the 5th Division of the U.S. Marines planted a U.S. flag atop Mount Suribachi on the strategically important Pacific island of Iwo Jima at the end of one of World War II's bloodiest battles.

In 1982, Canada, Japan and the Common Market nations of Europe joined the United States in economic and diplomatic sanctions against Poland and the Soviet Union to protest imposition of martial law in Poland.

In 1991, military forces in Thailand overthrew the elected government and imposed martial law.

In 1994, Bosnia's warring Croats and Muslims signed a cease-fire. The Croats agreed to pull back from the Muslim city of Mostar, which had been under siege.

In 1995, the Dow Jones industrial average closed at more than 4,000 for the first time -- at 4,003.33.

In 1997, Scottish scientists introduced Dolly the cloned sheep to the world. She was the first mammal successfully cloned from a cell from an adult animal.

In 1998, a series of tornadoes raked central Florida, killing 42 people and injuring more than 200 others.

In 1999, a jury in Jasper, Texas, convicted self-described white supremacist John King in the June 1998 killing of a black man who'd been dragged to his death behind a pickup truck. (King was sentenced to death two days later.)

In 2006, the snow-covered roof of a Moscow market collapsed, killing at least 60 people and injuring more than two dozen others.

In 2010, a Gallup Poll indicated that 19.9 percent of the U.S. workforce was unemployed or underemployed.

In 2012, Joe Paterno, the longtime Penn State football coach who was fired amid a child sex abuse scandal involving former assistant coach Jerry Sandusky, died of lung cancer at age 85. In 46 years under Paterno, the Nittany Lions won 406 games, went to 37 bowl games and captured two national championships.

In 2013, Iran's atomic energy agency announced plans to build 16 nuclear power plants throughout the country. The announcement came days before Iran was to resume talks on its internationally disputed nuclear program.