The Almanac

Today is Wednesday, Nov. 27, the 331st day of 2002 with 34 to follow.

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

Those born on this date are under the sign of Sagittarius. They include Anders Celsius, Swedish astronomer and inventor of the centigrade thermometer, in 1701; American historian Charles Beard and Israeli statesman Chaim Weizmann, both in 1874; producer David Merrick in 1912 (age 88); "Buffalo Bob" Smith ("The Howdy Dowdy Show") in 1917; rock guitarist Jimi Hendrix in 1942; singer Eddie Rabbitt in 1944; and actors Fisher Stevens ("Early Edition") in 1963 (age 39), Robin Givens in 1964 (age 38), and Jaleel White in 1976 (age 26).

On this date in history:

In 1759, town officials in Stratford-upon-Avon, England, evicted the Rev. Francis Gastrell from William Shakespeare's home after he cut down a 150-year-old tree that had been planted by the famed writer.

In 1901, the War Department authorized creation of the Army War College to instruct commissioned officers. It was built in Leavenworth, Kan.

In 1940, two months after General Ion Antonescu seized power in Romania and forced King Carol II to abdicate, more than 60 aides of the exiled king, including Nicolae Iorga, a former minister and acclaimed historian, were executed.

In 1945, President Truman named Gen. George Marshall his special representative to China.

In 1970, a man with a knife attempted to injure Pope Paul VI at Manila Airport in the Philippines.

In 1984, the Treasury Department proposed a sweeping overhaul of the U.S. Tax Code.

In 1989, University of Chicago doctors implanted part of a woman's liver in her 21-month-old daughter in the nation's first living donor liver transplant.

Also in 1989, Virginia certified Douglas Wilder as the nation's first elected black governor by a margin of 0.38 percent.

In 1990, British treasury chief John Major was elected Conservative Party leader, succeeding Margaret Thatcher as prime minister.

In 1992, military dissidents attempted to overthrow Venezuelan President Carlos Andres Perez.

In 1994, Bosnian Serbs took 150 U.N. peacekeepers hostage to prevent NATO air strikes.

In 1997, tens of thousands of German students took to the streets of Bonn to protest the decline of Germany's higher education system.

In 2001, nearly half the 1,200 people detained after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, mostly of Middle Eastern descent, were still in custody more than two months later.

A thought for the day: King Louis XVIII of France had a favorite saying, "Punctuality is the politeness of kings."