The Almanac

Today is Friday, June 25, the 177th day of 2004 with 189 to follow.

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

Those born on this date are under the sign of Cancer. They include French composer Gustave Charpentier in 1860; Broadway producer George Abbott in 1887; English novelist and critic George Orwell, author of "1984," in 1903; movie director Sidney Lumet in 1924 (age 80); actress June Lockhart in 1925 (age 79); civil rights advocate James Meredith in 1933 (age 71); actor Jimmie Walker in 1948 (age 56); and pop singers Carly Simon in 1945 (age 59) and George Michael in 1963 (age 41).

On this date in history:

In 1876, Gen. George Custer and his force of 208 men were annihilated by Chief Sitting Bull's Sioux warriors at Little Big Horn in Montana.

In 1942, General Eisenhower takes command of the U.S. World War II forces in Europe.

In 1950, North Korean forces invaded South Korea.

In 1951, CBS aired the first color television broadcast. At the time, no color TV sets were owned by the public.

In 1962, the U.S. Supreme Court handed down a decision interpreted as barring prayer in public schools.

In 1967, with Mick Jagger, Keith Richard and others singing backup, the Beatles recorded "All You Need Is Love" before an international television audience estimated at 400 million people.

In 1973, White House attorney John Dean told a Senate committee that President Nixon joined in a plot to cover up the Watergate break-in.

In 1982, Alexander Haig resigned as President Reagan's secretary of state in a dispute over policy.

In 1991, Slovenia and Croatia declared independence that would lead to secession from Yugoslavia if negotiations for a confederation of republics collapsed. The declaration sparked civil war that spread throughout what was formerly Yugoslavia.

In 1993, with Vice President Gore casting the tie-breaking vote, the Senate narrowly passed the budget bill incorporating President Clinton's deficit-reduction program.

Also in 1993, Kim Campbell was sworn in as Canada's first woman prime minister.

In 1994, Japan's Prime Minister Tsutomu Hata resigned two months after taking office rather than face a no-confidence vote by the Diet, or parliament.

In 1996, a truck bomb killed 19 U.S. military personnel in Saudi Arabia. Several hundred more people were injured.

In 1997, about half of Mir's power supply was knocked out when an unmanned cargo ship collided with the Russian space station and put a hole in it.

Also in 1997, Montserrat's Soufriere Hills Volcano, after lying dormant for 400 years, erupted -- wiping out two-thirds of the Caribbean island and forcing most of the population to relocate.

In 1998, President Clinton arrived in China for a much-debated visit.

Also in 1998, Whitewater figure Susan McDougal was freed from prison after spending 18 months behind bars for refusing to testify.

In 1999, the San Antonio Spurs won their first National Basketball Association championship title, defeating the New York Knicks four games to one.

In 2002, WorldCom, the nation's second largest long-distance communication carrier, announced it had overstated its cash flow by $3.8 billion during the past 15 months. The troubled company's stock value had dropped more than 90 percent since the beginning of the year.

In 2003, the Federal Reserve Board lowered the key federal funds rate, the overnight loan rate between banks, to 1.0 percent, lowest since 1958.

A thought for the day: James H. Boren defined bureaucrats as "the only people in the world who can say absolutely nothing and mean it."