The almanac

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Today is Thursday, Oct, 2, the 276th day of 2008 with 90 to follow.

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

Those born on this date are under the sign of Libra. They include England's King Richard III in 1452; Nat Turner, a black slave and leader of the only effective and sustained U.S. slave revolt, in 1800; German statesman Paul von Hindenburg in 1847; French World War I military commander Ferdinand Foch in 1851; Indian independence leader Mohandas Gandhi, known as Mahatma Gandhi, in 1869; comedians Julius Henry "Groucho" Marx in 1890 and Bud Abbott in 1895; child actor George "Spanky" McFarland of "Our Gang" and "Little Rascals" fame, in 1928; movie critic Rex Reed in 1938 (age 70); pop singer Don McLean in 1945 (age 63); fashion designer Donna Karan in 1948 (age 60); rock singer Sting (Gordon Sumner) in 1951 (age 57); and actress Lorraine Bracco in 1955 (age 53).

On this date in history:

In 1780, British spy Maj. John Andre was convicted in connection with Benedict Arnold's treason and was hanged in Tappan, N.Y.

In 1950, the "Peanuts" comic strip by Charles M. Schulz was published for the first time.

In 1967, Thurgood Marshall was sworn in as the first African-American justice of the U.S. Supreme Court.

In 1969, U.S. Supreme Court Justice Abe Fortas resigned after admitting he had made a financial deal with the Louis Wolfson Foundation.

In 1984, Richard Miller became the first FBI agent to be charged with espionage. He was convicted two years later of passing government secrets to the Soviet Union through his Russian lover.

In 1985, actor Rock Hudson died of AIDS. He was 59 years old.

In 1991, the Organization of American States resolved to isolate Haiti's military junta and restore Aristide's government to power.

In 1992, the U.S. House of Representatives failed to override U.S. President George H.W. Bush's veto of a bill that would have reversed the administration's "gag rule" on abortion information.

In 1993, ousted Russian Vice President Aleksandr Rutskoi called for people to take to the streets against President Boris Yeltsin's "dictatorship."

In 2001, NATO said that the United States had shown evidence, sufficient to justify NATO military action, that Osama bin Laden and his organization were responsible for the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

In 2002, the first in a series of apparent random sniper attacks that terrorized the Washington area for three weeks occurred on this date with the slaying of a 55-year-old Maryland man.

In 2003, David Kay, the chief U.S. weapons inspector in Iraq, told Congress his team had yet to find conclusive evidence of weapons of mass destruction in that country.

Also in 2003, a federal judge barred prosecutors of accused terrorist Zacarias Moussaoui from seeking the death penalty or linking him with the Sept. 11 attacks because he hadn't been allowed to interview al-Qaida operatives who might help his case.

In 2004, at least 48 people were killed in a series of attacks across the Indian states of Nagaland and Assam.

In 2005, 21 people died after a tour boat flipped over on Lake George in New York's Adirondacks.

Also in 2005, Connecticut issued its first licenses for "civil unions," becoming the third state to offer same-sex couples a legal way to unite.

In 2006, five Amish girls were fatally wounded in a series of shootings in a rural, one-room schoolhouse in Nickle Mines, Pa. The suspect, a milk truck driver who also killed himself, had told his wife that he needed to avenge something that had happened 20 years ago, officers said.

In 2007, Yemen's coast guard and NATO ships worked to recover bodies from the Red Sea after a volcano erupted on an island some 85 miles off the coast.

Also in 2007, the U.S. military said 64 troops had died in Iraq in September, 20 fewer than the previous month.

A thought for the day: Queen Elizabeth I of England said, "A fool too late bewares when all the peril is past."