The almanac

Today is Friday, Jan. 9, the ninth day of 2009 with 356 to follow.

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

Those born on this date are under the sign of Capricorn. They include women's suffrage and peace movement leader Carrie Chapman Catt in 1859; pioneer psychologist John Watson in 1878; choreographer George Balanchine in 1904; French novelist Simone de Beauvoir in 1908; Richard Nixon, 37th president of the United States, in 1913; striptease artist Gypsy Rose Lee in 1914; actors Fernando Lamas in 1915, Lee Van Cleef in 1925 and Bob Denver in 1935; author Judith Krantz in 1928 (age 81); sportscaster Dick Enberg in 1935 (age 74); singer Joan Baez and actress Susannah York, both in 1941 (age 68); country singer Crystal Gayle in 1951 (age 58); actress Joely Richardson in 1965 (age 44); and bandleader Dave Matthews in 1967 (age 42).

On this day in history:

In 1768, the first modern circus was staged in London.

In 1861, Mississippi seceded from the Union.

In 1945, in World War II, U.S. troops invaded the Philippine island of Luzon and went on to liberate Manila.

In 1969, the British-French supersonic Concorde jetliner made its first test flight at Bristol, England.

In 1972, the luxury liner Queen Elizabeth was gutted by fire while docked in Hong Kong.

In 1986, the Internal Revenue Service announced it would withhold income tax refunds coming to 750,000 government loan defaulters, most of them former students.

In 1995, House Speaker Newt Gingrich, R-Ga., asked for the resignation of House historian Christina Jeffrey after it was revealed she'd once criticized a school program on the Holocaust for not including the "Nazi point of view" or that of the Ku Klux Klan.

In 1996, rebels in the Russian republic of Chechnya overran the town of Kizlyar and took 2,000 hostages at a hospital and in nearby homes.

In 2004, a Kenyan survey said about 1 million adults were infected with HIV in the country, one-third of previous estimates.

In 2007, fierce fighting was reported in Baghdad between Sunni Muslim insurgents and Iraqi forces backed by U.S. troops and air assaults. Fighting flared soon after a new security plan for the city was announced, reports said.

Also in 2007, Venezuelan stocks fell almost 19 percent -- their biggest drop on record – and the country's currency lost almost one-third of its value after President Hugo Chavez pledged to nationalize the country's utilities.

In 2008, U.S. President Bush began a trip to the Middle East, including his first visit as president to Israel. After meeting with Palestinian leaders, Bush called for an end to Israeli "occupation that began in 1967."

Also in 2008, the top U.N. peacekeeper warned the security council of a "grave deterioration" in security in Sudan's embattled Darfur region.

A thought for the day: Seneca said, "If one does not know to which port one is sailing, no wind is favorable."