The almanac

Today is Sunday, Aug. 16, the 228th day of 2009 with 137 to follow.

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

Those born on this date are under the sign of Leo. They include the French physicist Gabriel Lippmann, inventor of color photography, in 1845; Amos Alonzo Stagg, pioneer basketball, football hall of fame coach, in 1862; labor leader George Meany in 1894; former Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin in 1913; actors Fess Parker in 1924 (age 85), Ann Blyth in 1928 (age 81) and Robert Culp in 1930 (age 79); football star and sports commentator Frank Gifford, also in 1930 (age 79), TV personality Kathie Lee Gifford, in 1953 (age 56); singer Eydie Gorme in 1931 (age 78); actresses Julie Newmar in 1933 (age 76) and Lesley Ann Warren in 1946 (age 63); actor Reginald VelJohnson in 1952 (age 57); director James Cameron ("Titanic") in 1954 (age 55); actor Jeff Perry in 1955 (age 54); actress Angela Bassett and singer Madonna, both in 1958 (age 51); and actors Laura Innes in 1959 (age 60) and Timothy Hutton in 1960 (age 49).

On this date in history:

In 1812, British forces foiled plans for a U.S. invasion of Canada by capturing the city of Detroit.

In 1896, the North Country gold rush began with the discovery of gold in the Klondike region of Canada's Yukon Territory.

In 1939, New York's famous vaudeville house, the Hippodrome, closed after 34 years.

In 1948, baseball legend Babe Ruth died in New York of cancer at age 53.

In 1977, Elvis Presley, the king of rock 'n' roll, died of heart failure at his home in Memphis at age 42.

In 1987, a Northwest Airlines jet bound for Phoenix crashed on takeoff from Detroit Metropolitan Airport, killing 156 people. A 4-year-old girl was the sole survivor.

In 1990, U.S. naval forces were ordered to prevent ships from reaching or leaving the ports of Iraq and Iraqi-occupied Kuwait.

In 2004, as many as seven helicopters were pressed into service to rescue hundreds of flood victims stranded on roof and car tops near Cornwall, England. Rescue workers called the situation "horrendous."

In 2005, a magnitude 7.2 earthquake hit northern Japan triggering a tsunami alert along the Pacific coast.

In 2006, authorities in Bangkok, Thailand, arrested American John Mark Karr for the widely publicized 1996 slaying of JonBenet Ramsey, a 6-year-old beauty queen from Boulder, Colo. Karr publicly confessed but said it was an accident. He was later cleared of any involvement.

Also in 2006, flooding in Ethiopia, which already had killed hundreds and stranded thousands, spread across the country as more rivers burst through their banks.

In 2007, Jose Padilla, accused of plotting to explode a dirty bomb in the United States, was convicted by a federal jury of conspiracy to commit terror and giving material support to al-Qaida.

In 2008, Ukraine said it wanted to join other European nations to establish a ballistic missile shield defense system. However, the report didn't specify whether the country was referring to the same missile shield being developed by the United States, Poland and the Czech Republic.

Also in 2008, military officials said at least 33 people, including eight civilians, died in a coalition airstrike in southern Afghanistan. The civilians reportedly were being held hostage at a military compound.

And in sports, American swimmer Michael Phelps won his record eighth gold medal in the Summer Olympic Games at Beijing.

A thought for the day: Nicholas Murray Butler said, "An expert is one who knows more and more about less and less."