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The almanac

By United Press International
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Today is Wednesday, Feb. 26, the 57th day of 2014 with 308 to follow.

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

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Those born this date are under the sign of Pisces. They include British playwright Christopher Marlowe in 1564; French novelist and poet Victor Hugo in 1802; Levi Strauss, who created the world's first pair of jeans, in 1829; American frontiersman William "Buffalo Bill" Cody in 1846; surgeon and cornflakes developer John Kellogg in 1852; Hall of Fame baseball pitcher Grover Cleveland Alexander in 1887; actors William Frawley in 1887, Robert Alda in 1914, Jackie Gleason in 1916, Tony Randall in 1920 and Betty Hutton in 1921; Rock and Roll Hall of Fame member Antoine "Fats" Domino in 1928 (age 86); former Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon in 1928; political commentator Robert Novak in 1931; singer Johnny Cash in 1932; rock musician Mitch Ryder in 1945 (age 69); singer Michael Bolton in 1953 (age 61); and Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan in 1954 (age 60).

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On this date in history:

In 1531, an earthquake in Lisbon, Portugal, killed an estimated 20,000 people.

In 1815, Napoleon Bonaparte and 1,200 men left his exile on the Isle of Elba to start his 100-day campaign to regain France.

In 1935, Germany began operation of its air force, the Luftwaffe, under Reichmarshal Hermann Goering.

In 1952, Prime Minister Winston Churchill announced that the United Kingdom had an atomic bomb.

In 1984, the last U.S. Marines sent to Lebanon as part of a multinational peacekeeping force left Beirut.

In 1993, a powerful bomb exploded in the parking garage below the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center in New York, killing six people and injuring more than 1,000.

In 1994, 11 members of the Branch Davidian religious cult were acquitted of murder and conspiracy charges stemming from a federal raid and siege at the compound near Waco, Texas, the year before.

In 1998, a federal jury in Amarillo, Texas, ruled in favor of Oprah Winfrey in a lawsuit filed by Texas cattlemen who said she caused beef prices to fall with a talk show about "mad cow" disease.

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In 2005, Bank of America acknowledged it lost computer tapes containing account information on 1.2 million federal employee credit cards, including those of some U.S. senators.

In 2006, the Winter Olympics ended in Turin, Italy. Germany won the most medals (29) and the most gold medals (11).

In 2011, the U.N. Security Council voted unanimously to impose strong sanctions on Libya and called for a war-crimes investigation.

In 2013, the U.S. Senate confirmed the nomination of Chuck Hagel as defense secretary.


A thought for the day: Victor Hugo wrote, "To learn to read is to light a fire; every syllable that is spelled out is a spark."

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