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UPI Almanac for Monday, March 30, 2015

Gunman wounds U.S. president, three others ... on this date in history.

By United Press International
U.S. President Ronald Reagan smiles and waves to White House staffers who gathered April 11, 1981, to welcome him home from George Washington University Hospital where he was treated for gunshot wounds suffered in an assassination attempt. Three other men also were wounded in the May 30, 1981, attack in Washington. File photo by Scott Stewart/UPI
1 of 9 | U.S. President Ronald Reagan smiles and waves to White House staffers who gathered April 11, 1981, to welcome him home from George Washington University Hospital where he was treated for gunshot wounds suffered in an assassination attempt. Three other men also were wounded in the May 30, 1981, attack in Washington. File photo by Scott Stewart/UPI | License Photo

Today is Monday, March 30, the 89th day of 2015 with 276 to follow.

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

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Those born on this date are under the sign of Aries. They include Spanish painter Francisco Jose de Goya in 1746; German chemist Robert Bunsen, inventor of the Bunsen gas burner, in 1811; English author Anna Sewell ("Black Beauty") in 1820; English social reformer Charles Booth in 1840; Dutch painter Vincent van Gogh in 1853; Irish dramatist Sean O'Casey in 1880; philanthropist Brooke Astor in 1902; former CIA Director Richard Helms in 1913; singer Frankie Laine in 1913; TV host Peter Marshall in 1926 (age 89); actor Richard Dysart in 1929 (age 86); actor John Astin in 1930 (age 85); actor Warren Beatty in 1937 (age 78); basketball Hall of Fame member Jerry Lucas in 1940 (age 75); rock musician Graeme Edge in 1941 (age 74); British blues/rock guitarist Eric Clapton in 1945 (age 70); actor Robbie Coltrane in 1950 (age 65); actor Paul Reiser in 1957 (age 58); rapper MC Hammer, born Stanley Burrell, in 1962 (age 53); singer Tracy Chapman in 1964 (age 51); television commentator Piers Morgan in 1965 (age 50); singer Celine Dion in 1968 (age 47); singer Norah Jones in 1979 (age 36).

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On this date in history:

In 1842, Dr. Crawford Long became the first physician to use anesthetic (ether) in surgery.

In 1858, a U.S. patent was granted to Hymen Lipman for a pencil with an attached eraser.

In 1867, U.S. Secretary of State William Seward reached an agreement with Russia for the purchase of Alaska for $7.2 million in gold.

In 1870, the 15th Amendment, granting African-American men the right to vote, was adopted into the U.S. Constitution.

In 1923, the Cunard liner "Laconia" arrived in New York City, the first passenger ship to circumnavigate the world. It was a cruise of 130 days.

In 1975, the South Vietnamese city of Da Nang fell to North Vietnamese forces.

In 1981, U.S. President Ronald Reagan was shot by John Hinckley Jr. outside a Washington hotel. White House press secretary James Brady, a Secret Service agent and a Washington police officer also were wounded.

In 1998, Armenian Premier Robert Kocharian was elected president in a runoff election in the former Soviet republic.

In 1999, a jury in Oregon awarded $81 million in damages to the family of a smoker who had died from lung cancer. (A state judge reduced the punitive portion to $32 million.)

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In 2006, Jill Carroll, a freelance reporter for The Christian Science Monitor, was freed in Baghdad after being held for 82 days by kidnappers.

In 2008, flooding in Tanzanian mines killed at least 75 men, government officials said. Many of the victims appeared to have been engulfed by rising water as they worked.

In 2010, gunmen killed 10 students after they apparently failed to stop at a checkpoint similar to those used by drug traffickers in the Mexican state of Durango while en route to pick up government scholarships.

In 2013, Kenya's Supreme Court upheld the country's disputed March 4 election of Uhuru Kenyatta as president.

In 2014, in a continuing mystery, an Australian official said objects spotted in the Indian Ocean had "nothing to do" with Malaysia Airlines flight 370, which disappeared more than three weeks earlier with 239 people aboard. (Nearly a year later, Malaysian officials ruled the disappearance of the aircraft was accidental and its occupants were "presumed to have lost their lives," but no wreckage had been found.)


A thought for the day: "There are no easy answers but there are simple answers. We must have the courage to do what we know is morally right." -- Ronald Reagan

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