The Almanac

Today is Saturday, April 24, the 115th day of 2004 with 251 to follow.

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

Those born on this date are under the sign of Taurus. They include English novelist Anthony Trollope in 1815; actor Leslie Howard in 1893; artist Willem DeKooning in 1904; U.S. poet laureate Robert Penn Warren in 1905; actresses Shirley MacLaine in 1934 (age 70) and Jill Ireland in 1936; singer, actress and director Barbra Streisand in 1942 (age 62); Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley in 1943 (age 61); and actors Eric Bogosian in 1953 (age 51) and Michael O'Keefe in 1955 (age 49).

On this date in history:

In 1704, the Boston News Letter became the first American newspaper to be published on a regular basis.

In 1800, Congress established the Library of Congress.

In 1877, federal troops moved out of New Orleans, ending the North's military occupation of the South following the Civil War.

In 1981, IBM introduced its first personal computer.

In 1986, the Duchess of Windsor, Wallis Warfield Simpson, for whom England's King Edward VIII gave up his throne, died in exile in Paris at age 89.

In 1987, genetically altered bacteria, designed to prevent frost damage, was sprayed on a California strawberry field in the first test of such biotechnology in nature.

In 1991, the first U.N. peacekeeping forces were deployed along the Kuwait-Iraq border.

Also in 1991, Greddie Stowers, a World War I corporal, was posthumously awarded the Medal of Honor to become the first African-American to receive the highest medal for valor in combat.

In 1992, a car driven by an elderly New York woman careened through a crowded Greenwich Village park, killing four people and injuring 27.

In 1993, an IRA bomb blast rocked London's financial district, injuring at least 35 people.

In 1995, the UNAbomber struck again: a mail bomb killed Gilbert Murray, president of the California Forestry Association, in Sacramento.

In 1996, President Clinton signed into law a bill to fight terrorism.

Also in 1996, the Palestinian National Council voted to drop its official commitment to the destruction of Israel.

In 1997, opening arguments began in Denver in the federal court trial of suspected Oklahoma City bomber Timothy McVeigh.

Also in 1997, with ratification by the Senate, the United States became the 75th country to approve the Chemical Weapons Convention.

In 1998, after threats from President Yeltsin and two negative votes, the Russian parliament approved Yeltsin's nomination of Sergei Kiriyenko as the nation's premier.

In 2003, North Korea announced it has nuclear weapons and has begun making bomb-grade plutonium.

A thought for the day: Erica Jong wrote, "Everyone has a talent. What is rare is the courage to nurture it in solitude and to follow the talent to the dark places where it leads."