UPI Almanac for Monday, May 5, 2014

This is Monday, May 5, the 125th day of 2014 with 240 to follow.

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

Those born on this date are under the sign of Taurus. They include Danish philosopher Soren Kierkegaard in 1813; German political theorist Karl Marx in 1818; hatmaker John Stetson in 1830; crusading journalist Nellie Bly in 1864; author Christopher Morley in 1890; radio actor Freeman Gosden, Amos of "Amos and Andy," in 1899; chef and cookbook author James Beard in 1903; actor Tyrone Power in 1914; singer/actor Alice Faye in 1915; actor Michael Murphy in 1938 (age 76); singer Tammy Wynette in 1942; journalists Kurt Loder in 1945 (age 69) and Brian Williams in 1959 (age 55); actors Lance Henriksen in 1940 (age 74), Michael Palin in 1943 (age 71), John Rhys-Davies and Roger Rees, both in 1944 (age 70) and Tina Yothers in 1973 (age 41); and singer-songwriter Adele Adkins in 1988 (age 26).

On this date in history:

In 1821, Napoleon Bonaparte died in exile on the island of St. Helena.

In 1847, the American Medical Association was founded in Philadelphia.

In 1862, Mexican troops, outnumbered 3-1, defeated the invading French forces of Napoleon III.

In 1904, Cy Young of the Boston Americans pitched Major League Baseball's first perfect game in a 3-0 win over Philadelphia.

In 1925, biology teacher John Scopes was arrested for teaching Darwin's theory of evolution in violation of Tennessee state laws.

In 1945, Elsie Mitchell and five neighborhood children were killed in Lakeview, Ore., when a Japanese balloon they had found in the woods exploded. They were listed as the only known World War II civilian fatalities in the continental United States.

In 1961, astronaut Alan Shepard became the United States' first man in space in a brief sub-orbital flight from Cape Canaveral.

In 1981, imprisoned Irish-Catholic militant Bobby Sands died after refusing food for 66 days in protest of his imprisonment as a criminal rather than a political prisoner by British authorities.

In 1996, Jose Maria Aznar became prime minister of Spain.

In 2003, a wave of tornadoes killed 40 people in Kansas, Missouri and Tennessee.

In 2005, British Prime Minister Tony Blair was elected to a third term.

In 2006, 10 U.S. soldiers were killed in the crash of a helicopter in Afghanistan near the Pakistan border.

In 2010, Nigerian President Umaru Yar'Adua died after a long illness and Goodluck Jonathan, the vice president, assumed the presidency.

In 2012, former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson won the Libertarian Party nomination for U.S. president.

In 2013, explosions shook buildings in Damascus and Syrian officials blamed Israel, one calling the attack "an act of war." No casualties were reported.

A thought for the day: “Wars can be prevented just as surely as they can be provoked, and we who fail to prevent them must share in the guilt for the dead.” -- Gen. Omar Bradley