UPI Almanac for Sunday, May 20, 2018

Today is Sunday, May 20, the 140th day of 2018 with 225 to follow.

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

Those born on this date are under the sign of Taurus. They include William Thornton, architect of the Capitol in Washington, in 1759; Dolley Madison, wife of the fourth U.S. president, James Madison, in 1768; French novelist Honore de Balzac in 1799; English philosopher and economist John Stuart Mill in 1806; German Emile Berliner, inventor of the flat phonograph record, in 1851; actor James Stewart in 1908; comedian George Gobel in 1919; actor Anthony Zerbe in 1936 (age 82); hockey Hall of Fame member Stan Mikita in 1940 (age 78); Japanese baseball home run king Sadaharu Oh in 1940 (age 78); singer/songwriter Joe Cocker in 1944; singer/actor Cher, born Cherilyn Sarkisian, in 1946 (age 72); Ronald Prescott Reagan, son of former U.S. President Ronald Reagan, in 1958 (age 60); actor Bronson Pinchot in 1959 (age 59); actor Tony Goldwyn in 1960 (age 59); TV personality Ted Allen in 1965 (age 53); actor Timothy Olyphant in 1968 (age 50); race car driver Tony Stewart in 1971 (age 47); rapper Busta Rhymes in 1972 (age 46); actor Matt Czuchry in 1977 (age 41); baseball player Jayson Werth in 1979 (age 39); actor Jack Gleeson in 1992 (age 27).

On this date in history:

In 526, up to 300,000 people were killed in an earthquake in Syria and Antioch.

In 1506, Christopher Columbus died in Spain.

In 1873, Levi Strauss and Jacob Davis were granted a patent for blue jeans with copper rivets.

In 1927, Charles Lindbergh took off from New York in his single-engine monoplane, "The Spirit of St. Louis," bound for Paris. While he winged his way across the Atlantic, his mother taught her chemistry class at Cass Technical High School as usual.

In 1974, Judge John Sirica ordered U.S. President Richard Nixon to turn over tapes and other records of 64 White House conversations on the Watergate affair.

In 1989, Chinese Premier Li Peng declared martial law in Beijing in response to heightened student demonstrations in Tiananmen Square.

In 1995, President Bill Clinton permanently closed Pennsylvania Avenue in front of the White House after more than 200 years of mostly unimpeded traffic.

In 1999, a high school student in Georgia opened fire on his classmates, injuring six of them before surrendering to school authorities. The same day, President Bill Clinton and first lady Hillary Clinton met in Littleton, Colo., with students, teachers and families of the victims of the previous month's deadly shootings at Columbine High School.

In 2002, East Timor, a small Pacific Coast nation, gained independence from Indonesia. It is called Timor Leste.

In 2008, U.S. Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., 76, a champion of liberal causes in the Senate for more than four decades, was diagnosed with a malignant brain tumor. Kennedy died Aug. 25, 2009.

In 2013, a tornado struck the Moore, Okla., area near Oklahoma City, killing 24 people, injuring more than 300 and destroying many buildings, including two elementary schools.

In 2017, President Donald Trump departs for his first foreign trip as leader, traveling to Saudi Arabia, Israel, the Vatican and Belgium. Upon his return to Washington, D.C., he declared the trip "a home run."

A thought for the day: "Children are made readers on the laps of their parents." -- Emilie Buchwald