Today is Wednesday, Aug. 24, the 236th day of 2021 with 129 to follow.
The moon is waning. Morning stars are Jupiter, Mars, Neptune, Saturn, Uranus and Venus. Evening stars are Jupiter, Mars, Mercury, Neptune, Saturn and Uranus.
Those born on this date are under the sign of Virgo. They include Argentine poet/author Jorge Luis Borges in 1899; Palestinian leader/Nobel Peace Prize laureate Yasser Arafat in 1929; British novelist A.S. Byatt, born Antonia Duffy, in 1936 (age 86); musician David Freiberg in 1938 (age 84); musician Mason Williams in 1938 (age 84); wrestling entrepreneur Vince McMahon in 1945 (age 77); Brazilian author Paulo Coelho in 1947 (age 75); actor Anne Archer in 1947 (age 75); former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in 1955 (age 67); actor Stephen Fry in 1957 (age 65); actor Steve Guttenberg in 1958 (age 64); baseball Hall of Fame member Cal Ripken Jr. in 1960 (age 62); political commentator Major Garrett in 1962 (age 60); actor Marlee Matlin in 1965 (age 57); director Ava DuVernay in 1972 (age 50); comedian Dave Chappelle in 1973 (age 49); actor Alex O'Loughlin in 1976 (46); young adult author John Green in 1977 (age 45); actor Chad Michael Murray in 1981 (age 41); actor Rupert Grint in 1988 (age 34); model Sofia Richie in 1998 (age 24); actor Griffin Gluck in 2000 (age 22).
On this date in history:
In 79 A.D., thousands died and the Roman cities of Pompeii and Herculaneum were buried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in Italy.
In 1814, the British captured Washington and burned the Capitol and the White House.
In 1932, Amelia Earhart became the first woman to fly non-stop across the United States.
In 1954, President Dwight Eisenhower signed the Communist Control Act outlawing the Communist Party. Though the act has never been repealed, the party exists to this day.
In 1981, Mark Chapman, who claimed devils forced him to kill John Lennon and God told him to confess, was sentenced to 20 years to life in prison for fatally shooting the former member of the Beatles.
In 1989, Pete Rose, whose slashing singles and head-first slides once made him the embodiment of America's national sport, was banished from baseball for life, ending a gambling scandal.
In 1990, Irish-British hostage Brian Keenan, held by pro-Iranian Muslim extremists in Lebanon for more than four years, was freed.
In 1991, Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev quit as general secretary of the Communist Party central committee. He also ordered his Cabinet to resign.
In 1992, Hurricane Andrew smashed into Florida south of Miami with sustained winds of 145 mph. The storm killed 15 people and caused more than $30 billion in damage.
In 1996, four women became students at The Citadel, a military school in South Carolina that had fought in court to remain all-male.
In 2004, two Russian passenger jetliners crashed within minutes of each other after taking off from Domodedovo Airport in Moscow. Authorities said terrorist attacks caused the crashes, which killed 89 people.
In 2006, Pluto, the small, distant astronomic body that has discovered in 1930, was demoted to "dwarf planet" status when the International Astronomical Union adopted a new definition of "planet."
In 2006, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration decided to make the "morning-after" contraceptive pill known as Plan B available without a prescription to people 18 and older.
In 2011, Steve Jobs, co-founder and chief executive officer of Apple Inc., resigned, telling his company's board he could "no longer meet my duties and expectations." Jobs, 56, who stayed on as chairman, had battled cancer for several years. He died Oct. 5, 2011.
In 2012, Anders Behring Breivik, who killed 77 people in Norway, was sentenced to 21 years in prison, the longest prison term possible for murder and terrorism under Norwegian law.
In 2013, Bolivian government officials said inmates at a prison in Santa Cruz used knives, machetes, self-made flamethrowers and other weapons in a gang battle that left 30 people dead and dozens injured.
In 2017, a single winner from Massachusetts won $758 million for the largest single-ticket lottery jackpot win in U.S. history.
In 2021, the 2020 Paralympic Summer Games opened in Tokyo with the largest number of athletes to date. The Games were postponed by one year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
A thought for the day: "Problems are only opportunities in work clothes." -- American industrialist Henry Kaiser
