UPI Almanac for Wednesday, Aug. 30, 2023

Today is Wednesday, Aug. 30, the 242nd day of 2023 with 123 to follow.

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

Those born on this date are under the sign of Virgo. They include English author Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley in 1797; civil rights leader Roy Wilkins in 1901; actor Fred MacMurray in 1908; baseball Hall of Fame member Ted Williams in 1918; businessman Warren Buffett in 1930 (age 93); U.S. astronaut Jack Swigert in 1931; musician John Phillips in 1935; actor Elizabeth Ashley in 1939 (age 84); French Olympic champion skier Jean-Claude Killy in 1943 (age 80); cartoonist Robert Crumb in 1943 (age 80); newspaper columnist Molly Ivins in 1944; actor Peggy Lipton in 1946; comedian Lewis Black in 1948 (age 75); actor Timothy Bottoms in 1951 (age 72); basketball Hall of Fame member Robert Parish in 1953 (age 70); Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko in 1954 (age 69); actor Michael Chiklis in 1963 (age 60); actor Michael Michele in 1966 (age 57); actor Cameron Diaz in 1972 (age 51); journalist Lisa Ling in 1973 (age 50); tennis player Andy Roddick in 1982 (age 41); actor Michael Grant Terry in 1984 (age 39); singer Bebe Rexha in 1989 (age 34); actor/singer Trevor Jackson in 1996 (age 27).

On this date in history:

In 30 B.C., Cleopatra, queen of Egypt and lover of Julius Caesar and Mark Antony, killed herself following the defeat of her forces by Octavian, the future first emperor of Rome.

In 1780, Gen. Benedict Arnold betrayed the United States when he promised secretly to surrender the fort at West Point to the British army. He fled to England and died in poverty.

In 1918, Fanta Kaplan, a member of the Socialist Revolutionary Party, attempted to assassinate Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Lenin, shooting him twice. He survived wounds to each shoulder, one of which pierced his lung.

In 1945, Gen. Douglas MacArthur landed in Japan to oversee the country's formal surrender at the end of World War II. MacArthur told United Press Japan's "punishment for her sins, which is just beginning, will be long and bitter."

In 1954, Hurricane Carol prompted evacuations along the North Carolina coast. The storm later battered states along the northern eastern seaboard and killed 72 people.

In 1963, a hotline was established between Washington, D.C., and Moscow, allowing President John F. Kennedy direct phone access to the Kremlin for the first time.

In 1967, the nomination of Thurgood Marshall to the U.S. Supreme Court was confirmed. Marshall was the first Black American to sit on the court.

In 1983, Guion Bluford became the first Black American astronaut in space aboard the Challenger as part of the STS-8 mission. Bluford participated in four Space Shuttle missions, his final in 1992.

In 1994, the Lockheed and Martin Marietta corporations agreed to a merger that would create the largest U.S. defense contractor.

In 2003, more than 120 people, including prominent Shiite cleric Ayatollah Mohammad Baqir al-Hakim, were killed in a bomb attack on Iraq's Imam Ali Mosque.

In 2003, a Russian K-159 nuclear-powered submarine was lost in the Barents Sea, claiming the lives of nine of its 10-member crew. Russian authorities blamed negligence by navy officials.

In 2011, two senior U.S. Justice Department officials charged with overseeing the failed government gun-smuggling "sting" operation dubbed "Fast and Furious" were replaced amid bitter congressional criticism of the mission. The plan was to pass thousands of weapons to suspected Mexican gun smugglers and trace them to drug leaders, but hundreds of firearms were lost, some showing up at crime scenes, including the 2010 slaying of a U.S. Border Patrol agent.

In 2021, the United States completed its evacuation mission at the international airport in Afghanistan, officially bringing an end to the longest war in U.S. history.

In 2022, Mikhail Gorbachev, the president of the former Soviet Union, died at the age of 91.

A thought for the day: "Nothing contributes so much to tranquilize the mind as a steady purpose -- a point on which the soul may fix its intellectual eye." -- English author Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley