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

Those born on this date are under the sign of Gemini. They include poet/philosopher Ralph Waldo Emerson in 1803; dancer Bill Bojangles Robinson in 1878; aircraft designer Igor Sikorsky in 1889; Yugoslavian leader Josip Broz Tito in 1892; heavyweight boxing champion Gene Tunney in 1897; humorist and publisher Bennett Cerf in 1898; actor Claude Akins in 1926; spy novelist Robert Ludlum in 1927; opera singer Beverly Sills (born Belle Miriam Silverman) in 1929 (age 78); actors Dixie Carter and Ian McKellan, both in 1939 (age 68); singer/actress Leslie Uggams in 1943 (age 64); Frank Oz (born Richard Frank Oznowicz) director, actor, puppeteer, in 1944 (age 63); actresses Karen Valentine in 1947 (age 60) and Connie Selleca in 1955 (age 52); comedian Mike Myers in 1963 (age 44); and actress Anne Heche in 1969 (age 38).

In 1787, the first regular session of the Constitutional Convention convened at Independence Hall in Philadelphia.

In 1935, winding up his legendary career with the Boston Braves, Babe Ruth hit his 714th and last home run in his final game. The home run record stood for 39 years until Hank Aaron, also with the Braves, broke it in 1974.

In 1949, Chinese communist forces entered Shanghai as Nationalist troops abandoned the city and prepared to move to the island of Formosa, now called Taiwan.

In 1979, 275 people were killed when an American Airlines DC-10 crashed on takeoff from Chicago's O'Hare International Airport.

In 1986, 5 million people formed a broken 4,000-mile human chain from Los Angeles to New York in Hands Across America, to benefit the nation's homeless. The event raised $24.5 million.

In 1990, U.S. President George H.W. Bush called for more research into global warming.

In 1991, the United States reversed its decision to allow HIV-infected people to enter the country.

Also in 1991, Cuban soldiers withdrew from Angola after 16 years of fighting South Africa and U.S.-backed rebels.

In 1993, the U.N. Security Council voted to establish a war-crimes tribunal to deal with atrocities in the civil war in Bosnia.

In 1994, after living 20 years in exile, mostly in the United States, Russian author Alexander Solzhenitsyn returned to his homeland. He had been expelled after The Gulag Archipelago, an expose of the Soviet prison camp system, was published in the West in 1974.

In 1995, the level of tension in war-torn Bosnia increased dramatically when the Serbs began taking U.N. peacekeepers hostage for use as human shields.

In 1997, mutinous soldiers seized power in Sierra Leone.

In 1999, a report by a U.S. House of Representatives committee on espionage said China stole information on the most advanced U.S. nuclear weapons.

In 2003, the Israeli Cabinet officially accepted the Palestinian claim to eventual statehood.

In 2004, a U.S. Army report said U.S. mistreatment of prisoners in Iraq and Afghanistan was more widespread than previously known.

In 2005, Amnesty International accused the Bush administration of atrocious human rights violations at Guantanamo Bay, Afghanistan and Iraq.

Also in 2005, some 1,000 U.S. and Iraqi troops mounted a surprise offensive in western Iraq, targeting insurgent hideouts and munitions caches.

In 2006, the U.S. Senate approved a compromise immigration reform bill that had few similarities to a House bill passed in December, setting the stage for a possible congressional showdown on the issue.

Also in 2006, Kenneth Lay and Jeffrey Skilling, former officers of Enron Corp., were convicted in Houston federal court of conspiracy and securities fraud.