ALMANAC

Today is Monday, Feb. 20, the 51st day of 2017. There are 314 days left in the year. This is Presidents Day.

Today’s highlight in history:

On Feb. 20, 1962, astronaut John Glenn became the first American to orbit the Earth as he flew aboard Project Mercury’s Friendship 7 spacecraft. On this date: In 1792, President George Washington signed an act creating the United States Post Office Department.

In 1862, William Wallace Lincoln, 11, the son of President Abraham Lincoln and Mary Todd Lincoln, died at the White House, apparently of typhoid fever.

In 1907, President Theodore Roosevelt signed an act which excluded “idiots, imbeciles, feebleminded persons, epileptics, insane persons” from being admitted to the United States.

In 1938, Anthony Eden resigned as British foreign secretary following Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain’s decision to negotiate with Italian dictator Benito Mussolini.

In 1950, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 5-3 that authorities making a lawful arrest did not need a warrant to search and seize evidence in an area that was in the “immediate and complete control” of the suspect.

In 1987, a bomb left by Unabomber Ted Kaczynski exploded behind a computer store in Salt Lake City, seriously injuring store owner Gary Wright.

In 2003, a fire sparked by pyrotechnics broke out during a concert by the group Great White at The Station nightclub in West Warwick, Rhode Island, killing 100 people and injuring about 200 others.

Today’s birthdays: Gloria Vanderbilt is 93. Actor Sidney Poitier is 90. Racing Hall of Famer Bobby Unser is 83. Racing Hall of Famer Roger Penske is 80. Actress Sandy Duncan is 71. Rock musician J. Geils is 71. Newspaper heiress Patricia Hearst is 63. Basketball Hallof-Famer Charles Barkley is 54. Model Cindy Crawford is 51. Actor Andrew Shue is 50. Actress Lili Taylor is 50. Comedian Trevor Noah is 33. Singer Rihanna is 29.