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GOOD MORNING – TODAY IS TUESDAY, March 17, the 77th day of 2020 with 289 to follow. Sunrise in the Boston area is @ 6:52 and sunset is @ 6:52. The moon is waning. The morning stars are Mars, Neptune and Uranus. Evening stars are Jupiter, Neptune, Saturn, Uranus and Venus.
ON THIS DAY IN: 0461 – Bishop Patrick, St. Patrick, died in Saul. Ireland celebrates this day in his honor. (More about St. Patrick’s Day)
1756 – St. Patrick’s Day was celebrated in New York City for the first time. The event took place at the Crown and Thistle Tavern.
1766 – Britain repealed the Stamp Act that had caused resentment in the North American colonies.
1776 – British forces evacuated Boston to Nova Scotia during the Revolutionary War.
1868 – Postage stamp canceling machine patent was issued.
1870 – Wellesley College was incorporated by the Massachusetts legislature under its first name, Wellesley Female Seminary.
1910 – The Camp Fire Girls organization was founded by Luther and Charlotte Gulick. It was formally presented to the public exactly 2 years later.
1914 – Russia increased the number of active duty military from 460,000 to 1,700,000.
1917 – America’s first bowling tournament for ladies began in St. Louis, MO. Almost 100 women participated in the event.
1930 – Al Capone was released from jail.
1930 – In New York, construction began on the Empire State Building. Excavation at the site began on January 22.
1958 – The Vanguard 1 satellite was launched by the U.S.
1959 – The Dalai Lama (Lhama Dhondrub, Tenzin Gyatso) fled Tibet and went to India.
1961 – The U.S. increased military aid and technicians to Laos.
1962 – Moscow asked the U.S. to pull out of South Vietnam.
1966 – A U.S. submarine found a missing H-bomb in the Mediterranean off of Spain.
1967 – Snoopy and Charlie Brown of “Peanuts” were on the cover of “LIFE” magazine.
1969 – Golda Meir was sworn in as the fourth premier of Israel.
1970 – The U.S. Army charged 14 officers with suppression of facts in the My Lai massacre case.
1972 – U.S. President Nixon asked Congress to halt busing in order to achieve desegregation.
1995 – Gerry Adams became the first leader of Sinn Fein to be received at the White House.
1998 – Washington Mutual announced it had agreed to buy H.F. Ahmanson and Co. for $9.9 billion dollars. The deal created the nation’s seventh-largest banking company.
1999 – A panel of medical experts concluded that marijuana had medical benefits for people suffering from cancer and AIDS.
2004 – NASA’s Messenger became the first spacecraft to enter into orbit around Mercury. The probe took more than 270,000 pictures before it crashed into the surface of Mercury on April 30, 2015.
2007 – Mike Modano (Dallas Stars) scored his 502nd and 503rd career goals making him the all-time U.S. leader in goal-scoring.
2009 – The iTunes Music Store reached 800 million applications downloaded.