Today in History for Nov. 26, 2012

Today is Monday, Nov. 26, the 331st day of 2012. There are 35 days left in the year.

Today’s Highlights:

On Nov. 26, 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered nationwide gasoline rationing, beginning Dec. 1. The motion picture “Casablanca,” starring Humphrey Bogart and Ingrid Bergman, had its world premiere at the Hollywood Theater in New York.

On this date:

In 1789, Nov. 26 was a day of thanksgiving set aside by President George Washington to observe the adoption of the Constitution of the United States.

In 1825, the first college social fraternity, the Kappa Alpha Society, was formed at Union College in Schenectady, N.Y.

In 1842, the founders of the University of Notre Dame arrived at the school’s present-day site near South Bend, Ind.

In 1912, CBS newsman Eric Sevareid was born in Velva, N.D.

In 1933, a judge in New York decided the James Joyce book “Ulysses” was not obscene and could be published in the United States.

In 1941, a Japanese naval task force consisting of six aircraft carriers left the Kuril Islands, headed toward Hawaii.

In 1943, during World War II, the HMT Rohna, a British transport ship carrying American soldiers, was hit by a German missile off Algeria; 1,138 men were killed.

In 1950, China entered the Korean War, launching a counteroffensive against soldiers from the United Nations, the U.S. and South Korea.

In 1965, France launched its first satellite, sending a 92-pound capsule into orbit.

In 1973, President Richard Nixon’s personal secretary, Rose Mary Woods, told a federal court that she’d accidentally caused part of the 18½-minute gap in a key Watergate tape.

In 1986, President Ronald Reagan appointed a commission headed by former Senator John Tower to investigate his National Security Council staff in the wake of the Iran-Contra affair.

In 1992, the British government announced that Queen Elizabeth II had volunteered to start paying taxes on her personal income, and would take her children off the public payroll.

Ten years ago: WorldCom and the government settled a civil lawsuit over the company’s $9 billion accounting scandal. A United Nations report said that for the first time in the 20-year history of the AIDS epidemic, about as many women as men were infected with HIV.

Five years ago: President George W. Bush met separately at the White House with the leaders of Israel and the Palestinian Authority a day ahead of a major Mideast peace conference in Annapolis, Md. Vice President Dick Cheney experienced an irregular heartbeat and was taken to George Washington University Hospital for evaluation. President Bush greeted the 2007 Nobel Prize winners – including former Vice President Al Gore – in the Oval Office. Mississippi Sen. Trent Lott announced his retirement after a 35-year career in Congress. Washington Redskins star safety Sean Taylor was mortally wounded during a botched armed robbery at his home in Palmetto Bay, Fla. (Taylor died the next day.) Hall of Fame jockey Bill Hartack died in Freer, Texas, at age 74.

One year ago: NASA’s Curiosity rover blasted off from the Kennedy Space Center on an 8½-month, 354 million-mile journey to Mars. NBA players and owners reached a tentative agreement to end a 149-day lockout.

Today’s birthdays: Actress Ellen Albertini Dow is 99. Impressionist Rich Little is 74. Singer Tina Turner is 73. Singer Jean Terrell is 68. Pop musician John McVie is 67. Actress Marianne Muellerleile is 64. Actor Scott Jacoby is 56. Actress Jamie Rose is 53. Country singer Linda Davis is 50. Blues singer-musician Bernard Allison is 47. Country singer-musician Steve Grisaffe is 47. Actress Kristin Bauer is 39. Actor Peter Facinelli is 39. Actress Tammy Lynn Michaels Etheridge is 38. Actress Maia Campbell is 36. Country singer Joe Nichols is 36. Contemporary Christian musicians Randy and Anthony Armstrong (Red) are 34. Actress Jessica Bowman is 32. Pop singer Natasha Bedingfield is 31. Country singer-musician Mike Gossin (Gloriana Rock) is 28. Ben Wysocki (The Fray) is 28. Singer Lil Fizz is 27. Singer Aubrey Collins is 25.

Thought for today: “The difference between the men and the boys in politics is, and always has been, that the boys want to be something, while the men want to do something.” — Eric Sevareid (1912-1992).