Wikipedia:Today's featured list/September 2017
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September 1
The Nanjing Metro rapid transit system has 128 stations. Nanjing Metro is a rapid transit system in the Chinese city of Nanjing, with stations in nine of the city's eleven districts. It is constructed, maintained, and operated by the Nanjing Metro Group Company. The results of Nanjing's 2015 Municipal Bureau of Statistics count showed that Nanjing Metro carried a total of 720 million rides that year. The idea for a metro system in Nanjing was first proposed in 1984 in the Nanjing Municipal People's Congress as a way to ease traffic concerns. In 1999, following the successful completion of the station's experimental phase, Nanjing became the fifth city after Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou, and Shenzhen to receive approval from the National Development and Reform Commission to begin work on a subway. Roughly one year later in December, construction on the initial 21.7 km (13.5 mi) line of the system broke ground. The system currently spans 257 km (160 mi) and its 128 stations are divided between urban lines and S-train lines. (Full list...)
September 4
The Atlantic campaign of 1806 was one of the most important and complex naval campaigns of the post-Trafalgar Napoleonic Wars. Seeking to take advantage of the withdrawal of British forces from the Atlantic in the aftermath of the Battle of Trafalgar, Emperor Napoleon ordered two battle squadrons to sea from the fleet stationed at Brest, during December 1805. Escaping deep into the Atlantic, these squadrons succeeded in disrupting British convoys, evading pursuit by British battle squadrons and reinforcing the French garrison at Santo Domingo. The period of French success was brief: on 6 February 1806 one of the squadrons, under Vice-Admiral Corentin Urbain Leissègues, was intercepted by a British squadron at the Battle of San Domingo and destroyed, losing all five of its ships of the line. The second French squadron, under Vice-Admiral Jean-Baptiste Willaumez, cruised in the South Atlantic and the Caribbean during the spring and summer of 1806, conducting several successful raids on British islands in the West Indies. The campaign included a number of subsidiary operations by both British and French ships. (Full list...)
September 8
The Alien film series centers around a character ensemble's struggle for survival against the Aliens, a hostile, endoparasitoid, extraterrestrial species, and against the greedy, unscrupulous megacorporation Weyland-Yutani. The franchise tells the story of humanity's ongoing encounters with Aliens, and is set between the 21st and 24th centuries over several generations. The main series consists of four films, Alien (1979), Aliens (1986), Alien 3 (1992) and Alien: Resurrection (1997), about Ellen Ripley's fight against the Aliens. Ripley is the sole survivor of an Alien rampage on the space freighter Nostromo, which leads her to a series of conflicts with the species and Weyland-Yutani. Ripley's struggle is the plot of the main series. The prequel series, Prometheus (2012) and Alien: Covenant (2017), depicts humanity's genesis at the hands of an ancient extraterrestrial race known as the Engineers and the origin story of the Aliens. A deadly mutagen developed by the Engineers is discovered, which is weaponized by the android David 8, to perfect the Alien strain. The evolution of the Aliens is the plot of the prequel series. (Full list...)
September 11
Twenty-five centuries were scored in World Series Cricket (WSC) Supertests, and two in international one-day matches. WSC was a professional cricket competition established by Kerry Packer which ran from 1977 and 1979. The International Cricket Conference barred the WSC from using the term "Test matches", or naming a team "Australia". As a result, the matches were dubbed "Supertests", while the teams were WSC Australia XI, WSC West Indies XI and WSC World XI. The first Supertest began on 2 December 1977, although the first century (100 or more runs in a single innings) was not scored until the third match, in which Ian Chappell accumulated 141 runs in the first innings. Bruce Laird and Viv Richards (pictured) went on to score centuries in the same match. A month later, Barry Richards achieved the competition's first double century, scoring 207 runs for the WSC World XI. Greg Chappell had a record five WSC centuries. (Full list...)
September 15
The first video game by Valve Corporation, an American developer and publisher, was Half-Life, a first-person shooter released in 1998. It received universal acclaim and sold over 9 million units in retail. Alongside Half-Life's launch, Valve released development tools to enable the player community to create content and mods. The company then proceeded to hire the creators of popular mods, such as Counter-Strike, which became the most popular multiplayer first-person shooter for the next decade. Valve continued their trend of developing predominantly first-person video games in the 2000s with a number of critically successful releases. By the end of 2008, combined retail sales of the Half-Life series, Counter-Strike series and The Orange Box had surpassed 32 million units. The company continued to release multiplayer games with the launches of Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and Dota 2, both of which have large eSports communities fostered by Valve. During the 2010s, Valve has focused on supporting their established multiplayer titles with regular content updates (Full list...)
September 18
The Grammy Award for Best Dance Recording is an award presented at the Grammy Awards to recording artists for works containing quality vocal performances in the dance music genre. The honor was first presented to Donna Summer and Giorgio Moroder at the 40th Annual Grammy Awards (1998) for the song "Carry On". Skrillex (pictured) holds the records for the most wins, with three. Justin Timberlake has won the award twice, and Madonna holds the record for the most nominations in this category, with five. Gloria Estefan holds the record for the most nominations without a win, with three. (Full list...)
September 22
There are 37 Grade I listed buildings in North Somerset, including the Clifton Suspension Bridge (pictured), which joins North Somerset to Bristol, and Clevedon Pier. North Somerset is a unitary authority in the ceremonial county of Somerset, England. In the United Kingdom, the term listed building refers to a building or other structure officially designated as being of special architectural, historical or cultural significance; Grade I structures are those considered to be "buildings of exceptional interest". Of the listed buildings, manor houses include Clevedon Court, built in the 14th century, and from the 15th century, Ashton Court and Nailsea Court. Somerset has many religious structures; the largest number are from the Norman or medieval eras. Some of the churches are included in the Somerset towers, a collection of distinctive, mostly spireless Gothic church towers. (Full list...)
September 25
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Walt Disney won or received a total of twenty-six Academy Awards, and holds the record for most Academy Awards in history. He won twenty-two competitive Academy Awards from a total of fifty-nine nominations, and holds the records for most wins and most nominations for an individual in history. Disney won his first competitive Academy Award and received his first Honorary Academy Award at the 5th Academy Awards (1932). He received the Honorary Academy Award for the creation of Mickey Mouse and won the Academy Award for Best Short Subject (Cartoon) for the film Flowers and Trees. In the seven Academy Award ceremonies that followed (6th–12th), Disney consecutively earned nominations and won in the same category. Disney received three more Honorary Academy Awards, one in 1939 and two in 1942. At the 26th Academy Awards (1954), Disney won the Academy Award in all four categories in which he was nominated. In 1965, Disney earned his sole Best Picture nomination, for the film Mary Poppins. He was posthumously awarded his final Academy Award in 1969. (Full list...)
September 29
American racing driver Jeff Gordon won 93 NASCAR Cup Series races. He drove in the Cup Series full-time from 1993 to 2015. In 1992, Rick Hendrick watched Gordon race in a Busch Series event at Atlanta Motor Speedway, and Gordon joined Hendrick Motorsports two days later. During Gordon's career with Hendrick, he won his first race in 1994 at Charlotte Motor Speedway in the Coca-Cola 600, and later became a four-time Cup Series champion. He also won the Daytona 500 three times, in 1997, 1999, and 2005. As of 2017, he ranks third on the all-time Cup wins list with 93 career wins, the most in NASCAR's modern era (1972–present). Over the course of his racing career, Gordon won a total of 98 NASCAR races, including five races in the Busch Series. His final NASCAR victory came at Martinsville Speedway in 2015 in the Goody's Headache Relief Shot 500. (Full list...)