Wikipedia:Main Page history/2020 January 20b

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From today's featured article

Buzz Aldrin (born January 20, 1930) is an American former astronaut and fighter pilot. As lunar module pilot on the Apollo 11 mission, he and Neil Armstrong were the first humans to land on the Moon. A graduate of West Point and MIT, where he earned a doctorate in astronautics, Aldrin served as an Air Force fighter pilot during the Korean War, flying 66 combat missions and shooting down two MiGs. He was selected as an astronaut with NASA's third group in 1963. His first spaceflight was in 1966 on Gemini 12, during which he spent over five hours outside the spacecraft. He set foot on the Moon on July 21, 1969 (UTC), nineteen minutes after Armstrong. He left NASA in 1971 and became commandant of the U.S. Air Force Test Pilot School. His autobiographies Return to Earth and Magnificent Desolation recount his struggles with depression and alcoholism. He developed the Aldrin cycler, a Mars spacecraft trajectory, and continues to advocate for space exploration, particularly a human mission to Mars. (Full article...)

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Did you know ...

Albert Lortzing in 1845

... that Albert Lortzing (engraving shown), who adapted a 1733 French play for his German Spieloper Die Opernprobe, died the day after its successful premiere at the Oper Frankfurt on 20 January 1851?
... that Chinese-Hawaiian politician and businessman John Ena was decorated with the Royal Order of the Crown of Hawaii by King Kalākaua?
... that a 1-metre (3.3 ft) section was added to the County Fermanagh War Memorial to commemorate eleven civilians who were killed in a 1987 IRA bombing at the site?
... that after the Indian team won the 1983 Cricket World Cup, their manager PR Man Singh ensured that Wisden Cricket Monthly editor David Frith would "eat his words"?
... that the Gorham Manufacturing Company opened buildings at Broadway and at Fifth Avenue to display its merchandise in New York City?
... that George Nathanael Anderson translated the New Testament into the Iramba language?
... that the 17th-century Antonio de Vea expedition to the fjords and channels of Patagonia was triggered by false rumours about English settlements?
... that Lake Kristi in North Carolina was built specifically to allow water skiing champion Kristi Overton Johnson to train?

In the news

Mikhail Mishustin

In China, a new strain of coronavirus infects more than two hundred people, killing four.
Mikhail Mishustin (pictured) is appointed Prime Minister of Russia following the resignation of Dmitry Medvedev and his cabinet.
Scientists announce that presolar stardust grains in the Murchison meteorite formed five to seven billion years ago, and are the oldest solid material found on Earth to date.

On this day

January 20: Martin Luther King Jr. Day in the United States (2020)

Simon de Montfort

250 – Pope Fabian was martyred during a widespread persecution of Christians for refusing to demonstrate loyalty to the Roman Empire.
1945 – World War II: Germany began the evacuation of at least 1.8 million people from East Prussia in anticipation of the advancing Soviet Red Army, an operation that took nearly two months to complete.
1968 – The Houston Cougars upset the UCLA Bruins in what became known as the "Game of the Century", ending the Bruins' 47-game winning streak, and establishing college basketball as a sports commodity on American television.
2018 – A group of Taliban gunmen attacked the Inter-Continental Hotel in Kabul, Afghanistan, sparking a 12-hour battle that left at least 21 people dead.

Sebastian Münster (b. 1488) · Myles Coverdale (d. 1569) · Mary Watson Whitney (d. 1921)

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Hurricane Michael making landfall in Florida on October 10

The 2018 Atlantic hurricane season was an above-average season for Atlantic hurricanes for the third consecutive year. Though the season officially began on June 1 and continued until November 30, dates which are adopted by convention and historically describe the period during each year when most tropical cyclones form, it effectively started with the formation of Tropical Storm Alberto on May 25. The year produced sixteen tropical depressions, all but one of which further intensified into named tropical storms. Of the fifteen named storms, eight developed into hurricanes, and two further intensified into major hurricanes, which are rated Category 3 or higher on the Saffir–Simpson scale. These two major hurricanes, Hurricane Florence and Hurricane Michael (pictured), contributed to a majority of the season's severe destruction and loss of life, mainly in the United States. (Full list...)

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Today's featured picture

In architecture, a bracket is a structural or decorative member that attaches a smaller object to a larger one. It projects from a wall, usually to carry weight and sometimes to strengthen an angle. Corbels and consoles are types of brackets. This picture shows a classical decorative bracket, attaching the base of a balcony to the walls of the chapel at Greenwich Hospital, London. The plasterwork was created by hand in situ by the eminent stuccoist John Papworth.

Greenwich Hospital (originally the Royal Hospital for Seamen) was founded in 1694 to provide a home for retired seamen of the Royal Navy, support for their widows and education for their children. Designed by Sir Christopher Wren, the chapel was not completed until 1742. The present chapel dates from 1779 to 1789, having been rebuilt to a design by James Stuart following a devastating fire that gutted the previous structure. The buildings of the hospital were later used by the Royal Naval College and the University of Greenwich, and are now known as the Old Royal Naval College, a World Heritage Site.

Photograph credit: Daniel Case

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