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Right-elevation drawing of a Francesco Caracciolo-class battleship

The Francesco Caracciolo-class battleships were a group of four battleships designed for the Royal Italian Navy in 1913 and ordered in 1914. The first ship of the class, Francesco Caracciolo, was laid down in late 1914; the other three ships followed in 1915. Armed with a main battery of eight 381 mm (15 in) guns and possessing a top speed of 28 knots (52 km/h; 32 mph), the four ships were intended to be the equivalent of fast battleships such as the British Queen Elizabeth class. The class was never completed due to material shortages and shifting construction priorities following the outbreak of World War I in 1914. Only the lead ship was launched, in 1920, and several proposals to convert her into an aircraft carrier were considered, but budgetary problems prevented any work being done. She was sold to an Italian shipping firm for conversion into a merchant vessel, but this also proved to be too expensive, and she was broken up for scrap, beginning in 1926. (Full article...)

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Hank Aaron in 1974

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On this day

January 24

Sutter's Mill

1458 – The Estates unanimously proclaimed 14-year-old Matthias Corvinus King of Hungary after being persuaded to do so by his uncle Michael Szilágyi.
1848 – James W. Marshall discovered gold at Sutter's Mill (reconstruction pictured) in Coloma, California, leading to the California Gold Rush.
1968 – Vietnam War: The 1st Australian Task Force launched Operation Coburg against the North Vietnamese army and the Viet Cong.
1977 – During the Spanish transition to democracy, neo-fascists attacked an office in Madrid, killing five people and injuring four others.
2011 – A North Caucasian jihadist carried out a suicide bombing at Moscow Domodedovo Airport, killing 37 people.

Charles James Fox (b. 1749)
Vasily Surikov (b. 1848)
Rosemary Bryant Mariner (d. 2019)

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Today's featured picture

Walter Forward (January 24, 1786 – November 24, 1852) was an American lawyer and politician from Pennsylvania. From 1841 to 1843, he served as Secretary of the Treasury under President John Tyler. After leaving his cabinet post, he resumed the practice of law in Pittsburgh until 1849, when he was appointed chargé d'affaires to Denmark by President Zachary Taylor. Forward Township in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, is named after him. This line engraving of Forward was produced around 1902 by the Department of the Treasury's Bureau of Engraving and Printing (BEP) as part of a BEP presentation album of the first 42 secretaries of the treasury.

Engraving credit: Bureau of Engraving and Printing; restored by Andrew Shiva

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