Wikipedia:Main Page history/2017 July 19

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From today's featured article

The McDonnell Douglas A-4G Skyhawk, a variant of the Douglas A-4 Skyhawk attack aircraft, was developed for the Royal Australian Navy (RAN), and first flown on 19 July 1967. Ten were delivered in 1967 and another ten in 1971, and the type was in service with the RAN until 1984. They joined the air group of the aircraft carrier HMAS Melbourne, and were primarily used to provide air defence for the fleet and take part in exercises throughout the Pacific region. They did not see combat. Ten A-4Gs were destroyed as a result of equipment failures and non-combat crashes during the type's service with the Navy, causing the deaths of two pilots. The RAN had no need for most of its fixed-wing aircraft after Melbourne was decommissioned in 1982, and the ten remaining A-4Gs were sold to the Royal New Zealand Air Force in 1984; they were initially used for training purposes, and were retired in 2001. Eight A-4Ks, including six former A-4Gs, were sold to Draken International in 2012, and are in service supporting United States military training exercises. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

Star Jet wreckage

... that after being thrown into the Atlantic Ocean by Hurricane Sandy, the Star Jet roller coaster (wreckage pictured) was replaced—safely inland—by Hydrus?
... that Indian Member of Parliament Mohammad Asrarul Haque polled the highest number of votes in his state of Bihar in the 2014 general election?
... that Mazaalai, the first Mongolian satellite in space, is named after the endangered Gobi bear?
... that Uwe Eric Laufenberg, General Manager of the Staatstheater Wiesbaden, presented his staging of Wagner's Der Ring des Nibelungen at the Internationale Maifestspiele in 2017?
... that the book Midas Touch, co-authored by Donald Trump and Robert Kiyosaki, praises the economic benefits of immigration to the United States?
... that in Norwegian fjords, the sea anemone Actinostola callosa feeds heavily on the helmet jellyfish?
... that while a member of the Philadelphia City Council, Thomas McIntosh challenged the school district to ensure that school conditions were equal in both black and white neighborhoods?
... that since first being built in 1888, Main Building at St. Edward's University has been burned down, torn open by a tornado, and used as a military academy?

In the news

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, former President of Brazil

Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva

Iranian mathematician Maryam Mirzakhani, the first woman to receive the Fields Medal, dies at the age of 40.
Liu Xiaobo, a Chinese pro-democracy activist, political prisoner and Nobel Peace Prize laureate, dies at the age of 61.
Former Brazilian president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (pictured) is sentenced to nearly ten years in prison over the Operation Car Wash corruption scandal.
A giant iceberg, covering approximately 5,800 km² (2,200 sq mi), breaks away from the Larsen C Ice Shelf in Antarctica.
After covering 450 kilometres (280 mi), the Turkish March for Justice concludes in Istanbul at a rally attended by hundreds of thousands of people.

On this day...

July 19

Georg Anton Schäffer

1817 – Having been unsuccessful in his attempt to seize the Kingdom of Hawaii for Russia, Georg Anton Schäffer (pictured) was forced to depart for China.
1845 – The last major fire to affect Manhattan destroyed 345 buildings and caused at least $5 million in damage.
1916 – First World War: "The worst 24 hours in Australia's entire history" occurred when Australian forces suffered heavy losses in their unsuccessful assault on the Germans at the Battle of Fromelles in France.
1992 – A car bomb killed anti-Mafia judge Paolo Borsellino and five policemen in Palermo, Italy, less than two months after the murder of his friend and colleague Giovanni Falcone.
1997 – The Provisional Irish Republican Army permanently resumed its ceasefire to end its 25-year campaign against British rule in Northern Ireland.

Richard Leveridge (b. 1670) · Mangal Pandey (b. 1827) · Yekaterina Budanova (d. 1943)

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Today's featured picture

A one-shilling note of the Japanese government-issued Oceanian Pound. This currency was issued during World War II by the Empire of Japan to replace local hard currencies in occupied Oceania, consisting of Guam, Gilbert and Ellice Islands, Caroline Islands, Marianas Islands, Solomon Islands, Palau, and the now-defunct Territory of New Guinea. Notes were printed before invasion and intended to circulate in multiple areas that were to be absorbed into the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere. They include the title "The Japanese Government" and a "serial number" consisting of an "O" (indicating issue for Oceania) and a printing batch identifier. After the war, they could be exchanged for United States dollars or Australian pounds.

Other notes: half-shilling, 10 shillings, 1 pound

Banknote: Empire of Japan (image courtesy of the National Numismatic Collection, National Museum of American History)

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