Wikipedia:Main Page history/2018 October 19

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From today's featured article

Evesham Abbey bell tower

Roger Norreis (died c. 1224) was a medieval Abbot of Evesham in England. A native of northern England, his family was probably of Norse origin. He was a monk at Christ Church Priory, the cathedral chapter of Canterbury Cathedral, and in 1187 he was appointed treasurer of the priory. The cathedral chapter sent him to King Henry II of England to plead their case against Baldwin of Forde, the Archbishop of Canterbury. After Norreis took Baldwin's side, the Canterbury monks captured Norreis and held him in custody. He escaped by travelling through the sewer and fled to the safety of the archbishop. In a mocking reference to his escape route, Norreis was sometimes called Roger Cloacarius or "Roger the Drain-Cleaner". In 1190 he was appointed to the abbacy of Evesham Abbey (16th-century bell tower pictured). There he was accused of immoral behaviour and failing to follow monastic rules. In 1202 he became embroiled in a dispute with his monks, and in 1213 the papal legate deposed him from the abbacy. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

Selangor silvered langurs

... that wild Selangor silvered langur monkeys (pictured) at Bukit Melawati in Malaysia sometimes touch or even climb onto human visitors?
... that the Israeli team at the 1972 Summer Olympics attended the German production of Fiddler on the Roof as guests of its star, Israeli actor Shmuel Rodensky, the night before the Munich massacre?
... that Nanchang Xiangtang Airport served 102 passengers in its first full year of operation, and more than 800,000 four decades later?
... that sugar refiner William Camden was also a partner in a business shipping slaves to the Caribbean?
... that the 2011 horror webtoon "Bongcheon-Dong Ghost" was released with a warning for "pregnant women, the elderly, and those suffering from serious medical conditions"?
... that Abhilasha Kumari, the first female Chief Justice of the Manipur High Court in India, served for only 13 days?
... that the shooting of Oscar Grant motivated Angie Thomas to write a short story that became the basis for her debut novel, The Hate U Give?
... that Canadian wheelchair basketball player Sandrine Bérubé is a brown belt in karate?

In the news

Soyuz MS-10 launch

A mass shooting at Kerch Polytechnic College in Kerch, Crimea, kills at least 19 people and injures at least 47 others.
Hurricane Leslie makes landfall in Portugal as an extratropical cyclone with 110 kilometres per hour (68 mph) winds, causing 15 deaths.
Both crew members survive an emergency landing when Soyuz MS-10 suffers a booster failure shortly after launch (pictured) from Baikonur, Kazakhstan.
Hurricane Michael makes landfall in Florida, United States, as a Category 4 storm, causing more than 30 deaths after killing at least 15 people in Central America.

On this day

October 19

Streptomycin

1596 – The Spanish ship San Felipe was shipwrecked on the Japanese island of Shikoku and its cargo was confiscated by the local daimyō.
1864 – American Civil War: Despite incurring nearly twice as many casualties as the Confederates, the Union Army emerged victorious in the Battle of Cedar Creek.
1943 – Streptomycin (molecular model pictured), the first antibiotic remedy for tuberculosis, was first isolated by a PhD student at Rutgers University.
1988 – The British government banned the voices of representatives from Sinn Féin and several Irish republican and Loyalist paramilitary groups from being broadcast on television and radio in the United Kingdom.
2005 – Hurricane Wilma became the most intense Atlantic hurricane on record with a minimum atmospheric pressure of 882 mbar.

Annie Smith Peck (b. 1850) · Demetrios Christodoulou (b. 1951) · Ali Treki (d. 2015)

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From today's featured list

The F-Zero media series includes eight released video games, a television series, and video game soundtracks released on audio CDs. F-Zero is a futuristic racing video game franchise originally created by Nintendo EAD and has been continually published by Nintendo although the company has let outside development houses work on some installments. The series premiered in Japan on November 21, 1990, with F-Zero (エフゼロ), which later was released in the North American and PAL regions. An original installment has appeared on nearly every succeeding Nintendo video game console since its debut until 2004. Gameplay consists of racing in futuristic hovercrafts and using their speed-boosting abilities to navigate through the courses as quickly as possible in settings like the recurring Mute City, Big Blue and Port Town. The first game was labeled by critics as an influential video game that created the futuristic racing subgenre as well as inspired the creation of numerous racing games such as Daytona USA and the Wipeout series. (Full list...)

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Today's featured picture

Danaus genutia, also known as the common tiger or striped tiger, is a species of butterfly found throughout India as well as Sri Lanka, Myanmar, South-East Asia and Australia. It is a member of the Danainae group of brush-footed butterflies. Both sexes have tawny wings with veins marked with broad black bands, and the male has a pouch on its hindwing. The butterfly is found in scrub jungles, fallow land adjacent to habitation, and deciduous forests, preferring areas of moderate to heavy rainfall. Its most common food plants in peninsular India are small herbs, twiners and creepers from the family Asclepiadaceae. The caterpillar of D. genutia obtains poison by eating poisonous plants, which make the caterpillar and butterfly taste unpleasant to predators. It has some 16 subspecies and although its evolutionary relationships are not completely resolved, it appears to be most closely related to the Malay tiger (D. affinis) and the white tiger.

Photograph: Vengolis

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