Wikipedia:Recent additions 212

Did you know...

 * ...that the writer Mikhail Mikhalkov, brother of Sergei Mikhalkov, who wrote the Soviet anthem, was an NKVD agent acting in Nazi Germany and later a GULAG inmate?
 * ...that the palm Dictyosperma album (pictured) in the Mascarene Islands is commonly called "hurricane palm" because of its ability to withstand strong winds by easily shedding leaves?
 * ...that cell-free protein array technology attempts to simplify protein microarray construction by using cells from sources such as E. coli, rabbit reticulocytes and wheat germ?
 * ...that Eugene, Oregon's The Register-Guard is the second largest newspaper in Oregon?
 * ...that the Joseon Korean official Choe Bu wrote a travel diary about his shipwrecked stay in Ming China that eventually became widely printed in Korea and Japan during the 16th century?
 * ...that about 63 dams with a capacity of over 100 million cubic metres account for 95% of the water storage capacity of Mexico?
 * ...that 2007 Colorado Buffaloes' starting quarterback Cody Hawkins was on ESPNU's reality show Summer House?
 * ...that Cassià Maria Just was one of the Catholic Church members in Spain who showed their opposition to Francisco Franco?
 * ...that some Norton, Massachusetts residents complain they have trouble selling their homes because Lake Winnecunnett is "a weed-infested, mosquito breeding swamp"?
 * ...that, buried in the porch of St Alkmund's Church, Whitchurch (pictured), is the heart of John Talbot, 1st Earl of Shrewsbury, who was killed at the Battle of Castillon in 1453?
 * ...that television pioneer Thomas T. Goldsmith, Jr. became the inventor of the video game when he took out a video game patent in 1948?
 * ...that the 2002 surge of the Kolka Glacier resulted in deaths of at least 125 people?
 * ...that the Concessionary Bus Travel Act 2007 entitles all persons in England who are over the age of 60 or disabled to free bus travel throughout the country during off-peak hours?
 * ...that Johnson Creek, one of the few free-flowing streams in the Portland, Oregon area, overflowed its banks 37 times between 1971 and 2006?
 * ...that Major League Baseball player Sparky Adams was part of the St. Louis Cardinals team in 1930 when every single regular player had a batting average over .300, the only time in history this has happened?
 * ...that the original Victoria Dam, constructed in 1891, was the first dam in Western Australia, and it stood for almost 100 years before being replaced with the current dam?
 * ...that in 1745, Daniel Juslenius, a Finnish Fennoman, finished the first formal Finnish dictionary?
 * ...that military engineer Thomas Phillips (pictured), is pictured in a 17th-century painting with Brave Benbow, but an almost identical painting has him replaced by the Earl of Orford?
 * ...that over 90% of Lithuanian Jews perished in the first few months of Operation Barbarossa in the Holocaust in Lithuania?
 * ...that Max Noether, called "one of the greatest mathematicians of the nineteenth century", learned advanced mathematics mostly through self-study?
 * ...that the Emberá in Panama use the hard, durable trunks of Dictyocaryum palms to construct coffins?
 * ...that Finnish film director Valentin Vaala was reportedly so disappointed with his first film that he dumped the original camera negatives into the sea?
 * ...that rock edicts of Emperor Ashoka, found at Brahmagiri in the present-day Karnataka state of India, indicated the southernmost extent of the Mauryan Empire?
 * ...that Mike Menosky, a probation officer who was a former baseball player, helped to dismiss a court case by proving the defendant could not have thrown a rock 250 feet (76 meters)?
 * ...that the Cone sisters (pictured) were friends of Gertrude Stein and amassed a collection of artwork of Picasso, Renoir, Gauguin and van Gogh – now worth one billion dollars?
 * ...that Japan Steel Works is the only company in the world which can make the central part of a nuclear reactor's containment vessel in a single piece, and a backlog may lead to a global delay in constructing nuclear power plants?
 * ...that the practice of slavery in Wallachia and Moldavia lasted until the 1850s, and is what forced many local Roma people into sedentism?
 * ...that Xue Ji was considered one of the four great calligraphers of the early Tang Dynasty?
 * ...that the Bahá'í community in Brazil was established when Leonora Holsapple Armstrong, the first Bahá'í permanent resident in South America, arrived in Brazil in 1921?
 * ...that Mohamed Camara's 1997 film Dakan was the first West African film to explore homosexuality?
 * ...that the Landing Vehicle Tracked was developed after future admiral Edward C. Kalbfus showed a magazine article about an amphibious rescue vehicle to a Marine Corps general at a cocktail party?
 * ...that the history of aspirin has been marked by fierce competition, patent and trademark battles, and even an international conspiracy known as the Great Phenol Plot?
 * ...that the contemporaries of Jean-Étienne Liotard regarded The Chocolate Girl as the artist's masterpiece?
 * ...that after Crewe Hall (pictured) in Cheshire was gutted by fire in 1866, E. M. Barry was employed to restore it to a facsimile of the Jacobean original?
 * ...that hard bop jazz drummer Roy Brooks, who played with Horace Silver and Max Roach, was sentenced to four years in prison for assault at age 62?
 * ...that, as a protection against abuses by a temporary majority, any two members of a deliberative assembly may postpone action to another day with a motion to reconsider and enter on the minutes?
 * ...that Ron Arias, a senior writer and correspondent for People magazine and People en Español, was influenced by twentieth-century Latin American literature?
 * ...that Alexander Solzhenitsyn composed his 12,000-line-long poem Prussian Nights while imprisoned in a GULAG camp, writing down each day a few lines on a bar of soap?
 * ...that the 1940 Battle of France forced 72-year-old British engineer William Binnie to work for his passage home as a cook's assistant on a collier?
 * ...that Stonehenge in its landscape, described by one reviewer as "one of the more important British archaeological publications this century", had a print run of just 800 copies?
 * ...that Bess Thomas, a former Australian librarian, became the first female to be given the position of "Chief Librarian" in New South Wales?
 * ...that, during a conflict which split the Romanian far right, the antisemitic newspaper Sfarmă-Piatră oscillated between the fascist Iron Guard and the corporatist National Renaissance Front?
 * ...that Irish-born Major League Baseball player Jimmy Archer (pictured) received a medal from the National Safety Council in 1931 for reviving two men overcome by carbon monoxide in the Chicago stockyards?
 * ...that the indemnity money paid to the U.S. after the Boxer Rebellion was used to fund a scholarship program which led to the founding of Tsinghua University in Beijing?
 * ...that former Chilean presidential spokesman Ricardo Lagos Weber was the main organizer of the 2004 APEC annual meeting held in Santiago, Chile that year, and the president of APEC's Senior Officials Meeting II?
 * ...that King Lugaid mac Lóegairi was said by the Vita tripartita Sancti Patricii to have been struck dead by lightning because he mocked Saint Patrick?
 * ...that a 1970 bomb caused US$170,000 worth of damage at City Hall in Portland, Oregon, but no one was ever arrested for the crime?
 * ...that the current Northam Bridge in Southampton, England was the first major road bridge to be built using prestressed concrete in the United Kingdom?
 * ...that Archbishop John Ireland refused to allow the Irish in Saint Paul, Minnesota to have a Saint Patrick's Day parade due to previous celebrations turning into what he called "midnight orgies"?
 * ...that St. Patrick's Blue, rather than green, was long the colour most associated with the patron saint of Ireland, and is present on Ireland's Presidential Standard (pictured)?
 * ...that physicists Herbert Anderson, Eugene Booth, G. N. Glasoe, John Dunning, Francis Slack and Enrico Fermi worked on splitting atoms in the basement of Pupin Hall, Columbia University in 1939?
 * ...that Thomas Clarke Luby and James Stephens took the oath as founding members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood on Saint Patrick's Day, 1858?
 * ...that Chris Levesque was cramming for an exam when the Vancouver Canucks signed him to an emergency one-game National Hockey League contract?
 * ...that members of the Senegalese rap group Daara J were hired by campaigners in the Senegalese election of 2000 to edit their speeches?
 * ...that Sir William Langhorne, 1st Baronet established the Madras Record Office, the oldest record office of the British East India Company and one of the oldest archival institutions in the world?
 * ...that a passenger train ran away backwards for over three miles (5 km) following a collision in Torquay railway station?
 * ...that the influx of  Irish to Louisville  (example of Irish-built housing pictured) led to the diminishing of slaves in Louisville  by 1860?
 * ...that when Drake University basketball player Adam Emmenecker was named 2008 Missouri Valley Conference Player of the Year, the conference called him "perhaps the most improbable Player of the Year" in its history?
 * ...that the  Kentucky Irish American  counted among its subscribers Franklin D. Roosevelt  and  Harry Truman ?
 * ...that the Albatros was the last sailing ship in European waters carrying commercial cargo?
 * ...that 150  Irish from Indianapolis  participated in the Fenian raids, an attempt to invade  Canada  from  Buffalo, New York  in 1866?
 * ...that Kiz, Utah, now a ghost town, was named for the first woman to settle in the area?
 * ...that French comics artist Patrice Killoffer was in 2005 the first foreigner to design stamps for the Swiss Post?
 * ...that on the festival celebrated in the month of Toxcatl the Aztecs sacrificed, flayed and ritually cannibalized a young man who had been impersonating the god Tezcatlipoca for an entire year?
 * ...that according to Tirechán 's life of  Saint Patrick  King  Lóegaire mac Néill  refused to be baptised by Patrick as his father  Niall of the Nine Hostages  had said that he must be buried in the walls of his fort on the  hill of Tara ?
 * ...that the Emancipation Memorial (pictured), a monument in Washington, DC depicting Abraham Lincoln in his role of the "Great Emancipator", was paid for by former slaves?
 * ...that Senegalese hip hop group Positive Black Soul ' s name abbreviation, PBS, is a play on that of the Parti Démocratique Sénégalais, PDS?
 * ...that the earliest known athletics competition in Australia took place in Sydney in 1810?
 * ...that Maharam's Synagogue in Lublin, Poland was burnt down during the Cossack-Muscovite invasion in 1655?
 * ...that chorus girls in shows produced by George Edwardes at the Gaiety Theatre were so popular that the restaurant where they dined became the centre of nightlife in London during the Victorian era?
 * ...that 2007 documentary film Operation Homecoming: Writing the Wartime Experience was based on a collection of writings by U.S. soldiers who have served in Afghanistan and Iraq?
 * ...that Oakmere Hall in Cheshire was built for John and Thomas Johnson of Runcorn but they became bankrupt before it was completed and the house was sold to a Liverpool merchant?
 * ...that listed buildings in Peckforton, Cheshire, include a carved stone elephant bearing a replica of a medieval castle (pictured)?
 * ...that jazz saxophonist John Coltrane's song "Ogunde" is based on the Afro-Brazilian folk song "Ogunde Varere", which translates to "Prayer of the Gods"?
 * ...that Alice Spencer Geddes Lloyd, who founded Alice Lloyd College in Kentucky, appeared on the TV show This is Your Life in 1955 to raise money for the college?
 * ...that the ethics guidelines for Israeli broadcasting have been revised four times since their introduction in 1972, and are now four times their original length?
 * ...that Garry Lake and the Christian cross are both translated as Hanningajuq in the local Inuktitut language?
 * ...that excavations at Chandravalli in the Indian state of Karnataka have unearthed coins of Roman emperor Augustus and Chinese Han emperor Wu Ti?
 * ...that more than half of the United Kingdom's specialist victim recovery dogs were used during the search for nine-year-old Shannon Matthews?
 * ...that two of the oldest buildings in Manchester's Shambles Square (pictured) were physically moved twice – once in 1974 and again in 1999?
 * ...that neoclassical Italian sculptor Giuseppe Ceracchi portrayed George Washington with a Roman haircut and a toga?
 * ...that Slindon Cricket Team was the winning team recorded on the earliest surviving cricket scoresheet?
 * ...that Gran Paradiso National Park is Italy's oldest national park?
 * ...that quarterback Jack Crabtree of the Oregon Ducks football team was named Most Valuable Player of the 1958 Rose Bowl even though his team lost the game?
 * ...that French mycologist René Maire wrote a work on the local flora of the Haute-Saône in the Franche-Comté region of northeastern France when he was only 18 years old?
 * ...that several US Navy's WWII troop transports, such as USS Hermitage, USS Monticello and USS Lejeune, were former ocean liners that were seized from the enemy?
 * ...that the same spectacular mountain, Kriváň, links a Polish rock band, a King of Saxony, and the Slovak national movement from the 19th century?
 * ...that Lady Florence Dixie (pictured), feminist, big game hunter, war correspondent, and suffragette, was the aunt of Oscar Wilde's lover Lord Alfred Douglas?
 * ...that the Hillel Yaffe Medical Center in Hadera, Israel, is named after Hillel Yaffe, a doctor who served nearby Jewish settlements in the early 20th century?
 * ...that Maria, the Finnish form of Mary, is the most popular Finnish name used during the modern era?
 * ...that Robert D. Knapp ' s squadron failed to see any action in World War I because the propellers for their Handley Page O/400 bombers arrived late?
 * ...that Lake Piso, a brackish water lake in western Liberia, is the largest in the country?
 * ...that the final decades of Visigothic rule in Spain have been labelled "protofeudal" by Spanish historians, but this label has been largely rejected in English historiography?
 * ...that Wesley L. McDonald was the last admiral to hold the Allied Atlantic Command and the U.S. Atlantic Command, and lead the U.S. Atlantic Fleet at the same time?
 * ...that Ukrainian Baroque architecture (example pictured) is distinct from Western European Baroque in its moderate ornamentation and simpler design?
 * ...that after retiring, former Premier League footballer Adrian Whitbread worked in four different clubs as assistant coach for Martin Allen?
 * ...that Jonathan Swift's "A Description of a City Shower" is considered by many, including Swift himself, to be his best poem?
 * ...that Nurul Izzah Anwar, daughter of Malaysia's de facto opposition leader Anwar Ibrahim, defeated a three-term minister incumbent in her first contest for a parliament seat in Lembah Pantai?
 * ...that oil tanker MV Transpacific is currently under contract to transport fuel for the U.S. Defense Department for US$18,848 a day?
 * ...that Te Kopuru once had the largest sawmill in New Zealand?
 * ...that writer-director Zoe Cassavetes appeared in her late father's film Minnie and Moskowitz at the age of one?
 * ...that Salem First United Methodist Church is the tallest building in Salem, Oregon and is also the oldest Methodist church west of the Rocky Mountains?
 * ...that Silas C. Overpack's Michigan logging wheels (pictured), designed to haul logs across rough terrain, were nine to ten feet high and always painted red?
 * ...that the Mitchell Recreation Area near Bly, Oregon, is the only location in the continental United States where Americans were killed during World War II as a direct result of enemy action?
 * ...that English writer Anne Brontë is buried in Scarborough, and not in Haworth with all her family?
 * ...that Cumberland was a short-lived rugby league team in the inaugural NSW premiership season in 1908?
 * ...that A Walk to Beautiful, a film about five Ethiopian women with childbirth injuries, was picked by the International Documentary Association as the best feature documentary of 2007?
 * ...that "Spieprzaj dziadu!" (Polish for "Piss off, old man!"), said by current Polish President Lech Kaczynski to a passerby during the 2002 Warsaw mayoral campaign, has become one of the most famous phrases in modern Poland?
 * ...that Honoré de Balzac's novel Louis Lambert contains many autobiographical elements relating to his time at an Oratorian school in Vendôme?
 * ...that Jonathan Swift's (pictured) 1709 poem "A Description of the Morning", which discusses contemporary life in London, provided inspiration for William Hogarth's series of paintings Four Times of the Day?
 * ...that only one of the twenty six tunnels on the Blue Ridge Parkway is in Virginia?
 * ...that Knut Rød, a Norwegian police inspector who arranged the deportation of over 500 Jews to Auschwitz in 1942, was acquitted after the war although no one denied he did it?
 * ...that St John the Evangelist's Church in the village of Sandiway, Cheshire, was designed by John Douglas who had been born in the village and who was lord of the manor of Sandiway?
 * ...that the town of Gratiot, Wisconsin is named after French-American U.S. Indian Agent Henry Gratiot?
 * ...that most of the land that makes up the Santiam State Forest today was acquired by Oregon authorities because of delinquent taxes or purchases at minimal costs prior to foreclosure during the Great Depression?
 * ...that Dennis Letts, who began acting at the age of fifty, made his Broadway in December 2007 in August: Osage County, which was written by his son, Tracy Letts?
 * ...that Chamunda (pictured), a fearsome aspect of the Hindu Divine Mother, was worshipped by ritual human and animal sacrifices along with offerings of wine?
 * ...that the 2007 Texas Longhorns football suspensions involved seven players, including one of the highest-ranking recruits for the Texas Longhorns college football team?