Wikipedia:Recent additions 36

Did you know...

 * ... that urushiol-induced contact dermatitis accounts for 10% of all lost-time injuries in the United States Forest Service?
 * ...that day beacons and other navigational aids vary in standard designation worldwide much like driving on the right or left?
 * ...that three of the stars named after people, often thought to have traditional Arabic names, were in fact named for members of the Apollo 1 crew?
 * ... that Driftless Area National Wildlife Refuge in Iowa has rare ice age snails that survive living on rock formations cooled from underground ice?
 * ...that the definitive image of the African and Caribbean goddess Mami Wata was based on a poster of a Samoan snake charmer?


 * ... that the Khardungla Pass is the highest motorable road in the world?
 * ...that Brendon Kuruppu was the first Sri Lankan cricketer to score more than 200 runs (a double century) in a Test innings?
 * ...that Foundation 9 Entertainment is the largest independent video game developer in North America?
 * ...that the Indian Shaker Church is a Christian denomination founded by an American Indian in 1881 which incorporates Catholic, Protestant, and indigenous beliefs, but traditionally rejects the Bible and other written scriptures?
 * ...that the Islamic Spaniard Judar Pasha led 4,000 Moroccans to victory against more than 40,000 Songhai troops at the Battle of Tondibi, putting an end to West Africa's Songhai Empire?


 * ... that the Cotswold Games were organized by Robert Dover as a protest against Puritanism in the early 17th century?
 * ...that Lancashire cricketer Dick Barlow was immortalised in Francis Thompson's poem "At Lord's"?
 * ...that Henri Blowitz, the Paris correspondent of the Times, averted a war between the French Third Republic and the German Empire in 1875?
 * ...that the African Grove theater was founded by free blacks in New York City in 1821&mdash;when New York was still a slave state&mdash;and that it launched the career of the great black Shakespearean actor Ira Aldridge?


 * ...that several countries, including Sweden and Germany have started a nuclear power phase-out, with the goal of gradually shutting down all nuclear power plants?
 * ...that sociocracy is a form of government relying on principles of consensus?
 * ...that the Philadelphia Metro is a free daily newspaper that was first published in 2000?
 * ...that the Ever Victorious Army, consisting of Chinese imperial forces led by a European officer corps, was instrumental in putting down the Taiping Rebellion?
 * ...that adjustable pedals as well as an adjustable driver's seat were luxury features of the Renault Spider?


 * ...that the leg break bowled by Shane Warne to Mike Gatting that turned around the 1993 Ashes cricket series is widely known as the Ball of the Century?
 * ...that the most popular deity worshipped by the Duala peoples of Cameroon is a mermaid called a jengu?
 * ...that though only 14% of all U.S. nuclear testing was conducted at the Pacific Proving Grounds, they comprised nearly 80% of the total explosive yields of all U.S. tests?
 * ...that the Mauritania Railway transports iron ore on trains up to three kilometers long?


 * ...that the Swan Bells is an 82.5m belltower in Perth, Western Australia containing the largest set of change ringing bells in the world, several of which are 280 years old?
 * ...that Liberia is the only nation in the history of West Africa never to have been colonised?
 * ...that the Spined Loach is able to breathe through its intestine during times of oxygen scarcity, and can inflict an excruciating sting with the two-pointed spike under its eyes?
 * ...that DC Comics sued Fawcett Comics in 1941 over Fawcett's Captain Marvel being a Superman rip-off, and the resulting National Comics Publications v. Fawcett Publications lawsuit took thirteen years to settle?


 * ...that Andrew Ellicott taught Meriwether Lewis the art of surveying?
 * ...that Juan Esteban Pedernera was interim President of Argentina in 1861, following the death of Santiago Derqui?
 * ...that Plumpy'nut is a peanut-based food supplement that is being used to combat malnutrition in Niger?
 * ...that the Baltusrol Golf Club, the golf course that is the site of this week's PGA Championship, is a Certified Audubon Cooperative Sanctuary for its managing of its lands with concern to the environment?
 * ...that John Brown's Fort in Harpers Ferry, West Virginia, was built there in 1848, moved to Chicago in 1891, and then returned to its original site in 1968?
 * ...that Silvio O. Conte was a U.S. Congressman who once donned a pig mask in order to protest pork barrel spending?
 * ...that the Kittlitz's Murrelet nests in isolated locations on inland mountaintops, unlike most other seabirds, which nest in seashore colonies?
 * ...that Peter de Noronha was the first Indian to become an envoy of the Legion of Mary and was later knighted by Pope Paul VI?


 * ...that the Capitoline Museums are housed in a complex of palazzi surrounding a piazza in Rome, designed by Michelangelo in 1536 but not fully completed until Mussolini ordered it in 1940?
 * ...that 1999's Scooby Doo: Mystery of the Fun Park Phantom was the first commercial Scooby-Doo computer game for the Windows platform?
 * ...that Saudi Prince Mohammed bin Fahd bin Abdul Aziz al-Saud is estimated to have lost tens of millions of U.S. dollars gambling in casinos?
 * ...that the Saskatchewan town of Macklin erected a 32-foot-high statue of a horse's anklebone to commemorate the sport of Bunnock?


 * ...that Margaret Roper, daughter of Thomas More, purchased his head after his execution and preserved it in spices until her own death?
 * ...that Iowa's Black Hawk Purchase is named for the Sac chief Black Hawk, despite that fact that he was in prison when the land-transfer treaty was signed?
 * ...that oakmoss is a type of lichen used extensively in modern perfumery?
 * ...that the recent massive flooding in Mumbai could have been avoided if the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai had upgraded the city's drainage system by building the Brihanmumbai Storm Water Disposal System?


 * ...that the United States Army managed Yellowstone National Park for 32 years from Fort Yellowstone?
 * ...that the Liga Indonesia is the top football league in Indonesia ?
 * ...that Vote-OK, a pro-fox hunting group, claimed to have helped defeat 29 Members of Parliament at the 2005 British general election?
 * ...that the Thunderdome, the home of the basketball and volleyball teams of the University of California, Santa Barbara, is famous for a tortilla-throwing incident in a men's basketball game televised on ESPN?


 * ...that attempts have been made to produce rubber from Common Milkweed latex?
 * ...that the Statute of Westminster Adoption Act 1942 was seen as formally demonstrating Australia's independence to the world?
 * ...that Mantle Hood was an ethnomusicologist known for the idea that students should learn to play the music from the cultures they study?
 * ...that chuño is a freeze-dried potato product made since before the time of the Inca empire by a five-day process of alternately freezing, sun-drying, and trampling under foot?


 * ...that Saint Anthony's nut, popular with pigs as well as humans, is named for Anthony of Padua, patron saint of swineherds?
 * ...that in response to the 1852 publication of Uncle Tom's Cabin, writers in the Southern United States produced a body of anti-Tom literature which attempted to show that slavery was not evil?
 * ...that at the Battle of Cajamarca in 1532 the Inca Emperor Atahualpa was captured by Pizarro's conquistadors and that the battle was a decisive victory in the Spanish conquest of Peru?
 * ...that famine scales are the ways in which degrees of food security are measured, from situations in which an entire population has adequate food to full-scale famine?