Wikipedia:Wikipedia Signpost/2015-03-18/Featured content

This Signpost "Featured content" report covers material promoted from c. 28 February through a mysterious date circa a week later.

Featured articles
Four featured articles were promoted this week.
 * Gary Cooper (nominated by Bede735) Gary Cooper was born Frank James Cooper in 1901. He began his career in silent films as a stunt rider, before paying for a screen test to become an actor. He had become disgusted with the cruelty shown to the horses used in the Westerns he appeared in. Casting director Nan Collins, who became his agent, suggested that he change his name to "Gary" after her hometown of Gary, Indiana. There were other Frank Coopers also pursuing acting careers, not to mention careers in marmalade. He "liked the name immediately." Gradually, Cooper began to land roles with more screen time. He was noticed by Samuel Goldwyn Productions, who signed him in June 1926 for $50 a week (probably equivalent to $3,000 now). His first sound film, The Virginian, made him a Hollywood star. His most famous film is 1952's High Noon, with Grace Kelly. Playing the part of a sheriff menaced by outlaws and abandoned by the townsfolk he serves, Cooper's performance was aided by his stomach ulcers, the pain from which gave him an air of "self-doubt".
 * Cosmic Stories and Stirring Science Stories (nominated by Mike Christie) These two science fiction magazines were edited by Donald A. Wollheim and published by Albing Publications, a father-and-son team operating from a desk in the corner of someone else's office. Wollheim had noticed a magazine called Stirring Detective and Western Stories published by Albing, and had written to them inquiring whether they'd be interested in adding science fiction to their list. The two magazines alternated monthly, with Stirring Science Stories appearing first in February 1941. Wolheim got his friends in the Futurians to donate stories (his contract meant he also wasn't getting paid until the third issue was published). Writers included Isaac Asimov, Frederik Pohl, C.M. Kornbluth, and James Blish. Albing published six issues, and a seventh was published by Manhattan Fiction Publications, but wartime restrictions on paper caused the magazines to fold.
 * Les Holden (nominated by Ian Rose) "Lucky Les" was an Australian fighter pilot in the Great War, and afterwards a commercial aviator. He was also known as the "homing pigeon"; both sobriquets refer to two instances in three days where he returned from strafing German trenches with his aeroplane a "flying wreck". Holden went on to become an "ace", with five confirmed kills. After the war, he returned to Australia and joined the civilian reserve of the Royal Australian Air Force, before purchasing a Giant Moth to fly on charter operations out of Sydney. Holden's Air Transport Services established air freight services in Papua New Guinea. Holden was killed in 1932 when a plane in which he was a passenger crashed at Byron Bay.
 * Benjamin Tillman (nominated by Wehwalt) Benjamin Tillman was a one-eyed white supremacist and politician who was Democratic Governor of South Carolina from 1890 to 1894 and a U.S. senator from 1895 to his death in 1918. He became known as "Pitchfork Ben" for his advocacy of the interests of (white) farmers, as well as for his threat to impale President Grover Cleveland on said farm implement. Once governor, he determined to force African Americans from political life altogether, denying that Thomas Jefferson's "all men are created equal" was true even when Jefferson wrote it. His oratory used the techniques of accusation and insinuation, even as a senator. Tillman's views on white supremacy were so extreme that he held "that blacks must submit to either domination or extermination." He was against extermination, on the grounds that many white men might lose their lives achieving it.

Featured lists
Four featured lists were promoted this week.


 * List of South Africa cricketers who have taken five wickets on Test debut (nominated by Vensatry) A list of those cricketers who, playing for South Africa in a Test match for the first time, have taken five or more wickets in a single innings. The difficulty of this can be seen in the fact that only 144 cricketers of any national team have achieved such a feat, of which 22 have been South African. The list starts with Albert Rose-Innes in 1889, and the latest is Kyle Abbot in 2013.
 * List of works by Georgette Heyer (nominated by Ruby2010) Georgette Heyer was an English author who published her first novel, The Black Moth, as a nineteen-year-old in 1921. It was set in the Georgian period, and featured Lord Jack Carstares, who became a highwayman after he took the blame when his younger brother cheated at cards. The novel displayed themes that would run through her novels: romance, history, and no end of the doings of the nobility. The male lead is usually described as "saturnine" or gloomy. Heyer went on to establish the Regency romance, which entailed thorough historical research on the nine years of the Regency era. In her heyday, she wrote one romance and one thriller a year. Heyer's last novel was My Lord John, unfinished at her death in 1974, and published posthumously. It's a story of John of Lancaster, 1st Duke of Bedford and his brothers; Heyer was fascinated by the period in which the House of Lancaster held sway, and regarded John as a "great man".
 * Kangana Ranaut, roles and awards (nominated by Krimuk90) Kangana Ranaut, an Indian actress, has appeared in 29 Bollywood films. She has played a wide range of roles, such as a village girl in the Tamil film Dhaam Dhoom, a supermodel with a penchant for abusing substances in Fashion, and a form-changing mutant in Krrish 3. The latter film, released in 2013, is one of the highest-grossing Bollywood films (that's gross as in money, not gross as in... oh never mind).
 * Kareena Kapoor Khan filmography (nominated by BOLLYWOOD DREAMZ, Frank Boy, and Krimuk90) Kareena Kapoor Khan is an Indian actress who has appeared in more than 50 Bollywood films since her debut in Refugee (2000). Like Kangana, Kareena has played a multitude of roles, of which our favourite is Riana Braganza, "a hairdresser who accidentally marries an uptight architect", in the film Ek Main Aur Ekk Tu.

Featured topics
One featured topic was promoted this week.
 * Vidya Balan (nominated by User:Krimuk90) Vidya Balan, an Indian actress, has appeared in a number of Bollywood films, for which she has received several awards. Through her depictions of such characters as Krishna Verma, the wife of a gang lord, in Ishqiya, and Sabrina Lall, the sister of Jessica Lal, she has been "acknowledged in the media for pioneering a change in the concept of a Hindi film heroine."

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