Wikipedia:Recent additions/2007/November

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Did you know...

30 November 2007

21:24, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the Swedish-American entrepreneur Lars-Eric Lindblad who led the first tourist expedition to Antarctica in 1966, for many years operated his own vessel, the MS Lindblad Explorer (pictured), in the region?
...that Republican Jerry Sonnenberg was the only member of the largest class of freshman legislators in the history of the Colorado House of Representatives to be elected to an open seat without opposition?
...that Somerset cricket captain Jack Meyer was entrusted with the education of seven Indian boys, six of them princes, and founded the Millfield School to do so?
...that the Alicante Bouschet is the only Vitis vinifera wine grape with red juice?
...that Frank Fulco, a Democratic member of the Louisiana House of Representatives between 1956 and 1972, was once honored on his House floor by the government of Italy for his long involvement in Italian American causes?
...that the Hudson River Historic District is, at 35 square miles (89 km²), the largest Registered Historic District in the contiguous United States?
...that the haor located in north-eastern Bangladesh, is a bowl-shaped depression with such vast stretches of turbulent water that it is thought of as a sea during a monsoon?

11:31, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the United Overseas Bank's 20-story Bangkok headquarters (pictured) is shaped like a robot?
...that Eagle River, Wisconsin is known as the "Snowmobile Capital of the World" because it hosts the World Championship Snowmobile Derby?
...that Washington Ellsworth Lindsey became the third Governor of New Mexico after his predecessor died while in office?
...that a silver dish thought to be the Ancient Roman Risley Park Lanx was on display in the British Museum for several years before being determined to be a complete fabrication?
...that the new airport being constructed near Islamabad, Pakistan will be named Gandhara International Airport, after the ancient kingdom Gandhara?
...that Haiti has the lowest coverage of electricity in the Western Hemisphere, with only about 12.5% of the population having regular access to electricity?
...that Lesbian wines were some of the most highly sought after wines of the Ancient Greeks?

05:46, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

...that billionaire Leonore Annenberg (pictured, left), wife of business magnate Walter Annenberg, was the Chief of Protocol of the United States from 1981 to 1982 under President Ronald Reagan?
...that in 1512, the 2nd Marquess of Dorset unsuccessfully led an English army to France to reconquer Aquitaine, which had been lost during the Hundred Years' War?
...that safety Don Dufek was cut from the Seattle Seahawks four times?
...that Alexandre Bontemps, senior head valet to Louis XIV of France, was a rich and powerful figure, feared by courtiers, whose behaviour was reported to him by the Swiss Guard?
...that no viable solution has yet been found to counteract radiation from space, which is a serious threat to astronauts on any future mission to Mars?
...that Norma Elizabeth Boyd, founder of the Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, was a United Nations observer in 1949 and supported the Principle 10 of the Declaration of Human Rights?
...that John Straffen, a triple child-killer who escaped from Broadmoor, served 55 years in prison becoming the longest-serving prisoner in British history?

29 November 2007

23:15, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Nobel Prize winner Seamus Heaney's poem "January God" is about a stone sculpture called the Boa Island Janus figure (pictured)?
...that R Family Vacations offered the first all-gay and lesbian family vacation packages where LGBT parents can bring their children?
...that Thomas Bancroft's Times out of Tune (1658) includes verses against whoring, gluttony, alcoholism, hedonism, lying, pride in clothing, betrayal, ambition, cowardice, and the abuse of poetry?
...that Hadspen House has been owned by the family of Henry Hobhouse since 1785?
...that Michigan Wolverines football player Bill Yearby was an All-American football player as well as a champion shot putter who the coaches felt could have starred for the Wolverines basketball team?
...that until Darren Cheeseman's win in 2007, the Australian seat of Corangamite had not been won by a Labor candidate in over 70 years?
...that during the winter the Romans of the Mosel wine region would drink their wine hot like a tea?
...that the green-flag wielding Republican Army defeated the Spanish forces during the Battle of Rosillo at Salado Creek in San Antonio and established the first Texas Republic in April 1813?

16:52, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the tallest building in Jersey City, New Jersey is the 781-foot (238 m) 30 Hudson Street (pictured)?
...that Ornatifilum is likely to be the oldest known fossil fungus?
...that although Ohio State Buckeye Archie Griffin defended the Heisman Trophy in 1975, Michigan Wolverines football player Gordon Bell won the 1975 Big Ten rushing championship?
...that certain biological neuron models are a literally spherical cow, in that the cell is approximated to be a sphere?
...that William Scrots, King's Painter to Henry VIII and his son Edward VI, was paid a salary twice as large as that of his predecessor, Hans Holbein?
...that Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority founder, Margaret Flagg Holmes and her husband were received by Pope Pius XI in 1931?
...that KGB head Ivan Serov did not go on tour in Britain as planned because the British press labelled him "Ivan the Terrible"?
...that Irena Iłłakowicz, a secret agent of the Polish resistance during WWII, was formerly married to a Persian prince?

08:34, 29 November 2007 (UTC)

Ontario pavilion at Expo 67

...that Gazell Macy DuBois designed the Ontario pavilion at Expo 67 (pictured) which looked like "a mess of paper triangles or mentally disarranged envelopes"?
...that Michigan Wolverines football player Jim Pace not only won the Chicago Tribune Silver Football as the Most Valuable Player in the Big Ten Conference, but also won the Big Ten 60-yard indoor dash title?
...that in 1866 Polish exilees to Siberia staged an uprising trying to escape to China?
...that Sam Little, a retired farmer from Bastrop, Louisiana, was elected to the Louisiana House of Representatives by a margin of only 9 votes out of 7,863 cast in a low-turnout contest?
...that as cricket in Ireland is organised on an All-Ireland basis, a team representing Northern Ireland has appeared just once, at the 1998 Commonwealth Games cricket tournament?
...that Queensland MP Peter Wellington held the balance of power for four months, until a by-election allowed the Australian Labor Party to form a majority government?
...that, after hitting another driver from behind in heavy traffic, screenwriter Jennifer Philbin and her husband Michael Schur raised $26,000 for charity in a retaliation campaign instead of paying $840 to fix the driver's broken bumper?

28 November 2007

22:00, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the 1300 identified Mesoamerican ballcourts used for playing the Mesoamerican ballgame (see drawing) were all built in the same basic shape despite a span of 2700 years?
...that in 1902, 23-year-old British archaeozoologist Dorothea Bate discovered a new species of dwarf elephant in a cave on the island of Cyprus?
...that Pundravardhana was a territory, mostly in present-day Bangladesh, of the Pundras, a group of non-Aryan people, dating back to 8th-7th centuries BC?
...that Neil Riser, an incoming Republican member of the Louisiana State Senate from Columbia, Louisiana, began working at the age of fourteen as a logger?
...that the urn atop Charles Bulfinch's grave in Mount Auburn Cemetery in Massachusetts, U.S. once stood at the center of Franklin Place, Boston?
...that the mythical Connla's Well, home to the Salmon of Wisdom, is the legendary source of the Shannon and Boyne Rivers as well as Irish poetic inspiration?
...that Etaples Military Cemetery is the largest Commonwealth War Graves Commission cemetery in France, with over 11,500 burials?

14:16, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

...that on the banks of Shitalakshya River, in Bangladesh, there are artistic weaving (pictured) centres, where once the muslin industry flourished?
...that Fred Ryan was instrumental in the development of the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library?
...that the Kiva Koffeehouse in the Canyons of the Escalante was designed by Bradshaw Bowman, the inventor of Bomanite, on property his family has owned since homesteading it in the 1860s?
...that James Wayne "Jim" Tucker of suburban New Orleans will in 2008 become the first Republican Speaker of the Louisiana House of Representatives since Reconstruction?
...that Betzy Kjelsberg, a Norwegian member of the international feminist movement, founded or co-founded six women's rights associations and organizations?
...that Jim Hermiston, a member of the Aberdeen FC "Hall of Fame", was cited for bravery after intervening in a bank robbery in Brisbane in 1999?
...that Asit Kumar Haldar was the first Indian fellow at the Royal Society of Arts?

05:43, 28 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the surrender of Japanese troops in China was first announced in a Chinese language by Dr. Ernest B. Price (pictured) in October 1945?
...that the Bristol Packers American football team won every game in its debut season, but failed to win any in its final year?
...that Robert L. Howard received his Congressional Medal of Honor while part of a Hatchet Force operating near the Laos–Cambodia border during the Vietnam War in 1968?
...that the Lachine massacre, in which Iroquois warriors destroyed a New France settlement on Montreal Island, was instigated by English forces in New York following the declaration of King William's War?
...that the field of DNA nanotechnology has used the unique molecular recognition properties of DNA to construct two-dimensional lattices, nanomechanical devices, computers, polyhedra, and even a smiley face out of DNA?
...that Henry Lomb became a co-founder of the Bausch & Lomb Company when he loaned $60 to his friend John Jacob Bausch?

27 November 2007

23:36, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the allegorical Armada Portrait of Queen Elizabeth I (pictured) commemorates England's defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588?
...that in 1846, Albert Tirrell became the first to successfully use sleepwalking as a defense for murder and arson in the United States?
...that Frank Rennie joined the New Zealand Army at age 16, to prove to himself 20 months in hospital hadn't crippled him, and went on to become Colonel?
...that American federal judge James Alger Fee ruled in 1942 that Minoru Yasui lost his U.S. citizenship after Yasui had worked for the Japanese consulate until the attack on Pearl Harbor?
...that the 6th Canadian Infantry Division was raised in 1942 and disbanded in 1945 without having taken part in any World War II fighting?
...that Dennis Franklin was the first African American quarterback for the Michigan Wolverines football team?
...that the Lombardy wine region of Franciacorta produces a style of sparkling wine that is more bubbly than frizzante but has less carbon dioxide than most sparkling wines?
...that scientists have used microbaroms for inverse remote sensing of the upper atmosphere?
...that the first Earl of Wiltshire was a Breton viscount, Harvey of Léon, who served Stephen of England in the first phase of the civil war called the Anarchy?

15:45, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Mahasthangarh (ramparts pictured) is the earliest urban archaeological site so far discovered in Bangladesh, dating back to at least the 3rd century B.C.?
...that royal favourites were often compared to mushrooms, as they sprang up overnight, and grew in excrement?
...that "Here I Am", the song chosen for the winner of Australian Idol 2007 to release as a single, has been heavily criticised by both finalists?
...that William Hopper became the founder Chairman of the Institute for Fiscal Studies with hopes that it would lead to a more rational system of taxation in the United Kingdom?
...that Bob Timberlake, an unsuccessful placekicker for the New York Giants who made only 1 of 15 field goal attempts in his NFL career, was an award-winning quarterback for the Michigan Wolverines before he was drafted in 1965?
...that the Mosque of the Rose in Istanbul is so named because on the day of the Fall of Constantinople the building was adorned with garlands of roses?
...that the title of Dan Castellaneta's album of comedy sketches I Am Not Homer is a parody of Leonard Nimoy's first autobiography I Am Not Spock?

09:41, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

window

...that Dutch artist Folke Heybroek's works include stained glass windows (pictured), iron and concrete sculptures, paintings, and textile designs, decorating about 70 public spaces in Sweden?
...that in the 1659 English play The English Moor, noted for its use of blackface make-up, one main character implies that Blacks and Whites are created equal by God?
...that Project Lauren is the codename for an unannounced British airline that will provide service between the U.S. and continental Europe, bypassing the U.K., and that aircraft have already been acquired?
...that June Bride, filmed with two versions of a dialog naming the candidates to the 1948 U.S presidency, opened in theaters with the wrong future president?
...that John Mawe, who studied the mineralogy of Derbyshire, was arrested as a spy in 1805 before publishing accounts of his travels in Brazil?
...that Richard Whitaker's research into the correlation between surface temperature in the Pacific Ocean and rainfall in Australia contributed to the discovery of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation?
...that there are more than 40 Community Rail Partnerships supporting local rail lines in the United Kingdom?

01:12, 27 November 2007 (UTC)

...that a summit, a spur, a wooden building and an avenue are named after Michel Croz, a mountain guide who died on the first ascent of the Matterhorn (pictured)?
...that double-stranded RNA viruses cause everything from gastroenteritis in young children to bluetongue disease in livestock?
...that in Amgen v Hoechst, the House of Lords affirmed that an incredible similarity between two patents does not constitute patent infringement in the UK?
...that as Navy production chief during World War II, electric drive pioneer Samuel Murray Robinson became the first staff officer to attain the rank of four-star admiral in the history of the United States Navy?
...that although Adam Freeland has said that his 2003 song We Want Your Soul is about "the destructive side of consumer culture", Target tried to license the song for use in a commercial?

26 November 2007

17:25, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the English engraver John Boydell (pictured) founded the fashionable Shakespeare Gallery in London in 1786, but had to sell it in a lottery in 1804 after he was bankrupted by the Napoleonic Wars?
...that some types of human learning can be described mathematically by Oja's rule, which is commonly used in image processing software?
...that Filipino film producer Narcisa de Leon did not start her career in the film industry till she was 61 years old?
...that the Pompallier Mission is New Zealand's oldest industrial building and printed some of the earliest texts in Māori?
...that xenobiotic metabolism is the set of metabolic pathways that detoxify xenobiotics, such as drugs and poisons?
...that Emma Cunningham was acquitted of the 1857 murder of her landlord because she falsely claimed to be pregnant by him, and Victorian morality prevented doctors from physically examining her?

11:14, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the White House Entrance Hall (pictured) had the President's seal removed from its floor in the early 1950s because President Truman thought it inappropriate to walk across it?
...that a prokaryotic cytoskeleton has been found in prokaryote organisms by recent advances in visualization technology?
...that Roger Wilmut went on from typing out the episode list of a BBC comedy show to become a Guardian Top 10 author of books about British comedy?
...that Chambercombe Manor is said to be one of the most haunted buildings in the United Kingdom?
...that the Alabama Drydock and Shipbuilding Company produced 90 navy tanker ships in two years, from 1943-1945 and employed over 18,000 people while doing so?
...that noitulovE, a cinema and television advertising campaign for Guinness draught stout, won more awards than any other commercial worldwide in 2006?
...that James Tennant took over from Sarah Mawe as "Mineralogist to Her Majesty" and he supervised the recutting of the Koh-i-Noor diamond?
...that the hazardous Welland Canal Bridge 15 featured a bell ringing whenever a ship made contact, warning the crew to check for damage?

00:15, 26 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the Solomon Courthouse (pictured) has twice served as a post office, and was the setting for a courtroom scene in The Hunted?
...that Rob Carpenter retired from the National Football League after catching his second touchdown in the 1995 NFL playoffs?
...that Mel Rose, the runner-up on the seventh cycle of America's Next Top Model, dropped the "-issa" from her first name because she "didn't need it"?
...that the subject of sex was central to The Antipodes, an English Renaissance play by Richard Brome, first performed by Queen Henrietta's Men at the Salisbury Court Theatre in 1637?
...that Colorado Rep. Stella Garza-Hicks dropped out of high school in the ninth grade?
...that Bertram Fraser-Reid is a Jamaica-born chemist who founded a non-profit organization to find cures for tropical parasitic diseases like malaria?
...that the Champawat tigress and the Tsavo lions had suffered injuries that disabled them from pursuing their natural prey, leading them to become man-eaters?
...that the Barack Obama Muslim rumor has been circulating on the Internet since 2004?

25 November 2007

18:12, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

...that a stone run (pictured) is a stable and conspicuous rock landform caused by a myriad of freezing-thawing cycles and also called a stone river, stone stream, or stone sea?
...that the Théâtrophone service (1890-1932) allowed the subscribers to listen to opera and theatre performances over the telephone lines?
...that the T.G. Richards and Company Store is the oldest brick building in Washington?
...that during the negotiations in Ostrów in 1392, the principal Polish negotiator, Henry of Masovia, bishop of Płock, fell in love with the sister of his opponent, Vytautas the Great?
...that a series of storms in south-east Queensland spawned two of the most powerful tornadoes in recorded Australian history?
...that Arthur Segal was prevented from exhibiting his art in Germany because of his Jewish background?
...that the massacre in Vinnytsia by the Soviet secret police NKVD in the purges of 1937-1938 was investigated in 1943 during the German invasion of Ukraine and used in the propaganda war against the Soviet Union?
...that U.S. activist Kit Bakke went on from being considered a terrorist with a 400-page FBI file to become a nurse for children with cancer?

01:34, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Italian painter Parmigianino distorted nature for his own artistic purposes in the unfinished Renaissance oil painting Madonna with the Long Neck (pictured)?
...that forest brother Alfred Käärmann hid for 7 years from Soviet officials, spent 15 years in Siberian prison camps, had his passport stamped "annulled" and was banished from Estonia until 1981?
...that flutist Masakazu Yoshizawa was hired by John Williams to play the shakuhachi for the Jurassic Park soundtrack because the instrument sounded "like a dinosaur's cry"?
...that the Allegheny Arsenal explosion on September 17, 1862 was the single largest civilian disaster during the American Civil War?
...that Robert G. Pugh and his son, Robert, Jr., were the first father-son team to present oral arguments together before the United States Supreme Court?
...that the French chemist Louis Pasteur owned a vineyard in the Jura wine region that is still producing wine today?
...that Yegor Ligachev is renowned for being Gorbachev's main critic, even though he has repudiated that in many speeches and his memoirs?
...that the city of Union Valley, Texas, population 226, incorporated in 2007 out of fear of annexation by neighboring cities?

24 November 2007

19:15, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the Hyde Park Railroad Station (pictured) in Hyde Park, New York was a day away from demolition when it was leased to a local rail historical society?
...that football referees in England officiate at eleven different levels according to ability, activity and age?
...that Georgia Tech professor Mark Guzdial was the inventor of Swiki, one of the earliest wiki engines?
...that Gordon K. Douglass qualified for the Canadian national canoe paddling team, but was not allowed to go to the 1936 Olympics because he was American?
...that the Telefon Hírmondó was the longest-running telephone newspaper?
...that the aphid Brevicoryne brassicae has been called a "walking mustard oil bomb" due to its use of glucosinolates as a chemical defense mechanism against predators?
...that the ill-fated Yen Bai mutiny proceeded because a messenger sent to delay the mutiny was intercepted?
...that 16th-century English diplomat Francis Bryan disgraced himself by throwing eggs and stones at the common people during a mission to Paris?

03:36, 24 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Rev. Justus Henry Nelson (pictured) (1850-1937) established the first Protestant church in the Amazon Basin and was a self-supporting Methodist missionary in Belém, Pará, Brazil for 45 years?
...that the International Olympic Committee has shortlisted five cities — Athens, Bangkok, Moscow, Singapore and Turin — out of nine bids to host the first Youth Olympic Games in 2010?
...that a Catalan wine was secretly added to the classified Bordeaux wine category of the 1979 Gault Millau Wine Olympics and won?
...that John John Florence was the youngest ever surfer to compete in the Vans Triple Crown of Surfing?
...that the Barotse Floodplain is the second largest wetland in Zambia and also one of the most productive areas for raising cattle in the country?
...that Ashta Lakshmi are a group of Hindu goddesses who preside over eight sources of wealth?
...that Singapore's 5.4-ton Pegasus is the first helicopter-portable 155mm howitzer with a self-propelled capability?
...that an Australian chief justice Terence John Higgins dismissed a defamation case alleging "lazy journalism" against an Australian journalist even though he found that the claim wasn't true?

23 November 2007

17:04, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

...that HMS Amphion (pictured) was sunk in the opening 36 hours of the First World War?
...that the River Bourne in Kent used to power a dozen mills in its 10 mile length?
...that stock investor Ronald S. Baron has nonetheless been nicknamed "the Count" since his student days?
...that the 1984 Rajneeshee bioterror attack was the first bioterrorism attack in the United States, and one of only two confirmed terrorist uses of biological weapons to harm humans?
...that Rapides-des-Joachims, Quebec has no paved road connection with the rest of Quebec?
...that the first McDonald's restaurant in Eastern Europe was opened March 24 1988 in a former family house in Belgrade, constructed by Serbian architect Dimitrije T. Leko in 1893?
...that the Mongolian Stock Exchange in Ulaanbaatar, the world's smallest by market capitalisation, is housed in a refurbished children's cinema?
...that a Cambridge University society has launched high altitude balloons that have taken a picture of the earth's curvature from a height of 32 km?
...that, while a legislator in Colorado, Dan Gibbs trained as a volunteer firefighter and was deployed to fight the Santiago Fire during the October 2007 California wildfire epidemic?

03:31, 23 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Berlinka (pictured) was a partially constructed highway built by Nazi Germany that was intended to span the Polish Corridor from Berlin to Königsberg, Prussia?
...that the wallet of Scottish curate Arnold Spencer-Smith was found in Captain Scott's Antarctic hut in 1999, about 83 years after Spencer-Smith died in 1916?
...that the Battle of the Espero Convoy during the Mediterranean Campaign in World War II resulted in such a shortage of ammunition that planned Allied convoys to Malta had to be postponed for two weeks?
...that Florida has over 20 official state symbols, including a state soil and a state wildflower?
...that SantralIstanbul, a modern art museum in Istanbul, Turkey, is located in what was the first power station of the Ottoman Empire?
...that the Supreme Court of the United States ruled in Yasui v. United States and its companion case Hirabayashi v. United States that curfews for a minority group were constitutional during war time?
...that Rear-Admiral Horace Hood was posthumously knighted following his death in the destruction of HMS Invincible at the Battle of Jutland in 1916?
...that when Hugh Randall Syme won the George Cross in 1943 for bomb disposal work, he became the most decorated member of the Royal Australian Navy at that time, having already been awarded two George Medals?

22 November 2007

20:00, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

...that, during World War II, an anti-submarine boom net (pictured) to defend against torpedoes and submarines spanned the entire length of Sydney Harbour, Australia?
...that U.S. General Omar Bundy, who was awarded the French Legion of Honor and Croix de Guerre for his service in World War I, was a veteran of the Indian War campaigns against Crow and Sioux Indians?
...that Austrian film company Wien-Film was given its official mission statement in 1938 by Joseph Goebbels?
...that activist Terry Robbins inspired the name of the terrorist organization Weathermen with a Bob Dylan quote?
...that a Ghostbusters video game is scheduled for late 2008, a quarter-century after the original film?
...that painter and stage designer George Sheringham was one of the first recipients of the Royal Designers for Industry distinction?
...that the earliest Portuguese description of Malaysia, Tomé Pires's Suma Oriental, lay unpublished and presumed lost in an archive until 1944?
...that tourism in Zimbabwe fell by seventy-five percent in 2000 compared to the previous year?

13:49, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Winchester Cathedral (pictured) is the longest of the medieval cathedrals of England?
...that Indologist Burton Stein was known for questioning the existence of the Chola Dynasty as an empire?
...that the Federated Malay States and the Straits Settlements had a combined cricket team from 1906 to 1961?
...that Pancha Carrasco became Costa Rica's first woman in the military by joining the defending forces at the Battle of Rivas?
...that after World War II, the Soviets took nearly 100 tons of uranium oxide as reparations from a facility of the company Auergesellschaft, accelerating their development of the atomic bomb by a year?
...that professor George E. Kimball gave a zero in physical chemistry to Isaac Asimov?
...that Virgil Walter Ross animated Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck for decades under Tex Avery and Fritz Freleng and received the highest awards in his profession?
...that some birds, including flamingos, display homosexual behavior?
...that the mythological sea creature Aspidochelone is so massive that it is said to have been mistaken for an island?

05:54, 22 November 2007 (UTC)

...that more than 200 species of mammals (male kob pictured) display homosexual behavior including oral sex, genital stimulation, and urolagnia?
...that Angus Purden, regular presenter of the BBC's Cash in the Attic, modelled for Giorgio Armani for three years in Milan?
...that under the leadership of its Ministry of Defense, Ukraine voluntarily gave up its nuclear weapons?
...that Arpiar Arpiarian introduced realism to modern Armenian literature?
...that John Gouriet organised the "Operation Pony Express" in 1977, where 100,000 films from the strikebound Grunwick laboratory were posted across the United Kingdom, getting around the refusal of the local postal workers to handle them?
...that the frigate HMNZS Canterbury was decommissioned by the Royal New Zealand Navy, sold to a trust for a symbolic NZ$1, and scuttled in the Bay of Islands by a former crewmember?
...that Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority founder Harriet Josephine Terry wrote the sorority's hymn, "Hail Alpha Kappa Alpha Dear"?
...that as Burton Abbott was being executed in California's gas chamber in 1957, the governor was contacting the warden to stay the execution?
...that the conflict between Communist Romanian leader Nicolae Ceauşescu and his ideological rival Petre Borilă worsened after Ceauşescu's son Valentin decided to marry Borilă's daughter?

21 November 2007

23:39, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

...that although the Azad Hind Stamps (pictured) are Cinderella stamps, the Indian Postal department deems them postage stamps?
...that Japanologist Hugh Borton took up his field after being posted to Japan by a Quaker service organization?
...that Madison Limestone, a layer of mostly carbonate rocks formed in the Mississippian period, serves as an aquifer and an oil reservoir in the Rocky Mountains and Great Plains areas?
...that one of the first known instances of a composer specifically calling for the use of a bass violin, the predecessor of the modern cello, was in the opera Orfeo by Claudio Monteverdi?
...that the Carlsberg papyrus is the most complete of the ancient Egyptian medical papyri, containing substantial amounts of artifacts of the original papyrus?
...that the forthcoming television adaptation of the BBC Radio 2 sitcom Teenage Kicks, originally for BBC Two, has been taken over by ITV?
...that the United Issarak Front leader Son Ngoc Minh declared Cambodian independence on June 19 1950?
...that Colorado Sen. Nancy Spence's bill to create a statewide school voucher program was the first to be enacted into law in the U.S. — and then overturned by state courts — after Zelman v. Simmons-Harris?
...that a bronze bowl from the Iron Age Glastonbury Lake Village was made from the remnants of two separate vessels, before it was deposited in the peat?

17:08, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

...that landscape and portrait painter Herbert A. Collins (pictured) made several portraits of naturalist John Muir as well as paintings of the evolution of Yosemite Valley?
...that a report by the Judicial Commission of New South Wales almost led to a New South Wales judge being removed from office because of the time delays in giving decisions?
...that Nguyen Truong To was called to serve Emperor Tu Duc of Vietnam despite having earlier assisted France's colonization of southern Vietnam?
...that Miyazaki Ichisada was known for adding a fourth phase to periodisation of the history of China and Japan?
...that at the time of his death, A. Ronald Walton was estimated to have reviewed more language programs than anyone else in the world?
...that the Barasoain Church, where three major events in Philippine history took place, became known as the Cradle of Democracy in the East?
...that Mary Perkins was the first female optician to be made a Dame Commander of the British Empire?
...that fruit as a slang term developed in London with the costermongers and later in Cockney rhyming slang and Polari, with most variations becoming pejorative against gay men who have since reclaimed usages?
...that the Crowcombe church spire was damaged by lightning in 1724 and the top has been planted in the churchyard ever since?

04:22, 21 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the owners of the Spade Ranch (pictured) in the Nebraska Sandhills hired Civil War veterans and widows to circumvent homesteading laws?
...that British art forger Shaun Greenhalgh was a self-taught artist, yet managed to fool the British Museum, the Tate Modern, and Bonhams, Sotheby's and Christie's?
...that in the 2000, 2001, and 2002 seasons of the Super 12, the Highlanders rugby union team went undefeated at their home ground of Carisbrook?
...that Colorado state senator John Morse worked as an emergency medical technician, accountant, and police chief before entering the legislature?
...that the Korotoa River, a small stream in Bangladesh, was once a large and sacred river?
...that the term "doomsday cult" can refer to apocalyptic groups that prophesy catastrophe and those that attempt to bring it about?
...that the ancient Kingdom of Nri was one of the few governments that governed its subjects with a taboo system instead of military power?
...that a complete backstory was constructed by Mike Leigh for Vinette Robinson's character in Vera Drake, even though the role was minor?
...that the frigate HMS Alarm was the first ship of the Royal Navy ever to have a fully copper-sheathed hull?
...that Robert F. Kennedy's speech on the assassination of Martin Luther King is believed to have prevented riots from breaking out in Indianapolis?

20 November 2007

22:21, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

...that 18th century English obstetrician Thomas Denman (pictured) was an early advocate for inducing premature labour in cases involving a narrow pelvis or other conditions which endanger the mother's life?
...that in Puritan Massachusetts Bay Colony, when Dorothy Talbye fell into despair with fits of violence in 1638, she was excommunicated from the church, bound and chained to a post, publicly whipped and finally, after murdering her daughter, hanged?
...that the German national rail strike of 2007 is the largest strike in history affecting Deutsche Bahn?
...that Adenovirus serotype 14 is an emerging virus, related to the common cold, that has recently caused 10 deaths in the United States, including at least one healthy young adult?
...that Spencer Campbell regretted producing the year-long fly on the wall series The Living Soap, about students living in a purpose-built house, when some participants started deliberately avoiding the cameras after only a few days?
...that USS General S. D. Sturgis was the transport ship assigned to deliver officials of the United States, Australia, Canada, Dutch East Indies, China and the Philippines to Tokyo Bay for the Japanese surrender ceremonies at the end of World War II?

16:20, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

...that three out of every seventy-seven rainbow runners (pictured) have five spines in their first dorsal fin, as a result of not being born with the normal six?
...that Valentyn Rechmedin, a Ukrainian journalist and writer, received the Order of the Red Star after World War II?
...that nineteenth century New Zealand gum-diggers retrieved 5,000 tons of kauri resin a year for the varnish trade, and that the gum was Auckland's main export?
...that USNS General R. L. Howze held the record for ships assisting the 1954 mass exodus out of North Vietnam with 38 births on board during Operation Passage to Freedom?
...that the Susquehanna and Tidewater Canal, built along the Susquehanna River in the 1830s, had a wooden bridge with a two-tier towpath to allow mules towing cargoboats in opposite directions to cross the river simultaneously without colliding?
...that Robert Ropner, who built the first trunk deck ship in 1896, was sued for patent infringement because his design was similar to that of turret deck ships?
...that the Chemical Automatics Design Bureau produced the Soviet Union's only operational nuclear rocket engine?
...that although Ernest Wild developed scurvy during the Ross Sea Party Antarctic expedition, and lost part of a toe and part of an ear to frostbite, he survived - but died of typhoid the next year in Malta?

08:19, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the last three piano sonatas by Franz Schubert (pictured), published eleven years after the Austrian composer's death, are often regarded as a trilogy?
...that following his term as Mayor of Boston, Frederick O. Prince advocated and oversaw the construction of the Boston Public Library's McKim Building in Copley Square?
...that Julius Garfinckel, founder of the department store Garfinckel's, died from pneumonia on his 64th birthday?
...that Wotif.com only allows consumers to organise hotel reservations 28 days in advance?
...that Indo-Guyanese lawyer and civil rights activist Rudy Narayan could, Michael Mansfield has written, have been the great black barrister of his generation?
...that Brigadier Arthur Frederick Crane Nicholls is the only member of the Coldstream Guards to have won the George Cross, the highest civil decoration of the Commonwealth of Nations?
...that Gautam Adani, a school dropout, is the 13th richest person in India?
...that El Salvador has the highest geothermal energy production in Central America?
...that Frederick Winslow Taylor developed the core of his philosophy of scientific management at Midvale Steel?

01:56, 20 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the northern whiting (pictured) has been declared an invasive species in the eastern Mediterranean, having passed through the Suez Canal as part of the Lessepsian migration?
...that an offer sheet in the National Hockey League requires compensation in the form of future draft picks if a restricted free agent is signed by a different team in the league?
...that the son of French Admiral Georges René Le Peley de Pléville was released as a prisoner of war because the British Admiralty thanked his peg-legged father for saving a British frigate 10 years earlier?
...that American academic Jackson Bailey was decorated with the Order of the Sacred Treasure, the highest possible honor given by Japan to a foreigner?
...that Galicia started exporting plant cuttings to other European vineyards as early as the 14th century?
...that playwright Sam Thompson's Over the Bridge about Northern Irish sectarian violence became Belfast's most-seen play despite a prediction it would "offend and affront every section of the public"?
...that the town of Booleroo Centre, South Australia is home to one of Australia's largest collections of tractors and steam engines?
...that Felipe Agoncillo, who topped the highest possible score in a bar exam, was also the outstanding first Filipino diplomat?
...that historian Holden Furber was appointed as a social science analyst to the Office of Strategic Services after the United States entered World War II?
...that François Denhaut built the world's first flying boat, or seaplane with a hull?

19 November 2007

19:09, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the Devon and Cornwall Rail Partnership has won £1,000,000 of grants to improve and promote six rural railway lines (Looe Valley Line pictured) in south-west England?
...that among the founding members of Philomathes - a clandestine Polish student organization in Imperial University of Vilna in partitioned Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth - was Adam Mickiewicz, one of the three national poets of Poland?
...that the establishment of Mahendra Pratap's Provisional Government of India was one of the reasons that the Rowlatt Commission was set up to investigate German and Bolshevik links to nationalist terrorism in British India?
...that the author of Tom Cruise: An Unauthorized Biography stated he had to go into hiding after receiving threats related to his yet unpublished book?
...that during Operation Deep Freeze II in 1956, US Navy Rear Admiral George J. Dufek commanded the first aircraft to land at the South Pole, the C-47 Skytrain “Que Sera Sera”?
...Niek Loohuis is now a Dutch First Division football (soccer) player, despite having been declared unfit and removed from FC Twente's youth academy at age 18?
...that Nicaragua has the lowest electricity generation, the lowest percentage of population with access to electricity, and the highest dependence on oil for electricity generation in Central America?
...that the collision between aircraft carrier HMAS Melbourne and destroyer HMAS Voyager is the only event in Australian history to be subject to two Royal Commissions?
...that the gardens of the Petit Trianon were once thought to be haunted?
...that in 1846 Albert Wilson became the first American merchant to open a store in Astoria, Oregon?

11:24, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

...that 12,000 people paid 25 cents to view Frederic E. Church's The Heart of the Andes (pictured), a ten-foot-wide landscape painting exhibited in 1859?
...that according to Jainism, the first Purva of ancient knowledge would take a volume of ink equal to an elephant to write, whereas the last would require the ink volume of 2¹³ elephants?
...that attempts to soften the harsh tannic nature of the Tannat wine grape led to the development of the winemaking technique of micro-oxygenation?
...that in Rose Macaulay's novel The Towers of Trebizond (1956) the English traveller Aunt Dot aims to emancipate the women of Turkey by converting them to Anglicanism and popularizing the bathing hat?
...that Myles Rudge wrote the lyrics to three Top 10 novelty songs in the 1960s, "Hole in the Ground", "Right Said Fred", and "A Windmill in Old Amsterdam"?
...that Colorado state representative Amy Stephens wrote an abstinence-based sex education curriculum that was translated into over a dozen languages?
...that Romanian communist poet Alexandru Toma adapted several works of his Classicist predecessor Mihai Eminescu, removing their pessimistic tone and adding Socialist Realist rhetoric?
...that in 1656, Judith Catchpole was tried before colonial Maryland's first all-female jury because a woman's expertise was needed to evaluate the evidence?

04:04, 19 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the shrimp scad (pictured) was first scientifically described by Swedish naturalist Peter Forsskål in 1775, who mistook it for mackerel?
...that the Sam Sheepdog and Ralph Wolf cartoons Sheep Ahoy, A Sheep in the Deep, and Don't Give Up the Sheep were censored by ABC to remove a dynamite stick, a smoke break scene, and a spanking scene respectively?
...that John Cartier was eulogized by Edmund Burke for his Governorship of Bengal despite losing a third of the population during the 1770 famine?
...that Colorado State Senate president pro tem Peter Groff is the highest-ranking African-American elected official in the U.S. state of Colorado?
...that Robert Crouch led the Parliamentary campaign on the Crichel Down affair involving his constituency, which forced the resignation of Minister of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food Sir Thomas Dugdale?
...that Westmoreland v. CBS demonstrated that a public figure cannot win a libel suit in the United States unless reckless and defamatory statements are evidence of actual malice?
...that New Zealand rugby union footballer Jimmy Hunter's 44 tries on the 1905 All Blacks tour is a record that is unlikely to ever to be surpassed?
...that by providing government assistance to vineyard owners so they could replant and redesign their vineyards, the Flurbereinigung restructuring of the late 20th century had a dramatic impact on the German wine industry?

18 November 2007

22:03, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the mosque of Hirami Ahmet Pasha (pictured) in Istanbul is the smallest Byzantine church of Constantinople still extant?
...that The Gentleman Usher is the only play in which late 16th-century playwright George Chapman takes a positive view of women?
...that 7th-century duke Waldalenus traded off with the Church his firstborn son against his wife's miraculous fertility?
...that Edgar Allan Poe's 1848 essay Eureka presaged the Big Bang theory and black holes?
...that the airdate of "The Beginning of the End", the fourth season premiere of the television series Lost, means that the season may be interrupted by the 2007 Writers Guild of America strike even if a settlement is reached?
...that since humidity and the cold climate inhibited its production in the Low Countries, salt was imported from Iberia in the Middle Ages?
...that Lord Uxbridge's leg became a tourist attraction after the Battle of Waterloo?
...that the indologist Ernest Bender also published work on the Cherokee language?
...that after the Champagne region, the Loire Valley produces more sparkling wine than any other region in France?

15:07, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

...that a schoolboy's work gives an insight into life at Thomas Rossell Potter's country school "The Hermitage" (pictured) in 19th century England?
...that James Blake Miller, made famous in a 2004 photograph during the Second Battle of Fallujah as the "Marlboro Marine", suffered post-traumatic stress disorder and was discharged exactly one year after his picture made worldwide news?
...that Lawrence Olson, who was awarded the Order of the Sacred Treasure, Japan's highest honour for foreigners, for his work on Japanese history, deciphered Japanese messages during World War II for the US Navy?
...that Alpha Kappa Alpha founder Nellie Pratt Russell is remembered with a building named in her and her husband's honor at St. Paul's College?
...that 1.5 million people logged on to the website of the cheddar cheese Wedginald to watch it mature?
...that Greek temples went from small structures of mud and wood (9th century BC) to the classical stone monuments widely known today (6th century BC)?
...that Calimerius, a 3rd century bishop of Milan, was said to have been killed by being thrown into a well after his relics were found submerged in water?

09:07, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

...that it was Napoleon Bonaparte who recalled Captain Bruix (pictured), after he was sacked for being a noble, to continue his distinguished naval career?
...that Seattle, Washington businessman Herman Sarkowsky was a co-founder of both the Seattle Seahawks and the Portland Trail Blazers?
...that Clyde Fastlink, a planned £42m dedicated bus service, is an interim measure for Glasgow's proposed light rail system?
...that the Gerald Loeb Award, administered by the UCLA Anderson School of Management, is considered the most prestigious honor in business journalism?
...that Michael Varah, son of Chad Varah, achieved an athletics world record as part of a 4×800m relay team, and then spent 35 years working in the Probation Service?
...that the establishment of Camp Joe Holt, the first significant act to keep Kentucky from fully seceding to the Confederate States of America, had to be done in Indiana?
...that Khanmohammad Ibrahim was the oldest living Indian Test cricketer at the time of his death?
...that the location of the first mass in the Philippines in 1521 remains a matter of dispute?

00:46, 18 November 2007 (UTC)

...that mercury(IV) fluoride (model pictured), the first mercury compound ever to have an oxidation state of 4, was synthesized at 4 degrees above absolute zero?
...that Zen Buddhist scholar Philip Yampolsky was the grandson of Franz Boas, the founder of Columbia University's anthropology department?
...that Ottomar Pinto has served three non-consecutive times as governor in the history of Roraima, Brazil?
...that Canada issues special licence plates available only to war veterans?
...that University of Michigan Wolverine Tyrone Wheatley was not only both a Big Ten rushing and scoring champion, but also a Big Ten 110 meter hurdles champion?
...that in 2002, an officer of the Wellington Free Ambulance was accidentally shot by police during an Armed Offenders Squad training exercise?
...that Alabama lawyer and Republican Party pioneer John Grenier of Birmingham was self-taught in four foreign languages: French, Spanish, German, and modern Greek?
...that Chen Chi-li, late head of Taiwan's United Bamboo Gang, claimed to have killed dissident journalist Henry Liu out of patriotism, and refused the $20,000 payout he was offered?

17 November 2007

18:46, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Princess Beatrice of the United Kingdom (pictured) was a devoted companion to her mother, Queen Victoria, for over forty years?
...that during the five years of fighting in the Cabanagem revolt in Brazil, it is estimated that the population of Pará was reduced from about 100,000 to 60,000?
...that Truong Dinh, who led a guerrilla army that fought French colonials in southern Vietnam against the orders of Emperor Tu Duc, was so effective that the French thought Tu Duc had supported him secretly?
...that Senator Bob Hagedorn introduced legislation to name John Denver's "Rocky Mountain High" Colorado's second official state song?
...that Donald Stone Macdonald was a Korean studies expert who served as mayor of Kwangju while a member of the US Department of State?
...that Isocrates developed a personal hatred for Chares of Athens after his closest pupil, General Timotheos, was impeached for refusing to fight in the Battle of Embata during a storm?
...that the South Australian wine industry produces more than half of all Australian wines, including the premium Penfolds Grange and many of the mass produced box wines?

12:44, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

1948 British Grand Prix

...that the 1948 British Grand Prix (pictured) was the first motor racing meeting ever held on the Silverstone Circuit, which until then had been an aerodrome?
...that University of Colorado football player Jordon Dizon, one of three finalists for the Dick Butkus Award as America's top collegiate linebacker, attended Waimea High School, the westernmost high school in the United States?
...that the Sinologist and Confucius expert Herrlee Glessner Creel was a lieutenant colonel in the US Army during World War II?
...that Australian Bob Marshall won the World Amateur Billiards Championship four times and the Australian championship 21 times in a career spanning 50 years?
...that in 1953, Polish Air Force pilot Franciszek Jarecki escaped to Denmark with a Soviet MiG-15, which helped the U.S. Air Force in the Korean War?
...that orange snow fell in February of 2007 in western Siberia?
...that Michael Garcia has introduced legislation to lower the legislative age of candidacy in Colorado from 25 to 21 after being himself elected at age 26?
...that Sir James Whitehead, 1st Baronet, Lord Mayor of London in 1888-9, replaced the circus-like elements of the Lord Mayor's Show with a State Procession, and was the arbitrator in the London Dock Strike of 1889?

03:49, 17 November 2007 (UTC)

...that most artists of the Tudor court produced works in many media, including miniatures, panel portraits (pictured), illuminated manuscripts, and decorative schemes for masques and tournaments?
...that sociologist Ralph Larkin published Comprehending Columbine after teaching about the Columbine High School massacre at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice?
...that the publishers of Hindustan Ghadar are said to have memorised the names of over a thousand of its subscribers to prevent these being known to British Intelligence?
...that Thai history scholar Benjamin Batson took up his field while posted in Bangkok as a university maths lecturer?
...that a replica of the Old Plantation Flats Light built in 2004 contains the first new lens constructed to Fresnel's patterns in eighty years?
...that there are three unilingually Swedish municipalities in one province of mainland Finland?
...that Felician of Foligno was the first ever bishop to receive the pallium as a symbol of his office?
...that the cost of transporting crushed stone often exceeds its cost at the quarry?

16 November 2007

21:48, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the use of speech scrolls (example pictured) developed independently in European and Mesoamerican art?
...that Irish actor Paudge Behan is the son of IRA Chief of Staff Cathal Goulding and Beatrice Behan, the widow of playwright Brendan Behan?
...that The O.C.'s music supervisor Alexandra Patsavas worked in the music department of over fifty Roger Corman B-movies before her television debut?
...that research into attitude polarization suggests that when people read research that both supports and contradicts their current views, they come to hold their original attitudes more strongly than before?
...that Cecil Hobbs began his interest in Southeast Asian history after his career as a missionary in Burma was ended in 1942 by the Japanese invasion?
...that in 1708 the Bonnington pavilion in Scotland had a "hall of mirrors" designed to give visitors the illusion that they were standing in the middle of the Corra Linn?
...that the parents of Anna Seidel, a German Sinologist and expert on Taoism, risked the death penalty by hiding a Jewish friend during World War II?

14:52, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Saint Mary of the Mongols (pictured) is the only Byzantine church in Constantinople to have remained Eastern Orthodox to this day?
...that the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue caused so many cancellations that Sports Illustrated and its publisher Time Warner had to stop delivery to certain subscribers, such as libraries?
...that the skink Chalcides colosii was once considered a subspecies of another species, Chalcides ocellatus (named for its ocelli), despite the fact that C. colosii has no ocelli?
...that Rear-Admiral Henry Blagrove, who died in the destruction of HMS Royal Oak in October 1939, was the first Royal Navy flag officer killed in the Second World War?
...that the Oliver Typewriter Company of Chicago, Illinois produced and sold over one million of the first "visible print" typewriters?
...that German lawyer Horst Mahler had for his own lawyer the future Chancellor of Germany Gerhard Schröder?
...that Oregon's longest covered bridge is the Office Bridge and is the only one west of the Mississippi River with a sidewalk?

08:46, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

...that U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt personally oversaw the design of the post office (pictured) in Poughkeepsie, New York?
...that though legend says the mid-way bend in Pittsburgh's Armstrong Tunnel was a mistake and that the engineer responsible killed himself in shame, the chief engineer, Vernon R. Covell, did not commit suicide?
...that the antibody class IgE was discovered by the Japanese scientist Kimishige Ishizaka?
...that after the death of Ukrainian novelist Mykhailo Kotsiubynsky, a museum was built in his hometown of Vinnytsia, films were made and his son was executed for having counter-revolutionary contacts?
...that Major Carl Mothander, the leader of Swedish volunteers in the Estonian War of Independence, later wrote books on Estonian politics that were banned in Finland?
...that world champion bridge player Paul Soloway earned the most masterpoints in history?
...that before becoming King of the United Kingdom, Edward VII was a frequent visitor to the luxurious Belle Époque brothel Le Chabanais in Paris and had himself built a special "love seat" there?

02:38, 16 November 2007 (UTC)

...that New York Journal cartoonist and illustrator Nell Brinkley created the "Brinkley Girl" (pictured), an iconic representation of independent working women popular in the early 20th century?
...that South Vietnamese Special Forces under Ngo Dinh Diem, which were used mainly for repressing dissidents, also attacked pagodas during the Buddhist crisis and killed a giant carp that had attracted pilgrims?
...that U.S. professor of oriental studies Earl H. Pritchard was the first ever recipient of the Distinguished Civilian Service Medal, in recognition of his work on military intelligence in World War II?
...that actuaries can use the Schuette–Nesbitt formula to calculate the net single premium for life annuities and life insurances?
...that the main cargo of the Peggy Stewart, burned in the 1774 Annapolis Tea Party, was not tea but 53 indentured servants?
...that former Swansea mayor Percy Morris called for Swansea Castle to be demolished and redeveloped because it was a "shambles"?
...that ANDRILL is a scientific drilling project in Antarctica to gather information about global warming over the last 65 million years?

15 November 2007

20:20, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

...that one T206 Honus Wagner baseball card (pictured) was sold for US$500,000 to Treat Entertainment and Wal-Mart in 1995 for use as the top prize in a promotional contest?
...that British submariner Arthur Hezlet torpedoed the heavy cruiser Ashigara, the largest Japanese warship sunk by the Royal Navy Submarine Service during the Second World War?
...that Trafalgar Square's original fountains were made from stone quarried near Boddam in Aberdeenshire?
...that the membership of the Ghanaian national labor federation Trades Union Congress fell by 58% after a law requiring civil servants to be members was repealed in 1966?
...that despite British Conservative MP Denis Keegan winning a marginal constituency by over 7,000 votes, he ended his political career after one term, preferring to work for the trade association for television shops?
...that turret deck ships incurred lower canal tolls because tonnage measurements used to calculate those tolls did not account for the vessels' unique shape?
...that Field Marshal Sir John Stanier was the first British Chief of the General Staff after the Second World War who had not seen active service?
...that knopper galls, caused by the eggs laid by gall wasps, develop as a chemically induced distortion of growing acorns on Pedunculate Oak trees?

13:19, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

...that aloin (pictured), a natural stimulant-laxative produced by the aloe plant, is no longer deemed safe and effective by the US FDA?
...that an operational nuclear reactor and an orbiting satellite are high points in 2007 of science and technology in Colombia?
...that strikebreakers are used more frequently in the US than in any other industrialized country?
...that adjoining the house where the Cato Street conspirators intended to kill all of the cabinet, was the home of Archbishop of York, Edward Harcourt, who was entertaining the Prince Regent and the Dukes of Cambridge, Cumberland and Wellington?
...that Bob Woodward has twice won the Worth Bingham Prize: in 1972 for reports on Watergate and in 1987 for covering covert action in United States foreign policy?
...that despite a history of identifying Communist intrigues, British Parliamentarian Percy Daines demanded that Marcus Lipton name his sources or withdraw the claim that Kim Philby was a Soviet spy?
...that one of the founders of modern Russian psychiatry, Pavel Jacobi, brother of the painter Valery Jacobi, participated in the January Uprising in Poland and volunteered in the Army of the Vosges led by Giuseppe Garibaldi?
...that Alexei Mikhailovich was the only Imperial Russian Grand Duke to bear the name and patronymic of a Tsar?

05:33, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the Flower class corvette HMS Bryony (pictured) was sunk before she could even be launched?
...that the coat of arms of Andalusia bears the Pillars of Hercules, the ancient name given to the promontories that flank the entrance to the Strait of Gibraltar?
...that, by joining the Democratic caucus in 2007, Rep. Debbie Stafford became the first Colorado state legislator to switch parties in two decades?
...that shortly after the Revolution of 1848, the socialist feminist Jeanne Deroin became the first woman to stand in a national election in France?
...that the Sanskrit literature scholar Barbara Stoler Miller, whose translation of the Bhagavad Gita helped to popularise Indian literature in the United States, also translated Spanish poetry?
...that, although sentenced to death during the Great Purge, Soviet politician Sergey Kavtaradze was set free and reinstated by Joseph Stalin, and was eventually his representative in Iran and Romania?
...that Mute Swans ring for lunch at the Bishop's Palace in Wells, UK?
...that Michael Rowntree was Chairman of Oxfam for six years, and is one of only two people ever to be elected as its Chair Emeritus?

14 November 2007

23:32, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the covering of the Senne River (construction pictured) created the major boulevards of Brussels?
...that synthetic analogues of camptothecin, a cytotoxic quinoline alkaloid isolated from the Chinese tree Camptotheca acuminata, are being used as anti-cancer drugs?
...that the Doric-style temple in Mote Park near Maidstone in Kent commemorates the review by George III and William Pitt the Younger of a militia formed to repel Napoleon?
...that the British motor tanker SS Atheltempler, part of Convoy PQ-18 to aid the Soviet Union in the war against Nazi Germany, was sunk north of Bear Island?
...that Alan Entwistle, a leading Hindi language scholar, continued researching for ten years despite a terminal brain tumour?
...that The Big Blowdown, a crime novel by American author George Pelecanos, was the recipient of the International Crime Novel of the Year award in France, Germany and Japan?
...that the Nurses and Midwives Tribunal of New South Wales can order the suspension or removal of a nurse or midwife from practice?
...that when immature, the "death angel" fungus, Amanita ocreata, closely resembles an edible mushroom?

15:48, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the seventh century hermit Goar of Aquitaine (pictured) is said to have suspended his cloak on a beam of sunlight?
...that the sweating mushroom is called so from the symptoms of its poisoning?
...that Charles Hucker, a leading historian on Imperial China, was awarded the Bronze Star in World War II and wrote plays?
...that the Pasig River reverses its flow of water from Manila Bay to Laguna de Bay when there is a high tide during the dry season?
...that when Barry Cohen sued under the Hyde Amendment, the U.S. Government was forced to pay a record-setting $2.9 million in legal fees for the "vexatious, frivolous" prosecution of his client?
...that tariffs imposed by the Austrian Empire on the export of Piedmontese wines to Austrian controlled areas of Italy was one of the underlying sparks of the revolutions of 1848–1849?
...that J. L. Wilkinson was named the manager of the All Nations professional baseball team after the previous manager absconded with the gate proceeds?
...that Rajo Jack, one of the first African-American racecar drivers, pretended to be Portuguese to avoid racism?
...that when analyzing relationships of the harvestmen it is found that they are not true spiders, as often believed, but are in fact more closely related to scorpions?

05:11, 14 November 2007 (UTC)

...that although flowers of the deciduous tree Tilia tomentosa (pictured) are pollinated by honeybees, the nectar is somewhat toxic to bumblebees?
...that the German scientist Günter Wirths was brought to the Soviet Union after World War II, where he later was awarded a Stalin Prize for his contribution to the Soviet atomic bomb project?
...that Sisnando Davides, a Mozarab who had previously served Abbadid Seville, was the first Christian governor of Coimbra and Toledo after their reconquest?
...that Florida attorney Ellis Rubin claimed his client was driven to nymphomania by the side-effects of Prozac?
...that Ramon Zamora, the Filipino film actor popularly dubbed the "Bruce Lee of the Philippines," won an award imitating Adolf Hitler on the gag show Super Laff-In?
...that the history of sherry has been greatly influenced by many of the world's major empires and civilizations including the Phoenicians, Greeks, Romans, Moors, Spanish and English?
...that Lauriston Sharp, a professor of anthropology at Cornell University, studied the indigenous culture of four continents?
...that Gal, Bishop of Clermont was known to be so even-tempered that once a man who had insulted him repented on the spot and threw himself at his feet?
...that the British composer William Denis Browne chose the grave site on Skyros for his friend, poet Rupert Brooke, just months before he himself was killed in the Gallipoli campaign of World War I?

13 November 2007

23:01, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the brightly coloured shells of the Liguus snails (pictured) are so prized by collectors that some varieties are now extinct?
...that in 2007, Phil Collins' 1981 hit "In the Air Tonight" reached Number 13 in the UK Singles Chart after appearing in Cadbury's Gorilla advertising campaign?
...that after Anthony Kemp returned to England where he was questioned about his involvement in the overthrow of William Bligh as Governor of New South Wales, he again went south and became known as the "father of Tasmania"?
...that Bonawentura Niemojowski, a Polish politician during the Congress Poland period, became one of the most vocal supporters of the November Uprising against the Russian Empire and a leader of the revolutionary Polish government?
...that Wendy Kaminer's critique of the self-help movement, I'm Dysfunctional, You're Dysfunctional, was highlighted among The New York Times' "Notable Books of the Year 1992"?
...that Peire d'Alvernhe is the only troubadour in whose works appear the Occitan phrase for "courtly love"?
...that Gerard of Lunel became widely venerated after it was reported snakes carried bread to him and his brother while they were trapped by a flood in a cave?

15:34, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

...that 4,400 year old dugout canoes have been found at the bottom of Lake Phelps in Pettigrew State Park (pictured), a North Carolina state park named for J. Johnston Pettigrew, a hero of the Battle of Gettysburg?
...that Anglican clergyman Chad Varah founded the Samaritans, the world's first crisis hotline, in 1953, at a time when he was also writing for the Eagle comic?
...that famous tenor Antonio Giuglini used to jaywalk through traffic on London's Brompton Road while flying his kite?
...that Julia Evangeline Brooks, an incorporator of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, was a dean of girls at Danbury High School?
...that Sir Rowland Whitehead, 5th Baronet was a Briton born in Kenya, a banker engaged with charities, a hyperpolyglot who wrote about cybernetics, and a church warden who skydived?
...that the civil rights of Panama's Chinese minority, today the largest in Central America, were curtailed from 1903 until they received full citizenship under the constitution passed in 1946?
...that despite having only $300,000 to the incumbent's $4 million in campaign funds, Greg Ballard won the 2007 mayoral election in Indianapolis, one of the biggest electoral upsets in Indiana history?

03:03, 13 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the British Hawkins-class heavy cruiser HMS Frobisher (pictured) in 1944 was involved in Operation Neptune as a member of Gunfire Bombardment Support Force D allocated to Sword Beach in the D-Day landings?
...that Jerrold Wexler helped save a transaction to purchase the Denver Nuggets, helped save Goldblatt's from bankruptcy and led the Drake Hotel to a National Register of Historic Places listing?
...that Serhii Vasylkivsky was the first painter after Taras Shevchenko to draw upon Ukrainian historical and ethnographic themes?
...that 1992 was the only year the American Society of Journalists and Authors presented the Conscience-in-Media Award to more than one journalist?
...that the McGhee Center for Eastern Mediterranean Studies in Alanya is run by Georgetown University as the only independent study program in Turkey?
...that Alpha Kappa Alpha founder Sarah Meriweather Nutter visited Grover Cleveland's grave, and cut a portion of ivy to plant at Howard University?
...that global warming has had a positive effect on the Tasmanian wine industry allowing it to grow grapes more successfully than what would otherwise be possible?

12 November 2007

20:54, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the Saint Paul City Hall and Ramsey County Courthouse (pictured) is an Art Deco skyscraper adorned with artwork by Lee Lawrie, Carl Milles, John W. Norton, and Albert Stewart?
...that Ève Curie did not receive a Nobel Prize, unlike her parents Marie and Pierre, her sister Irène, and, on behalf of UNICEF, her husband Henry Richardson Labouisse, Jr.?
...that Bangalore Gayana Samaja, which celebrated its centenary in 2005, is one of the oldest cultural organisations in Bangalore?
...that Gerald Long, an incoming Republican member of the Louisiana State Senate, is believed to be the only Long family member to have held significant public office in Louisiana outside the Democratic Party?
...that after Robert de Ferrers, the 6th Earl of Derby was pardoned for his part in a civil war against King Edward I, he rebelled again?
...that the veneration of Saints Felinus and Gratian, which has a weak historical foundation, has been alleged to have been created to further the interests of Perugia?
...that Susan Hadden, an Internet affairs advisor to Al Gore, was killed by bandits while visiting Angkor Wat?
...that wine from the Greek island of Chios, prized in both classical Greece and ancient Rome, was according to mythology the first red wine?

14:44, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the Raphael Cartoons (example pictured), tapestry designs from 1515 which are among the most influential works of Renaissance art, remained torn into strips for 175 years?
...that Gun Hill Road in the Bronx was proposed to become the Gun Hill Crosstown Expressway?
...that Ethel Jones Mowbray was a founder of the first African-American sorority, Alpha Kappa Alpha?
...that Carlos Eugénio Correia da Silva, Count of Paço d'Arcos served as the governor of various colonies as far as India, Timor, Macao and Mozambique in the Portuguese Empire?
...that "Professor Dull is anything but", referring to the historian of Han China Jack Dull, was a conventional joke on the campus of the University of Washington?
...that although it was destroyed by the Jordanian Arab Legion in the 1948 War, the moshav Atarot is now the site of Jerusalem's largest industrial park?
...that the militants of the Viet Nam Quoc Dan Dang were given training in Yunnan in China by the Kuomintang, but then went on to engage in robbery on KMT territory?
...that Jerome Avenue is one of three streets in the Bronx with a whole subway line following it?

05:25, 12 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the Pterodactyl Ascender (pictured) has been one of the most influential designs in ultralight aviation?
...that East 233rd Street was part of the former New York State Route 22?
...that the assassination of Bazin, a French labor recruiter in Vietnam, was the first attack by the revolutionary Viet Nam Quoc Dan Dang?
...that in 1882 impresario Alfred Schulz-Curtius organized the first performance ever in the UK of Wagner's's epic operatic Ring Cycle?
...that the famous Roman "first growth" wine Falernian was made from the Aglianico grape which is still being used to make wine today?
...that King Richard I of England was killed while beseiging the small castle of Château de Chalus-Chabrol, which was under the control of Aimar V of Limoges?
...that British cricketer Michael Spurway was thought to be the oldest surviving county cricket player at the time of his death, and the last living person to have played county cricket in the 1920s?
...that when Mark DeSantis lost the 2007 Pittsburgh mayoral election to Luke Ravenstahl by thirty percentage points, it was the best performance by a Republican Party candidate in Pittsburgh in over thirty years?

11 November 2007

23:24, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Richard Brinsley Sheridan's comedy The School for Scandal (1781 performance pictured) has been widely admired, but also criticized for hints of anti-Semitism, particularly regarding its references to Jewish moneylenders?
...that actress Ethel Jackson remarried with the lawyer who had obtained her divorce the same month?
...that Don Durdan was selected as the most valuable player of college football's Rose Bowl in 1942, and six years later, won a professional basketball championship with the Portland Indians?
...that Flemish Baroque painting (1585–1700) saw many pieces created as collaborations between independent masters, such as Rubens with Jan Brueghel the Elder and Frans Snyders?
...that science historians have done so much work related to Charles Darwin that this area of research is often called the Darwin Industry?
...that there are over 90 mash-ups of the Kersal Massive's demo song?
...that the expressions 'top dog' and 'underdog' may originate with the two sawyers in a saw pit?

16:16, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Manuela Beltrán (monument pictured) was a Colombian woman who organized a peasant revolt against excessive taxation in 1780?
...that in 2003, thousands of dead cod mysteriously washed up on the shores of Smith Sound, Trinity Bay, Newfoundland and Labrador with their internal organs frozen solid?
...that the firm formed by John Brogden to build Manchester Victoria station and various railroads to the rapidly expanding Manchester in mid-19th century began as a contractor to undertake the sweeping, cleansing and watering of the city?
...that Les Parrott, a professor of clinical psychology, a motivational speaker, and a Nazarene minister, co-created, along with his wife, the eHarmony Marriage program?
...that the resort town Arniston, Western Cape near Cape Agulhas, the southern-most tip of Africa, was named after Arniston, an East Indiaman that shipwrecked in the vicinity in 1815?
...that Saint Terence was proclaimed the patron saint of Pesaro for appearing in times of crisis, lifting a siege of the Italian town by French troops?

00:49, 11 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the obelisk in Rome's Piazza Montecitorio (pictured) was erected in 10 BC as a giant sundial gnomon, but stopped keeping accurate time within 30 years?
...that the car combat video game Grudge Warriors was the first PlayStation title by Take-Two Interactive not requiring payment of a licensing fee to Sony?
...that the All-American Wistert brothers Albert, Alvin and Whitey wore number 11 and played offensive tackle as University of Michigan Wolverines before being named to the College Football Hall of Fame?
...that the half-brother of William the Conqueror, Bishop Odo of Bayeux, was successfully tried for defrauding the Archbishop of Canterbury of church property a decade after the Norman Conquest of England?
...that U.S. soldiers considered the silver chevrons awarded for non-combat service in World War I a badge of shame?
...that despite $170m spent on security, Australian comedy group The Chaser managed to enter the restricted zone of the 2007 APEC Summit in a fake motorcade?

10 November 2007

15:36, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Bechor-Shalom Sheetrit (pictured) was the only signatory of the Israeli declaration of independence to have been born in the Land of Israel?
...that in 1982, Maurice Couve de Murville was plucked from obscurity as the Roman Catholic chaplain at Cambridge University to become the seventh Archbishop of Birmingham?
...that the PowerShot TX1 by Canon is their first attempt at a hybrid digital camera that offers both advanced ultra zoom photography and advanced HDTV movie capture?
...that in 2007, Arlene Holt Baker became the first African American AFL-CIO officer?
...that Monosolenium tenerum is a species of weed that is threatened with habitat loss in Japan?
...that Lucas Horenbout was "King's Painter" to King Henry VIII and the founder of the English tradition of the portrait miniature, painting Henry and several of his wives?
...that Agatha Christie's longest book was her autobiography?
...that on November 3 2007, Navy beat Notre Dame after losing for 43 consecutive years, ending college football's longest bilateral streak?

07:37, 10 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the orca Springer (pictured) is the only whale in history to have been successfully re-integrated into a wild pod after human intervention?
...that the leader of the Tran Cao rebellion, a peasant revolt against the Le Dynasty in Vietnam in 1516, claimed to be a reincarnation of the Hindu deity Indra?
...that the White House has an official position called Chief Floral Designer?
...that despite being made from the same grape variety and less than 10 miles apart, the Barbaresco and the Barolo are two distinctly different Italian wines?
...that cricket writer Gerald Howat won the Cricket Society's golden jubilee award for his biography of Learie Constantine?
...that on June 14, 1835, USRC Ingham became the first United States warship to engage a Mexican ship in combat?
...that nobody knows the meaning of "Delmo", the subtitle given by Rachmaninoff to his 1899 composition Morceau de Fantaisie in G minor?
...that millionaire's daughter Rose Dugdale joined an IRA active service unit and took part in the first helicopter bombing raid on the British Isles in 1974?

9 November 2007

23:07, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the odds of Sir John Eardley Wilmot (pictured), an eminent judge, also having a eminent grandson were calculated in Galton's book Hereditary Genius as 30 to 1 against?
...that the famous quote "No man who hates dogs and children can be all bad" generally attributed to Leo Rosten was actually first used in 1930 by future war correspondent Byron Darnton?
...that the most famous archeological finding of Bronze and Iron Age Poland is the Biskupin fortified lake settlement?
...that the Port of Geelong, located on the shores of Corio Bay in Geelong, Victoria, Australia, is the sixth largest in Australia by tonnage?
...that Security Advisory Opinions, which can take more than 120 days to resolve, are the source of long delays in issuing United States visas?
...that Singaporean Teresa Hsu, a 110-year old social worker who teaches yoga and selfless service to the needy, was named 'Hero for Today' by the Chinese edition of the Reader's Digest?

12:24, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Jan Czerski (pictured), exiled to Siberia after the January Uprising, became a self-taught scientist and Siberian explorer, thrice decorated with the gold medal by the Russian Geographical Society?
...that Tui bei tu, a banned 7th century prophecy book about China which has been compared to the work of Nostradamus, became a bestseller in the 1990s?
...that the Palestinian Fedayeen campaign against Israel was one of the causes of the 1956 Suez Crisis?
...that the Reverend Sir Frederick Ouseley founded his £30,000 1856 church near the small village of Middleton on the Hill?
...that during the 1991 NFL season, Cris Dishman had a seven game stretch where he forced at least one turnover in each game?
...that the Stillwell Avenue/Surf Avenue intersection in New York City is the site of the world's largest subway station?
...that a lift attached to the side of the viaduct at Calstock railway station was used to lower railway trucks to the quays on the River Tamar 113 feet below?

06:00, 9 November 2007 (UTC)

...that during the process of maceration (pictured) the clear-grayish color of grape juice gets its red wine coloring?
...that according to the book The World Without Us radioactive waste, bronze statues, and Mount Rushmore will be the longest lasting evidence of human presence on Earth?
...that 10TP was a Polish tank design, which advanced the Polish armor programme but came too late to provide the Polish Army with tanks of sufficient number and quality before the German invasion of Poland in 1939?
...that Marrack Goulding, a former Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations, was Warden of St Antony's College, Oxford from 1997 to 2006?
...that Cornelius, Oregon is named after pioneer Thomas R. Cornelius, who served in the both the Territorial and State legislatures?
...that the Ferranti Argus was developed to control the Bristol Bloodhound missile, but went on to be Ferranti's most successful industrial control computer?
...that Thai filmmaker Aditya Assarat writes his scripts in English and then translates them to the Thai language?

8 November 2007

23:38, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

...that chryselephantine sculptures (fragments pictured) were monumental statues made of gold and ivory that depicted the gods in Ancient Greek temples?
...that Bolivia-Chile relations have been strained due to a border dispute unresolved since the 19th century?
...that the transport ship USNS General Hoyt S. Vandenberg is scheduled to be sunk in 2008 to form an artificial reef off the Florida Keys?
...that there is no statutory body in India to investigate academic misconducts such as scientific plagiarism?
...that Acme Tackle Company's Little Cleo fishing lure was deemed by Field & Stream Magazine to be one of the 50 greatest lures of all time?
...that IKB Deutsche Industriebank was the first European bank to announce substantial losses from the U.S. subprime mortgage crisis?
...that the 13th century Venetian troubadour Bertolome Zorzi composed songs while a prisoner of war for seven years in Genoa?
...that Marcela de Agoncillo, who made the first Philippine flag, was married to the first Filipino diplomat?

16:22, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the Fayum mummy portraits (pictured) are detailed paintings of individuals from 1st to 3rd century CE Egypt, representing a rare survival of ancient Graeco-Roman painting?
...the Provisional IRA attack on Derryard checkpoint was carried out by a flying column of volunteers, created in an attempt to avoid infiltration by informers?
...that the Bushy-tailed Woodrat is the original "pack rat" due to its strong affinity for shiny objects such as coins and spoons?
...that French conductor Louis Antoine Jullien received thirty-six given names at his baptism?
...that the harvesting of wine grapes can happen every month of the calendar year somewhere in the world?
...that Horace King was the architect of dozens of bridges in the Southern United States in the 1800s, despite being a slave?
...that the Swiss Federal Police in 2005 noted a slight increase of far-right extremist activism, rising by some 100 to 1,800 involved individuals (0.02% of the total population)?
...that Kirsten Sheridan, director of the new movie August Rush, got her start in film portraying the younger sister of Irish artist Christy Brown (Daniel Day-Lewis) in her father Jim Sheridan's 1989 film, My Left Foot?
...that Air Chief Marshal Sir Charles Burnett was born in the United States to a Scottish father, educated in England and eventually became the Australian Chief of the Air Staff?

07:30, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Matthew Vassar's Springside estate (pictured), Andrew Jackson Downing's only extant work, has been a proposed site for a cemetery, high school and condominiums?
...that the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis began in the home of Harriet G. Walker and her husband T. B. Walker?
...that Lord Michael Fitzalan-Howard and his seven siblings all had first names beginning with the letter "M"?
...that China supported the Zimbabwe African National Union's fight against British rule in the country and recognized it right from independence day on April 18, 1980?
...that the history of Rioja wine has been greatly influenced by the Bordeaux wine industry with many Riojan bodegas benefiting from the influx of Bordeaux winemakers into the region following the phylloxera epidemic of the 1860s?
...that visitors to the House of the Binns in Scotland can see the table where General Tam Dayell is supposed to have played cards with Satan?
...that Elijah White's only two children drowned in separate instances in Oregon Country during 1838?
...that the principles of learning pioneered by Edward Thorndike nearly a century ago are still widely used in practical instruction?
...that rabbi Balfour Brickner was selected as one of the 50 sexiest New Yorkers at age 77?
...that Australian rock band Small Mercies first encountered their producer, Matt Wallace, when he left a message on their MySpace?

01:30, 8 November 2007 (UTC)

...that when the Texan schooner Austin (pictured) led the brig Wharton and several Yucatecan ships to victory over a Mexican fleet in the Battle of Campeche in 1843, it was the only time that steam-driven warships were defeated by sailing ships?
...that although the first specimen of the smallmouth scad, a tropical fish endemic to northern Australia, was already taken in 1984 and deposited in the Queensland Museum, it was not officially named till 1987?
...that when English composer Sir Edward Elgar died in 1934, he left more than 130 pages of sketches for a third symphony?
...that in Sell v. United States, the Supreme Court decided a dentist was unconstitutionally jailed for eight years without trial for refusing to be medicated with psychiatric drugs?
...that Julian Howard Ashton, a prominent figure of media and art in Britain and Australia in the 19th and 20th century, won the Sydney sesquicentenary prize for landscape drawings for his art work?
...that the Nachtigall Battalion of the German army consisting of Ukrainian volunteers actively participated in the murder of around 4,000 Jews of Lviv in July 1941?
...that Buganda, the largest of the traditional kingdoms in present-day Uganda, maintained a fleet of large outrigger canoes, which allowed commandos to raid any shore on Lake Victoria?

7 November 2007

19:23, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the Great French Wine Blight, caused by the deadly phylloxera (cartoon pictured), destroyed over 40% of France's vineyards in the mid-19th century?
...that measuring the oxidizable carbon ratio is a way to determine the age of charcoal samples up to 35,000 years old?
...that the Pitsa panels from 530 BCE are the only surviving examples of ancient Greek panel painting, the most important art style of Ancient Greek art?
...that Billy the pygmy hippo was the pet of U.S. President Calvin Coolidge, outlived him by 23 years, and sired 18 children all named Gumdrop?
...that Canada was the first Western country to recognize Ukraine's independence in 1991?
...that in 1918, the National Federation of Federal Employees became the first labor union in the United States to win the legal right to represent federal employees?
...that Apaliunas, a Luwian deity of Wilusa (Troy) attested among gods in a treaty inscription, ca. 1280 BCE, is a likely precursor of Apollo of Greek mythology?
...that the Apocalypse of Zerubbabel is a seventh-century Hebrew apocalypse in which the angel Metatron revealed to Zerubbabel that the Messiah would appear in 1058?

12:16, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the Joseph Priestley House (pictured) in Northumberland, Pennsylvania was the site of the first and only laboratory Priestley designed, built and outfitted himself, as well as several American Chemical Society celebrations?
...that Scouting in displaced persons camps was very active during and after World War II and that Scout groups provided postal delivery in Displaced Persons camps?
...that vaudeville performer Birdie Reeve was billed as the "World's Fastest Typist" in the 1920s, typing 200 words a minute using just two fingers of each hand?
...that Slovak collaborationist Ferdinand Durčanský was both dismissed by the Nazis as pro-Jewish and later condemned to death for complicity in the murder of Jews?
...that Simon Sainsbury, who had given funds to establish the Judge Business School in the old Addenbrooke Hospital in Cambridge, also gave paintings worth £100 million to the Tate and National Gallery?
...that the Fightmaster Cup is the first and only international golfing tournament for one-handers?
...that runemaster Ulf of Borresta was a successful Viking who returned from England thrice with a share of the Danegeld?

05:38, 7 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the irises of Saint Gaugericus Island became a symbol of Brussels, and the iris is now on the flag of the Brussels-Capital Region (pictured)?
...that Series III of the Sri Lanka Navy's Ultra Fast Attack Craft is the fastest of its class of patrol boats in the South Asian region, with a maximum speed of 53 knots?
...that in 2006, only 79% of the population in Peru had access to electricity, well below the 94.6% average for Latin America?
...that the Knightly Order of Vitéz, formed by Miklós Horthy, the Regent of Hungary, for distinguished World War I veterans, was originally established by Imre Thököly, Prince of Transylvania, during an anti-Habsburg uprising in the late 17th century?
...that a small silicon disc containing goodwill messages from 73 countries was left on the Moon by the Apollo 11 astronauts?
...that for his part in the Bangladesh Liberation War, Dutch Australian commando officer William Ouderland is the only foreign recipient of Bir Pratik, Bangladesh's fourth highest gallantry award?
...that the Þingalið was a standing army of 3,000 elite Viking warriors, whose main purpose was to defend England against other Vikings?
...that the Berlin Committee was formed during World War I by Indian nationalists to foment a revolution against the British Raj?

6 November 2007

23:33, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

...that "Professor" Jerry Thomas (pictured), who wrote the first book of cocktail recipes in the United States in 1862, at one time earned more than the Vice President of the United States?
...that the Catholic Church denied the German-Nicaraguan Enrique Gottel burial in a Managua cemetery because he was a Freemason?
...that Excello Records did not release south Louisiana black Creole musician King Karl's 1958 rock and roll ballad "This Should Go On Forever" until it had already become a national hit for Karl's hometown friend, Cajun swamp pop musician Rod Bernard?
...that NHS Together, a group of unions which support Britain's National Health Service, are supported by celebrities such as football (soccer) player Geoff Hurst, adventurer Ranulph Fiennes, actress Tamsin Greig and comedian Arthur Smith?
...that the highly toxic all-white toadstool Amanita virosa, one of several species known as the destroying angel, can be confused with the common mushroom when young?

13:25, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

...that despite losing almost one third of their men in the Battle of Osuchy (reenactment pictured), Polish resistance in the Zamość region successfully engaged Germans during the nationwide Operation Tempest only a month later?
...that milestone home runs by Barry Bonds have caused crowd mêlées, necessitating police escorts, and that special baseballs were issued to avoid counterfeiting?
...that the Texan schooner Zavala was the first steamship-of-war in North America?
...that the Gothic king Radagaisus abandoned his forces and tried escaping after a counterattack by the Roman army in 406?
...that Rev William Cotton, vicar of Frodsham, Cheshire, introduced the skills of beekeeping to New Zealand in the 1840s?
...that your biological chronotype characterizes your morningness or eveningness?
...that Singapore’s Sungei Road, formerly a place designated for affluent Europeans and Asians, is now the largest and oldest flea market better known as the Thieves' Market?
...that at 24, Wilfred Arthur was the youngest Group Captain in the history of the Royal Australian Air Force?

02:23, 6 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the Lesser Antillean Iguana (pictured) uses a nasal salt gland to rid its body of excess potassium from its herbivorous diet?
...that the slang term brass razoo is speculated to have originated from Egyptian or Indian currency?
...that the fight scene between Peter Griffin and a giant chicken on Family Guy episode "Blind Ambition" was originally created for the episode "The Cleveland–Loretta Quagmire"?
...that conservative radio talk show host Moon Griffon, who broadcasts statewide from Monroe, is sometimes known as the Rush Limbaugh of Louisiana?
...that the Raichur Thermal Power Station is the first thermal power plant to be set up in the Indian state of Karnataka and accounts for about 40% of the total power generated in the state?
...that tradition states Severus of Barcelona was given the position of Bishop of Barcelona because a pigeon landed on his head?
...that Siniloan River in the Philippines is known by tourists for its five waterfalls and clear and easily accessible headwaters?
...that the Valle d'Aosta DOC in the Alps of northwestern Italy is home to the highest elevated vineyards in all of Europe?

5 November 2007

19:42, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the Japanese-backed Empire of Vietnam (flag pictured) of Tran Trong Kim reunified the country in 1945 for the first time since French colonisation?
...that businessman Peter Bynoe oversaw the development of New Comiskey Park, which was instrumental in keeping the Chicago White Sox from leaving the city?
...that the Visigothic Reccopolis, founded in Hispania in 578 by King Leovigild, and lost until 1944, was one of only two new cities founded in Western Europe between the 5th and 9th centuries?
...that Lavinia Fisher is widely recognised as the first female serial killer in the United States of America?
...that the Articulating Propulsion System with thrust vectoring control allows the Super Dvora Mk III to function in shallow waters at drafts of 1.2 meters?
...that the series of unconventional aircraft designed by Jonathan Edward Caldwell may be responsible for reported sightings of flying saucers in the United States throughout the 1950s and 60s?
...that upon completion, the thirteen-volume History of Lithuania will be the largest and the most comprehensive academic publication covering Lithuania’s history ever released?

12:33, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

...that there is more variation in the design of direction signs (example pictured) internationally than in any other class of road sign?
...that in 2007, the Trinity Tigers threw 15 backward passes in 62 seconds to defeat the Millsaps Majors with the longest play in college football history?
...that the Jami al-Tawarikh, a work of Persian literature by Rashid al-Din, was initially commissioned to document the history of the Mongols, but later expanded to cover the history of the entire world as known to Persians from the time of Adam to the 14th century?
...that some U.S. commercial airliners are now being equipped with the Northrop Grumman Guardian anti-missile system to counter terrorist attacks with shoulder-launched missiles?
...that during the Peninsular War, French forces in Extremadura led by Marshal Édouard Mortier took barely an hour to kill 1,000 Spanish soldiers and take 4,000 prisoners in winning the Battle of the Gebora?
...that Praejectus, Bishop of Clermont, was assassinated for his supposed involvement in the earlier death of a lord of Marseilles?
...that Batesian and Müllerian mimicry provided early evidence for the theory of evolution put forward by Charles Darwin and Alfred Russel Wallace?

06:14, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

...that French poet Ronsard correctly predicted that Tuileries Palace, one of the many building projects of Catherine de' Medici (pictured), would be deserted within a hundred years?
...that water absorption is responsible for most of the incoming sunlight and outgoing thermal radiation absorbed by the Earth's atmosphere?
...that the police officer who illegally shot Nathaniel Levi Gaines in 1996 became the third officer from the New York City Police Department to be sentenced for committing a crime while on active duty?
...that Khoo Kheng-Hor, a Malaysian author, was appointed as honorary Assistant Superintendent of Police in Singapore, in recognition for his contemporary application of Sun Tzu's Art of War?
...that David Letterman parodied Werner Erhard in the 1978 Mork & Mindy episode Mork Goes Erk?
...that the American Ceylon Mission founded Asia's first all girls boarding school in 1824, in Sri Lanka?
...that Juan Bautista Villalpando proposed that the classical orders were derived originally from Solomon's Temple, not from ancient Greek architecture as Vitruvius had written?

00:46, 5 November 2007 (UTC)
...that Howard Greer designed costumes for the Katharine Hepburn films Christopher Strong and Bringing Up Baby?

00:17, 5 November 2007 (UTC)

...that California's 2007 Santiago Fire (pictured) was started deliberately?
...that Andrew Michael Dasburg's three "daringly experimental" Cubist pieces at the 1913 Armory Show introduced many Americans to modern art?
...that the Lwów dialect was one of the first dialects of the Polish language to be properly classified?
...that the human mouth is colonized by bacteroides and spirochetes around puberty?
...that Judge Henry Stump of Baltimore's circuit court was the only jurist in the history of Maryland to be removed from the bench by the Maryland General Assembly?
...that BBC journalist Leonard Miall worked on psychological warfare in New York and San Francisco with the Political Warfare Executive during World War II?
...that granular cheese is produced by repeatedly stirring and draining a mixture of curds and whey?

4 November 2007

17:01, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the monastery of Nea Moni on the island of Chios, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, contains some of the finest surviving mosaics (example pictured) from the Macedonian Renaissance?
...that Prema Karanth is the first woman to direct a Kannada film?
...that the astronomical observatory at the Amundsen-Scott South Pole Station in Antarctica is named after physicist Martin A. Pomerantz?
...that a T-54 tank of the Polish Army killed seven children watching on the sidewalk during a military parade in Szczecin in 1962?
...that Shaukat Usmani was a candidate for the Communist Party of Great Britain in the 1929 UK general election while imprisoned in India?
...that Node Magazine, a hypertext version of William Gibson's Spook Country, is a fictional magazine named after a fictional magazine in the novel?

10:53, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Abdulameer Yousef Habeeb (pictured) was jailed for his failure to submit to a U.S. Special Registration program from which he was supposed to be exempt?
...that the First International Syndicalist Congress in 1913 was compared to "Hamlet without the Prince of Denmark" because the world's largest syndicalist organization was absent?
...that Sir John Port, patron of Oxford University, was involved in the trials of two saints and a Queen?
...that though it started as a block party in 1975, Capital Pride in Washington, D.C., is now the fourth-largest gay pride parade and festival in the United States?
...that William Couper is considered one of the first prominent entomologists in Canada?
...that Shoyna, on a peninsula of Russia's Nenets Autonomous Okrug, is more than half buried by sand dunes caused by permafrost and trawling?
...that the foundation of the largest dam in Iraq is subject to so much erosion that the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has warned about the risk of a collapse that would kill up to 500,000 people?
...that BBC cameraman Charles de Jaeger got the idea for the Panorama April Fools report on the Swiss spaghetti harvest from a phrase used by one of his school teachers in Vienna?

00:55, 4 November 2007 (UTC)

...that fossil Thelodont fish (depiction pictured) surprised scientists by showing that stomachs evolved before jaws?
...that the Treaty of Reichenbach signaled both Prussia's first retreat from the policies of Frederick the Great, as well as the beginning of its decline?
...that an explanation for the derivation of Aughanduff, a townland in Armagh, is that it means ford of the ox or Áth an Daimh in Irish?
...that Song Hye-rang is a North Korean defector who looked after Kim Jong-nam, the child of North Korean leader Kim Jong-il?
...that the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Beard v. Banks that it is not unconstitutional to deny newspapers to violent prison inmates, who can use them to start fires and make weapons?
...that the Australian lamington cake is believed to have been named after Charles Cochrane-Baillie, 2nd Baron Lamington, the then-Governor of Queensland?
...that during the Lithuanian press ban from 1864 to 1904, it was illegal in Lithuania to print, import, distribute, or possess any publications that were written in the Lithuanian language using the Latin alphabet?
...that Chef Morou Ouattara opened his own restaurant after he lost his job as Signatures Restaurant's executive chef in the fallout of the Jack Abramoff scandals?
...that RAOC officer George Styles was awarded the George Cross in 1972 for defusing booby-trapped bombs planted by terrorists in Northern Ireland, including two bombs left at the Europa Hotel in Belfast within a matter of days?

3 November 2007

18:21, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Joshua Jebb designed equipment for siege warfare and famous prisons like Pentonville (pictured), Mountjoy and Broadmoor?
...that the programmable metallization cell is one of many contenders aiming to become a Flash RAM replacement?
...that in the year 2004, both the Tamil and Telugu language versions of the Kannada novel Parva won the Sahitya Akademi of India's translation award?
...that a church was built in memory of Parkin Jeffcock who led a rescue during the Oaks colliery explosions which killed over 350?
...that the paddle-wheel cyclogyro aircraft design refuses to die after almost a century of failed attempts to build one?
...that Powderfinger's "Living Type" was about Charles Manson's cult victims, not about love or menstruation as had been speculated by some lyrical analysts?
...that Luzerne County Commissioner, former professional athlete and University of Michigan Wolverine offensive lineman, Greg Skrepenak, was inducted into the Pennsylvania State Sports Hall of Fame?
...that Edward Abbott was the first judge to sit in a permanent civil court in the Australian State of Tasmania?

11:59, 3 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the 74181 chip (pictured) greatly simplified the development and manufacture of computers during the late 1960s and 1970s?
...that Bartolomé Calvo became President of the Granadine Confederation after his predecessor's term ended and no new president had been elected?
...that during the Italian War of 1542–1546, the population of Toulon, France was expelled to make room for an Ottoman naval base?
...that Olegarius, Archbishop of Tarragona, became a canon priest when he was only ten years old?
...that John Phillips was one of the first judges appointed to the Victorian Court of Appeal and that his nickname was "Equity Jack"?
...that an aircraft which misses the arrestor cables on an aircraft carrier and needs to accelerate away is referred to as a bolter?
...that the exploits of the 6th century Roman general John Troglita are the subject of one of the last epic poems of Antiquity, the Iohannis by Flavius Cresconius Corippus?

2 November 2007

18:40, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Gladstone's Land (pictured) is a restored six-storey-high tenement building, built in 1550, and situated on Edinburgh's Royal Mile?
...that Julia Ward Howe, author of "The Battle Hymn of the Republic" and champion of emancipation and women's suffrage, was also a founder of the Women's Rest Tour Association of Boston?
...that Michael Jordan's Restaurant in Chicago received as many as 7,000 telephone calls per day during its first few months of operation?
...that Hare Field was the first all-weather high school football field in Oregon?
...that founder Beulah Burke organized and was the first regional director of Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, Incorporated's Midwestern region?
...that Sardarji jokes are the most popular ethnic jokes in India?
...that John Fowler won the 1858 prize of the Royal Agricultural Society for mechanical cultivation using winches and a steam engine?
...that Sagittarius B2 is a giant molecular cloud near the Galactic Center where half of all known interstellar molecules were first discovered?
...that there are seven dialectal groups of the Polish language, each primarily associated with a certain geographical region?

00:50, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Stanislavski and Craig's symbolist production of Hamlet in 1911 (pictured) put the Moscow Art Theatre on the cultural map of Europe?
...that the annual Global Peace and Unity conference held at the ExCeL Exhibition Centre in London is the largest Muslim event in Europe?
...that Teimuraz I, a Georgian monarch of the Bagrationi Dynasty, was also an accomplished poet whose literary works includes original Georgian poems as well as translations and adaptations from Persian literature?
...that only after five years since its founding in 1991, Reel Affirmations became the fourth-largest LGBT film festival in the United States?
...that Alex Niño quit medical school at the University of Manila in 1959 to pursue his childhood goal of becoming a comic book artist?
...that A. Roswell Thompson, a taxi operator and a figure in the Ku Klux Klan, ran for governor of Louisiana in 1959, 32 years before David Duke waged his more publicized race in 1991?
...that Jehovah's Witnesses in Canada were persecuted in the early to mid-20th century, and that their religion was banned during World War II under the War Measures Act as a result of their refusal to serve in the military?
...that Buryat Mongolian Buddhist Agvan Dorzhiev was a tutor and debating partner of the teenage Thubten Gyatso, 13th Dalai Lama?

1 November 2007

16:37, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

...that Admiral Robert Holmes (statue pictured) of the Royal Navy destroyed 130 ships and burned the town of Terschelling for the loss of three men in the action Holmes's Bonfire?
...that Peter Birkhäuser was so moved by a moth trapped by a window that he painted its picture, and later analysed his thoughts and corresponded with Carl Jung?
...that in 1921, future four-star admiral Louis M. Nulton tried to save the battlecruiser USS Constitution from being scrapped by illegally transferring funds from the construction and repair of other warships?
...that the 1994 Guinness television advertisement Anticipation used jump cutting techniques to make an actor appear to be performing a physically impossible dance?
...that the Comoedienhaus theater, built in 1782, the first theater of performing arts in Frankfurt, Germany, played host to concerts by Mozart, Schiller and Goethe, among others?
...that in numerical analysis, the error of an approximation of a function $\textstyle u$ by a polynomial of order at most $\textstyle m-1$ in terms of derivatives of $\textstyle u$ of order $\textstyle m$ is bound by the Bramble-Hilbert lemma?
...that the United Church of Christ in Blooming Grove, New York was a Presbyterian congregation until its pastor was tried for heresy?
...that popularity of German Minority, a party of the German minority in Poland, has been steadily declining since its establishment?
...that Clímaco Calderón was President of Colombia for only one day?

06:28, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

...that the Lockheed NF-104A (pictured), equipped with a reaction control system as well as a rocket engine to supplement a jet engine, was a low-cost training vehicle for American astronauts in the 1960s?
...that Bhadda Kundalakesa attained arahantship faster than any other Buddhist nun?
...that bugged conversations with surgeon-crime boss Giuseppe Guttadauro revealed how the Mafia funded the 2001 election campaign of Sicilian President Salvatore Cuffaro?
...that the opening session of the Estonian Constituent Assembly on April 23 1919 is considered the birth of the Estonian Parliament?
...that according to a Dakota Indian legend, the Great Spirit divided Barn Bluff between two rival villages of Minnesota, with the remaining portion moving to Winona and became Sugar Loaf?
...that Credonia Mwerinde founded the doomsday cult, the Movement for the Restoration of the Ten Commandments of God, with Joseph Kibweteere?
...that in the United Kingdom, speed limits imposed by variable-message signs are advisories only, and there are no legal sanctions for drivers who exceed them?
...that razor manufacturer Thiers Issard produces a singing razor whose blade produces a resonant tone when plucked?