Wikipedia:Main Page history/2018 May 23

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From today's featured article

The 1988 Giro d'Italia was the 71st running of this annual race in cycling's Grand Tour. It started in Urbino on 23 May with a 9 km (5.6 mi) individual time trial, and concluded in Vittorio Veneto on 12 June. A total of 180 riders from 20 teams entered the 21-stage race, which was won by Andrew Hampsten of the United States, with Erik Breukink of the Netherlands finishing second and Urs Zimmermann of Switzerland third. It was the third time – and second successive year – in the history of the Giro with no Italian riders in the top three finishers. In the first half of the race, the overall classification was headed for several days by Massimo Podenzana, who participated in a breakaway during stage 4a and held the race leader's jersey for more than a week. The 14th stage of the race was conducted in adverse weather, including a snowstorm. Hampsten became the first American, and non-European, to win the Giro. Johan van der Velde was the winner of the points classification, and Carrera Jeans–Vagabond won the team classification. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

HMS Victorious

... that the UK's Trident nuclear missile submarines (HMS Victorious pictured) use a control system which the media have nicknamed "Windows for Submarines", because it is based on Windows XP?
... that Japanese voice actress Inori Minase, who won the Best Lead Actress Award at the 10th Seiyu Awards in 2015, is releasing her second album today?
... that the Assyrian captivity of the Israelites was one instance of forced resettlement carried out by the Neo-Assyrian Empire?
... that Katharina Magiera, a member of the Frankfurt Opera, has appeared as Lisa, a former SS officer in Auschwitz, in Weinberg's opera The Passenger?
... that workplace robotics safety applies to both traditional industrial robots and emerging technologies such as robotic exoskeletons and drone aircraft?
... that the Irish lawyer and satirist William Norcott ended his life in poverty in Constantinople where he was reportedly decapitated and his body thrown into the sea?
... that the Morelia and Guadalajara International Film Festivals were used as a reference for the creation of FotoFilm Tijuana?
... that in Re Bristol South-East Parliamentary Election, it was held that votes for Tony Benn were effectively "thrown away" because, as a hereditary peer, he was disqualified from sitting in the House of Commons?

In the news

Nicolás Maduro

Incumbent Nicolás Maduro (pictured) is re-elected President of Venezuela.
Shoplifters wins the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival.
In the United Kingdom, Prince Harry marries Meghan Markle.
A passenger aircraft crashes shortly after takeoff from Havana, Cuba, killing 111 people.
Israeli troops kill more than 60 Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, on the day the United States moves its embassy to Jerusalem.

On this day...

May 23

Collapsed section of the I-5 bridge

1555 – Giovanni Pietro Carafa became Pope Paul IV, beginning a short but tumultuous papacy, during which the Papal States suffered a serious military defeat.
1706 – War of the Spanish Succession: Led by the Duke of Marlborough, the allied forces of England, the Dutch Republic, and Denmark–Norway defeated the Franco-Spanish-Bavarian army in Ramillies, present-day Belgium.
1873 – The North-West Mounted Police, the forerunner of the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, was established to bring law and order to, and assert Canadian sovereignty over, the Northwest Territories.
1951 – Delegates of the 14th Dalai Lama and the government of the newly established People's Republic of China signed the Seventeen Point Agreement for the Peaceful Liberation of Tibet, affirming Chinese sovereignty over Tibet.
2013 – An oversize load struck several support beams on the bridge carrying Interstate 5 over the Skagit River in the U.S. state of Washington, leading to its immediate collapse (pictured).

Elias Ashmole (b. 1617) · Margaret Fuller (b. 1810) · David Lewis (d. 1981)

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Today's featured picture

Adoration of the Magi is a tondo in tempera on a wood panel, believed to have been painted mostly by Filippo Lippi in the mid-15th century. It depicts the Adoration of the Magi, the Biblical story in which the three Magi present the Christ Child with gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh, and worship him. The painting is now in the National Gallery of Art in Washington D.C.

Painting: Filippo Lippi, with contributions by other artists

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