Wikipedia:Main Page history/2019 September 22

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From today's featured article

Joseph B. Foraker (1846–1917) was an American Republican politician, who served as the 37th governor of Ohio (1886–1890) and a U.S. senator (1897–1909). Born in rural Ohio, Foraker enlisted in the Union Army at age 16 and fought in the Civil War. After the war, he was a member of Cornell's first graduating class, and became a lawyer; he was elected a judge in 1879. Although defeated in his first run for governor in 1883, he was elected in 1885. Foraker lost re-election in 1889, but was elected senator by the legislature in 1896. In the Senate, he supported the Spanish–American War and the annexation of the Philippines and Puerto Rico. He differed with President Theodore Roosevelt over the Brownsville affair, in which black soldiers had been accused of terrorizing a Texas town; Roosevelt had dismissed the entire battalion. Foraker fought unsuccessfully for their reinstatement, and Roosevelt helped defeat Foraker's re-election bid. In 1972, the Army reversed the dismissals and cleared the soldiers. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

Bernard Schriever

... that when Bernard Schriever (pictured) was promoted to general in 1961, General Curtis LeMay looked at his four stars and said that had it been up to him, Schriever would not be wearing them?
... that during the Battle of Bovey Heath, Royalist officers escaped by "throwing their stakes of money", which the enemy soldiers paused to collect?
... that Kevin Harlan said his "first good move" in sports broadcasting was getting into radio at WGBP-FM?
... that after 78-year-old Maggy Hurchalla was ordered to pay US$4 million for interfering with a mining company, her kayaks were seized?
... that the Celebes warty pig has been domesticated and introduced into other Indonesian islands?
... that bassist Fred Thomas performed with James Brown for over thirty years?
... that the African tropical tree Pouteria adolfi-friedericii was named after a German explorer?
... that the gynaecologist Margaret Puxon, who started studying law to prevent boredom while on maternity leave, eventually became a barrister?

In the news

Climate change protesters in Sydney, Australia

Global climate change strikes take place in 150 countries (protesters in Sydney pictured) as part of the Fridays for Future protests.
The FIBA Basketball World Cup concludes, with Spain defeating Argentina in the final.
In Gaelic football, the All-Ireland Championship concludes, with Dublin defeating Kerry in the final.
Drone attacks on two major oil facilities force Saudi Arabia to cut more than half of its oil production.

On this day

September 22: Banned Books Week begins (2019); Independence Day in Mali (1960); Baltic Unity Day in Latvia and Lithuania

Richard Wagner

1586 – Eighty Years' War: Spanish forces were victorious against a combined Anglo-Dutch army in the Battle of Zutphen.
1869 – Das Rheingold, the first of four operas in Der Ring des Nibelungen by German composer Richard Wagner (pictured), was first performed in Munich.
1914 – First World War: The German submarine U-9 sank three Royal Navy cruisers, resulting in approximately 1,450 deaths.
1979 – An American Vela satellite detected an unidentified flash of light near the Prince Edward Islands in the Indian Ocean, thought to be a nuclear weapons test.
2013 – Two suicide bombers attacked a church in Peshawar, Pakistan, killing 127 and injuring over 250 others in the deadliest attack on the Christian minority in the country's history.

Dōgen (d. 1253) · Selim I (d. 1520) · Norma McCorvey (b. 1947)

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Today's featured picture

Elizabeth L. Gardner (1921–2011) was an American pilot during World War II who served as a member of the Women Airforce Service Pilots (WASP). Gardner was born in Rockford, Illinois, and graduated from Rockford High School in 1939. She was a mother and housewife before the war started. After she married, she took the last name Remba. Upon enlisting as a WASP member, Gardner "had two days of training under Lieutenant Col. Paul Tibbets, who later commanded the B-29 that dropped the first atom bomb on Hiroshima". She flew Martin B-26 Marauder medium bombers, including the AT-23 trainer version of the bomber. One of her stations was in Dodge City, Kansas. She was trained as a test pilot and flight instructor, and she also flew aircraft that towed aerial targets. After years of fighting for recognition of their military service, the 300 surviving WASP pilots were recognized with the Congressional Gold Medal in 2009.

This picture shows Gardner sitting in the pilot's seat of a Martin B-26 Marauder at Harlingen Army Airfield, Texas. The often-reproduced photograph was taken when she was about 22 and became emblematic of the place of women in the service of their country.

Photograph credit: United States Department of the Air Force; restored by Hohum and Bammesk

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