Wikipedia:Main Page history/2021 March 3b

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From today's featured article

Carmen, illustration in Journal Amusant

Carmen is an opera in four acts which Georges Bizet set to a libretto by the team of Henri Meilhac and Ludovic Halévy, based on Prosper Mérimée's novella. When it was first performed by the Opéra-Comique in Paris on 3 March 1875, its breaking of conventions shocked and scandalized its first audiences. The opera was originally written with musical numbers and spoken dialogue. Set in southern Spain, it tells of the downfall of Don José, a naïve soldier who is seduced by the fiery gypsy Carmen, and finally kills her in a jealous rage. The depictions of proletarian life, immorality, and lawlessness broke new ground in French opera. Bizet died suddenly after the 33rd performance, unaware that the work would achieve international acclaim within the following ten years. Carmen has become one of the most frequently performed operas, with the "Habanera" and the "Toreador Song" among the best known of all operatic arias. The music has been acclaimed for its brilliance of melody, harmony, atmosphere and orchestration, and for Bizet's skill in expressing the emotions and suffering of his characters. (Full article...)

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Did you know ...

The Thankful Poor by Henry Ossawa Tanner

... that The Thankful Poor (pictured), an 1894 painting by Henry Ossawa Tanner, was discovered in a storage closet in 1970?
... that Molly Clutton-Brock treated the spines of African babies until she was deported by the government of Rhodesia?
... that at the 1997 Bully Hill Vineyards 150, Ron Fellows, driving for a team that did not have garage space, became the first Canadian to win a NASCAR Craftsman Truck Series race?
... that Caleb Grafton Roberts, head of the Second World War Allied Intelligence Bureau, was a highway engineer before the war?
... that the architect of Singapore's Stadium MRT station rotated the original plan on its side after being forced to revise the station's design?
... that former Minnesota governor Harold LeVander jokingly said that he served under state senator Gordon Rosenmeier?
... that in 1356 Henry of Lancaster marched an English expedition through Normandy 330 miles (530 km) in 22 days while successfully avoiding battle with the French king's far larger army?
... that Michael van der Veen, who represented Donald Trump at his second impeachment trial, also represented a man claiming to have been served a fried rat at a KFC?

In the news

Naomi Osaka and Novak Djokovic

About 300 girls kidnapped from a secondary school by armed bandits in Zamfara, Nigeria, are released.
In tennis, Naomi Osaka wins the women's singles and Novak Djokovic wins the men's singles at the Australian Open (both winners pictured).
Porfirije is enthroned as the 46th Patriarch of the Serbian Orthodox Church.
NASA's Perseverance rover, carrying the Ingenuity helicopter, successfully lands on Mars.

On this day

March 3: Liberation Day in Bulgaria (1878); Hinamatsuri in Japan

Rodney King

1875 – The first indoor game of ice hockey was played at the Victoria Skating Rink in Montreal by James Creighton and students of McGill University.
1891 – Shoshone National Forest, in the U.S. state of Wyoming, was established as the country's first national forest.
1924 – The Ottoman Caliphate, the world's last widely recognized caliphate, was abolished.
1991 – Motorist Rodney King (pictured) was beaten by Los Angeles Police Department officers during an arrest, causing public outrage that increased tensions between the African-American community and the police department over police brutality and social inequality.
2012 – Two passenger trains collided near Szczekociny, Poland, resulting in 16 deaths and 58 injuries.

Maurice Garin (b. 1871)
Thomas Field Gibson (b. 1803)
Xavier Bettel (b. 1973)

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Today's featured picture

The hardhead (Aythya australis) is a species of diving duck found in Australia. Also known as the white-eyed duck, its plumage is chocolate brown in both sexes, but only males have the distinctive white eye. The common name "hardhead" has nothing to do with the density of the bird's skull, instead referring to the difficulty encountered by early taxidermists in processing the head. These female (top) and male (bottom) hardheads were photographed at Hurstville Golf Course in Mortdale, New South Wales.

Photograph credit: John Harrison

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