Wikipedia:Main Page history/2021 May 21

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George Vincent (1796 – c. 1832) was an English landscape artist who produced watercolours, etchings and oil paintings. He is considered to be one of the most talented of the Norwich School of painters, a group of artists inspired by the Norfolk countryside. Vincent's work was founded on the Dutch school of landscape painting and the style of John Crome, also of the Norwich School. The son of a weaver, Vincent was apprenticed to Crome. Vincent exhibited at the Royal Academy and the British Institution. From 1811 until 1831 he showed at the Norwich Society of Artists, exhibiting over 100 pictures of Norfolk landscapes and marine works. By 1818 he had relocated to London, yet struggled financially. He was imprisoned for debt from 1824 to 1827. After 1831, Vincent disappeared and was never found. The art historian Herbert Cundall wrote in the 1920s that had Vincent "not given way to intemperate habits he would probably have ranked amongst the foremost of British landscape painters". (Full article...)

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In the news

Darwin's Arch before collapsing

Darwin's Arch (pictured), a rock formation in the Galápagos Islands, collapses due to natural erosion.
Cyclone Tauktae makes landfall in Gujarat, killing at least 122 people in India and Pakistan and forcing the evacuation of over 200,000 others.
In association football, Leicester City win the FA Cup, and Manchester City win the Premier League.
The China National Space Administration's Tianwen-1 lander-rover vehicle successfully lands on Mars.

On this day

May 21

Recreation of the Manhattan Project "demon core"

878 – Arab–Byzantine wars: The city of Syracuse was captured by the Aghlabids as part of the Muslim conquest of Sicily.
1851 – The Congress of Colombia passed a law abolishing slavery in the country, to take effect at the beginning of the new year.
1917 – The Imperial War Graves Commission was established by royal charter to mark, record and maintain the graves and places of commemoration of British Empire military forces.
1946 – Working with a mass of plutonium known as the "demon core" (recreation pictured), Manhattan Project physicist Louis Slotin accidentally exposed himself to a lethal dose of hard radiation.
1991 – Former Indian prime minister Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated by a suicide bomber in Sriperumbudur, Tamil Nadu.

Olaf the Black (d. 1237)
Tudor Arghezi (b. 1880)
Al Franken (b. 1951)

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The Marine Corps Brevet Medal, also known as the Brevet Medal, was a military decoration of the United States Marine Corps; it was created in 1921 as a result of Marine Corps Order No. 26. The decoration was a one-time issuance and retroactively recognized living Marine Corps officers who had received a brevet rank. Brevet promotions were used by the United States military in some capacity from 1775 until they were discontinued in 1900. The Army was the only branch authorized to grant brevets until 1814, when the Marine Corps was granted the same privilege. For the 86 years, the Marine Corps awarded 121 brevet promotions to 100 Marine Corps officers. Captain Anthony Gale was the first to receive a brevet promotion in 1814, and John Twiggs Myers, who died in 1952, was the last surviving recipient. In 1921 John A. Lejeune, Commandant of the Marine Corps, requested that a Marine Corps Brevet Medal be authorized; after it was approved and created, the decoration was given to the last 20 living Marine Corps officers who received brevet promotions. (Full list...)

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Cavalleria rusticana is an 1890 opera in one act by Pietro Mascagni with an Italian libretto written by Giovanni Targioni-Tozzetti and Guido Menasci, adapted from a short story and play by Giovanni Verga. These two illustrations show key scenes in the opera: in the first, Santuzza begs Turiddu to stay with her, instead of continuing his affair with Lola; in the second, Lola's husband Alfio embraces Turiddu, challenging him to a duel according to Sicilian custom, while Turiddu bites his ear, drawing blood, thus accepting the challenge and indicating that it will be a duel to the death.

Illustration credit: unknown; restored by Adam Cuerden

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