Wikipedia:Main Page history/2022 December 13
From today's featured article
CSS Baltic was a casemate ironclad that served in the Confederate States Navy during the American Civil War. A towboat and cotton lighter before the war, it was purchased by the state of Alabama in December 1861 for conversion into an ironclad. After being transferred to the Confederate Navy in May 1862, it served on Mobile Bay off the Gulf of Mexico. Its condition in Confederate service was such that naval historian William N. Still Jr. has described her as "a nondescript vessel in many ways". Over the next two years, parts of the ship's wooden structure were affected by wood rot. Her armor was removed to be put onto the ironclad CSS Nashville in 1864. By that August, Baltic had been decommissioned. She was taken up the Tombigbee River near the end of the war, where she was captured by Union forces on May 10, 1865. An inspection the next month found that her upper hull and deck were rotten and that her boilers were unsafe. She was sold on December 31, and was likely broken up in 1866. (Full article...)
Did you know ...
- ... that aerospace engineer Sabrina Thompson (pictured) founded a streetwear brand after she felt the "artist inside of me was internally starving", despite being satisfied with her career?
- ... that Nanjing Massacre Memorial Day has a memorial tripod?
- ... that after Alfred Fell moved his family to England for better education opportunities, his son Walter Fell and two of his brothers returned permanently to New Zealand?
- ... that scholars disagree about whether the closure of the Walter Hines Page School of International Relations in 1953 had anything to do with McCarthyism?
- ... that Howard Mayers is credited with the destruction of at least eleven enemy aircraft during World War II?
- ... that musician John Mayer dismissed Taylor Swift's "Dear John" as "cheap songwriting"?
- ... that Chinese physician Yu Yan described theories like yinyang and the five phases as "simply all lies, absolutely not factual, and completely groundless"?
- ... that when Seattle sandwich restaurant Paseo abruptly closed, fans left flowers and lit candles?
In the news
- In video games, Elden Ring wins Game of the Year at The Game Awards.
- American basketball player Brittney Griner and Russian arms dealer Viktor Bout (pictured) are freed via a prisoner exchange.
- In Germany, 25 members of a far-right group are arrested in connection with a coup d'état plot.
- Albert Rösti and Élisabeth Baume-Schneider are elected to the Federal Council, Switzerland's government.
On this day
- 1643 – First English Civil War: Roundhead forces under Sir William Waller led a successful surprise attack in Hampshire on a winter garrison of Cavalier infantry and cavalry.
- 1769 – Dartmouth College was established by royal charter in present-day Hanover, New Hampshire.
- 1937 – Second Sino-Japanese War: Japanese forces, capturing the Chinese city of Nanjing, began committing numerous atrocities over the next several weeks, including looting, rape and the execution of prisoners of war and civilians.
- 1981 – Polish prime minister Wojciech Jaruzelski (pictured) declared martial law.
- 2011 – A man threw grenades and fired a rifle at crowds in Liège, Belgium, causing 6 deaths and injuring more than 120 others, before killing himself.
- Pope Callixtus II (d. 1124)
- Emily Carr (b. 1871)
- Hans-Joachim Marseille (b. 1919)
Today's featured picture
|
|
Project Riese was the code name for an unfinished construction project undertaken by Nazi Germany between 1943 and 1945. It consisted of seven underground structures in the Owl Mountains and Książ Castle – pictured here in 2014 – in Lower Silesia (now part of Poland). The purpose of the project remains uncertain because of a lack of documentation. Some sources suggest that all the structures were part of the Führer Headquarters; according to others, it was a combination of headquarters and arms industry, but comparison to similar facilities can indicate that only the castle was adapted as a headquarters or official residence, and the tunnels in the Owl Mountains were planned as a network of underground factories. Photograph credit: Jarosław Ciuruś
Recently featured:
|
Other areas of Wikipedia
- Community portal – The central hub for editors, with resources, links, tasks, and announcements.
- Village pump – Forum for discussions about Wikipedia itself, including policies and technical issues.
- Site news – Sources of news about Wikipedia and the broader Wikimedia movement.
- Teahouse – Ask basic questions about using or editing Wikipedia.
- Help desk – Ask questions about using or editing Wikipedia.
- Reference desk – Ask research questions about encyclopedic topics.
- Content portals – A unique way to navigate the encyclopedia.
Wikipedia's sister projects
Wikipedia is written by volunteer editors and hosted by the Wikimedia Foundation, a non-profit organization that also hosts a range of other volunteer projects:
-
Commons
Free media repository -
MediaWiki
Wiki software development -
Meta-Wiki
Wikimedia project coordination -
Wikibooks
Free textbooks and manuals -
Wikidata
Free knowledge base -
Wikinews
Free-content news -
Wikiquote
Collection of quotations -
Wikisource
Free-content library -
Wikispecies
Directory of species -
Wikiversity
Free learning tools -
Wikivoyage
Free travel guide -
Wiktionary
Dictionary and thesaurus
Wikipedia languages
This Wikipedia is written in English. Many other Wikipedias are available; some of the largest are listed below.
-
1,000,000+ articles
-
250,000+ articles
-
50,000+ articles