Wikipedia:Today's featured list/April 2016
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April 1
A group of baseball players have played in the major leagues despite not having made a name for themselves. The media has lacked enough information to assist the players in this regard; one player, Stoddard, had more than 30 possible names to choose from. Possible mistakes in box scores from the 19th century could have also led to this phenomenon. Regardless, some players in the group received attention in the press. In his lone major league appearance for the Philadelphia Athletics, pitcher Sterling's opponents "took kindly to [his] curves". Fellow pitcher O'Rourke received praise in the local media for one 1872 appearance, in which he allowed 15 runs to score against the Troy Trojans. Lewis was less successful in his lone major league game, as he was left a "much disgusted ball tosser". Washington Nationals third baseman Larkin played 17 games without making a name for himself. Four such players appeared in one game in 1890. (Full list...)
April 4
The 1st Magritte Awards ceremony, presented by the Académie André Delvaux, honored the best films of 2010 in Belgium and took place on February 5, 2011, at the Square in the historic site of Mont des Arts, Brussels, beginning at 7:30 p.m. CET. During the ceremony, the Académie André Delvaux presented Magritte Awards in twenty categories. The ceremony, televised in Belgium by BeTV, was produced by José Bouquiaux and directed by Vincent J. Gustin. Film director Jaco Van Dormael (pictured) presided over the ceremony, while actress Helena Noguerra hosted the evening. The pre-show ceremony was hosted by film director Fabrice Du Welz. Mr. Nobody won six awards, including Best Film and Best Director for Van Dormael. Other winners included Illegal, Private Lessons, and A Town Called Panic with two awards each, and The Barons, The Boat Race, Looking for Eric, Paths of Memory, Sleepless Night, and Soeur Sourire with one. (Full list...)
April 8
The works of Joseph Priestley include contributions in the fields of philosophy, political theory, and education. A British natural philosopher and Dissenting clergyman, Priestley is best known for his discovery, simultaneously with Antoine Lavoisier, of oxygen gas. A member of marginalized religious groups throughout his life and a proponent of what was called "rational Dissent," he advocated religious toleration and equal rights for Dissenters. Priestley argued for extensive civil rights in works such as Essay on the First Principles of Government, believing that individuals could bring about progress and eventually the Millennium; he was the foremost British expounder of providentialism. Priestley made significant contributions to education, publishing, among other things, The Rudiments of English Grammar, a seminal work on English grammar. Throughout his life, Priestley was also known as a natural philosopher. His scientific reputation rested on his writings on electricity, his invention of soda water, and his discovery of 10 previously unknown "Airs" (gases), that he reported about from 1774–1786 in a giant book of 6 volumes: Experiments and Observations on Different Kinds of Air. (Full list...)
April 11
Scandinavian Airlines (SAS) operates 158 aircraft—jetliners and turboprops—including 83 Boeing 737, 18 Bombardier CRJ900, 25 Airbus A319/A320/A321 and 16 Airbus A330/A340 (pictured). SAS, previously known as Scandinavian Airlines System, is the national airline of Denmark, Norway and Sweden. Headquartered in Sigtuna outside Stockholm, Sweden, it operates out of three main hubs, Copenhagen Airport, Stockholm-Arlanda Airport and Oslo Airport, Gardermoen. The airline has operated 702 aircraft throughout its history. It was a loyal customer of Douglas Aircraft Company and its successor McDonnell Douglas, operating 290 aircraft and all major models from the DC-3 through the MD-90, except the MD-11. Boeing is the second-largest manufacturer with 127 aircraft, of which 105 were 737s. SAS has been the launch customer of the Saab Scandia, the Sud Aviation Caravelle, the McDonnell Douglas DC-9-20 and −40 and the Boeing 737–600. (Full list...)
April 15
There are 58 scheduled monuments in Bath and North East Somerset. Bath and North East Somerset (commonly referred to as BANES or B&NES) is a unitary authority created on 1 April 1996, following the abolition of the County of Avon, which had existed since 1974. Part of the ceremonial county of Somerset, Bath and North East Somerset occupies an area of 220 square miles (570 km2), two-thirds of which is green belt. A scheduled monument is a nationally important archaeological site or monument which is given legal protection by being placed on a list (or "schedule") by the Secretary of State for Culture, Media and Sport; English Heritage takes the leading role in identifying such sites. Some of the oldest scheduled monuments in Bath and North East Somerset are Neolithic including the Stanton Drew stone circles and several tumuli. There are also several Iron Age hillforts such as Maes Knoll, which was later incorporated into the medieval Wansdyke, a defensive earthwork. The Romano-British period is represented with several sites, most notably the Roman Baths (pictured) and city walls in Bath. (Full list...)
April 18
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NASA space-flown Gemini and Apollo medallions were mission-specific commemorative medallions—often astronaut-designed—which were approved by NASA and carried aboard the mission spacecraft into orbit. Beginning with the first manned Gemini mission in 1965, commemorative medallions were prepared for the astronauts at their request. These were produced by a company only known as Fliteline and were struck either in a pewter-colored base metal, sometimes painted a gold color, or sterling silver, and were flown on all 10 manned Gemini missions. The Robbins Company of Attleboro, Massachusetts, was contracted in 1968 to produce commemorative medallions beginning with Apollo 7, the first manned Apollo flight since the Apollo 1 disaster. These were purchased by astronauts and support crew personnel at NASA Astronaut Flight Office, and a total of over 3,000 sterling silver Robbins medallions were flown into space across the 12 manned flights of the Apollo program. Some of these were later sold in public auction for up to $60,000. (Full list...)
April 22
The National Natural Landmarks in Alaska include 16 of the almost 600 National Natural Landmarks (NNLs) in the United States. They cover areas of geological and biological importance, and include craters, volcanoes, glaciers, lakes, islands and habitats for several rare species. The first set of five designations was made in 1967, while the most recent were made when two new sites were designated in 1976. Six landmarks are found within the Unorganized Borough, while the rest are located in organized boroughs; Aleutians East Borough holds the most, with four. Natural Landmarks in Alaska range from 170 to 1,800,000 acres (69 to 728,434 ha; 0.27 to 2,812.50 sq mi) in size. Owners include private individuals and several state and federal agencies. The National Natural Landmarks Program is administered by the National Park Service, a branch of the Department of the Interior. The National Park Service determines which properties meet NNL criteria and, after notifying the owners, makes nomination recommendations. (Full list...)
April 25
The American television series Miami Vice received numerous accolades during its five seasons on the National Broadcasting Company between 1984 and 1990. Starring Philip Michael Thomas, Don Johnson and Edward James Olmos (pictured), the police procedural focuses on the lives of two undercover Metro-Dade police officers, Ricardo Tubbs (Thomas) and James "Sonny" Crockett (Johnson). Miami Vice's nominations include twenty at the Emmy Awards, seven at the Golden Globe Awards, two People's Choice Awards and two Grammy Awards. Although Thomas coined the phrase "EGOT" for his ambitions to win Emmy, Grammy, Oscar and Tony Awards, only Johnson and Olmos won acting awards for their work on the series, while composer Jan Hammer earned two Grammy awards for his composition for the show's opening credits, "Miami Vice Theme". Of a total of thirty-three nominations earned by the series, it went on to win ten awards. The series spawned several successful soundtrack albums, with both Miami Vice and Miami Vice II charting in several countries worldwide. (Full list...)
April 29
The discography of Led Zeppelin consists of nine studio albums, four live albums, nine compilation albums, 16 singles and eight music downloads. Formed in London in 1968, the rock group consisted of guitarist Jimmy Page, singer Robert Plant, bass player John Paul Jones, and drummer John Bonham. The band (Plant and Page pictured) pioneered the concept of album-oriented rock and often refused to release popular songs as singles. Their debut album, Led Zeppelin (1969), released by Atlantic Records, charted at number six on the UK Albums Chart and at number ten on the United States Billboard 200. Led Zeppelin's second studio album, Led Zeppelin II, produced the group's most successful single, "Whole Lotta Love", which peaked at several music charts in the top 10. Led Zeppelin's untitled fourth album, often called Led Zeppelin IV and released on 8 November 1971, is their most commercially successful album. It received a 23 times multi-platinum certification from the Recording Industry Association of America, the third-highest of all albums. The band has sold over 300 million albums worldwide, including 111.5 million certified units in the United States. (Full list...)