Wikipedia:Today's featured list/December 2020
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December 4
The works of English writer Dorothy L. Sayers include mysteries, a series of novels and short stories, set between the First and Second World Wars, which feature the fictional Lord Peter Wimsey, an English aristocrat and amateur sleuth. Sayers was educated at home and then at the University of Oxford. In 1916, a year after her graduation, Sayers published her first book, a collection of poems entitled Op. I, which she followed two years later with a second, a slim volume titled Catholic Tales and Christian Songs. In 1923 she published Whose Body?, a murder mystery novel featuring Lord Peter Wimsey, and went on to write eleven novels and five collections of short stories about the character. The Wimsey stories were popular, and successful enough for Sayers to leave the advertising agency where she was working. Towards the end of the 1930s, and without explanation, Sayers stopped writing crime stories and turned instead to religious plays and essays, and to translations. Some of her plays were broadcast on the BBC, others performed at the Canterbury Festival and some in commercial theatres. (Full list...)
December 7
There are 92 well-preserved churches from the Middle Ages on the Swedish island of Gotland, more than in any other part of Sweden. Most of these churches were built between the early 12th century and the middle of the 14th century, when the wealth of the island increased thanks to trade between Western and Eastern Europe. The oldest of these churches are Romanesque in style, and while Gothic forms eventually replaced Romanesque, church architecture remained conservative on Gotland. The churches were often decorated with murals, with stained glass, and with decorative sculptures both of wood (such as the Viklau Madonna) and stone (especially decorated baptismal fonts). In the middle of the 14th century, Gotland entered a period of decline and turmoil, and a loss of trade from which the island would never recover. Church-building activity ceased after around 1350. In the main town of Visby, only Visby Cathedral (pictured) was maintained, while other churches were left as ruins. (Full list...)
December 11
American filmmaker Orson Welles is best remembered for his innovative work in radio, theatre, and film. He is widely considered one of the greatest and most influential directors of all time. While in his twenties, Welles directed a number of stage productions before creating the infamous 1938 radio adaptation of H. G. Wells's novel The War of the Worlds. Welles's directorial film debut Citizen Kane (1941), in which he also starred as Charles Foster Kane, garnered him the Academy Award for Best Original Screenplay and nominations for Best Actor and Best Director. The film is consistently ranked as the greatest film ever made. Welles's second film was The Magnificent Ambersons (1942). He then directed the film-noir The Lady from Shanghai (1947), in which he also starred opposite his estranged wife Rita Hayworth. His 1951 film Othello won the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival. (Full list...)
December 14
The United States has 154 protected areas known as national forests, covering 188,336,179 acres (762,169 km2; 294,275 sq mi). National forests are managed by the Forest Service, an agency of the Department of Agriculture. The first national forest was established as the Yellowstone Park Timber and Land Reserve on March 30, 1891, then in the Department of the Interior. In 1897, the Organic Act provided purposes for which forest reserves could be established, including to protect the forest, secure water supplies, and supply timber. By 1907, President Theodore Roosevelt had more than doubled the forest-reserve acreage, and Congress responded by limiting the president's ability to proclaim new reserves. The National Forest System underwent a major reorganization in 1908, and in 1911 Congress authorized new additions to the system under the authority of the Weeks Act. There is at least one national forest in all but ten states. Alaska has the most land in national forests, with 21.9 million acres (8.9 million ha), including Tongass National Forest (pictured), the largest by area in the country. (Full list...)
December 18
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Championships were held across three continents in 2018 to determine the best players in major cue sports, including snooker, pool, and English billiards. The snooker season runs between May and April, while the pool and billiards seasons run through the calendar year. Four men's adult world championships were held in 2018, with Mark Williams (pictured) winning the World Snooker Championship, Joshua Filler holding the WPA World Nine-ball Championship, Sourav Kothari the World Billiards Championship and Dick Jaspers winning the UMB World Three-cushion Championship. Three women's world championships were also held, with Han Yu winning the WPA Women's World Nine-ball Championship, the World Billiards Championship being won by Emma Bonney and Ng On-yee winning the World Women's Snooker Championship. The snooker Triple Crown featured Ronnie O'Sullivan winning the UK Championship, while the Masters was won by Mark Allen. (Full list...)
December 21
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Procyonids are members of Procyonidae, a family of mammals in the order Carnivora. The family includes raccoons, coatis, olingos, kinkajous, ring-tailed cats, and cacomistles, and many other extant and extinct mammals. They are native to North and South America, though the common raccoon (pictured) has been introduced to Europe, western Asia, and Japan. Procyonid habitats are generally forests, though some are found in shrublands and grasslands as well. The fourteen species of Procyonidae are split into six genera, which are not currently grouped into named clades. Procyonidae is believed to have diverged as a separate family within Carnivora around 22.6 million years ago. Procyonidae includes forty extinct species placed in the six extant and nineteen extinct genera, though due to ongoing research and discoveries the exact number and categorization is not fixed. (Full list...)
December 25
During the 2000s, 44 singles reached the number-one position on the Billboard Christian Songs chart. The Christian Songs chart is a record chart compiled by Billboard magazine. Launched on June 21, 2003, the chart is ranked by overall audience impressions (the approximate number of audience impressions made for each play, as determined by BDS data cross-referenced with Arbitron listener information). MercyMe (pictured) was the most successful group, with seven of their singles topping the chart during the 2000s. MercyMe's "Word of God Speak" was the longest-running number one single of the 2000s, having spent a total of 23 non-consecutive weeks atop the chart. Casting Crowns spent the longest time atop the chart during the decade, as their six number-one singles spent a combined total of 62 weeks at the summit. (Full list...)
December 28
The second season of Prison Break, an American serial drama television series, commenced airing in the United States on August 21, 2006, on Mondays at 9:00 pm (EST) on the Fox Broadcasting Company. Prison Break was produced by Adelstein-Parouse Productions, in association with Rat Entertainment, Original Film and 20th Century Fox Television. The season contains 22 episodes, and concluded on April 2, 2007. Prison Break revolves around two brothers: one who has been sentenced to death for a crime he did not commit, and his younger sibling, a genius who devises an elaborate plan to help him escape prison. The brothers, along with six other prisoners at Fox River State Penitentiary, manage to escape, and the second season follows a massive manhunt chasing the group. For the season, three characters are downgraded from series regular to recurring status, and a new character is introduced. Filming took place in Dallas, Texas, due to a close proximity of rural and urban settings. For the final three episodes, scenes were filmed in Pensacola, Florida, to represent Panama. (Full list...)