Wikipedia:Today's featured list/June 2014
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June 2
The 1987 Major League Baseball (MLB) Draft took place as a conference call to the Commissioner of Baseball's office in New York from June 2–4. The American League (AL) and the National League (NL) alternated picks throughout the first round; because an NL team drafted first in the 1986 MLB Draft, an AL team had the first selection in 1987. Finishing 67–95, the Seattle Mariners had the worst record in the AL and thus obtained the first overall selection. The second selection went to the Pittsburgh Pirates. With the first overall pick, the Mariners drafted Ken Griffey, Jr.; Griffey, Jr. became a 13-time All-Star and helped Seattle make its first postseason appearance in franchise history. Mark Merchant, the second overall pick, however, never played in a major league game. The total number of athletes selected, 1,263, broke a record for the most players ever chosen in a draft. As of 2013, no players from the draft have been elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame, though several players made the honorary MLB All-Star Game in their careers. (Full list...)
June 6
Most national anthems are either marches or hymns in style. The first national anthem to be composed was the Dutch national anthem "Wilhelmus", which was written between 1568 and 1572. The first anthem to be officially adopted as such was the Spanish anthem "Marcha Real" in 1770. The French anthem "La Marseillaise" (first performance pictured) was written soon after in 1792 and adopted in 1795. National anthems are usually written in the most common language of the state, whether de facto or official. For example, India's anthem "Jana Gana Mana" is written in a Sanskritized version of Bengali, and Sanskrit and Bengali are both official languages of India. The New Zealand national anthem "God Defend New Zealand" is traditionally sung with the first verse in Māori and the second in English. South Africa's national anthem is unique in that five of the eleven official languages are used in the same anthem, in which each language comprises a stanza. (Full list...)
June 9
Fifty-nine companies have been acquired by Apple Inc. (logo pictured), an American multinational corporation with a focus on designing and manufacturing consumer electronics and software products. Apple has also purchased a stake in two companies. Apple's business philosophy is to acquire small companies that can be easily integrated into existing company projects. For example, Apple acquired Emagic and its professional music software, Logic Pro, in 2002. The acquisition led to the creation of the digital audio workstation software GarageBand, now part of the iLife software suite. The company made its first acquisition on March 2, 1988 when it purchased Network Innovations. It has also made five divestments, all in the 1990s, in which parts of the company were sold to another company. The company's largest acquisition was the purchase of Beats Electronics in 2014 for US$3 billion. In 2013, Apple acquired thirteen companies, more than in any other single year thus far. Of the companies that Apple has acquired, 44 were based in the United States. (Full list...)
June 13
There are 53 municipalities of Finland in which Finnish is not the sole official language. At the local level, a municipality can officially use Finnish, Swedish, Sami languages, or some combination thereof. The Finnish language law provides for official bilingualism at the municipal level if two languages each represent at least 8% of the population, or at least 3,000 speakers. A previously bilingual municipality retains its status until the proportion falls below 6%, but a municipality can choose to retain bilingualism even if the percentage drops below 6. Of the 320 Finnish municipalities, 19 are monolingually Swedish. 30 municipalities are bilingually Finnish and Swedish; of these, 12 have a Swedish-speaking majority and 18 a Finnish-speaking one. Four municipalities have a Finnish-speaking majority and a Sami-speaking minority: Enontekiö, Inari (coat of arms pictured), Sodankylä, and Utsjoki. All four of these municipalities are located in Lapland. (Full list...)
June 16
The palms native to the Caribbean are often seen as symbolically important, appearing on the coats of arms of several Caribbean nations and on the flag of the West Indies cricket team. Most species either have a wide distribution which includes part of the Caribbean, or are endemic to the Greater Antilles. Of the islands in the Caribbean, Cuba has the most species of palm, followed by Hispaniola. The Windward and Leeward Islands have the fewest. The palm flora of Trinidad and Tobago consists primarily of species with a South American distribution. Three genera of palm are endemic to the Greater Antilles: Calyptronoma, Hemithrinax and Zombia. Although nearly ubiquitous in the region, the coconut is not native to the Caribbean. The Caribbean species in the genus Copernicia are all Greater Antillean endemics; two species are restricted to Hispaniola, while the others, such as C. glabrescens (pictured), are restricted to Cuba. (Full list...)
June 20
The CMLL World Women's Championship is the top female professional wrestling championship promoted by the Mexican lucha libre promotion Consejo Mundial de Lucha Libre (CMLL). The championship has existed since 1992 and is one of two women's championships currently recognized by CMLL; the other is the Mexican National Women's Championship. Being a professional wrestling championship, it is won via a scripted ending to a match or awarded to a wrestler because of a storyline. Bull Nakano became the first CMLL World Women's Champion after winning a 12-woman battle royal to receive the title on June 12, 1992. Marcela is the current CMLL World Women's Champion, having defeated Ayumi (pictured) on March 9, 2012. This is Marcela's third reign with the title; she is the 15th overall champion and the 11th person to hold the championship. La Amapola holds the record for the longest reign with 1,442 days. Marcela and Lady Apache have had the most reigns, with three each. (Full list...)
June 23
Indian submissions for the Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film date back to 1957. The Film Federation of India (FFI) appoints a committee to choose one entry as India's official submission to the Oscars. India's first entry, a Hindi film called Mother India, came close to winning the award, but lost to the Italian film Nights of Cabiria by one vote. As of 2013, only three films have made it to the final shortlist—the other two being Salaam Bombay! (1988) and Lagaan (2001). Since 1984, India has submitted entries for every year except 2003, when the members of the FFI decided not to send an entry as they felt no film was competent enough. Most of the submissions have been Hindi films, while Tamil films have been the next most common with eight. Three films directed by Satyajit Ray were sent to the competition, while Kamal Haasan (pictured) has starred in more films that entered the competition than any other actor. To date, 46 films have been sent by India, with the most recent entry being the Gujarati film The Good Road for the 86th Academy Awards. (Full list...)
June 27
The campaigns of the Jin–Song Wars were conducted by the Jurchen Jin dynasty and the Song dynasty in the 12th and 13th centuries. This series of conflicts began when the Jurchens declared war against the Song dynasty in November 1125. The Jin captured the provincial capital of Taiyuan and besieged the Song capital of Kaifeng. The Jurchens withdrew when the Song promised to pay an annual indemnity. As the Song dynasty weakened, the Jin armies conducted a second siege against Kaifeng. The city was captured and looted, and the Song dynasty emperor, Emperor Qinzong (pictured), was imprisoned and taken north to Manchuria as a hostage. The remainder of the Song court retreated to southern China, beginning the Southern Song period of Chinese history. A peace accord, the Treaty of Shaoxing, was negotiated and ratified in 1142. Peace between the Song and Jin was interrupted twice. Emperor Hailingwang of Jin invaded the Southern Song in 1161, while Song revanchists tried and failed to retake northern China in 1204. (Full list...)
June 30
Dozens of Square Enix companion books have been produced since 1998, when video game developer Square began to produce books that focused on artwork, developer interviews, and background information on the fictional worlds and characters in its games rather than on gameplay details. The first series of these books was the Perfect Works series, written and published by Square subsidiary DigiCube. They produced three books between 1998 and 1999 before the line was stopped in favor of the Ultimania series. This series of books is written by Studio BentStuff, which had previously written game guides for Square for Final Fantasy VII. They were published by DigiCube until the company was dissolved in 2003. Square merged with video game publisher Enix on April 1, 2003 to form Square Enix, which resumed publication of the companion books. Sometimes, multiple books have been written per game or revised editions have been published years afterwards. One of the books, Final Fantasy IX Ultimania Online, was solely published online as part of an experiment by Square Enix with online content delivery. The Ultimania series had sold over 10 million books by July 2007. (Full list...)