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Today's featured article

Specimen ballot from Lake County, Illinois

On November 3, 1964, Illinois chose all 177 members of the state's House of Representatives in a single at-large election. The government was required to draw new electoral districts before the election, each of which would choose three representatives, but both the legislative process and a special commission failed to produce a district map. As a result, the state's constitution mandated that all 177 representatives were to be elected from a statewide at-large district. The Republican Party and the Democratic Party each nominated 118 candidates to appear on the ballot (specimen pictured); voters were allowed to choose up to 177. All 118 Democratic candidates were elected, flipping the Illinois House of Representatives from its previous narrow Republican control, alongside the concurrent presidential election won by Democratic incumbent Lyndon B. Johnson in a landslide. This election is the only time in American history that a state legislative chamber has been elected at-large. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

James Davis

... that convict James Davis (pictured) escaped custody in Australia and lived with Aboriginal Australians for 13 years?
... that America's first small-size silver certificate was referred to as a Funnyback?
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... that Cate Blanchett played 13 different characters in the multi-screen film installation Manifesto?
... that Marie Marcks sarcastically caricatured gender roles like no one before, according to Jutta Limbach?
... that the tenants of a New York City apartment building protested against its owner by going to a racetrack and betting on his horse?
... that one of the last surviving women from Rapa Nui to receive traditional facial tattoos was queen consort Ana Eva Hei?
... that the Nualas' 2015 novelty song "Yes 2 Love" was created to promote a yes vote?
... that Ivan Ivan played for the Eagles and the Eagles?

In the news

Collapsed canopy

A canopy collapse (pictured) at Serbia's Novi Sad railway station kills fourteen people.
The ruins of a Maya city, dubbed Valeriana, are discovered in Campeche, Mexico.
The Botswana general election is won by the opposition Umbrella for Democratic Change.
In baseball, the Los Angeles Dodgers defeat the New York Yankees to win the World Series.

On this day...

November 3: Culture Day in Japan

Truman showing the "Dewey Defeats Truman" headline

1793 – French Revolution: Playwright, journalist and outspoken feminist Olympe de Gouges was guillotined.
1898 – The Fashoda Incident ended with French forces withdrawing after several months of military stalemate with the British in Fashoda (now in South Sudan).
1948 – The Chicago Daily Tribune published the erroneous headline "Dewey Defeats Truman" (pictured) in its early morning edition shortly after incumbent U.S. president Harry S. Truman officially upset the heavily favored governor of New York Thomas Dewey in the presidential election.
1957 – The Soviet Union launched Sputnik 2, carrying the space dog Laika as the first living creature to enter orbit around Earth.

Achilles Gasser (b. 1505)
Kinjirō Ashiwara (b. 1850)
Bangalore Nagarathnamma (b. 1878)
Ronald Barnes (d. 1997)

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Today's featured media

The coconut (Cocos nucifera) is a member of the palm tree family, Arecaceae. Originally native to the Central Indo-Pacific, in the regions of Maritime Southeast Asia and Melanesia, coconuts are now found across the world due to human cultivation and dispersal. They are normally cultivated in hot and wet tropical climates. The term coconut also commonly refers to the seed and fruit of the coconut tree, which is botanically a drupe. The fruit has three layers including an edible white, fleshy endosperm and is filled with a liquid known as coconut water. The coconut thus played a critical role in the migration of Austronesian peoples across the Indian Ocean, as it provided a portable source of both food and water for long sea voyages. In modern times coconuts are used extensively in cooking and cuisine, using the raw flesh, the water or in alternative forms such as coconut milk and coconut butter. These coconuts, one whole and one halved, were grown in the Dominican Republic; this photograph was focus-stacked from 19 separate images.

Photograph credit: Ivar Leidus