Wikipedia:Main Page history/2020 May 16

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From today's featured article

Historical markers at Anahuac, Texas

Juan Davis Bradburn (1787–1842) was a brigadier general in the Mexican Army. His actions as commandant of the garrison at Anahuac (historical markers pictured) in Mexican Texas in 1831 and 1832 led to the events known as the Anahuac Disturbances. Born in the United States, he became an officer in the Mexican Army in 1821. In 1830, he established a new military and customs post at Anahuac in Texas. The local settlers resented Bradburn's efforts to withhold land titles from those who had dubious ownership, his attempts to enforce previously ignored customs laws, and his refusal to return fugitive slaves. A large force of Texians marched on Anahuac to secure the release of arrested settlers who had been denied protections offered by the United States Bill of Rights, even though these rights were not guaranteed in Mexico. The confrontation forced Bradburn's expulsion from Texas and encouraged further armed action against Mexican soldiers. (Full article...)

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Did you know ...

Wigwag flags and torches

... that an officer continued to send wigwag flag signals (example flags pictured) with a bedsheet after the flagman retreated during Pickett's Charge in 1863?
... that Richard Grenfell Thomas and Isabel Bear scientifically described the smell of rain, for which Thomas coined the term "petrichor"?
... that Taunton bus station, built in the 1950s, was described as "a rare survivor" just five years before it was closed?
... that German war criminal Hans Walter Zech-Nenntwich gave a television interview after escaping from prison?
... that Travis Scott's guest appearance in Jay Electronica's song "The Blinding" has been described as "a cynical attempt to attract younger listeners"?
... that Miller's langur, one of the rarest primates in Borneo, was feared to be extinct until a 2012 study rediscovered it in an area where it was previously unknown?
... that feminist Mary Stuart Smith publicly admonished the aristocracy of Virginia in 1893 for their failure to recognize the talent of native artists?
... that the State Emblem of India was embossed on the wheels of the Chandrayaan-2 mission's lunar rover to leave behind patterned tracks on the lunar surface?

In the news

COVID-19 pandemic

Iranian frigate Jamaran

The Iranian Navy frigate Jamaran (pictured) accidentally strikes the support vessel Konarak with a missile, killing nineteen sailors.
A gas leak in Andhra Pradesh, India, kills thirteen people and injures over a thousand others.
Astronomers announce the discovery of the first black hole located in a star system visible to the naked eye.

On this day

May 16: Night of Decree (Shia Islam, 2020)

Theodore Maiman with his laser

1811 – Peninsular War: Allied British, Spanish, and Portuguese forces clashed with French troops at the Battle of Albuera south of Badajoz, Spain.
1866 – The United States Congress authorized the minting of the Shield nickel, the country's first five-cent piece to be made of a copper–nickel alloy.
1943 – Second World War: The Royal Air Force's "Dambusters" squadron embarked on an attack on German dams using bouncing bombs designed by Barnes Wallis.
1960 – American physicist Theodore Maiman (pictured) operated the first working laser at Hughes Research Laboratories in Malibu, California.
2014 – At least 12 people were killed and 70 others injured when two bombs exploded in a market in Nairobi, Kenya.

Pietro da Cortona (d. 1669)
Margaret Fountaine (b. 1862)
Anna Costanza Baldry (b. 1970)

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Today's featured picture

Tephra is unconsolidated pyroclastic material produced by a volcanic eruption. The particles are formed by magma and fragments of rock; they vary in size and composition, and form layers of material when they land. On the ground, tephra can be transported by water and in time consolidates to form a soft rock known as tuff.

This picture shows a 6-foot-high (1.8 m) boulder of tephra photographed on the beach near Brown Bluff, a volcano on the Antarctic Peninsula that formed in the past million years when it erupted under a glacier. The larger, dark-coloured particles are fragments of alkali basalt, which are embedded in layers formed from volcanic ash.

Photograph credit: Andrew Shiva

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