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From today's featured article

SS Minnesotan was a cargo ship built in 1912 for the American-Hawaiian Steamship Company. During World War I, she was known as USAT Minnesotan in service for the U.S. Army and USS Minnesotan (ID-4545) in service for the U.S. Navy. She was built as one of eight sister ships, and employed in inter-coastal service via the Isthmus of Tehuantepec and the Panama Canal. In World War I, Minnesotan carried cargo and animals to France from September 1917. After the Armistice, she returned over 8,000 American troops. In 1919, Minnesotan resumed inter-coastal cargo service. During World War II, the ship was requisitioned by the War Shipping Administration and initially sailed between New York and Caribbean ports. In the latter half of 1943, Minnesotan sailed between Indian Ocean ports, and the following year between ports in New York and the United Kingdom, before returning to the Caribbean. In 1949, Minnesotan was sold to Italian owners, who renamed her Maria Luisa R. She was scrapped in 1952 at Bari. (Full article...)

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Did you know ...

Charles Nolte as Billy Budd

... that Robert Chapman and Louis O. Coxe's play Billy Budd (title role pictured), adapted from a novella by Herman Melville, won the Donaldson Award and the Outer Critics Circle Award for Best Play in 1951?
... that on June 8, 1826, rioters destroyed William Lyon Mackenzie's printing press in the Types Riot?
... that Anisomeles malabarica plants are defended from unwanted foragers by carpenter bees?
... that geographer Hildegard Binder Johnson fled Third Reich Germany after the Nazi Party destroyed her scientific paper criticizing the development of European colonies in Africa?
... that the Sherwood Studio Building was characterized in 1892 as New York City's "uptown headquarters of Art", with many of its tenants having studied art together?
... that one airline has flown more than 5,600 preighter flights, carrying cargo in place of passengers?
... that Sonny Bloch invested $500,000 in improvements to Connecticut radio station WCNX, only to be unable to complete the purchase after he was arrested on federal fraud charges?
... that Kühkopf-Knoblochsaue is a large Naturschutzgebiet in Hesse, Germany, protecting the ecology of the floodplains where the Rhine formerly meandered?

In the news

Abdirahman Mohamed Abdullahi

Using information obtained from a compromised encrypted device network, an international sting operation results in hundreds of arrests and the seizure of several tons of illegal drugs.
Two trains collide in Sindh, Pakistan, killing at least 63 people.
Waddani, led by Abdirahman Mohamed Abdullahi (pictured), wins the most seats in the Somaliland parliamentary election.
At least 174 people are killed in attacks on two villages in Yagha Province, Burkina Faso.

On this day

June 8

Police activity in the aftermath of the Akihabara massacre

218 – Led by the inexperienced Gannys, Elagabalus's legions defeated the forces of Roman emperor Macrinus at the Battle of Antioch.
1783 – Laki, a volcanic fissure in Iceland, began an eight-month eruption, triggering a major famine and causing massive fluoride poisoning.
1941 – World War II: The Allies commenced the Syria–Lebanon campaign against Vichy French possessions in the Levant.
1953 – An F5 tornado struck Flint and Beecher, Michigan, causing 116 fatalities, 844 injuries and $19 million in damage during a larger tornado outbreak sequence.
2008 – A Japanese man drove a truck into a crowd of pedestrians in Akihabara, Tokyo, and proceeded to stab at least 12 people before being apprehended (police activity pictured).

George I Rákóczi (b. 1593)
Charlotte Scott (b. 1858)
Bonnie Tyler (b. 1951)

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Today's featured picture

Lucy Arbell (8 June 1878 – 21 May 1947), was a French mezzo-soprano whose operatic career was largely centred in Paris. Her career was particularly associated with the composer Jules Massenet, who created a number of operatic roles for her before his death in 1912. This carte de visite of Arbell was created by the French photographer Nadar.

Photograph credit: Nadar; restored by Adam Cuerden

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