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From today's featured article

The Chickasaw Turnpike is a short two-lane toll road in the rural south central region of the U.S. state of Oklahoma. It stretches for 13.3 miles (21.4 km) from north of Sulphur to just south of Ada, running southwest-to-northeast through Murray and Pontotoc counties. The first section opened in 1991. The Oklahoma Turnpike Authority owns, maintains, and collects tolls on most of it; a four-mile (6.4 km) segment was transferred to the Oklahoma Department of Transportation in 2011. Originally it was part of a plan to link Ada to the Interstate system and connect southern and eastern Oklahoma with a longer turnpike. It was proposed at the same time as three other turnpikes, which would become the Kilpatrick Turnpike in Oklahoma City, the Creek Turnpike in Tulsa, and the Cherokee Turnpike in eastern Oklahoma. Rural legislators objected to the Kilpatrick and Creek Turnpikes, and moved to block them unless the Chickasaw Turnpike was built. Lightly traveled, the road is used by about 2,000 vehicles per day. It is the only two-lane turnpike in Oklahoma. (Full article...)

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In the news

Sidney Crosby

British Member of Parliament Jo Cox dies after being shot and stabbed in Birstall, West Yorkshire.
In association football, fan violence at UEFA Euro 2016 results in arrests and deportation of fans, and a €150,000 fine and suspended disqualification for the Russian team.
Microsoft announces its $26.2-billion acquisition of the professional networking site LinkedIn.
A shooting at a gay nightclub in Orlando, Florida, kills 49 people.
In ice hockey, the Pittsburgh Penguins defeat the San Jose Sharks to win the Stanley Cup (Conn Smythe Trophy winner Sidney Crosby pictured).

Ongoing events
Recent deaths:
- Robert T. Paine
- Christina Grimmie

On this day...

June 18

Cavalry charge, Battle of Waterloo

860 – A fleet of about 200 Rus' vessels sailed into the Bosporus and started pillaging the suburbs of Constantinople.
1815 – War of the Seventh Coalition: Napoleon Bonaparte fought and lost his final battle, the Battle of Waterloo (pictured) in present-day Belgium.
1953 – A Douglas C-124 Globemaster II aircraft crashed just after takeoff from Tachikawa, Japan, killing all 129 people on board.
1983 – Iranian teenager Mona Mahmudnizhad and nine other women were hanged because of their membership in the Bahá'í Faith.
2009 – NASA launched the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, its first mission to the moon in over ten years.

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Today's featured picture

Charles I in Three Positions is an oil painting of Charles I of England by Flemish artist Anthony Van Dyck. It depicts the King from three viewpoints: left full profile, face on, and right three quarter profile. Painted in 1635 or 1636, it was sent to Rome in 1636 to be used as a reference work for the Italian sculptor Gian Lorenzo Bernini's marble bust of Charles I. Widely copied, the original stayed with Bernini and his heirs until c. 1802, when it was sold to British art dealer William Buchanan and returned to England. The painting was acquired for the Royal Collection in 1822, and is usually displayed at Windsor Castle.

Painting: Anthony van Dyck

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