Wikipedia:Main Page history/2017 January 20

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From today's featured article

The impala (Aepyceros melampus) is a medium-sized antelope in eastern and southern Africa. First described by German zoologist Hinrich Lichtenstein in 1812, it reaches 70–92 centimetres (28–36 inches) at the shoulder, weighs 40–76 kilograms (88–168 pounds), and has a glossy, reddish brown coat. The male's slender, lyre-shaped horns can reach 45–92 centimetres (18–36 in), measured along the curve. Active mainly during the day, the impala may be gregarious or territorial. Three distinct social groups can be observed – the territorial males, bachelor herds and female herds. Browsers as well as grazers, impala feed on monocots, dicots, forbs, fruits and acacia pods. An annual, three-week-long rut takes place toward the end of the wet season, typically in May, and gestation lasts six to seven months. Calves are suckled for four to six months. The impala is found close to water, in woodlands and sometimes at the interface between woodlands and savannahs. The common impala is widespread across its range and has been reintroduced in Gabon and southern Africa, but the black-faced subspecies has been classified as a vulnerable species. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

Fissure at Þingvellir

... that the geological deformation of Iceland is resulting in cracks opening up in the surface (example pictured)?
... that quarterback Sam Darnold's high school footage submitted to college football coaches consisted of his basketball highlights?
... that Radio Universidad Autónoma de Guerrero has broadcast since 1982 but has never been recognized at the federal level?
... that Kamran Aziz is the first Turkish Cypriot female composer, as well as one of the first Turkish Cypriot female pharmacists?
... that a recent United States Supreme Court case began when insurance adjusters claimed they were instructed to falsely categorize damages after Hurricane Katrina?
... that in 1999, Rajeev Nayyar set the record for the longest first-class cricket innings, batting for almost 17 hours?
... that Giant Days was published by BOOM! Box after writer John Allison saved a BOOM! editor from falling?

In the news

The Plasco Building

At least 20 firefighters are killed and more than 70 other people injured after the collapse of Tehran's Plasco Building (pictured) due to a high-rise fire.
A suicide bombing at a military camp near Gao, Mali, kills at least 77 people.
NASA, NOAA and the Met Office announce that anthropogenic climate change caused 2016 to be the warmest year on record.
U.S. president Barack Obama commutes the sentence of Chelsea Manning, who will now be released in May 2017, instead of 2045.
An airstrike in Rann, Nigeria, kills more than 50 civilians after a refugee camp is mistaken for a Boko Haram encampment.

On this day...

January 20: Martyrs' Day in Azerbaijan (1990)

Soviet Pole of Inaccessbility station, Antarctica

250 – Pope Fabian was martyred during a widespread persecution of Christians for refusing to demonstrate loyalty to the Roman Empire.
1877 – The Constantinople Conference concluded with the Great Powers declaring the need for political reforms that the Ottoman Empire refused to undertake, which later led to the Russo-Turkish War.
1942 – The Holocaust: SS-Obergruppenführer Reinhard Heydrich and other senior Nazi officials met at the Wannsee Conference in the Berlin suburb of Wannsee to discuss implementation of the "Final Solution to the Jewish Question".
1969 – Bengali student activist Amanullah Asaduzzaman was shot and killed by East Pakistani police, one of the catalysts that led to the Bangladesh Liberation War.
2007 – A four-man team, using only skis and kites, completed a 1,093-mile (1,759 km) trek to reach the southern pole of inaccessibility (pictured) for the first time since 1967, and for the first time ever without mechanical assistance.

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From today's featured list

Rickmansworth Aquadrome

Forty-two Local Nature Reserves (LNRs) in Hertfordshire have been reported to Natural England. Hertfordshire is a county in eastern England. It is bordered by Bedfordshire to the north, Cambridgeshire to the north-east, Essex to the east, Buckinghamshire to the west and Greater London to the south. The county town is Hertford. LNRs are designated by local authorities under the National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act 1949. The local authority must have a legal control over the site, by owning or leasing it or having an agreement with the owner. LNRs are sites which have a special local interest either biologically or geologically, and local authorities have a duty to care for them. The largest site in Hertfordshire is Therfield Heath with 147.3 hectares (364 acres). It has some of the richest chalk grassland in England, and it is also a Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI). The smallest is Oxleys Wood in Hatfield, which has an area of only 1.2 hectares (3.0 acres). This wood often floods, and it provides a habitat for a wide range of insects and birds. (Full list...)

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Robert E. Lee (1807–1870) was an American general known for commanding the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia in the American Civil War from 1862 until his surrender in 1865. Lee was a top graduate of the United States Military Academy and an exceptional officer and military engineer in the United States Army for 32 years. When Virginia seceded from the Union in April 1861, Lee followed his home state. After a year as senior military adviser to President Jefferson Davis, Lee took command of the main field army in 1862 and soon emerged as a shrewd tactician and battlefield commander. After the war, Lee supported President Andrew Johnson's program of Reconstruction and intersectional friendship.

Photograph: Levin Corbin Handy; restoration: Adam Cuerden

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