Wikipedia:Main Page history/2018 January 3

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From today's featured article

The red-backed fairywren (Malurus melanocephalus) is a species in the Australasian wren family, Maluridae. It is endemic to Australia and can be found near rivers and coastal areas along the northern and eastern coastlines from the Kimberley in the northwest to the Hunter Region in New South Wales. Most males adopt a striking breeding plumage, with brown wings, a brightly coloured red back, and a black head, upperparts and tail. Females, juveniles, and some males have brownish upperparts and paler underparts. The species mainly eats insects, and supplements its diet with seed and small fruits. The preferred habitat is heathland and savannah, particularly where low shrubs and tall grasses provide cover. A group consists of a socially monogamous pair with one or more grown offspring who assist in raising the young. The red-backed fairywren is sexually promiscuous, and each partner may mate with other individuals. As part of a courtship display, the male wren plucks red petals from flowers and displays them to females. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

Shu Xiuwen on the cover of The Screen Pictorial

... that Shu Xiuwen (pictured) became an escort dancing girl after her father tried to sell her to repay debts, but later supported him when she became a movie star?
... that the Radioplane OQ-17 target drone was claimed to be able to match the maneuverability of any fighter aircraft of the mid-1940s?
... that Eugénie Henderson taught Far Eastern languages to the British Armed Forces during World War II?
... that a collaborative practice agreement, which allows a pharmacist to prescribe medications, order drug therapy-related laboratory tests, and design therapy plans, can improve people's health?
... that the dramatic soprano Catherine Foster, a former midwife, appeared as Brünnhilde at the Bayreuth Festival celebrating Wagner's bicentenary?
... that in a legacy game, players may be instructed to destroy physical components?
... that Jordan Murphy was the first basketball player to earn Big Ten Conference Player of the Week three weeks in a row since Evan Turner did so eight seasons earlier?
... that underwater thumps and moans in a West African swamp may indicate the presence of certain air-breathing fish?

In the news

Rob Cross

In darts, Rob Cross (pictured) wins the PDC World Championship on his debut.
George Weah is elected President of Liberia.
Peruvian President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski pardons jailed ex-president Alberto Fujimori.
Typhoon Tembin sweeps through the southern Philippines, killing more than two hundred people and leaving dozens of others missing.
HMAS AE1, a Royal Australian Navy submarine lost at sea in 1914, is located off the Duke of York Islands.

On this day...

January 3

Battle of Princeton by John Trumbull

1749 – The first issue of Berlingske, Denmark's oldest continually operating newspaper, was published.
1777 – American Revolutionary War: American forces under General George Washington defeated British troops at the Battle of Princeton (pictured).
1919 – Emir Faisal of Iraq signed an agreement with Zionist leader Chaim Weizmann on the development of a Jewish homeland in Palestine and an Arab nation in a large part of the Middle East.
1976 – The multilateral International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, part of the International Bill of Human Rights, came into effect.
1990 – United States invasion of Panama: General Manuel Noriega, the deposed "strongman of Panama", surrendered to American forces.

George Monck, 1st Duke of Albemarle (d. 1670) · Clement Attlee (b. 1883) · Lynn Hill (b. 1961)

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Today's featured picture

Brompton Oratory is a large neo-classical Roman Catholic church in Brompton, London. Dedicated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary and designed by Herbert Gribble, it was completed in 1884 and remained the largest Roman Catholic church in London until the opening of Westminster Cathedral. It was designated a Grade II* listed building in 1969.

Photograph: David Iliff

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