Wikipedia:Main Page history/2018 December 7

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From today's featured article

Other Worlds, Universe Science Fiction, and Science Stories were three related American magazines edited by Raymond A. Palmer. As both publisher and editor of Other Worlds (1949–1953, 1955–1957), he presented a wide array of science fiction, including "Enchanted Village" by A. E. van Vogt and "Way in the Middle of the Air", later included in Ray Bradbury's The Martian Chronicles. Science Stories (1953–1955) was visually attractive but contained no memorable fiction. Universe Science Fiction (also 1953–1955) was more drab but included some well-received stories, such as Theodore Sturgeon's "The World Well Lost", which examined homosexuality, a controversial topic for the time. The second incarnation of Other Worlds ran Marion Zimmer Bradley's first novel, Falcons of Narabedla, but was otherwise less successful. In 1957 Palmer changed the focus of the magazine to UFOs, retitling it Flying Saucers from Other Worlds. No more fiction appeared in it after the September 1957 issue. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

The Purple Noon's Transparent Might

... that Arthur Streeton's 1896 painting 'The purple noon's transparent might' won critical acclaim at the 1898 Exhibition of Australian Art in London?
... that Toshio Hosokawa composed several operas based on Japanese Noh theatre, including Vision of Lear after Shakespeare?
... that mathematicians disagree about whether a proof in Georg Cantor's first set theory article actually shows how to construct a transcendental number, or merely proves that such numbers exist?
... that Karel František Koch was blamed by some Jews for the death of the chief rabbi of Slovakia, despite his having rescued Jews during the Holocaust?
... that seven of eight major bridges on Washington State Route 504 were destroyed by a lahar during the 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens?
... that Wang Enduo survived breast cancer to become an academician of both the Chinese Academy of Sciences and The World Academy of Sciences?
... that 79 years after Herbert Maryon and Joseph Alderson discovered one of Britain's earliest known metal objects in the Kirkhaugh cairns, a group including Alderson's great-grandsons discovered another?
... that Tracy LaQuey Parker received more than 5,000 emails over two days in 1997 because of spoofing?

In the news

Asteroid 101955 Bennu

The sample-return spacecraft OSIRIS-REx arrives at the asteroid 101955 Bennu (pictured).
Former U.S. President George H. W. Bush dies at the age of 94.
Magnus Carlsen defeats Fabiano Caruana to retain the World Chess Championship.
NASA's InSight successfully lands on Mars.
Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko declares martial law after Russian forces seize three ships in the disputed Kerch Strait near Crimea.

On this day

December 7: Armed Forces Flag Day in India; Pearl Harbor Day in the United States

HMS Spiteful

43 BC – Cicero, widely considered one of Rome's greatest orators and prose stylists, was killed after having been proscribed as an enemy of the state.
1904 – Comparative trials began between HMS Spiteful (pictured), the first warship powered solely by fuel oil, and a similar Royal Navy ship burning coal.
1936 – Australian cricketer Jack Fingleton became the first player to score centuries in four consecutive Test innings.
1988 – A 6.8 M_s earthquake struck the Spitak region of Armenia, killing at least 25,000 people.
1993 – A passenger murdered six people and injured nineteen others on the Long Island Rail Road in Garden City, New York.

Richard Bellingham (d. 1672) · Hamilton Fish III (b. 1888) · Barbara Howard (d. 2002)

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From today's featured list

Meghan Trainor

American singer-songwriter Meghan Trainor has received several awards and nominations for her work in music. She signed a record deal with Epic Records in 2014 and released her debut single "All About That Bass", which earned her Grammy nominations for Record of the Year and Song of the Year. It also received an ASCAP Pop Music Award and Billboard Music Awards for both Top Hot 100 Song and Top Digital Song. Trainor's follow-up single, "Lips Are Movin", earned her a nomination for Choice Break-Up Song at the Teen Choice Awards. Trainor released her major-label debut album, Title, in 2015. It won Favorite Album at the 42nd People's Choice Awards. In 2016, Trainor won the Grammy Award for Best New Artist and received a nomination for the Brit Award for International Female Solo Artist. Trainor has received two nominations at the Hollywood Music in Media Awards for her soundtrack songs "Better When I'm Dancin'" and "I'm a Lady". Her second major-label studio album, Thank You, was preceded by its lead single "No", which earned a nomination for Favorite Song at the 43rd People's Choice Awards. (Full list...)

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Today's featured picture

Camelopardalis is a large but faint constellation of the northern sky. Introduced in 1612 or 1613 by Petrus Plancius, it represents a giraffe. The brightest stars in Camelopardalis are β Cam, a double star 1,000 light-years from Earth with apparent magnitude 4.03; CS Cam, a 4.21-magnitude variable star; and α Cam, a blue-hued supergiant star of magnitude 4.3. At 5,000 light-years from Earth, α Cam is one of the most distant stars easily visible with the naked eye. The constellation is located in the part of the celestial sphere facing away from the galactic plane, which means it has many distant galaxies visible within its borders. This includes the NGC 2403 galaxy in the M81 Group, located approximately 12 million light-years from Earth.

This illustration was produced in around 1823 and comes from Urania's Mirror, a set of 32 astronomical star chart cards. Above the giraffe are the now-abandoned constellations of Tarandus and Custos Messium.

Lithograph: Sidney Hall. Restoration: Adam Cuerden.

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