Wikipedia:Main Page history/2018 December 9

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From today's featured article

Brachiosaurus (from Greek for "arm lizard") was a sauropod dinosaur that lived in what is now North America during the Late Jurassic, about 154–153 million years ago. The genus was first described by American paleontologist Elmer S. Riggs in 1903 from fossils found in the Colorado River valley in western Colorado. Only a few other specimens of Brachiosaurus are known to exist, making it one of the rarer sauropods of the Morrison Formation. It was probably between 18 and 21 meters (59 and 69 ft) long; weight estimates range from 28.3 to 58 metric tons (31.2 to 63.9 short tons). Like other sauropods, it was a large dinosaur with a long neck and small skull; atypically, it had longer forelimbs than hindlimbs, a steeply inclined trunk, and a proportionally shorter tail. It was a high browser, possibly cropping or nipping vegetation up to 9 meters (30 ft) off the ground. Brachiosaurus appeared in the 1993 film Jurassic Park. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

Fulton

... that the French submarine Fulton (pictured) was named after Robert Fulton, the American inventor of the first commercially successful steamboat?
... that U.S. Representative-elect Antonio Delgado once released a rap album?
... that the sea anemone Mesacmaea mitchellii uses the base of its column to burrow into the sediment?
... that 16-year-old artistic gymnast Ana Padurariu won silver on beam at her first senior world championships, becoming the second-ever Canadian world medalist on the apparatus?
... that the perpetrator of the 2018 Tallahassee shooting identified with the involuntary celibate community and denounced interracial dating?
... that Prince Nyi Kan-Kaung helped his half-brother Binnya Nwe seize the throne of Hanthawaddy Pegu, only to be executed by him four years later?
... that "temporary" bridges have provided a road crossing of the River Trent at Walton-on-Trent, England, for more than 70 years?
... that Buzz Aldrin's father, Edwin Eugene Aldrin Sr., married Marion G. Moon?

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 9

The first computer mouse

1688 – In the only substantial military action in England during the Glorious Revolution, forces loyal to William of Orange were decisively victorious in the Battle of Reading.
1892 – The English association football club Newcastle United was founded by the merger of Newcastle East End and Newcastle West End.
1948 – The United Nations General Assembly adopted the Genocide Convention, which defines genocide in legal terms and advises its signatories to prevent and punish such actions.
1968 – Douglas Engelbart gave what became known as "The Mother of All Demos", publicly debuting the computer mouse (pictured), hypertext, and the bit-mapped graphical user interface using the oN-Line System (NLS).
2008 – Governor of Illinois Rod Blagojevich was arrested for a number of corruption crimes, including attempting to sell the U.S. Senate seat that was being vacated by then-President-elect Barack Obama.

Nasr ibn Sayyar (d. 748) · Fritz Haber (b. 1868) · Lilias Armstrong (d. 1937)

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Today's featured picture

The $100 bill is a banknote of the United States dollar. It has been the highest-value bill circulated since 1969, when the $500, $1,000, $5,000, and $10,000 bills were retired. The first $100 United States Note was issued in 1862 and the Federal Reserve Note version was launched in 1914, alongside other denominations. The obverse of the bill has featured the image of US founding father Benjamin Franklin since 1914, while the reverse has shown the Independence Hall in Philadelphia since 1928.

This picture shows a 1934 Gold Certificate with signatures of US Treasurer W. A. Julian and Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau Jr..

Banknote: Bureau of Engraving and Printing

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