Wikipedia:Main Page history/2018 January 15

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From today's featured article

Ankylosaurus was an armored dinosaur that lived roughly 67 million years ago, at the very end of the Cretaceous Period. This genus was among the last of the non-avian dinosaurs, living alongside Tyrannosaurus, Triceratops, and Edmontosaurus. Its name means "fused lizard"; bones in its skull and other parts of its body were fused, increasing their strength. Ankylosaurus was up to 6.25 m (20.5 feet) long and 1.7 m (5.6 feet) tall, weighing about 4.8–8 tonnes (11,000–18,000 lb). It had a broad, robust body with a wide, low skull. The front parts of the jaws were covered in a beak, with rows of small, leaf-shaped teeth behind it, adapted for a herbivorous diet. It was covered in armor plates for protection against predators, with bony half-rings covering the neck, and had a large club on the end of its tail which may have been used as a weapon. Fossils from a few specimens of Ankylosaurus have been found in various geological formations in western North America, but a complete skeleton has not been discovered. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

Left panel of Baegert's altar

... that the high altar in the Propsteikirche, created by Derick Baegert, includes the oldest depiction of Dortmund on its left panel (pictured)?
... that Didier Drogba scored twice for the Ivory Coast in a match which was abandoned after fans rioted, throwing food and drinks onto the pitch?
... that the Orchard Pond Parkway is Florida's first privately-built toll road?
... that the Han scholar Gao You—responsible for the present editions of the Huainanzi—had to quit school owing to the Yellow Turban Rebellion?
... that the British government's Construction 2025 industrial strategy sought to reduce whole-life greenhouse gas emissions from the built environment to half of 2013 levels by 2025?
... that the Japanese singer Asaka spent part of her childhood in Michigan?
... that approximately 160,000 birds across twenty-two different species nest and breed on the Pearl and Hermes Atoll of the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands?
... that a 1942 letter addressed to "the blonde Wren from Argentina on the platform at Bletchley station" led to marriage in 1945?

In the news

Steve Smith

The oil tanker MV Sanchi sinks with the loss of all 32 crew eight days after colliding with another ship.
At least 18 people are killed after mudflows strike the area of Montecito, California, in the area affected by the recent Thomas Fire.
In cricket, the Ashes series concludes with Australia (captain and man of the series Steve Smith pictured) beating England.
The National Unity Party wins the most seats in the parliamentary election in Northern Cyprus.
A passenger train collides with a truck on a level crossing near Kroonstad, South Africa, killing 19 people and injuring more than 250 others.

On this day...

January 15: Mattu Pongal (Tamils, 2018); John Chilembwe Day in Malawi; Martin Luther King Jr. Day in the United States (2018)

Wilson Bentley takes a snowflake photograph.

1885 – American photographer Wilson Bentley took the first known photograph of a snowflake by attaching a bellows camera to a microscope (process pictured).
1934 – At least 10,700 people died when an 8.0 magnitude earthquake struck Nepal and the Indian state of Bihar.
1951 – Ilse Koch, the wife of the commandant of the Buchenwald and Majdanek concentration camps, was sentenced to life imprisonment by a West German court.
1962 – The Derveni papyrus, which dates to 340 BC, making it the oldest surviving manuscript in Europe, was discovered in Macedonia, northern Greece.
1975 – Portugal signed the Alvor Agreement with UNITA, the MPLA, and the FNLA, ending the Angolan War of Independence.

Wang Jingchong (d. 950) · Marjorie Fleming (b. 1803) · Millie Knight (b. 1999)

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From today's featured list

M. G. Ramachandran

M. G. Ramachandran was well known for his career in Tamil language films. After starring in numerous commercially successful films from the 1950s to the early 1970s, he has continued to hold a matinée idol status in Tamil Nadu. Ramachandran made his debut in Ellis R. Dungan's 1936 film Sathi Leelavathi. In the 1950s, he established himself as an action hero akin to Errol Flynn and Douglas Fairbanks in Tamil cinema with Manthiri Kumari (1950), Marmayogi (1951), Malaikkallan (1954) and Nadodi Mannan (1958). All of these films had political undertones which earned Ramachandran a Robin Hood persona of being a champion for the downtrodden. The films he appeared in during the 1960s such as Enga Veettu Pillai (1965), Aayirathil Oruvan (1965) and Adimaippenn (1969) played a crucial part in his subsequent career as a politician. In 1971, Ramachandran received the National Film Award for Best Actor for his role as a cycle rickshaw driver in Rickshawkaran, making it the first film and him the first actor from South Indian cinema to win the award. Ramachandran retired from filmmaking in 1978 to take up his duties as the Chief Minister of Tamil Nadu. (Full list...)

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Kadavar are a rock band from Berlin, Germany, founded in 2010. Their retro sound, incorporating psychedelic rock and stoner rock, has been compared to bands of the 1970s hard rock/heavy metal era. Kadavar currently consists of three members: guitarist and lead vocalist Christoph "Lupus" Lindemann, drummer Christoph "Tiger" Bartelt, and bassist Simon "Dragon" Bouteloup.

Photograph: Henry W. Laurisch

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