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From today's featured article

Robert Christgau

Christgau's Record Guide: Rock Albums of the Seventies is a music reference book by American music journalist and essayist Robert Christgau (pictured). It was first published in October 1981 by Ticknor & Fields. Covering a variety of genres with a focus on rock music, the book compiles approximately 3,000 capsule album reviews, most of which were originally written for his "Consumer Guide" column in The Village Voice throughout the 1970s. Many of the older reviews were rewritten for the guide to reflect his matured perspective and style, informed by an interest in the aesthetic and political dimensions of popular music and a desire to communicate his ideas to readers in an entertaining, provocative way. The guide was critically well received, with praise given for its extensive discography, Christgau's judgment, and colorful writing. A staple of rock-era reference works, it became a source for popular music studies and a guide for fellow critics, record collectors, and music shops. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

Sher Mandal

... that Mughal emperor Humayun died after falling down the stairs of his library, Sher Mandal (pictured)?
... that French sinologist Claude Cadart and his wife Cheng Yingxiang published the memoirs of her father Peng Shuzhi, a Trotskyist leader expelled from the Communist Party of China?
... that both Mueller and Barr can be found in Lincoln, Nebraska?
... that Sandy Schreier's clothing collection includes three Valentino outfits owned by Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis?
... that the 1826 Canary Islands storm claimed 298 victims on Tenerife and may have been a tropical cyclone?
... that Ernst Christoph Dressler, an 18th-century operatic tenor, violinist, composer, and music theorist, composed a march on which Beethoven based his earliest published work?
... that every week Cincinnati's La Soupe turns 5,000 lb (2,300 kg) of rescued food into 3,000 meals for people in need with the help of sixty local chef volunteers?
... that every Garden of Eden contains an orphan?

In the news

Mohamed Morsi

At least 184 people are killed by a heat wave in India.
Former President of Egypt Mohamed Morsi (pictured) dies during his trial, at the age of 67.
An outbreak of acute encephalitis in Bihar, India, results in the deaths of more than 100 children.
A power outage affects Argentina, Uruguay and parts of Paraguay.
In golf, Gary Woodland wins the U.S. Open at Pebble Beach.

On this day

June 23: Grand Duke's Official Birthday in Luxembourg

Stand Watie

1280 – Reconquista: Troops of the Emirate of Granada defeated those of the Kingdom of Castile and the Kingdom of León in the Battle of Moclín.
1865 – Stand Watie (pictured) became the last Confederate general to surrender in the American Civil War.
1926 – The College Board administered the first SAT, a major standardized test for university and college admissions in the United States.
1985 – A bomb attributed to the Sikh separatist group Babbar Khalsa destroyed Air India Flight 182 above the Atlantic Ocean, killing all 329 on board.
2016 – Citizens of the United Kingdom voted to support a non-binding resolution to leave the European Union.

Richard W. Meade (b. 1778) · Verena Holmes (b. 1889) · Sanjay Gandhi (d. 1980)

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Today's featured picture

Marie Leszczyńska (23 June 1703 – 24 June 1768) was a Polish noblewoman and French queen consort. The daughter of King Stanisław I Leszczyński of Poland and Catherine Opalińska, she married King Louis XV of France in 1725 and became queen consort of France, serving in that role for 42 years until her death, the longest of any French queen. Marie was popular due to her generosity and piety. She was the grandmother of future French kings Louis XVI, Louis XVIII and Charles X.

This picture is an oil-on-canvas portrait of Marie by French painter Charles-André van Loo, commissioned by Louis XV in 1747. She is depicted wearing the Sancy diamond, part of the French Crown Jewels. The painting now hangs in the Palace of Versailles.

Painting credit: Charles-André van Loo

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