Wikipedia:Main Page history/2021 February 6

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From today's featured article

Robert Goff, Baron Goff of Chieveley (1926–2016) was an English barrister and judge. He was the original co-author of Goff & Jones, the leading English law textbook on restitution and unjust enrichment, first published in 1966. He practised as a commercial barrister from 1951 to 1975, and then began his career as a judge. He was appointed to the Judicial Committee of the House of Lords in 1986 and was Senior Lord of Appeal in Ordinary from 1996 until his retirement in 1998. Goff long advocated a complementary view of the roles of the legal academic and judge. The former Lord Justice of Appeal Stephen Tomlinson said that "no judge has done more than Robert to ensure that the views of legal academic commentators now regularly inform the decision-making in our higher courts". For building bridges between judges in the United Kingdom and Germany, Goff was awarded the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany (First Class). (Full article...)

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Did you know ...

Lithograph of Innisfallen Abbey after Crofton

... that artist Frances Emilia Crofton had lithograph copies made of eight of her paintings (example pictured), and sold them for charity?
... that former Speaker of the Oregon House of Representatives Frank J. Van Dyke was born in Penang, Straits Settlements, British Malaya, in 1907?
... that Camille Saint-Saëns dedicated his Caprice on Danish and Russian Airs to a Danish princess who became Empress of Russia?
... that stocks of mustard gas, thought to have been destroyed in the 1940s, were discovered at RAF Bowes Moor in 1997?
... that Albuquerque radio station KRZY broadcast a college football game without permission by smuggling in gear under blankets and disguising an announcer in the opposing team's student section?
... that in a 1982 book about the printing industry of 16th-century Strasbourg, historian Miriam Usher Chrisman demonstrated the scholarly potential of the digital analysis of large archival datasets?
... that the first scene of the 2010 film The Social Network took 99 takes to finish?
... that when the chimpanzee Sami escaped from the Belgrade Zoo for the second time in less than a week, thousands of people cheered him on?

In the news

Aung San Suu Kyi

Aung San Suu Kyi (pictured), the State Counsellor of Myanmar, is detained by the military in a coup d'état.
A coordinated short squeeze targeting American hedge funds causes GameStop's stock price to spike.
Kaja Kallas becomes the first female Prime Minister of Estonia, following the resignation of Jüri Ratas.
In Russia, protests against the arrest of Alexei Navalny occur in more than 120 towns and cities.

On this day

February 6: Sámi National Day (1917); Waitangi Day in New Zealand (1840)

Stamford Raffles

1778 – France and the United States signed the Treaty of Amity and Commerce and the Treaty of Alliance, respectively establishing commercial and military ties between the two nations.
1806 – Napoleonic Wars: A British naval squadron captured or destroyed five French ships of the line at the Battle of San Domingo in the Caribbean Sea.
1819 – British official Stamford Raffles (pictured) signed a treaty with Sultan Hussein Shah of Johor, establishing Singapore as a trading post for the East India Company.
1951 – A train derailed while crossing a temporary wooden trestle in Woodbridge, New Jersey, causing 85 deaths.
1987 – Mary Gaudron became the first woman to be appointed a justice of the High Court of Australia.

Joseph Priestley (d. 1804)
Pierre André Latreille (d. 1833)
Barbara W. Tuchman (d. 1989)

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Today's featured picture

The Javan slow loris (Nycticebus javanicus) is a species of primate native to western and central portions of the Indonesian island of Java. It is arboreal, feeding on fruit, gum, eggs, lizards, and the seeds of the cocoa tree. Weighing up to 680 g (24 oz), this small nocturnal mammal sleeps in the open on branches during the day and is easily poached for the exotic-pet trade. Populations are declining, and the animal is listed by the International Union for Conservation of Nature as a critically endangered species and included in a list of the world's 25 most endangered primates.

Photograph credit: Aprisonsan

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