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From today's featured article

Finbarr Donnelly

Five Go Down to the Sea? were an Irish post-punk band from Cork, active during 1978 to 1989. Vocalist and lyricist Finbarr Donnelly (pictured), guitarist Ricky Dineen and brothers Philip O'Connell (bass) and Keith O'Connell (drums) formed the band as Nun Attax when they were teenagers. They became known for Donnelly's absurdist lyrics and stage presence, Dineen's angular guitar and bass parts, and a rhythm section influenced by Captain Beefheart. After developing a following in Ireland in the early 1980s, they changed their name to "Five Go Down to the Sea?" and moved to London. They did not find commercial success and split up in 1985. Donnelly and Dineen reformed in 1988 as Beethoven, and released the EP Him Goolie Goolie Man, Dem the following year. Their reformation was short-lived, as Donnelly drowned on 18 June 1989, aged 27. The band's reputation has grown over time and they have influenced later generations of Irish musicians, especially a succession of dryly humorous Cork bands. (Full article...)

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Did you know ...

Hall of mirrors at Amna Suraka

... that Amna Suraka, "the world's most depressing museum", includes a hall of broken mirrors (pictured) with a shard for each victim of the Anfal genocide?
... that in a 1922 letter to the editor, Flora Kaai Hayes defended the morality of hula compared to the "bosom to bosom, thigh to thigh dances" seen on steamships and roof gardens at the time?
... that Shin Hae-chul, who previously made hard rock and heavy metal albums, was inspired by big band music when he made The Songs for the One?
... that despite ducking and avoiding being hit in the head by a baseball, Joe Beckwith suffered double vision that required two surgeries to correct?
... that until its demolition in 2014, The Jungle in San Jose, California, was often considered to be one of the largest homeless encampments in the United States?
... that according to one source, The Embroidered Couch is "most likely China's earliest vernacular pornographic novel"?
... that in Hindu mythology, the creator deity Daksha married Asikni, after realising that copulation was necessary for procreation?
... that some members of the formerly all-male University Club of New York voted to reject women from membership to protest a New York City law that would have required it?

In the news

Naftali Bennett

A new government is formed in Israel, with Naftali Bennett (pictured) becoming prime minister, ending Benjamin Netanyahu's 12-year tenure.
The spacecraft Juno performs a flyby of Jupiter's moon Ganymede.
Using a compromised encrypted device network, a multinational sting operation results in hundreds of arrests and the seizure of several tons of illegal drugs.
Two trains collide in Sindh, Pakistan, killing at least 65 people.

On this day

June 18: Autistic Pride Day

Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk

618 – Sui–Tang transition: Chinese governor Li Yuan declared himself emperor, establishing the Tang dynasty, which would last for three centuries.
1858 – Charles Darwin received a manuscript by fellow naturalist Alfred Russel Wallace on natural selection, which encouraged him to publish his own theory of evolution.
1954 – Carlos Castillo Armas led a CIA-sponsored invasion force across the Guatemalan border, beginning the 1954 Guatemalan coup d'état.
1967 – American musician Jimi Hendrix burned his guitar on stage at the end of a performance at the Monterey Pop Festival in California.
1981 – The Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk (pictured), the first operational aircraft to be designed around stealth technology, made its maiden flight.

Ambrose Philips (d. 1749)
James Montgomery Flagg (b. 1877)
Barack Obama Sr. (b. 1934)

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From today's featured list

Georgetown University seal

Forty-one individuals have held the office of President of Georgetown University, a private Jesuit research university in Washington, D.C. The president of Georgetown University is its chief executive officer, and from its establishment until the 1960s was also the rector of the university's Jesuit community. The president is elected by and may be removed by the university's board of directors, and is ex officio a member of the board. The president is also one of five members of the university's legal corporation, known as the President and Directors of Georgetown College, which was first chartered by the United States Congress in 1815. Of the 41 presidents, nearly all have been Jesuits. Only one has been a member of another religious order while president: Louis William Valentine DuBourg, who was a Sulpician. Three presidents have gone on to become bishops: DuBourg, Leonard Neale, and Benedict Joseph Fenwick. The current officeholder, John J. DeGioia, is the university's first lay president. (Full list...)

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Today's featured picture

The Madonna del cardellino (Madonna of the Goldfinch) is an oil-on-panel painting by the Italian Renaissance artist Raphael, created around 1505–1506. It depicts the Virgin Mary, the Christ Child, and the young John the Baptist, holding a goldfinch in his hand, which Christ is reaching out to touch. A ten-year restoration of the painting was completed in 2008, and the work is now in the collection of the Uffizi in Florence.

Painting credit: Raphael

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