Wikipedia:Main Page history/2019 January 2

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From today's featured article

The Australian raven (Corvus coronoides) is a bird native to much of southern and northeastern Australia. Its plumage is all black with glossy upperparts, and its strong legs and feet are grey-black. Nicholas Aylward Vigors and Thomas Horsfield described the bird in 1827, with a species name highlighting its similarity to the carrion crow (C. corone). The preferred habitat is open woodland and transitional zones. It has adapted well to urban environments and is a common city bird in Sydney, Canberra and Perth. An opportunistic feeder, it eats a wide variety of plant and animal material, as well as food waste from urban areas. In eastern Australia its range includes many sheep farms, and it has been blamed for attacking healthy lambs, but very rarely does. The Australian raven is territorial, with pairs breeding between July and September and generally bonding for life. The nest is a bowl-shaped structure of sticks sited high in a tree, or occasionally in a man-made structure. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

Male orange-breasted bunting

... that an attempt to introduce the orange-breasted bunting (pictured) to Oahu in 1941 was unsuccessful?
... that David Long Jr. set the West Virginia Mountaineers football record for single-game tackles for a loss?
... that Guêpe-class submarines were solely intended for use in harbor defense?
... that Chief Minister Zeik-Bye of Hanthawaddy persuaded Prince Binnya Nwe to revolt by saying that his mother Princess Maha Dewi was planning to put her lover on the throne?
... that, in the 1980s, the British physician John R. Seale advocated the theory that HIV might have been created in a germ warfare laboratory?
... that the namesake of the Brigadier General Thomas F. Barr Award served for just one day as Judge Advocate General of the United States Army?
... that during the filming of There She Goes, a programme based on series creator Shaun Pye's learning disabled daughter, he became so emotional that he had to leave the set?
... that Scharwenzel is a card game, at least three centuries old, that is played today only on the German island of Fehmarn?

In the news

New Horizons image of Ultima Thule

NASA's New Horizons space probe performs a successful flyby of trans-Neptunian object Ultima Thule (pictured).
The Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership, the third largest free-trade area in the world, comes into effect for Australia, Canada, Japan, Mexico, New Zealand and Singapore.
A tsunami hits the Sunda Strait, Indonesia, killing at least 437 people and injuring more than 14,000 others.
In field hockey, the World Cup concludes with Belgium defeating the Netherlands in the final.

On this day

January 2: Feast day of Gregory of Nazianzus (Roman Catholic Church)

A. Mitchell Palmer

533 – Mercurius became Pope John II, possibly the first pope to adopt a regnal name upon elevation to the papacy.
1680 – Trunajaya rebellion: Amangkurat II of Mataram of Java and his courtiers stabbed Trunajaya to death a week after the rebel leader surrendered to the Dutch.
1920 – Under the leadership of U.S. Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer (pictured), Department of Justice agents launched a series of raids against radical leftists and anarchists in more than 30 cities and towns in 23 states.
1981 – English serial killer Peter Sutcliffe, the "Yorkshire Ripper", was arrested in Sheffield, ending one of the largest police investigations in British history.
2016 – Nimr al-Nimr, a prominent Shia cleric in Saudi Arabia, was executed by the Saudi government along with 46 others.

Salima Sultan Begum (d. 1613) · Mily Balakirev (b. 1837) · Norodom Ranariddh (b. 1944)

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Today's featured picture

The blue petrel (Halobaena caerulea) is a small seabird in the Procellariidae family, the only member of its genus. It is distributed across the Southern Ocean but breeds at only six known sites, all close to the Antarctic Convergence zone. Its plumage is predominantly blue-grey, with an "M" banding across its top, which is similar to that of the closely-related prion. It also has a white-tipped tail. The blue petrel is 28 cm (11 in) in length with a wing span of 66 cm (26 in), and feeds predominantly on krill as well as other crustaceans, fish, and squid.

Photograph: JJ Harrison

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