Wikipedia:Main Page history/2017 December 30

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From today's featured article

William Borah (1865–1940) was an outspoken Republican United States Senator from the state of Idaho. A progressive who served in the Senate from 1907 until his death, he is often considered an isolationist. He reluctantly voted for U.S. entry into World War I in 1917 and, once the war ended, fought successfully against Senate ratification of the Treaty of Versailles, which would have made the U.S. part of the League of Nations. Remaining a maverick, he often fought with the Republican presidents in office between 1921 and 1933, though Coolidge offered to make Borah his running mate in 1924. Deprived of his post as Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee when the Democrats took control in 1933, Borah supported some New Deal legislation, but opposed other proposals. In his final years, he felt he might be able to settle differences in Europe by meeting with Hitler; though he did not go, this has not enhanced his historical reputation. His statue, presented by the state of Idaho in 1947, stands in the National Statuary Hall Collection. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

Detail of The Doctor (1891)

... that Luke Fildes' painting The Doctor (detail pictured) was used to promote state-run healthcare in Britain and to campaign against it in the United States?
... that Chiyuki Urano, a soloist and choir member of the Bach Collegium Japan, recorded songs by Russian amateur composers including Diaghilev with pianist Lera Auerbach?
... that relative to its length, one species of mite is the fastest animal on Earth?
... that Antoinette Montaigne left her position as city councillor in France to become a minister in the government of the Central African Republic?
... that Aric Almirola received credit for winning the 2007 AT&T 250 despite not finishing the race?
... that Xiong Huizhen, who spent 22 years completing his teacher's unfinished work, was admired by historian Gu Jiegang for his devotion?
... that the Soviet Air Defense Forces' 177th Fighter Aviation Regiment operated Lend-Lease Supermarine Spitfires as air defense for Moscow between 1944 and 1948?
... that Ghanaian engineer Benjamin Asante is one of a few black oil and gas pipeline engineers who have given expert testimony before the United States Supreme Court?

In the news

HMAS AE1 in 1914

George Weah is elected President of Liberia.
HMAS AE1 (pictured), a Royal Australian Navy submarine lost at sea in 1914, is located off the Duke of York Islands.
Peruvian President Pedro Pablo Kuczynski pardons jailed ex-president Alberto Fujimori.
Typhoon Tembin sweeps through the southern Philippines, killing more than two hundred people and leaving dozens of others missing.
In the Catalan election, pro-independence parties, spearheaded by the exiled Carles Puigdemont, secure a majority.

On this day...

December 30: Rizal Day in the Philippines (1896)

Richard, Duke of York

1460 – Wars of the Roses: Richard, Duke of York (pictured), was killed in the Battle of Wakefield in West Yorkshire, England, and his army was destroyed.
1813 – War of 1812: British forces captured Buffalo, New York, and engaged in considerable plundering and destruction.
1906 – The All-India Muslim League, a political party in British India that developed into the driving force behind the creation of Pakistan as a Muslim state on the Indian subcontinent, was founded in Dhaka.
1954 – The Finnish National Bureau of Investigation was established to consolidate criminal investigation and intelligence into a single agency.
2009 – Pro-government counter-demonstrators held rallies in several Iranian cities in response to recent anti-government protests held on the holy day of Ashura.

Rudyard Kipling (b. 1865) · Josephine Butler (d. 1906) · Fatima Jibrell (b. 1947)

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Today's featured picture

Wrocław Główny is the largest passenger station of the southwestern Polish city of Wrocław and in the Lower Silesian Voivodeship. Built in the mid-19th century near the city centre, it boasted a 200-metre (660 ft) long platform hall that has since been refurbished. Located at the junction of several important routes, Wrocław Główny serves nearly a dozen local lines.

Photograph: Marcin Szala

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