The horned sungem (Heliactin bilophus) is a species of hummingbird native to Brazil, Bolivia and Suriname. It prefers open habitats such as savanna, grassland and garden, and expanded its range into southern Amazonas and Espírito Santo, probably due to deforestation. It is a small hummingbird with a long tail and a short, black bill. The sexes differ in appearance, with males having two shiny red, golden, and green feather "horns" above the eyes, a shiny blue head crest and a black throat with a pointed "beard". The female is plainer, with a brown or yellow–buff throat. It is a nomadic species, responding to the seasonal flowering of its food plants. If a flower's shape is unsuited to the bird's short bill, it may rob nectar through a hole at its base. It also eats small insects. Only the female builds the small cup nest, incubates the two white eggs, and rears the chicks. The species is currently classified as least concern, and its population is thought to be increasing. (Full article...)
1877 – An earthquake struck northern Chile, leading to the deaths of 2,385 people, mostly victims of the ensuing tsunami, as far away as Hawaii and Fiji.
2013 – One World Trade Center(pictured) in New York City, the tallest building in the Western Hemisphere, was topped out at a height of 1,776 feet (541 m).
Leucippus was a Greek philosopher of the 5th century BCE. He is credited with founding atomism, with his student Democritus. Leucippus divided the world into two entities: atoms, indivisible particles that make up all things, and the void, the nothingness between the atoms. Leucippus's ideas were influential in ancient and Renaissance philosophy. They were a precursor to modern atomic theory, but the two are only superficially similar. Leucippus's atoms come in infinitely many forms, all in constant motion, creating a deterministic world created by the collisions of atoms. The soul is viewed as an arrangement of spherical atoms, cycled through the body by respiration and creating thought and sensory input. Little is known of his life, with a few scholars doubting that he existed, attributing his ideas purely to Democritus. Two works are attributed to Leucippus, The Great World System and On Mind, but all of his writing has been lost except for one sentence. (Full article...)
Thank You is the second major-label studio album by American singer-songwriter Meghan Trainor. Epic Records released it on May 13, 2016. Trainor wrote it with Jacob Kasher Hindlin and producer Ricky Reed, among others, incorporating various genres to showcase her versatility. Thank You is a pop, dance-pop, and R&B album with themes such as self-acceptance, empowerment, and fame. Trainor promoted it with televised performances and the Untouchable Tour (2016). Thank You's singles included "No" and "Me Too", which reached the top twenty in the US. A few reviewers thought its production was an improvement from her 2015 album Title, while others believed it lacked artistic identity and criticized the lyrical themes. Thank You debuted at number three in the US. It reached the top five in Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Scotland, and the United Kingdom and received Platinum certifications in the US and Canada. (This article is part of two featured topics: Thank You (Meghan Trainor album) and Meghan Trainor albums.)
1938 – During an exercise to demonstrate air power, United States Army Air Corps bomber aircraft intercepted the Italian ocean liner SS Rex(pictured) 620 nautical miles (1,100 km) off the US Atlantic coast.
Marty Stratton and Hugo Martin, the game's directors
Doom is a first-person shooter video game and a reboot of the Doom franchise released on May 13, 2016. Players take the role of an unnamed space marine who battles demonic forces within an energy-mining facility on Mars and in Hell. The game also has an online multiplayer mode and a level editor. Developer id Software and co-developers took eight years to make the game. Their "Doom 4" project was fully overhauled in 2011 to better replicate the tone of the 1993 original Doom. Bethesda Softworks published the 2016 Doom as the first major series installment following Doom 3 in 2004. Its single-player campaign, graphics, soundtrack, and gameplay received considerable praise, while its multiplayer mode drew significant criticism. Doom became a best-seller, with over two million PC copies sold by the next year. Multiple industry outlets named Doom among 2016's best video games. It received a sequel four years later. (Full article...)
2000 – An explosion(aftermath pictured) at a fireworks factory in Enschede, Netherlands, resulted in 23 deaths and approximately €450 million in damage.
Operation Title was an unsuccessful Allied attack on the German battleship Tirpitz during World War II. The Allies considered Tirpitz to be a major threat to their shipping and after several Royal Air Force heavy bomber raids failed to inflict any damage it was decided to use Royal Navymidget submarines instead. Operation Title involved a pair of two-man British Chariots which were transported to Norway on board a small boat named Arthur. Both Chariots were lost when bad weather caused them to detach from Arthur on 31 October. It was not possible for the Allied boat to reach the sea due to German security measures, and Arthur was scuttled. The Allied personnel attempted to escape overland and all but one reached neutral Sweden on 5 November. The other – a British serviceman – was taken prisoner by German forces and murdered on 19 January 1943. Tirpitz was eventually sunk by another bomber raid on 12 November 1944. (Full article...)
Hö'elün (fl. 1162–1210) was a Mongolian noblewoman and the mother of Temüjin, better known as Genghis Khan. She played a major role in his rise to power. Born into the Olkhonud clan of the Onggirat tribe, Hö'elün was originally married to Chiledu, but was captured shortly after her wedding by Yesügei, an important member of the Mongols, becoming his primary wife. She and Yesügei had three sons and one daughter, as well as Temüjin. After Yesügei was fatally poisoned and the Mongols abandoned her family, Hö'elün shepherded all her children through poverty to adulthood—her resilience and organisational skills have been remarked upon by historians. She continued to play an important role after Temüjin's marriage to Börte. Hö'elün married Münglig, an old retainer of Yesügei, in thanks for his support after a damaging defeat. During the next decades, she arranged marriages, maintained alliances, and was heavily involved in disputes between Genghis, his brothers, and Münglig's sons. (Full article...)
1987 – An Iraqi jet aircraft fired two Exocet missiles at the American frigate USS Stark leaving 37 personnel of the warship dead and 21 others injured.
Tropical Storm Hernan intensifying offshore Mexico on August 26.
Tropical Storm Hernan was a short-lived tropical cyclone that caused widespread flooding and destructive mudslides across southwestern Mexico in late August 2020. The eighth named storm of the 2020 Pacific hurricane season, Hernan formed to the southwest of Mexico on August 26. The cyclone peaked with maximum sustained winds of 75 km/h and a minimum atmospheric pressure of 1001 millibars, before passing just offshore western Mexico and dissipating in the Gulf of California. Hernan, despite not making landfall, dropped extremely heavy rainfall across several states, peaking at nearly 610 millimeters (24 inches) in Jalisco. Over 305 millimeters (12 inches) of rain fell across the Costa Grande of Guerrero from August 24–27. 1,674 homes and 9 schools all suffered severe damage. A man died after falling off his roof checking damages from Hernan. The cyclone caused a total of MXN$594.05 million (USD$26.91 million) in damages across seven states along the Pacific coast of Mexico. (Full article...)
1936 – In a crime that captivated Japan, Sada Abe(pictured) strangled her lover, cut off his genitals, and carried them around with her for several days until her arrest.
"Gento" is a song recorded by the Filipino boy bandSB19(pictured). It was written by the band's leader, Pablo, and produced along with his brother Joshua Daniel Nase and the record producer Simon Servida. The lyrics of the pop and hip hop track are themed around empowerment and use gold mining as a metaphor for achieving success. Sony Music Philippines released the song on May 19, 2023, as the lead single from the boy band's second extended play (EP), Pagtatag! (2023). The song won multiple awards, and music critics praised its catchiness and lyricism. A dance challenge set to the song became a trend on TikTok. "Gento" achieved top 15 chart positions in the Philippines and on Billboard'sWorld Digital Song Sales chart; the latter made the boy band the first Filipino group to enter the chart. SB19 accompanied the song with a music video depicting them mining for gold, various live performances, and its inclusion on the set list of their Pagtatag! World Tour. (Full article...)
City of Champaign v. Madigan is a 2013 case decided by the Illinois Appellate Court, ruling that messages sent and received by elected officials during a city council meeting and pertaining to public business are public records subject to disclosure, even when stored on personal electronic devices. It was the first court ruling in Illinois to hold that private messages were subject to disclosure under the state's Freedom of Information Act (FOIA). The case addressed a public records request from a reporter for The News-Gazette in Champaign, Illinois, who observed city council members and the mayor using their personal electronic devices to send messages during a city council meeting. City officials denied the reporter's request; the case eventually reached the Appellate Court, which held that public officials have to disclose their records, even if they are stored on a personal electronic device or account, but only when acting as a public body, such as during a council meeting. (Full article...)
The oyster dress is a high fashion gown created by British fashion designer Alexander McQueen for his Spring/Summer 2003 collection Irere. McQueen's design is a one-shouldered dress in bias-cut beige silk chiffon with a boned upper body and a full-length skirt consisting of hundreds of individual circles of organza sewn in dense layers to the base fabric, resembling an oyster shell. The dress originated as a reinterpretation of the "shellfish dress" designed by John Galliano in 1987, which McQueen had long admired and sought to emulate. Contemporary critical response to McQueen's oyster dress was positive and it is considered an iconic piece of McQueen's work. Only two copies are known to exist, one held by the Metropolitan Museum of Art (the Met) in New York City and one by media personality Kim Kardashian. McQueen returned to the oyster dress concept several times over his career, most prominently in his Autumn/Winter 2006 collection The Widows of Culloden. (Full article...)
1816 – A riot broke out in Littleport, England, over high unemployment and rising grain costs, spreading to Ely the next day before being quelled by troops.
The Mount Edziza volcanic complex (MEVC) is a group of volcanoes and associated lava flows in northwest British Columbia, Canada. Located on the Tahltan Highland, the MEVC has a broad, steep-sided lava plateau; its highest summit is 2,786 metres (9,140 feet). Its volcanoes formed over the last 7.5 million years during five cycles of magmatic activity which spanned four epochs; the most recent eruptions took place in the last 11,000 years. Current activity occurs in the form of hot springs. The MEVC has warm summers and cold, snowy winters; snow and ice remain on the highest peaks year-round. Indigenous peoples have lived adjacent to the MEVC for thousands of years. Historically, the local Tahltan people used volcanic glass from the MEVC to make tools and weaponry. Animal species such as birds, rodents, bears, sheep, goats, moose and caribou inhabit the area. A large provincial park dominates the MEVC which can only be accessed by aircraft or by a network of footpaths. (Full article...)
1986 – A stationary front began over the central Caribbean Sea, leading to severe floods that over two weeks killed dozens of people in Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Haiti and Jamaica.
The 2019 FA Cup final was an association football match between Manchester City and Watford for the 138th FA Cup final. In the 21st minute, Abdoulaye Doucouré's shot struck Vincent Kompany's arm; the referee declined to award a penalty and showed Doucouré the first yellow card of the game for his protests. David Silva scored the first goal from a header and Gabriel Jesus side-footed the ball for the second goal. At 61 minutes City extended their lead with a goal from substituteKevin De Bruyne(pictured), and seven minutes later, Jesus scored on the counter-attack. Sterling scored twice at the 81st and the 87th minutes and the match ended 6–0 to Manchester City. De Bruyne was named man of the match. It was only the third time that a team has scored six goals in an FA Cup final and the margin of victory is the joint-largest in an FA Cup final. The win completed a domestic treble for Manchester City, who already won the League Cup and the Premier League that season. (Full article...)
"The Day Before the Revolution" is a science fictionshort story by American writer Ursula K. Le Guin. First published in Galaxy in August 1974, it was republished in her The Wind's Twelve Quarters (1975). Set in her fictional Hainish universe, the story has strong connections to her novel The Dispossessed (also 1974), and is sometimes referred to as a prologue to the novel. The story follows Odo, an aging anarchist, who over the course of a day relives memories of her life as an activist as she learns of plans for a general strike the next day. The strike is implied to be the start of the revolt leading to the idealized anarchist society based on Odo's teachings depicted in the novel. The story was critically well-received. It won the Nebula and Locus awards for Best Short Story in 1975, and was also nominated for a Hugo Award. Multiple scholars commented that it represented a shift in Le Guin's writing toward non-linear narrative structures and works infused with feminism. (Full article...)
Nicholas of Worcester (died 24 June 1124) was prior of the Benedictine priory of Worcester Cathedral from about 1115 until his death. He was born around the time of the Norman Conquest. It is not known who his parents were, but William of Malmesbury wrote that he was "of exalted descent",and it has been argued that he was a son of King Harold Godwinson. Nicholas was the favourite pupil of Wulfstan, Bishop of Worcester, who brought him up. Wulfstan was influential in transmitting Old English culture to Anglo-Norman England, and Nicholas carried on this work as prior. He was respected by the chroniclers, William of Malmesbury, John of Worcester and Eadmer for his assistance with their histories. Nicholas was an English monk at a time when both Englishmen and monks rarely received promotion in the church, and when Bishop Theulf of Worcester died in October 1123, Nicholas led an unsuccessful attempt of the monks of the priory chapter to be allowed to choose the next bishop. (Full article...)
1987 – Mathias Rust, a West German aviator, flew his Cessna 172 from Helsinki, Finland, through Soviet air defences, landing illegally near Red Square in Moscow.
The Beulé Gate is a fortified gate leading to the Propylaia of the Acropolis of Athens. It was constructed largely of repurposed material taken from the fourth century BCE Choragic Monument of Nikias and integrated into the Post-Herulian Wall, a late Roman fortification built around the Acropolis in the years following the city's sack by the Germanic Heruli people in 267 or early 268 CE. Its construction marked the beginning of a new phase in the Acropolis's use, in which it came to be seen more as a defensive position than in the religious terms. During the medieval period, the gate was further fortified, before being built over with a bastion in Ottoman times. The monument was discovered by the French archaeologist Charles Ernest Beulé on 29 May 1852, and excavated in 1852 and 1853. Archaeologists and Greek commentators criticised the aggressive means – particularly the use of explosives. In modern times, the gate has served primarily as an exit for tourists from the Acropolis. (Full article...)
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