Wikipedia:Main Page history/2019 March 12

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From today's featured article

State Route 522 (SR 522) is a state highway in the U.S. state of Washington that serves the Seattle metropolitan area. Approximately 25 miles (40 km) long, it connects the city of Seattle to the northeastern suburbs of Kenmore, Bothell, Woodinville, and Monroe. Its western half is primarily an arterial street, named Lake City Way and Bothell Way, that follows the northern shore of Lake Washington; the eastern half is a grade-separated freeway that runs between Woodinville and Monroe. SR 522 connects several of the metropolitan area's major highways, including Interstate 5, Interstate 405, SR 9, and U.S. Route 2. The present day route of SR 522 was built in stages between 1907 and 1965, beginning with the Red Brick Road from Seattle to Bothell, then part of the Pacific Highway and later U.S. Route 99. Since the late 1990s, the SR 522 corridor between Woodinville and Monroe has been partially converted to a freeway to address safety concerns and a growing population. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

Hutchison's sketch of his Bust of Queen Victoria (1887)

... that Scottish sculptor John Hutchison was commissioned by Queen Victoria to create her portrait bust (sketch shown)?
... that the opening of the Senegambia bridge has eliminated the need for a 400-kilometre (250 mi) diversion to cross the Gambia River when the ferry is out of use?
... that after scientist Qian Lingxi was denounced during the Cultural Revolution, China's nuclear submarine project sought the help of Premier Zhou Enlai to make him available for this strategic program?
... that the solitary coral Heterocyathus aequicostatus often lives in symbiosis with a small worm that moves it around?
... that Spas Wenkoff, first a tenor at a Bulgarian amateur theatre, appeared as Tristan at the Staatsoper Dresden, and was then invited to sing the role at the centenary Bayreuth Festival?
... that the Battle of Cape Ecnomus in 256 BC was possibly the largest naval battle ever?
... that the Eiss Archive is composed of materials that document the rescue of Jews threatened by the Holocaust through the efforts of Polish diplomats?
... that major general John K. Singlaub said that Frank Dux's book The Secret Man, which states Dux was recruited in a urinal to work for the CIA, was "an insult" to the reader's intelligence?

In the news

Ethiopian Airlines aircraft ET-AVJ in February 2019

Ethiopian Airlines Flight 302 (aircraft pictured) crashes shortly after take-off from Addis Ababa for Nairobi, Kenya, killing all 157 people on board.
A severe tornado outbreak hits the Southeastern United States, with one tornado causing 23 deaths in Alabama.
Heightened tensions remain between India and Pakistan after both countries conduct airstrikes.
Muhammadu Buhari is re-elected President of Nigeria.

On this day

March 12

Gandhi and Sarojini Naidu

1881 – Andrew Watson made his debut with the Scotland national football team and became the world's first black international footballer.
1913 – The future capital of Australia was officially named Canberra during a ceremony officiated by Gertrude, Lady Denman, the wife of Governor-General Lord Denman.
1930 – Gandhi (pictured with Sarojini Naidu) began the Salt March, a 24-day walk to defy the British tax on salt in colonial India.
1971 – The Turkish Armed Forces executed a "coup by memorandum", forcing the resignation of Prime Minister Süleyman Demirel.
1989 – Tim Berners-Lee issued the first proposal for what would become the World Wide Web, when he wrote a document to CERN with details of an information-management system
2014 – A gas leak caused an explosion in the East Harlem neighborhood of New York City, destroying two apartment buildings and causing eight deaths.

Symeon the New Theologian (d. 1022) · Lilian Faithfull (b. 1865) · Zhao Wei (b. 1976)

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Today's featured picture

Portrait of a Lady with a Squirrel and a Starling is an oil-on-oak portrait completed in around 1526–1528 by German Renaissance painter Hans Holbein the Younger. The subject of this portrait is believed to be Anne Lovell, wife of Sir Francis Lovell (d. 1551), an esquire of the body to Henry VIII. The evidence for this was uncovered by stained-glass historian David J. King while studying the windows of the church in East Harling, Norfolk, the Lovell family's seat. King noted the Lovell family's coat of arms alongside squirrels in the stained glass, and also that the starlings in the painting are a pun on the name of the village.

Painting: Hans Holbein the Younger

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