Wikipedia article of the day for August 29, 2021

The Wikipedia article of the day for August 29, 2021 is Raiders of the Lost Ark.
Raiders of the Lost Ark is a 1981 American action-adventure film directed by Steven Spielberg and written by Lawrence Kasdan, based on a story by George Lucas and Philip Kaufman. It stars Harrison Ford (pictured), Karen Allen, Paul Freeman, Ronald Lacey, John Rhys-Davies, and Denholm Elliott. Ford portrays Indiana Jones, a globe-trotting archaeologist vying with Nazi forces in 1936 to recover the lost Ark of the Covenant, a relic said to make an army invincible. With his former lover Marion Ravenwood (Allen), Jones races to stop rival archaeologist René Belloq (Freeman) from guiding the Nazis to the Ark. Principal photography took place during June–September 1980 on sets at Elstree Studios, England, and on location in Tunisia, Hawaii, and La Rochelle. The highest-grossing film of 1981, it won five Oscars, seven Saturn Awards, and one BAFTA. Appearing in many lists of all-time best films, it has had a lasting impact on popular culture. It led to further Indiana Jones films, games and toys.

Wikipedia article of the day for August 28, 2021

The Wikipedia article of the day for August 28, 2021 is William Lyon Mackenzie.
William Lyon Mackenzie (March 12, 1795 – August 28, 1861) was a Scottish-born Canadian-American journalist and politician. He founded newspapers critical of the Family Compact, represented York County in the Legislative Assembly of Upper Canada and aligned with Reformers. Dundee-born, Mackenzie emigrated to York, Upper Canada, (now Toronto) in 1820 and published his first newspaper in 1824. He was elected to the legislative assembly in 1827 and became Toronto's first mayor in 1834. In 1837, he commanded the rebels in the Upper Canada Rebellion, but was defeated at the Battle of Montgomery's Tavern. He fled to the U.S. to rally American support for an invasion of Upper Canada. This violated the Neutrality Act and he was imprisoned. He discovered and published documents that outlined corrupt financial transactions and government appointments by New York state officials. He represented Haldimand County in the legislature of the Province of Canada from 1851 to 1858, and died in August 1861.

Wikipedia article of the day for August 27, 2021

The Wikipedia article of the day for August 27, 2021 is USS Iowa (BB-61).
USS Iowa is a retired battleship, the lead ship of her class and the last lead ship of any class of United States battleships. Iowa served with the Pacific Fleet in 1944, shelling beachheads at Kwajalein and Eniwetok and screening aircraft carriers operating in the Marshall Islands. She also served as the flagship of the Third Fleet, flying Admiral William F. Halsey's flag at the Japanese surrender in Tokyo Bay. During the Korean War, Iowa was involved in raids on the North Korean coast, after which she was decommissioned. She was reactivated in 1984 and operated in both the Atlantic and Pacific Fleets to counter the recently expanded Soviet Navy. In April 1989, an explosion wrecked her No. 2 gun turret, killing 47 sailors. Iowa was decommissioned for the last time in October 1990 after 19 total years of active service. In 2012 she was donated to the nonprofit Pacific Battleship Center and opened as a museum in Los Angeles. (This article is part of a featured topic: Iowa-class battleships.)

Wikipedia article of the day for August 26, 2021

The Wikipedia article of the day for August 26, 2021 is Crécy campaign.
The Crécy campaign was an expedition by an English army from the north of Normandy to the County of Boulogne, devastating the French countryside on a wide front, followed by the successful siege of Calais. It began on 12 July 1346 during the Hundred Years' War. Led by King Edward III, the English stormed and sacked Caen, slaughtering the population. They then devastated the country to the suburbs of Rouen before cutting a swath along the Seine's left bank to Poissy, 20 miles (30 km) from Paris. Turning north, the English became trapped in territory which the French had denuded of food. They escaped by fighting their way across the Somme against a French blocking force. Two days later, on ground of their choosing, the English inflicted a heavy defeat on the French at the Battle of Crécy on 26 August, before moving on to besiege Calais. After an eleven-month siege, which severely stretched both countries' financial and military resources, the town fell. (This article is part of a featured topic: Crécy campaign.)

Wikipedia article of the day for August 25, 2021

The Wikipedia article of the day for August 25, 2021 is Santería.
Santería is an African diasporic religion that developed among Afro-Cuban communities during the late 19th century. It arose through the syncretism of the Yoruba religion of West Africa, the Roman Catholic form of Christianity, and Spiritism. Santería is an initiatory tradition with no central authority. It is polytheistic and revolves around deities called oricha. Deriving their names and attributes from traditional Yoruba divinities, they are equated with Roman Catholic saints. Each human is believed to have a personal link to a particular oricha. Practitioners venerate the oricha at altars, where offerings include fruit, liquor, flowers and sacrificial animals. A central ritual involves practitioners drumming, singing, and dancing to encourage an oricha to possess one of their members and thus communicate with them. Healing rituals and the preparation of herbal remedies and talismans also play a prominent role. The number of initiates is estimated to be in the high hundreds of thousands.

Wikipedia article of the day for August 24, 2021

The Wikipedia article of the day for August 24, 2021 is Chandler's Ford shooting.
The Chandler's Ford shooting was an attempted robbery on 13 September 2007 in which two men were shot dead by officers of London's Metropolitan Police while robbing a cash-in-transit van. The Met had been tracking a gang who had stolen an estimated £500,000 from security vans and learned that the gang intended to rob the HSBC bank in Chandler's Ford. Armed officers hid nearby early in the morning, with snipers in overlooking buildings. Shortly after the G4S van's arrival, a masked Mark Nunes demanded at gunpoint that the guard hand over the cash box. A police sniper shot Nunes in the chest. A second gangster, Andrew Markland, picked up Nunes's gun and was shot twice by another sniper. Officers gave first aid but both men died. An IPCC investigation concluded that the snipers had acted properly, though it found flaws in the planning. An inquest reached a verdict of lawful killing, after which the IPCC recommended that an independent firearms commander be appointed to lead future operations.

Wikipedia article of the day for August 23, 2021

The Wikipedia article of the day for August 23, 2021 is Edvard August Vainio.
Edvard August Vainio (1853–1929) was a Finnish lichenologist. His early works on the lichens of Lapland, his three-volume monograph on the lichen genus Cladonia, and, in particular, his study of the classification and form and structure of lichens in Brazil made Vainio renowned internationally. Vainio's earliest works dealt with phytogeography—elucidating and enumerating flora and its distribution—in the Finnish language. In these publications he demonstrated an attention to detail and thoroughness that became characteristic of his later work. Vainio described about 1700 new taxa, and published more than 100 scientific works. He made significant scientific collections of lichens, and while a herbarium curator at the University of Helsinki and the University of Turku he catalogued and processed other collections from all over the world. He has been called the Father of Brazilian Lichenology and the Grand Old Man of Lichenology.