Wikipedia:Main Page history/2017 August 8

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From today's featured article

Quehanna Wild Area is a wildlife area in Cameron, Clearfield, and Elk counties in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. At 48,186 acres (75 sq mi; 195 km²), it is the largest state forest wild area in Pennsylvania, and hosts herds of native elk. In the 19th and early 20th centuries, the logging industry cut the area's virgin forests. In 1955 the Curtiss-Wright Corporation bought 80 square miles (210 km²) of state forest for a facility developing nuclear-powered jet engines. A succession of tenants further contaminated the nuclear reactor facility and its hot cells with radioactive isotopes, including strontium-90 and cobalt-60. Pennsylvania reacquired the land in 1963 and 1967, and in 1965 established Quehanna as a wild area, but retained the nuclear facility and industrial complex. The facilities were used to treat hardwood flooring with radiation until 2002. The cleanup of the reactor and hot cells took over eight years and cost $30 million. Quehanna Wild Area has many sites with radioactive and toxic waste; some have been cleaned up, but others have been dug up by black bears and white-tailed deer. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

Falls along the protected section of stream

... that the 1841 conservation agreement between the owners of the land where the Saw Kill (falls pictured) drains into the Hudson River is one of the earliest in American history?
... that Céleste Mogador may have been the inspiration for the title character in Georges Bizet's opera Carmen?
... that Darren Sammy took seven wickets for 66 runs in his debut Test for the West Indies in 2007?
... that the extinct ant species Cephalotes hispaniolicus was first described from a single Miocene fossil found in amber on Hispaniola?
... that beer ice cream has been served at the Great American Beer Festival?
... that the Guilden Morden boar may have adorned a helmet like those worn by the poetical warrior Beowulf?
... that René Morax founded the Thêatre du Jorat, where his play Le Roi David premiered with dramatic music by Arthur Honegger?
... that the extinct Nicarao people of pre-Columbian Nicaragua shared many cultural traits with the Aztecs of Mexico, including their calendar, screenfold books, and human sacrifice?

In the news

Neymar

Brazilian footballer Neymar (pictured) joins French club Paris Saint-Germain for a world-record fee of €222 million.
After Nawaz Sharif is disqualified from public office, Shahid Khaqan Abbasi succeeds him as Prime Minister of Pakistan.
Flooding in Gujarat, India, kills at least 224 people.
A suicide bombing in Lahore, Pakistan, kills 25 people and wounds 53 others.
In golf, Jordan Spieth wins the Open Championship.
The Women's Cricket World Cup concludes with England defeating India in the final.

On this day...

Uraniborg

1576 – The cornerstone of Danish astronomer Tycho Brahe's observatory Uraniborg (pictured) was laid on the island of Hven.
1956 – A major mining disaster killed 262 workers, mainly Italian nationals, at the Bois du Cazier coal mine in Belgium.
1963 – The Zimbabwe African National Union was formed when Ndabaningi Sithole, Robert Mugabe, and others decided to split from the Zimbabwe African People's Union.
1998 – The Iranian consulate in Mazar-i-Sharif, Afghanistan, was raided by Taliban leading to the death of 10 Iranian diplomats and an Iranian journalist.
2009 – Nine people died when a tour helicopter and a small private airplane collided over the Hudson River near Frank Sinatra Park in Hoboken, New Jersey, U.S.

Sophia Duleep Singh (b. 1876) · Ernest Lawrence (b. 1901) · Sheila Varian (b. 1937)

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Today's featured picture

The Toyota FJ Cruiser is a mid-size SUV with styling and off road performance reminiscent of the original Toyota Land Cruiser (FJ40). Introduced as a concept car at the 2003 North American International Auto Show, a production version debuted two years later. Produced by the Toyota subsidiary Hino Motors and sharing many structural underpinnings with the Prado, the FJ Cruiser was discontinued in the United States in 2014 after selling more than 150,000 units. It was discontinued worldwide in 2016.

Photograph: Stefan Krause

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