Wikipedia:Main Page history/2017 December 19

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From today's featured article

Chad Harris-Crane is a fictional character on the American soap opera Passions, which aired on NBC from 1999 to 2007 and on DirecTV in 2007–08. Developed by the soap's creator and head writer James E. Reilly, Chad was portrayed by Donn Swaby (1999 to 2002) and Charles Divins (2002 to 2007). The son of the evil patriarch Alistair Crane of the Crane family, Chad becomes involved in a love triangle with the sisters Whitney and Simone Russell. He is initially believed to be Whitney's half-brother, but is revealed to be her adoptive cousin. His later storylines focus on his confusion over his sexual identity; his relationship with tabloid reporter Vincent Clarkson includes a depiction of the two men having sex, the first such scene in any daytime soap opera. Chad attempts to reconcile with Whitney before being killed by Alistair. Critical response to Chad was mixed; some reviewers praised the handling of the incest storyline and the representation of LGBT characters of color on daytime television, while others criticized his relationship with Vincent as an irresponsible representation of racial and sexual identity. (Full article...)

Part of the Russell family (Passions) series, one of Wikipedia's featured topics.

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Did you know...

Skin-to-skin contact

... that skin-to-skin contact (pictured) can help to augment low milk supply in breastfeeding women?
... that Ge Jianxiong, who did not go to college, and Zhou Zhenhe, a mining engineer, were awarded China's first two doctoral degrees in humanities?
... that Steven Soderbergh's Mosaic is both a mobile app and a television miniseries?
... that in the 1960s, child psychiatrist Mildred Creak proposed that autism was caused by genetics rather than poor parenting?
... that Saudi Arabia's government has been accused of detaining Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri, following his abrupt resignation while in Saudi Arabia?
... that Rachel Skinner "fell into engineering completely by chance" before being named as one of the Top 50 Influential Women in Engineering?
... that the wildlife of Malawi includes so many species of cichlid that Lake Malawi National Park has been inscribed as a World Heritage Site?
... that Harry Bush obsessed that if anyone found out he was a gay erotic artist he would lose his American military pension?

In the news

Sebastián Piñera

Sebastián Piñera (pictured) is elected President of Chile.
In the United States, the Amtrak Cascades passenger train derails in DuPont, Washington, killing three people and injuring more than seventy others.
Incumbent Juan Orlando Hernández is declared the winner of the Honduran presidential election, with the Organization of American States calling for a new vote amidst widespread irregularities.
The United States Federal Communications Commission votes to repeal Title II net neutrality rules.
The Walt Disney Company announces its intention to buy most of 21st Century Fox's entertainment divisions, valued at roughly $52.4 billion.

On this day...

December 19

Charles Dickens

1776 – Thomas Paine published the first in a series of pamphlets entitled The American Crisis, opening with the line, "These are the times that try men's souls."
1843 – A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens (pictured), a novella about the miser Ebenezer Scrooge and his transformation after being visited by three Christmas ghosts, was first published.
1964 – The Army of the Republic of Vietnam, the ruling junta of South Vietnam led by Nguyễn Khánh, initiated a coup, dissolving and arresting members of the High National Council, a civilian advisory body.
1983 – The Jules Rimet Trophy, awarded to the winner of the FIFA World Cup, was stolen from a display case in the Brazilian Football Confederation offices.
1997 – SilkAir Flight 185 crashed into the Musi River in Indonesia, killing 104 people.

Vitus Bering (d. 1741) · Ann Bishop (b. 1899) · Stella Gibbons (d. 1989)

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Today's featured picture

The Umbrellas is an oil painting on canvas by Pierre-Auguste Renoir, painted in two phases in the 1880s. It depicts a busy street scene in Paris, with most of the people depicted using umbrellas against the rain. The principal female figure to the left of the frame, modelled by Renoir's lover and frequent subject Suzanne Valadon, holds up her skirt against the mud and water on the road as she carries a hatbox, but has no hat, raincoat or umbrella. The painting is owned by the National Gallery in London as part of the Lane Bequest.

Painting: Pierre-Auguste Renoir

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