Wikipedia:Main Page history/2021 November 5

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From today's featured article

John Thirtle (1777–1839) was an English watercolour artist and frame-maker. Born in Norwich, where he lived for most of his life, he was a leading member of the Norwich School of painters. He produced frames for paintings by several members of that school, including John Crome and John Sell Cotman. He also worked as a drawing-master, a printseller and a looking glass maker. At the Norwich School's first exhibition in 1805, Thirtle exhibited five paintings as one of the five featured artists. Most of his watercolours are of Norwich and the surrounding Norfolk countryside. His style, influenced by Thomas Girtin, Crome and Cotman, was technically accomplished. His earlier landscapes were painted with a restricted range of buffs, blues and grey-browns, but he later developed a brilliancy of colour, producing works that included angular block forms. His Manuscript Treatise on Watercolour, unpublished before 1977, was probably for his own use, and he exhibited fewer than 100 paintings. (Full article...)

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Did you know ...

Frank Jeremiah Armstrong

... that Frank Jeremiah Armstrong (pictured), the first African-American graduate of Cornell College, became an assistant to Booker T. Washington?
... that the African zebrawood is in danger of becoming extinct?
... that landscape architect Harriet Pattison collaborated with her lover Louis Kahn on the design of Four Freedoms Park and the grounds of the Kimbell Art Museum?
... that climate change in Malaysia may cause its mangroves to be inundated by sea level rise by 2060?
... that Małgorzata Kalinowska-Iszkowska was awarded a Polish Gold Cross of Merit for her work in information technology?
... that the Nashua, Acton and Boston Railroad was also known as the "Red Line" because it was consistently unprofitable?
... that the railway network in Lithuania will have its first high-speed line by 2026?
... that a mock funeral was held outside company headquarters during the 1986–1987 John Deere strike in which 700 union workers ceremoniously burned a coffin and a Christmas tree covered in company hats?

In the news

Damon Galgut

Damon Galgut (pictured) is awarded the Booker Prize for his novel The Promise.
In baseball, the Atlanta Braves defeat the Houston Astros to win the World Series.
At the United Nations Climate Change Conference, world leaders vow to end deforestation and cut methane emissions by 2030.
At least 22 people die in a building collapse in Lagos, Nigeria.

On this day

November 5: Guy Fawkes Night in Great Britain and some Commonwealth countries (1605)

Meir Kahane

1138 – Lý Anh Tông was enthroned as Emperor of Đại Việt at the age of two, beginning a 37-year reign.
1605 – The arrest of Guy Fawkes, found during a search of the Palace of Westminster, foiled the Gunpowder Plot, which planned to blow up the House of Lords.
1916 – An armed confrontation in Everett, Washington, between local authorities and members of the Industrial Workers of the World resulted in seven deaths.
1943 – World War II: An unknown aircraft dropped four bombs on Vatican City, which maintained neutrality during the war.
1990 – Ultra-Zionist rabbi Meir Kahane (pictured) was assassinated in a New York City hotel by an Arab gunman.

Louis Bertrand Castel (b. 1688)
Otto Wahle (b. 1879)
Habibollah Asgaroladi (d. 2013)

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Hawaii's congressional districts, as drawn for the 113th United States Congress

Hawaii has sent congressional delegations to the United States Senate and House of Representatives since it became a U.S. state in 1959. Before becoming a state, the Territory of Hawaii elected a non-voting delegate at-large to Congress from 1888 to 1958. The longest-serving senator was Daniel Inouye, from 1963 to 2012—he served as President pro tempore of the United States Senate from 2010 to 2012 as the longest-serving senator. Patsy Mink was the first woman of color to serve in the House, and the first woman to represent Hawaii in Congress. The current dean of the Hawaii delegation is Mazie Hirono, having served in the Senate since 2013 and in Congress since 2007. (Full list...)

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Today's featured picture

Fort Ross is a former Russian establishment on the west coast of North America in present-day Sonoma County, California. It was established in 1812 by the Russian-American Company to act as an agricultural base from which the Russian settlements in North America could be supplied with food and trade with Spanish Alta California. By 1841, the settlement was no longer needed for that purpose and was sold. The fort became a National Historic Landmark on November 5, 1961, and is part of California's Fort Ross State Historic Park. This photograph shows the Russian Orthodox Holy Trinity St. Nicholas Chapel at Fort Ross, which was rebuilt in 1973 after a fire.

Photograph credit: Frank Schulenburg

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