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From today's featured article
Ford Island is an islet in the center of Pearl Harbor, Oahu, in the US state of Hawaii. Its original area of 334 acres (135 ha) was increased during the 1930s to 441 acres (178 ha) with fill dirt after the US Navy dredged Pearl Harbor to accommodate battleships. The island was the site of a Hawaiian fertility ritual until missionaries stopped the practice by 1830. It was given by Kamehameha I to Spanish deserter Francisco de Paula Marín, and was later owned by physician Seth Porter Ford. In 1917 the US Army bought part of it for use by an aviation division, and by 1939 it was taken over by the US Navy. It was at the center of the attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, and was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1964. By the late 1990s hundreds of millions of dollars had been invested in real estate development and infrastructure. Ford Island is home to the USS Arizona memorial, the USS Missouri museum, the Pacific Warfighting Center, and the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center. (Full article...)
Did you know ...
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- ... that Alexander Hamilton lived in the only house he ever owned (pictured) for just two years?
- ... that the 16th-century In the Village of Guaraparim, written by a Catholic saint in a now-dead American language, features a character speaking "in a way that resembles the characters of Aristophanes"?
- ... that Femke Bol broke the 41-year-old indoor world record for the 400 metres with a time of 49.26 seconds in 2023?
- ... that Desulfovibrio vulgaris can remove toxic heavy metals from the environment?
- ... that graffiti artist Al Diaz cuts up New York metro signs and reconfigures the letters into his own text?
- ... that the initial lyrics to "Shukusei!! Loli Kami Requiem" were "as painful as hitting someone with concrete"?
- ... that the New Orleans Saints went their first 20 seasons without a winning season?
- ... that five peregrine falcon chicks were released from the roof of an office building in Virginia in an unsuccessful attempt to combat an overpopulation of pigeons?
In the news
- Mount Marapi erupts (pictured) on the island of Sumatra in Indonesia, killing 23 hikers.
- Former U.S. secretary of state Henry Kissinger dies at the age of 100.
- All 41 workers trapped in a road tunnel collapse in Uttarakhand, India, are rescued after 17 days underground.
- In motorcycle racing, Francesco Bagnaia wins the MotoGP World Championship.
- The novel Prophet Song by Paul Lynch wins the Booker Prize.
On this day
December 7: Feast day of Saint Ambrose (Christianity); National Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day in the United States (1941)
- 43 BC – Cicero, widely considered one of ancient Rome's greatest orators and prose stylists, was killed after having been proscribed as an enemy of the state.
- 1837 – British troops swiftly defeated rebels led by William Lyon Mackenzie and Anthony Van Egmond at the Battle of Montgomery's Tavern, the only major confrontation of the Upper Canada Rebellion.
- 1942 – Second World War: A small unit of Royal Marines launched Operation Frankton, in which they damaged six ships in the port of Bordeaux in German-occupied France.
- 1988 – A 6.8 Ms earthquake struck the Spitak region of Armenia, killing at least 25,000 people (aftermath pictured).
- 2011 – The United States transferred its last base in the Al Anbar Governorate to the Iraqi government, ending the Anbar campaign.
- Charles Saunders (d. 1775)
- Hamilton Fish III (b. 1888)
- Noam Chomsky (b. 1928)
- Barbara Howard (d. 2002)
Today's featured picture
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Platycypha caligata, commonly known as the dancing jewel, is a species of damselfly in the family Chlorocyphidae. It is found in eastern, central and southern Africa from Ethiopia to Angola and South Africa. Its natural habitats include shady parts of subtropical or tropical streams and rivers in forest, woodland, savanna, shrubland, and the shorelines of lakes. Males perform remarkable territorial and courtship displays which include flashing their brightly coloured legs with flattened tibiae and waving their abdomens. This male dancing jewel, with a length of around 35 mm, was photographed near Victoria Falls in Zambia. Photograph credit: Charles J. Sharp
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