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From today's featured article

Kaiman-class torpedo boat 69 F

The 24 Kaiman-class ships were high-seas torpedo boats built for the Austro-Hungarian Navy between 1904 and 1910. Yarrow Shipbuilders built the lead ship (launched on 3 June 1905), Stabilimento Tecnico Triestino of Trieste built 13 boats, and Ganz-Danubius constructed the remaining 10 boats at their shipyards at Fiume. The class was considered to be a very successful design, and all boats saw extensive active service during World War I, undertaking a range of tasks, including escort duties, shore bombardments and minesweeping. All survived, although several were damaged by naval mines and collisions. One was torpedoed and badly damaged by a French submarine, and two sank an Italian submarine. All the boats were transferred to the Allies and scrapped at the end of the war, except for four that were allocated to the navy of the newly created Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes. These were discarded and broken up between 1928 and 1930. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

Nikolskoe Cemetery

... that among those buried in the Nikolskoe Cemetery (pictured) is Fyodor Uglov, who was the world's oldest practising surgeon when he retired at age 102?
... that James Bruce Lockhart's career in the Foreign Office was a cover for his real work with the Secret Intelligence Service?
... that one theory holds that aquatic cold-water species entered Sweden's Lake Sommen by a natural lock system at the end of the last ice age?
... that Australian rules footballer Tyla Hanks set a record in the agility component at the 2018 AFL Women's draft combine?
... that the pea crab Tunicotheres moseri lives inside the water-filled chamber of a sea squirt?
... that military geologists were employed to find the best landing sites during the planning of the invasions of the United Kingdom, Sicily, and France in World War II?
... that although the Transylvanian nobleman János Gerendi refrained from eating blood and animals that had been strangled, he did not keep all the Old Testament laws?
... that the roof of the Temple of Hera in Corfu was decorated with large terracotta figures painted in vivid colour, making it one of the most intricately adorned buildings of Archaic Greece?
... that Barbie likes welding?

In the news

Jordan Henderson

In association football, the UEFA Champions League concludes with Liverpool (captain Jordan Henderson pictured) defeating Tottenham Hotspur in the final.
Brigitte Bierlein is named interim chancellor of Austria, after a parliamentary motion of no confidence dismisses the government of Sebastian Kurz.
James Marape is elected Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea, following the resignation of Peter O'Neill.
A river cruiser collides with another vessel and sinks in Budapest, Hungary, killing at least seven people.

On this day

June 3: Feast day of Saint Charles Lwanga and the Uganda Martyrs (Catholicism, Anglicanism and Lutheranism); Queen's Official Birthday in New Zealand (2019); Western Australia Day (2019)

Great auks by John Gerrard Keulemans

1781 – American Revolutionary War: Jack Jouett made a 40-mile (64 km) ride to warn Thomas Jefferson and the Virginia legislature of coming British cavalry who had been sent to capture them.
1844 – The last known pair of great auks (specimens depicted), the only modern species in the genus Pinguinus, were killed on Eldey, off the coast of Iceland.
1950 – Herzog and Lachenal of the French Annapurna expedition became the first climbers to reach the summit of an 8,000-metre peak.
1969 – During a SEATO exercise HMAS Melbourne of the Royal Australian Navy collided with the U.S. Navy's USS Frank E. Evans, cutting the latter in two and killing 74 people.
1982 – An assassination attempt on Shlomo Argov, the Israeli ambassador to the United Kingdom, failed; this was later used as justification for the 1982 Lebanon War.

Ivan Shishman of Bulgaria (d. 1395) · Charles Lecocq (b. 1832) · Jill Biden (b. 1951)

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From today's featured list

John Newbery

The Newbery Medal is a literary award given by the Association for Library Service to Children, a division of the American Library Association (ALA), to the author of "the most distinguished contribution to American literature for children". The Newbery and the Caldecott Medal are considered the two most prestigious awards for children's literature in the United States. Named for John Newbery (pictured), an 18th-century English publisher of juvenile books, the winner of the Newbery is selected at the ALA's Midwinter Conference by a fifteen-person committee. The physical bronze medal was designed by Rene Paul Chambellan and is given to the winning author at the next ALA annual conference. Besides the Newbery Medal, the committee awards a variable number of citations to leading contenders, called Newbery Honors or Newbery Honor Books; until 1971, these books were called runners-up. To be eligible, a book must be written by a United States citizen or resident and must be published first or simultaneously in the United States in English during the preceding year. Six authors have won two Newbery Medals each. As of 2019^[update], the most recent winner is Meg Medina for Merci Suárez Changes Gears. (Full list...)

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Today's featured picture

Allen Ginsberg (June 3, 1926 – April 5, 1997) was an American poet, philosopher and writer. He is considered to be one of the leading figures of both the Beat Generation during the 1950s and the counterculture that soon followed. Ginsberg vigorously opposed militarism, economic materialism and sexual repression; he was also known to embody various aspects of this counterculture, such as his views on drugs, hostility to bureaucracy and openness to Eastern religions. He was one of many influential American writers of his time who were associated with the Beat Generation, including Jack Kerouac and William S. Burroughs. Ginsberg is best known for his poem "Howl", in which he denounced what he saw as the destructive forces of capitalism and conformity in the United States.

This picture, taken in 1979, shows Ginsberg signing books at the Atheneum bookstore in Amsterdam. The photograph is in the collection of the Algemeen Nederlandsch Fotobureau (General Dutch Photo Bureau, also known as Anefo), part of the Dutch national archives.

Photograph credit: Hans van Dijk; cropped by Materialscientist

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