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From the day after tomorrow's featured article

James and Margaret Reed of the Donner Party

The Donner Party was a group of American pioneers who set out for California in a wagon train, but became snowbound in the Sierra Nevada mountains in November 1846. Running out of food, some resorted to cannibalism to survive. The journey west usually took between four and six months, but the Donner Party had been slowed by following a new route called the Hastings Cutoff, which crossed the Rocky Mountains' Wasatch Range and the Great Salt Lake Desert in present-day Utah. They lost many cattle and wagons in the rugged terrain, and divisions formed within the group. Their food supplies ran low after they became trapped by an early, heavy snowfall high in the mountains. In mid-December some of the group set out on foot and were able to obtain help. Of the 87 members of the party, 48 survived to reach California. Historians have described the episode as one of the most spectacular tragedies in California history. (Full article...)

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Did you know ...

Royal Game of Ur board, c. 2500 BCE

... that scholars disagree on whether the earliest-known game boards (example pictured) date to the Neolithic or the Early Bronze Age?
... that the Estado Novo deprived Aurora Rodrigues of sleep for more than two weeks to induce hallucinations?
... that the Hogmanay special Live into 85 was so shambolic it ended a 32-year tradition?
... that Casey Washington made the game-winning score that ended a record nine-overtime college football game?
... that the distinctive coloration of the giant panda appears to serve as camouflage in both winter and summer?
... that Saparinah Sadli defended one of her former students when Indonesia's State Intelligence Agency challenged her gendered exploration of the New Order regime?
... that the 18th-century hymn "Alas! and Did My Saviour Bleed" has been criticised because its lyrics have singers call themselves a "worm"?
... that Elizabeth Yeampierre has called Puerto Rico the "poster child for climate injustice" due to the devastation caused by Hurricane Maria?
... that Boston's World's Museum was a theatre, an aquarium, a menagerie, and a freak show?

In the news (For today)

Donald Trump

Former U.S. president Donald Trump (pictured) is found guilty on all 34 counts of falsifying business records.
In Indy car racing, Josef Newgarden wins the Indianapolis 500.
In cricket, the Kolkata Knight Riders defeat Sunrisers Hyderabad to win the Indian Premier League.
Gitanas Nausėda is re-elected as president of Lithuania.
A landslide in Papua New Guinea's Enga Province leaves thousands of people missing and presumed dead.

In two days

June 3: Anniversary of Khomeini's Death in Iran (1989); Martyrs Day in Uganda; King's Official Birthday in New Zealand (2024); Western Australia Day (2024)

One of the last two great auks

1602 – Anglo-Spanish War: An English naval force defeated a Spanish-Portuguese fleet off Sesimbra, Portugal, and captured a carrack.
1844 – The last known pair of great auks (one pictured), the only modern species in the genus Pinguinus of flightless birds, were killed on Eldey, Iceland.
1968 – American radical feminist Valerie Solanas shot and wounded visual artist Andy Warhol and two others at Warhol's New York City studio, The Factory.
1973 – At the Paris Air Show, a Tupolev Tu-144 broke up in mid-air, killing all six members of its crew and eight bystanders on the ground.
1979 – Having invaded Uganda and deposed President Idi Amin, Tanzanian forces secured Uganda's western border, ending a seven-month war.

Garret Hobart (b. 1844)
Eric A. Havelock (b. 1903)
Franz Kafka (d. 1924)
Pierre Poilievre (b. 1979)

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From the day after tomorrow's featured list

Alan Turing

The Turing Award is an annual prize given by the Association for Computing Machinery for contributions of lasting and major technical importance to computer science. It is generally recognized as the highest distinction in the field of computer science and is often referred to as the "Nobel Prize of Computing". The award is named after Alan Turing (pictured), who was a British mathematician and reader in mathematics at the University of Manchester. Turing is often credited as being the founder of theoretical computer science and artificial intelligence, and a key contributor to the Allied cryptanalysis of the Enigma cipher during World War II. The first recipient, in 1966, was Alan Perlis, of Carnegie Mellon University. The youngest recipient was Donald Knuth who won in 1974, at the age of 36, while the oldest recipient was Alfred Aho who won in 2020, at the age of 79. As of 2024, 77 people have been awarded the prize. (Full list...)

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Featured picture (Check back later for the day after tomorrow's.)

Moissac Abbey was a Benedictine monastery in Moissac, Tarn-et-Garonne, in south-western France. A number of its medieval buildings survive, including the abbey church, which has a notable Romanesque sculpture around the entrance. This picture shows the abbey's cloisters.

Photograph credit: Benh Lieu Song

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