User:Allard

Hello and a warm welcome to all my fellow Wikipedians. How nice of you to drop in to see who I am!

Morning>

Wikipedia & me:

How I discovered Wikipedia, I do not remember. But from being a reader I slowly became a contributor. Although I don't work that much on Wikipedia I do see myself as a Wikipedian. I don't go searching on Wikipedia what I can edit next, I edit what I find and want to do. This means I add and mainly improve a lot of small things and only rarely I make large edits.

My work:

My list of contributions

Articles I've started on Wikipedia:

Images I made for Wikipedia:

Article guide:

A list of articles worth looking at, if one can find them:

And there's always the Random article

And to all citizens of the European Union, please read this: Oneseat.eu

News

Protest in Central Jakarta

A magnitude-7.7 earthquake leaves more than 200 people dead in Myanmar and Thailand.
Nationwide protests (example pictured) are held throughout Indonesia following the enactment of legislation increasing military involvement in civilian government roles.
Archaeologists announce the discovery of the Melsonby Hoard, a collection of Iron Age artefacts, in a field in North Yorkshire, England.
American world heavyweight boxing champion George Foreman dies at the age of 76.

Selected anniversaries

March 29: Boganda Day in the Central African Republic (1959); Martyrs' Day in Madagascar (1947)

Mariner 10

1461 – Wars of the Roses: The Yorkists defeated the Lancastrian army at the Battle of Towton, allowing Edward IV to secure the English throne.
1882 – The Knights of Columbus, the world's largest Catholic fraternal service organization, was founded by Michael J. McGivney in New Haven, Connecticut, U.S.
1974 – NASA's Mariner 10 (pictured) became the first space probe to make a flyby of Mercury.
1999 – The Chamoli earthquake, one of the strongest to hit the foothills of the Himalayas in more than 90 years, killed at least 100 people.
2014 – The first same-sex marriages in England and Wales took place following the passage of the Marriage (Same Sex Couples) Act 2013.

Thomas Coram (d. 1751)
Emilia Baeyertz (b. 1842)
Sam Loxton (b. 1921)
Ruth A. M. Schmidt (d. 2014)

More anniversaries:

Did you know...

De Lamar Mansion

... that the exterior of the De Lamar Mansion (pictured) was cleaned using toothbrushes during the 2000s?
... that Edward Skeletrix, to promote his album Museum Music, held an exhibition during which he sat inside a glass box?
... that the fortified walls surrounding the Iron Age Tell Ruqeish in Palestine are up to 5.5 metres (18 feet) thick?
... that the Raymond C. and Mildred Kramer House was one of fewer than half a dozen houses built in Manhattan during 1934?
... that the sustainability of the Baggu reusable bag is challenged by collector culture?
... that NFL player Obe Wenig was named an All-Pro even though he played only one game?
... that director Isao Takahata reportedly stayed overnight at a doss-house to ensure that the Japanese animated film Jarinko Chie accurately depicts the city of Osaka?
... that the least populous of Oregon's cities has three people?
... that journalist Ivan Miller was once bitten by a disgruntled Santa Claus?

Today's featured article

Hurricane Cindy was a tropical cyclone that made landfall in the U.S. state of Louisiana in July 2005. The third named storm of the 2005 Atlantic hurricane season, Cindy developed from a tropical wave on July 3, off the east coast of Mexico's Yucatán Peninsula. Soon after, it moved over land before emerging into the Gulf of Mexico. It tracked toward the northern Gulf Coast and strengthened to reach maximum sustained winds of 75 mph (120 km/h), making it a Category 1 on the Saffir–Simpson scale. The hurricane struck Louisiana, on July 5 at peak intensity, but weakened by the time it made a second landfall along southern Mississippi. It weakened over the southeastern US and transitioned into an extratropical cyclone on July 7. The remnants of Cindy produced an outbreak of 42 tornadoes across six states before they moved into Atlantic Canada and dissipated on July 13 over the Gulf of St. Lawrence. Cindy caused six traffic deaths and its damage was significant. (Full article...)

Recently featured:

Picture of the day

Silene flos-cuculi, commonly known as the ragged robin, is a perennial herbaceous plant in the family Caryophyllaceae. Native to Europe and Asia, it is found along roads and in wet meadows and pastures, and has also become naturalized in parts of North America. It forms a rosette of low growing foliage with numerous stems that are 30 to 90 centimetres (12 to 36 inches) tall. The stems rise above the foliage and branch near the top of the stem, the stems having barbed hairs which point downward and make the plant rough to the touch. The middle and upper leaves are linear-lanceolate with pointed apexes. Butterflies and long-tongued bees feed on the flowers' nectar. In addition to these pollinators, the flowers are visited by many types of insects, and can be characterized by a generalized pollination syndrome. This S. flos-cuculi flower was photographed in Niitvälja, Estonia. This picture was focus-stacked from 27 separate images.Photograph credit: Ivar Leidus

Archive – More featured pictures...