Wikipedia:Main Page history/2016 June 21

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From today's featured article

The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara, painting by Moritz Daniel Oppenheim, 1862. This depiction departs significantly from the historical record of how Mortara was taken—no clergy were present, for example.

The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara, by Moritz Daniel Oppenheim

The Mortara case was a controversy precipitated by the Papal States' seizure of Edgardo Mortara, a six-year-old Jewish child, from his family in Bologna, Italy, in 1858. The city's inquisitor, Father Pier Feletti, heard from a servant that she had administered emergency baptism to the boy when he fell sick as an infant, and the Supreme Sacred Congregation of the Roman and Universal Inquisition held that this made the child irrevocably a Catholic. Because the Papal States had forbidden the raising of Christians by members of other faiths, it was ordered that he be taken from his family and brought up by the Church. After visits from the child's father, international protests mounted, but Pope Pius IX would not be moved. The boy grew up as a Catholic with the Pope as a substitute father, trained for the priesthood in Rome until 1870, and was ordained in France three years later. In 1870 the Kingdom of Italy captured Rome during the unification of Italy, ending the pontifical state; opposition across Italy, Europe and the United States over Mortara's treatment may have contributed to its downfall. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

Mr. Dooley (drawn in 1900)

... that although the fictional bartender Mr. Dooley (pictured) was a very popular political commentator in his time, he is almost forgotten today?
... that Maison Bertaux in Soho is London's oldest pâtisserie shop?
... that Boyers Run starts in Pennsylvania and ends up near Liverpool?
... that the 2016–17 rugby season of London 1 South will feature a national RFU cup champion?
... that Fantasia described her song "No Time for It" as a combination of her childhood singing in church and desire to "tap into that whole rock world"?
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In the news

LeBron James

In basketball, the Cleveland Cavaliers defeat the Golden State Warriors to win the NBA Finals (MVP LeBron James pictured).
The United Nations reports 80,000 civilians have fled Fallujah, as Iraqi Army and Shia militias retake most of the city from ISIL.
British Member of Parliament Jo Cox dies after being shot and stabbed in Birstall, West Yorkshire.
In association football, fan violence at UEFA Euro 2016 results in arrests and deportation of fans, and a €150,000 fine and suspended disqualification for the Russian team.

On this day...

June 21: World Music Day; National Aboriginal Day in Canada

SpaceShipOne

1529 – War of the League of Cognac: The French army under Francis de Bourbon was destroyed in Lombardy, present-day Italy, by the Spanish army.
1848 – In the Wallachian Revolution, Ion Heliade Rădulescu and Christian Tell proclaimed a new republican government.
1919 – During the Winnipeg general strike in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, members of the Royal Northwest Mounted Police charged into the crowd of strikers on horseback, beating them with clubs and firing weapons.
1963 – Italian cardinal Giovanni Battista Montini was elected as Pope Paul VI.
2004 – SpaceShipOne (pictured) completed the first privately funded human spaceflight.

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Today's featured picture

Draco is a constellation in the far northern sky. Its name is Latin for dragon. It was one of the 48 constellations listed by the 2nd century astronomer Ptolemy and remains one of the 88 modern constellations today. Draco is circumpolar and can thus be seen all year from northern latitudes.

This illustration comes from Urania's Mirror, a set of 32 astronomical star chart cards first published in November 1824. Shown beneath Draco is Ursa Minor.

Lithograph: Sidney Hall; restoration: Adam Cuerden

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