Wikipedia:Main Page history/2013 July 9

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From today's featured article

Pipe Dream is the seventh musical by the team of Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II. Premiering on Broadway on November 30, 1955, it was a flop and a financial disaster. It is based on John Steinbeck's short novel Sweet Thursday, which he wrote in the hope of having it adapted into a musical. Set in Monterey, California, the musical tells the story of the romance between Doc, a marine biologist, and Suzy, who in the novel is a prostitute; her profession is only alluded to in the stage work. Rodgers and Hammerstein signed operatic diva Helen Traubel to play Fauna, the house madam. They had concerns about featuring a prostitute as female lead and setting part of the musical in a bordello and as the show progressed through tryouts, Hammerstein repeatedly revised it, obscuring Suzy's profession and the nature of Fauna's house. Pipe Dream met with poor reviews, and rapidly closed once it exhausted its advance sale. It had no national tour or London production, and has rarely been presented since. There was no film at the time; the Rodgers & Hammerstein Organization once hoped for a film version featuring the Muppets with Fauna played by Miss Piggy. (Full article...)

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Did you know...

From Wikipedia's newest content:

... that Bluthochzeit (Blood Wedding), Wolfgang Fortner's opera based on García Lorca's play Bodas de sangre, premiered in 1957 at the Cologne Opera (pictured)?

... that Gary Chalandon won the Formula Le Mans class of the Le Mans Series in 2010?

... that Betty Woz Gone is based on a true story of a mother who sold her body to help fund her addictions to alcohol and drugs?

... that the Byzantine official known as epi tou eidikou was responsible for providing all kinds of matériel for the Byzantine military, including Arab clothing for spies?

... that the participants in the 2013 Great North 10K run shared the finish line at Gateshead International Stadium with Mo Farah?

... that K. Hariharan in his initial days started making films for the Children's Film Society, India?

... that the concrete bunker housing RAAF North-Eastern Area Command's operational headquarters during World War II was topped with a suburban house to mislead enemy aircraft?

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In the news

Nine bombs are detonated at one of the holiest sites in Buddhism, the Mahabodhi Temple complex (pictured) in India, injuring five people.

More than fifty supporters of deposed Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi are killed in clashes with the military in Cairo.

In tennis, Marion Bartoli wins the women's singles and Andy Murray wins the men's singles at the Wimbledon Championships.

Asiana Airlines Flight 214 crashes while landing at San Francisco International Airport, killing two people.

A runaway fuel train derails in Lac-Mégantic, Quebec, killing at least thirteen people and destroying at least thirty buildings in the town's core.

At least 42 people, mostly students, are killed in a pre-dawn attack at a school in Yobe State, Nigeria.

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On this day...

July 9: Ramadan begins (Islam, 2013); Independence Day in Argentina (1816)

1572 – Nineteen Catholic friars and clerics were hanged in Gorkum during the 16th century religious wars in the Low Countries.

1745 – War of the Austrian Succession: The French victory in the Battle of Melle made their subsequent capture of Ghent possible.

1868 – The Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution, including the Citizenship Clause and the Equal Protection Clause, was ratified by the minimum required twenty-eight U.S. states.

1943 – World War II: The Allies began their invasion of Sicily, a large scale amphibious and airborne operation, followed by six weeks of land combat.

1981 – Nintendo released the arcade game Donkey Kong (pictured), which featured the debut of Mario, one of the most famous characters in video game history.

More anniversaries: July 8 – July 9 – July 10

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It is now July 9, 2013 (UTC) – Reload this page

Today's featured picture

The Australian water dragon (Physignathus lesueurii) is a lizard native to eastern Australia, from Victoria north to Queensland. Adult males can grow slightly longer than one metre (3 feet), and both males and females have long powerful limbs and a long muscular tail. The dragons are primarily arboreal, although they can also swim.

Photograph: John O'Neill

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