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Stanley Price Weir (23 April 1866 – 14 November 1944) was a public servant and Australian Army officer. During World War I, he commanded the 10th Battalion of the Australian Imperial Force during the landing at Anzac Cove and the Gallipoli campaign against the Ottoman Turks, and during the battles of Pozières and Mouquet Farm in France. Weir returned to Australia at his own request at the age of 50 in late 1916, when he was appointed as the first public service commissioner of South Australia. In 1917 he was awarded the Distinguished Service Order and was mentioned in despatches for his performance at Pozières and Mouquet Farm. On his retirement from the Australian Military Forces in 1921, he was given an honorary promotion to brigadier general, only the second officer born in South Australia to reach this rank. Before his retirement from public service in 1931, Weir was the chairman of both the Central Board of Health and the Public Relief Board. (Full article...)

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On this day

April 23: First day of Passover (Judaism); National Sovereignty and Children's Day in Turkey; the Third Month Fair begins in Dali City, China (2024)

Liberation of Flossenbürg

1467 – Ottoman wars in Europe: Albanian leader Skanderbeg defeated an Ottoman army under Ballaban Badera to raise the siege of Krujë.
1945 – World War II: The US Army's 90th Infantry Division liberated Flossenbürg concentration camp (pictured) in Germany, freeing 1,500 prisoners.
1976 – The American band the Ramones released their debut album, which became highly influential on the emerging punk rock movement.
1979 – Blair Peach, a New Zealand teacher, was fatally injured after being knocked unconscious during an Anti-Nazi League demonstration against a National Front election meeting in Southall, London.
2018 – A man intentionally struck pedestrians with a van on Yonge Street in Toronto, Canada, leading to 11 deaths.

Joan of France (b. 1464)
Pandita Ramabai (b. 1858)
Satyajit Ray (d. 1992)

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Today's featured picture

Bistorta officinalis, also known as the common bistort, is a species of flowering plant in the dock family Polygonaceae. It is native to Europe and northern and western Asia, but has also been cultivated and become naturalized in other parts of the world such as in the United States. It is typically found growing in moist meadows, nutrient-rich wooded swamps, forest edges, wetlands, parks, gardens and disturbed ground. A herbaceous perennial, it grows to a height of 20 to 80 centimetres (8 to 31 inches). It blooms from late spring into autumn, producing tall, erect, unbranched and hairless stems ending in single terminal racemes that are club-like spikes, 5 to 7 centimetres (2 to 3 inches) long, of rose-pink flowers. This B. officinalis inflorescence was photographed in the Austrian Alps.

Photograph credit: Uoaei1

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