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The County Ground, Taunton, where Somerset played their home matches

In the 1891 English cricket season, Somerset County Cricket Club returned to first-class cricket after a five-year absence. They competed in the County Championship, which had been established the previous year. Somerset began the season poorly, drawing one and losing two of their opening three fixtures. Results improved and Somerset won five, lost six and drew one of their County Championship matches, finishing fifth in the table. The Somerset team predominantly consisted of amateur batsmen, supported by two professional bowlers. Lionel Palairet led Somerset's batting in terms of both runs and average, scoring 560 runs at an average of 31.11; he was also the only Somerset player to score a century during 1891. Somerset's professional bowlers, George Nichols and Ted Tyler, along with an amateur all-rounder, Sammy Woods, did almost all of the bowling for the county; Woods led the bowling tables with 72 wickets at an average of 17.08. (Full article...)

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On this day

February 4: Lichun begins in East Asia (2024)

Yasser Arafat

1169 – A strong earthquake struck the eastern coast of Sicily, causing at least 15,000 deaths.
1969 – Yasser Arafat (pictured) was elected chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization.
1974 – American newspaper heiress and socialite Patty Hearst was kidnapped by the Symbionese Liberation Army, which she later joined, in one of the most well-known cases of Stockholm syndrome.
1999 – Amadou Diallo, a 23-year-old immigrant from Guinea, was shot and killed by four New York City Police Department plain-clothed officers, prompting outrage both within and outside the city.

Bill Haywood (b. 1869)
Virginia M. Alexander (b. 1899)
Jean Bolikango (b. 1909)
Hilda Hilst (d. 2004)

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Today's featured picture

San Pedro is a composite volcano in northern Chile and one of the tallest active volcanoes in the world. It is part of the Andean Volcanic Belt and, like other Andean volcanoes, was formed by the subduction of the Nazca Plate beneath the South America Plate. San Pedro is formed of two separate edifices, the Old Cone and the Young Cone, and is adjoined to a neighbouring volcano, San Pablo. The Old Cone was active over one hundred thousand years ago and was eventually truncated by a giant landslide that removed its northwestern side. Within the landslide scar lava flows and pyroclastic flows constructed the Young Cone as well as the lateral centre La Poruña. Some eruptions have been reported during historical time, and presently the volcano is fumarolically active. This photograph shows San Pedro in the foreground, with San Pablo visible behind it to the right.

Photograph credit: Diego Delso

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