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The Wikipedia article of the day for March 17, 2018 is Freedom Planet . Freedom Planet is a two-dimensional platform video game developed and published by independent developer GalaxyTrail, a studio set up for the project by designer Stephen DiDuro. The player controls one of three anthropomorphic animal protagonists: the dragon Lilac, the wildcat Carol, or the basset hound Milla. Aided by the duck-like Torque (concept art shown), the player attempts to defeat Lord Brevon, who plans to conquer the galaxy. While the game focuses on fast-paced platforming, its levels are interspersed with slower action scenes. Freedom Planet began development as a Sonic the Hedgehog fangame, but DiDuro lost interest in creating a derivative work and reconceived the project as his own intellectual property. Developed in Denmark and the United States, the game and its art have East Asian influences: its background visuals were inspired by medieval Chinese art, and its title is written in katakana. Critics

The Wikipedia article of the day for March 16, 2018 is Hurricane Marie (2014) . Hurricane Marie is tied as the seventh-most intense Pacific hurricane on record, attaining a barometric pressure of 918 mbar (hPa; 27.11 inHg) in August 2014. At its peak, the hurricane's gale-force winds spanned an area 575 miles (925 km) across. Although its center remained well away from land, its large size created dangerous surf from Southwestern Mexico to southern California. Off the coast of Los Cabos, three people drowned after their boat capsized in rough seas. In Colima and Oaxaca, heavy rains and flooding from outer bands caused two fatalities. Toward the end of August, swells of 10 to 15 ft (3.0 to 4.6 m), the largest seen from a hurricane in decades, battered coastlines in southern California, with structural damage on Santa Catalina Island and in the Greater Los Angeles Area. A breakwater near Long Beach sustained $10 million worth of damage, with portions gouged out. One person drowned i

The Wikipedia article of the day for March 15, 2018 is Ferugliotherium . Ferugliotherium was a mammal of the Late Cretaceous, around 70 million years ago. The genus was first described in 1986 but misidentified as a member of Multituberculata, an extinct group of rodent-like mammals, on the basis of a single tooth, a low-crowned molar. It is thought to have had a small body mass, about 70 g (2.5 oz), and may have eaten insects and plant material. Its remains have been found in two geological formations of present-day southern Argentina, as part of a mammal fauna that included the sudamericid Gondwanatherium and a variety of dryolestoids. The upper and lower incisors were long and rodent-like, with enamel on only one side of the crown. A fragment of the lower jaw shows that the tooth socket of the lower incisor was very long. Although Ferugliotherium had much lower-crowned teeth than the sudamericids, they shared the same backward jaw movement during chewing and essentially similar pat

The Wikipedia article of the day for March 14, 2018 is Thomas R. Marshall . Thomas R. Marshall (March 14, 1854 – June 1, 1925) was a Democratic politician who served as the 28th Vice President of the United States from 1913 to 1921. As the 27th Governor of Indiana, he proposed a new, controversial state constitution and pressed for other Progressive Era reforms. His popularity as governor, and Indiana's status as a critical swing state, helped him secure the vice presidential nomination on a ticket with Woodrow Wilson in 1912 and win the general election. During World War I, after a small number of anti-war senators kept the Senate deadlocked by refusing to end debate, Marshall led the body to adopt its first rule allowing filibusters to be ended by a two-thirds majority vote. After a stroke incapacitated Wilson in October 1919, many cabinet officials and Congressional leaders urged Marshall to become acting president, but he refused to forcibly assume the presidency for fear of s

The Wikipedia article of the day for March 13, 2018 is Winter War . The Winter War (30 November 1939 – 13 March 1940) began when the Soviet Union (USSR) invaded Finland three months after the outbreak of World War II. The USSR had sought to annex Finnish territory, including land near Leningrad, 32 km (20 mi) from the border. After Finland refused, the USSR attacked with more than twice as many soldiers, thirty times as many aircraft, and a hundred times as many tanks as the defending forces. The Red Army had been crippled by Joseph Stalin's Great Purge and the Finnish Defence Forces repelled the invasion in temperatures down to −43 °C (−45 °F) for much longer than expected. A reorganized Soviet offensive broke through in February 1940 and forced the Finns to seek peace. Finland ceded 11 percent of its territory, but retained sovereignty. Soviet casualties have been estimated at 321,000 to 381,000, compared to Finnish casualties of 70,000. The poor performance of the Red Army enco

The Wikipedia article of the day for March 12, 2018 is Family Trade . Family Trade is an American reality television series broadcast by Game Show Network (GSN). The show premiered on March 12, 2013, and continued to air new episodes until April 16, 2013. Filmed in Middlebury, Vermont, the series chronicles the daily activities of G. Stone Motors (pictured), a GMC and Ford car dealership that employs the barter system in selling its automobiles. The business is operated by its founder, Gardner Stone, his son and daughter, Todd and Darcy, and General Manager Travis Romano. The series features the shop's daily interaction with its customers, who bring in pigs, maple syrup, collectable dolls and other items for resale to make a down payment on a vehicle they are leasing or purchasing. Family Trade was part of GSN's attempt to broaden their programming beyond traditional game shows. The series was given unfavorable reviews by critics, and its television ratings fell over time, los

The Wikipedia article of the day for March 11, 2018 is Douglas MacArthur's escape from the Philippines . Douglas MacArthur's escape from the Philippines during World War II began on 11 March 1942, after U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered him to withdraw. MacArthur left Corregidor Island and traveled in PT boats with his forces through stormy seas patrolled by Japanese warships, reaching Mindanao two days later. Arriving in Australia, he declared, "I came through and I shall return". MacArthur, a well-known general who had a distinguished record in World War I, had retired from the army in 1937 to become a defense advisor to the Philippine government. He was recalled to active duty in July 1941, a few months before the outbreak of the Pacific War with the Empire of Japan, to become commander of the U.S. Army Forces in the Far East, which included Philippine forces. By March 1942, the Japanese invasion of the Philippines had compelled him to withdraw his forc

The Wikipedia article of the day for March 10, 2018 is Amazing Stories Quarterly . Amazing Stories Quarterly was a U.S. science fiction pulp magazine published from 1928 to 1934. Launched by Hugo Gernsback as a companion to his Amazing Stories, the first science fiction magazine, it premiered with a reprint of H.G. Wells' When the Sleeper Wakes in the Winter 1928 issue. Over the next five issues only one more reprint appeared: Gernsback's own novel Ralph 124C 41+, in the Winter 1929 issue. He went bankrupt in early 1929, and lost control of both publications; his assistant, T. O'Conor Sloane, took over as editor. The magazine began having financial difficulties in 1932, and the schedule became irregular; the last issue was dated Fall 1934. Authors whose work appeared in Amazing Stories Quarterly include Stanton A. Coblentz, Miles J. Breuer, A. Hyatt Verrill, and Jack Williamson. Critical opinions differ; Everett Bleiler considers few of the stories to be of acceptable qual

The Wikipedia article of the day for March 9, 2018 is Armillaria gallica . Armillaria gallica is a species of honey mushroom in the family Physalacriaceae. It is a common and ecologically important wood-decay fungus that can feed on dead organic material in soil, or live as an opportunistic parasite in weakened tree hosts to cause root or butt rot. It is found in temperate regions of Asia, North America, and Europe. The yellow-brown mushrooms, covered with small scales, can grow to around 10 cm (4 in) in diameter. On the underside of the caps are gills that are white to creamy or pale orange. The fungus has been the subject of considerable scientific research into its role as a plant pathogen, its ability to bioluminesce, its unusual life cycle, and its ability to form large and long-lived colonies. A 1,500-year-old colony was discovered in the early 1990s in a Michigan forest, reported to cover an area of 15 hectares (37 acres) and weigh at least 9,500 kilograms (21,000 lb); as a tou

The Wikipedia article of the day for March 8, 2018 is Louise Bryant . Louise Bryant (1885–1936) was an American feminist, political activist, and journalist. After growing up in rural Nevada and graduating with a degree in history from the University of Oregon, she wrote for two newspapers, the Spectator and The Oregonian. After leaving her first husband in 1915, she married John Reed and moved to Greenwich Village, where she formed friendships with leading feminists of the day. Like Reed, she took lovers, including the playwright Eugene O'Neill and painter Andrew Dasburg. Her news stories were distributed by Hearst during and after her trips to Petrograd and Moscow, and appeared in newspapers across the United States and Canada. Generally in sympathy with the Bolsheviks during the Russian Revolution, her articles featured Catherine Breshkovsky, Maria Spiridonova, Alexander Kerensky, Vladimir Lenin, and Leon Trotsky. A collection of articles from her first trip was published as a

The Wikipedia article of the day for March 7, 2018 is Henry Wrigley . Henry Wrigley (1892–1987) was an air vice marshal in the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF). A pioneering flyer and aviation scholar, he piloted the first trans-Australia flight from Melbourne to Darwin in 1919, and afterwards laid the groundwork for the RAAF's air power doctrine. During World War I, he joined the Australian Flying Corps and saw combat with No. 3 Squadron on the Western Front, earning the Distinguished Flying Cross; he later commanded the unit and published a history of its wartime exploits. He was awarded the Air Force Cross for his 1919 cross-country flight. He was a founding member of the RAAF in 1921. In 1936, he was promoted to group captain and took command of RAAF Station Laverton. Raised to air commodore soon after the outbreak of World War II, he became Air Member for Personnel in November 1940. He was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire the next year. He served as A

The Wikipedia article of the day for March 6, 2018 is 3 of Hearts (album) . 3 of Hearts is the self-titled debut studio album by the American group 3 of Hearts, released on March 6, 2001, through the record label RCA Nashville. It is a teen pop and country music album, though according to some music critics, it leans more towards pop music. The album was managed by American producer Byron Gallimore; its marketing focused on the group's crossover appeal to teenagers and young adults. 3 of Hearts performed on a national tour sponsored by Seventeen magazine and another sponsored by Walmart, and the singers were featured in several marketing campaigns. Reviews of the album were mixed; some critics praised the group's vocals and public image, but others criticized the songs as generic and lacking an authentic country sound. The album peaked at number 45 on Billboard's Top Country Albums chart. "Love Is Enough" and "Arizona Rain" were released as singles and

The Wikipedia article of the day for March 5, 2018 is Thorium . Thorium is a chemical element with symbol Th and atomic number 90. A reactive actinide metal, its chemistry is dominated by the +4 oxidation state; it is silvery and tarnishes black in air, forming the dioxide. It is malleable and moderately hard, with a high melting point. Its most stable isotope, 232Th, is weakly radioactive with a half-life of 14.05 billion years, roughly the age of the universe: it decays very slowly to stable lead. Thorium and uranium are the only two significantly radioactive primordial elements. Thorium is chiefly refined from monazite sands as a byproduct of extracting rare earth metals. It was discovered in 1829 by the Norwegian mineralogist Morten Thrane Esmark and identified by the Swedish chemist Jöns Jacob Berzelius, who named it after Thor, the Norse god of thunder. Applications were found for the element in the 19th century, but after its radioactivity was discovered in the early 20th centu

The Wikipedia article of the day for March 4, 2018 is Miriam Makeba . Miriam Makeba (4 March 1932 – 9 November 2008) was a South African singer, actor, and civil rights activist. She was a vocal opponent of apartheid and white-minority government, in South Africa and elsewhere. Associated with genres including afropop, jazz, and world music, she began singing professionally in the 1950s. She had a brief role in the anti-apartheid film Come Back, Africa (1959), which led to performances in Venice, London, and New York City. Makeba moved to the United States, where her career flourished, and released several albums and songs, including the hit "Pata Pata" (1967). She and Harry Belafonte received a Grammy Award for their 1965 album An Evening with Belafonte/Makeba. Her 1968 marriage to Stokely Carmichael of the Black Panther Party was not well received in the US, and she moved to Guinea, where she wrote and performed music more explicitly critical of apartheid. Nicknamed Mama A

The Wikipedia article of the day for March 3, 2018 is HMS St Vincent (1908) . HMS St Vincent was the lead ship of her class of three dreadnought battleships, built for the Royal Navy in the first decade of the 20th century. She was equipped with ten 12-inch (305 mm) guns in five gun turrets. After commissioning in 1910, her entire career was spent with the Home and Grand Fleets, often serving as a flagship. In the Battle of Jutland in May 1916, the ship discharged 98 shells from her main guns, firing first at the crippled German light cruiser SMS Wiesbaden. Targeting the battlecruiser SMS Moltke, her first hit wrecked the sickbay and slightly damaged the surrounding superstructure and hull, causing minor flooding. The second hit penetrated the rear armour of the superfiring turret at the rear of the ship. Apart from Jutland and the inconclusive Action of 19 August several months later, her service during World War I generally consisted of routine patrols and training in the North Sea.

The Wikipedia article of the day for March 2, 2018 is Indian Head cent . The Indian Head cent is a penny ($0.01) that was produced by the U.S. Bureau of the Mint from 1859 to 1909. It was preceded by the large cent (1793–1857), a copper coin about the size of a half dollar, and the Flying Eagle cent. The large cent was discontinued after a rise in the price of copper in the wake of the California Gold Rush (1848–1855). The 1857 Flying Eagle is identical in diameter to the modern U.S. cent, but thicker, with a composition of 12% nickel and 88% copper. The Indian head cent, designed by James Barton Longacre, the Chief Engraver at the Philadelphia Mint, was initially the same size as the Flying Eagle. Cents were hoarded during the economic chaos of the American Civil War, when nickel was in short supply, and privately issued bronze tokens began to circulate until Congress authorized a thinner cent of bronze alloy. After the war the cent became popular, and even more so with the advent of

The Wikipedia article of the day for March 1, 2018 is Sheshi . Sheshi was a ruler of parts of Ancient Egypt sometime between 1800 and 1550 BC, near the end of the Middle Kingdom or during the Second Intermediate Period. Based on the archaeological evidence, he is the best attested king in this timeframe; hundreds of scaraboid seals bearing his name have been found as far away as Carthage and throughout Canaan, Egypt, and Nubia. Nevertheless, historians cannot pin down basic facts about this ruler, such as his dynasty or the duration and extent of his reign. Three competing hypotheses have been put forth: he may have been Salitis, founder of the 15th Dynasty and king of the invading Hyksos, or a later Hyksos king or vassal of the second half of the 15th Dynasty, or a ruler of the 14th Dynasty, a line of kings of Canaanite descent ruling over the Eastern Nile Delta immediately before the arrival of the Hyksos.

The Wikipedia article of the day for February 28, 2018 is Flight Unlimited III . Flight Unlimited III is a 1999 flight simulator video game developed by Looking Glass Studios and published by Electronic Arts. It allows players to pilot reproductions of real-world commercial and civilian aircraft in and around Seattle in the US state of Washington. Players may fly freely or engage in challenges such as thwarting a theft or locating Bigfoot. The development team built on the general aviation gameplay of Flight Unlimited II, with more detailed physics and terrain, more planes and a real-time weather system. Lead designer Peter James described Flight Unlimited III's development as a struggle, due to a lack of interest from Electronic Arts and from Looking Glass's management. Directly competing with Microsoft Flight Simulator 2000 and Fly!, the game became one of Looking Glass's biggest commercial flops. After selling only around 20,000 units in the United States during 1999, t

The Wikipedia article of the day for February 27, 2018 is Olivia Manning . Olivia Manning (1908–1980) was a British novelist, poet, writer and reviewer. Her fiction and non-fiction, frequently detailing journeys and personal odysseys, were principally set in England, Ireland, Europe and the Middle East. Her first serious novel, The Wind Changes, was published in 1937. She lived in Bucharest, Romania, and in Greece, Egypt and Palestine, as Nazi Germany overran Eastern Europe. Her experiences helped form the six novels making up The Balkan Trilogy and The Levant Trilogy, known collectively as Fortunes of War. The overall quality of her output was considered uneven by critics, but this series, published between 1960 and 1980, was described by Anthony Burgess as "the finest fictional record of the war produced by a British writer". Manning returned to London after the war, writing poetry, short stories, novels, non-fiction, reviews, and drama for the British Broadcasting Corpora

The Wikipedia article of the day for February 26, 2018 is Stegoceras . Stegoceras, a pachycephalosaurid (dome-headed) dinosaur, lived in what is now North America during the Late Cretaceous period, about 77.5 to 74 million years ago. (This genus is unrelated to Stegosaurus, which lived more than 70 million years earlier.) Small and bipedal, Stegoceras was about 2 to 2.5 metres (6.6 to 8.2 ft) long and weighed around 10 to 40 kilograms (22 to 88 lb). It had a rigid vertebral column and a stiffened tail. The pelvic region was broad, perhaps due to an extended gut. The skull was roughly triangular with a short snout, topped by a thick, broad, and relatively smooth dome. The skull jutted out in the back over the occiput, and had a thick ridge over the eyes. The teeth were small and serrated. The skull is thought to have been flat in juvenile animals, growing into a dome with age. The dome may have been used for combat, display, or recognition. Specimens have been found in the Dinosaur Par