Wikipedia:Main Page history/2018 February 24

From today's featured article

Pyxis is a small and faint constellation in the southern sky. The name comes from Pyxis Nautica, Latin for a mariner's compass (as opposed to a draftsman's compass, represented by the constellation Circinus). Introduced by Nicolas Louis de Lacaille in the 18th century, Pyxis is counted among the 88 modern constellations. In the 19th century, astronomer John Herschel suggested renaming Pyxis to Malus, the mast, since it appears near the old constellation of the ship Argo Navis, but the suggestion was not followed. Pyxis is completely visible from latitudes south of 53 degrees north, with its best evening-sky visibility in February and March. The plane of the Milky Way passes through it. Its three brightest stars—Alpha, Beta and Gamma Pyxidis—are in a rough line; the brightest of these is Alpha (magnitude 3.68), a blue-white star around 22,000 times as luminous as the Sun. Near Alpha is T Pyxidis, a recurrent nova that has flared up to magnitude 7 every few decades. Three star systems have planets, all discovered by Doppler spectroscopy. (Full article...)

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John W. Overton

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Billy Graham

American evangelical preacher Billy Graham (pictured) dies at the age of 99.
Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri wins five awards, including Best Film, at the British Academy Film Awards.
Iran Aseman Airlines Flight 3704 crashes in the Zagros Mountains, killing all 65 people on board.
South African president Jacob Zuma resigns amid corruption claims, and is succeeded by Cyril Ramaphosa.
A gunman kills 17 people and injures 15 others at a school in Parkland, Florida, United States.

February 24: Independence Day in Estonia (1918)

The Burning of Drury Lane Theatre from Westminster Bridge by Thomas Luny

303 – Roman emperor Diocletian's first "Edict against the Christians" was published, beginning the Diocletianic Persecution, the last and most severe episode of the persecution of Christians in the Roman Empire.
1809 – After standing only 15 years, London's Drury Lane theatre, the third building of that name, burned down (pictured).
1826 – The Treaty of Yandabo was signed, ending the First Anglo-Burmese War, the longest and most expensive war in the history of British India.
1868 – Andrew Johnson became the first U.S. President to be impeached.
1943 – World War II: The Battle of Kasserine Pass, the first major engagement between American and Axis forces in Africa, ended with the Allied forces suffering heavy losses.

Arcangela Tarabotti (b. 1604) · Thomas Bowdler (d. 1825) · Alain Prost (b. 1955)

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William H. Crawford (1772–1834) was an American politician and judge during the early 19th century. He served as United States Secretary of War and United States Secretary of the Treasury before running for president in the 1824 election. Born in Virginia, Crawford moved to Georgia at a young age and studied law. In 1803 he was elected to the Georgia House of Representatives, and in 1807 the Georgia legislature elected him to the United States Senate. Under President James Madison, he was made U.S. minister to France before taking several cabinet posts. Despite suffering a severe stroke in 1823, Crawford sought the presidency with the Democratic-Republican Party. As no candidate won a majority of the electoral vote, the United States House of Representatives selected John Quincy Adams as president from the three candidates who had received the most electoral votes. Crawford was then asked to remain at Treasury, but refused.

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