On today's front page, in the Did You Know section:

# ... that at the Tzintzuntzan pyramids (pictured) huge fires were lit to signal the P'urhépecha kingdom that it was time to go to war?

# ... that the last empress of the Lý Dynasty, Trần Thị Dung, married her cousin, grand chancellor Trần Thủ Độ, who was responsible for the death of her first husband Lý Huệ Tông?

# ... that there is an oil field underneath Los Angeles, California, called the Salt Lake Oil Field?

# ... that Bulgarian physician and politician Georgi Stranski, best man to national poet Hristo Botev, was the only Commissar of South Bulgaria?

# ... that since 1995 a quintet of untitled jazz musicians has been performing near Indiana Avenue in Indianapolis?

# ... that Philippine real estate company Megaworld Corporation renamed a condominum project from "The Trumps" to "One Central" after threats of legal action from Donald Trump?

# ... that the music video for alternative rock band Soul Asylum's 1995 song "Just Like Anyone" features actress Claire Danes?

# ... that an attempted Russian conquest of Hawaii in 1815–1817 was led by a German physician?

May I ask...does anyone really care about Clare Danes being in a 1995 music video or whether some doctor was the best man at a Bulgarian poet's wedding? This stuff gets weirder and dumber all of the time.

To which I will ask: what do you think was the among the very worst DYK offerings?

I'm kinda curious why they don't mention the Attack on Pearl Harbor on On this day...

Off the top of my head, I can't think of a single titled jazz musician. Of course there's Duke Ellington, Count Basie, King Oliver, and Benny Goodman (the "King of Swing"), but finding a quintet of titled jazz musicians must be near impossible...

Let's not forget that these five non-knighted musicians are also performing near Indiana Avenue in Indianapolis. Why aren't they performing on the avenue directly? Are they so bad that they're not allowed on the avenue?

It was removed (just) for this year due to the topic of the Picture of the day.

I get increasingly dubious about this great restoration effort of pictures and whether it is valid, especially in the hands of amateurs. Comparing the original, I see little benefit in the clean up aside from a crop and even at the standard display resolution it is obvious that a cable running along the top of the picture has been mistaken for a cablescratch and I'd guess the same applies to another running from the middle to bottom left.

Are they cars? (As it turns out, they are sculptures, not actual musicians - I thought this DYK "cleverness" was reserved for April 1st.

Oh, that's Pearl Harbor? I thought surely it was the Wreck of the Ella Fitzgerald.

It is nothing more or less than what the kids call a "photoshoop". Durova is under the mad delusion that because she knows how to use Photoshop, that somehow makes her a "photograph restorer".

I think you are confusing Pearl Harbor with Pearl Bailey.

Humphrey Lyttelton was the son of the Hon. George Lyttelton and a cousin of the 10th Viscount Cobham.

No, it's not sung by CriscoDisco.

"Did you know that the Rufous Songlark is an Australian songbird that sometimes ends up as roadkill?".. I don't know if that will ever be beaten for sheer who-gives-a-shit-ness.

As I've said before, the really irritating thing about DYK is that if you click through to the pages in question you quite often find some genuinely interesting things, that are passed over in favor of the "Did you know that former Baton Rouge Mayor-President Bobby Simpson worked to end chronic homelessness in his city?" (currently gracing the main page) style of crap. (I don't know what it says about Louisiana if "elected official is opposed to homelessness" is considered newsworthy.)


Sir George Shearing.

There was a few DYK that was deleted, including one as a hoax, and another who was a very marginal BLP, that I remember. Those has to be among the worst.

Did you Know ...

... that the gay pornography film studio Corbin Fisher offers contracted actors health benefits and a 401(k) plan?


fascinating

That [[Corbin Fisher]] article is quite a piece of work. Benjiboi could learn a thing or two from whoever the PR person was for that one.

It seems to have been written almost entirely by my "hasten the day" man, Cirt!