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Sir William Gordon-Cumming (20 July 1848 – 20 May 1930) was a Scottish landowner, soldier and socialite. He was the central figure in the royal baccarat scandal of 1891. He joined the British Army in 1868 and saw service in South Africa, Egypt and the Sudan; he served with distinction and rose to the rank of lieutenant-colonel. An adventurer, he also hunted in the US and India. A friend of Edward, Prince of Wales, for over 20 years, in 1890 he attended a house party at Tranby Croft, where he took part in a game of baccarat at the behest of the prince. During the course of two nights' play he was accused of cheating, which he denied. After news of the affair leaked out, he sued five members of the party for slander; Edward was called as a witness. The case was a public spectacle in the UK and abroad, but the verdict went against Gordon-Cumming and he was ostracised from polite society. After the court case he married an American heiress, but their relationship was unhappy. (Full article...)

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Did you know ...

Postcard with a Fula woman

... that François-Edmond Fortier published more than 3,300 postcards of French West Africa (example pictured) between 1901 and 1920?
... that a language riot broke out between members of Our Lady of the Rosary in 1917?
... that Oleksandr Rodin's opera Kateryna was staged despite barricades, bombings, and an air-raid alarm?
... that Paul Among the People treats the Pauline epistles as sources comparable to Homer, Aristophanes and Virgil on Greco-Roman attitudes?
... that Gyula Kakas competed at two Olympics in gymnastics, set the Hungarian pole-vault record, and played for a national-champion football club?
... that a lyric in Beautiful Chaos was praised for "spreading queer joy"?
... that defending champions Bermuda did not compete in the women's football tournament at the 2015 Island Games?
... that Vatican Taekwondo has no registered athletes or coaches?
... that Iceland's entry for Eurovision in 2025 brought out a line of Ash Wednesday costumes?

In the news

Muhammadu Buhari

Former president of Nigeria Muhammadu Buhari (pictured) dies at the age of 82.
Clashes between Druze militias and the Syrian Armed Forces result in hundreds of deaths.
The International Criminal Court issues arrest warrants for Taliban leaders Hibatullah Akhundzada and Abdul Hakim Haqqani over their alleged persecution of women in Afghanistan.
Flooding in Central Texas, United States, leaves at least 140 people dead.

On this day

July 20

Forensic experts at the site of the Suruç bombing

1807 – French brothers Claude and Nicéphore Niépce received a patent for their Pyréolophore, one of the world's first internal combustion engines.
1951 – Abdullah I of Jordan was assassinated while visiting the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem.
1976 – The Viking 1 lander became the first spacecraft to successfully land on Mars and perform its mission.
1997 – USS Constitution, one of the United States Navy's original six frigates, sailed for the first time in 116 years after a full restoration.
2015 – A suicide attack (aftermath pictured) in Suruç, Turkey, for which Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) claimed responsibility, killed 34 people and injured 104 others.

Alexander the Great (b. 356 BC)
Amanda Clement (d. 1971)
Bruce Lee (d. 1973)
Gisele Bündchen (b. 1980)

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Today's featured picture

C/2022 E3 (ZTF) is a non-periodic comet from the Oort cloud that was discovered by the Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) in 2022. With a comet nucleus of around 1 kilometre (0.6 mi) in diameter, C/2022 E3 rotates on its axis once every 8.5 to 8.7 hours. Its tails of dust and gas extended for millions of kilometers and, during January 2023, an anti-tail was also visible. The comet reached its most recent perihelion in January 2023, at a distance of 1.11 AU (166 million km; 103 million mi) from the sun, and the closest approach to Earth was a few weeks later, at a distance of 0.28 AU (42 million km; 26 million mi). The comet reached magnitude 5 and was visible with the naked eye under moonless dark skies. This photograph of C/2022 E3 was taken in January 2023 and released by the Italian National Institute for Astrophysics.

Photograph credit: Alessandro Bianconi; National Institute for Astrophysics

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