Britannica On This Day October 12 2023

This Day in History: October 12

Featured Event

1492







New World sighted
The New World was “discovered” this day in 1492 when land (most likely San Salvador) was sighted in the Caribbean from the Pinta, one of the three ships that participated in Christopher Columbus's historic voyage.


San Salvador Island, also called Watlings Island, one of the islands of The Bahamas, in the West Indies.


San Salvador is believed by many scholars to be the island of Guanahani, where Christopher Columbus made his first landing in the New World on October 12, 1492. Some scholars assert, however, that the island of Guanahani is actually Samana Cay, 65 miles (105 km) southeast of San Salvador. San Salvador is about 13 miles (21 km) long and 5 miles (8 km) wide. Its alternate name, Watlings Island, comes from the name of a famous buccaneer. Area 63 square miles (163 square km). Pop. (2000) 970; (2010) 940.


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Featured Biography

Hugh Jackman
Australian performer







Hugh Jackman, in full Hugh Michael Jackman, (born October 12, 1968, Sydney, Australia), Australian performer who was considered a “triple threat”—a successful actor, dancer, and singer. He was perhaps best known for his action movies and stage musicals.
Jackman grew up in Sydney, and he made his acting debut as King Arthur in a production of Camelot when he was just five years old. After graduating in 1991 from the University of Technology, Sydney, with a degree in communications, Jackman began working temporary jobs to pay for classes at the Actors Centre Australia. Though offered a role in the long-running television soap opera Neighbours, Jackman chose to further refine his acting skills at the Western Australian Academy of Performing Arts in suburban Perth. Shortly after graduating from there in 1994, he landed a role in the 10-part TV prison drama Correlli (1995). Cast as an inmate who begins a dangerous flirtation with his psychologist (played by Deborra-Lee Furness), Jackman won fans as attractive bad boy Kevin Jones. Jackman and Furness continued their relationship offscreen, and the two were married in 1996. That same year he took to the stage, scoring the lead in the Australian premiere of Andrew Lloyd Webber’s musical adaptation of Billy Wilder’s noir classic Sunset Boulevard. That performance led Jackman to London’s Royal National Theatre, where he won the role of Curly in a revival of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Oklahoma! (1998). The sold-out run set box-office records.


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