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21,776,701	Nothing Important Happened Today	1,170,121,667	null	[ "2001 American television episodes", "Television episodes directed by Kim Manners", "Television episodes set in Maryland", "Television episodes set in Virginia", "Television episodes written by Chris Carter (screenwriter)", "Television episodes written by Frank Spotnitz", "The X-Files (season 9) episodes" ]	"Nothing Important Happened Today" refers to the two premiere episodes of the ninth season of the science fiction television series The X-Files. Part 1 first aired on November 11 and Part 2 aired on November 18, 2001, on Fox in the United States. The episodes were written by executive producers Chris Carter and Frank Spotnitz. "Nothing Important Happened Today I" was directed by Kim Manners and "Nothing Important Happened Today II" was directed by Tony Wharmby. The episode helped to explore the series' overarching mythology and earned a Nielsen rating of 6.5 and was viewed by 10.6 million viewers, whereas the second part earned a rating of 5.9 and was viewed by 9.4 million viewers. Critical reception to the episode was largely mixed. The show centers on FBI special agents who work on cases linked to the paranormal, called X-Files; this season focuses on the investigations of John Doggett (Robert Patrick), Monica Reyes (Annabeth Gish), and Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson). The episodes introduced both the story arc about baby William, which would continue to develop throughout the ninth season. Part 1 deals with the investigation of Deputy Director Alvin Kersh by special agent John Doggett (Robert Patrick) and Doggett's related investigation into the death of EPA official Carl Wormus. In Part 2, Scully, Reyes, and Doggett are led to a ship, where they find evidence of experimentation on human embryos. The episode was supposed to be the first appearance of recurring regular Lucy Lawless as Shannon McMahon, a female Super Soldier, but Lawless' high-risk pregnancy prevented her from returning to the show after these episodes. These episodes marked, however, the first appearance of recurring regular, Cary Elwes as FBI Assistant Director Brad Follmer. The phrase "nothing important happened today" comes from King George III's supposed diary entry on 4 July 1776, the same day that America declared Independence from Britain. ## Plot ### Nothing Important Happened Today I Carl Wormus, an EPA official, picks up a beautiful woman, Shannon McMahon (Lucy Lawless), in a Baltimore bar. While he is driving her home, she forces the car off a bridge and holds Wormus underwater until he drowns. Later, Monica Reyes (Annabeth Gish) meets FBI Assistant Director Brad Follmer (Cary Elwes) in his office, where he hands her two videotapes from the night Dana Scully's (Gillian Anderson) son was born. The tapes show no evidence of the paranormal events John Doggett (Robert Patrick) has reported. Doggett goes to Fox Mulder's (David Duchovny) apartment to consult him, but finds it empty. Meanwhile, McMahon surfaces at a water reclamation plant and drowns a worker there. Scully refuses to disclose Mulder's whereabouts to Doggett. Meanwhile, Assistant Director Walter Skinner urges him to drop his investigation of Deputy Director Alvin Kersh's (James Pickens, Jr.) actions against the X-Files. Doggett tries to contact some of his old friends from the Marine Corps to find out what happened to Knowle Rohrer (Adam Baldwin); one of them turns out to be McMahon. Meanwhile, at FBI headquarters, an unseen figure slips Wormus' obituary to Reyes. Scully's baby causes the mobile of his crib to spin without touching it. Scully is shocked, contacts Doggett, and tells him to continue his investigation. Scully also performs an autopsy on Wormus' body, where she finds fingerprints on his ankle. After leaving, Scully and Reyes see McMahon, who removes the body from the morgue. Follmer, whom Kersh has ordered to rein in Doggett, arrives at the scene and accuses Scully and Reyes of moving the body. The Lone Gunmen find that Wormus had been receiving data from Roland McFarland, the drowned reclamation worker. Doggett breaks into McFarland's office with Skinner and finds files on monochloramine, a mutation-inducing chemical, before Follmer arrives. Doggett slips into a filtration tank to hide, but is pulled deep underwater by McMahon. ### Nothing Important Happened Today II The naval captain (Ryan Cutrona) delivers a communication to Dr. Nordlinger (Jeff Austin), who orders the vessel returned to its base. Follmer leaves the water reclamation facility after failing to spot Doggett, who is still underwater; McMahon keeps him alive by passing air from her lungs into his. Back at FBI headquarters, Reyes is warned by Follmer to distance herself from Doggett and his investigation of Kersh. Reyes believes that Follmer simply wants to force Doggett out of the FBI and storms out of the office. Doggett wakes up at his home to find McMahon, who tells him that both she and Knowle Rohrer are invulnerable Super Soldiers developed by a military program. Doggett calls Scully to his house, and McMahon tells them that the program is to be expanded by adding chloramine to the water supply. Meanwhile, at the ship, now docked in Baltimore, the captain attempts to call Wormus. Rohrer approaches the captain, informing him that he is now second-in-command and demanding information on the vessel's mission. The body of the original officer is found in the water nearby. Scully examines McMahon and finds her to be physically normal. Doggett is then suspended by Kersh and Follmer. Reyes tries to find out more about McMahon's history and learns that she is a Justice Department employee who had been contacted by Wormus and McFarland in their attempts to expose the plans to contaminate the water supply. The Lone Gunmen intercept the captain's call to Wormus, on which Rohrer is eavesdropping. The captain then pulls a gun on the Navy Seal guarding the lab, demanding that Nordlinger surrender the project's data. He does not notice Rohrer creeping up behind him. Scully, Reyes and Doggett go to the ship, where they are confronted by Rohrer. Just as Rohrer is about to crush Doggett's skull, he is decapitated by McMahon. Rohrer is presumed dead, but soon awakens and stabs McMahon. Both bodies tumble into the water. The three agents board the abandoned ship and find the captain's decapitated body. Scully gains access to the lab and finds evidence of manipulation of ova. However, she is forced to leave when Doggett finds a time bomb on the bridge. The agents narrowly escape the explosion. Later, Doggett confronts Kersh, who was not implicated in the conspiracy. Kersh explains to Doggett that he left the evidence that helped Doggett, and that he had told Mulder to flee, but ultimately it was Scully who actually convinced Mulder to do so. Meanwhile, Scully dreams of McMahon's and Rohrer's lifeless bodies below the harbor. Suddenly, she sees McMahon's eyes snap open. Scully wakes up and the episode cuts to William's mobile; it begins to move on its own accord. ## Production The phrase "Nothing Important Happened Today" comes from an apocryphal legend that King George III's wrote the phrase in his diary on 4 July 1776, the same day that the United States declared Independence from Britain. The style of the opening credits in "Nothing Important Happened Today" was changed from the original credits, which, more or less, had been the same for the previous eight seasons. The credits included new graphics as well as new cards for Annabeth Gish and Mitch Pileggi. The tagline for Part 2 is "Nothing Important Happened Today", replacing the usual phrase "The Truth is Out There". The first part of the episode marks the first appearance of Assistant Director Brad Follmer, who was named after Chris Carter's writing assistant. Five different actors portrayed Baby William: Rikki Held, Rowdy Held, Ashley Knutson, James Riker and Travis Riker. After learning about the 2001 cancellation of Xena Warrior Princess, Lawless was approached by the producers of The X-Files for a spot on the show. According to Lawless, one reason why she made an appearance on the show was that her daughter was a "mad X-Files fan". She further commented that she knew about the show and based her character Xena on Fox Mulder. Originally, Shannon McMahon was to be a recurring character and was due to be featured in "The Truth", the series finale of The X-Files. However, Lawless, who has a history of miscarriages, became pregnant shortly after part two of these episodes was filmed; her high-risk pregnancy prevented her returning to the series for future episodes. Carter called Lawless "hot stuff", saying it was "fun" having a female Super Soldier, something that had never occurred to him or to the show's production crew. In the first underwater scene, most of which was shot at the water tank at Universal, Lawless had to be seat-belted into a car that was supposed to be submerged thirteen feet. In actuality, the water tank was four feet deep. Lawless, being six feet tall, had to kneel and breathe into a hookah while filming the scene. For the special effects team, one of the hardest parts of the episode was to hide the fact that Lawless was wearing a swimming suit. ## Reception ### Ratings "Nothing Important Happened Today, Part 1" earned a Nielsen household rating of 6.5 share, meaning that it was seen by 6.5% of all 18- to 49-year-olds, of the nation's estimated households. The episode was viewed by 10.6 million viewers and ranked number 55 for the week ending November 11 and subsequently became the second most watched episode of the ninth season behind the series finale "The Truth". Part 2 earned a rating of 5.9. The episode was viewed by 9.4 million viewers ranked number 63 for the week ending November 18. The first part of the episode, which aired on Sunday, November 11, competed with Saving Private Ryan which aired on ABC. The second part of the episode earned the lowest rating on the night of November 18, receiving lower ratings and viewership numbers than The Simpsons and Malcolm in the Middle. When talking about the ninth season, Carter stated, "We lost our audience on the first episode. It's like the audience had gone away, and I didn't know how to find them. I didn't want to work to get them back because I believed what we are doing deserved to have them back". The episode was later included on The X-Files Mythology, Volume 4 – Super Soldiers, a DVD collection that contains episodes involved with the alien super soldiers arc. ### Reviews The episode received mixed reviews from critics. Daryl H. Miller of Los Angeles Times wrote positively of the episode, claiming it is "craftily written, solidly acted and moodily photographed". Michael R. Farkash of The Hollywood Reporter gave the first part of the episode a largely positive review. Farkash called it "entertaining and appealing" and noted its "suspenseful plot twists and fascinating visuals". An unnamed staff writer of Airlock Alpha was mostly positive about the episode, with the exception of Cary Elwes as Brad Follmer, calling Elwes' acting "forced". Rob Lowman from the Los Angeles Daily News said that Carter had been able to "breathe new life" into the series mythology arc, and had a positive view of Lucy Lawless' performance. Ken Tucker of Entertainment Weekly gave the episode a B+. Starpulse named the changed credits the "Most Shocking Moment" in the series run, writing that the most drastic moment "came with the opening credits for season nine, a complete re-design that saw Annabeth Gish and Mitch Pileggi added to the opening sequence and the familiar graphics totally scrapped. These credits looked like they belonged to a different series and at that point, it was." Emily St. James of The A.V. Club awarded the first part a "C", and the second part a "C−". She argued that the series was unable to figure out both how to re-situate itself after the events of September 11, and deal with the permanent departure of Duchovny. Ultimately, she wrote that the episodes as a whole represent "a limp piece of storytelling that has maybe enough good ideas for three-quarters of an episode but is stretched across two for no particular reason." M.A. Crang, in his book Denying the Truth: Revisiting The X-Files after 9/11, was highly critical of the script, arguing it was difficult "to pinpoint any significant moments that occur during either episode", but he did praise the production team's execution of "some impressive set-pieces." Robert Shearman and Lars Pearson, in their book Wanting to Believe: A Critical Guide to The X-Files, Millennium & The Lone Gunmen, rated both episodes one star out of five. In a review of the first part, the two noted that "this isn't quite the dullest season opener to The X-Files [but] this episode [...] has all the passion of a wet Monday morning." In a review of the second half, the two noted, "there is at least the semblance of drama here, but this second episode isn't significantly better than the first." Marisa Guthrie from the Boston Herald felt that Gillian Anderson's character, Dana Scully had been "rendered impotent".
662,845	Sir William James, 1st Baronet	1,171,723,195	Welsh naval officer and politician (1721–1783)	[ "1722 births", "1783 deaths", "18th-century Royal Navy personnel", "18th-century Welsh politicians", "Baronets in the Baronetage of Great Britain", "British East India Company Marine personnel", "British MPs 1774–1780", "British MPs 1780–1784", "Directors of the British East India Company", "Members of the Parliament of Great Britain for English constituencies", "Members of the Parliament of Great Britain for West Looe", "People from Milford Haven", "Welsh sailors" ]	Commodore Sir William James, 1st Baronet (5 September 1721 – 16 December 1783) was a Welsh naval officer and politician who sat in the British House of Commons representing West Looe from 1774 to 1783. James is best known for his career in India, where he served as an officer in the Bombay Marine, the navy of the East India Company (EIC), and led several successful campaigns against forces commanded by the Angre family. Born on 5 September 1721 near Milford Haven, James went to sea at an early age. Initially serving on a coaster from Bristol, James entertained a brief stint as a Royal Navy cabin boy before becoming a sea captain engaged in the trade between Britain and its colonies. During the War of Jenkins' Ear, James was briefly imprisoned by the Spanish before being released and making his way back to England during the 1740s, when he married. In 1747, James entered into the service of the East India Company, serving as first mate onboard two Company ships before being appointed as an officer in the Bombay Marine. Commanding the 44-gun warship Protector, James participated in several successful expeditions against fortresses controlled by the Angre family, whose ships frequently launched attacks on EIC merchant shipping. He returned to England in 1759 a wealthy man. Settling down in England, James remarried and purchased an English country house in Eltham, in addition to being elected several times as a director of the East India Company. Harbouring political ambitions, he was elected to the British Parliament in the 1774 general election. James died in his London home on 16 December 1783, leaving behind his wife and two children. Severndroog Castle was built in 1784 by his widow to memorialise him. ## Early life William James was born on 5 September 1721 near the town of Milford Haven, Wales. Information about his parents is extremely scarce; English politician Nathaniel Wraxall wrote that "[his] origin was so obscure as almost to baffle inquiry." His father was variously reported to be either a miller or farmer, and some accounts claimed that James worked as a ploughboy before embarking on a career at sea, reportedly at the age of twelve. The first merchant ship that James served onboard was a coastal trading vessel operating out of Bristol, though historian Charles Rathbone Low claimed that by 1738 James, by now at the age of sixteen, had entered into the Royal Navy as a cabin boy. After a few years, James left the navy and became a sea captain, sailing a merchant ship which participated in the trade between Virginia, the British West Indies and Great Britain. While serving as a sea captain, James was captured during the War of Jenkins' Ear by the Royal Spanish Navy after his ship was shipwrecked. He was imprisoned for a period before being released, making his way back to England at some point during the 1740s. There, he married a woman, whose identity was reported to be either the landlady of a Wapping pub or a widow whose husband had been the captain of an East Indiaman. ## Career in India In 1747, James entered into the service of the East India Company (EIC), serving as first mate onboard the Company ship Hardwicke. Two years later in 1749, he was transferred to the Suffolk before becoming an officer in the Bombay Marine, the navy of the EIC. His first command was the warship Guardian, and James served as a senior officer in a small squadron which operated between Bombay (then under Company control) and Goa. During this period, the Bombay Marine was primarily focused on protecting Company shipping against attacks from ships commanded by the Angre family. James spent a period of time convoying EIC ships, which led to a reduction in losses. In recognition of his efforts, James was eventually promoted to the rank of Commodore in 1751 and placed in command of the Protector, a 44-gun warship. She had been constructed at the Bombay Dockyard by the East India Company to protect their trade routes on the Malabar Coast. In April 1755, James participated in an expedition against the fortress of Severndroog, which was controlled by the Angre family, in conjunction with Maratha forces. James led his squadron, which consisted of the Protector, Revenge and Bombay, into the fortress harbour and directed an effective offshore naval bombardment which led to the Severndroog garrison capitulating on 2 April. After taking control of the fortress, James quickly handed over control to his Maratha allies before returning to Bombay in order to avoid the seasonal monsoons damaging his squadron. Seven months later, a Royal Navy squadron commanded by Charles Watson arrived in Bombay, linking up with James and Colonel Robert Clive. The British decided to mount another expedition against the Angre family. On February 1756, a British force sailed from Bombay to attack a fortress at Gheriah which was under the Angre family's control. The British captured the fortress with no casualties, breaking the power of the Angre family. Although control of the fortress was handed over to British-allied Maratha forces, 130,000 rupees worth of loot fell into British hands. In 1757, James, who was in Bombay, was charged by his superiors with informing Watson, who was commanding a squadron near the French Indian city of Chandernagore, of an outbreak of war between Great Britain and France. As noted by historian T. H. Bowyer, since the seasonal Northeast monsoon made travelling through the Bay of Bengal dangerous, James made a detour via Sumatra, which allowed him to reach the Hooghly River and inform Watson in "exceptionally good time." James continued serving in the Bombay Marine until 1759, when he returned to England. ## Later life and death James had acquired a large fortune during his career in India, primarily through his private business dealings and prize money. Once he had returned to England, James purchased Park Farm Place, an English country house in Eltham, Kent. On 15 June 1765, he remarried to Anne Goddard in St Marylebone Parish Church. James, a supporter of fellow EIC official and politician Laurence Sulivan, was elected as a director of the East India Company in 1768. Despite his relationship with Sulivan, James soon began cultivating a friendship with prominent statesman John Montagu, 4th Earl of Sandwich, "whose influence brought him the honours that he enjoyed." On 22 July 1769, he was appointed as an elder brother of Trinity House, before rising to the position of deputy master in 1778. During this period, James was also served as a governor of Greenwich Hospital, a permanent home for retired British sailors. James also started to harbour political ambitions, unsuccessfully running in a parliamentary by-election for the New Shoreham constituency in 1770. Although he was also attempting to secure the governorship of Bombay during this period, James withdrew his candidature after making his political aspirations clear to government officials. In the 1774 British general election, James was elected to the House of Commons, representing West Looe. In Parliament, James continued to support both the Earl of Sandwich and the ministry of incumbent Prime Minister Lord North. However, his relationship with Sulivan started to deteriorate when under government pressure James voted for the recall of EIC official Warren Hastings. In 1776, James secured a government contract to provision British forces stationed in Canada; in the same year, he was also elected as a deputy chairman of the East India Company. On 27 August 1778, James was granted a baronetcy, the same date as he was re-elected as deputy chairman. His relationship with Sulivan had improved to the point where James was twice elected as chairman again, in 1779 and 1781. Together, the two successfully defended accusations from a parliamentary committee that they had secretly altered EIC records in order to mislead the committee, maintaining that the charges were "without foundation." James died at his home on Gerrard Street, London on 16 December 1783, and was buried at Eltham six days later. ## Personal life, family and legacy According to Bowyer, James "seems never to have shown any inclination to shed light on the first thirty years of his life; he left no tracks, only conjecture." He had two children with his second wife Anne, a son named Edward and a daughter named Elizabeth. Edward, who was born in 1774, succeeded his father's title and died unmarried in 1792, leading to the baronetcy becoming extinct. Elizabeth, named as sole heir of James' estate, married Thomas Parkyns, who was later elevated to the Irish peerage as Baron Rancliffe. Together, the couple had nine children. During and after his career in India, rumours developed that James had married an Indian woman and had a son named Richard who was supposedly the first person of Asian descent to succeed to a British title; these have been dismissed as baseless by Bowyer. Relationships between European employees of the East India Company and Indian women were common during the 18th century; Scottish historian William Dalrymple noted in his 2004 work White Mughals that roughly one in three wills left by EIC employees during this period left something to an Indian spouse. After James died, Anne commissioned English architect Richard Jupp to construct Severndroog Castle, a triangular Gothic folly built in 1784. The building was constructed at the summit of Shooter's Hill near Blackheath, and was intended by Anne to serve as a memorial to her husband, being named after the site of his most famous victory. During the First World War, Severndroog Castle served as an observation post for a detachment of Special Constabulary officers, who were charged with detecting incoming air raids over London by the Luftstreitkräfte. James' victories over the Angre family have been seen by historians David Cordingly and John Falconer as marking a turning point for the fortunes of the East India Company in establishing naval supremacy in India. They noted that prior to James' arrival in India, the Bombay Marine had participated in several unsuccessful battles against the Angre family, who after their defeats at Severndroog and Gheriah ceased to pose an effective threat to Company shipping. The pair attributed James' victories to the EIC's superior ship-making skills vis-à-vis that of the Angre family.
2,073,037	River martin	1,165,592,447	Subfamily of birds	[ "Pseudochelidon" ]	The river martins form a distinctive subfamily Pseudochelidoninae within the swallow and martin bird family Hirundinidae. The two species are the African river martin Pseudochelidon eurystomina, found in the Congo and Gabon, and the white-eyed river martin Pseudochelidon sirintarae, known only from one site in Thailand. These are medium-sized, largely black swallows that have a light buoyant flight and feed on insects caught in the air. They appear to be more terrestrial than other swallows, frequently walking rather than perching, and the white-eyed may be crepuscular. The African species excavates nest holes in sandy ridges in rivers, while the breeding locations and habits of the Asian bird are unknown. When the African river martin was first discovered in the 19th century, Gustav Hartlaub thought it was a roller, and later authors either placed it in its own family, or with the woodswallows. Study of the anatomy revealed that the species was closest to the swallows and martins, but that it possessed a number of distinctive features, such as its robust legs and feet and stout bill. These indicated that it should be placed in a separate subfamily. The two river martin species are usually considered to belong to a single genus, Pseudochelidon, due to their having a number of structural similarities. However, Brooke proposed that the white-eyed river martin be placed in a separate monotypic genus Eurochelidon. The African river martin has a restricted distribution; it appears to be locally numerous, although its true status has not been fully investigated. The white-eyed river martin was discovered as recently as 1969 and is only known from specimens and anecdotal evidence – no modern ornithologists have seen the species in the wild, and its breeding grounds are unknown. It may be extinct, although a possible sighting was reported in 2004. ## Taxonomy When a specimen of the African river martin from Gabon was first formally described by German zoologist Gustav Hartlaub in 1861, it was not initially identified as a member of the swallow and martin family. Hartlaub placed it with the rollers, and later authors either put it in its own separate family, or with the woodswallows. It was only following study of the anatomy of the species by Lowe that it was determined to be closely related to the swallows and martins, but sufficiently different that it could be placed in a separate subfamily Pseudochelidoninae. The genus name Pseudochelidon comes from the Ancient Greek prefix ψευδο/pseudo, "false", and χελιδων/chelidôn, "swallow", reflecting its distinctiveness from the "true" swallows. For many years the African river martin was the sole member of its genus and subfamily until the discovery of the white-eyed river martin, Pseudochelidon eurystomina, by Thai ornithologist Kitti Thonglongya in 1968. Although some authorities follow Brooke in placing that species in a separate genus Eurochelidon due to its significant differences from the African species, it remains a member of the same subfamily. Genetic studies confirmed that the two river martins form a distinct clade from the typical swallows in the Hirundininae subfamily. The river martins are in some ways intermediate between typical swallows and other passerines: they have stout bills, large feet and relatively strong legs, which is unusual in aerial feeders. They also have a large syrinx (vocal organ) and a different bronchial structure. The extent of their differences from other swallows and the wide geographical separation of these two martins suggest that they are relict populations of a group of species that diverged from the main swallow lineage early in its evolutionary history, and they may be the most primitive of the swallows. Like other early hirundine lineages, they nest in burrows, rather than adopted nest holes or mud nests. ## Description Both species are medium-sized (14–18 cm or 5.5–7.1 in), mainly black-plumaged swallows, unlikely to be confused with any other hirundine in their respective ranges. Adults of both species have large, blue-glossed heads, a green tinge to the body plumage, and brown wings. The sexes are similar in plumage. The white-eyed has elongated outer tail feathers, a whitish rump, a white eye and eye-ring, and a yellow bill. The African has a red eye-ring and bill and lacks a contrasting rump patch or tail streamers. The juveniles of both species are similar to the adults, but with brown heads, and young white-eyeds lack the long tail streamers of the adults. The African river martin has a chee chee or cheer-cheer-cheer call when it is flying in flocks. It is very vocal during migration, giving harsh gull-like calls, and appears to have a jingling courtship song. No calls have been described for the white-eyed river martin. ## Distribution and habitat The two members of the subfamily have geographically separate ranges. The African river martin breeds along the Congo and Ubangi rivers in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is migratory, wintering in coastal savannah in southern Gabon and the Republic of Congo; it has recently been discovered to nest in beach ridges and grassland in its coastal wintering areas. The white-eyed river martin is known only from its wintering site at Bueng Boraphet lake in Thailand, where it was seen between the months of November and February. It may be migratory, but its breeding grounds and habitat are unknown, although river valleys in Northern Thailand or south-western China are possibilities, as are Cambodia and Myanmar. However, doubts have been cast on whether it is actually migratory at all. The African species' breeding habitat consists of forested rivers with islands with sandy shores for breeding. The nesting grounds of the white-eyed river martin are unknown, but if the breeding habitat resembles that of its relative, it is likely to be the forested valleys of large rivers, which can provide sandbars and islands for nesting, and woodland over which the birds can catch insect prey. The African river martin uses coastal savannah as its winter habitat. Based on its only known wintering site, the non-breeding habitat of the white-eyed is assumed to be in the vicinity of open fresh water for feeding, with reed-beds for the night-time roost. ## Behaviour Breeding behaviour is known only for the African river martin. It nests in large colonies of up to 800 birds from December to April, when the river levels are low. Each pair excavates a 1–2 m (39–79 in) long tunnel in the exposed sandbanks. The pocket at the end of the tunnel has a few twigs and leaves to serve as a nest, onto which two to four unspotted white eggs are laid. It has chasing flight displays and will walk on the ground; it also displays on the ground, but the function of this is uncertain. It rarely perches during the breeding season. Although it has been assumed that the breeding habits of the white-eyed species resemble those of the African species, distinctive differences in foot and toe morphology suggest that it might not use a burrow for nesting. The African river martin feeds in flocks over river and forest, often far from water. It eats insects, mainly taking winged ants. The flight is strong and fast, interspersed with glides. Wintering birds regularly perch on treetops, wires and roofs. The white-eyed river martin feeds on insects, including beetles, which are caught on the wing. Given its size and unusual mouth structure, it may take larger insects than other swallows. This species is described as graceful and buoyant in flight, and, like its African relative, appears reluctant to use perches. This behaviour, together with its unusual toe-shape and the fact that mud was found on the toes of one of the first specimens, suggests that this species may be relatively terrestrial. In winter, it roosts with barn swallows in reedbeds. Pamela C. Rasmussen suggested that, given its unusually large eyes, the species might be nocturnal or crepuscular, a factor that could make it highly cryptic and thus partly explain how such a distinctive species remained undetected for so long. Although the fact that the first specimens were supposedly collected roosting at night in reed-beds might be a contraindication, it is possible that the birds might not actually have been caught at the roost; or they might be crepuscular, feeding at dawn and dusk; or they might be capable of both diurnal and nocturnal behaviour, depending on the season or local circumstances. ## Status The white-eyed river martin was seen in Thailand in 1972, 1977 and 1980, but not definitely since. There are unconfirmed sightings from Thailand in 1986 and Cambodia in 2004. It is classified as critically endangered by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN). This designation means that a species' numbers have decreased, or will decrease, by 80% within three generations. This species may be extinct, but the IUCN will not categorise it as such until extensive targeted surveys have been conducted. Despite legal protection under Appendix 1 of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) agreement, it was captured by locals along with other swallows for sale as food or for release by devout Buddhists. Following its discovery by ornithologists, trappers were reported to have caught as many as 120 and sold them to the director of the Nakhon Sawan Fisheries Station who was unable to keep them alive in captivity. The small population may therefore have become non-viable. One factor that reduces the chances of re-discovering the white-eyed martin is the drastic decline in the numbers of swallows wintering at Bueng Boraphet, its only known site, from the hundreds of thousands reported around 1970 to maximum counts of 8,000 made in the winter of 1980–1981. It is not certain whether this represents a real decline or a shift in site in response to persecution. Other potential causes for the species' decline include the disturbance of riverine sand bars, the construction of dams which flood the area upstream and alter the downstream hydrology, deforestation, and increasing conversion of its habitat to agriculture. Very few swallows now roost in the Bueng Boraphet reedbeds, preferring sugarcane plantations, and, despite searching, the white-eyed river martin has not been found in other nearby large swallow roosts. Bueng Boraphet has been declared a non-hunting area in an effort to protect the species, but surveys to find this martin have been unsuccessful. Past surveys include several at Bueng Boraphet, a 1969 survey of the Nan Yom and Wang Rivers of northern Thailand, and a 1996 survey of rivers in northern Laos. A possible unverified sighting was reported in 2004. The total population size of the African river martin is unknown. In the late 1980s, it appeared to be common, if local, and large numbers were seen on migration in Gabon. However, it is particularly poorly known in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), and it is unclear if there is any relationship between the birds breeding in the DRC and those breeding in coastal areas of Gabon and the Republic of Congo. A flock of 15,000 birds was seen in 1997, and a mixed flock with rosy bee-eater Merops malimbicus was estimated at 100,000 birds; nevertheless, due to the lack of detailed information, the species is classed by the IUCN as Data Deficient. In the 1950s, the species was caught and eaten in large quantities in the DRC by the local population, and this practice could be increasing. Breeding colonies in river sandbars are also liable to flooding, but thousands of birds were breeding on the grasslands east of Gamba as recently as 2005.
6,173,130	Harvey Littleton	1,148,000,334	American artist and educator	[ "1922 births", "2013 deaths", "American glass artists", "Cranbrook Academy of Art alumni", "People from Corning, New York", "People from Spruce Pine, North Carolina", "People from Verona, Wisconsin", "University of Michigan College of Literature, Science, and the Arts alumni", "University of Wisconsin–Madison faculty" ]	Harvey Littleton (June 14, 1922 – December 13, 2013) was an American glass artist and educator, one of the founders of the studio glass movement; he is often referred to as the "Father of the Studio Glass Movement". Born in Corning, New York, he grew up in the shadow of Corning Glass Works, where his father headed Research and Development during the 1930s. Expected by his father to enter the field of physics, Littleton instead chose a career in art, gaining recognition first as a ceramist and later as a glassblower and sculptor in glass. In the latter capacity he was very influential, organizing the first glassblowing seminar aimed at the studio artist in 1962, on the grounds of the Toledo Museum of Art. Imbued with the prevailing view at the time that glassblowing could only be done on the factory floor, separated from the designer at his desk, Littleton aimed to put it within the reach of the individual studio artist. In his role as an educator, Littleton was an "... outspoken and eloquent advocate of university education in the arts." He initiated the first hot glass program at an American university (the University of Wisconsin–Madison) and promoted the idea of glass as a course of study in university art departments in the United States. Littleton's students went on to disseminate the study of glass art and establish other university-level hot glass programs throughout the U.S. Littleton retired from teaching in 1977 to focus on his own art. Exploring the inherent qualities of the medium, he worked in series with simple forms to draw attention to the complex interplay of transparent glass with multiple overlays of thin color. While at Wisconsin, as an outgrowth of a workshop he taught in cold-working techniques for glass, Littleton began experimenting with printmaking from glass panes. As an independent artist, his studio included space for printmaking, and he continued to explore and develop the techniques of vitreography. Littleton worked as an independent glassblower and sculptor until chronic back problems forced him to abandon hot glass in 1990, and he continued his creative interest in vitreography well beyond that. ## Early life Harvey Kline Littleton was born in Corning, New York , the fourth offspring of Dr. Jesse T. Littleton Jr., and Bessie Cook Littleton. His father was a physicist who had been recruited from the faculty at the University of Michigan to join the first research team at Corning Glass Works. Director of Research at the time of Harvey's birth (and later a Vice President of Corning), Dr. Littleton is remembered today as the developer of Pyrex glassware and for his work on tempered glass. Harvey Littleton's introduction to the world of glass began when he was six. On Saturdays his father would take Harvey off his mother's hands for a few hours by bringing him to the laboratory. There he was turned over to the laboratory stockman who entertained him or, at least, kept the little boy out of trouble. When he was twelve, Harvey and his siblings were at the glassworks watching at the time of the failure of the first casting of the two-hundred inch mirror for the Hale Telescope at Palomar Observatory. At home, the properties of glass and its manufacture were frequent topics at the family dinner-table. Dr. Littleton was fascinated by glass and believed that the material had almost unlimited uses. Littleton attended high school at Corning Free Academy. His interest in art developed during this time, and he took life drawing and sculpture courses through an extension program at Elmira College. ## Education When he was eighteen, Littleton enrolled at the University of Michigan to study physics. His choice of major was influenced by his father, who wanted one of his children to follow him in his profession (Littleton's oldest sibling Martha was an industrial psychologist; his oldest brother Jesse chose medicine as a career; and his brother Joe became a Vice President of Corning's Technical Products Division). According to Littleton, "I always thought I would be a physicist like my father". While studying physics, Littleton also took sculpture classes with Avard Fairbanks at Michigan, which fueled his growing preference for art. After three semesters of physics, the pull of art proved stronger than his respect for his father's wishes, and, with sister Martha's encouragement he arranged to study at Cranbrook Academy of Art for the 1941 spring semester. There he studied metalwork with Harry Bertoia and sculpture with Marshall Fredericks, and worked part-time as a studio assistant to the aging Carl Milles. Dr. Littleton was not pleased by his son's decision. Littleton enlisted Martha's aid in arriving at a compromise: Littleton would return to the University of Michigan that fall, to major in industrial design. He also enrolled in a ceramics class, with Mary Chase Stratton During the summers of 1941 and 1942 Littleton worked at Corning. In summer 1942, working as a mold maker in the Vycor multiform project laboratory, he cast his first work in glass. Using a neoclassic torso he had modeled in clay, he made a casting in white Vycor. Following the Pearl Harbor attack, Littleton tried to volunteer in the Coast Guard, the Air Force, and the Marines, but was rejected because of his poor eyesight. In the fall of 1942, he was drafted into the Army, interrupting his continued study. He was assigned to the Signal Corps, and served in North Africa , France, and Italy. Near the end of the war, he received a commendation for developing a decoding device. In England awaiting his turn to be shipped home, he attended classes at the Brighton School of Art to fill time. He modeled and fired another small clay torso that he carried home in his barracks bag. Once back in Corning, New York, Littleton cast the torso, again in Vycor, as a small edition. Littleton returned to the University of Michigan in January, 1946, and finished his degree in industrial design in 1947. With his father's encouragement Littleton submitted a proposal to Corning to create a workshop within the factory to research the aesthetic properties of industrial glass. When this proposal was not accepted, Littleton and two friends, Bill Lewis and Aare Lahti, opened a design studio called Corporate Designers in Ann Arbor. After obtaining an equipment order from the Goat's Nest Ceramic Studio in Ann Arbor, Littleton began teaching evening pottery classes there. Later, when the Goat's nest was put on the market, he helped his students form a co-op that became the Ann Arbor Potter's Guild. At about the same time, he found a teaching job at the Museum School of the Toledo Museum of Art. In 1949, Littleton enrolled under the GI Bill as a graduate student in ceramics at Cranbrook Academy of Art, studying under Finnish potter Maija Grotell. Commuting weekly between Toledo, Ohio and Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, he played Wednesday-night poker in Toledo with a group that included Dominick Labino, who would be important to the success of his seminal workshops a dozen years later. Littleton received the MFA degree in ceramics in 1951, with a minor in metals. With a recommendation from Grotell, he landed a teaching post at the University of Wisconsin, Madison (UWM). ## Career ### University of Wisconsin 1951–1962: ceramics and glass exploration Littleton and his family purchased a farm about 12 miles from the Wisconsin campus. This location served Harvey as home, studio, laboratory, and sometime-classroom. His production as a potter focused on functional stoneware that he sold in Chicago-area art fairs and in galleries from Chicago to New York City. His work was included in group shows in the United States, including "Designer Craftsmen U.S.A.," sponsored by the American Craft Council (ACC) in 1953 and the Ceramic National exhibition at the Syracuse Museum of Fine Arts (now the Everson Museum of Art) in 1954. His pottery gained international exposure in 1956 at the First International Exposition of Ceramics in Cannes, France. As his reputation grew, he also participated in advancing his craft; he was elected one of the first craftsmen-trustees of the American Craft Council, he received a small research grant from the university to explore glazing processes, and he designed a manually operated wheel called the "Littleton Kick Wheel," which was used by students in the ceramics lab at the UWM. In 1957-58 Littleton took a year's leave. A university research grant allowed him to visit Europe to study the influence of Islamic culture on contemporary Spanish pottery. He first stopped in Paris to visit Jean Sala, who had been recommended to him as an artist who worked alone in glass. Though Sala was no longer active in glass, he took Littleton to his now-idle studio. Conditioned by all of his experience at Corning, Littleton knew only of glass-making in an industrial setting, by a team of workers. After four and a half months of research in Spain, Littleton visited the site of his war-time service in Naples. He was surprised to find seven small glass factories there. On a later visit to the island of Murano, he visited more than fifty glass factories. He was fascinated by the little demonstration furnaces that some of the factories placed outside their walls. The furnaces would be staffed by a couple of the factory's glassblowers, who would perform their craft for tourists. His meeting with Sala and his Murano experiences stimulated his interest in making glass art in a private studio. Upon his return to the university and his Verona, Wisconsin studio Littleton began melting small batches of glass in his ceramics kiln, using hand-thrown stoneware bowls as crucibles. He built his first glass furnace in the summer of 1959. As a result of these ongoing experiments, the ACC asked him to chair a panel on glass at its Third National Conference, at Lake George, New York, in 1958. The panelists were glass artists and designers Michael and Frances Higgins and Earl McCutchen, who worked in laminated glass at the University of Georgia. Paul Perrot, director of the Corning Museum of Glass, was the fifth panelist. At this conference, Littleton suggested that glass should be a medium for the individual artist. By the time the ACC convened its fourth conference in 1961, Littleton not only presented a paper on his own work in glass but also exhibited a sculpture made of three faceted pieces of cullet that he had melted, formed and carved in the previous year. By this time, Littleton was applying for grants to get his vision of a hot glass studio program at the university off the ground. ### 1962 glass workshops When no grants for a hot glass studio had materialized by the fall of 1961, Otto Wittmann, director of the Toledo Museum of Art, suggested that Littleton consider giving a glassblowing seminar at the museum, and offered the use of a storage shed on the museum grounds. The first of two workshops was held in this makeshift facility from March 23 to April 1, 1962. Wittman had sent a letter to a number of ceramists in the U.S. inviting them to participate in the workshop, and asked Norm Schulman, the pottery instructor at the museum school, to facilitate the arrangements. The eight attendees in addition to Littleton and Schulman were: Dominick Labino (then director of research for Johns Manville Corporation), Clayton Bailey, who was Littleton's graduate assistant from the University of Wisconsin, Tom McGlauchlin from the University of Iowa (who had been Littleton's graduate assistant at Wisconsin the previous year), Karl Martz from Indiana University, John Stephenson from the University of Michigan, William Pitney from Wayne State University, artist Dora Reynolds, and Edith Franklin, one of Schulman's ceramics students. Littleton provided a small pot furnace he had built. In the first couple of days, the participants spent much of the time trying to find a workable glass formula and getting batches of glass melted, leaving very little time to experiment with actual blowing. Labino suggested converting the furnace to a day tank, which would have a larger capacity, and provided some borosilicate marbles to melt instead of mixing a formula. This glass proved easy to work for glass blowing, and the workshop participants experimented with it in shifts for the remainder of the week. On the final day of the workshop, Harvey Leafgreen, a retired glassblower from the Libbey glass plant in Toledo, happened in to see the public display of the workshop products, and presented an unexpected two-hour demonstration of the craft. The facilities that had been built for the first workshop were left in place, and a second, longer, better advertised Toledo workshop was held from June 18–30. Littleton and Wittman had attracted a small amount of financial support for scholarships and other costs. Leafgreen was enlisted to assist, and shared teaching duties with Littleton, Labino, and Schulman. In addition, there were lecturers on glass history and on furnace and annealing technology. This workshop had a larger and more diverse group of participants. Because the facilities for annealing were very crude, very few of the pieces made in the two workshops survived for very long. Of all the participants in the workshops, only McLaughlin and Littleton himself pursued a glass career. Even so, from the standpoint of what was learned about how to build and operate a studio/teaching facility, the two Toledo workshops were a resounding success, and have been recognized as the genesis of the American studio glass movement. ### University of Wisconsin 1962–1977: glass development In the summer of 1962 Littleton once again traveled to Europe, this time to research how glass was taught in universities there. He found nothing that he could bring back to the U.S. to help him educate art students at the University of Wisconsin. At that time, European glass programs were geared solely toward industrial production. Students were not taught hands-on techniques with the material; the craft of working with hot glass was still taught at the factories, under the apprenticeship system. What Littleton did find in Europe was a kindred spirit in glass art, the German Erwin Eisch, who is recognized today as a founder of European studio glass. Eisch had set up a small work area in his family's glass factory in Frauenau for the production of his own glass art. Trained as a fine artist in the academies of Germany, he was largely self-taught as a glass blower and at the time produced his work with the help of the factory's craftsmen. The friendship begun when Littleton visited Eisch in Frauenau in 1962 lasted for the rest of Littleton's life, and had profound influence on the work of each. The two spent some of almost every summer together for the next thirty years. Through the fall 1962 and spring 1963 semesters, Littleton taught glass in a garage at his Verona farm to six students under an independent study program. By the following year, based on the success of the Toledo workshops and the independent study course, he had secured University of Wisconsin funding to rent and equip an off-campus hot shop in Madison and authorization to offer a graduate level glass course. With the launching of the first college glass program Littleton said that he "... became a kind of evangelist for the medium." He gave lectures at university art departments throughout the United States about the potential of glass as a medium for the studio artist. "Studio glass," to Littleton, meant hands-on glassblowing (as opposed to kiln-forming or cold-working) by the individual artist. As the glass program grew, so did Littleton's work and reputation as an artist who used glass. In 1964, he had a solo exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Crafts in New York. In 1966, a five-year retrospective, Harvey Littleton: Glass, showed at the Milwaukee Art Center. Littleton presented papers on his experiments in glassblowing at crafts conferences in the United States and elsewhere. In 1968, Labino's book Visual Art in Glass became the first book to be written about the studio glass movement. It was followed in 1971 by Glassblowing: A Search for Form, by Harvey K. Littleton. Through the university's glass program, Littleton taught many who became prominent glass artists, and who, in turn, spread the word about studio glassmaking into academic institutions throughout the United States. These included Bill Boysen, who originated the glass program at Southern Illinois University Carbondale and taught there for many years; Dale Chihuly, who developed the glass program (which had been started by Norm Schulman) at the Rhode Island School of Design and later was a founder of Pilchuck Glass School in Stanwood, Washington; Fritz Dreisbach, teacher at more than 130 institutions around the world over his career; Henry Halem, who introduced glass at Kent State University; Sam Herman, who took the studio glass movement to Great Britain; Curt Hoard, originator of a glass program at the University of Minnesota; Marvin Lipofsky, who started glass programs at the University of California, Berkeley and at California College of Arts and Crafts; Fred Marcus, who started programs at Illinois State University, the University of Illinois, and University of California, Los Angeles; Tom McGlauchlin, who taught the second-ever course in glass at an American college, at the University of Iowa; Christopher Ries; Michael Taylor, who headed the glass program at the Rochester Institute of Technology for almost 20 years; Kent Ipsen, one of Littleton's first students who taught at Mankato State College and later chaired the crafts department and founded the highly respected glass program at the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Arts; Michael Whitley, initiator of a glass program at Central Washington State College. Throughout these years a steady stream of visitors from elsewhere in the United States, and from Europe, came to Madison, where they observed and learned, and occasionally demonstrated their own skills. Many carried the idea of studio glass back to their home institutions. Littleton served as the chairman of the University of Wisconsin art department from 1964 to 1967 and from 1969 to 1971. He retired from teaching in 1976, in order to devote his full attention to making work in glass. In 1977 Littleton was named professor emeritus of art at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. ### "Technique is cheap" In 1972 Littleton was at the Seventh National Sculpture Conference in Lawrence, Kansas when he uttered the words, "Technique is cheap." The statement touched off a debate that still finds currency among glass artists: Should technique, or content, take precedence in glass art? This was a question that Littleton had evidently been thinking about for some time. In his 1971 book, Glassblowing: A Search for Form, he wrote: > The method used by the contemporary artist is a constant probing and questioning of the standards of the past and the definitions of the present to find an opening for new form statements in the material and process. It is even said that this search is an end in itself. Although knowledge of chemistry or physics as they apply to glass will broaden the artist's possibilities, it cannot create them. Tools can be made, furnaces and annealing ovens can be built cheaply. But it is through the insatiable, adventurous urge of the artist to discover the essence of glass that his own means of expression will emerge. The offhand phrase "technique is cheap" soon took on a life of its own. For some it was a rallying cry to discover the inherent possibilities of a "new" medium for the artist; for others the statement expressed nothing more than arrogant disdain for the timeless value of craftsmanship. In a 2001 interview for the Smithsonian's Archives of American Art, Littleton commented on what he termed the "misinterpretation" of the phrase: > All I meant by that is that technique is available to everybody, that you can read technique, if you have any background. Technique in and of itself is nothing. But technique in the hands of a strong, creative person, like Voulkos or Dante Marioni, takes on another dimension. Behind this point is another, as expressed by writer and curator William Warmus: "It might even be argued that Littleton sought long-term to put the artist back in control of the factory, even as he sought to put the furnace into the artist's studio." For Littleton, the epitome of technique vs. content was to be found in factory-made art glass, where the division of labor was inflexible. Traditionally the art glass designer was a draftsman who made a conceptual drawing for a glass object, and then passed it along to industry craftsmen for execution. According to Littleton, the factory designer "... is frustrated by the peculiar misplacement of his skill, and his inclusion in a process where little experimentation or interference is permitted. As for the factory craftsman, his training under the apprenticeship system "limited him to one phase in the production of glass. This training could not prepare anyone to function as an independent artist, but only to serve as a cog in the industrial machinery." ### Work in glass In 1962 Littleton's first pieces in blown glass were, like his earlier works in pottery, functional forms: vases, bowls and paperweights. His breakthrough to non-functional form came in 1963 when, with no purpose in mind, he remelted and finished a glass piece that he had earlier smashed in a fit of pique. The object lay in his studio for several weeks before he decided to grind the bottom. As Littleton recounts in his book Glassblowing: A Search for Form, he brought the object into the house where "it aroused such antipathy in my wife that I looked at it much more closely, finally deciding to send it to an exhibition. Its refusal there made me even more obstinate, and I took it to New York ... I later showed it to the curators of design at the Museum of Modern Art. They, perhaps relating it to some other neo-Dada work in the museum, purchased it for the Design Collection." This led to Littleton's mid-1960s series of broken-open forms, and "Prunted," "Imploded" and "Exploded" forms. These sculptures, especially the "Prunted," or "Anthropomorpic," forms were heavily influenced Eisch. Shortly after Eisch's departure from a several-week period as artist-in-residence at Wisconsin in fall 1967, Littleton realized that he had unconsciously adopted his friend's strongly personal figural style in his own work, and began a radical change. In a period of a few weeks he eliminated references to the vessel and turned from complexity to a new vocabulary of simple, clean geometric shapes, forming graceful tubes, rods and columns of clear glass encasing lines of color, that he cut and grouped together on bases of plate glass or steel. Allowing the pull of gravity to stretch and bend hot glass while on the blowpipe or punty led Littleton to his "Folded Forms" and "Loops" series, which continued until 1979. His "Eye" forms, also from the 1970s, take the form of concentric cups of various colors in diminishing sizes that nestle one inside the next. Littleton explored cutting and slumping industrial glass, including plate and optic glass, beginning in 1970. In sculptures such as Do Not Spindle and Distortion Box, slumped squares of glass are transfixed by a brass rod. In Rock Around the Clock, a bent piece of optic glass bar from Corning Glass Works in Danville, Virginia, can be set rocking on its bronze plate glass base with a touch of the hand. Littleton incorporated optical lens blanks manufactured by Corning with his own hot-worked glass. In each case he sandblasted and cut the optical disc, draping, and in one case piercing, the disc with fluid, cased glass forms. These were followed, in 1978, by Littleton's Solid Geometry series, in which heavy cased glass forms were cut into trapezoidal, spheroid and ovoid shapes and highly polished. Perhaps Littleton's best known body of work is his "Topological Geometry" group of series, made between 1983 and 1989. Included under this heading are his signature "Arc" forms and "Crowns," as well as his late "Lyrical Movement" and "Implied Movement" sculptural groups. In 1989 chronic back problems forced Littleton to retire from working in hot glass. In 1974, Littleton also began experimenting with vitreography (printmaking using glass plates). He received a research grant from the university in 1975 to continue this work, and his first prints from this process were shown in a show at the Madison Art Center. When he left Wisconsin in 1977 and established his own studio in Spruce Pine, North Carolina, he designated one room in the studio for printmaking. By 1981, he had hired a part-time printmaker, and in 1983 he built a separate facility for the presses. He regularly invited artists in various media to explore the possibilities. Littleton's own prints were often simple geometric shapes, and sometimes made from shotgun-shattered safety glass. When back problems forced him to stop working in hot glass in 1990, Littleton continued his printmaking. ## Personal life Littleton was married to Bess Tamura Littleton in 1947. She predeceased him on October 8, 2009. The couple had five children, one of whom died in her early youth. The surviving four all work in the field of glass art. Daughter Carol L. Shay is the curator at Littleton Studios; Tom Littleton owns and manages Spruce Pine Batch Company (founded by his father), which supplies batch (the dry ingredients of which glass is made) and colors to artists and art departments around the U.S.; Maurine Littleton is the owner and director of Maurine Littleton Gallery which specializes in glass art, in Washington, DC. With his wife and collaborative partner, Kate Vogel, John Littleton is a glass artist in Bakersville, North Carolina. Harvey Littleton died on December 13, 2013, aged 91 at his home in Spruce Pine, North Carolina. ## Public collections Sources: - Bergstrom-Mahler Museum of Glass (Neenah, WI) - Chrysler Museum of Art (Norfolk, VA) - Corning Museum of Glass (NY) - Detroit Institute of Arts (MI) - Glasmuseet Ebeltoft (Denmark) - Frauenau Glass Museum (Germany) - High Museum of Art (Atlanta, GA) - Hokkaido Museum of Modern Art (Sapporo, Japan) - Indianapolis Museum of Art (IN) - Kunstgewerbemuseum Berlin (Germany) - Kunstmuseum der Veste Coburg (Coburg, Germany) - Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum (Wausau, WI) - Los Angeles County Museum of Art (CA) - Memphis Brooks Museum of Art (TN) - Metropolitan Museum of Art (New York, NY) - Milwaukee Art Museum (WI) - Morris Museum (Morristown, NJ) - Museum Angewandte Kunst (Frankfurt, Germany) - Museum of Applied Arts, Vienna (Austria) - Museum of Arts & Design (New York, NY) - Museum Boijmans van Beuningen (Rotterdam, Netherlands) - Museum of Decorative Arts, Prague (Czech Republic) - Museum of Design Zürich (Switzerland) - Museum of Fine Arts, Houston (TX) - Museum für Kunst und Gewerbe Hamburg (Germany) - Museum of Modern Art (New York, NY) - National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto (Japan) - New Orleans Museum of Art (LA) - Smithsonian American Art Museum (Washington, DC) - Toledo Museum of Art (OH) - Victoria and Albert Museum (London, England)
10,933,825	1928 World Snooker Championship	1,110,440,806	Professional snooker tournament	[ "1927 in snooker", "1928 in English sport", "1928 in snooker", "World Snooker Championships" ]	The 1928 World Snooker Championship was a professional snooker tournament held at various venues from 28 December 1927 to 17 May 1928. It was the second staging of the World Snooker Championship. It was played on a challenge basis with the other six entrants playing off for the right to challenge defending champion Joe Davis in the final. The final was held at the Camkin's Hall in Birmingham, England, with three of the other matches contested there, and one each played in Leamington Spa and Nottingham. Davis won 16–13 in the final against Fred Lawrence, and retained the title. Davis had won the professional billiards championship earlier in May, and became the first person to hold the professional titles in billiards and snooker titles concurrently, and then the first person to win them both in the same season. The highest of the snooker tournament was 46, compiled by Alec Mann in the third of his first round match against Albert Cope. ## Background Professional English billiards player and billiard hall manager Joe Davis had noticed the increasing popularity of snooker compared to billiards in the 1920s, and with Birmingham-based billiard hall manager Bill Camkin, who had also seen snooker's increasing appeal, persuaded the Billiards Association and Control Council (BACC) to recognise an official professional snooker championship in the 1926–27 season. The inaugural event was won by Davis, who defeated Tom Dennis 20–11 in the final. Originally called the Professional Championship of Snooker, the annual competition was not titled the World Championship until 1935, but the 1927 tournament is now referred to as the first World Snooker Championship. For the 1928 championship, a qualifying competition was held to produce a challenger to Davis, the defending champion. Most of the rules of the competition were as per the previous year, except that the preliminary rounds were to be played over 23 (rather than the 15 in 1927). Entry fees would be used to provide prize money for the finalists, with 60 per cent going to the champion. As a trophy had been purchased the previous year, there was no need to deduct money from entry fees to buy one, unlike at the first staging. The venue for the semi-finals and final was to be Camkin's Hall, Birmingham, with those matches supervised by the Midland Counties Billiard Association, and the players concerned would be left to arrange the locations for earlier rounds. The entry fee was set at five guineas per player (), with a five-guineas sidestake required. The Billiards Championship had been contested on a similar basis, with qualifying matches to produce a challenger to the champion, previously, and the system continued for that competition as well, but with an entry fee of £50 for the preliminary rounds, . The closing date for entries for the snooker championship was 1 November 1927. There were seven entrants: Davis, Dennis, Tom Newman, Fred Smith, Albert Cope, Alec Mann, and Fred Lawrence. ## Summary The first match played was between Tom Newman and Fred Smith at the Albert Hall, Kenilworth Street, Leamington Spa from 28 to 30 December. Newman led 7–1 after the first day and 10–6 at the end of the second day. Newman won the first two frames on the final day to secure victory at 12–6. Alec Mann compiled a of 46 in the third frame against Albert Cope and made a 23 break at his following visit. During that frame he conceded points from five successive shots, and more from two later fouls, finally winning the frame by 107 points to 42. The match was 2–2 at the first interval, before Mann took three of the next four to lead 5–3 after the first day. On the second day, Mann added the first four frames, with Cope subsequently recovering from 3–9 to 6–10, and on the third day secured the win at 12–8. The three "dead" frames were played, resulting in a final score of 14–9 to Mann. Mann's break of 46 was the highest made in the 1928 tournament. On 16 January, the day after he had eliminated Cope, Mann's match against Fred Lawrence commenced. Mann obtained a 3–1 lead, before the first day finished at 4–4. Lawrence took a 7–5 lead, and after the players each added a further two frames, was 9–7 ahead going into the last day. After the first on the third day, Lawrence led 11–9, but Mann won the following frame, and added the almost 50-minute long 22nd frame. In the , Lawrence led by 17 points to 4, before a 21 break from Mann. Lawrence, through play and , gained penalty points conceded by Mann and won the frame with a 20 break from the to the . The match between Tom Dennis and Newman was played from 29 to 31 March at The Lounge, Shakespeare Street, Nottingham. Newman took a 5–3 lead on the first day and increased this to 11–5 after two days, just one frame from victory. Newman won the first frame on the final day to take a winning 12–5 lead. The evening session was rearranged to include a billiards match as well as a frame of snooker. Newman and Lawrence met in Birmingham from 7 to 9 May. Lawrence led 6–2 after the first day. From 5–9, Newman won the last two frames on the second day to reduce Lawrence's lead to 9–7 but Lawrence progressed to the final against Davis by securing the first three frames on the final day to win the match 12–7. On 5 May, Davis became the professional English billiards champion for the first time, defeating Newman 16,000 – 14,874, making sixty in the last professional final to be played with ivory balls. Davis thereby became the first player to hold the professional titles in both billiards and snooker, an achievement not matched until his brother Fred Davis won the billiards championship in 1980. ### Final The final between Davis and Lawrence was played from 14 to 17 May in Camkin's Hall in Birmingham. Lawrence and Davis shared the opening four frames in the afternoon session for 2–2, but Davis won all four frames in the evening to lead 6–2 after the first day. Lawrence won three frames on the second evening but Davis still led 9–7 after two days play. Three consecutive frame victories on the third afternoon helped Davis obtain a 14–10 after the third day, needing just two frames on the final day. Lawrence won three of the four afternoon frames on the final day to reduce Davis's lead to 15–13, well in the first two frames before what the Birmingham Daily Gazette termed a "woefully weak shot" when he was attempting to pot the failed. Directly after this, Davis made a break of 18. Lawrence was 26 points behind after all the had been potted, and although he potted the first five of the six , left an easy opportunity on the , with Davis potting it to take the frame. Lawrence, who made a 42 break, claimed the following frame for 13–15. Lawrence led 52–14 in the first evening frame but Davis eventually won it 64–56 to retain his title by 16 frames to 13. Davis became the first player to claim both the professional billiards and snooker titles in the same season. The highest break of the final was a 44 by Davis in the 24th frame, the last of the third evening. Two "dead" frames were then played, both won by Davis. The presentation of the trophy and a gold medal to Davis, and of cheques to both players, was made by Mr. T. Heyman, chairman of the Midland Amateur Billiards Association. Davis recorded in his 1976 autobiography that "my old rival Fred Lawrence ... played extremely well and made me sweat it out," adding that "the finances worked out rather more favourably than in 1927," with Davis receiving £32 prize money () and a £25 12s 6d share of the gate receipts (). ## Main draw ### Schedule The schedule for the tournament is shown below. ### Results Match results are shown below. Winning players and scores are denoted in bold text. The score in the match between Mann and Cope includes "dead" frames. ## Final
23,665,498	A Vision of the Last Judgement	1,172,500,995	Painting by William Blake	[ "1808 paintings", "1810 paintings", "Angels in art", "Art by William Blake", "Books in art", "Cultural depictions of Adam and Eve", "Lost paintings", "Paintings depicting Jesus", "Paintings depicting Moses", "The Last Judgement in art", "Visions (spirituality)", "Watercolor paintings" ]	A Vision of the Last Judgement is a painting by William Blake that was designed in 1808 before becoming a lost artwork. The painting was to be shown in an 1810 exhibition with a detailed analysis added to a second edition of his Descriptive Catalogue. This plan was dropped after the exhibition was cancelled, and the painting disappeared. Blake's notes for the Descriptive Catalogue describe various aspects of the work in a detailed manner, which allow the aspects of the painting to be known. Additionally, earlier designs that reveal similar Blake depiction of the Last Judgement have survived, and these date back to an 1805 precursor design created for Robert Blair's The Grave. In addition to Blake's notes on the painting, a letter written to Ozias Humphrey provides a description of the various images within an earlier design of the Last Judgement. ## Origins Blake claimed to have seen visions throughout his life, and he claimed that they were a common aspect of life. His understanding of these events was, as he explained, similar to the experiences of biblical prophets. In the commentary to A Vision of the Last Judgement, Blake claimed that the image originated in a particular vision he experienced that allowed him to see the host of Heaven praising God. The actual design of A Vision of the Last Judgement was created in 1808 as an expansion of his 1805 work The Day of Judgement. Blake created this work to be used in Blair's The Grave, which was published 1808. The seven foot by five foot painting was to be shown in an 1810 exhibit of Blake's work, but the exhibit was cancelled after problems resulting from an 1809 exhibit of his works. The actual painting was lost, but earlier versions of the work survived. These include an 1808 watercolour version made for Elizabeth Ilive, wife of George Wyndham, 3rd Earl of Egremont, that was displayed at their Petworth House. A similar illustration in pencil and ink became part of the Rosenwald Collection. Other editions included watercolours made for Thomas Butts in 1806, 1807, and 1809, one for John Flaxman in 1806 (lost), and an 1809 unsold version in tempera. These are in addition to The Day of Judgement made for Blair's The Grave. The painting was to be discussed in Blake's Descriptive Catalogue, a work that, in 1809, described Blake's feelings about various painters and poets in addition to descriptions of his own works and their various meanings. Blake planned to create another edition for the 1810 collection but the plan was stopped after the exhibition was cancelled. Notes for what Blake planned to write for the works A Vision of the Last Judgement and Public Address survived. The notes were discovered by William Michael Rossetti and first mentioned in a letter to Horace Scudder on 27 November 1864. Rossetti transcribed the notes for Alexander Gilchrist's The Life of William Blake, an early biography on Blake. One piece of the work was missing: part of page 71 was sent by Rossetti to Scudder. Blake discussed the 1808 watercolour sold to Ilives in two works, a poem, "The Caverns of the Grave Ive Seen", written for Ilives provided by Blake with her design. and a description of Ilives's design for Humphry in January 1808. ## Painting The description provided by Blake to Humphrey explains that the work depicts the resurrection. The top of the work depicts Christ on the Throne of Judgement with Heaven opened up across the painting. Behind Christ are the heads of infants which represent creation coming from Jesus. Christ is surrounded by the four Zoas and seven angels that have vials filled with God's wrath. An image of a tabernacle with a cross inside is depicted above Christ. An image of baptism is to Christ's right and the Last Supper is to Christ's left with both representing eternal life. Further to Christ's right is the resurrection of the just and to the left is the resurrection and subsequent fall of the wicked. Adam and Eve are below Christ, and Abraham and Moses are nearby. Below Moses is Satan wrapped by the Serpent and in the centre is the book of death. At the top is the book of life, and the Christian Church is the figure of a woman on top of the moon. Blake, in his notes to A Vision of the Last Judgement, describes how his design is to work: "If the Spectator could Enter into these Images in his Imagination approaching them on the Fiery Chariot of his Contemplative Thought [...] then would he arise from his Grave". He relies on the word representation frequently in the work, and he tries to represent action in a visible manner that distances his depiction of the apocalypse from a traditional version that disguises the various components of an apocalyptic vision. To Blake, he must create an image of the Last Judgement, then represent the image, and then describe with a written gloss of the work. This creates a layer of representation that separates the audience from the apocalyptic experience, which undermines the concept of apocalypse as both mysterious and directly experienced. In discussing the nature of time, Blake wrote in his notes: "The Greeks represented Chronos or Time as a very Aged Man; this is Fable, but the Real Vision of Time is in Eternal Youth. I have, however, somewhat accommodated my Figure of Time to the common opinion, as I myself am also infected with it & my Visions also infected, as I see Time Aged, alas, too much so." ## Themes Blake based his portrayal of the apocalypse on his belief that God's love allowed for a personal apocalypse as part of the human experience. In the notes to the work, he claimed that "whenever any Individual Rejects Error & Embraces Truth a Last Judgement passes upon that Individual". This idea is connected to views of David Hartley of the "pure disinterested love of God", and appears in other works by Blake, including his Jerusalem. Also, Blake's Milton describes the process that an individual goes through during an apocalypse, which includes having to confront their errors and their flaws. There is no peace during the struggle, as it involves a direct interaction between contrary views that would eventually establish the new state. On the details in the painting, Blake claimed that each component had a specific meaning that provides an allegory-like dimension to the work. Blake dismissed the idea of using allegory within his works except, as he wrote in a letter to Butts, 6 July 1803, "Allegory Address'd to the intellectual powers, while it is altogether hidden from the Corporeal Understanding, is My Definition of the Most Sublime Poetry". Blake's philosophical interpretation of time is similar to Samuel Taylor Coleridge's depiction of the relationship between time and the state of limbo within his poem "Limbo". Both claim that their understanding of time is connected to the common, contemporary view, but they alter their perspective of time within their works to that of an older person. The figure of time appears in other works by Blake, including as the figure Los and in the illustration Blake made for Edward Young's Night Thoughts.
44,638,871	Don't Nod	1,172,072,424	French video game developer	[ "Companies based in Paris", "Companies listed on Euronext Paris", "Don't Nod", "French companies established in 2008", "Tencent", "Video game companies established in 2008", "Video game companies of France", "Video game development companies" ]	Don't Nod Entertainment SA (trade name: Don't Nod, formerly Dontnod Entertainment) is a French video game developer and publisher based in Paris. Founded in June 2008, it started development on Remember Me (2013). Because of its poor return on investment, Don't Nod entered "judicial reorganisation" in 2013. With the help of French agency funding, it developed Life Is Strange (episodically in 2015), whose successful release raised Don't Nod's industry status. It began third-party publishing in 2022. ## History Dontnod Entertainment was founded by Hervé Bonin, Aleksi Briclot, Alain Damasio, Oskar Guilbert and Jean-Maxime Moris on 1 May 2008, alongside other former Criterion Games, Ubisoft and Electronic Arts staff. "Dontnod" is a palindrome devised by co-founder Alain Damasio. Originally based in Quartier des Quinze-Vingts in the 12th arrondissement, the studio moved into a new office in Quartier de la Villette in the 19th arrondissement to accommodate the company's growth in late 2008. The studio used Unreal Engine 3 for their first game, working with Epic Games' engineering team which leading to Epic extending Dontnod's UE3 evaluation and has since used the engine for all of its games. The developer's debut title was Remember Me, which would at first be a PlayStation 3-exclusive role-playing game, but was dropped by publisher Sony Interactive Entertainment in 2011 on account of cuts in funding. It was presented at Gamescom the same year to attract another publishing deal; the following year, Capcom Europe acquired the rights and reimagined it as an action-adventure game, released in June 2013. In 2013, Dontnod was the most subsidised studio with 600 000€ aid by the French agency Centre national du cinéma et de l'image animée (CNC). Including aid for a new intellectual property (IP) project codenamed "What if?" (later Life is Strange) for 200 000€. On 28 January 2014, Dontnod filed for redressement judiciaire ("judicial reorganisation"), a form of receivership in France; the proceeding was finalised in February 2018. The proceeding filing was discovered by Factornews and some media outlets like Polygon reported it as Dontnod filing for bankruptcy as a result of the poor sales of Remember Me. Dontnod responded to these reports explaining that they were in the process of "judicial reorganisation" to resize the company and denying bankruptcy. In June 2014, Dontnod announced that they were working with Square Enix Europe on a new game, which was announced as Life Is Strange that year and released in 2015 over the course of five instalments. The critical and commercial success of Life Is Strange caused Dontnod to be solicited by publishers, whereas they previously had to pursue publishers themselves. Guilbert said in April 2016 that the studio had cast off the ambition of making triple A games and would only see themselves devoted to independent projects, in particular, original, narrative-driven intellectual properties, which narrative director Stéphane Beauverger agreed was "part of Dontnod's DNA". The company's guiding principle is to reinvent itself with every game. For the sake of maintaining the motivation of players and publishers, the production cycle since releasing the five-year commitment Remember Me was reduced to two and a half or three years. "Dontnod Days" are maintained for unsupervised work related to ongoing projects. Dontnod announced in July 2016 that it had entered into a partnership with Hesaw, a Parisian game studio in which Guilbert also held a management role, that saw the latter renamed but remained an independent entity. In April 2018, Dontnod registered with the French stock market regulator Autorité des marchés financiers to become a public company. This came after a turnover of €9.7 million in 2017, a 33-per cent increase from the previous year. The subscription period opened on 3 May 2018, with the first day of trading on 23 May. Listed on Euronext PME (Euronext Growth), Dontnod raised the intended €20.1 million. 25 per cent of the funds were spent on finding another studio to partner with; according to Guilbert, the rest would allow further project investment as well as improvement and optimisation of production pipelines, with an internal motion capture studio cited among possibilities. Despite Dontnod's public listing, Guilbert, together with investor Kostadin Yanev, intended to keep control over the company. Around this time, the company employed 166 staff members. The studio subsequently acquired Dontnod Eleven and absorbed its operations in June 2018. Dontnod released Vampyr with Focus Home Interactive, an action role-playing game, in June 2018. 70% of the studio's 120 employees (in 2016) were devoted to the development of Vampyr, many of whom had worked on Life Is Strange. The Awesome Adventures of Captain Spirit, set within the Life Is Strange universe, released in June 2018. Dontnod started developing Life Is Strange 2 in early 2016, after its predecessor proved financially successful, release episodically between September 2018 and December 2019. In 2018, Guilbert said the company would pursue a co-production strategy with future publishers, as was done for Vampyr, limiting their part to forty per cent. Each project begins with a designer, writer, and art director, with the occasional producer or engineer. Dontnod worked with Xbox Game Studios on Tell Me Why, a 2020 episodic adventure game. Also in 2020, Dontnod published its first self-owned IP, Twin Mirror co-developed with Shibuya Productions, which was originally published by Bandai Namco Entertainment. A subsidiary studio in Montreal, Canada, was announced in May 2020, adding to its more than 250 employees in France. In January 2021, Dontnod announced that Tencent had acquired a minority stake in the company for , granting the option to appoint a member to their board. The investment will allow Dontnod to continue self-publishing their titles and expand into China and the mobile game sector. Dontnod stated in April 2021 they plan to expand their self-publishing capabilities to third-party publishing as well, with the first planned title from Copenhagen-based studio PortaPlay. In September 2021, Dontnod made their remote work policy (Fully Remote Organization scheme) permanent for all employees. On 31 May 2022, the company changed its name to Don't Nod. Its third-party publishing side released its first game, Gerta: A Flame in Winter in September 2022. As a part of the Xbox Games Showcase held on 11 June 2023, Don't Nod announced an action puzzle game Jusant to be released in late 2023. ## Games developed ## Games published
68,978,383	CSS Maurepas	1,092,690,873	Confederate states sidewheel steamer	[ "Battle of St. Charles", "Gunboats of the Confederate States Navy", "Maritime incidents in June 1862", "Maritime incidents in the United States", "Scuttled vessels", "Ships built in New Albany, Indiana" ]	CSS Maurepas was a sidewheel steamer that briefly served as a gunboat in the Confederate States Navy during the American Civil War. Built in 1858 in Indiana as Grosse Tete (English: "big head"), the vessel was used in commercial trade until 1860 and then delivered mail until 1861, when she was acquired by the Confederate Navy. After being outfitted with five or six cannons and renamed Maurepas, she was sent to the defenses of Columbus, Kentucky, in March 1862, and participated in actions near Island Number Ten. After an abortive naval skirmish near Fort Pillow in Tennessee, Maurepas and the gunboat CSS Pontchartrain were sent up the White River to resist Union advances and aid transport. On June 16, the eve of the Battle of Saint Charles, Maurepas was sunk as an obstruction and her cannons sent ashore. ## Service history ### Construction and civilian usage A sidewheel steamer, the vessel was constructed at New Albany, Indiana, in 1858, under the name Grosse Tete, having been ordered by one J. A. Cotton of New Orleans, Louisiana. She was 180 feet (55 m) long, had a beam of 34 feet (10 m), measured 399 tons, and had a draft of 7 feet (2.1 m). No depiction of the ship is known to exist. It had two sidewheels, a wooden hull, and held a crew of 79. Grosse Tete was used for commercial trade until 1860, when she was purchased by the Bayou Sara Mail Company for mail delivery. ### Confederate States Navy After the outbreak of the American Civil War, Grosse Tete was purchased by the Confederate States Navy at New Orleans in November 1861 to be used as a gunboat, although her sidewheel propulsion system was considered less useful than if she was a screw steamer. The Confederates rechristened her Maurepas, after Lake Maurepas, and placed her under the command of First Lieutenant Joseph Fry, formerly of the gunboat CSS Ivy. An early report stated the vessel was armed with six cannon, although a later one from February 1862 listed only five. According to naval historian W. Craig Gaines, these pieces were 24-pounders and 32-pounders; she was reported to have had at least one 9-inch Dahlgren gun in April 1862. It is not known if the difference in cannon count between reports represents a piece being removed or if the previous figure of six was an error. Beginning in November 1861, a number of Confederate warships were sent north up the Mississippi River to support the defenses at Columbus, Kentucky. Maurepas made this journey in March 1862. At Columbus, the vessel was part of a fleet commanded by Commander George N. Hollins. Beginning on March 12, Maurepas helped defend Island Number Ten. Union Navy forces were bombarding the island, and Brigadier General John M. Palmer's Union troops had established batteries downriver across the Mississippi from Tiptonville, Tennessee, in hopes of cutting off Island Number Ten's supply line. On March 18, Palmer's position opened fire on Confederate transports. In response, Hollins sent Maurepas and the gunboats CSS Pontchartrain, CSS McRae, and CSS General Polk, downriver to shell Palmer's position. Return fire from the Union position struck the Confederate ships. General Polk was hit by cannon fire, started taking on water, and had to go downriver and out of the fight. Maurepas was struck eight or nine times by cannon fire and 30 or 40 times by small arms fire and suffered damage, with internal damage to cabins, her decks covered with splinters, and a ship's boat knocked away. Eventually, Palmer's men fell back, and Hollins's ships withdrew from the area. However, the Union troops reoccupied the position, and Hollins took his ships downriver to avoid fire from the batteries. Any ships heading upstream to Island Number Ten came under fire from Palmer's position. On the night of April 4/5, the ironclad USS Carondelet ran past the Confederate defenses of Island Number Ten to New Madrid, Missouri, which was under Union control. A second Union ironclad, USS Pittsburgh, completed the run early on the morning of April 7, and most of the Confederates withdrew from Island Number Ten during the night of April 7/8, as it was no longer feasible to hold the island. However, Union forces cut the Confederates off from their escape route at Tiptonville, and the garrison of the island was captured. Hollins's ships were prevented from going to their support by the two Union ironclads. The Confederate ships then withdrew to Fort Pillow in Tennessee. On April 9, Hollins was informed that New Orleans was threatened, so he traveled downriver with Ivy and the gunboat CSS Jackson. In Hollins's absence, the ships were temporarily commanded by First Lieutenant Thomas Huger, with Commander Robert Pinckney expected to arrive shortly to take command. Huger learned that Union ships were nearby and on the morning of April 12, sent his ships upriver for a surprise attack. Union scouts picked up the movement, and the ironclad USS Benton fired on Huger's fleet. Maurepas responded with a shot from a 9-inch Dahlgren gun, to no effect. After navigating a bend in the river, the Confederate ships realized they were facing a large and prepared Union fleet and fell back to Fort Pillow. The Union ships pursued to a range close enough for them to bombard the fort. Pinckney soon arrived to take command, and sent Maurepas and Pontchartrain to operate on the White River to resist Union advances and serve as transports. On June 2, Maurepas was at the junction of the White River and the Black River. On June 13, a Union Navy flotilla left Memphis, Tennessee, to travel up the White with the intention of resupplying Union land forces further north in Arkansas. Composed of two ironclads and two timberclads, the Union fleet moved upriver. Two guns from Pontchartrain were taken ashore near St. Charles, with sailors and a portion of the 29th Arkansas Infantry Regiment manning the fortifications. The Union ships approached St. Charles on June 16, but did not attack that day. As planned obstructions in the river were not complete, Maurepas and two civilian steamboats were sunk in the river as a blockage, but not before three or four guns from the ship were removed. It had been thought that Maurepas would be outmatched against the Union ironclads. The next day, in the Battle of Saint Charles, the Union forces brushed aside the Confederate defenses, although a cannon shot struck the ironclad USS Mound City, puncturing the ship's steam drum and scalding most of those on board. The Union supply mission eventually failed due to low water levels, and the infantry force had to march overland to a point from which they could be resupplied. For years after the battle, the wreck of Maurepas could be seen at low water, but is no longer visible.
47,576,276	Typhoon Goni (2015)	1,161,536,826	Pacific typhoon in 2015	[ "2015 Pacific typhoon season", "August 2015 events", "Tropical cyclones in 2015", "Typhoons", "Typhoons in Guam", "Typhoons in Japan", "Typhoons in Taiwan", "Typhoons in the Northern Mariana Islands", "Typhoons in the Philippines" ]	Typhoon Goni, known in the Philippines as Typhoon Ineng, was a powerful tropical cyclone that affected much of East Asia in late August 2015. Developing in tandem with Typhoon Atsani to its east, Goni formed on August 13, and passed through the Mariana Islands two days later. By that time, radar imagery showed a formative eye, signaling an rapidly intensifying storm. Goni evolved into an intense typhoon in the Philippine Sea before weakening and stalling north of Luzon. The typhoon re-intensified and attained peak winds of 185 km/h (115 mph) on August 23 while moving through the southern Ryukyu Islands. Goni weakened slightly and moved across the Japanese island of Kyushu. The tropical cyclone transitioned into an extratropical cyclone in the Sea of Japan on August 25, crossed into eastern Russia and China a day later, and dissipated on August 30. Along its path, Goni killed 74 people and left \$1.05 billion (USD) in damage. On Guam, one of the first landmasses affected, heavy rainfall caused flooding and power outages. Across northern Luzon in the Philippines, Goni also dropped intense precipitation. This resulted in deadly landslides, flooded fields, and the destruction of thousands of houses. The typhoon also brought heavy rainfall and rough seas to Taiwan and the east coast of China. In the southern Ryukyu Islands and Kyushu, high wind overturned vehicles, damaged buildings, and left over 490,000 homes without power. Off the coast of Kyushu, a man drowned amid high waves. Flooding killed 40 people in North Korea. The extratropical remnants of Goni damaged crops and flooded a zoo in eastern Russia. ## Meteorological history In the middle of August 2015, a strong westerly wind burst along the equator produced two areas of convection, or thunderstorm activity, near the Marshall Islands in the western Pacific Ocean. The westernmost disturbance became associated with a circulation center near Ujelang Atoll. With low wind shear and favorable sea surface temperatures, tropical cyclone forecast models anticipated further development of both convective systems. The westernmost system developed a banding pattern by August 13, indicative of increased organization. At 18:00 UTC that day, the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) classified it as a tropical depression, centered about 700 km (430 mi) east-southeast of Guam. Early on August 14, the Joint Typhoon Warning Center (JTWC) initiated advisories on the system with the designation Tropical Depression 16W. The nascent system tracked generally west-northwestward around a subtropical ridge to its north. Favorable outflow to the south counteracted moderate wind shear, though a tropical upper tropospheric trough to the northeast disrupted the thunderstorm structure. Late on August 14, the JMA upgraded the depression to a tropical storm, naming it Goni. The storm slowly intensified and organized as it approached the Marianas Islands on August 15. With diminished wind shear, rainbands were able to wrap tightly around the center. When Goni passed just north of Rota on August 15, radar on Guam indicated a developing eyewall in the storm's core. At 18:00 UTC on August 15, the JMA upgraded Goni to a severe tropical storm, and further to typhoon status by the next day. The previously disruptive trough to the north soon aided the storm's intensification by enhancing its outflow, and other environmental conditions remained favorable. Consequently, Goni began a period of rapid deepening on August 16. By early on August 17, Goni reached an initial peak intensity; the JMA estimated 10-minute maximum sustained winds of 175 km/h (109 mph), and the JTWC assessed higher 1-minute winds of 215 km/h (134 mph), derived from satellite intensity estimates using the Dvorak technique. At the time, the typhoon had a small eye just 9 km (5.6 mi) in diameter. While the typhoon was moving westward toward the Philippine island of Luzon, thunderstorms in the northern eyewall deteriorated as a result of unfavorable subsidence from a high pressure system to the north. Early on August 18, the Philippine warning center PAGASA began national advisories on the typhoon, giving Goni the local name Ineng. On the next day, the typhoon rounded the subtropical ridge, co-existing with Typhoon Atsani, which developed concurrently over the western Pacific Ocean to the east. On August 21, Goni's movement became nearly stationary about 100 km (62 mi) off the northern coast of Luzon. Land interaction weakened the typhoon's convective core until a building ridge to the southeast drove Goni northeastward and allowed convection to redevelop. A new eye developed on August 23 as Goni passed east of Taiwan. The eye crossed over Iriomote-jima and Ishigaki, both part of the southern Ryukyu Islands. Late on August 23, Goni attained its peak intensity with JMA-estimated peak winds of 185 km/h (115 mph). Goni maintained much of its strength while traversing the East China Sea, as low wind shear allowed convection to persist around the eyewall. Goni made landfall on southwestern Japan near Uki, Kumamoto, at 19:00 UTC on August 19, and shortly thereafter it struck Arao. The convection diminished while interacting with Japan's mountainous terrain, leaving the storm's center exposed once it entered the much cooler Sea of Japan. Around 12:00 UTC on August 25, Goni transitioned into an extratropical cyclone. The remnants turned northward and moved ashore near Vladivostok in the Russian Far East on August 26. Former Typhoon Goni turned westward and entered northeastern China in the province of Heilongjiang. The storm stalled over northeastern China for several days, before dissipating on August 30. ## Preparations, impact, and aftermath ### Mariana Islands Tropical Storm Goni affected the Marianas Islands about two weeks after Typhoon Soudelor damaged houses in the same island chain and caused an island-wide power outage on Saipan. Damaged structures were not repaired in the interim, making airborne debris a concern. Goni's approach halted aid distribution for victims of the previous typhoon. A total of 680 people in the Marianas Islands sought shelter during the storm. One flight was cancelled, and three others were diverted. Wind gusts of 91 km/h (57 mph) damaged Saipan's electrical system. On Guam, Andersen Air Force Base recorded sustained winds of 80 km/h (50 mph), with gusts to 93 km/h (58 mph). The storm's slow movement enabled heavy rain to fall over Guam, totaling 345 mm (13.58 in) at the National Weather Service office near the center of the island; this was enough rainfall to cause flooding, particularly on the western side of Guam. The concurrence of heavy rainfall and gusty winds caused isolated power outages on the island, with floods temporarily shutting down the Tumon power sub-station. Increased water flow along the Ugum River shut down the Ugum Water Treatment Plant, leaving some residents without water access. ### Philippines PAGASA – the Philippine Atmospheric, Geophysical and Astronomical Services Administration – started issuing advisories on Goni when the storm entered the agency's area of responsibility on August 18. The next day, the agency issued the lowest tropical cyclone warning signal for the Batanes and Cagayan provinces, later upgrading the warning to signal \#3; lower-level warnings were posted for most of the Cagayan Valley, Cordillera Administrative Region, and the Ilocos Region. The National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council (NDRRMC) was placed on red alert in preparation for the typhoon, meaning that the agency would issue 24-hour public weather forecasts and general flood advisories. The Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) pre-stocked funds, food packs, and other emergency items to be utilized in the aftermath of the typhoon. In response to the storm threat, Philippine Airlines, SKYJET Airlines, and Cebu Pacific canceled flights throughout the Philippines, 67 boats were confined to port, and most schools closed in northern Luzon. Initially, 8,426 people evacuated to emergency shelters in advance of the cyclone, drastically increasing to 397,154 people seeking shelter during the height of the storm. While stalling north of Luzon, Goni enhanced the southwest monsoon across the Philippines, resulting in rainfall and gusty winds across the western portion of the nation. The storm spawned seven tornadoes, one of which damaged or destroyed ten houses in Carranglan, Nueva Ecija. Rough seas swamped a motor boat near Banton Island, forcing the crew of seven to swim ashore. Across Luzon, flooding caused landslides in 13 locations, including a mountain slope in Mankayan, Benguet, that buried three mining camps, killing 13 miners. More than 100 policemen and miners searched through the mud for survivors. Water levels quickly rose in rivers across Luzon, washing away 14 flood control systems, including one dyke. Swollen rivers also inundated several bridges and washed away one in Santa, Ilocos Sur, that left 5,100 people isolated. At three dams, water gates were opened after flood levels reached critical heights. Across Luzon, trees were knocked down and the power supply was disrupted; all electrical service was restored by September 1, or 11 days after the storm's closest approach. In total, Typhoon Goni damaged 5,742 houses, of which 188 were completely destroyed. Total damages amounted to ₱4.55 billion (US\$97.6 million), split roughly evenly between agricultural and infrastructural impacts. In Ilocos Norte province in northwestern Luzon, damage was estimated at ₱1.8 billion (US\$38.6 million). Overall, Typhoon Goni killed 33 people and left 9 missing in the Philippines, mostly due to landslides or drownings, and injured 24 others. A state of calamity was declared in nine provinces. In response, the Philippine Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), in conjunction with local governments, provided ₱15.5 million (US\$332,000) toward relief funds. Various agencies, including the NDRM and the Philippine Red Cross, distributed water, meals, medicine, and blankets to affected families. The provincial government of Ilocos Norte provided seeds to farmers whose crops were damaged during the storm. The Government Service Insurance System provided ₱197 million (US\$4.22 million) to pension fund holders in Abra province. ### East Asia In Taiwan, about 2,500 people in outlying islands and mountainous areas evacuated their homes, including 1,500 residents of the Wulai District near Taipai. Schools and offices closed in the district. Two locations recorded rainfall totals in excess of 150 mm (5.9 in). Along the coast of China's Fujian province, about 5,000 people evacuated and 10,490 boats returned to port. Heavy rainfall affected eastern China while Goni was moving through the East China Sea. Pudong, near Shanghai, recorded 337 mm (13.3 in) of rainfall over three days. The remnants of Goni also brought rainfall to southeastern China, reaching 109 mm (4.3 in) in Jiaohe, Jilin. Floodwaters covered expressways and parts of Shanghai's Hongqiao Airport, delaying or halting 400 flights. Nationwide, the storm caused flooding along 15 small to medium-sized rivers in Zhejiang and Heilongjiang provinces. In Northeast China, storm rainfall increased water levels in 57 large reservoirs. Overall economic losses in the country totaled ¥204 million (US\$31.9 million). The Korea Meteorological Administration warned for the potential of heavy rainfall for the provinces of Jeju, Gangwon, and North and South Gyeongsang. Rainfall was heaviest along the east coast of South Korea, peaking at 327 mm (12.9 in) in Gangwon Province and helping to ease drought conditions there. On the island of Ulleungdo off the country's east coast, wind gusts reached 130 km/h (81 mph). Along the shores of the mainland, winds reached around 90 km/h (56 mph). The stormy weather caused flights to be canceled in Ulsan and Busan. Rough seas from the storm prompted a temporary ban on swimming along beaches in Busan. The cyclone halted salvage operations of the passenger ferry MV Sewol, which capsized a year prior. In North Korea, rainfall from Goni exceeded 300 mm (12 in) in Kangwon Province. The rains caused flash flooding in Rason near the country's borders with China and Russia, killing 40 people in the town. The floods wrecked 1,070 houses and 99 public buildings, including schools, hospitals, and nurseries. Floodwaters inundated 1.24 km<sup>2</sup> (0.48 sq mi) of farmlands, while bridges and railroads were washed out. One road to the Chinese border was damaged, leaving 484 Chinese tourists stranded in North Korea; officials from the two countries worked to restore road access. With the 70th annual Foundation Day of the Workers' Party of Korea looming, Supreme Leader Kim Jong-un ordered troops to promptly repair the flood damage by building 1,800 new apartment houses and restoring 4,000 impacted homes. The Red Cross Society of the Democratic People's Republic of Korea provided tarps, water purification tablets, and other emergency supplies to affected residents. On September 8, the agency set up two water treatment units to provide Rason residents with clean water for a month. To prepare for the storm in the Russian Far East, local officials advised people living along rivers and the coastline to seek shelter and to remove livestock from low-lying areas. Goni's remnants brought damaging winds and heavy rains to Primorsky Krai. Some areas received more than the average rain of two months during the storm's passage, resulting in widespread flooding. About 1,100 houses, mostly in Ussuriysk, were inundated, directly affecting 9,500 people. More than 300 buildings in Ussuriysk sustained damage. The zoo in Ussuriysk was flooded with waters 1.5 m (4.9 ft) deep after the nearby Rakovka River overflowed its banks; the animals had to be evacuated after their cages were submerged, and one bear drowned. With 88,300 hectares (218,000 acres) of crops damaged or destroyed, Goni took a heavy toll on the agriculture industry, with losses estimated at ₽2.4 billion (US\$35 million). Total damage from the storm in Russia amounted to ₽8 billion (US\$116.6 million). A state of emergency was declared in 10 districts, and the government provided compensation for people who lost their house or farms. #### Japan Responding to the threat of the typhoon, Japanese officials advised 600,000 people in vulnerable areas to leave their homes. Bus and air services were disrupted, affecting over 10,000 travelers. Nippon Oil suspended oil shipment at three refineries during the storm. On August 23, Typhoon Goni passed over Iriomote-jima and Ishigaki. A station on the latter island recorded four hours of typhoon conditions, peaking with sustained winds of 162 km/h (101 mph) and gusts as high as 256 km/h (159 mph). The winds damaged buildings and upended vehicles. Five people were lacerated by broken glass on Ishigaki Island. Across the southern Ryukyu Islands, the typhoon cut power to 21,400 houses. Agricultural losses in Okinawa were estimated at ¥782 million (US\$6.51 million). Across Japan, the typhoon left ¥70 billion (US\$585 million) in insured losses, along with 70 injuries. A 66-year-old man drowned amid high waves after falling from a fishing boat off Miyazaki Prefecture, on the southern island of Kyushu. The typhoon brought flooding rainfall to Japan from Okinawa northeastward to the Kantō region, with a 24-hour total of 533 mm (21.0 in) recorded in Owase on Shikoku. Goni's winds damaged houses and farming equipment, and overturned cars. Across Kyushu, the storm left over 470,000 households without power. Damage to agriculture, forestry, and fishery industries totaled ¥26 billion (US\$216.3 million) nationwide. ## See also - Other tropical cyclones named Goni - Other tropical cyclones named Ineng - Typhoon Mindulle (2004) - Similar strength and damage, also stalled and weakened while heading towards Luzon - Typhoon Shanshan (2006) - Similar strength and track, though didn't impact the Philippines - Typhoon Tembin (2012) - Also affected much of East Asia, though had a different track and didn't cause much damage - Typhoon Hinnamnor (2022) - Somewhat similar track, also impacted a substantial part of East Asia
875,148	Evolution of cetaceans	1,170,054,599	null	[ "Articles containing video clips", "Cetaceans", "Evolution of mammals" ]	The evolution of cetaceans is thought to have begun in the Indian subcontinent from even-toed ungulates (Artiodactyla) 50 million years ago (mya) and to have proceeded over a period of at least 15 million years. Cetaceans are fully aquatic marine mammals belonging to the order Artiodactyla and branched off from other artiodactyls around 50 mya. Cetaceans are thought to have evolved during the Eocene (56-34 mya), the second epoch of the present-extending Cenozoic Era. Molecular and morphological analyses suggest Cetacea share a relatively recent closest common ancestor with hippopotami and that they are sister groups. Being mammals, they surface to breathe air; they have 5 finger bones (even-toed) in their fins; they nurse their young; and, despite their fully aquatic life style, they retain many skeletal features from their terrestrial ancestors. Research conducted in the late 1970s in Pakistan revealed several stages in the transition of cetaceans from land to sea. The two modern parvorders of cetaceans – Mysticeti (baleen whales) and Odontoceti (toothed whales) – are thought to have separated from each other around 28–33 mya in a second cetacean radiation, the first occurring with the archaeocetes. The adaptation of animal echolocation in toothed whales distinguishes them from fully aquatic archaeocetes and early baleen whales. The presence of baleen in baleen whales occurred gradually, with earlier varieties having very little baleen, and their size is linked to baleen dependence (and subsequent increase in filter feeding). ## Early evolution The aquatic lifestyle of cetaceans first began in the Indian subcontinent from even-toed ungulates 50 million years ago, over a period of at least 15 million years, but a jawbone discovered in Antarctica may reduce this to 5 million years. Archaeoceti is an extinct parvorder of Cetacea containing ancient whales. The traditional hypothesis of cetacean evolution, first proposed by Van Valen in 1966, was that whales were related to the mesonychids, an extinct order of carnivorous ungulates (hoofed animals) that resembled wolves with hooves and were a sister group of the artiodactyls (even-toed ungulates). This hypothesis was proposed due to similarities between the unusual triangular teeth of the mesonychids and those of early whales. However, molecular phylogeny data indicates that whales are very closely related to the artiodactyls, with hippopotamuses as their closest living relative. Because of this observation, cetaceans and hippopotamuses are placed in the same suborder, Whippomorpha. Cetartiodactyla (formed from the words Cetacea and Artiodactyla) is a proposed name for an order that includes both cetaceans and artiodactyls. However, the earliest anthracotheres, the ancestors of hippos, do not appear in the fossil record until the Middle Eocene, millions of years after Pakicetus, whereas the first known whale ancestor appeared during the Early Eocene; this difference in timing implies that the two groups diverged well before the Eocene. Molecular analysis identifies artiodactyls as being very closely related to cetaceans, so mesonychids are probably an offshoot from Artiodactyla, and cetaceans did not derive directly from mesonychids, but the two groups may share a common ancestor. The molecular data are supported by the discovery of Pakicetus, the earliest archaeocete. The skeletons of Pakicetus show that whales did not derive directly from mesonychids. Instead, they are artiodactyls that began to take to the water soon after artiodactyls split from mesonychids. Archaeocetes retained aspects of their mesonychid ancestry (such as the triangular teeth) which modern artiodactyls, and modern whales, have lost. The earliest ancestors of all hoofed mammals were probably at least partly carnivorous or scavengers, and today's artiodactyls and perissodactyls became herbivores later in their evolution. Whales, however, retained their carnivorous diet because prey was more available and they needed higher caloric content in order to live as marine endotherms (warm-blooded). Mesonychids also became specialized carnivores, but this was likely a disadvantage because large prey was uncommon. This may be why they were out-competed by better-adapted animals like the hyaenodontids and later Carnivora. ### Indohyus Indohyus was a small chevrotain-like animal that lived about 48 million years ago in what is now Kashmir. It belongs to the artiodactyl family Raoellidae, which is believed to be the closest sister group of Cetacea. Indohyus is identified as an artiodactyl because it has two trochlea hinges, a trait unique to artiodactyls. Approximately the size of a raccoon or domestic cat, this omnivorous creature shared some traits of modern whales, most notably the involucrum, a bone growth pattern which is the diagnostic characteristic of any cetacean; this is not found in any other species. It also showed signs of adaptations to aquatic life, including dense limb bones that reduce buoyancy so that they could stay underwater, which are similar to the adaptations found in modern aquatic mammals such as the hippopotamus. This suggests a similar survival strategy to the African chevrotain or water chevrotain which, when threatened by a bird of prey, dives into water and hides beneath the surface for up to four minutes. The first fossils of the Indohyus were unearthed by Indian geologist A. Ranga Rao. He discovered a few teeth and a jawbone amongst rocks that he had collected. After his death, his widow Leelavathi Rao donated the rocks to professor Hans Thewissen. His technician accidentally broke open a couple of the donated rocks and discovered additional Indohyus fossils. ### Pakicetidae The pakicetids were digitigrade hoofed mammals that are thought to be the earliest known cetaceans, with Indohyus being the closest sister group. They lived in the early Eocene, around 50 million years ago. Their fossils were first discovered in North Pakistan in 1979, located at a river not far from the shores of the former Tethys Sea. After the initial discovery, more fossils were found, mainly in the early Eocene fluvial deposits in northern Pakistan and northwestern India. Based on this discovery, pakicetids most likely lived in an arid environment with ephemeral streams and moderately developed floodplains millions of years ago. By using stable oxygen isotopes analysis, they were shown to drink fresh water, implying that they lived around freshwater bodies. Their diet probably included land animals that approached water for drinking or some freshwater aquatic organisms that lived in the river. The elongated cervical vertebrae and the four, fused sacral vertebrae are consistent with artiodactyls, making Pakicetus one of the earliest fossils to be recovered from the period following the Cetacea/Artiodactyla divergence event. Pakicetids are classified as cetaceans mainly due to the structure of the auditory bulla (ear bone), which is formed only from the ectotympanic bone. The shape of the ear region in pakicetids is highly unusual and the skull is cetacean-like, although a blowhole is still absent at this stage. The jawbone of pakicetids also lacks the enlarged space (mandibular foramen) that is filled with fat or oil, which is used in receiving underwater sound in modern cetaceans. They have dorsal orbits (eye sockets facing up), which are similar to crocodiles. This eye placement helps submerged predators observe potential prey above the water. According to a 2009 study, the teeth of pakicetids also resemble the teeth of fossil whales, being less like a dog's incisors, and having serrated triangular teeth, which is another link to more modern cetaceans. It was initially thought that the ears of pakicetids were adapted for underwater hearing, but, as would be expected from the anatomy of the rest of this creature, the ears of pakicetids are specialized for hearing on land. However, pakicetids were able to listen underwater by using enhanced bone conduction, rather than depending on the tympanic membrane like other land mammals. This method of hearing did not give directional hearing underwater. Pakicetids have long thin legs, with relatively short hands and feet which suggest that they were poor swimmers. To compensate for that, their bones are unusually thick (osteosclerotic), which is probably an adaptation to make the animal heavier to counteract the buoyancy of the water. According to a 2001 morphological analysis by Thewissen et al., pakicetids display no aquatic skeletal adaptation; instead they display adaptations for running and jumping. Hence pakicetids were most likely aquatic waders. ### Ambulocetidae Ambulocetus, which lived about 49 million years ago, was discovered in Pakistan in 1994. They were vaguely crocodile-like mammals, possessing large brevirostrine jaws. In the Eocene, ambulocetids inhabited the bays and estuaries of the Tethys Sea in northern Pakistan. The fossils of ambulocetids are always found in near-shore shallow marine deposits associated with abundant marine plant fossils and littoral mollusks. Although they are found only in marine deposits, their oxygen isotope values indicate that they consumed a range of water with different degrees of salinity, with some specimens having no evidence of sea water consumption and others that did not ingest fresh water at the time when their teeth were fossilized. It is clear that ambulocetids tolerated a wide range of salt concentrations. Hence, ambulocetids represent a transition phase of cetacean ancestors between fresh water and marine habitat. The mandibular foramen in ambulocetids had increased in size, which indicates that a fat pad was likely to be housed in the lower jaw. In modern toothed whales, this fat pad in the mandibular foramen extends posteriorly to the middle ear. This allows sounds to be received in the lower jaw, and then transmitted through the fat pad to the middle ear. Similar to pakicetids, the orbits of ambulocetids are on the top of the skull, but they face more laterally than in pakicetids. Ambulocetids had relatively long limbs with particularly strong hind legs, and they retained a tail with no sign of a fluke. The hindlimb structure of Ambulocetids shows that their ability to engage in terrestrial locomotion was significantly limited compared to that of contemporary terrestrial mammals, and likely did not come to land at all. The skeletal structures of the knee and ankle indicates that the motion of the hindlimbs was restricted into one plane. This suggests that, on land, propulsion of the hindlimbs was powered by the extension of dorsal muscles. They probably swam by pelvic paddling (a way of swimming which mainly utilizes their hind limbs to generate propulsion in water) and caudal undulation (a way of swimming which uses the undulations of the vertebral column to generate force for movements), as otters, seals and modern cetaceans do. This is an intermediate stage in the evolution of cetacean locomotion, as modern cetaceans swim by caudal oscillation (a way of swimming similar to caudal undulation, but is more energy efficient). A recent study suggests that ambulocetids were fully aquatic like modern cetaceans, possessing a similar thoracic morphology and being unable to support their weight on land. This suggests that complete abandonment of the land evolved much earlier among cetaceans than previously thought. However the scientists involved in the study cautioned that the study was limited by a lack of information on the exact density of the bone, the location of the centre of mass, and the reliance of false ribs for thoracic support. ### Remingtonocetidae Remingtonocetids lived in the Middle-Eocene in South Asia, about 49 to 43 million years ago. Compared to family Pakicetidae and Ambulocetidae, Remingtonocetidae was a diverse family found in north and central Pakistan and western India. Remingtonocetids were also found in shallow marine deposits, but they were obviously more aquatic than ambulocetidae. This is demonstrated by the recovery of their fossils from a variety of coastal marine environments, including near-shore and lagoonal deposits. According to stable oxygen isotopes analysis, most remingtonocetids did not ingest fresh water, and had hence lost their dependency on fresh water relatively soon after their origin. The orbits of remingtonocetids faced laterally and were small. This suggests that vision was not an important sense for them. The nasal opening, which eventually becomes the blowhole in modern cetaceans, was located near the tip of the snout. The position of the nasal opening had remained unchanged since pakicetids. One of the notable features in remingtonocetids is that the semicircular canals, which are important for balancing in land mammals, had decreased in size. This reduction in size had closely accompanied the cetacean radiation into marine environments. According to a 2002 study done by Spoor et al., this modification of the semicircular canal system may represent a crucial 'point of no return' event in early cetacean evolution, which excluded a prolonged semi-aquatic phase. Compared to ambulocetids, remingtonocetids had relatively short limbs. Based on their skeletal remains, remingtonocetids were probably amphibious cetaceans that were well adapted to swimming, and likely to swim by caudal undulation only. ### Protocetidae The protocetids form a diverse and heterogeneous group known from Asia, Europe, Africa, and North America. They lived in the Eocene, approximately 48 to 35 million years ago. The fossil remains of protocetids were uncovered from coastal and lagoonal facies in South Asia; unlike previous cetacean families, their fossils uncovered from Africa and North America also include open marine forms. They were probably amphibious, but more aquatic compared to remingtonocetids. Protocetids were the first cetaceans to leave the Indian subcontinent and disperse to all shallow subtropical oceans of the world. There were many genera among the family Protocetidae. There were different degrees of aquatic adaptations in this group, with some able to support their weight on land, and others not. The discovery of the southeastern Pacific Peregocetus indicates they crossed the Atlantic and achieved circumstances-equatorial distribution by 40 mya. Their amphibious nature is supported by the discovery of a pregnant Maiacetus, in which the fossilised fetus was positioned for a head-first delivery, suggesting that Maiacetus gave birth on land. If they gave birth in the water, the fetus would be positioned for a tail-first delivery to avoid drowning during birth. Unlike remingtonocetids and ambulocetids, protocetids have large orbits which are oriented laterally. Increasingly lateral-facing eyes might be used to observe underwater prey, and are similar to the eyes of modern cetaceans. Furthermore, the nasal openings were large and were halfway up the snout. The great variety of teeth suggests diverse feeding modes in protocetids. In both remingtonocetids and protocetids, the size of the mandibular foramen had increased. The large mandibular foramen indicates that the mandibular fat pad was present. However the air-filled sinuses that are present in modern cetaceans, which function to isolate the ear acoustically to enable better underwater hearing, were still not present. The external auditory meatus (ear canal), which is absent in modern cetaceans, was also present. Hence, the method of sound transmission that were present in them combines aspects of pakicetids and modern odontocetes (toothed whales). At this intermediate stage of hearing development, the transmission of airborne sound was poor due to the modifications of the ear for underwater hearing while directional underwater hearing was also poor compared to modern cetaceans. Some protocetids had short, wide fore- and hindlimbs that were likely to have been used in swimming, but the limbs gave a slow and cumbersome locomotion on land. It is possible that some protocetids had flukes. However, it is clear that they were adapted even further to an aquatic life-style. In Rodhocetus, for example, the sacrum (a bone that, in land-mammals, is a fusion of five vertebrae that connects the pelvis with the rest of the vertebral column) was divided into loose vertebrae. However, the pelvis was still connected to one of the sacral vertebrae. The ungulate ancestry of these archaeocetes is still underlined by characteristics like the presence of hooves at the ends of the toes in Rodhocetus. The foot structure of Rodhocetus shows that protocetids were predominantly aquatic. A 2001 study done by Gingerich et al. hypothesized that Rodhocetus locomoted in the oceanic environment similarly to how ambulocetids pelvic paddling, which was supplemented by caudal undulation. Terrestrial locomotion of Rodhocetus was very limited due to their hindlimb structure. It is thought that they moved in a way similar to how eared seals move on land, by rotating their hind flippers forward and underneath their body. ### Basilosauridae Basilosaurids and dorudontines lived together in the late Eocene around 41 to 33.9 million years ago, and are the oldest known obligate aquatic cetaceans. They were fully recognizable whales which lived entirely in the ocean. This is supported by their fossils usually found in deposits indicative of fully marine environments, lacking any freshwater influx. They were probably distributed throughout the tropical and subtropical seas of the world. Basilosaurids are commonly found in association with dorudontines, and were closely related to one another. The fossilised stomach contents in one basilosaurid indicates that it ate fish. Although they look very much like modern cetaceans, basilosaurids lacked the 'melon organ' that allows toothed whales to use echolocation. They had small brains; this suggests they were solitary and did not have the complex social structures of some modern cetaceans. The mandibular foramen of basilosaurids covered the entire depth of the lower jaw as in modern cetaceans. Their orbits faced laterally, and the nasal opening had moved even higher up the snout, closer to the position of the blowhole in modern cetaceans. Furthermore, their ear structures were functionally modern, with the insertion of air-filled sinuses between ear and skull. Unlike modern cetaceans, basilosaurids retained a large external auditory meatus. Both basilosaurids have skeletons that are immediately recognizable as cetaceans. A basilosaurid was as big as the larger modern whales, with genera like Basilosaurus reaching lengths of up to 60 ft (18 m) long; dorudontines were smaller, with genera like Dorudon reaching about 15 ft (4.6 m) long. The large size of basilosaurids is due to the extreme elongation of their lumbar vertebrae. They had a tail fluke, but their body proportions suggest that they swam by caudal undulation and that the fluke was not used for propulsion. In contrast, dorudontines had a shorter but powerful vertebral column. They too had a fluke and, unlike basilosaurids, they probably swam similarly to modern cetaceans, by using caudal oscillations. The forelimbs of basilosaurids were probably flipper-shaped, and the external hind limbs were tiny and were certainly not involved in locomotion. Their fingers, however, retained the mobile joints of their ambulocetid relatives. The two tiny but well-formed hind legs of basilosaurids were probably used as claspers when mating. The pelvic bones associated with these hind limbs were not connected to the vertebral column as they were in protocetids. Essentially, any sacral vertebrae can no longer be clearly distinguished from the other vertebrae. Both basilosaurids and dorudontines are relatively closely related to modern cetaceans, which belong to parvorders Odontoceti and Mysticeti. However, according to a 1994 study done by Fordyce and Barnes, the large size and elongated vertebral body of basilosaurids preclude them from being ancestral to extant forms. As for dorudontines, there are some species within the family that do not have elongated vertebral bodies, which might be the immediate ancestors of Odontoceti and Mysticeti. The other basilosaurids became extinct. ## Evolution of modern cetaceans ### Baleen whales All modern baleen whales or mysticetes are filter-feeders which have baleen in place of teeth, though the exact means by which baleen is used differs among species (gulp-feeding within balaenopterids, skim-feeding within balaenids, and bottom plowing within eschrichtiids). The first members of both groups appeared during the middle Miocene. Filter feeding is very beneficial as it allows baleen whales to efficiently gain huge energy resources, which makes the large body size in modern varieties possible. The development of filter feeding may have been a result of worldwide environmental change and physical changes in the oceans. A large-scale change in ocean current and temperature could have contributed to the radiation of modern mysticetes. The earlier varieties of baleen whales, or "archaeomysticetes", such as Janjucetus and Mammalodon had very little baleen and relied mainly on their teeth. There is also evidence of a genetic component of the evolution of toothless whales. Multiple mutations have been identified in genes related to the production of enamel in modern baleen whales. These are primarily insertion/deletion mutations that result in premature stop codons. It is hypothesized that these mutations occurred in cetaceans already possessing preliminary baleen structures, leading to the pseudogenization of a "genetic toolkit" for enamel production. Recent research has also indicated that the development of baleen and the loss of enamel-capped teeth both occurred once, and both occurred on the mysticete stem branch. Generally it is speculated the four modern mysticete families have separate origins among the cetotheres. Modern baleen whales, Balaenopteridae (rorquals and humpback whale, Megaptera novaengliae), Balaenidae (right whales), Eschrichtiidae (gray whale, Eschrictius robustus), and Neobalaenidae (pygmy right whale, Caperea marginata) all have derived characteristics presently unknown in any cetothere and vice versa (such as a sagittal crest). Mysticetes are also known for their gigantism, as baleen whales are among the largest organisms to ever have lived; they reach lengths greater than 20 m and weigh more than 100,000 kg. This gigantism is directly related to their feeding mechanism – mysticete size has been found to be dependent on the amount of baleen a mysticete can use to filter its prey. Additionally, size is a positively selected trait that gives mysticetes a boost in fitness. Mysticete populations will therefore slowly become even more gigantic as whales with larger amounts of baleen are selected. ### Toothed whales The adaptation of echolocation occurred when toothed whales (Odontoceti) split apart from baleen whales, and distinguishes modern toothed whales from fully aquatic archaeocetes. This happened around 34 million years ago in a second cetacean radiation. Modern toothed whales do not rely on their sense of sight, but rather on their sonar to hunt prey. Echolocation also allowed toothed whales to dive deeper in search of food, with light no longer necessary for navigation, which opened up new food sources. Toothed whales echolocate by creating a series of clicks emitted at various frequencies. Sound pulses are emitted, reflected off objects, and retrieved through the lower jaw. Skulls of Squalodon show evidence for the first hypothesized appearance of echolocation. Squalodon lived from the early to middle Oligocene to the middle Miocene, around 33–14 million years ago. Squalodon featured several commonalities with modern toothed whales: the cranium was well compressed (to make room for the melon, a part of the nose), the rostrum telescoped outward into a beak, a characteristic of the modern toothed whales that gave Squalodon an appearance similar to them. However, it is thought unlikely that squalodontids are direct ancestors of modern toothed whales. The first oceanic dolphins such as kentriodonts, evolved in the late Oligocene and diversified greatly during the mid-Miocene. The first fossil cetaceans near shallow seas (where porpoises inhabit) were found around the North Pacific; species like Semirostrum were found along California (in what were then estuaries). These animals spread to the European coasts and Southern Hemisphere only much later, during the Pliocene. The earliest known ancestor of arctic whales is Denebola brachycephala from the late Miocene around 9–10 million years ago. A single fossil from Baja California indicates the family once inhabited warmer waters. Ancient sperm whales differ from modern sperm whales in tooth count and the shape of the face and jaws. For example, Scaldicetus had a tapered rostrum. Genera from the Oligocene and Miocene had teeth in their upper jaws. These anatomical differences suggest that these ancient species may not have necessarily been deep-sea squid hunters like the modern sperm whale, but that some genera mainly ate fish. Contrary to modern sperm whales, most ancient sperm whales were built to hunt whales. Livyatan had a short and wide rostrum measuring 10 feet (3.0 m) across, which gave the whale the ability to inflict major damage on large struggling prey, such as other early whales. Species like these are collectively known as killer sperm whales or macroraptorial sperm whales. Beaked whales consist of over 20 genera. Earlier variety were probably preyed upon by killer sperm whales and large sharks such as megalodon. In 2008, a large number of fossil ziphiids were discovered off the coast of South Africa, confirming the remaining ziphiid species might just be a remnant of a higher diversity that has since gone extinct. After studying numerous fossil skulls, researchers discovered the absence of functional maxillary teeth in all South African ziphiids, which is evidence that suction feeding had already developed in several beaked whale lineages during the Miocene. Extinct ziphiids also had robust skulls, suggesting that tusks were used for male-male interactions. ## Skeletal evolution Modern cetaceans have internal, rudimentary hind limbs, such as reduced femurs, fibulas, and tibias, and a pelvic girdle. Indohyus has a thickened ectotympanic internal lip of the ear bone. This feature compares directly to that of modern cetaceans. Another similar feature was the composition of the teeth, which contained mostly calcium phosphate which is needed for eating and drinking by aquatic animals, though, unlike modern day toothed whales, they had a heterodont (more than one tooth morphology) dentition as opposed to a homodont (one tooth morphology present) dentition. Although they somewhat resembled a wolf, the fossils of pakicetids showed the eye sockets were much closer to the top of their head than that of other terrestrial mammals, but similar to the structure of the eyes in cetaceans. Their transition from land to water led to reshaping of the skull and food processing equipment because the eating habits were changing. The change in position of the eyes and limb bones is associated with the pakicetids becoming waders. The ambulocetids also began to develop long snouts, which is seen in current cetaceans. Their limbs (and hypothesized movement) were very similar to otters. Limblessness in cetaceans does not represent a regression of fully formed limbs nor the absence of limb bud initiation, but rather arrest of limb bud development. Limb buds develop normally in cetacean embryos. Limb buds progress to the condensation phase of early skeletogenesis, where nerves grow into the limb bud and the apical ectodermal ridge (AER), a structure that ensures proper limb development, appears functional. Occasionally, the genes that code for longer extremities cause a modern whale to develop miniature legs (atavism). Pakicetus had a pelvic bone most similar to that of terrestrial mammals. In later species, such as Basilosaurus, the pelvic bone, no longer attached to the vertebrae and the ilium, was reduced. Certain genes are believed to be responsible for the changes that occurred to the cetacean pelvic structure, such as BMP7, PBX1, PBX2, PRRX1, and PRRX2. The pelvic girdle in modern cetaceans were once thought to be vestigial structures that served no purpose at all. The pelvic girdle in male cetaceans is different in size compared to females, and the size is thought to be a result of sexual dimorphism. The pelvic bones of modern male cetaceans are more massive, longer, and larger than those of females. Due to the sexual dimorphism displayed, they were most likely involved in supporting male genitalia that remain hidden behind abdominal walls until sexual reproduction occurs. Early archaeocetes such as Pakicetus had the nasal openings at the end of the snout, but in later species such as Rodhocetus, the openings had begun to drift toward the top of the skull. This is known as nasal drift. The nostrils of modern cetaceans have become modified into blowholes that allow them to break to the surface, inhale, and submerge with convenience. The ears began to move inward as well, and, in the case of Basilosaurus, the middle ears began to receive vibrations from the lower jaw. Today's modern toothed whales use their melon organ, a pad of fat, for echolocation. ## Radiation events There are three major radiation events that mark diversification and speciation in the evolutionary history of Cetacea. The first occurred around the middle Eocene (40 Mya) when these early cetaceans abandoned riverine and shallow coastal habitats, setting the scene for Protocetidae – the first fully marine cetacean. With the oceans and its nutrients at their disposal, rapidly diversifying protocetids were also responsible for the first major geographic expansion, dispersing throughout North Africa, Europe, and North America. The second of three major radiation events occurred near the start of the Oligocene (\~34 Mya) when Neoceti diverged from Basilosauridae. This radiation event concurrently occurs with the breakup of Gondwana and the opening of the Southern Ocean, wildly changing ocean ecosystems, productivity, and temperature gradients. The timing of this second radiation event is not coincidental, as the following diversification of cetaceans was likely due to new ecological opportunities the change in oceans gave them. The final major radiation event, occurring throughout the middle Miocene and into the Pliocene (12 Mya to 2 Mya), was not due to a specific event but is associated with widespread generic expansion of odontocetes and mysticetes. Some modern genera of cetaceans began to emerge, including Balaenoptera, a genus of rorquals that includes the blue whale. Delphinidae, ocean dolphins, also arose during this radiation event in the late Miocene. ## Ongoing evolution ### Culture Culture is group-specific behavior transferred by social learning. Tool use to aid with foraging is one example. Whether or not a dolphin uses a tool affects its eating behavior, which causes differences in diet. Also, using a tool allows a new niche and new prey to open up for that particular dolphin. Due to these differences, fitness levels change within the dolphins of a population, which further causes evolution to occur in the long run. Culture and social networks have played a large role in the evolution of modern cetaceans, as concluded in studies showing dolphins preferring mates with the same socially learned behaviors, and humpback whales using songs between breeding areas. For dolphins particularly, the largest non-genetic effects on their evolution are due to culture and social structure. Based on a 2014 study, the population of Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops sp.) around Shark Bay of Western Australia can be divided into spongers and nonspongers. Spongers put sea sponges on their snouts as protection against abrasions from sharp objects, stingray barbs, or toxic organisms. The sponges also help the dolphins target fish without swim bladders, since echolocation cannot detect these fish easily against a complex background. Spongers also specifically forage in deep channels, but nonspongers are found foraging in both deep and shallow channels. This foraging behavior is mainly passed on from mother to child. Therefore, since this is a group behavior being passed down by social learning, this tool use is considered a cultural trait. Researchers in a 2014 study in Shark Bay found the fatty acid analyses between the West and East Gulf populations to differ, which is due to the two areas having different food sources. However, when comparing data from within the West Gulf, the spongers vs. the nonspongers in the deep channels had very different fatty acid results even though they are in the same habitat. Nonspongers from deep and shallow channels had similar data. This suggests that sponging was the cause of the different data and not the deep vs. shallow channels. Sponging opened up a new niche for the dolphins and allowed them access to new prey, which caused long-term dietary changes. By producing different food sources within a population, there is less intrapopulation competition for resources, showing character displacement. As a result, the carrying capacity increases since the entire population does not depend on one food source. The fitness levels within the population also change, thus allowing this culture to evolve. #### Social structure Social structure forms groups with individuals that interact with one another, and this allows for cultural traits to emerge, exchange, and evolve. This relationship is especially seen in the bottlenose dolphin populations in southwestern Australia, which have been known to beg for food from fishermen. This begging behavior was spread through the population due to individual (dolphins spending time around boats) and social (dolphins spending time with other dolphins who express begging behavior) learning. Culture can, however, impact social structure by causing behavior matching and assortive mating. Individuals within a certain culture are more likely to mate with individuals using the same behaviors rather than a random individual, thus influencing social groups and structure. For example, the spongers of Shark Bay preferentially stick with other spongers. Also, some bottlenose dolphins in Moreton Bay, Australia followed prawn trawlers to feed on their debris, while other dolphins in the same population did not. The dolphins preferentially associated with individuals with same behavior even though they all lived in the same habitat. Later on, prawn trawlers were no longer present, and the dolphins integrated into one social network after a couple of years. Social networks can still affect and cause evolution on their own by impending fitness differences on individuals. According to a 2012 study, male calves had a lower survival rate if they had stronger bonds with juvenile males. However, when other age and sex classes were tested, their survival rate did not significantly change. This suggests that juvenile males impose a social stress on their younger counterparts. In fact, it has been documented that juvenile males commonly perform acts of aggression, dominance, and intimidation against the male calves. According to a 2010 study, certain populations of Shark Bay dolphins had varying levels of fitness and calf success. This is either due to social learning (whether or not the mother passed on her knowledge of reproductive ability to the calves), or due to the strong association between mother dolphins in the population; by sticking in a group, an individual mother does not need to be as vigilant all the time for predators. Genetic studies conducted on Clymene dolphins (Stenella clymene) focused on their natural histories, and the results show that the origin of the species was actually an outcome of hybrid speciation. Hybridization between spinner dolphins (Stenella longirostris) and striped dolphins (Stenella coeruleoalba) in the North Atlantic was caused by constant habitat sharing of the two species. Relationships between these three species had been speculated according to notable resemblances between anatomies of the Clymene and the spinner dolphins, resulting in the former being regarded as subspecies of the latter until 1981, and the possibility of the Clymene dolphin as a hybrid between the spinner and the striped dolphins have come to question based on anatomical and behavioral similarities between these two species. ### Environmental factors Genome sequences done in 2013 revealed that the Yangtze river dolphin, or "baiji" (Lipotes vexillifer), lacks single nucleotide polymorphisms in their genome. After reconstructing the history of the baiji genome for this dolphin species, researchers found that the major decrease in genetic diversity occurred most likely due to a bottleneck event during the last deglaciation event. During this time period, sea levels were rising while global temperatures were increasing. Other historical climate events can be correlated and matched with the genome history of the Yangtze river dolphin as well. This shows how global and local climate change can drastically affect a genome, leading to changes in fitness, survival, and evolution of a species. The European population of common dolphins (Delphinus delphis) in the Mediterranean have differentiated into two types: eastern and western. According to a 2012 study, this seems to be due to a recent bottleneck as well, which drastically decreased the size of the eastern Mediterranean population. Also, the lack of population structure between the western and eastern regions seems contradictory of the distinct population structures between other regions of dolphins. Even though the dolphins in the Mediterranean area had no physical barrier between their regions, they still differentiated into two types due to ecology and biology. Therefore, the differences between the eastern and western dolphins most likely stems from highly specialized niche choice rather than just physical barriers. Through this, environment plays a large role in the differentiation and evolution of this dolphin species. The divergence and speciation within bottlenose dolphins has been largely due to climate and environmental changes over history. According to research, the divisions within the genus correlate with periods of rapid climate change. For example, the changing temperatures could cause the coast landscape to change, niches to empty up, and opportunities for separation to appear. In the Northeast Atlantic, specifically, genetic evidence suggests that the bottlenose dolphins have differentiated into coastal and pelagic types. Divergence seems most likely due to a founding event where a large group separated. Following this event, the separate groups adapted accordingly and formed their own niche specializations and social structures. These differences caused the two groups to diverge and to remain separated. Two endemic, distinctive types of short-finned pilot whale, Tappanaga (or Shiogondou) the larger, northern type and Magondou the smaller, southern type, can be found along the Japanese archipelago where distributions of these two types mostly do not overlap by the oceanic front border around the easternmost point of Honshu. It is thought that the local extinction of long-finned pilot whales in the North Pacific in the 12th century could have triggered the appearance of Tappanaga, causing short-finned pilot whales to colonize the colder ranges of the long-finned variant. Whales with similar characteristics to the Tappanaga can be found along Vancouver Island and northern US coasts as well. ## See also - Aquatic adaptation - Evolution of mammals - Evolution of sirenians - List of extinct cetaceans - Transitional form
2,239,970	Incoming (1998 video game)	1,171,837,310	1998 video game	[ "1998 video games", "Alien invasions in video games", "Arcade video games", "Dreamcast games", "Imagineer games", "Interplay Entertainment games", "Multiplayer and single-player video games", "Rage Games games", "Tank simulation video games", "Video games about extraterrestrial life", "Video games developed in the United Kingdom", "Video games set in 2009", "Windows games", "Xicat Interactive games" ]	Incoming is a 3D shooter video game developed and published by Rage Software. The game was first released for Microsoft Windows in mid-1998, and was followed by a Sega Dreamcast version, which was released in Japan on December 17, 1998, in Europe on October 14, 1999, and in North America on September 15, 1999. Set in the near-future of 2009, the game primarily revolves around controlling vehicles and turrets to fight alien invaders of Earth in one of the campaign modes, the arcade mode, and with or against another player. Some levels include brief real-time strategy segments. Praised for its then-advanced graphics and sound, the game was generally well-received on the PC, though the critical response was less positive for the Dreamcast version. A sequel entitled Incoming Forces was released in 2002 exclusively for the PC. An arcade version of the game, utilising a unique hardware interface, was released in 2003. ## Gameplay Primarily a vehicle simulation game, the player controls one of a number of possible vehicles in order to complete objectives. The vehicle used could be an aerial craft, defence emplacement, or surface craft, and is usually armed with a primary weapon (with unlimited ammunition) and sometimes secondary weapons (with either a limited or infinite supply). Incoming employs an arcade style; in particular, the logging of high scores and a "life" system. There are three different game modes. The campaign mode follows the main storyline, in which the player must complete a series of objectives to neutralise the alien threat. Typical goals include transporting cargo and defending allied convoys. Two variants of the campaign exist: "campaign action" purely consists of the simulation missions; "campaign tactics" features the same main missions as campaign action, but with some extra sub-missions. These sub-missions take place in the "tactical display", where the player controls several vehicles and gun emplacements in a similar manner to real-time strategy games. Either campaign consists of ten missions (referred to as "phases" in the game) in each of the six locations. These locations can also be accessed in the arcade mode. This mode sees the player fight off alien craft while picking up as many power-ups as is possible. The same mechanics apply to the multiplayer mode, with some slight variations depending on the game type selected. Multiplayer is available in split-screen mode on both platforms, in addition to networking and Internet options on the PC version. ## Story Acknowledged by critics for having a simple storyline, Incoming is set in 2009 over a period of fifteen days. An increasing number of UFO sightings culminate in attacks on the international lunar base and other locations on Earth; and the construction of a base in the Arctic. Secret work is started on an "ADATA" (Anomaly Detection And Tracking Array) near Mount Kilimanjaro. The events of the game take place after an attack on the ADATA facility is initiated by alien forces. The game is set in six locations: Kenya, defending the ADATA facility; the Arctic, attacking an alien base while defending a human one; the North Atlantic Ocean, where the player must defend oil rigs and attack a second alien base; Florida, where parts of a fleet to invade the alien's moon base must be defended; the Moon, attacking a further alien base; and a planet in the Crab Nebula, assaulting the planet from which the alien attackers came. If the player has completed these in the Campaign Action mode, then in addition to these ten missions in each location, there are bonus "virus" scenarios, with one level in each location. Shortly before these missions, the aliens launched four virus bombs which impacted in the four location on Earth the player had previously visited. All buildings in these areas must be destroyed by the player to prevent the virus from spreading further. ## Development Rage Software, developers of Incoming, were known for their cutting-edge graphics and effects. The game utilized the 3dfx technology, and was included in some retail versions of the Voodoo2 graphics card. While exhibiting the PC version at the September 1997 European Computer Trade Show, Rage Software stated that they were considering a Nintendo 64 version of the game. However, none was ever released. An arcade version followed in 2003, running on the Vortek V3 Global VR arcade board, utilising the system's unique virtual reality hardware interface. ## Critical reception The Windows version of Incoming was generally well received. In particular, the explosions, similar special effects and cut scenes using the main game engine were noted for their quality. The Dolby Surround-encoded sound was a further source of acclaim. British magazine PC Zone described it as "bloody good", with "some modest simulation elements". The magazine praised the setting of the game, commenting: "A refreshing change from the deep space of most futuristic combat sims, and something which definitely has a positive effect on gameplay". The review concluded by saying that "it's as fun as it looks. Just for once, all those people who don't read reviews and buy games purely on the strength of pretty pictures on the packaging are gonna find themselves playing a very, very enjoyable game". Edge highlighted the game's efficient gameplay mechanics, giving it eight out of ten and stating that designers "managed to produce something more than a lightshow, taking care to fine-tune a design that, if not exactly original, at least does its thing with flair and solid understanding of gameplay". Next Generation said the game was "definitely an improvement to the action/arcade genre, as well as a visual improvement to the 3D market as a whole. The amount of varied units and different setting give Incoming the commendable originality and replay value that make it a title worth checking out". Though considering the game "pretty darn tough", IGN praised the game's variety and length. It also praised the sound and graphics, though the latter was a source of criticism: "Incomings got it all... but it all comes at a high price: getting this game to run on our PCs was one big pain in the butt". Despite calling it "an outstanding-looking and great playing game", IGN only gave the game a "decent" review score because of the system problems. Conversely, GameSpot's review noted none of these hardware issues, praising the visuals as "some of the finest... of any action game". The reviewer, however, described the game design as "strong yet slightly flawed... [it] definitely pulls you in, but leaves a little to be desired as far as keeping you there", complaining that "what [the developer] have presented gets tiresome quickly". The publication summarised the game as "a fine game and a definite must-have for arcade fans... What it lacks is a realization that computer games have moved beyond this simplistic style of gameplay". The reception was less positive when the game was ported to the Dreamcast. A release title for Sega's console, IGN complained that the graphics were not top-of-the-range at the time of its late 1999 release, with the draw distance being cited as a specific hindrance on gameplay. IGN also said that, although the game "is lacking in many areas, there's more than enough here for the hardcore shooting fans out there to have their requisite blast of shooting action". Though criticizing the graphics' ability to "get in the way at times", the "very vague" mission briefings and the "odd flying model for the planes", the reviewer conceded that "if you're a hardcore shooting fan, and you're looking for a good challenge, you'll probably want to look into Incoming". Jonathan Licata of AllGame gave it three stars out of five, saying: "With the two-player modes falling short due to lack of innovation, Incoming exists as a one-player game for all intents and purposes. When you have completed all of the campaigns in their entirety, the appeal of the game wears very thin". PlanetDreamcast's review was harsher, describing the plot as "the same recycled garbage used in tons of other games of this type", the multiplayer split screen mode as "lame" and the objectives as "mundane". The reviewer also noted graphical issues, clipping problems and poor controls. Though dismissing the graphics as "a bit dated", the reviewer did acknowledge the "nifty special effects" and admitted that "Incoming may be worth a rental... [it] is only slightly better than mediocre". In a rare positive review for the Dreamcast version, Game Vortex described the visuals as "some of the most breathtaking visuals you'll find in any game". Though describing the multiplayer as "fun", it considered "by far, the best [mode to be] Campaign mode". The review concluded by describing the game as "lots of fun and highly recommended". In Japan, where said console version was released under the name Incoming: Ginrui Saishū Kessen' (インカミング人類最終決戦, Inkamingu Ginrui Saishū Kessen, lit. "Incoming: Humanity's Final Showdown"), Famitsu gave it a score of 27 out of 40.
33,251,782	The Binding of Isaac (video game)	1,163,652,006	2011 video game	[ "2011 video games", "Abortion in fiction", "Cancelled Nintendo 3DS games", "Child abuse in fiction", "Criticism of Christianity", "Cultural depictions of Abraham", "Cultural depictions of Isaac", "Dungeon crawler video games", "Flash games", "Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse in popular culture", "Game jam video games", "Indie games", "Linux games", "MacOS games", "Roguelike video games", "Seven deadly sins in popular culture", "Shooter games", "Single-player video games", "Video games about children", "Video games about religion", "Video games designed by Edmund McMillen", "Video games developed in the United States", "Video games scored by Danny Baranowsky", "Video games using procedural generation", "Video games with expansion packs", "Windows games" ]	The Binding of Isaac is a roguelike video game designed by independent developers Edmund McMillen and Florian Himsl. It was released in 2011 for Microsoft Windows, then ported to OS X, and Linux. The game's title and plot are inspired by the Biblical story of the Binding of Isaac. In the game, Isaac's mother receives a message from God demanding the life of her son as proof of her faith, and Isaac, fearing for his life, flees into the monster-filled basement of their home where he must fight to survive. Players control Isaac or one of seven other unlockable characters through a procedurally generated dungeon in a roguelike manner, fashioned after those of The Legend of Zelda, defeating monsters in real-time combat while collecting items and power-ups to defeat bosses and eventually Isaac's mother. The game was the result of a week-long game jam between McMillen and Himsl to develop a The Legend of Zelda-inspired roguelike that allowed McMillen to showcase his feelings about both positive and negative aspects of religion that he had come to discover from conflicts between his Catholic and born again Christian family members while growing up. McMillen had considered the title a risk but one he could take after the financial success of Super Meat Boy, and released it without much fanfare to Steam in September 2011, not expecting many sales. The game soon gained popularity partially as a result of various Let's Play videos showcasing the title. McMillen and Himsl released an expansion "Wrath of the Lamb" in May 2012, but were limited from further expansion due to limitations with the Flash platform. They had started working with Nintendo in 2012 to release a 3DS version, but Nintendo later backed out of the deal, citing controversy over the game's religious themes. Developer Nicalis worked with McMillen in 2014 to complete a remake of the game, The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth, bringing additional features that McMillen had planned that exceeded Flash's limitation, as well as to improve the game's graphics and enable ports for other systems beyond personal computers, including PlayStation 4 and Vita, Xbox One, Wii U, Nintendo 3DS, and the Nintendo Switch. This remake has commonly been cited as one of the best roguelike games of all time. McMillen later worked with James Id to develop The Legend of Bum-bo, which serves as a prequel to The Binding of Isaac. The Binding of Isaac has been well-received, with critics praising the game's roguelike nature to encourage repeated playthroughs. By July 2014, McMillen reported over 3 million copies had been sold. The game has been said to contribute to renewed interest in the roguelike genre from both players and developers. ## Gameplay The Binding of Isaac is a top-down dungeon crawler game, presented using two-dimensional sprites, in which the player controls Isaac or other unlockable characters as they explore the dungeons located in Isaac's basement. The characters differ in speed, amount of health, amount of damage they deal, and other attributes. The game's mechanics and presentation is similar to the dungeons of The Legend of Zelda, while incorporating random, procedurally-generated levels in the manner of a roguelike game. On each floor of the basement dungeon, the player must fight monsters in a room before continuing onto the next room. This is most commonly done by the character's tears as bullets in the style of a twin-stick shooter, but the player can also use a limited supply of bombs to damage enemies and clear out parts of the room. Other methods of defeating enemies become possible as the character gains power-ups, items that are automatically worn by the player-character when picked up that can alter the character's core attributes, such as increasing health or the strength of each tear, or cause additional side effects, such as for allowing charged tear shots to be fired after holding down a controller button for a short while, or a means to fire tears behind the character. Power-ups include passive items that improve the character's attributes automatically, active power-ups that can be used once before they are recharged by completing additional rooms in the dungeon, and single-use power-ups such as pills or Tarot cards that confer a one-time benefit when used, such as regaining full health, or increasing or decreasing all attributes of the character. The effect of power-ups stack, so that the player may come into highly-beneficial power-up combinations. Once a room is cleared of monsters, it will remain clear, allowing the player to re-trace their way through the level, though once they move onto the next level, they cannot return. Along the way, the player can collect money to buy power-ups from shopkeepers, keys to unlock special treasure rooms, and new weapons and power-ups to strengthen their chances against the enemies. The player's health is tracked by a number of hearts; if the character loses all his hearts, the game ends in permadeath and the player must start over from a freshly-generated dungeon. Each floor of the dungeon includes a boss which the player must defeat before continuing to the next level. On the sixth of eight floors, the player fights Isaac's mother; after defeating her, Isaac crawls into her womb. Later levels are significantly harder, culminating in a fight against the heart of Isaac's mother on the eighth floor. An optional ninth floor, Sheol, contains the boss Satan. Winning the game with certain characters or by certain conditions unlocks new power-ups that might appear in the dungeon or the ability to use one of the other characters. The game tracks the various power-ups that the player has found over time which can be reviewed from the game's menus. ## Plot The Binding of Isaac's plot is very loosely inspired by the biblical story of the same name. Isaac, a child, and his mother live in a small house on a hill, both happily keeping to themselves, with Isaac drawing pictures and playing with his toys, and his mother watching Christian broadcasts on television. Isaac's mother then hears "a voice from above", a voice that she believes is that of God Himself, stating that her son is corrupted with sin, and needs to be saved. It asks her to remove all that is evil from Isaac, in an attempt to save him. His mother agrees, taking away his toys, drawings, and even his clothes. The voice once again speaks to Isaac's mother, stating that Isaac must be cut off from all that is evil in the world. Once again, his mother agrees, and locks Isaac inside his room. Once more, the voice speaks to Isaac's mother. It states that she has done well, but it still questions her devotion, and tells her to sacrifice her son. She agrees, grabbing a butcher's knife from the kitchen and walks to Isaac's room. Isaac, watching through a sizable crack in his door, starts to panic. He finds a trapdoor hidden under his rug and jumps in, just as his mother bursts through his bedroom door. Isaac then puts the paper he was drawing onto his wall, which becomes the title screen. Until The Binding of Isaac: Repentance expansion in the remake, there is no clear conclusion, or even consistent narrative, to the story past this point. The game features 13 possible endings, one after each major boss fight. The first ten endings serve as introductions to unlocked items and mechanics, while the final three suggest that Isaac climbs into a toy chest and suffocates. During the game's loading points, Isaac is shown curled up in a ball, crying. His thoughts are visible, ranging among rejection from his mother and humiliation from his peers to a scenario involving his own death. ## Development and release The Binding of Isaac was developed following the release of Super Meat Boy, which McMillen considered a significant risk and a large time effort. When Super Meat Boy was released to both critical praise and strong sales, he felt that he no longer had to worry about the consequences of taking risks with his finances supported by its sales. He also considered he could take further risk with the concept. He had been planning to work with Tommy Refenes, the co-developer of Super Meat Boy, on their next game, Mewgenics, but as Refenes had taken some time off, McMillen looked to develop something he considered to be "low stress" with minimal expectations such as an Adobe Flash game. The Binding of Isaac's main concept was the result of a weeklong game jam that McMillen had with Florian Himsl; at the time, his co-contributor on Super Meat Boy, Tommy Refenes, was on vacation. The concept McMillen had was two-fold: to develop a roguelike title based on the first The Legend of Zelda game's dungeon structure, and to develop a game that addressed McMillen's thoughts on religion. McMillen had been inspired by Shigeru Miyamoto, the designer of the original Zelda games. McMillen saw the potential of the procedural generation aspect of roguelikes including in Spelunky and Desktop Dungeons, and considered that working on procedural generation would help towards development of his planned game Mewgenics. Random rooms were created for each floor of the dungeon by selecting ten to twenty rooms from a pre-built library of 200 layouts, adding in the monsters, items, and other features, and then including fixed rooms that would be found on each floor, such as a boss room and treasure room. In expanding the gameplay, McMillen used the structure of Zelda's dungeons to design how the player would progress through the game. In a typical Zelda dungeon, according to McMillen, the player acquires a new item that helps them to progress farther in the game; he took the same inspiration to assure that each level in Isaac included at least one item and one bonus item on defeating the boss that would boost the character's attributes. McMillen also wanted to encourage players to experiment to learn how things work within Isaac, mirroring how Miyamoto had done with the original Zelda game. He designed the level progression to become more difficult with the player's progression in the game, as well as additional content that became available after beating the game as to make it feel like the game was long. McMillen designed four of the selectable characters based on the main classes of Dungeons & Dragons—fighter, thief, cleric and wizard. On the story side, McMillen explained that the religious tone is based on his own experiences with his family, split between Catholics and born-again Christians. McMillen noted that while both sides born out faith from the same Bible, their attitudes were different; he found some of the Catholic rituals his family performed inspiring, while other beliefs they had were condemning of several pastimes McMillen had participated in like Dungeons & Dragons. He took inspiration from that duality to create Isaac's narrative, showing how religion can both instill harmful feelings while also bringing about dark creativity. McMillen also considered the scare tactics used by the Christian right to condemn popular media of the 1980s, such as heavy metal and video games. McMillen noted how many of the propaganda films from this period featured satanic cults that would sacrifice children, and he noted how many Biblical stories mirrored these concepts, subsequently building the story around that. He also stated that he also tended to like "really weird stuff" relating to toilet humor and similar types of off-color humor that did not sit well with his family and which he had explored in previous games before Super Meat Boy. While Super Meat Boy helped to make his reputation (including being one of the featured developers in Indie Game: The Movie), he felt it was a "safe" game considering his preferred type of humor, and used Isaac to return to this form, considering that the game could easily be "career suicide" but would make a statement about what he really wanted to do. The Binding of Isaac began as a game jam between McMillen and Florian Himsl. Within the week, they had a working game written in Adobe Flash's ActionScript 2. The two agreed to complete it out as a game they could release on Steam though with no expectations of sales. Completion of the game from the prototype to the finished state took about 3 months with part-time development. During this time, they discovered there were several limitations on the size and scope of both Flash and ActionScript that limited how much they could do with the game, but continued to use the tools as to release the title. McMillen said that because they were not worried about sales, they were able to work with Valve to release the game without fears of censorship or having to seek an ESRB rating. Releasing through Steam also enabled them to update the game freely, several times on its initial release, an aspect that they could not do with other consoles without significant cost to themselves. They did release without significant end-user testing, as it would have taken several hundreds of users to go through all the various combinations of items that a player could collect, and McMillen recognized they had released the title with their buyers being playtesters for them. A week after the Steam release, McMillen released a demo version via the website Newgrounds. Merge Games produced a physical edition that included the game, soundtrack, and a poster, for stores in the United Kingdom in 2012. AS2 was a very outdated program at the time, and caused many low-end PCs and even high-end PCs to encounter slow down at times. AS2 also lacked controller support, and Tommy Refenes had to help write an achievement program that would allow people to unlock Steam achievements. McMillen later stated that he would not have made it in Flash at all if he had known anyone would actually care about Isaac. ### Soundtrack Danny Baranowsky, the game's composer and who previously worked with McMillen on Super Meat Boy, was involved early on with the project shortly after the completion of the first prototype. McMillen and Baranowsky worked back and forth, with McMillen providing artwork from the game and allowing Baranowsky to develop the musical themes based on that; this would often lead to McMillen creating more art to support the music as it progressed. Baranowsky had been drawn to The Binding of Isaac as though the game puts forth a dark tone, he stated it had rather silly undertones underneath and such that one could not take it too seriously. Some of the songs were inspired by classical choral music but modified to fit the theme of the game. Other works were inspired by boss fight songs composed by Nobuo Uematsu for the Final Fantasy series. Baranowsky also had additional time after finishing the main songs for the game to craft short additional tracks that were used for special rooms like shops and secret areas. ### Cancelled Nintendo 3DS port In January 2012, as the game has surpassed 450,000 units sold, McMillen stated that he was approached by a publisher that had interest in bringing the title to the Nintendo 3DS as a downloadable title through the Nintendo eShop, though McMillen had reservations given Nintendo's reputation for less risque content. In late February, McMillen stated that Nintendo had rejected the game because of "questionable religious content". He believed this stemmed from Germany's classification board rating the existing Windows version of the game as "age 16+" due to potentially blasphemous content, the first such time a game was rated in that manner in the country. McMillen noted that Nintendo executives he spoke to before this decision had noted some blasphemous content would have been acceptable, and were more concerned with overtly religious content. He also noted that he was approached about his willingness to make some changes to the game to make it more suitable for the 3DS, but never was given a list of specific changes. McMillen speculated that Nintendo was worried about its reputation; because of the game's resemblance to The Legend of Zelda, an unknowing child could potentially have downloaded the title and been shocked by the content, which would have reflected poorly on Nintendo. Several game websites were outraged at Nintendo's decision. Though disappointed with Nintendo's decision, McMillen did not think the loss of the 3DS port was a major issue, and saw a brief sales burst on Steam as the news was covered on gaming websites. McMillen further praised the flexibility of the Steam platform, which does not require games to obtain ESRB ratings to be published on the service, and the freedom it gave to the publishers regardless of the game content. Nintendo would later allow the Rebirth remake to be released on both the New Nintendo 3DS and the Wii U in 2015; this came in part because Nintendo's Steve Singer (vice president of licensing), Mark Griffin (a senior manager in licensing), and Dan Adelman (the head of indie development) championed support for The Binding of Isaac. ### Wrath of the Lamb An expansion to the game, entitled Wrath of the Lamb, was released through Steam on May 28, 2012. McMillen was inspired to create the expansion not only due to the success of the base game, but because his wife Danielle had fully completed the base game, the first game he had written in which she had shown significant interest. The expansion adds 70% more content to the original, and contains more than 10 bosses, over 100 items, over 40 unlocks, two additional endings, and two additional optional levels. This expansion added new "alternate" floors, which can replace the normal floors, creating an alternate route through the game. These floors contain harder enemies, and a different set of bosses. Other features include a new item type, Trinkets, which have a variety of passive or triggered effects when carried, as well as new room types. McMillen had plans to release a second expansion beyond Wrath of the Lamb, but was constrained by the limits of Flash at this point. ### The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth Sometime in 2012 after Isaac's release, McMillen was approached by Tyrone Rodriguez of Nicalis who asked if McMillen was interested in bringing the game to consoles. McMillen was interested, but insisted that they would have to reprogram the game to get around the limitations of Flash and to include Wrath of the Lamb and the second planned expansion, remaking the game's graphics in 16-bit instead of vector-based Flash graphics. Further, McMillen had wanted nothing to do with the business aspects of the game, having recounted the difficulties he had in handling this for Super Meat Boy. Nicalis agreed to these, and began work in 2012 on what would become The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth, an improved version of the title. It was released on November 4, 2014, for Microsoft Windows, OS X, Linux, PlayStation 4, and PlayStation Vita, with versions for the Wii U, New Nintendo 3DS, and Xbox One released on July 23, 2015. The game introduced numerous new playable characters, items, enemies, bosses, challenges, and room layout seeds for floors. A content pack, entitled Afterbirth was released for Rebirth starting October 2015, adding new alternate chapters, characters and items, as well as wave-based Greed mode. A second update, Afterbirth+, added further additional content and support for user-created modifications, and was released on January 3, 2017. A third and final update, Repentance added a lot of new content and bug fixes, including most of the content from Antibirth, one of the biggest fan-made expansions, such as a new alternate path through the whole game as well as numerous character variations and new final bosses. This expansion was released on March 31, 2021. ### Other games McMillen collaborated with James Id to develop The Legend of Bum-bo, which was released on November 12, 2019, for Windows and later for iOS and Switch. Bum-bo is described as a prequel to Isaac, and Isaac and Gish appear as characters in the game. Isaac also appears as a playable character in the fighting game Blade Strangers and the puzzle game Crystal Crisis. On June 27, 2018, Edmund McMillen announced and later released a card game adaptation in cooperation with Studio 71 titled The Binding of Isaac: Four Souls. ## Reception The Binding of Isaac received generally favorable reviews from game critics. On Metacritic, the game has an average of 84 out of 100 based on 30 reviews. The Binding of Isaac has been received by reviewers as a game with high replayability with the extensive range and combinations of power-ups that the player can encounter during a run-through, while providing an accessible Zelda-inspired framework that most video game players would recognize and easily come to understand. John Teti for Eurogamer praised the game for its replayability through the randomization aspects, calling it "the most accessible exploration of the roguelike idea" that he had seen. Edge's similarly commented on the lure to replay the game due to its short playthrough time, calling it "an imaginative and quick-witted arcade experience that manages to be both depraved and strangely sweet by turn". GameSpot's Maxwell McGee stated that the game smartly has removed extraneous features such that "what remains is a tightly focused game that continues to feel fresh even after multiple completions". Though the game is considered to be accessible to new players, reviewers found the game to be a difficult challenge, often set by the randomness of what power-ups the player happened to acquire during a single run. Writers for The A.V. Club rated the game an A on a grading scale, and favorably compared the title to McMillen's Super Meat Boy, requiring the player to have "masochistic patience in the face of terrible odds". This difficulty was considered mitigated by the large number of possible power-ups that the game offers, most would not be seen by players until they have replayed the game many times. McGee noted that while players can review what items they have discovered prior to a run-through, this feature does not explain what each item does, leaving the effect to be determined by the player while in game. Game Informer's Adam Biessener noted that while The Binding of Isaac had a number of software bugs on release that may briefly detract from the experience, "McMillen's vision shines through" in the game's playability, art style, and story. Neilie Johnson for IGN found that some players may be put off by the game's crudeness but otherwise "it's totally random, highly creative and brutally unforgiving". Similarly, Nathan Muenier for GameSpy noted the game had some shock value that one must work past, but otherwise was "imaginative" and "utterly absorbing". Alternatively, Jordan Devore for Destructoid considered the visual style of the game one of its "biggest selling points", following from McMillen's past style of dark comedy from Super Meat Boy. Baranowsky's soundtrack was found by reviewers to well-suit the themes of the game, and used appropriately to avoid extensive repetition during a playthrough. Kirk Hamilton of Kotaku called the soundtrack as the combination of several genres and the musical styles of Danny Elfman, Muse, and Final Fantasy that created something "dark and unique". The Binding of Isaac was nominated in the Best Independent Game category at the 2011 Spike Video Game Awards, but lost to Minecraft. McMillen had only expected the game to sell a few hundred copies when he released it on Steam. For the first few months of its release, sales were roughly a few hundred per day, but shortly thereafter, McMillen found sales suddenly were boosted, a fact he attributed to numerous Let's Play videos that had been published by players to showcase the game and drove sales. This popularity also drew interest by players that wanted to create custom mods for the game, which would become a factor in the design of the sequel to better support modding. By November 2012, the game sold over one million copies, with at least one-quarter of those having purchased the "Wrath of the Lamb" extension. As of July 2014, the game has sold over 3 million copies. By July 2015, following the release of Rebirth, the combined games had over 5 million units sold. The Binding of Isaac is said to be a contributing factor towards the growth of the roguelike genre since around 2010, with its success paving the way for later games that used the roguelike formula, such as FTL: Faster Than Light and Don't Starve.
4,572,557	Fly Me Away	1,159,174,626	2006 single by Goldfrapp	[ "2006 singles", "Electronic songs", "Goldfrapp songs", "Mute Records singles", "Songs written by Alison Goldfrapp", "Songs written by Will Gregory" ]	"Fly Me Away" is an electronic song performed by British group Goldfrapp. The song was written and produced by Alison Goldfrapp and Will Gregory for the duo's third album Supernature (2005). The song features a synthesizer and orchestral arrangement and was written about the need to escape from the troubles of daily life. The song was released as the album's fourth single in May 2006 to positive reviews from music critics. It was a modest commercial success, reaching the top forty in Ireland and the United Kingdom. The song has been remixed a number of times and was featured in advertising campaigns for the US retail company Target. ## Background and writing "Fly Me Away" is a mid-tempo electronic song about the need to escape from the troubles of daily life. It was composed as a collaborative effort between Alison Goldfrapp and Will Gregory in late 2004 in a rented cottage in the countryside of Bath, England. The song was written and recorded while Goldfrapp and Gregory were "jamming in the recording studio, bouncing song ideas off each other". "Fly Me Away" is written in the common verse-chorus form and features instrumentation from synthesizers and an orchestra that was conducted by Nick Ingman. The North American digital EP featured a cover version of "Boys Will Be Boys" as its B-side. The song was originally performed by British rock group The Ordinary Boys. ## Marketing and release In late 2006, "Fly Me Away" was featured in Christmas advertising campaigns for the US retail company Target. The song, along with "Number 1", was featured in winter themed television commercials. An instrumental of the song was also featured in advertisements for L'Oréal Feria, which starred actress Scarlett Johansson. "Fly Me Away" was released as a various formats throughout the world. While most territories received a CD single and digital download release, the single was released as a limited edition 12-inch single in April 2006 in the UK. A DVD single was also issued and included the "Fly Me Away: Inflight Movies (Paris - New York - London)" film, directed by Hannah Holland, and Diane Martel's music video for "Ride A White Horse". The Chris Hopewell-directed music video for "Fly Me Away" was never released. Clips from the video have, however, leaked on to the internet, appearing on the video sharing website YouTube. Instead, Goldfrapp released a performance video on their MySpace page and an animated short film version, directed by Andreas Nilsson and titled "Jakko & the Poet", on the Supernature Limited Edition DVD. ## Chart performance "Fly Me Away" was released in the United Kingdom on 1 May 2006. Because it was released as the fourth single, success was very limited since many consumers had already purchased the album, which at the time had been certified platinum in the UK. The song entered the UK Singles Chart on 8 May 2006 at number twenty-six. The following week it dropped thirty-five positions to number sixty-one and exited the singles chart in its third week of release. In Ireland, the song entered at number forty, remaining on the singles chart for one week. In the US, "Fly My Away" became Goldfrapp's fourth song to chart within the top ten of the Billboard Dance Chart, reaching number six. ## Remixes Carl Craig made the most well-known remix of the song, titled the "C2 rmx 4", which was included on the limited edition CD single. The track uses Goldfrapp's original vocals over a heavy bass line and layered synths. Craig also created two other C2 remixes, which focus on Gregory's instrumentation. Ladytron's remix of "Fly Me Away" remained close to the original, but was called less "fun and bouncy" by About.com reviewer Mike Stier. Stier also disliked Filippo Moscatello's "Naughty rmx" writing that it did not contain the "zest and zing" that Craig's remixes had. ## Formats and track listings These are the formats and track listings of major single releases of "Fly Me Away". - CD single 1 1. "Fly Me Away" (Single Version) – 3:37 2. "Satin Chic" (Bombay Mix by The Shortwave Set) – 4:40 - CD single 2 1. "Fly Me Away" (C2 Remix 4) – 7:04 2. "Fly Me Away" (Ladytron Remix) – 5:27 3. "You Never Know" (Múm Remix) – 2:59 - DVD single 1. "Fly Me Away: Inflight Movies (Paris – New York – London)" – 3:10 2. "Ride a White Horse" (Video) – 3:15 3. "Time Out from the World" (Fields Remix) (Audio) – 6:01 - 12-inch single 1. "Fly Me Away" (C2 Remix 1) – 7:24 2. "Fly Me Away" (C2 Remix 2) – 7:16 3. "Slide In" (DFA Remix) – 12:59 - Digital single (2019) 1. "Fly Me Away" (Single Version) — 3:37 2. "Satin Chic" (Bombay Mix by The Shortwave Set) – 4:40 3. "Fly Me Away" (C2 Rmx 4) – 7:02 4. "Fly Me Away" (Ladytron Remix) – 5:26 5. "You Never Know" (Múm Remix) – 2:59 6. "Time Out from the World" (Fields Remix) – 6:01 7. "Slide In" (DFA Remix) – 12:59 8. "Fly Me Away" (C2 Rmx 1) – 7:24 9. "Fly Me Away" (C2 Rmx 2) – 7:16 10. "Fly Me Away" (Ladytron Dub) – 5:26 11. "Fly Me Away" (The Naughty Rmx) – 6:28 ## Personnel The following people contributed to Fly Me Away: - Alison Goldfrapp – lead vocals, backing vocals, synthesizer - Nick Batt – synthesizer, programming - Will Gregory – synthesizer - Mark "Spike" Stent – mixing - Ted Jensen – mastering ## Charts
24,740,193	A Rugrats Passover	1,172,879,672	null	[ "1990s American television specials", "1990s animated television specials", "1995 American television episodes", "Cultural depictions of Moses", "Films directed by Jeff McGrath", "Passover television episodes", "Rugrats and All Grown Up! episodes", "Television episodes about Jews and Judaism", "Television series created by Paul Germain" ]	"A Rugrats Passover" is the 23rd and final episode of the third season of the American animated television series Rugrats (and the 65th episode of the series overall). It first aired on Nickelodeon in the United States on April 13, 1995. The episode follows series regulars Grandpa Boris and the babies as they become trapped in the attic on Passover; to pass the time, Boris tells the Jewish story of the Exodus. During the episode, the babies themselves reenact the story, with Tommy portraying Moses, while his cousin Angelica represents the Pharaoh of Egypt. "A Rugrats Passover" was directed by Jim Duffy, Steve Socki, and Jeff McGrath from a script by Peter Gaffney, Paul Germain, Rachel Lipman, and Jonathan Greenberg. The episode was conceived in 1992, when Germain responded to a Nickelodeon request for a Rugrats Hanukkah special by creating a Passover episode instead. The episode scored a 3.1 Nielsen Rating, making it the highest-rated show in Nickelodeon's history, and received overwhelmingly positive reviews, including from Jewish community publications. It was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award, an Annie Award, and a CableACE Award. The episode made Rugrats one of the first animated series to focus on a Jewish holiday; its success precipitated the creation of "A Rugrats Chanukah" in 1996, which also attracted critical acclaim. However, both episodes faced controversy when the Anti-Defamation League compared the artistic design of the older characters to anti-Semitic drawings from a 1930s Nazi newspaper. Despite this, in 2007, a novelization of the Passover episode was exhibited at the Sherwin Miller Museum of Jewish Art in Tulsa, Oklahoma. ## Plot As the episode opens, Tommy and Angelica Pickles and their parents are all gathering to celebrate the Passover Seder at the home of Didi's parents, Boris and Minka Kropotkin. Stu and Angelica, who are Christians, both find Passover boring, and Angelica argues why she and her parents should be at the Seder at all, especially considering Boris and Minka aren't actually related to them. Following an argument with Minka about what type of wine glasses they should use (either the glasses that belonged to Minka's mother or the ones that belonged to Boris' father), Boris storms out of the room; the two families arrive and Didi tries comforting her mom, who believes Boris has run away. Boris hasn't reappeared by the time Tommy's best friend, Chuckie Finster, and his dad, Chas, arrives to join the celebration. When the Seder begins, Angelica releases the babies due to Tommy leaving his screwdriver behind. The children set off to search for toys, eventually finding Boris in the attic. Boris explains that he felt bad about yelling at Minka, and had gone to look for her mother's wine glasses, but had become locked inside when the door closed behind him (it can't open from the inside). Angelica tests the door and inadvertently locks them all in again, thus beginning a running gag throughout the episode. Angelica tells Boris that he's not really missing anything and admits that she thinks that Passover's a dumb holiday. Boris tries convincing her otherwise by telling her and the boys the story of the Exodus, hoping to improve their understanding of Passover. As he talks, Angelica imagines herself as the Pharaoh of Egypt, who commands the Hebrew slaves (imagined as the other Rugrats and numerous other babies) to throw their newborn sons into the Nile River. One Hebrew slave defies the order by putting her infant son, Moses (imagined as Tommy), into a basket and setting the basket afloat in the river. The basket and baby are discovered by Pharaoh Angelica, who shows Moses around her palace and kingdom, and decides to make him her partner. As Boris explains that the Pharaoh was oblivious that Moses himself was actually a Hebrew, Chas enters the attic, looking for the kids, and becomes locked in with the rest of them. He sits down and listens as Boris continues: years later, Boris says, Moses stood up for an abused Hebrew slave (imagined as Chuckie) and was outed as a Hebrew. The episode then pictures Tommy as Moses fleeing to the desert, where he becomes a shepherd and forgets about Egypt and the Pharaoh, until the voice of God calls to him from a burning bush, telling him that he must free the Hebrews from slavery. Moses confronts the Pharaoh and demands that she free the Hebrews. She refuses and calls her guards (one of which is voiced by Dana Hill) to drag Moses away; he curses her kingdom with terrible plagues until she relents and allows Moses to leave with the enslaved Hebrews. As Boris is explaining how the Pharaoh deceived the Hebrews and prevented them from leaving because she said "well I changed my mind". Angelica's parents, Drew and Charlotte, then arrive and become locked in the room with the others. Boris resumes the story: the Pharaoh's treachery causes Moses to curse her once more, this time with a plague on the first-born children of Egypt. The Pharaoh, after realizing that she herself is a first-born child, bargains with Moses: he can leave if he calls off this final plague. Moses hesitates at first but complies and leads the Hebrews out of Egypt. The Pharaoh reneges on her promise after realizing that she set "all" of the Hebrews free like the slave who gets the Reptar cereal, the slave who gets the goat milk, and the slave who prepares her bath. She leads her remaining army to pursue them. Minka, Didi, and Stu arrive in the attic to find the group enthralled by the end of Boris' story: Moses, cornered, calls down the power of God to part the Red Sea, which the Hebrews are approaching. They pass through the parted waters, which then crash back together behind them, engulfing the Pharaoh and her army. Underwater, Pharaoh blames Cynthia for this mess they are in as Cynthia is snatched up by a shark. With the story over, the family gets up to finish the Seder only to see the wind blow the door shut, locking them all in. Boris decides to tell them another story. At first, Chas thinks is about how the Hebrews wandered the desert for forty years before finally reaching the Promised Land. Boris actually explains that it's actually a story about how his aunt and uncle met at Passover Seder back in Russia. ## Production The episode's inception in 1992 followed a call by Nickelodeon to the Rugrats production staff, pitching the concept of a special episode concerning Hanukkah. The crew agreed instead that a Passover special would offer both "historical interest" and a "funny idea", so Paul Germain—founder of the series along with Arlene Klasky and Gábor Csupó—pitched the Passover idea instead. Germain wrote the episode's teleplay along with regular Rugrats writers Peter Gaffney, Rachel Lipman, and Jonathan Greenberg; animators Jim Duffy, Steve Socki, and Jeff McGrath directed. While scripting the episode, now entitled "A Rugrats Passover", the writers were forced to audit many elements of the portrayal of plagues, particularly the third one, so it could still be accessible to children and not too frightening. Though regular episodes of the series comprised two separate 15-minute segments, "A Rugrats Passover" had a special 22-minute format, occupying the show's full network Rugrats slot. The show's voice actors each spent from fifteen minutes to four hours in recording sessions for the episode. ## Themes "A Rugrats Passover" was unusual among contemporary animations in its attention to Jewish ritual and tradition. Its portrayal of a Seder dinner received press attention as a rare occurrence in children's programming. The episode was also unusual among animated series for discussing the characters' religious affiliations. It revealed Boris, Minka, and Didi's adherence to Judaism, and compared it with the relative non-participation of Stu and his side of the family. Chuckie and his father Chas, meanwhile, were portrayed as nonreligious yet inclusive and enthused to learn about the customs of the holiday. As with other Rugrats episodes, "A Rugrats Passover" depicts "the innocence of a baby's perception of the world," emphasizing the young characters' intense, childlike reactions to their environment. Creator Klasky identified the episode's depiction of the Pickles family as "very loving, [and] basically functional" as strikingly different from the prevailing trends in contemporary television programming. Another episode element common to the series' broader themes is its treatment of Angelica's mother Charlotte, who throughout the episode is glued to her cell phone and engrossed in her business life, despite her professed desire to provide Angelica with an educational environment. ## Reception ### Ratings and accolades "A Rugrats Passover" was initially broadcast on Nickelodeon in the United States on April 13, 1995. Repeats of the episode began that Saturday at 7:30 p.m. The episode received a Nielsen Rating of 3.1, with a 4.8% share of American audiences, making it the sixth most-watched cable telecast that week. According to Catherine Mullally, then-Vice President and Executive Producer of Nickelodeon Video and Audio Works, the episode was the highest Nielsen-rated telecast in the network's history. However, in 1998, it was supplanted by another Rugrats special, the Thanksgiving episode "The Turkey Who Came to Dinner", which attracted 3.7 million viewers (9.4/28). The episode was nominated for a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Animated Program (for Programming Less Than One Hour), losing to The Simpsons episode "Lisa's Wedding". At the 23rd Annual Annie Awards, it was nominated for Best Individual Achievement for Writing in the Field of Animation, losing to "The Tick vs. Arthur’s Bank Account" from Fox Kids' animated series The Tick. In 1995, it was Rugrats' submission for a CableACE award, receiving a nomination but not winning. ### Home video and merchandise The episode was released in several formats, including DVD and VHS. It appears on the video release A Rugrats Passover alongside features "Toys in the Attic", and Rugrats Passover: Let My Babies Go. The cassette was reissued, alongside newer Rugrats videos Grandpa's Favorite Stories and Return of Reptar, in early 1997. In 1998, publisher Simon Spotlight released a novelization of the episode, entitled Let My Babies Go! A Passover Story, written by Sarah Wilson and illustrated by Barry Goldberg. A LaserDisc release was planned, titled "A Rugrats Chanukah/A Rugrats Passover", but was cancelled. One copy of the disc is known to exist. ### Critical response "A Rugrats Passover" received overwhelmingly positive reviews, and became one of the series' most popular episodes. John J. O'Connor of The New York Times wrote, "If not a first, it certainly is a rarity." Ted Cox of the Daily Herald called the episode "among the best holiday TV specials ever produced." Other reviews applauded the episode for its treatment of Judaism. Authors Michael Atkinson and Laurel Shifrin, in their book Flickipedia: Perfect Films for Every Occasion, Holiday, Mood, Ordeal, and Whim, praised the episode for celebrating "secular Jewishness in the wisest and most entertaining fashion [...] Grandpa Boris regales the kids with an epic, albeit abridged, Exodus story." Halley Blair of Forward Magazine called the episode "a comical primer for getting children ready for upcoming seders," and Danny Goldberg, in How the Left Lost Teen Spirit, noted that the episode's Jewish themes were "clearly expressed in the context of a mass appeal entertainment." Among many positive reviews in Jewish community publications, Gila Wertheimer of the Chicago Jewish Star said it "will entertain children of all ages – and their parents." In 2006, however, Joel Keller of AOL's TV Squad noted that he "always hated" the episode, and resented that it was one of only two Passover-themed television episodes he could find via a Google search. ### Anti-Defamation League controversy "A Rugrats Passover," along with other Rugrats episodes featuring Boris and Minka, attracted controversy when the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) claimed that the two characters resembled anti-Semitic drawings that had appeared in a 1930s Nazi newspaper. Then-Nickelodeon president Albie Hecht, himself Jewish, stated he was dumbfounded by this criticism, which he deemed absurd. The controversy resurfaced in 1998, when the ADL criticized another appearance of Boris, this time reciting the Mourner's Kaddish in a Rugrats comic strip published in newspapers during the Jewish New Year. Unlike Hecht, Nickelodeon's then-president Herb Scannell agreed with the criticism and apologized, promising never to run the character or the strip again. ### Legacy "A Rugrats Passover" is Nickelodeon's first programming involving Passover; the network went on to broadcast other episodes concerning Jewish traditions, including "Harold's Bar Mitzvah", a 1997 episode of Hey Arnold! in which the character Harold Berman prepares for his Bar Mitzvah. Rugrats in turn produced a second Jewish holiday episode, this time to meet the network executives' original Hanukkah special pitch. David N. Weiss (who had recently converted to Judaism) and J. David Stem wrote the script, and Raymie Muzquiz directed the episode. The special, entitled "A Rugrats Chanukah", was originally broadcast on December 4, 1996, and received a Nielsen rating of 7.9 in the Kids 2–11 demographic. Like "A Rugrats Passover", it was critically acclaimed and became one of the most popular episodes of the series. In 2007, the Sherwin Miller Museum of Jewish Art in Tulsa, Oklahoma opened an exhibition of Biblical images in art and pop culture, including a poster for Let My Babies Go! A Passover Story, the picture book based on "A Rugrats Passover". Other items highlighted in the gallery included a promotional poster for The Simpsons episode "Simpsons Bible Stories" and a vintage Superman comic book entitled "The Red-Headed Beatle of 1000 B.C.", featuring the character Jimmy Olsen's time-traveling adventures in the Biblical age. ## See also - Judaism in Rugrats - All Grown Up! - Rugrats Go Wild
35,321,177	Symphonic Fantasies	1,143,887,031	Concert tour of music from four Square Enix video game series	[ "2010 live albums", "Chrono (series)", "Final Fantasy music", "Kingdom Hearts", "Mana (series)", "Video game concert tours" ]	Symphonic Fantasies: Music from Square Enix was an award-winning symphonic tribute concert originally held in Cologne, Germany on September 12, 2009, at the Cologne Philharmonic Hall featuring video game music from Japanese game developer Square Enix. The concert featured symphonic movements based on the Kingdom Hearts series, Secret of Mana, the Chrono series, and the Final Fantasy series. It was produced and directed by Thomas Böcker, with arrangements provided by Finnish composer and musician Jonne Valtonen with assistance by Roger Wanamo. Due to overwhelming demand, a second concert was added at the König-Pilsener-Arena in Oberhausen, on September 11, 2009. Both performances were by the WDR Radio Orchestra Cologne and the WDR Radio Choir Cologne under conduction from Arnie Roth, with guest performers Rony Barrak and Benyamin Nuss joining the orchestra. Symphonic Fantasies was broadcast over radio on the WDR4 station and streamed live video online. In 2012, five new performances were scheduled, taking stage in Tokyo, Stockholm, and a reprise in Cologne. These performances featured slightly modified versions of the original arrangements, and like the original concerts, were sold out. Another performance was held in London in October 2016 by the London Symphony Orchestra. The original concert and the Tokyo concert both sparked the release of an album. These albums, along with the concerts themselves, were heavily praised, both for the quality of the performance and for the quality of Valtonen's arrangements, which overlaid themes from multiple pieces rather than relying on a traditional medley. ## Concerts ### Production Thomas Böcker and then WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne director Winfried Fechner began collaborating on orchestrated video game concerts in 2007, after Fechner had attended the Fifth Symphonic Game Music Concert held in Leipzig. As their ideas and plans materialized, three projects were set in motion to determine the interest of a younger audience in classical music performance and the aptitude of the WDR orchestra in focusing on a new source of compositions. The first project was PROMS: That's Sound, That's Rhythm, held in early 2008, featuring a mixture of classical works and video game music, ranging from works by Ralph Vaughan Williams and Morton Gould as well as arrangements of music from video games such as Shenmue and Castlevania previously featured in the Symphonic Game Music Concerts. The second project, held in August 2008, was a composer specific concert titled Symphonic Shades - Hülsbeck in Concert, focusing entirely on the works of German video game composer Chris Hülsbeck. After the concert, Fechner revealed in an interview the existence of the third project, saying that he and Böcker would be involved in another concert of video game music the following September. The third project was to be a concert of music from one game company, focusing on multiple titles released by the same developer. This company was later confirmed to be Square Enix when Fechner announced Symphonic Fantasies as a video game music concert to take place on September 12, 2009. A website was set up for announcements, interviews and other concert information. Böcker later explained that the decision to focus on Square Enix was made due to the large library of games to choose from, all of which he felt had a distinct sound, and many of which were very well known in Germany. An emphasis was put on balancing out the concert program and the arrangements, so that the music would appeal to first-time listeners, classical music fans, and longtime gamers. The titles chosen to be featured in the concert were Kingdom Hearts and Kingdom Hearts II from the Kingdom Hearts series, Secret of Mana, Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross from the Chrono series, and the Final Fantasy series. In order to select the pieces presented, the original composers were consulted to assemble a list of their personal favorites. The composers were Yoko Shimomura for the music of Kingdom Hearts, Hiroki Kikuta for the music of Secret of Mana, Yasunori Mitsuda for the music of Chrono Trigger and Cross, and Nobuo Uematsu for the music of the Final Fantasy series. For the concert, Jonne Valtonen returned as the lead arranger; he had previously been the arranger for video game music concerts since 2005, including Symphonic Shades. He was given complete freedom to arrange the music based on the general outline given to him by Böcker. Valtonen spent six months on the arrangements, during which Valtonen studied each song and referred to the composer's original intended expression. No Japanese guest arrangers were used for this concert in order to maintain a unique European take on the source material, but Valtonen brought in former classmate and close friend Roger Wanamo to assist on the arrangement of the music from the Chrono games. This was Wanamo's first time arranging video game music. On March 9, 2009, it was also announced that Valtonen had additionally been commissioned to compose an original fanfare to be played at the start of the concert, and with a video preview of his composition was released. The arrangements in the concert were structured as suites, dubbed "Fantasies", with multiple songs from each game series positioned and arranged together to tell melodic stories rather than using the conventional medley structure more commonly heard in video game music arrangements. The fanfare, titled Fanfare Overture, was done in a style of traditional fanfares with some accentuated textures in order to introduce all the elements of the orchestra. The Kingdom Hearts suite featured seven songs from the two titles, and was arranged as a romantic piano concerto. Secret of Mana featured six songs featured in the original game. The arrangement made use of notable unique techniques in order to replicate the atmosphere found in the original game; for example, the choir was used to create "sound effects" such as floor vibration by foot stomping and simulating distant rain with their voices. The Chrono suite featured ten songs from Chrono Trigger and Chrono Cross. The suite featured a "crossing" of melodies, in which multiple melodies would be layered on top of one another, resulting in different well-known themes performed simultaneously in harmony. The Final Fantasy suite contained eight songs from the first seven titles in the series. Unlike the other suites, it featured a simpler structure, focusing more on each individual theme rather than overlapping multiple pieces. This was due to a request by Uematsu that the arrangement remain similar to those of prior Final Fantasy concerts. ### Original performance The orchestra received about two weeks of rehearsal time prior to their performances, more than any other game concert before. The concert was originally scheduled to be performed on September 12, 2009 in the Cologne Philharmonic Hall in Cologne, but once the tickets were sold out, a second performance was added for September 11, 2009 at the König Pilsener Arena in Oberhausen. Ticket sales for the initial concert began on January 17, and half of them were sold within a week, with the remainder sold by April 2, 2009. The concert was preceded by a Meet and Greet session that included the original composers as well as the arrangement team and guest artists for the show. The concerts were performed by the WDR Symphony Orchestra Cologne and WDR Radio Choir Cologne, conducted by Arnie Roth. Before each suite, the moderator would introduce the upcoming musical piece, as well as introduce the composer in attendance. Each "Fantasy" lasted for more than 15 minutes each. The Kingdom Hearts suite featured solo pianist Benyamin Nuss. For the Chrono suite, Rony Barrak joined the orchestra and performed on his signature darbuka. A surprise encore was performed after the final suite, which took the form of a medley of the final boss themes from each game. Rony Barrak returned on stage as a soloist for the encore. No video screens or other form of tools were used during the concert, with only minimal lighting effects at certain parts for atmosphere being employed. The event was broadcast live on the WDR4 radio station, as well as through an online video stream, enabling a worldwide audience to watch the concert. It was the first fully live-streamed video game concert. ### Later performances Three years after the original performance, on September 14, 2011, during the Tokyo Game Show, Square Enix Japan announced on their website that the Symphonic Fantasies concert would be performed in Tokyo on January 7 and 8, 2012. They also announced that Benyamin Nuss, Rony Barrak, Jonne Valtonen, Roger Wanamo and Thomas Böcker would be in attendance. Böcker returned to produce the event, and Nuss and Barrak returned as soloists. The concerts were held at the Tokyo Bunka Kaikan Main Hall, and were performed by the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra and the Tokyo Philharmonic Chorus. The concerts were conducted by Eckehard Stier. In addition to the originally announced attendees, in attendance were guest of honors Hiroki Kikuta, Yoko Shimomura, and Yasunori Mitsuda, as well as guests such as video game composers Takenobu Mitsuyoshi, Yuzo Koshiro, Masashi Hamauzu, and Mahito Yokota. The concerts were featured extensively in the February issue of Famitsu as well as on their official website. Symphonic Fantasies Tokyo was the first all-European video game concert production to take place in Japan. More than 4600 fans were in attendance, and the concerts sold out within days. The arrangements and tempo were slightly modified from the original concert, and the encore was changed by Wanamo to add elements from an additional Final Fantasy song. At the conclusion of the Symphonic Odysseys concert in Cologne by Merregnon Studios on July 9, 2011, the WDR announced that Symphonic Fantasies would return to Germany in 2012. The concerts were held on July 6 and 7, 2012 at the Cologne Philharmonic Hall. The concert was again performed by the WDR Radio Orchestra Cologne and WDR Radio Choir Cologne, conducted by Niklas Wíllen. On March 26, 2012, Merregnon Studios announced that Symphonic Fantasies would also be performed at the Stockholm Concert Hall on June 9, 2012. The concert was performed by Royal Stockholm Philharmonic Orchestra and Katarina Choir, conducted by Andreas Hanson. Like the other concerts, the 2012 European concerts were sold out. Four years later, on October 6, 2016, the Symphonic Fantasies concert was performed in London at the Barbican Centre by the London Symphony Orchestra and London Symphony Chorus. Selections from the concert, along with ones from Final Symphony and Final Symphony II, were performed at Symphonic Memories concerts on June 9, 2018 in Stockholm, March 14, 2019 in Oulu, Finland, June 6, 2019 in St. Gallen, Switzerland, December 1, 2019 in Kawasaki, Japan, and April 7, 2023 in Lyon, France. The Kawasaki concert was released as an album by Square Enix as Symphonic Memories - music from Square Enix the following year. ### Set list ## Albums The September 12, 2009 concert in Cologne was recorded and released as an album titled Symphonic Fantasies. It was announced to be in production on April 15, 2010, and made available for pre-order. In an interview, Fechner stated the album was being mixed and edited at a "prestigious European studio". This was later revealed to be Abbey Road Studios in London. The album was first released in Japan on September 15, 2010, published by Square Enix Japan's own label under the auspices of Sony Music Distribution. The album was released in Europe on September 17, 2010, published by Decca Records. Both album versions feature identical track listings and production, with the only differences being the artwork and provided booklet. The artwork for the European album was designed by the German design house, schech, and features a cross between a violin and a game controller, while the Japanese cover has an image of a white book. Böcker produced the European album, and was a consultant for the production of the Japanese release. The album does not contain the encore suite, which was released as a single on iTunes on December 14, 2010. The album's five tracks have a duration of 1:12:30, with the encore track bringing it to 1:20:56. Upon release, it reach position \#13 on the German classical Media Control Charts for sales in September 2010. The Japanese release reached position \#102 on the Oricon charts and stayed on the charts for one week. After the concert in Tokyo, a second album was released. Titled Symphonic Fantasies Tokyo, the two-disc album is a recording of that performance, including the encore. The album, produced by Merregnon Studios and mixed by a team of sound engineers from Japan and Germany, was released on June 11, 2012. Its cover is a modified version of the original European album with a large red circle, and it includes a twenty-page booklet with comments from the original composers. The album's six tracks have a length of 1:20:50. A new printing of the Symphonic Fantasies Tokyo album on two CDs or three vinyl records, as well as a double album combination with the Final Symphony concert album (2015) was released by Laced Records in December 2016. The Symphonic Fantasies Tokyo album was re-released as a lossless digital album on Bandcamp for streaming and download on January 1, 2021. ## Reception The initial event received widespread critical acclaim, with much praise given to the focused presentation, deeply developed arrangements and evolution of the concept. Audun Sorlie of Original Sound Version stated that the concert "exceeded all expectations" and further added that the event was "absolutely amazing". Chris Greening of Square Enix Music Online concluded in his report that "Symphonic Fantasies ranks among the greatest musical and social experiences of my life. Each arrangement took listeners on an extended journey through the atmospheres, emotions, and melodies of their respective series." Polish site GameMusic.net's Kamil Rojek said in his report that "Symphonic Fantasies is a significant turning point in the history of video game music concerts. It was a remarkable event that made great progress in breaking the boundaries between game music and traditional classical works." The composers themselves expressed great regard for the concert and the arrangement. Yoko Shimomura noted she was extremely pleased with Valtonen's arrangement of Kingdom Hearts, feeling it "very colorful and beautiful, just superb really". Hiroki Kikuta stated that Valtonen's arrangement "defied the framework of regular orchestra and was a very experimental attempt," resulting in "free and unbound expression". Yasunori Mitsuda expressed that he was "really amazed by its fantastic quality", and Nobuo Uematsu said that it was "an exceptionally well-produced concert compared to most game concerts." Uematsu was very taken with the unique arrangements of the other sections of the concert, especially the Mana portion, that he asked Böcker to take more liberties with the source material if the opportunity arose in the future; this led to the creation of the Final Symphony concert in 2013. The composers also voiced their desire to bring the concert to Japan. The Symphonic Fantasies album garnered universal praise upon its release. Patrick Gann of RPGFan said that it was "the best game music arranged album of 2010. It may be the best in years, with the only things rivaling it being other recordings from the WDR." Audun Sorlie of Original Sound Version called it "the best symphonic game arrangement CD you can get your hands on," and further added "for every game music fan out there, especially the ones with a taste for Square Enix, this is the definitive pick for you." Chris Greening of Square Enix Music Online gave the album the score of 10 out of 10, and stated that it "offers a definitive tribute to Square Enix" and "certainly deserves a perfect score and an unconditional recommendation." Benjamin Schmädig of the German site 4players.de said of the album "Symphonic Fantasies represents memories of great emotional moments. The orchestra and choir put in all their strength, all their subtlety in these moments." He further complimented Jonne Valtonen, saying that he "knows exactly how to arrange the known motifs in such an imaginative way that they tell the familiar stories from scratch." Denis Brown of the German site OnlineWelten said that for Square Enix fans, it is an obligatory purchase. Symphonic Fantasies Tokyo was also praised upon release. Jayson Napolitano of Destructoid said that the "arrangements are brilliant and are some of the best in the business," and that the addition of the encore was an improvement over the physical version of the original album, though he felt that the sound quality "lacks some of the dynamics of the original release" in the bass regions. Joe Hammond of Square Enix Music Online found the opposite difference in the sound quality, finding that the deep drum sounds had more impact than in the first album. Stephen Meyerink of RPGFan felt that "the production and mastering on the album is stellar", and was pleased by the modifications to the arrangements between the original concert and the Tokyo concert, especially the slight increase in tempo. Audun Sorlie of Original Sound Version also praised the changes, not only in the tempo but also in the arrangements, noting the more integrated piano in the Kingdom Hearts suite and the more impressive brass section in the opening fanfare. He also noted that, unlike the original performance and album, the recording of live audience did not include any laughter when the chocobo theme interrupted "One Winged Angel" in the Final Fantasy'' suite. He concluded that the album was worth purchasing even for owners of the first album.
4,571,247	The CIA and September 11	1,142,374,557	2003 book by Andreas von Bülow	[ "2003 non-fiction books", "9/11 conspiracy theories", "Books about George W. Bush", "Books about the September 11 attacks", "German non-fiction books", "Non-fiction books about the Central Intelligence Agency" ]	The CIA and September 11 (German: Die CIA und der 11. September) is a controversial 2003 non-fiction book by Andreas von Bülow, a former state-secretary in the German Federal Ministry of Defence and a Social Democratic member of the Bundestag from 1969 to 1994. The book disputes al-Qaeda's responsibility for the September 11 attacks and suggests that it may have instead been a false flag operation arranged by the U.S. federal government and Israel. The book has enjoyed considerable commercial success in Germany, where it is published by Piper Verlag, and has sold over 100,000 copies. However, it has faced allegations ranging from absurdity and fostering anti-Americanism, to anti-Semitism, while the quality of its sourcing and the timing of its publication have given rise to debate within the German publishing industry. In subsequent media appearances, Bülow has defended his work, and strongly denied that its content is anti-Semitic. ## Synopsis The book suggests that the September 11 attacks were self-inflicted: a covert operation aimed at influencing domestic opinion and to persuade Americans to support the invasions of Afghanistan and of Iraq. It is written in a speculative style, laden with terms such as "could", "might", "maybe" and "if", and does not directly accuse the Central Intelligence Agency of direct responsibility for the attacks. It does, however, attempt to demolish the "conventional" account of the 9/11 attacks, and while it does not build up a substantive account to replace it, it leaves insinuations and rumours to suggest possibilities. For instance, while it is argued that such well-organized attacks could only occur with "the support of the intelligence agencies", the exact details of that support are left unspecified. The book suggests that no plane crashed into The Pentagon and none in Pennsylvania on 9/11, and that the alleged mobile phone calls on United Airlines Flight 93 were not real. It states that the theory of the Arab hijackers was created by the CIA, and that these Arabs may not even have been aware that the planes were going to crash. Seven of the alleged hijackers are claimed in the book to have been found alive and well after the attacks. The book explores the possibility that the various aircraft could have been remote-controlled. It cites observations in support of the theory that the collapse of the World Trade Center might have been due to explosives. Von Bülow does not believe that Osama bin Laden and al-Qaeda are responsible for the 9/11 attacks. ## Publication The book caused a storm at the 2003 Frankfurt Book Fair, together with a number of other German books on the "real story" behind the 9/11 attacks, following the success of Thierry Meyssan's 9/11: The Big Lie in France. Other best-selling books included Mathias Bröckers's Conspiracies, Conspiracy Theories and the Secrets of September 11th and Gerhard Wisnewski's Operation 9/11 (), but The CIA and September 11 became the best known. The 271 page book has had a vast print run in Germany, with more than 100,000 copies being sold, and became a number three best-seller on the Der Spiegel non-fiction chart. Piper Verlag is considered a reputable publisher. The editor of Piper Verlag, Klaus Stadler, contended in an interview with Deutsche Welle that: > We told ourselves that we would take it seriously, but we do not feel obligated to independently check each and every detail ... And my own personal position is that Mr. von Bülow poses a number of very interesting and important questions. The answers to these questions should be weighed by responsible readers, who should take time to consider them. We don't want to patronize people. However, Deutsche Welle found other industry observers who credited an increasingly competitive German publishing market with persuading companies to take on books they previously might not have accepted. A representative from the Börsenblatt bookstore also suggested that in the past, companies would at least have waited longer before releasing such a sensitive book. The release coincided with widespread skepticism among the German public about the honesty and motivation of the George W. Bush administration, to the extent that a Forsa survey published in Die Zeit in July 2003 found that nineteen percent of Germans (rising to thirty one percent among under 30s) believed that elements within the United States government were behind the 9/11 attacks. This provided fertile ground for The CIA and September 11, which sold strongly: von Bülow eclipsed the sales of writers who clung to a "conventional" interpretation of the 9/11 attacks, such as the intelligence expert Oliver Schrom. ## Response The work has been described as supporting or fostering anti-Americanism. However, in an interview with The Daily Telegraph, von Bülow denied that his book was contributing to anti-American sentiment in Germany: > I'm not in the least anti-American ... I'm just part of a growing momentum against Bush and his chess power-politics. I feel sorry for those who are being sucked in by his ideas. The book has also been attacked for the quality of its journalism and research. The author admitted that much of the material came from the Internet and discharged the burden of proof by claiming that it was for the American government to refute the allegations rather than for him to prove them. This produced anger among authors using more conventional journalistic methods: "The line in the sand is when respectable media and publishers start serving up fiction as truth," was the response of Oliver Schrom (whose study of the 9/11 attacks pointed the finger at intelligence failures, rather than a more spectacular claim of CIA complicity). The CIA and September 11 was one of the subjects of a cover story in Der Spiegel in September 2003, along with Gerhard Wisnewski's WDR documentary Aktenzeichen 11.9. ungelöst and the books Conspiracies, Conspiracy Theories and the Secrets of September 11th (Bröckers) and Operation 9/11 (Wisnewski). The article, entitled "Panoply of the Absurd", sharply criticizes von Bülow's reliance on Internet research, in particular that he had used archived but inaccurate stories that had been written in the confusion of the immediate aftermath of the attacks and then dropped. An example of this is the assertion that at least six of the suspected hijackers named in the aftermath of the attacks turned up alive, the so-called "zombie hijackers" claim. Der Spiegel offers an explanation for this apparent mystery: BBC News used as a source the Arab News, an English-language Saudi newspaper, which in turn had compiled reports from Arabic newspapers, of people who obviously had nothing to do with the attacks but happened to share the same names with some of the suspected hijackers. No photographs of the suspected hijackers had been released at this point in time, and thus a few cases of mistaken identity occurred. In one instance, a man with the name of Said al-Ghamdi had given an interview to Asharq Al-Awsat newspaper in Tunis, outraged that he had been portrayed by CNN as one of the hijackers. CNN had broadcast his photograph after doing research on their own and finding a Saudi "Said al-Ghamdi" who had received flight training in the United States. CNN had found the wrong suspect, which only became clear once the FBI officially released the photographs of the suspected hijackers. The Spiegel article accuses von Bülow of accepting without due scrutiny any fragment or urban legend that fits his suspicions of foul play, and describes him as a "dreamer". However, in his analysis of von Bülow's book and the response to it in Germany, Stefan Theil has contended that Der Spiegel is, itself, not unknown to publish speculative or conspiratorial theories, and suggests that the surprisingly strenuous article had deeper motivations than high feelings over journalistic quality. He speculates that the fact that Germans who claimed to believe that George W. Bush masterminded 9/11 were not actually demonstrating in the streets was a sign that they simply regarded the conspiracy theorist literature as "political entertainment". With American difficulties in Iraq intensifying, and the possibility of Europe becoming dragged in, politicians and journalists alike were being forced to turn away from the escapism the plots offered. ## Allegations of anti-Semitism Der Spiegel followed up several claims in an interview with the author. One of the claims in the book is that only one Israeli citizen died in the WTC attack (this was reported in the New York Times on September 22, 2001, but the Israeli Consulate later asserted that seven Israelis were among the dead in the WTC), and that "a number of indications" exist "that point to some sort of connection between the Israeli Mossad and the act and perpetrators of 9/11." However, when interviewed by the magazine about the claim that 4,000 Jewish employees did not attend work at the WTC on the day of the attacks, he avoided concrete statements ("They didn't know about it. They had an idea"), an approach the magazine described as "convoluted". It concludes that his allegations were little more than "whispers in the dark", fueled by conspiracy myths circulating on the Internet. Mentions of the theory that Jews stayed away from the WTC on 9/11, and the idea of Mossad involvement in or foreknowledge of the attacks, has led to claims that the book feeds the "new anti-Semitism". A report by the American Jewish Committee accused the book, along with other so-called 9/11 conspiracy literature of 2003, of perpetuating myths and stereotyping Jews as criminal and conspiratorial. The Anti-Defamation League has found evidence of Bülow being cited by anti-Semitic publications and websites keen to link Mossad to the 9/11 attacks. In a prominently placed TV interview ("Menschen bei Maischberger" - ARD, 9.9.2003), Andreas von Bülow said it was a "Medienmasche" (media scam) to accuse him of anti-Semitism. He denied that he ever said or believed anything about "Jews" being warned of the attacks (one of the urban legends). He said such claims were nonsense. He confirmed, however, that in his opinion a number of indications exist which point to some sort of connection between the Israeli Mossad and the act and perpetrators of 9/11. ## Editions - Die CIA und der 11. September. Internationaler Terror und die Rolle der Geheimdienste. Piper Verlag GmbH, München 2003, and 2004, ## See also - Bin Laden Issue Station - The CIA'S tracking unit, 1996-2005 - Hijackers in the September 11 attacks - 9/11 Truth movement - 9/11 conspiracy theories
42,238,234	The Lion and the Rose	1,171,285,367	null	[ "2014 American television episodes", "Fiction about regicide", "Game of Thrones (season 4) episodes", "Poisoning in fiction", "Television episodes about murder", "Television episodes about weddings", "Television episodes directed by Alex Graves", "Television episodes written by George R. R. Martin" ]	"The Lion and the Rose" is the second episode of the fourth season of HBO's fantasy television series Game of Thrones, and the 32nd overall. The episode was written by George R. R. Martin, the author of the A Song of Ice and Fire novels from which the series is adapted, and directed by Alex Graves. It aired on April 13, 2014. The episode focuses principally on the long-awaited royal wedding between Joffrey Baratheon and Margaery Tyrell. It ends with Joffrey's death after drinking poisoned wine at the reception, a plot development that despite being in the books came as a shock to viewers since it abruptly killed the show's principal villain just a few episodes after the Red Wedding had violently killed off several of the show's protagonists. Other storylines include House Bolton's quest to retake the North, and Bran's continued journey north of The Wall. The title refers to the sigils of the wedding couple's respective houses – a lion for Joffrey Baratheon, who is in truth an illegitimate bastard, and a rose for Margaery Tyrell. Unlike Martin's previous three episodes, his draft of the screenplay has some major differences from the episode as produced, with more minor characters and detail at the wedding feast. Most significantly, it sets up some plotlines from the books that the series would ultimately not use, such as Ramsay marrying an impostor woman posing as Arya instead of Sansa. It would have also resolved the unanswered question from the show's first season of who had been behind the attempted assassination of Bran Stark by implying more strongly than the books did that it was Joffrey, rather than Littlefinger as the series would suggest several seasons later. "The Lion and the Rose" received critical acclaim, and was declared one of the best episodes of the series. It received five Emmy Award nominations, including Outstanding Cinematography for a Single-Camera Series, Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series for Lena Headey and Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series for Diana Rigg, winning the award for Outstanding Costumes for a Series. Martin received a Writers Guild of America Award nomination for Television: Episodic Drama. ## Plot ### At the Dreadfort Ramsay hunts a woman with the assistance of his servant, Reek (formerly Theon), his bedwarmer Myranda, and his hounds. Roose and his wife, Walda, arrive at the Dreadfort. Roose, having intended to trade Theon to the Ironborn for Moat Cailin, is unable to do so and castigates Ramsay for torturing Theon. Ramsay demonstrates his brainwashing of Reek by being shaved by him while Ramsay coaxes out the true story about what happened to Bran and Rickon Stark. Roose orders Locke to eliminate the Stark boys, who pose a threat to his new position as Warden of the North. Ramsay suggests that they also kill Jon. Roose dispatches Locke to Castle Black, and orders Ramsay to retake Moat Cailin, hinting Ramsay may be legitimized if successful. ### Beyond the Wall After stopping at a weirwood, Bran has strange visions, including the same one of a ruined and snowbound Red Keep that Daenerys had in the House of the Undying, a dragon above King's Landing, a large weirwood further North, and a voice telling him to go there. He tells his companions he knows where they must go. ### At Dragonstone Melisandre orders several men burned at the stake, including Selyse's brother Ser Axell Florent, as a tribute to the Lord of Light. Melisandre speaks with Shireen about her faith. ### In King's Landing Tyrion encourages Jaime to train his left hand with Bronn. Varys tells Tyrion that Cersei knows about Shae. After overhearing Cersei and Tywin discussing Shae, Tyrion orders Bronn to escort Shae to the boat to sail for Essos, but she refuses to leave until Tyrion calls her a whore. Joffrey and Margaery are married at the Sept of Baelor, and the court returns to the Red Keep for the wedding feast. Jaime tells Loras that if he weds Cersei she would kill him in his sleep; Loras retorts with a remark about their incest. Cersei accuses Brienne of being in love with Jaime. Oberyn and his paramour, Ellaria Sand, trade thinly veiled insults with Cersei and Tywin. Joffrey presents a crude play with dwarves depicting the War of the Five Kings and suggests that Tyrion participate. Embarrassed by Tyrion's witty response, Joffrey belittles Tyrion into being his cupbearer. Margaery defuses the tension, but then Joffrey begins choking. During the commotion, Dontos tells Sansa to flee with him. As he dies, Joffrey points accusingly at Tyrion and a grief-stricken Cersei orders him arrested for poisoning the king. ## Production ### Writing The episode was written by George R. R. Martin, author of the A Song of Ice and Fire novels. Chapters adapted from A Storm of Swords to the episode were part of chapter 9 (Bran I), and chapters 59 and 60 (Sansa IV and Tyrion VIII). #### Original draft In 2018, Vanity Fair writer Joanna Robinson compared the episode as aired with an early draft by Martin archived at the Writers Guild of America library in Los Angeles. Unlike the two previous episodes he had written, this draft had significant differences from the produced version. Robinson considers it the moment the show began to diverge considerably from the books, whose plotlines it had begun to outpace, and believes this may be why Martin wrote no more for the series. The most significant difference involved who had masterminded the attempted assassination of Bran Stark in season 1, precipitating the War of the Five Kings that dominated the next two seasons. In Martin's script, after Joffrey is presented with the Valyrian steel sword, reforged from that of the executed Ned Stark's Ice, as a wedding gift by his father, he says "I am no stranger to Valyrian steel." This remark prompts Tyrion Lannister, who was framed for the assassination attempt, to realize that Joffrey was actually behind it (as the books heavily imply); Tyrion then makes remarks to Joffrey, and later Sansa, insinuating that he knows this. Scenes that built on this disclosure remained in the final script. Had they made it to screen, they would have illuminated Joffrey's antagonism toward his uncle the morning of the wedding and more credibly implicated Tyrion as a suspect in the king's poisoning. Tyrion in Martin's draft is straightforward with Shae when he implores her to leave the city, pointing out that Ros, the last prostitute his family discovered in relation to him, was captured and murdered. Both are violent, with Tyrion slapping Shae to underline his point and she drawing a dagger to fend him off. In Martin's draft, Bran's first vision is more extensive. While it does not include the Night King's first appearance onscreen as it does in the series, it would have been an extensive montage of scenes from the past, present and possible future in the series. Flashbacks would have included scenes of Ned cleaning Ice beneath a weirwood tree from the show's original pilot, Bran's uncle Benjen and Lyanna Stark as children (later shown in a more extensive flashback in season 6), King Aerys watching and laughing as Ned's father and brother are burned and Jaime and Cersei embracing in the old keep at Winterfell just before Bran discovered them. Scenes reflecting the show's present included Jon with Ghost, a bloodied Robb surrounded by the Red Wedding dead, and Arya holding her sword Needle as her face blurs and changes. Possible future images include a dragon's shadow passing over King's Landing, "hints of strange small children with very dark eyes" and a group of four distinctive northern hills behind a very large weirwood. The episode would also have set up some of the plotlines from the books that were not used in the later seasons of the series. Roose Bolton tells Ramsay that he has arranged for him to marry Arya as a way of consolidating the family's hold on the North; a role assigned to Sansa instead in the next season. Several lines were also intended to set up Jaime's trip to the Riverlands, which in the books immediately follows Joffrey's wedding but in the series was largely replaced by Jamie and Bronn's expedition to Dorne to bring Myrcella back to King's Landing. The two characters who take that trip instead in the books, along with many other minor characters from the wedding scenes, were in Martin's draft but eliminated from the produced version as showrunners David Benioff and D. B. Weiss were beginning to focus on the more established characters in the later seasons. Robinson believes a note by Martin in the script suggests a different resolution to Ramsay's plot arc in the books, where he is still alive and in power at Winterfell at the end of A Dance with Dragons, in contrast to his death at the end of the sixth season of Game of Thrones. Martin's note told the showrunners that Ramsay's dogs would eventually battle the Stark children's direwolves, so the show should emphasize the former as much as possible to build audience anticipation. However, that never happened onscreen, where all but two of the wolves are dead as of the end of season 7, and seems unlikely in the books. Robinson believes this indicates that Ramsay will have a very different plot arc in the series' two final books. Lesser differences include a more protracted, bloodier death scene for Joffrey as the poison drives him to slash his own face, a more lavish feast, and Theon's appearance as Reek following Ramsay's extensive torture more closely resembling that described in the books, complete with whitened hair and missing fingers, something that would have required more extensive special effects for the remainder of the series, as well as speaking in rhyme. Similarly, the burning of the heretics on the beach at Dragonstone would have demonstrated the power of the Lord of Light, with the bonfires suddenly changing to different colors and apparitions of the now-forgiven dead seen briefly above; the scene would have also foreshadowed Shireen's sacrifice by the same method the next season. The scene where Varys warns Tyrion that Cersei has told Tywin about Shae, a short conversation on a garden path in the finished episode, instead takes place at more length in the Red Keep's dungeons, with Varys dressed as "a denizen of the dungeons" in armor, carrying a whip and wearing a false beard. Martin also wrote that some of the scenes should be shot from an individual character's point of view, much as most of his book chapters are written from the point of view of the character they take their name from. While he admitted that it had been difficult to bring that aspect of his story to the screen, he nevertheless attempted it here, calling for the scene where Ramsay and Myranda chase the woman to her death at the hands of his hounds to be seen from the woman's point of view as she runs and then falls to the ground, then from Theon's as he looks on defeated. The producers did, however, shoot scenes from the point of view of Bran's direwolf Summer, which Robinson notes saved them money since the animals have been expensive to shoot scenes with. ### Casting The episode has the introduction of new recurring cast members Roger Ashton-Griffiths as Mace Tyrell, the Lord of Highgarden, and Elisabeth Webster as Walda Frey, Roose Bolton's new bride. Young actor Dean-Charles Chapman takes over the role of Tommen Baratheon as of this episode. In a cameo appearance, the Icelandic band Sigur Rós performed their rendition of "The Rains of Castamere" at King Joffrey's wedding, and again during the credits. Bryan Cogman, a regular screenwriter for the show, made an uncredited cameo in the episode as a Dragonstone waiter. With this episode, Iwan Rheon (Ramsay Snow) is promoted to series regular. ## Reception ### Ratings "The Lion and the Rose" was watched by an estimated 6.31 million people during its first hour. In the United Kingdom, the episode was viewed by 1.651 million viewers, making it the highest-rated broadcast that week. It also received 0.095 million timeshift viewers. ### Critical reception The episode received unanimous critical acclaim; according to Rotten Tomatoes all 35 reviews aggregated by the website were positive, with an average score of 9.5 out of 10. James Poniewozik at Time called it the best episode of the series, singling out the protracted wedding sequence for particular praise. Writing for The A.V. Club, Emily VanDerWerff gave the episode an "A" grade, calling it "one of the best episodes of this show, and Joffrey’s wedding is one of the best sequences in the whole series." VanDerWerff praised Martin's script as well as the directing by Alex Graves, which she said "smartly creates a real sense of tension throughout the sequence, even when nothing particularly dramatic is going on." In his review for IGN, Matt Fowler gave the episode a 9.4/10 and noted that it "featured a shocking death that was actually an immense crowd-pleaser." TVLine named Jack Gleeson the "Performer of the Week" for his performance in this episode. James Hibberd of Entertainment Weekly named it the third best television episode of 2014. #### Awards and nominations
29,494,794	New Don Pedro Dam	1,147,131,108	Dam in California	[ "1971 establishments in California", "Buildings and structures in Tuolumne County, California", "Dams completed in 1971", "Dams in California", "Dams on the Tuolumne River", "Embankment dams", "Energy infrastructure completed in 1971", "Hydroelectric power plants in California", "United States local public utility dams" ]	New Don Pedro Dam, often known simply as Don Pedro Dam, is an earthen embankment dam across the Tuolumne River, about 2 miles (3.2 km) northeast of La Grange, in Tuolumne County, California. The dam was completed in 1971, after four years of construction, to replace the 1924 concrete-arch Don Pedro Dam. The dam serves mainly for irrigation water storage, flood control and hydroelectricity production, and impounds Don Pedro Reservoir in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada. The New Don Pedro Dam is owned and operated by the Modesto Irrigation District (MID) and Turlock Irrigation District (TID). At 585 feet (178 m) tall, the dam is the tenth highest in the U.S. and its reservoir is the sixth largest artificial lake in California. The original dam was named for the old mining town of Don Pedros Bar on the Tuolumne River, which in turn takes its name from prospector Pierre "Don Pedro" Sainsevain. ## Background Shortly after their formation in 1887, the MID and TID acquired water rights to the Tuolumne River to secure a water supply for their combined 1,000-square-mile (2,600 km<sup>2</sup>) service area in the San Joaquin Valley. After selling revenue bonds totaling \$4.1 million, the two irrigation districts began construction of the Don Pedro Dam (now known as Old Don Pedro Dam) in 1921, about one and a half miles (2.4 km) upriver of the present location of New Don Pedro Dam. Upon its completion in 1923, this 284-foot (87 m) concrete gravity arch dam was the highest dam in the world, forming a 289,000-acre-foot (0.356 km<sup>3</sup>) reservoir with a surface area of 3,086 acres (1,249 ha). The dam's 15 megawatt (MW) hydroelectric plant, later expanded to 37.5 MW, delivered its first power in October 1923. Expanding Don Pedro or constructing a new dam altogether was first seriously considered in the 1940s because the existing dam could only store a year's supply of water for valley farmers, with no guarantee that a multiyear drought could be weathered. An enlarged Don Pedro would provide a "bank" of water storage for prolonged droughts, capture more spring runoff, and provide increased flood control. Another proponent of a high dam was the city of San Francisco, which also sought a share of the Tuolumne's water and decided to cooperate with the irrigation districts to construct the new dam. The U.S. Bureau of Reclamation made tentative studies for a high dam on the Tuolumne River as part of its Central Valley Project, though it later dropped the plans in favor of other sites. ## Construction In 1961, an overwhelming majority of voters in the TID and MID service areas and San Francisco approved bond issues to finance the construction of a new dam. The irrigation districts hoped to complete the dam by 1966, but concerns that the dam would further impact decreasing populations of king salmon in the Tuolumne put a temporary stop to the project. In fact, it was not until that year that the Federal Power Commission (now Federal Energy Regulatory Commission) licensed the irrigation districts to go ahead on New Don Pedro. The \$49.7 million primary construction contract for the dam was awarded to Guy F. Atkinson Company on August 22, 1967. When he first saw the dam site, chief engineer John Goodier was reported to have said "[it'd be a] tough nut to crack". Clearing the dam site began immediately afterwards, in addition to the construction of access roads and a camp for construction workers. Construction of the dam's service spillway began a week later on August 29. On September 22, 1967, work began on the diversion tunnel that would allow the river to bypass the construction site. The 3,415-foot (1,041 m) tunnel was fully excavated by March 13 of the following year and lined with reinforced concrete by August. On September 7, a 40-foot (12 m) cofferdam was constructed and the diversion tunnel began to carry the flow of the Tuolumne. As the dam site dried out, the foundations were excavated down to bedrock; cracks in the rock were injected with so-called "dental concrete" to stabilize the foundation. Construction of the embankment began on September 16, 1968 using the hydraulic fill method. The dam's massive concrete emergency spillway was completed on January 19, 1969. However, severe flooding on January 26 destroyed the cofferdam and all of the construction site's bridges, putting work a month behind schedule. Cleanup proceeded at a rapid pace and placing of impervious material for the dam's core commenced on February 27. For the next fifteen months, a fleet of massive 125-ton (113 t) dump trucks delivered an almost constant stream of dirt and rock to the site, and the dam wall rose at an average rate of one and a half feet (0.46 m) per day. The workforce peaked at 500 men in mid-1969 and on December 10, the service spillway was completed. On May 28, 1970, the embankment was finally topped out with the last of over 250,000 truckloads of material. After the clearing of over 7,000 acres (2,800 ha) of the future reservoir site and the relocation of several roads that ran through it, the diversion tunnel was closed and water began to rise behind New Don Pedro. The rising lake submerged Old Don Pedro Dam on April 12, 1970 and inundated the Gold Rush town of Jacksonville by June. The powerhouse and penstocks were completed by August 1970, after lengthy delays and setbacks due to the sheer scale of the generators, pipes and gates used in their construction. Some of the individual components were so heavy that a truck delivering one of the penstock sections sank up to its trailer bed in the road, and another was crushed when the driver braked, inadvertently snapping the chains that held the load in place. The total cost of the New Don Pedro Dam project, including site preparations, reservoir clearing and road relocations, was \$115,679,000. The dam was formally dedicated on May 22, 1971 to a crowd of over 3,000 people. Among the dedication ceremonies were a speech by San Francisco mayor Joseph Alioto and a beef barbecue hosted by TID. ## Design and usage Rising 585 feet (178 m) above its foundations and 560 feet (170 m) above the Tuolumne River, New Don Pedro is a massive earth and rock fill structure containing 16,750,000 cubic yards (12,810,000 m<sup>3</sup>) of material. The 1,900-foot (580 m) long dam is 40 feet (12 m) wide at the crest and over 2,800 feet (850 m) wide at the base. High water releases are controlled by four sets of gates. A set of internal gates in the diversion tunnel can release up to 7,370 cubic feet per second (209 m<sup>3</sup>/s), while a hollow jet valve at the base of the dam can discharge 3,100 cubic feet per second (88 m<sup>3</sup>/s). The service spillway, controlled by three 45-by-30-foot (13.7 m × 9.1 m) radial gates, has a capacity of 172,000 cubic feet per second (4,900 m<sup>3</sup>/s), and finally the emergency spillway, a 995-foot (303 m) long concrete overflow structure, can discharge more than 300,000 cubic feet per second (8,500 m<sup>3</sup>/s). The hydroelectric plant at the base of the dam has four generators capable of producing 203 MW combined. The TID's share is 139 MW or 68.47%, while MID receives 64 MW or 31.53%. Three generators, each with a capacity of 55 MW, were included in the original design of the dam while an additional 38 MW generator was incorporated in 1989. The plant generates an average of 618.4 million kilowatt hours (KWh) of electricity each year, equal to an average output of 70.6 MW. The cities of Modesto and Turlock receive a large share of their power supplies from New Don Pedro Dam. Don Pedro Reservoir has a capacity of 2,030,000 acre-feet (2.50 km<sup>3</sup>), of which 340,000 acre-feet (0.42 km<sup>3</sup>) is reserved for flood control and 1,381,000 acre-feet (1.703 km<sup>3</sup>) is available for irrigation, municipal water supply, and hydroelectric generation. The flood control reservation is one of the smallest among major California reservoirs because it allows for more water to be stored for power generation, but this has often resulted in inadequate flood protection such as in 1997 when the dam released more than 50,000 cubic feet per second (1,400 m<sup>3</sup>/s) – almost six times the capacity of downstream levees. The bottom 309,000 acre-feet (0.381 km<sup>3</sup>) is considered dead storage, or the lowest point at which water can be released to generate power. At an elevation of 804 feet (245 m) (service spillway crest), the reservoir is 25 miles (40 km) long, and has an area of 12,960 acres (5,240 ha) with 160 miles (260 km) of shoreline. The maximum elevation of the reservoir at the crest of the emergency spillway is 830 feet (250 m) above sea level. During construction of the dam, it was anticipated that the large size and scenic location of the reservoir, coupled with its proximity to urban centers, would make it a large tourist draw. A \$40,000 plan was put forth to develop the reservoir for recreational activities. This entailed the construction of campsites, picnic areas, boat ramps, a landing strip, and hiking trails, including on 14 of the 33 islands in the lake. Don Pedro has become a popular summer destination in Central California, attracting 360,000–400,000 visitors each year. ## Future development In 1923, the same year that Old Don Pedro was completed, the City of San Francisco finished construction of O'Shaughnessy Dam, which forms a reservoir in the upper Tuolumne River's Hetch Hetchy Valley and is the focus of one of the most longstanding environmental controversies in United States history. Proponents of the dam's removal, including former Sierra Club president David Brower, suggest raising New Don Pedro Dam to replace the storage that would be lost with the draining of Hetch Hetchy. Increasing the height of New Don Pedro by just 20 feet (6.1 m) would add about 360,000 acre-feet (0.44 km<sup>3</sup>) to the reservoir's storage capacity, replacing most of the storage in Hetch Hetchy, though new tunnels would have to be built to deliver water from Don Pedro Reservoir to the Hetch Hetchy Aqueduct and there would be a net loss of hydroelectric generation from O'Shaughnessy. Of note is that San Francisco is already entitled to 453,000 acre-feet (0.559 km<sup>3</sup>) of the water stored in Don Pedro, although this allocation is overruled by the senior water rights of the irrigation districts during dry years. TID is currently investigating the feasibility of constructing a large pumped-storage hydroelectric plant on Lake Don Pedro in order to better meet peaking power demands without releasing extra water at New Don Pedro Dam. The proposed Red Mountain Bar Project would involve building a 465-foot (142 m) high dam across a canyon adjacent to Lake Don Pedro, creating a reservoir with a capacity of 25,000 to 42,000 acre-feet (0.031 to 0.052 km<sup>3</sup>). Water would be pumped into this new reservoir using power generated at New Don Pedro Dam during periods of low electricity demand, while during high demand water would be released through a penstock to an 880 MW generating facility. As of September 2011, poor economic conditions had put the project "on hold indefinitely". ## See also - La Grange Dam - List of dams and reservoirs in California - List of largest reservoirs of California - List of power stations in California - List of the tallest dams in the United States - Raker Act
7,767,692	Norma Paulus	1,128,208,011	American politician	[ "1933 births", "2019 deaths", "20th-century American lawyers", "20th-century American women", "21st-century American women", "American women educators", "Deaths from dementia in Oregon", "Deaths from vascular dementia", "Educators from Nebraska", "Educators from Oregon", "Lions Clubs International", "Oregon Superintendents of Public Instruction", "Oregon lawyers", "People from Burns, Oregon", "People from Nance County, Nebraska", "Republican Party members of the Oregon House of Representatives", "Secretaries of State of Oregon", "Willamette University College of Law alumni", "Women state legislators in Oregon" ]	Norma Jean Paulus (née Petersen; March 13, 1933 – February 28, 2019) was an American lawyer and politician in the state of Oregon. A native of Nebraska, she was raised in Eastern Oregon before becoming a lawyer. A Republican, she first held political office as a representative in the Oregon House of Representatives, and then became the first woman elected to statewide public office in Oregon when she became Oregon Secretary of State in 1977. Paulus later served as Oregon Superintendent of Public Instruction for nine years. She made unsuccessful bids to become Governor of Oregon and United States Senator. Prior to her death on February 28, 2019, Paulus lived in Portland, where she was involved with several non-profit groups and sponsored a ballot measure to create open primaries in Oregon's statewide elections. ## Early life Norma Jean Petersen was born in Belgrade, Nebraska, on March 13, 1933. She was raised as one of seven children in Eastern Oregon, where she graduated from Burns Union High School in Burns, in 1950. Paulus started her career as the secretary for the district attorney for Harney County in Burns, Oregon. After recovering from poliomyelitis, she moved to Salem, Oregon (the state's capital), and worked as a legal secretary, including working for Oregon Supreme Court Chief Justices Earl C. Latourette and William M. McAllister. Latourette recommended Paulus to attend law school, which she did at Willamette University without a college degree, enrolling in 1956. While in law school, she met her future husband William G. Paulus. Norma Paulus graduated with honors from Willamette University College of Law in Salem with a LL.B. in 1962. Following law school Paulus worked in private practice until entering politics. ## Political career Paulus began her political career by winning election to the Oregon House of Representatives in 1970. Elected as a Republican, she represented Salem and Marion County in District 11. She won re-election in 1972 and 1974 to additional two-year terms in the House with her district changing to District 31, serving through the 1975 special legislative session. Paulus was then elected as Oregon's first female Secretary of State in 1976, the first time a woman won election to a statewide office in Oregon. She took office on January 3, 1977, and served through January 7, 1985, after winning re-election to a second four-year term in 1980. Paulus kept a small statue of a lion on a desk in her downtown Portland home that was given to her in October 1981 by the northeast Portland Lions Club when she was inducted as the group's first female member. The next day, Paulus was visited in her office at the Oregon Capitol by the president of the statewide Oregon Lions Club. He had come to ask Paulus to return the Portland club's gift. He did not think the statue – or membership into the club – should have been given to a woman. Paulus was a founding member of the Oregon Women's Political Caucus, a bipartisan group of Oregon legislators in 1972. She was instrumental in efforts to pass an Equal Rights Amendment in Oregon in 1973 and 1977. Also, in 1972, she was invited to be part of the Eagleton Institute of Politics' first conference on women in politics. A decade later, while serving as Secretary of State, she was a principal speaker at the Institute's 1982 conference. Paulus remarked in her speech that "We have come a long way" referring to women in politics. In 1984, followers of the Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh bused homeless people to Wasco County in an attempt to sway local elections. As Secretary of State, Paulus recommended the county institute emergency procedures to restrict these transients from registering to vote, which the Rajneeshees challenged in federal court. At that time Oregon allowed citizens to register to vote on the same day as an election. Then federal district judge Edward Leavy ruled against the Rajneeshees, determining the emergency procedures were proper. The religious sect later faced government investigations over immigration fraud, a related failed murder plot, and the first bioterrorist attack in the United States. Following her two terms as the Secretary of State, Paulus ran for governor in 1986. She won the Republican primary in May, but lost to Democrat Neil Goldschmidt in the November election. While campaigning for the office she had been a critic of the new MAX Light Rail that opened that year. During this period, Paulus was appointed by President Ronald Reagan to help oversee the 1986 Philippine presidential elections. In 1987, she was appointed as one of two Oregon members of the Northwest Power and Conservation Council. While on the council, she was a supporter of regional fish habitat protection. She resigned her position on the Council in late 1989 to run for Oregon Superintendent of Public Instruction after the retirement of Verne Duncan. Goldschmidt later appointed her as the Superintendent of Public Instruction on October 1, 1990. Paulus won election to a full four-year term in that office later in the year, and was re-elected in 1994. Paulus then ran for the United States Senate in the December 5, 1995, special primary election. The election was for the nominations to replace Bob Packwood who resigned. Paulus lost to Gordon H. Smith in the Republican primary. Smith then lost to Ron Wyden in the general election before he was elected later in 1996 to fill the vacancy left when Mark Hatfield retired. As state superintendent, Paulus helped introduce statewide assessment testing for grades 3, 5, 8, and 11 in 1991. Other education reforms introduced that year were the Certificate of Initial Mastery (CIM) and Certificate of Advanced Mastery (CAM) that were designed to replace the high school diploma in Oregon. These were optional programs which were part of a broader program that included issuing a report card outlining the progress as a state, as required by a law the state legislature passed in 1991. Paulus also supported school-to-work initiatives for reforming public education while in office, which were part of the 1991 reforms. At the time Paulus was one of only ten women in the nation to hold the top education position in their state. She left the office on January 4, 1999, after two terms. In 2007, the Oregon Legislature eliminated the optional certificates from schools in the state. ## Later life and family Norma and her husband William had two children, Elizabeth and Fritz. In 1996, she was named to the National Assessment Governing Board by United States Secretary of Education Richard Riley. She was conferred with honorary degrees by Willamette University in 1999, Whitman College, Lewis & Clark College, and Linfield College. In December 2000, she was appointed as the executive director of the Oregon Historical Society and served in that position until 2003. From 2000 until 2013, Paulus was a member of the Oregon State Capitol Foundation Board. She was an original member of the organization and served as chair of the group. She served on the boards of the High Desert Museum in Bend, the Oregon Coast Aquarium in Newport, and the City Club of Portland. In 2004, she received the University of Oregon's Distinguished Service Award. She worked to raise funds for a statue honoring former governor and longtime friend Tom McCall, with the statue completed and installed in Salem along the Willamette River in 2008. In 2008, Paulus and co-petitioner Phil Keisling, also a former Oregon Secretary of State, brought Ballot Measure 65 to the November ballot, in an effort to reform the state's primary election system for partisan races. In 2015, then-Oregon Secretary of State Kate Brown dedicated the 2015–2016 edition of the Oregon Blue Book to Paulus, in honor of her lifelong service to the state, including her role as the first woman elected to that office, and statewide, in Oregon history. In May 2017, Oregon State University Press published "The Only Woman In the Room": the Norma Paulus story, which is based on oral histories and archives held at Oregon Historical Society Research Library, Willamette University Archives, and the Oregon State Archives. Norma Paulus died in a Portland nursing home on February 28, 2019, from complications of vascular dementia, at the age of 85. ## See also - List of female secretaries of state in the United States
2,953,963	Sheamus	1,172,316,174	Irish professional wrestler and actor	[ "1978 births", "21st-century professional wrestlers", "Alumni of the National College of Ireland", "Bodyguards", "Expatriate professional wrestlers", "FCW Florida Heavyweight Champions", "Irish bodybuilders", "Irish expatriates in the United States", "Irish male professional wrestlers", "Living people", "Money in the Bank winners", "NWA/WCW/WWE United States Heavyweight Champions", "People educated at Coláiste Mhuire, Dublin", "People from Cabra, Dublin", "Royal Rumble winners", "Sportspeople from Dublin (city)", "WWE Champions", "WWF/WWE King's Crown Champions/King of the Ring winners", "World Heavyweight Champions (WWE)" ]	Stephen Farrelly (born 28 January 1978) is an Irish professional wrestler and actor. He is currently signed to WWE, where he performs on the SmackDown brand under the ring name Sheamus. He is also the leader of The Brawling Brutes stable. Prior to joining WWE, he wrestled on the European independent circuit. After becoming part of WWE's main roster in 2009, he went on to become a four-time world champion, having held the WWE Championship three times and WWE's World Heavyweight Championship once. He is the first Irish world champion in WWE history, and is also a three-time United States Champion and a five-time tag team champion (four Raw and one SmackDown) with his tag team partner Cesaro. In addition to these championships, he also won the 2010 King of the Ring tournament, the 2012 Royal Rumble match, and the 2015 Money in the Bank ladder match, making him the second wrestler (after Edge) to achieve all three accomplishments. ## Early life Stephen Farrelly was born in the Cabra suburb of Dublin on 28 January 1978. He was raised on North Great George's Street in Dublin. He speaks fluent Irish, having attended Scoil Caoimhin Primary and the Gaelscoil Coláiste Mhuire Secondary School. During his school years, he sang in the Palestrina Choir until the age of 13; during this time, he appeared on the Irish shows The Late Late Show and Live at 3. He played Gaelic football for the Erin's Isle team, where he was once proclaimed "sports star of the month". He also played rugby union for the National College of Ireland, where he gained a National Diploma. He is a former IT technician and also worked as security for a nightclub, which led to him occasionally working as a bodyguard for Bono and Larry Mullen, Jr. of U2, as well as actress Denise van Outen. ## Professional wrestling career ### Training and debut (2002–2004) Farrelly was inspired to become a professional wrestler by watching British wrestling on World of Sport and American wrestling via the WWF. Following advice given to him by Bret Hart, he began training at Larry Sharpe's Monster Factory wrestling school in April 2002, alongside Tank Toland and Cliff Compton. Six weeks later, he officially debuted as a fan favorite against Robert Pigeon under the name Sheamus O'Shaunessy. After hitting an opponent in the groin, he gained the nickname of the "Irish Curse" (a reference to a slang term supposedly denoting a man's inability to perform sexually after consuming an excessive amount of whiskey). He soon suffered a serious neck injury after botching a hip toss, sidetracking his career for two years. Farrelly developed his wrestling character by drawing on Celtic mythology, moving away from Irish stereotypes of lucky charms, leprechauns, and alcoholism while aiming to portray a fiann, a type of mythical Irish warrior. Having attended an Irish-speaking school, he was aware of the four cycles of Irish mythology and, inspired by the artwork of Jim Fitzpatrick, incorporated sword- and axe-wielding imagery into his gimmick. This included the design of his own pendant, the crossos, which combines the Celtic cross with a Celtic War sword to illustrate his character's "indigenous origins with a hybrid of warrior strength matched with a strong ethical centre". ### European independent circuit #### Irish Whip Wrestling (2004–2006) In May 2004, still using the ring name Sheamus O'Shaunessy, Farrelly returned to wrestling at the newly opened Irish Whip Wrestling (IWW) school in Dublin. He then made his debut match for the promotion at their Mount Temple show on 9 July, facing Mark Burns in a winning effort. He went on to win a battle royal the following month. O'Shaunessy spent the rest of the year engaged in a rivalry with Vid Vain after losing to his tag team partner Joey Cabray the same night he won the battle royal. On 22 and 23 October they traded wins, leading to O'Shaunessy recruiting help from CJ Summers to help defeat the tag team on 24 October. O'Shaunessy was still unsuccessful to defeat Vain in singles action the following day. Despite these losses, his impressive showings earned him a place against Alex Shane in a guest match for the Frontier Wrestling Alliance (FWA) British Heavyweight Championship. Although he put on a proficient exhibit and came close to win, his friend Red Vinny interfered in the match and cost him the championship. In March 2005, he avenged this loss by teaming with Raven to defeat Shane and Vinny. This victory was part of a winning streak over the end of March where O'Shaunessy wrestled twice a day on 24, 25, 26 – including an 11-man Rumble win – and 27 March with a standard tag match and a ten-man tag team match. This series of victories, aside from one loss by disqualification to Vain, put him to a good form for the one-day tournament held in County Kildare to crown the inaugural IWW International Heavyweight Champion. On 28 March, O'Shaunessy put an end to his main rivalries when he defeated Vinny and then Vain in the quarter and semi finals, respectively. He met Darren Burridge in the final match and won to become IWW's first champion, but had to compete again in an evening show in Dublin, defeating Burridge and Vinny once more in a tag match alongside Vain. O'Shaunessy's first successful title defence came against Burridge the following month but Burridge would not let his grudge rest, continuing to attack O'Shaunessy and finally costing him the title during a match against D'Lo Brown on 29 May. O'Shaunessy earned revenge in July by defeating Burridge in a grudge match, though lost to him in an arm wrestling contest the following day. Still, he continued on his quest to regain the title by winning a contendership three-way match against Vinny and Red Viper in August setting him up to regain the International Heavyweight Championship in October from Brown in Newcastle upon Tyne in England. After defending his title against Vampiro and Viper, O'Shaunessy found himself embroiled in a new feud with rising Scottish wrestling star "Thee" Drew Galloway, whom he later admitted was his toughest opponent. On 28 January 2006, he received his first championship match, evolving their rivalry from previous non-title contests. The rivalry quickly took on a patriotic flavour, with Galloway's blue colours of Scotland clashing O'Shaunnesy's green colours of Ireland, mirroring the Old Firm football derby between Rangers and Celtic, respectively. This football allusion became particularly prominent when the two met again at Verona Football Club again for the title, though the match changed into a Lumberjack match, the result and champion remained the same. With Galloway defeated, O'Shaunessy continued to dominate by again defending his title against Vampiro on 17 March. Galloway earned himself a two out of three falls match against the champion the following day, however, which O'Shaunessy won two falls to one; the next day produced the same result in a match O'Shaunessy claimed was his best on the independent circuit. With Galloway briefly answered, O'Shaunessy took on the newcomer Pierre Marcaeu and defeated him in two successive title matches only to find Galloway had earned another shot. With their rivalry intensifying, Galloway's next challenge to O'Shaunnesy was given the stipulation of a Last Man Standing match. O'Shaunessy retained the title, as he also did in June with the same stipulation. Finally, on 28 August, O'Shaunessy lost the IWW International Heavyweight Championship in a singles match to Galloway in what would be his last appearance with the promotion. #### British promotions (2005–2007) As well as wrestling in Ireland, O'Shaunessy occasionally traveled to Great Britain to make appearances on the British independent circuit. In April 2006 he was brought into Wales' Celtic Wrestling promotion as a contender for their top title but was defeated by the champion, Chris Recall. Later that year in November, he was employed by London's LDN Wrestling to appear on their Capital TV show where, after quickly defeating William Hill, he gained an LDN Championship match against Tex Benedict which ended with Benedict winning by disqualification and O'Shaunessy attacking him after the match. During his time overseas he worked for Brian Dixon's All Star Wrestling, which gave him a taste of large audiences that he had not experienced in Ireland, as well as wrestling English veteran Robbie Brookside and other British wrestlers, including Nigel McGuinness and Doug Williams. He also represented the UK in a Battle of the Nations tag team match between the UK and Austria alongside Drew McDonald and The Celtic Warrior in a losing effort against Chris Raaber, Michael Kovac, and Robert Ray Kreuzer at the European Wrestling Association's Night of Gladiators. As well as making top contender appearances based on his growing reputation, O'Shaunessy also brought with him to Britain his long-standing rivalry with Galloway. He had already wrestled in Galloway's home promotion, British Championship Wrestling (BCW), twice in 2005, losing to Jay Phoenix on the day before Phoenix lost to Galloway in March, and returning in September to defeat one of BCW's top stars, Wolfgang, via countout. In the middle of their IWW feud the following year, O'Shaunessy went back to Scotland to take part in BCW's Path To Glory tour, defeating Galloway on the first night but conceding a loss to him the next night in May. Though their feud finished in Ireland in August 2006, it continued on across the Irish Sea when the two wrestled for the umbrella promotion Real Quality Wrestling (RQW) the following year. The two first met during April's Taking On The World show which ended in a double countout. The lack of a decision led to a rematch in June, and one of O'Shaunessy's last on the independent circuit, where Galloway picked up the victory in a No Holds Barred match ahead of an RQW Heavyweight Championship match. ### World Wrestling Entertainment/WWE #### Early appearances and developmental territories (2006–2009) On 13 November 2006, O'Shaunessy and English wrestler Stu Sanders appeared on the World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) show Raw at the Manchester Evening News Arena, as part of the security team ejecting D-Generation X (DX) from ringside, only for O'Shaunessy to later receive a Pedigree from Triple H. The following day, he and Drew Galloway had a tryout match against each other. In April 2007, he received another set of tryout matches in Milan and London against Galloway, as well as Sanders, WWE talent Jimmy Wang Yang, and Monster Factory alumnus Domino. This led to an offer and signing of a developmental contract with WWE, at which point he relocated to the United States. O'Shaunessy debuted for the WWE developmental territory Florida Championship Wrestling (FCW) on 2 October in a double-debut match with a win over Bryan Kelly. While wrestling regularly, he was not part of any long feuds but did wrestle with a number of short-term tag teams alongside Hade Vansen and Jake Hager before teaming with Kafu (and managed by Dave Taylor) in the tournament to crown the inaugural FCW Florida Tag Team Champions. They advanced past the first round after defeating The British Lions ("Thee Superstar" Christopher Gray and "The Rascal" Tommy Taylor), but lost to Brad Allen and Nick Nemeth in the second round. By September, O'Shaunessy had focused his attention on singles competition and wrestled his way to the top of the card, successfully defeating former partner Hager for the Florida Heavyweight Championship. He defended the title against Hager on 23 October and took on a number of competitors, with Eric Escobar and Joe Hennig consistently earning themselves into contention. Eventually, on 11 December, O'Shaunessy lost the title to Escobar in a four-way match also involving Hennig and Drew McIntyre (formerly Drew Galloway). O'Shaunessy spent 2009 continuing to chase gold, earning two shots in January and February at the Florida Tag Team Champions Johnny Curtis and Tyler Reks, but he and Ryback were unsuccessful in both attempts. In March he challenged the two for the titles again, this time with McIntyre as his partner, but could not defeat them, nor could he defeat McIntyre for the Florida Heavyweight Championship the following month. He received a series of chances throughout the rest of the year, but could not win any more titles before being called up to WWE television, unsuccessfully challenging Justin Angel for the Florida Heavyweight Championship in November. On 22 July 2008, O'Shaunessy worked a dark match at a SmackDown taping, losing to R-Truth. The following year in May, O'Shaunessy began appearing at the Raw brand's house shows, and on both 8 and 9 May he defeated Jamie Noble along with another dark match victory over Noble before an episode of Raw. #### WWE Champion (2009–2010) On 30 June 2009 episode of ECW, Farrelly made his unannounced debut as a villain under the shortened ring name of Sheamus, quickly defeating local competitor Oliver John. Sheamus soon entered into a critically well-received rivalry with Goldust after defeating him on 29 July. After exchanging victories in the following weeks they competed in a no disqualification match on 1 September which was won by Sheamus. Sheamus then began a feud with Shelton Benjamin which was hot-shot into a deciding match on 27 October which Sheamus won. His rivalry with Benjamin ended prematurely when Sheamus was moved to the Raw brand. He made his Raw debut by defeating Jamie Noble on 26 October. In the following weeks, he continued to attack Noble causing him to retire, and, in lieu of competition, assaulted the timekeeper and commentator Jerry Lawler on 16 November. The following week Sheamus appeared on his first WWE pay-per-view event, Survivor Series, on 22 November, when he was part of The Miz's team in a traditional five-on-five elimination tag team match. He eliminated fellow Irishman Finlay and made the final pinfall to eliminate the opposing captain John Morrison and survive along with The Miz and longtime former rival Drew McIntyre. The following night on Raw, Sheamus won a "break-through" battle royal for wrestlers who had never won a world championship, to become the number one contender to John Cena's WWE Championship. At the contract signing immediately afterward, Sheamus put Cena through the table, and the Raw guest host, Jesse Ventura, announced it would be a Tables match. On 13 December at TLC: Tables, Ladders and Chairs pay-per-view, Sheamus defeated Cena to win the WWE Championship, his first championship in WWE, making him the first Irish-born WWE Champion. He also captured the major title in just 166 days since his WWE debut, making it the third shortest time to capture a title since his WWE/ECW debut. The following night on Raw, Sheamus was awarded the 2009 Breakout Superstar of the Year Slammy Award. He would make his first title defense on the final Raw of 2009, getting disqualified in a rematch against Cena. On 31 January 2010 at the Royal Rumble, Sheamus defeated Randy Orton by disqualification to retain the WWE Championship, following interference from Orton's teammate Cody Rhodes. On 21 February, Sheamus lost the WWE Championship at the Elimination Chamber pay-per-view in the Elimination Chamber match after he was eliminated by Triple H. During the match, Sheamus suffered a concussion and as a result did not attend Raw the following night. Upon his return, he attacked Triple H in revenge, setting up a match at WrestleMania XXVI on 28 March where Sheamus lost. At Extreme Rules on 25 April, Sheamus attacked Triple H at the beginning of the show and later defeated him in a Street Fight. After a series of kicks to the head to win, he continued his assault after the match finished resulting in Triple H being written off television for ten months. On 20 June at Fatal 4-Way pay-per-view, Sheamus won a fatal four-way match, following interference from The Nexus that allowed him to pin John Cena, winning the WWE Championship for the second time and being named the one-hundredth WWE Champion in history. He defeated Cena in a steel cage match to retain the championship on 18 July at the Money in the Bank pay-per-view, after The Nexus interfered again. He retained the title against Randy Orton on 15 August at SummerSlam by disqualification. On 19 September at Night of Champions, Sheamus lost the WWE Championship to Randy Orton in a six-pack elimination challenge, which also included Chris Jericho, Edge, John Cena, and Wade Barrett. Sheamus received his rematch for the title on 3 October at Hell in a Cell, but was again defeated by Orton in a Hell in a Cell match. #### King Sheamus and Royal Rumble winner (2010–2012) He bounced back on 29 November, with wins over Kofi Kingston and John Morrison to become the 2010 King of the Ring, after receiving a bye through the second round. As "King Sheamus", he faced Morrison again on 19 December at the TLC: Tables, Ladders and Chairs pay-per-view for a future WWE Championship match, but lost in a ladder match. Going into 2011, he continued to lose to Morrison in a mixture of singles and tag team matches. Triple H returned on 28 February and took revenge for his scripted ten-month injury by putting Sheamus through the announce table. On 7 March, after losing a match against Daniel Bryan, Sheamus challenged him to a rematch with his WWE career on the line against Bryan's United States Championship. He won his match against Bryan the following week, winning his first United States title. The rematch between Sheamus and Bryan took place on 3 April, during the pre-show of WrestleMania XXVII, and ended in a draw after interference from the lumberjacks. The next night on Raw, Sheamus retained the United States Championship against Bryan in a rematch. In the 2011 Supplemental Draft, Sheamus was drafted to the SmackDown brand, and made his SmackDown debut on 29 April by attacking Kofi Kingston. He brought the United States Championship to SmackDown, but lost it back to the Raw brand at Extreme Rules on 1 May when Kingston defeated him in a Tables match. On 3 June episode of SmackDown, Sheamus lost a World Heavyweight Championship match to Randy Orton due to biased refereeing from Christian. Two weeks later, he lost a match to Christian, ending his chance to compete in the World Heavyweight Championship match at Capitol Punishment on 19 June. At Money in the Bank on 17 July, he competed in the Money in the Bank ladder match for a World Heavyweight Championship match contract, but lost. On 29 July episode of SmackDown, Sheamus started a feud with Mark Henry over Henry being a bully, turning face in the process. At SummerSlam on 14 August, he lost to Henry via countout. Sheamus went on a fourteen match winning streak that ended after interference from Christian, with whom he had been feuding. During this time, Sheamus defeated Christian in three consecutive matches at Hell in a Cell on 2 October, Vengeance on 23 October, and on SmackDown. He then went on a twelve match winning streak building towards winning the Royal Rumble on 29 January 2012. He entered the match twenty-second and won by last eliminating Chris Jericho to earn a main event championship match at WrestleMania XXVIII. #### World Heavyweight Champion (2012–2013) On 19 February at Elimination Chamber, Sheamus attacked World Heavyweight Champion Daniel Bryan after Bryan retained his title, thus challenging Bryan the World Heavyweight Championship on 1 April at WrestleMania XXVIII, which Sheamus won in a record 18 seconds. On 6 April episode of SmackDown, Sheamus lost to Alberto Del Rio in a non-title match by disqualification, thus earning Del Rio a future title match and starting a feud between the two. On 29 April at Extreme Rules, Sheamus successfully defended the World Heavyweight Championship against Bryan in a two out-of-three falls match. Sheamus then returned to his feud with Del Rio which eventually began to include Chris Jericho and Randy Orton. The rivalry between them culminated in a fatal-four-way match for the World Heavyweight Championship on 20 May at Over the Limit, where Sheamus pinned Jericho to retain the title. Del Rio earned another title shot on 25 May episode of SmackDown, but suffered a concussion a week before their match at No Way Out and was subsequently replaced by Dolph Ziggler; Sheamus retained the title in their match at the event on 17 June. Sheamus went on to retain the title against Del Rio and Ziggler over the next few months, including at Money in the Bank on 15 July, SummerSlam on 19 August, and Night of Champions on 16 September. On 28 October at Hell in a Cell, Sheamus lost the World Heavyweight Championship to Big Show, ending his reign, which was the third longest in the title's history, at 210 days. Sheamus faced Big Show for the World Heavyweight Championship on November at Survivor Series, defeating Big Show by disqualification, failing to win the title. Afterward, Sheamus repeatedly hit Big Show with a steel chair. This led to a Chairs match on 16 December at TLC: Tables, Ladders and Chairs, where Sheamus again failed to regain the title. On 24 December episode of Raw, Sheamus defeated Big Show in a non-title lumberjack match. On 27 January 2013, at the Royal Rumble, Sheamus entered the Royal Rumble at number eleven, eliminating five other superstars before Ryback eliminated him. After being a frequent target of The Shield, Sheamus gained vengeance on the stable when he united with John Cena and Ryback to attack them. This culminated in a six-man tag team match at Elimination Chamber, where the Shield emerged victorious. In late February, Sheamus aligned himself with Randy Orton to feud with The Shield. Over the next weeks, Sheamus and Orton saved each other from attacks by The Shield and Big Show. On 15 March episode of SmackDown, Sheamus and Orton were then allowed to pick a third partner to face the Shield in a six-man tag team match at WrestleMania 29 and chose Ryback. Three days later on Raw, however, Ryback was booked for another match at WrestleMania, leaving the spot open. Later that night, Big Show saved the two from an attack by The Shield and was recruited as their partner. On 7 April at WrestleMania 29, Sheamus, Orton and Big Show were defeated by The Shield, after which both men were knocked out by Big Show. The following night on Raw, Sheamus and Orton faced off in a match to earn a match with Big Show, however, the match ended in a no contest after Big Show interfered. Sheamus and Orton then defeated Big Show in two handicap matches on SmackDown and Raw. #### United States Champion (2013–2014) Later that month, Sheamus re-entered a feud with Mark Henry after the two repeatedly attacked each other backstage. Sheamus and Henry then challenged each other in tests of strength, but with Sheamus unable to best Henry, he resorted to attacking Henry. After Sheamus attacked a commentary-bound Henry during a match, Henry whipped Sheamus with a belt, prompting a strap match on 19 May at Extreme Rules, where Sheamus emerged victorious. Sheamus then began feuding with Damien Sandow, when Sandow hosted a series of mental challenges on SmackDown, and Sheamus repeatedly interrupted and tried to solve the challenges. However, when Sheamus failed to solve the puzzles, he instead resorted to physical violence. On 16 June, during the Payback pre-show, Sheamus defeated Sandow in a singles match. The following night on Raw, Sheamus was defeated by Sandow and Cody Rhodes in a handicap match after Sandow pinned him with a roll-up. The rivalry culminated in a Dublin Street Fight on 28 June episode of SmackDown, where Sheamus emerged victorious. On 14 July at Money in the Bank, Sheamus competed in the WWE Championship Money in the Bank ladder match, but was unsuccessful as the match was won by Randy Orton. During the match, Sheamus suffered a hematoma on his left thigh after being thrown into a horizontal ladder, which prevented him from competing that week. Sheamus returned to in-ring action on 22 July episode of Raw, losing to World Heavyweight Champion Alberto Del Rio in a non-title match. On 7 August, WWE confirmed Sheamus had suffered a torn labrum in his shoulder that would require surgery, and was expected to miss between four and six months of ring action. On 26 January 2014, at the Royal Rumble, Sheamus returned as a surprise entrant in the Royal Rumble match; he was eliminated by Roman Reigns in the final three. The following night on Raw, Sheamus, Daniel Bryan, and John Cena qualified for the Elimination Chamber match for the WWE World Heavyweight Championship; he was eliminated by Christian in the match. This began a brief feud leading up to WrestleMania, in which Sheamus consistently was victorious. He was part of the final four in the André the Giant Memorial battle royal at WrestleMania XXX on 6 April, before he and Alberto Del Rio eliminated each other. On 14 April, Sheamus participated in the Intercontinental Championship number one contender tournament, which was held on Raw. He advanced to the next round by defeating Jack Swagger, before losing to Bad News Barrett in the semi-finals on 21 April. On 5 May episode of Raw, Sheamus won a 20-man battle royal to win the United States Championship for the second time, last eliminating previous champion Dean Ambrose. Sheamus then began feuding with Cesaro and his manager Paul Heyman, culminating in a match between Sheamus and Cesaro for the title at Payback on 1 June, which Sheamus won. On 9 June, Sheamus defeated Bad News Barrett to qualify for the Money in the Bank ladder match for the vacant WWE World Heavyweight Championship; the match was won by John Cena on 29 June. Sheamus was in the Intercontinental Championship battle royal at Battleground on 20 July; the match was won by The Miz. Sheamus successfully defended the title against Cesaro at Night of Champions on 21 September, and The Miz at Hell in a Cell on 26 October. He lost the title to Rusev on 3 November, in a match which aired exclusively on the WWE Network ending his reign at 182 days. Following this, Sheamus was written off television when he and Big Show were attacked by Rusev and Mark Henry, allowing Sheamus time off for surgery. #### The League of Nations (2015–2016) On 30 March episode of Raw, Sheamus returned from injury, having drastically changed his look, including a mohawk and braided beard, appearing to save Daniel Bryan and Dolph Ziggler from an attack by Bad News Barrett, but then attacked Bryan and Ziggler instead, turning heel in the process for the first time since 2011. Sheamus then explained his heel turn and new attitude by claiming that "the era of underdogs is over", resulting in a feud with Ziggler. On 16 April episode of SmackDown, Sheamus announced that he would face Ziggler in a Kiss Me Arse match at Extreme Rules on 26 April, which he lost. However, Sheamus refused to follow the stipulation, and instead made Ziggler kiss his arse, despite losing. At Payback on 17 May, Sheamus defeated Ziggler in a rematch. At Elimination Chamber on 31 May, Sheamus participated in the Elimination Chamber match for the vacant Intercontinental Championship, but was unsuccessful as the match was won by Ryback. At Money in the Bank on 14 June, Sheamus won the Money in the Bank ladder match to earn a WWE World Heavyweight Championship contract. Sheamus then began a feud with Randy Orton, who was also part of the ladder match, with both men attacking each other and facing off in tag-team matches. Sheamus lost to Orton at Battleground on 19 July, but defeated Orton at SummerSlam on 23 August. In November, Sheamus competed in the tournament for the vacant WWE World Heavyweight Championship, being eliminated in the first round by Cesaro. At Survivor Series on 22 November, Sheamus cashed in his Money in the Bank contract and defeated newly crowned champion Roman Reigns, after he refused to shake hands with Triple H, to win the title, thus aligning with Triple H and The Authority. On 30 November episode of Raw, Sheamus announced that he had formed his own stable called The League of Nations with Alberto Del Rio, Rusev and King Barrett, with the members of which having been born outside the U.S., while remaining associated with the Authority. In addition, he proclaimed his championship reign as "Sheamus 5:15", a play on Austin 3:16 and Reigns' short-lived title reign of five minutes and 15 seconds. At TLC: Tables, Ladders and Chairs on 13 December, Sheamus defeated Reigns in a Tables, Ladders and Chairs match after interference from The League of Nations. After the match, Reigns attacked Sheamus and Triple H. This resulted in a rematch the following night on Raw for the title with the stipulation that Reigns would be fired should he lose. Despite interference from chairman Mr. McMahon, Sheamus lost the title, ending his reign at 22 days. On 4 January 2016 episode of Raw, he failed to regain the title from Reigns with McMahon as special guest referee. On 24 January 2016, Sheamus entered the Royal Rumble at number 29, where he made to the final four, before being eliminated by Reigns. At Fastlane on 21 February, WWE Tag Team Champions The New Day began mocking The League of Nations, calling them the "league of booty". They continued to mock The League of Nations in various segments and skits while simultaneously feuding with other teams. At Roadblock on 12 March, Sheamus and Barrett unsuccessfully challenged for the WWE Tag Team Championship. The next night on Raw, The New Day defeated Del Rio and Rusev, prompting all four members of The League to attack The New Day after the match. The League of Nations then challenged and defeated The New Day in a six-man tag team match at WrestleMania 32 on 3 April. After the match, they were confronted and attacked by Mick Foley, Stone Cold Steve Austin, and Shawn Michaels. The next night on Raw, Barrett and Sheamus faced The New Day in another tag team title match, in a losing effort. After the match, the League of Nations blamed Barrett for being the "weak link" and attacked him, ejecting him from the group, before the rest of the team was attacked by The Wyatt Family. The feud was suspended within a month as Bray Wyatt suffered an injury, which led to Alberto Del Rio saying that The League might split soon in result. On 28 April episode of SmackDown, The League of Nations would compete in a six-man tag match against Sami Zayn, Cesaro and Kalisto, however, Del Rio and Rusev walked out during the match. Sheamus, who would do the same, confronted Del Rio and Rusev during a brawl, and said that the league is finished, confirming the end of the group. Del Rio would also confirm in an interview that the group was finished. At Money in the Bank on 19 June, he lost to Apollo Crews. #### The Bar (2016–2019) On 19 July at the 2016 WWE draft, Sheamus was drafted to Raw. Sheamus would then begin a rivalry with Cesaro, after losing to Cesaro on 1 August episode of Raw, the two would continue to brawl after the match with match officials having to pull them apart. On 8 August episode of Raw, after losing to Cesaro in a rematch, he would later cost Cesaro the United States Championship after interfering in his main event impromptu match against Rusev. The following week, Raw General Manager Mick Foley booked Sheamus and Cesaro in a Best of Seven Series, with the first match taking place on 21 August on the SummerSlam kick-off show, which Sheamus won. Sheamus would defeat Cesaro in the second and third matches, but lost to Cesaro in the fourth, fifth and sixth matches. At Clash of Champions on 25 September, the match ended in a no contest, leaving their series tied at 3-3. The next night on Raw, Mick Foley decided to make the two partners to receive a future Raw Tag Team Championship opportunity. Later that night, they defeated a few local athletes, but still did not seem to be seeing eye to eye. Sheamus and Cesaro defeated The New Day on 24 October episode of Raw and defeated them by disqualification at Hell in a Cell on 30 October. On 7 November episode of Raw, Sheamus and Cesaro were announced as part of Team Raw for the 10–on–10 Survivor Series Tag Team Elimination match at Survivor Series on 20 November, which Team Raw won with Sheamus and Cesaro being the sole survivors of their team. The next night on Raw, Sheamus and Cesaro again failed to capture Raw Tag Team Championship from The New Day. After hinting at a break-up, the pair got into a bar brawl with men who offended them and finally began to cooperate with each other, thus turning Sheamus into a face. On 18 December at Roadblock: End of the Line, Sheamus and Cesaro defeated The New Day to win the Raw Tag Team Championship, marking Sheamus' first tag team championship in both his WWE and entire wrestling career. On 29 January on the Royal Rumble kickoff show, Sheamus and Cesaro lost the Raw Tag Team Championship to Luke Gallows and Karl Anderson, and failed to regain them after The Hardy Boyz won the title at WrestleMania 33 on 2 April. The following night on Raw, Sheamus and Cesaro defeated Enzo Amore and Big Cass to become the number one contender's for the Raw Tag Team Championship at Payback. At Payback on 30 April, after failing to regain the title, both Sheamus and Cesaro turned heel by attacking The Hardy Boyz. From there, now known as "The Bar", their entrances became further synchronized as they wore the same attire into the ring. They then won a tag team turmoil to earn another opportunity for the tag title at Extreme Rules. The match was made a steel cage match after Matt Hardy defeated Sheamus on 22 May episode of Raw in a match where the winner chose the stipulation for their Extreme Rules bout. At the event on 4 June, The Bar defeated The Hardy Boyz to win the Raw Tag Team Championship for the second time, making Cesaro a three-time champion and Sheamus a two-time champion. The duo made their first televised defence of the title against The Hardy Boyz on 12 June episode of Raw in a two out of three falls match where the two teams tied at 1-1 after being counted out. They defended their title against The Hardy Boyz at the Great Balls of Fire pay-per-view on 9 July in a 30-minute Iron Man tag team match by the score 4–3. The Bar lost the Raw Tag Team Championship to Seth Rollins and Dean Ambrose at SummerSlam on 20 August. The Bar lost their rematch for the title to Rollins and Ambrose at No Mercy on 24 September. They teamed with The Miz, Braun Strowman and Kane against reunited The Shield and Kurt Angle who replaced Roman Reigns after he wasn't medically cleared to compete in a five-on-three TLC match at TLC: Tables, Ladders & Chairs on 22 October in a losing effort. On 6 November episode of Raw, the duo regained their titles from Rollins and Ambrose, winning the title for the third time. At Survivor Series on 19 November, SmackDown Tag Team Champions they were defeated by The Usos in an interbrand Champion vs Champion match. The Bar later lost the tag team titles to the team of Seth Rollins and Jason Jordan on the Christmas episode of Raw. On 28 January 2018, The Bar won back the title at Royal Rumble, setting the record for the most reigns as a team at four. Earlier in the Royal Rumble match, Sheamus entered at number 11 and was quickly eliminated by Heath Slater, lasting just one second in the match. Following consecutive losses to Titus Worldwide (Apollo Crews and Titus O'Neil) on Raw, they defended their title against the two at Elimination Chamber, retaining successfully at the event on 25 February. On 12 March episode of Raw, after Braun Strowman single-handedly won a tag team battle royale to determine the number one contenders for their tag titles at WrestleMania 34 although he lacked a partner, Raw General Manager Kurt Angle still allowed Strowman to wrestle for the titles, under the provision that he reveal his mystery partner at the event. At the event on 8 April, Strowman revealed his partner to be a 10 year old fan called Nicholas. The Bar was defeated by Strowman and Nicholas, therefore losing the tag team title and in turn making Nicholas the youngest champion of any kind in WWE history. On 17 April, Sheamus and Cesaro were both drafted to SmackDown as part of the Superstar Shake-up. Despite the trade, they still had an opportunity to win the Raw Tag Team Championship as they faced Matt Hardy and Bray Wyatt at Greatest Royal Rumble event on 27 April, but failed to win the titles. The Bar entered a short feud with The New Day losing to them and failing to qualify for the Money in the Bank ladder match. After going on a hiatus, the duo returned in late July to take part in a number one contendership tournament for the SmackDown Tag Team Championship and beat The Usos to advance to the finals, where they lost to The New Day. After failing to become number one contenders again, the duo finally was gifted a title match. At Super Show-Down event on 6 October, The Bar failed to win the titles. At SmackDown 1000, The Bar won the titles from The New Day with the help of Big Show. They retained against The New Day in a rematch at Crown Jewel on 2 November. The Bar lost to Raw Tag Team Champions AOP in an interbrand Champion vs Champion match at Survivor Series on 18 November. On 27 November episode of SmackDown, they had a backstage argument with Big Show, causing him to break away from the team. At TLC on 16 December, they successfully defended the championship against The Usos and The New Day in a triple threat tag team match. On 8 January episode of SmackDown, they accepted a challenge from The Miz and Shane McMahon, which would lead to a tag team title match at the Royal Rumble pay-per-view on 27 January 2019, where they lost the titles. The following SmackDown Live, they lost a number one contenders match to The Usos. The Bar defeated Kofi Kingston in a handicap match at Fastlane on 10 March. At WrestleMania 35 on 7 April, The Bar lost to The Usos in a fatal four-way tag team match for the SmackDown Tag Team Championship. At the Raw following WrestleMania, The Bar interrupted a Winner Takes All match between Seth Rollins and Kofi Kingston, resulting in a tag team match. This resulted in "bullshit", "AEW" and "CM Punk" chants from the crowd, voicing their displeasure in the match they were given instead. The next day on SmackDown Live, Sheamus reportedly suffered a concussion in a six-man tag team match with The New Day. Cesaro was drafted to Raw a few weeks later, and later confirmed in an interview that The Bar was over. #### Return to singles competition (2019–2021) On 19 September, it was reported that Sheamus was healed and ready to return to the ring. On 29 November episode of SmackDown, Sheamus, with his old hairstyle, appeared in a vignette announcing that he will return soon. On 3 January 2020 episode of SmackDown, Sheamus returned from injury, appearing to save Shorty G from an attack by The Revival (Dash Wilder and Scott Dawson), but then delivered a Brogue Kick to Shorty G. Sheamus then defeated Shorty G at Royal Rumble on 26 January, and on 31 January episode of SmackDown. He began a feud with Jeff Hardy insulting him for his various addiction problems, but was defeated by him in the first round of the Intercontinental Championship tournament on 22 May episode of SmackDown. On 29 May, episode of SmackDown, Hardy was "arrested" after crashing his car into Elias, however later in the episode, Hardy would cause a distraction for Sheamus, costing him a match against Daniel Bryan, and attacked Sheamus after the match. The feud led to a match at Backlash on 14 June, which Sheamus won. On 24 July episode of SmackDown Sheamus lost to Hardy in a Bar Fight, ending their feud. Sheamus then started a short feud with Big E after he wanted help from the SmackDown wrestlers against Retribution's attacks, but Sheamus denied and mocked him. Sheamus lost to Big E on 21 August episode of SmackDown, at Payback on 30 August and on 9 October episode of SmackDown, ending their feud. As part of the 2020 Draft in October, Sheamus was drafted to the Raw brand. On 26 October episode of Raw, Sheamus defeated Riddle to qualify for Team Raw at Survivor Series. Later on, he was involved in a triple threat match against Keith Lee and Braun Strowman for the latter's qualification. He also competed in a tag team match with Strowman against Lee and Riddle in a losing effort. At Survivor Series on 22 November, Team Raw defeated Team SmackDown in a clean sweep. Sheamus eliminated Seth Rollins after a Brogue Kick to score the first elimination. In November, Sheamus began a storyline with Drew McIntyre where their real-life friendship was acknowledged. On 30 November episode of Raw, Sheamus was a guest on Miz TV, where The Miz and John Morrison berated him for his friendship with McIntyre to which Sheamus defended McIntyre from the accusations, and attempted to attack Miz, but was beat down by Miz and Morrison. Sheamus teamed with McIntyre to defeat Miz and Morrison in a tag team match later on in the night. At the Royal Rumble on 31 January 2021, Sheamus entered at number 27 but was eliminated by Braun Strowman. On 1 February 2021 episode of Raw, Sheamus delivered a Brogue Kick to McIntyre after shortly confronting then Royal Rumble winner, Edge. He bemoaned the fact that he was only acknowledged as just "Drew McIntyre's friend", implying that he was overshadowed by his success as the WWE Champion. As a result, he terminated his friendship with McIntyre, and vowed to take the WWE Championship away from him. At the Elimination Chamber on 21 February, Sheamus faced McIntyre, AJ Styles, Jeff Hardy, Kofi Kingston, and Randy Orton in an Elimination Chamber match for the WWE Championship. Sheamus would eliminate Kingston but would be the second to last man eliminated in the match by Styles. Following the event, Sheamus would continue to feud with McIntyre and the two faced each other on 1 March episode of Raw where Sheamus was defeated. The two had a rematch the following week in a No Disqualification match where Sheamus would once again lose to McIntyre. Sheamus and McIntyre would fight once more in a No Holds Barred match at Fastlane on 21 March, with McIntyre defeating Sheamus, ending the feud. On 22 March episode of Raw, Sheamus would face WWE Champion Bobby Lashley in a losing effort and backstage, attacked United States Champion Riddle. The following week, Sheamus defeated Riddle in a non-title match to earn a championship opportunity at WrestleMania 37. On the second night of the event on 11 April, Sheamus defeated Riddle to win the United States Championship for the third time. He would go on to defend the title against the likes of Humberto Carrillo and Ricochet over the next several months. At SummerSlam on 21 August, Sheamus dropped the title to Damian Priest, ending his third reign at 132 days. #### The Brawling Brutes (2021–present) As part of the 2021 Draft, Sheamus was drafted to the SmackDown brand. In November, Sheamus formed an alliance with Ridge Holland, after Holland would refer to him as his idol and help Sheamus win his matches. At the Day 1 event on 1 January 2022, he and Holland teamed up to defeat Cesaro and Ricochet. At Royal Rumble on 29 January, Sheamus entered at No. 17 but was eliminated by Bad Bunny. In March, they entered a feud with The New Day, where on the 11 March episode of SmackDown, Sheamus and Holland would introduce Butch as part of their stable. On the second night of WrestleMania 38 on April 3, Sheamus and Holland defeated The New Day in a quick match. At Money in the Bank on 2 July, Sheamus competed in the Money in the Bank ladder match, which was won by Theory. On the 29 July episode of SmackDown, Sheamus faced Drew McIntyre in a "Good Old Fashioned Donnybrook" to determine the \#1 contender for the Undisputed WWE Universal Championship at Clash at the Castle, but lost. On the 19 August episode of SmackDown, Sheamus won a fatal five-way match, earning a match against Gunther for the Intercontinental Championship at Clash at the Castle. The following week on SmackDown, Sheamus and Gunther had a confrontation, in which Sheamus and Gunther's respective allies, Butch and Ludwig Kaiser, engaged in a brawl while Sheamus and Gunther remained motionless, staring each other down. At Clash at the Castle on 3 September, Sheamus failed to win the Intercontinental Championship from Gunther in a hard hitting, critically acclaimed match, but received a standing ovation from the Cardiff crowd after the match, turning face in the process. It became the seventh main roster WWE match to receive five stars from Dave Meltzer, and the first five star match of Sheamus' career. At Extreme Rules, The Brawling Brutes defeated Imperium in a Six-Man Tag Team Good Old Fashioned Donnybrook match. At Survivor Series WarGames on 26 November, The Brawling Brutes along with Drew McIntyre and Kevin Owens lost to The Bloodline in a WarGames match. At the Royal Rumble on 28 January 2023, Sheamus entered the Royal Rumble match at No. 2 but was eliminated by McIntyre and Gunther. Sheamus went on to face McIntyre and Gunther in a triple threat match for the Intercontinental Championship on Night 2 of WrestleMania 39 but the match was won by Gunther. This was the second match in Sheamus's career to receive a 5 star rating from popular wrestling journalist Dave Meltzer. ## Other media Farrelly (credited as "Sheamus O'Shaunessy") played the role of "Two Ton" in the 2008 film The Escapist. In 2009, he appeared as a Celtic warrior zombie in the opening sequence of the film Assault of Darkness, and had a small part in Once Upon a Time in Dublin (aka 3 Crosses) as a security guard. He played Rocksteady in 2016's Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows. Farrelly appeared on several episodes of Dustin's Daily News, where he had a rivalry with Dustin the Turkey, the famous Irish sock puppet; this ended with Dustin and Farrelly having a "fight", which Dustin won. Farrelly played a leprechaun wrestler on The Podge and Rodge Show. In July 2014, he made a guest appearance on the USA Network television series Royal Pains. Farrelly runs a YouTube channel called "Celtic Warrior Workouts", in which he invites fellow wrestlers to guide him through their own personal workout routines. As Sheamus, Farrelly is a playable character in the video games WWE SmackDown vs Raw 2011, WWE '12, WWE '13, WWE 2K14, WWE 2K15, WWE 2K16, WWE 2K17, WWE 2K18, WWE 2K19, WWE 2K20 WWE 2K Battlegrounds, WWE 2K22 and WWE 2K23. ## Personal life As of 2020, Farrelly resides in Nashville, Tennessee, having previously lived in Lutz, Florida. He is a supporter of the sports teams Celtic FC, Liverpool FC, and the Tennessee Titans. In November 2017, Farrelly revealed that he suffers from spinal stenosis. On October 28, 2022, Farrelly married Isabella Revilla. ## Filmography ### Film ### Television ## Championships and accomplishments - ESPN - Match of the year (2022) vs. Gunther at Clash at the Castle - Florida Championship Wrestling - FCW Florida Heavyweight Championship (1 time) - Irish Whip Wrestling - IWW International Heavyweight Championship (2 times) - IWW International Heavyweight Championship Tournament (2005) - Pro Wrestling Illustrated - Ranked No. 5 of the top 500 wrestlers in the PWI 500 in 2012 - Rolling Stone - Most Welcome Heel Turn (2015) tied with Naomi - World Wrestling Entertainment/WWE - WWE Championship (3 times) - World Heavyweight Championship (1 time) - WWE United States Championship (3 times) - WWE Raw Tag Team Championship (4 times) – with Cesaro - WWE SmackDown Tag Team Championship (1 time) – with Cesaro - King of the Ring (2010) - Money in the Bank (2015) - Royal Rumble (2012) - Slammy Award (4 times) - Breakout Star of the Year (2009) - Feat of Strength of the Year (2012) Delivering "White Noise" to Big Show - Outstanding Achievement in Muppet Resemblance (2011) - Superstar/Diva Most in Need of Make-up (2010) - WWE Year-End Award for Tag Team of the Year (2018) – with Cesaro - Wrestling Observer Newsletter - Most Improved (2010)
55,200,320	Disappearance of Lars Mittank	1,173,107,993	2014 incident in Varna, Bulgaria	[ "2010s missing person cases", "2014 in Bulgaria", "Bulgaria–Germany relations", "German expatriates in Bulgaria", "Missing person cases in Europe" ]	Lars Joachim Mittank (born 9 February 1986) is a German man who disappeared on 8 July 2014, near Varna Airport in Varna, Bulgaria. Mittank was vacationing at the Golden Sands resort, where he was supposedly involved in a fight, and was subsequently unable to fly home with his friends for health reasons. Mittank was documented acting strangely while alone in Bulgaria. He called home to his mother claiming that people were trying to kill him. On the day when he was supposed to fly home, Mittank went to the Varna Airport to consult with a doctor. He was later seen on airport security footage running out of the airport and towards an adjacent forest. He has never been seen since. The case has generated intense interest, and the frequency with which people viewed the footage of him fleeing the airport has led to him being named "the most famous missing person on YouTube." ## Background of Lars Mittank Lars Mittank was born on 9 February 1986, in Berlin, Germany. He grew up in Itzehoe, Schleswig-Holstein, and lived there for his entire life. He worked at a power plant, had friends and a girlfriend. He visited his parents frequently. After his father suffered a stroke, he often helped at his parents' home after work. He was described as a normal person. ## Unusual behaviour and disappearance On 30 June 2014, 28-year-old Mittank traveled with five of his friends to Varna, Bulgaria. It was his first journey outside of Germany. The group vacationed at the Golden Sands, a seaside resort just outside of the city of Varna. "The week went by really fast," said Paul Rohmann, one of Mittank’s friends, in 2016 on German television. "We relaxed on the beach, swam in the pool, played football, went clubbing. He was relaxed. He was in a good mood." Another friend, Tim Schuldt, said that Mittank did not eat much, and that he would have only a small bowl of soup or a small salad at a time. His friends reported no additional abnormal behavior by Mittank until the final part of the trip. On 6 July 2014, the day before they were supposed to return home, Mittank and friends were at a bar in town, and Mittank got into a disagreement with some other German nationals over football. Mittank, a fan of the football club Werder Bremen, had differences with fans of Bayern Munich. He then parted from his friends outside a restaurant after leaving the bar, and disappeared for the rest of the night. Mittank turned up at the resort the following morning and told his friends he was beaten up by four men hired by the group in the bar whom he disagreed with the night before. The fight resulted in Mittank suffering an injured jaw and a ruptured ear drum. He went and saw a doctor who advised him not to fly due to his injury, and prescribed the antibiotic Cefprozil (500 mg). Mittank's friends wanted to stay with him, but he insisted he was fine on his own, and told them to follow the original travel plan and fly home on 7 July, which they did. Mittank checked out of the resort the same time as his friends, and checked into the Hotel Color Varna for one night. The hotel was cheap and close to the airport. However, a day after his friends left, he began to act paranoid. While at the hotel, Mittank called his mother, Sandra Mittank. In a whisper, he told her that people were trying to kill or rob him and that she should cancel his credit cards. The closed-circuit television security cameras in the hotel recorded him pacing up and down the halls, looking out windows, and hiding in an elevator. At 1 A.M., he left the hotel before returning about an hour later. It is not known what he did in the intervening period. In the morning, he once again called his mother, telling her that the people pursuing him were getting closer. Mittank was last seen at Varna Airport on 8 July 2014, the day he was hoping to fly home to Germany. He texted his mother that he had arrived at the airport. He went to consult with the airport doctor, Dr. Kosta Kostov. Kostov would later describe his behavior as "nervous and erratic." According to Kostov, he told Mittank that he was fine and could return home. However, Mittank did not leave his office, expressing doubt about the medication that he was taking. At that time, a construction worker entered the office. The airport was undergoing renovation at the time. Kostov said that Mittank then began to tremble. He yelled, "I don't want to die here. I have to get out of here." He then got up and fled the office. He left behind all of his luggage, which included his wallet, cell phone, and passport. He was captured by airport security cameras fleeing the terminal. Once outside, he can be seen on the footage jogging away from the airport, climbing a fence, running into a meadow, and sprinting off camera in the direction of an adjacent forest near Bulgarian national highway A2. These are his last confirmed whereabouts. ## Speculation and subsequent developments There is no definitive agreement among experts and family members as to the causes of Mittank's behaviour and to what extent his paranoia was rooted in reality. Mittank's mother, alongside Bulgarian and German doctors, have suspected that Mittank's unusual behaviour was the result of a rare side effect from the antibiotic that he was prescribed, Cefprozil. It is a cephalosporin, which have been known to induce psychotic side effects, including hallucinations and paranoia. However, according to Kostov, Mittank had not been taking his medication. "He didn't take those antibiotics. He didn't even fill out his prescription,” Kostov said. "So his behavior couldn't have been a result of that. I can't think of a single reason why he left my office in such a panic. I'm still confused." His mother said that he had no history of mental illness. However, a mental breakdown caused by an undiagnosed mental illness has been discussed as a possible explanation for his conduct. It is also unknown what happened to Mittank after he fled the airport. With the police unable to determine Lars Mittank's fate, Sandra Mittank hired a private investigator, Andreas Gütig. He checked hospital records for patients without identification, but found nothing. Mittank had experience in hunting, fishing, and trapping, but there is skepticism about whether he would have been able to survive for long outdoors due to intense heat in the summers and lack of food. His mother has expressed belief that he is still alive, possibly having lost his memory. About a year after his disappearance, a truck driver thought he saw him hitchhiking in Varna. There have been multiple reported sightings of him in several other countries, but none have been confirmed. In 2019, a German truck driver gave a hitchhiker a ride from Dresden to Schildow in Oberhavel, Brandenburg. The driver became aware of the Mittank case later, and said that the man with him resembled an older version of Mittank. The driver said that the man had long hair and a beard. He said that his eyes seemed tired and his cheekbones were prominent. Mittank has been described as "the most famous missing person on YouTube." By May 2018, less than four years after his disappearance, the security footage of him in the airport had been viewed more than 16 million times. The mysterious nature of the case has led to frequent discussions and the growth of numerous theories. The case remains unsolved. Mittank is listed as 180 centimetres (5 ft 11 in) tall with dark blond hair. He has a scar on his left forearm. ## See also - Disappearance of Stoyan Kostov – another high-profile disappearance of a man in Bulgaria, which has led to an international search. It was later discovered that his partner at the time of his disappearance was British murderer Dena Thompson. - List of people who disappeared
8,476,157	Battle of Stockach (1799)	1,096,162,233	1799 Battle during the War of the Second Coalition	[ "1799 in the Holy Roman Empire", "Battles involving Austria", "Battles involving France", "Battles of the French Revolutionary Wars", "Battles of the War of the Second Coalition", "Campaigns of the French Revolutionary Wars by year", "Conflicts in 1799", "War of the Second Coalition" ]	The Battle of Stockach occurred on 25 March 1799, when French and Austrian armies fought for control of the geographically strategic Hegau region in present-day Baden-Württemberg. In the broader military context, this battle constitutes a keystone in the first campaign in southwestern Germany during the Wars of the Second Coalition, part of the French Revolutionary Wars. It was the second battle between the French Army of the Danube, commanded by Jean-Baptiste Jourdan, and the Habsburg Army under Archduke Charles; the armies had met a few days earlier, 20–22 March, on the marshy fields southeast of Ostrach and the Pfullendorf heights. The Austrian Army's superior strength, almost three-to-one, forced the French to withdraw. At Stockach, the French concentrated their forces into shorter lines, creating intense fighting conditions; initially, Charles's line was more extended, but he quickly pulled additional troops from his reserves to strengthen his front. When a small French force commanded by Dominique Vandamme nearly flanked the Austrian Army, Charles's personal intervention was crucial for the Austrians, buying time for reinforcements to arrive. General Jourdan, while trying to rally his men, was nearly trampled to death. Ultimately, the French were driven back upon the Rhine River. ## Background Although the First Coalition forces achieved several initial victories at Verdun, Kaiserslautern, Neerwinden, Mainz, Amberg and Würzburg, the efforts of Napoleon Bonaparte in northern Italy pushed Austrian forces back and resulted in the negotiation of the Peace of Leoben (17 April 1797) and the subsequent Treaty of Campo Formio (October 1797). This treaty proved difficult to administer. Austria was slow to give up some of the Venetian territories. A Congress convened at Rastatt for the purposes of deciding which southwestern German states would be mediatised to compensate the dynastic houses for territorial losses, but was unable to make any progress. Supported by French republican forces, Swiss insurgents staged several uprisings, ultimately causing the overthrow of the Swiss Confederation after 18 months of civil war. By early 1799, the French Directory had become impatient with stalling tactics employed by Austria. The uprising in Naples raised further alarms, and recent gains in Switzerland suggested the timing was fortuitous to venture on another campaign in northern Italy and southwestern Germany. ## Prelude to battle As winter broke in 1799, on 1 March, General Jean Baptiste Jourdan and his army of 25,000, the so-called Army of Observation, crossed the Rhine between Basel and Kehl. This crossing officially violated the Treaty of Campo Formio. On 2 March, the Army was renamed Army of the Danube, upon orders of the French Directory. The Army met little resistance as it advanced through the Black Forest in four columns, through the Höllental (Hölle valley), via Oberkirch, and Freudenstadt, and at the southern end of the forest, along the Rhine bank. Although prudent counsel might have advised Jourdan to establish a position on the eastern slope of the mountains, he did not; instead he pushed across the Danube plain, taking position between Rottweil and Tuttlingen. The Austrian Army and Archduke Charles, its commander-in-chief, had wintered with his army in the Bavarian, Austrian, and Salzburg territories on the eastern side of the Lech; his force alone numbered close to 80,000 troops, and outnumbered the French force by three to one. An additional 26,000, commanded by Friedrich Freiherr von Hotze, guarded the Vorarlberg, and further south, another 46,000, under command of Count Heinrich von Bellegarde, formed the defense of the Tyrol. The Austrians had already reached an agreement with Tsar Paul of Russia by which the legendary Alexander Suvorov would leave retirement to assist Austria in Italy with another 60,000 troops. ### Engagement at Ostrach The Army of the Danube advanced on Pfullendorf and Ostrach, the former an imperial city in Upper (southern) Swabia, and the latter a nearby village of 300 belonging to the Imperial Abbey of Salem, an influential and wealthy ecclesiastical territory on Lake Constance. Jourdan's objective was simple and direct: cut the Austrian line at the border of the southwestern German states and Switzerland, preventing the Coalition's use of Switzerland as an overland route between central and southern Europe. Isolation of the two theaters would prevent the Austrians from assisting one another; furthermore, if the French held the interior passes in Switzerland, they could use these routes to move their own forces between the two theaters. Stretching between the Pfullendorf heights and the village lies a flat, wide plain, marshy in places, ringed with low-lying hills, and creased with a small tributary stream from which the village takes its name. Ostrach itself lies almost at the northern end of this plain, but slightly south of the Danube itself. By 7 March, the first French forces arrived there, and the Austrians arrived a day or so later. Over the following week, additional forces for both sides arrived, and the two armies faced each other across this valley. The French army extended in a long line from the Danube to Lake Constance. The Third Division, commanded by Laurent de Gouvion Saint-Cyr, positioned itself at the far left flank, and Dominique Vandamme's detached force, returning from reconnaissance near Stuttgart, roamed on the north shore of the river. François Joseph Lefebvre commanded the Advance Guard, positioned on the slope below Pfullendorf, and Joseph Souham, with the Second Division, took position behind him. Pierre Marie Barthélemy Ferino's First Division held the southernmost flank, to defend against any encirclement by Charles' force. Jourdan set up command at Pfullendorf, and the Cavalry Reeserve, commanded by Jean-Joseph Ange d'Hautpoul, stood slightly to the north and west of Souham. By late on the 19th, Austrian and French soldiers had been skirmishing at outposts for more than 30 hours, with the action growing increasingly intense. In the early hours of the 21st, General Lefebvre informed Jourdan that the Austrians were attacking all his positions, and that the general engagement would begin shortly. After 24 hours of fighting, Austrian forces pushed Lefebvre and Saint Cyr's troops back to the Pfullendorf heights. Although sappers blew up the primary bridge over the Ostrach river, the Austrians managed to ford the stream anyway. They nearly outflanked General Saint Cyr's forces on the right flank, did outflank Lefebvre's forces in the center, and cut off a portion of the southern flank from the main body. Saint Cyr's troops barely managed to pull back before being fully cut off. Finally, General Friedrich Freiherr von Hotze, marching north with 10,000 men, from Feldkirch, threatened Ferino's First Division from the south. ### Retreat from Ostrach On 21 March, at 2200, Jourdan ordered the wounded to be transported to Schaffhausen in Switzerland, via Stockach. The main army then began its own retreat in the early morning of the 22nd. The reserve division of d'Hautpoul left first, and pulled back via Stockach to Emmengen ob Eck. The first division pulled back to Bodman, on the northern tip of the Überlingen-finger of Lake Constance; in the retreat, a portion of the force was encircled and cut off by the 2nd Lancers of Karl Philipp, Prince Schwarzenberg's brigade, and more than 500 were taken prisoner. ## Battle at Stockach and Engen Fought at the junction of the east–west and north–south roads on the eastern side of the Black Forest, the day-long battle at Stockach and Engen pitted the two armies against each other for the second time in seven days. The Austrians still had the numerical superiority, but this time it was closer to two-to-one, instead of almost three-to-one. Jourdan had consolidated his force over a shorter line, and had the full Army of the Danube under his direct command. Charles, likewise, had shortened his line; although Hotze had not yet caught up with the archduke, he and his 10,000 men were approaching from the Austrians' left rear. ### Dispositions By 23 March, Jourdan had his headquarters in the vicinity of Stockach. He had recalled Barthélemy Ferino from the far right flank; Ferino had retreated along the coast of the Überlingen Lake, the northwestern finger of Lake Constance, to be in position at the close right flank, adjacent to Souham's division. Lefebvre, wounded at Ostrach, was unable to take the field himself, and Laurent Saint Cyr commanded the left flank. When Jourdan considered his position, he felt it too extended, so he drew back further behind Stockach, toward Engen, where he could concentrate his force. The first division camped near the Hohentwiel, the 11th-century fortress overlooking the marshes at the westernmost point of the Lake Constance. The second division, the advanced guard, and a cavalry division were camped on the heights above Engen. The third division was camped by Leibtengen (Liptingen, the French called it), and Neuhausen. Vandamme and his small corps worked themselves discreetly into a position behind the Austrian right flank. Jourdan established his headquarters at Engen. The plan was straightforward: Vandamme and Saint Cyr would make a simultaneous attack on the Austrian right, and Soult's and Jourdan's main force would attack the Austrian center and left. Jourdan's plan, to attack four points of the opposition simultaneously, seemed to him to be the only reasonable action against a force with such numerical superiority. The Habsburg center columns included 17,000 men under the command of field marshal Friedrich Joseph, Count of Nauendorf, formed into three columns and approaching from the north east. The main force, under the command of the Archduke Charles, included 53,000 men, also in three columns; in the main force, Charles had under his command the princes of Anhalt and Fürstenberg plus six battalions in a fourth column, north of the main column, but south of Nauendorf's command. An additional force of 13,000 troops under the command of Lieutenant Field Marshal Anton Count Sztáray formed the southern flank. ### General engagement The general engagement on 25 March was brutal and bloody. Before daybreak, at close to 0500, Saint Cyr opened by sending his forces in a headlong attack on the Austrian right, coordinated with Souham and Ferino's assault on the Austrian left. The ferocious attack forced the Austrians out of the woods in which they had been positioned overnight, and down the road to the village of Schwandorf. Fearing that his forces would be flanked, Charles directed some reinforcements to back up General Mervelt's force on the Austrian right, six squadrons of lancers of the First Regiment. At this point, Vandamme's small corps, which had moved into position in the night of 24 March, attacked from the rear. Saint Cyr's forces had taken hold of the woods outside Stockach, named by the Austrians as the gruesome wood, with the conflict there described as "obstinate and bloody." The Archduke himself arrived with six battalions of Hungarian grenadiers and twelve squadrons of cuirassiers and led them into the fight. His grenadiers, experienced and battle-hardened, objected to his exposure and one actually grabbed the bridle of Charles' horse, to stop him. As the archduke prepared to dismount and lead his men on foot, Karl Aloys zu Fürstenberg stepped forward to volunteer, reportedly stating that he would die first, before allowing the archduke to put himself in such danger. As Karl Aloys Fürstenberg led the hussars and grenadiers into a counter-attack, he was hit by French case shot and killed. Archduke Charles eventually did lead his grenadiers, and the French momentum was not only arrested, but reversed. The Prince of Anhalt was also killed in the battle. Saint Cyr made no progress until Vandamme's assault, but both withered under the Archduke's response. In the melee, Claude Juste Alexandre Legrand, a general of brigade of Saint Cyr's III. Division, lost both his brother at his side, and his aide-de-camp, and Jourdan himself had barely escaped being trampled to death or captured, as he tried to rally his own troops. The superior number of Austrians stalled the main French assault on the Habsburg center. At the French right flank, General Ferino attempted to push the Austrians back, first with a cannonade, followed by an attack through the woods on both sides of the road between Asch and Stockach. Two columns made two attacks, both of which were repulsed; finally, Ferino added his third column to the assault, which resulted in the Austrian reformation of the line, cannons at the center firing a heavy cannonade. Ferino could not respond because he had run out of artillery ammunition. The French fixed bayonets and charged the village of Wahlwies, successfully taking it, but they were unable to hold it in the night, and subsequently fell back. ## Aftermath ### Withdrawal On the evening of 26 March, Jourdan arranged for the abandonment of the positions in Engen and Stockach. Saint Cyr had already withdrawn along the Danube, after his and Vandamme's assaults on the Austrian right failed, and was working his way west toward the Black Forest. Inexplicably, at least at the time, the Austrians failed to pursue the retreating French; instead of pursuing the French, Charles ordered his army into cantonments at Stockach and Engen, as far south as Wahlweiss. The Aulic Council, in establishing a plan of battle, had forbidden his approach to the Rhine until Switzerland was also cleared of the French army; Charles simply held his ground. By 31 March, the Army of the Danube established itself in Neustadt, Freiburg im Breisgau, Freudenstadt and Schiltach. Jourdan set up his command headquarters at Hornberg. The cavalry could not find enough forage in the mountains, and were sent to Offenburg. ## Interpretation Jourdan later claimed that the Austrians had lost 7,000 killed or wounded, plus another 4,000 prisoners, and several cannons. For the whole day of the general engagement, the French had remained on the field of battle without meat, bread or brandy, and their animals had been without forage: "it is impossible to deny," Jourdan wrote later, "without the most glaring injustice or falsehood, that we gained a victory." Both sides claimed a victory, but most 19th- and 20th-century historians granted it to the Austrian force. The French Directory did as well. In mid April, suffering from an nephritic complaint, Jourdan handed over command to his chief of staff, general of division Jean Augustin Ernouf, and returned to Paris to complain about the lack of men, the inexperience of the men he had, their supplies, and the size, experience, and supply of the army he had to face. He found little sympathy there, and when he told the Directory that he was ill, tendering his resignation, it was accepted. From exile on Elba fifteen years later, Napoleon analyzed the Battle of Stockach and the French defeat: its cause, he concluded, lay in Jourdan's division of force. Although Jourdan had increased concentration from his dispositions at Ostrach, the French force was still over-extended. Against a more concentrated force, the Austrians could not have moved troops from the left to reinforce the right flank when Saint Cyr and Vandamme attacked from front and rear. Furthermore, Napoleon averred, Ferino's force on the French right had not been concentrated sufficiently and d'Hautpoul's cavalry assault had taken too long to materialize, giving the Austrians the upper hand. The Austrian left had halted his assault, freeing men from the southern flank to reinforce the northern one. Importantly, the Austrian line was short enough that troops could move quickly from the southern flank to the northern one. Furthermore, Napoleon argued, Jourdan had retreated north-northwest, to the Black Forest to protect Alsace. He should have retreated south, to join with André Masséna's well-positioned Army of Helvetia, where in combination the Army of Helvetia and the Army of the Danube could have combined forces to defeat the Habsburg army. With Jourdan's misguided overall strategy, Napoleon asserted, the French snatched defeat from the jaws of victory.
30,403,508	2011 Cofidis season	1,141,362,504	2011 Cofidis season	[ "2011 in French sport", "2011 road cycling season by team", "Cofidis (cycling team)" ]	The 2011 season for the cycling team began in January at the Grand Prix d'Ouverture La Marseillaise and ended in October at Paris–Tours. Cofidis was a UCI Professional Continental team in 2011, meaning they had to be proactively selected by the organizers of UCI World Tour events, including each of the season's Grand Tours, if they were to compete. The team's most successful rider in 2011 was David Moncoutié. The veteran Frenchman won the Tour Méditerranéen and Tour de l'Ain overall crowns, as well as successes in the Vuelta a España. Moncoutié took a stage win and the King of the Mountains, each for the fourth straight year (a new record for the mountains title). Sprinter Samuel Dumoulin was also a prolific winner, winning six races. ## 2011 roster Ages as of 1 January 2011. Riders who joined the team for the 2011 season Riders who left the team during or after the 2010 season ## One-day races The team was active in races which preceded those known as "classics" and the traditional start of the spring season. At the Grand Prix d'Ouverture la Marseillaise, held in January as the first race of the season in France, El Fares rode to tenth place by finishing in the main field behind the solo winner. In February, Gallopin was the team's best finisher at two of the races in the Vuelta a Mallorca series, coming ninth at the unofficial Trofeo Palma de Mallorca and tenth at the Trofeo Inca. ### Spring classics Duque took a high placing at the Gran Premio dell'Insubria-Lugano, finishing just off the podium in fourth place, coming home in a group that trailed two leading riders. At Kuurne–Brussels–Kuurne, a race which included most of the sport's top teams, Petit finished ninth in a field sprint finish at the front of the race. Ista narrowly missed out on a victory at Le Samyn in early March. The race's top finishers came across the finish line scattered, in groups of eight or fewer. Ista finished second, alone, 8 seconds back of solo winner Dominic Klemme. Two weeks later, Keukeilere finished fourth in a sprint at Nokere Koerse. Gallopin finished on the podium at Cholet-Pays de Loire. 's Thomas Voeckler won the race with a late attack, with the peloton coming so close to catching him at the finish line that there was no time gap. Gallopin was first from the peloton for second overall. Vogondy rode to fourth place at the Route Adélie de Vitré, just missing the podium after figuring into a winning breakaway. The team picked up their first single-day win the same day as the more prestigious Tour of Flanders, in which they participated but were not especially competitive, with Duque in 19th their best finisher. The race they won was the inaugural Flèche d'Emeraude, a new race in the UCI Europe Tour and the French Road Cycling Cup. Gallopin came first at the head of a field sprint in Saint-Malo. Zingle figured into a winning breakaway at the Brabantse Pijl, the precursor to the Ardennes classics. He took seventh place, a minute and a half back of the winner Philippe Gilbert. Vogondy was sixth at the Tour du Finistère, finishing with a big main group behind two leaders. Demaret took the team's second single-day win at the Tartu GP in late May. He was the best of a five-rider breakaway at the front of the race, one which included teammate Taaramäe. That same day, Gallopin took sixth in a sprint finish to the Grand Prix de Plumelec-Morbihan. The team's last race of the early season was Halle–Ingooigem in June, where Sijmens rode to ninth place. The team was not especially competitive at the spring season's monument classics, coming in 37th at Milan–San Remo, 19th at the Tour of Flanders, 29th at Paris–Roubaix, and 57th at Liège–Bastogne–Liège. The team also sent squads to the Trofeo Laigueglia, Omloop Het Nieuwsblad, Gran Premio di Lugano, Les Boucles du Sud Ardèche, Dwars door Vlaanderen, E3 Prijs Vlaanderen – Harelbeke, Gent–Wevelgem, Scheldeprijs, Paris–Camembert, the Grand Prix de Denain, the Amstel Gold Race, Tro-Bro Léon, La Flèche Wallonne, the Eschborn–Frankfurt City Loop, and the Tallinn-Tartu GP, but finished no higher than 12th in any of these races. ### Fall races The team secured several high placings in the later season, but did not obtain any victories. In late July, the team took two of the top six placings at the Polynormande, with El Fares in second and Gallopin in sixth. El Fares had been part of a breakaway, and Gallopin first from the peloton four and a half minutes back. The result put Gallopin into the lead in the French Road Cycling Cup, the year-long competition among French single-day races where French riders, and those on French teams, can earn points. Cusin came eighth at the Tour du Doubs in September. Petit just missed out on the podium at the Grand Prix de Fourmies, finishing fourth in a large field sprint. He made the podium in a similar finish at Binche–Tournai–Binche in October, finishing third. Also in October, Dumoulin took ninth place at Paris–Bourges, from a selective sprint of ten riders. Duque was seventh in a leading group of thirteen at the Grand Prix de la Somme. Though he won only the one race, Gallopin's consistent high finishes in the French single-day races made him the overall victor of the season-long French Road Cycling Cup, which he clinched after the Tour de Vendée. The team sent squads to the Châteauroux Classic, the GP Ouest-France, Paris–Brussels, the Grand Prix Cycliste de Québec, the Grand Prix Cycliste de Montréal, the Grand Prix de Wallonie, the Tour de Vendée, and Paris–Tours, but finished no higher than 11th in any of these races. ## Stage races The team got their first win of the season, in their first stage race, at the Étoile de Bessèges. Dumoulin made a late selection in stage 3, joining nine other riders who finished just ahead of the rest of the peloton, and won the sprint to the finish line. Later in February, Moncoutié won the queen stage of the Tour Méditerranéen, finishing at Mont Faron. He had previously won stages there in 2003 and 2009, but his win this year was enough to win him the race overall thanks to his time gap. The squad also won the teams classification. Dumoulin took another win later in February, in the first stage of the two-day Tour du Haut Var. He stayed latched onto Rinaldo Nocentini's wheel during the stage's final climb, and came around him in the sprint. Taaramäe took fourth overall at Paris–Nice in March, winning the youth classification with this performance, which was easily the strongest for an Estonian rider in the event's history. Taaramäe turned in a similar strong ride at the two-day, three-stage Critérium International, finishing on the event's final podium in third place, and securing the youth classification. At the concurrent Volta a Catalunya, Dumoulin took two stage wins. The first was in stage 5, on an uphill false flat finish which Dumoulin felt suited him well. The second was more unexpected, in that it was a dead flat run in to the finish on wide roads, a more traditional field sprint. Dumoulin was delighted to win twice in front of some of the sport's biggest stars, and stated that his next goal would be a major spring classic, perhaps the Amstel Gold Race. Dumoulin, however, was not a factor at the Amstel, finishing 104th, over eight minutes behind the winner. In June, Maté won the final stage at the Route du Sud, coming best in a five-man breakaway sprint. Keukeleire, a prolific winner in his neo-pro season of 2010 but shut out in the first several months of 2011, took his first win of the year in July at the Tour of Austria. He won a selective sprint at the end of stage 3, finishing at the head of a 23-rider group that included the race's top riders. It was also in that stage that Edet took the lead in the mountains classification. He went on to win it at the end of the race, holding off 's Alexandre Geniez by a single point. The team took several wins in August. Dumoulin took a win in the first stage of Paris–Corrèze, breaking away near the end of the day to finish 4 seconds better than the main field. By finishing in the front group the next day, he secured overall victory in the two-day event. On the same day Dumoulin secured Paris–Corrèze, Cusin narrowly defeated 's Matti Breschel at the end of stage 2 at the Tour of Denmark. After laying 28 seconds down in the overall classification before the final day at the Tour de l'Ain, Moncoutié secured overall victory the next day. He missed out on the stage win to 's Thibaut Pinot, but by finishing only 3 seconds back he moved past previous race leader Wout Poels to win the event itself. Lastly, Gallopin took a stage at the Tour du Limousin. He took his second win of the season by breaking away from the peloton within stage's final kilometer, and holding on for first by 6 seconds. The team also sent squads to the Volta ao Algarve, Three Days of West Flanders, the Circuit de la Sarthe, the Presidential Cycling Tour of Turkey, Four Days of Dunkirk, the Circuit de Lorraine, the Tour of Belgium, the Critérium du Dauphiné, the Tour of Slovenia, the Eneco Tour, the Tour du Poitou Charentes, and Circuit Franco-Belge, but did not obtain a stage win, classification win, or podium finish in any of them. ## Grand Tours As a Professional Continental team, Cofidis needed to be selected by the organizers of any of the Grand Tours in order to participate. They were selected to ride the Tour de France and the Vuelta a España, but not the Giro d'Italia. ### Tour de France The Amaury Sport Organisation announced the wildcard entries to the Tour de France in January, much earlier in than in past years. Cofidis, who had participated in the Tour every year of their existence, were among the four teams added to the 18 UCI ProTeams obligated to attend. After not racing the Tour in 2010 and indicating at the time that he may not return to it, Moncoutié decided instead to ride the 2011 Tour with hopes of winning the King of the Mountains title. The decision put a bit of doubt to his potential return to the Vuelta a España, notwithstanding the team needing a wildcard for that race as well, in spite of his three-year string of winning the mountains classification at that race. Taaramäe, Dumoulin, El Fares, and Vogondy were also named to the squad. Taaramäe finished near the front of the race on stage 1 atop the short Mont des Alouettes hill. He was distanced by stage winner Philippe Gilbert and eventual Tour de France winner Cadel Evans, but finished with the main front group six seconds back for eighth on the day. The team had a very poor team time trial, coming in 21st. They were second to last, ahead of , who are renowned for having weak time trialists on their roster, and only by 2 seconds. The result dropped Taaramäe down to 66th place. The squad was mostly quiet in the first half of the Tour, with Gallopin taking fourth in a field sprint to finish stage 5 and Dumoulin tenth in stage 10 their best finishes. On stage 13 into Lourdes, which included a passage over the hors catégorie climb Col d'Aubisque, Moncoutié figured into a ten-man breakaway. Given the lack of overall threat in the group, the peloton did not mount a serious chase, meaning the stage winner would come from this group of ten. 's Jérémy Roy broke away from the group on the way up the climb. Moncoutié strenuously chased him, with Thor Hushovd following behind. The other breakaway riders all faded, finishing five minutes back on the stage. Roy crested the Aubisque first, and Moncoutié second. Hushovd, a rider known as a very strong descender, caught up with Moncoutié on the way down the Aubisque. With a short flat section still to race after the descent, Moncoutié and Hushovd worked cohesively as a chase group behind Roy. They caught and passed Roy 3 km (1.9 mi) from the end of the stage, and Hushovd eventually dropped Moncoutié as well to be the solo stage winner; Moncoutié finished second and Roy third. Moncoutié was roundly criticized by the French press for collaborating with Hushovd in the chase, with Roy (a fellow Frenchman) up the road. To that point in the Tour, no French rider had yet won a stage. Team manager Boyer defended Moncoutié, saying Hushovd was likely to surpass Roy and win any sprint at the end of the stage no matter what, and by working with him Moncoutié assured himself second place rather than falling to third. Taaramäe took over the white jersey for best young rider from Rigoberto Urán on stage 18. Urán finished a distant 27th on the day, seven minutes off the pace of stage winner Andy Schleck. Taaramäe's eighth place, three minutes back of Schleck but four minutes the better of Urán, moved him into 11th place overall and into the best young rider's position, by 33 seconds over Pierre Rolland. Rolland won the stage at Alpe d'Huez the next day, with Taaramäe finishing 14th two minutes back. This gave Rolland an advantage of a minute and 33 seconds going into the stage 20 individual time trial, where Taaramäe's skills are superior. Taaramäe indeed finished better than Rolland in the time trial, tenth to Rolland's 21st, but gained only 48 seconds. This was insufficient to win back the white jersey before the final, largely ceremonial stage into Paris on the Tour's final day. Taaramäe finished the Tour in 12th place overall, at a deficit of eleven and a half minutes to Tour champion Cadel Evans. Moncoutié was not a major factor in any classification, finishing 41st overall and 25th in the mountains classification. Given his result at just 24 years of age, and that he retains eligibility for the white jersey in the 2012 Tour de France, Boyer expressed that he was quite pleased with Taaramäe's performance, and that he expected the Estonian to be a contender for the overall podium at the Tour within two or three years. ### Vuelta a España Cofidis was one of the four wildcard entries to the Vuelta a España. After a disappointing Tour de France, Moncoutié decided to ride the Vuelta in hopes of capturing his fourth consecutive King of the Mountains jersey at the Spanish Grand Tour, which would be a new record. While he had entered 2011 thinking it would likely be his last season as a professional rider, Moncoutié changed his mind about that as well and said he would "probably be part of the bunch in 2012." Taaramäe was also named to the team for the Vuelta. The squad did slightly better in the stage 1 team time trial than they did in the equivalent stage at the Tour de France, coming 17th of 22 teams. Moncoutié secured a high placing on stage 6, coming in ninth on the day with the lead chase group that finished behind four riders at the head of the race. Taaramäe climbed with the race's best riders on stage 9, coming in seventh on La Covatilla. However, he was not any sort of overall threat – he was already over an hour down in the overall standings, having been in breakaways in stages 4, 6, and 8 which did not succeed and lost considerable time to the stage winner each day. Moncoutié participated in a winning breakaway in stage 11. Some 19 km (12 mi) from the end of the stage, which concluded on a climb at Estación de Montaña Manzaneda, Moncoutié set out on a solo attack to win the stage. The attack was successful, and the veteran Frenchman won a Vuelta stage for the fourth consecutive year. He said after the stage that he rued falling short at Sierra Nevada, and had studied this course profile carefully to know when to attack to get away for victory. The result also moved Moncoutié up to second in the mountains classification, just a single point behind 's Matteo Montaguti. He took the jersey two days later on stage 13 by joining another winning breakaway. Montaguti had also made the breakaway, but he was unable to stay at the front of the race all day. Moncoutié took two second places and one win on the final three climbs of the day, resulting in a 12-point lead over Montaguti in the classification. The next day was another good one for the team. Taaramäe made the morning breakaway and held off the race's top riders as they neared the front of the race. He held on for victory atop La Farrapona by 25 seconds ahead of eventual Vuelta champion Juan José Cobo in second, as all other members of the breakaway finished well back. Moncoutié all but clinched his mountains classification triumph on stage 15. While he finished nine minutes behind Cobo on Angliru, he won the day's second climb to score ten mountain points and increase his lead over Montaguti to 22 points. He scored his final mountain classification points on stage 17, ending with a total of 63. Montaguti nearly reclaimed the jersey on stage 18, when he made a breakaway and Moncoutié did not. Fortunately for Moncoutié, teammate Sijmens had made the escape group and kept Montaguti from maximum points on four of the five climbs. Given that riders who are not involved in a classification nor have teammates that are will generally not ride against someone who is, Sijmens' presence in this breakaway was effectively the only way Moncoutié could have retained the jersey. Moncoutié continued to lead Montaguti, by a score of 63–56. Neither rider scored again, and Moncoutié won his fourth consecutive mountains title, a first in Vuelta history. He was the team's best overall finisher as well, but was not any real threat, coming in 37th overall at a deficit of over an hour to Cobo. Taaramäe, for his part, did not complete the Vuelta, abandoning on stage 17. ## Season victories ## National, Continental and World champions
3,254,017	Puff adder	1,153,916,056	Species of highly venomous snake	[ "Articles containing video clips", "Bitis", "Reptiles described in 1820", "Reptiles of Ethiopia", "Reptiles of North Africa", "Reptiles of Uganda", "Snakes of Africa", "Taxa named by Blasius Merrem" ]	The puff adder (Bitis arietans) is a viper species found in savannahs and grasslands from Morocco and western Arabia throughout Africa except for the Sahara and rainforest regions. It is responsible for causing the most snakebite fatalities in Africa owing to various factors, such as its wide distribution, frequent occurrence in highly populated regions, and aggressive disposition. Like all other vipers, it is venomous. Two subspecies are currently recognized, including the nominate subspecies described here. The species is commonly known as the puff adder, African puff adder, or common puff adder. ## Taxonomy German naturalist Blasius Merrem described the puff adder in 1820. The word arietans means "striking violently" and is derived from the Latin arieto. The type locality given is "Promontorio bonae spei" (Cape of Good Hope), South Africa. ### Subspecies ## Description The snake's typical size is about 1.0 m (39.3 in) in total length (body and tail) and very stout. Large specimens of 190 cm (75 in) total length, weighing over 6.0 kg (13.2 lb) and with a girth of 40 cm (16 in) have been reported. Specimens from Saudi Arabia are not as large, usually no more than 80 cm (31 in) in total length. Males are usually larger than females and have relatively longer tails. The color pattern varies geographically. The head has two well-marked dark bands – one on the crown and the other between the eyes. On the sides of the head, two oblique, dark bands or bars run from the eye to the supralabials. Below, the head is yellowish white with scattered dark blotches. Iris color ranges from gold to silver-gray. Dorsally, the ground color varies from straw yellow, to light brown, to orange or reddish brown. This is overlaid with a pattern of 18–22 backwardly directed, dark brown to black bands that extend down the back and tail. Usually, these bands are roughly chevron-shaped, but may be more U-shaped in some areas. They also form two to six light-and-dark cross-bands on the tail. Some populations are heavily flecked with brown and black, often obscuring other coloration, giving the animal a dusty-brown or blackish appearance. The belly is yellow or white, with a few scattered dark spots. Newborn young have golden head markings with pinkish to reddish ventral plates toward the lateral edges. One unusual specimen, described by Branch and Farrell (1988), from Summer Pride, East London, in South Africa, was striped. The pattern consisted of a narrow (one scale wide), pale yellowish stripe that ran from the crown of the head to the tip of the tail. Generally, though, these are relatively dull-looking snakes, except for male specimens from highland East Africa and the Western Cape province of South Africa, that usually have a striking yellow-and-black color pattern. Puff adders have a form of olfactory crypsis which has been shown to make detecting them difficult for trained dogs and meerkats, both scent-based predators. The exact nature of this ability is not known, but is hypothesized to be related to a low metabolic rate, as well as relocation after shedding and defecating. ### Scalation The head has a less than triangular shape with a blunt and rounded snout. Still, the head is much wider than the neck. The rostral scale is small. The circumorbital ring consists of 10–16 scales. Across the top of the head, there are 7–11 interocular scales; three or four scales separate the suboculars and the supralabials. It has 12 to 17 supralabials and 13–17 sublabials. The first three or four sublabials contact the chin shields, of which only one pair exists. Often, two fangs are on each maxilla, and both can be functional. Midbody, the snake has 29–41 rows of dorsal scales. These are strongly keeled except for the outermost rows. The ventral scale count is 123–147, the subcaudals number 14–38. Females have no more than 24 subcaudals. The anal scale is single. ## Distribution and habitat This species may be the most common and widespread snake in Africa. It is found in most of sub-Saharan Africa south to the Cape of Good Hope, including southern Morocco, Mauritania, Senegal, Mali, southern Algeria, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Côte d'Ivoire, Ghana, Togo, Benin, Niger, Nigeria, Chad, Sudan, Cameroon, the Central African Republic, northern, eastern, and southern Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda, Kenya, Somalia, Rwanda, Burundi, Tanzania, Angola, Zambia, Malawi, Mozambique, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Namibia, and South Africa. It also occurs on the Arabian Peninsula, where it is found in southwestern Saudi Arabia and Yemen. It is found in all habitats except true deserts, rainforests, and (tropical) alpine habitats. It is most often associated with rocky grasslands. It is not found in rainforest areas, such as along the coast of West Africa and in Central Africa (i.e., central DR Congo); it is also absent from the Mediterranean coastal region of North Africa. On the Arabian Peninsula, it is found as far north as Ta'if. It has been reported to be found in the Dhofar region of southern Oman. ## Behaviour Normally a sluggish species, the puff adder relies on camouflage for protection. Locomotion is primarily rectilinear, using the broad ventral scales in a caterpillar fashion and aided by its own weight for traction. When agitated, it can resort to a typical serpentine movement of surprising speed. Although mainly terrestrial, these snakes are good swimmers and can also climb with ease; often they are found basking in low bushes. One specimen was found 4.6 m above the ground in a densely branched tree. If disturbed, they hiss loudly and continuously, adopting a tightly coiled defensive posture with the forepart of their body held in a taut "S" shape. At the same time, they may attempt to back away from the threat towards cover. They may strike suddenly and fast, to the side as easily as forwards, before returning quickly to the defensive position, ready to strike again. During a strike, the force of the impact is so strong, and the long fangs penetrate so deeply, that prey items are often killed by the physical trauma alone. The fangs apparently can penetrate soft leather. They can strike to a distance of about one-third of their body length, but juveniles can launch their entire bodies forwards in the process. These snakes rarely grip their victims, but instead release quickly to return to the striking position. ## Feeding Mostly nocturnal, they rarely forage actively, preferring, instead, to ambush prey as it happens by. Their prey includes mammals, birds, amphibians, and lizards. ## Reproduction `Females produce a pheromone to attract males, which engage in neck-wrestling combat dances. A female in Malindi was followed by seven males. They give birth to large numbers of offspring; litters over 80 have been reported, while 50–60 are not unusual. Newborns are 12.5–17.5 cm in length. Very large specimens, particularly those from East Africa, give birth to the highest numbers of offspring. A Kenyan female in a Czech zoo gave birth to 156 young, the largest litter for any species of snake.` ## Captivity These snakes do well in captivity, but gluttony has been reported. Kauffeld (1969) mentions that specimens can be maintained for years on only one meal per week, but that when offered all they can eat, the result is often death, or at best wholesale regurgitation. They are bad-tempered snakes, and some specimens never settle down in captivity, always hissing and puffing when approached. ## Venom This species is responsible for more snakebite fatalities than any other African snake, due to a combination of factors, including its wide distribution, common occurrence, large size, potent venom that is produced in large amounts, long fangs, and their habit of basking by footpaths and sitting quietly when approached. The venom has cytotoxic effects and is one of the most toxic of any vipers based on LD<sub>50</sub>. The values in mice vary: 0.4–2.0 mg/kg intravenously, 0.9–3.7 mg/kg peritoneally, and 4.4–7.7 mg/kg subcutaneously (SC). Mallow et al. (2003) give an LD<sub>50</sub> range of 1.0–7.75 mg/kg SC. Venom yield is typically 150–350 mg, with a maximum of 750 mg. Brown (1973) mentions a venom yield of 180–750 mg. About 100 mg are thought to be enough to kill a healthy adult human male, with death occurring after 25 hours. In humans, bites from this species can produce severe local and systemic symptoms. Based on the degree and type of local effect, bites can be divided into two symptomatic categories – those with little or no surface extravasation, and those with hemorrhages evident as ecchymosis, bleeding, and swelling. In both cases, severe pain and tenderness occur, but in the latter, widespread superficial or deep necrosis and compartment syndrome are seen. Serious bites cause limbs to become immovably flexed as a result of significant hemorrhage or coagulation in the affected muscles. Residual induration, however, is rare and usually these areas completely resolve. Other bite symptoms that may occur in humans include edema, which may become extensive, shock, watery blood oozing from the puncture wounds, nausea and vomiting, subcutaneous bruising, blood blisters that may form rapidly, and painful swelling of the regional lymph nodes. Swelling usually decreases after a few days, except for the area immediately around the bite site. Hypotension, together with weakness, dizziness, and periods of semi- or unconsciousness is also reported. If not treated carefully, necrosis will spread, causing skin, subcutaneous tissue, and muscle to separate from healthy tissue and eventually slough with serous exudate. The slough may be superficial or deep, sometimes down to the bone. Gangrene and secondary infections commonly occur and can result in loss of digits and limbs. The fatality rate highly depends on the severity of the bites and some other factors. Deaths can be exceptional and probably occur in less than 15% of all untreated cases (usually in 2–4 days from complications following blood volume deficit and disseminated intravascular coagulation), although some reports show that severe envenomations have a 52% mortality rate. Most fatalities are associated with poor clinical management and neglect.
36,329,023	Can't Stop Won't Stop (Usher song)	1,166,129,791	Song performed by Usher	[ "2012 songs", "Eurodance songs", "Song recordings produced by Keith Harris (record producer)", "Song recordings produced by will.i.am", "Songs written by Billy Joel", "Songs written by Keith Harris (record producer)", "Songs written by will.i.am", "Usher (musician) songs" ]	"Can't Stop Won't Stop" is a song recorded by American recording artist Usher for his seventh studio album Looking 4 Myself (2012). Written and produced by Will "will.i.am" Adams and Keith Harris, the song contains an interpolation of the bridge to Billy Joel's 1983 hit single "Uptown Girl". Musically, "Can't Stop Won't Stop" is a eurodance and dance-pop song that incorporates elements of dubstep. "Can't Stop Won't Stop" received generally mixed reviews from music critics, who praised the song's production, but dismissed its lyrics. Additionally, similarities between "Can't Stop Won't Stop" and Usher's 2010 single "OMG" were noted. Upon the release of Looking 4 Myself, the song debuted at number 22 on the South Korea Gaon International Chart, with sales of 9,374 digital copies. ## Background "Can't Stop Won't Stop" was written by William M. Joel, Keith Harris and William Adams. The production of the song was helmed by Harris and Adams under his stage name will.i.am. Adams had previously written and produced Usher's 2010 single "OMG". "Can't Stop Won't Stop" contains a portion of Joel's single "Uptown Girl" (An Innocent Man, 1983). Mark "Exit" Goodchild recorded the song at Glenwood Place Studios in Burbank, while Jacob Dennis served as recording assistant. It was mixed by Dylan "3-D" Dresdow at Paper V.U. Studios North Hollywood with Jaime Martinez serving as a mixing assistant. The track's producers Harris and Adams provided the complete instrumentation of "Can't Stop Won't Stop". ## Composition "Can't Stop Won't Stop" is a eurodance and pop-dance song that incorporates dubstep elements. According to Carrie Battan of Pitchfork Media, "even though the track opens builds like a throwaway Eurodance arena anthem, but instead of exploding into oblivion after the breakdown it splits into a fizzy and wonky slap of a beat." Ryan Hadfield of Time wrote that, "'Can't Stop Won't Stop' and 'Scream' are aggressively seductive club songs" and drew comparisons to Usher's single "Yeah!" (Confessions, 2004) and his collaboration with French disk jockey David Guetta entitled "Without You" (Nothing but the Beat, 2011). Jody Rosen writing for Slate argued the song has its foundations on a "pummeling 4/4 dance beat behind a synthesizer refrain borrowed from Billy Joel's "Uptown Girl"." Billboard'''s Erika Ramirez concluded that "Can't Stop Won't Stop" is built around "synth-heavy hook". Lyrically, the track regards the subject of sex. It tries to be a club jam by asking the listener to turn the volume up, "on the off chance that the record reaches the antennae of an extraterrestrial", with its opening lines: "Hey what's up / This is a jam, turn it up / Play it loud in the club / This is fire, burning it up".Unterberger noted that the lines "I don't want to do all the normal things / That all these other normal dudes do" could be the inspiration for the title of the album and its "thesis statement", while Rosen thought they could also "be describing Usher's career trajectory". Ramirez was critical towards its "mediocre lyricism". ## Critical reception "Can't Stop Won't Stop" received generally mixed review from music critics. Nathan S. of DJ Booth stated that "Can't Stop Won't Stop" would be shocking to a "My Way-era Usher", but "coming from a man who's [sic] last huge hit was OMG, it's really nothing new". Sobhi Youssef of Sputnikmusic praised the song's productions, but dismissed its "truly cliched lyrics". Erika Ramirez of Billboard stated that the song "simply sets the stage for better tracks to come". Eric Henderson of Slant Magazine wrote a negative review of the song, calling it "yet another dispiritingly hollow attempted revver-upper in the Pitbull/LMFAO mode". He also criticized the song's interpolation from "Uptown Girl." Killian Fox of The Guardian called the song "horribly overblown", while Trent of the Lava Lizard labelled the song as "forgettable". Brad Wete of Complex disagreed, calling the song, along with "Lemme See", a "gem". Andrew Unterberger of Popdust called the song "not exactly single-worthy material", being "a hobbled-together bunch of musical cliches, where David Guetta stadium house beats meets Skrillex wub-wubs, like the brainchild of the most uncreative EDM think tank possible." According to Unterberger, the lyrics are "even more hackneyed", with its "Kardashian-worthy opening lines" Evan Rytlewski of The A.V. Club both "Can't Stop Won't Stop" and "Scream" as two "overinflated dance numbers" that open the album on a "discouragingly perfunctory note". He concluded by stating that: "If there's a bright spot to either, it's that they forgo the garish auto-tune of Usher's previous dance forays, so at least his whole register comes across cleanly." ## Credits and personnel Recording and mixing - Recorded at Glenwood Place Studios, Burbank, California; mixed at Paper V.U. Studios North Hollywood, California Personnel - Songwriting – William M. Joel, Keith Harris, William Adams - Production – Keith Harris, will.i.am - Mixing – Dylan "3-D" Dresdow - Mixing assistant – Jaime Martinez - Recording – Mark "Exit" Goodchild - Recording assistants – Jacob Dennis - Instrumentation – Keith Harris, will.i.am Credits adapted from the liner notes of Looking 4 Myself, RCA Records. ## Chart Upon the release of Looking 4 Myself'', due to digital downloads "Can't Stop Won't Stop" debuted on the singles chart in South Korea. It debuted on the South Korea Gaon International Chart at number 22 on June 10, 2012, with sales of 9,374 digital copies. The next week, the song sold an additional 3,593 copies and fell to number 78.
216,072	Home Alone	1,173,601,536	1990 film directed by Chris Columbus	[ "1990 comedy films", "1990 films", "1990s American films", "1990s Christmas comedy films", "1990s English-language films", "1990s crime comedy films", "20th Century Fox films", "American Christmas comedy films", "American children's comedy films", "American crime comedy films", "Burglary in film", "Compositions by Leslie Bricusse", "Films about mother–son relationships", "Films about vacationing", "Films directed by Chris Columbus", "Films involved in plagiarism controversies", "Films produced by John Hughes (filmmaker)", "Films scored by John Williams", "Films set in 1990", "Films set in Chicago", "Films set in Illinois", "Films set in Paris", "Films set in Pennsylvania", "Films shot in Illinois", "Films with screenplays by John Hughes (filmmaker)", "Home Alone (franchise)", "Home invasions in film" ]	Home Alone is a 1990 American Christmas comedy film directed by Chris Columbus and written and produced by John Hughes. The first film in the Home Alone franchise, the film stars Macaulay Culkin, Joe Pesci, Daniel Stern, John Heard, and Catherine O'Hara. Culkin plays Kevin McCallister, a boy who defends his suburban Chicago home from a home invasion after his family accidentally leaves him behind on their Christmas vacation to Paris. Hughes conceived Home Alone while on vacation, with Warner Bros. being originally intended to finance and distribute the film. However, Warner Bros. shut down production after it exceeded its assigned budget. 20th Century Fox assumed responsibilities following secret meetings with Hughes. Columbus and Culkin were hired soon afterwards. Filming took place between February and May 1990 on location across Illinois. Home Alone premiered in Chicago on November 10, 1990, and was theatrically released in the United States on November 16. While the film's reception was initially mixed, in later years reception has been generally positive, with praise for its cast, humor, and music. Home Alone grossed \$476.7 million worldwide, becoming the highest-grossing live-action comedy until the release of The Hangover Part II (2011), and made Culkin a child star. Moreover, it was the second-highest-grossing film of 1990, behind Ghost. It was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy, and Best Actor in a Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy for Culkin, and for the Academy Award for Best Original Score for John Williams, and Best Original Song for "Somewhere in My Memory". Home Alone has since been considered one of the best Christmas films. A sequel, Home Alone 2: Lost in New York, was released in 1992. ## Plot The McCallister family is preparing to spend Christmas in Paris, gathering at Kate and Peter's home in a Chicago suburb on the night before their departure. Kate and Peter's youngest son, Kevin, is frequently ridiculed by his cousins and siblings, particularly his older brother Buzz. Kevin inadvertently ruins the family dinner after a brief scuffle with Buzz, in which Kevin's airplane ticket is accidentally thrown away, resulting in Kate sending him up to the attic. Kevin berates his mother for allowing the rest of the family to pick on him and wishes that his family would disappear. During the night, heavy winds cause a power outage, disabling the alarm clocks and causing the family to oversleep. In the confusion and rush to get to the airport, Kevin is accidentally left behind. Kevin wakes to find the house empty and the family's cars still in the garage, unaware that they had rented vans to take them to the airport. Thinking that his wish has come true, he is overjoyed with his newfound freedom. Later, Kevin becomes frightened by his next-door neighbor, "Old Man" Marley, who is rumored to be a serial killer who murdered his family. The McCallister home is soon targeted by the "Wet Bandits", Harry Lyme and Marv Murchins, a pair of burglars who have been breaking into other vacant houses in the neighborhood. Kevin tricks them into thinking that his family is still home, forcing them to postpone their plans to rob the McCallister home. Kate realizes mid-flight that Kevin was left behind, and upon arrival in Paris, the family discovers that all flights for the next two days are booked, and that the phone lines are still down back home in Chicago. Peter and the rest of the family stay in his brother's apartment in Paris, while Kate, fearing for Kevin's safety, manages to get a flight back to Scranton, Pennsylvania. She tries to find a flight to Chicago, but all the flights are booked. Kate is overheard by Gus Polinski, the lead member of a traveling polka band, who offers to let her travel with them to Chicago in a moving van. Meanwhile, on Christmas Eve, Harry and Marv finally realize that only Kevin is in the McCallister home, and Kevin overhears them discussing plans to break into the house that night. Kevin starts to miss his family and asks the local Santa Claus impersonator if he could bring his family back for Christmas. He goes to church and watches a choir perform, eventually re-encountering Marley, who disproves the rumors about him. Marley points out his granddaughter in the choir and mentions he otherwise would not get to see her since she is the daughter of his estranged son. Kevin suggests to Marley that he should reconcile with his son. Kevin returns home and rigs the house with booby traps. Harry and Marv break in, spring the traps, and suffer various injuries. While Harry and Marv pursue Kevin around the house, he calls the police and lures the duo into a vacant neighboring house that they had previously broken into. Harry and Marv ambush Kevin and prepare to get their revenge, but Marley intervenes and knocks them out with his snow shovel. The police arrive and arrest Harry and Marv, having identified all the houses that they broke into due to Marv's habit of flooding them. On Christmas Day, Kevin is initially disappointed to find that his family is still gone, but Kate arrives home, and they reconcile. The rest of the family then returns after waiting in Paris until they could obtain a direct flight to Chicago. Kevin keeps silent about his encounter with Harry and Marv, although Peter finds Harry's knocked-out gold tooth. Kevin then watches Marley reuniting with his son, daughter-in-law, and granddaughter. ## Cast ## Production ### Development Writer and producer John Hughes conceived Home Alone while preparing to go on vacation. He said: "I was going away on vacation, and making a list of everything I didn't want to forget. I thought, 'Well, I'd better not forget my kids.' Then I thought, 'What if I left my 10-year-old son at home? What would he do?'" Hughes wrote eight pages of notes that developed into the screenplay. Imagining that children are naturally most scared of robbers, Hughes also worked that aspect into the plot of the film. Home Alone was initially set to be financed and distributed by Warner Bros. Hughes promised that he could make the movie for less than \$10 million, considerably less than most feature film production budgets of that era. Concerned that the film might exceed that amount, Hughes met secretly with 20th Century Fox before production to see if they would fund the project if Warner proved inflexible. According to executive producer Scott Rosenfelt, a copy of the script was "clandestinely" delivered to Fox, bypassing the legal restrictions that would have otherwise prevented Fox from seeing it until the project was in turnaround. Early in production, the budget grew to \$14.7 million. Warner demanded that it be cut by \$1.2 million; the producers responded with a memo arguing that the budget could not be cut any further. Unconvinced, Warner shut down production the next day, but it quickly resumed when Fox took up Hughes on his offer. The final budget grew to \$18 million. Hughes had asked Patrick Read Johnson to direct, but he was committed to directing Spaced Invaders. He turned to Chris Columbus, who had left National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation before shooting started because of a personality clash with starring actor Chevy Chase, who Columbus said treated him "like dirt". Hughes gave him the scripts for both Home Alone and Reach the Rock; Columbus chose to direct Home Alone, as he found it funnier and liked the Christmas theme. Columbus did an uncredited rewrite of the script, which included the character Old Man Marley. He added the character to give the story a more serious layer, as well as a more emotional, happier ending. ### Casting Hughes suggested to Columbus that they cast Macaulay Culkin as Kevin, because of his experience while shooting Uncle Buck. Columbus met with 200 other actors for the part, as he felt it was his "directorial responsibility". John Mulaney was asked to audition for the role of Kevin after being scouted in a children's sketch comedy group, but his parents refused the opportunity. Columbus finally met with Culkin and agreed he was the right choice. After Robert De Niro and Jon Lovitz turned down the role of Harry, Joe Pesci accepted it. The role of Uncle Frank was written for Kelsey Grammer, but was given to Gerry Bamman when Grammer was unavailable. Daniel Stern was cast as Marv, but before shooting started, he was told that the production schedule had been extended from six weeks to eight. He dropped out after as he would not be paid more for the extended schedule. Daniel Roebuck was hired to replace him, but after two days of rehearsal, Columbus felt he was lacking chemistry with Pesci and brought back Stern. Roebuck later said that, although he was upset to be fired from the production, he now believed the experience was "a little blip of unimportance". Chris Farley auditioned for the role of the Santa Claus impersonator, but he failed to impress Columbus. John Candy was available for only one day to film his scenes, which took 23 hours to shoot. He was paid only \$414, since he did the film as a favor to Hughes. In return, he was the only actor Hughes allowed to go off-script; according to Columbus, all his dialogue was improvised. ### Filming Principal photography took place from February 14, 1990, to May 8, 1990, over a course of 83 days on an \$18.3 million budget. The house exterior scenes were filmed on location at a three-story single-family house located at 671 Lincoln Avenue in the North Shore village of Winnetka, Illinois, where Hughes' previous films Breakfast Club, Ferris Bueller's Day Off, Sixteen Candles, Planes, Trains and Automobiles, She's Having a Baby, and Uncle Buck had also been shot. The only interiors of the house used for filming that made it to the film were the main staircase, basement, attic and most of the first floor landing, while all the other interiors of the house (including the aforementioned rooms) were duplicated on a sound stage to allow more room for equipment and crew. It was built in the gym and empty swimming pool of New Trier High School's former campus, previously used by Hughes for Uncle Buck and Ferris Bueller's Day Off, where the production company had already set up its offices. The house later became a tourist attraction. The tree house in the back yard was built specifically for the film and dismantled after filming ended. Kevin runs away from his third encounter with Marley in Hubbard Woods Park in Winnetka. In addition, the scene where Kevin wades in his neighbor's flooded basement was shot at another swimming pool of the aforementioned former campus of New Trier High School, with the airplane cabin interiors built on the basketball courts. The church exteriors were shot at Trinity United Methodist Church in Wilmette, Illinois, while the interiors were shot at Grace Episcopal Church in Oak Park, Illinois. Filming also took place over four sixteen-hour days at O'Hare International Airport, which served for both itself and Orly Airport in Paris. John Candy filmed his cameo appearance for the film over the course of one day at Meigs Field. For the film within a film, Angels with Filthy Souls (the title of which parodies the 1938 crime film Angels with Dirty Faces), shooting took only one day, on the final "test day" prior to the official start of principal photography. To create the illusion that the film was an authentic 1940s gangster film, the scene was filmed on black-and-white negative film, and Johnny's office featured props from that era. Like much of the film, most of the sequence was shot with low, wide angles that, according to journalist Darryn King, "capture the action as if a child were perceiving it". Originally, Ralph Foody was to play Snakes and Michael Guido was to play Johnny, but since Foody had recently undergone knee replacement surgery, he was unable to do the death scene where Snakes drops to his knees, leading to the roles being switched. Cinematographer Julio Macat recalled that Pesci was more difficult to work with than Culkin. The older actor believed some of the dialogue was not of a quality commensurate with his acting ability. He also resented the early unit calls, since they prevented him from starting his day with nine holes of golf as he preferred to do. After he took the assistant director by the collar one day to complain about this, daily call times were moved back from 7 to 9 a.m. to accommodate his rounds. On the other end of the schedule, the crew had limited time to film the many nighttime scenes, since Culkin could not work any later than 10 p.m. due to his age. Pesci said in a 2022 interview with People of working with Culkin, "I intentionally limited my interactions with him to preserve the dynamic" and made sure not "to come across on the screen that we were in any way friendly" in order to "maintain the integrity of the adversarial relationship." On the set, Pesci and Stern both had difficulty refraining from cursing, which became annoying to Pesci, since Culkin was on set as well. In fact, the only curse words that made it into the film were "shit", accidentally said by Daniel Stern when his shoe fell through the pet door, and "hell", which was said by both Pesci and Stern after their characters encounter one another after going through Kevin's booby traps and by Johnny to the character of Snakes in Angels with Filthy Souls. Pesci's use of "cartoon cursing", or menacing gibberish, garnered comparisons to Looney Tunes character Yosemite Sam. The film's stunts also created tension for the crew during shooting. Columbus said, "Every time the stunt guys did one of those stunts it wasn't funny. We'd watch it, and I would just pray that the guys were alive." Stunts were originally prepared with safety harnesses, but because of their visibility on camera, the film's final stunts were performed without them. Troy Brown and Leon Delaney were stuntmen for Pesci and Stern, respectively. An injury had occurred between Pesci and Culkin during one of the rehearsals for the scene in which Harry tries to bite off Kevin's finger. Culkin still has the scar. The tarantula that walks on Stern's face was real. Senta Moses, who played Tracy, recalled in 2020 that one of the most difficult scenes to shoot was the family's run through O'Hare International Airport to catch their flight. While it does not last long, it required several days to film. "There were thousands of extras, all expertly choreographed so none of us would be in danger running at full speed through the American Airlines terminal", she told The Hollywood Reporter. "And we ran at full speed. Sometimes we'd bump into each other, like a multi-car pileup on the expressway, and just crack up laughing ... There were so many setups and narrowly missed moments of disaster, but to my knowledge, no one got hurt." ## Music Columbus initially hoped to have Bruce Broughton score the film, and early posters listed him as the composer. However, Broughton was busy with The Rescuers Down Under, and he had to cancel at the last minute. Columbus was later able to get in touch with Steven Spielberg, who helped him contact John Williams to produce the final score. Traditional Christmas songs, such as "O Holy Night" and "Carol of the Bells", are featured prominently in the film, as well as the film's theme song "Somewhere in My Memory". The soundtrack was released by Sony Classical Records on cassette on December 4, 1990, and on CD on May 27, 2015. ## Release ### Theatrical Home Alone premiered in Chicago on November 10, 1990. It was given a wide release on November 16, 1990. ### Home media Home Alone was first released by Fox Video on VHS and LaserDisc in the United States on August 22, 1991, their first video to go direct to sell-through rather than to the video rental market first. It sold 11 million copies, generating Fox revenue of \$150 million making it, along with E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, the highest-selling video of all time at that point. Due to the sales, the film did not perform as well in the rental market. It was later released on DVD on October 5, 1999, as a basic package. The film was released on Blu-ray on December 2, 2008, titled Family Fun Edition, and was released alongside Home Alone 2: Lost in New York in a collection pack on October 5, 2010. The film was reissued again on DVD and Blu-ray on October 6, 2015, alongside all four of its sequels in a box set titled Home Alone: 25th Anniversary Ultimate Collector's Christmas Edition. On September 15, 2020, Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment and 20th Century Studios Home Entertainment released Home Alone on Ultra HD Blu-ray in time for its 30th anniversary in the United States. ## Reception ### Box office Home Alone grossed \$285.8 million in the United States and Canada and \$190.9 million in other countries for a worldwide total of \$476.7 million, against a production budget of \$18 million. In its opening weekend, Home Alone grossed \$17 million from 1,202 theaters, averaging \$14,211 per site and just 6% of the final total and added screens over the next six weeks, with a peak screen count of 2,174 during its eighth weekend at the start of January 1991. Home Alone was the number-one film at the box office for 12 consecutive weeks, from its release weekend of November 16–18, 1990 through the weekend of February 1–3, 1991. It was removed from the top spot when Sleeping with the Enemy opened with \$13 million. It remained in the top ten until the weekend of April 26, well past Easter weekend. It made two more appearances in the top ten (the weekend of May 31 – June 2 and the weekend of June 14–16) before finally falling out of the top ten. After over nine months into its run, the film had earned 16x its debut weekend and ended up making a final gross of \$285,761,243, the top-grossing film of its year in North America. The film is listed in the Guinness World Records as the highest-grossing live-action comedy ever and held the record until it was overtaken by The Hangover Part II in 2011. By the time the film had run its course in theaters, Home Alone was the third-highest-grossing film of all time worldwide, as well as in the United States and Canada behind only Star Wars (\$322 million at the time) and E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (\$399 million at the time), according to the home video box. Box Office Mojo estimates that the film sold over 67.7 million tickets in the United States. It was also the highest-grossing Christmas film until it was surpassed by Dr. Seuss' The Grinch in 2018. The film made Culkin a child star. ### Critical response On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 66% based on 62 reviews, with an average rating of 5.8/10. The website's critical consensus reads, "Home Alone's uneven but frequently funny premise stretched unreasonably thin is buoyed by Macaulay Culkin's cute performance and strong supporting stars." On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 63 out of 100 based on nine critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale. Variety magazine praised the film for its cast. Jeanne Cooper of The Washington Post praised the film for its comedic approach. Hal Hinson, also of The Washington Post, praised Columbus' direction and Culkin's performance. Although Caryn James of The New York Times complained that the film's first half is "flat and unsurprising as its cute little premise suggests", she praised the second half for its slapstick humor. She also praised the dialogue between Kevin and Marley, as well as the film's final scenes. Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film a 2+1⁄2 out of a 4-star rating and 2 thumbs down. He compared the elaborate booby-traps in the film to Rube Goldberg machines, writing "they're the kinds of traps that any 8-year-old could devise, if he had a budget of tens of thousands of dollars and the assistance of a crew of movie special effects people" and criticized the plot as "so implausible that it makes it hard for [him] to really care about the plight of the kid [Kevin]". However, he praised Culkin's performance. Owen Gleiberman of Entertainment Weekly magazine gave the film a "D" grade, criticizing the film for its "sadistic festival of adult-bashing". Gleiberman said that "[John] Hughes is pulling our strings as though he'd never learn to do anything else". Peter Bradshaw of The Guardian gave the film three out of five and praised Culkin's "vivid screen presence, almost incandescent with confidence". However, he criticised his acting, calling it "a bit broad and mannered". Ali Barclay of the BBC wrote "Culkin walks a fine line between annoyance and endearment throughout the film." He also called Home Alone "a film which manages to capture some of the best qualities of Christmas". Naomi Barnwell of Roobla said that "Home Alone has all the ingredients that make for a great kids' film". Adrian Turner of Radio Times commented "[Home Alone is] a celebration of enterprise that captured the heart and wickedness of every child on the planet." According to TV Guide, "[Home Alone]'s slapstick falls flat and only the pain remains." Marielle Sabbag of Vocal wrote "Everything about [Home Alone] is beautiful and has a realistic quality." Peter Rainer of the Los Angeles Times criticised the fact that "there is a reason why this film plays better as a trailer than as a full-length film." Home Alone gradually became a Christmas classic. It was praised for its quotable phrases, morals, traps, and main character. Hannah-Rose Yee of Stylist called the ending "very sweet" and praised the score from John Williams, calling it "fantastic". Christopher Hooton of The Independent also praised the film, calling the film-within-a-film Angels with Filthy Souls "a fond footnote in cinema history". Matt Talbot from Simcoe.com said that the Wet Bandits were "fantastic" and "never [got] old" on "repeat viewings". Michael Walsh of Nerdist noted the church scene as "One of the best, most touching scenes [in the film]". Home Alone remains a highly popular Christmas movie in Poland, when it is played on Polsat every Christmas Eve. In 2010, Polsat did not play Home Alone, which caused over 90,000 people to protest on Facebook. In 2016, over 4.44 million Poles tuned in to Polsat to watch Home Alone. Since the 2010s, its TV trailers even include a tagline that acknowledges this popularity: "Christmas without him? It's absolutely impossible!". Julio Macat, the films cinematographer, considers Home Alone his favorite film out of all the projects he has shot. It was the favorite film of former U.S. President Gerald Ford. ### Accolades At the 12th Youth in Film Awards, Macaulay Culkin won Best Young Actor Starring in a Motion Picture. The film was nominated for two Academy Awards, one for Best Original Score, which was written by John Williams, and the other for Best Original Song for "Somewhere in My Memory", music by Williams and lyrics by Leslie Bricusse, but lost to Dances with Wolves and Dick Tracy respectively. ### Accusations of plagiarism The 1989 French horror thriller film 3615 code Père Noël, which is about a young boy who is home alone with his elderly grandfather and has to fend off a home invader dressed up as Santa Claus, has been noted for its plot similarities to Home Alone. 3615 code Père Noël director René Manzor threatened the producers of Home Alone with legal action on the grounds of plagiarism, alleging that Home Alone was a remake of his film. 3615 code Père Noël was not released in the United States during its original theatrical run in January 1990 and did not become widely available there until 2018. ## Use in media The music video for Snoop Dogg's 1994 song "Gin and Juice" opens with a gag where, after a teenaged Snoop's parents have left him to watch the house in their absence, he places his hands to his face and yells in the manner of Kevin McCallister in the first film, while a title comes on screen reading "Home Boy Alone". In December 2015, Culkin reprised his role as an adult Kevin McCallister in the inaugural episode of the Jack Dishel web series, "DRYVRS", where a visibly disturbed Kevin recounts his experience of being left home alone by his family. In response to Culkin's video, Daniel Stern appeared in a short video reprising his role as Marv, released in conjunction with Stern's Reddit AMA, where he pleads for Harry to return to help protect him against Kevin's traps. The 2016 Christmas-set horror film Better Watch Out includes a scene where a character who is obsessed with the Home Alone films demonstrates how, in real life, it would be deadly for someone to be hit in the face with a paint can swung from a distance. The season 13 episode of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, "Charlie's Home Alone", is intended to be a direct parody of the first Home Alone film. In the episode Charlie Kelly is accidentally forgotten while the rest of "the gang" attend Super Bowl LII. Charlie mistakingly believes he must protect the bar by setting up traps, only for himself to accidentally activate said traps, nearly preventing from performing his Super Bowl "rituals". On December 15, 2018, Culkin made a guest appearance as himself in an episode of The Angry Video Game Nerd to review multiple video game adaptations of the first two Home Alone films, as well as a gameplay session of The Pagemaster with James Rolfe and Mike Matei in the days following that episode's release. On December 19, 2018, Culkin again reprised his role as Kevin McCallister in a 60-second advertisement for Google Assistant, titled Home Alone Again. The commercial contains shot for shot remakes of scenes from the film. Google Assistant helps Kevin set up the house to look active by remotely turning on lights, devices, and setting up cutouts of people, to have the thieves parked in a van outside (presumably Harry and Marv) steer clear of the house. Additionally, Pesci also reprised his Harry role, only for his archival voice making a small cameo. Pesci later appeared in another ad where he watches the short with his friends and jokes about his brief cameo. The 2022 action comedy film Violent Night references Home Alone several times, and character Trudy Lightston attempts to emulate Kevin McCallister's fighting tactics against the burglars who take her family hostage. ## Use in Poland Films such as Home Alone and Die Hard are very popular at Christmas time in Poland, because they were some of the first Western movies to be released in Poland since the end of communist rule. However, the Polish premiere of "Home Alone" took place not during the Christmas season, but on May 22, 1992. Three years later, on Christmas Day (December 25), 1995, at 20:10 CET on TVP1, the Polish television premiere of the film took place. Then three times on December 26, 1997, and December 24 and 25, 1999, the film was broadcast on television TVN. In 29 December 2000, 8.9 million Poles were watching Home Alone on Christmas Eve; At that time, the broadcasting of the film was taken over by the only nationwide TV station, Polsat (TVN was broadcasting terrestrial broadcasts only in larger cities at that time), which continues it every year (with the exception of 2002, when the third part of the film was broadcast on January 1, 2003) to the present. It is Polsat that is mainly responsible for the popularity of the film "Home Alone" in Poland. On Polsat from 2000 to 2001 and from 2003 to 2013, the film "Home Alone" was broadcast alternatively both during the Christmas season (for the first time on December 24, 2003) and in the period preceding it (then the sequel of the film, i.e. "Home Alone 2: Lost in New York" or both films appeared on Polsat in the pre-Christmas or post-Christmas period, but not later than before New Year's Eve. In 2010, Telewizja Polsat did not include the film in the Christmas schedule, which was met with a protest of over 90,000 people on Facebook. Under the pressure of public opinion, Polsat changed its mind, however, broadcasting the film on Christmas Day (December 25) at 20:00 CET and additionally on Boxing Day (December 26) at 12:45 CET. Starting from 2014 (except for 2015, when the film was broadcast only on Christmas Day, i.e. December 25 at 16:40 CET, the comedy "Home Alone" is shown on Polsat every Christmas Eve (December 24) around 20:00 CET. In 2017, about four million people (11.6% of Poland's population) were watching it on Christmas Eve and in 2018 again in Christmas Eve the film recorded the highest viewership with 4.51 million viewers. ## Other media ### Novelization Home Alone () was novelized by Todd Strasser and published by Scholastic in 1990 to coincide with the film. On October 6, 2015, to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the movie, an illustrated book () by Kim Smith and Quirk Books was released. ### Sequels and franchise The film was followed by a commercially successful sequel in 1992, Home Alone 2: Lost in New York, which brought back most of the first film's cast. Culkin was paid \$4.5 million to appear in the sequel, compared to \$110,000 for the original. The film within a film, Angels with Filthy Souls, had a sequel in Home Alone 2, Angels with Even Filthier Souls. Both Angels meta-films featured character actor Ralph Foody as stereotypical 1930s mobster Johnny. A third film, Home Alone 3, was released in 1997; it has entirely different actors and characters as well as a different storyline, with Hughes writing the screenplay. A fourth made-for-TV film followed in 2002: Home Alone 4: Taking Back the House. The movie features some of the same characters who were in the first two films, but with a new cast and a storyline. The fifth film, The Holiday Heist, premiered during ABC Family's Countdown to 25 Days of Christmas programming event on November 25, 2012. Similarly to the third film, it does not focus on the McCallister family. Chris Columbus later revealed that there had been discussions on a sequel starring Kevin's son: "This was talked about maybe 10 years ago – I don't know, we were just having fun with it – and we said, 'What if Kevin is an adult and he has a kid?' But it was still Pesci and Stern – Pesci and Stern are still obsessed with this kid. They're going to get this kid." A sixth film was released digitally on Disney+ on November 12, 2021, titled Home Sweet Home Alone. Devin Ratray, who played Buzz McCallister in the first two films, reprised his role in the film. ## See also - List of films featuring home invasions, a plot device in thriller films that Home Alone lampoons - List of films featuring fictional films - List of Christmas films - Home Alone (video game)
2,774,307	Welsh Springer Spaniel	1,157,988,045	null	[ "Dog breeds originating in Wales", "FCI breeds", "Gundogs", "Spaniels" ]	The Welsh Springer Spaniel (Welsh: Llamgi Cymru) is a breed of dog and a member of the spaniel family. Thought to be comparable to the old Land Spaniel, they are similar to the English Springer Spaniel and historically have been referred to as both the Welsh Spaniel and the Welsh Cocker Spaniel. They were relatively unknown until a succession of victories in dog trials by the breed increased its popularity. Following recognition by The Kennel Club in 1902, the breed gained the modern name of Welsh Springer Spaniel. The breed's coat only comes in a single colour combination of white with red markings, usually in a piebald pattern. Loyal and affectionate, they can become very attached to family members and are wary of strangers. Health conditions are limited to those common among many breeds of dog, although they are affected more than average by hip dysplasia and some eye conditions. They are a working dog, bred for hunting, and while not as rare as some varieties of spaniel, they are rarer than the more widely known English Springer Spaniel with which they are sometimes confused. ## History The origin of the Welsh Springer Spaniel is unknown, but dogs resembling the breed with its distinctive red and white coat are frequently depicted in old pictures and prints. This type of dog was known as the Land Spaniel, and is considered to be similar to the modern Welsh Springer. John Caius, writing in 1570, said "Spaniels whose skynnes are white and if marked with any spottes they are commonly red". It is thought that these Spaniels may have made their way into the Welsh valleys where local sportsman and hunters managed to conserve them in a pure state. At one time called the Welsh Starter, it was used to spring game, originally for hunters using falcons. The traditional red and white colour of the Welsh Springer was once also found in English dogs, but by the early 20th century any such dogs were considered to have "died out long ago". The Welsh Springer Spaniel was also at one time called the Welsh Spaniel, and also at one point was included in the Kennel Club (UK) studbook as Cocker Spaniels, and was known as the Welsh Cocker. During the 19th century were several different varieties of Cocker Spaniel, including the English, the Welsh and the Devonshire as the term was used to describe the size of the dog rather than the breed. Unusually, in John George Wood's 1865 book The Illustrated Natural History, an image is described showing a Welsh Cocker Spaniel as a solid coloured dark spaniel. The same inscription is used in the 1867 work The Dog in Health and Disease by Stonehenge and he further describes the Welsh Cocker and the Devonshire Cocker as "both being of a deep-liver colour". The Welsh Springer was relatively unknown during the 19th Century, but this changed in 1900 when Mr. A. T. Williams of Ynis-y-Gerwn won the team stake at the Sporting Spaniel Club Trials. The trials were held on Mr. Williams' own estate, and it was thought that when his team defeated eight well known teams it was because of the home advantage. This was disproved when dogs from the same kennel went on to win in successive years around the UK. His conformation show champion dog Corrin was the first Welsh Springer Spaniel to be photographed. Welsh Springers were recognised by The Kennel Club, after the breed had gained popularity, in 1902 under the new name of Welsh Springer Spaniel. Until then the breed was shown alongside the English Springer Spaniel. The Welsh Springer Spaniel was transported to America in the late 19th century and gained recognition by the American Kennel Club in 1906. World War I caused problems for the breed in the United Kingdom, and when the war was over there were no dogs whose parents had registered pedigrees. The breed restarted with the remaining unregistered dogs, and it is these dogs that formed the modern day breed. The breeders in the 1920s and 1930s developed these dogs into the type of Welsh Springer Spaniel which remains today. The Welsh Springer Spaniel Club (UK) was formed in 1923, registrations slowly increased between the wars but all records held by the breed club were destroyed in an air raid during World War II. Following the two World Wars, it was thought that no Welsh Springers remained in the United States. The breed was reintroduced, and the descendants of those dogs make up the breed today in the United States and Canada. The breed was officially imported into Australia in 1973. In 2000, The Kennel Club registered 424 Welsh Springer Spaniels, compared with 12,599 English Springer Spaniels and 13,445 English Cocker Spaniels. Numbers remained steady, with 420 Welsh Springer Spaniels being registered in 2004, however numbers of English Springer Spaniels increased to 14,765 and English Cocker Spaniels to 16,608. Numbers remain closer to the American Cocker Spaniel which registered 610 in 2000, and 599 in 2004. The breed remains more popular than some other breeds of Spaniel, including the Clumber Spaniel, Field Spaniel, Sussex Spaniel and Irish Water Spaniel. Total registrations in the UK during 2016 fell to 299 qualifying it to be included on The Kennel Club's list of Vulnerable Native Breeds. ## Description ### Appearance The Welsh Springer Spaniel is a compact, solidly built dog, bred for hard work and endurance. Their body can give the impression of length due to its obliquely angled forequarters and developed hindquarters. The build of the Welsh Springer Spaniel should be slightly off square, meaning that the length of the dog should be slightly greater than the height at the withers. However, some dogs may be square, and this is not penalised in the show ring as long as the height is never greater than the length. Traditionally a docked breed, dependent on legislation in the country of origin, and where allowed the dew claws can be removed. In conformation showing, eyes should be brown in colour; yellow eyes do sometimes occur but are penalised in the show ring. Ears are small, pendulous (suspended and hanging), vine-shaped and with a light setter-like feathering. Nostrils are well developed and are black or any shade of brown; a pink nose is penalised in the AKC standard for the show ring, in Britain the colour is not specified in The Kennel Club's breed standard. In showing, a scissors bite is preferred with an undershot jaw severely penalised. Unlike the English Springer Spaniel and English Cocker Spaniel, there is no divergence into show and field styles of the breed. Male dogs are 46 to 48 centimetres (18 to 19 in) high at the withers, with females a little smaller at 43 to 46 centimetres (17 to 18 in). On average, members of the breed weigh between 16 and 20 kg (35 and 45 lb). The back of the legs, chest, and underside of the body are feathered, and the ears and tail are lightly feathered. The only colour is a rich red-and-white. Any pattern is acceptable and any white area may be flecked with red ticking. Welsh Springers are often confused with the English Springer Spaniel, but there are marked differences. The Welsh Springer is slightly smaller, and its reddish markings on a white background as opposed to the English Springers black or liver-coloured markings. Both breeds are admired for their hunting abilities and their trademark trait of "springing" at game. This can be seen during play also, as a dog may "spring" on his toy. Some experts believe that the Welsh Springer Spaniel and the Brittany share the same ancestry as there is a great deal of resemblance between the two breeds. The colours of the Welsh Springer, while exclusive from the English Springer, appear in the Brittany and the Brittany and Welsh Springers are both of similar sizes. The Welsh Springer is larger than the English Cocker Spaniel. ### Temperament The Welsh Springer Spaniel is active, loyal, and affectionate. They may meet strangers barking when in their territory, or act aloof, cautious or wary. The breed is well known for being friendly and demonstrative to all members of the family, especially children, and accepting other pets of the household with a friendly, playful attitude. The breed is quick to learn but can be headstrong, though with correct training can become very obedient. The Welsh Springer was bred for work and endurance, and as with many breeds of hunting dogs requires a regular exercise routine to keep them healthy and content. Without adequate exercise, a Welsh Springer Spaniel may appear hyperactive. Some Welsh Springers can become clingy towards their owners and suffer separation anxiety when alone. ## Health The Welsh Springer is generally a healthy breed, but some can suffer conditions common to many breeds such as hip dysplasia, Canine glaucoma and like other dogs with pendulous ears, they are prone to ear infections such as otitis externa. Some Welsh Springer Spaniels are predisposed to become overweight. In a survey of over a hundred breeds of dog conducted in 1997, the Welsh Springer Spaniel was ranked 14th for worst hip score, with the average score of the breed being 18.45. The average lifespan is 12 to 15 years. ### Eye disorders Welsh Springers can be prone to entropion, which is a disorder that affects the eyelids. The condition causes them to curl inwards, pressing the eyelashes against the surface of the eye itself and causing them to scratch it. This can lead to irritation and damage to the cornea. In most cases it only affects the lower eyelid on one or both eyes, but in some cases the upper eyelid can be affected as well. Symptoms can include tearing, squinting, the rubbing of the eyes, thick discharge from the eyes and rolling of the eyelid along with wetness on the hairs next to the eyelids. There is no medical treatment for entropion, and surgical correction may be necessary depending on the severity of the case. This condition may be present soon after birth, or later in life as a secondary condition to other eye related diseases or infections. Other breeds also affected by the condition include the Chow Chow, Great Dane, Golden Retriever and the English Springer Spaniel. Narrow/closed angle glaucoma is an autosomal dominant inheritable trait in the breed. It is a leading cause of blindness in dogs, and is where there is increased fluid pressure within the eye. If the fluid is not reduced, the pressure causes permanent damage to the retina and optic nerve. Loss of eyesight can happen as quickly as within 24 hours if the pressure if elevated enough, or slowly over time if it is only a mild elevation. The sudden, rapid elevation of pressure is more common with narrow/closed angle glaucoma which is more common to the breed than the slower open angle glaucoma. Symptoms can include redness in the eye, the eye itself looking cloudy, sensitivity to light and the dog may rub at their eye, or even rub it along other objects and carpet as the condition is moderate to extremely painful. Treatment can vary depending on the severity of the condition but if inherited glaucoma appears in one eye then it usually occurs in the other eye eventually. ## See also - Hunting dog - Sporting Group
6,613,165	Crocodile shark	1,170,474,663	Pseudocarcharias kamoharai (species of mackerel shark)	[ "Extant Miocene first appearances", "Fish described in 1937", "Ovoviviparous fish", "Pseudocarchariidae", "Serravallian first appearances", "Taxa named by Kiyomatsu Matsubara" ]	The crocodile shark (Pseudocarcharias kamoharai) is a species of mackerel shark and the only extant member of the family Pseudocarchariidae.A specialized inhabitant of the mesopelagic zone, the crocodile shark can be found worldwide in tropical waters from the surface to a depth of 590 m (1,940 ft). It performs a diel vertical migration, staying below a depth of 200 m (660 ft) during the day and ascending into shallower water at night to feed. Typically measuring only 1 m (3.3 ft) in length, the crocodile shark is the smallest living mackerel shark. It can be distinguished by its elongated cigar-shaped body, extremely large eyes, and relatively small fins. An active-swimming predator of pelagic bony fishes, squid and shrimp, the crocodile shark has a sizable oily liver that allows it to maintain its position in the water column with minimal effort. The size and structure of its eyes suggests that it is adapted for hunting at night. The crocodile shark is aplacental viviparous, with females typically giving birth to litters of four. The fetuses are oophagous, meaning that they feed on undeveloped eggs ovulated for this purpose by their mother. Due to its small size, the crocodile shark poses little danger to humans and is of little commercial importance. This species was responsible for damaging deep sea fiberoptic cables when the technology was first deployed in 1985. ## Taxonomy and phylogeny The English common name "crocodile shark" is derived from its Japanese name mizuwani (水鰐, literally "water crocodile"), which refers to its sharp teeth and habit of snapping vigorously when taken out of the water. Other common names for this species include Japanese ragged-tooth shark, Kamohara's sand-shark, and water crocodile. The crocodile shark was first described as Carcharias kamoharai in a 1936 issue of Zoological Magazine (Tokyo) by ichthyologist Kiyomatsu Matsubara, based on a 73.5 cm (28.9 in) long specimen found at the Koti Fish Market in Japan. The type specimen is a 1 m (3.3 ft) long adult male found at a fish market in Su-ao, Taiwan. After being shuffled between the genera Carcharias and Odontaspis in the family Odontaspididae by various authors, in 1973 Leonard Compagno resurrected Jean Cadenat's 1963 subgenus Pseudocarcharias from synonymy for this species and placed it within its own family. The morphology of the crocodile shark suggests affinity with the megamouth shark (Megachasmidae), basking shark (Cetorhinidae), thresher sharks (Alopiidae), and mackerel sharks (Lamnidae). More recent phylogenetic analyses, based on mitochondrial DNA, have suggested that the crocodile shark is closely related to either the megamouth shark or the sand sharks (Odontaspididae). Alternately, analysis based on dentition suggests that the closest relatives of the crocodile shark are the thresher sharks, followed by the mackerel sharks. Fossil Pseudocarcharias teeth dating to the Serravallian age (13.6–11.6 Ma) of the Miocene epoch have been found in Italy, and are identical to those of the modern-day crocodile shark. ## Description The crocodile shark has a spindle-shaped body with a short head and a bulbous, pointed snout. The eyes are very large and lack nictitating membranes (protective third eyelids). The five pairs of gill slits are long, extending onto the dorsal surface. The sizable, arched jaws can be protruded almost to the tip of the snout and contain large teeth, shaped like spikes in the front and knives on the sides. There are fewer than 30 tooth rows in either jaw; in the upper jaw, the first two large teeth are separated from the lateral teeth by a row of small intermediate teeth. The pectoral fins are small, broad, and rounded. The pelvic fins are nearly as large as the pectorals. The first dorsal fin is small, low and angular; the second dorsal fin is smaller than the first but larger than the anal fin. The caudal fin is asymmetrical with a moderately long upper lobe. The caudal peduncle is slightly compressed with weak lateral keels. The dermal denticles are small, with a flattened crown bearing small ridges and backward-pointing cusps It is dark brown above and paler below, sometimes with a few dark blotches on the sides and belly and/or a white blotch between the corner of the mouth and the first gill slit. The fins have thin translucent to white margins. The crocodile shark grows to a maximum length of 1.1 m (3.6 ft). Most individuals are 1 m (3.3 ft) long and weigh 4–6 kg (8.8–13.2 lb). ## Distribution and habitat The crocodile shark is almost circumtropical in distribution. In the Atlantic Ocean, it is known from off Brazil, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Guinea, Angola, South Africa, and Saint Helena Island, though it has not yet been reported from the northwestern Atlantic. In the Indian Ocean, it occurs in the Mozambique Channel and possibly the Agulhas Current and the Bay of Bengal. In the Pacific, it occurs from Japan, Taiwan, and the Korean Peninsula in the northwest, southward to Indonesia, Australia, and New Zealand, and eastward to the western coast of the Americas from Baja California to Chile, including the Marshall, Phoenix, Palmyra, Johnston, Marquesas, Line, and Hawaiian Islands in between. In New Zealand this species has been recorded at the Three Kings Ridge, off the coast of Northland and on the northern Kermadec Ridge. From distribution records, the crocodile shark's range seems to be bound by the latitudes 37°N and 44°S, where the average sea surface temperature is 20 °C (68 °F). This species is not evenly distributed but is rather locally abundant in certain areas, suggesting that it is not strongly migratory. The crocodile shark is usually found in the pelagic zone from the surface to a depth of 590 m (1,940 ft). It is occasionally encountered inshore near the bottom and has been known to strand on the beaches of South Africa, possibly after being stunned by upwellings of cold water. In March 2017, one crocodile shark washed ashore dead off the coast of Devon, England in Hope Cove, the first ever seen off the coasts of the United Kingdom. Thus far, it remains unknown as to why this particular shark was present so far north of its normal range. ## Biology and ecology With a long body, small fins, and large liver rich in squalene and other low-density lipids, the crocodile shark is convergently similar to mesopelagic dogfish sharks such as the cookiecutter shark (Isistius brasiliensis). The liver may comprise a fifth of the shark's weight, and acts as an incompressible float that allows it to maintain neutral buoyancy in the water column with little effort. Like many other inhabitants of the mesopelagic zone, the crocodile shark apparently migrates closer to the surface at night to feed and descends into deeper water during the day, being rarely found above a depth of 200 m (660 ft) during daytime. The large eyes of the crocodile shark, equipped with a reflective green or yellow retina and lacking an expanded iris, suggest that it is a nocturnal hunter that relies on sight to pick out the silhouettes or bioluminescence of its prey. Little is known of the crocodile shark's feeding habits; it is thought to be an active, fast-swimming predator based on its strong musculature, large tail, and behavior when captured. On one occasion, a crocodile shark off Cape Point, South Africa, jumped out of the water in pursuit of bait. Its diet consists of small to medium-sized bony fishes (including bristlemouths and lanternfishes), squid (including onychoteuthids, mastigoteuthids, pholidoteuthids, and cranchiids) and shrimp. Crocodile sharks are not known to be preyed upon by any other species. The crocodile shark is aplacental viviparous and typically gives birth to litters of four, two pups to each uterus. The gestation period is unknown but believed to be long. The embryos have yolk sacs at 3–4 cm (1.2–1.6 in) long; once the yolk sac is fully absorbed they become oophagous: the mother produces large numbers of thin-walled egg capsules that contain 2–9 eggs each, which are then consumed by the unborn embryos. The abdomens of the embryos become characteristically distended with ingested yolk material, which can make up a quarter of the embryo's total weight. It is unclear how two crocodile shark fetuses manage to share a single uterus, when in some other oophagous mackerel sharks such as the sand tiger shark (Carcharias taurus), only one fetus survives in each uterus. The pups are born at approximately 40 cm (16 in) long; males attain maturity at 74–110 cm (29–43.5 in) and females at 89–102 cm (35–40 in). There is no defined reproductive season. ## Human interactions With its small size, non-cutting teeth, and oceanic habitat, the crocodile shark is not considered dangerous to humans. However, it has a powerful bite that invites caution. This species is a common bycatch of various pelagic longline fisheries meant for tuna and swordfish. The largest numbers are caught by the Japanese yellowfin tuna fishery and the Australian swordfish fishery, both operating in the Indian Ocean. This species is also sometimes caught on squid jigs and in tuna gillnets. It is usually discarded due to its small size and low-quality meat. However, its oily liver is potentially valuable. No data is available on the population status of the crocodile shark, though it is probably declining from bycatch mortality. Coupled with its low reproductive rate, this has led the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) to assessed it as Near Threatened. In June 2018 the New Zealand Department of Conservation classified the crocodile shark as "Data Deficient" with the qualifier "Secure Overseas" under the New Zealand Threat Classification System. After AT&T installed the first deep sea fiberoptic cables between Gran Canaria and Tenerife in the Canary Islands in September 1985, the system suffered a series of shorts that necessitated costly repairs. It was discovered that attacks from the crocodile shark were responsible for most of the failures, possibly because they were attracted to the electric field around the cables. Since crocodile sharks are not benthic in nature, they were presumably biting the cables as they were being deployed. The problem was solved by protecting the cables with a layer of steel tape beneath a dense polyethylene coating.
5,979,273	Norsk Air	1,097,409,242	Former Norwegian airline, 1961–1996	[ "1961 establishments in Norway", "1996 disestablishments in Norway", "Airlines disestablished in 1996", "Airlines established in 1961", "Companies based in Sandefjord", "Defunct airlines of Norway", "Sandefjord Airport, Torp", "Widerøe" ]	Norsk Air was a Norwegian airline based at Sandefjord Airport, Torp. At its height from the mid-1980s and onwards it operated scheduled flights to Stavanger, Bergen, Trondheim and Copenhagen, and for shorter periods also other Norwegian and international destinations. The airline had 156 employees and 150,000 annual passengers in 1989. The company was established as a sole proprietorship by Øyvind Skaunfelt as Vestfoldfly in 1961, after purchasing Thor Solberg's aviation school at Tønsberg Airport, Jarlsberg. In addition to an aviation college, the company operated various charter services using mostly Cessna aircraft. The company split into a flying school and an airline in 1972, with the latter taking the name Norsk Flytjeneste. Three 50-passenger Douglas DC-6 were subsequently bought and were among other places flown with aid charters to Bangladesh. Both the DC-6 and later charter flights with business jets proved unprofitable and were quickly terminated. The company turned to regular charter services to Bergen and Stavanger in the 1980s, and from 1984 served the routes with scheduled flights, using seven-passenger Beechcraft 200 King Air. In 1985 the company was converted to a limited company and bought by Kosmos. It subsequently acquired four 30-passenger Embraer EMB 120 Brasilias—as the second European airline. It introduced several new routes, including international flights to Denmark and the United Kingdom, and took the name Norsk Air. The company bought Norving's Skien Airport, Geiteryggen division in 1987 and started operations from a second base. Kosmos failed in 1988 and Norsk Air was eventually given for free to Widerøe in 1990. Skien operations were discontinued the following year and the airline changed name to Widerøe Norsk Air. It remained a subsidiary until being amalgamated in 1996. ## History ### Vestfoldfly The airline was established as Vestfoldfly by Øyvind Skaunfelt in 1961. He had been working at Thor Solberg's aviation school at Tønsberg Airport, Jarlsberg, and offered to purchase the school and airplanes when Solberg retired. Two years earlier, Sandefjord Airport, Torp had opened a civilian sector and Skaunfelt decided to establish his company there. In May 1961, he received government permission for commercial flying. He started a newspaper route to Oslo Airport, Fornebu, and could also carry three passengers in his single-engined Cessna. The route continued onwards from Sandefjord to Tønsberg, Larvik and at Skien Airport, Geiteryggen. Vestfoldfly also started offering scenic trips and charter. During the summer, the airline also flew seaplanes south along the coast to Kragerø, Risør and Arendal. Other activities involved crop dusting of forest for Felleskjøpet. The airline also provided a target service for the military. Four aircraft were permanently used to tow a target about 1,000 to 2,000 meters (3,300 to 6,600 ft) behind the aircraft, and military personnel would practice shooting at the target. During the 1960s, Vestfoldfly never received a concession for a regular, scheduled flight from Sandefjord to Oslo. The reason was that the Skien-based Fjellfly held the concession for the routes from Oslo to Sandefjord, Tønsberg and Skien. Fjellfly never used its landing rights at Sandefjord, but nevertheless still hindered Vestfoldfly from starting a competing route. Skaunfelt eventually split his activity in two, demerging the aviation school and renaming it Den Norske Luftfartsskole, which remained in operation until 1999. The other activity was renamed Norsk Flytjeneste. In 1969, Norsk Flytjeneste and Jotun, a large Sandefjord-based industrial company, established Penguin Air Service, where Norsk Flytjeneste owned 25 percent of the shares. Penguin Air Service company bought a six-seat Piper PA-31 Navajo and started charter services for Jotun. In 1975, Bugge Supplyship also joined the joint venture and a second aircraft was bought. Most of the traffic was for the oil industry to Stavanger. ### Norsk Flytjeneste In 1972, Norsk Flytjeneste purchased two 50-passenger Douglas DC-6Bs from Braathens SAFE and leased one from Sterling Airways. They were used for domestic and international charter. The largest contract was from the Norwegian Church Aid, who contracted Norsk Flytjeneste to fly aid to Bangladesh. However, the airline failed to make money on the DC-6s, mostly because of the high operating costs, and sold them after a year. The company followed up with purchasing a ten-seat Cessna Citation business jet that they offered in the charter market. However, the market was not large enough, and the jet was sold. The main market for the charter services was Stavanger Airport, Sola, mainly serving transport of personnel in the oil industry. By the 1980s, Norsk Air had up to four daily round trips between the two cities. In 1983, the airline received concession to start a regular scheduled service to Stavanger. A ten-seat Beechcraft Super King Air was bought and services started on 12 January 1984. Services to Bergen Airport, Flesland started on 10 July. Soon there were four daily round trips to both cities, supplemented by charter trips operated by Penguin. Starting on 26 March 1984, Norsk Flytjeneste experienced competition on the routes from Sandefjord to Bergen and Stavanger, when Busy Bee, on contract with Braathens SAFE, started flights using 50-passenger Fokker F27s. However, they operated only one round trip, with the same aircraft serving Sandefjord–Stavanger–Haugesund–Bergen. In 1984, Norsk Flytjenesete started negotiations with the Sandefjord-based conglomerate Kosmos, who were seeking to invest in a local airline. Kosmos had decided to start a diversification strategy to spread their risk. Norsk Flytjeneste was at the time not making money on its routes, but Kosmos was willing to carry the loss as an investment. The airline was sold to Kosmos on 15 April 1985. At the time of the take-over, Norsk Flytjeneste had four Cessna 310s and one Piper Navajo. The airline's seven-passenger Beechcraft 200 and C90 King Airs were already owned by Kosmos. The company was changed from a sole propriatoriship to a limited company. Kjell Riege from Kosmos was appointed managing director while Tor Lundstrøm continued as chief pilot. ### Norsk Air On 30 July 1985, Norsk Flytjeneste opened their first international route, to Copenhagen Airport in Denmark. The concessions had a limitation on not using aircraft with more than ten seats. However the limitation was lifted later in the year. Under Kosmos' management, Norsk Flytjeneste started an aggressive expansion. Applications were made for concessions from Sandefjord to Gothenburg in Sweden, and from Oslo via Hamar and Røros to Trondheim. Norsk Flytjeneste also needed larger aircraft, and the airline evaluated several types, including the Embraer EMB 120 Brasilia, the 30-passenger Saab 340 and the Fokker F27. The company chose to order four 30-passenger Brasilias. During the negotiations with Embraer, the company realized that Norsk Flytjeneste was a difficult name for foreigners, since the Brazilians could not pronounce "Flytjeneste". When the new aircraft were delivered, the airline rebranded as Norsk Air. The company also joined the joint venture Commuter Service along with other Norwegian regional airlines, Coast Aero Center, Mørefly and Trønderfly. The intention was to create a cooperative company which could compete in a more diversified market. The group's lawyer stated that the organizational structure among regional airlines was 15 years out of date and that the group would take market shares in a growing market, especially by starting new niche direct services. Norsk Air was the second airline in Europe to order the Brasilia, after Air Excel. Three were financed with loans from Banco de Brasil and the last was leased. With the introduction of the Brasilias in 1986, the airline started a route from Sandefjord to Trondheim Airport, Værnes. From 1985 to 1986, the airline's costs doubled, but not their income. In 1987, Terje Røsjode, former bank chief for Christiania Bank in Sandefjord, took over as managing director. The Brasilias had state-of-art technology, and although airlines purchase new aircraft to reduce their maintenance costs, this was not the reality for Norsk Air because they did not have sufficient competence to maintain the aircraft. In particular, they lacked sufficient electronic expertise, due to the increase of electronic components in the aircraft. All the other aircraft were sold. In 1986, the company established a duty-free shop at Torp. By 1987, Norsk Air was losing NOK 20 million per year. The company established a route from Sandefjord to Göteborg Landvetter Airport and to London Stansted Airport, but neither were profitable, and were quickly terminated. Norsk Air started a route from Fagernes Airport, Leirin to Oslo and Bergen on 4 November 1987. The route turned out to be unprofitable, and was terminated on 1 June 1988, after the company had lost NOK 5 million on the route. To develop the company, Kosmos and Norsk Air bought the Kirkenes-based airline Norving, which also operated flights from Skien Airport, Geiteryggen—about one hour's drive from Sandefjord—to Bergen, Trondheim and Stavanger. Norving had seven types of aircraft, but was losing large amounts of money, although the Norwegian Ministry of Transport and Communications covered their losses on some state-subsidized regional routes. The purchase of Norving caused an internal organization conflict between the two organizations. The operations from Skien were merged into Norsk Air, while the rest of Norving was sold. The latter went bankrupt in 1993. Norsk Air also showed interest in purchasing Widerøe, but none of the large owners were interested in selling. ### Widerøe Norsk Air Kosmos was bought by the Skaugen Group in 1988, and on 21 October, Kosmos' Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Bjørn Bettum and Chairman Otto Grieg Tidemand were fired. The Skaugen Group decided to integrate Kosmos' shipping and oil-related activities into their group. All other investments, including Norsk Air, were to be sold or closed. At the time, Norsk Air had 140 employees. Norsk Air's CEO, Mr. Røsjodet, made contact with Bård Mikkelsen, who was CEO of Widerøe, to try to convince them to purchase Norsk Air. Widerøe was at that time solely occupied with flying on the subsidized regional routes. The company was interested in having some non-subsidized routes to better benchmark its operations. The two largest owners, Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS) and Braathens SAFE, did not want to purchase Norsk Air, but the third-largest owner, Fred. Olsen & Co. liked the idea, and bought SAS' and Braathens SAFE's 62.3 percent stake in Widerøe to make the deal possible. Other possible purchasers who had negotiated with Norsk Air were Sterling Airlines, Partnair and Jan Einar Johansen, former owner of Scandi Line. By 1989, the airline had 156 employees and 150,000 annual passengers. On 9 February 1989, Norsk Air's board decided to start the termination process if a sale was not made. The employees agreed to cut their wages 10 percent and not take sick days during the sales process. One of the main difficulties in the sales process was that Widerøe could not afford to purchase Norsk Air's hangar at the airport. Widerøe intended to continue operations at both Torp and Geiteryggen for a year to see where to establish its base. In fear that the airline would move to Skien, the municipalities of Sandefjord and Stokke, who owned the majority of the airport, agreed to purchase the hangar, which had been built for NOK 20 million in 1987, for NOK 11.5 million. Half the hangar would be rented to Widerøe for NOK 500,000 per year. This was insufficient to cover the NOK 1.2 million in annual interest costs. Widerøe took over Norsk Air free of charge on 1 May 1989, and changed the company's name to Widerøe Norsk Air. The company was kept as a subsidiary to avoid cross-subsidization of the subsidized routes. Widerøe started negotiations with Busy Bee, and agreed to lease the Fokker 50 used by Busy Bee to Sandefjord, in exchange for Busy Bee terminating the route in 1990. Widerøe Norsk Air also decided that it was not profitable to fly from both Skien and Sandefjord, and terminated all Skien services. Starting on 28 October 1991, the airline also started a route from Sandefjord via Kristiansand Airport, Kjevik to London. This route was terminated one year later. In 1993, Widerøe sold its Fokker 50 to Norwegian Air Shuttle. On 1 May 1996, Widerøe Norsk Air was merged with Widerøe and ceased to exist. After the merger, Widerøe phased out the Brasilias and replaced them with de Havilland Canada Dash 8 aircraft. ## Destinations The following is a list of destinations served by Norsk Air in regular scheduled services. It includes the city, country, airport and the period in which the airline served the airport. Hubs are denoted with a dagger ().
19,626,580	Fantastic Story Quarterly	1,062,075,351	US pulp science fiction magazine	[ "1950 establishments in the United States", "Bimonthly magazines published in the United States", "Defunct science fiction magazines published in the United States", "Magazines disestablished in 1955", "Magazines established in 1950", "Magazines published in Indiana", "Magazines published in New York (state)", "Pulp magazines", "Quarterly magazines published in the United States", "Science fiction magazines established in the 1950s" ]	Fantastic Story Quarterly was a pulp science fiction magazine, published from 1950 to 1955 by Best Books, a subsidiary imprint of Standard Magazines, based in Kokomo, Indiana. The name was changed with the Summer 1951 issue to Fantastic Story Magazine. It was launched to reprint stories from the early years of the science fiction pulp magazines, and was initially intended to carry no new fiction, though in the end every issue contained at least one new story. It was sufficiently successful for Standard to launch Wonder Story Annual as a vehicle for more science fiction reprints, but the success did not last. In 1955 it was merged with Standard's Startling Stories. Original fiction in Fantastic Story included Gordon R. Dickson's first sale, "Trespass", and stories by Walter M. Miller and Richard Matheson. ## Publication history and contents The first science fiction (sf) magazine, Amazing Stories, was launched in 1926 by Hugo Gernsback at the height of the pulp magazine era. It helped to form science fiction as a separately marketed genre, and by the mid-1930s several more sf magazines had appeared, including Wonder Stories, also published by Gernsback. In 1936, Ned Pines of Beacon Publications bought Wonder Stories from Gernsback. Pines changed the title to Thrilling Wonder Stories, and in 1939 and 1940 added two more sf titles: Startling Stories and Captain Future. Pines had acquired reprint rights to the fiction published in Wonder Stories as part of the transaction, and he instituted a "Hall of Fame" department in Startling Stories to carry some of this material. Captain Future also carried reprint material, but neither Startling nor Captain Future had room for some of the longer stories in the backfile. At the end of the 1940s a boom in science fiction magazines encouraged Pines to issue a new magazine, titled Fantastic Story Quarterly, as a vehicle for reprinting this older material. The original plan was for the magazine to carry no new fiction, but this policy was changed shortly before publication, and at least one new story was included in every issue. The initial schedule was quarterly. The magazine became popular with fans because of the access it gave them to old favorite stories, and it was immediately successful, soon becoming more popular than the other Standard Magazine science fiction pulps. The success led Standard to issue Wonder Story Annual in 1950 to provide an outlet for reprinting longer material. In late 1952 it switched to a bimonthly schedule, having changed its title to Fantastic Story Magazine the previous year, but this only lasted until the following year, by which time it was no longer doing well financially. It was back on a quarterly schedule starting with the Winter 1954 issue. The pulps were in rapid decline by the mid-1950s, and both Fantastic Story Magazine and Thrilling Wonder Stories were merged with Startling Stories in mid-1955, though Startling itself ceased publication at the end of that year. The pulp format was intended to appeal to readers who were nostalgic for the early years of the science fiction pulp market. Sf historian Mike Ashley suggested that Pines was right to launch Fantastic Story Quarterly as a pulp; in Ashley's words, "Early pulp fiction somehow never reads right in book form. You need the crumbling paper, the smell of woodpulp, and the mixture of advertisements, illustrations and old pulp-style text to create the right atmosphere". Most of the contents were reprinted from Wonder Stories, but occasionally material from other publishers appeared, such as A.E. van Vogt's novel, Slan, which had originally appeared in Street and Smith's Astounding Science Fiction in 1940, and which was reprinted in Fantastic Story's Summer 1952 issue. New fiction included Richard Matheson's "Lazarus II", and Walter M. Miller's "A Family Matter". Fantastic Story also printed Gordon R. Dickson's first sale, "Trespass", a collaboration with Poul Anderson which appeared in the very first issue. In addition to fiction, there was an editorial page and a letter column. Illustrators whose work appeared in its pages included Virgil Finlay, Ed Emsh, and Earle Bergey. ## Bibliographic details The magazine was a quarterly for all but six issues, from November 1952 to September 1953. The title changed from Fantastic Story Quarterly to Fantastic Story Magazine with the fifth issue, and remained under that title through the end of its run, though the magazine was still a quarterly at the time the title changed. The Fall 1952 issue was also dated September 1952. There were seven volumes of three issues, and a final volume of two issues. The magazine was in pulp format and priced at 25 cents throughout its life; it began at 160 pages and dropped to 144 pages with the Spring 1951 issue, then to 128 pages with the September 1953 issue, and finally to 112 pages for the last two issues. The publisher was Best Books, of Kokomo, Indiana, which was owned by Standard Magazines of New York. The editor was initially Sam Merwin; Samuel Mines took over with the Winter 1952 issue, and the last two issues were edited by Alexander Samalman. A Canadian edition of the first four editions appeared from Better Publications in Toronto with the same contents as the U.S. editions.
5,767,999	Ring the Alarm	1,166,128,002	null	[ "2006 singles", "2006 songs", "Beyoncé songs", "Columbia Records singles", "Music videos directed by Sophie Muller", "Song recordings produced by Beyoncé", "Song recordings produced by Swizz Beatz", "Songs written by Beyoncé", "Songs written by Sean Garrett", "Songs written by Swizz Beatz" ]	"Ring the Alarm" is a song recorded by American singer Beyoncé for her second studio album, B'Day (2006). It was written by Knowles, Kasseem "Swizz Beatz" Dean, and Sean Garrett. Columbia Records released "Ring the Alarm" as the second single from B'Day in the United States on October 17, 2006, while "Irreplaceable" (2006) was serviced as the album's second international and third US single. The song's development was motivated by Knowles' role in the Broadway musical adaptation Dreamgirls (2006). The cover art of "Ring the Alarm" proved controversial because Knowles used alligators during the photography session. PETA declared that Knowles' posing with a baby alligator was arguably abusive to an animal. "Ring the Alarm" is an R&B song. Its introduction features a blaring siren, which sets an aggressive tone. The song's lyrics involve a woman who feels threatened, and is unwilling to allow another woman to profit from the protagonist's efforts to improve her lover's life. The lyrics were rumored to be about Barbadian recording artist Rihanna's relationship with Jay-Z; Knowles refuted the allegation in an interview with Seventeen magazine. The song was received with mixed reception for contemporary music critics, who noted that it was different from Knowles' previous work. While some commended her willingness to take risks, others were polarized about her aggressive vocals. "Ring the Alarm" was nominated for Best Female R&B Vocal Performance at the 49th Annual Grammy Awards. The single debuted at number 12 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart, becoming Knowles' highest US debut at the time. It reached number 11 on the chart, becoming her first solo single to peak below the top 10. Its accompanying music video was inspired by the 1992 film Basic Instinct and was directed by Sophie Muller. It was filmed inside a cavernous hangar on the Brooklyn waterfront in New York City. The video garnered generally mixed reviews critics, who universally thought that it was eccentric. Knowles promoted "Ring the Alarm" through various live performances on televised shows and awards ceremonies, including the 2006 MTV Video Music Awards. The song was included on her set list on the Beyoncé Experience (2007) in Los Angeles, her world tour I Am... World Tour. (2009–10), her On the Run Tour (2014) with Jay-Z, the Formation World Tour (2016), and her OTR II (2018) with Jay-Z again. ## Background and development After six months of filming for the Broadway musical adaptation of Dreamgirls, Knowles was on vacation. Inspired by her role in the film, she said: "[When filming ended,] I had so many things bottled up, so many emotions, so many ideas". After contacting American songwriters and record producers Sean Garrett along with Rodney Jerkins, Rich Harrison, and Kasseem "Swizz Beatz" Dean, Knowles rented Sony Music Studios to begin working on her second solo album B'Day. Garret said: "I came to the studio and saw the zone...everybody in here is banging out. Rodney Jerkins had his session, Rich Harrison had his session going on...I started banging out some shit." "Ring the Alarm" was produced by Knowles, Garrett and Swizz Beatz; its lyrics were being written at the same time by the trio. Swizz Beatz stated: "['Ring the Alarm' is] just one of the many presents I gave [Knowles] for her B'Day. I have the most tracks on her album as a single producer". "Ring the Alarm" was co-arranged by Knowles and recorded in the same studio. She said about her collaboration with Swizz Beatz, "I love working with Swizz. He's challenging. His beats are so complex it's hard to find a melody. But ['Ring the Alarm'] just clicked". ## Composition According to the sheet music published by EMI Music Publishing, it is composed in the key of A minor but changes to E major in the bridge and changes to A minor, and set in common time at a moderately slow tempo of 85 beats per minute. The instrumentation of "Ring the Alarm" includes drums, clattering percussion instrument, treble synthesizers, and bass instrument. It also makes use of a slapping backbeat, an air horn, titanic handclaps, plonks, and breathing noises. A blaring siren is used as the song's introductory sound, setting an aggressive tone, which is augmented by Knowles' throaty mezzo-soprano growl. Tim Finney of Pitchfork described her vocals as "thrillingly sharp with anxiety and paranoia", and Tom Breihan of The Village Voice commented that she sings with "a frantic intensity". Knowles' vocals range from the note of A<sub>3</sub> to F<sub>5</sub>. Her strong shout vocal styling is meshed with the grooves, and enhanced with echo and shimmer, which overlap with one another, creating a neo-warm vibe. Knowles commented on the song, "It's energetic, aggressive and filled with hard beats". She explained that the album was completed in three weeks, which is the reason most of the record, including "Ring the Alarm" sounds aggressive. She further clarified that she did not intend to write an angry song, "Swizz's ['Ring the Alarm'] had that tough vibe, like the guy had cheated, and I wanted to write something honest. If you're in a relationship, even if the man's cheating and you end up not wanting him, the thought of another woman benefiting from the lessons you taught him." "Ring the Alarm" features Knowles as the female protagonist impersonating a threatened woman involved in a love triangle. She is unwilling to allow another woman to profit from all the efforts she put on to make her lover a better man. Frances Romero of Time magazine noted that Knowles' anger is due to her man's wandering eye, her desire to leave, and the thought of having to give him up to some unworthy woman. Tamara Coniff of Billboard magazine noted that the verses of "Ring the Alarm" resemble those of Aretha Franklin's songs. Tom Breihan commented that Knowles "[wails] with force and purpose on the verses". As the song opens, she tells her lover, "I can't let you go", and that she will not allow another woman to take everything she owns, including the chinchilla coats and the house on the coast. Knowles screams the refrain—"Ring the alarm, I've been doin[g] this too long / But I'll be damned if I see another chick on your arm"—"through a thick fog of distortion", as noted by Jody Rosen of Entertainment Weekly. Sarah Rodman of The Boston Globe added that she chants the lines with grit and urgency, while Breihan wrote that she sings them "with a frantic intensity". Knowles later declares that her relationship is "not the picture perfect movie everyone would assume". ## Release In June 2006, Knowles invited Tamara Coniff of Billboard to a New York recording studio where she played "Ring the Alarm" and "Freakum Dress" (2006) for the prospect of the next US single, and she also had plans for "Green Light" (2007) and "Get Me Bodied" (2007) to hit international markets. However, she ultimately opted for "Ring the Alarm" to be released as the second single of the album in the United States, following "Déjà Vu" (2006). On September 10, 2006, it was added to US urban contemporary radio playlists. A two-track CD single was released on October 3, 2006, and a five-track remix CD was later made available on October 17, 2006. Knowles approached English production team Freemasons to remix "Ring the Alarm". A club-oriented remix was produced and included on the band's debut studio album Shakedown (2007). ## Controversies The lyrics of "Ring the Alarm" were rumored to be about singer Rihanna's relationship with rapper Jay-Z. According to media speculation, Knowles, Rihanna and Jay-Z were part of a love triangle in 2006. It was rumored that Jay-Z had always been faithful to Knowles until he met Rihanna, whose popularity grew considerably during that year. She tempted Jay-Z to live a romantic relationship with her while he was still with Knowles. As commented by Tom Breihan of The Village Voice, Knowles took advantage of "[people's] sympathy and unleash[ed] a burst of public rage in the form of ['Ring the Alarm']". In an interview for Seventeen magazine, she however clarified that the lyrics had no connection with Rihanna, before adding that she was unaware of the rumors that had been circulating. Concerned that someone was trying to sabotage Knowles' second studio album, Knowles' father and manager, Mathew Knowles, released an official statement: > It is apparent that there is a consistent plan by some to create chaos around Beyoncé's B'Day album release on September 4 in the US. First, it was a petition against the single, 'Déjà Vu', then a rumor regarding conflict between Beyoncé and Rihanna, seizures caused by the 'Ring the Alarm' video, putting out a single to compete with LeToya's album and now to add to all the ridiculous rumors, is my plan to postpone the release of her 'B'Day' album. What will be next? Beyoncé's cut off all her hair? Dyed it green? Maybe she's singing the songs in reverse with some hidden subliminal message! The cover art of "Ring the Alarm", caused controversy because alligators were used during the photography session. Knowles affirmed that using the animal, and taping their mouths shut, was her idea. People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA), which had previously confronted her after she used furs for her fashion line's clothing design, contacted a biologist who wrote a letter to Knowles, "As a specialist in reptile biology and welfare, I'm concerned about your posing with a terrified baby alligator for your new album cover. Humans and alligators are not natural bedfellows, and the two should not mix at events such as photo shoots. In my view, doing so is arguably abusive to an animal." ## Critical reception "Ring the Alarm" received polarized responses from contemporary music critics, who noted that it was a marked departure from Knowles' previous material. Eb Haynes of AllHipHop wrote that the song is "emotionally high-powered. The Boston Globe's Sarah Rodman noted that it finds Knowles in "full hell-hath-no-fury mode", singing with grit and urgency that feel genuine. A critic of Billboard magazine viewed "Ring the Alarm" as a memorable release even though he wrote that it is not as good as Knowles' 2003 single "Crazy in Love". He praised her distorted vocals and the "ranting assault of a lyric", which she uses to convince her love interest. Jody Rosen of Entertainment Weekly called "Ring the Alarm" torrid, and wrote that Knowles "sounds positively horrified by the prospect of relinquishing the luxury goodies her boyfriend has bought her". Brian Hiatt of Rolling Stone stated that she sings with "enough frantic, quavering intensity to make you believe she really is crazy in love". Marcos Chin of Vibe magazine described "Ring the Alarm" as "both a sexual invitation and a threat". Darryl Sterdan of Jam! described "Ring the Alarm" as a "shrill tantrum of green-eyed monsterdom", and Kelefa Sanneh of The New York Times described it as a "canny display of emotional vulnerability". Tom Breihan of The Village Voice commented that "Ring the Alarm" may become Knowles' "You Oughta Know". Spence D. of IGN Music commented that the best examples of Knowles vocal stylings come on "Ring The Alarm", adding that it is one of the few tracks on the album where she goes for a throaty growl. Sal Cinquemani of Slant Magazine wrote that it was a bold choice for a single Dave de Sylvi of Sputnikmusic noted that "Ring the Alarm" was a brave choice for a single, called it "angry and lyrically incendiary", and noted that Swizz Beatz's beats are "unusually intricate". Norman Meyers of Prefix Magazine noted that the song is evidence of Knowles' willingness to take chances. Calling "Ring the Alarm" a "bunny-boiling bonanza" and a "killer club track", Rach Read of TeenToday wrote that it is a definite highlight and that "it's great to see an artist at the top of her game prepared to take risks with a track as unhinged as this." Chris Richards of The Washington Post defined Knowles' character in the song as a "jealousy-crazed ex", and expressed his disappointment that it could not manage a "more convincing refrain". Andy Kellman of Allmusic called it "an angered, atonal, and out-of-character song". Tim Finney of Pitchfork Media wrote, "the siren-assisted caterwaul of second single 'Ring the Alarm' sounds genuinely (and marvelously) incoherent." Bernard Zuel of The Sydney Morning Herald described "Ring the Alarm" as a "posturing and eventually annoying" track. ## Accolades Vibe ranked "Ring the Alarm" at number forty-eight on its list of the Top 60 Songs of 2006, complimenting the vocal distortion and the way Knowles shouts on the chorus and the hook. Frances Romero of Time listed "Ring the Alarm" at number nine on her list of the Top 10 Angry Breakup Songs of the 2000s decade, writing: "Critics had mixed feelings about the song ... In the end, what it does show is that Beyoncé will have her way." Staff members of Pitchfork ranked the song on their list of The Top 100 Tracks of 2006 at number eighty-five. The song was nominated for Best Female R&B Vocal Performance at the 49th Annual Grammy Awards (2007) but lost to Mary J. Blige's song "Be Without You" (2005). Jody Rosen from The New Yorker credited the jarring timbral and tonal variations on the song for giving a new musical sound that didn't exist in the world before Knowles. He further wrote, "If they sound 'normal' now, it's because Beyoncé, and her many followers, have retrained our ears." On their ranking of the best singles of aughts, Slant Magazine included "Ring the Alarm" at number two-hundred-and-twenty-six. ## Commercial performance For the week ending September 23, 2006, "Ring the Alarm" debuted at number twelve on the US Billboard Hot 100, following its entry at number seven on the US Hot Digital Songs, selling around 56,000 digital downloads. It was the highest debut that week in the United States, and was the highest debuting song of Knowles' career until "Formation" and "Sorry" debuted at numbers ten and eleven, respectively, in May 2016. The song peaked at number eleven on the Hot 100 chart issue dated September 30, 2006, and was Knowles' lowest peaking single until "Get Me Bodied", which peaked at number sixty-eight. Several weeks after leaving the Hot 100 chart, "Ring the Alarm" re-entered it for the week ending January 13, 2007, at number eighty-one; it remained on the chart for fourteen non-consecutive weeks. "Ring the Alarm" was more successful on the US Billboard component charts. It topped the Dance Club Songs, Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Singles Sales and Hot 100 Singles Sales chart, and reached number three on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs. The song additionally charted at number twenty-one on the US Rhythmic and at number nineteen on the US Pop 100. Though not released outside the United States, "Ring the Alarm" charted at number fifty-six on January 15, 2007, in Sweden. ## Music video The music video for "Ring the Alarm" was the second video of Knowles' to be directed by Sophie Muller, who worked on "Déjà Vu". The video was filmed inside a cavernous hangar located on the waterfront in Brooklyn, New York City. It remakes a scene from the film Basic Instinct (1992), referred to by Natalie More of In These Times as an infamous scene. Knowles wears a white skirt and turtleneck to emulate Sharon Stone. She told Elysa Gardner of USA Today that she considered the video to be a movie scene; "I put six months aside, worked with a coach for two months. And that carried through to my music. I treated the video for 'Ring the Alarm' like a movie scene. I was thinking, 'I've got to make my acting coach proud." The video premiered at Yahoo! Music on August 16, 2006 and was released to US iTunes Store on November 21, 2006. It debuted on MTV's Total Request Live at number ten on August 22, 2006, reached number one, and remained on the show for 35 days until it was replaced by the music video for "Irreplaceable" (2006). The video credited then-16-year-old dancer Teyana Taylor as the choreographer. The video starts with Knowles laying on a table, lit with a flashing bright red light. While a siren is blaring, she half-stands and sings while dancing on the table. She proceeds to an interrogation room similar to the one in the film Basic Instinct. Knowles sings the first verse in a house with a seashore backdrop. She wants to escape, and struggles with masked and uniformed guards in a hallway. She is then returned to the interrogation room. In between cuts, she sings in a corner of a room, is seen reflected in a mirror while screaming, and among a group of reporters. As the song closes, Knowles is shown crying. The video ends with a close-up view of Knowles putting on red lipstick. The scene shows only her lips. The music video gained mostly mixed reviews from critics. Andy Kellman of AllMusic wrote that it "invited all kinds of perplexed analysis". Jose Antonio Vargas of The Washington Post described Knowles' persona as a "ranting, angry woman". Elizabeth Goodman of Rolling Stone speculated that the use of guards in riot gear is a reference to Alias. Tom Breihan of The Village Voice described the clip as a "quick-and-dirty" video and a "fast montage of disconnected and disconnecting images". Blogger Roger Friedman of Fox News called it a "bizarre video depicting a wildly angry and unappealing Beyoncé telling off someone (maybe Jay-Z?) for cheating as if she were an enraged guest on Maury Povich." The staff members of Pitchfork Media included the music video at number twenty-one on the list of Top 25 Music Videos of 2006. Ryan Dombal further wrote that it was "Almost as good as Basic Instinct 2: Risk Addiction". In 2013, John Boone and Jennifer Cady of E! Online placed the video at number six on their list of Knowles' ten best music videos. ## Live performances Knowles performed "Ring the Alarm" at the 2006 MTV Video Music Awards on August 31, 2006, wearing a flowing trench coat, a corset and hotpants. The performance referenced Janet Jackson's "Rhythm Nation" routine. James Montgomery of MTV News commented that as Knowles sang, she "...stripped and stalked." Jocelyn Vena of the same publication, wrote that she had a "frantic performance" of the song along with a "fiercely choreographed breakdown" at the end. Erika Ramirez of Billboard magazine put the performance at number five on her list of "Beyonce's 5 Biggest TV Performances" saying that Knowles "kill[ed]" the live performance. She later performed the song on the American morning news and talk show, Good Morning America. "Ring the Alarm" was included on Knowles' set list for her The Beyoncé Experience concert in Los Angeles, and I Am... World Tour venues. During a performance of "Ring the Alarm" in Orlando, Florida on July 26, 2007, Knowles fell down a flight of stairs on stage and was videoed by several fans. She told her audience that it "hurt so bad" and requested, "Don't put [the footage] on YouTube." However, the next morning, several clips of Knowles' fall were available on YouTube, and reported in the media. The videos were quickly removed from YouTube because users had transgressed the website's terms of use." A representative from YouTube said that users posting their footage of the incident were guilty of infringement because "even if [they] took the video [themselves], the performer controls the right to use his/her image in a video, the songwriter owns the rights to the song being performed and sometimes the venue prohibits filming without permission." After being removed, clips of Knowles' fall were later reposted on YouTube and other video-sharing sites like eBaum's World and Dailymotion. Jay-Z later stated on radio that even though Knowles is "...a great performer who's on point 99 percent of the time, she's still human." Knowles performed "Ring the Alarm" on August 5, 2007, at Madison Square Garden in Manhattan, wearing a long red overcoat. Jon Pareles of The New York Times praised her performance, stating: "Beyoncé needs no distractions from her singing, which can be airy or brassy, tearful or vicious, rapid-fire with staccato syllables or sustained in curlicued melismas. But she was in constant motion, strutting in costumes." In Los Angeles, Knowles performed song, dressed in a long red overcoat. She was accompanied by several backup dancers and live instrumentation. When she sang "Ring the Alarm" in Sunrise, Florida on June 29, 2009, Knowles was wearing a glittery gold leotard. Animated graphics of turntables, faders and other club equipment were projected behind her, the dancers and the musicians. Knowles was accompanied by two drummers, two keyboardists, a percussionist, a horn section, three backup vocalists and a lead guitarist. "Ring the Alarm" was included on her 2007 live album The Beyoncé Experience Live. ## Formats and track listings - US CD single and 12-inch vinyl 1. "Ring the Alarm" – 3:26 2. "Ring the Alarm" (instrumental) – 3:25 - US remix CD single 1. "Ring the Alarm" (Karmatronic Remix) – 3:21 2. "Ring the Alarm" (Migtight Remix) – 3:21 3. "Ring the Alarm" (Tranzformas Remix) – 4:14 4. "Ring the Alarm" (Jazze Pha Remix) – 3:48 5. "Ring the Alarm" (Grizz Remix) – 3:32 - US Dance Mixes EP 1. "Ring the Alarm" (Freemasons Club Mix) – 8:33 2. "Ring the Alarm" (Karmatronic Remix) – 3:19 3. "Ring the Alarm" (Migtight Remix) – 3:19 - US Urban Mixes EP 1. "Ring the Alarm" (Tranzformas Remix) (feat. Collie Buddz) – 4:12 2. "Ring the Alarm" (Jazze Pha Remix) – 3:47 3. "Ring the Alarm" (Grizz Remix) – 3:32 - Spanglish Mix 1. "Ring the Alarm" (Spanglish Mix) - 3:24 ## Credits and personnel - Beyoncé Knowles – vocals, production, writing, executive production - Mathew Knowles – executive production, management, A&R - Jim Caruana – recording - Rob Kinelski – recording assistance - Jason Goldstein – mixing - Swizz Beatz – mixing, production, writing - Sean Garrett – production, writing - Steve Tolle – mixing assistance - Brian Gardner – mastering - Max Gousse – A&R ## Charts ### Weekly charts ### Year-end charts ### Decade-end charts ## Certifications ## Release history ## See also - List of number-one dance singles of 2006 (U.S.) ## In popular culture - "Ring the Alarm" has featured in the third series premiere of popular UK teen drama Skins. - Haven Holidays had sampled the main instrumental part of the Freemason's Club Mix of "Ring the Alarm" for their Funstars Go! Live background music whenever the Funstars play silly or funny games within a time limit.
12,561,040	You Can't Win (song)	1,162,990,859	1979 single by Michael Jackson	[ "1978 songs", "1979 singles", "Epic Records singles", "Michael Jackson songs", "Song recordings produced by Quincy Jones", "Songs written by Charlie Smalls", "Songs written for films" ]	"You Can't Win" is an R&B, pop and soul song written by Charlie Smalls and performed by American recording artist Michael Jackson, who played Scarecrow in the 1978 musical film The Wiz, an urbanized retelling of L. Frank Baum's The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. The movie featured an entirely African American cast and was based on the 1975 Broadway musical The Wiz. After the original soundtrack version was recorded, Michael Jackson and Quincy Jones went back into the studio and re-recorded the track. It was the re-recording that was released in January 1979 as the second single from The Wiz: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack, following the release of "Ease On Down the Road" in 1978, and was Michael's first solo chart single on Epic Records (despite the fact that the soundtrack album for The Wiz was released by Motown and the now-defunct MCA Records). The 7-inch version split the song in half, with "Part 1" as the A-side and "Part 2" as the B-side; the full-length version was released as a 12-inch single and later was included on The Ultimate Collection in 2004. The single only charted in the United States, where it reached number 81 on the Billboard Hot 100 and number 42 on the R&B singles chart. Since its release, the song has been well received by music critics. The song has been performed by contemporary singers such as Jill Scott and Charles Grigsby. In 1982 "Part 2" of "You Can't Win", in which Michael Jackson repeatedly sings the line "Can't get outta the game", was vocally overdubbed, and the resulting track was titled "Can't Get Outta the Rain"; it became the B-side of "The Girl Is Mine", the first single from Jackson's landmark album Thriller. Despite "Can't Get Outta the Rain" being melodically identical to "You Can't Win", as well as lyrically identical except for the word "rain", Jackson and Quincy Jones are credited as the song's composers, not Charlie Smalls. ## Composition "You Can't Win" was originally written and performed during the pre-Broadway Baltimore run of the stage version of The Wiz in 1974, sung by the chorus of Winkies, the Wicked Witch's slaves. The number was cut from the musical before the official Broadway opening and wasn't performed again until the movie version was under consideration, 3 years later. The producers resurrected the song as a solo for Michael Jackson to replace "I Was Born on the Day Before Yesterday", which had been Scarecrow's solo in the Broadway musical. "You Can't Win" and its corresponding scene in the movie allude to mistreatment of African Americans. Jackson stated in his 1988 autobiography Moonwalk that the lyrics to "You Can't Win" are about humiliation and helplessness, feelings, he stated, that many people have experienced at one point in their life. The singer added that the song was also about "the feeling that there are people out there who don't actively hold you back as much as they work quietly on your insecurities so that you hold yourself back". "You Can't Win" opens with the lines, "You can't win, you can't break even, and you can't get out of the game. People keep sayin', things are gonna change, but they look just like they're staying the same." William F. Brown, who wrote the book for the Broadway musical, stated that such verses made "You Can't Win" a "black message song". Musically, the track has been described as an R&B, pop and soul song by Renée Graham of The Boston Globe. According to the sheet music published on Musicnotes.com by Alfred Music Publishing, the track was performed in common time, with a tempo of 80 beats per minute. It adds that the song is composed in E major with a range from B<sub>3</sub> to C<sub>5</sub>. ## In The Wiz The scene that corresponds with "You Can't Win" in The Wiz begins with Dorothy Gale (played by Diana Ross) stumbling upon a scarecrow being heckled by crows while stuck in the air on a pole. Dorothy remains hidden while the crows mock Scarecrow for asking to be let down. They state that he will remain on the pole because that is his role and there is nothing to get down for. The crows tell Scarecrow that even if he was let down, he would not be able to walk as he is a "straw paper dummy". Scarecrow tries to reason with the birds by reading relevant quotations from figures such as Francis Bacon and Cicero as a rationale to be freed. The crows do not relent, however, and make him recite their "Crow Commandments": "Thou shall honor all crows", "Thou shall stop reading all bits of paper and literature" and "Thou shall never, never get down off of this here pole". In addition, the birds tell Scarecrow to sing the crow anthem, "You Can't Win". After the song concludes, Dorothy comes out of hiding and releases Scarecrow from the pole. Together, they then dance their way down the yellow brick road in search of The Wiz, singing "Ease on Down the Road" as they go. The song is also heard in The Wiz Live!, replacing "I Was Born on the Day Before Yesterday". ### Analysis Elwood Watson, author of Pimps, Wimps, Studs, Thugs and Gentlemen: Essays on Media Images of Masculinity, states that The Wiz offers an "important allegorical treatment of ordinary African American men living in the wake of the Civil Rights Movement". Watson writes that while the crows do not intend to cause physical harm to Scarecrow, the beginning of their scene recalls experiences of the ritual lynching of black men in the United States. The author states that the crows' refusal to allow Scarecrow to read literature was reminiscent of laws that forbade black slaves from being educated. Watson writes, "Scarecrow's desire for knowledge that will help him interpret the discourses and institutions that shape his life signifies on the slave narrative. With its emphasis on literacy and freedom, African American slave narratives document that for many African Americans literacy was understood as an essential path to freedom." Watson continues: > The Crows' insistence that reading is useless, even dangerous for Scarecrow because it only leads to discontentment takes on an especially haunting reminder of the ways in which the residues of slavery continue to injure contemporary African Americans. The Crows reinforce Scarecrow's subjection at their hands through a song whose refrain "you can't win child, you can't get out of the game" that aims to disabuse Scarecrow of any aspirations toward freedom ... Their insistence that "reading is stupid" suggests that a Eurocentric education does not promise liberation from "the game" that race and racism create ... The Crow's dismissal of education and western thought fails because they do not offer Scarecrow an alternative that will emancipate him. The Crow's attempt to discipline Scarecrow by displacing his hope with nihilism. For The Crow's so-called book of knowledge is less valuable than what they perceive to be real knowledge-street smarts. Though they are not tethered to a pole, they are seemingly unable or as their commandments and anthem suggests, unwilling to find opportunities than their present location provides. The Crow's chorus to Scarecrow's song is revealing for what it says about their loss of hope ... The Crow's are even more disadvantaged than Scarecrow because, unlike him, they are hopeless. The Crow's chorus, like The Crow Commandments, reflects their disillusionment with their inability to realize the promise of upward mobility. Watson continued his analysis, writing that despite the crows' attempts to erode Scarecrow's confidence, "[he] gives no indication that he intends to abort his efforts to liberate himself physically and intellectually." Watson concluded his study of Scarecrow and his scene by stating, "His encounter with Dorothy will help him to realize, contrary to The Crow's assertions, that Scarecrow's pursuit of knowledge can indeed help him to win opportunities for improving his life." ## Release and reception In January 1979, "You Can't Win" was released as the second single from The Wiz: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack, a double album distributed by Motown Records in September 1978. The single was issued after the September 1978 release of "Ease on Down the Road", a duet between Jackson and Diana Ross, who played protagonist Dorothy Gale in The Wiz. "You Can't Win" was distributed under Epic Records, and was Jackson's first solo single issued by the company after Epic executives signed him and his brothers to the label in 1976. "You Can't Win" entered Billboard's R&B singles chart on January 20, 1979. It reached number 42 and remained in the chart for ten weeks. A month later, on February 24, 1979, it entered the Billboard Hot 100, where it peaked at number 81. The single stayed in the chart for three weeks. In May 1979, "You Can't Win" was released in Britain, as was a 7" picture disc of the song. The single failed to enter the British charts. When Jackson's Off the Wall was first released in August 1979, the picture disc supplemented the album. Since its release, "You Can't Win" has received positive reviews from music critics. A journalist from the Kansas City Star said that the song was the best one from The Wiz. Kenny Mack of the Santa Monica Daily Press asserted that Jackson's "famous vulnerability and the power of his voice on 'You Can't Win' combined for perfect casting" in the film. The Boston Globe's Renée Graham stated in 2005, "Halfway through the [song], Jackson lets out a whoop, and the tune evolves from a pop-soul confection into a true R&B delight, spiced with barking horns and hand-claps as funky and loose as anything Jackson has ever done." Writer Geoff Brown wrote in his book Michael Jackson: A Life in Music that the singer's performance of "You Can't Win" in The Wiz was "one of the few bright moments in a drab remake of The Wizard of Oz". Margo Jefferson wrote in the biography On Michael Jackson that the entertainer sang the song in the film with "rough, gospel edges of desperation". She added, "The torment feels genuine. It's a painful scene." After Jackson's death in 2009, Edmund W. Lewis of The Louisiana Weekly said that he was "still amazed at the quality of [the singer]'s performance in The Wiz". He added, "As the scarecrow, he sang the hell out of [the song]." ## Legacy "You Can't Win" has been referenced and performed on several occasions. In the 1982 blockbuster film E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial, a snippet of the song is heard on a car radio. In 2001 Jill Scott performed the song during the Michael Jackson: 30th Anniversary Special celebration. In 2003, during the second season of American Idol, contestant Charles Grigsby sang "You Can't Win" for a movie theme night. An Entertainment Weekly writer said that the song choice was "oddly appropriate", as the hopeful was eliminated from the competition after the performance. Decades after the release of "You Can't Win", William F. Brown stated that the song had been dropped from his theater productions of The Wiz. He said this was because the musical was not a black message show, but a show for everybody to enjoy. He expressed the opinion that "You Can't Win" was no longer relevant, stating, "[It's] all changed. Black people can win." ## Track listings Limited edition picture disc – 7-inch single - "You Can't Win (Pt. 1)" – 3:43 - "You Can't Win (Pt. 2)" – 2:58 ## Charts
8,798,424	Tunguska (The X-Files)	1,170,110,666	null	[ "1996 American television episodes", "Television episodes directed by Kim Manners", "Television episodes set in Hawaii", "Television episodes set in Maryland", "Television episodes set in New York (state)", "Television episodes set in Russia", "Television episodes set in Virginia", "Television episodes written by Chris Carter (screenwriter)", "Television episodes written by Frank Spotnitz", "The X-Files (season 4) episodes" ]	"Tunguska" is the eighth episode of the fourth season of the American science fiction television series The X-Files. It premièred on the Fox network on November 24, 1996. It was directed by Kim Manners, and written by Frank Spotnitz and series creator Chris Carter. "Tunguska" featured guest appearances by John Neville, Nicholas Lea and Fritz Weaver. The episode helped explore the series' overarching mythology. "Tunguska" earned a Nielsen household rating of 12.2, being watched by 18.85 million people in its initial broadcast. In the episode, FBI special agent Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) travels to Russia to investigate the source of a black oil contamination. His partner Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) and assistant director Walter Skinner (Mitch Pileggi) are summoned to attend a United States Senate hearing on Mulder's whereabouts. "Tunguska" is a two-part episode, with the plot continuing in the next episode, "Terma". "Tunguska" was inspired by reports of evidence of extraterrestrial life possibly being found in the Allan Hills 84001 meteorite, while the gulag setting was inspired by the works of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. The story offered the writers a chance to expand the scale of the series' mythology globally, although production of the episode was described as troublesome and expensive. ## Plot The episode opens in medias res to Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) as she is brought before a Senate select committee to be questioned about the whereabouts of Fox Mulder (David Duchovny). Scully refuses to answer the committee's questions and attempts to read a statement denouncing the conspiracy within the government. Senator Sorenson threatens to hold Scully in contempt of Congress. Ten days earlier, at Honolulu Airport, a courier returning from the Republic of Georgia (David Bloom) is searched by customs officers. One of the officers (Andy Thompson) removes a glass canister from the courier's briefcase and accidentally shatters it, exposing both men to the black oil. Meanwhile, in New York City, Mulder and Scully take part in an FBI raid against a domestic terrorist group. Mulder's tipster within the group is revealed to be Alex Krycek (Nicholas Lea), whom the terrorists released from the missile silo where he had been trapped. Krycek has turned against The Smoking Man (William B. Davis), and tells the distrustful agents that he can help expose him. Krycek leads the agents to Dulles International Airport, where they try to apprehend a second courier carrying a diplomatic pouch from Russia. The courier leads the agents on a pursuit through the airport, but drops the pouch before escaping. The pouch is revealed to carry a seemingly unremarkable rock. Mulder has Krycek confined at the high rise apartment of Assistant Director Walter Skinner before having the rock analyzed at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center. Dr. Sacks, a NASA scientist, tells Mulder and Scully that the rock is a prehistoric meteorite fragment that might contain fossilized alien bacteria. Skinner is approached by the Smoking Man, who demands that the pouch be returned. The courier breaks into Skinner's apartment and searches for the pouch, only to be thrown off Skinner's patio by Krycek. Meanwhile, Dr. Sacks cuts into the fragment, but inadvertently releases the black oil inside; the organism penetrates the scientist's hazmat suit and puts him in a coma-like state. Mulder travels to New York to visit Marita Covarrubias (Laurie Holden), who reveals that the fragment originated from the Russian province of Krasnoyarsk and provides the documents needed to travel there. Mulder reluctantly brings along Krycek, who is fluent in Russian. In Charlottesville, Virginia, the Smoking Man is admonished by the Well-Manicured Man (John Neville) when the latter learns about Mulder's travels. Skinner and the agents are subpoenaed to appear before Senator Sorenson's panel over the missing pouch; when Skinner questions Scully about Mulder's whereabouts, she is not forthcoming. Meanwhile, as Mulder and Krycek hike through the forests of Krasnoyarsk, the former theorizes that the fragment may be tied to the Tunguska event, a mysterious cosmic impact that occurred in the area in 1908. The two men come across a slave labor camp, but are captured by the taskmasters and thrown into a gulag. Skinner and Scully meet with Senator Sorenson, who questions them on the death of the courier and the location of Agent Mulder. Mulder talks with a fellow prisoner who tells him that innocent people have been captured and brought here to be subjected to experiments. Immediately afterwards guards burst into the room and inject Mulder with a syringe. When Mulder awakens he is in a large room bound with chicken wire along with many other prisoners. Black material is dumped onto his face, infecting him with the black oil. ## Production "Tunguska" and its follow-up "Terma" were conceived by the writers when they were trying to conceive a "big and fun canvas" to tell stories. They decided to create a story connected to the Russian gulags, which led to the "natural" idea that the Russians were experimenting separately from the Syndicate to create a vaccine for the black oil. Series writer John Shiban felt it was natural to create an arms race-like story between the United States and Russia, being that the Cold War had ended a few years earlier. The writers desired to expand the series' mythology globally, a concept that continued into the fifth season and the series' 1998 feature film adaptation. The idea of a conspiracy with a global reach was first broached in the series' second season, and it was felt that this two-part story was a good place to expand upon this, allowing the production crew to "stretch the limits" of their resources and imagination. The inspiration for the oil-containing rocks was NASA's announcement of possible evidence of extraterrestrial life in the Allan Hills 84001 meteorite; while the gulag scenes were based on Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn's books The Gulag Archipelago and One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich. The scenes featuring the SWAT raid on a terrorist cell found to be harbouring Alex Krycek were filmed in a single night, requiring sixty individual film setups split between three camera crews working simultaneously. By dawn, only four of the sixty required shots had not been filmed, and these were later completed on a sound stage. Additional scenes shot for the episode featuring The Smoking Man and the Well-Manicured Man were cut due to time constraints. A scene featuring Scully briefing Skinner on the events of the episode was also cut, as it was felt that it was "redundant" within the narrative, repeating information that had already been shown to the audience. David Duchovny's father was present during production of the episode, leaving the actor to enjoy the shoot, although the crew described production as expensive and "stubbornly trouble-plagued". "Tunguska" marked the fourth appearance in the series by Malcolm Stewart, who had previously appeared in "Pilot", "3" and "Avatar". ## Reception ### Ratings "Tunguska" premiered on the Fox network on November 24, 1996, and was first broadcast in the United Kingdom on BBC Two on October 28, 1997. The episode earned a Nielsen household rating of 12.2 with an 18 share, meaning that roughly 12.2 percent of all television-equipped households, and 18 percent of households watching television, were tuned in to the episode. A total of 18.85 million viewers watched this episode during its original airing. ### Reviews "Tunguska" received mostly positive reviews from critics. Based on an advance viewing of the episode's script, Entertainment Weekly rated "Tunguska" an A−, praising the "arms race" plotline. Sarah Stegall, in The Munchkyn Zone, wrote positively of the entry and gave it a 5 out of 5 rating. Stegall highlighted the "taut storyline" and the "excellent direction". Writing for The A.V. Club, Emily VanDerWerff rated the episode a B, noting that the move to a global scale detracted from the series' overall relevance. VanDerWerff felt that "the action setpieces in this episode and the next one are really terrific", and praised William B. Davis' portrayal of The Smoking Man. However, she described "Tunguska" as being "one of the first really unfocused mythology episodes in the show's run", and found the plot of the episode to not be moving the series forward enough, noting that "for the first time, Mulder feels less like he's driving the action and more like he's a messenger boy". David Duchovny described this episode, along with "Terma", as being action-heavy and "lots of fun". ### Awards "Tunguska" received a nomination for a CAS Award by the Cinema Audio Society for Outstanding Achievement in Sound Mixing - Television Series.
51,547,096	Rockingham 500	1,158,915,285	Motor race held in Corby, England	[ "2001 establishments in England", "Auto races in the United Kingdom", "Champ Car races" ]	The Rockingham 500 was an annual Championship Auto Racing Teams (CART) motor race held in 2001 and 2002 at the Rockingham Motor Speedway oval track in Corby, Northamptonshire, England, United Kingdom. The race was the first major motor race in the United Kingdom to be held on an oval track with Champ cars. It was created in the hope of competing with the Formula One British Grand Prix, but CART had difficulty publicising the event. The first race, in 2001, was marred by drainage issues and won by Team Penske's Gil de Ferran. It was last held the following year, when the track was hampered by a poor trading environment and inclement weather. For 2003, the race was relocated to Brands Hatch and renamed the London Champ Car Trophy. The race helped Rockingham Motor Speedway establish itself on the global motorsport scene, and it introduced a new type of racing to the UK. ## History During the construction of the Rockingham Motor Speedway in October 1999, former property developer Peter Davies revealed publicly a plan to hold a CART motor race there. In July 2000, it was announced that Rockingham would hold a race for the 2001 season. The event would be Europe's second, following the German 500 at the EuroSpeedway Lausitz in Klettwitz, Germany. The event would take place on a four-turn 1.479-mile (2.380 km) oval track that has banking of up to 7.9 degrees. The organisers signed a five-year contract with CART to hold the event. Champ Cars would race in Europe for the first time since 1978, and on a British oval track for the first time. Several observers questioned CART's chances of staging a race in England, noting that previous similar schemes were unsuccessful. It was started in the hope of competing with the British Grand Prix. CART encountered difficulties in promoting the race early on. They were unable to adequately educate British motor racing fans about the series. The owners of Rockingham attempted to display an advertisement at the 2001 British Grand Prix, but the owner of Formula One's commercial rights, Bernie Ecclestone, cancelled the plan shortly before it was to take place. In response, a major marketing strategy was implemented. The Michaelides & Bednash agency oversaw the advertising, which began in the printed press in August and included two television commercials and an official poster. The event was hampered by drainage issues on the new track, which forced the cancellation of the practise sessions. The starting order was determined by the drivers' points standings. Its length was reduced from 210 to 140 laps, and Team Penske driver Gil de Ferran won after overtaking pole position starter Kenny Bräck on the final lap. Most drivers praised the circuit but did not criticise the problems affecting it. Despite two days of practice and qualifying rounds being cancelled because of the drainage issues, 38,000 spectators watched the race. The track later had an extra layer added along with a sealant to allow it to drain water. During the 2002 race preparations, it was announced that a provisional date for 2003 had been set at 4 May. The circuit's chief executive, David Grace, said it provided an opportunity to hold the event at the start of summer, giving motor racing fans "the ideal start" to the season. He noted that moving the dates did not increase the risk of bad weather because the track's meteorological data showed that the months of May and September were the driest of the year. The 2002 event had better weather but fewer attendees. Dario Franchitti of Team Green won the race. Dale Coyne Racing formed a "all-England" team called Team St. George with British American Racing Formula One test driver and ASCAR Days of Thunder series competitor Darren Manning in an attempt to promote the race. Some journalists speculated that the race might not be held because of the cancellation of the German 500 due to financial difficulties. Rockingham renegotiated its sanctioning fee from \$4.2 million to \$2.8 million, claiming that the German 500's had harmed the event's reputation. Rockingham Motor Speedway CEO Ashley Power began talks with CART officials in November 2002, hoping to end the race's five-year contract early due to a poor trading environment and inclement weather. He also stated that the track would lose money, contradicting a prediction made by the track's former chairman Peter Middleton in January. This was due in part to the track financing Team St. George, though Rockingham sold sponsorship to recoup some of its losses. On November 25, it was announced that Rockingham Motor Speedway would not hold its scheduled 2003 race, but CART and track personnel stated their intention to look into holding similar events in the future. It was revealed that the track lacked the resources and time to create a marketing programme and find a new title sponsor. The postponement until 2004 would allow them to meet those targets. The race established Rockingham in world motor sport and provided a new attraction for British motor racing enthusiasts. For 2003, it was moved to the Brands Hatch Indy circuit and renamed the London Champ Car Trophy. ## Race winners - 2001: 210 laps were originally planned for the race. Due to a lack of practice, the race was shortened to 168 laps. Due to darkness, the race was subsequently cut short.
19,585,789	Oh! How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning	1,104,555,148	1918 song written by Irving Berlin	[ "1918 songs", "Songs of World War I", "Songs written by Irving Berlin" ]	"Oh! How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning" is a song written by Irving Berlin in 1918 that gives a comic perspective on military life. Berlin composed the song as an expression of protest against the indignities of Army routine shortly after being drafted into the United States Army in 1918. The song soon made the rounds of camp and became popular with other soldiers, partly because hatred of reveille was universal. The commanding officer of Camp Upton in eastern Long Island took an interest in Berlin's talents and assigned him to write and produce a fundraising benefit to raise funds for a new visitors' center at the base. The show was entitled Yip, Yip, Yaphank after the Camp Upton locale in Yaphank, New York. Although Berlin initially wrote "Oh! How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning" without commercial intent, it eventually appeared in three different Broadway shows, including Ziegfeld Follies of 1918, and the film This Is the Army. More than any other Irving Berlin song, it became the one most associated with Berlin as a performer. ## Background Irving Berlin was born in the Russian Empire in 1888, either in Tolochin or Tyumen, and had moved with his family to New York City in 1893. He acquired United States citizenship in early 1918 with the expectation that his medical history would exempt him from his final year of draft eligibility. So it came as an unpleasant surprise that within months Berlin was drafted and serving as a private at Camp Upton at a salary of \$30 a month, far below his usual earnings. Although as a civilian he employed a private valet, as an Army private he was compelled to perform unskilled labor in support of camp operations. "There were a lot of things about army life I didn't like", said Berlin, "and the thing I didn't like most of all was reveille." During World War I, Berlin was drafted into the United States Army's 152nd Depot Brigade shortly after he became a naturalized United States citizen in 1918. By the time he entered the service the war was in its final months and prospects for victory were steadily improving. He was assigned to a camp on eastern Long Island that was mainly an interim station for infantry troops headed overseas. ## Composition The incident that inspired Berlin to write "Oh! How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning" was an occasion when a colonel wanted a group of buglers to play George M. Cohan's "Over There". The buglers were unable to comply because it exceeded the range of their instruments, so the oblivious officer ordered them to practice Cohan's song. He wrote it as "a thin little sergeant." Berlin's civilian work schedule had been that of a hardworking night owl, generally writing material until two or three in the morning. His efforts to adjust to military life and become a good soldier included springing out of bed obediently each morning, which earned him the resentment of fellow soldiers because he concealed his hatred of reveille too well and appeared eager to wake up in the mornings. So during an era when popular songs about war praised its heroism, Berlin instead gave voice to the subversive impulses shared by ordinary soldiers. The lyrics begin with a mundane recounting of a newly recruited soldier's camp life and progress to hyperbole as he describes a series of increasingly absurd plans to escape from morning reveille. "Someday I'm going to murder the bugler, Someday they're going to find him dead; I'll amputate his reveille and step upon it heavily, and spend the rest of my life in bed." Berlin would later describe the song as "a protest written from the heart out, absolutely without the slightest thought that it would ever earn a cent". He wrote the song before any plans for a larger production were underway and it soon gained popularity around the camp. ## Production The camp's commanding officer Major General J. Franklin Bell called Berlin into his office and asked the showman to raise funds for a new community house to lodge families of service members who visited the camp. The projected expense of the project was \$35,000. At first, Berlin called in favors from civilian colleagues to visit and put on local performances to boost morale, but news of a Navy fundraising show on Broadway called Boom Boom inspired Berlin to request permission to write and stage a full Broadway production of their own. The songwriter not only obtained permission for the show, but also received General Bell's personal permission to return to Berlin's normal creative working schedule and a special exemption from reveille. Civilian musician Harry Ruby joined Berlin in camp to transcribe and arrange the music and collaborate on the show. ## Parodies Berlin's song "inspired a dozen parodies." An uncredited parody was recounted in The New York Times: Oh, how I hate to go into the mess hall! Oh, how I long for the foods at home! For it isn't hard to guess Why they call the meals a mess- You've got to eat beans, you've got to eat beans, You've got to eat beans in the Army. ## Performances The song was performed in soldier revues including 1918's Yip Yip Yaphank, and Ziegfeld Follies of 1918, as well as in 113 Broadway performances of This Is The Army in 1942. Jack Haley sang "Oh! How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning" in the 1938 movie Alexander's Ragtime Band and in 1938 Alice Faye and Ethel Merman also sang the song at the Roxy Theatre in New York City. It was sung at a 1941 war rally against the America First Committee by New York City Mayor Fiorello La Guardia in Philadelphia. The song is sung in the 1932 Betty Boop short entitled Oh! How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning. ### Yip Yip Yaphank The song appeared in two shows of 1918: Yip Yip Yaphank and Ziegfeld Follies of 1918. Yip Yip Yaphank opened on August 19 and Berlin made his entrance late in the show, being dragged from a pup tent by two other soldiers as he pretended to be asleep on his feet to sing "Oh! How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning". The song was a centerpiece of the show; both it and Berlin's performance received favorable reviews. According to reviewers, Berlin's voice was thin but his timing was perfect and he presented a hilarious stage persona. 24 years later, The New York Times declared Yip "an immediate hit." > George M. Cohan may have conveyed the spirit of the aggressive patriotism in his rousing "Over There", but it was Berlin who caught the more human emotions of the lowly soldier in such poignant pieces as "Oh, How I Hate to Get Up In the Morning" and "Kitchen Police" ... The show was extended twice and exceeded its fundraising goal of \$35,000. Estimates of the proceeds range from \$83,000 to over \$158,000, but the planned visitor center was never built because the war ended shortly afterward and Berlin was never informed what happened to the money. Berlin received no financial benefit beyond his ordinary sergeant's pay, but he was well compensated in publicity. He was recognized as a Broadway star wherever he went after he returned to civilian life. Along with the acclaim, however, he also "received a death threat and a kidnapping threat", which he took seriously enough to purchase a bulletproof limousine and hire a bodyguard/chauffeur. ### This Is the Army Berlin also performed "Oh! How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning" in the 1942 stage play This Is The Army, which ran for 113 performances on Broadway and was adapted as a Warner Brothers musical the following year. `It was declared the "modern version of Yip, Yip, Yaphank," and contained "all-new music" except for two or three songs. Twenty-five years after the original show, he was still dark haired and wiry, but his face was strained. More importantly, his voice—which had never been strong—was weakened from months of recent stage touring. The number was filmed in late afternoon when he expected his voice to be at its best, but an internal studio memo still reported, "Irving Berlin is no singer." Berlin wrote about the filming in an April 10, 1943 letter:` > Today they finished shooting my portion of the picture and I am certainly glad it's over with. All I do is sing "Hate to Get Up in the Morning" as I did in the show, but the camera is a severe judge and I am afraid even with the great amount of care and fuss they can't improve what the Fates decreed to be a homely face. As for my voice, I made a recording. When the record was first played on the set, one of the electricians, who didn't know whose voice it was, said, "If the guy who wrote that song could hear the record, he would turn over in his grave"--which gives you a fair idea. However I am hoping it won't be too bad. In May 1988 The Tonight Show Band honored Irving Berlin's one hundredth birthday by playing "Oh! How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning" as part of a medley in tribute to the songwriter at the close of a show. In 2016, June and earlier, the song was used in ads by McDonald's restaurants for the breakfast menu.
1,034,709	Earthsuit	1,156,210,236	Christian rock band from New Orleans	[ "American rap rock groups", "Christian rock groups from Louisiana", "Musical groups established in 1995", "Reggae rock groups", "Sparrow Records artists" ]	Earthsuit was a New Orleans-based Christian rock band formed in 1995. The band consisted of guitarist Dave Rumsey, keyboardist/vocalist Paul Meany, bassist Roy Mitchell, drummer David "Hutch" Hutchison, and vocalist Adam LaClave. Earthsuit's sound was primarily rock, but also incorporated elements of hip-hop, electronica, reggae, soul, and experimental music. The group recorded several independent EPs and played primarily in their New Orleans area before becoming noticed by Sparrow Records at a concert in 1999. The ensuing record deal saw the band's only commercial release, a critically acclaimed album entitled Kaleidoscope Superior, in 2000. Shortly after, the band left Sparrow and drifted out of the public eye. A final album, entitled The Rise of Modern Simulation was independently released before the group disbanded in 2003. Many of the band members continue to play together and collaborate in various bands, namely Mutemath and Club of the Sons. ## Biography Earthsuit began in 1995 as a collaboration between Adam LaClave and Paul Meany, who began composing music together after being introduced at a church in New Orleans. In an interview with Family Christian Stores, Meany explained that a sermon was the inspiration for the band's name: "...This man was preaching about how humans are really spirit beings encased in fleshly bodies. The term "earth suit" came up. At the time we liked it, and we took it." The two regularly performed at Café Joel, a small coffeehouse their church had started where Meany was music director. These performances helped cultivate their unique sound and introduced them to future band member David Rumsey. In 1997 they released a self-titled EP, which is sometimes called the Headless Clown EP due to its album cover. The record featured an early version of "One Time" (of which they later made a music video) as well as portions of live performances where Earthsuit covered Roberta Flack's "Killing Me Softly", albeit with re-written lyrics. Rumsey helped produce the EP and played guitar; however, the official band lineup only comprised LaClave and Meany. Shortly after, Rumsey officially joined along with bassist Roy Mitchell, another Café Joel regular. The band played and ministered in their hometown and did not tour much. In 1998, the band recorded and released a second EP, entitled Noise for Your Eyes. The EP included a remix of "One Time" and early song demos, which were interspersed with short clips of live performances. Drummer David Hutchison joined the band after they met him through a friend. In 1999, Earthsuit performed two sets at the Cornerstone Festival, one in a label showcase and the other opening for P.O.D. on the main stage. This garnered the attention of several major Christian labels, and the band subsequently signed to Sparrow Records. The band began working with Prince producer David Leonard on their debut record, which excited Meany: "[Sparrow] loved what we were doing musically, and they wanted to find the producer who would capitalize on that." Kaleidoscope Superior was released on June 20, 2000 and elicited positive reviews from critics. It also received a Dove Award nomination and experienced some success on Christian radio stations. Christian rock peers Rebecca St. James and dc Talk members, Kevin Max and Michael Tait, expressed excitement over the record. The same year, Earthsuit embarked on a tour called Festival Con Dios with other Christian bands, such as the Elms, PAX 217, and Switchfoot. The following year saw the band embark on their "Do You Feel The Distortion" tour with Ill Harmonics and The Benjamin Gate. Despite critical reception, Kaleidoscope Superior would remain the band's only commercial release; they were soon dropped from Sparrow's lineup due to "creative differences and marketing conundrums". Earthsuit disappeared from the public eye and began posting on a website about a new independent album. In September 2001, Hutchison left the band so he could spend more time with his family. Rumors began circling that the band would break up. In 2003, Earthsuit revealed they were disbanding and released their last record, The Rise of Modern Simulation. The final collection featured six original studio songs and ten bonus tracks, including a live remix of "Against the Grain", practice sessions of concert material, and covers of various songs. The album could only be purchased on the internet. Meany would later state "most people didn't care when [they] broke up". Shortly after Earthsuit's break up, Meany began working with drummer Darren King in a production team called "The Digitals". The name later changed to "Math" while the group helped produce music for Christian music stalwart TobyMac. The band recruited guitarist Greg Hill and changed their name to Mutemath. To accommodate new recordings, Meany and producer Tedd T started an independent label named Teleprompt Records. Their first release was an EP titled Reset in September 2004. Earthsuit alumnus Roy Mitchell joined the venture in 2005. Teleprompt later signed a distribution deal directly with Warner Bros. Records, allowing Mutemath to release a full-length self-titled album on September 26, 2006. Adam LaClave formed two bands, Macrosick and Club of the Sons. Macrosick has released only an independent CD titled demodisk; the Hurricane Katrina disaster of 2005 forced the band members to go on hiatus. LaClave then turned his attention towards Club of the Sons with friend and bassist Jonathan Allen. They released an EP called The Roughs in spring 2007 and an album entitled Young Quanta on July 7, 2009. ## Musical style and influences Earthsuit music was primarily rock, but also possessed strong hip-hop, electronica, reggae, soul, and experimental elements. Their sound had sometimes been compared to The Police, while Meany's rapping had been likened to the Beastie Boys. Adam LaClave stated the differing musical tastes of the band helped cultivate their sound: "Each one of us is really into a lot of different things ... it helps make our sound because you can hear all kinds of things". Live performances were characterized by sunglasses, futuristic costumes, and energetic showmanship. Many bands have influenced Earthsuit's style; the group has performed covers of songs by Basement Jaxx, Black Sheep, Kraftwerk, and Talking Heads. They have also utilized samples by DJ Shadow and The Verve. Adam LaClave and Paul Meany were the primary songwriters for Earthsuit. As Christians, the two wrote lyrics that often communicated a Christian message. For example, the song "Said the Sun" is an allegory about God telling Christians to be carriers of light. "Whitehorse" was written to present a different view of the return of Jesus, as LaClave stated in an interview, "Most people, when they hear the term "white horse," think of the analogy of Jesus coming back ... [We] wanted to bring a different meaning to it, because ... He comes to rescue us in our everyday life [too]." The men's lyrics also reflect experiences they have had. Meany once had a dream that inspired him to write "Gummy Buffalo"; he found himself in a candy store and squeezed a gummy buffalo whereupon he heard the melody for the song. Christianity Today has proposed the lyrics in "Foreign" may have been inspired by their departure from Sparrow Records. The lyrics read "There's no place in your world for me / I've been from sea to shining sea / And I can't retain your policies, excuse me / If I'm just hanging around, I'm foreign." ## Discography - Earthsuit (aka The Headless Clown EP) (independent, 1997) - Noise for Your Eyes (independent, 1998) - Kaleidoscope Superior (Sparrow Records, 2000) - The Rise of Modern Simulation (independent, 2003)
133,392	Johann Strauss II	1,164,885,231	Austrian composer (1825–1899)	[ "1825 births", "1899 deaths", "19th-century Austrian composers", "19th-century classical composers", "19th-century male musicians", "Artists from Coburg", "Austrian Protestants", "Austrian Romantic composers", "Austrian male classical composers", "Austrian opera composers", "Austrian operetta composers", "Austrian people of German descent", "Austrian people of Hungarian-Jewish descent", "Ballet composers", "Burials at the Vienna Central Cemetery", "Composers from Vienna", "Converts to Protestantism from Roman Catholicism", "Deaths from pneumonia in Austria-Hungary", "Johann Strauss II", "Light music composers", "Male opera composers", "Male operetta composers", "People from Neubau", "Strauss family" ]	Johann Baptist Strauss II (; 25 October 1825 – 3 June 1899), also known as Johann Strauss Jr., the Younger or the Son (German: Johann Strauß Sohn), was an Austrian composer of light music, particularly dance music and operettas as well as a violinist. He composed over 500 waltzes, polkas, quadrilles, and other types of dance music, as well as several operettas and a ballet. In his lifetime, he was known as "The Waltz King", and was largely responsible for the popularity of the waltz in Vienna during the 19th century. Some of Johann Strauss's most famous works include "The Blue Danube", "Kaiser-Walzer" (Emperor Waltz), "Tales from the Vienna Woods", "Frühlingsstimmen", and the "Tritsch-Tratsch-Polka". Among his operettas, Die Fledermaus and Der Zigeunerbaron are the best known. Strauss was the son of Johann Strauss I and his first wife Maria Anna Streim. Two younger brothers, Josef and Eduard Strauss, also became composers of light music, although they were never as well known as their brother. ## Spelling of name Although the name Strauss can be found in reference books frequently with "ß" (Strauß), Strauss himself wrote his name with a long "s" and a round "s" (Strauss), which was a replacement form for the Fraktur-ß used in antique manuscripts. His family called him "Schani" (Johnny), derived from the French "Jean" with addition of the endearment ending "-i". ## Early life Strauss was born into a Catholic family in St Ulrich near Vienna (now a part of Neubau), Austria, on 25 October 1825, to the composer Johann Strauss I and his first wife, Maria Anna Streim. His paternal great-grandfather was a Hungarian Jew – a fact which the Nazis, who lionised Strauss's music as "so German", later tried to conceal. His father did not want him to become a musician but rather a banker. Nevertheless, Strauss Jr. studied the violin secretly as a child with the first violinist of his father's orchestra, Franz Amon. When his father discovered his son secretly practising on a violin one day, he gave him a severe whipping, saying that he was going to beat the music out of the boy. It seems that rather than trying to avoid a Strauss rivalry, the elder Strauss only wanted his son to escape the rigours of a musician's life. It was only when the father abandoned his family for a mistress, Emilie Trampusch [de], that the son was able to concentrate fully on a career as a composer with the support of his mother. Strauss studied counterpoint and harmony with theorist Professor Joachim Hoffmann, who owned a private music school. His talents were also recognized by composer Joseph Drechsler, who taught him exercises in harmony. It was during that time that he composed his only sacred work, the gradual Tu qui regis totum orbem (1844). His other violin teacher, Anton Kollmann, who was the ballet répétiteur of the Vienna Court Opera, also wrote excellent testimonials for him. Armed with these, he approached the Viennese authorities to apply for a license to perform. He initially formed his small orchestra where he recruited his members at the Zur Stadt Belgrad tavern, where musicians seeking work could be hired easily. ## Debut as a composer Johann Strauss I's influence over the local entertainment establishments meant that many of them were wary of offering the younger Strauss a contract for fear of angering the father. Strauss Jr. was able to persuade Dommayer's Casino in Hietzing, a suburb of Vienna, to allow him to perform. The elder Strauss, in anger at his son's disobedience, and at that of the proprietor, refused to ever play again at Dommayer's Casino, which had been the site of many of his earlier triumphs. Strauss made his debut at Dommayer's in October 1844, where he performed some of his first works, such as the waltzes "Sinngedichte", Op. 1 and "Gunstwerber", Op. 4 and the polka "Herzenslust", Op. 3. Critics and the press were unanimous in their praise of Strauss's music. A critic for Der Wanderer commented that "Strauss's name will be worthily continued in his son; children and children's children can look forward to the future, and three-quarter time will find a strong footing in him." Despite the initial fanfare, Strauss found his early years as a composer difficult, but he soon won over audiences after accepting commissions to perform away from home. The first major appointment for the young composer was his award of the honorary position of "Kapellmeister of the 2nd Vienna Citizen's Regiment", which had been left vacant following Joseph Lanner's death two years before. Vienna was wracked by the revolutions of 1848 in the Austrian Empire, and the intense rivalry between father and son became much more apparent. The son decided to side with the revolutionaries. It was a decision that was professionally disadvantageous, as the Austrian royalty twice denied him the much coveted position of KK Hofballmusikdirektor, which was first designated especially for Johann I in recognition of his musical contributions. Further, the younger Strauss was also arrested by the Viennese authorities for publicly playing "La Marseillaise", but was later acquitted. The elder Strauss remained loyal to the monarchy and composed his "Radetzky March", Op. 228 (dedicated to the Habsburg field marshal Joseph Radetzky von Radetz), which would become one of his best-known compositions. When the elder Strauss died from scarlet fever in Vienna in 1849, the younger Strauss merged both their orchestras and engaged in further tours. Later, he also composed a number of patriotic marches dedicated to the Habsburg Emperor Franz Josef I, such as the "Kaiser Franz-Josef Marsch" Op. 67 and the "Kaiser Franz Josef Rettungs Jubel-Marsch" Op. 126, probably to ingratiate himself in the eyes of the new monarch, who had ascended the Austrian throne after the 1848 revolution. ## Career advancements Strauss Jr. eventually attained greater fame than his father and became one of the most popular waltz composers of the era, extensively touring Austria, Poland and Germany with his orchestra. He applied for the position of KK Hofballmusikdirektor (Music Director of the Royal Court Balls), which he finally attained in 1863, after being denied several times before for his frequent brushes with the local authorities. In 1853, due to constant mental and physical demands, Strauss suffered a nervous breakdown. He took a seven-week vacation in the countryside in the summer of that year on the advice of doctors. Johann's younger brother Josef was persuaded by his family to abandon his career as an engineer and take command of Johann's orchestra in the interim. In 1855, Strauss accepted commissions from the management of the Tsarskoye-Selo Railway Company of Saint Petersburg to play in Russia for the Vauxhall Pavilion at Pavlovsk in 1856. He would return to perform in Russia every year until 1865. In 1862, the 27-year-old Eduard Strauss officially joined the Strauss orchestra as another conductor, and he and his brother Josef would lead it until 1870. Later, in the 1870s, Strauss and his orchestra toured the United States, where he took part in the Boston Festival at the invitation of bandmaster Patrick Gilmore and was the lead conductor in a "Monster Concert" of over 1000 performers (see World's Peace Jubilee and International Musical Festival), performing his "Blue Danube" waltz, amongst other pieces, to great acclaim. As was customary at the time, requests for personal mementos from celebrities were often in the form of a lock of hair. In the case of Strauss during his visit to America, his valet obliged by clipping Strauss' black Newfoundland dog and providing "authentic Strauss hair" to adoring female fans. However, on account of the high volume of demand, there grew a fear that the dog would be trimmed bald. ## Marriages Strauss married the singer Henrietta Treffz in 1862, and they remained together until her death in 1878. Six weeks after her death, Strauss married the actress Angelika Dittrich. Dittrich was not a fervent supporter of his music, and their differences in status and opinion, and especially her indiscretion, led him to seek a divorce. Strauss was not granted a decree of annulment by the Roman Catholic Church, and therefore changed religion and nationality, and became a citizen of Saxe-Coburg-Gotha in January 1887. Strauss sought solace in his third wife Adele Deutsch, whom he married in August 1887. She encouraged his creative talent to flow once more in his later years, resulting in many famous compositions, such as the operettas Der Zigeunerbaron and Waldmeister and the waltzes "Kaiser-Walzer" Op. 437, "Kaiser Jubiläum" Op. 434, and "Klug Gretelein" Op. 462. ## Musical rivals and admirers Although Strauss was the most sought-after composer of dance music in the latter half of the 19th century, Carl Michael Ziehrer and Émile Waldteufel provided stiff competition; the latter held a commanding position in Paris. Also, Philipp Fahrbach denied the younger Strauss the commanding position of the KK Hofballmusikdirektor when the latter first applied for the post. The German operetta composer Jacques Offenbach, who made his name in Paris, also posed a challenge to Strauss in the operetta field. Strauss was admired by other prominent composers: Richard Wagner once admitted that he liked the waltz "Wein, Weib und Gesang" (Wine, Women and Song) Op. 333. Richard Strauss (unrelated), when writing his Rosenkavalier waltzes, said in reference to Johann Strauss, "How could I forget the laughing genius of Vienna?" Johannes Brahms was a personal friend of Strauss; the latter dedicated his waltz "Seid umschlungen, Millionen!" ("Be Embraced, You Millions!"), Op. 443, to him. A story is told in biographies of both men that Strauss's wife Adele approached Brahms with a customary request that he autograph her fan. It was usual for the composer to inscribe a few measures of his best-known music, and then sign his name. Brahms, however, inscribed a few measures from the "Blue Danube", and then wrote beneath it: "Unfortunately, NOT by Johannes Brahms." ## Stage works The most famous of Strauss' operettas are Die Fledermaus, Eine Nacht in Venedig, and Der Zigeunerbaron. There are many dance pieces drawn from themes of his operettas, such as "Cagliostro-Walzer" Op. 370 (from Cagliostro in Wien), "O Schöner Mai" Walzer Op. 375 (from Prinz Methusalem), "Rosen aus dem Süden" Walzer Op. 388 (from Das Spitzentuch der Königin), and "Kuss-Walzer" op. 400 (from Der lustige Krieg), that have survived obscurity and become well-known. Strauss also wrote an opera, Ritter Pázmán, and was in the middle of composing a ballet, Aschenbrödel, when he died in 1899. ## Death and legacy Strauss was diagnosed with pleuropneumonia, and on 3 June 1899 he died in Vienna, at the age of 73. He was buried in the Zentralfriedhof. At the time of his death, he was still composing his ballet Aschenbrödel. As a result of the efforts by Clemens Krauss, who performed a special all-Strauss programme in 1929 with the Vienna Philharmonic, Strauss's music is now regularly performed at the annual Vienna New Year's Concert. Distinguished Strauss interpreters include Willi Boskovsky, who carried on the Vorgeiger tradition of conducting with violin in hand, as was the Strauss family custom, as well as Herbert von Karajan, Carlos Kleiber, Lorin Maazel, Zubin Mehta and Riccardo Muti. In addition, the Wiener Johann Strauss Orchester, which was formed in 1966, pays tribute to the touring orchestras which once made the Strauss family so famous. In 1987 Dutch violinist and conductor André Rieu also created a Johann Strauss Orchestra. Eduard Strauss surprisingly wound up the Strauss Orchestra on 13 February 1901 after concerts in 840 cities around the globe, and pawned the instruments. The orchestra's last violins were destroyed in the firestorm of the Second World War. Most of the Strauss works that are performed today may once have existed in a slightly different form, as Eduard Strauss destroyed much of the original Strauss orchestral archives in a furnace factory in Vienna's Mariahilf district in 1907. Eduard, then the only surviving brother of the three, took this drastic precaution after agreeing to a pact between himself and brother Josef that whoever outlived the other was to destroy their works. The measure was intended to prevent the Strauss family's works from being claimed by another composer. This may also have been fueled by Strauss's rivalry with another of Vienna's popular waltz and march composers, Karl Michael Ziehrer. Two museums in Vienna are dedicated to Johann Strauss II. His residence in the Praterstrasse, where he lived in the 1860s, is now part of the Vienna Museum. The Strauss Museum is about the whole family, with a focus on Johann Strauss II. ## Portrayals in the media The lives of the Strauss dynasty members are the subject of several film and television features, such as The Great Waltz (1938), remade in 1972; The Strauss Family (1972); The Strauss Dynasty (1991) and Strauss, the King of 3/4 Time (1995). Many other films used his works and melodies. Alfred Hitchcock made a biographical film of Strauss in 1934 called Waltzes from Vienna. After a trip to Vienna, Walt Disney was inspired to create four feature films. One of those was The Waltz King, a loosely adapted biopic of Strauss, which aired as part of The Wonderful World of Disney in the U.S. in 1963. ## Works
53,394,507	Yodel It!	1,171,469,111	Song by Ilinca and Alex Florea	[ "2017 singles", "2017 songs", "English-language Romanian songs", "Eurovision songs of 2017", "Eurovision songs of Romania", "Romanian hip hop songs" ]	"Yodel It!" is a song recorded by Romanian singers Ilinca and Alex Florea, released on 30 January 2017 by Cat Music. The track was written by Alexandra Niculae and produced by Mihai Alexandru for the Swiss band Timebelle who rejected it. It was then given to Ilinca to record. Florea was chosen as a featured artist as both Alexandru and Ilinca felt her version was incomplete. "Yodel It!" is a mixture of rock, pop and hip hop music, including Ilinca yodeling during the chorus and Florea's rap vocals. The track's optimistic lyrical message was compared to that of Taylor Swift's "Shake It Off" (2014). "Yodel It!" represented Romania in the 2017 Eurovision Song Contest in Kyiv, Ukraine after winning the pre-selection show Selecția Națională. The country reached seventh place in a field of 26, scoring a total of 282 points. During their show, Ilinca and Florea were accompanied by a variety of colorful imagery displayed in the background. The song received mixed reviews from music critics. While it was praised for its catchiness and appeal, the yodeling sequences were criticized as being atypical of Romanian culture. Some parts of the recording were also likened to the band The Script and will.i.am's song "Hall of Fame" (2012). "Yodel It!" won in the Song of the Year category at the 2017 Radar de Media Awards in Romania. In order to promote and support "Yodel It!", the singers made various appearances to perform the song, including at the 2017 European Artistic Gymnastics Championships, as well as in London, Madrid, Amsterdam and Tel Aviv. An accompanying music video was filmed by Dan Petcan in Cluj-Napoca and was uploaded to YouTube on 21 April 2017. It shows Ilinca and Florea singing to each other standing atop huge computer-generated towers. Commercially, "Yodel It!" reached the top 100 of various charts after Eurovision, including those in France, Germany, the United Kingdom and Spain. ## Background and composition "Yodel It!" was written solely by Alexandra Niculae, while production was handled by Mihai Alexandru. In an interview, Ilinca revealed that after Alexandru had finished the song, he invited her via Facebook to his studio as she was the only person he knew in Romania who could yodel. The track was originally recorded with a solo vocal, but Florea was chosen as a featured vocal artist as Ilinca and Alexandru felt the initial version was incomplete. He received the offer to sing on the track two weeks before the song was to be submitted for the selection of the Romanian song for the 2017 Eurovision Song Contest. It was later revealed that Niculae wrote "Yodel It!" initially for the Swiss band Timebelle, the Swiss representative for Eurovision 2017, and that it was planned to be the song that represented Switzerland in the contest with Ilinca as the band's vocalist. However, the track was rejected by the group in favor of "Apollo". Alexandru submitted "Yodel It!" to the Romanian national selection committee although it "ha[d] nothing Romanian in it". "Yodel It!", which is two minutes and 56 seconds in length, was made available for digital download on the iTunes Store on 30 January 2017 by Cat Music. On the same date, the label uploaded an audio video for the track to its YouTube channel. "Yodel It!" was also included on the Eurovision Song Contest: Kyiv 2017 compilation, which was released on 21 April 2017 and featured the 43 participating entries. Alexandru eventually remixed the song and stretched it to three minutes and 41 seconds. An English language track, "Yodel It!" combines rock with pop and hip hop music. Ilinca yodels prominently during the chorus, while Florea provides rap vocals. The song runs at a moderate tempo of 87 beats per minute. Bogdan Honciuc from Wiwibloggs likened its lyrical message to that of Taylor Swift's "Shake It Off" (2014), as "Ilinca teaches us to break free from the daily doom and gloom, but she suggests yodeling our hearts out instead of shaking it off". The song's instrumental was sent to specialists in Sweden to remaster prior to the duo's appearance at the Eurovision Grand Final in Kyiv. ## Critical reception and accolades Upon its release, "Yodel It!" was met with a mixed response from music critics. Reviewers from Wiwibloggs had both positive and negative opinions of the recording, praising its staging potential, the mixture of multiple genres and the singers' stage presence, but also criticized the yodeling sequences. An editor jokingly wrote, "Look, if Switzerland are sending a Romanian band this year, why shouldn't Romania send a yodeller in return?" Overall, the reviewers on the website gave the song 7.36 out of 10 points. A later review lowered the score to 5.69 out of 10 points. Matei Ruta from EuroVisionary noticed that "Yodel It!" had a "mass appealing sound and has the important quality of being an earworm". Critical commentary also likened parts of the song to the sound of the band The Script and will.i.am's "Hall of Fame" (2012). The judges of the Selecția Națională were positive and found that the song had a simple construction and applauded its catchiness. Traian Danciu of Adevărul similarly praised "Yodel It!" and its optimistic message. The track was also predicted to rank highly at Eurovision by a number of international publications, and reached number six in the betting odds before the contest. Eurovision specialist Andrei Faur had a negative opinion of the track, calling it mediocre and unfeeling. He also noted yodeling was not a typical element of Romanian culture. At the 2017 Radar de Media Awards gala on 26 October 2017 in Bucharest, Romania, "Yodel It!" won in the Song of the Year category based on the public's vote, which ran from 28 June–22 October. The track garnered 24% in televote, surpassing Romanian singers Andra and Lora in second and third place, respectively. During her acceptance speech, Ilinca thanked voters on behalf of herself and Florea. ## Promotion The singers performed the song on the television shows Neața cu Răzvan și Dani on 20 February and La Măruță on 20 March 2017. They were also the closing act for the 2017 European Artistic Gymnastics Championships on 23 April 2017, and toured to London, Madrid, Amsterdam and Tel Aviv, as well as performing at Eurovision in Concert on 8 April and Eurovision Spain Pre-Party on 15 April 2017. Another notable appearance was at the Euroclub in Ukraine, where they sang an a cappella version of the song. An accompanying music video for "Yodel It!" was uploaded to Cat Music's YouTube channel on 21 April 2017. It was shot over three days in Cluj-Napoca by Dan Petcan. The cinematography was handled by Florin Bălan, with production by Vali Aniță and Sergiu Stoiadin. The video features scenes in the Cluj-Napoca Central Park, Piața Unirii, on the roof of a NTT DATA building and in front of the National Theatre. It was sponsored by Visit Cluj, a city programme run by the municipal government. The video begins with Ilinca walking through the city wearing a "flowy, canary" yellow dress with a plunging neckline, followed by a shot of Florea standing on top of a tall, computer-generated tower, sporting "his trademark dark clothes", singing to her from above. Later in the video, the ground under her rises to his level, and they sing to each other. Then various people are shown stopping what they are doing, the ground under them also rises to the sky, and they join the duo. The video closes with everyone dancing and having a good time on their respective towers. After its release, the clip amassed 250,000 views in 48 hours which, according to Wiwibloggs, is "amazing for a Eurovision video". Honciuc, a writer on the same website, reacted favourably to the music video saying, "The visuals highlight the positive message of the song but also the beauty of Cluj Napoca, Ilinca's hometown that serves as a backdrop." ESC Covers's Ian Fowell called it "charming". ## At Eurovision ### National selection TVR opened the submission period for artists' and composers' entries between 20 December 2016 and 22 January 2017. 84 were received, and each artist participated in the televised audition stage. The auditions were held between 27 January and 29 January 2017, and broadcast on a number of Romanian television channels between 5 February and 11 February 2017. From these songs, 15 qualified for the semi-finals held on 26 February where a jury determined the ten songs that qualified for the final held on 5 March 2017. The winner was then determined solely by televoting. Ilinca and Florea auditioned their song during the live audition round of the Selecția Națională, qualifying for the semi-finals on 12 February 2017. In the semi-finals, they performed ninth, preceded by Zanga with "Două sticle" and followed by Alexandra Crăescu with "Hope". The singers went on to qualify in first place for the final on 27 February 2017, receiving the maximum of 60 points from the jurors; jury members Andrei Tudor, Paula Seling, Ovidiu Cernăuțeanu, Luminița Anghel and Adrian Romcescu each awarded them 12 points. The artists performed second in the final round on 5 March 2017, preceded by Ana Maria Mirică with "Spune-mi tu" and followed by Eduard Santha with "Wild Child". Ilinca and Florea ultimately won the Selecția Națională, gathering 10,377 audience votes, nearly twice as many as follow-up Mihai Trăistariu with "I Won't Surrender". ### In Kyiv The Eurovision Song Contest 2017 took place at the International Exhibition Centre in Kyiv, Ukraine and consisted of two semi-finals on 9 and 11 May, and the final on 13 May 2017. According to Eurovision rules each country, except the host country and the "Big 5" (France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom), is required to qualify from one of two semi-finals to compete for the final; the top ten countries from each semi-final progress to the final. On 31 January 2017, it was announced that Romania would perform sixth in the second semi-final, preceded by Malta and followed by the Netherlands. This order was later changed after Russia's withdrawal from the contest, resulting in Romania performing in fifth place. In an interview with Adevărul in March 2017, the singers stated that the €5,000 they had received after winning the Romanian national selection was fully invested in their live performance at the Eurovision. They also revealed that they were in the process of creating a simple movement to accompany the song's yodeling sequences. Ilinca and Florea's rehearsals in Kyiv were scheduled on 2 May and 5 May 2017. Complaints about camera work were lodged, and Florea injured himself after falling off a cannon during the first rehearsal. The concept for the stage show—which was done in Romania along with the stage graphics in Kyiv—was revealed during their first rehearsal. Florea thought that the concept reinforced the message of love saying, "It's about making love, not war". In an interview, the head of delegation Marciuc stated that the performance would not be accompanied by pyrotechnics as it was "impactful enough". The show was directed by Aurel Badea, Sergiu Ardelean was director of photography, and Gabriel Scirlet was the musical director. A scene where Florea jumps out from a cannon was inspired by a similar one from the 1997 movie Life Is Beautiful, representing "the end of the war". The show began with a number of large toy soldiers drumming in the background. Colourful imagery was displayed during the rest of the performance, including "colourful butterflies, blue clouds, white roses, blue musical notes and images flying all over the place" along with the letters YODEL IT in different tones. The singers performed in a yellow circle, with Ilinca wearing an Athena Phillip dress designed by Rodica Puca, and Florea clothing designed by Adina Buzatu. At the end of the performance Florea appeared on a glittery cannon originally planned to shoot colorful objects—which according to the singer would have represented an "explosion of love and happiness"—followed by a second cannon which was introduced and displayed in the background. Florea's brother provided backing vocals. The concept was praised by EuroVisionary writer Michael Outerson, who called it "by far the most colourful stage so far" and concluded, "It seems to be qualifying based on this performance." William Lee Adams from Wiwibloggs stated that the show "really worked [...] Oozing happiness at every turn, this was three minutes of feel-good fun" and predicted Romania would rank highly in the televote. Romania qualified for the Grand Final in sixth place with 174 points on 11 May 2017, ranked 15th by the jury's 26 points, and third by the televote of 148 points. Soon after, the country was scheduled to perform 20th in the final, following Cyprus and preceding Germany. Florea's "disastrous" attempt to kiss Ilinca at the end of their performance was the subject of controversy and irony on social media due to her wry facial expression. Adam Miller from Daily Express wrote, "The 18-year-old singer appeared to be mortified when her duet partner came in for the kill, squirming and leaning back to escape Alex's clutches." Ilinca's dress was also deemed too short, with Daily Express writer Helen Daly saying it "flaunted her enviable pins" and "almost revealed more". The country reached seventh place in a field of 26 with 282 points, placed 15th by the jury's 58 points and fifth by the televote of 224 points. #### Points awarded to Romania Below is a breakdown of points awarded to Romania in the second semi-final and Grand Final of the contest, and the breakdown of the jury voting and televoting conducted during the two shows. On the latter occasion, the nation received televoting points from 38 of the total 42 countries. ## Charts ## Release history
16,028,520	1986 Peach Bowl	1,170,955,151	null	[ "1986 in sports in Georgia (U.S. state)", "1986–87 NCAA football bowl games", "December 1986 sports events in the United States", "NC State Wolfpack football bowl games", "Peach Bowl", "Virginia Tech Hokies football bowl games" ]	The 1986 Peach Bowl was a post-season American college football bowl game at Fulton County Stadium in Atlanta, Georgia between the Virginia Tech Hokies and the North Carolina State Wolfpack from on December 31, 1986. The game was the final contest of the 1986 NCAA Division I-A football season for both teams, and ended in a 25–24 victory for Virginia Tech, the first bowl victory in school history. Virginia Tech came into the game with an 8–2–1 record that included a lopsided loss to the Temple Owls, who would forfeit the season two years later after using an ineligible player. Facing the Hokies in the Peach Bowl were the 18th-ranked Wolfpack from North Carolina State University. N.C. State was led by head coach Dick Sheridan and had a regular-season record of 8–2–1 that included five wins over Atlantic Coast Conference teams. The 1986 Peach Bowl kicked off five years minus one day since Virginia Tech had last played in Atlanta—during the 1981 Peach Bowl. Virginia Tech scored first in the game, but NC State's Bulluck blocked a Tech punt in the Tech end zone and recovered it for a tying touchdown. Virginia Tech kicked a field goal at the end of the quarter to take a 10–7 lead, but NC State fought back, scoring 14 unanswered points in the second quarter to take a 21–10 lead by halftime. In the third quarter, the game turned into a defensive battle. Neither side scored until late in the third quarter, when Tech took advantage of a State fumble to score the first touchdown of the second half. Tech failed to convert a two-point conversion, but NC State fumbled again on the ensuing possession, and Tech was able to drive for another touchdown. Leading 22–21, Tech attempted another two-point conversion, which also failed. NC State, needing to score, drove down the field and kicked a go-ahead 33-yard field goal with 7:12 remaining in the game. After a failed possession, Tech was forced to punt the ball, allowing NC State to run down the clock. The Virginia Tech defense eventually forced a stop, giving the Tech offense one final chance to win the game. With 1:53 on the clock and beginning from their own 20-yard line, the Hokies drove 57 yards to the NC State 23-yard line. With under a minute left Virginia Tech had no timeouts and was stopped by NC State but an injury timeout stopped the clock, allowing kicker Chris Kinzer successfully kicked a 40-yard field goal as time expired to give Virginia Tech the win. ## Team selection The Peach Bowl game was created in 1968 by the Lions Club of Atlanta as a means to attract tourism to the city. First played at Grant Field on the campus of Georgia Tech, the game was moved to Fulton County Stadium in 1971. By the mid-1980s, the Peach Bowl was facing hard times. At the time, NCAA guidelines for bowls required 75 percent of gross receipts to go to participating schools, with 33 percent of tickets to the game also required to go to each school. In 1983, the NCAA threatened to revoke the Peach Bowl's charter when ticket sales hovered around 25,000 with a week to go before the bowl. Last-minute sales saved the game, as attendance at the 1983 game climbed to 40,000 and a new television contract allowed the bowl to make a payout of \$580,000 to each team. Still, the bowl's future was in doubt. In the spring of 1986, the Metro Atlanta Chamber of Commerce (MACOC) took over the Peach Bowl. The bowl executive director at the time was Dick Bestwick, and he encouraged the Chamber to step up its support of the game over what had been provided by the Lions Club. In 1986, the Peach Bowl had no contractual obligations with college football conferences, as its successor, the Chick-fil-A Bowl, does today. Team selections were made by the Peach Bowl committee, a board of Atlanta community members, business leaders, and organizers of the Peach Bowl. To form one half of the matchup, the committee selected second-place Atlantic Coast Conference team NC State, which accepted the bowl bid on November 22, 1986, the day of their final regular-season game. The other half of the matchup was Virginia Tech, a football independent that had finished with nine wins, one loss, and one tie during the regular season and received its invitation one week after the regular season concluded. Virginia Tech had not participated in a bowl game since the 1984 Independence Bowl against Air Force, while NC State was playing in its first postseason game since 1978. The two teams had played each other 39 times prior to the Peach Bowl, with Virginia Tech leading the all-time series, 20–16–3. ### Virginia Tech In the days leading up to the Peach Bowl, one sportswriter called Virginia Tech's 1986 football season a "season of surprises." Tech began the season having gone 6–5 in 1985. In their first game, the Hokies faced the Cincinnati Bearcats. Tech lost, 24–20, on a last-minute play that saw a Cincinnati pass tipped twice and caught for a sustaining first down. The drive eventually resulted in a game-winning touchdown for Cincinnati. Tech recovered from that season-opening loss by going on a four-game winning streak, defeating Clemson in South Carolina, Syracuse in New York, and and West Virginia in Blacksburg. On October 11, against South Carolina, the Hokies tied, 27–27. Then, on a trip to Norfolk, Virginia to face the Temple Owls in the Oyster Bowl, Tech fell 29–13 for what appeared to be its second loss of the season. It was later revealed, however, that Temple used an ineligible player in the game, and the Owls were forced to forfeit the win. Following the Temple game, Tech returned to its winning ways, defeating archrival Virginia, Kentucky, Richmond, and Vanderbilt. One week after defeating Vanderbilt, November 22, 1986, Tech received an invitation to the 1986 Peach Bowl. ### NC State NC State began the 1986 college football season coming off three consecutive losing seasons. Those losing seasons also resulted in the firing of head coach Tom Reed, who was replaced by Dick Sheridan. Sheridan's first game with the Wolfpack was at home against East Carolina on September 6. It was an auspicious beginning, as NC State won, 38–10. After a 14–14 tie the next week against Pittsburgh, the Wolfpack won their next two games: at home against Wake Forest, and in Maryland against Maryland. On October 11, NC State traveled to Grant Field in Atlanta, Georgia, home of the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets. There, they suffered a lopsided 59–21 loss, the worst ever suffered by a Sheridan-coached team at the time. Following the loss to the Yellow Jackets, said linebacker Pat Teague, "the coaches and players came together. The coaches were hurting as bad as we were. We pulled them up and they pulled us up. That was the turning point." Following the "turning point," the Wolfpack won three consecutive games, boosting their overall record to 6–1–1. One of the victories was against the Clemson Tigers, who would ultimately go on to win that year's ACC football championship. On November 8, NC State traveled to Charlottesville, Virginia, to play the Virginia Cavaliers. In a close-fought game, State lost, 20–16. Though the Wolfpack won their final two regular-season games (against Duke and ), the loss to Virginia denied them a share of the ACC championship. Despite that missed opportunity, NC State finished the season with a winning record and received a bid to the Peach Bowl. ## Pregame buildup The Peach Bowl was the final game as head coach of Virginia Tech for Bill Dooley, who had accumulated a record of 62–38–1 for the Hokies since assuming the head coaching job in 1978. Tech president William Lavery had long disagreed with Dooley about the role of football at Virginia Tech, and prior to the beginning of the season, Lavery told Dooley that his tenure as coach would end on January 1, 1987. This fact was revealed to the football team and the general public after Tech's third game of the season. At the time, Dooley was the winningest head coach in Virginia Tech history, but was under investigation for recruiting violations and had settled a breach-of-contract lawsuit against the university for \$3.5 million. As part of the out-of-court settlement, Dooley was required to quit his position following the Peach Bowl. In the weeks leading up to the game, Dooley dodged questions about his future. On December 23, it was announced that Murray State head coach Frank Beamer would replace Dooley after the Peach Bowl. Facing Dooley across the field was NC State head coach Dick Sheridan, who in his first year as head coach of the Wolfpack, was named Atlantic Coast Conference coach of the year and guided the Wolfpack to eight wins. ### Offense The game was expected to be an offensive struggle that could potentially break the then-record 74 points scored in the 1970 Peach Bowl. During the regular season, NC State averaged 359 yards on offense per game, while Virginia Tech averaged 358 yards. On defense, State gave up an average of 402 yards per game, while Tech allowed an average of 366 yards. NC State averaged almost 28 points per game, while Virginia Tech averaged just over 24 points. This statistical parity was reflected by pre-game point spreads, which favored NC State by two points. State quarterback Erik Kramer was the cornerstone of one of those high-powered offenses, passing for 2,092 yards and 14 touchdowns en route to All-ACC honors and being named the ACC's player of the year. He set school records for passing yards in a season and total yards in a season despite being hampered by an injured ankle suffered in the Wolfpack's game against South Carolina. He was ably assisted in the passing game by All-ACC receiver Nasrallah Worthen, who led the team in receptions after catching 41 passes for 686 yards. State's offense was mostly accumulated through the air, as the Wolfpack averaged less than 160 yards per game on the ground. Virginia Tech's offense was slightly more balanced, featuring two running backs who had success throughout the regular season. Maurice Williams rushed the ball 166 times for 1,029 yards and six touchdowns during the regular season, and Eddie Hunter contributed 872 rushing yards. Through the air, Tech quarterback Erik Chapman passed for 1,627 yards and 10 touchdowns during the season prior to the Peach Bowl, making him the most prolific Virginia Tech passer in the nine-year tenure of Tech head Coach Bill Dooley. The Hokies suffered a setback on offense a few days prior to the Peach Bowl when it was announced that offensive tackle Jim Davie was suspended from playing in the game after testing positive for anabolic steroids as part of a nationwide series of random tests conducted by the NCAA. Tech defensive end Morgan Roane was also suspended from playing for reasons not revealed by the university. ### Defense On defense, Tech allowed an average of 190 yards per game through the air. Free safety Carter Wiley and cornerback Billy Myers had three interceptions each during the regular season. Virginia Tech linebacker Lawrence White was expected to miss the game after undergoing knee surgery following the Hokies' last regular-season game. White was the team's No. 3 tackler in terms of statistics, having accumulated 77 during the course of the regular season. The team's No. 1 and 2 tacklers were linebackers Paul Nelson and Jamel Agemy, who had 104 and 80 tackles, respectively. The Hokies' rush defense allowed an average of 175 rushing yards per game and 14 total rushing touchdowns. State's defense allowed an average of 228.6 yards through the air during the regular season and the pass defense led by Derrick Taylor, who had six interceptions. At linebacker, Pat Teague and Kelvin Crooms were considered keys to the Wolfpack run defense, which allowed an average of 173 rushing yards per game and 14 total rushing touchdowns. ### Special teams Both Virginia Tech and NC State featured All-America placekickers. NC State's Mike Cofer was named an Associated Press All-America honorable mention selection after converting 13 of his 17 field goal attempts, while Virginia Tech's Chris Kinzer had been successful throughout the regular season, making 22 of 27 field goal attempts, and breaking the school record for single-season scoring with 93 points. ## Game summary The 1986 Peach Bowl kicked off at 1:05 p.m. EST on December 31, 1986, at Fulton County Stadium in Atlanta, Georgia. At kickoff, the sky was partly cloudy with an air temperature of 45 °F (7 °C). The wind was from the south at 12 miles per hour (19 km/h). The game was played before a sellout crowd of 53,668, just the third sellout in the history of the Peach Bowl at that point. Virginia Tech won the ceremonial pre-game coin toss, and elected to kick off to NC State. Therefore, the Wolfpack received the ball to begin the game, while Virginia Tech received the ball to begin the second half. The referee for the game was John Nealon, Bob Pickens was the umpire, and Ed Maracich was the linesman. Each team received more than \$600,000 for participating in the game. ### First quarter Following Virginia Tech's kickoff, NC State returned the ball to the 27-yard line, where the Wolfpack began the game's first play. That play was a short run to the right. On the next play, NC State picked up the game's first first down with a rush up the middle by fullback Mal Crite. Crite picked up another first down on the next play, driving the Wolfpack inside Virginia Tech territory, but the Hokies' defense stiffened and forced the Wolfpack to punt after NC State failed to gain another first down. Tech returned the punt to its 21-yard line, where the Tech offense took over. On Virginia Tech's first offensive play, running back Maurice Williams broke free for a 77-yard run that took the Hokies inside the one-yard line of NC State. The run was the longest of Williams' career and is a Peach Bowl record for longest play from scrimmage. Two plays later, Virginia Tech's Eddie Hunter crossed the goal line and scored the game's first points. The touchdown and extra point made the score 7–0, Virginia Tech. Following Virginia Tech's post-touchdown kickoff, NC State began its second possession of the game at its 24-yard line after a short kick return. The NC State's second drive of the game was more successful than its first, but as before, the Wolfpack offense ground to a halt before penetrating too deeply into Tech territory, and State was forced to punt the ball back to Virginia Tech. The Hokie offense began work at its eight-yard line but went three and out and prepared to punt the ball back to NC State. Tech punter Tony Romero, kicking from the Tech goal line, had his kick blocked by State defender Derrick Taylor. The ball rolled into the Virginia Tech end zone and was recovered by an NC State's Brian Bulluck for a touchdown. The play and extra point tied the game at 7–7. Virginia Tech received NC State's kickoff and returned it to their 25-yard line, where Tech's offense returned to the field. After picking up short yardage on two rushing plays, Tech quarterback Erik Chapman completed a pass to tight end Steve Johnson to give the Hokies a first down at their 48-yard line with just over four minutes to go in the quarter. Tech continued to drive into Wolfpack territory, but inside the NC State 35-yard line, Tech committed a 15-yard illegal block penalty that pushed the Hokies back to the Wolfpack 47-yard line and had them facing a first down and 25 yards. Though unable to gain the 25 yards needed for another first down, Tech did make up most of the penalty yards, putting the ball at the Wolfpack 30-yard line. Facing fourth down, Tech sent in kicker Chris Kinzer to attempt a 46-yard field goal, which was successfully completed. The score gave Tech a 10–7 lead with 1:06 remaining the first quarter. Kinzer delivered the post-score kickoff, and NC State began its final drive of the first quarter at its 32-yard line with 1:01 remaining. The Wolfpack picked up a quick first down but were forced to punt when they did not gain another. NC State's punt was returned to the Tech 13-yard line and the quarter came to an end with Virginia Tech leading, 10–7. ### Second quarter Tech began the second quarter in possession of the ball with a first down at their 13-yard line. The Hokies picked up a first down, but then NC State safety Michael Brooks jumped in front of a Virginia Tech pass, intercepting it at the 50-yard line. With 13:05 remaining in the quarter, NC State had its first offensive possession of the second quarter. The Wolfpack picked up several first downs, driving within the Virginia Tech 25-yard line for their furthest offensive penetration of the game. After being stopped for no or little gain on consecutive plays, NC State quarterback Erik Kramer completed a 25-yard touchdown pass to Nasrallah Worthen. The score and extra point gave NC State its first lead of the game, 14–10, with 8:55 remaining in the first half. Virginia Tech returned the post-touchdown kickoff to its 26-yard line. The Hokie offense picked up short gains on first and second down before Tech quarterback Erik Chapman threw his second interception of the game, a pass that was tipped into the air and caught by NC State defender Derrick Taylor. The Wolfpack offense took over at the 46-yard line of Virginia Tech. On its first play after the interception, Kramer completed a 19-yard pass to Haywood Jeffires. After a short run, Kramer completed a 13-yard pass to Jeffries for another first down. Deep inside the Tech red zone, it took the Wolfpack two more plays before Kramer connected on a pass to tight end Ralph Britt for a touchdown. NC State now led 21–10 with just over four minutes remaining before halftime. Following the score, kickoff, and return, Tech began another offensive possession at its 24-yard line. The Hokies picked up two first downs and drove into NC State territory, but the clock continued to tick toward halftime. In the Wolfpack side of the field, Tech running back Eddie Hunter broke free for a 23-yard run, the longest play by Virginia Tech in the second quarter. There was now just over two minutes remaining in the quarter. Tech was unable to pick up another first down after Hunter's run, and attempted to convert the fourth down rather than trying a field goal. When the play was stopped for a loss, however, Virginia Tech was denied points and NC State's offense returned with 47 seconds remaining in the half. The Wolfpack proceeded to run out the clock and took a 21–10 lead into halftime. ### Third quarter Because NC State received the ball to begin the game, Virginia Tech received the ball to begin the second half. Tech received NC State's kickoff and returned it to the 10-yard line, where the Hokie offense began work. Tech began working down the field, running the ball for short gains and throwing passes for longer gains. Tech picked up three first downs, then reached NC State territory on a pass to Donnelly. Once on the NC State side of the field, Tech picked up another first down, but Tech's quarterback was sacked on third down for a loss, and the Hokies were forced to punt the ball away. The ball landed at the NC State 12-yard line where the Wolfpack began a drive. NC State went three and out after receiving the ball, and after Tech incurred a running into the kicker penalty on the first punt attempt, NC State punted the ball away. After the kick, Tech took over on offense at its 27-yard line. On Tech's first play after the punt, however, Hunter fumbled the ball after a 10-yard rush. NC State recovered the ball, and the Wolfpack offense returned to the field at the Tech 40-yard line. On their first play after the fumble recover, Kramer completed a 12-yard pass to Worthen for a first down. During the next play, Kramer fumbled the ball while attempting to run with it, and Virginia Tech's defense recovered. This allowed the Tech offense to return to the field and attempt another offensive drive beginning at their 27-yard line. Tech picked up a first down, then Chapman was forced to scramble for a first down after facing third and 10. Stopped inches short of gaining the first down, Tech risked turning the ball over by attempting to convert the fourth down. Unlike their previous try in the game, Tech was successful and the Hokies' drive continued. Tech continued to pick up yardage and first downs, advancing deep into the NC State side of the field. Inside the State 30-yard line, Tech quarterback Chapman was sacked for a 10-yard loss. He responded by throwing a 30-yard pass on the next play, driving Virginia Tech inside the State one-yard line. Williams rushed into the end zone with 33 seconds remaining in the quarter, cutting the Wolfpack lead to 21–16. Virginia Tech elected to attempt a two-point conversion, which was unsuccessful. NC State received Tech's post-touchdown kickoff and returned the ball to their 32-yard line. The Wolfpack offense had time for just one play—an eight-yard pass—before the end of the quarter. With one quarter remaining in the game, NC State still held a 21–16 lead. ### Fourth quarter The fourth quarter began with NC State in possession of the ball at their 40-yard line and facing a second down and one yard. On the first play of the quarter, NC State quarterback Erik Kramer ran the ball, but fumbled at the end of the run. The ball was recovered by Virginia Tech, and the Hokie offense took the field. The first Virginia Tech play of the quarter was a first-down throw to David Everett that drove the Hokies into Wolfpack territory. Tech followed the pass by driving down the field with alternating run and pass plays. Tech penetrated the NC State 20-yard line with 12 minutes remaining in the quarter, and continued to drive. Once the Hokies crossed the State 10-yard line, the State defense stiffened and the Hokies were able to gain a first down only with difficulty. With a first down at the State seven-yard line, it took Tech just two plays to earn a touchdown. The Hokies again attempted a two-point conversion, but were again stopped short. Despite that setback, the touchdown gave Tech six points and a 22–21 lead, their first since the 8:55 mark in the second quarter. Because Tech committed a 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct penalty following the touchdown, NC State was able to acquire good field position during the kickoff return, starting their drive at their 44-yard line. On the second play of the drive, Erik Kramer completed an 18-yard pass to Nasrallah Worthen, driving State into the Tech side of the field. After a short play, Kramer again completed a long pass, this time to Bobby Crumpler for 24 yards. Now inside the Tech red zone, Kramer was tackled for a big loss, losing some of the yardage that he had gained with the previous play. NC State was unable to pick up another first down and sent in Mike Cofer to attempt a 33-yard kick, which was successfully completed. The field goal regained NC State a 24–22 lead. Following the post-score kick, Tech began its offensive drive at its 23-yard line with just under seven minutes to play in the game. The Hokies picked up a first down on three short rushing plays, then another on a single passing play. This drove the Hokies to their 45-yard line with just over five minutes to play. Tech was unable to gain another first down and was forced to punt the ball to NC State. The ball was fielded at the 14-yard line, which was where the NC State offense began its final drive of the game. On State's first play after the punt, fullback Mal Crite ran for a 40-yard gain, pushing State's offense to the Tech 46-yard line with just over four minutes left. State pushed forward another seven yards, but failed to gain another first down and prepared to punt the ball back to Tech with 3:14 remaining in the game. Rather than punt the ball, however, State punter Kelly Hollodick instead received the snap on fourth down and ran for a first down. Because State retained possession, it was able to continue to run down the clock after the fake punt. Tech stopped the clock once by calling a timeout and prevented State from gaining another first down. With 2:01 remaining in the game, State punted the ball into Tech's end zone for a touchback. Tech's offense took the field at their 20-yard line with 1:53 remaining in the game, two timeouts left (used to stop the clock as necessary), and needing at least a field goal to win the game. Tech picked up one first down via a pass, then another as the Hokies drove to their 44-yard line. Stopped short of midfield with less than a minute to play, Tech called its second timeout in order to stop the game clock from ticking down. In college football, the clock stops after a team earns a first down, and because Virginia Tech had not earned a first down on the short run, Tech was forced to call the timeout. Following the timeout, the Hokies ran for a first down, penetrating to the NC State 44-yard line. With 53 seconds remaining, Chapman scrambled out of bounds on a short run. Another short run brought the Hokies to the State 36-yard line, and the Hokies called their final timeout to stop the clock. A few plays later, Tech ran a short running play that kept the clock running down. With just 33 seconds remaining and no other way to stop the clock, Tech's Maurice Williams questionably stayed down with a leg cramp and the referees stopped the clock to allow the injured player to receive assistance from athletic trainers before the next play. Facing fourth down and needing three yards for drive-continuing first down, Chapman passed for a first down at the State 29-yard line with 15 seconds remaining in the game. On the game's next play, Tech committed a holding penalty, which pushed the Hokies 10 yards further away from the end zone, out of field goal range, with 11 seconds remaining. On the game's next play, Chapman passed the ball deep, toward the end zone. Though the pass fell incomplete, a game official called a 15-yard pass interference penalty against NC State. This moved the ball to the NC State 23-yard line and forced Tech kicker Chris Kinzer to attempt a potentially game-winning 40-yard field goal with four seconds remaining. Though NC State coach Dick Sheridan called a timeout in an attempt to ice Chris Kinzer, the kick sailed through the uprights and Virginia Tech won a 25–24 victory as time expired. ## Statistical summary In recognition of their performance in a losing effort, NC State quarterback Erik Kramer was named the game's offensive most valuable player, while on defense, NC State cornerback Derrick Taylor won the honor. Kramer finished the game having completed 12 of his 19 passes for 155 yards. On the opposite side of the field, Virginia Tech quarterback Eric Chapman finished with 20 completions out of 30 attempts for two touchdowns and 200 passing yards. Virginia Tech running back Maurice Williams' 77-yard run on the second play of the game remains the longest play from scrimmage in the Peach Bowl (today the Chick-fil-A Bowl), and Virginia Tech also set the current record for the most first downs in a Peach Bowl (29). Williams finished the game with 16 carries for 129 yards, and was the game's leading rusher. The second-place rusher was fellow Hokie running back Hunter, who ran with the ball 22 times for 113 yards. NC State's leading rusher was fullback Mal Crite, who finished the game with 14 carries for 101 yards. ## Postgame effects Virginia Tech's win brought it to a final 1986 record of 9–2–1, later modified to 10–1–1 two years later after a Temple forfeit, while NC State's loss took it to a final record of 8–3–1. The victory was Virginia Tech's first bowl win in school history and was the team's only such win until 1993, when Tech defeated Indiana University in the 1993 Independence Bowl. Peach Bowl officials pronounced themselves pleased with both the turnout for the game and the action on the field. Though traffic jams snarled attendees' arrival to the stadium, there were only 5,366 no-shows out of 58,212 tickets sold. Following the game, Peach Bowl chairman Ira Hefter announced that the bowl would seek corporate sponsorship and a potential television broadcast deal with a major American television network. The takeover by the chamber of commerce also proved to be successful, as the 1986 game made a small profit. This was an improvement over the three previous Peach Bowls, which lost more than \$170,000. The sellout also confirmed that the game would continue to be held annually instead of being abandoned, as sportswriters had speculated prior to the 1986 game. Tech kicker Chris Kinzer, who kicked the game-winning field goal, did not go on to play in the National Football League despite predictions that he might do so. He attended several NFL teams' tryouts, but a contract to play in the league never materialized. He sold insurance for several years, then reentered school and graduated from Virginia Tech in 1994 with a degree.
2,912,450	Soviet cruiser Maxim Gorky	1,169,097,101	Soviet Navy's Kirov-class cruiser	[ "1938 ships", "Cold War cruisers of the Soviet Union", "Kirov-class cruisers", "Ships built at the Baltic Shipyard", "World War II cruisers of the Soviet Union" ]	Maxim Gorky (Russian: Максим Горький) was a Project 26bis Kirov-class cruiser of the Soviet Navy that saw action during World War II and continued in service into the Cold War. The ship's bow was blown off by a mine in the Gulf of Riga during the opening stages of Operation Barbarossa, but she made it to Kronstadt for repairs. However, after being repaired, the ship was trapped in harbour for most of the war, by Axis minefields at Leningrad and Kronstadt. Despite being trapped, Maxim Gorky was active in two engagements: the ship provided gunfire in support for the defenders during the Siege of Leningrad, and she later bombarded Finnish positions during the Vyborg–Petrozavodsk Offensive in mid-1944. She saw no further action in World War II. A major modernization was begun in 1953, but the navy reconsidered the cost-effectiveness of the refit and work was cancelled in 1955. Maxim Gorky was sold for scrap in 1959. ## Description Maxim Gorky was 187 meters (613 ft 6 in) long at the waterline, and 191.4 meters (627 ft 11 in) long overall. She had a beam of 17.66 meters (57 ft 11 in) and had a draft between 5.87 to 6.3 meters (19 ft 3 in to 20 ft 8 in). She displaced 8,177 metric tons (8,048 long tons) at standard load and 9,728 metric tons (9,574 long tons) at full load. Her steam turbines produced a total of 129,750 shaft horsepower (96,750 kW) during her sea trials and propelled the ship to a maximum speed of 36.72 knots (68.01 km/h; 42.26 mph). This was barely short of her designed speed of 37 knots and was because she was over 900 tonnes (886 long tons) overweight. She normally carried 650 metric tons (640 long tons) of fuel oil, 1,660 metric tons (1,630 long tons) at full load and 1,750 metric tons (1,720 long tons) at overload. This gave her an endurance of 4,220 nautical miles (7,820 km; 4,860 mi) at 18 knots (33 km/h; 21 mph). Maxim Gorky carried nine 180-millimeter (7.1 in) 57-calibre B-1-P guns in three electrically powered MK-3-180 triple turrets. Her secondary armament consisted of six single 100-millimeter (3.9 in) 56-calibre B-34 anti-aircraft guns fitted on each side of the rear funnel. Her light anti-aircraft guns consisted of nine semi-automatic 45-millimeter (1.8 in) 21-K guns and four DShK 12.7-millimeter (0.50 in) machine guns. Six 533-millimeter (21 in) 39-Yu torpedo tubes were fitted in two triple mountings. ### Wartime modifications By 1944 Maxim Gorky had exchanged her 45 mm (1.8 in) guns for 15 fully automatic 37 mm 70-K AA guns with one thousand rounds per gun, two extra DsHK machine guns and two quadruple Lend-Lease Vickers .50 machine gun MK III mounts. When war broke out in 1941 Maxim Gorky lacked radar, but she was equipped with British Lend-Lease radar by 1944. One Type 291 was used for air search. One Type 284 and two Type 285 radars were for main battery fire control, while anti-aircraft fire control was provided by two Type 282 radars. ## Service Maxim Gorky was laid down at the Ordzhonikidze Yard, Leningrad on 20 December 1936 as a slightly improved version, Project 26bis as designated by the Soviets, of the first pair of Kirov-class cruisers, which were called Project 26. She was launched on 30 April 1938 and was completed on 12 December 1938. The ship, and her escorts, ran into the German-laid "Apolda" minefield in the Gulf of Riga while providing cover for Soviet defensive mining efforts on 23 June 1941 and Maxim Gorky and the destroyer Gnevny both lost their bows, although Gorky made it to port where temporary repairs were made. The ship was transferred, with assistance, to Tallinn and later to Kronstadt. She had a new bow section fabricated at Kronstadt and it was mated with the ship on 21 July. For most of the rest of the war she was blockaded in Leningrad and Kronstadt by Axis minefields and could only provide gunfire support for the defenders during the Siege of Leningrad, for example she fired 285 180 mm shells on 4 September 1941 and 701 rounds during the Krasnoye Selo–Ropsha Offensive in January 1944. The cruiser was awarded the Order of the Red Banner on 22 March for her "exemplary fulfillment of combat missions" and the "courage and valor" demonstrated by her crew. She also bombarded Finnish positions as part of the 4th Artillery Group during the Soviet Vyborg–Petrozavodsk Offensive in June, firing a hundred 180 mm shells off Kuokkala on 9 June. Maxim Gorky was repeatedly, if lightly, damaged by German air and artillery attacks, but her only extended refit occurred over the winter of 1942–43 when her upper deck was reinforced with 37-millimetre armour plates. ## Postwar career Following the end of the war, Maxim Gorky was transferred to the squadron of the 4th Fleet in the Southern Baltic when the Baltic Fleet was briefly divided on 25 February 1946. As the squadron headquarters she relocated to Liepāja and then Baltiysk. To participated in a parade, the cruiser briefly returned to Leningrad on 7 November 1947. Maxim Gorky tested the first Soviet naval helicopter, the Kamov Ka-10 in December 1950. The helicopter was located on the aft deck and made the first helicopter first landing aboard a Soviet warship on 7 December, watched by chief designer Nikolay Kamov. She was relocated to Kronstadt pending a refit at Shipyard No. 194 in mid-1953 and transferred to the ships of the Kronstadt Fortress on 16 June, leading the naval parade up the Neva River for Navy Day in July. The refit, which began late that year, was planned to include a complete overhaul of her machinery while her radar, fire-control systems and anti-aircraft guns were to be replaced by the latest Soviet systems. Torpedo bulges were to be fitted which would increase her displacement by 1,000 metric tons (980 long tons), with consequent penalties to her speed and range. The navy re-evaluated the scope of the work in 1955 and deemed it insufficient to create a fully modern ship and suspended the refit. Maxim Gorky was removed from the Baltic Fleet on 17 February 1956 before being similarly removed from the navy list and handed over for scrapping on 18 April 1959 after the navy had decided that she was unneeded as a missile-test ship.
61,744,055	The Sumerian Game	1,172,503,327	1964 video game	[ "1960s electronic literature works", "1964 video games", "Early history of video games", "Educational video games", "Fiction set in the 4th millennium BC", "Lost video games", "Mainframe games", "Single-player video games", "Strategy video games", "Sumer in fiction", "Teleprinter video games", "Video games developed in the United States", "Video games set in antiquity", "Video games with textual graphics" ]	The Sumerian Game is an early text-based strategy video game of land and resource management. It was developed as part of a joint research project between the Board of Cooperative Educational Services of Westchester County, New York and IBM in 1964–1966 for investigation of the use of computer-based simulations in schools. It was designed by Mabel Addis, then a fourth-grade teacher, and programmed by William McKay for the IBM 7090 time-shared mainframe computer. The first version of the game was played by a group of 30 sixth-grade students in 1964, and a revised version featuring refocused gameplay and added narrative and audiovisual elements was played by a second group of students in 1966. The game is composed of three segments, representing the reigns of three successive rulers of the city of Lagash in Sumer around 3500 BC. In each segment the game asks the players how to allocate workers and grain over a series of rounds while accommodating the effects of their prior decisions, random disasters, and technological innovations, with each segment adding complexity. At the conclusion of the project the game was not put into widespread use, though it was used as a demonstrations in the BOCES Research Center in Yorktown Heights, New York and made available by "special arrangement" with BOCES into at least the early 1970s. A description of the game, however, was given to Doug Dyment in 1968, and he recreated a version of the first segment of the game as King of Sumeria. This game was expanded on in 1971 by David H. Ahl as Hamurabi, which in turn led to many early strategy and city-building games. The Sumerian Game has been described as the first video game with a narrative, as well as the first edutainment game. As a result, Mabel Addis has been called the first female video game designer and the first writer for a video game. ## Gameplay The Sumerian Game is a largely text-based strategy video game centered on resource management. The game, set around 3500 BC, has players act as three successive rulers of the city of Lagash in Sumer—Luduga I, II, and III—over three segments of increasingly complex economic simulation. Two versions of the game were created, both intended for play by a classroom of students with a single person inputting commands into a teleprinter, which would output responses from the mainframe computer. The second version had a stronger narrative component to the game's text and interspersed the game with taped audio lectures, presented as the discussions of the ruler's court of advisors, corresponding with images on a slide projector. In both versions, the player enters numbers in response to questions posed by the game. In the first segment of the game, the player plays a series of rounds—limited to 30 in the second version of the game—in which they are given information about the current population, acres of farmland, number of farmers, grain harvested that round, and stored grain. The rounds start in 3500 BC, and are meant to represent seasons. The player then selects how much grain will be used as food, seed for planting, and storage. After making their selections, the game calculates the effect of the player's choices on the population for the next round. Additionally, after each round, the game selects whether to report several events. The city may be struck with a random disaster, such as a fire or flood, which destroys a percentage of the city's population and harvest. Independent of disasters, a percentage of the stored grain may also be lost to rot and rats. Additionally, the game may report a technological innovation which has a positive effect on subsequent rounds, such as reducing the amount of grain that may spoil or reducing the number of farmers needed for each acre of land. Several of these innovations require the player to have first "exhibited some good judgement", such as by adequately feeding their population for multiple rounds. In the second and third segments of the game, the city's population and grain are adjusted to preset levels, regardless of the player's performance in the prior segment, to represent that some time has passed since the decisions of the prior ruler. The player then again plays through a series of rounds. In the second segment, the player can also apply workers towards the development of several crafts—which in turn can result in innovations—while the third increases the complexity of the simulation by adding trade and expansion choices. In the original version of the game, the second and third segments were expansions on the first, requiring the same choices around grain in addition to the new choices. In the second version of the game, the second segment was refocused. The rounds were limited to 10 and the player was no longer required to make choices around grain allocation, but instead only make decisions about applying workers to farming or crafts. The third segment was not changed, though plans were made to either also remove the grain allocation choices and add more choices around trade, colonization, and war, or else to instead make the third segment a combination of the first two segments. ## Development In 1962, the Board of Cooperative Educational Services (BOCES) of Westchester County, New York, began a series of discussions with researchers at IBM about the use of computers in education research. The BOCES system had been established in New York to help rural school districts pool resources, and the Westchester BOCES Superintendent Dr. Noble Gividen believed that computers, along with computer simulation games like the Carnagie Tech Management Game being used in colleges, could be used to improve educational outcomes at small districts in Westchester. BOCES and IBM held a joint workshop, led by Bruse Moncreiff and James Dinneen of IBM along with Dr. Richard Wing, curriculum research coordinator for BOCES, in June 1962, involving ten teachers from the area to discuss ways of using simulations in classroom curricula. Based on the result of the workshop, BOCES applied for a US\$96,000 (equivalent to \$929,000 in 2022) grant from the U.S. Office of Education that December to continue to study the concept for 18 months, receiving almost US\$104,000 (equivalent to \$1,006,000 in 2022) instead for "Cooperative Research Project 1948". The project began in February 1963 under the direction of Dr. Wing, who asked for proposals from nine teachers. One of the teachers, Mabel Addis, proposed an expansion of an idea made by Moncreiff at the summer workshop: an economic model of a civilization, intended to teach basic economic theory. Moncreiff had been inspired by prior research, especially the paper "Teaching through Participation in Micro-simulations of Social Organization" by Richard Neier, and by the board game Monopoly, and wanted to use the ancient Sumerian civilization as the setting to counter what he saw as a trend in school curriculum to ignore pre-Greek civilizations, despite evidence of their importance to early history. Addis, a fourth-grade teacher at Katonah Elementary School, agreed with Moncreiff about the undervaluation of pre-Greek civilizations in schools, and had studied Mesopotamian civilizations in college. Her proposal was approved, and she began work with IBM programmer William McKay to develop the game. The game itself, The Sumerian Game, was designed and written by Addis and programmed by McKay in the Fortran programming language for an IBM 7090 time-shared mainframe computer. Like many early mainframe games, it was only run on a single computer. Commands were entered and results printed with an IBM 1050 teleprinter. The researchers ran one play session with 30 sixth-grade students. Project 1948 concluded in August 1964, and a report on its outcome given to the Office of Education in 1965 listing the eight "subprojects" that had been proposed in it, of which The Sumerian Game was the only game. Two weeks after its conclusion a new project was started as Cooperative Research Project 2148, with two more grants given totaling over US\$194,000 (equivalent to \$1,831,000 in 2022), focusing on the first project's progress with the game and to run through 1967. This project created three games: The Sierra Leone Game, The Free Enterprise Game, and an expansion of The Sumerian Game. Addis rewrote and expanded the game in the summer of 1966 by adding a stronger narrative flow to how the advisor tells the player about the events of the city, refocusing the second segment of the game on the new concepts introduced, and interspersing the game with taped audio lectures corresponding with images on a slide projector. These have been described as the first cutscenes. A 1973 summary guide to educational games described The Sierra Leone Game as being very similar to The Sumerian Game, including having interspersed slides and audio lectures, with only the context and terminology changed. The researchers conducted a playtest of the new version of The Sumerian Game with another 30 sixth-grade students the following school year, and produced a report in 1967. ## Legacy BOCES copyrighted The Sumerian Game in 1964. Following the creation of the second version of the game, the first segment was reprogrammed by Jimmer Leonard, a graduate student in Social Relations at Johns Hopkins University, for the IBM 1401, to be used at demonstrations at a terminal in the BOCES Research Center in Yorktown Heights, New York. The project was mentioned in Time and Life magazines in 1966. The game continued to be available by "special arrangement" with BOCES into at least the early 1970s. In 1968, however, Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) employee Doug Dyment gave a talk about computers in education at the University of Alberta, and after the talk a woman who had once seen The Sumerian Game described it to him. Dyment decided to recreate the game as an early program for the FOCAL programming language, recently developed at DEC, and programmed it for a DEC PDP-8 minicomputer. He named the result King of Sumeria. Needing the game to run in the smallest memory configuration available for the computer, he included only the first segment of the game. He also chose to rename the ruler to the more famous Babylonian king Hammurabi, misspelled as "Hamurabi". Dyment's game, sometimes retitled The Sumer Game, proved popular in the programming community: Jerry Pournelle recalled in 1989 that "half the people I know wrote a Hammurabi program back in the 1970s; for many, it was the first program they'd ever written in their lives". Around 1971, DEC employee David H. Ahl wrote a version of The Sumer Game in the BASIC programming language. Unlike FOCAL, BASIC was run not just on mainframe computers and minicomputers, but also on personal computers, then termed microcomputers, making it a much more popular language. In 1973, Ahl published BASIC Computer Games, a best-selling book of games written in BASIC, which included his version of The Sumer Game. The expanded version was renamed Hamurabi and added an end-of-game performance appraisal. In addition to the multiple versions of Hamurabi, several simulation games have been created as expansions of the core game. These include Kingdom (1974) by Lee Schneider and Todd Voros, which was then expanded to Dukedom (1976). Other derivations include King (1978) by James A. Storer, and Santa Paravia en Fiumaccio (1978) by George Blank; Santa Paravia added the concept of city building management to the basic structure of Hamurabi, making The Sumerian Game an antecedent to the city-building genre as well as an early strategy game. As The Sumerian Game was created during the early history of video games as part of research into new uses for computer simulations, it pioneered several developments in the medium. In addition to being a prototype of the strategy and city-building genres, The Sumerian Game has been described as the first video game with a narrative, as well as the first edutainment game. As a result, Mabel Addis has been called the first female video game designer and the first writer for a video game. The original code for The Sumerian Game is lost, but the projector slides and three printouts of individual game sessions were found in 2012 and donated to The Strong National Museum of Play, where they are kept in the Brian Sutton-Smith Library and Archives of Play.
17,771,250	Satisfied (DecembeRadio album)	1,058,669,082	null	[ "2008 albums", "DecembeRadio albums" ]	Satisfied is the fourth studio album by American Christian rock band DecembeRadio; it was released in August 2008 through Slanted Records. Like their previous album, DecembeRadio (2006), it was recorded at Southern Tracks Recording in Atlanta, Georgia, and produced by Scotty Wilbanks. The songs were written to ensure they would translate well in a concert setting, and the band strove to write more uplifting lyrics than those on their previous album. Recording sessions began in September 2007 and were not completed until the second quarter of 2008, as the sessions twice were interrupted for concert tours. The album debuted at its peak positions of number 116 on the Billboard 200 and number three on the Billboard Top Christian Albums charts; first week sales nearly doubled those of the band's previous album. DecembeRadio promoted Satisfied by making television and radio appearances ahead of its release, filming two promotional videos and headlining a concert tour of the United States. Satisfied received generally positive reviews; most critics approved of the band's continuation of the Southern rock sound evident on DecembeRadio. While critics disagreed on whether Satisfied measured up to DecembeRadio, a frequent complaint was the album's lack of lyrical depth. Satisfied won the 2009 Gospel Music Association Dove Award for Rock Album of the Year. ## Writing and production DecembeRadio felt pressure to meet growing expectations following the accolades received for their previous album, DecembeRadio (2006), which won a Gospel Music Association Dove Award and was nominated for a Grammy Award. "We had some great stuff go on with the first record, but I think the biggest thing over the past two years has been trying to make sure Satisfied is not a sophomore slump" said lead guitarist Brian Bunn. While the self-titled album was written and recorded with little thought to how the songs would translate in concert, the experience of opening for Third Day helped DecembeRadio learn what works best live. Thus it was the band's goal to "make sure every single song on the [next] album worked well in a live concert setting", according to Bunn. Writing for Satisfied began soon after the release of DecembeRadio and occurred in spurts, as the band found more success in letting ideas come to them spontaneously than in meeting for dedicated writing sessions. The chorus melody of "Be Alright", for example, popped into bassist and lead singer Josh Reedy's head while showering. On another occasion, Reedy came up with a riff on GarageBand while traveling between gigs. Two of the earliest completed songs, "Satisfy Me" and "Find You Waiting", were included in the band's live shows by April 2008. The former was the first song written for the album, and the latter was first released on the expanded edition of DecembeRadio in November 2007. For Satisfied, DecembeRadio made a concerted effort to write lyrics that were more uplifting than those featured on their previous album. Said Bunn, "Our first record had a lot of darker songs such as 'Razor' and 'Greed'. Even though we liked some of that, we truly realized we're a bunch of happy guys! We like to have fun onstage and in our lives, so we didn't want this album to be as dark as the last one." To that end, the band wrote and included on Satisfied songs like "Better Man", which Reedy says imparts that "if we learn from our mistakes and follow Jesus Christ it will make us a better man", and the "vertical worship song" "For Your Glory". The band was inspired to write "Find You Waiting" following the death of a friend of producer Scotty Wilbanks. At the funeral, the man's widow stood over the casket praising God with arms raised amidst her sorrow. "It struck a chord in our hearts to write a song about how, no matter what current problem we might be facing, God's love and mercy is always waiting there for us", said Reedy. Recording of Satisfied began in September 2007 at Southern Tracks Recording in Atlanta, Georgia. As with DecembeRadio's previous album, Scotty Wilbanks was hired as the producer. Said Reedy of Wilbanks, "We just have a kindredship as musicians and as players.... There's a lot of excitement and passion that comes from his end.... [A] big thing for us is having a really good time. If we're not having a good time making a record, it's gonna show and you're gonna hear it." To capture the excitement of their live shows, DecembeRadio recorded basic tracks live in the studio. Reedy said recording live is particularly useful for capturing energetic performances from drummer Boone Daughdrill. "It's definitely very critical for him to be on top of his game and feeling like it's a unit, because you play off of each other. It's a real push and pull thing that happens in rock and roll music that you really can't sometimes capture by just doing it track by track by track", said Reedy. Miker said the band recorded a handful of songs that were "out of the box of where CCM music is", and Reedy noted that some tracks "stretched what we're doing ... with production." "Gasoline", for example, includes a "Beatlesque" section with a children's choir, string section and piccolo trumpet, and "Falling for You" begins and ends with some guitar "shred licks" that started as a joke in the writing process. DecembeRadio took a break from recording to headline the Drifter Tour in October and November, which also featured Nevertheless, Superhero and Bread of Stone. Recording resumed in early 2008, but the sessions were again interrupted for a major tour, this time in support of Third Day in March and April. Soon after the tour ended, DecembeRadio finished recording the album. ## Promotion and release Satisfied was released through Slanted Records on August 26, 2008, and debuted at its peak positions of number 116 on the Billboard 200 and number three on the Billboard Top Christian Albums charts. First week sales nearly doubled those of DecembeRadio. The album cover was the product of a spontaneous suggestion from the band's manager on the day of a photoshoot. Another photo had been slated for the album cover, but the band found a swamp and acted on their manager's idea. "We went down there, took off our shoes, rolled up our jeans a little bit and walked right into the water—and stood there for 45 minutes while we got our picture taken. It's a good thing we did it because when we got the pictures back, those were by far our favorite!" said Bunn. DecembeRadio promoted Satisfied by making television and radio appearances in Atlanta before their concert at the local Hard Rock Cafe on August 20. Six days later, the band hosted an album release party at the Jefferson Center in Roanoke, Virginia, which sold out the 938-seat venue. After returning to the studio in September to record the Comfort & Joy Christmas EP, DecembeRadio filmed promotional videos for "Gasoline" and "Look for Me" in October. The band then headlined a month-long U.S. tour in support of Satisfied with Ruth, Sevenglory and speaker Billy Wayne. DecembeRadio returned to the road in February 2009 to open for Newsboys on their Join the Tribe Tour. During the tour, the video for "Look for Me" debuted on the Gospel Music Channel. According to Miker, however, some radio stations refused to play the track because the lyrics were written from the perspective of God. ## Critical reception <table class="wikitable floatright" style="float:right;clear:right;width:24.2em;font-size:88%;text-align:center;margin:0.5em 0 0.5em 1em;padding:0;border-spacing:0"> 'Cross Rhythms </td> </tr> </table> Satisfied was generally regarded by critics as a continuation of the musical style from their previous album. Many reviewers praised DecembeRadio's "southern flavored rock", "punchy rhythm section" and "great guitar work", as well as the "ferocious howls of front man Josh Reedy". Gospel Music Channel's Beau Black, however, found that DecembeRadio's roots are "getting tougher to spot" as they try to be "all things to all people". Critics varied more widely on whether Satisfied's tracks measure up to those of DecembeRadio. Russ Breimeier of Christianity Today felt the songs "fail to leave as lasting an impression as those on the debut". Conversely, Andy Argyrakis, writing for Christian Music Central, detected more "blissfully controlled chaos" on Satisfied than on DecembeRadio, and Billboard's Deborah Evans Price called the album "even stronger" than the last and the band's playing "even tighter". A more moderate view was offered by Allmusic's Jared Johnson, who noted that while Satisfied contains "few, if any, inconsistencies or weak spots", it "falls short" due to "the lack of a strong single". A frequent complaint among critics was the album's lack of lyrical depth. Black wrote that "Satisfy Me" "delivers a message listeners have likely heard a time or six before", and Scott Fryberger of Jesus Freak Hideout opined that DecembeRadio struggle to "be blatant about [their] faith without sounding cheesy". Breimeier described the lyrics as walking "a fine line between open expressions of faith and CCM clichés" and granted that while "Find You Waiting" "relies heavily on platitudes, it's still powerfully affecting and relatable testimony". Argyrakis, though, remarked that the band "has plenty to say" and their "stacked sounds are never at the expense of a meaningful gospel message". Satisfied'' won the 2009 Dove Award for Rock Album of the Year and two of its tracks, "Find You Waiting" and "Better Man", were nominated for Rock/Contemporary Recorded Song of the Year and Rock Recorded Song of the Year, respectively. Reedy said that such recognition "inspires us to be ... better at what we do musically and bolder in what we believe in our faith." ## Track listing All songs written by Brian Bunn, Boone Daughdrill, Eric Miker, Josh Reedy and Scotty Wilbanks, except where noted. 1. "Better Man" – 3:23 2. "Satisfy Me" – 3:22 3. "Believer" – 3:40 4. "For Your Glory" (Bunn, Daughdrill, Miker, Reedy, Wilbanks, Brian White) – 3:56 5. "Gasoline" – 2:51 6. "Falling for You" – 2:39 7. "Look for Me" (Bunn, Daughdrill, Miker, Reedy, Wilbanks, White) – 4:01 8. "Love Can" (Bunn, Daughdrill, Miker, Reedy, Wilbanks, Russ Lee) – 4:14 9. "Peace of Mind" – 3:32 10. "Be Alright" – 3:16 11. "Powerful Thing" (Bunn, Daughdrill, Miker, Reedy, Wilbanks, White) – 3:24 12. "Find You Waiting" – 4:07 - 1:31 of silence brings the track length to 5:38 13. (hidden track) – 4:48 ## Personnel DecembeRadio - Josh Reedy – lead vocals, bass - Brian Bunn – lead guitar, vocals - Eric Miker – guitar, vocals - Boone Daughdrill – drums Additional personnel - Scotty Wilbanks – B3 organ, Clavinet, Wurlitzer, horn arrangements, string arrangements on "Gasoline" and "Look for Me", "other junk" - David Davidson – string arrangements on "Gasoline", "Look for Me" and "For Your Glory" - Love Sponge Strings – strings - The Soul Sisters – vocals - Keesha Dement, Carole Ford, Cheryl Rogers, Tann Smith - Kids Choir – vocals on "Gasoline" - Dustin Bearden, Anna Reeves, Abby Hoenstine, Rebecca Bearden, Sarah Shiver, Will Coleburn - Sam Skelton – saxophone - Mike Barry – trumpet - Eric Alexander – trombone - Truett Pumphrey – cowbell on "Satisfy Me" Production - Scotty Wilbanks – producer, engineering - Tom Tapley – engineering - Swaff – additional engineering, digital editing - Darren Tablan and Stephen Kaiser – assistant engineers - Shane D. Wilson – mixing - Sarah Deane – mix coordinator - Hank Williams – mastering - Billy Williams – drum tech - Joel "Angus" Huggins – tone chaperone - The Reverend Snorty Haggard – special guest - Jordan Butcher – layout - Joshua Sage Newman – photography - Abby Sasser – stylist - Tina Davis – hair and makeup ## Chart positions ### Album ### Singles
28,196,452	Flame fougasse	1,171,184,334	null	[ "British Army equipment", "Explosive weapons", "Incendiary weapons", "Land mines", "Pyrotechnics", "Weapons and ammunition introduced in 1940", "World War II weapons of the United Kingdom" ]	A flame fougasse (sometimes contracted to fougasse and may be spelled foo gas) is a type of mine or improvised explosive device which uses an explosive charge to project burning liquid onto a target. The flame fougasse was developed by the Petroleum Warfare Department in Britain as an anti-tank weapon during the invasion crisis of 1940. During that period, about 50,000 flame fougasse barrels were deployed in some 7,000 batteries, mostly in southern England and a little later at 2,000 sites in Scotland. Although never used in combat in Britain, the design saw action later in Greece. Later in World War II, Germany and Russia developed flame throwing mines that worked on a somewhat different principle. After World War II, flame fougasses similar to the original British design have been used in several conflicts including the Korean and Vietnam Wars where it was improvised from easily available parts. The flame fougasse remains in army field manuals as a battlefield expedient to the present day. ## Development history Following the Dunkirk evacuation in 1940, Britain faced a shortage of weapons. In particular, there was a severe scarcity of anti-tank weapons, many of which had to be left behind in France. One of the few resources not in short supply was petroleum oil since supplies intended for Europe were filling British storage facilities. Maurice Hankey, then a cabinet minister without portfolio, joined the Ministerial Committee on Civil Defence (CDC) chaired by Sir John Anderson, the Secretary of State for the Home Office and Home Security. Among many ideas, Hankey "brought out of his stable a hobby horse which he had ridden very hard in the 1914–18 war – namely the use of burning oil for defensive purposes." Hankey believed that oil should not just be denied to an invader, but used to impede him. Towards the end of June, Hankey brought his scheme up at a meeting of the Oil Control Board and produced for Commander-in-Chief Home Forces Edmund Ironside extracts of his paper on experiments with oil in the First World War. On 5 June, Churchill authorised Geoffrey Lloyd, the Secretary for Petroleum to press ahead with experiments with Hankey taking the matter under his general supervision. To this end, the Petroleum Warfare Department (PWD) was created and it was made responsible for developing weapons and tactics. Sir Donald Banks was put in charge of the department. The PWD soon received the assistance of William Howard Livens. Livens was well known for his First World War invention: the "Livens Gas and Oil Bomb Projector", known more simply as the Livens Projector. The Livens Projector was a large, simple mortar that could throw a projectile containing about 30 pounds (14 kg) of explosives, incendiary oil or, most commonly, poisonous phosgene gas. The great advantage of the Livens Projector was that it was cheap; this allowed hundreds, and on occasions thousands, to be set up and then fired simultaneously catching the enemy by surprise. One of Livens' PWD demonstrations, probably first seen about mid-July at Dumpton Gap, was particularly promising. A barrel of oil was blown up on the beach; Lloyd was said to have been particularly impressed when he observed a party of high-ranking officers witnessing a test from the top of a cliff making "an instantaneous and precipitate movement to the rear". The work was dangerous; Livens and Banks were experimenting with five-gallon drums in the shingle at Hythe when a short circuit triggered several weapons. By good fortune, the battery of drums where the party was standing failed to go off. The experiments led to a particularly promising arrangement: a forty-gallon steel drum buried in an earthen bank with just the round front end exposed. At the back of the drum was an explosive which, when triggered, ruptured the drum and shot a jet of flame about 10 feet (3.0 m) wide and 30 yards (27 m) long. The design was reminiscent of a weapon dating from post-medieval times called a fougasse: a hollow in which was placed a barrel of gunpowder covered by rocks, the explosives to be detonated by a fuse at an opportune moment. Livens' new weapon was duly dubbed the flame fougasse. The flame fougasse was demonstrated to Clement Attlee, Maurice Hankey and General Liardet on 20 July 1940. Experiments by the Fuel Research Station with the flame fougasse continued and it rapidly evolved. The fuel mixture was at first 40% petrol and 60% gas-oil, a mixture calculated to be useless as a vehicle fuel. A concoction of tar, lime, and petrol gel known as 5B was also developed. "5B was dark coloured, sticky, smooth paste which burned fiercely for many minutes, stuck easily to anything with which it came in contact and did not flow on burning." Early flame fougasse designs had a complex arrangement of explosive charges: a small one at the front to ignite the fuel and a main charge at the back to throw the fuel forward. An important discovery was that including magnesium alloy turnings (the waste product of machining magnesium pieces in a lathe) with the main charge at the rear of the barrel would give reliable ignition. This eliminated the need for a separate ignition charge and its associated wiring. The alloy of about 90% magnesium and 10% aluminium was, at the time, known under the trade name Elektron. ## Design variations Of the original British flame fougasse designs, there were three main variants: the safety fougasse, the demigasse and the hedge hopper. They all used metal barrels and similar pre-prepared explosive charges, although they varied in the details of construction and the amount of ammonal used for the propelling charge. ### Safety fougasse The most common form of the flame fougasse was the safety fougasse. This design allowed the propelling charge to be stored separately until needed. The safety fougasse was constructed as follows: a small section was excavated from the side of a slope, leaving a shallow platform of earth, and a barrel of incendiary mixture was placed horizontally in a low position with one round face pointing towards the target. At the back, a section of stove or drain pipe was placed vertically against the rear face of the barrel. The lower end of the pipe was blocked off with a thin cover and positioned a few inches above the bottom of the barrel. The top of the pipe was fitted with a loose cap to keep water out. This pipe is what makes it a "safety" fougasse because it allows later installation of the propelling charge. Soil was then built up over the weapon until all that could be seen were the front disk of the barrel and top of the pipe. The propelling charge was prepared with an electrically triggered detonator in a primer bound with insulating tape to three or four cartridges of ammonal explosive. This assembly was placed in a small, waterproof rubber bag that was, in turn, placed inside a used cocoa tin. Four ounces (110 g) of magnesium alloy turnings were added to ensure ignition of the fuel. The electrical wires were passed through a small hole in the lid of the tin which was then tightly fitted. The propelling charges were kept in storage, only to be deployed when enemy action was imminent. To activate the device, the propelling charge was lowered down the pipe and tamped down with dry soil before being connected to a firing point about 100 yards (91 m) away. Firing required the current delivered by a 120 V battery. Private Harold Wimshurst later recalled: > We had a special job. We had to go all round these villages where there are banks and bends in the road and we had to insert these barrels of inflammable material into the banks. A charge was put behind them with a wire running behind them to the nearest cover. A detonator was put in a pipe down the back of these barrels and the idea was that if the tanks came round on the road, we'd detonate these barrels of flaming liquid over them. A non-safety fougasse could be built by simply burying the propelling charge behind the fuel drum and running leads through the soil. Instructions for several variants of this design were published but this construction increases the hazard because the leads would have to be left exposed on the surface and any electrical current applied could, theoretically, ignite the charge. Also, underground moisture could also easily ruin the charge over an extended period of time. The safety fougasse design had the advantage that without the propelling charge the fougasse was sufficiently safe that it did not require a guard. Banks records that installing the charge only when there was clear danger relatively close at hand was a safety feature required to protect the public from accidents. The ammonal used for the main propellant charge is a cheap industrial explosive that is notoriously hygroscopic, becoming less effective when it absorbs moisture. Even though the charge was packed into a rubber bag in a tin and sealed with insulating tape, it would not have been a good idea to store it for long in the damp conditions of a flame fougasse installation. Flame fougasses were camouflaged with a covering of light material such as netting – anything heavier would significantly affect the range. They could easily be merged into hedgerows or the banks of a sunken lane within view of a well-hidden firing point. They were placed where a vehicle would be obliged to stop, or at least slow down. The flame fougasse would offer instant and horrific wounds to any unprotected men caught in its fiery maw and would cause a vehicle engine to stop within seven seconds simply because it was deprived of oxygen (although it would easily start again once the fireball subsided, provided nothing was damaged). British soldier Fred Lord Hilton MM later recalled: > On one occasion digging in and actually blowing a set of Fougasse—these were 50-imperial-gallon (230 L; 60 US gal) oil drums filled with petrol and oil, buried in the side of a defile with a small charge of explosives behind or underneath. The idea was that when a column of enemy tanks [illegible] the spot the Fougasse were blown. I don’t know if they were ever used in action but, at the demonstration we did, the flame covered an area of about 50 square yards (42 m<sup>2</sup>) and nothing could have lived in it. I think this would have stopped some of the tanks, of course, this was the whole point of the exercise! ### Demigasse The demigasse was a simpler variant of the flame fougasse. It was a barrel of petroleum mixture laid on its side with a cocoa tin charge in a shallow pit just below one of the barrel's ridges. On detonation, the barrel would rupture and flip over spilling its contents over an area of about 36 square yards (30 m<sup>2</sup>). Left on its own at a roadside, in the open and with no attempt at disguise other than to hide the firing wires, it was indistinguishable from the barrels of tar commonly used in road repair. It was hoped that in addition to the damage done by the weapon itself, experience would cause the enemy to treat every innocent roadside barrel with the greatest caution. ### Hedge hopper Another variant of the flame fougasse was the "hedge hopper". This was a barrel of petroleum mixture placed upright with a cocoa tin charge containing two primers and just one ammonal cartridge buried in an eight-inch (200 mm) deep pit placed underneath and slightly off centre, but carefully aligned with the seam of the barrel. On firing, the barrel would be projected 10 feet (3 m) into the air and 10 yards (9 m) forwards, bounding over a hedge or wall behind which it had been hidden. It was difficult to get the hedge hopper's propelling charge right, but it had the great advantage of being quick to install and easy to conceal. Home Guard member William Leslie Frost later recalled seeing a hedge hopper in action. > I was most impressed with the full gas [sic] hedge-hopper, which consisted of a forty gallon mixture of tar and oil and all sorts of things like that with a charge underneath it; the ideal thing was you waited until an enemy tank was just the other side of a hedge, and you blew it up. The idea was that you just tried to hawk it over the hedge, set it on fire so it smothered the tank and enveloped it in flame. Unfortunately, (or fortunately as it went a bit wrong) one had a bit too much charge underneath it (it was a delicate operation) and it went up in the air in one big ball of fire about 50 feet (15 m) across, very impressive! Placing the hedge hopper so that it worked properly proved difficult to get right and the War Office discouraged its use in favour of the more conventional flame fougasse installation. A further variant of the hedge hopper idea was devised for St Margaret's Bay where the barrels would be sent rolling over the cliff edge. ## Deployment In all 50,000 flame fougasse barrels were distributed of which the great majority were installed in 7,000 batteries, mostly in southern England and a little later at 2,000 sites in Scotland. Some barrels were held in reserve while others were deployed at storage sites to destroy petrol depots at short notice. The size of a battery varied from just one drum to as many as fourteen; a four barrel battery was the most common installation and the recommended minimum. Where possible, half the barrels in a battery were to contain the 40/60 mixture and half the sticky 5B mixture. A battery would be placed at a location such as a corner, steep incline or roadblock where vehicles would be obliged to slow. ## Later development Although the flame fougasse was never used in Britain, the idea was exported to Greece by a couple of PWD officers when, in 1941, German invasion threatened. They were reported to have a powerful effect on enemy units. By 1942, there were proposals for completely buried flame fougasses to be used as oil mines but by then the emergency was over. Almost all flame fougasses were removed before the end of the war and in most instances even the slightest traces of their original locations have disappeared. A few instances were missed, and their remains have been found. For example, the rusty remnants of a four-barrel battery, one of which still contained an oily residue, were discovered in 2010 in West Sussex. Both the Russians and the Germans later used weapons described as fougasse flame throwers or flame thrower mines. They worked on a different principle to the flame fougasse. Fougasse flame throwers comprised a cylinder containing a few gallons of petrol and oil; this would be hidden, typically by being buried. On being triggered electrically, either by an operator or by a booby trap mechanism, a gas generator is ignited. The pressure ruptures a thin metal seal and the liquid is forced up a central pipe and out through one or more nozzles. A squib is automatically fired to ignite the fuel. The range of the flame varied considerably, generally just a few tens of yards and lasted only one to two seconds. The German version, the Abwehrflammenwerfer 42, had an 8 imperial gallons (36 L; 9.6 US gal) fuel tank and were wired back to a control point from where they could be fired individually or together. The flame fougasse has remained in army field manuals as a battlefield expedient to the present day. Such weapons are improvised from available fuel containers combined with standard explosive charges or hand grenades and are triggered electrically or by lengths of detonating cord. In some designs, detonating cord is used to rupture the container immediately before triggering the propelling charge. In order to guarantee ignition, the improvised devices frequently feature two explosive charges, one to throw and the other to ignite the fuel. Weapons of this sort were widely used in the Korean and Vietnam Wars as well as other conflicts. ## See also - British anti-invasion preparations of World War II - British hardened field defences of World War II - Lagonda flamethrower - List of flamethrowers - Molotov cocktail - Petroleum Warfare Department - Improvised explosive device
180,532	Vanilla Ice	1,172,064,097	American rapper (born 1967)	[ "1967 births", "20th-century American drummers", "20th-century American guitarists", "20th-century American rappers", "21st-century American rappers", "American bass guitarists", "American hip hop record producers", "American keyboardists", "American male bass guitarists", "American male drummers", "American male film actors", "American male rappers", "American people who self-identify as being of Native American descent", "American rap rock musicians", "Arista Records artists", "Cleopatra Records artists", "EMI Records artists", "Ichiban Records artists", "Juno Award for International Album of the Year winners", "Living people", "Nu metal singers", "People from Wellington, Florida", "Psychopathic Records artists", "Rap metal musicians", "Rappers from Dallas", "Rappers from Miami", "Record producers from Texas", "Republic Records artists", "SBK Records artists", "Universal Records artists", "Vanilla Ice" ]	Robert Matthew Van Winkle (born October 31, 1967), known professionally as Vanilla Ice, is an American rapper, actor, and television host. Born in South Dallas, and raised in Texas and South Florida, Ice released his debut album, Hooked, in 1989 on Ichiban Records, before signing a contract with SBK Records, a record label of the EMI Group, which released a reformatted version of the album in 1990 under the title To the Extreme; which became the fastest-selling hip hop album of all time and contained Ice's best-known hits: "Ice Ice Baby" and a cover of "Play That Funky Music". "Ice Ice Baby" was the first hip hop single to top the Billboard charts and has been credited with helping to diversify hip hop by introducing it to a mainstream audience. Although he was successful, Ice later regretted his business arrangements with SBK, which had paid him to adopt a more commercial appearance to appeal to a mass audience and published fabricated biographical information without his knowledge. Soundtrack appearances and a live album, Extremely Live, continued the success, but a second mainstream studio album, Mind Blowin, featured an image change that saw a massive drop in popularity for Ice, and his subsequent albums, Hard to Swallow, Bi-Polar and Platinum Underground, failed to chart or receive much radio airplay. In 2009, Ice began hosting The Vanilla Ice Project on DIY Network. ## Early life Robert Matthew Van Winkle was born in Dallas, Texas, on October 31, 1967. Van Winkle has never known his biological father; he was given the family name of the man his mother was married to at the time of his birth. When Van Winkle was four, his mother divorced. Afterward, he grew up moving between Dallas and Miami, where his new stepfather worked at a car dealership. Van Winkle was affected by hip hop at an early age, saying "It's a very big passion of mine because I love poetry. I was just heavily influenced by that whole movement and it's molded me into who I am today." Between the ages of 13 and 14, Van Winkle practiced breakdancing, which led to his friends nicknaming him "Vanilla", as he was the only one in the group who was not black. Although he disliked the nickname, it stuck. Shortly afterward, Van Winkle started battle rapping at parties and because of his rhymes, his friends started calling him "MC Vanilla". However, when he became a member of a breakdance troupe, Van Winkle's stage name was "Vanilla Ice" combining his nickname "Vanilla" with one of his breakdance moves, "The Ice". When Ice's stepfather was offered a better job in Carrollton, Texas, he moved back to Texas with his mother. When Ice was not learning to ride motorbikes, he was dancing as a street performer with his breakdancing group, now called The Vanilla Ice Posse. Ice wrote "Ice Ice Baby" at the age of 16, basing its lyrics on a weekend he had with friend and disc jockey D-Shay in South Florida. The lyrics describe Ice and Shay on a drug run that ends in a drive-by shooting while praising Ice's rhyming skills. He attended R. L. Turner High School. ## Career ### Early career (1985–1989) In 1985, he was focusing all of his energy on motocross, winning three championships. After breaking his ankle during a race, Ice was not interested in racing professionally for some time, using his spare time to perfect his dance moves and creating his own while his ankle was healing. Ice used his beatboxing and breakdancing skills as a street performer with his friends at local malls during this time. One evening he visited City Lights, a South Dallas nightclub, where he was dared to go on stage by his friend Squirrel during an open-mic. He won the crowd over and was asked by City Lights manager John Bush if he wanted to perform regularly, which he accepted. Ice would be joined on stage by his disc jockeys D-Shay and Zero, as well as Earthquake, the local disc jockey at City Lights. The Vanilla Ice Posse or The V.I.P. would also perform with Ice on stage. As a performer for City Lights, Ice opened up for N.W.A, Public Enemy, The D.O.C., Tone Lōc, 2 Live Crew, Paula Abdul, Sinbad and MC Hammer. In January 1987, Ice was stabbed five times during a scuffle outside of City Lights. After spending ten days in the hospital, Ice signed a contract with the owner of City Lights, Tommy Quon, and his management company, Ultrax. Two years later, Ice would open for EPMD, Ice-T, Stetsasonic, and Sir Mix-A-Lot on the Stop the Violence Tour. Quon saw commercial potential in Ice's rapping and dancing skills. Buying studio time with Quon's earnings from City Lights, they recorded songs that had been perfected on stage by Ice and his acquaintances with various producers, including Khayree. The two year production was distributed by an independent record company called Ichiban Records in 1989. "Play That Funky Music" was released as the album's first single, with "Ice Ice Baby" appearing as the B-side. Tommy Quon personally sent out the single to various radio stations around the US, but the single was seldom played and when it was, it did not get the reaction Quon was hoping for. When disc jockey Darrell Jaye in Georgia played "Ice Ice Baby" instead of the single's A-side, the song gained a quick fanbase and other radio stations followed suit. Quon financed \$8,000 for the production of a music video for "Ice Ice Baby", which received heavy airplay by The Box, increasing public interest in the song. Following the success of "Ice Ice Baby", record producer Suge Knight and two bodyguards arrived at The Palm in West Hollywood, where Ice was eating. After shoving Ice's bodyguards aside, Knight and his own bodyguards sat down in front of Ice, staring at him before finally asking "How you doin'?" Similar incidents were repeated on several occasions. Eventually, Knight showed up at Ice's hotel suite on the fifteenth floor of the Bel Age Hotel, accompanied by a member of the Los Angeles Raiders football team. According to Ice, Knight took him out on the balcony by himself, and implied that he would throw him off the balcony unless he signed the publishing rights to the song over to Knight; Knight used Ice's money to help fund Death Row Records. ### Mainstream success (1990–1993) On the basis of Ice's good looks and dance moves, Public Enemy tried to convince their producer, Hank Shocklee, to sign Ice to Def Jam, but Ice later signed a contract with SBK Records in 1990. SBK remixed and re-recorded Hooked under the title To the Extreme. The reissue contained new artwork and music. According to Ice, SBK paid him to adopt a more commercial, conventional appearance. This led Ice to later regret his business agreements with SBK. To the Extreme became the fastest selling hip hop album of all time, spending sixteen weeks at \#1 on the Billboard 200 and selling eleven million copies. SBK Record executive Monte Lipman stated that he received calls from radio stations reporting over 200 phone calls requesting "Ice Ice Baby". SBK wanted Ice on the road as soon as possible. MC Hammer, an old acquaintance from his club days, had Ice on as an opening act on his tour. Reviews of To the Extreme were mixed. Entertainment Weekly reviewer Mim Udovitch gave the album a B, citing "Ice Ice Baby", "Play That Funky Music", "Dancin'" and "It's a Party" as the album's highlights. Robert Christgau gave the album a C− rating, writing that Ice's "suave sexism, fashionably male supremacist rather than dangerously obscene, is no worse than his suave beats". Criticizing the technique and style of Vanilla Ice, Allrovi reviewer Steve Huey wrote: > Ice's mic technique is actually stronger and more nimble than MC Hammer's, and he really tries earnestly to show off the skills he does have. Unfortunately, even if he can keep a mid-tempo pace, his flow is rhythmically stiff, and his voice has an odd timbre; plus, he never seems sure of the proper accent to adopt. He's able to overcome those flaws somewhat in isolated moments, but they become all too apparent over the course of an entire album. In late 1990, Ice began an eight-month relationship with Madonna, and appeared in photographs for her book, Sex. In the height of Ice's popularity, SBK licensed a 12" doll which was made by THQ. In January 1991, he was the musical guest on Saturday Night Live. Ice branched out into the film industry with an appearance in the film Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze, which he later called "one of the coolest experiences" of his career. Ice was very secretive about his personal life, with the intention of protecting his family. When a Dallas Morning News reporter asked Ice what his mother's profession was, he replied, "None of your fucking business." In an attempt to rectify this, his former label wrote a fake biography in his name and tried to pass it off as his official life story without his knowledge. While on tour in 1991, Ice found out that SBK had instigated the publication of the biography which detailed false biographical information, including claims that he had attended school with Luther Campbell, and exaggerating his living conditions in Miami, which Ice later had to debunk by himself. Ice's second major release was the live album Extremely Live, released in March 1991. The album was a live recording during Vanilla Ice's performance in Miami during his To The Extreme tour. Premiering new songs like Rollin' in My 5.0, Road To My Riches and Satisfaction, the album peaked at \#30 on the Billboard 200, but it received mainly negative reviews. Entertainment Weekly reviewer David Browne called it "one of the most ridiculous albums ever released", comparing it to The Best of Marcel Marceau, an album which consisted of two sides of silence opened by brief applause. According to Browne, Extremely Live "affords you the chance to hear inane stage patter [...] and unaccompanied drumming, during which, one assumes, Ice and his posse are onstage dancing." Monte Lipman later stated that SBK only released the live disc to make more money from Ice's fame. In April 1991, Ice began to film the SBK produced Cool as Ice, in which he played a leading role. Cool as Ice opened on October 18, 1991, in 393 theaters in the United States, grossing \$638,000, ranking at \#14 among the week's new releases. Reviews of the film were negative. Film website Rotten Tomatoes, which compiles reviews from a wide range of critics, gives the film a score of 8%. Ice received a Golden Raspberry Award for Worst New Star. SBK stated that they overexposed Ice and Ice decided to stop taking their business advice, as well as distancing himself from the image that SBK was trying to create for him. In late 1991, Ice appeared in the Circus of the Stars and Sideshow, driving his motorcycle through a wall of fire. While his fame in the United States had severely dropped, Ice continued touring in 1992, playing in South America, Europe, Australia and Asia, and premiering new songs like "Get Loose", "The Wrath", "Now & Forever", "Where the Dogs At? (All Night Long)", "Minutes of Power" and "Iceman Party". After a performance in Acapulco, the city honored Ice with a medal that represented "all the respect and admiration to [Ice's] music and to [him] as an artist from the Mexican people". Ice also served as a spokesperson for Nike and Coca-Cola throughout 1991 and 1992. In 1993, Ice toured Eastern Europe again and premiered songs off his upcoming album in St. Petersburg, Russia in front of President Boris Yeltsin. ### Mind Blowin, music break and drug abuse (1994–1996) After almost non-stop touring for the previous three years, Ice took a break from music in 1993 and began competing in jet skiing, as well as resuming Motocross racing. By 1994, Ice received less publicity and faded from the public spotlight. After becoming more interested with the Rastafari movement, Ice became a vegetarian, grew dreadlocks and talked more openly about smoking cannabis. On March 22, 1994, Ice released his second studio album, Mind Blowin'''. Reviews were unfavorable. Entertainment Weekly reviewer James Bernard called the album "more clunky than funky". Allrovi reviewer Stephen Thomas Erlewine wrote that "There isn't a single moment that establishes a distinct musical identity, and the whole thing is rather embarrassing." At around this time, Ice began using ecstasy, cocaine and heroin. During periods of heavy drug use, Ice received many tattoos from artist acquaintances. According to Ice, he "was in [his] binge days. [He] didn't even realize how many [he] was getting". Ice attempted suicide with a heroin overdose on July 4, 1994, but was revived by his friends. After being revived, Ice decided that it was time to change his lifestyle. As a symbol of his attempt to begin anew, he got a tattoo of a leaf on his stomach. After expanding his Mind Blowin tour overseas in 1995, Ice sold his estate in California and took a break from music, rather focusing on motocrossing and jet skiing in Florida. By the summer, Ice was the world's No. 6-ranked sit-down jet ski racer, competing nearly every weekend and earning a Kawasaki sponsorship. Uncertain about his future career, Ice studied real estate and started working on the side renovating and selling houses. In late 1995, he set up a recording studio in Miami and joined a grunge band, Pickin Scabz. The name was set to reflect Ice's career, and how he was healing from his suicide attempt, and that he was now "picking up the pieces". In 1996, longtime associate and friend Monte Lipman signed Ice for Universal Republic Records. He did guest vocals with no stage name for the song "Boom" by Bloodhound Gang on their CD One Fierce Beer Coaster. ### 1997–2001 Ice later developed a friendship with producer Ross Robinson, who had become known for producing music by Deftones, Korn, Limp Bizkit and Sepultura. Robinson and Ice shared an interest in motocross racing. Monte Lipman hoped that Robinson would produce a new Vanilla Ice album. According to Robinson, others had attempted to discourage him from working with Ice, saying it might hurt his reputation. Rather than being dissuaded, Robinson was encouraged by their reticence and agreed to work with Ice. In an interview, Robinson stated, "It's the most punk-rock thing you could do." Despite not being happy with his old image, Van Winkle stated that he never had a problem with his older music. He decided against changing his stage name, as he felt no need to run from his past, despite being uneasy with some of it, and started performing again, booking a hundred shows a year. Ice's third studio album, Hard to Swallow, featured a darker sound and lyrics than Ice's previous work, as well as various mixtures of different styles of hip hop and hard rock, which garnered media attention. Ice attracted a whole new audience when he started touring again, some who were even unfamiliar with his more mainstream sound. Reviews were generally negative; Jon Pareles of The New York Times wrote, "The most earnest new song, Scars, condemns an abusive father. The sentiments would sound more genuine if Korn hadn't gotten there first." Richard Torres of Rolling Stone gave the album two out of five stars, writing that while "nothing, however, can redeem Ice's wack boasting," the album "isn't half-bad." In The New Rolling Stone Album Guide, Rob Kemp gave the album three out of five stars, writing that it contained Ice's "most convincing music". In promotion of Hard to Swallow, Ice toured with a seven-piece live band which included future Weezer bassist Scott Shriner. The band opened with rock-oriented material from Hard to Swallow and concluded with older hip hop songs. The setlist also included "Power", based upon Led Zeppelin's "Immigrant Song". Ice said that writing the songs and performing them were like therapy, as he had tried to hide his anger when making his older songs but Robinson was the first producer who told him to use it to create. Vanilla Ice was a member of the softball team The Hip Hop Stars alongside Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg and Method Man in a 1999 game shown on MTV Rock N' Jock . Later in 1999, MTV asked Vanilla Ice to join their cast to "retire" the music video for "Ice Ice Baby" on the MTV special 25 Lame, in which Ice himself was asked to destroy the video's master tape. When Ice was given a baseball bat, he ended up destroying not only the film but the show's entire set as well. In 2001, DJ ReAnimator remixed "Ice Ice Baby" with Vanilla Ice re-doing his vocals for the track. Ice Ice Baby 2001 was released as a single and music video for the European market, spawning a wave of new overseas interest in Vanilla Ice. Having attracted a following outside of his former mainstream audience, Ice began recording independently, despite still being signed to Universal. During a recording session, Ice met the all-female American hard rock band from Southern California, Betty Blowtorch. Bianca Halstead bonded with Ice and asked if he wanted to contribute a rap interlude to their track Size Queen. On Ice's collaboration with the band, lead vocalist and bassist Halstead was quoted saying, "I asked him if he could rap over [the track] and he said he can rap over anything. And he could!" Per his stepfather's request, Ice started working with his former manager Tommy Quon again. While hoping to re-create some of the magic that they worked hard on in the early 1990s, Ice denied any interest in trying to become big again, stating that his only passion was music, not fame. In May 2000, Ice wrestled in a match promoted by Juggalo Championshit Wrestling, filling in for Insane Clown Posse member Shaggy 2 Dope, who had been injured during a match. MTV News reported that Insane Clown Posse would make an appearance on Ice's next album, tentatively titled Bomb Tha System. In July 2001, Ice performed at the second Gathering of the Juggalos. On October 23, 2001, Ice released the album Bi-Polar. Initially conceived as a double album consisting of one disc of rock music (Skabz) and one disc of hip hop music (Bomb Tha System), both parts were released on one disc. The album also featured La the Darkman, Perla, Insane Poetry and Bob Kakaha. Bradley Torreano of Allrovi disliked the album, criticizing it as "wildly uneven and at times hilariously bad," but also stating "Vanilla Ice is still better than a lot of the rap-metal bands that erupted in 2000/2001" and that the rap beats on Bomb Tha System "are surprisingly solid." In The New Rolling Stone Album Guide, Rob Kemp gave the album one out of five stars, calling the album "utterly listless". According to a Sony BMG executive, sales of Bi-Polar were "not bad...for Vanilla Ice. That's pretty respectable. Seriously." ### Independent releases (2002–2009) With Quon back as manager, Ice was scheduled to appear in various reality TV programs. Ice, still an entertainer at heart, felt that the experience would be good for him. In 2002, he appeared on Celebrity Boxing, fighting Todd Bridges under the name 'Bi-Polar'. In 2003, he appeared in five episodes of Hollywood Squares, eight episodes of The Farm and three episodes of Celebrity Bull Riding Challenge, and made a cameo appearance in The New Guy in 2002. Around this time, Vanilla Ice also returned to the world of motocross. He auditioned for the 2002 X Games in the freestyle division and placed seventh at the 2003 Suzuki Crossover challenge, according to Sports Illustrated. He told the magazine that the track "is where I'm happiest." In 2003, Ice contributed vocals to "Off the Chain" by 7x70, a side project of Iron Maiden drummer Nicko McBrain and Anthrax guitarist Dan Spitz. A demo of the song was leaked in June. In 2003, Ultrax reissued Bomb Tha System (the second part of "Bi-Polar") under the title Hot Sex, which was a single from the original album. From January to February 2004, Ice appeared on the reality television series The Surreal Life. Although much of the series was staged, Ice found the experience to be therapeutic, stating that a comment made by Tammy Faye Messner during filming, "We are who we are because of who we were", helped him accept his past. On August 2, 2005, Ice released his fifth studio album, Platinum Underground. He stated that the title of the album reflected the fact that he could maintain a fanbase without mainstream airplay. Allrovi reviewer Rob Theakston panned the album, writing that it "has more bad spots in it than most". Ice included a song titled Ninja Rap 2, which was set to be a hardcore remix. Aside from the name, the song has very little connection to Ice's original 1991 single, but rather talks about his appreciation of his fans, his love of performing at clubs and playing at the Gathering of the Juggalos with Insane Clown Posse. Ninja Rap 2 was the first song to be released from Platinum Underground and was available to download for free off of Ice's official website. In 2007, Ice returned to a spin-off of The Surreal Life titled The Surreal Life: Fame Games, where he again trashed the set after being voted off. In September 2008, Ice signed a contract with Cleopatra Records, recording the cover album Vanilla Ice Is Back! at the label's request. The album was released on November 4, 2008, and contained covers of songs by Public Enemy, House of Pain, Bob Marley, and Cypress Hill. IGN reviewer Spence D. called the album "an embarrassing endeavor that sounds like it should have stayed locked inside Ice's studio (or at the very least leaked on YouTube and passed off as a piss take)." On February 27, 2009, Ice performed as part of a joint performance with MC Hammer in Orem, Utah, called "Hammer Pants And Ice", which featured twenty four dancers and a full choir. ### 2010–present In August 2009, Ice signed a contract with StandBy Records; however, Ice later left the label. Ice was a special musical guest at the 2010 National Television Awards in January, performing with Jedward for their remix and debut single "Under Pressure (Ice Ice Baby)". Ice also recorded his verse for their album Planet Jedward and appeared in the music video. He was a part of The Back2Kool concert tour with Turbo B and MC Hammer, playing worldwide in late 2010, and reunited with his former DJ, Floyd 'Earthquake' Brown, for the shows overseas. In early 2011, Vanilla Ice appeared on the sixth season of the UK show Dancing on Ice, as well as various ice skating tours surrounding the show. In 2009, Ice started filming a reality television series called The Vanilla Ice Project, which premiered on DIY Network on October 14, 2010. The season was focused on renovating a house in Palm Beach, Florida, with each episode dedicated to a different room in the house. In 2011, Ice published a book on the subject, Vanilla Ice Project – Real Estate Guide, on how to succeed in real estate. The book was made available as a free digital download on his real estate website. The second season began airing in January 2012, the third season in January 2013. In June 2011, Ice filmed a role in the movie That's My Boy, starring Adam Sandler and Andy Samberg, (released in 2012). In the film, Ice portrays an exaggerated version of himself called Uncle Vanny. While shooting, he collaborated with Samberg and Sandler musically. In August, Ice performed at the 2011 Gathering of the Juggalos; he signed with Psychopathic Records, but later departed from the label without releasing anything. His sixth studio album, WTF, was released on August 19 through Radium Records. While the record featured an array of different styles, like other recent Vanilla Ice albums, it also featured Ice's return to Electronica, with songs like "Turn It Up", "Rock Star Party", "Nightmare Disco" and "Cadillac Ninjas". Regarding the new record and its numerous musical genres, Ice said, "It's like techno hip-hop. European. I live a lot in Europe, and when I'm over there I get way into the techno stuff and I get into new music. So I thought I'd make a record of it. I did the thing and it was a lot of fun". In December 2011, Ice played Captain Hook in the Chatham, Kent, Central Theatre pantomime production of Peter Pan, a role that previously belonged to Henry Winkler. He also turned on the Christmas lights for Rochester, Kent, in Rochester Castle, as part of the promotion for the panto. On May 12, 2012, Vanilla Ice helped in the launch of the Mr. Freeze Reverse Blast roller coaster at Six Flags over Texas in Arlington with a free concert for valid daily park ticket or 2012 Season Pass holders. In mid 2013, Vanilla Ice joined the New Kids on the Block tour alongside Boyz II Men. On September 15, 2013, Vanilla Ice performed at the halftime show of a Houston Texans game. Houston went on to lose the remaining fourteen games of the season, leading some players to blame Vanilla Ice for the losing streak. In the Western comedy film The Ridiculous Six, released in 2015, Ice portrayed Mark Twain. He also had a non-speaking cameo in another Netflix movie; Sandy Wexler In 2016, Vanilla Ice competed on season 23 of Dancing with the Stars. He was partnered with professional dancer Witney Carson. They were eliminated on October 4, 2016. On September 16, 2017, Vanilla Ice joined Insane Clown Posse in a free concert, the Juggalo March On Washington. Between 2015 and 2016, Vanilla Ice was one of the main headliners for the worldwide 'I Love the 90s Tour'. On January 4, 2019, Dave Franco was cast to star as Ice in a biopic chronicling the rapper's life. On December 31, 2020, Ice was the star attraction at a New Year's Eve party at President Trump's mansion Mar-a-Lago. The President himself was unable to attend, but Donald Trump Jr. captured Ice's performance on his cellphone. New Year's Eve 2020 was also the younger Trump's 43rd birthday. Notable attendees included Don Jr.'s girlfriend Kimberly Guilfoyle, Rudy Giuliani, Sean Spicer and others. In June 2021, Ice narrated a BBC Radio 5 Live documentary podcast covering the theft of the racehorse Shergar. ## Personal life Vanilla Ice dated Madonna for eight months in 1991–1992. Ice married Laura Giaritta in 1997; they have two daughters, Dusti Rain (born 1998) and KeeLee Breeze (born 2000). Ice describes himself as a "Juggalo", a fan of Psychopathic Records hip hop groups. By 2012, he was a vegetarian for six years. In 2013, Ice stated that he has Choctaw heritage through his maternal grandmother. In 2015, after Ice repeated his claim of Choctaw identity in response to criticisms of Native American portrayals in The Ridiculous 6, Choctaw genealogists researched his family tree, finding his maternal genealogy to be mostly German, with no Choctaw ancestry possible. Ice responded via Twitter that "I'm not going to pretend I'm Indian, Just because I have Indian blood. Sorry for any disrespect, to me Indians are American royalty." In 2016, Ice's wife filed for divorce, saying that the marriage was "irretrievably broken." His third child with his new wife was born in 2018. ### Legal issues On August 8, 1988, Ice was arrested in South Dallas for illegal drag racing. In 1990, Ice was threatened with copyright infringement for use of samples from "Under Pressure" by Queen and David Bowie. The matter was settled out of court. On June 3, 1991, he was arrested in Los Angeles on firearm charges after threatening a homeless man, James N. Gregory, with a pistol. Gregory had approached Ice's car outside of a supermarket and attempted to sell him a silver chain. Ice and his bodyguard were charged with three weapons offenses. Ice pleaded no contest. In January 2001, Ice was arrested by police in Davie, Florida, for assaulting his wife, Laura. According to the criminal complaint, Ice and his wife argued as they drove on Interstate 595. Ice admitted to pulling hair from her head to prevent her from jumping out of the truck's window. He pleaded guilty to charges of disorderly conduct four months later and was sentenced to probation and ordered to attend family therapy sessions. Ice's pet wallaroo, Bucky, and pet goat, Pancho, escaped from his wife's grandmother's home in Port St. Lucie, Florida in November 2004. After wandering around local streets for over a week, the animals were caught and returned to Ice. He paid a \$220 fine for expired pet tags and an undisclosed fine for the escape of the animals. On April 10, 2008, Ice was arrested in Palm Beach County on a battery charge for allegedly kicking and hitting his wife. He was released the following day, after she declared that her husband had only pushed her. In court, the couple's neighbor, Frank Morales, stated that it was merely a verbal argument. Ice was ordered by a Florida court to stay away from his wife following his arrest, and to communicate with his children only if Morales accompanied him. The judge told Ice that he could only contact his wife via telephone. On April 29, 2008, Ice's lawyers, Bradford Cohen and Joseph LoRusso, were able to get the charges dropped after providing the state attorney with evidence that conflicted with what was originally reported. In February 2015, Ice was arrested and charged with residential burglary and grand theft after he allegedly stole furniture, a pool heater, bicycles and other items from a Florida home that he believed to be vacant. He later accepted a plea deal which would result in the charges being dropped following his completion of 100 hours of community service and payment of restitution to the estate of the homeowner. ## Style and influences As of the late 2000s, Ice's live performances feature a mix of newer, rock and techno-influenced material and old-school hip hop. Ice performs with a live drummer and DJ, and sometimes sprays his audience with bottled water. Ice's performances often feature an inflatable grim reaper balloon, a dancer in a clown mask, and confetti thrown into the audience. Describing his performances, Ice stated "It's high energy, stage diving, pyrotechnics, girls showing their breasts. It's crazy party atmosphere." Ice stated that his musical style was influenced by underground music, rather than mainstream music, and that his influences included hip hop and funk artists such as Funkadelic, Rick James, Roger Troutman, Egyptian Lover and Parliament. Ice is a big fan of 50's and 60's reggae and Bob Marley's work and has also stated that he enjoys Rage Against the Machine, Slipknot, and System of a Down. Ice sometimes plays bass, drums and keyboards on studio recordings. Vanilla Ice referred to his mainstream music as "above-ground" rather than underground, as he tried to make danceable beats and removed expletives so that the songs could reach a wider audience. A lot of his early hits had Ice boasting sexual conquests, in 1991, Ice was quoted "I rap about what I know. Girls and stuff. That's what is going through my head." When asked about his darker sound in 2002, Ice replied; "Music is about reflection and I'm just reflecting my life and everything it's been and there's no way I'm going to be able to stress what I want and mean over a break beat, you know, it's too emotional and it's too intense, so you have to have the intensity of the band, it's like a symphony, you know, you have to build on the intense parts, and so it just wasn't going to happen, to come extreme over some hip hop record, so to exorcise my demons I had to have the band." ## Legacy Along with Beastie Boys, 3rd Bass, and House of Pain, Ice was one of the earliest white rappers to attain major success. Chuck D has credited Ice as a regional breakthrough, stating "He broke through in the mid-South, in a Southern area in Texas, in something that was kind of indigenous to that hip-hop culture down there. He just doesn't get credit for it." In 1991, 3rd Bass released a single called "Pop Goes the Weasel", and in the lyrics comparing Ice unfavorably to Elvis Presley. The song's music video featured Henry Rollins as Ice, who is depicted as being assaulted by 3rd Bass. Ice responded to "Pop Goes the Weasel" with his 1992 song "The Wrath". Del tha Funkee Homosapien referred to Ice in the lyrics of "Pissin' on Your Steps", which appeared on his 1991 debut album I Wish My Brother George Was Here. Similar to 'Pop Goes the Weasel', the song negatively makes a connection between Ice and Elvis, while saying Ice alongside MC Hammer are mocking hip hop by being commercial. Vanilla Ice answered back to most of his critics in the song "Hit 'em Hard". Vanilla Ice appears as a video game character in Championship Motocross released in 2001 on PlayStation 2. Former Ultimate Fighting Championship light heavyweight champion Chuck 'The Iceman' Lidell used Ice's song Too Cold for his entrance to the ring. In 2007, Nike released Vanilla Ice shoes for their Fallen Heroes pack. Rapper G-Child, best known for her appearance on ego trip's The (White) Rapper Show, has credited Ice as being a major influence on her work. After meeting Ice in 2000, G-Child performed freestyle raps at six of Ice's performances, and opened for him four times. The late rapper Ol' Dirty Bastard appeared on stage with Vanilla Ice during the 2004 Gathering of the Juggalos and expressed interest in working on a song together after stating that he was Ice's "greatest fan". In March 2009, Ice participated in a Virgin Mobile advertising campaign titled "Right Music Wrongs", apologizing for his 1990s image. As part of the campaign, Ice was placed on "trial", and was voted innocent by users of the campaign website. He also appeared in a commercial for the South African light beer Castle Lite. In 2010, Vanilla Ice was featured on the debut single of the Irish duo Jedward, a mashup of "Under Pressure" and "Ice Ice Baby". "Under Pressure (Ice Ice Baby)" was released in the United Kingdom on January 31, 2010, via download and as a physical single on February 15, 2010. In 2010, Serbian musicians Slađa Delibašić and Shwarz released the single and music video Dizel Power. The music video and song feature various references to Vanilla Ice, including the performers dancing next to a graffiti mural of Ice. The video has reached two million views on YouTube. After signing with Psychopathic Records, Violent J mentioned that Insane Clown Posse were longtime fans of Ice's work; "We were bumping him way before "Ice Ice Baby" blew up. We were bumping him when he had his first record out on Ichiban. Shaggy had the vinyl and we used to bump that shit up in his room. It felt like two summers before that shit blew up." "Thanda Thanda Pani" (Cold Cold Water) by Baba Sehgal was inspired heavily by Vanilla Ice's music and style. Rapper Riff Raff has mentioned in interviews that Vanilla Ice was one of his biggest influence. Eminem has often name-dropped Vanilla Ice in his songs. Starting during taped freestyles he did with rapper Proof in 1992 where they performed against each other portraying Ice and MC Hammer, respectively. In his first single "Just Don't Give a Fuck", Eminem mentions Ice alongside Everlast, boasting in a playful manner that he is a better rapper. In "Role Model", Eminem says he ripped out Vanilla Ice's dreadlocks. Ice responded to in a magazine interview with Vibe saying that Eminem "raps like a girl". While Vanilla Ice and Eminem neither look at their responses as an actual beef, Eminem did reply to the quote in his song "Marshall Mathers" which also featured a verbal attack on the Insane Clown Posse. Eminem mentioned Ice again in the song "Purple Pills" in 2001, which caused Vanilla Ice's only response in song. On his album Bi-Polar, Ice mentions Eminem in a positive light ("Hip Hop Rules") and in a negative light ("Exhale"), however, Ice stated that he has no bad feelings towards Eminem. In a 2002 interview, Vanilla Ice stated that he thought Eminem's references were flattering, going on to say "I give him credit, I think he's talented, I think he's a killer rapper, you know I don't compare myself to him because he's another white rapper, I don't compare myself to any other rapper period, I don't colorize hip hop, it's stupid, but for people who are doing that are just looking through the eyes of a racial standpoint, and it really shouldn't be looked at that way, you're looking at two musicians that are in a broad brand of hip hop, so you don't need to compare us two. Following me, any white rapper is going to have to hear 'oh, you think you're Vanilla Ice?', so I am sure he's heard that." In April 2009, Ice appeared in the music video for Eminem's song "We Made You". ## Band members Current - DJ Dirty Chopstix – turntables - Kool Keith – drums - Trent Laugerman – drums - Krazy Klown – dancer and background vocals - Maniac – dancer Former - Earthquake (1987–2014) – turntables and background vocals - DJ Don't Play (1985–2009) – turntables and background vocals - Zero (1985–2014) – turntables and background vocals - D-Shay (1985–1991) – turntables and drums - Clint Barlow – drums (2004–2011) - Tha Hit Man (1997–2005) – drums - Boom (1990–1995) – drums - Bobzilla (2000–2004) – bass - Doug Ardito (1998–2001) – bass - Scott G. Shriner (1997–1999) – bass - 2Hype / Rod-J (1991–2004) – Hype Man and background vocals - Chill (1992–1994) – Hype Man and background vocals - Hi-Tec (1985–1995) – dancer and background vocals - Koko (1985–2010) – dancer and background vocals - Squirrel (1985–1995) – dancer and background vocals - Twist (1987–1993) – dancer and background vocals - E-Rock (1987–1991) – dancer and background vocals - Juice (1989–1991) – dancer and background vocals - Ste\~bo (1990–1992) – dancer and background vocals ## Discography ### Studio albums - To the Extreme (1990) - Mind Blowin (1994) - Hard to Swallow (1998) - Bi-Polar (2001) - Platinum Underground (2005) - W.T.F. (Wisdom, Tenacity and Focus)'' (2011) ## Filmography ## Awards and nominations American Music Awards Grammy Awards People's Choice Awards Kids' Choice Awards Soul Train Music Awards The Factual Entertainment Awards Golden Raspberry Awards
41,617,651	Typhoon Saomai (2000)	1,169,479,755	Pacific typhoon in 2000	[ "2000 Pacific typhoon season", "2000 disasters in Asia", "2000 in Japan", "2000 in North Korea", "2000 in South Korea", "Tropical cyclones in 2000", "Typhoons", "Typhoons in Japan", "Typhoons in North Korea", "Typhoons in South Korea" ]	Typhoon Saomai, known in the Philippines as Typhoon Osang, was a long-tracked and intense tropical cyclone that brought flooding rainfall in Japan and the Korean Peninsula in September 2000. The torrential precipitation in Japan was considered some of the worst in the past century. Saomai, the second strongest typhoon in the western Pacific in 2000, developed from an area of disturbed weather in open sea on August 31. The system was initially quick to intensify, reaching an initial peak intensity as a typhoon on September 4. Wind shear caused a hiatus in Saomai's strengthening phase, and as a result Saomai weakened back to a tropical storm as it tracked northwest for the next few days. On September 9, the system regained typhoon intensity and began to rapidly intensify, reaching peak intensity on September 10 with maximum sustained winds of 175 km/h (109 mph). Over the ensuing two days Saomai would weaken slightly before making landfall on Okinawa Island. The typhoon later entered the East China Sea, where it recurved towards the northeast before making landfall on South Korea as a severe tropical storm, later transitioning into an extratropical cyclone on September 16. Saomai's remnants would move into Russia before dissipating three days later. As a developing typhoon, the outer rainbands of Saomai affected the Mariana Islands, causing moderate damage. Localized power outages were reported, and damage totaled to US\$650,000. Even before Saomai made landfall on Okinawa, the typhoon caused rough seas off the coast of Japan that resulted in several shipping incidents. Concurrently, the approach of a front into the country interacted with the typhoon, resulting in unprecedented rainfalls in Japan. Due to the floods, approximately 400,000 people were evacuated in three prefectures. In Nagoya, observed rainfall totals were the highest since records began in 1891. Despite making landfall on Okinawa, damage was not as severe, though several landslides and strong winds were reported. Overall, damage in Japan and its outlying islands totaled JP¥24.8 billion (US\$223 million) and eleven fatalities were reported. As Saomai tracked near China, its outer rainbands and strong waves prompted the evacuation of 20,000 people and caused record high stream heights. In South Korea, eight people were killed and damage figures equated to US\$71 million. Widespread power outages took a toll on as many as 422,000 homes and heavy rains flooded numerous fields of crops. Minor damage occurred in North Korea, though the damage wrought by Typhoon Prapiroon earlier in the month was exacerbated by Saomai's impacts. In Russia, where the typhoon made landfall as an extratropical storm, nine people were killed due to car accidents spurred by rainfall caused by the Saomai. Overall, Saomai's effects resulted in the death of 28 people and roughly US\$6.3 billion in damage. ## Meteorological history Typhoon Saomai emerged from an area of convection that developed well east of Guam in late-August. Though the disturbance was associated with a low-pressure area, the circulation center was too weak to support persistent shower activity. Despite the satellite presentation, the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) classified the system as a tropical depression at 1800 UTC on August 31. Over the next few days, the system organized and curved towards the west from its initial northerly track. At 1200 UTC on September 2, the JMA upgraded the small depression to tropical storm intensity. Within Saomai, convection deepened near the center, signifying continued intensification. A cold central dense overcast eventually developed, and at 1200 UTC the next day, Saomai became a severe tropical storm. Early on September 4, the tropical cyclone intensified further into a typhoon. At the time, Saomai was still well northeast of Guam. Upon reaching typhoon strength, Saomai attained an initial peak intensity with maximum sustained winds of 120 km/h (75 mph). Shortly after, despite the fact that a primitive eye had begun to develop, wind shear increased, shearing the storm's convection away. As a result, the JMA downgraded Saomai below typhoon strength on September 5, and at roughly the same time a subtropical ridge to the storm's southeast steered Saomai southward. This break in the storm's westerly course was short lived, and early on September 6, Saomai assumed its previous heading. Over time the shearing conditions gradually abated, and rainbanding about the cyclone was showing signs of organization and strengthening. On September 8, Saomai finally re-developed a central dense overcast, prompting the JMA to upgrade the tropical storm back to typhoon intensity at 0000 UTC the following day. Back in favorable conditions, the typhoon entered a phase of rapid intensification beginning six hours later. During this period a well-defined eye developed, and the storm's eyewall significantly intensified. At 1200 UTC on September 10, Saomai reached its peak intensity with sustained winds estimated at 175 km/h (109 mph) and a minimum barometric pressure of 925 mbar (hPa; 27.32 inHg). The intense typhoon held this intensity for approximately nine hours before it began to weaken. Following peak intensity, Saomai's eye became cloud-filled, and the storm began to develop concentric eyewalls. Shortly after 1000 UTC on September 12, the typhoon made landfall on central Okinawa, Japan with sustained winds of 140 km/h (87 mph) and a pressure of 945 mbar (945 hPa; 27.9 inHg). Saomai quickly passed over the island, and concurrently its weakening phase came to a halt. After tracking into the East China Sea, the typhoon began to track towards the northeast in response to a mid-latitude trough. At its westernmost point along its track, Saomai was located approximately 345 km (214 mi) east of Wenzhou, China. Atmospheric conditions became increasingly more hostile as Saomai tracked northeast, and the typhoon became elongated and ragged in appearance. At 1200 UTC on September 15, Saomai was downgraded to severe tropical storm intensity as the cyclone began to undergo extratropical transition. At around 2030 UTC that day, Saomai made its final landfall as a tropical system west of Pusan, South Korea; after emerging into the Yellow Sea the storm was declared extratropical at 0600 UTC the next day. These remnants later tracked inland near Vladivostok, Russia before dissipating on September 19. ## Preparations, impact, and aftermath ### Northern Mariana Islands and Guam Early in Saomai's developmental history, the rainbands associated with the storm dropped heavy rain across the Northern Mariana Islands. Schools across the archipelago nation were closed, and ferry service between Saipan and Tinian was cancelled. Reports of flooding were widespread, including in Saipan. In Tianan, some banana trees were damaged by the storm's affects. Damage from the islands amounted to US\$650,000, with \$600,000 to infrastructure. The presence of the nearby tropical cyclone caused the delaying of two flights and the cancellation of another at Antonio B. Won Pat International Airport. On Guam, the United States Navy ordered the release of ships from the local harbor. There, peaked at 251 mm (9.9 in) over a 24-hour period at Piti. At the National Weather Service office in Tiyan, a gauge observed 100 mm (3.9 in) of rain. Gusty winds were also associated with Saomai's outer rainbands, with gusts peaking at a measured 105 km/h (65 mph) on September 4. The winds caused power outage in localized areas and downed two telephone poles. Severe flooding occurred in Merizo after a storm drain became clogged with debris, inundating six houses. ### Japan On September 10, rough seas caused by Saomai capsized a fishing boat off of Shizuoka Prefecture, causing one person to go missing. Another occupant of the boat was rescued three hours after the sinking by police helicopter. The waves also caused a dozen containers from the South Korean Heunga Nagoya to fall into the sea 5.5 km (3.4 mi) off the coast of Susami and Wakayama Prefecture. Off of Oita Prefecture, the waves were the impetus for red tides, resulting in significant marine loss. The approach of the typhoon towards Okinawa coincided with the approach of a weather front over mainland Japan, resulting in prolonged rainfall over the mainland. The rains caused extensive flooding, prompting the Cabinet of Japan to make reassurances in the repair of the ensuing damage. Rail service along the Tōkaidō Shinkansen between Tokyo and Osaka was suspended for more than 18 hours at one point, the longest delay to be enforced in the rail's service history. As a result, 50,000 passengers were forced to wait out the storm in the line's stopped trains. Toyota closed 24 of its manufacturing plants, resulting in the incompletion of 10,000 vehicles. Similarly, Mitsubishi stopped production at two of its facilities in Nagoya. Japan Airlines, All Nippon Airways, and Japan Air System cancelled a combined 114 flights, which adversely affected about 21,000 people. Across the country, rainfall peaked at 1,000 mm (39 in) in Miyagawa, Mie; the same station also recorded 522 mm (20.6 in) of rain in a single 24-hour period. As a result of the flooding in Mie, 2,819 homes were inundated and 25 landslides occurred. Several buildings succumbed to the water and thus collapsed. Extensive power outage occurred in Kagoshima Prefecture, affecting approximately 4,500 households. In addition, the heavy rains caused damage to agriculture, including sugar cane crops. Damage in the prefecture totaled JP¥356 million (US\$3 million). Similar effects were felt across Kyushu. Several flights into Nagasaki Prefecture were cancelled; the rains there also caused agricultural damage totaling JP¥99 million (US\$900,000). Flooding also occurred on Shikoku, where rainfall totals peaked at 976 mm (38.4 in) in Funato, Kōchi. Severe damage occurred elsewhere in Kōchi, where combined forestry and agricultural damage figures reached JP¥2.1 billion (US\$19 million). In Tokushima Prefecture, several landslides occurred, disrupting transportation routes. Record rainfall was observed in Aichi Prefecture, with 511 mm (20.1 in) of rain in Tokai and 532 mm (20.9 in) of rain in Nagoya in a span of a single day; both observations were the highest since records began in 1891. Due to the threat of landslides in Nagoya, the municipal government ordered the evacuation of 140,000 families. In the ward of Nakagawa-ku, two rivers overflowed their banks and over-topped the surrounding embankment. Two tornadoes occurred in the prefecture, with one striking Mihama and another striking Minamichita; the former tornado injured 22 people, of which two were hospitalized. Another 41,000 families encompassing 400,000 people were evacuated across Aichi, Gifu, and Mie prefectures as a precautionary measure. Damage in Okinawa, the site of Saomai's first landfall, was considerable but not unprecedented. On September 10, the provincial government established a disaster warning headquarters on Daito Island to more efficiently deal with the typhoon's effects. Rainfall peaked on Mount Yonaha, where a station recorded 537 mm (21.1 in) of rain. During the storm, 31 roads sustained damage and 26 landslides occurred. Damage in Okinawa Prefecture reached JP¥636 million (US\$6 million). Overall, Saomai caused the destruction of 609 homes and the inundation of 70,017 others in Japan. Damage costs in the country totaled JP¥24.8 billion (US\$223 million). Eleven people were killed and 103 others suffered injury. At the height of the storm, over 17,000 people had been displaced in emergency shelters. ### Korean peninsula As Saomai approached South Korea, the typhoon forced the cancellation of flights beginning on September 12. Four airports had their air service suspended. Other suspensions of transportation included the refuge of 362 fishing boats in ports and the closure of 10 national parks and 43 mountain paths. As a result, about 16,600 campers and hikers were evacuated to safer areas. As a result of the inclement weather, the operation of 149 passenger ships were cancelled. On September 13, the Korea Meteorological Administration (KMA) issued a typhoon warning for waters south of South Korea and Jeju Province. The administration anticipated heavy rainfall, though not as much as what had taken place in Japan. Offshore, an Indonesian freighter with 39 crewmen became stranded by the typhoon in waters south of Pusan. The crew were rescued by maritime police, but 270 tons of oil spilled into the ocean from a broken oil container. In South Korea, the northern and southern Gyeongsang provinces were the most heavily impacted. At least 6,000 hectares (15,000 acres) of paddy fields were flooded. Heavy rains caused the Nakdong River to breach a section of embankment, prompting the evacuation of 100 families. Flood warnings were issued by the KMA on sections of the river for the first time in 2000. In South Gyeongsang, an electricity pylon collapsed, cutting power supply to about 700 houses. Strong winds uprooted trees and destroyed homes and fishing boats in Pusan. Countrywide, losses were initially estimated at KR₩20 billion (US\$18 million), though these figures later rose to US\$71 million. As a result of Saomai, eight people were killed, and 411 others were displaced. More than 600 buildings were either inundated or destroyed entirely. At the height of the storm, roughly 422,000 households were without power, primarily in northern and southern Gyeongsang provinces. Relatively minor damage occurred in North Korea, previously impacted by Typhoon Prapiroon earlier in September. Rainfall peaked at 147 mm (5.8 in) in Kaesong. Saomai somewhat exacerbated the unprecedented damage caused by Prapiroon, and damaged maize crops which were set to be harvested in the coming weeks. ### Elsewhere At its closest approach to China, Saomai generated high waves that coincided with high tide, resulting in extensive damage. In preparation for the storm, schools in Ningbo were forced to close, and ferry service was discontinued. Over 20,000 people were evacuated by the Chinese government onto higher land. The most severely affected Chinese province was Zhejiang. A station in Dinghai District observed 102 mm (4.0 in) of rain in 18 hours, equivalent to more than half of that station's monthly average. In Zhoushan, 20,000 hectares of farmland were inundated and 2,500 homes collapsed. Off the island, ten fishing boats collided, and another oil tanker capsized. Areas in Gaoting were submerged under as much as 1 m (3.3 ft) of water. Off the coast, 225 boats and 130 piers were damaged. In Shanghai, 20 streets were flooded and hundreds of homes were flooded with water. At nearby Hongqiao Airport, an Airbus A340 bound for Paris slipped off the runway. Though no people were injured, the airport was closed for eight hours. The typhoon also caused the Huangpu River to rise to its third highest level in recorded history. Despite being a much weaker storm upon impacting Russia, Saomai's rains flooded coal retrieval sites, cutting down on electric power supplies in Primorsky Krai. Due to the shortages, electric power was transferred there from other surrounding areas. Furthermore, a 50 percent decrease in electricity output was documented at the local power station in Luchegorsk. To the south, an overflowing of the Kazachka River prompted the evacuation of over 60 people. Overall, 55 automobile accidents occurred in eastern Russia, leading to nine fatalities and 76 people injured. ## See also - Other tropical cyclones named Saomai - Tropical cyclones in 2000 - Typhoon Rusa (2002) - Typhoon Maemi (2003) - Typhoon Nari (2007) - Typhoon Hinnamnor (2022) - Typhoon Khanun (2023)
5,853,146	Color Air	1,166,924,645	Former Norwegian airline	[ "1998 establishments in Norway", "1999 disestablishments in Norway", "Airlines disestablished in 1999", "Airlines established in 1998", "Companies based in Oslo", "Defunct European low-cost airlines", "Defunct airlines of Norway" ]	Color Air AS was the first Norwegian low-cost airline. It operated from Oslo Airport, Gardermoen in 1998 and 1999 with a fleet of three Boeing 737-300 aircraft. Color Air was a brand extension of Color Line, which shared a common owner in the Olav Nils Sunde-controlled Color Group. The airline operated five daily round trips from Oslo to Trondheim and Bergen, four to Ålesund and one to London, in addition to a weekly trip to Alicante. Color Air pioneered the low-cost business model in Norway, with a denser seating, no frills and lack of a frequent flyer program. Tickets were sold only via the Internet, by telephone or in supermarkets; when bought from travel agents, there was a surcharge. The airline was established in response to the opening of Gardermoen, which would allow any airline sufficient landing slots to compete with the incumbents Braathens and Scandinavian Airlines (SAS). Color Air commenced operations on 1 August 1998, with the two other airlines moving from Oslo Airport, Fornebu on 8 October. Following the airline's establishment, a price war broke out between it and the two incumbents. All three increased capacity and dropped prices, giving a 40% increase in seats on the dominant domestic routes and seat loads of between 30 and 50 percent. After thirteen months and NOK 400 million in losses, Color Air gave up and filed for bankruptcy. The price war cost the three airlines more than NOK 3 billion, and ultimately forced the other two to merge. ## Service All flights were based at Oslo Airport, Gardermoen. For the summer routes of 1999, Color Air operated four daily round trips to Ålesund Airport, Vigra, and five daily round trips to Bergen Airport, Flesland and Trondheim Airport, Værnes. In addition, there was a single daily round trip to London Stansted Airport, and a weekly round trip to Alicante Airport. From each domestic destination, flights were made to correspond with the Color Line cruiseferries departing from Oslo to Kiel, Germany, and Hirtshals, Denmark. Color Air had only one seating class, offered no on-board beverages and had no frequent flyer program or lounges. Color Air had an agreement for tickets to be sold at the Rimi supermarkets, as well as by phone and Internet. If bought at a travel agency, there was a NOK 200 surcharge. This was because Color Air was not linked to the Amadeus booking system, owing to the costs associated with membership. ## Fleet The airline had three Boeing 737-300 aircraft, built in 1994. Originally fitted with 136 seats each, they were later reduced to 124, and then increased to 142. The aircraft were owned by International Lease Finance Corporation and General Electric Capital, and cost NOK 2.25 million per month to lease, plus additional costs per hour. They were British-registered and operated by Air Foyle HeavyLift, while maintenance was performed by British Midland. Both companies are based in the United Kingdom. Ground handling was carried out by SAS Ground Services in Trondheim, Bergen and Ålesund, and by Servisair in Oslo. ## Destinations ## History ### Background With Norway joining the European Economic Area, the Norwegian airline market was deregulated from 1 April 1994. While airlines formerly needed a concession from the Ministry of Transport to fly a particular route, they could now compete freely on any domestic or international routes. Previously the two major airlines Scandinavian Airlines System (SAS) and Braathens SAFE each had their own routes, but from 1994 both established themselves on several of the main-haul routes. With increased traffic, there soon became a capacity problem at Oslo Airport, Fornebu, the main hub for both SAS and Braathens. During the peak times during the morning and afternoon rush, there were no excess slots for new airlines. To compensate, the Norwegian Airport Administration was building a new main airport for Eastern Norway, to be located at Gardermoen. A larger terminal and two runways would give ample room for expansion, and entry of new airlines. The new airport opened on 8 October 1998. ### Establishment In January 1998, Olav Nils Sunde announced that he would establish a low-cost airline following the opening of the new airport. The company would be led by CEO Morten Andersen, who previously had been CEO of Norway Airlines, and the lawyer Stein Øxseth. Sunde would own 92% of the company through his shipping company Larvik Scandi Line, while Andersen and Øxseth would own 4% each. The company would be a brand extension of Sunde's shipping company Color Line. The company aimed at a 15–20% market share, with 1.4 million passengers annually. It was the first low-cost airline in Norway. The company launched tickets down to NOK 500 each way, and sold cheap tickets without demanding that the traveler be away during a weekend. Color Air made an agreement with the British airline Air Foyle HeavyLift to operate a fleet of Boeing 737-300 aircraft. Following the announcement to establish Color Air, Braathens SAFE chose to rebrand itself. They launched a new livery, and changed their name to just Braathens. Starting with the company's first Boeing 737-700 delivered on 23 March, Braathens introduced the business class, Braathens Best, that would take up 70% of the cabin, and the economy class Braathens Back, that would be at the back of the cabin. From 1 April, a new NOK 65 tax was introduced on all domestic flights. Braathens and SAS decided to divide the cross-subsidize the taxes between their routes, something Color Air was not able to do. This was because the tax was only valid for routes within Southern Norway; Braathens and SAS could therefore tacitly collude to increase the prices to Northern Norway, and thereby subsidize their routes in Southern Norway. Color Air, on the other hand, would be forced to put the full tax on all its departures. While the government had no way to hinder the incumbents from doing this, Gudmund Restad, Minister of Finance from the Centre Party, encouraged the airlines to not "cheat", and follow the intentions of the law, even if he admitted that there was nothing the government could do to hinder the airlines from cross-subsidizing. The contract to lease two Boeing 737-300 aircraft from 1994 was made with International Lease Finance Corporation in May. Maintenance was outsourced to a British company, after Braathens, which also operated 737 Classic aircraft, had denied Color Air the use of its simulators and technical workshops. For the start-up, Color Air hired 18 pilots, 40 flight attendants and 40 ground employees, in addition to the administration. The company was criticized for only hiring women flight attendants. Braathens operated with an internal pension age of 58 years for its pilots, while SAS had a 60-year age limit. Due to EEA rules, the judicial age limit was 65 years, so Color Air was able to hire retired SAS and Braathens pilots. These could be paid only NOK 500,000 in annual wage, since they received a full pension from their old employers on top of it. The Norwegian Airline Pilots Association stated that this was morally reprehensible, but Color Air was supported by the Norwegian Civil Aviation Authority, medical experts, and SAS, who all claimed that there were no medical reasons to not let people in their 60s operate aircraft. ### Start of operation The first aircraft was delivered on 1 August 1998. While the new airport at Gardermoen would not officially open until 8 October, when also SAS and Braathens would move to the airport, Color Air started flights from Gardermoen to Ålesund Airport, Vigra on 6 August. Flights to Trondheim Airport, Værnes commenced on 8 August, while the Bergen Airport, Flesland-route started 15 August. After a week, very few passengers were traveling with Color Air, with two at the least and twenty-four at the most per departure. Color Air was losing NOK 650,000 per week of operation. The pricing scheme was based on tickets for NOK 399, 499, 599 and 699, plus NOK 71 in taxes. At least ten tickets were available at the lowest price per departure, and the first to order were granted the cheapest tickets. Tickets had no restrictions on cancellation, and were not subject to restrictions on return dates. With the opening of Gardermoen, both Braathens and SAS increased the number of flights. Braathens established a route to Haugesund, while SAS started routes to Ålesund and Kristiansand. The number of daily trips from Oslo for SAS increased from 59 to over 80. In total, the three companies increased their daily round trip from 138 to 200, and the daily seat capacity from 18,000 to 26,000. Ålesund had the largest increase, from seven daily round trips only with Braathens, to seventeen offered by all three companies. On the route to Trondheim, the number of departures had increased from 27 to 39, with Braathens operating 19, SAS 16 and Color Air 5. The increase in seats was profitable for the state; the new seat tax—which was also applicable to unsold seats—received an annual revenue increase of NOK 110 million. The first plane planned to leave Gardermoen was an SAS aircraft. However, since it was 20 minutes delayed, a Color Air aircraft was instead the first to take off, at 06:52 on 8 August 1998. By the end of October, the airline had between 40 and 50% cabin load, and the company stated that it needed "slightly more than 50%" to make a profit. It also announced that it would receive three more aircraft to supplement the two it had in service. Instead of starting a route to Stavanger, the company instead chose to open a route to London Stansted Airport starting 1 December. The airline stated that it did not have sufficient aircraft do make more than two round trips to Stavanger, and that this would be too little to be a credible operator on the route. ### Price war In November, Color Air changed the conditions tied to purchase of tickets. Reduced price tickets were only available seven days or more before departure, and only full-price tickets could be refunded. At the same time, the maximum price increased to NOK 870, though all ticket prices were changed to include all taxes, after requirements from the authorities. A new, cheapest ticket was introduced at NOK 345, including taxes. After the winter settled, the front between Color Air and Braathens grew colder following Braathens' denying Color Air to use their deicing equipment at Ålesund, resulting in the plane being stuck at the airport. In November, Color Air transported 102,544 passengers. From mid-December, the company had a time-limited offer of tickets for NOK 200. In September, the ownership of Color Air was rearranged. Sunde reallocated his ownership and created Color Group, that would wholly own both Color Line, Scandi Line, Larvik Line and Color Air. Sunde retained a 77% ownership in the corporation through Larvik Scandi Line. The group was subsequently listed on the Oslo Stock Exchange. In the general meeting held in December, two of the largest owners of Color Line, Vital Forsikring and the Government Pension Fund of Norway, both were opposed to the merger, as they felt the purchased companies were overvalued. Color Air was at the time valuated at NOK 157 million. After a long process between the minority shareholders and Color Group, the valuation was adjusted to NOK 108 million. In May, Olav Nils Sunde bought the entire Color Group, and delisted it from the stock exchange following the conflict with the other shareholders. By the end of 1998, it became clear that Braathens had increased capacity by 20%, but only achieved a 5.2% ridership increase after the opening of Gardermoen. Similar numbers were applicable for SAS. The business market, in particular the large corporations with divisions in several large cities, were demanding high frequencies on the routes. Color Air could get by with fewer departures because they mainly targeted the leisure segment. In particular, the routes from Oslo to Ålesund and Kristiansand had a very low seat utilization; to Ålesund there were 1.2 million seats annually, but only 345,000 passengers, giving a 29% cabin load. Accumulated cabin load for Color Air was 32%, with 116,176 passengers. In the course of the last quarter of 1998, Color Air lost NOK 91 million, or NOK 1 million each day. For the whole year, Color Air had an average ticket price of NOK 453, giving a revenue of NOK 57 million. NOK 45 million was used on taxes, giving NOK 12 million to cover operating costs of NOK 209 million. The company lost NOK 197 million in 1998. In February 1999, Braathens announced that they would re-register all their planes in Sweden to avoid having to pay value added tax on catering and fuel. Color Air and SAS, who had their planes registered abroad, had gotten away without paying the taxes, since it only applied to Norway-registered planes. Following this announcement, the Ministry of Finance changed the rules so also foreign-owned planes had to pay the tax. The change in rules cost Color Air NOK 10 million per plane per year. From 1 July 1999, the seat tax was removed, but replaced by an equivalent tax for each passenger. This made it cheaper to fly an empty plane, but more expensive to fly a full one. Color Air had reduced the number of seats in each plane to avoid the seat tax, but increased them again after the tax was removed. In the first quarter of 1999, Color Air transported 100,472 passengers. This gave a cabin load of 35%, of which the Trondheim route had 40% and the Ålesund route 32%. This gave the airline a deficit of NOK 92 million. SAS lost NOK 22 million, while Braathens had lost NOK 300 million. In comparison, both Braathens and SAS Norway made a NOK 320 million profit in the first quarter of 1998. On 1 April, Color Air won a two-year contract with Norway Post for all air mail from Oslo to Trondheim and Ålesund. On 10 April, Color Air started a weekly round trip each Saturday to Alicante Airport in Spain. On 12 April, Ove Johan Solem took over as CEO of Color Air. In May, the company increased the cabin load from 38 to 48%, with ridership increasing from 33,978 to 44,081. These numbers also included a change in the number of seats per plane. The following month, 46,777 people traveled with the airline. By the end of July, Color Air had lost NOK 350 million. However, in July, Color Air had a cabin load exceeding 50%, the level Sunde had stated was necessary to make a profit. In September, SAS announced that if Braathens took the first step to reduce capacity between Bergen and Oslo, they would follow immediately to reduce the overcapacity in the combined 37 daily departures. However, Braathens was not willing to reduce. On 15 September, Color Air announced that they would start flying five round trips from Oslo to Stavanger Airport, Sola on 1 October, following the delivery of their fourth aircraft. At the same time, the airline would reduce the number of round trips to Ålesund from four to two. The load factor in August was 43%, and management stated that 50% load would not be sufficient to make money. In particular, the company stated that while aircraft were full during the weekends, the company was not succeeding at garnering the necessary business ridership to fill up the planes during the weekdays. To become more attractive, the company changed its fares to two classes: Business Full Flex and Saver No Flex. The company also stated that to attract more business travelers, it was looking for an international partner to conduct codesharing on international routes, and perhaps also introduce a frequent flyer program alone or in cooperation with the partner. ### Bankruptcy On 27 September 1999, Color Air terminated all flights and ceased operations. Sunde stated that he regretted having started the airline, and said that he had overestimated the synergies between his ferry company and the airline, but also underestimated the price elasticity for business travel. In particular, the frequent flyer programs that SAS and Braathens had made it difficult to convince corporate travelers to switch to Color Air. Sunde believed that the company would continue to lose money in 2000. 220 employees lost their jobs, while Color Group estimated it lost NOK 400 million on the airline. There were discussions concerning cooperation with, or a take-over by, British Airways, but these discussions did not lead to an agreement. In total, Color Air flew 430,000 passengers, effectively subsidizing each passenger with almost NOK 1000. The company was not declared bankrupt, as Sunde wanted to insure his good reputation by paying everyone he owed money. While this was about NOK 10 million in airport fees and smaller sums to other parties, the largest creditors were the two aircraft leasing companies, to whom NOK 270 million was owed for the rest of the rental period. The 20,000 people who had tickets with Color Air were all rebooked onto Braathens flights. After NOK 170 million in debt was registered by the company, and assets were only worth NOK 17 million, Color Air was declared bankrupt on 10 November 1999. On the day of the termination, the stock price of Braathens increased by 16%, while SAS's increased 3%. Immediately following the bankruptcy, the two airlines increased their prices. Subsequently, Braathens increased their ticket price by 15%, but stated that this had nothing to do with the elimination of competition, since the price increase was not on any Oslo routes. In November, Braathens started to remove routes, and announced they would increase prices by 20%. They also reintroduced the Flag of Norway on the tailplane that since the rebranding had been replaced by a silver, abstract wing. Both Braathens and SAS lost more than NOK 1 billion in 1999, and the total cost of the price war between the three airlines exceeded NOK 3 billion.
23,218,695	2011 24 Hours of Le Mans	1,172,221,129	79th 24 Hours of Le Mans endurance race	[ "2011 Intercontinental Le Mans Cup season", "2011 in French motorsport", "2011 in motorsport", "24 Hours of Le Mans races" ]	The 79th 24 Hours of Le Mans (French: 79<sup>e</sup> 24 Heures du Mans) was a 24-hour automobile endurance race for 56 teams of three drivers in Le Mans Prototype (LMP) and Le Mans Grand Touring Endurance (LMGTE) cars, held before 249,500 spectators on 11 and 12 June 2011 at the Circuit de la Sarthe, near Le Mans, France. It was the third round of the 2011 Intercontinental Le Mans Cup and the race's 79th edition as organised by the automotive group the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO) since 1923. On 24 April, six weeks prior, a test day was held. An Audi R18 TDI—driven by Marcel Fässler, André Lotterer, and Benoît Tréluyer—started from the pole position after Tréluyer set the fastest lap in the third qualifying session. The car battled a trio of Peugeot 908s and secured the first Le Mans victory for the drivers, and Audi's tenth Le Mans victory. The Peugeot 908 driven by Sébastien Bourdais, Pedro Lamy, and Simon Pagenaud finished second, 13.854 seconds behind, in the race's fourth-closest result; and their teammates Nicolas Minassian, Franck Montagny, and Stéphane Sarrazin completed the podium in third, two laps behind the race-winning Audi. The Greaves Motorsport team of Tom Kimber-Smith, Olivier Lombard, and Karim Ojjeh won the Le Mans Prototype 2 (LMP2) category after leading for the race's final 137 laps in a Zytek Z11SN-Nissan car. The trio finished six laps ahead of Signatech Nissan's Oreca 03 vehicle driven by Soheil Ayari, Franck Mailleux, and Lucas Ordóñez, and seven laps in front of Level 5 Motorsports' Lola B08/80 car driven by João Barbosa, Christophe Bouchut, and Scott Tucker. Corvette Racing took their seventh class win—courtesy of drivers Olivier Beretta, Antonio García, and Tommy Milner—finishing first in a Chevrolet Corvette C6.R in the new Le Mans Grand Touring Professional (LMGTE Pro) category. An AF Corse-fielded Ferrari 458 Italia GT2—driven by Gianmaria Bruni, Giancarlo Fisichella, and Toni Vilander—and BMW Motorsport's BMW M3 GT2—driven by Joey Hand, Dirk Müller, and Andy Priaulx—in second and third, respectively, completed the class podium. Larbre Compétition took the first two positions in the new Le Mans Grand Touring Endurance Amateur (LMGTE Am) class with their Chevrolet Corvette C6.R—driven by Patrick Bornhauser, Julien Canal, and Gabriele Gardel—ahead of the sister Porsche 997 GT3-RSR—driven by Jean-Philippe Belloc, Christophe Bourret, and Pascal Gibon. Audi's victory moved them closer to Peugeot in the LMP1 Manufacturers' Cup, while Corvette's class victory moved it past BMW and Ferrari for the LMGTE Manufacturers' Cup lead. Audi Sport Team Joest took over the LMP1 Teams' Cup lead from Peugeot Sport Total, and Larbre overtook Proton Competition for the LMGTE Am Teams' Cup lead. Signatech and AF Corse maintained their advantage in the LMP2 and LMGTE Pro Teams' Cups, respectively, with four rounds remaining in the season. ## Background The 24 Hours of Le Mans began in 1923 when automotive journalist Charles Faroux, the Automobile Club de l'Ouest (ACO) general secretary Georges Durand, and the industrialist Emile Coquile agreed to hold a test of vehicle reliability and durability. The 24 Hours of Le Mans is considered one of the world's most prestigious motor races and is part of the Triple Crown of Motorsport. The race's 79th iteration was held on 11 and 12 June 2011 at the 13.629 km (8.469 mi) Circuit de la Sarthe, near Le Mans, France. It was the third of seven automobile endurance races in the 2011 Intercontinental Le Mans Cup. Peugeot led the LMP1 Manufacturers' Cup with 55 points, 17 ahead of second-place Audi after winning the 1000 km of Spa six weeks earlier. BMW led the LMGTE Manufacturers Cup with 49 points, 11 more than second-placed Ferrari and 14 more than third-place Corvette. Peugeot Sport led the LMP1 Teams' Cup with 27 points, followed by Audi Sport Team Joest, Team Oreca, and Rebellion Racing, each 19, 18, and 12 points. Signatech Nissan led the LMP2 Teams' Cup with 22 points, and OAK Racing was second with four less. AF Corse led the LMGTE Pro Teams' Cup, with 27 points, followed by BMW Motorsport, with 26 points. Proton Competition led the LMGTE Am standings with 24 points, followed by Krohn Racing with 21 points. ## Regulation changes The ACO authored the 2011 regulations to respect the environment and support sustainable development by encouraging the use of new technologies and techniques that reduce carbon emissions and fuel consumption. Le Mans Prototype (LMP) cars could now be equipped with four-wheel or kinetic energy recovery system hybrid powertrains, to recover energy otherwise lost by braking, exhaust, or heat generated by the engine and suspension dampers. Each hybrid system was limited to 500 kW (670 hp) between braking zones, and driver aids such as push-to-pass were prohibited. The ACO reduced fuel capacity for petrol and diesel vehicles and decreased engine sizes for turbocharged and diesel engines. To reduce lift, all prototype cars had to weigh 900 kg (2,000 lb) and have vertical fins atop the engine cover. The second-tier Le Mans Prototype 2 (LMP2) category was overhauled to keep costs low and affordable for privateer entries. All LMP2 vehicles had to be equipped with production-series engines, with the required engine life gradually increasing over the following three years from 30 hours to 50 hours. 2010 LMP2 cars could be entered until , but they had to be 20 kg (44 lb) heavier than 2011 vehicles, with no bodywork modifications permitted and made slower than all 2011-specification cars. Each LMP2 team had to sign at least one silver or bronze-rated driver. The ACO dropped the LM GT1 category and created a single set of regulations for the GT Endurance category, which was divided into two classes: LM GTE Pro and LM GTE Am, based on 2009 LMGT2 rules. This was done to avoid multiple calendar clashes with several other racing series and because there were few entrants in the class other than the Le Mans race, as well as the category being exclusively for short-distance sprints. The LM GTE Pro category featured new cars that could be driven by any driver, whereas the LM GTE Am class featured one-year-old cars driven by a minimum of two Fédération Internationale de l'Automobile (FIA) silver or bronze licensed drivers per team. ## Entries The ACO received 71 applications by the entry deadline, 19 January 2011. Its eight-member Selection Committee granted 56 invitations to the race, and entries were divided between the LMP1, LMP2, LMGTE Pro, and LMGTE Am categories on 25 January. 40 per cent of the applications were for entry to the LMGTE Am class. ### Automatic entries Teams received automatic entries based on their results in the 2010 24 Hours of Le Mans, or Le Mans-based series and events such as the Intercontinental Le Mans Cup (ILMC), the American Le Mans Series (ALMS), the Le Mans Series (LMS), and the Petit Le Mans, and the Michelin Green X Challenge. Because teams received automatic entries, they could change their cars from the previous year to the next, but not their category. Automatic invitations in the two GTE categories could be swapped based on the driver line-ups chosen by those teams. As the ALMS did not differentiate between the Pro and Am categories, only a single GTE invitation was granted to their entries. On 3 December 2010, the ACO announced the list of automatic entries. ### Entry list and reserves The ACO announced the full 56-car entry list and 10-vehicle reserve list at a press conference at Radio France's headquarters in Paris, on the afternoon of 9 February, in conjunction with the announcement of entries for the 2011 ILMC, In addition to the 26 full-season entries from the ILMC, the field included ALMS and LMS entries, along with one-off entries competing only at Le Mans. The ACO initially nominated ten reserves: two from LMP1, three from LMP2, and the remaining five from the two LMGTE classes. Withdrawals after 1 February were replaced class-by-class: an LMGTE entry would be replaced by another LMGTE car, and an LMP vehicle replaced by another LMP entry. Signatech Nissan withdrew its second vehicle, the No. 27 Oreca 03-Nissan, from the entry list on 12 April. Consequently, the ACO promoted the No. 44 Extrême Limite AM Paris Norma MP200P-Judd BMW car to the race; and the Kronos Racing Lola-Aston Martin entry moved to first on the reserve list. The Pegasus Racing and Rangoni Motorsport entries were subsequently removed from the reserve list. The Highcroft Racing team withdrew its LMP1 ARX-01e-Honda car on 16 May, citing a lack of financial support as the reason, while also announcing the end of their partnership with Honda and HPD, due to the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami. The Kronos Racing Lola-Aston Martin was then promoted to the entry list. At the start of the event, the No. 69 Robertson Racing Ford GT-R-Doran and the No. 86 Young Driver AMR Vantage were the two cars still on the reserve list. ## Testing and practice For the 2011 race, the test session was reintroduced to Le Mans for the first time since to allow manufacturers and teams enough time to develop the new technologies on their cars by the ACO's aim to improve safety. On April 24, seven weeks before the race, two four-hour test sessions were held. During testing, there were 54 cars from the race entry and reserve lists, including three Formula Le Mans-class Oreca-FLM09s from Hope Racing, Genoa Racing, and JMB Racing. The United States-based Flying Lizard Motorsports, Highcroft Racing, and Krohn teams did not participate in the test due to cost and logistics. The European-based JMW Motorsport, Prospeed Competition, Quifel-ASM Team, and Strakka Racing squads also did not participate in the test session. Romain Dumas set the fastest time in the first test session in the No. 1 Audi R18 TDI—with a lap of 3 minutes, 27.900 seconds. His teammate Tom Kristensen—in the sister No. 3 Audi—improved that time to 3 minutes, 27.687 seconds in the second session. Mike Rockenfeller followed, two-tenths of a second behind, in second place, while the fastest Peugeot 908 car was the No. 8 of Stéphane Sarrazin, in third. André Lotterer's No. 2 Audi was fourth, with Sébastien Bourdais's No. 7 Peugeot fifth, and the No. 10 Team Oreca Matmut Peugeot 908 HDi FAP sixth after a lap from Loïc Duval. The fastest non-diesel LMP1 car was Emmanuel Collard's eighth-place No. 16 Pescarolo. The time of 3 minutes, 42.992 seconds set by Franck Mailleux for Signatech led LMP2 with the Oreca-Nissans, ahead of Alexandre Prémat's No. 48 Team Oreca Matmut car and Alex Brundle's No. 41 Greaves Motorsport entry. Allan Simonsen, in the No. 89 Hankook Team Farnbacher Ferrari 458 Italia, was the only driver to go below the 4-minute mark in LMGTE Pro, with a 3 minute, 59.966 second lap to top the class. Tommy Milner helped Larbre Compétition's Chevrolet Corvette C6.R to the lead in LMGTE Am with a 4 minutes, 4.222 seconds lap. Separate incidents led to disruptions during practice: Dominik Kraihamer at Arnage corner, Andrea Belicchi on the Mulsanne Straight with a fractured right-rear toe link, and Guy Smith in the gravel trap at the PlayStation chicane due to a broken front toe link. Official practice was held on 8 June with the full 56-car field on track for four hours. Audi and Peugeot's drivers traded fastest laps until the fastest overall time was a 3 minute, 27.986 second lap set by Rockenfeller's No. 1 Audi, three-tenths of a second ahead of Lotterer's No. 2 entry. Bourdais was the highest-placed Peugeot driver in third, followed by Alexander Wurz's No. 7 vehicle and Allan McNish's No. 3 Audi. Jonny Kane's No. 42 Strakka HPD ARX-01d led LMP2 with a 3 minute, 42.863 second lap, ahead of Prémat's No. 48 Oreca Matumt entry and Signatech's Soheil Ayari. The No. 55 BMW M3 GT2 led LMGTE Pro, with the sister No. 56 vehicle of Andy Priaulx second. Despite a dislodged power steering hose, Jan Magnussen's third-place No. 74 Corvette was the fastest non-BMW car. Fabien Giroix in Gulf AMR Middle East's No. 61 Aston Martin Vantage GT2 lapped fastest in LMGTE Am, ahead of Flying Lizard's No. 81 Porsche 997 GT3-RSR of Darren Law. Raymond Narac's No. 76 IMSA Performance Matmut Porsche was severely damaged against the tyre wall in the Porsche Curves' first part and stopped in the gravel trap, stopping practice for 18 minutes. Roger Wills, driving CRS Racing's No. 62 Ferrari F430 GT2, struck the barrier exiting the Porsche Curves and damaged the car's front-left suspension and radiator just before mid-point. ## Qualifying The first of three, two-hour qualifying sessions to determine the race's starting order through the quickest lap times set by each team's fastest driver began late on a cool and dry 8 June night. Audi led from the start with a flying lap from McNish, followed by Rockenfeller, and then Lotterer leading overall. Sarrazin's 3 minutes, 27.033 seconds lap, set with half an hour remaining, put the No. 8 Peugeot on provisional pole position, which it held to the session's conclusion. The next three positions were taken by a trio of Audis driven by Lotterer, Rockenfeller, and Kristensen. Wurz was the next fastest Peugeot in fifth after being slowed by traffic in the final third of the lap. Bourdais, his teammate, was provisionally sixth. Collard, driving the No. 16 Pescarolo, was eighth among the petrol-powered LMP1 entries. Dumas exited Mulsanne corner at speed and collided side-on with the right-hand corner in the door area of Roald Goethe's stopped No. 60 Aston Martin, which had spun earlier. Both drivers were unhurt, and qualifying was stopped for five minutes. Kane put Strakka's car on provisional pole in LMP2, with a 3 minute, 42.615 second lap almost 40 minutes in, ahead of Mailleux's Singatech, Premat's Oreca Matmut, and Tom Kimber-Smith's Greaves entries. At approximately 195 km/h (121 mph) and 9.4 G, Nick Leventis crashed the Strakka car backwards into the tyre barrier just before the Dunlop Bridge, scattering debris on the track and concluding the session with 30 seconds left. The professional class of LMGTE saw BMW lead with a flying lap from Priaulx's No. 56 car, ahead of Gianmaria Bruni's No. 51 Ferrari and Augusto Farfus's sister No. 55 BMW, with the first eight separated by 1.572 seconds. Jean-Philippe Belloc helped Porsche top LMGTE Am, ahead of Spencer Pumpelly's Flying Lizard and Giroix's Gulf AMR Middle East's Aston Martin entries. Strakka reconstructed its car overnight after the first session and changed its programme to allow their drivers to acclimatise to race conditions. The IMSA Performance Porsche was able to resume competitive racing after being transported and rebuilt overnight at the team's headquarters in Rouen, Normandy. Sarrazin improved his provisional pole time to 3 minute, 26.336 second and then to a 3 minute, 26.156 second lap in the second qualifying session. Marcel Fässler then overtook Sarrazin to move the No. 2 Audi to first with a 3 minute, 25.961 second lap, which he held until the session ended. The No. 8 Peugeot was demoted to second as the sister No. 7 car improved to third after a lap from Marc Gené. McNish kept Audi's No. 3 entry in fourth, with Dumas' No. 1 car falling to fifth and Franck Montagny staying sixth for the No. 9 Peugeot team. Ayari reset LMP2's quickest lap time to a 3 minute, 41.458 second for Signatech. Premat improved the Oreca Matmut car, while Pierre Kaffer moved the PeCom Lola-Judd entry to second and third in class, respectively. In LMGTE Pro, AF Corse led the session and claimed provisional pole position with Bruni's quickest class lap, demoting Jörg Müller's No. 55 BMW. Similarly, AF Corse's No. 61 Ferrari of Marco Cioci improved the LMGTE Am pole position lap, with Horst Felbermayer Jr moving the Felbermayr-Proton Porsche to second in class. During the session, which saw several cars affected by mechanical issues, Priaulx lost control of the No. 56 BMW at the Ford Chicane, after possibly driving over debris or gravel, and crashed into the outside tyre barrier. In the third session, Dumas, in the No. 1 Audi, bested the No. 2 car's provisional pole lap before Benoît Tréluyer reset the fastest time to a 3 minute, 25.738 second, achieving Audi's first overall pole position at Le Mans since . Dumas gained the No. 1 entry to join Tréluyer's No. 2 vehicle on the grid's front row while Simon Pagenaud qualified the No. 9 Peugeot third. Nicolas Minassian put the No. 8 Peugeot fourth, Kristensen qualified the No. 3 Audi fifth, with the No. 7 Peugeot of Anthony Davidson sixth. Early in the session, Davidson spun the No. 7 Peugeot in the Ford Chicane before Kristensen lost control of the No. 3 Audi upon a kerb and crashed in the Tetre Rouge gravel trap. Signatech's second-session lap did not improve on Ayari's lap, securing Ayari LMP2 pole position. Strakka could not best Kane's lap, so it started second in LMP2, with Oreca Matmut beginning third. Farfus improved the LMGTE Pro pole lap, and the No. 55 BMW led the class until the session's conclusion. The No. 51 Ferrari began from second, as the No. 56 BMW fell to third after not being able to partake in the session following Priaulx's second-session accident. Cioci lapped faster to earn AF Corse the inaugural LMGTE Am pole position. The session was halted for 20 minutes when Anthony Beltoise crashed the No. 58 Luxury Racing Ferrari at Mulsanne Corner after hitting oil and Christian Klien, in the No. 009 Aston Martin AMR-One, picked up a left-rear puncture, prompting the laying of cement dust on the racing line. ### Qualifying results Pole position winners in each class are indicated in bold. The fastest time set by each entry is denoted in grey. ## Warm-up A 45-minute warm-up session took place at 09:00 local time on 11 June in cloudy conditions without rain. Bourdais' No. 9 Peugeot set the fastest lap—3 minutes, 27.228 seconds—just before the session's end. Tréluyer was second-fastest, with his Audi teammates Timo Bernhard and Kristensen third and fourth. Mallieux's Signatech entry led LMP2 with a 3 minute, 43.449 second lap. AF Corse's LMGTE Pro Ferrari of Toni Vilander led that class, while Niclas Jönsson's Krohn Ferrari led LMGTE Am. Rui Águas stopped AF Corse's No. 71 Ferrari at Mulsanne corner with a suspected differential issue. Kaffer continued straight on at the Arnage turn and restarted the PeCom car to continue his race preparations. ## Race ### Start to early evening Pre-race weather was dry and clear with the air temperature between 8 and 18 °C (46 and 64 °F) and the track temperature between 14.5 and 28.6 °C (58.1 and 83.5 °F). The race began with a rolling start at 15:00 local time, with FIA President Jean Todt waving the French Tricolour from the starter's gantry in front of 249,500 spectators. Tréluyer led the 56-car field for the first ten laps. His teammate McNish passed Bourdais for fourth before the Mulsanne Straight and Montagny on the outside at the PlayStation chicane after a five-lap duel that saw Montagny put McNish towards the pit lane wall. Aston Martin Racing lost both of its LMP1-class AMR Ones during the first hour when Darren Turner got the No. 009 car stuck in the first Mulsanne chicane gravel and Adrián Fernández brought the No. 007 car into the garage with unrepairable broken engine aluminium alternator pulleys breaking the pulley-linked drive alternator and water pump gear. Bruni moved Ferrari's No. 51 car to the LMGTE Pro lead followed by Oliver Gavin's No. 74 Corvette in second after passing Farfus which he held until Farfus reclaimed the position. Mallieux's Signatech car forfeited the LMP2 lead it had held since the start, to Prémat's No. 48 Oreca entry after 34 minutes, due to a left-rear puncture that damaged the bodywork. The first hour ended with McNish passing Bernhard's slowing No. 1 Audi for the lead on the inside, past the Dunlop Bridge, before Beltoise was caught off guard and collided with the rear of the No. 3 car in the high speed right-hand Esses. McNish went backwards through the gravel, striking the outside tyre wall at high speed, through a gap designed to allow cars to be moved to a safer location beyond the gravel, and landing upside down on its side. The impact destroyed the Audi and sent debris flying through the inside catch fence across a group of photographers. McNish was unhurt as the marshals turned the Audi upright. He was transported to the infield medical centre and then to a local hospital for tests that cleared him. The safety cars were deployed for 72 minutes as marshals worked to repair the damaged walls. Under safety car conditions, Montagny brought the No. 8 Peugeot into the garage earlier than scheduled to rectify a stuck vehicle brake-balance distribution unit in the rearmost area, and it rejoined the race in eighth with Sarrazin driving. When racing resumed, Nick Tandy's No. 88 Felbermayr Porsche lapped faster than Corvette's Olivier Beretta and overtook him for second in LMGTE Pro. Tréluyer maintained the lead until a pit stop cycle saw his teammate Bernhard temporarily move past him, as the cars made pit stops in numerical order. Bernhard had driven over a kerb, damaging the No. 1 Audi's nose line while lapping a slower GT car, reducing the available downforce. Following separate overtakes on the Mulsanne Straight, Tréluyer and Wurz demoted Bernhard to third. Bernhard fell to fifth after Audi brought the No. 1 car into the pit lane for a replacement front nose. The LMP2 lead was contested between Prémat and, later, Kraihamer's Oreca and Danny Watts' Strakka car, which was gaining on the Oreca. Jörg Müller No. 55 BMW's lost third in LMGTE Pro, due to a right-rear puncture that required it to enter the garage, dropping him two laps behind the class leader. Pagenaud lost control of the No. 9 Peugeot and went straight at Arnage turn, forcing him to steer the car around to rejoin the circuit. Davidson took the lead in the No. 7 Porsche from Fässler's No. 2 Audi since his car could go longer between pit stops. Dumas was recovering lost ground in the No. 1 Audi when he lost control while lapping the LMGTE Am-category No. 71 Porsche on the inside at Tetre Rouge; he maintained the car's hold on fourth. AF Corse lost third in LMGTE Pro to Antonio García's No. 73 Corvette because Vilander required trackside recovery to return his Ferrari to the circuit after going into the gravel trap at Mulsanne Corner. Matías Russo overtook Leventis's Strakka car for third in LMP2. Davidson's No. 7 Peugeot and Fässler's No. 2 Audi exchanged the race lead during the sixth hour until Fässler was able to establish a minute's lead over every other car. Due to the length of the track, the distance between the LMGTE Am class leader and sixth in category became just over a minute, involving the Flying Lizard, Krohn, AF Corse, and Larbre teams. ### Night to dawn As night began to fall, Rockenfeller's No. 1 Audi overtook Lamy's No. 9 Peugeot for third place after Lamy had been affected by a door repeatedly flapping open, as Lotterer and Gené continued to duel for the race lead. Priaulx relinquished the No. 56 BMW's hold on second in LMGTE Pro, due to an engine misfire requiring changing the engine control unit and ignition coil. LMGTE Am saw the two Larbre entries—the No. 70 Corvette and the No. 50 Porsche—duel for the category lead with the Corvette consistently lapping faster than the Porsche. Gené fell back from Lotterer in the duel for the overall lead, and the No. 7 Peugeot was put under pressure by Rockenfeller's No. 1 Audi, which took second by causing Gené to drift wide onto the Arnage corner run-off area and lose 30 seconds in the eighth hour. Not long after, Rockenfeller was lapping the No. 71 Ferrari of Rob Kauffman at the second kink on the straight linking Mulsanne and the Indianapolis corner, when Kauffman drove into Rockenfeller's path and made contact with the rear of the No. 1 Audi. Rockenfeller's car was sent spearing left into the Armco barrier at high speed; The Audi and around 20 metres (66 ft) of barrier were destroyed, with the car recrossing the road, scattering much debris on it. The ACO ordered Kauffman to not partake in the remainder of the race, and Rockenfeller was kept in hospital overnight with a minor flesh wound to his right arm. The safety cars were deployed for the second time, for 2 hours, 22 minutes, to allow marshals to repair the damaged Armco barrier and remove debris. All of the leading prototype cars were driven into the pit lane for full-service pit stops. CRS brought their No. 62 Ferrari into the garage for new tyres, due to driver Shaun Lynn heavily damaging the vehicle's right-rear corner against the Ford Chicane barrier after losing control turning into the corner. The resulting damage included bodywork jamming the right-rear wheel against the fuel cell, causing an oil leak that Lynn repaired before the car's clutch burned out. When racing resumed, the sole remaining No. 2 Audi and the three Peugeots exchanged the lead several times over the following hours during pit stop cycles. Prémat relinquished the LMP2 lead, which the No. 48 Oreca had maintained for 96 laps, to the Greaves entry of Olivier Lombard, because of electrical issues that forced the Oreca's moving to the garage. The battle for second place in the LMGTE classes saw four drivers within twelve seconds of each other in Pro and three competitors within three seconds of one another in Am. Watts moved the Strakka LMP2 car to second in class, with successive overtakes of Russo and Kraihamer. Two cars that were among the top three in LMP2 retired. Russo lost control of the third-place PeCom car in the Porsche Curves when it suddenly drove right into the barrier. Watts' Strakka entry struck a kerb and damaged the car's front aerodynamics. Before Watts smelled oil and stopped the car at the first Mulsanne chicane due to a suspected oil cooler issue, a front nose cone change during a pit stop fixed the problem. Watts abandoned the car after telemetry determined that it should not be restarted. Kraihamer was lapping faster than Karim Ojjeh's No. 41 Greaves car and overtook him to reclaim the LMP2 lead in the No. 48 Oreca since he had made one fewer pit stop. When the Nos. 7 and 8 Peugeots exchanged third overall during a pit stop cycle, Ayari's Singatech car passed João Barbosa and for third in LMP2. Pagenaud and his teammate Davidson closed up to Fässler's No. 2 Audi and took first and second just before the third deployment of the safety cars. Jean-Christophe Boullion substantially damaged the front of the No. 13 Rebellion in an accident at the Porsche Curves. He was unhurt. Marshals removed the vehicle and cleaned up the wreckage. As racing continued in the early morning, the first three entries were all close together. Fässler moved from third to first after a pit stop cycle, but lost the lead when Davidson overtook him on the inside, entering the Indianapolis corner. Davidson flat-spotted the No. 7 Peugeot's front wheels at the first Mulsanne chicane while under pressure from Fässler through the Porsche Curves, allowing Fässler to reclaim the lead. The safety cars were deployed for the fourth time when Christophe Bourret beached the No. 70 Larbre Porsche on the edge of the gravel in the Porsche Curves and reversed back onto the track. Stéphane Ortelli then stopped the No. 59 Ferrari on the track and required assistance from marshals and trackside equipment for recovery. David Hallyday damaged the front-right corner of the No. 48 Oreca LMP2 entry at Arnage corner while attempting to maintain tyre temperature. Hallyday abandoned the car on the run-off area during the safety car period. The Oreca's retirement promoted Mallieux's No. 28 Signatech car to second in LMP2 and Christophe Bouchut's No. 33 Level 5 Motorsports entry to third in class. ### Morning to afternoon Beretta, who was combating carbon monoxide poisoning from inhaling fumes during previous safety car periods, missed his braking point for Arnage corner and damaged the No. 73 Corvette's front end against the turn's tyre barrier. He reversed the car and rejoined the circuit, retaining third in LMGTE Pro. Seth Neiman's No. 81 Flying Lizard Porsche ran wide into the gravel at Mulsanne, requiring him to temporarily relinquish the LMGTE Am lead to Gabriele Gardel's No. 50 Larbre when Neiman entered the garage with liquids leaking from the car's rear. Pumpelly then relieved Neiman, losing a battle with Gardel for the category lead. Magnussen, driving Corvette's No. 74 LMGTE Pro–leading car, was lapping Horst Felbermayr's No. 63 LMGTE Am Proton Porsche on the inside when he lost control of his car's rear. He collided with the side of Felbermayr's car, sending both vehicles into the barriers. The Corvette and Porsche were both forced to retire due to the accident, moving Vilander's No. 51 Ferrari to the LMGTE Pro lead, with Beretta's No. 73 Corvette second. The safety cars were deployed for the fifth time. Marshals spent 29 minutes clearing debris in the accident area, and recovery vehicles were used to extricate the damaged vehicles. Following the resumption of racing, the No. 7 and 8 Peugeots were released from the pit lane a lap before the No. 2 Audi of Tréluyer that was at the back of the nearest safety car's queue. Pagenaud took the race lead from Tréluyer before the latter was able to reclaim the position on the outside, entering the second Mulsanne chicane and pulling away with a series of fastest laps. Sarrazin's No. 8 Peugeot received a one-minute stop-and-go penalty because the team member holding the refuelling hose had an incorrectly placed visor when adding fuel to the car., losing a lap to the race leader. In the 19th hour, Wurz missed the apex for Indianapolis corner and went straight on and minor contact with the tyre barrier exiting the turn damaged the No. 7 Peugeot's front-left corner and right-front wheel. The car was extricated by a tractor and driven to the garage, where it lost four laps to the race leaders while its front suspension was repaired. To end the 19th hour, light rain began to fall on parts of the circuit and quickly increased in intensity, though not enough to disrupt the race. Tréluyer approached the rear of the lapped Davidson and could not lap the No. 7 Peugeot because it blocked his path and removed downforce from Audi's No. 2 car. Audi instructed Tréluyer to slow and not put Davidson another lap down. Lotterer replaced Tréluyer during a routine pit stop before another Peugeot slowed the No. 2 Audi, this time by Montagny's No. 8 entry before being lapped at Mulsanne turn. Due to clutch and electrical issues, Vilander was unable to immediately restart the No. 51 Ferrari at its pit box, giving García's No. 73 Corvette the LMGTE Pro lead. Rain returned to the track during the 22nd hour, causing some cars to be caught out in the changing weather. Kimber-Smith lost control of the Greaves Zytek car at the Dunlop S and was temporarily stuck in the gravel before recovering with assistance and maintaining his LMP2 lead. Collard retired the fifth-place No. 16 Pescarolo 01 after crashing into the tyre barrier entering the Porsche Curves. In the 23rd hour, Lotterer was delayed by the fourth-place Gené, whom he was attempting to lap; and the two drivers made contact going into the second chicane on the Mulsanne Straight. Lotterer was able to lap Gené after the Mulsanne turn. Robertson Racing's No. 68 Ford GT was promoted to third in LMGTE Am after the JMB Racing Ferrari had to twice enter the garage for clutch repairs. The circuit had become completely dry by the final hour's start. Lotterer was forced to make an extra pit stop to receive four new tyres, and fuel, with fewer than 40 minutes remaining, after Audi noticed the No. 2 car's left-rear tyre was slowly deflating. Race control decided that instead of the traditiona slow lap with marshals waving flags, a full lap at slow speed would take place after the race was over. Pascale Gibson, driving the second-place LMGTE Am Larbre Porsche, collided with a tyre wall but recovered without losing his position. ### Finish Lotterer was able to pull away from the No. 9 Peugeot by responding to the car's fast pace in the final half-hour; and the No. 2 Audi was the first to finish after 355 laps, achieving Lotterer's, Fässler's, and Tréluyer's first and Audi's tenth Le Mans win. Their lead engineer, Leena Gade, was the first female race engineer to win the event. In the fourth-closest recorded Le Mans finish, Pagenaud's No. 9 Peugeot came in second 13.854 seconds later. Due to overnight car vibrations, the No. 8 Peugeot, driven by the headache-affected and visually impaired Minassian, finished two laps behind in third place. Greaves led the final 137 laps in LMP2, earning drivers Kimber-Smith, Lombard, and Ojjeh their first class wins and Nissan's first since . Signatech were six laps behind in second, and Level 5 took third in their Le Mans debut. Corvette Racing held their lead in LMGTE Pro, earning the team their seventh category win, Milner's maiden class victory, García's fourth, and Beretta's sixth. The No. 51 Ferrari took AF Corse's first Le Mans class podium in second place, and BMW's No. 56 car was third. Corvette also won in LMGTE Am, with Larbre achieving their sixth category win with the No. 50 entry, ahead of the sister No. 70 Porsche and Robertson's Ford GT. On David and Andrea Robertson's wedding anniversary, the two became the first married couple to finish on the podium. ## Post-race The top three teams from each of the four classes had a prize giving ceremony on the podium and spoke to the media at press conferences. Fässler described his emotions as he watched his co-drivers battle Peugeot in the closing stages: In the last five hours I was in the pits with everybody, standing by the car when it came in. I didn't know where we were going in the rain. I know how difficult it is to drive a car like this on slicks in the rain.'" Bourdais conceded Peugeot lost to a slightly stronger, quicker, and more reliable Audi squad; and his teammate Pagenaud preferred to have been the driver being caught, adding: It was more difficult to finish second by only 13 seconds because it was such a tough battle.'" Davidson denied employing gamesmanship against Lotterer, saying he had not received a team order and acted on his own initiative. He also said he did not deliberately collide with Lotterer and that the closed-cockpit Peugeot allowed him only to observe the latter whilst braking. McNish was advised not to travel, so that he could recover from body trauma. He praised the strength of the Audi, and said of the first-hour accident that led to the No. 3 car's retirement: Obviously, it was a very big accident. I think everybody realises that. I've been banged around a little bit, but the biggest thing is a little bit of pain in the bottom of my back and a big graze around my shin. Considering the impact, the speed and everything else, I think we all got away quite fortunate.'" Beltoise said he did not observe McNish approaching his Ferrari from behind and was very surprised'" by the incident. Rockenfeller praised car safety standards following his accident with Kauffman, saying: The safety standards at Audi are simply incredible and have saved my life. I've never had such an accident before in my career and hope I'll never have such an experience again.'" Audi team principal Wolfgang Ullrich said that the closed-cockpit vehicle design did not provide as wide a view as from an open-cockpit car but denied that visibility-related issues caused the team's two major race accidents. Kimber-Smith stated that Greaves's race-long low-risk strategy had proved fruitful, adding: There's a perception that you always have to be fast, but in LMP2 you also have to finish and that's exactly what we did.'" His teammate Lombard described the team's victory as truly exceptional'" , having tested the car just once, saying: It was a delight for me and even though there was fatigue and stress I thought I coped well. Hopefully this success can be the start of things, maybe even a driver for next year as well.'" Milner described his LMGTE Pro victory as the hardest drive of my life'" and said the changeable conditions would have made it easier. Beretta stated that he became ill inhaling exhaust gas during a safety car period and that Corvette faced a challenge: "We had a lot of pressure and we just pushed as hard as we could. I think we really deserve the victory.'" Doug Fehan, Corvette Racing's general manager, commented: If I were to write a script to celebrate the 100th anniversary of Chevrolet and the 10th anniversary of Corvette Racing's first win at Le Mans, this would undoubtedly be it.'" Peugeot maintained its lead in the LMP1 Manufacturers' Cup lead with 103 points, ahead of Audi with 69 points. Corvette's class victory moved them to the top of the LMGTE Manufactuers' Cup with 84 points, ahead of Ferrari and BMW, who both had 72 points. Audi Sport Team Joest overtook Peugeot Sport to lead the LMP1 Teams' Cup, while Signatech and AF Corse retained the LMP2 and LMGTE Pro Teams' Cups, respectively. Larbre passed Proton Competition to lead the LMGTE Am Teams' Cup with four rounds remaining in the 2011 ILMC season. ## Race results Class winners are marked in bold. Cars failing to complete 70 per cent of the winner's distance (249 laps) are marked as Not Classified (NC). ## Championship standings after the race
19,823,316	Maybe This Christmas Too?	1,158,103,175	2003 compilation album by various artists	[ "2003 Christmas albums", "2003 compilation albums", "Charity albums", "Christmas compilation albums", "Folk compilation albums", "Nettwerk Records compilation albums", "Pop rock Christmas albums", "Pop rock compilation albums" ]	Maybe This Christmas Too? is a holiday compilation album released in October 2003 through Nettwerk Records featuring contemporary musicians performing both classic and original Christmas songs. The compilation served as a sequel to Maybe This Christmas (2002) and preceded Maybe This Christmas Tree (2004). A portion of the proceeds from the album went to Toys for Tots, a charity supported by the United States Marine Corps. Critical reception of the compilation, which failed to chart in any nation, was mixed. ## Background and composition Maybe This Christmas Too? is a sequel to the 2002 compilation album Maybe This Christmas, which reached a peak position of number thirty-eight on Billboard's Top Holiday Albums chart. Maybe This Christmas Tree, released in 2004, was the third installment of the series. A portion of the proceeds from the sales of the three albums went to Toys for Tots, a charity supported by the United States Marine Corps. Maybe This Christmas Too? features fourteen tracks recorded by various artists, most of whom were associated with the Nettwerk record label during its release. Ten of the tracks were recorded specifically for this compilation album. Darin Harmon served as the album's executive producer and Ianthe Zevos served as the project manager. Mastering of the compilation was donated by Louie Teran. In August 2003, MTV reported on the possible inclusions of The Used's "Alone This Holiday", The Flaming Lips' "Winter Wonderland" and The Polyphonic Spree's "Winter Wonderslumber", none of which ended up on the final release. The album opens with Rufus Wainwright's "Spotlight on Christmas", an acoustic-based, original track recorded exclusively for this set. "Spotlight on Christmas" was written and produced by Wainwright; among other guests, the song features Teddy Thompson and Martha Wainwright on backing vocals and bells as well as Thompson on electric guitar. "The Winter Song" was written, arranged, and produced by members of Eisley. "O Holy Night", based on a poem by Placide Cappeau, was composed by Adolphe Adam and translated by John Sullivan Dwight. The song is performed by Avril Lavigne and Chantal Kreviazuk. Kreviazuk also produced the track. "Silent Night", performed by Lisa Hannigan, was originally recorded by Damien Rice for his 2002 studio album O. The song is less than two minutes in length and features original lyrics. The band Rilo Kiley contributed "Xmas Cake", a song originally written by group members Jenny Lewis and Blake Sennett. The track was produced and mixed by Mike Mogis and features "jazzy guitar chords and a piano-led wintery feel" to address poverty and conflict. "¿Dónde Está Santa Claus?" (Spanish for "Where Is Santa Claus?") is performed by the band Guster and was produced, recorded, and mixed by Peter Katis. The track contains castanets, "bouncing" rhythm, and "silky" backing vocals. "Rudy", a song about "Rudolf the red-nosed wino", was originally written by Danny Dolinger; the version appearing on the compilation album was arranged and performed by The Be Good Tanyas. Instrumentation included: guitar, mandolin, organ, piano, percussion, and twelve-string guitar. "Christmas Song" was written by Dave Matthews and performed by the Dave Matthews Band. The "organ-tinged, gospel rendition" of "Go Tell It on the Mountain", originally written by John Wesley Work Jr. with traditional music, was arranged and given additional lyrics by Suzie Ungerleider (also known as Oh Susanna). The Barenaked Ladies' "Green Christmas", a song credited to Steven Page and Ed Robertson, about experiencing Christmas in a location where snow never falls, was recorded originally for the soundtrack to the 2000 film How the Grinch Stole Christmas. The acoustic studio version that appeared on Maybe This Christmas Too? differed from the soundtrack version as well as a third version appearing on the band's 2004 studio album Barenaked for the Holidays. Martina Sorbara performs a "vampish, bluesy" rendition of Edward Pola and George Wyle's "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year". The track was produced and recorded by David Matheson. "Donna & Blitzen" was written and performed by Badly Drawn Boy and features "bouncy vintage rock piano". Irving Berlin's "White Christmas" is performed by The Flaming Lips. Sixpence None the Richer performs "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear", the album's final track. The song contains music by Richard Storrs Willis and lyrics by Edmund Hamilton. The version was arranged by Matt Slocum, produced by Sam Ashworth and Taylor Harris, and engineered and mixed by Harris. Leigh Nash performs vocals, Slocum features on guitar, pedal steel and Wurlitzer, Rob Mitchell plays drums, and Justin Cary plays bass. Ashworth also contributed on EBow guitar and percussion, and Harris on percussion and programming. ## Reception Allmusic's MacKenzie Wilson wrote that Maybe This Christmas Too? would appeal to "both casual and die-hard music fans of all ages". Wilson called Wainwright's performance "classic chamber pop with a warm spirit" and also noted the "fetching" graphic design work for the album's cover art by Brian "Goatpillow" Brooks of Cosmic Debris. Andrew Gilstrap's review for PopMatters also complimented "Spotlight on Christmas", calling the song a "clever piece of class-conscious commentary" that provides a "perfect example of [Wainwright's] meticulous toyshop brand of pop." Simmy Richman of The Independent considered The Flaming Lips' rendition of "White Christmas" to be the "strangest" he had ever heard. Gilstrap used the same adjective ("strange") to describe "O Holy Night", and thought "Silent Night" was "incredibly potent" despite its short length. The New York Times' Kelefa Sanneh called "White Christmas" "spooky" and wrote that the album "brings to the world something more ambivalent than joy". Gilbert concluded that Maybe This Christmas Too? "feels just about right" and "does a fine job of representing the less than stellar aspects of a wintry, commercialized holiday like Christmas." In 2008 The A.V. Club included "Spotlight on Christmas" as number thirty-nine on its list of "42 holiday entertainments that don't make us want to claw our eyes out with rage". ## Track listing 1. "Spotlight on Christmas" (Rufus Wainwright), performed by Rufus Wainwright – 3:22 2. "The Winter Song" (Eisley), performed by Eisley – 4:34 3. "O Holy Night" (Adolphe Adam, Placide Cappeau, John Sullivan Dwight), performed by Avril Lavigne and Chantal Kreviazuk – 4:22 4. "Silent Night" (Lisa Hannigan, traditional), performed by Lisa Hannigan – 1:48 5. "Xmas Cake" (Jenny Lewis, Blake Sennett), performed by Rilo Kiley – 5:22 6. "¿Dónde Está Santa Claus?" (Alvin G. Grenier, Gordon Rod Parker, George Scheck), performed by Guster – 2:21 7. "Rudy" (Danny Dolinger), performed by The Be Good Tanyas – 4:33 8. "Christmas Song" (Dave Matthews), performed by Dave Matthews Band – 5:33 9. "Go Tell It on the Mountain" (John Wesley Work Jr., traditional), performed by Oh Susanna – 3:48 10. "Green Christmas" (Steven Page, Ed Robertson), performed by Barenaked Ladies – 2:37 11. "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year" (Edward Pola, George Wyle), performed by Martina Sorbara – 2:45 12. "Donna & Blitzen" (Badly Drawn Boy), performed by Badly Drawn Boy – 3:29 13. "White Christmas" (Irving Berlin), performed by The Flaming Lips – 4:20 14. "It Came Upon a Midnight Clear" (Edmund Hamilton, Richard Storrs Willis), performed by Sixpence None the Richer – 3:46 Track listing and song lengths adapted from album liner notes. ## Personnel - Adolphe Adam – composer (3) - Jon Aley – backing vocals (6), group member (6) - Sam Ashworth – percussion (14), producer (14), ebow guitar (14), group member (14) - Badly Drawn Boy – group (12) - Barenaked Ladies – group (10) - The Be Good Tanyas – arranger (7), group (7) - Irving Berlin – author (13) - Melissa Bisagni – backing vocals (6) - Brian "Goatpillow" Brooks – graphic design, design, layout design - Justin Cary – bass (14), group member (14) - Jay Crouch – assistant engineer (6), backing vocals (6) - Dave Matthews Band – group (8) - Leon Dewan – arranger (6), backing vocals (6), bass (6), guitar (6) - Danny Dolinger – author (7) - Bazil Donovan – bass (9), group member (9), guitar (9) - Sabrina Duim – harp (5) - John Sullivan Dwight – English translations (3) - Eisley – arranger (2), producer (2), vocals (2), writer (2) - Matthew Elkins – choir (5), chorus (5) - Alma Fernandez – viola (3) - The Flaming Lips – group (13) - Frazey Ford – vocals (7), group member (7) - Samuel Formicola – violin (3) - Brian E. Garcia – mixing - Camille Giroux – drums (9), group member (9), vocals (9) - Alvin G. Grenier – writer (6) - Guster – group (6), instrumentation (6), vocals (6) - Edmund Hamilton – author (14) - Lisa Hannigan – publisher (4), vocals (4) - Darin Harmon – executive producer - Taylor Harris – percussion (14), programming (14), producer (14), engineer (14), mixing (14) - Jeff Hill – bass (1) - Greg White Hunt – engineer (2) - Matt Johnson – drums (1) - Henry Katis – backing vocals (6) - Peter Katis – producer (6), engineer (6), mixing (6) - Tarquin Katis – backing vocals (6) - Tom Katis – backing vocals (6) - Rilo Kiley – vocals (5) - Trish Klein – mandolin (7), vocals (7), group member (7) - Chantal Kreviazuk – producer (3), vocals (3) - Tom Lagleder – choir (5), chorus (5) - Avril Lavigne – vocals (3) - Victor Lawrence – cello (3) - Gary Leach – engineer (2) - Philip Levesque – choir (5), chorus (5) - Jenny Lewis – writer (5) - Dave Matthews – author (8) - David Matheson – producer (11), engineer (11) - Rob Mitchell – drums (14), group member (14) - Mike Mogis – mixing (5), producer (5) - Leigh Nash – vocals (14), group member (14) - Tim Oberthier – engineer (10), mixing (10) - Matt Orifice – backing vocals (6), group member (6) - Bob Packwood – group member (9), organ (9), piano (9) - Steven Page – author (10) - Gordon Rod Parker – writer (6) - Samantha Parton – group member (7), guitar (7), mixing (7), organ (7), producer (7), vocals (7) - Damien Rice – engineer (4) - Edward Pola – author (11) - Florence Riggs – choir (5), chorus (5) - Ed Robertson – author (10) - Mark Robertson – violin (3) - George Scheck – writer (6) - Tom Schick – mixing (1) - David Schneider – backing vocals (6), group member (6) - Blake Sennett – writer (5) - Chris Shreenan-Dyck – engineer (9) - Kerri Silvestri – backing vocals (6) - Sixpence None the Richer – group (14) - Matt Slocum – guitar (14), pedal steel (14), arranger (14), Wurlitzer (14), group member (14) - Brodie Smith – engineer (7), group member (7), mixing (7), organ (7), percussion (7), piano (7), producer (7), twelve-string guitar (7) - Louie Teran – mastering - Teddy Thompson – backing vocalist (1), bells (1), electric guitar (1) - Suzie Ungerleider – arranger (9), group member (9), lyrics (9), vocals (9) - Martha Wainwright – backing vocalist (1), bells (1) - Rufus Wainwright – acoustic guitar (1), bells (1), piano (1), producer (1), vocals (1) - John Wesley Work Jr. – author (9) - Richard Storrs Willis – composer (14) - George Wyle – author (11) - The Zambonis – backing vocals (6), group (6) - Ianthe Zevos – project manager Credits adapted from Allmusic and album liner notes.
578,181	Ned Rorem	1,171,594,120	American composer and writer (1923–2022)	[ "1923 births", "2022 deaths", "20th-century American composers", "20th-century American male musicians", "20th-century classical composers", "21st-century American composers", "21st-century American male musicians", "21st-century classical composers", "American Conservatory of Music alumni", "American LGBT composers", "American classical composers", "American contemporary classical composers", "American diarists", "American gay musicians", "American male classical composers", "American opera composers", "American people of Norwegian descent", "Bienen School of Music alumni", "Chevaliers of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres", "Curtis Institute of Music alumni", "Fulbright alumni", "Gay composers", "Juilliard School alumni", "LGBT classical composers", "Male opera composers", "Musicians from Richmond, Indiana", "Presidents of the American Academy of Arts and Letters", "Pulitzer Prize for Music winners", "University of Chicago Laboratory Schools alumni" ]	Ned Miller Rorem (October 23, 1923 – November 18, 2022) was an American composer of contemporary classical music and a writer. Best known for his art songs, which number over 500, Rorem was considered the leading American of his time writing in the genre. Frequently described as a neoromantic composer, he showed limited interest in the emerging modernist aesthetic of his lifetime. As a writer, he kept—and later published—numerous diaries in which he spoke candidly of his exchanges and relationships with many cultural figures of America and France. Born in Richmond, Indiana, Rorem found an early interest in music, studying with Margaret Bonds and Leo Sowerby. He developed a strong enthusiasm for French music and received mentorship from Aaron Copland and Virgil Thomson, among others. After two productive years in Morocco, Rorem was hosted by the arts patron Marie-Laure de Noailles in Paris, where he was influenced by the neoclassicist group Les Six, particularly Francis Poulenc and Darius Milhaud. He returned to America in around 1957, establishing himself as a prominent composer and receiving regular commissions. For the American Bicentennial, he worked on seven different commissions concurrently, among which was Air Music: Ten Etudes for Orchestra, which won a Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1976. Much of Rorem's life was spent with his lifelong partner James Holmes, between his apartment in New York and house in Nantucket. From 1980 onwards he taught at the Curtis Institute, where his students included Daron Hagen and Jennifer Higdon. He wrote the large-scale song cycle Evidence of Things Not Seen (1997) to 36 texts by 24 writers, for the New York Festival of Song. It is considered by commentators and Rorem himself to be his magnum opus. Much of his later compositions were devoted to concertante and his final major work was the opera Our Town (2006). ## Life and career ### 1923–1940: Childhood and youth Ned Miller Rorem was born in Richmond, Indiana, US on October 23, 1923. Born to parents of Norwegian descent, he was their second child after his sister Rosemary. His father Clarence Rufus Rorem was a medical economist at Earlham College whose work later inspired the Blue Cross Blue Shield Association, while his mother Gladys Miller Rorem was active in antiwar movements and the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers). Ned described his background as "upper middle-class, semi-bohemian but with a strong Quaker emphasis". He later explained that his family was more culturally but not religiously Quaker; he described himself as a "Quaker atheist" throughout his life. The family moved to Chicago a few months after Rorem's birth, where he attended the University of Chicago Laboratory Schools. Though not musicians themselves, his parents were enthusiastic about the arts, and brought their children to numerous concerts by the famous pianists and dancers. Rorem showed an early talent and interest in music, learning piano in his youth with Nuta Rothschild. Though he had other teachers before Rothschild, she was his first to make a lasting impression: she inaugurated his life-long enthusiasm for French music and culture, especially Impressionists such as Claude Debussy and Maurice Ravel. By age 12, Rorem began piano lessons with Margaret Bonds, who helped foster his interest in music composition and introduced him to both American jazz and American classical music by composers such as Charles Tomlinson Griffes and John Alden Carpenter. The music of Igor Stravinsky and songs of Billie Holiday were also particularly impressionable. He began piano study with Belle Tannenbaum in 1938, under whom he learned and performed the first movement of Edvard Grieg's Piano Concerto. Throughout his youth he also studied music theory at the American Conservatory of Music with Leo Sowerby, a well known church music composer of the time. He graduated high school in 1940, around when he began a close friendship with the future-writer Paul Goodman, whose poems he would later set to music. Rorem also found interest in literary activities, having kept a diary since his youth. ### 1940–1948: Emerging composer Rorem attended the School of Music of Northwestern University in 1940, studying composition with Alfred Nolte and piano with Harold Van Horne. Under the latter he focused on standard repertoire by Bach, Beethoven and Chopin, but transferred to the Curtis Institute of Music in 1942. There, he studied composition and orchestration under Gian Carlo Menotti and counterpoint under Rosario Scalero. He had numerous compositions premiered, including The 70th Psalm (1943), a choral piece with orchestral accompaniment, and a Piano Sonata for Four Hands. Considering Scalero unprogressive, he left Curtis after a year; his parents disagreed with the decision and ceased providing him a regular allowance. Moving to New York in late 1943, to support himself he took a job as copyist for the composer Virgil Thomson, with whom he also studied orchestration and prosody. Via a mutual friend, he became acquainted with the conductor and composer Leonard Bernstein, and Bernstein introduced him to Aaron Copland. Rorem later attended two of the Tanglewood Music Center's summer sessions to study with Copland. He later remarked in an article of The New York Times: "Well, I took the job with Virgil, became an instant fan of Aaron and Lenny, and for the next 42 years with many an up and a down I've remained staunch friends with all three men. Some weekend!" Later in 1943 he enrolled in the Juilliard School and studied composition with Bernard Wagenaar. Rorem graduated from Juilliard with a Bachelor of Arts in 1946 and a Master of Music in 1948. While a student he worked as a piano accompanist for performers such as the dancer Martha Graham and the singer Éva Gauthier. Due to his interest in literature he became increasingly interested in composing art songs, and also wrote incidental music, ballet music and music for a puppet show. In 1948, his song The Lordly Hudson on a poem by Goodman won the Music Library Association's published song of the year award. That same year, his orchestral Overture in C won a Gershwin Prize and was premiered by New York Philharmonic under Mishel Piastro [de] in May 1948. The positive reception of both these compositions was an important milestone in his career as an emerging composer. ### 1949–1957: France and Morocco Rorem later remarked that the 1940s were formative for charting his future career and by 1950 he was certain of being a composer. With money from the Gershwin Prize, he left for France in early 1949, though spent much of the next two years in Morocco. He was hugely productive in the comparatively quieter Morocco, and produced a variety of compositions in rapid succession. He later explained that "The best influence for a composer is four walls. The light must come from inside. When it comes from outside, the result is postcard music." Among his earliest large-scale works, he wrote the ballet Melos in 1949, and both his Piano Concerto No. 2 and Symphony No. 1 1950. The ballet won the Prix de Biarritz in 1951, while the Symphony was premiered in Vienna in February 1951 by Jonathan Sternberg and the piano concerto in 1954 by Julius Katchen via French Radio. During this period he wrote numerous song cycles dedicated to a single textual source: Flight for Heaven (1950) to Robert Herrick; Six Irish Poems (1950) to George Darley; Cycle of Holy Songs (1951) to biblical texts; and To a Young Girl to W. B. Yeats. He composed his first opera, A Childhood Miracle, to Elliott Stein's libretto based on The Snow-Image, and Other Twice-Told Tales by Nathaniel Hawthorne. Though written in 1951, the opera was not premiered until May 10, 1955 in New York. He later received two further honors: the Lili Boulanger Memorial Fund Award in 1950 and a Fulbright Scholarship in 1951. On the Fulbright Scholarship, in 1951 Rorem settled in Paris to study with Arthur Honegger, a representative from the Les Six group of neoclassicist music. Unlike most young American musicians in the city, he did not study with Nadia Boulanger, as she opined that her instruction might tarnish his already individual style. He became associated with the wealthy arts patron Marie-Laure de Noailles, at whose mansion he resided. Through her influence, he met with the leading Parisian cultural figures of his time, including other composers of Les Six, Francis Poulenc, Georges Auric and Darius Milhaud. Their proximity solidified the French influence of his style and he set numerous medieval French poems in the 1953 song cycle Poémes pour la paix. Other compositions written in Paris include: Piano Sonata No. 2 (1950); two ballets, Ballet for Jerry (1951) and Dorian Gray (1952); Design for Orchestra (1953); The Poet's Requiem (1955); and Symphony No. 2. A Paris concert in 1953 featured solely Rorem's compositions. ### 1957–1973: Return to the US Rorem returned to the US in either 1957 or 1958 to further pursue composition. By now, his music had attracted the attention of several important American musicians and ensembles, and most of his compositions from the 1960s onwards were commissions. In 1959, the Philadelphia Orchestra under Eugene Ormandy premiered Rorem's Eagles, a Whitman-inspired and dreamlike tone poem. His Symphony No. 3 (1958) was premiered by Bernstein and the New York Philharmonic in 1959 to critical praise; the New York Herald Tribune's music editor Jay S. Harrison called it "lavish, luscious, and luxe". Conversely, his first full-length opera, Miss Julie, was not well received at its 1965 premiere at the New York City Opera. Rorem received commissions from organizations such as the Elizabeth Sprague Coolidge Foundation, Ford Foundation and Koussevitzky Foundation among others. By this time, he was established as a neoromantic composer, who largely rejected a strict application of modernist techniques or emerging genres such as electroacoustic music. Rorem held his first teaching position at the University of Buffalo from 1959 to 1960, during which he wrote 11 Studies for 11 Players. A few years later he taught composition at the University of Utah from 1965 to 1967. His short tenures were because he believed that "this is the kind of assignment that should not last more than two years as a teacher begins to believe what he says after that long a time and becomes sterile". His compositions of the time included more instrumental music, although songs remained a central aspect of his activities. These songs were largely set to 20th-century American poets, though copyright issues sometimes prevented their immediate publication. Among these was the song cycle for mezzo-soprano and piano, Poems of Love and Rain (1963), written to texts by W. H. Auden, Emily Dickinson, Howard Moss and Theodore Roethke. Premiered by Regina Sarfaty and Rorem at the piano on April 12, 1964, it included two different musicals settings for each of the poems. Throughout the 1950s and 60s, Rorem struggled with alcoholism. He commented that "The minute a drop of wine touches my lips I begin to be this other person—an infantile regression takes place", though he insisted that he was "not be categorized as an alcoholic because [he had] such a puritanical sense of order". Although he scheduled it carefully, he admitted to feeling a strong sense of guilt when drinking, which he considered detrimental to his artistic creativity. Rorem attended Alcoholics Anonymous meetings and used Antabuse, to little success. In late 1967 he became partners with the organist James Roland Holmes; their relationship offered enough stability for Rorem to abandon alcohol completely. ### 1974–1999: Pulitzer and Curtis In 1974 Rorem and Holmes bought a summer house in Nantucket, Massachusetts. His time there was generally peaceful and he later remarked that "I wrote Air Music, made pies, felt no competition, was content". There Rorem worked on seven different commissions concurrently between 1974 and 1975 for the American Bicentennial. One of these was Air Music: Ten Etudes for Orchestra for Thomas Schippers with the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, where each movement was limited to different combinations of instruments. Air Music would win the Pulitzer Prize for Music in 1976; Rorem later noted his surprise from the award, having been convinced that his music would not be accepted by "those stuffy Pulitzer people". Other major works of this time include the 1977 orchestral suite Sunday Morning, inspired by the poem of the same name by Wallace Stevens. Rorem accepted his third teaching post in 1980 at the Curtis Institute, his alma mater, where he headed the composition department with David Loeb until 2001. His students at Curtis included Daron Hagen and Jennifer Higdon. During this time, Rorem's pace of composition did not diminish. He wrote compositions for varied genres, including The Santa Fe Songs (1980) song cycle for baritone and piano quartet and the String Symphony (1985), a recording of which by the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra won the 1989 Grammy Award for Best Orchestral Recording. In 1993, Rorem wrote the Piano Concerto No. 4 for Left Hand and Orchestra for his Curtis colleague with an injured right hand, Gary Graffman. The following year, his earlier opera Miss Julie was revived at the Manhattan School of Music Opera Theater. For the 1997 New York Festival of Song, Rorem wrote the large-scale song cycle Evidence of Things Not Seen, described as his "masterwork" by Daniel Lewis in the Times. A deeply personal work, the composition included settings of 36 texts by 24 poets, split into three larger sections: "Beginnings" for optimistic and forward-looking songs, "Middles" exploring coming of age and the devastation of war, as well as the final "Ends" that concerns death, particularly Rorem's friends killed by AIDS. With an hour and a half duration, it called for a soprano, mezzo-soprano, tenor, and baritone with piano accompaniment. The music critic Peter G. Davis called it "one of the musically richest, most exquisitely fashioned, most voice-friendly collections of songs", while Rorem himself lauded it as his best work. His partner Holmes died in 1999, after having lived with Rorem for 32 years. ### 2000–2022: Later years In the Times, Daniel Lewis noted that "Well into the 21st century, when quite a few of his modernist critics had passed into irrelevance, Mr. Rorem was still going strong. Admirers turned up at concerts to help celebrate his 80th birthday, his 85th, his 90th, his 95th; the audiences looked that much older each time around, while he looked pretty much as always". The music critic Steve Smith furthered that compared to the birthday anniversaries of Britten, Verdi and Wagner, "Mr. Rorem's birthday has occasioned less fanfare, seemingly confirming his oft-repeated assertions about the invisibility of living composers". This latter sentiment would be a focus of his tenure while president of the American Academy of Arts and Letters from 2000 to 2003. During this time he engaged in a series of larger works, beginning with Aftermath (2002) a ten-part song cycle written in response to the September 11 attacks. Set to English-language poets from the 18th-century to present day, it was written for medium voice accompanied by violin, cello and piano. What followed next was concertante: a Cello Concerto (2002) and Flute Concerto (2002), both written in memory of Thomas Schippers. His next concerto, the 2003 Mallet Concerto, was compared by the writer Bret Johnson in its evocation and sparseness to his first two symphonies. In 2006, his opera Our Town premiered at the Indiana University Opera Theater, Bloomington. From 2010 onwards, Rorem essentially ceased composing, explaining that "I’ve kind of said everything I have to say, better than anyone else". Two exceptions were the 2013 song "How Like a Winter", based on Shakespeare's Sonnet 97, as well as his final work, Recalling Nadia, a brief organ piece written in 2014. Regardless, Rorem himself noted that by then he didn't receive commissions, "but then, nobody I know does". His last years were instead spent in the care of his niece, playing piano, doing crossword puzzles and walking through Central Park. Rorem died at home in Manhattan on November 18, 2022, at age 99. ## Music Although Rorem wrote works for piano, orchestra and chamber ensemble and solo instruments, he considered all of his music vocal and song-like in nature. Often described as a neoromantic composer, Rorem generally rejecting the emergence of strict modernist aesthetics. He wrote in a generally tonal manner, Grove Music Online asserts that he did so with considerable diversity, complexity and potency. ### Songs He is best known for his art songs, of which he wrote more than 500. Many are coupled into some thirty or so song cycles, written from the early 1940s to 2000s. Rorem stressed the importance of a cycle's overall structure, paying close attention to the song order, progression of keys and transition between songs. He also emphasized theatricality, aiming to convey an overarching message via a unified emotional affect or mood. Like in other genres, the musicologist Philip Lieson Miller remarked that "Rorem's chosen field of song is not for the avant garde and he must be classified as [...] conservative", and that "he has never striven for novelty". Rorem's strict definitions of what constitutes a song has molded them to be typically be single-voice and piano settings of lyrical poems of moderate length. He named songs by Monteverdi, Schumann, Poulenc and the Beatles as particular favorites. To obtain certain effects, however, Rorem has occasionally experimented with more modernist sentiments, such as intense chromaticism, successive modulations and alternating time signatures. Rorem's main interest in the art song is the setting of poetry, rather than the sound of the human voice. Numerous commentators have lauded his abilities in prosody, with Grove Music Online noting that he "sets words with naturalness and clarity, without compromising the range and scope of vocal lines". The vast majority of Rorem's songs are set in English and he has criticized American colleagues who prioritize setting other languages over English. In his early years, he was particularly devoted to the poems of his friend Paul Goodman, and later set many works by Theodore Roethke. Rorem often composed entire cycles to the poetry of a single writer: John Ashbery, Witter Bynner, Demetrios Capetanakis, George Darley, Frank O'Hara, Robert Herrick, Kenneth Koch, Howard Moss, Sylvia Plath, Wallace Stevens, Alfred, Lord Tennyson, and Walt Whitman, to whom he dedicated three cycles. His few settings in other languages include French poems by Jean-Antoine de Baïf, Jean Daurat, Olivier de Magny [fr], Henri de Régnier, Pierre de Ronsard, as well as ancient Greek texts by Plato. Many of Rorem's songs are accompanied by piano, though some have mixed instrumental ensemble or orchestral accompaniment. A pianist himself, his accompaniment parts for the instrument are not completely secondary to the voice and more a "full complement to the melody". They include motives to emphasize textual elements—such as rain and clouds—and are wildly diverse in function, sometimes responding to the voice in counterpoint or simply doubling the vocal line. He sometimes uses the Renaissance-derived ground bass technique of a slow and repeated bassline in the left hand. Reflecting on his piano accompaniments, the writer Bret Johnson describes Rorem's musical hallmarks as "chiming piano, rushing triplets, sumptuous harmonies". ### Operas Only two full-length operas were written by Rorem: Miss Julie (1965) and Our Town (2005). Miss Julie was not well-received; the music critic Harold C. Schonberg commented that his melodies were bland and lacked individuality. Holmes explained that Rorem himself "contends that song specialists cannot automatically turn out good operas any more than opera composers can turn out true songs: a gift for tune and a gift for tragedy do not always join hands". The opera's libretto was written by Kenward Elmslie, itself based on the play of the same name by August Strindberg. Rorem revised it for a more successful revival in 1979; it was again revived again in 1994 at the Manhattan School of Music Opera. His second full-length opera, Our Town, was written 40 years later on the play of the same name by Thornton Wilder. It received a successful 2006 premiere at the Indian University Opera Theater and was later performed at the Juilliard Opera Center, New York (2008) and the Central City Opera, Denver (2013). The music critic Joshua Barone noted that it is "a tastefully restrained echo of the play's text that has found a home on smaller stages but deserves bigger ones". The play's already small-scale set and condense narrative was matched by Rorem's setting as a chamber opera and Johnson explained that "the economy of resources may well be the key to the opera's mobility and then its success". The work's final monologue-aria from the character Emily Webb is particularly well-regarded and often standard repertoire for soprano singers. Throughout his career Rorem wrote some 6 small one-act operas, many of which do not fit squarely into the genre. The first of these was A Childhood Miracle of 1951, which had to wait three years for its premiere in New York 1955. Rorem wrote his own libretto for his 1958 opera based on Chaucer's "The Pardoner's Tale", The Robbers. His 1961 two-act opera The Anniversary was never performed. It included a libretto by Jascha Kessler and was, unusually for Rorem, based on the serialist tone row which he included on the title page. Rorem wrote the one-act Bertha (1968) to a libretto by Kenneth Koch. The same year he wrote the three-act Three Sisters who are Not Sisters (1971), his second collaboration with Stein as the librettist. The 1970s saw his two final short operas: Fables (1971), 5 brief scene based on La Fontaine's Fables; and Hearing (1976) on a libretto by Holmes based on Rorem's song cycles. ### Orchestral works Rorem's three numbered symphonies were written in a span of eight years during the 1950s. They have remained relatively "ostracized", even during the late 20th-century revival of neoromanticism. The music critic David Hurwitz remarked that "Ned Rorem's symphonies are shot through with long, lyrical melodies that some observers might relate to his gifts as a songwriter, but strike me as more likely inspired by the "Sunrise" sequence from Ravel's Daphnis et Chloë–music so strikingly lovely that the beauty it describes can only exist in the world of fantasy and make-believe." Rorem's Symphony No. 1 (1950) is cast in four fairly brief movements: I: Maestoso, II: Andantino, III: Largo, and IV: Allegro; the composer himself noted that it "could easily be called a Suite". The AllMusic critic Blair Sanderson considered it the most lyrical and gentle of his symphonies. His Symphony No. 2 (1956) is cast in 3 movements, I: Broad, Moderate; II: Tranquillo; III: Allegro. They are of highly unequal propertion—the 2nd & 3rd combined being less than half the length of the first—akin to the structure of Symphony No. 6 by Dmitri Shostakovich. Both the first and second symphonies are infrequently performed; the second in particularly had not been performed since 1959 until, as the composer puts it, "José Serebrier resurrected" it 43 years later. The Third Symphony (1958) is cast in five movements: I: Passacaglia, II: Allegro molto vivace, III: Largo, IV: Andante, V: Allegro molto. It is the best known of Rorem's numbered symphonies, described by Sanderson as "the most fully realized, [with] resilient rhythms and cogent structures". Hurwitz opines that it should be among the "great American symphonies". Rorem later arranged the Scherzo movement for wind orchestra in 2002. ### Piano music From 1948 onwards, Rorem wrote numerous pieces for solo piano, usually dedicated to relatives or close friends. Many of these were written for his partner Holmes, and others are named for their recipient, such as For Shirley (1989) and For Ben (1999). Johnson described most of them as brief sketches that contained precedents for his later works. His earliest published piano work was the 1948 set A Quiet Afternoon, written for his sister's children. Among his main piano compositions are three sonatas written in his early years 1948, 1949 and 1954. Barone singles out the "sparking Toccata" third movement from the First Sonata, noting that it is a common encore for pianists. A few months after its publication, Rorem published the Toccata as a separate piece. ## Legacy Rorem's reputation primarily revolves around art songs, during a time when the genre lacked interest from other American composers. Since the 1950s, he has been described as the "America's foremost composer of art songs", a designation echoed by the choral conductor Robert Shaw. Miller ranks him highly with the British song composers Ralph Vaughan Williams, Peter Warlock, Gerald Finzi and Benjamin Britten. His mentor Thomson characterized him as "an American Poulenc", explained by Grove Music Online as due to his expression of "restraint, wit, elegance and direct yet unsentimental expressivity" Although his music for orchestra, piano and chamber ensemble is substantial, it less known than his art songs. In light of his renown for small-scale works, Barone concludes that "You would be hard-pressed to find greatness in Mr. Rorem's vast oeuvre. But he has never aimed to be a Beethoven." Rorem was called "an icon of gay history" by Barone, who cited his confidence and openness towards his sexuality. Barone furthered that although his writings were not central Gay liberation texts, they offered impetus for the movement. Rorem himself frequently commented as to the general unremarkability of both homosexuality and heterosexuality. In an interview with Rorem, the physician and writer Lawrence D. Mass compared Rorem's indifference to the writer William Hoffman—who "is similarly defensive about being called a gay writer"—and contrasted it to Lou Harrison—who is "proud to be a gay composer and interested in talking about what that might mean". Rorem similarly rejected any connection between a composer's music and sexuality, ridiculing the proposal that Schubert's supposed homosexuality had any effect on his music. A dedicated diarist, Rorem wrote candidly on his and other men's sexuality, describing his relationships with Leonard Bernstein, John Cheever, Noël Coward and Tennessee Williams. Rorem's writings estimate his total romantic and sexual relationships as 3,000. He wrote extensively about music as well, collected the anthologies Music from Inside Out (1967), Music and People (1968), Pure Contraption (1974), Setting the Tone (1983), Settling the Score (1988), and Other Entertainment (1996). ## Writings Books Articles ## Recordings ## Awards and honors - 1950: Lili Boulanger Memorial Fund Award - 1951: Fulbright Fellowship - 1957: Guggenheim Fellowship - 1968: Award from the National Institute of Arts and Letters - 1976: Pulitzer Prize for Music - 1977: Honorary doctorate from Northwestern University - 1977: Guggenheim Fellowship - 2003: ASCAP's Lifetime Achievement Award - 2004: Chevalier de l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres
15,905,210	Battle of Cooch's Bridge	1,173,633,003	1777 battle of the American Revolutionary War	[ "1777 in Delaware", "1777 in the United States", "Battles involving Ansbach-Bayreuth", "Battles involving Great Britain", "Battles involving Hesse-Kassel", "Battles involving the United States", "Battles of the American Revolutionary War in Delaware", "Battles of the Philadelphia Campaign", "Conflicts in 1777", "Newark, Delaware" ]	The Battle of Cooch's Bridge, also known as the Battle of Iron Hill, was a battle fought on September 3, 1777, between the Continental Army and American militia and primarily German soldiers serving alongside the British Army during the American Revolutionary War. It was the only significant military action during the war on the soil of Delaware (though there were also naval engagements off the state's coast), and it took place about a week before the major Battle of Brandywine. Some traditions claim this as the first battle which saw the U.S. flag. After landing in Maryland on August 25 as part of a campaign to capture Philadelphia, the seat of the Continental Congress, British and German forces under the overall command of General William Howe began to move north. Their advance was monitored by a light infantry corps of Continental Army and militia forces that had based itself at Cooch's Bridge, near Newark, Delaware. On September 3, German troops leading the British advance were met by musket fire from the U.S. light infantry in the woods on either side of the road leading toward Cooch's Bridge. Calling up reinforcements, they flushed the Americans out and drove them across the bridge. ## Background After having successfully captured New York City in 1776, British military planners organized two expeditions to divide the Thirteen Colonies and, they hoped, decisively end the rebellion. One expedition was to take control of the Hudson River by a descent from Quebec, while the other was targeted at the colonial capital, Philadelphia. In pursuit of the latter objective, Lieutenant General William Howe embarked an army numbering about 18,000 (plus about 5,000 camp followers) onto transports in late July 1777, and sailed from New York City to the Chesapeake Bay. The Continental Army of Major General George Washington remained near New York until Howe's objective became clear. Howe's plan was gauged to the south, intending to move against Philadelphia via the Chesapeake. Washington marched his army, numbering about 16,000, through Philadelphia, and established a camp at Wilmington, Delaware. Riding further south and west to perform reconnaissance on August 26, Washington learned that the British had landed. On August 25, Howe's army disembarked below a small town called Head of Elk (now known as Elkton, and located at the head of navigation of the Elk River) in Maryland, about 50 miles (80 km) south of Philadelphia. Due to the relatively poor quality of the landing area, his troops moved immediately to the north, reaching Head of Elk itself on August 28. Advance troops consisting of British light infantry and German Jäger moved east across Elk Creek and occupied Gray's Hill, about one mile (1.6 km) west of Iron Hill, near Cooch's Bridge, which was a few miles south of Newark. The bridge was named for Thomas Cooch, a local landowner whose house was near the bridge. Washington would normally have assigned the duties of advance guard to Daniel Morgan and his riflemen, but he had detached these to assist Horatio Gates in the defense of the Hudson River Valley against the advance of General John Burgoyne. Since they were unavailable, he organized a light infantry corps consisting of 700 picked men from Continental Army regiments (including future Supreme Court Chief Justice John Marshall, who would go on to fight in the coming battle) and about 1,000 Pennsylvania and Delaware militia, and placed them under the command of Brigadier General William Maxwell. These troops occupied Iron Hill and Cooch's Bridge. General Nathanael Greene advocated moving the entire Continental Army to this position, believing the Christina River to be a more defensible point, but Washington declined, instead ordering Maxwell to monitor British movements and slow its advance while the rest of the army fortified the Red Clay Creek and Wilmington. Maxwell's men were encamped on either side of the road leading south from Cooch's Bridge toward Aiken's Tavern (present-day Glasgow, Delaware) in a series of small camps designed to facilitate ambushes. On August 28, Washington, atop Iron Hill, and Howe, on Gray's Hill, observed each other as they took stock of the enemy's position; one of the Hessian generals wrote, "These gentlemen observed us with their glasses as carefully as we observed them. Those of our officers who know Washington well, maintained that the man in the plain coat was Washington." On September 2, Howe's right wing, under the command of the Hessian general, Wilhelm von Knyphausen, left Cecil County Court House and headed north, hampered by rain, bad roads, and poor health of a portion of his soldiers. Early the next morning, Howe's left wing, headed by troops under the command of Charles Cornwallis, left Head of Elk, expecting to join with Knyphausen's division at Aiken's Tavern, about 5 miles (8.0 km) east. Cornwallis reached the tavern first, and Howe, traveling with Cornwallis, decided to press on to the north without waiting for Knyphausen. ## Battle A small company of Hessian dragoons led by Captain Johann Ewald headed up the road from the tavern toward Cooch's Bridge as Cornwallis's advance guard. These were struck by a volley of fire from an American ambush and many of them fell, either killed or wounded. Ewald remained unwounded, and quickly alerted the Hessian and Ansbach Jäger, who rushed forward to meet the Americans. This began a running skirmish that Major John André described as follows: "Here the rebels began to attack us about 9 o'clock with a continued irregular fire for nearly two miles." Howe rode to the front lines, and seeing Iron Hill crawling with enemy soldiers, ordered his troops to clear it. At this time, much of Maxwell's force was defending Iron Hill, while the rest were protecting Cooch's Bridge. The Jäger, numbering over 400 men led by Lieutenant Colonel Ludwig von Wurmb, formed a line and, with the support of some artillery, advanced on the Americans. Von Wurmb sent one detachment to Maxwell's left, hoping to flank his position, and supported the move with a bayonet charge against the American center. The battle lasted for much of the day; at Cooch's Bridge, Maxwell's men made a stand until they "had shot themselves out of ammunition" and "the fight was carried on with the sword" and bayonet (the latter being a weapon Maxwell's militia lacked experience in using). After seven hours of fighting, the Americans were forced to retreat from Iron Hill across Cooch's Bridge, taking up a position on the far side. Howe ordered the 1st and 2nd British Light Infantry Battalion to assist the Jäger in taking the bridge. While the 1st Battalion under Robert Abercromby became mired in swampy terrain attempting to ford the Christina River, the 2nd Battalion reached the right of the Jäger and the bridge was taken. Maxwell's army then retreated back toward Wilmington. Casualty reports for the British range from 3 killed and 20 wounded to about 30 killed or wounded. One British deserter reported that nine wagonloads of wounded were sent toward the fleet. The Americans claimed 20 killed and another 20 wounded, and Washington in a letter to Congress said the losses were "not very considerable"; however, the British reported burying 41 Americans, and Howe's official report claimed "not less than fifty killed and many more wounded". General Maxwell was criticized for his leadership by a number of Washington's subordinates. One foreign officer with service in the Army of Prussia commented to Henry Laurens in reference to Maxwell, "Your soldiers are very good men, so good as any brave men in the world, but your officers my dear colonel, your officers..." ## Aftermath General Cornwallis occupied the house of Thomas Cooch, and Howe's forces remained at Iron Hill for five days. In a letter to Congress, Washington justified the defeat by saying, "This Morning the Enemy came out with considerable force and three pieces of Artillery, against our Light advanced Corps, and after some pretty smart skirmishing obliged them to retreat, being far inferior in number and without Cannon." Certain that Howe would advance along the main road toward Wilmington in his bid to capture Philadelphia, Washington continued to fortify the city and the Red Clay Creek. He moved his headquarters from Wilmington to Newport, and the army formed defenses between Newport and Marshallton. While Howe's army remained in place, the two forces engaged in small skirmishes over the next few days. One officer under Howe noted that the rebel patrols, which usually consist of 10 to 15 dragoons and 20 to 30 infantrymen, now appear more often, and they fire at our posts occasionally." Sensing an attack coming, Washington told his troops on September 5th, "Should they [the British] push their design against Philadelphia, on this route, their all is at stake—they will put the contest on the event of a single battle: If they are overthrown, they are utterly undone—the war is at an end." Two days later, upon hearing that British ships had left the Chesapeake, Washington was sure Howe's move was imminent. He rallied his troops, referencing Horatio Gates's successes against the British in the north, saying "Who can forbear to emulate their [Gates's army] noble spirit? Who is there without ambition, to share with them, the applauses of their countrymen, and of all posterity, as the defenders of Liberty, and the procurers of peace and happiness to millions in the present and future generations? Two years we have maintained the war and struggled with difficulties innumerable. But the prospect has since brightened, and our affairs put on a better face—Now is the time to reap the fruits of all our toils and dangers! ... The eyes of all America, and of Europe are turned upon us." But the attack never came. Instead, on September 8, Howe moved his force north, through Newark and Hockessin into Pennsylvania. Upon realizing what the British were doing late in the night, Washington rushed his forces north as well to find a new defensive position. He settled on Chadds Ford, just across the Delaware border, upon the Brandywine River—the last natural defense before the Schuylkill River and Philadelphia. It was there that the two armies clashed again in the major Battle of Brandywine on September 11. The British victory in that battle paved the way for their eventual entry into and occupation of the city of Philadelphia. This success was more than offset by the failure of the expedition to the Hudson, in which General Burgoyne surrendered his army after the Battles of Saratoga, in October. News of Burgoyne's surrender greatly changed the war, because it (and the Battle of Germantown, fought after the British occupied Philadelphia) was a major factor in France's decision to enter the war as an American ally in 1778. ## Legacy The site of the battle has been preserved as the Cooch's Bridge Historic District, and is listed on the National Register of Historic Places. In 2003, the Cooch family sold the state some land as well as development rights for an additional 200 acres (81 ha) of land in the area of the battlefield. They also established a \$1.5 million fund to restore and maintain the property, and granted the state a right of first refusal to purchase the Thomas Cooch house, which remained with the family. In 2007, the 230th anniversary of the battle was commemorated by a re-enactment event hosted by members of the recreated 2nd Virginia Regiment. The Battle of Cooch's Bridge is memorialized on the coat of arms for Glasgow High School which is built on part of the battlefield. It shows Continental soldiers fighting British Army soldiers while flying the "Betsy Ross flag". In 2010, the Christina School District All-District Honor Band performed a selection written and named for the event: "The Battle of Cooch's Bridge March" In late 2018, the state of Delaware announced its intention to purchase the house at the center of the battlefield site, as well as some of the surrounding land, from the Cooch family. The purchase, of which \$875,000 was funded by the state and \$225,000 from private philanthropic trusts, was intended to allow the site to be used to educate the public about the battle. The state government also proposed to allow archaeologists to excavate the site, in the hope of locating unmarked graves of those involved in the conflict. The family pledged to donate twenty percent of the sale to the Cooch's Bridge Historic District Fund, which provides funding the ongoing preservation of the site. ## General references - Boatner, Mark Mayo, Cassell's Biographical Dictionary of the American War of Independence 1763–1783, Cassell, London, 1966, . - 2003 Da Capo reprint, . - Ward, Christopher L., The Delaware Continentals, 1776–1783, The Historical Society of Delaware, Wilmington, DE, 1941, . [Conflicts in 1777](Category:Conflicts_in_1777 "wikilink") [1777 in the United States](Category:1777_in_the_United_States "wikilink") [Battles involving the United States](Category:Battles_involving_the_United_States "wikilink") [Battles involving Hesse-Kassel](Category:Battles_involving_Hesse-Kassel "wikilink") [Battles involving Ansbach-Bayreuth](Category:Battles_involving_Ansbach-Bayreuth "wikilink") [Battles involving Great Britain](Category:Battles_involving_Great_Britain "wikilink") [Cooch](Category:Battles_of_the_American_Revolutionary_War_in_Delaware "wikilink") [Cooch](Category:Battles_of_the_Philadelphia_Campaign "wikilink") [Newark, Delaware](Category:Newark,_Delaware "wikilink") [1777 in Delaware](Category:1777_in_Delaware "wikilink")
1,871,687	J. H. Hobart Ward	1,145,465,532	American general (1823–1903)	[ "1823 births", "1903 deaths", "American military personnel of the Mexican–American War", "People from Monroe, New York", "People of New York (state) in the American Civil War", "Railway accident deaths in the United States", "Trinity College (Connecticut) alumni", "Union Army generals" ]	John Henry Hobart Ward (June 17, 1823 – July 24, 1903) was an American soldier who fought in the Mexican–American War and in the American Civil War. Ward joined the army in 1842 and fought in multiple battles in the Mexican–American war, including the Battle of Monterrey, where he was wounded. After leaving the army, he served successively as the assistant commissary general and commissary general for the state of New York. With the outbreak of the American Civil War in 1861, Ward rejoined the army, and became the colonel of the 38th New York Infantry Regiment. Ward and his regiment were engaged in the First Battle of Bull Run and in several battles in the Peninsula campaign. He was promoted to command a brigade after the Battle of Chantilly in September 1862. Ward then led his brigade at the battles of Fredericksburg, Chancellorsville, and Gettysburg. By early 1864, he had developed a strong reputation as a military leader, although there had been an incident when he panicked and fled the field during a night attack at Chancellorsville. On May 6, 1864, during the Battle of the Wilderness, Ward left his command and was observed riding to the rear on an artillery caisson. Six days later, during the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House, Ward was found to be intoxicated by two superior officers. He was removed from command that day, and was arrested on June 12, although he was given an honorable discharge in July and was not sent to a trial. After his removal from military service, Ward served as a clerk in the New York court system, and was struck and killed by a train while vacationing in 1903. ## Early life and Mexican War John Henry Hobart Ward was born on June 17, 1823, in New York City. Both his father and grandfather had died of the effects of wounds suffered while serving in the United States military. After receiving an education from Trinity Collegiate School, he enlisted as a private in the 7th United States Infantry Regiment in August 1842, at the age of 18. He was promoted to sergeant major in 1845. While Ward was in the army, the Mexican-American War began. He was present at the Siege of Fort Brown in Texas, which was an unsuccessful attempt by the Mexican Army to capture Fort Brown in May 1846. Ward later fought in the Battle of Monterrey, where he was wounded, and was also present at the capture of Vera Cruz. Ward was additionally present at the battles of Cerro Gordo and Huamantla. He later married one of the local women of Vera Cruz. According to historian Ezra J. Warner, Ward left the army in April 1847, while historian Larry Tagg states that he remained until 1851. Ward was next the New York state assistant commissary general, a position which he held from 1851 until 1855, when he took over the role of state commissary general itself. He remained in that position until 1859. ## Civil War service After the outbreak of the American Civil War, Ward used his military experience and political connections to gain a commission as colonel in the 38th New York Infantry Regiment. Recruited from the populace of New York and organized by the state, the unit mustered in to the Union Army on June 3, 1861. On July 21, Ward led the regiment in the First Battle of Bull Run. Part of Orlando B. Willcox's brigade, the 38th New York deployed behind two Union artillery batteries on Henry House Hill. The regiment later fell back towards the rear under heavy artillery fire. Later in the battle, Ward led the regiment in a charge against Confederate positions on Henry House Hill, along with the 69th New York Infantry Regiment. The two Union regiments took a foothold on the hill, but were driven off by Confederate reinforcements. Willcox was wounded and captured during the battle, and Ward temporarily took command of the brigade. Willcox's official report of the action praised Ward. The battle ended in a rout, with Union troops fleeing the field in disorganization. Ward then saw service in the Peninsula campaign in early 1862, fighting at the battles of Yorktown, Williamsburg, and Seven Pines. A charge by the 38th New York at Williamsburg brought praise to Ward from Brigadier General Phil Kearny, and Ward gained further adulation from Kearny, III Corps commander Brigadier General Samuel P. Heintzelman, and Brigadier General Joseph Hooker for his performance at Seven Pines. At that battle, Ward had briefly led the brigade his regiment was in, after Brigadier General David B. Birney was temporarily removed from command. Ward and his men were only minimally involved in the Seven Days' Battles, and while he was engaged in the Second Battle of Bull Run and the Battle of Chantilly, his overall participation in the Second Bull Run campaign was minimal. Kearny had been killed in September at Chantilly, and when Birney advanced to divisional command to replace Kearny, Ward took over the brigade. On October 4, 1862, Ward was promoted to brigadier general. At the Battle of Fredericksburg, Ward's brigade was engaged against the portion of the Confederate line defended by Stonewall Jackson's men. After other Union troops were repulsed, Ward led his brigade in an attack. Ward's brigade was repulsed, having suffered heavy casualties. He continued to lead his brigade at the Battle of Chancellorsville. At Chancellorsville, on the night of May 2/3, 1863, Birney's division made a night attack under orders from III Corps commander Daniel Sickles, with Ward's brigade leading the charge. The attack resulted in chaos, including multiple friendly fire incidents. Ward panicked during the event and rode down two Union soldiers while fleeing to the rear. While his panicked flight at Chancellorsville was an embarrassment for him, Ward's military career suffered no long-term harm from the incident. By this time, Ward had developed an excellent reputation as a combat leader. By the time of the Battle of Gettysburg in early July 1863, Ward had led his brigade for 10 months, which was longer than most brigade commanders in the Army of the Potomac. At Gettysburg, on July 2, Ward's brigade defended a position near the Devil's Den. When Confederate forces attacked, Ward's brigade fought hard, but was eventually forced to retreat under heavy enemy pressure. Sickles was wounded during the battle, leading to Birney assuming corps command and Ward was advanced to command the division. Ward himself suffered a wound during the battle. Ward saw further action in an engagement at Kelly's Ford and in the Battle of Wapping Heights after Gettysburg. In early 1864, the Army of the Potomac underwent a reorganization, and Birney's division was transferred to the II Corps. Ward retained a brigade command after the reorganization. Historian Ezra J. Warner wrote that by May 1864, Ward "had been almost universally eulogized by his superiors for bravery and ability". On May 5, during the Battle of the Wilderness, Ward's brigade entered the fighting when it was sent forward to support the line of the Vermont Brigade, which was heavily engaged with Confederate troops. The next day, Ward's brigade was part of the Union line as it was fighting off Confederate attacks. A brushfire broke out in front of the position of Ward's brigade, and some of the Union soldiers fled in panic, including Ward, who, according to a staff officer, rode a caisson to the rear. Another staff officer claimed to have later encountered Ward on the caisson and to have suggested he dismount and attempt to rally his men. Four days later, in the Battle of Spotsylvania Court House, Ward's men participated in an attack against Confederate lines in the Laurel Hill area. A Confederate shell fragment gave Ward a head wound not long before the attack began. His men succeeded in temporarily breaking the Confederate line, but were not sufficiently supported and were forced to withdraw. May 12, in another phase of the fighting at Spotsylvania Court House, saw Ward's brigade participate in an attack that broke a major hole in the Confederate line. ## Dismissal from command and later life During the fighting on May 12, Birney noted Ward heading for the rear, claiming that he was looking for his horse. Major General Winfield Scott Hancock also noticed Ward behaving recklessly, and concluded that he was drunk. Hancock informed Birney of the matter, and the latter officer agreed that Ward was intoxicated and sent him to the rear. That same day, he was removed from command under charges of "misbehavior and intoxication in the presence of the enemy during the Battle of the Wilderness". Charles Dana, the Assistant Secretary of War, had written a letter dated May 9 stating that Ward had been arrested for "running away in the Wilderness battle". Warner suggests that this letter is evidence that the decision to relieve Ward had already been made by the time that Dana wrote his letter. On June 12, Ward was formally placed under arrest and sent to Fort Monroe. Ward was never brought to trial; historian Harry W. Pfanz suggests that this was due to his multiple wounds and long military career. He received an honorable discharge on July 18, and the United States Secretary of War refused requests to restore Ward to the service and then hold a trial to ascertain if he was guilty of the charges or not. In his following civilian career, Ward spent 32 years as a clerk with the superior court and the Supreme Court of New York. On July 24, 1903, while on vacation in Monroe, New York, Ward was struck and killed by a train. He received a Masonic funeral in Brooklyn, and his body was then taken to Monroe for permanent burial in the Community Cemetery there. ## See also - List of American Civil War generals (Union)
3,607,465	Nu-Clear Sounds	1,171,964,385	null	[ "1998 albums", "Albums produced by Chris Kimsey", "Albums produced by Owen Morris", "Ash (band) albums", "Infectious Records albums" ]	Nu-Clear Sounds is the second studio album by Northern Irish rock band Ash. It was released on 5 October 1998, through Infectious Records and Home Grown. Following the release of the band's debut studio album, 1977 (1996), guitarist Charlotte Hatherley became a member. They wrote new material at a farmhouse, before going to Wales to record their next album at Rockfield Studios. With additional sessions held at the Astoria in London, Ash produced the proceedings alongside Chris Kimsey and Owen Morris. A garage rock record, the New York Dolls, the Rolling Stones and the Velvet Underground inspired the album. Preceded by Nu-Clear Sounds' lead single "Jesus Says" in September 1998, the band toured the United Kingdom and other parts of Europe until the end of the year. "Wildsurf" was released as the second single partway through the European segment in November. In early 1999, Ash played shows in New Zealand, Australia and Japan. Following this, they performed a handful of shows in the United States and the UK, before appearing at the Glastonbury Festival. The album was released in the US in September 1999; it featured an alternate track listing and three remixes by Butch Vig of songs. A supporting US tour was planned throughout October, however, it was cut short. Music critics gave Nu-Clear Sounds mixed reviews; some complimented the musicianship, while others found it inconsistent. The album peaked at number seven in the UK, alongside reaching the top 50 in Australia, Norway and Scotland. It was certified gold in the UK by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI). "Jesus Says", "Wildsurf" and "Numbskull" reached the Irish top 10, while the first two charted in the UK top 20. ## Background Ash released their debut studio album 1977 in May 1996. With its release, frontman Tim Wheeler left school to tour the album for a year and a half. Suffering from writer's block, he was unable to write new material while touring. Wheeler wanted to explore more of the darker but melodic nature of "Goldfinger", a track from 1977. As Ash were supporting Weezer on their US tour, Wheeler became interested in the interplay between Rivers Cuomo and Brian Bell; he dreamt of having another member who could play certain parts while he simply sang. Nightnurse guitarist Charlotte Hatherley joined Ash temporarily, after learning the band wanted another guitarist. She had previously met Wheeler when Ash and Nightnurse shared a rehearsal room in London, and liked their singles. Hatherley made her recording debut as part of Ash with the release of "A Life Less Ordinary", taken from the film of the same name, in October 1997. It was the first song they had written since the making of 1977 over a year before. Impressed by her contribution to the band, she became an official member. They felt pressed to follow-up the success of 1977 while also evolving themselves. Ash wanted to break free from the pigeonholing they experienced; in Germany, the band was marketed similar to a boy band, while in Australia, 1977 was released with postcards of each member, both of which Wheeler disliked. According to Wheeler, in an attempt to be seen as more serious artists they wanted to make "a more abrasive record" but "be as successful as before and keep it going". Wheeler said they were "psychologically damaged" from the 1977 cycle, resulting in the members being on separate wavelengths. He was becoming aware that contemporary acts of theirs were making darker-sounding music, listing off Radiohead and Unkle. They spent a few months at Stambridge Farm, which had been turned into a residential writing studio, coming up with several new tracks and working on developing their sound. Wheeler had his own cottage detached from the main house where the rest of the band stayed to deal with his writer's block. ## Recording and production Ash recorded Nu Clear Sounds at Rockfield Studios in Wales during early and mid-1998. The band, Chris Kimsey and Owen Morris produced the sessions, with David Nicholas handling recording. Nick Brine, Sorrel Merchant and Damon Iddins did additional engineering. The band had an argument with Morris before making "A Life Less Ordinary" and had begun recording Nu Clear Sounds with Kimsey for two weeks. They recorded nearly all the album, except one track, live in the studio. Ash had previously built tracks by laying each instrument separately; Wheeler said the live aspect "as a band sort of worked a lot better". In between sessions, the band played three UK shows and several European festivals. Mixing was done at the Astoria in London. Kimsey was trying to drive a wedge between the band during the mixing; they were unhappy with how some of the tracks sounded and sought to involve Morris. Morris and Ash mixed the recordings; Morris completely remixed "Death Trip 21" over the course of a weekend while the band played shows. He also altered Kimsey's arrangements of "Low Ebb" and "I'm Gonna Fall", alongside adding "more darkness and intimacy" to "Aphrodite". Additional recording was done at the Astoria. Mike Marsh mastered the recordings. ## Music and lyrics Musically, the sound of Nu-Clear Sounds has been described as garage rock. Drummer Rick McMurray said the New York Dolls, the Velvet Underground and the Rolling Stones circa Sticky Fingers (1971) inspired the album. Wheeler wrote the lyrics for all the tracks, except for "Wildsurf", which he co-wrote with Hatherley. He wrote the music for most of the tracks, with the exception of "Projects" (co-written by bassist Mark Hamilton and Hatherley), "Jesus Says" (written solely by Hamilton), "Death Trip 21" (co-written by Wheeler and Hamilton), "Numbskull" (written solely by Hamilton) and "I'm Gonna Fall" (co-written by Wheeler and Hamilton). Discussing her vocals throughout the album, Hatherley said she was "drinking a lot and wasn’t focused on singing at all. I was just singing backing vocals and trying my best to get away with it". Consumable Online writer Robin Lapid felt that Hatherley brought "plenty of glam-punk, heavy-artillery riffage" into the band's sound. Nu-Clear Sounds is dominated by either harder-sounding songs—namely "Projects", "Jesus Says", "Numberskull" and "Fortune Teller"—or ballads, such as "Low Ebb", "Folk Song", "Burn Out", "Aphrodite" and "I'm Gonna Fall". Nearly every song on the album has what Hamilton referred to as "searing atmospherics", which he said reflected their state of mind. The ballads marked a shift from the punk rock-like tracks Ash were known for, showcasing the burn out they were going through, while the harder tracks were "a mixture of frustration". In a 2004 interview, Wheeler remaked, "That was a hazy time when we didn't really know what we were doing. Nu-Clear Sounds captures that well: one half consists of schizophrenic, crazy noise rock and the other half with only gloomy ballads". Hossam Ramzy and Dave Larkin contributed percussion; Wil Malone arranged the strings. The opening metal track "Projects" uses Nirvana-influenced guitar riffs. It starts off with the sounds of strings and a bleep noise from R2-D2, a character from Star Wars (1977). The bass part and Hatherley's guitar parts conflict with each other rhythmically; the track was initially called "Pickefoo", alluding to the bands Pixies and the Foo Fighters. The Oasis-esque ballad "Low Ebb" talks about despair and hope, relating to the pressure Wheeler was feeling with his writer's block. "Jesus Says" discusses the pressure of a job promotion and using alcohol to deal with it. The song evokes the sound of both the Jesus and Mary Chain and the New York Dolls, while it heavily features percussion instrumentation, courtesy of Ramsey. The Beach Boys-styled "Wildsurf" was one of the first tracks written for Nu-Clear Sounds. The song was described by Hamilton as most reminiscent of the material on 1977 and features a guitar solo by Hatherley, which was edited down for the final version. "Death Trip 21" sounds like a mix between the Chemical Brothers and Metallica, and tells the story of a dead drug dealer. It features turntable scratching, courtesy of Dick Kurtaine. The down-tempo "Folk Song" includes elements reminiscent of New Order and talks about lost innocence. The Pixies-indebted "Numbskull" opens with Wheeler screaming in a similar vein to Henry Rollins, and features turntable scratching. Hamilton wrote the music while on a sofa in the studio control room. "Burn Out" employs a 1960s-like vocal melody in the style of Phil Spector. "Aphrodite" comes across as a rock version of the Ronettes. With "Fortune Teller", Wheeler evokes the Stooges frontman Iggy Pop. Ash said it was the "sound of us just blowing away all the bullshit we’d been dealing with and just going for it". The closing track, "I'm Gonna Fall", features strings that Morris sent through a Fender amplifier with added distortion, making them become inaudible. ## Release and promotion On 14 July 1998, Nu-Clear Sounds was announced for release in three months' time. The following month, Ash played a few festivals in mainland Europe and appeared at the Reading Festival. After a premier on BBC Radio 1, "Jesus Says" was released as the album's lead single on 21 September 1998. Two versions were released on CD: one with "Taken Out" and "Heroin, Vodka, White Noise", while the other included "Radiation" and "Dancing on the Moon". The music video for "Jesus Says" sees the band perform in an atic as the camera swivels 360-degrees. In October and early November 1998, the band embarked on a tour of the United Kingdom. Nu-Clear Sounds was released on 5 October. The Australian version featured "Radiation" and "Dancing on the Moon", while the European edition featured "Taken Out". The Japanese version included "Taken Out" and "A Life Less Ordinary". In the United States, Ash had been on Reprise Records, who released 1977 in that territory; for Nu-Clear Sounds, the band ran into issues with Reprise's owner Warner Bros. Records, delaying the album's US release. From mid-November to late December 1998, Ash embarked on a European tour. Idlewild and the Chicks appeared on the first handful of shows, while Carrie appeared on the rest of the dates. "Wildsurf" was released as the second single from Nu-Clear Sounds on 23 November. Two versions were released on CD: one with "Stormy Waters" and "When I'm Tired" and the other with "Lose Control" and "Gonna Do It Soon". The music video for "Wildsurf" shows the band performing in front of an assortment of TV screens, cut with footage of a woman exploring buildings and hallways. The band closed the year with two shows in their home country of Ireland. In January 1999, the band appeared at Big Day Out in New Zealand and Australia, before embarking on a Japanese tour the following month. Ash played a benefit show for the Campaign for a Living Wage charity in mid-April 1999, preceded by three warm-up shows. The Numbskull EP was released on 26 April, with covers of "Who You Drivin' Now" by Mudhoney and "Blew" by Nirvana, along with live versions of "Jesus Says", "Girl from Mars" and "Fortune Teller". The music video for "Numbskull" premiered for The Jo Whiley Show on 5 May 1999. Directed by Darran Tiernan, the video features people having sex in a hotel room, amidst blood and drugs and a naked Wheeler. In June 1999, the band played a few showcase shows in the US and three UK shows, leading up to a performance at the Glastonbury Festival. Ash played a few European festivals and a show in Ireland in September. After originally being scheduled for release in June and then in August, Nu-Clear Sounds, which included the bonus track "A Life Less Ordinary", was eventually released in the US on 28 September 1999 through DreamWorks Records. Garbage drummer Butch Vig re-sequenced the order of the songs and remixed "Jesus Says", "Wildsurf" and "Folk Song" for the release. Vig got involved after he had approached the band; he was found of the album and played it every night before Garbage went on stage. They planned to promote it with a US tour in October, however, the A&R person at DreamWorks left, resulting in the tour being shortened to three shows. Ash's first compilation album Intergalactic Sonic 7′′s (2003) included "Jesus Says", "Wildsurf" and "Numbskull". Their second compilation album The Best of Ash (2011) included "Wildsurf". "Jesus Says", "Wildsurf", and "Numbskull" were released on 7" vinyl as part of '94–'04 The 7" Singles Box Set (2019). The band's third compilation album Teenage Wildlife: 25 Years of Ash (2020) included "Projects", "Jesus Says" and "Wildsurf". BMG released Nu-Clear Sounds on CD in 2019. ## Reception Nu-Clear Sounds was met with generally positive reviews from music critics. AllMusic reviewer Jason Ankeny said that while the album "lacks the immediate appeal" of 1977, "over the course of repeated listens it emerges as the group's most bracing effort to date". He further wrote that Hatherley "galvanizes ... Wheeler's songs, giving them a dimension and scope they previously lacked". Sylvia Patterson of NME noted two of the songs are "completely unlistenable to anyone over the age of 15", which "only serve to make 'Nu-Clear Sounds' the very first 'mainstream' rock'n'roll record of 1998 to do its job properly". Wall of Sound's Russell Hall wrote the album sees Ash "building upon the joyous abandon and hook-laden melodies" that exemplified their debut. CMJ New Music Report writer Cherly Botchick said the band provided "its tunes with the kind of pop star impudence that only the English can pull off with such magnetic results". Pitchfork contributor Brent DiCrescenzo found Nu-Clear Sounds delivered "simple pleasures, with occasional punch and constant nostalgic sincerity". Alexandra Flood of MTV said that while it "may not be the album that's going to get you to rehang your Union Jack or regrow your sideburns", there is "enough good stuff here at least to make you crave a crumpet". The Irish Times writer Kevin Courtney said Ash "are not really an albums band", adding they "handle the heavyweight artillery with consummate ease, but it's the gentle, almost dippy ballads ... which gives Nu-Clear Sounds its heart of gold". Buffo Schnadelbach of Rock Hard wrote that the band are "far from out of their infancy, they also seem to have matured a little", offering "a whole series of hard-core tracks", alongside "sugar-sweet, mostly flat ballads" that the "fearful metal crowd" might find to "cause nausea, diarrhea or incontinence". Exclaim!'s Rob Bolton said that as Ash get older, "they also seem to be bidding farewell to a lot of the sizzle that they are capable of". He went on to say, "Nu-Clear Sounds is somewhat disjointed ... lack[ing] the consistency of their outstanding prior release". Nu-Clear Sounds entered the charts at number seven in the UK and number eight in Scotland. The album was later certified gold in the UK by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI) for selling 100,000 copies. Outside these territories, it reached number 37 in Norway, number 44 in Australia and number 86 in Germany. "Jesus Says" charted at number nine in Ireland, alongside reaching number 15 in the UK. "Wildsurf" charted at number seven in Ireland, while it peaked at number 31 in the UK. "Numbskull" charted at number eight in Ireland. In a 2022 interview, when asked about the album's lack of success, Hatherley theorised that it was "down to the singles", explaining that it lacked the "big singalong" songs such as "Girl from Mars" or "Goldfinger". ## Track listing Writing credits per booklet. All recordings produced by Ash, Chris Kimsey, and Owen Morris. ## Personnel Personnel per booklet. Ash - Tim Wheeler – guitar, vocals - Mark Hamilton – bass - Rick McMurray – drums - Charlotte Hatherley – guitar, vocals Additional musicians - Dick Kurtaine – DJ - Hossam Ramzy – percussion - Dave Larkin – percussion - Mel Wesson – additional programming (track 6) - Wil Malone – string arrangements Production - Ash – producer, mixing - Chris Kimsey – producer - Owen Morris – producer, mixing - David Nicholas – recording - Nick Brine – additional engineering - Sorrel Merchant – additional engineering - Damon Iddins – additional engineering - Mike Marsh – mastering - Grant Fear – photography ## Charts and certifications ### Weekly charts ### Certifications
133,462	Beauty and the Beast (1991 film)	1,173,114,050	American animated musical fantasy romance film	[ "1990s American animated films", "1990s English-language films", "1990s children's animated films", "1990s musical drama films", "1990s musical fantasy films", "1990s romantic fantasy films", "1990s romantic musical films", "1991 animated films", "1991 comedy-drama films", "1991 directorial debut films", "1991 fantasy films", "1991 films", "1991 musical films", "3D re-releases", "American animated fantasy films", "American animated feature films", "American comedy-drama films", "American musical fantasy films", "American romantic fantasy films", "American romantic musical films", "Animated films about princes", "Animated films about shapeshifting", "Animated films about witchcraft", "Animated films based on Beauty and the Beast", "Animated films set in France", "Animated films set in castles", "Animated films set in the 18th century", "Animated musical films", "Animated romance films", "Beauty and the Beast (franchise)", "Best Animated Feature Annie Award winners", "Best Musical or Comedy Picture Golden Globe winners", "Disney Princess films", "Disney Renaissance", "Films about curses", "Films about father–daughter relationships", "Films adapted into comics", "Films adapted into plays", "Films directed by Gary Trousdale", "Films directed by Kirk Wise", "Films produced by Don Hahn", "Films scored by Alan Menken", "Films that won the Best Original Score Academy Award", "Films that won the Best Original Song Academy Award", "Films with screenplays by Brenda Chapman", "Films with screenplays by Brian Pimental", "Films with screenplays by Burny Mattinson", "Films with screenplays by Chris Sanders", "Films with screenplays by Joe Ranft", "Films with screenplays by Linda Woolverton", "IMAX films", "Resurrection in film", "United States National Film Registry films", "Walt Disney Animation Studios films", "Walt Disney Pictures animated films" ]	Beauty and the Beast is a 1991 American animated musical romantic fantasy film produced by Walt Disney Feature Animation and released by Walt Disney Pictures. The 30th Disney animated feature film and the third released during the Disney Renaissance period, it is based on the 1756 fairy tale of the same name by Jeanne-Marie Leprince de Beaumont (who was only credited in the French dub), while also containing ideas from the 1946 French film of the same name directed by Jean Cocteau. The film was directed by Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise (in their feature directorial debuts) and produced by Don Hahn, from a screenplay by Linda Woolverton. Beauty and the Beast focuses on the relationship between the Beast (voice of Robby Benson), a prince who is magically transformed into a monster and his servants into household objects as punishment for his arrogance, and Belle (voice of Paige O'Hara), a young woman whom he imprisons in his castle in exchange for her father's freedom. To break the curse, the Beast must learn to love Belle and earn her love in return before the last petal falls from an enchanted rose or else he will remain a monster forever. The film also features the voices of Richard White, Jerry Orbach, David Ogden Stiers, and Angela Lansbury. Walt Disney first attempted to adapt Beauty and the Beast into an animated film during the 1930s and 1950s, but was unsuccessful. Following the success of The Little Mermaid (1989), Walt Disney Pictures decided to adapt the fairy tale, which Richard Purdum originally conceived as a non-musical period drama. After seeing a test reel, Disney chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg scrapped Purdum's idea and ordered that the film be a musical similar to The Little Mermaid instead. Lyricist Howard Ashman and composer Alan Menken wrote the film's songs. Ashman, who additionally served as the film's executive producer, died of AIDS-related complications six months before the film's release, and the film is thus dedicated to his memory. Beauty and the Beast premiered as an unfinished film at the New York Film Festival on September 29, 1991, followed by its theatrical release as a completed film at the El Capitan Theatre on November 13. The film grossed \$331 million at the box office worldwide on a \$25 million budget and received widespread acclaim for its romantic narrative, animation (particularly the ballroom scene), characters, and musical numbers. Beauty and the Beast won the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy, the first animated film to ever win that category. It also became the first animated film to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture at the 64th Academy Awards (ultimately losing to The Silence of the Lambs), where it won the Academy Award for Best Original Score and Best Original Song for its title song and received additional nominations for Best Original Song and Best Sound. In April 1994, Beauty and the Beast became Disney's first animated film to be adapted into a Broadway musical, which ran until 2007. An IMAX version of the film was released in 2002 and included the new song "Human Again", originally an eight-minute storyboarded musical sequence ultimately replaced with "Something There", but later revised in the 1994 musical as a five-minute piece. That same year, the film was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress for being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". After the success of the 3D re-release of The Lion King, the film was reissued in 3D in 2012. In 2014, Time magazine ranked Beauty and the Beast as the greatest film of the Disney Renaissance and one of the greatest animated films of all time. Other derived works and material inspired by the film, include a 2017 live-action remake of the film directed by Bill Condon, which was released on March 17, 2017, and a 2022 musical presentation of the film on ABC as part of The Wonderful World of Disney. ## Plot An enchantress disguised as a beggar woman visits a castle and offers an enchanted rose to a cruel and selfish prince in exchange for shelter from a storm. When he refuses, she reveals her identity and transforms the prince into a beast and his servants into household objects. She warns the prince that the spell will only be broken if he learns to love another and be loved in return before the last petal falls, or he will remain a beast forever. Several years later, in a nearby village, Belle, the book-loving daughter of an eccentric inventor named Maurice, dreams of adventure. She frequently tries avoiding Gaston, a narcissistic hunter who wants to marry her because of her beauty. En route to a fair to showcase his latest invention, an automatic wood chopper, Maurice gets lost in the forest and seeks refuge in the Beast's castle; There, the Beast finds Maurice and imprisons him for trespassing. When Maurice's horse returns alone, Belle ventures out searching for her father, finding him locked in the castle dungeon. Belle agrees to take Maurice's place as the Beast's prisoner in exchange for her father's freedom. Belle befriends the castle's servants: Lumière the candelabra, Cogsworth the clock, Mrs. Potts the teapot, and her son Chip, the teacup; they serve her a dinner through song. When she wanders into the forbidden west wing and finds the rose, the Beast catches her and angrily forces her to flee the castle. In the woods, she is ambushed by a pack of wolves, but the Beast rescues her, and is injured in the process. As Belle nurses his injuries, a rapport develops between them and as time passes, they begin to fall in love. Meanwhile, Maurice returns to the village and fails to convince the townsfolk of Belle's predicament. Hearing Maurice's statements about the Beast, Gaston hatches a plan: He bribes Monsieur D'Arque, the warden of the town's insane asylum, to have Maurice locked up as a lunatic. Gaston will use this to force Belle into marrying him in exchange for Maurice's release. Before they can act, however, Maurice leaves for the castle to attempt a rescue alone. After sharing a romantic dance with the Beast, Belle uses the Beast's magic mirror to check on her father and sees him collapsing in the woods. The Beast releases her to save Maurice, giving her the mirror as a memento. After Belle takes her father to the village, a band of villagers led by Gaston arrives to detain Maurice. Belle uses the mirror to show the Beast to the townsfolk, proving her father's sanity. Realizing that Belle loves the Beast, a jealous Gaston locks Belle and her father in the cellar, and rallies the villagers to help him slay the Beast. Chip, who arrived at their house as a stowaway, activates Maurice's wood-chopping machine, freeing Maurice and Belle from the cellar. When the villagers arrive at the castle, the Beast's servants fend them off. Meanwhile, Gaston attacks the Beast, who is too depressed from Belle's departure to fight back but regains his spirit upon seeing Belle return. He defeats Gaston but spares his life before reuniting with Belle. However, Gaston fatally wounds the Beast before losing his footing and falling to his death. The Beast dies in Belle's arms before the last petal falls. Belle tearfully professes her love to the Beast, and the spell is undone, reviving the Beast and restoring his human form along with his servants and castle. The Prince and Belle host a ball for the kingdom, where they dance happily. ## Voice cast - Paige O'Hara as Belle, a bibliophilic young woman who seeks adventure and offers her own freedom to the Beast in return for her father's. In an effort to "enhance" the character from the original story, the filmmakers felt that Belle should be "unaware" of her own beauty and made her "a little odd". Wise recalls casting O'Hara because of a "unique tone" she had, "a little bit of Judy Garland", after whose appearance Belle was modeled. James Baxter and Mark Henn served as the supervising animators for Belle. - Robby Benson as the Beast, a young prince who is transformed into a talking beast by an enchantress as punishment for his arrogance and selfishness. The animators drew him with the head structure and horns of an American bison, the arms and body of a bear, the eyebrows of a gorilla, the teeth and mane of a lion, the tusks of a wild boar, and the legs and tail of a wolf. Chris Sanders, one of the film's storyboard artists and visual development artists, drafted the designs for the Beast and came up with designs based on birds, insects, and fish before coming up with something close to the final design. Glen Keane, supervising animator for the Beast, refined the design by going to the zoo and studying the animals on which the Beast was based. Benson commented, "There's a rage and torment in this character I've never been asked to use before." The filmmakers commented that "everybody was big fee-fi-fo-fum and gravelly" while Benson had the "big voice and the warm, accessible side" so that "you could hear the prince beneath the fur". - Richard White as Gaston, a vain hunter who vies for Belle's hand in marriage and is determined not to let anyone else win her heart. He serves as a foil personality to the Beast, who was once as egotistical as Gaston prior to his transformation. Gaston's supervising animator, Andreas Deja, was pressed by Jeffrey Katzenberg to make Gaston handsome in contrast to the traditional appearance of a Disney villain, an assignment he found difficult at first. In the beginning, Gaston is depicted as more of a narcissist than a villain, but later he threatens to put Maurice in a mental institution if Belle does not marry him, and eventually leads all the villagers to kill the Beast, enraged that Belle would love a beast more than him. - Jerry Orbach as Lumière, the kind-hearted but rebellious French-accented maître d' of the Beast's castle, who has been transformed into a candelabra. He has a habit of disobeying his master's strict rules, sometimes causing tension between them, but the Beast often turns to him for advice. He is depicted as flirtatious, as he is frequently seen with the Featherduster and immediately takes a liking to Belle. A running gag throughout the film is Lumière burning Cogsworth. Nik Ranieri served as the supervising animator for Lumière. - David Ogden Stiers as Cogsworth, the Beast's majordomo, the head butler of the household staff and Lumière's best friend, who has been turned into a mantel clock. He is extremely loyal to the Beast so as to save himself and anyone else any trouble, often leading to friction between himself and Lumière. Will Finn served as the supervising animator for Cogsworth. Stiers also narrates the prologue. - Angela Lansbury as Mrs. Potts, the castle cook, turned into a teapot, who takes a motherly attitude toward Belle. The filmmakers went through several names for Mrs. Potts, such as "Mrs. Chamomile", before Ashman suggested the use of simple and concise names for the household objects. David Pruiksma served as the supervising animator for Mrs. Potts. - Bradley Pierce as Chip, Mrs. Potts's son, who has been transformed into a teacup. Originally intended to only have one line, the filmmakers were impressed with Pierce's performance and expanded the character's role significantly, eschewing a mute Music Box character. Pruiksma also served as the supervising animator for Chip. - Rex Everhart as Maurice, Belle's inventor father. The villagers see him as insane for crafting devices believed impossible to construct in reality, but his loyal daughter believes he will be famous one day. Ruben A. Aquino served as the supervising animator for Maurice. - Jesse Corti as LeFou, Gaston's often abused yet loyal and bumbling sidekick. He looks up to Gaston as his hero, and sings a song with the other villagers to cheer him up. His name is French for "The Madman" and also a phonetic play on "The Fool". Chris Wahl served as the supervising animator for LeFou. - Jo Anne Worley as the Wardrobe, the castle's authority over fashion, and a former opera singer, who has been turned into a wardrobe. The character of Wardrobe was introduced by visual development artist Sue C. Nichols to the then entirely male cast of servants, and was originally a more integral character named "Madame Armoire". Wardrobe is known as "Madame de la Grande Bouche" (Madame Big Mouth) in the stage adaptation of the film and is the only major enchanted object character whose human form does not appear in the film. Tony Anselmo served as the supervising animator for the Wardrobe. - Hal Smith as Philippe, Belle's horse. Russ Edmonds served as the supervising animator for Philippe. - Mary Kay Bergman and Kath Soucie as the Bimbettes, a trio of village maidens who constantly fawn over Gaston, known as the "Silly Girls" or "Les Filles De La Ville" (the village girls) in the stage adaptation. - Jack Angel, Phil Proctor, Bill Farmer, and Patrick Pinney as Tom, Dick, Stanley, and Gramps, respectively, Gaston and LeFou's circle of friends. - Brian Cummings as the Stove, the castle's chef who has been transformed into a stove. He is named Chef Bouche in 1998's Belle's Magical World. - Alvin Epstein as the Bookseller, the owner of a book shop in Belle's village. - Tony Jay as Monsieur D'Arque, the sadistic warden of the Asylum de Loons. Gaston bribes him to help in his plan to blackmail Belle. - Alec Murphy as the Baker, the owner of a bakery in Belle's village. - Kimmy Robertson as the Featherduster, a maid and Lumière's sweetheart, who has been turned into a feather duster. She is never mentioned by name in the 1991 film (listed as Featherduster in the credits); Babette is the name given to this character later in the 1994 stage adaptation of the film; Fifi in the 1998 animated musical film Belle's Magical World and Plumette in the 2017 live-action remake. - Frank Welker as Sultan, the castle's pet dog turned into a footstool. ## Production ### Early versions After the success of Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs in 1937, Walt Disney sought out other stories to adapt into feature films, with Beauty and the Beast being among the stories he considered. Attempts to develop the Beauty and the Beast story into a film were made in the 1930s and 1950s, but were ultimately given up because it "proved to be a challenge" for the story team. Peter M. Nichols states Disney may later have been discouraged by Jean Cocteau having already done his 1946 version. Decades later, during the production of Who Framed Roger Rabbit in 1987, the Disney studio resurrected Beauty and the Beast as a project for the satellite animation studio it had set up in London, England to work on Roger Rabbit. Richard Williams, who had directed the animated portions of Roger Rabbit, was approached to direct but declined in favor of continuing work on his long-gestating project The Thief and the Cobbler. In his place, Williams recommended his colleague, English animation director Richard Purdum, and work began under producer Don Hahn on a non-musical version of Beauty and the Beast set in 19th-century France. At the behest of Disney CEO Michael Eisner, Beauty and the Beast became the first Disney animated film to use a screenwriter. This was an unusual move for an animated film, which is traditionally developed on storyboards rather than in a scripted form. Linda Woolverton wrote the original draft of the story before storyboarding began, and worked with the story team to retool and develop the film. ### Script rewrite and musicalization Upon seeing the initial storyboard reels in 1989, Walt Disney Studios chairman Jeffrey Katzenberg was dissatisfied with Purdum's idea and ordered that the film be scrapped and started over from scratch. A few months after starting anew, Purdum resigned as director. The studio had approached John Musker and Ron Clements to direct the film, but they turned down the offer, saying they were "tired" after just having finished directing Disney's recent success The Little Mermaid. Katzenberg then hired first-time feature directors Kirk Wise and Gary Trousdale. Wise and Trousdale had previously directed the animated sections of Cranium Command, a short film for a Disney EPCOT theme park attraction. In addition, wanting another musical film, Katzenberg asked songwriters Howard Ashman and Alan Menken, who had written the song score for The Little Mermaid, to turn Beauty and the Beast into a Broadway-style musical film in the same vein as Mermaid. Ashman, who at the time had learned he was dying of complications from AIDS, had been working with Disney on a pet project of his, Aladdin, and only reluctantly agreed to join the struggling production team. To accommodate Ashman's failing health, pre-production of Beauty and the Beast was moved from London to the Residence Inn in Fishkill, New York, close to Ashman's New York City home. Here, Ashman and Menken joined Wise, Trousdale, Hahn, and Woolverton in retooling the film's script. Since the original story had only two major characters, the filmmakers enhanced them, added new characters in the form of enchanted household items who "add warmth and comedy to a gloomy story" and guide the audience through the film, and added a "real villain" in the form of Gaston. These ideas were somewhat similar to elements of the 1946 French film version of Beauty and the Beast, which introduced the character of Avenant, an oafish suitor somewhat similar to Gaston, as well as inanimate objects coming to life in the Beast's castle. The animated objects were, however, given distinct personalities in the Disney version. By early 1990, Katzenberg had approved the revised script, and storyboarding began again. The production flew story artists back and forth between California and New York for storyboard approvals from Ashman, though the team was not told the reason why. ### Casting and recording Disney had originally considered casting Jodi Benson from The Little Mermaid as Belle. They eventually decided upon Broadway actress and singer Paige O'Hara in favor of having a heroine who sounded "more like a woman than a girl". According to co-director Kirk Wise, O'Hara was given the role because she "had a unique quality, a tone she would hit that made her special", reminiscent to that of American actress and singer Judy Garland. O'Hara, who, after reading about the film in The New York Times, competed for the role against 500 hopefuls, believes the fact that lyricist Howard Ashman admired her cast recording of the musical Show Boat proved integral in her being cast. Laurence Fishburne, Val Kilmer and Mandy Patinkin were originally considered to voice the Beast, the role was eventually given to actor Robby Benson. John Cleese was originally intended to voice Cogsworth, but later turned it down to voice Cat. R. Waul in the Universal Pictures animated film An American Tail: Fievel Goes West, and the role was eventually given to David Ogden Stiers. Julie Andrews was originally considered to voice Mrs. Potts, but the role was eventually given to Angela Lansbury. ### Animation Production of Beauty and the Beast was to be completed on a compressed timeline of two years rather than the traditional four-year Disney Feature Animation production schedule; this was due to the loss of production time spent developing the earlier Purdum version of the film. Most of the production was done at the main Feature Animation studio, housed in the Air Way facility in Glendale, California. A smaller team at the Disney-MGM Studios theme park in Lake Buena Vista, Florida assisted the California team on several scenes, particularly the "Be Our Guest" number. Beauty and the Beast was the second film, after The Rescuers Down Under, produced using CAPS (Computer Animation Production System), a digital scanning, ink, paint, and compositing system of software and hardware developed for Disney by Pixar. The software allowed for a wider range of colors, as well as soft shading and colored line effects for the characters, techniques lost when the Disney studio abandoned hand inking for xerography in the early 1960s. CAPS/ink & paint also allowed the production crew to simulate multiplane effects: placing characters and/or backgrounds on separate layers and moving them towards/away from the camera on the Z-axis to give the illusion of depth, as well as altering the focus of each layer. In addition, CAPS/ink & paint allowed an easier combination of hand-drawn art with computer-generated imagery, which before had to be plotted to animation paper and then xeroxed and painted traditionally. This technique was put to significant use during the "Beauty and the Beast" waltz sequence, in which Belle and Beast dance through a computer-generated ballroom as the camera dollies around them in simulated 3D space. The filmmakers had originally decided against the use of computers in favor of traditional animation, but later, when the technology had improved, decided it could be used for the one scene in the ballroom. Before that, CGI environments had first been printed out as wireframe, but this was the first time Disney made use of 3D rendering. The success of the ballroom sequence helped convince studio executives to further invest in computer animation. The technology hardware that was used for the CGI was SGI, and the software that was used is Pixar's RenderMan. The final dance between Belle and the Prince was reused from the final dance sequence between Princess Aurora and Prince Phillip from the 1959 film Sleeping Beauty. According to Trousdale, this was done because production of the film was nearing the deadline, and this was the easiest way to do that sequence. ### Music Ashman and Menken wrote the Beauty song score during the pre-production process in Fishkill, the opening operetta-styled "Belle" being their first composition for the film. Other songs included "Be Our Guest", sung (in its original version) to Maurice by the objects when he becomes the first visitor to eat at the castle in a decade, "Gaston", a solo for the swaggering villain and his bumbling sidekick, "Human Again", a song describing Belle and Beast's growing love from the objects' perspective, the love ballad "Beauty and the Beast (Tale as Old as Time)" and the climactic "The Mob Song". As story and song development came to a close, full production began in Burbank while voice and song recording began in New York City. The Beauty songs were mostly recorded live with the orchestra and the voice cast performing simultaneously rather than overdubbed separately, in order to give the songs a cast album-like "energy" the filmmakers and songwriters desired. During the course of production, many changes were made to the structure of the film, necessitating the replacement and re-purposing of songs. After screening a mostly animated version of the "Be Our Guest" sequence, story artist Bruce Woodside suggested that the objects should be singing the song to Belle rather than her father. Wise and Trousdale agreed, and the sequence and song were retooled to replace Maurice with Belle. The film's title song went through a noted bit of uncertainty during production. Originally conceived as a rock-oriented song, it was changed to a slow, romantic ballad. Howard Ashman and Alan Menken asked Angela Lansbury to perform the song, but she did not think her voice was suited for the melody. When she voiced her doubts, Menken and Ashman asked her for at least one take and told her to perform the song as she saw fit. Lansbury reportedly reduced everyone in the studio to tears with her rendition, nailing the song in the one take asked of her. This version went on to win the Oscar for Best Original Song. "Human Again" was dropped from the film before animation began, as its lyrics caused story problems about the timeline over which the story takes place. This required Ashman and Menken to write a new song in its place. "Something There", in which Belle and Beast sing (via voiceover) of their growing fondness for each other, was composed late in production and inserted into the script in place of "Human Again". Menken would later revise "Human Again" for inclusion in the 1994 Broadway stage version of Beauty and the Beast, and another revised version of the song was added to the film itself in a new sequence created for the film's Special Edition re-release in 2002. Ashman died of AIDS-related complications at the age of 40 on March 14, 1991, eight months before the film's release. He never saw the finished film, though he did get to see it in its unfinished format. Ashman's work on Aladdin was completed by another lyricist, Tim Rice. Before Ashman's death, members of the film's production team visited him after the film's well-received first screening, with Don Hahn commenting that "the film would be a great success. Who'd have thought it?" Ashman replied, "I would". A tribute to the lyricist was included at the end of the credits crawl: "To our friend, Howard, who gave a mermaid her voice, and a beast his soul. We will be forever grateful. Howard Ashman: 1950–1991." A pop version of the "Beauty and the Beast" theme, performed by Céline Dion and Peabo Bryson over the end credits, was released as a commercial single from the film's soundtrack, supported with a music video. The Dion/Bryson version of "Beauty and the Beast" became an international pop hit and performed considerably well on charts around the world. The song became Dion's second single to land within the top-10 of the Billboard Hot 100, peaking at number nine. The song peaked at number three on the Billboard Hot Adult Contemporary chart. In Canada, "Beauty and the Beast" peaked at number two. Outside of North America, the song peaked within the top ten in New Zealand and the United Kingdom, while peaking within the top twenty in Australia, Netherlands, and Ireland. The song sold over a million copies worldwide. This version of the song was also nominated for Record of the Year, Song of the Year, and Best Pop Duo/Group Vocal Performance at the 35th Annual Grammy Awards, winning the latter. ## Release ### Work-in-progress and original theatrical run In a first-time accomplishment for The Walt Disney Company, an unfinished version of Beauty and the Beast was shown at the New York Film Festival on September 29, 1991. The film was deemed a "work in progress" because roughly only 70% of the animation had been completed; storyboards and pencil tests were used in replacement of the remaining 30%. Additionally, certain segments of the film that had already been finished were reverted to previous stages of completion. At the end of the screening, Beauty and the Beast received a ten-minute-long standing ovation from the film festival audience. The completed film was also screened out of competition at the 1992 Cannes Film Festival. The finished film premiered at the El Capitan Theatre in Hollywood on November 13, 1991, beginning a limited release before expanding wide on November 22, along with An American Tail: Fievel Goes West. ### Re-issues The film was restored and remastered for its New Year's Day, 2002 re-release in IMAX theatres in a special-edition edit, including a new musical sequence. For this version of the film, much of the animation was cleaned up, a new sequence set to the deleted song "Human Again" was inserted into the film's second act, and a new digital master from the original CAPS production files was used to make the high-resolution IMAX film negative. A sing-along edition, hosted by Jordin Sparks, was released in select theaters on September 29 and October 2, 2010. Prior to the showing, Sparks showed an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at the newly restored film and the making of her new Beauty and the Beast music video. There was also commentary from producer Hahn, interviews with the cast and an inside look at how the animation was created. A Disney Digital 3D version, the second of a traditionally animated film, was originally scheduled to be released in US theatres on February 12, 2010, but the project was postponed, first to 2011 and then to 2012. On August 25, 2011, Disney announced that the 3D version would make its American debut at Hollywood's El Capitan Theatre from September 2–15, 2011. Disney spent less than \$10 million on the 3D conversion. After the successful 3D re-release of The Lion King, Disney announced a wide 3D re-release of Beauty and the Beast in North America beginning January 13, 2012. Beauty and the Beast was re-released between August 18 to 31, 2023 in selected Cinemark theaters as part of Disney's 100th anniversary. ### Home media On October 30, 1992, in the United States and Canada, Walt Disney Home Video (currently known as Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment) released the film to VHS and LaserDisc as part of the Walt Disney Classics series, and later put it on moratorium on April 30, 1993, it was not included in the Walt Disney Masterpiece Collection line. The "work-in-progress" version screened at the New York Film Festival was also released on VHS and LaserDisc at this time; however, said version was the only one available on the latter format until the fall of 1993, when the completed theatrical version was released. This measure was to diminish the threat of video pirates making copies derived from the LaserDisc (which are not copy-protected) and selling them in international markets, where the film was yet to be available for home release. By October 1993, the VHS sold a record 20-22 million units. In 1993, the film was also released on home video in different countries, including the United Kingdom on September 20 of that year, and sold a record 8.5 million units. Beauty and the Beast: Special Edition, as the enhanced version of the film released in IMAX/large-format is called, was released on a THX certified "Platinum Edition" two-disc DVD and VHS on October 8, 2002. The DVD set features three versions of the film: the extended IMAX Special Edition with the "Human Again" sequence added, the original theatrical version, and the New York Film Festival "work-in-progress" version. This release went to "Disney Vault" moratorium status in January 2003, along with its direct-to-video follow-ups Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas and Belle's Magical World. The Special Edition DVD was released on November 2, 2002, in the United Kingdom, while the other 50 international territories released on Autumn 2002 as "Special Limited Edition". The film was released from the vault on October 5, 2010, as the second of Disney's Diamond Editions, in the form of a three-disc Blu-ray Disc and DVD combination pack—the first release of Beauty and the Beast on home video in high-definition format. This edition consists of four versions of the film: the original theatrical version, an extended version, the New York Film Festival storyboard-only version, and a fourth iteration displaying the storyboards via picture-in-picture alongside the original theatrical version. Upon its first week of release, the Blu-ray sold 1.1 million units, topping the Blu-ray sales chart and finishing in third place on the combined Blu-ray and DVD sales chart for the week ending on October 10, 2010. It was the second-best-selling Blu-ray of 2010, behind Avatar. A two-disc DVD edition was released on November 23, 2010. A five-disc combo pack, featuring Blu-ray 3D, Blu-ray 2D, DVD and a digital copy, was released on October 4, 2011. The 3D combo pack is identical to the original Diamond Edition, except for the added 3D disc and digital copy. The Blu-ray release went into the Disney Vault along with the two sequels on April 30, 2012. A 25th-anniversary Signature Edition was released on Digital HD September 6, 2016, and was followed by Blu-ray/DVD combo pack on September 20, 2016. Upon its first week of release on home media in the U.S., the film topped the Blu-ray Disc sales chart, and debuted at number 3 in the Nielsen VideoScan First Alert chart, which tracks overall disc sales, behind Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out of the Shadows and Captain America: Civil War. The film was released on 4K digital download and Ultra HD Blu-ray on March 10, 2020. ## Reception ### Box office For its original theatrical run, Beauty and the Beast earned \$9.6 million in its opening weekend, ranking in third place behind The Addams Family and Cape Fear. During its initial release in 1991, the film grossed \$145.9 million in revenues in North America and \$331.9 million worldwide. It ranked as the third-most successful film of 1991 in North America, surpassed only by the summer blockbusters Terminator 2: Judgment Day and Robin Hood: Prince of Thieves. At the time, Beauty and the Beast was the most successful animated Disney film release, and the first animated film to reach \$100 million in the United States and Canada in its initial run. In its IMAX re-release, it earned \$25.5 million in North America and \$5.5 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of \$31 million. It also earned \$9.8 million from its 3D re-release overseas. During the opening weekend of its North American 3D re-release in 2012, Beauty and the Beast grossed \$17.8 million, coming in at the No. 2 spot, behind Contraband, and achieved the highest opening weekend for an animated film in January. The film was expected to make \$17.5 million over the weekend; however, the results topped its forecast and the expectations of box office analysts. The re-release ended its run on May 3, 2012, and earned \$47.6 million, which brought the film's total gross in North America to \$219 million. It made an estimated \$206 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of \$425 million. It was the highest-grossing film in Italy, surpassing the 39 billion lira grossed by Johnny Stecchino. ### Critical response Upon its release, Beauty and the Beast received universal acclaim from critics and audiences alike for its animation, screenplay, characters, musical score, musical numbers, and voice acting. Review aggregator website Rotten Tomatoes gives the film an approval rating of based on reviews from critics, with an average rating of . The website's critical consensus reads, "Enchanting, sweepingly romantic, and featuring plenty of wonderful musical numbers, Beauty and the Beast is one of Disney's most elegant animated offerings." The film also holds a score of 95/100 on Metacritic, which indicates the reviews as "universal acclaim". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film a rare "A+" grade. Janet Maslin of The New York Times praised the film with the following statement, "Two years ago, Walt Disney Pictures reinvented the animated feature, not only with an eye toward pleasing children, but also with an older, savvier audience in mind. Disney truly bridged a generation gap with The Little Mermaid ... Now, lightning has definitely struck twice with Beauty and the Beast." Awarding the film a perfect score of four stars, Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times compared Beauty and the Beast positively to Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and Pinocchio, writing, "Beauty and the Beast reaches back to an older and healthier Hollywood tradition in which the best writers, musicians and filmmakers are gathered for a project on the assumption that a family audience deserves great entertainment, too." In 2001 Ebert again gave the IMAX re-release a full 4 out of 4 stars. James Berardinelli of ReelViews rated the film similarly while hailing it as "the finest animated movie ever made", writing, "Beauty and the Beast attains a nearly-perfect mix of romance, music, invention, and animation." The use of computer animation, particularly in the ballroom sequence, was singled out in several reviews as one of the film's highlights. Hal Hinson of The Washington Post gave the film a positive review, calling the film "A delightfully satisfying modern fable, a near-masterpiece that draws on the sublime traditions of the past while remaining completely in sync with the sensibility of its time." Janet Maslin of The New York Times gave the film a positive review, saying "It is a surprise, in a time of sequels and retreads, that the new film is so fresh and altogether triumphant in its own right." Dave Kehr of the Chicago Tribune gave the film three out of four stars, saying "Beauty and the Beast is certainly adequate holiday entertainment for children and their more indulgent parents ... But the film has little of the technical facility, vivid characterization and emotional impact of Disney past." Jay Boyar of the Orlando Sentinel gave the film four out of five stars, saying "It's not an especially scary movie, but right from the start, you can tell that this Beauty and the Beast has a beauty of a bite." John Hartl of The Seattle Times gave the film three-and-a-half stars out of four, saying "It's exceptionally difficult to make an audience care for animated characters unless they're mermaids or anthropomorphized animals or insects, yet the Disney animators, with a big assist from the vocal talents of a superb cast, have pulled it off." Gene Siskel, also of the Chicago Tribune, gave the film four out of four stars, saying "Beauty and the Beast is one of the year's most entertaining films for both adults and children." On their Beauty and the Beast edition of Siskel & Ebert, both Siskel and Roger Ebert proclaimed that the film is "a legitimate contender for Oscar consideration as Best Picture of the Year". Michael Sragow of The New Yorker gave the film a positive review, saying "It's got storytelling vigor and clarity, bright, eclectic animation, and a frisky musical wit." Eric Smoodin writes in his book Animating Culture that the studio was trying to make up for earlier gender stereotypes with this film. Smoodin also states that, in the way it has been viewed as bringing together traditional fairy tales and feminism as well as computer and traditional animation, the film's "greatness could be proved in terms of technology narrative or even politics". Animation legend Chuck Jones praised the film, in a 1992 guest appearance on Later with Bob Costas he claimed he "Loved it. I think it should have won [Best Picture] ... I think the animation on the beast is one of the greatest pieces of animation I've seen". Animation historian Michael Barrier wrote that Belle "becomes a sort of intellectual less by actually reading books, it seems, than by hanging out with them", but says that the film comes closer than other "Disney-studio" films to "accepting challenges of the kind that the finest Walt Disney features met". David Whitley writes in The Idea of Nature in Disney Animation that Belle is different from earlier Disney heroines in that she is mostly free from the burdens of domestic housework, although her role is somewhat undefined in the same way that "contemporary culture now requires most adolescent girls to contribute little in the way of domestic work before they leave home and have to take on the fraught, multiple responsibilities of the working mother". Whitley also notes other themes and modern influences, such as the film's critical view of Gaston's chauvinism and attitude towards nature, the cyborg-like servants, and the father's role as an inventor rather than a merchant. Beauty and the Beast has been named one of Disney's most critically acclaimed films. In 2010, IGN named Beauty and the Beast as the greatest animated film of all time, directly ahead of WALL-E, The Incredibles, Toy Story 2, and The Iron Giant. Most critics regard the 1991 animated film as superior to the 2017 live-action remake. Michael Phillips of the Chicago Tribune stated that the 1991 film "worked wonderfully because it was pure Broadway, written for the screen, blending comedy and romance and magic and just enough snark in the margins", while the 2017 remake got lost in translation since "The movie takes our knowledge and our interest in the material for granted. It zips from one number to another, throwing a ton of frenetically edited eye candy at the screen, charmlessly." Phillips also wrote of the 2017 film that "too often we're watching highly qualified performers, plus a few less conspicuously talented ones ..., stuck doing karaoke, or motion-capture work of middling quality". Dana Schwartz of the Observer criticized some of the 2017 film changes to characters such as the Beast and Gaston as regressive by watering down their distinguishing personalities from the 1991 film, further arguing that the added backstory to the characters in the 2017 version failed to "advance the plot or theme in any meaningful way". David Sims of The Atlantic wrote that the 2017 film "feels particularly egregious, in part, because it's so slavishly devoted to the original; every time it falls short of its predecessor (which is quite often), it's hard not to notice". ### Accolades `Alan Menken and Howard Ashman's song "Beauty and the Beast" won the Academy Award for Best Original Song, while Menken's score won the award for Best Original Score. Two other Menken and Ashman songs from the film, "Belle" and "Be Our Guest", were also nominated for Best Original Song. Beauty and the Beast was the first picture to receive three Academy Award nominations for Best Original Song, a feat that would be repeated by The Lion King (1994), Dreamgirls (2006), and Enchanted (2007). Academy rules have since been changed to limit each film to two nominations in this category, due to the consecutive unintentional failures of Dreamgirls and Enchanted to win the award.` The film was also nominated for Best Picture and Best Sound. It was the first animated film ever to be nominated for Best Picture, and remained the only animated film nominated until 2009 when the Best Picture field was widened to ten nominees, and it remains the only animated film nominated for the award when it had five nominees. It was the third Disney film ever to be nominated for Best Picture, following Mary Poppins (1964) and Dead Poets Society (1989). It became the first musical in twelve years to be nominated for the Academy Award for Best Picture of the Year, following All That Jazz (1979), and the last one to be nominated until Moulin Rouge! (2001), ten years later. It lost the Best Picture award to The Silence of the Lambs and the Best Sound award to Terminator 2: Judgment Day. With six nominations, the film currently shares the record for the most nominations for an animated film with WALL-E (2008), although, with three nominations in the Best Original Song category, Beauty and the Beast's nominations span only four categories, while WALL-E's nominations cover six individual categories. While The Little Mermaid was the first to be nominated, Beauty and the Beast became the first animated film to win the Golden Globe Award for Best Motion Picture – Musical or Comedy. This feat was later repeated by The Lion King and Toy Story 2. In 2002, Beauty and the Beast was added to the United States National Film Registry as being deemed "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". In June 2008, the American Film Institute revealed its "Ten Top Ten" lists of the best ten films in ten "classic" American film genres, based on polls of over 1,500 people from the creative community. Beauty and the Beast was acknowledged as the seventh-best film in the animation genre. In previous lists, it ranked number 22 on the institute's list of best musicals and number 34 on its list of the best romantic American films. On the list of the greatest songs from American films, Beauty and the Beast ranked number 62. American Film Institute recognition: - AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies – Nominated - AFI's 100 Years...100 Passions – No. 34 - AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes and Villains: - Belle – Nominated Hero - AFI's 100 Years...100 Songs: - "Beauty and the Beast" – No. 62 - "Be Our Guest" – Nominated - AFI's Greatest Movie Musicals – No. 22 - AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies (10th Anniversary Edition) – Nominated - AFI's 10 Top 10 – No. 7 Animated film ## Adaptations ### Broadway musical According to an article in the Houston Chronicle, "The catalyst for Disney's braving the stage was an article by The New York Times theater critic Frank Rich that praised Beauty and the Beast as 1991's best musical. Theatre Under The Stars (TUTS) executive director Frank Young had been trying to get Disney interested in a stage version of Beauty about the same time Eisner and Katzenberg were mulling over Rich's column. But Young couldn't seem to get in touch with the right person in the Disney empire. Nothing happened till the Disney execs started to pursue the project from their end. When they asked George Ives, the head of Actors Equity on the West Coast, which Los Angeles theater would be the best venue for launching a new musical, Ives said the best theater for that purpose would be TUTS. Not long after that, Disney's Don Frantz and Bettina Buckley contacted Young, and the partnership was under way." A stage condensation of the film, directed by Robert Jess Roth and choreographed by Matt West, both of whom moved on to the Broadway development, had already been presented at Disneyland at what was then called the Videopolis stage. Beauty and the Beast premiered in a joint production of Theatre Under The Stars and Disney Theatricals at the Music Hall, Houston, Texas, from November 28, 1993, through December 26, 1993. On April 18, 1994, Beauty and the Beast premiered on Broadway at the Palace Theatre in New York City to mixed reviews. The show transferred to the Lunt-Fontanne Theatre on November 11, 1999. The commercial success of the show led to productions in the West End, Toronto, and all over the world. The Broadway version, which ran for over a decade, received a Tony Award, and became the first of a whole line of Disney stage productions. The original Broadway cast included Terrence Mann as the Beast, Susan Egan as Belle, Burke Moses as Gaston, Gary Beach as Lumière, Heath Lamberts as Cogsworth, Tom Bosley as Maurice, Beth Fowler as Mrs. Potts, and Stacey Logan as Babette the feather duster. Many well-known actors and singers also starred in the Broadway production during its thirteen-year run, including Kerry Butler, Deborah Gibson, Toni Braxton, Andrea McArdle, Jamie-Lynn Sigler, Christy Carlson Romano, Ashley Brown, and Anneliese van der Pol as Belle; Chuck Wagner, James Barbour, and Jeff McCarthy as the Beast; Meshach Taylor, Patrick Page, Bryan Batt, Jacob Young, and John Tartaglia as Lumière; Marc Kudisch, Christopher Sieber, and Donny Osmond as Gaston; and Nick Jonas, Harrison Chad, and Andrew Keenan-Bolger as Chip. The show ended its Broadway run on July 29, 2007, after 46 previews and 5,461 performances. As of 2017, it is Broadway's tenth-longest-running show in history. ### Live-action film In June 2014, Walt Disney Pictures announced that a live-action film adaptation of the original animated film was in the works, with Bill Condon directing and Evan Spiliotopoulos penning the screenplay. Condon originally planned on not only drawing inspiration from the animated film, but also to include most, if not all, of the Menken/Rice songs from the Broadway musical, with the intention of making the film as a "straight-forward, live-action, large-budget movie musical". In September 2014, it was announced that Stephen Chbosky would re-write the script. In January 2015, Emma Watson announced via her Facebook page that she would portray Belle in the live-action film. In March 2015, Dan Stevens, Luke Evans, Emma Thompson, Josh Gad, Audra McDonald, and Kevin Kline joined the film as the Beast, Gaston, Mrs. Potts, Lefou, Garderobe, and Maurice, respectively. The following month, Ian McKellen, Ewan McGregor, Stanley Tucci, and Gugu Mbatha-Raw joined the cast, as Cogsworth, Lumière, Cadenza, and Plumette, respectively. Composer Alan Menken returned to score the film's music, with new material written by Menken and Tim Rice. In June 2015, Menken said the film would not include the songs that were written for the Broadway musical. Filming began on May 18, 2015, in London, and at Shepperton Studios in Surrey. Production officially wrapped in August 2015. The film was released on March 17, 2017. ### Beauty and the Beast at the Hollywood Bowl In 2018, a live concert celebration took place at the Hollywood Bowl, directed by Richard Kraft and Kenneth Shapiro. The cast included Zooey Deschanel as Belle, Anthony Evans as the Beast, Taye Diggs as Gaston, Kelsey Grammer as Lumiere, Rebel Wilson as LeFou, Jane Krakowski as Mrs. Potts, and Baraka May as Chip. They were accompanied by a live orchestra, singing songs from the original film. ### Beauty and the Beast: A 30th Celebration On July 5, 2022, ABC reported that a live-action/animation special was in development that would air on December 15, 2022, with Hamish Hamilton set to direct and Jon M. Chu as executive producer. ABC said that it would include live never-before-seen musical performances, along with new sets and costumes inspired by the classic story. On July 20, 2022, it was reported that H.E.R. was cast to play Belle. In September 2022, Josh Groban, Joshua Henry, and Rita Moreno, had been cast as the Beast, Gaston, and the narrator, respectively. David Alan Grier was later announced to play Cogsworth. During the month, Martin Short and Shania Twain entered final talks to play Lumiere and Mrs. Potts, respectively. Rizwan Manji, Jon Jon Briones, and Leo Abelo Perry complete the cast as LeFou, Maurice, and Chip, respectively. On December 12, 2022, D23 revealed that Paige O'Hara (the original voice of Belle), Richard White (the original voice of Gaston), and composer Alan Menken would cameo in the special as, respectively, the Bookseller, the Baker, and a piano player during "Belle". ## Merchandise Beauty and the Beast merchandise cover a wide variety of products, among them storybook versions of the film's story, a comic book based on the film published by Disney Comics, toys, children's costumes, and other items. In addition, the character of Belle has been integrated into the "Disney Princess" line of Disney's Consumer Products division, and appears on merchandise related to that franchise. In 1995, a live-action children's series entitled Sing Me a Story with Belle began running in syndication, remaining on the air through 1999. Two direct-to-video followups (which take place during the timeline depicted in the original film) were produced by Walt Disney Television Animation: Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas in 1997 and Belle's Magical World in 1998; in contrast to the universal acclaim of the original, reception to the sequels was extremely negative. Disney on Ice produced an ice version of the movie that opened in 1992 in Lakeland, Florida. The show was such a huge commercial and critical success, touring around the world to sell-out crowds, that a television special was made when it toured Spain in 1994. The show ended its run in 2006, after 14 years. ### Video games The first video game based on the film was titled Beauty and the Beast: Belle's Quest and is an action platformer for the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis. Developed by Software Creations, the game was released in North America in 1993. It is one of two video games based on the film that Sunsoft published for the Mega Drive/Genesis, the other being Beauty and The Beast: Roar of the Beast. Characters from the film like Gaston can help the player past tricky situations. As Belle, the player must reach the Beast's castle and break the spell to live happily ever after. To succeed, she must explore the village, forest, castle, and snowy forest to solve puzzles and mini-games while ducking or jumping over enemies. Belle's health is represented by a stack of blue books, which diminishes when she touches bats, rats, and other hazards in the game. Extra lives, keys and other items are hidden throughout the levels. While there is no continue or game saving ability, players can use a code to start the game at any of the seven levels. The second video game based on the film was titled Beauty and the Beast: Roar of the Beast and is a side-scrolling video game for the Genesis. As the Beast, the player must successfully complete several levels, based on scenes from the film, in order to protect the castle from invading villagers and forest animals and rescue Belle from Gaston. The third and fourth video games based on the film are action platformers developed by Probe Software and published by Hudson Soft. One, titled Beauty and the Beast, was released in Europe in 1994 for the NES, while the other, Disney's Beauty and the Beast, was released in North America in July 1994 and in Europe on February 23, 1995, for the SNES. The entire games are played through the perspective of the Beast. As the Beast, the player must get Belle to fall in love so that the curse cast upon him and his castle will be broken. The final boss of the game is Gaston. The Beast can walk, jump, swipe, stomp, super stomp, and roar, the last of which is used to both damage enemies and reveal hidden objects. The fifth video game based on the film was titled Disney's Beauty and the Beast: A Board Game Adventure and is a Disney Boardgame adventure for the Game Boy Color. It was released on October 25, 1999. The video game series Kingdom Hearts features a world based on the film, named "Beast's Castle", along with several of the film's characters. In the first game, the world has been destroyed and Belle kidnapped by the Heartless, led by Maleficent, but the Beast travels to Maleficent's stronghold and works with Sora to defeat Maleficent and rescue Belle and the other captured princesses. In Kingdom Hearts II, the world has since been restored following Ansem's defeat, but Beast and Belle are having difficulties due to the enigmatic Xaldin of Organization XIII attempting to bring out the Beast's darker side in order to turn him into a Heartless and a Nobody, but the Beast eventually comes to his senses and works with Sora once again to defeat Xaldin once and for all. In the game's ending credits, the Beast turns back into the Prince. In Kingdom Hearts: 358/2 Days, the world is featured as a playable level but the story is not essential to the main plot. In Kingdom Hearts χ, the world is featured again, this time as a hallucination that follows the plot of the movie more closely. The characters featured in the series are Beast, Belle, Lumiere, Gaston, Cogsworth, Mrs. Potts, Chip, Maurice, and the Wardrobe. After Gaston is defeated, the Beast transforms back into the Prince. Gaston does not appear in Kingdom Hearts II, the world's primary antagonist being Xaldin, an original character created for the series, but who shares several traits with Forte, the main antagonist of Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas. ## Sequels The success of the film spawned three direct-to-video sequels: Beauty and the Beast: The Enchanted Christmas (1997) and Beauty and the Beast: Belle's Magical World (1998), and Belle's Tales of Friendship (1999), all of which take place in the timeline of the original. This was followed by a live-action spin-off television series, Sing Me a Story with Belle. ## Theme park attraction - A dark ride based on the film, Enchanted Tale of Beauty and the Beast, opened at Tokyo Disneyland in 2020. ## See also - List of Disney theatrical animated feature films - List of Disney animated films based on fairy tales
2,944,620	Japanese battleship Aki	1,136,854,039	Imperial Japanese Navy's Satsuma-class battleship	[ "1907 ships", "Maritime incidents in 1924", "Satsuma-class battleships", "Ships built by Kure Naval Arsenal", "Ships sunk as targets", "Shipwrecks in the Pacific Ocean", "World War I battleships of Japan" ]	Aki (安芸) was one of two Satsuma-class semi-dreadnought battleship built for the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) during the first decade of the 20th century. She was the second battleship built domestically in Japan and the first to use steam turbines for propulsion. The ship was named for Aki Province, now a part of Hiroshima Prefecture. The ship saw no combat during World War I. Aki was disarmed in 1922 and sunk as a target in 1924 in accordance with the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty of 1922. ## Background The Satsuma class was ordered in late 1904 under the 1904 War Naval Supplementary Program during the Russo-Japanese War. Unlike the previous Katori-class pre-dreadnought battleships, they were the first battleships ordered from Japanese shipyards. They were originally designed with a dozen 12-inch (305 mm) guns, but had to be redesigned because of a shortage of guns in Japan and to reduce costs. ## Design and description The ship had an overall length of 492 feet (150 m), a beam of 83 feet 7 inches (25.5 m), and a normal draft of 27 feet 6 inches (8.4 m). She displaced 20,100 long tons (20,400 t) at normal load. The crew consisted of 931 officers and enlisted men. Aki was fitted with a pair of Curtiss steam turbine sets, each driving one shaft using steam from 15 Miyabara water-tube boilers. The turbines were rated at a total of 24,000 shaft horsepower (18,000 kW) for a design speed of 20 knots (37 km/h; 23 mph). The ship reached a top speed of 20.25 knots (37.5 km/h; 23.3 mph) during her sea trials from 27,740 shp (20,690 kW). She carried enough coal and oil to give her a range of 9,100 nautical miles (16,900 km; 10,500 mi) at a speed of 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph). Unlike her half-sister, she had three funnels. The ship's main battery consisted of four 45-caliber 12-inch (305 mm) 41st Year Type guns in two twin-gun turrets, one each fore and aft of the superstructure. Her intermediate armament consisted of six twin-gun turrets equipped with 45-caliber Type 41 10-inch (254 mm) guns, three turrets on each side of the superstructure. Her heavy intermediate armament of guns larger than 9 inches (229 mm) is why the ship is considered to be a semi-dreadnought. Aki's secondary armament consisted of eight 45-caliber 6-inch (152 mm) 41st Year Type guns, mounted in casemates in the sides of the hull. The ship was also equipped with eight quick-firing (QF) 40-caliber 12-pounder (3-inch (76 mm)) 12-cwt guns and four 28-caliber 12-pounder QF guns. In addition, the battleship was fitted with five submerged 18-inch (457 mm) torpedo tubes, two on each broadside and one in the stern. The waterline main belt of the Satsuma-class vessels consisted of Krupp cemented armor that had a maximum thickness of nine inches amidships. It tapered to a thickness of four inches (102 mm) at the ends of the ship. A six-inch strake of armor protected the casemates. The barbettes for the main guns were seven–nine point five inches (180–240 mm) thick. The armor of Aki's main gun turrets had a maximum thickness of eight inches (203 mm). The deck armor was two–three inches (51–76 mm) thick and the conning tower was protected by six inches of armor. ## Construction and service Aki was laid down at Kure Naval Arsenal on 15 March 1906. She was launched on 15 April 1907, but construction was suspended for about five months after the decision was made on 26 November to install steam turbines on Aki and the armored cruiser Ibuki. Aki's turbines were already behind schedule and the suspension allowed the less valuable ship to be completed first, and changes made to its turbines after testing were also incorporated into Aki's turbines. Aki was finally completed on 11 March 1911 and her first captain was Tatsuo Matsumura. When World War I began in August 1914, Aki was refitting at Kure Naval Arsenal. She was assigned to the 1st Battleship Squadron upon the completion of her refit and remained with it until she was transferred to the 2nd Battleship Squadron in 1918, seeing no combat during the war. From December 1915 to December 1916, she was commanded by Captain Kiyokazu Abo. The ship was disarmed at Yokosuka in 1922 to comply with the provisions of the Washington Naval Treaty, stricken from the navy list during 1923 and converted into a target ship. Her guns were turned over to the Imperial Japanese Army for use as coastal artillery. The rest of her guns were placed in reserve and ultimately scrapped in 1943. Two of her 10-inch gun turrets were installed as coastal artillery batteries on Jōgashima island to protect Tokyo Bay. Aki was sunk by the battlecruiser Kongō and the battleship Hyūga on 2 September 1924 in Tokyo Bay.
30,577,128	Here I Stand (Usher song)	1,167,070,688	null	[ "2000s ballads", "2008 singles", "2008 songs", "Song recordings produced by Dre & Vidal", "Songs written by Adam Blackstone", "Songs written by Andre Harris", "Songs written by Polow da Don", "Songs written by Usher (musician)", "Songs written by Vidal Davis", "Soul ballads", "Usher (musician) songs" ]	"Here I Stand" is a song by American recording artist Usher. It was sent to urban adult contemporary radio on August 18, 2008 by LaFace Records and RCA Records as the fifth single from Usher's fifth studio album of the same name. Penned by the singer with Polow da Don, Adam Blackstone, Gerrell Gaddis, and Dre & Vidal, and produced by Dre & Vidal, "Here I Stand" is a slow soul ballad and contains similarities to Stevie Wonder's music. The record was nominated for the Best Male R&B Vocal Performance award at the 51st Grammy Awards. "Here I Stand" maintained a position on the United States Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs for several weeks in 2008 and 2009, reaching the top twenty. It also appeared on the US Radio Songs and Bubbling Under Hot 100 Singles charts, peaking at numbers seventy-two and six, respectively. ## Background and composition "Here I Stand" was written by Usher, Polow da Don, Adam Blackstone and Gerrell Gaddis, as well as Dre & Vidal, who also produced the track. The song was recorded by Vincent Dilorenzo, with assistance from Geoff Rice, at Sony Music Studios, New York City and Zac Recording, Atlanta. Dilorenzo also mixed the record, with assistance from Matt DeSando, at Studio 609, Philadelphia. According to Josh Eells of Blender, "Here I Stand" was written for Tameka Foster, whom Usher married in August 2007. Composed before their engagement, "Here I Stand" was played at Usher and Foster's wedding, on Foster's request. The tune is an assurance of sexual fidelity and commitment. In an interview with MTV News, Usher stated, "If you listen to the words [of 'Here I Stand'], it is very heartfelt, simplistic, yet very soulful. ... It's a man's words to his woman: a vow to say that you are the one, and I'll be there for you." A slow jam soul ballad, "Here I Stand" has been compared to the work of Stevie Wonder by critics. It was included on Usher's fifth studio album of the same name, released on May 13, 2008 by LaFace Records. ## Release and promotion The song was released to urban adult contemporary radio by LaFace and RCA Records on August 18, 2008, serving as the fifth single from Here I Stand. Usher sang "Here I Stand" along with "Trading Places" and "What's Your Name" at the warmup concert for the 2008 National Football League Kickoff game on September 4. Usher performed "Here I Stand" at Sony's keynote address at the 2009 Consumer Electronics Show. The song was performed on his One Night Stand: Ladies Only Tour, with a slower tempo. ## Reception Leah Greenblatt of Entertainment Weekly called "Here I Stand" a throwback to Stevie Wonder, and was disappointed that it was placed near the end of the parent album. USA Today's Steve Jones noted the track as a highlight of the album. Joshua Alston from The A.V. Club wrote that the song "lyrically and musically sounds more passionate and more adult than Usher ever has," and called it a "syrupy ballad". However, Blender's Josh Eells called the "chivalrous" number "sweet but taxing, like looking at photos from someone else’s wedding," while Jim Farber of the Daily News wrote that "the [song's] melody fails [Usher]." The song ranked at number one on AOL Radio's list of top Usher songs. At the 51st Grammy Awards, "Here I Stand" was nominated for the Best Male R&B Vocal Performance award, but lost to Ne-Yo's "Miss Independent" from his 2008 album, Year of the Gentleman. Following its radio release, "Here I Stand" debuted on the Hot R&B/Hip-Hop Songs at number seventy-five on the issue dated September 20, 2008, and peaked at number eighteen on March 14, 2009. On July 18, 2009 it fell off the chart, having spent forty-three weeks on the chart. "Here I Stand" entered the Bubbling Under Hot 100 Singles at number fourteen on the chart of December 17, 2008. It peaked at number six on January 3, 2009, before it slipped off the chart the following week, having lasted four weeks there. On February 7, 2009, the song appeared on the Hot 100 Airplay (Radio Songs) at number seventy-three, but failed to reappear on the chart the next week. It re-entered one place higher, at number seventy-two, on March 14, 2009, but again did not gain any traction, with no place achieved on the following chart. However, it became his first number one hit on the Adult R&B Songs chart on December 6, 2008. ## Credits Credits lifted from the liner notes of Here I Stand. - Adam Blackstone – writing, additional musician - Matt DeSando – assistant mixing - Vincent Dilorenzo – recording, mixing - Dylan Dresdow – mixing - Dre & Vidal – writing, production, all instruments - Gerrell Gaddis – writing - Mark Pitts – executive production - Polow da Don – writing, additional musician - Geoff Rice – assistant recording - Usher – vocals, writing, executive production ## Charts ### Weekly charts ### Year-end charts
5,993,677	Operation Labrador	1,144,518,032	1991 Yugoslav Air Force operation in Croatia	[ "1991 in Croatia", "Antisemitism in Yugoslavia", "August 1991 events in Europe", "Battles and conflicts without fatalities", "Croatian War of Independence", "False flag operations", "Intelligence operations", "Propaganda in Yugoslavia", "Serbian war crimes in the Croatian War of Independence" ]	Operation Labrador was a false flag operation carried out by the Yugoslav Air Force's Counterintelligence Service (KOS) in the Croatian capital city of Zagreb during the early stages of the Croatian War of Independence. It was devised as a series of terrorist attacks intended to create an image of Croatia as a pro-fascist state. Two bombings were carried out on 19 August 1991, with one at the Jewish Community Centre and a second near Jewish graves at the Mirogoj Cemetery; there were no casualties. Additional attacks targeted the national railway network and were designed to implicate the Croatian President. Operation Labrador was complemented by Operation Opera — a propaganda campaign devised by the KOS to feed disinformation to the media. Further activities of Operation Labrador were abandoned in September, after Croatian authorities captured the Yugoslav Air Force regional headquarters in Zagreb, and confiscated documents related to the operation. The authorities took nearly a month to analyze the captured documents, allowing time for the principal agents involved in the bombings to flee. Fifteen others were arrested in connection with the attack, but they were subsequently released in a prisoner exchange. Five KOS agents involved in Operation Labrador were tried in the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia on terrorism charges and acquitted. Croatian authorities captured two KOS agents who were part of the operation and tried them along with seven other agents who were tried in absentia. Those in custody were acquitted, while those tried in absentia were convicted. The existence of Operation Labrador was further confirmed through the testimony of a former KOS agent, Major Mustafa Čandić, during the trial of Slobodan Milošević at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in 2002. ## Background In August 1990, an insurrection took place in Croatia centering in the predominantly Serb-populated areas of the Dalmatian hinterland near Knin, the Lika, Kordun, and Banovina regions, and eastern Croatia. The areas were subsequently named SAO Krajina (Serb Autonomous Oblast) and, after local leaders announced their intention to integrate SAO Krajina with Serbia, the Government of Croatia declared the SAO Krajina secession movement a rebellion. By March 1991, the conflict had escalated into the Croatian War of Independence. In June 1991, Croatia declared its independence as Yugoslavia disintegrated. A three-month moratorium followed, after which the declaration came into effect on 8 October 1991. The SAO Krajina, renamed Republic of Serbian Krajina (RSK) on 19 December 1991, responded with a campaign of ethnic cleansing against Croatian civilians. With the Yugoslav People's Army (JNA) lending support to SAO Krajina leadership and the Croatian Police unable to cope with the situation, the Croatian National Guard (ZNG) was formed in May 1991. The development of the military of Croatia was hampered by a UN arms embargo introduced in September, while the military conflict in Croatia continued to escalate. The JNA maintained substantial forces in the Croatian capital, Zagreb, throughout 1991. ## Bombings In August 1991, the Yugoslav Air Force's Counterintelligence Service (KOS) executed a series of activities, codenamed Operation Labrador, aimed at discrediting the new Croatian government. Operation Labrador was planned to include several terrorist attacks that would go hand-in-hand with the activities of Operation Opera — a propaganda campaign devised to feed disinformation to the media. The two operations were intended to portray Croatia as a pro-fascist state. An alternative name for Operation Opera was Operation Opera-Orijentalis, or Operation Opera Orientalis. Operation Labrador was headed by Colonel General Slobodan Rakočević, head of the Yugoslav Air Force branch of the KOS, based in Zemun. In Zagreb, operational control of Labrador was assigned to Lieutenant Colonel Ivan Sabolović, and Major Čedo Knežević. Lieutenant Colonel Radenko Radojčić was tasked with the storage of a substantial quantity of explosives in Zagreb and its surrounding areas and the subsequent planting of explosive devices in designated locations. The explosives and other munitions were stored across several sites. On 19 August, the Jewish Community Centre in Palmotićeva Street in Zagreb, and Jewish graves at the Mirogoj Cemetery, were bombed as a part of Operation Labrador. The explosions caused property damage, but resulted in no casualties. There were no public claims of responsibility for the attack. Aside from the two explosions in Zagreb, agents assigned to Operation Labrador were thought to also be responsible for bombing the Zagreb–Belgrade railway near Vinkovci and a railway line between Glina and Vojnić. The railway attacks have also been ascribed to Operation Opera. ## Aftermath In the immediate aftermath of the bombings in Zagreb, Josip Manolić, who had just been appointed head of the Croatian intelligence service, claimed Croatian right-wing extremists were responsible. Operation Labrador was abandoned after the ZNG and the Croatian police captured the Yugoslav Air Force headquarters in Zagreb on 15 September 1991, during the Battle of the Barracks. The materials captured inside the facility included codes and computer disks related to Operation Labrador, as well as Sabolović's notes. Sabolović turned the materials over to his immediate superior at headquarters, Mirko Martić, but Martić failed to destroy them. In response, Sabolović fled Zagreb. Croatian police took almost a month to analyze the captured materials properly and uncover Operation Labrador. Sabolović later claimed that only a part of the Operation Labrador network was dismantled, but he was contradicted by KOS Major Mustafa Čandić who was posted at the Zemun headquarters of KOS. In autumn of 1991, Croatian intelligence services launched Operation Janissary (Operacija Janjičar) aimed at dismantling the remaining KOS network in Croatia. The operation was a joint operation of all Croatian intelligence services. It was authorized by Ivan Vekić and Gojko Šušak, then interior and defence ministers, and initially headed by Josip Perković. Fifteen suspects were arrested by the end of 1991; they were subsequently exchanged for Anton Kikaš, who was captured by the JNA while smuggling a plane-load of weapons to Croatia. The operation also produced a list of suspected KOS operatives in Croatia containing 1,789 names and pseudonyms. Rakočević, Sabolović, Radojčić and two other former KOS agents were tried in Belgrade in 1993. The five were charged with instigation of terrorism and other crimes, but all were acquitted. Radojčić was arrested again in Zagreb in late 1993. The second Trial of Radojčić and eight other suspects charged in connection with Operations Labrador and Opera, held in Zagreb, ended with the acquittal of Radojčić and Ratomir Mažibrada, who were in custody, and the convictions of the other defendants who were all tried in absentia. Testifying at the Trial of Slobodan Milošević at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in 2002, Čandić stated that all Operation Labrador agents left Zagreb and took the remaining documents with them. He also said that the KOS had an extensive network of informants within Croatian intelligence services and the ruling Croatian Democratic Union in 1991. Čandić also testified that the railway bombing near Vinkovci was intended to implicate Croatian President Franjo Tuđman. Bomb damage to the Jewish Community Centre was repaired between February and September 1992, using government funds.
599,658	Panzer Dragoon (video game)	1,173,591,726	1995 video game	[ "1995 video games", "Airships in fiction", "Forever Entertainment games", "Land Ho! games", "Nintendo Switch games", "Panzer Dragoon", "PlayStation 2 games", "PlayStation 4 games", "Rail shooters", "Sega Saturn games", "Sega video games", "Single-player video games", "Stadia games", "Video game remakes", "Video games about dragons", "Video games developed in Japan", "Video games set in the future", "Windows games", "Xbox One games" ]	Panzer Dragoon is a 1995 rail shooter game for the Sega Saturn, published by Sega and developed by Sega's Team Andromeda studio. It is the first game in the Panzer Dragoon series. The game follows hunter Keil Fluge, who becomes the rider of a powerful dragon. The player moves an aiming reticle (representing the dragon's laser and Kyle's gun) and shoots enemies while the dragon flies through 3D environments on a predetermined track. As one of six games available at the Sega Saturn's surprise North American launch, Panzer Dragoon was the first game created by Team Andromeda. It was also the directorial debut of Yukio Futatsugi, who was 25 years old at the time of release. Panzer Dragoon received positive reviews in 1995 and in retrospective coverage. Electronic Gaming Monthly named it game of the month and the best Saturn game of the year, and named it the 140th-best game of all time in 2006. In particular, its art direction and post-apocalyptic universe gained acclaim. Panzer Dragoon was ported to Windows and PlayStation 2, and was followed by Panzer Dragoon II Zwei (1996) and Panzer Dragoon Saga (1998) for Saturn and Panzer Dragoon Orta (2002) for Xbox, which includes the original Panzer Dragoon as a bonus feature. A remake of Panzer Dragoon was developed by MegaPixel Studio and published by Forever Entertainment in 2020 for Nintendo Switch, Stadia, Windows, PlayStation 4, Amazon Luna and Xbox One. ## Gameplay Panzer Dragoon spans six levels, each lasting about five minutes, with a variety of boss battles. Over the course of the game, the plot is revealed through cutscenes using the game's own graphic engine. Gameplay consists of a player controlling a flying dragon and his rider through an aiming reticle that can be moved over the whole screen with the D-pad; the player must shoot a variety of enemies (ranging from machines to monsters) in a 3D post-apocalyptic fantasy environment of barren landscapes and mysterious ruins of a fallen civilization. Progression through the levels is made at a predetermined pace, as the player is constantly set along a rail of gameplay. The only time the game pauses is during boss battles. The field of vision can be directed with the aiming reticle on the x and y-axis, but the overall direction of travel is predetermined. The dragon follows the reticle movements, allowing the player to avoid enemy projectiles and obstacles. The player has a full, 360-degree field of view, and can quickly look left, right, forward, and behind the dragon. Enemies come from all directions, varying in size and health, and also appear on an on-screen radar that monitors the dragon's surroundings. Two weapons are available: the rider's handgun, which can be fired with a single button press when an enemy enters the aiming reticle, and the homing laser fired by the dragon, which can lock on up to eight enemies by moving the reticle over them while holding down the fire button. Some situations with many enemies on screen require the use of the lock-on laser, while in others, quick gunshots to weak spots will prove more efficient. ## Plot Panzer Dragoon is set in the distant future, thousands of years after a great war between humans and their biologically engineered weapons, when humans live in everything from small tribes to large nations. One nation, the Empire, has discovered a black tower in the middle of a lake near their capital, which gave them access to large amounts of ancient weapons which they used to beat back and control the ever present monsters in the world. The Imperials were corrupted by this power and became conquerors of others as opposed to liberators from a violent world. The introduction movie opens with the protagonist, Keil Fluge (unnamed in the North American version), hunting in a canyon. After seeing an Imperial flying battleship in the sky, he is attacked by two creatures and chases one of them to a large, ancient complex built directly into the rock. He explores the ruin, and sees relics of old technology still hanging from the ceilings. Another gigantic creature suddenly attacks him, and though his weapon is useless against the armored creature, a rumbling triggers a cave in, which crushes the monster and saves Keil. From the newly created hole, an armored, blue dragon flies down the cavern with a rider across its shoulders, being chased by an even bigger black dragon as the cavern is destroyed in an explosion. Regaining consciousness outside, Keil sees the two dragons locked in combat in the air before him. Dodging a blast from the black dragon, the blue dragon's rider is then hit by single shot to the chest, and the black dragon flies away. The blue dragon flies towards Keil. A psychic connection is made between the rider and Keil, who is told not to let the black dragon reach the black tower. The rider then dies and Keil picks up his fallen gun, climbs atop the dragon and flies away, determined to finish the rider's quest. During the first level of the game, Keil and his dragon fly through a drowned city, where they encounter a small Imperial patrol ship. That ship sends a report to a large fleet of ships flying above the clouds. It is revealed that the Imperial forces are specifically searching for the blue dragon. The second level is a desert, where Keil and the dragon encounter gigantic worm-like creatures. At the stormy edge of the desert, they are confronted by the Black Dragon, which is defeated and speeds away. The third level is a mountainous landscape at night-time where Keil and the dragon get reacquainted with the Imperial forces, which were exploring ancient ruins. These encounters illustrate the ongoing conflict between the Imperial forces and the ancient machines and creatures. The fourth level is an ancient facility in which Keil and the dragon are pursued by both Imperial airships and cybernetic sentinels left behind by the ancient civilization. During the fifth level, they defeat a large armada of the most powerful Imperial ships over a forested area. A cutscene then shows a fleet of dragon-like creatures coming out of the tower to attack the Imperial forces. The sixth level features the black dragon and Keil racing through the battle-scarred Imperial capital. During this, they are both waylaid by the creatures and machines seen attacking the Imperial fleet around the tower while also being fired on by Imperial defenses. The black dragon then reaches the Tower and is mutated into a gigantic super-dragon and begins a climactic battle with Keil and the blue dragon, after which the black dragon is defeated and falls into the ocean. In the ending cutscene, Keil and the dragon enter the tower. While traveling down a long corridor, the dragon surrounds Keil in a force field, lifting him from the saddle and suspending him in the hallway. Keil watches as the dragon continues on to the core of the tower, then a blinding light is seen and the tower explodes. Keil wakes up some time later in a desert area abutting the ocean. Looking down, he sees the foot prints of the blue dragon around him, indicating that after the explosion, the dragon carried him to safety and flew away. ## Development Panzer Dragoon was created in the early 1990s as the Japanese video game company Sega was preparing to release its Saturn console. In 1993, as the Saturn lacked third-party games, Sega asked its developers for game ideas; according to art director Manabu Kusunoki, Sega asked for shooting game ideas to add variety to the Saturn's launch library. Twenty-three-year-old Yukio Futatsugi, who had joined Sega only two years before, proposed several concepts, including Panzer Dragoon. Futatsugi became the head of Team Andromeda, a development team that Sega assembled for the project in early 1994 and was built around the duo formed by Futatsugi and Kusunoki. Development lasted almost a year, with a staff of 15. The project was designed as arcade-style, as core members of the team like Kusunoki came from Sega's arcade department. Team Andromeda wanted to create a fully 3D arcade game, having worked on similar games such as Out Run which were not truly 3D. With influences including Space Harrier, Starblade, Star Fox, and RayForce, the project became a 3D rail shooter. Usually, in 3D shooters, the player rides a 3D object like a jet fighter or a tank. Futatsugi and Kusunoki decided it would be more original for the player to ride an armored dragon, a living creature which would also allow for richer animations. The original concept for the game was named "Armored Dragon" (kikō-ryū in Japanese), but Futatsugi, feeling that this was too bland, decided to change it to the pseudo-German translation "Panzer Dragoon". With this basic concept in mind, the creators had 3 months to define a visual identity and a setting for their game, prior to development. The game would be set in a post-apocalyptic science fantasy world, featuring ruins and relics of a fallen civilization with mankind rebuilding itself while surviving, enduring and so forth in that era of perdition. A theme presented in many anime series at that time. Futatsugi was particularly influenced by one of his childhood readings, The Long Afternoon of Earth, a science-fiction novel by Brian Aldiss, in which one side of the earth became perpetually hot, the other perpetually cold. The first presentation video featured a green dragon, in line with traditional European/medieval depictions, however the team quickly decided to change it and make it "more sci-fi". In order for the dragon to be more original, it was made blue and covered in a white, bone-like armor. The dragon was supposed to come from the ancient times, so ruins and ancient flying technology also featured this white, shell-like material. The overall fantasy look of the game's world, which mixed natural and technological elements, was also chosen in order to set it apart from classic science-fiction 3D games of the time. This world, as well as dragon and character designs, were mainly the work of Manabu Kusunoki, who took inspiration from various sources, including anime and manga, and who pushed the art direction toward a more Turkish/Ottoman style to avoid the European aesthetics of the early presentation video. Critics have noted similarities with the works of French artist Moebius (notably his comic book Arzach,) of whom Kusunoki was a fan, as well as with Hayao Miyazaki's Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, and David Lynch's Dune movie. Kentaro Yoshida, texturing and modeling artist, described the creation process as similar in style to Star Wars, in that it "made an unearthly world appear so real". Takashi Iwade, in charge of the opening cutscene and character models, designed the enemies using a lot of various influences: "I got inspiration from antique clocks and various industrial products from the era of the industrial revolution for mechanics, and myriapods, marine mollusks, ammonite, and a rusty fishing boat for creatures when I started thinking of the original battleship". The team wanted a famous artist to make the game's cover art. Manabu Kusunoki suggested Moebius, who accepted, and the team sent him designs that he was to interpret. The resulting illustration was used as the cover art for the Japanese release of the game. The Saturn's hardware was new to the team, and it was their first attempt at creating an original environment. It was also Futatsugi's first year working as a full developer at Sega, so he was only able to do simple things while having a clear vision of what he wanted, which helped him to keep the overall style pure, with stark and minimalist cutscenes. Similarly, Iwade kept the enemies easy to understand visually, with simple shapes, and this overall simple style ended up fitting well with the Saturn's hardware. Then, Team Andromeda set to work on elaborating an extensive back story, and Futatsugi, to be original and to avoid using Japanese or English, went so far as to create a fictional language for the game: a mix of Ancient Greek, Latin and Russian. This was apparently inspired by the anime The Wings of Honneamise, of which team members were fans and which also features an invented language. After the story and art were established, the team set to work on the graphics. Working on new hardware proved difficult for the young team, and the game ended up missing the initial deadline given by Sega, which was the Saturn Japanese launch on November 1994. One of the problems was that the Saturn hardware was only finalized in mid-1994, and without actual Saturn prototype to test their progress, the programmers initially had to work with hypothetical hardware performance. Team Andromeda created its own graphics library and mapping tools instead of using Sega's, in order to make the most of their first game on the new system. The game's graphics and cutscenes were done with Softimage, and the 3D elements were programmed on SGI workstations using OpenGL. The programmers were eventually able to transition to the debug Saturn they had received, but the process was difficult and the game had a very low frame rate at first, before it increased to approx. 20 FPS. The six levels of Panzer Dragoon are barren landscapes with ancient ruins, which is consistent with the "simple" style appropriate for the Saturn. The first two levels that the team programmed, a desert (level 2) and a forest (level 5), did not have any objects or anything besides sand and forest effects, again because the team was unsure how far the hardware could be pushed. Keeping CPU limitations in mind, simple tornado effects were added to level 2, so that it did not look too bland. Work on the soundtrack began after completion of the game, similar to the way movie soundtracks are made. The idea was to create music that would specifically reflect each level's art-style and events. As the game had an "on rails" progression system, the developers knew exactly where the player would be at any given time, so they showed videos to the composer and asked him to write specifically timed pieces that would match the player's progression in each level. The soundtrack was outsourced to Yoshitaka Azuma, who was composing music for NHK TV programs at that time. The music of Panzer Dragoon is a mix between orchestral and synthesizer tracks. Sega of America made several alterations to the game to make the North American release more challenging. These alterations were retained in the PAL version. ## Releases Panzer Dragoon was released in Japan on March 10, 1995, North America on May 11, 1995 as one of the six launch games for the North American release, and Europe on August 30, 1995, on the Sega Saturn console. It was followed by Panzer Dragoon II Zwei (1996) and Panzer Dragoon Saga (1998), both for Saturn, and Panzer Dragoon Orta (2002) for Xbox. In 1996, Panzer Dragoon was ported to Windows. Identical to the Saturn version except with a higher resolution, this version was also included as a bonus in Panzer Dragoon Orta. Aside from providing the source code, Team Andromeda had no involvement in the development of the Windows version. It was sold bundled with the NV1 PCI Card. In 1997, a software rendered version was released, requiring at least an Intel Pentium P5 processor. An updated version of Panzer Dragoon was included in the Japan-only Sega Ages 2500 collection for PlayStation 2 in 2006. The port was handled by development studio Land Ho!, and features the original Saturn game and an "arrange" version with anti-aliasing filter, better texturing, and improved 3D models for the dragon and some enemies. The "arrange" version also adds unlockable extras such as level selection and artworks, in the form of a "Pandora's Box" option menu. ## Reception Panzer Dragoon received positive reviews, both in 1995 and in retrospective coverage. Though sales were not as high as Sega expected, possibly due to the success of Sony's PlayStation console over the Saturn, they were substantial enough for Sega to develop sequels. As one of the first Saturn games, Panzer Dragoon was highly anticipated by journalists after its appearance in promotional material. A reviewer for Next Generation said the game "orchestrates incredible story animation with brilliant, 3D flight graphics to create what is, basically, the ultimate evolution of Space Harrier." He also highly praised the gameplay, particularly the variety of enemies, the difficulty slope, and the controls. Ed Semrad and Danyon Carpenter from Electronic Gaming Monthly praised the game for its "innovative game play" and its "awe-inspiring visuals" from the opening cinematic to the backgrounds and the dragon's animations. Al Manuel and Ken Williams criticized the game's lack of diversity in weapons and its predetermined progression; but the four EGM reviewers agreed that it was a must-have game for Saturn owners. Similarly, The Unknown Gamer from GamePro called the game a "masterpiece", highlighted its high-quality graphics and music, and described the story as "captivat[ing]". However, the journalist noted the game's overall difficulty "will single out all but advanced players" with its lack of power-ups or extra lives of any kind. Nevertheless, the game was seen as a good example of the Saturn's capabilities. In contrast, a reviewer from Maximum said that the game was much too easy even on the highest difficulty setting, greatly reducing its already low longevity. He also said the gameplay would be too simplistic for many players, with its on-rails shooting and selection of only two weapons, but was overall very positive in his assessment of the game, highly praising the 360 degrees of rotation and most especially the textured 3D graphics of the enemies, settings, and bosses. Patrick Baggatta from Game Players stated that while the game may come off as "just a simple shooter", it is at least a "very good one" that "puts a twist on the tired formula", again praising the game play and the variety in camera angles. Chris Gore from VideoGames & Computer Entertainment named the game "the best shooter since Star Fox", and a must-have for fantasy and sci-fi fans, with its "eerie" atmosphere noted by editor Betty Hallock. While the story itself was said to be "somewhat typical" and editor Chris Bieniek criticized the on-rail aspect, Gore noted the game's "spectacular visuals", and presented it as one of the Saturn's system sellers. Famitsu magazine's Reader Cross Review gave the game a 9 out of 10 in April 1995. The game's universe itself was deemed "coolly surreal" by Entertainment Weekly reviewer Albert Kim, who thought the game's seven-minute "movie-quality" introduction was "gorgeous" and "nearly overshadowed the game itself". Kim argued that Panzer Dragoon could be seen as a "lyrical and exhilarating epic", a "story, not just a game" which could pave the way for a "transformation" of the videogame industry. Film director Steven Spielberg approached Team Andromeda to say he was impressed by the game's presentation at the 1995 E3 show. James Mielke from online game magazine 1UP.com gave Panzer Dragoon a retroactive review of 8/10 for what the game offered in 1995, but gave it a modern score of 6/10. Mielke highlighted the music as "one of the finest game soundtracks ever produced," but said that the game itself "staggers a bit under the glaring light of a critical rereview[sic]", arguing it is "little more than Space Harrier with a 3D camera and cut-scenes." By contrast, Levi Buchanan from IGN gave the game a retrospective score of 9/10, opining that "the fact that Panzer Dragoon holds up as well in 2008 as it did in 1995 is a just testament to the staying power of good art and tight gameplay." Kurt Kalata, in a Gamasutra retrospective, also praised its art and universe, but said the actual game looked "a bit cut and dried" compared to its sequels. Game developer Taro Yoko is a well known fan of the game. ### Accolades It was named "Best Saturn Game of 1995" by Electronic Gaming Monthly in their 1996 Buyers' Guide. Panzer Dragoon ranked 140th in EGM′s "The Greatest 200 Videogames of their time" feature published in 2006. In 1996, GamesMaster ranked the game 5th on their "The GamesMaster Saturn Top 10." ## Remake A remake of Panzer Dragoon was developed by MegaPixel Studio and published by Forever Entertainment in March 2020 for Nintendo Switch. It was released on Stadia on June 1, with Windows, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Amazon Luna versions later in 2020. The remake features updated graphics and an optional new control system that allows players to aim independently of movement with the second control stick. Switch reviewers criticized the updated controls and short length. Nintendo Life concluded that it was "a decent take on an all-time classic that goes some way to modernising it, but doesn't quite nail the landing".
60,511,404	I Rise (song)	1,157,304,156	2019 song by Madonna	[ "2010s ballads", "2019 songs", "Madame X (Madonna)", "Madonna songs", "Pop ballads", "Song recordings produced by Madonna", "Songs written by Jason Evigan", "Songs written by Madonna", "Songs written by Starrah" ]	"I Rise" is a song by American singer-songwriter Madonna from her fourteenth studio album Madame X (2019). The song was written by the singer herself, alongside Starrah and Jason Evigan, while produced by Madonna and Evigan. It was released on May 3, 2019, by Interscope Records, as the first promotional single from the album, and later sent to Italian radio on October 4, 2019, as the album's third single, by the aforementioned label. The song is a mid tempo pop track which lyrically deals about self-empowerment and draws attention to gun violence in the United States, and contains a sample from a speech by American activist X González. "I Rise" received generally positive reviews from music critics, who complimented its message and production. The song became Madonna's 49th chart-topping single on the US Hot Dance Club Songs chart, and reached the top 10 on the digital charts in Finland and Greece. An accompanying music video for the song was made in partnership with Time Studios, which was directed by Peter Matkiwsky and released on June 19, 2019. The video features footage of Stoneman Douglas High School shooting survivors, LGBTQ supporters, and women's rights protesters, among other social justice movements. The song was performed during Madonna's set at Stonewall 50 – WorldPride NYC 2019, and as the final number of her 2019–20 Madame X Tour. ## Background and composition In 2017, Madonna relocated to Lisbon when seeking a top football academy for her son David Banda, who wanted to become a professional association football player. While living in the city, she began meeting artists; painters and musicians, who would invite her to "living room sessions". In the sessions, they would bring food and sit around the table, and musicians would start playing instruments, singing fado and samba music. Finding herself "connected through music", the singer decided to record a new album, which she titled Madame X: "I found my tribe [in Lisbon] and a magical world of incredible musicians that reinforced my belief that music across the world is truly all connected and is the soul of the universe." For Madame X, she worked with several producers, such as longtime collaborator Mirwais, who had previously contributed to her albums Music (2000), American Life (2003) and Confessions on a Dance Floor (2005), as well as Mike Dean, who was a producer on Rebel Heart (2015), and Diplo. Madonna stated that she wrote "I Rise" as a way of giving a voice to marginalized people who felt they did not have an opportunity to speak their minds, and that she hoped that it would encourage "all individuals to be who they are, to speak their minds and to love themselves". The song was released on May 3, 2019, as the first promotional single from Madame X, by Interscope Records. It was later sent to Italian radio stations on October 4, 2019, as the album's third single, by the aforementioned label. "I Rise" was written by Madonna, Starrah and Jason Evigan, while production was handled by the singer and Evigan. It has been described as a mid tempo pop song that lyrically deals about self-empowerment and draws attention to gun violence in the United States, but can also be seen as "an allegory for the highs and lows" of Madonna's career, according to HuffPost's Daniel Welsh. The song begins with a sample from Stoneman Douglas High School shooting survivor and activist X González's speech, in which they declare, "They say us kids don't know what we're talking about, that we're too young to understand how the government works. We call BS". Later within the track, the words "no BS" are echoed at the end of several verses. On "I Rise", Madonna sings: "There's nothing you can do to me that hasn't been done/ Not bulletproof, shouldn't have to run from a gun/ River of tears ran dry, let 'em run/ No game that you can play with me I ain't won", over Auto-Tuned vocals. She also cites a quote by French philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre, that says, "Freedom's what you choose to do with what's been done to you." ## Critical reception "I Rise" was met with generally positive reviews from music critics. Mark Kennedy from the Associated Press gave Madame X an overall negative review, but selected the track as one of the album's best songs. Louise Bruton of The Irish Times opined that it was a "gimmick-free, uplifting ballad", and noted that "Madonna knows the power she wields, and as a long-time advocate for the LGBTQ+ community and people living with HIV, she plays that card very well" on the song. For Nick Smith from musicOMH, "I Rise" was "powerful and introspective", and complimented the González's sample, calling it "emotional". Wren Graves from Consequence of Sound wrote that the track was "rousing stuff", while Hot Press' Paul Nolan called it "stirring". Jamie Tabberer from Gay Star News classified the track as a "self-empowerment anthem" with "heartfelt lyrics" that sounded "autobiographical". Samuel R. Murrian from Parade wrote that it was a "moving, triumphant ode to genuine strength" and also noted the "dreamy lyrics and ethereal production". According to The Guardian's Ben Beaumont-Thomas, "I Rise" has "elegant, sinewy melodies that twine around you rather than jabbing you into submission". Trey Alston from MTV called it "powerful and uplifting". He further wrote that the song was "as soft as war chants come, but there's power in this fragility". According to Victoria Segal from Q magazine, "I Rise" "keep[s] pace with a world out of joint", while Michael Arceneaux of NBC News commented that it was one of the songs that "do deserve airplay". Chuck Arnold of the New York Post thought the song was an "anthemic ballad" and that it "proves once more" as to why Madonna is "pop's ultimate survivor". Metro Weekly's Sean Maunier felt that Madonna found "some redemption" on the song. Daniel Megarry from Gay Times opined that while the track "isn't top tier" with other Madonna songs such as "Live To Tell" (1986) and "Take a Bow" (1994), "it's still a pleasant listen", and praised its lyrical message. Mike Wass from Idolator thought the song was "well-intentioned, but it didn't need a children's choir to bludgeon the point home". According to NME's El Hunt, the song's Sartre quote "can border on inspirational fridge magnet territory, too broad to establish real connection". A more critical review came from Milenio's Ernesto Sanchez, who complimented the production, but was not impressed with the song's chorus and level of creativity, and said it sounded like an outtake from Rebel Heart. Slant Magazine placed "I Rise" at number 67 on their list of the 82 best Madonna singles. For the magazine, Sal Cinquemani wrote, "The track itself is less affecting than its message, with unnecessary Auto-Tune rendering Madonna's soaring rhetoric nearly robotic." The Tracy Young remix of the song won the Best Remixed Recording award at the 62nd Annual Grammy Awards. With this feat, Young became the first woman to win the award. It also achieved a nomination at the 34th Annual International Dance Music Awards, in the category Best Remix. ## Commercial performance In the United States, "I Rise" became Madonna's 65th entry on Billboard's Dance Club Songs chart. The song ultimately reached the summit of the chart, becoming her 48th chart-topping single on it for the issue date of August 31, 2019. On the year-end US Dance Club Songs chart, "I Rise" ranked at number 31. The song debuted on its peak of number 37 on the US Dance/Mix Show Airplay chart for the issue dated July 13, 2019. This gave Madonna her 15th entry on the chart and her 1st since "Living for Love" (2014). "I Rise" also peaked at number 95 in Croatia, on the week of May 20, 2019. The song further peaked at numbers four and nine on Finland and Greece's digital songs charts, respectively. In Hungary, it reached number 27 on the national chart, while the song peaked at number 45 on the Scottish Singles Chart for the week ending May 10, 2019. "I Rise" reached number 40 on the UK Singles Downloads Chart. ## Promotion Madonna partnered with Time Studios to create a music video for "I Rise", which was directed by Peter Matkiwsky and released on June 19, 2019. Madonna herself does not appear in the video, but it instead shows footage of the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting survivors, LGBTQ supporters, women's rights protesters, Olympic gymnast Aly Raisman's testimony about sexual abuse, Filipino journalist Maria Ressa's arrest, among other social justice movements. Mike Wass from Idolator commented that the clip "conveys the song's powerful message in a striking way", while according to Alexander Kacala from The Advocate, "Madonna has never shied away from making bold statements with her work", and the video was "a testament to that". The first live performance of "I Rise" took place during Madonna's appearance at Stonewall 50 – WorldPride NYC 2019, where it was the closing number. The backdrops depicted imagery of the students who spearheaded the March for Our Lives movement, along with the word "resist"; Madonna wore an eye-patch over her left eye, while her background dancers were dressed as police officers that wielded. After the performance, fireworks exploded over the venue. "I Rise" was performed as the encore of the singer's 2019–20 Madame X Tour. The performance began with González's speech being presented on the screen, which then showed news footage of protests and marches. At the end of the performance, the screen turned the colors of the Rainbow flag, followed by Madonna and her dancers exiting the stage with their fists raised. During her stop at the London Palladium on February 5, 2020, halfway through the song's performance, the theatre dropped the stage curtain and switched off the sound as Madonna had gone past her deadline; the rest of the performance was done a capella. This angered the singer, who took to her Instagram account for accusing the venue of trying to censor her show. ## Track listings ## Personnel Credits adapted from Tidal. - Madonna – vocals, songwriter, production - X González – vocals - Jason Evigan – songwriter, production - Brittany Talia Hazzard – songwriter ## Charts ### Weekly charts ### Year-end charts ## Release history ## See also - List of Billboard Dance Club Songs number ones of 2019
25,730,305	A Many Splendored Thing (Homicide: Life on the Street)	1,143,752,695	null	[ "1994 American television episodes", "Homicide: Life on the Street (season 2) episodes" ]	"A Many Splendored Thing" is the second season finale of the American police drama television series Homicide: Life on the Street, and the thirteenth overall episode of the series. It originally aired on NBC in the United States on January 27, 1994. In the episode, Pembleton and Bayliss investigate the S&M-related murder of a young woman, which forces an uncomfortable Bayliss to confront his darker side. Meanwhile, Lewis is disturbed when a man commits murder over a \$1.49 pen, and a despairing Munch crashes Bolander's date and ruins it by venting his own romantic woes. Written by Noel Behn and directed by John McNaughton, "A Many Splendored Thing" was not originally planned to close the second season, but the expected finale "Bop Gun" was changed to the season premiere to capitalize on a guest performance by Robin Williams. The homicide case in "A Many Splendored Thing" involving a man who committed murder over a pen was based on a similar real-life killing that took place in Anne Arundel County, Maryland. The episode featured the second of two guest appearances by actress Julianna Margulies as Linda, Bolander's romantic interest, as well as an appearance by Adrienne Shelly as the owner of an S&M fashion store. "A Many Splendored Thing" marked the final appearance by Jon Polito, who had played Detective Steve Crosetti since the series debuted, but was dismissed reportedly because NBC officials were unhappy with his physical appearance. Polito was publicly critical of the show after his dismissal. According to Nielsen Media Research, the episode was seen by 11.2 million household viewers, a slight increase from the previous week's episode, "Black and Blue". It received generally positive reviews, and was identified by The Baltimore Sun as one of the ten best episodes of the series. "A Many Splendored Thing" was nominated for a Writers Guild of America Award for Best Screenplay of an Episodic Drama. ## Plot summary Pembleton (Andre Braugher) and Bayliss (Kyle Secor) investigate the murder of Angela Frandina, who was found strangled in her bed clutching a note reading, "Ed did it", although it proves to be a false lead. Their investigation leads the detectives to discover Angela had several strange boyfriends and worked at an S&M fashion store and a phone sex hotline. Bayliss claims to be disgusted by the sexual taboos, but Pembleton insists everybody has a darker side and that until Bayliss recognizes his own, his virtues can never truly be tested. Pembleton and Bayliss return to the S&M fashion store and ask about leather belts with bead patterns matching the marks on Angela's neck. Store owner Tanya (Adrienne Shelly) tells them Angela's neighbor Jeremy (Scott Nielson) has a jacket with a matching belt. After an interrogation, Jeremy confesses to choking and accidentally killing Angela with the belt during quirky and violent (but consensual) sex. As a thank you for solving the murder, Tanya brings Bayliss a leather jacket as gift, which he reluctantly accepts. That night, Bayliss visits Baltimore's red light district wearing the jacket, as a way to test himself as Pembleton suggested. He is approached by a prostitute but rejects her, thus passing the test. Lewis (Clark Johnson) and Crosetti (Jon Polito) investigate the fatal shooting of a man, who was apparently killed for a \$1.49 pen. Lewis believes there must be more to the story, refusing to believe a pen is worth killing for. When they search suspect Mitchell Forman's (Sal S. Koussa) apartment, they find thousands of pens, many of which line the walls like bizarre decorations. Lewis later finds Forman at the police station, where he originally planned to turn himself, but instead went up to the roof to commit suicide. Lewis lures Forman away from the ledge by enticing him with a beautiful golden pen, which belonged to Lewis' deceased grandmother. Forman is taken into custody. Later, Lewis still cannot believe someone would kill over a pen, but Gee (Yaphet Kotto) suggests it is no worse than killing over a car or woman. Lewis, determined not to develop such a strong attachment to a material item, gives his grandmother's pen to Felton (Daniel Baldwin). Meanwhile, although Munch (Richard Belzer) is cynical and despairing over his recent break-up with ex-girlfriend Felicia, the normally-grumpy Bolander (Ned Beatty) is unusually cheerful due to his romantic relationship with Linda (Julianne Margulies), a much younger 26-year-old waitress. Nervous about his first real date with her, Bolander asks Howard (Melissa Leo) to go on a double-date with him, along with Howard's boyfriend, prosecuting attorney Ed Danvers (Željko Ivanek). The double date goes well until a lonely Munch crashes, joins the table and ruins the mood of the evening complaining about his romantic woes. Bolander, Munch and Linda leave together and walk to Fort McHenry, where Linda offers Munch words of encouragement. Impressed with her, Munch leaves Linda and Bolander alone, where they happily watch a fireworks show. ## Production "A Many Splendored Thing" was written by Noel Behn and directed by John McNaughton, who previously directed Homicide star Richard Belzer in the film Mad Dog and Glory (1993). Like the other three second season episodes, the script for "A Many Splendored Thing" was already finished by the time the first season ended, but due to poor Nielsen ratings throughout the duration of the show, NBC executives asked for several refinements – including fewer episode subplots and fewer camera movements and jump cuts – before approving a second season. "A Many Splendored Thing" was the second-season finale. The season premiere, "Bop Gun", was originally meant to serve as the finale, but NBC decided to instead open the season with it, with the hopes of getting increased ratings from a guest appearance by actor Robin Williams. The title "A Many Splendored Thing" is a reference to the 1952 historical romance novel A Many-Splendoured Thing and the subsequent film Love Is a Many-Splendored Thing (1955). The title refers to the episode's theme of the many variations of love, as demonstrated by the sexual taboos from the world of Angela Frandina, the dysfunctional relationship of Munch and Felicia, the budding romance between Bolander and Linda, and the twisted love Mitchell Forman harbors for pens. The Forman case was inspired by a real-life murder that took place in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, in which a 23-year-old man shot another man 10 times in a doughnut shop when the victim refused to sell the shooter his pen. During the double date Munch crashes, Howard becomes depressed about the hopelessness of life and love, leaving unhappily with Danvers. This scene foreshadows the eventual break-up of Howard and Danvers, which occurs at an unspecified time in the third season. The episode marked the final appearance by Jon Polito, who had been a regular cast member since the series debuted, but was dismissed reportedly because NBC officials were unhappy with his weight and physical appearance and did not believe he appealed to audiences. The departure was not amicable, as Polito publicly criticized the direction Homicide had taken in the second season and claimed he voiced concerns about the recent scripts to Fontana and Menaul. "A Many Splendored Thing" featured the second of two guest appearances by actress Julianna Margulies as Linda. A few months later, Margulies started her long-running lead role as nurse Carol Hathaway on the medical drama series ER. She was cast in the part after having worked with Fontana on the unaired pilot of Philly Heat, an ABC miniseries he worked on about members of the Philadelphia Fire Department. Tom Fontana had offered Margulies a recurring role on Homicide, but she turned it down in favor of ER. "A Many Splendored Thing" also featured guest appearances by Adrienne Shelly who played S&M fashion store owner Tanya Quinn, and Sal Koussa as murder suspect Mitchell Forman. Koussa was not a professional actor, and was working as a waiter at Ristorante i Ricchi, a Washington, D.C. favorite, when the episode was filmed. The songs "Hideaway" and "Out of Time", both of which were written by Bernie McNabb and performed by Scarlet Bride, were featured in "A Many Splendored Thing". Other featured songs include "Whoa" by Soul Asylum, the Donna Summer song "Bad Girls", and a rendition of Italian composer Ottorino Respighi's "Feste Romane", as performed by the Oregon Symphony. ## Reception ### Ratings NBC had renewed Homicide for a second season to assess how the show performed in the Nielsen ratings and make a determination whether to continue the series. The series premiere, "Bop Gun", drew unusually large viewership numbers due to a guest appearance by Robin Williams, but the subsequent episodes had dropped in the ratings, making the viewership of "A Many Splendored Thing" particularly important for the future of the series. Fontana said if the episode performed well, "NBC's going to have to do some hard thinking." In its original American broadcast on January 27, 1994, "A Many Splendored Thing" was watched by 11.2 million households, according to Nielsen Media Research, earning the episode an 11.9 rating. That constituted a slight increase from the previous week's episode, "Black and Blue", which was seen by 10.83 million households. It was the 37th highest rated television show of the week, tied with the Fox animated comedy series The Simpsons. "A Many Splendored Thing" faced unusually tough competition in its timeslot from the ABC news series Primetime Live, which did a special report about convicted murderer Richard Allen Davis. ### Reviews "A Many Splendored Thing" received generally positive reviews. It was identified by The Baltimore Sun as one of the ten best episodes of the series. Sun writers David Zurawik and Chris Kaltenbach particularly praised the creative pairing of Ned Beatty and Julianna Margulies, of whom they said, "somehow it is as touching a love story as you could want". The Washington Post television reviewer Tom Shales strongly complimented the episode, especially for its serious and unflinching approach to disturbing and twisted events like the Forman murder: "Homicide is more than a superb cop show; it's a helpful guide on dealing with the madness of the modern world. It's Attention Television – a program that grips one's attention and rewards it." The Atlanta Journal-Constitution writer Drew Jubera said the episode "shifts deftly between the underbelly of cop work and the surprising moments of light that leak into these detectives' lives". Greg Paeth of The Cincinnati Post called it "another stunning installment of a cop drama that defines the genre", and particularly praised the "perfect" performance of Ned Beatty. The Baltimore Sun writer David Bianculli called the episode superb and said Adrienne Shelly left a "stunning impression in her performance. Bianculli said it left him "hungry for the next episode," adding, "Personal plea to NBC: Please, please renew this series." "A Many Splendored Thing" was nominated for a Writers Guild of America Award for Best Screenplay of an Episodic Drama, but ultimately lost to the Homicide episode "Bop Gun". ## Home media "A Many Splendored Thing" and the rest of the first and second-season episodes were included in the four-DVD box-set "Homicide: Life on the Street: The Complete Seasons 1 & 2", which was released by A&E Home Video on May 27, 2003, for \$69.95.
43,910,621	Star Wars: The Last Jedi	1,173,781,024	2017 film by Rian Johnson	[ "2010s American films", "2010s English-language films", "2010s science fiction adventure films", "2017 3D films", "2017 films", "2017 science fiction action films", "2017 science fiction films", "American 3D films", "American science fiction action films", "American science fiction war films", "American sequel films", "Films directed by Rian Johnson", "Films produced by Kathleen Kennedy", "Films produced by Ram Bergman", "Films scored by John Williams", "Films set on fictional islands", "Films shot at Longcross Studios", "Films shot at Pinewood Studios", "Films shot in Buckinghamshire", "Films shot in County Kerry", "Films shot in Croatia", "Films using motion capture", "Films with screenplays by Rian Johnson", "IMAX films", "Lucasfilm films", "Puppet films", "Star Wars Skywalker Saga films" ]	Star Wars: The Last Jedi (also known as Star Wars: Episode VIII – The Last Jedi) is a 2017 American epic space opera film written and directed by Rian Johnson. Produced by Lucasfilm and distributed by Walt Disney Studios Motion Pictures, it is the second installment of the Star Wars sequel trilogy, following The Force Awakens (2015), and the eighth episode of the nine-part "Skywalker saga". The film's ensemble cast includes Mark Hamill, Carrie Fisher, Adam Driver, Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, Oscar Isaac, Andy Serkis, Lupita Nyong'o, Domhnall Gleeson, Anthony Daniels, Gwendoline Christie, Kelly Marie Tran, Laura Dern, and Benicio del Toro. The Last Jedi follows Rey as she seeks the aid of Luke Skywalker in hopes of turning the tide for the Resistance in the fight against Kylo Ren and the First Order while General Leia Organa, Finn, and Poe Dameron attempt to escape a First Order attack on the dwindling Resistance fleet. The film features the first posthumous film performance by Fisher, who died in December 2016, and the film is dedicated to her memory. The Last Jedi is part of a new trilogy of films announced after Disney's acquisition of Lucasfilm in October 2012. It was produced by Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy and Ram Bergman and executive produced by The Force Awakens director J. J. Abrams. John Williams, composer for the previous episodic films, returned to compose the score. A number of scenes were filmed at Skellig Michael in Ireland during pre-production in September 2015, but principal photography began at Pinewood Studios in England in February 2016 and wrapped that July. The Last Jedi premiered in Los Angeles on December 9, 2017, and was released in the United States on December 15. It grossed over \$1.3 billion worldwide, becoming the highest-grossing film of 2017 and the ninth-highest-grossing film of all time by the time its theatrical run was over. It is also the second-highest-grossing Star Wars film and turned a net profit of over \$417 million. The film was well received by critics and received four nominations at the 90th Academy Awards, including Best Original Score and Best Visual Effects, as well as two nominations at the 71st British Academy Film Awards. A sequel, The Rise of Skywalker, was released in December 2019. ## Plot Shortly after the battle of Starkiller Base, General Leia Organa is leading the Resistance forces in evacuating their base when the First Order fleet arrives. Against Leia's orders, Poe Dameron leads a costly counterattack that destroys a First Order dreadnought. The remaining Resistance escapes into hyperspace, but the First Order uses a device to track them, and attacks again. Kylo Ren hesitates to fire on the lead Resistance ship after sensing his mother Leia's presence on board, but his wingmen destroy the bridge, killing most of the Resistance's leaders. Leia is dragged into space but survives by using the Force. While Leia recovers, Vice-Admiral Holdo assumes command of the Resistance. Running low on fuel, the remaining fleet is pursued by the First Order. On Ahch-To, Rey attempts to recruit Luke Skywalker to the Resistance. Under self-imposed exile, Luke refuses to help and says that the Jedi should end. After encouragement from R2-D2, he agrees to give Rey three lessons in the ways of the Force. Rey and Kylo begin communicating through the Force, which puzzles them both. Kylo tells Rey that Luke feared his power. Luke confesses that he momentarily contemplated killing Kylo upon sensing that Snoke was corrupting him, which prompted Kylo to destroy Luke's new Jedi Order. Convinced that Kylo can be redeemed, Rey leaves Ahch-To. Luke prepares to burn the Jedi library but hesitates. The spirit of Luke's master Yoda appears and destroys the library by summoning a bolt of lightning. He encourages Luke to learn from his failure. Meanwhile, Poe entrusts Finn, mechanic Rose, and BB-8 with a secret mission to disable the First Order's tracking device. Maz Kanata directs them to the casino town of Canto Bight, where they meet the hacker DJ. Pursued by the local security, they escape Canto Bight with the help of stablehand children and racing animals they set free. Finn, Rose, and DJ infiltrate Snoke's flagship but are captured by Captain Phasma. Rey also infiltrates the flagship and is captured by Kylo, who brings her before Snoke. Snoke reveals that he connected their minds to discover Luke's whereabouts. Holdo plans to evacuate the remaining members of the Resistance using small transport vessels. Believing her plan cowardly and futile, Poe leads a mutiny. A recovered Leia stuns Poe with a blaster and proceeds with the evacuation. Holdo remains aboard the ship as a decoy to mislead Snoke's fleet as the others flee to an abandoned base on Crait. DJ buys his freedom by revealing the Resistance's plan to General Hux, and the First Order fleet begins firing on the evacuation transports, destroying many. Ordered to kill Rey, Kylo instead kills Snoke and defeats his Praetorian Guard with her help. Rey hopes that Kylo has abandoned the dark side, but he instead asks her to rule the galaxy with him. Refusing, she battles him for control of Luke's lightsaber, bisecting the weapon. Holdo sacrifices herself by slicing through Snoke's flagship at lightspeed, crippling the First Order fleet with the debris field. Rey escapes the destruction while Kylo declares himself Supreme Leader. BB-8 frees Finn and Rose; they defeat Phasma and join the survivors on Crait. When the First Order arrives, Poe, Finn, and Rose attack with obsolete speeders. Rey and Chewbacca draw TIE fighters away in the Millennium Falcon, while Rose stops Finn from sacrificing himself. The First Order penetrates the Resistance fortress using a siege cannon. Luke appears and confronts the First Order, allowing the surviving Resistance to escape. Kylo orders the First Order's forces to fire on Luke, but they fail to harm him. He then engages Luke in a lightsaber duel; upon striking Luke, Kylo realizes that Luke is not physically present, but projecting his image through the Force. Rey helps the remaining Resistance escape on the Falcon. Exhausted, Luke dies peacefully on Ahch-To, becoming one with the Force. Rey and Leia sense his death, and Leia tells Rey that the Resistance can rise again. At Canto Bight, the stablehands recount the story of Luke Skywalker; afterward, one of them moves a broom with the Force and gazes into space. ## Cast - Mark Hamill as Luke Skywalker, a powerful Jedi Master who has been in self-imposed exile on the planet Ahch-To - Hamill voices Dobbu Scay, named after the film's editor, Bob Ducsay. On Canto Bight, the character mistakes BB-8 for a slot machine. - Carrie Fisher as General Leia Organa, twin sister to Luke, former princess of Alderaan, and a leading general in the Resistance - Adam Driver as Kylo Ren, Supreme Leader Snoke's disciple, who is strong with the Force. He is the son of Han Solo and Leia Organa, and Luke's nephew. - Daisy Ridley as Rey, a highly Force-sensitive scavenger from the desert planet Jakku who joined the Resistance and goes to find Luke - John Boyega as Finn, a former stormtrooper of the First Order who defected to the Resistance. - Oscar Isaac as Poe Dameron, a high-ranking X-wing fighter pilot in the Resistance. - Andy Serkis as Supreme Leader Snoke, the leader of the First Order and Kylo Ren's master. - Lupita Nyong'o as Maz Kanata, a pirate and ally of the Resistance. - Domhnall Gleeson as General Hux, the former head of the First Order's Starkiller Base. - Anthony Daniels as C-3PO, a humanoid protocol droid in the service of Leia Organa. - Gwendoline Christie as Captain Phasma, the commander of the First Order's stormtroopers. - Kelly Marie Tran as Rose Tico, a member of the Resistance who works in maintenance. - Laura Dern as Vice-Admiral Amilyn Holdo, an officer in the Resistance. - Benicio del Toro as DJ, an underworld codebreaker. Frank Oz returns as Yoda, the deceased former Jedi Master and Luke's wise mentor, who appears as a Force spirit. Joonas Suotamo appears as Chewbacca, taking over the role from Peter Mayhew after previously serving as his body double in The Force Awakens. Mayhew, who suffered from chronic knee and back pain, was credited as "Chewbacca consultant". Billie Lourd, Mike Quinn, and Timothy D. Rose reprise their roles as Lieutenant Connix, Nien Nunb, and Admiral Ackbar, respectively; with Tom Kane voicing Ackbar. Amanda Lawrence appears as Commander D'Acy, and Mark Lewis Jones and Adrian Edmondson play Captains Canady and Peavey, respectively. BB-8 is controlled by puppeteers Dave Chapman and Brian Herring, with initial voice work by Ben Schwartz and final sound effects voiced by Bill Hader modulated through a synthesizer. Jimmy Vee portrays R2-D2, taking over the role from Kenny Baker, who died in August 2016. Veronica Ngo portrays Rose's sister Paige Tico, a Resistance gunner who sacrifices her life to destroy a First Order dreadnought. Justin Theroux plays the master codebreaker, while Lily Cole plays his companion. Joseph Gordon-Levitt has a voice cameo as Slowen Lo, and Warwick Davis plays Wodibin. Rogue One (2016) director Gareth Edwards has a cameo appearance as a Resistance Soldier, with Edgar Wright and Joe Cornish also cameo in the film. Hermione Corfield appears as Tallissan "Tallie" Lintra, a Resistance A-Wing pilot and squadron leader, and Noah Segan and Jamie Christopher appear as Resistance pilots Starck and Tubbs. Hugh Skinner cameos as a Resistance Officer; while Hamill's children, Griffin, Nathan, and Chelsea, cameo as Resistance soldiers. Prince William, Duke of Cambridge; Prince Harry, Duke of Sussex; and Gary Barlow have cameo appearances as stormtroopers, and Tom Hardy also had an appearance as a stormtrooper, but his cameo was dropped from the final cut. ## Production ### Development In October 2012, Star Wars creator George Lucas sold his production company Lucasfilm to The Walt Disney Company. Disney announced a new trilogy of Star Wars films. J. J. Abrams was named director of the first episode in the trilogy, Star Wars: The Force Awakens, in January 2013. In June 2014, director Rian Johnson was reported to be in talks to write and direct its sequel, Episode VIII, and to write a treatment for the third film, Episode IX, with Ram Bergman producing both films. Johnson confirmed in August that he would direct Episode VIII. In January 2015, Disney CEO Bob Iger stated that Episode VIII would be released in 2017. In December, Lucasfilm president Kathleen Kennedy said that the film had not been mapped out and that Abrams was collaborating with Johnson, who would in turn work with (then) Episode IX director Colin Trevorrow to ensure a smooth transition. Additionally, Abrams served as an executive producer along with Tom Karnowski and Jason McGatlin. In January 2017, Lucasfilm announced the title for Episode VIII as Star Wars: The Last Jedi. ### Writing The Last Jedi story begins immediately after The Force Awakens. Johnson had his story group watch films such as Twelve O'Clock High (1949), The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), Gunga Din (1939), Three Outlaw Samurai (1964), Sahara (1943), and Letter Never Sent (1960) for inspiration while developing ideas. He felt it was difficult to work on the film while The Force Awakens was being finished. Johnson wrote the scene with the mirrored versions of Rey to symbolise her search for identity; when she asks for a vision of her parents, she sees only herself. Rey learns that her parents were "nobodies" because it would be "the hardest thing" she and the audience could hear; Johnson likened the scene to Luke Skywalker learning that Darth Vader is his father in The Empire Strikes Back (1980). During production, Hamill expressed disagreement with the direction of his character, Luke, feeling his disillusioned state was at odds with the character. Hamill later said he regretted making his initial misgivings public and compared his disagreements to his clashes with George Lucas during the filming of Return of the Jedi (1983). ### Casting In September 2015, Disney shortlisted the female cast members to Gina Rodriguez, Tatiana Maslany, and Olivia Cooke. That same month, Benicio del Toro confirmed his involvement in the film, but denied that he was playing a villain, and Mark Hamill was also confirmed. Joaquin Phoenix was also courted to portray the role of DJ, but would end up passing on the offer. In October 2015, Gugu Mbatha-Raw was rumored to have been cast in the film. In November, Kennedy announced at the London premiere of The Force Awakens that the entire cast would return for Episode VIII, along with "a handful" of new cast members. In February 2016, at the start of filming, it was confirmed that Laura Dern and Kelly Marie Tran had been cast in undisclosed roles. In April 2017, at the Star Wars Celebration Orlando, Lucasfilm announced that Tran would play Resistance maintenance worker Rose Tico, which Johnson described as the film's largest new role. To keep Frank Oz's return as Yoda a secret, producers excluded Oz's name in the billing for the film's pre-release marketing and ensured that Oz stayed on set during filming. ### Filming Second unit photography began during pre-production at Skellig Michael in Ireland on September 14, 2015, due to the difficulties of filming at that location during other seasons. It would have lasted five days, but filming was canceled for the first day due to poor weather and rough conditions. In September 2015, del Toro revealed that principal photography would begin in March 2016. The production began work on the 007 Stage at Pinewood Studios on November 15, 2015. Rick Heinrichs served as production designer. In January 2016, production of Episode VIII was delayed until February due to script rewrites. Filming was in danger of being delayed further due to an upcoming strike between the Producers Alliance for Cinema and Television and the Broadcasting, Entertainment, Cinematograph and Theatre Union. On February 10, 2016, Disney CEO Bob Iger confirmed that principal photography had begun under the working title Space Bear. Additional filming took place in Dubrovnik, Croatia from March 9 to 16, as well as in Ireland in May. Malin Head in County Donegal and a mountain headland, Ceann Sibeal in County Kerry, served as additional filming locations. To increase the scenes' intimacy Driver and Ridley were both present when filming Kylo and Rey's Force visions. Location filming for the battle scenes on the planet Crait took place at the Salar de Uyuni salt flats in Bolivia. Additional filming took place in Mexico. Principal photography wrapped on July 22, 2016, though as of early September, Nyong'o had not filmed her scenes. In February 2017, it was announced that sequences from the film were shot in IMAX. Production designer Rick Heinrichs said the original script called for 160 sets, double what might be expected, but that Johnson did some "trimming and cutting". Ultimately, 125 sets were created on 14 sound stages at Pinewood Studios. According to creature designer Neal Scanlan, The Last Jedi has more practical effects than any Star Wars film, with 180 to 200 creatures created with practical effects, some cut from the final edit. For Yoda's appearance in the film as a Force ghost, the character was created using puppetry, as was done in the original Star Wars trilogy (as opposed to computer-generated imagery, which was used to create Yoda in most of the prequel trilogy). Rian Johnson explained the decision was because he felt a digital Yoda would not have been true to how Luke knew him in The Empire Strikes Back. ### Music In July 2013, Kennedy confirmed at the Star Wars Celebration Europe that John Williams would return to score the Star Wars sequel trilogy. Williams confirmed his assignment for The Last Jedi at a Tanglewood concert in August 2016, stating he would begin recording the score "off and on" in December 2016 until March or April 2017. On February 21, 2017, it was confirmed that recording was underway, with both Williams and William Ross conducting the sessions. In lieu of a traditional spotting session with Johnson, Williams was provided a temp track of music from his previous film scores as a reference for scoring The Last Jedi. The official soundtrack album was released by Walt Disney Records on December 15, 2017. ## Marketing On September 19, 2017, Australia Post released a set of stamp packs. On October 12, Royal Mail released a set of eight promotional postage stamps designed by Malcolm Tween. Several tie-in books were released on the same day as the film's release, including The Last Jedi: The Visual Dictionary, and various children's reading and activity books. Related novelizations included the prequel book Cobalt Squadron, and Canto Bight, a collection of novellas about the Canto Bight Casino. As with The Force Awakens, there is no official tie-in game for The Last Jedi, in favor of integrating content from the film into other Star Wars video games, including Star Wars Battlefront II, which introduced various content from the film, during the game's first "season". ## Release ### Theatrical The film had its world premiere at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles on December 9, 2017, and was released in the United States on December 15, in IMAX and 3D. The film was originally scheduled to be released in the United States on May 26; however, it was pushed back to December to avoid competition with Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (2017). ### Home media Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment released Star Wars: The Last Jedi digitally in HD and 4K via digital download and Movies Anywhere on March 13, 2018, with an Ultra HD Blu-ray, Blu-ray, and DVD physical release on March 27. On March 31, 2020, a 27-disc Skywalker Saga box set was released, containing all nine films in the series, with each film receiving three discs, a Blu-ray version, a 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray, and special features found on the 2011 release for the first six episodic films. ## Reception ### Box office Star Wars: The Last Jedi grossed \$620.2 million in the United States and Canada, and \$712.5 million in other territories, for a worldwide total of \$1.333 billion. It was the highest-grossing film of 2017 and the ninth-highest-grossing film of all time. The film had a worldwide opening of \$450.8 million, the eighth-biggest of all time, including \$40.6 million that was attributed to IMAX screenings, the second biggest for IMAX. It was estimated that the film would need to gross \$800 million worldwide to break even; On December 31, 2017, the film crossed the \$1 billion mark, making it the third Star Wars film to do so. Deadline Hollywood calculated the film's net profit as \$417.5 million, accounting for production budgets, marketing, talent participations, and other costs; box office grosses and home media revenues placed it first on their list of 2017's "Most Valuable Blockbusters". #### United States and Canada Pre-sale tickets went on sale in the United States on October 9, 2017, and as with The Force Awakens and Rogue One, ticket service sites such as Fandango had their servers crash due to heavy traffic and demand. In the United States and Canada, industry tracking had The Last Jedi grossing around \$200 million from 4,232 theaters in its opening weekend. The film made \$45 million from Thursday night previews, the second-highest amount ever (behind The Force Awakens' \$57 million). It went on to make \$104.8 million on its first day (including previews), and \$220 million over the weekend, both the second-highest amounts of all time. The opening weekend figure included an IMAX opening-weekend of \$25 million, the biggest IMAX opening of the year, and the second biggest ever behind The Force Awakens. After dropping by 76% on its second Friday, the worst Friday-to-Friday drop in the series, the film fell by a total of 67% in its second weekend, grossing \$71.7 million. It was the largest second-weekend drop of the series, although it remained atop the box office. It made \$52.4 million in its third weekend, again topping the box office. It also brought its domestic total to \$517.1 million, overtaking the Disney film Beauty and the Beast (2017) as the highest of 2017. It grossed \$23.6 million and was surpassed the following weekend by Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle (2017) (which was in its third week) and Insidious: The Last Key (2018). #### Other countries In its first two days of release the film made \$60.8 million from 48 markets. The top countries were the United Kingdom (\$10.2 million), Germany (\$6.1 million), France (\$6 million), Australia (\$5.6 million), and Brazil (\$2.5 million). By the end of the weekend, the film made \$230 million outside the United States and Canada. All-time opening weekend records were set in various countries, including France, Germany, Spain, United Kingdom, and Finland. On its second weekend, it grossed \$76.1 million outside the United States and Canada and became the fourth-highest-grossing film of the year in Europe. As of January 21, the largest markets outside of the United States and Canada are the United Kingdom (\$109.3 million), Germany (\$79.8 million), France (\$63.5 million), Japan (\$60.8 million), and Australia (\$43.5 million). The film had a \$28.7 million opening weekend in China. A week after its debut, China's movie exhibitors dropped the film's showtimes by 90%. The film grossed \$910,000 in its third weekend, dropping to ninth place at the Chinese box office, overshadowed by new releases including Bollywood film Secret Superstar (2017), Hollywood films Ferdinand (2017) and Wonder (2017), and Chinese film A Better Tomorrow 2018. The Last Jedi grossed \$42.5 million in China. ### Critical response ` Metacritic analysis found the film was the 25th-most mentioned film on "best of the year" film rankings and the 22nd-most mentioned on "best of the decade" film rankings.` Matt Zoller Seitz of RogerEbert.com gave the film four stars out of four, praising the surprises and risks that it took, writing that "The movie works equally well as an earnest adventure full of passionate heroes and villains and a meditation on sequels and franchise properties", in which the film "includes multiple debates over whether one should replicate or reject the stories and symbols of the past." Writing for Rolling Stone, Peter Travers gave the film three-and-a-half stars out of four, praising Johnson's direction and the cast performances, particularly Hamill's, and concluding that the film "ranks with the very best Star Wars epics (even the pinnacle that is The Empire Strikes Back)". Richard Roeper of the Chicago Sun-Times gave the film three-and-a-half stars out of four, praising the action sequences and humor, and said that the film "doesn't pack quite the same emotional punch [as The Force Awakens] and it lags a bit in the second half, [but] this is still a worthy chapter in the Star Wars franchise", containing a few callbacks of "previous characters and iconic moments". Will Gompertz, arts editor of BBC News, gave the film four stars out of five, writing "Rian Johnson [...] has not ruined your Christmas with a turkey. His gift to you is a cracker, a blockbuster movie packed with invention, wit, and action galore." The unpredictability of the plot was appreciated by reviewers such as Alex Leadbeater of Screen Rant, who commented specifically that the death of Snoke was "the best movie twist in years". Creator of the franchise George Lucas, who was not involved with the film's production, described The Last Jedi as "beautifully made" shortly after its release. His reaction to Star Wars: The Force Awakens was generally more negative. Conversely, Richard Brody of The New Yorker wrote that the film "comes off as a work that's ironed out, flattened down, appallingly purified". Kate Taylor of The Globe and Mail gave the film two stars out of four, saying it suffered from too many new additions and adding, "as it seeks to uphold a giant cultural legacy, this unfolding trilogy struggles to maintain a balance that often seems just out of reach." Owen Gleiberman of Variety criticized the film for being too derivative of the past films, noting "it's now repeating things that have already been repeated", becoming "an official monument to nostalgia". ### Audience reception Audience reception measured by scientific polling methods was highly positive. Audiences polled by CinemaScore during the opening weekend gave the film an average grade of "A" on an A+ to F scale, and those at PostTrak gave the film an 89% overall positive score, a 79% "definite recommend", and a rare five-star rating. SurveyMonkey determined that 89% of its polled audience graded the film positively. User-generated scores at Rotten Tomatoes and Metacritic received considerable coverage for being more negative. Audience scores on such sites require only registration and do not ensure that contributing voters have seen the film. Several reviewers speculated that coordinated vote brigading from internet groups and bots contributed to the low scores, including analysis provided by Quartz and Bleeding Cool. After initially rejecting tampering claims, Rotten Tomatoes later said in 2019 that The Last Jedi had been "seriously targeted" by a review-bombing campaign. Scott Mendelson of Forbes labeled the negative reaction "alleged", saying it was based on "easily trolled online user polls", and he criticized Disney for placating the "vocal minority" in its approach to the sequel, The Rise of Skywalker. The Last Jedi was also characterized by reviewers as divisive among audiences. Emily VanDerWerff of Vox found that dissatisfied fans saw the film as too progressive, disliked its humor, plot, or character arcs, or felt betrayed that it ignored fan theories. Other reviewers made similar observations. Particularly divisive was the reveal that Rey's parents are insignificant; many fans had expected her to be Luke's daughter or to share a lineage with another character from the original trilogy. There was also sentiment that Snoke's character was underdeveloped and that Luke's actions contradicted his previous heroic portrayal. Reviewers claimed that fan theories were held so strongly among some viewers that it was difficult for them to accept different stories, but they noted that other viewers appreciated the film's action, tone, and deviation from Star Wars tradition. #### Harassment The casting of Asian-American actress Kelly Marie Tran as Rose Tico spurred both a racial and misogynistic backlash against the film, including sexist and racist commentary about both Tran and her character. Tran was accused of representing "forced diversity" imposed by "social justice warriors" because of her race. After facing extensive harassment over her ethnicity and appearance, Tran quit social media. The incident highlighted the challenges faced by people of color who are in Star Wars. Tran was the first woman of color to have a lead role in a Star Wars film, and similarly John Boyega faced the same type of abuse when he was cast in The Force Awakens. After leaving social media, director Rian Johnson and co-stars Mark Hamill and John Boyega defended Tran against the harassment she received. ### Accolades ## Sequel The Rise of Skywalker, the final installment of the sequel trilogy, was released on December 20, 2019. Colin Trevorrow was expected to direct the film, but on September 5, 2017, Lucasfilm announced that he had stepped down. A week later, Lucasfilm announced that J. J. Abrams would return to direct the film and co-write it with Chris Terrio.
28,017,253	Better than Today	1,124,924,987	2010 single by Kylie Minogue	[ "2010 singles", "2010 songs", "Kylie Minogue songs", "Parlophone singles", "Song recordings produced by Stuart Price", "Songs written by Andy Chatterley", "Songs written by Nerina Pallot" ]	"Better Than Today" is a song recorded by Australian singer Kylie Minogue for her eleventh studio album, Aphrodite (2010). The track was originally written and produced by Nerina Pallot and Andy Chatterley for Pallot's 2009 extended play, Buckminster Fuller EP. It was re-recorded by Minogue in 2009, and received additional production by Stuart Price. Musically, "Better Than Today" is a dance-pop song that emulates other styles using guitars, synthesizers and drum programming. "Better Than Today" was released on 3 December 2010 as the album's third single. It was not as successful as Minogue's preceding releases. After debuting on the chart early with album downloads, it peaked on the UK Singles Chart at number 32, making it her lowest placing since "The One" in 2008. The single was released in Australia on 28 February 2011. It debuted on the ARIA Singles Chart at number 55, making it her third single to miss the top-fifty, after "Finer Feelings" in 1992 (number 60) and "Get Outta My Way" in 2010 (number 69). Despite under-performing in the United Kingdom and Australia, it became Minogue's sixth number-one on the US Hot Dance Club Songs chart and her third consecutive number-one single from the album Aphrodite on that chart. "Better Than Today" received mixed reviews from contemporary music critics. They applauded the dance-oriented lyrics, comparing the track's composition to Minogue's works in the early 1990s on Rhythm of Love and the songs of the Scissor Sisters. Many critics praised the song as a part of the album, but did not believe it was strong as an independent single. An accompanying music video, directed by Minogue and her tour staff, was released on 19 November 2010. The video reflected the fashion and choreography of the performances done during her 2009 For You, For Me Tour, where she debuted the song. Reception for the video was mainly positive, with most publications noting its similarities to Minogue's previous music videos. ## Background and release "Better Than Today" was written and produced by married couple Nerina Pallot and Andy Chatterley. The song was originally included on Pallot's project Buckminster Fuller EP in February 2009. After hearing Pallot's work, Minogue's A&R contacted her manager. Pallot stated when Minogue called her later, she "really didn't believe it was her", continuing, "when [Minogue] came to the studio in a nasty part of London I thought: 'OK, she really does want to do this'". Pallot and Chatterley were the first two writers and producers to work with Minogue when recording sessions for Aphrodite began in April 2009. "Better Than Today" was one of the prominent results of the collaboration. Pallot commented on working with Minogue, calling her "accommodating and lovely and approachable and normal [sic]". Subsequent sessions Minogue had with the duo were not as successful. After Parlophone president Miles Leonard made Stuart Price the executive producer over the album in December 2009, Price and Jake Shears (a friend and former collaboration partner of Price and Minogue) began to re-produce the album. After being retooled by Price, "Better Than Today" was left as one of only two remaining collaborations Minogue had with Pallot and Chatterly, along with the album's title track. Additional production and mixing took place at London in 2009. "Better Than Today" was released as the third single from the album on 3 December 2010. It was released digitally in Minogue's native Australia on 28 February 2011 and physically on 18 March 2011. ## Composition "Better Than Today" is a dance-pop song with influences from other styles, including funk, soul and country. It also incorporates the use of the electric and acoustic guitar, synthesizers and drum programming by both Pallot and Chatterley. According to the sheet music published by Hal Leonard Corporation, it is set in common time with a tempo of 110 beats per minute. Minogue's version is composed in the key of F major with her vocal range spanning from the low-note of A<sub>4</sub> to the high-note of F<sub>6</sub>. The chord progression F-E♭-Dm-Dm-E♭-F follows throughout her edition while the middle eight remains in F (Pallot's version did not contain a middle eight). Many comparisons have been made on the song's style. Popjustice compared "Better Than Today" to the style used in Minogue's 1990 album Rhythm of Love. Hannah Kim of the Korea JoongAng Daily stated the track adds on to a "classic 70s disco sound". When reviewing the album, Ian Wade of BBC Music called the song a "tech-country strut". Fraser McAlpine of BBC said that without research, it "bears the musical fingerprint" of Shears. "It's got that 'Laura' bounce ... And the bit where Kylie goes way up high? Well you've heard the verses to 'I Don't Feel Like Dancin right? Sonically similar..." Christel Loar of PopMatters and Nick Levine of Digital Spy praised the lyric in the song, "What's the point in living if you don't wanna dance?" Levine specifically applauded Pallot and Chatterly for "coming up with probably the Kyliest Kylie lyric ever". ## Critical reception The song has received positive reviews in context of the album. Mikael Wood of Entertainment Weekly called "Better Than Today" a standout track on Aphrodite. Wade of BBC Music also gave a favorable review, saying the track "throws up imagery of line-dancing cyborgs". Loar of PopMatters labeled it a "sugary bounce". However in contrast to the positive album reviews, Nick Ward of The Nelson Mail was not impressed. He said that there is no "oomph" that "would have made ['Better Than Today'] complete". When "Better Than Today" became a single, reviews for the song itself were mixed. McAlpine of BBC said "the relentless swaggering momentum" of the track "gets a little wearing". He continued, "At some point, something ELSE needs to happen, y'see [sic]. No matter how many times Kylie's voice swoops up high and skips back down again, no matter how firmly she pushes herself into those demanding choruses; it begins like Tigger and ends like a route march around an aerobics class." He gave the single three out of five stars. Popjustice, while stating the song is "rather enjoyable", added that it is a "no-harm-intended album track" instead of "the big balls-out I'm-bloody-Kylie comeback single". They remarked at a later date, saying that they were "slightly alarmed" when the song became a single. Nima Baniamer of Contact Music described the song as "a fun electro number", but it "sadly doesn't seem to pack a punch enough to stand firm as a lead-out track". Originally in an album review, Levine of Digital Spy called the tune "as uplifting a dance-pop ditty as we're likely to hear all year". In a single review, Levine re-evaluated the song, stating that it is not "the freshest confection you'll sample this party season" but he continued, calling it "sweet, seductive and pretty much impossible not to succumb to over and over again". He gave the single four out of five stars. ## Chart performance During the week of 20 November 2010, "Better Than Today" made its UK Singles Chart debut at number 67. This was based purely on digital sales from the album as the single was not released until 3 December 2010. The day before its release, it reached a new peak of number 40, before dropping to number 63, only to go on to peak at number 32 on 18 December 2010. As a result, "Better Than Today" is one of Minogue's lowest charting singles in the United Kingdom. It proved to be her least successful UK charting since 2008's "The One" which peaked at number 36. The single had similar results in other European countries, peaking at number 27 in Scotland and number 63 in France. In the United States, "Better Than Today" debuted at number 44 on the Hot Dance Club Songs chart. It rose to number-one on the issue date entitled 5 March 2011, not only becoming Minogue's sixth number-one single on the chart, but also her third consecutive number-one from the Aphrodite album on that chart. At the time, Minogue also held the third spot on the chart with "Higher", her collaboration with British recording artist Taio Cruz, becoming the first artist to claim two of the top three spots at the same time in the American dance chart's history. After its release in Australia, the song made its debut on the ARIA Singles Chart at number 55. This proved to be her third single to miss the top-fifty along with "Finer Feelings" (1992), which peaked at number 60, and "Get Outta My Way" (2010), which peaked at number 69. In a March 2011 interview with Perth Now, Minogue expressed disappointment with the commercial performance of her singles from Aphrodite. Minogue said, > "It's confusing. I felt a little let down with my releases from Aphrodite,... I was caught out like a lot of artists were, with record companies figuring out how to do single releases these days. I remember doing a promo for one of the last singles and it just felt really old-fashioned. I'm pretty computer-savvy, something didn't feel right, but no one said anything to me." Consequently, after acknowledging that both "Better Than Today" and "Get Outta My Way" charted poorly across the world, she announced there would be no more singles released from the album. However, "Put Your Hands Up" was released in late May 2011 following a press release from Astralwerks, Minogue's North American record label. ## Music video ### Background and synopsis Minogue premiered the video for "Better Than Today" at her official website on 19 November 2010. The video was directed by Minogue herself with help from her tour staff, including her long-time stylist and friend William Baker. The video resembles performances of the song done during her 2009 For You, For Me Tour, featuring the same dances by choreographer Tony Testa. The video begins with Minogue dancing on a stage surrounded by laser beams. As the first verse starts, she is surrounded by female dancers wearing pink wigs as shoulder pads and a band wearing Pac-Man helmets. She is wearing a blue bodysuit with fringed material on top and silver, spiked Louboutin stilettos similar to the golden ones featured in the video for "Get Outta My Way". Screens in the background show several colourful projections inspired by Space Invaders and other arcade games. When the chorus starts, Minogue sits on two Marshall amps while animated flowers, 3D bears and bold letters echoing lyrics move through the screens. During the bridge, Minogue is surrounded once again with laser beams, some projected from her microphone stand. The screens display colourful lips inspired by the musical The Rocky Horror Picture Show. After the final chorus cuts through all scenes the video ends with Minogue surrounded by the laser beams again, lowering her beamed microphone stand. ### Reception Feedback to the music video was mostly positive. Pink is the New Blog applauded the video, labelling it a "very colorful, 80s video game inspired video". Gary Pini of Paper described the set of the music video as being "designed by Murakami and Pac Man" with "a cool microphone stand the shoots out laser beams". Becky Bain of Idolator also enjoyed the "sexified" video, saying "You have to love a super cool chick like Kylie who isn't afraid to let her inner nerd out in the open." Bradley Stern of MuuMuse described it as a mixture of the music videos for "2 Hearts" and "The One". He continued, "...the video for "Better Than Today" kicks Kylie's X Factor performance up ten notches with laser lights, bright neon animations, extra furry pink shoulders–and of course, killer spiked heels." HardCandy was reminded of the music video for "Can't Get You Out of My Head". "I love that she's brought back her 'Can't Get You Out of My Head' robots with an updated Tron feel to them." They added that the video was "nothing special or ground breaking". ## Live performances Minogue premiered "Better Than Today" by adding it to the set list of her 2009 For You, For Me Tour. Prior to performing the song on the first tour date in Oakland, she said, "I know it's taken me a little long to get [to the United States], so I thought I'd give you guys a first..." Rolling Stone commented on Minogue's background singers during the song, saying they had "the evening's most striking fashion innovation": neon pink wigs worn as shoulder pads. After the tour stop in Chicago, John Dugan of Time Out said that the performance was his "favorite song of the night". The song was added in the Aphrodite: Les Folies Tour setlist in 2011. Simon Collins of The West Australian praising Minogue's ability to "regather herself to deliver the sassy stomp" of the song. To promote the single, Minogue took on a number of television performances. On 7 November 2010, she sang the song live on The X Factor's results show. She wore a red, fringed cocktail dress with small cut-outs in the waist and the silver heels featured in the music video. She received a standing ovation from all four judges; Dannii Minogue, who is a judge on the show and Minogue's sister, gave her praise. She called the performance a "ten out of ten". Minogue reprised this performance for BBC One's Children in Need 2010 television special on 19 November 2010. She donned a bodysuit similar to the one featured in the video, but in white. Minogue opened Capital FM's Jingle Bell Ball on 6 December 2010, adding "Better Than Today" to her set list. She wore a sheer, white floor-length gown with the same silver heels. She then went on to perform the song at the annual Royal Variety Performance on 10 December 2010. Minogue and Gary Barlow got the chance to greet Prince Charles and Camilla at the London Palladium, where the event was held. At the end of 2010, she performed a big band version of the song at Jools Holland's annual Hootenanny''. ## Track listings Australian CD single and UK CD1 1. "Better Than Today" – 3:26 2. "Better Than Today" (Bills and Hurr remix) – 8:36 3. "Better Than Today" (The Japanese Popstars mix) – 6:45 4. "Get Outta My Way" (BBC Live Lounge version) – 3:40 UK CD2 1. "Better Than Today" – 3:26 2. "Can't Get You Out of My Head" (BBC Live Lounge version) – 3:12 ## Credits and personnel Credits adapted from the liner notes of "Better Than Today": - Nerina Pallot – producer, writer, background vocals, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, piano, keyboards, synthesizer, engineer - Andy Chatterley – producer, writer, piano, keyboards, synthesizer, drum programming, engineer - Stuart Price – producer (additional), mixing - Ben Vella – electric guitar - Kylie Minogue – background vocals, lead vocals - Jason Tarver – engineer (assistant) - Dave Emery – mixing (assistant) ## Charts ### Weekly charts ### Year-end chart ## Release history ## See also - List of number-one dance singles of 2011 (U.S.)
638,936	Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.	1,173,676,158	American television sitcom	[ "1960s American sitcoms", "1964 American television series debuts", "1969 American television series endings", "American television spin-offs", "Black-and-white American television shows", "CBS original programming", "English-language television shows", "Military comedy television series", "Television series by CBS Studios", "Television shows about the United States Marine Corps", "Television shows set in California", "Television shows set in North Carolina", "The Andy Griffith Show" ]	Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C. is an American situation comedy that originally aired on CBS from September 25, 1964, to May 2, 1969. The series was a spin-off of The Andy Griffith Show, and the pilot episode was aired as the season finale of the fourth season of its parent series on May 18, 1964. The show ran for a total of 150 half-hour episodes spanning over five seasons, in black-and-white for the first season, and then in color for the remaining four seasons. In 2006, CBS Home Entertainment (distributed by Paramount) began releasing the series on DVD. The final season was released in November 2008. Like its parent series, Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C. was also a major ratings hit, never placing lower than tenth in the Nielsen ratings, and ended its run as the second-highest-rated series in the United States. It has enjoyed continued popularity through reruns and DVD releases. The series was created by Aaron Ruben, who also produced the show with Sheldon Leonard and Ronald Jacobs. Filmed and set in California, it stars Jim Nabors as Gomer Pyle, a naïve but good-natured gas station attendant from the town of Mayberry, North Carolina, who enlists in the United States Marine Corps. Frank Sutton plays Gomer's high-octane, short-fused Gunnery Sergeant Vince Carter, and Ronnie Schell plays Gomer's friend Duke Slater. Roy Stuart portrayed Corporal Chuck Boyle, GySgt Carter's good-natured sidekick. Allan Melvin played in the recurring role of Gunnery Sergeant Carter's rival, Staff Sergeant Charley Hacker. ## History Everett Greenbaum and Jim Fritzell, writers for The Andy Griffith Show, are credited with creating the character of Gomer Pyle. The character was based on an "incompetent" gas station attendant whom Greenbaum met and named after Gomer Cool (a writer) and Denver Pyle (an actor on The Andy Griffith Show). Jim Nabors was cast to play Gomer; he had been performing for a Santa Monica nightclub, The Horn, when Andy Griffith discovered him. Though originally intended to appear in only one episode, Gomer proved popular, and after appearing in seasons 3 and 4, Nabors was given his own spin-off produced by Aaron Ruben. The pilot episode of Gomer Pyle was filmed in 1963 as part of The Andy Griffith Show, but was not aired until 1964, as the finale of The Andy Griffith Show's fourth season. The 1960s saw a return to "the more mundane sensibilities of comedy," due to viewers' wishes for television programming to be a "cultural antidepressant." Thus, fantasy- and rurally-oriented comedies gained popularity and dominated the Nielsen ratings. Like other comedies at the time, Gomer Pyle was a "deep escapist" show; it avoided political commentary and offered viewers a distraction from the social changes of the 1960s. Despite being a military-themed show and airing during the peak of the Vietnam War, the show never discussed the war. Instead, the show was founded on "Gomer's innocent simplicity [and] Sergeant Carter's frustration and later concern for Gomer's well-being." This, compounded with the popularity of rural comedies in the 1960s, made the show popular. Frank Sutton, who played Carter, ascribed the show's popularity to its concentration on its two main characters, and the plots being built around their respective personalities. The program remained in the top 10 of the ratings throughout its run—in the top three for all but its third season when CBS moved it from Fridays to Wednesdays. Approaching age 40, Nabors quit because he desired to move to something else, "reach for another rung on the ladder, either up or down." After Gomer Pyle left the air, Jim Nabors hosted his own variety show, The Jim Nabors Hour, from 1969 to 1971. As well as showcasing Nabors' singing and rich baritone voice, the show included comedy sketches that featured Nabors's Gomer Pyle co-stars Frank Sutton and Ronnie Schell. Though told that he should not leave Gomer Pyle, Nabors felt that the show would still be exciting and noted that every character he portrayed in his sketches "turn[ed] out to be Gomer." ## Production The show was produced by creator Aaron Ruben, Andy Griffith Show producer Sheldon Leonard (in partnership with Griffith), and Ronald Jacobs; it was co-produced by Bruce Bayley Johnson and Duke Vincent. Among the writers were Sam Bobrick, Harvey Miller, Aaron Ruben, Jack Elinson, and Bill Idelson; Andy Griffith Show writers Everett Greenbaum and Jim Fritzell also wrote episodes. Coby Ruskin was the primary director in the first four seasons, before John Rich took over the role for the fifth season; other directors included Gary Nelson, Peter Baldwin, and Alan Rafkin. Ruth Burch was in charge of the casting, and John Finger directed the cinematography. The theme song was composed by Earle Hagen, who also composed the themes for shows such as The Andy Griffith Show, The Dick Van Dyke Show, and That Girl. The show was filmed at Camp Pendleton, Desilu Studios's Desilu-Cahuenga, and RKO Forty Acres backlot, where The Andy Griffith Show was filmed. Though Ruben preferred the use of a multiple-camera setup for comedy programs, Gomer Pyle used a single-camera setup because much of the shooting was conducted outdoors. In his book And The Show Goes On, Sheldon Leonard explained that the armed forces offer levels of "cooperation" with filmmakers. Because the Marines felt that the show would be good for the branch's image, Gomer Pyle was given "total cooperation," meaning that the show was allowed unlimited access to military equipment. The vehicles in the show were provided by the Chrysler Corporation, as opposed to the parent series' vehicles that came from the Ford Motor Company. Although Jeeps are also prominent in the show, the brand itself would not become a part of Chrysler until the AMC buyout that occurred in 1987. Nabors and Sutton were the only actors credited in every episode (however, Sutton did not appear in every episode). Ronnie Schell (who played Duke Slater) left after the third season to star in Good Morning World, though he returned for the fifth season, promoted to corporal, after graduating from non-commissioned officer training. Roy Stuart, who played Corporal Chuck Boyle, made his debut in the second season and left after the fourth. Andy Griffith, Frances Bavier, Ron Howard, and George Lindsey made guest appearances on the series reprising their respective roles from The Andy Griffith Show. Denver Pyle and Allan Melvin, who both had roles on The Andy Griffith Show, appeared in Gomer Pyle, but did not reprise their original roles. Denver Pyle, who had played Briscoe Darling in six episodes of The Andy Griffith Show, played tomato farmer Titus Purcell in the Gomer Pyle episode "The Price of Tomatoes." Allan Melvin, who had played Clarence "Doc" Malloy and other antagonists on The Andy Griffith Show, played Sergeant Carter's rival, Staff Sergeant Hacker, for four seasons. Nabors also carried the Gomer Pyle character to fellow CBS series The Lucy Show, in which he made a cameo appearance in a 1966 episode. Nabors always said he had a hard time watching the show's opening credits, as many of the Marines he was filmed training with were later killed in Vietnam. ## Episodes ## Premise The premise of Gomer Pyle is similar to and perhaps inspired by Andy Griffith's starring role in the Broadway play and film version of No Time for Sergeants, which was based on the Mac Hyman novel of the same title. Like Leonard's other shows, Gomer Pyle was character-driven; the main characters were "accessible" and "engaging," and the supporting characters were often eccentric. In the show's pilot episode, Gomer, a gas-station attendant from Mayberry, joins the Marines. Gomer's naivete immediately exasperates his drill instructor, Gunnery Sergeant Carter (Frank Sutton). Originally situated in Camp Wilson in North Carolina, the setting was moved to the fictional Camp Henderson in California. The show was a fish-out-of-water piece, which, like its contemporary The Beverly Hillbillies, featured rural characters out of their normal settings. Like other comedies of the 1960s, the show avoided political commentary (especially concerning the Vietnam War) and focused instead on the predicaments that ensued from Gomer's unintentional breaking of the rules or sticking his foot in his mouth. Among the themes explored were the honesty and "strong family values supposedly inherent in small-town life"; according to author Gerard Jones, Gomer Pyle'''s basic message was "far simpler than any corporate suburban sitcoms with their lessons in compromise and role-following [...] It said merely that the oldest, most basic, least sophisticated sort of sweetness could redeem even the toughest modern types". Author Elizabeth Hirschman noted that Gomer represented a "uniquely American archetype"—a "large, powerful man physically" with the "simple, honest nature of a child or animal". She also noted that, like stories with characters of such an archetype, Gomer's trusting nature was often taken advantage of, though in the end he "reaps happiness" because of his innocence. In his book Watching M\A\S\*H, Watching America, media and communications scholar James Wittebols said that Gomer Pyle illustrated how class differences "supposedly negated or diminished by military training" made themselves apparent in the military world. ## Characters Gomer Pyle (played by Jim Nabors), from Mayberry, North Carolina, is a good-natured and innocent private whose naïvete constantly annoys his drill instructor, Sergeant Carter. Eventually, however, his "unquestioning love and trust of the world" lead those in his platoon to befriend him. His good nature attracts the friendship of women; meanwhile, in so far as Carter's abrasiveness repels women, Gomer is in the position of salvaging numerous social occasions by charming the women whose opinions are important to officers at the Marine base. Gomer was created as a stereotype of a rural American; according to Time, he "wears a gee-whiz expression, spouts homilies out of a lopsided mouth and lopes around uncertainly like a plowboy stepping through a field of cow dung. He is a walking disaster area." Though never promoted beyond private first class during the show's run, Jim Nabors (who played Gomer) was given an honorary promotion to lance corporal in 2001, to corporal in 2007, and then to sergeant in 2013 by the Marines. Vince Carter (played by Frank Sutton), a gunnery sergeant from Kansas, is Gomer's irritable, abrasive, and socially inept drill instructor (later his platoon sergeant) who is constantly annoyed by Gomer's well-intentioned mistakes. Carter disdains Gomer's country idiosyncrasies ("golly!" "Shazam!" "surprise, surprise, surprise!"). He is also put off by Gomer's expectation that the platoon should be a family, of which Carter is the father figure: As much as Carter wants their working relationship to be temporary, as is common in the military, Gomer expects a life-long friendship, which exasperates Carter. Due to the audience's demand for more family-oriented programming, he eventually revealed his softer side: Carter became a father figure to Gomer as well as his best friend. Sutton stated that his character was created "out of whole cloth for the show" and, as the actor played him "by ear," Carter greatly changed during the first season. Barbara Stuart played his girlfriend "Miss Bunny" for three seasons. Mark Slade appeared in eight episodes in 1964 in the role of "Eddie" though in the first of those appearances he was billed as "Private Swanson." Duke Slater (played by Ronnie Schell) is Gomer's friend and platoon-mate. Schell left the show in the fourth season to star in the short-lived show Good Morning, World but returned in the final season as the corporal of Gomer's platoon. Chuck Boyle (played by Roy Stuart) is Gomer's corporal. He often serves as Carter's conscience and sticks up for Gomer when Sergeant Carter is annoyed over his mistakes. Stuart debuted in the second season and left the show after the fourth season; Boyle was replaced by Duke Slater as corporal for the final season. Lou-Ann Poovie (played by Elizabeth MacRae) is Gomer's girlfriend. She debuts in the third season as a singer for a nightclub, but leaves the job at Gomer's urging to return home to Turtle Creek, North Carolina, and marry her beau Monroe Efford. In a later episode in the same season, she returns to California and reveals that she called the wedding off. At the end of the episode, she reveals that she wants Gomer to be her boyfriend, to the dismay of Carter and Duke. After she loses her job at the nightclub, Gomer finds her a job as a salesclerk at a record shop. ## Ratings and timeslots ## Legacy In the song "Nobody Home" from Pink Floyd's 1979 album The Wall, an audio clip of Pyle saying his signature line "Surprise, surprise, surprise!" can be heard. The audio clip, however, is not present in the 1982 film. In 1987, some 18 years after Gomer Pyle finished its broadcast run, Stanley Kubrick's film Full Metal Jacket was released. In it, the nickname "Gomer Pyle" is derogatorily given to Private Leonard Lawrence (played by Vincent D'Onofrio) during boot camp, after incurring the drill instructor's wrath (Gunnery Sergeant Hartman played by R. Lee Ermey) for being unable to turn off his idiot's grin and his perceived incompetence. A brief clip of the show airing on American Forces Vietnam Network television appears during the military hospital scene in the 1994 film Forrest Gump. In the scene, Gump is scolded for watching the show by a fellow soldier who calls it "stupid shit". ## Media E. Kitzes Knox wrote a novel based on the series, also titled Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C. The paperback was published by Pyramid and released in 1966. Jim Nabors recorded Shazam!, which is not a soundtrack of the show but features Jim singing novelty songs in his "Gomer" voice, and released it on the Columbia Records label. ## Home media CBS DVD (distributed by Paramount Home Entertainment) has released all five seasons of Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C. on DVD in Region 1. All episodes have been fully restored and digitally remastered in full-color, but due to clearance issues, some episodes that feature Nabors (and other cast members) singing have been edited to remove those performances. On March 10, 2015, CBS DVD (distributed by Paramount) released Gomer Pyle, U.S.M.C.- The Complete series'' on DVD in Region 1. In Region 4, Shock Entertainment has released all five seasons on DVD in Australia. ## Explanatory notes ## General bibliography
11,896,394	Hello Sunshine (Super Furry Animals song)	1,122,256,131	null	[ "2003 singles", "Super Furry Animals songs" ]	"Hello Sunshine" is a song by the Welsh band Super Furry Animals from their album Phantom Power. It was the seventeenth single released by the group and reached number 31 on the UK Singles Chart in October 2003. Several versions of the track were released: the single version omits the short sample of the song "By the Sea" by Wendy and Bonnie which begins the album version, while two remixes, by Weevil and Freiband, appear on the album Phantom Phorce. An animated music video, featuring drawings by regular Super Furries sleeve designer Pete Fowler, was produced to accompany the release of "Hello Sunshine" as a single. The track received mostly positive reviews from critics. The band turned down "a seven-figure offer" from Coca-Cola to allow the use of "Hello Sunshine" in an advertising campaign citing alleged malpractice on the part of the drinks firm. The group have stated that despite the financial incentives of licensing their songs, they are happy to simply be able to make a living from music. ## Recording and themes The track begins with a sample of the song "By the Sea" by the teenage sibling duo Wendy and Bonnie, from their 1969 album Genesis, which Super Furries singer Gruff Rhys has described as "amazing songs, amazing lyrics and amazing voices". The decision to begin the track with a snippet of "By the Sea" came about due to laziness on the band's part—the track had originally being conceived as a duet but the group "never got around to getting anyone to sing" with them so they "chopped up the Wendy & Bonnie song and stuck it on [as] it's in the same key [and] seemed to make sense". The edit version, issued as a single, does not contain the sample. "Hello Sunshine" shares the same key, D major, the same guitar tuning, D-A-D-D-A-D, and was written around the same time as several other songs from Phantom Power including the "Father Father" instrumentals, "Golden Retriever", "Cityscape Skybaby" and "Out of Control". The track was recorded at the Super Furry Animals' own studio in Cardiff along with the rest of Phantom Power. Rhys has stated that the song is "a courting ballad with a 'been so down looks like up to me' mentality". ## Musical structure The album version of "Hello Sunshine" is 3 minutes 35 seconds long and is in the key of D major. The track begins with 43 seconds of the track "By the Sea" from Wendy & Bonnie's 1969 album Genesis featuring sparse fingerstyle guitar and female harmony vocals. The last syllable of the line "...so hard to say goodbye" is held and pans from left to right until "Hello Sunshine" itself begins with Gruff Rhys singing the title phrase, joined by the band on the second word. The first verse follows with simple piano and bass guitar backing Rhys's acoustic guitar to a basic 4/4 beat provided by drummer Dafydd Ieuan. The first chorus enters at 1 minute 13 seconds with Rhys being joined by falsetto harmony backing vocals on the lines "In honesty it's been a while, since we had reason left to smile". The song breaks down for the bridge with just arpeggio guitar, simple bass and occasional drum rolls playing as the lines "Hello sunshine, come into my life" are sung. Another verse follows featuring the lyrics "I'm a minger, you're a minger too, so come on minger, I want to ming with you" (quoted in many reviews of Phantom Power) before the second chorus. This time the bridge leads, not into another verse, but the song's middle 8 which again sees Rhys backed by multiple falsetto harmony backing vocals. The outro follows during which the title phrase is sung five times before a lead guitar line heralds the end of the song with Rhys singing "Come into my life". ### Alternative versions A radio edit of "Hello Sunshine" was issued to radio stations and was also used in the music video. This version of the track is 2 minutes and 54 seconds long and omits the opening extract from "By the Sea". The rest of song is identical to the album version. Two remixes were included on the DVD version of Phantom Power and the album Phantom Phorce. The first, by Weevil, is 4 minutes 22 seconds in length and is largely based around samples of lead guitar from the track along with occasional snippets of Rhys's vocal. Samples of Ieuan's drums are also used in the second half of the song. The track ends with a brief clip of the band's road manager, in the guise of 'Kurt Stern', giving a fictionalised account of Phantom Power's production. The second remix, by Freiband, is 10 minutes 31 seconds long, is "utterly minimal" and barely resembles the original with no recognisable vocal or musical samples from the album or radio versions. ## Critical response "Hello Sunshine" received generally positive reviews with musicOMH calling it "one of the best tracks from ... Phantom Power", and Rolling Stone describing it as a "gorgeous opening track". The 'summery' nature of the track was commented on by several journalists with The Observer calling "Hello Sunshine" a "gloriously hazy opener" and Music Critic describing it as "passionately mellow summer doo-wop". However BBC Wales, although describing the track as "an excellent song and a near perfect album opener", called the decision to release "Hello Sunshine" as a single "rather mystifying" stating that it is "a world away from the SFA we've grown to love over the years". The song was featured on the soundtrack of the 2006 film Snow Cake and also appeared in "The Heartbreak", an episode of The O.C. It was also featured on the soundtrack of the 2008 documentary film The Rock-afire Explosion#Documentary, which follows the story of collectors who own old Animatronics that were made to perform songs for children in the 1980s. At the end of the film, the band members of The Rock-afire are synchronized to Hello Sunshine. ## Coca-Cola controversy According to a Gruff Rhys interview with Red Pepper magazine, the band turned down "a seven-figure offer by an advertising agency" for the use of "Hello Sunshine" in a Coca-Cola commercial due to alleged malpractice: > We have never been a big selling band, but when it came to the crunch, we felt we couldn't justify endorsing a product that may have had a part in violently suppressing some of its workers. For a moment, sitting in the Sinaltrainal office, I thought that we could have done the advert and donated the money for their campaign for justice. Yet the thought of having to hear our song used to sell anything that exploits anyone for the worse turns my stomach. The band ultimately allowed the track to be used in a short film about human rights abuses by anti-poverty charity War on Want. The charity has frequently criticized the Coca-Cola company's impact on local communities. In late 2005 Rhys reiterated that, although licensing one of their tracks for use in advertising would make a big difference financially, the Super Furries are happy to simply be able to make a living from making music. Rhys went on to state that a "Red Stripe advert in Jamaica" is one of the few advertising opportunities the band could live with. ## Music video An animated music video was produced for "Hello Sunshine", directed by Pete Fowler, Neil McFarland and Passion Pictures and featuring Fowler's cartoon drawings. The video begins with the sun rising over a country landscape. A small, blue, 'Hello Sunshine' winged horse flies across the sky and is watched by a man holding a 1:16 scale model kit for the same horse. The picture of the horse on the box flies away as he looks at it and lands on one of five hot air balloons flown by cartoon representations of the Super Furry Animals. The video cuts to a brief shot of a man staring through a shop window at an advertising display featuring models of the 'Hello Sunshine' horse before we see Gruff Rhys coming across a huge statue of the same horse in his car. The next shot shows the 'Hello Sunshine' horse forming part of a stained glass window in a place of worship as a priest urges his followers (all dressed in dark blue with a gold pendant of the 'Hello Sunshine' horse around their necks) to help him cause two rockets at either side of him to rise into the air and explode in the clouds. These rockets cause a thunder storm. The resultant lightning strikes an 'Hello Sunshine' horse as it flies through the air and a duplicate horse is created. This happens repeatedly until the sky is full of small horses which fly out of the storm and towards the Super Furries' hot air balloons. The last section shows the band playing "Hello Sunshine" and being confronted by the 'Hello Sunshine' horse who Rhys strokes on the nose. The video appears on the DVD release of the band's greatest hits album Songbook: The Singles, Vol. 1. ## Track listing All songs by Super Furry Animals. - Digipak CD (674360 2) 1. "Hello Sunshine (Radio Edit)" – 2:54 2. "Cowbird" – 5:41 3. "Sanitizzzed" – 2:45 - 7" (674360 7) 1. "Hello Sunshine (Radio Edit)" – 2:54 2. "Cowbird" – 5:41 - DVD (674360 9) 1. "Hello Sunshine (Video)"\* – 3:34 2. "Cowbird" – 5:41 3. "Sanitizzzed" – 2:45 \*The "Hello Sunshine" video features the radio edit of the track. A brief preliminary video featuring animal noises means that the run time matches that of the album version. ## Personnel - Gruff Rhys – vocals - Huw Bunford – guitar - Guto Pryce – bass guitar - Cian Ciaran – keyboards - Dafydd Ieuan – drums - Kris Jenkins – percussion ## Charts
17,112,098	Anthony Kohlmann	1,170,842,269	Alsatian Jesuit educator and missionary	[ "1771 births", "1836 deaths", "19th-century American Jesuits", "19th-century French Catholic theologians", "19th-century French Jesuits", "Academic staff of the Pontifical Gregorian University", "Alsatian Jesuits", "Collège Saint-Michel alumni", "French Roman Catholic missionaries", "French expatriates in the United States", "French military chaplains", "Inquisitors", "Jesuit missionaries", "Jesuit theologians", "Missionary educators", "People from Kaysersberg-Vignoble", "People of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York", "Presidents of Georgetown University", "Presidents of Gonzaga College High School", "Roman Catholic missionaries in the United States" ]	Anthony Kohlmann SJ (born Anton; July 13, 1771 – April 11, 1836) was an Alsatian Catholic priest, missionary, theologian, and Jesuit educator. He played a decisive role in the early formation of the Archdiocese of New York, where he was the subject of a lawsuit that for the first time recognized the confessional privilege in the United States, and served as the president of Georgetown College from 1817 to 1820. Kohlmann joined the Society of the Sacred Heart and ministered throughout Europe before entering the Society of Jesus. He left for the United States in 1806, where he taught at Georgetown College and ministered to German-speaking congregations in the mid-Atlantic region. In 1808, he became the pastor of New York City's only Catholic church, and then was made the apostolic administrator and first vicar general of the newly created Diocese of New York. He established the diocese's first cathedral in 1809. Kohlmann also founded a school, the New York Literary Institution; established an orphanage; and invited the first Ursuline nuns to the United States. In 1813, the City of New York sought to compel Kohlmann to disclose the identity of a thief, which he learned during a confession. In a landmark decision, the state court ruled that he could not be compelled to violate the seal of the confessional, recognizing the confessional privilege for the first time in the United States. Kohlmann returned to Maryland in 1815 as superior of the Jesuits' Maryland Mission and president of Georgetown College. Three years later, he left Georgetown to establish the Washington Seminary, which became Gonzaga College High School. In 1824, Pope Leo XII named Kohlmann the chair of theology at the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome. Kohlmann later became a consultor to the College of Cardinals and various curial congregations, and was then appointed Qualificator of the Inquisition. ## Early life Anton Kohlmann was born on July 13, 1771, in Kaysersberg, in the region of Alsace in the Kingdom of France. As a youth, he began his studies in the nearby town of Colmar. He joined the Capuchin order, but fled to Switzerland because the order was persecuted as part of the larger dechristianization of France during the French Revolution. He completed his theological studies at the Collège Saint-Michel, and was ordained a priest in Fribourg in April 1796. Kohlmann's brother, Paul, also became a priest and would join him in the United States. ### Ministry Shortly after his ordination, he joined the Society of the Sacred Heart, and completed his novitiate period in Göggingen, located in the Holy Roman Empire. He ministered throughout Austria for two years, during which he drew commendations for his work in Hagenbrunn during a plague. He then went to Italy, where he was chaplain at a military hospital in Pavia for two years. Kohlmann was sent to Bavaria in 1801, where he became the director of the Ecclesiastical Seminary at Dillingen. He then spent time as the rector of a college in Berlin, before founding a college in Amsterdam, which was run by the Society of the Faith of Jesus, an order with which the Society of the Sacred Heart had merged in 1799. Kohlmann applied for admission to the Society of Jesus, which, despite its worldwide suppression since 1773, had been operating in the Russian Empire. During the two years that his application being considered, he resided at Kensington College in London, where he learned English. He eventually was instructed to travel to Russia, and he arrived in Riga in June 1805. He entered the Jesuit novitiate in Daugavpils on June 21, 1803, where he spent only a year before the superiors were satisfied that he was academically qualified. The following year, John Carroll, the Bishop of Baltimore, put out a call for additional Jesuits in the United States, and Kohlmann was sent as a missionary, prior to taking his final vows. ## Missionary to the United States Kohlmann left Hamburg on August 20, 1806, arrived in Baltimore on November 4. In the United States, he began anglicizing his name as Anthony. The Jesuit Superior General formally permitted the Jesuits to be restored in the United States in 1805, and a novitiate was opened the following year at Georgetown College in Washington, D.C. Francis Neale was named the master of novices, and Kohlmann, though still a novice himself, was made the socius to the master of novices. He was also assigned to teach philosophy. Kohlmann introduced many of the customs that the Jesuits in exile the Russian Empire observed. While at Georgetown, he made trips to minister to the people of Alexandria, Virginia, and Baltimore, as well as to German-speaking congregations in rural Pennsylvania. He also heard confessions from parishioners at Holy Trinity Church in Philadelphia because their pastor had not mastered the English language. ## New York Bishop Carroll found it difficult to govern a diocese whose territory encompassed the entire United States. The church in New York suffered neglect and mismanagement, and he had repeatedly requested that the authorities in Rome remove New York to form a separate diocese. Before news could arrive that his request was granted and R. Luke Concanen was appointed as the first Bishop of New York, Carroll sent a party of clergy to New York City. Headed by Kohlmann, it consisted of the future bishop Benedict Fenwick and four Jesuit scholastics. Arriving in October 1808, Kohlmann assumed pastoral responsibility for approximately 14,000 Catholics, who were primarily Irish, French, and German. Upon his arrival, Kohlmann found New York suffering an economic depression resulting from the Embargo Act of 1807. Kohlmann became the pastor of St. Peter's Church, replacing Matthew Byrne, who sought to be relieved so that he could join the Society of Jesus. There, he celebrated Masses in English, French, and German for the congregation's multilingual parishioners. He also was prolific in administering the other sacraments, visiting hospitals, and teaching catechesis. He also created a subscription among parishioners to raise money for the poor. Kohlmann determined that St. Peter's was inadequate to serve the entire Catholic population of New York City. He began establishing a new church that would serve as the cathedral of the diocese. He purchased land on what were then the outskirts of New York City, among farmland and on the edge of the wilderness. The cornerstone of the St. Patrick's Old Cathedral was laid on June 8, 1809. He oversaw its completion and gave it the name of St. Patrick. In 1809, he became the cathedral's first pastor, alongside Fenwick. Upon its completion, Old St. Patrick's became the largest and most ornate church in New York State. By this time, Cooncanen still had not yet arrived from Europe, delayed by the Napoleonic Wars. Therefore, on October 11 of that year, upon Bishop Concanen's request, John Carroll named Kohlmann the first vicar general of the Diocese of New York. In 1809, in the course of their pastoral duties, Kohlmann and Fenwick were called to the deathbed of the American revolutionary and avowed atheist Thomas Paine, who hoped that the priests would be able to heal him. When they attempted to persuade him to disavow his atheist beliefs, Paine became enraged and expelled them from his house. In 1810, Bishop Concanen died in Naples, having never reached his diocese in America. Therefore, Kohlmann was made apostolic administrator of the diocese. When it appeared that Concanen's successor, John Connolly, would arrive in the United States, Kohlmann was recalled to Maryland in January 1815. He was succeeded by Fenwick as vicar general and administrator of New York and pastor of St. Peter's Church. ### New York Literary Institution In addition to his pastoral work, Carroll charged Kohlmann with establishing a Catholic college in the city. In 1808, he opened a classical school called the New York Literary Institution, which functioned as an offshoot of Georgetown College. He rented a house on Mulberry Street, across from the cathedral, where the four Jesuit scholastics began teaching 35 Catholic and Protestant students, a minority of whom boarded at the school. With the school outgrowing its location, in September 1809, it moved to Broadway, and, in March of the following year, Kohlmann relocated the school far into the countryside of New York City, across the street from the Elgin Botanic Garden. The new site of the New York Literary Institution would later house the new St. Patrick's Cathedral in Midtown Manhattan. Following its move, the school began to prosper. Kohlmann, however, continued to reside at Mulberry Street, where he could perform his pastoral duties at Old St. Patrick's and St. Peter's. He made Benedict Fenwick the president of the school. Kohlmann became convinced that New York City would remain the preeminent city in the United States and that the Jesuits should shift their ministerial efforts to it, rather than focus on their rural plantations in Maryland, which he described as "graveyards for Europeans". He went so far as to advocate the relocation of Georgetown College to New York, which he argued was of "greater importance to the Society than all the other states together". Before long, the Jesuit superiors in Maryland determined that there were not enough Jesuits to staff both the New York school and Georgetown. Despite Kohlmann's protestations, the New York Literary Institution was disbanded in 1813, and the Jesuits were recalled to Maryland. In addition to the New York Literary Institution, Kohlmann established a school for girls in April 1812 near the literary institution. The school was put under the care of the Ursuline nuns, whom he had invited from County Cork, Ireland, to run the new school. The nuns accepted Kohlmann's invitation on the condition that they would remain only as long as they received novices for their order. Their arrival marked the Ursuline order's first presence in the United States. When their desire for novices did not materialize, the nuns returned to Ireland three years after their arrival. Kohlmann also established an orphanage, which he placed under the care of Trappist nuns who had fled persecution in France. This institution was short-lived, as the Trappists left for Le Havre in October 1814. ### Seal of the confessional In 1813, Kohlmann became the subject of a lawsuit that rose to the national interest. A New York City merchant, James Keating, accused a man named Phillips and Phillips' wife of stealing goods from him. The police prosecuted the two accused, but before the trial could be brought to a close, Keating declared that he had been paid restitution, with Kohlmann acting as an intermediary in the transaction. The New York County District Attorney subpoenaed Kohlmann to provide the name of the thief who paid the restitution, but Kohlmann refused to reveal his identity, stating that it had been disclosed to him during the Sacrament of Penance and was therefore protected under canon law by the seal of the confessional. In response to the district attorney's demand that he disclose the thief, Kohlmann stated that he would suffer imprisonment or death before violating the seal. Kohlmann was brought before the Court of General Sessions to compel him to provide the identity of the thief. He was represented by two Protestant defense attorneys: Richard Riker and William Sampson. The four judges, DeWitt Clinton, Josiah Ogden Hoffman, Richard Cunnin, and Isaac Douglas, ruled in favor of Kohlmann, citing religious liberty as the basis of their decision. Speaking for a unanimous court, DeWitt Clinton wrote: > It is essential to the free exercise of religion, that its ordinances should be administered—that its ceremonies as well as its essentials should be protected... Secrecy is the essence of penance. The sinner will not confess, nor will the priest receive his confession, if the veil of secrecy is removed. The court's decision represented the first legal recognition of the confessional privilege in the United States. As a result, the New York State Legislature passed a law on December 10, 1828, codifying the confessional privilege: that when clergy members come to know of facts through their ministerial capacity and their denomination imposes a requirement of secrecy, they cannot be compelled to reveal those facts. Kohlmann also wrote a book directed at non-Catholics, explaining the Catholic doctrine on the Sacrament of Penance. ## Maryland and Washington, D.C. Upon his arrival in Maryland in 1815, Kohlmann was made the master of novices at the novitiate at White Marsh Manor. Shortly after that, Giovanni Antonio Grassi left Maryland for Rome, and Kohlmann succeeded him as the superior of the Jesuits' Maryland Mission on September 10, 1817. As superior, Kohlmann advocated selling the Jesuits' plantations in rural Maryland to finance the establishment of other colleges in the major American cities. The Anglo-American Jesuits fiercely opposed this proposal. Disagreements between the Continental European Jesuits in the United States and the Anglo-American ones became so entrenched that the Jesuit Superior General sent the Irish Jesuit Peter Kenney as an ecclesiastical visitor. He also assumed Kohlmann's role of mission superior on April 23, 1819. ### Georgetown College When Benedict Fenwick left for Rome in 1817, Kohlmann was selected to succeed him as president of Georgetown College. Though Kohlmann remained convinced that the Jesuits must close Georgetown to concentrate their meager resources on the training of Jesuits, he did not attempt to close the college while in office. Kohlmann aligned with the European Jesuits who advocated a rigorous classical curriculum that placed a special emphasis on Latin and Ancient Greek, while the Anglo-American Jesuits supported a diminished emphasis on the classics in favor of mathematics and science. He also encouraged proselytization of the Protestant students, to which their parents and some of the Anglo-American Jesuits objected. During his administration, the number of students enrolled at the college declined somewhat. This was due in large part to the Panic of 1819 and partly to the strict discipline that Kohlmann enforced, which resulted in a significant number of students being expelled or transferring out. In 1818, students at the college staged a revolt by plotting to kill the prefect of students, Stephen Larigaudelle Dubuisson, who was responsible for maintaining discipline. While such conspiracies had become frequent at other American colleges, this was the first time such a design had appeared at a Catholic college. However, the plot was discovered before it could be acted upon, and Kohlmann expelled the six conspirators. Overall, his leadership of the college was not considered successful. Kohlmann's term as president of the college ended in 1820, and he was succeeded by Enoch Fenwick. ### Washington Seminary In 1819, a building was constructed next to St. Patrick's Church in downtown Washington, D.C. It was to serve as the home of the Washington Seminary, which was envisioned as a standalone Jesuit novitiate, to alleviate overcrowding at Georgetown. This never came to fruition, however, and the building went unused for one or two years. Instead, the novitiate found another location, and the Washington Seminary opened as a Jesuit scholasticate under Kohlmann's leadership. He became the first president and rector of the school on August 15, 1820, and also assumed the position of professor of dogma. Soon after its founding, prominent Catholics in the area petitioned Kohlmann to open the school to lay students, which he did. The first lay students enrolled on September 1, 1821, alongside the Jesuit scholastics. Kohlmann admitted day students reluctantly and out of financial necessity, as it violated a law of the Jesuit order that forbade them from accepting compensation for educating youths. As a result of it no longer being exclusively for priestly training, the school would later become Gonzaga College High School. The school prospered and came to be the preeminent day school in Washington. In response to the writings of the Unitarian minister Jared Sparks, which were aimed at Baltimore readers, Kohlmann published an apologetical book titled Unitarianism, Theologically and Philosophically Considered. The book was well received in Catholic circles; several editions were published, and it was considered sufficiently authoritative to be read aloud in the refectory of St. Mary's Seminary in Baltimore. Kohlmann's tenure as president came to an end in 1824 when he was recalled to Rome by Pope Leo XII, and he was succeeded by Adam Marshall. Kohlmann became involved in the purported miraculous cure of Ann Mattingly, the sister of Thomas Carbery, the Mayor of the District of Columbia. Kohlmann instructed her to pray a novena in union with the German Prince Alexander von Hohenlohe, who had gained a reputation as a miracle worker. On March 10, 1824, Mattingly was restored to health. Despite wariness by Archbishop Ambrose Maréchal and William Matthews (Mattingly's pastor), Kohlmann was the most emphatic priest in declaring the cure a miracle and published an account of it in a Baltimore newspaper. Seeking to have the miracle declare true, he would later arrange an audience with Pope Leo XII, in which the pope was impressed by the event and ordered a pamphlet about it translated into Italian and published. ## Roman career In 1824, Pope Leo XII placed the Pontifical Gregorian University under the care of the Society of Jesus, as it had been before the order's suppression. Impressed by Kohlmann's book on Unitarianism, he named Kohlmann as the university's chair of theology. He held this post for five years, during which time one of his students was Vincenzo Gioacchino Pecci, who would go on to become Pope Leo XIII; another was Paul Cullen, who would become the Archbishop of Dublin and the first Irish cardinal. Kohlmann's inquisition of Pecci during the latter's public academic defense again caught the attention of the pope, who named him a consultor to the Congregation for Extraordinary Ecclesiastical Affairs and the Congregation of Bishops and Regulars. He also became a consultor to the staff of the College of Cardinals. Pope Gregory XVI promoted him within the curial staff to the position of Qualificator of the Inquisition and considered making him a cardinal. In 1830, he resigned and spent a year as spiritual director at the Roman College. Kohlmann retired to the Jesuit house attached to the Church of the Gesù in 1831, where he served as confessor, aided by his knowledge of several languages. In 1833, he met the future theologian Augustin Theiner; along with the future cardinal Karl-August von Reisach, Kohlmann influenced Theiner's decision to convert to Catholicism. By 1836, Kohlmann's health had begun to deteriorate, and he died on April 11, 1836. Kohlmann Hall at Fordham University was constructed in 1923 and named in his honor. Originally the headquarters of the Jesuit Order's New York province, it was later converted into the residence for Jesuits teaching at Fordham Preparatory School.
1,160,467	Gale Sayers	1,164,737,247	American football player (1943–2020)	[ "1943 births", "2020 deaths", "20th-century African-American sportspeople", "21st-century African-American people", "African-American college athletic directors in the United States", "African-American players of American football", "All-American college football players", "American football return specialists", "American football running backs", "American stockbrokers", "Chicago Bears players", "College Football Hall of Fame inductees", "Deaths from dementia in Indiana", "Kansas Jayhawks football players", "National Football League players with retired numbers", "Omaha Central High School alumni", "Players of American football from Chicago", "Players of American football from Omaha, Nebraska", "Players of American football from Wichita, Kansas", "Pro Football Hall of Fame inductees", "Southern Illinois Salukis athletic directors", "Tennessee State Tigers and Lady Tigers athletic directors", "University of Kansas staff", "Western Conference Pro Bowl players" ]	Gale Eugene Sayers (May 30, 1943 – September 23, 2020) was an American professional football player who was both a halfback and return specialist in the National Football League (NFL). In a relatively brief but highly productive NFL career, Sayers spent seven seasons with the Chicago Bears from 1965 to 1971, though multiple injuries effectively limited him to five seasons of play. He was known for his elusiveness and agility and was regarded by his peers as one of the most difficult players to tackle. Nicknamed the "Kansas Comet", Sayers played college football for the Kansas Jayhawks football team of the University of Kansas, where he compiled 4,020 all-purpose yards over three seasons and was twice recognized as a consensus All-American. In Sayers' rookie NFL season, he set a league record by scoring 22 touchdowns—including a record-tying six in one game—and gained 2,272 all-purpose yards en route to being named the NFL's Rookie of the Year. He continued this production through his first five seasons, earning four Pro Bowl appearances and five first-team All-Pro selections. A right knee injury forced Sayers to miss the final five games of the 1968 season, but he returned in 1969 to lead the NFL in rushing yards and be named the NFL Comeback Player of the Year. An injury to his left knee in the 1970 preseason as well as subsequent injuries kept him sidelined for most of his final two seasons. His friendship with Bears teammate Brian Piccolo, who died of cancer in 1970, inspired Sayers to write his autobiography, I Am Third, which in turn was the basis for the 1971 made-for-TV movie Brian's Song. Sayers was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1977 at age 34 and remains the youngest person to have received the honor. He is one of four players in the Super Bowl era to be enshrined in the Hall of Fame without ever playing a postseason game. He was named to the NFL's 75th Anniversary Team as a halfback and kick returner, the only player to occupy two positions on the team. In 2019, he was named to the NFL 100th Anniversary All-Time Team. For his achievements in college, Sayers was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame the same year. His jersey number is retired by both the Bears and the University of Kansas. Following his NFL career, Sayers began a career in sports administration and business and served as the athletic director of Southern Illinois University from 1976 to 1981. ## Early years Gale Eugene Sayers was born to Roger Earl Sayers and Bernice Ross in Wichita, Kansas, and raised in Omaha, Nebraska. His father was a mechanic for Goodyear, farmed, and worked for auto dealerships. Sayers' younger brother, Ron, later played running back for the San Diego Chargers of the American Football League. Roger, his older brother, was a decorated college track and field athlete. Gale graduated from Omaha Central High School, where he starred in football and track and field. A fine all-around track athlete, he set a state long jump record of 24 ft 101⁄2 in (7.58m) as a senior in 1961. ## College career Sayers was recruited by several major Midwestern colleges before deciding to play football at the University of Kansas. While being interviewed during a broadcast of a Chicago Cubs game on September 8, 2010, Sayers said he had originally intended to go to the University of Iowa. Sayers said that he decided against going to Iowa after the Iowa head coach, Jerry Burns, did not have time to meet Sayers during his one campus visit. During his Jayhawks career, he rushed for 2,675 yards and gained a Big Eight Conference-record 4,020 all-purpose yards. He was three times recognized as a first-team All–Big Eight selection and was a consensus pick for the College Football All-America Team in both 1963 and 1964. As a sophomore in 1962, his first year on the varsity team, Sayers led the Big Eight Conference and was third in the nation with 1,125 rushing yards. His 7.1 yards-per-carry average was the highest of any player in the NCAA that season. Against Oklahoma State, he carried 21 times for a conference single-game-record 283 yards to lead Kansas to a 36–17 comeback victory. In 1963, Sayers set an NCAA Division I FBS record with a 99-yard run against Nebraska. He finished the year with 917 rushing yards, again leading all rushers in the Big Eight. He earned first-team All-America recognition from the American Football Coaches Association (AFCA), the Football Writers Association of America (FWAA), the Newspaper Enterprise Association (NEA), The Sporting News, and United Press International (UPI), among others. In 1964, his senior year, he led the Jayhawks to a 15–14 upset victory over Oklahoma with a 93-yard return of the game's opening kickoff for a touchdown. He finished the year with 633 rushing yards, third most among Big Eight rushers, and also caught 17 passes for 178 yards, returned 15 punts for 138 yards, and returned seven kickoffs for 193 yards. He earned first-team All-America honors from each of the same selectors as in the previous year, in addition to the Associated Press (AP), among others. ## Professional career ### 1965: Rookie season Sayers was drafted by the Chicago Bears in the first round, fourth overall, in the 1965 NFL Draft, and was also picked fifth overall by the Kansas City Chiefs of the American Football League in the AFL draft. After consulting his wife, he decided he would rather play in Chicago, signing with George Halas's Bears. In his rookie year, he scored an NFL-record 22 touchdowns: 14 rushing, six receiving, and one each on punt and kickoff returns. He gained 2,272 all-purpose yards, a record for an NFL rookie, with 1,371 of them coming from scrimmage. Sayers averaged 5.2 yards per rush and 17.5 yards per reception. His return averages were 14.9 yards per punt return and a league-high 31.4 yards per kickoff return. Against the Minnesota Vikings on October 17, Sayers carried 13 times for 64 yards and a touchdown; caught four passes for 63 yards and two touchdowns; and had a 98-yard kickoff return touchdown in the 45–37 Bears victory. He was the last NFL player to score a rushing, receiving, and kickoff return touchdown in the same game until Tyreek Hill accomplished the feat over 50 years later, in 2016. Bears coach Halas lauded Sayers after the game, saying, "I don't ever remember seeing a rookie back who was as good," and deemed his talents equal to former Bears greats Red Grange and George McAfee. "And remember," said Halas, "we used to call George 'One-Play McAfee'." On December 12, Sayers tied Ernie Nevers' and Dub Jones' record for touchdowns in a single game, scoring six in a 61–20 victory over the San Francisco 49ers that was played in muddy conditions at the Chicago Cubs' Wrigley Field. He accounted for 326 yards in the game: 113 rushing, 89 receiving, and 134 on punt returns. Sayers was the consensus choice for NFL Rookie of the Year honors from the AP, UPI, and NEA. He was quoted as saying at the time: > Just give me 18 inches of daylight. That's all I need. ### 1966: First rushing title In his second season, Sayers led the league in rushing with 1,231 yards, averaging 5.4 yards per carry with eight touchdowns, and becoming the first Chicago Bears halfback to win the rushing title since 1949. He also led the Bears in receiving with 34 catches, 447 yards, and two more touchdowns. He surpassed his rookie season's kick return numbers, averaging 31.2 yards per return with two touchdowns. He also supplanted his all-purpose yards total from the previous season, gaining 2,440 to set the NFL record. The first of his kickoff return touchdowns that season came against the Los Angeles Rams, as he followed a wedge of blockers en route to a 93-yard score. Against the Minnesota Vikings in the Bears' final game of the season, and the first of Sayers' pro career with his parents in attendance, he carried 17 times for a franchise-record 197 yards after returning the opening kickoff 90 yards for a touchdown. Sayers was named to All-Pro first-teams by the AP, UPI, the NEA, The Sporting News, and the Pro Football Writers Association, among others. Starring in his second straight Pro Bowl, Sayers carried 11 times for 110 yards and was named the back of the game. The Bears finished the season with a 5–7–2 record, and the Chicago Tribune tabbed Sayers as "the one bright spot in Chicago's pro football year." ### 1967: Shared workload In Halas's final season as an NFL coach, Sayers again starred. Sharing more of the rushing duties with other backs, such as Brian Piccolo, Sayers gained 880 yards with a 4.7-yard average per carry. His receptions were down as well. He had three kickoff returns for touchdowns on 16 returns, averaging 37.7 yards per return. Only rarely returning punts—he returned three all season—Sayers still managed to return one for a score against the San Francisco 49ers, a game in which he also returned the opening kickoff 97 yards for a touchdown and scored a rushing touchdown on a rain-soaked field in San Francisco's Kezar Stadium. "It was a bad field, but it didn't stop some people," said 49ers coach Jack Christiansen of Sayers' performance. Christiansen said that after Sayers' kickoff return, he ordered that all punts go out of bounds. But Sayers received the punt and ran 58 yards through the middle of the field for the score. In a November game against the Detroit Lions, a cutback by Sayers caused future hall of fame cornerback Lem Barney to fall over, after which Sayers sprinted for a 63-yard gain. Later in the game he returned a kickoff 97 yards for a touchdown. After the season, Sayers was chosen for his third straight Pro Bowl, in which he returned a kickoff 75 yards and scored a three-yard rushing touchdown and again earned player of the game honors. Chicago finished in second place in the newly organized Central Division with a 7–6–1 record. ### 1968–1969: Right knee injury and comeback season Sayers had the most productive rushing yardage game of his career on November 3, 1968, against the Green Bay Packers, during which he carried 24 times for 205 yards. His season ended prematurely the following week against the 49ers' Kermit Alexander, when he tore several ligaments in his right knee including his anterior cruciate ligament, his medial collateral ligament, and his meniscus cartilage. Garry Lyle, the teammate nearest Sayers at the time, said, "I saw his eyes sort of glass over. I heard him holler. I knew he was hurt." Sayers had again been leading the league in rushing yards through the first nine games, and finished the year with 856 yards. After surgery, Sayers went through a physical rehabilitation program with the help of Piccolo, who had replaced him in the starting lineup. Despite missing the Bears' final five games, he earned first-team All-Pro recognition from several media outlets, including the AP, UPI, and NEA. In the 1969 season, after a slow start and despite diminished speed and acceleration, Sayers led the league in rushing once again with 1,032 yards. He averaged 4.4 yards per carry and was the only player to gain over 1,000 rushing yards that year. He moved into second place on the Bears' all-time rushing yards list, passing Bronko Nagurski. Sayers was recognized as the NFL's Comeback Player of the Year by United Press International. The Bears, long past the Halas glory years, finished in last place with a franchise-worst 1–13 record. In his fourth and final Pro Bowl appearance, Sayers was the West's leading rusher and its leading receiver. For the third time in as many Pro Bowl performances, he was named the "Back of the Game". ### 1970–1971: Left knee injury and retirement In the 1970 preseason, Sayers suffered a second knee injury, this time bone bruises to his left knee. Attempting to play through the injury in the opening game against the Giants, his production was severely limited. He sat out the next two games and returned in Week 4 against the Vikings, but he was still visibly hampered, most evidently when he was unable to chase down Vikings defensive lineman Alan Page during a 65-yard fumble return. Sayers carried only six times for nine yards before further injuring his knee. He underwent surgery the following week and was deemed out for the remainder of the season. He had carried 23 times for 52 yards to that point. During his off time, Sayers took classes to become a stockbroker and became the first black stockbroker in his company's history. He also entered a Paine Webber program for 45 nationwide stockbroker trainees and placed second highest in sales. After another knee operation and rehabilitation period, Sayers attempted a comeback for the 1971 season. He was kept out of the first three games after carrying the ball only twice in the preseason, as Bears head coach Jim Dooley planned to slowly work him back into the rotation. His first game back was against the New Orleans Saints on October 10, in which he carried eight times for 30 yards. After the game, he told reporters he was satisfied with his performance and that his knee felt fine. The following week, against the 49ers, he carried five times before injuring his ankle in the first quarter, an injury that ultimately caused him to miss the remainder of the season. He was encouraged to retire but decided to give football one last try. Sayers' final game was in the 1972 preseason in which he fumbled twice in three carries; he retired from professional football days later. ### Career statistics ## Playing style Sayers' ability as a runner in the open field was considered unmatched, both during his playing career and since his retirement. He possessed raw speed and was also highly elusive and had terrific vision, a combination which made him very difficult to tackle. Actor Billy Dee Williams, who portrayed Sayers in the 1971 film Brian's Song, likened his running to "ballet" and "poetry". Mike Ditka, a teammate of Sayers' for two seasons, called him "the greatest player I've ever seen. That's right—the greatest." Another former teammate, linebacker Dick Butkus, famous for his tackling ability, said of Sayers: > He had this ability to go full speed, cut and then go full speed again right away. I saw it every day in practice. We played live, and you could never get a clean shot on Gale. Never. On his tendency to escape from tight situations, Sayers once proclaimed, "Just give me 18 inches of daylight. That's all I need." He felt if his blockers created 18 inches of space for him to run through, he could break a run into the open field. This quick acceleration became a hallmark of his running style, although some of it was lost following the injury to his right knee. After the injury, he relied more on tough running and engaging tacklers for extra yards. Despite the production from Sayers, the Bears as a whole struggled to find success; in games that Sayers played, the team compiled a record of 29 wins, 36 losses, and 3 ties, and failed to reach the postseason. Because of this, Sayers' main focus each postseason was on the Pro Bowl, where he excelled. Showcasing his breakaway talents, throughout his Pro Bowl career he achieved runs of 74, 52, 51, 48, and 42 yards. In the Pro Bowl following his rookie season, he had kickoff returns of 51 and 48 yards, despite limited opportunities due to the East's attempts to punt and kick away from him. In the next season's game, his 10 yards-per-carry average set a Pro Bowl record. He was named the "Back of the Game", an honor he received again in 1968 and 1969, joining Johnny Unitas as the only players to win three Pro Bowl MVP awards. "The Pro Bowl is the time to prove how good you are, playing against the best of your peers," recalled Sayers. "I took it as a challenge. I came into the game in shape, came to play." ## Brian Piccolo In 1967, Sayers and Bears teammate Brian Piccolo became roommates in the NFL. Sayers' ensuing friendship with Piccolo and Piccolo's struggle with cancer (embryonal cell carcinoma, which was diagnosed after it metastasized to a large tumor in his chest cavity), became the subject of the made-for-TV movie Brian's Song. The movie, in which Sayers was portrayed by Billy Dee Williams in the 1971 original and by Mekhi Phifer in the 2001 remake, was adapted from Sayers' account of this story in his 1970 autobiography, I Am Third. Sayers and Piccolo were devoted friends and deeply respectful of and affectionate with each other. Piccolo helped Sayers through rehabilitation after injury, and Sayers was by Piccolo's side throughout his illness until his death in June 1970. ## Later life ### Sports administration and business career Sayers worked in the athletic department at his alma mater, the University of Kansas, for three and half years, before he was named the athletic director at Southern Illinois University Carbondale in 1976. He resigned from his position at Southern Illinois in 1981. From 1985-86, Sayers worked as the athletic director at Tennessee State University in Nashville, TN. In 1984, Sayers founded Crest Computer Supply Company in the Chicago area. Under Sayers' leadership, this company experienced consistent growth and was renamed Sayers 40, Inc. He was chairman of Sayers 40, Inc., the aforementioned technology consulting and implementation firm serving Fortune 1000 companies nationally with offices in Vernon Hills, Illinois, Walpole, Massachusetts, Clearwater, Florida, and Atlanta. Sayers, along with his wife Ardythe, were also active philanthropists in Chicago. He supported the Cradle Foundation—an adoption organization in Evanston, Illinois, and founded the Gale Sayers Center in the Austin neighborhood of Chicago. The Gale Sayers Center is an after-school program for children ages 8–12 from Chicago's west side and focuses on leadership development, tutoring, and mentoring. In 2009, Sayers joined the University of Kansas Athletic Department staff as Director of Fundraising for Special Projects. ### Concussion lawsuits In September 2013, Sayers reportedly sued the NFL, claiming the league negligently handled his repeated head injuries during his career. The lawsuit claimed Sayers suffered headaches and short-term memory loss since retirement. It stated he was sometimes sent back into games after suffering concussions, and that the league did not do enough to protect him. The case was withdrawn after Sayers initially claimed it was done so because the case was filed without his permission, but was actually withdrawn due to other litigation that Sayers was involved in at the time. Sayers filed a new lawsuit in January 2014 along with six other former players. The lawsuit was finally settled in late October, 2017. Sayers was represented by James Acho. ### Legacy and honors #### Records Sayers' record of 22 touchdowns in a season was broken by O. J. Simpson in 1975, who scored 23; his 22 touchdowns remains a rookie record as of 2021. Sayers was the last player to score at least six touchdowns in a game until 2020, when Alvin Kamara scored six against the Minnesota Vikings. His career kickoff return average of 30.56 yards is an NFL record for players with at least 75 attempts, and he is one of several players to have scored two return touchdowns in a game. He is tied with four other players for the second most career kickoff return touchdowns, with six. Sayers' rookie record of 2,272 all-purpose yards was broken in 1988 by Tim Brown, who gained 2,317 yards through 16 games, which was two more games than Sayers set the record in. His single-season all-purpose yards record of 2,440 set in 1966 was broken in 1974 by Mack Herron, who surpassed it by four yards. #### Post-career recognition Sayers was elected to the Lincoln Journal'''s Nebraska Sports Hall of Fame in 1973, the first black athlete to be so honored. He was inducted into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1977. His number 48 jersey is one of three retired by the Kansas Jayhawks football team. Later in 1977, Sayers was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame and is still the youngest inductee in its history. On October 31, 1994, at halftime of a Monday night game, the Bears retired his number 40 at Soldier Field, along with number 51, which had been worn by teammate, linebacker Dick Butkus. The Pro Football Hall of Fame selection committee named Sayers to its NFL 1960s All-Decade Team, which is composed of the best players of the 1960s at each position. In 1994, Sayers was selected for the NFL 75th Anniversary All-Time Team as both a halfback and a kickoff returner; he was the only player selected for multiple positions. In 2019, he was one of twelve running backs selected to the NFL 100th Anniversary All-Time Team. In 1999, he was ranked 22nd on The Sporting News'''s list of the 100 Greatest Football Players. ### Illness and death In March 2017, Sayers' wife, Ardythe, revealed that he had been diagnosed with dementia four years prior. She stated that a Mayo Clinic doctor confirmed it was likely caused by his football career. "It wasn't so much getting hit in the head," she said. "It's just the shaking of the brain when they took him down with the force they play the game in." While he remained physically healthy, the disease had an adverse effect on his mental health and memory in particular, making simple tasks such as signing his own name difficult. After suffering from dementia for several years, Sayers died on September 23, 2020, at the age of 77.
2,148,041	Maryland Route 70	1,149,421,757	State highway in Anne Arundel County, Maryland, US	[ "Annapolis, Maryland", "Roads in Anne Arundel County, Maryland", "State highways in Maryland" ]	Maryland Route 70 (MD 70) is a state highway in the U.S. state of Maryland. Known for most of its length as Roscoe Rowe Boulevard, the highway runs 2.31 miles (3.72 km) from MD 450 in Annapolis north to Bestgate Road in Parole. MD 70 is the primary highway connecting U.S. Route 50 (US 50) and US 301 with downtown Annapolis. The highway also serves several sets of Maryland state government offices and Navy–Marine Corps Memorial Stadium. MD 70 was constructed in the mid-1950s contemporaneously with the US 50 freeway. The highway was extended north to Bestgate Road in the early 1990s. ## Route description MD 70 begins at an intersection with MD 450 (College Avenue) in downtown Annapolis. This intersection is next to Government House, the residence of the Governor of Maryland, and one block north of the Maryland State House. MD 70 heads northwest for two blocks as Bladen Street, a four-lane divided boulevard that passes between state office buildings, including the offices of members of the Maryland General Assembly. At Calvert Street, the highway's name changes to Roscoe Rowe Boulevard. A two-lane ramp splits from southbound MD 70 just south of the southern end of the highway's bridge over College Creek, the point at which maintenance responsibility changes from the city of Annapolis to the state. The highway passes between several sets of government offices, including the Maryland Court of Appeals and the Maryland State Archives, leading up to its intersection with MD 435 (Taylor Avenue). MD 70 passes to the east of Navy–Marine Corps Memorial Stadium before crossing Weems Creek and leaving the city of Annapolis. The highway meets US 50/US 301/MD 2 (John Hanson Highway) at a partial cloverleaf interchange. Beyond the interchange, MD 70 curves to the west and intersects Bestgate Road and Tidewater Colony Drive; the latter street leads to the historic home Howard's Inheritance. The highway continues along Bestgate Road and becomes a four-lane road with a center left-turn lane before reaching its northern terminus at an arbitrary point west of Compton Drive and Willie Drive. Bestgate Road continues west as a county highway toward the Westfield Annapolis shopping mall in the center of Parole. ## History MD 70 from College Avenue to US 50 and US 301 is named for Roscoe C. Rowe, the mayor of Annapolis from 1949 until his 1952 death. Rowe was credited with organizing the city of Annapolis's financial contribution to construct the boulevard and for persuading the Maryland State Roads Commission to finance the construction of the bridge across College Creek. Construction of MD 70 began from US 50, then also under construction, to Weems Creek, including the bridge over the creek, in October 1952. Construction on the highway resumed in May 1954; the section from Weems Creek to College Avenue was completed in November 1954, five months after the US 50 freeway opened from MD 450 to MD 2 east of the Severn River. The boulevard's interchange with US 50 was originally a trumpet interchange. MD 70's southern end was originally a one-way pair; traffic leaving Annapolis followed Bladen Street from College Avenue toward College Creek and traffic entering Annapolis veered south onto Northwest Street to end at Church Circle. Bladen Street was expanded to a two-way boulevard in 1983. MD 70 was extended north to its present terminus and its junction with US 50 and US 301 was changed to a partial cloverleaf interchange in 1991. The state highway's bridges over Weems Creek and College Creek were replaced between 2004 and 2006. ## Junction list ## Auxiliary routes MD 70 has two existing auxiliary routes and one former route. All three routes were established in 2002 along county highways relocated as part of the extension of MD 70 north to Bestgate Road. - MD 70A is the designation for the 0.15-mile (0.24 km) stretch of North Lawrence Road north from MD 70. - MD 70B was the designation for the 0.09-mile (0.14 km) portion of Tidewater Colony Drive south from the intersection between Roscoe Rowe Boulevard and Bestgate Road. MD 70B was transferred to county maintenance in 2009. - MD 70C is the designation for the 0.08-mile (0.13 km) segment of Bestgate Road east from the intersection of MD 70 and Tidewater Colony Drive. ## See also
37,009,720	Turning Tables	1,166,127,515	null	[ "2010s ballads", "2011 singles", "2011 songs", "Adele songs", "Columbia Records singles", "Gwyneth Paltrow songs", "Pop ballads", "Song recordings produced by Jim Abbiss", "Songs about heartache", "Songs written by Adele", "Songs written by Ryan Tedder", "Soul ballads", "XL Recordings singles" ]	"Turning Tables" is a song recorded by English singer-songwriter Adele for her second studio album, 21 (2011). Conceived after an altercation with her former lover, the song was co-written by Adele and singer-songwriter Ryan Tedder, whilst the production was completed by Jim Abbiss. "Turning Tables" is a pop ballad with a soulful sound; its instrumentation consists of piano, "Broadway-worthy" strings, and guitar. Lyrically, the song describes a domestic dispute in which its narrator assumes a defensive stance against a manipulative ex-lover. XL Recordings sent the song to UK mainstream radio on 5 November 2011 as the fifth single from 21 along with "Rumour Has It". "Turning Tables" received acclaim from music critics, who praised its lyrics, production, and Adele's vocal performance. The song reached the top-twenty of the singles charts in four countries, including Belgium, Italy and the Netherlands. It also peaked at number 62 on the UK Singles Chart and 63 on the US Billboard Hot 100 chart. It was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) for selling over 500,000 digital downloads. Adele performed "Turning Tables" on television shows such as Late Night with David Letterman in the US and The Jonathan Ross Show in the UK and included it on the Adele Live concert tour. American actress and singer Gwyneth Paltrow performed a cover of the single in the Glee episode "A Night of Neglect". ## Background In April 2009, 20-year-old Adele, who had recently embarked on her first serious relationship with a man 10 years her senior, began composing the follow-up to her 2008 debut album 19. In response to the media's typecasting her as an "old soul" due to the vintage production and sentimental nature of her songs, Adele decided on a more upbeat and contemporary second album. However, studio sessions were generally unproductive and, after two weeks, yielded only one song recorded to the singer's satisfaction—the Jim Abbiss-produced "Take It All", a lovelorn piano ballad not unlike the songs on 19. Disillusioned with her lack of inspiration and the slow progress of the studio sessions, she cancelled the remaining recording dates. Adele had written "Take It All" during a difficult moment in her relationship. When she played the song for her boyfriend, the two got into a bitter argument that culminated in the end of their 18-month relationship. Heartbroken but musically stimulated, the singer channelled her rush of emotions into her music, crafting songs that examined her failed relationship from the perspectives of vengeful ex-lover, heartbroken victim, and nostalgic old flame. After several recording sessions with writers and producers like Paul Epworth, Fraser T Smith and Rick Rubin, Adele got enough material for creating a full LP. She released her second studio album on 19 January 2011 under the title 21. Adele first intended to title the album Rolling in the Deep, her adaptation of the slang phrase "roll deep", which summarises how she felt about her relationship; in her loose translation, the phrase refers to having someone "that has your back" and always supports you. However, the singer later deemed the title too confusing for some of her audiences. Although she had wanted to avoid the number motif of her debut, Adele considered "21" the most fitting title as it represented her age at the time of the album's composition, serving as an autobiographical period piece, and symbolised the personal maturity and artistic evolution since her debut. ## Writing, production and release "Turning Tables" was written by American singer-songwriter and frontman of pop-rock band OneRepublic, Ryan Tedder and Adele herself. The production of the song was helmed by Jim Abbiss. When the demos to two songs were completed, Adele approached Tedder, who was in London at the time for a radio show. Tedder had expressed interest in collaborating with the singer after they met at the 2009 Grammy Awards ceremony in February. He arrived four hours early to their first studio session held at Sphere Studios in London, buying time to better familiarise himself with some of her previous work. Although unaware of Adele's personal predicament, he composed the opening piano sequence and first few lines of "Turning Tables". Coincidentally, it perfectly captured the experience of the singer, who arrived at the studio moments after another altercation with her former lover. Angry and unfocused, she denounced her ex-lover's tendency to "turn the tables" on her during their arguments, an expression that Tedder decided to reference in the song's lyrics. Adele recorded the demo with Abbis the following day. "Turning Tables" was mixed by Abbiss and Ian Dowling. Neil Cowley played the piano in the song, while the string arrangement was made by Chris Elliot. The strings were played by Patrick Kernan, Stephen Morris, Tom Pigott-Smith, Julian Leaper, Boguslaw Kostecki, Bruce White, Peter Lale, Rachel Stephanie Bolt, David Danels, Caroline Dale, Warren Zelnski, Jackie Shave, Chris Laurence, Rita Manning, Cathy Thompson, Emlyn Singleton and Chris Worsey. XL Recordings serviced the song to UK mainstream radio on 5 November 2011 as fifth single from 21 alongside "Rumour Has It". On 14 December 2011, the song was sent for airplay to Italian radio stations. ## Composition "Turning Tables" is a pop ballad with a soulful sound that lasts for four minutes and 10 seconds. John Murphy of musicOMH recognized the single as a fragile piano ballad which shows off Adele's voice to its best effect. Sputnikmusic's Joseph Viney described the song as a delicate ballad that possesses an astonishing beauty. Its instrumentation consists of piano, "Broadway-worthy" strings and guitar. According to the digital sheet music published by Sony/ATV Music Publishing, "Turning Tables" is written in the key of C minor and set in common time, with 78 beats per minute. The song accompaniment uses the Seventh and Ninth chords and follows Two Chord Progressions and a Bridge(Passage) Progression of progression \#1: Cm7(i7)-AM9(VI M9)-Fm9(iv9)-A(VI),Bridge progression: A(VI)-Fm7(iv7)-A(VI)-B(VII), Progression \#2:Cm7(i7)-AM9(VI M9)-E(III)-Fm(iv). Adele's vocal range spans from the low note of G<sub>3</sub> to the high note of C<sub>5</sub>. Lyrically, "Turning Tables" is a song of domestic dispute, where its narrator assumes a defensive stance against a manipulative ex-lover. Reconciling herself with the termination of a contentious relationship, she vows emotional distance to shield herself from future heartbreak. Bryan Boyd of The Irish Times likened the singer to 1980s Welsh rocker Bonnie Tyler in delivering the vocals with a mixture of anger, pain and pathos. According to Paste magazine, cinematic strings "serve as fitting counterpoint to [the song's] heartbroken, hollowed-out lyrics." "Turning Tables" opens with a piano sequence after which Adele sings the first lines: "Close enough to start a war/All that I have is on the floor". The chorus consists of the lyrics: "So I won't let you / Close enough to hurt me / No, I won't rescue / You to just desert me / I can't give you / The heart you think you gave me / It's time to say goodbye / To turning tables." ## Reception ### Critical "Turning Tables" received acclaim from music critics. Ian Walker of the website AbsolutePunk commented that the song "contains some of the album's greatest vocal moments, further cementing Adele's reputation as a competent vocalist showing no signs of stopping." A writer from the Daily Herald said that Adele sounds "epic" on the song. Entertainment Weekly's Leah Greenblatt found a "scorned-woman balladry" in the song. Greg Kot of the Chicago Tribune found a "piano-based melancholy" in the song. A reviewer of HauteThought wrote that "Adele's natural ease and original tone shines in Turning Tables. The song allows her to explore her upper register without ignoring the lower, soulful sound she always seems able create." Lily Moayeri stated that on the "barely contained 'Turning Tables', Adele lets forth her formidable lungpower." Ryan Reed of Paste called the single "tearjerking", while Margaret Wappler of Los Angeles Times labeled the song as "softly sentimental". ### Commercial "Turning Tables" debuted at its peak of number 63 on the US Billboard Hot 100 for the issue dated 7 May 2011. The next week, the song dropped 22 places to number 85 and became the biggest fall of the week. The single stayed on the chart for total of three weeks and was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) for selling over 500,000 digital copies. As of May 2015 "Turning Tables" has sold 883,000 digital downloads in the US alone. On the Canadian Hot 100, the song debuted at number 60 for the issue dated 7 May 2011. It fell to number 91 the next week becoming the biggest fall of the week. "Turning Tables" was certified platinum by Music Canada for sales and streams of over 80,000 units. In the UK, it entered the singles chart at its peak of number 62 on 14 May 2011. On 21 May 2011 "Turning Tables" dropped to number 80, before falling off the chart the next week. On 17 September 2011 the song re-entered the UK Singles Chart at number 68. It was more successful on Belgium Ultratip singles chart where it reached number two in Wallonia and number four in Flanders. "Turning Tables" debuted at number nine on the Italian Singles Chart on 19 January 2012. After three weeks on the chart, the song reached its peak of number eight on 16 February 2012. ## Live performances and covers Adele performed "Turning Tables" at Live at Largo in Los Angeles on 9 February 2011. Robie Daw of Idolator recognized the performance as "intimate" and commented that it featured Adele's soulful vocals simply accompanied by "haunting" piano chords. She performed the single on VH1 Unplugged on 3 March 2011. Adele performed the song at Late Night with David Letterman; the performance was later uploaded to her Vevo account on YouTube. On 4 September 2011, the singer performed "Turning Tables" at the premiere of The Jonathan Ross Show and was also interviewed. "Turning Tables" was part of the set list on Adele's second concert tour entitled Adele Live (2011). On 22 November 2011, Adele unveiled a video of her performance of the song from the concert held at the Royal Albert Hall in London. The performance was later included in her first video album Live at the Royal Albert Hall which was released on 25 November 2011. Adele described the concert as the most special show that she would ever play. Adele performed the song on 27 January 2012 at Live from the Artists Den. During the performance the singer stated: "Nothing in life moves me as much as being on stage does. I love the closeness of playing in small rooms, and this room was lovely and simple, just beautiful." "Turning Tables" was covered by American actress and singer Gwyneth Paltrow, in the "A Night of Neglect" episode of the Fox Broadcasting Company television show Glee. Her performance of the song was considered inferior to the original. Erica Futterman of Rolling Stone named it her least-favorite of Paltrow's covers to date and said that her vocals "lacked the texture that made Adele's version so heartbreaking." Sandra Gonzalez of Entertainment Weekly gave it her lowest grade of the episode, a "B−", and Aly Semigran of MTV opined that while Paltrow is "a nice enough singer," she "in no way has the chops" the song requires. Whilst The Wall Street Journals Raymund Flandez called it a "scene-stealing turn" and commended it visually and vocally, he noted that Paltrow lacks Adele's veracity. Released as a single, this version peaked at number 66 on US Billboard Hot 100 and Canadian Hot 100. As of 2 July 2012, the Glee version had sold 113,000 paid downloads in the US alone. Co-writer of the song Ryan Tedder performed the song at Denver's Acoustic Christmas (a charity concert hosted by all Colorado artists) with his band OneRepublic in 2011. As the song boomed, there has been many covers made on Turning Tables from various artists. Various representations of this song in different versions have been trending in the UK and other countries as well. ## Credits and personnel Credits adapted from the liner notes of 21, XL Recordings. Recording - Recorded at Sphere Studios, London, United Kingdom Personnel' - Lead vocals – Adele - Songwriting – Adele Adkins, Ryan Tedder - Record producer – Jim Abbiss - Mixing – Jim Abbiss, Ian Dowling - Piano – Neil Cowley - String section arranged by – Chris Elliott - Strings performed by – Patrick Kernan, Stephen Morris, Tom Pigott-Smith, Julian Leaper, Boguslaw Kostecki, Bruce White, Peter Lale, Rachel Stephanie Bolt, David Daniels, Caroline Dale, Warren Zielinski, Jackie Shave, Chris Laurence, Rita Manning, Cathy Thompson, Emlyn Singleton, Chris Worsey ## Charts ### Weekly charts ### Year-end charts ## Certifications ## Release history
69,804,312	John Wieting	1,172,348,860	American lecturer and philanthropist	[ "1817 births", "1888 deaths", "19th-century American philanthropists", "American lecturers", "American people of Prussian descent", "Burials at Oakwood Cemetery (Syracuse, New York)", "People from Springfield, New York" ]	John Manchester Wieting (February 8, 1817 – February 13, 1888) was an American lecturer and philanthropist. He spent his early years as a teacher and then as an engineer and grader. After moving to Syracuse, New York, he read medicine to become a physician. After purchasing anatomical models he began giving lectures across upstate New York, gradually expanding the reach and the size of his lectures. They were extravagant affairs, and Wieting became known as one of the era's most prominent anatomical lecturers. He retired from lecturing at the age of 45 in 1862, and spent his remaining years traveling the world and engaging in philanthropic efforts, mainly aimed at the development of Syracuse. Wieting funded construction of the Wieting Opera House in the city, which was open until 1930 and became a place for Broadway plays to be tried out. He has been cited by several scholars as one of the most famous anatomical lecturers of his era. ## Biography John Manchester Wieting was born in Springfield, New York, on February 8, 1817, to Peter Wieting and Mary Elizabeth Wieting née Manchester. His grandfather, John Christopher Wieting, had immigrated to the United States from Prussia or Germany and fought with the colonists in the American Revolutionary War. After the war, John Christopher became an American citizen and moved to Minden, New York, where he was pastor of the Lutheran Church. Wieting started teaching at the public schools of Deerfield, New York, when he was fourteen years old, after his father's business failed. He reportedly spent his summers as a student at the Clinton Liberal Institute. He worked on a survey of the Erie Railroad in 1835 and two years later moved to Syracuse, New York, where he found employment as a civil engineer, working on construction of the Syracuse and Utica Railroad. Wieting surveyed Rosehill Cemetery and graded streets around the city. When not working, he studied medicine with Hiram Hoyt, a local physician, and was a physician's apprentice for a time. Wieting eventually switched careers and become a physician. He also embarked upon a career as a lecturer, after purchasing the "lecturing apparatus" used by Austin Flint, chiefly a manikin and anatomical charts. He began lecturing across upstate New York in 1843, gradually expanding his performance in the years that followed. Ten years later, he owned six life-sized manikins which he could take apart and use to show over 1,700 body parts. He also owned models of organs and human skeletons. Wieting gave his lectures primarily about anatomy and physiology. While his wife maintained that these lectures were "modest and quiet", others such as Frederick Hollick criticized his talks as including "generally erroneous" and misleading explanations, specifically about contraception. Hollick also argued that Wieting had stolen portions of his work. In 1994 the scholar Janet Farrell Brodie wrote that Wieting's lectures were aimed at "shock[ing] and titillat[ing] audiences" and providing information on contraception information. His scientific lectures were very popular. They were also known for being dramatic affairs, with the stage carefully arranged and "dramatic lighting." In 1850 a Boston newspaper wrote of Wieting's lecture series at Tremont Temple: "such an immense rush was never caused in Boston before by any lecturer on scientific objects." Wieting gave over one hundred lectures in Boston alone. He retired from lecturing when he was forty-five years old in 1862. Wieting also gained a reputation as a philanthropist working to develop Syracuse. He funded the construction of the Wieting Block and Wieting Opera House near Clinton Square, and its rebuilding twice after being destroyed by fire. In the late 1860s, Wieting became involved with the Cardiff Giant, a local archaeological hoax then believed to be authentic, attempting to purchase it for \$25,000. A consortium of local businessmen including Amos Westcott, Amos Gillett, and David Hannum, emerged to challenge Wieting's bid. They soon joined forces with another group consisting of Simeon Rouse and Alfred Higgins. The owner of the Cardiff Giant eventually accepted their offer of \$30,000 for 3⁄4 ownership over Wieting's. Wieting reportedly became involved in arguing that the giant was a fraud after his offer was rejected. ## Personal life and death Wieting was married to Mary Elizabeth Plumb. The two traveled the world in 1875. They visited Europe in 1887, at which point Wieting was in poor health. He died on February 13, 1888, of pneumonia and was buried in Oakwood Cemetery. Wieting's mausoleum in Oakwood Cemetery was built while he was still alive, in 1880. It has been compared to a Buddhist stupa, which Wieting may have seen on his tour of the world. ## Legacy Scholar Michael Sappol named Wieting, along with Frederick Hollick, one of the two most significant anatomical lecturers of the era. An obituary estimated that he had earned the most money of any contemporary American through lecturing. His collection used in lectures was donated to Syracuse University by his widow. Mary Wieting also wrote Prominent Incidents in the Life of Dr. John M. Wieting, Including His Travels with his Wife around the World, an account of Wieting's life including their tour around the world. However, despite its title, the novel is largely an autobiographical work about her life. ### Wieting Opera House Wieting had decided to fund work on Wieting Hall because he felt that Syracuse did not have a public hall that was proportionally large enough for the city. He rebuilt the hall twice after fires and developed it into a performance space and convention hall attended by many. In 1870 Wieting renovated and renamed the hall the Wieting Opera House. Upon Wieting's death in 1888, his wife, Mary Elizabeth Wieting, inherited his estate and began managing the opera house. This hall burnt down on September 3, 1896, and Mary Wieting funded a rebuilding. The construction of several theatres in Syracuse, namely the Wieting— considered "one of the premiere theaters in the East", developed the city into a place to try-out plays that would later go to be performed on Broadway. The final iteration of the Wieting Opera House was open until 1930.
5,477,445	Hodj 'n' Podj	1,121,753,325	1995 video game	[ "1995 video games", "Classic Mac OS games", "Digital tabletop games", "Fantasy video games", "Minigame compilations", "Multiplayer and single-player video games", "Puzzle video games", "Steve Meretzky games", "Video games developed in the United States", "Virgin Interactive games", "Windows games" ]	Hodj 'n' Podj is a 1995 computer board game and minigame compilation developed by Boffo Games and published by Media Vision and Virgin Interactive. It was designed by Steve Meretzky, previously known for adventure games such as The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. Hodj 'n' Podj features 19 minigames based on peg solitaire, Pac-Man, Battleship and other games. These may be played separately or within an overarching fairy tale story, which follows the suitors Hodj and Podj in their attempts to rescue two princesses. Meretzky conceived Hodj 'n' Podj in the late 1980s, as a way to revive simpler games that had become hard to obtain. It began production in 1994, and was the first product developed by Meretzky's company Boffo Games. Production was troubled, thanks to a \$100 million securities fraud scandal at Media Vision, which led to the project's sale to Virgin. During development, Boffo discovered that Hodj 'n' Podj appealed to a wider demographic than Meretzky's past work, and Meretzky has since cited it as an early casual game. Selling 40,000 to 50,000 units, Hodj 'n' Podj was commercially unsuccessful. Reviewers found the game simplistic but enjoyable, although Computer Gaming World criticized its reuse of minigames from titles like the Dr. Brain series. Retrospectively, Meretzky has called Hodj 'n' Podj a career turning point that led him toward casual game development, and an inspiration for his subsequent work with WorldWinner and Playdom. In 2009, he reported that Hodj 'n' Podj continued to receive as many fan letters as all of his other games combined. ## Gameplay and plot Hodj 'n' Podj is a computer board game and minigame compilation for one to two players. It is set in a fairy tale world, in the kingdom of Po-Poree, whose twin princesses Mish and Mosh have been kidnapped by the villainous Salmagundi. The player controls the suitor Hodj, and races the competing suitor Podj—controlled by the computer or a second player—to rescue the princesses first. Each turn, a spinner randomly determines the distances Hodj and Podj may travel across the game board. The board features 19 important locations, each of which contains a minigame that the player completes to earn items or information necessary to rescue the princesses. These include Battlefish, inspired by Battleship; Pack Rat, inspired by Pac-Man; Garfunkel, inspired by Simon; and a peg solitaire game called Peggleboz. All 19 minigames may also be played in "stand-alone mode", without the board game elements. Once one player locates the princesses, they must take them to the center of the board to win. During the journey, the opposing player or computer may intervene and steal the princesses by succeeding in a competitive minigame. ## Development and release After spending several years as a contractor for Legend Entertainment, designer Steve Meretzky started the company Boffo Games with two of his friends in 1994. Discussions about this venture had begun in 1993, but the final decision was made after Media Vision, an American electronics manufacturer, offered the group a lucrative multi-game contract in January 1994. As a result, the developer was founded in February. Hodj 'n' Podj became Boffo's first project under Media Vision, which acted as its publisher. It was the highest-budget production of Meretzky's career at that time (later surpassed by The Space Bar), and was the first project on which he acted only as a designer, rather than as a designer and programmer. According to Boffo co-founder Mike Dornbrook, the Hodj 'n' Podj concept was chosen in order to meet a difficult deadline proposed by Media Vision, which wanted Boffo's first title finished by August 1994. The simplicity of Hodj 'n' Podj made it viable in this timeframe, in part because its segmented structure allowed numerous programmers to develop different sections of the game simultaneously. Its completion date was ultimately set for September 30. Following the closure of his employer Infocom, Meretzky had conceived Hodj 'n' Podj in summer 1989, five or more years before the project began. His initial goal was to revive "all those fun, simple games which had pretty much disappeared" at the time. To increase its value, he believed it needed a structure that tied together its minigames; and this inspired its storyline and board game motif. Its story was written in the style of Fractured Fairy Tales, from The Rocky and Bullwinkle Show. Meretzky later noted that other companies beat him to reviving these games in the years between Hodj 'n' Podj's conception and release, and saw success without using any overarching structures. However, he still felt "very happy creatively" with the final design of his project. As production of Hodj 'n' Podj progressed, the team "began to suspect that it was going to appeal to a very different gaming audience", according to Meretzky. They discovered that an unexpected number of female players, families and non-gamers reacted with praise toward the game, compared to Meretzky's past projects. In a post-release letter to Computer Gaming World, Meretzky wrote, "[F]or the first time, I have designed a game which my 4-year-old daughter and my 70-year-old mother both enjoy." He has retrospectively called Hodj 'n' Podj an example of a casual game. On May 10, after three months of development, reports broke that Media Vision was being scrutinized by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. It became public that the company had engaged in a \$100 million securities fraud, which Meretzky later called "kind of a mini-Enron". Media Vision filed for bankruptcy in July, but Boffo was able to proceed with Hodj 'n' Podj during the publisher's dissolution because much of its funding had come as a down payment. Ultimately, the bankruptcy estate opted to give Boffo enough money to complete the game and then liquidate the final product, as this would be more profitable than canceling it mid-development. It was finished around the second week of October 1994, below its expected budget. Following bids from companies such as BMG Interactive and Ocean Software, Hodj 'n' Podj was purchased at auction by Virgin Interactive, alongside the titles The Daedalus Encounter and Rivers of Dawn. The United States bankruptcy court overseeing Media Vision's case delayed the final sale of Hodj 'n' Podj to December. Virgin obtained the game on the 9th, a point deemed too late in the holiday shopping season to justify a launch. In addition, none of the game's packaging had been created. As a result, the game missed 1994. Hodj 'n' Podj ultimately debuted in March 1995. Dornbrook explained that Virgin had pushed its release back from January to avoid a conflict with the launch of its game The 11th Hour, which was ultimately delayed. Boffo's title was released with what Meretzky considered "a half-hearted marketing effort" by Virgin. Dornbrook remarked that it "was really launched with no marketing support", as a result of corporate restructuring at the publisher; and that the game's "PR was actually done completely by us." Like other games of the time, Hodj 'n' Podj was sold through traditional retail channels, which Meretzky later believed to be a mistake. He argued in 2009, "The [retail] channel evolved and eventually perfected the art of selling hardcore games to a hardcore audience, but it was horribly inadequate for selling any other type of game or reaching any other demographic." ## Reception Hodj 'n' Podj sold between 40,000 and 50,000 copies, which Meretzky later called "a disappointing number even in the much smaller games market of the time." Despite its low sales, it went on to surpass all of his other games in its number of fan letters. By 2009, he still received as many fan letters about Hodj 'n' Podj as the rest of his games put together. He said in 2005 that Hodj 'n' Podj was his only game that he could play for enjoyment, and that he continued to "play [it] with my kids every now and then." Ann M. Marcus of Electronic Entertainment summarized Hodj 'n' Podj as "charming", and considered it an "exquisitely illustrated, hilariously funny medieval romp". Despite some "minor quibbles," she considered the game "a true delight." The reviewer for Next Generation wrote that it "won't appeal to those hungry for action", but that it was ideal "for laid back fun on a rainy afternoon." In Entertainment Weekly, Bob Strauss summarized, "This impeccable British production is one of those rare CD-ROMs that can be enjoyed by both kids and adults—and its simple menu-driven interface guarantees that you'll keep it on your hard drive long after your other software has vanished." William R. Trotter of PC Gamer US wrote, "Don't expect too much from this game. It breaks no new ground, pushes no 'envelopes,' and veteran gamers will no doubt be bored by parts of it." However, he argued that players who "accept Hodj 'n' Podj in the spirit in which it is offered" will derive "considerable delight in playing it — especially if you have kids." Computer Gaming World's Charles Ardai found the game's use of traditional games "downright baffling", given their presence in past compilations, as well as in Sam & Max: Hit the Road and the Dr. Brain series. Although he enjoyed the game's graphics and humor, he summarized, "You've seen all the puzzles before, often done better than they're done here. How jazzed can you get about Life or Solitaire, anyway?" ### Legacy A sequel to Hodj 'n' Podj was commissioned by Virgin Interactive before the first game's release, and development began in late 1994, funded by Boffo Games' earlier payment from Media Vision. The project was canceled after Virgin's restructuring in early 1995. According to Mike Dornbrook, an offer for the sequel was made later in 1995 by Sanctuary Woods. In August 2000, Steve Meretzky joined WorldWinner as a game designer. Among the draws of the job, in his view, was that it allowed him to create games "very reminiscent of the kind of games in Hodj 'n' Podj". He has cited the game as a career turning point, which led him away from adventure games and toward the casual game market. While working at Playdom on the role-playing game Sorority Life, he took direct inspiration from Hodj 'n' Podj's implementation of minigames into an overarching structure. Sorority Life was a success, which Meretzky saw as proof that Hodj 'n' Podj's commercial failure was caused by marketing and distribution factors rather than design flaws.
19,009,110	Rain	1,171,184,203	Precipitation in the form of water droplets	[ "Articles containing video clips", "Rain" ]	Rain is water droplets that have condensed from atmospheric water vapor and then fall under gravity. Rain is a major component of the water cycle and is responsible for depositing most of the fresh water on the Earth. It provides water for hydroelectric power plants, crop irrigation, and suitable conditions for many types of ecosystems. The major cause of rain production is moisture moving along three-dimensional zones of temperature and moisture contrasts known as weather fronts. If enough moisture and upward motion is present, precipitation falls from convective clouds (those with strong upward vertical motion) such as cumulonimbus (thunder clouds) which can organize into narrow rainbands. In mountainous areas, heavy precipitation is possible where upslope flow is maximized within windward sides of the terrain at elevation which forces moist air to condense and fall out as rainfall along the sides of mountains. On the leeward side of mountains, desert climates can exist due to the dry air caused by downslope flow which causes heating and drying of the air mass. The movement of the monsoon trough, or intertropical convergence zone, brings rainy seasons to savannah climes. The urban heat island effect leads to increased rainfall, both in amounts and intensity, downwind of cities. Global warming is also causing changes in the precipitation pattern globally, including wetter conditions across eastern North America and drier conditions in the tropics. Antarctica is the driest continent. The globally averaged annual precipitation over land is 715 mm (28.1 in), but over the whole Earth, it is much higher at 990 mm (39 in). Climate classification systems such as the Köppen classification system use average annual rainfall to help differentiate between differing climate regimes. Rainfall is measured using rain gauges. Rainfall amounts can be estimated by weather radar. ## Formation ### Water-saturated air Air contains water vapor, and the amount of water in a given mass of dry air, known as the mixing ratio, is measured in grams of water per kilogram of dry air (g/kg). The amount of moisture in the air is also commonly reported as relative humidity; which is the percentage of the total water vapor air can hold at a particular air temperature. How much water vapor a parcel of air can contain before it becomes saturated (100% relative humidity) and forms into a cloud (a group of visible and tiny water and ice particles suspended above the Earth's surface) depends on its temperature. Warmer air can contain more water vapor than cooler air before becoming saturated. Therefore, one way to saturate a parcel of air is to cool it. The dew point is the temperature to which a parcel must be cooled in order to become saturated. There are four main mechanisms for cooling the air to its dew point: adiabatic cooling, conductive cooling, radiational cooling, and evaporative cooling. Adiabatic cooling occurs when air rises and expands. The air can rise due to convection, large-scale atmospheric motions, or a physical barrier such as a mountain (orographic lift). Conductive cooling occurs when the air comes into contact with a colder surface, usually by being blown from one surface to another, for example from a liquid water surface to colder land. Radiational cooling occurs due to the emission of infrared radiation, either by the air or by the surface underneath. Evaporative cooling occurs when moisture is added to the air through evaporation, which forces the air temperature to cool to its wet-bulb temperature, or until it reaches saturation. The main ways water vapor is added to the air are wind convergence into areas of upward motion, precipitation or virga falling from above, daytime heating evaporating water from the surface of oceans, water bodies or wet land, transpiration from plants, cool or dry air moving over warmer water, and lifting air over mountains. Water vapor normally begins to condense on condensation nuclei such as dust, ice, and salt in order to form clouds. Elevated portions of weather fronts (which are three-dimensional in nature) force broad areas of upward motion within the Earth's atmosphere which form clouds decks such as altostratus or cirrostratus. Stratus is a stable cloud deck which tends to form when a cool, stable air mass is trapped underneath a warm air mass. It can also form due to the lifting of advection fog during breezy conditions. ### Coalescence and fragmentation Coalescence occurs when water droplets fuse to create larger water droplets. Air resistance typically causes the water droplets in a cloud to remain stationary. When air turbulence occurs, water droplets collide, producing larger droplets. As these larger water droplets descend, coalescence continues, so that drops become heavy enough to overcome air resistance and fall as rain. Coalescence generally happens most often in clouds above freezing and is also known as the warm rain process. In clouds below freezing, when ice crystals gain enough mass they begin to fall. This generally requires more mass than coalescence when occurring between the crystal and neighboring water droplets. This process is temperature dependent, as supercooled water droplets only exist in a cloud that is below freezing. In addition, because of the great temperature difference between cloud and ground level, these ice crystals may melt as they fall and become rain. Raindrops have sizes ranging from 0.1 to 9 mm (0.0039 to 0.3543 in) mean diameter but develop a tendency to break up at larger sizes. Smaller drops are called cloud droplets, and their shape is spherical. As a raindrop increases in size, its shape becomes more oblate, with its largest cross-section facing the oncoming airflow. Large rain drops become increasingly flattened on the bottom, like hamburger buns; very large ones are shaped like parachutes. Contrary to popular belief, their shape does not resemble a teardrop. The biggest raindrops on Earth were recorded over Brazil and the Marshall Islands in 2004 — some of them were as large as 10 mm (0.39 in). The large size is explained by condensation on large smoke particles or by collisions between drops in small regions with particularly high content of liquid water. Raindrops associated with melting hail tend to be larger than other raindrops. Intensity and duration of rainfall are usually inversely related, i.e., high-intensity storms are likely to be of short duration and low-intensity storms can have a long duration. ### Droplet size distribution The final droplet size distribution is an exponential distribution. The number of droplets with diameter between $d$ and $D+dD$ per unit volume of space is $n(d) = n_0 e^{-d/\langle d \rangle} dD$. This is commonly referred to as the Marshall–Palmer law after the researchers who first characterized it. The parameters are somewhat temperature-dependent, and the slope also scales with the rate of rainfall $\langle d \rangle^{-1}=41 R^{-0.21}$ (d in centimeters and R in millimeters per hour). Deviations can occur for small droplets and during different rainfall conditions. The distribution tends to fit averaged rainfall, while instantaneous size spectra often deviate and have been modeled as gamma distributions. The distribution has an upper limit due to droplet fragmentation. ### Raindrop impacts Raindrops impact at their terminal velocity, which is greater for larger drops due to their larger mass-to-drag ratio. At sea level and without wind, 0.5 mm (0.020 in) drizzle impacts at 2 m/s (6.6 ft/s) or 7.2 km/h (4.5 mph), while large 5 mm (0.20 in) drops impact at around 9 m/s (30 ft/s) or 32 km/h (20 mph). Rain falling on loosely packed material such as newly fallen ash can produce dimples that can be fossilized, called raindrop impressions. The air density dependence of the maximum raindrop diameter together with fossil raindrop imprints has been used to constrain the density of the air 2.7 billion years ago. The sound of raindrops hitting water is caused by bubbles of air oscillating underwater. The METAR code for rain is RA, while the coding for rain showers is SHRA. ### Virga In certain conditions, precipitation may fall from a cloud but then evaporate or sublime before reaching the ground. This is termed virga and is more often seen in hot and dry climates. ## Causes ### Frontal activity Stratiform (a broad shield of precipitation with a relatively similar intensity) and dynamic precipitation (convective precipitation which is showery in nature with large changes in intensity over short distances) occur as a consequence of slow ascent of air in synoptic systems (on the order of cm/s), such as in the vicinity of cold fronts and near and poleward of surface warm fronts. Similar ascent is seen around tropical cyclones outside the eyewall, and in comma-head precipitation patterns around mid-latitude cyclones. A wide variety of weather can be found along an occluded front, with thunderstorms possible, but usually, their passage is associated with a drying of the air mass. Occluded fronts usually form around mature low-pressure areas. What separates rainfall from other precipitation types, such as ice pellets and snow, is the presence of a thick layer of air aloft which is above the melting point of water, which melts the frozen precipitation well before it reaches the ground. If there is a shallow near-surface layer that is below freezing, freezing rain (rain which freezes on contact with surfaces in subfreezing environments) will result. Hail becomes an increasingly infrequent occurrence when the freezing level within the atmosphere exceeds 3,400 m (11,000 ft) above ground level. ### Convection Convective rain, or showery precipitation, occurs from convective clouds (e.g., cumulonimbus or cumulus congestus). It falls as showers with rapidly changing intensity. Convective precipitation falls over a certain area for a relatively short time, as convective clouds have limited horizontal extent. Most precipitation in the tropics appears to be convective; however, it has been suggested that stratiform precipitation also occurs. Graupel and hail indicate convection. In mid-latitudes, convective precipitation is intermittent and often associated with baroclinic boundaries such as cold fronts, squall lines, and warm fronts. ### Orographic effects Orographic precipitation occurs on the windward side of mountains and is caused by the rising air motion of a large-scale flow of moist air across the mountain ridge, resulting in adiabatic cooling and condensation. In mountainous parts of the world subjected to relatively consistent winds (for example, the trade winds), a more moist climate usually prevails on the windward side of a mountain than on the leeward or downwind side. Moisture is removed by orographic lift, leaving drier air (see katabatic wind) on the descending and generally warming, leeward side where a rain shadow is observed. In Hawaii, Mount Waiʻaleʻale, on the island of Kauai, is notable for its extreme rainfall, as it is amongst the places in the world with the highest levels of rainfall, with 9,500 mm (373 in). Systems known as Kona storms affect the state with heavy rains between October and April. Local climates vary considerably on each island due to their topography, divisible into windward (Koʻolau) and leeward (Kona) regions based upon location relative to the higher mountains. Windward sides face the east to northeast trade winds and receive much more rainfall; leeward sides are drier and sunnier, with less rain and less cloud cover. In South America, the Andes mountain range blocks Pacific moisture that arrives in that continent, resulting in a desert-like climate just downwind across western Argentina. The Sierra Nevada range creates the same effect in North America forming the Great Basin and Mojave Deserts. ### Within the tropics The wet, or rainy, season is the time of year, covering one or more months, when most of the average annual rainfall in a region falls. The term green season is also sometimes used as a euphemism by tourist authorities. Areas with wet seasons are dispersed across portions of the tropics and subtropics. Savanna climates and areas with monsoon regimes have wet summers and dry winters. Tropical rainforests technically do not have dry or wet seasons, since their rainfall is equally distributed through the year. Some areas with pronounced rainy seasons will see a break in rainfall mid-season when the intertropical convergence zone or monsoon trough move poleward of their location during the middle of the warm season. When the wet season occurs during the warm season, or summer, rain falls mainly during the late afternoon and early evening hours. The wet season is a time when air quality improves, freshwater quality improves, and vegetation grows significantly. Tropical cyclones, a source of very heavy rainfall, consist of large air masses several hundred miles across with low pressure at the centre and with winds blowing inward towards the centre in either a clockwise direction (southern hemisphere) or counterclockwise (northern hemisphere). Although cyclones can take an enormous toll in lives and personal property, they may be important factors in the precipitation regimes of places they impact, as they may bring much-needed precipitation to otherwise dry regions. Areas in their path can receive a year's worth of rainfall from a tropical cyclone passage. ### Human influence The fine particulate matter produced by car exhaust and other human sources of pollution forms cloud condensation nuclei leads to the production of clouds and increases the likelihood of rain. As commuters and commercial traffic cause pollution to build up over the course of the week, the likelihood of rain increases: it peaks by Saturday, after five days of weekday pollution has been built up. In heavily populated areas that are near the coast, such as the United States' Eastern Seaboard, the effect can be dramatic: there is a 22% higher chance of rain on Saturdays than on Mondays. The urban heat island effect warms cities 0.6 to 5.6 °C (1.1 to 10.1 °F) above surrounding suburbs and rural areas. This extra heat leads to greater upward motion, which can induce additional shower and thunderstorm activity. Rainfall rates downwind of cities are increased between 48% and 116%. Partly as a result of this warming, monthly rainfall is about 28% greater between 32 and 64 km (20 and 40 mi) downwind of cities, compared with upwind. Some cities induce a total precipitation increase of 51%. Increasing temperatures tend to increase evaporation which can lead to more precipitation. Precipitation generally increased over land north of 30°N from 1900 through 2005 but has declined over the tropics since the 1970s. Globally there has been no statistically significant overall trend in precipitation over the past century, although trends have varied widely by region and over time. Eastern portions of North and South America, northern Europe, and northern and central Asia have become wetter. The Sahel, the Mediterranean, southern Africa and parts of southern Asia have become drier. There has been an increase in the number of heavy precipitation events over many areas during the past century, as well as an increase since the 1970s in the prevalence of droughts—especially in the tropics and subtropics. Changes in precipitation and evaporation over the oceans are suggested by the decreased salinity of mid- and high-latitude waters (implying more precipitation), along with increased salinity in lower latitudes (implying less precipitation and/or more evaporation). Over the contiguous United States, total annual precipitation increased at an average rate of 6.1 percent since 1900, with the greatest increases within the East North Central climate region (11.6 percent per century) and the South (11.1 percent). Hawaii was the only region to show a decrease (−9.25 percent). Analysis of 65 years of United States of America rainfall records show the lower 48 states have an increase in heavy downpours since 1950. The largest increases are in the Northeast and Midwest, which in the past decade, have seen 31 and 16 percent more heavy downpours compared to the 1950s. Rhode Island is the state with the largest increase, 104%. McAllen, Texas is the city with the largest increase, 700%. Heavy downpour in the analysis are the days where total precipitation exceeded the top one percent of all rain and snow days during the years 1950–2014. The most successful attempts at influencing weather involve cloud seeding, which include techniques used to increase winter precipitation over mountains and suppress hail. ## Characteristics ### Patterns Rainbands are cloud and precipitation areas which are significantly elongated. Rainbands can be stratiform or convective, and are generated by differences in temperature. When noted on weather radar imagery, this precipitation elongation is referred to as banded structure. Rainbands in advance of warm occluded fronts and warm fronts are associated with weak upward motion, and tend to be wide and stratiform in nature. Rainbands spawned near and ahead of cold fronts can be squall lines which are able to produce tornadoes. Rainbands associated with cold fronts can be warped by mountain barriers perpendicular to the front's orientation due to the formation of a low-level barrier jet. Bands of thunderstorms can form with sea breeze and land breeze boundaries if enough moisture is present. If sea breeze rainbands become active enough just ahead of a cold front, they can mask the location of the cold front itself. Once a cyclone occludes an occluded front (a trough of warm air aloft) will be caused by strong southerly winds on its eastern periphery rotating aloft around its northeast, and ultimately northwestern, periphery (also termed the warm conveyor belt), forcing a surface trough to continue into the cold sector on a similar curve to the occluded front. The front creates the portion of an occluded cyclone known as its comma head, due to the comma-like shape of the mid-tropospheric cloudiness that accompanies the feature. It can also be the focus of locally heavy precipitation, with thunderstorms possible if the atmosphere along the front is unstable enough for convection. Banding within the comma head precipitation pattern of an extratropical cyclone can yield significant amounts of rain. Behind extratropical cyclones during fall and winter, rainbands can form downwind of relative warm bodies of water such as the Great Lakes. Downwind of islands, bands of showers and thunderstorms can develop due to low-level wind convergence downwind of the island edges. Offshore California, this has been noted in the wake of cold fronts. Rainbands within tropical cyclones are curved in orientation. Tropical cyclone rainbands contain showers and thunderstorms that, together with the eyewall and the eye, constitute a hurricane or tropical storm. The extent of rainbands around a tropical cyclone can help determine the cyclone's intensity. ### Acidity The phrase acid rain was first used by Scottish chemist Robert Augus Smith in 1852. The pH of rain varies, especially due to its origin. On America's East Coast, rain that is derived from the Atlantic Ocean typically has a pH of 5.0–5.6; rain that comes across the continental from the west has a pH of 3.8–4.8; and local thunderstorms can have a pH as low as 2.0. Rain becomes acidic primarily due to the presence of two strong acids, sulfuric acid (H<sub>2</sub>SO<sub>4</sub>) and nitric acid (HNO<sub>3</sub>). Sulfuric acid is derived from natural sources such as volcanoes, and wetlands (sulfate-reducing bacteria); and anthropogenic sources such as the combustion of fossil fuels, and mining where H<sub>2</sub>S is present. Nitric acid is produced by natural sources such as lightning, soil bacteria, and natural fires; while also produced anthropogenically by the combustion of fossil fuels and from power plants. In the past 20 years, the concentrations of nitric and sulfuric acid has decreased in presence of rainwater, which may be due to the significant increase in ammonium (most likely as ammonia from livestock production), which acts as a buffer in acid rain and raises the pH. ### Köppen climate classification The Köppen classification depends on average monthly values of temperature and precipitation. The most commonly used form of the Köppen classification has five primary types labeled A through E. Specifically, the primary types are A, tropical; B, dry; C, mild mid-latitude; D, cold mid-latitude; and E, polar. The five primary classifications can be further divided into secondary classifications such as rain forest, monsoon, tropical savanna, humid subtropical, humid continental, oceanic climate, Mediterranean climate, steppe, subarctic climate, tundra, polar ice cap, and desert. Rain forests are characterized by high rainfall, with definitions setting minimum normal annual rainfall between 1,750 and 2,000 mm (69 and 79 in). A tropical savanna is a grassland biome located in semi-arid to semi-humid climate regions of subtropical and tropical latitudes, with rainfall between 750 and 1,270 mm (30 and 50 in) a year. They are widespread on Africa, and are also found in India, the northern parts of South America, Malaysia, and Australia. The humid subtropical climate zone is where winter rainfall is associated with large storms that the westerlies steer from west to east. Most summer rainfall occurs during thunderstorms and from occasional tropical cyclones. Humid subtropical climates lie on the east side continents, roughly between latitudes 20° and 40° degrees away from the equator. An oceanic (or maritime) climate is typically found along the west coasts at the middle latitudes of all the world's continents, bordering cool oceans, as well as southeastern Australia, and is accompanied by plentiful precipitation year-round. The Mediterranean climate regime resembles the climate of the lands in the Mediterranean Basin, parts of western North America, parts of Western and South Australia, in southwestern South Africa and in parts of central Chile. The climate is characterized by hot, dry summers and cool, wet winters. A steppe is a dry grassland. Subarctic climates are cold with continuous permafrost and little precipitation. ### Pollution ## Measurement ### Gauges Rain is measured in units of length per unit time, typically in millimeters per hour, or in countries where imperial units are more common, inches per hour. The "length", or more accurately, "depth" being measured is the depth of rain water that would accumulate on a flat, horizontal and impermeable surface during a given amount of time, typically an hour. One millimeter of rainfall is the equivalent of one liter of water per square meter. The standard way of measuring rainfall or snowfall is the standard rain gauge, which can be found in 100-mm (4-in) plastic and 200-mm (8-in) metal varieties. The inner cylinder is filled by 25 mm (0.98 in) of rain, with overflow flowing into the outer cylinder. Plastic gauges have markings on the inner cylinder down to 0.25 mm (0.0098 in) resolution, while metal gauges require use of a stick designed with the appropriate 0.25 mm (0.0098 in) markings. After the inner cylinder is filled, the amount inside it is discarded, then filled with the remaining rainfall in the outer cylinder until all the fluid in the outer cylinder is gone, adding to the overall total until the outer cylinder is empty. Other types of gauges include the popular wedge gauge (the cheapest rain gauge and most fragile), the tipping bucket rain gauge, and the weighing rain gauge. For those looking to measure rainfall the most inexpensively, a can that is cylindrical with straight sides will act as a rain gauge if left out in the open, but its accuracy will depend on what ruler is used to measure the rain with. Any of the above rain gauges can be made at home, with enough know-how. When a precipitation measurement is made, various networks exist across the United States and elsewhere where rainfall measurements can be submitted through the Internet, such as CoCoRAHS or GLOBE. If a network is not available in the area where one lives, the nearest local weather or met office will likely be interested in the measurement. ### Remote sensing One of the main uses of weather radar is to be able to assess the amount of precipitations fallen over large basins for hydrological purposes. For instance, river flood control, sewer management and dam construction are all areas where planners use rainfall accumulation data. Radar-derived rainfall estimates complement surface station data which can be used for calibration. To produce radar accumulations, rain rates over a point are estimated by using the value of reflectivity data at individual grid points. A radar equation is then used, which is $Z = A R^b ,$ where Z represents the radar reflectivity, R represents the rainfall rate, and A and b are constants. Satellite-derived rainfall estimates use passive microwave instruments aboard polar orbiting as well as geostationary weather satellites to indirectly measure rainfall rates. If one wants an accumulated rainfall over a time period, one has to add up all the accumulations from each grid box within the images during that time. ### Intensity Rainfall intensity is classified according to the rate of precipitation, which depends on the considered time. The following categories are used to classify rainfall intensity: - Light rain — when the precipitation rate is \< 2.5 mm (0.098 in) per hour - Moderate rain — when the precipitation rate is between 2.5 mm (0.098 in) – 7.6 mm (0.30 in) or 10 mm (0.39 in) per hour - Heavy rain — when the precipitation rate is \> 7.6 mm (0.30 in) per hour, or between 10 mm (0.39 in) and 50 mm (2.0 in) per hour - Violent rain — when the precipitation rate is \> 50 mm (2.0 in) per hour Terms used for a heavy or violent rain include gully washer, trash-mover and toad-strangler. The intensity can also be expressed by rainfall erosivity R-factor or in terms of the rainfall time-structure n-index. ### Return period The average time between occurrences of an event with a specified intensity and duration is called the return period. The intensity of a storm can be predicted for any return period and storm duration, from charts based on historic data for the location. The return period is often expressed as an n-year event. For instance, a 10-year storm describes a rare rainfall event occurring on average once every 10 years. The rainfall will be greater and the flooding will be worse than the worst storm expected in any single year. A 100-year storm describes an extremely rare rainfall event occurring on average once in a century. The rainfall will be extreme and flooding worse than a 10-year event. The probability of an event in any year is the inverse of the return period (assuming the probability remains the same for each year). For instance, a 10-year storm has a probability of occurring of 10 percent in any given year, and a 100-year storm occurs with a 1 percent probability in a year. As with all probability events, it is possible, though improbable, to have multiple 100-year storms in a single year. ## Forecasting The Quantitative Precipitation Forecast (abbreviated QPF) is the expected amount of liquid precipitation accumulated over a specified time period over a specified area. A QPF will be specified when a measurable precipitation type reaching a minimum threshold is forecast for any hour during a QPF valid period. Precipitation forecasts tend to be bound by synoptic hours such as 0000, 0600, 1200 and 1800 GMT. Terrain is considered in QPFs by use of topography or based upon climatological precipitation patterns from observations with fine detail. Starting in the mid to late 1990s, QPFs were used within hydrologic forecast models to simulate impact to rivers throughout the United States. Forecast models show significant sensitivity to humidity levels within the planetary boundary layer, or in the lowest levels of the atmosphere, which decreases with height. QPF can be generated on a quantitative, forecasting amounts, or a qualitative, forecasting the probability of a specific amount, basis. Radar imagery forecasting techniques show higher skill than model forecasts within 6 to 7 hours of the time of the radar image. The forecasts can be verified through use of rain gauge measurements, weather radar estimates, or a combination of both. Various skill scores can be determined to measure the value of the rainfall forecast. ## Impact ### Agricultural Precipitation, especially rain, has a dramatic effect on agriculture. All plants need at least some water to survive, therefore rain (being the most effective means of watering) is important to agriculture. While a regular rain pattern is usually vital to healthy plants, too much or too little rainfall can be harmful, even devastating to crops. Drought can kill crops and increase erosion, while overly wet weather can cause harmful fungus growth. Plants need varying amounts of rainfall to survive. For example, certain cacti require small amounts of water, while tropical plants may need up to hundreds of inches of rain per year to survive. In areas with wet and dry seasons, soil nutrients diminish and erosion increases during the wet season. Animals have adaptation and survival strategies for the wetter regime. The previous dry season leads to food shortages into the wet season, as the crops have yet to mature. Developing countries have noted that their populations show seasonal weight fluctuations due to food shortages seen before the first harvest, which occurs late in the wet season. Rain may be harvested through the use of rainwater tanks; treated to potable use or for non-potable use indoors or for irrigation. Excessive rain during short periods of time can cause flash floods. ### Culture and religion Cultural attitudes towards rain differ across the world. In temperate climates, people tend to be more stressed when the weather is unstable or cloudy, with its impact greater on men than women. Rain can also bring joy, as some consider it to be soothing or enjoy the aesthetic appeal of it. In dry places, such as India, or during periods of drought, rain lifts people's moods. In Botswana, the Setswana word for rain, pula, is used as the name of the national currency, in recognition of the economic importance of rain in its country, since it has a desert climate. Several cultures have developed means of dealing with rain and have developed numerous protection devices such as umbrellas and raincoats, and diversion devices such as gutters and storm drains that lead rains to sewers. Many people find the scent during and immediately after rain pleasant or distinctive. The source of this scent is petrichor, an oil produced by plants, then absorbed by rocks and soil, and later released into the air during rainfall. Rain holds an important religious significance in many cultures. The ancient Sumerians believed that rain was the semen of the sky god An, which fell from the heavens to inseminate his consort, the earth goddess Ki, causing her to give birth to all the plants of the earth. The Akkadians believed that the clouds were the breasts of Anu's consort Antu and that rain was milk from her breasts. According to Jewish tradition, in the first century BC, the Jewish miracle-worker Honi ha-M'agel ended a three-year drought in Judaea by drawing a circle in the sand and praying for rain, refusing to leave the circle until his prayer was granted. In his Meditations, the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius preserves a prayer for rain made by the Athenians to the Greek sky god Zeus. Various Native American tribes are known to have historically conducted rain dances in effort to encourage rainfall. Rainmaking rituals are also important in many African cultures. In the present-day United States, various state governors have held Days of Prayer for rain, including the Days of Prayer for Rain in the State of Texas in 2011. ## Global climatology Approximately 505,000 km<sup>3</sup> (121,000 cu mi) of water falls as precipitation each year across the globe with 398,000 km<sup>3</sup> (95,000 cu mi) of it over the oceans. Given the Earth's surface area, that means the globally averaged annual precipitation is 990 mm (39 in). Deserts are defined as areas with an average annual precipitation of less than 250 mm (10 in) per year, or as areas where more water is lost by evapotranspiration than falls as precipitation. ### Deserts The northern half of Africa is dominated by the world's most extensive hot, dry region, the Sahara Desert. Some deserts also occupy much of southern Africa: the Namib and the Kalahari. Across Asia, a large annual rainfall minimum, composed primarily of deserts, stretches from the Gobi Desert in Mongolia west-southwest through western Pakistan (Balochistan) and Iran into the Arabian Desert in Saudi Arabia. Most of Australia is semi-arid or desert, making it the world's driest inhabited continent. In South America, the Andes mountain range blocks Pacific moisture that arrives in that continent, resulting in a desert-like climate just downwind across western Argentina. The drier areas of the United States are regions where the Sonoran Desert overspreads the Desert Southwest, the Great Basin and central Wyoming. ### Polar deserts Since rain only falls as liquid, it rarely falls when surface temperatures are below freezing, unless there is a layer of warm air aloft, in which case it becomes freezing rain. Due to the entire atmosphere being below freezing most of the time, very cold climates see very little rainfall and are often known as polar deserts. A common biome in this area is the tundra which has a short summer thaw and a long frozen winter. Ice caps see no rain at all, making Antarctica the world's driest continent. ### Rainforests Rainforests are areas of the world with very high rainfall. Both tropical and temperate rainforests exist. Tropical rainforests occupy a large band of the planet mostly along the equator. Most temperate rainforests are located on mountainous west coasts between 45 and 55 degrees latitude, but they are often found in other areas. Around 40–75% of all biotic life is found in rainforests. Rainforests are also responsible for 28% of the world's oxygen turnover. ### Monsoons The equatorial region near the Intertropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ), or monsoon trough, is the wettest portion of the world's continents. Annually, the rain belt within the tropics marches northward by August, then moves back southward into the Southern Hemisphere by February and March. Within Asia, rainfall is favored across its southern portion from India east and northeast across the Philippines and southern China into Japan due to the monsoon advecting moisture primarily from the Indian Ocean into the region. The monsoon trough can reach as far north as the 40th parallel in East Asia during August before moving southward thereafter. Its poleward progression is accelerated by the onset of the summer monsoon which is characterized by the development of lower air pressure (a thermal low) over the warmest part of Asia. Similar, but weaker, monsoon circulations are present over North America and Australia. During the summer, the Southwest monsoon combined with Gulf of California and Gulf of Mexico moisture moving around the subtropical ridge in the Atlantic Ocean bring the promise of afternoon and evening thunderstorms to the southern tier of the United States as well as the Great Plains. The eastern half of the contiguous United States east of the 98th meridian, the mountains of the Pacific Northwest, and the Sierra Nevada range are the wetter portions of the nation, with average rainfall exceeding 760 mm (30 in) per year. Tropical cyclones enhance precipitation across southern sections of the United States, as well as Puerto Rico, the United States Virgin Islands, the Northern Mariana Islands, Guam, and American Samoa. ### Impact of the Westerlies Westerly flow from the mild north Atlantic leads to wetness across western Europe, in particular Ireland and the United Kingdom, where the western coasts can receive between 1,000 mm (39 in), at sea level and 2,500 mm (98 in), on the mountains of rain per year. Bergen, Norway is one of the more famous European rain-cities with its yearly precipitation of 2,250 mm (89 in) on average. During the fall, winter, and spring, Pacific storm systems bring most of Hawaii and the western United States much of their precipitation. Over the top of the ridge, the jet stream brings a summer precipitation maximum to the Great Lakes. Large thunderstorm areas known as mesoscale convective complexes move through the Plains, Midwest, and Great Lakes during the warm season, contributing up to 10% of the annual precipitation to the region. The El Niño-Southern Oscillation affects the precipitation distribution, by altering rainfall patterns across the western United States, Midwest, the Southeast, and throughout the tropics. There is also evidence that global warming is leading to increased precipitation to the eastern portions of North America, while droughts are becoming more frequent in the tropics and subtropics. ### Wettest known locations Cherrapunji, situated on the southern slopes of the Eastern Himalaya in Shillong, India is the confirmed wettest place on Earth, with an average annual rainfall of 11,430 mm (450 in). The highest recorded rainfall in a single year was 22,987 mm (905.0 in) in 1861. The 38-year average at nearby Mawsynram, Meghalaya, India is 11,873 mm (467.4 in). The wettest spot in Australia is Mount Bellenden Ker in the north-east of the country which records an average of 8,000 mm (310 in) per year, with over 12,200 mm (480.3 in) of rain recorded during 2000. The Big Bog on the island of Maui has the highest average annual rainfall in the Hawaiian Islands, at 10,300 mm (404 in). Mount Waiʻaleʻale on the island of Kauaʻi achieves similar torrential rains, while slightly lower than that of the Big Bog, at 9,500 mm (373 in) of rain per year over the last 32 years, with a record 17,340 mm (683 in) in 1982. Its summit is considered one of the rainiest spots on earth, with a reported 350 days of rain per year. Lloró, a town situated in Chocó, Colombia, is probably the place with the largest rainfall in the world, averaging 13,300 mm (523.6 in) per year. The Department of Chocó is extraordinarily humid. Tutunendaó, a small town situated in the same department, is one of the wettest estimated places on Earth, averaging 11,394 mm (448.6 in) per year; in 1974 the town received 26,303 mm (86 ft 3.6 in), the largest annual rainfall measured in Colombia. Unlike Cherrapunji, which receives most of its rainfall between April and September, Tutunendaó receives rain almost uniformly distributed throughout the year. Quibdó, the capital of Chocó, receives the most rain in the world among cities with over 100,000 inhabitants: 9,000 mm (354 in) per year. Storms in Chocó can drop 500 mm (20 in) of rainfall in a day. This amount is more than what falls in many cities in a year's time. ## See also - Atmospheric river - Hydropower - Intensity-duration-frequency curve - Johad - Petrichor – the cause of the scent during and after rain - Precipitation types - Rain dust - Rain sensor - Rain water harvesting - Rainbow - Raining animals - Rainmaking - Red rain in Kerala - Sanitary sewer overflow - Sediment precipitation - Water resources - Weather
13,746,790	Maternal deprivation	1,171,786,701	Work on the effects of separating infants/young children from their mother	[ "Adoption, fostering, orphan care and displacement", "Attachment theory", "Evolutionary psychology", "History of mental health", "Interpersonal relationships" ]	Maternal deprivation is a scientific term summarising the early work of psychiatrist and psychoanalyst John Bowlby on the effects of separating infants and young children from their mother (or primary caregiver). Although the effect of loss of the mother on the developing child had been considered earlier by Freud and other theorists, Bowlby's work on delinquent and affectionless children and the effects of hospital and institutional care led to his being commissioned to write the World Health Organization's report on the mental health of homeless children in post-war Europe whilst he was head of the Department for Children and Parents at the Tavistock Clinic in London after World War II. The result was the monograph Maternal Care and Mental Health published in 1951, which sets out the maternal deprivation hypothesis. Bowlby drew together such empirical evidence as existed at the time from across Europe and the US, including Spitz (1946) and Goldfarb (1943, 1945). His main conclusions, that "the infant and young child should experience a warm, intimate, and continuous relationship with his mother (or permanent mother substitute) in which both find satisfaction and enjoyment" and that not to do so might have significant and irreversible mental health consequences, were both controversial and influential. The monograph was published in 14 different languages and sold over 400,000 copies in the English version alone. Bowlby's work went beyond the suggestions of Otto Rank and Ian Suttie that mothering care was essential for development, and focused on the potential outcomes for children deprived of such care. The 1951 WHO publication was highly influential in causing widespread changes in the practices and prevalence of institutional care for infants and children, and in changing practices relating to the stays of small children in hospitals so that parents were allowed more frequent and longer visits. Although the monograph was primarily concerned with the removal of children from their homes it was also used for political purposes to discourage women from working and leaving their children in daycare by governments concerned about maximising employment for returned and returning servicemen. The publication was also highly controversial with, amongst others, psychoanalysts, psychologists and learning theorists, and sparked significant debate and research on the issue of children's early relationships. The limited empirical data and lack of comprehensive theory to account for the conclusions in Maternal Care and Mental Health led to the subsequent formulation of attachment theory by Bowlby. Following the publication of Maternal Care and Mental Health Bowlby sought new understanding from such fields as evolutionary biology, ethology, developmental psychology, cognitive science and control systems theory and drew upon them to formulate the innovative proposition that the mechanisms underlying an infant's ties emerged as a result of evolutionary pressure. Bowlby claimed to have made good the "deficiencies of the data and the lack of theory to link alleged cause and effect" in Maternal Care and Mental Health in his later work Attachment and Loss published between 1969 and 1980. Although the central tenet of maternal deprivation theory—that children's experiences of interpersonal relationships are crucial to their psychological development and that the formation of an ongoing relationship with the child is as important a part of parenting as the provision of experiences, discipline and child care—has become generally accepted, "maternal deprivation" as a discrete syndrome is not a concept that is much in current use other than in relation to severe deprivation as in "failure to thrive". In the area of early relationships it has largely been superseded by attachment theory and other theories relating to even earlier infant–parent interactions. As a concept, parental deficiencies are seen as a vulnerability factor for, rather than a direct cause of, later difficulties. In relation to institutional care there has been a great deal of subsequent research on the individual elements of privation, deprivation, understimulation and deficiencies that may arise from institutional care. ## History Scientific research has stressed the grief of mothers over deprivation of their children but little has been said historically about young children's loss of their mothers; this may have been because loss of the mother in infancy frequently meant death for a breast-fed infant. In the 19th century, French society bureaucratised a system in which infants were breast-fed at the homes of foster mothers, returning to the biological family after weaning, and no concern was evinced at the possible effect of this double separation on the child. Sigmund Freud may have been among the first to stress the potential effect of loss of the mother on the developing child, but his concern was less with the actual experience of maternal care than with the anxiety the child might feel about the loss of the nourishing breast. As little of Freud's theory was based on actual observations of infants, little effort was made to consider the effects of real experiences of loss. Following Freud's early speculations about infant experience with the mother, Otto Rank suggested a powerful role in personality development for birth trauma. Rank stressed the traumatic experience of birth as a separation from the mother, rather than birth as an uncomfortable physical event. Not long after Rank's introduction of this idea, Ian Suttie, a British physician whose early death limited his influence, suggested that the child's basic need is for mother-love, and his greatest anxiety is that such love will be lost. In the 1930s, David Levy noted a phenomenon he called "primary affect hunger" in children removed very early from their mothers and brought up in institutions and multiple foster homes. These children, though often pleasant on the surface, seemed indifferent underneath. He questioned whether there could be a "deficiency disease of the emotional life, comparable to a deficiency of vital nutritional elements within the developing organism". A few psychiatrists, psychologists and paediatricians were also concerned by the high mortality rate in hospitals and institutions obsessed with sterility to the detriment of any human or nurturing contact with babies. One rare paediatrician went so far as to replace a sign saying "Wash your hands twice before entering this ward" with one saying "Do not enter this nursery without picking up a baby". In a series of studies published in the 1930s, psychologist Bill Goldfarb noted not only deficits in the ability to form relationships, but also in the IQ of institutionalised children as compared to a matched group in foster care. In another study conducted in the 1930s, Harold Skeels, noting the decline in IQ in young orphanage children, removed toddlers from a sterile orphanage and gave them to "feeble-minded" institutionalised older girls to care for. The toddlers' IQ rose dramatically. Skeels study was attacked for lack of scientific rigour though he achieved belated recognition decades later. René Spitz, a psychoanalyst, undertook research in the 1930s and '40s on the effects of maternal deprivation and hospitalism. His investigation focused on infants who had experienced abrupt, long-term separation from the familiar caregiver, as, for instance, when the mother was sent to prison. These studies and conclusions were thus different from the investigations of institutional rearing. Spitz adopted the term anaclitic depression to describe the child's reaction of grief, anger, and apathy to partial emotional deprivation (the loss of a loved object) and proposed that when the love object is returned to the child within three to five months, recovery is prompt but after five months, they will show the symptoms of increasingly serious deterioration. He called this reaction to total deprivation "hospitalism". He was also one of the first to undertake direct observation of infants. The conclusions were hotly disputed and there was no widespread acceptance. During the years of World War II, evacuated and orphaned children were the subjects of studies that outlined their reactions to separation, including the ability to cope by forming relationships with other children. Some of this material remained unpublished until the post-war period and only gradually contributed to understanding of young children's reactions to loss. Bowlby, who, unlike most psychoanalysts, had direct experience of working with deprived children through his work at the London Child Guidance Clinic, called for more investigation of children's early lives in a paper published in 1940. He proposed that two environmental factors were paramount in early childhood. The first was death of the mother, or prolonged separation from her. The second was the mother's emotional attitude towards her child. This was followed by a study on forty–four juvenile thieves collected through the Clinic. There were many problematic parental behaviours in the samples but Bowlby was looking at one environmental factor that was easy to document, namely prolonged early separations of child and mother. Of the forty-four thieves, fourteen fell into the category which Bowlby characterised as being of an "affectionless character". Of these fourteen, twelve had suffered prolonged maternal separations as opposed to only two of the control group. An NIH study published in 2011 examined the impact of short, non-traumatic separation from the child's primary caregiver. The subjects were infants separated from their primary caregiver for at least a week. Controlling for various factors including income, stability, and parenting style, the study found increased aggressiveness at ages 3 and 5 in separated infants, but it did not find other cognitive impairment. Most infants in the study stayed with close relatives or the other parent, often in the infant's home, suggesting that even in ideal circumstances, maternal separation can have lasting detrimental impact on infant development. ## Maternal Care and Mental Health Bowlby's work on delinquent and affectionless children and the effects of hospital and institutional care lead to his being commissioned to write the World Health Organization's report on the mental health of homeless children in post-war Europe whilst he was head of the Department for Children and Parents at the Tavistock Clinic in London after World War II. Bowlby travelled on the Continent and in America, communicating with social workers, paediatricians and child psychiatrists including those who had already published literature on the issue. These authors were mainly unaware of each other's work, and Bowlby was able to draw together the findings and highlight the similarities described, despite the variety of methods used, ranging from direct observation to retrospective analysis to comparison groups. In addition, there was work from England undertaken by Dorothy Burlingham and Anna Freud on children separated from their families due to wartime disruption, and Bowlby's own work. The result was the monograph Maternal Care and Mental Health published in 1951, which sets out the maternal deprivation hypothesis. The WHO report was followed by the publication of an abridged version for public consumption called Child Care and the Growth of Love. This book sold over half a million copies worldwide. Bowlby tackled not only institutional and hospital care, but also policies of removing children from "unwed mothers" and untidy and physically neglected homes, and lack of support for families in difficulties. In a range of areas Bowlby cited the lack of adequate research and suggested the direction this could take. ## Principal concepts of Bowlby's theory The quality of parental care was considered by Bowlby to be of vital importance to the child's development and future mental health. It was believed to be essential that the infant and young child should experience a warm, intimate, and continuous relationship with his mother (or permanent mother substitute) in which both found satisfaction and enjoyment. Given this relationship, emotions of guilt and anxiety (characteristics of mental illness when in excess) would develop in an organised and moderate way. Naturally extreme emotions would be moderated and become amenable to the control of the child's developing personality. He stated, "It is this complex rich and rewarding relationship with the mother in the early years, varied in countless ways by relations with the father and with siblings, that child psychiatrists and many others now believe to underlie the development of character and mental health." The state of affairs in which the child did not have this relationship he termed "maternal deprivation". This term covered a range from almost complete deprivation, not uncommon in institutions, residential nurseries and hospitals, to partial deprivation where the mother, or mother substitute, was unable to give the loving care a small child needs, to mild deprivation where the child was removed from the mother's care but was looked after by someone familiar whom he trusted. Complete or almost complete deprivation could "entirely cripple the capacity to make relationships". Partial deprivation could result in acute anxiety, depression, neediness and powerful emotions which the child could not regulate. The end product of such psychic disturbance could be neurosis and instability of character. However, the main focus of the monograph was on the more extreme forms of deprivation. The focus was the child's developing relationships with his mother and father and disturbed parent–child relationships in the context of almost complete deprivation rather than the earlier concept of the "broken home" as such. In terms of social policy, Bowlby advised that parents should be supported by society as parents are dependent on a greater society for economic provision and "if a community values its children it must cherish its parents". Also "husbandless" mothers of children under 3 should be supported to care for the child at home rather than the child be left in inadequate care whilst the mother sought work. (It was assumed the mother of the illegitimate child would usually be left with the child). Fathers left with infants or small children on their hands without the mother should be provided with "housekeepers" so that the children could remain at home. Other proposals included the proper payment of foster homes and careful selection of foster carers, and frank, informative discussions with children about their parents and why they ended up in care and how they felt about it rather than the "least said, soonest mended" approach. The point that children were loyal to and loved even the worst of parents, and needed to have that fact understood non-judgementally, was strongly made. On the issue of removal of children from their homes, Bowlby emphasised the strength of the tie that children feel towards their parents and discussed the reason why, as he put it, "children thrive better in bad homes than in good institutions". He was strongly in favour of support being provided to parents and extended families to improve the situation and provide care within the family rather than removal if possible. ## "Maternal" Bowlby used the phrase "mother (or permanent mother substitute)". As it is commonly used, the term maternal deprivation is ambiguous as it is unclear whether the deprivation is that of the biological mother, of an adoptive or foster mother, a consistent caregiving adult of any gender or relationship to the child, of an emotional relationship, or of the experience of the type of care called "mothering" in many cultures. Questions about the exact meaning of this term are by no means new, as the following statement by Mary Ainsworth in 1962 indicates: "Although in the early months of life it is the mother who almost invariably interacts most with the child ... the role of other figures, especially the father, is acknowledged to be significant ... [P]aternal deprivation ... has received scant attention ... [In the case of] institutionalization ... the term 'parental deprivation' would have been more accurate, for the child has been ... deprived of interaction with a father-figure as well as a mother-figure ... [It may be better to] discourage the use of [the term 'deprivation'] and encourage the substitution of the terms 'insufficiency', 'discontinuity', and 'distortion' instead." Ainsworth implies, neither the word "maternal" nor the word "deprivation" seems to be a literally correct definition of the phenomenon under consideration. A contemporary of Ainsworth spoke of "the mother, a term by which we mean both the child's actual mother and/or any other person of either sex who may take the place of the child's physical mother during a significant period of time". However, another contemporary referred to "the quasi-mystical union of mother and child, of the dynamic union that mother and child represent". ## Influence on institutionalised care The practical effects of the publication of Maternal Care and Mental Health were described in the preface to the WHO 1962 publication Deprivation of Maternal Care: A Reassessment of its Effects as "almost wholly beneficial" with reference to widespread changes in the institutional care of children. The practice of allowing parents frequent visiting to hospitalised children became the norm and there was a move towards placing homeless children with foster carers, rather than in institutions, and a move towards the professionalisation of alternative carers. In hospitals, the change was given added impetus by the work of social worker and psychoanalyst James Robertson who filmed the distressing effects of separation on children in hospital and collaborated with Bowlby in making the 1952 documentary film A Two-Year Old Goes to the Hospital. According to Michael Rutter, the importance of Bowlby's initial writings on "maternal deprivation" lay in his emphasis that children's experiences of interpersonal relationships were crucial to their psychological development and that the formation of an ongoing relationship with the child was as important a part of parenting as the provision of experiences, discipline and child care. Although this view was rejected by many at the time, the argument focussed attention on the need to consider parenting in terms of consistency of caregivers over time and parental sensitivity to children's individuality and it is now generally accepted. Bowlby's theory sparked considerable interest and controversy in the nature of early relationships and gave a strong impetus to what Mary Ainsworth described as a "great body of research" in what was perceived as an extremely difficult and complex area. ## Psychoanalysis Bowlby departed from psychoanalytical theory which saw the gratification of sensory needs as the basis for the relationship between infant and mother. Food was seen as the primary drive and the relationship, or "dependency" was secondary. He had already found himself in conflict with dominant Kleinian theories that children's emotional problems are almost entirely due to fantasies generated from internal conflict between aggressive and libidinal drives, rather than to events in the external world. (His breach with the psychoanalysts only became total and irreparable after his later development of attachment theory incorporating ethological and evolutionary principles, when he was effectively ostracised). Bowlby also broke with social learning theory's view of dependency and reinforcement. Bowlby proposed instead that to thrive emotionally, children needed a close and continuous caregiving relationship. Bowlby later stated that he had concluded that, contrary to the focus of psychoanalysts on the internal fantasy world of the child, the important area to study was how a child was actually treated by his parents in real life and in particular the interaction between them. He chose the actual removal of children from the home at this particular time because it was a specific event, the effects of which could be studied, and because he believed it could have serious effects on a child's development and because it was preventable. In addition, views that he had already expressed about the importance of a child's real life experiences and relationship with carers had been met by "sheer incredulity" by colleagues before World War II. This led him to see that far more systematic knowledge was required of the effects on a child of early experiences. Bowlby and his colleagues were pioneers of the view that studies involving direct observation of infants and children were not merely of interest but were essential to the advancement of science in this area. ## Animal studies Researchers have for years studied depression, alcoholism, aggression, maternal-infant bonding and other conditions and phenomena in nonhuman primates and other laboratory animals using an experimental maternal deprivation paradigm. Most influentially, Harry Harlow would, in the mid-1950s, begin raising infant monkeys in his University of Wisconsin–Madison laboratory in total or partial isolation and with inanimate surrogate mothers in an attempt to study maternal-infant bonding as well as various states of mental illness. In Harlow's laboratory, infant rhesus monkeys were immediately removed from their mothers and placed with cloth or wire surrogate mothers, sometimes called "iron maidens" by the researchers. Harlow found that the infants would become attached to their inanimate mothers—both those made of wire and those covered with cloth—and when removed from them they would "screech in terror". Harlow and his colleagues would later develop "evil artificial mothers" meant to "impart fear and insecurity to infant monkeys"—including one designed with brass spikes—but contrary to the researcher's hypothesis, these animals too demonstrated an attachment to their surrogates. Subsequent experiments would study the effects of total and partial isolation on the animals' mental health and interpersonal bonding using a stainless steel vertical chamber designed by Harlow, named the "pit of despair", which was found to produce "profound and prolonged depression" in monkeys. Similarly, Harlow found that extended isolation in bare wire cages left monkeys with "profound behavioral abnormalities" including "self-clutching and rocking" and later "apathy and indifference to external stimulation". Harlow likened this behavior to catatonic schizophrenia. Later experiments were devised to test the mother-child bond with mothers who had themselves been reared in isolation as infants. This early deprivation was found to have retarded the mothers' emotional development and her ability to engage in intercourse and in turn become pregnant. In response, Harlow and his colleagues created an apparatus to impregnate these mothers they named a "rape rack". Harlow found that once these monkeys gave birth, they cared little for their offspring writing, "these monkey mothers that had never experienced love of any kind were devoid of love for their infants". While some mothers simply ignored their children, Harlow characterized others as "evil" and abusive and in some instances reported them "crushing the infant's face to the floor, chewing off the infant's feet and fingers, and in one case... putting the infant's head in her mouth and crushing it like an eggshell". Harlow's experiments have been heralded as revolutionary and also robustly criticized as scientifically invalid and sadistically cruel. Writing on the researcher's legacy, John Gluck, a former student of Harlow's opined, "On the one hand, his work on monkey cognition and social development fostered a view of the animals as having rich subjective lives filled with intention and emotion. On the other, he has been criticized for the conduct of research that seemed to ignore the ethical implantations of his own discoveries." Maternal deprivation experiments on nonhuman primates have continued into the 21st century and remain controversial. Stephen Suomi, an early collaborator of Harlow, has continued to conduct maternal deprivation experiments on rhesus monkeys in his NIH laboratory and has been vigorously criticized by PETA, Members of Congress and others. ## Controversy, misinterpretation and criticism Aside from his profound differences with psychoanalytic ideas, the theoretical basis of Bowlby's monograph was controversial in a number of ways. Some profoundly disagreed with the necessity for maternal (or equivalent) love in order to function normally, or that the formation of an ongoing relationship with a child was an important part of parenting. The idea that early experiences have serious consequences for intellectual and psychosocial development was controversial in itself. Others questioned the extent to which his hypothesis was supported by the evidence. There was criticism of the confusion of the effects of privation (no primary attachment figure) and deprivation (loss of the primary attachment figure) and in particular, of the failure to distinguish between the effects of the lack of a primary attachment figure and the other forms of deprivation and understimulation that might affect children in institutions. It was also pointed out that there was no explanation of how experiences subsumed under the broad heading of "maternal deprivation" could have effects on personality development of the kinds claimed. Bowlby explained in his 1988 work that the data were not at the time "accommodated by any theory then current and in the brief time of my employment by the World Health Organization there was no possibility of developing a new one". He then goes on to describe the subsequent development of attachment theory. In addition to criticism, his ideas were often oversimplified, misrepresented, distorted or exaggerated for various purposes. This heightened the controversy. In 1962, the WHO published Deprivation of Maternal Care: A Reassessment of its Effects to which Mary Ainsworth, Bowlby's close colleague, contributed with his approval, to present the recent research and developments and to address misapprehensions. Bowlby's work was misinterpreted to mean that any separation from the natural mother, any experience of institutional care or a multiplicity of "mothers" necessarily resulted in severe emotional deprivation and sometimes, that all children undergoing such experiences would develop into "affectionless children". As a consequence it was claimed that only 24-hour care by the same person (the mother) was good enough, day care and nurseries were not good enough and mothers should not go out to work. The WHO advised that day nurseries and creches could have a serious and permanent deleterious effect. Such strictures suited the policies of governments concerned about finding employment for returned and returning servicemen after World War II. In fact, although Bowlby was of the view that proper care could not be provided "by roster", he was also of the view that babies should be accustomed to regular periods of care by another and that the key to alternative care for working mothers was that it should be regular and continuous. He addressed this point in a 1958 publication called Can I Leave My Baby?. Ainsworth in the WHO 1962 publication also attempted to address this misapprehension by pointing out that the requirement for continuity of care did not imply an exclusive mother–child pair relationship. Bowlby's quotable remark, that children thrived better in bad homes than in good institutions, was often taken to extremes leading to reluctance on the part of Children's Officers (the equivalent of child care social workers) to remove children from homes however neglectful and inadequate. In fact, although Bowlby mentioned briefly the issue of "partial deprivation" within the family, this was not fully investigated in his monograph as the main focus was on the risks of complete or almost complete deprivation. Michael Rutter made a significant contribution to the controversial issue of Bowlby's maternal deprivation hypothesis. His 1981 monograph and other papers comprise the definitive empirical evaluation and update of Bowlby's early work on maternal deprivation. He amassed further evidence, addressed the many different underlying social and psychological mechanisms and showed that Bowlby was only partially right and often for the wrong reasons. Rutter highlighted the other forms of deprivation found in institutional care and the complexity of separation distress; and suggested that anti-social behaviour was not linked to maternal deprivation as such but to family discord. The importance of these refinements of the maternal deprivation hypothesis was to reposition it as a "vulnerability factor" rather than a causative agent, with a number of varied influences determining which path a child would take. Rutter has more recently advised attention to the complexity of development and the roles of genetic as well as experiential factors, noting that separation is only one of many risk factors related to poor cognitive and emotional development. ### Fathers In accordance with the prevailing social realities of his time, namely the assumption that the daily care of infants and small children was undertaken by women and in particular, mothers, Bowlby referred primarily to mothers and "maternal" deprivation, although the words "parents" and "parental" are also used. Fathers are mentioned only in the context of the practical and emotional support they provide for the mother but the monograph contains no specific exploration of the father's role. Nor is there any discussion as to whether the maternal role had, of necessity, to be filled by women as such. Bowlby's work was misinterpreted by some to mean natural mothers only. The 1962 WHO publication contains a chapter on the effect of "paternal deprivation", there having by 1962 been some limited research on the issue which illustrated the importance of the father's relationship with his children. The hope was expressed by Ainsworth that in the future there would be more such research and indeed her early research, which contributed significantly to attachment theory, covered infants relationships with all family members. It was also stated that in relation to institutional care, "parental deprivation" would have been more accurate, although Ainsworth preferred the terms "insufficiency", "discontinuity" and "distortion" to either. Michael Rutter in Maternal Deprivation Reassessed (1972), described by New Society as a "classic in the field of child care", argued that research showed that it did not matter which parent the child got on well with as long as he got on well with one of them, that both parents influence their child's development and that which parent is more important varies with age, sex and temperamental development. He concluded, "For some aspects of development the same-sexed parent seems to have a special role, for some the person who plays and talks most with the child and for others the person who feeds the child. The father, the mother, brother and sisters, friends, school-teachers and others all affect development, but their influences and importance differ for different aspects of development. A less exclusive focus on the mother is required. Children also have fathers!" Within attachment theory, Bowlby, in Attachment and Loss, volume one of Attachment (1969), makes it quite clear that infants become attached to carers who are sensitive and responsive in their social interactions with them and that this does not have to be the mother or indeed a female. As a matter of social reality mothers are more often the primary carers of children and therefore are more likely to be the primary attachment figure, but the process of attachment applies to any carer and infants develop a number of attachments according to who relates to them and the intensity of the engagement. However, attachment theory relates to the development of attachment behaviours and relationships after about 7 months of age and there are other theories and research relating to earlier carer–infant interactions. Schaffer in Social Development (1996) suggests that the father–child relationship is primarily a cultural construction shaped by the requirements of each society. In societies where the care of infants has been assigned to boys rather than girls, no difference in nurturing capacity was found. ### Feminist criticism There were three broad criticisms aimed at the idea of maternal deprivation from feminist critics. The first was that Bowlby overstated his case. The studies on which he based his conclusions involved almost complete lack of maternal care and it was unwarranted to generalise from this view that any separation in the first three years of life would be damaging. Subsequent research showed good quality care for part of the day to be harmless. The idea of exclusive care or exclusive attachment to a preferred figure, rather than a hierarchy (subsequently thought to be the case within developments of attachment theory) had not been borne out by research and this view placed too high an emotional burden on the mother. Secondly, they criticised Bowlby's historical perspective and saw his views as part of the idealisation of motherhood and family life after World War II. Certainly his hypothesis was used by governments to close down much needed residential nurseries although governments did not seem so keen to pay mothers to care for their children at home as advocated by Bowlby. Thirdly, feminists objected to the idea of anatomy as destiny and concepts of "naturalness" derived from ethnocentric observations. They argued that anthropology showed that it is normal for childcare to be shared by a stable group of adults of which maternal care is an important but not exclusive part. ## Today Whilst Bowlby's early writings on maternal deprivation may be seen as part of the background to the later development of attachment theory, there are many significant differences between the two. At the time of the 1951 publication, there was little research in this area and no comprehensive theory on the development of early relationships. Aside from its central proposition of the importance of an early, continuous and sensitive relationship, the monograph concentrates mostly on social policy. For his subsequent development of attachment theory, Bowlby drew on concepts from ethology, cybernetics, information processing, developmental psychology and psychoanalysis. The first early formal statements of attachment theory were presented in three papers in 1958, 1959 and 1960. His major work Attachment was published in three volumes between 1969 and 1980. Attachment theory revolutionised thinking on the nature of early attachments and extensive research continues to be undertaken. According to Zeanah, "ethological attachment theory, as outlined by John Bowlby ... 1969 to 1980 ... has provided one of the most important frameworks for understanding crucial risk and protective factors in social and emotional development in the first 3 years of life. Bowlby's (1951) monograph, Maternal Care and Mental Health, reviewed the world literature on maternal deprivation and suggested that emotionally available caregiving was crucial for infant development and mental health." Beyond that broad statement, which is now generally accepted, little remains of the underlying detail of Bowlby's theory of maternal deprivation that has not been either discredited or superseded by attachment theory and other child development theories and research, except in the area of extreme deprivation. The opening of East European orphanages in the early 1990s following the end of the Cold War provided substantial opportunities for research on attachment and other aspects of institutional rearing, however such research rarely mentions "maternal deprivation" other than in a historical context. Maternal deprivation as a discrete syndrome is a concept that is rarely used other than in connection with extreme deprivation and failure to thrive. Rather there is consideration of a range of different lacks and deficiencies in different forms of care, or lack of care, of which attachment is only one aspect, as well as consideration of constitutional and genetic factors in determining developmental outcome. Subsequent studies have however confirmed Bowlby's concept of "cycles of disadvantage" although not all children from unhappy homes reproduce the deficiencies in their own experience. Rather, it is now conceptualised as a series of pathways through childhood and a number of varied influences will determine which path a particular child takes. ## The concept outside mainstream psychology The idea that separation from the female caregiver has profound effects is one with considerable resonance outside the conventional study of child development. In United States law, the "tender years" doctrine was long applied when custody of infants and toddlers was preferentially given to mothers. Over the last decade or so, some decisions appear to have been derived from the "tender years" concept, but others involve the contrary assumption that a 2-year-old is too young to have developed a relationship with either parent. Concern with the harm of separation from the mother is characteristic of the belief systems behind some complementary and alternative (CAM) psychotherapies. Such belief systems are concerned not only with the effect of the young child's separation from the care of the mother, but with an emotional attachment between mother and child which advocates of these systems believe to develop prenatally. Such attachment is said to lead to emotional trauma if the child is separated from the birth mother and adopted, even if this occurs on the day of birth and even if the adoptive family provides all possible love and care. These beliefs were at one time in existence among psychologists of psychoanalytic background. Today, however, beliefs in prenatal communication between mothers and infants are largely confined to unconventional thinkers such as William Emerson. Belief in prenatal fetal awareness, mental communication between mother and unborn child, and emotional attachment of child to mother as a prenatal phenomenon, are concepts that connect easily to the unfounded assumption that all adopted children suffer emotional disorders. These beliefs are also congruent with CAM psychotherapies such as attachment therapy (not based on attachment theory), which purport to bring about age regression and to recapitulate early development to produce a better outcome. ## See also - Dead mother complex
34,331,126	Vicinage Clause	1,156,934,876	Portion of the sixth amendment to the US Constitution	[ "Clauses of the United States Constitution", "Juries in the United States", "United States constitutional criminal procedure" ]	The Vicinage Clause is a provision in the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution regulating the vicinity from which a jury pool may be selected. The clause says that the accused shall be entitled to an "impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law". The Vicinage Clause limits the vicinity of criminal jury selection to both the state and the federal judicial district where the crime has been committed. This is distinct from the venue provision of Article Three of the United States Constitution, which regulates the location of the actual trial. The Vicinage clause has its roots in medieval English criminal procedure, the perceived abuses of criminal vicinage and venue during the colonial period (when trials for treason were being held in England rather than in the colony where the crime is alleged to have happened) and Anti-federalist objections to the United States Constitution. The clause is one of the few constitutional criminal procedure provisions that has not been incorporated to apply to proceedings in state courts, the other being the Grand Jury Clause of the Fifth Amendment. The Clause has led to very little litigation, in part because of its overlap (as a practical matter) with the venue provision of Article Three and Rule 18 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure. Further, with the exception of the Court for the District of Wyoming, whose district includes the portions of Yellowstone National Park in Idaho and Montana, no federal judicial district includes the territory of two or more states (except, historically, the District of Potomac, which existed from February 1801 to March 1802). ## Background ### English law during the Colonial period The Oxford English Dictionary defines "vicinage" as "A number of places lying near to each other taken collectively; an area extending to a limited distance round a particular spot; a neighbourhood." The OED cites Thomas Fuller's Church History (1655): "King Ethelred . . . began the tryal of Causes by a Jury of twelve men to be chosen out of the Vicenage." According to Blackstone, in medieval England, the "vicinage of the jury" referred to a jury drawn from the relevant county. A 1543 statute of Henry VIII of England permits treason committed outside the "realm" to be tried "before such commissioners, and in such shire of the realm, as shall be assigned by the King's majesty's commission." Parliament renewed the statute in 1769. This law was used to try colonists accused of treason in England. A 1772 statute of George III of the United Kingdom permits destruction of dockyards, magazines, ships, ammunition, and supplies committed outside the "realm" to be tried in any "shire or county within this realm". A 1772 statute permitted capital crimes committed in Massachusetts to be tried in England or a neighboring province if "an indifferent trial cannot be had within" Massachusetts. ### Protests from the Revolutionary period The Virginia House of Burgesses condemned the renewal of the treason law on May 16, 1769 in the Virginia Resolves: [A]ll Trials for Treason, Misprison for Treason, and for any Felony or Crime whatsoever, committed and done in this his Majesty's said Colony and Dominion, by any Person or Persons residing therein, ought of right to be had, and conducted in and before his Majesty's Courts, held within the said Colony, according to the fixed and known Course of Proceedings; and that the seizing of any Person or Persons, residing in this Colony, suspected of any Crime whatsoever, committed therein, and sending such Person or Persons to Places beyond the Sea, to be tried, is highly derogatory of the Rights of British subjects . . . . The same resolution referred to the "inestimable Privilege of being tried by a Jury from the Vicinage." The Declaration and Resolves of the First Continental Congress adopted on October 14, 1774, resolved: That the respective colonies are entitled to the common law of England, and more especially to the great and inestimable privilege of being tried by their peers of the vicinage, according to the course of that law. On October 26, 1774, the Continental Congress approved an address to the people of Quebec, drafted by Thomas Cushing, Richard Henry Lee, and John Dickinson, arguing that: [One] great right is that of trial by jury. This provides, that neither life, liberty nor property, can be taken from the possessor, until twelve of his unexceptionable countrymen and peers of his vicinage, who from that neighbourhood may reasonably be supposed to be acquainted with his character, and the characters of the witnesses . . . . The United States Declaration of Independence (1776) accuses King George III of "transporting us beyond seas to be tried for pretended offences". ### Drafting of the Constitution The New Jersey Plan contained a provision that: "[N]o person shall be liable to be tried for any criminal offense, committed within any of the United States, in any other state than that wherein the offense shall be committed . . . ." The proposals of Alexander Hamilton and Charles Cotesworth Pinckney were similar. The Committee of Detail and Committee of the Whole amended this language and included it within Article Three, Section Two, Clause Three. Article III provides: "The Trial of all Crimes . . . shall be held in the State where the said Crimes shall have been committed." This provision received almost no debate in the Constitutional Convention. The omission of a vicinage right from the United States Constitution was among the objections of the Anti-federalists to the ratification of the Constitution. James Madison explained the omission of a vicinage clause in the Virginia Ratifying Convention as follows: It was objected yesterday, that there was no provision for a jury from the vicinage. If it could have been done with safety, it would not have been opposed. It might so happen that a trial would be impracticable in the county. Suppose a rebellion in a whole district, would it not be impossible to get a jury? The trial by jury is held as sacred in England as in America. There are deviations of it in England: yet greater deviations have happened here since we established our independence, than have taken place there for a long time, though it be left to the legislative discretion. It is a misfortune in any case that this trial should be departed from, yet in some cases it is necessary. It must be therefore left to the discretion of the legislature to modify it according to circumstances. This is a complete and satisfactory answer. Virginia ratified the Constitution, with a proviso that a Bill of Rights, including a right to "trial by an impartial jury of his vicinage", be added by amendment. North Carolina adopted the same proviso as Virginia, but refused to ratify the Constitution in its absence. New York and Rhode Island ratified the constitution with similar provisos as Virginia (but, in the case of Rhode Island, the Sixth Amendment had already been sent to the states for ratification). The ratifying provisos of Massachusetts did not include a vicinage right; a proviso including a vicinage right was considered and rejected in Pennsylvania. ## Drafting of the Clause ### House James Madison's (A-VA) original draft of the jury provision of the Sixth Amendment provided: The trial of all crimes (except in cases of impeachment, and cases arising in the land or naval forces, or the militia when on actual service, in time of war or public danger) shall be by an impartial jury of freeholders of the vicinage, with the requisite of unanimity for conviction, of the right of challenge, and other accustomed requisites . . . provided that in cases of crimes committed within any county which may be in possession of an enemy, or in which a general insurrection may prevail, the trial may by law be authorized in some other county of the same state, as near as may be to the seat of the offence. Madison intended this language to replace Article Three, Section Two, Clause Three, rather than be appended to the Constitution. The Committee of Eleven of the House amended Madison's language as follows: The trial of all crimes (except in cases of impeachment, and in cases arising in the land or naval forces, or in the militia when on actual service in the time of war, or public danger,) shall be by an impartial jury of freeholders of the vicinage, with the requisite of unanimity for conviction, the right of challenge, and other accustomed requisites . . . . [B]ut if a crime be committed in a place in the possession of an enemy, or in which an insurrection may prevail, the indictment and trial may by law be authorized in some other place within the same State; and if it be committed in a place not within a state, the indictment and trial may be at such place or places as the law may have directed. Aedanus Burke (A-SC) proposed that "vicinage" be replaced by "district or county in which the offence has been committed". Richard Henry Lee (A-VA) argued that "vicinage" was better, "it being a term well understood by every gentleman of legal knowledge". Rep. Burke's amendment was defeated. As amended by the Committee of Eleven, this language passed the House. The Committee of Three, undertaking the task of transforming the amendments to the body of the Constitution into a separate Bill of Rights, moved the language to Article X and deleted the language concerning crimes not committed within a state. ### Senate The Senate debated the Bill of Rights from September 2 to September 9 and returned a version to the House on September 10. The Senate deleted every clause from the House version of the Sixth Amendment, with the exception of the grand jury indictment clause. A motion to restore the House wording failed. Little is known about the Senate debate due to the illness of Senator Samuel Maclay whose journal is a key source for the proceedings of the Senate during the first Congress. A September 14, 1789 letter from Madison to Edmund Pendleton reports: The Senate have sent back the plan of amendments with some alternations, which strike, in my opinion, at the most salutary articles. In many of the States, juries, even in criminal cases, are taken from the State at large; in others, from districts of considerable extent; in very few from the County alone. Hence a dislike to the restraint with respect to vicinage, which has produced a negative on that clause. . . . Several others have had a similar fate. ### Conference Committee The altered form in which the Senate returned the Bill of Rights to the House led to a conference committee composed of members of both bodies. The members of the committee from the House proposed that the jury simply be defined as comporting with "the accustomed requisites". The members of the committee from the Senate were opposed to constitutionalizing the vicinage requirement, believing that the vicinage provisions of the first Judiciary Act (already being debate) were sufficient. A second letter from Madison to Pendleton recounts that the Senators were inflexible in opposing a definition of the locality of Juries. The vicinage they contend is either too vague or too strict a term; too vague if depending on limits to be fixed by the pleasure of the law, too strict if limited to the county. It was proposed to insert after the word Juries, "with the accustomed requisites", leaving the definition to be construed according to the judgment of professional men. Even this could not be obtained. The truth is that in most of the States the practice is different, and hence the irreconcilable difference of ideas on the subject. In most States, jurors are drawn from the whole body of the community indiscriminately; in others, from large districts comprehending a number of Counties; and in a few only from a single County. The Senate suppose, also, that the provision for vicinage in the Judiciary bill will sufficiently quiet the fears which called for an amendment on this point. The committee adopted the version that passed Congress and was ratified by the states: In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a . . . trial by an impartial jury of the State and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law . . . . ## Interpretation ### "Jury..." The Vicinage Clause applies only to petit juries, not grand juries, although some cases finding no violation of the Clause have assumed without deciding that the Clause does apply to grand juries. ### "...of the State and district..." In murder cases arising from the Indian Territory, Navassa Island, and the No Man's Land of the Oklahoma Panhandle, the Supreme Court has held that the Clause places no limits on the prosecution of crimes committed outside the territory of a state. The Clause does not require a jury drawn from the judicial division (a subset of a federal judicial district) within which the crime occurred; rather, the jury may be drawn from any division of the district. Nor does the Clause prevent the jury from being drawn solely from a judicial division, or any other subset of a judicial district (rather than the entire judicial district). ### "...wherein the crime shall have been committed,..." The "wherein the crime shall have been committed" language of the clause is in parallel with the venue provision of Article Three—"where the said Crimes shall have been committed."—and with Rule 18 of the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure—"where the offense was committed". The three provisions have been interpreted in tandem to refer to the locus delicti of the offense. ### "...which district shall have been previously ascertained by law" Lower courts are split on whether the Clause requires that the defendant be tried in a judicial district that was in existence at the time the crime was committed. Some courts have held that it does. Others have held that it does not and that the district need only be ascertained prior to trial. Even proponents of the former view have found no infirmity when Congress prospectively divides a judicial district but retains the former configuration for past offenses. ### Incorporation The Third, Fifth, and Sixth Circuits have held that the Vicinage Clause was not incorporated against the states by the Fourteenth Amendment. The Supreme Court has not yet heard an appeal on the matter. A lower federal appeals court in Zicarelli v. Gray (3d Cir. 1976), however, "assumed" that the vicinage right applied at the state level. ### Zone of death In 2005, Professor Brian C. Kalt of Michigan State University College of Law put forth an argument that the Vicinage Clause, requiring jury selection from the state and district, may permit the commission of the "perfect crime" (technically, more of an "unprosecutable crime") in the portion of Yellowstone National Park within the state of Idaho and that a less perfect crime could be committed in the lightly populated portion of the park contained within the borders of the state of Montana. The entire park has been placed within the jurisdiction of the Court for the District of Wyoming, but the Idaho-state portion of the park has no residents with which to form a jury. Kalt argues that two arguments the government might make in favor of prosecution would be unsuccessful: that the Idaho portion of the park is not part of a state and that the judicial district could be changed after the crime. However, Kalt argues that the Vicinage Clause might permit a variety of prosecutorial strategies that would at least partially close this loophole. First, the government might be able to charge other crimes that did not occur exclusively within the Idaho portion of the park (for example, if the defendant(s) conspired elsewhere). Second, the government could charge crimes for which the maximum authorized sentence is six months or less, to which the jury right does not attach. Third, the Clause might permit the government to encourage potential jurors to move into the Idaho portion of the park after the crime. Fourth, the government might argue for a purposive, rather than textualist, interpretation of the Clause by arguing that a jury drawn from elsewhere could satisfy the purposes of the Clause. Kalt also notes that the Vicinage Clause would not protect against civil liability or vigilante justice. The defendant could also be charged under state law if it was violation of that as well. Others have noted that the prosecution could simply move for a change of venue due to the impossibility of finding an impartial jury in the location where the crime was committed. A similar problem was cited by the Nevada Legislature in 1989 when it dissolved Bullfrog County, an uninhabited county (the only uninhabited county in the history of the United States) created in 1987 for the sole purpose of shifting federal transfer payments related to the creation of the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste facility directly to the Nevada state treasury. ## Similar provisions in state constitutions Before the adoption of the federal Constitution, only two state constitutions provided an explicit vicinage right. The Virginia Constitution of 1776 provided: "in all capital or criminal prosecutions a man hath a right to . . . an impartial jury of twelve men of his vicinage." The Pennsylvania Constitution of 1776 read similarly, but said "county" instead of "vicinage"; it was amended in 1790 to say "vicinage". By contrast, four of the original thirteen state constitutions contained explicit criminal venue provisions. New Hampshire (1784) and Georgia (1777 and 1789) required crimes to be tried in the county where committed. Maryland (1776) and Massachusetts (1780) contained similar provisions. In Coleman's Appeal (1874), the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania held that "a man shall only be liable to be called on to answer for civil wrongs in the forum of his home, and the tribunal of his vicinage". ## See also - Population Zero, a 2016 feature film with the Vicinage Clause as the central plot device - For the People season 2 episode 2 "This is America" also dealt with a character named Arthur Covington exploiting the clause in Yellowstone
73,115,205	Reginald Hyde	1,167,225,964	New Zealander flying ace	[ "1912 births", "1985 deaths", "Military personnel from Christchurch", "New Zealand World War II flying aces", "New Zealand World War II pilots", "New Zealand people of World War II", "Recipients of the Air Force Cross (United Kingdom)", "The Few" ]	Reginald Jack Hyde, (21 December 1912 – 23 March 1985) was a New Zealand flying ace of the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve (RAFVR) during the Second World War. He was officially credited with having shot down at least five aircraft. Born in Christchurch, Hyde was working in the United Kingdom in an electrical factory when he joined the RAFVR in July 1938. The following year he started receiving full-time flight training with the Royal Air Force (RAF). Mobilised after the outbreak of the Second World War, he was loaned to the Fleet Air Arm and trained to operate from aircraft carriers. Returning to RAF service, he was posted to No. 66 Squadron, and flew patrols over Dunkirk during the evacuation of the British Expeditionary Force and the North Sea during the Battle of Britain. In August 1940 he was sent to Malta, where he served for several months with No. 261 Squadron and achieved the majority of his aerial victories. He returned to the United Kingdom in May 1941, instructing until the end of 1942. He was then posted to No. 197 Squadron, flying on operations to German-occupied Europe as part of the Circus offensive. Hyde was involved in the making of the film Signed with Their Honour in the later part of 1943, before taking up a series of instructing posts. In February 1945 he transferred to the Royal New Zealand Air Force but continued to serve with the RAF. His final posting was as the commanding officer of No. 3 Tactical Exercise Unit. In September he returned to New Zealand and went onto the Reserve of Pilots at the end of the year. He worked in the electrical industry until his retirement. He died in 1985, aged 72. ## Early life Reginald Jack Hyde was born on 21 December 1912 in Islington, a suburb of Christchurch, New Zealand. He was educated at North Linwood Primary School and then Christchurch Boys' High School. Following his schooling, he gained an apprenticeship as an electrician at a firm in Christchurch, while working towards his certification at the Christchurch Technical College. In 1936, he went to the United Kingdom for work experience, finding employment as an assistant factory manager at an electric tool company near London. In July 1938, Hyde joined the Royal Air Force Volunteer Reserve (RAFVR); prior to this he had been learning to fly with Cambridge Aero Club. As a sergeant pilot with the RAFVR, he received flight training at the weekends at Redhill. The following year, he applied to receive full-time training and gained his wings in August 1939, just before the outbreak of the Second World War. ## Second World War Following the invasion of Poland, Hyde, as a member of the RAFVR was mobilised for war service with the Royal Air Force (RAF). He was loaned to the Fleet Air Arm (FAA), being posted to No. 769 Training Squadron at Donibristle in Scotland. Here he flew Gloster Gladiators fighters and Fairey Swordfish torpedo bombers, and practiced landing on the aircraft carrier HMS Furious. In October, he and another RAFVR pilot deliberately failed their FAA training and were returned to the RAF. Hyde was posted to No. 66 Squadron. Hyde's new unit, based at Duxford and operating the Supermarine Spitfire fighter, regularly patrolled the North Sea and was occasionally scrambled on interception missions. In May 1940, the squadron helped with air cover over the evacuation beaches at Dunkirk during Operation Dynamo. Afterwards, the squadron was based at Coltishall and during the early stages of the Battle of Britain it resumed its patrol duties over the North Sea. ### Service on Malta In mid-July, Hyde was posted to No. 418 Flight, based at Abbotsinch as a delivery flight to transfer Hawker Hurricane fighters from an aircraft carrier to Malta. The island had been under siege from the Regia Aeronautica (Royal Italian Air Force) following the entry of Italy into the Second World War the previous month. The flight of twelve pilots embarked on HMS Argus on 20 July and after a stop at Gibraltar, flew their Hurricanes off the aircraft carrier on 2 August. The Hurricanes arrived at Luqa after a flight of nearly three hours. It had originally been intended that the pilots would return to Gibraltar via a flying boat but it was later decided that they would stay on Malta as the basis of a new flying unit, No. 261 Squadron; this was to be the first fighter squadron on the island. At the time of the squadron's formation, the Regia Aeronautica was regularly bombing Malta and, on 8 September, Hyde destroyed two Fiat CR.42 Falco fighters off Grand Harbour. He shot down a Macchi C.200 Saetta fighter on 4 October. By this time, the squadron was operating from Takali as the airstrip at Luqa was required for use by recently arrived RAF bombers. On 10 January 1941, the squadron helped provide cover for the stricken aircraft carrier HMS Illustrious as it made its way to Malta with major damage after being bombed. By this phase of the siege of Malta, the Luftwaffe were also attacking the island and on 19 January, Hyde destroyed a Junkers Ju 88 medium bomber. He shot down one Messerschmitt Bf 109 fighter and damaged another on 22 April. The next month, No. 261 Squadron was disbanded and Hyde, now a flight sergeant, returned to the United Kingdom. ### Later war service Hyde was appointed as an instructor at No. 52 Operational Training Unit (OTU) in Grangemouth in July. Promoted to warrant officer in October, he was mentioned in despatches in the 1942 New Year Honours for his services with the OTU. In January 1942 he was commissioned as a pilot officer and three months later was transferred to No. 55 OTU, instructing pilots on Spitfires. In December, Hyde, having been promoted to acting flight lieutenant, was posted to No. 197 Squadron. This newly formed unit operated the Hawker Typhoon fighter from the RAF station at Drem and was still in training. It became operational in February 1943, initially carrying out patrols on the east coast but soon it shifted south to Tangmere and started flying on operations to German-occupied Europe as part of the RAF's Circus offensive. On 16 April he probably destroyed a Bf 109 during the squadron's first engagement with German fighters. The frequency of operations increased into the later part of the year and in October, it converted to a fighter-bomber role. At this time Hyde was rested from operational flying and was sent to Wales, where he was involved in the filming of a movie, Signed with Their Honour; this was based on a book about the RAF in Greece during 1941. Hyde flew Gladiators for three months, during which time he was confirmed in his rank of flight lieutenant. Although aerial sequences were filmed, the movie itself was never completed. In early 1944, he went to Sutton Bridge for a course at the Central Gunnery School there before taking up a posting at No. 3 Tactical Exercise Unit (TEU) at Annan. This was followed by an appointment as the Officer Commanding (OC) of the Gunnery and Rocket Squadron at No. 62 OTU. At this time, he was promoted to acting wing commander. In recognition of his services with the RAFVR, Hyde was awarded the Air Force Cross in the 1945 New Year Honours. He transferred to the Royal New Zealand Air Force the following month, in the rank of squadron leader, although he remained attached to the RAF. In March, he was named as OC Flying at No. 59 OTU at Acklington and three months later was appointed to command his previous unit, No. 3 TEU, now at Milfield and operating the Hawker Tempest fighter along with Typhoons. With the war in Europe at an end, Hyde was credited with five aerial victories, as well as the probable destruction of one aircraft and the damage of another. ## Later life In July 1945, Hyde was removed from duties in the RAF in anticipation of his return to New Zealand. He arrived in Christchurch in September and went onto the Reserve of Pilots at the end of the year. A recipient of the Air Efficiency Award for his service with the RAFVR, he was mentioned in despatches for the second time in the 1946 New Year Honours, which recognised his service with No. 59 OTU. On resuming his civilian career, he established an electrical business. He was subsequently employed by the local Power Board until his retirement. He died in Christchurch on 23 March 1985.
71,218,264	That's Not My... (book series)	1,159,406,704	Children's book series	[ "1999 children's books", "Book series introduced in 1999", "British children's books", "British picture books", "Children's books about mice and rats", "Series of children's books" ]	That's Not My... is a series of baby and toddler children's books written by Fiona Watt, illustrated by Rachel Wells and published by Usborne Publishing. Every book focuses on a different subject, which have included animals, vehicles and people. The first book in the series was That's Not My Puppy... which was published in 1999. Each two-page spread of the books contains a different brightly coloured picture of the subject with different attributes represented by a material. The reader is introduced to the different versions of the subject of the book with the phrase "That's not my". The inclusion of materials creates a sensory experience for the reader as they are invited to feel the material and identify why the subject on the page is or is not the correct version. By 2019, the That's Not My... series had sold 6.4 million copies of over 50 books and made over £30.6 million. As of July 2022, there are 72 books in the series. ## Format The books in the That's Not My... series are picture board books targeted towards babies and toddlers. They are part of the Usborne "touchy-feely" collection of books; the collection consists of books which contain patches of material on brightly coloured pictures which the reader is invited to feel. The Oxford Companion to Children's Literature (2015) describes the That's Not My... series as "novelty books", which are books which contain "an element other than paper or card". Each book is square and made out of cardboard. Every two-page spread contains a different picture of the subject of the book. The subject of the books include animals, vehicles, people (such as pirates and Santa), and fantasy creatures. In each book, different attributes of the subject are represented by contrasting materials. The material is incorporated into the picture itself—including on the front page—rather than being placed at the side of the page. For example, in That's Not My Elephant... (2011), the material patches cover the elephant's ears, trunk, tusks, tail, tummy and feet. Watt has stated that it is important for the materials to vary in tactile nature throughout the book, and she gets inspiration for materials from her daily life. According to the Oxford Companion to Children's Literature, the use of different textures encourages "independent exploration" of the book by the reader. Watt has said that the formula of the books is "deceptively simple". She says that the success of the books is likely due to the combination of the "tactile and sensory experience" along with a comforting repetition in the text. The pictures in the books are simple and brightly coloured. Watt said that the bold colour choice was intentional and she did not want to use "soft baby pinks and blues". The reader is invited to feel the texture and identify why the picture isn't the subject of the book, prompted by the text "That's not my". For example, in That's Not My Meerkat (2013)..., one two-page spread reads "That's not my meerkat. Its cheeks are too squashy." The final two-page spread reveals the correct subject; in That's Not My Meerkat..., the correct meerkat is revealed by the text: "That's my meerkat! Its tummy is so soft." With this setup, the reader is encouraged to work through the book until they find the right creature, person, or object. In the book Precursor Math Concepts: The Wonder of Mathematical Worlds with Infants and Toddlers (2021), the authors identify That's Not My Puppy... as an example of a book which encourages interaction between the child and adult and facilitates an understanding of "attributes". They write that the discovery of the correct subject at the end of each book amounts to a "happy ending". Each two-page spread of every That's Not My... book also includes a picture of a mouse. The mouse is sometimes accessorised to match the environment of the subject; in books with underwater subjects, for example, it wears swimming gear including goggles. Watt does not name or gender the mouse, although she had said that many readers believe that the mouse is the one collecting the subjects of the book. Watt also does not imply the gender of any of the subjects of the book where the gender would otherwise be ambiguous. The one exception is That's Not My Bunny... (2005), in which the bunny is identified as male. ## Background and publication history The That's Not My... series is written by Fiona Watt—who is also the editorial director of Usborne Publishing—and illustrated by Rachel Wells. They have collaborated with designer Non Taylor since the inception of the series. Watt's name appears on only some of the That's Not My... books, which Watt says sometimes leads to a misconception that "Fiona Watt" is a pseudonym. Every idea for a That's Not My... book begins in a meeting with Usborne executives, where they decide upon a subject for the book. Watt then comes up with a list of attributes for the subject. Peter Usborne, the founder of Usborne Publishing, was not initially interested in the idea of the That's Not My... series because he did not like its negative title. He later changed his mind, and the first book in the That's Not My... series—That's Not My Puppy...—was published in 1999. Within the first eleven years of its publication, the book had sold 900,000 copies. In 2019, Usborne held celebration events for the 20th anniversary of That's Not My Puppy... in collaboration with the National Literacy Trust's Read On Nottingham campaign. As of July 2022, the That's Not My... series has 72 books. ## Reception Fiona Watt is one of the bestselling authors of children's books in the United Kingdom, owing to the success of both the That's Not My... series and the Sticker Dolly Dressing series. In 2019, 20 years after the publication of That's Not My Puppy..., the series had reached over 50 titles, sold 6.4 million copies, and made £30.6 million through Nielsen BookScan. The British book retailer Waterstones writes that the series "has revolutionised baby and toddler books". Public Lending Right data from 2016 to 2017 shows that books by Fiona Watt, including the That's Not My... series, came 14th in the top 20 most borrowed authors from public libraries. The That's Not My... series and individual books within it have won various literary and children's awards. In 2004 and 2006, That's Not My Penguin... (2003) won the Best Buy award in the Prima Baby Awards. That's Not My Unicorn... (2017), the 50th book in the series, was a Gold Winner in the Made for Mums Awards in 2018. The following year, That's Not My Llama... (2018) won the Gold Award in the Made For Mums Awards. The That's Not My... series won a Gold Award at the Progressive Preschool Awards in 2019. In the summer of 2014, a That's Not My Meerkat...–themed bench was part of the Books about Town event organised by the National Literacy Trust and held in London. The bench formed part of the City Trail which contained other benches with themes including The Wind in the Willows, Peter Pan and Charles Dickens.
69,755	Avro Canada CF-105 Arrow	1,171,095,798	Canadian interceptor aircraft family	[ "1950s Canadian fighter aircraft", "Abandoned military aircraft projects of Canada", "Aircraft first flown in 1958", "Aviation history of Canada", "Avro Canada aircraft", "Cancelled aircraft projects", "High-wing aircraft", "Military history of Canada", "Tailless delta-wing aircraft", "Twinjets" ]	The Avro Canada CF-105 Arrow was a delta-winged interceptor aircraft designed and built by Avro Canada. The CF-105 held the promise of Mach 2 speeds at altitudes exceeding 50,000 feet (15,000 m) and was intended to serve as the Royal Canadian Air Force's (RCAF) primary interceptor into the 1960s and beyond. The Arrow was the culmination of a series of design studies begun in 1953 that examined improved versions of the Avro Canada CF-100 Canuck. After considerable study, the RCAF selected a dramatically more powerful design, and serious development began in March 1955. The aircraft was intended to be built directly from the production line, skipping the traditional hand-built prototype phase. The first Arrow Mk. 1, RL-201, was rolled out to the public on 4 October 1957, the same day as the launch of Sputnik I. Flight testing began with RL-201 on 25 March 1958, and the design quickly demonstrated excellent handling and overall performance, reaching Mach 1.9 in level flight. Powered by the Pratt & Whitney J75, another four Mk. 1s were completed, RL-202, RL-203, RL-204 and RL-205. The lighter and more powerful Orenda Iroquois engine was soon ready for testing, and the first Mk 2 with the Iroquois, RL-206, was ready for taxi testing in preparation for flight and acceptance tests by RCAF pilots by early 1959. On 20 February 1959, Prime Minister of Canada John Diefenbaker abruptly halted the development of both the Arrow and its Iroquois engines before the scheduled project review to evaluate the program could be held. Canada tried to sell the Arrow to the US and Britain, but no agreements were concluded. Two months later the assembly line, tooling, plans, existing airframes, and engines were ordered to be destroyed. The cancellation was the topic of considerable political controversy at the time, and the subsequent destruction of the aircraft in production remains a topic for debate among historians and industry pundits. "This action effectively put Avro out of business and its highly skilled engineering and production personnel scattered". ## Design and development ### Background In the post-Second World War period, the Soviet Union began developing a capable fleet of long-range bombers with the ability to deliver nuclear weapons across North America and Europe. The main threat was principally from high-speed, high-altitude bombing runs launched from the Soviet Union travelling over the Arctic against military bases and built-up industrial centres in Canada and the United States. To counter this threat, Western countries developed interceptors that could engage and destroy these bombers before they reached their targets. A. V. Roe Canada Limited had been set up as a subsidiary of the Hawker Siddeley Group in 1945, initially handling repair and maintenance work for aircraft at the Malton, Ontario Airport, today known as Toronto Pearson International Airport. The next year the company began the design of Canada's first jet fighter for the Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF), the Avro CF-100 Canuck all-weather interceptor. The Canuck underwent a lengthy and troubled prototype stage before entering service seven years later in 1953. Nevertheless, it went on to become one of the most enduring aircraft of its class, serving in a variety of roles until 1981. Recognizing that the delays that affected the development and deployment of the CF-100 could also affect its successor, and the fact that the Soviets were working on newer jet-powered bombers that would render the CF-100 ineffective, the RCAF began looking for a supersonic, missile-armed replacement for the Canuck even before it had entered service. In March 1952, the RCAF's Final Report of the All-Weather Interceptor Requirements Team was submitted to Avro Canada. ### Higher speeds Avro engineering had been considering supersonic issues already at this point. Supersonic flight works in a very different fashion and presents a number of new problems. One of the most critical, and surprising, was the sudden onset of a new form of drag, known as wave drag. The effects of wave drag were so strong that engines of the era could not provide enough power to overcome it, leading to the concept of a "sound barrier". German research during the Second World War had shown the onset of wave drag was greatly reduced by using airfoils that varied in curvature as gradually as possible. This suggested the use of thinner airfoils with much longer chord than designers would have used on subsonic aircraft. These designs were impractical because they left little internal room in the wing for armament or fuel. The Germans also discovered it was possible to "trick" the airflow into the same behaviour if a conventional thicker airfoil was used swept rearward at a sharp angle, creating a swept wing. This provided many of the advantages of a thinner airfoil while also retaining the internal space needed for strength and fuel storage. Another advantage was that the wings were clear of the supersonic shock wave generated by the nose of the aircraft. Almost every fighter project in the postwar era immediately applied the concept, which started appearing on production fighters in the late 1940s. Avro engineers explored swept-wing and tail modifications to the CF-100 known as the CF-103, which had proceeded to wooden mock-up stage. The CF-103 offered improved transonic performance with supersonic abilities in a dive. The basic CF-100 continued to improve through this period, and the advantages were continually eroded. When a CF-100 broke the sound barrier on 18 December 1952, interest in the CF-103 waned. ### Delta wings Another solution to the high-speed problem is the delta wing. The delta wing had many of the same advantages of the swept wing in terms of transonic and supersonic performance, but offered much more internal room and overall surface area. This provided more room for fuel, an important consideration given the inefficient early jet engines of the era, and the large wing area provided ample lift at high altitudes. The delta wing also enabled slower landings than swept wings in certain conditions. The disadvantages of the design were increased drag at lower speeds and altitudes, and especially higher drag while maneuvering. For the interceptor role these were minor concerns, as the aircraft would be spending most of its time flying in straight lines at high altitudes and speeds, mitigating these disadvantages. Further proposals based on the delta wing resulted in two versions of the design known as C104: the single engine C104/4 and twin-engined C104/2. The designs were otherwise similar, using a low-mounted delta-wing and sharply raked vertical stabilizer. The primary advantages of the C104/2 were its twin-engine reliability and a larger overall size, which offered a much larger internal weapons bay. The proposals were submitted to the RCAF in June 1952. ### AIR 7-3 and C105 Intensive discussions between Avro and the RCAF examined a wide range of alternative sizes and configurations for a supersonic interceptor, culminating in RCAF Specification AIR 7-3 in April 1953. AIR 7-3 called specifically for a two crew, twin engine, aircraft with a range of 300 nautical miles (556 km) for a normal low-speed mission, and 200 nmi (370 km) for a high-speed interception mission. It also specified operation from a 6,000 ft (1,830 m) runway; a Mach 1.5 cruising speed at an altitude of 70,000 ft (21,000 m); and manoeuvrability for 2 g turns with no loss of speed or altitude at Mach 1.5 and 50,000 ft. The specification required five minutes from starting the aircraft's engines to reaching 50,000 ft altitude and Mach 1.5. It was also to have turn-around time on the ground of less than 10 minutes. An RCAF team led by Ray Foottit visited US aircraft producers and surveyed British and French manufacturers before concluding that no existing or planned aircraft could fulfill these requirements. In 1955 Avro estimated the performance of the Arrow Mk 2 (with Iroquois) as follows, from the January 1955 British evaluation titled Evaluation of the CF.105 as an All Weather Fighter for the RAF: "Max speed Mach 1.9 at 50,000 ft, Combat speed of Mach 1.5 at 50.000 feet and 1.84 G without bleeding energy, time to 50,000 ft of 4.1 minutes, 500-foot per minute climb ceiling of 62,000 feet, 400 nmi radius on a high-speeds mission, 630 nmi radius on a low-speed mission, Ferry range is not given, but estimated at 1,500 nmi." Avro submitted their modified C105 design in May 1953, essentially a two-man version of the C104/2. A change to a "shoulder-mounted" wing allowed rapid access to the aircraft's internals, weapons bay, and engines. The new design also allowed the wing to be built as a single structure sitting on the upper fuselage, simplifying construction and improving strength. The wing design and positioning required a long main landing gear that still had to fit within the thin delta wing, presenting an engineering challenge. Five different wing sizes were outlined in the report, ranging between 1,000 ft<sup>2</sup> and 1,400 ft<sup>2</sup> (93 m<sup>2</sup> to 130 m<sup>2</sup>); the 1,200 ft<sup>2</sup> (111 m<sup>2</sup>) sized version was eventually selected. The primary engine selection was the Rolls-Royce RB.106, an advanced two-spool design offering around 21,000 pounds-force (93 kN). Backup designs were the Bristol Olympus OL-3, the US-built Curtiss-Wright J67 version of the OL-3, or the Orenda TR.9 engines. Armament was stored in a large internal bay located in a "belly" position, taking up over one third of the aircraft fuselage. A wide variety of weapons could be deployed from this bay, such as the Hughes Falcon guided missile, the CARDE Velvet Glove air-to-air missile, or four general-purpose 1,000 lb bombs. The Velvet Glove radar-guided missile had been under development with the RCAF for some time, but was believed unsuitable for supersonic speeds and lacked development potential. Consequently, further work on that project was cancelled in 1956. In July 1953, the proposal was accepted and Avro was given the go-ahead to start a full design study under the project name: "CF-105". In December, CA\$27 million was provided to start flight modelling. At first, the project was limited in scope, but the introduction of the Soviet Myasishchev M-4 Bison jet bomber and the Soviet Union's testing of a hydrogen bomb the next month dramatically changed Cold War priorities. In March 1955, the contract was upgraded to CA\$260 million for five Arrow Mk.1 flight-test aircraft, to be followed by 35 Arrow Mk. 2s with production engines and fire-control systems. ### Production In order to meet the timetable set by the RCAF, Avro decided that the Arrow program would adopt the Cook-Craigie plan. Normally a small number of prototypes of an aircraft were hand built and flown to find problems, and when solutions were found these changes would be worked into the design and then the production line would be set up. In a Cook-Craigie system, the production line was set up first and a small number of aircraft were built as production models. Any changes would be incorporated into the jigs while testing continued, with full production starting when the test program was complete. As Jim Floyd noted at the time, this was a risky approach: "it was decided to take the technical risks involved to save time on the programme ... I will not pretend that this philosophy of production type build from the outset did not cause us a lot of problems in Engineering. However, it did achieve its objective." In order to mitigate risks, a massive testing program was started. By mid-1954, the first production drawings were issued and wind tunnel work began, along with extensive computer simulation studies carried out both in Canada and the United States using sophisticated computer programs. In a related program, nine instrumented free-flight models were mounted on solid fuel Nike rocket boosters and launched from Point Petre over Lake Ontario while two additional models were launched from the NASA facility at Wallops Island, Virginia, over the Atlantic Ocean. These models were for aerodynamic drag and stability testing, flown to a maximum speed of Mach 1.7+ before intentionally crashing into the water. Experiments showed the need for only a small number of design changes, mainly involving the wing profile and positioning. To improve high-alpha performance, the leading edge of the wing was drooped, especially on outer sections, a dog-tooth was introduced at about half-span to control spanwise flow, and the entire wing given a slight negative camber which helped control trim drag and pitch-up. The area rule principle, made public in 1952, was also applied to the design. This resulted in several changes including the addition of a tailcone, sharpening the radar nose profile, thinning the intake lips, and reducing the cross-sectional area of the fuselage below the canopy. The construction of the airframe was fairly conventional, with a semi-monocoque frame and multi-spar wing. The aircraft used a measure of magnesium and titanium in the fuselage, the latter limited largely to the area around the engines and to fasteners. Titanium was still expensive and not widely used because it was difficult to machine. The Arrow's thin wing required aviation's first 4,000 lb/in<sup>2</sup> (28 MPa) hydraulic system to supply enough force to the control surfaces, while using small actuators and piping. A rudimentary fly-by-wire system was employed, in which the pilot's input was detected by a series of pressure-sensitive transducers in the stick, and their signal was sent to an electronic control servo that operated the valves in the hydraulic system to move the various flight controls. This resulted in a lack of control feel; because the control stick input was not mechanically connected to the hydraulic system, the variations in back-pressure from the flight control surfaces that would normally be felt by the pilot could no longer be transmitted back into the stick. To re-create a sense of feel, the same electronic control box rapidly responded to the hydraulic back-pressure fluctuations and triggered actuators in the stick, making it move slightly; this system, called "artificial feel", was also a first. In 1954, the RB.106 program was cancelled, necessitating the use of the backup Wright J67 engine instead. In 1955, this engine was also cancelled, leaving the design with no engine. At this point, the Pratt & Whitney J75 was selected for the initial test-flight models, while the new TR 13 engine was developed at Orenda for the production Mk 2s. After evaluating the engineering mock-ups and the full-scale wooden mock-up in February 1956, the RCAF demanded additional changes, selecting the advanced RCA-Victor Astra fire-control system firing the equally advanced United States Navy Sparrow II in place of the MX-1179 and Falcon combination. Avro vocally objected on the grounds that neither of these were even in testing at that point, whereas both the MX-1179 and Falcon were almost ready for production and would have been nearly as effective for "a very large saving in cost". The Astra proved to be problematic as the system ran into a lengthy period of delays, and when the USN cancelled the Sparrow II in 1956, Canadair was quickly brought in to continue the Sparrow program in Canada, although they expressed grave concerns about the project as well and the move added yet more expense. ### Rollout and flight testing Go-ahead on the production was given in 1955. The rollout of the first CF-105, marked as RL-201, took place on 4 October 1957. The company had planned to capitalize on the event, inviting more than 13,000 guests to the occasion. Unfortunately for Avro, the media and public attention for the Arrow rollout was dwarfed by the launch of Sputnik the same day. The J75 engine was slightly heavier than the PS-13, and therefore required ballast to be placed in the nose to return the centre of gravity to the correct position. In addition, the Astra fire-control system was not ready, and it too, was replaced by ballast. The otherwise unused weapons bay was loaded with test equipment. RL-201 first flew on 25 March 1958 with Chief Development Test Pilot S/L Janusz Żurakowski at the controls. Four more J75-powered Mk 1s were delivered in the next 18 months. The test flights, limited to "proof-of-concept" and assessing flight characteristics, revealed no serious design faults. The CF-105 demonstrated excellent handling throughout the flight envelope, in large part due to the natural qualities of the delta-wing, but responsibility can also be attributed to the Arrow's Stability Augmentation System. The aircraft went supersonic on its third flight and, on the seventh, broke 1,000 mph (1,600 km/h) at 50,000 ft (15,000 m) while climbing. A top speed of Mach 1.98 was achieved, and this was not at the limits of its performance. An Avro report made public in 2015 clarifies that during the highest speed flight, the Arrow reached Mach 1.90 in steady level flight, and an indicated Mach number of 1.95 was recorded in a dive. Estimates up to Mach 1.98 likely originated from an attempt to compensate for lag error, which was expected in diving flight. Although no major problems were encountered during the initial testing phase, some minor issues with the landing gear and flight control system had to be rectified. The former problem was partly due to the tandem main landing gear being very narrow, in order to fit into the wings; the leg shortened in length and rotated as it was stowed. During one landing incident, the chain mechanism (used to shorten the gear) in the Mark 1 gear jammed, resulting in incomplete rotation. In a second incident with Arrow 202 on 11 November 1958, the flight control system commanded elevons full down at landing; the resulting reduction in weight on the gears reduced the effective tire friction, ultimately resulting in brake lockup and subsequent gear collapse. A photograph taken of the incident proved that inadvertent flight control activation had caused the accident. The only occasion when a test flight was diverted occurred on 2 February 1959, when a TCA Viscount crash-landed in Toronto, necessitating a landing at CFB Trenton. The stability augmentation system also required much fine-tuning. Although the CF-105 was not the first aircraft to use such a system, it was one of the first of its kind, and was problematic. By February 1959, the five aircraft had completed the majority of the company test program and were progressing to the RCAF acceptance trials. ### Political issues From 1953, some senior Canadian military officials at the chiefs of staffs began to question the program. The chiefs of staff of the army and navy were both strongly opposed to the Arrow, since "substantial funds were being diverted to the air force", while Air Marshal Hugh Campbell, RCAF Chief of Staff, backed it right up until its cancellation. In June 1957, when the governing Liberals lost the federal election and a Progressive Conservative government under John Diefenbaker took power, the aircraft's prospects began to noticeably change. Diefenbaker had campaigned on a platform of reining in what the Conservatives claimed was "rampant Liberal spending". Nonetheless, by 1958, the parent company had become Canada's third largest business enterprise and had primary interests in rolling stock, steel and coal, electronics, and aviation with 39 different companies under the A. V. Roe Canada banner. In August 1957, the Diefenbaker government signed the NORAD (North American Air Defense) Agreement with the United States, making Canada a partner with American command and control. The USAF was in the process of completely automating their air defence system with the SAGE project, and offered Canada the opportunity to share this sensitive information for the air defence of North America. One aspect of the SAGE system was the Bomarc nuclear-tipped anti-aircraft missile. This led to studies on basing Bomarcs in Canada in order to push the defensive line further north, even though the deployment was found to be extremely costly. Deploying the missiles alone was expected to cost C\$164 million, while SAGE would absorb another C\$107 million, not counting the cost of improvements to radar; in all, it was projected to raise Canada's defence spending "as much as 25 to 30%", according to George Pearkes, the minister of national defence. Defence against ballistic missiles was also becoming a priority. The existence of Sputnik had also raised the possibility of attacks from space, and, as the year progressed, word of a "missile gap" began spreading. An American brief of the meeting with Pearkes records his concern that Canada could not afford defensive systems against both ballistic missiles and manned bombers. It is also said Canada could afford the Arrow or Bomarc/SAGE, but not both. By 11 August 1958, Pearkes requested cancellation of the Arrow, but the Cabinet Defence Committee (CDC) refused. Pearkes tabled it again in September and recommended installation of the Bomarc missile system. The latter was accepted, but again the CDC refused to cancel the entire Arrow program. The CDC wanted to wait until a major review on 31 March 1959. They cancelled the Sparrow/Astra system in September 1958. Efforts to continue the program through cost-sharing with other countries were then explored. In 1959, Pearkes would say the ballistic missile was the greater threat, and Canada purchased Bomarc "in lieu of more airplanes". ## Operational history ### Foreign interest Canada unsuccessfully tried to sell the Arrow to the US and Britain. The aircraft industry in both countries was considered a national interest and the purchase of foreign designs was rare. Nevertheless, from 1955 onwards, the UK had shown considerable interest in the Arrow. Desiring a high-performance interceptor like the Arrow, the RAF began the F.155 program in 1955, projecting a service entry date of 1962. As the program continued, it was clear the aircraft would not be ready by that date, and attention turned to interim designs that could be in service by the late 1950s to cover this period. At first, consideration was given to a "thin-wing" version of the Gloster Javelin that would provide moderate supersonic performance, along with the extremely high performance but short range Saunders-Roe SR.177. In April 1956, the UK's Air Council recommended a purchase of 144 Arrows to fill the role of the thin-wing Javelin. These would be powered by UK engines; the Bristol Olympus 7R – 17,000 lbf (76 kN) thrust dry, 23,700 lbf (105 kN) with reheat, the Rolls-Royce Conway Stage 4 – 18,340 lbf (81.6 kN) thrust dry, 29,700 lbf (132 kN) with reheat, or de Havilland Gyron – 19,500 lbf (87 kN) thrust dry, 28,000 lbf (120 kN) with reheat. Procurement of the Arrow from Canada, and setting up a production line in the UK, was studied, the unit price per aircraft built in the UK being estimated at £220,000 each for a production run of 100 aircraft, as opposed to the estimate of £150,000 per aircraft for the thin wing Javelin. The CF-105 would serve as a stopgap until the UK's F.155 project came to fruition, but with the F.155 due in 1963 and the Arrow not likely to reach the RAF before 1962, there was little point in proceeding. The infamous 1957 Defence White Paper, described as "the biggest change in military policy ever made in normal times", led to the cancellation of almost all British manned fighter aircraft then in development, and completely curtailed any likelihood of a purchase. In January 1959, the UK's final answer was no; Britain countered with an offer to sell Canada the English Electric Lightning. The French government expressed an interest in the Iroquois engine for an enlarged version of the Dassault Mirage IV bomber, the Mirage IVB. This was one of several engines being considered, including the Olympus, with an order for 300 Iroquois being considered. Acting on media speculation that the Iroquois engine program was also in jeopardy of being cancelled, the French government chose to end negotiations in October 1958 and opted for an upgraded version of the indigenous Snecma Atar, instead. There was never an explanation for this decision offered by the French government, even after Avro tried to offer the Iroquois as a private venture. In the US, the 1954 interceptor was well underway, and would ultimately introduce the Convair F-106 Delta Dart, an aircraft with many similarities to the Arrow. More advanced designs were also being considered, notably the Mach 3 Republic XF-103, and by the time the Arrow was flying, the much more advanced North American XF-108. Both of these programs were cancelled during the mock-up stage, as it was believed the need for a manned interceptor of very high-performance simply did not exist as the Soviets were clearly moving their strategic force to ICBMs. This argument added weight to the justification of cancelling the Arrow. In 1958, Avro Aircraft Limited president and general manager Fred Smye elicited a promise from the USAF to "supply, free, the fire control system and missiles and if they would allow the free use of their flight test centre at ... Edwards AFB." ### Cancellation The Arrow's cancellation was announced on 20 February 1959. The day became known as "Black Friday" in the Canadian aviation industry. Diefenbaker claimed the decision was based on "a thorough examination" of threats and defensive measures, and the cost of defensive systems. More specifically, the cost would have needed to be amortized over hundreds of manufactured models. At the time the trend was "away from conventional bombers" that the Avro Arrow could intercept and "towards atmospheric weapons like intercontinental ballistic missiles", according to Global News. As a result, the foreign demand for the Avro Arrow had declined substantially. Canada's alternative to the Arrow was to purchase some American McDonnell F-101 Voodoo interceptors and Bomarc B missiles. The decision immediately put 14,528 Avro employees, as well as nearly 15,000 other employees in the Avro supply chain of outside suppliers out of work. Declassified records show Avro management was caught unprepared by the suddenness of the announcement by the government; while executives were aware that the program was in jeopardy, they expected it to continue until the March review. It was widely believed during this lead-up to the review, the first Arrow Mk 2, RL-206, would be prepared for an attempt at both world speed and altitude records. An attempt was made to provide the completed Arrows to the National Research Council of Canada as high-speed test aircraft. The NRC refused, noting that without sufficient spare parts and maintenance, as well as qualified pilots, the NRC could make no use of them. A similar project initiated by the Royal Aircraft Establishment (Boscombe Down) had resulted in Avro vice-president (engineering) Jim Floyd's preparing a transatlantic ferry operation. This proposal, like others from the United States, was never realized. ### Aftermath Within two months of the project cancellation, all aircraft, engines, production tooling and technical data were ordered scrapped. Officially, the reason given for the destruction order from cabinet and the chiefs of staff was to destroy classified and "secret" materials used in the Arrow and Iroquois programs. The action has been attributed to Royal Canadian Mounted Police fears that a Soviet "mole" had infiltrated Avro, later confirmed to some degree in the Mitrokhin Archives. Rumours had circulated that Air Marshal W. A. Curtis, a World War I ace who headed Avro, had ignored Diefenbaker and spirited one of the Arrows away to be saved for posterity. These rumours were given life in a 1968 interview, when Curtis was asked directly if the rumour was true. He replied, "I don't want to answer that." He proceeded to question the wisdom of printing the story of a missing Arrow, and wondered whether it would be safe to reveal the existence of a surviving airframe only nine years later. "If it is in existence it may have to wait another 10 years. Politically it may cause a lot of trouble." The legend endures that one of the prototypes remains intact somewhere. Following the cancellation of the Avro Arrow project, CF-105 chief aerodynamicist Jim Chamberlin led a team of 25 engineers to NASA's Space Task Group to become lead engineers, program managers, and heads of engineering in NASA's manned space programs—projects Mercury, Gemini and Apollo. The Space Task Group team eventually grew to 32 Avro engineers and technicians, and became emblematic of what many Canadians viewed as a "brain drain" to the United States. Among the former Arrow team engineers to go south were Tecwyn Roberts (NASA's first flight dynamics officer on Project Mercury and later director of networks at the Goddard Space Flight Center), John Hodge (flight director and manager on the cancelled Space Station Freedom project), Dennis Fielder (director of the Space Station Task Force, later the Space Station), Owen Maynard (chief of the LM engineering office in the Apollo Program Office), Bruce Aikenhead, and Rod Rose (technical assistant for the Space Shuttle program). Many other engineers, including Jim Floyd, found work in either the UK or the United States. Work undertaken by both Avro Canada and Floyd benefited supersonic research at Hawker Siddeley, Avro Aircraft's UK parent, and contributed to programs such as the HSA.1000 supersonic transport design studies, influential in the design of the Concorde. In 1961, the RCAF obtained 66 McDonnell CF-101 Voodoo aircraft, one of the American designs the RCAF originally rejected, to serve in the role originally intended for the Avro Arrow. The controversy surrounding this acquisition, and Canada's acquiring nuclear weapons for the Voodoos and Bomarcs eventually contributed to the collapse of the Diefenbaker government in 1963. Although nearly everything connected to the CF-105 and Orenda Iroquois programs was destroyed, the cockpit and nose gear of RL-206, the first Mk 2 Arrow, and two outer panels of RL-203's wings were saved and are on display at the Canada Aviation and Space Museum in Ottawa, alongside an Iroquois engine. With specifications comparable to then-current offerings from American and Soviet design bureaus, at the time of its cancellation, the Arrow was considered by one aviation industry observer to be one of the most advanced aircraft in the world. The Arrow's cancellation eventually led to the end of Avro Aircraft Limited (Canada) and its president and general manager, Crawford Gordon Jr. was fired shortly afterward. In 1962, the Hawker Siddeley Group formally dissolved A. V. Roe Canada and transferred all its assets to Hawker Siddeley's newly formed subsidiary, Hawker Siddeley Canada. According to Bill Gunston: > In its planning, design and flight-test programme, this fighter, in almost every way the most advanced of all the fighters of the 1950s, was as impressive, and successful as any aircraft in history. The nose cone section of Avro Arrow RL-206, currently on display at the Canada Aviation and Space Museum in Ottawa, was smuggled out of the Avro Aircraft plant in Malton by members of the RCAF Flying Personnel Medical Establishment, a detachment of RCAF Station Downsview on Avenue Road in Toronto, where it resided for many years and was employed in high-altitude work. The commanding officer of the Flying Personnel Medical Establishment, Wing Commander Roy Stubbs, provides this prologue to the former aircraft: > One day after a change of government, the new RCAF Chief of the Air Staff came to inspect our facilities and programs and after lunch, I asked if he would like to see something special. I showed him a piece of the Arrow; cockpit section and engine nacelles and a few other bits. I asked him what we should do with it and he said to keep it hidden until the climate in Ottawa was right, and then he would arrange to have it placed in the National Aeronautical Museum in Ottawa. Eventually this was done and at least a bit of history was saved. In 2012, a new version of the Avro Arrow was privately proposed as an alternative to a Canadian purchase of F-35 aircraft. The proposal, promoted by former Canadian Forces infantry officer Lewis MacKenzie, was rejected by Ottawa as being too risky, too costly and too time-consuming given the need to re-engineer the 1950s-era aircraft with modern communication, targeting and stealth features. Member of Parliament and former Canadian Forces fighter pilot Laurie Hawn described the CF-105 as having been advanced 50 years prior, but "hopelessly behind its time" in 2012. ## Variants ### Mark 1 The Arrow Mark 1 was the initial version powered by two Pratt & Whitney J75 turbojet engines that produced 23,500 pounds-force (105 kN) of thrust each. The Mk 1 was used for development and flight testing. Five were completed. ### Mark 2 The Mk 2 version was to be fitted with the Orenda PS-13 Iroquois engines and would be evaluated by RCAF acceptance pilots as well as Avro test pilots. The new PS-13S engines were designed to produce 30,000 lbf (130 kN) each. The Astra/Sparrow fire control system had been terminated by the government in September 1958 with all aircraft to employ the Hughes/Falcon combination. At the time of cancellation of the entire program, the first Arrow Mk 2, RL-206, was ready for taxi trials; Avro expected it to break the world speed record, but it never flew. Top speed would have been limited by atmospheric frictional heating, according to project engineer James Floyd, "[t]he aluminum alloy structure which we favoured was good for speeds greater than a Mach number of 2." ### Other designs Avro Canada had a wide range of advanced Arrow variants under development at the time of project cancellation. Frequent mention is made of an Arrow that could have been capable of Mach 3, similar to the Mikoyan-Gurevich MiG-25. This was not the production version, but one of the design studies, and would have been a greatly modified version of the Arrow Mk 2, featuring revised engine inlets and extensive use of carbon steel and titanium to withstand airframe heating. The Mark 2A and Mark 3 were also to have updated engines, capable of producing 39,800 lbf (177 kN) each, increasing the maximum takeoff weight by 7,700 kg (17,000 lb) and flight ceiling to 70,000 ft. ### Replicas A replica Arrow built by Allan Jackson was used in The Arrow, a Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC) production. He began building a full-scale replica of the Arrow in 1989, and was approached by the producers of the Arrow miniseries in 1996, then about 70% complete, who made an offer to complete the construction if the replica could be used for the production. It was used on the miniseries and several public appearances at air shows. The replica was later donated to the Reynolds-Alberta Museum in his home town of Wetaskiwin, Alberta. While in a temporary outdoor collection, it was damaged in a wind storm in 2009. It has since been repaired, but is no longer on public display. The Avro Museum, based out of Calgary/Springbank Airport (CYBW) west of Calgary, Alberta, Canada, is building a 2/3rd scale, manned, high performance flying replica of the Avro Arrow (officially known as ARROW II) to Canadian Aviation Experimental Aircraft Regulations in order to become an airshow demonstration aircraft. Construction began in October 2007, and by 2012 the fuselage was completed and passed its first MDRA inspection, and now has a serial number. Powered by a pair of Pratt & Whitney JT-15D-4s, the ARROW II is to have a top speed of approximately 500 knots and a range of 1,800 miles. Current projections show a final cost of the project at approximately one million dollars and it was hoped that ground tests would start in about 2016 with the first flight to follow. The 2018 Annual report from the museum updates the previous predictions, and states > We look forward to more exciting progress in the coming year as we work towards the goal of having the Arrow II on its landing gear and able to be presented as a work in progress static display at the 2019 Springbank Airshow. The Canadian Air and Space Museum (CASM), previously located at the Toronto/Downsview Airport (CYZD), featured a full-size replica Arrow built by volunteers with materials supplied by local aerospace firms. With a metal structure, the replica features many authentic-looking components including landing gear constructed by Messier-Dowty, the original Arrow primary landing gear sub-contractor. Painted by Bombardier Inc. at their Downview plant in the colours of Arrow 25203, the Arrow replica was rolled out for a media event on 28 September 2006 and was on public display on 8–9 October 2006 to commemorate the 49th anniversary of the original aircraft's rollout in 1957. CASM was closed in 2011 when the hangar was rebuilt for use by a college. This replica was in storage at Toronto Pearson Intl Airport (CYYZ) after being displayed at the Toronto International Centre (across the road from where the actual aircraft were built) for a technology trade show that ran from 30 September to 4 October 2013. In late 2019, Milan Kroupa brought the replica to Edenvale Airport (CNV8), south of Georgian Bay in Southern Ontario. It is currently on display in a hangar, with weekly showings to the public. ### Scale models Between 1954 and 1957, nine Avro Arrow models, scaled at one-eighth size or about 3 m (9.8 ft) long, are believed to have been launched, using rockets, over Lake Ontario from Point Petre in Prince Edward County, Ontario as part of the process for testing the hull design. (Two others were launched in Virginia.) They travelled at supersonic speeds as onboard sensors sent data back to shore. After many attempts to find the models, a new search was started in late July 2017. The Raise the Arrow project, operated by OEX Recovery Group Incorporated, was a joint venture by several companies, the Canadian Coast Guard and the Royal Canadian Military Institute. A Thunderfish autonomous submarine, equipped with an AquaPix interferometric synthetic aperture sonar, was being used to survey the relevant area of the lake bottom. Any scale models found will be restored and displayed at the Canada Aviation and Space Museum in Ottawa and the National Air Force Museum of Canada in Trenton, Ontario. In September 2017, the Raise the Arrow Project confirmed the discovery of one of the 1/8 scale Delta Test Vehicle (DTV) models at the bottom of Lake Ontario. It was recovered in August 2018. The model was restored and has been on display at the Canadian Aviation and Space Museum since 2019. The search for one of the more advanced Arrow test models, in cooperation with the Royal Canadian Air Force, continued. In September 2020, OEX announced that a piece of another test model had been discovered; the Project was working on a method to recover that piece and to find other pieces of the same wreck. ### "Destroyed" plans re-discovered On January 6, 2020, CBC News announced that the Arrow's plans, long thought to have been destroyed, were kept. Ken Barnes, a senior draftsman on the project in 1959, was ordered to destroy all documents related to the Avro Arrow project. Instead, he quietly took the blueprints home where they remained stored for decades. The blueprints were on display in the "Touch the Sky: The Story of Avro Canada" exhibit at the Diefenbaker Canada Centre at the University of Saskatchewan until April 2020. In 2021, the National Research Council of Canada digitized and released 595 Avro Arrow reports stored in their rare book room and the NRC Archives, both located in Ottawa. ### Legacy The "Avro Arrow Private" street name commemorates the aircraft at Ottawa Macdonald–Cartier International Airport. ## Prospective operator Canada - Royal Canadian Air Force – Cancelled before entering service. ## Specifications (Arrow Mk 1) ## Notable appearances in media In 1997, the CBC broadcast their two-part miniseries, The Arrow. The production used a combination of archival film, remote-control flying models and computer animation for the static, ground and flying sequences. Although highly acclaimed, receiving praise from film historian and former Avro employee Elwy Yost and winner of numerous awards including the Gemini that year, the miniseries was also criticized for its "docu-drama" style and departing from a strict factual account. The continued rebroadcasts and accompanying DVD releases have re-animated the controversy over the Arrow's cancellation and introduce the story to a new generation. ## See also
44,328,167	Campania-class cruiser	1,170,372,391	Protected cruiser class of the Italian Royal Navy	[ "Campania-class cruisers" ]	The Campania class was a pair of small protected cruisers built for the Italian Regia Marina (Royal Navy) in the 1910s. The two ships, Campania and Basilicata, were the last ships of that type built by the 'Regia Marina, as it had been superseded by more effective light cruisers. The Campania class was designed for use in Italy's overseas colonies, on the model of the old Calabria. Neither ship had a particularly eventful career. Basilicata was destroyed by a boiler explosion in 1919, two years after entering service, and was subsequently raised and scrapped. Campania remained in service for significantly longer, but she did not see action and ended her career as a training ship before being scrapped in 1937. ## Design The ships of the Campania class were designed for use in Italy's overseas colonies and to serve as training ships for naval cadets. The design was based on the old cruiser Calabria, which had also been built as a colonial cruiser. They were small ships, at 76.8 meters (252 ft) long at the waterline and 83 m (272 ft 4 in) long overall. They had a beam of 12.7 m (41 ft 8 in) and a draft of 5 m (16 ft 5 in). They displaced 2,483 long tons (2,483 long tons) normally and up to 3,187 long tons (3,187 long tons) at full load. The ships were fitted with a pair of pole masts equipped with spotting tops. They had a crew of 11 officers and 193 enlisted men, and were also capable of carrying 100 cadets, along with their officers, petty officers, staff, and equipment. Their propulsion system consisted of a pair of vertical triple-expansion steam engines each driving a single screw propeller, with steam supplied by four coal-fired, cylindrical fire-tube boilers. The boilers were trunked into a single funnel amidships. Campania's engines were rated at 5,001 indicated horsepower (3,729 kW) and produced a top speed of 15.7 knots (29.1 km/h; 18.1 mph), while Basilicata's produced only 4,129 ihp (3,079 kW) and 15.5 kn (28.7 km/h; 17.8 mph). The ships had a cruising radius of about 1,850 nautical miles (3,430 km; 2,130 mi) at a speed of 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph). Campania and Basilicata were armed with a main battery of six 152 mm (6 in) 40-caliber (cal.) guns mounted singly; one was placed on the forecastle, one at the stern, and two on each broadside in sponsons on the main deck. These weapons, which were built-up guns, could fire armor-piercing and high-explosive shells at a muzzle velocity of 690 meters per second (2,280 ft/s). They were also equipped with two Ansaldo 76 mm (3 in) 40-cal. guns in low-angle mounts and three 76 mm 40-cal. guns in high-angle anti-aircraft mountings; they fired a 6-kilogram (13 lb) shell at a muzzle velocity of 680 meters per second (2,200 ft/s). They also carried several small guns, including two 47 mm (1.9 in) guns manufactured by Vickers and a pair of machine guns. The ships were only lightly armored, with a 25 mm (0.98 in) thick deck, and 50 mm (2 in) thick plating on her conning tower. ## Ships Campania and Basilicata were small enough that they could be built on the same slipway, and they were launched on the same day. They were the last protected cruisers to be built by the Regia Marina. This was partly a result of the outbreak of World War I during the construction of these ships, and the resulting shortage of steel as resources were dedicated to the construction of smaller scouts, destroyers, and submarines, which proved to be more useful in the confined waters of the Adriatic Sea. After the war, Italy received several light cruisers as war prizes from Germany and Austria-Hungary, and these ships formed the backbone of the Italian reconnaissance force in the immediate post-war period. ## Service history Both ships served abroad in the first few years of their active service in Italian Libya, and had uneventful careers. Basilicata's career was cut short on 13 August 1919, when one of her boilers exploded while she was moored in Tewfik at the southern end of the Suez Canal. The explosion sank the ship; she was raised in September 1920 but was deemed not worth repairing, and so she was sold for scrap in July 1921. Campania was reclassified as a gunboat that year and had two of her 152 mm guns removed. She became a full-time training ship in 1932, a role in which she served until March 1937, when she was stricken from the naval register and sold for scrap.
51,410,162	Samoa at the 2016 Summer Paralympics	1,085,777,929	null	[ "2016 in Samoan sport", "Nations at the 2016 Summer Paralympics", "Samoa at the Paralympics" ]	Samoa competed at the 2016 Summer Paralympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, from 7 to 18 September 2016, sending two discus athletes, one male and one female. This was Samoa's fifth consecutive Paralympics, with their first Paralympics in 2000. Alefosio ‘Sio’ Laki finished 12th, setting a new personal record. Maggie Aiono finished the Paralympics in 11th place. As of the conclusion of these Paralympics, Samoa has not won a Paralympic medal. ## Background Samoa's first Paralympic appearance was in 2000. The country has competed in every Summer Paralympics since then, and has never participated in a Winter Paralympics. As of these Paralympics, the country has never medalled. ## Disability classifications Every participant at the Paralympics has their disability grouped into one of five disability categories; amputation, the condition may be congenital or sustained through injury or illness; cerebral palsy; wheelchair athletes, there is often overlap between this and other categories; visual impairment, including blindness; Les autres, any physical disability that does not fall strictly under one of the other categories, for example dwarfism or multiple sclerosis. Each Paralympic sport then has its own classifications, dependent upon the specific physical demands of competition. Events are given a code, made of numbers and letters, describing the type of event and classification of the athletes competing. Some sports, such as athletics, divide athletes by both the category and severity of their disabilities, other sports, for example swimming, group competitors from different categories together, the only separation being based on the severity of the disability. ## Athletics Alefosio ‘Sio’ Laki qualified to represent Samoa at the 2016 Summer Paralympics in Rio in the discus. He started participating in discus three years prior. Laki is based in Australia, but both of his parents are from Samoa. His representation for Samoa came about because of a relationship developed with the Samoans by Athletics Australia. Laki has cerebral palsy, and went to Rio when he was a year 12 student at Hampton Park Secondary College. He prepared for the Paralympics by training for three hours per day at the track three times a week and the gym three times a week. Laki threw a personal best distance of 33.53 meters. He placed 12th in the competition out of the 12 participants. Maggie Aiono received a wildcard spot to compete in the discus event. Her left foot was amputated after a car accident in 1994, and she uses a prosthetic. The Paralympic Committee also gave Aiono a new prothesis for walking and one specially for discus throwing. Aiono used to do shotput, but changed to discus a couple of months before the Paralympics. She received her new prosthetic leg just before arriving at Rio. Aiono was Samoa's flag bearer for these Paralympics. Aiono finished 11th out of 12 in the event, with a throw of 19.56 meters. ### Men's field ### Women's field ## See also - Samoa at the 2016 Summer Olympics
3,164,661	Imperatritsa Mariya-class battleship	1,163,358,389	Imperial Russian Navy's Imperatritsa Mariya-class dreadnoughts	[ "Battleship classes", "Imperatritsa Mariya-class battleships", "World War I battleships of Russia" ]	The Imperatritsa Mariya-class (Russian: Императрица Мария) battleships were the first dreadnoughts built for the Black Sea Fleet of the Imperial Russian Navy. All three ships were built in Nikolayev during World War I; two of the ships were built by the Rossud Dockyard and the third was built by the Associated Factories and Shipyards of Nikolayev (Russian: ONZiV). Two ships were delivered in 1915 and saw some combat against ex-German warships that had been 'gifted' to the Ottoman Empire, but the third was not completed until 1917 and saw no combat due to the disorder in the navy after the February Revolution earlier that year. Imperatritsa Mariya was sunk by a magazine explosion in Sevastopol harbor in 1916. Imperatritsa Ekaterina Velikaya, having been renamed Svobodnaya Rossiya in 1917, was scuttled in Novorossiysk harbor in 1918 to prevent her from being turned over to the Germans as required by the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. The crew of Volia, as Imperator Aleksandr III had been renamed in 1917, voted to turn her over to the Germans. They were only able to make one training cruise before they had to turn her over the victorious Allies in 1918 as part of the armistice terms. The British took control of her, but turned her over to the White Russians in 1920 who renamed her General Alekseyev. She only had one operable gun turret by this time and she provided some fire support for the Whites, but it was not enough. They were forced to evacuate the Crimea later that year and sailed with Wrangel's fleet to Bizerte (Tunisia) where she was interned by the French. She was eventually scrapped there during the 1930s to pay her docking fees. ## Design and development The Naval Ministry began planning a class of dreadnoughts for the Black Sea Fleet in 1910 when they learned that the Ottomans were on the verge of ordering dreadnoughts of their own from the British. This rumor proved to false, but the Russians had decided that they should continue the design process for the time when the Ottomans did procure dreadnoughts of their own. Preliminary specifications were issued on 12 August 1910 for a design based on that of the Gangut-class battleships then being built for the Baltic Fleet. 23 knots (43 km/h; 26 mph) was thought to be excessive in the confined environs of the Black Sea so the new design was capable of only 21 knots (39 km/h; 24 mph) which allowed more weight to be devoted to more guns or heavier armor. A main armament of a dozen 12-inch (305 mm) guns in four triple turrets was specified in the same 'linear' non-superfiring arrangements as the Ganguts. The sixteen 120-millimeter (4.7 in) anti-torpedo boat guns of the Ganguts were replaced by twenty 130-millimeter (5.1 in)/55 B7 Pattern 1913 guns to counter the ever-increasing size of torpedo boats. The maximum elevation of the 12-inch guns was to be increased to 35°, 10° more than in the Gangut-class ships, and turret armor was to be increased from 200 mm (7.9 in) to 250 mm (9.8 in). A design competition was announced in July 1911, but there were not many contenders. The Naval Ministry favored the design from the Russud Works and gave preliminary orders for three ships on 2 September, even before the competition was concluded in November. Russud's design was unsurprisingly selected and the government transferred designers from the government-owned Baltic Works as well as a complete set of drawings for the Gangut-class to speed up the detailed design process. ### General characteristics The ships of the Imperatritsa Mariya-class were 168 meters (551 ft 2 in) long overall, had a beam of 27.43 meters (90 ft 0 in) and at full load a draft of 8.36 meters (27 ft 5 in). They displaced 23,413 long tons (23,789 t) at (standard). High-tensile steel was used throughout the hull with mild steel used only in areas that did not contribute to structural strength. The hull was subdivided by 18 transverse watertight bulkheads. The engine room was divided by two longitudinal bulkheads and a double bottom was provided. Their designed metacentric height was 1.76 meters (5 ft 9 in). Imperatritsa Ekaterina Velikaya was slightly larger than her half-sisters because ONZiV enlarged her in an effort to counter the usual problem Russian battleships had with weight. She was 168 meters (551 ft 2 in) long at the waterline and had a beam of 28.07 meters (92 ft 1 in); 4 feet 10 inches (1.47 m) longer and 2 feet (0.61 m) wider than her half sisters. Her exact draft is not known, but she had a draft of 8.7 meters (28 ft 7 in) on trials. Her displacement was 24,644 long tons (25,039 t) at load, over 900 long tons (914 t) more than her designed displacement of 23,783 long tons (24,165 t). Imperatritsa Mariya proved to be very bow-heavy in service and tended to ship large amounts of water through her forward casemates. The ammunition for the forward 12-inch guns was reduced from 100 to 70 rounds each while the 130 mm ammunition was reduced from 245 to 100 rounds per gun in an attempt to compensate for her trim. This did not fully cure the problem, but Imperatritsa Mariya was lost before any other changes could be implemented. This did not fully cure the problem so Volia's, as she was known by then, forward pair of 130 mm guns were removed while she was fitting out. Imperatritsa Ekaterina Velikaya did not suffer from the same degree of trim by the bow by virtue of her greater size and retained her forward guns. ### Propulsion The two Russud-built ships were fitted with four Parsons-type steam turbines imported from John Brown & Company of the United Kingdom while Imperatritsa Ekaterina Velikaya's turbines were built by ONZiV with technical assistance from Vickers Limited. They were designed for a total of 26,000 shaft horsepower (19,388 kW) (27,000 shp (20,134 kW) in Imperatritsa Ekaterina Velikaya), but produced over 33,000 shp (24,608 kW) on trials. 20 mixed-firing triangular Yarrow water-tube boilers powered the turbines at a working pressure of 17.5 atm (1,773 kPa; 257 psi). Their designed speed was 21 knots. Their maximum coal capacity ranged from 1,700 to 2,300 long tons (1,727 to 2,337 t) plus 420 to 630 long tons (427 to 640 t) of fuel oil which gave them a range of approximately 1,640 nautical miles (3,037 km; 1,887 mi) at full speed or 2,960 nautical miles (5,482 km; 3,406 mi) at economical speed. All of their electrical power was generated by three main Curtis 360 kilowatt turbo generators and two 200 kilowatt auxiliary units. ### Armament The main armament of the Imperatritsa Mariya-class consisted of a dozen Obukhovskii 12-inch (305 mm) Pattern 1907 52-caliber guns mounted in four triple turrets distributed the length of the ship. The guns were identical to those used in the Gangut-class ships, but the turrets were of a new and roomier design. The fore and aft turrets could traverse a total of 310° while the middle turrets covered an arc of 130° on each side. The guns could be depressed to −5° and elevated to 25° and could be loaded at any angle between −5° and +15°; their rate of fire was supposed to three rounds per minute up to 15° of elevation. The turrets could elevate at 3–4° per second and traverse at a rate of 3.2° per second. 100 rounds per gun were carried at full load. The guns fired 470.9-kilogram (1,038 lb) projectiles at a muzzle velocity of 762 m/s (2,500 ft/s); this provided a maximum range of 23,230 meters (25,400 yd). The secondary armament consisted of twenty 130-millimeter (5.1 in)/55-caliber B7 Pattern 1913 guns mounted in casemates. They were arranged in two groups, six guns per side from the forward turret to the rear funnel and the remaining four clustered around the rear turret. Three guns per side were situated to fire ahead as that was the most likely direction of attack by torpedo boats as anticipated by the Naval General Staff. Their rate of fire ranged from five to eight rounds per minute and they were provided with 245 rounds per gun. They had a maximum range of about 15,364 meters (16,802 yd) with a 36.86-kilogram (81.3 lb) shell at a muzzle velocity of 823 m/s (2,700 ft/s). No anti-aircraft (AA) armament was originally planned. In October 1916, the Naval Ministry specified that four 37-caliber 4-inch (102 mm) guns of a new design were to be fitted, but they never entered service. The two older ships had three or four 50-caliber 75-millimeter (3 in) Pattern 1892 guns mounted on turret roofs. The 75 mm gun had maximum elevation of 50°. It fired a 12.63-pound (5.73 kg) shell at a muzzle velocity of 2,450 ft/s (750 m/s) at a rate of fire of 12–15 rounds per minute. It had a maximum ceiling of less than 16,000 ft (4,900 m). Volia used four of the newer 30-caliber 76.2-millimeter (3 in) 'Lender' AA guns, mounted on the fore and aft turrets. This had a maximum depression of 5° and a maximum elevation of 65°. It fired a 14.33-pound (6.50 kg) shell at a muzzle velocity of 1,929 ft/s (588 m/s). It had a rate of fire of 10–12 rounds per minute and had a maximum ceiling of 19,000 ft (5,800 m). Four underwater 17.7-inch (450 mm) torpedo tubes were also fitted, two on each broadside in a compartment immediately abaft the forward magazine. Imperatritsa Mariya's trials revealed problems with her magazine cooling systems where the heat generated by the ventilation system mostly negated the cooling effects of the refrigeration system. Her sisters shared this problem, which may have contributed to the magazine fire suffered by Imperatritsa Mariya that led to her loss in 1916. The two older ships mounted Zeiss 5-meter (16 ft 5 in) rangefinders on each conning tower, but Volia was given four 18-foot (5.5 m) Barr and Stroud rangefinders, one for each turret. These would provide data for the central artillery post to calculate, using the standard Geisler mechanical computer, and then transmit to the guns for the gun crew to follow. ### Armor The full-scale armor trials with the hulk of the old pre-dreadnought battleship Chesma greatly affected the armor protection of the Imperatritsa Mariya-class ships. The Krupp cemented armor plates were sized to match the frames to provide support for their joints and they were locked together by a type of mortise and tenon joint to better distribute the shock of a shell's impact. The waterline belt had a maximum thickness of 262.5 millimeters (10.33 in). It was continued forward and aft of the citadel by plates 217 millimeters (8.5 in) and 175 millimeters (6.9 in) thick. These reduced to 125 millimeters (4.9 in) and then to 75 millimeters just before the bow. Aft the belt thinned to 125 millimeters all the way to the stern. It had a total height of 5.25 meters (17.2 ft), 3.5 meters (11 ft) of which was above the design waterline and 1.75 meters (5 ft 9 in) below. It was backed by 75 millimeters of wood to make a better fit between the hull and the armor. The forward end of the citadel was protected by other armor and the transverse bulkhead was therefore only 25.4 millimeters (1.00 in) thick, barely enough to consider as splinter protection. However, the rear bulkhead had no other protection and was 100 millimeters (3.9 in) thick. These thin bulkheads left the end magazines very vulnerable to shells fired from bearings in front of or behind the ship. The upper belt was 100 millimeters (3.9 in) thick and had a height of 2.7 millimeters (0.11 in). It thinned to 75 mm forward of the casemates all the way to the bow. The casemates were also protected by a 25 millimeters (0.98 in) transverse bulkhead from axial fire as well as a 25 mm screen between each casemate. Behind the side armor was an inboard longitudinal splinter bulkhead that was 50 millimeters (2.0 in) thick, but the casemates had their own separate 25 mm splinter bulkhead. The main gun turrets had sides 250 millimeters (9.8 in) thick with 125 mm roofs. 50 mm plates protected the gun ports and 25-millimeter (0.98 in) bulkheads separated each gun. The barbettes were 250 mm thick, but reduced to 125 mm below the upper deck, except in the forward and rear turrets which thinned only to 150 millimeters (5.9 in). The forward conning tower sides were 300 millimeters (11.8 in) thick with a 200 millimeters (7.9 in) roof and 250 mm supporting tube which reduced to 100 mm below the upper deck. The rear conning tower also had 300 mm sides and a 250 mm support tube, but the roof was only 100 mm thick. The funnel uptakes were protected by 75 mm of armor above the upper deck, but this reduced to 19 millimeters (0.75 in) below it. The upper deck was 37.5 millimeters (1.48 in) thick while the middle deck was 25 mm thick over the armored citadel. Outside the citadel the middle deck was 37.5 mm thick and the lower deck was 25 mm thick. Underwater protection was minimal as there was only an unarmored watertight bulkhead behind the upwards extension of the double bottom. ## Construction All three ships were laid down on 30 October 1911, but this was just a ceremonial event as the design had not yet been finalized nor the contracts signed. A contract was finally signed on 13 April 1912 with Russud that specified delivery dates of 2 September 1915 for both Imperatritsa Mariya and Imperator Aleksander III. Imperatritsa Ekaterina Velikaya was built to a larger design that added over two million gold rubles to her cost and delayed the start of her construction three months after her half-sisters. Despite the demanding schedule the ships suffered from a number of delays during construction. On 10 February 1914 changes were ordered by the Naval Ministry to incorporate the lessons learned from the full-scale armor trials conducted using the Chesma. This added almost 500 long tons (508 t) of weight to the ships and raised their cost by 220,000–250,000 rubles. Other delays were incurred after the war began as imported components took longer to reach the shipyards and factories switched over to war production. The construction of Imperator Aleksander III was deliberately delayed in order to accelerate the completion of her two sisters and some of her turrets were transferred to Imperatritsa Mariya as well. ## Service history ### Imperatritsa Mariya Imperatritsa Mariya (Russian: Императрица Мария, "Empress Maria") was launched on 19 October 1913 and arrived in Sevastopol on 13 July 1915, where she completed her fitting out during the next few months and conducted sea trials. She provided cover while the pre-dreadnought battleships conducted shore bombardment missions in October 1915. She encountered the ex-German light cruiser Midilli twice during 1916, but the cruiser escaped with nothing more than splinter damage. On 20 October 1916, she capsized and sank in Sevastopol harbor after a magazine fire and subsequent explosion. Following a complex salvage operation, she was eventually raised and placed in drydock in May 1918. However, in the chaos of the Russian Revolution and subsequent Civil War, no further repair work was done, and the ship was scrapped beginning in 1926. Her guns and their turrets, which had fallen out of the ship when she capsized, were later salvaged in 1931–1933. Two of the guns were used in the 30th Coast Defense Battery defending Sevastopol during World War II, also known as Maksim Gor'kii I by the Germans. ### Imperatritsa Ekaterina Velikaya Imperatritsa Ekaterina Velikaya (Russian: Императрица Екатерина Великая, "Empress Catherine the Great") was launched on 6 June 1914 and completed on 18 October 1915. She was originally named Ekaterina II until 27 June 1915 and was renamed Svobodnaya Rossiya (Russian: Free Russia) in 1917. She engaged the German battlecruiser SMS Goeben while the latter was in Turkish service as Yavuz Sultan Selim only once, but failed to inflict anything more severe than splinter damage. She also encountered Midilli on 16 April 1916, but the cruiser used her higher speed to escape. She was scuttled on 18 June 1918 in Novorossiysk to prevent her from being turned over to the Germans as required by the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. No attempt was made to salvage her during the 1920s, but the 12-inch shells were salvaged from her wreck until a magazine explosion was triggered in 1930 by the explosive charges used to gain access to the shells. ### Imperator Aleksander III Imperator Aleksander III (Russian: Император Александр Третий, Emperor Alexander III) was launched on 2 April 1914, renamed Volya (Ukrainian: Воля—Freedom) in 1917 and then General Alekseyev (Russian: Генерал Алексеев) in 1920. The ship did not take part in operations during World War I due to long delays in the delivery of its machinery from Britain, but was able to go to sea by 1917 and conduct a series of trials. On 1 May 1918 she sailed from Sevastopol to Novorossiysk to avoid capture by advancing German troops. While at Novorossiysk she received an order to scuttle on 19 June 1918, but the majority of the crew refused to do so and decided to return to Sevastopol. Upon arrival she was disarmed and only guards were left on board, but the Germans took control on 1 October. She made a brief cruise with a German crew on 15 October, but her guns were still inoperable. After Germany's surrender she was turned over to the British, who moved her to İzmit in Turkey. In 1919 the British brought her back to the Black Sea and turned her over to the White Russian forces, where she fought in the Russian Civil War against the Red Army, mainly carrying out shore bombardments. With the collapse of the White Russian armies in Southern Russia in 1920, the battleship assisted in their evacuation to French-owned Tunisia, where she was interned in Bizerte. She was eventually scrapped there to pay her docking fees. The French stored her guns and later donated them to the Finns during the Winter War, although they did not arrive until after the end of the war. The Germans captured four of these 12-inch and some 130 mm guns in transit in Narvik harbor when they invaded Norway in April 1940. Both the Finns and Germans used these guns as coastal artillery. The Germans emplaced all four guns, after rebuilding them to accept German ammunition, in armored turrets in 'Batterie Mirus' on Guernsey. The Finns used three of the 12-inch guns to repair railway guns that had fallen into their hands in 1941. They were used throughout the Continuation War and the Finns were forced in 1944 to surrender them to the Soviets who used them until the 1990s. ## See also - Naval warfare of World War I#Black Sea
31,072,343	Delta County Courthouse	1,054,575,813	Historic courthouse building in Texas, United States	[ "Art Deco architecture in Texas", "Art Deco courthouses", "Buildings and structures in Delta County, Texas", "County courthouses in Texas" ]	The Delta County Courthouse is a historic, three-story courthouse building in the city of Cooper, in Delta County, Texas, United States. The building is located at 200 West Dallas Avenue, and functions as the meeting place for the county government. The building also houses all of the county records. The county's first courthouse was built in 1873, in Cooper. A courthouse was built to replace the original in 1898. After the Great Depression, the new courthouse was built by the Works Progress Administration (WPA), helping the community to grow. The building has remained virtually unchanged since. ## History ### Background During the Texas Constitutional Convention of 1868, the delegates paid attention to northeastern portion of the state, especially the increasing need for the creation of new counties in the region. At the time, there were a total of twenty counties located in the region, compared to twenty-three presently. The convention originally met to write a new state constitution, but members quickly tried to shift the focus to other issues. During the convention, the Committee on Counties and County Boundaries presented proposals for the creation of three new counties in the region. They were to be called Delta, Webster, and Richland. Delta County was established on July 29, 1870, by the Twelfth State Legislature. The proposals for Webster and Richland counties, however, were not passed. ### Creation and development After Delta County was established, it held its first election on October 6, 1870. The first five members of the county commissioners board were chosen in the election. Cooper was established as the county seat for the newly formed county. However, a courthouse was not established for the county government until 1873. Constructed in the county seat, the courthouse was built in the town square. Confederate and Union veterans of the Civil War planted pecan trees on the square around the courthouse, to symbolize the end of conflict. The building, which was two stories tall, was designed by architects R.C. Andrews and E. Blackwell, for a price of approximately \$6000 (equivalent to \$ in 2023). In 1898, the newly incorporated city of Cooper passed a \$40,000 bond (equivalent to \$ in 2023) to begin construction of a new, three-story brick courthouse. While construction of the new courthouse was underway, the original courthouse was destroyed in a fire. Construction of the second courthouse was completed in 1900. Delta County's economy plummeted in 1926 when the local cotton crop failed. The county's economy was slow to recover, finally reaching a steady level in the late 1930s. In 1940, the Works Progress Administration (WPA) began working on improving several items in Delta County. Among these projects was the demolition of the existing courthouse and the construction of a new one. The new courthouse was built at a cost of \$110,450 (equivalent to \$ in 2023). The courthouse was designed by architect Hook Smith. The building was constructed in a modern architecture style, and is three stories tall. The present courthouse was constructed two blocks west of the previous building, on the site of the former Blackwell Livery Stable, which had closed in 1912. The site of the former courthouse is still surrounded by the brick roads that were constructed for the courthouse and is now home to a gazebo. ## Location and usage The present courthouse is located at 200 West Dallas Avenue, two blocks west of the center of the city of Cooper. The building and its property take up half of the city block. It is bordered by Texas State Highway 154 (Dallas Avenue) to the south, Bonham Avenue to the north, NW 2nd Street to the east, and a small alleyway to the west. The courthouse is located slightly south of the geographic center of Delta County. The courthouse serves as the offices for most of the county government, including the county judge, commissioners' court, county auditor, clerk, sheriff, and the justice of the peace. The court also houses all of the county's historical records. ## See also - List of county courthouses in Texas
4,894,893	Carnosaur (film)	1,173,719,791	1993 film by Adam Simon	[ "1990s American films", "1990s English-language films", "1990s monster movies", "1990s science fiction horror films", "1993 films", "1993 horror films", "American monster movies", "American science fiction horror films", "American splatter films", "Films about dinosaurs", "Films about genetic engineering", "Films based on Australian novels", "Films based on science fiction novels", "Films based on urban legends", "Films produced by Roger Corman", "Mad scientist films", "Mockbuster films" ]	Carnosaur is a 1993 American science fiction horror film written and directed by Adam Simon. The film stars Diane Ladd, Raphael Sbarge, Jennifer Runyon, and Harrison Page. Loosely based on the 1984 John Brosnan novel of the same name, it follows characters Doc Smith and Ann Thrush in their efforts to thwart Dr. Jane Tiptree's plan to exterminate the human race with a lethal virus and replace them with her own genetically created dinosaurs. Roger Corman acquired the rights to Brosnan's novel in 1991 and the project entered production two years later to capitalize on an extensive marketing campaign used to promote Jurassic Park. Simon was hired to direct Carnosaur and is credited with writing the screenplay, reworking most of the plot elements of the novel. Afforded an \$850,000 budget, the special effects were completed with models and animatronics largely designed by John Carl Buechler. Carnosaur was released on May 14, 1993, in Ogden, Utah and then released regionally in the United States one day later and grossed \$1.8 million. The film was panned by critics. Roger Ebert named it the worst movie of 1993, though his colleague Gene Siskel liked the film. The film has since gained a cult following as a "mockbuster". Carnosaur has spawned a film series and was followed by two sequels, Carnosaur 2 (1995) and Carnosaur 3: Primal Species (1996); the series also includes two official spin-offs Raptor (2001) and The Eden Formula (2006). ## Plot Dr. Jane Tiptree has withdrawn from public life to conduct sequestered research for the Eunice Corporation. DARPA is wary of her work with genetically modified chickens but cannot legally interfere in her research. While in transport, one of Tiptree's chickens hatches a reptilian creature, which kills the driver and escapes. Meanwhile, near her laboratory in the small town of Climax, Nevada, the populace begin suffering from a mysterious illness with flu-like symptoms. At a nearby quarry, watchman Doc Smith protects excavation equipment from environmentalists. He reports a trespasser, Ann Thrush, but Sheriff Fowler is investigating a series of gruesome killings, perpetrated by Tiptree's missing creature, a Deinonychus. Among the victims is the daughter of Eunice employee Jesse Paloma, but before he raises any suspicion to her research, Tiptree lures him into a laser-protected dinosaur pen where a fully grown Tyrannosaurus rex kills him. Despite the deaths, Thrush and a group of activists handcuff themselves to excavation equipment in a form of protest. They're attacked by the Deinonychus and everyone except Thrush is slaughtered. Still in shock, Thrush is brought back by Doc to his trailer, where she survives another attack by the creature. Doc discovers a truck with two corpses belonging to Eunice and contacts Tiptree on the vehicle's radio, deducing the creature originated from her facility. As he approaches the lab, Fowler discovers a dinosaur embryo in a carton of eggs and takes it for investigation. Doc infiltrates Tiptree's laboratory and, at gunpoint, she reveals her experiment subjects to him. The town's mysterious illness is caused by infected chicken eggs, which contain a lethal airborne virus that impregnates women with dinosaur embryos. Her objective is to exterminate the human race and enable dinosaurs to repopulate the Earth. News of the town's deaths reach Eunice sponsors, who trace it to Tiptree. In response, the government places the community under quarantine and resolves to kill all civilians on sight. With the illness rapidly spreading, Fowler responds to a disturbance at a pet shop. He confronts the Deinonychus, but both he and the dinosaur suffer fatal wounds in the exchange. Top governmental officials, in a secure underground bunker, also begin plotting the repopulation of the human race in response to the virus; they envision a new social order propagated by strict fertilization policies and artificial wombs. At the laboratory, Doc attempts to escape with a cure to the illness and mistakenly enters the dinosaur pen. Tiptree releases the T. rex which pursues Doc out of the facility. Infected herself, Tiptree births a dinosaur and succumbs to the illness. Doc returns to Thrush, who's been exposed to the illness. The T. rex enters the quarry where Doc uses a loader to battle it. He disembowels and kills the T. rex with Thrush's assistance. After injecting her with the serum, Doc is killed by government soldiers alerted to his presence, and both his and Thrush's bodies are burned. ## Cast - Diane Ladd as Dr. Jane Tiptree - Raphael Sbarge as "Doc" Smith - Jennifer Runyon as Ann Thrush - Harrison Page as Sheriff Fowler - Ned Bellamy as Fallon - Clint Howard as "Slim" Friar - Frank Novak as Jesse Paloma - Ed Williams as Dr. Raven - Brent Hinkley as Peregrine - Martha Hackett as Miss Kroghe ## Production John Brosnan's 1984 science fiction novel Carnosaur first came to the attention of Roger Corman during the author's book signing tour. Brosnan was first approached to write the screenplay in mid-1991 by Corman's wife, Julie, who agreed to meet and they formalized a deal at a bar, written on some napkins. Although Corman secured the rights to produce Carnosaur, the project advanced only when he learned that Jurassic Park was entering production. According to co-producer Mike Elliot, Corman "felt that now was the time to shoot our movie, because he knew he could make the movie faster than anybody else and get it out there first". Adam Simon, a frequent collaborator with Corman, was tasked with directing Carnosaur and writing its screenplay. The crew was allocated more time to carry out their work than was typical for a Corman production, with Simon having six months for research and writing. On a small budget, his screenplay ignored key plot elements of the novel and reduced the large variety of dinosaur species to two. According to Corman, the main antagonist Dr. Jane Tiptree was originally envisioned for a male actor who had a "great deal of strength and at the same time an intelligent person". With no one available, Corman rewrote the character as a woman and offered it to Diane Ladd having previously worked together in the 1966 film, The Wild Angels. TV Guide considered the hiring of Ladd—the mother of Jurassic Park star Laura Dern—a "casting coup". Other cast members included Raphael Sbarge and Jennifer Runyon. On an \$850,000 budget, principal photography lasted 18 days. Sbarge expressed his enthusiasm to work alongside Ladd, who had an ability to "bring a real sense of believability to the role". He also recalled, with Carnosaur limited by its special effects budget, that the cast's most daunting task was "making all this seem real" for the audience. ### Special effects Carnosaur'''s special effects were largely designed by John Carl Buechler. Because Corman felt that stop-motion techniques and optical effects would interfere with filming, Buechler agreed with him that all the creatures would be "real-time" models. In constructing the dinosaurs, he hired Mike Jones to sculpt the Deinonychus and Jeff Farley to sculpt the Tyrannosaurus rex. The first creature constructed for the film, Farley's three-foot T. rex animatronic puppet, served as the basis for an unused suit model and the full-scale prop. A system of hinges and cables was used to operate the creature and radio-operated eyes. With seven weeks of pre-production spent sculpting the puppet, the special effects team was left with three weeks to construct a life-size T. rex model. The design of the creature was reminiscent of classic B movie T. rex of the 1950s. The crew cut and pasted sheets of L200, a sturdy, light polyurethane, for its innards, which were then covered with polyurethane foam skin; the final creature was 16 feet (4.9 m) tall, 25 feet (7.6 m) long, and weighted 450 pounds (200 kg). In Carnosaurs penultimate fight scene, with Doc Smith fighting the creature in a shiploader, the production used both the puppet and life-sized model. Buechler later commented the scene was "nearly shot for shot modeled on the finale of Aliens". Some shots were accomplished with the puppet being filmed in a miniature set which featured scale models of Doc Smith and the shiploader. Buechler and his crew designed the scaled T. rex in order to use forced perspective camera techniques, but only a few forced-perspective shots were actually included in the film. ## Release The Hollywood Reporter stated that the film was originally scheduled to open on June 11, 1993, the same day as Jurassic Park. A week later the same magazine announced that Corman was expected to premiere the film on May 13, at the Wilshire Theater in Ogden, Utah, to coincide with the city's new George S. Eccles Dinosaur Park. The film was shown in Ogden on May 13 and received a regional release on May 14, 1993. Corman planned to release Carnosaur before Jurassic Park to capitalize on the latter's big-budget marketing campaign. The film opened in 65 theatres four weeks before Jurassic Park but was mainly a home media release. In its limited theatrical run, Carnosaur became a surprise small box office success, earning \$1.8 million in total. The film was first released on DVD by New Concorde Home Entertainment in April 2000. All three films in the series were released in The Carnosaur Collection in 2001. New Concorde reissued Carnosaur on DVD, along with its sequel in 2003. ### Reception Brosnan credited Carnosaur with raising awareness of his novel but stated that the dinosaurs were "laughable" compared to those in Jurassic Park, and "I will no doubt take the lead in shouting abuse at the screen". Leonard Maltin was critical of what he considered a largely forgettable film, saying its only notoriety will be as "1993's 'other' dinosaur movie". John Petrakis of Chicago Tribune described the film as "convoluted, obtuse and eventually nonsensical" and undermined by its creature models. Variety'''s Leonard Klady compared Carnosaur to B movie creature films released in the 1950s and surmised it was "destined for a quick trip to the tar pits of video shelves and cable screenings". The Los Angeles Times contributor Kevin Thomas remarked that the film takes itself too seriously and, with consideration to its modest budget, opined that "technically, Carnosaur, looks good, and to its credit, it has a refreshingly cynical finish". In the Deseret News, Chris Hicks wrote that the film could have been "campy and fun" had it not been for its slow pacing and gore. Roger Ebert named it as the worst film he saw in 1993, but Gene Siskel liked the movie and gave it a thumbs-up on their show (ironically, Roger also liked Gene's pick for the worst 1993 movie, Cop and a Half). On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 11% based on 9 reviews, with an average rating of 3.22/10. Scott Meslow of The Week called Carnosaur bold for inviting comparisons to Jurassic Park, despite its limitations; he described the film as a "cheaper, stupider, bloodier, crazier" version of Jurassic Park. AllMovies Brian J. Dillard wrote the effects were poor, but enjoyable, while Daniel Dockery of Syfy felt that Buechler's work and creature designs were underrated. A review in TV Guide described Carnosaur as "a low-budget attempt to cash in on the success of an expensive studio film", but still thought the screenplay was cleverly written. ## Sequels and spin-offs Carnosaur 2 was filmed and released in 1994. Buechler returned to work on the film and reused the creature models from the original: "They're the same dinosaurs. They're just shot the way they were designed to be shot", he explained. Carnosaur 2 is considered to be an improvement over the original, both in its cinematography and special effects. A second sequel was released in 1996, Carnosaur 3: Primal Species. Two spin-off films, Raptor and The Eden Formula, were released in 2001 and 2006, respectively. ## Trivia Diane Ladd is Laura Dern's mother. Dern portrayed Dr. Ellie Sattler in Jurassic Park in the same year that Carnosaur was released. ## See also - List of films featuring dinosaurs
64,624,707	August (song)	1,173,096,943	2020 song by Taylor Swift	[ "2020 songs", "2020s ballads", "Dream pop songs", "Pop ballads", "Song recordings produced by Jack Antonoff", "Song recordings produced by Joe Alwyn", "Song recordings produced by Taylor Swift", "Songs written by Jack Antonoff", "Songs written by Taylor Swift", "Taylor Swift songs" ]	"August" (stylized in all lowercase) is a song by American singer-songwriter Taylor Swift, taken from her eighth studio album, Folklore (2020). Swift wrote and produced "August" with Jack Antonoff; Joe Alwyn was credited as a co-producer. The track is a dream pop and guitar pop ballad, with a production featuring soft rock guitars, strings, and vocal reverberation. Journalists consider "August" the signature song of the month of August, as the song experiences resurgence on various charts during the month. Alongside fellow tracks "Cardigan" and "Betty", "August" constitutes a fictitious love triangle involving three points of view: those of Betty, James, and an unnamed female character. The song is written from the latter's perspective, depicting her sorrow over her derailed summer romance with James, who abandoned her and reconciled with Betty. Swift, in her 2020 concert documentary Folklore: The Long Pond Studio Sessions, said that she personally calls the unnamed narrator "Augustine" or "Augusta". Critics lauded the song's instrumentation and lyrics, with some of them picking it as a standout on Folklore and a career highlight for Swift. "August" has charted within the top 40 of the singles charts in Australia, Canada, Ireland, Malaysia, Singapore, and the United States. In the US, the song peaked at number 23 on the US Billboard Hot 100 and number five on the Billboard Hot Rock & Alternative Songs. At the 63rd Annual Grammy Awards on March 14, 2021, Swift performed it as part of a medley with "Cardigan" and "Willow", the lead single off of Folklore's sister record, Evermore (2020). ## Background and production Taylor Swift and producer Jack Antonoff had written and produced songs for Swift's previous studio albums 1989 (2014), Reputation (2017), and Lover (2019). They collaborated again on Folklore, which Swift surprise-released amid the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. Folklore was released on July 24, 2020, through Republic Records. Swift wrote or co-wrote all songs on the album, and Swift and Antonoff produced six, including "August". For the song, Antonoff produced the instrumental first, and sent it to Swift who wrote the lyrics "on the spot; it just was an intuitive thing". As with other tracks of Folklore, Swift created "August" based on a fictional narrative with imagined story arcs and characters. ## Lyrics and composition Swift wrote "August" as part of three Folklore songs (together with "Cardigan" and "Betty") that explore a love triangle between James, Betty, and Augustine. It was the first song of the three that Swift wrote. According to Swift, she wanted to explore the idea of a girl in an undefined relationship: the lyrics are in the viewpoint of "August", who falls in love with James, who is already in a relationship with someone else. The song was inspired by what Swift described as the image of "the sun drenched month of August, sipped away like a bottle of wine". Throughout the song, imagery of late summer is prevalent: "Your back beneath the sun / Wishing I could write my name on it." Set in a suburban area with "salt air", "August" captures feelings of a teenage girl who goes through an unrequited love in the summer. She naively believes that she is in love, pondering on her summer romance: "August sipped away like a bottle of wine / Because you were never mine." While the narrators of "Cardigan" and "Betty" are explicitly named, the narrator of "August" is never mentioned by name, which Vulture's Nate Jones considered a highlight of her "relative unimportance in her lover's life". Swift said that she did not determine a name for the protagonist of "August", calling her "Augusta" or "Augustine" inside her head. As the summer romance progresses, the narrator is portrayed as unassertive and inexperienced, recalling the times when she "canceled my plans just in case you'd call". Though she knows she and James will never become a couple, she tells herself that it was enough "to live for the hope of it all". She attempts to run away with James: "Remember when I pulled up and said 'Get in the car' / And then canceled my plans just in case you'd call?" Finally, when the summer ends, so does the romance, and the narrator is left with a revelation: "You weren't mine to lose." Swift explained that after this summer romance, James and Betty later return to each other, while the "August" protagonist mourns the summer fling which she considered love. Compared to the overarching folk sound of Folklore, "August" displays a more pop-oriented production. Aaron Dessner, a producer on Folklore, characterized it as the album's "closest thing to a pop song. It gets loud. It has this shimmering summer haze to it." Musically, "August" is a gloomy dream pop and guitar pop ballad incorporating 1990s-influenced guitars, vocal reverberation, and key changes. Its guitar arrangements are soft rock oriented. In The A.V. Club, Annie Zaleski noted the song features "shivering" string instruments, keyboards, and minimal synthesizers, and "subtle splotchy grooves". Writing for The Guardian, Laura Snapes wrote: "Her vocal trademarks remain in the yo-yoing vocal yelps." The outro of "August" is a "full orchestra major chord climax" according to Lucy Harbron of Clash. ## Commercial performance Upon the release of Folklore, "August" debuted on various singles charts worldwide. In the United States, the song entered at number 23 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart dated August 8, 2020. It charted on the Hot 100 for two consecutive weeks. The song simultaneously debuted and peaked at number five on the Billboard Hot Rock & Alternative Songs, where it stayed for 20 weeks on the chart. "August" experienced a 39 percent gain in streams in the US in the 2021 month of August. In 2022, the song resurged once again the same month, with its daily streams skyrocketing 277 percent. Billboard called it Swift's "seasonal streaming perennial" similar to Mariah Carey's "All I Want for Christmas Is You" (1994). "August" peaked within the top 20 on singles charts of Malaysia (11), Singapore (12), Australia (13), and Canada (16), upon release. In Ireland, the song arrived on the Irish Singles Chart for the first time in August 2021, debuting at number 74, and reached a new peak of number 38 in August 2022. "August" first debuted on the UK Singles Chart in 2022 at number 78. ## Live performances At the 63rd Annual Grammy Awards on March 14, 2021, Swift performed "August" as part of a medley with "Cardigan" and "Willow", the latter was taken from her album Evermore. The performance was accompanied by the Folklore producers Jack Antonoff and Aaron Dessner, marking the first time the three performed together. She began with "Cardigan", singing while laying atop a cottage, before performing "August" on a guitar inside the cottage, accompanied by instruments from Antonoff and Dessner. The trio then stepped outside the cottage to perform the last song, "Willow". Music journalist Rob Sheffield ranked Swift's performance first on his list of the "10 Reasons We Loved the 2021 Grammys." Rolling Stone listed it as one of the top-five greatest Grammy performances of all time. "August" was included on the set list for the Eras Tour (2023). ## In popular culture "August" was featured in the first trailer for the second season of the Prime Video original series, The Summer I Turned Pretty, released on June 8, 2023. The song experiences hiked popularity and resurgence on various charts during August each year, also garnering a range of viral memes on the internet. Publications such as Billboard and The A.V. Club opined that the month of August is one amongst the things Swift "owns". ## Critical reception Critics praised the song's production and Swift's songwriting, and opined that the third-person perspective of its lyrics—a departure from Swift's trademark confessional narratives inspired by her personal life—showcased her maturity as a songwriter. Valerie Magan from Clash remarked that the lyrics feel "vouyeristic, as we lean in to hear all the stories that 'innocent-era' Swift would've kept secret". The same magazine's Lucy Harbron lauded Swift's ability to portray "niche" emotions and her storytelling prowess. Music journalist Jody Rosen, in a review for the Los Angeles Times, appreciated the shift from "pure first-person subjectivity" to fictional narratives. Rolling Stone critic Rob Sheffield picked "August" as one of the album's highlights, calling the song "the album's most plainly beautiful ballad". He placed it fifth on his 2021 ranking of all the 199 songs of Swift's discography. Ellen Johnson from Paste labeled the track one of the best in Swift's discography as well. The A.V. Club's Annie Zaleski and Under the Radar's Caleb Campbell both selected the song as one of Folklore's best and compared the production to the music by Scottish dream pop band Cocteau Twins. The latter commented that the track serves as a testament to Swift's abilities of "writing the undeniably catchy hooks that make for a great pop song". While acknowledging Swift's indie reinvention on Folklore, Pitchfork's Jillian Mapes opined that "August", along with other songs produced by Antonoff, are not really radical transformations, however still display signs of maturity. On behalf on Consequence of Sound, Katie Moulton was somewhat disappointed that the song's theme is not far from Swift's trademark "pop-culture tropes", but found certain lyrics original enough to "refresh the clichés". The Observer's Kitty Empire was more reserved in her praise and said "August", although a solid song, did not expand beyond Swift's comfort zone. "August" featured on lists of the best songs of 2020 by publications including Rolling Stone (No. 5), the Chicago Tribune (unranked), and Yahoo! (unranked). Complex's Edwin Ortiz ranked it second on his year-end list. In Vulture's list ranking all songs in Swift's discography, Jones wrote about "August": "Even in fiction, Swift's ability to capture the wistful ache of nostalgia remains unmatched." Sheffield picked it among the best five songs of Swift's discography: " 'August' feels like such a simple tune, yet it's one of the craftiest creations in the Swiftian Multiverse." Insider's Callie Ahlgrim named "August" as The Best Song of 2020. ## Credits and personnel Credits are adapted from Tidal. - Taylor Swift – vocals, songwriter, producer - Jack Antonoff – producer, songwriter, recording, live drums, percussion programming, electric guitar, acoustic guitar - Joe Alwyn – producer - Evan Smith – saxophones, flute, electric guitar, keyboards - Bobby Hawk – strings - Laura Sisk – recording - Mike Williams – string recording - Jon Gautier – string recording - Jonathan Low – mixing, synth bass, synth bass recording - Randy Merrill – mastering ## Charts ### Weekly charts ### Year-end charts ## Certifications
1,537,153	108 St Georges Terrace	1,147,280,639	Skyscraper in Perth, Western Australia	[ "Bank buildings in Australia", "Office buildings completed in 1988", "Skyscraper office buildings in Perth, Western Australia", "St Georges Terrace", "William Street, Perth" ]	108 St Georges Terrace or South32 Tower (formerly known as the Bankwest Tower, the Bond Tower and the R&I Tower) is a 50-storey office tower in Perth, Western Australia. Completed in 1988, the building measures 214 metres (702 ft) to its roof and 247 metres (810 ft) to the tip of its communications antenna. It was the tallest building in Perth from its completion in 1988 until 1992 when it was overtaken in height by Central Park. As of 2023, it is the third-tallest building in the city. The concrete tower has a distinctive profile, with a triangular plan. The site occupied by the tower was home to the Palace Hotel, and organised opposition was formed to try to save that building from demolition to make way for an office tower. The site was subsequently acquired by businessman Alan Bond and the tower was approved and constructed in a plan that would retain much of the Palace Hotel. The tower then remained the headquarters of Bond's companies until their collapse. The tower has also been the headquarters of Bankwest (formerly known as the R&I Bank), between its completion and 2012. As of 2015, it is now the headquarters of mining company South32. ## History ### Pre-1978 The tower's prime location at the corner of William Street and St Georges Terrace was the site of the first licensed premises in Perth from the 1830s. The then-opulent Palace Hotel opened on this corner in 1897 during the days of the Western Australian gold rush, and developed a "colourful" history, hosting numerous celebrities of the time. The plot was purchased by the Commonwealth Banking Corporation, which announced in 1972 that it planned to redevelop the site as high-rise offices. During the 1950s and 1960s, many of Perth's older buildings had been demolished to make way for modern developments, which led to wide criticism of the Perth City Council for approving such redevelopments. In this atmosphere, wide public protest resulted and a lobby group of concerned citizens calling themselves "The Palace Guards" worked to save the historic building. This outcry led to condemnation of the plans and heritage listing of the property by the National Trust, and forced the Commonwealth Bank to ask the Federal Government to take the property off its hands. The property was subsequently purchased from the Commonwealth Bank by businessman Alan Bond in 1978 along with the adjacent Terrace Arcade. ### Bond Corporation and construction: 1978–1988 In 1980, Bond unveiled new plans for the redevelopment of the site. These plans made some effort at preservation of the Palace Hotel, by retaining the facade and main foyer area of the building. However, the construction of the modern office tower at the site's north-eastern corner required demolition of Terrace Arcade, the eastern accommodation wing and the hotel's renowned dining room. The rationale given for the works required was that extensive renovations to the Palace Hotel in 1915 and the 1930s had weakened its structure significantly, as well as problems controlling white ants in the structure. The development exceeded the acceptable plot ratio in the town planning scheme, however the Perth City Council pre-approved the plans nonetheless, on the condition that Bond Corporation kept the Palace Hotel operating as a hotel. Demolition of parts of the site commenced in August 1981, and by August 1983 construction had completed on the tower's foundation and three levels of underground parking. However, there were continuing doubts about the viability of the building, slowing the pace of the development. This changed on 7 September 1984 when R&I Bank Chairman David Fischer signed a joint venture agreement over the development with Austmark International, a subsidiary of Bond Corporation. The bank, which was at the time wholly owned by the Government of Western Australia, consulted then-Premier Brian Burke in deciding whether to invest in the project. Following the investment in the project by the bank, the developers successfully sought modification of the original planning approval by the Perth City Council to allow the use of the Palace Hotel as a bank, rather than remaining as a public hotel. With this permission, construction of the development by Multiplex proceeded, and floor space was leased rapidly; by October 1985 only four floors of the building remained for lease and it was expected to be fully let before completion. With construction finally proceeding once more, the Palace Hotel closed in June 1986. In April 1987, while the tower was still under construction, five men were arrested after illegally entering the site and parachuting from the top of the tower in the early hours of the morning. Construction proceeded at the rate of about one floor every eight to ten days. The construction of the tower took three years to complete, with the first occupants moving into the tower in July 1988. The tower was officially opened in October 1989. Construction of the building cost A\$120 million, up from the 1984 estimates of \$100 million. Upon its completion, the building was the 88th-tallest building in the world, the third-tallest in Australia and the tallest in Perth (overtaking St Martins Tower). It was also the eighth-tallest concrete skyscraper in the world. However, at this time there were already plans to build a taller building on the site of the former David Jones department store between Hay Street and St Georges Terrace, which became Central Park. ### After completion: 1988–2012 The top three floors of the building were occupied by Alan Bond's private investment company Dallhold Investments, which owned a majority stake in Bond Corporation. In November 1987, Alan Bond bought the Vincent van Gogh painting Irises and unveiled it in a purpose-built secure art gallery on the 49th floor of the tower on 23 December 1988. Amidst a worsening financial situation for the Bond companies, Bond Corporation sold its half share in the building to R&I Bank for \$108 million, making R&I Bank its outright owner. In 1991 amid the collapse of the Bond empire, Bond shifted his offices out of the tower, leaving the top three floors vacant. These floors then remained vacant for almost a decade. From when it opened, the tower was referred to as both the Bond Tower and the R&I Tower, owing to the presence of both logos on the building's exterior. The Bond Corporation logos were later removed from the tower, and by the end of 1994, the signage on the building was updated to match the new name and logo of its owner and head tenant, Bankwest. Bankwest sold the building in November 1994 for \$146 million to Jetcloud Pty Ltd, which was owned by AMP and UniSuper. However, Bankwest retained the head lease over the building, and in 2000 the Bank occupied around 20 floors. In 2002, Valad purchased a half-share in the tower for \$92.5 million, which it then sold to Stockland in early 2007. Meanwhile, Brookfield inherited its half-stake in the tower through its 2007 acquisition of Multiplex, who had merged with Ronin Property Group (the renamed AMP Office Trust) in late 2004. Bankwest announced in 2006 that it would not renew its lease, instead moving to a new tower proposed for Raine Square. Due to delays with the Raine Square development, Bankwest was forced in November 2009 to seek a 5-year renewal of its lease in the Bankwest Tower, the remainder of which will be taken on by Raine Square property developer Saracen Properties. Saracen Properties announced in May 2009 that they would not seek to renew their lease, and would vacate at the termination of their lease in November 2009. It was also revealed that the 50th floor office space once occupied by Alan Bond was still in the same condition as when he left in 1991, with Bond's former chair, desk and boardroom table available as part of the lease. Brookfield put its half share in the building up for sale in early 2008, however an offer for the tower by Luke Saraceni fell through and the half share in the tower was taken off the property market. Stockland divested their 50% holding via an asset swap in 2011, transferring full ownership of the tower to Brookfield in exchange for two residential projects. It was announced in January 2015 that base metal and mining company South32 would sign a 101⁄2-year lease for 8,300 square metres (89,000 sq ft) of office space, starting from May 2015. The company also took up the naming and rooftop signage rights for the tower. In 2017 a number of glass panels shattered dropping some glass fragments. In response the building owners installed temporary gantries to protect pedestrians while carrying out rectification works. In May 2022, Brookfield commenced a sale process for the building, with an expected price of \$350 million. The process was concluded in October 2022, with the building being sold for \$340 million to a 50/50 joint venture between Lendlease and Realside Financial. ## Design The tower was designed by architects Cameron Chisholm Nicol. The major parameter given to them in the planning of the building was that "all office areas should face the excellent views that exist of the Swan River". Working within this brief, they selected a triangular cross-section of the tower because it lent "itself to open plan office layouts" by allowing natural light to reach most parts of the working floors. Also, the stepped front of the building maximised the number of corner offices on each floor. The eastern and northern sides of the building are slip-formed concrete shear walls, and have fewer windows. These sides house the services of the building, including the lift shafts and stairwells. Some difficulty was encountered in the design stage with how to execute the diagonal slopes forming the top of these walls alongside the top five floors of the building, since a standard concrete pour was not possible. Instead, reinforced concrete panels were prefabricated elsewhere and subsequently attached to the structure. The floor plates of the tower are constructed from conventional reinforced concrete beams and slabs. The building's 14 passenger lifts are divided into three zones: low-rise (floors G-17), mid-rise (18–29) and high-rise (30–51), thought to be the first building in Australia to use such a configuration. The foyer of the tower was originally planned to be an open-air forecourt between the building and the remains of the Palace Hotel, however extensive aeroelastic wind testing of the structure by the Institute of Environmental Sciences at Murdoch University forced this area to be covered with a glass canopy. Mocks of the curtain walls to be used in the tower were also tested to 1.5 times the proof load to ensure they could withstand cyclone-force weather and seismic shocks. The building is clad with green-tinted double-pane glass on windows, with the service core and structure of the building covered with aluminium sheeting skin coated with a light grey fluoropolymer paint. Upon completion, the mass of the building above ground was 66,000 tonnes (146,000,000 lb). The building rests upon 43 belled concrete and steel piles, of average length 30 metres (98 ft), which go "through 3 layers of swamp" to solid siltstone bedrock. These piles range in diameter from 2.5 metres (8 ft 2 in) to 2.9 metres (9 ft 6 in). The basement of the building has a depth of 16 metres (52 ft), and has a 0.5-metre (1 ft 8 in) thick diaphragm wall to prevent water ingress. While the building was under construction, on 21 September 1987 the Perth City Council approved the addition of a 48-metre (157 ft) spire to the top of the tower to house television and radio antennas, microwave antennas, navigation lights and surveillance cameras. However, when asked about the surveillance cameras, the R&I Bank's development spokesman Terry Pilbeam denied any knowledge about what any cameras would be used for. The spire was also approved by the Department of Transport and Communications, which said the spire would cause no air traffic problems, and the spire was added to the building upon completion. ## Gallery
20,347,079	Jessen's icosahedron	1,149,927,033	Right-angled non-convex polyhedron	[ "Nonconvex polyhedra" ]	Jessen's icosahedron, sometimes called Jessen's orthogonal icosahedron, is a non-convex polyhedron with the same numbers of vertices, edges, and faces as the regular icosahedron. It is named for Børge Jessen, who studied it in 1967. In 1971, a family of nonconvex polyhedra including this shape was independently discovered and studied by Adrien Douady under the name six-beaked shaddock; later authors have applied variants of this name more specifically to Jessen's icosahedron. The faces of Jessen's icosahedron meet only in right angles, even though it has no orientation where they are all parallel to the coordinate planes. It is a "shaky polyhedron", meaning that (like a flexible polyhedron) it is not infinitesimally rigid. Outlining the edges of this polyhedron with struts and cables produces a widely-used tensegrity structure, also called the six-bar tensegrity, tensegrity icosahedron, or expanded octahedron. ## Construction and geometric properties The vertices of Jessen's icosahedron may be chosen to have as their coordinates the twelve triplets given by the cyclic permutations of the coordinates $(\pm 2, \pm 1, 0)$. With this coordinate representation, the short edges of the icosahedron (the ones with convex angles) have length $\sqrt{6}$, and the long (reflex) edges have length $4$. The faces of the icosahedron are eight congruent equilateral triangles with the short side length, and twelve congruent obtuse isosceles triangles with one long edge and two short edges. Jessen's icosahedron is vertex-transitive (or isogonal), meaning that it has symmetries taking any vertex to any other vertex. Its dihedral angles are all right angles. One can use it as the basis for the construction of an infinite family of combinatorially distinct polyhedra with right dihedral angles, formed by gluing copies of Jessen's icosahedron together on their equilateral-triangle faces. As with the simpler Schönhardt polyhedron, the interior of Jessen's icosahedron cannot be triangulated into tetrahedra without adding new vertices. However, because its dihedral angles are rational multiples of $\pi$, it has Dehn invariant equal to zero. Therefore, it is scissors-congruent to a cube, meaning that it can be sliced into smaller polyhedral pieces that can be rearranged to form a solid cube. It is star-shaped, meaning that there is a point in its interior (for instance its center of symmetry) from which all other points are visible. It provides a counterexample to a question of Michel Demazure asking whether star-shaped polyhedra with triangular faces can be made convex by sliding their vertices along rays from this central point. Demazure had connected this question to a point in algebraic geometry by proving that, for star-shaped polyhedra with triangular faces, a certain algebraic variety associated with the polyhedron would be a projective variety if the polyhedron could be made convex in this way. However, Adrien Douady proved that, for a family of shapes that includes Jessen's icosahedron, this sliding motion cannot result in a convex polyhedron. Demazure used this result to construct a non-projective smooth rational complete three-dimensional variety. ## Structural rigidity Jessen's icosahedron is not a flexible polyhedron: if it is constructed with rigid panels for its faces, connected by hinges, it cannot change shape. However, it is also not infinitesimally rigid. This means that there exists a continuous motion of its vertices that, while not actually preserving the edge lengths and face shapes of the polyhedron, does so to a first-order approximation. As a rigid but not infinitesimally rigid polyhedron, it forms an example of a "shaky polyhedron". Because very small changes in its edge lengths can cause much bigger changes in its angles, physical models of the polyhedron seem to be flexible. Replacing the long concave-dihedral edges of Jessen's icosahedron by rigid struts, and the shorter convex-dihedral edges by cables or wires, produces the tensegrity icosahedron, the structure which has also been called the "six-bar tensegrity" and the "expanded octahedron". As well as in tensegrity sculptures, this structure is "the most ubiquitous form of tensegrity robots", and the "Skwish" children's toy based on this structure was "pervasive in the 1980's". The "super ball bot" concept based on this design has been proposed by the NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts as a way to enclose space exploration devices for safe landings on other planets. Anthony Pugh calls this structure "perhaps the best known, and certainly one of the most impressive tensegrity figures". Jessen's icosahedron is weakly convex, meaning that its vertices are in convex position, and its existence demonstrates that weakly convex polyhedra need not be infinitesimally rigid. However, it has been conjectured that weakly convex polyhedra that can be triangulated must be infinitesimally rigid, and this conjecture has been proven under the additional assumption that the exterior part of the convex hull of the polyhedron can also be triangulated. ## Related shapes A similar shape can be formed by keeping the vertices of a regular icosahedron in their original positions and replacing certain pairs of equilateral triangles by pairs of isosceles triangles. This shape has also sometimes incorrectly been called Jessen's icosahedron. However, although the resulting polyhedron has the same combinatorial structure and symmetry as Jessen's icosahedron, and looks similar, it does not form a tensegrity structure, and does not have right-angled dihedrals. Jessen's icosahedron is one of a continuous family of icosahedra with 20 faces, 8 of which are equilateral triangles and 12 of which are isosceles triangles. Each shape in this family is obtained from a regular octahedron by dividing each of its edges in the same proportion and connecting the division points in the pattern of a regular icosahedron. These shapes can be parameterized by the proportion into which the octahedron edges are divided. The convex shapes in this family range from the octahedron itself through the regular icosahedron to the cuboctahedron, with its square faces subdivided into two right triangles in a flat plane. Extending the range of the parameter past the proportion that gives the cuboctahedron produces non-convex shapes, including Jessen's icosahedron. This family was described by H. S. M. Coxeter in 1947. Later, the twisting, expansive-contractive transformations between members of this family, parameterized differently in order to maintain a constant value for one of the two edge lengths, were named jitterbug transformations by Buckminster Fuller. In 2018, Jessen's icosahedron was generalized by V. A. Gor’kavyi and A. D. Milka [uk] to an infinite family of rigid but not infinitesimally rigid polyhedra. These polyhedra are combinatorially distinct, and have chiral dihedral symmetry groups of arbitrarily large order. However, unlike Jessen's icosahedron, not all of their faces are triangles.
796,252	SimTower	1,108,806,896	null	[ "1994 video games", "3DO Interactive Multiplayer games", "Business simulation games", "Classic Mac OS games", "Maxis Sim games", "Sega Saturn games", "Video games developed in Japan", "Windows games" ]	SimTower: The Vertical Empire (known as The Tower (ザ・タワー, Za Tawā) in Japan) is a construction and management simulation video game developed by OpenBook Co., Ltd. and published by Maxis for the Microsoft Windows and Macintosh System 7 operating systems in November 1994. In Japan, it was published by OpenBook that same year and was later released for the Sega Saturn and 3DO in 1996. The game allows players to build and manage a tower and decide what facilities to place in it, in order to ultimately build a five-star tower. Random events take place during play, such as terrorist acts that the player must respond to immediately. Critical reception towards the game was generally positive. Reviews praised the game's formula, including its open-ended nature and its ability to immerse the player into the game. Criticism targeted the game's lack of documentation, which some reviewers found made it harder to learn how to play the game. The in-game speed was also criticized for being too slow, which was a crucial issue in the game because time must pass for the player to earn income to purchase new facilities. ## Gameplay SimTower allows the player to build and manage the operations of a modern, multi-use skyscraper. They must plan where to place facilities in the tower that include restaurants, condominiums, offices, hotel rooms, retail stores and elevators. To prevent tenants from vacating their properties, the player must keep their stress low by fulfilling their demands for medical centers, parking lots, recycling facilities, clean hotel rooms staffed with housekeepers, and an efficient transportation system, which involves managing elevator traffic. SimTower, which was built around an elevator simulation program, places a strong emphasis on good elevator management. The game begins with a one-star tower with limited building options. To increase the tower's star rating, it must attract more tenants by providing more living space (or office space, and later in the game, hotel and various types of commercial space). New facilities are made available while the tower progresses from a one-star rating to a five-star rating. The highest achievable rating is the designation of "Tower" which can only be awarded by building a cathedral at the very top of a five-star building with all possible tower levels above ground developed. The tower is limited to a maximum of 100 floors above ground and nine stories below ground. Standard elevators, which can span a maximum of 30 floors, and express elevators, which can span the entire height of the building, must be used efficiently to decrease tenant stress. Certain events can take place in the course of managing the tower. For example, terrorists may phone the player to let them know that they have hidden a bomb in the building, and that they demand a ransom. If the ransom is not paid, then security services must find the bomb before it detonates, or else the tower will incur significant damages. If the player builds facilities underground, the game may notify them that their workers have discovered gold treasure, which gives the player a significant amount of funds. At random intervals during the game, there are notifications that state that a VIP will be visiting the tower soon, so the player must prepare for their visit. If the VIP enjoys their visit because of variables such as a comfortable hotel suite and efficient navigation, the VIP will give the tower a favorable rating. A favorable rating would then allow the tower to advance to the next star level, assuming the other qualifications are met. Although it does not have any impact on the tower, at the end of the fourth quarter every year in the game, Santa Claus and his reindeer fly across the tower. ## Development Developed by Yoot Saito of OpenBook, SimTower was originally titled The Tower. It works on computers running the Microsoft Windows or Macintosh System 7 operating systems; the game will operate on 68k-based Macs at a minimum. It requires 8-bit colors and four megabytes of random-access memory. Graphics and sounds used in SimTower are similar to those of previous Sim games, and high-resolution graphics are also used. The sound effects are kept to a minimum; noises that are played in the background include office "buzz" and elevator bells. While attending Waseda University, Saito played SimCity on the Macintosh, which prompted him to pursue video game creation after graduating. His first game was a simulation title that was part of a future media project for a publishing house. When Saito asked to develop a second, the business refused because it was not a video game company. He left the company to personally produce the second game, which built on ideas he conceived while working on his first: elevators and towers. Saito teamed up with freelance programmer Takumi Abe to complete the project. To research the gameplay, Saito contacted an elevator company to learn about elevator scheduling and management. However, the company declined to provide the information. Saito handled the graphic design, starting with a monochromatic scaled tower created in HyperCard. The designer added color to differentiate between office- and hotel-type buildings. As development neared completion, Saito noticed that the Mac's performance had improved and decided to increase the color palette size from 16 to 256 colors. Saito enlisted a second designer to produce animation for the graphics and improve the details for the color increase. ## Release and reception SimTower was successful in Japan, earning the developers a profit. The Nihon Keizai Shimbun awarded Saito the "Best Young Manager/Venture of the Year" for his work on the game. After the initial Japanese release, Maxis president Jeff Braun contacted Saito regarding a worldwide release; SimCity creator Will Wright had informed Braun of the game. The company localized the game for sale in the United States, and changed the name to capitalize on the popularity of the Sim franchise and increase sales figures. Maxis published SimTower for the Windows and Macintosh System 7 operating systems in November 1994 in the United States. In 1996, it was ported to the Sega Saturn and 3DO Interactive Multiplayer in Japan. The South China Morning Post praised the game's formula, noting that it followed in the footsteps of previous open-ended Maxis games. Comparing SimTower to SimCity 2000, the review remarked that it was more interesting to watch people live out their lives in a tower rather than to observe cars moving around. They also appreciated the "homely" feeling of SimTower, in contrast with other Sim games such as SimEarth and SimLife, which they felt were too universal to take on a personal identity. Benjamin Svetkey of Entertainment Weekly praised the game and commented that it is "more fun than [the concept] sounds". However, he stated that the gameplay may be too much for fans of the series. A reviewer for Next Generation panned the game, saying it lacks the bustling interactivity of previous games in the Sim franchise: "There are bug infestations and the occasional fire with which to deal, but most of the time, SimTower sees you standing around waiting for cash reserves to grow in order to add more floors. Not much fun at all." Australia's The Age found SimTower a pleasing return to form for Maxis, after the release of the disappointing SimFarm. Lisa Karen Savignano of Allgame stated that the game had decent graphics and sound. However, she also felt that SimTower had good replay value due to the non-linear gameplay, giving the game four stars out of five. The game was criticized by the South China Morning Post for lacking documentation, making it more difficult to learn how to play the game. They also predicted that players would be unhappy with the game's speed, as time plays an important role in earning money from tenants. Before the player can purchase new facilities, a long period of time must pass before income is earned from tenants. The newspaper was also unhappy with complaints from tenants; specific reasons for their dissatisfaction are never given. The Age was disappointed by the lack of pre-built towers and scenarios, suggesting that one along the lines of The Towering Inferno's plot could have been included. Game Informer referred to SimTower as a "lesser-known" simulation game, and described it as "fun and addictive". Writing for the San Diego Union-Tribune, Matt Miller felt that, when compared to SimCity 2000 (1993), gameplay in SimTower moved slowly. He also disliked the moments when he had to wait several minutes to pass by before he could make enough money to purchase new additions for his building. Dragon magazine's reviewers Jay and Dee praised the visuals and gameplay. However, the two commented that the game can feel slow because it lacks gameplay elements and options present in other strategy games. In 1995, the Software and Information Industry Association listed SimTower as the "Best Simulation Program" in the Consumer software category of their annual Codie awards. The game was followed by Yoot Tower (called The Tower II in Japan), also designed by Yoot Saito, which was initially released on November 24, 1998, for the Macintosh. It was later made available for the Windows operating systems in January 1999. Yoot Tower's gameplay is similar to that of SimTower—players build hotels, resorts, and office buildings, and work towards building a five-star tower. Vivarium launched a version of SimTower for the Game Boy Advance, called The Tower SP, published by Nintendo in Japan on April 28, 2005, and by Sega in the United States on March 15, 2006. A version of SimTower called The Tower DS was published by DigiToys in Japan on June 26, 2008. Yoot Tower was also released for iPad devices via the online iOS App Store. ## See also - Project Highrise
41,468,466	U.S. Route 75 in Iowa	1,160,510,651	Highway in Iowa	[ "Transportation in Lyon County, Iowa", "Transportation in Plymouth County, Iowa", "Transportation in Sioux County, Iowa", "Transportation in Woodbury County, Iowa", "U.S. Highways in Iowa", "U.S. Route 75" ]	U.S. Highway 75 (US 75) is a United States Highway in northwestern Iowa. It begins at the Missouri River on a bridge with Interstate 129 (I-129) and US 20. Immediately upon landing in Iowa from Nebraska, I-129 ends at an interchange with I-29. US 20 and US 75 continue around Sioux City on a four-lane expressway until US 20 exits to the east. US 75 heads to the north-northeast, parallel to the Floyd River, until Le Mars. There, Iowa Highway 60 (Iowa 60) continues northeastward on the expressway while US 75 heads due north. Near Hull, it is briefly overlapped by US 18. It leaves the state and enters Minnesota north of Rock Rapids. US 75 was one of the original U.S. Highways to be created in 1926, though its roots trace back nine years prior to the creation of the King of Trails, a 2,000-mile-long (3,200 km) auto trail that connected Winnipeg, Manitoba, and Galveston, Texas. In the Upper Midwest, there were two branches of the King of Trails that converged at Sioux City, which then continued south to Council Bluffs. In 1920, the Iowa State Highway Commission assigned route numbers to roads in order to improve wayfinding for travelers. The King of Trails was assigned Primary Road No. 12 (No. 12) from Council Bluffs to Sioux City and the western branch and No. 22 along the eastern branch. In 1926, the U.S. Highway 75 name was applied through Iowa to Primary Roads No. 12 and 22, the King of Trails route. In the 1950s, US 75's importance began to wane as I-29 was built along the Missouri River. As sections of the Interstate Highway opened up between Council Bluffs and Sioux City, US 75 were rerouted onto the new road. In 1984, the southern half of US 75 was removed from Iowa and rerouted into Nebraska. Today, the highway is still an important part of Iowa's highway system. In the late 1990s and throughout the 2000s, the highway along with Iowa 60 were improved into a continuous four-lane expressway between Sioux City and Minnesota. ## Route description US 75 enters Iowa on the Sergeant Floyd Memorial Bridge, which also carries I-129 and US 20 from Nebraska, over the Missouri River. Almost immediately upon landing in Iowa, there is an interchange with I-29, at which I-129 ends. US 75's business loop of Sioux City begins at the I-29 interchange as well. Continuing east, US 20 and US 75 run together around the southern and eastern sides of Sioux City. The two routes split and US 75 continues to the north; it soon curves to the west around Bacon Creek Park. In the northeastern corner of the city, two half interchanges complete the reconnection of the business loop to the mainline highway. The four-lane highway now heads to the north-northeast parallel to the meandering Floyd River. Between the road and the river lie two sets of railroad tracks, one track operated by BNSF Railway and the other Union Pacific. In Hinton, the highway and railroads separate the residential western half of the town from the eastern half's grain elevator operation. Through Merrill, the highway's divided highway configuration ends, though it remains a four-lane road. There is a level crossing with the BNSF Railway line as it splits away to the north. After crossing the western branch of the Floyd River, the four-lane, divided highway resumes. US 75 bypasses Le Mars to the west and north. Near the southwestern corner of the city, there is an interchange that marks the beginning of the business route through the city. On the western side, an interchange with Iowa 3 helps direct more traffic to the downtown area. The last Le Mars interchange takes US 75 off of the four-lane road; Iowa 60 assumes the expressway. At the end of the exit ramp, US 75 reconnects with the business loop and the highway heads north. Now on a two-lane road, US 75 heads due north. The BNSF Railway line and West Branch Floyd River, which previously split away from the course of the highway, rejoin the highway near Maurice. Two miles (3.2 km) north of Maurice is an intersection with Iowa 10, which connects to Orange City and Alton to the east and Hawarden to the west. A curve in the railway forces the highway to deviate from its due-north path, though it shortly resumes that course; the river again departs here. As the road enters Sioux Center, it becomes a four-lane, undivided highway again. It passes through the city's downtown area and then through the industrial district. North of the town, the road becomes three lanes for a short while, and then two lanes again as it approaches US 18 near Hull. The two highways overlap for one mile (1.6 km) before US 18 turns to the west. North of US 18, US 75 continues on its due-north course. It is crossed twice by the BNSF Railway line as the railroad tracks curve to the northwest. Near Doon, it crosses the Little Rock River followed by the Rock River four miles (6.4 km) later. It soon enters Rock Rapids and meets Iowa 9, the northernmost east–west highway in the state, west of the downtown area. The two highways head west out of the city and US 75 turns to the north shortly thereafter. The road continues north toward the Minnesota state line still on a northerly path. At the state line, Iowa's section lines do not line up with Minnesota's section lines, so US 75 turns west to follow the boundary. After a short distance, the road then turns north and enters the state completely. ## History US 75 was created in 1926 with the U.S. Highway System, but its route dates back to 1917 when the King of Trails Association formed. The King of Trails entered Iowa at Council Bluffs and traveled north along the Missouri River to Sioux City, where it branched. The western branch traveled up into South Dakota while the eastern branch followed the Floyd River to Le Mars and then north to Minnesota from Le Mars. In 1920, the Iowa State Highway Commission applied route numbers to the King of Trails — Primary Road No. 12 from Council Bluffs to Sioux City and the western branch and No. 22 along the eastern branch. In 1926, US 75 was designated along Primary Roads No. 12 and 22. As Interstate 29 (I-29) was built along the banks of the Missouri River, US 75 was gradually moved on Interstate Highway. The portion of the highway south of Sioux City was moved into Nebraska in 1984. ### King of Trails The King of Trails was a 2,000-mile-long (3,200 km) highway that connected Winnipeg, Manitoba, and Galveston, Texas. As it was first planned out in July 1917, the road would connect 89 cities with populations over 1000 residents and nine military posts. Through Iowa, the King of Trails entered at Council Bluffs and traveled north along the Missouri River through Onawa and Salix before it reached Sioux City. There, the route divided into two forks which met again at Ortonville, Minnesota. The western branch followed the Big Sioux River through the eastern tier of counties in South Dakota. The eastern branch traveled through Le Mars and Rock Rapids before entering Minnesota. There had been some competition between advocates for the South Dakota–Minnesota and Iowa–Minnesota routes, but in early 1918, compromise was reached and both forks were designated as the King of Trails. ### Primary highways In 1919, the Iowa General Assembly passed a bill that created a fund for improving and hard-surfacing nearly 6,300 miles (10,100 km) of primary roads in the state. The primary road system was to connect every city and town with at least 1000 inhabitants. The bill gave Iowa's 99 counties the responsibility for maintaining the roads, which had previously fallen upon road associations that sponsored their respective highways. The new primary roads were assigned route numbers, a trend in other Midwestern states. Route numbers were painted onto telegraph and telephone poles in order to guide travelers without the need for maps. The King of Trails route was assigned two numbers: Primary Road No. 12 from Council Bluffs to Sioux City, which included the western fork into South Dakota, and Primary Road No. 22 from Sioux City to Minnesota. ### U.S. Highway origins In the mid-1920s, automobile associations continued to sponsor their named routes — there were 64 such named routes in Iowa — on top of the route numbers given by the state highway commission. This proved to be more confusing than helpful to the casual traveler, so in 1924, the American Association of State Highway Officials (AASHO, later AASHTO) called for a national system of interstate highways. Of the 75,884 miles (122,123 km) proposed by AASHO, nearly 3,000 miles (4,800 km) were allocated to Iowa. Support for the system was unanimous among Iowa transportation officials and the new national routings and route numbers were assigned in 1925. The Iowa State Highway Commission chose to renumber a few highways as to not have conflicting route numbers along important routes. US 75 was designated along Primary Roads No. 12 and 22, which was the King of Trails route. Once the U.S. Highway System was established, the automobile association-sponsored roads gradually disappeared. ### Original routing US 75 and US 30 entered Iowa via the Ak-Sar-Ben Bridge over the Missouri River. The two highways followed Broadway through Council Bluffs and then north along the Lincoln Highway, which was a graded dirt road. The routes winded through the Loess Hills until Honey Creek and at the base of the hills until Missouri Valley. There, US 30 split away to the east and US 75 to the west and then to the north again. US 75 continued along the base of the Loess Hills where it met Iowa 127. It then curved west onto the Missouri River flats. At Mondamin, the highway turned north again to run roughly parallel to the Missouri River. It passed through Little Sioux, River Sioux, and Blencoe before meeting Iowa 37 in Onawa. North of Onawa to the Monona–Woodbury county line, US 75 headed north-northwest on a gravel road. After crossing into Woodbury County near Sloan, a long section of paved road began. The road headed north-northwest through Whiting and Sloan. At Sergeant Bluff, it turned north toward Sioux City. Upon entering the city, US 75 followed Lakeport Road until reaching Morningside Avenue, which carried Iowa 141. US 75 turned west to follow Morningside Avenue past the eponymous college. The routes followed a stair-step routing until they reached Correctionville Road, which carried US 20. The three routes crossed the Floyd River together and entered downtown Sioux City along 4th Street. At Court Street, they diverged; US 20 and Iowa 141 continued west along 4th and US 75 turned north onto Court. When it reached 27th Street, the route turned back to the east toward Floyd Avenue, onto which it turned. Floyd Avenue headed northeast; it became Leeds Road upon exiting the city. North of Sioux City, US 75 followed a paved road that ran parallel to the Floyd River and two rail lines, the Chicago, St. Paul, Minneapolis and Omaha Railway and the Dubuque and Sioux City Railroad operated by Illinois Central. It passed through Hinton and Merrill before entering Le Mars. It intersected Iowa 27 a few blocks west of downtown. North of Le Mars, US 75 followed a gravel road that roughly traveled due north; it passed near Struble and Maurice, intersected Iowa 10 and then went through Sioux Center. At Perkins, the highway intersected US 18 and the two highways headed north, then west, and then north again for a few miles. At Doon, US 18 turned west to go toward Inwood. US 75 eased back to the east to reach Rock Rapids and Iowa 9. The highway moved back to the west and entered Minnesota. ### Improvements The system of auto trails that coursed through Iowa prior to the U.S. Highway System were routed to bring tourist traffic through the towns along the trails. Oftentimes, trail routes were determined by which cities had paid dues to the trail's association. By 1929, the highway was paved from Council Bluffs to Missouri Valley, the stretch of highway overlapped by US 30. The next year, the entire route between Council Bluffs and Sioux City was paved. In the 1930s, Iowa received a \$10 million grant, equivalent to \$ in , from the federal government for improving highways. Along the northern section of US 75, engineers sought to straighten the highway before paving could begin. By the end of the decade, the highway was straightened and paved between Sioux Center and Rock Rapids. US 18 was also relocated in the area, so the overlap of the two routes was eliminated between Perkins and Doon. Since Doon was bypassed to the east, Iowa 167 was created to serve the town. In Sioux City, the road was shifted west to near the Missouri River, past the Sergeant Floyd Memorial along Lewis Road and Plymouth Street. In later years, the road would be straightened through Sioux City again and renamed Lewis Boulevard. The former alignment on Lakeport Road and Morningside Avenue became Iowa 230. ### Decline The Federal Aid Highway Act of 1956 brought the Interstate Highway System to the United States and 700 miles (1,100 km) of new highways to Iowa, which included a highway along the eastern bank of the Missouri River. Construction began, in segments, on what would become I-29 in the late 1950s near Sioux City and Council Bluffs. When the 20-mile-long (32 km) section of I-29 opened between N. 16th Street in Council Bluffs and Missouri Valley, US 75 was rerouted off of its old Lincoln Highway alignment and onto the new freeway. US 30 Alternate, which had replaced the mainline US 30, was the only remaining route along the old Lincoln Highway. A new bridge for I-480 adjacent to the Ak-Sar-Ben Bridge opened in 1966. Within a few years, I-29 was complete between Council Bluffs and Sioux City and US 75 was shifted off of its two-lane road and onto the Interstate Highway. In Sioux City, US 75 exited I-29 at Industrial Road, now known as Singing Hills Boulevard, which was a short connector to Lewis Boulevard. In 1984, the Iowa Department of Transportation and the Nebraska Department of Roads proposed to AASHTO a number of changes that would alter the highway systems of both states. Nebraska proposed that US 73, which ended at US 20 in South Sioux City would be truncated and its northern end pulled all the way back to an intersection with US 75 in southeastern Nebraska. Iowa and Nebraska jointly proposed moving US 75 out of Iowa between Council Bluffs and Sioux City, from the redundant I-29 corridor, and onto the corridor abandoned by US 73. The proposed changes were approved. Iowa DOT officials made the transfer official on December 5, 1984. Now a much shorter highway within Iowa, it entered the state on the I-129 bridge with US 20. Upon entering the state, northbound US 75 immediately exited onto southbound I-29 in order to reach Singing Hills Boulevard and resume its course. ### Modernization While the highway south of Sioux City was growing less important due to the construction of I-29, the highway north of Sioux City was growing in importance. In the late 1950s, US 75 was widened to four lanes from Lewis Boulevard in Sioux City to Le Mars. In 1968, the state highway commission slated a number of important corridors, including the Sioux City to Minnesota corridor, which comprised US 75 and then-Iowa 33, to be expanded to a four-lane expressway. These corridors were to be completed with the highest priority once the Interstate Highway System was completed in the state. However, only the section of the corridor between Sioux City and Le Mars was improved by the end of the 20th century. In the late 1990s, the Iowa DOT once again identified six corridors in need of upgrading to four lane highway. One of those corridors was US 75 and Iowa 60 from Sioux City to Minnesota. Part of the corridor improvements included two bypasses on US 75, the completion of the one around Sioux City and construction of one around Le Mars. The Sioux City bypass took five years to complete and opened on November 19, 2001. The former routing along Lewis Boulevard became US 75 Business. Residents of the Le Mars area were presented plans for construction of their bypass in February 2003. Acquisition of property and construction of the bypass took three-and-a-half years; the bypass opened on November 22, 2006. Like in Sioux City, the former routing of US 75 through Le Mars became a business route. ## Major intersections
2,671,477	French ship Courageux (1753)	1,168,541,446	French 74-gun ship of the line	[ "1753 ships", "Captured ships", "Maritime incidents in 1796", "Ships of the line of the French Navy", "Ships of the line of the Royal Navy", "Shipwrecks in the Mediterranean Sea" ]	Courageux was a 74-gun ship of the line of the French Navy, launched in 1753. She was captured by the Royal Navy in 1761 and taken into service as HMS Courageux. In 1778 she joined the Channel Fleet, and she was later part of the squadron commanded by Commodore Charles Fielding that controversially captured a Dutch convoy on 31 December 1779, in what became known as the Affair of Fielding and Bylandt. On 4 January 1781, Courageux recaptured Minerva in a close-range action west of Ushant that lasted more than an hour. That April, Courageux joined the convoy under George Darby which successfully relieved the Great Siege of Gibraltar. At the start of the French Revolutionary Wars, Courageux took part in the blockade and subsequent occupation of Toulon in 1793. That September, she was sent with a squadron under Robert Linzee to support an insurrection in Corsica and took part in an unsuccessful attack on San Fiorenzo. When Toulon was evacuated, Courageux was in a state of disrepair and was forced to warp out of her mooring without a rudder, but was able to complete repairs while rescuing allied troops from the waterfront. At the Battle of Genoa in March 1795, she was instrumental in the capture of the French ships Ça Ira and Censeur, but at the subsequent Battle of the Hyères Islands, she was so slow getting into the action that, by the time she arrived, the order had been given to disengage. In December 1796, Courageux was with the Mediterranean Fleet, anchored in the bay of Gibraltar, when a great storm tore her from her mooring and drove her onto the rocks of the Barbary coast. Of the 593 officers and men who were on board, only 129 escaped: five by means of a launch, and the rest by clambering along the fallen mainmast to the shore. ## Design Courageux was a 74-gun ship of the line of the French Royal Navy. Her keel of 140 feet 1+1⁄8 inches (42.7 m) was laid down at Brest in April 1751, and her dimensions as built were 172 feet 3 inches (52.5 m) along the gun deck, with a beam of 48 feet 3⁄4 inch (14.6 m) and a depth in the hold of 20 feet 10+1⁄2 inches (6.4 m). At 1,721 30⁄94 tons burthen, her size was typical for French 74s, which were at least 100 tons larger than their British equivalents. When fully manned, she would have carried a complement of 650 men. While in French service, Courageux carried thirty 36-pounder (16 kg) guns on her lower deck and an equal number of 18-pounder (8.2 kg) guns on her upper deck. Her upper works were furnished with sixteen 8-pounder (3.6 kg) guns. Following her capture, her main guns were reduced both in weight and number. Her lower deck was re-equipped with twenty-eight 32 pounders (15 kg), while the number of 18-pound guns on her upper deck was also reduced to twenty-eight. The armament on her upper works was increased to eighteen 9-pounder (4.1 kg) guns, fourteen on the quarterdeck and four on the forecastle. With the end of the Seven Years' War came spending cuts which led not only to a drop in the number of Royal Navy ships being ordered, but also the Admiralty favouring existing designs over new. By 1783 the industry was booming once more, and a proposal for the new Carnatic class was approved. The four ships of this series were built to the exact lines of Courageux, and as such were noticeably larger than the other British 74s then in production. ## Service ### Capture In the late evening of 13 August 1761, Courageux was off Vigo in the company of the frigates Malicieuse and Hermione, when the 74-gun British ship HMS Bellona and the frigate Brilliant were seen. Mistaking them for ships of the line, Courageux and her compatriots sought escape into the darkness. The moon was bright, however, and the British were able to pursue. The next morning, Courageux's captain decided that Bellona was a 50-gun ship and, believing he had the superior force, ordered the frigates to attack Brilliant while he turned to close with Bellona. When the ships were within musket-shot, Courageux opened fire and, within nine minutes, had brought down Bellona's mizzen-mast and cut her rigging so badly that the ship became difficult to handle. Bellona's captain, seeing the danger, ordered a boarding party, but Courageux sheered off. With difficulty, the British ship was able to wear and, coming up on Courageux's starboard quarter, unleashed a series of devastating broadsides. Courageux was greatly damaged and, with about 200 men killed and a further 100 wounded, struck her colours. The two French frigates withdrew. Courageux was purchased by the Admiralty on 2 February the following year, for £9,797.16.4d, and taken into the Royal Navy as the third-rate HMS Courageux. Another £22,380.11.4d was invested in July, when a large repair was begun at Portsmouth, which took until the middle of June 1764 to complete. A further substantial repair was made between January 1772 and July 1773, the price for which was £16,420.19.10d. In July 1776, Courageux was commissioned under Captain Samuel Hood, and, in November, £10,132.6.2d was spent having her fitted out as a guardship at Portsmouth. ### The Channel Fleet Courageux was part of Admiral Augustus Keppel's Channel Fleet in 1778 and shared in the capture of the 32-gun French frigate Licorne and the French lugger Coureur on 17 June. The following day, Courageux was despatched with HMS Foudroyant and HMS Robust in pursuit of another French vessel. Other British ships soon joined the chase, which was concluded on 19 June when the prize, the 32-gun Pallas, was brought to. Courageux received a share of the prize money for three more captures in September and five more in October. Between April and May 1779, she underwent another refit, which included the sheathing of her hull with copper, at a cost of £7,468.7.0d. She then returned to the Channel Fleet, by then under the command of Sir Charles Hardy. Hardy's fleet continued to take prizes in the Channel, and Courageux shared in the rewards: in June, HMS Southampton took the Spanish ship Purísima Concepción, Ambuscade recaptured the 14-gun HMS Helena, and an American schooner, Marmy was taken by HMS Milford. On 31 December 1779, Courageux was part of the squadron commanded by Commodore Charles Fielding that captured a Dutch convoy, prior to a declaration of war. In what later became known as the Affair of Fielding and Bylandt, the British stopped the convoy in the Channel for the purpose of searching for contraband. The request was refused, and an action began which ended with the Dutch surrendering after a token resistance. The British took the captured ships as prizes, and Courageux received her share. Courageux was in the Western Approaches on 12 March 1780, in the company of another seventy-four, HMS Alexander, when a large frigate was seen to the south-east. Alexander set off in pursuit and after eighteen hours was close enough to engage with her chase guns. After two hours more, as she was overhauling her quarry, Alexander's fore-top mast snapped. Courageux had by this time caught up and continued the chase, eventually forcing the French frigate's surrender. The prize was the Monsieur, a privateer from Granville of 40 guns and a crew of 362. In 1781, Courageux was under the command of Lord Mulgrave, and in the action of 4 January 1781, she and HMS Valiant recaptured Minerva, approximately 5 miles west of Ushant. Minerve had sailed in company from Brest the previous day for a fortnight's cruise around the Scilly Isles. Courageux exchanged fire at close range for more than an hour, during which time all of Minerve's masts were put out of action and extensive damage done to her hull, while fifty of her crew were killed and a further twenty-three injured. Courageux's mizzen, foremast and bowsprit were damaged, and ten of her crew were killed and seven wounded. Valiant, in the meantime, had gone off in pursuit of another ship. Courageux towed her prize to Spithead, arriving on the morning of 8 January. In April, Courageux was part of the convoy under George Darby sent to relieve the Great Siege of Gibraltar, maintained by French and Spanish forces since June 1779. Courageux shared in the prize money for the French brigs Duc de Chartres and Trois Amis and the Spanish frigate Santa Leucadia captured during the cruise. An £8,547.17.7d refit was carried out in April 1782. Then, in June 1787 a greater repair was required, costing £30,369.13.4d and taking until July 1789. Following a dispute with Spain over territorial rights along the Nootka Sound, Courageux was commissioned in April 1790 under George Countess for the Spanish Armament. The crisis was largely resolved through a series of agreements signed between October 1790 and January 1794. In February 1791, Alan Gardner was in command when Courageux was recommissioned for the Russian Armament. Again, the matter was settled before she was called into action, and she paid off in September of that year. ### Toulon and Corsica France declared war on Britain and the Dutch Republic in February 1793, and Courageux, under William Waldegrave, was sent with other British ships to blockade the French fleet in Toulon. By the middle of August, this British force, under Hood in the 100-gun HMS Victory, had grown to twenty-one ships of the line. On 23 August, a deputation of French royalists came aboard Victory to discuss the conditional surrender of the town, and on 27 August 1500 troops were landed to remove the republicans occupying the forts guarding the port. The landings were covered by Courageux, Meleager, Tartar, Egmont and Robust. Once the forts were secure, the remainder of Hood's fleet, accompanied by seventeen Spanish ships of the line which had just arrived, sailed into the harbour. In September 1793, during the occupation, Courageux joined a squadron under Robert Linzee, which was sent to Corsica to support an insurrection there. General Pasquale Paoli, the leader of the insurgent party, had assured Hood that a small show of strength was all that was needed to force the island's surrender. This turned out not to be the case, however, and Linzee's appeals to the French garrisons there were rejected. His force, of three ships of the line and two frigates, was too small to blockade the island, so an attack on San Fiorenzo was decided upon. The two frigates, Lowestoffe and Nemesis, were charged with destroying a Martello tower at Forneilli, two miles from the town, which guarded the only secure anchorage in the bay. After taking a few salvos from the ships, the French garrison deserted, and the British landed men to secure the fort. Linzee's squadron entered the bay but was prevented from engaging the batteries of San Fiorenzo by contrary winds. During the night, HMS Ardent was warped into a position where, at 03:30 on 1 October, she was able to attack the batteries and cover the approach of the other British ships. Half an hour later, HMS Alcide tried to take up a station nearby but was blown towards some rocks by a sudden change of wind and had to be towed clear. Courageux in the meantime covered Alcide's stern by coming between it and the gunfire from a redoubt on the shore. Alcide eventually got into a position where she could join in the action, and the three ships bombarded the redoubt until 08:15 when, there being little sign of damage, Linzee gave the order to withdraw. Courageux bore the brunt of the action, having been exposed to a raking fire from the town, and caught on fire four times after being hit by heated shot. During the same month, French troops laid siege to the city of Toulon, and in December, the allied force within was driven out. When the order to withdraw was given, Courageux was being repaired and was without a rudder, but she was able to warp out of the harbour and assist in the evacuation of allied troops from the waterfront. A replacement rudder was brought out, suspended between two ship's boats, and fitted later. ### Battle of Genoa Courageux was one of thirteen ships of the line, which, together with seven frigates, two sloops and a cutter, were anchored in the roads of Livorno on 8 March 1795. The following day, a British scout, the 24-gun sloop Moselle, brought news that a French fleet of fifteen ships of the line, six frigates and two brigs, had been seen off the islands of Sainte-Marguerite. Vice-Admiral William Hotham immediately set off in pursuit, and on 10 March the advanced British frigates spotted the French fleet at some distance, making its way back to Toulon against the wind. Two days later, on the night of 12 March, a storm developed which badly damaged two French ships of the line. These ships were escorted to Gourjean Bay by two French frigates, leaving the opposing fleets roughly equal in strength and number. The next morning, Hotham attempted to get his ships into a form line but, seeing no response from the French fleet, changed his orders to general chase. At 08:00 the 80-gun Ça Ira at the rear collided with Victoire, and her fore and main topmasts collapsed overboard. The leading British ship was the 36-gun frigate HMS Inconstant under Captain Thomas Fremantle, which reached the damaged Ça Ira within an hour of the collision and opened fire at close range, causing further destruction. Seeing the danger, the French frigate Vestale fired upon Inconstant from a distance before taking the limping Ça Ira in tow. Shortly after, HMS Agamemnon under Captain Horatio Nelson joined the action, until several of the French ships bearing down forced her to drop back into her station in the line. Throughout the day and the following night, the British van sporadically engaged the French rearguard, with Ça Ira dropping further behind the main body of the French force. In order to better protect the damaged ship, the French admiral, Pierre Martin, ordered the ship of the line Censeur to replace Vestale as the towing ship. By morning the fleets were 21 nautical miles (39 km) south-west of Genoa, with the British rapidly gaining ground. Ça Ira and Censeur had fallen further behind, and Hotham sent his two fastest ships after them. Captain and Bedford did not arrive simultaneously and both were repulsed, although further damage was inflicted on the French stragglers in the process. Martin ordered his line to wear in succession and get between the British fleet and the badly damaged Ça Ira and Censeur, which in the meantime had come under a new threat from the recently arrived Courageux and HMS Illustrious. A sudden drop in wind made manoeuvres difficult, and the leading French ship, Duquesne under Captain Zacharie Allemand, found itself sailing down the opposite side of the British vanguard. At 08:00, Duquesne was in a position to engage Illustrious and Courageux, which, in their efforts to reach Ça Ira and Censeur, were now far ahead and to leeward of their line. Two other French ships, Victoire and Tonnant, joined the action, and, for an hour, the French and British vanguards exchanged heavy fire. Both British ships were badly mauled: Illustrious had drifted out of the battle, having lost her main and mizzen masts over the side, while Courageux also had two masts down and her hull much holed by French shot. The Duquesne, Victoire, and Tonnant then exchanged passing shots with the British ships coming up, before turning away and leaving Ça Ira and Censeur to their fate. Hotham, considering the condition of his van ships, and content with his prizes, did not pursue. ### Action off Hyeres The fleet was re-victualling in San Fiorenzo bay on 8 July 1795, when a small squadron under Commodore Horatio Nelson approached, pursued by the French Fleet from Toulon. The British fleet was not able to put to sea immediately, due to contrary winds, but was spotted by the French, who abandoned their chase. Hotham finished refitting and supplying his ships, and finally managed to set off after his quarry at 21:00, almost twelve hours later. On the night of 12 July, the British ships were hit by a storm, and they were still carrying out repairs the following morning when the French fleet was sighted again. At 03:45 Hotham gave the order to make all possible sail in pursuit of their enemy, which by then was 5 nautical miles (9.3 km) away, bearing towards Fréjus. By 08:00, the French had formed a tight line of battle, but the British ships were strung out over an 8 nmi (15 km) distance. The leading British ships, Victory, Culloden, and Cumberland, at 3⁄4 nmi (1.4 km), were within range and opened fire. After six hours, as more ships were arriving, one of the rearmost French ships, Alcide struck. Before the British could take possession of her she caught fire and exploded. Courageux, under the command of Benjamin Hallowell, and some way back, was unable to get into the action before Hotham, believing the fleet to be running out of sea room, signalled to disengage. ## Fate In December 1796, Courageux was with St Vincent's fleet, anchored in the bay of Gibraltar, when a great storm tore her from her mooring and drove her onto the rocks. Sources differ as to which day this occurred and the number of lives lost. William James records that on 10 December a French squadron under Admiral Villeneuve left the Mediterranean, but the British were unable to pursue due to a strong lee-shore wind. The weather took a turn for the worse, and that night several ships cut or had their cables snapped, including HMS Culloden and HMS Gibraltar. When Courageux parted from her anchor, Captain Benjamin Hallowell was ashore at Gibraltar, serving on a court martial, and Lieutenant John Burrows was in command. The ship drifted across the bay and almost under the guns of the Spanish batteries, after which she was blown towards the Barbary coast under close-reefed topsails; Burrows was reluctant to run through the Straits for fear of meeting with Villeneuve's ships. Towards evening, the wind and rain increased to hurricane force, and soon after 20:00, the crew, who had been exhausted from trying to sail the ship out of trouble, were sent to dinner; the officers also retired below, except for a lieutenant of the watch. At 21:00, when land was sighted, there were too few men available to prevent the Courageux hitting the rocks at the foot of Mons Abyla on the African coast. She broadsided, losing her masts over the side, and water entered rapidly as waves and winds battered her. Of the 593 officers and men who were on board, only 129 escaped: five by means of the ship's launch, and the remainder by moving along the fallen mainmast to the shore. Lloyd's List stated that she had been lost in a gale on 12 December that also resulted in several transport vessels and merchant ships being driven on shore, with the Spaniards capturing the transports. Lloyd's List reported that only five people had been saved from Courageux. In the first printings of his book, The Naval History of Great Britain, Volume I, (1793–1796), James gave the date of the wrecking as 17 December, but this is changed to the 10th from the second edition on. David Hepper says it occurred on the 18th, as does David Steel in Steel's Naval Remembrancer: From the Commencement of the War in 1793 to the End of the Year 1800. John Marshall in his Royal Naval Biography (Volume I, Part II) says the wreck took place on the 19th.
4,435,775	All We Know Is Falling	1,172,239,130	null	[ "2005 debut albums", "Albums produced by James Paul Wisner", "Fueled by Ramen albums", "Paramore albums" ]	All We Know Is Falling is the debut studio album by American rock band Paramore, released on July 26, 2005, under the Atlantic-distributed Fueled by Ramen in the United States. The production was led by James Paul Wisner, Mike Green, Nick Trevisick, and Roger Alan Nichols. The departure of bassist Jeremy Davis, which occurred a few days after arriving in Orlando, served as the album's main theme. This theme was reflected especially in the album's cover and title. Mostly categorized as a pop-punk album, the album received mostly positive reviews and has been labeled a "scene classic". The album's production took place in Orlando, Florida. Instead of making a major push towards radio, the band's A&R recommended that the band build a fanbase through word of mouth. Initially, the album received positive reviews by music critics, praising the vocals of Hayley Williams; retrospective criticism has been mixed. The album had a weak domestic commercial performance: it failed to enter the Billboard 200, though it did reach number 30 on Billboard's Heatseekers Chart. It reached No. 4 on the UK Rock Chart, and in 2010 it managed to reach No. 51 on the UK Albums Chart and earned a gold certification by the BPI. In July 2014, after the group found success with its following records, All We Know Is Falling received a gold certification from the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). Three singles from the album were released: "Pressure", "Emergency" and "All We Know". None of the singles managed to reach any major chart, although "Pressure" was certified gold by the RIAA in 2016 after the band found commercial success with subsequent releases. ## Background Hayley Williams was originally signed to Atlantic Records in 2003 as a solo pop singer. However, Williams resisted the label's solo-career wishes, saying she did not envision herself as "the next Madonna". As a result, she formed Paramore with Josh Farro, Zac Farro, and Jeremy Davis. In her short solo career, Williams recorded some demos, which were later re-recorded with the band for a "more authentic" sound. However, the band was almost fired because the label thought they "were terrible." Williams and Farro wrote two new songs, "Here We Go Again" and "Hallelujah", which saved the group from being fired. The former song became the fifth track on All We Know Is Falling, while "Hallelujah" was saved for their sophomore album Riot! (2007). ## Production The group traveled to Orlando, Florida, to write and record the remainder of the album. A few days after arriving in Orlando, Davis left the band. The remaining members continued work on the album. The band decided to base the album's theme around Davis' departure. According to Williams, the album's cover art also represented Davis' departure: "The couch with no one there and the shadow walking away; it's all about Jeremy leaving us and us feeling like there's an empty space." The album's artwork was created by Electric Heat. The album's recording process took about three weeks, with Josh Farro calling the sessions "rushed". "All We Know", "Never Let This Go" and "My Heart" were recorded with producer James Paul Wisner at Wisner Productions, located in St. Cloud, Florida. "Pressure", "Emergency", "Brighter", "Whoa", "Conspiracy" and "Franklin" were recorded with producer Mike Green at ARS Studios, located in Orlando, Florida. "Here We Go Again" was recorded with producers Roger Alan Nichols and Nick Trevisick at Bigger Dog Studio, located in Franklin, Tennessee. Additional recording took place at Stone Gables Studio, located in Brentwood, Tennessee and at The Skyview Church of Tone and Soul, located in East Nashville, Tennessee. All of the songs were mixed by Green, except for "Here We Go Again", which was mixed by Nichols and Trevisick. Tom Baker mastered the recordings at Precision Mastering in Hollywood, California. Nath Warshowsky acted as the studio drum tech for every song, except for "Here We Go Again". Dave Buchman engineered "Here We Go Again". Lucio Rubino, then frontman of StorySide:B, replaced the absent Davis in the studio. He performed bass on every song except for "Here We Go Again", which was done by Jeremy Caldwell. Typically, Farro would write the music while Williams wrote the lyrics. On occasion, Farro would contribute lyrics as well. "Conspiracy" was composed by Williams, Farro, and Taylor York. It was the first song they wrote together. Many of the lyrics in All We Know Is Falling which are not related to Davis' departure deal with the bad relationship and divorce of Williams' parents. ## Composition Critics have variously called All We Know Is Falling a pop-punk, emo, pop rock, and alternative rock album. Trevor Kelley at Alternative Press categorized the music on the album as "vaguely emo, but mostly mall-punk". Tom Whitson of Click Music defined the music on the album as emo with "pop-punk beats", drawing comparisons from Avril Lavigne and Fall Out Boy. The Allmusic review by Neil Z. Yeung referred to the album as a "formulaic" pop punk album, complete with "head-bobbing drums, straightforward riffs, and a midtempo sameness throughout". In a retrospective Alternative Press review by Tyler Sharp, the album was referred to as what would have been "just another pop-rock effort that ultimately fell short in the face of its true potential" if not for the band's later success. Gigwise reviewer David Renshaw also drew comparisons to Lavigne, but believed that the songs on the album were inferior to those of Lavigne's. ## Release and promotion Paramore released All We Know Is Falling on July 26, 2005, in the United States. According to Paramore's A&R at Atlantic Records, Steve Robertson, the promotion strategy behind the album was that the band would start small and slowly build through word of mouth instead of giving the debut album a major radio promotional push. In his own words, Robertson "wanted kids to discover the band without it being shoved down their throats." In September 2005, a special Japanese edition containing a previously unreleased song "Oh Star" was made available. In January 2009, the album was released on vinyl for the first time. On May 19, 2009, a deluxe edition of the album was released exclusively on iTunes with live versions of "Pressure" and "Here We Go Again", and the music videos for all the singles. A 10th anniversary edition of the album was released on December 4, 2015 on vinyl, which contains "O Star" and "This Circle" as bonus tracks; this version was limited to 4,000 copies. The album featured three singles: "Pressure", "Emergency" and "All We Know". Two weeks before starting a tour to promote the album, John Hembree joined the band to replace bassist Jeremy Davis, though Davis ended up rejoining the group after five months away from the band. In October and November, the group supported Simple Plan on their headlining tour in the United States, followed by a supporting slot for Funeral for a Friend in December. In February 2006, the group went on Midwest and east coast tour with Halifax, My American Heart, and So They Say. Through the spring of 2006, Paramore was an opening act on tours for both Bayside and The Rocket Summer. The band was initially planned to appear on the 2006 edition of the Take Action Tour in early March 2006, but Williams came down with flu, which resulted in the band being replaced by Sullivan. The band went on the 2006 edition of the Warped Tour, which took place in Nashville, near the group's hometown. In August and September, the band headlined a tour in the US with support from Hit the Lights, Cute Is What We Aim For and This Providence, followed by some dates in the United Kingdom in October. ## Reception ### Critical reception All We Know Is Falling was met with generally positive reviews from music critics. Kelley stated "it's obvious that someone has done Williams wrong" from the lyrics in the album's songs, and noted its similarity to Lavigne's previous studio album Under My Skin (2004). Tony Pascarella of The Trades said that "these passionate, rocking tracks are what make this Tennessee group so talented [...] Paramore is a band you may not yet have heard of, but look for them to make a major splash in the very near future." He also praised Williams' voice as "a rich, powerful voice that rarely makes a mistake on this stunning debut." In a tenth-anniversary review from Alternative Press, Tyler Sharp wrote that the album evolved into "a scene classic" after the band's gradual rise to mainstream popularity in later years. The album is often held in a negative light in comparison to the band's subsequent studio albums, however, and retrospective reviews have been mixed. In a retrospective review, Yeung showed mixed feelings about the album. He regarded the album as "alright", however, he believed that the songs were too straightforward and lacked "differentiation, excitement, or the brightness that would be found on later albums." Whitson said that the album was "this group of youngsters have written a great debut album for their age [...] [All We Know Is Falling] isn't the best album around, but is far from the worst." Renshaw was critical about the fact that "Paramore are for the kids who think Pink is not cool enough but My Chemical Romance are too scary, they want to rebel but they have to be in by 9 o' clock. Paramore are not terrible; they are simply a transitional band." Jordan "Anchors" Rogowski from Punknews.org was more critical of the album; he praised Williams' voice, but criticized the structures of the songs, regarding them "just too flat, too linear [...] the guitar seems a bit uninspired, the drumming a bit lazy, and the bass is barely existent, if existent at all." ### Commercial performance Initially, All We Know Is Falling only charted on the Billboard Heatseekers Albums chart, peaking at number 30 in September 2006. After the success of their second studio album Riot! (2007), the album sales gradually built. Although it never charted on the Billboard 200, it did manage to take number eight on the Billboard Catalog Albums chart in 2009. All We Know Is Falling only reached number 51 on the UK Albums Chart, but still received gold certification in 2009 by the British Phonographic Industry for shipping over 100,000 copies. It was then certified in Australia in 2012, where it went gold for shipments of over 35,000 units despite never reaching an Australian chart. In 2014, the album was certified gold in the United States for shipments of over 500,000 copies. Initially, none of the singles managed to chart, but after the success of Riot!, "Pressure" was able to peak at number 62 on the Billboard Digital Songs chart. In 2016, the recording was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). ## Track listing Bonus tracks ## Personnel Paramore - Hayley Williams – lead vocals - Josh Farro – lead guitar, backing vocals - Jason Bynum – rhythm guitar, backing vocals - Jeremy Davis – bass (5) - Zac Farro – drums Additional musicians - Lucio Rubino – bass (all except 5) Production - James Paul Wisner – producer and recording (1, 6, 10) - Mike Green – producer and recording (2–4, 7–9); mixing (all except 5) - Roger Alan Nichols and Nick Trevisick – producers, recording and mixing (5) - Nathan Warshowsky – studio drum technician (all except 5) - Tom Baker – mastering engineer - Dave Buchanan – engineer (5) - John Janich – executive producer - John Deeb – photography - Electric Heat – album artwork ## Charts ## Certifications ## Release history
667,089	Poodle Hat	1,173,141,886	null	[ "\"Weird Al\" Yankovic albums", "2000s comedy albums", "2003 albums", "Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album" ]	Poodle Hat is the eleventh studio album by "Weird Al" Yankovic, released on May 20, 2003. It was the fifth studio album self-produced by Yankovic. The musical styles on the album are built around parodies and pastiches of pop of the early-2000s. The album's lead single, "Couch Potato", is a parody of "Lose Yourself" by Eminem. The single failed to chart, although the album's song "eBay" (a parody of "I Want It That Way" by Backstreet Boys) eventually peaked at 15 on the Bubbling Under Hot 100 Singles in 2007. The album featured five parodies. Aside from the aforementioned "Couch Potato" and "eBay", the album also spoofs "Hot in Herre" by Nelly, "Complicated" by Avril Lavigne, and "Piano Man" by Billy Joel. The album includes six original songs, featuring many "style parodies", or musical imitations of existing artists. These style parodies include imitations of specific artists like Ben Folds, Beck, and Frank Zappa. A polka medley of popular songs was also included on the album. A music video for the song "Couch Potato" was planned but was cancelled due to objections by Eminem. Poodle Hat was released as an Enhanced CD, meaning that when the disc is placed in a computer, bonus content (including alternate song mixes, short videos, and photo galleries) is viewable. The album met with mixed reviews from critics; some felt that the album represented an artistic misstep for Yankovic, whereas others enjoyed its skewering of early 2000s popular culture. The album peaked at number 17 on the Billboard 200. The album also peaked at number 12 on the Billboard Comedy Albums chart, making it the first of Yankovic's records to earn a position on said chart. ## Production ### Originals On March 25, 2002, recording for Poodle Hat officially began. By mid-2002, six originals—"Hardware Store", "Party at the Leper Colony", "Wanna B Ur Lovr", "Why Does This Always Happen to Me?", "Bob", and "Genius in France"—had been recorded. The album's first original song is "Hardware Store", a list song that, as the title suggests, is about a new neighborhood hardware store and describes the items that can be purchased there with excruciating detail. The song was originally intended to be a pastiche, or "style parody", of another (unspecified) artist, but during recording sessions it evolved into an original composition. In a GQ interview, Yankovic opted not to reveal the identity of the original parodied musical artist, explaining that if he did, the factoid would end up as a Wikipedia entry. "Party at the Leper Colony" is a dance song set in a leper colony. The song makes heavy use of wordplay, lampooning common English idioms by taking them literally, often to a grotesque degree, as the characters with leprosy lose body parts throughout the song (e.g. "Dance all night to a rotten band/Come on, people, let's give 'em a hand"). "Wanna B Ur Lovr", a pastiche of Midnite Vultures-era Beck, consists of pick-up lines which become steadily more ridiculous and suggestive. Because the spelling of the song's title recalls the manner in which Prince titled many of his records, Yankovic specified on his website that the "song is actually intended to sound like me trying to sound like Beck trying to sound like Prince" [emphasis in original]. "Why Does This Always Happen to Me?" emulates the style of Ben Folds. According to music critic Nathan Rabin, the song "amplifies the noxious self-absorption of the American character to hilarious extremes" by describing a narrator who, upon hearing about a number of horrible tragedies, only complains about the (minor) inconveniences that affect him. Folds himself plays piano on the track. Yankovic later told The A.V. Club: "Ben and I are old friends at this point, and of course I sought his keyboard work for that song. So he came in and knocked it out. I think that's an F-Sharp, so he was kind of mad at me for that." "Bob" is a style parody of Bob Dylan, composed entirely of palindromes (for instance, the song's first line is "I, man, am regal—a German am I", which reads the same when reversed). Rabin argues that the song's lyrics "sound cryptic enough to be genuine Dylanesque, but are in fact palindromes deliver in an uncanny re-creation of Dylan's nasal whine." The album's closer, "Genius in France", emulates the idiosyncratic style of Frank Zappa. Zappa's son, Dweezil performed the song's intro guitar solo. Lyrically, the song describes a person who, although rejected elsewhere, finds acceptance in France. ### Parodies and polka On March 21, 2003, Yankovic began working on the album's parody songs, as well as the record's polka medley. The album opens with the parody "Couch Potato", a play on Eminem's "Lose Yourself", the critically acclaimed single from the film 8 Mile (2002). In Yankovic's version, the singer describes his obsession with watching television; the song references many TV shows, as well as cable and network channels. Prior to recording "Couch Potato", Yankovic researched television so that his resulting parody would be accurate. He noted, "If I'm writing a song about TV, I'll spend a lot of time watching TV. I'll study TV Guide, I'll look at articles about television, and I'll try to make sure I'm giving every show its fair do [sic]. I can also spend all day watching TV and convince myself that I'm working, because I'm doing research." The album's second parody, "Trash Day", is a parody of "Hot in Herre" by Nelly. In this song, the narrator discusses the filthiness of his house and bemoans the titular day wherein people place their garbage outside of their living quarters to be picked up by a waste collector and brought to a landfill. "A Complicated Song" is spoof of "Complicated" by Avril Lavigne. The song is composed of three vignettes: in the first, the singer laments that he is constipated, in the second, he discovers that he and his girlfriend are related, and in the third, he expresses regret that he recently was decapitated. "Ode to a Super Hero" is a play on Billy Joel's song "Piano Man", and recounts to the plot of the 2002 Spider-Man film. The album's final parody is "eBay", based on "I Want It That Way" by Backstreet Boys. In this song, the narrator describes a variety of obscure items that he purchased on the online auction site eBay. Yankovic later noted, "I was going to shoot a video for eBay, but right at the same time, eBay started doing all of these commercials with song parodies. [...] I didn't want my parody to come off as a commercial for eBay. In retrospect, I probably should have done a video because it would have been one of my biggest hits." Indeed, the song is one of Yankovic's most popular, and ranks as one of his most-downloaded tracks on digital music outlets. "Angry White Boy Polka", a medley of popular hit songs set to a polka beat, was recorded at the same time as the album's parodies. Yankovic explained, "[The medley] is a reflection on what songs I think would sound most ridiculous done as a polka [...] and for the [...] album, it reflected a genre of music that I thought probably would benefit from getting a polka treatment." ## Artwork and packaging The cover of the CD depicts Yankovic with a poodle on his head, standing in a crowded subway car. The poodle in question was Yankovic's own dog, Bela. Before deciding on the final shot of his poodle, Yankovic and his production crew tried a setup that featured Bela urinating on his head, but Yankovic later admitted, "It was more disgusting than funny." In regards to the people standing behind him in the subway car, Yankovic specified via the "Ask Al" Q&A on his website: > Well, let's see... the guy with the poodle on his head would be me. The very pregnant woman with the sunglasses is my wife Suzanne. The guy in the surgical scrubs is my friend Joel Miller. The woman in the foreground with her legs crossed is my first-cousin-once-removed Tammy (who also played Queen Amidala in my video for "The Saga Begins"). Uh Jeff, the guy that screens my fan mail, is the guy wearing the NY Yankees cap way in the back. Steve Jay's son Ian is the really tall blond bicycle messenger. Tracy Berna, one of the writers for The Weird Al Show, is the waitress with the beehive hair-do. The Boy Scout is Dylan Bostick, the oldest son of one of Suzanne's oldest friends. Bermuda's wife Leslie is in there too. Plus there's my mother-in-law, my father-in-law, my electrician, a couple from my church, the owner of my favorite ice cream shop, my aunt's boyfriend... I think we got maybe 2 or 3 people from the casting office, but the overwhelming majority were friends and family members that just wanted to come to the shoot. The album was released on an Enhanced CD, and when the CD is placed into a computer, bonus content is made available. This content includes several of Yankovic's real home videos and his commentary on them, as well as synchronized lyrics and instrumental or acoustic versions of some songs. A photo gallery is also included. ## Music video controversy A music video for "Couch Potato" was to be shot shortly after the album's release, but Eminem denied Yankovic permission to shoot it. Yankovic told the Chicago Sun-Times in 2003: > We were already in pre-production. We believed that it was just a formality, that Eminem just wanted to hear the final mix of the song... And then we got a phone call saying he was not going to give permission for a video. We were devastated [...] I certainly don't have any bad feelings toward Eminem. He was gracious enough to let us use the song on the album—and we use "The Real Slim Shady" in the "Angry White Boy Polka" medley, too. But this is the first album I've ever released without an accompanying video. According to Yankovic, Eminem worried that a parody of his video might "detract from his legacy [and] that [...] would somehow make people take him less seriously as an important hip-hop artist". Musicologist Lily Hirsch noted that, while race was not mentioned by either party, the powerful visual impression of a Weird Al video could have undermined Eminem's efforts to be seen as a serious rap artist instead of a "wigger". Yankovic was rather upset that a video for "Couch Potato" would not be made, as he felt that it would have been "the best video that [he had] ever done". Yankovic later revealed that the video would have taken on the form of a "'patchwork quilt' montage spoofing the most famous scenes from Eminem's videos." Yankovic mocked the situation on his 2003 Al TV special where he staged a mock interview with the rapper using footage from a real Eminem interview on MTV News. Eminem said, "I believe in... artistic expression." Yankovic countered with, "So you think, for example if somebody wanted to do, oh, I don't know, a parody of somebody else's video, they should be able to... artistically express themselves and just do it?" Eminem was shown at a loss for words. Eminem later discussed the mock interview in the book The Way I Am, wherein he claimed to have taken the jab in good fun: > Weird Al also got me. He made a video, did a fake interview with me, spliced it with clips from my old interviews, and put it up on the Internet. He's a very funny motherfucker. When something like that happens, you have to sit back and say, "Oh, he got me." It's something you pick up from battles: you learn to be a good sport about a lot of stuff. If you want to dish it out, you've got to be able to take it. So that the album wouldn't be without a video, a quick one for "Bob" was shot and used on the tour and for the 2003 edition of Al TV. The video for "Bob" was subsequently released on "Weird Al" Yankovic: The Ultimate Video Collection DVD (2003). ## Critical reception The album received mixed reviews from music critics. Evan Serpick of Entertainment Weekly awarded the album a "B". While he felt that "Couch Potato" was, musically, up to par with Eminem's original, he noted, "It's hard to imagine today's tough tykes choosing" to listen to the somewhat tame parody. Serpick also felt that the Nelly and Avril Lavigne parodies were "full of noisome effects and clownish voices that would make even the widest eyes roll." He ended his review by praising the album's polka medley, saying it "exposes the songs for the pretentious rock babble they are." Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic claimed that the album was evidence that "pop culture [was] ahead of Weird Al". He felt that many of songs belied an inherent misconception of youth culture on the part of Yankovic, and that with Poodle Hat, the artist was "offering generalizations about a culture he doesn't understand". But while he claimed that the record "stumbles over the obviousness and awfulness of its parodies", Erlewine enjoyed "Hardware Store", "Why Does This Always Happen to Me?", and "Genius in France" (for being "complicated" and "intricate"; a "sensitive piano pop tune with a good send-up of narcissistic lyrics and nice, layered vocal harmonies"; and "the most ambitious and weirdest thing here, which counts for a lot," respectively). The writers of The Rolling Stone Album Guide awarded the album two stars, denoting a record that is "fair to poor" and that "fall[s] below an artist's established standard". A review of the album by Billboard, however, praised the album, noting that it "crackles with amusing parodies", proving that Yankovic is "a sharp observer of the world—and that's what makes [him] such an enduring, compelling figure." ### Accolades Poodle Hat won a Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album. This made it his first Grammy Award win since 1988, when his video for "Fat" won for Best Concept Music Video. Part of the reason for this dearth of awards was because, from 1993 until 2003, the Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album had been changed to "Grammy Award for Best Spoken Word Comedy"—meaning that Yankovic's musical comedy records were not eligible for nomination. ## Commercial performance Upon its release, Poodle Hat charted domestically at number 17 on the Billboard 200. It also charted at number 12 on Billboard's Top Internet Albums. Poodle Hat has not been certified by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA), making it one of only a handful of "Weird Al" Yankovic albums to not receive the honor. Nathan Rabin, in Weird Al: The Book (2012), argues that this is because "Couch Potato" never had a music video, resulting in the album stumbling commercially. Although no official singles were released from the album, the song "eBay" nevertheless charted at number 15 on Billboard's Bubbling Under Hot 100 Singles chart (which, in effect, corresponds to 115 on the Billboard Hot 100 singles chart). In late 2013, Yankovic sued his label, Volcano, and its parent company, Sony Music, for unpaid publishing royalties from several of his albums and singles, including Poodle Hat. Yankovic claimed thatdespite the album's successhe never earned royalties from the record. The initial lawsuit was for \$5 million; Yankovic won the lawsuit and was awarded an undisclosed sum of money from Sony. ## Track listing ## Personnel Credits adapted from CD liner notes, except where noted. Band members - "Weird Al" Yankovic – lead vocals (tracks 1–12), background vocals (tracks 1–8, 11–12), keyboards (tracks 1–2, 12), group vocals (tracks 4, 6), accordion (tracks 5, 9, 12), claps (track 5), shouts (track 5), party noises (track 5) - Jon "Bermuda" Schwartz – drum programming (track 1, 3, 6, 11), drums (tracks 2, 4–5, 7–10, 12), percussion (track 4–5, 7, 10, 12), group vocals (tracks 4, 6), claps (track 5), shouts (track 5), party noises (track 5), laugh (track 12), snork (track 12) - Jim West – guitars (tracks 1–7, 9–12), group vocals (tracks 4, 6), claps (track 5), shouts (track 5), party noises (track 5), mandolin (track 9) - Steve Jay – bass guitar (tracks 1–12), group vocals (tracks 4, 6), banjo (track 5), claps (track 5), shouts (track 5), party noises (track 5) Additional musicians - Kim Bullard – keyboards (tracks 1, 3, 6, 7, 11) - Lisa Popeil – female background vocals (track 2) - Julia Waters – female vocal (track 3), female background vocals (track 12) - Rubén Valtierra – keyboards (tracks 4, 10), piano (track 9) - Tom Evans – saxophone (tracks 4, 6, 12) - Warren Luening – trumpets (track 5) - Joel Peskin – clarinets (track 5) - Tommy Johnson – tuba (track 5) - Lee Thornburg – trumpet and trombone (track 6, 12) - DJ Swamp – scratching (track 6) - Ben Folds – piano (track 8) - John "Juke" Logan – harmonica (track 9) - Will Anderson – harmonica (track 10) - Herb Pedersen – banjo (track 12) - Maxine Waters – female background vocals (track 12) - Carmen Twillie<sup>1</sup> – female background vocals (track 12) - Bela – barking (track 12) - Dweezil Zappa – intro guitar solo (track 12) Technical - "Weird Al Yankovic" – producer - Tony Papa – engineer, mixing - Rafael Serrano – engineer - Mark Seliger – photography - Jackie Murphy – art design - Nick Gamma – art design - Bernie Grundman – mastering - Doug Sanderson – assistant engineer (track 5) - Aaron Kaplan – assistant mixing engineer (tracks 2, 4, 6, 8, 10, 12) - Tony Zoeller – assistant mixing engineer (tracks 1, 3, 5, 7, 9, 11) ## Charts and certifications ### Charts ### Singles
158,410	Oleg the Wise	1,172,898,717	Varangian prince, founder of Kievan Rus'	[ "10th-century princes from Kievan Rus'", "9th-century monarchs in Europe", "Deaths due to snake bites", "Grand Princes of Kiev", "Princes of Kiev", "Princes of Novgorod", "Rurikids", "Varangians", "Year of birth uncertain" ]	Oleg (Old East Slavic: Ѡлегъ, Ольгъ; Old Norse: Helgi; died 912), known as Oleg the Wise, Oleg of Novgorod, or Oleg of Kiev, was a Varangian prince of the Rus' who became prince of Kiev and laid the foundations of the Kievan Rus' state. According to the Primary Chronicle, he succeeded his "kinsman" Rurik as ruler of Novgorod, and subdued many of the East Slavic tribes to his rule, extending his control from Novgorod to the south along the Dnieper river. Oleg also launched a successful attack on Constantinople. He died in 912 and was succeeded by Rurik's son, Igor. This traditional dating has been challenged by some historians, who point out that it is inconsistent with such other sources as the Schechter Letter, which mentions the activities of a certain khagan HLGW (Hebrew: הלגו usually transcribed Helgu. Compare Swedish first name Helge.) of Rus' as late as the 940s, during the reign of Byzantine Emperor Romanus I. The nature of Oleg's relationship with the Rurikid ruling family of the Rus', and specifically with his successor Igor of Kiev, is a matter of much controversy among historians. ## Oleg of the Rus' chronicles According to the Primary Chronicle, Oleg was a "relative" or "kinsman" of Rurik, and was entrusted by Rurik to take care of both his realm and his young son Igor. However, his relation to Rurik is debatable, and has been rejected by several modern scholars. Oleg is narrated to have succeeded Rurik as the ruler of Novgorod in 879. In 881/882, he took control of Smolensk, and then seized power in Kiev by tricking and slaying Askold and Dir, and setting himself up as prince in Kiev, which is commonly taken as the founding of Kievan Rus'. Although Oleg was the first "prince" (knyaz) of Kiev according to the Primary Chronicle, he was not yet a "grand prince" (velikiy knyaz). Whereas later Muscovite chroniclers would call Oleg a "grand prince" and Kiev a "grand principality" (Old East Slavic: великое княжение, romanized: velikoe knyazhenie), the earliest sources do not. In 883, Prince Oleg of Novgorod made the Drevlians pay tribute to Kiev. In 907, the Drevlians took part in the Kievan military campaign against the Byzantine Empire: the Rus'-Byzantine War (907) against Constantinople in 907. According to the chronicle, Oleg, assaulting the city, ordered to wait for favorable wind with sails spread at some other point. When wind arose, it drove the wheeled boats towards the city through the land. The citizens were forced to start a peace negotiation. Having fixed his shield to the gate of the imperial capital, Oleg won a favourable trade treaty, which eventually was of great benefit to both nations. Although Byzantine sources did not record these hostilities, the text of the treaty survives in the Chronicle. The Primary Chronicle'''s brief account of Oleg's life contrasts with other early sources, specifically the Novgorod First Chronicle, which states that Oleg was not related to Rurik, and was rather a Scandinavian client-prince who served as Igor's army commander. The Novgorod First Chronicle does not give the date of the commencement of Oleg's reign, but dates his death to 922 rather than 912. Scholars have contrasted this dating scheme with the "epic" reigns of roughly thirty-three years for both Oleg and Igor in the Primary Chronicle. The Primary Chronicle and other Kievan sources place Oleg's grave in Kiev, while Novgorodian sources identify a funerary barrow in Ladoga as Oleg's final resting place. ### Death according to legend In the Primary Chronicle, Oleg is known as the Prophet, an epithet alluding to the sacred meaning of his Norse name ("priest"). According to the legend, romanticised by Alexander Pushkin in his ballad "The Song of the Wise Oleg," it was prophesied by the pagan priests (volkhvs) that Oleg would take death from his stallion. To defy the prophecies, Oleg sent the horse away. Many years later he asked where his horse was, and was told it had died. He asked to see the remains and was taken to the place where the bones lay. When he touched the horse's skull with his boot a snake slithered from the skull and bit him. Oleg died, thus fulfilling the prophecy. Oleg's death has been interpreted as a distorted variant of the threefold death theme in Indo-European myth and legend, with prophecy, the snake and the horse representing the three functions: the prophecy is associated with sovereignty, the horse with warriors, and the serpent with reproduction. In Scandinavian traditions, this legend lived on in the saga of Orvar-Odd. Another variant is found in the tale of Sir Robert de Shurland on the Isle of Sheppey in Kent, England. ## Oleg of the Schechter Letter According to the Primary Chronicle, Oleg died in 912 and his successor, Igor of Kiev, ruled from then until his assassination in 945. The Schechter Letter, a document written by a Jewish Khazar, a contemporary of Romanus I Lecapenus, describes the activities of a Rus' warlord named HLGW (Hebrew: הלגו), usually transcribed as "Helgu". For years many scholars disregarded or discounted the Schechter Letter account, which referred to Helgu (often interpreted as Oleg) as late as the 940s. Recently, however, scholars such as David Christian and Constantine Zuckerman have suggested that the Schechter Letter's account is corroborated by various other Rus' chronicles, and suggests a struggle within the early Rus' polity between factions loyal to Oleg and to the Rurikid Igor, a struggle that Oleg ultimately lost. Zuckerman posited that the early chronology of the Rus' had to be re-determined in light of these sources. Among Zuckerman's beliefs and those of others who have analyzed these sources are that the Khazars did not lose Kiev until the early 10th century (rather than 882, the traditional date), that Igor was not Rurik's son but rather a more distant descendant, and that Oleg did not immediately follow Rurik, but rather that there is a lost generation between the legendary Varangian lord and his documented successors. Of particular interest is the fact that the Schechter Letter account of Oleg's death (namely, that he fled to and raided FRS, tentatively identified with Persia, and was slain there) bears remarkable parallels to the account of Arab historians such as Ibn Miskawayh, who described a similar Rus' attack on the Muslim state of Arran in the year 944/5. ## Attempts to reconcile the accounts In contrast to Zuckerman's version, the Primary Chronicle and the later Kiev Chronicle place Oleg's grave in Kiev, where it could be seen at the time of the compilation of these documents. Furthermore, scholars have pointed out that if Oleg succeeded Rurik in 879 (as the East Slavic chronicles assert), he could hardly have been active almost 70 years later, unless he had a life-span otherwise unheard of in medieval annals. To solve these difficulties, Parkomenko (1924) proposed that the pagan monarch-priests of Rus' used the hereditary title of helgu, standing for "holy" in the Norse language, and that Igor and others held this title. It has also been suggested that Helgu-Oleg who waged war in the 940s was distinct from both of Rurik's successors. He could have been one of the "fair and great princes" recorded in the Russo-Byzantine treaties of 911 and 944 or one of the "archons of Rus" mentioned in De administrando imperio. But the Primary Chronicle does not specify the relations between minor Rurikid princes active during the period, although the names Rurik, Oleg and Igor were recorded among the late-10th-century and 11th-century Rurikids. Georgy Vernadsky even identified the Oleg of the Schechter Letter with Igor's otherwise anonymous eldest son, whose widow Predslava is mentioned in the Russo-Byzantine treaty of 944. Alternatively, V. Ya. Petrukhin speculated that Helgu-Oleg of the 940s was one of the vernacular princes of Chernigov, whose ruling dynasty maintained especially close contacts with Khazaria, as the findings at the Black Grave, a large royal kurgan excavated near Chernigov, seem to testify. ## Legacy Olehivska Street, Kyiv, and Prince Oleg Lane, Kremenchuk, both in Ukraine, are both named after Oleg. ## In popular culture - Oleg appears briefly in the Soviet film The Legend of Princess Olga (1983), played by Russian-Ukrainian actor Nikolay Olyalin. - Hungarian actor László Helyey portrayed Oleg in the Hungarian production Honfoglalás (1996), a biopic on Árpád (played by Franco Nero). - The Danish film A Viking Saga (2008) tells of the early life and career of Oleg. Oleg is played by Ken Vedsegaard, with Erik Holmey in the role of Rurik, Kim Sønderholm as Dir and Peter Gantzler as Askold, the primary antagonist. - Prince Oleg appears as the primary villain in season 6 of Vikings (2019–2020). In this production, Askold and Dir are portrayed as his brothers. He is played by Russian actor Danila Kozlovsky. - Prince Oleg appears in Russian docudrama The Rurikids. The story of the first dynasty (2019), which tells the story of the Rurik dynasty (9th–16th centuries). He is portrayed by Russian actor Dmitry Moguchev. - Oleg appears in the video game Crusader Kings III'', where he is Rurik Rurikid's son named Helgi 'The Seer' who is of the Slovianska Pravda faith as opposed to Rurik's Ásatrú (Norse Pagan) faith.
4,986,259	Powell Butte	1,168,662,243	Extinct cinder cone butte in Portland, Oregon, U.S.	[ "Buttes of Oregon", "Cascade Volcanoes", "Cinder cones of the United States", "Extinct volcanoes of the United States", "Landforms of Multnomah County, Oregon", "Parks in Portland, Oregon", "Southeast Portland, Oregon", "Subduction volcanoes", "Volcanoes of Multnomah County, Oregon", "Volcanoes of Oregon" ]	Powell Butte is an extinct cinder cone butte in Portland, Oregon, United States. It is part of the Boring Lava Field, which includes more than 80 small volcanic edifices and lava flows in the Portland–Vancouver metropolitan area. The region around Powell Butte has a cool climate, and the butte and its surroundings feature meadows, rivers, and mixed forests. Powell Butte hosts the Powell Butte Nature Park, which includes about 612 acres (2.48 km<sup>2</sup>) of trails for biking, hiking, and horseback riding. Powell Butte lies within historic territory of the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde Community of Oregon. The land surrounding the butte has been used for an orchard and dairy farming. Today two underground reservoirs at the Butte each hold 50,000,000 US gallons (190,000,000 L) of fresh water as a primary part of the public water system for Portland and much of the surrounding region. ## Geography and geology Powell Butte is located in Multnomah County in the U.S. state of Oregon. According to the U.S. National Geodetic Survey, the butte reaches an elevation of 614 feet (187 m), while the Geographic Names Information System lists the mountain's elevation at 627 feet (191 m). J.E. Allen, an emeritus professor of Geology at Portland State University, listed its elevation as 560 feet (170 m) in a 1975 publication. Powell Butte is a cinder cone butte and is part of the Plio-Pleistocene Boring Lava Field, a group of volcanic cones that got their name from the low, forested Boring Hills formation. Located in the Portland Basin, the Boring Lava Field consists of monogenetic volcanic cones that appear as hills throughout the area, reaching heights of 650 feet (200 m) above their surroundings. The field includes more than 80 small volcanic edifices and lava flows in the Portland–Vancouver metropolitan area, with the possibility of more volcanic deposits buried under sedimentary rock layers. Volcanism in the Boring Lava Field is the product of subduction of the Juan de Fuca oceanic tectonic plate under the North American continental tectonic plate, as well as regional rifting. Powell Butte lies northwest of the Boring Hills, and the surrounding area includes (moving clockwise from the north) other volcanic centers like Green Mountain, Prune Hill, Chamberlain Hill, Devils Rest, Larch Mountain, Pepper Mountain, Kelly Butte, and Mount Tabor. The top of Powell Butte consists of volcanic rock from the Troutdale Formation, on top of which are remnants from a local eruption in the Boring Lava Field, including scoria and volcanic ash. Powell Butte is one of the smaller volcanic cones in the Boring Lava Field. During the Pliocene (5 million to 2 million years ago), hyaloclastite formed from interaction of Cascade, alumina-rich basalt lava with the Columbia River. After these hyaloclastite units were deposited, further deformation occurred, leading to the accumulation of gravel and lithic fragments to elevations of 600 to 700 feet (180 to 210 m) in the Portland area. Powell Butte is partially mantled by post hyaloclastite gravel from the Troutdale Formation, which is likely the result of redeposited soil after erosion. Like the rest of the Boring Lava Field, Powell Butte is extinct. ## Climate and ecology The climate at Powell Butte is cool, creating a short growing season environment. It supports grass meadows, which sustain apple, pear, and walnut trees. Powell Butte sits near Johnson Creek, a tributary of the Willamette River that sustains native salmon and rainbow trout. It also supports the Powell Butte Nature Park and its associated meadow and forest areas. These habitats are populated by bats, black-tailed mule deer, chipmunks, coyotes, gray foxes, ground squirrels, rabbits, raccoons, ring-necked pheasants, and skunks. Birds of prey are common among the park's open meadows, groves of wild hawthorn and western red cedar trees, and wetlands. Kestrels and red-tailed hawks hunt on top of the butte. There are mixed forests of bigleaf maple and Douglas fir trees on the butte's northern side. ## Human history Powell Butte lies within historic territory of the Confederated Tribes of the Grand Ronde Community of Oregon, which covered more than 20,000,000 acres (81,000 km<sup>2</sup>) and extended from the Columbia River to the Klamath River. At the end of the 19th century, much of the meadow area near Powell Butte was cleared and replaced with an orchard by settlers. In 1925, the Portland city government bought the land encompassing Powell Butte from George Wilson with the intent to use it for water reservoirs. They leased the northeastern part of the land to farmer Henry Anderegg, who owned and operated the Meadowland Crest Dairy until 1948. In the mid-1970s, Portland's Water Bureau created a development plan for Powell Butte including four 50,000,000-US-gallon (190,000,000 L) underground reservoirs to be built at the northern side of the mountain. The first of these reservoirs was constructed in 1981 and the second in 2014. ## Recreation Powell Butte hosts the Powell Butte Nature Park, which encompasses an area of about 612 acres (2.48 km<sup>2</sup>). The nature park was established by Portland city government in 1987 and opened to the public in 1990 and is maintained by Portland Parks & Recreation; it currently includes a natural area, trails for biking, horseback riding, and hiking. The Friends of Powell Butte is an organization formed in 1990, which is focused on protecting the resources of the nature park. It meets monthly to implement park planning and improvement and gather citizen input. Within the Boring Lava Field, Mount Tabor and Powell Butte are better known for their recreational uses than other cones. Powell Butte Nature Park offers 9 miles (14 km) of trails, with many formal and informal paths. The top of the butte also offers views of Mount Adams, Mount Hood, Mount Jefferson, and Mount St. Helens.
40,818,982	My Transsexual Summer	1,173,790,768	British reality TV series	[ "2010s British LGBT-related television series", "2010s LGBT-related reality television series", "2011 British television series debuts", "2011 British television series endings", "Channel 4 documentaries", "Channel 4 reality television shows", "Television series by Warner Bros. Television Studios", "Transgender in the United Kingdom", "Transgender-related television shows" ]	My Transsexual Summer is a British documentary-style reality series about seven transgender people in different stages of transition. For five weekends in the summer of 2011, they stay together in a large holiday home in Bedfordshire, where they meet and help each other with some of the struggles that transgender people face. Between these weekend retreats, they go back to their lives and real-world challenges. In the early 2010s, Channel 4 resolved to improve the accuracy and depth of their representation of transgender people. My Transsexual Summer was the first transgender programme they created after making this resolution. Channel 4 broadcast the series in November 2011. It was rebroadcast in the UK on More4 in 2012, and on ABC2 in Australia in 2013. Also in 2013, two of the show's participants themselves started making documentary short films and videos about being transgender. ## Background In April 2010, non-profit organisation Trans Media Watch published a study called "How Transgender People Experience the Media", which found that there is "an endemic problem with negative and inaccurate representations [of transgender people in British media stories], and observed that this leads to considerable real-life suffering". The following September, the Westminster Media Forum hosted a keynote seminar on the representation of LGBT people in British mass media. Two speakers in particular addressed the subject of transgender representation: Stuart Cosgrove, Director of Creative Diversity at Channel 4; and Tim Davie, chairperson of the BBC Working Group on Portrayal and Inclusion of Lesbian, Gay and Bisexual Audiences. They noted a general absence of transgender people in British broadcasting, and reported that "transgender storylines... are frequently lacking in breadth and substance." In a later interview, Cosgrove added that there are "high levels of inaccuracy" in British media reports about transgender people. In an effort to improve this situation, Trans Media Watch drafted and published a memorandum of understanding for media companies: signatories of the memorandum agree to "work toward... increasing positive, well-informed representations of transgender people in the media." In March 2011, Channel 4 became the first company to sign the memorandum. "Our editorial independence always come first; but it is part of our remit to reflect the diversity of the UK", said Cosgrove. After signing, Channel 4 engaged journalist/activist Paris Lees of Trans Media Watch to be a production consultant for the show; Lees served as consultant for the duration of production. ### Production Channel 4 gave the programme the working title Girls Will Be Boys and Boys Will Be Girls. Mark Raphael, the commissioning editor for documentaries, contracted a British production company called Twenty Twenty Productions to make the series. Twenty Twenty was at the time a subsidiary of Shed Media. Former commissioning editor for documentaries Meredith Chambers served as executive producer for Channel 4, and Sam Whittaker was executive producer for Twenty Twenty. The series producer and director was Helen Richards. Filming began several weeks after the signing of the memorandum, and continued over a period of four months. My Transsexual Summer aired on Channel 4 in November 2011. ## Participants The participants in the programme are four trans women and three trans men from different parts of England. They range in age from 22 to 52; five of the participants are under 30. Drew-Ashlyn Cunningham Drew-Ashlyn, a 22-year-old trans woman from Wakefield, has been living as a woman for more than four years. Her family are supportive, but before the show she had never met another trans person—let alone trans people near her own age. Fox Fisher Fox (age 30) is a screen printing artist from Brighton. Since starting HRT six months ago, Fox is all-too aware that the hormones are slow to manifest visible changes. Karen Gale Karen, from Essex, worked for many years as a police officer, and later as a lorry driver. She divorced in 1985, and wants to be able to see her daughter again. At age 52, she is about to undergo vaginoplasty. Lewis Hancox Lewis (age 22) is from St Helens, Merseyside. Like Drew, he says he has never knowingly met another trans person before. He decided at age 18 to transition, and he has been living as a man for three years. Sarah Savage Sarah (age 29) is from Jersey. She has only recently begun presenting as a woman full-time; during the course of the show, she comes out to her mother. Donna Whitbread Donna is a 25-year-old from Norwich. She and Drew have both been on hormone replacement therapy (HRT) for two years. Maxwell Zachs Max is a 25-year-old trans man from Tottenham. He is Reform Jewish, and hopes to become a rabbi. Max was living in New Zealand when he began preparing to undergo mastectomy. After seeking help locally, he had the procedure done in Thailand instead. ## Episodes ## Response Before the first episode aired, journalist Patrick Strudwick asked, "Channel 4, why call your new documentary My Transsexual Summer? It sounds like gender tourism, a fun little trip to the other side." Sarah Dean, an entertainment editor for The Huffington Post UK, called the title "sensationalist". Although Sarah Lake of Trans Media Watch found the title contentious, she defended it by pointing out that transition is a temporary process like coming of age; even so, she believed the title to be "only slightly better" than the "dire and totally inappropriate" working title, Girls Will Be Boys and Boys Will Be Girls. Her overall assessment was that "although the programme makers undeniably made some compromises to draw in viewers, millions will have enjoyed the company of these seven, shared in their lives and learned a lesson in diversity.... They will now have an entry point to broadening their understanding of the rich and joyful diversity of gender experience, something which has always existed but of which they were previously unaware." Politician and activist Zoe O'Connell described some of the wording in the narration as "cringeworthy", but felt that "it’s more than just a step in the right direction, it’s a programme that pretty accurately reflected how many trans people carry on with each other in private." Musician, activist, and writer CN Lester listed some ways in which the show perpetuated misconceptions or otherwise fell short, but still saw it as a turning point in the representation of transgender people on television: "It felt like a game changer. The overall feel of it—of hope, of warmth—that felt totally new to me. And hats off to the seven trans people... for putting that across." When the second episode aired, transgender journalist Juliet Jacques posted her thoughts to the New Statesman'''s politics blog, The Staggers: "At this point... the limited level of improvement in trans representation on TV shown by My Transsexual Summer is probably the best we can expect." She felt the major barriers to better representation to be "producers' prejudices about what viewers will accept or understand" and extremely narrow bandwidth for "minority subjects". After seeing the first three episodes, Maxwell Zachs called the series "a disappointment". One reason for this, he says, is that although "we see... lovely, endearing transsexuals" portrayed in the show, "what I don’t see is anything that is going to make people think or feel any differently about what gender is or how it limits us all in one way or another." He lamented that their expressions of nuance in gender identity and discussions of genderqueerness were absent from the broadcast edit of the show. After the final episode aired, Juliet Jacques wrote a follow-up article for Time Out. She concludes: "Perhaps in 30 years' time, My Transsexual Summer will look as dated as [the 1980 documentary] A Change of Sex does now. If so, this will be because it has, for all its faults, taken trans-related television in a more positive direction." ## Participants' lives after the show ### Karen, Drew, Max and Donna Less than a month after the final episode of My Transsexual Summer aired, Karen Gale delivered part of Channel 4's alternative Christmas message on Christmas Day, 2011. The theme of the broadcast was "Just Be Yourself". In February 2016, Karen's local newspaper, the Romford Recorder, interviewed her about what life was like before she transitioned. Drew-Ashlyn Cunningham made speaking appearances at schools, universities, and youth groups. She became a supporter of Gendered Intelligence (a nonprofit organisation that aids trans youth), and a celebrity patron of the 2012 and 2013 National Diversity Awards. In 2012 she became a make-up artist for Illamasqua, and also wrote for Gay Star News. In late 2012, she began to train in professional wrestling, as this was a childhood dream of hers; by September 2013 she was preparing for her first match. Her wrestling name is Harley Ryder. By April 2013, she was also working part-time for Gaydio, an LGBT FM radio station in the UK. In January 2014, she reported that she was continuing to work with make-up and to wrestle, that she was still making appearances at schools, and that she was writing an autobiography. Drew-Ashlyn has since left Illamasqua to go on her own. Drew-Ashlyn underwent facial surgery in 2016 which consisted of a nose job, jaw and chin contouring as well as a trachea shave. She was voted number 1 of the 24 Instagram makeup artists to follow for Halloween in 2017 by ELLE magazine. She continues to do volunteer work. She also wrote a chapter in the book To My Trans Sisters by Charlie Craggs. Maxwell Zachs is a writer, Judaic studies scholar, and trans activist. Since 2011 he has written for various publications on subjects pertaining to gender and Judaism. In 2012, he started a petition calling on the WHO to delist transsexualism from the International Classification of Diseases. After a period of charity work, he moved to Stockholm to study at Paideia, the European Institute for Jewish Studies in Sweden, on a one-year fellowship. In 2013, while living in Stockholm, he published some of his plays, as well as a dystopian novella called The People's Republic of Nowhere. Donna Whitbread is a stage and festival performer. In 2014, she joined the cast of cabaret act Ladyboys of London—a company of three trans women plus four male dancers, with choreography by Kamilah Beckles. They debuted at the Hippodrome Casino in London's West End on the 29th of December, and Donna opened the show with a fire breathing act. One year later she announced that she had a role in John Cameron Mitchell's film How to Talk to Girls at Parties (2017). In 2017 BBC News videotaped her for Gay Britannia, television programming that marked the 50th anniversary of the Sexual Offences Act 1967. She answered questions written by cisgender people about trans women. ### Sarah, Lewis and Fox After her time with her new friends at the retreat, Sarah Savage was optimistic. "I left the retreat with a different outlook on life, I could feel my confidence growing, slowly." She appeared on chat shows ITV Breakfast and Live with Gabby in 2011, and returned to television in March 2013 as a guest on The Alan Titchmarsh Show. She took a job in Brighton, and has a blog that she started during the production of My Transsexual Summer. In the spring of 2013, she started HRT. 2013 was also the inaugural year of Trans\* Pride Brighton, the first transgender pride festival in the UK, and she and Fox Fisher served on the organisation committee. In 2015 Sarah and Fox published a picture book, Are You a Boy or are You a Girl?, which Sarah wrote and Fox illustrated. "Before I started transitioning, I never wrote, I never... did anything creative," said Sarah in a 2013 interview. "For some reason... living in a female role has allowed me to be more creative." Lewis Hancox' fundraising events attracted donations from TV viewers; among those who gave to the cause were Stephen Fry and Graham Norton. Later that year, Lewis began preparing for a more complicated gender-confirmation surgery: metoidioplasty. Lewis moved to London to study Digital Film and Video at London South Bank University. In 2013, he and Fox Fisher started the My Genderation project, in which they make short documentaries about transgender people and gender variance. Their production company is called Lucky Tooth Films. The Independent on Sunday placed Lewis and Fox on their Pink List for 2013 (a list of "101 gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people that make a difference"), and on the Rainbow List in 2015. (The Pink List was renamed to Rainbow List in 2014). In 2014, The Guardian included Lewis on their "30 under 30" list of "top young people in digital media". Fox Fisher (aka Raphael Fox) continued to work as a freelance screen printer and visual artist. In addition to their creative projects with Lewis and Sarah, Fox wrote a few pieces for The Huffington Post. Like Sarah, they felt a new creative freedom from transitioning: "It's easier to make art now because I feel like I've got a huge chunk of my life out of the way." In 2014, Fox spoke at TEDxBrighton, and was nominated for the alumnus award at the University of Brighton, where they were a Master of Arts student. Fox completed a Master's degree in Sequential Design and Illustration in 2015. In July 2017, the university granted them an honorary doctorate "in recognition of their major contribution to raising the profile, both nationally and internationally, of issues affecting trans people and the promotion of arts in the media". Fox is active in the media as a trans spokesperson, consultant, actor, and filmmaker. They have spoken about trans issues on Good Morning Britain, Inside Out, and This Morning''. ## See also
2,594,711	Marge on the Lam	1,172,175,166	null	[ "1993 American television episodes", "Parodies of films", "Parody television episodes", "The Simpsons (season 5) episodes" ]	"Marge on the Lam" is the sixth episode of the fifth season of the American animated television series The Simpsons. It originally aired on the Fox network in the United States on November 4, 1993. After Marge invites her neighbor Ruth Powers to attend the ballet, they become friends. Homer grows jealous of their friendship and pursues them, resulting in a police chase led by Chief Wiggum that ends in near-disaster. The episode, which serves largely as a parody of the film Thelma & Louise and the Dragnet franchise, was written by Bill Canterbury and directed by Mark Kirkland. Phil Hartman, Pamela Reed and George Fenneman were the guest stars. ## Plot After donating money to public television, Marge receives complimentary ballet tickets. Marge guilts Homer into accompanying her by reminding him of how he once volunteered as a human guinea pig in a United States Army experiment to avoid visiting Patty and Selma with her. However, Homer gets both of his arms stuck in vending machines at work. Disappointed and doubting Homer's story, Marge invites her neighbor, Ruth Powers, to go with her instead. They enjoy themselves and continue spending time together visiting bars and clubs in Springfield. Ruth demonstrates how to use a pistol to Marge, and they use a forlorn farmer's "precious antique cans" for target practice. To show he can have a good time without Marge, Homer visits the hilltop where he and Marge used to spend time before they got married, but finds it is no fun without Marge. While tending his moonshine still on the hill, Chief Wiggum spots Homer, and Wiggum offers Homer a ride home. At one point, Wiggum tries to make a routine traffic stop, but Ruth speeds up, revealing to Marge that she is driving her ex-husband's stolen car as revenge for his failure to pay child support. Still in Wiggum's backseat, Homer realizes Marge is in Ruth's car and suspects she is leaving him after discovering that she can have a better time without him. Ruth successfully evades Wiggum by turning off her headlights. After seeing Marge and Ruth again the next morning, Wiggum continues his chase, joined by other police cars. Homer sees a cliff ahead and mistakenly thinks Marge and Ruth are attempting suicide. He uses a megaphone to apologize to Marge for all of his shortcomings and urges them not to drive into the Grand Chasm. Ruth, suddenly aware of the cliff, slams on the brakes and stops near its edge. Homer and Wiggum fail to stop in time, fly off the cliff's edge, and land in a mountain of landfill debris. They emerge slightly soiled from the garbage but otherwise unscathed. Because of Lionel Hutz's incompetence, the charges against Ruth are dropped and her ex-husband is forced to pay all back child support. ## Production Dan Castellaneta actually used a bullhorn to record his part when Homer was talking on one. The sunset shown when Marge and Ruth are at the café was airbrushed in, although the episode was done before computer animation was put into practice. ## Cultural references Much of the plot, including the scene when Homer is in Moe's Tavern, and the climax where Ruth's blue convertible and Homer and Wiggum's fall over the chasm, is a parody of the Ridley Scott film Thelma & Louise. The music played during Homer's visualisation of the term ballet is Entrance of the Gladiators by Julius Fučík. Crystal Buzz Cola is a reference to the fad drink Crystal Pepsi, and when Homer reaches into the vending machine, a can of Fresca is seen in a skeletal hand stuck there. The comedian who performs at the telethon who the Simpson family does not find funny is a parody of Garrison Keillor. Ruth mistakenly inserts Lesley Gore's song "Sunshine, Lollipops and Rainbows" into her car stereo before beginning her and Marge's wild night out; later, Chief Wiggum plays the song on his police cruiser's stereo as "appropriate" car chase music. After extracting the wrong tape, Ruth pops in "Welcome to the Jungle" by Guns N' Roses. Quimby dancing in a night club is in reference to the Kennedys. When Marge gets hit on in the bar, the guy who does not talk is a caricature of show runner David Mirkin. The old man that comes out when Marge is shooting his cans is a parody of Walter Brennan. The episode's closing sequence is a reference to Dragnet. George Fenneman recorded the ending in the same fashion as he did on Dragnet. ## Reception ### Critical reception The authors of the book I Can't Believe It's a Bigger and Better Updated Unofficial Simpsons Guide, Warren Martyn and Adrian Wood, said "Marge getting to let her hair down is always a treat, and in Ruth Powers she seems to have a real friend. A pity we don't see more of her". The A.V. Club named Homer's line "Stupid TV! Be more funny!" as one of the quotes from The Simpsons that can be used in everyday situations. On their 2000 album And Then Nothing Turned Itself Inside Out, indie rock band Yo La Tengo has a song entitled "Let's Save Tony Orlando's House"; the song is named after a telethon in Troy McClure's fictional CV seen in this episode. ### Ratings In its original broadcast, "Marge on the Lam" finished 32nd in ratings for the week of November 1–7, 1993, with a Nielsen rating of 13.1, equivalent to approximately 12.2 million viewing households. It was the highest-rated show on the Fox network that week, beating Beverly Hills, 90210.
1,560,693	USS Aylwin (DD-47)	1,134,932,413	Aylwin-class destroyer	[ "1912 ships", "Aylwin-class destroyers", "Ships built by William Cramp & Sons", "World War I destroyers of the United States" ]	USS Aylwin (Destroyer No. 47/DD-47) was the lead ship of Aylwin-class destroyers built for the United States Navy prior to the American entry into World War I. The ship was the second U.S. Navy vessel named in honor of John Cushing Aylwin, a U.S. Navy officer killed in action aboard Constitution during the War of 1812. Aylwin was laid down by She was sponsored by Mrs. Joseph Wright Powell. The ship was a little more than 305 ft (93 m) in length, just over 30 ft (9.1 m) abeam, and had a standard displacement of 1,036 long tons (1,053 t). She was armed with four 4 in (100 mm) guns and had eight 18-inch (450 mm) torpedo tubes. Aylwin was powered by a pair of steam turbines that propelled her at up to 29.5 kn (33.9 mph; 54.6 km/h) Aylwin failed to make her contracted speed of 29.5 kn (33.9 mph; 54.6 km/h) in builder's trials in August 1913, but was eventually accepted by the U.S. Navy and commissioned in January 1914. On 6 April, two sailors on board Aylwin died when she suffered an explosion in her No. 1 fire room. Out of commission while repairs were made, Aylwin was recommissioned in May 1915 and joined the Atlantic Fleet. In October 1916, she was one of several U.S. destroyers sent to rescue survivors from five victims of German submarine U-53 off the Lightship Nantucket. After the United States entered World War I in April 1917, Aylwin conducted experiments with Reginald Fessenden until January 1918. She was then sent overseas to conduct anti-submarine patrols from Queenstown, Ireland, and Plymouth. In December, she accompanied light cruiser Chester on an inspection tour of German Baltic ports. Upon returning to the United States at the end of June 1919, Aylwin was placed in reserve. She was decommissioned at Philadelphia in February 1921. In July 1933 she dropped her name, becoming known only as DD-47. She was struck from the Naval Vessel Register in March 1935 and ordered scrapped in April. ## Design and construction Aylwin was authorized in March 1911 as the lead ship of the four-ship Aylwin class, which was almost identical to the Cassin-class destroyers authorized at the same time. Construction of the vessel—like her three sister ships—was awarded to William Cramp & Sons of Philadelphia which laid down her keel on 7 May 1912. On 23 November, Aylwin was launched by sponsor Mrs. Joseph Wright Powell, wife of the assistant to the president of the Cramp shipyard. The ship was the second U.S. Navy ship named for John Cushing Aylwin, a U.S. Navy officer killed in action aboard Constitution during the War of 1812. As built, the destroyer was 305 ft 3 in (93.04 m) in length, 30 ft 4 in (9.25 m) abeam, and drew 9 ft 5 in (2.87 m). The ship had a standard displacement of 1,036 long tons (1,053 t) and displaced 1,235 long tons (1,255 t) when fully loaded. Aylwin had two steam turbines that drove her two screw propellers, and an additional pair triple-expansion steam engines, each connected to one of the propeller shafts, for cruising purposes. Four oil-burning boilers powered the engines, which could generate 16,000 shp (12,000 kW), and it was hoped, move the ship at the design speed of 29.5 kn (33.9 mph; 54.6 km/h). However, during builder's trials conducted in July 1913, Aylwin failed to reach this speed, and was withdrawn from testing. After sister ship Parker exceeded the design speed in August with a different propeller design, The Washington Post reported that Aylwin's propellers would be changed to the new design. Aylwin's main battery consisted of four 4 in (100 mm)/50 caliber Mark 9 guns, with each gun weighing in excess of 6,100 lb (2,800 kg). The guns fired 33 lb (15 kg) armor-piercing projectiles at 2,900 ft/s (880 m/s). At an elevation of 20°, the guns had a range of 15,920 yd (14,560 m). Aylwin was also equipped with four twin 18 in (460 mm) torpedo tubes. ## Pre-World War I Aylwin was commissioned into the U.S. Navy on 17 January 1914, under the command of Lieutenant Commander Leigh C. Palmer, the former naval aide of U.S. Secretary of the Navy Josephus Daniels. Following a short cruise to Cuba, Aylwin conducted operations off the North Carolina coast in April. On 6 April, she and sister ships Benham and Parker were exercising off the North Carolina coast, about 15 nautical miles (28 km) off the Diamond Shoals lightship. An explosion ripped through the forward fire room on Aylwin, injuring three men. Benham loaded the three wounded sailors and sped to the naval hospital at Norfolk, Virginia, while Parker took on the remainder of Aylwin's crew. One of the injured men died on Benham before landfall was made in Virginia; another died a short time later. The crews of all three destroyers raised \$250 to help defray funeral expenses for the widow of one of the men. Aylwin remained afloat but, unmanned, was towed into Norfolk by Parker and U.S. Navy tug Sonoma, arriving on 7 April. According to a report in The Washington Post, Aylwin made it to port with only five hours of buoyancy to spare. The report described the fore deck of the ship as "badly rent and torn up" and noted that two of the destroyer's four stacks were knocked out of alignment by the blast, with one askew at a 25° angle from its normal position. The newspaper speculated that faulty metal in the No. 1 boiler's mud drum was the cause of the explosion. Although repairs were estimated to take roughly three months, Aylwin was placed out of commission and remained inactive for more than a year at the Norfolk Navy Yard. She was recommissioned on 25 May 1915 and assigned to the 6th Division, Torpedo Flotilla, Atlantic Fleet. The ship then cruised along the east coast carrying out routine patrols. Prior to the entrance of the United States into World War I, she served on Neutrality Patrols, trying to protect American and neutral-flagged merchant ships from interference by British or German warships and U-boats. In the course of performing those duties, Aylwin was at Newport, Rhode Island in early October 1916. At 05:30 on 8 October, wireless reports came in of a German submarine stopping ships near the Lightship Nantucket, off the eastern end of Long Island. After an SOS from the British steamer West Point was received at about 12:30, Rear Admiral Albert Gleaves ordered Aylwin and other destroyers at Newport to attend to survivors. The American destroyers arrived on the scene about 17:00 when the U-boat, U-53 under the command of Kapitänleutnant Hans Rose, was in the process of stopping the Holland-America Line cargo ship Blommersdijk. Shortly after, U-53 stopped the British passenger ship Stephano. As Rose had done with three other ships, U-53 had sunk earlier in the day, he gave passengers and crew aboard Blommersdijk and Stephano adequate time to abandon the ships before sinking the pair. At one point, Rose signaled Aylwin requesting that she move out of the way to allow Stephano to be torpedoed, much to the later chagrin of Lord Beresford, who denounced Aylwin's compliance as "aiding and abetting" the Germans in a speech in the House of Lords. In total, 226 survivors from U-53's five victims were rescued by the destroyer flotilla. Aylwin picked up the crew of Stephano and a number of passengers, later transferring them to destroyer Jenkins for return to Newport. During the early months of 1917, Aylwin sailed to Cuban waters for winter maneuvers and returned to the Virginia capes area upon America's entry into World War I. ## World War I From June 1917-January 1918, the destroyer participated in special experimental work with Reginald Fessenden while operating out of Boston, Massachusetts, and Newport, Rhode Island. On 4 January 1918, Aylwin sailed for Queenstown, Ireland; and, shortly after her arrival there, began patrolling out of that port. However, shortly thereafter, she was detached to join British forces operating from Portsmouth and Devonport in conducting antisubmarine patrols. Aylwin remained in European waters following the end of the war. On 26 December 1918, she sailed in company with light cruiser Chester for an inspection tour of the Baltic ports of Germany. The ships, which, were operating under the auspices of the Inter-Allied Naval Armistice Commission, were to remove any American prisoners of war or citizens discovered in the German ports. ## Postwar In May 1919, the base of operations for U.S. destroyers in European waters was shifted from Brest, France, to Antwerp, and Aylwin, arriving there on 22 May, was the first ship to relocated to the Belgian port. The following month, Aylwin returned to Brest, and departed from there for the United States, arriving at New York on 26 June. She then proceeded to the Philadelphia Navy Yard where she was placed in reserve. Aylwin was decommissioned at Philadelphia on 23 February 1921. On 1 July 1933, she dropped the name Aylwin to free it for a new destroyer of the same name, becoming known only as DD-47. The ship was struck from the Naval Vessel Register on 8 March 1935, and on 23 April was ordered scrapped in accordance with the terms of the London Naval Treaty.
55,939,260	Butterfly (TV series)	1,173,625,684	British miniseries	[ "2010s British LGBT-related drama television series", "2010s British television miniseries", "2018 British television series debuts", "2018 British television series endings", "English-language television shows", "ITV miniseries", "ITV television dramas", "Television series about children", "Television series about families", "Television series by Red Production Company", "Television series by StudioCanal", "Television shows set in Manchester", "Transgender-related television shows" ]	Butterfly is a three-part British television drama series that premiered on 14 October 2018. Made for ITV by Red Production Company, the series focuses on the family of an 11-year-old child Maxine (Callum Booth-Ford) who begins to realise that she is a transgender girl. Anna Friel and Emmett J. Scanlan play her parents, Vicky and Stephen, who reluctantly begin to accept Maxine's need to transition from male to female. The programme was also broadcast in France, Germany, Italy, Spain and Sweden, and made available on the American subscription service Hulu. The series was created by Tony Marchant, who met transgender people and their families during the writing process through trans charity Mermaids. Critical reception was very positive, with reviewers praising the actors and scenes that they found particularly emotive. Further praise was given to the subject matter of the story, though this also received some criticism. The miniseries was well received by social media users and several trans commentators, the first episode garnering 2.8 million overnight viewers. A scene in which Maxine attempts suicide was criticised by a gender clinic of the National Health Service. ## Production The programme was created and written by Tony Marchant, who had previously written Different for Girls, a 1996 film about an adult trans woman. In 1999, he worked on family-related programmes Kid in the Corner, about ADHD, and Bad Blood, about adoption. In an interview with HuffPost, Marchant said that an idea which he found appealing was "the fluidity of gender". The series' lead consultant was Susie Green, UK director of the charity Mermaids, which supports transgender youth. The storyline has similarities to Green's experiences with her transgender daughter Jackie, who in 2010 became the youngest British girl to receive sex reassignment surgery at age 16. Whilst writing the series, Marchant was able to visit families who Mermaids support and listen to their experiences. Marchant aimed to dispel two myths about transgender children: that they identify as such to be "trendy", and that puberty blockers are easy for trans people to access. Digital Spy reported that filming began in January 2018 and OK! reported that filming concluded in March 2018. Callum Booth-Ford, a cisgender boy, was cast as Maxine; around five actors were auditioned for the part. Marchant considered casting a trans child, but was told by Mermaids that it would be "really difficult and painful" for a trans actor. Green added that anonymity was a factor. ITV announced the miniseries in September 2017, along with the casting of Anna Friel of Maxine's mother Vicky. Emmett J. Scanlan was cast as Stephen, Maxine's father. Scanlan read all three episodes' scripts in one sitting, finding it "so relevant and so well-written". He aimed to treat the subject with the "utmost honesty and care". Though saying she had little knowledge of transgender people prior to the project, Friel hoped to change public perception of transgender children, comparing it to her 1990s role on the soap opera Brookside where her character kissed another woman. Friel's daughter was aged thirteen during Butterfly's production. Marchant noted a common theme among families at Mermaids was the presence of transgender children's mothers and absence of their fathers. Vicky's attitudes were written to be representative of her generation and Stephen's doubts were written to be reasonable and relatable. As research before filming began, Scanlan and Friel visited families that Mermaids work with. During filming, Friel listened to synth-pop and wore a specific perfume to get into the mindset of her character. The soundtrack, which consists of synth music, was composed by Michael Stein and Kyle Dixon, who previously worked together on Netflix's science fiction-horror series Stranger Things. It was released upon the miniseries' broadcast in America on the subscription service Hulu. ## Cast - Callum Booth-Ford as Maxine Duffy, birth name Max. Maxine is a trans girl who has wanted to wear girls' clothing since age five. Dysphoria with her body leads her to self-harm at age 11, and she wants to stop her body developing into a male one. - Anna Friel as Vicky Duffy, Maxine's mother and guardian. Vicky has allowed Maxine to wear female clothing in the household but not in public; after consultation with professionals, she fully embraces Maxine's gender identity and works towards getting her treatment. - Emmett J. Scanlan as Stephen Duffy, Maxine's father. Stephen left the household after slapping Maxine for acting feminine in a moment of anger and he is reluctant to accept Maxine's identity. He returns home and is eventually able to support her. - Millie Gibson as Lily Duffy, Maxine's sister. Lily watches out for Maxine at school and encourages her to begin identifying as female. As her parents begin to pay more attention to Maxine, Lily begins to feel unloved. She is romantically interested in a school friend. - Alison Steadman as Barbara Pannell, Vicky's mother. She is initially critical of Vicky for allowing Maxine to identify as female, but later supports it. - Seán McGinley as Peter Duffy, Stephen's father. At first, he is concerned with Maxine's female gender identity. ## Episodes ## Broadcast The programme first aired on the free channel ITV in the UK, on Sunday evenings in the prime time slot of 9 p.m. It began on 14 October 2018 and concluded on 28 October. The American subscription service Hulu released the series in January 2019. In Italy, the series was broadcast on the paid channel Fox Life in December 2018 on Mondays at 9 p.m., after premiering at a film festival in Milan. In Sweden, it was shown in January 2019 by public broadcaster Sveriges Television. The programme aired in February 2019 in France, under the title De Max à Maxine (From Max to Maxine). It premiered on the M6-owned paid channel DTT before airing on the free channel 6ter. The same month, Butterfly was played at a cinema and appeared on the channel EITB in the Basque Country in Spain. It commemorated the one-year anniversary of transgender teenager Ekai Lersundi [eu]'s suicide. Under the title Butterfly – Alle Meine Farben (Butterfly – All My Colours), the miniseries aired in Germany on the paid channel RTL Passion in January 2020, in the slot of Tuesday 8:15 p.m. ## Reception The first episode received an overnight rating of 2.8 million viewers. The three episodes overall garnered an average of 2.5 million viewers. Following the broadcast, Green reported that Mermaids had seen a spike in new members. Reaction to the miniseries by the transgender community and the public was largely positive. In Radio Times, Ash Palmisciano – the first transgender actor on the British soap Emmerdale – praised Butterfly as "a landmark story", describing it as "truthful, dark, heart-breaking [and] beautiful". The article contains praise from other trans commentators and activists who found the programme to present accurate and positive portrayals of trans people, whilst also displaying the difficulties of transitioning. Woman & Home, Digital Spy, OK! and PinkNews reported that it was well received by viewers on social media, including by trans newsreader India Willoughby and Labour politician Dawn Butler. One woman interviewed by the Manchester Evening News described having a very similar situation to that of the programme's characters and said that the story "really hit home". However, some parents of transgender youth questioned whether Maxine was a gay boy who did not need to transition. The National Health Service's gender clinic, the Gender Identity Development Service, criticised the series' depiction of Maxine's suicide attempt, stating that it was "not helpful" due to the rarity of 11-year-olds attempting suicide, and reporting that fewer than one per cent of their patients attempted suicide. Green cited a 2016 Stonewall survey in which 45 percent of transgender children reported that they had attempted suicide. ITV commented that "Butterfly is one family's fictional story". The Sunday Times reported that "programme-makers visited the clinic early on but it is understood they parted company over differences". ### Critical reception Butterfly received very positive critical reception. The Independent gave the series four out of five stars, with the first episode receiving four stars in The Guardian and three in The Telegraph and The Times, and the next two episodes receiving four and three stars in The Times, respectively. It was widely praised for its subject matter and described as groundbreaking, emotional to watch and engaging. The writing was found to be nuanced. The acting and characterisation was lauded by critics, with Lucy Mangan of The Guardian describing the characters as "fully realised" by "uniformly brilliant performances". Booth-Ford's acting as Maxine was praised by Euan Ferguson of The Observer, Sean O'Grady of The Independent and Carol Midgley of The Times, with Samantha Allen of The Daily Beast saying that he brought "believable vulnerability" to the character. The parents were praised by James Jackson of The Times as relatable. They were further praised by Midgley, who called Friel's acting "realistic" and found that Scanlan "plays a difficult role beautifully". Steadman's role of Barbara received mixed reception, Ferguson calling her cynical nature "superb" but Gabriel Tate of The Telegraph finding her character "phoned in". The depiction of transgender issues received widespread praise. Allen found it "informative" for audience members "who have only encountered transgender children in news articles". Jack Seale of The Guardian found it "unflinching" in its depiction of trauma caused by gender dysphoria, whilst Allen reviewed that a scene in which Vicky cries and wonders if she was responsible for Maxine's gender identity is "as moving as it is revealing of a specific anxiety". O'Grady highlights for praise a scene in which Lily says to Maxine: "I think of you as my sister". However, the subject matter also received limited negative reception. A negative review in The Telegraph by Allison Pearson criticised the programme as "highly irresponsible" for displaying Maxine's suicide attempt. Also in The Telegraph, Tim Stanley critiqued the programme's depiction of manhood, commenting that "our culture doesn't value manly men quite the way it did". Gabriel Tate called the series "carefully calibrated pushback against lazy prejudice" but nonetheless criticised its use of clichés and negatively compared parts of it to a public information film.
8,123,782	Pennsylvania Route 171	1,146,935,891	State highway in Lackawanna and Susquehanna counties in Pennsylvania, United States	[ "State highways in Pennsylvania", "Transportation in Lackawanna County, Pennsylvania", "Transportation in Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania" ]	Pennsylvania Route 171 (PA 171, also designated by the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation as SR 0171) is a 40.17-mile-long (64.65 km) north–south state highway located in northeast Pennsylvania. The southern terminus of the route is at U.S. Route 6 Business (US 6 Bus.) in Carbondale. The northern terminus is officially at an intersection with US 11, 250 feet (76 m) to the west of Interstate 81 (I-81). PA 171, at its southern end, was once part of the Providence and Carbondale Turnpike, a turnpike which ran along US 6 Bus. from Dickson City to Carbondale and PA 171 from Carbondale to Forest City. The turnpike, chartered in 1851, ran from Scranton until being abandoned in 1889. In 1911, after the Sproul Road Bill was signed, a large segment of PA 171 was designated as Legislative Route 10. This was its designation for several years, and in 1928, the mass amount of state highways in Pennsylvania were designated. In the 1928 renumbering, the alignments of PA 171 were designated as Pennsylvania Route 70, Pennsylvania Route 602, and Pennsylvania Route 692, which stretched the highway from US 6/US 106 in Carbondale to the New York state line at Hallstead. In 1946, PA 692 and PA 602 were later removed from the state system and replaced by an extended PA 70. In 1961, PA 70 was renumbered as PA 171 to prevent duplication with I-70. ## Route description ### Carbondale to Herrick Center PA 171 begins at an intersection with US 6 Bus. in the eastern part of the city of Carbondale. The route progresses northward, along Belmont Street, passing several homes for several blocks. At an intersection with Spencer Street, the highway leaves downtown Carbondale and enters Fell Township, a nearby community. There, PA 171 changes names to Main Street, passing more residential homes and local businesses, until entering the community of Simpson. At Reservoir Street, PA 171 turns northward and leaves Simpson. After an intersection with Owego Street, PA 171 leaves Fell Township and becomes parallel to the Owego Turnpike through a residential community surrounded by forests. After about a mile, PA 171 turns away from the residential and commercial buildings and winds through the local woodlands. This scenery continues for several miles, passing by a reservoir. After an intersection with Buffalo Road, the road turns to the northeast. After the turn, PA 171 enters the community of Richmondale. In Richmondale, the highway heads eastward, the development of the scenery around the highway once again. After leaving Richmondale, the highway enters the borough of Vandling, where the highway becomes highly developed. After an intersection with Clinton Street, PA 171 leaves Vandling and crosses into Susquehanna County, where the highway enters the borough of Forest City. PA 171 continues into Forest City, where it curves along as Main Street, and enters downtown. In downtown Forest City, the highway is squeezed to two local lanes and PA 171 intersects with PA 247, which heads eastward. However, PA 247 westbound becomes concurrent with PA 171 through downtown Forest City, and the highway eventually splits off westbound, while PA 171 continues north through the northern ends of Forest City. The route bends around for a while in Forest City, where at an intersection with Cemetery Road, the route leaves the community. North of Forest City, PA 171 heads north for several miles through deep forests. After a while, PA 171 crosses over the Lackawanna River, which straddles the Wayne County border. The route, at that point, changes names to Stillwater Road, parallelling Old Logging Road 296 until approaching Stillwater Lake, where the logging road merges back into the highway. PA 171 parallels the shores of Stillwater Lake and passes the Stillwater Dam, maintained by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. While PA 171 continues to follow the lake, it enters the borough of Union Dale. PA 171 enters Union Dale, leaving forests that it was following. The route intersects and parallels Mausoleum Road, which heads through a cemetery in southern Union Dale. After an intersection with Asley Drive, Stillwater Lake ends, and the community enters the center of Union Dale. The center consists of an intersection with Skyline Drive, and PA 171 leaves. The highway continues out of Union Dale, winding its way to the north. PA 171 continues running as Stillwater Road into the deep forests which break up soon after. A short distance later, PA 171 becomes slightly developed, entering the small community of Herrick Center. There, the highway intersects with the eastern terminus of PA 374 and the western terminus of PA 371, also known as the Great Bend Turnpike. The route leaves Herrick Center and heads northward through rural parts of Susquehanna County. ### Thompson to Oakland After leaving Herrick Center and PA 371/PA 374, PA 171 progresses through Susquehanna County, leaving Stillwater Road. The route continues through the rural parts of Susquehanna County. After a break in a patch of trees, PA 171 intersects with Township Road 592, beginning a wind along the Wayne County border. The township road parallels for sometime, and the highways eventually enters the small community of Burnwood, where the highway becomes slightly developed. North of Burnwood, the route continues northward, entering the community of East Ararat, where PA 370's western terminus is located. The route passes through East Ararat, leaving soon after. After that, PA 171 begins to progress through the rural areas once again, paralleling a short distance of PA 370. After an intersection with Borden Hollow Road, the highway progresses through a deep area of forests. The route passes Dunn Pond, where it bends to the northwest, entering Ararat Township. Along this stretch, PA 171 passes to the north of the community of Ararat. The route continues for several miles, and after turning to the east, the highway enters the borough of Thompson. Into the borough of Thompson, PA 171 becomes known as Jackson Street and heads through a moderately developed region. The route, at an intersection with Main Street, leaves Jackson and continues northward. After the intersection with Erie Avenue, PA 171 leaves Thompson. A short distance later, the highway continues northward through deep forests and rural farms before continuing into Thompson Township. After that the road starts winding its way northward, it returns to the unpopulated area and intersects with local roads. This pattern continues for several miles, with PA 171 passing a large pond and deep forests. At the intersection with Comforts Pond Road and Bethels Hill Road, the highway becomes slightly developed. This quickly reverts to the undeveloped rural farms, which follow PA 171 along its trip to the northwest. A short distance later, the highway becomes surrounded by forests once again, beginning to wind its way as the Belmont Turnpike. The forests quickly ends, and the surroundings become highly developed as the community enters the borough of Lanesboro. After entering Lanesboro, PA 171 becomes highly developed and continues as Belmont Turnpike until the intersection with Main Street, where the highway turns to the southwest. The route heads along Main Street, progressing along the developed parts of the Susquehanna River, and enters the borough of Susquehanna Depot. In Susquehanna Depot, PA 171 runs along East Main Street through the eastern segment of the community. Near the dead-end Jackson Street, the highway turns to the south, intersecting with PA 92. From there, the two highways are concurrent. PA 92 and PA 171 head along Main Street, passing some local businesses and residences before crossing the Susquehanna River on the Susquehanna County Veterans Memorial Bridge into the borough of Oakland. After crossing the bridge, PA 171 and PA 92 split onto State Street and River Street respectively. PA 171 continues westward, paralleling High Street, which merges in along the shores of the Susquehanna. Soon after the intersection with High Street, PA 171 progresses westward leaving Oakland soon after. ### Hickory Grove to Great Bend After leaving Susquehanna Depot and Oakland Township, PA 171 heads on a westward progression along the Susquehanna River. To the south of the highway is the river, to the north of the highway is residential homes and deep forests behind those. After the intersection with Towner Road, PA 171 enters the small community of Hickory Grove, where the route and river makes a curve to the southwest, still paralleling each other. PA 171 quickly leaves Hickory Grove and enters another set of deep forests which separate the highway and the river. The highway continues on its southwest progression, with the trees surrounding dissipating. After that, both the river and the highway pass to the north of Island Plain. There, the routes curve to the northwest once again, becoming more developed and now following a railroad line in the area. The route makes a curve to the west, progressing through a short development of residential homes. After that, the highway enters the borough of Great Bend and heads to the southwest. The designation crosses at Interchange 230 along I-81 in downtown Great Bend, but continues to the intersection with US 11 in Great Bend, where the route terminates. ## History ### Pre-designation turnpikes A short segment of PA 171, from Carbondale to the community of Forest City, was part of the Providence and Carbondale Turnpike, a turnpike which went from the city of Scranton, Pennsylvania, following much of US 6 and US 106 (current day US 6 Bus.) through many of the communities in the area: Dickson City, Jermyn, and Carbondale, before turning onto current day PA 171. There, the turnpike followed the alignment through Carbondale, Fell Township, Vandling and into Forest City, where it ended, 20 miles (32 km) from Scranton. This tolled turnpike provided the main highway through many of the communities, including the towns along PA 171, until on December 7, 1889, when local citizens tore down the abandoned tollbooths in Blakely. Originally, the turnpike was chartered by the commonwealth of Pennsylvania in 1851, and remained strong until 1889, the year the tollbooths were torn down. After that the turnpike was abandoned, with control of the turnpike's alignment turned over Lackawanna County for future maintenance. In 1897, the portion of PA 171 along Main Street in Susquehanna Depot was paved. The project to pave the main highway cost \$10,000 (equivalent to \$ in 2023) with funds split equally between the borough of Susquehanna Depot, the local businesses, and the nearby Erie Railroad. ### Designation The original route designation that follows current-day PA 171 was a part of Legislative Route 10, which ran from an intersection with Legislative Route 9 (currently an intersection with PA 706) in New Milford Township to the New York state line, where it follows current day PA 92's alignment. In 1928, the alignment of PA 171 was designated as Pennsylvania Route 70 from US 6 in Carbondale to Oakland at PA 92, from there to US 11 in Great Bend, it was designated as PA 692, and from US 11 to the New York state line at Hallstead, it was designated as PA 602. The alignment of PA 70 was under construction in 1929 from the Thompson Township line to Lanesboro. It was completed the next year, when the Pennsylvania Department of Highways paved the highway from Herrick Center to Thompson and Stack Road to the Harmony Township line. These three routes remained intact (in terms of alignment) for eighteen years, until 1946, when PA 692 and PA 602 were removed from the state highway system in favor of extending PA 70 to the north to Hallstead. The route, PA 70, remained intact for another seventeen years, when in April 1961, I-70 was already commissioned, and PA 70 was decommissioned. The PA 70 designation was renumbered to PA 171 to prevent duplication. ## Major intersections ## See also
59,474,254	Ryan Ashley	1,167,318,039	American tattoo artist (born 1987)	[ "1987 births", "American tattoo artists", "Artists from Pennsylvania", "Fashion Institute of Technology alumni", "Ink Master", "Living people", "Participants in American reality television series", "People from Luzerne County, Pennsylvania", "Reality show winners" ]	Ryan Ashley DiCristina (née Malarkey, born April 29, 1987), known as Ryan Ashley, is an American tattoo artist known for her appearances on the television shows Ink Master and its spin-offs. Her signature style reflects her training and experience as a fashion designer: Ashley specializes in black-and-gray designs with beadwork, lace detail, and ornamental jewels. Ashley won Ink Master's season eight competition in 2016 and in the following years returned to host a spin-off show (Angels), judge another spin-off (Grudge Match), and judge in the main series. She also owns two oddities and antiques shops in Pennsylvania. ## Early life and career Ashley was raised in Dallas, a small borough in northeast Pennsylvania. Her single mother worked at a fast food restaurant while taking night school in accounting. Ashley's mother, who was also an artist, taught her how to draw. She graduated from Fashion Institute of Technology in 2007 and spent five years as a fashion designer in New York City at a private label, where she designed beadwork, lace details, embroidery, and appliqués for garments. Her intricate tattoo style would later reflect these themes. Seeking a career outside of a traditional office environment, Ashley returned to Pennsylvania to apprentice as a tattoo artist. Her experience working at a street shop (a tattoo parlor that takes walk-in requests) convinced her to only work by appointment. Ashley and her companion opened a shop in Kingston, Pennsylvania, in 2013, The Strange and Unusual Oddities Parlor. Ashley tattooed from the back of the shop while the front featured their collection of taxidermy, objects, and restored antiques for sale. The latter had been a hobby from her youth, when she had attended yard and estate sales with her mother and grandmother. The couple opened a second shop in Philadelphia with taxidermist business partners. Ashley's signature black-and-gray tattoo designs feature beadwork, lace detail, and ornamental jewels. When designing filigree, she references Victorian furniture scrollwork. She references bridal accessories and chandeliers for her beading designs, and old, illustrated wildlife books for animal and bird designs. Her clients have included rock musicians Maria Brink and Ash Costello. ### Ink Master In late 2016, Ashley appeared on Ink Master, a reality competition television series in which tattoo artists participate in artistic challenges to outlast other competitors and receive the season's title and monetary prize. Ashley was the eighth season's champion, the first woman to win the title. Mic noted the occasion as a moment for female tattoo artists, who are subject to social stigmas in a male-dominated profession. Under Ashley, the women on the show formed an alliance to outlast their competitors. The show's executive producer said it was the first time such an alliance had held throughout the season. With only five years of tattoo experience, she won the title as a relative newcomer. She entered the show to develop new areas of tattooing expertise and test herself. She had been approached to participate in previous seasons of the show, but declined for scheduling conflicts. Ashley is featured in the two seasons of Ink Master: Angels, a spin-off from Ink Master in which Ashley and several co-competitors from the main series' eighth season traveled across the United States to face off against local tattoo artists. Winners received spots in the next season of Ink Master. The show appeared on Paramount Network in 2017 and 2018. Angels was originally planned as a one-hour special with the same premise, but expanded into a full-season spin-off. Ashley later served as a judge in another spin-off, Ink Master: Grudge Match (2019). Ashley returned to Ink Master as a judge in 2022 (season 14), as part of a revamped show format. ## Personal life Ashley was formerly engaged to Josh Balz, former keyboardist in the metal band Motionless in White. She married tattooer Arlo DiCristina in late 2019. Their son, Atheus, was born in May 2020. She announced both her relationship with DiCristina and her pregnancy on covers of Inked magazine. She returned to New York City in 2018. As of 2019, she lives and works in Grand Junction, Colorado.
19,023,511	HIV/AIDS in Malawi	1,136,943,870	Impact of the immunodeficiency virus in the African nation	[ "HIV/AIDS by country", "HIV/AIDS in Africa", "Health in Malawi" ]	As of 2012, approximately 1,100,000 people in Malawi are HIV-positive, which represents 10.8% of the country's population. Because the Malawian government was initially slow to respond to the epidemic under the leadership of Hastings Banda (1966–1994), the prevalence of HIV/AIDS increased drastically between 1985, when the disease was first identified in Malawi, and 1993, when HIV prevalence rates were estimated to be as high as 30% among pregnant women. The Malawian food crisis in 2002 resulted, at least in part, from a loss of agricultural productivity due to the prevalence of HIV/AIDS. Various degrees of government involvement under the leadership of Bakili Muluzi (1994–2004) and Bingu wa Mutharika (2004–2012) resulted in a gradual decline in HIV prevalence, and, in 2003, many people living in Malawi gained access to antiretroviral therapy. Condoms have become more widely available to the public through non-governmental organizations, and more Malawians are taking advantage of HIV testing services. Due to several successful television and radio campaigns by the Malawian government and non-governmental organizations in Malawi, levels of awareness regarding HIV/AIDS are high among the general population. However, many men have adopted fatalistic attitudes in response to the epidemic, convincing themselves that death from AIDS is inevitable; on the other hand, some have implemented preventive techniques such as partner selection to try to reduce their risk of infection. Although many women have developed strategies to protect themselves from HIV, women are more likely to be HIV-positive than men in Malawi. The epidemic has affected sexual relationships between partners, who must cooperate to protect themselves from the disease. In addition, many teachers exclude HIV/AIDS from their curricula because they are uncomfortable discussing the topic or because they do not feel knowledgeable about the issue, and, therefore, many children are not exposed to information about HIV/AIDS at school. Finally, the epidemic has produced significant numbers of orphans in Malawi, leaving children vulnerable to abuse and exploitation. ## History The first case of HIV/AIDS in Malawi was reported at Lilongwe's Kamuzu Central Hospital in 1985. President Hastings Banda, who was in power at the time, responded with several small-scale prevention initiatives and created the National AIDS Control Programme, a division of the Ministry of Health, to manage the growing epidemic. Banda believed that issues relating to sex, including HIV transmission, should not be addressed in the public sphere; during this time, it was illegal for Malawian citizens to discuss the epidemic openly. In 1989, Banda introduced a five-year World Bank Medium Term Plan to combat the epidemic, but HIV prevalence had already increased drastically at this point. In 1994, when Bakili Muluzi became president, he addressed the nation's need for a coordinated response to the HIV/AIDS epidemic. In 2000, Muluzi introduced another five-year policy known as the National Strategic Framework, but, like Banda's five-year World Bank Medium Term Plan, this plan was largely ineffective. In 2001, in response to problems within the National AIDS Control Programme established by Banda, Muluzi created the National AIDS Commission. Unlike Banda, who prevented the public from accessing information about the epidemic, Muluzi ensured that information about HIV/AIDS was available on the radio and television, in newspapers, and on billboards. However, despite Muluzi's efforts, HIV prevalence was already significantly influencing national agricultural productivity during this period, and Malawi experienced an AIDS-related nationwide famine in 2002. Malawians gained access to antiretroviral drugs in 2003, and, with a donation from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria and the election of new President Bingu wa Mutharika in 2004, government interventions increased substantially. However, soon after his election, Mutharika experienced tensions with Muluzi after implementing an anti-corruption program, which distracted the government from addressing the nation's food and HIV/AIDS-related crises. Despite these obstacles, Mutharika successfully developed a National AIDS Policy and appointed a Principal Secretary for HIV/AIDS during his presidency. ## Awareness and risk perception Despite Malawi's limited health and educational infrastructure, knowledge regarding HIV/AIDS is high among many people living in both urban and rural Malawi. According to a 2004 study by Barden-O'Fallon et al. involving 100 households, women in Malawi are most likely to learn about HIV/AIDS through radio and television, health workers at local clinics, and female members of their social networks. Men are also likely to access information about HIV/AIDS through radio and television; however, unlike women, they are not likely to gain information about HIV/AIDS from their male friends. When 57 Malawian men were interviewed in 2003, 100% of them said they had heard about the HIV/AIDS epidemic on the radio, and 84.2% of them said they had learned about HIV/AIDS during their visits to local health facilities; this supports the fact that many people in Malawi have access to information about the epidemic, both through the radio and other sources. However, this is not a universal sentiment; there are indicators that HIV knowledge is not that high and is comparable to other countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, and that there is a socio-economic knowledge gap. Personal traits such as age, gender, location, and education correlate, either positively or negatively, with HIV/AIDS awareness levels. For example, older women have demonstrated higher levels of knowledge regarding HIV/AIDS than younger women in Malawi. Because men typically have greater access to education and other social resources, they are often more knowledgeable about HIV prevention and transmission than women. While men are, on average, able to list 2.2 ways to prevent HIV transmission, women are only able to list 1.5 ways. Only 38% of women surveyed in 2003-2004 understood that their husbands would be less likely to contract HIV if they used condoms during intercourse with prostitutes and other women from high-risk groups. In addition, men who are raised in urban environments are, on average, more informed about HIV/AIDS than men who are raised in rural environments, presumably because urban children typically have greater access to educational resources than rural children. Among both men and women, higher levels of education correspond to increased knowledge about HIV/AIDS: men and women who have received secondary school educations are significantly more likely to understand complex aspects of the disease, such as the fact that people who appear healthy can still be HIV-positive, than those who have not. Finally, people who have lost friends or family members to the disease are likely to have greater knowledge about HIV/AIDS due to their personal, firsthand exposure to the problem. The aforementioned study by Barden-O'Fallon et al., which surveyed 940 women and 661 men, indicated that, despite their knowledge and awareness, many people in Malawi do not feel personally susceptible to HIV infection. On average, only 23% of the adults who were surveyed during this study, both male and female, believed that they were likely to contract HIV and die of AIDS. Greater HIV/AIDS awareness among men does not seem to correspond with increased perceived risk; on the other hand, increased levels of knowledge about HIV/AIDS do correlate positively to perceived risk among women. Another study conducted in rural Malawi between 1998 and 2001 by Kirsten P. Smith et al. indicated that concerns about personal vulnerability to HIV/AIDS declined during this four-year time frame, probably because the increased use of preventive strategies gave people a sense of control. In fact, many participants in this study claimed that they were "not at all worried" about HIV/AIDS; unless they had simply adopted a fatalistic standpoint towards the epidemic, these respondents probably felt that they had successfully reduced their risk of exposure through personal behavioral changes. ## Education Students in Malawi have expressed high levels of dissatisfaction regarding the HIV/AIDS-related education and support they receive at school. According to a survey of students in Malawi, most secondary students do not believe that the HIV/AIDS curricula at their schools provide them with an adequate understanding of the disease. Although the Malawian government and non-governmental organizations have conducted many campaigns to improve awareness about HIV/AIDS in schools, there is still a significant shortage of age-appropriate audio and visual educational materials relating to HIV/AIDS available to instructors, particularly in rural areas. In addition, most teachers cannot identify the students in their classes who have been personally affected by the epidemic, either through friends or relatives, which suggests that school-based support for HIV/AIDS is minimal. However, despite this lack of support, surveys indicate that children who have been affected by the epidemic do not usually experience HIV/AIDS-based discrimination at school. Most teachers are required to address HIV/AIDS in their curricula; although instructors are, for the most part, committed to helping their students understand and avoid the disease, they face many obstacles that prevent them from informing their students about HIV/AIDS in productive ways. For example, some teachers cannot advise their students to remain faithful to their sexual partners without seeming hypocritical because they engage in extramarital sexual relations themselves. Others feel uncomfortable discussing sexual matters with their students, and some believe that, due to their limited training, they are not knowledgeable enough about HIV/AIDS to direct classroom discussions about the disease. In addition, many teachers feel unsupported by community members, who often either deny the extent of the epidemic or believe that HIV/AIDS should not be addressed in the classroom. ## Affected groups Although the HIV/AIDS epidemic has affected men, women, and children in Malawi, certain factors such as sexual orientation, gender, and age influence infection patterns. In Malawi, HIV/AIDS is usually transmitted through heterosexual sex, but the epidemic has also significantly impacted the homosexual male population in Malawi. In addition, women in Malawi are more likely to be HIV-positive than men, suggesting that women are particularly vulnerable to HIV/AIDS. Finally, the disease has affected children and young adults both directly and indirectly; 170,000 Malawian children were HIV-positive in 2011, and the number of orphans in Malawi has increased dramatically since the epidemic began in 1985. ### Men Due to the vast scope of the HIV/AIDS epidemic, many Malawian men believe that HIV contraction and death from AIDS are inevitable. Older men in particular often claim that the HIV/AIDS epidemic is a punishment issued by God or other supernatural forces. Other men refer to their own irresponsible sexual behaviors when explaining why they believe that death from AIDS is inevitable. These men sometimes claim that unprotected sex is natural (and therefore necessary and good) when justifying their lack of condom use during sex with extramarital partners. Finally, some men identify as HIV-positive without having undergone testing for HIV, preferring to believe that they have already been infected so they can avoid adopting undesirable preventive measures such as condom use or strict fidelity. Because of these fatalistic beliefs, many men continue engaging in extramarital sexual relations despite the prevalence of HIV/AIDS in Malawi. However, despite these widespread feelings of fatalism, some men believe that they can avoid HIV contraction by modifying their personal behaviors. Men who decide to change their behaviors to reduce their risk of infection are unlikely to use condoms consistently, particularly during marital intercourse; instead, they usually continue engaging in extramarital sexual relations, but alter the ways in which they choose their sexual partners. For example, before selecting extramarital sexual partners, men sometimes survey their peers to determine whether their potential partners are likely to have exposed themselves to the virus. Men who choose their sexual partners based on external appearances and peer recommendations often believe that women who violate traditional gender norms by, for example, wearing modern clothing are more likely to carry HIV, while young girls, who are perceived as sexually inexperienced, are considered "pure". Because of this perception, many people are concerned that schoolchildren in Malawi, particularly girls, are becoming exposed to the virus through sexual harassment or abuse by their instructors. ### Women According to traditional gender roles in Malawi, men operate primarily in the formal work sector and are responsible for supporting their families through paid labor, whereas women, who are valued for their domestic skills, are responsible for agricultural labor and care work; this gender-based division of labor decreases women's autonomy, thereby increasing their vulnerability to HIV/AIDS. Even within the home, women often lack bargaining power because they have limited access to education, formal employment, and other resources that could give them a sense of financial and personal independence. Women who are able to work in the formal sector typically earn significantly less money than men, even when they are completing the same tasks, making it difficult for them to elevate their status. Many women are convinced that their husbands are putting their lives at risk by engaging in extramarital sexual relations without using protection; however, because of their secondary status, they are often unwilling to initiate discussions about HIV/AIDS in the home. Most women in Malawi do not view divorce as a viable option, even when their husbands are HIV-positive and refuse to protect them from the virus by wearing condoms during marital intercourse. Because they lack the education and training needed to seek gainful employment, women are not usually able to support themselves and their children outside of marriage without resorting to commercial sex work for money. However, despite their vulnerability, some women in rural Malawi believe that they do, to a certain extent, have control over their own health and well-being. They tell their husbands that the HIV/AIDS epidemic has made sexual infidelity extremely dangerous and encourage them to refrain from engaging in extramarital sexual contact. In addition, many women are convinced that, by appealing to the vulnerability of their children (who will probably be orphaned if their parents contract HIV), they can convince their husbands to use condoms consistently during extramarital sexual encounters. Other women seek support from their friends and family members when they believe that their husbands' unsafe behaviors are putting their lives at risk. Finally, as a last resort, women might warn their husbands that they will visit the ankhoswe, or traditional marriage counselor, and demand divorce if their husbands refuse to remain faithful and actively prevent the transmission of the disease. ### Children The number of orphaned children in Malawi has increased dramatically since the HIV/AIDS epidemic began in 1985, with certain surveys indicating that more than 35% of schoolchildren have experienced the death of at least one parent due to HIV/AIDS. Because HIV is transmitted sexually, married couples who engage in unprotected sexual relations put their children at increased risk of becoming double orphans, or children who have lost both parents to HIV/AIDS. Older children who have lost both parents to HIV/AIDS often become responsible for the care of their younger siblings, and many double orphans drop out of school or migrate to urban areas to try to support themselves and their siblings. Girls who have been orphaned by HIV/AIDS have unusually high rates of school absenteeism in Malawi. When parents die of HIV/AIDS, extended family members usually become the children's primary caregivers: in Malawi, 44% of double orphans are adopted by grandparents or other close relatives. Extended family members often provide crucial support to HIV/AIDS orphans; however, some sources indicate that extended family members mistreat orphans whose parents have died from HIV/AIDS. For example, family members who are unable to support adopted children often arrange early marriages for female orphans, who may then become victims of domestic violence and sexual abuse. Evidence suggests that schoolchildren in Malawi are at risk of being exposed to HIV by their teachers, who sometimes value them as sexual partners because they believe that children have not yet been exposed to the virus. Children are particularly vulnerable to exploitation by adults who offer them money in exchange for sex; because they are often unable to afford basic necessities, they might feel compelled to accept gifts in exchange for sex out of desperation. Interviews indicate that teachers and school administrators in Malawi often misinterpret the definition of sexual assault, as some believe that sexual relations between teachers and students are appropriate as long as the children have consented. Although most schools have strict policies against sexual abuse, children are often hesitant to accuse adults of wrongdoing, and many administrators are unwilling or unable to investigate the truth behind the accusations. ## Marriage and relationships Although couples are starting to use condoms during extramarital intercourse more frequently, condom use during marital sex is still viewed as inappropriate by many Malawians; in 2000, only 2.3% of people reported using condoms regularly during sexual intercourse with their spouses. Some people believe that condoms are only necessary during sex with high-risk partners such as sex workers, and that condom use during marital sex implies infidelity. Others believe that marital condom use violates the religious purposes of marriage: sexual pleasure and reproduction. In a study published in 2007 by Agnes M. Chimbiri, men claimed that they use condoms with their wives for the sake of avoiding unwanted pregnancies; on the other hand, they were more concerned about sexually transmitted infections when discussing condom use with extramarital sexual partners. Many different sources of information can motivate discussion about HIV/AIDS among married couples. After hearing information about HIV/AIDS at local health facilities or during conversations with friends or family members, people are more likely to address the risk of HIV contraction with their spouses. In addition, women are more likely than men to mention the dangers of HIV/AIDS when they suspect that their spouses are engaging in extramarital sexual relations. According to a 2003 study by Eliya Msiyaphazi Zulu and Gloria Chepngeno, although higher levels of education do correspond to greater knowledge about HIV/AIDS, education levels do not significantly impact the likelihood that couples will discuss HIV-related prevention strategies. ## Economic impact A 2002 study conducted by CARE International across three districts in the Central Region of Malawi considers how HIV/AIDS has affected economic well-being in rural Malawi. When skilled laborers are infected with HIV, they are usually unable to work; therefore, they often shift agricultural production on their land to less labor-intensive crops, sacrificing the opportunity to grow more profitable, labor-intensive crops such as tobacco. When family members fall ill with HIV/AIDS, their relatives invest time in their treatment and care, further reducing household productivity. In addition, when family members are infected with HIV, households often use the money they would normally invest in agriculture to cover medical expenses, further decreasing economic stability at the household level. Finally, when adults contract HIV, their children often remain home from school to work in the fields, threatening long-term productivity and economic advancement in Malawi. CARE International proposes several strategies that might reduce the destructive economic impact of HIV/AIDS on rural households. They recommend introducing new technologies that improve productivity to allow households affected by HIV/AIDS to continue supporting themselves through agriculture. Women in patrilineal/patrilocal villages are often unable to support themselves and their children when their husbands die of HIV/AIDS; therefore, helping women acquire traditionally masculine agricultural skills might decrease their vulnerability while improving agricultural productivity at the household and community levels. CARE International recommends increasing cooperation at the community level by establishing labor and food banks in areas that have been devastated by the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Finally, CARE International highlights the importance of increasing access to information about HIV/AIDS in Malawi to help families prepare for and cope with the economic burdens associated with the epidemic. ## Impact on health services The HIV/AIDS epidemic in Malawi has been characterized by drastic declines in the number of health workers available to provide treatment and care and increasing strain on health services: more than half of all hospital admissions in Malawi are related to HIV/AIDS. However, Malawi currently faces a significant deficit in human resources: only 159 doctors were practicing in Malawi in 2007. The World Health Organization's Essential Health Package recommends placing at least three health workers at every health facility in the country, but the vast majority of Malawi's health facilities fail to meet this standard. While migration to more developed countries in search of better opportunities, also known as "brain drain", is partially responsible for the shortage of health care workers in Malawi, many health care workers have been personally affected by the HIV/AIDS epidemic; in fact, an average of 48 nurses die of HIV/AIDS in Malawi every year. The HIV/AIDS epidemic has resulted in high levels of absenteeism among health workers in Malawi, who often leave work to spend time with HIV-positive friends or relatives, and the Malawian government has failed to respond to the declining number of full-time employees working in the health sector. Health workers who are not chronically absent frequently abandon their jobs because they are unable to cope with the heavy patient loads or because they are afraid that working in a medical environment will increase their risk of becoming infected with HIV. Malawi has adopted task shifting strategies to overcome the shortage of workers available for HIV/AIDS treatment and care. Task shifting, which has been successful in many other regions, involves training less specialized health workers to perform health-related tasks that do not require professional training, such as the initiation of antiretroviral therapy. For example, at Thyolo District Hospital, health workers spend one week learning how to initiate antiretroviral therapy in a classroom setting and an additional two weeks practicing their knowledge in a supervised clinical setting; after completing this course, they are legally (under Ministry of Health guidelines) allowed to initiate antiretroviral therapy. Another form of task shifting involves training health-oriented counselors in HIV testing and counseling, which relieves nurses of this additional task. ## Interventions Malawi has taken many steps towards slowing the spread of HIV/AIDS, such as increasing access to condoms and improving testing services and treatment options. Many of these efforts have been funded by international donors including the World Bank, the Global Fund, the World Health Organization (WHO), the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), and the Joint United Nations Programme on HIV and AIDS (UNAIDS). The World Bank has lent \$407.9 million to Malawi, the Global Fund has agreed to give \$390 million, and PEPFAR has donated \$25 million for prevention and treatment campaigns. ### Antiretroviral therapy The number of people using antiretroviral therapy in Malawi has increased dramatically in the past decade: between 2004 and 2011, an estimated 300,000 people gained access to antiretroviral treatment. In addition to improving access to antiretroviral therapy, in 2008, Malawi introduced the WHO's treatment guidelines for antiretroviral therapy, which improved the quality of treatment available to Malawians. However, Malawi's proposal for a new antiretroviral treatment plan in 2011, which would have cost \$105 million per year, was rejected by the Global Fund, threatening Malawi's ability to continue expanding access to antiretroviral treatment. In 2000, Malawi's Ministry of Health and Population began developing a plan to distribute antiretroviral drugs to the population, and, as of 2003, there were several sites providing antiretroviral drugs in Malawi. The Lighthouse, a trust in Lilongwe that fights HIV/AIDS, provides antiretroviral drugs at a cost of 2,500 kwacha per month. Queen Elizabeth Central Hospital in Blantyre provides antiretroviral therapy through its outpatient department, and Médecins Sans Frontières distributes antiretroviral drugs to patients for free in the Chiradzulu and Thyolo Districts. Many different private providers sell antiretroviral drugs, particularly in cities; however, very few patients can afford to receive drugs from the private sector in Malawi. In addition, private providers are not currently required to obtain certification before selling antiretroviral drugs, and, therefore, this practice is not closely monitored. Finally, some employees receive access to antiretroviral drugs through the health insurance policies provided by their employers, but this practice is not widespread. Due to the advent of antiretroviral drugs, HIV/AIDS has become a manageable disease for people who can access and afford treatment; however, antiretroviral therapy remains largely unaffordable and inaccessible to most people in Malawi. For example, the South East region of Malawi has disproportionately low access to antiretroviral drugs. In many rural areas, poor health infrastructure combined with widespread famine have made sustained, high-quality antiretroviral therapy difficult or impossible. In addition, donations from the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria were used to fund antiretroviral therapy programs that distributed medication on a "first-come, first-served" basis, making the drugs more accessible to the male, urban, educated population. Because there are no explicit policies regarding the fair distribution of antiretroviral drugs in Malawi, individual health care workers often become responsible for deciding who will receive treatment, which inevitably leads to inequitable distribution. ### Condom distribution Although condoms effectively prevent the sexual transmission of HIV, several factors have limited widespread condom distribution and uptake in Malawi. People living in non-urban areas often have difficulty accessing condoms, and condoms are not typically available at bars and other social locations where they could have a significant impact on HIV prevention. Many people oppose condoms because they believe that condoms make sex less enjoyable or because they question their ability to prevent the transmission of HIV. However, despite these factors, many unmarried couples have started using condoms more consistently as concern and fear about the HIV/AIDS epidemic have increased. Non-governmental organizations such as Population Services International (Malawi), an organization that strives to improve the health of Malawians, and Banja La Mtsogolo, an organization that distributes information and resources related to family planning, have conducted campaigns advertising condom use as an effective form of protection against HIV/AIDS. Banja La Mtsogolo provides condoms to both men and women, and has significantly improved the availability of condoms for women in particular. Because of efforts by Population Services International, Banja La Mtsogolo, and many other organizations, condoms have become more widely available to many people in Malawi. ### Voluntary counseling and testing People living in areas with high rates of HIV/AIDS face several psychological barriers when deciding whether to undergo testing for HIV. For example, people may prefer not to know if they are HIV-positive because, due to the obstacles they often face in gaining access to antiretroviral drugs, many view HIV/AIDS diagnoses as death sentences. Others may simply believe that they are HIV-negative, either because they practice strict monogamy and consistently use condoms during sexual intercourse or because they are in denial about the prevalence of the disease. However, despite these barriers, both mobile and static testing services have become more widely available in Malawi recently: 1,392 testing and counseling sites existed in 2011. Certain non-governmental organization such as the Malawi AIDS Counseling and Resource Organisation (MACRO) provide door-to-door counseling and testing services, which have drastically improved the accessibility of HIV testing. ## See also - Sub-Saharan Africa - HIV/AIDS in Africa - Diseases of poverty - Epidemiology of HIV/AIDS - Misconceptions about HIV and AIDS - AIDS orphan - Healthcare in Malawi - Sex for Fish
45,383,868	Battle of Mykonos	1,075,959,493	1794 naval engagement of the French Revolutionary Wars	[ "1794 in the Ottoman Empire", "Conflicts in 1794", "Mykonos", "Naval battles involving France", "Naval battles involving the United Kingdom", "Naval battles of the French Revolutionary Wars" ]	The Battle of Mykonos was a minor naval engagement fought in the main harbour of the Cycladic island of Mykonos on 17 June 1794 during the French Revolutionary Wars. A British Royal Navy squadron led by fourth rate ship HMS Romney was escorting a convoy of eight merchant ships westwards through the Aegean Sea to Smyrna when the French frigate Sibylle was sighted at anchor in the harbour of Mykonos town with three French merchant ships. Ordering the convoy to continue with the rest of the squadron, Captain William Paget diverted the 50-gun Romney to the port and demanded the surrender of the 40-gun French ship and its convoy. The French Commodore Jacques-Mélanie Rondeau refused Paget's demands, and prepared to defend his ship. After some manoeuvring to ensure that the town was not within his firing arc, Paget brought Romney alongside the French frigate and for an hour and ten minutes the two vessels exchanged broadsides at close range. The engagement was hard fought and both ships suffered heavy casualties, but eventually the greater size of the two-decked Romney was too great for the smaller frigate and Rondeau surrendered. Sibylle was subsequently commissioned into the Royal Navy and participated in a celebrated battle in the Indian Ocean against the French frigate Forte in 1799. ## Background In August 1793, seven months after the British entry into the French Revolutionary Wars, the Royal Navy Mediterranean Fleet under Lord Hood seized control of Toulon, the principal naval base in Southern France, as well as the French Mediterranean Fleet anchored in the harbour. Although French Republican armies recaptured the city in December 1793 at the conclusion of the Siege of Toulon, a hastily organised operation succeeded in destroying half the fleet and damaging most of the remainder. Parts of the French fleet were at sea during the siege and thus avoided capture or destruction, particularly frigates operating against British commerce. During 1794, as the French fleet underwent repairs in Toulon, these frigates remained in operation across the Mediterranean. Once such ship was the newly built 40-gun Hébé-class frigate Sibylle under Commodore Jacques-Mélanie Rondeau, which was detached to operate independently in the Aegean Sea. With the French fleet inactive, the Royal Navy focused their attention on the capture of Corsica, conducting sieges at Bastia and Calvi, with smaller forces sent out across the Mediterranean to escort convoys of merchant ships and hunt for the missing French frigates. One such force, sent in June 1794 from Naples to the Aegean Sea with a convoy of seven Dutch and one British merchant ships bound for Smyrna, consisted of the 50-gun fourth rate ship HMS Romney under Captain William Paget and three frigates HMS Inconstant, HMS Leda and HMS Tartar. ## Battle On 16 June, off Kimolos, information reached the British convoy that a French frigate had been sighted near the Cycladic Islands of Tinos and Mykonos. Inconstant was detached to search for the enemy ship, without success. The following day, as the British convoy passed through the straits between the islands, a large warship was sighted at anchor in the harbour of Mykonos. Ordering the convoy to continue under the escort of the three frigates, Paget turned Romney south to investigate. The ship was discovered to be Sibylle, anchored alongside three French merchant ships and flying Rondeau's pennant. Paget's approach rendered escape impossible, and Rondeau remained at anchor as the larger British vessel entered the harbour and came to a halt just short of the French ship. Paget then sent a junior officer to Sibylle in a ship's boat with a request that Rondeau surrender his ship and convoy to prevent the loss of life that an engagement with the larger Romney would entail. Rondeau responded that he was well aware of his opponent's size and was not intimidated; he was prepared for battle and had sworn "never to strike his colours". Rondeau was subsequently reported to have learned before the engagement that Romney was operating with a reduced crew, only carrying 266 men of the 341 who should have been aboard, which compared unfavourably with the 380 men on board the French ship. The junior officer returned with Rondeau's reply, the French commodore using the delay to manoeuvre Sibylle so that the ship lay directly between Romney's line of fire and the town of Mykonos. He believed that Paget would be unwilling to attack if there was a risk of causing damage and casualties to the town, which was under the control—as with the rest of the Cylades—of the neutral Ottoman Empire. This forced Paget to alter his own ship's position, warping Romney around so that the ship's broadside faced away from the town but could still be brought to bear against Sibylle. As he did so, he moved a cannon from the unengaged side of Romney to fill an empty gunport, the manoeuvre uninterrupted by Rondeau. At 13:00 the British ship was adequately positioned, Paget ordering "springs" on the anchor cables, a system of attaching the bow anchor that increased stability and allowed Romney to swing its broadside while stationary. Satisfied with his preparations, Paget ordered his gunners to open fire on Sibylle and the French ship immediately returned fire. The frigates were anchored immobile in the bay before Mykonos and the engagement was fought broadside to broadside, with no opportunity to manoeuvere or avoid enemy shot. The battle continued until 14:10, Sibylle taking severe damage under fire from the larger Romney. With casualties rapidly mounting and some his men slipping away from their stations and swimming to shore, Rondeau recognised that defeat was inevitable and, despite his oath, surrendered his ship to prevent further bloodshed. Casualties on Sibylle totaled two officers and 44 sailors killed, nine more dying and 103 wounded. By contrast the losses on Romney were comparatively light, with eight killed and 30 wounded, two of whom subsequently died. ### Order of battle In this table, "Guns" refers to all cannon carried by the ship, including the maindeck guns which were taken into consideration when calculating its rate, as well as any carronades carried aboard. Broadside weight records the combined weight of shot which could be fired in a single simultaneous discharge of an entire broadside. ## Aftermath Although Romney officially carried ten more guns than Sibylle, their respective strengths were considerably closer than this indicates. Sibylle carried twenty-six 18-pounder long guns, sixteen 8-pounder long guns and two 36-pounder obusiers for a broadside weight of about 380 pounds (170 kg) (once one adjusts for the fact that the French pound was heavier than the British pound). This contrasts with a broadside weight of 414 pounds (188 kg) from Romney's main battery of 24-pounder long guns, which was therefore, in the opinion of British naval historian William James, "not, in reality, a decided overmatch for a 40-gun French frigate". He further considered that the two gun-decks on Romney were likely to have been the decisive factor in the outcome of the battle. Although James considered that the French fought hard, he did criticise Rondeau personally, stating "had the French captain foreborne to communicate the oath he had taken, not to strike his ship's colours, this engagement would have been yet more creditable than it was to the officers and men of Sibylle." Following Rondeau's surrender Paget seized Sibylle and the three merchant ships from the harbour. The next morning Inconstant arrived in support and all of the ships rejoined the convoy and continued to Smyrna, arriving on 22 June. Sibylle was subsequently purchased into British service as HMS Sybille and considered, in the words of historian James Henderson, "one of the finest frigates in the Navy". In 1799, under the command of Captain Edward Cooke, who had distinguished himself at the siege of Toulon, Sibylle fought a famous action in the Indian Ocean against the French frigate Forte. By the battle's end, Forte had been captured and Cooke mortally wounded. More than five decades after the battle, the Admiralty recognised the action with the clasp "ROMNEY 17 JUNE 1794" attached to the Naval General Service Medal, awarded upon application to all British participants still living in 1847.
56,526	Diabetic ketoacidosis	1,172,876,948	null	[ "Diabetes", "Medical emergencies", "Wikipedia medicine articles ready to translate", "Wikipedia neurology articles ready to translate" ]	Diabetic ketoacidosis (DKA) is a potentially life-threatening complication of diabetes mellitus. Signs and symptoms may include vomiting, abdominal pain, deep gasping breathing, increased urination, weakness, confusion and occasionally loss of consciousness. A person's breath may develop a specific "fruity" smell. The onset of symptoms is usually rapid. People without a previous diagnosis of diabetes may develop DKA as the first obvious symptom. DKA happens most often in those with type 1 diabetes but can also occur in those with other types of diabetes under certain circumstances. Triggers may include infection, not taking insulin correctly, stroke and certain medications such as steroids. DKA results from a shortage of insulin; in response, the body switches to burning fatty acids, which produces acidic ketone bodies. DKA is typically diagnosed when testing finds high blood sugar, low blood pH and keto acids in either the blood or urine. The primary treatment of DKA is with intravenous fluids and insulin. Depending on the severity, insulin may be given intravenously or by injection under the skin. Usually, potassium is also needed to prevent the development of low blood potassium. Throughout treatment, blood sugar and potassium levels should be regularly checked. Underlying causes for the DKA should be identified. In those with severely low blood pH who are critically ill, sodium bicarbonate may be given; however, its use is of unclear benefit and typically not recommended. Rates of DKA vary around the world. Each year, about 4% of type 1 diabetics in the United Kingdom develop DKA, versus 25% of type 1 diabetics in Malaysia. DKA was first described in 1886, and until the introduction of insulin therapy in the 1920s, it was almost universally fatal. With adequate and timely treatment, the risk of death is between \<1% and 5%. ## History The first full description of diabetic ketoacidosis is attributed to Julius Dreschfeld, a German pathologist working in Manchester, United Kingdom. In his description, which he gave in an 1886 lecture at the Royal College of Physicians in London, he drew on reports by Adolph Kussmaul as well as describing the main ketones, acetoacetate and β-hydroxybutyrate, and their chemical determination. The condition remained almost universally fatal until the discovery of insulin in the 1920s; by the 1930s, mortality had fallen to 29 percent, and by the 1950s it had become less than 10 percent. The entity of cerebral edema due to DKA was described in 1936 by a team of doctors from Philadelphia. Numerous research studies since the 1950s have focused on the ideal treatment for diabetic ketoacidosis. A significant proportion of these studies have been conducted at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center and Emory University School of Medicine. Treatment options studied have included high- or low-dose intravenous, subcutaneous or intramuscular (e.g. the "Alberti regime") insulin, phosphate supplementation, need for a loading dose of insulin, and the appropriateness of using bicarbonate therapy in moderate DKA. Various questions remain unanswered, such as whether bicarbonate administration in severe DKA makes any real difference to the clinical course, and whether an insulin loading dose is needed in adults. ## Signs and symptoms The symptoms of an episode of diabetic ketoacidosis usually evolve over a period of about 24 hours. Predominant symptoms are nausea and vomiting, pronounced thirst, excessive urine production and abdominal pain that may be severe. In severe DKA, breathing becomes rapid and of a deep, gasping character, called "Kussmaul breathing". The abdomen may be tender to the point that a serious abdominal condition may be suspected, such as acute pancreatitis, appendicitis or gastrointestinal perforation. Vomiting altered blood that resembles coffee grounds occurs in a minority of people and tends to originate from erosion of the esophagus. In severe DKA, there may be confusion or a marked decrease in alertness, including coma. On physical examination there is usually clinical evidence of dehydration, such as a dry mouth and decreased skin turgor. If the dehydration is profound enough to cause a decrease in the circulating blood volume, a rapid heart rate and low blood pressure may be observed. Often, a "ketotic" odor is present, which is often described as "fruity" or "like pear drops". The smell is due to the presence of acetone. If Kussmaul respiration is present, this is reflected in an increased respiratory rate. Small children with DKA are relatively prone to brain swelling, also called cerebral edema, which may cause headache, coma, loss of the pupillary light reflex, and can progress to death. It occurs in about 1 out of 100 children with DKA and more rarely occurs in adults. ## Cause DKA most frequently occurs in those who know they have diabetes, but it may also be the first presentation in someone who has not previously been known to be diabetic. There is often a particular underlying problem that has led to the DKA episode; this may be intercurrent illness (pneumonia, influenza, gastroenteritis, a urinary tract infection), pregnancy, inadequate insulin administration (e.g. defective insulin pen device), myocardial infarction (heart attack), stroke or the use of cocaine. Young people with recurrent episodes of DKA may have an underlying eating disorder, or may be using insufficient insulin for fear that it will cause weight gain. Diabetic ketoacidosis may occur in those previously known to have diabetes mellitus type 2 or in those who on further investigations turn out to have features of type 2 diabetes (e.g. obesity, strong family history); this is more common in African, African-American and Hispanic people. Their condition is then labeled "ketosis-prone type 2 diabetes". Drugs in the gliflozin class (SGLT2 inhibitors), which are generally used for type 2 diabetes, have been associated with cases of diabetic ketoacidosis where the blood sugars may not be significantly elevated ("euglycemic DKA"). While this is a relatively uncommon adverse event, it is thought to be more common if someone receiving an SGLT2 inhibitor who is also receiving insulin has reduced or missed insulin doses. Furthermore, it can be triggered by severe acute illness, dehydration, extensive exercise, surgery, low-carbohydrate diets, or excessive alcohol intake. Proposed mechanisms for SGLT2-I induced "euglycemic DKA" include increased ketosis due to volume depletion combined with relative insulin deficiency and glucagon excess. SGLT2 inhibitors should be stopped before surgery and only recommenced when it is safe to do so. SGLT2 inhibitors may be used in people with type 1 diabetes, but the possibility of ketoacidosis requires specific risk management. Specifically, they should not be used if someone is also using a low carbohydrate or ketogenic diet. ## Mechanism Diabetic ketoacidosis arises because of a lack of insulin in the body. The lack of insulin and corresponding elevation of glucagon leads to increased release of glucose by the liver (a process that is normally suppressed by insulin) from glycogen via glycogenolysis and also through gluconeogenesis. High glucose levels spill over into the urine, taking water and solutes (such as sodium and potassium) along with it in a process known as osmotic diuresis. This leads to polyuria, dehydration, and polydipsia. The absence of insulin also leads to the release of free fatty acids from adipose tissue (lipolysis), which the liver converts into acetyl CoA through a process called beta oxidation. Acetyl CoA is metabolised into ketone bodies under severe states of energy deficiency, like starvation, through a process called ketogenesis, whose final products are aceto-acetate and β-Hydroxybutyrate. These ketone bodies can serve as an energy source in the absence of insulin-mediated glucose delivery, and is a protective mechanism in case of starvation. The ketone bodies, however, have a low pKa and therefore turn the blood acidic (metabolic acidosis). The body initially buffers the change with the bicarbonate buffering system, but this system is quickly overwhelmed and other mechanisms must work to compensate for the acidosis. One such mechanism is hyperventilation to lower blood carbon dioxide levels (a form of compensatory respiratory alkalosis). This hyperventilation, in its extreme form, may be observed as Kussmaul respiration. In various situations such as infection, insulin demands rise but are not matched by the failing pancreas. Blood sugars rise, dehydration ensues, and resistance to the normal effects of insulin increases further by way of a vicious circle. As a result of the above mechanisms, the average adult with DKA has a total body water shortage of about 6 liters (or 100 mL/kg), in addition to substantial shortages in sodium, potassium, chloride, phosphate, magnesium and calcium. Glucose levels usually exceed 13.8 mmol/L or 250 mg/dL. DKA is common in type 1 diabetes as this form of diabetes is associated with an absolute lack of insulin production by the islets of Langerhans. In type 2 diabetes, insulin production is present but is insufficient to meet the body's requirements as a result of end-organ insulin resistance. Usually, these amounts of insulin are sufficient to suppress ketogenesis. If DKA occurs in someone with type 2 diabetes, their condition is called "ketosis-prone type 2 diabetes". The exact mechanism for this phenomenon is unclear, but there is evidence both of impaired insulin secretion and insulin action. Once the condition has been treated, insulin production resumes and often the person may be able to resume diet or tablet treatment as normally recommended in type 2 diabetes. The clinical state of DKA is associated, in addition to the above, with the release of various counterregulatory hormones such as glucagon and adrenaline as well as cytokines, the latter of which leads to increased markers of inflammation, even in the absence of infection. Cerebral edema, which is the most dangerous DKA complication, is probably the result of a number of factors. Some authorities suggest that it is the result of overvigorous fluid replacement, but the complication may develop before treatment has been commenced. It is more likely in those with more severe DKA, and in the first episode of DKA. Likely factors in the development of cerebral edema are dehydration, acidosis and low carbon dioxide levels; in addition, the increased level of inflammation and coagulation may, together with these factors, lead to decreased blood flow to parts of the brain, which then swells up once fluid replacement has been commenced. The swelling of brain tissue leads to raised intracranial pressure ultimately leading to death. ## Ketosis prone diabetes The entity of ketosis-prone type 2 diabetes was first fully described in 1987 after several preceding case reports. It was initially thought to be a form of maturity onset diabetes of the young, and went through several other descriptive names (such as "idiopathic type 1 diabetes", "Flatbush diabetes", "atypical diabetes" and "type 1.5 diabetes") before the current terminology of "ketosis-prone type 2 diabetes" was adopted. It has been reported predominantly in non-white ethnicity in African–Americans, Hispanics, Black Africans and Black Caribbeans. There is a link with G6PD deficiency. ## Diagnosis ### Investigations Diabetic ketoacidosis may be diagnosed when the combination of hyperglycemia (high blood sugars), ketones in the blood or on urinalysis and acidosis are demonstrated. In about 10% of cases the blood sugar is not significantly elevated ("euglycemic diabetic ketoacidosis"). A pH measurement is performed to detect acidosis. Blood from a vein is adequate, as there is little difference between the arterial and the venous pH; arterial samples are only required if there are concerns about oxygen levels. Ketones can be measured in the urine (acetoacetate) and blood (β-hydroxybutyrate). When compared with urine acetoacetate testing, capillary blood β-hydroxybutyrate determination can reduce the need for admission, shorten the duration of hospital admission and potentially reduce the costs of hospital care. At very high levels, capillary blood ketone measurement becomes imprecise. In addition to the above, blood samples are usually taken to measure urea and creatinine (measures of kidney function, which may be impaired in DKA as a result of dehydration) and electrolytes. Furthermore, markers of infection (complete blood count, C-reactive protein) and acute pancreatitis (amylase and lipase) may be measured. Given the need to exclude infection, chest radiography and urinalysis are usually performed. If cerebral edema is suspected because of confusion, recurrent vomiting or other symptoms, computed tomography may be performed to assess its severity and to exclude other causes such as stroke. ### Criteria Diabetic ketoacidosis is distinguished from other diabetic emergencies by the presence of large amounts of ketones in blood and urine, and marked metabolic acidosis. Hyperosmolar hyperglycemic state (HHS, sometimes labeled "hyperosmolar non-ketotic state" or HONK) is much more common in type 2 diabetes and features increased plasma osmolarity (above 320 mosm/kg) due to profound dehydration and concentration of the blood; mild acidosis and ketonemia may occur in this state, but not to the extent observed in DKA. There is a degree of overlap between DKA and HHS, as in DKA the osmolarity may also be increased. Ketoacidosis is not always the result of diabetes. It may also result from alcohol excess and from starvation; in both states the glucose level is normal or low. Metabolic acidosis may occur in people with diabetes for other reasons, such as poisoning with ethylene glycol or paraldehyde. The American Diabetes Association categorizes DKA in adults into one of three stages of severity: - Mild: blood pH mildly decreased to between 7.25 and 7.30 (normal 7.35–7.45); serum bicarbonate decreased to 15–18 mmol/L (normal above 20); the person is alert - Moderate: pH 7.00–7.25, bicarbonate 10–15, mild drowsiness may be present - Severe: pH below 7.00, bicarbonate below 10, stupor or coma may occur A 2004 statement by the European Society for Paediatric Endocrinology and the Lawson Wilkins Pediatric Endocrine Society (for children) uses slightly different cutoffs, where mild DKA is defined by pH 7.20–7.30 (bicarbonate 10–15 mmol/L), moderate DKA by pH 7.1–7.2 (bicarbonate 5–10) and severe DKA by pH\<7.1 (bicarbonate below 5). ## Prevention Attacks of DKA can be prevented in those known to have diabetes to an extent by adherence to "sick day rules"; these are clear-cut instructions to patients on how to treat themselves when unwell. Instructions include advice on how much extra insulin to take when sugar levels appear uncontrolled, an easily digestible diet rich in salt and carbohydrates, means to suppress fever and treat infection, and recommendations on when to call for medical help. People with diabetes can monitor their own ketone levels when unwell and seek help if they are elevated. ## Management The main aim in the treatment of diabetic ketoacidosis is to replace the lost fluids and electrolytes while suppressing the high blood sugars and ketone production with insulin. Admission to an intensive care unit (ICU) or similar high-dependency area or ward for close observation may be necessary. ### Fluid replacement The amount of fluid replaced depends on the estimated degree of dehydration. If dehydration is so severe as to cause shock (severely decreased blood pressure with insufficient blood supply to the body's organs), or a depressed level of consciousness, rapid infusion of saline (1 liter for adults, 10 mL/kg in repeated doses for children) is recommended to restore circulating volume. Slower rehydration based on calculated water and sodium shortage may be possible if the dehydration is moderate, and again saline is the recommended fluid. Very mild ketoacidosis with no associated vomiting and mild dehydration may be treated with oral rehydration and subcutaneous rather than intravenous insulin under observation for signs of deterioration. Normal saline (0.9% saline) has generally been the fluid of choice. There have been a few small trials looking at balanced fluids with few differences. A special but unusual consideration is cardiogenic shock, where the blood pressure is decreased not due to dehydration but due to the inability of the heart to pump blood through the blood vessels. This situation requires ICU admission, monitoring of the central venous pressure (which requires the insertion of a central venous catheter in a large upper body vein), and the administration of medication that increases the heart pumping action and blood pressure. ### Insulin Some guidelines recommend a bolus (initial large dose) of insulin of 0.1 units of insulin per kilogram of body weight. This can be administered immediately after the potassium level is known to be higher than 3.3 mmol/L; if the level is any lower, administering insulin could lead to a dangerously low potassium level (see below). Other guidelines recommend a bolus given intramuscularly if there is a delay in commencing an intravenous infusion of insulin, whereas guidelines for the management of pediatric DKA recommend delaying the initiation of insulin until fluids have been administered. It is possible to use rapid acting insulin analogs injections under the skin for mild or moderate cases. In general, insulin is given at 0.1 units/kg per hour to reduce blood sugars and suppress ketone production. Guidelines differ as to which dose to use when blood sugar levels start falling; American guidelines recommend reducing the dose of insulin once glucose falls below 16.6 mmol/L (300 mg/dL) and UK guidelines at 14 mmol/L (253 mg/dL). Others recommend infusing glucose in addition to saline to allow for ongoing infusion of higher doses of insulin. ### Potassium Potassium levels can fluctuate severely during the treatment of DKA, because insulin decreases potassium levels in the blood by redistributing it into cells via increased sodium-potassium pump activity. A large part of the shifted extracellular potassium would have been lost in urine because of osmotic diuresis. Hypokalemia (low blood potassium concentration) often follows treatment. This increases the risk of dangerous irregularities in the heart rate. Therefore, continuous observation of the heart rate is recommended, as well as repeated measurement of the potassium levels and addition of potassium to the intravenous fluids once levels fall below 5.3 mmol/L. If potassium levels fall below 3.3 mmol/L, insulin administration may need to be interrupted to allow correction of the hypokalemia. ### Sodium bicarbonate The administration of sodium bicarbonate solution to rapidly improve the acid levels in the blood is controversial. There is little evidence that it improves outcomes beyond standard therapy, and indeed some evidence that while it may improve the acidity of the blood, it may actually worsen acidity inside the body's cells and increase the risk of certain complications. Its use is therefore discouraged, although some guidelines recommend it for extreme acidosis (pH\<6.9), and smaller amounts for severe acidosis (pH 6.9–7.0). ### Cerebral edema Cerebral edema, if associated with coma, often necessitates admission to intensive care, artificial ventilation, and close observation. The administration of fluids is slowed. The ideal treatment of cerebral edema in DKA is not established, but intravenous mannitol and hypertonic saline (3%) are used—as in some other forms of cerebral edema—in an attempt to reduce the swelling. Cerebral edema is unusual in adults. ### Resolution Resolution of DKA is defined as the general improvement in the symptoms, such as the ability to tolerate oral nutrition and fluids, normalization of blood acidity (pH\>7.3), and absence of ketones in the blood (\<1 mmol/L) or urine. Once this has been achieved, insulin may be switched to the usual subcutaneously administered regimen, one hour after which the intravenous administration can be discontinued. In people with suspected ketosis-prone type 2 diabetes, determination of antibodies against glutamic acid decarboxylase and islet cells may aid in the decision whether to continue insulin administration long-term (if antibodies are detected), or whether to withdraw insulin and attempt treatment with oral medication as in type 2 diabetes. Generally speaking, routine measurement of C-peptide as a measure of insulin production is not recommended unless there is genuine doubt as to whether someone has type 1 or type 2 diabetes. ## Epidemiology Diabetic ketoacidosis occurs in 4.6–8.0 per 1000 people with diabetes annually. Rates among those with type 1 diabetes are higher with about 4% in the United Kingdom developing DKA a year while in Malaysia the condition affects about 25% a year. In the United States, 135,000 hospital admissions occur annually as a result of DKA, at an estimated cost of \$2.4 billion or a quarter to half the total cost of caring for people with type 1 diabetes. There has been a documented increasing trend in hospital admissions. The risk is increased in those with an ongoing risk factor, such as an eating disorder, and those who cannot afford insulin. About 30% of children with type 1 diabetes receive their diagnosis after an episode of DKA. Lower socio‐economic status and higher area‐level deprivation are associated with an increased risk of diabetic ketoacidosis in people with diabetes mellitus type 1. Previously considered universally fatal, the risk of death with adequate and timely treatment is between \<1% and 5%. Up to 1% of children with DKA develop a complication known as cerebral edema. Rates of cerebral edema in US children with DKA have risen from 0.4% in 2002 to 0.7% in 2012. Between 2 and 5 out of 10 children who develop brain swelling will die as a result. ## Resolution of DKA Resolution of DKA requires meeting the following parameters: - blood ketones \< 0.6 mmol/L - venous pH \> 7.3
54,227,017	Inspired (song)	1,162,009,748	null	[ "2010s ballads", "2017 singles", "2017 songs", "American country music songs", "Billy Ray Cyrus", "Charity singles", "Country ballads", "Environmental songs", "Hillary Clinton 2016 presidential campaign", "LGBT-related songs", "Miley Cyrus songs", "RCA Records singles", "Song recordings produced by Miley Cyrus", "Song recordings produced by Oren Yoel", "Songs written by Miley Cyrus", "Songs written by Oren Yoel" ]	"Inspired" is a song recorded by American singer Miley Cyrus. It was released on June 9, 2017, as a promotional single from her sixth studio album Younger Now (2017). Written and produced by Cyrus and Oren Yoel, "Inspired" is a country ballad about creating a difference in the world. Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign inspired Cyrus to write the track, which references her father Billy Ray and her childhood in Tennessee. Media suggested that this song was as an example of Cyrus' career change following the more hip hop approach to her fourth studio album Bangerz. "Inspired" was first made available for music download and streaming during Pride Month. Cyrus donated her personal profits from the song to her Happy Hippie Foundation, which deals with homelessness among LGBTQ youth. Her fans created a lyric video, which she shared on her Instagram account. Critics had a mixed response to the song. "Inspired" charted in Australia, Russia, and Spain. Cyrus promoted the track with live performances, including at the One Love Manchester benefit concert. ## Background and recording Miley Cyrus wrote and produced "Inspired" with Oren Yoel for her sixth studio album Younger Now (2017). The pair have writing and production credits on all of the album's tracks. Paul David Hager recorded "Inspired" at the House of Blues Studios in Nashville, Tennessee, and mixed it with assistance from Mark Ralston. Doran Dina was the audio engineer and Dave Kutch mastered the final version. Backing musicians included: Nicole Row, bass guitar; Matt Walker, cello; Antoine Silverman, fiddle; Jaco Caraco and James Arentzen, guitar; and Paul Franklin, pedal steel guitar. As well as playing drums, Stacy Jones was the song's music director. Cyrus based the lyrics on Hillary Clinton's 2016 presidential campaign. A week prior to campaigning for Clinton, Cyrus was caught in the middle of a funeral procession and was surrounded by mourners. The situation caused her to reflect on her family and environmental issues, leading her to develop the concept for the song. The day after the 2016 United States presidential election, Cyrus sent the song to Clinton, who responded with a letter. ## Music and lyrics "Inspired" is a country ballad lasting three minutes and 21 seconds. Composed in the key of G major, the song uses common time and a tempo of 104 beats per minute. The instrumental focuses on string instruments, and Entertainment Weekly's Eric King described the sound as "backroad [and] fiddle-prone." The Ringer'''s Lindsay Zoladz identified the song as acoustic and downtempo. Music journalist John Norris wrote that the final version had a richer production than the more sparse demo he had heard while visiting Cyrus in April 2017. Cyrus' vocal range, described as raspy by Billboard's Zachariah Porter, is between the low note of G<sub>3</sub> and the high note of C<sub>5</sub>. Music critics referred to "Inspired" as the singer's return to country music, following Cyrus' foray into hip hop music for her fourth studio album, Bangerz. Media outlets wrote that Cyrus adopted a flower child persona for the song. In an interview on The Zach Sang Show, Cyrus said "Inspired" was a "new, older version" of her 2009 single "The Climb". Throughout the song, she hopes the world will improve. "Inspired" begins with the lyrics "I'm writing down my dreams, all I'd like to see, starting with the bees, or else they're gonna die", which Bustle's Dana Getz interpreted as a commentary on climate change. The song transitions into Cyrus' memories of her father Billy Ray Cyrus and her childhood in Tennessee. She sings about running barefoot, spending time with her dad in a creek, and getting words of encouragement from him. Cyrus said she was inspired by the stories Clinton told of her father, Hugh Rodham, during the 2016 United States presidential debates. Norris interpreted the chorus "we are meant for more, with a handle on the door, that opens up for change" as intended to celebrate the victory of Clinton in the 2016 election. On the other hand, Getz attributed the chorus as Cyrus reaching out to her fans. The final verse, with the lyrics "death is life, it's not a curse, reminds us of time and what it's worth", is about fear and the future. The song ends with the lyric "is anyone watching us down here" which Anna Gaca of Spin likened to an appeal to God. E! News' Zach Johnson wrote that "Inspired" also addresses mental health. ## Release and promotion RCA released "Inspired" as a promotional single from Younger Now. It was the second song from the album, following the release of its lead single "Malibu". "Inspired" was made available on June 9, 2017 via music download and streaming. Cyrus donated her personal profits from the song to her Happy Hippie Foundation, which focuses on homelessness among LGBTQ youth. The single's cover photograph was taken by her fiancé, Liam Hemsworth, who also did the artwork for "Malibu". Cyrus released the song during Pride Month in response to what she called a "desperate cry for more love in this world." On July 1, she shared a fan-made lyric video through her Instagram account. In the video, the singer's fans hold handwritten lyrics while lip syncing to the track; Cyrus said she "shed a few tears" on seeing it. Cyrus promoted the track with live performances. She first performed "Inspired" on May 26, 2017, during an episode of Today. She also sang it as part of the One Love Manchester concert where she dedicated it to Manchester. Her performance received positive reviews from media outlets. On June 11, she sang it during the Washington, D.C. pride festival, where she was the headliner for the event. On June 16, she performed "Inspired" and "Malibu" as the closing for an episode of The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. She also sang it for the iHeartSummer '17 concert, sponsored by iHeartMedia, and dedicated the performance to the LGBT community. Commercially, "Inspired" reached number 152 on the French SNEP singles chart for one week. It debuted and peaked at number 97 on the Australian ARIA chart. The single reached number 450 on the Tophit chart in Commonwealth of Independent States. According to Cantor, "Inspired" performed poorly during its first day on Spotify and the iTunes Store. ## Critical reception "Inspired" received positive reviews. Getz said the simplicity of the lyrics was appropriate for the divisive political climate in the United States. Porter described "Inspired" as a gay anthem and enjoyed its focus on LGBT equality and self-confidence. Teen Vogue's Suzannah Weiss summed up the single as being an "uplifting message [that] is much-needed right now." Cillea Houghton of Taste Of Country praised "Inspired" as Miley's dedication to her dad, and Norris called it one of the best Father's Day presents. Alex Young of Consequence of Sound likened the single to music recorded by Loretta Lynn and Emmylou Harris. McDermott praised Cyrus' vocals for her "soaring harmonies" and "blissful croon", and Brian Cantor of Headline Planet wrote that she balanced her emotional performance with restraint. NME's Leonie Cooper praised the instrumental was "delicate [and] fiddle-laced." Other critics had a more negative response. Tom Breihan of Stereogum cited the single as an example of how Cyrus' career change was "absolutely forced and cynical", and McDermott questioned the effectiveness of the lyrics, which he compared to a word salad. Gaca criticized "Inspired" as lacking the intensity of "The Climb" and referred to Halsey's duet with Lauren Jauregui on "Strangers" as a superior LGBT anthem. Along with the album tracks "I Would Die For You" and "Miss You So Much", Noisey's Richard S. Hei felt Cyrus was unsuccessful in her attempt to emotionally bond with the listener. Gaca questioned Cyrus' decision to record a tribute to her father when he had said that his daughter's Hannah Montana fame ruined their family. ## Personnel Credits adapted from the liner notes of Younger Now'': Recording location - House of Blues Studios (Nashville) Credits - Bass – Nicole Row - Cello – Matt Walker - Drums, Music Director, Producer – Stacy Jones - Fiddle – Antoine Silverman - Guitar – Jaco Caraco, James Arentzen - Mixed By [Assistant], Recorded By [Assistant] – Mark Ralston - Mixed By, Recorded By – Paul David Hager - Pedal Steel Guitar – Paul Franklin - Producer – Oren Yoel, Miley Cyrus - Written By – Miley Cyrus, Oren Yoel - Mastered By – Dave Kutch - Engineer – Doron Dina ## Charts ## Release history

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