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1811_24 | machines worked to create the effect of a helicopter hovering over water. Other practical filming locations included Nichols Canyon Beach, the Los Angeles Police Academy and the York Street police station for interiors. A bar called Monty's in downtown Los Angeles was used for a scene involving the rough alien played by Brian Thompson. The interior of Sykes's house was filmed at a home near the studio, while a location in Beverly Glen stood in for a church in the final wedding scene. Some of the more elaborate sets used extensively in the film, were the Millennium Biltmore Hotel and an Anheuser–Busch plant. The alien villain Harcourt, is introduced at the hotel in the elite Crystal Room. The lobby section of the hotel with its very high ceilings and extensive complement of gold motif, was used in an interview scene between the characters of Harcourt, Kipling and the detectives. Alternatively, the beverage plant was used as a disguise for a petroleum factory. Unused portions of the |
1811_25 | facility containing steel tanks were used as an interesting gloomy background. A methane lab was recreated with translucent tubes running through them, as though drugs were in the process of being refined. Certain visual smoke effects were also created to copy the look of an oil refinery. |
1811_26 | As scripted by writer Rockne S. O'Bannon, Alien Nation was originally called, Future Tense. The film took some of its concept from the TV series In the Heat of the Night, with science fiction elements integrated in the plot. During production, the film had a working title called, Outer Heat, which essentially was an amalgam of In the Heat of the Night and a 1960s science fiction TV series, The Outer Limits. Jack Collis emphasized that the film was not a "space epic" but more of an action film. He admitted, "We did build a spaceship, but it's a simple thing that you see on a TV monitor describing the landing of the aliens several years ago, before they became assimilated into our society. It gives us a background but not a lot of detail,..." Collis noted that the film was even "reminiscent of the work I did in Cocoon." An earlier draft of the film was actually written by director James Cameron in 1987, but his name however, was not credited in the final cut of the film. One conceit of |
1811_27 | the script was that immigrations officials ran out of names for the 300,000 aliens, and began to name them after familiar appellations of the past. Actor Mandy Patinkin's original name for his character was set to be George Jetson. However, three days before the start of shooting, Hanna-Barbera wouldn't allow the name to be used. Expressing his disappointment, Patinkin said, "I assumed that the name of the character I agreed to play was George Jetson. And I was pretty pissed off that there was a screw-up and that the name couldn't be used." He went on to say, "I thought it made a tremendous difference to the piece that the guy's name was George Jetson because it gave a cartoon feeling, an innocence that was important to the movie's whole idea. It's a great loss to the piece that we couldn't recover, a great misfortune that couldn't be solved. It would have helped a lot." In reference to the cartoon character, the producers would leave in the name "George" as a substitute. Patinkin |
1811_28 | added, "Everything in the script is Jetson, everything on the makeup is labeled Jetson, we always refer to him as Jetson. Not even George, but Jetson. So in our minds, he's George Jetson. So as far as I'm concerned, anybody who sees the movie, they're watching George Jetson no matter what the hell they call him." To understand his role of being a police officer, Patinkin spent two weeks hanging out with the New York City Police Department. He took their training course, joined them on patrol, and spent time with them at the firing range. Commenting on the character development of Francisco, he said "It's one of the better jobs that people from his race have acquired. He feels very proud of the fact that he's able to be a cop." In 2013, when asked about his role in the film, Caan initially replied, "Why would you bring up that?" before stating, "Yeah, well, I don't know. I don't have too many ... [Hesitates.] I mean, I loved Mandy Patinkin. Mandy was a riot. But ... I don't know. It |
1811_29 | was a lot of silly stuff, creatively. And we had this English director who I wasn't really that fond of. I mean, nice guy, but ... it was just one of those things where, you know, you don't quit, you get through it. It certainly wasn't one of ... I wouldn't write it down as one of my favorite movies. But it was pretty popular." |
1811_30 | Cinematography |
1811_31 | Cinematographer Adam Greenberg, whose previous film credits included Three Men and a Baby, La Bamba and Near Dark, approached the film with a unique documentary-style technique. Commenting on the initial photography lighting tests, Greenberg remarked, "The first ones were a disaster. They didn't look good at all. I didn't know how to photograph these aliens. It was the first time I had to deal with this kind of thing. But I have an eye and I learned from these tests." At the Biltmore Hotel, a peculiar situation arose where the ceilings were simply too tall for standard lighting equipment. An ingenious idea was devised by the crew to have six to eight weather balloons sent up and have artificial light bounce off of them to create the proper lighting mood. Greenberg remarked, "I wanted a very rich look from that place, gold and very warm. In the story it is very late after a big party. I wasn't going for any special effect, just nice light from lamps on the tables. The problem was, the |
1811_32 | hotel management wouldn't let us hang anything from the ceiling. In pre-production they had told us we could hang lights, but I didn't believe them. The ceilings there are very high and very beautiful." |
1811_33 | On character interactions, Greenberg noted how there was "a lot of dialogue between Jimmy and Mandy in the car. We used a lot of car mounts. I would light the alien so that he looked good, but if he passed into a shadow while going down the street you could see all the seams in his make-up. So I sometimes had to block all the streets with black paper." The aliens were not too different from humans, and an incorrect lighting or camera angle could give away seams in the makeup. In attempting to identify the aliens with a unique look, Greenberg chose a deep blue color for filming. He said, "We ended up with very deep, strong blue – a sort of moonlight blue. We tried to do all the scenes in the movie that appear to be their places heavily favored by this deep blue color. The Encounters Club was one of those places." Greenberg used Arriflex cameras and Zeiss lenses along with Fuji stock. Commenting on film grain he said, "I figured out from tests that it is better for me to use Fuji. Once |
1811_34 | film is blown up to 70mm the grain will stand out more and Fuji has smaller grain than Kodak. I can control the contrast with light, but I have to live with the grain." Making use of multiple cameras, Greenberg noted, "Photographically, of course, one camera is best. But as a movie maker, and because I want the film to be a success, I realize that the photography is not the most important thing. The whole movie is most important. So in pre-production, I was the one pushing the director to always shoot with two or three cameras." |
1811_35 | Lighting challenges were abound for Greenberg as most of the film took place at night. One of the simplest techniques for lighting employed by Greenberg was using a car's headlights to dramatically produce a scene of terror. Greenberg explained, "We had a scene on Zuma Beach where the bad guys are dragging somebody into the ocean. I wanted to have a very hard, but very natural, and strong look. So, I used the car headlights. It was nice because everything behind the villains fell into darkness. It had a surrealistic look." Greenberg also remarked how he had a close working relationship with DeLuxe lab in getting the correct color for the extensive night shooting in the film by bluntly saying, "In a movie like this I wanted the blacks to be very black, so I worked closely with DeLuxe lab..." He felt the daily challenges of night shooting visibly enhanced the appeal of Alien Nation by figuratively mentioning, "as a cameraman, you can create a lot more at night. Sometimes you have to |
1811_36 | feel your way. You also have true control at night. If a light is on it is because you turned it on." |
1811_37 | Music and soundtrack |
1811_38 | The score for the film was originally composed by Jerry Goldsmith, but later rejected in favor of music composed by Curt Sobel. Goldsmith's score was however used for the film's theatrical trailer. Musical artists Smokey Robinson, The Beach Boys, Michael Bolton, Mick Jagger and David Bowie among others, contributed songs which appear in the film. The audio soundtrack in Compact Disc format composed by Sobel was never officially released, but a limited edition of the original score initially composed by Goldsmith featuring 18 tracks, was released in 2005. The score was entirely synthesized and limited to 3,000 copies. The melody featured throughout the film recorded by Goldsmith, was originally composed for the movie Wall Street. After being rejected for both that film project and later Alien Nation, the score was used in the 1990 film The Russia House. The sound effects in the film were supervised by Mark Mangini. The mixing of the sound elements were orchestrated by David MacMillan |
1811_39 | and Charles Wilborn. |
1811_40 | Release
Box office
The film premiered in cinemas on October 7, 1988. At its widest distribution in the U.S., the film was screened at 1,436 theaters grossing $8,421,429, averaging $5,889 in revenue per theater in its opening weekend. During that first weekend in release, the film opened in first place beating out the films, The Accused and Punchline. The film's revenue dropped by 49% in its second week of release, earning $4,252,252. In the month of November during its final weekend showing in theaters, the film came out in 10th place grossing $1,306,849. The film went on to top out domestically at $25,216,243 in total ticket sales through a 5-week theatrical run. Internationally, the film took in an additional $6,938,804 in box office business for a combined total of $32,155,047. For 1988 as a whole, the film would cumulatively rank at a box office performance position of 41. |
1811_41 | Home mediaAlien Nation was released on VHS by CBS/Fox Video in 1989. One currently available VHS version of the film was originally released on September 10, 1996. The Region 1 Code widescreen edition of the film was released on DVD in the United States on March 27, 2001, and includes a narrative and interview filled Featurette, a Behind the Scenes clip featuring director Graham Baker, a TV Spots special, the Theatrical Trailer and Fox Flix theatrical trailers for The Abyss, Aliens, Enemy Mine, Independence Day and Zardoz. Currently, there is no exact set date on a future US Blu-ray Disc release for the film. The film was released on blu-ray in Australia in April 2016 and in Europe (Region B locked) in March 2017. |
1811_42 | Reception
Critical response
The film received mixed reviews from critics. Rotten Tomatoes reported that 52% of 31 sampled critics gave the film a positive review, with an average score of 5.4 out of 10. At Metacritic, which assigns a weighted average out of 100 to critics' reviews, Alien Nation was given a score of 45 based on 10 reviews. |
1811_43 | Among critics, Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun Times, gave the film two stars in a mostly negative review, saying the film lacked a science fiction theme and was more akin to a police murder revenge flick, musing "they've just taken the standard cop-buddy-drug lord routine and changed some of the makeup. The Newcomers have no surprises." Regarding the fictional alien culture, he expressed disappointment saying "a feeble attempt is made to invest the Newcomers with interest, by having them get drunk on sour milk instead of booze, and depriving them of any sense of humor." However, on a slightly complimentary note, Ebert mentioned "the makeup took trouble, the photography looks good, the cast and technical credits are top-drawer." But overall, he summed it up by declaring "Alien Nation feels like a movie made by people who have seen a lot of movies, but don't think the audience has." In agreement with Ebert over the originality of the buddy cop genre with the aliens inserted in as just a |
1811_44 | new rendition, Rita Kempley of The Washington Post said, "Alien Nation wants to be In the Heat of the Night as science fiction, but it's neither morally instructive nor prophetic. It proves a lumbering marriage of action and sci-fi that alienates both audiences. It's too dull for one and too dumb for the other." Kempley did find the first half hour to be suspenseful, though: "...well paced, brawny and intense, looks like it was made by another director. But the rest is the cinematic equivalent of overcooked asparagus." However, the more enthusiastic staff of Variety found originality in the extraterrestrial–injected plot, saying, "Solid performances by leads James Caan and his humanoid buddy-cop partner Mandy Patinkin move this production beyond special effects, clever alien makeup and car chases" while also adding the film was a "compelling humanhumanoid drama." |
1811_45 | Another positive review centering on the science fiction elements of the film was relayed by Janet Maslin of The New York Times. She praised the theme, saying, "Alien Nation has the best science-fiction idea this side of The Terminator." However, Maslin was quick to admit the film "settles down, with remarkable ease, into the routine of a two-cop buddy film, extraterrestrials and all. Matthew and Sam (whom Matthew refuses to address that way, renaming him George) go through all the familiar stages of forging a friendship between partners: cool antipathy, exchanges of insults, growing mutual respect on the job and, finally, an all-night drinking binge to solidify their buddyhood." On a negative front, author Jay Carr of The Boston Globe commented on James Caan's performance, viewing him as "Looking like a Paul Newman gone wrong,..." He went on, further stating that "the film's air of enlightenment is only makeup deep. And while Alien Nation is no smarter than, say, a Lethal Weapon, it |
1811_46 | hasn't got the juice or the level of sensory jolt a Lethal Weapon supplies." Other critics such as Gene Siskel acknowledged the similarities between other police thriller movies, but still found the film to be a "Genuinely entertaining version of that old reliable; a cop buddy picture with two very different detectives." He explained, "Now this is an example of how you can put a nice twist on a familiar story, and it will work if it's been fully written. Caan and Patinkin have special characters to play." Compelled by the acting, he felt "The buddy combination here worked for me." He ultimately gave the film a "Thumbs Up" review. Not nearly as impressed with the film was author NF of TimeOut Magazine, calling it "worthy, predictable, and dull." A summation of the negativity was, "Played hard and fast, the film might just have worked, but the decision to soft-pedal the violence merely emphasizes the obviousness of the liberal point-scoring (parallels with Vietnamese or Nicaraguan |
1811_47 | refugees are so facile as to be crass)." Critic Leonard Maltin referred to the film as "a great concept that doesn't quite pay off." But in a hint of commendation, he remarked how the film contains "many clever touches and terrific performances by Caan and Patinkin." |
1811_48 | Accolades
The film won the Saturn Award for Best Science Fiction Film of 1988, and received two Saturn nominations for Best Supporting Actor for Mandy Patinkin as well as Best Make-Up for John M. Elliott Jr. and Stan Winston. The film also received two other nominations, among them for Best Dramatic Presentation from the Hugo Awards and Best Film for Graham Baker from the Fantasporto International Fantasy Film Awards.
In other media
TV series |
1811_49 | The following year after the film's release, the extraterrestrial plot concept was used as the basis for a television series of the same name. The show attempted to move away from the original film's "Buddy Cop" premise, and delve more into the aliens' distinct culture and characteristics. Premiering on September 18, 1989, the series aired 22 episodes and ran for a single season, ending on May 7, 1990. Gary Graham played the lead role of Matt Sikes, while Eric Pierpoint was chosen to play the character of the Tenctonese newcomer George Francisco. Supporting acting roles were played by Michele Scarabelli, Lauren Woodland and Sean Six. Contributing directors to various episodes included Harry Longstreet, Stan Lathan, Lyndon Chubbuck and Kenneth Johnson. Writing credits were assigned to Steve Mitchell, Kenneth Van Sickle and Kenneth Johnson among others.
TV films |
1811_50 | Following the demise of the television series in 1990, plans were devised to continue the popularity of the concept surrounding the race of the Newcomers through a string of television films. Premiering on October 25, 1994, the first of five sequels entitled Alien Nation: Dark Horizon, was released with a plot surrounding a distinct Newcomer arriving on Earth attempting to lure the aliens back into a life of slavery. The film was written on a screenplay conceived by Andrew Schneider and Diane Frolov. Alien Nation: Body and Soul followed on October 10, 1995, with a story revolving around a slaveship medical experiment involving a child who appears to be part human and part Newcomer. A side plot also involves the character of Sikes and a female Tenctonese exploring a relationship. Harry and Renee Longstreet were credited writers for the storyline. The franchise saw two more sequels in 1996. Alien Nation: Millennium was released on January 2, 1996, and dealt with a mysterious cult that |
1811_51 | uses mind-altering alien artifacts to lure Newcomer followers into a doomsday scenario. The film's plot was a tie-in to one of the television episodes titled: Generation to Generation that premiered on January 29, 1990. Alien Nation: The Enemy Within was aired on November 12, 1996, and revolved around a story from which the detectives try to save their city from an alien threat originating from a waste disposal facility. Racism was a key theme encountered by the character of Francisco. The fifth and final sequel appeared on July 29, 1997. Alien Nation: The Udara Legacy, finds the detectives trying to stop a resistance group among the Newcomers trying to indoctrinate those among them into causing mayhem. A side plot involved the younger Newcomer Buck, played by actor Sean Six, enlisting to become a police officer. All the sequels in the series were directed by producer Kenneth Johnson. |
1811_52 | Comics
Between 1990 and 1992, Malibu Comics printed several comics adaptations.
Books
In 1993, Pocket Books, a division of Simon & Schuster, published a novel series, including the Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens' Day of Descent, Peter David's Body and Soul, along with Barry B. Longyear's The Change and Slag Like Me.
Remake
On March 25, 2015, Fox announced a remake with Art Marcum and Matt Holloway writing. On September 9, 2016, Deadline reported that Jeff Nichols will write and direct the film. However, the series was later put on hold. On January 25, 2021, it is announced that Nichols would remake the film as a ten-part television series.
See also
District 9''
Bright
References
External links |
1811_53 | 1988 films
1980s science fiction action films
20th Century Fox films
Alien Nation films
American buddy cop films
American science fiction action films
American films
1980s English-language films
Fictional-language films
Fictional portrayals of the Los Angeles Police Department
Films about racism
Films adapted into television shows
Films directed by Graham Baker
Films set in 1991
Films set in the future
Films set in Los Angeles
Films shot in Los Angeles
Films produced by Gale Anne Hurd
American neo-noir films
American police detective films
Films adapted into comics
Films with screenplays by Rockne S. O'Bannon
1980s buddy cop films |
1812_0 | Polaris is a star in the northern circumpolar constellation of Ursa Minor. It is designated α Ursae Minoris (Latinized to Alpha Ursae Minoris) and is commonly called the North Star or Pole Star. With an apparent visual magnitude that fluctuates around 1.98, it is the brightest star in the constellation and is readily visible to the naked eye at night. The position of the star lies less than a degree away from the north celestial pole, making it the current northern pole star. Historically, the stable position of the star in the northern sky has made it useful for navigation.
The revised Hipparcos parallax gives a distance to Polaris of about , while calculations by some other methods derive distances up to 35% closer. |
1812_1 | Although appearing to the naked eye as a single point of light, Polaris is a triple star system, composed of the primary, a yellow supergiant designated Polaris Aa, in orbit with a smaller companion, Polaris Ab; the pair is in a wider orbit with Polaris B. The outer pair AB were discovered in August 1779 by William Herschel.
Stellar system
Polaris Aa is an evolved yellow supergiant of spectral type F7Ib with 5.4 solar masses (). It is the first classical Cepheid to have a mass determined from its orbit. The two smaller companions are Polaris B, a F3 main-sequence star orbiting at a distance of (AU), and Polaris Ab (or P), a very close F6 main-sequence star with a mass of . Polaris B can be resolved with a modest telescope. William Herschel discovered the star in August 1779 using a reflecting telescope of his own, one of the best telescopes of the time. In January 2006, NASA released images, from the Hubble telescope, that showed the three members of the Polaris ternary system. |
1812_2 | The variable radial velocity of Polaris A was reported by W. W. Campbell in 1899, which suggested this star is a binary system. Since Polaris A is a known cepheid variable, J. H. Moore in 1927 demonstrated that the changes in velocity along the line of sight were due to a combination of the four-day pulsation period combined with a much longer orbital period and a large eccentricity of around 0.6. Moore published preliminary orbital elements of the system in 1929, giving an orbital period of about 29.7 years with an eccentricity of 0.63. This period was confirmed by proper motion studies performed by B. P. Gerasimovič in 1939.
As part of her doctoral thesis, in 1955 E. Roemer used radial velocity data to derive an orbital period of 30.46 y for the Polaris A system, with an eccentricity of 0.64. K. W. Kamper in 1996 produced refined elements with a period of and an eccentricity of . In 2019, a study by R. I. Anderson gave a period of with an eccentricity of . |
1812_3 | There were once thought to be two more widely separated components—Polaris C and Polaris D—but these have been shown not to be physically associated with the Polaris system.
Observation
Variability
Polaris Aa, the supergiant primary component, is a low-amplitude Population I classical Cepheid variable, although it was once thought to be a type II Cepheid due to its high galactic latitude. Cepheids constitute an important standard candle for determining distance, so Polaris, as the closest such star, is heavily studied. The variability of Polaris had been suspected since 1852; this variation was confirmed by Ejnar Hertzsprung in 1911. |
1812_4 | The range of brightness of Polaris is given as 1.86–2.13, but the amplitude has changed since discovery. Prior to 1963, the amplitude was over 0.1 magnitude and was very gradually decreasing. After 1966, it very rapidly decreased until it was less than 0.05 magnitude; since then, it has erratically varied near that range. It has been reported that the amplitude is now increasing again, a reversal not seen in any other Cepheid.
The period, roughly 4 days, has also changed over time. It has steadily increased by around 4.5 seconds per year except for a hiatus in 1963–1965. This was originally thought to be due to secular redward (lower temperature) evolution across the Cepheid instability strip, but it may be due to interference between the primary and the first-overtone pulsation modes. Authors disagree on whether Polaris is a fundamental or first-overtone pulsator and on whether it is crossing the instability strip for the first time or not. |
1812_5 | The temperature of Polaris varies by only a small amount during its pulsations, but the amount of this variation is variable and unpredictable. The erratic changes of temperature and the amplitude of temperature changes during each cycle, from less than 50 K to at least 170 K, may be related to the orbit with Polaris Ab.
Research reported in Science suggests that Polaris is 2.5 times brighter today than when Ptolemy observed it, changing from third to second magnitude. Astronomer Edward Guinan considers this to be a remarkable change and is on record as saying that "if they are real, these changes are 100 times larger than [those] predicted by current theories of stellar evolution".
Role as pole star |
1812_6 | Because Polaris lies nearly in a direct line with the Earth's rotational axis "above" the North Pole—the north celestial pole—Polaris stands almost motionless in the sky, and all the stars of the northern sky appear to rotate around it. Therefore, it makes an excellent fixed point from which to draw measurements for celestial navigation and for astrometry. The elevation of the star above the horizon gives the approximate latitude of the observer. |
1812_7 | In 2018 Polaris was 0.66° away from the pole of rotation (1.4 times the Moon disc) and so revolves around the pole in a small circle 1.3° in diameter. It will be closest to the pole (about 0.45 degree) soon after the year 2100. Because it is so close to the celestial north pole, its right ascension is changing rapidly due to the precession of the earth's axis, going from 2.5h in AD 2000 to 6h in AD 2100. Twice in each sidereal day Polaris' azimuth is true north; the rest of the time it is displaced eastward or westward, and the bearing must be corrected using tables or a rule of thumb. The best approximation is made using the leading edge of the "Big Dipper" asterism in the constellation Ursa Major. The leading edge (defined by the stars Dubhe and Merak) is referenced to a clock face, and the true azimuth of Polaris worked out for different latitudes. |
1812_8 | The apparent motion of Polaris towards and, in the future, away from the celestial pole, is due to the precession of the equinoxes. The celestial pole will move away from α UMi after the 21st century, passing close by Gamma Cephei by about the 41st century, moving towards Deneb by about the 91st century. |
1812_9 | The celestial pole was close to Thuban around 2750 BC, and
during classical antiquity it was slightly closer to Kochab (β UMi) than to Polaris, although still about from either star. It was about the same angular distance from β UMi as to α UMi by the end of late antiquity. The Greek navigator Pytheas in ca. 320 BC described the celestial pole as devoid of stars. However, as one of the brighter stars close to the celestial pole, Polaris was used for navigation at least from late antiquity, and described as ἀεί φανής (aei phanēs) "always visible" by Stobaeus (5th century), and it could reasonably be described as stella polaris from about the High Middle Ages. On his first trans-Atlantic voyage in 1492, Christopher Columbus had to correct for the "circle described by the pole star about the pole". In Shakespeare's play Julius Caesar, written around 1599, Caesar describes himself as being "as constant as the northern star", though in Caesar's time there was no constant northern star. |
1812_10 | Polaris was referenced in Nathaniel Bowditch's 1802 book, American Practical Navigator, where it is listed as one of the navigational stars.
Names
The modern name Polaris is shortened from New Latin stella polaris "polar star", coined in the Renaissance when the star had approached the celestial pole to within a few degrees.
Gemma Frisius, writing in 1547, referred to it as stella illa quae polaris dicitur ("that star which is called 'polar'"), placing it 3° 8' from the celestial pole.
In 2016, the International Astronomical Union organized a Working Group on Star Names (WGSN) to catalog and standardize proper names for stars. The WGSN's first bulletin of July 2016 included a table of the first two batches of names approved by the WGSN; which included Polaris for the star α Ursae Minoris Aa. |
1812_11 | In antiquity, Polaris was not yet the closest naked-eye star to the celestial pole, and the entire constellation of Ursa Minor was used for navigation rather than any single star. Polaris moved close enough to the pole to be the closest naked-eye star, even though still at a distance of several degrees, in the early medieval period, and numerous names referring to this characteristic as polar star have been in use since the medieval period. In Old English, it was known as scip-steorra ("ship-star");
In the Old English rune poem, the T-rune is apparently associated with "a circumpolar constellation", compared to the quality of steadfastness or honour. |
1812_12 | In the Hindu Puranas, it became personified under the name Dhruva ("immovable, fixed"). In the later medieval period, it became associated with the Marian title of Stella Maris "Star of the Sea" (so in Bartholomeus Anglicus, c. 1270s)
An older English name, attested since the 14th century, is lodestar "guiding star", cognate with the Old Norse leiðarstjarna, Middle High German leitsterne.
The ancient name of the constellation Ursa Minor, Cynosura (from the Greek "the dog's tail"), became associated with the pole star in particular by the early modern period. An explicit identification of Mary as stella maris with the polar star (Stella Polaris), as well as the use of Cynosura as a name of the star, is evident in the title Cynosura seu Mariana Stella Polaris (i.e. "Cynosure, or the Marian Polar Star"), a collection of Marian poetry published by Nicolaus Lucensis (Niccolo Barsotti de Lucca) in 1655. |
1812_13 | Its name in traditional pre-Islamic Arab astronomy was al-Judayy الجدي ("the kid", in the sense of a juvenile goat ["le Chevreau"] in Description des Etoiles fixes), and that name was used in medieval Islamic astronomy as well. In those times, it was not yet as close to the north celestial pole as it is now, and used to rotate around the pole. |
1812_14 | It was invoked as a symbol of steadfastness in poetry, as "steadfast star" by Spenser.
Shakespeare's sonnet 116 is an example of the symbolism of the north star as a guiding principle: "[Love] is the star to every wandering bark / Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken." In Julius Caesar, he has Caesar explain his refusal to grant a pardon by saying, "I am as constant as the northern star/Of whose true-fixed and resting quality/There is no fellow in the firmament./The skies are painted with unnumbered sparks,/They are all fire and every one doth shine,/But there's but one in all doth hold his place;/So in the world" (III, i, 65–71). Of course, Polaris will not "constantly" remain as the north star due to precession, but this is only noticeable over centuries.
In Inuit astronomy, Polaris is known as Niqirtsuituq. It is depicted on the flag and coat of arms of the Canadian Inuit territory of Nunavut, as well as on the flag of the U.S. state of Alaska. |
1812_15 | In traditional Lakota star knowledge, Polaris is named "Wičháȟpi owáŋžila". This translates to "The Star that Sits Still". This name comes from a Lakota story in which he married Tapun San Win "Red Cheeked Woman". However she fell from the heavens, and in his grief he stared down from "waŋkátu" (the above land) forever.
Distance
Many recent papers calculate the distance to Polaris at about 433 light-years (133 parsecs), based on parallax measurements from the Hipparcos astrometry satellite. Older distance estimates were often slightly less, and research based on high resolution spectral analysis suggests it may be up to 110 light years closer (323 ly/99 pc). Polaris is the closest Cepheid variable to Earth so its physical parameters are of critical importance to the whole astronomical distance scale. It is also the only one with a dynamically measured mass. |
1812_16 | The Hipparcos spacecraft used stellar parallax to take measurements from 1989 and 1993 with the accuracy of 0.97 milliarcseconds (970 microarcseconds), and it obtained accurate measurements for stellar distances up to 1,000 pc away. The Hipparcos data was examined again with more advanced error correction and statistical techniques. Despite the advantages of Hipparcos astrometry, the uncertainty in its Polaris data has been pointed out and some researchers have questioned the accuracy of Hipparcos when measuring binary Cepheids like Polaris. The Hipparcos reduction specifically for Polaris has been re-examined and reaffirmed but there is still not widespread agreement about the distance. |
1812_17 | The next major step in high precision parallax measurements comes from Gaia, a space astrometry mission launched in 2013 and intended to measure stellar parallax to within 25 microarcseconds (μas). Although it was originally planned to limit Gaia's observations to stars fainter than magnitude 5.7, tests carried out during the commissioning phase indicated that Gaia could autonomously identify stars as bright as magnitude 3. When Gaia entered regular scientific operations in July 2014, it was configured to routinely process stars in the magnitude range 3 – 20. Beyond that limit, special procedures are used to download raw scanning data for the remaining 230 stars brighter than magnitude 3; methods to reduce and analyse these data are being developed; and it is expected that there will be "complete sky coverage at the bright end" with standard errors of "a few dozen µas". Gaia Data Release 2 does not include a parallax for Polaris, but a distance inferred from it is (445.5 ly) for |
1812_18 | Polaris B, somewhat further than most previous estimates and several times more accurate. This was further improved to (447.6 ly), upon publication of the Gaia Early Data Release 3 catalog on 3 December 2020 which superseded Gaia Data Release 2. |
1812_19 | Polaris has long been important for the cosmic distance ladder because, prior to Gaia, it was the only Cepheid variable for which direct distance data existed, which had a ripple effect on distance measurements that use this "ruler".
Observational history
Gallery
See also
Extraterrestrial sky (for the pole stars of other celestial bodies)
Polar alignment
Polaris Australis
Polaris Flare
Regiment of the North Pole
References
F-type supergiants
F-type main-sequence stars
Classical Cepheid variables
Triple star systems
Northern pole stars
Ursa Minor (constellation)
Ursae Minoris, Alpha
Durchmusterung objects
Ursae Minoris, 01
008890
011767
0424
Stars with proper names |
1813_0 | "My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!" is a sentimental ballad written by Stephen Foster, probably composed in 1852. It was published in January 1853 by Firth, Pond, & Co. of New York. Foster was likely inspired by Harriet Beecher Stowe's anti-slavery novel Uncle Tom's Cabin, as evidenced by the title of a sketch in Foster’s sketchbook, “Poor Uncle Tom, Good-Night!”
Interpretations of the song vary widely. Frederick Douglass wrote in his 1855 autobiography My Bondage and My Freedom that the song "awakens sympathies for the slave, in which antislavery principles take root, grow, and flourish". However, the song’s publication by Firth & Pond as a minstrel song and its use in “Tom shows” (stagings of Stowe’s novel of varying degrees of sincerity and faithfulness to the original text), and other settings, have clouded its reception. |
1813_1 | Creation and career impact |
1813_2 | The creation of the song "My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!" established a decisive moment within Stephen Foster's career in regard to his personal beliefs on the institution of slavery as following the publishing of the song, Foster began to abandon minstrelsy and writing music with African-American vernacular. It also is an example of the common theme of the loss of home, which is prevalent throughout Foster's work. Foster was greatly inspired by Harriet Beecher Stowe's abolitionist novel Uncle Tom's Cabin, which appeared in bookstores in Foster's hometown of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania in March 1852. The novel, written about the plight of an enslaved person in Kentucky, had a profound effect on Foster's future songwriting by altering the tone of his music to sympathize the position of the enslaved person. In his notebook, Foster penned the lyrics inspired by Stowe's novel, initially named "Poor Old Uncle Tom, Good-Night!" Foster ultimately removed references to Stowe's book, renaming |
1813_3 | the work, "My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!" |
1813_4 | Foster's brother Morrison indicated in correspondence in 1898 that Foster was an "occasional visitor" to the plantation of their cousins the Rowan Family known as, Federal Hill. No evidence exists to confirm that Foster was inspired by imagery seen at Federal Hill for the song's composition, and the imagery in the song does not include any specific markers to Federal Hill. The Foster and Rowan family's close relationship appears to have been initiated through Stephen's sister Charlotte, who stayed with the Rowans at Federal Hill in 1828. While Charlotte lived with the Rowan family, Atkinson Hill Rowan made a proposal of marriage to her, which she ultimately declined. Charlotte died in the home of George Washing Barclay, a cousin of both families, with Atkinson Hill Rowan at her bedside. |
1813_5 | The song "My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!" is one of many examples of the loss of home in Foster's work. Biographers believe that this common theme originated from the loss of Foster's childhood home, known as the "White Cottage", an estate his mother referred to as an Eden, in reference to the Garden of Eden. The family was financially supported by the family patriarch William Foster, who owned vast holdings, which were lost through bad business dealings that left the family destitute and unable to keep possession of the White Cottage; the family was forced to leave the estate when Stephen Foster was three years old. After years of financial instability and the sharing of memories of the White Cottage with Stephen by his parents and siblings, the impact of longing for a permanent home that was no longer available to him greatly influenced his writing. |
1813_6 | Public sentiment
Upon its release in 1853 by Firth, Pond & Company, "My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night" grew quickly in popularity, selling thousands of copies. The song's popular and nostalgic theme of the loss of home resonated with the public and received support from some within the abolitionist movement in the United States. For example, African-American abolitionist Frederick Douglass promoted the song, among other similar songs of the time period, in his autobiography My Bondage and My Freedom as evoking a sentimental theme that promotes and popularizes the cause of abolishing slavery in the United States. Douglass commented, "They [My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!, etc.] are heart songs, and the finest feelings of human nature are expressed in them. [They] can make the heart sad as well as merry, and can call forth a tear as well as a smile. They awaken the sympathies for the slave", he stated, "in which anti-slavery principles take root and flourish". |
1813_7 | Foster sold the work to the music publishing company Firth & Pond that published and branded the work as a "plantation melody" among the catalog of Christy's Minstrels. As a result, the song was popular on the blackface minstrel stage and in melodrama through the nineteenth century. Frequently, the song was included in "Tom shows," stagings of Uncle Tom's Cabin. The song remained popular in amateur blackface minstrel shows through at least the first half of the twentieth century. While some of the shows in which "My Old Kentucky Home" depicted slavery as wrong and the enslaved people sympathetically, examples exist in which some of these shows hewed to the common demeaning traditions and tropes of blackface minstrelsy. |
1813_8 | The song held popularity for over a decade and throughout the American Civil War. The song's reach throughout the United States and popularity has been attributed to soldiers of the war, who passed the tune from location to location during the war's tenure. The song remained popular through the nineteenth century. The typical reduction of the song's title from "My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!" to "My Old Kentucky Home" occurred after the turn of the century. |
1813_9 | The song's first verse and chorus are recited annually at the Kentucky Derby. Colonel Matt Winn introduced the song as a Derby tradition. As early as 1930, Foster's song was played to accompany the post parade; the University of Louisville Marching Band has played the song for all but a few years since 1936. In 1982, Churchill Downs honored Foster by establishing the Stephen Foster Handicap. The University of Kentucky, University of Louisville, Murray State University, Eastern Kentucky University, and Western Kentucky University bands play the song at their schools' football and basketball games.
Kentucky state song
During the first decades of the twentieth century, the song became increasingly popular nationwide and the state legislature of the Commonwealth of Kentucky sought to utilize the song's popularity by establishing it as Kentucky's state song. |
1813_10 | In 1986, a Japanese youth group visiting the Kentucky General Assembly sang the song, using the original lyrics that included the word "darkies." Legislator Carl Hines subsequently introduced a resolution that would substitute the word "people" in place of "darkies" whenever the song was used by the House of Representatives. State Senator Georgia Davis Powers introduced a similar resolution in the Kentucky State Senate. Both chambers adopted the resolution. |
1813_11 | Modern impact
Today, the song "My Old Kentucky Home" remains an important composition due to its role in the evolution of American songwriting and is an influential song in American culture. According to popular-song analysts, the appeal of the theme of 'returning home' is one in which listeners of "My Old Kentucky Home" are able to personally relate within their own lives. Many revisions and updates of the song have occurred throughout the past century, which have further ingrained the song in American culture. These revisions and a constantly adapting cultural landscape also complicate the song's legacy and meanings for different people. |
1813_12 | Recording history |
1813_13 | "My Old Kentucky Home" was recorded many times during the early era of cylinder recordings. The Cylinder Audio Archive at the University of California (Santa Barbara) Library contains 19 commercial recordings of the song (in addition to several home recordings). In most cases, even those of the commercial recordings, the Archive is unable to determine the precise dates (or even years) of either their recording or their release, with some cylinders being dated only to a forty-year range from the 1890s to the 1920s. The earliest recording of "My Old Kentucky Home" for which the Archive was able to determine a precise year of release is from 1898 and features an unidentified cornet duo. However, the song is known to have been recorded earlier than that (in February 1894) by the Standard Quartette, a vocal group that was appearing in a musical that featured the song (making their recording perhaps the earliest example of a cast recording). No copy of that cylinder is known to have |
1813_14 | survived. And although cylinder recordings were more popular during the 1800s than disc records, some of the latter were being sold, mostly by Berliner Gramophone. A version sung by A.C. Weaver was recorded in September 1894 and released with catalog number 175. |
1813_15 | The popularity of "My Old Kentucky Home" as recording material continued into the 20th century, despite the fact that the song was then more than fifty years old. In the first two decades of the century, newly established Victor Records released thirteen versions of the song (plus five more recordings that included it as part of a medley). During that same period, Columbia Records issued a similar number, including one by Margaret Wilson (daughter of U.S. president Woodrow Wilson). One of the major vocal groups of the day, the Peerless Quartet, recorded it twice, as did internationally known operatic soprano Alma Gluck. It was also recorded by various marching and concert bands, including three recordings by one of the most well-known, Sousa's Band, as well as three by the house concert band at Edison Records. |
1813_16 | Although the frequency of its recording dropped off as the century progressed, "My Old Kentucky Home" continued to be used as material by some of the major popular singers of the day. Versions were recorded by Kate Smith, Bing Crosby, and Al Jolson. A version by operatic contralto Marian Anderson was released in Japan and Paul Robeson recorded his version for an English company while living in London in the late 1920s. The song continued to find expression in non-traditional forms, including a New Orleans jazz version by Louis Armstrong and a swing version by Gene Krupa. For a listing of some other recorded versions of the song, see External links. |
1813_17 | In 2001, the National Endowment for the Arts and the Recording Industry Association of America promoted a list of the 365 "Songs of the Century" that best displayed "historical significance of not only the song but also of the record and artist". "My Old Kentucky Home" appeared on that list (the only song written by Foster to do so), represented by the 1908 recording of operatic soprano Geraldine Farrar (Victor Records 88238). |
1813_18 | Adaptations |
1813_19 | By the time commercial music began to be recorded, the verse melody of "My Old Kentucky Home" had become so widely known that recording artists sometimes quoted it in material that was otherwise unrelated to Foster's song. The 1918 song "Rock-a-Bye Your Baby with a Dixie Melody", recorded and popularized by Al Jolson, quotes the chorus phrase "weep no more my lady", and also makes reference to two other Foster songs. Henry Burr's 1921 recording of "Kentucky Home" quotes the verse melody in an interlude midway through the record. And vaudeville singer Billy Murray's 1923 recording of "Happy and Go-Lucky in My Old Kentucky Home" adds the melody in the record's finale. An earlier recording by Murray, 1915's "We'll Have a Jubilee in My Old Kentucky Home", takes the further step of incorporating a portion of Foster's melody (but not his lyrics) into each chorus. And a few decades earlier than that, a young Charles Ives, while still a student at Yale University in the 1890s, used |
1813_20 | Foster's melody (both the verse and the chorus) as a strain in one of his marches. Ives often quoted from Foster and musicologist Clayton Henderson has detected material from "My Old Kentucky Home" in eight of his works. |
1813_21 | In the mid-1960s, songwriter Randy Newman used the verse of "My Old Kentucky Home" (with modified lyrics) as the chorus to his "Turpentine and Dandelion Wine". Newman recorded this adaptation for his 12 Songs album (1970, Reprise RS 6373) under the title "Old Kentucky Home". However, the adaptation had been recorded earlier at least twice. The first was by the Beau Brummels, who recorded it for their Triangle album (1967, Warner Brothers WS 1692). The second was by the Alan Price Set, who included it as the B-side to their "Love Story" single (1968, Decca F 12808). Since Newman's recording, the adaptation was covered several times more. The only version that charted was by Johnny Cash, who released it as a single from his John R. Cash album (1975, Columbia KC 33370). The single reached No. 42 on Billboard's country-music chart. Note that the various cover versions generally use slightly different titles, some adding "My" to Newman's title, others omitting "Old". Also, some |
1813_22 | use Newman's original title of "Turpentine and Dandelion Wine" as a subtitle. A more complete listing of these cover versions can be found in External links. In 2021, Tyler Childers released the song "Long Violent History" on his album of the same name. The introduction of the song contains the chorus melody of My Old Kentucky Home, and the song's coda contains the coda melody of My Old Kentucky Home. |
1813_23 | Appearance in media
"My Old Kentucky Home" has appeared in many films, live action and animated, and in television episodes, in the 20th and 21st centuries.
The original title for the first draft of Margaret Mitchell's 1936 novel Gone with the Wind was "Tote The Weary Load", a lyric from "My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!" Scarlett O’Hara and Rhett Butler sing the song in Chapter 17, and the lyric "a few more days for to tote the weary load" appears in the text of the novel as Scarlett is returning to Tara. In 1939, "My Old Kentucky Home" was featured in the film version of Gone With The Wind both instrumentally and with lyrics. In the movie, Prissy, played by Butterfly McQueen, sings the line, "a few more days for to tote the weary load".
Fleischer Studios adapted the song in their 1926 cartoon short [[[Bimbo (Fleischer Studios)#History||My Old Kentucky Home]], noteworthy for containing the first ever fully animated dialogue. |
1813_24 | Judy Garland sang "My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!" live on December 14, 1938, on the radio show, America Calling. She later covered it again on The All Time Flop Parade with Bing Crosby and The Andrews Sisters. On April 29, 1953, Garland headlined a Kentucky Derby week appearance in Lexington, Kentucky, named "The Bluegrass Festival" where she sang the song "My Old Kentucky Home", accompanied by a single violin.
In 1940, Bing Crosby sang "My Old Kentucky Home, Good-Night!" via radio broadcast with Leopold Stokowski conducting a symphony for the dedication of the Stephen Foster postage stamp release held in Bardstown, Kentucky, at My Old Kentucky Home.
Bugs Bunny sang the opening bars to this song in the original version of the 1953 Warner Brothers cartoon Southern Fried Rabbit. In the unedited version, Bugs is playing the banjo disguised in blackface to fool Yosemite Sam. Later releases omit this part due to negative racial stereotypes. |
1813_25 | Kate Smith performed the song on March 20, 1969, on The Dean Martin Show with Mickey Rooney and Barbara Eden.
In 2009 the song was covered in Mad Men, Season 3, Episode 3, "My Old Kentucky Home." Roger Sterling (played by John Slattery) performs the song in blackface for a company Kentucky Derby party.
In 2010 the song was covered in The Simpsons, Season 21, Episode 13, "The Color Yellow". Marge and Lisa read from the footnotes of a cookbook written by Mabel Simpson in which she describes the escape of a slave, Virgil, who is assisted by Eliza Simpson. Virgil and Eliza find safe harbor in a circus operated by Krusty the Clown, who hides them from slave patrollers by disguising them as circus acts. Krusty asks what talents Virgil possesses, to which he replies that he has music talent and then performs the song, "My Old Kentucky Home" while playing violin. The song also appears in the episode "Rosebud", where a young George Burns sings the song's first line. |
1813_26 | Johnny Depp, Lyle Lovett, David Amram and Warren Zevon covered the song "My Old Kentucky Home" at the tribute memorial of journalist Hunter Thompson in December 1996. One of Thompson's most notable pieces, "The Kentucky Derby Is Decadent and Depraved", in addition to Thompson being a native of Louisville, Kentucky, inspired the performers to cover the song for his tribute. The performance was recreated 9 years later in 2005 at midnight after Thompson's ashes were blasted from a cannon. |
1813_27 | Don Henley stated in 2015 for the Los Angeles Times that some of the music he wrote for the band, the Eagles was inspired by the music of Stephen Foster, and states that as a child, his grandmother singing song such as My Old Kentucky Home. "“My grandmother lived with us. She sat in a rocking chair every day, singing hymns and Stephen Foster songs: ‘My Old Kentucky Home,’ ‘Way Down Upon the Suwanee River’ and ‘The Old Folks At Home,’ and all those very American things. That’s probably where I got ‘Desperado.’ If you listen to that melody and those chords ... Billy Joel said to me the minute he heard it, ‘That’s Stephen Foster! I said, ‘OK, fine!’"
Lyrics by Stephen C. Foster
The original Stephen Foster lyrics of the song are:
My old Kentucky Home, good-night! |
1813_28 | The sun shines bright in the old Kentucky home,
'Tis summer, the darkies are gay,
The corn top's ripe and the meadow's in the bloom
While the birds make music all the day.
The young folks roll on the little cabin floor,
All merry, all happy and bright:
By'n by Hard Times comes a knocking at the door,
Then my old Kentucky Home, good night.
Chorus:
Weep no more, my lady, oh! weep no more today!
We will sing one song
For the old Kentucky Home,
For the old Kentucky Home, far away.
They hunt no more for the possum and the coon
On the meadow, the hill and the shore,
They sing no more by the glimmer of the moon,
On the bench by the old cabin door.
The day goes by like a shadow o'er the heart,
With sorrow where all was delight:
The time has come when the darkies have to part,
Then my old Kentucky Home, good-night!
Chorus. |
1813_29 | The head must bow and the back will have to bend,
Wherever the darkey may go:
A few more days, and the trouble all will end
In the field where the sugar-canes grow.
A few more days for to tote the weary load,
No matter 'twill never be light,
A few more days till we totter on the road,
Then my old Kentucky Home, good-night!
Chorus.
References
Further reading
External links
Performances
My Old Kentucky Home (instrumental) as played by one of the University of Kentucky Bands
Geraldine Farrar's 1908 recording
Other
List of recordings of "My Old Kentucky Home" at SecondHandSongs.com
List of recordings of Randy Newman's adaptation at SecondHandSongs.com
1853 songs
American songs
Blackface minstrel songs
Music of Kentucky
Songs written by Stephen Foster
Kentucky
Songs about Kentucky
Kentucky Derby |
1814_0 | The Intimidator (or Timmy for short) is an electropneumatic paintball marker that was manufactured by former professional paintball player Bob Long and his company, Bob Long Technologies.
Introduced in 2000, it was, along with the Smart Parts Impulse, one of the first fully electropneumatic markers to be adopted by professional tournament teams on a widespread basis. There are over 28 versions of the Intimidator, spread over six "generations."
Bob Long Technologies was later sold to Eric Crandall in 2017.
Team Dynasty shoots Bob Long now known as Field One. The newest marker out of the factory is the Field One Force which is based on Bob Long’s NG Insight with newly designed parts from Field One.
History
The Intimidator was developed and tested by Bob Long, and manufactured in the United States. The marker was tested using computer controlled shooting machines and ballistic chronographs, invented to test machine guns. |
1814_1 | In 2004, Bob Long introduced the Alias Intimidator. The marker was redesigned from the ground up. Features like the regulator and valve were made smaller to increase flow and lower the pressure of the marker. The LCD was moved from the top of the trigger frame to the grip frame, and the internals were modified so that it cycled faster. As a result of these modifications, the Alias was more compact than the original Intimidator, and about 20% more air efficient. This version of the Intimidator served at the basis for all subsequent markers under the Intimidator name until 2006 when the Generation 4 Intimidators were released. |
1814_2 | At the peak of its popularity in the mid-2000s, the Intimidator saw use in national and international tournament play. Its popularity began to decline however in later years as other poppet valve markers with similar rates of fire (such as the Planet Eclipse Ego) became available. As a comparison a brand new Bob Long Vice Intimidator retails from the company at $749.99 USD whereas the Planet Eclipse Etek3 (aluminum body style) and Planet Eclipse Ego 9 retails at the company's site at $595 and $1,095 USD respectively. Nonetheless, the Intimidator can still be seen in use today at many paintball fields. |
1814_3 | Generation 5 Intimidators were made in two body styles: the Vice marker and the Protege, the former being the more expensive and in some ways more refined high-end version. The Vice came with a Tadao board stock as well as a lever lock feedneck, a pillow bolt and more intricate milling. Generation 5 markers are four-eye capable which is a Bob Long design to incorporate four breakbeam eyes rather than the usual two. This design is intended to improve the reaction time of the board and bolt. Generation 5 markers are also in the category of very light guns weighing in at 1 lb. 13.2oz without a barrel. |
1814_4 | Some aftermarket upgrades designed specifically for the Generation 5 markers are the Yakuza OLED board made by Tadao technologies which offers a screen to change modes instead of using the stock flashing LED and adds numerous new parameters to change, including the ability to set up multiple preset fire modes and adjust rate of fire by intervals of 0.1bps. a low pressure poppet which uses a slightly longer shaft to open the valve for a slightly longer time and more air as it cycles to create a softer shot by reducing recoil, it also reduces recoil to small degree. The aforementioned 4C eye and laser 4C eye systems which uses two additional sensors to calculate the amount of time it takes for a ball to be fully loaded into the breach and tells the board to pre-charge the solenoid. This helps increase rate of fire in semi-auto and allows for more uniform streams of paint. Protege users can buy the same pillow bolt that comes stock in the Vice from Bob Long Direct; it uses a rubber |
1814_5 | insert in the bolt face to put less pressure on the paintball being fired and to prevent paint from breaking inside the barrel. Lurker paintball makes an adjustable ram for the Gen 5 markers to help reduce recoil and lower dwell, thus increasing efficiency. Lurker rams have a cult following within the Intimidator owning and collecting community. |
1814_6 | Generation 6 intimidators are the first non-macro line, stacked tube marker. Named the G6r, the marker was released in 2011. This model was the standard edition. Bob Long Manufactures released a 2012 edition. This edition was upgraded with a cam-drive ASA, a Frenzy OLED board, and new through air passage ways, with a new pricetag of $999.99.
A 2012 special edition Generation 6 Intimidator was also released with multi-colored anodizing and the body surface milled into the shape of flames. This limited release is intended to be a modern incarnation of the ultra rare flame milled Intimidators of generations past, of which only two are known to exist.
Operation
Like other open bolt, poppet-valve-based markers, the Intimidator uses a solenoid to drive a pneumatic ram into a poppet valve, which causes it to open, firing the paintball. On earlier Intimidators, a recognizable external feature was a dual low-pressure chamber.
References
External links
Bob Long Technologies |
1814_7 | Paintball markers |
1815_0 | The fortifications of the town of Rhodes are shaped like a defensive crescent around the medieval town and consist mostly of a modern fortification composed of a huge wall made of an embankment encased in stone, equipped with scarp, bastions, moat, counterscarp and glacis. The portion of fortifications facing the harbour is instead composed of a crenellated wall. On the moles, towers and defensive forts are found.
They were built by the Knights Hospitaller of Saint John by enhancing the existing Byzantine walls starting from 1309, the year in which they took possession of the island after a three-year struggle.
Like most of the defensive walls, they were built with a technique called rubble masonry which allows for a great mass capable of withstanding the gunshots with smooth external stone faces to prevent climbing. |
1815_1 | The defence of different portions of fortifications was assigned to different Langue (tongues) of Knights. The North face was under the rule of the Grand Master, then moving West and South the posts were held by the Langue of France and Alvernia, the Langue of Spain (Spanish and Portuguese), the Langue of Germany (English and German), and the Langue of Italy. Bastions and terrepleins still hold the name of the langue involved (e.g. Bastion of Italy, terreplein of Spain).
History |
1815_2 | Due to its geographical position as a gate to the Aegean Sea, Rhodes has always had a vantage position on the trade routes between the West and the East and has been an important stop thanks to its well protected harbours. During the Hellenistic period in the late 4th century BC, the town of Rhodes was already enclosed in defensive walls which allowed to withstand the siege of Demetrius Poliorketes king of Macedonia, in 305 BC. The famous Colossus of Rhodes was built to thank gods for the victory against Demetrius.
Philo of Byzantium author of the treatise "Paraskeuastica" on defensive works, stayed in Rhodes in the 3rd century BC and expressed his admiration for its walls. The earthquake of 226 BC severely damaged the fortifications, but they were soon rebuilt. The Byzantines built a fortress on the highest part of the town. |
1815_3 | When the Knight Hospitallers conquered the island, the town was still wealthy but in decline. Rhodes underwent an economical growth thanks to the richness that the knights brought in from the Holy Land and to the inheritance of the Templars' assets given to the Hospitallers after the Templar Order was suppressed in 1312 by decree of the king of France Philip IV. The richness of the island attracted the Ottomans from the nearby coast (Turkey is just 18 km away and can be easily seen from Rhodes). The knights started continuous works on the fortifications, both to include the new villages in the South of the historical Byzantine town and to update the fortification to the new military defensive techniques after the artillery started to be used currently as a siege means. |
1815_4 | The Knights of Saint John had had a long experience in building fortresses and fortifications during the almost three centuries of their stay in the Holy Land, nevertheless the reference model for the construction of the fortification were the Theodosian Walls of Constantinople which, during the centuries, had shown a great capacity to withstand sieges.
The expansion of the walls was undertaken by Grand Master Antonio Fluvian de Riviere who allowed the (medieval) town of Rhodes to reach the current area of about 42 hectares (104 acres). The wall curtain was finished between 1457 and 1465. The Byzantine fortifications were demolished leaving just a portion of those of the old fort known at the time of Knights as Collachium ().
In 1440 the Mameluke sultan of Egypt tried without success to conquer the town sieging it for 40 days. |
1815_5 | In 1480 Rhodes was besieged by the troops of Mehmed II but the powerful army of the conqueror of Constantinople manned with 100,000 troops and 170 ships was repelled by the courage of the Knights and the strong fortifications, notwithstanding the outnumbering assailants. In 1481 a destructive earthquake struck the island causing severe damages to the houses and the fortification and about 30,000 casualties. A new Ottoman siege could not be withstood, so the Knights made available their great financial resources and in a very short time the most important palaces of the town and the fortifications were rebuilt. In the following years Grand Masters Pierre d'Aubusson, Emery d'Amboise, Fabrizio del Carretto and Philippe Villiers de l’Isle Adam ordered the fortifications to be rebuilt to withstand the cannons. For the purpose they called to Rhodes the best Italian military architects. Among them Matteo Gioeni, Basilio della Scuola, Gerolamo Bartolucci and Gabriele Tadino da Martinengo. The |
1815_6 | latter two were present in Rhodes during the final siege in 1522. |
1815_7 | The Bastion of Italy (or Post of Italy) in which the Ottomans had opened a breach in 1480 was rebuilt with a powerful chemin de ronde for the reverse fire of cannons on the nearby spans of wall. This bastion was named "Bastion Del Carretto" after the Grand Master. The gate of Saint John was closed and a pentagonal bastion with the same name was built on the western side of the walls to guard Gate d'Amboise. After The Ottoman conquered Rhodes in 1522 they did not demolish the walls but repaired them and kept them under maintenance during the four centuries of their rule. |
1815_8 | The fortifications of Rhodes were frozen at 1522 so that Rhodes is one of the few European walled towns that still shows the transition between the classical medieval fortification and the modern ones. The fortifications that still today make a belt around the medieval town, so that it is a separate neighbour from the new town, were restored during the Italian administration of the island and are, at present (2011), being studied, restored and maintained.
After their expulsion from Rhodes, the Hospitallers moved to the central Mediterranean island of Malta in 1530. They settled in the town of Birgu, and the first fortifications they built within the city were in a similar style to the fortifications of Rhodes. |
1815_9 | The gates of the old town of Rhodes
There are 11 gates to access the old city. Some of them are ancient, some are modern. The ancient gate of Saint George was closed by the Grand Master d'Aubusson after the siege of 1480 and transformed into a bastion. Starting from the Palace of the Grand Master that is from North-West towards the South they are:
Gate d’Amboise
The d’Amboise Gate () is a grand gate just below the Palace of the Grand Master. It has a triple defensive belt with chemins de ronde, two round towers and covered entrance. Remains of the ancient studded wood doors are still visible. The Saint George bastion, pentagonal in shape, covered with its cannons the access through the gate.
Gate of Saint Athanasios |
1815_10 | The Gate of St Athanasios (Πύλη Αγίου Αθανασίου) was built between 1441 and 1442. It is also known to locals as Saint Francis Gate since the church of Saint Francis of Assisi, built by the Italians, is just outside the gate. The round tower of Saint Mary that controlled the entrance to the gate was built in 1441 by the Grand Master Jean de Lastic
According to the Turkish tradition the troops of the conqueror Suleiman the Magnificent entered Rhodes through this gate. The gate was closed by the sultan who wished to avoid that any other conqueror could pass after him. Probably the door was closed by the Hospitallers for security reasons. It was re-opened by the Italians in 1922 during the 400th anniversary of the conquest of Rhodes by the Ottomans.
Gate of Saint John |
1815_11 | The Gate of St John (Πύλη Αγίου Ιωάννου) is commonly known as Koshkinou or Porta Kokkini (Πόρτα Κόκκινη, "red door"). According to the tradition during the siege of 1522 there were so many fallen men in front of this gate that the stones were dyed red. The external fortification the Gate of Saint John was built by the Grand Master d'Aubusson to protect the previous fortifications built by Grand Masters Fluvian, Jacques de Milly and Pedro Raimundo Zacosta.
In 1912 the Italian troops entered the town through this gate. A frame which is currently empty, hosted a commemorative stone. |
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