title: Reincarnation

text: Academic psychiatrist and believer in reincarnation, Ian Stevenson, reported that belief in reincarnation is held (with variations in details) by adherents of almost all major religions except Christianity and Islam. In addition, between 20 and 30 percent of persons in western countries who may be nominal Christians also believe in reincarnation. One 1999 study by Walter and Waterhouse reviewed the previous data on the level of reincarnation belief and performed a set of thirty in-depth interviews in Britain among people who did not belong to a religion advocating reincarnation. The authors reported that surveys have found about one fifth to one quarter of Europeans have some level of belief in reincarnation, with similar results found in the USA. In the interviewed group, the belief in the existence of this phenomenon appeared independent of their age, or the type of religion that these people belonged to, with most being Christians. The beliefs of this group also did not appear to contain any more than usual of "new age" ideas (broadly defined) and the authors interpreted their ideas on reincarnation as "one way of tackling issues of suffering", but noted that this seemed to have little effect on their private lives.


title: Reincarnation

text: Waterhouse also published a detailed discussion of beliefs expressed in the interviews. She noted that although most people "hold their belief in reincarnation quite lightly" and were unclear on the details of their ideas, personal experiences such as past-life memories and near-death experiences had influenced most believers, although only a few had direct experience of these phenomena. Waterhouse analyzed the influences of second-hand accounts of reincarnation, writing that most of the people in the survey had heard other people's accounts of past-lives from regression hypnosis and dreams and found these fascinating, feeling that there "must be something in it" if other people were having such experiences.


title: Reincarnation

text: Other influential contemporary figures that have written on reincarnation include Alice Ann Bailey, one of the first writers to use the terms New Age and age of Aquarius, Torkom Saraydarian, an Armenian-American musician and religious author, Dolores Cannon, Atul Gawande, Michael Newton, Bruce Greyson, Raymond Moody and Unity Church founder Charles Fillmore. Neale Donald Walsch, an American author of the series "Conversations with God" claims that he has reincarnated more than 600 times. The Indian spiritual teacher Meher Baba who had significant following in the West taught that reincarnation followed from human desire and ceased once a person was freed from desire.


title: Reincarnation

text: According to various Buddhist scriptures, Gautama Buddha believed in the existence of an afterlife in another world and in reincarnation,


title: Reincarnation

text: The Buddha also asserted that karma influences rebirth, and that the cycles of repeated births and deaths are endless. Before the birth of Buddha, ancient Indian scholars had developed competing theories of afterlife, including the materialistic school such as Charvaka, which posited that death is the end, there is no afterlife, no soul, no rebirth, no karma, and they described death to be a state where a living being is completely annihilated, dissolved. Buddha rejected this theory, adopted the alternate existing theories on rebirth, criticizing the materialistic schools that denied rebirth and karma, states Damien Keown. Such beliefs are inappropriate and dangerous, stated Buddha, because such annihilationism views encourage moral irresponsibility and material hedonism; he tied moral responsibility to rebirth.


title: Reincarnation

text: The Buddha introduced the concept that there is no permanent self (soul), and this central concept in Buddhism is called "anattā". Major contemporary Buddhist traditions such as Theravada, Mahayana and Vajrayana traditions accept the teachings of Buddha. These teachings assert there is rebirth, there is no permanent self and no irreducible "ātman" (soul) moving from life to another and tying these lives together, there is impermanence, that all compounded things such as living beings are aggregates dissolve at death, but every being reincarnates. The rebirth cycles continue endlessly, states Buddhism, and it is a source of "duhkha" (suffering, pain), but this reincarnation and "duhkha" cycle can be stopped through nirvana. The "anattā" doctrine of Buddhism is a contrast to Hinduism, the latter asserting that "soul exists, it is involved in rebirth, and it is through this soul that everything is connected."


title: Reincarnation

text: Different traditions within Buddhism have offered different theories on what reincarnates and how reincarnation happens. One theory suggests that it occurs through consciousness (Sanskrit: "vijñāna"; Pali: "samvattanika-viññana") or stream of consciousness (Sanskrit: "citta-santāna", "vijñāna-srotām, or vijñāna-santāna"; Pali: "viññana-sotam") upon death, which reincarnates into a new aggregation. This process, states this theory, is similar to the flame of a dying candle lighting up another. The consciousness in the newly born being is neither identical to nor entirely different from that in the deceased but the two form a causal continuum or stream in this Buddhist theory. Transmigration is influenced by a being's past "karma" (Pali: "kamma"). The root cause of rebirth, states Buddhism, is the abiding of consciousness in ignorance (Sanskrit: "avidya"; Pali: "avijja") about the nature of reality, and when this ignorance is uprooted, rebirth ceases.


title: Reincarnation

text: Buddhist traditions also vary in their mechanistic details on rebirth. Most Theravada Buddhists assert that rebirth is immediate while the Tibetan and most Chinese and Japanese schools hold to the notion of a "bardo" (intermediate state) that can last up to 49 days. The "bardo" rebirth concept of Tibetan Buddhism, originally developed in India but spread to Tibet and other Buddhist countries, and involves 42 peaceful deities, and 58 wrathful deities. These ideas led to maps on karma and what form of rebirth one takes after death, discussed in texts such as "The Tibetan Book of the Dead". The major Buddhist traditions accept that the reincarnation of a being depends on the past karma and merit (demerit) accumulated, and that there are six realms of existence in which the rebirth may occur after each death.


title: Reincarnation

text: Within Japanese Zen, reincarnation is accepted by some, but rejected by others. A distinction can be drawn between 'folk Zen', as in the Zen practiced by devotional lay people, and 'philosophical Zen'. Folk Zen generally accepts the various supernatural elements of Buddhism such as rebirth. Philosophical Zen, however, places more emphasis on the present moment.


title: Reincarnation

text: Some schools conclude that karma continues to exist and adhere to the person until it works out its consequences. For the Sautrantika school, each act "perfumes" the individual or "plants a seed" that later germinates. Tibetan Buddhism stresses the state of mind at the time of death. To die with a peaceful mind will stimulate a virtuous seed and a fortunate rebirth; a disturbed mind will stimulate a non-virtuous seed and an unfortunate rebirth.


title: Reincarnation

text: In the major Christian denominations, the concept of reincarnation is not present and it is nowhere explicitly referred to in the Bible. However, the impossibility of a second earthly death is stated by , where it affirms that the messiah, Jesus of Nazareth, died once forever for the sins of all the human kind. mentions that king Herod Antipas took Jesus to be a risen John the Baptist, when introducing the story of John's execution at Herod's orders.


title: Reincarnation

text: In a survey by the Pew Forum in 2009, 22% of American Christians expressed a belief in reincarnation, and in a 1981 survey 31% of regular churchgoing European Catholics expressed a belief in reincarnation.


title: Reincarnation

text: Some Christian theologians interpret certain Biblical passages as referring to reincarnation. These passages include the questioning of Jesus as to whether he is Elijah, John the Baptist, Jeremiah, or another prophet (Matthew 16:13–15 and John 1:21–22) and, less clearly (while Elijah was said not to have died, but to have been taken up to heaven), John the Baptist being asked if he is not Elijah (John 1:25). Geddes MacGregor, an Episcopalian priest and professor of philosophy, has made a case for the compatibility of Christian doctrine and reincarnation.


title: Reincarnation

text: There is evidence that Origen, a Church father in early Christian times, taught reincarnation in his lifetime but that when his works were translated into Latin these references were concealed. One of the epistles written by St. Jerome, "To Avitus" (Letter 124; Ad Avitum. Epistula CXXIV), which asserts that Origen's "On the First Principles" (Latin: "De Principiis"; Greek: Περὶ Ἀρχῶν) was mistranscribed:


title: Reincarnation

text: Under the impression that Origen was a heretic like Arius, St. Jerome criticizes ideas described in "On the First Principles". Further in "To Avitus" (Letter 124), St. Jerome writes about "convincing proof" that Origen teaches reincarnation in the original version of the book:


title: Reincarnation

text: The original text of "On First Principles" has almost completely disappeared. It remains extant as "De Principiis" in fragments faithfully translated into Latin by St. Jerome and in "the not very reliable Latin translation of Rufinus."


title: Reincarnation

text: Reincarnation is a paramount tenet in the Druze faith. There is an eternal duality of the body and the soul and it is impossible for the soul to exist without the body. Therefore, reincarnations occur instantly at one's death. While in the Hindu and Buddhist belief system a soul can be transmitted to any living creature, in the Druze belief system this is not possible and a human soul will only transfer to a human body. Furthermore, souls cannot be divided into different or separate parts and the number of souls existing is finite.


title: Reincarnation

text: Few Druzes are able to recall their past but, if they are able to they are called a "Nateq". Typically souls who have died violent deaths in their previous incarnation will be able to recall memories. Since death is seen as a quick transient state, mourning is discouraged. Unlike other Abrahamic faiths, heaven and hell are spiritual. Heaven is the ultimate happiness received when soul escapes the cycle of rebirths and reunites with the Creator, while hell is conceptualized as the bitterness of being unable to reunite with the Creator and escape from the cycle of rebirth.


title: Reincarnation

text: The body dies, assert the Hindu traditions, but not the soul, which they assume to be the eternal reality, indestructible and bliss. Everything and all existence is believed to be connected and cyclical in many Hinduism-sects, all living beings composed of two things, the soul and the body or matter. Ātman does not change and cannot change by its innate nature in the Hindu belief. Current Karma impacts the future circumstances in this life, as well as the future forms and realms of lives. Good intent and actions lead to good future, bad intent and actions lead to bad future, impacting how one reincarnates, in the Hindu view of existence.


title: Reincarnation

text: There is no permanent heaven or hell in most Hinduism-sects. In the afterlife, based on one's karma, the soul is reborn as another being in heaven, hell, or a living being on earth (human, animal). Gods, too, die once their past karmic merit runs out, as do those in hell, and they return getting another chance on earth. This reincarnation continues, endlessly in cycles, until one embarks on a spiritual pursuit, realizes self-knowledge, and thereby gains "mokṣa", the final release out of the reincarnation cycles. This release is believed to be a state of utter bliss, which Hindu traditions believe is either related or identical to Brahman, the unchanging reality that existed before the creation of universe, continues to exist, and shall exist after the universe ends.


title: Reincarnation

text: The Upanishads, part of the scriptures of the Hindu traditions, primarily focus on the liberation from reincarnation. The Bhagavad Gita discusses various paths to liberation. The Upanishads, states Harold Coward, offer a "very optimistic view regarding the perfectibility of human nature," and the goal of human effort in these texts is a continuous journey to self-perfection and self-knowledge so as to end "Saṃsāra"—the endless cycle of rebirth and redeath. The aim of spiritual quest in the Upanishadic traditions is find the true self within and to know one's soul, a state that they assert leads to blissful state of freedom, moksha.


title: Reincarnation

text: There are internal differences within Hindu traditions on reincarnation and the state of moksha. For example, the dualistic devotional traditions such as Madhvacharya's Dvaita Vedanta tradition of Hinduism champion a theistic premise, assert that human soul and Brahman are different, loving devotion to Brahman (god Vishnu in Madhvacharya's theology) is the means to release from Samsara, it is the grace of God which leads to moksha, and spiritual liberation is achievable only in after-life ("videhamukti"). The non-dualistic traditions such as Adi Shankara's Advaita Vedanta tradition of Hinduism champion a monistic premise, asserting that the individual human soul and Brahman are identical, only ignorance, impulsiveness and inertia leads to suffering through Saṃsāra, in reality there are no dualities, meditation and self-knowledge is the path to liberation, the realization that one's soul is identical to Brahman is moksha, and spiritual liberation is achievable in this life ("jivanmukti").


title: Reincarnation

text: Most Islamic schools of thought reject any idea of reincarnation of living beings. It teaches a linear concept of life, wherein a human being has only one life and upon death he or she is judged by God, then rewarded in heaven or punished in hell. Islam teaches final resurrection and Judgement Day, but there is no prospect for the reincarnation of a human being into a different body or being. During the early history of Islam, some of the Caliphs persecuted all reincarnation-believing people, such as Manichaeism, to the point of extinction in Mesopotamia and Persia (modern day Iraq and Iran). However, some Muslim minority sects such as those found among Sufis, and some Muslims in South Asia and Indonesia have retained their pre-Islamic Hindu and Buddhist beliefs in reincarnation. For instance, historically, South Asian Isma'ilis performed chantas yearly, one of which is for seeking forgiveness of sins committed in past lives. However Inayat Khan has criticized the idea as unhelpful to the spiritual seeker.


title: Reincarnation

text: From the teachings of Modern Sufi "Sheikh" M.R. Bawa Muhaiyadeen (Guru Bawa); a person's state continuously changes during his one lifetime (angry/violent at once and being gentle/nice in another). So when a person's state changes, his previous state dies. Even though it dies, the earlier state (of anger) will be reborn in another minute. According to Guru Bawa; the changing of a person's state is described as “rebirth” or reincarnation, this should not be confused with the physical death & rebirth. Although some scholars wrongly misquote that Guru Bawa accepts the common belief of reincarnation. For Guru Bawa, the reincarnation is spiritual, perhaps in kind, and with each rebirth a stage of consciousness is removed. The first birth consist of six consciousness and with each rebirth, a stage is removed until one is born with single stage of consciousness, such as a tree, shrub or a flower if he at least hold good principals in last stage of consciousness. If not, he will be born as a worm or something similar.


title: Reincarnation

text: The idea of reincarnation is accepted by a few non-Sunni Muslim sects, particularly of the Ghulat. Alawites hold that they were originally stars or divine lights that were cast out of heaven through disobedience and must undergo repeated reincarnation (or metempsychosis) before returning to heaven. They can be reincarnated as Christians or others through sin and as animals if they become infidels.


title: Reincarnation

text: In Jainism, the reincarnation doctrine, along with its theories of "Saṃsāra" and Karma, are central to its theological foundations, as evidenced by the extensive literature on it in the major sects of Jainism, and their pioneering ideas on these topics from the earliest times of the Jaina tradition. Reincarnation in contemporary Jainism traditions is the belief that the worldly life is characterized by continuous rebirths and suffering in various realms of existence.


title: Reincarnation

text: Karma forms a central and fundamental part of Jain faith, being intricately connected to other of its philosophical concepts like transmigration, reincarnation, liberation, non-violence ("ahiṃsā") and non-attachment, among others. Actions are seen to have consequences: some immediate, some delayed, even into future incarnations. So the doctrine of karma is not considered simply in relation to one life-time, but also in relation to both future incarnations and past lives. "Uttarādhyayana Sūtra" 3.3–4 states: "The "jīva" or the soul is sometimes born in the world of gods, sometimes in hell. Sometimes it acquires the body of a demon; all this happens on account of its karma. This "jīva" sometimes takes birth as a worm, as an insect or as an ant." The text further states (32.7): "Karma is the root of birth and death. The souls bound by karma go round and round in the cycle of existence."


title: Reincarnation

text: Actions and emotions in the current lifetime affect future incarnations depending on the nature of the particular karma. For example, a good and virtuous life indicates a latent desire to experience good and virtuous themes of life. Therefore, such a person attracts karma that ensures that their future births will allow them to experience and manifest their virtues and good feelings unhindered. In this case, they may take birth in heaven or in a prosperous and virtuous human family. On the other hand, a person who has indulged in immoral deeds, or with a cruel disposition, indicates a latent desire to experience cruel themes of life. As a natural consequence, they will attract karma which will ensure that they are reincarnated in hell, or in lower life forms, to enable their soul to experience the cruel themes of life.


title: Reincarnation

text: There is no retribution, judgment or reward involved but a natural consequences of the choices in life made either knowingly or unknowingly. Hence, whatever suffering or pleasure that a soul may be experiencing in its present life is on account of choices that it has made in the past. As a result of this doctrine, Jainism attributes supreme importance to pure thinking and moral behavior.


title: Reincarnation

text: The Jain texts postulate four "gatis", that is states-of-existence or birth-categories, within which the soul transmigrates. The four "gatis" are: "deva" (demigods), "manuṣya" (humans), "nāraki" (hell beings), and "tiryañca" (animals, plants, and microorganisms). The four "gatis" have four corresponding realms or habitation levels in the vertically tiered Jain universe: "deva" occupy the higher levels where the heavens are situated; "manuṣya" and "tiryañca" occupy the middle levels; and "nāraki" occupy the lower levels where seven hells are situated.


title: Reincarnation

text: Single-sensed souls, however, called "nigoda", and element-bodied souls pervade all tiers of this universe. "Nigodas" are souls at the bottom end of the existential hierarchy. They are so tiny and undifferentiated, that they lack even individual bodies, living in colonies. According to Jain texts, this infinity of "nigodas" can also be found in plant tissues, root vegetables and animal bodies. Depending on its karma, a soul transmigrates and reincarnates within the scope of this cosmology of destinies. The four main destinies are further divided into sub-categories and still smaller sub-sub-categories. In all, Jain texts speak of a cycle of 8.4 million birth destinies in which souls find themselves again and again as they cycle within "samsara".


title: Reincarnation

text: In Jainism, God has no role to play in an individual's destiny; one's personal destiny is not seen as a consequence of any system of reward or punishment, but rather as a result of its own personal karma. A text from a volume of the ancient Jain canon, "Bhagvati sūtra" 8.9.9, links specific states of existence to specific karmas. Violent deeds, killing of creatures having five sense organs, eating fish, and so on, lead to rebirth in hell. Deception, fraud and falsehood lead to rebirth in the animal and vegetable world. Kindness, compassion and humble character result in human birth; while austerities and the making and keeping of vows lead to rebirth in heaven.


title: Reincarnation

text: Each soul is thus responsible for its own predicament, as well as its own salvation. Accumulated karma represent a sum total of all unfulfilled desires, attachments and aspirations of a soul. It enables the soul to experience the various themes of the lives that it desires to experience. Hence a soul may transmigrate from one life form to another for countless of years, taking with it the karma that it has earned, until it finds conditions that bring about the required fruits. In certain philosophies, heavens and hells are often viewed as places for eternal salvation or eternal damnation for good and bad deeds. But according to Jainism, such places, including the earth are simply the places which allow the soul to experience its unfulfilled karma.


title: Reincarnation

text: Jewish mystical texts (the Kabbalah), from their classic Medieval canon onward, teach a belief in "Gilgul Neshamot" (Hebrew for metempsychosis; literally 'soul cycle'; plural "gilgulim"). The Zohar and the Sefer HaBahir specifically discuss reincarnation. It is a common belief in contemporary Hasidic Judaism, which regards the Kabbalah as sacred and authoritative, though understood in light of a more innate psychological mysticism. Kabbalah also teaches that "The soul of Moses is reincarnated in every generation." Other, Non-Hasidic, Orthodox Jewish groups while not placing a heavy emphasis on reincarnation, do acknowledge it as a valid teaching. Its popularization entered modern secular Yiddish literature and folk motif.


title: Reincarnation

text: The 16th century mystical renaissance in communal Safed replaced scholastic Rationalism as mainstream traditional Jewish theology, both in scholarly circles and in the popular imagination. References to "gilgul" in former Kabbalah became systematized as part of the metaphysical purpose of creation. Isaac Luria (the Ari) brought the issue to the centre of his new mystical articulation, for the first time, and advocated identification of the reincarnations of historic Jewish figures that were compiled by Haim Vital in his Shaar HaGilgulim. "Gilgul" is contrasted with the other processes in Kabbalah of Ibbur ('pregnancy'), the attachment of a second soul to an individual for (or by) good means, and Dybuk ('possession'), the attachment of a spirit, demon, etc. to an individual for (or by) "bad" means.


title: Reincarnation

text: In Lurianic Kabbalah, reincarnation is not retributive or fatalistic, but an expression of Divine compassion, the microcosm of the doctrine of cosmic rectification of creation. "Gilgul" is a heavenly agreement with the individual soul, conditional upon circumstances. Luria's radical system focused on rectification of the Divine soul, played out through Creation. The true essence of anything is the divine spark within that gives it existence. Even a stone or leaf possesses such a soul that "came into this world to receive a rectification." A human soul may occasionally be exiled into lower inanimate, vegetative or animal creations. The most basic component of the soul, the nefesh, must leave at the cessation of blood production. There are four other soul components and different nations of the world possess different forms of souls with different purposes. Each Jewish soul is reincarnated in order to fulfill each of the 613 Mosaic commandments that elevate a particular spark of holiness associated with each commandment. Once all the Sparks are redeemed to their spiritual source, the Messianic Era begins. Non-Jewish observance of the 7 Laws of Noah assists the Jewish people, though Biblical adversaries of Israel reincarnate to oppose.


title: Reincarnation

text: Among the many rabbis who accepted reincarnation are Nahmanides (the Ramban) and Rabbenu Bahya ben Asher, Levi ibn Habib (the Ralbah), Shelomoh Alkabez, Moses Cordovero, Moses Chaim Luzzatto; early Hasidic masters such as the Baal Shem Tov, Schneur Zalman of Liadi and Nachman of Breslov, as well as virtually all later Hasidic masters; contemporary Hasidic teachers such as DovBer Pinson, Moshe Weinberger and Joel Landau; and key Mitnagdic leaders, such as the Vilna Gaon and Chaim Volozhin and their school, as well as Rabbi Shalom Sharabi (known at the RaShaSH), the Ben Ish Chai of Baghdad, and the Baba Sali. Rabbis who have rejected the idea include Saadia Gaon, David Kimhi, Hasdai Crescas, Joseph Albo, Abraham ibn Daud, Leon de Modena, Solomon ben Aderet, Maimonides and Asher ben Jehiel. Among the Geonim, Hai Gaon argued in favour of "gilgulim".


title: Reincarnation

text: Reincarnation is an intrinsic part of some northern Native American and Inuit traditions. In the now heavily Christian Polar North (now mainly parts of Greenland and Nunavut), the concept of reincarnation is enshrined in the Inuit language.


title: Reincarnation

text: The following is a story of human-to-human reincarnation as told by Thunder Cloud, a Winnebago (Ho-Chunk tribe) shaman referred to as T. C. in the narrative. Here T. C. talks about his two previous lives and how he died and came back again to this his third lifetime. He describes his time between lives, when he was “blessed” by Earth Maker and all the abiding spirits and given special powers, including the ability to heal the sick.


title: Reincarnation

text: Founded in the 15th century, Sikhism's founder Guru Nanak had a choice between the cyclical reincarnation concept of ancient Indian religions and the linear concept of Islam, he chose the cyclical concept of time. Sikhism teaches reincarnation theory similar to those in Hinduism, but with some differences from its traditional doctrines. Sikh rebirth theories about the nature of existence are similar to ideas that developed during the devotional Bhakti movement particularly within some Vaishnava traditions, which define liberation as a state of union with God attained through the grace of God.


title: Reincarnation

text: The doctrines of Sikhism teach that the soul exists, and is passed from one body to another in endless cycles of Saṃsāra, until liberation from the death and rebirth cycle. Each birth begins with karma ("karam"), and these actions leave a karmic signature ("karni") on one's soul which influences future rebirths, but it is God whose grace that liberates from the death and rebirth cycle. The way out of the reincarnation cycle, asserts Sikhism, is to live an ethical life, devote oneself to God and constantly remember God's name. The precepts of Sikhism encourage the bhakti of One Lord for "mukti" (liberation from the death and rebirth cycle).


title: Reincarnation

text: Spiritism, a Christian philosophy codified in the 19th century by the French educator Allan Kardec, teaches reincarnation or rebirth into human life after death. According to this doctrine, free will and cause and effect are the corollaries of reincarnation, and reincarnation provides a mechanism for a person's spiritual evolution in successive lives.


title: Reincarnation

text: The Theosophical Society draws much of its inspiration from India. In the Theosophical world-view reincarnation is the vast rhythmic process by which the soul, the part of a person which belongs to the formless non-material and timeless worlds, unfolds its spiritual powers in the world and comes to know itself. It descends from sublime, free, spiritual realms and gathers experience through its effort to express itself in the world. Afterwards there is a withdrawal from the physical plane to successively higher levels of reality, in death, a purification and assimilation of the past life. Having cast off all instruments of personal experience it stands again in its spiritual and formless nature, ready to begin its next rhythmic manifestation, every lifetime bringing it closer to complete self-knowledge and self-expression. However it may attract old mental, emotional, and energetic "karma" patterns to form the new personality.


title: Reincarnation

text: Anthroposophy describes reincarnation from the point of view of Western philosophy and culture. The ego is believed to transmute transient soul experiences into universals that form the basis for an individuality that can endure after death. These universals include ideas, which are intersubjective and thus transcend the purely personal (spiritual consciousness), intentionally formed human character (spiritual life), and becoming a fully conscious human being (spiritual humanity). Rudolf Steiner described both the general principles he believed to be operative in reincarnation, such as that one's will activity in one life forms the basis for the thinking of the next, and a number of successive lives of various individualities.


title: Reincarnation

text: Inspired by Helena Blavatsky's major works, including "Isis Unveiled" and "The Secret Doctrine", astrologers in the early twentieth-century integrated the concepts of karma and reincarnation into the practice of Western astrology. Notable astrologers who advanced this development included Alan Leo, Charles E. O. Carter, Marc Edmund Jones, and Dane Rudhyar. A new synthesis of East and West resulted as Hindu and Buddhist concepts of reincarnation were fused with Western astrology's deep roots in Hermeticism and Neoplatonism. In the case of Rudhyar, this synthesis was enhanced with the addition of Jungian depth psychology. This dynamic integration of astrology, reincarnation and depth psychology has continued into the modern era with the work of astrologers Steven Forrest and Jeffrey Wolf Green. Their respective schools of Evolutionary Astrology are based on "an acceptance of the fact that human beings incarnate in a succession of lifetimes."


title: Reincarnation

text: Past reincarnation, usually termed past lives, is a key part of the principles and practices of the Church of Scientology. Scientologists believe that the human individual is actually a "thetan", an immortal spiritual entity, that has fallen into a degraded state as a result of past-life experiences. Scientology auditing is intended to free the person of these past-life traumas and recover past-life memory, leading to a higher state of spiritual awareness.


title: Reincarnation

text: This idea is echoed in their highest fraternal religious order, Sea Org, whose motto is ""Revenimus"" ('We Come Back'), and whose members sign a "billion-year contract" as a sign of commitment to that ideal. L. Ron Hubbard, the founder of Scientology, does not use the word "reincarnation" to describe its beliefs, noting that: "The common definition of reincarnation has been altered from its original meaning. The word has come to mean 'to be born again in different life forms' whereas its actual definition is 'to be born again into the flesh of another body.' Scientology ascribes to this latter, original definition of reincarnation."


title: Reincarnation

text: The first writings in Scientology regarding past lives date from around 1951 and slightly earlier. In 1960, Hubbard published a book on past lives entitled "Have You Lived Before This Life". In 1968 he wrote "Mission into Time", a report on a five-week sailing expedition to Sardinia, Sicily and Carthage to see if specific evidence could be found to substantiate L. Ron Hubbard's recall of incidents in his own past, centuries ago.


title: Reincarnation

text: Wicca is a neo-pagan religion focused on nature, guided by the philosophy of Wiccan Rede that advocates the tenets "Harm None, Do As Ye Will". Wiccans believe in a form of karmic return where one's deeds are returned, either in the current life or in another life, threefold or multiple times in order to teach one lessons (the Threefold Law). Reincarnation is therefore an accepted part of the Wiccan faith. Wiccans also believe that death and afterlife are important experiences for the soul to transform and prepare for future lifetimes.


title: Reincarnation

text: While there has been no scientific confirmation of the physical reality of reincarnation, where the subject has been discussed, there are questions of whether and how such beliefs may be justified within the discourse of science and religion. Some champions of academic parapsychology have argued that they have scientific evidence even while their detractors have accused them of practicing a form of pseudoscience. Skeptic Carl Sagan asked the Dalai Lama what he would do if a fundamental tenet of his religion (reincarnation) were definitively disproved by science. The Dalai Lama answered, "If science can disprove reincarnation, Tibetan Buddhism would abandon reincarnation…but it's going to be mighty hard to disprove reincarnation." Sagan considered claims of memories of past lives to be worthy of research, although he considered reincarnation to be an unlikely explanation for these.


title: Reincarnation

text: Over a period of 40 years, psychiatrist Ian Stevenson, from the University of Virginia, recorded case studies of young children who claimed to remember past lives. He published twelve books, including "Twenty Cases Suggestive of Reincarnation", Reincarnation and Biology: A Contribution to the Etiology of Birthmarks and Birth Defects (a two-part monograph), "European Cases of the Reincarnation Type," and "Where Reincarnation and Biology Intersect". In his cases he reported the child's statements and testimony from family members and others, often along with what he considered to be correlates to a deceased person who in some ways seemed to match the child's memory. Stevenson also investigated cases where he thought that birthmarks and birth defects seemed to match wounds and scars on the deceased. Sometimes included in his documentation were medical records like autopsy photographs. As any claim of past life memory is subject to charges of false memories and the ease with which such claims can be hoaxed, Stevenson expected the controversy and skepticism of his beliefs that followed. He said that he looked for disconfirming evidence and alternative explanations for reports, but, as the "Washington Post" reported, he typically concluded that no normal explanation sufficed.


title: Reincarnation

text: Other academic researchers who have undertaken similar pursuits include Jim B. Tucker, Antonia Mills, Satwant Pasricha, Godwin Samararatne, and Erlendur Haraldsson, but Stevenson's publications remain the most well known. Stevenson's work in this regard was impressive enough to Carl Sagan that he referred to what were apparently Stevenson's investigations in his book "The Demon-Haunted World" as an example of carefully collected empirical data, and though he rejected reincarnation as a parsimonious explanation for the stories, he wrote that the phenomenon of alleged past-life memories should be further researched. Sam Harris cited Stevenson's works in his book "The End of Faith" as part of a body of data that seems to attest to the reality of psychic phenomena, but that only relies on subjective personal experience.


title: Reincarnation

text: Stevenson's claims have been subject to criticism and debunking, for example by the philospher Paul Edwards, who contended that Ian Stevenson's accounts of reincarnation were purely anecdotal and cherry-picked. Edwards attributed the stories to selective thinking, suggestion, and false memories that result from the family's or researcher's belief systems and thus did not rise to the standard of fairly sampled empirical evidence. The philosopher Keith Augustine wrote in critique that the fact that "the vast majority of Stevenson's cases come from countries where a religious belief in reincarnation is strong, and rarely elsewhere, seems to indicate that cultural conditioning (rather than reincarnation) generates claims of spontaneous past-life memories." Further, Ian Wilson pointed out that a large number of Stevenson's cases consisted of poor children remembering wealthy lives or belonging to a higher caste. In these societies, claims of reincarnation have been used as schemes to obtain money from the richer families of alleged former incarnations. Robert Baker asserted that all the past-life experiences investigated by Stevenson and other parapsychologists are understandable in terms of known psychological factors including a mixture of cryptomnesia and confabulation. Edwards also objected that reincarnation invokes assumptions that are inconsistent with modern science. As the vast majority of people do not remember previous lives and there is no empirically documented mechanism known that allows personality to survive death and travel to another body, positing the existence of reincarnation is subject to the principle that "extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence". Researchers such as Stevenson acknowledged these limitations.


title: Reincarnation

text: Stevenson also claimed there were a handful of cases that suggested evidence of xenoglossy, including two where a subject under hypnosis allegedly conversed with people speaking the foreign language, instead of merely being able to recite foreign words. Sarah Thomason, a linguist (and skeptical researcher) at the University of Michigan, reanalyzed these cases, concluding that "the linguistic evidence is too weak to provide support for the claims of xenoglossy."


title: Reincarnation

text: Some believers in reincarnation (Stevenson famously not among them) give much importance to supposed past-life memories retrieved under hypnosis during past life regressions. Popularized by psychiatrist Brian Weiss who claims he has regressed more than 4,000 patients since 1980, the technique is often identified as a kind of pseudoscientific practice. Such supposed memories have been documented to contain historical inaccuracies originating from modern popular culture, common beliefs about history, or books that discuss historical events. Experiments with subjects undergoing past life regression indicate that a belief in reincarnation and suggestions by the hypnotist are the two most important factors regarding the contents of memories reported. The use of hypnosis and suggestive questions can tend to leave the subject particularly likely to hold distorted or false memories. Rather than recall of a previous existence, the source of the memories is more likely cryptomnesia and confabulations that combine experiences, knowledge, imagination and suggestion or guidance from the hypnotist. Once created, those memories are indistinguishable from memories based on events that occurred during the subject's life.


title: Reincarnation

text: Past-life regression has been critiqued for being unethical on the grounds that it lacks any evidence to support its claims and that it increases one's susceptibility to false memories. Luis Cordón states that this can be problematic as it creates delusions under the guise of therapy. The memories are experienced as being as vivid as those based on events experienced in one's life and impossible to differentiate from true memories of actual events, and accordingly any damage can be difficult to undo.


title: Reincarnation

text: APA accredited organizations have challenged the use of past-life regressions as a therapeutic method, calling it unethical. Additionally, the hypnotic methodology that underpins past-life regression has been criticized as placing the participant in a vulnerable position, susceptible to implantation of false memories. Because the implantation of false memories may be harmful, Gabriel Andrade argues that past-life regression violates the principle of "first, do no harm" (non-maleficence), part of the Hippocratic Oath.


title: The Wonder Years

text: The Wonder Years is an American coming-of-age comedy/drama television series created by Neal Marlens and Carol Black. It ran on ABC from January 31, 1988, until May 12, 1993. The series premiered immediately after ABC's coverage of Super Bowl XXII. The series stars Fred Savage as Kevin Arnold, a teenager growing up in a suburban middle class family in the late 1960s and early 1970s. It co-stars Dan Lauria as his father Jack, Alley Mills as his mother Norma, Jason Hervey as his brother Wayne, Olivia d'Abo as his sister Karen, Josh Saviano as his best friend Paul Pfeiffer, and Danica McKellar as his girlfriend Winnie Cooper, with narration by Daniel Stern as an adult version of Kevin.


title: The Wonder Years

text: The show earned a spot in the Nielsen Top 30 during its first four seasons. "TV Guide" named it one of the 20 best shows of the 1980s. After six episodes, "The Wonder Years" won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Comedy Series in 1988. In addition, at age 13, Fred Savage became the youngest actor ever nominated as Outstanding Lead Actor for a Comedy Series. The show was also awarded a Peabody Award in 1989 for "pushing the boundaries of the sitcom format and using new modes of storytelling". In total, the series won 22 awards and was nominated for 54 more. In 1997, "My Father's Office" was ranked number 29 on "TV Guide"s 100 Greatest Episodes of All Time, and in the 2009 revised list, the pilot episode was ranked number 43. In 2016, "Rolling Stone" ranked "The Wonder Years" number 63 on its list of 100 Greatest TV Shows of All Time. In 2017, James Charisma of "Paste" ranked the show's opening sequence number 14 on a list of the 75 Best TV Title Sequences of All Time. As of recent years, many critics and fans consider "The Wonder Years" to be a classic with tremendous impact on the industry over the years, inspiring many other shows and how they are structured.


title: The Wonder Years

text: The series depicts the social and family life of a boy in a stereotypical American suburban middle-class family from 1968 to 1973, covering the ages of 12 through 17. Where the Arnold family lives is never specified other than being a suburb, but some episodes have license plates showing California and New York. Each year in the series takes place exactly 20 years before airing (1988 to 1993).


title: The Wonder Years

text: The show's plot centers on Kevin Arnold, son of Jack and Norma Arnold. Kevin's father holds a management job at NORCOM, a defense contractor, while his mother is a housewife. Kevin also has an older brother, Wayne, and an older sister, Karen. Two of Kevin's friends and neighbors are prominently featured throughout the series: his best friend, Paul Pfeiffer, and his crush-turned-girlfriend Gwendolyn "Winnie" Cooper. Storylines are told through Kevin's reflections as an adult in his mid-30s, voiced by Daniel Stern.


title: The Wonder Years

text: In the pilot episode, Winnie's older brother Brian, whom Kevin admires, is killed in action in Vietnam in 1968. Kevin meets Winnie in a nearby wooded area called Harpers Woods, and they share what is implied to be each other's first kiss. This unsaid relationship between Winnie and Kevin remains dormant for a long while, with Winnie starting to date a popular eighth-grader named Kirk McCray and Kevin briefly going steady with Becky Slater. After Kevin breaks up with Becky due to his feelings for Winnie, Becky becomes a recurring nuisance for Kevin. Winnie eventually dumps Kirk, as well, and Kevin and Winnie share a second kiss at the start of the 1969 summer vacation. Around Valentine's Day 1970, Winnie temporarily dates Paul, who has broken up with his girlfriend Carla. Winnie and Kevin start dating each other soon after.


title: The Wonder Years

text: Just before the summer break, Winnie and her family move to a house four miles away. Although Winnie attends a new school, Lincoln Junior High, she and Kevin decide to remain together and maintain a successful long-distance relationship. A beautiful new student named Madeline Adams joins Kevin's school and quickly catches Kevin's eye, but it is Winnie who breaks up with Kevin after meeting Roger, a jock at her new school. Neither relationship lasts long, but Winnie and Kevin don't reunite until she is injured in a car crash. After graduating from junior high, Kevin and Winnie both go to McKinley High and Paul attends a prep school. Paul would later transfer to McKinley High and join Kevin and Winnie.


title: The Wonder Years

text: Earlier seasons of the show tended to focus on plots involving events within the Arnold household and Kevin's academic struggles, whereas later seasons focused much more on plots involving dating and Kevin's friends.


title: The Wonder Years

text: Kevin has several brief flings during the summer of 1971 and the 1971–1972 academic year. After Kevin's grandfather gets his driver's license revoked, he sells his car to Kevin for a dollar. Paul transfers to McKinley High after his first semester at preparatory school when his father runs into financial troubles. Wayne decides to join the army as a result of his inability to do well in school. This gets turned around when Wayne is not able to pass his physical. Winnie and Kevin are reunited when they go on a double date to a school dance, and find themselves more attracted to each other than their respective partners. In late 1972, Kevin's older brother Wayne starts working at NORCOM, and dates his co-worker Bonnie, a divorcée with a son, but the relationship does not last. Kevin's father quits NORCOM, and buys a furniture-manufacturing business.


title: The Wonder Years

text: In the series finale, Winnie decides to take a job for the summer of 1973 as a lifeguard at a resort. Kevin, meanwhile, is at his job at his father's furniture factory and calls Winnie, who is distant and seems to be enjoying her time away from Kevin. Eventually, Kevin and his father fight and Kevin announces that he is leaving, reasoning that he needs to "find himself". Kevin drives to the resort where Winnie is working, hopeful that she can secure him a job and they can spend the rest of the summer together.


title: The Wonder Years

text: Kevin eventually secures a job at the resort and plays a round of poker with the house band. He wins big and goes out to search for Winnie to tell her of his good fortune. To his surprise, he sees Winnie engaged in a passionate kiss with another lifeguard.


title: The Wonder Years

text: The next day, Kevin confronts her and they fight. Kevin then plays another round of poker, losing his car in a bet. Desperate, Kevin confronts Winnie and her new boyfriend at the restaurant and ends up punching him in the face. Kevin then leaves the resort on foot.


title: The Wonder Years

text: On a desolate stretch of highway, Kevin decides to begin hitchhiking. He finally gets picked up by an elderly couple and much to his surprise finds Winnie in the backseat. Winnie was fired over the fight Kevin instigated at the resort. Kevin and Winnie begin to argue and the elderly couple lose patience and kick them out of the car. A rainstorm begins and Kevin and Winnie search for shelter. They find a barn and discuss how much things are changing and the future. They make up and kiss passionately (it is heavily implied that they lose their virginity to each other).


title: The Wonder Years

text: They soon find their way back to their hometown and arrive hand-in-hand to a Fourth of July parade. During this parade, the adult Kevin (Daniel Stern) describes the fate of the show's main characters. Kevin makes up with his father, graduates from high school in 1974, and leaves for college, later becoming a writer. Paul studies law at Harvard. Karen, Kevin's sister, gives birth to a son in September 1973. Kevin's mother becomes a businesswoman and corporate board chairwoman. Kevin's father dies in 1975 and Wayne takes over his father's furniture business. Winnie studies art history in Paris while Kevin stays in the United States. Winnie and Kevin end up writing to each other once a week for the next eight years. When Winnie returns to the United States in 1982, Kevin meets her at the airport, with his wife and eight-month-old son.


title: The Wonder Years

text: The final sounds, voice-over narration, and dialogue of the episode and series is that of Kevin as an adult, with children heard in the background:


title: The Wonder Years

text: A little boy (Stern's real life son, Henry) can be heard asking "Hey, Dad, want to play catch?" during a break in the final narration. Kevin responds, "I'll be right there."


title: The Wonder Years

text: In 2011, the finale was ranked number 11 on the TV Guide Network special, "TV's Most Unforgettable Finales".


title: The Wonder Years

text: The series was conceived by writers Neal Marlens and Carol Black. They set out to create a family show that would appeal to the baby-boomer generation by setting the series in the late '60s, a time of radical change in America's history. They also wanted the series to tie this setting in to the life of a normal boy growing up during the period. After writing the script for the pilot episode, Marlens and Black began pitching the series to television networks. None of them were interested, except for ABC, with whom Marlens and Black reached an agreement.


title: The Wonder Years

text: Marlens had originally wanted the setting to be Huntington, Long Island, where he grew up. Elements were also taken from Black's childhood from the White Oak section of Silver Spring, Maryland. ABC, however, insisted that the location remain nonspecific (the colloquial "Anytown, USA").


title: The Wonder Years

text: When they started writing the series, Marlens and Black took a script for a future film with which they had been toying, which featured an off-screen narrator. Black explained, "We liked the concept that you could play with what people think and what they're saying, or how they would like to see themselves as opposed to how the audience is seeing them." They based the show, in part, on their own childhood growing up in the suburbs. Black recalled that "we naturally [took] elements of our experience and [threw] them into the pot. The basic setup, the neighborhood, the era – that's the time and place where we grew up." The show's title was a satirical nod to a famous 1970s Wonder Bread ad campaign promoting the highly processed white bread as perfect for "The Wonder Years," ages 1 through 12.


title: The Wonder Years

text: The search for the main lead of the show did not take long. Marlens and Black went to five casting directors and interviewed them for recommendations. All five of them recommended Fred Savage, who at the time was famous for his roles as the grandson in "The Princess Bride" and as Charlie/Marshall in "Vice Versa". Marlens and Black, having never heard of Savage, decided to see the rough cut of "Vice Versa". Said Marlens, "[We saw] a marvelous actor with a natural quality – which essentially means he has no quality at all except being a kid. It sounds funny, but it's a rare thing to find in a child actor." Marlens and Black took this approach when casting the other kids for the show, looking for natural ability rather than professionalism. According to Marlens, they saw 300 to 400 kids before narrowing it down to 70. "My wife and I made the final choice ... each of whom had to be approved by the network."


title: The Wonder Years

text: For the choice of Savage's character's main love interest, the choice came down to actress Danica McKellar and her sister, Crystal McKellar. With just days to go before shooting, the producers eventually selected Danica to play Winnie Cooper. However, Mary Buck, the head of casting, noted, "it was practically a tossup". Crystal McKellar was liked so much by the producers that they eventually created the character of Becky Slater so that they could have her on the show. Danica later reflected on the experience, "I auditioned, like everyone else. They had read lots of girls but hadn't found their 'Winnie' yet, and I was thrilled to be chosen."


title: The Wonder Years

text: At the end of the first season, Marlens and Black departed from the show. Although they never gave a reason for their sudden departure, it may have been due to Black's pregnancy. She hinted at it in an interview in April 1988, saying "We have secret plans to leave Los Angeles before our kids reach the age of cognizance." One challenge for the cast and crew was filming around a child actor, meaning that the show had to obey child labor laws. Savage at the time explained, "You have to get at least three hours of school in every day. So whenever I'm on a break, I go to school. It's really intense because I have to get a lot done in short periods. And it's hard because if they need you back on the set, they pull you away every 20 minutes. If you're writing an essay and suddenly get inspired, you've got to stop and go back to work." Many exterior shots were filmed in Burbank, California.


title: The Wonder Years

text: Three different versions of the opening were made, each set to the Joe Cocker rendition of "With a Little Help from My Friends".


title: The Wonder Years

text: This first version of the opening was very basic: Nothing but a black screen was shown, after the title logo, with each cast member's name appearing in the center one by one. Much like the Arye Gross narration, this version of the opening was only used once when the pilot first aired after Super Bowl XXII.


title: The Wonder Years

text: This opening consists of home-movie footage from the pilot, after the title logo is shown, ending with the "Created by" credit. In season five, more footage is added to show how much the cast has aged.


title: The Wonder Years

text: The opening was overhauled completely in this version. It consisted of stock footage and images of various moments throughout 1960s and early 1970s culture (i.e. John Lennon and Yoko Ono's Bed-in, the Kent State shootings, the Moon Landing, and an antiwar protest), and was set to a new edit of Cocker's rendition of the song (starting with the chorus, versus the opening of the song, as was the case in seasons one through five). The final image in this version is of Kevin, Paul, Winnie, and presumably some of their classmates in a group photograph edited to look like it belonged in the time period.


title: The Wonder Years

text: The official soundtrack released in 1988 by Atlantic/WEA contains a total of 13 tracks, featuring Joe Cocker's cover of The Beatles' "With a Little Help from My Friends", which is the show's theme song.


title: The Wonder Years

text: After the series' original run was over, Laserlight Digital released a five-disc compilation box set under the title "Music from 'The Wonder Years" in 1994. This same company later released the first two DVDs for the series, "The Best of The Wonder Years" and "The Christmas Wonder Years". The disc included 40 oldies favorites and five original songs (each is repeated twice in the set) written exclusively for the series by W. G. Snuffy Walden.


title: The Wonder Years

text: In 2014, Time Life released a new soundtrack for the show that accompanies deluxe versions of its complete series DVD set. The CD is not available for purchase separately from the DVD box set, however.


title: The Wonder Years

text: The Time Life DVD releases feature around 96% of the original music soundtrack, including Joe Cocker's cover of "With a Little Help From My Friends" at the opening. Fourteen songs were replaced, in most instances featuring generic studio replacement music in place of the original song, while on a few occasions, the original soundtrack song was replaced with another version of the same song. None of the necessary music replacements resulted in footage from the episodes being removed.


title: The Wonder Years

text: Also, not a music change per se, but the Daniel Stern redub of the pilot is used, with the standard opening sequence.


title: The Wonder Years

text: The UK DVD release from Fabulous Films was intended to have no replaced music, but reviews on online retailers and fan websites show that this is not the case.


title: The Wonder Years

text: "The Wonder Years" wrapped its sixth and final season in May 1993. Its cancellation was partially blamed on conflict between producers and executives at ABC. As Kevin matured, the producers wanted the storylines to mature, as well. The executives at ABC, though, felt uncomfortable with more explicit content given the time slot, saying, "We felt it was inappropriate to present Kevin's awakening because of the setting in the 1960s, the gentle tone of the series, and most importantly, the 8 pm time period." Bob Brush noted, "When Kevin became 16 and 17, there were really things he needed to get to that we couldn't do at 8 pm, especially with the kind of venerable cachet that the show had obtained with its audience. We would get notes from the network saying, "You could do this on any show besides "The Wonder Years"." Other reasons for the show's cancellation were escalating costs and declining ratings. The cast's salary increases, coupled with location shooting (which was due to the producers wanting to reflect Kevin obtaining his driver's license), led to Brush claiming that they were spending $1.2 million an episode. The final episode aired on May 12, 1993. Bob Brush noted that the finale was not what he would have wanted it to be, but because the cast and crew were unsure at the time of filming if the sixth season would be the last, he was forced to have the ending be open-ended until the recording of Daniel Stern's narration. Fans were somewhat disappointed with the ending, in particular the revelation that Kevin and Winnie do not end up as a couple. Brush acknowledged this disappointment, saying, "Some viewers [were] surprised that nothing works out the way your fondest wish would be," and explained, "The message I wanted in there is that that's part of the beauty of life. It's fine to say, 'I'd like everything to be just the way it was when I was 15 and I was happy,' but it seemed more nurturing to me to say that we leave these things behind and we go on to forge new lives for ourselves."


title: The Wonder Years

text: As the show was in the process of wrapping its final season, a costume designer on the show named Monique Long filed a sexual harassment charge against stars Fred Savage and Jason Hervey. The suit brought forward unwanted publicity to the show. In the end, the case was settled out of court with Savage stating that he was "completely exonerated" and adding that it was a "terrible experience".


title: The Wonder Years

text: In January 2018, Alley Mills said that a "completely ridiculous" sexual harassment lawsuit against Savage and Hervey was a significant factor in the show's cancellation.


title: The Wonder Years

text: Reruns of the show aired in syndication between September 1992 and September 1997. Nick at Nite then reran the show from October 13, 1997, to January 21, 2001. It also reran on The New TNN (January 22, 2001, to September 28, 2001), ABC Family (November 12, 2001, to October 2, 2004), Ion Television (April 2, 2007, to October 4, 2007), and The Hub (October 11, 2010, to August 31, 2012). The complete series is currently available on streaming service, Hulu.


title: The Wonder Years

text: In Canada, the show aired on CTS Ontario from September 2010 until September 2, 2011. In Australia, the show aired on Network Ten between 1989 and 1995, then from March 31, 2012 on ABC1. In the Philippines, the show aired on GMA Network.


title: The Wonder Years

text: In Spain, the series initially aired Mondays 9:30 pm on TVE2 (now La2) as part of the Monday-night comedy block, which also featured "Murphy Brown". The series was later promoted to main channel TVE1, where it aired Fridays 9:00 pm. Years later, in the late '90s, commercial station Antena 3TV recovered the series and aired it first in its 2:00 pm comedy hour, later relocating it to a 5:30 pm slot as part of the youth macroshow "La Merienda".


title: The Wonder Years

text: Initially, the first four episodes were released on two VHS cassettes by Anchor Bay in 1997, with most of the music intact (a select few songs, however, were re-recordings). In the coming years, fees for licensing music prevented further episodes from being released on VHS. The two volumes that were released on VHS were later released on DVD in 2000. Four episodes of the series were also included in two official "best-of" DVD sets ("The Best of The Wonder Years" and "The Christmas Wonder Years"), without much of the original music.


title: The Wonder Years

text: For many years, full seasons of "The Wonder Years" remained unreleased on DVD due to music licensing issues. Because of this issue, "The Wonder Years" routinely appeared on the list of TV shows in high demand for a DVD release.


title: The Wonder Years

text: In a blog update on the Netflix website on March 30, 2011, and a press release issued the next day, Netflix stated that they would be adding "The Wonder Years" to their instant streaming service. The other three 20th Century Fox series noted as part of the deal were added to the Watch Instantly service by April 2, 2011 while "The Wonder Years" remained unavailable. On October 1, 2011, 114 full-length episodes of the series were added to Netflix. The clip show from the end of Season 4, which was released on DVD, was not included.


title: The Wonder Years

text: On September 26, 2011, Amazon Prime's streaming video service announced it would be adding "The Wonder Years", describing the series as "available on digital video for the first time", although Netflix added the series ahead of Amazon's release. All 115 episodes (including the clip show) became available to Prime members starting October 6, 2011.


title: The Wonder Years

text: On both digital streaming services, portions of the soundtrack have been replaced. The show's opening theme has been replaced on Netflix and Amazon with the version of the song that played in the UK and other overseas airings. The majority of the show's soundtrack remains unchanged. Songs such as "Light My Fire" by The Doors and "Foxy Lady" by Jimi Hendrix have been replaced by generic sound-alikes with different lyrics.


title: The Wonder Years

text: On February 11, 2014, StarVista/Time Life announced the upcoming DVD release of the complete series in the second half of the year, noting that it was "painstakingly securing the rights for virtually every song." On June 11, packaging details for complete set were revealed. The packaging consists of a miniature school locker featuring a replica yearbook with signatures from cast members, behind-the-scenes photos, and classic show memorabilia. Also included are two notebooks similar to those carried by the two lead characters, each featuring detailed episode information, production photos, all 115 episodes, and over 15 hours of bonus features on 26 DVDs. Customized "Wonder Years" magnets are also included. On September 30, 2014, the complete series was released to those who ordered the set through mail order from Time Life/Star Vista. A box set for the first four seasons was also released. October 10, 2014, though, was considered the official release date.


title: The Wonder Years

text: On October 7, 2014, Star Vista released season one on DVD in Region 1 for the first time. Season two was released on February 3, 2015. Season three was released on May 26, 2015. Season four was released on January 12, 2016. Season five was released on May 24, 2016. Season six was released on September 27, 2016.


title: The Wonder Years

text: On October 6, 2015, Star Vista released "The Wonder Years- The Complete Series: Collectors Box Set" and "The Wonder Years- The Complete Series" DVD collections in a wide general retail release.


title: The Wonder Years

text: On May 9, 2016, Fabulous Films released "The Wonder Years - The Deluxe Edition" on 26 DVDs in the UK. It was intended to be the first release to contain every episode in its original transmission presentation, although in the end this did not happen. The set includes over 23 hours of bonus material.


title: The Wonder Years

text: On Rotten Tomatoes, the series has an approval rating of 100% with an average rating of 10.00/10 based on 9 reviews. On Metacritic, the series has a score of 82 out of 100, based on 9 reviews, indicating "universal acclaim."


title: The Wonder Years

text: In 1997, "My Father's Office" was ranked number 29 on "TV Guide"s 100 Greatest Episodes of All Time, and in the 2009 revised list, the pilot episode was ranked number 43. In 2016, "Rolling Stone" ranked "The Wonder Years" number 63 on its list of 100 Greatest TV Shows of All Time. In 2017, James Charisma of "Paste" ranked the show's opening sequence number 14 on a list of the 75 Best TV Title Sequences of All Time. As of recent years, many critics and fans consider "The Wonder Years" to be a classic with tremendous impact on the industry over the years, inspiring many other shows and how they are structured.


title: The Wonder Years

text: In 1990, the book "The Wonder Years - Growing up in the Sixties" by Edward Gross was published by Pioneer Books (). It contains information about the creation and production of the show, interviews with cast and crew, and an extensive episode guide (up to the middle of the 4th season when the book was published). While long out of print and hard to find, the author gave permission to a fan website to publish the book online for free in its entirety.


title: The Wonder Years

text: In Colombia, the production company BE-TV made a version for Caracol Televisión also titled "Los años maravillosos" ("The Wonder Years"), set in the 1980s and with a Colombian cast. The series was a critical failure.


title: The Wonder Years

text: On July 8, 2020, ABC announced that they were rebooting the series with film director, producer, and screenwriter Lee Daniels, longtime television writer and producer Saladin Patterson, and original series star Fred Savage as executive producers. Savage would also direct the pilot episode, and original series co-creator Neal Marlens will be a consultant on the project. The new series would once again take place in the late 1960s—but this time, it would focus on the life of a black middle-class family living in Montgomery, Alabama. In March 2021, it was announced that Don Cheadle would serve as the series narrator. In May 2021, ABC officially picked up the series. The series premiered on September 22, 2021.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: RMS "Queen Mary" is a retired British ocean liner that sailed primarily on the North Atlantic Ocean from 1936 to 1967 for the Cunard-White Star Line and was built by John Brown & Company in Clydebank, Scotland. "Queen Mary", along with , were built as part of Cunard's planned two-ship weekly express service between Southampton, Cherbourg and New York. The two ships were a British response to the express superliners built by German, Italian and French companies in the late 1920s and early 1930s.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: "Queen Mary" sailed on her maiden voyage on 27 May 1936 and won the Blue Riband that August; she lost the title to in 1937 and recaptured it in 1938, holding it until 1952, when it was taken by the new . With the outbreak of World War II, she was converted into a troopship and ferried Allied soldiers during the conflict.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: Following the war, "Queen Mary" was refitted for passenger service and along with "Queen Elizabeth" commenced the two-ship transatlantic passenger service for which the two ships were initially built. The two ships dominated the transatlantic passenger transportation market until the dawn of the jet age in the late 1950s. By the mid-1960s, "Queen Mary" was ageing and was operating at a loss.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: After several years of decreased profits for Cunard Line, "Queen Mary" was officially retired from service in 1967. She left Southampton for the last time on 31 October 1967 and sailed to the port of Long Beach, California, United States, where she was permanently moored. The City of Long Beach bought the ship to serve as a tourist attraction featuring restaurants, a museum and a hotel. The city contracted out management of the ship to various third-party firms over the years. It took back operational control in 2021 when the operator filed for bankruptcy and it was found that extensive repairs were needed to keep the ship from sinking.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: With Weimar Germany launching and into service, Britain did not want to be left behind in the shipbuilding race. White Star Line began construction on their 80,000-ton "Oceanic" in 1928, while Cunard planned a 75,000-ton unnamed ship of their own.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: Construction on the ship, then known only as "Hull Number 534", began in December 1930 on the River Clyde by the John Brown & Company shipyard at Clydebank in Scotland. Work was halted in December 1931 due to the Great Depression and Cunard applied to the British Government for a loan to complete 534. The loan was granted, with enough money to complete the unfinished ship, and also to build a running mate, with the intention to provide a two ship weekly service to New York.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: One condition of the loan was that Cunard merge with the White Star Line, another struggling British shipping company, which was Cunard's chief British rival at the time and which had already been forced by the depression to cancel construction of its "Oceanic". Both lines agreed and the merger was completed on 10 May 1934. Work on "Queen Mary" resumed immediately and she was launched on 26 September 1934. Completion ultimately took years and cost 3.5 million pounds sterling, then equal to $17.5 million . Much of the ship's interior was designed and constructed by the Bromsgrove Guild. Prior to the ship's launch, the River Clyde had to be specifically deepened to cope with her size, this being undertaken by the engineer D. Alan Stevenson.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: The ship was named after Mary of Teck, consort of King George V. Until her launch, the name was kept a closely guarded secret. Legend has it that Cunard intended to name the ship "Victoria", in keeping with company tradition of giving its ships names ending in "ia", but when company representatives asked the King's permission to name the ocean liner after Britain's "greatest Queen", he said his wife, Mary of Teck, would be delighted. And so, the legend goes, the delegation had, of course, no other choice but to report that No. 534 would be called "Queen Mary".


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: This story was (and still is) denied by company officials, and traditionally the names of sovereigns have only been used for capital ships of the Royal Navy. This anecdote has been widely contested ever since Frank Braynard published it in his 1947 book, "Lives of the Liners". Some support for the story was provided by "Washington Post" editor Felix Morley, who sailed as a guest of the Cunard Line on "Queen Mary"s 1936 maiden voyage. In his 1979 autobiography, "For the Record", Morley wrote that he was placed at a table with Sir Percy Bates, chairman of the Cunard Line. Bates told him the story of the naming of the ship "on condition you won't print it during my lifetime." The story was finally proven in 1988 when Braynard attended the same dinner party as Eleanor Sparkes, daughter of Sir Ashley Sparkes, who'd been with Bates during the conversation with George V. She confirmed the "favourite ship story" to him, telling the exact anecdote that Braynard had published in his book.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: Despite this, Cunard still denies the name change. It is also possible the name "Queen Mary" was decided upon as a compromise between Cunard and the White Star Line, as both lines had traditions of using names either ending in "ic" with White Star and "ia" with Cunard.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: The name had already been given to the Clyde turbine steamer , so Cunard made an arrangement with its owners and this older ship was renamed "Queen Mary II".


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: "Queen Mary" was fitted with 24 Yarrow boilers in four boiler rooms and four Parsons turbines in two engine rooms. The boilers delivered 400 pounds per square inch (28 bar) steam at 700 °F (371 °C) which provided a maximum of to four propellers, each turning at 200 RPM. "Queen Mary" achieved 32.84 knots on her acceptance trials in early 1936.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: On 24 March 1936, leaving Clydebank she ran aground on the River Clyde but with the help of tugboats she was refloated.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: In 1934 the new liner was launched by Her Majesty Queen Mary as RMS "Queen Mary". On her way down the slipway, "Queen Mary" was slowed by eighteen drag chains, which checked the liner's progress into the River Clyde, a portion of which had been widened to accommodate the launch.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: When she sailed on her maiden voyage from Southampton on 27 May 1936, she was commanded by Sir Edgar Britten, who had been the master designate for Cunard White Star whilst the ship was under construction at the John Brown shipyard. "Queen Mary" measured . Her rival , which originally measured 79,280 Gross register tons, had been modified the preceding winter to increase her size to . "Queen Mary" sailed at high speed for most of her maiden voyage to New York, until heavy fog forced a reduction of speed on the final day of the crossing, arriving in New York Harbor on 1 June 1936.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: "Queen Mary" design was criticised for being too traditional, especially when "Normandie" hull was revolutionary with a clipper-shaped, streamlined bow. Except for her cruiser stern, she seemed to be an enlarged version of her Cunard predecessors from the pre–First World War era. Her interior design, while mostly Art Deco, seemed restrained and conservative when compared to the ultramodern French liner. "Queen Mary" proved to be the more popular vessel than her rival, in terms of passengers carried.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: In August 1936, "Queen Mary" captured the Blue Riband from "Normandie", with average speeds of westbound and eastbound. "Normandie" was refitted with a new set of propellers in 1937 and reclaimed the honour, but in 1938 "Queen Mary" took back the Blue Riband in both directions with average speeds of westbound and eastbound, records which stood until lost to in 1952.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: Among facilities available onboard "Queen Mary", the liner featured two indoor swimming pools, beauty salons, libraries and children's nurseries for all three classes, a music studio and lecture hall, telephone connectivity to anywhere in the world, outdoor paddle tennis courts and dog kennels. The largest room onboard was the cabin class (first class) main dining room (grand salon), spanning three stories in height and anchored by wide columns. The ship had many air-conditioned public rooms onboard. The cabin-class swimming pool facility spanned over two decks in height. This was the first ocean liner to be equipped with her own Jewish prayer roompart of a policy to show that British shipping lines avoided the antisemitism evident in Nazi Germany.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: The cabin-class main dining room featured a large map of the transatlantic crossing, with twin tracks symbolising the winter/spring route (further south to avoid icebergs) and the summer/autumn route. During each crossing, a motorised model of "Queen Mary" would indicate the vessel's progress en route.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: As an alternative to the main dining room, "Queen Mary" featured a separate cabin-class Verandah Grill on the Sun Deck at the upper aft of the ship. The Verandah Grill was an exclusive "à la carte" restaurant with a capacity of approximately eighty passengers and was converted to the Starlight Club at night. Also on board was the Observation Bar, an Art Deco-styled lounge with wide ocean views.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: Woods from different regions of the British Empire were used in her public rooms and staterooms. Accommodation ranged from fully equipped, luxurious cabin (first) class staterooms to modest and cramped third-class cabins. Artists commissioned by Cunard in 1933 for works of art in the interior include Edward Wadsworth and A. Duncan Carse.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: In late August 1939, "Queen Mary" was on a return run from New York to Southampton. The international situation led to her being escorted by the battlecruiser . She arrived safely and set out again for New York on 1 September. By the time she arrived, war had been declared and she was ordered to remain in port alongside "Normandie" until further notice.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: In March 1940, "Queen Mary" and "Normandie" were joined in New York by "Queen Mary" new running mate , fresh from her secret voyage from Clydebank. The three largest liners in the world sat idle for some time until the Allied commanders decided that all three ships could be used as troopships. "Normandie" was destroyed by fire during her troopship conversion. "Queen Mary" left New York for Sydney, Australia, where she, along with several other liners, was converted into a troopship to carry Australian and New Zealand soldiers to the United Kingdom.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: In the Second World War conversion, the ship's hull, superstructure, and funnels were painted navy grey. As a result of her new colour, and in combination with her great speed, she became known as the "Grey Ghost". To protect against magnetic mines, a degaussing coil was fitted around the outside of the hull. Inside, stateroom furniture and decoration were removed and replaced with triple-tiered (fixed) wooden bunks, which were later replaced by "standee" (fold-up) bunks.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: A total of of carpet, 220 cases of china, crystal and silver services, tapestries, and paintings were removed and stored in warehouses for the duration of the war. The woodwork in the staterooms, the cabin-class dining room, and other public areas were covered with leather. "Queen Mary" and "Queen Elizabeth" were the largest and fastest troopships involved in the war, often carrying as many as 15,000 men in a single voyage, and often travelling out of convoy and without escort. Their high speed and zigzag courses made it virtually impossible for U-boats to catch them.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: On 2 October 1942, "Queen Mary" accidentally sank one of her escort ships, slicing through the light cruiser off the Irish coast with a loss of 239 lives. "Queen Mary" was carrying thousands of Americans of the 29th Infantry Division to join the Allied forces in Europe. Due to the risk of U-boat attacks, "Queen Mary" was under orders not to stop under any circumstances and steamed onward with a fractured stem. Some sources claim that hours later, the convoy's lead escort, consisting of and one other ship, returned to rescue 99 survivors of "Curacoa" crew of 338, including her captain John W. Boutwood. This claim is contradicted by the liner's then Staff Captain (and later Cunard Commodore) Harry Grattidge, who records that "Queen Mary" Captain, Gordon Illingsworth, immediately ordered the accompanying destroyers to look for survivors within moments of "Curacoa" sinking.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: From 8–14 December 1942, "Queen Mary" carried 10,389 soldiers and 950 crew (total 11,339). During this trip, while from Scotland during a gale, she was suddenly hit broadside by a rogue wave that might have reached a height of . An account of this crossing can be found in Carter's book. As quoted in the book, Carter's father, Dr. Norval Carter, part of the 110th Station Hospital on board at the time, wrote in a letter that at one point "Queen Mary" "damned near capsized... One moment the top deck was at its usual height and then, swoom! Down, over, and forward she would pitch." It was calculated later that the ship rolled 52 degrees, and would have capsized had she rolled another three degrees.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: From 25–30 July 1943, "Queen Mary" carried 15,740 soldiers and 943 crew (total 16,683), a standing record for the most passengers ever transported on one vessel. This was only possible in summer as passengers had to sleep on deck.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: During the war "Queen Mary" carried British Prime Minister Winston Churchill across the Atlantic for meetings with fellow Allied forces officials on several occasions. He was listed on the passenger manifests as "Colonel Warden". Churchill would later remark that the "Queen Mary" had ""shortened the war by a year.""


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: After delivering war brides to Canada, "Queen Mary" made her fastest ever crossing, returning to Southampton in only three days, 22 hours and 42 minutes at an average speed of just under . From September 1946 to July 1947, "Queen Mary" was refitted for passenger service, adding air conditioning and upgrading her berth configuration to 711 first class (formerly called cabin class), 707 cabin class (formerly tourist class) and 577 tourist class (formerly third class) passengers. Following their refit, "Queen Mary" and "Queen Elizabeth" dominated the transatlantic passenger trade as Cunard White Star's two-ship weekly express service through the latter half of the 1940s and well into the 1950s. They proved highly profitable for Cunard (as the company was renamed in 1947).


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: On 1 January 1949, "Queen Mary" ran aground off Cherbourg, France. She was refloated the next day and returned to service.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: In 1952, "Queen Mary" lost the Blue Riband she held for 14 years to the "SS United States" during her maiden voyage.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: In 1958, the first commercial transatlantic flights by jet began a completely new era of competition for the Cunard Queens. With a London–New York travel time of just 7–8 hours now possible with the new aircraft, demand for a sea crossing of the ocean fell away markedly. On some voyages, winters especially, "Queen Mary" sailed into harbour with more crew than passengers, though both she and "Queen Elizabeth" still averaged over 1,000 passengers per crossing into the middle 1960s. By 1965, the entire Cunard fleet was operating at a loss.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: Hoping to continue financing "Queen Elizabeth 2" which was under construction at Brown's shipyard, Cunard mortgaged the majority of the fleet. Due to a combination of age, lack of public interest, inefficiency in a new market and the damaging after-effects of the national seamen's strike, Cunard announced that both "Queen Mary" and "Queen Elizabeth" would be retired from service and sold off. Many offers were submitted, and the bid of $3.45m/£1.2m from Long Beach, California surpassed the Japanese scrap merchants. "Queen Mary" was featured in the film "Assault on a Queen" (1966) starring Frank Sinatra.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: "Queen Mary" was retired from service in 1967. On 27 September, she completed her 1,001st and last crossing of the North Atlantic having carried 2,112,000 passengers over . Under the command of Captain John Treasure Jones, who had been her captain since 1965, she sailed from Southampton for the last time on 31 October with 1,093 passengers and 806 crew. After a voyage around Cape Horn, she arrived in Long Beach on 9 December.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: "Queen Elizabeth" was withdrawn in 1968 and "Queen Elizabeth 2" took over the transatlantic route in 1969.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: "Queen Mary" is permanently moored as a tourist attraction, hotel, museum and event facility in Long Beach.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: "Queen Mary", bought by Long Beach in 1967, was converted from a seafaring vessel to floating hotel. The plan included clearing almost every area of the ship below "C" deck (called "R" deck after 1950, to lessen passenger confusion, as the restaurants were located on "R" deck) to make way for Jacques Cousteau's new Living Sea Museum. This increased museum space to .


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: It required the removal of all the boiler rooms, the forward engine room, both turbo generator rooms, the ship stabilisers and the water softening plant. The ship's empty fuel tanks were filled with local mud to keep the ship's centre of gravity and draft at the correct levels, as these critical factors had been affected by the removal of the various components and structure. Only the aft engine room and "shaft alley", at the stern of the ship, would be spared. The remaining space would be used for storage or office space.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: One problem that arose during the conversion was a dispute between land-based and maritime unions over conversion jobs. The United States Coast Guard had the final say. "Queen Mary" was deemed a building, since most of her propellers had been removed and her machinery gutted. The ship was also repainted with its red water level paint at a slightly higher level than previous. During the conversion, the funnels were removed, as this area was needed to lift out the scrap materials from the engine and boiler rooms. Workers found that the funnels were significantly degraded and they were replaced with replicas.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: With all of the lower decks nearly gutted from R deck and down, Diners Club, the initial lessee of the ship, converted the remainder of the vessel into a hotel. Diners Club Queen Mary dissolved and vacated the ship in 1970 after their parent company, Diners Club International, was sold, and a change in corporate direction was mandated during the conversion process. Specialty Restaurants, a Los Angeles-based company that focused on theme-based restaurants, took over as master lessee the following year.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: This second plan was based on converting most of her first- and second-class cabins on A and B decks into hotel rooms, and converting the main lounges and dining rooms into banquet spaces. On Promenade Deck, the starboard promenade was enclosed to feature an upscale restaurant and café named Lord Nelson's and Lady Hamilton's; it was themed in the fashion of early-19th century sailing ships. The famed and elegant Observation Bar was redecorated as a western-themed bar.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: The smaller first-class public rooms, such as the Drawing Room, Library, Lecture Room and the Music Studio, would be stripped of most of their fittings and converted to commercial use. This markedly expanded retail space on the ship. Two more shopping malls were built on the Sun Deck in separate spaces previously used for first-class cabins and engineers' quarters.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: A post-war feature of the ship, the first-class cinema, was removed for kitchen space for the new Promenade Deck dining venues. The first-class lounge and smoking room were reconfigured and converted into banquet space. The second-class smoking room was subdivided into a wedding chapel and office space. On the Sun Deck, the elegant Verandah Grill would be gutted and converted into a fast-food eatery, while a new upscale dining venue was created directly above it on Sports Deck, in space once used for crew quarters.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: The second-class lounges were expanded to the sides of the ship and used for banqueting. On R deck, the first-class dining room was reconfigured and subdivided into two banquet venues, the Royal Salon and the Windsor Room. The second-class dining room was subdivided into kitchen storage and a crew mess hall, while the third-class dining room was initially used as storage and crew space.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: Also on R deck, the first-class Turkish bath complex, the 1930s equivalent to a spa, was removed. The second-class pool was removed and its space initially used for office space, while the first-class swimming pool was open for viewing by hotel guests and visitors. Because of modern safety codes and the compromised structural soundness of the area directly below, the swimming pool could not be used for swimming after the conversion, although it was filled with water until the late 1980s. Today the pool can only be seen on guided tours and is in a derelict condition, having never been maintained by the hotel operators. No second-class, third-class or crew cabins remain intact aboard the ship today.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: On 8 May 1971, "Queen Mary" opened her doors to tourists. Initially, only portions of the ship were open to the public as Specialty Restaurants had yet to open its dining venues and PSA had not completed work converting the ship's original First Class staterooms into the hotel. As a result, the ship was open only on weekends. On 11 December 1971, Jacques Cousteau's Museum of the Sea opened, with a quarter of the planned exhibits completed. Within the decade, Cousteau's museum closed due to low ticket sales and the deaths of many of the fish that were housed in the museum. On 2 November 1972, the PSA Hotel Queen Mary opened its initial 150 guest rooms. Two years later, with all 400 rooms finished, PSA brought in Hyatt Hotels to manage the hotel, which operated from 1974 to 1980 as the Queen Mary Hyatt Hotel.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: By 1980, it had become apparent that the existing system was not working. The ship was losing millions each year for the city because the hotel, restaurants and museum were run by three separate concessionaires, while the city owned the vessel and operated guided tours. It was decided that a single operator with more experience in attractions was needed.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: Jack Wrather, a local millionaire, had fallen in love with the ship because he and his wife, Bonita Granville, had fond memories of sailing on it numerous times. Wrather signed a 66-year lease with the city of Long Beach to operate the entire property. He oversaw the display of the "H-4 Hercules", nicknamed the "Spruce Goose", on long-term loan. The immense plane, which had been sitting in a hangar in Long Beach for decades unseen by the public, was installed in a huge geodesic dome adjacent to the liner in 1983, attracting increased attendance.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: Wrather Port Properties operated the entire attraction after his death in 1984 until 1988, when his holdings were bought by the Walt Disney Company. Wrather had built the Disneyland Hotel in 1955, when Walt Disney had insufficient funds to construct the hotel himself. Disney had been trying to buy the hotel for 30 years. When they finally succeeded, they also acquired "Queen Mary." This was never marketed as a Disney property.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: Through the late 1980s and early 1990s, "Queen Mary" struggled financially. Disney pinned their hopes for turning the attraction around on Port Disney, a huge planned resort on the adjacent docks. It was to include an attraction known as "DisneySea", a theme park celebrating the world's oceans. The plans eventually fell through; in 1992 Disney gave up the lease on the ship to focus on building what would become Disney California Adventure Park. The DisneySea concept was recycled a decade later in Japan as Tokyo DisneySea, with a recreated ocean liner resembling "Queen Mary" named the SS "Columbia" as the centrepiece of the American Waterfront area.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: With Disney gone, the Hotel "Queen Mary" closed on 30 September 1992. The owners of the "Spruce Goose", the Aero Club of Southern California, sold the plane to the Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum in Oregon. The plane departed on barges on 2 October 1992. The "Queen Mary" remained open until 31 December 1992 when it closed.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: During this period, the ship was nominated and listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1993. Also the Port of Long Beach turned over control over the vessel to the city in 1993.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: On 5 February 1993, RMS Foundation, Inc signed a five-year lease with the city of Long Beach to act as the operators of the property. The foundation was run by President and C.E.O. Joseph F. Prevratil, who had managed the attraction for Wrather. On 26 February 1993 the tourist attraction reopened completely, while the hotel reopened partially on 5 March with 125 rooms and the banquet facilities, with the remainder of the rooms coming online on 30 April. In 1995, RMS Foundation's lease was extended to twenty years, while the scope of the lease was reduced to operation of the ship. A new company, Queen's Seaport Development, Inc. (QSDI), was established in 1995 to control the real estate adjacent to the vessel. The dome was used extensively as a soundstage for film and television by taking advantage of the adaptable interior space that was larger than any sound stage in the Los Angeles area. In 1998, the city of Long Beach extended the QSDI lease to 66 years. Carnival Cruises repurposed a portion of the dome as a passenger terminal in 2001. The California State Lands Commission also issued a report in response to citizens concerns about the use of public trust lands and mismanagement of public trust funds. The report determined that the uses were not barred by the granting statutes or the public trust doctrine, but may be considered necessarily incidental to the enjoyment of public tidelands. They found no evidence of mismanagement, a conclusion that was reviewed and affirmed by the State Attorney General.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: In 2004, "Queen Mary" and Stargazer Productions added Tibbies Great American Cabaret to the space previously occupied by the ship's bank and wireless telegraph room. Stargazer Productions and "Queen Mary" transformed the space into a working dinner theatre complete with stage, lights, sound and scullery.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: In 2005, QSDI sought Chapter 11 protection due to a rent credit dispute with the city. In 2006, the bankruptcy court requested bids from parties interested in taking over the lease from QSDI. The minimum required opening bid was $41M. The operation of the ship, by RMS Foundation, remained independent of the bankruptcy. In summer 2007, "Queen Mary" lease was sold to a group named "Save the Queen", managed by Hostmark Hospitality Group.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: They planned to develop the land adjacent to "Queen Mary", and upgrade, renovate and restore the ship. During their management, staterooms were updated with iPod docking stations and flatscreen TVs and the ship's three funnels and waterline area were repainted their original Cunard red colour. The portside Promenade Deck's planking was restored and refinished. Many lifeboats were repaired and patched, and the ship's kitchens were renovated with new equipment.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: In late September 2009, management of "Queen Mary" was taken over by Delaware North Companies, who planned to continue the restoration and renovation of the ship and its property. They were determined to revitalise and enhance the ship as an attraction. But in April 2011, the city of Long Beach was informed that Delaware North was no longer managing "Queen Mary". Garrison Investment Group said this decision was purely business. Delaware North continued to manage "Scorpion," a Soviet submarine that has been a separate attraction next to "Queen Mary" since 1998.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: Evolution Hospitality, LLC. assumed operational control of "Queen Mary" on 23 September 2011, with Garrison Investments leasing "Queen Mary". The dome was used as a venue for the Long Beach Derby Gals roller derby team and as an event venue.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: On 23 February 2006, saluted her predecessor as she made a port of call in Los Angeles Harbor, while on a cruise to Mexico.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: In March 2011, "Queen Mary" was saluted by while fireworks were going on, and on 12 March 2013, made a salute while there were fireworks.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: The salute was carried out with "Queen Mary" replying with her one working air horn in response to "Queen Mary 2" sounding her combination of two brand new horns and an original 1934 "Queen Mary" horn, which is on loan from the City of Long Beach. "Queen Mary" originally had three whistles tuned to 55 Hz, a frequency chosen because it was low enough that the extremely loud sound of it would not be painful to human ears.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: Modern IMO regulations specify ships' horn frequencies to be in the range 70–200 Hz for vessels that are over in length. Traditionally, the lower the frequency, the larger the ship. "Queen Mary 2", being long, was given the lowest possible frequency (70 Hz) for her regulation whistles, in addition to the refurbished 55 Hz whistle on permanent loan. Fifty-five Hz is the "A" note an octave above the lowest note of a standard piano keyboard. The air-driven "Tyfon" whistle can be heard at least away.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: In 2016, Urban Commons, a real estate company, bought the lease, which extends to 2082, out of default. The lease obligates them to perform the ship’s daily upkeep and long-term projects. Carnival Cruises took over the entire dome and made efficiency improvements under their management. The operator generates funds through its events, the hotel bookings, and passenger fees from the nearby Carnival cruise terminal, which is the largest source. Taxpayer funds were not being used to maintain the ship under the lease agreement. Urban Commons had plans to extensively renovate the liner and to redevelop the adjacent of parking with a boutique hotel, restaurants, a marina, an amphitheater, jogging trails, bike paths and possibly a huge Ferris wheel, all at a cost of up to $250 million.


title: RMS Queen Mary

text: In July 2017, while making repairs to a bathroom, workers rediscovered the ship's forward gear room which had once controlled the ship's 16-ton anchors. The room was apparently sealed up during the 1960s conversion and was forgotten for decades.