title: Knoxville, Tennessee

text: State Route 158 (SR 158) loops around the Downtown area from Kingston Pike just west of UT's campus, southward and eastward along Neyland Drive and the riverfront, and northward along the James White Parkway before terminating at I-40. SR 62 (Western Avenue, Oak Ridge Highway), connects Downtown Knoxville with Oak Ridge to the west. SR 168, known as Governor John Sevier Highway, runs along the eastern and southern periphery of the city. SR 162 (Pellissippi Parkway) connects West Knoxville with Oak Ridge. SR 331 (Tazewell Pike) connects the Fountain City area to rural northeast Knox County. SR 332 (Northshore Drive) connects West Knoxville and Concord. SR 33 (Maryville Pike, Maynardville Pike) traverses much of South Knoxville southward, and connects to the suburbs of Halls Crossroads and Maynardville northward.


title: Knoxville, Tennessee

text: Four vehicle bridges connect Downtown Knoxville with South Knoxville, namely the South Knoxville Bridge (James White Parkway), the Gay Street Bridge (Gay Street), the Henley Street Bridge, or Henley Bridge (Henley Street), and the J. E. "Buck" Karnes Bridge (Alcoa Highway). Two railroad bridges, located between the Henley Street Bridge and Buck Karnes Bridge, serve the CSX and Northfolk Southern railroads. Smaller bridges radiating out from the downtown area include the Western Avenue Viaduct and Clinch Avenue Viaduct, the Robert Booker Bridge (Summit Hill Drive), the Hill Avenue Viaduct, and the Gay Street Viaduct.


title: Knoxville, Tennessee

text: Public transportation is provided by Knoxville Area Transit (KAT), which operates over 80 buses, road trolleys, and paratransit vehicles, and transports more than 3.6million passengers per year. Regular routes connect the Downtown area, U.T., and most residential areas with major shopping centers throughout the city. KAT operates using city, state, and federal funds, and passenger fares, and is managed by Veolia Transport.


title: Knoxville, Tennessee

text: Knoxville and the surrounding area is served by McGhee Tyson Airport (IATA:TYS), a airport equipped with twin runways. The airport is located south of Knoxville in Alcoa, but is owned by the non-profit Metropolitan Knoxville Airport Authority (MKAA). McGhee Tyson offers eight major airlines serving 19 non-stop destinations, and averages 120 arrivals and departures per day. The airport includes the Air Cargo Complex, which serves FedEx, UPS, and Airborne Express. The McGhee Tyson Air National Guard Base, located adjacent to the civilian airport, is home to the Tennessee National Guard's 134th Air Refueling Wing.


title: Knoxville, Tennessee

text: The MKAA also owns the Downtown Island Airport, a general aviation facility located on Dickinson's Island in southeast Knoxville. This airport is equipped with a runway, and averages about 225 operations per day. Over 100 aircraft, mostly single-engine planes, are based at the airport.


title: Knoxville, Tennessee

text: Rail freight in Knoxville is handled by two Class I railroads, CSX and Norfolk Southern, and one shortline, the Knoxville and Holston River Railroad. Railroads account for about 12% of the Knoxville area's outbound freight and 16% of the area's inbound freight. The city has two major rail terminals: the Burkhart Enterprises terminal at the Forks of the River Industrial Park just east of the city, and the TransFlo facility adjacent to the U.T. campus. Knoxville's two old passenger stations, the Southern Terminal and the L&N Station, now serve non-railroad functions.


title: Knoxville, Tennessee

text: Norfolk Southern, which controls about of tracks in the Knoxville area, averages 35 freight trains through the city per day, and operates a major classification yard, the John Sevier Yard, just east of the city. The company uses a small rail yard near the I-40/I-275 interchange in Downtown Knoxville for a staging area. The Norfolk Southern system includes spur lines to the coal fields around Middlesboro, Kentucky, and the ALCOA plants in Blount County.


title: Knoxville, Tennessee

text: CSX controls about of tracks in the Knoxville area, much of which is located along an important north–south line between Cincinnati and Louisville to the north and Chattanooga and Atlanta to the south. Minor switching operations for CSX occur at the TransFlo facility near the U.T. campus. The CSX system includes spur lines to TVA's Bull Run Fossil Plant and the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Anderson County, and the ALCOA plants in Blount County.


title: Knoxville, Tennessee

text: The Knoxville and Holston River Railroad (KXHR) is a subsidiary of Gulf and Ohio Railways, a shortline holding company headquartered at the James Park House in Downtown Knoxville. The KXHR operates a line between the Burkhart terminal at Forks of the River and the Coster Yard in North Knoxville, where the freight is transferred to CSX and Norfolk Southern lines or transloaded onto trucks. The KXHR also manages the Knoxville Locomotive Works at the Coster Yard, and operates the "Three Rivers Rambler", a tourist train that runs along the riverfront.


title: Knoxville, Tennessee

text: Until the mid-20th century three railroads and their stations operated regular trains, serving points north, east, south and west: the Louisville and Nashville Railroad's L&N Station (last train operating there, 1968), the Smoky Mountain Railroad's station and the Southern Railway's Southern Terminal (last train operating there, 1970).


title: Knoxville, Tennessee

text: Knoxville is an international port connected via navigable channels to the nation's inland waterways and the Gulf of Mexico. The city's waterfront lies just under 700 river miles from the Mississippi River (via the Tennessee and Ohio rivers), and just under 900 river miles from Mobile, Alabama, on the Gulf of Mexico (via the Tennessee River and Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway). TVA maintains a minimum channel on the entirety of the Tennessee River. The minimum size of locks on Tennessee River and Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway dams is by .


title: Knoxville, Tennessee

text: Most commercial shipping on the Tennessee River is provided by barges, which deliver on average half a million tons of cargo to Knoxville per year, mostly asphalt, road salt, and steel and coke. Burkhart Enterprises operates the city's most active public barge terminal at its Forks of the River facility, handling approximately 350,000 tons of barge cargo per year. Knoxville Barge and Chattanooga-based Serodino, Inc., provide barge shipping services to and from the city.


title: Knoxville, Tennessee

text: Recreational craft that frequent the river include small johnboats, fishing boats and yachts. Boat slips and a marina are located at Volunteer Landing in the Downtown area. The VOL Navy, a flotilla of several dozen boats, swarms the river during weeks when the U.T. football team plays at Neyland Stadium. Cruise lines operating in the city include the "Volunteer Princess", a luxury yacht, and the "Star of Knoxville", a paddlewheel riverboat.


title: Atacama Desert

text: The Atacama Desert () is a desert plateau in South America covering a 1,600 km (990 mi) strip of land on the Pacific coast, west of the Andes Mountains. The Atacama Desert is the driest nonpolar desert in the world, and the second driest overall, just behind some very specific spots within the McMurdo Dry Valleys as well as the only hot true desert to receive less precipitation than the polar deserts, and the largest fog desert in the world. Both regions have been used as experimentation sites on Earth for Mars expedition simulations. The Atacama Desert occupies , or if the barren lower slopes of the Andes are included. Most of the desert is composed of stony terrain, salt lakes ("salares"), sand, and felsic lava that flows towards the Andes.


title: Atacama Desert

text: The desert owes its extreme aridity to a constant temperature inversion due to the cool north-flowing Humboldt ocean current and to the presence of the strong Pacific anticyclone. The most arid region of the Atacama Desert is situated between two mountain chains (the Andes and the Chilean Coast Range) of sufficient height to prevent moisture advection from either the Pacific or the Atlantic Ocean, a two-sided rain shadow.


title: Atacama Desert

text: Despite modern views of the Atacama Desert as fully devoid of vegetation, in pre-Columbian and colonial times a large flatland area there known as Pampa del Tamarugal was a woodland, but demand for firewood associated with silver and saltpeter mining in the 18th and 19th centuries resulted in widespread deforestation.


title: Atacama Desert

text: According to the World Wide Fund for Nature, the Atacama Desert ecoregion occupies a continuous strip for nearly 1,600 km (1,000 mi) along the narrow coast of the northern third of Chile, from near Arica (18°24′S) southward to near La Serena (29°55′S). The National Geographic Society considers the coastal area of southern Peru to be part of the Atacama Desert and includes the deserts south of the Ica Region in Peru. However, other sources consider that the part of the desert in Peru is a different ecosystem, and should properly be named as Pampas de la Joya desert.


title: Atacama Desert

text: Peru borders it on the north and the Chilean Matorral ecoregion borders it on the south. To the east lies the less arid Central Andean dry puna ecoregion. The drier portion of this ecoregion is located south of the Loa River between the parallel Sierra Vicuña Mackenna and Cordillera Domeyko. To the north of the Loa lies the Pampa del Tamarugal.


title: Atacama Desert

text: The Coastal Cliff of northern Chile west of the Chilean Coast Range is the main topographical feature of the coast. The geomorphology of the Atacama Desert has been characterized as a low-relief bench "similar to a giant uplifted terrace" by Armijo and co-workers. The intermediate depression (or Central Valley) forms a series of endorheic basins in much of the Atacama Desert south of latitude 19°30'S. North of this latitude, the intermediate depression drains into the Pacific Ocean.


title: Atacama Desert

text: On 25 March 2015, heavy rainfall affected the southern part of the Atacama Desert. Resulting floods triggered mudflows that affected the cities of Copiapo, Tierra Amarilla, Chanaral, and Diego de Almagro, causing the deaths of more than 100 people.


title: Atacama Desert

text: The Atacama Desert is commonly known as the driest place in the world, especially the surroundings of the abandoned Yungay mining town, where the University of Antofagasta Desert Research Station is located, in Antofagasta Region, Chile. The average rainfall is about per year, although some locations receive in a year. Moreover, some weather stations in the Atacama have never received rain. Periods up to four years have been registered with no rainfall in the central sector, delimited by the cities of Antofagasta, Calama, and Copiapó, in Chile. Evidence suggests that the Atacama may not have had any significant rainfall from 1570 to 1971.


title: Atacama Desert

text: The Atacama Desert may be the oldest desert on earth, and has experienced hyperaridity since at least the Middle Miocene, though punctuated by intervals of increased humidity, such as between around 10.86 and 6.4 Ma, when the Tiliviche Palaeolake existed before turning into a salar sometime before the Middle Pliocene. The long history of aridity raises the possibility that supergene mineralisation, under the appropriate conditions, can form in arid environments, instead of requiring humid conditions. The presence of evaporite formations suggest that in some sections of the Atacama Desert, arid conditions have persisted for the last 200 million years (since the Triassic).


title: Atacama Desert

text: The Atacama is so arid that many mountains higher than are completely free of glaciers. Only the highest peaks (such as Ojos del Salado, Monte Pissis, and Llullaillaco) have some permanent snow coverage.


title: Atacama Desert

text: The southern part of the desert, between 25° and 27°S, may have been glacier-free throughout the Quaternary (including during glaciations), though permafrost extends down to an altitude of and is continuous above . Studies by a group of British scientists have suggested that some river beds have been dry for 120,000 years. However, some locations in the Atacama receive a marine fog known locally as the "camanchaca", providing sufficient moisture for hypolithic algae, lichens, and even some cacti—the genus "Copiapoa" is notable among these.


title: Atacama Desert

text: Geographically, the aridity of the Atacama is explained by its being situated between two mountain chains (the Andes and the Chilean Coast Range) of sufficient height to prevent moisture advection from either the Pacific or the Atlantic Oceans, a two-sided rain shadow.


title: Atacama Desert

text: In June 1991, Antofagasta and Taltal and inland regions as far as Calama received unusual rainfall leading to formation of a series of mudflows that killed 91 persons.


title: Atacama Desert

text: In a region about south of Antofagasta, which averages in elevation, the soil has been compared to that of Mars. Owing to its otherworldly appearance, the Atacama has been used as a location for filming Mars scenes, most notably in the television series "".


title: Atacama Desert

text: In 2003, a team of researchers published a report in which they duplicated the tests used by the "Viking 1 "and" Viking 2" Mars landers to detect life and were unable to detect any signs in Atacama Desert soil in the region of Yungay. The region may be unique on Earth in this regard and is being used by NASA to test instruments for future Mars missions. The team duplicated the Viking tests in Mars-like Earth environments and found that they missed present signs of life in soil samples from Antarctic dry valleys, the Atacama Desert of Chile and Peru, and other locales.


title: Atacama Desert

text: However, in 2014, a new hyperarid site was reported, María Elena South, which was much drier than Yungay and, thus, a better Mars-like environment.


title: Atacama Desert

text: In 2008, the "Phoenix Mars Lander" detected perchlorates on the surface of Mars at the same site where water was first discovered. Perchlorates are also found in the Atacama and associated nitrate deposits have contained organics, leading to speculation that signs of life on Mars are not incompatible with perchlorates. The Atacama is also a testing site for the NASA-funded Earth–Mars Cave Detection Program.


title: Atacama Desert

text: In spite of the geographic and climatic conditions of the desert, a rich variety of flora has evolved there. Over 500 species have been gathered within the border of this desert. These species are characterized by their extraordinary ability to adapt to this extreme environment. The most common species are herbs and flowers such as thyme, llareta, and saltgrass ("Distichlis spicata"), and where humidity is sufficient, trees such as the chañar ("Geoffroea decorticans"), the pimiento tree, and the leafy algarrobo ("Prosopis chilensis").


title: Atacama Desert

text: The llareta is one of the highest-growing wood species in the world. It is found at altitudes between . Its dense form is similar to a pillow some thick. It concentrates and retains the heat from the day to cope with low evening temperatures. The growth rate of the llareta has been recently estimated at about , making many llaretas over 3,000 years old. It produces a much-prized resin, which the mining industry once harvested indiscriminately as fuel, making this plant endangered.


title: Atacama Desert

text: The desert is also home to cacti, succulents, and other plants that thrive in a dry climate. Cactus species here include the candelabro ("Browningia candelaris") and cardon ("Echinopsis atacamensis"), which can reach a height of and a diameter of .


title: Atacama Desert

text: The Atacama Desert flowering (Spanish: "desierto florido") can be seen from September to November in years with sufficient precipitation, as happened in 2015.


title: Atacama Desert

text: The climate of the Atacama Desert limits the number of animals living permanently in this extreme ecosystem. Some parts of the desert are so arid, no plant or animal life can survive. Outside of these extreme areas, sand-colored grasshoppers blend with pebbles on the desert floor, and beetles and their larvae provide a valuable food source in the "lomas" (hills). Desert wasps and butterflies can be found during the warm and humid season, especially on the lomas. Red scorpions also live in the desert.


title: Atacama Desert

text: A unique environment is provided by some "lomas", where the fog from the ocean provides enough moisture for seasonal plants and a few animal species. Surprisingly few reptile species inhabit the desert and even fewer amphibian species. "Chaunus atacamensis", the Vallenar toad or Atacama toad, lives on the "lomas", where it lays eggs in permanent ponds or streams. Iguanians and lava lizards inhabit parts of the desert, while salt flat lizards, "Liolaemus", live in the dry areas bordering the ocean. One species, "Liolaemus fabiani", is endemic to the Salar de Atacama, the Atacama salt flat.


title: Atacama Desert

text: Birds are one of the most diverse animal groups in the Atacama. Humboldt penguins live year-round along the coast, nesting in desert cliffs overlooking the ocean. Inland, high-altitude salt flats are inhabited by Andean flamingos, while Chilean flamingos can be seen along the coast. Other birds (including species of hummingbirds and rufous-collared sparrow) visit the "lomas" seasonally to feed on insects, nectar, seeds, and flowers. The "lomas" help sustain several threatened species, such as the endangered Chilean woodstar.


title: Atacama Desert

text: Because of the desert's extreme aridity, only a few specially adapted mammal species live in the Atacama, such as Darwin's leaf-eared mouse. The less arid parts of the desert are inhabited by the South American gray fox and the viscacha (a relative of the chinchilla). Larger animals, such as guanacos and vicuñas, graze in areas where grass grows, mainly because it is seasonally irrigated by melted snow. Vicuñas need to remain near a steady water supply, while guanacos can roam into more arid areas and survive longer without fresh water. South American fur seals and South American sea lions often gather along the coast.


title: Atacama Desert

text: The Atacama is sparsely populated, with most towns located along the Pacific coast. In interior areas, oases and some valleys have been populated for millennia and were the location of the most advanced pre-Columbian societies found in Chile.


title: Atacama Desert

text: The Chinchorro culture developed in the Atacama Desert area from 7000 BCE to 1500 BCE. These peoples were sedentary fishermen inhabiting mostly coastal areas. Their presence is found from today's towns of Ilo, in southern Peru, to Antofagasta in northern Chile. Presence of fresh water in the arid region on the coast facilitated human settlement in these areas. The Chinchorro were famous for their detailed mummification and funerary practices.


title: Atacama Desert

text: San Pedro de Atacama, at about elevation, is like many of the small towns. Before the Inca Empire and prior to the arrival of the Spanish, the extremely arid interior was inhabited primarily by the Atacameño tribe. They are noted for building fortified towns called "pucarás", one of which is located a few kilometers from San Pedro de Atacama. The town's church was built by the Spanish in 1577.


title: Atacama Desert

text: The oasis settlement of Pica has Pre-hispanic origins and served as an important stopover for transit between the coast and the Altiplano during the time of the Inca Empire.


title: Atacama Desert

text: The coastal cities originated in the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries during the time of the Spanish Empire, when they emerged as shipping ports for silver produced in Potosí and other mining centers.


title: Atacama Desert

text: During the 19th century, the desert came under control of Bolivia, Chile, and Peru. With the discovery of sodium nitrate deposits and as a result of unclear borders, the area soon became a zone of conflict and resulted in the War of the Pacific. Chile annexed most of the desert, and cities along the coast developed into international ports, hosting many Chilean workers who migrated there.


title: Atacama Desert

text: With the guano and saltpeter booms of the 19th century, the population grew immensely, mostly as a result of immigration from central Chile. In the 20th century, the nitrate industry declined and at the same time, the largely male population of the desert became increasingly problematic for the Chilean state. Miners and mining companies came into conflict, and protests spread throughout the region.


title: Atacama Desert

text: Around 1900, there were irrigation system of puquios spread through the oases of Atacama Desert. Puquios are known from the valleys of Azapa and Sibaya and the oases of La Calera, Pica-Matilla and Puquio de Núñez. In 1918, geologist Juan Brüggen mentioned the existence of 23 "socavones" (shafts) in the Pica oasis, yet these have since been abandoned due to economic and social changes.


title: Atacama Desert

text: The desert has rich deposits of copper and other minerals and the world's largest natural supply of sodium nitrate (Chile saltpeter), which was mined on a large scale until the early 1940s. The Atacama border dispute over these resources between Chile and Bolivia began in the 19th century and resulted in the War of the Pacific.


title: Atacama Desert

text: The desert is littered with about 170 abandoned nitrate (or "saltpeter") mining towns, almost all of which were shut down decades after the invention of synthetic nitrate in Germany in the first decade of the 20th century (see Haber process). The towns include Chacabuco, Humberstone, Santa Laura, Pedro de Valdivia, Puelma, María Elena, and Oficina Anita.


title: Atacama Desert

text: The Atacama Desert is rich in metallic mineral resources such as copper, gold, silver and iron, as well as nonmetallic minerals including important deposits of boron, lithium, sodium nitrate, and potassium salts. The Salar de Atacama is where bischofite is extracted. These resources are exploited by various mining companies such as Codelco, Lomas Bayas, Mantos Blancos, and Soquimich.


title: Atacama Desert

text: Because of its high altitude, nearly nonexistent cloud cover, dry air, and freedom from light pollution and radio interference from widely populated cities and towns, this desert is one of the best places in the world to conduct astronomical observations. Hundreds of thousands of stars can be viewed via telescope since the desert experiences more than 200 cloudless nights each year. A number of telescopes have been installed to help astronomers from across the globe study the universe. A radio astronomy telescope, called the Atacama Large Millimeter Array, built by European countries, Japan, the United States, Canada, and Chile in the Llano de Chajnantor Observatory officially opened on 3 October 2011. A number of radio astronomy projects, such as the CBI, the ASTE and the ACT, among others, have been operating in the Chajnantor area since 1999. On 26 April 2010, the ESO council decided to build a fourth site, Cerro Armazones, to be home to the Extremely Large Telescope. Construction work at the ELT site started in June 2014.


title: Atacama Desert

text: The European Southern Observatory operates three major observatories in the Atacama and is currently building a fourth:


title: Atacama Desert

text: The Atacama Desert is popular with all-terrain sports enthusiasts. Various championships have taken place here, including the Lower Atacama Rally, Lower Chile Rally, Patagonia-Atacama Rally, and the latter Dakar Rally's editions. The rally was organized by the Amaury Sport Organisation and held in 2009, 2010, 2011, and 2012. The dunes of the desert are ideal rally races located in the outskirts of the city of Copiapó. The 2013 Dakar 15-Day Rally started on 5 January in Lima, Peru, through Chile, Argentina and back to Chile finishing in Santiago. Visitors also use the Atacama Desert sand dunes for sandboarding (Spanish: "duna").


title: Atacama Desert

text: A week-long foot race called the Atacama Crossing has the competitors cross the various landscapes of the Atacama.


title: Atacama Desert

text: Eighteen solar powered cars were displayed in front of the presidential palace ("La Moneda") in Santiago in November 2012. The cars were then raced through the desert from 15–19 November 2012.


title: Atacama Desert

text: Most people who go to tour the sites in the desert stay in the town of San Pedro de Atacama. The Atacama Desert is in the top three tourist locations in Chile. The specially commissioned ESO hotel is reserved for astronomers and scientists.


title: Atacama Desert

text: About 80 geysers occur in a valley about 80 km from the town of San Pedro de Atacama. They are closer to the town of Chiu Chiu.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: Norman Percevel Rockwell (February 3, 1894 – November 8, 1978) was an American painter and illustrator. His works have a broad popular appeal in the United States for their reflection of the country's culture. Rockwell is most famous for the cover illustrations of everyday life he created for "The Saturday Evening Post" magazine over nearly five decades. Among the best-known of Rockwell's works are the "Willie Gillis" series, "Rosie the Riveter",


title: Norman Rockwell

text: "The Problem We All Live With", "Saying Grace", and the "Four Freedoms" series. He is also noted for his 64-year relationship with the Boy Scouts of America (BSA), during which he produced covers for their publication "Boys' Life", calendars, and other illustrations. These works include popular images that reflect the "Scout Oath" and "Scout Law" such as "The Scoutmaster", "A Scout Is Reverent" and "A Guiding Hand", among many others.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: Rockwell was a prolific artist, producing more than 4,000 original works in his lifetime. Most of his surviving works are in public collections. Rockwell was also commissioned to illustrate more than 40 books, including "Tom Sawyer" and "Huckleberry Finn" as well as painting the portraits for Presidents Eisenhower, Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon, as well as those of foreign figures, including Gamal Abdel Nasser and Jawaharlal Nehru. His portrait subjects included Judy Garland. One of his last portraits was of Colonel Sanders in 1973. His annual contributions for the Boy Scouts calendars between 1925 and 1976 (Rockwell was a 1939 recipient of the Silver Buffalo Award, the highest adult award given by the Boy Scouts of America), were only slightly overshadowed by his most popular of calendar works: the "Four Seasons" illustrations for Brown & Bigelow that were published for 17 years beginning in 1947 and reproduced in various styles and sizes since 1964. He created artwork for advertisements for Coca-Cola, Jell-O, General Motors, Scott Tissue, and other companies. Illustrations for booklets, catalogs, posters (particularly movie promotions), sheet music, stamps, playing cards, and murals (including "Yankee Doodle Dandy" and "God Bless the Hills", which was completed in 1936 for the Nassau Inn in Princeton, New Jersey) rounded out Rockwell's oeuvre as an illustrator.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: Rockwell's work was dismissed by serious art critics in his lifetime. Many of his works appear overly sweet in the opinion of modern critics, especially the "Saturday Evening Post" covers, which tend toward idealistic or sentimentalized portrayals of American life. This has led to the often deprecatory adjective "Rockwellesque". Consequently, Rockwell is not considered a "serious painter" by some contemporary artists, who regard his work as bourgeois and kitsch. Writer Vladimir Nabokov stated that Rockwell's brilliant technique was put to "banal" use, and wrote in his novel "Pnin": "That Dalí is really Norman Rockwell's twin brother by in babyhood." He is called an "illustrator" instead of an artist by some critics, a designation he did not mind, as that was what he called himself.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: In his later years, however, Rockwell began receiving more attention as a painter when he chose more serious subjects such as the series on racism for "Look" magazine. One example of this more serious work is "The Problem We All Live With", which dealt with the issue of school racial integration. The painting depicts Ruby Bridges, flanked by white federal marshals, walking to school past a wall defaced by racist graffiti. This 1964 painting was displayed in the White House when Bridges met with President Barack Obama in 2011.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: Norman Rockwell was born on February 3, 1894, in New York City, to Jarvis Waring Rockwell and Anne Mary "Nancy" Rockwell, born Hill. His father was a Presbyterian and his mother was an Episcopalian; two years after their engagement, he converted to the Episcopal faith. His earliest American ancestor was John Rockwell (1588–1662), from Somerset, England, who immigrated to colonial North America, probably in 1635, aboard the ship "Hopewell" and became one of the first settlers of Windsor, Connecticut. He had one brother, Jarvis Waring Rockwell Jr., older by a year and a half. Jarvis Waring Sr. was the manager of the New York office of a Philadelphia textile firm, George Wood, Sons & Company, where he spent his entire career.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: Rockwell transferred from high school to the Chase Art School at the age of 14. He then went on to the National Academy of Design and finally to the Art Students League. There, he was taught by Thomas Fogarty, George Bridgman, and Frank Vincent DuMond; his early works were produced for "St. Nicholas Magazine", the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) magazine "Boys' Life", and other youth publications. As a student, Rockwell had some small jobs, including one as a supernumerary at the Metropolitan Opera. His first major artistic job came at age 18, illustrating Carl H. Claudy's book "Tell Me Why: Stories about Mother Nature".


title: Norman Rockwell

text: After that, Rockwell was hired as a staff artist for "Boys' Life". In this role, he received 50 dollars' compensation each month for one completed cover and a set of story illustrations. It is said to have been his first paying job as an artist. At 19, he became the art editor for "Boys' Life", published by the Boy Scouts of America. He held the job for three years, during which he painted several covers, beginning with his first published magazine cover, "Scout at Ship's Wheel", which appeared on the "Boys' Life" September 1913 edition.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: Rockwell's family moved to New Rochelle, New York, when Norman was 21 years old. They shared a studio with the cartoonist Clyde Forsythe, who worked for "The Saturday Evening Post". With Forsythe's help, Rockwell submitted his first successful cover painting to the "Post" in 1916, "Mother's Day Off" (published on May 20). He followed that success with "Circus Barker and Strongman" (published on June 3), "Gramps at the Plate" (August 5), "Redhead Loves Hatty Perkins" (September 16), "People in a Theatre Balcony" (October 14), and "Man Playing Santa" (December 9). Rockwell was published eight times on the "Post" cover within the first year. Ultimately, Rockwell published 323 original covers for "The Saturday Evening Post" over 47 years. His "Sharp Harmony" appeared on the cover of the issue dated September 26, 1936; it depicts a barber and three clients, enjoying an a cappella song. The image was adopted by SPEBSQSA in its promotion of the art.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: Rockwell's success on the cover of the "Post" led to covers for other magazines of the day, most notably the "Literary Digest", the "Country Gentleman", "Leslie's Weekly", "Judge", "Peoples Popular Monthly" and "Life" magazine.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: When Rockwell's tenure began with "The Saturday Evening Post" in 1916, he left his salaried position at "Boys' Life", but continued to include scouts in "Post" cover images and the monthly magazine of the "American Red Cross". He resumed work with the Boy Scouts of America in 1926 with production of his first of fifty-one original illustrations for the official Boy Scouts of America annual calendar, which still may be seen in the "Norman Rockwell Art Gallery" at the National Scouting Museum in Cimarron, New Mexico.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: During World War I, he tried to enlist into the U.S. Navy but was refused entry because, at , he was eight pounds underweight for someone tall. To compensate, he spent one night gorging himself on bananas, liquids and doughnuts, and weighed enough to enlist the next day. He was given the role of a military artist, however, and did not see any action during his tour of duty.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: In 1943, during World War II, Rockwell painted the "Four Freedoms" series, which was completed in seven months and resulted in him losing fifteen pounds. The series was inspired by a speech by Franklin D. Roosevelt, wherein Roosevelt described and articulated Four Freedoms for universal rights. Rockwell then painted "Freedom from Want", "Freedom of Speech", "Freedom of Worship" and "Freedom from Fear".


title: Norman Rockwell

text: The paintings were published in 1943 by "The Saturday Evening Post". Rockwell used the Pennell shipbuilding family from Brunswick, Maine as models for two of the paintings, "Freedom from Want" and "A Thankful Mother", and would combine models from photographs and his own vision to create his idealistic paintings. The United States Department of the Treasury later promoted war bonds by exhibiting the originals in sixteen cities. Rockwell considered "Freedom of Speech" to be the best of the four.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: That same year, a fire in his studio destroyed numerous original paintings, costumes, and props. Because the period costumes and props were irreplaceable, the fire split his career into two phases, the second phase depicting modern characters and situations. Rockwell was contacted by writer Elliott Caplin, brother of cartoonist Al Capp, with the suggestion that the three of them should make a daily comic strip together, with Caplin and his brother writing and Rockwell drawing. King Features Syndicate is reported to have promised a $1,000 per week deal, knowing that a Capp–Rockwell collaboration would gain strong public interest. The project was ultimately aborted, however, as it turned out that Rockwell, known for his perfectionism as an artist, could not deliver material so quickly as would be required of him for a daily comic strip.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: During the late 1940s, Norman Rockwell spent the winter months as artist-in-residence at Otis College of Art and Design. Occasionally, students were models for his "Saturday Evening Post" covers. In 1949, Rockwell donated an original "Post" cover, "April Fool", to be raffled off in a library fund raiser.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: In 1959, after his wife Mary died suddenly from a heart attack, Rockwell took time off from his work to grieve. It was during that break that he and his son Thomas produced Rockwell's autobiography, "My Adventures as an Illustrator", which was published in 1960. The "Post" printed excerpts from this book in eight consecutive issues, the first containing Rockwell's famous "Triple Self-Portrait".


title: Norman Rockwell

text: Rockwell's last painting for the "Post" was published in 1963, marking the end of a publishing relationship that had included 321 cover paintings. He spent the next 10 years painting for "Look" magazine, where his work depicted his interests in civil rights, poverty, and space exploration.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: In 1966, Rockwell was invited to Hollywood to paint portraits of the stars of the film "Stagecoach", and also found himself appearing as an extra in the film, playing a "mangy old gambler".


title: Norman Rockwell

text: In 1968, Rockwell was commissioned to do an album cover portrait of Mike Bloomfield and Al Kooper for their record, "The Live Adventures of Mike Bloomfield and Al Kooper".


title: Norman Rockwell

text: In 1969, as a tribute on the 75th anniversary of Rockwell's birth, officials of Brown & Bigelow and the Boy Scouts of America asked Rockwell to pose in "Beyond the Easel", the calendar illustration that year.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: His last commission for the Boy Scouts of America was a calendar illustration entitled "The Spirit of 1976", which was completed when Rockwell was 82, concluding a partnership which generated 471 images for periodicals, guidebooks, calendars, and promotional materials. His connection to the BSA spanned 64 years, marking the longest professional association of his career. His legacy and style for the BSA has been carried on by Joseph Csatari.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: For "vivid and affectionate portraits of our country", Rockwell was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the United States of America's highest civilian honor, in 1977 by President Gerald Ford. Rockwell's son, Jarvis, accepted the award.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: Rockwell died on November 8, 1978, of emphysema at age 84 in his Stockbridge, Massachusetts, home. First Lady Rosalynn Carter attended his funeral.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: Rockwell married his first wife, Irene O'Connor, on July 1, 1916. Irene was Rockwell's model in "Mother Tucking Children into Bed", published on the cover of The "Literary Digest" on January 19, 1921. The couple divorced on January 13, 1930.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: Depressed, he moved briefly to Alhambra, California as a guest of his old friend Clyde Forsythe. There he painted some of his best-known paintings including "The Doctor and the Doll". While there he met and married schoolteacher Mary Barstow on April 17, 1930. The couple returned to New York shortly after their marriage. They had three children: Jarvis Waring, Thomas Rhodes, and Peter Barstow. The family lived at 24 Lord Kitchener Road in the Bonnie Crest neighborhood of New Rochelle, New York.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: Rockwell and his wife were not regular church attendees, although they were members of St. John's Wilmot Church, an Episcopal church near their home, where their sons were baptized. Rockwell moved to Arlington, Vermont, in 1939 where his work began to reflect small-town life. He would later be joined by his good friend, John Carlton Atherton.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: In 1953, the Rockwell family moved to Stockbridge, Massachusetts, so that his wife could be treated at the Austen Riggs Center, a psychiatric hospital at 25 Main Street, close to where Rockwell set up his studio. Rockwell also received psychiatric treatment, seeing the analyst Erik Erikson, who was on staff at Riggs. Erikson told biographer Laura Claridge that he painted his happiness, but did not live it. On August 25, 1959, Mary died unexpectedly of a heart attack.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: Rockwell married his third wife, retired Milton Academy English teacher, Mary Leete "Mollie" Punderson (1896–1985), on October 25, 1961. His Stockbridge studio was located on the second floor of a row of buildings. Directly underneath Rockwell's studio was, for a time in 1966, the Back Room Rest, better known as the famous "Alice's Restaurant". During his time in Stockbridge, chief of police William Obanhein was a frequent model for Rockwell's paintings.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: From 1961 until his death, Rockwell was a member of the Monday Evening Club, a men's literary group based in Pittsfield, Massachusetts. At his funeral, five members of the club served as pallbearers, along with Jarvis Rockwell.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: A custodianship of his original paintings and drawings was established with Rockwell's help near his home in Stockbridge, Massachusetts, and the Norman Rockwell Museum still is open today year-round. The museum's collection includes more than 700 original Rockwell paintings, drawings, and studies. The Rockwell Center for American Visual Studies at the Norman Rockwell Museum is a national research institute dedicated to American illustration art.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: Rockwell's work was exhibited at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in 2001. Rockwell's "Breaking Home Ties" sold for $15.4 million at a 2006 Sotheby's auction. A 12-city U.S. tour of Rockwell's works took place in 2008.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: In 2008, Rockwell was named the official state artist of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The 2013 sale of "Saying Grace" for $46 million (including buyer's premium) established a new record price for Rockwell. Rockwell's work was exhibited at the Reading Public Museum and the Church History Museum in 2013–2014.


title: Norman Rockwell

text: He designed an album cover for "The Live Adventures of Mike Bloomfield and Al Kooper" (1969). He was also commissioned by English musician David Bowie to design the cover artwork for his 1975 album "Young Americans", but the offer was retracted after Rockwell informed him he would need at least half a year to complete a painting for the album.


title: Moses Malone

text: Moses Eugene Malone (March 23, 1955 – September 13, 2015) was an American professional basketball player who played in both the American Basketball Association (ABA) and the National Basketball Association (NBA) from 1974 through 1995. A center, he was named the NBA Most Valuable Player (MVP) three times, was a 12-time NBA All-Star and an eight-time All-NBA Team selection. Malone led the Philadelphia 76ers to an NBA championship in 1983, winning both the league and Finals MVP. He was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility in 2001. Widely regarded as one of the greatest players in the sport's history, Malone is also seen as one of the most underrated NBA players.


title: Moses Malone

text: Malone began his professional career out of high school after he was selected in the third round of the 1974 ABA draft by the Utah Stars. He was named an ABA All-Star as a rookie and played two seasons in the league until it merged with the NBA in 1976. He landed in the NBA with the Buffalo Braves, who traded him after two games to the Houston Rockets. Malone became a five-time All-Star in six seasons with the Rockets. After leading the NBA in rebounding in 1979, he was named league MVP for the first time. He led the Rockets to the NBA Finals in 1981, and won his second MVP award in 1982. Traded to Philadelphia the following season, he repeated as MVP and led the 76ers to the 1983 championship. In his first of two stints with Philadelphia, he was an All-Star in each of his four seasons. Following another trade, Malone was an All-Star in his only two seasons with the then Washington Bullets (today's Wizards). He signed as a free agent with the Atlanta Hawks, earning his 12th straight and final NBA All-Star selection in his first season. In his later years, he played with the Milwaukee Bucks before returning to the 76ers and completing his career with the San Antonio Spurs.


title: Moses Malone

text: Malone was a tireless and physical player who led the NBA in rebounding six times, including a then-record five straight seasons (1981–1985). Nicknamed the "Chairman of the Boards" for his rebounding prowess, he finished his career as the all-time leader in offensive rebounds after leading both the ABA and NBA in the category a combined nine times. Combining his ABA and NBA statistics, Malone ranks ninth all-time in career points (29,580) and third in total rebounds (17,834). He was named to the ABA All-Time Team along with the NBA's 50th and 75th anniversary teams.


title: Moses Malone

text: Malone was born in Petersburg, Virginia. He was an only child, raised primarily by his mother, Mary, who had dropped out of school after finishing the fifth grade. When Malone was two years old, Mary forced her husband to move out of their home due to his Malone's father then moved


title: Moses Malone

text: Malone attended Petersburg High School, where he played basketball for the school's Crimson Wave. The team went undefeated in his final two years, winning 50 games and back-to-back Virginia state championships. Malone signed a letter of intent to play college basketball for the University of Maryland under head coach Lefty Driesell.


title: Moses Malone

text: After the Utah Stars of the American Basketball Association (ABA) selected him in the third round of the 1974 ABA Draft, Malone decided to become becoming the first player in modern professional basketball to enter directly from high school. He began his professional career with Utah in the 1974–75 season after signing a five-year contract worth At and a somewhat skinny at the Malone began his pro career playing at forward until he bulked up enough to handle the rigors at center. As a rookie, he was named an ABA All-Star and earned ABA All-Rookie In the 1975 ABA Playoffs, Malone averaged 22.7 points, 17.5 rebounds, and 1.5 blocks per game during a first round loss to the Denver Nuggets.


title: Moses Malone

text: The Stars folded 16 games into the 1975–76 season, and Malone was sold to the ABA's Spirits of St. Louis to help pay down the Stars' debts, alongside Utah Teammates Ron Boone, Randy Denton, and Steve Green. He played for the Spirits for the remainder of the 1975–76 season, and they did not make the playoffs and finished with a 35-49 record. In two seasons in the ABA, Malone averaged 17.2 points and 12.9 rebounds per game.


title: Moses Malone

text: The ABA–NBA merger occurred after the 1975–76 season, but the Spirits of St. Louis were not among the ABA teams chosen to join the NBA. Malone had already been selected by the NBA's New Orleans Jazz in a December 1975 pre-merger draft for ABA players of undergraduate age. However, the NBA let them place Malone into the 1976 ABA Dispersal Draft pool in exchange for the return of their first-round draft pick in 1977, which they used to trade for Gail Goodrich. In the 1976 dispersal draft, held for the remaining ABA players, Malone was selected by the Portland Trail Blazers with the fifth overall pick.


title: Moses Malone

text: The Blazers, who had also acquired power forward Maurice Lucas in the draft, chose Malone for trading purposes. With a frontline of Lucas, Bill Walton and Lloyd Neal, Portland figured Malone would see little action. They traded him to the Buffalo Braves prior to the first game of the 1976–77 season for a first-round draft choice in the 1978 NBA draft and $232,000. Malone played in two games with Buffalo. Because they could not meet Malone's demands for playing time, they then traded him to the Houston Rockets in exchange for first-round draft picks in the 1977 and 1978 drafts.


title: Moses Malone

text: With the Houston Rockets, Malone played forward opposite Rudy Tomjanovich. He appeared in 82 games overall for both Buffalo and Houston and finished the season averaging 13.2 points per game (ppg) with 13.1 rebounds per game (rpg), ranking third in rpg. Malone set a then-NBA record with 437 offensive rebounds in a season, going on to surpass the mark two years later. Malone also blocked 2.21 shots per game, the seventh-most in the league. In the second game of the Eastern Conference Semifinals against the Washington Bullets, Malone recorded 15 offensive rebounds in the overtime win, setting an NBA playoff record. The Rockets reached the Eastern Conference Finals, where they lost 4–2 to the Philadelphia 76ers, his future team.


title: Moses Malone

text: During his second season in the NBA, Malone was diagnosed with a stress fracture in his right foot, which caused him to miss the final 23 games. Despite the time missed to injury, Malone led the NBA with 380 total offensive rebounds and finished second with 15.0 rpg. His scoring improved to 19.4 ppg, and he made his first appearance in an NBA All-Star Game in 1978.


title: Moses Malone

text: During the 1978–79 season, Malone emerged as one of the top centers in the league after gaining in the offseason. He averaged 24.8 points with a career-best .540 shooting percentage and established another career high with a league-leading 17.6 rpg while winning the NBA Most Valuable Player Award. He again led the league in offensive rebounds, setting an all-time single-season record with 587 offensive rebounds. He was voted to the All-NBA First Team and the All-Defensive Second Team. He was also voted by fans to start for the East at center in the 1979 NBA All-Star Game. On February 9, he grabbed a career-high 37 rebounds versus the New Orleans Jazz. Although the Rockets qualified for the playoffs, they were eliminated by the Atlanta Hawks in a first-round sweep. Malone averaged 24.5 points and 20.5 rebounds in the two games.


title: Moses Malone

text: In 1979–80, Malone averaged 25.8 points, fifth-best in the NBA, and 14.5 rebounds, second-best in the league. He was named an All-Star for a third straight season and was also named to the All-NBA Second Team. In the opening round of the playoffs, Houston defeated the San Antonio Spurs in a best-of-three series. Malone registered 37 points and 20 rebounds in the deciding third game, leading the Rockets to a 141–120 victory. In the conference semifinals, the Rockets lost in a sweep to the Boston Celtics.


title: Moses Malone

text: In the 1980–81 season, Malone led the league with 14.8 rpg in 80 games and was again an All-Star as well as a member of the All-NBA Second Team. He finished second in scoring (28.8) to Adrian Dantley (30.7). On March 11, Malone scored 51 points against the Golden State Warriors. That postseason, Malone advanced the Rockets to the 1981 NBA Finals, by scoring 36 points and grabbing 11 rebounds in a decisive Game 5 Western Conference Finals win over the Kansas City Kings. In the finals, despite Malone averaging 22.3 points, 15.7 rebounds, and 2.2 blocks a game, he and the Rockets lost in six games to the Boston Celtics.


title: Moses Malone

text: In their first season in the Midwest Division, Houston and the Kansas City Kings tied for second place with identical 40–42 records. During the 1981-82 NBA season, Malone averaged 31.1 points with 14.7 rebounds and won his second MVP award. He repeated as the NBA leader in rebounds and was the runner-up for the league's scoring title to George Gervin (32.3). He was also the league leader in offensive rebounds (558) and minutes played (3,398, 42.0 per game). At the end of the season Malone earned his second placement on the All-NBA First Team. He set a career-high in scoring average and also set a single-game career-high with 53 points on February 2 against the San Diego Clippers. Nine days later, on February 11 against the Seattle SuperSonics, Malone eclipsed his own league record with 21 offensive rebounds. In Malone's last season in Houston the Rockets followed their NBA Finals appearance in 1981 with a first-round exit in the 1982 playoffs. Though he averaged 24.0 points with 17.0 rebounds, Seattle defeated Houston 2–1.


title: Moses Malone

text: Malone became a restricted free agent after the 1981–82 season. He signed an offer sheet of six-years for $13.2 million with the Philadelphia 76ers on September 2, 1982. The 76ers were coming off a 4–2 loss in the Finals to the Los Angeles Lakers, whose center, Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, outplayed their big-man duo of Darryl Dawkins and Caldwell Jones. The Rockets franchise was sold, and the new owners decided that Malone's $2 million annual salary did not fit their plans. Houston matched the offer and agreed to trade Malone to the 76ers for Jones and their first-round pick in the 1983 NBA draft on September 15. With Julius Erving, Maurice Cheeks, Andrew Toney, and Bobby Jones, the Sixers ran away from the league en route to the NBA championship. Malone was named the league MVP for the second straight year, becoming the only NBA player ever to win the award in consecutive seasons with two different teams, a feat matched only by Barry Bonds (1992–1993) in the four major American sports leagues.


title: Moses Malone

text: That year, Malone averaged 15.3 rebounds per game, which led the league for the third consecutive year, and also averaged 24.5 points, which was fifth-best in the NBA. He was an All-Star for the sixth consecutive season and earned first-team honors on both the All-NBA and All-Defensive teams. The 76ers lost only one game in the postseason as they won the league championship, defeating the Lakers in a 4–0 sweep in the 1983 NBA Finals. In 13 playoff games, Malone averaged 26.0 points with 15.8 rebounds. He was named the Finals MVP, having outrebounded Abdul-Jabbar 72–30 in the series. It was also around this time that Malone began to tutor Hakeem Olajuwon, passing on the torch to the future Rockets superstar.


title: Moses Malone

text: His head coach Billy Cunningham said, "Let's not make believe. The difference from last year was Moses." Before the playoffs began, Malone predicted in Southern vernacular that Philadelphia would go "fo, fo, fo", envisioning a four-game sweep in each of the playoffs' three rounds. His prediction (and its formulation) became famous: "The New York Times" called it "an enduring quotation" and "an unforgettable line," and Comcast SportsNet called it "one of the greatest rallying cries ever uttered." As it transpired, the Sixers only lost one playoff game (Game 4 of the Eastern Conference Finals to the Milwaukee Bucks) en route to making Malone a world champion for the first time, sweeping the Knicks in the first round and the Lakers in the finals. This led to the inside of that year's championship ring being inscribed "fo' fi' fo (four, five, four)." The 76ers' 12–1 cruise through the 1983 playoffs was, at the time, the most dominant playoff run in NBA history.


title: Moses Malone

text: In the 1983–84 season Malone led the league in rebounding with 13.4 rpg. He was limited to 71 games that season due to ankle injuries, his lowest since the 1977–78 season. Malone scored 22.7 ppg in his second season with Philadelphia and was named to the All-NBA Second Team. Malone was selected again for the All-Star Game but he was unable to play because of an ankle injury. During the season he averaged 21.4 points with 13.8 rebounds in five games in the playoffs, but Philadelphia lost in a first-round upset against the New Jersey Nets.


title: Moses Malone

text: The Sixers selected Charles Barkley in the 1984 NBA draft. When he reported to training camp at , Malone began to mentor him, encouraging him to get in better shape. Barkley got down to and made the NBA All-Rookie Team. In the 1984–85 season, Malone recorded 13.1 rpg, leading the NBA in rebounding for a record-setting fifth straight season (since surpassed by Dennis Rodman with seven consecutive seasons). He was voted by a fan ballot to the All-Star team for the eighth time and finished the season with 24.6 ppg, which ranked ninth-best in the league. He received his fourth All-NBA First Team honor and finished third in the NBA Most Valuable Player Award balloting; the award was won by Larry Bird. Malone scored his 15,000th NBA point on November 28, and grabbed his 10,000th NBA rebound on March 29. He scored 51 points against the Detroit Pistons on November 14. The 76ers reached the Eastern Conference Finals in 1985 but were defeated 4–1 by the Celtics.


title: Moses Malone

text: Malone's 1985–86 season ended when he suffered an orbital fracture in his right eye in a March 28 game against the Bucks. Despite hopes that he might return during the playoffs, he was ruled out for the postseason. In the Eastern Conference Semifinals, Philadelphia lost 4–3 to the Bucks. Malone averaged 23.8 points with 11.8 rebounds in 74 appearances that season. He ranked seventh in the league in scoring and fourth in rebounding, ending his five-season streak as the NBA rebounding champion. Malone was named an All-Star, but he was not named to the All-NBA Team, the first time he was not selected since 1978.


title: Moses Malone

text: Shortly after the 1985–86 season, Philadelphia traded Malone, Terry Catledge, and two first-round draft picks to the Washington Bullets in exchange for Jeff Ruland and Clifford T. Robinson. Malone bounced back from an injury-shortened 1985–86 campaign, averaging 24.1 points with 11.3 rebounds. He was named to his 10th consecutive All-Star Game and again was named to the All-NBA Second Team. Malone was the only player to finish in the top 10 in both ppg and rpg; he placed ninth in both categories.


title: Moses Malone

text: Malone scored his 20,000th NBA point on April 12 against the Detroit Pistons. He scored 50 points versus the New Jersey Nets on April 8, joining Earl Monroe (56) and Phil Chenier (52) as the only Bullets players ever to score 50 points in a game. Washington appeared in the postseason but was swept by the Pistons in the first round. Malone averaged 20.7 points and 12.7 rebounds in the series.


title: Moses Malone

text: In his 12th NBA season, Malone ranked eighth in the NBA in rebounding (11.2) and 19th in scoring (20.3). Malone was named to his 11th consecutive All-Star Game in 1988. Malone scored in double figures in 76 of 79 games and recorded 55 double-doubles for the year. The Bullets reached the 1988 NBA Playoffs, but lost to Detroit 3–2 in their first-round series. Malone averaged 18.6 points with 11.2 rebounds in the series.


title: Moses Malone

text: Before the 1988–89 season, Malone agreed to a three-year deal to play with the Atlanta Hawks. The Hawks, featuring Dominique Wilkins, had won at least 50 games in the prior three seasons, and believed the free-agent center was a missing piece to a potential championship team. During the season, Malone averaged 20.2 points with 11.8 rebounds, becoming the first and only player in professional history to average 20 points and 10 rebounds for four different teams. He was voted by a fan ballot to the 1989 NBA All-Star Game, which was his 12th straight and final appearance. Malone reached double figures in points in 75 of his 81 games and recorded double figures in rebounds 55 times. On February 4, 1989, he scored a season-high 37 points against the Phoenix Suns. The Hawks were eliminated in the first round of the playoffs by Milwaukee. In the series, Malone scored 21.0 ppg and had 12.0 rpg.


title: Moses Malone

text: The following season, Malone finished with 18.9 ppg and 10.0 rpg, ending a string of 11 consecutive 20–10 campaigns. Malone led the NBA with 364 offensive rebounds and tied for eighth in rpg. In Mike Fratello's final year as head coach, Atlanta finished with a 41–41 record, failing to qualify for the playoffs. Malone began the 1990–91 season as the Hawks' starting center, but after 15 games, Atlanta's new coach, Bob Weiss, made Jon Koncak the starter and Malone his backup for the final 67 contests.


title: Moses Malone

text: Coming off the bench for the first time in his career, Malone averaged 10.6 points with 8.1 rebounds in 23.3 minutes per game while starting just 18 of 82 games played during the 1990–91 season—all career lows at that point. On November 3, against the Indiana Pacers, Malone became the NBA career leader in free throws made with 7,695, besting the previous record set by Oscar Robertson. On November 21, against the Bucks, Malone scored his 25,000th career point. On March 15, he recorded his 15,000th career rebound against the Dallas Mavericks. Malone surpassed Wilt Chamberlain's mark of consecutive games without fouling out with his 1,046th straight game against the Detroit Pistons on April 19. The Hawks returned to the playoffs but were eliminated in the first round by Detroit, 3–2. In the series, Malone averaged just 4.2 points with 6.2 rebounds.


title: Moses Malone

text: A free agent after the 1990–91 season, Malone signed a two-year contract with the Milwaukee Bucks. Malone was reported to earn $1.6 million in the first season and $2 million for the second season. Malone once again started at center during the 1991–92 season, averaging 15.6 points with 9.1 rebounds while playing in all 82 games. He led the Bucks in rebounding and finished second on the team in scoring. He scored a season-high 30 points twice and grabbed 19 rebounds against the Seattle SuperSonics on March 27. Milwaukee finished with a 31–51 record, tied for last place of the Central Division with the Charlotte Hornets.


title: Moses Malone

text: After one practice in training camp in October 1992, Malone was sidelined due to a herniated disc in his back. After trying to play through the pain, he decided to have surgery in November. Recovery from the surgery caused Malone to miss the majority of the 1992–93 season. He returned to the Bucks on March 27, appearing in 11 games during the remainder of the season. Struggling with the younger players on their roster, the Bucks finished 28–54 and last in the Central Division.


title: Moses Malone

text: The Philadelphia 76ers signed Malone as a free agent in August, so that he could serve as a backup and mentor to rookie Shawn Bradley. Malone appeared in 55 games as a reserve for the 76ers, averaging 5.3 points with 4.1 rebounds.


title: Moses Malone

text: In 1994, Malone signed with the San Antonio Spurs, where he was used as a back-up center to David Robinson. The 1994–95 NBA season was his last in the NBA, and at that time, he was the only remaining active former ABA player. During the final game of his NBA career, against the Charlotte Hornets, he hit a buzzer-beating three-point shot from the opposing free throw line, away from the basket. He played 17 games for the Spurs.


title: Moses Malone

text: Malone stood and weighed . Described as"relentless" and "a force on the boards like no other," he pounded his opponents into submission with ferocious effort and physical play. Nicknamed "Chairman of the Boards" for his rebounding prowess, he was notable for rebounding and scoring off his own misses, possessing the strength, quickness, and zeal to recover the ball before his opponents. This led to some contending he intentionally missed shots to pad his rebounding statistics. He was not a very good passer. When Carroll Dawson, an assistant coach with the Rockets, suggested that Malone needed to improve his passing, he replied, "They ain't paying me to pass."


title: Moses Malone

text: He finished his career with the most combined ABA and NBA offensive rebounds (7,382), 35 percent over runner-up Artis Gilmore. Nine times he led his respective league in offensive rebounds, and five other times he finished in the top three. He also holds NBA records for the most offensive rebounds in a career (6,731), season (587), and game (21). Malone was a 13-time All-Star, and earned eight All-NBA selections, ranking ninth all-time with 29,580 points, and third with 17,834 rebounds. He is one of three players to exceed 28,000 points and 17,000 rebounds. He also ranks second all-time in free throws made (9,018) and attempted (11,864). Malone is one of just eight players who have been named NBA MVP three or more times. He led the league in rebounds six times, including five straight from 1980 through 1985. He was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in his first year of eligibility in 2001. The Rockets retired his No. 24 jersey in 1998, and the 76ers retired his No. 2 on February 8, 2019. In addition to retiring Malone's jersey number, the 76ers also unveiled a statue in front of the team's training facility in Camden, New Jersey.


title: Moses Malone

text: Malone and his wife, Alfreda Gill, had two sons, Moses Eugene Jr. and Michael Malone. Alfreda sued for divorce in September 1991, on the grounds of irreconcilable differences, cruelty, and adultery. She got a restraining order in June 1992, ordering Malone to refrain from contact with her during the course of the lawsuit. At that time, Malone denied allegations that he abused his wife or threatened to kill her. The divorce was granted in October 1992.


title: Moses Malone

text: In January 1993, Malone was arrested driving in Galveston, Texas, across Galveston Bay from his former wife's home, for having violated a peace bond Alfreda had obtained. Her affidavit for its issuance alleged that Malone had stalked her, illegally entered her home in League City, Texas, damaged her property and threatened to kill her. Malone posted bail and was released.


title: Moses Malone

text: Malone dated Leah Nash, whom he had met in 2006, though they did not marry nor live together. They had a son, Micah Francois Malone, who was six years old at the time of Malone's death.


title: Moses Malone

text: Malone died in his sleep from heart disease at the age of 60, on the morning of September 13, 2015, at a hotel in Norfolk, Virginia. He had been scheduled to play in a charity golf tournament that day and was found unresponsive in his room when he did not appear for breakfast or answer his phone. Malone had previously complained of an irregular heartbeat and was reported to have been wearing a heart monitor when he died.


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: Adolf Hitler, dictator of Germany from 1933 to 1945, was also a painter. He produced hundreds of works and sold his paintings and postcards to try to earn a living during his Vienna years (1908–1913). Despite little success professionally, he continued to paint throughout his life.


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: A number of his paintings were recovered after the Second World War and have been sold at auction for tens of thousands of dollars. Others were seized by the United States Army and are still held by its government. General opinion on his work is mixed; it has been criticized as being cold and unfeeling, with many arguing that Hitler had greater talent as an architect, demonstrated by how he addressed architecture in his paintings as compared to other details such as trees or people.


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: Hitler's style was very calculated when representing architecture in his paintings. Instead of progressing in his artistic influence, his works copied the artists of the nineteenth century and other masters. He claimed to be the synthesis of many artistic movements but drew primarily from Greco Roman classicism, the Italian Renaissance, and Neoclassicism. He liked the technical ability of these artists, as well as the comprehensible symbolism. He called Rudolf von Alt his greatest teacher. The two show similar subject matter and use of color, but Alt displays fantastical landscapes giving equal if not more attention to nature and the surrounding environment than to the architecture.


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: In his 1925 autobiography "Mein Kampf", Adolf Hitler described how, in his youth, he wanted to become a professional artist, but his dreams were ruined because he failed the entrance exam of the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna. Hitler was rejected twice by the institute, once in 1907 and again in 1908. In his first examination, he had passed the preliminary portion which was to draw two of the assigned iconic or Biblical scenes, in two sessions of three hours each. The second portion was to provide a previously prepared portfolio for the examiners. It was noted that Hitler's works contained too few heads. The institute considered that he had more talent in architecture than in painting. One of the instructors, sympathetic to his situation and believing he had some talent, suggested that he apply to the academy's School of Architecture. However, that would have required returning to secondary school from which he had dropped out and to which he was unwilling to return.


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: According to a conversation in August 1939 before the outbreak of World War II, published in the British War Blue Book, Hitler told British ambassador Nevile Henderson, "I am an artist and not a politician. Once the Polish question is settled, I want to end my life as an artist."


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: From 1908 to 1913, Hitler tinted postcards and painted houses for a living. He painted his first self-portrait in 1910 at the age of 21. This painting, along with twelve other paintings by Hitler, was discovered by US Army Sergeant Major Willie J. McKenna in 1945 in Essen, Germany.


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: Samuel Morgenstern, an Austrian businessman and a business partner of the young Hitler in his Vienna period, bought many of the young Hitler's paintings. According to Morgenstern, Hitler came to him for the first time at the beginning of the 1910s, either in 1911 or in 1912. When Hitler came to Morgenstern's glazier store for the first time, he offered Morgenstern three of his paintings. Morgenstern kept detailed records of his clientele, through which it was possible to locate the buyers of young Hitler's paintings. It was found that the majority of the buyers were Jewish. An important client of Morgenstern, a lawyer by the name of Josef Feingold, bought a series of paintings by Hitler depicting old Vienna.


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: When Hitler served in World War I at the age of 25 in 1914, he carried fine paper and canvas with him to the front and spent hours of leave time drawing and painting. The works he painted during this period were among his last before he became a politician. The themes of his wartime painting included farmers' houses, the dressing-station, etc.


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: A number of Hitler's paintings were seized by the United States Army (some believed to still be in Germany) at the end of World War II. They were taken to the United States with other captured materials and are still held by the US government, which has declined to allow them to be exhibited. Other paintings were kept by private individuals. In the 2000s, a number of these works began to be sold at auction. In 2009, auction house Mullock's of Shropshire sold 15 of Hitler's paintings for a total of £97,672 (US $143,358), while auctioneers at Ludlow Racecourse of Shropshire sold 13 works for over €100,000. In a 2012 auction in Slovakia, a mixed-media painting fetched €32,000. And on November 18, 2014, a watercolor by Hitler of the old registry office in Munich ("Standesamt München") sold for €130,000 at an auction in Nuremberg. The watercolor included a bill of sale and a signed letter by Albert Bormann, which may have contributed to its comparatively high selling price.


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: In 2015, an auction was held at the Weidler auction house in Nuremberg where 14 paintings dated 1904 to 1922 by Hitler were sold in total for €391,000. A watercolor of "Neuschwanstein Castle" by Hitler was sold for €100,000 to a buyer from China. A year previously Weidler auction house had sold a Hitler painting to a buyer from Middle East for around €152,000.


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: A group of scholars estimate that there are only 300 completed works by Hitler over the span of his life; however, Hitler mentioned in his book, "Mein Kampf", that while in Vienna, he produced around two or three paintings a day. Even if he were to paint one portrait a day for the years he spent in Vienna, that number would be well over 600. Peter Jahn, perhaps one of the foremost experts on Hitler's art, said he had two interviews with Hitler. Hitler said in the six years he spent in Vienna and Munich, from 1908 to 1914, he produced over a thousand paintings, a few of them in oils, like Hitler's tree at a track from 1911.


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: Jahn was one of the original people assigned by Schulte Stratthaus, before Hitler annexed Austria in 1938. Stratthaus had been appointed by Hitler in 1936 to locate and buy paintings Hitler had painted from 1907 to 1912, and 1921 to 1922. Jahn spent nearly four years tracking down Hitler's early works, until he was called into military service. Jahn became the Art Consultant to the German Embassy in Vienna in 1937, where he would then search for, purchase and collect individual pieces of Hitler's art, in order to allegedly destroy a majority of the paintings. Jahn sold one of the largest collections of Hitler's art, about 18 pieces, with an average selling price of $50,000.


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: One of the most extensive private collections of Hitler's art was housed at The International Museum of World War II in Natick, Massachusetts.


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: In 1936, after seeing the paintings Hitler submitted to the Vienna art academy, John Gunther, an American journalist and author, wrote, "They are prosaic, utterly devoid of rhythm, color, feeling, or spiritual imagination. They are architect's sketches: painful and precise draftsmanship; nothing more. No wonder the Vienna professors told him to go to an architectural school and give up pure art as hopeless".


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: One modern art critic was asked in 2002 to review some of Hitler's paintings without being told who painted them. He said they were quite good, but that the different style in which he drew human figures represented a profound lack of interest in people.


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: In a report entitled "The Water Colours of Hitler: Recovered Art Works Homage to Rodolfo Siviero", prepared by Fratelli Alinari, Sergio Salvi rejects the characterization of Hitler as "a grim Sunday painter" and describes him instead as a "small time professional painter" of "innocuous and trivial urban landscapes".


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: Working primarily in watercolor, Hitler used the medium to express both his love of painting and architecture. Charles Snyder says that Hitler's watercolors often show detailed attention to architecture in contrast to the conventional and negligent treatment of plants and trees that often frame the subject.


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: "The Courtyard of the Old Residency in Munich" (1914) is a watercolor by Hitler. He depicts the Alter Hof, a stone quad in front of a large manor. During Hitler's time in Munich, he spent most of his days reading and painting, furthering his dream as an independent artist.


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: The painting shows his style and mastery of watercolor to create strict delineation of the building, but on the left, we see two soft standing trees to contrast the harsh lines of the house. A small fountain between two trees is painted on the left.


title: Paintings by Adolf Hitler

text: "The Courtyard of the Old Residency in Munich" and a few other paintings by Hitler are archived in the basement of the Army Center of Military History in Washington, D.C., never shown to the public due to their controversial nature.


title: The Stig

text: The Stig is a character from the British motoring television show "Top Gear". Created by former "Top Gear" presenter Jeremy Clarkson and producer Andy Wilman, the character is a play on the anonymity of racing drivers' full-face helmets, with the running joke that nobody knows who or what is inside the Stig's racing suit. The Stig's primary role is setting lap times for cars tested on the show. Previously, he would also instruct celebrity guests, off-camera, for the show's "Star in a Reasonably Priced Car" segment.


title: The Stig

text: The identity of the original "Black" Stig, Perry McCarthy, was exposed by a Sunday newspaper in January 2003, and confirmed by McCarthy later that year. The black-suited Stig was subsequently "killed off" that October in the series 3 premiere, and replaced in the following episode by a new White Stig who lasted through to the end of series 15.


title: The Stig

text: In series 13 episode 1, the show jokingly unmasked the Stig as seven-time world champion F1 driver Michael Schumacher. In the hiatus following series 15, racing driver Ben Collins was revealed to be the Stig in a court battle over Collins' impending autobiography, titled "The Man in the White Suit". In series 16, debuting in December 2010, Collins was replaced by a second White Stig, whose identity has thus far remained secret.


title: The Stig

text: The idea for the character was part of former host Jeremy Clarkson and former producer Andy Wilman's concept for the relaunched "Top Gear" show, bringing a new format to the original version of "Top Gear" which ceased production in 2001. The relaunched show introduced a live studio audience, the Stig, a racetrack, and madcap stunts. Clarkson is credited with having come up with the original idea for the Stig.


title: The Stig

text: Clarkson and Wilman wanted to have a professional racing driver as part of the show's cast, but ran into difficulty finding a driver sufficiently adept at speaking on-camera. Clarkson then asked Wilman why the driver needed to speak at all, and they decided that the Stig's role would be silent.


title: The Stig

text: The name Stig derives from Wilman and Clarkson's time at Repton School, where new boys had always been called "Stig". "Stig" is a pejorative referring to someone from a poor background with a poor dress sense (originating from the eponymous character in the children's book "Stig of the Dump").


title: The Stig

text: According to the original Stig, Perry McCarthy, speaking in 2006, the producers had first wanted the anonymous driver to be called "The Gimp", referring to the use of gimp suits in BDSM sexual role-playing. After McCarthy objected, they settled upon the name Stig. McCarthy had said of the idea at the time that "I don't want to be forever remembered as the Gimp".


title: The Stig

text: When introducing the Stig in the "Top Gear" premiere, Clarkson said, "We don't know its name, we really don't know its name, nobody knows its name, and we don't want to know, because it's a racing driver."


title: The Stig

text: According to a 2006 article in "The Sunday Times", most of the "Top Gear" crew did not know the Stig's identity; one camera assistant reportedly observed the Stig eating his lunch in the back of an ambulance to avoid being spotted. In 2009, another "Times" article reiterated that only a few production staff, the show's presenters and other BBC journalists knew the Stig's true identity.


title: The Stig

text: Former Stig Perry McCarthy described in 2009 how, to maintain his anonymity, he would put on the Stig's helmet while going through the "Top Gear" security gates, and then change into his racing overalls in a special room behind the gatehouse before driving into the studio areas. He would speak as little as possible in the backstage areas, and put on an accent which some mistook as French. McCarthy also explained that hiding his identity while coaching the celebrities for "Star in a Reasonably Priced Car" proved difficult. He said that he did reveal his true identity while coaching Ross Kemp and David Soul, as he had previously known them and they promised that they would be silent about his role. For other drives, if celebrities asked if he was a particular person, he would just say "How did you know?", adding that more often than not, the suggestion was Michael Schumacher.


title: The Stig

text: The Stig is never shown talking on screen, although he does talk with celebrities off-camera while training them to drive around the track. Clarkson has joked that he is "not a very talkative chap". When asked about his identity in a rare spoken interview for the show "Veronica Vibes" of a Dutch channel, the Stig reportedly said, "I don't remember; my memory was erased when I got the job." The Stig's muteness has extended to appearances in other media, such as the "Brain Stig" video released by the BBC on YouTube in 2009.


title: The Stig

text: Clarkson has written in his newspaper column that the Stig is not permitted to talk or comment on the cars he is given to drive because "the opinions of all racing drivers are completely worthless," going on to explain that, because of their familiarity with cars equipped for track racing, racing drivers believe any and all road cars are on low-scale compared to racing cars.


title: The Stig

text: The show has often compared the Stig's driving ability to others, particularly Formula One drivers. When Jeremy Clarkson said that the Stig believed that the Suzuki Liana, the show's Reasonably Priced Car at the time, could do a lap time of 1:44.0, former F1 driver Nigel Mansell, appearing as a guest on the programme, duly obliged by posting a time of 1:44.6; the Stig then posted a time of 1:44.4. After Rubens Barrichello became the first person to beat the Stig's time (coming in at 1:44.3), the show repeatedly referred to a jealous rivalry between the Stig and Barrichello. Sebastian Vettel then further beat this time by posting a time of 1:44.0. Clarkson has often mentioned that F1 drivers seem to take a different racing line on the test track than the Stig, such as on Jenson Button's drive; however, during Barrichello's and Lewis Hamilton's visits to the show, Clarkson observed that they took the same line around the track as The Stig. F1 driver Mark Webber's appearance on the show was marked at the conclusion of his lap with Clarkson presenting him with an "I AM THE STIG" T-shirt.


title: The Stig

text: The Stig's introductions on the show have underlined his oddness. Initially the presenters heralded his appearance with simple humorous introductions, such as "His Holiness, the Stig!" Beginning in series 6, the introductions began to follow a format of, "Some say that [two bizarre characteristics]. All we know is, he's called the Stig." Characteristics described in this format include:


title: The Stig

text: In the Stig's debut, he was described by Clarkson as having a very small brain, worthless opinions, and a disorder called "Mansell Syndrome". Richard Porter, Top Gear's script editor, described the Stig as "single minded, stubborn and hilariously petulant; specifically, a mix of Kimi Räikkönen, the keyboard player from Pet Shop Boys, and a 15-year-old boy forced to go on holiday with his parents." He has been depicted as a piece of cargo, being collected by Clarkson from the baggage conveyor at the airport; he has also been shown stored in a cupboard when not in use.


title: The Stig

text: It has been said that the Stig "has no understanding of money" and during challenges he has been shown using an Oyster card to access London public transportation, and a credit card in the name of "The Stig" issued by the "Bank of Money" to obtain petrol. The show has also featured the Stig's listening habits, as heard on the car stereo as he drives laps. Often a specific genre is chosen for one or more series. The Stig has been shown listening to:


title: The Stig

text: In 2009, the Stig appeared at the National Television Awards, where he silently accepted an award and handed host Griff Rhys Jones a letter from the "Top Gear" hosts, which instructed Jones to give the Stig the award in his left hand, as his right one is magnetic, and cautioning organisers that he wasn't to be seated near the cast of "Coronation Street", as "he's decided all northerners are edible".


title: The Stig

text: In the "Top Gear" end credits, the Stig is credited alongside Clarkson, Richard Hammond, and James May as a presenter. The Stig's primary role on the show is at the "Top Gear" test track at the show's base at Dunsfold Aerodrome, Surrey. His two main functions are to post lap times for featured performance cars in the "Power Laps" segment, and to train celebrity guests to set lap times in the "Star in a Reasonably Priced Car" segment, although Chris Harris later took on the instructional role.


title: The Stig

text: When first introduced, the Stig was described as the resident test driver, as the presenters could not consistently post fast times themselves. His stated mission was to "just go out there and drive fast". The original Stig, Perry McCarthy, described in 2006 how a racing driver was intended to be used as part of the presenting team in order to produce definitive fastest lap times for tested cars.


title: The Stig

text: McCarthy was cast as the Stig following a chance meeting with Jeremy Clarkson at the 2002 launch party for McCarthy's autobiography, "". This led to an audition as a regular presenter, before the production team decided the racing driver would be anonymous. (Contradicting this, McCarthy said in 2008 that Clarkson had mentioned the idea of a "top secret" racing driver at their first meeting.)


title: The Stig

text: After the first series ended, an article in "The Sunday Mirror" on 12 January 2003 named McCarthy as the Stig. The newspaper quoted a show insider as saying, "Just a handful of the crew know that he is actually Perry." McCarthy responded at the time, "I do know who the Stig is but I cannot comment any further." After the second series ended, McCarthy published the second edition of his autobiography, in which he confirmed that he was the Stig. McCarthy was then "killed off" in the first episode of the third series.


title: The Stig

text: The scene which saw Black Stig "killed off," nicknamed "Top Gun vs Top Gear," was an attempt to race to and then come to a halt on the long flight deck of HMS "Invincible", a Royal Navy aircraft carrier on which British Aerospace Sea Harrier jump jets reach before take-off. He would be using the "old Top Gear Jag," a white Jaguar XJS bought for a "couple of hundred quid," stripped of its fittings and fitted with nitrous injection to take it to . The Stig accelerated along the deck, and an on-screen speedometer indicated before a cutaway shot saw the car flying off the end of the runway ramp and into the sea. Clarkson then revealed in the last scene of the episode that a glove floating on the sea was all that divers had found. According to McCarthy, "We tried to make it as much like a scene out of James Bond as possible."


title: The Stig

text: The explanations for McCarthy's exit vary. While McCarthy described the parting as amiable in 2008, "The Times" claimed in 2009 that he had fallen out with producers. In 2010, McCarthy said he had become tired of the job, which he claimed paid £700 a week, and that part of his annoyance stemmed from an attempt by a car owner to sue him for ruining his car and the BBC's refusal to defend him due to his anonymity. He said the BBC chose not to renew his contract and had him written out of the show.


title: The Stig

text: Although McCarthy said in 2006 that, following his exit from "Top Gear," he harboured ambitions of re-entering racing in the Grand Prix Masters series, he went on to run an investment company and appear as an after-dinner speaker.


title: The Stig

text: According to the "Sunday Times," writing in 2009, McCarthy revealed in his book that there had always been more than one Stig, and that then 47-year-old Julian Bailey, a former Formula One driver, had acted as a stand-in for McCarthy.


title: The Stig

text: The first White Stig was introduced in November 2003, following the Black Stig's exit in the prior episode. His identity remained secret until it was revealed as Ben Collins in August 2010. During this Stig's time on the show, the character's role expanded from Power Lap times and "Reasonably Priced Car" training to include appearances in other show segments, such as producing timed runs in the Isle of Man road test; driving a Caterham Seven from Caterham to Knockhill; riding a London Bus, the DLR and the Tube across London; jumping a snowmobile off a ski-jump in Lillehammer, Norway; and playing a police pursuit driver in the White Van Man challenge.


title: The Stig

text: After the White Stig's debut, there was widespread speculation over his identity. Various sources claimed him to be a number of different racing drivers, including Collins, Damon Hill, Julian Bailey, Russ Swift, Darren Turner and Tim Schrick, as well as former "Top Gear" presenter Tiff Needell. Several people, including Hill and musician Jay Kay, claimed to be the Stig themselves. It was also speculated that the Stig was played by multiple drivers, a theory hinted at by original Stig Perry McCarthy. After observing the Stig's charity drive around the Silverstone Circuit just before the July 2008 British Grand Prix, former Formula One World Champion Fernando Alonso remarked, "Whoever's in that car is a seriously good driver. ... I've no idea who he is, but he's definitely ex-F1."


title: The Stig

text: In January 2009, rumours about the Stig's identity were stoked, in part by a "News of the World" article alleging to have discovered the Stig to be a married man in his 30s, living in a £300,000 home and driving a £15,000 car, on an income of around £150,000 from his "Top Gear" job and some stunt and test driving. In the same month, an art gallery owner reported that the Stig had revealed his identity to the gallery owner and his son, after contracting with them (under the guise of a BBC executive) for a series of signed and limited prints of the Stig. In the latter instance, the Stig was alleged to be Ben Collins. It was also reported that a builder doing work at Collins' home had found the Stig's trademark suit and gloves on display there.


title: The Stig

text: As these rumours were ongoing, the "Top Gear" blog published three entries on 21 January revealing the Stig to be, respectively, Damon Hill's deceased father Graham Hill; Royal Bank of Scotland chairman Sir Tom McKillop; and newly inaugurated U.S. president Barack Obama.


title: The Stig

text: When Richard Hammond crashed a jet-powered car, the accident report into the crash described Ben Collins as someone "who worked closely with Top Gear as a high performance driver and consultant."


title: The Stig

text: On 20 June 2009, Clarkson announced in his newspaper column that the Stig would show his face in "Top Gear"'s series thirteen premiere, airing the next day. According to Clarkson, the Stig was "fed up with newspapers speculating that he's a photocopier salesman from Bolton, or lives in a pebble-dashed house in Bristol."


title: The Stig

text: The episode showed the Stig driving a black Ferrari FXX around the test track for a record-setting time of 1:10.7, before walking into the studio and sitting down. As the audience shouted "Off! Off!" the Stig removed his helmet to reveal himself as seven-time world champion F1 driver Michael Schumacher. In the subsequent interview, Schumacher exhibited some of the Stig's supposedly defining character traits, such as knowing only two facts about ducks (both "facts" being wrong).


title: The Stig

text: Following the revelation, the Stig alleged to be Schumacher was shown driving the Suzuki Liana but did not set a lap time; instead, video clips showed the Stig exhibiting very poor car control, striking a camera tripod, and eventually getting lost. Clarkson closed the segment by observing that possibly, Schumacher was not truly the Stig after all. While the BBC initially would not confirm whether Schumacher's revelation was a stunt, "The Telegraph" reported the next day that a "Top Gear" spokesman confirmed Schumacher had played the Stig, due to Ferrari only allowing Schumacher to drive the FXX, but that "the identity of the driver at other times would remain 'a mystery'."


title: The Stig

text: On 19 August 2010, it was reported that a legal dispute was developing between the BBC and publishers representing the Stig, over plans by the Stig to release an autobiography revealing his identity. A BBC spokesman said, "The BBC is in a legal dispute over the publication of a book relating to "Top Gear" as this breaches agreed contractual and confidentiality obligations relating to the show." The Stig was reportedly unhappy that he had been unable to profit from his "Top Gear" role to the same degree as the other presenters.


title: The Stig

text: Around the same time, the "Sunday Times" claimed that financial documents for Ben Collins' company, Collins Autosport, provided evidence that he was the Stig. The "Times" stated that beginning a month after the White Stig's first appearance, the company had experienced an increase in profits ascribed to "driving services provided for the BBC, mainly in the "Top Gear" programme." Collins did not comment on this story; the BBC said it was "no surprise" as Collins had appeared several times on the show as well as provided other services.


title: The Stig

text: On 23 August 2010, the BBC and the Stig's publisher, HarperCollins, appeared in court. HarperCollins confirmed that it was being sued by the BBC over the autobiography's publication, stating, "We are disappointed that the BBC has chosen to spend licence fee payers' money to suppress this book and will vigorously defend the perfectly legitimate right of this individual to tell his story." The BBC said, "This situation has come about as a result of an attempt by an external party to profit from unauthorised use of the "Top Gear" brand, one of the BBC's biggest and most watched shows in the UK and around the world. As a result, it is important that the BBC does all it can to uphold confidentiality clauses that have been agreed to in relation to the show."


title: The Stig

text: In a 27 August 2010 entry on the "Top Gear" blog, executive producer Andy Wilman attacked HarperCollins for attempting to reveal the Stig's identity: "The whole point of the Stig is the mystique – the bizarre characteristics he has, the wonderment created about what he might think, feel, do or look like. ... HarperCollins have decided none of that is as important as their profits." He also clarified that half of the BBC's legal costs were being funded by BBC Worldwide, their commercial arm.


title: The Stig

text: On 29 August, the "Daily Mirror" claimed that photos of Collins at his England home on the same day that the Stig had appeared at a "Top Gear" event in Germany proved that Collins had already been fired from the Stig role. When asked about the ongoing High Court action, Collins stated, "I am not allowed to talk about it."


title: The Stig

text: On 1 September 2010, the case was decided against the BBC, as the High Court refused to grant an injunction blocking the publication of the autobiography now acknowledged to be authored by Collins. Collins was in court for part of that day's hearing, but neither he nor the BBC confirmed afterward that he was the Stig; a BBC spokesman said, "The BBC brought this action as we believe it is vital to protect the character of The Stig, which ultimately belongs to the licence-fee payer. Today's judgment does not prevent the BBC from pursuing this matter to trial and it will not be deterred from protecting such information from attack no matter when or by whom it should arise." On 3 September 2010, the BBC News website published a profile of Collins that began: "Former Formula Three driver Ben Collins has won a legal fight to publish an autobiography in which he claims to be The Stig."


title: The Stig

text: Immediately following the High Court's decision, "Top Gear" presenter James May commented, "Obviously I'm now going to have to take some legal action of my own, because I have been the Stig for the past seven years, and I don't know who this bloke is, who's mincing around in the High Court pretending it's him." He expounded on the pretence in a newspaper column the next day, describing his dual life as the Stig and "Captain Slow".


title: The Stig

text: Speculation about the future of the Stig character began immediately. On 3 September 2010, May told a radio show that the Stig would be "dealt with" in a similar manner to how the Black Stig was eliminated. On the same day, "The Telegraph" reported that the BBC would not be renewing Collins' contract and that Collins would be soliciting offers to star in his own programme. (A month later, he joined the show "Fifth Gear" for its eighteenth series; he then became a co-presenter on the Polish programme "Automaniak".) Clarkson advertised for a new driver in his 4 September newspaper column, noting the successful applicant must know that "no one, under any circumstances, should ever rat on their friends". In a 7 September interview, Clarkson said that Collins was "history as far as we are concerned. He's sacked."


title: The Stig

text: Bookmakers' favourites to become the new Stig included Anthony Davidson, Damon Hill, Russ Swift, Heikki Kovalainen, and an unspecified female driver.


title: The Stig

text: On 1 October 2010, it was announced that Collins would join Five's "Fifth Gear" motoring show, where he was introduced by Vicki Butler-Henderson as someone whose name "rhymes with The Twig." Collins appeared unmasked, saying "Yes, I can speak. It's a massive pleasure to do so."


title: The Stig

text: On 5 November 2010, the "Top Gear" website released a video clip about its "Stig Farm," the end of which introduced a new Stig for the travelling stage show "Top Gear Live." The video also featured a Stig attempting to write a book on a computer, and correcting one of its many mistakes with Tippex.


title: The Stig

text: In the "USA Road Trip" special (debuting 21 December 2010), the presenters branded the Stig a traitor; May declared his true name to be Judas Iscariot. In a challenge mimicking a drive-by shooting, the targets used were cardboard representations of the Stig (with Hammond taking special care to shoot the Stig in the back).


title: The Stig

text: During Collins' appearance with a military amputees rally team, broadcast in July 2011, he was introduced by Hammond as "ex-Stig Ben Collins." Collins returned to "Top Gear" in the series 18 special "50 Years of Bond Cars," where Hammond interviewed him on his work as a stunt driver in the film "Skyfall." Hammond again introduced him as an ex-Stig and referred several times during the interview to Collins' departure. Collins wore a T-shirt during the interview which read "I am the Stig."


title: The Stig

text: On 26 December 2010, five days after the "USA Road Trip" special, "Top Gear" aired a "" in which the presenters re-enacted the journey of the Three Wise Men to Bethlehem. At the episode's conclusion, they discovered a manger cradling not Jesus, but a baby Stig.


title: The Stig

text: In the series 16 premiere a month later, the presenters explained that Stigs grow very quickly, and the new Stig was thus already fully grown. Aside from a slightly different helmet and overalls, the current Stig resembles the previous Stig. In his first episode, he set a speed record around the track (1:15.1) in an Ariel Atom V8 – Clarkson commenting that this Stig posted times "broadly comparable to those of Sacked Stig".


title: The Stig

text: Various episodes have featured "cousins" and other relatives of the Stig, often when the show is filming outside the United Kingdom.