title: Oops!... I Did It Again (album)

text: The album's supporting tour, the Oops!... I Did It Again Tour, was scheduled to begin on June 15 but started five days later, visiting North America during the summer and Europe during the fall, hence becoming Spears's first European tour. On June 24, Spears was featured in a print and television advertising campaign for Clairol's Herbal Essences shampoo line. In a special coup for Clairol, Spears recorded her own song for the brand, titled "I've Got the Urge to Herbal", which was featured in 60-second radio spots and was part of a pre-concert video presentation for the tour, which Herbal Essences sponsored. The tour ended with a concert during Rock in Rio in Brazil on January 18, 2001.


title: Oops!... I Did It Again (album)

text: According to "Billboard", as of 2022, "Oops!... I Did It Again" is one of the 15 best-performing 21st-century albums without any of its singles being number-one hits on the "Billboard" Hot 100; its only top-ten hit was its


title: Oops!... I Did It Again (album)

text: lead single and title track, which reached number nine. In addition to its worldwide popularity, it became Spears's third top-ten hit single on the US "Billboard" Hot 100; however, in comparison to the huge success of her debut single "...Baby One More Time", Jive Records considered "Oops!... I Did It Again" a minor disappointment. The song peaked at number one on the US Mainstream Top 40, holding the record for the most radio additions in one day. "Oops!... I Did It Again" peaked atop the charts in Australia, Belgium, Canada, Italy, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Romania, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. An accompanying music video for "Oops!... I Did It Again" saw Spears on Mars in now-iconic red shiny catsuit, while she is visited by an American astronaut who hands her the fictional Heart of the Ocean jewel which Rose threw into the sea at the end of "Titanic".


title: Oops!... I Did It Again (album)

text: The album's second single, "Lucky", was released on July 25, 2000 and received positive response from the music critics, who considered one of her best offerings from the album. Commercially, "Lucky" topped the charts in Austria, Germany, Sweden and Switzerland, while reaching number five on the UK Singles Chart. In the United States, "Lucky" only managed to peak at number twenty-three on the "Billboard" Hot 100 chart and at number nine on the Mainstream Top 40. The "glittery" music video sees Spears as the narrator and an actress named Lucky, who is a melancholy movie star and shows her conflicted relationship to fame.


title: Oops!... I Did It Again (album)

text: The third single, "Stronger", was released on October 31, 2000 and became the album's second highest-charting single in the United States, peaking at number eleven on the "Billboard" Hot 100 and number one on the Hot Single Sales. It reached number seven on the UK Singles Chart. Its music video sees Spears catching her boyfriend cheating on her at a futuristic turntable nightclub, driving off, getting in a wreck and singing in the rain, while the chair sequence in the video was inspired by Janet Jackson's video for "The Pleasure Principle".


title: Oops!... I Did It Again (album)

text: The fourth and final single, "Don't Let Me Be the Last to Know", was released on March 12, 2001 and is one of Spears' favorite tracks of her career. In the United States, the song performed well below expectations, failing to chart on the "Billboard" Hot 100 nor the Mainstream Top 40. However, the song attained success in Europe, topping the Romanian Top 100 and peaking inside the top ten in Austria, Poland and Switzerland, while just missing the top ten in Germany, Ireland, Sweden and the United Kingdom, peaking at number twelve in all of them. The music video was considered too racy at the time, portraying Spears in love scenes with her fictional boyfriend, played by French model Brice Durand.


title: Oops!... I Did It Again (album)

text: "You Got It All" received a promotional release in France in May 2000. A promotional CD single for "When Your Eyes Say It" was released in the United Kingdom in January 2001.


title: Oops!... I Did It Again (album)

text: "Oops!... I Did It Again" received favorable reviews from music critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, "Oops!... I Did It Again" received an average score of 72, based on 12 reviews, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Giving the album four out of five stars, Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic noted that the album "has the same combination of sweetly sentimental ballads and endearingly gaudy dance-pop that made 'One More Time'," but remarked that, "Fortunately, she and her production team not only have a stronger overall set of songs this time, but they also occasionally get carried away with the same bewildering magpie aesthetic, [...] giv[ing] the album character apart from the well-crafted dance-pop and ballads that serve as its heart. In the end, it's what makes this an entertaining, satisfying listen." "Billboard" magazine wrote that "'Oops!...' indicates that she's developing a soulful edge and emotional depth that can't be conjured with a glass-shattering note," praising the album for consistently cast[ing] Spears as a young woman coming to terms with her inner power—and that's a darn good message to offer an impressionable audience." "Entertainment Weekly"'s David Browne gave the album a B-rating, writing that the album "reminds us once again that the best new pop can be a blast of cool air in a stifling room."


title: Oops!... I Did It Again (album)

text: Rob Sheffield of "Rolling Stone" gave the album a three-and-a-half out of five stars rating, calling the album "fantastic pop cheese, with much better song-factory hooks than 'N Sync or BSB get", also noting that "the great thing about "Oops!", under the cheese surface, is complex, fierce and downright scary, making her a true child of rock & roll tradition." A writer of "NME" reported that "she's modern-day pop perfection realised in a nearly, human form", commenting that "she's done it again." Lennat Mak of MTV Asia named it "a brilliant second album", writing that Spears "is armed with a more mature and seasoned pop star look, stronger and poppier songs, and of course, extensive media exposure." Andy Battaglia of "Salon" called the album "a masterpiece of sorts not for its message but for the way it applies the conventions of the pop-musical medium." Website "The A.V. Club" was more mixed, calling it "a joyless bit of redundant, obvious, competent cheese, recycling itself at every turn and soliciting songwriting from such soulless hacks as Diane Warren and assorted Swedes."


title: Oops!... I Did It Again (album)

text: In the United States, "Oops!... I Did It Again" reportedly sold 500,000 copies in its first day of release. It debuted at number one on the "Billboard" 200 chart, with first-week sales of 1,319,193 copies. With its success, Spears held the record for the highest first-week sales by a female artist. This record was held for 15 years, only to be surpassed in November 2015 by the album "25" by Adele, which sold over 3.38 million albums in the United States in its first week. The album fell to number two in its second week, with additional sales of 612,000 copies. It held this position for fifteen consecutive weeks. By its fifth week of availability, "Oops!... I Did It Again" had sold over three million copies and had passed five million copies by August. On its seventeenth week on the chart, it was certified septuple Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) for shipments of seven million units. The album spent eighty-four weeks on the "Billboard" 200, thirty-one weeks on the Canadian Albums Chart, and two weeks on the US Catalog Albums. "Oops!... I Did It Again" debuted at number eighty-two on the European Top 100 Albums, and quickly peaked at number one; it sold over four million copies within the continent, being certified four-times Platinum by the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry. "Oops!... I Did It Again" reached number two on the UK Albums Chart, selling 88,000 copies in the first week of release; it remained in the top five for four weeks. The album debuted at number one in Canada, selling 95,275 copies in its first week.


title: Oops!... I Did It Again (album)

text: It topped the French Albums Chart and the German Offizielle Top 100, also being certified triple Platinum by the British Phonographic Industry (BPI), double Gold by the Syndicat National de l'Édition Phonographique (SNEP) and triple Platinum by Bundesverband Musikindustrie (BVMI), denoting shipments to retailers of 900,000 units, 200,000 copies sold and 900,000 units shipped, respectively. Additionally, the album debuted at number two on the Australian Albums Chart, and spent ten weeks in the top twenty; it became the fourteenth highest-selling of 2000 in the country and was certified double Platinum by the Australian Recording Industry Association (ARIA) the following year after shipping 140,000 copies to retailers. "Oops!... I Did It Again" opened at number three on the New Zealand Albums Chart and was certified Gold after just one week on the chart. The Recording Industry Association of New Zealand (RIANZ) ultimately certified it double Platinum. "Oops!... I Did It Again" became the third best-selling album of 2000 in the United States, selling 7,893,544 albums according to Nielsen SoundScan and fourth best-selling album according to "Billboard" Year-End of 2000. On January 24, 2005, the album was certified decuple Platinum (Diamond) by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). Also, the album landed at number twenty-seven on BMG Music Club all-time best-sellers list with 1.21 million units, behind Shania Twain's "The Woman in Me" (1.24 million) and Nirvana's "Nevermind" (1.24 million). As of July 2009, the album has sold 9,184,000 copies in the United States, excluded copies sold through clubs, such as the BMG Music Service.


title: Oops!... I Did It Again (album)

text: Worldwide, "Oops!... I Did It Again" sold 2.5 million copies in its first week (second highest first week sales by a female artist worldwide) and sold 15 million copies by the end of the year. It was the best-selling female album and 3rd best selling album of 2000. The album has sold 20 million copies worldwide.


title: Oops!... I Did It Again (album)

text: Musicians Michael Cottril and Lawrence Wnukowski filed a copyright case against Spears, Zomba Recording Corporation, Jive Records, Wright Entertainment Group and BMG Music Publishing, claiming Spears' "What U See (Is What U Get)" and "Can't Make You Love Me" are "virtually identical" to one of their songs. Cottrill and Wnukowski claimed that they authored, recorded and copyrighted a song called "What You See Is What You Get" in 1999 to one of Spears' representatives for consideration on a future album, though it was rejected. The case was later dismissed after it was ruled that they lacked sufficient evidence and that there "weren't enough similarities between the two songs to prove copyright infringement."


title: Pterocarpus santalinus

text: Pterocarpus santalinus, with the common names red sanders, red saunders, protect it Yerra Chandanam, Chenchandanam, red sandalwood, Rakta Chandana, and saunderswood, is a species of "Pterocarpus" endemic to the southern Eastern Ghats mountain range of South India. This tree is valued for the rich red colour of its wood. The wood is traditionally considered not aromatic. However, in recent years there has been a marked uptick in the use of red sandalwood as a component of incense, especially in the west. The tree is not to be confused with the aromatic "Santalum" sandalwood trees that grow natively in Southern India.


title: Pterocarpus santalinus

text: "Pterocarpus santalinus" is a light-demanding small tree, growing to tall with a trunk 50–150 cm diameter. It is fast-growing when young, reaching tall in three years, even on degraded soils. It is not frost tolerant, being killed by temperatures of −1 °C.


title: Pterocarpus santalinus

text: The flowers are produced in short racemes. The fruit is a pod 6–9 cm long containing one or two seeds.


title: Pterocarpus santalinus

text: The wood has historically been valued in China, particularly during the Qing dynasty periods, and is referred to in Chinese as "zitan" (紫檀) and spelt tzu-t'an by earlier western authors such as Gustav Ecke, who introduced classical Chinese hardwood furniture to the west. An exquisite chair made of red sandalwood can be seen today in China's Forbidden City in Beijing, inside the "Hall of Supreme Harmony", and once used by the emperors of the Qing dynasty.


title: Pterocarpus santalinus

text: Due to its slow growth and rarity, furniture made from zitan is difficult to find and can be expensive. It has been one of the most prized woods for millennia.


title: Pterocarpus santalinus

text: In India sandalwood is one main and lucrative market for smugglers, as a high price is paid for this wood in China. Since the exporting of sandalwood is illegal in India, the underground market is growing and there are a number of arrests every year of those trying to smuggle this wood to China.


title: Pterocarpus santalinus

text: The other form of "zitan" is from the species "Dalbergia louvelii", "Dalbergia maritima", and "Dalbergia normandii", all similar species named in trade as bois de rose or violet rosewood which when cut are bright crimson purple changing to dark purple again. It has a fragrant scent when worked.


title: Pterocarpus santalinus

text: Red sandalwood has been used for making the bridge and also the neck of the Japanese musical instrument shamisen. The heartwood is preferred for this purpose.


title: Pterocarpus santalinus

text: "Pterocarpus santalinus" is used in traditional herbal medicine as an antipyretic, anti-inflammatory, anthelmintic, tonic, hemorrhage, dysentery, aphrodisiac, anti-hyperglycaemic and diaphoretic.


title: Pterocarpus santalinus

text: Red sandalwood grown on the shale subsoils, at altitudes around , and in semi-arid climatic conditions gives a distinctive wavy grain margin. Lumber pieces with the wavy grain margin are graded as "A" grade. Red sandalwood with wavy grain margins sells at higher prices than the standard wood.


title: Pterocarpus santalinus

text: "Pterocarpus santalinus" was listed as an Endangered species by the IUCN, because of overexploitation for its timber in South India; however, it was later reclassified to Near Threatened in 2018, as the scale of this loss is not properly known.


title: Pterocarpus santalinus

text: It is also listed in the appendix II of the CITES, which means that a certificate is required in order to export it, that should only be granted if the trade is not detrimental to the survival of the species.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: Modern development began after the establishment of the Pacific Branch of the National Home for Disabled Soldiers and Sailors in the 1880s. A small community sprang up outside that facility's west gate, taking on the name "Westgate". Annexed by the City of Los Angeles on June 14, 1916, Westgate's included large parts of what is now the Pacific Palisades and a small portion of today's Bel-Air. Westgate Avenue is one of the last reminders of that namesake.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: Local traditions include a Maypole erected each year on the lawn of the Archer School for Girls, carrying on that set by the Eastern Star Home previously housed there. This building was the exterior establishing shot for the "Mar Vista Rest Home" that provided a key scene in the 1974 film "Chinatown".


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: The State Cal-Fire Authority officially designated Brentwood, from Mulholland down to Sunset Boulevard a Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zone, due to the long, uninterrupted border of urban-wildlife interface in the hillsides that has resulted in multiple fires over many years, destroying entire neighborhoods and requiring numerous evacuations. For this reason, the Brentwood community has been strongly in favor of halting all further development in the hillside and canyon areas.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: On November 6, 1961, a construction crew working in Sherman Oaks in the San Fernando Valley north of Brentwood on the far side of the Santa Monica Mountains noticed smoke and flames in a nearby pile of rubbish. Within minutes, Santa Ana winds gusting up to sent burning brush aloft and over the ridge into Brentwood.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: More than 300 police officers helped evacuate 3,500 residents during the 12-hour fire, and some 2,500 firefighters battled the blaze, pumping water from neighborhood swimming pools to douse flames. Pockets of the fire smoldered for several days. Even as firefighters battled what was to become a Bel Air disaster, another fire erupted in Santa Ynez Canyon to the west. That blaze was contained the next day after consuming nearly and nine structures and burning to within a mile of Bel Air and Brentwood. The fires were the fifth-worst conflagration in the nation's history at the time, burning , destroying more than 484 homes and 190 other structures and causing an estimated $30 million in damage.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: Brentwood was the site of the 1994 stabbing deaths of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman, outside Nicole Brown Simpson's Bundy Drive townhouse. Nicole's ex-husband, football player and actor O. J. Simpson, was acquitted of the murders, but was later found liable for the deaths in a civil trial. O. J. Simpson's Brentwood home was subsequently sold. The new owners demolished Simpson's home and built a new residence.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: The district is located at the base of the Santa Monica Mountains, bounded by the San Diego Freeway on the east, Wilshire Boulevard on the south, the Santa Monica city limits on the southwest, Sullivan Canyon/Westridge Trail on the west and Mulholland Drive on the north.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: Brentwood, like nearby Santa Monica, has a temperate climate influenced by marine breezes off the Pacific Ocean. Residents frequently wake to a "marine layer", a cover of clouds brought in at night which burns off by mid-morning. The topography is generally split into two characters, broadly divided by Sunset Boulevard: the area north of Sunset is defined by ridges and canyons of the Santa Monica Mountains and is located in a Cal-Fire designated Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zone; south of Sunset the area is mostly flat. The area South of San Vicente features an underground spring which bubbles up into a small creek along "the Gully" near the Brentwood Country Club.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: The 2000 U.S. census counted 31,344 residents in the 15.22-square-mile Brentwood neighborhood—or 2,059 people per square mile. In 2008, the city estimated that the population had increased to 33,312.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: The population was 84.2% Non-Hispanic White, 6.5% Asian American, 4.5% Hispanic or Latino, 1.2% African American, and 3.6% of other origins. Iran (27.2%) and the United Kingdom (4.8%) were the most common places of birth for the 21.1% of the residents who were born abroad—which was a low percentage for Los Angeles as a whole. The median yearly household income in 2008 dollars was $112,927, high for the city of Los Angeles as well as the county.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: San Vicente Boulevard is divided by a wide median on which stand many large coral trees. This green belt replaced a Pacific Electric trolley track, and the trees have been named a City of Los Angeles Historic-Cultural Monument.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: Brentwood's Barrington Recreation Center has an indoor gymnasium which converts into a small auditorium with a capacity of 250. Outdoors is a lighted baseball diamond, an unlighted baseball diamond, lighted indoor basketball courts, lighted outdoor basketball courts, a children's play area, picnic tables and lighted tennis courts. As of March 2018, Barrington Park received a grade of "D" from the Los Angeles Parks and Rec Department due its poor facilities; upon investigation, the Brentwood Community Council discovered $1.1M in missing funds that were supposed to be used for capital upgrades at the park and fought the city for their return - successfully. With the funds back in place, the Community has worked to improve the park. The Barrington Dog Park is across the street from the recreation center and is part of Barrington Veterans Park, which is owned by the West LA VA and leased to the City of Los Angeles.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: The vast majority of office space in Brentwood is rented to professional services firms: accountants, lawyers, medical care.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: There are three upscale commercial areas: Brentwood Country Mart, Barrington Plaza and the San Vicente Business District, which include restaurants, clothing stores, and other high-end retailers.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: A few long time businesses should be noted: Brent-Air Pharmacy, run by the founding Lassoff family from its inception until June 2007, served Brentwood for more than 50 years. The drug store has been the scene of many famous scandals and, like its defunct West Hollywood cousin Schwab's, is known as the pharmacy to the stars, where many now-notable actors and actresses worked as delivery boys or "candy counter" girls.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: The Brentwood Country Mart, near the corner of San Vicente Blvd and 26th Street next to the Santa Monica city limit, is a shopping and food center that first opened in 1948.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: Vicente Foods is an independently owned and operated grocery market that has served Brentwood since 1948. Other local markets include Whole Foods and Ralphs.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: A popular area for dining and coffee for local residents is located in Brentwood Village at the intersection of Barrington and Sunset. More than a dozen restaurants and coffee shops are located within a two-block stretch offering a wide variety of cuisine.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: Dutton's Brentwood Books, a local landmark called by "Sunset" magazine "the last of the truly independent bookstores", closed its doors in April 2008.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: Brentwood and Pacific Palisades both chose to form community councils in order to have an independent voice with regard to issues that impact their communities, such as their joint Community Plan, which is a City approved document that governs the aesthetics of zoning and design for the neighborhoods. The Brentwood Community Council holds monthly public meetings, as does its Land Use Committee, and has been a powerful and effective voice for the community since the 1990s. The BCC Board includes members from all local HOA's, plus members representing schools, business, environment, transportation, civic affairs and a group dedicated only to residents under 40, called Brentwood '49. City Services are provided by the Los Angeles Fire Department Station 19 is in Brentwood. The Los Angeles Police Department operates the West Los Angeles Community Police Station in West Los Angeles, serving Brentwood. The City of Los Angeles Department of Water and Power provide utilities. All areas of Brentwood are served by a Residents Association of some kind.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: While the annual County of Los Angeles homeless count rarely attributes more than 50 persons as homeless in Brentwood, the majority of the homeless persons are Veterans. While the VA does have available beds and treatment programs, many Veterans find it hard to take the first step to accept VA assistance for a variety of reasons, including deep mistrust of the VA, dishonorable discharges that prevent them from receiving services, the mandatory sober living environment on the VA campus. The Brentwood Community Council took the lead in 2013 to help establish Veteran safe parking and safe camping programs, which allow Veterans to take an 'intermediate step" between homelessness and accepting full VA assistance and these programs have been successful and have grown over time. Some Veterans believed the VA was derelict in its duty to provide housing and successfully sued the VA, proving that multiple leases of VA property had been used for fraudulent means. Several individuals went to prison, including a former VA executive. As a result of the settlement in the Veterans civil suit against the VA, the $1B VA Master Plan Redevelopment of the West LA VA property, including 2000+ units of housing, was approved by Congress in 2019 and was completed in late 2020.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: The Los Angeles County Department of Health Services SPA 5 West Area Health Office serves Brentwood. The Supervisor for this area is Sheila Kuehl.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: Brentwood is represented in the California State Senate by Ben Allen and in the California State Assembly by Richard Bloom.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: The United States Postal Service operates the Barrington Post Office in Brentwood. Ted Lieu represents the area in the U.S. House of Representatives.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: Seventy percent of Brentwood residents aged 25 and older had earned a four-year degree by 2000, a high percentage for the city and the county. The percentages of residents in that age range with a bachelor's degree or greater were high for the county.


title: Brentwood, Los Angeles

text: The elementary schools in the area are Kenter Canyon Elementary School (an LAUSD charter school) and Brentwood Science Magnet Elementary School (an LAUSD alternative school). Paul Revere Charter Middle School is Brentwood's middle school. High school students are zoned to University High School in West Los Angeles, and Palisades Charter High School, in the nearby neighborhood of Pacific Palisades.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk, (1473 – 25 August 1554) was a prominent English politician and nobleman of the Tudor era. He was an uncle of two of the wives of King Henry VIII, Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard, both of whom were beheaded, and played a major role in the machinations affecting these royal marriages. After falling from favour in 1546, he was stripped of his Dukedom and imprisoned in the Tower of London, avoiding execution when Henry VIII died on 28 January 1547.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: He was released on the accession of the Roman Catholic queen, Mary I, whom he aided in securing her throne, thus setting the stage for tensions between his Catholic family and the Protestant royal line that would be continued by Mary I's half-sister, Elizabeth I.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: Thomas was the son of Thomas Howard, 2nd Duke of Norfolk (1443–1524), by his first wife, Elizabeth Tilney (died 1497), the daughter of Sir Frederick Tilney and widow of Sir Humphrey Bourchier. He was descended in the female line from Thomas of Brotherton, 1st Earl of Norfolk, the sixth son of King Edward I of England. In 1485, both his father and his grandfather, John Howard, 1st Duke of Norfolk, had fought for the Yorkist king, Richard III, at the Battle of Bosworth, in which his grandfather was killed, thus bringing the Tudor king, Henry VII, to the throne. Due to their allegiance to the losing side, most of the Howard family's titles became forfeit.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: Howard was an able soldier, and was often employed in military operations. In 1497, he served in a campaign against the Scots under the command of his father, who knighted him on 30 September 1497. He was made a Knight of the Garter after the accession of King Henry VIII, and became the King's close companion, with lodgings at court. On 4 May 1513, he was appointed Lord Admiral, and on 9 September, he helped to defeat the Scots at the Battle of Flodden. His first wife, Anne of York, died in 1511, and early in 1513, Howard married Lady Elizabeth Stafford, the daughter of Edward Stafford, 3rd Duke of Buckingham and Lady Eleanor Percy, the daughter of Henry Percy, 4th Earl of Northumberland.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: On 1 February 1514, Howard's father, then Earl of Surrey, was created Duke of Norfolk, and by letters patent issued on the same day, Thomas Howard was created Earl of Surrey for life. Over the next few years, he served King Henry VIII in a variety of ways. In September 1514, he escorted the King's sister Mary to France for her forthcoming marriage to King Louis XII of France. In 1517, he quelled a May Day riot in London with the use of soldiers.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: On 10 March 1520, Howard was appointed Lord Deputy of Ireland. By July 1520, he entered upon the thankless task of endeavouring to keep Ireland in order. His letters contain accounts of attempts to pacify the rival factions of the Earl of Kildare and the Earl of Ormonde, and are full of demands for more money and troops.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: At the end of 1521, Howard was recalled from Ireland to take command of the English fleet in naval operations against France. His ships were ill-provisioned, and his warfare consisted of a series of raids upon the French coast for the purpose of inflicting all the damage possible. When he abandoned the siege of Brest, he left Vice-Admiral William FitzWilliam on station to blockade the port. The English navy patrolled the coast of Brittany for the next three months, but was unable to score a decisive victory with their Spanish allies. In July 1522, Howard had burned Morlaix, in September, he had laid waste the country around Boulogne, spreading devastation on every side until the winter brought back the fleet to England. The sea patrol was abandoned with little achieved.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: On 4 December 1522, Thomas Howard was made Lord Treasurer upon his father's resignation of the office, and on 21 May 1524, he succeeded his father as Duke of Norfolk. His liking for war brought him into conflict with Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, who preferred diplomacy in the conduct of foreign affairs. In 1523, Wolsey had secured to the Duke of Suffolk the reversion of the office of Earl Marshal by Howard's father, and in 1525, he was replaced as Lord Admiral by the Duke of Richmond. Finding himself pushed aside, the Duke of Norfolk spent considerable time away from court in 1525–1527 and 1528.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: In the mid-1520s, Howard's niece, Anne Boleyn, had caught the eye of King Henry VIII, thereby reviving his political fortunes with his involvement in the King's attempt to annul his marriage to Catherine of Aragon. By 1529, matters of state were being increasingly handled by the Duke of Norfolk, the Duke of Suffolk, and the Boleyns, who pressed King Henry VIII to remove Cardinal Wolsey. In October, the King sent him and the Duke of Suffolk to obtain the great seal from the Cardinal. In November, Wolsey was arrested on a charge of treason, but died before trial. Howard benefited from Wolsey's fall, becoming the King's leading councillor and applying himself energetically in the King's efforts to find a way out of his marriage to Queen Catherine. His loyalty and service to King Henry VIII brought him ample rewards in the form of monastic lands in Norfolk and Suffolk, employment on diplomatic missions, and being named a knight of the French Order of St Michael in 1532 and Earl Marshal of England on 28 May 1533. In May 1536, when Henry VIII arrested his second wife, Anne Boleyn, Howard presided at the trial of his niece as Lord High Steward.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: Thomas Howard's marriage to his second wife, Lady Elizabeth Stafford, which had apparently been mutually affectionate at first, deteriorated in 1527 when he took a mistress, Elizabeth Holland (died 1547/8), whom he installed in the Howard household. Lady Elizabeth formally separated from her husband in the 1530s. She claimed that in March 1534, the Duke of Norfolk 'locked me up in a chamber, [and] took away my jewels and apparel'. Howard then moved her to Redbourn, Hertfordshire, where she lived as an actual prisoner with a meagre annual allowance of only £200. She also claimed to have been physically maltreated by Howard and his household servants.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: When the Pilgrimage of Grace broke out in Lincolnshire and the northern counties late in 1536, Howard shared command of the King's forces with the Earl of Shrewsbury, persuading the rebels to disperse by promising them a pardon and that Parliament would consider their grievances. However, when further rebellions erupted in January 1537, he carried out a policy of brutal retribution.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: By 1539, the Duke of Norfolk was seriously challenging the religious reforms of the King's chief minister, Thomas Cromwell. In that year, King Henry VIII sought to have Parliament put an end to diversity in religious opinion. On 5 May, the House of Lords appointed a committee to consider questions of doctrine. Although he was not a member of the committee, on 16 May, Howard presented six conservative articles of religion to Parliament for consideration. On 30 May, the Six Articles and the penalties for failure to conform to them were enacted into law, and on 28 June, received royal assent.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: On 29 June 1539, Thomas Howard, the Duke of Suffolk, and Thomas Cromwell dined with King Henry VIII as guests of the Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer. During a heated discussion about Cardinal Wolsey, Cromwell charged Thomas Howard with disloyalty who in turn called Cromwell a liar. Their mutual hostility was now out in the open. Cromwell inadvertently played into Howard's hands by taking the initiative in the King's marriage to Anne of Cleves. The King's disillusionment with Anne's physical appearance when he met her in January 1540, and his desire to have the marriage annulled after the wedding had taken place, gave Howard an opportunity to bring down his enemy, Cromwell. On 10 June 1540, Cromwell was arrested at a Privy Council meeting on charges of high treason, and the Duke of Norfolk personally 'tore the St George from his neck'. On 9 July 1540, King Henry's marriage to Anne of Cleves was annulled. On 28 July 1540, Cromwell was executed, and on the same day, the King wed the Duke's other niece, Catherine Howard, as his fifth wife. As a result of this marriage, for a time, Howard enjoyed political prominence, royal favour, and material rewards.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: However, when Queen Catherine's premarital sexual indiscretions and her alleged adultery with Thomas Culpeper were revealed to King Henry VIII by Archbishop Cranmer, the King's wrath turned upon the Howard family, who were accused of concealing her misconduct. Queen Catherine was condemned by a bill of attainder and was later executed on 13 February 1542. Several other members of the Howard family were sent to the Tower, including the Duke of Norfolk's stepmother, the Dowager Duchess of Norfolk. However, the French ambassador Marillac wrote on 17 January 1542, that the Duke had not only escaped punishment, but had apparently been restored to his "full former credit and authority".


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: Thomas Howard was appointed Lieutenant-General north of the River Trent on 29 January 1541, and Captain-General in a campaign against the Scots in August 1542. In June 1543, he declared war on France in the King's name and was appointed Lieutenant-General of the army. During the campaign of May–October 1544, he besieged Montreuil, while King Henry VIII captured Boulogne, before returning home. Complaining of lack of provisions and munitions, Howard eventually raised the siege of Montreuil, and realizing that Boulogne could not realistically be held by the English for long, he left it garrisoned and withdrew to Calais, for which he was severely rebuked by the King.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: During the King's final years Edward Seymour, Earl of Hertford, and Henry VIII's last queen, Catherine Parr, both of whom favoured Protestantism, gained influence with the King while the conservative Duke of Norfolk became isolated politically. He attempted to form an alliance with the Seymours through a marriage between his widowed daughter, Mary Howard and Hertford's brother Thomas Seymour, but the effort was forestalled by the provocative conduct of his eldest son and heir, Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, who had assumed the royal arms of Edward the Confessor as part of his personal heraldry. On 12 December 1546 both Thomas Howard and his son were arrested and sent to the Tower. On 24 December 1546, the elder Howard acknowledged that he had "concealed high treason, in keeping secret the false acts of my son, Henry Earl of Surrey, in using the arms of St. Edward the Confessor, which pertain only to kings", and offered his lands to the King. The Duke of Norfolk's family, including his estranged wife, his daughter Mary, and his mistress, Elizabeth Holland, all gave evidence against him. His son was beheaded on 19 January 1547, and on 27 January 1547, he was attainted by statute without trial. The dying King gave his assent to Howard's death by royal commissioners, and it was rumoured that he would be executed on the following day. He was saved by the King's death on 28 January and the council's decision not to inaugurate the new reign with bloodshed. His estates fell prey to the ruling clique in the reign of King Edward VI, for which he was later partly compensated by lands worth £1626 a year from Queen Mary I.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: Howard remained in the Tower throughout the reign of Edward VI. He was released and pardoned by Queen Mary in 1553, and in Mary's first parliament (October–December 1553), his statutory attainder was declared void, thereby restoring him to the dukedom. He was appointed to the Privy Council, and presided as Lord High Steward at the trial of the Duke of Northumberland on 18 August. He was also restored to the office of Earl Marshal and officiated in that capacity at Mary's coronation on 1 October 1553. His last major service to the Crown was his command of the forces sent in early 1554 to put down Wyatt's rebellion, a group of disaffected gentlemen who opposed the Queen's projected marriage to Philip II of Spain, but his men fled before the enemy.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: The Duke died at Kenninghall on 25 August 1554 and was buried at St. Michael's Church at Framlingham in Suffolk.


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: Norfolk has been portrayed several times in film. In "The Private Life of Henry VIII" (1933) he was played by Frederick Culley. In "The Prince and the Pauper" (1937) he was played by Henry Stephenson. In "A Man for All Seasons" (1966), he was played by Nigel Davenport. In "Anne of the Thousand Days" (1969), Peter Jeffrey took the role. He went on to reprise the role in a 1996 BBC adaptation of Mark Twain's 1881 novel "The Prince and the Pauper".In the 1970 BBC miniseries "The Six Wives of Henry VIII", the role was played by Patrick Troughton. In the "1973 film", based on the miniseries, he was played by Michael Gough. Sir Rex Harrison portrayed him in the 1977 adaptation of the same novel called "The Prince and the Pauper". Mark Strong portrayed Norfolk in the 2003 ITV feature "Henry VIII". In the Showtime series "The Tudors" (2007),


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: he was played by Henry Czerny. David Morrissey played the Duke in the film "The Other Boleyn Girl". Bernard Hill played the Duke in the acclaimed 2015 BBC adaptation of Hilary Mantel's "Wolf Hall".


title: Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

text: D. L. Bogdan's novels "Rivals in the Tudor Court" and "Secrets of the Tudor Court" (published in the UK under the name of Darcey Bonnette) feature Norfolk as one of the central characters. Norfolk is also one of the characters in the Philippa Gregory novels "The Other Boleyn Girl" and "The Boleyn Inheritance". He is an important character in "The Man on a Donkey" by H.F.M. Prescott and "The Fifth Queen" by Ford Madox Ford, and a prominent antagonist in Hilary Mantel's "Wolf Hall", "Bring Up the Bodies", and "The Mirror & the Light".


title: Spartacus: Blood and Sand

text: Spartacus: Blood and Sand is the first season of American television series "Spartacus", which premiered on Starz on January 22, 2010. The series was inspired by the historical figure of Spartacus (played by Andy Whitfield), a Thracian gladiator who from 73 to 71 BC led a major slave uprising against the Roman Republic. Executive producers Steven S. DeKnight and Robert Tapert focused on structuring the events of Spartacus' obscure early life leading up to the beginning of historical records.


title: Spartacus: Blood and Sand

text: The program is preceded by a warning that it purports to portray a "historical portrayal of ancient Roman society that contains graphic violence and adult content". Incidental nudity and scenes of a sexual or of a violent nature are present throughout.


title: Spartacus: Blood and Sand

text: On December 22, 2009, the show was renewed for a second season but its production was postponed after Andy Whitfield was diagnosed with early-stage non-Hodgkin lymphoma. Starz announced in May 2010 that it would develop a six-episode prequel series, entitled "", to allow star actor Whitfield to undergo medical treatment. The prequel featured both new and returning characters; it was headlined by John Hannah (as Batiatus) and Lucy Lawless (as Lucretia). Whitfield also provided a brief voice-over role. Filming began in New Zealand in the summer of 2010. The prequel aired beginning January 2011.


title: Spartacus: Blood and Sand

text: In June 2010, season two's pre-production resumed after Starz announced Whitfield was cancer-free. But when his cancer recurred, Starz replaced Whitfield (with the actor's consent) with Liam McIntyre as Spartacus for season two which is titled "". Andy Whitfield died on September 11, 2011.


title: Spartacus: Blood and Sand

text: Three days after the US premiere, the series began airing in Canada on TMN beginning on January 25, 2010. RTL 5 announced in their January newsletter that "Spartacus: Blood and Sand" would debut in the Netherlands in March 2010. In the United Kingdom, Bravo began airing the series on May 25, 2010. Following the axe of the Bravo network on UK television, Sky1 picked up the rights to the series with plans to carry all subsequent seasons. The series was also scheduled to premiere in Poland on HBO Poland starting from June 19, 2010 and in Hungary on HBO Magyarország starting from June 1, 2010. The series aired in Ireland on TV3. In Brazil, the show aired on Globosat HD. In Turkey the show releases on CNBC-E TV, while in Italy Sky Television gained the rights of the series. In India and Pakistan, the show aired (as of June 2011) on HBO. In Slovenia, the series started airing on Kanal A on January 2, 2012, from Monday to Friday at 9.45 pm, and ended January 18, 2012.


title: Spartacus: Blood and Sand

text: The premiere episode of the series set a record for Starz, with 553,000 viewers on their network, and another 460,000 on Encore, where the show was available only that weekend. For the rest of the season the show had an average of 1.285 million viewers.


title: Spartacus: Blood and Sand

text: Critical reception of the first episode was mixed; the review aggregate website Metacritic which assigns a normalized average score out of 100 gave the show a score of 54% based on 22 reviews.


title: Spartacus: Blood and Sand

text: Ken Tucker of "Entertainment Weekly" gave it the grade B+, saying it "might prove to be the not-at-all-guilty pleasure of the season."


title: Spartacus: Blood and Sand

text: Barry Garron of "The Hollywood Reporter" suggested that with "such thin stories... it's small wonder that sex and violence are used to take up the slack." Robert Lloyd of the "Los Angeles Times" wrote that John Hannah as Batiatus "keeps the show grounded with a persuasive portrait of a man engaged in a stressful daily business" and called Whitfield as Spartacus "handsome and buff and smart and beastly."


title: Spartacus: Blood and Sand

text: Mark Perigard of the "Boston Herald" gave the season finale a positive review, rating it a B+. He commented on the improvement of the series throughout its first season.


title: Spartacus: Blood and Sand

text: In 2012 Titan Books announced the publication of a series of novels based on "Spartacus: Blood and Sand". The first, titled "Spartacus: Swords & Ashes", was written by J.M. Clements and released on January 3, 2012. The second book in the series was "Spartacus: Morituri" by Mark Morris.


title: Spartacus: Blood and Sand

text: In 2012 Gale Force Nine announced the creation of a licensed board game based on the series. The English language release, "Spartacus: A Game of Blood and Treachery", had a limited release at Gen Con 2012 and a general release to game and hobby stores on September 28, 2012. Gameplay involves players taking on the role of Dominus, or head of a Roman house in ancient Rome, buying and trading assets, scheming with and against the other players, and battling in the arena. In May 2013 an expansion entitled "Spartacus: The Serpents and the Wolf" was released. The expansion allows for two extra players (to an updated maximum of six) with the addition of two more houses and includes alternative rules allowing for group battles in the arena.


title: Spartacus: Blood and Sand

text: Earlier, in 2009, Devil's Due had published a four-part prequel comic series titled "Spartacus - Blood and Sand". Each issue spotlighted a character from the planned television series, mostly the minor gladiator rivals of the main cast.


title: Spartacus: Blood and Sand

text: The series was adapted as a 4-part motion comic adaptation called "Spartacus – Blood and Sand – Motion Comic". Ray Park and Heath Freeman were cast. Kyle Newman was the director, and the producers were Andy Collen and Jeff Krelitz.


title: Ron Rivera

text: Ronald Eugene Rivera (born January 7, 1962), nicknamed "Riverboat Ron", is an American football head coach for the Washington Commanders of the National Football League (NFL). He attended the University of California, Berkeley in the early 1980s, where he was recognized as an All-American linebacker for the Golden Bears. Following graduation, he was drafted by the Chicago Bears in the second round of the 1984 NFL Draft and played nine seasons with them, including as a member of the 1985 team that won Super Bowl XX.


title: Ron Rivera

text: Rivera's coaching career began in 1997 when he served as a quality control coach for the Bears. He joined the Philadelphia Eagles as a linebackers coach two years later before rejoining the Bears as their defensive coordinator in 2004. The following year, he was named Assistant Coach of the Year by the PFWA and helped coach linebacker Brian Urlacher into being named Defensive Player of the Year. In 2006, the team made an appearance in Super Bowl XLI. Rivera also interviewed for a few head coaching vacancies around this time. In 2007, he joined the San Diego Chargers coaching linebackers before being promoted to defensive coordinator a year later.


title: Ron Rivera

text: After three years with the Chargers, Rivera was hired as head coach for the Carolina Panthers and would become their all-time leader in wins. He was also recognized as the NFL Coach of the Year in 2013 and 2015 and led the team to an appearance in Super Bowl 50. Rivera was fired midway through the 2019 season due to the teams new ownership wanting change and became Washington's head coach in 2020. He was diagnosed with squamous cell carcinoma that same year but was considered cancer free by early 2021. He is the only coach in NFL history to have led a team with a losing record to the playoffs more than once, doing so with Carolina in 2014 and Washington in 2020.


title: Ron Rivera

text: Rivera was born in Fort Ord, California on January 7, 1962. His father, Eugenio Rivera, was a Puerto Rican commissioned officer in the US Army stationed in California. There Eugenio met his future wife, Dolores, who is of Mexican descent. The family moved often due to his father's military service, with Rivera being educated in bases in Germany, Panama, and Washington, D.C.<ref name="Q/A"></ref> The family eventually settled in Marina, California, where he attended and played football at Seaside High School before graduating in 1980.


title: Ron Rivera

text: Rivera was granted a football scholarship at the University of California, Berkeley, where he led the Golden Bears in tackles as a linebacker during his three years there. For his final season in 1983, Rivera received several awards and honors for his performance, including being named a consensus All-American, Pac-10 Football Defensive Player of the Year along with Arizona linebacker Ricky Hunley, the Pop Warner Trophy, and being named MVP of the East–West Shrine Game.


title: Ron Rivera

text: Rivera was selected in the second round of the 1984 NFL Draft by the Chicago Bears, playing for them as a rotational linebacker and special teamer. In 1985, Rivera became the first American of Puerto Rican descent to win a Super Bowl, as the Bears defeated the New England Patriots in Super Bowl XX. He was named the team's Man of the Year in 1988, and was named their Ed Block Courage Award recipient the following year. He played nine seasons for them before retiring after the 1992 season, playing in 137 games with 62 starts, 392 tackles, 7.5 sacks, 5 forced fumbles, 4 fumble recoveries, and 9 interceptions.


title: Ron Rivera

text: In 1993, Rivera went to work for WGN-TV and SportsChannel Chicago as a television analyst covering the Bears and college football. In 1997, he joined the Bears as a defensive quality control coach.


title: Ron Rivera

text: In 1999, Rivera was named linebackers coach for the Philadelphia Eagles under newly hired head coach Andy Reid. During his tenure, the Eagles advanced to the NFC championship for three consecutive seasons. He also was credited with developing linebacker Jeremiah Trotter into a two-time All-Pro.


title: Ron Rivera

text: Rivera was named defensive coordinator of the Chicago Bears on January 23, 2004. In 2005, the Bears defense was rated second in the league by total yardage, with the team winning the NFC North division with a record of 11-5 before losing in the divisional round of the playoffs to the Carolina Panthers. For his efforts that year, Rivera was named Assistant Coach of the Year by the Pro Football Writers Association. In 2006, the Bears had the league's third-ranked defense in terms of points allowed, which helped them advance to Super Bowl XLI. Although the Bears lost to the Indianapolis Colts 29–17, the defense's success earned Rivera recognition among franchises looking for new head coaches. In February 2007, it was announced that Rivera's contract with the Bears would not be extended due to failed negotiations. Around the same time, he interviewed for several vacant head coaching positions around the league, including with the Pittsburgh Steelers and Dallas Cowboys.


title: Ron Rivera

text: Rivera was hired by the San Diego Chargers to become their inside linebackers coach in February 2007 and was promoted to defensive coordinator after the team fired Ted Cottrell in October 2008.


title: Ron Rivera

text: On January 11, 2011, Rivera was hired to become the fourth head coach of the Carolina Panthers. He was the third Latino in NFL history to become a head coach, following Tom Fears and Tom Flores. During his first year, the Panthers went 6–10 and finished third in the division. In 2012, the Panthers finished 7–9 and finished second in the division. During his first two years with the Panthers, Rivera was known for his conservative decision-making, with journalists noting his record of 2–14 record in games decided by less than a touchdown. Following an 1–3 start to the 2013 season, reports suggested that the Panthers were already contemplating getting a new head coach. As a result, Rivera began to make more aggressive decisions. The Panthers then went 11–1 to finish the season, including a then-franchise record eight-game winning streak, to win the NFC South division and make the playoffs for the first time since 2008. For his efforts, Rivera was honored as the 2013 AP NFL Coach of the Year.


title: Ron Rivera

text: During the early part of the 2013 season, Rivera was given the nickname of "Riverboat Ron" by fans and the media after he took several risky decisions, something previously not attributed to him. The name was inspired after 19th century frontier gamblers, with Rivera later embracing it for use on his social media profiles. Rivera was also known as "Chico" during his playing time with the Chicago Bears, a common practice that the team had under head coach Mike Ditka. Rivera received the nickname from defensive coordinator Buddy Ryan, who reminded him of actor Freddie Prinze from the television series "Chico and the Man".


title: Ron Rivera

text: In 2014, the Panthers recovered from a 3–8–1 start to win its final four regular-season games and clinch the NFC South for the second consecutive year. They defeated the Arizona Cardinals 27–16 in the NFC Wild Card playoff game for the team's first playoff win since 2005 before falling to the eventual NFC champion Seattle Seahawks the following week.


title: Ron Rivera

text: The team's momentum would continue in 2015, as the Panthers produced their best season in franchise history by finishing 15–1, with their only loss being against the Atlanta Falcons on the road in Week 16. Rivera was recognized as the 2015 AP NFL Coach of the Year, his second such honor. The team held the #1 seed in the NFC playoffs, where they defeated the Seahawks in the divisional round and the Arizona Cardinals in the NFC Championship Game, advancing to Super Bowl 50 against the Denver Broncos. It was the first Super Bowl in which both head coaches, Rivera and the Broncos' Gary Kubiak, had previously played in a Super Bowl. The Panthers lost the Super Bowl to the Broncos 24–10, in a game which both sides's defenses dominated.


title: Ron Rivera

text: The Panthers struggled in 2016, finishing 6–10 and out of the playoffs for the first time in four seasons. They improved in 2017 and finished with an 11–5 record, entering the playoffs, but they lost in their first game.


title: Ron Rivera

text: Rivera signed a two-year contract extension worth 15.5 million in January 2018. The Panthers finished 7–9 in the 2018 season, missing the playoffs. After a 5–7 start to the 2019 season, Rivera was fired on December 3, 2019 after nine seasons as head coach. Owner David Tepper, who bought the team in 2018, made the decision to move on from him as he wanted to build his own approach for the team. Rivera finished his career with the Panthers with four playoff appearances and a total record of 79–67–1, both of which rank first all-time in team history.


title: Ron Rivera

text: On January 1, 2020, Rivera was hired to become the 30th head coach of the Washington Football Team, known as the Redskins at his time of hiring. At his introductory press conference, Rivera stated that he was convinced that the team was the right fit for him after having meetings with Washington owner Daniel Snyder and former head coach Joe Gibbs, which started almost immediately after he was fired from the Panthers. Rivera hired several former assistant coaches that worked under him with the Panthers, assigning Scott Turner, the son of Norv Turner, as offensive coordinator and former Jacksonville Jaguars and Oakland Raiders head coach Jack Del Rio as defensive coordinator. Rivera was also granted considerable authority over roster personnel, with him acting as the team's de facto general manager until the team hired Martin Mayhew for the role in 2021. Despite that, Rivera's final say over the team's personnel remained.


title: Ron Rivera

text: Rivera's first season with the team was met with a number of challenges, including implementing a new culture, assisting the process of changing the team's name, dealing with a vastly altered season due to the COVID-19 pandemic, and being diagnosed with cancer and undergoing treatment for it during the season. Rivera released quarterback Dwayne Haskins in December after on-field struggles and off-field controversies throughout the year. Despite all that, he led the team to a NFC East title with a record of 7–9, mirroring his 2014 Panthers team that also won the division with a losing record.


title: Ron Rivera

text: Rivera is Catholic and has three brothers: Steven, Michael, and John. He is married to Stephanie (), whom he met while at Cal in August 1983 before marrying her in 1984. Stephanie, a Filipino American, was a point guard for the Golden Bears women's basketball team in the early 1980s and later served as a coach for the sport, most notably as an assistant for the Washington Mystics of the WNBA in 2000. The couple have two children together, Christopher and Courtney. Courtney played for the UCLA Bruins softball team in the early 2010s and has worked as a social media producer under Rivera in Carolina and Washington. Rivera's nephew Vincent was hired as a defensive quality control coach under him in Washington in 2020.


title: Ron Rivera

text: Rivera's idol while growing up was Puerto Rican baseball player Roberto Clemente, who died in a plane crash while en route to deliver aid to victims of the 1972 Nicaragua earthquake. Rivera was inducted into the California Athletics Hall of Fame in 1994. On January 5, 2015, Rivera's home in Charlotte, North Carolina caught fire and was partially damaged, but he and his family escaped without injury. Rivera held a charity yard sale there after his hiring as Washington head coach in 2020, with various Panthers apparel and merchandise up for sale that raised more than 30,000 for the humane society of Charlotte.


title: Ron Rivera

text: In August 2020, Rivera was diagnosed with squamous cell carcinoma in a lymph node of his neck. Although he has a family history with cancer, his father Eugenio was diagnosed with it while his brother Michael died from pancreatic cancer in 2015 and his mother Dolores from lung cancer in 2022, his diagnosis was discovered in its early stage. He underwent a seven-week treatment regimen that included 35 proton therapy appointments and three cycles of chemotherapy. Although Rivera missed only a total of three practices, he lost over 30 pounds and had to receive intravenous therapy during halftime of some games to relieve fatigue. A campaign known as "Rivera Strong" was organized by the team to support him. He was considered cancer free by late January 2021. In April 2021, Rivera donated $100,000 to Rich Eisen's Run Rich Run charity event for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital. He was later awarded the 2022 George Halas Award by the Pro Football Writers of America for the adversity he dealt with.


title: Mathura

text: Mathura () is a city and the administrative headquarters of Mathura district in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh. It is located approximately north of Agra, and south-east of Delhi; about from the town of Vrindavan, and from Govardhan. In ancient times, Mathura was an economic hub, located at the junction of important caravan routes. The 2011 Census of India estimated the population of Mathura at 441,894.


title: Mathura

text: In Hinduism, Mathura is birthplace of Krishna, which is located at the Krishna Janmasthan Temple Complex. It is one of the Sapta Puri, the seven cities considered holy by Hindus, also called Mokshyadayni Tirth. The Kesava Deo Temple was built in ancient times on the site of Krishna's birthplace (an underground prison). Mathura was the capital of the kingdom of Surasena, ruled by Kansa, the maternal uncle of Krishna. Mathura is part of the Lord Krishna circuit (Mathura,Vrindavan,Barsana, Govardhan, Kurukshetra, Dwarka and Bhalka). Janmashtami is grandly celebrated in Mathura every year.


title: Mathura

text: Mathura has been chosen as one of the heritage cities for the Heritage City Development and Augmentation Yojana scheme of Government of India.


title: Mathura

text: Traditionally it is believed that it was founded by Satrughana after killing Yadava Lavana at the site of Madhuvana. According to Ramayana it was founded by Madhu (a man of the Yadu tribe). Later on Madhu's son Lavanasura was defeated by Satrughana. Madhu says all the territory of Mathura belongs to Abhiras.


title: Mathura

text: Mathura, which lies at the centre of the cultural region of Braj has an ancient history and is also believed to be the homeland and birthplace of Krishna, who belonged to the Yadu dynasty. According to the Archaeological Survey of India plaque at the Mathura Museum, the city is mentioned in the oldest Indian epic, the "Ramayana". In the epic, the Ikshwaku prince Shatrughna slays a demon called Lavanasura and claims the land. Afterwards, the place came to be known as Madhuvan as it was thickly wooded, then Madhupura and later Mathura. The most important pilgrimage site in Mathura was Katra ('market place'), now referred to as Krishna Janmasthan ('the birthplace of Krishna'). Excavations at the site revealed pottery and terracotta dating to the sixth century BCE, the remains of a large Buddhist complex, including a monastery called Yasha Vihara of the Gupta period, as well as Jain sculptures of the same era.


title: Mathura

text: Archaeological excavations at Mathura show the gradual growth of a village into an important city during the Vedic age. The earliest period belonged to the Painted Grey Ware culture (1100–500 BCE), followed by the Northern Black Polished Ware culture (700–200 BCE). Mathura derived its importance as a center of trade due to its location where the northern trade route of the Indo-Gangetic Plain met with the routes to Malwa (central India) and the west coast. Archaeologists have discovered a fragment of Mathura red sandstone from Rakhigarhi - a site of Indus Valley civilization dated to third millennium BCE - which was used as a grindstone; red sandstone was also a popular material for historic period sculptures.


title: Mathura

text: By the sixth century BCE Mathura became the capital of the Surasena Kingdom. The city was later ruled by the Maurya empire (fourth to second centuries BCE). Megasthenes, writing in the early third century BCE, mentions Mathura as a great city under the name Μέθορα ("Méthora"). It seems it never was under the direct control of the following Shunga dynasty (2nd century BCE) as not a single archaeological remain of a Shunga presence were ever found in Mathura.


title: Mathura

text: The Indo-Greeks may have taken control, direct or indirect, of Mathura some time between 180 BCE and 100 BCE, and remained so as late as 70 BCE according to the Yavanarajya inscription, which was found in Maghera, a town from Mathura. The opening of the 3 line text of this inscription in Brahmi script translates as: "In the 116th year of the Yavana kingdom..." or '"In the 116th year of Yavana hegemony" (""Yavanarajya"") However, this also corresponds to the presence of the native Mitra dynasty of local rulers in Mathura, in approximately the same time frame (150 BCE—50 BCE), possibly pointing to a vassalage relationship with the Indo-Greeks.


title: Mathura

text: After a period of local rule, Mathura was conquered by the Indo-Scythians during the first century BCE. The Indo-Scythian satraps of Mathura are sometimes called the "Northern Satraps", as opposed to the "Western Satraps" ruling in Gujarat and Malwa. However, Indo-Scythian control proved to be short lived, following the reign of the Indo-Scythian "Mahakshatrapa" ("Great Satrap") Rajuvula, –25 CE. The Mora Well inscription of Mahakshatrapa Rajuvula, of the early decades of the first century CE, found in a village seven miles from Mathura, stated that images "pratima(h)" of the blessed ("bhagavatam") five Vrishni heroes, were installed in a stone shrine of a person called Tosa. The heroes were identified from a passage in the Vayu Purana as Samkarsana, Vasudev, Pradyumna, Samba, and Aniruddha. The English translation of the inscription read:-


title: Mathura

text: The Mathura inscription of the time of Mahakshatrapa Rajuvula's son, Mahakshatrapa Sodasa recorded erection of a "torana" (gateway), "vedika" (terrace) and "chatuhsala" (quadrangle) at the "Mahasthana" (great place) of Bhagavat Vasudeva. Several male torsos representing the Vrisni heroes were also found in a shrine in Mora dating to the time of Mahakshatrapa Sodasa.


title: Mathura

text: During the rule of the great Kushanas, art and culture flourished in the region and reached new heights and is now famously known as the Mathura School of Art. The Kushans took control of Mathura some time after Mahakshatrapa Sodasa, although several of his successors ruled as Kushans vassals, such as the Indo-Scythian "Great Satrap" Kharapallana and the "Satrap" Vanaspara, both of whom paid allegiance to the Kushans in an inscription at Sarnath, dating to the third year of the reign of the Kushan emperor Kanishka the Great CE. Mathuran art and culture reached its zenith under the Kushan dynasty which had Mathura as one of its capitals. The preceding capitals of the Kushans included Kapisa (modern Bagram, Afghanistan), Purushapura (modern Peshawar, Pakistan) and Takshasila/Sirsukh/ (modern Taxila, Pakistan). Mathura ateliers were most active during the epoch of the great Kushan emperors Kanishka, Huvishka, Vasudeva whose reign represents the Golden Age of Mathura sculpture. During the third century, Nagas ruled Mathura after decline of Kushan Empire.


title: Mathura

text: In the reign of Chandragupta Vikramaditya, a magnificent temple of Vishnu was built at the site of Katra Keshavadeva. Kalidasa, hailed as the greatest poet and dramatist in Sanskrit, in the fourth-fifth century CE mentioned the groves of Vrindavan and Govardhan hill as:


title: Mathura

text: Chinese Buddhist Monk Faxian mentions the city as a centre of Buddhism about 400 CE. He found the people were very well off, there were no taxes other than for those on farmers who tilled the royal land. He found that people did not kill animals, no one consumed wine, and did not eat onion or garlic. He found that engraved title deeds were issued to land owners. Visiting priests were provided with accommodation, beds, mats, food, drinks and clothes to perform scholarly works.


title: Mathura

text: Xuanzang, who visited the city in 634 CE, mentions it as Mot'ulo, recording that it contained twenty Buddhist monasteries and five Hindu temples. Later, he went east to Thanesar, Jalandhar in the eastern Punjab, before climbing up to visit predominantly Theravada monasteries in the Kulu valley and turning southward again to Bairat and then Mathura, on the Yamuna river.


title: Mathura

text: The famous female Alvar saint, Andal visualized going to a pilgrimage which began at Mathura, then proceeded to Gokul, the Yamuna, the pool of Kaliya, Vrindavan, Govardhan, and finished at Dwarka. The eleventh century Kashmiri poet, Bilhana visited Mathura and Vrindavan after leaving Kashmir en route to Karnataka.


title: Mathura

text: The city was sacked and many of its temples destroyed by Mahmud of Ghazni in 1018 CE. The capture of Mathura by Maḥmūd Ibn Sebüktegīn is described by the historian al-Utbi (Abu Nasr Muhammad ibn Muhammad al Jabbaru-l 'Utbi) in his work Tarikh Yamini as follows:


title: Mathura

text: The temple at Katra was sacked by Maḥmūd Ibn Sebüktegīn. A temple was built to replace it in 1150 CE. The Mathura "prasasti" (Eulogistic Inscription) dated Samvat (V.S.) 1207 (1150 CE), said to have been found in 1889 CE at the Keshava mound by Anton Fuhrer, German Indologist who worked with the Archaeological Survey of India, recorded the foundations of a temple dedicated to Vishnu at the Katra site:


title: Mathura

text: Jajja was a vassal of the Gahadavalas in charge of Mathura, and the committee mentioned in the "prasasti" could have been of an earlier Vaishnava temple. The temple built by Jajja at Katra was destroyed by the forces of Qutubuddin Aibak, though Feroz Tughlaq (r. 1351–88 CE) was also said to have attacked it. It was repaired and survived till the reign of Sikandar Lodi (r. 1489–1517 CE).


title: Mathura

text: In the twelfth century, Bhatta Lakshmidhara, chief minister of the Gahadavala king Govindachandra (r. 1114–1155 CE), wrote the earliest surviving collection of verses in praise of the sacred sites of Mathura in his work Krtyakalpataru, which has been described as "the first re-statement of the theory of "Tirtha-yatra" (pilgrimage)". In his Krtyakalpataru, Bhatta Lakshmidhara devoted an entire section (9) to Mathura.


title: Mathura

text: Later on the city was sacked again by Sikandar Lodi, who ruled the Sultanate of Delhi from 1489 to 1517 CE. Sikandar Lodi earned the epithet of 'Butt Shikan', the 'Destroyer of Idols'. Ferishta recorded that Sikandar Lodi was a staunch Muslim, with a passion for vandalizing heathen temples:


title: Mathura

text: Vallabhacharya and Chaitanya Mahaprabhu arrived in the Braj region, in search of sacred places that had been destroyed or lost. In "Shrikrsnashrayah", that make up the "Sodashagrantha", Vallabha said of his age:


title: Mathura

text: The Portuguese, Father Antonio Monserrate (1536 CE-1600 CE), who was on a Jesuit mission at the Mughal Court during the times of Akbar, visited Mathura in 1580–82, and noted that all temples built at sites associated with the deeds of Krishna were in ruins:-


title: Mathura

text: The Keshavadeva temple was rebuilt by the Bundela Rajput Rajah Vir Singh Deo at a cost of thirty-three lakh rupees when the gold was priced at around ₹ 10/- per "tola". And the grand structure of the temple in Mathura was regarded a "wonder of the age".


title: Mathura

text: The Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb, built the Shahi-Eidgah Mosque during his rule, which is adjacent to Shri Krishna Janmabhoomi believed to be over a Hindu temple. He also changed the city's name to Islamabad. In 1669, Aurangzeb issued a general order for the demolition of Hindu schools and temples, in 1670, specifically ordered the destruction of the Keshavadeva temple. Saqi Mustaid Khan recorded:


title: Mathura

text: The Muslim conquest resulted in the destruction of all Buddhist, Jain, and Hindu temples and monuments in and around Mathura. Buddhism, already in decline, never revived, and for the next four hundred years the Jains and Hindus were unable to erect any temples that were not sooner or later demolished. Many of the sites that had been places of religious importance were abandoned and gradually sank beneath the earth. But some of them were not forgotten, owing to the persistence of oral tradition, the refashioning of a temple into a mosque, or the presence of humble shrines, some of which housed sculptural fragments of earlier buildings. Several of them have survived as places of significance in the modern pilgrimage circuit.


title: Mathura

text: "The rebellion in Mathurá district seems to have gained ground. 'On the 14th Rajab, 1080, [28 November 1669], his Majesty left Dihlí for Akbarábád, and almost daily enjoyed the pleasures of the chase. On the 21st Rajab, whilst hunting, he received the report of a rebellion having broken out at Mauza' Rewarah, Chandarkah, and Surkhrú. Hasan 'Ali Khán was ordered to attack the rebels at night, which he did, and the firing lasted till 12 o'clock the next day. The rebels, unable longer to withstand, thinking of the honour of their families, now fought with short arms, and many imperial soldiers and companions of Hasan ’Alí were killed. Three hundred rebels were sent to perdition, and two hundred and fifty, men and women, caught. Hasan ’Alí, in the afternoon, reported personally the result of the fight, and was ordered to leave the prisoners and the cattle in charge of Sayyid Zain ul-'Abidin, the jágirdár of the place. Çaf Shikan Khán also (who after ’Abdunnabí's death had been appointed Faujdár of Mathura) waited on the emperor, and was ordered to tell off two hundred troopers to guard the fields attached to the villages, and prevent soldiers from plundering and kidnapping children. Námdár Khán, Faujdár of Murádábád, also came to pay his respects. Çafshikan Khán was removed from his office, and Hasan 'Ali Khán was appointed Faujdár of Mathura, with a command of Three Thousand and Five Hundred, 2000 troopers, and received a dress of honour, a sword, and a horse. * * * On the 18th Sha'bán [1st January, 1670), his Majesty entered Agrah. Kokilá Ját, the wicked ringleader of the rebels of District*..., who had been the cause of ’Abdunnabí's death and who had plundered Parganah Sa'dábád, was at last caught by Hasan ’Alí Khán and his zealous peshkár, Shaikh Razíuddin, and he was now sent with the Shaikh to Agrah, where by order of his Majesty he was executed. Kokila's son and daughter were given to Jawahir Khán Nazir [a eunuch]. The girl was later married to Shah Quli, the well-known Chelah; and his son, who was called Fázil, became in time so excellent a Hafiz [one who knows the Qorán by heart], that his Majesty preferred him to all others and even chaunted passages to him. Shaikh Razíuddin, who had captured Kokila, belonged to a respectable family in Bhagalpur, Bihár, and was an excellent soldier, administrator, and companion; he was at the same time so learned, that he was ordered to assist in the compilation of the Fatáwá i 'Alamgiri [the great code of Muhammadan laws]. He received a daily allowance of three rupees.'+ (Haásir i ’Alamgiri, pp. 92 to 91.) Hasan ’Alí Khán retained his office from 1080 to Sha'bán 1087 (October, 1676), when Sulțán Qulí Khán was appointed Faujdír of Mathurá.", Asiatic Society of Bengal, "Proceedings"


title: Mathura

text: According the biographer of Raja Jai Singh, Atmaram, when Jai Singh was campaigning against the Jat Raja Churaman Singh, he bathed at Radha "kund" on the full moon of Kartik, went to Mathura in the month of Shravan in 1724, and performed the marriage of his daughter on "Janmashtami". He then undertook a tour of the sacred forests of Braj, and, on his return to Mathura, founded religious establishments and celebrated Holi.


title: Mathura

text: During the period of the expansion of Maratha Empire, pilgrimage to the holy places in the north became quite frequent. Pilgrims required protection on the way and took advantage of the constant movement of troops that journeyed to and back from their homeland for military purposes. That is how the practice arose of ladies accompanying military expeditions. The mother of Peshwa Balaji Baji Rao, Kashitai performed her famous pilgrimage for four years in the north, visiting Mathura, Prayag, Ayodhya, Banaras, and other holy places.


title: Mathura

text: Mathura is a holy city in Hinduism and is considered the heart of Brij Bhoomi, the land of Krishna. The twin-city to Mathura is Vrindavan.


title: Mathura

text: Krishna Janmasthan Temple Complex is an important group of temples built around what is considered to be the birthplace of Krishna. The temple complex contains Keshav Deva temple, Garbha Griha shrine, Bhagavata Bhavan and the Rangabhoomi where the final battle between Krishna and Kans took place.


title: Mathura

text: The Dwarkadheesh Temple is one of the largest temples in Mathura. Vishram Ghat at the bank of river Yamuna is said to be the place were Krishna had rested after killing Kans.


title: Mathura

text: Other notable Hindu religious sites and heritage locations includes the Gita Mandir, Govind Dev temple, ISKCON temple, Kusum Sarovar, Naam yog Sadhna Mandir, Peepleshwar Mahadeo Temple and Yum Yamuna Temple


title: Mathura

text: Kankali Tila brought forth many treasures of Jain art. The archaeological findings testify the existence of two Jain temples and stupas. Numerous Jain sculptures, Ayagapatas (tablet of homage), pillars, crossbeams and lintels were found during archaeological excavations. Some of the sculptures are provided with inscriptions that report on the contemporary society and organization of the Jain community.


title: Mathura

text: Most sculptures could be dated from the second century BC to the 12th century CE, thus representing a continuous period of about 14 centuries during which Jainism flourished at Mathura. These sculptures are now housed in the Lucknow State Museum and in the Mathura Museum.


title: Mathura

text: The Mathura Museum is notable for archaeological artefacts, especially those from the Kushan and Gupta empires. It has sculptures associated with Hinduism, Buddhism and Jainism.


title: Mathura

text: Krishna Janmashtami is grandly celebrated every year in Mathura. Every year 3 to 3.5 million devotees celebrate Janmashtami in Mathura, with the maximum number of devotees visiting the Keshav Deva temple and the Dwarkadheesh temple. Devotees generally observe a fast and break it at midnight when Krishna was believed to have been born. Devotional songs, dance performances, bhog and aartis are observed across Mathura-Vrindavan.


title: Mathura

text: The 2011 census of India estimates the population of Mathura to be 441,894, with a decadal growth rate of 22.53 per cent. Males account for 54% (268,445) and females for 46% (173,449) of this population. Sex ratio of Mathura is 858 females per 1000 males, which has increased from 840 (2001). However, national sex ratio is 940. Population density in 2011 has increased from 621 per km in 2001 to 761 per km. Mathura has an average literacy rate of 72.65 per cent which has increased from 61.46 percent (2001) but still lower than the national average of 74.04 per cent. Male and female literacy rate are 84.39 and 58.93 per cent respectively. 15.61 percent of Mathura's population is under 6 years of age. This figure was 19.56 per cent in 2001 census.


title: Mathura

text: According to the 2011 census on Mathura NPP, 95.4% of the people identified as Hindi speakers, 2.6% as Urdu speakers and 1.4% as speakers of Braj Bhasha (the local dialect). The city also lies within the cultural region of Braj.


title: Mathura

text: Actress turned political leader, Hema Malini is the sitting MP of holy constituency Mathura in Uttar Pradesh.


title: Mathura

text: Mathura Junction railway station is situated on the major Delhi-Mumbai rail route. Both Central Railway and Western Railway routes pass through Mathura. Trains from NCR (north-central railway) to ER (eastern railway) also pass through the Mathura junction. Mathura Cantt railway station is a major route for eastern and central railway.


title: Mathura

text: Mathura is well-connected by road to the rest of India. National Highway NH-19(previously NH-2) from Delhi to Kolkata, with diversion for Chennai also passes through Mathura. Yamuna Expressway from Greater-Noida to Agra (165 km 6 lane access controlled express highway) also passes through, providing good connectivity to Noida, Agra, Kanpur and Lucknow.


title: Mathura

text: A tram network has been proposed in the city, which would make Mathura the second only city in India (besides Kolkata) to have a functional tram transport. In 2017, the local MLA Shrikant Sharma announced that the trams will be operational in Mathura and Vrindavan by 2018.


title: Mathura

text: Currently the city has no airport. The nearest airports are the Agra Airport (about 60 km away) and the Delhi Airport (about 160 km away) with major national and international air routes.The under-construction Jewar Airport in Greater Noida is approximately 75 km from Mathura and is expected to be country's largest airport when fully operational. Land has been earmarked, and construction is in progress near the Yamuna Expressway, with plans to open in the next five years with regular flights to major national and international air routes in future.


title: Mathura

text: In 2012, the then civil aviation minister Ajit Singh suggested Mathura's name for the site of a new greenfield international airport to the then chief minister of Uttar Pradesh, Akhilesh Yadav. Mathura's name came to note when a group of ministers terminated the plan of building Taj International Airport at Agra.


title: Mathura

text: I Corps (Strike Formation) within the Indian Army's Central Command is based in Mathura, hosting Strike I Corps headquarters in a large classified area in the outskirts of the city known as Mathura Cantonment (Central Command is headquartered in Lucknow). It hosts Strike Infantry units, air defence units, armoured divisions, engineer brigades, artillery Units, and classified units of Strategic Forces Command. The I Corps is primarily responsible for the western borders of India. In 2007 during Exercise Ashwamedha, all the armoured, artillery, and infantry divisions performed a simulation of an overall NBC (nuclear-chemical-biological) environment. The aim was to show operational ability in high intensity, short duration and 'sudden' battle


title: Mathura

text: Mathura Refinery located in the city is one of the biggest oil refineries of Asia with a refining capacity of 8.0 million tonnes per year. This oil refinery of Indian Oil Corporation Ltd. is a technologically advanced oil refinery and provides local employment opportunities as well. Its main focus is to meet the demands from the NCR. The refinery had undertaken projects to upgrade its diesel and gasoline units to bring Sulphur levels down by nearly 80 percent


title: Private Eyes (TV series)

text: Private Eyes (during production first known as The Code) was a Canadian comedy-drama television series inspired by the novel of the same name by G.B. Joyce, created by Tim Kilby and Shelley Eriksen starring Jason Priestley and Cindy Sampson as the two protagonist private investigators solving crimes in Toronto.


title: Private Eyes (TV series)

text: In Canada, the series first season of ten episodes premiered on May 26, 2016 on Global. Seasons two (split into two nine-episode batches) and three were shown in Canada each summer from 2017 to 2019. The fourth season premiered in November 2020. In the United States, the series premiered on February 11, 2018 on Ion Television.


title: Private Eyes (TV series)

text: A second season was confirmed and production started in fall 2016 in Toronto. On March 27, 2017, Ion Television picked up the exclusive rights to broadcast the series in the United States, where it is presented as an original series for the network, airing new episodes Tuesday nights with a rebroadcast episode on Sunday nights. The first half of the second season premiered in Canada on May 25, 2017 and concluded on July 20, 2017. The second half premiered on May 27, 2018 and concluded on July 29, 2018. On September 21, 2017, Global ordered a 12-episode third season set to start airing in spring 2019. On May 30, 2019, the day after season three premiered, Global renewed the series for a 12-episode fourth season to air in summer 2020. Production on the fourth season began in July 2019. Global and eOne announced on October 1, 2020 that season 5 production started for 8 new episodes to air in 2021. The season 5 limitation of only 8 episodes is due to the COVID-19 pandemic in Canada. In June 2021 it was announced the show would conclude with the fifth season.


title: Private Eyes (TV series)

text: As of January 2021, "Private Eyes" is distributed internationally to 180 territories as well as on-line streaming.


title: Private Eyes (TV series)

text: Throughout the series Shade drives a silver '69 Porsche 911T. The car has a personalized licence plate "SHADE 17".


title: The Peripheral

text: The Peripheral is a 2014 science fiction mystery-thriller novel by William Gibson set in near- and post-apocalyptic versions of the future. The story focuses on a young rural-town American woman who lives in the near future, and on a London publicist who lives 70 years hence.


title: The Peripheral

text: The novel focuses on Flynne and her brother, Burton. When Burton is hired for a security job which takes place in what he thinks is cyberspace and Flynne temporarily takes his place, she witnesses a possible murder.


title: The Peripheral

text: The novel begins sometime in the near-future in a small town in rural America. Flynne Fisher works at a local 3D printing shop and lives with her mother and her brother Burton, who sustained brain trauma from cybernetic implants he received while serving in the U.S. Marine Corps' elite Haptic Recon unit. When Burton heads to another town to counter-protest the protests of a religious extremist group known as Luke 4:5, he asks her to take over his job working security in a video game/virtual world for a supposedly Colombian company called Milagros Coldiron. Flynne takes the job and notices the game world looks suspiciously like London, but far more empty and more futuristic. Piloting a security quadcopter, she fends off paparazzi drones from an unknown woman's high-rise apartment. On the second night of doing so she witnesses a man and a woman out on a balcony, where the woman is apparently killed and gruesomely devoured by a swarm of nanobots; Flynne is uncertain whether this is real or part of a virtual game.


title: The Peripheral

text: The novel alternates between Flynne's experiences and those of Wilf Netherton, a publicist who lives in the early 22nd century, seventy years later than Flynne's time, and several decades after an apocalyptic period known as the Jackpot took place. As the book begins, Wilf is working with Daedra West, an American artist/celebrity/diplomat, on establishing relations with a group of deformed native humans known as "Patchers," on an enormous cultivated garbage patch in the Pacific Ocean. However, Daedra's reckless behavior triggers her personal security system, killing all the Patchers and their boss, Hamed al-Habib. Wilf is fired (he assumes; he doesn't check his mail) and goes to his friend Lev Zubov's house. Lev, the son of a powerful and wealthy Russian family that moved to Britain several generations ago, is a "continua enthusiast." He has introduced Wilf to "stubs" which are alternate pasts whose futures begin to deviate from the ones that lead to his and Wilf's present at the moment contact is made from their present - a contact only possible in a data sense and only made possible by a mysterious quantum computer running in China. Milagros Coldiron is Zubov's front organization for accessing the stub in which Flynne and Burton live. Inhabitants of Flynne's time are able to access the early 22nd century of Zubov and Netherton via headsets built using a 3D printer and technological knowhow passed back to them from the 22nd century. These headsets allow the wearer's consciousness to inhabit and control a 'peripheral' a.k.a. an artificial physical human body in the 22nd century. Using this technology, Wilf had hired Burton Fisher from his stub to act as drone security for Daedra's sister, Aelita, as a novelty gift to her.


title: The Peripheral

text: When Aelita goes missing, Wilf realizes that the drones controlled by Flynne were the only witness of the event while all other recording devices were disabled.


title: The Peripheral

text: Returning from his trip, Burton tells Flynne that Milagros Coldiron wants to speak with her. Via a video call, she tells Wilf and the others about what she saw on the tower, but Wilf is reluctant to tell her that the murder was not part of a game. He does tell Flynne that an assassination contract has been put out on Burton, on their timeline, using the darknet. Burton responds by getting his military colleagues to set up a perimeter around their house. Shortly after, his friend Conner, a triple amputee who uses a motorized, road-capable wheelchair, kills four armed men in a car heading up the country road to their house, using a mentally-controlled gun rig. Milagros Coldiron begins using their advanced technology and foreknowledge to build financial and political power in the past.


title: The Peripheral

text: Wilf, Lev, and their allies in the further future are visited by Inspector Ainsley Lowbeer, investigating Aelita's disappearance. When they tell her what Flynne told them, she insists that Flynne be brought to the future via a peripheral (a cyborg avatar that users can connect to from another location) via the quantum server so that Flynne can identify the man who was present when Aelita died, to help solve the case. Lev and his assistants Ash and Ossian send back 3D printing instructions for a peripheral-controlling headset, which Flynne's computer-savvy friends Macon and Edward use to create a connectivity headband for her called "the crown". She connects to a peripheral that has been brought to Lev's house, where Wilf explains that this is really the future, albeit not one possible for her now that her timeline has been altered.


title: The Peripheral

text: Lowbeer notices that Daedra is holding a new party at her sister's apartment, and she gets Wilf to get himself and Flynne's peripheral invited, with Wilf pretending that the peripheral will be controlled by a woman who studies neoprimitive art and is a huge fan of Daedra's work. Deciding they might need extra muscle to confront Daedra, Wilf's group recruits Conner to manufacture another crown and control another peripheral, a bodyguard for Wilf at the party; Conner is ecstatic at being able to walk again while piloting a peripheral. Meanwhile, back in the 21st century, a second group of assassins is killed by Burton's military colleagues. Milagros Coldiron attempts to "buy" the state governor, who, like most officials of the time, is corrupt, to avoid a police investigation. Burton's group use Milagros Coldiron's money and connections to build a secure base and acquire military equipment. Flynne is kidnapped by one of Burton's colleagues under blackmail by a local drug baron named Corbell Pickett. Pickett explains that the people who killed Aelita are operating corporate collective called Matryoshka with the goal of killing Flynne, and Pickett is negotiating a higher reward before executing her. She is rescued by Burton and Conner, who kill Pickett’s security guards and destroy his compound. Wilf's crew in the future make her, Burton, and their friends executives of Coldiron USA, which is now battling economically and politically against Matryoshka around the globe, and declares their base the corporate headquarters.


title: The Peripheral

text: Wilf reveals that the Jackpot begins in the middle of the 21st century as a combination of climate change and other causes, followed by a series of droughts, famines, pandemics, political chaos, and anarchy. 80% of the global human population dies off. But as this is going on, scientists have created nanotech called Assemblers that begins to rebuild society, as well as finding other scientific and engineering breakthroughs. As a result, everything is very efficient and advanced in Wilf's future, but it has mostly empty cities and most natural animal species are extinct.


title: The Peripheral

text: Wilf, Flynne and Conner (the latter two in their peripherals) go to Daedra's party, which has become a celebration of Aelita's life. Flynne spots the man who killed Aelita, but he and Daedra kidnap them, revealing themselves to be behind the plot to kill Flynne. Conner's peripheral is destroyed while trying to kill the kidnappers. The man who was present when Aelita was killed is revealed to be Hamed al-Habib, who had been "killed" by Daedra as a peripheral that day on the garbage patch, and had undergone surgery to revert himself to a more normal human form long ago. Daedra and Hamed have conspired with a city official named Sir Henry, who holds the position of remembrancer, to exterminate the patchers and sell their resources to profit themselves. Aelita was killed for reasons not entirely clear, most likely because Hamed and Daedra feared she was going to sell them out.


title: The Peripheral

text: Conner (operating a robotic weapon designed in another stub under Lowbeer's influence) and Burton (operating a peripheral-like exoskeleton) break into the room where Flynne and Wilf are being held. Flynne and Burton fire special weapons that direct Assembler nanobots, and both Hamed and Sir Henry are eaten down to the bone by the machines; Daedra is temporarily detained but is released after interrogation. In Flynne's world Matryoshka becomes completely inoperative and Milagros Coldiron gains uncontested power.


title: The Peripheral

text: Years later, Flynne winds up married to the police officer she had long been interested in; her brother and their friends find love as well. Conner receives a set of bionic limbs constructed from plans sent from the future. Wilf finds love with his former coworker from Canada, with whom he moves in. He and Flynne still connect back and forth between timelines to see each other; Flynne meets weekly with Lowbeer (via peripheral) to discuss the changes to Flynne's world that are being made through the funding of Milagros Coldiron in an attempt to avert the Jackpot.


title: The Peripheral

text: Gibson was working on the book as early as August 2012. "The Peripheral" was Gibson's 13th book. On April 19, 2013, Gibson appeared at the New York Public Library and read from the first chapter: "The Gone Haptics". The book was published in November 2014.


title: The Peripheral

text: Gibson's book "Agency" is set in the same world as "The Peripheral", also involving alternative but connected futures.


title: The Peripheral

text: "The Peripheral" was positively received by "The Guardian". According to "GQ's" Zach Baron, "Like many Gibson books, "The Peripheral" is basically a noirish murder mystery wearing a cyberpunk leather jacket and, after an uncharacteristically dense first one hundred pages, a super enjoyable read—though perhaps less so when you consider just how accurate Gibson can be when he's thinking about what might come next. Because according to "The Peripheral", what is coming next is, to borrow Gibson's phrase again, well…fucked." "The Sydney Morning Herald" noted an "ultimate lack of narrative cohesion," but said that the book was still dense with "imaginative technological inventions and societal extrapolations, not least on capitalism, government surveillance and retro Third World colonialism."


title: The Peripheral

text: "The Irish Times" wrote that it was "a formidable novel, and one that boasts just about the only plausible depiction of time travel in recent fiction. But it does suffer from slow pacing and a flat final-act climax." "The Financial Times" gave it a mixed review, calling the "twin narratives [...] complex and tangled," but overly drawn out over the book's nearly 500 pages. "The Verge" said the book was a "smart, nuanced twist on time travel" and praised how detail was integrated more into the characters' lives than his other recent series. NPR gave the book a positive review. "The Toronto Star" said it could be difficult to keep up with the book, but it was "fast-paced and chock full of fascinating speculations into not only what the future will look like, but how it will work."


title: The Peripheral

text: A streaming series adaptation was commissioned in 2018 by Amazon to be developed by "Westworld" creators Lisa Joy and Jonathan Nolan. The series was put into development in April 2018 with a "script-to-series commitment", receiving a firm go-ahead in the middle of November 2019. Beyond Joy and Nolan, executive producers include Athena Wickham, Steven Hoban and Vincenzo Natali. It has one-hour episodes and was developed by Kilter Films, through Amazon Studios. Warner Bros. Television was also involved as a producer, with Scott B. Smith as writer. Smith created the series and served as the showrunner as well as executive producer. Natali directed the show's pilot.


title: Sympathy for the Devil

text: "Sympathy for the Devil" is a song by English rock band the Rolling Stones and the opening track from the band's 1968 album "Beggars Banquet". The song is a product of Mick Jagger and Keith Richards' songwriting partnership.


title: Sympathy for the Devil

text: It is considered one of the best songs of the popular music era, and has been included on multiple "best of" lists, such as 106th on "Rolling Stone"s 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. It is also the 22nd best ranked song on critics' all-time lists according to Acclaimed Music.


title: Sympathy for the Devil

text: "Sympathy for the Devil" is credited to Jagger and Richards, though the song was largely a Jagger composition. The working title of the song was "The Devil Is My Name", having earlier been called "Fallen Angels". Jagger sings in first person narrative as the Devil, who boasts of his role in each of several historical atrocities and repeatedly asks the listener to "guess my name." The singer then ironically demands the listener's courtesy towards him, implicitly chastising the listeners for their collective culpability in the listed killings and crimes. In the 2012 documentary "Crossfire Hurricane", Jagger stated that his influence for the song came from Baudelaire and from the Russian author Mikhail Bulgakov's novel "The Master and Margarita" (which had just appeared in English translation in 1967). The book was given to Jagger by Marianne Faithfull and she confirmed the inspiration in an interview with Sylvie Simmons for the magazine "Mojo" in 2005.


title: Sympathy for the Devil

text: In a 1995 interview with "Rolling Stone", Jagger said, "that was taken from an old idea of Baudelaire's, I think, but I could be wrong. Sometimes when I look at my Baudelaire books, I can't see it in there. But it was an idea I got from French writing. And I just took a couple of lines and expanded on it. I wrote it as sort of like a Bob Dylan song." It was Richards who suggested changing the tempo and using additional percussion, turning the folk song into a samba.