title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: In the post-1994 era the Kimberley City Council was renamed the Sol Plaatje Local Municipality after the area it served was expanded to include surrounding towns and villages, most notably Ritchie. Sol Plaatje, the prominent writer and activist, lived for much of his life in Kimberley. Similarly the erstwhile Diamantveld District Council became the Frances Baard District Municipality, with reference to the trade unionist, Frances Baard, who was born in Greenpoint, Kimberley.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Municipality – The Kimberley borough council assumed a coat of arms in 1878. The arms were registered with the Cape Provincial Administration in December 1964 and at the Bureau of Heraldry in February 1968.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: The design was a combination of the Union Jack and the charges from the Cape Colony's coat of arms, with a lozenge to represent the diamond-mining industry : "Azure, a cross and saltire superimposed Gules both fimbriated Argent, in chief three bezants Or, each charged with a fleur de lis Azure, and in base three annulets Or; on a lozenge Or, superimposed over the fess point, a lion rampant Gules". The motto was "Spero meliora". The arms were depicted on a cigarette card issued in 1931.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Divisional council – The Kimberley divisional council, which administered the rural areas outside the city, registered its own arms at the Bureau in August 1970.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: The arms were: "Per saltire, in chief, barry wavy of six Argent and Azure; in base, Argent, a pale Sable charged with three fusils Argent; dexter, Gules, a shovel and pick in saltire, handles downward, Or; sinister, a staff of Aesculapius, Or". In layman's terms, the shield was divided in four by two diagonal lines, and depicted (1) six silver and blue stripes with wavy edges, (2) a crossed pick and shovel on a red background, (3) a golden staff of Aesculapius, and (4) three silver diamond-shaped fusils on a black vertical stripe on a silver background.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: The crest was two crossed rifles in front of an upright sword; the supporters were two kudus; and the motto was "Nitanir semper ad optima".


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Kimberley was the initial hub of industrialisation in South Africa in the late nineteenth century, which transformed the country's agrarian economy into one more dependent on its mineral wealth. A key feature of the new economic arrangement was migrant labour, with the demand for African labour in the mines of Kimberley (and later on the gold fields) drawing workers in growing numbers from throughout the subcontinent. The labour compound system developed in Kimberley from the 1880s was later replicated on the gold mines and elsewhere.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: The city housed South Africa's first stock exchange, the Kimberley Royal Stock Exchange, which opened on 2 February 1881.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: On 2 September 1882, Kimberley became the first town in the Southern Hemisphere to install electric street lighting.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: The rising importance of Kimberley led to one of the earliest South African and International Exhibitions to be staged in Kimberley in 1892. It was opened by Sir Henry Loch, the then Governor of the Cape of Good Hope on 8 September. It presented exhibits of art, an exhibition of paintings from the royal collection of Queen Victoria and mining machinery and implements amongst other items. The exhibition aroused considerable interest at international level, which resulted in a competition for display space.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: South Africa's first school of mines was opened here in 1896 and later relocated to Johannesburg, becoming the core of the University of the Witwatersrand. A Pretoria campus later became the University of Pretoria. In fact the first two years were attended at colleges elsewhere, in Cape Town, Grahamstown or Stellenbosch, the third year in Kimberley and the fourth year in Johannesburg. Buildings were constructed against a total cost of 9,000 pounds with De Beers contributing on a pound for pound basis.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: South Africa's first school of aviation, to train pilots for the proposed South African Aviation Corps (SAAC), was established in Kimberley in 1913. Known as "Paterson's Aviation Syndicate School of Flying", it is commemorated in the Pioneers of Aviation Museum (and replica of the first Compton Patterson Biplane preserved there), situated near to Kimberley airport. In the 1930s Kimberley boasted the best night-landing facilities on the continent of Africa. A major air rally was hosted there in 1934. In the war years Kimberley Airport was commandeered by the Union Defence Force and run by the 21 Flying School for the training of fighter pilots.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Today Kimberley Airport services the area, with regular scheduled flights from Cape Town and Johannesburg.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Work on connecting Kimberley by rail to the cities along the Cape Colony's coastline began in 1872, under the management of the Cape Government Railways. The railway line from Cape Town to Kimberley was completed in 1885, accelerating the transport of both passengers and goods. The railway connected Kimberley with cheaper sources of grain and other products, as well as supplies of coal, so that one of its local impacts was to undercut (mainly African) trade in fresh produce and firewood in Kimberley's hinterland. Another footnote to railway history is its role in the initial rapid spread of the Spanish Influenza epidemic in 1918.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: The railway reticulation eventually would link Kimberley with Port Elizabeth, Johannesburg, Durban and Bloemfontein. The major junction at De Aar in the Karoo linked early twentieth century lines to Upington (later to Namibia) and to Calvinia. From the 1990s there was a decline in the use of the railways.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Today passenger train services to and from Kimberley are provided by Spoornet's Shosholoza Meyl, with connections south to Cape Town and Port Elizabeth and north to Johannesburg. Luxury railway experiences are provided on the main north–south line by the Blue Train and Rovos Rail. The central railway station of Kimberley is Kimberley railway station.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Wagon and coach routes were developed rapidly as the rush for the diamond fields gathered momentum. Two of the major routes were from the Cape and from Port Elizabeth, the nearest maritime port at the time. Contemporary accounts of the 1870s describe the appalling condition of some of the roads and decry the absence of bridges. From the mid-1880s the route through Kimberley and Mafeking (now Mahikeng) became the main axis of British colonial penetration and it was from Kimberley, along that route, that the Pioneer Column for the settlement of Rhodesia set forth in 1890. Today, however, the central arterial route to the north, the N1 from the Cape to Johannesburg, goes via Bloemfontein, not Kimberley.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Today, Kimberley is the seat of the Provincial Legislature for the Northern Cape and the Provincial Administration. It services the mining and agricultural sectors of the region.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: The city projects itself as a significant tourist destination, the 'City that Sparkles', boasting a diversity of museums and visitor attractions. It is also a gateway to other Northern Cape destinations including the Mokala National Park, nature reserves and numerous game farms or hunting lodges, as well as historic sites of the region.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Kimberley has hosted significant meetings and conferences, developing a major venue, the Mittah Seperepere Convention Centre, and other conference hosting facilities. Recent gatherings have included the founding meeting of the Kimberley Process (2000) and a follow-up meeting of this organisation in 2013, and the International Indigenous Peoples Summit on Sustainable Development (2002).


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Under the Köppen system Kimberley has a semi-arid climate (BSk) courtesy of its dry winters. Summers are long, wet, and long lasting. Winters are short, mild, and dry with chilly nights.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: According to the 2011 census, the population of Kimberley "proper" was 96,977, while the townships Galeshewe and Roodepan had populations of 107,920 and 20,263 respectively. This gives the urban area a total population of 225,160. Of this population, 63.1% identified themselves as "Black African", 26.8% as "Coloured", 8.0% as "White" and 1.2% as "Indian or Asian". 43.2% of the population spoke Afrikaans as their first language, 35.8% spoke Setswana, 8.7% spoke English, 6.0% spoke isiXhosa and 2.7% spoke Sesotho.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Kimberley is set in a relatively flat landscape with no prominent topographic features within the urban limits. The only "hills" are debris dumps generated by more than a century of diamond mining. From the 1990s these were being recycled and poured back into De Beers Mine (by 2010 it was filled to within a few tens of metres of the surface). Certain of the mine dumps, in the vicinity of the Big Hole, have been proclaimed as heritage features and are to be preserved as part of the historic industrial landscape of Kimberley.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: The surrounding rural landscape, not more than a few minutes' drive from any part of the city, consists of relatively flat plains dotted with hills, mainly outcropping basement rock (andesite) to the north and north west, or Karoo age dolerite to the south and east. Shallow pans formed in the plains.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: One of Kimberley's famous features is Kamfers Dam, a large pan north of the city, which is an important wetland supporting a breeding colony of lesser flamingos. Conservation initiatives in the area aim to bring people from the city in touch with its wildlife. In 2012 rising water levels flooded the artificial island built to enhance flamingo breeding, while in December 2013 a local outbreak of avian botulism bacteria resulted in the deaths of hundreds of birds. The island has since re-emerged.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: The administration of the Crown Colony of Griqualand West (from 1873) was conducted from Government Buildings in Kimberley up until the annexation of the Colony to the Cape in 1880. At the level of local government, separate Borough Councils operated in Kimberley and Beaconsfield up to the time of their amalgamation as the City of Kimberley in 1912. Thereafter a single City Council regulated the affairs of the city, while a Divisional Council administered the surrounding rural district. In the 1980s, in the last days of apartheid, a separate political entity referred to as Galeshewe (with Mankurwane) was brought into existence with its own council.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Post-1994 the Kimberley City Council became the Sol Plaatje Local Municipality while the successor to what had become the Diamandveld Regional Services Council was the Frances Baard District Municipality.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: The idea of establishing the Northern Cape as a distinct geographic entity dates from the 1940s but it became a political and administrative fact only in 1994, with Kimberley formally becoming the new province's legislative capital. The provincial legislature initially occupied the old Cape Provincial Administration building at the Civic Centre before moving into a purpose-built Legislature deliberately situated between one of the townships and erstwhile white suburbs. Kimberley is also the seat of the Northern Cape Division of the High Court of South Africa, which exercises jurisdiction over the province.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: The Sol Plaatje University opened in Kimberley in 2014, accommodating a modest initial intake of 135 students. Announcing the name for the university, former President Jacob Zuma mentioned the development of academic niche areas that did not exist elsewhere, or were under-represented, in South Africa. "Given the rich heritage of Kimberley and the Northern Cape in general," Zuma said, "it is envisaged that Sol Plaatje will specialise in heritage studies, including interconnected academic fields such as museum management, archaeology, indigenous languages, and restoration architecture."


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Tertiary education institutions no longer in existence (or absorbed into the above organisational configurations):


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Kimberley, from its earliest days, attracted people of diverse faiths which are still reflected by practising faith communities in the city. Pre-eminently these are various denominations of Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, as well as other faiths. Traditional African beliefs continue as an element in the Zionist Christian Church (ZCC). Kimberley is the seat of the Anglican Diocese of Kimberley and Kuruman and also of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Kimberley – previously the Apostolic Vicariate of Kimberley in Orange. Other denominations having churches in the city are the Methodist Church, the Presbyterian Church, the Congregational Church, the Dutch Reformed Church (Afrikaans: Nederduitse Gereformeerde Kerk), the Baptist Church, the Afrikaans Baptist Church (Afrikaans: Afrikaanse Baptiste Kerk), the Apostolics, Pentecostalists. The Seventh-day Adventist Church in South Africa was first established in Kimberley.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Notable artists from Kimberley include William Timlin and Walter Westbrook, while an artist noted for his depiction of Kimberley was Philip Bawcombe.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Writers from the city or with strong Kimberley links include Diane Awerbuck, Benjamin Bennett, Lawrence Green, Dorian Haarhoff, Dan Jacobson, E P Lekhela, Z.K. Matthews, Sarah Gertrude Millin, Sol Plaatje, Frank Templeton Prince, Olive Schreiner, A.H.M. Scholtz.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: The earliest newspaper here was the "Diamond Field", published initially at Pniel on 15 October 1870. Other early papers with the "Diamond News" and the "Independent". The "Diamond Fields Advertiser" is Kimberley's current daily newspaper, published since 23 March 1878.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: The Volksblad, with a free local supplement called "Noordkaap", is read by Afrikaans-speaking readers.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Kimberley has contributed to much of cricket's history having supplied several international players. There was Frank (Nipper) Nicholson, Xenophon Balaskas born in Kimberley to Greek parents and Ken Viljoen, Ronnie Draper and in more recent times Pat Symcox and the Proteas coach Mickey Arthur.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Frank Dobbin known as Uncle Dobbin was a member of Paul Roos' original Springboks in the tour to the British Isles in 1906/1907. His memory lives in his old colonial-style home in Roper street, bearing a simple brass plaque with the name 'Dobbin'. Later Springboks to wear green and gold included Ian Kirkpatrick, Tommy Bedford and Gawie Visagie, brother of Ammosal-based Springbok flyhalf Piet Visagie.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Kimberley is home to the Griquas rugby team, which has won the Currie Cup three times in 1899, 1911 and 1970. Ronnie Bauser an ex-mayor of Kimberley were involved in Griquas rugby for 1950–1971.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Richard Henyekane, South African footballer, is from Kimberley, his younger brother Joseph played for Golden Arrows. Jimmy Tau is from Kimberley.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Karen Muir, born in Kimberley, became in 1965 the youngest person to break a world record in any sport. This age group record stands to this day. She set it in August 1965 at the junior world champions in Blackpool, England in the backstroke at the age of 12. She went on to break many more world records but was denied a role in world swimming when she lost the opportunity to represent her country at the 1968 Olympic games in Mexico City as a result of South Africa being excluded due to its racial apartheid policies. Kimberley also saw a world record broken in the municipal pool which now bears Karen Muir's name. It was Johannesburg's Anne Fairlie who beat Karen Muir and Frances Kikki Caron in world record breaking time.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Charl Bouwer, the paralympic swimmer from South Africa who won gold in the 50m freestyle at the 2012 Summer Paralympics in London, was born in Kimberley.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: The first Maloof Money Cup World Skateboarding Championships were held in Kimberley in September 2011 and again in 2012. When the Maloof family sponsorship ended in 2013 the event became known as the Kimberley Diamond Cup.


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: "Kimberley has had a profound effect on the course of history in Southern Africa. The discovery of diamonds there, more than a century ago, proved to be the first step in the transformation of South Africa from an agricultural into an industrial country. When gold and other minerals were later discovered to the north, there were already Kimberley men of vision and enterprise with the capital and technology to develop the new resources." - H.F. Oppenheimer, 1976. Foreword to Brian Roberts’ book, "Kimberley, turbulent city".


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Anthony Trollope visited Kimberley in 1877 and was notoriously put off by the heat, enervating and hideous, while the dust and the flies of the early mining town almost drove him mad:


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Of the townscape, largely built of sun-dried brick, and of plank and canvas and corrugated iron sheets brought up by ox-wagon from the coast, he remarked:


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: "In Kimberley there are two buildings with a storey above the ground, and one of these is in the square: this is its only magnificence. There is no pavement. The roadway is all dust and holes. There is a market place in the midst which certainly is not magnificent. Around are the corrugated iron shops of the ordinary dealers in provisions. An uglier place I do not know how to imagine."


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: A.H.J. Bourne, a former headmaster of Kimberley Boys' High School, returned to the city in 1937, observing that: "The history of Kimberley would appear remarkable to any stranger who could not fail to think that some supermind was behind its destinies. In so short a time it has grown from bare veld."


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: In the early 1990s writer Dan Jacobson returned to Kimberley, where he had grown up in the 1930s, giving a sense of how things had changed:


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: "The people I had known had vanished; so had their language. That contributed to my ghostlike state. In my earliest years the whites of Kimberley spoke English only; Afrikaans was the tongue of the Cape Coloured people ... Now I was addressed in Afrikaans everywhere I went, by white, black, and Coloured alike".


title: Kimberley, Northern Cape

text: Kimberley dull? – asked "virtualtourist" reviewer Catherine Reichardt: "Happily, the answer is a resounding 'No', provided that you have a passion for history - in which case Kimberley has it in spades, and you'll probably need to overnight to fully appreciate its attractions and charms. In many ways, exploring Kimberley and its heritage is like experiencing South African history in microcosm."


title: Kannada script

text: The Kannada script (IAST: "Kannaḍa lipi"; obsolete: Kanarese or Canarese script in English) is an abugida of the Brahmic family, used to write Kannada, one of the Dravidian languages of South India especially in the state of Karnataka. Kannada script is also widely used for writing Sanskrit texts in Karnataka. Several minor languages, such as Tulu, Konkani, Kodava, Sanketi and Beary, also use alphabets based on the Kannada script. The Kannada and Telugu scripts share very high mutual intellegibility with each other, and are often considered to be regional variants of single script. Other scripts similar to Kannada script are Sinhala script (which included some elements from the Kadamba script), and Old Peguan script


title: Kannada script

text: The Kannada script ( "akṣaramāle" or "varṇamāle") is a phonemic abugida of forty-nine letters. The character set is almost identical to that of other Brahmic scripts. Consonantal letters imply an inherent vowel. Letters representing consonants are combined to form digraphs "(" "ottakṣara)" when there is no intervening vowel. Otherwise, each letter corresponds to a syllable.


title: Kannada script

text: The letters are classified into three categories: "svara" (vowels), "vyañjana" (consonants), and "yōgavāhaka" (semiconsonants).


title: Kannada script

text: The Kannada words for a letter of the script are "akshara", "akkara", and "varṇa". Each letter has its own form ( "ākāra") and sound ( "śabda"), providing the visible and audible representations, respectively. Kannada is written from left to right.


title: Kannada script

text: The Brahmi script evolved into the Kadamba script by the 5th century, which in turn developed into the Kannada-Telugu script (or 'Old Kannada script') in the 7th century. The Kannada and Telugu scripts then separated by around 1300 C.E.


title: Kannada script

text: Two categories of consonant letters ( "vyan̄jana") are defined in Kannada: the structured consonants and the unstructured consonants.


title: Kannada script

text: The structured consonants are classified according to where the tongue touches the palate of the mouth and are classified accordingly into five structured groups. These consonants are shown here with their ISO transcriptions.


title: Kannada script

text: The Kannada script is rich in conjunct consonant clusters, with most consonants having a standard subjoined form and few true ligature clusters. A table of consonant conjuncts follows although the forms of individual conjuncts may differ according to the font.


title: Kannada script

text: Of special note is the sequence concerning the letter (ra). Unlike other letters, the conjunct form is written second even if it is pronounced first in the sequence.


title: Kannada script

text: Kannada literary works employed the letters (transliterated " or 'rh') and (transliterated ", 'lh' or 'zh'), whose manner of articulation most plausibly could be akin to those in present-day Malayalam and Tamil. The letters dropped out of use in the 12th and 18th centuries, respectively. Later Kannada works replaced 'rh' and 'lh' with (ra) and (la) respectively.


title: Kannada script

text: It is still used to write the Badaga language and a vowel + virama + ḻ is used to transcribe its retroflex vowels.


title: Kannada script

text: Another letter (or unclassified "vyanjana" (consonant)) that has become extinct is 'nh' or 'inn'. Likewise, this has its equivalent in Telugu, where it is called "Nakaara pollu". The usage of this consonant was observed until the 1980s in Kannada works from the mostly coastal areas of Karnataka (especially the Dakshina Kannada district). Now, hardly any mainstream works use this consonant. This letter has been replaced by (consonant n).


title: Kannada script

text: Articulation of consonants is be logical combination of components in the two prayatnams. The below table gives a view upon articulation of consonants.


title: Kannada script

text: Written Kannada is composed of akshara or "kagunita", corresponding to syllables. The letters for consonants combine with diacritics for vowels. The consonant letter without any diacritic, such as "ka", has the inherent vowel "a" . This is called "dīrgha". A consonant without a vowel is marked with a 'killer' stroke, such as "k". This is known as "hrasva".


title: Kannada script

text: Several transliteration schemes/tools are used to type Kannada characters using a standard keyboard. These include Baraha (based on ITRANS), Pada Software and several internet tools like Google transliteration, Quillpad (predictive transliterator). Nudi, the Government of Karnataka's standard for Kannada Input, is a phonetic layout loosely based on transliteration.


title: Kannada script

text: Due to its resemblance to an eye and an eyebrow, the Kannada letter "ṭha" is used in the "look of disapproval" (displayed as "ಠ_ಠ"), a popular emoticon used to convey disapproval or contempt. Similarly, the akshara "rr̥a" has been used in emoticons to represent a monocle, while "tha" has been used to represent a tearing eye.


title: Eddie Jemison

text: Edward Francis Jemison, Jr. (born November 25, 1963) is an American film and television actor. He is known for his roles as Livingston Dell in the "Ocean's" film trilogy and Mickey Duka in "The Punisher", as well as the television series "Hung", "iZombie" and "Chicago Med".


title: Eddie Jemison

text: Jemison was born in New Orleans, Louisiana, the son of Rosalie ("née" Centanni) and Edward Francis Jemison and is of Irish and Italian descent. He was raised in Kenner, Louisiana, and attended a Catholic secondary school, Archbishop Rummel High School. He graduated from Louisiana State University where he was a member of the Delta Chi fraternity.


title: Eddie Jemison

text: Jemison has made multiple appearances on "Late Night with David Letterman" and starred in television pilots for NBC and ABC. He is also a veteran of the Chicago theatre scene where his stage credits include "The Wizards of Quiz" at the National Jewish Theatre; "Only Kidding" at the Wisdom Bridge Theatre; "Loot" at Tulane Repertory; "A Christmas Carol" at the Goodman Theatre; "Talking to Myself" and "Holiday Memories" at the Northlight Theatre; and "T Bone N Weasel" at Victory Gardens. Jemison also performed in "The Two Gentlemen of Verona" and "As You Like It" at the Chicago Shakespeare Theater.


title: Eddie Jemison

text: In the mid-1990s, before launching a film career, he starred in a series of Bud Light commercials with the tagline "Yes, I am". Offered a contract to continue playing the character, Jemison instead chose to pursue music for a time, which prompted the creation of the "Budweiser Frogs". Online, Jemison starred in the web series "Self Storage".


title: John Illsley

text: John Edward Illsley (born 24 June 1949) is an English musician, best known as bass guitarist of the rock band Dire Straits. With it, he has received multiple BRIT and Grammy Awards, and a Heritage Award.


title: John Illsley

text: As one of the founding band members, with guitarist brothers Mark and David Knopfler, and drummer Pick Withers, Illsley played a role in the development of Dire Straits' sound. By the time the group disbanded in 1995 changes in personnel meant that Illsley and lead singer Mark Knopfler were the only two original band members remaining. Illsley was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of Dire Straits in 2018.


title: John Illsley

text: Illsley has produced two albums of his own, with Mark Knopfler as a guest musician, and has helped with Mark's personal projects and charities. He released two more albums, influenced by the Celtic-based band Cunla.


title: John Illsley

text: Illsley's childhood memories include searching for sticklebacks in the River Jordan in Little Bowden (near Market Harborough), with friends. Illsley attended Bromsgrove School, Worcestershire and a Further Education College near Kettering, Northamptonshire, before starting work as a management trainee for a timber firm. He then studied Sociology at Goldsmiths College, University of London and opened a record shop with his girlfriend.


title: John Illsley

text: While in London, he roomed with David Knopfler. Illsley was introduced to David's older brother, Mark, who had just undergone a marital breakup and was playing music in the pubs nearby. Illsley recounts returning home very early one morning, and "walked into the lounge room, and saw this figure lying on the floor... asleep ... with a guitar over his legs, and he'd... fallen asleep on the floor while he was playing... his head was sort of cranked back, and there was an ashtray with cigarette butts and coffee on the floor... ", and that was how the two first encountered one another.


title: John Illsley

text: David Knopfler was keen to start a band and approached his roommate. Illsley already played bass guitar and had the same interest. Convinced that they could make a go of it, with David's brother Mark as lead guitarist and vocalist, David playing rhythm guitar, Illsley on bass, and Pick Withers, a friend, as drummer, the four set about forming a band, eventually named Dire Straits which according to rumour is because they gave up their day jobs and were in financial "dire straits" by the time their band became popular. However, David Knopfler denies this on his personal website: "The notion that the band were literally in dire straits is largely retrospective myth making and not really factually supportable. We all had day jobs until we got a whacking big advance from Polygram." In contrast, Illsley himself said,"We were living on next to nothing and weren't even able to pay the gas bill." He added that they "weren't called Dire Straits for nothing".


title: John Illsley

text: As well as playing bass on all the Dire Straits recordings, Illsley also contributed backing vocals, with David Knopfler, and both harmonized to Mark's lead vocals and guitar in concert, and on the band's first two studio albums, "Dire Straits" and "Communiqué".


title: John Illsley

text: During a period when most major labels expected bands to compose and record one to two albums per year, as well as tour to support them, tensions grew within the band between David Knopfler, and his elder brother Mark. Mark wrote nearly every song, was the frontman in the band, and had, in a short time, become a virtuoso on the guitar. During the recording sessions for their third project, "Making Movies", the stress between the Knopfler brothers after nearly non-stop recording, touring, and publicity took its toll on the band, and David left the band over creative differences with his brother, who had assumed the role of "de facto" leader.


title: John Illsley

text: The band hired Hal Lindes to replace David, who stayed with the band for five years, and keyboards were also added when Alan Clark joined the band in 1980. Although the band's lineup continued to change, Illsley remained in his role as bassist, and provided the harmony and backing vocals with the other bandmates. Throughout it all, Illsley and Mark Knopfler were the only founding members to remain in the lineup of Dire Straits right through from 1977 until the group's dissolution in 1995. Illsley unsuccessfully tried to persuade Mark Knopfler to reform the group in October 2008. In his November 2021 autobiography "My Life in Dire Straits", Illsley confirms that Knopfler has no interest in reforming Dire Straits.


title: John Illsley

text: Before Dire Straits disbanded, Illsley released two solo albums of his own, "Never Told a Soul" (1984) and "Glass" (1988). Knopfler contributed some of the guitar parts on both.


title: John Illsley

text: In March 2005, in a pub in Leicestershire, Illsley happened upon an Irish Celtic rock group, Cunla. For the first time since 1993 he took to the stage and played a couple of Dire Straits numbers with the band. Cunla subsequently played at a summer party Illsley was hosting in Hampshire. He then appeared with them on several occasions, most notably on 23 September 2006 at Cathedrale d'Image in Les Baux de Provence, France. This performance was recorded and subsequently released as an album in 2007. With Illsley, they covered a couple of Dire Straits numbers, albeit in an Irish style, with Johnny Owens replacing all keyboards and brass parts with traditional Irish violin. They also have a large amount of their own material, much of it penned by Greg Pearle.


title: John Illsley

text: In October 2008, Illsley released an album, "Beautiful You", and embarked on a tour of Ireland with singer–songwriter Greg Pearle. This would be Illsley's fourth solo album, and the second one released without the assistance of Mark Knopfler. Illsley collaborated with Pearle and Paul Brady on the song "One" and featured in the accompanying music video (2008). "One" was also the theme song for the Irish film "Anton".


title: John Illsley

text: Illsley now lives in Hampshire, with his second wife Stephanie and his four children. He also spends time at his home in Provence, France. He owns a local pub, the 'East End Arms', located in the hamlet of East End between Lymington and Beaulieu, and which has been listed by critics as one of the "Fifty Best Pubs Around Britain". He is also a partner in two nearby hotels: The Master Builder's House Hotel near Beaulieu and The George Hotel on the Isle of Wight. Illsley is a keen painter and the first exhibition of his work was shown at the Nevill Keating McIlroy Gallery, Pickering Place, London in 2007.


title: John Illsley

text: In August 2014, Illsley was one of 200 public figures who were signatories to a letter to "The Guardian" opposing Scottish independence in the run-up to September's referendum on that issue.


title: John Illsley

text: In 2019 Illsley appeared in the final episode of BBC's "Rick Stein’s Secret France" where he dined with Rick Stein at a restaurant near his home in Provence. In November 2021, Illsley published his autobiography, "My Life in Dire Straits".


title: Paul Karason

text: Paul Karason (November 14, 1950 – September 23, 2013) was an American from Bellingham, Washington whose skin turned a purple-blue color over a period of about a decade.


title: Paul Karason

text: In 2008, Karason first gained prominence after appearing on "Today". His skin was described as turning blue after he took a homemade silver chloride colloid and rubbing a solution of colloidal silver on his face in an attempt to treat problems with his sinuses, dermatitis, acid reflux and other issues. He claimed it cured his acid reflux and arthritis.


title: Paul Karason

text: Karason was fair-skinned and freckled until about 1993, when his complexion began to develop the bluish hue associated with argyria. The condition was permanent.


title: Paul Karason

text: Karason moved from Oregon to the California Central Valley community Madera in the summer of 2007 seeking greater community acceptance. He described himself as somewhat of a recluse. By 2012, Karason lost his home while battling a heart condition and prostate cancer. He later moved to a homeless shelter in Bellingham.


title: Paul Karason

text: In 2013, Karason died after a heart attack led to pneumonia and a severe stroke. He was a heavy smoker and underwent a triple bypass surgery in 2008. He was estranged from his wife at the time of his death. Karason continued to use colloidal silver until his death.


title: Benedict's reagent

text: Benedict's reagent (often called Benedict's qualitative solution or Benedict's solution) is a chemical reagent and complex mixture of sodium carbonate, sodium citrate, and copper(II) sulfate pentahydrate. It is often used in place of Fehling's solution to detect the presence of reducing sugars. The presence of other reducing substances also gives a positive result. Such tests that use this reagent are called the Benedict's tests. A positive test with Benedict's reagent is shown by a color change from clear blue to brick-red with a precipitate.


title: Benedict's reagent

text: Generally, Benedict's test detects the presence of aldehydes, alpha-hydroxy-ketones, and hemiacetals, including those that occur in certain ketoses. Thus, although the ketose fructose is not strictly a reducing sugar, it is an alpha-hydroxy-ketone and gives a positive test because the base in the reagent converts it into the aldoses glucose and mannose. Oxidation of the reducing sugar by the cupric (Cu) complex of the reagent produces a cuprous (Cu), which precipitates as insoluble red copper(I) oxide (CuO).


title: Benedict's reagent

text: Separate solutions of the reagents are made. The sodium carbonate and sodium citrate are mixed first, and then the copper sulfate is added slowly with constant stirring.


title: Benedict's reagent

text: Sodium citrate acts as a complexing agent which keeps Cu in solution, since it would otherwise precipitate. Sodium carbonate serves to keep the solution alkaline. In the presence of mild reducing agents, the copper(II) ion is reduced to copper(I), which precipitates in the alkaline conditions as very conspicuous red copper(I) oxide.


title: Benedict's reagent

text: To test for the presence of monosaccharides and reducing disaccharide sugars in food, the food sample is dissolved in water and a small amount of Benedict's reagent is added. During a water bath, which is usually 4–10 minutes, the solution should progress through the colors of blue (with no reducing sugar present), orange, yellow, green, red, and then brick red precipitate or brown (if a high concentration of reducing sugar is present). A color change would signify the presence of a reducing sugar.


title: Benedict's reagent

text: The common disaccharides lactose and maltose are directly detected by Benedict's reagent because each contains a glucose with a free reducing aldehyde moiety after isomerization.


title: Benedict's reagent

text: Sucrose (table sugar) contains two sugars (fructose and glucose) joined by their glycosidic bond in such a way as to prevent the glucose undergoing isomerization to an aldehyde, or fructose to alpha-hydroxy-ketone form. Sucrose is thus a non-reducing sugar which does not react with Benedict's reagent. However, sucrose indirectly produces a positive result with Benedict's reagent if heated with dilute hydrochloric acid prior to the test, although it is modified during this treatment as the acidic conditions and heat break the glycosidic bond in sucrose through hydrolysis. The products of sucrose decomposition are glucose and fructose, both of which can be detected by Benedict's reagent as described above.


title: Benedict's reagent

text: Starches do not react or react very poorly with Benedict's reagent due to the relatively small number of reducing sugar moieties which occur only at the ends of carbohydrate chains. Other carbohydrates which produce a negative result include inositol.


title: Benedict's reagent

text: Benedict's reagent can also be used to test for the presence of glucose in urine, elevated levels of which is known as glucosuria. Glucosuria can be indicative of diabetes mellitus, but Benedict's test is not recommended or used for diagnosis of the aforementioned condition. This is due to the possibility of a reaction in which the presence of other reducing substances such as ascorbic acid, drugs (levodopa, contrast used in radiological procedures) and homogentisic acid (alkaptonuria) creates a false positive.


title: Benedict's reagent

text: As color of the obtained precipitate can be used to infer the quantity of sugar present in the solution, the test is semi-quantitative. A greenish precipitate indicates about 0.5 g% concentration; yellow precipitate indicates 1 g% concentration; orange indicates 1.5 g% concentration; and red indicates 2 g% or higher concentration.


title: Benedict's reagent

text: Benedict's quantitative reagent contains potassium thiocyanate and is used to quantitatively determine the concentration of reducing sugars. This solution forms a copper thiocyanate precipitate which is white and can be used in titration. The titration should be repeated with 1% glucose solution instead of the sample for calibration.


title: Benedict's reagent

text: The net reaction between an aldehyde (or an alpha-hydroxy-ketone) and the copper(II) ions in Benedict's solution may be written as:


title: Benedict's reagent

text: The hydroxide ions in the equation forms when sodium carbonate dissolves in water. With the citrate included, the reaction becomes:


title: Retreat of the government of the Republic of China to Taiwan

text: The retreat of the government of the Republic of China to Taiwan (), also known as the Kuomintang's retreat to Taiwan or the Great Retreat () in Taiwan, refers to the exodus of the remnants of the internationally recognized Kuomintang-ruled government of the Republic of China (ROC) to the island of Taiwan (Formosa) on 7 December 1949 after losing the Chinese Civil War in the mainland. The Kuomintang (Chinese Nationalist Party), its officers, and approximately 2 million ROC troops took part in the retreat, in addition to many civilians and refugees, fleeing the advance of the People's Liberation Army of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).


text: In 1895, Qing China was defeated by Japan in the First Sino-Japanese War, forcing the Qing dynasty to cede Taiwan and the Pescadores to the Japanese Empire, which began its 50-year long colonial rule. As World War II ended, the ROC, which ousted the Qing in 1911, regained control of Taiwan in 1945 after the Japanese surrender and placed under military occupation. The Chinese Civil War between the KMT and the CCP, that began in 1927, resumed in 1946. By 1948–1949, most of the mainland fell to the communists, including its national capital of Nanjing, later Guangzhou, followed by Chongqing and then Chengdu.


text: ROC troops mostly fled to Taiwan from provinces in southern China, in particular Sichuan Province, where the last stand of the ROC's main army took place. The flight to Taiwan took place over four months after Mao Zedong had proclaimed the founding of the People's Republic of China (PRC) in Beijing on . The island of Taiwan remained part of Japan during the occupation until Japan severed its territorial claims in the Treaty of San Francisco, which came into effect in 1952.


text: After the retreat, the leadership of the ROC, particularly "Generalissimo" and President Chiang Kai-shek, planned to make the retreat only temporary, hoping to regroup, fortify, and reconquer the mainland. This plan, which never came into fruition, was known as "Project National Glory", and made the national priority of the ROC on Taiwan. Once it became apparent that such a plan could not be realized, the ROC's national focus shifted to the modernization and economic development of Taiwan. The ROC, however, continues to officially claim exclusive sovereignty over the now-CCP governed mainland China.


text: The Chinese Civil War between Chiang Kai-shek’s KMT forces and Mao Zedong's CCP entered its final stage in 1945, following the surrender of Japan. Both sides sought to control and unify China. While Chiang heavily relied on assistance from the United States, Mao relied on support from the Soviet Union as well as the rural population of China.


text: The bloody conflict between the KMT and the CCP began when both parties were attempting to subdue Chinese warlords in northern China () and continued though the Second Sino-Japanese War (), during which time vast portions of China fell under Japanese occupation. The need to eliminate the warlords was seen as necessary by both Mao Zedong and Chiang Kai-shek, but for different reasons. For Mao, their elimination would end the feudal system in China, encouraging and preparing the country for socialism and communism. For Chiang, the warlords were a great threat to the central government. This basic dissimilarity in motivation continued throughout the years of fighting against the Japanese invasion of China, in spite of a common enemy.


text: Mao's Communist forces mobilized the peasantry in rural China against the Japanese, and at the time of the Japanese surrender in 1945 the CCP had built an army of nearly a million soldiers. The pressure Mao's forces placed on the Japanese benefitted the Soviet Union, and thus the CCP forces were supplied by the Soviets. The ideological unity of the CCP, and the experience acquired in fighting the Japanese, prepared it for the next battles against the Kuomintang. Though Chiang's forces were well equipped by the US, they lacked effective leadership and political unity.


text: In January 1949, Chiang Kai-shek stepped down as leader of the KMT and was replaced by his vice-president, Li Zongren. Li and Mao entered into negotiations for peace, but Nationalist hardliners rejected Mao's demands. When Li sought an additional delay in mid-April 1949, the Chinese Red Army crossed the Yangtze (Chang) River. Chiang fled to the island of Formosa (Taiwan), where approximately 300,000 soldiers had already been airlifted.


text: Over the course of 4 months beginning in August 1949, the ROC leaders relocated the Republic of China Air Force to Taiwan, taking over 80 flights and 3 ships. Chen Chin-Chang writes in his book on the subject that an average of 50 or 60 planes flew daily between Taiwan and China transporting fuel and ammunition between August 1949 and December 1949.


text: Chiang also sent the 26 naval vessels of the Nationalist army to Taiwan. The final Communist assault against Nationalist forces began on 20 April 1949 and continued until the end of summer. By August, the People's Liberation Army dominated almost all of mainland China; the Nationalists held only Taiwan and the Pescadores Islands, some parts of Kwangtung, Fukien, Chekiang and a few regions in China's far west.


text: Institute of History and Philology director Fu Ssu-nien spearheaded a rush to persuade scholars to flee to Taiwan, as well as bringing books and documents. Institutions and colleges like Academia Sinica, National Palace Museum, National Tsing Hua University, National Chiao Tung University, Soochow University, Fu Jen Catholic University and were re-established in Taiwan.


text: In total, according to current estimates, a migration of between 900,000 and 1,100,000 people must have taken place to Taiwan from the Chinese mainland between 1945 and 1955. The prior population of the island, at the end of Japanese rule, is estimated as 6,500,000 (see also Population of Taiwan). Of these, the Japanese subpopulation of about 500,000 were mostly repatriated by 1946. The number of immigrants is not known for certain, however, since no precise census was made before or during Japanese rule. The census of 1956 counts 640,000 "civilian" migrants from the mainland. The size of the army was secret at the time. Taiwanese documents found much later count 580,000 soldiers. American contemporary intelligence, however, put the number at only 450,000. Additionally, some army personnel were discharged before 1956 and are therefore (or for other reasons) included in both numbers, while others were drafted locally and were not immigrants. Such considerations led scholars to the above estimate. It is noted that upper estimates of up to two or three million immigrants are commonly found in older publications. Immigration on a similar scale took place in Hong Kong at the time.


text: In 1948, Chiang Kai-shek began planning the KMT retreat to Taiwan with a plan to take gold and treasure from the mainland. The amount of gold that was moved differs according to sources, but it is usually estimated as between three million to five million taels (approximately 113.6-115.2 tons; one tael is 31.25 grams). Other than gold, KMT brought old relics, which are now kept in the National Palace Museum in Taipei, Taiwan. Some scholars say the movement of gold and treasure was one of a number of protective measures against the Japanese invasion and occupation, similar to how European governments transferred gold to other locations during World War II.


text: There are different opinions on treasures that are at Taiwan's national palace museum. Some in China view the relocation as looting. Others believe these treasures have been accidentally protected, and might have been lost forever due to the Four Olds campaign during the Cultural Revolution. Many historians believe that the treasure was taken to Taiwan by the Nationalists to keep it safe from the CCP. Others believe that Taiwan is still part of Chinese sovereign territory so the relocation is not an issue.


text: The National Palace Museum claims that in 1948 when China was going through its Civil War, executive director Chu Chia-hua and others (Wang Shijie, Fu Ssu-nien, Xu Hong-Bao (), Li Ji (), and Han Lih-wu) discussed shipping masterpieces to Taiwan for the artifacts' safety.


text: Chiang Kai-shek's mission to take gold from China was held secretly because, according to Dr Wu Sing-yung (), the entire mission was operated by Chiang himself. Only Chiang and Dr Wu's father, who was the head of Military Finance for the KMT government, knew about the expenditure and moving of gold to Taiwan and almost all orders by Chiang were issued verbally. Dr Wu stated that even the finance minister had no power over the final expenditure and transfer. The written record was kept as the top military secret by Chiang in the Taipei Presidential Palace and the declassified archives only became available to the public more than 40 years after his death in April 1975.


text: It is a widely held belief that the gold brought to Taiwan were used to lay foundations for the Taiwanese economy and government. After six months of the gold operation by Chiang, the New Taiwanese dollar was launched, which replaced the old Taiwanese dollar at a ratio of one to 40,000. It is believed that 800,000 taels of gold were used to stabilize the economy which had been suffering from hyperinflation since 1945.


text: Three of the most famous artifacts taken by Chiang are the so-called Three Treasures of the National Palace Museum in Taipei: the Meat-shaped Stone, the Jadeite Cabbage, and the Mao Gong Ding.


text: The Meat-shaped Stone is a piece of jasper, dyed and carved to make it look like "Dong po-ruo", a Chinese stewed pork belly.


text: The second of the Three Treasures is the Jadeite Cabbage. It is carved out of a natural jade stone which was half green and half white. Its size is , smaller than the average human hand. Since it was carved out of natural jade, it has a lot of flaws and cracks. This makes the sculpture seem more natural, for those cracks and flaws look like the cabbage's stem and leaves.


text: The Mao Gong Ding is the third of the Three Treasures. It is a bronze tripod/cauldron. It has a height of , width of , and a weight of . It has an inscription of 497 characters arranged in 32 lines, the longest inscription among the Ancient Chinese bronze inscriptions. It is said to date back to the Ancient Zhou Era.


text: From Taiwan, Chiang's air force attempted to bomb the mainland cities of Shanghai and Nanking, but to no effect. Chiang's ground forces aimed to return to the mainland, but had no long-term success. Thus Mao Zedong's Communist forces were left in control of all of China except Hainan Island and Taiwan.


text: As a whole, the Civil War had an immense impact on the Chinese people. The historian Jonathan Fenby proposes that “hyperinflation [during the Chinese Civil War] undermined everyday lives and ruined tens of millions, hampered by a poor taxation base, increased military spending and widespread corruption."


text: Originally, the Republic of China planned to reconquer the mainland from the People's Republic. After the retreat to Taiwan, Chiang Kai-shek established a dictatorship over the island with other Nationalist leaders, and began making plans to invade the mainland. Chiang conceived a top secret plan called Project National Glory or Project Guoguang (), to accomplish this. Chiang's planned offensive involved 26 operations including land invasions and special operations behind enemy lines. He had asked his son Chiang Ching-kuo to draft a plan for air raids on the provinces of Fujian and Guangdong, from where many ROC soldiers and much of the population of Taiwan had origins. If it had taken place, it would have been the largest seaborne invasion in history.


text: The 1960s saw Mao Zedong's so-called "Great Leap Forward" in mainland China lead to catastrophic famines and millions of deaths, as well as progress by the PRC towards possible development of nuclear weapons. Thus, Chiang Kai-shek saw a crisis-opportunity to launch an attack to reclaim mainland China.


text: At this time, the U.S. was fighting the Vietnam War. For Project National Glory to be successful Chiang Kai-shek knew he needed US military assistance. Thus he offered to help the Americans fight the Vietnam War in exchange for U.S. support conducive to take back his lost territory. The U.S. opposed and refused Chiang's suggestions. This did not stop him. Rather, Chiang went ahead with the preparations and continued to further his plan to take back their lost territory.


text: In 1965, Chiang's plans to strike were completed. His generals and admirals planned possible dates to deploy while soldiers and field officers prepared for battle, according to the government archives.


text: 1 April 1961: The year witnessed the advent of the Project National Glory. The office was built by the Republic of China Armed Forces together with the Ministry of National Defense in the town of Sanxia, Taipei County (now a district in New Taipei City). Army Lieutenant General Zhu Yuancong took the role of governor and officially launched the project to compose a prudent plan of operations to recover the lost territories in mainland China. At the same time, the establishment of came to light whereby military members began to work out a possible alliance with American troops to attack mainland China.


text: April 1964: During this year, Chiang Kai-shek arranged an ensemble of air-raid shelters and five military offices at Lake Cihu (), which served as a secret command centre. Following the establishment of Project National Glory, several sub-plans were put into place, such as the frontal area of the enemy, rear area special warfare, surprise attack, take advantage of the counterattack, and assistance against tyranny.


text: However, the United States Armed Forces and the U.S. Department of Defense, together with the State Department, strongly opposed Project National Glory; rejecting the KMT plan to retake mainland China. Thus, every week American troops checked the inventory of Republic of China Marine Corps amphibious landing vehicles used by ROC and ordered American military advisory group members to fly over the Project National Glory camp on scouting missions. These flyovers infuriated Chiang Kai-Shek.


text: 17 June 1965: Chiang Kai-shek visited the Republic of China Military Academy to convene with all mid level and higher officers to devise and launch the counterattack.


text: 24 June 1965: A multitude of soldiers died during a training drill to feign a Communist attack on major naval bases in southern Taiwan near Zuoying District. The deaths that occurred during the happening were the first but not the last in Project National Glory.


text: 6 August 1965: A People's Liberation Army Navy torpedo boat ambushed and drowned 200 soldiers as the "Zhangjiang" naval warship carried out assignment Tsunami Number 1, in an attempt to transport special forces to the vicinity of the Eastern mainland Chinese coastal island of Dongshan to carry out an intelligence gathering operation.


text: November 1965: Chiang Kai-shek ordered two other naval vessels, the "CNS Shan Hai" and the "CNS Lin Huai" to pick up injured soldiers from Taiwan's offshore islands of Magong and Wuqiu. The vessels were attacked by 12 PRC ships, the "Lin Huai" sunk, and roughly 90 soldiers and sailors were killed in action. Surprised by the heavy loss of life in the naval battle at Magong, Chiang gave up all hope for Project National Glory.


text: After several unsuccessful feigned invasions between August 1971 and June 1973, in the lead up to the main landings, the 1973 coup which witnessed Nie Rongzhen's rise to power in Beijing drove Chiang to call off all further false attacks and commence full landing operations. Having said this, according to General Huang Chih-chung, who was an army colonel at the time and part of the planning process, Chiang Kai-shek never completely gave up the desire to recapture China; "even when he died (in 1975), he was still hoping the international situation would change and that the Communists would be wiped out one day."


text: The failure of Chiang's Project National Glory changed the course of Chinese and Taiwanese history, forever altering cross-strait relations. For example, the Taiwanese “shifted the focus to modernizing and defending Taiwan instead of preparing Taiwan to take back China,” stated Andrew Yang, a political scientist specializing in Taiwan-Mainland China relations at the Taipei-based Council of Advanced Policy Studies. Chiang Kai-shek's son Chiang Ching-kuo, who later succeeded him as president, focused on maintaining peace between the mainland and Taiwan. Today, political relations between Taiwan and China have changed; as General Huang said, "I hope it will develop peacefully... There's no need for war."


text: After being expelled from the mainland, Chiang Kai-shek and other KMT leaders realized they must reform the party.


text: In late 1949, having been almost destroyed by the Chinese Communists, the Kuomintang relocated to Taiwan and reinvented itself. Not only did the KMT leadership build a new party, but it built a new polity on Taiwan that created economic prosperity. From August 1950 to October 1952, more than four hundred working meetings were held almost four times a week to discuss how to build a new political party and implement Nationalist government policies. On August 5, 1950, Chiang chose the Central Reform Committee (CRC) to serve as the party's core leadership for planning and acting. The CRC members had an average age of 47 and all had college degrees.


text: All CRC members took an oath to fulfill the party's ultimate goals which is to get rid of the Communists and recover the Chinese mainland.


text: Having organized a cohesive, loyal party, Chiang Kai-shek wanted to extend its influence deep into Taiwan's society in order to broaden its social base. One way to do that was to select new members from different socioeconomic groups. Various party branch members were ordered to recruit new members, especially students and teachers. New members had to show loyalty to the KMT party, understand what the party represented, obey party principles, and perform services for the party. In return, the CRC promised to pay attention to society's needs, which helped the CRC define a clear political purpose. Party policy also targeted ways to improve ordinary people's living conditions. Having new party branches made up of people of similar social status was a strategy that improved relations with workers, business leaders, farmers, and intellectuals. With the new party branches promoting the various groups of people, the KMT was able slowly to extend its control and influence into Taiwan's villages. By October 1952, KMT membership had reached nearly 282,000, compared to the 50,000 members who had fled to Taiwan. More significant, more than half the party members were Taiwanese. By the late 1960s, this number had risen to nearly one million.


text: CRC made its work teams responsible for enforcing party policies and informing members how to behave. They also prevented communist infiltration, and recruited new party members after investigating their backgrounds, in order to hold regular meetings to discuss party strategy. The new party, then, behaved very differently from the way it had before 1949, with its work teams having new managerial and training responsibilities. According to the KMT's new rules, all party members had to join a work team and attend its meetings so that the party leadership could discover who was loyal and active. According to one report, in the summer of 1952, the KMT's Taiwan provincial party headquarters had at least 30,000 work-team units in the field, each unit having at least nine members who worked in various state agencies, areas of Taiwan, and occupations. Gradually, the party expanded its influence in society and in the state.


text: An important KMT tactic was to promote limited, local-level political reforms to enhance the party's authority with the Taiwanese people. To legitimize the Republic of China (ROC) as the central government for all China, Taiwan's Nationalist government needed elected representatives for all China. Thus, in 1947 more than one thousand mainlanders in Nanking were elected by the Chinese people as members of the National Assembly, Legislative Yuan, and the Control Yuan. After coming to Taiwan, those representatives were permitted to hold their seats until the next ROC election could be held on the mainland, thus legitimizing the ROC's control of Taiwan.


text: In this new political environment, the reformed KMT and the ROC government were able to propose their new power. Chiang Kai-shek believed that, in this authoritarian polity, local elections could promote Taiwan's eventual democracy. People did not believe that the KMT would ever not interfere with such elections. However, having so many local elections in a year, many voters became convinced that the KMT wanted to advance political pluralism. Party leaders tried to broaden their influence, while only slowly allowing opposing politicians to compete, by giving political lessons to teach voters how democracy should work.


text: In January 1951, the first elections for county and city council were held. In April, other elections followed for county and municipal offices. In December 1951, the Taiwan Provisional Provincial Assembly was organized. Its members were appointed by county and municipal assemblies. Through martial law and the control of local election rules, the KMT won most of those local elections but claimed that free elections had been held. Chiang believed that enough liberty had been granted. Therefore, party leaders continued to emphasize that martial law was still necessary.


text: The new approach of the party also extended to its approach to education. Initially, the party had seen public schools as a necessary instrument of assimilation and nation-building. Private schools, seen as unwanted competition, were therefore suppressed. However, as education needs on the island began to outstrip government resources, the party reevaluated their approach. Starting in 1954, private schools were not only tolerated, but backed by state funding. Simultaneously, steps were taken to secure the obedience of private schools, such as ensuring the placement of party loyalists on school boards and the passing of strict laws to control the political content of the curricula.


text: There are opposing views on the legality of the KMT takeover of Taiwan. The Chinese Communist government maintains to this day that the Republic of China on Taiwan is a province that must eventually return to rule by the mainland.


text: According to an article published in 1955 on the legal status of Taiwan, "It has been charged that Chiang Kai-shek has no claim to the island because he is 'merely a fugitive quartering his army' there and besides, his is a government in exile." Moreover, the Treaty of San Francisco, which was officially signed by 48 nations on 8 September 1951, did not specify to whom Japan was ceding Taiwan and the Pescadores. Despite this, the ROC was viewed by the vast majority of states at the time as the legitimate representative of China, as it had succeeded the Qing Dynasty, while the PRC was at the time a mostly unrecognized state. Japan was, at the time of the signing of the Treaty of San Francisco, still technically under American occupation. After full independence, Japan established full relations with the ROC and not the PRC.


text: According to Professor Gene Hsiao, "since the San Francisco Peace Treaty and the separate KMT treaty with Japan did not specify to whom Japan was ceding Taiwan and the Pescadores, the implication of the U.S. position was that legally, and insofar as the signatories of those two treaties were concerned, Taiwan became an 'ownerless' island and the KMT, by its own assent to the American policy, a foreign government-in-exile."


title: Paper chromatography

text: Paper chromatography is an analytical method used to separate coloured chemicals or substances. It is now primarily used as a teaching tool, having been replaced in the laboratory by other chromatography methods such as thin-layer chromatography (TLC).


title: Paper chromatography

text: A paper chromatography variant, two-dimensional chromatography, involves using two solvents and rotating the paper 90° in between. This is useful for separating complex mixtures of compounds having similar polarity, for example, amino acids. The setup has three components. The mobile phase is a solution that travels up the stationary phase, due to capillary action. The mobile phase is generally a mixture of non-polar organic solvent, while the stationary phase is polar inorganic solvent water. Here paper is used to support the stationary phase, water. Polar water molecules are held inside the void space of the cellulose network of the host paper. The difference between TLC and paper chromatography is that the stationary phase in TLC is a layer of adsorbent (usually silica gel, or aluminium oxide), and the stationary phase in paper chromatography is less absorbent paper.


title: Paper chromatography

text: The retention factor (R) may be defined as the ratio of the distance travelled by the solute to the distance travelled by the solvent. It is used in chromatography to quantify the amount of retardation of a sample in a stationary phase relative to a mobile phase. R values are usually expressed as a fraction of two decimal places.


title: Paper chromatography

text: For example, if a compound travels 9.9 cm and the solvent front travels 12.7 cm, the R value = (9.9/12.7) = 0.779 or 0.78. R value depends on temperature and the solvent used in experiment, so several solvents offer several R values for the same mixture of compound. A solvent in chromatography is the liquid the paper is placed in, and the solute is the ink which is being separated.


title: Paper chromatography

text: Paper chromatography is one method for testing the purity of compounds and identifying substances. Paper chromatography is a useful technique because it is relatively quick and requires only small quantities of material. Separations in paper chromatography involve the principle of partition. In paper chromatography, substances are distributed between a stationary phase and a mobile phase. The stationary phase is the water trapped between the cellulose fibers of the paper. The mobile phase is a developing solution that travels up the stationary phase, carrying the samples with it. Components of the sample will separate readily according to how strongly they adsorb onto the stationary phase versus how readily they dissolve in the mobile phase.


title: Paper chromatography

text: When a colored chemical sample is placed on a filter paper, the colors separate from the sample by placing one end of the paper in a solvent. The solvent diffuses up the paper, dissolving the various molecules in the sample according to the polarities of the molecules and the solvent. If the sample contains more than one color, that means it must have more than one kind of molecule. Because of the different chemical structures of each kind of molecule, the chances are very high that each molecule will have at least a slightly different polarity, giving each molecule a different solubility in the solvent. The unequal solubility causes the various color molecules to leave solution at different places as the solvent continues to move up the paper. The more soluble a molecule is, the higher it will migrate up the paper. If a chemical is very non-polar it will not dissolve at all in a very polar solvent. This is the same for a very polar chemical and a very non-polar solvent.


title: Paper chromatography

text: It is very important to note that when using water (a very polar substance) as a solvent, the more polar the color, the higher it will rise on the papers.


title: Paper chromatography

text: Development of the chromatogram is done by allowing the solvent to travel down the paper. Here, mobile phase is placed in solvent holder at the top. The spot is kept at the top and solvent flows down the paper from above.


title: Paper chromatography

text: Here the solvent travels up the chromatographic paper. Both descending and ascending paper chromatography are used for the separation of organic and inorganic substances.


title: Paper chromatography

text: This is the hybrid of both of the above techniques. The upper part of ascending chromatography can be folded over a rod in order to allow the paper to become descending after crossing the rod.


title: Paper chromatography

text: A circular filter paper is taken and the sample is deposited at the center of the paper. After drying the spot, the filter paper is tied horizontally on a Petri dish containing solvent, so that the wick of the paper is dipped in the solvent. The solvent rises through the wick and the components are separated into concentric rings.


title: Paper chromatography

text: In this technique a square or rectangular paper is used. Here the sample is applied to one of the corners and development is performed at a right angle to the direction of the first run.


title: Paper chromatography

text: The discovery of paper chromatography in 1943 by Martin and Synge provided, for the first time, the means of surveying constituents of plants and for their separation and identification. Erwin Chargaff credits in Weintraub's history of the man the 1944 article by Consden, Gordon and Martin. There was an explosion of activity in this field after 1945.


title: Kompromat

text: The term is a borrowing of the Russian KGB slang term from the Stalin era, which is short for "compromising material" (). It refers to disparaging information that can be collected, stored, traded, or used strategically across all domains: political, electoral, legal, professional, judicial, media, and business. The origins of the term in Russian trace back to 1930s secret police jargon.


title: Kompromat

text: In the early days, featured doctored photographs, planted drugs, grainy videos of liaisons with prostitutes hired by the KGB, and a wide range of other primitive entrapment techniques. More contemporary forms of appear as a form of cybercrime. One aspect of that stands the test of time is that the compromising information is often sexual in nature.


title: Kompromat

text: is part of the political culture in Russia, with many members of the business and political elite having collected and stored potentially compromising material on their political opponents. does not necessarily target individuals or groups, but rather collects information that could be useful at a later time. Compromising videos are often produced long in advance of when leverage over people is needed.


title: Kompromat

text: Opposition research is conducted in the U.S. to find compromising material on political opponents so that such material may be released to weaken those opponents. Some contend that differs from opposition research, in that such information is used to exert influence over people rather than to simply win elections. Nevertheless, compromising material uncovered by opposition research need not be used in only legal or ethical ways. It can be used to exert influence over Western leaders just as surely as it can be used to exert influence over Russian leaders.


title: Kompromat

text: In the 1950s, British civil servant John Vassall was a victim of a gay honey trap operation, producing which could be used against him since homosexuality was illegal in Britain at the time. During a 1957 visit to Moscow, American journalist Joseph Alsop also fell victim to a gay honey trap operation conducted by the KGB.


title: Kompromat

text: In 1997, Valentin Kovalyov was removed as the Russian Minister of Justice after photographs of him with prostitutes in a sauna controlled by the Solntsevskaya Bratva crime organization were published in a newspaper. In 1999, a video aired with a man resembling Yury Skuratov in bed with two women that later would lead to his dismissal as Prosecutor General of Russia. It was released after he began looking into charges of corruption by President Boris Yeltsin and his associates.


title: Kompromat

text: In April 2010, politician Ilya Yashin and comedian Victor Shenderovich were involved in a sex scandal with a woman claimed to have acted as a Kremlin honey trap to discredit opposition figures. The video was released only two days before the wedding of Shenderovich's daughter.


title: Kompromat

text: In cases of during the early 21st century, Russian operatives have been suspected, or accused of, placing child pornography on the personal computers of individuals they were attempting to discredit. In 2015, the UK's Crown Prosecution Service announced that it would prosecute Vladimir Bukovsky for "prohibited images" found on his computer; however, the case against Bukovsky was put on hold as investigators tried to determine whether the pornographic images were planted. Bukovsky died in October 2019.


title: Kompromat

text: During the 2016 U.S. presidential election, U.S. intelligence agencies were investigating possibly compromising personal and financial information on President-elect Donald Trump, leading to allegations that he and members of his administration may be vulnerable to manipulation by the Russian government.


title: Kompromat

text: British Labour Party MP Chris Bryant, an ex-chair of the all-party parliamentary group for Russia, who claims that the Russian government orchestrated a homophobic campaign to remove him from this position, has claimed that the Russian government has acquired on high-profile Conservative Party MPs including Boris Johnson, Liam Fox, Alan Duncan, and David Davis.


title: Kompromat

text: Following a 2016 phone call between incoming-U.S. National Security Adviser Michael Flynn and Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak, Flynn allegedly lied to the White House on the extent of those contacts placing him in a position vulnerable to blackmail. According to congressional testimony delivered by former Acting U.S. Attorney General Sally Yates, the Department of Justice believed that "General Flynn was compromised," and placed Flynn in “a situation where the national-security adviser essentially could be blackmailed by the Russians.”


title: Arthur C. Brooks

text: Arthur C. Brooks (born May 21, 1964) is an American author, public speaker, and academic. Brooks served as the 11th President of the American Enterprise Institute. He is the author of twelve books, including "Love Your Enemies" (2019), The "Conservative Heart" (2015), and "The Road to Freedom" (2012), and "From Strength to Strength: Finding Success, Happiness and Deep Purpose in the Second Half of Life." Since 2020, he has written for the Atlantic’s "How to Build a Life" column on happiness and hosted its podcast, "How to Build a Happy Life".


title: Arthur C. Brooks

text: In 2019, he began work at the Harvard Kennedy School as the William Henry Bloomberg Professor of the Practice of Public Leadership and at the Harvard Business School as a Professor of Management Practice and Faculty Fellow.


title: Arthur C. Brooks

text: Brooks was born on May 21, 1964, in Spokane, Washington, to David C. Brooks, a mathematics professor, and Jacqueline Brooks, an artist. When he was very young, his family moved to Seattle, where he spent his childhood.


title: Arthur C. Brooks

text: Brooks returned to school in his late twenties to earn a bachelor’s degree in economics, via distance learning, from Thomas Edison State College, while continuing his work as a professional musician. He then earned master’s degree in economics from Florida Atlantic University while also working full time.


title: Arthur C. Brooks

text: In 1998, Brooks earned his MPhil and PhD in public policy analysis from the RAND Graduate School in Santa Monica, California, while working at the RAND Corporation as a military operations research analyst for Project Air Force. Brooks has since been awarded honorary doctorates from Saint Thomas Aquinas College in 2020, Brigham Young University in 2019, Claremont McKenna College in 2019, Hampden-Sydney College in 2018, Jacksonville University in 2018, Ave Maria University in 2015, and Thomas Edison State College in 2013.


title: Arthur C. Brooks

text: Brooks began his academic career in 1998 at Georgia State University as an assistant professor of public administration and economics. From 2001 to 2008, he taught at Syracuse University, where he was made a full professor in 2006, and was named the Louis A. Bantle Professor of Business and Government Policy in 2007. He held a joint appointment at the Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs and the Martin J. Whitman School of Management. During his tenure at Syracuse, Brooks published over 60 peer-reviewed articles and four books.


title: Arthur C. Brooks

text: From 2009 to 2019, Brooks served as the 11th President and Beth and Ravenel Curry Scholar in Free Enterprise for the American Enterprise Institute (AEI).


title: Arthur C. Brooks

text: In 2018, Brooks announced his resignation from AEI, writing in a "Wall Street Journal" op-ed that "social enterprises generally thrive best when chief executives don't stay much longer than a decade, because it's important to refresh the organizational vision periodically and avoid becoming uniquely associated with one person." Since 2019, he has taught at the Harvard Kennedy School and at the Harvard Business School. His "Leadership and Happiness" class at Harvard has gained immense popularity and attention in the press.


title: Arthur C. Brooks

text: In February 2022, Brooks published "From Strength to Strength: Finding Happiness, Success, and Deep Purpose in the Second Half of Life". Brooks’ ideas on happiness research on aging professionals were first introduced to the public in a 2019 Atlantic article, “Your Professional Decline Is Coming (Much) Sooner Than You Think". "From Strength to Strength" debuted at #1 on the New York Times bestseller list, where it remained for several months. It received widespread attention, including from Oprah Winfrey, who recommended the book, and was endorsed by the Dalai Lama.


title: Arthur C. Brooks

text: Brooks began focusing intensively on the study of happiness following his professional move from AEI to Harvard, where he taught classes in happiness, also writing weekly on the subject in "The Atlantic". He also began hosting podcasts on happiness such as "How to Build a Happy Life".


title: Arthur C. Brooks

text: In 2019, Brooks published "Love Your Enemies: How Decent People Can Save America from the Culture of Contempt", which he describes as an antidote to the toxic political culture he found in the United States, especially after the 2016 election. With ideas based in behavioral research, ancient philosophy, and his own experience as the president of AEI, Brooks encourages a culture of love and respectful disagreement for political and economic progress and shows how this can be done. "Love Your Enemies" was a national bestseller and was included in Politico’s “Top Books of 2019.”


title: Arthur C. Brooks

text: Brooks was the subject of the 2019 documentary "The Pursuit". This film follows Brooks around the world as he searches for answers to issues of global poverty.


title: Arthur C. Brooks

text: Brooks is married to Ester Munt-Brooks, a native of Barcelona. They have three adult children and one daughter-in-law. They live in Needham, Massachusetts. He is a practicing Roman Catholic. In the past he has been registered as both Democrat and Republican; he now identifies as Independent.


title: Common brushtail possum

text: The common brushtail possum (Trichosurus vulpecula, from the Greek for "furry tailed" and the Latin for "little fox", previously in the genus "Phalangista") is a nocturnal, semiarboreal marsupial of the family Phalangeridae, native to Australia and naturalised in New Zealand, and the second-largest of the possums.


title: Common brushtail possum

text: Like most possums, the common brushtail possum is nocturnal. It is mainly a folivore, but has been known to eat small mammals such as rats. In most Australian habitats, eucalyptus leaves are a significant part of the diet, but rarely the sole item eaten. Its tail is prehensile and naked on its lower underside. The four colour variations are silver-grey, brown, black, and gold.


title: Common brushtail possum

text: It is the Australian marsupial most often seen by city dwellers, as it is one of few that thrive in cities and a wide range of natural and human-modified environments. Around human habitations, common brushtails are inventive and determined foragers with a liking for fruit trees, vegetable gardens, and kitchen raids.


title: Common brushtail possum

text: The common brushtail possum was introduced to New Zealand in the 1850s to establish a fur industry, but in the mild subtropical climate of New Zealand, and with few to no natural predators, it thrived to the extent that it became a major agricultural and conservation pest.


title: Common brushtail possum

text: The common brushtail possum has large and pointed ears. Its bushy tail (hence its name) is adapted to grasping branches, prehensile at the end with a hairless ventral patch. Its fore feet have sharp claws and the first toe of each hind foot is clawless, but has a strong grasp. The possum grooms itself with the third and fourth toes which are fused together. It has a thick and woolly pelage that varies in colour depending on the subspecies. Colour patterns tend to be silver-grey, brown, black, red, or cream. The ventral areas are typically lighter and the tail is usually brown or black. The muzzle is marked with dark patches.


title: Common brushtail possum

text: The common brushtail possum has a head and body length of 32–58 cm with a tail length of 24–40 cm. It weighs 1.2-4.5 kg. Males are generally larger than females. In addition, the coat of the male tends to be reddish at the shoulders. As with most marsupials, the female brushtail possum has a forward-opening, well-developed pouch. The chest of both sexes has a scent gland that emits a reddish secretion which stains that fur around it. It marks its territory with these secretions.


title: Common brushtail possum

text: The common brushtail possum is perhaps the most widespread marsupial of Australia. It is found throughout the eastern and northern parts of the continent, as well as some western regions, Tasmania and a number of offshore islands, such as Kangaroo Island and Barrow Island. It is also widespread in New Zealand since its introduction in 1850. The common brushtail possum can be found in a variety of habitats, such as forests, semi-arid areas and even cultivated or urban areas. It is mostly a forest inhabiting species, however it is also found in treeless areas. In New Zealand, possums favour broadleaf-podocarp near farmland pastures. In southern beech forests and pine plantations, possums are less common. Overall, brushtail possums are more densely populated in New Zealand than in their native Australia. This may be because Australia has more fragmented eucalypt forests and more predators. In Australia, brushtail possums are threatened by humans, tiger quolls, dogs, foxes, cats, goannas, carpet snakes, and powerful owls. In New Zealand, brushtail possums are threatened only by humans and cats. The IUCN highlight the population trend in Australia as decreasing.


title: Common brushtail possum

text: The common brushtail possum can adapt to numerous kinds of vegetation but it is largely omnivorous. It prefers "Eucalyptus" leaves, but also eats flowers, shoots, fruits, and seeds. It may also consume animal matter such as insects, birds' eggs and chicks, and other small vertebrates. Brushtail possums may eat three or four different plant species during a foraging trip, unlike some other arboreal marsupials, such as the koala and the greater glider, which focus on single species. The brushtail possum's rounded molars cannot cut "Eucalyptus" leaves as finely as more specialised feeders. They are more adapted to crushing their food, which enables them to chew fruit or herbs more effectively. The brushtail possums' caecum lacks internal ridges and cannot separate coarse and fine particles as efficiently as some other arboreal marsupials. The brushtail possum cannot rely on "Eucalyptus" alone to provide sufficient protein. Its more generalised and mixed diet, however, does provide adequate nitrogen.


title: Common brushtail possum

text: The common brushtail possum is largely arboreal and nocturnal. It has a mostly solitary lifestyle, and individuals keep their distance with scent markings (urinating) and vocalisations. They usually make their dens in natural places such as tree hollows and caves, but also use spaces in the roofs of houses. While they sometimes share dens, brushtails normally sleep in separate dens. Individuals from New Zealand use many more den sites than those from Australia. Brushtail possums compete with each other and other animals for den spaces, and this contributes to their mortality. This is likely another reason why brushtail possum population densities are smaller in Australia than in New Zealand. Brushtail possums are usually not aggressive towards each other and usually just stare with erect ears. They vocalise with clicks, grunts, hisses, alarm chatters, guttural coughs, and screeching.


title: Common brushtail possum

text: The common brushtail possum can breed at any time of the year, but breeding tends to peak in spring, from September to November, and in autumn, from March to May, in some areas. Mating is promiscuous and random; some males can sire several young in a season, while over half sire none. In one Queensland population, males apparently need a month of consorting with females before they can mate with them. Females have a gestation period of 16–18 days, after which they give birth to single young. A newborn brushtail possum is only 1.5 cm long and weighs only 2 g. As usual for marsupials, the newborn may climb, unaided, through the female's fur and into the pouch and attach to a teat. The young develops and remains inside the mother's pouch for another 4–5 months. When older, the young is left in the den or rides on its mother's back until it is 7–9 months old. Females reach sexual maturity when they are a year old, and males do so at the end of their second year. Brushtail possums can live up to 13 years in the wild.


title: Common brushtail possum

text: Female young have a higher survival rate than their male counterparts due to establishing their home ranges closer to their mothers, while males travel farther in search of new nesting sites, encountering established territories from which they may be forcibly ejected. In New Zealand's Ōrongorongo population, female young have been found to continue to associate with their mothers after weaning, and some inherit the prime den sites. A possible competition exists between mothers and daughters for dens, and daughters may be excluded from a den occupied by the mother. In forests with shortages of den sites, females apparently produce more sons, which do not compete directly for den sites, while in forests with plentiful den sites, female young are greater in number.


title: Common brushtail possum

text: The common brushtail possum is considered a pest in some areas, as it is known to cause damage to pine plantations, regenerative forest, flowers, fruit trees, and buildings. Like other possums, it is rather tolerant of humans and can sometimes be hand fed, although it is not encouraged, as their claws are quite sharp and can cause infection or disease to humans if scratched. It is a traditional food source for some indigenous Australians.


title: Common brushtail possum

text: Its fur has been considered valuable and has been harvested. Although once hunted extensively for its fur in Australia, the common brushtail possum is now protected in mainland states, but it has only been partially protected in Tasmania, where an annual hunting season is used. In addition, Tasmania gives crop-protection permits to landowners whose property has been damaged.


title: Common brushtail possum

text: While its populations are declining in some regions due to habitat loss, urban populations indicate an adaptation to the presence of humans. In some mainland states, possum trapping is legal to catch when attempting to evict possums from human residences (e.g. roofs), but possums must be released after dusk within 24 hours of capture, no more than 50 m from the trapping site. In some states, e.g. Victoria, trapped possums may be taken to registered veterinarians for euthanasia. In South Australia, they are fully protected and permits are required for trapping possums in human residences or for keeping or rescuing sick or injured wild possums and other native animals. In Queensland, they can only be trapped by licensed commercial relocators who must release possums within 25 metres of the point of capture to ensure that an animal is not released into another possum's home range (possums are less likely to survive if they are released into a new area where they do not have access to a den or must compete with a neighbouring possum for den space).


title: Common brushtail possum

text: Since its introduction from Australia by European settlers in the 1850s, the common brushtail possum has become a major threat to New Zealand native forests and birds. It is also a host for the highly contagious bovine tuberculosis. (This is not an issue in Australia, where the disease has been eradicated.)


title: Common brushtail possum

text: By the 1980s, the peak population had reached an estimated 60–70 million, but is now down to an estimated 30 million due to control measures. The New Zealand Department of Conservation controls possum numbers in many areas via the aerial dropping of 1080-laced bait. Hunting is not restricted, but the population seems to be stable despite the annual killing of thousands of the animals.


title: Brown Eyed Girl

text: "Brown Eyed Girl" is a song by Northern Irish singer and songwriter Van Morrison. Written by Morrison and recorded in March 1967 for Bang Records owner and producer Bert Berns, it was released as a single in June of the same year on the Bang label, peaking at No. 10 on the "Billboard" Hot 100. The song spent a total of sixteen weeks on the chart. It featured the Sweet Inspirations singing back-up vocals and is considered to be Van Morrison's signature song.


title: Brown Eyed Girl

text: After finishing his contract with Decca Records and the mid-1966 break-up of his band, Them, Morrison returned to Belfast seeking a new recording company. When he received a phone call from Bert Berns, owner of Bang Records, who had produced a number of recordings with Them, he flew to New York City and hastily signed a contract (which biographer Clinton Heylin says probably still gives him sleepless nights). During a two-day recording session starting 28 March 1967, he recorded eight songs intended to be used as four singles. The recording session took place at A & R Studios and "Brown Eyed Girl" was captured on the 22nd take on the first day. Of the musicians Berns had assembled, there were three guitarists – Eric Gale, Hugh McCracken, and Al Gorgoni – plus bassist Russ Savakus, organist Garry Sherman and drummer Gary Chester. It was released as a single in mid-June 1967.


title: Brown Eyed Girl

text: Originally titled "Brown-Skinned Girl", Morrison changed it to "Brown Eyed Girl" when he recorded it. Morrison remarked on the title change: "That was just a mistake. It was a kind of Jamaican song. Calypso. It just slipped my mind [that] I changed the title." "After we'd recorded it, I looked at the tape box and didn't even notice that I'd changed the title. I looked at the box where I'd lain it down with my guitar and it said 'Brown Eyed Girl' on the tape box. It's just one of those things that happen."


title: Brown Eyed Girl

text: The song's nostalgic lyrics about a former love were considered too suggestive at the time to be played on many radio stations. A radio-edit of the song was released which removed the lyrics "making love in the green grass", replacing them with "laughin' and a-runnin', hey hey" from a previous verse. This edited version appears on some copies of the compilation album "The Best of Van Morrison". However, the remastered album seems to have the bowdlerised lyrics in the packaging but the original "racy" lyrics on the disc. Lyrically, it "shows early hints of the idealized pastoral landscapes that would flow through his songs through the decades, a tendency that links him to the Romantic poets, whom Morrison has cited as an influence".


title: Brown Eyed Girl

text: Because of a contract he signed with Bang Records without legal advice, Morrison states that he has never received any royalties for writing or recording this song. The contract made him liable for virtually all recording expenses incurred for all of his Bang Records recordings before royalties would be paid, and after those expenses were recouped, the revenue would become the "subject of some highly creative accounting". Morrison vented frustration about this unjust contract in his sarcastic nonsense song "The Big Royalty Check". Morrison has stated that "Brown Eyed Girl" is not among his favourite songs, remarking "it's not one of my best. I mean I've got about 300 songs that I think are better".


title: Brown Eyed Girl

text: To capitalise on the success of the single, producer Berns assembled the album "Blowin' Your Mind!" without Morrison's input or knowledge. Released in September 1967, the album contained the single as its lead-off track as well as songs recorded by Morrison at the March recording sessions for Berns. The album peaked at No. 182 on the "Billboard" 200.


title: Brown Eyed Girl

text: Morrison's original recording of "Brown Eyed Girl" has remained widely familiar, as the uncensored version of the song is regularly played by many "oldies" and "classic rock" radio stations. In 2011, "Brown Eyed Girl" was honoured for having 10 million US radio air plays; it was one of only ten songs registered with BMI to have received that number of radio plays. As of 2015, "Brown Eyed Girl" remains the most downloaded and most played song of the entire 1960s decade. As of 2020, the song remains one of the longest-surviving songs from the 1960s in recurrent rotation in an era when the music of that decade has become increasingly rare as oldies stations have transitioned to 1970s and 1980s classic hits.


title: Brown Eyed Girl

text: Paul Williams included "Brown Eyed Girl" in his book "Rock and Roll: The 100 Best Singles", writing that:


title: Brown Eyed Girl

text: I was going to say this is a song about sex, and it is, and a song about youth and growing up, and memory, and it's also—very much and very wonderfully—a song about singing.


title: Brown Eyed Girl

text: This song proved to be the impetus for Morrison's career. It was his first single after leaving his position as lead singer for the Belfast-formed Them and led to his relocation to the United States and an eventual contract with Warner Bros. Records, where he recorded his career-defining album, "Astral Weeks".


title: Brown Eyed Girl

text: In a contemporaneous review, "Billboard" described the single as an "exciting debut" and a "groovy piece of original rock material that should fast establish [Morrison] as a top disk seller and writer". "Cash Box" said that "scores of deejays and consumers should dig this hard, thumping lid."


title: Brown Eyed Girl

text: In his 1989 book "The Heart of Rock and Soul, The 1001 Greatest Singles Ever", Dave Marsh rated "Brown Eyed Girl" No. 386. In 1999, Broadcast Music, Inc. (BMI) listed it as one of the Top 100 Songs of the Century. In 2000, it was listed at No. 21 on the "Rolling Stone"/MTV list of 100 Greatest Pop Songs and as No. 49 on VH1's list of the 100 Greatest Rock Songs. In 2001, it was ranked No. 131 as one of the RIAAs Songs of the Century, a list of the top 365 songs of the 20th century chosen with historical significance in mind.


title: Brown Eyed Girl

text: In 2010, "Brown Eyed Girl" was ranked No. 110 on the "Rolling Stone" magazine list of 500 Greatest Songs of All Time. It was listed as No. 79 on the All Time 885 Greatest Songs compiled by WXPN from listeners' votes. In January 2007, "Brown Eyed Girl" was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. It is ranked as the 205th greatest song of all time, as well as the 11th best song of 1967, by Acclaimed Music. It is also one of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll.


title: Brown Eyed Girl

text: El Chicano remade "Brown Eyed Girl" for their 1972 album "Celebration". Kapp Records had invited music journalist Don Buday to produce the album, being impressed by Buday's writings on El Chicano: Buday had the group remake "Brown Eyed Girl" and also the Cream hit "I Feel Free" "[to try] to give [El Chicano] more of a rock-and-roll identity". Journeyman recording engineer Val Garay, who had his first engineering assignment producing "Celebration", would recall that "Don got this brilliant idea of [remaking] 'Brown Eyed Girl'...kind of like the 'Mexican Everly Brothers". Released as the album's lead single, "Brown Eyed Girl" peaked at No. 45 on the "Billboard" Hot 100. Chicanismo scholar Dionne Espinoza opined that the El Chicano version of "Brown Eyed Girl" turned the song into "an affirmation of the beauty of brown[-skinned] women".


title: Brown Eyed Girl

text: British singer/songwriter Iain Matthews remade "Brown Eyed Girl" for his 1976 album "Go for Broke" from which it was issued as the lead single, becoming a hit in the Netherlands (No. 22) and in New Zealand (No. 25).


title: Brown Eyed Girl

text: An Adult Contemporary hit (No. 13) for Jimmy Buffett as recorded for his "One Particular Harbour" album (1983), "Brown Eyed Girl" was a 1984 C&W hit for Joe Stampley (No. 29).


title: Brown Eyed Girl

text: "Brown Eyed Girl" has been performed by a wide variety of other artists, including Adele,John Anderson, the Black Sorrows, Busted, Billy Ray Cyrus, Ellert Driessen (), Everclear, Caroline Jones, Roberto Jordán (as "La Chica De Los Ojos Cafés" ), Bertie Higgins, Ronan Keating, Brian Kennedy, Lagwagon, Glen Medeiros, Reel Big Fish, Johnny Rivers, Shooting Gallery, Bruce Springsteen, Steel Pulse and U2.