cahya/wikipedia-simple-en huggingface dataset:
Sonic boom

A sonic boom is created when an object travels faster than the speed of sound. When an airplane reaches the speed of sound, it makes a bang sound or an explosive noise that can be seen with the naked eye.  This is often called "breaking the sound barrier." The visible part of a sonic boom is actually air that becomes squashed by sound waves.  The thunder that a storm makes is also a sonic boom caused by lightning forcing air to move faster than the speed of sound.

The first plane to fly at a level altitude above the speed of sound was the Bell X-1 in 1947 and was piloted by Chuck Yeager.

References 

Sound
Aviation
Spelling bee

A Spelling bee is a spoken spelling competition. In a spelling bee, children are asked to spell words. The child who spells the most words correctly is the winner. Schools hold spelling bee competitions to encourage children to learn to read. As well, spelling bees encourage children to learn about spelling words and improve their vocabulary. One type of spelling bee is the Scripps National Spelling Bee, in Washington, D.C.

The United States National Spelling Bee was started in 1926 by The Courier-Journal, the newspaper of Louisville, Kentucky. Contests may have been held before that year. A key impetus for the contests was Noah Webster's spelling books. Webster's spelling books were an essential part of the curriculum of elementary school children in the United States for five generations. They were first published in 1786 and known as "The Blue-backed Speller". Now the key reference for the contests is the Merriam-Webster unabridged dictionary.

In a Spelling Bee it is actually best to go first rather than last because words usually go by levels in a school competition, so if it goes from easiest to hardest you will most likely get the less difficult words.

Type of game: Nytimes Spelling Beefor free online.

Language
Learning
Arabic language

Arabic () is a Semitic language, like Hebrew and Aramaic. Around 292 million people speak it as their first language. Many more people can also understand it as a second language. The Arabic language has its own alphabet written from right to left, like Hebrew. Since it is so widely spoken throughout the world, the language is one of the six official languages of the United Nations. The others are English, French, Spanish, Russian and Chinese.

Many countries speak Arabic as an official language, but not all of them speak it the same way. The language has many dialects, or varieties, such as Modern Standard Arabic, Egyptian Arabic, Gulf Arabic, Maghrebi Arabic, Levantine Arabic and many others. Some of the dialects are so different from one another that speakers have a hard time understanding the other.

Most of the countries that use Arabic as their official language are in the Middle East. They are part of the Arab World because the largest religion is in the region is Islam.

Arabic is very important in Islam because Muslims believe that Allah (God) used it to talk to Muhammad through the Archangel Gabriel (Jibril), giving him the Quran in the language. Many but not all Arabic-speakers are Muslims.

Arabic is also becoming a popular language to learn in the Western world even though its grammar is sometimes very hard to learn for native speakers of Indo-European languages. Many other languages have borrowed words from Arabic because of its importance in history. Some English words that can be traced to Arabic are sugar, cotton, magazine, algebra, alcohol and emir.

Arabic is an official language of these countries:

 Algeria
 Bahrain
 Comoros
 Chad
 Djibouti
 Egypt
 Eritrea
 Iraq
 Jordan
 Kuwait
 Lebanon
 Libya
 Mauritania
 Morocco
 Oman
 Palestine
 Qatar
 Western Sahara
 Saudi Arabia
 Somalia
 Sudan
 Syria
 Tunisia
 United Arab Emirates
 Yemen

It is also a national language of:
 Mali
 Senegal

References
Dresden

Dresden (Upper Sorbian: Drježdźany) is the capital of the Free State of Saxony. It is in the southeast of Germany, on the River Elbe near the border with the Czech Republic. It has an oceanic climate (Cfb in the Köppen climate classification).

History 
Dresden was already settled in the Neolithic part of the Stone Age, but the first written record of the city was in 1206, when Dresden began to develop as a royal residence.

Dresden was bombed a lot at the end of World War II. It was bombed by American and British bombers between 13 February and 15 February 1945. Most of the city's buildings were damaged beyond repair after the bombings. The city had to rebuild most of its buildings after the war.

In 2002 Dresden was flooded in Germany's so-called "century flooding".

Politics and cultural 
Dresden is the political and cultural centre of Saxony. It is the seat of the governmental district of Dresden and of many universities. The city had a popiulation that exceeded 100,000 around 1852.

Dresden has about 488,000 inhabitants (2005). Dresden forms the core of the densely-populated area of the same name in Central Europe and is a traffic junction and an economic centre. Together with the population centres of Chemnitz, Zwickau and Leipzig, it forms the population centre known as the Metropolregion Saxonia Triangle .

Traffic 
Dresden has got an international airport (Flughafen Dresden-Klotzsche) which has about 2 million passengers/year. This Airport has got daily flight connections to Frankfurt and Munich (Lufthansa), Moscow (Aeroflot), Cologne and Stuttgart (germanwings), Düsseldorf (germanwings)  as well as to Zurich (InterSky), Hamburg (eurowings on behalf of germanwings) and London-City (CityJet). The biggest station is Dresden Hauptbahnhof (Dresden Main station) with an ICE (InterCityExpress) connection to Leipzig, Erfurt, Frankfurt and Wiesbaden. There's an EuroCity connection to Prague, Graz and Vienna just as an InterCity connection to Berlin and Hamburg. The metropolitan of Dresden has got four highwas:
 A4:   Frankfurt - Dresden - Goerlitz - Wrocław - Kraków

 A13: Dresden - Berlin
 A14: Nossen (near Dresden) - Leipzig - Magdeburg (- Schwerin)
 A17: Dresden - Prague
Dresden has got 3 S-Bahn (Metropolitan overground railway) lines and a big Tram network.

References 

 
1206 establishments in Europe
13th-century establishments in Germany
Arabic

Arabic might mean:

Arabic language
Arabic alphabet
Hindu–Arabic numeral system, sometimes called "Arabic numerals"
Irrigation

Irrigation is when people add water to plants, to help them grow when there is not enough rain. Irrigation water can be pumped from rivers, natural lakes or lakes created by dams, from wells or allowed to flow to the fields by the force of gravity along pipes or open canals.

Types of Irrigation 
There are many different types of irrigation methods. The most common ones are:
 Sprinkler Irrigation
 Drip irrigation
 Surface irrigation
 Sub surface irrigation
 Manual irrigation
Sprinkler irrigation mimics natural rainfall where water falls on the plants.
In sprinkler irrigation, water is moved through pipes to sprinklers scattered around and within the field. The Sprinklers shoot water from pressurized outlets or guns from pipes into the air which then fall on the plants. Center pivot irrigation is a type of sprinkler irrigation. It's basically, sprinklers on wheels.

In drip irrigation, water drips directly to the roots of plants from pipes which have small holes or special emitters spaced along the pipe. Drip irrigation is more efficient than other irrigation methods because water is applied directly or close to plants' roots i.e. where it is needed. Thus, it uses less water, reduces leeching of soil nutrients and erosion of top soil.

In Surface irrigation, water from a source such as rivers, pipes, dams, canals e.t.c. floods the soil surface. Surface irrigation uses a lot of water compared to other irrigation methods. It could also drain nutrients beyond the reach of the plant roots. If the water is excessive, it could cause damage to the plant. However, surface irrigation is used extensively in rice farming. This is because the permanent flooding acts as a natural pest control method and rice can survive waterlogged soil.

Sub-Surface irrigation is when water comes from below the surface of the soil. Sub-surface irrigation create an artificial water table to place water right within reach of plants. Water seeps through the walls into the soil of farms from canals passing through and/or around the farm. Drip irrigation becomes sub-surface irrigation when the pipes are placed underground.

With Manual irrigation irrigation is done by humans using buckets, pipes or watering cans. It is labor-intensive and inefficient.

Impacts 
Irrigation can let more crops be grown on the same land, or allow a crop to grow in a dry period. It is expensive and care should be taken to ensure that the benefits from increased crop yields are not exceeded by the installation and operating costs of the irrigation scheme.

Irrigation causes a subsequent rise in water-tables. If saline water is below, it may rise to the surface. Sometimes salinity becomes high enough to kill the plants. Irrigation water itself can carry salt and sometimes other toxic materials that hurt the plants. To prevent this, irrigation projects must also assure good drainage.

References

Agriculture
Detroit

Detroit is the largest city in the state of Michigan in the United States. In 1950, Detroit was the fifth largest city in the United States, with 1.8 million people. It was the 10th largest city in the United States at the time of the 2000 census. As of 2004, it fell to 11th biggest as people have moved away, and San Jose, California, which is growing, moved to 10th. The Population of Detroit was 700,000 in the 2010s decade. Nearly six million people live in Detroit and the surrounding counties that encompass Metro Detroit. The city borders Windsor, Ontario in Canada. The international border between Detroit and Windsor is one of the most crossed in the world.

The person who started the city was Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac. He was from France. Detroit was made a city in 1701. From 1805 to 1847, Detroit was the capital of Michigan.

The state governor declared a financial emergency in March 2013, appointing an emergency manager. On July 18, 2013, Detroit filed the largest municipal bankruptcy case in U.S. history.

Sports 
Detroit is a city where many automobiles are made and this is why it is sometimes called the "Motor City", or "Motown". Many people call it the car capital of the world.  General Motors, Ford and Chrysler have their offices and many of their plants in and around Detroit.

In 2006, the Super Bowl was played at Ford Field in Detroit.

Media 

WXYZ American Broadcasting Company

People 
Detroit is home to one of the largest black communities in the United States, with over 91% being African-American.  Violent crime rate is also one of the highest in the USA. Detroit also has a large Arab population. Many Arabs live in metro Detroit. The Arab-American community in Detroit began with a small group of Syrian and Lebanese merchants who immigrated to Detroit in the late 1800s. Mexicans have recently replaced the shrinking population.

Climate 
Detroit has a humid continental climate (Dfa in the Köppen climate classification).

References

Other websites

 
County seats in Michigan
Michigan
1700s establishments in North America
1701 establishments
18th-century establishments in New France
War communism

War communism is the name for the economic policies that introduced to Russia in 1918 by Vladimir Lenin, leader of Russia from 1917-24. The policy was ended in 1921 because it was not successful. Instead, he introduced the New Economic Policy in 1921.

War Communism was introduced for many reasons. However, the most important ones were: 
 to feed and supply the hungry Red Army of Bolsheviks during the Russian Civil War
 to move towards complete communism

It was bad for the Russian economy because the government took away extra grain produced by the peasants. This was known as grain requisitioning. Peasants were not allowed to sell their extra food, so they stopped producing more than they needed to eat. This created a Russian famine with millions of people foodless and starving.

Communism
Economic policy
Russian Revolution
1918 establishments in the Soviet Union
1921 disestablishments
Foreign aid

Foreign aid is when one country helps another country. The country may give money or things; it may also send people. This is especially needed when a disaster happens in a poor country. Sometimes this help comes from a country's government and sometimes the ordinary people give money. Some foreign aid helps by giving food and clean water to people who need them. Most of the time it is a charity which donates to the poor countries. Some aid is for Economic development.  

The poor countries are called LEDC's (Less Economically Developed Countries). The richer countries are called MEDC's (More Economically Developed Countries). 

United Nations and Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development also work for such aid for poor countries.

References 

Politics
Mallaig

Mallaig is a small town in Scotland. It is also a port. Ferries link Mallaig, which is on the mainland, to some islands. About 797 lived there in 2001.

Towns in Scotland
Sum

The sum of two numbers is what we get when we add the two numbers together. This operation is called summation. There are a number of ways of writing sums, with the most common being:
Addition ()
Summation ()
Computerization:
Sum = 0
For I = M to N 
Sum = Sum + X(I)
Next I (in Visual BASIC)

Sigma notation
Sigma notation is a mathematical notation to write long sums in a short way. Sigma notation uses the Greek letter Sigma (), and takes upper and lower bounds which tell us where the sum begins and where it ends. The lower bound usually has a variable (called the index, often denoted by ,  or ) along with a value, such as "". This tells us that the summation begins at 2, and goes up by 1 until it reaches the number on the top.

Properties

Applications
Sums are used to represent series and sequences. For example:

The geometric series of a repeating decimal can be represented in summation. For example:

The concept of an integral is a limit of sums, with the area under a curve being defined as:

Related pages 

 Product (mathematics)

References

Further reading
 Nicholas J. Higham, "The accuracy of floating point summation", SIAM J. Scientific Computing 14 (4), 783–799 (1993).

Other websites
 
 Sigma Notation  on PlanetMath
 Derivation of Polynomials to Express the Sum of Natural Numbers with Exponents 

Arithmetics
Mathematical notation
The Lost World: Jurassic Park

The Lost World: Jurassic Park (known also as The Lost World) is an American movie directed by Steven Spielberg. It was released in 1997. It is the sequel to the movie Jurassic Park. The Lost World is the second in a series of three movies. It was followed by Jurassic Park III and Jurassic World. It is based on a book by Michael Crichton, and sticks generally to the plot of the book. The movie was quite successful but not as much as the first.

Other websites 

1990s adventure movies
1997 science fiction movies
Jurassic Park movies
Movies set in islands
Jungle movies
Movies based on books
Movies composed by John Williams
Movies directed by Steven Spielberg
Sequel movies
Universal Pictures movies
Mario Party 6

Mario Party 6 is a party board video game for the Nintendo GameCube. It is the sixth game in the Mario Party series. It was released in Japan on November 18, 2004, in North America on December 6, 2004, and in Europe on March 18, 2005. It is the first Mario Party game to use the Nintendo GameCube's microphone add-on.

Gameplay

Mario Party 6 plays the same as previous games in the Mario Party series. Players go around on boards to collect coins, which they can use to buy stars. Movement is done with the use of a dice block with the numbers one through 10. After all four players take their turns, a mini-game is played. The player that wins the mini-game wins coins. The winner is the player with the most stars at the end of the game. In multiplayer, the sun will rise and fall every three turns. Changes that happen include spaces moving, new characters appearing, and changes to mini-games.

Six boards are in the game. The last one has to be unlocked. Players can play as 11 characters. One of them, Toadette, makes her first playable appearance in a Mario Party game in this game.

2004 video games
Nintendo GameCube games
Mario Party games
Video games developed in Japan
Nintendo GameCube-only games
Nintendo games by franchise
Party video games
Board games
Don Quixote

Don Quixote is a novel by Miguel de Cervantes. The book was published in two parts (1605 and 1615). It was first written in Spanish. Soon afterwards it was translated to English by Thomas Shelton. It is considered by many scholars to be the first modern novel. The main character, Don Quixote, is a paragon of chivalry, but in a deeply flawed and impractical way. Don Quixote is so influential as a character that the word "quixotic" is used to describe his type of behavior.

The story is about Alonso Quixano, a rich middle-aged man. Quixano, having read many tales about chivalry and knights, goes crazy and believes that he is a knight named Don Quixote. He rides around the country with his squire, Sancho, having adventures. He believes his adventures are real, but everyone else laughs at him.

One of the most famous stories in the book is Don Quixote's fight with windmills. He sees some windmills and thinks they are giants. When he rides to fight with them, he is knocked off his horse. Sancho tells him they are only windmills, but Don Quixote does not believe him. He is sure a magician changed windmills into the giants to hurt him.

At the end of the book, Alonso Quixano returns home, hurt badly. He becomes sane again, then dies.

17th-century books
Novels
Spanish-language literature
Vandalism

Vandalism is a crime that is done by destroying or damaging the property of someone else. This can include graffiti and website damage.

A person that does this is called a vandal. The name comes from the Vandals, a tribe that attacked and damaged the city of Rome in 455 CE.

Examples 

Many websites, such as wikis (like Wikipedia), forums, and blogs, can be changed by anyone. Because of this, they can be "vandalized" by adding comments or replacing everything on the page with spam, nonsense or other silly content. It is a kind of trolling, and these websites have special users, called administrators, whose job is to remove the vandalism and to block users who do not stop vandalizing.                                     

Examples of physical vandalism include salting lawns, cutting trees without permission, egg throwing, breaking windows, arson, spraying paint on others' properties, tagging,

Types of crime
Property crimes
Still Standing

Still Standing is a CBS sitcom starring Mark Addy. It is about a working-class couple who live in Chicago, Illinois. Addy's character is a father of three with a wife named Judy (Jami Gertz). Judy and Addy's character, Bill Miller, deal with having an annoying relative, Aunt Linda (Jennifer Irwin), and with having children of different ages. It was first shown in September 2002. Lifetime had the rights to have the show in 2005. It ended in March 2006.

Other websites 
  CBS
  Lifetime
 
 

2002 American television series debuts
2006 American television series endings
2000s American television series
American sitcoms
CBS network shows
Television series set in Chicago, Illinois
English-language television programs
Everybody Loves Raymond

Everybody Loves Raymond is an American television series. It stars Ray Romano. The series was a popular sitcom on the CBS network.

Overview
Ray Romano plays Ray Barone, a sports writer in Lynbrook, New York. Patricia Heaton plays his wife, Debra. Ray and Deborah have a fun set of neighbors: Ray's parents. Robert, Ray's "loser" brother, is a police officer, and is very unlucky in love. By the end of season seven, however, he marries a woman named Amy. The show aired from September 13, 1996 to May 16, 2005.

Other websites 

1996 American television series debuts
2005 American television series endings
1990s American sitcoms
2000s American sitcoms
CBS network shows
Television series about families
Television series set in New York
English-language television programs
The Game of Life

The Game of Life is a popular board game. Players spin a spinner, which tells them where to go next. They then go through an imaginary "life," getting married and having kids. The object of the game is to have more money than the other players by the end of the game.
Wasted time that you gave us. Thank you

Board games
Poster

A poster is a large piece of printed paper that has a message, usually with picture of something. Posters are made to be shown in public on a wall or other flat surfaces. They were the main form of public advertising before the web.

Posters may be used for advertising, education, propaganda, and decoration. They may also be copies of famous works of art.

Chromolithography and the poster 
Chromolithography (color lithography) was invented by Engelmann & Son, who were granted a patent in 1837. After that, it was a matter of time before it reached full commercial development.

Because of its low production costs, over the 50 years after the American Civil War, millions of chromolithographs were printed and were sold for under $10. Louis Prang, a Bostonian, produced fine-art subjects, such as still lifes, landscapes, and classical subjects. Nevertheless, it was only after 1847 that the Jules Chéret posters showed their potential.

Examples

Jules Chéret

19th century posters in the US
General source:

Louis John Rhead

Edward Penfield

Toulouse-Lautrec and Post-impressionism

Art nouveau posters and the impact of graphics on painting

Posters in the first half of the 20th century 
Posters were used for war propaganda, to encourage young people to enlist in the army, and to sell government war bonds. From a strictly artistic view, the posters were unimaginative and far from the masterpieces of the late 19th century posters. The posters almost all came with a caption to bang the message home.

References 

History of printing
Graphics
Advertising
Gretchen Wilson

Gretchen Wilson (born June 26, 1973) is a country music singer.

In 2004 she had her first number one album on Billboard's Hot Country Songs music chart. As late as 2013 she had a song on Billboard's Country Airplay music chart.

Career
Wilson got a contract with Epic Records in 2003.

Discography

Albums
 Here for the Party
 All Jacked Up
 One of the Boys

Singles
 Redneck Woman (2004)
 Here for the Party (2004)
 Red Bird Fever
 When I Think About Cheatin'
 Homewrecker
 All Jacked Up
 I Don't Feel Like Loving You Today
 Our America
 Politically Uncorrect
 That's How They Do It In Dixie
 California Girls
 Come To Bed
 One Of The Boys
 Stacy (2018)

References

1973 births
Living people
Country musicians from Illinois
American guitarists
Wallet

A wallet is a small flat container, mostly of leather or fabric, that a person uses to hold cash, credit cards, identification cards, etc. Most men usually keep their wallets in their pockets, while women usually keep them in larger bags called purses.

Wallets, particularly in Europe, where larger coins are prevalent, contain also a coin purse compartments. Some wallets have built-in clasps or bands to keep them closed. 

As European banknotes, such as Euros and Pounds, are typically larger than American banknotes in size, they do not fit in some smaller American wallets.

Other websites
Collection of Unique Wallet Designs
Some images for wallet design
Wallet stealing

Money
Accessories
Chasing Vermeer

Chasing Vermeer is a children's novel. It is about two children noticing strange coincidences relating to art. The book was written by Blue Balliett and published (printed) by Scholastic in 2003. It says many things about the Dutch painter Johannes Vermeer. 

The sequel to the book is The Wright 3.

Characters

 Petra Andalee
 Calder Pillay
 Mrs. Sharpe
 Ms. Hussey
 Tommy Segovia

2003 books
Children's books
Johannes Vermeer
Care Bears

The Care Bears are a very successful toy franchise from the 1980s. Over forty million of these stuffed teddy bears, made with a variety of colours, were sold from 1983 to 1987. Each Bear had a name, a job, and a symbol tied to it. For example, Funshine Bear helps people wake up, and has a sun on his stomach.

The toys were first made as characters on cards in 1981; the original artwork was done by James Lewis. Later, other toys called the Care Bear Cousins were introduced.

They also gave way to three animated movies for the cinema in the mid-1980s. A related TV series from DIC and, later, Canada's Nelvana Limited came out at almost that same time.

Recently, Care Bear toys have been brought back in a new edition for the twenty-first century. As part of this comeback, the Bears have appeared in their first two DVD movies (both computer-animated), as well as a few video games.

Care Bears

First ten

The later additions

New Bears (2004)

Care Bear Cousins

The movies
The Care Bears Movie (1985)
Care Bears Movie II: A New Generation (1986)
The Care Bears Adventure in Wonderland (1987)
Care Bears: Journey to Joke-a-lot (2004) (direct to video)
The Care Bears' Big Wish Movie (2005) (direct to video)
Care Bears: Oopsy Does It! (2007) (direct to video)
Care Bears: Share Bear Shines (2009) (direct to video)

Care Bears in other languages

 (France) / Les Calinours ( Canadian French )

 (Doobonei eechpattli)

 (Kea Bea)
 (Keo Beoseu)

Norwegian: Care Bears

Serbo-Croatian: Mede medenjaci
 (Latin America) / Osos Amorosos ( European Spanish )

Other websites 
 The Official Site
 Care Bears Forever
 Take Care Bear's Place
 The Memories Board 
 The Care Bear Zone

Toys
Animated television series
Bolzano

Bolzano (; ; , Southern Bavarian: Bozn) is the capital city of the province of Province of Bolzano-Bozen in northern Italy's Alto Adige.

Data

Its population is 98.057 (March 2005) and the area of the municipality is 52.34 km2. Bolzano has a history of Italian-speaking inhabitants since the Middle Ages. The region of Alto Adige/Südtirol is mainly German speaking, but in the city the Italian speaking population was the majority (75%) in 2001. The German speaking population of the city was 24% and the Ladin speaking less than 1%. Actually the foreign-born are around 7% (mostly are from eastern Europe).

Historically between the Renaissance and the 19th century, the whole area, originally populated by neolatins from the time of the Roman Empire, experienced a lot of Germanisation. In the centuries before Napoleon, only the Dolomite's area of the western part of the present area of South Tyrol (especially the Val Venosta near Merano) remained neolatin. After the Italian victory in WWI the Italian government promoted a huge immigration of Italians in the city, that was fully modernized with new areas and with the creation of an industrial section: since then the Italians are the majority and in the 2011 census they were nearly 77% of the total population.

Bolzano actually is an international city with a trilingual English-German-Italian university (Free University of Bolzano), the European Academy (EURAC), a Business Innovation Centre (BIC), an international airport (ABD, daily flights to Rome and Munich), the "Bolzano Fair Area", the Archaeology Museum with the Frozen Fritz (the Iceman called here Ötzi), other important museums, the famous "Monumento alla Vittoria" and an old  Tyrolean medieval centre with the typical alpine arcades ("Portici"-Lauben).

Bolzano is the centre of the "Euregio Tirol-Südtirol/Alto Adige-Trentino" and with Innsbruck is the capital of the "Alps Convention".

City districts and neighboring communities

Bolzano has five city districts:
 Centro-Piani-Rencio (German: Zentrum-Bozner Boden-Rentsch)
 Don Bosco
 Europa-Novacella (German: Europa-Neustift)
 Gries-San Quirino (German: Gries-Quirein)
 Oltrisarco-Aslago (German: Oberau-Haslach)

Communities next to Bozen are: Appiano, Cornedo, Laives, Deutschnofen, Renon, Genesio, Terlan, and Vadena.

Other important towns near Bozen are: Bressanone, Brunico and Merano.

Twin cities
 Sopron, Hungary

Notes

Other websites 
 City of Bolzano-Bozen (only in Italian and German)
 Tourism Board
 University
 Eurac
 Airport
 Archaeology Museum

Capital cities in Italy
Cities in Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol
Isle of Wight

The Isle of Wight is an island county that is just off the south coast of England. It is about 40 kilometres (25 miles) by 20 kilometres (13 miles) in size. About one hundred and twenty thousand people live on the island.

The Isle of Wight is known as a county. This means that it has a council of people who make decisions about some things that affect the people who live there.  The county town of the island, which is the place where the council work, is called Newport.

Tourism
Many people like to go on holiday on the island.  There are many hotels and tourist attractions.  Queen Victoria used to like to visit the Isle of Wight where she had a house called Osborne House.  Tourism is the most important industry on the island.

Nature
Over half of the island is officially designated as an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.  It is also widely recognised as the most important site in Europe for finding dinosaur remains.

 
Ceremonial counties of England
Unitary authorities
Evita (musical)

Evita is a musical. The lyrics were written by Tim Rice. The music was written by Andrew Lloyd Webber. The musical is based on the life of Eva Perón (1919-1952), the wife of Argentine President Juan Perón, which Che is telling.

Evita opened on the West End in 1978, and on Broadway in 1979. It won the Laurence Olivier Award for Best New Musical and the Tony Award for Best Musical. In 1996, a movie version was released starring Madonna.

1970s musicals
Musicals by Andrew Lloyd Webber
Musicals by Tim Rice
Tony Award winning musicals
Laurence Olivier Award winning musicals
Broadway musicals
West End musicals
Musicals adapted to movies
Sunset Boulevard (movie)

Sunset Boulevard is a 1950 movie about a screenwriter (William Holden) accompanying a silent movie actress (Gloria Swanson). It was nominated for eleven Academy Awards and won three. For Andrew Lloyd Webber's musical theater, it starred Patti LuPone, Glenn Close, Betty Buckley and Elaine Paige.

1950 movies
United States National Film Registry movies
English-language movies
Movies directed by Billy Wilder
1785



Events 
 January 1 – The Montgolfier brothers fly across the English Channel.

Births 
 December 26 – Laurent Clerc, co-founder of the first American school for the deaf

Deaths 
January 3 – Baldassare Galuppi, Italian composer (b. 1706)
January 19 – Jonathan Toup, English classical scholar and critic (b. 1713)
January 23 – Matthew Stewart, Scottish mathematician (b. 1717)
April 14 – William Whitehead, English writer (b. 1715)
May 8 – Etienne Francois, Duke of Choiseul, French statesman (b. 1719)
June 2 – Jean Paul de Gua de Malves, French mathematician (b. 1713)
June 30 – James Oglethorpe, English general and founder of the state of Georgia (b. 1696)
August 17 – Jonathan Trumbull, Governor of the Colony and the state of Connecticut (b. 1710)
August 26 – George Germain, 1st Viscount Sackville, British soldier and politician (b. 1716)
August 28 – Jean-Baptiste Pigalle, French sculptor (b. 1714)
October 4 – David Brearly, delegate to the U.S. Constitutional Convention (b. 1703)
November 19 – Bernard de Bury, French composer (b. 1720)
November 25 – Richard Glover, English poet (b. 1712)
December 29 – Johan Herman Wessel, Norwegian writer (b. 1742)
Molière

Molière (1622 – 17 February 1673) was a French actor, director and writer. His real name was Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, Molière was his stage name. He wrote some of the most important comedies in human history. 

He was born in Paris where his father owned a carpet shop. As a young person, Molière decided to live an artist's life. At the age of 21, he founded a theatre company that soon went bankrupt. From 1645–1658, he toured France with some of his friends. 

Later, King Louis XIV made Molière responsible for the entertainment at the court of Versailles near Paris.  Molière was happy to have the king among his friends, because he had many enemies, especially important people in the Roman Catholic church. Molière's comedies deal with human weaknesses: jealousy, meanness, hypocrisy, fear of death. By putting his characters in ridiculous situations, Molière wants to entertain and educate his audience. 

One of his most important plays is Tartuffe, showing a bigoted man stealing his way into a rich family. Molière's last play was Le Malade Imaginaire, called in English The Hypochondriac. As in many of his comedies, Molière played the main role. He died on stage during the fourth performance.  Because of his problems with the church, he was not allowed to be buried in a church cemetery.

References

Other websites 

 
 Molière's works online at toutmoliere.net (in French)
 Molière's works online at site-moliere.com
 Molière's works online  at InLibroVeritas.net
 Molière's works online at classicistranieri.com
 Biography, Bibliography, Analysis, Plot overview  at biblioweb.org (in French)
 Molière's Verses Plays Publication, Statistics, Words Research (in French)
 Professional quality parody - "The Life & Times of Molière" at YouTube.com

1622 births
1673 deaths
Actors from Paris
French playwrights
Writers from Paris
Pen names
Burials at Père Lachaise Cemetery
Ted Danson

Edward Bridge "Ted" Danson III (born December 29, 1947) is an American actor and producer. Danson was born in San Diego, California and raised in Flagstaff, Arizona. He is best known from his work on television. His roles include:

 Dr. John Becker in Becker
 Sam Malone in Cheers
 Jack Holden in Three Men and a Baby and Three Men and a Little Lady
 D.B. Russell in CSI: Crime Scene Investigation
 Michael in The Good Place

Ted Danson was nominated for Outstanding Lead Actor in a Comedy Series in 2018, 2019 and 2020 for playing Michael on The Good Place. The Good Place won a Peabody Award in 2019.

Other websites

References

1947 births
Living people
Actors from Arizona
Actors from San Diego, California
American movie actors
American movie producers
American television actors
American television producers
American voice actors
Emmy Award winning actors
Golden Globe Award winning actors
Flagstaff, Arizona
Cheers

Cheers is a long-running American sitcom made by Charles-Burrows-Charles Productions in association with Paramount Television for NBC. The show premiered on September 30, 1982 and had its widely watched series finale on May 20, 1993, followed by a long and ongoing run in syndication. In eleven seasons, there were 270 episodes.

Format: Sitcom
Run time: approx. 0:30 (per episode)
Creators: James Burrows, Glen Charles, and Les Charles
Producers: David Angell

Characters and actors who portrayed them 

Sam Malone (Ted Danson)
Diane Chambers (Shelley Long)
Rebecca Howe (Kirstie Alley)
Coach Ernie Pantusso (Nicholas Colasanto)
Carla Tortelli (Rhea Perlman)
Cliff Calvin (John Ratzenberger)
Woody Boyd (Woody Harrelson)
Frasier Crane (Kelsey Grammer)
Lilith Sternin (Bebe Neuwirth)
Norm Peterson (George Wendt)

Setting

Cheers was set in a Boston bar.  This bar was where a group of friends would come to sit, drink alcohol, complain, and make practical jokes on a rival bar in town.

The show's main theme in its early seasons was the romance between Diane Chambers (Shelley Long) and ex-baseball pitcher and bar owner Sam Malone (Ted Danson). Long's departure from the show in 1987 shifted the emphasis to Sam's relationship with a new character, Rebecca Howe (Kirstie Alley). Diane returned for the finale.

The show also created the character Frasier Crane. Frasier got his own show (Frasier) the season after Cheers ended.  Frasier's love interest Lilith Sternin appeared on both shows but Frasier and Lilith were no longer married in Frasier.

The producers, not wanting the show to be construed as promoting drinking, had Sam's character written as an ex-alcoholic. Most of the early episodes took place entirely within the confines of the bar. When the series became popular, some scenes were outside the bar.

The outer shots of the bar were actually the Bull and Finch pub, north of Boston Common, which has become a tourist attraction because of its association with the series. It is said to be the bar that the series creators saw and wanted to model the bar in their show after. It has now been renamed Cheers on Beacon Hill, though its interior is quite different from the TV bar.

Ratings 
It was nearly cancelled during its first season (in which it ranked dead last among 63 shows).  But it eventually became one of the most popular shows on TV because it had a top-ten rating during seven of its eleven seasons. The show earned 26 Emmy Awards out of a total of 111 nominations.

Other websites 

1982 television series debuts
1993 television series endings
1980s American sitcoms
1990s American sitcoms
Boston, Massachusetts in fiction
NBC network shows
Television series set in Massachusetts
Emmy Award winning programs
English-language television programs
Pixar

Pixar Animation Studios, or simply Pixar, is an American animation studio. It is known for its advanced CGI productions. It has been a partner of Disney for many years. In 2006, Disney bought the company.

Pixar started as a division of George Lucas' Lucasfilm in early 1979. In 1986, Apple Inc. founder Steve Jobs bought it for $10 million. He worked as a chairman and CEO until 2011.

The company has made a total of 28 movies and short films based on the characters, starting with Toy Story which was released on November 22, 1995, Toy Story 2 was premiered in 1999 and Toy Story 3 was made in 2010. The fourth film of the franchise is Toy Story 4 which released in 2019. The Toy Story franchise has globally become the highest-grossing animated films of all time and has also released several short films and several television series.

Movies 

 Toy Story (1995)
 A Bug's Life (1998)
 Toy Story 2 (1999)
 Monsters, Inc. (2001)
 Finding Nemo (2003)
 The Incredibles (2004)
 Cars (2006)
 Ratatouille (2007)
 WALL-E (2008)
 Up (2009)
 Toy Story 3 (2010)
 Cars 2 (2011)
 Brave (2012)
 Monsters University (2013)
 Inside Out (2015)
 The Good Dinosaur (2015)
 Finding Dory (2016)
 Cars 3 (2017)
 Coco (2017)
 Incredibles 2 (2018)
 Toy Story 4 (2019)
 Onward (2020)
 Soul (2020)
 Luca (2021)

Short movies 

 A Computer Animated Hand
 Adventures of André & Wally B. (Lucasfilm)
 Luxo Jr.
 Red's Dream
 Tin Toy
 Knick-Knack
 Geri's Game
 For the Birds
 Mike's New Car
 Boundin'''
 Jack-Jack Attack One Man Band Lifted Mater and the Ghostlight Your Friend the Rat Presto Resuce Squad Mater El Materdor BURN-E Tokyo Mater Partly Cloudy Dug's Special Mission George & A.J. Day & Night La Luna Hawaiian Vacation Small Fry Partysaurus Rex The Legend of Mor'du The Blue Umbrella Party Central Lava Sanjay's Super Team Riley's First Date? PiperLou Bao''

Other websites 
 The Official Site
National Hockey League

The National Hockey League or NHL, is the highest-level ice hockey league in the world. It has 32 teams - seven are from Canada and the other 25 are from the United States. The winner of the playoffs each year wins the Stanley Cup.

The NHL began in 1917. Some of the owners in the National Hockey Association had problems with owner Edward Livingstone, so they got rid of him by creating a new league. There were five teams in 1917:

 Montreal Canadiens
 Montreal Wanderers
 Ottawa Senators (later St. Louis Eagles; not related to the current Ottawa Senators)
 Quebec Bulldogs (later Hamilton Tigers)
 Toronto Arenas (later St. Patricks, then Maple Leafs)

They played 22 games a year. The Wanderers had to stop playing in the first year because their arena burned down. Over the years some teams died out, and others were created: the Boston Bruins, New York Americans, Montreal Maroons, Pittsburgh Pirates (later Philadelphia Quakers), New York Rangers, Chicago Black Hawks and Detroit Cougars (later Falcons, then Red Wings).

Some teams folded during the Great Depression, so by 1942 there were only six teams:

 Boston Bruins
 Chicago Black Hawks
 Detroit Red Wings
 Montreal Canadiens
 New York Rangers
 Toronto Maple Leafs

There were only these six teams for 25 years, so they became known as the "Original Six".

By the 1940s, they were playing 50 games a year, but this increased slowly to 80 games by the 1970s. In 1967, the league increased to 12 teams. By 1979 it had 21 teams, and today it has 31. Some of the teams that no longer exist are the Oakland Seals, Minnesota North Stars (now the Dallas Stars), Winnipeg Jets (now the Arizona Coyotes), Kansas City Scouts (which became the Colorado Rockies and are now the New Jersey Devils), Hartford Whalers (now the Carolina Hurricanes), Quebec Nordiques (now the Colorado Avalanche) and Atlanta Thrashers (now the current Winnipeg Jets).

Today they play 82 games a year, plus four rounds of playoffs. The players make a lot of money (many make over a million dollars a year). Because they could make so much money, many Europeans came over to North America to play in the NHL. Today almost all the world's best hockey players are in the NHL.

List of teams

Notes

 An asterisk (*) denotes a franchise move. See the respective team articles for more information.
 The Edmonton Oilers, Hartford Whalers (now Carolina Hurricanes), Quebec Nordiques (now Colorado Avalanche), and original Winnipeg Jets (now Arizona Coyotes) all joined the NHL in 1979 as part of the NHL–WHA merger.

Related pages
 History of the National Hockey League

References

Notes

Other websites 
 Official NHL website

National Hockey League
1917 establishments in North America
Isaac Asimov

Isaac Asimov ( – April 6, 1992) was a  writer of science fiction. He was also a biochemist with a PhD from Columbia University.

Life 
Asimov was born in Petrovichi, Smolensk Oblast, Russian SFSR to a Jewish family, on an unknown date between October 4, 1919 and January 2, 1920. Asimov celebrated his birthday on January 2. He was taken to the United States when he was three, and learned English and Yiddish as his native languages. He wrote many books. People know about Isaac Asimov because of his science fiction books and his science books for non-scientists.

Writing 
Asimov's most famous books were the Foundation series. He also wrote the Galactic Empire and the Robot Series. He also wrote mystery, fantasy, and non-fiction books. He wrote or edited over 500 books and about 90,000 letters. Other subjects he wrote about were history, the Bible, literature, and sexuality.

Many of Asimov's early writings were short stories published in cheap science fiction and fantasy magazines. Years later, most of them were collected and republished as collections. Well-known collections include I, Robot, The Rest of the Robots, Earth is Room Enough and The Early Asimov.

Asimov's reading list 
Asimov made a list of 15 of his science fiction books, which he advised should be read in this order:
 I, Robot (1950). Alternatively, The Complete Robot (1982).
 Caves of Steel (1954).
 The Naked Sun (1957).
 The Robots of Dawn (1983).
 Robots and Empire (1985).
 The Currents of Space (1952).
 The Stars, Like Dust (1951).
 Pebble in the Sky (1950).
 Prelude to Foundation (1988).
 Forward the Foundation (1993).
 Foundation (1951).
 Foundation and Empire (1952).
 Second Foundation (1953).
 Foundation's Edge (1982).
 Foundation and Earth (1986).

Numbers 1–5 are 'Robot' books; 6–8 are 'Galacticos Empire' books; 9–15 are Foundation series books.

Asimov's novels have influenced science fiction on television and movie. Especially his 'Three Laws of Robotics' is a lasting contribution to our thinking.

 A robot may not injure a human being or, through inaction, allow a human being to come to harm.
 A robot must obey any orders given to it by human beings, except where such orders would conflict with the First Law.
 A robot must protect its own existence as long as such protection does not conflict with the First or Second Law.

Beliefs 
Although ethnically a Jew, Asimov was an atheist:
"I am an atheist, out and out. It took me quite a long time to say it. I've been an atheist for years and years, but somehow ... it was better to say one was a humanist or an agnostic".

Death 
When he had heart surgery in 1983, he received blood infected with HIV. He developed AIDS, and died of the effects of the medical condition in 1992. His widow did not speak of this until years later.

Related pages 
 Arthur C. Clarke

Notes

References 

1919 births
1920 births
1992 deaths
American atheists
American biochemists
Columbia University alumni
Deaths from AIDS
Jewish American writers
Writers from New York City
Scientists from New York
1907

1907 (MCMVII) was a common year starting on Tuesday of the Gregorian calendar.

Events 
 January 6 – Maria Montessori opens her first school and daycare center for working class children in Rome (Casa dei Bambini in San Lorenzo).
 January 14 – An earthquake in Kingston, Jamaica kills more than 1,000.
 January 23 – Charles Curtis from Kansas, becomes the first Native American US Senator.
 Charles Louis Alphonse Laveran, French doctor, won in 1907 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
 Rudyard Kipling awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature.

Births 
 May 12– Katharine Hepburn, American actress
 May 14 – Edythe Wright, American singer
 May 22 – Hergé, Belgiun cartoonist
 June 16 - Jack Albertson, American actor, singer, musician, comedian, and dancer (d. 1981)
 August 8 – Benny Carter, American jazz saxophonist, composer, arranger and bandleader
 September 29 – Gene Autry American actor
 October 5 – Mrs. Miller, singer (d. 1997)
 November 15 – Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg, German army officer during World War Two (d. 1944)
 December 25 – Cab Calloway

Deaths 
 January 31 – Timothy Eaton, Canadian department store founder (b. 1834)
 February 2 – Dmitri Mendeleev, Russian chemist (b. 1834)
 February 16 – Giosue Carducci, Italian writer, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1835)
 February 16 – Clémentine of Orléans, daughter of King Louis-Philippe of France (b. 1817)
 February 20 – Henri Moissan, French chemist, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1852)
 February 26 – C. W. Alcock, English footballer, journalist, and football promoter (b. 1842)
 March 19 – Thomas Bailey Aldrich, American poet and novelist (b. 1836)
 May 12 – Joris-Karl Huysmans, French writer (b. 1848)
 August 15 – Joseph Joachim, Austrian violinist (b. 1831)
 August 16 – James Hector, Scottish geologist (b. 1834)
 September 4 – Edvard Grieg, Norwegian composer (b. 1843)
 September 6 – Sully Prudhomme, French writer, Nobel Prize laureate (b. 1829)
 November 16 – Robert I, Duke of Parma, last ruling Duke of Parma (b. 1848)
 November 28 – Stanisław Wyspiański, Polish writer, painter, and architect (b. 1869)
 December 8 – King Oscar II of Sweden (b. 1829)
 December 17 – Lord Kelvin, Irish-born physicist and engineer (b. 1824)
1911

1911 (MCMXI) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar.

Events 
 April 19 – Michel Fokine's Le Spectre de la Rose debuts in Monte Carlo with Nijinsky in the title role
 June 13 – Michel Fokine's Petrushka debuts in Paris with Nijinsky in the title role
 December 14 – Roald Amundsen arrived the south pole

Date unknown 
 The Secret Garden is published
 Allvar Gullstrand, Swedish ophthalmologist, won the 1911 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
 The Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition is published

Births 
 February 6 – Ronald Reagan, 40th President of the United States (d. 2004)
 June 24 – Juan Manuel Fangio, legendary Formula 1 driver

Deaths 
 January 17 – Sir Francis Galton
 March 1 – Jacobus Henricus van 't Hoff
 April 25 – Emilio Salgari
 May 18 – Gustav Mahler
 May 21 – Williamina Fleming
 May 29 – William S. Gilbert
 June 9 – Carrie Nation
 August 1 – Edwin Austin Abbey
 August 8 – William P. Frye
 September 16 – Edward Whymper
 October 7 – John Hughlings Jackson
 October 14 – John Marshall Harlan
 October 29 – Joseph Pulitzer
 October 31 – John Joseph Montgomery
 December 10 – Joseph Dalton Hooker