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California condor

Large New World vulture, North America

The California condor (Gymnogyps californianus) is a New World vulture and the largest North American land bird. It became extinct in the wild in 1987 when all remaining wild individuals were captured, but has since been reintroduced to northern Arizona and southern Utah (including the Grand Canyon area and Zion National Park), the coastal mountains of California, and northern Baja California in Mexico. It is the only surviving member of the genus Gymnogyps, although four extinct members of the genus are also known. The species is listed by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature as Critically Endangered, and similarly considered Critically Imperiled by NatureServe. The plumage is black with patches of white on the underside of the wings; the head is largely bald, with skin color ranging from gray on young birds to yellow and bright orange on breeding adults. Its 3.0 m (9.8 ft) wingspan is the widest of any North American bird, and its weight of up to 12 kg (26 lb) nearly equals that of the trumpeter swan, the heaviest among native North American bird species. The condor is a scavenger and eats large amounts of carrion. It is one of the world's longest-living birds, with a lifespan of up to 60 years. Condor numbers dramatically declined in the 20th century due to agricultural chemicals (DDT), poaching, lead poisoning, and habitat destruction. A conservation plan put in place by the United States government led to the capture of all the remaining wild condors by 1987, with a total population of 27 individuals. These surviving birds were bred at the San Diego Wild Animal Park and the Los Angeles Zoo. Numbers rose through captive breeding, and beginning in 1991, condors were reintroduced into the wild. Since then, their population has grown, but the California condor remains one of the world's rarest bird species. In December 2020 there were 504 California condors living in the wild or in captivity, while by December 2022 the population totaled 537, of which 336 lived in the wild. The condor is a significant bird to many Californian Native American groups and plays an important role in several of their traditional myths. ## Taxonomy The California condor was described by English naturalist George Shaw in 1797 as Vultur californianus; Archibald Menzies collected the type specimen "from the coast of California" during the Vancouver expedition. It was originally classified in the same genus as the Andean condor (V. gryphus), but, due to the Andean condor's slightly different markings, slightly longer wings, and tendency to kill small animals to eat, the California condor has been placed in its own monotypic genus. The generic name Gymnogyps is derived from the Greek gymnos/γυμνος "naked" or "bare", and gyps/γυψ "vulture", while the specific name californianus comes from its location in California. The word condor itself is derived from the Quechua word kuntur. The exact taxonomic placement of the California condor and the other six species of New World vultures remains unclear. Though similar in appearance and ecological roles to Old World vultures, the New World vultures evolved from a different ancestor in a different part of the world. Just how different the two are is under debate, with some earlier authorities suggesting that the New World vultures are more closely related to storks. More recent authorities maintain their overall position in the order Falconiformes along with the Old World vultures or place them in their own order, Cathartiformes. The South American Classification Committee has removed the New World vultures from Ciconiiformes and instead placed them in Incertae sedis, but notes that a move to Falconiformes or Cathartiformes is possible. As of the 51st Supplement (2010) of the American Ornithologists' Union, the California condor is in the family Cathartidae of the order Cathartiformes. ### Evolutionary history The genus Gymnogyps is an example of a relict distribution. During the Pleistocene Epoch, this genus was widespread across the Americas. From fossils, the Floridian Gymnogyps kofordi from the Early Pleistocene and the Peruvian Gymnogyps howardae from the Late Pleistocene have been described. A condor found in Late Pleistocene deposits on Cuba was initially described as Antillovultur varonai, but has since been recognized as another member of Gymnogyps, Gymnogyps varonai. It may even have derived from a founder population of California condors. The California condor is the sole surviving member of Gymnogyps and has no accepted subspecies. However, there is a Late Pleistocene form that is sometimes regarded as a palaeosubspecies, Gymnogyps californianus amplus. Opinions are mixed, regarding the classification of the form as either a chronospecies or a separate species, Gymnogyps amplus. Gymnogyps amplus occurred over much of the bird's historical range – even extending into Florida – but was larger, having about the same weight as the Andean condor. This bird also had a wider bill. As the climate changed during the last ice age, the entire population became smaller until it had evolved into the Gymnogyps californianus of today, although more recent studies by Syverson question that theory. ## Description The adult California condor is a uniform black with the exception of large triangular patches or bands of white on the underside of the wings. It has gray legs and feet, an ivory-colored bill, a frill of black feathers surrounding the base of the neck, and brownish red eyes. The juvenile is mostly a mottled dark brown with blackish coloration on the head. It has mottled gray instead of white on the underside of its flight feathers. The condor's head has little to no feathers, which helps keep it clean when feeding on carrion. The skin of the head and neck is capable of flushing noticeably in response to emotional state. The skin color varies from yellowish to a glowing reddish-orange. The birds do not have true syringeal vocalizations. They can make a few hissing or grunting sounds only heard when very close. The female condor is smaller than the male, an exception to the rule among birds of prey (the related Andean condor is another exception). Overall length ranges from 109 to 140 cm (43 to 55 in) and wingspan from 2.49 to 3 m (8 ft 2 in to 9 ft 10 in). Their weight ranges from 7 to 14.1 kg (15 to 31 lb), with estimations of average weight ranging from 8 to 9 kg (18 to 20 lb). Wingspans of up to 3.4 m (11 ft) have been reported but no wingspan over 3.05 m (10.0 ft) has been verified. Most measurements are from birds raised in captivity, so it is difficult to determine if major differences exist between wild and captive condors. California condors have the largest wingspan of any North American bird. They are surpassed in both body length and weight only by the trumpeter swan and the introduced mute swan. The American white pelican and whooping crane also have longer bodies than the condor. Condors are so large that they can be mistaken for a small, distant airplane, which possibly occurs more often than that they are mistaken for other bird species. The middle toe of the California condor's foot is greatly elongated, and the hind toe is only slightly developed. The talons of all the toes are straight and blunt and are thus more adapted to walking than gripping. This is more similar to their supposed relatives the storks than to birds of prey and Old World vultures, which use their feet as weapons or organs of prehension. ## Historic range At the time of human settlement of the Americas, the California condor was widespread across North America; condor bones from the late Pleistocene have been found at the Cutler Fossil Site in southern Florida. However, at the end of the last glacial period came the extinction of the megafauna that led to a subsequent reduction in range and population. Five hundred years ago, the California condor roamed across the American Southwest and West Coast. Faunal remains of condors have been found documented in Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico, and Texas. The Lewis and Clark Expedition of the early 19th century reported on their sighting and shooting of California condors near the mouth of the Columbia River. In the 1970s, two Condor Observation Sites were established in the Santa Clara River Valley to host hopeful birders interested in the endangered species: one about 15 miles north of Fillmore, California, near the Sespe Wildlife Area of Los Padres National Forest, and one atop Mount Pinos, "accessible from a dirt road off the highway in from Gorman". ## Habitat The California condor lives in rocky shrubland, coniferous forest, and oak savanna. They are often found near cliffs or large trees, which they use as nesting sites. Individual birds have a huge range and have been known to travel up to 250 km (160 mi) in search of carrion. There are two sanctuaries chosen because of their prime condor nesting habitat: the Sisquoc Condor Sanctuary in the San Rafael Wilderness and the Sespe Condor Sanctuary in the Los Padres National Forest. The Los Padres Condor Range and River Protection Act of 1992 expanded existing wilderness by 34,200 hectares (84,400 acres) and designated 127,900 hectares (316,050 acres) of new wilderness that provide habitat for the condor in the Los Padres. ## Ecology and behavior The California condor's large flight muscles are not anchored by a correspondingly large sternum, which restricts them to being primarily soarers. The birds flap their wings when taking off from the ground, but after attaining a moderate elevation they largely glide, sometimes going for miles without a single flap of their wings. They have been known to fly up to speeds of 90 km/h (56 mph) and as high as 4,600 m (15,100 ft). They prefer to roost on high perches from which they can launch without any major wing-flapping effort. Often, these birds are seen soaring near rock cliffs, using thermals to aid them in keeping aloft. The California condor has a long life span, reaching up to 60 years. If it survives to adulthood, the condor has few natural threats other than humans. Because they lack a syrinx, their vocal display is limited to grunts and hisses. Condors bathe frequently and can spend hours a day preening their feathers. Condors also perform urohidrosis, or defecate on their legs, to reduce their body temperature. There is a well-developed social structure within large groups of condors, with competition to determine a pecking order decided by body language, competitive play behavior, and a variety of hisses and grunts. This social hierarchy is displayed especially when the birds feed, with the dominant birds eating before the younger ones. ### Breeding Condors begin to look for a mate when they reach sexual maturity at the age of 6. To attract a prospective mate, the male condor performs a display, in which the male turns his head red and puffs out his neck feathers. He then spreads his wings and slowly approaches the female. If the female lowers her head to accept the male, the condors become mates for life. The pair makes a simple nest in caves or on cliff clefts, especially ones with nearby roosting trees and open spaces for landing. A mated female lays one bluish-white egg every other year. Eggs are laid as early as January to as late as April. The egg weighs about 280 grams (10 oz) and measures from 90 to 120 mm (3.5 to 4.7 in) in length and about 67 mm (2.6 in) in width. If the chick or egg is lost or removed, the parents "double clutch", or lay another egg to take the lost one's place. Researchers and breeders take advantage of this behavior to double the reproductive rate by taking the first egg away for puppet-rearing; this induces the parents to lay a second egg, which the condors are sometimes allowed to raise. The eggs hatch after 53 to 60 days of incubation by both parents. Chicks are born with their eyes open and sometimes can take up to a week to leave the shell completely. The young are covered with a grayish down until they are almost as large as their parents. They are able to fly after 5 to 6 months, but continue to roost and forage with their parents until they are in their second year, at which point the parents typically turn their energies to a new nest. Ravens are the main predatory threat to condor eggs, while golden eagles and bears are potential predators of condor offspring. In 2021, the San Diego Zoo reported having had two unfertilized eggs hatch within its breeding program in 2001 and 2009, producing male young by parthenogenesis as indicated by genetic studies. The mothers had been housed with males and had mated before, but the offspring lacked markers of male paternity and showed all-maternal inheritance, suggesting the specific mechanism of parthenogenesis involved automixis, gametic fusion, or endomitosis. Earlier evidence of similar parthenogenesis in birds found that among the known examples the embryos died before hatching, unlike these condor chicks. Neither chick lived to sexual maturity, preventing data collection on their reproductive potential. ### Feeding - See Evolutionary anachronism. Wild condors maintain a large home range, often traveling 250 km (160 mi) a day in search of carrion. It is thought that in the early days of its existence as a species, the California condor lived off the carcasses of the Pleistocene megafauna, which are largely extinct in North America. They still prefer to feast on large, terrestrial mammalian carcasses such as deer, goats, sheep, donkeys, horses, pigs, cougars, bears, or cattle. Alternatively, they may feed on the bodies of smaller mammals such as rabbits, squirrels, or coyotes, aquatic mammals such as whales and California sea lions, or salmon. Bird and reptile carcasses are rarely eaten. Condors prefer fresh kills, but they also eat decayed food when necessary. Since they do not have a sense of smell, they spot these corpses by looking for other scavengers, like eagles and smaller vultures, the latter of which cannot rip through the tougher hides of these larger animals with the efficiency of the larger condor. They can usually intimidate other scavengers away from the carcass, with the exception of bears, which will ignore them, and golden eagles, which will fight a condor over a kill or a carcass. In the wild they are intermittent eaters, often going for between a few days to two weeks without eating, then gorging themselves on 1–1.5 kilograms (2.2–3.3 lb) of meat at once. ## Conservation The California condor conservation project may be one of the most expensive species conservation projects in United States history, costing over \$35 million, including \$20 million in federal and state funding, since World War II. As of 2007, the annual cost for the condor conservation program was around \$2.0 million per year. ### Recovery plan As the condor's population continued to decline, discussion began about starting a captive breeding program for the birds. Opponents to this plan argued that the condors had the right to freedom and that capturing all of the condors would change the species' habits forever, and that the cost was too great. The project received the approval of the United States government, and the capture of the remaining wild condors was completed on Easter Sunday 1987, when AC-9, the last wild condor, was captured. At that point, there were only 22 surviving condors, all of them in captivity. The goal of the California Condor Recovery Plan was to establish two geographically separate populations, one in California and the other in Arizona, each with 150 birds and at least 15 breeding pairs. The study and capture of the remaining California condors was made possible through the efforts of Jan Hamber, an ornithologist with the Santa Barbara Museum of Natural History. Hamber personally captured AC-9, the final wild California condor, and her dedication to the bird's conservation led her to compile decades of field notes into the Condor Archives, a searchable database focused on condor biology and conservation. The captive breeding program, led by the San Diego Wild Animal Park and Los Angeles Zoo, and with other participating zoos around the country, including the Oklahoma City Zoo and Botanical Garden, got off to a slow start due to the condor's mating habits. However, utilizing the bird's ability to double clutch, biologists began removing the first egg from the nest and raising it with puppets, allowing the parents to lay another egg. Aside from breeding programs, the Condor Recovery Center at Oakland Zoo treats condors that are ill from lead poisoning. ### Reintroduction to the wild In 1988, the United States Fish and Wildlife Service began a reintroduction experiment involving the release of captive Andean condors into the wild in California. Only females were released, to eliminate the possibility of accidentally introducing a South American species into the United States. The experiment was a success, and all the Andean condors were recaptured and re-released in South America. California condors were released in 1991 and 1992 in California at Big Sur, Pinnacles National Park and Bitter Creek National Wildlife Refuge and in 1996 at the Vermilion Cliffs release site in Arizona near the Grand Canyon. The Fish and Wildlife Service designated the Arizona condors as an experimental, nonessential animal so they would not affect land regulations or development as ranchers were concerned they could be charged with an offense if any birds were injured on their property after the release. Though the birth rate remains low in the wild, their numbers are increasing steadily through regular releases of captive-reared adolescents. ### Obstacles to recovery In modern times, a wide variety of causes have contributed to the California condor's decline. Its low clutch size (one young per nest), combined with a late age of sexual maturity, make the bird vulnerable to artificial population decline. Significant past damage to the condor population has also been attributed to poaching, lead poisoning (from eating animals containing lead shot), DDT poisoning, electric power lines, egg collecting, and habitat destruction. During the California Gold Rush, some condors were even kept as pets. The leading cause of mortality in condor nestlings is the ingestion of trash that is fed to them by their parents. Premature deaths among condor populations continued to occur due to contact with golden eagles, lead poisoning, and other factors such as power line collisions. Since 1994, captive-bred California condors have been trained to avoid power lines and people. Since the implementation of this aversion conditioning program, the number of condor deaths due to power lines has greatly decreased. Lead poisoning due to fragmented lead bullets in large game waste is a particularly big problem for condors due to their extremely strong digestive juices; lead waste is not as much of a problem for other avian scavengers such as the turkey vulture and common raven. In California, the Ridley-Tree Condor Preservation Act went into effect July 1, 2008, requiring that hunters use non-lead bullets when hunting in the condor's range. Blood lead levels in golden eagles as well as turkey vultures has declined with the implementation of the Ridley-Tree Condor Preservation Act, demonstrating that the legislation has helped reduce other species' lead exposures aside from the California condor. There is no comparable anti-lead-bullet legislation in the other states in which the condor resides. "Over 60 percent of the adult and juvenile deaths (that is, excluding chicks and fledglings) in the wild population have been as a result of lead poisoning" according to Dawn Starin in an article ("Condors or lead ammunition? We can't have both") published by The Ecologist in January 2015. She continues: "Because condors have been known to live past the age of 50, do not breed until they are at least six years old, and raise only one chick every other year, their populations cannot withstand the mortality rates caused by this neurological toxin." According to epidemiologist Terra Kelly: "Until all natural food sources are free from lead-based ammunition, lead poisoning will threaten recovery of naturally sustaining populations of condors in the wild." The article also states: "The military doesn't use lead, and if that isn't a huge message I don't know what is." Avian influenza infected and killed condors in the Arizona-Utah flock in 2023. ### Population growth Nesting milestones have been reached by the reintroduced condors. In 2003, the first nestling fledged in the wild since 1981. In March 2006, a pair of California condors, released by Ventana Wildlife Society, attempted to nest in a hollow tree near Big Sur, California. This was the first time in more than 100 years that a pair of California condors had been seen nesting in Northern California. In October 2010, the wild condor population reached 100 individuals in its namesake state of California, plus 73 wild condors in Arizona. In November 2011, there were 394 living individuals, 205 of them in the wild and the rest in the San Diego Zoo Safari Park, the Santa Barbara Zoo, the Los Angeles Zoo, the Oregon Zoo, and the World Center for Birds of Prey in Boise, Idaho. In May 2012, the number of living individuals had reached 405, with 179 living in captivity. By June 2014, the condor population had reached 439: 225 in the wild and 214 in captivity. Official statistics from the December 2016 USFWS recorded an overall population of 446, of which 276 are wild and 170 are captive. A key milestone was reached in 2015 when more condors were born in the wild than died. ### Reintroduction to Mexico As the Recovery Program achieved milestones, a fifth active release site in Sierra de San Pedro Mártir National Park, Baja California, Mexico, was added to the three release sites in California and the release site in Arizona. In early 2007, a California condor laid an egg in Mexico for the first time since at least the 1930s. In June, 2016, three chicks that were born in Chapultepec Zoo in Mexico City, were flown to Sierra de San Pedro Mártir National Park, Baja California, Mexico. In the spring of 2009, a second wild chick was born in the Sierra de San Pedro Mártir National Park and was named Inyaa ("Sun" in the Kiliwa language) by local environmentalists. ### Expanded range In 2014, Condor \#597, also known as "Lupine", was spotted near Pescadero, a coastal community south of San Francisco. Lupine had been routinely seen at Pinnacles National Park after having been released into the wild at Big Sur the previous year. Younger birds of the central California population are seeking to expand their territory, which could mean that a new range expansion is possible for the more than 60 condors flying free in central California. Also in 2014 the first successful breeding in Utah was reported. A pair of condors that had been released in Arizona, nested in Zion National Park and the hatching of one chick was confirmed. The 1,000th chick since recovery efforts began hatched in Zion in May 2019. The California condor was seen for the first time in nearly 50 years in Sequoia National Park in late May 2020. As part of an effort headed by the Yurok tribe to reintroduce the condor to the coastal redwoods of northern California, birds hatched at the Oregon Zoo and the World Center for Birds of Prey were released at Redwood National Park in 2022. ### Condor Watch A crowdsourcing project called Condor Watch (CW) was started on April 14, 2014, and ended in 2020. Hosted by the web portal Zooniverse, volunteers were asked to examine motion-capture images of California condors associated with release sites managed by the United States Fish and Wildlife Service, National Park Service and Ventana Wildlife Society. The tasks on the website included identifying tagged condors and marking the distance to feeding sources such as animal carcasses. Biologists can then use this data to deduce which birds are at risk of lead poisoning. Condor Watch enabled volunteers, or citizen scientists, to participate in active research. The project had up 175,000 images to view and assess far more than the team could hope to view on their own. Lead scientist Myra Finkelstein believes volunteering is fun because it allows enthusiasts to track the "biographies" of individual condors. Citizen science has long been used in ornithology, for instance in the Audubon Society's Christmas Bird Count, which began in 1900 and the breeding bird survey which began in 1966. McCaffrey (2005) believes this approach not only directly benefits ongoing projects, but will also help train aspiring ornithologists. ## Relationship with humans Throughout its historic range, the California condor has been a popular subject of mythology and an important symbol to Native Americans. Unusually, this bird takes on different roles in the storytelling of the different tribes. The Wiyot tribe of California say that the condor recreated mankind after Above Old Man wiped humanity out with a flood. However, other tribes, such as California's Mono, view the condor as a destroyer, not a creator; they say that Condor seized humans, cut off their heads, and drained their blood so that it would flood Ground Squirrel's home. Condor then seized Ground Squirrel after he fled, but Ground Squirrel managed to cut off Condor's head when Condor paused to take a drink of the blood. According to the Yokuts people, the condor sometimes ate the moon, causing the lunar cycle, and his wings caused eclipses. The Chumash tribe of Southern California tell that the condor was once a white bird, but it turned black when it flew too close to a fire. Condor bones have been found in Native American graves, as have condor feather headdresses. Cave paintings of condors have also been discovered. Some tribes ritually killed condors to make ceremonial clothing out of their feathers. Shamans then danced while wearing these to reach the upper and lower spiritual worlds. Whenever a Shaman died, his clothes were said to be cursed, so new clothing had to be made for his successor. Some researchers, such as Noel Snyder, believe that this practice of making ceremonial clothing contributed to the condor's decline. ### See also - Colpocephalum californici, an extinct species of louse that exclusively parasitized the California condor

Columbia River

River in the Pacific Northwest of North America

The Columbia River (Upper Chinook: Wimahl or Wimal; Sahaptin: Nch’i-Wàna or Nchi wana; Sinixt dialect swah'netk'qhu) is the largest river in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. The river forms in the Rocky Mountains of British Columbia, Canada. It flows northwest and then south into the U.S. state of Washington, then turns west to form most of the border between Washington and the state of Oregon before emptying into the Pacific Ocean. The river is 1,243 miles (2,000 kilometers) long, and its largest tributary is the Snake River. Its drainage basin is roughly the size of France and extends into seven states of the United States and one Canadian province. The fourth-largest river in the United States by volume, the Columbia has the greatest flow of any North American river entering the Pacific. The Columbia has the 36th greatest discharge of any river in the world. The Columbia and its tributaries have been central to the region's culture and economy for thousands of years. They have been used for transportation since ancient times, linking the region's many cultural groups. The river system hosts many species of anadromous fish, which migrate between freshwater habitats and the saline waters of the Pacific Ocean. These fish—especially the salmon species—provided the core subsistence for native peoples. The first documented European discovery of the Columbia River occurred when Bruno de Heceta sighted the river's mouth in 1775. On May 11, 1792, a private American ship, Columbia Rediviva, under Captain Robert Gray from Boston became the first non-indigenous vessel to enter the river. Later in 1792, William Robert Broughton of the British Royal Navy commanding HMS Chatham as part of the Vancouver Expedition, navigated past the Oregon Coast Range and 100 miles upriver to what is now Vancouver, Washington. In the following decades, fur-trading companies used the Columbia as a key transportation route. Overland explorers entered the Willamette Valley through the scenic, but treacherous Columbia River Gorge, and pioneers began to settle the valley in increasing numbers. Steamships along the river linked communities and facilitated trade; the arrival of railroads in the late 19th century, many running along the river, supplemented these links. Since the late 19th century, public and private sectors have extensively developed the river. To aid ship and barge navigation, locks have been built along the lower Columbia and its tributaries, and dredging has opened, maintained, and enlarged shipping channels. Since the early 20th century, dams have been built across the river for power generation, navigation, irrigation, and flood control. The 14 hydroelectric dams on the Columbia's main stem and many more on its tributaries produce more than 44 percent of total U.S. hydroelectric generation. Production of nuclear power has taken place at two sites along the river. Plutonium for nuclear weapons was produced for decades at the Hanford Site, which is now the most contaminated nuclear site in the United States. These developments have greatly altered river environments in the watershed, mainly through industrial pollution and barriers to fish migration. ## Course The Columbia begins its 1,243-mile (2,000 km) journey in the southern Rocky Mountain Trench in British Columbia (BC). Columbia Lake 2,690 feet (820 meters) above sea level and the adjoining Columbia Wetlands form the river's headwaters. The trench is a broad, deep, and long glacial valley between the Canadian Rockies and the Columbia Mountains in BC. For its first 200 miles (320 km), the Columbia flows northwest along the trench through Windermere Lake and the town of Invermere, a region known in BC as the Columbia Valley, then northwest to Golden and into Kinbasket Lake. Rounding the northern end of the Selkirk Mountains, the river turns sharply south through a region known as the Big Bend Country, passing through Revelstoke Lake and the Arrow Lakes. Revelstoke, the Big Bend, and the Columbia Valley combined are referred to in BC parlance as the Columbia Country. Below the Arrow Lakes, the Columbia passes the cities of Castlegar, located at the Columbia's confluence with the Kootenay River, and Trail, two major population centers of the West Kootenay region. The Pend Oreille River joins the Columbia about 2 miles (3 km) north of the United States–Canada border. The Columbia enters eastern Washington flowing south and turning to the west at the Spokane River confluence. It marks the southern and eastern borders of the Colville Indian Reservation and the western border of the Spokane Indian Reservation. The river turns south after the Okanogan River confluence, then southeasterly near the confluence with the Wenatchee River in central Washington. This C-shaped segment of the river is also known as the "Big Bend". During the Missoula Floods 10–15,000 years ago, much of the floodwater took a more direct route south, forming the ancient river bed known as the Grand Coulee. After the floods, the river found its present course, and the Grand Coulee was left dry. The construction of the Grand Coulee Dam in the mid-20th century impounded the river, forming Lake Roosevelt, from which water was pumped into the dry coulee, forming the reservoir of Banks Lake. The river flows past The Gorge Amphitheatre, a prominent concert venue in the Northwest, then through Priest Rapids Dam, and then through the Hanford Nuclear Reservation. Entirely within the reservation is Hanford Reach, the only U.S. stretch of the river that is completely free-flowing, unimpeded by dams, and not a tidal estuary. The Snake River and Yakima River join the Columbia in the Tri-Cities population center. The Columbia makes a sharp bend to the west at the Washington–Oregon border. The river defines that border for the final 309 miles (497 km) of its journey. The Deschutes River joins the Columbia near The Dalles. Between The Dalles and Portland, the river cuts through the Cascade Range, forming the dramatic Columbia River Gorge. No other rivers except for the Klamath and Pit River completely breach the Cascadesthe other rivers that flow through the range also originate in or very near the mountains. The headwaters and upper course of the Pit River are on the Modoc Plateau; downstream, the Pit cuts a canyon through the southern reaches of the Cascades. In contrast, the Columbia cuts through the range nearly a thousand miles from its source in the Rocky Mountains. The gorge is known for its strong and steady winds, scenic beauty, and its role as an important transportation link. The river continues west, bending sharply to the north-northwest near Portland and Vancouver, Washington, at the Willamette River confluence. Here the river slows considerably, dropping sediment that might otherwise form a river delta. Near Longview, Washington and the Cowlitz River confluence, the river turns west again. The Columbia empties into the Pacific Ocean just west of Astoria, Oregon, over the Columbia Bar, a shifting sandbar that makes the river's mouth one of the most hazardous stretches of water to navigate in the world. Because of the danger and the many shipwrecks near the mouth, it acquired a reputation as the "Graveyard of Ships". The Columbia drains an area of about 258,000 square miles (670,000 square kilometers). Its drainage basin covers nearly all of Idaho, large portions of British Columbia, Oregon, and Washington, and ultimately all of Montana west of the Continental Divide, and small portions of Wyoming, Utah, and Nevada; the total area is similar to the size of France. Roughly 745 miles (1,200 km) of the river's length and 85 percent of its drainage basin are in the US. The Columbia is the twelfth-longest river and has the sixth-largest drainage basin in the United States. In Canada, where the Columbia flows for 498 miles (801 km) and drains 39,700 square miles (103,000 km²), the river ranks 23rd in length, and the Canadian part of its basin ranks 13th in size among Canadian basins. The Columbia shares its name with nearby places, such as British Columbia, as well as with landforms and bodies of water. ### Discharge With an average flow at the mouth of about 265,000 cubic feet per second (7,500 cubic meters per second), the Columbia is the largest river by discharge flowing into the Pacific from the Americas and is the fourth-largest by volume in the U.S. The average flow where the river crosses the international border between Canada and the United States is 99,000 cubic feet per second (2,790 cubic meters per second) from a drainage basin of 39,700 square miles (102,800 km²). This amounts to about 15 percent of the entire Columbia watershed. The Columbia's highest recorded flow, measured at The Dalles, was 1,240,000 cubic feet per second (35,000 m³/s) in June 1894, before the river was dammed. The lowest flow recorded at The Dalles was 12,100 cubic feet per second (340 m³/s) on April 16, 1968, and was caused by the initial closure of the John Day Dam, 28 miles (45 km) upstream. The Dalles is about 190 miles (310 km) from the mouth; the river at this point drains about 237,000 square miles (610,000 km²) or about 91 percent of the total watershed. Flow rates on the Columbia are affected by many large upstream reservoirs, many diversions for irrigation, and, on the lower stretches, reverse flow from the tides of the Pacific Ocean. The National Ocean Service observes water levels at six tide gauges and issues tide forecasts for twenty-two additional locations along the river between the entrance at the North Jetty and the base of Bonneville Dam, its head of tide. The Columbia River multiannual average discharge: ## Geology When the rifting of Pangaea, due to the process of plate tectonics, pushed North America away from Europe and Africa and into the Panthalassic Ocean (ancestor to the modern Pacific Ocean), the Pacific Northwest was not part of the continent. As the North American continent moved westward, the Farallon Plate subducted under its western margin. As the plate subducted, it carried along island arcs which were accreted to the North American continent, resulting in the creation of the Pacific Northwest between 150 and 90 million years ago. The general outline of the Columbia Basin was not complete until between 60 and 40 million years ago, but it lay under a large inland sea later subject to uplift. Between 50 and 20 million years ago, from the Eocene through the Miocene eras, tremendous volcanic eruptions frequently modified much of the landscape traversed by the Columbia. The lower reaches of the ancestral river passed through a valley near where Mount Hood later arose. Carrying sediments from erosion and erupting volcanoes, it built a 2-mile (3.2 km) thick delta that underlies the foothills on the east side of the Coast Range near Vernonia in northwestern Oregon. Between 17 million and 6 million years ago, huge outpourings of flood basalt lava covered the Columbia River Plateau and forced the lower Columbia into its present course. The modern Cascade Range began to uplift 5 to 4 million years ago. Cutting through the uplifting mountains, the Columbia River significantly deepened the Columbia River Gorge. The river and its drainage basin experienced some of the world's greatest known catastrophic floods toward the end of the last ice age. The periodic rupturing of ice dams at Glacial Lake Missoula resulted in the Missoula Floods, with discharges exceeding the combined flow of all the other rivers in the world, dozens of times over thousands of years. The exact number of floods is unknown, but geologists have documented at least 40; evidence suggests that they occurred between about 19,000 and 13,000 years ago. The floodwaters rushed across eastern Washington, creating the channeled scablands, which are a complex network of dry canyon-like channels, or coulees that are often braided and sharply gouged into the basalt rock underlying the region's deep topsoil. Numerous flat-topped buttes with rich soil stand high above the chaotic scablands. Constrictions at several places caused the floodwaters to pool into large temporary lakes, such as Lake Lewis, in which sediments were deposited. Water depths have been estimated at 1,000 feet (300 m) at Wallula Gap and 400 feet (120 m) over modern Portland, Oregon. Sediments were also deposited when the floodwaters slowed in the broad flats of the Quincy, Othello, and Pasco Basins. The floods' periodic inundation of the lower Columbia River Plateau deposited rich sediments; 21st-century farmers in the Willamette Valley "plow fields of fertile Montana soil and clays from Washington's Palouse". Over the last several thousand years a series of large landslides have occurred on the north side of the Columbia River Gorge, sending massive amounts of debris south from Table Mountain and Greenleaf Peak into the gorge near the present site of Bonneville Dam. The most recent and significant is known as the Bonneville Slide, which formed a massive earthen dam, filling 3.5 miles (5.6 km) of the river's length. Various studies have placed the date of the Bonneville Slide anywhere between 1060 and 1760 AD; the idea that the landslide debris present today was formed by more than one slide is relatively recent and may explain the large range of estimates. It has been suggested that if the later dates are accurate there may be a link with the 1700 Cascadia earthquake. The pile of debris resulting from the Bonneville Slide blocked the river until rising water finally washed away the sediment. It is not known how long it took the river to break through the barrier; estimates range from several months to several years. Much of the landslide's debris remained, forcing the river about 1.5 miles (2.4 km) south of its previous channel and forming the Cascade Rapids. In 1938, the construction of Bonneville Dam inundated the rapids as well as the remaining trees that could be used to refine the estimated date of the landslide. In 1980, the eruption of Mount St. Helens deposited large amounts of sediment in the lower Columbia, temporarily reducing the depth of the shipping channel by 26 feet (7.9 m). ## Indigenous peoples Humans have inhabited the Columbia's watershed for more than 15,000 years, with a transition to a sedentary lifestyle based mainly on salmon starting about 3,500 years ago. In 1962, archaeologists found evidence of human activity dating back 11,230 years at the Marmes Rockshelter, near the confluence of the Palouse and Snake rivers in eastern Washington. In 1996 the skeletal remains of a 9,000-year-old prehistoric man (dubbed Kennewick Man) were found near Kennewick, Washington. The discovery rekindled debate in the scientific community over the origins of human habitation in North America and sparked a protracted controversy over whether the scientific or Native American community was entitled to possess and/or study the remains. Many different Native Americans and First Nations peoples have a historical and continuing presence on the Columbia. South of the Canada–US border, the Colville, Spokane, Coeur d'Alene, Yakama, Nez Perce, Cayuse, Palus, Umatilla, Cowlitz, and the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs live along the US stretch. Along the upper Snake River and Salmon River, the Shoshone Bannock tribes are present. The Sinixt or Lakes people lived on the lower stretch of the Canadian portion, while above that the Shuswap people (Secwepemc in their own language) reckon the whole of the upper Columbia east to the Rockies as part of their territory. The Canadian portion of the Columbia Basin outlines the traditional homelands of the Canadian Kootenay–Ktunaxa. The Chinook tribe, which is not federally recognized, who live near the lower Columbia River, call it Wimahl or Wimal in the Upper Chinook (Kiksht) language, and it is Nch’i-Wàna or Nchi wana to the Sahaptin (Ichishkíin Sɨ́nwit)-speaking peoples of its middle course in present-day Washington. The river is known as swah'netk'qhu by the Sinixt people, who live in the area of the Arrow Lakes in the river's upper reaches in Canada. All three terms essentially mean "the big river". Oral histories describe the formation and destruction of the Bridge of the Gods, a land bridge that connected the Oregon and Washington sides of the river in the Columbia River Gorge. The bridge, which aligns with geological records of the Bonneville Slide, was described in some stories as the result of a battle between gods, represented by Mount Adams and Mount Hood, in their competition for the affection of a goddess, represented by Mount St. Helens. Native American stories about the bridge differ in their details but agree in general that the bridge permitted increased interaction between tribes on the north and south sides of the river. Horses, originally acquired from Spanish New Mexico, spread widely via native trade networks, reaching the Shoshone of the Snake River Plain by 1700. The Nez Perce, Cayuse, and Flathead people acquired their first horses around 1730. Along with horses came aspects of the emerging plains culture, such as equestrian and horse training skills, greatly increased mobility, hunting efficiency, trade over long distances, intensified warfare, the linking of wealth and prestige to horses and war, and the rise of large and powerful tribal confederacies. The Nez Perce and Cayuse kept large herds and made annual long-distance trips to the Great Plains for bison hunting, adopted the plains culture to a significant degree, and became the main conduit through which horses and the plains culture diffused into the Columbia River region. Other peoples acquired horses and aspects of the plains culture unevenly. The Yakama, Umatilla, Palus, Spokane, and Coeur d'Alene maintained sizable herds of horses and adopted some of the plains cultural characteristics, but fishing and fish-related economies remained important. Less affected groups included the Molala, Klickitat, Wenatchi, Okanagan, and Sinkiuse-Columbia peoples, who owned small numbers of horses and adopted few plains culture features. Some groups remained essentially unaffected, such as the Sanpoil and Nespelem people, whose culture remained centered on fishing. Natives of the region encountered foreigners at several times and places during the 18th and 19th centuries. European and American vessels explored the coastal area around the mouth of the river in the late 18th century, trading with local natives. The contact would prove devastating to the Indian tribes; a large portion of their population was wiped out by a smallpox epidemic. Canadian explorer Alexander Mackenzie crossed what is now interior British Columbia in 1793. From 1805 to 1806, the Lewis and Clark Expedition entered the Oregon Country along the Clearwater and Snake rivers, and encountered numerous small settlements of natives. Their records recount tales of hospitable traders who were not above stealing small items from the visitors. They also noted brass teakettles, a British musket, and other artifacts that had been obtained in trade with coastal tribes. From the earliest contact with westerners, the natives of the mid- and lower Columbia were not tribal, but instead congregated in social units no larger than a village, and more often at a family level; these units would shift with the season as people moved about, following the salmon catch up and down the river's tributaries. Sparked by the 1847 Whitman Massacre, a number of violent battles were fought between American settlers and the region's natives. The subsequent Indian Wars, especially the Yakima War, decimated the native population and removed much land from native control. As years progressed, the right of natives to fish along the Columbia became the central issue of contention with the states, commercial fishers, and private property owners. The US Supreme Court upheld fishing rights in landmark cases in 1905 and 1918, as well as the 1974 case United States v. Washington, commonly called the Boldt Decision. Fish were central to the culture of the region's natives, both as sustenance and as part of their religious beliefs. Natives drew fish from the Columbia at several major sites, which also served as trading posts. Celilo Falls, located east of the modern city of The Dalles, was a vital hub for trade and the interaction of different cultural groups, being used for fishing and trading for 11,000 years. Prior to contact with westerners, villages along this 9-mile (14 km) stretch may have at times had a population as great as 10,000. The site drew traders from as far away as the Great Plains. The Cascades Rapids of the Columbia River Gorge, and Kettle Falls and Priest Rapids in eastern Washington, were also major fishing and trading sites. In prehistoric times the Columbia's salmon and steelhead runs numbered an estimated annual average of 10 to 16 million fish. In comparison, the largest run since 1938 was in 1986, with 3.2 million fish entering the Columbia. The annual catch by natives has been estimated at 42 million pounds (19,000 metric tons). The most important and productive native fishing site was located at Celilo Falls, which was perhaps the most productive inland fishing site in North America. The falls were located at the border between Chinookan- and Sahaptian-speaking peoples and served as the center of an extensive trading network across the Pacific Plateau. Celilo was the oldest continuously inhabited community on the North American continent. Salmon canneries established by white settlers beginning in 1866 had a strong negative impact on the salmon population, and in 1908 US President Theodore Roosevelt observed that the salmon runs were but a fraction of what they had been 25 years prior. As river development continued in the 20th century, each of these major fishing sites was flooded by a dam, beginning with Cascades Rapids in 1938. The development was accompanied by extensive negotiations between natives and US government agencies. The Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs, a coalition of various tribes, adopted a constitution and incorporated after the 1938 completion of the Bonneville Dam flooded Cascades Rapids; Still, in the 1930s, there were natives who lived along the river and fished year round, moving along with the fish's migration patterns throughout the seasons. The Yakama were slower to do so, organizing a formal government in 1944. In the 21st century, the Yakama, Nez Perce, Umatilla, and Warm Springs tribes all have treaty fishing rights along the Columbia and its tributaries. In 1957 Celilo Falls was submerged by the construction of The Dalles Dam, and the native fishing community was displaced. The affected tribes received a \$26.8 million settlement for the loss of Celilo and other fishing sites submerged by The Dalles Dam. The Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs used part of its \$4 million settlement to establish the Kah-Nee-Ta resort south of Mount Hood. ## New waves of explorers Some historians believe that Japanese or Chinese vessels blown off course reached the Northwest Coast long before Europeans—possibly as early as 219 BCE. Historian Derek Hayes claims that "It is a near certainty that Japanese or Chinese people arrived on the northwest coast long before any European." It is unknown whether they landed near the Columbia. Evidence exists that Spanish castaways reached the shore in 1679 and traded with the Clatsop; if these were the first Europeans to see the Columbia, they failed to send word home to Spain. In the 18th century, there was strong interest in discovering a Northwest Passage that would permit navigation between the Atlantic (or inland North America) and the Pacific Ocean. Many ships in the area, especially those under Spanish and British command, searched the northwest coast for a large river that might connect to Hudson Bay or the Missouri River. The first documented European discovery of the Columbia River was that of Bruno de Heceta, who in 1775 sighted the river's mouth. On the advice of his officers, he did not explore it, as he was short-staffed and the current was strong. He considered it a bay, and called it Ensenada de Asunción (Assumption Cove). Later Spanish maps, based on his sighting, showed a river, labeled Río de San Roque (The Saint Roch River), or an entrance, called Entrada de Hezeta, named for Bruno de Hezeta, who sailed the region. Following Hezeta's reports, British maritime fur trader Captain John Meares searched for the river in 1788 but concluded that it did not exist. He named Cape Disappointment for the non-existent river, not realizing the cape marks the northern edge of the river's mouth. What happened next would form the basis for decades of both cooperation and dispute between British and American exploration of, and ownership claim to, the region. Royal Navy commander George Vancouver sailed past the mouth in April 1792 and observed a change in the water's color, but he accepted Meares' report and continued on his journey northward. Later that month, Vancouver encountered the American captain Robert Gray at the Strait of Juan de Fuca. Gray reported that he had seen the entrance to the Columbia and had spent nine days trying but failing to enter. On May 12, 1792, Gray returned south and crossed the Columbia Bar, becoming the first known explorer of European descent to enter the river. Gray's fur trading mission had been financed by Boston merchants, who outfitted him with a private vessel named Columbia Rediviva; he named the river after the ship on May 18. Gray spent nine days trading near the mouth of the Columbia, then left without having gone beyond 13 miles (21 km) upstream. The farthest point reached was Grays Bay at the mouth of Grays River. Gray's discovery of the Columbia River was later used by the United States to support its claim to the Oregon Country, which was also claimed by Russia, Great Britain, Spain and other nations. In October 1792, Vancouver sent Lieutenant William Robert Broughton, his second-in-command, up the river. Broughton got as far as the Sandy River at the western end of the Columbia River Gorge, about 100 miles (160 km) upstream, sighting and naming Mount Hood. Broughton formally claimed the river, its drainage basin, and the nearby coast for Britain. In contrast, Gray had not made any formal claims on behalf of the United States. Because the Columbia was at the same latitude as the headwaters of the Missouri River, there was some speculation that Gray and Vancouver had discovered the long-sought Northwest Passage. A 1798 British map showed a dotted line connecting the Columbia with the Missouri. When the American explorers Meriwether Lewis and William Clark charted the vast, unmapped lands of the American West in their overland expedition (1803–1805), they found no passage between the rivers. After crossing the Rocky Mountains, Lewis and Clark built dugout canoes and paddled down the Snake River, reaching the Columbia near the present-day Tri-Cities, Washington. They explored a few miles upriver, as far as Bateman Island, before heading down the Columbia, concluding their journey at the river's mouth and establishing Fort Clatsop, a short-lived establishment that was occupied for less than three months. Canadian explorer David Thompson, of the North West Company, spent the winter of 1807–08 at Kootanae House near the source of the Columbia at present-day Invermere, BC. Over the next few years he explored much of the river and its northern tributaries. In 1811 he traveled down the Columbia to the Pacific Ocean, arriving at the mouth just after John Jacob Astor's Pacific Fur Company had founded Astoria. On his return to the north, Thompson explored the one remaining part of the river he had not yet seen, becoming the first Euro-descended person to travel the entire length of the river. In 1825, the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) established Fort Vancouver on the bank of the Columbia, in what is now Vancouver, Washington, as the headquarters of the company's Columbia District, which encompassed everything west of the Rocky Mountains, north of California, and south of Russian-claimed Alaska. Chief Factor John McLoughlin, a physician who had been in the fur trade since 1804, was appointed superintendent of the Columbia District. The HBC reoriented its Columbia District operations toward the Pacific Ocean via the Columbia, which became the region's main trunk route. In the early 1840s Americans began to colonize the Oregon country in large numbers via the Oregon Trail, despite the HBC's efforts to discourage American settlement in the region. For many the final leg of the journey involved travel down the lower Columbia River to Fort Vancouver. This part of the Oregon Trail, the treacherous stretch from The Dalles to below the Cascades, could not be traversed by horses or wagons (only watercraft, at great risk). This prompted the 1846 construction of the Barlow Road. In the Treaty of 1818 the United States and Britain agreed that both nations were to enjoy equal rights in Oregon Country for 10 years. By 1828, when the so-called "joint occupation" was renewed for an indefinite period, it seemed probable that the lower Columbia River would in time become the border between the two nations. For years the Hudson's Bay Company successfully maintained control of the Columbia River and American attempts to gain a foothold were fended off. In the 1830s, American religious missions were established at several locations in the lower Columbia River region. In the 1840s a mass migration of American settlers undermined British control. The Hudson's Bay Company tried to maintain dominance by shifting from the fur trade, which was in decline, to exporting other goods such as salmon and lumber. Colonization schemes were attempted, but failed to match the scale of American settlement. Americans generally settled south of the Columbia, mainly in the Willamette Valley. The Hudson's Bay Company tried to establish settlements north of the river, but nearly all the British colonists moved south to the Willamette Valley. The hope that the British colonists might dilute the American presence in the valley failed in the face of the overwhelming number of American settlers. These developments rekindled the issue of "joint occupation" and the boundary dispute. While some British interests, especially the Hudson's Bay Company, fought for a boundary along the Columbia River, the Oregon Treaty of 1846 set the boundary at the 49th parallel. As part of the treaty, the British retained all areas north of the line while the United States acquired the south. The Columbia River became much of the border between the U.S. territories of Oregon and Washington. Oregon became a U.S. state in 1859, while Washington later entered into the Union in 1889. By the turn of the 20th century, the difficulty of navigating the Columbia was seen as an impediment to the economic development of the Inland Empire region east of the Cascades. The dredging and dam building that followed would permanently alter the river, disrupting its natural flow but also providing electricity, irrigation, navigability and other benefits to the region. ## Navigation American captain Robert Gray and British captain George Vancouver, who explored the river in 1792, proved that it was possible to cross the Columbia Bar. Many of the challenges associated with that feat remain today; even with modern engineering alterations to the mouth of the river, the strong currents and shifting sandbar make it dangerous to pass between the river and the Pacific Ocean. The use of steamboats along the river, beginning with the British Beaver in 1836 and followed by American vessels in 1850, contributed to the rapid settlement and economic development of the region. Steamboats operated in several distinct stretches of the river: on its lower reaches, from the Pacific Ocean to Cascades Rapids; from the Cascades to the Dalles-Celilo Falls; from Celilo to Priests Rapids; on the Wenatchee Reach of eastern Washington; on British Columbia's Arrow Lakes; and on tributaries like the Willamette, the Snake and Kootenay Lake. The boats, initially powered by burning wood, carried passengers and freight throughout the region for many years. Early railroads served to connect steamboat lines interrupted by waterfalls on the river's lower reaches. In the 1880s, railroads maintained by companies such as the Oregon Railroad and Navigation Company began to supplement steamboat operations as the major transportation links along the river. ### Opening the passage to Lewiston As early as 1881, industrialists proposed altering the natural channel of the Columbia to improve navigation. Changes to the river over the years have included the construction of jetties at the river's mouth, dredging, and the construction of canals and navigation locks. Today, ocean freighters can travel upriver as far as Portland and Vancouver, and barges can reach as far inland as Lewiston, Idaho. The shifting Columbia Bar makes passage between the river and the Pacific Ocean difficult and dangerous, and numerous rapids along the river hinder navigation. Pacific Graveyard, a 1964 book by James A. Gibbs, describes the many shipwrecks near the mouth of the Columbia. Jetties, first constructed in 1886, extend the river's channel into the ocean. Strong currents and the shifting sandbar remain a threat to ships entering the river and necessitate continuous maintenance of the jetties. In 1891, the Columbia was dredged to enhance shipping. The channel between the ocean and Portland and Vancouver was deepened from 17 feet (5.2 m) to 25 feet (7.6 m). The Columbian called for the channel to be deepened to 40 feet (12 m) as early as 1905, but that depth was not attained until 1976. Cascade Locks and Canal were first constructed in 1896 around the Cascades Rapids, enabling boats to travel safely through the Columbia River Gorge. The Celilo Canal, bypassing Celilo Falls, opened to river traffic in 1915. In the mid-20th century, the construction of dams along the length of the river submerged the rapids beneath a series of reservoirs. An extensive system of locks allowed ships and barges to pass easily from one reservoir to the next. A navigation channel reaching Lewiston, Idaho, along the Columbia and Snake rivers, was completed in 1975. Among the main commodities are wheat and other grains, mainly for export. As of 2016, the Columbia ranked third, behind the Mississippi and Paraná rivers, among the world's largest export corridors for grain. The 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens caused mudslides in the area, which reduced the Columbia's depth by 25 feet (7.6 m) for a 4-mile (6.4 km) stretch, disrupting Portland's economy. ### Deeper shipping channel Efforts to maintain and improve the navigation channel have continued to the present day. In 1990 a new round of studies examined the possibility of further dredging on the lower Columbia. The plans were controversial from the start because of economic and environmental concerns. In 1999, Congress authorized deepening the channel between Portland and Astoria from 40 to 43 feet (12–13 m), which will make it possible for large container and grain ships to reach Portland and Vancouver. The project has met opposition because of concerns about stirring up toxic sediment on the riverbed. Portland-based Northwest Environmental Advocates brought a lawsuit against the Army Corps of Engineers, but it was rejected by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in August 2006. The project includes measures to mitigate environmental damage; for instance, the US Army Corps of Engineers must restore 12 times the area of wetland damaged by the project. In early 2006, the Corps spilled 50 US gallons (190 L) of hydraulic oil into the Columbia, drawing further criticism from environmental organizations. Work on the project began in 2005 and concluded in 2010. The project's cost is estimated at \$150 million. The federal government is paying 65 percent, Oregon and Washington are paying \$27 million each, and six local ports are also contributing to the cost. ## Dams In 1902, the United States Bureau of Reclamation was established to aid in the economic development of arid western states. One of its major undertakings was building Grand Coulee Dam to provide irrigation for the 600 thousand acres (2,400 km²) of the Columbia Basin Project in central Washington. With the onset of World War II, the focus of dam construction shifted to production of hydroelectricity. Irrigation efforts resumed after the war. River development occurred within the structure of the 1909 International Boundary Waters Treaty between the United States and Canada. The United States Congress passed the Rivers and Harbors Act of 1925, which directed the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Federal Power Commission to explore the development of the nation's rivers. This prompted agencies to conduct the first formal financial analysis of hydroelectric development; the reports produced by various agencies were presented in House Document 308. Those reports, and subsequent related reports, are referred to as 308 Reports. In the late 1920s, political forces in the Northwestern United States generally favored the private development of hydroelectric dams along the Columbia. But the overwhelming victories of gubernatorial candidate George W. Joseph in the 1930 Republican primary, and later his law partner Julius Meier, were understood to demonstrate strong public support for public ownership of dams. In 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed a bill that enabled the construction of the Bonneville and Grand Coulee dams as public works projects. The legislation was attributed to the efforts of Oregon Senator Charles McNary, Washington Senator Clarence Dill, and Oregon Congressman Charles Martin, among others. In 1948, floods swept through the Columbia watershed, destroying Vanport, then the second largest city in Oregon, and impacting cities as far north as Trail, BC. The flooding prompted the U.S. Congress to pass the Flood Control Act of 1950, authorizing the federal development of additional dams and other flood control mechanisms. By that time local communities had become wary of federal hydroelectric projects, and sought local control of new developments; a public utility district in Grant County, Washington, ultimately began construction of the dam at Priest Rapids. In the 1960s, the United States and Canada signed the Columbia River Treaty, which focused on flood control and the maximization of downstream power generation. Canada agreed to build dams and provide reservoir storage, and the United States agreed to deliver to Canada one-half of the increase in United States downstream power benefits as estimated five years in advance. Canada's obligation was met by building three dams (two on the Columbia, and one on the Duncan River), the last of which was completed in 1973. Today the main stem of the Columbia River has fourteen dams, of which three are in Canada and eleven in the United States. Four mainstem dams and four lower Snake River dams contain navigation locks to allow ship and barge passage from the ocean as far as Lewiston, Idaho. The river system as a whole has more than 400 dams for hydroelectricity and irrigation. The dams address a variety of demands, including flood control, navigation, stream flow regulation, storage, and delivery of stored waters, reclamation of public lands and Indian reservations, and the generation of hydroelectric power. The larger U.S. dams are owned and operated by the federal government (some by the Army Corps of Engineers and some by the Bureau of Reclamation), while the smaller dams are operated by public utility districts and private power companies. The federally operated system is known as the Federal Columbia River Power System, which includes 31 dams on the Columbia and its tributaries. The system has altered the seasonal flow of the river to meet higher electricity demands during the winter. At the beginning of the 20th century, roughly 75 percent of the Columbia's flow occurred in the summer, between April and September. By 1980, the summer proportion had been lowered to about 50 percent, essentially eliminating the seasonal pattern. The installation of dams dramatically altered the landscape and ecosystem of the river. At one time, the Columbia was one of the top salmon-producing river systems in the world. Previously active fishing sites, such as Celilo Falls in the eastern Columbia River Gorge, have exhibited a sharp decline in fishing along the Columbia in the last century, and salmon populations have been dramatically reduced. Fish ladders have been installed at some dam sites to help the fish journey to spawning waters. Chief Joseph Dam has no fish ladders and completely blocks fish migration to the upper half of the Columbia River system. ### Irrigation The Bureau of Reclamation's Columbia Basin Project focused on the generally dry region of central Washington known as the Columbia Basin, which features rich loess soil. Several groups developed competing proposals, and in 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt authorized the Columbia Basin Project. The Grand Coulee Dam was the project's central component; upon completion, it pumped water up from the Columbia to fill the formerly dry Grand Coulee, forming Banks Lake. By 1935, the intended height of the dam was increased from a range between 200 and 300 feet (61 and 91 m) to 500 feet (150 m), a height that would extend the lake impounded by the dam to the Canada–United States border; the project had grown from a local New Deal relief measure to a major national project. The project's initial purpose was irrigation, but the onset of World War II created a high electricity demand, mainly for aluminum production and for the development of nuclear weapons at the Hanford Site. Irrigation began in 1951. The project provides water to more than 670 thousand acres (2,700 square kilometers) of fertile but arid land in central Washington, transforming the region into a major agricultural center. Important crops include orchard fruit, potatoes, alfalfa, mint, beans, beets, and wine grapes. Since 1750, the Columbia has experienced six multi-year droughts. The longest, lasting 12 years in the mid‐19th century, reduced the river's flow to 20 percent below average. Scientists have expressed concern that a similar drought would have grave consequences in a region so dependent on the Columbia. In 1992–1993, a lesser drought affected farmers, hydroelectric power producers, shippers, and wildlife managers. Many farmers in central Washington build dams on their property for irrigation and to control frost on their crops. The Washington Department of Ecology, using new techniques involving aerial photographs, estimated there may be as many as a hundred such dams in the area, most of which are illegal. Six such dams have failed in recent years, causing hundreds of thousands of dollars of damage to crops and public roads. Fourteen farms in the area have gone through the permitting process to build such dams legally. ### Hydroelectricity The Columbia's heavy flow and large elevation drop over a short distance, 2.16 feet per mile (40.9 centimeters per kilometer), give it tremendous capacity for hydroelectricity generation. In comparison, the Mississippi drops less than 0.65 feet per mile (12.3 cm/km). The Columbia alone possesses one-third of the United States's hydroelectric potential. In 2012, the river and its tributaries accounted for 29 GW of hydroelectric generating capacity, contributing 44 percent of the total hydroelectric generation in the nation. The largest of the 150 hydroelectric projects, the Grand Coulee Dam and Chief Joseph Dam are also the largest in the United States. As of 2017, Grand Coulee is the fifth largest hydroelectric plant in the world. Inexpensive hydropower supported the location of a large aluminum industry in the region because its reduction from bauxite requires large amounts of electricity. Until 2000, the Northwestern United States produced up to 17 percent of the world's aluminum and 40 percent of the aluminum produced in the United States. The commoditization of power in the early 21st century, coupled with a drought that reduced the generation capacity of the river, damaged the industry and by 2001, Columbia River aluminum producers had idled 80 percent of its production capacity. By 2003, the entire United States produced only 15 percent of the world's aluminum and many smelters along the Columbia had gone dormant or out of business. Power remains relatively inexpensive along the Columbia, and since the mid-2000 several global enterprises have moved server farm operations into the area to avail themselves of cheap power. Downriver of Grand Coulee, each dam's reservoir is closely regulated by the Bonneville Power Administration (BPA), the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, and various Washington public utility districts to ensure flow, flood control, and power generation objectives are met. Increasingly, hydro-power operations are required to meet standards under the U.S. Endangered Species Act and other agreements to manage operations to minimize impacts on salmon and other fish, and some conservation and fishing groups support removing four dams on the lower Snake River, the largest tributary of the Columbia. In 1941, the BPA hired Oklahoma folksinger Woody Guthrie to write songs for a documentary film promoting the benefits of hydropower. In the month he spent traveling the region Guthrie wrote 26 songs, which have become an important part of the cultural history of the region. ## Ecology and environment ### Fish migration The Columbia supports several species of anadromous fish that migrate between the Pacific Ocean and freshwater tributaries of the river. Sockeye salmon, Coho and Chinook (also known as "king") salmon, and steelhead, all of the genus Oncorhynchus, are ocean fish that migrate up the rivers at the end of their life cycles to spawn. White sturgeon, which take 15 to 25 years to mature, typically migrate between the ocean and the upstream habitat several times during their lives. Salmon populations declined dramatically after the establishment of canneries in 1867. In 1879 it was reported that 545,450 salmon, with an average weight of 22 pounds (10.0 kg) were caught (in a recent season) and mainly canned for export to England. A can weighing 1 pound (0.45 kg) could be sold for 8d or 9d. By 1908, there was widespread concern about the decline of salmon and sturgeon. In that year, the people of Oregon passed two laws under their newly instituted program of citizens' initiatives limiting fishing on the Columbia and other rivers. Then in 1948, another initiative banned the use of seine nets (devices already used by Native Americans, and refined by later settlers) altogether. Dams interrupt the migration of anadromous fish. Salmon and steelhead return to the streams in which they were born to spawn; where dams prevent their return, entire populations of salmon die. Some of the Columbia and Snake River dams employ fish ladders, which are effective to varying degrees at allowing these fish to travel upstream. Another problem exists for the juvenile salmon headed downstream to the ocean. Previously, this journey would have taken two to three weeks. With river currents slowed by the dams, and the Columbia converted from a wild river to a series of slackwater pools, the journey can take several months, which increases the mortality rate. In some cases, the Army Corps of Engineers transports juvenile fish downstream by truck or river barge. The Chief Joseph Dam and several dams on the Columbia's tributaries entirely block migration, and there are no migrating fish on the river above these dams. Sturgeons have different migration habits and can survive without ever visiting the ocean. In many upstream areas cut off from the ocean by dams, sturgeon simply live upstream of the dam. Not all fish have suffered from the modifications to the river; the northern pikeminnow (formerly known as the squawfish) thrives in the warmer, slower water created by the dams. Research in the mid-1980s found that juvenile salmon were suffering substantially from the predatory pikeminnow, and in 1990, in the interest of protecting salmon, a "bounty" program was established to reward anglers for catching pikeminnow. In 1994, the salmon catch was smaller than usual in the rivers of Oregon, Washington, and British Columbia, causing concern among commercial fishermen, government agencies, and tribal leaders. US government intervention, to which the states of Alaska, Idaho, and Oregon objected, included an 11-day closure of an Alaska fishery. In April 1994 the Pacific Fisheries Management Council unanimously approved the strictest regulations in 18 years, banning all commercial salmon fishing for that year from Cape Falcon north to the Canada–US border. In the winter of 1994, the return of coho salmon far exceeded expectations, which was attributed in part to the fishing ban. Also in 1994, United States Secretary of the Interior Bruce Babbitt first proposed the removal of several Pacific Northwest dams because of their impact on salmon spawning. The Northwest Power Planning Council approved a plan that provided more water for fish and less for electricity, irrigation, and transportation. Environmental advocates have called for the removal of certain dams in the Columbia system in the years since. Of the 227 major dams in the Columbia River drainage basin, the four Washington dams on the lower Snake River are often identified for removal, for example in an ongoing lawsuit concerning a Bush administration plan for salmon recovery. These dams and reservoirs limit the recovery of upriver salmon runs to Idaho's Salmon and Clearwater rivers. Historically, the Snake produced over 1.5 million spring and summer Chinook salmon, a number that has dwindled to several thousand in recent years. Idaho Power Company's Hells Canyon dams have no fish ladders (and do not pass juvenile salmon downstream), and thus allow no steelhead or salmon to migrate above Hells Canyon. In 2007, the destruction of the Marmot Dam on the Sandy River was the first dam removal in the system. Other Columbia Basin dams that have been removed include Condit Dam on Washington's White Salmon River, and the Milltown Dam on the Clark Fork in Montana. ### Pollution In southeastern Washington, a 50-mile (80 km) stretch of the river passes through the Hanford Site, established in 1943 as part of the Manhattan Project. The site served as a plutonium production complex, with nine nuclear reactors and related facilities along the banks of the river. From 1944 to 1971, pump systems drew cooling water from the river and, after treating this water for use by the reactors, returned it to the river. Before being released back into the river, the used water was held in large tanks known as retention basins for up to six hours. Longer-lived isotopes were not affected by this retention, and several terabecquerels entered the river every day. By 1957, the eight plutonium production reactors at Hanford dumped a daily average of 50,000 curies of radioactive material into the Columbia. These releases were kept secret by the federal government until the release of declassified documents in the late 1980s. Radiation was measured downstream as far west as the Washington and Oregon coasts. The nuclear reactors were decommissioned at the end of the Cold War, and the Hanford site is the focus of one of the world's largest environmental cleanup, managed by the Department of Energy under the oversight of the Washington Department of Ecology and the Environmental Protection Agency. Nearby aquifers contain an estimated 270 billion US gallons (1 billion m³) of groundwater contaminated by high-level nuclear waste that has leaked out of Hanford's underground storage tanks. As of 2008, 1 million US gallons (3,785 m³) of highly radioactive waste is traveling through groundwater toward the Columbia River. This waste is expected to reach the river in 12 to 50 years if cleanup does not proceed on schedule. In addition to concerns about nuclear waste, numerous other pollutants are found in the river. These include chemical pesticides, bacteria, arsenic, dioxins, and polychlorinated biphenyls (PCB). Studies have also found significant levels of toxins in fish and the waters they inhabit within the basin. Accumulation of toxins in fish threatens the survival of fish species, and human consumption of these fish can lead to health problems. Water quality is also an important factor in the survival of other wildlife and plants that grow in the Columbia River drainage basin. The states, Indian tribes, and federal government are all engaged in efforts to restore and improve the water, land, and air quality of the Columbia River drainage basin and have committed to work together to enhance and accomplish critical ecosystem restoration efforts. Several cleanup efforts are currently underway, including Superfund projects at Portland Harbor, Hanford, and Lake Roosevelt. Timber industry activity further contaminates river water, for example in the increased sediment runoff that results from clearcuts. The Northwest Forest Plan, a piece of federal legislation from 1994, mandated that timber companies consider the environmental impacts of their practices on rivers like the Columbia. On July 1, 2003, Christopher Swain of Portland, Oregon, became the first person to swim the Columbia River's entire length, to raise public awareness about the river's environmental health. ### Nutrient cycle Both natural and anthropogenic processes are involved in the cycling of nutrients in the Columbia River basin. Natural processes in the system include estuarine mixing of fresh and ocean waters, and climate variability patterns such as the Pacific Decadal Oscillation and the El Nino Southern Oscillation (both climatic cycles that affect the amount of regional snowpack and river discharge). Natural sources of nutrients in the Columbia River include weathering, leaf litter, salmon carcasses, runoff from its tributaries, and ocean estuary exchange. Major anthropogenic impacts on nutrients in the basin are due to fertilizers from agriculture, sewage systems, logging, and the construction of dams. Nutrient dynamics vary in the river basin from the headwaters to the main river and dams, to finally reaching the Columbia River estuary and ocean. Upstream in the headwaters, salmon runs are the main source of nutrients. Dams along the river impact nutrient cycling by increasing residence time of nutrients, and reducing the transport of silicate to the estuary, which directly impacts diatoms, a type of phytoplankton. The dams are also a barrier to salmon migration and can increase the amount of methane locally produced. The Columbia River estuary exports high rates of nutrients into the Pacific Ocean; except for nitrogen, which is delivered into the estuary by ocean upwelling sources. ## Watershed Most of the Columbia's drainage basin (which, at 258,000 square miles or 670,000 square kilometres, is about the size of France) lies roughly between the Rocky Mountains on the east and the Cascade Mountains on the west. In the United States and Canada the term watershed is often used to mean drainage basin. The term Columbia Basin is used to refer not only to the entire drainage basin but also to subsets of the river's full watershed, such as the relatively flat and unforested area in eastern Washington bounded by the Cascades, the Rocky Mountains, and the Blue Mountains. Within the watershed are diverse landforms including mountains, arid plateaus, river valleys, rolling uplands, and deep gorges. Grand Teton National Park lies in the watershed, as well as parts of Yellowstone National Park, Glacier National Park, Mount Rainier National Park, and North Cascades National Park. Canadian National Parks in the watershed include Kootenay National Park, Yoho National Park, Glacier National Park, and Mount Revelstoke National Park. Hells Canyon, the deepest gorge in North America, and the Columbia Gorge are in the watershed. Vegetation varies widely, ranging from western hemlock and western redcedar in the moist regions to sagebrush in the arid regions. The watershed provides habitat for 609 known fish and wildlife species, including the bull trout, bald eagle, gray wolf, grizzly bear, and Canada lynx. The World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) divides the waters of the Columbia and its tributaries into three freshwater ecoregions, naming them Columbia Glaciated, Columbia Unglaciated, and Upper Snake. The Columbia Glaciated ecoregion, making up about a third of the total watershed, lies in the north and was covered with ice sheets during the Pleistocene. The ecoregion includes the mainstem Columbia north of the Snake River and tributaries such as the Yakima, Okanagan, Pend Oreille, Clark Fork, and Kootenay rivers. The effects of glaciation include a number of large lakes and a relatively low diversity of freshwater fish. The Upper Snake ecoregion is defined as the Snake River watershed above Shoshone Falls, which totally blocks fish migration. This region has 14 species of fish, many of which are endemic. The Columbia Unglaciated ecoregion makes up the rest of the watershed. It includes the mainstem Columbia below the Snake River and tributaries such as the Salmon, John Day, Deschutes, and lower Snake Rivers. Of the three ecoregions it is the richest in terms of freshwater species diversity. There are 35 species of fish, of which four are endemic. There are also high levels of mollusk endemism. In 2016, over eight million people lived within the Columbia's drainage basin. Of this total about 3.5 million people lived in Oregon, 2.1 million in Washington, 1.7 million in Idaho, half a million in British Columbia, and 0.4 million in Montana. Population in the watershed has been rising for many decades and is projected to rise to about 10 million by 2030. The highest population densities are found west of the Cascade Mountains along the I-5 corridor, especially in the Portland-Vancouver urban area. High densities are also found around Spokane, Washington, and Boise, Idaho. Although much of the watershed is rural and sparsely populated, areas with recreational and scenic values are growing rapidly. The central Oregon county of Deschutes is the fastest-growing in the state. Populations have also been growing just east of the Cascades in central Washington around the city of Yakima and the Tri-Cities area. Projections for the coming decades assume growth throughout the watershed, including the interior. The Canadian part of the Okanagan subbasin is also growing rapidly. Climate varies greatly from place to place within the watershed. Elevation ranges from sea level at the river mouth to more than 14,000 feet (4,300 m) in the mountains, and temperatures vary with elevation. The highest peak is Mount Rainier, at 14,411 feet (4,392 m). High elevations have cold winters and short cool summers; interior regions are subject to great temperature variability and severe droughts. Over some of the watershed, especially west of the Cascade Mountains, precipitation maximums occur in winter, when Pacific storms come ashore. Atmospheric conditions block the flow of moisture in summer, which is generally dry except for occasional thunderstorms in the interior. In some of the eastern parts of the watershed, especially shrub-steppe regions with Continental climate patterns, precipitation maximums occur in early summer. Annual precipitation varies from more than 100 inches (250 cm) a year in the Cascades to less than 8 inches (20 cm) in the interior. Much of the watershed gets less than 12 inches (30 cm) a year. Several major North American drainage basins and many minor ones share a common border with the Columbia River's drainage basin. To the east, in northern Wyoming and Montana, the Continental Divide separates the Columbia watershed from the Mississippi-Missouri watershed, which empties into the Gulf of Mexico. To the northeast, mostly along the southern border between British Columbia and Alberta, the Continental Divide separates the Columbia watershed from the Nelson-Lake Winnipeg-Saskatchewan watershed, which empties into Hudson Bay. The Mississippi and Nelson watersheds are separated by the Laurentian Divide, which meets the Continental Divide at Triple Divide Peak near the headwaters of the Columbia's Flathead River tributary. This point marks the meeting of three of North America's main drainage patterns, to the Pacific Ocean, to Hudson Bay, and to the Atlantic Ocean via the Gulf of Mexico. Further north along the Continental Divide, a short portion of the combined Continental and Laurentian divides separate the Columbia watershed from the MacKenzie-Slave-Athabasca watershed, which empties into the Arctic Ocean. The Nelson and Mackenzie watersheds are separated by a divide between streams flowing to the Arctic Ocean and those of the Hudson Bay watershed. This divide meets the Continental Divide at Snow Dome (also known as Dome), near the northernmost bend of the Columbia River. To the southeast, in western Wyoming, another divide separates the Columbia watershed from the Colorado–Green watershed, which empties into the Gulf of California. The Columbia, Colorado, and Mississippi watersheds meet at Three Waters Mountain in the Wind River Range of Wyoming. To the south, in Oregon, Nevada, Utah, Idaho, and Wyoming, the Columbia watershed is divided from the Great Basin, whose several watersheds are endorheic, not emptying into any ocean but rather drying up or sinking into sumps. Great Basin watersheds that share a border with the Columbia watershed include Harney Basin, Humboldt River, and Great Salt Lake. The associated triple divide points are Commissary Ridge North, Wyoming, and Sproats Meadow Northwest, Oregon. To the north, mostly in British Columbia, the Columbia watershed borders the Fraser River watershed. To the west and southwest the Columbia watershed borders a number of smaller watersheds that drain to the Pacific Ocean, such as the Klamath River in Oregon and California and the Puget Sound Basin in Washington. ### Major tributaries The Columbia receives more than 60 significant tributaries. The four largest that empty directly into the Columbia (measured either by discharge or by size of watershed) are the Snake River (mostly in Idaho), the Willamette River (in northwest Oregon), the Kootenay River (mostly in British Columbia), and the Pend Oreille River (mostly in northern Washington and Idaho, also known as the lower part of the Clark Fork). Each of these four averages more than 20,000 cubic feet per second (570 m³/s) and drains an area of more than 20,000 square miles (52,000 km²). The Snake is by far the largest tributary. Its watershed of 108,000 square miles (280,000 km²) is larger than the state of Idaho. Its discharge is roughly a third of the Columbia's at the rivers' confluence but compared to the Columbia upstream of the confluence the Snake is longer (113%) and has a larger drainage basin (104%). The Pend Oreille River system (including its main tributaries, the Clark Fork and Flathead rivers) is also similar in size to the Columbia at their confluence. Compared to the Columbia River above the two rivers' confluence, the Pend Oreille-Clark-Flathead is nearly as long (about 86%), its basin about three-fourths as large (76%), and its discharge over a third (37%). ## See also - Columbia Park (Kennewick, Washington), a 400-acre (160 ha) recreational area - Columbia River Estuary - Columbia River Maritime Museum, Astoria, Oregon - Empire Builder, an Amtrak rail line that follows the river from Portland to Pasco, Washington - Estella Mine, an abandoned mine with a view of the Columbia River Valley - Historic Columbia River Highway, a scenic highway on the Oregon side - List of crossings of the Columbia River - List of dams in the Columbia River watershed - List of longest rivers of Canada - List of longest rivers of the United States (by main stem) - List of longest streams of Oregon - Lists of ecoregions in North America and Oregon - Lists of rivers of British Columbia, Oregon, and Washington - Okanagan Trail, a historic trail that followed the Columbia and Okanagan rivers - Robert Gray's Columbia River expedition

Okęcie Airport incident

Polish football incident

The Okęcie Airport incident (Polish: Afera na Okęciu) was a dispute between players and technical staff of the Poland national football team on 29 November 1980, starting at the team hotel in Warsaw and climaxing at Okęcie Airport. As an incident of insubordination, when strikes and other forms of civil resistance were intensifying in communist Poland, it caused a domestic press storm, and led to the suspension of several prominent players and the resignation of Ryszard Kulesza, the team manager. Józef Młynarczyk, the team's goalkeeper, was hung over when the time came to leave the hotel for the airport, having not slept following a night on the town with a friend. Kulesza and one of his assistants, Bernard Blaut, decided to leave Młynarczyk behind, much to the indignation of some of the players, including Stanisław Terlecki, Zbigniew Boniek, Włodzimierz Smolarek, and Władysław Żmuda. Terlecki, a stridently pro-Western intellectual with a reputation for mocking the communist establishment, was particularly angered, and drove Młynarczyk to the airport himself, where the players continued their protests. Kulesza eventually relented and allowed Młynarczyk to travel with the team. The Polish media took hold of the story and over the following days, vociferously attacked the rebellious players. Meanwhile, Terlecki again defied the communist authorities by arranging for the players to meet Pope John Paul II. The Polish Football Association sent Terlecki, Młynarczyk, Boniek, and Żmuda home and imposed various bans preventing them from playing at the international and club level, over the next year. Terlecki and Boniek, in particular, were condemned by the association as insubordinate "rabble-rousers". Smolarek received a more modest, suspended ban. Kulesza resigned in protest at the sanctions imposed on the players, saying they were too harsh. Most of the banned players were reinstated during 1981, but Terlecki was not. He emigrated to the United States in June of that year and, although he returned home five years later, he never played for Poland again. ## Background In June 1976, a series of protests took place across communist Poland, soon after the government announced plans to sharply increase the fixed prices charged nationwide for many basic commodities. Violent incidents occurred in Płock, Radom, and Ursus, as the protests were forcibly put down and the planned price hikes were cancelled. These demonstrations and the events surrounding them brought the Polish workforce and intellectual political opposition together, and by 1980, a campaign of civil resistance for political change was strongly intensifying. Industrial strike action in Lublin in July 1980 (the so-called Lublin July) preceded formation of Solidarity (Solidarność) in the port city of Gdańsk, during the following months. This was the first non-communist trade union in an Eastern Bloc country. The government took several steps to obstruct Solidarity's emergence, enforcing press censorship and cutting off telephone connections between the coast and the hinterland, but despite these efforts, by late 1980, four out of every five Polish workers were members of the union. Poland's national football team, managed by Ryszard Kulesza, was then regarded as one of the world's best, having finished third at the 1974 FIFA World Cup. In November 1980, it was ranked sixth in the world by the Elo rating system. Later that month, the team was preparing for a 1982 World Cup qualifying match away against Malta on 7 December. The squad's departure was scheduled for 29 November, ten days before the game, so the players could attend a training camp in Italy, then contest a warm-up match against a team representing the Italian league. One of Poland's key players at the time was Stanisław Terlecki, a forward whose club was ŁKS Łódź. The son of university lecturers, Terlecki held a degree in history from the University of Łódź, as well as fervent anti-communist political views and a strident attitude regarding their display. He was known for openly mocking the establishment with subversive abandon, and regularly made jokes in public about communist authority figures and organisations, prompting the ire of the Polish Football Association (PZPN) and the Warsaw police force. The first Polish international player with a university degree in anything other than physical education, he eschewed the Polish sports magazines read by many of his teammates on road trips in favour of Western news journals, such as Newsweek and Time. Like many Polish intellectuals, he sympathised with movements such as Solidarity; following their example, he twice attempted to unionise Polish footballers during the late 1970s. The PZPN blocked both attempts, banning Terlecki from all organised football each time; first for six months, then for a year. ## Incident ### Main incident Late on 28 November 1980, the night before the team's departure from Warsaw for Italy, goalkeeper Józef Młynarczyk and forward Włodzimierz Smolarek, both of Widzew Łódź, left the Hotel Vera without permission. According to Smolarek they did this to get some dinner because they did not like the food at the hotel. They met a friend of Młynarczyk's, sports journalist Wojciech Zieliński, at the Adria nightclub. According to Andrzej Iwan, another member of the team, the main topic of conversation was Zieliński's estranged wife, who had been caught prostituting herself around Warsaw, and had since moved to Italy. Several Poland players knew her, and Młynarczyk had just been to Italy to play for Widzew Łódź against Juventus. According to Iwan, the journalist encouraged Młynarczyk to drink as they talked, hoping the goalkeeper might have news of her. Smolarek left the club around 02:00, but Młynarczyk and Zieliński stayed until about three hours later. A senior national team official, Colonel Roman Lisiewicz of the Polish Army, said he saw the goalkeeper and the journalist reach the hotel in a taxi soon after 05:00, but rather than going to his room Młynarczyk left again with Zieliński before returning around 07:00. Tired and hungover, Młynarczyk joined the rest of the players for breakfast, and according to Terlecki spent most of the meal getting worked up about possible managerial retribution. Młynarczyk was in such bad shape that he was unable to carry his own bags; Smolarek took them for him. Next to the team bus, one of Kulesza's assistants, Bernard Blaut, confronted Smolarek and told him Młynarczyk was to stay behind. Smolarek, Terlecki and two other Polish players – Zbigniew Boniek and Władysław Żmuda, both of Widzew Łódź – angrily objected and nearly came to blows with Blaut. Grzegorz Lato, one of the team's forwards, did not join the protest but later said he had not thought Młynarczyk drunk enough to warrant exclusion. The team eventually left without Terlecki or Młynarczyk. Terlecki, whose own car was on hand, drove himself and Młynarczyk to the airport, where the confrontation continued. Terlecki tried to stop the many pressmen at the airport from photographing Młynarczyk by running around, yelling, and snatching cameras and microphones from their hands. Meanwhile, the other players attempted to talk Kulesza around, telling him Młynarczyk had serious personal problems. Kulesza eventually relented and allowed the goalkeeper to travel with the team. ### Press storm; players meet the Pope Among the journalists at the airport were Jacek Gucwa of Polish Television, Bogdan Chruścicki of Polish Radio, and Remigiusz Hetman of the weekly football journal Piłka Nożna. News about the incident quickly spread across the country, partly because of Terlecki's outlandish actions in the reporters' presence. Iwan later reflected that Terlecki had "made so much commotion it was impossible to sweep everything under the carpet". Boniek corroborates this version of events: "Terlecki was massively to blame. He brought Młynarczyk to the airport in his own car, then pulled the plug powering a TV camera out of the wall." Grzegorz Majchrzak, a historian of the Polish Institute of National Remembrance, questions Boniek's words, positing that he might have distorted events in an attempt to distance himself from Terlecki. The government attempted to use the scandal as a popular distraction, aiming to deflect attention from the strikes and other industrial action. A number of journalists attacked the players who had supported Młynarczyk; the Przegląd Sportowy sports magazine ran the headline "No Mercy for Those Guilty of the Scandal at the Airport" while Tempo, another journal, was similarly severe, proclaiming "This Cannot Be Tolerated". Piłka Nożna condemned the "magnificent men ... who think they can do what they want", but at the same time questioned the conduct of the team's non-playing staff. In the Italian capital, Terlecki continued to defy the establishment. The players were under strict instructions not to associate with the Vatican while in Rome, but Terlecki arranged for them to meet Pope John Paul II, who was himself Polish. Seeing this as a second act of defiance, the PZPN promptly sent Terlecki, Młynarczyk, Boniek and Żmuda home, escorted by General Marian Ryba of the Polish Army, who was also the football association president. Lech Poznań's Piotr Mowlik replaced Młynarczyk for the match against Malta, which Poland won 2–0. ## Aftermath ### Hearings and suspensions Ryba announced on 1 December 1980 that he intended to bar the dissenting players from the Poland squad. When the rest of the team returned to Poland, Terlecki once again attempted to form a footballers' union. Securing the support of 16 other Poland international players, he wrote a letter to the PZPN declaring their intention to do so, leading the authorities to order them to face a tribunal. Only Terlecki, Boniek, Żmuda and Młynarczyk continued to endorse the letter when challenged in court. On 15 December, PZPN officials attempted to reconstruct the night's events, asking various players and staff to give accounts of what had happened. Several journalists were present. The stories told contradicted each other in several places, notably regarding how much Młynarczyk had had to drink. The team's technical staff said he had been obviously intoxicated when they had seen him, while the goalkeeper insisted he had taken only "three glasses of champagne and a sip of beer" with his friend. Another point of contention regarded the conversation at the airport, which had caused Kulesza to yield. It was generally agreed that the players had talked the manager around by telling him Młynarczyk had personal problems, but the non-playing staff now accused them of emotional blackmail. The players said their intention had been to explain the goalkeeper's off-field issues to help the manager make a more informed decision. Terlecki's answers at this meeting under the questioning of General Ryba, a former military prosecutor, were typically provocative; when the general asked what time Terlecki had left the hotel on 29 November, the ŁKS forward said 08:00. "Are you sure it was 08:00?" Ryba pressed – "Are you sure it wasn't 08:02?" The player replied that he was not: "No. Maybe it was even 08:03. I don't know this time exactly, because I have one of your Russian watches." A week later, the PZPN announced its final verdict. The only versions of events accepted for consideration were those recounted by Kulesza and Blaut; those of all the players and of the team physiotherapist and sport psychologist were dismissed. Żmuda and Młynarczyk were barred from playing for either Poland or their clubs for eight months, and Terlecki and Boniek for twelve. Smolarek received a two-month ban, which was suspended for six months. Citing their previous records of insubordination and misconduct, the PZPN called Terlecki and Boniek "rabble-rousers". ### Reactions Kulesza left his job soon afterwards; according to Majchrzak, he resigned in protest at the players' punishments, which he thought were too harsh. Officials at Widzew Łódź accused the PZPN of bias, saying the association had not supervised the players properly and should shoulder some of the blame. Directors at Widzew and ŁKS Łódź briefly considered resigning their PZPN memberships and organising their own league championship, but did not. The national team players' council, at that time comprising Marek Dziuba, Paweł Janas and Wojciech Rudy, wrote an open letter expressing surprise at what they saw as excessive sanctions against Terlecki, Boniek, Żmuda and Młynarczyk. They admitted the goalkeeper's conduct had been far from exemplary, but contended that the incident was only minor, and had been exacerbated by disproportionately prominent and negative press coverage. Despite being without some of their top players, Widzew Łódź were crowned champions of Poland at the end of the 1980–81 season. Ryba left his post in April 1981, along with a number of his contemporaries, described by Stefan Szczepłek, a sports journalist and football historian, as "honest officials, together with some football-friendly Polish Army officers". In their place came a number of communist officials, most prominently Włodzimierz Reczek, an erstwhile Politburo member, who took over as head of the football association despite a reputation for not liking the sport. Młynarczyk, Boniek and Żmuda had their bans cancelled early. Żmuda and Młynarczyk returned in the 1–0 home win over East Germany on 2 May 1981, and Boniek was reinstated four months later. The players' recall was partly due to the efforts of Kulesza's replacement, Antoni Piechniczek, to secure their return. According to Majchrzak, Boniek and Żmuda apologised for their actions before the General Committee for Physical Culture and Sport of the Polish People's Republic, the PZPN's governing body, but kept this from Terlecki, who appealed to have his ban lifted several times, but to no avail. ## Legacy Terlecki openly participated in students' strikes at his old university in Łódź and across Poland over the next few months, providing food to the students by the car-load. ŁKS cancelled his registration in early 1981. Majchrzak stresses that Terlecki was the only player involved in the incident not to regain his place in the Poland team, and claims that this was down to an intense grudge held against him by the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Secret Police (SB). Terlecki developed his own theory that the media circus following the airport incident had been deliberately engineered by the SB to head the players off forming their own trade union. There were several other incidents of drunkenness involving Młynarczyk, Majchrzak writes, but this was the only occasion when any player was punished for it. In October 1981, when the team travelled to Argentina, Młynarczyk arrived at Okęcie "completely drunk", according to Iwan, but far from reprimanding him, team staff gave him even more alcohol during the flight to help ease the pain of his broken finger. Poland qualified for the 1982 World Cup with a perfect record, and performed strongly in the competition, losing to Italy in the semi-finals but beating France in a play-off to claim third place. Kulesza became the manager of Tunisia, and later founded a coaching school in Warsaw. Saying he was "being treated like a leper", Terlecki emigrated to the United States in June 1981, and joined the Pittsburgh Spirit of the Major Indoor Soccer League. He pursued a new life in America with great vigour. Terlecki's on-field displays in the U.S. were widely praised. In three seasons with Pittsburgh he became the club's all-time top goalscorer, but managers reportedly had trouble "harness[ing] Terlecki's fiery temper" and his wife Ewa became intensely homesick. Terlecki announced his intention to move back to Poland in 1985, saying he believed the political situation had improved and that he wished to reunite his family. He returned home the following year, and resumed his career in Polish club football. He expressed a desire to play for the national team again, but was never selected.

GRB 970508

Gamma-ray burst detected on May 8, 1997

GRB 970508 was a gamma-ray burst (GRB) detected on May 8, 1997, at 21:42 UTC; it is historically important as the second GRB (after GRB 970228) with a detected afterglow at other wavelengths, the first to have a direct redshift measurement of the afterglow, and the first to be detected at radio wavelengths. A gamma-ray burst is a highly luminous flash associated with an explosion in a distant galaxy and producing gamma rays, the most energetic form of electromagnetic radiation, and often followed by a longer-lived "afterglow" emitted at longer wavelengths (X-ray, ultraviolet, optical, infrared, and radio). GRB 970508 was detected by the Gamma Ray Burst Monitor on the Italian–Dutch X-ray astronomy satellite BeppoSAX. Astronomer Mark Metzger determined that GRB 970508 occurred at least 6 billion light years from Earth; this was the first measurement of the distance to a gamma-ray burst. Until this burst, astronomers had not reached a consensus regarding how far away GRBs occur from Earth. Some supported the idea that GRBs occur within the Milky Way, but are visibly faint because they are not highly energetic. Others concluded that GRBs occur in other galaxies at cosmological distances and are extremely energetic. Although the possibility of multiple types of GRBs meant that the two theories were not mutually exclusive, the distance measurement unequivocally placed the source of the GRB outside the Milky Way, effectively ending the debate. GRB 970508 was also the first burst with an observed radio frequency afterglow. By analyzing the fluctuating strength of the radio signals, astronomer Dale Frail calculated that the source of the radio waves had expanded almost at the speed of light. This provided strong evidence that GRBs are relativistically expanding explosions. ## Discovery A gamma-ray burst (GRB) is a highly luminous flash of gamma rays—the most energetic form of electromagnetic radiation. GRBs were first detected in 1967 by the Vela satellites (a series of spacecraft designed to detect nuclear explosions in space). The initial burst is often followed by a longer-lived "afterglow" emitted at longer wavelengths (X-ray, ultraviolet, optical, infrared, and radio). The first GRB afterglow to be discovered was the X-ray afterglow of GRB 970228, which was detected by BeppoSAX, an Italian–Dutch satellite originally designed to study X-rays. On Thursday May 8, 1997, at 21:42 UTC, BeppoSAX's Gamma Ray Burst Monitor registered a gamma-ray burst that lasted approximately 15 seconds. It was also detected by Ulysses, a robotic space probe designed to study the Sun, and by the Burst and Transient Source Experiment (BATSE) on board the Compton Gamma Ray Observatory. The burst also occurred within the field of view of one of BeppoSAX's two X-ray Wide Field Cameras. Within a few hours, the BeppoSAX team localized the burst to an error box—a small area around the specific position to account for the error in the position—with a diameter of approximately 10 arcminutes. ## Observations After a rough position of the burst had been determined, Enrico Costa of the BeppoSAX team contacted astronomer Dale Frail at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory's Very Large Array. Frail began making observations at a wavelength of 20 centimeters at 01:30 UTC, less than four hours after the discovery. While preparing for his observations Frail contacted astronomer Stanislav Djorgovski, who was working with the Hale telescope. Djorgovski immediately compared his images of the region with older images from the Digitized Sky Survey, but he found no new sources of light within the error box. Mark Metzger, a colleague of Djorgovski at the Caltech observatory, conducted a more extensive analysis of the data, but was also unable to identify any new light sources. The following evening Djorgovski again observed the region. He compared the images from both nights but the error box contained no objects that had decreased in luminosity between May 8 and May 9. Metzger noticed one object that had increased in luminosity, but he assumed it was a variable star rather than the GRB afterglow. Titus Galama and Paul Groot, members of a research team in Amsterdam led by Jan van Paradijs, compared images taken by the WIYN Telescope on May 8 and the William Herschel Telescope on May 9. They were also unable to find any light sources which had faded during that time. After discovering the burst's X-ray afterglow, the BeppoSAX team provided a more accurate localization, and what Metzger had assumed to be a variable star was still present in this smaller error box. Both the Caltech team and the Amsterdam team were hesitant to publish any conclusions on the variable object. On May 10 Howard Bond of the Space Telescope Science Institute published his discovery, which was later confirmed to be the burst's optical afterglow. On the night between May 10 and May 11, 1997, Metzger's colleague Charles Steidel recorded the spectrum of the variable object at the W. M. Keck Observatory. He then sent the data to Metzger, who after identifying a system of absorption lines associated with magnesium and iron determined a redshift of z = 0.8349 ± 0.0002, indicating that light from the burst had been absorbed by matter roughly 6 billion light-years from Earth. Although the redshift of the burst itself had not been determined, the absorbent matter was necessarily located between the burst and the Earth, implying that the burst itself was at least as far away. The absence of Lyman-alpha forest features in the spectra constrained the redshift to z ≤ 2.3, while further investigation by Daniel E. Reichart of the University of Chicago suggested a redshift of z ≈ 1.09. This was the first instance in which scientists were able to measure the redshift of a GRB. Several optical spectra were also obtained at the Calar Alto Observatory at wavelength ranges of 4,300–7,100 Å (430–710 nm) and 3,500–8,000 Å (350–800 nm), but no emission lines were identified. On May 13, five days after the first detection of GRB 970508, Frail resumed his observations with the Very Large Array. He made observations of the burst's position at a wavelength of 3.5 cm and immediately detected a strong signal. After 24 hours, the 3.5 cm signal became significantly stronger, and he also detected signals at the 6 and 21 cm wavelengths. This was the first confirmed observation of a radio afterglow of a GRB. Over the next month, Frail observed that the luminosity of the radio source fluctuated significantly from day to day but increased on average. The fluctuations did not occur simultaneously along all of the observed wavelengths, which Jeremy Goodman of Princeton University explained as being the result of the radio waves being bent by interstellar plasma in the Milky Way. Such radio scintillations (rapid variations in the radio luminosity of an object) occur only when the source has an apparent diameter of less than 3 microarcseconds. ## Characteristics BeppoSAX's Gamma-Ray Burst Monitor, operating in the energy range of 40–700 keV, recorded a fluence of (1.85 ± 0.3) × 10⁻⁶ erg/cm² (1.85 ± 0.3 nJ/m²), and the Wide Field Camera (2–26 keV) recorded a fluence of (0.7 ± 0.1) × 10⁻⁶ erg/cm² (0.7 ± 0.1 nJ/m²). BATSE (20–1000 keV) recorded a fluence of (3.1 ± 0.2) × 10⁻⁶ erg/cm² (3.1 ± 0.2 nJ/m²). About 5 hours after the burst the apparent magnitude of the object—a logarithmic measure of its brightness with a higher number indicating a fainter object—was 20.3 ± 0.3 in the U-band (the ultraviolet region of the spectrum) and 21.2 ± 0.1 in the R-band (the red region of the spectrum). The afterglow reached its peak luminosity in both bands approximately 2 days after the burst was first detected—19.6 ± 0.3 in the U-band at 02:13 UTC on May 11, and 19.8 ± 0.2 in the R-band at 20:55 UTC on May 10. James E. Rhoads, an astronomer at the Kitt Peak National Observatory, analyzed the burst and determined that it was not strongly beamed. Further analysis by Frail and his colleagues indicated that the total energy released by the burst was approximately 5×10⁵⁰ ergs (5×10⁴³ J), and Rhoads determined that the total gamma-ray energy was approximately 3×10⁵⁰ erg (3×10⁴³ J). This implied that the gamma-ray and kinetic energy of the burst's ejecta were comparable, effectively ruling out those GRB models which are relatively inefficient at producing gamma rays. ## Distance scale and emission model Prior to this burst, astronomers had not reached consensus regarding how far away GRBs occur from Earth. Although the isotropic distribution of bursts suggested that they do not occur within the disk of the Milky Way, some astronomers supported the idea that they occur within the Milky Way's halo, concluding that the bursts are visibly faint because they are not highly energetic. Others concluded that GRBs occur in other galaxies at cosmological distances and that they can be detected because they are extremely energetic. The distance measurement and the calculations of the burst's total energy release unequivocally supported the latter theory, effectively ending the debate. Throughout the month of May the radio scintillations became less noticeable until they ceased altogether. This implies that the radio source significantly expanded in the time that had passed since the burst was detected. Using the known distance to the source and the elapsed time before the scintillation ended, Frail calculated that the radio source had expanded at almost the speed of light. While various existing models already encompassed the notion of a relativistically expanding fireball, this was the first strong evidence to support such a model. ## Host galaxy The afterglow of GRB 970508 reached a peak total luminosity 19.82 days after the burst was detected. It then faded with a power law slope over about 100 days. The afterglow eventually disappeared, revealing the burst's host, an actively star-forming dwarf galaxy with an apparent magnitude of V = 25.4 ± 0.15. The galaxy was well fitted by an exponential disk with an ellipticity of 0.70 ± 0.07. The redshift of GRB 970508's optical afterglow, z = 0.835, agreed with the host galaxy's redshift of z = 0.83, suggesting that, unlike previously observed bursts, GRB 970508 may have been associated with an active galactic nucleus. ## See also - List of gamma-ray bursts

Half-Life 2: Episode One

2006 video game

Half-Life 2: Episode One is a 2006 first-person shooter game developed and published by Valve for Windows. It continues the story of Half-Life 2 (2004); as scientist Gordon Freeman, players must escape City 17 with Gordon's companion Alyx Vance. Like previous Half-Life games, Episode One combines shooting, puzzles and storytelling. After the six-year development of Half-Life 2, Valve switched to episodic development, hoping to release games more frequently. For Episode One, they focused on developing the character of Alyx and expanded her artificial intelligence. It uses an updated version of Valve's Source engine, with new lighting and animation technology. Episode One received mostly positive reviews; the co-operative gameplay with Alyx received particular praise, although the short length was criticized. It was ported to Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 as part of the 2007 compilation The Orange Box. Episode Two followed in 2007. ## Gameplay In Episode One, players make their way through a linear series of levels and encounter various enemies and allies. The gameplay is broken up between combat-oriented challenges and physics-based puzzles. Episode One integrates tutorial-like tasks into the story to familiarize the player with new gameplay mechanics without breaking immersion. A head-up display appears on the screen to display the character's health, energy, and ammunition. Throughout the course of the game, the player accesses new weapons and ammunition that are used to defend the character from enemy forces. Unlike in Half-Life 2, where Gordon's first weapon is the crowbar, Gordon first acquires the Gravity Gun, which plays a crucial role in the game by allowing the player to use physics to manipulate objects at a distance in both combat and puzzle-solving scenarios. The artificial intelligence (AI) for Alyx Vance, Gordon's companion, was explicitly designed for co-operative play in Episode One to complement the player's abilities. The developers described Alyx's programming for Episode One as a "personality code" as opposed to an "AI code", emphasizing the attention they gave to make Alyx a unique and believable companion. For part of the code, she was explicitly programmed to avoid performing too many mechanical or repetitive actions, such as repeating lines of dialogue or performing certain routines in combat situations. Examples of this co-operative gameplay include combat in underground levels. In this scenario, the player can conserve their ammunition by using a flashlight to help Alyx spot and kill oncoming enemies. Similarly, Alyx will often take up strategic positions and provide covering fire to keep the player safe while they travel to a certain area or perform certain actions. ## Plot In City 17, Gordon Freeman and Alyx Vance (Merle Dandridge) have destroyed the Citadel's reactor. As it explodes, several vortigaunts (Louis Gossett Jr.) appear and extract Alyx. The G-Man (Michael Shapiro), who extracted Freeman from the explosion, is suddenly confronted by the vortigaunts and pushed away from Freeman; as the vortigaunts rescue Freeman, the G-Man responds by angrily stating that "We'll see... about that." Freeman awakens in the ruins of City 17, where he is rescued from a pile of rubble by Dog and reunited with Alyx. At a nearby piece of communication equipment, Alyx makes contact with Eli Vance (Robert Guillaume) and Isaac Kleiner (Harry S. Robins), who have escaped the city. Kleiner informs them that the Citadel's core will soon collapse, leaving Freeman and Alyx with no chance of safely escaping the city. Freeman and Alyx proceed into the core and temporarily stabilize it; in there, Alyx discovers that the Combine is attempting to accelerate the destruction of the Citadel in order to send a transmission back to their homeworld. Alyx downloads a copy of the transmission along with a video recorded by Judith Mossman (Michelle Forbes) where she discusses finding the location of an unknown project before being cut off by a Combine attack. Freeman and Alyx board a train and use it to escape the Citadel, which subsequently derails. Leaving the train, the two proceed on foot through an underground transportation system and the city streets, fighting past disorganized Combine forces and rampant Xen wildlife. Near a Combine-held train station, Freeman and Alyx reunite with Barney Calhoun (Michael Shapiro), who is planning to use the station to evacuate refugees from the city. Freeman and Alyx escort the refugees to the station, eliminating the Combine forces there. The two take a different train out of City 17, escaping just as the reactor detonates, which delivers the Combine transmission. As several pods containing Combine Advisors flee the Citadel, the explosion's shockwave derails the train. ## Development Valve developed Half-Life 2 (2004) over six years using its new game engine, Source. In April 2005, Valve announced an expansion for Half-Life 2 under the working title Aftermath. The designer Robin Walker said the team had become comfortable with the engine and tools, and wanted to capitalize on their experience instead of developing new technologies. Valve's president, Gabe Newell, said customers would be happier with a new Half-Life game delivered in a shorter time rather than waiting years for another "monolithic product". In February 2006, Valve announced a new title for the expansion, Episode One. In May, Valve announced that Episode One was the first in a planned trilogy of episodic games to be released over the following two years. Newell said he considered the trilogy the equivalent of Half-Life 3. According to Newell, whereas the original Half-Life (1998) saw the G-Man transform Freeman into his tool, and Half-Life 2 saw Freeman being used by G-Man, the episodes would see G-Man lose control. While the plots and dialogue of Half-Life and Half-Life 2 were written solely by Marc Laidlaw, the Half-Life 2 episodes were written by Laidlaw and the new employees Chet Faliszek and Erik Wolpaw. Valve's focus was character development, particularly that of Gordon's companion Alyx, who accompanies the player for most of Episode One. Walker said: "It's kind of ironic that despite so much of the theme of Half-Life 2 being about other characters and other people, you spent most of the game alone." Valve made modifications to Alyx's AI to allow her to react to the player. Changes include commentating on objects the player manipulates or obstacles they have overcome. She also acts as an essential device in both plot exposition and directing the player's journey, often vocalizing what the player is required to do next to progress. At the same time, Valve did not want Alyx to obstruct the player, and sometimes reduced her input and dialogue so players would not feel pressured or bothered by her presence. Valve placed what they described as "hero moments" throughout the game, which allow the player to single-handedly overcome obstacles such as particularly challenging enemies, during which Alyx takes the role of an observer and gives the player praise and adulation for their feats. The game was extensively playtested so that Valve could gauge its effectiveness and difficulty. Episode One was made with an upgraded version of Source, with more advanced lighting effects and a new version of its facial animation/expression technology. Upgrades to enemy AI allow Combine soldiers to use tactics previously unavailable to them. For example, Combine soldiers were given the ability to crouch while being fired upon so they could duck underneath the player's line of fire. The soundtrack was composed by Kelly Bailey. The music is used sparingly; it plays primarily during scenes of major plot developments or particularly important action sequences such as large battles or when encountering a new enemy. While no new locales were introduced in Episode One, extensive alterations were made to the appearance of both City 17 where the game takes place and the Citadel from the end of Half-Life 2 to reflect the changing shape of the world and remind the player that their actions have major effects on the storyline. The Citadel has degenerated from the cold, alien, and imposing fortress of the previous game into an extremely unstable state. This provides a visual cue to the player of the catastrophic damage they inflicted, and it allows for the introduction of new gameplay elements that accentuate the dangers which come with the Citadel's imminent collapse. It also serves a thematic purpose by highlighting the weakening of the Combine's dominance in City 17. Likewise, City 17 has been altered to reflect the aftermath of the resistance's open rebellion, with vast swathes of destroyed buildings, and the introduction of foes previously kept outside its confines in Half-Life 2 to emphasize the scale of the uprising. ## Release Episode One was sold in both retail stores and Valve's online Steam distribution system, where it was sold at a discount price. The game was also distributed by Electronic Arts as a standalone release. It was available for pre-load and pre-purchase through Steam on May 1, 2006, with Half-Life Deathmatch: Source and Half-Life 2: Deathmatch immediately available for play as part of the package. Episode One was rereleased in the compilation The Orange Box for Mac, PC, Xbox 360, and PlayStation 3. About 1.4 million retail copies of Episode One had been sold by 2008. ## Reception Response to Episode One was generally positive, and reviewers praised the game for having more intricate, well-paced gameplay than Half-Life 2. The game's interactivity, particularly in the form of Alyx and her reactions to the player's actions and the events of the game, was also singled out for praise. PC Gamer commented that "while this inaugural episode may not be the essential FPS that Half-Life 2 is, I can't imagine any shooter fan who'd want to miss it." In its review, PC Gamer directed particular praise to the balance between puzzle-oriented and action-oriented challenges throughout the game. In Australia, the magazine PC PowerPlay awarded the game 10 out of 10. Edge praised the "deftness" with which the game was able to direct the player's eyes, and the strength of Alyx as a companion, concluding, "In an interactive genre bound to the traditions of the pop-up gun and invisible hero, it simply doesn't get more sophisticated than this." Episode One earned scores of 87/100 and 85.59% on review aggregators Metacritic and GameRankings respectively. IGN awarded Episode One "Best PC FPS of 2006" and described it as a "great bang for the buck using Valve's new episodic plan", although it did not offer "the complete experience that Half-Life 2 was". GameSpy ranked Episode One ninth on its 2006 "Games of the Year" list, and it also noted the implementation of Alyx as a believable and useful companion. A common criticism of the game is its short length. Episode One takes roughly 4–6 hours to complete, which raised the issue of whether the game justified its price. Computer Games Magazine argued the futility of reviewing the game due to its episodic nature; as the first part of a three-part story arc, it is difficult to judge it when divorced from the final product. Game Revolution expressed disappointment at a lack of new features such as environments and weapons. ## Sequels Half-Life 2: Episode Two was released in 2007. Episode Three was scheduled for release by Christmas 2007, but was canceled as Valve found the episodic model contrary to their growing ambition for new instalments. After canceling several further Half-Life projects, Valve released a prequel, Half-Life: Alyx, in 2020.

Thaddeus McCotter 2012 presidential campaign

2012 United States presidential election candidacy

Congressman Thaddeus McCotter of Michigan unsuccessfully sought the Republican Party's 2012 nomination for President of the United States. He announced his intention to run when he filed papers with the Federal Election Commission on July 1, 2011, and officially declared his candidacy the next day at a rock festival near Detroit. McCotter, who had served in Congress since 2003, was first mentioned as a potential presidential candidate on an April 2011 episode of Fox News' Red Eye w/ Greg Gutfeld. After entering the race two months later, McCotter based his campaign on "five core principles" listed on his campaign website, and used the slogan Seize Freedom!, derived from the title of his 2011 book. During the campaign, he focused on government reform and Wall Street. Commentators noted that McCotter's lack of name recognition hindered his chances for nomination. When included in Republican presidential preference polls, he regularly received less than one percent support. Following a last-place finish in the Ames Straw Poll and the lack of any invitation to presidential debates, he dropped his candidacy on September 22, 2011, and endorsed Mitt Romney. Thereafter, McCotter reportedly wrote a television pilot, which was released to the media prior to his resignation from Congress in July 2012 amid a fraud investigation surrounding his congressional re-election campaign. ## Background Thaddeus McCotter began his political career upon election to the Wayne County (Michigan) Commission in 1993. Five years later, he left that position after winning a seat in the Michigan State Senate. He remained there until 2002 when elected to serve Michigan's 11th congressional district in the United States House of Representatives. In Congress, leadership assigned McCotter to the House Financial Services Committee. In addition, he joined the moderate Republican Main Street Partnership. In 2006, he attained the chairmanship of the House Republican Policy Committee, and two years later was named head of his party's Fiscal Integrity Task Force. On the task force, he gained a reputation as a leading opponent of pork barrel spending. He voted against the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 and the Affordable Health Care for America Act of 2010, but supported the bailout of the automobile industry in 2009. He also supported an increase in the minimum wage and advocated fair trade with China. Nevertheless, the Detroit Free Press described him as a "conservative's conservative" and GovTrack labeled him a "far-right Republican". McCotter was also known as an "oddball" in Congress, displaying a wry sense of humor. Betsy Woodruff of National Review identified him as "the strangest Congressman." Showing a fondness for rock music, he played lead guitar in the Second Amendments. President George W. Bush referred to him as "that rock and roll dude." Moreover, McCotter frequently appeared on Fox News' late night/early morning show Red Eye w/ Greg Gutfeld. Bloomberg Businessweek described his celebrity as a "tiny cult following of insomniac conservatives." ## Campaign speculation Speculation about a presidential run began several months after the release of his February 2011 book Seize Freedom! American Truths and Renewal in a Chaotic Age. The first instance occurred during the April 22 episode of Red Eye, where host Greg Gutfeld asked McCotter to enter the presidential race. Five days later, political commentator and fellow Red Eye frequenter S. E. Cupp listed McCotter as a potential candidate in her Daily News column. McCotter confirmed in May that he was seriously considering a run for the presidency. He told the newspaper Politico he felt most Republicans lacked enthusiasm for the current crop of candidates. Commentator Andrew Breitbart expressed excitement at the prospect of a McCotter run. Describing him as "blunt, sarcastic, pop-culture-savvy, constitutionally sound and an authentic voice," Breitbart remarked "[t]here's no one I'd like to see more at a debate than McCotter." In May 2011, speculation increased as McCotter attacked Republican frontrunner Mitt Romney as Romney visited Detroit. He connected Romney to President Barack Obama, arguing that people see Romney and Obama as running mates rather than as rivals. Later that month, he addressed the Republican Leadership Conference in New Orleans and entered the event's straw poll. Out of the 1,542 votes cast, he received two, last place among those considered. At this time, McCotter remained undecided about a run, according to his aides, though he paid \$18,000 for a prime spot at the August 13 Ames Straw Poll. During a visit to Iowa, the first caucus state, McCotter announced he would reveal his campaign plans prior to the straw poll. On June 30, Politico reported McCotter was ready to begin a campaign. ## Campaign developments ### Announcement McCotter filed a presidential campaign committee statement with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) and opened a campaign website on July 1, 2011. The website, which warned "your American Dream is endangered" was based on his book Seize Freedom! and listed "five core principles". These were: 1. "Our liberty is from God not the government" 2. "Our sovereignty is in our souls not the soil" 3. "Our security is from strength not surrender" 4. "Our prosperity is from the private sector not the public sector" 5. "Our truths are self-evident not relative" McCotter officially announced his candidacy at the WAAM-sponsored "Freedom Festival" in Whitmore Lake, Michigan on July 2. He declared, "what we need in Washington is someone who understands that the wave of the future is not big government, but self-government". He played with his rock band at the event. Upon his entrance, Charlie Cook of The Cook Political Report rated McCotter's chances of nomination as "virtually impossible". CBS News and other outlets commented on McCotter's lack of name recognition and described him as a "little-known" candidate. Nevertheless, the Free Press noted he had about \$480,000 available in his congressional account to transfer to his presidential campaign account. Political communications operative Mark Corallo was hired along with a core group of advisers that included former Senator Bill Frist's chief of staff Eric Uelind, and former Iowa representative Christopher Rants. ### Campaign events As McCotter embarked on his first official campaign trip to the first-in-the-nation primary state of New Hampshire, he received media attention for his hometown newspaper's reaction to his run. An editorial in The Oakland Press, based out of Oakland County, Michigan, wrote that the idea of a McCotter presidency "isn't a pleasant thought and is, in fact, a bit scary". It added, "the representative comes off as cold, arrogant and egotistical". Nevertheless, McCotter continued his campaign in New Hampshire, focusing on the "fundamental restructuring of government". Radio host Chris Buck was hired as leader of operations in New Hampshire. McCotter returned to Iowa in mid-July for further campaign events. Around this time, Chris Cillizza of The Washington Post placed McCotter's odds of winning the Ames Straw Poll at one hundred to one, last place among the candidates listed. A Harris poll conducted July 11–18 found that 92 percent of voters were not familiar with McCotter, and less than one percent supported him when matched against his fellow presidential contenders. In a hypothetical head-to-head matchup with President Obama, McCotter received 43 percent, compared to 57 percent for the President. To build support, McCotter used Twitter, with which he attempted to bypass the news media and connect directly with supporters. Campaign spokesman Randall Thompson stated that McCotter was "relying on social media...[and]...developed a very loyal following". McCotter participated in the first-ever Twitter presidential debate, on July 20, against fellow candidates former New Mexico governor Gary Johnson, businessman Herman Cain, representative Michele Bachmann, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, and former Senator Rick Santorum. At one point, moderator S. E. Cupp asked whether President Obama was anti-Israel, McCotter answered, "Obama's motivations are not the issue, the impact of his policies, both proposed and pursued, have strained our relationship" with Israel. When asked to comment on the U.S. role in the 2011 military intervention in Libya, McCotter referred to the Obama administration's mission as "ill-defined," and argued for "no US boots on ground." However, he added the caveat, "once committed [to the mission], we can't abruptly withdraw." In late July, during the height of the debt ceiling crisis, McCotter canceled several appearances in Iowa and returned to Washington. He supported the plan of House Speaker John Boehner, and voted in favor of the compromise bill. He was the only presidential candidate in the House of Representatives to approve the bill in Congress since both fellow members Bachmann and Ron Paul voted against it. Ahead of the Ames Straw Poll, McCotter had not reached the one percent polling threshold necessary to participate in the event's August 11 debate on Fox News. At the time, McCotter had little support, even at home. Public Policy Polling showed him with only five percent from Michigan Republicans, a figure pollsters described as rare coming from a candidate's home state. With news of his standing, McCotter cancelled a scheduled stop in New Hampshire, and returned to his headquarters in Michigan to coordinate a debate inclusion effort. As part of the effort, the campaign filmed a YouTube video in a kitchen, featuring McCotter making puns about food, and concluding with "Thanks, dude." The Los Angeles Times described the video as "unfortunate". Despite the effort, McCotter did not meet the polling threshold and was excluded. He was the only candidate missing from the debate that had secured a spot on the ballot. Just before the vote the Ames, McCotter addressed voters in what Politico described as "a slow, abstract, exceptionally sober speech". It drew little crowd reaction other than applause at the denunciation of the "regime in Beijing" and the proclamation, "I will not cede the 21st Century to a Communist, nuclear-armed dictatorship." At his tent, McCotter spent a large amount of time playing guitar. In the straw poll, he finished last among ten candidates, receiving 35 votes or 0.21 percent. Based on the \$18,000 he paid for campaign space, the result corresponded to \$514 per vote. Senior adviser Christopher Rants explained that the purpose of the straw poll "was not about votes, it was about introducing our candidate to the public in our first large forum... By any measure, we did that". Three days after the straw poll, McCotter wrote an article in National Review outlining some of his economic plans. He advocated spending reductions, a twenty percent reserve requirement for banks to keep available as capital, and incentives to reduce home foreclosures. He campaigned in New Hampshire on August 19, and filmed "Conversation with the Candidate" for WMUR-TV. The next day, he attended a party with S. E. Cupp for the Young Republicans of Seacoast. He returned to Iowa for his last campaign stop in the state from August 24 to August 27. At the end of the month, McCotter appeared on the Dennis Miller Show and talked about his exclusion from debates. He failed to meet the requirements for both the September 7 MSNBC and the September 12 CNN debates. For the MSNBC debate, a candidate had to show one poll with four percent support. McCotter argued that while he did not meet this, in a Quinnipiac poll, he tied with Rick Santorum and Jon Huntsman Jr., both of whom qualified. Other candidates who did not qualify included Gary Johnson and former Louisiana governor Buddy Roemer, who like McCotter, did not qualify for any televised debates. McCotter continued his efforts to be included in the debates in September. On September 9, McCotter made his last campaign trip to New Hampshire, attending events for two days. He was supposed to appear in Iowa again five days later, but had to cancel due to a vote in Congress. While in Washington, he introduced a Grover Norquist-backed Social Security reform plan, which would have created private accounts for those under 50 years of age with limited guaranteed government benefits. He called on the other GOP presidential candidates to release their plans on Social Security. Shortly thereafter, McCotter participated in the California Republican Convention. In a speech there, he criticized President Obama, arguing, "No matter how many times his campaign clown car crisscrosses America, we know that the most prosperous and equitable economy in human history was created by you, the American people, not by bureaucrats in Washington." At the event's straw poll, he received less than one percent of the vote. McCotter tried to gain entry into the September 22 Fox News debate, but reported via Twitter, "@Foxnews has kindly advised me I will be excluded from the Orlando GOP POTUS debate." ### Withdrawal On September 22, 2011, McCotter notified The Detroit News he would withdraw from the presidential race. He explained it "was sort of death by media" because of the exclusion from the presidential debates, and argued "if they keep you out of the debates, you are out of the conversation and you can't run." He then released a statement in which he endorsed Mitt Romney for president, and called on the Republican Party to unite behind Romney as the most electable candidate. In the press release, McCotter also announced that he would run for re-election in his congressional district. In reporting on the withdrawal, the Los Angeles Times wrote, "What's that? You've never heard of Thaddeus McCotter? Well, that's the main reason he's now a former candidate." Pundit Bill Ballenger of Inside Michigan Politics said that McCotter "really had no business running for president. If he wants to have any political future, endorsing Mitt Romney now is the smart thing to do." McCotter's neighbor, former Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox, remarked, "He tried it out, obviously it wasn't working. And he's doing the rational thing and dropping out." Steve Kornacki of Salon summarized the overall campaign as "a cautionary tale about what can go wrong when your average backbench member of Congress becomes a minor cable news celebrity and mistakes it for having a genuine national following." ## Aftermath A few days after the campaign ended, The Detroit News asked McCotter whether he enjoyed his presidential campaign, he replied, "No. It was the worst 15 minutes of my life." Fundraising totals for the three months of McCotter's run were released to the FEC in October 2011. Overall, he raised \$548,606 (\$468,561 of which was transferred from authorized committees), paid \$541,532 on expenses, and had a debt of \$105,367. As of June 2013, a debt of \$105,636 remains. In an interview with GQ ahead of the Michigan primary in February 2012, McCotter expressed concern that Republicans were underestimating the strength of Democrats, and that winning in the Midwest would be difficult because of the Republicans' position on manufacturing and the Wall Street bailout. He maintained that though he disagreed with Romney on the auto industry bailout, Romney had the best chance to overcome the obstacles. Though McCotter had decided to run for reelection in his congressional district, he failed to qualify for his district's Republican primary after the majority of his petitions were declared fraudulent. An investigation of the campaign by the office of the Michigan Attorney General ensued. Steve Kornacki suggested the fraud may have been related to the presidential campaign, if it "caused him to take his eye off the ball on his House reelection," but McCotter rejected this as an "idiotic line of thinking." He initially hoped to wage a write-in campaign, but decided against it, finding he could not run the campaign while cooperating with the investigation and serving the remainder of his term in Congress. A month later, he resigned from Congress, claiming this was needed to fully assist with the petition fraud investigation. The investigation found that in addition to the 2012 petitions, McCotter's Congressional reelection petitions from 2006, 2008, and 2010, also showed evidence of fraud. McCotter sued two aides accusing them of deliberate obstruction. Eventually, four aides, including one who was sued, were charged and convicted of violations related to the fraud. A day prior to his resignation from Congress, The Detroit News reported that after ending his presidential campaign, McCotter took to writing a television pilot he titled, "Bumper Sticker: Made On Motown". It centered on McCotter as the host of a variety show with characters based on his congressional staffers, who made fun of his presidential campaign and discussed such risqué topics as sex, race, and bodily functions. In one scene in the script, S. E. Cupp guest stars; McCotter tries to conduct a serious interview with her, but the other characters make sexually explicit comments, leading Cupp to describe the show as a "train wreck." A former staffer released the work to the media to show what McCotter did while in office. In response, McCotter denied any wrongdoing, saying it had been largely composed in his garage as a way to get over his failed presidential campaign. He said the script was unfinished and had not authorized it for release, but decided to discuss it with The News. He cited comedian Martin Mull's short-lived 1977 show Fernwood 2 Night as an inspiration, and revealed that he had planned to leave Congress in 2014 and was preparing for a future career.

Hellraiser: Judgment

2018 horror film

Hellraiser: Judgment is a 2018 American horror film written and directed by Gary J. Tunnicliffe, based on the characters created by Clive Barker. The tenth installment in the Hellraiser film series, the film stars Damon Carney, Randy Wayne, Alexandra Harris, Heather Langenkamp, and Paul T. Taylor, and centers on three police detectives who, investigating a series of murders, are confronted by the denizens of hell. The film expands the fictional universe by introducing a new faction of hell: the Stygian Inquisition. While the Cenobites offer sadomasochistic pleasures to humans that enter their dominion, the Inquisition processes the souls of sinners. Tunnicliffe plays the Inquisition's auditor, a prominent role in the film. Unable to direct his screenplay for Hellraiser: Revelations due to a scheduling conflict, Tunnicliffe initially removed all references to the series from his Judgment concept and tried to have it funded as an independent film in 2013. He intended on making a "true" Hellraiser film because of his disappointment with the later films. Several years later, Dimension Films was required to make another Hellraiser film to retain the rights, giving Tunnicliffe a chance to propose his vision. The concept was initially rejected but accepted after he negotiated changes with the studio executives. It was filmed in Oklahoma with Children of the Corn: Runaway, both films produced by Michael Leahy. It is the second Hellraiser film without Doug Bradley as Pinhead; newcomer Taylor was cast after impressing Tunnicliffe in an audition. He and Tunnicliffe decided to develop a new look and interpretation, rather than imitating Bradley's performance. Judgment was scheduled for release in 2017 with minimal marketing to avoid negative publicity, but was temporarily shelved. According to Taylor, its release was not a priority for Dimension until the sexual abuse allegations involving parent company co-founder Harvey Weinstein (when the film was put back into post production). It was distributed by Lionsgate Films in video on demand and home media on February 13, 2018. Although critics compared the film favorably to its predecessors, its low budget and police procedural aspects were criticized. ## Plot In hell, Pinhead from the Cenobite sect, and the Auditor of the Stygian Inquisition are discussing how to adapt their methods of harvesting souls in the face of advancing human technology that is making the Configurations—gateways to hell—obsolete. Meanwhile on Earth, three detectives—brothers Sean and David Carter and Christine Egerton—investigate a serial killer known as the Preceptor, whose murders are based on the Ten Commandments. A connection with one of the victims leads the detectives to Karl Watkins, a local criminal who went missing near an abandoned house. Sean goes there and loses consciousness, waking up in the Stygian Inquisition's domain in hell. As the Inquisition prepares to hand down a verdict on Sean for his sins, the angel Jophiel intervenes and tells them to release him. Sean escapes the realm with a stolen puzzle box, and the Auditor requests Pinhead's guidance on the matter. Sean and his brother return to search the house, finding no trace of hell or the Inquisition. That night he is haunted by visions of the Cenobites and hell's denizens, who promise "judgment and redemption" to anyone who opens the box. Sean and Christine go to the coroner's office and find that a cell phone of one of the Preceptor's victims was stored in her body, recording her final location with its GPS. They find the Preceptor's hideout, where Sean incapacitates Christine and reveals himself as the killer. David deduces the Preceptor's identity and meets with the coroner to find the building. Upon arrival, Sean disarms David and reveals that he is holding his wife Alison hostage, outraged that she had an affair. He forces David and Alison to open the box at gunpoint, summoning the Cenobites and opening a gateway to their realm. Aware that someone from hell would come to collect his soul after his initial escape, Sean attempts to offer Alison and David to Pinhead. Pinhead tells him they will be dealt with for opening the box but, because a separate faction of hell wanted his soul, no deal will be made. The Auditor appears, telling Sean the Inquisition has found him guilty of his sins. Jophiel intervenes again and protests to Pinhead and the Auditor that Sean is part of heaven's plan to instill fear into sinners. Pinhead arranges for Christine to kill Sean, and spitefully dispatches Jophiel. As punishment, God expels Pinhead from hell and forces him to walk the earth as a mortal man. In a post-credits scene, a group of Mormon missionaries in Germany approach a house and are answered by the now human pinhead. ## Cast and characters - Damon Carney as Detective Sean Carter / The Preceptor: A police detective who investigates a string of murders and discovers an other-worldly threat. Unbeknownst to his colleagues, he murders people who violate the Ten Commandments. - Randy Wayne as Detective David Carter:Sean's partner during the investigation. Wayne initially questioned some of Tunnicliffe's decisions; according to the director, defending a character to the actor was not a problem for him: "I think Randy wants to trust the Director and you have to earn that by showing respect for the process. Once that trust was established, Randy relaxed and found David". - Alexandra Harris as Detective Christine Egerton: A detective who assists Sean and David in the murder investigation. Although Christine did not appear in the original story, the studio suggested her as a foil to Sean and David. - Heather Langenkamp as the Landlady: Langenkamp, known for her role as Nancy Thompson in A Nightmare on Elm Street, plays an obscene, cigarette-smoking landlady in Judgment. Casting director Chris Freihofer, who was acquainted with Langenkamp, showed her the screenplay before suggesting her to Tunnicliffe. He was pleased that Langenkamp agreed to take part in the film, since she is regularly offered horror-film roles. - Paul T. Taylor as Pinhead: The leader of the Cenobites, a religious faction of mutilated humans in hell who belong to the Order of the Gash and offer those who solve the Lament Configuration sadomasochistic pleasures. His face is marked with cuts arranged in a grid, with nails inserted into the intersections of creased flesh. Taylor made his debut as the priest of hell, who was played by Doug Bradley in the first eight films and Stephen Smith Collins in Hellraiser: Revelations. According to Taylor, in Pinhead's Judgment character arc events directly affect him (unlike the more recent sequels, with "him just showing up and doing his job"). Tunnicliffe was inspired by Hellbound: Hellraiser II in crafting Pinhead's fate in Judgment's climax: "I got to a point where I was writing the end of the film, and I thought, 'Well, he came from being immortal. We saw him birthed in Hellbound,' which I really loved, and I thought, 'If you're the king, then the very worst thing that can happen to you is you get stripped and thrown out with the paupers'". The filmmaker said that if he had had the budget, Pinhead would have been shown getting stripped of his pins and his clothing shredded. He suggested an ending in which a naked, now-human Pinhead is found on a rainy night bleeding in a gutter by a policeman, with the grid still in his face. - Gary J. Tunnicliffe as the Auditor: A clerk in hell who notes a person's sin before sending the person to the Assessor for judgment. The Auditor's typewriter paper is made of flesh and inked in blood; he often carries a music box that plays "Für Elise" as a comforting remnant of his human past. According to Tunnicliffe, the character is German. Not a Cenobite, he is part of the Stygian Inquisition separate from the Order of the Gash (one of hell's many orders). There are many auditors in the Inquisition; Tunnicliffe's character shares the faction with the Assessor, the Jury, the Butcher and the Surgeon. Other members (the Bone Collectors, the Seamstress, the Sentinels, the Order of Exudation, and the Effluviam) were planned for introduction but removed for budgetary reasons. The character was influenced by Sam Lowry from Brazil and Itzhak Stern from Schindler's List. The Stygian Inquisition lures their victims (candidates) to houses on earth that connect to hell, evaluating their sins and desires to decide their fate. Occasionally, its victims are deemed more suited to the Cenobites. Time and budget contributed to Tunnicliffe playing the character, allowing him to come in before shooting to apply the make-up; prosthetics could be applied in advance, and a body double could be used as needed. He accepted acting advice from a number of sources (including Damon Carney), and Mike Leahy and script supervisor Pepper helped direct his on-screen scenes. Tunnicliffe said: "I've been acting for many years, I love the franchise and I wanted to play the character. I thought in the very worst-case scenario if I suck, then I can dub myself later!" - John Gulager as the Assessor: A gluttonous member of the Stygian Inquisition who processes pages given to him by the Auditor and passes the results to the Jury. Although Tunnicliffe had never seen filmmaker John Gulager act, he knew that Gulager is an actor and wrote the Assessor for him. Gulager previously directed the horror films Feast, Feast II: Sloppy Seconds, Feast III: The Happy Finish, and Piranha 3DD. - Mike Jay Regan as the Chatterer: A Cenobite and follower of the Order of the Gash with facial deformities and continuously-clicking teeth. Succeeding Nicholas Vince in the role, Regan played the Chatterer Torso in Hellraiser: Inferno and the Chatterer in Hellraiser: Hellseeker, Hellraiser: Deader, and Hellraiser: Hellworld. Grace Montie plays Crystal Lanning, a dog-loving socialite whose murder sets the plot into motion. Rheagan Wallace plays Alison Carter, Sean's wife. Diane Goldner plays a Cleaner, an aging nude woman and part of the Stygian Inquisition who forces her tongue on victims as penance. Tunnicliffe conceived the Cleaners as in their nineties (similar to the three Witches from Macbeth), saying his worst nightmare would be being chained to a bed with old women licking him clean. Andi Powers plays one of the Jury, three nude women in their twenties with skinless faces who hand down verdicts from the Inquisition. Other acting credits include Jeff Fenter as sinner Karl Watkins and Helena Grace Donald as the angel Jophiel. Judgment is the first Hellraiser film to include heaven in its mythology. According to Tunnicliffe, he took influence from The Scarlet Gospels, stating "I am in no way religious, but if you are writing a story that acknowledges the existence of Hell, then you have to acknowledge the existence of Heaven. I'm a big fan of things like Constantine and Prophecy, so it was fun bringing those characters into it". ## Production ### Development > Only took a mere 30 years to get from being a 19 yr old [sic] make up fx wannabe living in rural Staffordshire to finally getting to write and direct a Hellraiser movie (whilst creating make up effects for a whole bunch of them along the way). Decades before the development of Hellraiser: Judgment, Dimension Films obtained the rights to the Hellraiser and Children of the Corn film series; Dimension's first films were Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth and Children of the Corn II: The Final Sacrifice, shot back-to-back in North Carolina in 1991. Since then, the company has been required to produce films in both series to retain the rights. Around the release of Hellraiser: Bloodline in 1996, Gary Tunnicliffe (who was involved with the special effects of Hellraiser III and Bloodline) pitched a Hellraiser story, Holy War, to Dimension executive Bob Weinstein; an opening scene, about a priest seeking a path to heaven through suffering, was storyboarded. Tunnicliffe continued to provide special effects for the series' sequels through Hellraiser: Hellworld (2005), which all were released to direct-to-video after Bloodline, but was unhappy with the quality of the films. Nearing a later deadline to retain Hellraiser and Children of the Corn, Dimension Films offered him an opportunity to write and direct a Hellraiser sequel. Tunnicliffe wrote the screenplay for 2011's Hellraiser: Revelations, but could not direct it due to a scheduling conflict with Scream 4. Instead of being an original screenplay converted into a Hellraiser film, Tunnicliffe's idea for Judgment was intended as part of the series from its conception. He removed its Hellraiser elements after trying to meet with Dimension, who were uninterested in making another Hellraiser film immediately after Revelations. Tunnicliffe showed Judgment to Mike Jay Regan, who enjoyed its premise and suggested the removal of Pinhead for a standalone project. He then attempted to make it as an independent film, but failed to find financial backers, leading to an unsuccessful Kickstarter campaign in 2013. Five years after being unable to direct Revelations, Dimension (facing another rights-retention deadline) offered Tunnicliffe the job of writing and directing another Hellraiser film. Tunnicliffe pitched Hellraiser: Judgment to Dimension three times (being rejected each time), and wrote a script treatment for a more traditional Hellraiser film, Enter Darkness, to demonstrate that he could come up with other ideas. The treatment's plot involved psychiatric hospital interns studying patients with shared experiences of the Lament Configuration, while the head doctor collates them to meet the Cenobites himself. The studio approved it, but Tunnicliffe insisted on making Judgment. Dimension told him to write the script for Judgment with the proviso that if they disliked it, he would direct Enter Darkness without being paid. After reading it, they allowed Tunnicliffe to direct Judgment as part of the series after negotiating rewrites, notes, and suggested changes. Saying that Judgment "will have moments unlike any other [film] you have ever seen", he was inspired by the works of Hieronymus Bosch, Francis Bacon, David Cronenberg, David Lynch, David Fincher, and Hellraiser creator Clive Barker. #### Original story Tunnicliffe's original treatment began with a Christian missionary approaching a rundown house to spread the Gospel and being captured by the Auditor at the door. The film's next fifteen to twenty minutes would focus on the missionary's audit as he is processed (judged) by the Auditor, the Assessor, the Jury, the Surgeon, the Butcher, the Seamstress, and the Bone Collectors. Two days later, a police officer is captured by the Auditor when he searches for the missing missionary. Tunnicliffe wanted the scenes in hell to be more nightmarish than they were in the finished film. The Assessor chokes on the pages of the policeman's sins during the audit, leading the distraught Auditor to seek assistance from Pinhead. Pinhead gathers the Chatterer and the Female Cenobite to find out what went wrong. Flashbacks show several police investigations, misleading the audience into thinking the police officer is innocent. An angel confronts Pinhead, demanding the police officer's release. The officer leaves the house, returning to raid it with armed colleagues, but find it to be empty. Pinhead and the Auditor review the officer's sins, discover that he is not innocent, and confront the angel. The next day, the officer awakens to the Cenobites invading his home. The audience learns about his sins, and the next fifteen minutes of the film would involve the Cenobites capturing and tormenting him. ### Casting Judgment was cast by a team led by casting director Chris Freihofer. Gary Tunnicliffe wanted Doug Bradley to reprise his role as Pinhead, the lead Cenobite; Bradley refused, criticizing Dimension Films for the quality of the Hellraiser sequels. Tunnicliffe pleaded with him, but Bradley again declined when he learned that he would have to sign a non-disclosure agreement to obtain the screenplay. In an interview with Bloody-Disgusting, Bradley said he had not read the script and declined to comment on the film's quality, but he expressed chagrin that it was another rights-retention project. Paul T. Taylor was cast as Pinhead, and Tunnicliffe played the Auditor. Mike Jay Regan reprised his role as the Chatterer, and Heather Langenkamp would play a character in the film. Taylor became involved when he received an email inviting him to screen test as the Auditor; after the test, he was asked to audition as Pinhead. The latter audition took place in Los Angeles, where Taylor thought he "nailed" his performance. Tunnicliffe allowed him to interpret the character, and he was given months to prepare before filming began. The preparation included smoking (unusual for Taylor), to give his voice a gravelly quality. He took late-night walks in high-crime neighborhoods near his home, which he described as "facing the fear". He said of his performance: "I have a vulnerability in my acting no matter what I do. It's just there ... It's about the stillness. [Pinhead]'s already so terrifying that when he makes a move, it means something. He's very economical and when he speaks, he's so eloquent". Believing "Pinhead has to be British", the American actor used a British accent when in-character. For research, he visited a comic-book store to read Hellraiser comic books in which Pinhead appeared. Tunnicliffe detailed his reasons for selecting Taylor, saying he was prepared and open to listening, but also wanting to give his own interpretation: "I wanted a slightly different Pinhead for this new tale, there's a stillness, a dry resolve to this new version, coldness, sarcasm. I wanted a Pinhead with a regal sense of arrogance and boredom and Paul delivered". ### Filming and editing Filming took place over a three-week period in Oklahoma, on a relatively small budget of \$350,000. Tunnicliffe and cinematographer Samuel Calvin prepared substantially beforehand to maximize shooting time, using a daily average of 30 to 35 complex camera and lighting set-ups. According to Tunnicliffe, all departments were enthusiastic about their work and a work day never exceeded thirteen hours. Filming locations included a derelict building, a bar, a luxury apartment building and penthouse suite, a church interior, a children's playground, alleys, and stages and sets built by the film's art department. Some actors had to be persuaded to arrive at certain shoots, partially because of the film's budget. Tunnicliffe said about filming: "I'm a great believer in really using the time on set. You only get up to twelve to thirteen hours a day, maximum, and I don't like going over time and over budget. I like to have a strong plan going in and the way I do that is that I act out the entire script with my D.P. [director of photography], we act out everybody's roles in every scene. We pick our angles based on that". Local residents contributed to the shoot by suggesting specific locations, and a car dealership loaned a van for the film. Taylor shot his scenes in an Oklahoma City studio, where a set for the "offices of hell" was built. The film was shot at the same time and place as Children of the Corn: Runaway, also produced by Mike Leahy; Judgment actor John Gulager directed Runaway. According to Leahy, "blood has been flowing here in Oklahoma City. These are two horror films that are going to be seen by a core audience". Another three weeks were devoted to editing, and the film's limited budget restricted the number of lengthy edits. This was followed by the implementation of color timing, sound, and music. The score was composed by Deron Johnson, who was influenced by Trent Reznor and the score of Seven. Although Tunnicliffe's original cut had cues from Christopher Young's orchestral soundtrack from Hellraiser and Hellbound, a more modern approach was adopted for budgetary reasons. The domains of hell inhabited by the Cenobites and the Stygian Inquisition were distinguished by color, with a blue palette used for the Cenobites' domain and a "piss" yellow applied to the Inquisition's. Some of the film's sexual content and violence was deemed too extreme by the studio, and was removed. Tunnicliffe said: "I don't think people could stomach my original version. The studio certainly couldn't. I could have easily made the film ten to fifteen minutes longer with a more intense cut, but it would probably be TOO much. In the end, wiser heads prevailed". Among Judgment's deleted content were a longer scene of Karl Watkins being skinned to death by the Inquisition's surgeon, and scenes involving the Cleaners. The original version of the sex scene between Sean and Alison Carter was more intense, with the camera cutting back and forth between Sean's view of his wife and visions of the Cenobites. Several false endings were conceived for the scene, including Sean's hallucination of Alison fellating him when he looks up after his orgasm to see David Carter smiling back at him. The nightmare scene in which Sean enters an alley and sees flashes of hell was originally longer and more graphic; at one point, he stumbles across Alison as part of a threesome behind a dumpster with two strange men in pig masks. Tunnicliffe wanted to use surreal imagery to convey that "Sean's world was being torn apart, undone by his experiences at the house within the hellish dimension". In Judgment's original concept pitch, the Jury eats the Assessor's regurgitated pages (not sifting through them) before handing down its verdict on the Stygian Inquisition's captives. ### Special effects The makeup-effects team was led by Mike Regan and Mike Measimer. Taylor's portrayal of Pinhead was intended to be leaner and more serious than previous incarnations, lacking the earlier films' glib one-liners. This was incorporated into the makeup and costume design, with longer silver pins, deeper blade-slice cuts, solid black eyes and a more-visceral, sleeker wardrobe. The character's original attire was replaced with a ragged robe and butcher's skirt made of chain mail. His many tools and weapons were replaced by a streamlined skinning utensil. Some grid-like cuts were rearranged from his previous design, with one square removed from each side of his jaw and one added to the back of his head. The flesh exposed on his chest was made a rhombus in honor of Leviathan, the god worshiped by the Cenobites; a homage to the Eye of Agamotto symbolism from Doctor Strange lore was integrated into the costume. The Lament Configuration was also altered, built with bleached wood and copper etching. The self-inflicted lacerations on the Auditor's face were intended to be less patterned and more chaotic than that of the more-ordered Cenobites. The facial cuts' positions were borrowed from an unsolicited redesign for Pinhead created by Tunnicliffe for Pascal Laugier's cancelled Hellraiser remake. A blood-stained shirt and threadbare two-piece suit cover the cuts on the Auditor's body. Religious symbols, implicitly torn from the necks of the guilty, are on the bracelet of his right wrist. His black spectacles convey the impression of soulless eyes. Tunnicliffe had to balance directing the film and overseeing the effects work. About the quality of the blood effects, he said: "I don't think it's so much the quantity of blood but more the nature of the effects, the content and the context. I think some of our blood gags are actually quite beautiful; when you see blood raining down on a naked girl with a skinned face at 300 frames per second you can't help but be mesmerized by the fluid dynamics". Taylor compared the simulated gore to that of the Saw series: "I think people are going to be fascinated with it and the things that are, what I would say, on the border of horror porn, there's some elements of that in it and that will please many Hellraiser fans and fans of just what contemporary horror can be these days where it's just a gross-out". He later clarified: "I think [the gore in the film] is done because of the style and aesthetics in a beautiful way. This is not masturbation, and let's just throw blood at the screen". Tunnicliffe sent pictures to the wardrobe department of what he wanted the characters to wear, and the department measured the actors. Costumes designed and built for the Cenobites were handled by Tunnicliffe's department. He chose to have certain characters nude because he thought it would look visually more interesting than designing cheap costumes. The costume department used a cast of Taylor's head to design a pin mask for him to wear as Pinhead, which covered his entire head except for his ears. Although he found the costume and makeup extremely uncomfortable, he integrated the discomfort into his performance as the sadomasochist. When he saw his reflection in the mirror in the Pinhead makeup, he said he instantly fell into the character's mindset. Taylor thought the makeup menacing enough that he had a minimalist approach to his performance, feeling that attempting to be conventionally frightening would be overacting. ## Release and marketing Hellraiser: Judgment was initially scheduled for a 2017 release. In his interview with Dread Central, Tunnicliffe stated that marketing would be kept to a minimum, aside from the promotional images and casting news that had been released: "It seems to me that any images or fodder given out in good faith are kinda twisted around – usually to the negative – so the best response really is the film itself". Harvey Weinstein is said to be too embarrassed in promoting Judgment, thus credited to delaying the film's release. Taylor gave a possible explanation in October for the delay, saying the film may not have finished post-production: "I have a reliable source who just informed me that Hellraiser: Judgment has been on a shelf for a while, unfinished. But now that Harvey Weinstein is out of the picture, Hellraiser: Judgment has been taken off that shelf and is back in post-production". Taylor expanded on his reasoning in a later interview, stating the film might not have been released if not for the sexual abuse allegations against Weinstein, which financially compromised the studio. The film's trailer and release date were released on January 9, 2018. After nearly two years of silence from Dimension Films, Lionsgate Films picked up the distribution rights for Hellraiser: Judgment and Children of the Corn: Runaway; the former was released on digital and home media platforms on February 13. In the United States and Canada, the film made a total of US\$426,290 in home media sales: US\$83,599 on DVD and US\$343,029 on Blu-ray. ## Critical response The film was favorably compared to the franchise's earlier sequels, with Brad Miska of Bloody Disgusting calling it "the most authentic Hellraiser since Bloodline." Collider's Haleigh Foutch praised its attempt to expand the Hellraiser universe, but found the execution sloppy due to a low budget and "pedestrian" human drama. Forbes critic Luke Y. Thompson wrote that it integrated the Earth and Hell scenes more effectively than previous sequels and praised the additional mythology as "the best attempt since the early, more [Clive] Barker-infused theatrical films to deliver a coherent cosmology." However, he criticized the suggested retail price of the release, recommending it only for Hellraiser fans. Although Miska found Judgment "sluggish", he noted the narrative served its purpose as a lead-in to the finale: "Everything comes full circle in the final moments, adding an entirely new dimension to the Hellraiser franchise," yet the film is "solely for Hellraiser apologists." Some critics deemed it the worst of the franchise, with The Irish Times' Tara Brady becoming pessimistic over the franchise's future, and Scott Weinberg of Thrillist giving up on it entirely, also noting that its reputation has decayed anyway, leaving Judgment with few potential buyers. Critical reviews mainly decried bland acting and storyline. Birth.Movies.Death's Scott Wampler was also disappointed by the lack of screentime for Pinhead, though he anticipated a future Tunnicliffe film "with a decent budget, or less meddling from the rights holders." Andrew Gaudion of FilmHounds additionally called it a boring copy of the 1995 thriller Seven and "half baked when it comes to constructing its central gimmick." He, and We Got This Covered's Matt Donato, found the police procedural elements generic and cliched, with the latter opining that the gore and Hell elements are inadequate; he called the film "one of the least realized, most throwaway" of the series. The film's special effects and surreal imagery received mixed reviews: Foutch and Gaudion enjoyed them, while The Guardian's Felperin calling the effects fake looking, though praised the production design; the imagery was criticized by Weinberg. Although IGN'''s William Bibbiani called the pacing "brisk," he deemed the story a faded carbon copy of other, better serial killer thrillers, and felt the new additions to the Hellraiser mythology rob the Cenobites of their deviant allure and otherworldly menace. Wampler criticized the acting, story, and lack of screentime for Pinhead, calling the film a "mixed bag with the stuff I enjoyed ultimately outweighed by the stuff I did not." Steve Barton of Dread Central disagreed, stating that the acting and story are surprisingly good: "Pinhead is omnipresent, and Taylor delivers a worthy performance and is every bit as majestic as you'd hope he'd be." ## Future Judgment expands on lore introduced in the earliest films, with Taylor calling it a jumping-off point for a sequel that tells a "true" Hellraiser script with an ambiguous ending. He said the characters in the film could be used in future installments and expressed an interest in returning as Pinhead, but stated he would also be content with a bigger-budgeted reboot starring Doug Bradley. Tunnicliffe had no particular idea for a sequel, spin-off, or follow-up of any kind when developing the film, but has since suggested a scenario where the Auditor helps Pinhead reclaim his status to overthrow an incompetent successor; a "battle of the Hell priests". In May 2019, Spyglass Media Group began to develop a reboot of the series, with David S. Goyer serving as a writer and producer alongside Gary Barber, who described the project as an "evolved" reimagining of the original film. In April 2020, writing team Ben Collins and Luke Piotrowski came on to write, with David Bruckner attached to direct. The film, Hellraiser, released in October 2022 on Hulu, with Jamie Clayton taking over the role of Pinhead. In April 2020, HBO finalized a deal with David Gordon Green to direct a Hellraiser television series, penned by Mark Verheiden and Michael Dougherty. The rights to the Stygian Inquisition remain with Tunnicliffe, who has expressed an interest in doing a novel or short story involving the Auditor or the Order of the Effluvium. Bradley is open to returning to the Pinhead role, but only with the "right place, right time, right motives, right script ... Since I turned down both movies, I knew other actors would get to play the part. I don't know about 'taking over': enjoying temporary ownership, maybe". He was interested in starring in a film version of the Hellraiser novel The Scarlet Gospels'', but is unaware of any plans for such a film.

Pinguicula moranensis

Perennial insectivorous herb in the family Lentibulariaceae

Pinguicula moranensis /pɪŋˈɡwɪkjʊlə ˌmɒrəˈnɛnsɪs/ is a perennial rosette-forming insectivorous herb in the flowering plant family Lentibulariaceae. It is native to El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras and Mexico. A species of butterwort, it forms summer rosettes of flat, succulent leaves up to 10 centimeters (4 in) long, which are covered in mucilaginous (sticky) glands that attract, trap, and digest arthropod prey. Nutrients derived from the prey are used to supplement the nutrient-poor substrate that the plant grows in. In the winter the plant forms a non-carnivorous rosette of small, fleshy leaves that conserves energy while food and moisture supplies are low. Single pink, purple, or violet flowers appear twice a year on upright stalks up to 25 centimeters long. The species was first collected by Humboldt and Bonpland on the outskirts of Mina de Morán in the Sierra de Pachuca of the modern-day Mexican state of Hidalgo on their Latin American expedition of 1799–1804. Based on these collections, Carl Sigismund Kunth described this species in Nova Genera et Species Plantarum in 1817. The extremely variable species has been redefined at least twice since, while several new species have been segregated from it based on various geographical or morphological distinctions, although the legitimacy of some of these is still debated. P. moranensis remains the most common and most widely distributed member of the Section Orcheosanthus. It has long been cultivated for its carnivorous nature and attractive flowers, and is one of the most common butterworts in cultivation. The generic name Pinguicula is derived from the Latin pinguis (meaning "fat") due to the buttery texture of the surface of the carnivorous leaves. The specific epithet moranensis refers to its type location, Mina de Moran. ## Plant characteristics ### Habit Pinguicula moranensis is seasonally dimorphic, in that it undergoes two distinct growth habits throughout the year. During the summer when rain and insect prey are most plentiful, the plant forms a ground hugging rosette composed of 6–8 generally obovate leaves, each up to 95 millimeters (3+3⁄4 in) long. These leaves are carnivorous, having a large surface area densely covered with stalked mucilaginous glands with which they attract, trap, and digest arthropod prey, most commonly flies. These so-called "summer leaves" are replaced by "winter rosettes" of small, glandless succulent leaves with the onset of the dry season in October. This protective winter rosette allows the plant to undergo winter dormancy until the first rains begin in May. Flowers born singly on upright 10–25 centimeters (4–10 in.) peduncles emerge twice during the year (from the summer rosette and again from the winter rosette), a feature rare among the Mexican species. In the summer these appear in June, peak in August and September, and disappear with the return to the winter rosette in October or November. ### Leaves and carnivory The leaf blades of the summer rosettes of P. moranensis are smooth, rigid, and succulent, varying from bright yellow-green to maroon in colour. The laminae are generally obovate to orbicular, between 5.5 and 13 centimeters (2–5 in.) long and supported by a 1 to 3.5 centimetre (3⁄8–1 3⁄8 in.) petiole. As with all members of the genus, these leaf blades are densely covered by peduncular (stalked) mucilaginous glands and sessile (flat) digestive glands. The peduncular glands consist of a few secretory cells on top of a single-celled stalk. These cells produce a mucilaginous secretion which forms visible droplets across the leaf surface. This wet appearance probably helps lure prey in search of water; a similar phenomenon is observed in the sundews. The droplets secrete only limited enzymes and serve mainly to entrap insects. On contact with an insect, the peduncular glands release additional mucilage from special reservoir cells located at the base of their stalks. The insect struggles, triggering more glands and encasing itself in mucilage. P. moranensis can bend its leaf edges slightly by thigmotropism, bringing additional glands into contact with the trapped insect. The sessile glands, which lie flat on the leaf surface, serve to digest the insect prey. Once the prey is entrapped by the peduncular glands and digestion begins, the initial flow of nitrogen triggers enzyme release by the sessile glands. These enzymes, which include amylase, esterase, phosphatase, protease, and ribonuclease break down the digestible components of the insect body. These fluids are then absorbed back into the leaf surface through cuticular holes, leaving only the chitin exoskeleton of the larger insects on the leaf surface. The holes in the cuticle which allow for this digestive mechanism pose a challenge for the plant, since they serve as breaks in the cuticle (waxy layer) that protects the plant from desiccation. As a result, P. moranensis is usually found in relatively humid environments. The production of the stalked capture glands and sessile digestive glands is also costly. A recent study found that the density of these respective glands can be correlated to environmental gradients. For example, capture gland density was found to be highest where prey availability was low, whereas digestive glands density showed direct correlation to prey availability. These results suggest that the amount of investment in carnivorous features is an adaptation to the environmental gradients. #### Winter rosette The "winter" or "resting" rosette of P. moranensis is two to three (maximum five) centimeters (3⁄4–2 in.) in diameter and consists of 60 to 100 or more small, fleshy, non-glandular leaves. These are each 10 to 30 millimeters (3⁄8–1 1⁄4 in.) long and three to eight millimeters (1⁄8–5⁄16 in.) wide, generally spatulate or oblong-spatulate, and densely covered with fine hairs. The rosette is either open or compact and bulb-like, depending on variety (see below). ### Flowers Pinguicula moranensis produces one to seven flowers during each flowering period. These are borne singly on upright flower stalks which are green to brown-green in color and usually, like the upper surface of the carnivorous leaves, are densely covered in glandular hairs; the peduncles do, in fact, trap insect prey. The peduncles are 10 to 25 centimeters (4–10 in.) long and taper from two to three millimeters (1⁄8 in.) at the base to one millimeter (1⁄16 in.) at the top. The flowers themselves are composed of five petals which are fused at one end. The throat, the portion of the flower near the attachment point which holds the reproductive organs, is funnel shaped, and the petals flare out from there into a five-lobed zygomorphic corolla. The flowers 30 to 50 millimeters (1 1⁄4–2 in.) long. Below the attachment point to the stem the petals are fused into a 15–30 millimeter long spur which protrudes backwards roughly perpendicular to the rest of the flower. The ovary and attached pistil protrude from the top of the floral tube near its opening, with the receptive stigma surface toward the front. Two 1 millimeter anthers hang from recurved, 2 millimeter filaments behind the pistil. Pollinators exiting after collecting nectar from the spur brush against the anther, transferring pollen to the stigma of the next flower they visit. The flowers can last up to 10 days but will wilt once they are pollinated. Pollinated ovaries ripen into 5 millimeter (3⁄16 in.) dehiscent seed capsules containing numerous 1 millimeter long seeds. The chromosome count for this species is 2n=44. The color and morphology of the flowers of this species is extremely variable, a source of delight to the horticulturist and headache to the taxonomist. Some generalizations, however, can be made. The corolla flares open into five lobes, two upper lobes and three lower lobes. The upper lobes are 7–16 millimeters (1⁄4–3⁄8 in.) long by 4–9 millimeters (5⁄32–3⁄8 in.) wide and generally oblong, obovate, or cuneate. The lower lobes are similarly shaped and are 7–20 millimeters (1⁄4–3⁄4 in.) long by 4–18 millimeters (5⁄32–3⁄4 in.) wide. The central lower lobe is usually slightly longer than its neighbors. All of the petal lobes have rounded ends. The floral tube that houses the reproductive organs and is visible at the base of corolla lobes is white or lilac in color and 4–6 millimeters (5⁄32–1⁄4 in.) long. The white color of the floral tube can extend to a variable distance onto the corolla lobes, particularly in a stripe on the lower middle lobe. The color of the corolla lobes generally varies from pink to purple, but has been described by collectors as being "purple, scarlet, rosy-lavender to bluish-purple, dark pink to lavender, pinkish-purple, deep violet-purple, dark purple, bright mauve-pink, bright purple-pink, magenta with [white eye], [and] reddish pale with white eye." A rare white-flowered form is also known. ## Taxonomy Sergio Zamudio Ruiz, in his 2001 revision of the section Orcheosanthus, called the identity and exact delimitation of P. moranensis "perhaps the most difficult problem to solve within the genus". This difficulty is due mainly to the high variability and large geographic distribution of the species, which has given rise to the description of many synonyms since the species was first described nearly 200 years ago. Botanists have attempted to delimitate the species through various morphological, ecological and genetic methods, though to this date some debate remains as to the placement and description of P. moranensis and its relationship to the species to which it is closely related. ### Botanical history Prior to Alexander von Humboldt and Aimé Bonpland's Latin American expedition in 1799–1804, only 8 Pinguicula species were known to science — 5 from Europe, 2 from North America and P. involuta from Peru. From 1803–1805, three additional species from Europe and North America were described, bringing the total of known species to 11. In 1817, Carl Sigismund Kunth described 3 new species from Alexander von Humboldt and Aimé Bonpland'sLatin American expedition: The Peruvian P. calyptrata and the first known Mexican species: P. macrophylla and P. moranensis. At this point no infrageneric classification had yet been suggested. In 1844, a French-Swiss botanist by the name of Alphonse Pyrame de Candolle (who created the first Code of Botanical Nomenclature) proposed a division of the genus into three sections based on floral morphology. He placed in the section Orcheosanthus those species with purple, deeply bilabiate corollas with 5 sub-equal lobes, a short floral tube, and a large spur not protruding past this tube. He included four species in this section, all of them from Mexico: P. oblongiloba, P. orchidioides, P. caudata and P. moranensis. He excluded P. macrophylla H.B.K. on the grounds that it was a "dubious species". The section Orcheosanthus grew as Charles Morren described P. flos-mulionis in 1872, Eugene Fournier added P. sodalium in 1873 and Sander proposed P. bakeriana in 1881. In 1879–1888, however, botanist William Hemsley, after studying multiple specimens in herbariums and in culture, came to the conclusion that all the taxa placed in the section Orcheosanthus up to that point belonged to the same single species. Due to doubts as to the identity of the original two species described by Kunth, Hemsley decided to use the name P. caudata Schltdl. for his conglomerate species. This name has been "indiscriminately" applied to members of the complex ever since. #### Twentieth century When Barnhart revised the family Lentibulariaceae in 1916, he recognized six species in the section Orcheosanthus, admitting however that this number was likely to change as others studied the section in the future. Sprague in 1928 proposed that the species joined by Hemsley were probably distinct, but that they were likely so interrelated that distinguishing between them would require observing characteristics that were usually or always indistinct in dried specimens. Sprague recognized eight species in the section: P. moranensis H.B.K, P. caudata Schltdl., P. oblongiloba, P. flos-mulionis, P. bakeriana, a P. moranensis-like P. rosei described by Watson in 1911, and the very distinct P. gypsicola. In 1966, Casper published the first ever monograph of the genus. He clearly defined his taxonomic organization according to a broad range of morphological and phenotypic characteristics. Casper considered P. caudata, as well as various other taxa, to be synonyms of P. moranensis. He therefore recognized only 6 species for the section Orcheosanthus: P. moranensis, P. gypsicola, P. macrophylla H.B.K., P. oblongiloba, and the two recently discovered species P. colimensis and P. cyclosecta. Since that time 14 additional species have been discovered and assigned to the section. When Zamudio redefined the section in 1999, however, he chose to include only 12 species, including all six of Casper's choices. P. moranensis, therefore, remains in the section Orcheosanthus, along with over a dozen synonyms it has inherited in its 200-year taxonomic history. ### Phylogenetics The varying importance which different authors have placed on various morphological characteristics when determining the taxonomy of the genus has long made the resulting subdivision of the genus a subject of controversy. Zamudio (2001) supported his revision of the section Orcheosanthus with a phylogenetic analysis, using 20 morphological and phenological characteristics. In 2005, Cieslak et al. conducted the first comprehensive phylogenetic analysis of the entire genus Pinguicula. Using molecular data, they were able to isolate those morphological characteristics that were synapomorphies for various groups, providing evidence for a genetically based taxonomic structure. Their overall results did not support the placement of P. moranensis in the section Orcheosanthus, rather indicating that it should be placed in the section Longitubus along with P. laueana. In further disagreement with Zamudio's 2001 revision of the section Orcheosanthus, Cieslak et al.'s phylogenetic data indicated that P. rectifolia and several unnamed taxa that had been treated as synonyms of P. moranensis are in fact a distinct complex. They isolated several morphological characteristics that could be used to differentiate between the complexes, including floral spur length (longer in P. moranensis), flower color (never with a blue tinge in P. moranensis), and the shape of the lateral corolla lobe (exhibiting a twist in P. rectifolia). A more thorough study analyzing numerous P. moranensis populations and other members of closely related taxa is needed to resolve this complex. ### Varieties After extensively studying P. moranensis in habitat, Zamudio (1999) came to the conclusion that the species could be divided into two distinct varieties, mainly on the basis of the shape of the leaves composing their winter (resting) rosettes: - Pinguicula moranensis Kunth in Humb., Bonpl. et Kunth. var. moranensis This variety has open winter rosettes composed of leaves which are spatulate in shape and have an obtuse or rounded end. It tends to grow in limestone-based substrates. - Pinguicula moranensis Kunth in Humb., Bonpl. et Kunth. var. neovolcanica This variety has a closed, bulb-like rosette of winter leaves which are acicular (pointy) at the tip. It tends to grow on igneous substrates. Zamudio also noted that these subspecies differed in their preference of soil substrate. He first noted this while attempting to find the population of plants from which Humboldt and Bonpland had collected their type specimens in 1803. Although Zamudio was able to find many populations of the species growing in the areas that Humboldt and Bonpland had visited in the vicinity if Mina de Moran, only one population, the only one growing on limestone, matched H.B.K.'s description and their type and isotype specimens now housed in the herbarium of the French national museum of natural history. The other populations in the area grew on substrate of igneous origin and more closely matched Hooker's 1846 description of P. orchidioides. These latter plants then became the new variety, P. moranensis ssp. neovolcanica. ## Distribution and habitat Pinguicula moranensis is the most widely distributed member of the Section Orcheosanthus. It is also the most common and widely distributed Pinguicula species in Mexico, being found in all the major mountain ranges except Sierra Madre Occidental and Baja California. Locations are known from the Mexican states of Tamaulipas, Guanajuato, Nuevo León, Campeche, Chiapas, Oaxaca, Puebla, Distrito Federal, Veracruz, México, Querétaro, San Luis Potosí, Morelos, Hidalgo, Guerrero, Zacatecas, Tlaxcala, Quintana Roo, and Michoacán and the Guatemalan departments of Huehuetenango, Quiché, San Marcos, Quetzaltenango, Totonicapán, Sololá, Chimaltenango, Baja Verapaz, Guatemala and El Progreso. Here it grows in mountainous regions between 800 and 3200 meters (2600–10500 ft) in altitude. Generally, the species tends to follow sedimentary outcrops of the Cretaceous period. P. moranensis var. neovolcanica, however, tends to grow on igneous rocks of the Trans-Mexican Volcanic Belt. Pinguicula moranensis most often grows in oak, pine-oak, or temperate montane woodlands. However, its distribution penetrates into tropical forests and xerophytic shrublands, as well as in gorges and canyon walls with high environmental humidity. P. moranensis prefers humid and shady environments, such as slopes by streams, gullies, or road cuts, or among leaf litter in sandy soil high in organic matter. Its ability to gather nutrients from the arthropod prey it catches allows it to grow in low-nutrient environments where other plants would usually out-compete it. As a result, it is often found in disturbed areas or on steep cliffs or hillsides. Since its roots do little more than provide anchorage, the plant requires little or no soil, and dense clusters can be found clinging onto boulders, moss or crags in rock faces, or even epiphytically on tree trunks. Common companion plants include mosses, Selaginella, ferns and other herbaceous plants, as well as canopy trees such as pines and oaks. ## Cultivation Pinguicula moranensis is one of the most popular and commonly cultivated Pinguicula, in part due to its large size, large and pretty flowers, and the ease with which it can be grown as a container plant. Most growers use an open soil mix composed of some combination of washed sand, perlite, vermiculite, peat moss, gypsum and/or decomposed granite. Soil should be kept well drained, but watered regularly with distilled water in the summer and only very rarely once the plant enters its winter rosette. The species grows readily on well-lit windowsills, under fluorescent lights, or in warm to hot greenhouses. ### Hybrids and cultivars Although no natural hybrids involving P. moranensis have been reported, the species is known to hybridize quite readily in cultivation. As a result, a number of cultivars involving the species have been registered and are recognized by the International Carnivorous Plant Society: Additionally, three clones of P. moranensis have been registered as cultivars:

Thomas Hardy (Royal Navy officer, died 1732)

Rear-Admiral Sir Thomas Hardy (13 September 1666 – 16 August 1732) was a Royal Navy officer of the late 17th and early 18th centuries. Having joined the navy sometime before 1688, Hardy's career was supported by Captain George Churchill, whom he served as first lieutenant during the Battle of Barfleur in 1692. Promoted to captain in 1693, Hardy served in the Channel Islands and off the coast of England until 1702 when he was given command of HMS Pembroke off the coast of Spain. He fought at the Battle of Cádiz, and subsequently discovered the location of the Franco-Spanish fleet through the intervention of his chaplain, which resulted in the Battle of Vigo Bay. Hardy was knighted for his services. Having commanded several ships in the Mediterranean Fleet, in 1706 Hardy was given command of a small squadron in the west of the English Channel tasked with protecting arriving merchant ships. In 1707 Hardy was sent as escort to a 200-ship convoy sailing for Lisbon. While conveying the ships he met with the squadron of René Duguay-Trouin in late August, chasing him until dusk before returning to shepherd the convoy. Hardy returned to England in September and was court martialled in the following month for not fully engaging Duguay-Trouin. He was acquitted but was further investigated by a panel from the Admiralty and committees of the Houses of Commons and Lords, which again exonerated him. Hardy became first captain to Sir John Leake in the Mediterranean in 1708, assisting in the transport of Elisabeth Christine of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel to Spain for her marriage to the important British ally Archduke Charles, and participating in the capture of Cagliari and assault on Minorca. In 1711 he was promoted to rear-admiral and given command of a squadron to blockade Dunkirk. Pushed off station by a storm, he was unable to stop a force of privateers from escaping and destroying a British convoy. After briefly serving as commander-in-chief, the Nore, Thames and Medway Hardy commanded a squadron off Ushant where he failed to intercept the squadrons of Duguay-Trouin and Jean-Baptiste du Casse in 1712. In 1715 he was second-in-command of the Baltic Fleet sent to serve in the Great Northern War. He was dismissed in 1716 possibly because, as a Tory, he continued to support the deposed House of Stuart after the succession of the House of Hanover. ## Naval career ### Early service Thomas Hardy was born on Jersey on 13 September 1666. He was the son of John le Hardy, Solicitor-General of Jersey, whose father in turn had held the same position. Coming from a naval-minded family, Hardy's first cousin was the future Vice-Admiral Sir Charles Hardy. Hardy himself joined the Royal Navy sometime before 1688, at which time he was serving as a captain's clerk to Captain George Churchill, who would go on to support Hardy in his rise through the service. By 1692 Hardy had been promoted to lieutenant, and was serving as the first lieutenant of Churchill's 96-gun ship of the line HMS St Andrew. With the Nine Years' War ongoing, he fought at the Battle of Barfleur, between 19 and 24 May. ### Initial commands On 6 January 1693 Hardy was promoted to captain and given command of the 6-gun fireship HMS Charles. In May he moved to the 18-gun frigate HMS Swallow Prize. In Swallow Prize Hardy served in the Channel Islands protecting Guernsey merchant ships from French privateers. In 1695 and 1696 he served a term as High Sheriff of Dorset. In September 1695 he was transferred into the brand new 48-gun ship of the line HMS Pendennis, which he commissioned in 1696. Serving in Captain John Benbow's squadron, he sailed from Norway protecting a convoy of ships carrying masts in October. He continued in command of Pendennis until the end of the Nine Years' War in September 1697. Hardy's next command came in May 1698 when he joined the 20-gun frigate HMS Deal Castle. This began a streak of changes in command for Hardy, with him moving to the 50-gun ship of the line HMS Coventry in April 1701 and the 60-gun ship of the line HMS Pembroke in January 1702. With the War of the Spanish Succession ongoing, in Pembroke Hardy formed part of Admiral Sir George Rooke's Grand Alliance fleet off the coast of Spain. Pembroke subsequently fought at the Battle of Cádiz, an attempt to capture Cádiz from the Spanish so that it could not be used as a base by French fleets. Rooke's fleet arrived on 12 August, with the landings beginning three days later. Pembroke and the 70-gun ship of the line HMS Lenox bombarded the fort guarding the landing location, and the Anglo-Dutch army successfully got ashore. On 25 August Pembroke was the lead ship in a probe far into the Bay of Cádiz, sailing close enough to the shore that the ship ran aground at one point. The fortifications of Cádiz proved too strong, and the army re-embarked between 15 and 16 September. After Cádiz Pembroke joined a squadron of Rooke's fleet commanded by Captain James Wishart. The squadron subsequently sailed to Lagos in Portugal to take on supplies of water. There Hardy's chaplain, also from Jersey, went ashore and was assumed by the locals to be French. The French consul boasted to him that the Spanish treasure fleet, commanded by Vice-Admiral François Louis Rousselet de Châteaurenault, had recently arrived from the West Indies and was sheltering off Vigo. The location of the Franco-Spanish fleet was passed by Hardy to Rooke on 6 October, who in response sailed the fleet to Vigo. There they fought the successful Battle of Vigo Bay on 12 October, capturing or destroying the entire enemy fleet. After the battle Rooke gave Hardy the duty of sailing to England with news of the victory. He was rewarded with a knighthood by Queen Anne on 31 October. The biographer Stephen Leake wrote of Hardy in this period that he was "so ignorant of sea affairs that he did not know one rope from another", a claim that the historian John Charnock rebuffs. In January 1703 Hardy was given a new command, the 70-gun ship of the line HMS Bedford. ### Mediterranean service Bedford was sent to serve in the Mediterranean Fleet under Admiral Sir Cloudesley Shovell. While sailing out to the Mediterranean with Shovell's fleet Hardy was given command of a squadron of four ships to gather information at Lagos. The Portuguese there were unable to provide Hardy with any intelligence of French movements, but did inform him of the size of the French fleet in Toulon. Hardy's subsequent service in the Mediterranean was un-notable, apart from his capture of a "valuable ship" sailing from Santo Domingo. In October Hardy took a squadron of three ships to Tangier, Morocco, to present some diplomatic papers, while the rest of Shovell's fleet returned to England. Having completed his task Hardy also sailed home, arriving at Plymouth on 12 November. Hardy sailed again with the Mediterranean Fleet, this time under Rooke, in January 1704. Forming part of a squadron commanded by Rear-Admiral Thomas Dilkes, Bedford cruised off the Tagus in March. Dilkes subsequently received word of a Spanish force nearby, and on 12 March the squadron attacked and captured two enemy warships and an armed merchant ship, although the surrender occurred before Hardy could reach the fight. Hardy was also not present at the capture of Gibraltar in early August, but on 13 August Bedford formed part of the force that fought the Battle of Málaga, fighting in the centre division of the fleet and having seventy-four casualties from a total crew complement of around 460. Vice-Admiral Sir John Leake took command in the Mediterranean in 1705, and Hardy joined him in February, again serving in Dilkes's squadron. Towards the end of the year Hardy returned to England and left Bedford. He was appointed to the 70-gun ship of the line HMS Kent on 13 December. In summer 1706 Kent was attached to a squadron commanded by Vice-Admiral Sir Stafford Fairborne in the Bay of Biscay. It subsequently participated in the successful siege of Ostend between June and July. ### Squadron command In October 1706 Hardy was appointed a commodore and given command of a small squadron with which to protect merchant ships travelling through the Bay of Biscay and to the west of the English Channel. Ten days after assuming command of his squadron, Hardy captured a well-known French 20-gun privateer that had itself recently captured two British merchant ships. Hardy continued in command of his squadron into 1707, contending with the poor weather in the area and occasionally escorting convoys from Ireland to England. Present in the same area was René Duguay-Trouin's marauding French squadron that had begun patrolling the Channel in June, but Duguay-Trouin moved to the coast of Portugal soon afterwards, leaving Hardy's position safe for incoming shipping. #### Convoy escort On 13 June Hardy was appointed as escort to a convoy of around 200 merchant ships intended for Lisbon, with an expanded squadron. Before Hardy could sail with the convoy his orders were modified, with his convoy expanded to protect shipping going to other locations as well. This was in response to a fear that Duguay-Trouin was still in the Channel. Hardy was to stay with the convoy until it was safely away from the Channel, and then protect shipping returning from Portugal, with his orders being updated every ten days from Plymouth. Other parts of his squadron would continue on with the different sections of the convoy to their final destinations. The convoy sailed from Spithead in the first week of July. With the winds against them the convoy made slow progress down the Channel, finally clearing it only on 24 August. With some ships having already left the fleet, Hardy had 150 merchant ships and 30 military store ships left to convoy. In the meantime Duguay-Trouin had returned to the Channel, having been unproductive off Portugal. On 27 August Hardy and the convoy were sailing off the Lizard. There they encountered Duguay-Trouin's six-ship squadron. Hardy initially set sail to attack the French force as his orders required, but after several hours of chase he decided to return to close escort of the convoy, in fear that the French would avoid him in the night and destroy the convoy while he was parted from it. This decision was made through a council of war, with fourteen captains signing the agreement to discontinue the chase. With Hardy in attendance the convoy sailed unmolested, reaching the point at which Hardy could leave them to continue their journey on 30 August. Hardy then began to fulfil the second part of his orders, patrolling off the Scilly Isles to protect returning merchant ships. They occasionally caught sight of French privateers, but these vessels stayed at a safe distance from Hardy's squadron which was slowed by heavy biological growth on their hulls. On the evening of 10 September Hardy's ships sighted the French squadron of Rear-Admiral Claude de Forbin as it made a circuitous return from capturing British and Dutch merchant ships in the White Sea. Hardy thought he had encountered Duguay-Trouin again. Hardy formed line of battle and began a chase of Forbin, but the French force was far ahead of him and by the morning of 11 September he had lost contact with them. One of Hardy's ships, the 60-gun ship of the line HMS Canterbury, encountered Forbin later on 11 September, but the French ignored the vessel, entering Brest, France, on 13 September. #### Court martial In mid-September the squadron returned to Torbay, where it was split up variously for refits and redeployments. The Lord High Admiral, Prince George of Denmark, subsequently charged Hardy with "neglect of duty" for not continuing to chase Duguay-Trouin's squadron. He was court martialled at Portsmouth on 10 October. Hardy argued that his actions were more appropriate than "to continue an uncertain chase which might give the enemy an opportunity of getting by and falling in with [the convoy] after separation". The court, headed by Leake, fully acquitted him from blame, saying that Hardy had complied with his orders to chase any French force he fell in with, and had reacted sensibly to return to the convoy. While the court martial was ongoing Duguay-Trouin continued to harry British merchant ships in the Channel, incensing the Cabinet who considered Hardy at fault for not stopping him. In November the Admiralty was ordered to review Hardy's case. A panel of admirals discussed the acquittal, and decreed that the result of an honourable court martial should be upheld. Despite this result, Hardy's actions had upset the powerful merchant community and the Whig Junto that was attempting to bring down Hardy's patron Churchill, who was serving on the Lord High Admirals Council. Hardy was brought before committees of the House of Lords and House of Commons, to be further investigated as a "test case" on the results of failures to protect merchant ships. The House of Commons committee brought forward Hardy's court martial papers to be examined on 22 November, but the evidence was found by Hardy's accusers to be unsuitable to challenge the earlier decision, and debate on the matter was quickly dropped. Hardy left Kent in January 1708. His examination before the House of Lords in February was more in-depth and included the extra charge of refusing to convoy a merchant ship from Plymouth to Portsmouth, but Hardy was again acquitted of blame. Since he had already been found innocent at his court martial, the parliamentary investigations were widely denounced as "un-English". ### Return to service Leake, influenced by Churchill, subsequently demonstrated his support of Hardy by appointing him as first captain of his flagship for the Mediterranean, the 90-gun ship of the line HMS Albemarle. Despite this sign of naval approval, Hardy's appointment was not embraced by many of Leake's inner circle, who thought him "unpopular, a coward, and an incompetent seaman". The fleet sailed from England on 6 February, but Hardy only joined it after it had reached Lisbon. From Lisbon the fleet travelled to Barcelona, Spain, whence Hardy was sent to the court of Elisabeth Christine of Brunswick-Wolfenbüttel at Vado. Elizabeth Christine was the intended wife of Britain's ally Archduke Charles of the Holy Roman Empire, who was fighting for the kingship of Spain. Hardy coordinated Elizabeth Christine's planned move to Spain with Leake's fleet. He returned on 9 June, at which point Leake moved out of Albemarle and left Hardy in command of the ship. With Albemarle Hardy was given five other ships with which to embark Elizabeth Christine. He completed this on 2 July; the fleet conveyed her to Barcelona, where she and Charles married. The fleet afterwards captured Cagliari, the capital of Sardinia, on 1 August before sailing to Minorca, which it blockaded. Soon after an allied army arrived to assault the island; Leake split off part of his fleet to assist with this, and sailed for England with the remainder, including Hardy, on 19 September. They arrived off Portland on 15 October. Continuing with Leake now in the English Channel, in December Hardy was appointed to his flagship the 100-gun ship of the line HMS Royal Sovereign, moving with Leake in May 1709 to the 80-gun ship of the line HMS Russell. They both left Russell in July. In 1710 Hardy became an elder brother of Trinity House. ### Flag rank On 27 January 1711 Hardy was promoted to rear-admiral of the blue. In April he fought a by-election to become Member of Parliament for Weymouth and Melcombe Regis as a Tory, and upon petition was granted the seat on 22 May. His naval duties would mean that he spent little time in parliament. In this period Hardy was also given command of a squadron to blockade Dunkirk, France, with Canterbury as his flagship. While cruising he captured a French merchant ship, as it attempted to sail to Newfoundland, around 26 April. The squadron arrived off Dunkirk on 21 May, driving two 20-gun privateers and an 8-gun dogger into the port. At Dunkirk a French privateer squadron was fitting out to sail, and Hardy was tasked with ensuring that it did not escape, and to intercept a convoy that was expected to arrive there from Brittany. While there he captured several small privateers. His squadron was sometime afterwards blown off station and forced to shelter in Yarmouth Roads. There on 8 August Hardy was ordered to escort a convoy destined for Russia as far as the Orkney Islands. He sailed with the ships as far as the Shetland Isles and then returned to England. From there he was sent to search for the French squadron of Jean-Baptiste du Casse, who managed to escape him. Hardy was then finally able to re-start his blockade of Dunkirk, having been told that the squadron there was ready to leave. However, before he reached Dunkirk the French escaped and captured sixteen out of twenty-two ships sailing in a convoy from Virginia, although Hardy was not blamed for this. Hardy was discussed but eventually discarded as a candidate to lead the Quebec Expedition, an attempt to capture Quebec with a fleet of warships and troopships. His squadron arrived at Plymouth on 23 October, Hardy having instead on 6 October been made commander-in-chief, the Nore, Thames and Medway. He continued in that command until the start of 1712. In January 1712 Hardy was given a new squadron, moving to serve off Ushant, with Kent as his flagship. Tasked with intercepting the squadrons of du Casse and Duguay-Trouin off Cape Finisterre he failed to stop either, but was not deemed to be at fault. In August Hardy's squadron discovered and chased a French squadron of six merchant ships. The French formed line of battle assuming that Hardy was a force of privateers, but then attempted to escape once the warships were recognised. Hardy captured four of the ships while a fifth blew up when attacked. The sixth ship was not captured. At the time of the action there was an armistice in place to allow peace negotiations to begin, and the ships were later released to avoid legal entanglements relating to their status as prizes. ### Dismissal and death The Peace of Utrecht subsequently ended the War of the Spanish Succession and Hardy relinquished his command. He lost his Weymouth seat in the 1713 election, but had the decision reversed with another petition on 3 June 1714. On 11 June he was named a manager of the Longitude Act bill, providing a reward for discovering a method to accurately measure longitude. The bill was given royal assent on 9 July. This was Hardy's only significant parliamentary committee action, although he participated at the same time in the committee for the Stranded Ships Act, which created safeguards for such vessels. In the first half of 1715 Hardy was appointed second-in-command to Admiral Sir John Norris in the Baltic Fleet sent to serve in the Great Northern War. Hardy's flagship for the operation was the 80-gun ship of the line HMS Norfolk. They sailed on 18 May, and arrived on 10 June where they joined with an allied Dutch fleet. Charnock comments that "the events of this expedition were totally uninteresting", the fleet doing little but escorting merchantmen safely into port. Hardy relinquished his position within the fleet later in the year. This was his last active service with the Royal Navy, as he was dismissed from the service in 1716 because his secondary political career was looked upon unfavourably in the wake of George I's succession. Paula Watson in The History of Parliament suggests that Hardy's dismissal came about because of a suspicion that he was a Jacobite; after the Hanoverian succession much of the Tory party was believed to be supportive of the deposed House of Stuart, and the new administration removed many from positions of power. Hardy was also not returned for his seat in the 1715 election. He continued in naval circles after his dismissal, serving two terms as Master of Trinity House between 1729 and 1730. The naval historian John Knox Laughton suggests that Hardy was reinstated in the navy and promoted to vice-admiral of the red, but there is no official report of such a promotion occurring. Hardy died on 16 August 1732, age 67, and was buried with his late wife in Westminster Abbey. His monument, designed in 1737 by Sir Henry Cheere, shows him dressed in Roman armour lying on top of a sarcophagus and is a pair to the monument to John Conduitt opposite his. ## Personal life Hardy married Constance Hook (died 28 April 1720) sometime before 1710. She was the daughter of Colonel Henry Hook, Lieutenant-Governor of Plymouth. Together the couple had three children; one son and two daughters. Hardy's son, Thomas, and his younger daughter, Charlotte, never married. His other daughter, Constance, married the politician George Chamberlayne. She inherited Hardy's estate in Middlesex upon his death. ## Notes and citations

Island of stability

Predicted set of isotopes of relatively more stable superheavy elements

In nuclear physics, the island of stability is a predicted set of isotopes of superheavy elements that may have considerably longer half-lives than known isotopes of these elements. It is predicted to appear as an "island" in the chart of nuclides, separated from known stable and long-lived primordial radionuclides. Its theoretical existence is attributed to stabilizing effects of predicted "magic numbers" of protons and neutrons in the superheavy mass region. Several predictions have been made regarding the exact location of the island of stability, though it is generally thought to center near copernicium and flerovium isotopes in the vicinity of the predicted closed neutron shell at N = 184. These models strongly suggest that the closed shell will confer further stability towards fission and alpha decay. While these effects are expected to be greatest near atomic number Z = 114 and N = 184, the region of increased stability is expected to encompass several neighboring elements, and there may also be additional islands of stability around heavier nuclei that are doubly magic (having magic numbers of both protons and neutrons). Estimates of the stability of the nuclides within the island are usually around a half-life of minutes or days; some estimates predict half-lives of millions of years. Although the nuclear shell model predicting magic numbers has existed since the 1940s, the existence of long-lived superheavy nuclides has not been definitively demonstrated. Like the rest of the superheavy elements, the nuclides within the island of stability have never been found in nature; thus, they must be created artificially in a nuclear reaction to be studied. Scientists have not found a way to carry out such a reaction, for it is likely that new types of reactions will be needed to populate nuclei near the center of the island. Nevertheless, the successful synthesis of superheavy elements up to Z = 118 (oganesson) with up to 177 neutrons demonstrates a slight stabilizing effect around elements 110 to 114 that may continue in unknown isotopes, consistent with the existence of the island of stability. ## Introduction ### Nuclide stability The composition of a nuclide (atomic nucleus) is defined by the number of protons Z and the number of neutrons N, which sum to mass number A. Proton number Z, also named the atomic number, determines the position of an element in the periodic table. The approximately 3300 known nuclides are commonly represented in a chart with Z and N for its axes and the half-life for radioactive decay indicated for each unstable nuclide (see figure). As of 2019, 251 nuclides are observed to be stable (having never been observed to decay); generally, as the number of protons increases, stable nuclei have a higher neutron–proton ratio (more neutrons per proton). The last element in the periodic table that has a stable isotope is lead (Z = 82), with stability (i.e., half-lives of the longest-lived isotopes) generally decreasing in heavier elements, especially beyond curium (Z = 96). The half-lives of nuclei also decrease when there is a lopsided neutron–proton ratio, such that the resulting nuclei have too few or too many neutrons to be stable. The stability of a nucleus is determined by its binding energy, higher binding energy conferring greater stability. The binding energy per nucleon increases with atomic number to a broad plateau around A = 60, then declines. If a nucleus can be split into two parts that have a lower total energy (a consequence of the mass defect resulting from greater binding energy), it is unstable. The nucleus can hold together for a finite time because there is a potential barrier opposing the split, but this barrier can be crossed by quantum tunneling. The lower the barrier and the masses of the fragments, the greater the probability per unit time of a split. Protons in a nucleus are bound together by the strong force, which counterbalances the Coulomb repulsion between positively charged protons. In heavier nuclei, larger numbers of uncharged neutrons are needed to reduce repulsion and confer additional stability. Even so, as physicists started to synthesize elements that are not found in nature, they found the stability decreased as the nuclei became heavier. Thus, they speculated that the periodic table might come to an end. The discoverers of plutonium (element 94) considered naming it "ultimium", thinking it was the last. Following the discoveries of heavier elements, of which some decayed in microseconds, it then seemed that instability with respect to spontaneous fission would limit the existence of heavier elements. In 1939, an upper limit of potential element synthesis was estimated around element 104, and following the first discoveries of transactinide elements in the early 1960s, this upper limit prediction was extended to element 108. ### Magic numbers As early as 1914, the possible existence of superheavy elements with atomic numbers well beyond that of uranium—then the heaviest known element—was suggested, when German physicist Richard Swinne proposed that superheavy elements around Z = 108 were a source of radiation in cosmic rays. Although he did not make any definitive observations, he hypothesized in 1931 that transuranium elements around Z = 100 or Z = 108 may be relatively long-lived and possibly exist in nature. In 1955, American physicist John Archibald Wheeler also proposed the existence of these elements; he is credited with the first usage of the term "superheavy element" in a 1958 paper published with Frederick Werner. This idea did not attract wide interest until a decade later, after improvements in the nuclear shell model. In this model, the atomic nucleus is built up in "shells", analogous to electron shells in atoms. Independently of each other, neutrons and protons have energy levels that are normally close together, but after a given shell is filled, it takes substantially more energy to start filling the next. Thus, the binding energy per nucleon reaches a local maximum and nuclei with filled shells are more stable than those without. This theory of a nuclear shell model originates in the 1930s, but it was not until 1949 that German physicists Maria Goeppert Mayer and Johannes Hans Daniel Jensen et al. independently devised the correct formulation. The numbers of nucleons for which shells are filled are called magic numbers. Magic numbers of 2, 8, 20, 28, 50, 82 and 126 have been observed for neutrons, and the next number is predicted to be 184. Protons share the first six of these magic numbers, and 126 has been predicted as a magic proton number since the 1940s. Nuclides with a magic number of each—such as ¹⁶O (Z = 8, N = 8), ¹³²Sn (Z = 50, N = 82), and ²⁰⁸Pb (Z = 82, N = 126)—are referred to as "doubly magic" and are more stable than nearby nuclides as a result of greater binding energies. In the late 1960s, more sophisticated shell models were formulated by American physicist William Myers and Polish physicist Władysław Świątecki, and independently by German physicist Heiner Meldner (1939–2019). With these models, taking into account Coulomb repulsion, Meldner predicted that the next proton magic number may be 114 instead of 126. Myers and Świątecki appear to have coined the term "island of stability", and American chemist Glenn Seaborg, later a discoverer of many of the superheavy elements, quickly adopted the term and promoted it. Myers and Świątecki also proposed that some superheavy nuclei would be longer-lived as a consequence of higher fission barriers. Further improvements in the nuclear shell model by Soviet physicist Vilen Strutinsky led to the emergence of the macroscopic–microscopic method, a nuclear mass model that takes into consideration both smooth trends characteristic of the liquid drop model and local fluctuations such as shell effects. This approach enabled Swedish physicist Sven Nilsson et al., as well as other groups, to make the first detailed calculations of the stability of nuclei within the island. With the emergence of this model, Strutinsky, Nilsson, and other groups argued for the existence of the doubly magic nuclide ²⁹⁸Fl (Z = 114, N = 184), rather than ³¹⁰Ubh (Z = 126, N = 184) which was predicted to be doubly magic as early as 1957. Subsequently, estimates of the proton magic number have ranged from 114 to 126, and there is still no consensus. ## Discoveries Interest in a possible island of stability grew throughout the 1960s, as some calculations suggested that it might contain nuclides with half-lives of billions of years. They were also predicted to be especially stable against spontaneous fission in spite of their high atomic mass. It was thought that if such elements exist and are sufficiently long-lived, there may be several novel applications as a consequence of their nuclear and chemical properties. These include use in particle accelerators as neutron sources, in nuclear weapons as a consequence of their predicted low critical masses and high number of neutrons emitted per fission, and as nuclear fuel to power space missions. These speculations led many researchers to conduct searches for superheavy elements in the 1960s and 1970s, both in nature and through nucleosynthesis in particle accelerators. During the 1970s, many searches for long-lived superheavy nuclei were conducted. Experiments aimed at synthesizing elements ranging in atomic number from 110 to 127 were conducted at laboratories around the world. These elements were sought in fusion-evaporation reactions, in which a heavy target made of one nuclide is irradiated by accelerated ions of another in a cyclotron, and new nuclides are produced after these nuclei fuse and the resulting excited system releases energy by evaporating several particles (usually protons, neutrons, or alpha particles). These reactions are divided into "cold" and "hot" fusion, which respectively create systems with lower and higher excitation energies; this affects the yield of the reaction. For example, the reaction between ²⁴⁸Cm and ⁴⁰Ar was expected to yield isotopes of element 114, and that between ²³²Th and ⁸⁴Kr was expected to yield isotopes of element 126. None of these attempts were successful, indicating that such experiments may have been insufficiently sensitive if reaction cross sections were low—resulting in lower yields—or that any nuclei reachable via such fusion-evaporation reactions might be too short-lived for detection. Subsequent successful experiments reveal that half-lives and cross sections indeed decrease with increasing atomic number, resulting in the synthesis of only a few short-lived atoms of the heaviest elements in each experiment; as of 2022, the highest reported cross section for a superheavy nuclide near the island of stability is for ²⁸⁸Mc in the reaction between ²⁴³Am and ⁴⁸Ca. Similar searches in nature were also unsuccessful, suggesting that if superheavy elements do exist in nature, their abundance is less than 10⁻¹⁴ moles of superheavy elements per mole of ore. Despite these unsuccessful attempts to observe long-lived superheavy nuclei, new superheavy elements were synthesized every few years in laboratories through light-ion bombardment and cold fusion reactions; rutherfordium, the first transactinide, was discovered in 1969, and copernicium, eight protons closer to the island of stability predicted at Z = 114, was reached by 1996. Even though the half-lives of these nuclei are very short (on the order of seconds), the very existence of elements heavier than rutherfordium is indicative of stabilizing effects thought to be caused by closed shells; a model not considering such effects would forbid the existence of these elements due to rapid spontaneous fission. Flerovium, with the expected magic 114 protons, was first synthesized in 1998 at the Joint Institute for Nuclear Research in Dubna, Russia, by a group of physicists led by Yuri Oganessian. A single atom of element 114 was detected, with a lifetime of 30.4 seconds, and its decay products had half-lives measurable in minutes. Because the produced nuclei underwent alpha decay rather than fission, and the half-lives were several orders of magnitude longer than those previously predicted or observed for superheavy elements, this event was seen as a "textbook example" of a decay chain characteristic of the island of stability, providing strong evidence for the existence of the island of stability in this region. Even though the original 1998 chain was not observed again, and its assignment remains uncertain, further successful experiments in the next two decades led to the discovery of all elements up to oganesson, whose half-lives were found to exceed initially predicted values; these decay properties further support the presence of the island of stability. However, a 2021 study on the decay chains of flerovium isotopes suggests that there is no strong stabilizing effect from Z = 114 in the region of known nuclei (N = 174), and that extra stability would be predominantly a consequence of the neutron shell closure. Although known nuclei still fall several neutrons short of N = 184 where maximum stability is expected (the most neutron-rich confirmed nuclei, ²⁹³Lv and ²⁹⁴Ts, only reach N = 177), and the exact location of the center of the island remains unknown, the trend of increasing stability closer to N = 184 has been demonstrated. For example, the isotope ²⁸⁵Cn, with eight more neutrons than ²⁷⁷Cn, has a half-life almost five orders of magnitude longer. This trend is expected to continue into unknown heavier isotopes in the vicinity of the shell closure. ### Deformed nuclei Though nuclei within the island of stability around N = 184 are predicted to be spherical, studies from the early 1990s—beginning with Polish physicists Zygmunt Patyk and Adam Sobiczewski in 1991—suggest that some superheavy elements do not have perfectly spherical nuclei. A change in the shape of the nucleus changes the position of neutrons and protons in the shell. Research indicates that large nuclei farther from spherical magic numbers are deformed, causing magic numbers to shift or new magic numbers to appear. Current theoretical investigation indicates that in the region Z = 106–108 and N ≈ 160–164, nuclei may be more resistant to fission as a consequence of shell effects for deformed nuclei; thus, such superheavy nuclei would only undergo alpha decay. Hassium-270 is now believed to be a doubly magic deformed nucleus, with deformed magic numbers Z = 108 and N = 162. It has a half-life of 9 seconds. This is consistent with models that take into account the deformed nature of nuclei intermediate between the actinides and island of stability near N = 184, in which a stability "peninsula" emerges at deformed magic numbers Z = 108 and N = 162. Determination of the decay properties of neighboring hassium and seaborgium isotopes near N = 162 provides further strong evidence for this region of relative stability in deformed nuclei. This also strongly suggests that the island of stability (for spherical nuclei) is not completely isolated from the region of stable nuclei, but rather that both regions are instead linked through an isthmus of relatively stable deformed nuclei. ## Predicted decay properties The half-lives of nuclei in the island of stability itself are unknown since none of the nuclides that would be "on the island" have been observed. Many physicists believe that the half-lives of these nuclei are relatively short, on the order of minutes or days. Some theoretical calculations indicate that their half-lives may be long, on the order of 100 years, or possibly as long as 10⁹ years. The shell closure at N = 184 is predicted to result in longer partial half-lives for alpha decay and spontaneous fission. It is believed that the shell closure will result in higher fission barriers for nuclei around ²⁹⁸Fl, strongly hindering fission and perhaps resulting in fission half-lives 30 orders of magnitude greater than those of nuclei unaffected by the shell closure. For example, the neutron-deficient isotope ²⁸⁴Fl (with N = 170) undergoes fission with a half-life of 2.5 milliseconds, and is thought to be one of the most neutron-deficient nuclides with increased stability in the vicinity of the N = 184 shell closure. Beyond this point, some undiscovered isotopes are predicted to undergo fission with still shorter half-lives, limiting the existence and possible observation of superheavy nuclei far from the island of stability (namely for N \< 170 as well as for Z \> 120 and N \> 184). These nuclei may undergo alpha decay or spontaneous fission in microseconds or less, with some fission half-lives estimated on the order of 10⁻²⁰ seconds in the absence of fission barriers. In contrast, ²⁹⁸Fl (predicted to lie within the region of maximum shell effects) may have a much longer spontaneous fission half-life, possibly on the order of 10¹⁹ years. In the center of the island, there may be competition between alpha decay and spontaneous fission, though the exact ratio is model-dependent. The alpha decay half-lives of 1700 nuclei with 100 ≤ Z ≤ 130 have been calculated in a quantum tunneling model with both experimental and theoretical alpha decay Q-values, and are in agreement with observed half-lives for some of the heaviest isotopes. The longest-lived nuclides are also predicted to lie on the beta-stability line, for beta decay is predicted to compete with the other decay modes near the predicted center of the island, especially for isotopes of elements 111–115. Unlike other decay modes predicted for these nuclides, beta decay does not change the mass number. Instead, a neutron is converted into a proton or vice versa, producing an adjacent isobar closer to the center of stability (the isobar with the lowest mass excess). For example, significant beta decay branches may exist in nuclides such as ²⁹¹Fl and ²⁹¹Nh; these nuclides have only a few more neutrons than known nuclides, and might decay via a "narrow pathway" towards the center of the island of stability. The possible role of beta decay is highly uncertain, as some isotopes of these elements (such as ²⁹⁰Fl and ²⁹³Mc) are predicted to have shorter partial half-lives for alpha decay. Beta decay would reduce competition and would result in alpha decay remaining the dominant decay channel, unless additional stability towards alpha decay exists in superdeformed isomers of these nuclides. Considering all decay modes, various models indicate a shift of the center of the island (i.e., the longest-living nuclide) from ²⁹⁸Fl to a lower atomic number, and competition between alpha decay and spontaneous fission in these nuclides; these include 100-year half-lives for ²⁹¹Cn and ²⁹³Cn, a 1000-year half-life for ²⁹⁶Cn, a 300-year half-life for ²⁹⁴Ds, and a 3500-year half-life for ²⁹³Ds, with ²⁹⁴Ds and ²⁹⁶Cn exactly at the N = 184 shell closure. It has also been posited that this region of enhanced stability for elements with 112 ≤ Z ≤ 118 may instead be a consequence of nuclear deformation, and that the true center of the island of stability for spherical superheavy nuclei lies around ³⁰⁶Ubb (Z = 122, N = 184). This model defines the island of stability as the region with the greatest resistance to fission rather than the longest total half-lives; the nuclide ³⁰⁶Ubb is still predicted to have a short half-life with respect to alpha decay. The island of stability for spherical nuclei may also be a "coral reef" (i.e., a broad region of increased stability without a clear "peak") around N = 184 and 114 ≤ Z ≤ 120, with half-lives rapidly decreasing at higher atomic number, due to combined effects from proton and neutron shell closures. Another potentially significant decay mode for the heaviest superheavy elements was proposed to be cluster decay by Romanian physicists Dorin N. Poenaru and Radu A. Gherghescu and German physicist Walter Greiner. Its branching ratio relative to alpha decay is expected to increase with atomic number such that it may compete with alpha decay around Z = 120, and perhaps become the dominant decay mode for heavier nuclides around Z = 124. As such, it is expected to play a larger role beyond the center of the island of stability (though still influenced by shell effects), unless the center of the island lies at a higher atomic number than predicted. ## Possible natural occurrence Even though half-lives of hundreds or thousands of years would be relatively long for superheavy elements, they are far too short for any such nuclides to exist primordially on Earth. Additionally, instability of nuclei intermediate between primordial actinides (²³²Th, ²³⁵U, and ²³⁸U) and the island of stability may inhibit production of nuclei within the island in r-process nucleosynthesis. Various models suggest that spontaneous fission will be the dominant decay mode of nuclei with A \> 280, and that neutron-induced or beta-delayed fission—respectively neutron capture and beta decay immediately followed by fission—will become the primary reaction channels. As a result, beta decay towards the island of stability may only occur within a very narrow path or may be entirely blocked by fission, thus precluding the synthesis of nuclides within the island. The non-observation of superheavy nuclides such as ²⁹²Hs and ²⁹⁸Fl in nature is thought to be a consequence of a low yield in the r-process resulting from this mechanism, as well as half-lives too short to allow measurable quantities to persist in nature. Various studies utilizing accelerator mass spectroscopy and crystal scintillators have reported upper limits of the natural abundance of such long-lived superheavy nuclei on the order of 10⁻¹⁴ relative to their stable homologs. Despite these obstacles to their synthesis, a 2013 study published by a group of Russian physicists led by Valeriy Zagrebaev proposes that the longest-lived copernicium isotopes may occur at an abundance of 10⁻¹² relative to lead, whereby they may be detectable in cosmic rays. Similarly, in a 2013 experiment, a group of Russian physicists led by Aleksandr Bagulya reported the possible observation of three cosmogenic superheavy nuclei in olivine crystals in meteorites. The atomic number of these nuclei was estimated to be between 105 and 130, with one nucleus likely constrained between 113 and 129, and their lifetimes were estimated to be at least 3,000 years. Although this observation has yet to be confirmed in independent studies, it strongly suggests the existence of the island of stability, and is consistent with theoretical calculations of half-lives of these nuclides. The decay of heavy, long-lived elements in the island of stability is a proposed explanation for the unusual presence of the short-lived radioactive isotopes observed in Przybylski's Star. ## Synthesis and difficulties The manufacture of nuclei on the island of stability proves to be very difficult because the nuclei available as starting materials do not deliver the necessary sum of neutrons. Radioactive ion beams (such as ⁴⁴S) in combination with actinide targets (such as ²⁴⁸Cm) may allow the production of more neutron rich nuclei nearer to the center of the island of stability, though such beams are not currently available in the required intensities to conduct such experiments. Several heavier isotopes such as ²⁵⁰Cm and ²⁵⁴Es may still be usable as targets, allowing the production of isotopes with one or two more neutrons than known isotopes, though the production of several milligrams of these rare isotopes to create a target is difficult. It may also be possible to probe alternative reaction channels in the same ⁴⁸Ca-induced fusion-evaporation reactions that populate the most neutron-rich known isotopes, namely those at a lower excitation energy (resulting in fewer neutrons being emitted during de-excitation), or those involving evaporation of charged particles (pxn, evaporating a proton and several neutrons, or αxn, evaporating an alpha particle and several neutrons). This may allow the synthesis of neutron-enriched isotopes of elements 111–117. Although the predicted cross sections are on the order of 1–900 fb, smaller than when only neutrons are evaporated (xn channels), it may still be possible to generate otherwise unreachable isotopes of superheavy elements in these reactions. Some of these heavier isotopes (such as ²⁹¹Mc, ²⁹¹Fl, and ²⁹¹Nh) may also undergo electron capture (converting a proton into a neutron) in addition to alpha decay with relatively long half-lives, decaying to nuclei such as ²⁹¹Cn that are predicted to lie near the center of the island of stability. However, this remains largely hypothetical as no superheavy nuclei near the beta-stability line have yet been synthesized and predictions of their properties vary considerably across different models. The process of slow neutron capture used to produce nuclides as heavy as ²⁵⁷Fm is blocked by short-lived isotopes of fermium that undergo spontaneous fission (for example, ²⁵⁸Fm has a half-life of 370 μs); this is known as the "fermium gap" and prevents the synthesis of heavier elements in such a reaction. It might be possible to bypass this gap, as well as another predicted region of instability around A = 275 and Z = 104–108, in a series of controlled nuclear explosions with a higher neutron flux (about a thousand times greater than fluxes in existing reactors) that mimics the astrophysical r-process. First proposed in 1972 by Meldner, such a reaction might enable the production of macroscopic quantities of superheavy elements within the island of stability; the role of fission in intermediate superheavy nuclides is highly uncertain, and may strongly influence the yield of such a reaction. It may also be possible to generate isotopes in the island of stability such as ²⁹⁸Fl in multi-nucleon transfer reactions in low-energy collisions of actinide nuclei (such as ²³⁸U and ²⁴⁸Cm). This inverse quasifission (partial fusion followed by fission, with a shift away from mass equilibrium that results in more asymmetric products) mechanism may provide a path to the island of stability if shell effects around Z = 114 are sufficiently strong, though lighter elements such as nobelium and seaborgium (Z = 102–106) are predicted to have higher yields. Preliminary studies of the ²³⁸U + ²³⁸U and ²³⁸U + ²⁴⁸Cm transfer reactions have failed to produce elements heavier than mendelevium (Z = 101), though the increased yield in the latter reaction suggests that the use of even heavier targets such as ²⁵⁴Es (if available) may enable production of superheavy elements. This result is supported by a later calculation suggesting that the yield of superheavy nuclides (with Z ≤ 109) will likely be higher in transfer reactions using heavier targets. A 2018 study of the ²³⁸U + ²³²Th reaction at the Texas A&M Cyclotron Institute by Sara Wuenschel et al. found several unknown alpha decays that may possibly be attributed to new, neutron-rich isotopes of superheavy elements with 104 \< Z \< 116, though further research is required to unambiguously determine the atomic number of the products. This result strongly suggests that shell effects have a significant influence on cross sections, and that the island of stability could possibly be reached in future experiments with transfer reactions. ## Other islands of stability Further shell closures beyond the main island of stability in the vicinity of Z = 112–114 may give rise to additional islands of stability. Although predictions for the location of the next magic numbers vary considerably, two significant islands are thought to exist around heavier doubly magic nuclei; the first near ³⁵⁴126 (with 228 neutrons) and the second near ⁴⁷²164 or ⁴⁸²164 (with 308 or 318 neutrons). Nuclides within these two islands of stability might be especially resistant to spontaneous fission and have alpha decay half-lives measurable in years, thus having comparable stability to elements in the vicinity of flerovium. Other regions of relative stability may also appear with weaker proton shell closures in beta-stable nuclides; such possibilities include regions near ³⁴²126 and ⁴⁶²154. Substantially greater electromagnetic repulsion between protons in such heavy nuclei may greatly reduce their stability, and possibly restrict their existence to localized islands in the vicinity of shell effects. This may have the consequence of isolating these islands from the main chart of nuclides, as intermediate nuclides and perhaps elements in a "sea of instability" would rapidly undergo fission and essentially be nonexistent. It is also possible that beyond a region of relative stability around element 126, heavier nuclei would lie beyond a fission threshold given by the liquid drop model and thus undergo fission with very short lifetimes, rendering them essentially nonexistent even in the vicinity of greater magic numbers. It has also been posited that in the region beyond A \> 300, an entire "continent of stability" consisting of a hypothetical phase of stable quark matter, comprising freely flowing up and down quarks rather than quarks bound into protons and neutrons, may exist. Such a form of matter is theorized to be a ground state of baryonic matter with a greater binding energy per baryon than nuclear matter, favoring the decay of nuclear matter beyond this mass threshold into quark matter. If this state of matter exists, it could possibly be synthesized in the same fusion reactions leading to normal superheavy nuclei, and would be stabilized against fission as a consequence of its stronger binding that is enough to overcome Coulomb repulsion. ## See also - Island of inversion - Table of nuclides

1994–95 Gillingham F.C. season

During the 1994–95 English football season, Gillingham F.C. competed in the Football League Third Division, the fourth tier of the English football league system. It was the 63rd season in which Gillingham competed in the Football League, and the 45th since the club was voted back into the league in 1950. In January 1995, after several seasons spent near the bottom of the Football League and nearly a decade of financial difficulties, the club was declared insolvent and placed in receivership. Mike Flanagan was made redundant as the club's manager and replaced by player-coach Neil Smillie for the remainder of the season. Gillingham finished the season 19th in the Third Division, but the club's continued existence remained in doubt until June, when it was purchased by businessman Paul Scally. In addition to the Football League, Gillingham competed in three knock-out competitions. The team reached the third round of the FA Cup, at which stage they lost to Sheffield Wednesday of the FA Premier League, and the second round of the Football League Trophy, but were eliminated at the earliest stage of the Football League Cup. Gillingham played a total of 50 competitive matches, winning 12, drawing 12, and losing 26. Chris Pike was the team's leading goalscorer with 18 goals. Paul Watson made the most appearances, playing 47 times. The highest attendance recorded at the club's home ground, Priestfield Stadium, was 10,425, for the FA Cup game against Sheffield Wednesday. The lowest attendance was 963, for a Football League Trophy game against Brighton & Hove Albion, which was the smallest crowd recorded for a competitive match at Priestfield for more than 20 years. ## Background and pre-season The 1994–95 season was Gillingham's 63rd season playing in the Football League and the 45th since the club was elected back into the League in 1950 after being voted out in 1938. It was the club's sixth consecutive season in the English football league system's fourth tier, which had been named the Football League Third Division since 1992. Since being relegated to the fourth tier in 1989, Gillingham had only once finished in the top half of the league table, with a low point in the 1992–93 season when the team finished 21st out of 22 teams and narrowly avoided being relegated into non-League football. In the 1993–94 season, Gillingham had finished 16th. At the start of the 1994–95 season, Mike Flanagan was the club's manager, a position he had held since the summer of 1993. He was assisted by Neil Smillie, who held the position of player-coach. Adrian Foster, a forward, was the only new player to join the club before the start of the season, arriving from Torquay United for a transfer fee of . Gillingham lost their top goalscorer of the previous season, however, as Nicky Forster rejected the offer of a new contract and left to join Brentford of the Second Division, for which Gillingham received a fee of . The team prepared for the new season with a number of friendly matches, including a testimonial match for Ron Hillyard, who played for the club from 1974 until 1990, and a match to mark the club's centenary, which had been celebrated during the preceding season. Arsenal of the FA Premier League provided the opposition for the centenary match; the same club, then known as Woolwich Arsenal, had been the opposition in the first match contested by Gillingham, then known as New Brompton, in 1893. The previous season's kit was retained for a further year. It had been designed to mark the club's centenary and added panels of black and white stripes to the usual blue shirts, which were worn with white shorts and socks; the club's original shirts when it was founded in 1893 featured black and white stripes. The second-choice kit, to be worn in the event of a clash of colours with the opposition, was all red with similar black and white panels on the shirts. ## Third Division ### August–December Gillingham's first match was at home to Hartlepool United and resulted in a goalless draw. Foster made his debut, but had to be substituted after injuring his ankle. Although he was able to continue playing for two weeks, the injury then recurred and kept him out of the team until November. He scored his first goal for the team in the second league match of the season, a 3–0 victory away to Wigan Athletic; this was Gillingham's biggest win away from home for more than three years. The team extended their unbeaten run from the start of the season to three games with a 1–1 draw at home to Rochdale but then lost away games against Scunthorpe United and Exeter City. In Foster's absence, Andy Arnott was brought into the starting line-up against Scunthorpe for the first time since the opening game of the season. Neither he nor fellow forward Paul Baker were able to score against Scunthorpe or Exeter, however, and Gillingham lost both games 3–0. In response to the lack of goals, Flanagan signed Scottish forward Paul Ritchie on loan from Dundee. It was the second loan spell at Priestfield Stadium for Ritchie, who had played six Third Division games for Gillingham in 1993. He scored on his second debut for Gillingham to help the team to a 3–1 win at home to Scarborough on 10 September. Gillingham then began a run of consecutive defeats, losing at home to Preston North End and away to Hartlepool and Walsall. With Foster still out of action and Ritchie due to return to Dundee, Flanagan signed experienced Welsh forward Chris Pike from Hereford United for ; he made his debut on 1 October at home to Mansfield Town. The match resulted in a fourth consecutive league defeat, leaving Gillingham 20th in the table, only two places off the bottom of the entire Football League. A week later, Pike scored his first goal at home to Torquay United as Gillingham won 1–0 to end the run of defeats. He scored four more goals in the next four games, which resulted in two defeats, one win, and one draw, after which Gillingham had risen to 17th in the table. Gillingham extended their unbeaten league run to four games with two more draws in the last two games of November, but then began December with consecutive defeats at home to Wigan Athletic and away to Rochdale. Paul Watson, the only player to have played in every game up to this point in the season, was sent off in the defeat to Wigan. Foster scored his first goal since August against Rochdale. Gillingham ended the year by playing three games in six days. On Boxing Day the team won 4–1 at home to Fulham, the first time Gillingham had scored four goals in a game for nearly two years. The attendance of 4,737 would prove to be the largest of the season for a Third Division game at Priestfield. The following day Gillingham lost 1–0 away to Barnet. The team's final match of 1994 was a 1–0 defeat at home to Carlisle United on New Year's Eve; Gillingham finished the year 18th in the table. Although the team had only lost 3 of 10 league games at Priestfield up to this point in the season, their league position suffered from the fact that they had only won once and drawn twice in 11 games on their opponents' grounds, the worst away record in the division. ### January–May On 9 January, after nearly a decade of financial difficulties and with debts estimated at £2 million (equivalent to £ million in ), the club was declared insolvent and placed in receivership. Administrators from accountants Kidsons Impey took over the day-to-day running of the club while searching for a buyer. The first game after this announcement was away to Northampton Town and resulted in a 2–0 defeat for Gillingham, the team's third consecutive league defeat. The next game, which did not take place until 4 February due to the postponement of two scheduled matches, was a goalless draw at home to Lincoln City, the fourth consecutive league game in which the team had failed to score; the result meant that Gillingham had again slipped to 20th in the table. The team ended the goalless run with a 2–1 victory away to Doncaster Rovers in the first game of February, Pike scoring twice. It was the first time Gillingham had won away from home in the Third Division since August. The team's form away from home remained poor, however; they played three further away matches during February, against Chesterfield, Darlington and Mansfield Town, and lost all three without scoring a goal. On 28 February, three days after Gillingham lost to Mansfield, the administrators made Flanagan redundant as a cost-saving measure; Smillie was appointed player-manager for the remainder of the season. His first game in charge resulted in a 3–1 defeat at home to Walsall. Following this game, however, Gillingham did not lose for five games, their longest unbeaten run of the season. The sequence began with a 0–0 draw away to Scarborough, only the second time in the last eight away games that Gillingham had not lost, and continued with a 2–2 draw at home to Scunthorpe United. Gillingham then won 3–0 at home to Exeter City, another team struggling near the foot of the division, before achieving draws away to Preston North End and at home to Bury. In the game at Preston, defender Joe Dunne scored his only goal in over 130 games played for Gillingham between 1990 and 1996. Steve Brown, newly signed from Colchester United in a player exchange deal under which Robbie Reinelt was transferred in the opposite direction, made his debut against Bury in place of Pike and scored Gillingham's goal; Brown would start every game for the remainder of the season, paired with either Foster or Pike. The unbeaten run ended with a defeat away to Carlisle United, which was followed three days later by another at home to Colchester. Gillingham beat Barnet 2–1 at Priestfield on 15 April to climb slightly to 18th in the table, but two days later lost 1–0 away to Fulham. On 22 April, Pike achieved the team's only hat-trick of the season, scoring three times in a 4–2 win over Doncaster Rovers. The final home game of the season was a goalless draw with Hereford United; at the end of the game the Gillingham fans invaded the pitch to mark what many believed could be the last game ever played at Priestfield due to the club's still-unresolved financial issues. Gillingham's last game of the season was away to Torquay United and resulted in a 3–1 defeat, which meant that Gillingham finished 19th in the 22-team Third Division. Even if they had finished bottom (which would normally have resulted in relegation into non-League football) they would have retained their League status as Macclesfield Town, who won the fifth-tier Football Conference, were ineligible for promotion because their stadium did not meet the required standard. ### Match details Key - In result column, Gillingham's score shown first - H = Home match - A = Away match - pen. = Penalty kick - o.g. = Own goal ### Partial league table ## Cup matches ### FA Cup As a Third Division team, Gillingham entered the 1994–95 FA Cup in the first round and were paired with Heybridge Swifts of the Isthmian League First Division, three levels lower in the English football league system. Heybridge had progressed through five qualifying rounds to reach this stage of the competition for the first time. Due to Heybridge's stadium failing to meet the requirements for this stage of the competition, the match was played at Colchester United's Layer Road ground. Gillingham defeated their semi-professional opponents 2–0. In the second round, they played fellow Third Division team Fulham at Priestfield; the initial match finished 1–1, necessitating a replay at Fulham's Craven Cottage stadium. The replay also finished 1–1 but the rules of the competition meant that on this occasion extra time was played; Reinelt scored the winning goal during the extra period. In the third round, Gillingham played Sheffield Wednesday of the Premier League; the match drew a crowd of 10,425, the largest attendance recorded at Priestfield since 1987. Sheffield Wednesday took a 2–0 lead in the first half and, despite having their starting goalkeeper, Kevin Pressman, sent off and Pike scoring from a penalty kick, the Premier League team held on for a 2–1 victory. David Hunn of the Sunday Times wrote that Gillingham "dashed incessantly at their mighty but depleted visitors" and "went hell for leather for the equaliser" but were thwarted by substitute goalkeeper Lance Key. #### Match details Key - In result column, Gillingham's score shown first - H = Home match - A = Away match - pen. = Penalty kick - o.g. = Own goal a\. The match was played at Colchester United's Layer Road ground, but remained officially a home game for Heybridge rather than being considered to have taken place at a neutral venue. ### Football League Cup As a Third Division team, Gillingham entered the 1994–95 Football League Cup in the first round and were paired with Reading of the Football League First Division, the second tier of English football. Gillingham lost the first leg of the two-legged tie 1–0 and the second 3–0 and were eliminated from the competition by an aggregate score of 4–0. #### Match details Key - In result column, Gillingham's score shown first - H = Home match - A = Away match - pen. = Penalty kick - o.g. = Own goal ### Football League Trophy The 1994–95 Football League Trophy, a tournament exclusively for Second and Third Division teams, began with a round in which the teams were drawn into groups of three, contested on a round-robin basis. Gillingham were grouped with Brentford and Brighton & Hove Albion, both of the Second Division. Gillingham's first match was at home to Brighton and resulted in a 1–1 draw; the game drew an attendance of only 963, the lowest crowd for a competitive match at Priestfield since 1973. Gillingham's second group match was away to Brentford, who had already won their match against Brighton to top the group with maximum points from their two games. Gillingham lost 3–1 and finished the group stage with one point, the same as Brighton, but Pike's goal meant that his team finished second and qualified for the next round as they had scored more goals in total than Brighton. Gillingham's opponents in the second round were Birmingham City, another Second Division team. The game was played at Birmingham's St Andrew's stadium and drew a crowd of 17,028, by far the largest attendance for a match involving Gillingham during the season. Birmingham won 3–0 to eliminate Gillingham from the competition. #### Match details Key - In result column, Gillingham's score shown first - H = Home match - A = Away match - pen. = Penalty kick - o.g. = Own goal ## Player details During the course of the season, 31 players played for Gillingham in competitive matches. Watson made the most appearances, playing in 47 of the team's 50 games. He missed the final three Third Division matches of 1994, but played in every other league game as well as every game in the FA Cup, League Cup, and League Trophy. Four other players made over 40 appearances: Richard Green (44), Steve Banks and Gary Micklewhite (both 43), and Tony Butler (40). In contrast, both Jon Hooker and Abdul Kamara played only in one League Trophy match; in both cases it was the only appearance the player ever made for Gillingham. Seventeen players scored at least one goal for Gillingham during the season. Pike was the top scorer with 13 goals in the Third Division and 18 in total. Foster was the only other player to reach double figures, scoring 8 goals in Third Division matches and 10 in total. ## Aftermath At the end of the 1994–95 season, with no rescue deal finalised, fans were unsure whether the club would still be in existence to start the next season; one takeover bid had already collapsed when the leader of the consortium resigned after adverse publicity surrounding his financial status. In early June, however, shareholders and creditors voted overwhelmingly to accept a takeover bid from Sevenoaks-based businessman Paul Scally, who paid a nominal fee to purchase the club. The deal was finalised at the end of the month, one day before a deadline imposed on the club by the Football League to be out of receivership or face expulsion, and Scally was officially named as the club's new chairman. Having signed many new players, Gillingham began the 1995–96 season strongly and remained in the top three positions in the Third Division for the entire season, finishing in second place. The club thus gained promotion to the Second Division seven years after being relegated from the third tier.

Thomas Crisp

Recipient of the Victoria Cross

Thomas Crisp VC, DSC, RNR (28 April 1876 – 15 August 1917) was an English sailor and posthumous recipient of the Victoria Cross. Crisp, in civilian life a commercial fisherman operating from Lowestoft in Suffolk, earned his award after being killed during the defence of his vessel, the armed naval smack Nelson, in the North Sea against an attack from a German submarine in 1917. Crisp's self-sacrifice in the face of this "unequal struggle" was used by the government to bolster morale during some of the toughest days of the First World War for Britain, in late 1917, during which Britain was suffering heavy losses at the Battle of Passchendaele. His exploit was read aloud by David Lloyd George in the Houses of Parliament and made headline news for nearly a week. ## Early life Thomas Crisp was born into a family of shipwrights and fishermen in Lowestoft, one of ten children to William and Mary Anne Crisp. Although his father was the owner of a successful boatbuilding firm and thus could afford an education for his children, Thomas did not enjoy school, instead showing a "marked preference for quayside adventure to school routine". Leaving school, Thomas took to the sea, spending several years as a herring fisherman before joining a fishing trawler out of Lowestoft. He was a natural to the work, being a remarkably good sailor, but tired of it quickly and joined the Atlantic steamship SS Mobile, becoming her quartermaster and making several trans-Atlantic voyages. In 1895, aged 19, he met and married Harriet Elizabeth Alp and settled with her at 48 Staithe Road in Burgh St. Peter near Lowestoft, where they had two sons and a daughter, including Thomas Crisp Jr, who would be with his father on the day he won the Victoria Cross. Establishing himself as a fisherman, Thomas Sr achieved his mate and then skipper qualifications, entitling him to captain a fishing vessel sailing from the port. In 1902 he was taken on by Chambers, one of the largest boat owning families in Lowestoft, to crew and then captain their ketch George Borrow, in which he remained for thirteen years. In 1907 the family moved to Lowestoft while Crisp continued his work at sea, proving one of the most popular fishing captains in Lowestoft and joined on his ketch by his son in 1913. When the First World War began in July 1914, Crisp was at sea. Unaware of the outbreak of war, he remained in the North Sea for several days, and was surprised on his return to learn that enemy submarines were expected off the port at any moment. When this threat failed to materialise, Thomas Crisp returned to fishing, considered too old for military service and in an occupation vital to Britain's food supplies. In late September, George Borrow passed HMS Aboukir, HMS Hogue and HMS Cressy shortly before they were all sunk, with over a thousand lives lost, by German U-boat U-9. Tom Crisp Jr. later wrote of finding bodies in their fishing nets for weeks afterwards. ## War service In early 1915, Tom Crisp Jr left the vessel to join the Royal Navy. A few weeks later the U-boat threat expected so many months before arrived, as submarines surfaced among the undefended fishing fleets and used dynamite to destroy dozens of them after releasing the crews in small boats. This offensive was part of a wider German strategy to denude Britain of food supplies and took a heavy toll on the fishing fleets of the North Sea. George Borrow was among the victims, sunk in August, although it is not known if Tom Crisp (father) was aboard at the time. While temporarily working in a net factory following the loss of his vessel, he was scouted by a Navy officer recruiting experienced local fishing captains to command a flotilla of tiny fishing vessels, which were to be secretly armed. The boats were intended to be working fishing vessels fitted with a small artillery piece with which to sink enemy submarines as they surfaced alongside. In this manner it was hoped they would protect the fishing fleets without the diversion of major resources from the regular fleet, in the same manner as Q-ships deployed in the commercial sea lanes. Agreeing to this proposal, Crisp became first a Seaman and by mid-1916 a Skipper in the Royal Naval Reserve, arranging for his son to join the crew of his boat, the HM Armed Smack I'll Try, armed with a 3-pounder gun. On 1 February 1917 in the North Sea, I'll Try had its first confrontation with the enemy when two submarines surfaced close to the smack and her companion the larger Boy Alfred. Despite near misses from enemy torpedoes, both smacks scored hits on their larger opponents and reported them as probable sinkings, although post-war German records show that no submarines were lost on that date. Both skippers were awarded the Distinguished Service Cross and a present of £200 for this action, and Crisp was offered a promotion and transfer to an ocean-going Q-ship. He was forced to turn down this offer due to his wife's sudden and terminal illness. She died in June 1917. ## Victoria Cross action In July, I'll Try was renamed Nelson and Boy Alfred became Ethel & Millie, in an effort to maintain their cover. The boats continued to operate together and Crisp's crew was augmented with two regular seamen and a Royal Marine rifleman, providing Nelson with a crew of ten, including Crisp and his son. The smacks set out as usual on 15 August and pulled in a catch during the morning before making a sweep near the Jim Howe Bank in search of cruising enemies. At 2.30 pm, Crisp spotted a German U-boat on the surface 6,000 yards (5,500 m) away. The U-boat also sighted the smack and both vessels began firing at once, the U-boat's weapon scoring several hits before Nelson's could be brought to bear. By this stage in the war, German submarine captains were aware of the decoy ship tactics and no longer stopped British merchant shipping, preferring to sink them from a distance with gunfire. With such a heavy disparity in armament between the smack's 3-pounder and the submarine's 88 mm deck gun the engagement was short lived, the submarine firing eight shots before the Nelson could get within range of her opponent. The fourth shot fired by the U-boat holed the smack, and the seventh tore off both of Crisp's legs from underneath him. Calling for the confidential papers to be thrown overboard, Crisp dictated a message to be sent by the boat's four carrier pigeons: like many small ships of the era, Nelson did not possess a radio set. The sinking smack was abandoned by the nine unwounded crew, who attempted to remove their captain, who ordered that he should be thrown overboard rather than slow them down. The crew refused to do so, but found they were unable to move him and left him where he lay. He died in his son's arms a few minutes later. It is said that he was smiling as he died and remained so as the ship sank underneath him. Ethel & Millie had just arrived on the scene as Nelson sank, and her captain Skipper Charles Manning called for Nelson's lifeboat to come alongside. Realising that this would greatly overcrowd the second boat, the survivors refused and Manning sailed onwards towards the submarine, coming under lethal fire as he did so. His vessel was soon badly damaged and began to sink. The crew of Ethel & Millie then abandoned their battered boat and were hauled aboard the German submarine, where the Nelson survivors last saw them standing in line being addressed by a German officer. The seven British sailors of Ethel & Millie were never seen again, and much controversy exists surrounding their disappearance. Prevailing opinion at the time was that they were killed and dumped overboard by the German crew or abandoned at sea without supplies, as the German government had made it clear they regarded the crews of merchant ships who fought back against U-boat attacks as francs-tireurs, and thus liable to execution. These scenarios cannot be substantiated. Another theory is that they were taken prisoner and killed when the submarine was sunk. UC-63 has been named as the submarine that sank both vessels. The survivors of Nelson drifted for nearly two days until they arrived at the Jim Howe Buoy, where they were rescued by the fishery protection vessel Dryad. A pigeon named "Red Cock" had reached the authorities in Lowestoft with news of the fate of the boats and caused the Dryad to be despatched to search for survivors. A court of enquiry praised the surviving crew and their dead captain and authorised the award of the Victoria Cross posthumously to Thomas Crisp and Distinguished Service Medals to his son and another member of the crew. On 29 October 1917, David Lloyd George made an emotional speech in the House of Commons citing Crisp's sacrifice as representative of the Royal Navy's commitment "from the icy waters of the Arctic Ocean to the stormy floods of Magellan", which promoted Crisp into an overnight celebrity whose story ran in all the major London papers for nearly a week, containing as it did a story of personal sacrifice, filial devotion and perceived German barbarity. The medal presentation was made to Tom Crisp Jr at Buckingham Palace on 19 December 1917. Thomas Crisp, VC, DSC, is memorialised on his wife's gravestone in Lowestoft Cemetery. ## Post-war remembrance After the war, a small display in memory of Crisp was set up in Lowestoft Free Library and another in Lowestoft Maritime Museum. The former contained a specially commissioned painting and parts of the sunken Nelson, which were dredged up years later. This display was destroyed during the Second World War when the building was gutted in the Blitz. A new display featuring a replica of the Victoria Cross awarded to Crisp currently stands in Lowestoft Town Hall. The original is held securely by the local council after Crisp's family felt his interests would not be served if the medal were held privately. It can be viewed on request. Crisp's name is inscribed on the Chatham Naval Memorial for those lost at sea during the First World War, as well as two church memorials in Lowestoft to the town's war dead, St. John's and St. Margaret's. The latter church also contains a "VC Bell" dedicated to his memory. Tom Crisp Way, a street in his native Lowestoft, is named in his honour. In a footnote to the action, the pigeon "Red Cock", which brought news of the engagement to the authorities, was stuffed upon his death and was mounted in the Thomas Crisp display at Lowestoft Town Hall for many years before being reportedly relocated to a museum in South Kensington.

Benjamin Britten

English composer and pianist (1913–1976)

Edward Benjamin Britten, Baron Britten OM CH (22 November 1913 – 4 December 1976, aged 63) was an English composer, conductor, and pianist. He was a central figure of 20th-century British music, with a range of works including opera, other vocal music, orchestral and chamber pieces. His best-known works include the opera Peter Grimes (1945), the War Requiem (1962) and the orchestral showpiece The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra (1945). Born in Lowestoft, Suffolk, the son of a dentist, Britten showed talent from an early age. He studied at the Royal College of Music in London and privately with the composer Frank Bridge. Britten first came to public attention with the a cappella choral work A Boy was Born in 1934. With the premiere of Peter Grimes in 1945, he leapt to international fame. Over the next 28 years, he wrote 14 more operas, establishing himself as one of the leading 20th-century composers in the genre. In addition to large-scale operas for Sadler's Wells and Covent Garden, he wrote chamber operas for small forces, suitable for performance in venues of modest size. Among the best known of these is The Turn of the Screw (1954). Recurring themes in his operas include the struggle of an outsider against a hostile society and the corruption of innocence. Britten's other works range from orchestral to choral, solo vocal, chamber and instrumental as well as film music. He took a great interest in writing music for children and amateur performers, including the opera Noye's Fludde, a Missa Brevis, and the song collection Friday Afternoons. He often composed with particular performers in mind. His most frequent and important muse was his personal and professional partner, the tenor Peter Pears; others included Kathleen Ferrier, Jennifer Vyvyan, Janet Baker, Dennis Brain, Julian Bream, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, Osian Ellis and Mstislav Rostropovich. Britten was a celebrated pianist and conductor, performing many of his own works in concert and on record. He also performed and recorded works by others, such as Bach's Brandenburg Concertos, Mozart symphonies, and song cycles by Schubert and Schumann. Together with Pears and the librettist and producer Eric Crozier, Britten founded the annual Aldeburgh Festival in 1948, and he was responsible for the creation of Snape Maltings concert hall in 1967. In his last year, he was the first composer to be given a life peerage. ## Early years Britten was born in the fishing port of Lowestoft in Suffolk, on the east coast of England on 22 November 1913, the feast day of Saint Cecilia. He was the youngest of four children of Robert Victor Britten (1877–1934) and his wife Edith Rhoda, née Hockey (1874–1937). Robert Britten's youthful ambition to become a farmer had been thwarted by lack of capital, and he had instead trained as a dentist, a profession he practised successfully but without pleasure. While studying at Charing Cross Hospital in London he met Edith Hockey, the daughter of a civil service clerk in the British Government's Home Office. They were married in September 1901 at St John's, Smith Square, London. The consensus among biographers of Britten is that his father was a loving but somewhat stern and remote parent. Britten, according to his sister Beth, "got on well with him and shared his wry sense of humour, dedication to work and capacity for taking pains." Edith Britten was a talented amateur musician and secretary of the Lowestoft Musical Society. In the English provinces of the early 20th century, distinctions of social class were taken very seriously. Britten described his family as "very ordinary middle class", but there were aspects of the Brittens that were not ordinary: Edith's father was illegitimate, and her mother was an alcoholic; Robert Britten was an agnostic and refused to attend church on Sundays. Music was the principal means by which Edith Britten strove to maintain the family's social standing, inviting the pillars of the local community to musical soirées at the house. When Britten was three months old he contracted pneumonia and nearly died. The illness left him with a damaged heart, and doctors warned his parents that he would probably never be able to lead a normal life. He recovered more fully than expected, and as a boy was a keen tennis player and cricketer. To his mother's great delight he was an outstandingly musical child, unlike his sisters, who inherited their father's indifference to music, while his brother, Robert, though musically talented, was interested only in ragtime. Edith gave the young Britten his first lessons in piano and notation. He made his first attempts at composition when he was five. He started piano lessons when he was seven years old, and three years later began to play the viola. He was one of the last composers brought up on exclusively live music: his father refused to have a gramophone or, later, a radio in the house. ## Education ### Lowestoft When he was seven Britten was sent to a dame school, run by the Misses Astle. The younger sister, Ethel, gave him piano lessons; in later life he said that he remained grateful for the excellence of her teaching. The following year he moved on to a prep school, South Lodge, Lowestoft, as a day boy. The headmaster, Thomas Sewell, was an old-fashioned disciplinarian; the young Britten was outraged at the severe corporal punishments frequently handed out, and later he said that his lifelong pacifism probably had its roots in his reaction to the regime at the school. He himself rarely fell foul of Sewell, a mathematician, in which subject Britten was a star pupil. The school had no musical tradition, and Britten continued to study the piano with Ethel Astle. From the age of ten he took viola lessons from a friend of his mother, Audrey Alston, who had been a professional player before her marriage. In his spare time he composed prolifically. When his Simple Symphony, based on these juvenilia, was recorded in 1956, Britten wrote this pen-portrait of his young self for the sleeve note: > Once upon a time there was a prep-school boy. ... He was quite an ordinary little boy ... he loved cricket, only quite liked football (although he kicked a pretty "corner"); he adored mathematics, got on all right with history, was scared by Latin Unseen; he behaved fairly well, only ragged the recognised amount, so that his contacts with the cane or the slipper were happily rare (although one nocturnal expedition to stalk ghosts left its marks behind); he worked his way up the school slowly and steadily, until at the age of thirteen he reached that pinnacle of importance and grandeur, never to be quite equalled in later days: the head of the Sixth, head-prefect, and Victor Ludorum. But – there was one curious thing about this boy: he wrote music. His friends bore with it, his enemies kicked a bit but not for long (he was quite tough), the staff couldn't object if his work and games didn't suffer. He wrote lots of it, reams and reams of it. Audrey Alston encouraged Britten to go to symphony concerts in Norwich. At one of these, during the triennial Norfolk and Norwich Festival in October 1924, he heard Frank Bridge's orchestral poem The Sea, conducted by the composer. It was the first substantial piece of modern music he had ever encountered, and he was, in his own phrase, "knocked sideways" by it. Audrey Alston was a friend of Bridge; when he returned to Norwich for the next festival in 1927 she brought her not quite 14-year-old pupil to meet him. Bridge was impressed with the boy, and after they had gone through some of Britten's compositions together he invited him to come to London to take lessons from him. Robert Britten, supported by Thomas Sewell, doubted the wisdom of pursuing a composing career; a compromise was agreed by which Britten would, as planned, go on to his public school the following year but would make regular day-trips to London to study composition with Bridge and piano with his colleague Harold Samuel. Bridge impressed on Britten the importance of scrupulous attention to the technical craft of composing and the maxim that "you should find yourself and be true to what you found." The earliest substantial works Britten composed while studying with Bridge are the String Quartet in F, completed in April 1928, and the Quatre Chansons Françaises, a song-cycle for high voice and orchestra. Authorities differ on the extent of Bridge's influence on his pupil's technique. Humphrey Carpenter and Michael Oliver judge that Britten's abilities as an orchestrator were essentially self-taught; Donald Mitchell considers that Bridge had an important influence on the cycle. ### Public school and Royal College of Music In September 1928 Britten went as a boarder to Gresham's School, in Holt, Norfolk. At the time he felt unhappy there, even writing in his diary of contemplating suicide or running away: he hated being separated from his family, most particularly from his mother; he despised the music master; and he was shocked at the prevalence of bullying, though he was not the target of it. He remained there for two years and in 1930 he won a composition scholarship at the Royal College of Music (RCM) in London; his examiners were the composers John Ireland and Ralph Vaughan Williams and the college's harmony and counterpoint teacher, S P Waddington. Britten was at the RCM from 1930 to 1933, studying composition with Ireland and piano with Arthur Benjamin. He won the Sullivan Prize for composition, the Cobbett Prize for chamber music, and was twice winner of the Ernest Farrar Prize for composition. Despite these honours, he was not greatly impressed by the establishment: he found his fellow-students "amateurish and folksy" and the staff "inclined to suspect technical brilliance of being superficial and insincere." Another Ireland pupil, the composer Humphrey Searle, said that Ireland could be "an inspiring teacher to those on his own wavelength"; Britten was not, and learned little from him. He continued to study privately with Bridge, although he later praised Ireland for "nurs[ing] me very gently through a very, very difficult musical adolescence." Britten also used his time in London to attend concerts and become better acquainted with the music of Stravinsky, Shostakovich and, most particularly, Mahler. He intended postgraduate study in Vienna with Alban Berg, Arnold Schoenberg's student, but was eventually dissuaded by his parents, on the advice of the RCM staff. The first of Britten's compositions to attract wide attention were composed while at the RCM: the Sinfonietta, Op. 1 (1932), the oboe quartet Phantasy, Op. 2, dedicated to Léon Goossens who played the first performance in a BBC broadcast on 6 August 1933, and a set of choral variations A Boy was Born, written in 1933 for the BBC Singers, who first performed it the following year. In this same period he wrote Friday Afternoons, a collection of 12 songs for the pupils of Clive House School, Prestatyn, where his brother was headmaster. ## Career ### Early professional life In February 1935, at Bridge's instigation, Britten was invited to a job interview by the BBC's director of music Adrian Boult and his assistant Edward Clark. Britten was not enthusiastic about the prospect of working full-time in the BBC music department and was relieved when what came out of the interview was an invitation to write the score for a documentary film, The King's Stamp, directed by Alberto Cavalcanti for the GPO Film Unit. Britten became a member of the film unit's small group of regular contributors, another of whom was W. H. Auden. Together they worked on the documentary films Coal Face and Night Mail in 1935. They also collaborated on the song cycle Our Hunting Fathers (1936), radical both in politics and musical treatment, and subsequently other works including Cabaret Songs, On This Island, Paul Bunyan and Hymn to St Cecilia. Auden was a considerable influence on Britten, encouraging him to widen his aesthetic, intellectual and political horizons, and also to come to terms with his homosexuality. Auden was, as David Matthews puts it, "cheerfully and guiltlessly promiscuous"; Britten, puritanical and conventional by nature, was sexually repressed. In the three years from 1935 to 1937 Britten wrote nearly 40 scores for the theatre, cinema and radio. Among the film music of the late 1930s Matthews singles out Night Mail and Love from a Stranger (1937); from the theatre music he selects for mention The Ascent of F6 (1936), On the Frontier (1938), and Johnson Over Jordan (1939); and of the music for radio, King Arthur (1937) and The Sword in the Stone (1939). In 1937 there were two events of huge importance in Britten's life: his mother died, and he met the tenor Peter Pears. Although Britten was extraordinarily devoted to his mother and was devastated at her death, it also seems to have been something of a liberation for him. Only after that did he begin to engage in emotional relationships with people his own age or younger. Later in the year he got to know Pears while they were both helping to clear out the country cottage of a mutual friend who had died in an air crash. Pears quickly became Britten's musical inspiration and close (though for the moment platonic) friend. Britten's first work for him was composed within weeks of their meeting, a setting of Emily Brontë's poem, "A thousand gleaming fires", for tenor and strings. During 1937 Britten composed a Pacifist March to words by Ronald Duncan for the Peace Pledge Union, of which, as a pacifist, he had become an active member; the work was not a success and was soon withdrawn. The best known of his compositions from this period is probably Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge for string orchestra, described by Matthews as the first of Britten's works to become a popular classic. It was a success in North America, with performances in Toronto, New York, Boston, Chicago and San Francisco, under conductors including John Barbirolli and Serge Koussevitzky. ### America 1939–42 In April 1939 Britten and Pears sailed to North America, going first to Canada and then to New York. They had several reasons for leaving England, including the difficult position of pacifists in an increasingly bellicose Europe; the success that Frank Bridge had enjoyed in the US; the departure of Auden and his friend Christopher Isherwood to the US from England three months previously; hostile or belittling reviews of Britten's music in the English press; and under-rehearsed and inadequate performances. Britten and Pears consummated their relationship and from then until Britten's death they were partners in both their professional and personal lives. When the Second World War began, Britten and Pears turned for advice to the British embassy in Washington and were told that they should remain in the US as artistic ambassadors. Pears was inclined to disregard the advice and go back to England; Britten also felt the urge to return, but accepted the embassy's counsel and persuaded Pears to do the same. Already a friend of the composer Aaron Copland, Britten encountered his latest works Billy the Kid and An Outdoor Overture, both of which influenced his own music. In 1940 Britten composed Seven Sonnets of Michelangelo, the first of many song cycles for Pears. Britten's orchestral works from this period include the Violin Concerto and Sinfonia da Requiem. In 1941 Britten produced his first music drama, Paul Bunyan, an operetta, to a libretto by Auden. While in the US, Britten had his first encounter with Balinese gamelan music, through transcriptions for piano duo made by the Canadian composer Colin McPhee. The two met in the summer of 1939 and subsequently performed a number of McPhee's transcriptions for a recording. This musical encounter bore fruit in several Balinese-inspired works later in Britten's career. Moving to the US did not relieve Britten of the nuisance of hostile criticism: although Olin Downes, the doyen of New York music critics, and Irving Kolodin took to Britten's music, Virgil Thomson was, as the music scholar Suzanne Robinson puts it, consistently "severe and spiteful". Thomson described Les Illuminations (1940) as "little more than a series of bromidic and facile 'effects' ... pretentious, banal and utterly disappointing", and was equally unflattering about Pears's voice. Robinson surmises that Thomson was motivated by "a mixture of spite, national pride, and professional jealousy." Paul Bunyan met with wholesale critical disapproval, and the Sinfonia da Requiem (already rejected by its Japanese sponsors because of its overtly Christian nature) received a mixed reception when Barbirolli and the New York Philharmonic premiered it in March 1941. The reputation of the work was much enhanced when Koussevitzky took it up shortly afterwards. ### Return to England In 1942 Britten read the work of the poet George Crabbe for the first time. The Borough, set on the Suffolk coast close to Britten's homeland, awakened in him such longings for England that he knew he must return. He also knew that he must write an opera based on Crabbe's poem about the fisherman Peter Grimes. Before Britten left the US, Koussevitzky, always generous in encouraging new talent, offered him a \$1,000 commission to write the opera. Britten and Pears returned to England in April 1942. During the long transatlantic sea crossing Britten completed the choral works A Ceremony of Carols and Hymn to St Cecilia. The latter was his last large-scale collaboration with Auden. Britten had grown away from him, and Auden became one of the composer's so-called "corpses" – former intimates from whom he completely cut off contact once they had outlived their usefulness to him or offended him in some way. Having arrived in Britain, Britten and Pears applied for recognition as conscientious objectors; Britten was initially allowed only non-combatant service in the military, but on appeal he gained unconditional exemption. After the death of his mother in 1937 he had used money she bequeathed him to buy the Old Mill in Snape, Suffolk which became his country home. He spent much of his time there in 1944 working on the opera Peter Grimes. Pears joined Sadler's Wells Opera Company, whose artistic director, the singer Joan Cross, announced her intention to re-open the company's home base in London with Britten's opera, casting herself and Pears in the leading roles. There were complaints from company members about supposed favouritism and the "cacophony" of Britten's score, as well as some ill-suppressed homophobic remarks. Peter Grimes opened in June 1945 and was hailed by public and critics; its box-office takings matched or exceeded those for La bohème and Madame Butterfly, which were staged during the same season. The opera administrator Lord Harewood called it "the first genuinely successful British opera, Gilbert and Sullivan apart, since Purcell." Dismayed by the in-fighting among the company, Cross, Britten and Pears severed their ties with Sadler's Wells in December 1945, going on to found what was to become the English Opera Group. A month after the opening of Peter Grimes, Britten and Yehudi Menuhin went to Germany to give recitals to concentration camp survivors. What they saw, at Belsen most of all, so shocked Britten that he refused to talk about it until towards the end of his life, when he told Pears that it had coloured everything he had written since. Colin Matthews comments that the next two works Britten composed after his return, the song-cycle The Holy Sonnets of John Donne and the Second String Quartet, contrast strongly with earlier, lighter-hearted works such as Les Illuminations. Britten recovered his joie de vivre for The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra (1945), written for an educational film, Instruments of the Orchestra, directed by Muir Mathieson and featuring the London Symphony Orchestra conducted by Malcolm Sargent. It became, and remained, his most often played and popular work. Britten's next opera, The Rape of Lucretia, was presented at the first post-war Glyndebourne Festival in 1946. It was then taken on tour to provincial cities under the banner of the "Glyndebourne English Opera Company", an uneasy alliance of Britten and his associates with John Christie, the autocratic proprietor of Glyndebourne. The tour lost money heavily, and Christie announced that he would underwrite no more tours. Britten and his associates set up the English Opera Group; the librettist Eric Crozier and the designer John Piper joined Britten as artistic directors. The group's express purpose was to produce and commission new English operas and other works, presenting them throughout the country. Britten wrote the comic opera Albert Herring for the group in 1947; while on tour in the new work Pears came up with the idea of mounting a festival in the small Suffolk seaside town of Aldeburgh, where Britten had moved from Snape earlier in the year, and which became his principal place of residence for the rest of his life. ### Aldeburgh; the 1950s The Aldeburgh Festival was launched in June 1948, with Britten, Pears, and Crozier directing. Albert Herring played at the Jubilee Hall, and Britten's new cantata for tenor, chorus, and orchestra, Saint Nicolas, was presented in the parish church. The festival was an immediate success and became an annual event that has continued into the 21st century. New works by Britten featured in almost every festival until his death in 1976, including the premieres of his operas A Midsummer Night's Dream at the Jubilee Hall in 1960 and Death in Venice at Snape Maltings Concert Hall in 1973. Unlike many leading English composers, Britten was not known as a teacher, but in 1949 he accepted his only private pupil, Arthur Oldham, who studied with him for three years. Oldham made himself useful, acting as musical assistant and arranging Variations on a Theme by Frank Bridge for full orchestra for the Frederick Ashton ballet Le Rêve de Léonor (1949), but he later described the teacher–pupil relationship as "beneficial five per cent to [Britten] and ninety-five per cent to me!" Throughout the 1950s Britten continued to write operas. Billy Budd (1951) was well received at its Covent Garden premiere and was regarded by reviewers as an advance on Peter Grimes. Gloriana (1953), written to mark the coronation of Elizabeth II, had a cool reception at the gala premiere in the presence of the Queen and the British Establishment en masse. The downbeat story of Elizabeth I in her decline, and Britten's score – reportedly thought by members of the premiere's audience "too modern" for such a gala – did not overcome what Matthews calls the "ingrained philistinism" of the ruling classes. Although Gloriana did well at the box office, there were no further productions in Britain for another 13 years. It was later recognised as one of Britten's finer operas. The Turn of the Screw the following year was an unqualified success; together with Peter Grimes it became, and at 2013 remained, one of the two most frequently performed of Britten's operas. In the 1950s the "fervently anti-homosexual" Home Secretary, Sir David Maxwell Fyfe, urged the police to enforce the Victorian laws making homosexual acts illegal. Britten and Pears came under scrutiny; Britten was visited by police officers in 1953 and was so perturbed that he discussed with his assistant Imogen Holst the possibility that Pears might have to enter a sham marriage (with whom is unclear). In the end nothing was done. An increasingly important influence on Britten was the music of the East, an interest that was fostered by a tour there with Pears in 1956, when Britten once again encountered the music of the Balinese gamelan and saw for the first time Japanese Noh plays, which he called "some of the most wonderful drama I have ever seen." These eastern influences were seen and heard in the ballet The Prince of the Pagodas (1957) and later in two of the three semi-operatic "Parables for Church Performance": Curlew River (1964), The Burning Fiery Furnace (1966) and The Prodigal Son (1968). ### 1960s By the 1960s, the Aldeburgh Festival was outgrowing its customary venues, and plans to build a new concert hall in Aldeburgh were not progressing. When redundant Victorian maltings buildings in the village of Snape, six miles inland, became available for hire, Britten realised that the largest of them could be converted into a concert hall and opera house. The 830-seat Snape Maltings hall was opened by the Queen at the start of the twentieth Aldeburgh Festival on 2 June 1967; it was immediately hailed as one of the best concert halls in the country. The hall was destroyed by fire in 1969, but Britten was determined that it would be rebuilt in time for the following year's festival, which it was. The Queen again attended the opening performance in 1970. The Maltings gave the festival a venue that could comfortably house large orchestral works and operas. Britten conducted the first performance outside Russia of Shostakovich's Fourteenth Symphony at Snape in 1970. Shostakovich, a friend since 1960, dedicated the symphony to Britten; he was himself the dedicatee of The Prodigal Son. Two other Russian musicians who were close to Britten and regularly performed at the festival were the pianist Sviatoslav Richter and the cellist Mstislav Rostropovich. Britten composed his cello suites, Cello Symphony and Cello Sonata for Rostropovich, who premiered them at the Aldeburgh Festival. One of the best known of Britten's works, the War Requiem, was premiered in 1962. He had been asked four years earlier to write a work for the consecration of the new Coventry Cathedral, a modernist building designed by Basil Spence. The old cathedral had been left in ruins by an air-raid on the city in 1940 in which hundreds of people died. Britten decided that his work would commemorate the dead of both World Wars in a large-scale score for soloists, chorus, chamber ensemble and orchestra. His text interspersed the traditional Requiem Mass with poems by Wilfred Owen. Matthews writes, "With the War Requiem Britten reached the apex of his reputation: it was almost universally hailed as a masterpiece." Shostakovich told Rostropovich that he believed it to be "the greatest work of the twentieth century". In 1967 the BBC commissioned Britten to write an opera specially for television. Owen Wingrave was based, like The Turn of the Screw, on a ghost story by Henry James. By the 1960s Britten found composition much slower than in his prolific youth; he told the 28-year-old composer Nicholas Maw, "Get as much done now as you can, because it gets much, much more difficult as you grow older." He did not complete the score of the new opera until August 1970. Owen Wingrave was first broadcast in Britain in May 1971, when it was also televised in Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland, the Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland, the US and Yugoslavia. ### Last years In September 1970 Britten asked Myfanwy Piper, who had adapted the two Henry James stories for him, to turn another prose story into a libretto. This was Thomas Mann's novella Death in Venice, a subject he had been considering for some time. At an early stage in composition Britten was told by his doctors that a heart operation was essential if he was to live for more than two years. He was determined to finish the opera and worked urgently to complete it before going into hospital for surgery. His long-term colleague Colin Graham wrote: > Perhaps of all his works, this one went deepest into Britten's own soul: there are extraordinary cross-currents of affinity between himself, his own state of health and mind, Thomas Mann, Aschenbach (Mann's dying protagonist), and Peter Pears, who must have had to tear himself in three in order to reconstitute himself as the principal character. After the completion of the opera Britten went into the National Heart Hospital and was operated on in May 1973 to replace a failing heart valve. The replacement was successful, but he suffered a slight stroke, affecting his right hand. This brought his career as a performer to an end. While in hospital Britten became friendly with a senior nursing sister, Rita Thomson; she moved to Aldeburgh in 1974 and looked after him until his death. Britten's last works include the Suite on English Folk Tunes "A Time There Was" (1974); the Third String Quartet (1975), which drew on material from Death in Venice; and the dramatic cantata Phaedra (1975), written for Janet Baker. In June 1976, the last year of his life, Britten accepted a life peerage – the first composer so honoured – becoming Baron Britten, of Aldeburgh in the County of Suffolk. After the 1976 Aldeburgh Festival, Britten and Pears travelled to Norway, where Britten began writing Praise We Great Men, for voices and orchestra based on a poem by Edith Sitwell. He returned to Aldeburgh in August, and wrote Welcome Ode for children's choir and orchestra. In November, Britten realised that he could no longer compose. On his 63rd birthday, 22 November, at his request Rita Thomson organised a champagne party and invited his friends and his sisters Barbara and Beth, to say their goodbyes to the dying composer. When Rostropovich made his farewell visit a few days later, Britten gave him what he had written of Praise We Great Men. Britten died of congestive heart failure on 4 December 1976. His funeral service was held at Aldeburgh Parish Church three days later, and he was buried in its churchyard, with a gravestone carved by Reynolds Stone. The authorities at Westminster Abbey had offered burial there, but Britten had made it clear that he wished his grave to be side by side with that, in due course, of Pears. A memorial service was held at the Abbey on 10 March 1977, at which the congregation was headed by Queen Elizabeth The Queen Mother. ## Personal life and character Despite his large number of works on Christian themes, Britten has sometimes been thought of as an agnostic. Pears said that when they met in 1937 he was not sure whether or not Britten would have described himself as a Christian. In the 1960s Britten called himself a dedicated Christian, though sympathetic to the radical views propounded by the Bishop of Woolwich in Honest to God. Politically, Britten was on the left. He told Pears that he always voted either Liberal or Labour and could not imagine ever voting Conservative, but he was never a member of any party, except the Peace Pledge Union. Physically, Britten was never robust. He walked and swam regularly and kept himself as fit as he could, but in his 1992 biography, Carpenter mentions 20 illnesses, a few of them minor but most fairly serious, suffered over the years by Britten before his final heart complaint developed. Emotionally, according to some commentators, Britten never completely grew up, retaining in his outlook something of a child's view of the world. He was not always confident that he was the genius others declared him to be, and though he was hypercritical of his own works, he was acutely, even aggressively sensitive to criticism from anybody else. Britten was, as he himself acknowledged, notorious for dumping friends and colleagues who either offended him or ceased to be of use – his "corpses". The conductor Sir Charles Mackerras believed that the term was invented by Lord Harewood. Both Mackerras and Harewood joined the list of corpses, the former for joking that the number of boys in Noye's Fludde must have been a delight to the composer, and the latter for an extramarital affair and subsequent divorce from Lady Harewood, which shocked the puritanical Britten. Among other corpses were his librettists Montagu Slater and Eric Crozier. The latter said in 1949, "He has sometimes told me, jokingly, that one day I would join the ranks of his 'corpses' and I have always recognized that any ordinary person must soon outlive his usefulness to such a great creative artist as Ben." Dame Janet Baker said in 1981, "I think he was quite entitled to take what he wanted from others ... He did not want to hurt anyone, but the task in hand was more important than anything or anybody." Matthews feels that this aspect of Britten has been exaggerated, and he observes that the composer sustained many deep friendships to the end of his life. ### Controversies #### Boys Throughout his adult life, Britten had a particular rapport with children and enjoyed close friendships with several boys, particularly those in their early teens. The first such friendship was with Piers Dunkerley, who was 13 years old in 1934, when Britten was aged 20. Other boys Britten befriended were the young David Hemmings and Michael Crawford, both of whom sang treble roles in his works in the 1950s. Hemmings later said, "In all of the time that I spent with him he never abused that trust", and Crawford wrote "I cannot say enough about the kindness of that great man ... he had a wonderful patience and affinity with young people. He loved music, and loved youngsters caring about music." It was long suspected by several of Britten's close associates that there was something exceptional about his attraction to teenage boys: Auden referred to Britten's "attraction to thin-as-a-board juveniles ... to the sexless and innocent", and Pears once wrote to Britten: "remember there are lovely things in the world still – children, boys, sunshine, the sea, Mozart, you and me." In public, the matter was little discussed during Britten's lifetime and much discussed after it. Carpenter's 1992 biography closely examined the evidence, as do later studies of Britten, most particularly John Bridcut's Britten's Children (2006), which concentrates on Britten's friendships and relationships with various children and adolescents. Some commentators have continued to question Britten's conduct, sometimes very sharply. Carpenter and Bridcut conclude that he held any sexual impulses under firm control and kept the relationships affectionate – including bed-sharing, kissing and nude bathing – but strictly platonic. #### Cause of death A more recent controversy was the statement in a 2013 biography of Britten by Paul Kildea that the composer's heart failure was due to undetected syphilis, which Kildea speculates was a result of Pears's promiscuity while the two were living in New York. In response, Britten's consultant cardiologist said that, like all the hospital's similar cases, Britten was routinely screened for syphilis before the operation, with negative results. He described as "complete rubbish" Kildea's allegation that the surgeon who operated on Britten in 1973 would or even could have covered up a syphilitic condition. Kildea continued to maintain, "When all the composer's symptoms are considered there can be only one cause." In The Times, Richard Morrison praised the rest of Kildea's book, and hoped that its reputation would not be "tarnished by one sensational speculation ... some second-hand hearsay ... presenting unsubstantiated gossip as fact." ## Music ### Influences Britten's early musical life was dominated by the classical masters; his mother's ambition was for him to become the "Fourth B" – after Bach, Beethoven and Brahms. Britten was later to assert that his initial development as a composer was stifled by reverence for these masters: "Between the ages of thirteen and sixteen I knew every note of Beethoven and Brahms. I remember receiving the full score of Fidelio for my fourteenth birthday ... But I think in a sense I never forgave them for having led me astray in my own particular thinking and natural inclinations." He developed a particular animosity towards Brahms, whose piano music he had once held in great esteem; in 1952 he confided that he played through all Brahms's music from time to time, "to see if I am right about him; I usually find that I underestimated last time how bad it was!" Through his association with Frank Bridge, Britten's musical horizons expanded. He discovered the music of Debussy and Ravel which, Matthews writes, "gave him a model for an orchestral sound". Bridge also led Britten to the music of Schoenberg and Berg; the latter's death in 1935 affected Britten deeply. A letter at that time reveals his thoughts on the contemporary music scene: "The real musicians are so few & far between, aren't they? Apart from the Bergs, Stravinskys, Schoenbergs & Bridges one is a bit stumped for names, isn't one?" – adding, as an afterthought: "Shostakovitch – perhaps – possibly". By this time Britten had developed a lasting hostility towards the English Pastoral School represented by Vaughan Williams and Ireland, whose work he compared unfavourably with the "brilliant folk-song arrangements of Percy Grainger"; Grainger became the inspiration of many of Britten's later folk arrangements. Britten was also impressed by Delius, and thought Brigg Fair "delicious" when he heard it in 1931. Also in that year he heard Stravinsky's The Rite of Spring, which he found "bewildering and terrifying", yet at the same time "incredibly marvellous and arresting". The same composer's Symphony of Psalms, and Petrushka were lauded in similar terms. He and Stravinsky later developed a mutual antipathy informed by jealousy and mistrust. Besides his growing attachments to the works of 20th century masters, Britten – along with his contemporary Michael Tippett – was devoted to the English music of the late 17th and early 18th centuries, in particular the work of Purcell. In defining his mission as a composer of opera, Britten wrote: "One of my chief aims is to try to restore to the musical setting of the English Language a brilliance, freedom and vitality that have been curiously rare since the death of Purcell." Among the closest of Britten's kindred composer spirits – even more so than Purcell – was Mahler, whose Fourth Symphony Britten heard in September 1930. At that time Mahler's music was little regarded and rarely played in English concert halls. Britten later wrote of how the scoring of this work impressed him: "... entirely clean and transparent ... the material was remarkable, and the melodic shapes highly original, with such rhythmic and harmonic tension from beginning to end." He soon discovered other Mahler works, in particular Das Lied von der Erde; he wrote to a friend about the concluding "Abschied" of Das Lied: "It is cruel, you know, that music should be so beautiful." Apart from Mahler's general influence on Britten's compositional style, the incorporation by Britten of popular tunes (as, for example, in Death in Venice) is a direct inheritance from the older composer. ### Operas The Britten-Pears Foundation considers the composer's operas "perhaps the most substantial and important part of his compositional legacy." Britten's operas are firmly established in the international repertoire: according to Operabase, they are performed worldwide more than those of any other composer born in the 20th century, and only Puccini and Richard Strauss come ahead of him if the list is extended to all operas composed after 1900. The early operetta Paul Bunyan stands apart from Britten's later operatic works. Philip Brett calls it "a patronizing attempt to evoke the spirit of a nation not his own by W. H. Auden in which Britten was a somewhat dazzled accomplice." The American public liked it, but the critics did not, and it fell into neglect until interest revived near the end of the composer's life. Britten's subsequent operas range from large-scale works written for full-strength opera companies, to chamber operas for performance by small touring opera ensembles or in churches and schools. In the large-scale category are Peter Grimes (1945), Billy Budd (1951), Gloriana (1953), A Midsummer Night's Dream (1960) and Death in Venice (1973). Of the remaining operas, The Rape of Lucretia (1946), Albert Herring (1947), The Little Sweep (1949) and The Turn of the Screw (1954) were written for small opera companies. Noye's Fludde (1958), Curlew River (1964), The Burning Fiery Furnace (1966) and The Prodigal Son (1968) were for church performance, and had their premieres at St Bartholomew's Church, Orford. The secular The Golden Vanity was intended to be performed in schools. Owen Wingrave, written for television, was first presented live by the Royal Opera at Covent Garden in 1973, two years after its broadcast premiere. Music critics have frequently commented on the recurring theme in Britten's operas from Peter Grimes onward of the isolated individual at odds with a hostile society. The extent to which this reflected Britten's perception of himself, pacifist and homosexual, in the England of the 1930s, 40s and 50s is debated. Another recurrent theme is the corruption of innocence, most sharply seen in The Turn of the Screw. Over the 28 years between Peter Grimes and Death in Venice Britten's musical style changed, as he introduced elements of atonalism – though remaining essentially a tonal composer – and of eastern music, particularly gamelan sounds but also eastern harmonies. In A Midsummer Night's Dream the orchestral scoring varies to fit the nature of each set of characters: "the bright, percussive sounds of harps, keyboards and percussion for the fairy world, warm strings and wind for the pairs of lovers, and lower woodwind and brass for the mechanicals." In Death in Venice Britten turns Tadzio and his family into silent dancers, "accompanied by the colourful, glittering sounds of tuned percussion to emphasize their remoteness." As early as 1948 the music analyst Hans Keller, summarising Britten's impact on 20th-century opera to that date, compared his contribution to that of Mozart in the 18th century: "Mozart may in some respects be regarded as a founder (a 'second founder') of opera. The same can already be said today, as far as the modern British – perhaps not only British – field goes, of Britten." In addition to his own original operas, Britten, together with Imogen Holst, extensively revised Purcell's Dido and Aeneas (1951) and The Fairy-Queen (1967). Britten's Purcell Realizations brought Purcell, who was then neglected, to a wider public, but have themselves been neglected since the dominance of the trend to authentic performance practice. His 1948 revision of The Beggar's Opera amounts to a wholesale recomposition, retaining the original melodies but giving them new, highly sophisticated orchestral accompaniments. ### Song cycles Throughout his career Britten was drawn to the song cycle form. In 1928, when he was 14, he composed an orchestral cycle, Quatre chansons françaises, setting words by Victor Hugo and Paul Verlaine. Brett comments that though the work is much influenced by Wagner on the one hand and French mannerisms on the other, "the diatonic nursery-like tune for the sad boy with the consumptive mother in 'L'enfance' is entirely characteristic." After he came under Auden's influence Britten composed Our Hunting Fathers (1936), ostensibly a protest against fox-hunting but which also alludes allegorically to the contemporary political state of Europe. The work has never been popular; in 1948 the critic Colin Mason lamented its neglect and called it one of Britten's greatest works. In Mason's view the cycle is "as exciting as Les Illuminations, and offers many interesting and enjoyable foretastes of the best moments of his later works." The first of Britten's song cycles to gain widespread popularity was Les Illuminations (1940), for high voice (originally soprano, later more often sung by tenors) with string orchestra accompaniment, setting words by Arthur Rimbaud. Britten's music reflects the eroticism in Rimbaud's poems; Copland commented of the section "Antique" that he did not know how Britten dared to write the melody. "Antique" was dedicated to "K.H.W.S.", or Wulff Scherchen, Britten's first romantic interest. Matthews judges the piece the crowning masterpiece of Britten's early years. By the time of Britten's next cycle, Seven Sonnets of Michelangelo (1942) for tenor and piano, Pears had become his partner and muse; in Matthews's phrase, Britten wrote the cycle as "his declaration of love for Peter". It too finds the sensuality of the verses it sets, though in its structure it resembles a conventional 19th-century song cycle. Mason draws a distinction between this and Britten's earlier cycles, because here each song is self-contained, and has no thematic connection with any of the others. The Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings (1943) sets verses by a variety of poets, all on the theme of night-time. Though Britten described the cycle as "not important stuff, but quite pleasant, I think", it was immediately greeted as a masterpiece, and together with Peter Grimes it established him as one of the leading composers of his day. Mason calls it "a beautifully unified work on utterly dissimilar poems, held together by the most superficial but most effective, and therefore most suitable symphonic method. Some of the music is pure word-painting, some of it mood-painting, of the subtlest kind." Two years later, after witnessing the horrors of Belsen, Britten composed The Holy Sonnets of John Donne, a work whose bleakness was not matched until his final tenor and piano cycle a quarter of a century later. Britten's technique in this cycle ranges from atonality in the first song to firm tonality later, with a resolute B major chord at the climax of "Death, be not proud". Nocturne (1958) is the last of the orchestral cycles. As in the Serenade, Britten set words by a range of poets, who here include Shakespeare, Coleridge, Keats, Shelley, Tennyson and Wilfred Owen. The whole cycle is darker in tone than the Serenade, with pre-echoes of the War Requiem. All the songs have subtly different orchestrations, with a prominent obbligato part for a different instrument in each. Among Britten's later song cycles with piano accompaniment is the Songs and Proverbs of William Blake, composed for the baritone Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau. This presents all its poems in a continuous stream of music; Brett writes that it "interleaves a ritornello-like setting of the seven proverbs with seven songs that paint an increasingly sombre picture of human existence." A Pushkin cycle, The Poet's Echo (1965), was written for Galina Vishnevskaya, and shows a more robust and extrovert side of the composer. Though written ostensibly in the tradition of European song cycles, it draws atmospherically on the polyphony of south-east Asian music. Who Are These Children? (1969), setting 12 verses by William Soutar, is among the grimmest of Britten's cycles. After he could no longer play the piano, Britten composed a cycle of Robert Burns settings, A Birthday Hansel (1976), for voice and harp. ### Other vocal works Nicholas Maw said of Britten's vocal music: "His feeling for poetry (not only English) and the inflexions of language make him, I think, the greatest musical realizer of English." One of the best-known works in which Britten set poetry was the War Requiem (1962). It intersperses the Latin requiem mass, sung by soprano and chorus, with settings of works by the First World War poet Wilfred Owen, sung by tenor and baritone. At the end the two elements are combined, as the last line of Owen's "Strange meeting" mingles with the In paradisum of the mass. Matthews describes the conclusion of the work as "a great wave of benediction [which] recalls the end of the Sinfonia da Requiem, and its similar ebbing away into the sea that symbolises both reconciliation and death." The same year, he composed A Hymn of St Columba for choir and organ, setting a poem by the 6th-century saint. Other works for voices and orchestra include the Missa Brevis and the Cantata academica (both 1959) on religious themes, Children's Crusade to a text by Bertolt Brecht about a group of children in wartime Poland, to be performed by children (1969), and the late cantata Phaedra (1975), a story of fated love and death modelled on Handel's Italian cantatas. Smaller-scale works for accompanied voice include the five Canticles, composed between 1947 and 1974. They are written for a variety of voices (tenor in all five; counter-tenor or alto in II and IV and baritone in IV) and accompaniments (piano in I to IV, horn in III and harp in V). The first is a setting of Francis Quarles's 17th-century poem "A Divine Rapture", and according to Britten was modelled on Purcell's Divine Hymns. Matthews describes it as one of the composer's most serene works, which "ends in a mood of untroubled happiness that would soon become rare in Britten's music." The second Canticle was written in 1952, between Billy Budd and Gloriana, on the theme of Abraham's obedience to Divine Authority in the proffered sacrifice of his son Isaac. "Canticle III" from 1954 is a setting of Edith Sitwell's wartime poem "Still Falls the Rain", composed just after The Turn of the Screw with which it is structurally and stylistically associated. The twelve-note cycle in the first five bars of the piano part of the Canticle introduced a feature that became thereafter a regular part of Britten's compositional technique. Canticle IV: The Journey of the Magi, premiered in 1971, is based on T. S. Eliot's poem "Journey of the Magi". It is musically close to The Burning Fiery Furnace of 1966; Matthews refers to it as a "companion piece" to the earlier work. The final Canticle was another Eliot setting, his juvenile poem "Death of Saint Narcissus". Although Britten had little idea of what the poem was about, the musicologist Arnold Whittall finds the text "almost frighteningly apt ... for a composer conscious of his own sickness." Matthews sees Narcissus as "another figure from [Britten's] magic world of dreams and ideal beauty." ### Orchestral works The Britten scholar Donald Mitchell has written, "It is easy, because of the scope, stature, and sheer volume of the operas, and the wealth of vocal music of all kinds, to pay insufficient attention to the many works Britten wrote in other, specifically non-vocal genres." Maw said of Britten, "He is one of the 20th century's great orchestral composers ... His orchestration has an individuality, incisiveness and integration with the musical material only achieved by the greatest composers." Among Britten's best-known orchestral works are the Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge (1937), the Sinfonia da Requiem (1940), the Four Sea Interludes (1945) and The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra (1945). The Variations, an affectionate tribute to Britten's teacher, range from comic parodies of Italian operatic clichés and Viennese waltzes to a strutting march, reflecting the rise of militarism in Europe, and a Mahlerian funeral march; the piece ends with an exuberant fugal finale. The Sinfonia moves from an opening Lacrymosa filled with fear and lamentation to a fierce Dies irae and then to a final Requiem aeternam, described by the critic Herbert Glass as "the most uneasy 'eternal rest' possible". Mason considers the Sinfonia a failure: "less entertaining than usual, because its object is not principally to entertain but to express symphonically. It fails because it is neither picturesquely nor formally symphonic." The Sea Interludes, adapted by Britten from the full score of Peter Grimes, make a concert suite depicting the sea and the Borough in which the opera is set; the character of the music is strongly contrasted between "Dawn", "Sunday Morning", "Moonlight" and "Storm". The commentator Howard Posner observes that there is not a bar in the interludes, no matter how beautiful, that is free of foreboding. The Young Person's Guide, based on a theme by Purcell, showcases the orchestra's individual sections and groups, and gained widespread popularity from the outset. Christopher Headington calls the work "exuberant and uncomplicated music, scored with clarity and vigour [that] fits well into Britten's oeuvre." David Matthews calls it "a brilliant educational exercise." Unlike his English predecessors such as Elgar and Vaughan Williams, and composers from mainland Europe whom he admired, including Mahler and Shostakovich, Britten was not a classical symphonist. His youthful jeux d'esprit the Simple Symphony (1934) is in conventional symphonic structure, observing sonata form and the traditional four-movement pattern, but of his mature works his Spring Symphony (1949) is more a song cycle than a true symphony, and the concertante Cello Symphony (1963) is an attempt to balance the traditional concerto and symphony. During its four movements the Cello Symphony moves from a deeply pessimistic opening to a finale of radiant happiness rare for Britten by this point. The composer considered it "the finest thing I've written." The Piano Concerto (1938) was at first criticised for being too light-hearted and virtuoso. In 1945 Britten revised it, replacing a skittish third movement with a more sombre passacaglia that, in Matthews's view, gives the work more depth, and makes the apparent triumph of the finale more ambivalent. The Violin Concerto (1939), finished in the first weeks of the World War, has virtuoso elements, but they are balanced by lyrical and elegiac passages, "undoubtedly reflecting Britten's growing concern with the escalation of world hostilities." Neither concerto is among Britten's most popular works, but in the 21st century the Violin Concerto, which is technically difficult, has been performed more frequently than before, both in the concert hall and on record, and has enthusiastic performers and advocates, notably violinist Janine Jansen. Britten's incidental music for theatre, film and radio, much of it unpublished, was the subject of an essay by William Mann, published in 1952 in the first detailed critical assessment of Britten's music to that date. Of these pieces the music for a radio play, The Rescue, by Edward Sackville-West, is praised by the musicologist Lewis Foreman as "of such stature and individual character as to be worth a regular place alongside [Britten's] other dramatic scores." Mann finds in this score pre-echoes of the second act of Billy Budd, while Foreman observes that Britten "appears to have made passing allusions to The Rescue in his final opera, Death in Venice. ### Chamber and instrumental works Britten's close friendship with Rostropovich inspired the Cello Sonata (1961) and three suites for solo cello (1964–71). String quartets featured throughout Britten's composing career, from a student work in 1928 to his Third String Quartet (1975). The Second Quartet, from 1945, was written in homage to Purcell; Mason considered it Britten's most important instrumental work to that date. Referring to this work, Keller writes of the ease with which Britten, relatively early in his compositional career, solves "the modern sonata problem – the achievement of symmetry and unity within an extended ternary circle based on more than one subject." Keller likens the innovatory skill of the Quartet to that of Walton's Viola Concerto. The third Quartet was Britten's last major work; the critic Colin Anderson said of it in 2007, "one of Britten's greatest achievements, one with interesting allusions to Bartók and Shostakovich, and written with an economy that opens out a depth of emotion that can be quite chilling. The Gemini Variations (1965), for flute, violin and piano duet, were based on a theme of Zoltán Kodály and written as a virtuoso piece for the 13-year-old Jeney twins, musical prodigies whom Britten had met in Budapest in the previous year. For Osian Ellis, Britten wrote the Suite for Harp (1969), which Joan Chissell in The Times described as "a little masterpiece of concentrated fancy". Nocturnal after John Dowland (1963) for solo guitar was written for Julian Bream and has been praised by Benjamin Dwyer for its "semantic complexity, prolonged musical argument, and philosophical depth". ### Legacy Britten's fellow composers had divided views about him. To Tippett he was "simply the most musical person I have ever met", with an "incredible" technical mastery; some contemporaries, however, were less effusive. In Tippett's view, Walton and others were convinced that Britten and Pears were leaders of a homosexual conspiracy in music, a belief Tippett dismisses as ridiculous, inspired by jealousy of Britten's postwar successes. Leonard Bernstein considered Britten "a man at odds with the world", and said of his music: "[I]f you hear it, not just listen to it superficially, you become aware of something very dark." The tenor Robert Tear, who was closely associated with Britten in the latter part of the composer's career, made a similar point: "There was a great, huge abyss in his soul ... He got into the valley of the shadow of death and couldn't get out." In the decade after Britten's death, his standing as a composer in Britain was to some extent overshadowed by that of the still-living Tippett. The film-maker Tony Palmer thought that Tippett's temporary ascendancy might have been a question of the two composers' contrasting personalities: Tippett had more warmth and had made fewer enemies. In any event this was a short-lived phenomenon; Tippett adherents such as the composer Robert Saxton soon rediscovered their enthusiasm for Britten, whose audience steadily increased during the final years of the 20th century. Britten has had few imitators; Brett describes him as "inimitable, possessed of ... a voice and sound too dangerous to imitate." Nevertheless, after his death Britten was lauded by the younger generation of English composers to whom, in the words of Oliver Knussen, he became "a phenomenal father-figure". Brett believes that he affected every subsequent British composer to some extent: "He is a key figure in the growth of British musical culture in the second half of the 20th century, and his effect on everything from opera to the revitalization of music education is hard to overestimate." Whittall believes that one reason for Britten's enduring popularity is the "progressive conservatism" of his music. He generally avoided the avant-garde, and did not challenge the conventions in the way that contemporaries such as Tippett did. Perhaps, says Brett, "the tide that swept away serialism, atonality and most forms of musical modernism and brought in neo-Romanticism, minimalism and other modes of expression involved with tonality carried with it renewed interest in composers who had been out of step with the times." Britten defined his mission as a composer in very simple terms: composers should aim at "pleasing people today as seriously as we can". ## Pianist and conductor Britten, though a reluctant conductor and a nervous pianist, was greatly sought after in both capacities. The piano accompanist Gerald Moore wrote in his memoirs about playing at all the main music festivals except for Aldeburgh, because "as the presiding genius there is the greatest accompanist in the world, my services are not needed." Britten's recital partnership with Pears was his best-known collaboration, but he also accompanied Kathleen Ferrier, Rostropovich, Dietrich Fischer-Dieskau, James Bowman and John Shirley-Quirk, among others. Though usually too nervous to play piano solos, Britten often performed piano duets with Clifford Curzon or Richter, and chamber music with the Amadeus Quartet. The composers whose works, other than his own, he most often played were Mozart and Schubert; the latter, in Murray Perahia's view, was Britten's greatest idol. As a boy and young man, Britten had intensely admired Brahms, but his admiration waned to nothing, and Brahms seldom featured in his repertory. Singers and players admired Britten's conducting, and David Webster rated it highly enough to offer him the musical directorship of the Covent Garden Opera in 1952. Britten declined; he was not confident of his ability as a conductor and was reluctant to spend too much time performing rather than composing. As a conductor, Britten's repertory included Purcell, Bach, Haydn, Mozart and Schubert, and occasional less characteristic choices including Schumann's Scenes from Goethe's Faust; Elgar's The Dream of Gerontius and Introduction and Allegro; Holst's Egdon Heath and short pieces by Percy Grainger. ## Recordings Britten, like Elgar and Walton before him, was signed up by a major British recording company, and performed a considerable proportion of his output on disc. For the Decca Record Company he made some monaural records in the 1940s and 1950s, followed, with the enthusiastic support of the Decca producer John Culshaw, by numerous stereophonic versions of his works. Culshaw wrote, "The happiest hours I have spent in any studio were with Ben, for the basic reason that it did not seem that we were trying to make records or video tapes; we were just trying to make music." In May 1943 Britten made his debut in the Decca studios, accompanying Sophie Wyss in five of his arrangements of French folk songs. The following January he and Pears recorded together, in Britten's arrangements of British folk songs, and the following day, in duet with Curzon he recorded his Introduction and Rondo alla burlesca and Mazurka elegiaca. In May 1944 he conducted the Boyd Neel string orchestra, Dennis Brain and Pears in the first recording of the Serenade for Tenor, Horn and Strings, which has frequently been reissued, most recently on CD. Britten's first operatic recording was The Turn of the Screw, made in January 1955 with the original English Opera Group forces. In 1957 he conducted The Prince of the Pagodas in an early stereo recording, supervised by Culshaw. Decca's first major commercial success with Britten came the following year, with Peter Grimes, which has, at 2013, never been out of the catalogues since its first release. From 1958 Britten conducted Decca recordings of many of his operas and vocal and orchestral works, including the Nocturne (1959), the Spring Symphony (1960) and the War Requiem (1963). The last sold in unexpectedly large numbers for a classical set, and thereafter Decca unstintingly made resources available to Culshaw and his successors for Britten recordings. Sets followed of Albert Herring (1964), the Sinfonia da Requiem (1964), Curlew River (1965), A Midsummer Night's Dream (1966), The Burning Fiery Furnace (1967), Billy Budd (1967) and many of the other major works. In 2013, to mark the anniversary of Britten's birth, Decca released a set of 65 CDs and one DVD, Benjamin Britten – Complete Works. Most of the recordings were from Decca's back catalogue, but in the interests of comprehensiveness a substantial number of tracks were licensed from 20 other companies including EMI, Virgin Classics, Naxos, Warner and NMC. As a pianist and conductor in other composers' music, Britten made many recordings for Decca. Among his studio collaborations with Pears are sets of Schubert's Winterreise and Die schöne Müllerin, Schumann's Dichterliebe, and songs by Haydn, Mozart, Bridge, Ireland, Holst, Tippett and Richard Rodney Bennett. Other soloists whom Britten accompanied on record were Ferrier, Rostropovich and Vishnevskaya. As a conductor he recorded a wide range of composers, from Purcell to Grainger. Among his best-known Decca recordings are Purcell's The Fairy-Queen, Bach's Brandenburg Concertos, Cantata 151, Cantata 102 and St John Passion, Elgar's The Dream of Gerontius and Mozart's last two symphonies. ## Honours, awards and commemorations State honours awarded to Britten included Companion of Honour (Britain) in 1953; Commander of the Royal Order of the Polar Star (Sweden) in 1962; the Order of Merit (Britain) in 1965; and a life peerage (Britain) in July 1976, he took the title Baron Britten, of Aldeburgh in the County of Suffolk. He received honorary degrees and fellowships from 19 conservatories and universities in Europe and America. His awards included the Hanseatic Goethe Prize (1961); the Aspen Award, Colorado (1964); the Royal Philharmonic Society's Gold Medal (1964); the Wihuri Sibelius Prize (1965); the Mahler Medal (Bruckner and Mahler Society of America, 1967); the Léonie Sonning Music Prize (Denmark, 1968); the Ernst von Siemens Music Prize (1974); and the Ravel Prize (1974). Prizes for individual works included UNESCO's International Rostrum of Composers 1961 for A Midsummer Night's Dream; and Grammy Awards in 1963 and 1977 for the War Requiem. The Red House, Aldeburgh, where Britten and Pears lived and worked together from 1957 until Britten's death in 1976, is now the home of the Britten-Pears Foundation, established to promote their musical legacy. In Britten's centenary year his studio at the Red House was restored to the way it was in the 1950s and opened to the public. The converted hayloft was designed and built by H T Cadbury Brown in 1958 and was described by Britten as a "magnificent work". In June 2013 Dame Janet Baker officially opened the Britten-Pears archive in a new building in the grounds of the Red House. The Benjamin Britten Music Academy in Lowestoft, founded in the composer's honour, was completed in 1979; it is an 11–18 co-educational day school, with ties to the Britten-Pears Foundation. A memorial stone to Britten was unveiled in the north choir aisle of Westminster Abbey in 1978. There are memorial plaques to him at three of his London homes: 173 Cromwell Road, 45a St John's Wood High Street, and 8 Halliford Street in Islington. In April 2013 Britten was honoured by the Royal Mail in the UK, as one of ten people selected as subjects for the "Great Britons" commemorative postage stamp issue. Other creative artists have celebrated Britten. In 1970 Walton composed Improvisations on an Impromptu of Benjamin Britten, based on a theme from Britten's Piano Concerto. Works commemorating Britten include Cantus in Memoriam Benjamin Britten an orchestral piece written in 1977 by Arvo Pärt, and Sally Beamish's Variations on a Theme of Benjamin Britten, based on the second Sea Interlude from Peter Grimes; she composed the work to mark Britten's centenary. Alan Bennett depicts Britten in a 2009 play The Habit of Art, set while Britten is composing Death in Venice and centred on a fictional meeting between Britten and Auden. Britten was played in the premiere production by Alex Jennings. Tony Palmer made three documentary films about Britten: Benjamin Britten & his Festival (1967); A Time There Was (1979); and Nocturne (2013). In 2019, Britten's War Requiem was selected by the U.S. Library of Congress for preservation in the National Recording Registry for being "culturally, historically, and aesthetically significant". In April 2022 a community project was launched, with a special fundraising event, when Lowestoft-born broadcaster and children's author Zeb Soanes and a team of local people in Lowestoft, unveiled a maquette of a statue of Britten as a boy, by sculptor Ian Rank-Broadley, to be installed on the sea-front. ### Centenary In September 2012, to mark the composer's forthcoming centenary, the Britten-Pears Foundation launched "Britten 100", a collaboration of leading organisations in the performing arts, publishing, broadcasting, film, academia and heritage. Among the events were the release of a feature film Benjamin Britten – Peace and Conflict, and a centenary exhibition at the British Library. The Royal Mint issued a 50-pence piece, to mark the centenary – the first time a composer has featured on a British coin. Centenary performances of the War Requiem were given at eighteen locations in Britain. Opera productions included Owen Wingrave at Aldeburgh, Billy Budd at Glyndebourne, Death in Venice by English National Opera, Gloriana by The Royal Opera, and Peter Grimes, Death in Venice and A Midsummer Night's Dream by Opera North. Peter Grimes was performed on the beach at Aldeburgh, opening the 2013 Aldeburgh Festival in June 2013, with Steuart Bedford conducting and singers from the Chorus of Opera North and the Chorus of the Guildhall School of Music and Drama, described by The Guardian as "a remarkable, and surely unrepeatable achievement." Internationally, the anniversary was marked by performances of the War Requiem, Peter Grimes and other works in four continents. In the US the centennial events were described as "coast to coast", with a Britten festival at Carnegie Hall, and performances at the New York Philharmonic, the Metropolitan Opera and Los Angeles Opera. ## Notes, references and sources Notes References Sources

Dreamsnake

1978 science fiction novel by Vonda McIntyre

Dreamsnake is a 1978 science fiction novel by American writer Vonda N. McIntyre. It is an expansion of her 1973 novelette "Of Mist, and Grass, and Sand", for which she won her first Nebula Award in 1974. The story is set on Earth after a nuclear holocaust. The central character, Snake, is a healer who uses genetically modified serpents to cure sickness—one snake is an alien "dreamsnake", whose venom gives dying people pleasant dreams. The novel follows Snake as she seeks to replace her dreamsnake after its death. The book is considered an example of second-wave feminism in science fiction. McIntyre subverted conventionally gendered narratives by rewriting a typical heroic quest to place a woman at its center, and by using devices such as avoiding gender pronouns to challenge expectations about characters' gender identities. Dreamsnake also explored varying social structures and sexual paradigms from a feminist perspective, and examined themes of healing and cross-cultural interaction. The novel was well-received, winning the Nebula Award, the Hugo Award, and the Locus Poll Award in 1979. The strength and self-sufficiency of Snake as a protagonist were noted by several commentators. Reviewers also praised McIntyre's writing and the book's themes. Scholar Diane Wood wrote that Dreamsnake demonstrated "science fiction's potential to produce aesthetic pleasure through experimentation with linguistic and cultural codes", and author Ursula K. Le Guin called it "a book like a mountain stream—fast, clean, clear, exciting, beautiful". ## Background and setting In 1971, Vonda N. McIntyre, then living in Seattle, set up the Clarion West writers' workshop, which she helped run through 1973. One of the workshop's instructors was Ursula K. Le Guin. During a 1972 workshop session, one of the assignments was to create a story from two randomly chosen words, one pastoral, and one related to technology. McIntyre's effort would become her 1973 short story "Of Mist, and Grass, and Sand". That story grew into Dreamsnake, and was used unchanged as the first chapter of the novel, which also incorporated two other pieces by McIntyre: "The Broken Dome" and "The Serpent's Death", both published in 1978. Dreamsnake, McIntyre's second novel, was released by Houghton Mifflin in 1978, with a cover illustration by Stephen Alexander. The story is set after a nuclear holocaust that "destroyed everyone who knew or cared about the reasons it had happened". Most animal species are extinct, regions of the planet are radioactive, and the sky is hidden by dust. Human society is depicted as existing in what journalist Sam Jordison describes as "low-tech tribalism": the character Arevin, for instance, has never seen a book. The exception is the single city of Center, which has sophisticated technology and is in contact with other planets, but which has a rigidly hierarchical structure and does not permit outsiders to enter. The city also serves as the setting for McIntyre's first novel, The Exile Waiting (1975). The protagonist of Dreamsnake is Snake, a healer who uses snake venom in her trade. She travels with three genetically engineered snakes; a rattlesnake, named Sand, a cobra, named Mist, and a "dreamsnake" named Grass, from an alien world, and who relieves the pain of dying patients by letting them dream. ## Synopsis The novel opens with Snake coming to a nomadic tribe to treat a boy, Stavin, who has a tumor. While her cobra Mist manufactures an antidote in her venom glands, she leaves Grass, the dreamsnake, with Stavin to help him sleep. One of the nomads, Arevin, helps Snake control Mist as the cobra undergoes convulsions through the night, despite the terror that snakes hold for his people. She returns to Stavin in the morning to find that his parents have mortally wounded Grass, afraid he would hurt the boy. Despite her anger, she allows Mist to bite Stavin and inject the antidote. The leader of the nomads apologizes to Snake, and Arevin asks her to stay with them, but Snake explains that she needs a dreamsnake for her work and must return home and ask for a new one. She expresses fear that the other healers will take her snakes and cast her out instead. As she leaves, Arevin asks her to return someday. Snake stops at an oasis, where she is asked to help Jesse, a woman who has injured herself falling off a horse. Jesse's partner Merideth takes Snake to their camp, leaving Snake's baggage at the oasis. Snake finds that Jesse has broken her spine, leaving her paralyzed, something Snake cannot heal. Merideth and Alex, a third partner, convince Jesse that they should return to Center, where Jesse is from, in the hope that the off-worlders may be able to help her. Wandering around near the camp, Snake sees the body of Jesse's horse and realizes the area it fell is radioactive; Jesse had lain there long enough to have fatal radiation poisoning. Snake offers to let Mist bite Jesse and relieve her pain; Jesse accepts, and Merideth and Alex bid her farewell. Before she dies, Jesse tells Snake that her family is indebted to Snake and could help her get another dreamsnake from another planet. Returning to the oasis, Snake finds that someone has rifled through her belongings and stolen her journal. Grum, a caravan leader also camped there, says it was the work of a "crazy". Back among the nomads, Arevin decides to go after Snake. Snake crosses the Western desert to the town of Mountainside, where the mayor's son Gabriel asks her to heal the mayor. While staying with them, Snake invites Gabriel to sleep with her. After he expresses hesitation, she learns that he impregnated a friend as a result of being improperly taught "biocontrol", and that this led to a difficult relationship with his father. She tells him he can still learn, and suggests he find a different teacher when he leaves Mountainside, as he intends to do. While checking on her horses, Snake meets Melissa, a girl with a severely burned face who helps the stablemaster, who takes credit for her work. Her scars make her self-conscious of her appearance in a town of otherwise beautiful people. Shortly after, Snake is attacked on her way to the mayor's house by a man she assumes is the crazy. She discovers that Melissa has been physically and sexually abused by the stablemaster, and uses this knowledge to convince the mayor to free her. Melissa accompanies Snake as her adopted daughter when Snake leaves for Center. Snake explains to her that dreamsnakes are very rare, and that the healers have not found a way to make them breed. Meanwhile, Arevin arrives at the healer's dwelling north of Mountainside, but he is told that Snake is not there, and goes south to find her. In Mountainside, he is briefly detained on suspicion of having been Snake's attacker, but is released. Snake and Melissa cross the eastern desert and reach Center, but are turned away, like every previous emissary from the healers. Soon after they return to the mountains, they are attacked again by the crazy, who demands the dreamsnake, and collapses when he learns the serpent is dead. Snake learns he is addicted to dreamsnake venom. Snake makes him take her to a community whose leader, North, possesses several dreamsnakes, and occasionally allows his followers to be bitten by them as a reward. The community lives in a "broken dome", a relic of a past civilization. North, who bears all healers a grudge, puts Snake in a large, cold pit filled with dreamsnakes. In the pit, Snake realizes that the intense cold brings dreamsnakes to maturity, and they breed in triplets, rather than the paired sexes of Earth. Her immunity to venom allows her to survive the pit, and eventually to climb out. While North's henchmen are in venom-induced comas, she finds Melissa similarly comatose, and escapes with her and a bag of dreamsnakes. She is met outside by Arevin, who helps Melissa recover. ## Themes and structure Dreamsnake is considered an exemplar of second-wave feminism in science fiction, which had largely been devoted to masculine adventures prior to a body of science fiction writing by women in the 1960s and 1970s that subverted conventional narratives. McIntyre uses the post-apocalyptic setting to explore a variety of social structures and sexual paradigms from a feminist perspective. By giving female desire a prominent place, she explores gender relations in the communities Snake visits. As in McIntyre's later Starfarers books, women are depicted in many leadership positions. The archetype of a heroic quest is rewritten: the central figure is a woman, and the challenges faced require healing and care, rather than force, to overcome. A conventional fictional pattern of a hero being pursued, or waited for, by a female lover, is reversed, as Arevin follows Snake, who receives his support but does not require rescue. Gender expectations are also subverted through the character of Merideth, whose gender is never disclosed, as McIntyre entirely avoids using gender pronouns, thereby creating a "feminist construct" that suggests a person's character and abilities are more important than their gender. Characters are often introduced with reference to their profession, and later casually revealed to be female, thereby potentially subverting readers' expectations. The book's feminist themes are also related to an exploration of healing and wholeness, according to scholar Inge-Lise Paulsen. Snake is a professional healer, ostensibly fitting the stereotype of a nurturing woman, but McIntyre depicts her as someone who is a healer because she was trained to be and because it was an ethical choice, and not as a consequence of her femininity. Although she finds a family in Arevin and Melissa, that is not where Snake seeks her "ultimate fulfillment as a woman": her triumph at the story's end comes from her discovery of the dreamsnakes' breeding habits. Love is depicted as insufficient for a relationship; Arevin must learn to trust Snake's strength, and resist the temptation to protect her. The ideal of mutual respect is also shown in the utopian structure of the nomads' society. The nomads respect individual agency, in contrast to the people of the city, who isolate themselves from the world from a desire to protect themselves. Paulsen sees this as a cultural tendency typical of patriarchy, and writes that McIntyre's depiction of an ethical need for wholeness and an understanding of connections between the facets of society is also found in the work of Le Guin and in Doris Lessing's Canopus in Argos series. In Dreamsnake McIntyre uses language conveying complex and multiple meanings, thus challenging readers to engage deeply. Snake's name, and the snakes she uses, invoke images drawn from religion and mythology. For instance, modern-day physicians in the United States use a caduceus, or staff with intertwining snakes, as an emblem: in Greek mythology, the caduceus is the symbol of Hermes, and signifies that its carrier is a bearer of divine knowledge. Snakes have other symbolic meanings, including both death and rejuvenation. They are a recurring motif in fiction, being depicted in widely varying roles and forms. Their symbolic association with both poison and healing, for instance, connects McIntyre's protagonist to Asclepius, the Roman god of healing, who carries a serpent-entwined rod. These dual meanings are illustrated by the dreamsnake Grass, who in the story is a powerful tool for the healer while also being an object of fear for the desert people. Snake's use of serpents plays on the biblical myth of Genesis, reversing it so the woman controls the snakes. The depiction of Center, a place of sophisticated technology that has cut itself off from the rest of society, is associated with an exploration of the relationship between "centre and margins, insider and outsider, self and other" that is also found in McIntyre's The Exile Waiting and Superluminal (1983). Center exhibits a rigid social order; in contrast, social change occurs outside, at the margins of society, and Center, despite its name, is rendered irrelevant. Dreamsnake, along with much of McIntyre's work, also explores the effects of freedom and imprisonment. Many of her characters attempt to free themselves from shackles of varying kinds, including self-imposed psychological limitations, the challenges created by physical infirmity or appearance, and oppression by other humans. Snake encounters two freed slaves who work for the mayor of Mountainside, who freed them by banning slavery in his town. One bears a ring in her heel as a relic of enslavement; when Snake tells her she could have it removed, she is overjoyed, though the process risks laming her. The other is notionally free but feels obliged to serve the mayor's every whim out of gratitude. Melissa is handicapped differently: because of her disfiguring burns, in a society that judges people on their physical appearance, she leads a hidden existence. Other characters who are fettered in some way include North, whose incurable gigantism has led to constant psychotic rage; the "crazy", trapped by his addiction; Gabriel, embarrassed by his failure at controlling his fertility; and Arevin, who feels caught by familial responsibility. Interaction between cultural codes is a recurring theme in Dreamsnake, sometimes featuring dual meanings, as when Snake and Arevin discuss the term "friend", to which Arevin attaches greater significance, or in the figurative offer of help that the mountain people use to offer a sexual relationship. Arevin's initial unwillingness to share his name with Snake, and his explanation of what "friend" signifies to him shows his people's deep-rooted suspicion of strangers; and when he leaves, he seeks to explain to the healers the cultural factors that resulted in Grass being killed. Cultural biases also impede the healers' ability to understand the alien biology of the dreamsnakes. Their knowledge of Earth biology leads them to erroneously assume creatures mate in pairs; only Snake's circumstances enable her to discover they are triploid. The narrative thus argues that acceptance of difference can lead to growth and change. ## Characterization Multiple reviewers highlighted Dreamsnake'''s strong female protagonist. Snake's centrality to the book allows McIntyre to explore gender as its central theme and subvert gendered tropes: Snake, like many of McIntyre's protagonists, is an assertive woman in a traditionally male role, although she is a healer, rather than an archetypal male hero. Most of the male characters in Dreamsnake are depicted in a negative light, as with the mayor of Mountainside, the abusive stablemaster, or North; Arevin, who is "gentle and persistent", is in the background for most of the book. Orson Scott Card described Snake's character as self-sufficient: she has solved her own problems and subverted the expectation that she would be rescued at the novel's end. For Card, Snake has much in common with the Lone Ranger, improving peoples' lives with "love and understanding": she immunizes Grum's people, rescues Melissa, and helps Gabriel overcome his inability to control his fertility, a "hideous problem" in their society. Scholar Sarah LeFanu describes Snake as an "older and wiser" version of Mischa, the protagonist of The Exile Waiting, who struggles through much adversity before escaping the city of Center. Snake is depicted as "brave, loyal and intelligent", with a strong desire for justice, and a kind nature. Scholar Carolyn Wendell writes that Snake is more able to make her own choices than many of the other characters in Dreamsnake. Her freedom gives her greater responsibility and allows her to free others, such as Gabriel and Melissa. While exploring her sexuality, Snake also retains more agency than is typical for female characters in the genre. According to Lefanu, through Snake's sexual activity, and the sexual politics of the book more generally, McIntyre suggests that in the world of Dreamsnake, it is "possible both to be a woman and to be fully human". Snake's character has been described as an example of feminist reclamation of the archetype of a witch: a person shunned by patriarchal society, redrawn as an image of female power. ## Reception and recognition Dreamsnake won multiple awards, including the 1978 Nebula Award for Best Novel, the 1979 Hugo Award for Best Novel and the 1979 Locus Poll Award for Best Novel. It also won the Pacific Northwest Booksellers' Award, and was nominated for the 1979 Ditmar Award in International Fiction. In 1995, Dreamsnake was put on the shortlist for the Retrospective James Tiptree Award. "Of Mist, and Grass, and Sand" had won McIntyre her first Nebula Award, for best novelette, in 1974, as well as being nominated for the Hugo Award in the same category, and the Locus Award for Best Short Fiction. In 1980 the paperback was nominated for the American Book Awards. Dreamsnake has been identified as part of a wave of feminist speculative fiction that emerged in the 1970s and established the position of female authors in a field where they had been marginalized. This body of work included writing by Le Guin, Kate Wilhelm, and James Tiptree Jr. McIntyre's writing was highlighted by several reviewers. The Santa Cruz Sentinel described the book as a "truly mesmerizing story", while Sally Estes of the American Library Association called it "gripping", and the Cincinnati Enquirer described it as among the year's "most sensitively-written and poetic novels". Le Guin praised Dreamsnake, describing it as "a book like a mountain stream—fast, clean, clear, exciting, beautiful". Writing in 2011, she elaborated: "Dreamsnake is written in a clear, quick-moving prose, with brief, lyrically intense landscape passages that take the reader straight into its half-familiar, half-strange desert world, and fine descriptions of the characters' emotional states and moods and changes." In 1981 science fiction scholar Marshall Tymn commented that it was the "poetically negotiable authenticity" of Snake's adventure that made the book successful, and that it was an enduring work among those that had won Hugo and Nebula awards. A 2012 review in The Guardian called it a "challenging, unsettling book", and said that McIntyre's fictional world was "expertly drawn". The themes, symbology, and language use in Dreamsnake also attracted comment. Scholar Diane Wood wrote that the novel showed "science fiction's potential to produce aesthetic pleasure through experimentation with linguistic and cultural codes". Wood also praised McIntyre's theme of communication across cultures, saying that her style and "vivid characterization" strengthened her message of "greater compassion and understanding", and made the "richly textured novel" a pleasure to read. Scholar Gary Wesfahl favorably compared McIntyre's depiction of snakes to that in other works of speculative fiction, describing Dreamsnake as the "high-point" in portrayals of fictional relationships between snakes and humans. Card also highlighted the self-sufficiency of Snake's character, and added that McIntyre had successfully tied together a "superficially episodic story", and created a "vicious but beautiful world", with well-drawn characters. Some reviewers commented on the length and structure of the novel, and made varyingly favorable comparisons to "Of Mist, and Grass, and Sand". A Charlotte Observer review was critical of Dreamsnake, saying that nothing substantial occurred for much of the book, and that it was an example of why even excellent short stories ought not to be expanded into novels, while Estes also commented that it had "lost some of the subtlety" of the original short story. Other reviewers commented negatively on Arevin's brief appearances in the story, as being unnecessary. Wendell wrote in 1982 that the device was a reversal of a usual fictional trope, and that these reviewers may have been uncomfortable with a female protagonist solving her difficulties on her own. Brian Stableford commented that Dreamsnake'' had "little in the way of a plot", but that the story did not rely on plot for its effectiveness; he described it instead as a "novel of experience", written with a "good deal of thought and sincerity", and very readable. Card wrote that he was initially hesitant about the expansion of "Of Mist, and Grass, and Sand", which he called a "gem perfectly polished". He criticized some passages, such as the characterization of Melissa, as maudlin; and others as dragging on too long, but said that ultimately he did not wish for the book to end.

Theatre Royal, Drury Lane

West End theatre in Covent Garden, London

The Theatre Royal, Drury Lane, commonly known as Drury Lane, is a West End theatre and Grade I listed building in Covent Garden, London, England. The building faces Catherine Street (earlier named Bridges or Brydges Street) and backs onto Drury Lane. The building is the most recent in a line of four theatres which were built at the same location, the earliest of which dated back to 1663, making it the oldest theatre site in London still in use. According to the author Peter Thomson, for its first two centuries, Drury Lane could "reasonably have claimed to be London's leading theatre". For most of that time, it was one of a handful of patent theatres, granted monopoly rights to the production of "legitimate" drama in London (meaning spoken plays, rather than opera, dance, concerts, or plays with music). The first theatre on the site was built at the behest of Thomas Killigrew in the early 1660s, when theatres were allowed to reopen during the English Restoration. Initially known as "Theatre Royal in Bridges Street", the theatre's proprietors hired prominent actors who performed at the theatre on a regular basis, including Nell Gwyn and Charles Hart. In 1672, the theatre caught fire and Killigrew built a larger theatre on the same plot, renamed the "Theatre Royal in Drury Lane"; it opened in 1674. This building lasted nearly 120 years, under the leaderships of Colley Cibber, David Garrick and Richard Brinsley Sheridan, the last of whom employed Joseph Grimaldi as the theatre's resident Clown. In 1791, under Sheridan's management, the building was demolished to make way for a larger theatre which opened in 1794. This new Drury Lane survived for 15 years before burning down in 1809. The building that stands today opened in 1812. It has been the residency of well known actors including Edmund Kean, comedian Dan Leno and the musical composer and performer Ivor Novello. From the Second World War, the theatre has primarily hosted long runs of musicals, including Oklahoma!, My Fair Lady, 42nd Street and Miss Saigon, the theatre's longest-running show. The theatre is owned by the composer Andrew Lloyd Webber. Since January 2019, the venue has had ongoing renovations, and in July 2021, the theatre reopened after over two years' of extensive work and closures related to the COVID-19 pandemic. Disney's Frozen made its West End debut at Drury Lane on 27 August, with general shows starting from 8 September 2021. ## First theatre: Theatre Royal, Bridges Street (1663) A playhouse known as the Cockpit Theatre used by Queen Anne's Men on Drury Lane was targetted by rioting apprentices on 4 March 1617. After the eleven-year-long Puritan Interregnum, which had seen the banning of pastimes regarded as frivolous, such as theatre, the English monarchy was restored to the throne with the return of Charles II in 1660. Soon after, Charles issued Letters Patent to two parties licensing the formation of new acting companies. One of these went to Thomas Killigrew, whose company became known as the King's Company, and who built a new theatre in Drury Lane. The Letters Patent also granted the two companies a shared monopoly on the public performance of legitimate drama in London; this monopoly was challenged in the 18th century by new venues and by a certain slipperiness in the definition of "legitimate drama," but remained legally in place until 1843. The new playhouse, architect unknown, opened on 7 May 1663 and was known from the placement of the entrance as the "Theatre Royal in Bridges Street." It went by other names as well, including the "King's Playhouse." The building was a three-tiered wooden structure, 112 ft (34 m) long and 59 ft (18 m) wide; it could hold an audience of 700. Set well back from the broader streets, the theatre was accessed by narrow passages between surrounding buildings. The King himself frequently attended the theatre's productions, as did Samuel Pepys, whose private diaries provide much of what we know of London theatre-going in the 1660s. The day after the Theatre Royal opened, Pepys attended a performance of Francis Beaumont and John Fletcher's The Humorous Lieutenant. He has this to say in his diary: > The house is made with extraordinary good contrivance, and yet hath some faults, as the narrowness of the passages in and out of the Pitt, and the distance from the stage to the boxes, which I am confident cannot hear; but for all other things it is well, only, above all, the musique being below, and most of it sounding under the very stage, there is no hearing of the bases at all, nor very well of the trebles, which sure must be mended. Performances usually began at 3 pm to take advantage of the daylight: the main floor for the audience, the pit, had no roof in order to let in the light. A glazed dome was built over the opening, but according to one of Pepys' diary entries, the dome was not entirely effective at keeping out the elements: he and his wife were forced to leave the theatre to take refuge from a hail storm. Green baize cloth covered the benches in the pit and served to decorate the boxes, additionally ornamented with gold-tooled leather, and even the stage itself. The backless green benches in the pit were in a semicircular arrangement facing the stage, according to a May 1663 letter from one Monsieur de Maonconys: "All benches of the pit, where people of rank also sit, are shaped in a semi-circle, each row higher than the next." The three galleries formed a semicircle around the floor seats; both the first and second galleries were divided up into boxes. The King's Company was forced to commission the technically advanced and expensive Theatre Royal playhouse by the success of the rival Duke's Company, which was drawing fascinated crowds with their "moveable" or "changeable" scenery and visually gorgeous productions at the former Lisle's Tennis Court at Lincoln's Inn Fields. Imitating the innovations at Lincoln's Inn Fields, the Theatre Royal also featured moveable scenery with wings or shutters that could be smoothly changed between or even within acts. When not in use, the shutters rested out of sight behind the sides of the proscenium arch, which also served as a visual frame for the on-stage happenings. The picture-frame-like separation between audience and performance was a new phenomenon in English theatre, though it had been found on the Continent earlier. Theatre design in London remained ambivalent about the merits of the "picture-box" stage, and for many decades to come, London theatres including Drury Lane had large forestages protruding beyond the arch, often including the thrust stages found in the Elizabethan theatres. The players could still step forward and bridge the distance between performer and audience, and in addition, it was not unusual for audience members to mount the stage themselves. Killigrew's investment in the new playhouse put the two companies on a level as far as technical resources were concerned, but the offerings at the Theatre Royal nevertheless continued to be dominated by actor-driven "talk" drama, contrasting with William Davenant's baroque spectacles and operas at Lincoln's Inn Fields. Internal power structures were the main reason for this difference: while Davenant skilfully commanded a docile young troupe, Killigrew's authority over his veteran actors was far from absolute. Experienced actors Michael Mohun (who Pepys called "the best actor in the world") and Charles Hart held out for shares and good contracts in the King's Company. Such a division of power between the patentee, Killigrew, and his chief actors led to frequent conflicts that hampered the Theatre Royal as a business venture. Nevertheless, it was mostly at the struggling Theatre Royal, rather than at the efficiently run Lincoln's Inn Fields, that the plays were acted that are classics today. This applies especially to the new form Restoration comedy, dominated in the 1660s by William Wycherley and the Theatre Royal's house dramatist John Dryden. Actors such as Hart and Charles II's mistress Nell Gwyn developed and refined the famous scenes of repartee, banter and flirtation in Dryden's and Wycherley's comedies. With the appearance of actresses for the first time at Drury Lane and Lincoln's Inn Fields in the 1660s, British playwrights wrote parts for outspoken female characters, daring love scenes and provocative breeches roles. In any case, the competition between the King's Company and the Duke's was good for the rebirth and development of English drama. The Great Plague of London struck in the summer of 1665, and the Theatre Royal, along with all other public entertainment, was shut down by order of the Crown on 5 June. It remained closed for 18 months until the autumn of 1666, during which time it received at least a little interior renovation, including widening of the stage. Located well to the west of the City boundary, the theatre was unaffected by the Great Fire of London, which raged through the City in September 1666, but it burned down six years later on 25 January 1672. ## Second theatre: Theatre Royal, Drury Lane (1674) During the 20th century, one illustration was repeatedly – and wrongly – published as "Christopher Wren, design for the Theatre Royal Drury Lane, 1674". Since 1964, this presumption has been disputed by scholars. Careful inspection of the drawing at All Souls' College, Oxford Library shows that it has one pencil inscription: "Play house" [sic], which may have been added by a librarian or by anyone else. No sign of a signature (by Wren or anyone else) or a date appears anywhere on the drawing. Robert D. Hume of Penn State University explained that use of the drawing "rests almost entirely on the supposition that the so-called "Wren section" at All Souls represents this theatre. It could just as easily be a discarded sketch unconnected to Drury Lane in any way." Comparative evidence for Drury Lane's 1674 design can be found in the Theatre Royal, Bristol, built in 1766, whose design was modelled, in part, on Drury Lane's. The site measured 112 ft (34 m) east-west and 59 ft (18 m) north-south. The building was smaller than this, as reliable surveys and maps of the period show three passageways measuring between 5 and 10 ft (1.5 and 3.0 m) wide surrounding the Theatre Royal on three sides. The building probably measured between 40 and 50 ft (12 and 15 m) wide (the average width of all "Restoration" Theatres) and between 90 and 100 ft (27 and 30 m) long. Architect Robert Adam designed Drury Lane's 1674 interior. The theatre was managed, from 1747 to Adam's retirement in the 1770s, by David Garrick. The King's Company never recovered financially from the loss of the old Theatre Royal Bridges Street. The cost of constructing the new theatre, replacing their costumes and scenery lost in the fire and competitive pressure from the rival Duke's Company contributed to its decline. Eventually, in 1682, the King's Company merged with the Duke's. The 1674 Theatre Royal building contained a warren of rooms, including storage space and dressing rooms used by the management and performers, nearly seventy people in total, as well as some fifty technical staff members. Additionally three rooms were provided for scripts, including a library for their storage, a separate room for copying actors' parts and a special library for the theatre's account books, ledger books and music scores. This jumble of rooms often made communication among various departments difficult, a problem that Garrick corrected during his tenure as manager. The entire complex occupied 13,134 sq ft (1,220 m²) bounded by Drury Lane (east), Brydges Street (west), Great Russell Street (north) and Little Russell Street (south). From 1674, theatregoers accessed the Drury Lane via a long ten foot wide passageway from Bridges Street. The passageway opened onto a yard (previously a "Riding Yard") in which the theatre stood. It is likely that the yard remained open to the sky at this date, on three sides of the Theatre Royal walls. Henri Misson, a visitor from France, offers a description of the theatre in 1698: his use of the word "amphitheatre" supports the view that Drury Lane had a circular line of boxes surrounding its pit: > The Pit is an Amphitheatre, fill'd with Benches without Backboards, and adorn'd and cover'd with green Cloth. Men of Quality, particularly the younger Sort, some Ladies of Reputation and Virtue, and abundance of Damsels that haunt for Prey, sit all together in this Place, Higgledy-piggledy, chatter, toy, play, hear, hear not. Farther up, against the Wall, under the first Gallery and just opposite to the Stage, rises another Amphitheatre, which is taken by persons of the best Quality, among whom are generally very few Men. The Galleries, whereof there are only two Rows, are fill'd with none but ordinary People, particularly the Upper one. As Misson points out, the seating was divided by class, and tickets were priced accordingly. Box seats, used by the nobility and wealthy gentry, cost 5 shillings; the benches in the pit where some gentry sat, but also critics and scholars, cost 3 shillings; tradesmen and professionals occupied the first gallery with seats costing 2 shillings, while servants and other "ordinary people", as Misson refers to them, occupied the 1 shilling seats of the upper gallery. Seats were not numbered and were offered on a "first come, first served" basis, leading many members of the gentry to send servants to reserve seats well ahead of performances. The stage was 45 ft (14 m) wide and 30 ft (9.1 m) deep with a raked floor from the footlights to the backdrop. The angle of the rake rose one inch for every 24 in (610 mm) of horizontal stage. The stage floor included grooves for wings and flats in addition to trap doors in the floor. The proscenium arch covered the stage equipment above the stage that included a pair of girondels – large wheels holding many candles used to counteract the light from the footlights. Towards the latter part of the 18th century, doors were placed on either side of the stage, and a series of small spikes traced the edge of the stage apron to prevent audiences from climbing onto the stage. At the very back of the stage, a wide door opened to reveal Drury Lane. An added difficulty for Killigrew and his sons Thomas and Charles was the political unrest of 1678–1684 with the Popish Plot and the Exclusion Bill crisis distracting potential audiences from things theatrical. This affected both the King's and the Duke's companies, but most of all the King's which had no profit margin to carry them through the lean years. In 1682, the companies merged, or rather, the King's was absorbed by the Duke's. Led at the time by Thomas Betterton, the United Company, as it was now called, chose Drury Lane as their production house, leaving the Duke's Company's theatre in Dorset Garden closed for a time. In 1688, Betterton was removed from managerial control by Alexander Davenant, son of William Davenant, the original patent holder for the Duke's Company. Davenant's management (with Charles Killigrew) proved brief and disastrous, and by 1693 he was fleeing to the Canary Islands in the wake of embezzlement charges. The Theatre Royal found itself in the hands of lawyer Christopher Rich for the next 16 years. Neither Davenant's nor Killigrew's sons were much better than crooks, and Rich attempted to recoup their depredations of the company's resources by cost-cutting tyranny, pitting actor against actor and slashing salaries. By 1695, the actors, including day-to-day manager and acting legend Thomas Betterton, were alienated and humiliated enough to walk out and set up a cooperative company of their own. Nine men and six women departed, all of them established professional performers, including such draws as tragedian Elizabeth Barry and comedian Anne Bracegirdle, leaving the United Company – henceforth known as the "Patent Company" – in "a very despicable condition," according to an anonymous contemporary pamphlet: > The disproportion was so great at parting, that it was almost impossible, in Drury Lane, to muster up a sufficient number to take in all the parts of any play; and of them so few were tolerable, that a play must of necessity be damned, that had not extraordinary favour from the audience. No fewer than sixteen (most of the old standing) went away; and with them the very beauty and vigour of the stage; they who were left being for the most part learners, boys and girls, a very unequal match for them that revolted. A private letter from 19 November 1696 reported that Drury Lane "has no company at all, and unless a new play comes out on Saturday revives their reputation, they must break." The new play is assumed to have been John Vanbrugh's The Relapse, and it turned out the success the company needed. Christopher Rich continued as its head until 1709, when the patent in question was actually revoked amid a complex tangle of political machinations. A lawyer named William Collier was briefly given the right to mount productions in Drury Lane, but by 1710 the troupe was in the hands of the actors Colley Cibber, Robert Wilks, and Thomas Doggett – a triumvirate that eventually found themselves sharply satirised in Alexander Pope's Dunciad. In 1713, Barton Booth replaced Doggett. On 2 March 1717 was the premiere of the ballet The Loves of Mars and Venus choreographed by John Weaver, and was the first ballet to be performed in England. Cibber was the de facto leader of the triumvirate, and he led the theatre through a controversial but generally successful period until 1733, when he sold his controlling interest to John Highmore. It is likely that the sale was at a vastly inflated price and that Colley's goal was simply to get out of debts and make a profit (see Robert Lowe in his edition of Cibber's Apology). Members of the troupe at the time were most displeased; an actor's revolt was organised and executed; Charles Fleetwood came to control the theatre. Fleetwood's tenure was tumultuous; his abolition of the practice of allowing footmen free access to the upper gallery led to riots in 1737, and Fleetwood's gambling problems entangled the theatre in his own financial difficulties. It was during this period that actor Charles Macklin (a native of Inishowen in County Donegal in Ulster) rose to fame, propelled by a singular performance as Shylock in an early 1741 production of The Merchant of Venice, in which he introduced a realistic, naturalistic style of acting, abandoning the artificial bombast typical of dramatic roles prior. In 1747, Fleetwood's playhouse patent expired. The theatre and a patent renewal were purchased by actor David Garrick (who had trained under Macklin earlier) and partner James Lacy. Garrick served as manager and lead actor of the theatre until roughly 1766, and continued on in the management role for another ten years after that. He is remembered as one of the great stage actors and is especially associated with advancing the Shakespearean tradition in English theatre – during his time at Drury Lane, the company mounted at least 24 of Shakespeare's plays. Some of Shakespeare's surge in popularity during this period can be traced to the Licensing Act of 1737, which mandated governmental approval of any play before it could be performed and thereby created something of a vacuum of new material to perform. Garrick shared the stage with company including Peg Woffington, Susannah Cibber, Hannah Pritchard, Kitty Clive, Spranger Barry, Richard Yates and Ned Shuter. It was under Garrick's management that spectators were for the first time barred from the stage itself. Garrick commissioned Robert Adam and his brother James to renovate the theatre's interior, which they did in 1775. Their additions included an ornate ceiling and a stucco facade facing Bridges Street. This facade was the first time any structure that might be considered part of the theatre proper actually abutted the street: the building, like the 1663 original, had been built in the centre of the block, hemmed in by other structures. The narrow passage from Bridges street to the theatre now became an interior hallway; some theatre office space also went up behind the new facade. With a series of farewell performances, Garrick left the stage in 1776 and sold his shares in the theatre to the Irish playwright Richard Brinsley Sheridan. Sheridan and his partners, Thomas Linley the elder and Doctor James Ford (court physician to King George III), completed their purchase of Drury Lane two years later, and Sheridan owned it until 1809. Sheridan premiered his own comedy of manners The School for Scandal in 1777. Active management of the theatre was carried out by several parties during Sheridan's ownership, including himself, his father Thomas, and, from 1788 to 1796 and 1800 to 1802, the popular actor John Philip Kemble. Linley took up the post of Musical Director at the theatre, receiving a retainer of £500 per annum. Sheridan employed dozens of children as extras at Drury Lane including Joseph Grimaldi who made his stage debut at the theatre in 1780. Grimaldi became best known for his development of the modern day white-face clown and popularised the role of Clown in many Pantomimes and Harlequinades. Towards the end of the 1790s, Grimaldi starred in Robinson Crusoe, which confirmed him as a key Christmas pantomime performer. Many pantomimes followed, but his career at Drury Lane became turbulent, and he left the theatre for good in 1806. ## Third theatre (1794) The theatre was in need of updating by the end of the 18th century and was demolished in 1791, with the company moving temporarily to the new King's Theatre, in the Haymarket. A third theatre was designed by Henry Holland and opened on 12 March 1794. In the design of the theatre boxes, Henry Holland asked John Linnell for assistance. The designs by Linnell survive in the V&A Print Room – there are also designs by Henry Holland and Charles Heathcote Tatham who were involved in the design process. This was a cavernous theatre, accommodating more than 3,600 spectators. The motivation behind building on such a large scale? In the words of one owner: > I was aware of the very popular notion that our theatres ought to be very small; but it appeared to me that if that very popular notion should be suffered to proceed too far it would in every way deteriorate our dramatic performances depriving the proprietors of that revenue which is indispensable to defray the heavy expenses of such a concern. New technology facilitated the expansion: iron columns replaced bulky wood, supporting five tiers of galleries. The stage was large, too: 83 ft (25 m) wide and 92 ft (28 m) deep. Holland, the architect, said it was "on a larger scale than any other theatre in Europe." Except for churches, it was the tallest building in London. The "very popular notion that our theatres ought to be very small" proved hard to overcome. Various accounts from the period bemoan the mammoth size of the new theatre, longing for the "warm close observant seats of Old Drury," as one May 1794 theatre-goer put it. Actress Sarah Siddons, then part of the Drury Lane company, called it "a wilderness of a place" (and left Drury Lane along with her brother John Philip Kemble in 1803). Not only was any sense of intimacy and connection to the company on stage lost, but the very size of the theatre put a great deal of the audience at such a distance from the stage so as to make hearing a player's voice quite difficult. To compensate, the productions mounted in the new theatre tended more toward spectacle than the spoken word. An example of such a spectacle is a 1794 production that featured real water flowing down a rocky stream into a lake large enough on which to row a boat. This water issued from tanks in the attics above the house, which were installed – along with a much-touted iron safety curtain – as proof against fire. Richard Sheridan continued as theatre owner during the entire lifetime of this third building. He had grown in stature as a statesman during this time, but troubled finances were to be his undoing. The 1794 rebuilding had cost double the original estimate of £80,000, and Sheridan bore the entirety of the debt. Productions were more expensive to mount in the larger structure, and increased audience revenues failed to make up the difference. An assassination attempt against King George III took place at the theatre on 15 May 1800. James Hadfield fired two pistol shots from the pit toward the King, sitting in the royal box. The shots missed by inches, Hadfield having been jostled by a Mr Dyte. Hadfield was quickly subdued, and George, apparently unruffled, ordered the performance to continue. The comedy actor John Bannister became acting-manager in 1802. With Sheridan's son Tom, and in the circle of Richard Wroughton (stage-manager), William Dowton, Michael Kelly, Tom Dibdin and their likes, he helped to see the Theatre Royal through its next catastrophe. On 24 February 1809, despite the previously mentioned fire safety precautions, the theatre burned down. On being encountered drinking a glass of wine in the street while watching the fire, R.B. Sheridan was famously reported to have said: "A man may surely be allowed to take a glass of wine by his own fireside." Already on the shakiest financial ground, Sheridan was ruined entirely by the loss of the building. He turned to brewer Samuel Whitbread, an old friend, for help. As well as investing strongly in the project, Whitbread agreed to head a committee that would manage the company and oversee the rebuilding of the theatre, but asked Sheridan to withdraw from management himself, which he did entirely by 1811. ## Modern theatre (1812–present) The present Theatre Royal in Drury Lane, designed by Benjamin Dean Wyatt on behalf of the committee led by Whitbread, opened on 10 October 1812 with a production of Hamlet featuring Robert Elliston in the title role. The new theatre made some concessions toward intimacy, seating 3,060 people, about 550 fewer than the earlier building (though this size is still considered an extremely large theatre). On 6 September 1817, gas lighting was extended from the audience area to the stage, making it the first British theatre to be gaslit throughout. In 1820, the portico that still stands at the theatre's front entrance on Catherine Street was added, and in 1822 the interior underwent a significant remodelling. The colonnade running down the Russell Street side of the building was added in 1831. Productions relying more on scenery and effects than on dialogue and acting remained commonplace in the new facility. The 1823 production of Cataract of the Ganges had a finale featuring a horseback escape up a flowing cataract "with fire raging all around." Effects for an 1829 production were produced by hydraulic apparatus that reportedly could discharge 39 tons of water. There were those concerned that the theatre was failing in its role as one of the very few permitted to show legitimate drama. Management of the theatre after it reopened in 1813 fell to Samuel James Arnold, overseen by an amateur board of directors and a subcommittee focusing on the theatre as a centre for national culture. (Lord Byron was briefly on this subcommittee, from June 1815 until leaving England in April 1816.) Actor Edmund Kean was the on-stage highlight; like Macklin before him, he made his reputation as Shylock, premiering in the role in 1814. Kean remained until 1820 through praise and notorious disputes with local playwrights such as Charles Bucke. Elliston leased the theatre from 1819 until he went bankrupt in 1826. An American, Stephen Price of New York City's Park Theatre, followed from 1826 to 1830. Through most of the remainder of the 19th century, Drury Lane passed quickly from one proprietor to another. A colonnade was added to the Russell Street frontage, in 1831, by architect Samuel Beazley. In 1833, Alfred Bunn gained control of both Drury Lane and Covent Garden, managing the former from 1833 to 1839, and again from 1843 to 1850. Following the lead of the Lyceum Theatre, London, Bunn championed English opera, rather than the Italian operas that had played earlier at the theatre. These included Fair Rosamond and Farinelli by John Barnett; a series of twelve operas by Michael Balfe including The Maid of Artois and The Bohemian Girl; Maritana and others by William Vincent Wallace and several by Julius Benedict. In 1837, actor-manager Samuel Phelps (1804–1878) joined the company at Drury Lane, appearing with William Charles Macready, the gifted actor-manager in several Shakespeare plays. He also created the role of Captain Channel in Douglas Jerrold's melodrama, The Prisoner of War (1842), and of Lord Tresham in Robert Browning's A Blot in the 'Scutcheon (1843). Macready was briefly manager in 1841–1843, putting significant reforms in place. Nevertheless, most productions there were financial disasters. The theatrical monopoly first bestowed by Royal Letters Patent 183 years earlier was abolished by the Theatres Act 1843, but the patent had been largely toothless for decades and this had little immediate effect. On the other hand, other theatres, used to presenting musical entertainments, continued to do so, and Drury Lane continued as one of the most accepted venues for legitimate theatre. The 19th-century run of financial and artistic failures at Drury Lane was interrupted by four plays produced over a twenty-five-year period by the actor-playwright Dion Boucicault: The Queen of Spades (1851), Eugenie (1855), Formosa (1869), and The Shaughraun (1875). But this period of general decline culminated with F. B. Chatterton's 1878 resignation; in his words, "Shakespeare spells ruin, and Byron bankruptcy." During the 19th century, Drury Lane staged ballet as well, with performers including Italy's Carlotta Grisi. One famous musical director of Drury Lane was the eccentric French conductor and composer of light music Louis-Antoine Jullien (1812–1860), who successfully invited Berlioz to visit London and give concerts in the Theatre. The house's fortunes rose again under the management of Augustus Harris from 1879. In the 1880s and 1890s, the theatre hosted many of the productions of the Carl Rosa Opera Company. Harris focused increased resources on the theatre's annual pantomime, beginning at Christmas 1888, adding a well-known comedian, Dan Leno. These spectacular Christmas shows were a major success, often playing into March. They were choreographed by the theatre's dance master, John D'Auban. Many of the designs under Harris were created by the imaginative designer C. Wilhelm, including the spectacular drama, Armada (1888), and many of the pantomimes. Productions relying on spectacle became the norm at Drury Lane under the managements first of Harris, from 1879 to 1896, and then of Arthur Collins from 1896 to 1923. Examples include the 1909 play, The Whip, which featured not only a train crash, but also twelve horses recreating the 2,000 Guineas Stakes on an on-stage treadmill. Jimmy Glover, Director of Music from 1893 to 1923, was a significant figure at the theatre during the Collins years and wrote books which record much more than its musical life. ### Interior renovation (1922) In 1922, under the ownership of managing director Sir Alfred Butt, the theatre underwent its last major interior renovation of the 20th century. At a cost of £150,000, it became a four-tiered theatre able to seat just over 2,000 people. It was decorated with one of the most notable interiors produced by the specialist ornamental plasterwork company of Clark and Fenn. Composer and performer Ivor Novello, immensely popular in his time though little-remembered today, presented his musicals in Drury Lane from 1931 to 1939. The theatre was closed in 1939 because of the outbreak of the Second World War. During the war, it served as the headquarters for the Entertainments National Service Association, sustaining some minor bomb damage. It reopened in 1946 with Noël Coward's Pacific 1860. The building was Grade I listed in February 1958. In 2000, Theatre Royal Drury Lane was purchased by Andrew Lloyd Webber. Since 2014, it has been owned and managed by LW Theatres, Lloyd Webber's management company. The seating plan for the theatre remains the same and the auditorium is still one of the largest in London's West End. It is one of the 40 theatres featured in the 2012 DVD documentary series Great West End Theatres, presented by Donald Sinden. ### 350th anniversary renovation (2013) On 15 May 2013, Lloyd Webber revealed a £4 million restoration of the theatre to mark its 350th anniversary. Using a team of specialists, the detailed restoration has returned the public areas of the Rotunda, Royal Staircases and Grand Saloon, all of which were part of the 1810 theatre, to their original Regency style. ## Major productions of the 20th and 21st centuries Four of Rodgers and Hammerstein's musicals made their London debuts in Drury Lane, holding the stage almost continuously for nearly a decade, including Oklahoma! (1947–1950), Carousel (1950–1951), South Pacific (1951–1953) and The King and I (1953–1956). American imports also included Lerner and Loewe's My Fair Lady, which began a five-year run in 1958. Productions in the 1960s included Camelot (1964–1965), Hello, Dolly! (1965–1967) and The Great Waltz (1970–1972). In 1974, Monty Python recorded an album at the theatre, Live at Drury Lane. Later long runs at the theatre include productions of A Chorus Line (1976–1979), 42nd Street (1984–1989), Miss Saigon (1989–1999, the theatre's longest-running show), The Producers (2004–2007), The Lord of the Rings (2007–2008), Oliver! (2009–2011) and Shrek The Musical (2011–2013). Charlie and the Chocolate Factory the Musical played from 2013 to January 2017. Notable productions since 1919 have included: ## Hauntings The author Tom Ogden calls the Theatre Royal one of the world's most haunted theatres. The appearance of almost any one of the handful of ghosts that are said to frequent the theatre signals good luck for an actor or production. The most famous ghost is the "Man in Grey", who appears dressed as a nobleman of the late 18th century: powdered hair beneath a tricorne hat, a dress jacket and cloak or cape, riding boots and a sword. Legend says that the Man in Grey is the ghost of a knife-stabbed man whose skeletal remains were found within a walled-up side passage in 1848. Various people have reported seeing the ghost, including W. J. MacQueen-Pope, who described its usual path as starting at the end of the fourth row in the upper circle and then proceeding via the rear gangway to the wall near the royal box, where the remains were found. The ghosts of actor Charles Macklin and clown Joseph Grimaldi are also supposed to haunt the theatre. Macklin appears backstage, wandering the corridor which now stands in the spot where, in 1735, he killed fellow actor Thomas Hallam in an argument over a wig ("Goddamn you for a blackguard, scrub, rascal!" he shouted, thrusting a cane into Hallam's face and piercing his left eye). Grimaldi is reported to be a helpful apparition, purportedly guiding nervous actors skilfully about the stage on more than one occasion. The comedian Stanley Lupino said he had seen the ghost of Dan Leno in a dressing room. ## See also - European Route of Historic Theatres - Rose Theatre

Reese Witherspoon

American actress (born 1976)

Laura Jeanne Reese Witherspoon (born March 22, 1976) is an American actress and producer. She is the recipient of various accolades, including an Academy Award, a Primetime Emmy Award, and two Golden Globe Awards. Time magazine named her one of the 100 most influential people in the world in 2006 and 2015, and Forbes listed her among the World's 100 Most Powerful Women in 2019 and 2021. In 2021, Forbes named her the world's highest earning actress, and in 2023, she was named one of the richest women in America with an estimated net worth of \$440 million. Witherspoon began her career as a teenager, making her screen debut in The Man in the Moon (1991). Her breakthrough came in 1999 with a supporting role in Cruel Intentions, and for her portrayal of Tracy Flick in the black comedy Election. She gained wider recognition for playing Elle Woods in the comedy Legally Blonde (2001) and its 2003 sequel, and for starring in the romantic comedy Sweet Home Alabama (2002). In 2005, she gained critical acclaim and won the Academy Award for Best Actress for portraying June Carter Cash in the musical biopic Walk the Line. Following a career downturn, during which her sole box-office success was the romantic drama Water for Elephants (2011), Witherspoon made a comeback by producing and starring as Cheryl Strayed in the drama Wild (2014), which earned her a second nomination for Best Actress at the Academy Awards. She has since worked primarily in television, producing and starring in several female-led literary adaptations under her company Hello Sunshine. These include the HBO drama series Big Little Lies (2017–2019), the Apple TV+ drama series The Morning Show (2019–present), and the Hulu miniseries Little Fires Everywhere (2020). For the first of these, she won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Limited Series. She has also produced the film adaptations Gone Girl (2014) and Where the Crawdads Sing (2022), and the miniseries adaptation Daisy Jones & the Six (2023). Witherspoon also owns a clothing company, Draper James, and she is involved in children's and women's advocacy organizations. She serves on the board of the Children's Defense Fund (CDF) and was named Global Ambassador of Avon Products in 2007, serving as honorary chair of the charitable Avon Foundation dedicated to women's causes. ## Early life and education Laura Jeanne Reese Witherspoon was born on March 22, 1976, at Southern Baptist Hospital, in New Orleans, Louisiana, while her father, John Draper Witherspoon, was a student at Tulane University medical school. Her father was born in Georgia and served as a lieutenant in the United States Army Reserve. He was in private practice as an otolaryngologist until 2012. Her mother, Mary Elizabeth "Betty" (née Reese) Witherspoon, is from Harriman, Tennessee. She was a professor of nursing at Vanderbilt University and had a PhD in pediatric nursing. Reese Witherspoon has claimed descent from Scottish-born John Witherspoon, who signed the United States Declaration of Independence; however, this claim has not been verified by the Society of the Descendants of the Signers of the Declaration of Independence genealogists. Her parents are still legally married, although they separated in 1996. Witherspoon was raised an Episcopalian, and has said she is proud of the "definitive Southern upbringing" she received. She has said it gave her "a sense of family and tradition" and taught her about "being conscientious about people's feelings, being polite, being responsible and never taking for granted what you have in your life". At age seven, she was selected as a model for a florist's television advertisements, which motivated her to take acting lessons. At age 11, she took first place in the Ten-State Talent Fair. She received high grades in school, loved reading, and considered herself "a big dork who read loads of books". On mentioning her love for books, she said, "I get crazy in a bookstore. It makes my heart beat hard because I want to buy everything." She has been described as a "multi-achiever" and was nicknamed "Little Type A" by her parents. She attended middle school at Harding Academy and graduated from the all-girls' Harpeth Hall School in Nashville, during which time she was a cheerleader. She later attended Stanford University as an English literature major, but left prior to completing her studies to pursue an acting career. ## Career ### 1991–2000: Early work and breakthrough Witherspoon attended an open casting call in 1991 for The Man in the Moon, intending to audition for a bit part; but instead was cast for the lead role of Dani Trant, a 14-year-old country girl who falls in love for the first time with her 17-year-old neighbor. According to The Guardian, her performance made an early impression. Film critic Roger Ebert commented, "Her first kiss is one of the most perfect little scenes I've ever seen in a movie." For her role, Witherspoon was nominated for a Young Artist Award, in the category of Best Young Actress. Later that year, she made her television debut role in Wildflower with Patricia Arquette. In 1992, Witherspoon appeared in the television film Desperate Choices: To Save My Child, portraying a critically ill young girl. In 1993, Witherspoon played a young wife, Nonnie Parker, in the CBS miniseries Return to Lonesome Dove, appeared in the Disney film A Far Off Place, and had a minor role in Jack the Bear, which garnered her the Young Artist Award for Best Youth Actress Co-star. The next year, she had another leading role as Wendy Pfister in the 1994 film S.F.W., directed by Jefery Levy. In 1996, Witherspoon starred in two major films: the thriller Fear alongside Mark Wahlberg, as Nicole Walker, a teenager who starts dating a man with obsessive tendencies, and the black-comedy thriller Freeway, alongside Kiefer Sutherland and Brooke Shields, in which she played Vanessa Lutz; a poor girl living in Los Angeles who encounters a serial killer on the way to her grandmother's home in Stockton. The film received positive reviews from critics; San Francisco Chronicle's Mick LaSalle wrote, "Witherspoon, who does a Texas accent, is dazzling, utterly believable in one extreme situation after the other." Witherspoon's performance won her the Best Actress Award at the Cognac Police Film Festival and helped establish her as a rising star. The production of the film also gave her significant acting experience; she said "Once I overcame the hurdle of that movie – which scared me to death – I felt like I could try anything." In 1998, Witherspoon had major roles in three films: Overnight Delivery, Pleasantville and Twilight. In Pleasantville, she starred with Tobey Maguire in a tale about 1990s teenage siblings who are magically transported into the setting of a 1950s television series. She portrayed Jennifer, the sister of Maguire's character who is mainly concerned about appearances, relationships and popularity. Her performance earned her praise and garnered her the Young Hollywood Award for Best Female Breakthrough Performance. Director Gary Ross applauded her efforts saying, "she commits to a character so completely and she understands comedy". A year later, Witherspoon co-starred with Alessandro Nivola in the drama thriller Best Laid Plans; she played Lissa, a woman who schemes with her lover Nick to escape a small dead-end town. Also in 1999, she co-starred with Sarah Michelle Gellar and Ryan Phillippe in the drama Cruel Intentions, a modern version of the 18th-century French novel Les Liaisons Dangereuses. The critic for San Francisco Chronicle praised her performance as Annette Hargrove: "Witherspoon is especially good in the least flashy role, and even when called upon to make a series of cute devilish faces, she pulls it off." She also appeared in a music video by Marcy Playground for the film's soundtrack. Next, she appeared in Election (1999) opposite Matthew Broderick, based on Tom Perrotta's novel of the same name. For her portrayal of Tracy Flick, she earned acclaim and her first nominations in the Golden Globes and in the Independent Spirit Awards. She also won the Best Actress Award from the National Society of Film Critics and the Online Film Critics Society. Witherspoon received a rank on the list of 100 Greatest Film Performances of All Time by Premiere. Director Alexander Payne said "She's [Witherspoon] got that quality that men find attractive, while women would like to be her friend. But that's just the foundation. Nobody else is as funny or brings such charm to things. She can do anything." Following the success of Election, Witherspoon struggled to find work due to typecasting. "I think because the character I played was so extreme and sort of shrewish—people thought that was who I was, rather than me going in and creating a part. I would audition for things and I'd always be the second choice—studios never wanted to hire me and I wasn't losing the parts to big box office actresses but to ones who I guess people felt differently about", she said. In 2000, Witherspoon had a supporting role in American Psycho as Patrick Bateman's trophy girlfriend, and made a cameo appearance in Little Nicky as the mother of the Antichrist. She also made a guest appearance in the sixth season of Friends as Rachel Green's sister Jill. ### 2001–2006: Worldwide recognition The 2001 film Legally Blonde marked a turning point in Witherspoon's career; she starred as Elle Woods, a fashion-merchandising major who decides to become a law student to follow her ex-boyfriend to Harvard Law School. Witherspoon said about the role, "When I read Legally Blonde, I was like, 'She's from Beverly Hills, she's rich, she's in a sorority. She has a great boyfriend. Oh yeah, she gets dumped. Who cares? I still hate her.' So we had to make sure she was the kind of person you just can't hate." Legally Blonde was a box-office hit, grossing US\$96 million domestically. Witherspoon's performance earned her praise from critics, and the press began to refer her as "the new Meg Ryan". Roger Ebert commented, "Witherspoon effortlessly animated this material with sunshine and quick wit", and the critic from Salon magazine wrote "she [Witherspoon] delineates Elle's character beautifully". Meanwhile, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer concluded, "Witherspoon is a talented comedian who can perk up a scene just by marching in full of pep and drive and she powers this modest little comedy almost single-handedly." The film earned her a second nomination for Best Actress at the Golden Globes, and an MTV Movie Award for Best Comedic Performance. In 2002, Witherspoon starred in several features, such as Greta Wolfcastle in The Simpsons episode "The Bart Wants What It Wants", and as Cecily in the comedy The Importance of Being Earnest, a film adaptation of Oscar Wilde's play in which she received a Teen Choice Award nomination. Later that year, she starred with Josh Lucas and Patrick Dempsey in Andy Tennant's romantic comedy Sweet Home Alabama, in which she played Melanie Carmichael, a young fashion designer who intends to marry a New York politician but must return to Alabama to divorce her childhood sweetheart, from whom she has been separated for seven years. Witherspoon regarded it as a "personal role" as it reminded her of the experience of moving from Nashville to Los Angeles. The film became Witherspoon's biggest live-action box office hit, earning over \$35 million in the opening weekend and grossing over \$127 million in the U.S. Despite the commercial success, critics gave Sweet Home Alabama negative reviews. The Miami Herald called it "a romantic comedy so rote, dull and predictable", and the press opined that Witherspoon was the only reason the film attracted such a large audience. The Christian Science Monitor wrote of her, "She is not the movie's main attraction, she is its only attraction." The next year, Witherspoon followed up the success of Legally Blonde by starring in the sequel Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde. Elle Woods has become a Harvard-educated lawyer who is determined to protect animals from cosmetics industry science tests. The sequel was not as financially successful as the first film and it generated mostly negative reviews. USA Today considered the movie "plodding, unfunny and almost cringe-worthy", but also wrote "Reese Witherspoon still does a fine job portraying the fair-haired lovable brainiac, but her top-notch comic timing is wasted on the humorless dialogue." Meanwhile, Salon magazine concluded that the sequel "calcifies everything that was enjoyable about the first movie". Despite being panned by critics, the sequel took in over \$39 million in its first five days in the U.S. box office charts and eventually grossed \$90 million in the US. Witherspoon was paid \$15 million for the role—a starting point which would make her consistently one of Hollywood's highest-paid actresses between 2002 and 2010. In 2004, Witherspoon starred in Vanity Fair, adapted from the 19th-century classic novel Vanity Fair and directed by Mira Nair. Her character, Becky Sharp, is a poor woman with a ruthless determination to find fortune and establish herself a position in society. Witherspoon was carefully costumed to conceal her pregnancy during filming. This pregnancy was not a hindrance to her work as Witherspoon believed the gestation had helped her portrayal of Sharp's character: "I love the luminosity that pregnancy brings, I love the fleshiness, I love the ample bosom—it gave me much more to play with", she said. The film, and Witherspoon's performance received mixed reviews; The Hollywood Reporter wrote "Nair's cast is splendid. Witherspoon does justice to the juicy role by giving the part more buoyancy than naughtiness." The Charlotte Observer called her work "an excellent performance that's soft around the edges", and the Los Angeles Times concluded that Becky is "a role Reese Witherspoon was born to play". However, LA Weekly wrote "[Witherspoon] ends up conveying so little of what's at once appalling and perversely attractive about the would-be mistress of Vanity Fair" and stated that it may have to do with Witherspoon's vanity, "with an Oscar-less young star's need to be loved more than anyone could conceivably love the 'real' Becky Sharp." Some critics thought she was miscast. In late 2004, Witherspoon starred alongside Mark Ruffalo in the romantic comedy Just Like Heaven. Her character, Elizabeth Masterson, is an ambitious young doctor who is involved in a car accident on her way to a blind date and is left in a coma; her spirit returns to her old apartment where she later finds true love. Next, she was cast as June Carter Cash, the second wife of singer-songwriter Johnny Cash (Joaquin Phoenix), in James Mangold's Walk the Line (2005). She never had the chance to meet Carter Cash, as Witherspoon was filming Vanity Fair at the time the singer died. Witherspoon performed her own vocals in the film, and her songs had to be performed in front of a live audience; she was so worried about needing to perform that she asked her lawyer to terminate the film contract. "That was the most challenging part of the role," she later recalled. "I'd never sung professionally." Subsequently, she had to spend six months learning how to sing for the role, including from the help of vocal coach Roger Love. Witherspoon's portrayal of Carter Cash was acclaimed by critics, with Roger Ebert stating that her performance added "boundless energy" to the film. She won Best Actress at the Academy Awards, Golden Globes, British Academy Film Awards, and a Screen Actors Guild award for her performance. Witherspoon and Phoenix received a nomination for "collaborative video of the year" from the CMT Music Awards. Witherspoon has expressed her passion for the film: "I really like in this film that it is realistic and portrays sort of a real marriage, a real relationship where there are forbidden thoughts and fallibility. And it is about compassion in the long haul, not just the short easy solutions to problems." She also stated that she believed Carter Cash was a woman ahead of her time: "I think the really remarkable thing about her character is that she did all of these things that we sort of see as normal things in the 1950s when it wasn't really acceptable for a woman to be married and divorced twice and have two different children by two different husbands and travel around in a car full of very famous musicians all by herself. She didn't try to comply to social convention, so I think that makes her a very modern woman." After the success of Walk the Line, Witherspoon starred in the fantasy Penelope, as Annie, the best friend of Penelope (Christina Ricci), a girl who has a curse in her family. The film was produced by her company Type A Films, and filming began in March 2006. The film premiered at the 2006 Toronto International Film Festival, but went unreleased until February 2008. ### 2007–2012: Career setbacks and romantic comedy films Witherspoon admits to spending several years "kind of floundering career-wise". Reflecting on this period of time in a December 2014 interview, Witherspoon attributed it to the split from her first husband in October 2006 and their subsequent divorce, stating that she spent "a few years just trying to feel better. You know, you can't really be very creative when you feel like your brain is scrambled eggs." She claims that she "wasn't making things I was passionate about. I was just kind of working, you know. And it was really clear that audiences weren't responding to anything I was putting out there." Witherspoon appeared in the thriller Rendition, in which she played Isabella El-Ibrahim, the pregnant wife of a bombing suspect. The film was released in October 2007 and it was her first film appearance since the 2005's Walk the Line. The film received mostly mixed reviews and was deemed a major disappointment at the Toronto International Film Festival. Witherspoon's performance was also criticized; writing for USA Today, Claudia Puig wrote "Reese Witherspoon is surprisingly lifeless [...] She customarily injects energy and spirit into her parts, but here, her performance feels tamped down." In 2008, Witherspoon starred with Vince Vaughn in the comedy Four Christmases, a story about a couple who must spend their Christmas Day trying to visit all four of their divorced parents. Despite negative reviews from critics, the film was a box office success, earning more than \$120 million domestically and \$157 million worldwide. In 2009, Witherspoon voiced Susan Murphy, the lead character in the DreamWorks Animation Monsters vs. Aliens, released in March, which grossed \$381 million worldwide. She also co-produced the Legally Blonde spin-off Legally Blondes, starring Milly and Becky Rosso. However, Witherspoon did not appear in a live-action film for two years after Four Christmases. She told Entertainment Weekly that the "break" was unplanned, stating that, "I just didn't read anything I liked... There are a lot of really, really, really big movies about robots and things—and there's not a part for a 34-year-old woman in a robot movie." Witherspoon returned with three romances released in 2010, 2011 and 2012, all starring her as a woman caught in a love triangle between two men. In the first, she was cast in James L. Brooks' How Do You Know, in which she played a former national softball player who struggles to choose between a baseball-star boyfriend (Owen Wilson) and a business executive being investigated for white-collar crime (Paul Rudd). Filming took place in Philadelphia and Washington, D.C. during the summer and fall of 2009 and it was released on December 17, 2010. The film was critically and commercially unsuccessful; with a budget of more than \$100 million, the film only earned \$48.7 million worldwide, leading the Los Angeles Times to call it "one of the year's biggest flops". The film received mainly unfavorable reviews, with an approval rating of 35% on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 111 reviews as of December 2010. Witherspoon's second love-triangle film was the drama Water for Elephants, an adaptation of Sara Gruen's novel of the same name. She began circus training in March 2010 for her role as Marlena, a glamorous performer stuck in a marriage to a volatile husband (Christoph Waltz) but intrigued by the circus' new veterinarian (Robert Pattinson). Principal photography began between May and early August 2010 in various locations in Tennessee, Georgia, and California. It was released on April 22, 2011, and received mixed critical reviews. Her last love-triangle film began production in Vancouver in September 2010. Directed by McG and released by 20th Century Fox, This Means War, saw Witherspoon's character at the center of a battle between best friends (played by Chris Pine and Tom Hardy), who are both in love with her. The film had a "sneak-peek" release on Valentine's Day, before fully opening on February 17, 2012. The film was panned by critics, with a 25% approval rating on Rotten Tomatoes, and fared poorly at the box office, taking fifth place on its opening weekend with sales of \$17.6 million. The New York Times remarked that this "extended the box office cold streak for the Oscar-winning Ms. Witherspoon". In a 2012 interview with MTV, Witherspoon jokingly referred that 2010–12 was her "love triangle period". ### 2012–2015: Resurgence and career expansion In September 2011, a year after beginning work on This Means War, she filmed a small role in Jeff Nichols's coming-of-age drama Mud in Arkansas, playing Juniper, the former girlfriend of a fugitive (Matthew McConaughey), who enlists two local boys to help him evade capture and rekindle his romance with her. Mud premiered in May 2012 in competition for the Palme d'Or at the Cannes Film Festival, but did not win. Following its American debut at the Sundance Film Festival on January 19, 2013, the film had a limited release in selected North American theaters on April 26, 2013. Witherspoon next starred in Devil's Knot, which was directed by Atom Egoyan, and based on the true crime book of the same name, examining the controversial case of the West Memphis Three. Like Mud, the film is set in Arkansas. She played Pam Hobbs, the mother of one of three young murder victims. In an interview subsequent to her casting in the film, Egoyan noted that although the role requires "an emotionally loaded journey," he "met with Reese, and... talked at length about the project, and she's eager to take on the challenge." Filming took place in Georgia in June and July 2012, and Witherspoon was pregnant with her third child during filming. The film premiered at the 2013 Toronto International Film Festival, followed by a release in selected American theaters on May 9, 2014. Although the film received mainly negative reviews; London's Evening Standard thought Witherspoon was "the strongest, most involving character". In 2012, Witherspoon founded production company Pacific Standard (now part of Hello Sunshine). Her goal was to produce projects with "strong" female lead characters, as she felt this was lacking in Hollywood. Through the company, Witherspoon served as a producer for Gone Girl (2014), an adaptation of Gillian Flynn's novel of the same name. She also produced and starred in the biographical adventure Wild (2014), based on Cheryl Strayed's memoir of the same name. She portrayed Strayed on her 1,000-mile (1,600 km) hike along the Pacific Crest Trail. Wild was released in December 2014 to critical acclaim; Michael Phillips of Chicago Tribune wrote in his review, "Witherspoon does the least acting of her career, and it works. Calmly yet restlessly, she brings to life Strayed's longings, her states of grief and desire and her wary optimism." Wild was considered as Witherspoon's "comeback" role following her previous career slump, and she earned a second Academy Award nomination for her performance. Witherspoon appeared in Philippe Falardeau's drama The Good Lie, based on a true story about an employment counselor assigned to help four young Sudanese refugees, known as Lost Boys of Sudan, who win a lottery for relocation to the U.S. It was released on October 3, 2014. The film was mostly well-received; The Hollywood Reporter critic praised the touching story and performances of the cast, writing that Witherspoon does not "upstage" her colleagues. Next, she appeared in Inherent Vice (2014), an adaptation of Thomas Pynchon's novel of the same name. In May 2014, Witherspoon began production in Louisiana on Hot Pursuit, a comedy in which she plays a police officer trying to protect a drug lord's widow (Sofía Vergara). The feature was released on May 8, 2015. ### 2016–present: Television success In 2016, Witherspoon had a voice role in the animated musical comedy film Sing, and served as a performer to the film's soundtrack. Sing became Witherspoon's biggest commercial success, being the first of her films to make over \$200 million domestically and \$600 million worldwide. That same year, Witherspoon began filming her first television project since 1993's Return To Lonesome Dove, the seven-part miniseries adaptation of the Liane Moriarty bestseller, Big Little Lies. She co-produced the miniseries along with co-star Nicole Kidman and director Jean-Marc Vallée, her second project under his direction. The series premiered on February 19, 2017, on HBO and finished on April 2. Witherspoon garnered critical acclaim for her performance, with TVLine proclaiming her as "Performer of the Week" in the weeks of February 26 – March 4 in 2017 and June 23–29 in 2019. The Washington Post compared her performance to her roles in Election and Legally Blonde. In December 2017, HBO renewed Big Little Lies for a second season, which premiered in June 2019. Witherspoon also starred in the romantic comedy Home Again, the directorial debut of filmmaker Nancy Meyers' daughter, Hallie Meyers-Shyer, which was released on September 8, 2017. In 2018, she starred in Disney's A Wrinkle in Time, a film adaptation of Madeleine L'Engle's novel of the same name, in which she plays Mrs. Whatsit. Directed by Ava DuVernay, the feature co-stars Oprah Winfrey and Mindy Kaling, and was released in March 2018. Four months later, Witherspoon began hosting the talk show Shine On with Reese on DirecTV, in which she interviews female guests, focusing on how they achieved their ambitions. The show marks Witherspoon's first unscripted role in television. Witherspoon currently produces and stars in the Apple TV+ drama series The Morning Show alongside Jennifer Aniston and Steve Carell. The Morning Show has received a two-season order from Apple with the first season premiering in November 2019. Witherspoon was nominated for a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Television Series Drama and a Golden Globe Award for Best Television Series for her work in the series. Season two of The Morning Show was set to premiere in 2020 before the production shutdown caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. The first two episodes were in the final stages of being shot before the production shutdown. During the production shutdown, scripts were rewritten to reflect the pandemic. Production on season two of The Morning Show restarted on October 19, 2020, and premiered on Apple TV in September 2021. Witherspoon also serves as an executive producer for the Apple TV+ series Truth Be Told starring Octavia Spencer which premiered in December 2019; it was renewed for a second season in March 2020. In 2020, Witherspoon produced and starred in the Hulu drama miniseries Little Fires Everywhere opposite Kerry Washington, the televised adaptation of Celeste Ng's 2017 novel of the same name. In that same year, Witherspoon narrated the Quibi nature documentary series Fierce Queens which focuses on female animals in the animal kingdom. In 2023, Witherspoon executive produced, with Kacey Musgraves, the country music competition show, My Kind of Country. #### Upcoming projects In addition to starring and producing television shows of her own, Witherspoon will serve as an executive producer for six television series, for different streaming services and networks including Apple TV+, Amazon Prime Video, ABC, Starz and Netflix. Witherspoon will produce and star in three Netflix films; first, Pyros, a science fiction drama directed by Simon Kinberg, secondly, two romantic comedies on Netflix. Witherspoon will produce two films including A White Lie set to star Zendaya, and a documentary about Martina Navratilova. Witherspoon will also reprise the role of Elle Woods by starring in and producing Legally Blonde 3; the script will be written by Dan Goor and Mindy Kaling. The film will be the fourth collaboration between Kaling and Witherspoon after A Wrinkle in Time, The Mindy Project and The Morning Show. In 2015, it was reported that Witherspoon had signed on to star in and produce a live-action film about Tinker Bell for Disney. Six years later, the project re-entered development as a part of Gary Marsh's overall deal with Disney and Witherspoon still attached as a producer. ## Other ventures ### Business and philanthropy Witherspoon owned a production company called Type A Films, which the media believed was a nickname from her childhood, "Little Miss Type A". However, when asked about the company by Interview magazine, she clarified the name's origin: "... people think I named it after myself... It was actually an in-joke with my family because at [age] 7 I understood complicated medical terms, such as the difference between type A and type B personalities. But I just wished I'd named the company Dogfood Films or Fork or something. You carry that baggage all your life." In March 2012, Witherspoon merged Type A Films with Bruna Papandrea's "Make Movies" banner to form a new production company called Pacific Standard. In 2016, Witherspoon and Papandrea parted ways, and Witherspoon gained full control of the company. Pacific Standard has since become a subsidiary of Hello Sunshine, a firm co-owned by Witherspoon and Otter Media, focused on telling female-oriented stories through film, television and digital channels. Witherspoon also runs the Hello Sunshine book club, where she makes book recommendations. In May 2015, Witherspoon launched Draper James, a retail brand focusing on fashion and home décor inspired by the American South. It is named after her grandparents, Dorothea Draper and William James Witherspoon, who are said to be her greatest influences. Some of the products are being manufactured and designed in-house, and the brand was launched online before opening its first retail outlet in 2015 in her hometown of Nashville, Tennessee. In March 2017, Witherspoon became the chief storyteller for Elizabeth Arden, Inc., helping the company to shape the brand's narrative through advertising campaigns and marketing programs. Witherspoon stated that she was "excited to work as a creative partner alongside the Elizabeth Arden team, producing content that celebrates the spirit of the brand, highlighting female-centric stories that illustrate women's true life experiences which unite us all". Witherspoon is involved in children and women's rights advocacy. She is a longtime supporter of Save the Children, an organization that helps provide children around the world with education, healthcare and emergency aid. She also serves on the board of the Children's Defense Fund (CDF), a child advocacy and research group. In 2006, she was among a group of actresses who went to New Orleans, Louisiana in a CDF project to publicize the needs of Hurricane Katrina victims. During this trip, she helped open the city's first Freedom School, as she met and talked with the children. Witherspoon later called this an experience that she would never forget. In 2007, Witherspoon made her first move into endorsements, and she signed a multi-year agreement to serve as the first Global Ambassador for cosmetics firm Avon Products. She acts as a spokeswoman for Avon and serves as the honorary chair of the Avon Foundation, a charitable organization that supports women and focuses on breast cancer research and the prevention of domestic violence. She is also committed to the development of cosmetic products and making appearances in commercials. Explaining her motives for joining the foundation, she said, "As a woman and a mother I care deeply about the well being of other women and children throughout the world and through the years, I have always looked for opportunities to make a difference." In 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, Witherspoon announced the "Draper James Loves Teachers" initiative, offering free dresses from the clothing collection to teachers. ### Other work In 2013, Witherspoon recorded a cover of the classic Frank Sinatra and Nancy Sinatra duet, "Somethin' Stupid" with Michael Bublé for his 2013 album, To Be Loved. In September 2018, she published her first book, Whiskey in a Teacup, which is a lifestyle publication inspired by her southern upbringing. In 2018, she joined approximately 300 other actors, agents, writers and entertainment employees in creating the Time's Up initiative, which seeks to counteract sexual harassment in the workplace. In 2017, Witherspoon started Reese's Book Club. The club was born out of her Instagram account, where she posted photos of books she read. Each month she picks books she loves with a woman at the center of the story, with variety of genres, from women's fiction to thrillers to romance. Since 2017, the club's most influential pick has been Where the Crawdads Sing by Delia Owens. Chosen for the club in September 2018, it was adapted into a 2022 feature film by Witherspoon's production company Hello Sunshine, and was a box office hit that summer. ## Public image Witherspoon hosted Saturday Night Live on September 29, 2001, the first episode to air after the September 11 attacks. In 2005, she was ranked No. 5 in Teen People magazine's list of most powerful young Hollywood actors. In 2006, she was listed among the Time 100. Her featured article was written by Luke Wilson. That year, she was selected one of the "100 Sexiest Women In The World" by the readers of FHM. Witherspoon has been featured four times in the annual "100 Most Beautiful" issues of People magazine. She has appeared on the annual Celebrity 100 list by Forbes magazine in 2006 and 2007, at No. 75 and No. 80, respectively. Forbes also put her on the top ten Trustworthy Celebrities list. In 2007, she was selected by People and the entertainment news program Access Hollywood as one of the year's best-dressed female stars. The yellow dress she wore to that year's Golden Globe Awards was widely acclaimed. A study conducted by E-Poll Market Research showed that Witherspoon was the most likable female celebrity of 2007. That same year, she established herself as the highest-paid actress in the American film industry, earning \$15 to \$20 million per film. The following years, her appearance in many commercially unsuccessful films caused her to lose this status, and she was noted as one of the most overpaid actors in Hollywood in 2011, 2012 and 2013. In April 2011, she ranked No. 3 on the 22nd annual People's Most Beautiful issue. In June 2013, Witherspoon filed a lawsuit against Marketing Advantages International Inc., claiming they extensively used her name and image in jewelry advertising without permission in the U.S. and internationally. In December 2015, Witherspoon's trademark claims to her name were rejected on the grounds that she had not established secondary meaning to her full name, did not claim "emotional distress", and that the "photos and facts were generally known by the public and the photos were taken in public with Plaintiff's consent". However, the court ruled that she could proceed with her right of publicity claims against many defendants. Two months later, she withdrew her lawsuit, having "come to private agreements with the various defendants, including Centerbrook Sales, Fragrance Hut, Gemvara, and others". In October 2017, in the wake of the Harvey Weinstein sexual abuse scandal, Witherspoon revealed that she had been sexually assaulted at age 16 by a director and had had "multiple experiences of harassment and sexual assault" throughout her career. In 2015, Witherspoon made her second appearance on the Time 100 list, with her featured article written by Mindy Kaling. That year, she was awarded, by the committee's unanimous vote, the American Cinematheque for being "a perfect example of an actress flourishing in today's world" and "an active and successful movie producer who is moving her career forward both behind and in front of the camera". In 2017, Forbes reported her career earnings were in excess of \$198 million, making her the highest-paid primetime Emmy nominee in 2017. In 2019, Forbes listed her among the World's 100 Most Powerful Women. ## Personal life Witherspoon met actor Ryan Phillippe at her 21st birthday party in March 1997. They became engaged in December 1998 and married on June 5, 1999, at Old Wide Awake Plantation in Hollywood, South Carolina. They have two children together, daughter Ava Elizabeth Phillippe, born on September 9, 1999; and son Deacon Reese Phillippe, born on October 23, 2003. On October 30, 2006, Witherspoon and Phillippe announced their separation. She filed for divorce on November 8, 2006, citing irreconcilable differences. In light of their lack of a prenuptial agreement, she requested that the court refuse to grant spousal support to Phillippe, and asked for joint legal custody and sole physical custody of their two children. Phillippe filed for joint physical custody on May 15, 2007, and did not seek any spousal support. The marriage officially ended on October 5, 2007, with final divorce arrangements settled on June 13, 2008, according to court documents. Phillippe and Witherspoon share joint custody of their children. Witherspoon dated her Rendition co-star Jake Gyllenhaal from 2007 until 2009. In February 2010, she was reported to be dating Jim Toth, a talent agent and co-head of motion picture talent at Creative Artists Agency, where she is a client. They announced their engagement that December, and married on March 26, 2011, in Ojai, California, at Libbey Ranch, Witherspoon's country estate, which she later sold. They have a son together, Tennessee James Toth, born on September 27, 2012. On April 19, 2013, Witherspoon was arrested and charged with disorderly conduct after Toth was stopped for suspicion of driving under the influence. She pleaded no-contest to obstruction of an officer and was required to pay court costs. In March 2023, Witherspoon and Toth announced their divorce after 11 years of marriage. The couple released a joint statement on Witherspoon's Instagram account. The announcement was made a few days shy of their 12th wedding anniversary. ### Influences Witherspoon has cited Jodie Foster, Meryl Streep, Holly Hunter, Susan Sarandon, Frances McDormand, Debra Winger, Diane Ladd, Julia Roberts, Nicole Kidman, Jennifer Aniston, Goldie Hawn, Sally Field, Sigourney Weaver, Lucille Ball, Carole Lombard, Judy Holliday, Gena Rowlands, Tom Hanks, Jack Nicholson, and Michael Keaton as influences on her acting career and work. Her favorite films include Splendor in the Grass, Waiting for Guffman, Broadcast News, Raising Arizona, and Overboard. ## Filmography and accolades Witherspoon's most acclaimed and highest-grossing films, according to the review aggregate website Rotten Tomatoes, include Election (1999), Legally Blonde (2001), Walk the Line (2005), Monsters vs. Aliens (2009), Mud (2013), Wild (2014), and Sing (2016). Witherspoon has been nominated for two Academy Awards, nine Golden Globe Awards, four Screen Actors Guild Awards (SAG Awards), and two British Academy Film Awards (BAFTAs). She won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Comedy or Musical, the SAG Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role, the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role, and the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance as June Carter in the film Walk the Line (2005). In 2010, Witherspoon received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Jefferson nickel

US 5-cent coin minted since 1938

The Jefferson nickel has been the five-cent coin struck by the United States Mint since 1938, when it replaced the Buffalo nickel. From 1938 until 2004, the copper-nickel coin's obverse featured a profile depiction of Founding Father and third U.S. President Thomas Jefferson by artist Felix Schlag; the obverse design used in 2005 was also in profile, though by Joe Fitzgerald. Since 2006 Jefferson's portrayal, newly designed by Jamie Franki, faces forward. The coin's reverse is still the Schlag original, although in 2004 and 2005 the piece bore commemorative designs. First struck in 1913, the Buffalo nickel had long been difficult to coin, and after it completed the 25-year term during which it could be replaced only by Congress, the Mint moved quickly to replace it with a new design. The Mint conducted a design competition, in early 1938, requiring that Jefferson be depicted on the obverse and Jefferson's house Monticello on the reverse. Schlag won the competition, but was required to submit an entirely new reverse and make other changes before the new piece went into production in October 1938. As nickel was a strategic war material during World War II, nickels coined from 1942 to 1945 were struck in a copper-silver-manganese alloy which would not require adjustment to vending machines. They bear a large mint mark above the depiction of Monticello on the reverse. In 2004 and 2005, the nickel saw new designs as part of the Westward Journey nickel series, and since 2006 has borne Schlag's reverse and Franki's obverse. ## Inception The design for the Buffalo nickel is well regarded today, and has appeared both on a commemorative silver dollar and a bullion coin. However, during the time it was struck (1913–1938), it was less well liked, especially by Mint authorities, whose attempts to bring out the full design increased an already high rate of die breakage. By 1938, it had been struck for 25 years, thus becoming eligible to be replaced by action of the Secretary of the Treasury rather than by Congress. The Mint, which is part of the Department of the Treasury, moved quickly and without public protest to replace the coin. In late January 1938, the Mint announced an open competition for the new nickel design, with the winner to receive a prize of \$1,000. The deadline for submissions was April 15; Mint Director Nellie Tayloe Ross and three sculptors were to be the judges. Competitors were to place a portrait of Jefferson on the obverse, and a depiction of his house, Monticello, on the reverse. By mid-March, few entries had been received. This seeming lack of response proved to be misleading, as many artists had planned to enter the contest and submitted designs near the deadline. On April 20, the judges viewed 390 entries; four days later, Felix Schlag was announced as the winner. Schlag had been born in Germany and had come to the United States only nine years previously. Either through a misunderstanding or an oversight, Schlag did not include his initials in the design; they would not be added until 1966. The bust of Jefferson on the obverse closely resembles his bust by sculptor Jean-Antoine Houdon, which is to be found in Boston's Museum of Fine Arts. In early May, it was reported that the Mint required some changes to Schlag's design prior to coining. Schlag's original design showed a three-quarters view of Monticello, including a tree. Officials disliked the lettering Schlag had used, a more modernistic style than that used on the eventual coin. The tree was another source of official displeasure; officials decided it was a palm tree and incorrectly believed Jefferson could not have been growing such a thing. A formal request for changes was sent to Schlag in late May. The sculptor was busy with other projects and did not work on the nickel until mid-June. When he did, he changed the reverse to a plain view, or head-on perspective, of Monticello. Art historian Cornelius Vermeule described the change: > Official taste eliminated this interesting, even exciting, view, and substituted the mausoleum of Roman profile and blurred forms that masquerades as the building on the finished coin. On the trial reverse the name "Monticello" seemed scarcely necessary and was therefore, logically, omitted. On the coin as issued it seems essential lest one think the building portrayed is the vault at Fort Knox, a state archives building, or a public library somewhere. The designs were submitted to the Commission of Fine Arts for their recommendation in mid-July; the version submitted included the new version of Monticello but may not have included the revised lettering. The Commission approved the designs. However, Commission chairman Charles Moore asked that the positions of the mottos on the reverse be switched, with the country name at the top; this was not done. After the Fine Arts Commission recommendation, the Secretary of the Treasury, Henry Morgenthau, approved the design. On August 21, the Anderson (Indiana) Herald noted: > [T]he Federal Fine Arts Commission ... didn't like the view of Thomas Jefferson's home, Monticello, so they required the artist to do another picture of the front of the house. They did not like the lettering on the coin. It wasn't in keeping, but they forgot to say what it wasn't in keeping with ... There is no more reason for imitating the Romans in this respect [by using Roman-style lettering on the coin] than there would be for modeling our automobiles after the chariot of Ben Hur's day. ## Production ### 1938–1945: Early minting; World War II changes Production of the Jefferson nickel began at all three mints (Philadelphia, Denver, and San Francisco), on October 3, 1938. By mid-November, some twelve million had been coined, and they were officially released into circulation on November 15; more than thirty million would be struck in 1938. According to contemporary accounts, the Jefferson nickel was initially hoarded, and it was not until 1940 that it was commonly seen in circulation. In 1939, the Mint recut the hub for the nickel, sharpening the steps on Monticello, which had been fuzzy in initial strikings. Since then, a test for whether a nickel is particularly well struck has been whether all six steps appear clearly, with "full step" nickels more collectable. For specialty collectors this 1939 die change also created two varieties for all three mints and proof strikings that year, the "Reverse of 1938" and the "Reverse of 1940", the latter being more common for Philadelphia, scarcer for the other two mints. A 1940 proof with the 1938 reverse has also been discovered. With the entry of the United States into World War II, nickel became a critical war material, and the Mint sought to reduce its use of the metal. On March 27, 1942, Congress authorized a nickel made of 50% copper and 50% silver, but gave the Mint the authority to vary the proportions, or add other metals, in the public interest. The Mint's greatest concern was in finding an alloy which would use no nickel, but still satisfy counterfeit detectors in vending machines. An alloy of 56% copper, 35% silver and 9% manganese proved suitable, and this alloy began to be coined into nickels from October 1942. In the hopes of making them easy to sort out and withdraw after the war, the Mint struck all "war nickels" with a large mint mark appearing above Monticello. The mint mark P for Philadelphia was the first time that mint's mark had appeared on a US coin. The prewar composition and smaller mint mark (or no mint mark for Philadelphia) were resumed in 1946. In a 2000 article in The Numismatist, Mark A. Benvenuto suggested that the amount of nickel saved by the switch was not significant to the war effort, but that the war nickel served as a ubiquitous reminder of the sacrifices that needed to be made for victory. Within the war nickel series collectors recognize two additions, one official, the other counterfeit. Some 1943-P nickels are overdated. Here a die for the previous year was reused, allowing a "2" to be visible under the "3". In addition, a number of 1944 nickels are known without the large "P" mintmark. These were produced in 1954 by Francis LeRoy Henning, who also made counterfeit nickels with at least four other dates. ### 1946–2003: Later production of original designs When it became known that the Denver Mint had struck only 2,630,030 nickels in 1950, the coins (catalogued as 1950-D) began to be widely hoarded. Speculation in them increased in the early 1960s, but prices decreased sharply in 1964. Because they were so widely pulled from circulation, the 1950-D is readily available today. A number of reverse dies with an S mint mark, intended for the San Francisco Mint, were created in 1955; they were not used as that mint struck no nickels that year and subsequently closed, and the unused dies were sent for use at Denver, where the S mint mark was overpunched with a D. Proof coins, struck at Philadelphia, had been minted for sale to collectors in 1938 and continued through 1942. In the latter year proofs were struck in both the regular and "war nickel" compositions, after which they were discontinued. Sales of proof coins began again in 1950 and continued until 1964, when their striking was discontinued during the coin shortage. In 1966 a small change was made to the design to add the initials of the designer (FS) to the obverse, underneath Jefferson's portrait. In commemoration of that change, two proof 1966 nickels with the initials were struck and presented to him. Special mint sets, of lower quality than proof coins, were struck from 1965 to 1967. Proof coin sales resumed in 1968, with coins struck at the reopened San Francisco facility. Coins struck at any mint between 1965 and 1967 lack mint marks. Beginning in 1968, mint marks were again used, but were moved to the lower part of the obverse, to the right of Jefferson's bust. No nickels were produced in Philadelphia in 1968, 1969 or 1970, and so there are no nickels from these years bearing the P mint mark. From 1971, no nickels were struck for circulation in San Francisco—the 1971-S was the first nickel struck in proof only since 1878. In both 1994 and 1997 matte proof nickels, with distinctive grainy surfaces, were struck in small numbers at the Philadelphia mint for inclusion in commemorative coin sets. During the late twentieth century the Mint repeatedly modified the design. In 1982, the steps were sharpened in that year's redesign. The 1987 modification saw the sharpening of Jefferson's hair and the details of Monticello—since 1987, well-struck nickels with six full steps on the reverse have been relatively common. In 1993, Jefferson's hair was again sharpened. ### 2003–present: Westward Journey nickel series; redesign of obverse In June 2002, Mint officials were interested in redesigning the nickel in honor of the upcoming bicentennial of the Lewis and Clark Expedition. They contacted the office of Representative Eric Cantor (Republican-Virginia). Cantor had concerns about moving Monticello, located in his home state, off the nickel, and sponsored legislation which would allow the Mint to strike different designs in 2003, 2004, and 2005, and again depict Monticello beginning in 2006. The resultant act, the "American 5-Cent Coin Design Continuity Act of 2003", was signed into law on April 23, 2003. Under its terms, the Treasury Secretary could vary the nickel's designs in honor of the 200th anniversary of the Expedition and of the Louisiana Purchase, but the nickel would again feature Jefferson and Monticello beginning in 2006. Under Cantor's legislation, every future five-cent coin will feature Jefferson and Monticello. In November 2003, the Mint announced the first two reverse designs, to be struck with Schlag's obverse in 2004. The first, designed by United States Mint sculptor-engraver Norman E. Nemeth, depicts an adaptation of the Indian Peace Medals struck for Jefferson. The second, by Mint sculptor-engraver Alfred Maletsky, depicts a keelboat like that used by the Expedition. The 2005 nickels presented a new image of the former President, designed by Joe Fitzgerald based on Houdon's bust of Jefferson. The word "Liberty" was taken from Jefferson's handwritten draft for the Declaration of Independence, though to achieve a capital L, Fitzgerald had to obtain one from other documents written by Jefferson. The reverse for the first half of the year depicted an American bison, recalling the Buffalo nickel and designed by Jamie Franki. The reverse for the second half showed a coastline and the words "Ocean in view! O! The Joy!", from a journal entry by William Clark, co-leader of the Expedition. Clark had actually written the word as "ocian", but the Mint modernized the spelling. The obverse design for the nickel debuting in 2006 was designed by Franki. It depicts a forward-facing Jefferson based on an 1800 study by Rembrandt Peale, and includes "Liberty" in Jefferson's script. According to Acting Mint Director David Lebryk, "The image of a forward-facing Jefferson is a fitting tribute to [his] vision." The reverse beginning in 2006 was again Schlag's Monticello design, but newly sharpened by Mint engravers. As Schlag's obverse design, on which his initials were placed in 1966, is no longer used, his initials were placed on the reverse to the right of Monticello. In 2009, a total of only 86,640,000 nickels were struck for circulation. The figure increased in 2010 to 490,560,000. The unusually low 2009 figures were caused by a lack of demand for coins in commerce due to poor economic conditions. In 2020, the coin was struck for the first time at the West Point Mint with mint mark W; these pieces were not released into circulation but were used as premiums in the Mint's annual sets. A proof 2020-W nickel was placed in the clad proof set and a reverse proof 2020-W nickel in the silver proof set. Plans to include an uncirculated 2020-W nickel in the annual uncirculated coin set were abandoned due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The Circulating Collectible Coin Redesign Act of 2020 () was signed by President Donald Trump on January 13, 2021. It provides for, among other things, special one-year designs for the circulating coinage in 2026, including the nickel, for the United States Semiquincentennial (250th anniversary), with one of the designs to depict women. ## See also - United States nickel mintage figures

Mount Takahe

Shield volcano in the Antarctic continent

Mount Takahe is a 3,460-metre-high (11,350 ft) snow-covered shield volcano in Marie Byrd Land, Antarctica, 200 kilometres (120 mi) from the Amundsen Sea. It is a c. 30-kilometre-wide (19 mi) mountain with parasitic vents and a caldera up to 8 kilometres (5 mi) wide. Most of the volcano is formed by trachytic lava flows, but hyaloclastite is also found. Snow, ice, and glaciers cover most of Mount Takahe. With a volume of 780 km³ (200 cu mi), it is a massive volcano; the parts of the edifice that are buried underneath the West Antarctic Ice Sheet are probably even larger. It is part of the West Antarctic Rift System along with eighteen other known volcanoes. The volcano was active in the Quaternary period, from 2.5 million years ago to the present. Radiometric dating has yielded ages of up to 300,000 years for its rocks, and it reached its present height about 200,000 years ago. Several tephra layers encountered in ice cores at Mount Waesche and Byrd Station have been attributed to Mount Takahe, although some of them were later linked to eruptions of Mount Berlin instead. The tephra layers were formed by explosive or phreatomagmatic eruptions. Major eruptions took place around 17,700 years ago—possibly forming an ozone hole over Antarctica—and in the early Holocene. Mount Takahe's last eruption occurred about 7,600 years ago, and there is no present-day activity. ## Geography and geomorphology Mount Takahe is at the Bakutis Coast, eastern Marie Byrd Land, Antarctica. Bear Peninsula and the Amundsen Sea coast are 200 kilometres (120 mi) north of Mount Takahe. It is an isolated mountain, and the closest volcanoes are Mount Murphy 100 kilometres (62 mi) and Toney Mountain 140 kilometres (87 mi) away. No major air routes or supply roads to Antarctic stations pass close to the volcano, and some parts of the edifice are accessible only by helicopter. The name of the volcano refers to the takahē, a flightless nearly extinct bird from New Zealand; members of the 1957–1958 Marie Byrd Land Traverse party nicknamed an aircraft that had resupplied them "takahe". Mount Takahe was first visited in 1957–1958 and again in 1968, 1984-1985 and 1998-1999. The volcano rises 2,100 metres (6,900 ft) above the ice level to a maximum elevation of 3,460 metres (11,350 ft). It is an undissected nearly perfect cone, a 30-kilometre-wide (19 mi) shield volcano with an exposed volume of about 780 cubic kilometres (190 cu mi). The subglacial part, which might bottom out at 1,340–2,030 metres (4,400–6,660 ft) below sea level, could have an even larger volume and is elongated in an east–west direction. On its summit lies a flat, snow-filled 8-kilometre-wide (5 mi) caldera with a 10-metre-wide (33 ft) and 15-metre-high (50 ft) volcanic neck. A lava dome may crop out inside the caldera. Radial fissure vents are found around the volcano, and vents also occur around the caldera rim. There are at least three parasitic vents with basaltic composition on its lower flanks, with three cinder cones found on the western and southern slopes. One of these cinder cones has been described as a subdued 100-metre-wide (330 ft) vent. The Jaron Cliffs are found on the southern slope. The volcano is largely uneroded and thus exposures of its internal structure that would allow reconstructing its history are rare. Only twelve outcrops, with a total area of less than 0.5 square kilometres (0.19 sq mi), emerge from the ice that covers Mount Takahe. The interior structure of the volcano is unknown. Based on these outcrops, lava flows with a thickness of 2–10 metres (6 ft 7 in – 32 ft 10 in) appear to be widespread on Mount Takahe, while pyroclastic rocks such as deposits of Strombolian eruptions, lapilli tuffs and lahar deposits are less common. Occurrences of pyroclastic rocks at the summit have been correlated with tephra deposits elsewhere in Antarctica. Additionally, obsidian-bearing and recently erupted lava bomb-and-block units crop out in the caldera rim, at Bucher Rim. Tuyas reportedly exist at Mount Takahe. ### Glaciation Mount Takahe is almost entirely covered by ice of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, which rises about 1,300 metres (4,300 ft) above sea level. A tributary of the Thwaites Glacier passes close to Mount Takahe. There are two small glaciers on the volcano itself, on the southwestern and northern flanks. They are eroding eruption products from the summit area, and moraines have been mapped both on the western flank and in the summit caldera. Glacial erosion is not pronounced, only a few corries cut into the lower slopes. The ice cover on the mountain includes both snow-covered and ice-covered areas, with sastrugi and other wind-roughened surfaces. The polar environment is cold and dry, which slows weathering processes. Air temperatures recorded at Mount Takahe are usually below freezing. Some rock units at the foot of the volcano were emplaced underneath ice or water and feature hyaloclastite and pillow lavas. These units rise to about 350–400 metres (1,150–1,310 ft) above the present-day ice level. Some of these units, such as Gill Bluff, Möll Spur and Stauffer Bluff, are "hydrovolcanic deltas" comparable to lava deltas which formed when lava flows from Mount Takahe or parasitic vents entered the ice, generating meltwater lakes surrounding the lavas. They crop out at the base of the volcano and are well preserved. Ice elevation was not stable during the emplacement of these deltas, and meltwater drained away, leading to the formation of diverse structures within the hyaloclastite deltas. The deltas may have formed during ice highstands 66,000 and 22,000–15,000 years ago. ## Geology The West Antarctic Rift System is a basin and range province similar to the Great Basin in North America; it cuts across Antarctica from the Ross Sea to the Bellingshausen Sea. The Rift became active during the Mesozoic. Owing to thick ice cover it is not clear whether it is currently active, and there is no seismic activity. Most of the Rift lies below sea level. To the south it is flanked by the Transantarctic Mountains and to the north by the volcanic province of Marie Byrd Land. Volcanic activity in Marie Byrd Land commenced about 34 million years ago, but high activity began 14 million years ago. A major uplifted dome, 1,200 by 500 kilometres (750 mi × 310 mi) in width, is centred on the Amundsen Sea coast and is associated with the Rift. About 18 central volcanoes were active in Marie Byrd Land from the Miocene to the Holocene. Among the volcanic areas in Marie Byrd Land are the Flood Range with Mount Berlin, the Ames Range, the Executive Committee Range with Mount Sidley and Mount Waesche, the Crary Mountains, Toney Mountain, Mount Takahe and Mount Murphy. These volcanoes mainly occur in groups or chains, but there also are isolated edifices. Mount Takahe is located in the eastern Marie Byrd Land volcanic province and with an estimated volume of 5,520 cubic kilometres (1,320 cu mi) could be the largest of the Marie Byrd Land volcanoes, comparable to Mount Kilimanjaro in Africa. Most of these volcanoes are large, capped off by a summit caldera and appear to have begun as fast-growing shield volcanoes. Later, calderas formed. Eventually, late in the history of the volcanoes parasitic vents were active. The volcanoes are all surmounted by rocks composed of trachyte, phonolite, pantellerite, or comendite. Their activity has been attributed either to the reactivation of crustal structures or to the presence of a mantle plume. The volcanoes rise from a Paleozoic basement. Mount Takahe may feature a large magma chamber and a heat flow anomaly underneath the ice has been found at the volcano. A magnetic anomaly has also been linked to the mountain. ### Composition Trachyte is the most common rock on Mount Takahe, phonolite being less common. Basanite, hawaiite, and mugearite are uncommon, but the occurrence of benmoreite and pantellerite has been reported, and some rocks have been classified as andesites. Hawaiite occurs exclusively in the older outcrops, basanite only in parasitic vents and mugearite only on the lower sector of the volcano. Despite this, most of the volcano is believed to consist of mafic rocks with only about 10–15% of felsic rocks, as the upper visible portion of the volcano could be resting on a much larger buried base. The parasitic vents probably make up less than 1% of the edifice. Ice-lava interactions produced hyaloclastite, palagonite and sideromelane. No major changes in magma chemistry occurred during the last 40,000 years but some variation has been recorded. All these rocks appear to have a common origin and define an alkaline–peralkaline suite. Phenocrysts include mainly plagioclase, with less common olivine and titanomagnetite; apatite has been reported as well. The magmas appear to have formed through fractional crystallization at varying pressures, and ultimately came from the lithosphere at 80–90-kilometre (50–56 mi) depth, that was affected by subduction processes over 85 million years ago. ## Eruption history The volcano was active in the late Quaternary. Radiometric results reported in 1988 include ages of less than 360,000 years for rocks in the caldera rim and of less than 240,000 years for volcanic rocks on the flanks. In his 1990 book Volcanoes of the Antarctic Plate and Southern Oceans LeMasurier gave 310,000±90,000 years old as the oldest date for samples tested, citing unpublished K-Ar dates, but in a 2016 review of dates for Mount Takahe LeMasurier reported that none were older than 192,000 years. A 2013 paper also by LeMasurier reported maximum ages of 192,000 years for caldera rim rocks and of 66,000 years for lower flank rocks. The entire volcano may have formed in less than 400,000 years or even less than 200,000 years, which would imply a fast growth of the edifice. Rocks aged 192,000±6,300 years old are found at the summit caldera, implying that the volcano had reached its present-day height by then. Early research indicated that most of Mount Takahe formed underneath the ice, but more detailed field studies concluded that most of the volcano developed above the ice surface. The ice surface has fluctuated over the life of Mount Takahe with an increased thickness during marine isotope stages 4 and 2, explaining why units originally emplaced under ice or water now lie above the ice surface and alternate with lava flow deposits. These elevated deposits were emplaced about 29,000–12,000 years ago while the lava delta-like deposits are between about 70,000 and 15,000 years old. After it grew out of the ice, Mount Takahe increased in size through the emission of lava flows with occasional pyroclastic eruptions. Outcrops in the summit region indicate that most eruptions were magmatic, but some hydromagmatic activity occurred. Cinder cones and tuff cones formed during the late stage of activity. ### Tephra in ice cores Tephra layers in ice cores drilled at Byrd Station have been attributed to Mount Takahe. The volcano reaches an altitude high enough that tephras erupted from it can readily penetrate the tropopause and spread over Antarctica through the stratosphere. The occurrence of several volcanic eruptions in the region about 30,000 years ago has been suggested to have caused a cooling of the climate of Antarctica, but it is also possible that the growth of the ice sheets at that time squeezed magma chambers at Mount Takahe and thus induced an increase of the eruptive activity. Assuming that most tephra layers at Byrd come from Mount Takahe, it has been inferred that the volcano was very active between 60,000 and 7,500 years ago, with nine eruptive periods and two pulses between 60,000–57,000 and 40,000–14,000 years ago. In the latter part of the latter period hydrovolcanic eruptions became dominant at Mount Takahe, with a maximum around the time when the Wisconsin glaciation ended. It is possible that between 18,000 and 15,000 years ago, either a crater lake formed in the caldera or the vents were buried by snow and ice. The caldera itself might have formed between 20,000 and 15,000 years ago, probably not through a large explosive eruption. It cannot be entirely ruled out that Byrd Station tephras originate at other volcanoes of Marie Byrd Land such as Mount Berlin. In particular, tephra layers between 30,000 and 20,000 years ago have been attributed to the latter volcano. Tephra layers from Mount Takahe have also been found at Dome C, Dome F, Mount Takahe itself, Mount Waesche, Siple Dome and elsewhere in Antarctica. Apart from ice cores, tephras attributed to Mount Takahe have been found in sediment cores taken from the sea. Volcanic eruptions at Mount Takahe lack the pyroclastic flow deposits observed in other large explosive eruptions. The thickness of the Byrd ice core tephras attributed to Mount Takahe suggested that the eruptions were not large, but later research has indicated that large Plinian eruptions also occurred. A series of eruptions about 200 years long took place at Mount Takahe 17,700 years ago. These eruptions have been recorded from ice cores at the WAIS Divide and at Taylor Glacier in the McMurdo Dry Valleys, where they constrain estimates of the rate of deglaciation. These eruptions released a large quantity of halogens into the stratosphere, which together with the cold and dry climate conditions of the last glacial maximum would presumably have led to massive ozone destruction and the formation of an ozone hole. Bromine and sulfur isotope data indicate that the amount of UV radiation in the atmosphere did increase at that time in Antarctica. As is the case with the present-day ozone hole, the ozone hole created by the Takahe eruptions might have altered the Antarctic climate and sped up deglaciation, which was accelerating at that time, but later research has determined that the warming was most likely not volcanically forced. ### Holocene and recent activity Activity waned after this point, two hydromagmatic eruptions being recorded 13,000 and 9,000 years ago and a magmatic eruption 7,500 years ago. This last eruption is also known from the Byrd ice core and may correspond to an eruption 8,200±5,400 years ago recorded at Mount Waesche and the Takahe edifice and to two 6217 and 6231 BC tephra layers at Siple Dome. Tephra from a 8,200 before present eruption has been recorded at Siple Dome and Mount Waesche. A 7,900 before present eruption at Mount Takahe is one of the strongest eruptions at Siple Dome and Byrd Station of the last 10,000 years. Another eruption reported by the Global Volcanism Program may have occurred in 7050 BC. At Siple Dome, a further eruption between 10,700 and 5,600 years ago is recorded and one tephra layer around 1783 BC (accompanied by increased sulfate concentrations in ice) might also come from Mount Takahe. Glass shards at Law Dome emplaced in 1552 and 1623 AD may come from this volcano as well. The Global Volcanism Program reports 5550 BC as the date of the most recent eruption, and the volcano is currently considered dormant. There is no evidence of fumarolic activity or warm ground, unlike at Mount Berlin, which is the other young volcano of Marie Byrd Land. Seismic activity recorded at 9–19 kilometres (5.6–11.8 mi) depth around the volcano may be linked to its activity. Mount Takahe has been prospected for the possibility of obtaining geothermal energy. ## See also - List of Ultras of Antarctica - List of volcanoes in Antarctica ## Explanatory notes

Birth control movement in the United States

Social reform campaign beginning in 1914

The birth control movement in the United States was a social reform campaign beginning in 1914 that aimed to increase the availability of contraception in the U.S. through education and legalization. The movement began in 1914 when a group of political radicals in New York City, led by Emma Goldman, Mary Dennett, and Margaret Sanger, became concerned about the hardships that childbirth and self-induced abortions brought to low-income women. Since contraception was considered to be obscene at the time, the activists targeted the Comstock laws, which prohibited distribution of any "obscene, lewd, and/or lascivious" materials through the mail. Hoping to provoke a favorable legal decision, Sanger deliberately broke the law by distributing The Woman Rebel, a newsletter containing a discussion of contraception. In 1916, Sanger opened the first birth control clinic in the United States, but the clinic was immediately shut down by police, and Sanger was sentenced to 30 days in jail. A major turning point for the movement came during World War I, when many U.S. servicemen were diagnosed with venereal diseases. The government's response included an anti-venereal disease campaign that framed sexual intercourse and contraception as issues of public health and legitimate topics of scientific research. This was the first time a U.S. government institution had engaged in a sustained, public discussion of sexual matters; as a consequence, contraception transformed from an issue of morals to an issue of public health. Encouraged by the public's changing attitudes towards birth control, Sanger opened a second birth control clinic in 1923, but this time there were no arrests or controversy. Throughout the 1920s, public discussion of contraception became more commonplace, and the term "birth control" became firmly established in the nation's vernacular. The widespread availability of contraception signaled a transition from the stricter sexual mores of the Victorian era to a more sexually permissive society. Legal victories in the 1930s continued to weaken anti-contraception laws. The court victories motivated the American Medical Association in 1937 to adopt contraception as a core component of medical school curricula, but the medical community was slow to accept this new responsibility, and women continued to rely on unsafe and ineffective contraceptive advice from ill-informed sources. In 1942, the Planned Parenthood Federation of America was formed, creating a nationwide network of birth control clinics. After World War II, the movement to legalize birth control came to a gradual conclusion, as birth control was fully embraced by the medical profession, and the remaining anti-contraception laws were no longer enforced. ## Contraception in the nineteenth century ### Birth control practices The practice of birth control was common throughout the U.S. prior to 1914, when the movement to legalize contraception began. Longstanding techniques included the rhythm method, withdrawal, diaphragms, contraceptive sponges, condoms, prolonged breastfeeding, and spermicides. Use of contraceptives increased throughout the nineteenth century, contributing to a 50 percent drop in the fertility rate in the United States between 1800 and 1900, particularly in urban regions. The only known survey conducted during the nineteenth century of American women's contraceptive habits was performed by Clelia Mosher from 1892 to 1912. The survey was based on a small sample of upper-class women, and shows that most of the women used contraception (primarily douching, but also withdrawal, rhythm, condoms and pessaries) and that they viewed sex as a pleasurable act that could be undertaken without the goal of procreation. Although contraceptives were relatively common in middle-class and upper-class society, the topic was rarely discussed in public. The first book published in the United States which ventured to discuss contraception was Moral Physiology; or, A Brief and Plain Treatise on the Population Question, published by Robert Dale Owen in 1831. The book suggested that family planning was a laudable effort, and that sexual gratification – without the goal of reproduction – was not immoral. Owen recommended withdrawal, but he also discussed sponges and condoms. That book was followed by Fruits of Philosophy: The Private Companion of Young Married People, written in 1832 by Charles Knowlton, which recommended douching. Knowlton was prosecuted in Massachusetts on obscenity charges, and served three months in prison. A third early American novel on both prevention of conception and abortion was the book The married woman's private medical companion: embracing the treatment of menstruation, or monthly turns, during their stoppage, irregularity, or entire suppression: pregnancy, and how it may be determined, with the treatment of its various diseases: discovery to prevent pregnancy, its great and important necessity where malformation or inability exists to give birth: to prevent miscarriage or abortion when proper and necessary, to effect miscarriage when attended with entire safety: causes and mode of cure of barrenness or sterility, written by A. M Mauriceau in the year 1847. Mauriceau was a doctor and his work was cited many times in early volumes of the Birth Control Review. Birth control practices were generally adopted earlier in Europe than in the United States. Knowlton's book was reprinted in 1877 in England by Charles Bradlaugh and Annie Besant, with the goal of challenging Britain's obscenity laws. They were arrested (and later acquitted) but the publicity of their trial contributed to the formation, in 1877, of the Malthusian League – the world's first birth control advocacy group – which sought to limit population growth to avoid Thomas Malthus's dire predictions of exponential population growth leading to worldwide poverty and famine. By 1930, similar societies had been established in nearly all European countries, and birth control began to find acceptance in most Western European countries, except Catholic Ireland, Spain, and France. As the birth control societies spread across Europe, so did birth control clinics. The first birth control clinic in the world was established in the Netherlands in 1882, run by the Netherlands' first female physician, Aletta Jacobs. The first birth control clinic in England was established in 1921 by Marie Stopes, in London. ### Anti-contraception laws enacted Contraception was legal in the United States throughout most of the 19th century, but in the 1870s a social purity movement grew in strength, aimed at outlawing vice in general, and prostitution and obscenity in particular. Composed primarily of Protestant moral reformers and middle-class women, the Victorian-era campaign also attacked contraception, which was viewed as an immoral practice that promoted prostitution and venereal disease. Anthony Comstock, a postal inspector and leader in the purity movement, successfully lobbied for the passage of the 1873 Comstock Act, a federal law prohibiting mailing of "any article or thing designed or intended for the prevention of conception or procuring of abortion" as well as any form of contraceptive information. Many states also passed similar state laws (collectively known as the Comstock laws), sometimes extending the federal law by outlawing the use of contraceptives, as well as their distribution. Comstock was proud of the fact that he was personally responsible for thousands of arrests and the destruction of hundreds of tons of books and pamphlets. Comstock and his allies also took aim at the libertarians and utopians who comprised the free love movement – an initiative to promote sexual freedom, equality for women, and abolition of marriage. The free love proponents were the only group to actively oppose the Comstock laws in the 19th century, setting the stage for the birth control movement. The efforts of the free love movement were not successful and, at the beginning of the 20th century, federal and state governments began to enforce the Comstock laws more rigorously. In response, contraception went underground, but it was not extinguished. The number of publications on the topic dwindled, and advertisements, if they were found at all, used euphemisms such as "marital aids" or "hygienic devices". Drug stores continued to sell condoms as "rubber goods" and cervical caps as "womb supporters". ## Beginning (1914–1916) ### Free speech movement At the turn of the century, an energetic movement arose, centered in Greenwich Village, that sought to overturn bans on free speech. Supported by radicals, feminists, anarchists, and atheists such as Ezra Heywood, Moses Harman, D. M. Bennett, and Emma Goldman, these activists regularly battled anti-obscenity laws and, later, the government's effort to suppress speech critical of involvement in World War I. Prior to 1914, the free speech movement focused on politics, and rarely addressed contraception. Goldman's circle of radicals, socialists, and bohemians was joined in 1912 by a nurse, Margaret Sanger, whose mother had been through 18 pregnancies in 22 years, and died at age 50 of tuberculosis and cervical cancer. In 1913, Sanger worked in New York's Lower East Side, often with poor women who were suffering due to frequent childbirth and self-induced abortions. After one particularly tragic medical case, Sanger wrote: "I threw my nursing bag in the corner and announced ... that I would never take another case until I had made it possible for working women in America to have the knowledge to control birth." Sanger visited public libraries, searching for information on contraception, but nothing was available. She became outraged that working-class women could not obtain contraception, yet upper-class women who had access to private physicians could. Under the influence of Goldman and the Free Speech League, Sanger became determined to challenge the Comstock laws that outlawed the dissemination of contraceptive information. With that goal in mind, in 1914 she launched The Woman Rebel, an eight-page monthly newsletter which promoted contraception using the slogan "No Gods, No Masters", and proclaimed that each woman should be "the absolute mistress of her own body." Sanger coined the term birth control, which first appeared in the pages of Rebel, as a more candid alternative to euphemisms such as family limitation. Sanger's goal of challenging the law was fulfilled when she was indicted in August 1914, but the prosecutors focused their attention on articles Sanger had written on assassination and marriage, rather than contraception. Afraid that she might be sent to prison without an opportunity to argue for birth control in court, she fled to England to escape arrest. While Sanger was in Europe, her husband continued her work, which led to his arrest after he distributed a copy of a birth control pamphlet to an undercover postal worker. The arrest and his 30-day jail sentence prompted several mainstream publications, including Harper's Weekly and the New-York Tribune, to publish articles about the birth control controversy. Emma Goldman and Ben Reitman toured the country, speaking in support of the Sangers, and distributing copies of Sanger's pamphlet Family Limitation. Sanger's exile and her husband's arrest propelled the birth control movement into the forefront of American news. ### Early birth control organizations In the spring of 1915 supporters of the Sangers – led by Mary Dennett – formed the National Birth Control League (NBCL), which was the first American birth control organization. Throughout 1915, smaller regional organizations were formed in San Francisco, Portland, Oregon, Seattle, and Los Angeles. Sanger returned to the United States in October 1915. She planned to open a birth control clinic modeled on the world's first such clinic, which she had visited in Amsterdam. She first had to fight the charges outstanding against her. Noted attorney Clarence Darrow offered to defend Sanger free of charge but, bowing to public pressure, the government dropped the charges early in 1916. No longer under the threat of jail, Sanger embarked on a successful cross-country speaking tour, which catapulted her into the leadership of the U.S. birth control movement. Other leading figures, such as William J. Robinson and Mary Dennett, chose to work in the background, or turned their attention to other causes. Later in 1916, Sanger traveled to Boston to lend her support to the Massachusetts Birth Control League and to jailed birth control activist Van Kleeck Allison. ### First birth control clinic During Sanger's 1916 speaking tour, she promoted birth control clinics based on the Dutch model she had observed during her 1914 trip to Europe. Although she inspired many local communities to create birth control leagues, no clinics were established. Sanger therefore resolved to create a birth control clinic in New York that would provide free contraceptive services to women. New York state law prohibited the distribution of contraceptives or even contraceptive information, but Sanger hoped to exploit a provision in the law which permitted doctors to prescribe contraceptives for the prevention of disease. On October 16, 1916, she, partnering with Fania Mindell and Ethel Byrne, opened the Brownsville clinic in Brooklyn. The clinic was an immediate success, with over 100 women visiting on the first day. A few days after opening, an undercover policewoman purchased a cervical cap at the clinic, and Sanger was arrested. Refusing to walk, Sanger and a co-worker were dragged out of the clinic by police officers. The clinic was shut down, and it was not until 1923 that another birth control clinic was opened in the United States. Sanger's trial began in January 1917. She was supported by a large number of wealthy and influential women who came together to form the Committee of One Hundred, which was devoted to raising funds for Sanger and the NBCL. The committee also started publishing the monthly journal Birth Control Review, and established a network of connections to powerful politicians, activists, and press figures. Despite the strong support, Sanger was convicted; the judge offered a lenient sentence if she promised not to break the law again, but Sanger replied "I cannot respect the law as it exists today." She served a sentence of 30 days in jail. In protest to her arrest as well, Byrne was sentenced to 30 days in jail at Blackwell's Island Prison and responded to her situation with a hunger strike protest. With no signs of ending her demonstration anytime soon, Byrne was force fed by prison guards. Weakened and ill, Byrne refused to end her hunger strike at the cost of securing early release from prison. However, Sanger accepted the plea bargain on her sister's behalf, agreeing that Byrne would be released early from prison if she ended her birth control activism. Horrified, Byrne's relationship quickly eroded with her sister and, both forcefully and willingly, she left the birth control movement. Due to the drama of Byrne's demonstration, the birth control movement became a headline news story in which the organization's purpose was distributed across the country. Other activists were also pushing for progress. Emma Goldman was arrested in 1916 for circulating birth control information, and Abraham Jacobi unsuccessfully tried to persuade the New York medical community to push for a change in law to permit physicians to dispense contraceptive information. ## Mainstream acceptance (1917–1923) The publicity from Sanger's trial and Byrne's hunger strike generated immense enthusiasm for the cause, and by the end of 1917 there were over 30 birth control organizations in the United States. Sanger was always astute about public relations, and she seized on the publicity of the trial to advance her causes. After her trial, she emerged as the movement's most visible leader. Other leaders, such as William J. Robinson, Mary Dennett, and Blanche Ames Ames, could not match Sanger's charisma, charm and fervor. The movement was evolving from radical, working-class roots into a campaign backed by society women and liberal professionals. Sanger and her fellow advocates began to tone down their radical rhetoric and instead emphasized the socioeconomic benefits of birth control, a policy which led to increasing acceptance by mainstream Americans. Media coverage increased, and several silent motion pictures produced in the 1910s featured birth control as a theme (including Birth Control, produced by Sanger and starring herself). Opposition to birth control remained strong: state legislatures refused to legalize contraception or the distribution of contraceptive information; religious leaders spoke out, attacking women who would choose "ease and fashion" over motherhood; and eugenicists were worried that birth control would exacerbate the birth rate differential between "old stock" white Americans and "coloreds" or immigrants. Sanger formed the New York Woman's Publishing Company (NYWPC) in 1918 and, under its auspices, became the publisher for the Birth Control Review. British suffragette activist Kitty Marion, standing on New York street corners, sold the Review at 20 cents per copy, enduring death threats, heckling, spitting, physical abuse, and police harassment. Over the course of the following ten years, Marion was arrested nine times for her birth control advocacy. ### Legal victory Sanger appealed her 1917 conviction and won a mixed victory in 1918 in a unanimous decision by the New York Court of Appeals written by Judge Frederick E. Crane. The court's opinion upheld her conviction, but indicated that the courts would be willing to permit contraception if prescribed by doctors. This decision was only applicable within New York, where it opened the door for birth control clinics, under physician supervision, to be established. Sanger herself did not immediately take advantage of the opportunity, wrongly expecting that the medical profession would lead the way; instead she focused on writing and lecturing. ### World War I and condoms The birth control movement received an unexpected boost during World War I, as a result of a crisis the U.S. military experienced when many of its soldiers were diagnosed with syphilis or gonorrhea. The military undertook an extensive education campaign, focusing on abstinence, but also offering some contraceptive guidance. The military, under pressure from purity advocates, did not distribute condoms, or even endorse their use, making the U.S. the only military force in World War I that did not supply condoms to its troops. When U.S. soldiers were in Europe, they found rubber condoms readily available, and when they returned to America, they continued to use condoms as their preferred method of birth control. The military's anti-venereal disease campaign marked a major turning point for the movement: it was the first time a government institution had engaged in a sustained, public discussion of sexual matters. The government's public discourse changed sex from a secret topic into a legitimate topic of scientific research, and it transformed contraception from an issue of morals to an issue of public health. In 1917, advocate Emma Goldman was arrested for protesting World War I and American military conscription. Goldman's commitment to free speech on topics such as socialism, anarchism, birth control, labor/union rights, and free love eventually cost her American citizenship and the right to live in the United States. Due to her commitment to socialist welfare and anti-capitalism, Goldman was associated with communism which led to her expulsion from the country during the First Red Scare. While World War I led to a breakthrough on American acceptance of birth control relating to public health, anti-communist WWI propaganda sacrificed one of the birth control movement's most dedicated members. ### Legislative efforts While an important birth control activist and leader, Mary Dennett advocated for a wide variety of organizations. Starting as a field secretary for the Massachusetts Women's Suffrage Association, she worked her way up to win an elected seat as a corresponding secretary for the National American Women's Suffrage Association. Dennett headed the literary department, undertaking assignments such as distributing pamphlets and leaflets. Following disillusionment with the NAWSA's organizational structure, Dennett, as described above, helped found the National Birth Control League. The NBCL took a strong stance against militant protest strategies and instead focused attention on legislation changes at both the state and federal level. During World War I, Mary Dennett focused her efforts on the peace movement, but she returned to the birth control movement in 1918. She continued to lead the NBCL, and collaborated with Sanger's NYWPC. In 1919, Dennett published a widely distributed educational pamphlet, The Sex Side of Life, which treated sex as a natural and enjoyable act. However, in the same year, frustrated with the NBCL's chronic lack of funding, Dennett broke away and formed the Voluntary Parenthood League (VPL). Both Dennett and Sanger proposed legislative changes that would legalize birth control, but they took different approaches: Sanger endorsed contraception but only under a physician's supervision; Dennett pushed for unrestricted access to contraception. Sanger, a proponent of diaphragms, was concerned that unrestricted access would result in ill-fitting diaphragms and would lead to medical quackery. Dennett was concerned that requiring women to get prescriptions from physicians would prevent poor women from receiving contraception, and she was concerned about a shortage of physicians trained in birth control. Both legislative initiatives failed, partly because some legislators felt that fear of pregnancy was the only thing that kept women chaste. In the early 1920s, Sanger's leadership position in the movement solidified because she gave frequent public lectures, and because she took steps to exclude Dennett from meetings and events. ### American Birth Control League Although Sanger was busy publishing the Birth Control Review during 1919 and 1920, she was not formally affiliated with either of the major birth control organizations (NBCL or VPL) during that time. In 1921 she became convinced that she needed to associate with a formal body to earn the support of professional societies and the scientific community. Rather than join an existing organization, she considered creating a new one. As a first step, she organized the First American Birth Control Conference, held in November 1921 in New York City. On the final night of the conference, as Sanger prepared to give a speech in the crowded Town Hall theater, police raided the meeting and arrested her for disorderly conduct. From the stage she shouted: "we have a right to hold [this meeting] under the Constitution ... let them club us if they want to." She was soon released. The following day it was revealed that Patrick Joseph Hayes, the Archbishop of New York, had pressured the police to shut down the meeting. The Town Hall raid was a turning point for the movement: opposition from the government and medical community faded, and the Catholic Church emerged as its most vocal opponent. After the conference, Sanger and her supporters established the American Birth Control League (ABCL). ### Second birth control clinic Four years after the New York Court of Appeals opened the doors for physicians to prescribe contraceptives, Sanger opened a second birth control clinic, which she staffed with physicians to make it legal under that court ruling (the first clinic had employed nurses). This second clinic, the Clinical Research Bureau (CRB), opened on January 2, 1923. To avoid police harassment the clinic's existence was not publicized, its primary mission was stated to be conducting scientific research, and it only provided services to married women. The existence of the clinic was finally announced to the public in December 1923, but this time there were no arrests or controversy. This convinced activists that, after ten years of struggle, birth control had finally become widely accepted in the United States. The CRB was the first legal birth control clinic in the United States, and quickly grew into the world's leading contraceptive research center. ## Progress and setbacks (1920s–1940s) ### Widespread acceptance Following the successful opening of the CRB in 1923, public discussion of contraception became more commonplace, and the term "birth control" became firmly established in the nation's vernacular. Of the hundreds of references to birth control in magazines and newspapers of the 1920s, more than two-thirds were favorable. The availability of contraception signaled the end of the stricter morality of the Victorian era, and ushered in the emergence of a more sexually permissive society. Other factors that contributed to the new sexual norms included increased mobility brought by the automobile, anonymous urban lifestyles, and post-war euphoria. Sociologists who surveyed women in Muncie, Indiana in 1925 found that all the upper class women approved of birth control, and more than 80 percent of the working class women approved. The birth rate in America declined 20 percent between 1920 and 1930, primarily due to increased use of birth control. ### Opposition Although clinics became more common in the late 1920s, the movement still faced significant challenges: Large sectors of the medical community were still resistant to birth control; birth control advocates were blacklisted by the radio industry; and state and federal laws – though generally not enforced – still outlawed contraception. The most significant opponent to birth control was the Catholic Church, which mobilized opposition in many venues during the 1920s. Catholics persuaded the Syracuse city council to ban Sanger from giving a speech in 1924; the National Catholic Welfare Conference lobbied against birth control; the Knights of Columbus boycotted hotels that hosted birth control events; the Catholic police commissioner of Albany prevented Sanger from speaking there; the Catholic mayor of Boston, James Curley, blocked Sanger from speaking in public; and several newsreel companies, succumbing to pressure from Catholics, refused to cover stories related to birth control. The ABCL turned some of the boycotted speaking events to their advantage by inviting the press, and the resultant news coverage often generated public sympathy for their cause. However, Catholic lobbying was particularly effective in the legislative arena, where their arguments – that contraception was unnatural, harmful, and indecent – impeded several initiatives, including an attempt in 1924 by Mary Dennett to overturn federal anti-contraception laws. Dozens of birth control clinics opened across the United States during the 1920s, but not without incident. In 1929, New York police raided a clinic in New York and arrested two doctors and three nurses for distributing contraceptive information that was unrelated to the prevention of disease. The ABCL achieved a major victory in the trial, when the judge ruled that use of contraceptives to space births farther apart was a legitimate medical treatment that benefited the health of the mother. The trial, in which many important physicians served as witnesses for the defense, helped to unite the physicians with the birth control advocates. ### Eugenics and race Before the advent of the birth control movement, eugenics had become very popular in Europe and the U.S., and the subject was widely discussed in articles, movies, and lectures. Eugenicists had mixed feelings about birth control: they worried that it would exacerbate the birth rate differential between "superior" and "inferior" races, but they also recognized its value as a tool to "racial betterment". Eugenics buttressed the birth control movement's aims by correlating excessive births with increased poverty, crime and disease. Sanger published two books in the early 1920s that endorsed eugenics: Woman and the New Race and The Pivot of Civilization. Sanger and other advocates endorsed negative eugenics (discouraging procreation of "inferior" persons), but did not advocate euthanasia or positive eugenics (encouraging procreation of "superior" persons). However, many eugenicists refused to support the birth control movement because of Sanger's insistence that a woman's primary duty was to herself, not to the state. Like many white Americans in the U.S. in the 1930s, some leaders of the birth control movement believed that lighter-skinned races were superior to darker-skinned races. They assumed that African Americans were intellectually backward, would be relatively incompetent in managing their own health, and would require special supervision from whites. The dominance of whites in the movement's leadership and medical staff resulted in accusations of racism from blacks and suspicions that "race suicide" would be a consequence of large scale adoption of birth control. These suspicions were misinterpreted by some of the white birth control advocates as lack of interest in contraception. In spite of these suspicions, many African-American leaders supported efforts to supply birth control to the African-American community. In 1929, James H. Hubert, a black social worker and leader of New York's Urban League, asked Sanger to open a clinic in Harlem. Sanger secured funding from the Julius Rosenwald Fund and opened the clinic, staffed with African-American doctors, in 1930. The clinic was guided by a 15-member advisory board consisting of African-American doctors, nurses, clergy, journalists, and social workers. It was publicized in the African-American press and African-American churches, and received the approval of W. E. B. Du Bois, co-founder of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). In the early 1940s, the Birth Control Federation of America (BCFA) initiated a program called the Negro Project, managed by its Division of Negro Service (DNS). As with the Harlem clinic, the primary aim of the DNS and its programs was to improve maternal and infant health. Based on her work at the Harlem clinic, Sanger suggested to the DNS that African Americans were more likely to take advice from a doctor of their own race, but other leaders prevailed and insisted that whites be employed in the outreach efforts. The discriminatory actions and statements by the movement's leaders during the 1920s and 1930s have led to continuing allegations that the movement was racist. ### Expanding availability Two important legal decisions in the 1930s helped increase the accessibility of contraceptives. In 1930, two condom manufacturers sued each other in the Youngs Rubber case, and the judge ruled that contraceptive manufacturing was a legitimate business enterprise. He went further, and declared that the federal law prohibiting the mailing of condoms was not legally sound. Sanger precipitated a second legal breakthrough when she ordered a diaphragm from Japan in 1932, hoping to provoke a decisive battle in the courts. The diaphragm was confiscated by the U.S. government, and Sanger's subsequent legal challenge led to the 1936 One Package legal ruling by Judge Augustus Hand. His decision overturned an important provision of the anti-contraception laws that prohibited physicians from obtaining contraceptives. This court victory motivated the American Medical Association in 1937 to finally adopt contraception as a normal medical service and a core component of medical school curricula. However, the medical community was slow to accept this new responsibility, and women continued to rely on unsafe and ineffective contraceptive advice from ill-informed sources until the 1960s. By 1938, over 400 contraceptive manufacturers were in business, over 600 brands of female contraceptives were available, and industry revenues exceeded \$250 million per year. Condoms were sold in vending machines in some public restrooms, and men spent twice as much on condoms as on shaving. Although condoms had become commonplace in the 1930s, feminists in the movement felt that birth control should be the woman's prerogative, and they continued to push for development of a contraceptive that was under the woman's control, a campaign which ultimately led to the birth control pill decades later. To increase the availability of high-quality contraceptives, birth control advocates established the Holland–Rantos company to manufacture contraceptives – primarily diaphragms, which were Sanger's recommended method. By the 1930s, the diaphragm with spermicidal jelly had become the most commonly prescribed form of contraception; in 1938, female contraceptives accounted for 85 percent of annual contraceptive sales. ### Planned Parenthood The 1936 One Package court battle brought together two birth control organizations – the ABCL and the Birth Control Clinical Research Bureau (formerly the CRB) – who had joined forces to craft the successful defense effort. Leaders of both groups viewed this as an auspicious time to merge the two organizations, so, in 1937, the Birth Control Council of America, under the leadership of Sanger, was formed to effect a consolidation. The effort eventually led to the merger of the two organizations in 1939 as the Birth Control Federation of America (BCFA). Although Sanger continued in the role of president, she no longer wielded the same power as she had in the early years of the movement, and, in 1942, more conservative forces within the organization changed the name to Planned Parenthood Federation of America, a name Sanger objected to because she considered it too euphemistic. After World War II, the leadership of Planned Parenthood de-emphasized radical feminism and shifted focus to more moderate themes such as family planning and population policy. The movement to legalize birth control came to a gradual conclusion around the time Planned Parenthood was formed. In 1942, there were over 400 birth control organizations in America, contraception was fully embraced by the medical profession, and the anti-contraception Comstock laws (which still remained on the books) were rarely enforced. ## Legalization and aftermath After World War II advocacy for reproductive rights transitioned into a new era which focused on abortion, public funding, and insurance coverage. Birth control advocacy also took on a global aspect as organizations around the world began to collaborate. In 1946, Sanger helped found the International Committee on Planned Parenthood, which evolved into the International Planned Parenthood Federation and soon became the world's largest non-governmental international family planning organization. In 1952, John D. Rockefeller III founded the influential Population Council. Fear of global overpopulation became a major issue in the 1960s, generating concerns about pollution, food shortages, and quality of life, leading to well-funded birth control campaigns around the world. In the early 1970s, the United States Congress established the Commission on Population Growth and the American Future (Chairman John D. Rockefeller III) to provide recommendations regarding population growth and its social consequences. The Commission submitted its final recommendations in 1972, which included promoting contraceptives and liberalizing abortion regulations, for example. The 1994 International Conference on Population and Development and the 1995 Fourth World Conference on Women addressed birth control and influenced human rights declarations which asserted women's rights to control their own bodies. In the early 1950s in the United States, philanthropist Katharine McCormick provided funding for biologist Gregory Pincus to develop the birth control pill, which was approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in 1960. The pill became very popular and had a major impact on society and culture. It contributed to a sharp increase in college attendance and graduation rates for women. New forms of intrauterine devices were introduced in the 1960s, increasing popularity of long acting reversible contraceptives. In 1965, the Supreme Court ruled in Griswold v. Connecticut that it was unconstitutional for the government to prohibit married couples from using birth control. In 1967 activist Bill Baird was arrested for distributing a contraceptive foam and a condom to a student during a lecture on birth control and abortion at Boston University. Baird's appeal of his conviction resulted in the United States Supreme Court case Eisenstadt v. Baird (1972), which extended the Griswold holding to unmarried couples, and thereby legalized birth control for all Americans. In 1970, Congress finally removed references to contraception from federal anti-obscenity laws; and in 1973, the Roe v. Wade decision legalized abortion during the first trimester of pregnancy. Also in 1970, Title X of the Public Health Service Act was enacted as part of the war on poverty, to make family planning and preventive health services available to low-income and the uninsured. Without publicly funded family planning services, according to the Guttmacher Institute, the number of unintended pregnancies and abortions in the United States would be nearly two-thirds higher; the number of unintended pregnancies among poor women would nearly double. According to the United States Department of Health and Human Services, publicly funded family planning saves nearly \$4 in Medicaid expenses for every \$1 spent on services. In 1982, European drug manufacturers developed mifepristone, which was initially utilized as a contraceptive, but is now generally prescribed with a prostoglandin to induce abortion in pregnancies up to the fourth month of gestation. To avoid consumer boycotts organized by anti-abortion organizations, the manufacturer donated the U.S. manufacturing rights to Danco Laboratories, a company formed by pro-choice advocates, with the sole purpose of distributing mifepristone in the U.S, and thus immune to the effects of boycotts. In 1997, the FDA approved a prescription emergency contraception pill (known as the morning-after pill), which became available over the counter in 2006. In 2010, ulipristal acetate, a more effective emergency contraceptive was approved for use up to five days after unprotected sexual intercourse. Fifty to sixty percent of abortion patients became pregnant in circumstances in which emergency contraceptives could have been used. These emergency contraceptives, including Plan B and EllaOne, proved to be another battleground in the war over reproductive rights. Opponents of emergency contraception consider it a form of abortion, because it may interfere with the ability of a fertilized embryo to implant in the uterus; while proponents contend that it is not abortion, because the absence of implantation means that pregnancy never commenced. ### 21st Century In 2000, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission ruled that companies that provided insurance for prescription drugs to their employees but excluded birth control were violating the Civil Rights Act of 1964. President Obama signed the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (ACA) on 23 March 2010. As of 1 August 2011, female contraception was added to a list of preventive services covered by the ACA that would be provided without patient co-payment. The federal mandate applied to all new health insurance plans in all states from 1 August 2012. Grandfathered plans did not have to comply unless they changed substantially. To be grandfathered, a group plan must have existed or an individual plan must have been sold before President Obama signed the law; otherwise they were required to comply with the new law. The Guttmacher Institute noted that even before the federal mandate was implemented, twenty-eight states had their own mandates that required health insurance to cover the prescription contraceptives, but the federal mandate innovated by forbidding insurance companies from charging part of the cost to the patient. Burwell v. Hobby Lobby, , is a landmark decision by the United States Supreme Court allowing closely held for-profit corporations to be exempt from a law its owners religiously object to if there is a less restrictive means of furthering the law's interest. It is the first time that the court has recognized a for-profit corporation's claim of religious belief, but it is limited to closely held corporations. The decision is an interpretation of the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) and does not address whether such corporations are protected by the free-exercise of religion clause of the First Amendment of the Constitution. For such companies, the court's majority directly struck down the contraceptive mandate under the Affordable Care Act (ACA) by a 5–4 vote. The court said that the mandate was not the least restrictive way to ensure access to contraceptive care, noting that a less restrictive alternative was being provided for religious non-profits, until the court issued an injunction 3 days later, effectively ending said alternative, replacing it with a government-sponsored alternative for any female employees of closely held corporations that do not wish to provide birth control. Zubik v. Burwell was a case before the United States Supreme Court on whether religious institutions other than churches should be exempt from the contraceptive mandate. Churches were already exempt. On May 16, 2016, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a per curiam ruling in Zubik v. Burwell that vacated the decisions of the Circuit Courts of Appeals and remanded the case "to the respective United States Courts of Appeals for the Third, Fifth, Tenth, and D.C. Circuits" for reconsideration in light of the "positions asserted by the parties in their supplemental briefs". Because the Petitioners agreed that "their religious exercise is not infringed where they 'need to do nothing more than contract for a plan that does not include coverage for some or all forms of contraception'", the court held that the parties should be given an opportunity to clarify and refine how this approach would work in practice and to "resolve any outstanding issues". The Supreme Court expressed "no view on the merits of the cases." In a concurring opinion, Justice Sotomayor, joined by Justice Ginsburg noted that in earlier cases "some lower courts have ignored those instructions" and cautioned lower courts not to read any signals in the Supreme Court's actions in this case. In 2017, the Trump administration issued a ruling letting insurers and employers refuse to provide birth control if doing so went against their "religious beliefs" or "moral convictions". However, later that same year federal judge Wendy Beetlestone issued an injunction temporarily stopping the enforcement of the Trump administration ruling. In 2022, Roe v Wade was overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court. That ruling resulted in an unforeseen future of birth control and planned parenthood in America. ## See also - Birth control in the United States - History of abortion - History of condoms - Timeline of reproductive rights legislation - Social hygiene movement

William M. Branham

American Christian minister (1909–1965)

William Marrion Branham (April 6, 1909 – December 24, 1965) was an American Christian minister and faith healer who initiated the post-World War II healing revival, and claimed to be a prophet with the anointing of Elijah, who had come to prelude Christ's second coming; some of his followers have been labeled a "doomsday cult". He is credited as "a principal architect of restorationist thought" for charismatics by some Christian historians, and has been called the "leading individual in the Second Wave of Pentecostalism." He made a lasting influence on televangelism and the modern charismatic movement, and his "stage presence remains a legend unparalleled in the history of the Charismatic movement". At the time they were held, his inter-denominational meetings were the largest religious meetings ever held in some American cities. Branham was the first American deliverance minister to successfully campaign in Europe; his ministry reached global audiences with major campaigns held in North America, Europe, Africa, and India. Branham claimed that he had received an angelic visitation on May 7, 1946, commissioning his worldwide ministry and launching his campaigning career in mid-1946. His fame rapidly spread as crowds were drawn to his stories of angelic visitations and reports of miracles happening at his meetings. His ministry spawned many emulators and set in motion the broader healing revival that later became the modern charismatic movement. At the peak of his popularity in the 1950s, Branham was widely adored and "the neo-Pentecostal world believed Branham to be a prophet to their generation". From 1955, Branham's campaigning and popularity began to decline as the Pentecostal churches began to withdraw their support from the healing campaigns for primarily financial reasons. By 1960, Branham transitioned into a teaching ministry. Unlike his contemporaries, who followed doctrinal teachings which are known as the Full Gospel tradition, Branham developed an alternative theology which was primarily a mixture of Calvinist and Arminian doctrines, and had a heavy focus on dispensationalism and Branham's own unique eschatological views. While widely accepting the restoration doctrine he espoused during the healing revival, his divergent post-revival teachings were deemed increasingly controversial by his charismatic and Pentecostal contemporaries, who subsequently disavowed many of the doctrines as "revelatory madness". His racial teachings on serpent seed and his belief that membership in a Christian denomination was connected to the mark of the beast alienated many of his former supporters. His closest followers, however, accepted his sermons as oral scripture and refer to his teachings as The Message. Despite Branham's objections, some followers of his teachings placed him at the center of a cult of personality during his final years. Branham claimed that he had converted over one million people during his career. His teachings continue to be promoted by the William Branham Evangelistic Association, which reported that about 2 million people received its material in 2018. Branham died following a car accident in 1965. Throughout his healing revivals, Branham was accused of committing fraud by investigative news reporters, fellow ministers, host churches, and governmental agencies. Numerous people pronounced healed died shortly thereafter, investigators discovered evidence suggesting miracles may have been staged, and Branham was found to have significantly embellished and falsified numerous stories he presented to his audiences as fact. Branham faced legal problems as a result of his practices. The governments of South Africa and Norway intervened in order to stop his healing campaigns in their countries. In the United States, Branham was charged with tax evasion for failing to account for the donations received through his ministry; admitting his liability, he settled the case out of court. The news media has linked Branham to multiple notorious figures. Branham was baptized and ordained a minister by Roy Davis, the National Imperial Wizard (leader) of the Ku Klux Klan; the two men maintained a lifelong relationship. Branham helped launch and popularize the ministry of Jim Jones. Paul Schäfer, Robert Martin Gumbura, Leo Mercer, the Malindi cult and other followers of William Branham's teachings have regularly been in the news due to the serious crimes which they committed. Followers of Branham's teachings in Colonia Dignidad were portrayed in the 2015 film Colonia. ## Early life ### Childhood William M. Branham was born near Burkesville, Kentucky, on April 6, 1909, the son of Charles and Ella Harvey Branham, the oldest of ten children. He claimed that at his birth, a "Light come [sic] whirling through the window, about the size of a pillow, and circled around where I was, and went down on the bed". Branham told his publicist Gordon Lindsay that he had mystical experiences from an early age; and that at age three he heard a "voice" speaking to him from a tree telling him "he would live near a city called New Albany". According to Branham, that year his family moved to Jeffersonville, Indiana. Branham also said that when he was seven years old, God told him to avoid smoking and drinking alcoholic beverages. Branham stated he never violated the command. Branham told his audiences that he grew up in "deep poverty", often not having adequate clothing, and that his family was involved in criminal activities. Branham's neighbors reported him as "someone who always seemed a little different", but said he was a dependable youth. Branham explained that his tendency towards "mystical experiences and moral purity" caused misunderstandings among his friends, family, and other young people; he was a "black sheep" from an early age. Branham called his childhood "a terrible life." Branham's father owned a farm near Utica, Indiana, and took a job working for O. H. Wathen, owner of R. E. Wathen Distilleries in nearby Louisville, Kentucky. Wathen was a supplier for Al Capone's bootlegging operations. Branham told his audiences that he was required to help his father with the illegal production and sale of liquor during prohibition. In March 1924, Branham's father was arrested for his criminal activities; he was convicted and sentenced to a prison. The Indiana Ku Klux Klan claimed responsibility for attacking and shutting down the Jeffersonville liquor producing ring. Branham was involved in a firearms incident and was shot in both legs in March 1924, at age 14; he later told his audiences he was involved in a hunting accident. Two of his brothers also suffered life-threatening injuries at the same time. Branham was rushed to the hospital for treatment. His family was unable to pay for his medical bills, but members of the Indiana Ku Klux Klan stepped in to cover the expenses. The help of the Klan during his impoverished childhood had a profound impact on Branham throughout his life. As late as 1963, Branham continued to speak highly of the them saying, "the Ku Klux Klan, paid the hospital bill for me, Masons. I can never forget them. See? No matter what they do, or what, I still ... there is something, and that stays with me ...". Branham would go on to maintain lifelong connections to the KKK. ### Conversion and early influences Branham told his audiences that he left home at age 19 in search of a better life, traveling to Phoenix, Arizona, where he worked on a ranch for two years and began a successful career in boxing. While Branham was away, his brother Edward aged 18, shot and killed a Jeffersonville man and was charged with murder. Edward died of a sudden illness only a short time later. Branham returned to Jeffersonville in June 1929 to attend the funeral. Branham had no experience with religion as a child; he said that the first time he heard a prayer was at his brother's funeral. Soon afterward, while he was working for the Public Service Company of Indiana, Branham was overcome by gas and had to be hospitalized. Branham said that he heard a voice speaking to him while he was recovering from the accident, which led him to begin seeking God. Shortly thereafter, he began attending the First Pentecostal Baptist Church of Jeffersonville, where he converted to Christianity. The church was pastored by Roy Davis, a founding member of the second Ku Klux Klan and a leading recruiter for the organization. Davis later became the National Imperial Wizard (leader) of the KKK. Davis baptized Branham and six months later, he ordained Branham as an Independent Baptist minister and an elder in his church. Supported by the KKK's Imperial Kludd (chaplain) Caleb Ridley, Branham traveled with Davis and they participated together in revivals in other states. At the time of Branham's conversion, the First Pentecostal Baptist Church of Jeffersonville was a nominally Baptist church which adhered to some Pentecostal doctrines, including divine healing and speaking in tongues; Branham reported that his baptism at the church was done using the Jesus name formula of Oneness Pentecostalism. Branham claimed to have been opposed to Pentecostalism during the early years of his ministry. However, according to multiple Branham biographers, like Baptist historian Doug Weaver and Pentecostal historian Bernie Wade, Branham was exposed to Pentecostal teachings from his conversion. Branham claimed to his audiences he was first exposed to a Pentecostal church in 1936, which invited him to join, but he refused. Weaver speculated that Branham may have chosen to hide his early connections to Pentecostalism to make his conversion story more compelling to his Pentecostal audiences during the years of the healing revival. Weaver identified several parts of Branham's reported life story that conflicted with historical documentation and suggested that Branham began significantly embellishing his early life story to his audiences beginning in the 1940s. During June 1933, Branham held tent revival meetings that were sponsored by Davis and the First Pentecostal Baptist Church. On June 2 that year, the Jeffersonville Evening News said the Branham campaign reported 14 converts. His followers believed his ministry was accompanied by miraculous signs from its beginning, and that when he was baptizing converts on June 11, 1933, in the Ohio River near Jeffersonville, a bright light descended over him and that he heard a voice say, "As John the Baptist was sent to forerun the first coming of Jesus Christ, so your message will forerun His second coming". Belief in the baptismal story is a critical element of faith among Branham's followers. In his early references to the event during the healing revival, Branham interpreted it to refer to the restoration of the gifts of the spirit to the church. In later years, Branham significantly altered how he told the baptismal story, and came to connect the event to his teaching ministry. He claimed reports of the baptismal story were carried in newspapers across the United States and Canada. Because of the way Branham's telling of the baptismal story changed over the years, and because no newspaper actually covered the event, Weaver said Branham may have embellished the story after he began achieving success in the healing revival during the 1940s. Besides Roy Davis and the First Pentecostal Baptist Church, Branham reported interaction with other groups during the 1930s who were an influence on his ministry. During the early 1930s, he became acquainted with William Sowders' School of the Prophets, a Pentecostal group in Kentucky and Indiana. Through Sowders' group, he was introduced to the British Israelite House of David and in the autumn of 1934, Branham traveled to Michigan to meet with members of the group. ### Early ministry Branham took over leadership of Roy Davis's Jeffersonville church in 1934, after Davis was arrested again and extradited to stand trial. Sometime during March or April 1934, the First Pentecostal Baptist Church was destroyed by a fire and Branham's supporters at the church helped him organize a new church in Jeffersonville. At first Branham preached out of a tent at 8th and Pratt street, and he also reported temporarily preaching in an orphanage building. By 1936, the congregation had constructed a new church on the same block as Branham's tent, at the corner of 8th and Penn street. The church was built on the same location reported by the local newspaper as the site of his June 1933 tent campaign. Newspaper articles reported the original name of Branham's new church to be the Pentecostal Tabernacle. The church was officially registered with the City of Jeffersonville as the Billie Branham Pentecostal Tabernacle in November 1936. Newspaper articles continued to refer to his church as the Pentecostal Tabernacle until 1943. Branham served as pastor until 1946, and the church name eventually shortened to the Branham Tabernacle. The church flourished at first, but its growth began to slow. Because of the Great Depression, it was often short of funds, so Branham served without compensation. Branham continued traveling and preaching among Pentecostal churches while serving as pastor of his new church. Branham obtained a truck and had it painted with advertisements for his healing ministry which he toured in. In September 1934, he traveled to Mishawaka, Indiana where he was invited to speak at the Pentecostal Assemblies of Jesus Christ (PAJC) General Assembly meetings organized by Bishop G. B. Rowe. Branham was "not impressed with the multi-cultural aspects of the PAJC as it was contrary to the dogmas advanced by his friends in the Ku Klux Klan." Branham and his future wife Amelia Hope Brumbach (b. July 16, 1913) attended the First Pentecostal Baptist Church together beginning in 1929 where Brumbach served as young people's leader. The couple began dating in 1933. Branham married Brumbach in June 1934. Their first child, William "Billy" Paul Branham was born soon after their marriage; the date given for his birth varies by source. In some of Branham's biographies, his first son's birth date is reported as September 13, 1935, but in government records his birth date is reported as September 13, 1934. Branham's wife became ill during the second year of their marriage. According to her death certificate, she was diagnosed with pulmonary tuberculosis in January 1936, beginning a period of declining health. Despite her diagnosis, the couple had a second child, Sharon Rose, who was born on October 27, 1936. In September 1936, the local news reported that Branham held a multi-week healing revival at the Pentecostal Tabernacle in which he reported eight healings. The following year, disaster struck when Jeffersonville was ravaged by the Ohio River flood of 1937. Branham's congregation was badly impacted by the disaster and his family was displaced from their home. By February 1937, the floodwaters had receded, his church survived intact and Branham resumed holding services at the Pentecostal Tabernacle. Following the January flood, Hope's health continued to decline, and she succumbed to her illness and died on July 22, 1937. Sharon Rose, who had been born with her mother's illness, died four days later (July 26, 1937). Their obituaries reported Branham as pastor of the Pentecostal Tabernacle, the same church where their funerals were held. Branham frequently related the story of the death of his wife and daughter during his ministry and evoked strong emotional responses from his audiences. Branham told his audiences that his wife and daughter had become suddenly ill and died during the January flood as God's punishment because of his failure to embrace Pentecostalism. Branham said he made several suicide attempts following their deaths. Peter Duyzer noted that Branham's story of the events surrounding the death of his wife and daughter conflicted with historical evidence; they did not die during the flood, he and his wife were both already Pentecostals before they married, and he was pastor of a Pentecostal church at the time of their deaths. By the summer of 1940, Branham had resumed traveling and held revival meetings in other nearby communities. Branham married his second wife Meda Marie Broy in 1941, and together they had three children; Rebekah (b. 1946), Sarah (b. 1950), and Joseph (b. 1955). ## Healing revival ### Background Branham is known for his role in the healing revivals that occurred in the United States in the 1940s and 1950s, and most participants in the movement regarded him as its initiator. Christian writer John Crowder described the period of revivals as "the most extensive public display of miraculous power in modern history". Some, like Christian author and countercult activist Hank Hanegraaff, rejected the entire healing revival as a hoax and condemned the movement as cult in his 1997 book Counterfeit Revival. Divine healing is a tradition and belief that was historically held by a majority of Christians but it became increasingly associated with Evangelical Protestantism. The fascination of most of American Christianity with divine healing played a significant role in the popularity and inter-denominational nature of the revival movement. Branham held massive inter-denominational meetings, from which came reports of hundreds of miracles. Historian David Harrell described Branham and Oral Roberts as the two giants of the movement and called Branham its "unlikely leader." ### Early campaigns Branham had been traveling and holding revival meetings since at least 1940 before attracting national attention. Branham's popularity began to grow following the 1942 meetings in Milltown, Indiana where it was reported that a young girl had been healed of tuberculosis. The news of the reported healing was slow to spread, but was eventually reported to a family in Missouri who in 1945 invited Branham to pray for their child who was suffering from a similar illness; Branham reported that the child recovered after his prayers. News of two events eventually reached W. E. Kidston. Kidston was intrigued by the reported miracles and invited Branham to participate in revival meetings that he was organizing. W. E. Kidston, was editor of The Apostolic Herald and had many contacts in the Pentecostal movement. Kidston served as Branham's first campaign manager and was instrumental in helping organize Branham's early revival meetings. Branham held his first large meetings as a faith healer in 1946. His healing services are well documented, and he is regarded as the pacesetter for those who followed him. At the time they were held, Branham's revival meetings were the largest religious meetings some American cities he visited had ever seen; reports of 1,000 to 1,500 converts per meeting were common. Historians name his June 1946 St. Louis meetings as the inauguration of the healing revival period. Branham said he had received an angelic visitation on May 7, 1946, commissioning his worldwide ministry. In his later years, he also connected the angelic visitation with the establishment of the nation of Israel, at one point mistakenly stating the vision occurred on the same day. His first reported revival meetings of the period were held over 12 days during June 1946 in St. Louis. Time magazine reported on his St. Louis campaign meetings, and according to the article, Branham drew a crowd of over 4,000 sick people who desired healing and recorded him diligently praying for each. Branham's fame began to grow as a result of the publicity and reports covering his meetings. Herald of Faith magazine which was edited by prominent Pentecostal minister Joseph Mattsson-Boze and published by Philadelphia Pentecostal Church in Chicago also began following and exclusively publishing stories from the Branham campaigns, giving Branham wide exposure to the Pentecostal movement. Following the St. Louis meetings, Branham launched a tour of small Oneness Pentecostal churches across the Midwest and southern United States, from which stemmed reports of healing and one report of a resurrection. By August his fame had spread widely. He held meetings that month in Jonesboro, Arkansas, and drew a crowd of 25,000 with attendees from 28 different states. The size of the crowds presented a problem for Branham's team as they found it difficult to find venues that could seat large numbers of attendees. Branham's revivals were interracial from their inception and were noted for their "racial openness" during the period of widespread racial unrest. An African American minister participating in the St. Louis meetings claimed to be healed during the revival, helping to bring Branham a sizable African American following from the early days of the revival. Branham held interracial meetings even in the southern states. To satisfy segregation laws when ministering in the south, Branham's team would use a rope to divide the crowd by race. Author and researcher Patsy Sims noted that venues used to host campaign meetings also hosted KKK rallies just days prior to the revival meetings, which sometimes led to racial tensions. Sims, who attended both the KKK rallies and the healing revivals, was surprised to see some of the same groups of people at both events. According to Steven Hassan, KKK recruitment was covertly conducted through Branham's ministry. After holding a very successful revival meeting in Shreveport during mid-1947, Branham began assembling an evangelical team that stayed with him for most of the revival period. The first addition to the team was Jack Moore and Young Brown, who periodically assisted him in managing his meetings. Following the Shreveport meetings, Branham held a series of meetings in San Antonio, Phoenix, and at various locations in California. Moore invited his friend Gordon Lindsay to join the campaign team, which he did beginning at a meeting in Sacramento, California, in late 1947. Lindsay was a successful publicist and manager for Branham, and played a key role in helping him gain national and international recognition. In 1948, Branham and Lindsay founded Voice of Healing magazine, which was originally aimed at reporting Branham's healing campaigns. The story of Samuel the Prophet, who heard a voice speak to him in the night, inspired Branham's name for the publication. Lindsay was impressed with Branham's focus on humility and unity, and was instrumental in helping him gain acceptance among Trinitarian and Oneness Pentecostal groups by expanding his revival meetings beyond the United Pentecostal Church to include all of the major Pentecostal groups. The first meetings organized by Lindsay were held in northwestern North America during late 1947. At the first of these meetings, held in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canadian minister Ern Baxter joined Branham's team. Lindsay reported 70,000 attendees to the 14 days of meetings and long prayer lines as Branham prayed for the sick. William Hawtin, a Canadian Pentecostal minister, attended one of Branham's Vancouver meetings in November 1947 and was impressed by Branham's healings. Branham was an important influence on the Latter Rain revival movement, which Hawtin helped initiate. In January 1948, meetings were held in Florida; F. F. Bosworth met Branham at the meetings and also joined his team. Bosworth was among the pre-eminent ministers of the Pentecostal movement and a founding minister of the Assemblies of God; Bosworth lent great weight to Branham's campaign team. He remained a strong Branham supporter until his death in 1958. Bosworth endorsed Branham as "the most sensitive person to the presence and working of the Holy Spirit" he had ever met. During early 1947, a major campaign was held in Kansas City, where Branham and Lindsay first met Oral Roberts. Roberts and Branham had contact at different points during the revival. Roberts said Branham was "set apart, just like Moses". Branham spent many hours ministering and praying for the sick during his campaigns, and like many other leading evangelists of the time he suffered exhaustion. After one year of campaigning, his exhaustion began leading to health issues. Branham reported to his audiences that he suffered a nervous breakdown and required treatment by the Mayo Clinic. Branham's illness coincided with a series of allegations of fraud in his healing revivals. Attendees reported seeing him "staggering from intense fatigue" during his last meetings. Just as Branham began to attract international attention in May 1948, he announced that due to illness he would have to halt his campaign. His illness shocked the growing movement, and his abrupt departure from the field caused a rift between him and Lindsay over the Voice of Healing magazine. Branham insisted that Lindsay take over complete management of the publication. With the main subject of the magazine no longer actively campaigning, Lindsay was forced to seek other ministers to promote. He decided to publicize Oral Roberts during Branham's absence, and Roberts quickly rose to prominence, in large part due to Lindsay's coverage. Branham partially recovered from his illness and resumed holding meetings in October 1948; in that month he held a series of meetings around the United States without Lindsay's support. Branham's return to the movement led to his resumed leadership of it. In November 1948, he met with Lindsay and Moore and told them he had received another angelic visitation, instructing him to hold a series of meetings across the United States and then to begin holding meetings internationally. As a result of the meeting, Lindsay rejoined Branham's campaigning team. ### Style Most revivalists of the era were flamboyant but Branham was usually calm and spoke quietly, only occasionally raising his voice. His preaching style was described as "halting and simple", and crowds were drawn to his stories of angelic visitation and "constant communication with God". Branham tailored his language usage to best connect to his audiences. When speaking to poor and working-class audiences, he tended to use poor grammar and folksy language; when speaking to more educated audiences and ministerial associations, he generally spoke using perfect grammar and avoided slang usage. He refused to discuss controversial doctrinal issues during the healing campaigns, and issued a policy statement that he would only minister on the "great evangelical truths". He insisted his calling was to bring unity among the different churches he was ministering to and to urge the churches to return to the roots of early Christianity. In the first part of his meetings, one of Branham's companion evangelists would preach a sermon. Ern Baxter or F. F. Bosworth usually filled this role, but other ministers like Paul Cain also participated in Branham's campaigns in later years. Baxter generally focused on bible teaching; Bosworth counseled supplicants on the need for faith and the doctrine of divine healing. Following their build-up, Branham would take the podium and deliver a short sermon, in which he usually related stories about his personal life experiences. Branham would often request God to "confirm his message with two-or-three faith inspired miracles". Supplicants seeking healing submitted prayer cards to Branham's campaign team stating their name, address, and condition; Branham's team would select a number of submissions to be prayed for personally by Branham and organized a prayer line. After completing his sermon, he would proceed with the prayer line where he would pray for the sick. Branham would often tell supplicants what they suffered from, their name, and their address. He would pray for each of them, pronouncing some or all healed. Branham generally prayed for a few people each night and believed witnessing the results on the stage would inspire faith in the audience and permit them to experience similar results without having to be personally prayed for. Branham would also call out a few members still in the audience, who had not been accepted into the prayer line, stating their illness and pronouncing them healed. Branham told his audiences that he was able to determine their illness, details of their lives, and pronounce them healed as a result of an angel who was guiding him. Describing Branham's method, Bosworth said "he does not begin to pray for the healing of the afflicted in body in the healing line each night until God anoints him for the operation of the gift, and until he is conscious of the presence of the Angel with him on the platform. Without this consciousness he seems to be perfectly helpless." Branham explained to his audiences that the angel that commissioned his ministry had given him two signs by which they could prove his commission. He described the first sign as vibrations he felt in his hand when he touched a sick person's hand, which communicated to him the nature of the illness, but did not guarantee healing. Branham's use of what his fellow evangelists called a word of knowledge gift separated him from his contemporaries in the early days of the revival. This second sign did not appear in his campaigns until after his recovery in 1948, and was used to "amaze tens of thousands" at his meetings. As the revival progressed, his contemporaries began to mirror the practice. According to Bosworth, this gift of knowledge allowed Branham "to see and enable him to tell the many events of [people's] lives from their childhood down to the present". This caused many in the healing revival to view Branham as a "seer like the old testament prophets". Branham amazed even fellow evangelists, which served to further push him into a legendary status in the movement. Branham's audiences were often awestruck by the events during his meetings. At the peak of his popularity in the 1950s, Branham was widely adored and "the neo-Pentecostal world believed Branham to be a prophet to their generation". ### Growing fame and international campaigns In January 1950, Branham's campaign team held their Houston campaign, one of the most significant series of meetings of the revival. The location of their first meeting was too small to accommodate the approximately 8,000 attendees, and they had to relocate to the Sam Houston Coliseum. On the night of January 24, 1950, Branham was photographed during a debate between Bosworth and local Baptist minister W. E. Best regarding the theology of divine healing. Bosworth argued in favor, while Best argued against. The photograph showed a light above Branham's head, which he and his associates believed to be supernatural. The photograph became well-known in the revival movement and is regarded by Branham's followers as an iconic relic. Branham believed the light was a divine vindication of his ministry; others believed it was a glare from the venue's overhead lighting. In January 1951, former US Congressman William Upshaw was sent by Roy Davis to a Branham campaign meeting in California. Upshaw had limited mobility for 59 years as the result of an accident, and said he was miraculously healed in the meeting. The publicity of the event took Branham's fame to a new level. Upshaw sent a letter describing his healing claim to each member of Congress. The Los Angeles Times reported on the healing in an article titled "Ex-Rep. Upshaw Discards Crutches After 59 Years". Upshaw explained to reporters that he had been able to walk two or three steps without the aid of his crutches prior to attending Branham's meeting, but following Branham's prayer his strength increased so that he had walked four blocks. Upshaw died in November 1952, at the age of 86. According to Pentecostal historian Rev. Walter Hollenweger, "Branham filled the largest stadiums and meeting halls in the world" during his five major international campaigns. Branham held his first series of campaigns in Europe during April 1950 with meetings in Finland, Sweden, and Norway. Attendance at the meetings generally exceeded 7,000 despite resistance to his meetings by the state churches. Branham was the first American deliverance minister to successfully tour in Europe. A 1952 campaign in South Africa had the largest attendance in Branham's career, with an estimated 200,000 attendees. According to Lindsay, the altar call at his Durban meeting received 30,000 converts. During international campaigns in 1954, Branham visited Portugal, Italy, and India. Branham's final major overseas tour in 1955 included visits to Switzerland and Germany. Branham's meetings were regularly attended by journalists, who wrote articles about the miracles reported by Branham and his team throughout the years of his revivals, and claimed patients were cured of various ailments after attending prayer meetings with Branham. Durban Sunday Tribune and The Natal Mercury reported wheelchair-bound people rising and walking. Winnipeg Free Press reported a girl was cured of deafness. El Paso Herald-Post reported hundreds of attendees at one meeting seeking divine healing. Despite such occasional glowing reports, most of the press coverage Branham received was negative. ### Allegations of fraud To his American audiences, Branham claimed several high profile events occurred during his international tours. Branham claimed to visit and pray for King George VI while en route to Finland in 1950. He claimed the king was healed through his prayers. Researchers found no evidence that Branham ever met King George; King George was chronically ill and died about a year after Branham claimed to heal him. Branham also claimed to pray for and heal the granddaughter of Florence Nightingale at a London airport. Branham's campaign produced photos of an emaciated woman who they claimed to be Nightingale's granddaughter. However, Florence Nightingale never married and had no children or grandchildren. Investigators of Branham's claim were unable to identify the woman in the photograph. Branham similarly claimed to pray for King Gustaf V while in Sweden in April 1950. Investigators found no evidence for the meeting; King Gustaf V died in October 1950. Branham claimed to stop in Egypt in 1954 while en route to India to meet with King Farouk; however Farouk had been deposed in 1952 and was not living in Egypt at the time. Branham claimed to visit the grave of Buddha while in India, however Buddha was cremated and has no grave. In total, critics of Branham identified many claims which appeared to be false when investigated. Weaver accused Branham of major embellishments. Branham faced criticism and opposition from the early days of the healing revival, and he was repeatedly accused of fraud throughout his ministry. According to historian Ronald Kydd, Branham evoked strong opinions from people with whom he came into contact; "most people either loved him or hated him". Kydd stated that it "is impossible to get even an approximate number of people healed in Branham's ministry." No consistent record of follow-ups of the healing claims were made, making analysis of many claims difficult to subsequent researchers. Additionally, Branham's procedures made verification difficult at the time of his revivals. Branham believed in positive confession. He required supplicants to claim to be healed to demonstrate their faith, even if they were still experiencing symptoms. He frequently told supplicants to expect their symptoms to remain for several days after their healing. This led to people professing to be healed at the meetings, while still suffering from the condition. Only follow up after Branham's waiting period had passed could ascertain the result of the healing. From the early days of the healing revival, Branham received overwhelmingly unfavorable coverage in the news media, which was often quite critical. At his June 1947 revivals in Vandalia, Illinois, the local news reported that Beck Walker, a man who was deaf and mute from birth, was pronounced healed but failed to recover. Branham claimed Walker failed to recover his hearing because he had disobeyed Branham's instruction to stop smoking cigarettes. Branham was lambasted by critics who asked how it was possible the deaf man could have heard his command to stop smoking. At his 1947 meetings in Winnipeg, Branham claimed to have raised a young man from the dead at a Jeffersonville funeral parlor. Branham's sensational claim was reported in the news in the United States and Canada, leading to a news media investigation to identify the funeral home and the individual raised from the dead. Reporters subsequently found no evidence of a resurrection; no funeral parlor in the city corroborated the story. The same year the news media in Winnipeg publicized Branham's cases of failed healing. In response, the churches which hosted Branham's campaign conducted independent follow-up interviews with people Branham pronounced healed to gather testimonies which they could use to counter the negative press. To their surprise, their investigation failed to confirm any cases of actual healing; every person they interviewed had failed to recover. At meetings in Vancouver during 1947, newspaper reporters discovered that one young girl had been in Branham's prayer lines in multiple cities posing as a cripple, but rising to walk after Branham pronounced her healed each time. An investigative reporter suspected Branham had staged the miracle. Reporters at the meeting also attempted to follow up on the case of a Calgary woman pronounced healed by Branham who had died shortly after he left the city. Reporters attempted to confront Branham over these issues, but Branham refused to be interviewed. Branham was also accused of fraud by fellow ministers and churches that hosted his meetings. In 1947, Rev. Alfred Pohl, the Missionary-Secretary of Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada, served as Branham's guide and host at meetings across western Canada. Pohl stated that many people Branham pronounced as healed later died and produced witnesses to validate his allegations. Pohl stated that the numerous deaths "severely tested the faith" of many ministers who had trusted in Branham. Pohl also claimed Branham was frequently given and accepted large financial gifts from individuals who he pronounced as healed, including those who subsequently died. In 1948, W. J. Taylor, a district superintendent with the Pentecostal Assemblies of Canada, raised concerns again following another wave of Branham meetings and asked for a thorough investigation. Taylor presented evidence that claims of the number of people healed were vastly overestimated, and that multiple people pronounced healed by Branham had subsequently died. While he stated his personal admiration for Branham, the troubling number of deaths led him to suggest "there is a possibility that this whole thing is wrong". Churches in Canada continued to experience crises following Branham campaign meetings as they attempted to explain the numerous failed healings to their congregations. At meetings in Regina, Branham pronounced the wife of a prominent minister healed of cancer. The minister and his wife were overjoyed, and the minister excitedly shared the details of the healing with his radio audience in Ontario later that week. To his surprise, his wife died only days later of her illness. The confusion created by the situation led ministers to claim Branham had deceived them. According to Kydd, "the controversy surrounding Branham deepened" with time. Kydd reported that by watching films of the revival meetings, "the viewer would assume almost everyone was healed", but "results were less promising whenever follow-up was made." One such case was Carol Strubler, who at age nine in 1954 was prayed for by Branham at a recorded revival in Washington, D.C., when he preached a sermon entitled "The Deep Calleth Unto The Deep". One newspaper reported, "Rev. William Branham of Jeffersonville, Ind., prayed for her and assured the heartbroken mother her daughter would live. A week later the mother told this newspaper she was confident the evangelist's words were true and had cancelled a scheduled visit to St. Christopher's Hospital in Philadelphia." However, Strubbler died "of acute leukemia, just three weeks after [Branham] told her mother she was healed of the fatal sickness." Another case was four-year-old Donny Morton, who was diagnosed with a rare brain condition. At recorded meetings in California during April 1951, Branham pronounced Morton healed, but the child subsequently died in October. His story was published in Reader's Digest. Similar allegations came from Branham's European campaigns. Rev. Walter Hollenweger, who served as a translator on Branham's European tours, reported that "very few were actually healed" in the campaigns, and the overwhelming majority pronounced healed by Branham failed to recover. Hollenweger said that while there were a few "well-attested cases of miraculous healing", Branham was "naïve" and "dishonest" and misled his audiences when he reported the number of people healed. Hollenweger was disappointed that Branham refused to acknowledge the numerous failed pronouncements of healings. In 1955, Leonard Steiner, pastor of a Pentecostal church in Zurich Switzerland that hosted a Branham meeting reported cases of failed healing and the negative consequences for members of his congregation. Allegations in Norway led authorities to limit Branham's ability to hold meetings; the Directorate of Health forbade Branham from laying hands on the sick and sent police to his meetings to enforce the order. Serious allegations also were made following Branham's meetings in South Africa during 1952 and complaints were lodged with government authorities. Michael Plaff, a doctor, was pronounced healed of cancer by Branham during one meeting. In February 1952, the Branham campaign published an article claiming Plaff had visited the hospital the day after he was prayed for and his cure was confirmed by medical tests. However, Plaff had died of his cancer just days after being pronounced healed. A minister attending meetings in Durban with his congregation reported that over twenty people suffering from tuberculosis were pronounced healed by Branham, but all failed to recover. In another case, a woman suffering a heart condition was pronounced healed by Branham, but died less than a week later. A 23-year-old leukemia patient was pronounced healed by Branham, but failed to recover and died about thirteen months later. The Branham campaign published a book entitled "A Prophet Visit South Africa" to publicize the success of the tour. The book related the details of dozens of healings. Investigators in South Africa followed up on the reported healings and found that 46 of the people Branham said had been healed had failed to recover. After reviewing the results of the investigation, one minister concluded "that the cures claimed are so largely exaggerated as to be almost fraudulent in their claim." When Branham attempted to visit South Africa again in 1965, the South African government placed restrictions on his visa preventing him from holding any healing revivals while he was in the country. Ern Baxter, who participated in most of Branham's campaigns between November 1947 and 1953 including his tours to India and Europe, reflected on the exaggerated reports of miracles in the healing revival in a 1978 interview. He explained that the allegations eroded the trust of the crowds who attended the healing services. > I remember in the beginning of the healing movement, simply to report a healing would produce great jubilation and praise from congregations. However, the cynicism became so deep that the people's confidence was diminished. Even to this day, people are affected. People began to circulate healing testimonies which, when they were checked out by reputable journalists and reporters, even those who were friendly to the movement, were found to be false. The percentage of healings that stood up after investigation was embarrassingly low. Some attendees of Branham's meetings believed that some healings were staged and accused him of selectively choosing who could enter the prayer line. Some people left his meetings disappointed after finding Branham's conviction that everyone in the audience could be healed without being in the prayer line proved incorrect. Branham generally attributed the failure of supplicants to receive healing to their lack of faith. According to Pohl, Hollenweger, and Steiner, Branham's practice of blaming the supplicant for lack of faith was severely damaging in multiple churches and left many people who failed to receive healing in despair. > Their expectations had been raised so high, only to be dashed after all the excitement was over. Some seemed to experience a momentary relief from pain, but all too many would discover no lasting benefit. And by that time the healer would be too far away to be questioned or to explain. The sick person would then simply be forced to accuse himself of lack of faith, or in some cases, throw his faith overboard. The "word of knowledge" gift used by Branham was also subject to much criticism. Hollenweger investigated Branham's use of the "word of knowledge gift" and found no instances in which Branham was mistaken in his often-detailed pronouncements. Criticism of Branham's use of this gift was primarily around its nature; some asserted that it was a non-Christian practice and accused him of witchcraft and telepathy. Branham was openly confronted with such criticisms and rejected the assertions. Others alleged that Branham's discernments were not genuine. Many people Branham prayed for were required to first write their name, address, and what they were seeking prayer for on prayer cards. The cards were submitted to Branham's team who would choose the supplicants to be prayed for by Branham and organize the prayer line. Some critics accused Branham's team of sharing prayer card information with Branham before he began his prayer lines. ### Financial difficulties In 1955, Branham's campaigning career began to slow following financial setbacks. Even after he became famous, Branham continued to wear inexpensive suits and refused large salaries; he was not interested in amassing wealth as part of his ministry and was reluctant to solicit donations during his meetings. During the early years of his campaigns, donations had been able to cover costs, but from 1955, donations failed to cover the costs of three successive campaigns, one of which incurred a \$15,000 deficit. (\$ in 2020 dollars) Some of Branham's business associates thought he was partially responsible because of his lack of interest in the financial affairs of the campaigns and tried to hold him personally responsible for the debts. Branham briefly stopped campaigning and said he would have to take a job to repay the debt, but the Full Gospel Business Men's Fellowship International ultimately offered financial assistance to cover the debt. Branham became increasingly reliant on the Full Gospel Businessmen to finance his campaign meetings as the Pentecostal denominations began to withdraw their financial support. Finances became an issue again in 1956 when the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) charged Branham with tax evasion. The American government targeted the other leading revivalists with lawsuits during the same time period, including Oral Roberts, Jack Coe, and A. A. Allen. The IRS asserted income reported by the ministers as non-taxable gifts was taxable, despite the fact Branham had not kept the gifts for himself. Except Allen, who won his legal battle, the evangelists settled their cases out of court. The IRS investigation showed Branham did not pay close attention to the amount of money flowing through his ministry, and had failed to document gifts and donations he received or how the proceeds were used. It also revealed that others assisting in his campaigns were taking financial advantage of the campaigns. Branham reported his annual salary to the IRS as \$7,000 (\$ in 2020 dollars) while his manager Gordon Lindsay's was reported at \$80,000. (\$ in 2020 dollars) Comparatively, Oral Roberts earned a salary of \$15,000 in the same years. Branham's case was eventually settled out of court when Branham admitted to tax evasion and agreed to pay of a \$40,000 penalty. (\$ in 2020 dollars) Branham was never able to completely pay off the tax liability. ### End of the revival By the mid-1950s, dozens of the ministers associated with Branham and his campaigns had launched similar healing campaigns. In 1956, the healing revival reached its peak, as 49 separate evangelists held major meetings. Branham and Lindsay ineffectively attempted to encourage the other evangelists to help their local churches rather than launch national careers. The Branham campaign held meetings across the United States in 1956, and a large meeting in Mexico City that had 20,000 in attendance. However the swelling number of competitors and emulators were further reducing attendance at Branham's meetings. His correspondence also decreased sharply. Whereas he had once received "a thousand letters a day", by 1956 his mail dropped to 75 letters a day. Branham thought the decline was temporary. He continued expecting something greater, which he said "nobody will be able to imitate". In 1955, he reported a vision of a renewed tent ministry and a "third pull which would be dramatically different" than his earlier career; he began to increasingly refer to the vision as his popularity began to decline. Amid the financial issues in 1956, Lindsay left Branham's campaign team. Branham eventually criticized the Voice of Healing magazine which he had helped create as a "massive financial organization" that put making money ahead of promoting good. The loss of Lindsay as a manager and the publicity of Voice of Healing was a major setback for Branham. After 1956, attendance at Branham's meetings dwindled and his appeal became limited to the loyal following that developed around him during the earlier years. Branham came to depend on The Herald of Faith published by Joseph Mattsson-Bose as his primary publicity tool for the final years of his ministry. Branham also began to criticize other leading contemporaries in the healing revival leading to open hostilities between the evangelists. In 1957 Branham openly criticized A. A. Allen concerning the validity of a miracle reported in his campaigns. Allen replied by circulating a letter at the Christian Fellowship Convention criticizing Branham for creating divisions and suggesting Branham may soon die as a result of his actions. Branham also began to criticize Oral Roberts and Billy Graham. The bad feelings and breakdown of cooperation between the leaders of the movement contributed to the end of the healing revival. In the closing years of the revival, Branham helped launch and popularize the ministry of Jim Jones, the founder and leader of the Peoples Temple. According to Historian Catherine Wessinger, while rejecting Christianity as a false religion, Jones covertly used popular Christian figures to advance his own ideology. Jones needed a religious headliner to endorse his ministry and invited Branham to share the platform with him at a self-organized religious convention held at the Cadle Tabernacle auditorium in Indianapolis from June 11 to 15, 1956. Branham critics Peter Duyzer and John Collins reported that Branham "performed numerous miracles", drawing a crowd of 11,000. Branham was an important influence on Jones, who copied many of his styles, methods, and teachings. Jones later became known for the mass murder and suicide at Jonestown in November 1978. According to Collins, Jim Jones and Paul Schäfer were influenced to move to South America by Branham's 1961 prophecy concerning the destruction of the United States in a nuclear war. Jones later said that he and Branham "did not see eye to eye", and accused Branham of being disingenuous. Consensus among historians is that the healing revival ended in 1958. By 1960, the number of evangelists holding national campaigns dropped to 11. Several perspectives on the decline of the healing revival have been offered. Crowder suggested Branham's gradual separation from Gordon Lindsay played a major part in the decline. Harrell attributed the decline to the increasing number of evangelists crowding the field and straining the financial resources of the Pentecostal denominations. Weaver agreed that Pentecostal churches gradually withdrew their support for the healing revival, mainly over the financial stresses put on local churches by the healing campaigns. The Assemblies of God were the first to openly withdraw support from the healing revival in 1953. Weaver pointed to other factors that may have helped destroy the initial ecumenism of the revival; tension between the independent evangelists and the Pentecostal churches caused by the evangelists' fund-raising methods, denominational pride, sensationalism, and doctrinal conflicts – particularly between the Oneness and Trinitarian factions within Pentecostalism. Weaver also believed that "fraud and chicanary" by the revivals evangelists also played a major role in the decline. ## Later life ### Teaching ministry As the healing revival began to wane, many of Branham's contemporaries moved into the leadership of the emerging Charismatic movement, which emphasized use of spiritual gifts. The Charismatic movement is a global movement within both Protestant and non-Protestant Christianity that supports the adoption of traditionally Pentecostal beliefs, especially the spiritual gifts (charismata). The movement began in the teachings of the healing revival evangelists and grew as their teachings came to receive broad acceptance among millions of Christians. At the same time the Charismatic movement was gaining broad acceptance, Branham began to transition to a teaching ministry. He began speaking on the controversial doctrinal issues he had avoided for most of the revival. By the 1960s, Branham's contemporaries and the Pentecostal denominations that had supported his campaigns regarded him as an extremely controversial teacher. The leadership of the Pentecostal churches pressed Branham to resist his urge to teach and to instead focus on praying for the sick. Branham refused, arguing that the purpose of his healing ministry was to attract audiences and, having thus been attracted, it was time to teach them the doctrines he claimed to have received through supernatural revelation. Branham argued that his entire ministry was divinely inspired and could not be selectively rejected or accepted, saying, "It's either all of God, or none of God". At first, Branham taught his doctrines only within his own church at Jeffersonville, but beginning in the 1960s he began to preach them at other churches he visited. His criticisms of Pentecostal organizations, and especially his views on holiness and the role of women, led to his rejection by the growing Charismatic movement and the Pentecostals from whom he had originally achieved popularity. Branham acknowledged their rejection and said their organizations "had choked out the glory and Spirit of God". As a result of their view of his teachings, many Pentecostals judged that Branham had "stepped out of his anointing" and had become a "bad teacher of heretical doctrine". Despite his rejection by the growing Charismatic movement, Branham's followers became increasingly dedicated to him during his later life. Some even claimed he was the Messiah, treated him as deity, and began to baptise and pray in his name. Branham quickly condemned their belief as heresy and threatened to stop ministering, but the belief persisted. Many followers moved great distances to live near his home in Jeffersonville and, led by Leo Mercer, subsequently set up a colony in Arizona following Branham's move to Tucson in 1962. Many believed the rapture was imminent and that it was necessary to be near Branham in Arizona to take part. Branham lamented Mercer and the actions of his group as he worried that a cult was potentially being formed among his most fanatical followers. Before he died, some of his followers had already begun compiling his sermons and treating them as oral scripture, with a significant minority of his followers believing in his divinity. ### Teachings Branham developed a unique theology and placed emphasis on a few key doctrines, including his eschatological views, annihilationism, oneness of the Godhead, predestination, eternal security, and the serpent's seed. His followers refer to his teachings collectively as "The Message". Kydd and Weaver have both referred to Branham's teachings as "Branhamology"; other sources refer to his teachings as "Branhamism". Most of Branham's teachings have precedents within sects of the Pentecostal movement or in other non-Pentecostal denominations. The doctrines Branham imported from non-Pentecostal theology and the unique combination of doctrines that he created as a result led to widespread criticism from Pentecostal churches and the Charismatic movement. His unique arrangement of doctrines, coupled with the highly controversial nature of the serpent seed doctrine, caused the alienation of many of his former supporters. The Full Gospel tradition, which has its roots in Wesleyan Arminianism, is the theology generally adhered to by the Charismatic movement and Pentecostal denominations. Branham's doctrines are a blend of both Calvinism and Arminianism, which are considered contradictory by many theologians; the teachings have been described as "jumbled and contradictory and difficult to categorize". As a result, the theology he developed in the later years of his life seemed "complicated and bizarre" to many people who admired him personally during the years of the healing revival. Many of his followers regard his sermons as oral scripture and believe Branham had rediscovered the true doctrines of the early church. #### Divine healing Throughout his ministry, Branham taught a doctrine of faith healing that was often the central teaching he espoused during the healing campaign. He believed healing was the main focus of the ministry of Jesus Christ and believed in a dual atonement; "salvation for the soul and healing for the body". He believed and taught that miracles ascribed to Christ in the New Testament were also possible in modern times. Branham believed that all sickness was a result of demonic activity and could be overcome by the faith of the person desiring healing. Branham argued that God was required to heal when faith was present. This led him to conclude that individuals who failed to be healed lacked adequate faith. Branham's teaching on divine healing were within the mainstream of Pentecostal theology and echoed the doctrines taught by Smith Wigglesworth, Bosworth, and other prominent Pentecostal ministers of the prior generation. #### Restorationism Of all of Branham's doctrines, his teachings on Christian restorationism have had the most lasting influence on modern Christianity. Charismatic writer Michael Moriarty described his teachings on the subject as "extremely significant" because they have "impacted every major restoration movement since". As a result, Moriarty concluded Branham has "profoundly influenced" the modern Charismatic movement. Branham taught the doctrine widely from the early days of the healing revival, in which he urged his audiences to unite and restore a form of church organization like the primitive church of early Christianity. The teaching was accepted and widely taught by many of the evangelists of the healing revival, and they took it with them into the subsequent Charismatic and evangelical movements. Paul Cain, Bill Hamon, Kenneth Hagin, and other restoration prophets cite Branham as a major influence. They played a critical role in introducing Branham's restoration views to the Apostolic-Prophetic Movement, the Association of Vineyard Churches, and other large Charismatic organizations. The Toronto Blessing, the Brownsville Revival, and other nationwide revivals of the late 20th century have their roots in Branham's restorationist teachings. The teaching holds that Christianity should return to a form mirroring the primitive Christian church. It supports the restoration of apostles and prophets, signs and wonders, spiritual gifts, spiritual warfare, and the elimination of non-primitive features of modern Christianity. Branham taught that by the end of the first century of Christianity, the church "had been contaminated by the entrance of an antichrist spirit". As a result, he believed that from a very early date, the church had stopped following the "pure Word of God" and had been seduced into a false form of Christianity. He stated the corruption came from the desire of early Christianity's clergy to obtain political power, and as a result became increasingly wicked and introduced false creeds. This led to denominationalism, which he viewed as the greatest threat to true Christianity. Branham viewed Martin Luther as the initiator of a process that would result in the restoration of the true form of Christianity, and traced the advancement of the process through other historic church figures. He believed the rapture would occur at the culmination of this process. Although Branham referred in his sermons to the culmination of the process as a future event affecting other people, he believed he and his followers were fulfilling his restoration beliefs. #### Annihilationism Annihilationism, the doctrine that the damned will be totally destroyed after the final judgment so as to not exist, was introduced to Pentecostalism in the teachings of Charles Fox Parham (1873–1929). Not all Pentecostal sects accepted the idea. Prior to 1957, Branham taught a doctrine of eternal punishment in hell. By 1957 he began promoting an annihilationist position in keeping with Parham's teachings. He believed that "eternal life was reserved only for God and his children". In 1960, Branham claimed the Holy Spirit had revealed this doctrine to him as one of the end-time mysteries. Promoting annihilationism led to the alienation of Pentecostal groups that had rejected Parham's teaching on the subject. #### Godhead Like other doctrines, the Godhead formula was a point of doctrinal conflict within Pentecostalism. As Branham began offering his own viewpoint, it led to the alienation of Pentecostal groups adhering to Trinitarianism. Branham shifted his theological position on the Godhead during his ministry. Early in his ministry, Branham espoused a position closer to an orthodox Trinitarian view. By the early 1950s, he began to privately preach the Oneness doctrine outside of his healing campaigns. By the 1960s, he had changed to openly teaching the Oneness position, according to which there is one God who manifests himself in multiple ways; in contrast with the Trinitarian view that three distinct persons comprise the Godhead. Branham came to believe that trinitarianism was tritheism and insisted members of his congregation be re-baptized in Jesus's name in imitation of Paul the Apostle. Branham believed his doctrine had a nuanced difference from the Oneness doctrine and to the end of his ministry he openly argued that he was not a proponent of Oneness doctrine. He distinguished his baptismal formula from the Oneness baptism formula in the name of Jesus by teaching that the baptismal formula should be in the name of Lord Jesus Christ. He argued that there were many people named Jesus but there is only one Lord Jesus Christ. By the end of his ministry, his message required an acceptance of the oneness of the Godhead and baptism in the name of Lord Jesus Christ. #### Opposition to modern culture As Branham's ministry progressed, he increasingly condemned modern culture. According to Weaver, Branham's views on modern culture were the primary reason the growing Charismatic movement rejected him; his views also prevented him from following his contemporaries who were transitioning from the healing revival to the new movement. He taught that immoral women and education were the central sins of modern culture. Branham viewed education as "Satan's snare for intellectual Christians who rejected the supernatural" and "Satan's tool for obscuring the 'simplicity of the Message and the messenger'". Weaver wrote that Branham held a "Christ against Culture" opinion, according to which loyalty to Christ requires rejection of non-Christian culture. Pentecostalism inherited the Wesleyan doctrine of entire sanctification and outward holiness from its founders, who came from Wesleyan-influenced denominations of the post-American Civil War era. The rigid moral code associated with the holiness movement had been widely accepted by Pentecostals in the early twentieth century. Branham's strict moral code echoed the traditions of early Pentecostalism but became increasingly unpopular because he refused to accommodate mid-century Pentecostalism's shifting viewpoint. He denounced cigarettes, alcohol, television, rock and roll, and many forms of worldly amusement. Branham strongly identified with the lower-class roots of Pentecostalism and advocated living an ascetic lifestyle. When he was given a new Cadillac, he kept it parked in his garage for two years out of embarrassment. Branham openly chastised other evangelists, who seemed to be growing wealthy from their ministries and opposed the prosperity messages being taught. Branham did not view financial prosperity as an automatic result of salvation. He rejected the financial aspects of the prosperity gospel that originated in the teachings of Oral Roberts and A. A. Allen. Branham condemned any emphasis on expensive church buildings, elaborate choir robes, and large salaries for ministers, and insisted the church should focus on the imminent return of Christ. Branham's opposition to modern culture emerged most strongly in his condemnation of the "immorality of modern women". He taught that women with short hair were breaking God's commandments and "ridiculed women's desire to artificially beautify themselves with makeup". Branham believed women were guilty of committing adultery if their appearance was intended to motivate men to lust, and viewed a woman's place as "in the kitchen". Citing the creation story in which Eve is taken from Adam's side, Branham taught that woman was not part of God's original creation, and she was a byproduct of man. > There is nothing designed to stoop so low, or be filthy, but a woman. A dog can't do it, a hog can't do it, a bird can't do it. No animal is immoral, nor it can be, for it is not designed so it can be. A female hog can't be immoral, a female dog can't be immoral, a female bird can't be immoral. A woman is the only thing can do it. She is designed, alone, for filth and unclean living. ... A dog can't, and no other female can. It's just the woman that can. A dog or any other animals, once a year, and that for her babies; not for sexual pleasure, but for her babies. The old sow hog, the old slut dog, once a year, one moment, that's for her babies. But a woman is designed for any time she desires. ... A woman is a by-product of a man. She's not even in the original creation. That's exactly right. ... By her beauty and her sex control, her shape that was given to her by Satan, the by-product that Satan did, she is sent to deceive sons of God. And she can sway more of them to hell than any other instrument Satan has got. That's exactly right. Only a piece, scrap, made of a man, to deceive him by; God made it, right here has proved it. That's what she was made for. According to Weaver, "his pronouncements with respect to women were often contradictory". Branham once told women who refused to dress according to his instructions "not to call themselves Christians" but qualified his denunciations by affirming that obedience to the holiness moral code was not a requirement for salvation. While he did not condemn women who refused the holiness moral code to Hell, he insisted they would not be part of the rapture. Weaver wrote that Branham's attitude to women concerning physical appearance, sexual drive, and marital relations was misogynistic, and that Branham saw modern women as "essentially immoral sexual machines who were to blame for adultery, divorce and death. They were the tools of the Devil." Some of Branham's contemporaries accused him of being a "woman hater", but he insisted he only hated immorality. According to Edward Babinski, women who follow the holiness moral code Branham supported regard it as "a badge of honor". #### Serpent seed, Predestination, & Race Branham taught an unorthodox doctrine on the source of original sin. He believed that the story of the fall of man in the Garden of Eden is allegorical and interpreted it to mean that the serpent had sexual intercourse with Eve, and their offspring was Cain. Branham also taught the belief that Cain's modern descendants were masquerading as educated people and scientists, and were "a big religious bunch of illegitimate bastard children" who comprised the majority of society's criminals. He believed that the serpent was an intelligent human-like ape he described as the missing link between the chimpanzee and man. Branham believed that the serpent was transformed into a reptile snake after it was cursed by God. Branham believed the term "predestination" was widely misunderstood and preferred to use the word "foreknowledge" to describe his views. Branham's teachings on Predestination were deeply connected to his serpent seed doctrine. Branham taught that humanity's choice in salvation was negated by their ancestry, and that genetics determined one's eternal destiny; the offspring of Cain were foreordained to damnation while the offspring of Seth were foreordained to salvation. Weaver commented that Branham seemed unaware that his teachings conflicted with free will, and that he taught a Calvinistic form of the doctrine of predestination and openly supported Calvin's doctrine of Eternal Security, both of which were at odds with the Arminian view of predestination held by Pentecostalism. Unlike his views on the Godhead and Annihilationism, there was no precedent within Pentecostalism for his views on predestination, and opened him to widespread criticism. Branham lamented that more so than any other teaching, Pentecostals criticized him for his predestination teachings. According to Steven Hassan, "Branham's sermons lay the foundation to believe that black people are the inferior race." Branham used the term "hybrid" to describe anything he believed to be tainted by the serpent. Branham accused Eve of producing a "hybrid" race, and he provided a way to trace the hybrid line of the Serpent's Seed to Africans and Jews through Ham the biblical progenitor of the African peoples, King Ahab, and Judas Iscariot. Branham reported discussing the possibility that blacks were descended from apes as early as 1929, but claimed to reject the belief at the time. In his recorded sermons, Branham first publicly hinted at his belief in the serpent seed doctrine in 1953. He began to openly teach serpent seed in 1958 at the height of racial unrest in the United States. Doug Weaver, Jon Schambers, and Michael Barkun have investigated Branham's serpent seed doctrine to identify its origin. Weaver suggested that Branham may have become acquainted with the serpent seed doctrine through his Baptist roots. All three have suggested Branham may been influenced by the teachings of Baptist minister Daniel Parker's two-seed doctrine. Although not widely accepted, Parker's teachings were well known among Baptists in Indiana and Kentucky; Parker also connected the serpent's seed to the non-white races. Barkun and Schambers also connected Branham's teaching to the white supremacy movement and Christian Identity preacher Wesley Swift. Branham was baptized and ordained by Roy Davis, a founding member and later Imperial Wizard of the Ku Klux Klan; Branham and Davis continued to associate throughout Branham's life. Barkun wrote that Branham was the most significant proponent of the racial teaching outside of Wesley Swift and the Christian Identity movement. Steven Hassan described Branham's Serpent Seed teachings as "rebranded" Christian Identity theology. Branham was open about the implications of his beliefs and publicly supported segregation. > God is a segregationalist [sic]. I am too. Any Christian's a segregation. God segregates His people from all the rest of them. They're... They've always been a segregation. He chose a nation. He chooses a people. He is a segregationalist [sic]. He made all nations. But still, a real genuine Christian has to be a segregationalist [sic]. Separating himself from the things of the world and everything, and come into one purpose, Jesus Christ. Branham also openly opposed interracial relationships and connected people of mixed race ancestry to the wicked "hybrid" race of the serpent. > What good would a white woman want to have a baby by a colored man making him a mulatto child? It's not sensible. ... If I was a colored man, or a brown man, or a yellow man, or a red man, I would be just as happy about it. Yes, sir. I sure would. That's the way that my Maker wanted me and that's the way I am. Right. Why does man want to tamper with anything for? When man gets into it, he ruins it. Let it alone the way God made it. Let a man be what he is; by the grace of God let him be. But he has to cause great fusses now calling our... causing riots, and big fusses, and everything else across the nations, and across the world just because he wanted to stick his head out about something. That's the ignorance of the man. That's right; hybrid again. Instead of leaving it the way God wants it, he wants to make his own way. He has to do something about it, you know. He has to make his own self a name. God be merciful to him. It's a pitiful thing. According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, "Not all Branham churches are racist or embrace the anti-race-mixing position," "but the theology clearly invites racism." Weaver called Serpent Seed Branham's "most disreputable" doctrine. Branham's embrace of the serpent seed doctrine alienated most of the members of his Pentecostal audience. According to Pearry Green, the broader Pentecostal movement considers Branham's version of the serpent seed doctrine repugnant and in their point of view, it was the "filthy doctrine ... that ruined his ministry." No other mainstream Christian group held a similar view; Branham was widely criticized for spreading the doctrine. Branham's followers consider the serpent seed doctrine one of his greatest revelations, and his most original; despite its racial nature, most are unaware of the origins of the teaching within the white supremacy movement. When confronted with the accusations of racism, some of his followers have denied the teaching of serpent seed has any connection to white supremacy or racism, and have pointed out that non-white followers of Branham accept the doctrine and its implications. Some African followers of Branham's teachings have embraced the racial components and openly call for the "submission of the black man to the white man". Hassan wrote that Branham's followers use "deceptive tactics to recruit and indoctrinate unsuspecting people," and that "recruiters do not tell new members" about the historic "deep ties to white supremacy groups." Leaders in Branham's movement have taken actions to prevent followers from discovering the true origin of the serpent seed teaching. #### Eschatology and the Seven Seals In his later years, Branham began to preach almost exclusively on biblical prophecy. In 1960, Branham preached a series of sermons on the seven church ages based on chapters two and three of the Book of Revelation. The sermons used the dispensational system of C. I. Scofield, Clarence Larkin, and Jehovah's Witness founder Charles Taze Russel. As in their dispensational systems, Branham said each church represents a historical age, and that the angel of each age was a significant church figure. Branham identified historical Christian figures as church age messengers, naming some of the same men as Russel. Whereas Russel had claimed to be the seventh messenger himself during the 1890s, Branham's sermons differed and he described his own characteristics as the attributes of the Laodicean Church age messenger; Branham believed the age would immediately precede the rapture. Branham explained the Laodicean age would be immoral in a way comparable to Sodom and Gomorrah, and it would be a time in which Christian denominations rejected Christ. As described by Branham, the characteristics of the Laodicean age resemble the modern era. Branham also asserted the final messenger would be a mighty prophet who put the Word of God first, that he would be a lover of the wilderness, that he would hate wicked women, and be an uneducated person. Branham compared the messenger to this last age to John the Baptist and said he would come in the spirit of Elijah the prophet and cited the Book of Malachi 4:5–6 (3:23–24 in Hebrew) as the basis for claiming the Elijah spirit would return. Branham preached a series of sermons in 1963 on the Seven Seals, which he regarded as a highlight of his ministry. Branham believed the sermons would produce "rapturing faith" which was necessary for his followers to escape the tribulation, and that the sermons contained "the complete revelation of Jesus Christ". Weaver wrote that "the importance of the revelation of the seals to Branham's 'prophetic' identity cannot be overestimated". Branham viewed the revelation of the seals as the crowning achievement of his ministry and the ultimate fulfillment of his purpose as a prophet. According to Weaver, the sermons were primarily "a restatement of the dispensationalism espoused in the sermons on the seven church ages". The sermons focused on the Book of Revelation 6:1–17, and provided an interpretation of the meaning of each of the seals, which Branham connected with his prior sermons on the church ages. Like his sermons on the church ages, Branham's sermons on the seals were largely borrowed from the writings of Charles Taze Russell and Clarence Larkin. Branham claimed the sermons were inspired through an angelic visitation and the appearance of what he believed to be a supernatural cloud in Arizona that was visible in the American Southwest on February 28, 1963. Branham interpreted the cloud to be the face of Jesus Christ, and a fulfillment of 1 Thessalonians 4:16: "For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout". Branham believed the events of 1963 indicated the rapture was imminent. As a result of his teachings, many of Branham's followers believe that Jesus Christ returned in some form in 1963. By 1987, it was widely known the cloud Branham believed to be supernatural had been manmade and was reported as such by Weaver in his first biography of Branham. James McDonald of the University of Arizona Institute of Atmospheric Physics was present when the 1963 cloud phenomena appeared. He investigated the phenomena and discovered that the cloud had been created by an exploded Thor rocket carrying a classified spy satellite launched from Vandenberg Air Force Base that failed to make orbit. The United States Air Force later declassified the launch records and acknowledged the manmade origin of the cloud. Military personnel involved in the launch stated that they had "immediately recognized the McDonald cloud as from an explosion of a rocket the afternoon of 28 February 1963". Branham claimed to his audiences that he was hunting in Arizona when angels appeared to him and created the cloud overhead. Peter Duyzer presented evidence that Branham falsely claimed to be hunting in Arizona when the cloud appeared, and was actually in Texas where he was assisting with efforts to have the death sentence of Leslie Elaine Perez overturned. In his sermons on the seven seals, Branham again indicated he was a prophet who had the anointing of Elijah and was a messenger heralding the second coming of Christ. Branham did not directly claim to be the end-time messenger in either of his sermons on the church ages or the seven seals. Weaver believed Branham desired to be the eschatological prophet he was preaching about, but had self-doubt. At the time, Branham continued to leave the identity of the messenger open to the interpretation of his followers, who widely accepted that he was that messenger. Beginning in 1958, Branham began to claim Luke 17:30 was being fulfilled. By the 1960s, he began to make frequent references to the scripture claiming that through his ministry the "Son of Man was being revealed". According to Weaver, Branham's "obsession with Luke 17:30 and Malachi 4:5–6 dominated the end of his ministry". In 1964 and 1965 he began to make special emphasis that the Son of Man could only be revealed through the ministry of a prophet. Branham's teachings on the subject caused confusion among his followers who repeatedly asked him to clarify his relationship to Christ. Some of his followers believed he was claiming divinity and were prepared to accept his claims. Branham's responses and statements on the subject of his divinity were contradictory leaving his followers divided on the subject. In his final revival meetings before his death, Branham stated "The Elijah of this day is the Lord Jesus Christ. He is to come according to Luke 17:30. The Son of Man is to reveal Himself among His people. Not a man, God. But it'll come through a prophet." His final statement on the subject convinced a number of his followers he was indeed claiming divinity. #### Anti-denominationalism Branham believed denominationalism was "a mark of the beast", which added to the controversy surrounding his later ministry. Branham stated that he was not opposed to organizational structures; his concern focused on the "road block to salvation and spiritual unity" he believed denominations created by emphasizing loyalty to their organizations. Branham's doctrine was similar to the anti-Catholic rhetoric of classical Pentecostalism and Protestantism, which commonly associated the mark of the beast with Catholicism. Branham, however, adopted the teaching of Charles Taze Russell which associated the image of the beast with Protestant denominations. In his later years, he came to believe all denominations were "synagogues of Satan". Branham's teaching was particularly damaging to his relationship with Pentecostals denominations who were angered that he would associate them with the mark of beast. Scholar Robert Price and Doug Weaver suggested that Branham's stance on denominations was developed in response to their rejection of his teachings in an attempt to maintain the loyalty of his closest followers. Throughout the 1960s, Branham demanded his listeners leave any denomination they were part of to demonstrate their loyalty to him and his message. He argued that continued allegiance to any denomination would lead to an acceptance of the mark of the beast, which would mean missing the rapture. He insisted the prior healing revival when he cooperated with denominations had been a preparatory step to get the attention of God's chosen people, so he could eventually inform them of their need to exclusively follow his teaching ministry. #### Prophecies Branham issued a series of prophecies during his lifetime. One of his first was a prophetic vision he reported having in 1916 foretelling that 16 men would fall to their death during the construction of the Clark Memorial Bridge. Branham claimed repeatedly throughout his ministry that the vision was fulfilled during the 1927–1929 construction of the bridge, but there is no evidence of the drownings having ever occurred. Branham also claimed that he foretold the coming of the 1937 Ohio River Flood, the same flood he told his audience led to the death of his wife and daughter. His most significant prophecies were a series of prophetic visions he claimed to have in June 1933. The first time he published any information about the visions were in 1953. Branham reported that in his visions he saw seven major events would occur before the Second Coming of Christ, including the prediction of the rise of Adolf Hitler, the Second World War, the Italian occupation of Ethiopia, and the rise of communism. Most of his predictions had already been fulfilled by the first time he reported the visions in 1953. In the 1933 visions, he reported seeing self-driving "egg-shaped" cars in one vision. Branham later claimed he saw a car in 1960 that fulfilled his vision. Among the prophecies was also a prediction that the United States would "elect the wrong president" as a result of giving women the right to vote, which he later interpreted to be John F. Kennedy. He also predicted a powerful woman would take control of the United States, which he later interpreted to be the Roman Catholic Church, which he reported as also being fulfilled with the election of Kennedy who was Roman Catholic. His visions ended with the apocalyptic destruction of the United States that left the nation's cities in smoldering ruins. After sharing his prophetic visions, Branham offered a prediction that the rapture would happen by 1977. In 1964, Branham said judgement would strike the west coast of the United States and that Los Angeles would sink into the ocean, his most dramatic prediction. Following the 1964 prophecy, Branham again predicted the rapture would happen by 1977 and would be preceded by various worldwide disasters, the unification of denominational Christianity, and the rise-to-power of the Roman Catholic Pope. Branham was deeply anti-Catholic, and viewed the Pope and the Roman Catholic Church as the agents of Satan who would bring about the end of the world. Branham's prediction of the end of the world by 1977 was widely circulated and well known. After the world failed to end in 1977, Time Magazine included the failed prediction as one of the "top ten end-of-the-world prophecies". Weaver wrote that Branham gradually revised and embellished some of his prophecies over time, sometimes substantially. Critics of Branham investigated his prophecies. They claimed that many of Branham prophecies were only publicly reported after their fulfillment. Duzyer also reported that several of Branham's prophecies, like the 16 drownings or the destruction of the United States, were never fulfilled. Branham's followers believe his prophecies came true, or will do so in the future. ## Death Branham continued to travel to churches and preach his doctrine across Canada, the United States, and Mexico during the 1960s. His only overseas trip during the 1960s proved a disappointment. Branham reported a vision of himself preaching before large crowds and hoped for its fulfillment on the trip, but the South African government prevented him from holding revivals when he traveled to the country in 1965. Branham was saddened that his teaching ministry was rejected by all but his closest followers. Pentecostal churches which once welcomed Branham refused to permit him to preach during the 1960s, and those who were still sympathetic to him were threatened with excommunication by their superiors if they did so. He held his final set of revival meetings in Shreveport at the church of his early campaign manager Jack Moore in November 1965. Although he had hinted at it many times, Branham publicly stated for the first time that he was the return of Elijah the prophet in his final meetings in Shreveport. On December 18, 1965, Branham and his family – except his daughter Rebekah – were returning to Jeffersonville, Indiana, from Tucson for the Christmas holiday. About three miles (4.8 km) east of Friona, Texas, and about seventy miles (110 km) southwest of Amarillo on US Highway 60, just after dark, a car driven by a drunken driver traveling westward in the eastbound lane collided head-on with Branham's car. He was rushed to the hospital in Amarillo where he remained comatose for several days and died of his injuries on Christmas Eve, December 24, 1965. Branham's death stunned the Pentecostal world and shocked his followers. His funeral was held on December 29, 1965, but his burial was delayed until April 11, 1966; Easter Monday. Most eulogies only tacitly acknowledged Branham's controversial teachings, focusing instead on his many positive contributions and recalled his wide popularity and impact during the years of the healing revival. Gordon Lindsay's eulogy stated that Branham's death was the will of God and privately he accepted the interpretation of Kenneth E. Hagin, who claimed to have prophesied Branham's death two years before it happened. According to Hagin, God revealed that Branham was teaching false doctrine and God was removing him because of his disobedience. In the confusion immediately following Branham's death, expectations that he would rise from the dead developed among his followers. Most believed he would have to return to fulfill a vision he had regarding future tent meetings. Weaver attributed the belief in Branham's imminent resurrection to Pearry Green, though Green denied it. Even Branham's son Billy Paul seemed to expect his father's resurrection and indicated as much in messages sent to Branham's followers, in which he communicated his expectation for Easter 1966. The expectation of his resurrection remained strong into the 1970s, in part based on Branham's prediction that the rapture could occur by 1977. After 1977, some of his followers abandoned his teachings. ## Legacy and influence Branham was the "initiator of the post-World War II healing revival" and, along with Oral Roberts, was one of its most revered leaders. Branham is most remembered for his use of the "sign-gifts" that awed the Pentecostal world. According to writer and researcher Patsy Sims, "the power of a Branham service and his stage presence remains a legend unparalleled in the history of the Charismatic movement." The many revivalists who attempted to emulate Branham during the 1950s spawned a generation of prominent Charismatic ministries. Branham has been called the "principal architect of restorationist thought" of the Charismatic movement that emerged from the healing revival. The Charismatic view that the Christian church should return to a form like that of the early church has its roots in Branham's teachings during the healing revival period. The belief is widely held in the modern Charismatic movement, and the legacy of his restorationist teaching and ministering style is evident throughout televangelism and the Charismatic movement. The more controversial doctrines Branham espoused in the closing years of his ministry were rejected by the Charismatic movement, which viewed them as "revelatory madness". Charismatics are apologetic towards Branham's early ministry and embrace his use of the "sign-gifts". Charismatic author John Crowder wrote that his ministry should not be judged by "the small sliver of his later life", but by the fact that he indirectly "lit a fire" that began the modern Charismatic movement. Non-Charismatic Christianity completely rejected Branham. Crowder said Branham was a victim of "the adoration of man" because his followers began to idolize him in the later part of his ministry. Harrell took a similar view, attributing Branham's teachings in his later career to his close friends, who manipulated him and took advantage of his lack of theological training. Weaver also attributed Branham's eschatological teachings to the influence of a small group of his closest followers, who encouraged his desire for a unique ministry. According to Weaver, to Branham's dismay, his followers had placed him at the "center of a Pentecostal personality cult" in the final years of his ministry. Edward Babinski describes Branham's followers as "odd in their beliefs, but for the most part honest hard-working citizens", and wrote that calling them a cult "seems unfair". While rejecting Branham's teachings, Duyzer offered a glowing review of Branham's followers, stating he "had never experienced friendship, or love like we did there". Though Branham is no longer widely known outside Pentecostalism, his legacy continues today. Summarizing the contrasting views held of Branham, Kydd stated, "Some thought he was God. Some thought he was a dupe of the devil. Some thought he was an end-time messenger sent from God, and some still do." ## Branham's followers Followers of Branham's teachings can be found around the world; Branham claimed to have made over one million converts during his campaign meetings. In 1986, there were an estimated 300,000 followers. In 2000, the William Branham Evangelical Association had missions on every inhabited continent – with 1,600 associated churches in Latin America and growing missions across Africa. In 2018, Voice of God Recordings claimed to serve Branham-related support material to about two million people through the William Branham Evangelical Association, and estimated there were 2–4 million total followers of Branham's teachings. Branham's followers do not have a central unifying leadership. Shortly after Branham's death, his followers divided in multiple feuding groups. Many different followers of Branham's teachings have claimed to be his immediate successor, or an Elisha to his Elijah. Many also believe that Branham's son Joseph has claimed the inheritance of his father's ministry. Each of the men claiming to be his successor have established new sects of Branham's followers. Branham's sons Joseph and Billy Paul lead the William Branham Evangelical Association and hold influence over many churches. Peary Greene (1933–2015) in Arizona, and Ewald Frank in Germany both held influence over a significant number of churches. Tensions over Branham's identity are one the primary causes of divisions between the groups. Followers of Branham's son expect the resurrection of Branham to fulfill unfinished prophecies. Followers of the Green and Frank believe Branham's prophecies will have a spiritual fulfillment and not require his return. Still other groups believe Branham was the return of Christ. His followers "range widely in belief in practice." Some followers have attempted to reform Branham's most extreme teachings. While most churches adhere to a common set of tenets, the "extreme local authority" of the church promoted by Branham has led to widespread differences in interpretation of Branham's prophetic teachings. One common theme among all groups is the belief that Branham was the return of Elijah the prophet and receiving his prophetic revelations is necessary to escape the impending destruction of the world. Some groups of Branham's followers refuse medical treatment because of their divine healing beliefs. Many followers of Branham's teachings live within insular communities, with their own schools and with no access to television or internet or outside media. Some groups prohibit their members from having relationships with outsiders. Those who leave are often shunned or disowned. People who try to leave the teachings of Branham often face extreme repercussions. Carl Dyck wrote, "Those who have come out of this group give solemn evidence of the devastating effect that Branhamism had on them, both emotionally and psychologically. In fact, the followers of Branham pray that evil will come upon people who leave their church." Branham's followers have harassed critics and individuals who reject Branham's teachings. Dyck reported that people who published material critical of Branham's teachings have been threatened by his followers and warned they may be killed. The news media have also reported critics of Branham's teaching being threatened and harassed by his followers. In his book Churches that Abuse, Ronald Enroth wrote that some churches use Branham's teachings to "belittle, insult, and berate" their members as part of their discipleship teachings on submission, humility, and obedience. According to Enroth, Branham's followers believe subjecting themselves to this treatment is necessary for them to "be refined and perfect" and "ready to meet Jesus" at this second coming. Enroth reported instances of families being separated, with children being taken from their parents and reassigned to other families to be raised as a form of discipline. He also reported multiple cases of physical abuse against both adults and children in the United States and Mexico. Branham's followers are widely spread throughout the world. In Iran, Branham's followers have faced persecution, with the government shutting down ten of their house churches in 2018 and jailing several Branham followers. In 2020, the Russian government labeled missionaries of Branham's teaching as "extremists" and banned the importation of Branham related publications to the Russian Federation. Branham's followers are often in the news for criminal activity. In a 2008 California court case, authorities investigating Leo Mercer's group of Branham followers in Arizona discovered that following "Branham's death in 1965, Mercer gradually became more authoritative, employing various forms of punishment. He would ostracize people from the community and separate families. Children were beaten for minor infractions like talking during a march or not tying their shoes. Mercer would punish girls by cutting their hair, and force boys to wear girls' clothing. There was also evidence that Mercer sexually abused children." "In one instance, Mercer ordered that [a girl's] hair be cut off to punish her because he had had a vision from God that she was being sexually inappropriate with young children. [She] was beaten and forced to wear masculine clothes that covered much of her body, hiding her bruises. Her fingertips were burned so she would know what hell felt like." Mercer sexually abused children and adults. Survivors reported that they subjected themselves to Mercer's abuses because of direction they received personally from Branham. The Living Word Fellowship, a group of over 100 churches at its peak, was founded by John Robert Stevens, who had been heavily influenced by Branham and promoted many of his doctrines, was often reported in the news during the 1970s and 1980s as a doomsday cult. The organization disbanded in 2018 following widespread allegations of sexual molestation of children. In 2002, Ralph G. Stair, a leader of a Branham's followers in United States, was arrested and convicted of molesting minors, raping multiple women in his church, and financial crimes. Paul Schäfer, a follower and promoter of William Branham's teachings based in Chile, was discovered to have been running a compound where he was sexually molesting and torturing children in 1997. "Strong ties were forged" between Schäfer, William Branham, and Ewald Frank during Branham's time in Germany. Schäfer and other members of his church served as William Branham's personal security detail on his 1955 European tour. William Branham's second sermon during his visit to Karlsruhe, Germany, left a deep impression on Schäfer. Schäfer claimed to experience a healing in the meeting, and thereafter began to put more of William Branham's doctrines into practice in his group, and began to insist to his followers that they were the "only faithful ones" to William Branham's teachings. Schäfer had a history of child molestation dating to the 1950s. Schäfer was later arrested in 2006, convicted, and died in prison. The government of Chile banned Ewald Frank from entering the country after finding he had been visiting and holding revival meetings with Schäfer's followers at Colonia. Court records indicate Frank was a key figure in helping Colonia establish its weapons factories by contracting with German arms producers to assist the colony in setting up their operations. Alleged accomplices in Schäfer's crimes who were charged and awaiting trial fled Chile and took refuge in Frank's church in Germany, where they were protected from extradition. German protestors picketed in front of Frank's church to protest his actions. Schäfer and his compound were portrayed in the 2015 film Colonia. In 2014, Robert Martin Gumbura, a leader of Branham's followers in Zimbabwe, was arrested and convicted for raping multiple women in his congregation. Gumbura and his followers were polygamous. Gumbura reportedly had relations with over 100 women. He died in prison in 2021. In April 2023, government authorities discovered shallow graves where over 100 bodies were buried. The investigation is ongoing, and authorities believe more than 500 individuals may be buried in the graves. They had been allegedly starved to death by P. N. Mackenzie, a leader of Branham's followers in Kenya. Some had been buried alive, and authorities were able to rescue one who had been buried for three days. News reports labeled the group as the Malindi cult. Homicide detectives working the case said the group was radicalized by Branham's teachings, leading to their deaths. Investigators discovered some of the bodies were missing organs, and accused the cult of harvesting and selling the organs of the victims. Polygamist followers of Branham's teachings have also been reported by news media in the United States for marriage to minors. Authorities have gone so far as to raid one church and threaten members with legal action for violating bigamy laws. Polygamy is a point of conflict among Branham's followers; not all groups accept the practice. Supporters of polygamy claim Branham authorized the practice in his 1965 sermon entitled "Marriage and Divorce". Roberts Liardon commented, "According to Branham, since women introduced men to sex, polygamy was brought about. Women had to be punished. So men could have many wives, but women only one husband." In 2020, Joaquim Gonçalves Silva, a prominent leader of Branham's followers in Brazil was accused of raping multiple women. Sivas died while awaiting trial for his alleged crimes. In 1997, the O'odham Nation in Arizona accused Wayne Evans of defrauding their tribe of over \$1 million and giving that money to Voice of God Recordings. The tribe filed a racketeering case against them to recover their money. In 2001, Evans pleaded guilty to charges of embezzlement, and Voice of God Recordings returned the funds to the tribe. Joseph Coleman, a follower of William Branham in the United States with influence over multiple churches, was connected to "a multi-million dollar fraud through an investment management company". News reported that Coleman's son had solicited over \$20 million in funds under false claims. He and his fellow conspirators pleaded guilty in 2010 and in 2011 were sentenced to two years in prison and ordered to pay millions in restitution. The FBI reported that, "rather than using the investors' capital to support the two funds, the defendants used the vast majority of investor money to purchase lavish gifts for their friends and themselves". In 2020, Vinworth Dayal, a minister who promoted Branham's teachings in Trinidad, was arrested and charged with money laundering through his church. Pearry Green was a defendant in multiple criminal cases concerning his financial dealings. In a 2003 case, he pleaded guilty to theft of government property in U.S. District court. In 2014, Pastor Donny Reagan made news in the United States for promoting Branham's racial teachings. Several news outlets labeled Reagan as the "most racist pastor in America." Kacou Philippe, a leader of Bramham's followers in Africa, was arrested in 2017 for hate speech and sentenced to one year prison after preaching in multiple African nations that blacks should be submissive towards whites. Philippe insisted decolonization of Africa was a sin, and that Africans could only prosper when in servitude to Europeans. In 2017, street preachers promoting Branham in Canada began to make national news in the United States and Canada for their aggressive behavior. Their tactics prompted officials to pass legislation targeting their activities in 2019. They were arrested multiple times in both countries for harassing women for their appearance and disrupting church services. The CBC investigated Branham and focused their reporting on his connections to Jim Jones and the Ku Klux Klan and labeled Branham's followers a "doomsday cult". In 2021, they were reported in the news again as fugitives who were evading arrest after attacking women at a Presbyterian Church in Canada. In 2018, Pastor Théodore Mugalu, a leader of Branham's followers in the Democratic Republic of Congo encouraged his followers to violence against Catholics in his country. News reports claimed that Mugala's followers forced 145 priests and nuns to strip naked, cover their heads, and filmed their whippings. In 2021, Steven Hassan's Freedom of Mind Institute published an article labeling Branham's followers a cult stating, "Branham's ministry was characterized by white supremacy and deeply misogynist attitudes." "The Message cult has always been deeply connected to white supremacy groups." According to Hassan, Branham's followers use "deceptive tactics to recruit and indoctrinate unsuspecting people. Recruiters do not tell new members that the cult originated with deep ties to white supremacy groups." Hassan concluded by stating that "The Message churches have a significant following and an enormous potential to influence people and create violence."

Lady Saigō

Consort of Tokugawa Ieyasu (1552–1589)

Lady Saigō (西郷局 or 西郷の局 Saigō no Tsubone, 1552 – 1 July 1589), also known as Oai, was one of the concubines of Tokugawa Ieyasu, the samurai lord who unified Japan at the end of the sixteenth century and then ruled as shōgun. She was also the mother of the second Tokugawa shōgun, Tokugawa Hidetada. Her contributions were considered so significant that she was posthumously inducted to the Senior First Rank of the Imperial Court, the highest honor that could be conferred by the Emperor of Japan. During their relationship, Lady Saigō influenced Ieyasu's philosophies, choice of allies, and policies as he rose to power during the late Sengoku period, and she thus had an indirect effect on the organization and composition of the Tokugawa shogunate. Although less is known of her than some other figures of the era, she is generally regarded as the "power behind the throne", and her life has been compared to a "Cinderella story" of feudal Japan. Once she was in a respected and secure position as the official concubine and mother to Ieyasu's heir, Lady Saigō used her influence and wealth for charitable purposes. A devout Buddhist, she donated money to temples in Suruga Province, where she resided as the consort of Ieyasu, first in Hamamatsu Castle and later in Sunpu Castle. As she was quite near-sighted, she also established a charitable organization that assisted visually impaired women with no other means of support. Lady Saigō died at a fairly young age, under somewhat mysterious circumstances. Although murder was suspected, no culprit was identified. Lady Saigō bore four children: she had a son and a daughter (Saigō Katsutada and Tokuhime) while married, and she later bore two sons as the consort of Tokugawa Ieyasu: Tokugawa Hidetada and Matsudaira Tadayoshi. Among the descendants of Lady Saigō was the Empress Meishō (1624–1696), one of very few women to accede to the Chrysanthemum Throne as empress regnant. ## Name The term "Saigō-no-Tsubone", used in most historical texts, is an official title rather than a name. As an adult she was adopted into the Saigō clan, so she was permitted to use the surname. Later, when she was named first consort of Tokugawa Ieyasu, the title "tsubone" (pronounced ) was appended to the surname. The title was one of several titular suffixes conferred on high-ranking women (others include -kata and -dono). The bestowal of a title depended on social class and the relationship with her samurai lord, such as whether she was a legitimate wife or a concubine, and whether or not she had had children by him. The word tsubone indicates the living quarters reserved for ladies of a court, and it became the title for those who had been granted private quarters, such as high-ranking concubines with children. This title, tsubone, was in use for concubines from the Heian period until the Meiji period (from the eighth century to the early twentieth century), and is commonly translated to the English title "Lady". Though Lady Saigō's given name does not appear in surviving documents from the time, there is good evidence it was Masako (昌子), but this name is very rarely used. Her most commonly used name was Oai (お愛 or 於愛, meaning "love") and most sources agree this was a nickname she gained as a child. Intimate friends and family would call her Oai throughout her life, and it is the name most often used in modern popular cultural references. Following death, she was bestowed with a Buddhist posthumous name, and an abbreviation of that name, Hōdai-in (宝台院), is sometimes used out of pious respect. ## Background The Saigō family was one branch of the distinguished Kikuchi clan of Kyushu that had migrated northward to Mikawa Province in the fifteenth century. In 1524, the forces of Matsudaira Kiyoyasu (1511–1536), the grandfather of Tokugawa Ieyasu, stormed and took the Saigō clan's headquarters at Yamanaka Castle during his conquest of the Mikawa region. Shortly after the battle, Saigō Nobusada, the third head of the Saigō, submitted to the Matsudaira clan. Following the untimely death of Kiyoyasu in 1536, and the ineffectual leadership and early death of Matsudaira Hirotada (1526–1549), the leaderless Matsudaira clan finally submitted to Imagawa Yoshimoto (1519–1560) of Suruga Province, east of Mikawa. When the Matsudaira fell to the Imagawa, the clans of their retainers, which included the Saigō, likewise submitted to the Imagawa. Following the Battle of Okehazama (1560), Saigō Masakatsu attempted to re-assert the independence of the clan while yielding some land concessions to the Imagawa. In response, Imagawa Ujizane arrested thirteen Saigō men, and had them vertically impaled near Yoshida Castle. The executions did not deter the Saigō, and in 1562 the Imagawa launched punitive invasions of east Mikawa and attacked the two main Saigō castles. Masakatsu was killed in the battle of Gohonmatsu Castle; his eldest son Motomasa was killed during the battle for Wachigaya Castle. Clan leadership passed to Masakatsu's son, Saigō Kiyokazu (1533–1594), who pledged his loyalty to the Matsudaira clan, under the leadership of Tokugawa Ieyasu, in their mutual struggle against the Imagawa. In 1569, the power of the Imagawa ended with the siege of Kakegawa Castle. Neither the name of Lady Saigō's mother nor her dates of birth or death are recorded in any existing documents, although it is known that she was the elder sister of Saigō Kiyokazu. Lady Saigō's father was Tozuka Tadaharu [ja] of Tōtōmi Province, under direct control of the Imagawa clan. The marriage between Tadaharu and his wife was very likely arranged by the Imagawa clan. ## Biography ### Early life Lady Saigō was born in 1552 at Nishikawa Castle, a branch castle of the Saigō clan, and very likely given the name of Masako soon after birth. Japanese marriages are not usually matrilocal, but Tadaharu may have been assigned to Nishikawa Castle as an agent of the Imagawa. Masako spent her childhood with her two siblings in bucolic eastern Mikawa Province, and at some point gained the nickname Oai. In 1554, her father Tadaharu died in the Battle of Enshu-Omori, between the Imagawa and the Hōjō clan. Two years later her mother married Hattori Masanao; the union resulted in four children, though only two survived to adulthood. Some sources state that upon reaching "adulthood" Oai married, but was widowed soon afterward. The husband's name is not mentioned and there were apparently no children. Other sources do not mention the marriage, or suggest that there never was an earlier "first" marriage. It is known with certainty that in 1567, Oai married Saigō Yoshikatsu, her cousin and the son of Motomasa, who had already had two children by his late wife. Oai bore two children by Yoshikatsu: their son, Saigō Katsutada, was born about 1570; they also had a daughter, possibly named Tokuhime. In 1571, Saigō Yoshikatsu was killed at the Battle of Takehiro, fighting the invading forces of the Takeda clan led by Akiyama Nobutomo. Soon after Yoshikatsu's death, Oai was formally adopted by her uncle, Saigō Kiyokazu, then the head of the Saigō clan, though she chose to live with her mother in the house of her stepfather. ### Tokugawa Ieyasu Oai first met Tokugawa Ieyasu at about the age of 17 or 18, when he visited the Saigō family and Oai served him tea. It is believed she caught his eye on that occasion, but as she was still married, nothing came of it at the time. Later, during the 1570s, it is believed that friendship and genuine affection developed between the two. This view contradicts a common impression which maintains that Ieyasu was a ruthless leader who treated all the women in his life, and all of his offspring, as commodities to be used as needed to serve the clan or his own ambitions. However, it is also known that he valued personal merit over bloodlines. During this time, Ieyasu had a house built in eastern Mikawa, far from the residence of his wife, the Lady Tsukiyama, in Okazaki. The marriage between Ieyasu and Lady Tsukiyama had been arranged by her uncle, Imagawa Yoshimoto, ostensibly to help cement ties between the two clans, though Ieyasu found it difficult to live with his wife's jealousy, tempestuous moods, and eccentric habits. Starting around the time of the Battle of Mikatagahara (1573), perhaps in its aftermath, Ieyasu began to confide in Oai and sought her counsel on various matters. It may have been during this period that the two commenced an amorous relationship. Oai is credited with advising Ieyasu as the Battle of Nagashino (1575) approached, a major turning point in both Ieyasu's career and the history of Japan. It is also thought that Ieyasu continued to seek her advice concerning other battles and alliances, even as late as the Komaki-Nagakute Campaign (1584). In the spring of 1578, Oai moved to Hamamatsu Castle, where she took over management of the kitchen. She became very popular with the unit of warriors from her native province, who not only admired her beauty, but regarded her as a gentle and virtuous example of the women of Mikawa. While her manners and gentility were exemplary, she could, when the occasion warranted, be outspoken or sarcastic in speech, the probable result of growing up around rustic warriors in a remote castle outpost. With her move to the court of Ieyasu, Oai entered a bitter arena where prospective concubines schemed and competed with each other for a chance to bear Ieyasu's child. Bearing the child of a powerful samurai, especially a son, was one way an ambitious young woman of the period could elevate her status, ensure a comfortable life, and guarantee the prosperity of her family. These women usually relied on their physical attributes and sexual prowess to keep their lord's attention, and some resorted to the use of aphrodisiacs. Unlike these courtesans, Oai already had the attention of Ieyasu, which would have undermined the ambitions of some and very likely made her a target of resentment, hostility, and the intrigues that were common in Japanese harems. While Ieyasu's marriage was arranged for political reasons, and many of his later concubines were chosen in the same spirit, it is thought that he chose his relationship with Lady Saigō. Despite the image of Ieyasu as a calculating and stoic warlord, there was no new political advantage to the match, as the Saigō were already loyal vassals, and thus texts about Lady Saigō refer to her as the "most beloved" of Ieyasu's women. Moreover, Ieyasu valued her for her intelligence and sound advice and it is believed that he enjoyed her company and calm demeanor as well as their common background in Mikawa province. On 2 May 1579, Oai gave birth to Ieyasu's third son, who would become known as Tokugawa Hidetada. The news was probably a shock to all who had an interest in Ieyasu, but with the event, Oai's position became more secure and she was accepted as the first consort of Ieyasu. Based on this relationship, and out of respect for her gentle manner and devotion to Ieyasu, she became known by the respectful title of Saigō-no-Tsubone, or Lady Saigō. In the same year, Oda Nobunaga was informed that Lady Tsukiyama had conspired against him with the Takeda clan. Although evidence was weak, Ieyasu re-assured his ally by having his wife executed by the shore of Lake Sanaru in Hamamatsu. Tokugawa Nobuyasu, Ieyasu's first son by Lady Tsukiyama, was held in confinement until Ieyasu ordered him to commit seppuku. With their deaths, Lady Saigō's position at court was unassailable. With the death of Nobuyasu, Hidetada became Ieyasu's heir apparent. Ieyasu's fourth son, the second by Lady Saigō, was born on 18 October 1580. He would become known as Matsudaira Tadayoshi, after he was adopted by Matsudaira Ietada, the head of the Fukōzu branch of the Matsudaira clan. In the same year, Lady Saigō had a temple founded in her mother's memory, indicating she had died by that point. In 1586, Lady Saigō was at the side of Ieyasu when he entered the newly reconstructed Sunpu Castle in triumph. This was a highly symbolic celebration of his victories over his enemies and the subjugation of the region, but it was also a visible and symbolic gesture to Lady Saigō, a way that Ieyasu could credit her for her assistance, and publicly demonstrate the esteem in which he regarded her. ### Charity While at Sunpu Castle, Lady Saigō worshipped at a Buddhist temple called Ryūsen-ji (龍泉寺). She became devoted to the teachings of the Pure Land sect and was known for her piety and charity. Because she suffered a high degree of myopia, she often donated money, clothing, food, and other necessities to blind women and organizations that assisted them. She eventually founded a co-operative school with living quarters near Ryūsen-ji that assisted indigent blind women by teaching them how to play the shamisen (traditional stringed instrument) as a vocation, and helped them to find employment. These women were known as goze, and were akin to traveling minstrels in Edo period Japan. The women were granted membership to the guild-like organization, and musicians with apprentices were dispatched to various destinations. They played pieces from a sanctioned repertoire, and operated under a strict code of rules on behavior and permissible business transactions intended to maintain an upstanding reputation. On her deathbed, Lady Saigō wrote a letter pleading for the continued maintenance of the organization. ### Death Within a short time after taking up residence in Sunpu Castle, Lady Saigō's health began to deteriorate. It was said that "physical and emotional hardships" were taking their toll on her health, but nothing could be done to help her. Lady Saigō died on 1 July 1589, at the age of 37. The cause of her early death was never determined, and while murder was suspected at the time, no culprit was identified. There were later rumors that she was poisoned by a maidservant devoted to Ieyasu's late wife, the Lady Tsukiyama. By the time of her death, Lady Saigō was treated as Ieyasu's wife in deed if not in word. The remains of Lady Saigō were interred at Ryūsen-ji. At her death, a number of blind women reportedly gathered in front of the temple and prayed. ## Legacy Tokugawa Ieyasu continued his campaigns allied with Toyotomi Hideyoshi. After their victory at the siege of Odawara Castle in 1590, Ieyasu agreed to relinquish all of his domains to Hideyoshi in exchange for the Kantō region to the east. Hideyoshi died in 1598. By 1603, Ieyasu had recovered Sunpu Castle and completed his unification of Japan, and had been named shōgun by the Emperor. The following year, he had Ryūsen-ji moved from Yunoki to Kōyamachi near Sunpu Castle and attended Buddhist funeral rites conducted in honor of the late Lady Saigō on the anniversary of her death. To mark the occasion, Ieyasu presented the temple priests with the katana he inherited from his father, and a portrait of himself as he looked at the time. These items can still be viewed at the temple in Shizuoka city. In 1628, Tokugawa Hidetada, by then the retired second shōgun, attended ceremonies conducted in honor of his late mother on the anniversary of her death. These ceremonies were meant to help her spirit achieve buddha status. He also saw to it that she was made the honored tutelary patron of the temple by having her posthumous name changed and the first three characters appended to the name of the temple. Today, the temple Ryūsen-ji is known mainly by that appellation, Hōdai-in (宝台院). At the same time, the Emperor Go-Mizunoo conferred the name Minamoto Masako (源 晶子) upon Lady Saigō, in effect posthumously adopting her into the Minamoto clan, the extended family of the Imperial line. The new name was then inducted into the Lower First Rank of the Imperial Court. Her status was later upgraded to Senior First Rank, the highest and most prominent award, then or now, bestowed by the Emperor to a few subjects outside the Imperial family who had significantly and positively affected the history of Japan. In 1938, the mausoleum of Lady Saigō at Hōdai-in, which consisted of a five-tiered stupa over her grave and a sanctuary for the veneration of her spirit, was designated an Important Cultural Property. The designation was rescinded after the entire temple complex was destroyed in the Great Shizuoka Fire on 15 January 1940. The stupa remains, though evidence of the damage suffered when it toppled over is plainly visible. Many of the treasures of the temple, including a portrait of Lady Saigō and the sword and portrait bequeathed by Tokugawa Ieyasu in 1604, were saved by the priests who flung the objects out of windows and doorways before fleeing the burning temple. The temple was rebuilt using steel-reinforced concrete in 1970. Historical artifacts saved from the fire of 1940 are on display at the new Hōdai-in temple in Shizuoka city. ## Notable descendants Lady Saigō was the ancestral mother to the line of shōguns that began with the second Edo-period shōgun, Tokugawa Hidetada, and ended with the seventh, Tokugawa Ietsugu (1709–1716). Aside from this, Lady Saigō also became connected to the Imperial line. In 1620, Hidetada's daughter, Tokugawa Masako (1607–1678), married Emperor Go-Mizunoo and entered the Imperial palace. As empress consort, Masako helped maintain the Imperial Court, supported the arts, and significantly influenced the next three monarchs: the first was her daughter, and the two that followed, Emperors Go-Kōmyō and Go-Sai, were sons of Emperor Go-Mizunoo by different concubines. The daughter of Masako, and thus great-granddaughter of Lady Saigō, was Princess Okiko (1624–1696), who acceded to the Chrysanthemum Throne in 1629 as Empress Meishō. She reigned for fifteen years as the 109th monarch of Japan, the seventh of only eight empresses regnant in the history of Japan, until she abdicated in 1643. ## See also - Azuchi–Momoyama period

Greed (1924 film)

1924 film by Erich von Stroheim

Greed is a 1924 American silent psychological drama film written and directed by Erich von Stroheim and based on the 1899 Frank Norris novel McTeague. It stars Gibson Gowland as Dr. John McTeague; ZaSu Pitts as Trina Sieppe, his wife; and Jean Hersholt as McTeague's friend and eventual enemy Marcus Schouler. The film tells the story of McTeague, a San Francisco dentist, who marries his best friend Schouler's girlfriend Trina. Greed was one of the few films of its time to be shot entirely on location, with von Stroheim shooting approximately 85 hours of footage before editing. Two months alone were spent shooting in Death Valley for the film's final sequence, and many of the cast and crew became ill. Von Stroheim used sophisticated filming techniques such as deep focus cinematography and montage editing. He considered Greed to be a Greek tragedy, in which environment and heredity controlled the characters' fates and reduced them to primitive bêtes humaines (human beasts), a naturalistic concept in the vein of Zola. During editing, the production company merged into Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), putting Irving Thalberg in charge of post-production. Thalberg had fired von Stroheim a few years earlier at Universal Pictures. Originally almost eight hours long, Greed was edited against von Stroheim's wishes to about two-and-a-half hours. Only twelve people saw the full-length 42-reel version, now lost; some of them called it the greatest film ever made. Von Stroheim later called Greed his most fully realized work and was hurt both professionally and personally by the studio's re-editing of it. The uncut version has been called the "holy grail" for film archivists, amid repeated false claims of the discovery of the missing footage. In 1999, Turner Entertainment created a four-hour version that used existing stills of cut scenes to reconstruct the film. Greed was a critical and financial failure upon its initial release, but, by the 1950s, it began to be regarded as one of the greatest films ever made; filmmakers and scholars have noted its influence on subsequent films. In 1958, the film was voted number 6 on the prestigious Brussels 12 list at the 1958 World Expo. ## Synopsis In 1908, John McTeague works in a gold mine in Placer County, California. A traveling dentist calling himself Dr. "Painless" Potter visits the town, and McTeague's mother begs Potter to take her son on as an apprentice. Potter agrees and McTeague eventually becomes a dentist, practicing on Polk Street in San Francisco. Marcus Schouler brings Trina Sieppe, his cousin and intended fiancée, into McTeague's office for dental work. Schouler and McTeague are friends and McTeague gladly agrees to examine Trina. As they wait for an opening, she buys a lottery ticket. McTeague becomes enamored with Trina and begs Schouler for permission to court her. After seeing McTeague's conviction, Schouler agrees. Trina eventually agrees to marry McTeague and shortly afterwards her lottery ticket wins her \$5,000. Schouler bitterly claims that the money should have been his, causing a rift between him and McTeague. After McTeague and Trina wed, they continue to live in their small apartment with Trina refusing to spend her \$5,000. Schouler leaves San Francisco to become a cattle rancher. Before he goes, he secretly, in order to ruin his former friend, reports McTeague for practicing dentistry without a license. McTeague is ordered to shut down his practice or face jail. Even though she has saved over \$200 in addition to the original \$5,000 from the lottery ticket, Trina is still unwilling to spend her money. Money becomes increasingly scarce, with the couple forced to sell their possessions. McTeague finally snaps and bites Trina's fingers in a fit of rage. Later, he goes fishing to earn money, taking Trina's savings (now totaling \$450). Trina's bitten fingers become infected and have to be amputated. To earn money she becomes a janitor at a children's school. She withdraws the \$5,000 from the bank to keep it close to her, eventually spreading it on her bed so she can sleep on it. McTeague then returns, having spent the money he took, and asks Trina for more. The following day McTeague confronts Trina at the school. After a heated argument McTeague beats Trina to death and steals her \$5,000. Now an outlaw, McTeague returns to Placer County and teams up with a prospector named Cribbens. Headed towards Death Valley, they find a large quantity of quartz and plan to become millionaires. Before they can begin mining, McTeague senses danger and flees into Death Valley with a single horse, the remaining money and one water jug. Several marshals pursue him, joined by Schouler. Schouler wants to catch McTeague personally and rides into Death Valley alone. The oppressive heat slows McTeague's progress. Schouler's progress is also beginning to wane when he spies McTeague and moves in to arrest him. After a confrontation, McTeague's horse bolts and Schouler shoots it, puncturing the water container. The water spills onto the desert floor. The pair fight one last time, with McTeague proving the victor; however, Schouler has handcuffed himself to McTeague. The film ends with McTeague left in the desert with no horse and no water, handcuffed to a corpse and unable to reach the remaining money. ### Sub-plots Von Stroheim's original edit contained two main sub-plots that were later cut. The point of these sub-plots was to contrast two possible outcomes of Trina and McTeague's life together. The first depicted the lives of the junkman Zerkow and Maria Miranda Macapa, the young Mexican woman who collects junk for Zerkow and sold Trina the lottery ticket. Maria often talks about her imaginary solid gold dining set with Zerkow, who becomes obsessed by it. Eventually, believing she has riches hidden away, Zerkow marries her. He often asks about it, but she gives a different answer each time he mentions it. Zerkow does not believe her and becomes obsessed with prying the truth from her. He murders her and, after having lost his mind, leaps into San Francisco Bay. The second sub-plot depicts the lives of Charles W. Grannis and Miss Anastasia Baker. Grannis and Baker are two elderly boarders who share adjoining rooms in the apartment complex where Trina and McTeague live. Throughout their time at the apartment complex, they have not met. They both sit close to their adjoining wall and listen to the other for company, so they know almost everything about each other. They finally meet and cannot hide their long-time feelings for each other. When they reveal their love, Grannis admits he has \$5,000, making him just as rich as Trina. But this makes little difference to them. Eventually, they marry and a door connects their rooms. ## Cast - Gibson Gowland as Dr. John McTeague, a dentist - ZaSu Pitts as Trina Sieppe, McTeague's wife - Jean Hersholt as Marcus Schouler, McTeague's friend Prologue - Jack Curtis as McTeague's father - Tempe Pigott as McTeague's mother - Florence Gibson as a hag - Erich von Ritzau as Dr. "Painless" Potter, a traveling dentist Sieppe Family - Chester Conklin as Hans "Popper" Sieppe, Trina's father - Silvia Ashton as "Mommer" Sieppe, Trina's mother - Austen Jewell as August Sieppe, Trina's younger brother - Oscar Gottell as Max Sieppe, Trina's younger brother - Otto Gottell as Moritz Sieppe, Trina's younger brother - Joan Standing as Selina, Trina's cousin - Max Tyron as Uncle Rudolph Oelbermann, Trina's uncle Subplots - Dale Fuller as Maria Miranda Macapa, Zerkow's wife - Cesare Gravina as Zerkow, a junkman - Frank Hayes as Charles W. Grannis, proprietor of the Modern Dog Hospital - Fanny Midgley as Miss Anastasia Baker, Grannis's neighbor and later wife Friends and Neighbors at Polk Street - Hughie Mack as Mr. Heise, the harness maker - E. "Tiny" Jones as Mrs. Heise - J. Aldrich Libbey as Mr. Ryer - Reta Revela as Mrs. Ryer - S.S. Simon as Joe Frenna - Hugh J. McCauley as the photographer - William Mollenhauer as the palmist Others - William Barlow as the Minister - Lon Poff as the man from the lottery company - James F. Fulton as Cribbens, a prospector - James Gibson as a Deputy - Jack McDonald as the sheriff of Placer County - Erich von Stroheim as the balloon vendor ## Production ### Background and writing Greed is based on the American author Frank Norris's 1899 novel McTeague: A Story of San Francisco. Von Stroheim's interest in McTeague can be traced back to January 1920, when he told a journalist that he wanted to film the novel. He had lived in San Francisco in the early 1910s, living there in poverty like that of the story's characters. He eventually moved to Los Angeles, and worked his way up in the film industry from extra to acting in villainous or aristocratic roles in films. By 1919, von Stroheim had finally become a successful director in his own right at Universal Film Manufacturing Company, although one with a reputation of going over budget and over schedule. Upon the appointment of Irving Thalberg as general manager at Universal, von Stroheim's defiance of commercial and industrial norms was no longer tolerated. After Thalberg's prior shutdown of Foolish Wives in 1921 (which had been shooting nonstop for eleven months), and after six weeks of filming on Merry-Go-Round, von Stroheim was finally fired from the studio on October 6, 1922. This was a step unprecedented in Hollywood, heralding a new era in which the producer and the studio would hold artistic control over actors and directors. However, by this time von Stroheim had received several offers of contracts with other studios, even before being fired from Universal. He had met with executives of the Goldwyn Company on September 14, 1922, less than a month before, and he formally signed with them in late November. Von Stroheim chose his new studio because of the level of artistic freedom he was offered, which he had been denied at Universal under Thalberg. Since March of that year, Goldwyn had been run by Abe Lehr, who publicly promised that "each director will have his own staff and will be given every facility in putting into production his own individuality and personality." Von Stroheim signed a one-year, three-feature deal with Goldwyn on November 20, 1922. The deal stipulated that each feature would be between 4,500 and 8,500 feet (1,400 and 2,600 m) long, cost no more than \$175,000 and be completed in fourteen weeks. It also promised von Stroheim \$30,000 for each completed film. Lehr initially hired von Stroheim in order to film a big-budget version of the operetta The Merry Widow, which the producer saw as a guaranteed hit; von Stroheim, however, convinced Lehr to let him make Greed first, promising low costs. A press release of February 1923 said that although von Stroheim had "run rather freely to large sets in the past, [he] seems to have reformed—or surrendered—for it is announced that he will not build any sets at all." Von Stroheim wrote a highly detailed 300-page script that contained camera movements, composition and tint cues. Among the changes that he made to Norris's novel was giving McTeague the first name of John and omitting Norris's anti-Semitism. McTeague had been filmed once before as Life's Whirlpool, a five-reel short by William A. Brady's World Pictures, starring Broadway star Holbrook Blinn as McTeague, which had been released in 1916. Film critics disliked this version and von Stroheim later criticized Blinn's performance. According to film historian Kevin Brownlow, Life's Whirlpool was also shot on location in Death Valley. Von Stroheim was known for his meticulous perfectionism and attention to detail, as well as his insolence towards studio executives. Working on Greed, von Stroheim set out to make a realistic film about everyday people and rejected the Hollywood tropes of glamor, happy endings and upper-class characters. Before shooting began, von Stroheim told a reporter: > It is possible to tell a great story in motion pictures in such a way that the spectator forgets he is looking at beauteous Gertie Gefelta, the producer's pet and discovers himself intensely interested, just as if he were looking out of a window at life itself. He will come to believe that what he is gazing at is real—a cameraman was present in the household and nobody knew it. They went on in their daily life with their joys, fun and tragedies and the camera stole it all, holding it up afterward for all to see. In early January 1923, von Stroheim arrived in San Francisco, where he scouted locations and finished writing the shooting script. While researching for Greed, he attended society functions in town and met many friends of Frank Norris, including his brother Charles and his sister-in-law Kathleen. To capture the authentic spirit of the story, von Stroheim insisted on filming on location in San Francisco, the Sierra Nevada mountains, the Big Dipper Mine in Iowa Hill, and Death Valley. He rented some of the actual buildings that had inspired scenes in the novel. Other locations included Cliff House and San Francisco Bay. Norris had similarly scouted settings for his novel and chose the upstairs of a building on the corner of Polk and California street as McTeague's dentist office, as well as many of the saloons and lunch counters in the area. Von Stroheim discovered that many of the locations that Norris had described, such as Polk Street, had been destroyed in the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, but he was able to find suitable period locations on Hayes and Laguna streets. For authenticity, von Stroheim had no sets built in San Francisco and only redecorated existing locations, such as saloons, butcher shops, and wooden shacks, thus saving on construction costs. Despite the strict conditions of von Stroheim's initial contract, Goldwyn approved the lengthy shooting script before filming began. Production Manager J. J. Cohn later explained that "they thought they could control him when the time comes." ### Casting With the exception of Jean Hersholt, all of the main actors in Greed were regulars of von Stroheim's earlier films, a group dubbed the "Stroheim Stock Company". Gibson Gowland had previously appeared in Blind Husbands and returned to the U.S. from Scotland for the role of John McTeague. Cesare Gravina, who played the junkman Zerkow, and Dale Fuller, the lottery-ticket seller Maria, had both appeared in Foolish Wives and would later appear in The Merry Widow. Other actors in von Stroheim's Stock Company included Sidney Bracey, Mae Busch, George Fawcett, Maude George, Hughie Mack and George Nichols. Trina was the most difficult role to cast, and ZaSu Pitts was hired at the last minute, after von Stroheim had rejected both Claire Windsor and Colleen Moore. Pitts had previously acted only in comedic roles; Greed was her first dramatic part. The actress later appeared in both The Wedding March and Hello, Sister! Von Stroheim said that Pitts was "the greatest psychopathological actress in the American cinema" and that "she should not be in comedy, for she is the greatest of all tragediennes." Von Stroheim had met casually with Jean Hersholt to discuss the role of Marcus Schouler, but he was initially reluctant to cast him. However, after Hersholt adjusted his appearance and wardrobe to more closely resemble Schouler, von Stroheim changed his mind on the spot. With the exception of Gowland, von Stroheim shot extensive screen tests of all the other actors at Goldwyn with cinematographer Paul Ivano. A scene from the Goldwyn film Souls for Sale is thought to be behind-the-scenes footage of von Stroheim directing Greed, but it actually depicts him directing Hersholt during one of these screen tests. ### Filming Filming went on since March through October, 1923, for a total of 198 days, producing about 85 hours of footage. It started in San Francisco on March 13, 1923, and lasted there until late June. Despite the initial contract between von Stroheim and Goldwyn, Lehr agreed to double the film's budget to \$347,000 three days after shooting began. Von Stroheim had already worked twenty-hour days for over two months of pre-production and collapsed on set after a few days of filming. He remained in good health for the remainder of the shoot. This was not the only mishap on set; during scenes shot at San Francisco Bay, Cesare Gravina got double pneumonia, making von Stroheim bitterly ashamed that Gravina's entire performance was later cut from the film, despite the actor's dedication to the role. Hersholt was knocked out by Gowland during the picnic scene (later cut) in which McTeague and Schouler fight, and Pitts was almost run over by a trolley. In late May, Lehr visited von Stroheim on the set and praised the footage that he had seen, saying that "it has atmosphere, color and realism that could not possibly have been reproduced in the studio." One scene that von Stroheim re-shot at the studio's insistence depicted a younger McTeague in his apprenticeship with Potter. In the scene McTeague is too embarrassed to examine the teeth of a young woman and Potter has to take over. A thinly disguised ZaSu Pitts portrayed the woman so that the audience would see a resemblance to Trina, but the studio insisted that the scene was confusing and von Stroheim agreed to re-shoot it. Von Stroheim also conceded his original vision when shooting the bar confrontation between McTeague and Schouler. The director wanted to have a knife thrower actually throw a real knife at Gibson Gowland's head. Von Stroheim was overruled by Gowland himself, who refused to allow such a dangerous stunt. A special-effect shot was used instead. After filming in San Francisco wrapped in late June, the production traveled to Death Valley. Most Hollywood films that required desert scenes settled for the local Oxnard dunes north of Los Angeles, but von Stroheim insisted on authenticity. Death Valley had no roads, hotels, gas stations or running water and was occupied by tarantulas, scorpions and venomous snakes. The nearest populated area to the shoot was 100 miles (160 km) away and insurance coverage was denied. Filming in Death Valley lasted for two months during midsummer, allowing actors Gowland and Hersholt time to grow the beards necessary for the sequence. Some members of the production reported temperatures between 91 and 161 °F (33 and 72 °C), but the highest temperature officially recorded in Death Valley during the period was 123 °F (51 °C). Of the 43 members of the cast and crew who worked on the Death Valley sequence, 14 became ill and were sent back to Los Angeles. While shooting, crew members would collapse of heat exhaustion every day. Hersholt spent a week in the hospital after shooting was completed, suffering from internal bleeding. He claimed to have lost 27 pounds (12 kg), and was covered in blisters by the end of filming. Despite the hardship Hersholt said that he considered it the best role of his career. In order to motivate Hersholt and Gibson during the scene where they fight, von Stroheim yelled at them, "Fight, fight! Try to hate each other as you both hate me!" Throughout filming, von Stroheim brought musicians on set to help create mood for the actors. He continued to use this for the Death Valley scenes with a harmonium and violin player. A theme, inspired by the music of Ruggero Leoncavallo, was composed and played throughout production. Other music used included the popular songs "Nearer, My God, to Thee", "Hearts and Flowers", "Oh Promise Me", and "Call Me Thine Own". Filming moved to Placer County on September 13 and continued for less than a month. The Big Dipper Mine had been closed for ten years, so von Stroheim convinced the Goldwyn Company to lease and renovate it for filming. While first visiting Placer County during pre-production, von Stroheim had met Harold Henderson, a local resident and fan of Norris whose brother had worked in the mine in the 1890s. Von Stroheim hired Henderson to oversee the renovation of the mine and other locations in Iowa Hill. Von Stroheim also wanted to restore the local cemetery for a newly invented scene depicting McTeague's mother's funeral, but the Goldwyn Company turned down this proposal. Inside the mine, von Stroheim usually shot at night between 9 pm and 6 am. Cinematographer William H. Daniels later said that von Stroheim insisted on descending 3,000 feet (900 m) underground for realism, even though the setting would have looked exactly the same at 100 feet (30 m). Filming was completed on October 6, 1923, after 198 days. Despite his original contract stipulating that all films be under 8,500 feet (2,600 m), von Stroheim shot a total of 446,103 feet (135,972 m) of footage for the film, running approximately 85 hours. ### Style Von Stroheim's biographer Arthur Lennig compared the director's visual style to that of pioneering filmmaker D. W. Griffith, but felt that "unlike Griffith, who viewed scenes as though through a fourth wall, von Stroheim shot from many sides and from different angles; he also used deep focus, meaningful foregrounds and effective camera movement." Greed's lighting included high contrast, chiaroscuro techniques with pools or shafts of lights illuminating an otherwise dark space. Examples of this technique include the scene where McTeague begs Trina for money in a pool of moonlight and the merry-go-round scene in which characters alternate between appearing only as dark silhouettes and being fully lit. Daniels was especially proud of the wedding scene, which has a funeral procession visible through the window and was difficult to light properly. Greed has often been praised for its use of deep focus cinematography, seventeen years before its more-famous application in Citizen Kane. Daniels sometimes used incandescent lights instead of studio arc lights, due to the constraints of his locations. He later said that von Stroheim "was one of the first to insist on no make-up for men, on real paint on the walls which were shiny, real glass in the windows, pure white on sets and in costumes ... everything up to then had been painted a dull brown" to mask the scratches on worn-down film prints. Although not officially credited, Ernest B. Schoedsack worked on the picture as a camera operator. Von Stroheim favored "Soviet-style" montage editing. Greed often uses dramatic close-ups and cuts instead of long takes. One exception to this is the scene in which Schouler becomes angry with McTeague and breaks his pipe, which was shot in one long, unbroken take. Von Stroheim also used symbolic cross-cutting for dramatic effect, such as his use of animals in the film and a shot of a train when McTeague and Trina first kiss. In 1932 film theorist Andrew Buchanan called von Stroheim a montage director, stating that "each observation would be captured in a 'close-up' and at leisure, he would assemble his 'shots' in just the order which would most forcibly illustrate the fact." In the 1950s film critic André Bazin praised von Stroheim's use of mise en scène and noted his "one simple rule for directing. Take a close look at the world, keep on doing so and in the end it will lay bare for you all its cruelty and ugliness." Despite von Stroheim's reputation as a perfectionist, Greed contains anachronisms. In the scenes on Polk Street, the main characters are clothed in 1890s fashions, but the extras wear 1920s clothing. Von Stroheim did his best to avoid such historical mistakes; he shot only those buildings that were from the era Greed was set in, and he kept motor vehicles out of sight while filming. Daniels stated that, despite his desire for authenticity, von Stroheim sometimes had walls knocked out of real locations to achieve a desired camera position. ### Themes Frank Norris's novel belongs to the literary school of naturalism founded by French author Émile Zola. McTeague depicts the fate of its lower-class characters in terms of heredity and their environment, with the belief that "man's nature, despite free will, is determined by genetic and environmental factors" and that heredity controls fate, despite efforts at upward mobility. This literary style was influenced by Charles Darwin and portrayed characters whose higher states of being, the rational and compassionate, are in conflict with their lower states, the bête humaine (human beast). McTeague was first published in 1899 and was inspired by an October 1893 murder case in which Patrick Collins, a poor husband with a history of beating his wife Sarah, finally stole her money and stabbed her to death at her San Francisco workplace. Sarah Collins worked at the Lest Norris kindergarten, which was financed by Norris's family. Von Stroheim did not see Greed as political and told a journalist that he considered it to be like a Greek tragedy. Despite the characters' struggles with poverty and class, von Stroheim followed the naturalist technique of portraying characters whose lives are driven by fate and their inner nature. Von Stroheim employed variations of this theme in his other films, which often involved a commoner falling in love with an aristocrat or royal. One of the cinematic techniques by which von Stroheim portrayed naturalism was animal symbolism. In Greed McTeague is associated with a canary, only briefly mentioned in the novel. Von Stroheim altered Norris's original ending and has McTeague release the canary in Death Valley. McTeague buys Trina a female canary as a wedding gift and early in their marriage von Stroheim cuts from a shot of them kissing to birds fluttering wildly in their cage. Another scene with animal imagery includes cross-cutting between a cat attempting to pounce on the canaries in the scene where Schouler bids goodbye to McTeague and Trina without telling them that he has informed on McTeague. Dogs, cats and monkeys are associated with various supporting characters. Von Stroheim also used the naturalist technique of giving characters specific objects, gestures or phrases that repeat throughout the film as a visual leitmotif. For example, Trina tugs on her lips and McTeague fiddles with his birdcage. Throughout his career von Stroheim used grotesque imagery and characters. This is most apparent in the wedding-banquet scene, which includes a midget, a hunchback, a woman with buck teeth and a boy on crutches. The wedding guests violently and crudely devour their meal like animals. This scene was unlike any other in films of that period, which treated meals with dignity and a sense of communion. Other instances of grotesque imagery include Trina's fingers becoming infected and amputated. Von Stroheim contrasted love scenes between McTeague and Trina with their ugly, lower-class environment, such as the sewer with the dead rat and a garbage truck driving by as they kiss. As in his other films, von Stroheim used Christian imagery and symbols, such as crosses and churches. Trina first shows signs of greed on Easter Sunday and is murdered by McTeague on Christmas Eve. Christmas Eve was often depicted in von Stroheim's films and was close to the date of his father's death. Lennig asserted that the character of McTeague's father (who was only briefly mentioned in the novel) is based on von Stroheim's own father, while McTeague's mother is a tribute to von Stroheim's mother, to whom Greed is dedicated. Von Stroheim stated that he considered all of his good qualities to have come from his mother and all of his bad qualities to have come from his father. ## Editing ### Initial editing Editing Greed took almost a year and von Stroheim's contract did not include payment for his post-production work. He and his chief film cutter Frank Hull worked on the film for several months before completing a rough cut. Von Stroheim was indecisive during editing. He felt restricted by his contract's limitation on the length of the film. Von Stroheim colored certain scenes with gold tinting by using the Handschiegl Color Process, in which individual frames are hand colored with stencils. Von Stroheim credited himself in the beginning titles with "Personally directed by Erich von Stroheim." Other than studio personnel, only twelve people saw the original 42-reel version of Greed at a special screening in January 1924; they included Harry Carr, Rex Ingram, Aileen Pringle, Carmel Myers, Idwal Jones, Joseph Jackson, Jack Jungmeyer, Fritz Tidden, Welford Beaton, Valentine Mandelstam, and Jean Bertin. After the screening Jones, Carr and Ingram all agreed that they had just seen the greatest film ever made and that it was unlikely that a better film would ever be made. Carr wrote a review of the advance screening where he raved that he "saw a wonderful picture the other day—that no one else will ever see ... I can't imagine what they are going to do with it. It is like Les Miserables. Episodes come along that you think have no bearing on the story, then 12 or 14 reels later it hits you with a crash. For stark, terrible realism and marvelous artistry, it is the greatest picture I have ever seen. But I don't know what it will be like when it shrinks to 8 reels." Jonathan Rosenbaum suggested that Carr was most likely referring to a cut sequence early in the film that introduced all of the characters who lived in McTeague's building. The forty-minute scene depicted what the tenants did on a Saturday afternoon, and established cinematic atmosphere without furthering the plot. Rosenbaum compared the cut sequence to novels of the 19th century and to the first few hours of Jacques Rivette's Out 1. Jones publicly praised the advance screening and compared Greed to The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari and Dr. Mabuse the Gambler. However, Welford Beaton of The Film Spectator disliked the 42-reel version and criticized its excessive use of close-ups. Many sources claim that the 42-reel version was only ever intended to be a rough cut, and that Von Stroheim chose to cut it down to 24 reels by March 18, 1924, with the intention of screening it with intermissions over two nights. The director had difficulty cutting the film down, telling his friend Don Ryan, "I could take out sequences and thus get the job over in a day. That would be child's play. But I can't do it. It would leave gaps that could only be bridged through titles. When you do such a thing you have illustrated subtitles instead of a motion picture." Von Stroheim later claimed that at this time the Goldwyn Company wanted him to shoot a scene of McTeague waking up in his dentist chair, showing the entire film to have been a bad dream. While von Stroheim was editing the 24-reel cut June Mathis, who was the head of the Goldwyn Story Department, had made her own 13-reel version of Greed by January 21, 1924. She ordered even more cuts to be made on January 29, but then left for Rome in early February to oversee the production of Ben-Hur and was uninvolved in the film's editing for several months. After having completed the 24-reel cut of Greed, von Stroheim told Goldwyn executives that he could not cut another frame. Goldwyn producers thought that this version was still too long and told him to cut it to a more manageable length. Von Stroheim then sent the film to his friend, director Rex Ingram, who turned it over to his editor, Grant Whytock. Whytock had worked with von Stroheim on The Devil's Pass Key and was familiar with the director's style and tastes. Whytock initially proposed that it be split in two, with one 8-reel film ending with the wedding and a second 7-reel film ending at Death Valley. Whytock eventually cut the film down to 18 reels. His only major cut was the entire subplot of Zerkow and Maria, which he thought was "very distasteful". Otherwise he simply cut down scenes and cut out 1,200 feet (400 m) of quick "flash" shots that only lasted a few frames. However, Whytock's version of Greed retained the prologue and other subplots, as well as much of the humor that was later cut out of it. Whytock and Ingram screened their version of Greed to studio executives, who responded favorably to it but worried that the tragic ending would be hard to sell to the public. Ingram then sent the 18-reel version to von Stroheim and told him, "If you cut one more frame I shall never speak to you again." On April 10, 1924, the Goldwyn Company officially agreed to merge with Metro Pictures, putting von Stroheim's nemesis Thalberg directly in charge of Greed. Von Stroheim and Louis B. Mayer had a lengthy confrontation over the film's editing, which according to both men ended with von Stroheim claiming that all women were whores and Mayer punching him. Mayer disliked the film because of its lack of glamor, optimism, or morality and considered it to be a guaranteed flop. ### Studio editing MGM executives screened Greed at full length once to meet contractual obligations. Idwal Jones, a San Francisco critic, attended the all-day screening and wrote that while some of the scenes were compelling, von Stroheim's desire that "every comma of the book [be] put in" was ultimately negative. MGM then took control and re-edited it. The studio ordered June Mathis to cut it down further; she assigned the job to an editor named Joseph W. Farnham. Farnham was a well-known "titles editor", who patched scenes together using title cards to keep continuity. His contributions to Greed include the notorious title cards "Such was McTeague" and "Let's go over and sit on the sewer", which were snickered at for years. Eventually, Farnham reduced Greed to 10 reels, totaling 10,607 feet (3,233 m). Von Stroheim said that the film "was cut by a hack with nothing on his mind but his hat." He later bitterly lamented that Greed was made before the financial success of Eugene O'Neill's five-hour play Strange Interlude in 1928. Von Stroheim angrily disowned the final version, blaming Mathis for destroying his masterpiece. One week before Greed's release the New York State Motion Picture Committee (which censored films) demanded several more cuts on moral grounds. These cuts included the administration of ether in the dental scenes and certain instances of foul language. Although these cuts were made to prints that were screened in New York State, the footage was kept in many other prints. ### Difference between von Stroheim's cut and MGM's cut The main cuts to Greed were the elimination of its two sub-plots and other entire sequences, while individual scenes were often not touched. Commenting about the cuts made in the film to the Los Angeles Times, Thalberg stated: > This whole story is about greed—a progressive greed. It is the story of the way greed grew in Trina's heart until it obsessed her. I found that the junk dealer's greed was so much greater than hers that it almost destroyed the theme. His intense greed drowned out Trina's greed just as a steam whistle drowns out a small street noise. Instead of hurting the picture, throwing out this junk dealer's story made the picture stronger. Thalberg also stated that he "took no chances in cutting it. We took it around to different theaters in the suburbs, ran it at its enormous length, and then we took note of the places at which interest seemed to droop." Individual scenes or sequences that were cut include McTeague and Trina's early, happy years of marriage, the sequence showing McTeague and Trina eventually moving into their shack, the family life of the Sieppe family before Trina's marriage, the prologue depicting McTeague's mother and father at the Big Dipper mine and McTeague's apprenticeship. Other cuts included the more suggestive and sexual close-up shots depicting McTeague and Trina's physical attraction to each other, the scenes after McTeague has murdered Trina and roams around San Francisco and Placer County, additional footage of Death Valley, additional footage of Trina with her money, and a more gradual version of Trina's descent into greed and miserly obsession. ## Reception ### Release and critical reviews Greed premiered on December 4, 1924 at the Cosmopolitan Theatre in Columbus Circle, New York City, which was owned by William Randolph Hearst. Frank Norris had once worked for Hearst as a foreign correspondent during the Spanish–American War and Hearst praised Greed, calling it the greatest film he had ever seen. Hearst's newspapers promoted the film, but MGM did very little advertising. At the time of the release von Stroheim was in Los Angeles, having begun production on The Merry Widow on December 1. In May 1926 Greed was released in Berlin, where its premiere famously caused a riot at the theater that may have been instigated by members of the then-fledgling Nazi party. Greed received mostly negative reviews. The trade paper Harrison's Report said that "[i]f a contest were to be held to determine which has been the filthiest, vilest, most putrid picture in the history of the motion picture business, I am sure that Greed would win." Variety Weekly called it "an out-and-out box office flop" only six days after its premiere and claimed that the film had taken two years to shoot, cost \$700,000 and was originally 130 reels long. The review went on to say that "nothing more morbid and senseless, from a commercial picture standpoint, has been seen on the screen for a long, long time" and that despite its "excellent acting, fine direction and the undoubted power of its story ... it does not entertain." In its December 1924 – January 1925 issue, Exceptional Photoplays called it "one of the most uncompromising films ever shown on the screen. There have already been many criticisms of its brutality, its stark realism, its sordidness. But the point is that it was never intended to be a pleasant picture." In the February 1925 issue of Theatre Magazine, Aileen St. John-Brenon wrote that "the persons in the photoplay are not characters, but types—they are well selected, weighed and completely drilled. But they did not act; they do not come to life. They perform their mission like so many uncouth images of miserliness and repugnant animalism." Mordaunt Hall of the New York Times gave the film a mostly positive review in regards to the acting and directing while criticizing how it was edited, writing that MGM "clipped this production as much as they dared ... and are to be congratulated on their efforts and the only pity is that they did not use the scissors more generously in the beginning." In a Life Magazine article, Robert E. Sherwood also defended MGM's cutting of the film and called von Stroheim "a genius ... badly in need of a stopwatch." Iris Barry of the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) disliked the tinting, saying "a not very pleasing yellow tinge is smudged in." A March 1925 review in Pictureplay magazine stated, "perhaps an American director would not have seen greed as a vice." A more favorable review came from Richard Watts, Jr. of the New York Herald Tribune, who called Greed "the most important picture yet produced in America ... It is the one picture of the season that can hold its own as a work of dramatic art worthy of comparison with such stage plays as What Price Glory? and Desire Under the Elms." The April 20, 1925 edition of The Montreal Gazette claimed it "impresses as a powerful film" and described the "capacity audience" screening as "one of the few pictures which are as worthy of serious consideration ... which offer a real and convincing study of life and character and that secure their ends by artistic and intellectual means rather than by writing down to the level of the groundlings." The review went on to describe the direction as "masterly", citing "its remarkable delineation of character development and the subtle touches which convey ideas through vision rather than the written word, an all too-rare employment of the possibilities of the cinema play as a distinct branch of art capable of truthful and convincing revelation and interpretation of life's realities." A review in Exceptional Photoplays stated that "Mr. von Stroheim has always been the realist as Rex Ingram is the romanticist and Griffith the sentimentalist of the screen, and in Greed he has given us an example of realism at its starkest. Like the novel from which the plot was taken, Greed is a terrible and wonderful thing." ### Box office Greed was a financial disappointment. On its initial run, it earned \$224,500 in the United States, \$3,063 in Canada and \$47,264 in other markets. In total it earned \$274,827. Von Stroheim's biographer Arthur Lennig stated that according to MGM's records the final cost of Greed was \$546,883. Another biographer, Richard Koszarski, stated that its final cost was \$665,603: \$585,250 for the production, \$30,000 for von Stroheim's personal fee, \$54,971 for processing and editing, \$53,654 for advertising and \$1,726 for Motion Picture dues. Arthur Lennig asserted that MGM's official budget for Greed was suspiciously high for a film with no stars, no built sets, a small crew and inexpensive film stock. Lennig suspects that MGM averaged the film's cost with the more expensive The Merry Widow in order to prevent von Stroheim from getting a percentage of the more profitable film. The Merry Widow ended up being a hit and earned more profits than Greed had lost; it cost \$614,961 but earned \$996,226 on its initial run. ## Legacy In his final years, von Stroheim said that "of all my films, only Greed was a fully realized work; only Greed had a total validity." In 1926 a British foundation of arts and sciences requested a copy of the original version of Greed to keep in their archive, but their request was denied by MGM. Henri Langlois screened the studio version of Greed for von Stroheim in 1950. Von Stroheim said, "It was for me an exhumation. It was like opening a coffin in which there was just dust, giving off a terrible stench, a couple of vertebra and a piece of shoulder bone." He went on to say that "It was as if a man's beloved was run over by a truck, maimed beyond recognition. He goes to see her in the morgue. Of course, he still loves her but it's only the memory of her that he can love—because he doesn't recognize her anymore." In the early 1950s Greed's reputation began to grow and it appeared on several lists of the greatest films ever made. In 1952 at the Festival Mondial du Film et des Beaux Arts de Belgique, Greed was named the fifth greatest film ever made, with such directors as Luchino Visconti, Orson Welles, Luis Buñuel and Billy Wilder voting for it. Later in 1952, Sight and Sound magazine published its first list of the "ten greatest films ever made". Greed was tied for 7th place on that list, with such critics as Andre Bazin, Lotte Eisner, Curtis Harrington, Penelope Houston and Gavin Lambert voting for it. In 1962 it was tied for 4th on the same list. Since 1972 it has failed to reach a spot on the top ten. The Cinémathèque royale de Belgique released a list of "the most important and misappreciated American films of all time" in 1978. Greed was third on its list after Citizen Kane and Sunrise: A Song of Two Humans. In a University of Southern California list of the "50 Most Significant American Films" made by the school's Performing Arts Council, Greed was listed as number 21. In 1991 Greed was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". In 2020, the film's copyright lapsed, entering into the public domain. ### Influence Among those who have praised Greed over the years are Sergei Eisenstein; Joseph von Sternberg, who said, "We were all influenced by Greed"; Jean Renoir, who called it "the film of films"; and Ernst Lubitsch, who called von Stroheim "the only true 'novelist'" in films. More recently Guillermo del Toro called it "a perfect reflection of the anxiety permeating the passage into the 20th century and the absolute dehumanization that was to come", and Norbert Pfaffenbichler said that "the last shot of the movie is unforgettable." American writer, filmmaker, philosopher and political activist, Susan Sontag named Greed as one of her favorite films. Jonathan Rosenbaum has stated that Greed was a major influence on the style and content of many films. von Stroheim's shots filming the sun predated Akira Kurosawa's better-known uses of the technique in Rashomon (1950). Rosenbaum compared specific shot set-ups in Greed to shots in King Vidor's The Crowd, Jean Renoir's Le Crime de Monsieur Lange, Orson Welles's The Magnificent Ambersons, Howard Hawks' To Have and Have Not and Michelangelo Antonioni's L'Avventura. In addition, he likened certain plot elements or characters in Greed to John Huston's The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948), Alfred Hitchcock's Rear Window (1954), Claude Chabrol's Les Bonnes Femmes (1960) and Elaine May's Mikey and Nicky (1975). Rosenbaum singled out von Stroheim's influence on May, an American director, with Mikey and Nicky centering on the disintegration of a friendship over money and sex, and including grotesque elements and characters caught between innocence and corruption. Rosenbaum also asserts that Orson Welles's use of satirical caricatures in all of his films is in "the spirit of von Stroheim". The two films most commonly compared to Greed are Huston's The Treasure of the Sierra Madre and Welles's The Magnificent Ambersons. Rosenbaum believes that besides Huston's film ending with gold being lost in the desert and similarities between Trina's descent into madness with Fred C. Dobbs own obsessions, the two films have little else in common. The Magnificent Ambersons and Greed both have characters who struggle with class differences that lead to their downfall. Ambersons was famously edited down drastically by its studio and the cut footage is now lost. Rosenbaum goes on to state that Greed influenced the methods in which novels are adapted into films and filmmakers like Welles, Huston and Bill Forsyth followed von Stroheim's example by re-arranging the plot and adding new scenes to their films while still remaining faithful to the intentions of the original novels. In the first chapter of the 1966 serial film Captain Celluloid vs. the Film Pirates, the uncut version of Greed is used as a plot device. The 1994 Jonathan Lynn film Greedy pays tribute to the film by giving the main characters the last name McTeague. ### Reconstruction Attempts to reconstruct the uncut version of Greed without use of the lost footage first began in 1958. At the Brussels International Exposition, the Cinémathèque royale de Belgique named Greed as one of the twelve greatest films ever made and simultaneously published von Stroheim's original, uncut script for Greed, which came directly from von Stroheim's personal copy preserved by his widow Denise Vernac. This publication led to three separate books that all used von Stroheim's script in order to reconstruct the original version of the film and compare it to the released version: a French book edited by Jacques-G. Perret in 1968 and two versions edited by Joel Finler and Herman G. Weinberg, both in 1972. Weinberg's book utilized 400 individual stills and production photos to reconstruct the uncut version of Greed, the first time that images from the uncut version were publicly available. In 1999, Turner Entertainment decided to recreate, as closely as possible, the original version by combining the existing footage with over 650 still photographs of the lost scenes (many of which had been used in Weinberg's book), in accordance with an original continuity outline written by von Stroheim. All materials were provided by the Margaret Herrick Library. This restoration runs almost four hours. It was produced by film preservationist Rick Schmidlin and edited by Glenn Morgan. Schmidlin restored many characters and sub-plots from the original version. A new musical score was composed by Robert Israel. The reconstruction cost \$100,000 to produce. Schmidlin called the finished product "a reconstruction of Von Stroheim's lost narrative." It premiered at the 1999 Telluride Film Festival and was later screened at the Venice Film Festival and the Pordenone Silent Film Festival before being aired on Turner Classic Movies on December 5, 1999. Film critic Todd McCarthy called the restored version of Greed a triumph. Roger Ebert called Greed a masterpiece and said that the restored Schmidlin cut illustrates the "prudish sensibilities [that] went into MGM's chop job." Rosenbaum praised the project, but claimed it could only be considered a "study version". The reconstruction won a special citation from the Los Angeles Film Critics Association Awards. ## Myths and misconceptions Von Stroheim was known to exaggerate events from his life and create myths about himself, such as his fictitious aristocratic origins and military record in Austria. He claimed that shortly after having moved to the US in the early 1910s, he had found a copy of McTeague in a motel in New York and had read it in one sitting. He also said that wanting to adapt the book inspired him to make a career in filmmaking. Georges Sadoul later stated that von Stroheim had first read the novel in 1914, while living in poverty in Los Angeles. Claims that von Stroheim's original cut was a completely unabridged version of McTeague are not accurate. Von Stroheim's 300-page script was almost as long as the original novel, but he rethought the entire story and invented new scenes, as well as extensively elaborating existing ones. In the Norris novel, McTeague's back story in Placer County and relationships with his father, mother and Potter were remembered as a flashback and took two paragraphs. In von Stroheim's original Greed, this sequence took up the first hour of the film and was not a flashback. Von Stroheim also modernized the novel's time span to between 1908 and 1923, a quarter-century later than the novel. Greed has sometimes been said to be over 100 reels long. von Stroheim said that his initial edit was 42 reels, although several of the people who saw this cut remembered it as being anywhere from 42 to 47 reels. Grant Whytock remembered the edited version that von Stroheim initially sent to him as between 26 and 28 reels. MGM's official studio files list the original cut of the film at 22 reels. As recently as 1992, former MGM Story Editor Samuel Marx erroneously claimed that the original version of Greed was 70 reels. June Mathis is credited with co-writing the script due to her work on the 10-reel version. Mathis was the head of the Story Department at MGM and her contract stipulated that she would receive writing credit for all MGM films. She did not actually write any part of the screenplay. She is said to have changed its title from McTeague to Greed during post-production; however, a publicity still of the cast and crew taken during production clearly indicates that it was titled Greed before the MGM merger even took place. The film's working title was "Greedy Wives", a nod towards von Stroheim's previous film Foolish Wives; this working title never was considered as the film's actual title. The original version of Greed has been called the "holy grail" for film archivists. Various reports of the original version being uncovered have proved to be unfounded. Among these "sightings" are a claim that a copy existed in a vault in South America that only was screened once a year for invited guests on New Year's Eve. Another claim was that a copy in the possession of a Texan millionaire was sold to Henri Langlois of Cinémathèque Française. Other claims include that a film society in Boston held a private screening of a print found by a World War II veteran in Berlin from a tip by Emil Jannings, that David Shepherd of the American Film Institute had found a copy at a garage sale, and that the head of a film society in Redwood City, California owned "the longest existing version of Greed (purchased in Europe)." von Stroheim himself once stated that Benito Mussolini owned a personal copy of the film. Von Stroheim's son Joseph von Stroheim once claimed that when he was in the Army during World War II, he saw a version of the film that took two nights to fully screen, although he could not remember exactly how long it was. There were also reports that MGM had retained a copy of the original version. Iris Barry of the Museum of Modern Art claimed that a copy was locked in the MGM vaults, although Thalberg denied it. It was also reported that John Houseman had a private screening at MGM and that MGM owned two copies stored in a vault in a Utah salt mine. Lotte Eisner once claimed that in the 1950s and 1960s, several cans of films labeled "McTeague" were found in MGM's vaults and destroyed by executives who did not know that it was footage from Greed. MGM executive Al Lewin said that several years after the film's release von Stroheim asked him for the cut footage. Lewin and editor Margaret Booth searched MGM's vault but could not find any missing footage. ## See also - List of early color feature films - List of fiction works made into feature films - List of films cut over the director's opposition - List of incomplete or partially lost films - List of longest films

Elizabeth David

British cookery writer (1913–1992)

Elizabeth David CBE (born Elizabeth Gwynne, 26 December 1913 – 22 May 1992) was a British cookery writer. In the mid-20th century she strongly influenced the revitalisation of home cookery in her native country and beyond with articles and books about European cuisines and traditional British dishes. Born to an upper-class family, David rebelled against social norms of the day. In the 1930s she studied art in Paris, became an actress, and ran off with a married man with whom she sailed in a small boat to Italy, where their boat was confiscated. They reached Greece, where they were nearly trapped by the German invasion in 1941, but escaped to Egypt, where they parted. She then worked for the British government, running a library in Cairo. While there she married, but she and her husband separated soon after and subsequently divorced. In 1946 David returned to England, where food rationing imposed during the Second World War remained in force. Dismayed by the contrast between the bad food served in Britain and the simple, excellent food to which she had become accustomed in France, Greece and Egypt, she began to write magazine articles about Mediterranean cooking. They attracted favourable attention, and in 1950, at the age of 36, she published A Book of Mediterranean Food. Her recipes called for ingredients such as aubergines, basil, figs, garlic, olive oil and saffron, which at the time were scarcely available in Britain. Books on French, Italian and, later, English cuisine followed. By the 1960s David was a major influence on British cooking. She was deeply hostile to anything second-rate, to over-elaborate cooking, and bogus substitutes for classic dishes and ingredients. In 1965 she opened a shop selling kitchen equipment, which continued to trade under her name after she left it in 1973. David's reputation rests on her articles and her books, which have been continually reprinted. Between 1950 and 1984 she published eight books; after her death her literary executor completed a further four that she had planned and worked on. David's influence on British cooking extended to professional as well as domestic cooks, and chefs and restaurateurs of later generations such as Terence Conran, Simon Hopkinson, Prue Leith, Jamie Oliver, Tom Parker Bowles and Rick Stein have acknowledged her importance to them. In the US, cooks and writers including Julia Child, Richard Olney and Alice Waters have written of her influence. ## Life and career ### Early years David was born Elizabeth Gwynne, the second of four children, all daughters, of Rupert Sackville Gwynne and his wife, the Hon Stella Gwynne, daughter of the 1st Viscount Ridley. Both parents' families had considerable fortunes, the Gwynnes from engineering and land speculation and the Ridleys from coal mining. Through the two families, David was of English, Scottish and Welsh or Irish descent and, through an ancestor on her father's side, also Dutch and Sumatran. She and her sisters grew up at Wootton Manor in Sussex, a seventeenth-century manor house with extensive, early twentieth-century additions by Detmar Blow. Her father, despite having a weak heart, insisted on pursuing a demanding political career, becoming Conservative MP for Eastbourne, and a junior minister in Bonar Law's government. Overwork, combined with his vigorous recreational pastimes, chiefly racing, riding, and womanising, brought about his death in 1924, aged 51. The widowed Stella Gwynne was a dutiful mother, but her relations with her daughters were distant rather than affectionate. Elizabeth and her sisters, Priscilla, Diana and Felicité were sent away to boarding schools. Having been a pupil at Godstowe preparatory school in High Wycombe, Elizabeth was sent to St Clare's Private School for Ladies, Tunbridge Wells, which she left at the age of sixteen. The girls grew up knowing nothing of cooking, which in upper-class households of the time was the exclusive province of the family's cook and her kitchen staff. As a teenager David enjoyed painting, and her mother thought her talent worth developing. In 1930 she was sent to Paris, where she studied painting privately and enrolled at the Sorbonne for a course in French civilisation which covered history, literature and architecture. She found her Sorbonne studies arduous and in many ways uninspiring, but they left her with a love of French literature and a fluency in the language that remained with her throughout her life. She lodged with a Parisian family, whose fanatical devotion to the pleasures of the table she portrayed to comic effect in her French Provincial Cooking (1960). Nevertheless, she acknowledged in retrospect that the experience had been the most valuable part of her time in Paris: "I realized in what way the family had fulfilled their task of instilling French culture into at least one of their British charges. Forgotten were the Sorbonne professors. ... What had stuck was the taste for a kind of food quite ideally unlike anything I had known before." Stella Gwynne was not eager for her daughter's early return to England after qualifying for her Sorbonne diploma, and sent her from Paris to Munich in 1931 to study German. ### Actress After returning to England in 1932 David unenthusiastically went through the social rituals for upper-class young women of presentation at court as a débutante and the associated balls. The respectable young Englishmen she met at the latter did not appeal to her. David's biographer Lisa Chaney comments that with her "delicately smouldering looks and her shyness shielded by a steely coolness and barbed tongue" she would have been a daunting prospect for the young upper-class men she encountered. David decided that she was not good enough as a painter and, to her mother's displeasure, became an actress. She joined J. B. Fagan's company at the Oxford Playhouse in 1933. Her fellow performers included Joan Hickson, who decades later recalled having to show her new colleague how to make a cup of tea, so unaware of the kitchen was David in those days. From Oxford, David moved to the Open Air Theatre in Regent's Park, London, the following year. She rented rooms in a large house near the park, spent a generous 21st birthday present on equipping the kitchen, and learned to cook. A gift from her mother of The Gentle Art of Cookery by Hilda Leyel was her first cookery book. She later wrote, "I wonder if I would have ever learned to cook at all if I had been given a routine Mrs Beeton to learn from, instead of the romantic Mrs Leyel with her rather wild, imagination-catching recipes." At Regent's Park David made little professional progress. The company was distinguished, headed by Nigel Playfair and Jack Hawkins, and, in the leading female roles, Anna Neagle and Margaretta Scott. David was restricted to bit parts. Among her colleagues in the company was an actor nine years her senior, Charles Gibson Cowan. His disregard for social conventions appealed strongly to her, and she also found him sexually irresistible. His being married did not daunt either of them, and they began an affair that outlasted her stage career. Chaney comments, "Cowan was the ultimate outsider. He was working class, left wing, Jewish, an actor, a pickpocket, a vagabond, who lived in caves in Hastings for a time. Her mother called him a 'pacifist worm'. He was a sexual presence, and slept with anything that moved." David's mother strongly disapproved, and tried to put a stop to the affair. She arranged for her daughter to spend several weeks holidaying with family and friends in Malta in the first half of 1936 and in Egypt later in the same year, but in her 1999 biography Artemis Cooper comments that David's lengthy absence failed to detach her from her involvement with Cowan. During her stay in Malta, David was able to spend time learning from her hostess's cook, Angela, who was happy to pass on her expertise. Although she could produce elaborate grand dinners when required, the most important lesson she taught David was to work day in, day out, with all available ingredients, showing her how to make an old bird or a stringy piece of meat into a good dish. ### France, Greece, Egypt and India After her return to London in early 1937, David recognised that she was not going to be a success on the stage, and abandoned thoughts of a theatrical career. Later in the year she took a post as a junior assistant at the fashion house of Worth, where elegant young women from upper-class backgrounds were sought after as recruits. She found the subservience of retail work irksome, and resigned in early 1938. Over the next few months she spent time holidaying in the south of France and on Corsica, where she was greatly taken with the outgoing nature of the people she stayed with and the simple excellence of their food. After returning to London, and disenchanted with life there, she joined Cowan in buying a small boat—a yawl with an engine—with the intention of sailing it to Greece. They crossed the Channel in July 1939 and navigated the boat through the canal system of France to the Mediterranean coast. The outbreak of the Second World War in September 1939 halted their progress. After stopping briefly at Marseille they sailed on to Antibes, where they remained for more than six months, unable to gain permission to leave. There David met and became greatly influenced by the ageing writer Norman Douglas, about whom she later wrote extensively. He inspired her love of the Mediterranean, encouraged her interest in good food, and taught her to "search out the best, insist on it, and reject all that was bogus and second-rate". Cooper describes him as David's most important mentor. David and Cowan finally left Antibes in May 1940, sailing to Corsica and then towards Sicily. They had reached the Strait of Messina when Italy entered the war on 10 June. They were suspected of spying and were interned. After 19 days in custody in various parts of Italy, they were allowed to cross the border into Yugoslavia, which at that point remained neutral and non-combatant. They had lost almost everything they owned—the boat, money, manuscripts, notebooks, and David's cherished collection of recipes. With the help of the British Consul in Zagreb, they crossed into Greece, and arrived in Athens in July 1940. By this time, David was no longer in love with her partner but remained with him from necessity. Cowan found a job teaching English on the island of Syros, where David learnt to cook with the fresh ingredients available locally. When the Germans invaded Greece in April 1941, the couple managed to leave on a civilian convoy to Egypt. Able to speak excellent French and good German, David secured a job in the naval cipher office in Alexandria. She was quickly rescued from temporary refugee accommodation, having met an old English friend who had an "absurdly grandiose" flat in the city and invited her to keep house for him. She and Cowan amicably went their separate ways, and she moved into the grand flat. She engaged a cook, Kyriacou, a Greek refugee, whose eccentricities (sketched in a chapter of Is There a Nutmeg in the House?) did not prevent him from producing magnificent food: "The flavour of that octopus stew, the rich wine dark sauce and the aroma of mountain herbs was something not easily forgotten." In 1942 she caught an infection that affected her feet. She spent some weeks in hospital and felt obliged to give up her job in the cipher office. She then moved to Cairo, where she was asked to set up and run a reference library for the British Ministry of Information. The library was open to everyone and was much in demand by journalists and other writers. Her circle of friends in this period included Alan Moorehead, Freya Stark, Bernard Spencer, Patrick Kinross, Olivia Manning and Lawrence Durrell. At her tiny flat in the city, she employed Suleiman, a Sudanese suffragi (a cook-housekeeper). She recalled: > Suleiman performed minor miracles with two Primus stoves and an oven which was little more than a tin box perched on top of them. His soufflés were never less than successful. ... For three or four years I lived mainly on rather rough but highly flavoured colourful shining vegetable dishes, lentil or fresh tomato soups, delicious spiced pilaffs, lamb kebabs grilled over charcoal, salads with cool mint-flavoured yoghurt dressings, the Egyptian fellahin dish of black beans with olive oil and lemon and hard-boiled eggs—these things were not only attractive but also cheap. Cooper comments on this period of David's life, "Pictures of her at the time show a quintessential librarian, dressed in a dark cardigan over a white shirt with a prim little collar buttoned up to the neck: but at night, dressed in exotic spangled caftans, she was a different creature: drinking at Hedjaki's bar, eating at the P'tit Coin de France, dancing on the roof of the Continental and then going on to Madame Badia's nightclub or the glamorous Auberge des Pyramides." In her years in Cairo, David had a number of affairs. She enjoyed them for what they were, but only once fell in love. That was with a young officer, Peter Laing, but the relationship came to an end when he was seriously wounded and returned to his native Canada. Several other of her young men fell in love with her; one of them was Lieutenant-Colonel Anthony David (1911–1967). By now aged thirty, she weighed the advantages and disadvantages of remaining unmarried until such time as the ideal husband might appear, and with considerable misgivings she finally accepted Tony David's proposal of marriage. The couple were married in Cairo on 30 August 1944. Within a year, Tony David was posted to India. His wife followed him there in January 1946, but she found life as the wife of an officer of the British Raj tedious, the social life dull, and the food generally "frustrating". Later in life she came to appreciate the cuisine more, and wrote about a few Indian dishes and recipes in her articles and books. In June 1946, she suffered severe sinusitis and was told by her doctors that the condition would persist if she remained in the summer heat of Delhi. Instead, she was advised to go back to England. She did so; Cooper observes, "She had been away from England for six years, and in that time she, and England, had changed beyond recognition." ### Post-war England Returning after her years of Mediterranean warmth and access to a profusion of fresh ingredients, David found her native country in the post-war period grey and daunting, with food rationing still in force. She encountered terrible food: "There was flour and water soup seasoned solely with pepper; bread and gristle rissoles; dehydrated onions and carrots; corned beef toad in the hole. I need not go on." In London, she met George Lassalle, a former lover of hers from Cairo days, and their affair was rekindled. The couple went to Ross-on-Wye in November 1946 for a week's break, but were stranded in the town by the season's inclement weather. Frustrated by the poor food provided by the hotel, she was encouraged by Lassalle to put her thoughts on paper. > Hardly knowing what I was doing ... I sat down and started to work out an agonized craving for the sun and a furious revolt against that terrible cheerless, heartless food by writing down descriptions of Mediterranean and Middle Eastern cooking. Even to write words like apricot, olives and butter, rice and lemons, oil and almonds, produced assuagement. Later I came to realize that in the England of 1947, those were dirty words I was putting down. When her husband returned from India in 1947, David immediately separated from Lassalle and resumed the role of wife. With the aid of Stella Gwynne, David and her husband bought a house in Chelsea, which remained her home for the rest of her life. Tony David proved ineffectual in civilian life, unable to find a suitable job; he ran up debts, partly from a failed business venture. What remained of the spark in the relationship soon died, and they were living separately by 1948. Veronica Nicholson, a friend with connections in the publishing trade, persuaded David to continue writing, with the aim that she write a book. She showed some of David's work to Anne Scott-James, the editor of the British edition of Harper's Bazaar, who thought the writing showed a widely travelled person with an independent mind. She offered David a contract, and David's work began appearing in the publication from March 1949. David told Scott-James that she planned to publish the articles as a book, and was allowed to retain the copyright by the magazine. Even before all the articles had been published, she had assembled them into a typescript volume called A Book of Mediterranean Food; many of the recipes ignored the restrictions of rationing in favour of authenticity, and in several cases the ingredients were not available in British shops. David submitted her manuscript to a series of publishers, all of whom turned it down. One of them explained that a collection of unconnected recipes needed linking text. David took this advice, but conscious of her inexperience as a writer she kept her own prose short and quoted extensively from established authors whose views on the Mediterranean might carry more weight. She submitted the revised typescript to John Lehmann, a publisher more associated with poetry than cookery; he accepted it and agreed to an advance payment of £100. A Book of Mediterranean Food was published in June 1950. A Book of Mediterranean Food was illustrated by John Minton; writers including Cyril Ray and John Arlott commented that the drawings added to the attractions of the book. Martin Salisbury, the professor of illustration at the Cambridge School of Art, writes that Minton's "brilliant, neo-romantic designs perfectly complement the writing". David placed great importance on the illustration of books, and described Minton's jacket design as "stunning". She was especially taken with "his beautiful Mediterranean bay, his tables spread with white cloths and bright fruit" and the way that "pitchers and jugs and bottles of wine could be seen far down the street"; she considered the cover design aided the success of the book, but was less convinced by his black and white drawings. The book was well received by reviewers. Elizabeth Nicholas, writing for The Sunday Times, thought David a "gastronome of rare integrity" who "refuses ... to make any ignoble compromises with expediency". Although John Chandos, writing in The Observer, pointed out that "Let no one eating in London—with whatever abandon—imagine that he is eating Mediterranean food in the absence of Mediterranean earth and air", he finished his review by saying that the book "deserves to become the familiar companion of all who seek uninhibited excitement in the kitchen". The success of the book led to offers of work from The Sunday Times—for which she was paid an advance of 60 guineas—Go, a travel magazine owned by the newspaper, and Wine and Food, the journal of the Wine and Food Society. In August 1950 David and her husband went on their final holiday together with the money from the new contracts, although they had trouble with the car they were using for touring and the holiday was unsuccessful. On her return she invited Felicité, her youngest sister, to move into the top flat in her house. David was a reluctant and unskilful typist—she preferred the feel of writing with a pen—and in exchange for a low rent, Felicité expertly typed her articles and books, and later acted as her principal researcher. A Book of Mediterranean Food was successful enough for Lehmann to commission David to write a sequel, to show the dishes of rural France. This was French Country Cooking, which David finished writing in October 1950. Minton was employed to illustrate the work, and David gave him detailed instructions about the type of drawings; she was more pleased with them than those for her first work. Despite their difficult relationship, David dedicated the book to her mother. Before the book was published, David left England to live for a short time in France. She was motivated by a desire to gain a wider knowledge of life in the French countryside, and to put distance between her and her husband. She left London in March 1951 for Ménerbes, Provence. She spent three months in Provence; although the weather was initially cold and wet, it soon turned warmer and she enjoyed herself so much that she considered buying a house there. In June 1951 she left Ménerbes and travelled to the island of Capri to visit Norman Douglas. When she left in late August, she toured briefly around the Italian Riviera researching for an article for Go, before returning to London. In September, shortly after her return, French Country Cooking was published. It was warmly reviewed by critics, although Lucie Marion, writing in The Manchester Guardian, considered that "I cannot think that Mrs David has tried actually to make many of the dishes for which she gives recipes". David wrote to the paper to set the record straight, saying that it would have been "irresponsible and mischievous" if she had not tested them all. ### Italian, French and other cuisines Lehmann and David agreed that her next book should be about Italian food; at the time, little was known in Britain about Italian cuisine and interest in the country was on the rise. She received an advance of £300 for the book. She planned to visit Italy for research, and wanted to see Douglas in Capri again, but received news of his death in February 1952, which left her deeply saddened. David left London in March, arriving in Rome just before the Easter celebrations. She toured the country, watching cooks at home and in restaurants and making extensive notes on the regional differences in the cuisine. While in Rome she met the painter Renato Guttuso; deeply impressed by his work, particularly his still lifes, she asked if he would illustrate her book. To her surprise he agreed and, while considering the fee of £60 absurdly low, he kept to his word and produced a series of illustrations. Arriving back in London in October 1952, David began a relationship with an old flame from India, Peter Higgins, a divorced stockbroker; it was the beginning of the happiest period of her life. She spent the following months writing the book, recreating the recipes to work out the correct measurements. She felt less emotionally connected to Italy than with Greece and southern France and found the writing "uncommonly troublesome", although "as recipe after recipe came out ... I realized how much I was learning, and how enormously these dishes were enlarging my own scope and enjoyment". Italian Food was published in November 1954. At the time, many of the ingredients used in the recipes were still difficult to obtain in Britain. Looking back in 1963, David wrote: > In Soho but almost nowhere else, such things as Italian pasta, and Parmesan cheese, olive oil, salame, and occasionally Parma ham were to be had. ... With southern vegetables such as aubergines, red and green peppers, fennel, the tiny marrows called by the French courgettes and in Italy zucchini, much the same situation prevailed. Italian Food was warmly received by reviewers and the public, and the first print run sold out within three weeks. The Times Literary Supplement'''s reviewer wrote, "More than a collection of recipes, this book is in effect a readable and discerning dissertation on Italian food and regional dishes, and their preparation in the English kitchen." Freya Stark, reviewing for The Observer, remarked, "Mrs David ... may be counted among the benefactors of humanity." In The Sunday Times, Evelyn Waugh named Italian Food as one of the two books that had given him the most pleasure in 1954. By the time she completed Italian Food, Lehmann's publishing firm had been closed down by its parent company, and David found herself under contract to Macdonald, another imprint within the same group. She intensely disliked the company and wrote a most unflattering portrait of it in a 1985 article. Disapproving of the approach to her books that the company took, her agent, Paul Scott, persuaded Macdonald to relinquish their option on the next book. David signed instead with the publisher Museum Press for her next book, Summer Cooking, which was published in 1955. Summer Cooking was illustrated by David's friend, the artist Adrian Daintrey. He would visit her at home and sketch her in the kitchen while she cooked a lunch for them both. Unconstrained by the geographical agendas of her first three books, David wrote about dishes from Britain, India, Mauritius, Russia, Spain and Turkey, as well as France, Italy and Greece. The book reflected her strong belief in eating food in season; she loved "the pleasure of rediscovering each season's vegetables" and thought it "rather dull to eat the same food all year round". She said that her aim was to put: > emphasis on two aspects of cookery which are increasingly disregarded: the suitability of certain foods to certain times of the year, and the pleasures of eating the vegetables, fruits, poultry, meat or fish which is in season, therefore at its best, most plentiful, and cheapest. Soon after the publication of Summer Cooking, David was wooed away from her regular column in Harper's by Vogue magazine, which offered her more money and more prominence—a full central page with a continuing column following, and a full page photograph. The new contract meant she also wrote for Vogue's sister magazine House & Garden. Audrey Withers, the editor of Vogue, wanted David to write more personal columns than she had done for Harper's, and paid her £20 a month for food ingredients and from time to time £100 for research trips to France. David visited several areas of France, completing her research for her next book, French Provincial Cooking, which was "the culmination and synthesis of a decade of work and thought". Published in 1960, it is, according to Cooper in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, the book for which she would be best remembered. David's agent negotiated contracts with a new publisher, Michael Joseph, and a new illustrator, Juliet Renny. Reviews of the new book were as complimentary as those for its predecessors. The Times Literary Supplement wrote, "French Provincial Cooking needs to be read rather than referred to quickly. It discourses at some length on the type and origin of the dishes popular in various French regions, as well as the culinary terms, herbs and kitchen equipment used in France. But those who can give the extra time to this book will be well repaid by dishes such as La Bourride de Charles Bérot and Cassoulet Colombié." The Observer said that it was difficult to think of any home that could do without the book and called David "a very special kind of genius". French Provincial Cooking was dedicated to Peter Higgins, still her lover. David's estranged husband had lived in Spain since 1953 and, to his wife's embarrassment, he was named in a divorce case which was reported in the gossip column of The Daily Express. In an interview published in the newspaper, Tony had referred to David as "my ex-wife"; she filed for divorce, and the process was finalised in 1960. ### 1960s In 1960 David stopped writing for The Sunday Times, as she was unhappy about editorial interference with her copy; soon afterwards she also left Vogue as the change in direction of the magazine did not suit the style of her column. She joined the weekly publications The Spectator, Sunday Dispatch and The Sunday Telegraph. Her books were now reaching a wide public, having been reprinted in paperback by the mass-market publisher Penguin Books, where they sold more than a million copies between 1955 and 1985. Her work also had an impact on British food culture: the historian Peter Clarke considers that "The seminal influence of Elizabeth David's French Provincial Cooking (1960), with its enormous sales as a Penguin paperback, deserves historical recognition." Cooper considers that David's "professional career was at its height. She was hailed not only as Britain's foremost writer on food and cookery, but as the woman who had transformed the eating habits of middle-class England." David's private life was less felicitous. In April 1963 her affair with Higgins came to an end when he remarried. For a period she drank too much brandy and resorted too often to sleeping pills. Probably as a result of these factors and overwork, in 1963, when she was 49, David suffered a cerebral haemorrhage. She kept the news of the event within her close circle of friends—none of the editors of the publications she worked for were aware of the collapse—as she did not want her reputation as a hard worker to be damaged. She recovered, but her confidence was badly shaken and her sense of taste was temporarily affected; for a period she could not taste salt, or the effect salt had on what she was cooking, but her sense of the smell of frying onions was so enhanced as to be unpleasant for her. In November 1965, together with four business partners, David opened Elizabeth David Ltd, a shop selling kitchen equipment, at 46 Bourne Street, Pimlico. The partners were spurred on by the closure of a professional kitchenware shop in Soho on the retirement of its owner, and the recent success of Terence Conran's Habitat shops, which sold among much else imported kitchen equipment for which there was evidently a market. Among her customers were Albert and Michel Roux, who shopped there for equipment that they would otherwise have had to buy in France. David, who selected the stock, was uncompromising in her choice of merchandise; despite its large range of kitchen implements, the shop did not stock either wall-mounted knife sharpeners or garlic presses. David wrote an article called "Garlic Presses are Utterly Useless", refused to sell them, and advised customers who demanded them to go elsewhere. Not available elsewhere, by contrast, were booklets by David printed specially for the shop. Some of them were later incorporated into the collections of her essays and articles, An Omelette and a Glass of Wine and Is There a Nutmeg in the House? The shop was described in The Observer as: > ... starkly simple. Pyramids of French coffee cups and English pot-bellied iron pans stand in the window. ... Iron shelves hold tin moulds and cutters of every description, glazed and unglazed earthenware pots, bowls and dishes in traditional colours, plain pots and pans in thick aluminium, cast-iron, vitreous enamel and fireproof porcelain, unadorned crockery in classic shapes and neat rows of cooks' knives, spoons and forks. David reduced her writing commitments to concentrate on running the shop, but contributed some articles to magazines, and began to focus more on English cuisine. She still included many recipes but increasingly wrote about places—markets, auberges, farms—and people, including profiles of famous chefs and gourmets such as Marcel Boulestin and Édouard de Pomiane. In her later articles, she expressed strongly held views on a wide range of subjects; she abominated the word "crispy", demanding to know what it conveyed that "crisp" did not; she confessed to an inability to refill anybody's wineglass until it was empty; she insisted on the traditional form "Welsh rabbit" rather than the modern invention "Welsh rarebit"; she poured scorn on the Guide Michelin's standards; she deplored "fussy garnish ... distract[ing] from the main flavours"; she inveighed against the ersatz: "anyone depraved enough to invent a dish consisting of a wedge of steam-heated bread spread with tomato paste and a piece of synthetic Cheddar can call it a pizza." While running the shop, David wrote another full-length book, Spices, Salt and Aromatics in the English Kitchen (1970). It was her first book in a decade and the first of a projected series on English cookery to be called "English Cooking, Ancient and Modern". She had decided to concentrate on the subject while recuperating from her cerebral haemorrhage in 1963. The book was a departure from her earlier works and contained more food history about what she called "the English preoccupation with the spices and the scents, the fruit, the flavourings, the sources and the condiments of the orient, near and far". ### Later years Elizabeth David Ltd was never more than modestly profitable, but David would not lower her standards in search of a commercial return. A new manager was brought in to run the shop and David fought against many of his changes, but she was always in the minority against her fellow directors. The stress of disagreements over company policy—and the deaths of her sister Diana in March 1971 and her mother in June 1973—contributed to health problems and she suffered from chronic fatigue and swollen, ulcerous legs. Gradually her business partners found her commercial approach unsustainable, and in 1973 she left the company. To her annoyance, the shop continued to trade under her name, although she tried periodically to persuade her former colleagues to change it. David's second book on English food was English Bread and Yeast Cookery, which she spent five years researching and writing. The work covered the history of bread-making in England and an examination of each ingredient used. She was angered by the standard of bread in Britain and wrote: > What is utterly dismaying is the mess our milling and baking concerns succeed in making with the dearly bought grain that goes into their grist. Quite simply it is wasted on a nation that cares so little about the quality of its bread that it has allowed itself to be mesmerized into buying the equivalent of eight and a quarter million large white factory-made loaves every day of the year. In 1977 David was badly injured in a car accident—sustaining a fractured left elbow and right wrist, a damaged knee cap and a broken jaw—from which she took a long time to recover. While she was in hospital, English Bread and Yeast Cookery was published. Its scholarship won high praise, and Jane Grigson, writing in The Times Literary Supplement, suggested that a copy of the book should be given to every marrying couple, while Hilary Spurling, reviewing for The Observer, thought that not only was it "a scathing indictment of the British bread industry", but one done with "orderliness, authority, phenomenal scope and fastidious attention to detail". Some of the research David undertook for English Bread and Yeast Cookery was done with Jill Norman, her friend and publisher. The pair decided that they should produce two further books: Ice and Ices and a collection of David's early journalism. Like her book on bread, the scope for Ice and Ices grew the more David researched the subject. The compilation of existing essays and press articles took less time, and in 1984 An Omelette and a Glass of Wine was published, edited by Norman who became David's literary executor and edited further David works after the author's death. The death in 1986 of her younger sister Felicité, who had lived in the top floor of her house for thirty years, was a severe blow to David. She began to suffer from depression and went to the doctor after suffering chest pains; he diagnosed tuberculosis and she was hospitalised. After an uncomfortable time over a three-month stay in hospital, where the drugs she was prescribed had side-effects that affected her clarity of thinking, her friend, the wine importer and writer Gerald Asher, arranged for her to stay with him in California to recuperate. David made several visits to California, which she much enjoyed, but her health began to fail. Because her legs had been troublesome for some time, she suffered a succession of falls which resulted in several spells in hospital. She became increasingly reclusive but, despite spending periods in bed at home, she continued to work on Ice and Ices. She realised that she would not be able to finish the work, and asked Norman to complete it for her. It was published in 1994, under the title Harvest of the Cold Months. In May 1992 David suffered a stroke followed two days later by another, which was fatal; she died at her Chelsea home on 22 May 1992, aged 78. She was buried on 28 May at the family church of St Peter ad Vincula, Folkington. That September a memorial service was held at St Martin-in-the-Fields, London, followed by a memorial picnic at the Institute of Contemporary Arts. In February 1994 David's possessions were put up for auction. Many of those who attended—and who bid—were fans of David's work, rather than professional dealers. Prue Leith paid £1,100 for David's old kitchen table because it was "where she cooked her omelettes and wrote most of her books". The auction's total receipts were three times the expected value. ## Books From 1950 onwards David was well known for her magazine articles and, in the 1960s and '70s, for her kitchen shop, but her reputation rested and still rests principally on her books. The first five, published between 1950 and 1960, cover the cuisine of continental Europe and beyond. In the 1970s David wrote two books about English cooking. The last of her books published in her lifetime was a collection of previously-printed essays and articles. From the extensive notes and archives left by the author, her literary executor, Jill Norman, edited and completed four more books that David had planned. Six other books published since the author's death have been compilations drawn from her existing works. On the advice of her publisher, David constructed her early books to intersperse recipes with relevant excerpts of travel writing and scene-painting by earlier writers, and, as her confidence and reputation grew, by herself. A Book of Mediterranean Food (1950) draws on nine authors, from Henry James to Théophile Gautier, in between eleven sections of recipes. Reviewers commented that David's books possessed literary merit as well as practical instruction. Some critics, used to more prescriptive cookery writers, thought her approach assumed too much knowledge on the part of the reader. In her view, "The ideal cookery writer is one who makes his readers want to cook as well as telling them how it is done; he should leave something, not too much perhaps, but a little, unsaid: people must make their own discoveries, use their own intelligence, otherwise they will be deprived of part of the fun." In The New York Times Craig Claiborne wrote admiringly of David, but remarked that because she assumed her readers already knew the basics of cooking she would be "valued more by those with a serious regard for food than by those with a casual interest". The writer Julian Barnes commented that as an amateur cook he found David's terse instructions intimidating: of a recipe in Italian Food he wrote, "E.D.'s first sentence reads like this: 'Melt 11⁄2 lbs (675 g) chopped and skinned tomatoes in olive oil' ... Melt? Melt a tomato? ... Could it be that Elizabeth David was too good a writer to be a food writer?". A later cook, Tom Parker Bowles, observes, "You don't turn to Elizabeth David for nannying, step-by-step instruction, or precise amounts and timing. She assumes you know the basics, and is a writer who offers inspiration, and wonderful, opinionated prose. Her recipes are timeless, and all her books wonderful works of reference (and tirelessly researched) as well as beautiful reads." The eight books and eight booklets by David published in her lifetime cover the food of France; Italy; the rest of the Mediterranean and beyond, into Asia; and England. ### France Two of David's best-known books focus on the cuisine of France: French Country Cooking (1951) and French Provincial Cooking (1960); France features prominently, though not exclusively, in another two: A Book of Mediterranean Food (1950) and Summer Cooking (1955). She set the pattern for her books by grouping recipes by category, with sections linked by her chosen passages from literature. In her first book, Mediterranean Food, David presented chapters on soups; eggs and luncheon dishes; fish; meat; substantial dishes; poultry and game; vegetables; cold food and salads; sweets; jams, chutneys and preserves; and sauces. She broadly followed this pattern in her next four books. David's view on the place of French cooking in the hierarchy of world cuisine is set out in her introduction to French Country Cooking: "French regional and peasant cookery ... at its best, is the most delicious in the world; cookery which uses raw materials to the greatest advantage without going to the absurd lengths of the complicated and so-called Haute Cuisine." She was a firm believer in the traditional French approach to buying and preparing food: > Good cooking is honest, sincere and simple, and by this I do not mean to imply that you will find in this, or indeed any other book, the secret of turning out first-class food in a few minutes with no trouble. Good food is always a trouble and its preparation should be regarded as a labour of love, and this book is intended for those who actually and positively enjoy the labour involved in entertaining their friends and providing their families with first-class food. Though not neglecting elaborate dishes—she devoted six pages to the choice of ingredients for and cooking of pot-au-feu or lièvre à la Royale (a salmis of hare)—David regarded simple everyday cooking as in some ways more demanding, and gave many recipes for "the kind of food which is eaten frequently in thrifty French households, and it is very good". David emphasised the importance to cooks of careful and knowledgeable shopping for ingredients. She wrote chapters about French markets such as those at Cavaillon, Yvetot, Montpellier, Martigues and Valence. Despite a widespread perception that her view of food was essentially Mediterranean, French Provincial Cooking, by far her longest book to date, surveyed the cuisine of France from Normandy and the Île-de-France to Alsace, Burgundy, the Loire, Bordeaux and the Basque Country, as well as the south. Looking at the entire field of cookery books, Jane Grigson regarded this as "the best and most stimulating of them all". ### Italy Unlike its two predecessors, Mediterranean Food and French Country Cooking, David's Italian Food (1954) drew little from anything she had already written. She spent many months in Italy researching it before starting work on the manuscript. With two successful books already published, David felt less in need of extracts from earlier writers to bolster her prose, and interspersed the recipes with her own essays and introductions to the various sections. The book begins with a chapter on "The Italian store cupboard", giving British cooks, who at that time were generally unacquainted with most of Italy's cuisine and methods, an insight into Italian herbs, spices, tinned, bottled or dried staples including anchovies, tuna, funghi, prosciutto, and chickpeas, and Italian essentials such as garlic and olive oil, both seldom seen in Britain in the early 1950s. The rest of the book follows the basic pattern of the earlier works, with chapters on soups, fish, meat, vegetables and sweets, with the addition of extra subjects relevant to Italian food, pasta asciuta, ravioli and gnocchi, rice, and Italian wine. In addition to those in Italian Food, there are many Italian recipes and descriptions of the land and the people in David's other works. The first recipe in her first book, Mediterranean Food—soupe au Pistou—is of Genoese origin. Also in that book are recipes for bocconcini, osso bucco, and several Italian pasta and chicken dishes. Among the recipes in Summer Cooking is peperonata (pimentos or sweet peppers cooked with tomatoes in olive oil and butter) which was reprinted as the title article in a later selection from David's works. In An Omelette and a Glass of Wine, David printed Italian recipes including soups and omelettes made with hops (zuppa di lupolli and frittata con i loertis). Also in that book are substantial essays on Italian people and places. Is There a Nutmeg in the House? includes a six-page article on vegetable dishes from Mantua, and another of similar length on the variations of pizza in Italy and beyond. ### Other Mediterranean lands and beyond When David's first book, Mediterranean Food, was published in 1950 the British public was still enduring food rationing after the Second World War. Her evocation of the everyday plenty and excellence of Mediterranean food was revelatory, and although she did not reach a wide public until cheap paperback editions of her books came out in the mid 1950s, reviewers immediately spotted her importance. In the introduction to Mediterranean Food David set out her basic premise: "The cooking of the Mediterranean shores, endowed with all the natural resources, the colour and flavour of the South, is a blend of tradition and brilliant improvisation. The Latin genius flashes from the kitchen pans. It is honest cooking, too; none of the sham Grande Cuisine of the International Palace Hotel." She conceded, nevertheless, that the food culture of the Mediterranean was not exclusively Latin, and flowered in "the mainland of Greece and the much-disputed territories of Syria, the Lebanon, Constantinople and Smyrna". She described the ever-recurring elements in the food throughout these countries as: > ... the oil, the saffron, the garlic, the pungent local wines; the aromatic perfume of rosemary, wild marjoram and basil drying in the kitchens; the brilliance of the market stalls piled high with pimentos, aubergines, tomatoes, olives, melons, figs and limes; the great heaps of shiny fish, silver, vermilion or tiger-striped, and those long needle fish whose bones so mysteriously turn out to be green. In her other books David gives recipes from around the Mediterranean, including gazpacho and tortillas from Spain; dolmádés, and eggs with skordalia from Greece, mutton-stuffed aubergines, yoghurt soup, and a stew of carrots and rice from Turkey; and a Syrian dish of chicken with almonds and cream. From further afield she includes Mauritian prawn chutney; iced cucumber and beetroot soup from Russia; a Persian maqlub of aubergines, rice and mutton; Sikh kebabs and garam masala from India; and Armenian pizza, claimed to be older than the Italian version. In a 2012 survey for the Australasian Universities Language and Literature Association, Carody Culver writes, "It is David's language, particularly her use of description that most strongly enforces the narrative and literary quality of Mediterranean Food. Her imagery, anecdotes, and literary quotes transform her recipes into stories of experience and memory. ... Ingredients and dishes are not just given as part of a list of instructions, but represented as part of a specific culture." ### England Spices, Salt and Aromatics in the English Kitchen (1970) and English Bread and Yeast Cookery (1977) include a few British dishes from outside England, such as Scottish Arbroath smokies and bannocks; and Welsh salt duck and bara brith. David, like many of her generation and class, used the terms "England" and "English" to refer to the whole of Britain. Some writers have believed David neglected the cooking of her own country in favour of Mediterranean cuisine. In the humorous magazine Punch, Humphrey Lyttelton held that she preferred "inaccessible and often indigestible saucissons" to "the splendid Cumberland sausage". In 2009 the food writer Tim Hayward accused her of "wide-eyed romantic twaddle", excessively focused on France and the Mediterranean. Chaney comments that when Spices, Salt and Aromatics in the English Kitchen was published in 1970, some of David's most ardent admirers were taken aback to find her extolling the British culinary tradition, "at its best ... as rich and rewarding as that of the Mediterranean". Cooper writes that although the change of focus from French and Mediterranean food to English surprised the public, David had been moving towards it for some time. David treated her English topics in considerable detail: Spices, Salt and Aromatics in the English Kitchen is longer than Mediterranean Food, French Country Cooking or Summer Cooking. She intended it to be the first in a series of three or even five books on English cookery: "It depends how much time I have ... Later volumes will deal with bread, yeast, cakes, creams and cheeses and egg dishes, and meat and game". They were never written, except for English Bread and Yeast Cookery, which is by nearly 100 pages the longest of all David's works. David consciously followed in the path of Hilda Leyel and Dorothy Hartley in researching British ingredients and dishes. Like them, she looked back into regional history to find what she saw as "the traditions of a culture rooted to the soil" before "the ravages of the Industrial Revolution". She did not romanticise Britain's culinary past: "Farm and factory labourers, artisans and clerical workers, still lived on a very restricted diet ... their cooking facilities were so primitive and their equipment so scanty that only the most basic forms of cookery could be attempted". But her constant benchmarks were honest ingredients and uncomplicated cooking. She condemned—and explained the alternatives to—the artificial, the ersatz, the "notorious Chorleywood bread", and "all synthetic aids to flavouring ... Nobody has ever been able to find out why the English regard a glass of wine added to a soup or stew as a reckless extravagance and at the same time spend pounds on bottled sauces, gravy powders, soup cubes, ketchups and artificial flavourings". Both the English books are in two parts. The first section is historical, putting the subject into context for the modern reader. In Spices, Salt and Aromatics David writes about the background of the herbs and spices and condiments that came into use in British kitchens over the previous centuries, and sketches the history of their adoption from Asia and continental Europe. The Times Literary Supplement called this part of the book "as difficult to put down as a good thriller". David follows a similar path in English Bread and Yeast Cookery; reviewing the book Hilary Spurling wrote that it contained "a history of virtually every development since Stone Age crops and querns". The second, longer, sections of the two books contain the recipes and descriptions. ### Collections of essays and articles Although David had drawn on her many magazine articles for material in her earlier books, An Omelette and Glass of Wine (1984) was the first straightforward anthology of her work. Compiled with the assistance of Jill Norman, it consists of David's selections from her essays and articles published since 1949. The article from which the book takes its title is an essay on "the almost primitive and elemental meal evoked by the words: 'Let's just have an omelette and a glass of wine.'" Among the other subjects are profiles of people including Norman Douglas, Marcel Boulestin, Mrs Beeton, and "A gourmet in Edwardian London", Colonel Nathaniel Newnham-Davis. Several sections are devoted to descriptions of the markets of French country towns, and unpretentious restaurants and hotels in France. There are articles on lemons, potted meat, mayonnaise, pizza, syllabubs, truffles, and on the cuisines of Spain and Morocco. For most of the articles David provided either an introduction or an afternote, or both. David had intended to publish a second such volume, and eight years after the author's death, Norman, her literary executor, published a sequel, Is There a Nutmeg in the House? (2000). Like its predecessor, it was drawn from magazine articles, essays and other earlier writings, to which Norman added articles written by David in the 1980s. The first section of the book is a short autobiographical piece, a rarity from David, who guarded her privacy carefully. David's interest in the historical aspects of cuisine is given scope in essays on the history of Oxo and Bovril, Alexis Soyer and the potato. Articles aimed at the domestic cook include "Do not Despair over Rice", "Making Ice Cream", and one propounding a view for which she was famous: "Garlic Presses are Utterly Useless". The New York Times called the book "this very appealing, completely absorbing miscellany. ... This is a book good enough to eat—and, in a way, you can." ### Booklets David wrote eight booklets on individual topics. The first two, The Use of Wine in Fine Cooking (1950) and The Use of Wine in Italian Cooking (1952), were commissioned and published by the wine merchants Saccone and Speed. David reused the first as a chapter in French Country Cooking. For her kitchen equipment shop, David wrote Dried Herbs, Aromatics and Condiments (1967); English Potted Meats and Fish Pastes (1968); The Baking of an English Loaf (1969); Syllabubs and Fruit Fools (1969), and Green Pepper Berries (1972). Some of the content was taken from her previously-published magazine articles, and some was further reused and expanded in her later books. David's last booklet was Cooking with Le Creuset (1989) written for the French manufacturers of Le Creuset cooking ware. ### Posthumous publications In addition to Is There a Nutmeg in the House? three further books planned by David were completed and edited by Norman after the author died. Harvest of the Cold Months (1994) is subtitled "A social history of ice and ices". David had been working on it intermittently for several years before her last illnesses. The book traces the history of ice in the cuisines of Europe from mediaeval times, when it had to be brought from the mountains and kept in ice houses. The Independent's reviewer described it as "not a cookery book but an awe-inspiring feat of detective scholarship ... sumptuous and stately". Reviewing the book in The Times, Nigella Lawson wrote that although it deserved a place on the shelves of anyone who cared about food, it revealed a waning of the author's energies, and "lacks her customary, high-spirited, if fierce, readability". South Wind Through the Kitchen (1997) was the completion of one of the projects of David's later years on which she worked with Norman: a single-volume collection of the best of her extensive writings. Norman invited chefs, writers and David's friends to choose their favourite of her articles and recipes. Many of the contributors, such as the chef Simon Hopkinson, contributed an introduction or afterword to the pieces they chose. The extracts and recipes are taken from all David's books published by 1996. There are more than 200 recipes, organised in the customary way with sections on courses and ingredients—eggs and cheese, fish and shellfish, meat, poultry and game, vegetables, pasta, pulses and grains, sauces, sweet dishes and cakes, preserves, and bread—interspersed, as in David's earlier works, with articles and essays. The title of the book comes from an essay published in 1964 and reprinted in An Omelette and a Glass of Wine, and is a reference to South Wind, the best-known novel by David's mentor Norman Douglas. The last of the books planned by David was Elizabeth David's Christmas (2003). She and Norman had discussed such a book as early as the 1970s, but work on other projects precluded it. After David's death, Norman found when sorting out the author's papers that David had written and compiled far more material on a Christmas theme than anyone else had realised. The Christmas recipes David had most often been asked for formed the core of the book. Together with some Christmas recipes from Mediterranean Food, French Provincial Cooking, and Spices, Salt and Aromatics in the English Kitchen, and revised articles published in previous years in magazines, they were turned into a 214-page work. The chapters dealt with the social and historical side of Christmas, first courses and cold meats, soups, poultry and game, meat, vegetables and salads, sauces, pickles and chutneys, and desserts, cakes and drinks. The book reprints one of David's most quoted sentences, first printed in Vogue in 1959, and included in Is there a Nutmeg in the House in 2000: "If I had my way—and I shan't—my Christmas Day eating and drinking would consist of an omelette and cold ham and a nice bottle of wine at lunchtime, and a smoked salmon sandwich with a glass of champagne on a tray in bed in the evening." Between 1995 and 2011 Penguin Books issued four paperback selections from David's books: I'll be with You in the Squeezing of a Lemon (1995), Peperonata and Other Italian Dishes (1996), Of Pageants and Picnics (2005), and A Taste of the Sun (2011). Two further hardback selections of David's writings were published, with Norman as editor. At Elizabeth David's Table (2010) was published to mark the 60th anniversary of David's first book. With prefatory contributions from several prominent British chefs including Hopkinson, Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, Rose Gray and Jamie Oliver, it comprises recipes and essays from David's previously published works. There are twelve chapters, covering the various courses of a dinner from soups to desserts, and other topics such as baking, cooking "fast and fresh", and David's descriptions of French and Italian markets. Elizabeth David on Vegetables (2013) was drawn principally from Mediterranean Food, Italian Food, French Provincial Cooking and An Omelette and a Glass of Wine. There are sections on soups; small dishes; salads; pasta; gnocchi and polenta; rice; beans and lentils; main dishes; breads; and desserts. ## Awards and honours David won the Glenfiddich Writer of the Year award in 1978 for English Bread and Yeast Cookery. She was also awarded honorary doctorates by the Universities of Essex and Bristol, and the award of a Chevalier de l'Ordre du Mérite Agricole. She was appointed Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) in 1976 and promoted to Commander of the Order (CBE) in 1986. The honour that most pleased her, however, was being made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 1982 in recognition of her skills as a writer. In 2012, to mark the Diamond Jubilee of Elizabeth II, David was chosen by BBC Radio 4 as one of the 60 Britons who have been most influential during the 60 years of the Queen's reign. In 2013 her portrait was one of a series of first-class stamps issued to celebrate the centenary of ten "Great Britons". In 2016 an English Heritage blue plaque was erected on her former home at 24 Halsey Street, Chelsea, where she had lived for 45 years; she was the first food writer to receive this form of recognition. ## Legacy The obituaries for David were warm and full of praise for her work and legacy. In The Guardian, the food writer Christopher Driver called her "this century's most influential cookery writer and scholar in English", while the obituarist for The Times wrote: > Elizabeth David was the doyenne of English cookery writers. She influenced the generations who came after her, whether they, too, were intending to be culinary experts or merely taking a well-thumbed Elizabeth David Penguin from the kitchen shelf for the next day's dinner party. "Elizabeth David says ..." was the regular way of resolving how much spice—and which spices—should be added to a stew and how much garlic should be put in a dressing. At its best, her prose was as precise as her instructions, unlike that of some of her predecessors who sometimes wrapped up advice on what to do in the kitchen with impenetrable sentences. She was a pleasure to read, a stylist of true distinction. Perhaps only in Britain would she have been classified as a "food writer", too often rather a damning phrase. Elizabeth David combined a scholar's feeling for history with the traveller-aesthete's gift of conveying a sense of place. David's writing influenced the cultural approach of the British towards food. According to the food journalist Joanna Blythman, she "performed both a cultural and gastronomic miracle in post-war Britain by introducing the nation to a vision of fresh Continental food", while the writer Rose Prince considers that David "changed for ever the way British people cook". Janet Floyd, professor of American Literature at King's College London, argues that David was not a driver of change, but came to epitomise that change. The literary historian Nicola Humble observes that "the food revolution of the post-war years would probably have happened without Elizabeth David, though in her absence it would have happened very differently". Floyd comments that David "showed little interest in appealing to or engaging with an audience outside a social elite"; Cooper addresses the same point, although highlights a positive review of French Provincial Cooking in The Daily Worker—a newspaper that represented the Communist Party of Great Britain—as evidence that David had a broader readership than some give her credit for. David has appeared in fictional form at least twice. In 2000 a novel, Lunch with Elizabeth David by Roger Williams, was published by Carroll & Graf, and in 2006 the BBC broadcast Elizabeth David: A Life in Recipes, a film starring Catherine McCormack as David and Greg Wise as Peter Higgins. In 1998 Lisa Chaney published a biography of David; the journalist Paul Levy found it "hasty, botched", although in The New York Times Laura Shapiro considered it "comprehensive". The following year an authorised biography, Writing at the Kitchen Table, was published by Artemis Cooper. She also wrote the entry for David in the Dictionary of National Biography in 2004 (updated in 2011). David's papers are at the Schlesinger Library at the Radcliffe Institute for Advanced Study, Harvard University. David's passion for cookware proved influential on the style of the time. Conran acknowledges that her work "formed an important part of the learning process that led to Habitat", and the success of the Elizabeth David Ltd outlet contributed to a demand for French provincial cookware. David went to great lengths to ensure the illustrators of her books got small details right—in a draft introduction for French Provincial Cooking, she wrote: "I was anxious that such details should be put on record because some of these regional cooking pots are already becoming very hard to find in France, so that in some sense Juliet Renny's drawings constitute a little historical record in their own right." David's ongoing campaign against the mass-production and standardisation of food was ahead of her time, although Chaney describes her thoughts as "instinctive and unarticulated". One of David's passions, the premise of buying local produce in season and preparing it simply, is a message continued by Stein, Slater and Fearnley-Whittingstall. Fellow cooks and chefs have acknowledged David's influence on their own and their colleagues' works; her contemporary Jane Grigson wrote in 1967 "Nobody can produce a cookery book these days without a deep appreciation of Elizabeth David's work." Grigson later wrote: > Basil was no more than the name of bachelor uncles, courgette was printed in italics as an alien word, and few of us knew how to eat spaghetti or pick a globe artichoke to pieces. ... Then came Elizabeth David like sunshine, writing with brief elegance about good food, that is, about food well contrived, well cooked. She made us understand that we could do better with what we had. Rick Stein, a more recent chef, says that David was such an influence on his early work that he used one of Minton's illustrations from A Book of Mediterranean Food on his menus when he first opened a restaurant. Others, including Nigel Slater, Gordon Ramsay, Jamie Oliver, Prue Leith and Clarissa Dickson Wright, have been influenced by David; Dickson Wright said that David "taught me that food is more than cooking; it is poetry and passion as well. She also taught me never to settle for culinary second-best". Norman quotes Leith as being quite shocked when she asked students at a catering college how many of them had read David's books, and not a single one raised a hand. "But the books do sell—I see the royalty statements—and you see her influence in the cooking of Jeremy Lee, Shaun Hill and Rowley Leigh". David's influence travelled further afield than Britain, and Marian Burros, in The New York Times wrote in 1992 that "Dozens of the young chefs who have brought glory to American cooking over the last two decades are indebted to Mrs David." The same year, the journalist Susan Parsons wrote in The Canberra Times that "Every leading Australian chef over the age of 40 pays tribute to Elizabeth David as a major influence on their approach to food". More modern Australian cooks, such as Kylie Kwong, have also cited David as a continuing influence on their work. Michael Bateman, the food critic for The Independent, considered that David "will be remembered as a far greater influence on English food than Mrs Beeton"; the writer Auberon Waugh wrote that if asked to name the woman who had brought about the greatest improvement in English life in the 20th century, "my vote would go to Elizabeth David." David's biographer Cooper concludes her Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' article thus: > David was the best writer on food and drink this country has ever produced. When she began writing in the 1950s, the British scarcely noticed what was on their plates at all, which was perhaps just as well. Her books and articles persuaded her readers that food was one of life's great pleasures, and that cooking should not be a drudgery but an exciting and creative act. In doing so she inspired a whole generation not only to cook, but to think about food in an entirely different way. ## Notes, references and sources ### Further reading: works by David not cited above

Waiting (2015 film)

2015 film by Anu Menon

Waiting is a 2015 Indian Hindi-language drama film directed by Anu Menon. Produced by Priti Gupta and Manish Mundra under the banner of Ishka Films and Drishyam Films respectively, the film was co-written by Menon and James Ruzicka, and stars Naseeruddin Shah and Kalki Koechlin. Waiting focuses on the relationship between two people from different walks of life who befriend each other in a hospital, while nursing their respective comatose spouses. Rajat Kapoor, Suhasini Maniratnam, Arjun Mathur, Ratnabali Bhattacharjee and Rajeev Ravindranathan play supporting roles in the film. The development of the film began in June 2014, when Menon signed Koechlin and Shah for an untitled project. Principal photography started in November 2014 in the South Indian coastal city of Kochi; Neha Parti served as the cinematographer for the film. New Zealand-based singer-songwriter Mikey McCleary composed the film's score. Nitin Baid and Apurva Asrani edited the film, and Atika Chohan wrote the dialogue. Waiting also marked the Hindi film debut of the prominent South Indian actress-director Suhasini Maniratnam. Koechlin also made her debut as a lyricist with the film's soundtrack, writing the song "Waiting for You". Waiting had its world premiere at the Dubai International Film Festival on 11 December 2015 to positive reviews from critics. It was also screened at the closing gala of the London Asian Film Festival, where Menon won the Best Director Award. The film was released theatrically in India on 27 May 2016. Upon release in India, Waiting was well received by critics, with particular praise for the performances of Koechlin and Shah, and Menon's direction. The film had a below average run at the box office, collecting a total of ₹35 million (US\$440,000) during its theatrical run. ## Plot Shiv Natraj (Naseeruddin Shah), an elderly psychology professor, arrives at a hospital in Kochi to visit his comatose wife Pankaja (Suhasini Maniratnam). Tara Kapoor Desphande (Kalki Koechlin), a young advertising agent, also arrives at the hospital during the night after being delivered news of a car accident involving her husband, Rajat Deshpande (Arjun Mathur). She is consoled by Rajat's eccentric co-worker Girish (Rajeev Ravindranathan), but dismisses him abruptly. Tara is deeply disturbed to see Rajat breathing on a ventilator, and leaves immediately. In the waiting lounge, Tara approaches Shiv, believing him to be a doctor, and asks for his advice. He reveals that his wife had a stroke eight months ago while he was out watching a cricket match, and has been in a coma ever since. The two bond over their similar situations. Later, Girish drops Tara off at a hotel and gives her Rajat's bag. Tara finds his watch in it and puts it on. The next day she is angered after reading an intimate message on Rajat's phone from a colleague Sheetal, who is later revealed to be a man. Shiv witnesses the whole misunderstanding, and the two share a light moment. He later visits her at the hotel, and she shares her disappointment with her friends and followers on social media for having abandoned her. She commends Shiv for his composure, as he explains the five stages of grief to her. Tara finds her strength in Shiv, a wiser and more experienced counterpart. The two start spending most of their spare time together coping with their grief, despite being completely opposite in nature. Shiv takes Tara to the temple, and she takes him shopping. Rajat's doctor, Nirupam Malhotra (Rajat Kapoor), tells Tara that Rajat has a hematoma in his brain and an operation might help him recover, but it carries the risk of partial paralysis. Tara is torn, as she believes Rajat would not want to take the risk, and seeks advice from Shiv. He is already at loggerheads with Dr. Malhotra, dismissing him as a pawn of the hospital board and the insurance companies who only care about making money and not the patients. Tara and Shiv get into a heated argument. Shiv lashes out angrily at Tara for not giving Rajat a chance at life. Tara retorts that she is a realist, and dismisses Shiv for being selfish and making his wife go through pain for his own sake. Tara's best friend Ishita (Ratnabali Bhattacharjee) arrives at Kochi and advises her to start chanting prayers and to inform Rajat's estranged parents of his situation. Despite being an atheist, Tara chants Namu Myōhō Renge Kyō when she is alone with Rajat. Shiv desperately attempts to convince Malhotra to perform a spinal decompression on his wife, but he disregards Shiv's research and refuses to proceed with surgery. Tara discusses Rajat's surgery with Ishita and decides not to go ahead with it, which further angers Malhotra. Ishita leaves to aid her ailing son. Tara realises that she is no longer Ishita's top priority, now that Ishita is married. Shiv and Tara make up and later that night dance together at Shiv's house, much to the amusement of his neighbours. They get upset thinking about their spouses and discuss what they meant to them, before falling asleep in the living room. The next morning, Tara leaves early and decides to inform Rajat's mother. After Girish brings Tara the required insurance papers, she thanks him for always being there for her and apologises for being rude. She decides to go ahead with the surgery after all. Rajat is taken to surgery, and she holds his hand until they arrive at the operating room. Shiv, on the other hand, decides to take Pankaja off the ventilator and let his wife herself make the final call. Pankaja tries to breathe on her own as the viewers are treated with flashbacks of the heyday of both couples. Tara takes a seat in the waiting lounge, and is joined by Shiv as the camera pans out. ## Cast - Naseeruddin Shah as Professor Shiv Kumar Natraj - Kalki Koechlin as Tara Deshpande - Arjun Mathur as Rajat Deshpande - Rajat Kapoor as Dr. Nirupam Malhotra - Suhasini Maniratnam as Pankaja Natraj, the coma-ridden wife of Prof Shiv Kumar Natraj - Nandini Sree as Nurse Ann - Rajeev Ravindranathan as Girish - Ratnabali Bhattacharjee as Ishita - Marin Babu as Nurse Prema - Krishna Shankar as Ravi ## Production ### Development Made on a modest budget, the movie, Waiting was produced by Priti Gupta of Ishka Films and Manish Mundra of Drishyam Films. The film was directed by Anu Menon, her second directorial work after the romantic comedy London, Paris, New York (2012). She also co-wrote the script with fellow London Film School alumnus and former anesthesiologist James Ruzicka. Menon, inspired by her own personal experience, started working on the film's script with Ruzicka. She called the writing process extremely difficult as they had to figure out "what it means to be associated with a comatose patient, both emotionally and medically". She said later that Ruzicka's experience as a medical practitioner proved really helpful in developing a logical understanding of the situation. Menon revealed that she had begun writing the story years before the actual production for the film began, and that it took her several years to complete it. Pre-production work began in July 2014, when Mundra, a Dubai-based film producer, agreed to produce. Menon wanted an entirely different setting for the film, away from "fast paced city life", and decided to set the story in the South Indian state of Kerala. The film's director of photography was cinematographer Neha Parti Martyani, who had been previously associated with films including My Name Is Khan (2010) and Yamla Pagla Deewana (2011). The film's dialogue was written by Atika Chohan. Prajakta Ghag was the film's production designer. Entertainment website Bollywood Hungama reported that Kalki Koechlin was set to star in Menon's upcoming film. The published reports revealed that Koechlin would be playing the role of the young, brash, and social-media-savvy Tara Deshpande. Koechlin's co-star from That Girl in Yellow Boots (2011) and Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara (2011), Naseeruddin Shah, joined the cast after he was approached by Menon, who sent him the film's script in an e-mail. Shah, who did not have any prior knowledge of Menon's work, accepted the male lead role in the film. To prepare for the role, Koechlin worked on the dialect in which her character spoke, an amalgamation of Hindi and English. She also dyed her hair black for the role, as Menon wanted her to look more "earthy". In an interview with Gulf News, Koechlin said she loved the film's vibe and compared it to the American drama Lost In Translation (2003). In a separate e-mail interview with Arti Daniel of The Khaleej Times, Shah said that Waiting was his way of making up to the audience for the spate of "ghastly movies" that he did in 2014. South Indian actress and director Suhasini Maniratnam made her debut in Hindi cinema with Waiting; she was cast in the role of Pankaja, Shah's character's wife. Menon talked about her experience working with Suhasini saying, "With her experience, she also helped me with a few difficult scenes behind the camera." Arjun Mathur played the role of Rajat Deshpande, Tara's husband, who is involved in a car accident; Rajat Kapoor played Nirupam Malhotra, a doctor at the Kochi Hospital. Ratnabali Bhatachajee, Rajeev Ravindranathan and Marin Babu played supporting roles in the film. The rest of the film's supporting cast consisted mainly of Malayali actors, including Dinesh Nair and Krishna Sankar, who were signed up with assistance from Gautam Pisharody, a local casting agent. ### Filming and post-production Principal photography began in November 2014 in the coastal city of Kochi, Kerala. The shoot for the entire film was completed on schedule in around 30 days. Of the shooting experience, Menon said, "The experience was beautiful though there were many challenges as we were predominantly an all-woman crew." In an interview with The Hindu, Koechlin revealed that throughout the production process, she questioned Menon several times as she wanted to better understand her character's background. She said that she would have lengthy discussions regarding particular scenes with Menon, who would then redraft the part. She also enjoyed working with Shah, describing the experience as "gratifying". The team of editors for Waiting was headed by Apurva Asrani and Nitin Baid. The sound mixing was done by London-based sound engineer Roland Heap, with assistance from Mandar Kamalapurkar and Udit Daseja. Prajakta Ghag was the film's Production Designer and the marketing department was headed by Parull Gosain. The editing process for the film took place in March 2015. The film's final cut ran for a total of 98 minutes. Menon talked to The National about the film prior to its release, saying that the story was close to her heart as it was inspired by her own personal experience. On working with Koechlin and Shah she said, "He (Shah) was punctual and always prepared, he gave his best performance in the first take. Kalki allows herself to be vulnerable. She is more porous and chilled out." Menon acknowledged the chemistry of the leading duo and said that they were committed to the project and non-demanding. She described Waiting as a "gentle and poignant film" and said, "It would make the audiences want to reach out to the leading characters and help them find their answers." ## Soundtrack The film's music was composed by Mikey McCleary, with Kavita Seth, Nikhil D'Souza, Anushka Manchanda, Vishal Dadlani and McCleary serving as vocalists for the album. The tracks' lyrics were written by McCleary, Koechlin Manoj Muntashir, and Ankur Tewari. The first song on the album, "Tu Hai Toh Main Hoon", a pop ballad by Manchanda and D'Souza, was released on YouTube on 4 May 2016. The album consisted of three other songs; McCleary's "Got My Eyes For You", Manchanda's "Waiting For You", and Seth and Dadlani's "Zara Zara". The complete soundtrack for Waiting was released on 16 May 2016, under the Zee Music Company label. The film's soundtrack was well received by critics. The tracks "Tu Hai Toh Main Hoon" and "Zara Zara" garnered positive response from critics and audiences alike; Manavi Kapoor of Business Standard remarked, "'Zara Zara' and 'Tu Hai Toh Main Hun' are haunting and perfectly capture the poignant tone of the film." Ushnota Paul writing for Filmfare was also laudatory of both the songs, as each "lingers with you for long". In another soundtrack review for The Times of India, Mohar Basu praised McCleary's "trademark effervescence", which made the soundtrack of Waiting "oh-so-charming." She summed up by writing that the album had, "a few pleasant songs and even though they all sound fairly similar, it has a satisfying effect". Manish Gaekwad of Scroll.in gave a mixed review; he was analogous in the praise of the "pleasent" nature of the tracks, but was critical of the lyrics that didn't go beyond the "greeting-card sentiment". ## Release ### Marketing and release Waiting had its world premiere on 11 December 2015 at the 12th edition of the Dubai International Film Festival. There the film's executive producer Priti Gupta, founder of Ishka Films, emphasised the universality of the film and said, "It is an endearing and beautiful movie for not just Indian[s], but the world audience, as it is essentially about the universal human circumstances, which are deftly portrayed in a tender yet humorous way." Manish Mundra, founder of Drishyam Films, expressed his delight at the screening of the film, acknowledging that Dubai was one of the biggest overseas markets for Indian films. The film was also screened at the closing gala of the London Asian Film Festival, and at the Indian Film Festival of Los Angeles. The official trailer for Waiting was released on 22 April 2016 to positive response from both critics and audience alike. Rajani Chandel of The Times of India asserted that it "will move you to tears", while The Huffington Post India editor Ankur Pathak noted the leading duo's "effortlessly comfortable vibe", and dubbed the trailer "lovely". Menon talked about the challenges of promoting an independent film and attracting viewers saying, "The distribution is first weekend collection driven [...] Those depending on a buzz created by word of mouth are at a disadvantage." The film had a special screening prior to its theatrical release which was attended by the cast and crew and other Bollywood celebrities including: Gulshan Devaiah, Radhika Apte, Huma Qureshi, Rajkummar Rao and Adil Hussain. It had its theatrical release on 27 May 2016 in India. ### Box office The film had a poor opening at the box office as the morning vacancy varied from 2 to 3 per cent in multiplexes. The film managed to collect a mere ₹2.5 million (US\$31,000) on its opening day. It was released alongside other indie films including Veerappan and Phobia, both of which also had a relatively poor opening. However, Waiting showed good growth over the day with the best occupancy among the aforementioned films. The numbers grew as the film collected ₹4.8 million (US\$60,000) and ₹5.5 million (US\$69,000) on its second and third day respectively, bringing the first weekend gross to a total of ₹12.8 million (US\$160,000). It carried on with steady numbers through the first and the second week collecting ₹25 million (US\$310,000). Waiting grossed a total of around ₹35 million (US\$440,000) in its entire run at the box office. ## Reception ### India The film opened to largely positive reviews in India. Saibal Chatterjee of NDTV gave the film the highest praise and deemed it "a well-chiselled marvel" saying: "Waiting is at once heart-wrenching and uplifting ... marked by deep philosophical undertones, but it is never unduly ponderous." A reviewer for The New Indian Express also spoke highly of the film saying, "Not since Ritesh Batra's The Lunchbox have I seen an indie film addressing itself to the ageless issue of human desolation and individual grief with such warmth, dignity, grace, honesty and humour." For Namrata Joshi of The Hindu, the script was "dignified [and] without any false notes", and the film managed "to stand on its own emotional ground ... The people, situations, relationships, feelings are layered, warm and humorous, ringing true in their complexities." Mohar Basu of The Times of India called the film "thought-provoking" writing: "Menon has whipped up a warm tale about love, loss and surviving life's catastrophic blows, with such simplicity." Kunal Guha of the Mumbai Mirror lauded the film's direction and cinematography saying, "Menon has the tenacity of a Sofia Coppola to produce frames where not much happens but one is unable to look away", and concluded, "The film deserves a watch for being one that doesn't try too hard and for its approach to an extreme situation." Rohit Bhatnagar of Deccan Chronicle, while also praising the technical expertise, said, "Neha Parti Matiyani beautifully captures the beautiful city of Kochi" and called the film "unmissable" saying, "Waiting is a refreshing subject that is engaging enough right up till its open-ended climax." Shubhra Gupta writing for The Indian Express thought that the film was "too explanatory, too talky", and that "the most effective moments in the film occur when the two leads are allowed to fall silent, to just be in that moment, to loosen up". While lauding the film's treatment of the subject matter, Gupta described Waiting as "a film about life, lasting love and impending loss which explores a zone Bollywood doesn't bother with". The performances of the leading pair of Koechlin and Shah were chiefly praised by several critics. Guha in his review remarked "this film belongs to Kalki, who impresses by managing to wordlessly convey her character's state of mind in every scene". Chatterjee, offering a similar observation, wrote that Koechlin "provides the ideal foil, adding immensely to the emotional depth of the tale and heightening the conflict between two unlike poles". The latter thought that the lead performances empowered the film. In her review for Rediff.com Sukanya Verma called the film "absolutely riveting", and wrote of Koechlin that "[t]here's something stunningly unhindered about Kalki and her aura. She uses this quality in the most mesmeric fashion to create a woman we sympathise with and wish well for." In her review for Firstpost, Anna M. M. Vetticad wrote that the leading pair "shine in a lovely film" noting that chemistry between them was "unmistakable". She concluded by saying, "[Waiting] is both sad and amusing, believable, well acted and very well told". Sweta Kaushal of Hindustan Times summed up her review by writing, "Packaged with Naseeruddin as the adorable old man ... and Kalki as the charming young, energetic woman, Waiting is a delight." While acknowledging the "underdeveloped and overwritten" parts of the plot, Gupta was nonetheless appreciative of Koechlin and Shah, calling them good fits for their roles. Rajeev Masand writing for News18 offered similar observations; he criticized the "weak" plotting, but talked well of the characters: "you yearn for them to just shut up and soak in the silence. Each time they do, the film soars." Also lauding Shah's "real" and Koechlin's "endearing" performances, he wrote that Waiting, "raises important questions about life, love, and letting go. Plus there are those two splendid performances. That's plenty to merit a viewing." ### Overseas The film received positive reviews from critics at the Dubai International Film Festival who praised the story's narrative, Menon's direction, and the performances of the lead pairing of Koechlin and Shah. Gautaman Bhaskaran of Hindustan Times called the film a "tragic, witty affair" and praised the humour of presenting the contrast between Shiv and Tara. Fionnuala Halligan of Screen International lauded the cinematography and Neha Parti Mtiyani's "dignified lenswork" and wrote further, "Waiting simmers in its locales without being brash or boastful; the colours of India are there, glowing at the sidelines." She also lauded Koechlin's and Shah's performances saying that the film "benefits greatly from Koechlin's appeal ... she has an expressive face to match her talent" and added that Shah's presence "lends the film its grace-notes". Deborah Young of The Hollywood Reporter also gave it a positive review calling the film: "A tender, often humorous tale with sparkling performances." In her opinion, "Koechlin does an exceptional job navigating the shoals of this as a kooky drama queen" while "Shah brings great feeling and complexity to the role of the wise, tolerant Shiv." ## Accolades

Cleveland Street scandal

Discovery in 1889 of male brothel in London

The Cleveland Street scandal occurred in 1889, when a homosexual male brothel and house of assignation on Cleveland Street, London, was discovered by police. The government was accused of covering up the scandal to protect the names of aristocratic and other prominent patrons. At the time, sexual acts between men were illegal in Britain, and the brothel's clients faced possible prosecution and certain levels of social rejection if discovered. It was rumoured that Prince Albert Victor, the eldest son of the Prince of Wales and second-in-line to the British throne, had visited the brothel, though this has never been substantiated. Unlike overseas newspapers, the British press never named Albert Victor, but the allegation influenced the handling of the case by the authorities and has coloured biographers' perceptions of him since. The police acquired testimonies that Lord Arthur Somerset, an equerry to the Prince of Wales, was a patron. Both he and the brothel keeper, Charles Hammond, managed to flee abroad before a prosecution could be brought. The male prostitutes, who also worked as telegraph messenger boys for the General Post Office, were given light sentences and no clients were prosecuted. After Henry James FitzRoy, Earl of Euston, was named in the press as a client, he successfully sued for libel. The scandal fuelled the attitude that male homosexuality was an aristocratic vice that corrupted lower-class youths. Such perceptions were still prevalent in 1895 when the Marquess of Queensberry accused Oscar Wilde of being an active homosexual. ## Male brothel In July 1889, Police Constable Luke Hanks was investigating a theft from the London Central Telegraph Office. During the investigation, a fifteen-year-old telegraph boy named Charles Thomas Swinscow was discovered to be in possession of fourteen shillings, equivalent to several weeks of his wages. At the time, messenger boys were not permitted to carry any personal cash in the course of their duties, to prevent their own money being mixed with that of the customers. Suspecting the boy's involvement in the theft, Constable Hanks brought him in for questioning. After hesitating, Swinscow admitted that he earned the money working as a prostitute for a man named Charles Hammond, who operated a male brothel at 19 Cleveland Street. According to Swinscow, he was introduced to Hammond by a General Post Office clerk, eighteen-year-old Henry Newlove. In addition, he named two seventeen-year-old telegraph boys who also worked for Hammond: George Alma Wright and Charles Ernest Thickbroom. Constable Hanks obtained corroborating statements from Wright and Thickbroom and, armed with these, a confession from Newlove. Constable Hanks reported the matter to his superiors and the case was given to Detective Inspector Frederick Abberline. Inspector Abberline went to the brothel on 6 July with a warrant to arrest Hammond and Newlove for violation of Section 11 of the Criminal Law Amendment Act 1885. The Act made all homosexual acts between men, as well as procurement or attempted procurement of such acts, punishable by up to two years' imprisonment with or without hard labour. He found the house locked and Hammond gone, but Abberline was able to apprehend Newlove at his mother's house in Camden Town. In the time between his statement to Hanks and his arrest, Newlove had gone to Cleveland Street and warned Hammond, who had consequently escaped to his brother's house in Gravesend. ## Notable clients On the way to the police station, Newlove named Lord Arthur Somerset and Henry FitzRoy, Earl of Euston, as well as a British Army colonel by the name of Jervois, as visitors to Cleveland Street. Somerset was the head of the Prince of Wales's stables. Although Somerset was interviewed by police, no immediate action was taken against him, and the authorities were slow to act on the allegations of Somerset's involvement. A watch was placed on the now-empty house and details of the case shuffled between government departments. On 19 August, an arrest warrant was issued in the name of George Veck, an acquaintance of Hammond's who pretended to be a clergyman. Veck had actually worked at the Telegraph Office, but had been sacked for "improper conduct" with the messenger boys. A seventeen-year-old youth found in Veck's London lodgings revealed to the police that Veck had gone to Portsmouth and was returning shortly by train. The police arrested Veck at London Waterloo railway station. In his pockets they discovered letters from Algernon Allies. Abberline sent Constable Hanks to interview Allies at his parents' home in Sudbury, Suffolk. Allies admitted to receiving money from Somerset, having a sexual relationship with him, and working at Cleveland Street for Hammond. On 22 August, police interviewed Somerset for a second time, after which Somerset left for Bad Homburg, where the Prince of Wales was taking his summer holiday. On 11 September, Newlove and Veck were committed for trial. Their defence was handled by Somerset's solicitor, Arthur Newton, with Willie Mathews appearing for Newlove, and Charles Gill for Veck. Somerset paid the legal fees. By this time, Somerset had moved on to Hanover, to inspect some horses for the Prince of Wales, and the press was referring to "noble lords" implicated in the trial. Newlove and Veck pleaded guilty to indecency on 18 September and the judge, Sir Thomas Chambers, a former Liberal Member of Parliament who had a reputation for leniency, sentenced them to four and nine months' hard labour respectively. The boys were also given sentences that were considered at the time to be very lenient. Hammond escaped to France, but the French authorities expelled him after pressure from the British. Hammond moved on to Belgium from where he emigrated to the United States. Newton, acting for Somerset, paid for Hammond's passage. On the advice of the Prime Minister, Lord Salisbury, no extradition proceedings were attempted, and the case against Hammond was quietly dropped. Somerset returned to Britain in late September to attend horse sales at Newmarket but suddenly left for Dieppe on 26 September, probably after being told by Newton that he was in danger of being arrested. He returned again on 30 September. A few days later, his grandmother, Emily Somerset, Dowager Duchess of Beaufort, died and he attended her funeral. The Hon. Hamilton Cuffe, Assistant Treasury Solicitor, and James Monro, Commissioner of Police, pressed for action to be taken against Somerset, but the Lord Chancellor, Lord Halsbury, blocked any prosecution. Rumours of Somerset's involvement were circulating, and on 19 October Somerset fled back to France. Lord Salisbury was later accused of warning Somerset through Sir Dighton Probyn, who had met Lord Salisbury the evening before, that a warrant for his arrest was imminent. This was denied by Lord Salisbury and the Attorney General, Sir Richard Webster. Probyn's informant may have been the Assistant Commissioner of Police, Richard Pearson. The Prince of Wales wrote to Lord Salisbury, expressing satisfaction that Somerset had been allowed to leave the country and asking that if Somerset should "ever dare to show his face in England again", he would remain unmolested by the authorities, but Lord Salisbury was also being pressured by the police to prosecute Somerset. On 12 November, a warrant for Somerset's arrest was finally issued. By this time, Somerset was already safely abroad, and the warrant caught little public attention. After an unsuccessful search for employment in Turkey and Austria-Hungary, Somerset settled down to live anonymously in France, at first in Paris then in Hyères on the French Riviera. Other names mentioned by the press were Lord Ronald Gower and Lord Errol. Also implicated was the prominent social figure Alexander Meyrick Broadley, who fled abroad for four years. The Paris Figaro even alleged that Broadley took General Georges Boulanger and Henri Rochefort to the house. The allegation against Boulanger was later challenged by his supporters. In December 1889 it was reported that both the Prince and Princess of Wales were being "daily assailed with anonymous letters of the most outrageous character" bearing upon the scandal. By January 1890 sixty suspects had been identified, twenty-two of whom had fled the country. ## Public revelations Because the press initially barely covered the story, the affair would have faded quickly from public memory if not for journalist Ernest Parke. The editor of the obscure politically radical weekly The North London Press, Parke got wind of the affair when one of his reporters brought him the story of Newlove's conviction. Parke began to question why the prostitutes had been given such light sentences relative to their offence (the usual penalty for "gross indecency" was two years) and how Hammond had been able to evade arrest. His curiosity aroused, Parke found out that the boys had named prominent aristocrats. He subsequently ran a story on 28 September hinting at their involvement but without detailing specific names. It was only on 16 November that he published a follow-up story specifically naming Henry Fitzroy, Earl of Euston, in "an indescribably loathsome scandal in Cleveland Street". He further alleged that Euston may have gone to Peru and that he had been allowed to escape to cover up the involvement of a more highly placed person, who was not named but was believed by some to be Prince Albert Victor, the son of the Prince of Wales. Euston was in fact still in England and immediately filed a case against Parke for libel. At the trial, Euston admitted that when walking along Piccadilly a tout had given him a card which read "Poses plastiques. C. Hammond, 19 Cleveland Street". Euston testified that he went to the house believing Poses plastiques meant a display of female nudes. He paid a sovereign to get in but upon entering Euston said he was appalled to discover the "improper" nature of the place and immediately left. The defence witnesses contradicted each other, and could not describe Euston accurately. The final defence witness, John Saul, was a male prostitute who had earlier been involved in a homosexual scandal at Dublin Castle, and featured in a clandestinely published erotic novel The Sins of the Cities of the Plain which was cast as his autobiography. Delivering his testimony in a manner described as "brazen effrontery", Saul admitted to earning his living by leading an "immoral life" and "practising criminality", and detailed his alleged sexual encounters with Euston at the house. The defence did not call either Newlove or Veck as witnesses, and could not produce any evidence that Euston had left the country. On 16 January 1890, the jury found Parke guilty and the judge sentenced him to twelve months in prison. One historian considers Euston was telling the truth and only visited Cleveland Street once because he was misled by the card. However, another has alleged Euston was a well-known figure in the homosexual underworld, and was extorted so often by the notorious blackmailer Robert Cliburn, that Oscar Wilde had quipped Cliburn deserved the Victoria Cross for his tenacity. Saul stated that he told the police his story in August, which provoked the judge to enquire rhetorically why the authorities had not taken action. The judge, Sir Henry Hawkins, had a distinguished career, although after his death a former Solicitor General for England and Wales, Sir Edward Clarke, wrote: "Sir Henry Hawkins was the worst judge I ever knew or heard of. He had no notion whatever of what justice meant, or of the obligations of truth or fairness." The prosecuting counsels, Charles Russell and Willie Mathews, went on to become Lord Chief Justice and Director of Public Prosecutions, respectively. The defence counsel, Frank Lockwood, later became Solicitor General, and he was assisted by H. H. Asquith, who became Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twenty years later. While Parke's conviction cleared Euston, another trial began on 16 December 1889 when Newlove's and Somerset's solicitor, Arthur Newton, was charged with obstruction of justice. It was alleged that he conspired to prevent Hammond and the boys from testifying by offering or giving them passage and money to go abroad. Newton was defended by Charles Russell, who had prosecuted Ernest Parke, and the prosecutor was Sir Richard Webster, the Attorney General. Newton pleaded guilty to one of the six charges against him, claiming that he had assisted Hammond to flee merely to protect his clients, who were not at that time charged with any offence or under arrest, from potential blackmail. The Attorney General accepted Newton's pleas and did not present any evidence on the other five charges. On 20 May, the judge, Sir Lewis Cave, sentenced Newton to six weeks in prison, which was widely considered by members of the legal profession to be harsh. A petition signed by 250 London law firms was sent to the Home Secretary, Henry Matthews, protesting at Newton's treatment. During Newton's trial, a motion in Parliament sought to investigate Parke's allegations of a cover-up. Henry Labouchère, a Member of Parliament from the Radical wing of the Liberal Party, was staunchly against homosexuality and had campaigned successfully to add the "gross indecency" amendment (known as the "Labouchère Amendment") to the Criminal Law Amendment Act 1885. He was convinced that the conspiracy to cover up the scandal went further up the government than assumed. Labouchère made his suspicions known in Parliament on 28 February 1890. He denied that "a gentleman of very high position"—presumably Prince Albert Victor—was in any way involved with the scandal, but accused the government of conspiracy to pervert the course of justice. He suggested that the Prime Minister Lord Salisbury and other officials colluded to hamper the investigation, allowing Somerset and Hammond to escape, delaying the trials and failing to prosecute the case with vigour. Labouchère's accusations were rebutted by the Attorney General, Sir Richard Webster, who was also the prosecutor in the Newton case. Charles Russell, who had prosecuted Parke and was defending Newton, sat on the Liberal benches with Labouchère but refused to be drawn into the debate. After an often passionate debate over seven hours, during which Labouchère was expelled from Parliament after saying "I do not believe Lord Salisbury" and refusing to withdraw his remark, the motion was defeated by a wide margin, 206–66. In a subsequent speech to the House of Lords, Salisbury bore witness against himself by suggesting his memory of his handling of the affair was defective. ## Aftermath Public interest in the scandal eventually faded. Nevertheless, newspaper coverage reinforced negative attitudes about male homosexuality as an aristocratic vice, presenting the telegraph boys as corrupted and exploited by members of the upper class. That attitude reached its climax a few years later when Oscar Wilde was tried for gross indecency as the result of his affair with Lord Alfred Douglas. Oscar Wilde may have alluded to the scandal in The Picture of Dorian Gray, first published in 1890. Reviews of the novel were hostile. In a clear reference to the Cleveland Street scandal, one reviewer called it suitable for "none but outlawed noblemen and perverted telegraph boys". Wilde's 1891 revision of the novel omitted certain key passages, which were considered too homoerotic. In 1895, Wilde unsuccessfully sued Lord Alfred's father, the Marquess of Queensberry, for libel. Sir Edward Carson, Lord Queensberry's counsel, used quotes from the novel against Wilde and questioned him about his associations with young working men. After the failure of his suit, Wilde was charged with gross indecency, found guilty, and subsequently sentenced to two years' hard labour. He was prosecuted by Charles Gill, who had defended Veck in the Cleveland Street case. Prince Albert Victor died in 1892, but society gossip about his sex life continued. Sixty years after the scandal, the official biographer of King George V, Harold Nicolson, was told by Lord Goddard, who was a twelve-year-old schoolboy at the time of the scandal, that Prince Albert Victor "had been involved in a male brothel scene, and that a solicitor had to commit perjury to clear him. The solicitor was struck off the rolls for his offence, but was thereafter reinstated." In fact, none of the lawyers involved in the case was convicted of perjury or struck off at the time, and most had very distinguished careers. However, Arthur Newton was struck off for 12 months for professional misconduct in 1910 after falsifying letters from another of his clients—the notorious murderer Harvey Crippen. In 1913, he was struck off indefinitely and sentenced to three years' imprisonment for obtaining money by false pretences. Newton may have invented and spread the rumours about Prince Albert Victor in an attempt to protect his clients from prosecution by forcing a cover-up. State papers on the case in the Public Record Office, released to the public in the 1970s, provide no information on the prince's involvement other than Newton's threat to implicate him. Hamilton Cuffe wrote to the Director of Public Prosecutions, Sir Augustus Stephenson, "I am told that Newton has boasted that if we go on a very distinguished person will be involved (PAV). I don't mean to say that I for one instant credit it—but in such circumstances as this one never knows what may be said, be concocted or be true." Surviving private letters from Somerset to his friend Lord Esher, confirm that Somerset knew of the rumours but did not know if they were true. He writes, "I can quite understand the Prince of Wales being much annoyed at his son's name being coupled with the thing ... we were both accused of going to this place but not together ... I wonder if it is really a fact or only an invention." In his correspondence, Sir Dighton Probyn refers to "cruel and unjust rumours with regard to PAV" and "false reports dragging PAV's name into the sad story". When Prince Albert Victor's name appeared in the American press, the New York Herald published an anonymous letter, almost certainly written by Charles Hall, saying "there is not, and never was, the slightest excuse for mentioning the name of Prince Albert Victor." Biographers who believe the rumours suppose that Prince Albert Victor was bisexual, but that is strongly contested by others, who refer to him as "ardently heterosexual" and his involvement in the rumours as "somewhat unfair". In 1902, an American newspaper alleged that Lord Arthur Somerset, having learned in some way that 19 Cleveland Street was under police surveillance and that he may have been identified as a visitor, contrived to bring the prince to the house on an innocent pretext in the hope that the police, seeing him cross the threshold, would be afraid to take the case any further. The report alleged the ruse Somerset used was the prince's fondness for boulle furniture: he invited him to inspect a boulle cabinet which was in the house, and the prince remained there for no more than five minutes. The warrant for Somerset's arrest remained open, and he never returned to England. For more than thirty years he lived incognito in his self-imposed exile, until his death in 1926. He was buried in the town cemetery of Hyères, and his headstone gave his true name and paternity. ## House The site of the brothel at 19 Cleveland Street, Marylebone, and its historical context within the homosexual and other transgressive communities of London's Fitzrovia and neighbouring Soho and Bloomsbury, has become the subject of academic study and general interest. In Parliament, Labouchère indignantly described 19 Cleveland Street as "in no obscure thoroughfare, but nearly opposite the Middlesex Hospital". The house, which was located on the western side of Cleveland Street, no longer survives: it was demolished in the 1890s for an extension of the hospital, which itself was bulldozed in 2005. Two sketches of the house were published by The Illustrated Police News. It has occasionally been claimed that the house survives. This theory proposes that, following a renumbering of the street, No. 19 was deleted from the Land Survey to suppress its existence, and that the house is the current No. 18 on the eastern side of the street. Cleveland Street was indeed renumbered: the southernmost end was originally Norfolk Street. (For example, the current number 22 Cleveland Street, was originally 10 Norfolk Street, and for a time was the home of Charles Dickens.) However, the renumbering of Cleveland Street was ordered in 1867, long before the scandal, by the Metropolitan Board of Works: "the odd numbers, commencing with 1 and ending with 175, being assigned to the houses on the Western side; that the even numbers, commencing with 2 and ending with 140, to those on the Eastern side; that such numbers do commence at the Southern end." An Ordnance Survey of 1870 also shows No. 19 and its adjacent houses on the street's western side. In an 1894 Ordnance Survey these properties have been subsumed by the new Middlesex Hospital wing. ## See also - LGBT history - LGBT rights in the United Kingdom ## Notes and sources

Cock Lane ghost

1762 purported haunting in London

The Cock Lane ghost was a purported haunting that attracted mass public attention in 1762. The location was a lodging in Cock Lane, a short road adjacent to London's Smithfield market and a few minutes' walk from St Paul's Cathedral. The event centred on three people: William Kent, a usurer from Norfolk; Richard Parsons, a parish clerk; and Parsons' daughter Elizabeth. Following the death during childbirth of Kent's wife, Elizabeth Lynes, he became romantically involved with her sister, Fanny. Canon law prevented the couple from marrying, but they nevertheless moved to London and lodged at the property in Cock Lane, then owned by Parsons. Several accounts of strange knocking sounds and ghostly apparitions were reported, although for the most part they stopped after the couple moved out, but following Fanny's death from smallpox and Kent's successful legal action against Parsons over an outstanding debt, they resumed. Parsons claimed that Fanny's ghost haunted his property and later his daughter. Regular séances were held to determine "Scratching Fanny's" motives; Cock Lane was often made impassable by the throngs of interested bystanders. The ghost appeared to claim that Fanny had been poisoned with arsenic and Kent was publicly suspected of being her murderer. But a commission whose members included Samuel Johnson concluded that the supposed haunting was a fraud. Further investigations proved the scam was perpetrated by Elizabeth Parsons, under duress from her father. Those responsible were prosecuted and found guilty; Richard Parsons was pilloried and sentenced to two years in prison. The Cock Lane ghost became a focus of controversy between the Methodist and Anglican churches and is referenced frequently in contemporary literature. Charles Dickens is one of several Victorian authors whose work alluded to the story and the pictorial satirist William Hogarth referenced the ghost in two of his prints. ## Background In about 1756–57 William Kent, a usurer from Norfolk, married Elizabeth Lynes, the daughter of a grocer from Lyneham. They moved to Stoke Ferry where Kent kept an inn and later, the local post office. They were apparently very much in love, but their marriage was short-lived as within a month of the move Elizabeth died during childbirth. Her sister Frances—commonly known as Fanny—had during Elizabeth's pregnancy moved in with the couple and she stayed to care for the infant and its father. The boy did not survive long and rather than leave, Fanny stayed on to take care of William and the house. The two soon began a relationship, but canon law appeared to rule out marriage; when Kent travelled to London to seek advice he was told that as Elizabeth had borne him a living son, a union with Fanny was impossible. In January 1759 therefore, he gave up the post office, left Fanny and moved to London, intending to "purchase a place in some public office" in the hope that "business would erase that passion he had unfortunately indulged". Fanny meanwhile stayed with one of her brothers at Lyneham. Despite her family's disapproval of their relationship, Fanny began to write passionate letters to Kent, "filled with repeated entreaties to spend the rest of their lives together". He eventually allowed her to join him at lodgings in East Greenwich near London. The two decided to live together as man and wife, making wills in each other's favour and hoping to remain discreet. In this, however, they did not reckon on Fanny's relations. The couple moved to lodgings near the Mansion House, but their landlord there may have learnt of their relationship from Fanny's family, expressing his contempt by refusing to repay a sum of money Kent loaned him (about £20). In response, Kent had him arrested. While attending early morning prayers at the church of St Sepulchre-without-Newgate, William Kent and Fanny met Richard Parsons, the officiating clerk. Although he was generally considered respectable, Parsons was known locally as a drunk and was struggling to provide for his family. He listened to the couple's plight and was sympathetic, offering them the use of lodgings in his home on Cock Lane, to the north of St Sepulchre's. Located along a narrow, winding thoroughfare similar to most of central London's streets, the three-storey house was in a respectable but declining area, and comprised a single room on each floor, connected by a winding staircase. Shortly after Mr and Mrs Kent (as they called themselves) moved in, Kent loaned Parsons 12 guineas, to be repaid at a rate of a guinea per month. It was while Kent was away at a wedding in the country that the first reports of strange noises began. Parsons had a wife and two daughters; the elder, Elizabeth, was described as a "little artful girl about eleven years of age". Kent asked Elizabeth to stay with Fanny, who was then several months into a pregnancy, and to share her bed while he was away. The two reported hearing scratching and rapping noises. These were attributed by Mrs Parsons to a neighbouring cobbler, although when the noises recurred on a Sunday, Fanny asked if the cobbler was working that day; Mrs Parsons told her he was not. James Franzen, landlord of the nearby Wheat Sheaf public house, was another witness. After visiting the house he reported seeing a ghostly white figure ascend the stairs. Terrified, he returned home, where Parsons later visited him and claimed also to have seen a ghost. As Fanny was only weeks away from giving birth Kent made arrangements to move to a property at Bartlet's Court in Clerkenwell, but by January 1760 it was not ready and so they moved instead to an "inconvenient" apartment nearby, intending only a temporary stay. However, on 25 January Fanny fell ill. The attending doctor diagnosed the early stages of an eruptive fever and agreed with Kent that their lodgings were inadequate for someone at so critical a stage of pregnancy. Fanny was therefore moved, by coach, to Bartlet's Court. The next day her doctor returned and met with her apothecary. Both agreed that Fanny's symptoms were indicative of smallpox. On hearing this, Fanny sent for an attorney, to ensure the will she had had made was in good order, and that Kent would inherit her estate. An acquaintance of Kent's, Stephen Aldrich, Rector of St John Clerkenwell, reassured her that she would be forgiven for her sins. She died on 2 February. As sole executor of Fanny's will, Kent ordered a coffin, but fearful of being prosecuted should the nature of their relationship become known, asked that it remain nameless. On registering the burial he was, however, forced to give a name, and he gave her his own. Fanny's family was notified and her sister Ann Lynes, who lived nearby at Pall Mall, attended the funeral at St John's. When Ann learned of the terms of Fanny's will, which left her brothers and sisters half a crown each and Kent the rest, she tried but failed to block it in Doctors' Commons. The bulk of Kent's inheritance was Fanny's £150 share of her dead brother Thomas's estate. This also included some land owned by Thomas, sold by the executor of his estate, John Lynes, and Kent received Fanny's share of that too (almost £95). Her family resented this. Legal problems with Lynes's sale meant that each of Thomas's beneficiaries had to pay £45 in compensation to the purchaser, but Kent refused, claiming that he had already spent the money in settling Fanny's debts. In response to this, in October 1761 John Lynes began proceedings against Kent in the Court of Chancery. Meanwhile, Kent became a stockbroker and remarried in 1761. ## Haunting Echoing the actions of Kent's previous landlord, Parsons had not repaid Kent's loan—of which about three guineas was outstanding—and Kent therefore instructed his solicitor to sue him. He managed to recover the debt by January 1762, just as the mysterious noises at Cock Lane began again. Catherine Friend had lodged there shortly after the couple left but moved out when she found the noises, which had returned intermittently and which were becoming more frequent, could not be stopped. They apparently emanated from Elizabeth Parsons, who also suffered fits, and the house was regularly disturbed by unexplained noises, likened at the time to the sound of a cat scratching a chair. Reportedly determined to discover their source, Richard Parsons had a carpenter remove the wainscotting around Elizabeth's bed. He approached John Moore, assistant preacher at St Sepulchre's since 1754 and rector of St Bartholomew-the-Great in West Smithfield since June 1761. The presence of one ghost, presumed to belong to Fanny's sister, Elizabeth, had already been noted while Fanny lay dying, and the two concluded that the spirit now haunting Parsons' house must be that of Fanny Lynes herself. The notion that a person's spirit might return from the dead to warn those still alive was a commonly held belief, and the presence of two apparently restless spirits was therefore an obvious sign to both men that each ghost had an important message to disclose. Parsons and Moore devised a method of communication; one knock for yes, two knocks for no. Using this system, the ghost appeared to claim that Fanny had been murdered. It was conjectured that the mysterious figure in white which so terrified James Franzen, presumed to be the ghost of Elizabeth, had appeared there to warn her sister of her impending death. As the first ghost had seemingly vanished, this charge against Kent—that he murdered Elizabeth—was never acted on, but through repeated questioning of Fanny's ghost it was divined that she had died not from the effects of smallpox, but rather from arsenic poisoning. The deadly toxin had apparently been administered by Kent about two hours before Fanny died and now, it was supposed, her spirit wanted justice. Moore had heard from Parsons how Kent had pursued the debt he was owed, and he had also heard from Ann Lynes, who had complained that as Fanny's coffin lid was screwed down she had not been able to see her sister's corpse. Moore thought that Fanny's body might not show any visible signs of smallpox and that if she had been poisoned, the lack of scarring would have been something Kent would rather keep hidden. As a clergyman with inclinations toward Methodism he was inclined to trust the ghost, but for added support he enlisted the aid of Thomas Broughton, an early Methodist. Broughton visited Cock Lane on 5 January and left convinced the ghost was real. The story spread through London, The Public Ledger began to publish detailed accounts of the phenomenon, and Kent fell under public suspicion as a murderer. ## Séances After reading the veiled accusations made against him in the Public Ledger, Kent determined to clear his name, and accompanied by a witness went to see John Moore. The Methodist showed Kent the list of questions he and Parsons had drawn up for the ghost to answer. One concerned William and Fanny's marital status, prompting Kent to admit that they never married. Moore told him he did not think he was a murderer, rather, he believed the spirit's presence indicated that "there was something behind darker than all the rest, and that if he would go to Parson's house, he might be a witness to the same and convinced of its reality". On 12 January therefore, Kent enlisted the aid of the two physicians who attended Fanny in her last days, and with Broughton, went to Cock Lane. On the house's upper floor Elizabeth Parsons was publicly undressed, and with her younger sister was put to bed. The audience sat around the bed, positioned in the centre of the room. They were warned that the ghost was sensitive to disbelief and told that they should accord it due respect. When the séance began, a relative of Parsons, Mary Frazer, ran around the room shouting "Fanny, Fanny, why don't you come? Do come, pray Fanny, come; dear Fanny, come!" When nothing happened, Moore told the group the ghost would not come as they were making too much noise. He asked them to leave the room, telling them he would try to contact the ghost by stamping his foot. About ten minutes later they were told the ghost had returned and that they should re-enter the room. Moore then started to run through his and Parsons' list of questions: "Are you the wife of Mr. Kent?" —Two knocks "Did you die naturally?" —Two knocks "By poison?" —One knock "Did any person other than Mr. Kent administer it?" —Two knocks After more questions, a member of the audience exclaimed "Kent, ask this Ghost if you shall be hanged". He did so, and the question was answered by a single knock. Kent exclaimed "Thou art a lying spirit, thou are not the ghost of my Fanny. She would never have said any such thing." Public interest in the story grew when it was discovered that the ghost appeared to follow Elizabeth Parsons. She was removed to the house of a Mr Bray, where on 14 January, in the presence of two unidentified nobles, more knocking sounds were heard. A few days later she was returned to Cock Lane, where on 18 January another séance was held. In attendance were Kent, the apothecary, and local parish priest and incumbent of St John Clerkenwell, Stephen Aldrich. On that occasion, when a clergyman used a candle to look under the bed, the ghost "refused" to answer, Frazer claiming "she [the ghost] loving not light". After a few minutes of silence the questioning continued, but when Moore asked if the ghost would appear in court against Kent, Frazer refused to ask the question. When they lived at Cock Lane William and Fanny had employed a maid, Esther "Carrots" Carlisle (Carrots on account of her red hair). She had since moved to a new job and knew nothing of the haunting, but seeking evidence of Fanny's poisoning, Moore went to question her. Carrots told him that Fanny had been unable to speak in the days before she died, so Moore invited her to a séance, held on 19 January. Once there, she was asked to confirm that Fanny had been poisoned, but Carrots remained adamant that Fanny had said nothing to her, telling the party that William and Fanny had been "very loving, and lived very happy together." Kent arrived later that night, this time with James Franzen and priests William Dodd and Thomas Broughton. Frazer began with her usual introduction before Moore sent her out, apparently irritated by her behaviour. He then asked the party of about 20 to leave the room, calling them back a few minutes later. This time, the séance centred on Carrots, who addressed the ghost directly: "Are you my mistress?" —One knock, followed by scratches "Are you angry with me, Madam?" —One knock "Then I am sure, Madam, you may be ashamed of yourself for I never hurt you in my life." At this, the séance was ended. Frazer and Franzen remained alone in the room, the latter reportedly too terrified to move. Frazer asked if he would like to pray and was angered when he apparently could not. The séance resumed and Franzen later returned to his home, where he and his wife were reportedly tormented by the ghost's knocking in their bedchamber. ## Investigation On 20 January another séance was held, this time at the home of a Mr Bruin, on the corner of nearby Hosier Lane. Among those attending was a man "extremely desirous of detecting the fraud, and discovering the truth of this mysterious affair", who later sent his account of the night to the London Chronicle. He arrived with a small party which included James Penn of St Ann's in Aldersgate. Inside the house, a member of the group positioned himself against the bed, but was asked by one of the ghost's sympathisers to move. He refused, and following a brief argument the ghost's supporters left. The gentleman then asked if Parsons would allow his daughter to be moved to a room at his house, but was refused. For the remainder of the night the ghost made no sound, while Elizabeth Parsons, now extremely agitated, displayed signs of convulsions. When questioned she confirmed that she had seen the ghost, but that she was not frightened by it. At that point several of the party left, but at about 7 am the next morning the knocking once more recommenced. Following the usual questions about the cause of Fanny's death and who was responsible, the interrogation turned to her body, which lay in the vaults of St John's. Parsons agreed to move his daughter to Aldrich's house for further testing on 22 January, but when that morning Penn and a man of "veracity and fortune" called on Parsons and asked for Elizabeth, the clerk told them she was not there and refused to reveal her whereabouts. Parsons had spoken with friends and was apparently worried that Kent had been busy with his own investigations. Instead, he allowed Elizabeth to be moved that night to St Bartholomew's Hospital, where another séance was held. Nothing was reported until about 6 am, when three scratches were heard, apparently while the girl was asleep. The approximately 20-strong audience complained that the affair was a deception. Once Elizabeth woke she began to cry, and once reassured that she was safe admitted that she was afraid for her father, "who must needs be ruined and undone, if their matter should be supposed to be an imposture." She also admitted that although she had appeared to be asleep, she was in fact fully aware of the conversation going on around her. Initially only the Public Ledger reported on the case, but once it became known that noblemen had taken an interest and visited the ghost at Mr Bray's house on 14 January, the story began to appear in other newspapers. The St. James's Chronicle and the London Chronicle printed reports from 16 to 19 January (the latter the more sceptical of the two), and Lloyd's Evening Post from 18 to 20 January. The story spread across London and by the middle of January the crowds gathered outside the property were such that Cock Lane was rendered impassable. Parsons charged visitors an entrance fee to "talk" with the ghost, which, it was reported, did not disappoint. After receiving several requests to intercede, Samuel Fludyer, Lord Mayor of London, was on 23 January approached by Alderman Gosling, John Moore and Parsons. They told him of their experiences but Fludyer was reminded of the then recent case of fraudster Elizabeth Canning and refused to have Kent or Parsons arrested (on charges of murder and conspiracy respectively). Instead, against a backdrop of hysteria caused in part by the newspapers' relentless reporting of the case, he ordered that Elizabeth be tested at Aldrich's house. Meanwhile, Elizabeth was again the subject of study, in two séances held 23–24 January. Parsons accepted the Lord Mayor's decision, but asked that "some persons connected with the girl might be permitted to be there, to divert her in the day-time". This was refused, as were two similar requests, Aldrich and Penn insisting that they would accept only "any person or persons, of strict character and reputation, who are housekeepers". Aldrich and Penn's account of their negotiations with Parsons clearly perturbed the clerk, as he defended his actions in the Public Ledger. This prompted Aldrich and Penn to issue a pointed retort in Lloyd's Evening Post: "We are greatly puzzled to find Mr. Parsons asserting that he hath been always willing to deliver up the child, when he refused a gentleman on Wednesday evening the 20th inst. [...] What is to be understood, by requiring security"? Elizabeth was taken on 26 January to the house of Jane Armstrong, sleeping there in a hammock. The continued noises strengthened the resolve of the ghost's supporters, while the press's ceaseless reporting of the case continued. Horace Walpole, 4th Earl of Orford, announced that with the Duke of York, Lady Northumberland, Lady Mary Coke and Lord Hertford, he was to visit Cock Lane on 30 January. After struggling through the throngs of interested visitors though, he was ultimately disappointed; the Public Advertiser observed that "the noise is now generally deferred till seven in the morning, it being necessary to vary the time, that the imposition may be the better carried on". ## Exposure With Lord Dartmouth Aldrich began to draw together the people who would be involved in his investigation. They chose the matron of a local lying-in hospital as principal lady-in-waiting, the critic and controversialist Bishop John Douglas, and Dr George Macaulay. A Captain Wilkinson was also included on the committee; he had attended one séance armed with a pistol and stick; the former to shoot the source of the knocking, and the latter to make his escape (the ghost had remained silent on that occasion). James Penn and John Moore were also on the committee, but its most prominent member was Samuel Johnson, who documented the séance, held on 1 February 1762: > On the night of the 1st of February many gentlemen eminent for their rank and character were, by the invitation of the Reverend Mr. Aldrich, of Clerkenwell, assembled at his house, for the examination of the noises supposed to be made by a departed spirit, for the detection of some enormous crime. About ten at night the gentlemen met in the chamber in which the girl, supposed to be disturbed by a spirit, had, with proper caution, been put to bed by several ladies. They sat rather more than an hour, and hearing nothing, went down stairs, when they interrogated the father of the girl, who denied, in the strongest terms, any knowledge or belief of fraud. The supposed spirit had before publickly promised, by an affirmative knock, that it would attend one of the gentlemen into the vault under the Church of St. John, Clerkenwell, where the body is deposited, and give a token of her presence there, by a knock upon her coffin; it was therefore determined to make this trial of the existence or veracity of the supposed spirit. While they were enquiring and deliberating, they were summoned into the girl's chamber by some ladies who were near her bed, and who had heard knocks and scratches. When the gentlemen entered, the girl declared that she felt the spirit like a mouse upon her back, and was required to hold her hands out of bed. From that time, though the spirit was very solemnly required to manifest its existence by appearance, by impression on the hand or body of any present, by scratches, knocks, or any other agency, no evidence of any preter-natural power was exhibited. The spirit was then very seriously advertised that the person to whom the promise was made of striking the coffin, was then about to visit the vault, and that the performance of the promise was then claimed. The company at one o'clock went into the church, and the gentleman to whom the promise was made, went with another into the vault. The spirit was solemnly required to perform its promise, but nothing more than silence ensued: the person supposed to be accused by the spirit, then went down with several others, but no effect was perceived. Upon their return they examined the girl, but could draw no confession from her. Between two and three she desired and was permitted to go home with her father. It is, therefore, the opinion of the whole assembly, that the child has some art of making or counterfeiting a particular noise, and that there is no agency of any higher cause. Disappointed that the ghost had failed to reveal itself, Moore now told Kent he believed it was an imposter, and that he would help reveal it. Kent asked him to admit the truth and write an affidavit of what he knew, so as to end the affair and restore Kent's reputation, but Moore refused, telling him that he still believed that the spirit's presence was a reminder of his sin. Moore's view of the couple's relationship was shared by many, including Mrs Parsons, who believed that the supposed ghost of Elizabeth Kent had disapproved of her sister's new relationship. Another séance on 3 February saw the knocking continue unabated, but by then Parsons was in an extremely difficult—and serious—situation. Keen to prove the ghost was not an imposture he allowed his daughter to be examined at a house on The Strand from 7–10 February, and at another house in Covent Garden from 14 February. There she was tested in a variety of ways which included being swung up in a hammock, her hands and feet extended. As expected, the noises commenced, but stopped once Elizabeth was made to place her hands outside the bed. For two nights the ghost was silent. Elizabeth was told that if no more noises were heard by Sunday 21 February, she and her father would be committed to Newgate Prison. Her maids then saw her conceal on her person a small piece of wood about 6 by 4 inches (15 by 10 cm) and informed the investigators. More scratches were heard but the observers concluded that Elizabeth was responsible for the noises, and that she had been forced by her father to make them. Elizabeth was allowed home shortly after. On or about 25 February, a pamphlet sympathetic to Kent's case was published, called The Mystery Revealed, and most likely written by Oliver Goldsmith. Meanwhile, Kent was still trying to clear his name, and on 25 February he went to the vault of St John's, accompanied by Aldrich, the undertaker, the clerk and the parish sexton. The group was there to prove beyond any doubt that a recent newspaper report, which claimed that the supposed removal of Fanny's body from the vault accounted for the ghost's failure to knock on her coffin, was false. The undertaker removed the lid to expose Fanny's corpse, "and a very awful shocking sight it was". For Moore this was too much and he published his retraction: > In justice to the person, whose reputation has been attacked in a most gross manner, by the pretended Ghost in Cock-lane; to check the credulity of the weak; to defeat the attempts of the malicious, and to prevent further imposition, on account of this absurd phenomenon, I do hereby certify, that though, from the several attendances on this occasion, I have not been able to point out, how, and in what manner, those knockings and scratchings, of the supposed Ghost, were contrived, performed, and continued; yet, that I am convinced, that those knockings and scratchings were the effects of some artful, wicked contrivance; and that I was, in a more especial manner, convinced of its being such, on the first of this month, when I attended with several persons of rank and character, who assembled at the Rev. Mr. Aldrich's, Clerkenwell, in order to examine into this iniquitous imposition upon the Public. Since which time I have not seen the child, nor heard the noises; and think myself in duty bound to add, that the injured person (when present to hear himself accused by the pretended Ghost) has not, by his behaviour, given the least ground of suspicion, but has preserved that becoming steadfastness, which nothing, I am persuaded, but innocence could inspire. It was not enough to keep him from being charged by the authorities with conspiracy, along with Richard Parsons and his wife, Mary Frazer, and Richard James, a tradesman. ## Trial The trial of all five was held at the Guild Hall in London on 10 July 1762. Presiding over the case was Lord Chief Justice William Murray. Proceedings began at 10 am, "brought by William Kent against the above defendants for a conspiracy to take away his life by charging him with the murder of Frances Lynes by giving her poison whereof she died". The courtroom was crowded with spectators, who watched as Kent gave evidence against those in the dock. He told the court about his relationship with Fanny and of her resurrection as "Scratching Fanny" (so-called because of the scratching noises made by the "ghost"). James Franzen was next on the stand, his story corroborated by Fanny's servant, Esther "Carrots" Carlisle, who testified later that day. Dr Cooper, who had served Fanny as she lay dying, told the court that he had always believed the strange noises in Cock Lane to be a trick, and his account of Fanny's illness was supported by her apothecary, James Jones. Several other prosecution witnesses described how the hoax had been revealed, and Richard James was accused by the prosecution's last witness of being responsible for some of the more offensive material published in the Public Ledger. The defence's witnesses included some of those who had cared for Elizabeth Parsons and who presumably still believed that the ghost was real. Other witnesses included the carpenter responsible for removing the wainscotting from Parsons' apartment and Catherine Friend, who to escape the knocking noises had left the property. One witness's testimony caused the court to burst into laughter, at which she replied "I assure you gentlemen, it is no laughing matter, whatever you may think of it." Thomas Broughton was also called, as was a priest surnamed Ross, one of those who had questioned the ghost. Judge Murray asked him "Whether he thought he had puzzled the Ghost, or the Ghost had puzzled him?" John Moore was offered support by several esteemed gentlemen and presented Murray with a letter from Thomas Secker, Archbishop of Canterbury, who sought to intercede on his behalf. Murray placed the letter in his pocket, unopened, and told the court "it was impossible it could relate to the cause in question." Richard James and Richard Parsons also received support from various witnesses, some of whom although acknowledging Parsons' drink problem, told the court they could not believe he was guilty. The trial ended at about 9:30 pm. The judge spent about 90 minutes summing up the case, but it took the jury only 15 minutes to reach a verdict of guilty for all five defendants. The following Monday, two others responsible for defaming Kent were found guilty and later fined £50 each. The conspirators were brought back on 22 November but sentencing was delayed in the hope that they could agree on the level of damages payable to Kent. Having failed to do so they returned on 27 January 1763 and were committed to the King's Bench Prison until 11 February, by which time John Moore and Richard James had agreed to pay Kent £588; they were subsequently admonished by Justice Wilmot and released. The following day, the rest were sentenced: > The Court chusing that Mr. Kent, who had been so much injured on the occasion, should receive some reparation by punishment of the offenders, deferred giving judgment for seven or eight months, in hopes that the parties might make it up in the meantime. Accordingly, the clergyman, and tradesman agreed to pay Mr. Kent a round sum—some say between £500 and £600 to purchase their pardon, and were, therefore, dismissed with a severe reprimand. The father was ordered to be set in the pillory three times in one month—once at the end of Cock–Lane; Elizabeth his wife to be imprisoned one year; and Mary Frazer six months in Bridewell, with hard labour. The father appearing to be out of his mind at the time he was first to standing in the pillory, the execution of that part of his sentence was deferred to another day, when, as well as the other day of his standing there, the populace took so much compassion on him, that instead of using him ill, they made a handsome subscription for him. Parsons, all the while protesting his innocence, was also sentenced to two years' imprisonment. He stood in the pillory on 16 March, 30 March and finally on 8 April. In contrast to other criminals the crowd treated him kindly, making collections of money for him. ## Legacy The Cock Lane ghost was a focus for a contemporary religious controversy between the Methodists and orthodox Anglicans. Belief in a spiritual afterlife is a requirement for most religions, and in every instance where a spirit had supposedly manifested itself in the real world, the event was cherished as an affirmation of such beliefs. In his youth, John Wesley had been strongly influenced by a supposed haunting at his family home and these experiences were carried through to the religion he founded, which was regularly criticised for its position on witchcraft and magic. Methodism, although far from a united religion, became almost synonymous with a belief in the supernatural. Some of its followers therefore gave more credence to the reality of the Cock Lane ghost than did the Anglican establishment, which considered such things to be relics of the country's Catholic past. This was a view that was epitomised in the conflict between the Methodist John Moore and the Anglican Stephen Aldrich. In his 1845 memoirs, Horace Walpole, who had attended one of the séances, accused the Methodists of actively working to establish the existence of ghosts. He described the constant presence of Methodist clergymen near Elizabeth Parsons and implied that the church would recompense her father for his troubles. Samuel Johnson was committed to his Christian faith and shared the views of author Joseph Glanvill, who, in his 1681 work Saducismus Triumphatus, wrote of his concern over the advances made against religion and a belief in witchcraft, by atheism and scepticism. For Johnson the idea that an afterlife might not exist was an appalling thought, but although he thought that spirits could protect and counsel those still living, he kept himself distant from the more credulous Methodists, and recognised that his religion required proof of an afterlife. Ever a sceptic, in his discussions with his biographer James Boswell, he said: > Sir, I make a distinction between what a man may experience by the mere strength of his imagination, and what imagination cannot possibly produce. Thus, suppose I should think I saw a form, and heard a voice cry, "Johnson, you are a very wicked fellow, and unless you repent you will certainly be punished;" my own unworthiness is so deeply impressed upon my mind, that I might imagine I thus saw and heard, and therefore I should not believe that an external communication had been made to me. But if a form should appear, and a voice tell me that a particular man had died at a particular place, and a particular hour, a fact which I had no apprehension of, nor any means of knowing, and this fact, with all its circumstances, should afterwards be unquestionably proved, I should, in that case, be persuaded that I had supernatural intelligence imparted to me. Johnson's role in revealing the nature of the hoax was not enough to keep the satirist Charles Churchill from mocking his apparent credulity in his 1762 work The Ghost. He resented Johnson's lack of enthusiasm for his writing and with the character of 'Pomposo', written as one of the more credulous of the ghost's investigators, used the satire to highlight a "superstitious streak" in his subject. Johnson paid this scant attention, but was said to have been more upset when Churchill again mocked him for his delay in releasing Shakespeare. Publishers were at first wary of attacking those involved in the supposed haunting, but Churchill's satire was one of a number of publications which, following the exposure of Parsons' deception, heaped scorn on the affair. The newspapers searched for evidence of past impostures and referenced older publications such as Reginald Scot's Discoverie of Witchcraft (1584). The ghost was referenced in an anonymous work entitled Anti-Canidia: or, Superstition Detected and Exposed (1762), which sought to ridicule the credulity of those involved in the Cock Lane case. The author described his work as a "sally of indignation at the contemptible wonder in Cock-lane". Works such as The Orators (1762) by Samuel Foote, were soon available. Farcical poems such as Cock-lane Humbug were released, theatres staged plays such as The Drummer and The Haunted House. Oliver Goldsmith, who had in February 1762 published The Mystery Revealed, may also have been responsible for the satirical illustration, English Credulity or the Invisible Ghost (1762). It shows a séance as envisioned by the artist, with the ghost hovering above the heads of the two children in the bed. To the right of the bed a woman deep in prayer exclaims "O! that they would lay it in the Red Sea!" Another cries "I shall never have any rest again". The English magistrate and social reformer John Fielding, who was blind, is pictured entering from the left saying "I should be glad to see this spirit", while his companion says "Your W——r's had better get your Warrant back'd by his L—rds—p", referring to a Middlesex magistrate's warrant which required an endorsement from the Lord Mayor, Samuel Fludyer. A man in tall boots, whip in hand, says: "Ay Tom I'll lay 6 to 1 it runs more nights than the Coronation" and his companion remarks "How they swallow the hum". A clergymen says "I saw the light on the Clock" while another asks "Now thou Infidel does thou not believe?", prompting his neighbour to reply "Yes if it had happen'd sooner 't would have serv'd me for a new Character in the Lyar the Story would tell better than the Cat & Kittens". Another clergyman exclaims "If a Gold Watch knock 3 times", and a Parson asks him "Brother don't disturb it". On the wall, an image of The Bottle Conjuror is alongside an image of Elizabeth Canning, whose fraud had so worried Samuel Fludyer that he had refused to arrest either Parsons or Kent. Playwright David Garrick dedicated the enormously successful The Farmer's Return from London to the satirical artist William Hogarth. The story concerns a farmer who regales his family with an account of his talk with Miss Fanny, the comedy being derived from the reversal of traditional roles: the sceptical farmer poking fun at the credulous city-folk. Hogarth made his own observations of the Cock Lane ghost, with obvious references in Credulity, Superstition and Fanaticism (1762). This illustration makes a point of attacking Methodist ministers, one of whom is seen to slip a phallic "ghost" into a young woman's bodice. He again attacked the Methodists in The Times, Plate 2 (1762–1763), placing an image of Thomas Secker (who had tried to intervene on behalf of the Methodists) behind the Cock Lane ghost, and putting the ghost in the same pillory as the radical politician John Wilkes, which implied a connection between the demagoguery surrounding the Methodists and Pittites. The print enraged Bishop William Warburton, who although a vocal critic of Methodism, wrote: > I have seen Hogarth's print of the Ghost. It is a horrid composition of lewd Obscenity & blasphemous prophaneness for which I detest the artist & have lost all esteem for the man. The best is, that the worst parts of it have a good chance of not being understood by the people. The 19th-century author Charles Dickens—whose childhood nursemaid Mary Weller may have affected him with a fascination for ghosts—made reference to the Cock Lane ghost in several of his books. One of Nicholas Nickleby's main characters and a source of much of the novel's comic relief, Mrs. Nickleby, claims that her great-grandfather "went to school with the Cock-lane Ghost" and that "I know the master of his school was a Dissenter, and that would in a great measure account for the Cock-lane Ghost's behaving in such an improper manner to the clergyman when he grew up." Dickens also very briefly mentions the Cock Lane ghost in A Tale of Two Cities and Dombey and Son. According to a 1965 source, the site of Parson's lodgings corresponded to the building with the modern address 20 Cock Lane. The house was believed to have been built in the late 17th century, and was demolished in 1979.

Second War of Scottish Independence

1332–1357 war between Scotland and England

The Second War of Scottish Independence broke out in 1332 when Edward Balliol led an English-backed invasion of Scotland. Balliol, the son of former Scottish king John Balliol, was attempting to make good his claim to the Scottish throne. He was opposed by Scots loyal to the occupant of the throne, eight-year-old David II. At the Battle of Dupplin Moor Balliol's force defeated a Scottish army ten times their size and Balliol was crowned king. Within three months David's partisans had regrouped and forced Balliol out of Scotland. He appealed to the English king, Edward III, who invaded Scotland in 1333 and besieged the important trading town of Berwick. A large Scottish army attempted to relieve it but was heavily defeated at the Battle of Halidon Hill. Balliol established his authority over most of Scotland, ceded to England the eight counties of south-east Scotland and did homage to Edward for the rest of the country as a fief. As allies of Scotland via the Auld Alliance, the French were unhappy about an English expansion into Scotland and so covertly supported and financed David's loyalists. Balliol's allies fell out among themselves and he lost control of most of Scotland again by late 1334. In early 1335 the French attempted to broker a peace. However, the Scots were unable to agree a position and Edward prevaricated while building a large army. He invaded in July and again overran most of Scotland. Tensions with France increased. Further French-sponsored peace talks failed in 1336 and in May 1337 the French king, Philip VI, engineered a clear break between France and England, starting the Hundred Years' War. The Anglo-Scottish war became a subsidiary theatre of this larger Anglo-French war. Edward sent what troops he could spare to Scotland, in spite of which the English slowly lost ground in Scotland as they were forced to focus on the French theatre. Achieving his majority David returned to Scotland from France in 1341 and by 1342 the English had been cleared from north of the border. In 1346 Edward led a large English army through northern France, sacking Caen, heavily defeating the French at Crécy and besieging Calais. In response to Philip's urgent requests, David invaded England believing most of its previous defenders were in France. He was surprised by a smaller but nonetheless sizable English force, which crushed the Scots at the Battle of Neville's Cross and captured David. This, and the resulting factional politics in Scotland, prevented further large-scale Scottish attacks. A concentration on France similarly kept the English quiescent, while possible terms for David's release were discussed at length. In late 1355 a large Scottish raid into England, in breach of truce, provoked another invasion from Edward in early 1356. The English devastated Lothian but winter storms scattered their supply ships and they retreated. The following year the Treaty of Berwick was signed, which ended the war; the English dropped their claim of suzerainty, while the Scots acknowledged a vague English overlordship. A cash ransom was negotiated for David's release: 100,000 marks, to be paid over ten years. The treaty prohibited any Scottish citizen from bearing arms against Edward III or any of his men until the sum was paid in full and the English were supposed to stop attacking Scotland. This effectively ended the war, and while intermittent fighting continued, the truce was broadly observed for forty years. ## Background The First War of Scottish Independence between England and Scotland began in March 1296, when Edward I of England (r. 1272–1307) stormed and sacked the Scottish border town of Berwick as a prelude to his invasion of Scotland. The Scottish king, John I (r. 1292–1296), was captured by the English and forced to abdicate. Subsequent events went less well for the English and by 1323 Robert Bruce (r. 1306–1329) was securely on the Scottish throne and had carried out several major raids deep into England, leading to the signing in May of a 13-year truce. Despite this, Scottish raids continued, as did English piracy against Scottish shipping. After the newly crowned 14-year-old King Edward III was nearly captured by the Scots in the English disaster at Stanhope Park in 1327 his regents, his mother Isabella of France and her lover Roger Mortimer, were forced to the negotiating table. They agreed to the Treaty of Northampton with Bruce in 1328, recognising him as king of an independent Scotland and ending the war after 32 years. To further seal the peace, Robert's very young son and heir David married Joan, the likewise youthful sister of Edward. The treaty was widely resented in England and commonly known as the turpis pax, "the shameful peace". The 15-year-old Edward was forced into signing the treaty by his regents and was never reconciled to it. Some Scottish nobles, refusing to swear fealty to Bruce, were disinherited and left Scotland to join forces with Edward Balliol, the eldest son of King John. Robert Bruce died in 1329 and his heir was 5-year-old David II (r. 1329–1371). In 1330 Edward seized Mortimer and had him executed, confined his mother, and established his personal rule. ## English aggression ### English invasion of Scotland, 1332 In 1331, under the leadership of Edward Balliol and Henry Beaumont, Earl of Buchan, the disinherited Scottish nobles gathered in Yorkshire to plot an invasion of Scotland. Edward III was aware of the scheme and officially forbade it. The reality was different, as he was happy to cause trouble for his northern neighbour. He prohibited Balliol from invading overland from England, but overlooked his forces sailing for Scotland from Yorkshire ports on 31 July 1332. David II's regent, with the title of guardian of Scotland, was an experienced old soldier, Thomas Randolph, Earl of Moray. Moray was aware of the situation and was waiting for Balliol and Beaumont, but died ten days before they sailed. Balliol landed in Fife on 6 August with a predominately English force of some 2,000 men. There he immediately encountered fierce Scottish opposition, which he overcame at the Battle of Kinghorn. Five days later he met the 15,000–40,000 strong Scottish army under the new guardian Donald, Earl of Mar, 2 miles (3 km) south of the Scottish capital, Perth. The invaders crossed the River Earn at night via an unguarded ford and took up a strong defensive position. Next morning, in the Battle of Dupplin Moor, the Scots raced to attack the English, disorganising their own formations. Unable to break the line of English men-at-arms, the Scots became trapped in a valley with fresh forces arriving from the rear pressing them forward and giving them no room to manoeuvre, or even to use their weapons. English longbowmen fired into both Scottish flanks. Many Scots died of suffocation or were trampled underfoot. Eventually they broke and the English men-at-arms mounted and pursued the fugitives until nightfall. Thousands of Scots died, including Mar and much of the nobility of the realm, and Perth fell. This marked the start of the Second War of Scottish Independence. On the 24 September 1332 Balliol was crowned king of Scotland at Scone, the traditional place of coronation for Scottish monarchs. Almost immediately, Balliol granted Edward Scottish estates to a value of £2,000, which included "the town, castle and county of Berwick". Balliol's support within Scotland was limited and he was subject to constant military challenge; for example, on 7 October David's partisans recaptured Perth and destroyed its walls. On 16 December, less than three months after his coronation, Balliol was ambushed by supporters of David II at the Battle of Annan. He fled to England half-dressed and riding bareback. He appealed to Edward for assistance, who dropped all pretence of neutrality, recognised Balliol as king of Scotland and made ready for war. ### English invasion of Scotland, 1333 Although the idea of returning to war against Scotland did not have universal appeal among the English, Edward III gave Balliol his backing. The Scots launched minor raids into Cumberland, which achieved little. Edward invaded Scotland, claiming that this was a response to the raids. His chosen target was Berwick, on the Anglo-Scottish border astride the main invasion and trade route in either direction. According to a contemporary chronicle, Berwick was "so populous and of such trade that it might justly be called another Alexandria, whose riches were the sea and the waters its walls". It was the most successful trading town in Scotland; the duty on wool which passed through it was the Scottish Crown's largest single source of income. Edward hoped the possibility of losing it would draw the Scots into a set-piece battle, which he believed he would win. During centuries of war between the two nations, battles had been rare as the Scots preferred guerrilla tactics and border raids into England. Berwick was one of the few targets which might bring the Scots to battle as, in the words of the historian Clifford Rogers, "abandoning it was almost unthinkable". Balliol opened the siege of Berwick in late March 1333 and was joined by Edward with the main English army on 9 May. Berwick was well defended, well garrisoned and well stocked with provisions and materiel, but the English pressed the siege hard and by the end of June attacks by land and sea had brought Berwick to a state of ruin and the garrison close to exhaustion. A truce was arranged on 15 July, whereby the Scots promised to surrender if not relieved by sunset on 19 July. By this time the Scottish army under the third Scottish guardian within a year, Sir Archibald Douglas, had crossed the border and was devastating north-east England, but Edward ignored this. Douglas felt his only option was to engage the English in battle. Douglas ordered an attack. To engage the English, the Scots had to advance downhill, cross a large area of marshy ground and climb the northern slope of Halidon Hill. The Lanercost Chronicle reports: > ... the Scots who marched in the front were so wounded in the face and blinded by the multitude of English arrows that they could not help themselves, and soon began to turn their faces away from the blows of the arrows and fall. The Scots suffered many casualties and the lower reaches of the hill were littered with dead and wounded. The survivors continued upwards, through the arrows "as thick as motes in a sun beam", according to an unnamed contemporary quoted by Ranald Nicholson, and on to the waiting spears. The Scottish army broke, the camp-followers made off with the horses and the fugitives were pursued by the mounted English knights. The Scottish casualties numbered in thousands, including Douglas and five earls dead on the field. Scots who surrendered were killed on Edward's orders and some drowned as they fled into the sea. English casualties were reported as fourteen, some chronicles give a lower figure of seven. About a hundred Scots who had been taken prisoner were beheaded the next morning, 20 July. This was the date that Berwick's truce expired, and it surrendered. ### Scottish resurgence, 1334 In May 1334 David fled Scotland, taking refuge in France at the invitation of its king, Philip VI. On 19 June Balliol did homage to Edward for Scotland, after formally ceding to England the eight counties of south-east Scotland. Balliol ruled the truncated Scottish state from Perth and attempted to put down the remaining resistance. The invaders' common goal was seemingly attained, with David's partisans holding only five fortifications in all of Scotland. But Balliol's allies fell out among themselves, which in turn encouraged David's supporters. Balliol's divided allies proved easier targets and were captured, forced out of Scotland or switched sides. The French, unhappy about an English expansion into Scotland, covertly supported and financed the Bruce loyalists, although from when is unclear. Balliol retreated to Berwick where he persuaded Edward to spend the winter of 1334–1335 in Roxburgh. Both led excursions into the surrounding western lowlands, destroying the property of friend and foe alike, but found no Scottish troops, while more of Balliol's former supporters defected to the Bruce faction. The leading pro-Bruce nobles formally appealed to Philip for military assistance. ### French involvement Since the Norman Conquest of 1066, English monarchs had held titles and lands within France, the possession of which made them vassals of the kings of France. The status of the English king's French fiefs was a major source of conflict between the two monarchies throughout the Middle Ages. French monarchs systematically sought to check the growth of English power, stripping away lands as the opportunity arose. Over the centuries, English holdings in France had varied in size, but by 1334 only Gascony in south-western France and Ponthieu in northern France were left. Gascony was important to Edward; the duty levied by the English Crown on wine from there was more than all other customs duties combined and by far the largest source of state income. In 1320 Edward, in his capacity as Duke of Aquitaine, paid homage to Philip for Gascony. France already had an alliance with Scotland: a mutual defence pact signed in 1295 and renewed in 1326 known as the "Auld Alliance". It was intended to deter England from attacking either country by the threat that the other would in turn invade English territory. In 1331, after six years of often acrimonious negotiations, Edward and Philip had settled most of the differences between them in a formal agreement. Once this was in place Philip had begun arrangements for a crusade to the Holy Land, for which he would need at least English acquiescence and ideally active support. In early 1335 Philip sent an ambassador to England, who met Edward in Newcastle on 18 February and questioned the basis of Edward's aggression against Scotland. Edward prevaricated, but gave permission for the ambassador to attempt to negotiate a peaceful settlement. A truce was agreed, to last until mid-1335. The senior Scottish nobility fell out and could not agree on a position for the peace negotiations, while Edward seems to have been happy to use the episode as an opportunity to rebuild his finances and reassemble an army. ### English invasion of Scotland, 1335–1336 During the spring of 1335 Edward assembled an army of more than 13,000 men on the Scottish border, the largest force he ever led against the Scots, timing his invasion to the expiration of the truce. Aware of his plans, Bruce loyalists were also preparing for war, setting aside their personal differences and evacuating the Central Lowlands in preparation for invasion. In July Edward led part of his force north from Carlisle to Glasgow. There he joined up with the balance, who had marched from Berwick under Balliol, at the end of the month. The Scots followed a scorched earth policy of offering no resistance and both English armies devastated everything in their paths. The combined force marched north to occupy the Scottish capital, Perth. It continued to loot and devastate widely, in the hope of forcing the Scots to battle. The French, exasperated, assembled an army of 6,000 men to send to Scotland to restore David II and started to interfere in English possessions in France, even threatening to confiscate them. Scottish and French ships sailing out of French ports attacked English ships in the English Channel and raided settlements on the English south coast. Philip wrote to Edward asking him to submit the rival claims on the Scottish throne to arbitration by Pope Benedict XII to avoid an Anglo-French war. Edward refused. In Scotland, Edward and the Scots agreed a truce, to last from mid-October to 3 May 1336; this did not cover Balliol's forces and allowed the Bruce faction to concentrate against Balliol's supporters. On 30 November Sir Andrew Murray led 1,100 Bruce loyalists against a larger pro-Balliol force commanded by David Strathbogie in the Battle of Culblean, defeating it and killing Strathbogie. It was the first of several victories against Balliol and his followers, which raised Scottish morale and reduced Balliol to complete reliance on English arms. Philip was persuaded by the Pope to postpone any military action against England, partly to salvage the possibility of a crusade, but in March 1336 Philip persuaded David II to reject a peace treaty, which Murray, who had been appointed regent and guardian of Scotland, was prepared to accept. Philip, in turn, committed himself to restoring David to the Scottish throne. The French assembled more than 500 ships in Normandy with which they planned to transport one army to Scotland and land another at Portsmouth. While Edward spent the spring raising funds for the Scottish war and making arrangements to guard the English south coast, his subordinates further north struck repeatedly against the Scots. The Scots mostly avoided battle and were defeated when they tried to stand. They again practised a scorched earth policy, including razing Perth. Informed of the planned French descent on Scotland, Edward rode rapidly north, joining Balliol in Perth on 28 June. When the French failed to arrive Edward led 800 men out in mid-July, relieved the siege of Lochindorb, 100 miles (160 km) north of Perth and devastated the east coast of Scotland between the Firth of Tay and the Moray Firth. Forres and Aberdeen were razed; the latter was a potential port of disembarkation for any French expeditionary force. Murray continued to avoid battle. ## France joins the fight During the summer of 1336 an English embassy attempted to negotiate with Philip and David. On 20 August Philip rejected the English proposals and pledged full military support for David's partisans. French privateers immediately began a fresh round of attacks on English shipping and ports, causing panic along the English south coast. It was the middle of September before Edward received the news and returned to England. Arriving too late to strike at the French ships, he imposed new war taxes and returned to Scotland to winter in a fortress on the Clyde. The Scots kept up a campaign of harassment against the English, while Murray destroyed Dunnottar, Kinneff and Lauriston to prevent Edward using them. Famine and disease were widespread throughout Scotland. Political and legal pressure from the French increased and Philip readied his army to invade Gascony in 1337. Edward returned to England again in December 1336 to plan for a war with France in the spring. Papal attempts to mediate were brushed aside. From early 1337 Bruce loyalists took advantage of the English distraction in France. Murray and Sir William Douglas invaded Fife. Edward believed the French were the greater threat and so was unable to send reinforcements. The local English commanders did little with the resources they had. By early summer northern Scotland had been overrun and most of the English fortifications there slighted. In April another Scottish army invaded Balliol-held Galloway and devastated it. On 24 May 1337 Philip's Great Council ruled that Gascony and Ponthieu should be taken back into Philip's hands on the grounds that Edward was in breach of his obligations as a vassal. This marked the start of the Hundred Years' War, which was to last 116 years. As the year went on the Scots raided into the Lowlands, besieging Edinburgh Castle in November and even attacked Carlisle in England and devastated Cumberland. Despite the pressing need for troops with which to face the French Edward sent further forces to Scotland, although to little effect. ### Scottish resurgence, 1338–1346 Edward needed to guard the coast of England against the French and was attempting to form a field army to campaign on the continent again, but still found enough troops to send an expedition to Scotland in 1338. The French continued to supply the Scots, who had the better of the fighting. After several bitter campaigns, in which both sides freely destroyed crops and villages to limit their opponents' freedom of manoeuvre, the Scots wore down the English. French forces and ships assisted in the recapture of Perth in 1339. By 1340 the English influence in Scotland was limited to a handful of fortifications, Stirling being the most northerly, all of them either besieged or blockaded and supplied by sea from England. Hostilities were frequently interrupted by truces, which were not always well observed. By 1341 fighting with the English had died down, but the Scottish nobility was riven with feuds. The teenaged David II returned to Scotland on 2 June with his wife Joan, Edward's sister, and attempted to establish his own authority and surround himself with his own people; inflaming an already tense situation. Nevertheless, the English were steadily pushed back, with Stirling capitulating to the Scots in March 1342 after a lengthy siege, removing the last English stronghold in Scotland north of the immediate border area. Even there, the strong castle of Roxburgh fell to a dawn escalade in the same month. David's difficulties in imposing his authority were typified when he rewarded Alexander Ramsay of Dalhousie for retaking Roxburgh by appointing him constable of Roxburgh and sheriff of Teviotdale; this enraged Douglas, who had tried and failed to retake Roxburgh himself several times and who by some reports had already been given the positions. Douglas responded by imprisoning Ramsay and starving him to death. By 1345 David had established a degree of political control over the powerful Scottish nobility. The Scots continued to raid repeatedly into England. ### Scottish invasion of England, 1346 In July 1346 Edward III landed in Normandy with an army of 15,000. Philip pleaded with David to fulfil Scottish obligations under the Auld Alliance and invade England: "I beg you, I implore you ... Do for me what I would willingly do for you in such a crisis and do it as quickly ... as you are able." As the English had also committed troops to Gascony, Brittany and Flanders, Philip described northern England as "a defenceless void". David felt certain few English troops would be left to defend the rich northern English cities, but when the Scots probed into northern England they were sharply rebuffed by the local defenders. David agreed a truce, to last until 29 September, to allow him to fully mobilise the Scottish army. On 7 October the Scots invaded England with approximately 12,000 men. Many had modern weapons and armour supplied by France. A small number of French knights marched alongside the Scots. It was described by both Scottish and English chroniclers of the time, and by modern historians, as the strongest and best equipped Scottish expedition for many years. The invasion had been expected by the English for some time and when raising his army to invade France Edward had exempted the counties north of the River Humber. Once the Scots invaded, an army was quickly mobilised, commanded by William de la Zouche, the Archbishop of York, who was Lord Warden of the Marches, and Lord Ralph Neville, numbering about 6,000–7,000 men. The Scots were surprised by the appearance of the English close to Durham. On 17 October the two armies faced off. A stalemate lasted until the afternoon when the English sent longbowmen forward to harass the Scottish lines. The Earl of Menteith attempted to clear away the English archers with a cavalry charge, but this failed. The archers then succeeded in provoking the main Scottish force into attacking. By the time the first of the three Scottish divisions came to hand-to-hand combat it had been disorganised by the broken terrain and the fire of the English archers and was easily dealt with. Seeing their first attack repulsed, and also being harassed by the English archers, the third and largest Scottish division, on the Scottish left, under the Earl of March and Robert Stewart, broke and fled. The English stood off from the remaining Scots under David II and poured in arrows. The English men-at-arms then attacked and after fighting with what Jonathan Sumption describes as "ferocious courage", the remaining Scots attempted unsuccessfully to retreat and were routed. David, badly wounded, was captured after he fled the field, while the rest of the Scottish army was pursued by the English long into the night. More than 50 Scottish barons were killed or captured; Scotland lost almost all its military leadership. ## Captivity of David II With David an English captive, Balliol, who had fought at Neville's Cross, set about recruiting forces for another excursion into Scotland. Neville and Henry, Baron Percy swiftly pressed the English advantage in the Anglo-Scottish border area. Balliol's subsequent campaign restored some of the southern communities to his allegiance, but on the whole, made little headway. With their king a captive, the Scots appointed Stewart lord guardian and regent for David; Stewart was David's nephew, the heir-apparent and a future king of Scotland (as Robert II). Stewart could be depended upon to defend Scotland from Balliol and the English, but otherwise was more interested in securing his own power than looking after that of his king. Stewart's authority was weak, as it largely depended on his acting on David's behalf and David was himself attempting to control affairs from England. Added to this, Stewart's having abandoned David at Neville's Cross gave David reason to mistrust him. Edward attempted to come to terms with the Scots, using David as a bargaining counter. The details of the negotiations are unclear, but it seems that in 1348 Edward suggested David hold Scotland as a fief from England, naming Edward or one of his sons as his successor should he die without children. In 1350 Edward offered to ransom David for £40,000, the restoration of Balliol's Scottish supporters and the naming of Edward's young son John of Gaunt as David's successor, should the king die without children. Scotland as a fiefdom had been dropped from the negotiations. David was permitted to briefly return to Scotland in early 1352 to try to negotiate a settlement. Stewart was disinclined to support any terms which removed him from the succession, and the Parliament of Scotland rejected Edward's terms in March 1352. David returned to English imprisonment. Still preoccupied with the war in France, Edward tried again in 1354 with a simple demand of ransom, without settlement of the English claim to suzerainty over Scotland. The Scots also rejected this, partly because it would leave open the possibility of further English attempts to bring Scotland under their control. ### English invasion of Scotland, 1356 Tensions on the Anglo-Scottish border led to a military build-up by both sides in 1355. In September a nine-month truce was arranged and most of the English forces left to take part in a campaign in northern France. A few days after agreeing the truce, the Scots, encouraged and subsidised by the French, broke it and invaded and devastated Northumberland. In late December the Scots captured Berwick-on-Tweed and laid siege to its castle. The English army redeployed from France to Newcastle in northern England. The English advanced to Berwick, retook the town and moved to Roxburgh in southern Scotland by mid-January 1356. There, on 20 January, Balliol surrendered his nominal position as king of Scotland in favour of Edward, his overlord, in exchange for a generous pension. From Roxburgh the English advanced on Edinburgh, leaving a trail of devastation 50–60 miles (80–100 km) wide behind them. The Scots practised their by now traditional scorched earth policy, refusing battle and removing or destroying all food in their own territory. The English reached and burnt Edinburgh and were resupplied by sea at Haddington. Edward intended to march on Perth, perhaps to be crowned king of Scotland at nearby Scone. But contrary winds prevented the movement of the fleet he needed to supply his army. While waiting for a better wind, the English thoroughly despoiled Lothian. A winter storm drove the English fleet away and scattered it, and the English were forced to withdraw. They did so via Melrose, still widely devastating Scottish territory, but this time harassed by Scottish forces. The English army was disbanded in Carlisle in late February and the Scots went on to take two English-held castles. A truce was re-established in April. ### Treaty of Berwick, 1357 In September 1356 the French suffered a shattering defeat at the Battle of Poitiers. Approximately 6,000 from an army of 14,000–16,000 were killed or captured; the King of France was one of those taken prisoner. This destroyed any Scottish hopes of satisfying their war aims as part of a French-imposed general treaty and raised the possibility that English troops would be freed up for further campaigning in Scotland. With no prospect of further military or financial assistance from the French the Scots negotiated a ransom of 100,000 marks (£67,000) for the return of David. According to the Treaty of Berwick the ransom was to be paid over ten years, on 24 June (St. John the Baptist's Day) each year. As a guarantee of payment, 23 Scottish nobles were held by the English. The treaty prohibited any Scottish citizen from bearing arms against Edward III or any of his men until the sum was paid in full and the English were supposed to stop attacking Scotland. With the signing of the Treaty of Berwick, the Second War of Scottish Independence was effectively over. Edward had achieved little and the Scots had maintained their independence. However, the agreement was a truce, not a peace treaty, and while it lasted for four decades intermittent fighting continued. Large-scale hostilities resumed in 1400 when English king Henry IV (r. 1399–1413) led an army into Lothian. David returned to Scotland to deal with the rivalries of his nobles. He was accused of having acquired a luxurious and expensive lifestyle and had to put down a rebellion in 1360. Thereafter, his throne was secure. His wife Joan did not return to Scotland with him, objecting to the English mistress he had taken during his eleven years in captivity. The treaty did impose a financial hardship on Scotland but less than the constant ravages by the English army. David stopped paying after only 20,000 marks of the debt had been met, following which renegotiation led ultimately to a reduction in the debt. ## Notes, citations and sources

Sophie Blanchard

French balloonist (1778–1819)

Sophie Blanchard (; 25 March 1778 – 6 July 1819), commonly referred to as Madame Blanchard and also known by many combinations of her maiden and married names, including Madeleine-Sophie Blanchard, Marie Madeleine-Sophie Blanchard, Marie Sophie Armant and Madeleine-Sophie Armant Blanchard, was a French aeronaut and the wife of ballooning pioneer Jean-Pierre Blanchard. Blanchard was the first woman to work as a professional balloonist, and after her husband's death she continued ballooning, making more than 60 ascents. Known throughout Europe for her ballooning exploits, Blanchard entertained Napoleon Bonaparte, who promoted her to the role of "Aeronaut of the Official Festivals", replacing André-Jacques Garnerin. On the restoration of the monarchy in 1814 she performed for Louis XVIII, who named her "Official Aeronaut of the Restoration". Ballooning was a risky business for the pioneers. Blanchard lost consciousness on a few occasions, endured freezing temperatures and almost drowned when her balloon crashed in a marsh. In 1819, she became the first woman to be killed in an aviation accident when, during an exhibition in the Tivoli Gardens in Paris, she launched fireworks that ignited the gas in her balloon. Her craft crashed on the roof of a house and she fell to her death. ## Biography ### Early life and career Sophie Blanchard was born Marie Madeleine-Sophie Armant to Protestant parents at Trois-Canons, near La Rochelle. Little is known of her life before her marriage to Jean-Pierre Blanchard, the world's first professional balloonist. The date of her marriage is unclear; sources quote dates as early as 1794 or 1797, but most state 1804, the year of her first ascent. Blanchard had abandoned his first wife, Victoire Lebrun, and their four children to travel round Europe pursuing his ballooning career, and she later died in poverty. Variously described as Blanchard's "small, ugly, nervous wife", "small with sharp bird-like features" and later as "small and beautiful", Sophie was more at home in the sky than on the ground, where her nervous disposition meant she was easily startled. She was terrified of loud noises and of riding in carriages, but was fearless in the air. She and her husband were in an accident on a joint flight in 1807 (her 11th ascent, possibly his 61st), in which they crashed and he sustained a head injury. The shock apparently left her mute for a while. Sophie made her first ascent in a balloon with Blanchard in Marseilles on 27 December 1804. The couple faced bankruptcy as a result of Blanchard's poor business sense, and they believed a female balloonist was a novelty that might attract enough attention to solve their financial problems. She described the feeling as an "incomparable sensation". Sophie made a second ascent with Blanchard and for her third ascent on 18 August 1805, she flew solo from the garden of the Cloister of the Jacobins in Toulouse. She was not the first woman balloonist. On 20 May 1784, the Marchioness and Countess of Montalembert, the Countess of Podenas and a Miss de Lagarde had taken a trip on a tethered balloon in Paris. Neither was she the first woman to ascend in an untethered balloon: in Blanchard's time, Citoyenne Henri, who had made an ascent with André-Jacques Garnerin in 1798, was widely credited with that ballooning first, although the honour actually belonged to Élisabeth Thible. Thible, an opera singer, had made an ascent to entertain Gustav III of Sweden in Lyon on 4 June 1784, fourteen years before Citoyenne Henri. Blanchard was, however, the first woman to pilot her own balloon and the first to adopt ballooning as a career. On 7 March 1809, her husband died from injuries sustained on 20 February 1808 when he fell from his balloon in The Hague after suffering a heart attack. After his death, Sophie continued to make ascents, specialising in night flights, often staying aloft all night. ### Solo career Sophie conducted experiments with parachutes as her husband had, parachuting dogs from her balloon, and as part of her entertainments she launched fireworks and dropped baskets of pyrotechnics attached to small parachutes. Other aeronauts were making names for themselves by demonstrating parachute jumps from the baskets of balloons, in particular the family of André-Jacques Garnerin, whose wife, daughter and niece all performed regularly. His niece, Élisa Garnerin, was Blanchard's chief rival as a female aeronaut, and it was rare for a suitable event to lack a performance by one or the other. Blanchard may have given some demonstrations of parachuting herself, but her primary interest was in ballooning. The couple had still been in debt at the time of Blanchard's death, so to minimise her expenses, Sophie was as frugal as possible in her choice of balloon. She used a hydrogen-filled gas balloon (or Charlière), as it allowed her to ascend in a basket little bigger than a chair, and there was no requirement for the volume of material necessary for a hot-air balloon. A hydrogen balloon also freed her from having to tend a fire to keep the craft airborne. Having a smaller, easily inflatable balloon was also important in an era when "balloon riots" were common, and disappointed crowds were known to destroy balloons and attack aeronauts when balloons failed to go up as planned. Because she was small and light, she was able to cut back on the amount of gas used to inflate the balloon. Sophie had used, or at least owned, a hot-air balloon; Colonel Francis Maceroni recorded in his memoirs that she sold it to him in 1811 for £40. She became a favourite of Napoleon, and he appointed her to replace André-Jacques Garnerin in 1804. Garnerin had disgraced himself by failing to control the balloon that he had sent up to mark Napoleon's coronation in Paris; the balloon eventually drifted as far as Rome, where it crashed into the Lago di Bracciano and became the subject of many jokes at Napoleon's expense. The title given to her by Napoleon is unclear: he certainly made her "Aeronaut of the Official Festivals" ("Aéronaute des Fêtes Officielles") with responsibility for organising ballooning displays at major events, but he may have also made her his Chief Air Minister of Ballooning, in which role she is reported to have drawn up plans for an aerial invasion of England. She was able to dissuade Napoleon from this impractical plan by pointing out that the prevailing winds over the Channel made such an invasion nearly impossible. She made ascents for Napoleon's entertainment on 24 June 1810 from the Champ de Mars in Paris and at the celebration mounted by the Imperial Guard for his marriage to Marie-Louise of Austria. On the birth of Napoleon's son, Blanchard took a balloon flight over Paris from the Champs de Mars and threw out leaflets proclaiming the birth. She performed at the official celebration of his baptism at the Château de Saint-Cloud on 23 June 1811, with a firework display launched from the balloon, and again at the "Féte de l'Emperor" in Milan on 15 August 1811. She made an ascent in bad weather over the Campo Marte in Naples to accompany the review of the troops by Napoleon's brother-in-law Joachim Murat, the King of Naples, in 1811. When Louis XVIII entered Paris on 4 May 1814 after being restored to the French throne, Blanchard ascended in her balloon from the Pont Neuf as part of the triumphal procession. Louis was so taken with her performance that he dubbed her "Official Aeronaut of the Restoration". Known throughout Europe, Blanchard drew large crowds for her ascents. In Frankfurt she was apparently the cause of the poor reception of Carl Maria von Weber's opera Silvana on its opening night, 16 September 1810: the people of the city flocked to see her demonstration while only a few attended the opera's debut. She gave many displays in Italy. In 1811 she travelled from Rome to Naples, splitting the journey in half with a stop after 60 miles (97 km), and later ascended again from Rome to a height of 12,000 feet (3,660 m) where she claimed that she fell into a profound sleep for a while before landing at Tagliacozzo. In the same year she again lost consciousness after having to ascend to avoid being trapped in a hailstorm near Vincennes. She spent 141⁄2 hours in the air as a result. Sophie crossed the Alps by balloon, and on a trip to Turin on 26 April 1812 the temperature dropped so low that she suffered a nose bleed and icicles formed on her hands and face. She almost died on 21 September 1817 when, on a flight from Nantes (her 53rd), she mistook a marshy field for a safe landing spot. The canopy of her balloon became caught in a tree which caused the chair to tip over; Blanchard, entangled in the rigging, was forced into the water of the marsh and would have drowned had not help arrived soon after her landing. Sympathising with Marie Thérèse de Lamourous who was attempting to run a shelter for "fallen women" (La Miséricorde) in Bordeaux, she offered to donate the proceeds from one of her ascents to the venture. De Lamourous refused the offer on the grounds that she could not be the cause of another risking their life. ### Death On 6 July 1819, in the Tivoli Gardens in Paris, her hydrogen-filled balloon caught fire and Blanchard, entangled in the surrounding net, fell to her death. Blanchard had performed regularly at the Tivoli Gardens, making ascents twice a week when she was in Paris. She had been warned repeatedly of the danger of using fireworks in her exhibitions. This display was to be a particularly impressive one with many more pyrotechnics than usual, and it appears that the warnings had made an impression on her. Some spectators implored her not to make the ascent, but others, eager to see the show, urged her on. One report suggested that she finally made up her mind and stepped into her chair with the words "Allons, ce sera pour la dernière fois" ("Let's go, this will be for the last time"). At about 10:30 p.m. (accounts differ as to the exact time), Blanchard began her ascent, wearing a white dress, a white hat topped with ostrich plumes and carrying a white flag. The wind was blowing strongly, and it appears the balloon struggled to rise. By shedding ballast Blanchard managed to get some lift, but the balloon brushed through the trees as it ascended. Once she had cleared the treetops Blanchard began the display by waving her flag. The balloon was illuminated by baskets containing "Bengal fire", a slow-burning, coloured pyrotechnic. A few moments after beginning the display, and while still ascending, the balloon was seen to be in flames. Some reports say that the balloon momentarily disappeared behind a cloud and that when it reappeared it was on fire—whatever the circumstances, the gas in the balloon was burning. Blanchard began to descend rapidly, but the balloon, caught in the wind, continued to move off from the pleasure gardens even as it went down. Some spectators thought these events were part of the show and applauded and shouted their approval. The balloon had not risen to any great height and, although the escaping gas was burning, the gas within the balloon maintained sufficient lift to prevent the craft plummeting directly to the ground. By rapidly shedding ballast Blanchard was able to slow the descent. Most reports say she appeared to be calm during the descent, but she was said to be wringing her hands in despair as the craft approached the ground. Rumours later circulated that she had gripped the chair of her craft so tightly that "several arteries had snapt through the effort." Just above the rooftops of the Rue de Provence the balloon's gas was exhausted, and the craft struck the roof of a house. It was thought likely that she would have survived had that been the end of the incident, but the ropes holding the chair to the body of the balloon may have burnt through, or the impact may have thrown her forwards, with the result that Blanchard, trapped in the netting of the balloon, pitched over the side of the roof into the street below. John Poole, an eyewitness, described her final moments: > There was a terrible pause, then Mme Blanchard caught up in the netting of her balloon, fell with a crash upon the slanting roof of a house in the Rue de Provence, and then into the street, where she was taken up a shattered corpse. Some reports credit her with crying out "À moi!" ("help", or literally, "to me"), as she struck the roof. Although the crowds rushed to her assistance and attempts were made to save her, she either died instantly, from a broken neck, or at most ten minutes later. The most likely cause of the accident seemed to be that the fireworks attached to her balloon had been knocked out of position by a tree as she ascended; possibly the balloon was heavily loaded and failed to rise quickly enough. When she lit the fuses the fireworks headed towards the balloon instead of away from it; one of them burned a hole in the fabric, igniting the gas. One man reportedly spotted the problem and shouted to her not to light the fuses, but his cries were drowned out by the cheering of the crowd. Later reports suggested she had left the gas valve open, allowing sparks to ignite the gas and set fire to the balloon, or that her balloon was of poor construction and allowed gas to escape throughout the ascent. ### Legacy Norwich Duff, who had witnessed Blanchard's ascent and the accident, recorded: > The effect of so shocking an accident on the minds of several thousand people assembled for amusement, and in high spirits, may easily be imagined... On hearing she had died, the proprietors of the Tivoli Gardens immediately announced that the admission fees would be donated for the support of her children, and some spectators stood at the gates appealing to the citizens of Paris for donations. The appeal raised 2,400 francs, but after the collection it was discovered that she had no surviving children, so the money was used instead to erect a memorial, topped with a representation of her balloon in flames, above her grave in Père Lachaise Cemetery. Her tombstone was engraved with the epitaph "victime de son art et de son intrépidité" ("victim of her art and intrepidity"). The remainder of the money, about 1,000 francs, was donated to the Lutheran Église des Billettes which Blanchard had attended. Though not rich, at the time of her death she had cleared the debts left to her by her husband and was financially secure. Each of her ascents had cost her around 1,000 francs, not including the cost of maintenance of the balloon. In her will she left property worth between 1,000 and 50,000 francs to the daughter of some acquaintances. The story of her death was recounted throughout Europe. Jules Verne mentioned her in Five Weeks in a Balloon and, in The Gambler, Fyodor Dostoevsky likened the thrill of committing oneself in gambling to the sensation that Blanchard must have felt as she fell. For others, her death proved a cautionary tale, either as an example of a woman exceeding her station (as with Grenville Mellen, who said that it proved "a woman in a balloon is either out of her element or too high in it") or as the price of vanity for attempting such spectacular shows. Charles Dickens commented "The jug goes often to the well, but is pretty sure to get cracked at last". A novel inspired by Blanchard's story, Linda Donn's The Little Balloonist, was published in 2006. Released in 2019, The Aeronauts features a character, "pilot" Amelia Rennes (played by Felicity Jones), who was partly inspired by Blanchard. ## See also - List of firsts in aviation

Momčilo Đujić

Chetnik military commander (1907–1999)

Momčilo Đujić (Serbo-Croatian Cyrillic: Момчилo Ђујић, ; 27 February 1907 – 11 September 1999) was a Serbian Orthodox priest and Chetnik vojvoda. He led a significant proportion of the Chetniks within the northern Dalmatia and western Bosnia regions of the Independent State of Croatia (NDH), a fascist puppet state created from parts of the occupied Kingdom of Yugoslavia during World War II. In this role he collaborated extensively with the Italian and then the German occupying forces against the communist-led Partisan insurgency. Đujić was ordained as a priest in 1933 and gained a reputation as something of a firebrand in the pulpit. After the assassination of King Alexander of Yugoslavia in 1934, he joined the Chetnik Association of Kosta Pećanac, forming several bands in the Knin region of Dalmatia. The Chetnik Association became a reactionary force used by the central government to oppress the populace. Active in promoting workers' rights, Đujić was briefly jailed for leading a protest by railroad workers, and he was a member of the exclusively-Serb Agrarian Union political party. After the Axis invasion of Yugoslavia in April 1941, the Croatian Ustaše regime implemented a policy of widespread incarcerations, massacres, forced emigration and murder of Serbs and other groups, but Đujić escaped to the coastal zone annexed by Italy and began recruiting Chetniks in a refugee camp. When a general uprising began in August, Đujić returned to Knin and deployed his Chetniks to defend local Serbs from the Ustaše, and under his command they captured the town of Drvar in the Bosanska Krajina. He then quickly began collaborating with the Italians, gaining their help through signing a non-aggression agreement. At this time, he was still aligned with the insurgency led by the communists. He soon betrayed them and began subverting Partisan units and attacking them alongside the Italians. He formed the Chetnik Dinara Division in early 1942. By mid-1942, Đujić was encouraging his Chetniks to co-operate with NDH forces, and on 1 October Chetniks under his command perpetrated a massacre of nearly 100 Croat civilians in the village of Gata. In early 1943 he attempted to participate on the Axis side in the Case White campaign against the Partisans but this was blocked by the Germans. In August, the Dinara Division suffered significantly at the hands of the Partisans and through desertion. By the time of the Italian capitulation in September it was of little use for offensive operations. When the Germans occupied the area, they restricted it to guarding railway tracks from Partisan sabotage. By November 1943, the Chetnik supreme commander, Draža Mihailović, was ordering Đujić to collaborate with the Germans. In November 1944, Đujić and 4,500 of his Chetniks combined with German and NDH forces in an attempt to defend Knin from the ascendant Partisans. Đujić progressively withdrew his troops until they surrendered to the western Allies in May 1945. Đujić was tried and convicted in absentia for war crimes by the new Yugoslav communist government, which found him guilty of mass murder, torture, rape, robbery, forcible confinement and collaborating with the occupying forces. Included in these charges was responsibility for the deaths of 1,500 people. He eventually emigrated to the United States, settling in California. He played an important role in Serbian émigré circles and founded the Ravna Gora Movement of Serbian Chetniks alongside other exiled Chetnik fighters. He later retired to San Marcos, California. In 1989, Đujić appointed the ultranationalist Serb politician Vojislav Šešelj as a Chetnik vojvoda. He later stated that he regretted awarding the title to Šešelj due to his involvement with Slobodan Milošević and his Socialist Party. In 1998, Biljana Plavšić, then President of Republika Srpska, presented Đujić with an honorary award. Plavšić was later convicted of crimes against humanity related to her activities during the Bosnian War. Đujić died at a hospice in San Diego in 1999, aged 92. Moves in Serbia to rehabilitate the reputations of Đujić and the Chetnik movement have been criticised as historical revisionism and falsification of history. ## Early life, education and priesthood Momčilo Đujić was the oldest of three sons and two daughters of Rade Đujić and his wife Ljubica (née Miloš), and was born in the village of Kovačić, near Knin in the Kingdom of Dalmatia, on 27 February 1907. The family was of Bosnian origin. Rade had moved to Kovačić with his disabled Austro-Hungarian Army veteran father, Glišo, and his brother, Nikola, in the late 1880s and lived off his father's army pension for a time. Ljubica hailed from the village of Ljubač, southeast of Knin. Shortly after his marriage to Ljubica, Rade established himself as a successful farmer. Đujić's mother wished to name him Simo, after his uncle. Đujić's father disliked the name and, having been raised listening to the traditional Balkan gusle – a single-string musical instrument, and reciting Serbian epic poetry, named his son after Momchil, a 14th-century brigand in the service of Serbian Emperor Dušan the Mighty. It was not until Momčilo started primary school in 1914 that his mother discovered that he had not been named Simo at his baptism. Đujić finished primary school in 1918 and graduated as the best student in his class. Between 1920 and 1924, he attended lower gymnasium in Knin. After a two-year pause, he began attending the higher gymnasium in Šibenik, but in 1929 decided to leave for Sremski Karlovci, where he would attend the Serbian Orthodox seminary. He graduated from the seminary in 1931. In the same year he published a poetry book, Emiilijade. He was ordained a priest two years later. In 1931 Đujić was assigned to the Orthodox parish in Strmica, near Kovačić. Shortly before ordination, he married Zorka Dobrijević-Jundžić, the eldest daughter of a wealthy merchant from Bosansko Grahovo. The two were married in the Church of St. George in Knin, where Đujić had been baptised as an infant. Đujić's first child, Siniša, was born in 1934. In 1935, Zorka gave birth to twins, a son named Radomir and a daughter named Radojka. Đujić and his family were relatively wealthy by the standards of Depression-era Kingdom of Yugoslavia. Đujić consequently became the most influential person in the village. He sought to use his money and influence to help the Serb peasants in the Dalmatian hinterland. In 1934, he organised the construction of the "Petar Mrkonjić" cultural centre in Strmica, financed and oversaw the irrigation of farmland west of Mračaj and approved the casting of a pair of church bells on the Church of St. John the Baptist. The casting of new church bells – the originals having been destroyed by Austro-Hungarian artillery in 1916 – was financed with money donated by the Yugoslav government and further improved his reputation among the local population. Đujić's critics accused him of misappropriating funds, which he denied from the pulpit. ## Interwar Chetnik Association In October 1934, Vlado Chernozemski assassinated Yugoslavia's King Alexander. Đujić was chosen to stand by Alexander's coffin as the funeral train travelled through Knin. On this occasion, he met the future World War II Chetnik leader Draža Mihailović for the first and only time. The king's assassination was partially orchestrated by the Ustaše, a Croatian terrorist organisation at the time. Soon after this, Đujić began carrying arms and organising Serb paramilitary groups in and around Knin. "I knew that the country would not survive", Đujić explained, "because nobody can put Serbs and Croats in the same bag". In late 1934, he met with Kosta Pećanac, the head of the interwar Chetnik Association, and formed eleven Chetnik bands in the vicinity of the town. Chetnik insurgency did not have a long tradition in Dalmatia, and only emerged in the 1930s. Đujić subjected local Serbs to constant propaganda, hoping that it would convince them to join the Chetniks. Most ignored his appeals, and continued living peacefully with their Croat neighbours. On 9 January 1935, Đujić, with a carbine slung over his back, presided over a gathering of twenty newly recruited Chetniks in the village of Sveti Štefan, just north of Knin, together with gendarmerie Brigadni đeneral Ljubo Novaković and one of Pećanac's deputies who brought Chetnik and Sokol insignia from Belgrade. The gathering was held in full view of the villagers, and marked the first time that Đujić publicly donned a Chetnik uniform. On 6 September 1935, Đujić formed a Chetnik organisation in Vrlika. Several months later, he assembled a band of 70 Chetniks in the villages of Otrić and Velika Popina. By this time the Chetnik organisation had transformed from the popular Serb guerrilla bands of the Balkan Wars and World War I into a reactionary force that was used by the central government to oppress the populace. Đujić became known for his fiery speeches, which earned him the nickname "Father Fire" (Serbian: Pop vatra). The tone of his speeches changed depending on the course of political developments in Yugoslavia, and his statements ranged from right-wing royalism to left-wing progressivism. At certain points, Đujić appeared to embrace the quasi-fascism of the leader of the Yugoslav National Movement, Dimitrije Ljotić. At others, he strongly propagated conservative Chetnik ideology and Serb chauvinism. Đujić's repeated calls for democracy and national rights prompted the regency of Prince Paul to brand him a "left-wing agitator". He received considerable support from the Serbian Orthodox Church in Knin. He also used his position as a priest and respected local leader to influence how the people of Strmica would vote, instructing his parishioners to cast ballots for a candidate of his choosing in the 1935 Yugoslav parliamentary elections. In May 1937, Đujić gave a sermon in which he accused the Yugoslav government of being responsible for the poor working conditions of railroad workers in Dalmatia and western Bosnia. In mid-May, Đujić led a massive strike between Bihać and Knin in which more than 10,000 railroad workers participated. The Una–Butužnica railroad was one of eight being built in Yugoslavia by two French civil engineering companies, Société de Construction des Batignolles and Société Edmond Bayer de Agner. Đujić wished to minimise the influence that the communist-dominated United Workers Syndicate Union of Yugoslavia held over the workforce in Dalmatia, and presented himself as a man out to defend the rights of workers throughout the country. The strike began on 15 May, on the Srb–Dugopolje road. After three days, it was broken up by the Yugoslav gendarmerie. Đujić then led the striking workers south to Vrpolje, where he attempted to negotiate a deal with the authorities. After negotiations broke down, Đujić led the workers north to Strmica, via Golubić and Pileći kuk. He held a large rally at Pileći kuk – which was attended by a crowd of over 800 people – and delivered a speech criticising the regency for its "pro-[Roman] Catholic, anti-[Eastern] Orthodox and anti-worker" policies. An eyewitness reported that Đujić waved "a red [communist] flag and greeted followers with a clenched fist, all while being the leader of a Chetnik band." In Knin, Đujić and the striking workers clashed with police. The police fired on the protesters, wounding three and killing a young girl who was watching the clash. Đujić was subsequently arrested and spent ten days in prison for "insulting His Majesty" during the rally at Pileći kuk. He later received financial compensation from the Yugoslav government for the "spiritual suffering and pain" caused by his brief period of detention. Đujić's actions greatly enhanced his reputation among Dalmatian peasants, who referred to him as a "brave leader of working men". The local authorities continued to view Đujić with suspicion, describing him as a "priest of left-wing democracy" in internal documents. Unsubstantiated rumours circulated that Đujić supported Ljotić's organisation, and that he was one of the few people that had voted for Ljotić in the 1938 Yugoslav parliamentary elections. The local authorities suspected that Đujić was an "old Italian spy" who received orders from the Italian intelligence headquarters in Zadar, but never uncovered any evidence to substantiate these suspicions. Before World War II, Đujić was a member of the exclusively-Serb Agrarian Union political party. The historians Popović, Lolić and Latas observe that Đujić's espoused political views appear to be wildly inconsistent during the interwar period, but they ascribe this to his willingness to do anything to achieve power and wealth, including embracing the populism of opposing the Yugoslav state. Despite this apparent inconsistency, they also detect an underlying theme of Great Serb chauvinism in his actions throughout the period leading up to the war. ## World War II Following the 1938 annexation of Austria by Nazi Germany, Yugoslavia shared a border with the Third Reich and came under increasing pressure as her neighbours became aligned with the Axis powers. In April 1939, Yugoslavia gained a second frontier with Italy when that country invaded and occupied neighbouring Albania. At the outbreak of World War II, the Yugoslav government declared its neutrality. Between September and November 1940, Hungary and Romania joined the Axis, and Italy invaded Greece from Albania. From that time, Yugoslavia was almost completely surrounded by Axis powers and their satellites, and her neutral stance toward the war came under tremendous pressure. In late February 1941, Bulgaria joined the Axis. The next day, German troops entered Bulgaria from Romania, almost closing the ring around Yugoslavia. With the aim of securing his southern flank before the pending attack on the Soviet Union, Adolf Hitler began placing heavy pressure on Yugoslavia to join the Axis powers. The Yugoslav government conditionally signed the Tripartite Pact – the instrument that constituted the Axis – after some delay, on 25 March 1941. Two days later, a group of pro-Western Serb-nationalist air force officers deposed Prince Paul in a bloodless coup d'état. The conspirators declared 17-year-old Prince Peter of age and brought to power a government of national unity led by General Dušan Simović. The coup enraged Hitler, who ordered the invasion of Yugoslavia which commenced on 6 April 1941. Đujić did not support the coup. He realised that Yugoslavia's collapse was inevitable after seeing a column of demoralised troops from the barely mobilised 12th Infantry Division Jadranska pass his home. Once it became clear that the Royal Yugoslav Army (Serbo-Croatian: Vojska Kraljevine Jugoslavije, VKJ) could not hold the Axis advance, Đujić started blaming Croat fifth column activity for the VKJ's military defeats. On 10 April 1941, the Ustaše-led Independent State of Croatia (Croatian: Nezavisna Država Hrvatska, NDH) was proclaimed in Zagreb and divided into German and Italian zones of occupation. The Italians divided those parts of the NDH that they occupied into three zones: Zone I was those parts of Dalmatia that were annexed by Italy and formed the Governorate of Dalmatia; Zone II was an area which was demilitarised in respect of NDH forces, but was under NDH civil administration; and Zone III was the remainder up to the demarcation line with the Germans. This arrangement was implemented following the signing of the Treaties of Rome on 18 May. Following the signing, the Italians withdrew the bulk of their forces from Zones II and III, and those that remained there were formally considered to be allied forces stationed on NDH territory by mutual agreement. Strmica and Knin were included in the NDH and fell within Zone II. ### Collaboration agreements with the Italians Đujić's emergence as a Chetnik leader in the region around Knin was rapid. Commencing in April 1941, the Ustaše implemented a policy of widespread incarcerations, massacres, forced emigration, and murder of Serbs within the territory they controlled. Around this time, Đujić's Chetniks began killing and mutilating Croat civilians. According to Italian reports, Đujić had around 300 Chetniks under his command in April, centered mainly around Knin. The first Ustaše atrocity in the Knin area occurred on 29 May, when a group of Serbs were killed. Around the same time, a group of Ustaše surrounded Strmica with the aim of capturing Đujić, but he was forewarned and escaped to Kistanje in Zone I where he sought Italian protection. Between late May and 27 July, the Ustaše killed more than 500 Serbs in the Knin district. On 13 July, the Ustaše ordered the arrest of all Serbian Orthodox priests in the district and the confiscation of their property, but Đujić was already beyond their reach. While the Italians generally stood by as the Ustaše committed atrocities, they did open up the border crossings into the Governorate of Dalmatia for Serbs fleeing the Ustaše. Refugees from Knin and nearby regions were taken into Italian-run camps located in Split, Obrovac, Benkovac, Kistanje and Šibenik. Đujić was a principal organiser within the Kistanje camp, which held around 1,500 refugees, and from mid-July was recruiting among them for the Chetnik cause. Once a general uprising against the Ustaše had begun in August, Đujić went to the centre of the revolt in Drvar with another Chetnik leader and sought approval from the leadership of the uprising to take leadership of the rebellion in the Knin region. Đujić then established his Chetniks around Knin and coordinated with Chetniks in the Bosansko Grahovo district. Đujić's Chetniks successfully kept the Ustaše out of Knin and its surroundings, sparing the local Serb population from further massacres. As summer approached, Đujić's Chetniks captured Drvar from the Ustaše. By early summer, he and Chetnik commander Stevo Rađenović had contacted the Italians and asked them to put a halt to the Ustaše mistreatment of Serbs, enable the return of Serb refugees, and repeal a decree that enabled the confiscation of Serb-owned property in the NDH. The Italians obliged in the hope that doing so would win the Chetniks over to collaboration and seriously weaken any future uprising in the area, which would have further disrupted rail traffic along the Split–Karlovac railway line. On 13 August, at a meeting in the village of Pađene northwest of Knin, Đujić and several other Serb nationalists agreed to collaborate with the Italians. They secretly signed a pact of non-aggression with the Italian military, and in exchange, the Italians approved Đujić raising a force of up to 3,000 Chetniks. On 31 August, at a Drvar assembly, Đujić was given the task of stopping the Italian advance on the town. Immediately afterwards, he made an agreement with the Italians granting them free passage. Recruiting for Chetnik formations in the region was assisted by the so-called leftist errors of the Yugoslav Partisans, which drove undecided Serbs to join the Chetniks. ### Dinara Division #### 1942 In early January 1942, the Dinara Division was formed after Đujić was contacted by Mihailović, via a courier. Under Mihailović's putative control, Ilija Trifunović-Birčanin played a central role in organising the units of Chetnik leaders in western Bosnia, Lika, and northern Dalmatia into the Dinara Division and dispatched former Royal Yugoslav Army officers to help. Đujić was designated the commander of the division with a goal of the "establishment of a Serb national state" in which "an exclusively Orthodox population is to live". At the time of its formation, the division was no more than 1,500 strong. The headquarters of the Dinara Division was located in Knin. In mid-April, Đujić fomented a pro-Chetnik coup in a Partisan unit in the Gračac district northwest of Knin, which was part of a pattern of subversive Chetnik activity in the Knin region at the time. Around the same time Đujić's Chetniks were launching raids against villages held by the Partisans between Bosansko Grahovo and Drvar in conjunction with the Italians, who considered him a filibuster. He operated in northern Dalmatia under Trifunović-Birčanin who acted as liaison officer between the Chetniks and the Italians, and whose collaboration agreements were condoned by Mihailović. In June, Đujić was appointed as a Chetnik warlord (Serbo-Croatian: vojvoda, војвода) by Mihailović. By the summer of 1942, Đujić's Chetniks had effectively become Italian auxiliaries, and they began providing Chetnik detachments with arms, ammunition and supplies. It is likely that the agreements between Đujić and the Italians were negotiated without Mihailović's prior knowledge. They were later denounced by Mihailović. In mid-May, Đujić was a member of a Chetnik delegation that approached the Ustaše civil administration in the Knin region, and discussed joint action against the increasing threat from the Partisans. The Chetniks were given funds amounting to 100,000 kuna and arrangements were made for them to co-locate units with NDH forces and to receive food from the Ustaše authorities. On 28 June, as a gathering in the village of Kosovo near Knin, Đujić urged his Chetniks to be loyal to the NDH. In this way, Đujić and other Chetnik leaders established co-operation with the Ustaše, although according to the political scientist Sabrina P. Ramet, these relationships were "based only on their common fear of the Partisans" and "characterised by distrust and uncertainty". Đujić actively co-operated with Italian forces, with whom he had concluded a non-aggression pact. On 1 October, Italian units, accompanied by units of the Dinara Division under the command of Đujić, Mane Rokvić and Veljko Ilijić conducted an operation in and around the village of Gata near Split. During the operation, the Chetniks killed 95–96 Croats, mostly women, children and the elderly, then burned most of the village. According to the journalist Tim Judah, about 200 Croats were killed, and the actions of the Chetniks at Gata outraged the Italians. In the same month Đujić told his men "we Chetniks have to be in good relations with the Croats for the time being in order to get a large number of arms and munitions, but when the time comes we will settle accounts with them". At the same time, while Đujić and fellow Chetnik leader Uroš Drenović were hoping to join forces in western Bosnia, the Partisans were in the ascendancy. In November, arrangements were made with the Italians for 3,000 Herzegovinian Chetniks to be transferred to the Knin region and Lika to prevent the destruction of the Dinara Division by the Partisans. This transfer was effected in mid-December. #### 1943 In early February 1943, Đujić and fellow Chetnik leader Petar Baćović tried to participate in the Axis Case White offensive against the Partisans but the Germans stopped them from getting involved. On 10 February, Đujić, Ilija Mihić, Baćović and Radovan Ivanišević, the Chetnik commanders of east Bosnia, Herzegovina, Dalmatia, and Lika, signed a joint proclamation declaring to the "people of Bosnia, Lika, and Dalmatia" that "since we have cleansed Serbia, Montenegro, and Herzegovina, we have come to help to crush the pitiful remnants of the Communist international, criminal band of Tito, Moša Pijade, Levi Vajnert and other paid Jews". The Partisan rank and file was called upon to "kill the political commissars and join our ranks right away," like the "hundreds and hundreds who are surrendering every day, conscious that they have been betrayed and swindled by the Communist Jews." By 17 February, it was clear that the Chetniks in western Bosnia, including Đujić's Dinara Division, had failed to use Case White to recapture Drvar and unite the Chetnik forces in the Dinaric Alps and western Bosnia. Following the death of Trifunović-Birčanin in February 1943, Đujić, along with Dobroslav Jevđević, Baćović, and Ivanišević vowed to the Italians to carry on Trifunović-Birčanin's policies of closely collaborating with them against the Partisans. By March, detachments of the Dinara Division were refusing to budge from the localities in which they had been recruited, would not carry out mobile operations, and according to the Italians, "were good for little else but plunder". By April, difficulties had arisen between Mihailović's delegates and civilian Chetnik leaders like Đujić, to the extent that Mihailović's delegate told Đujić to avoid interaction with the Italians unless Mihailović had given prior approval. Despite these orders, Mihailović's delegates never achieved control of all of the civilian Chetnik leaders like Đujić. In late May, Đujić and the other long-term civilian collaborationist Chetnik leaders in the region suffered a severe setback when the Italian leader, Benito Mussolini, acquiesced to German demands and ordered the commander of the Italian Second Army, Generale di Corpo d'Armata (Lieutenant General) Mario Robotti, to coordinate with the Germans in the disarming of Chetnik detachments. Đujić prevailed upon Robotti to intercede with the Germans, and in June was granted a reprieve when the German Commander-in-Chief South-East Europe, Generaloberst Alexander Löhr, agreed that Đujić's Chetniks could be disarmed gradually, or in a few months time. At the same time as this was agreed, the Italian XVIII Army Corps were ordered to progressively reduce the supplies of food provided to the Dinara Division. Throughout the summer, Đujić's Chetniks fought the Partisans in western Bosnia, but by early August they had suffered severe reverses at the hands of the Partisans around Bosansko Grahovo and had to withdraw from that area. Around the same time, one of Mihailović's delegates, Mladen Žujović, reported that the Dinara Division was "poorly formed, badly armed and disciplined", did not have "accurate registers of officers and troops", and could muster no more than 3,000 men. Žujović concluded his report by stating that the division was a "figment of the imagination". Mihailović's delegate in western Bosnia, Đuro Plećaš, was killed in August after he clashed with Đujić. Around the middle of the month, Đujić and other Chetnik leaders approached the Italians and admitted that Mihailović had directed them to disarm Italian units in case of an Italian capitulation to the Allies. They promised that they would not carry out these orders. By late August, German pressure, reduced Italian supplies and the fighting against the Partisans was resulting in increased defections to the Partisans and was also undermining Đujić's position as leader. Around the same time, Đujić narrowly escaped arrest by the Italians, and thanks to an intervention by Robotti, also avoided arrest by the Germans. Despite these difficulties, Đujić's detachments in Dalmatia and western Bosnia were used by the Italians almost up to the point of their surrender. Just before the Italian surrender, in an attempt to shore up Italian support, Đujić travelled to XVIII Army Corps headquarters in Knin to assure the Italians of his "sincere friendship and cooperation with the Italian people", but at this point the Italians were incapable of developing a coherent policy towards the Chetniks. By this time, Đujić's detachments had rapidly declined in military value and were of little use for offensive operations. Following the Italian capitulation on 8 September, the Germans moved quickly to secure the Adriatic coastline ahead of a feared Allied landing, and Đujić's detachments tried unsuccessfully to slow their deployment through sabotage. Late that month, Đujić fled to avoid arrest by the Germans. In western Bosnia, many members of the Dinara Division had already transferred their allegiance to the Partisans or deserted. The remainder began collaborating with the Germans as early as October, although they did not number more than a few thousand. In mid-October, Đujić managed to persuade the Germans to withdraw their arrest order. Nevertheless, the Germans were less supportive of his Chetniks than the Italians had been, did not trust them in large-scale actions, and restricted their activities to guarding railway tracks between Knin and the Adriatic coast from Partisan sabotage. The Germans required all members of the Dinara Division to produce their German-issued identification passes to receive arms and munitions, and eschewed a written agreement with Đujić. His new situation was in stark contrast to the advantageous position he had enjoyed when dealing with the Italians, and the activities of the Dinara Division were strictly controlled, including a prohibition against undertaking operations in areas populated by Croats. The Germans had intercepted his radio communications with Mihailović in September, which meant that his reported strength and intentions were known to the Germans, and further undermined his attempts to gain greater freedom of action. On 19 or 20 November 1943, Mihailović ordered Đujić to collaborate with the Germans, adding that he himself was unable to openly do so "because of public opinion." By the end of December, Đujić began to develop links with Ljotić's Yugoslav National Movement in German-occupied Serbia. Đujić also began to actively circumvent Mihailović's influence by sending him false information. #### Retreat and surrender In February 1944, Đujić ordered his commanders to infiltrate the Partisans with the aim of engaging in sabotage and assassination. Đujić said of the Dinara Division that it was: > ... under Draža's command, but we received news and supplies for our struggle from Ljotić and [leader of the puppet government in occupied Serbia, [Milan] Nedić. ... Nedić's couriers reached me in Dinara and mine reached him in Belgrade. He sent me military uniforms for the guardists of the Dinara Chetnik Division; he sent me ten million dinars to obtain for the fighters whatever was needed and whatever could be obtained. On 25 November 1944, the Yugoslav Partisans attacked the town of Knin, which was defended by 14,000 German troops, 4,500 of Đujić's Chetniks, and around 1,500 Ustaše. On 1 December, Đujić was wounded and sent an emissary to General Gustav Fehn of the German 264th Infantry Division in Knin with the following message: > The Chetnik Command with all of its armed forces has collaborated sincerely and loyally with the German Army in these areas from September last year. Our common interest demanded this. This collaboration has continued to the present day. ... The Chetnik Command wishes to share the destiny of the German Army in the future, too. ... The Command requests that [the village of] Pađene be the base for supplying our units, until a further common agreement is reached. On 3 December 1944, Đujić's force of between 6,000 and 7,000 withdrew to Bihać with help from the Wehrmacht 373rd Infantry Division. The Chetniks received ammunition and food from the Germans and began a joint German-Chetnik offensive against the Partisans. Fehn organised the transportation of Đujić's wounded Chetniks through Zagreb to the Third Reich. Đujić requested a written guarantee from Ante Pavelić, leader of the NDH, to afford him and his forces refuge in German-occupied Slovenia. Ljotić and Nedić also petitioned to Nazi party official Hermann Neubacher in Vienna that Đujić's forces should be allowed passage, as did Slovene collaborationist General Leon Rupnik. On 21 December 1944, Pavelić ordered the military forces of the NDH to give Đujić and his forces "orderly and unimpeded passage". Đujić and his 6,000-odd typhus-ridden Chetniks took an alternate route towards the Istrian peninsula, as the routes offered by Pavelić were not secure from Partisan attacks. Along the way, hundreds were lost to Ustaše attacks. When Đujić and his troops reached Slovenia in late December, his forces joined Jevđević's Chetniks, Ljotić's Serbian Volunteer Corps, and Nedić's Serbian Shock Corps, forming a single unit that was under the command of Odilo Globocnik, the Higher SS and Police Leader in the Adriatic Littoral. In January Đujić's men were disarmed by the Germans. Together, the collaborationist forces tried to contact the western Allies in Italy in an attempt to secure foreign aid for a proposed anti-Communist offensive to restore royalist Yugoslavia. Mihailović did not oppose this plan openly and even sent warm letters to Đujić during this period. In May 1945, Đujić surrendered his troops to Allied forces and they were then taken to southern Italy, from there to displaced persons camps in Germany and then dispersed. ## Life in exile In 1947, Đujić was tried and convicted of war crimes in absentia by Yugoslavia's communist government. He was found guilty of mass murder, torture, rape, robbery, and forcible confinement, as well as collaborating with the German and Italians. He was accused of being responsible for the deaths of 1,500 people over the course of the war. Between 1947 and 1949, Đujić lived in Paris, before emigrating to the United States. Many of his former Chetniks followed him. Following his arrival in the United States, Đujić and his fighters played a role in the foundation of the Ravna Gora Movement of Serbian Chetniks. He was very active among the Serbian diaspora and the Serbian Orthodox Church in North America. In the 1960s, he enraged some in the diaspora by supporting German, the Tito-approved Serbian patriarch, against the anti-communist American bishop Dionisije Milivojević. Nevertheless, he remained strongly opposed to Yugoslavia's communist government. Đujić retired to San Marcos, California. In 1988, the Yugoslav authorities unsuccessfully sought Đujić's extradition from the United States. By this time, Đujić was the oldest surviving leader of the wartime Chetniks. On 28 June 1989, the 600th anniversary of the Battle of Kosovo, Đujić granted the title of vojvoda to Vojislav Šešelj. He further ordered him "to expel all Croats, Albanians, and other foreign elements from holy Serbian soil", stating he would return only when Serbia was cleansed of "the last Jew, Albanian, and Croat". Šešelj was at the time an anti-communist dissident. The writer and political analyst Paul Hockenos subsequently described Šešelj's activities in the Yugoslav Wars as those of "a man whose killer commando units operating in Croatia and Bosnia carried on the very worst of the Chetnik tradition." Šešelj later became the leader of the Serbian Radical Party, a government coalition partner of Serbian President Slobodan Milošević. In 1993, Đujić remarked: "[I condemn] Vojislav Šešelj who, by openly siding with the Socialist Party of Serbia, who are Communists who have only changed their name, has sullied the name of Chetnikdom and Serbian nationalism." In 1998, Đujić publicly stated that he regretted awarding the title to Šešelj. "I was naïve when I nominated Šešelj [as] vojvoda; I ask my people to forgive me," Đujić remarked. "The greatest gravedigger of Serbdom is Slobodan Milošević." Đujić considered Milošević the successor to Tito, and that he had compromised Serbian national rights within Yugoslavia. According to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) testimony of Croatian Serb leader Milan Babić, Đujić financially supported the Republic of Serbian Krajina in the 1990s with a donation of . Đujić's wife died in 1995. In 1998, Biljana Plavšić, then President of Republika Srpska, presented an honorary award to Đujić. Plavšić was later indicted by the ICTY and convicted of crimes against humanity. ## Death and legacy Đujić died on 11 September 1999 at a hospice in San Diego, California at the age of 92. A New York Times obituary by the journalist David Binder stated that Đujić participated in "epic World War II battles" and carried out many "acts of wartime bravery." Editorial writer for The Washington Post, Benjamin Wittes, observed that the obituary only mentioned "in passing" the war crimes and collaboration accusations against Đujić, as well as his influence in the Yugoslav Wars. He concludes that Đujić "was no anti-fascist hero," and that he was an example of the dangers inherent in ultranationalism. The historian Marko Attila Hoare stated that Binder was known for his "admiration of Serb Nazi-collaborator Momčilo Đujić." A commemoration marking six months since Đujić's death, organised by the Vojvoda Momčilo Đujić Dinara Chetnik Movement, was celebrated at St. Mark's Church in Belgrade in March 2000, and his death was commemorated again at the same church in 2012. The latter service was attended by Mladen Obradović, the leader of the far-right Serbian ultra-nationalist political party, Obraz. The Serbian diaspora in the United States set up a monument dedicated to Đujić at the Serbian cemetery in Libertyville, Illinois. The management and players of the football club Red Star Belgrade visited the monument on 23 May 2010. Darko Miličić – a former Serbian national basketball player who played in the NBA for ten years – has a tattoo of Đujić on his body. Commemorations of the Gata massacre committed by Đujić's Chetniks on 1 October 1942 have been conducted in the recent past, including on the 75th anniversary in 2017, at which Blaženko Boban, a prefect of Split-Dalmatia County, represented the president of Croatia, Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović. A survivor of the massacre, Andrija Pivčević, who was eight years old at the time and was stabbed nine times by Chetniks, placed a wreath and a candle during the 2017 commemorative service. Pivčević testified about the massacre at Mihailović's trial in 1946. Several of those who spoke at the service decried the rehabilitation of Chetnik collaborators and war criminals in Serbia. In 2021, Prvomajska (1st of May) Street, a busy thoroughfare in the Belgrade district of Zemun was renamed Father Momčilo Đujić Street. This action was condemned by Tomislav Žigmanov, the leader of the Democratic Alliance of Croats in Vojvodina – a political party in Serbia, and by the Serbian journalist Tomislav Marković in an opinion piece for Al Jazeera Balkans. Both decried the move as a continuation of the official rehabilitation of Serb World War II collaborators by Serbian authorities since 2004 via historical revisionism and falsification of history, which has even spread into school textbooks.

Development of Grand Theft Auto V

Development of 2013 video game

A team of approximately 1,000 people developed Grand Theft Auto V over several years. Rockstar Games released the action-adventure game in September 2013 for PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, in November 2014 for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, in April 2015 for Windows, and in March 2022 for PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S. The first main Grand Theft Auto series entry since Grand Theft Auto IV, its development was led by Rockstar North's core 360-person team, who collaborated with several other international Rockstar studios. The team considered the game a spiritual successor to many of their previous projects like Red Dead Redemption and Max Payne 3. After its unexpected announcement in 2011, the game was fervently promoted with press showings, cinematic trailers, viral marketing strategies and special editions. Its release date, though subject to several delays, was widely anticipated. The open world setting, modelled on Los Angeles and other areas of Southern California, constituted much of the development effort. Key team members conducted field trips around Southern California to gather research and footage, and Google Maps projections of Los Angeles were used to help design the city's road networks. The proprietary Rockstar Advanced Game Engine (RAGE) was overhauled to increase its draw distance rendering capabilities. For the first time in the series, players control three protagonists throughout the single-player mode. The team found the multiple-protagonist design a fundamental change to the story and gameplay devices. They refined the shooting and driving mechanics and tightened the narrative's pacing and scope. The actors selected to portray the protagonists invested much time and research into character development. Motion capture was used to record the characters' facial and body movements. Like its predecessors, the game features an in-game radio that plays a selection of licensed music tracks. An original score was composed over several years by a team of five music producers. They worked in close collaboration, sampling and incorporating different influences into each other's ideas. The game's 2014 re-release added a first-person view option along with the traditional third-person view. To accommodate first-person, the game received a major visual and technical upgrade, as well as new gameplay features like a replay editor that lets players create gameplay videos. ## History and overview Preliminary work on Grand Theft Auto V began around Grand Theft Auto IV's release in April 2008; full development lasted approximately three years. Rockstar North's core 360-person team co-opted studios around the world owned by parent company Rockstar Games to facilitate development between a full team of over 1,000. These included Rockstar's Leeds, Lincoln, London, New England, San Diego and Toronto studios. Technical director Adam Fowler said that while development was shared between studios in different countries, the process involved close collaboration between the core team and others. This was necessary to avoid difficulties if studios did not communicate with each other as many game mechanics work in tandem. Game development ceased by 25 August 2013, when it was submitted for manufacturing. Media analyst Arvind Bhatia estimated the game's development budget exceeded US\$137 million, and The Scotsman reporter Marty McLaughlin estimated that the combined development and marketing efforts exceeded (US\$265 million), making it the most expensive video game ever made at its time. The proprietary Rockstar Advanced Game Engine (RAGE) was overhauled for the game to improve its draw distance rendering capabilities, and the Euphoria and Bullet engines handle further animation and environment rendering tasks. The team found they could render the game world with greater detail than in Grand Theft Auto IV because they had become familiar with the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360's hardware. Art director Aaron Garbut said that while the consoles' ageing hardware was tiring to work with, the team could still render detailed lighting and shadows and "maintain a consistent look". Vice president Dan Houser felt working on Grand Theft Auto IV with relatively new hardware was a challenge, but the team had since learnt to develop for the consoles more efficiently. The PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions fit onto one Blu-ray Disc; Xbox 360 copies are distributed on two DVDs and require an 8 GB installation on the HDD or external storage device; while the Windows (PC) version takes up seven DVDs. The team asserted any differences between the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 versions would be negligible. ## Research and open world design Initial work on Grand Theft Auto V constituted the open world creation, where preliminary models were constructed in-engine during pre-production. The game's setting is the fictional US state of San Andreas and city of Los Santos, based on Southern California and Los Angeles respectively. San Andreas was first used as Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas' setting, which featured three cities separated by open countryside. The team thought the ambition of including three cities in San Andreas was too high, as it did not emulate the cities as well as they had hoped. Houser felt an effective portrayal of Los Angeles needs to emulate its urban sprawl, and that dividing the workforce between multiple cities would have detracted from capturing "what L.A. is". Garbut said PlayStation 2 era technology lacked the technical capabilities to capture Los Angeles adequately, such that San Andreas' rendition of Los Santos looked like a "backdrop or a game level with pedestrians randomly milling about". The team disregarded San Andreas as a departure point for Grand Theft Auto V because they had moved on to a new generation of consoles and wanted to build the city from scratch. According to Garbut, game hardware had "evolved so much from San Andreas" that using it as a model would have been redundant. The team's focus on one city instead of three meant they could produce Los Santos in higher quality and at a grander scale than in the previous game. Los Angeles was extensively researched for the game. The team organised field research trips with tour guides and architectural historians, and captured around 250,000 photographs and many hours of video footage. Houser said, "We spoke to FBI agents that have been undercover, experts in the Mafia, street gangsters who know the slang—we even went to see a proper prison". He considered the open world's research and creation the most challenging aspects of the game's production. Google Maps and Street View projections of Los Angeles were used by the team to help design Los Santos' road networks. The team studied virtual globe models, census data and documentaries to reproduce the city's geographical and demographic spread. The team opted to condense the city's spread into an area players could comfortably traverse to capture "the essence of what's really there in a city, but in a far smaller area", according to Houser. The New Yorker's Sam Sweet opined that the "exhaustive field work ... wasn't conducted to document a living space. Rather, it was collected to create an extremely realistic version of a Los Angeles that doesn't actually exist". Garbut noted that Los Angeles was used merely as a starting point and that the team were not "dictated by reality" while building Los Santos. The open world includes vast tracts of countryside around the city proper. Research took the team to California's rural regions; Garbut recalled a visit he took with Houser to Bombay Beach that inspired them to set Trevor's initial story against the Salton Sea. The team wanted a large world without open, empty areas and condensed Southern California's countryside into a detailed play space. The game world covers 49 square miles (130 km²)—about an eightieth of Los Angeles County. Its scale is greater than Rockstar's previous open world games; Garbut estimated it is large enough to fit San Andreas, Grand Theft Auto IV and Red Dead Redemption's worlds combined inside. To accommodate the world's size, the team overhauled the RAGE to improve its draw distance rendering capabilities. The large, open space permitted the re-introduction of fixed-wing aircraft, omitted from Grand Theft Auto IV because of its relatively smaller scale. "We wanted somewhere big [to let players] fly properly", Houser explained. Lead producer Leslie Benzies noted that to avoid a "hollow" countryside area, the team populated the open world with wildlife. ## Story and character development A single-player story revolving around three lead protagonists was one of Grand Theft Auto V's earliest design objectives. Garbut felt such a deviation from the gameplay's core structure was a risk, and recalled team concern that a departure from Grand Theft Auto's traditional, single lead character set-up "might backfire". Early game conceptualisations would have told three separate stories through different protagonists. Later, Grand Theft Auto IV's stories inspired the concept that story trajectories would meet throughout the game. Eventually, the concept evolved into three interconnected stories that intertwined through the missions. According to Benzies, the team made the multiple character formula "integral to the structure of the gameplay as well as the narrative". Houser opined that Grand Theft Auto V is their "strongest plotted game because the characters are so intertwined" and that the "meeting points [between the characters' stories] are very exciting". The central story theme is the "pursuit of the almighty dollar". Missions follow the lead characters' efforts to plan and execute complicated heists to accrue wealth for themselves. The team focused on money as the central theme in response to the 2007–08 financial crisis, as its effects turn the main characters back to a life of crime. "We wanted this post-crash feeling, because it works thematically in this game about bank robbers", Houser explained. The positive reaction to Grand Theft Auto IV's "Three Leaf Clover" mission—an elaborate heist executed by lead protagonist Niko Bellic and accomplices—encouraged the team to develop the story around the heists. Houser said while "Three Leaf Clover" was well-received, the team had not captured the thrill of the robbery to their best abilities and wanted Grand Theft Auto V to achieve it. He felt a strong bank robbery mission "was a good device that we'd never used in the past. Repeating ourselves is a fear when we're doing games where part of the evolution is just technological". The game has players control three characters: Michael De Santa, Franklin Clinton and Trevor Philips. The team wrote each character to embody a game protagonist archetype; Michael represents greed, Franklin ambition and Trevor insanity. Houser felt Michael and Trevor were written to juxtapose each other, with Michael "like the criminal who wants to compartmentalise and be a good guy some of the time" and Trevor "the maniac who isn't a hypocrite". He considered that the three lead characters helped move the game's story into more original territory than its predecessors, which traditionally followed a single protagonist rising through the ranks of a criminal underworld. Ned Luke portrayed Michael, Shawn "Solo" Fonteno portrayed Franklin, and Steven Ogg portrayed Trevor. Fonteno first became aware of the acting job through his friend DJ Pooh, who worked on San Andreas and was involved in Grand Theft Auto V's music production. When Luke's agent advised him of the casting call, he initially did not want to audition for the part because it was in a video game. After reading the audition material and learning more about the project, he became interested. He reflected, "I went immediately after reading the material from 'I'm not doing it' to 'nobody else is doing it'. It was just brilliant". During the initial audition process, Ogg noticed on-set chemistry between him and Luke, which he felt helped secure them the roles. "When [Luke] and I went in the room together we immediately had something", he explained. While the actors knew their auditions were for Rockstar Games, it was not until they signed contracts that they learnt it was a Grand Theft Auto title. Work for the actors began in 2010. Their performances were mostly recorded using motion capture technology. Dialogue for scenes with characters seated in vehicles was recorded in studios. Because the actors had their dialogue and movements recorded on-set, they found their performances no different to film or television roles. Their dialogue was scripted such that they could not ad-lib; however, with directorial approval, they sometimes made small changes to their performances. To prepare for his role as Michael, Luke gained 25 pounds and studied Rockstar's previous games, starting with Grand Theft Auto IV. He considered Michael's characterisation to be an amalgamation of Hugh Beaumont's portrayal of Ward Cleaver in the American sitcom Leave It to Beaver (1957–63) and Al Pacino's portrayal of Tony Montana in the 1983 film Scarface. Ogg felt Trevor's characterisation developed over time. He said, "Nuances and character traits that began to appear—his walk, his manner of speech, his reactions, definitely informed his development throughout the game". Ogg cites Tom Hardy's portrayal of English criminal Charles Bronson in the 2008 biopic Bronson as a strong stylistic influence. He opined that while Trevor embodies the violent, psychopathic Grand Theft Auto anti-hero archetype, he wanted to evoke player sympathy for Trevor's story. "To elicit other emotions was tough, and it was the biggest challenge and it's something that meant a lot to me", Ogg explained. Fonteno felt growing up in South Los Angeles and being exposed to drug trafficking and gang culture authenticated his portrayal of Franklin. "I lived his life before ... He's been surrounded by drugs, the crime, living with his aunt—I lived with my grandmother—so there was a lot of familiarity", Fonteno said. Having not worked as an actor since portraying Face in the 2001 film The Wash, he sought counsel from Luke and Ogg to refine his acting skills. ## Gameplay design Grand Theft Auto V's multiple protagonist design was envisioned to improve the series' core mechanics. The team sought to innovate game storytelling and negate stale familiarity by not evolving the gameplay's core structure. "We didn't want to do the same thing over again", said Houser. The multiple protagonist idea was first raised during San Andreas' development but contemporaneous hardware restrictions made it infeasible. Garbut explained, "It didn't work from a tech point of view because the three characters need three times as much memory, three types of animation and so on". After Grand Theft Auto IV's release, the team developed The Lost and Damned and The Ballad of Gay Tony, episodic content packages that followed new protagonists. The three interwoven stories received positive remarks, so the team structured Grand Theft Auto V around this model. The development team found that players experienced greater freedom when controlling three characters in missions. Lead mission designer Imran Sarwar felt they opened up more strategic manoeuvres. He cited a combat scenario where Michael sets up at a sniper outpost to cover Trevor, who makes a frontal assault on the enemy position while Franklin manipulates flank points. Benzies felt character switching streamlines the interplay between free roam and linear mission gameplay, as it eliminates San Andreas' cumbersome long-distance drives to mission start points. Players may "explore the whole map without having to worry about the long drive back", according to Benzies. Houser noted the mechanic's use during missions negated long drives as well. The team implemented dynamic mission content throughout the open world, a feature borrowed from Red Dead Redemption. Dynamic missions present themselves while players explore the open world and may be accepted or ignored. In Los Santos, for example, players may encounter an armoured van and try to intercept it to steal its contents. The team overhauled the game's shooting and driving mechanics to match the standards of its contemporaries. Public reception to the team's previous games (such as Grand Theft Auto IV, Red Dead Redemption and Max Payne 3) was considered during the process. To increase the pace of shootouts, the team removed hard locking—a central mechanic in Grand Theft Auto IV that instantly locks onto the enemy nearest to the crosshair. Associate technical director Phil Hooker found hard locking "too disorientating" and immersion-breaking, "as you didn't have to think about enemy locations". He said Grand Theft Auto IV players "just rely on holding and shooting until a target is dead", so Grand Theft Auto V introduces a timer that breaks the lock on a target after a few seconds. The team refined Red Dead Redemption's cover system for the game, with increased fluidity moving into and out of cover. Regarding the reworked vehicle mechanics, Houser felt the game took influence from racing games and corrected Grand Theft Auto IV's "boat-like" driving controls. ## Music production Grand Theft Auto V is the first game in its series to use an original score. Music supervisor Ivan Pavlovich summarised the original score idea as "daunting", because it was unprecedented for a Grand Theft Auto game. Like most previous series entries, the game uses licensed music tracks provided by an in-game radio as well. Pavlovich hoped the original score would enhance the licensed music use, not detract from it. He further noted the balancing act between the score's "ambient subtext and tensions" and the game's on-screen action. To work on the score, Rockstar engaged The Alchemist, Oh No and Tangerine Dream with Woody Jackson, who had previously worked on Red Dead Redemption, L.A. Noire and Max Payne 3's music. The team of producers collaborated over several years to create more than twenty hours of music that scores both the game's missions and dynamic gameplay throughout the single-player and multiplayer modes. Early in the game's development, the music team were shown an early build before starting work on the score. Their work was mostly completed later in development, but they continued composing until its final build was submitted for manufacturing. Edgar Froese, Tangerine Dream's founding member, initially rejected the offer of producing music for a video game. After he was flown to the studio and shown the game, he was impressed by its scale and cinematic nature and changed his mind. Froese's first eight months of work on the score produced 62 hours of music. He recorded with Tangerine Dream in Austria, but further work was conducted at Jackson's United States studio, which The Alchemist and Oh No used as well. Jackson's initial role was to provide the score for Trevor's missions, and he took influence from artists such as The Mars Volta and Queens of the Stone Age. When he learnt the team would be building off each other's work, he voiced concern that the finished product could be disjointed. After sharing his work with the team, however, he was particularly impressed by Froese's contributions. "Edgar evolved the music, made it into a whole other thing", Jackson said. Froese had interpolated funk sounds with Jackson's hip-hop influences. Froese and Jackson then sent their work between The Alchemist and Oh No, who heavily sampled it. The Alchemist opined, "We were sampling, taking a piece form [sic] here, a piece from there ... We pitched stuff up, chopped it, tweaked it. Then we chose the tracks that worked and everyone came in and layered on that". DJ Shadow then mixed the team's creations and matched them to the gameplay. Pavlovich considered "how to make the hip-hop and rock score not sound like they were instrumentals of songs on the radio, but rather something unique to the score" a challenge. Pavlovich found that while Rockstar assigned the team missions to write music for, some of their random creations influenced other missions and sparked inspiration for further score development. He discussed a "stem-based" system used to make music fit dynamic game factors where the team would compose music to underscore outcomes players could make immediately after completing missions. Each of these stems, Froese reflected, included up to 62 five-minute WAV files, which were sent to Pavlovich in New York. "He then created, very professionally, a mix down for each of the eight stems needed for a mission and sent out the material to the other artists involved", Froese elaborated. Oh No drew from scenes within the game to make his work feel contextually pertinent with the action on-screen. The iconographic introduction of Los Santos early in the game, for example, inspired him to "create a smooth West Coast vibe that embodied" the city. He supplied horns, electric and bass guitars, and percussion parts to fit with the car chase scenes. "We wanted everything to set the right tone", he explained. The Rockstar team wanted to synergise the game world's depiction of California with the radio stations by licensing tracks that imparted an appropriate "Cali feel". Pavlovich noted that Los Angeles' cultural saturation of pop music necessitated the Non-Stop-Pop FM station; he said "the first time you get off an airplane in L.A. and you hear the radio and the pop just seeps out ... We wanted that. It really connects you to the world". He felt that greater discernment was required for licensed music choices than in Grand Theft Auto IV because Grand Theft Auto V's music plays a pivotal role in generating Californian atmosphere. Music "reflects the environment in which the game is set", he said. Initially, the team planned to license over 900 tracks for the radio, but they refined the number to 241. The tracks are shared between fifteen stations, with an additional two talk-back stations and a radio station for custom audio files on the PC version. Some tracks were written specifically for the game, such as rapper and producer Flying Lotus' original work composed for the FlyLo FM station he hosts. Pavlovich noted how the team would first develop an idea of what each station would sound like, and then select a DJ to match the station's genre, such as Kenny Loggins who hosts the classic rock station Los Santos Rock Radio. He felt that to strike a balance between the radio and the score was a meticulous process, and cited a scenario where players would drive to a mission objective while listening to the radio, with the score taking over once players left the vehicle and proceeded to the mission's next stage. ## Release During a September 2009 earnings call, Take-Two Interactive CEO Strauss Zelnick was asked about Grand Theft Auto V, the purported next game in the series. He replied, "We're not going to announce it, we're not going to announce when we are going to announce it, and we are not going to announce a strategy about announcing it or about when we are going to announce it either, or about the announcement strategy surrounding the announcement of the strategy". That November, Houser discussed with The Times his work on the series and the process that would be undertaken for the next Grand Theft Auto game. He expressed plans to co-write a thousand-page script and said that, when developing a new game, the team typically created a city and then developed the lead cast. In July 2010, Rockstar North posted seven job advertisements related to a new title. The company wanted to recruit environment artists, physics programmers and character animators—the latter advertisement asked for recruits with "professional experience developing a third person action game". Journalists wrote that the job listing was indicative of Grand Theft Auto V's existence. In June 2011, anonymous sources allegedly close to the developer told GameSpot the title was "well under way", with a 2012 release date likely. Rockstar Games first confirmed the game's existence on 25 October 2011 in an announcement on its official website and Twitter feed. Take-Two Interactive's share price subsequently increased by seven per cent. Journalists said the announcement ignited significant anticipation within the gaming industry, which they owed to the series' cultural significance. The game did not meet its original projected March–May 2013 release date. By 30 October 2012, promotional posters had spread to the Internet, and a listing by the retailer Game had leaked the projected release date. Rockstar announced a scheduled Q2 2013 release that day and began accepting pre-orders on 5 November. On 31 January 2013, the company announced the release date had been postponed until 17 September of that year. "It simply needs a little more polish to be of the standard we and, more importantly, you require", Rockstar stated in a press release. On 23 August, reports stated that some European PlayStation 3 users who had pre-ordered Grand Theft Auto V were able to download parts of the game, including its soundtrack and some character dialogue. Details of the game were leaked later that day and on following days before Sony removed the pre-order file from the European PlayStation Network and released an official apology to Rockstar and its fans. In response, Rockstar stated it was "deeply disappointed by leaks and spoilers being spread in advance of the game's launch". The game was released in Japan on 10 October. At E3 2014, a re-release of the game was announced for PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. The PC version, initially scheduled for simultaneous release with the console versions, was delayed three times: first to 27 January 2015, later to 24 March and again to 14 April. According to Rockstar, the game required extra development time for "polishing". PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S versions were announced in June 2020; originally scheduled for release on 11 November 2021, they were later pushed to March 2022, specified in February 2022 to 15 March. They feature additional technical enhancements and performance upgrades. ## Promotion The game was extensively marketed through video trailers and press demonstrations. On 2 November 2011, a week after the announcement, the debut trailer was released. It is narrated by Michael and depicts the open world accompanied by the song "Ogdens' Nut Gone Flake" by English rock band Small Faces. A press release published the same day confirmed the game's open world recreation of Southern California and Los Angeles. Almost a year later, Game Informer ran a Grand Theft Auto V cover story for their December 2012 issue. Rockstar intended to release the second promotional trailer on 2 November. However, these plans were hampered by Hurricane Sandy, which cut power supplies to Rockstar's New York offices. The trailer was eventually released on 14 November; it introduces the lead protagonists' back-stories and features the song "Skeletons" by American musician Stevie Wonder. To unveil the cover art, Rockstar contracted artists to paint a mural on a wall in Manhattan on 31 March 2013, followed by the artwork's digital release on 2 April. It showed English model Shelby Welinder portraying a blonde beach-goer. Three trailers were released on 26 April, each focusing on one of the protagonists. The songs "Radio Ga Ga" by English band Queen, "Hood Gone Love It" by American rapper Jay Rock, and "Are You Sure Hank Done It This Way" by American musician Waylon Jennings are used in the Michael, Franklin and Trevor trailers respectively. A trailer released on 9 July features the first gameplay footage. It demonstrates the shooting and driving mechanics, and the ability to swap between characters instantaneously. Grand Theft Auto Online was unveiled in a trailer released on 15 August. The video displayed activities like bank heists, small robberies, "traditional" game modes, purchase of property and bicycle riding. The final pre-launch trailer was released on 29 August, intended to be a television advertisement. The song "Sleepwalking" by American band The Chain Gang of 1974 was used in this trailer. Viral marketing strategies were used to promote the game. Visitors to the website of The Epsilon Program—a fictional religious cult within the Grand Theft Auto universe—were offered a chance to register for that group. After filling in an online membership form, the terms and conditions revealed that the site was a casting call for five people to appear in the game as members of the fictional cult. The official Grand Theft Auto V website was redesigned on 13 August 2013 to show a preview of activities and locales within the open world and an examination of the lead protagonists' stories. More information was released on the website on 24 August, 6 September, and 13 September. To spur pre-order sales, Rockstar collaborated with several retail outlets to provide special edition versions of the game. The "Special Edition" includes a unique case packaging, a game map and unlock codes for additional content in the single-player and multiplayer modes. The publisher collaborated with Sony to release a 500 GB PlayStation 3 console, which includes a copy of the game, 30-day trial membership for the PlayStation Plus service, and set of Grand Theft Auto V-branded headphones. All game pre-orders granted the purchaser an access code for the in-game Atomic Blimp aircraft. GameStop held a promotional raffle with the chance to win a real-life Bravado Banshee sports car (the game's counterpart of the Dodge Viper). Rockstar collaborated with West Coast Customs to build the vehicle. Shortly after the game's release, the iFruit application was released for iOS devices. It let players customise vehicles, create custom license plates and teach Franklin's dog Chop new tricks, which unlocked additional in-game abilities. Upon its launch, some users reported problems connecting to the application's servers; these problems were resolved with an update on 25 September 2013. iFruit was released for Android on 29 October, and for Windows Phone devices on 19 November. A PlayStation Vita port was released on 1 April 2014. Rockstar stopped supporting the application on December 12, 2022. ## Re-release The enhanced version for PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One features an increased draw distance, finer texture details, denser traffic, upgraded weather effects, and new wildlife and vegetation. It features more than 162 new songs across the game's radio stations. Players could transfer Grand Theft Auto Online characters and progression between some platforms and gain exclusive activities and in-game discounts on weapons and vehicles. The re-release features a new on-foot first-person view option that players may configure to personal preference (for example, by making the view toggle to third-person when taking cover). Animation director Rob Nelson said that a first-person option was raised during PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 development, but their relatively smaller banks of memory were already being pushed, such that adding new first-person animations would have inhibited the open-world render. According to Nelson, the first-person view required more development effort than simply repositioning the camera, because of the need to adapt combat to a different view. The weapons were upgraded to a higher resolution, and new animations including weapon recoil, reload and switch were added. "I think we created 3,000 animations on weapons alone", said Nelson. The PlayStation 4 version uses the DualShock 4's touchpad to navigate camera options and speaker to play smartphone calls, while the Xbox One Controller's "Impulse Triggers" may rumble while players use vehicles. The PC version features the "Rockstar Editor", a replay editor that lets players create video clips of their gameplay. It features a "Director Mode" that lets players record footage with various characters that speak and perform contextual actions at will. Players can adjust the time of day and weather settings, and use cheat codes to access more cinematic effects. An editing suite lets players add music from the game's soundtrack and score, and access various depth of field and filter effects. Finished works may be uploaded directly to YouTube and entered into Rockstar Games Social Club contests. Later, the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions received the Rockstar Editor through a free title update, which added various features such as expanded sound effects and text styles libraries across all three platforms. Art director Aaron Garbut said the addition of first-person inspired the enhanced version's graphical upgrade. Remodelled cars feature interior effects including functional speedometers, fuel gauges and dashboard handbrake lights. The team added new particle and lighting effects, "like fireflies at night in the countryside, or ambient light pollution over Los Santos at night", according to Garbut. Red Dead Redemption inspired the team to add more vegetation to "break up the hard edges [and] straight lines" of the open world. The original version's vegetation was replaced with more detailed equivalents in the enhanced version. An upgraded weather system lets tree branches and leaves blow realistically in the wind. The team hand-placed weeds along fences and walls and placed grass over many of the open world's terrains. They then layered foliage, rocks and litter over the grass. An upgraded screen space ambient occlusion (SSAO) system renders new particle, shadow and weather effects, such as volumetric fog or neon reflections in cars at night. The ambient light pollution over nighttime Los Santos may dissipate in poor weather. A dynamic depth of field system sharpens and softens images to emulate camera autofocus, and improved shaders produce new colours in skin and terrain textures. Initial PC version development began in parallel with PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360. PC development later gave way as the focus shifted to the console releases but eventually resumed. Because the team had planned a PC version from early on, they made technical decisions in advance to facilitate later development, like support for 64-bit computing and DirectX 11. The art team authored their source art at high resolutions even though they needed to be compressed on the PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360, with the foresight that PC versions would display these assets uncompressed. These early decisions aided the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions' development as well, due to their similar system architectures to the PC. Their similarities helped the team "ramp up" to the PC version, where they could push the visuals and technology further than before. The PC development team consisted of members of the original team and PC specialists from Rockstar's other studios who had brought Grand Theft Auto IV, Max Payne 3 and L.A. Noire to the platform. The PC's recommended specifications are based on the game running a native 1080p resolution at 60 frames per second (fps); the team suggested 60 fps as the optimal performance benchmark. The PC build also supports 4K resolution and uncapped framerates. The team opted to give players the choice to configure the game according to their system specifications. Players may configure LOD draw distances, anisotropic filtering, graphics effects and so on. A population density slider affects the density of street-walking pedestrians and cars on the roads.

Caloboletus calopus

Species of fungus in the family Boletaceae found in Asia, Northern Europe and North America

Caloboletus calopus, commonly known as the bitter beech bolete or scarlet-stemmed bolete, is a fungus of the bolete family, found in Asia, Northern Europe and North America. Appearing in coniferous and deciduous woodland in summer and autumn, the stout fruit bodies are attractively coloured, with a beige to olive cap up to 15 cm (6 in) across, yellow pores, and a reddish stipe up to 15 cm (6 in) long and 5 cm (2 in) wide. The pale yellow flesh stains blue when broken or bruised. Christiaan Persoon first described Boletus calopus in 1801. Modern molecular phylogenetics showed that it was only distantly related to the type species of Boletus and required placement in a new genus; Caloboletus was erected in 2014, with C. calopus designated as the type species. Although Caloboletus calopus is not typically considered edible due to an intensely bitter taste that does not disappear with cooking, there are reports of it being consumed in eastern Europe. Its red stipe distinguishes it from edible species, such as Boletus edulis. ## Taxonomy Caloboletus calopus was originally published under the name Boletus olivaceus by Jacob Christian Schäffer in 1774, but this name is unavailable for use as it was later sanctioned for another species. Johann Friedrich Gmelin's 1792 synonym Boletus lapidum is also illegitimate. Christiaan Hendrik Persoon described the mushroom in 1801; its specific name is derived from the Greek καλος/kalos ("pretty") and πους/pous ("foot"), referring to its brightly coloured stipe. The German name, Schönfußröhrling or "pretty-foot bolete", is a literal translation. Alternate common names are scarlet-stemmed bolete and bitter beech bolete. Other synonyms include binomials resulting from generic transfers to Dictyopus by Lucien Quélet in 1886, and Tubiporus by René Maire in 1937. Boletus frustosus, originally published as a distinct species by Wally Snell and Esther Dick in 1941, was later described as a variety of B. calopus by Orson K. Miller and Roy Watling in 1968. Estadès and Lannoy described the variety ruforubraporus and the form ereticulatus from Europe in 2001. In his 1986 infrageneric classification of the genus Boletus, Rolf Singer placed C. calopus as the type species of the section Calopodes, which includes species characterised by having a whitish to yellowish flesh, bitter taste, and a blue staining reaction in the tube walls. Other species in section Calopodes include C. radicans, C. inedulis, B. peckii, and B. pallidus. Genetic analysis published in 2013 showed that C. calopus and many (but not all) red-pored boletes were part of a dupainii clade (named for Boletus (now Rubroboletus) dupainii), well-removed from the core group of the type species B. edulis and relatives within the Boletineae. This indicated it needed placement in a new genus. This took place in 2014, B. calopus was transferred to (and designated the type species of) the new genus Caloboletus by Italian mycologist Alfredo Vizzini. ## Description Up to 15 cm (6 in) or rarely 20 cm (8 in) in diameter, the cap is beige to olive and initially almost globular before opening out to a hemispherical and then convex shape. The surface of the cap is smooth or has minute hairs, and sometimes develops cracks with age. The cap cuticle hangs over the cap margin. The pore surface is initially pale yellow before deepening to an olive-yellow in maturity, and quickly turns blue when it is injured. The pores, numbering one or two per millimetre, are circular when young but become more angular as the mushroom ages. The tubes are up to 2 cm (0.8 in) deep. The attractively coloured stipe is typically yellow above to pink-red below, with a straw-coloured network (reticulation) near the top or over the upper half; occasionally the entire stipe is reddish. It measures 7–15 cm (2.8–5.9 in) long by 2–5 cm (0.8–2.0 in) thick, and is either fairly equal in width throughout, or thicker towards the base. Sometimes, the reddish stipe colour of mature mushrooms or harvested specimens that are a few days old disappears completely, and is replaced with ochre-brown tones. The pale yellow flesh stains blue when broken, the discolouration spreading out from the damaged area. Its smell can be strong, and has been likened to ink. The spore print is olive to olive-brown. Spores are smooth and elliptical, measuring 13–19 by 5–6 μm. The basidia (spore-bearing cells) are club-shaped, four-spored, and measure 30–38 by 9–12 μm. The cystidia are club-shaped to spindle-shaped, hyaline, and measure 25–40 by 10–15 μm. Variety frustosus is morphologically similar to the main type, but its cap becomes areolate (marked out into small areas by cracks and crevices) in maturity. Its spores are slightly smaller too, measuring 11–15 by 4–5.5 μm. In the European form ereticulatus, the reticulations on the upper stipe are replaced with fine reddish granules, while the variety ruforubraporus has pinkish-red pores. ## Similar species The overall colouration of Caloboletus calopus, with its pale cap, yellow pores and red stipe, is not shared with any other bolete. Large pale specimens resemble Suillellus luridus, and the cap of Rubroboletus satanas is a similar colour but this species has red pores. Fruit bodies in poor condition could be confused with Xerocomellus chrysenteron but the stipes of this species are not reticulated. Edible species such as B. edulis lack a red stipe. It closely resembles the similarly inedible C. radicans, which lacks the redness on the stipe. Like C. calopus, the western North American species C. rubripes also has a bitter taste, similarly coloured cap, and yellowish pores that bruise blue, but it lacks reticulation on its reddish stipe. Found in northwestern North America, B. coniferarum lacks reddish or pinkish colouration in its yellow reticulate stipe, and has a darker, olive-grey to deep brown cap. Two eastern North American species, C. inedulis and C. roseipes, also have an appearance similar to C. calopus. C. inedulis produces smaller fruit bodies with a white to greyish-white cap, while C. roseipes associates solely with hemlock. C. firmus, found in the eastern United States, eastern Canada, and Costa Rica, has a pallid cap colour, reddish stipe, and bitter taste, but unlike C. calopus, has red pores and lacks stipe reticulation. C. panniformis, a Japanese species described as new to science in 2013, bears a resemblance to C. calopus, but can be distinguished by its rough cap surface, or microscopically by the amyloid-staining cells in the flesh of the cap, and morphologically distinct cystidia on the stipe. ## Distribution and habitat An ectomycorrhizal species, Caloboletus calopus grows in coniferous and deciduous woodland, often at higher altitudes, especially under beech and oak. Fruit bodies occur singly or in large groups. The species grows on chalky ground from July to December, in Northern Europe, and North America's Pacific Northwest and Michigan. In North America, its range extends south to Mexico. Variety frustosus is known from California and the Rocky Mountains of Idaho. In 1968, after comparing European and North American collections, Miller and Watling suggested that the typical form of C. calopus does not occur in the United States. Similar comparisons by other authors have led them to the opposite conclusion, and the species has since been included in several North American field guides. The bolete has been recorded from the Black Sea region in Turkey, from under Populus ciliata and Abies pindrow in Rawalpindi and Nathia Gali in Pakistan, Yunnan Province in China, Korea, and Taiwan. ## Biochemistry Although it is an attractive-looking bolete, Caloboletus calopus is not considered edible on account of its very bitter taste, which does not disappear upon cooking. There are reports of it being eaten in far eastern Russia and Ukraine. The bitter taste is largely due to the compounds calopin and a δ-lactone derivative, O-acetylcyclocalopin A. These compounds contains a structural motif known as a 3-methylcatechol unit, which is rare in natural products. A total synthesis of calopin was reported in 2003. The frustosus variety is reported as causing severe sickness in Europe. The pulvinic acid derivatives atromentic acid, variegatic acid, and xerocomic acid are present in B. calopus mushrooms. These compounds inhibit cytochrome P450—major enzymes involved in drug metabolism and bioactivation. Other compounds found in the fruit bodies include calopin B, and the sesquiterpenoid compounds cyclopinol and boletunones A and B. The latter two highly oxygenated compounds have significant free-radical scavenging activity in vitro. The compounds 3-octanone (47.0% of total volatile compounds), 3-octanol (27.0%), 1-octen-3-ol (15.0%), and limonene (3.6%) are the predominant volatile components that give the fruit body its odour. ## See also - List of North American boletes

The Tower House

Late-Victorian townhouse in London, England

The Tower House, 29 Melbury Road, is a late-Victorian townhouse in the Holland Park district of Kensington and Chelsea, London, built by the architect and designer William Burges as his home. Designed between 1875 and 1881, in the French Gothic Revival style, it was described by the architectural historian J. Mordaunt Crook as "the most complete example of a medieval secular interior produced by the Gothic Revival, and the last". The house is built of red brick, with Bath stone dressings and green roof slates from Cumbria, and has a distinctive cylindrical tower and conical roof. The ground floor contains a drawing room, a dining room and a library, while the first floor has two bedrooms and an armoury. Its exterior and the interior echo elements of Burges's earlier work, particularly Park House in Cardiff and Castell Coch. It was designated a Grade I listed building in 1949. Burges bought the lease on the plot of land in 1875. The house was built by the Ashby Brothers, with interior decoration by members of Burges's long-standing team of craftsmen such as Thomas Nicholls and Henry Stacy Marks. By 1878 the house was largely complete, although interior decoration and the designing of numerous items of furniture and metalwork continued until Burges's death in 1881. The house was inherited by his brother-in-law, Richard Popplewell Pullan. It was later sold to Colonel T. H. Minshall and then, in 1933, to Colonel E. R. B. Graham. The poet John Betjeman inherited the remaining lease in 1962 but did not extend it. Following a period when the house stood empty and suffered vandalism, it was purchased and restored, first by Lady Jane Turnbull, later by the actor Richard Harris and then by the musician Jimmy Page. The house retains most of its internal structural decoration, but much of the furniture, fittings and contents that Burges designed has been dispersed. Many items, including the Great Bookcase, the Zodiac settle, the Golden Bed and the Red Bed, are now in museums such as the Ashmolean in Oxford, the Higgins in Bedford and the Victoria and Albert in London, while others are in private collections. ## Location and setting The Tower House is on a corner of Melbury Road, just north of Kensington High Street, in the district of Holland Park. It stands opposite Stavordvale Lodge and next to Woodland House, built for the artist Luke Fildes. The development of Melbury Road in the grounds of Little Holland House created an art colony in Holland Park, the Holland Park Circle. Its most prominent member, Frederic, Lord Leighton, lived at Leighton House, 12 Holland Park Road, and at the time of Leighton's death in 1896 six Royal Academicians, as well as one associate member, were living in Holland Park Road and Melbury Road. ## History ### Design, construction and craftsmanship, 1875–78 In 1863, William Burges gained his first major architectural commission, Saint Fin Barre's Cathedral, Cork, at the age of 35. In the following twelve years, his architecture, metalwork, jewellery, furniture and stained glass led his biographer, J. Mordaunt Crook to suggest that Burges rivaled Pugin as "the greatest art-architect of the Gothic Revival". But by 1875, his short career was largely over. Although he worked to finalise earlier projects, he received no further major commissions, and the design, construction, decoration and furnishing of the Tower House occupied much of the last six years of his life. In December 1875, after rejecting plots in Victoria Road, Kensington and Bayswater, Burges purchased the leasehold of the plot in Melbury Road from the Earl of Ilchester, the owner of the Holland Estate. The ground rent was £100 per annum. Initial drawings for the house had been undertaken in July 1875 and the final form was decided upon by the end of the year. Building began in 1876, contracted to the Ashby Brothers of Kingsland Road at a cost of £6,000. At the Tower House Burges drew on his own "experience of twenty years learning, travelling and building", and used many of the artists and craftsmen who had worked with him on earlier buildings. An estimate book compiled by him, and now in the Victoria and Albert Museum, contains the names of the individuals and companies that worked at the house. Thomas Nicholls was responsible for the stone carving, including the capitals, corbels and the chimneypieces. The mosaic and marble work was contracted to Burke and Company of Regent Street, while the decorative tiles were supplied by W. B. Simpson and Sons Ltd of the Strand. John Ayres Hatfield crafted the bronze decorations on the doors, while the woodwork was the responsibility of John Walden of Covent Garden. Henry Stacy Marks and Frederick Weekes were employed to decorate the walls with murals, and Campbell and Smith of Southampton Row had responsibility for most of the painted decoration. Marks painted birds above the frieze in the library, and the illustrations of famous lovers in the drawing room were by Weekes. They also painted the figures on the bookcases in the library. The stained glass was by Saunders and Company of Long Acre, with initial designs by Horatio Walter Lonsdale. ### Burges to Graham, 1878–1962 Burges spent his first night at the house on 5 March 1878. It provided a suitable backdrop for entertaining his range of friends, "the whole gamut of Pre-Raphaelite London." His dogs, Dandie, Bogie and Pinkie, are immortalised in paintings on various pieces of furniture such as the Dog Cabinet and the foot of The Red Bed. Burges displayed his extensive collection of armour in the armoury. The decoration of his bedroom hints at another of his passions: a fondness for opium. Stylised poppies cover the panels of a cupboard which was set next to his bed. In 1881, after catching a chill while overseeing work at Cardiff, Burges returned, half paralysed, to the house where he lay dying for some three weeks. Among his last visitors were Oscar Wilde and James Whistler. Burges died in the Red Bed on 20 April 1881, just over three years after moving into the Tower House; he was 53 years old. He was buried in West Norwood Cemetery. The lease on the house was inherited by Burges's brother-in-law, Richard Popplewell Pullan. Pullan completed some of Burges's unfinished projects and wrote two studies of his work. The lease was then purchased by Colonel T. H. Minshall, author of What to Do with Germany and Future Germany, and father of Merlin Minshall. Minshall sold his lease to Colonel E. R. B. and Mrs. Graham in 1933. The Tower House was designated a Grade I listed building on 29 July 1949. ### Betjeman to Turnbull, 1962–69 John Betjeman was a friend of the Grahams and was given the remaining two-year lease on the house, together with some of the furniture, on Mrs. Graham's death in 1962. Betjeman, a champion of Victorian Gothic Revival architecture, was an early admirer of Burges. In 1957 the Tower House had featured in the fifth episode of his BBC television series, An Englishman's Castle. In a radio interview of 1952 about Cardiff Castle Betjeman spoke of the architect and his foremost work: "a great brain has made this place. I don't see how anyone can fail to be impressed by its weird beauty ... awed into silence from the force of this Victorian dream of the Middle Ages." Because of a potential liability for £10,000 of renovation work upon the expiry of the lease, Betjeman considered the house too costly to maintain, and subsequently vacated it. From 1962 to 1966, the house stood empty and suffered vandalism and neglect. A survey undertaken in January 1965 revealed that the exterior stonework was badly decayed, dry rot had eaten through the roof and the structural floor timbers, and the attics were infested with pigeons. Vandals had stripped the lead from the water tanks and had damaged the mirrors, fireplaces and carving work. The most notable loss was the theft of the carved figure of Fame from the Dining Room chimneypiece. Betjeman suggested that the owner's agents had deliberately refused to let the house, and allowed it to decline, intending to demolish it and redevelop the site. Writing in Country Life in 1966, Charles Handley-Read took a different view saying that "the Ilchester Estate, upon which the house is situated, are anxious that it should be preserved and [have] entered into a long lease conditional upon the house being put into a state of good repair." In March 1965, the Historic Buildings Council obtained a preservation order on the house, enabling the purchaser of the lease, Lady Jane Turnbull, daughter of William Grey, 9th Earl of Stamford, to initiate a programme of restoration the following July. These renovations were supported by grants of £4,000 from the Historic Buildings Council and £3,000 from the Greater London Council. The lease was sold in 1969. ### Harris and Page, 1969 onwards The actor Richard Harris bought the lease for £75,000 in 1969 after discovering that the American entertainer Liberace had made an offer but had not put down a deposit. Reading of the intended sale in the Evening Standard, Harris bought it the following day, describing his purchase as the biggest gift he had ever given himself. In his autobiography, the entertainer Danny La Rue recalled visiting the house with Liberace, writing, "It was a strange building and had eerie murals painted on the ceiling [...] I sensed evil". Meeting La Rue later, Harris said he had found the house haunted by the ghosts of children from an orphanage that he believed had previously occupied the site and that he had placated them by buying them toys. Harris employed the original decorators, Campbell Smith & Company Ltd., to carry out restoration, using Burges's drawings from the Victoria and Albert Museum. Jimmy Page, the Led Zeppelin guitarist, bought the house from Harris in 1972 for £350,000, outbidding the musician David Bowie. Page, an enthusiast of Burges and for the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, commented in an interview in 2012: "I was still finding things 20 years after being there – a little beetle on the wall or something like that; it's Burges's attention to detail that is so fascinating." In 2015, Page successfully challenged a planning application lodged by the pop star Robbie Williams, who had purchased the adjacent Woodland House in 2013 and planned extensive renovations. Page argued that the alterations, particularly the intended underground excavations, would threaten the structure of the Tower House. Ongoing disagreements between Williams and Page over Williams' development plans continue to feature in Britain's press. ## Architecture ### Exterior and design The cultural historian Caroline Dakers wrote that the Tower House was a "pledge to the spirit of Gothic in an area given over to Queen Anne". Burges loathed the Queen Anne style prevalent in Holland Park, writing that it: "like other fashions [...] will have its day, I do not call it Queen Anne art, for, unfortunately I see no art in it at all". His inspirations were French Gothic domestic architecture of the thirteenth century and more recent models drawn from the work of the 19th-century French architect Viollet-le-Duc. Architectural historians Gavin Stamp and Colin Amery considered that the building "sums up Burges in miniature. Although clearly a redbrick suburban house, it is massive, picturesquely composed, with a prominent tourelle for the staircase which is surmounted by a conical roofed turret." Burges's neighbour Luke Fildes described the house as a "model modern house of moderately large size in the 13th-century style built to show what may be done for 19th-century everyday wants". The house has an L-shaped plan, and the exterior is plain, of red brick, with Bath stone dressings and green roof slates from Cumberland. With a floor plan of 2,500 square feet (230 m²), Burges went about its construction on a grand scale. The architect R. Norman Shaw remarked that the concrete foundations were suitable "for a fortress". This approach, combined with Burges's architectural skills and the minimum of exterior decoration, created a building that Crook described as "simple and massive". Following his usual pattern, Burges re-worked many elements of earlier designs, adapting them as appropriate. The frontages come from the other townhouse he designed, Park House, Cardiff, then known as the McConnochie House after its owner, although they have been reversed, with the arcaded, street front from Park House forming the garden front of the Tower House. The staircase is consigned to the conical tower, avoiding the error Burges made at the earlier house, where he placed the staircase in the middle of the hall. The cylindrical tower and conical roof derive from Castell Coch, and the interiors are inspired from examples at Cardiff Castle. The house has two main floors, with a basement below and a garret above. The ground floor contains a drawing room, a dining room and a library, while the first floor has two bedrooms and an armoury. ### Plan ### Interior The architectural writer Bridget Cherry wrote that "the sturdy exterior gives little hint of the fantasy [Burges] created inside", interiors which the art historian and Burges scholar Charles Handley-Read described as "at once opulent, aggressive, obsessional, enchanting, their grandeur border[ing] on grandiloquence". Each room has a complex iconographic scheme of decoration: in the hall it is Time; in the drawing room, Love; in Burges's bedroom, the Sea. Massive fireplaces with elaborate overmantels were carved and installed, described by Crook as "veritable altars of art [...] some of the most amazing pieces of decoration Burges ever designed". Handley-Read considered that Burges's decorations were "unique, almost magical [and] quite unlike anything designed by his contemporaries". #### Ground floor A bronze-covered door, with relief panels depicting figures, opens onto the entrance hall. In Burges's time the door had a letterbox, in the form of Mercury, the messenger of the gods. The letterbox is now lost, but a contemporary copy is in the collection of The Higgins Art Gallery & Museum. The porch contains a white marble seat and column, and on the floor is a mosaic of Pinkie, a favourite poodle of Burges. Cartooned by H. W. Lonsdale, it resembles the cave canem floor at Pompei. The interior centres on the double-height entrance hall, with the theme of Time. The painted ceiling depicts the astrological signs of the constellations, arranged in the positions they held when the house was first occupied. A large stained glass window contains four female figures representing Dawn, Noon, Twilight and Night. A mosaic floor in the entrance hall contains a labyrinth design, with the centre depicting the myth of Theseus slaying the Minotaur. The garden's entrance door, also covered in bronze, is decorated with a relief of the Madonna and Child. As elsewhere, Burges incorporated earlier designs, the bronze doors echoing those at Cork Cathedral, and the maze floor recalling an earlier ceiling at Burges's office at 15 Buckingham Street. Emblems adorn the five doors on the ground floor, each one relevant to their respective room. A flower marked the door to the garden, with the front door marked by a key. The library is indicated by an open book, the drawing or music room by musical instruments, and the dining room by a bowl and flask of wine. The library, its walls lined with bookcases, features a sculptured mantelpiece resembling the Tower of Babel. The hooded chimneypiece represents the "dispersion of languages", with figures depicting Nimrod ruling over the elements of speech. Two trumpeters represent the pronouns, a queen embodies the verb, a porter the noun, and numerous other gilded and painted figures are displayed. The ceiling is divided into eight compartments, with depictions of the six founders of law and philosophy: Moses, St. Paul, Luther, Mahomet, Aristotle and Justinian. An illuminated alphabet frieze of architecture and the visual arts running around the bookcases completes the scheme, with the letters of the alphabet incorporated, including a letter "H" falling below the cornice. Due to H-dropping being a social taboo in Victorian times, Handley-Read described it as the "most celebrated of all Burges's jokes". Artists and craftsmen are featured at work on each lettered door of the bookcases that surround the room. In a panel in one of the glazed doors which open onto the garden, Burges is shown standing in front of a model of the Tower House. He features as Architect, the 'A' forming the first letter of the alphabet frieze. Both the Architecture Cabinet and the Great Bookcase stood in this room. The stained glass windows in the room represent painting, architecture and sculpture, and were painted by Weekes. On the wall opposite the library fireplace is an opening into the drawing room. Inside there are three stained glass windows which are set in ornamented marble linings. Opposite the windows stood the Zodiac Settle, which Burges moved from Buckingham Street. Love is the central decorative scheme to the room, with the ceiling painted with medieval cupids, and the walls covered with mythical lovers. Carved figures from the Roman de la Rose decorate the chimneypiece, which Crook considered "one of the most glorious that Burges and Nicholls ever produced". Echoing Crook, Charles Handley-Read wrote, "Working together, Burges and Nicholls had transposed a poem into sculpture with a delicacy that is very nearly musical. The Roman de la Rose has come to life." The dining room is devoted to Geoffrey Chaucer's The House of Fame and the art of story-telling, Crook explaining that "tall stories are part of the dining room rite". The hooded chimneypiece, of Devonshire marble, contained a bronze figure above the fireplace representing the Goddess of Fame; its hands and face were made of ivory, with sapphires for eyes. It was later stolen. The tiles on the walls depict fairy stories, including Reynard the Fox, Jack and the Beanstalk and Little Red Riding Hood. The room also shows Burges's innovative use of materials: Handley-Read observed that the Victorians had "a horror of food smells" and therefore the room was constructed using materials that did not absorb odours and could be washed. The walls are covered with Devonshire marble, surmounted by glazed picture tiles, while the ceiling is of sheet metal. The ceiling is divided into coffered compartments by square beams and features symbols of the Sun, the planets and the signs of the Zodiac. Burges designed most of the cutlery and plates used in this room, which display his skills as a designer of metalwork, including the claret jug and Cat Cup chosen by Lord and Lady Bute as mementoes from Burges's collection after his death. The panels of the wine cupboard were decorated by Dante Gabriel Rossetti. #### First floor and garret The windows of the stair turret represent "the Storming of the Castle of Love". On the first floor are two bedrooms and an armoury. Burges's bedroom, with a theme of sea creatures, overlooks the garden. Its elaborate ceiling is segmented into panels by gilded and painted beams, studded with miniature convex mirrors set in to gilt stars. Fish and eels swim in a frieze of waves painted under the ceiling, and fish are also carved in relief on the chimneypiece. On the fire-hood, a sculpted mermaid gazes into a looking-glass, with seashells, coral, seaweed and a baby mermaid also represented. Charles Handley-Read described the frieze around the Mermaid fireplace as "proto-Art Nouveau" and noted "the debt of international art nouveau to Victorian Gothic designers, Burges included". In this room, Burges placed two of his most personal pieces of furniture, the Red Bed, in which he died, and the Narcissus washstand, both of which originally came from Buckingham Street. The bed is painted blood red and features a panel depicting Sleeping Beauty. The washstand is red and gold; its tip-up basin of marble inlaid with fishes is silver and gold. "The Earth and its productions" is the theme of the guest room facing the street. Its ceiling is adorned with butterflies and fleurs-de-lis, and at the crossing of the main beams is a convex mirror in a gilded surround. Along the length of the beams are paintings of frogs and mice. A frieze of flowers, once painted over, has since been restored. The Golden Bed and the Vita Nuova Washstand designed for this room are now in the Victoria and Albert Museum. Burges designated the final room on the first floor an armoury and used it to display his large collection of armour. The collection was bequeathed to the British Museum upon his death. A carved chimneypiece in the armoury has three roundels carved with the goddesses Minerva, Venus and Juno in medieval attire. The garret originally contained day and night nurseries, which the author James Stourton considers a surprising choice of arrangement for the "childless bachelor Burges". They contain a pair of decorated chimneypieces featuring the tale of Jack and the Beanstalk and three monkeys at play. ### Garden The garden at the rear of the house featured raised flowerbeds which Dakers described as being "planned according to those pleasances depicted in medieval romances; beds of scarlet tulips, bordered with stone fencing". On a mosaic terrace, around a statue of a boy holding a hawk, sculpted by Thomas Nicholls, Burges and his guests would sit on "marble seats or on Persian rugs and embroidered cushions." The garden, and that of the adjacent Woodland House, contain trees from the former Little Holland House. ## Furniture In creating the interior of the house, Burges demonstrated his skill as a jeweller, metalworker and designer. He included some of his best pieces of furniture such as the Zodiac Settle, the Dog Cabinet and the Great Bookcase, the last of which Charles Handley-Read described as "occupying a unique position in the history of Victorian painted furniture". The fittings were as elaborate as the furniture: the tap for one of the guest washstands was in the form of a bronze bull from whose throat water poured into a sink inlaid with silver fish. Within the Tower House Burges placed some of his finest metalwork; the artist Henry Stacy Marks wrote, "he could design a chalice as well as a cathedral ... His decanters, cups, jugs, forks and spoons were designed with an equal ability to that with which he would design a castle." Burges's furniture did not receive universal acclaim. In his major study of English domestic architecture, Das englische Haus, published some twenty years after Burges's death, Hermann Muthesius wrote of The Tower House, "Worst of all, perhaps, is the furniture. Some of it is in the earlier manner, some of it box-like and painted all over. This style had now become fashionable, though with what historical justification it is not easy to say". Many of the early pieces of furniture, such as the Narcissus Washstand, the Zodiac Settle and the Great Bookcase, were originally made for Burges's office at Buckingham Street and were later moved to the Tower House. The Great Bookcase was also part of Burges's contribution to the Medieval Court at the 1862 International Exhibition. Later pieces, such as the Crocker Dressing Table and the Golden Bed, and its accompanying Vita Nuova Washstand, were made specifically for the house. John Betjeman located the Narcissus Washstand in a junk shop in Lincoln and gave it to Evelyn Waugh, a fellow enthusiast for Victorian art and architecture, who featured it in his 1957 novel, The Ordeal of Gilbert Pinfold. Betjeman later gave Waugh both the Zodiac Settle and the Philosophy Cabinet. Many of the decorative items Burges designed for the Tower House were dispersed in the decades following his death. Kenneth Clark purchased the Great Bookcase for the Ashmolean Museum. Several pieces purchased by Charles Handley-Read, who was instrumental in reviving interest in Burges, were acquired by The Higgins Art Gallery & Museum, Bedford. The museum also bought the Zodiac Settle from the Waugh family in 2011. ### Dispersed furniture and locations The table below lists the known pieces of furniture originally in situ, with their dates of construction and their current location where known. ## Architectural coverage Edward Godwin, fellow architect and close friend of Burges, wrote of Burges's unified approach to building and design in an article in The British Architect, published in 1878: "the interior and the exterior, the building and its furniture, the enclosed as well as the enclosure, are in full accord." Richard Popplewell Pullan described the house in detail in the second of two works he wrote about his brother-in-law, The House of William Burges, A.R.A., published in 1886. The book contains photographs of the interior of the house by Francis Bedford. In 1893, the building was the only private house to be recorded in an article in The Builder, which gave an overview of the architecture of the previous fifty years. It was referenced again a decade later by Muthesius, who described it as "the most highly developed Gothic house to have been built in the 19th century (and) the last to be built in England". It was then largely ignored, with James Stourton describing its early twentieth-century decline as "a paradigm of the reputation of the Gothic Revival". A renewed understanding and appreciation of the building, and of Burges himself, began with Charles Handley-Read's essay on Burges in Peter Ferriday's collection Victorian Architecture, published in 1963. In 1966 Handley-Read followed this with a substantial article on the house for Country Life, "Aladdin's Palace in Kensington". His notes on Burges formed the basis of Mordaunt Crook's centenary volume, William Burges and the High Victorian Dream, published in 1981 and revised and reissued in 2013, in which Crook wrote at length on both the Tower House and its contents. More recent coverage was given in London 3: North West, the revision to the Buildings of England guide to London written by Nikolaus Pevsner and Bridget Cherry, published in 1991 (revised 2002). The house is referenced in Matthew Williams's William Burges (2004), and in Panoramas of Lost London by Philip Davies, published in 2011, which includes some of Francis Bedford's photographs of the house from 1885. In a chapter on the building in Great Houses of London (2012), the author James Stourton called The Tower House "the most singular of London houses, even including the Soane Museum."

1877 Wimbledon Championship

First staging of the Wimbledon Tennis Championships

The 1877 Wimbledon Championship was a men's tennis tournament held at the All England Croquet and Lawn Tennis Club (AEC & LTC) in Wimbledon, London. It was the world's first official lawn tennis tournament, and was later recognised as the first Grand Slam tournament or "Major". The AEC & LTC had been founded in July 1868, as the All England Croquet Club. Lawn tennis was introduced in February 1875 to compensate for the waning interest in croquet. In June 1877 the club decided to organise a tennis tournament to pay for the repair of its pony roller, needed to maintain the lawns. A set of rules was drawn up for the tournament, derived from the first standardised rules of tennis issued by the Marylebone Cricket Club in May 1875. The Gentlemen's Singles competition, the only event of the championship, was contested on grass courts by 22 players who each paid one guinea to participate. The tournament started on 9 July 1877, and the final – delayed for three days by rain – was played on 19 July in front of a crowd of about 200 people who each paid an entry fee of one shilling. The winner received 12 guineas in prize money and a silver challenge cup, valued at 25 guineas, donated by the sports magazine The Field. Spencer Gore, a 27-year-old rackets player from Wandsworth, became the first Wimbledon champion by defeating William Marshall, a 28-year-old real tennis player, in three straight sets in a final that lasted 48 minutes. The tournament made a profit of £10. An analysis made after the tournament led to some modifications of the rules regarding the court dimensions. ## Background ### Origins of lawn tennis The origin of tennis lies in the monastic cloisters in 12th-century France, where the ball was struck with the palm of the hand in a game called jeu de paume. Rackets were introduced to the game in the early 16th century. This original version of tennis, now called "real tennis", was mostly played indoors and popular among the royalty and gentry, while a crude outdoor version called longue paume was played by the populace. The prominence of the game declined in the 17th and 18th centuries, although there are sporadic mentions of a "long tennis" or "field tennis" version in the second half of the 18th century. Between 1858 and 1873 several people in Victorian England experimented with a lawn version of tennis. Major Harry Gem and Augurio Perera demonstrated their game of Pelota (Spanish for ball) and in 1872 created the world's first lawn tennis club at Leamington Spa. In February 1874 Major Clopton Wingfield introduced his version of lawn tennis, called Sphairistikè; on his patent application, he described it as a "New and Improved Court for Playing the Ancient Game of Tennis", and its rules were published in an eight-page booklet. Wingfield is widely credited with popularising the new game through his energetic promotional efforts. The Sphairistikè court was hourglass-shaped, wider at the baseline than at the net. The service was made from a single side in a lozenge shaped box situated in the middle of the court and it had to bounce beyond the service line. In November 1874 Wingfield published a second, expanded edition of The Book of the Game, which had 12 rules and featured a larger court and a slightly lower net. ### All England Croquet and Lawn Tennis Club The All England Croquet Club was founded on 23 July 1868 by six gentlemen at the offices of The Field, a weekly country and sports magazine. After a year-long search a suitable ground of four acres of meadowland was located between the London and South Western Railway and Worple Road in Wimbledon, then an outer suburb of London. The club's committee decided on 24 September 1869 to lease the ground and paid £50 rental for the first year, a fee which increased to £75 and £100, respectively, over the following two years. The increasing rent, coupled with a waning interest in the sedate sport of croquet, was causing the club financial difficulties. In February 1875 it decided to introduce lawn tennis at its grounds to capitalise on the growing interest in this new sport and generate additional revenue. The proposal was made by Henry Jones, a sports writer who published extensively in The Field under his nom de plume "Cavendish" and who had joined the club in 1869. The introduction of lawn tennis was approved at the annual meeting and the club's membership fee was set at two guineas to cover both sports. At a cost of £25, one croquet lawn was converted to a tennis court. Soon after its completion on 25 February 1875, a dozen new club members joined. In 1876 four more lawns, a third of the ground, were handed over to lawn tennis to address the increase in new members. A committee member, George Nicol, was appointed to deal exclusively with lawn tennis affairs. Lawn tennis had become so popular that on 14 April 1877 the name of the club was formally changed, at the suggestion of founding member John H. Hale, to the All England Croquet and Lawn Tennis Club (AEC&LTC). ### Rules of lawn tennis On 3 March 1875 the Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC), in its capacity as the governing body for rackets and real tennis, convened a meeting at Lord's Cricket Ground to test the various versions of lawn tennis with the aim to fully standardise the game's rules. Wingfield was present to demonstrate Sphairistikè, as was John H. Hale, who presented his version called Germains Lawn Tennis; there is no record of either Gem or Perera being present to showcase Pelota. After the meeting, the MCC Tennis Committee was tasked with framing the rules. On 29 May 1875 the MCC issued the Laws of Lawn Tennis, the first unified rules for lawn tennis, which were adopted by the club on 24 June. These were significantly based on the rules introduced by Wingfield in February 1874 and published in his rule-booklet titled Sphairistikè or Lawn Tennis. The MCC adopted Wingfield's hourglass-shaped court as well as the rackets method of scoring, in which the player who first scores 15 points wins the game and only the server ("hand-in") was able to score. The height of the net was set at 5 ft (1.52 m) at the posts and 4 ft (1.22 m) in the centre. Various aspects of these rules, including the characteristic court shape and the method of scoring, were the subject of prolonged debate in the press. The MCC rules were not universally adhered to following its publication and, among others, the Prince's Club in London stuck to playing on rectangular courts. ## Tournament On 2 June 1877, at the suggestion of the All England Club secretary and founding member John H. Walsh, the club committee decided to organise a lawn tennis championship for amateurs, a Gentlemen's Singles event, which they hoped would generate enough funds to repair the broken pony roller that was needed for the maintenance of the lawns. This championship became the world's first official lawn tennis tournament, and the first edition of what would later be called a Grand Slam tournament (or "Major"). The committee agreed to hold the tournament on the condition that it would not endanger the club's limited funds; to ensure this, Henry Jones persuaded 20 members and friends of the club to guarantee a part of the tournament's financial requirement and made himself responsible for the remaining amount. Jones investigated all potential tournament locations in and around London but came to the conclusion that no other ground was more suitable than the Wimbledon premises at Worple Road. As a consequence, the remaining croquet lawns were converted to tennis courts. ### Announcement The first public announcement of the tournament was published on 9 June 1877 in The Field magazine under the header Lawn Tennis Championship: > The All England Croquet and Lawn Tennis Club, Wimbledon, propose to hold a lawn tennis meeting, open to all amateurs, on Monday, July 9th and following days. Entrance fee, £1 1s 0d. Names and addresses of competitors to be forwarded to the Hon. Sec. A.E.C. and L.T.C. before Saturday, July 7, or on that day before 2.15 p.m. at the club ground, Wimbledon. Two prizes will be given – one gold champion prize to the winner, one silver to the second player. The value of the prizes will depend on the number of entries, and will be declared before the draw; but in no case will they be less than the amount of the entrance money, and if there are ten and less than sixteen entries, they will be made up to £10 10s and £5 5s respectively.– Henry Jones – Hon Sec of the Lawn Tennis sub-committee Players were instructed to provide their own racquets and wear shoes without heels. The announcement also stated that a programme would be available shortly with further details, including the rules to be adopted for the meeting. Invitations were sent to prospective participants. Potential visitors were informed that those arriving by horse and carriage should use the entrance at Worple Road while those who planned to come by foot were advised to use the railway path. Upon payment of the entrance fee, the participants were allowed to practise before the Championship on the twelve available courts with the provision that on Saturdays and during the croquet championship week, held the week before the tennis tournament, the croquet players had the first choice of courts. Practice balls, similar to the ones used for the tournament, were available from the club's gardener at a price of 12s per dozen balls. John H. Walsh, in his capacity as editor of The Field, persuaded his employer to donate a cup worth 25 guineas for the winner; the Field Cup. The cup was made of sterling silver and had the inscription: The All England Lawn Tennis Challenge Cup – Presented by the Proprietors of The Field – For competition by Amateurs – Wimbledon July, 1877. On 6 July 1877, three days prior to the start of the tournament, a notice was published in The Times: > Next week at the All England Croquet and Lawn Tennis Club Ground a Lawn Tennis Championship Meeting will be held. The ground is situated close to the Wimbledon Station on the South Western Railway, and is sufficiently large for the erection of thirty "courts". On each day the competition will begin at 3.30, the first ties, of course, beginning on Monday. The Hon. Sec. of the meeting is Mr. J.H. Walsh, while Mr. H. Jones will officiate as referee. The entries are numerous. ### Rules The committee of the club was not satisfied with certain aspects of the 1875 MCC unified rules. To address these perceived shortcomings, a sub-committee consisting of Charles Gilbert Heathcote, Julian Marshall and Henry Jones was set up on 2 June 1877, to establish the rules applicable for the upcoming tournament. They reported back on 7 June with a new set of rules, derived but significantly different from those published by the MCC; in order not to offend the MCC, these rules were declared "provisional" and valid only for the championship: - The court will have a rectangular shape with outer dimensions of 78 by 27 feet (23.8 by 8.2 m). - The net will be lowered to 3 feet 3 inches (0.99 m) in the centre. - The balls will be 2+1⁄2 to 2+5⁄8 inches (6.4 to 6.7 cm) in diameter and 1+3⁄4 ounces (50 g) in weight. - The real tennis method of scoring by fifteens (15, 30, 40) will be adopted. - The first player to win six games wins the set with 'sudden death' occurring at five games all except for the final, when a lead of two games in each set is necessary. - Players will change ends at the end of a set unless otherwise decreed by the umpire. - The server will have two chances at each point to deliver a correct service and must have one foot behind the baseline. These rules, drawn up by the club for this initial tournament, were eventually adopted for the entire sport and, with only slight modifications, have retained their validity. All matches during the tournament were played as best-of-five sets. ### Play In accordance with the All England Regulations for the Management of Prize Meetings, the draw for the 22 entrants was made on Saturday, 7 July 1877, at 3:30 p.m. in the club's pavilion. H.T. Gillson had the distinction of being the first player in the history of modern tennis to be drawn for a tournament. The posts, nets and hand-stitched, flannel-covered India-rubber balls for the tournament were supplied by Jefferies & Co from Woolwich, while the rackets used were an adaptation of those used in real tennis, with a small and slightly lopsided head. The ball-boys kept the tennis balls, 180 of which were used during the tournament, in canvas wells. The umpires who were provided for the matches sat on chairs which in turn were placed on small tables of 18 inches height to give them a better view of the court. The tournament began on Monday, 9 July 1877, at 3:30 p.m. and daily programmes were available for sixpence. On the first day, in sunny weather, ten matches were played, which completed the first round. Full match scores were published on the notice board inside the pavilion. F.N. Langham, a Cambridge tennis blue, was given a walkover in the first round when C.F. Buller, an Etonian and well-known rackets player, did not appear. Julian Marshall became the first player to win a five-set match when he fought back from being two sets down against Captain Grimston. Spencer Gore, a 27-year-old rackets player from Wandsworth and at the time a land agent and surveyor by profession, won his first round match against Henry Thomas Gillson in straight sets. The five second-round matches were played on Tuesday, 10 July, again in fine weather. Charles Gilbert Heathcote had a bye in the second round. J. Lambert became the first player in Wimbledon Championships' history to retire a match, conceding to L.R. Erskine after losing the first two sets. Julian Marshall again won a five-set match, this time against F.W. Oliver, while Gore defeated Montague Hankey in four sets. The quarter-finals were played on Wednesday, 11 July, before a larger number of spectators than had attended the previous matches. Start of play was delayed from the scheduled 3:30 p.m. due to strong winds. Gore defeated Langham in four sets, William Marshall beat Erskine, also in four sets, and Julian Marshall, who injured his knee during the match after a fall, lost to Heathcote in straight sets. The quarter-final matches left three players, instead of four, in the draw for the semi-finals scheduled for Thursday. To solve the situation lots were drawn and Marshall, a 28-year-old architect and Cambridge real tennis blue, was given a bye to the final. His opponent would be Gore, who defeated Heathcote in straight sets in the only semi-final played. When the semi-final stage had concluded on Thursday, 12 July, play was suspended until next Monday, 16 July, to avoid a clash with the popular annual Eton v Harrow cricket match that was played at Lord's on Friday and Saturday. The final was postponed from its scheduled start on Monday at 4 p.m. until Thursday, 19 July, at 3:30 p.m. because of rain. On Thursday it was still showery, causing the final to be further delayed by an hour. It began on a dead and slippery court in front of about 200 spectators. There was a temporary three-plank stand on one side of the court offering seating to about thirty people. Marshall won the toss, elected to serve first and was immediately broken by Gore. After the first set was won by Gore, it started to rain for a quarter of an hour; this further softened the ground and affected the quality of play. The final lasted 48 minutes, and Spencer Gore won the inaugural championship against William Marshall in three straight sets of 15, 13, and 20 minutes respectively. En route to the title Gore had won 15 sets and lost two and won 99 games for the loss of 46. Gore, the volley specialist, had beaten the baseline player, at a time when volleying was considered by some to be unsporting. Some tried to outlaw the volley and a discussion on its merits took place in The Field for weeks after the tournament. The final was followed by a play-off match for 2nd place between Marshall and Heathcote. The players could not fix another date for the match and decided to play it straight away. By agreement, the match was limited to best-of-three sets. Marshall, playing his second match of the day, defeated Heathcote in straight sets, in front of a diminished crowd, and won the silver prize of seven guineas. ## Aftermath On 20 July 1877, the day following the final, a report was published in The Morning Post newspaper: > Lawn Tennis Championship – A fair number of spectators assembled yesterday, notwithstanding the rain, on the beautifully kept ground of the All England Club, Wimbledon, to witness the final contest between Messrs. Spencer Gore and W. Marshall for the championship. The play on both sides was of the highest order and its exhibition afforded a great treat to lovers of the game. All three sets were won buy Mr. Gore, who, therefore, becomes lawn tennis champion for 1877, and wins the £12 12s. gold prize and holds the silver challenge cup, value £25 5s. The second and third prizes were then played for by Messrs. W. Marshall and G.C. Heathcote (best of three sets by agreement). Mr. Marshall won two sets to love, and therefore takes the silver prize (value £12 12s.). Mr. Heathcote takes the third prize, value £3 3s. A report in The Field stated: "The result was a more easy victory for Mr Spencer Gore than had been expected.". Third-placed Heathcote said that Gore was the best player of the year and had a varied service with a lot of twist on it. Gore, according to Heathcote, was a player with an aptitude for many games and had a long reach and a strong and flexible wrist. His volleying style was novel at the time, a forceful shot instead of merely a pat back over the net. All the opponents who were defeated by Gore on his way to the title were real tennis players. His victory was therefore regarded as a win of the rackets style of play over the real tennis style, and of the offensive style of the volley player – who comes to the net to force the point, over the baseline player – who plays groundstrokes from the back of the court, intent on keeping the ball in play. His volleying game was also successful because the height of the net at the post – 5 ft (1.52 m) in contrast to the modern height of 3 ft 6 in (1.07 m) – made it difficult for his opponents to pass him by driving the ball down the line. Gore indicated that the real tennis players had the tendency to play shots from corner to corner over the middle of the net and did so at such a height that made volleying easy. Despite his historic championship title, Gore was not enthusiastic about the new sport of lawn tennis. In 1890, thirteen years after winning his championship title, he wrote: "... it is want of variety that will prevent lawn tennis in its present form from taking rank among our great games ... That anyone who has really played well at cricket, tennis, or even rackets, will ever seriously give his attention to lawn tennis, beyond showing himself to be a promising player, is extremely doubtful; for in all probability the monotony of the game as compared with others would choke him off before he had time to excel in it." He did return for the 1878 Championship to defend his title in the Challenge Round but lost in straight sets to Frank Hadow, a coffee planter from Ceylon, who effectively used the lob to counter Gore's net play. It was Gore's last appearance at the Wimbledon Championships. ### Analysis and rules changes The tournament generated a profit of £10 and the pony roller stayed in use. When the tournament was finished, Henry Jones gathered all the score cards to analyse the results and found that, of the 601 games played during the tournament, 376 were won by the server ("striker-in") and 225 by the receiver ("striker-out"). At a time when the service was either made underarm or, usually, at shoulder height, this was seen as a serving dominance and resulted in a modification of the rules for the 1878 Championship. To decrease the target area for the server, the length of the service court was reduced from 26 to 22 ft (7.92 to 6.71 m) and to make passing shots easier against volleyers the height of the net was reduced to 4 ft 9 in (1.45 m) at the posts and 3 feet (0.91 m) at the centre. These rules were published jointly by the AEC & LTC and the MCC, giving the AEC & LTC an official rule-making authority and in effect retroactively sanctioning its 1877 rules. It marked the moment when the AEC & LTC effectively usurped the rule-making initiative from the MCC although the latter would still ratify rule changes until 1882. In recognition of the importance and popularity of lawn tennis, the club was renamed in 1882 to All England Lawn Tennis Club (AELTC). ### Commemorative plaque On 18 June 2012 a commemorative plaque was unveiled at the former home of the All England Lawn Tennis and Croquet Club, in Worple Road, Wimbledon celebrating both the first Wimbledon Championships and the 1908 Olympic tennis event. The ceremony was performed by Heather Hanbury, Headmistress of Wimbledon High School; Philip Brook, Chairman of the All England Club, and Cr David T Williams JP, Mayor of Merton. ## Gentlemen's singles ### Final `Spencer Gore defeated William Marshall, 6–1, 6–2, 6–4` - It was Gore's only Grand Slam tournament title. ### Second place match `William Marshall defeated Charles Gilbert Heathcote 6–4, 6–4`

Mirror symmetry (string theory)

In physics and geometry: conjectured relation between pairs of Calabi–Yau manifolds

In algebraic geometry and theoretical physics, mirror symmetry is a relationship between geometric objects called Calabi–Yau manifolds. The term refers to a situation where two Calabi–Yau manifolds look very different geometrically but are nevertheless equivalent when employed as extra dimensions of string theory. Early cases of mirror symmetry were discovered by physicists. Mathematicians became interested in this relationship around 1990 when Philip Candelas, Xenia de la Ossa, Paul Green, and Linda Parkes showed that it could be used as a tool in enumerative geometry, a branch of mathematics concerned with counting the number of solutions to geometric questions. Candelas and his collaborators showed that mirror symmetry could be used to count rational curves on a Calabi–Yau manifold, thus solving a longstanding problem. Although the original approach to mirror symmetry was based on physical ideas that were not understood in a mathematically precise way, some of its mathematical predictions have since been proven rigorously. Today, mirror symmetry is a major research topic in pure mathematics, and mathematicians are working to develop a mathematical understanding of the relationship based on physicists' intuition. Mirror symmetry is also a fundamental tool for doing calculations in string theory, and it has been used to understand aspects of quantum field theory, the formalism that physicists use to describe elementary particles. Major approaches to mirror symmetry include the homological mirror symmetry program of Maxim Kontsevich and the SYZ conjecture of Andrew Strominger, Shing-Tung Yau, and Eric Zaslow. ## Overview ### Strings and compactification In physics, string theory is a theoretical framework in which the point-like particles of particle physics are replaced by one-dimensional objects called strings. These strings look like small segments or loops of ordinary string. String theory describes how strings propagate through space and interact with each other. On distance scales larger than the string scale, a string will look just like an ordinary particle, with its mass, charge, and other properties determined by the vibrational state of the string. Splitting and recombination of strings correspond to particle emission and absorption, giving rise to the interactions between particles. There are notable differences between the world described by string theory and the everyday world. In everyday life, there are three familiar dimensions of space (up/down, left/right, and forward/backward), and there is one dimension of time (later/earlier). Thus, in the language of modern physics, one says that spacetime is four-dimensional. One of the peculiar features of string theory is that it requires extra dimensions of spacetime for its mathematical consistency. In superstring theory, the version of the theory that incorporates a theoretical idea called supersymmetry, there are six extra dimensions of spacetime in addition to the four that are familiar from everyday experience. One of the goals of current research in string theory is to develop models in which the strings represent particles observed in high energy physics experiments. For such a model to be consistent with observations, its spacetime must be four-dimensional at the relevant distance scales, so one must look for ways to restrict the extra dimensions to smaller scales. In most realistic models of physics based on string theory, this is accomplished by a process called compactification, in which the extra dimensions are assumed to "close up" on themselves to form circles. In the limit where these curled up dimensions become very small, one obtains a theory in which spacetime has effectively a lower number of dimensions. A standard analogy for this is to consider a multidimensional object such as a garden hose. If the hose is viewed from a sufficient distance, it appears to have only one dimension, its length. However, as one approaches the hose, one discovers that it contains a second dimension, its circumference. Thus, an ant crawling on the surface of the hose would move in two dimensions. ### Calabi–Yau manifolds Compactification can be used to construct models in which spacetime is effectively four-dimensional. However, not every way of compactifying the extra dimensions produces a model with the right properties to describe nature. In a viable model of particle physics, the compact extra dimensions must be shaped like a Calabi–Yau manifold. A Calabi–Yau manifold is a special space which is typically taken to be six-dimensional in applications to string theory. It is named after mathematicians Eugenio Calabi and Shing-Tung Yau. After Calabi–Yau manifolds had entered physics as a way to compactify extra dimensions, many physicists began studying these manifolds. In the late 1980s, Lance Dixon, Wolfgang Lerche, Cumrun Vafa, and Nick Warner noticed that given such a compactification of string theory, it is not possible to reconstruct uniquely a corresponding Calabi–Yau manifold. Instead, two different versions of string theory called type IIA string theory and type IIB can be compactified on completely different Calabi–Yau manifolds giving rise to the same physics. In this situation, the manifolds are called mirror manifolds, and the relationship between the two physical theories is called mirror symmetry. The mirror symmetry relationship is a particular example of what physicists call a physical duality. In general, the term physical duality refers to a situation where two seemingly different physical theories turn out to be equivalent in a nontrivial way. If one theory can be transformed so it looks just like another theory, the two are said to be dual under that transformation. Put differently, the two theories are mathematically different descriptions of the same phenomena. Such dualities play an important role in modern physics, especially in string theory. Regardless of whether Calabi–Yau compactifications of string theory provide a correct description of nature, the existence of the mirror duality between different string theories has significant mathematical consequences. The Calabi–Yau manifolds used in string theory are of interest in pure mathematics, and mirror symmetry allows mathematicians to solve problems in enumerative algebraic geometry, a branch of mathematics concerned with counting the numbers of solutions to geometric questions. A classical problem of enumerative geometry is to enumerate the rational curves on a Calabi–Yau manifold such as the one illustrated above. By applying mirror symmetry, mathematicians have translated this problem into an equivalent problem for the mirror Calabi–Yau, which turns out to be easier to solve. In physics, mirror symmetry is justified on physical grounds. However, mathematicians generally require rigorous proofs that do not require an appeal to physical intuition. From a mathematical point of view, the version of mirror symmetry described above is still only a conjecture, but there is another version of mirror symmetry in the context of topological string theory, a simplified version of string theory introduced by Edward Witten, which has been rigorously proven by mathematicians. In the context of topological string theory, mirror symmetry states that two theories called the A-model and B-model are equivalent in the sense that there is a duality relating them. Today mirror symmetry is an active area of research in mathematics, and mathematicians are working to develop a more complete mathematical understanding of mirror symmetry based on physicists' intuition. ## History The idea of mirror symmetry can be traced back to the mid-1980s when it was noticed that a string propagating on a circle of radius $R$ is physically equivalent to a string propagating on a circle of radius $1/R$ in appropriate units. This phenomenon is now known as T-duality and is understood to be closely related to mirror symmetry. In a paper from 1985, Philip Candelas, Gary Horowitz, Andrew Strominger, and Edward Witten showed that by compactifying string theory on a Calabi–Yau manifold, one obtains a theory roughly similar to the standard model of particle physics that also consistently incorporates an idea called supersymmetry. Following this development, many physicists began studying Calabi–Yau compactifications, hoping to construct realistic models of particle physics based on string theory. Cumrun Vafa and others noticed that given such a physical model, it is not possible to reconstruct uniquely a corresponding Calabi–Yau manifold. Instead, there are two Calabi–Yau manifolds that give rise to the same physics. By studying the relationship between Calabi–Yau manifolds and certain conformal field theories called Gepner models, Brian Greene and Ronen Plesser found nontrivial examples of the mirror relationship. Further evidence for this relationship came from the work of Philip Candelas, Monika Lynker, and Rolf Schimmrigk, who surveyed a large number of Calabi–Yau manifolds by computer and found that they came in mirror pairs. Mathematicians became interested in mirror symmetry around 1990 when physicists Philip Candelas, Xenia de la Ossa, Paul Green, and Linda Parkes showed that mirror symmetry could be used to solve problems in enumerative geometry that had resisted solution for decades or more. These results were presented to mathematicians at a conference at the Mathematical Sciences Research Institute (MSRI) in Berkeley, California in May 1991. During this conference, it was noticed that one of the numbers Candelas had computed for the counting of rational curves disagreed with the number obtained by Norwegian mathematicians Geir Ellingsrud and Stein Arild Strømme using ostensibly more rigorous techniques. Many mathematicians at the conference assumed that Candelas's work contained a mistake since it was not based on rigorous mathematical arguments. However, after examining their solution, Ellingsrud and Strømme discovered an error in their computer code and, upon fixing the code, they got an answer that agreed with the one obtained by Candelas and his collaborators. In 1990, Edward Witten introduced topological string theory, a simplified version of string theory, and physicists showed that there is a version of mirror symmetry for topological string theory. This statement about topological string theory is usually taken as the definition of mirror symmetry in the mathematical literature. In an address at the International Congress of Mathematicians in 1994, mathematician Maxim Kontsevich presented a new mathematical conjecture based on the physical idea of mirror symmetry in topological string theory. Known as homological mirror symmetry, this conjecture formalizes mirror symmetry as an equivalence of two mathematical structures: the derived category of coherent sheaves on a Calabi–Yau manifold and the Fukaya category of its mirror. Also around 1995, Kontsevich analyzed the results of Candelas, which gave a general formula for the problem of counting rational curves on a quintic threefold, and he reformulated these results as a precise mathematical conjecture. In 1996, Alexander Givental posted a paper that claimed to prove this conjecture of Kontsevich. Initially, many mathematicians found this paper hard to understand, so there were doubts about its correctness. Subsequently, Bong Lian, Kefeng Liu, and Shing-Tung Yau published an independent proof in a series of papers. Despite controversy over who had published the first proof, these papers are now collectively seen as providing a mathematical proof of the results originally obtained by physicists using mirror symmetry. In 2000, Kentaro Hori and Cumrun Vafa gave another physical proof of mirror symmetry based on T-duality. Work on mirror symmetry continues today with major developments in the context of strings on surfaces with boundaries. In addition, mirror symmetry has been related to many active areas of mathematics research, such as the McKay correspondence, topological quantum field theory, and the theory of stability conditions. At the same time, basic questions continue to vex. For example, mathematicians still lack an understanding of how to construct examples of mirror Calabi–Yau pairs though there has been progress in understanding this issue. ## Applications ### Enumerative geometry Many of the important mathematical applications of mirror symmetry belong to the branch of mathematics called enumerative geometry. In enumerative geometry, one is interested in counting the number of solutions to geometric questions, typically using the techniques of algebraic geometry. One of the earliest problems of enumerative geometry was posed around the year 200 BCE by the ancient Greek mathematician Apollonius, who asked how many circles in the plane are tangent to three given circles. In general, the solution to the problem of Apollonius is that there are eight such circles. Enumerative problems in mathematics often concern a class of geometric objects called algebraic varieties which are defined by the vanishing of polynomials. For example, the Clebsch cubic (see the illustration) is defined using a certain polynomial of degree three in four variables. A celebrated result of nineteenth-century mathematicians Arthur Cayley and George Salmon states that there are exactly 27 straight lines that lie entirely on such a surface. Generalizing this problem, one can ask how many lines can be drawn on a quintic Calabi–Yau manifold, such as the one illustrated above, which is defined by a polynomial of degree five. This problem was solved by the nineteenth-century German mathematician Hermann Schubert, who found that there are exactly 2,875 such lines. In 1986, geometer Sheldon Katz proved that the number of curves, such as circles, that are defined by polynomials of degree two and lie entirely in the quintic is 609,250. By the year 1991, most of the classical problems of enumerative geometry had been solved and interest in enumerative geometry had begun to diminish. According to mathematician Mark Gross, "As the old problems had been solved, people went back to check Schubert's numbers with modern techniques, but that was getting pretty stale." The field was reinvigorated in May 1991 when physicists Philip Candelas, Xenia de la Ossa, Paul Green, and Linda Parkes showed that mirror symmetry could be used to count the number of degree three curves on a quintic Calabi–Yau. Candelas and his collaborators found that these six-dimensional Calabi–Yau manifolds can contain exactly 317,206,375 curves of degree three. In addition to counting degree-three curves on a quintic three-fold, Candelas and his collaborators obtained a number of more general results for counting rational curves which went far beyond the results obtained by mathematicians. Although the methods used in this work were based on physical intuition, mathematicians have gone on to prove rigorously some of the predictions of mirror symmetry. In particular, the enumerative predictions of mirror symmetry have now been rigorously proven. ### Theoretical physics In addition to its applications in enumerative geometry, mirror symmetry is a fundamental tool for doing calculations in string theory. In the A-model of topological string theory, physically interesting quantities are expressed in terms of infinitely many numbers called Gromov–Witten invariants, which are extremely difficult to compute. In the B-model, the calculations can be reduced to classical integrals and are much easier. By applying mirror symmetry, theorists can translate difficult calculations in the A-model into equivalent but technically easier calculations in the B-model. These calculations are then used to determine the probabilities of various physical processes in string theory. Mirror symmetry can be combined with other dualities to translate calculations in one theory into equivalent calculations in a different theory. By outsourcing calculations to different theories in this way, theorists can calculate quantities that are impossible to calculate without the use of dualities. Outside of string theory, mirror symmetry is used to understand aspects of quantum field theory, the formalism that physicists use to describe elementary particles. For example, gauge theories are a class of highly symmetric physical theories appearing in the standard model of particle physics and other parts of theoretical physics. Some gauge theories which are not part of the standard model, but which are nevertheless important for theoretical reasons, arise from strings propagating on a nearly singular background. For such theories, mirror symmetry is a useful computational tool. Indeed, mirror symmetry can be used to perform calculations in an important gauge theory in four spacetime dimensions that was studied by Nathan Seiberg and Edward Witten and is also familiar in mathematics in the context of Donaldson invariants. There is also a generalization of mirror symmetry called 3D mirror symmetry which relates pairs of quantum field theories in three spacetime dimensions. ## Approaches ### Homological mirror symmetry In string theory and related theories in physics, a brane is a physical object that generalizes the notion of a point particle to higher dimensions. For example, a point particle can be viewed as a brane of dimension zero, while a string can be viewed as a brane of dimension one. It is also possible to consider higher-dimensional branes. The word brane comes from the word "membrane" which refers to a two-dimensional brane. In string theory, a string may be open (forming a segment with two endpoints) or closed (forming a closed loop). D-branes are an important class of branes that arise when one considers open strings. As an open string propagates through spacetime, its endpoints are required to lie on a D-brane. The letter "D" in D-brane refers to a condition that it satisfies, the Dirichlet boundary condition. Mathematically, branes can be described using the notion of a category. This is a mathematical structure consisting of objects, and for any pair of objects, a set of morphisms between them. In most examples, the objects are mathematical structures (such as sets, vector spaces, or topological spaces) and the morphisms are functions between these structures. One can also consider categories where the objects are D-branes and the morphisms between two branes $\alpha$ and $\beta$ are states of open strings stretched between $\alpha$ and $\beta$. In the B-model of topological string theory, the D-branes are complex submanifolds of a Calabi–Yau together with additional data that arise physically from having charges at the endpoints of strings. Intuitively, one can think of a submanifold as a surface embedded inside the Calabi–Yau, although submanifolds can also exist in dimensions different from two. In mathematical language, the category having these branes as its objects is known as the derived category of coherent sheaves on the Calabi–Yau. In the A-model, the D-branes can again be viewed as submanifolds of a Calabi–Yau manifold. Roughly speaking, they are what mathematicians call special Lagrangian submanifolds. This means among other things that they have half the dimension of the space in which they sit, and they are length-, area-, or volume-minimizing. The category having these branes as its objects is called the Fukaya category. The derived category of coherent sheaves is constructed using tools from complex geometry, a branch of mathematics that describes geometric curves in algebraic terms and solves geometric problems using algebraic equations. On the other hand, the Fukaya category is constructed using symplectic geometry, a branch of mathematics that arose from studies of classical physics. Symplectic geometry studies spaces equipped with a symplectic form, a mathematical tool that can be used to compute area in two-dimensional examples. The homological mirror symmetry conjecture of Maxim Kontsevich states that the derived category of coherent sheaves on one Calabi–Yau manifold is equivalent in a certain sense to the Fukaya category of its mirror. This equivalence provides a precise mathematical formulation of mirror symmetry in topological string theory. In addition, it provides an unexpected bridge between two branches of geometry, namely complex and symplectic geometry. ### Strominger–Yau–Zaslow conjecture Another approach to understanding mirror symmetry was suggested by Andrew Strominger, Shing-Tung Yau, and Eric Zaslow in 1996. According to their conjecture, now known as the SYZ conjecture, mirror symmetry can be understood by dividing a Calabi–Yau manifold into simpler pieces and then transforming them to get the mirror Calabi–Yau. The simplest example of a Calabi–Yau manifold is a two-dimensional torus or donut shape. Consider a circle on this surface that goes once through the hole of the donut. An example is the red circle in the figure. There are infinitely many circles like it on a torus; in fact, the entire surface is a union of such circles. One can choose an auxiliary circle $B$ (the pink circle in the figure) such that each of the infinitely many circles decomposing the torus passes through a point of $B$. This auxiliary circle is said to parametrize the circles of the decomposition, meaning there is a correspondence between them and points of $B$. The circle $B$ is more than just a list, however, because it also determines how these circles are arranged on the torus. This auxiliary space plays an important role in the SYZ conjecture. The idea of dividing a torus into pieces parametrized by an auxiliary space can be generalized. Increasing the dimension from two to four real dimensions, the Calabi–Yau becomes a K3 surface. Just as the torus was decomposed into circles, a four-dimensional K3 surface can be decomposed into two-dimensional tori. In this case the space $B$ is an ordinary sphere. Each point on the sphere corresponds to one of the two-dimensional tori, except for twenty-four "bad" points corresponding to "pinched" or singular tori. The Calabi–Yau manifolds of primary interest in string theory have six dimensions. One can divide such a manifold into 3-tori (three-dimensional objects that generalize the notion of a torus) parametrized by a 3-sphere $B$ (a three-dimensional generalization of a sphere). Each point of $B$ corresponds to a 3-torus, except for infinitely many "bad" points which form a grid-like pattern of segments on the Calabi–Yau and correspond to singular tori. Once the Calabi–Yau manifold has been decomposed into simpler parts, mirror symmetry can be understood in an intuitive geometric way. As an example, consider the torus described above. Imagine that this torus represents the "spacetime" for a physical theory. The fundamental objects of this theory will be strings propagating through the spacetime according to the rules of quantum mechanics. One of the basic dualities of string theory is T-duality, which states that a string propagating around a circle of radius $R$ is equivalent to a string propagating around a circle of radius $1/R$ in the sense that all observable quantities in one description are identified with quantities in the dual description. For example, a string has momentum as it propagates around a circle, and it can also wind around the circle one or more times. The number of times the string winds around a circle is called the winding number. If a string has momentum $p$ and winding number $n$ in one description, it will have momentum $n$ and winding number $p$ in the dual description. By applying T-duality simultaneously to all of the circles that decompose the torus, the radii of these circles become inverted, and one is left with a new torus which is "fatter" or "skinnier" than the original. This torus is the mirror of the original Calabi–Yau. T-duality can be extended from circles to the two-dimensional tori appearing in the decomposition of a K3 surface or to the three-dimensional tori appearing in the decomposition of a six-dimensional Calabi–Yau manifold. In general, the SYZ conjecture states that mirror symmetry is equivalent to the simultaneous application of T-duality to these tori. In each case, the space $B$ provides a kind of blueprint that describes how these tori are assembled into a Calabi–Yau manifold. ## See also - Donaldson–Thomas theory - Wall-crossing

Japanese fire-bellied newt

Species of amphibian

The Japanese fire-bellied newt or Japanese fire-bellied salamander (Cynops pyrrhogaster) is a species of newt endemic to Japan. The skin on its upper body is dark and its lower regions bright red, although coloration varies with age, genetics, and region. Adults are 8 to 15 cm (3.1 to 5.9 in) long. To deter predators, Japanese fire-bellied newts contain high levels of tetrodotoxin, a neurotoxin accumulated mainly from their diet. The species is found on many Japanese islands, including Honshu, Shikoku, and Kyushu. Their habitats include both natural and artificial bodies of water, as well as forests and grasslands. They breed from spring to the beginning of summer, both sexes producing pheromones when ready to mate. Eggs are laid separately, hatching after about three weeks. They grow from larval to juvenile form in between five and six months. Juveniles eat soil-dwelling prey, and adults eat a wide variety of insects, tadpoles, and the eggs of their own species. They have several adaptations to avoid predators, although which they use depends on where they live. Several aspects of their biology have been studied, including their ability to regrow missing body parts. The Japanese fire-bellied newt first diverged from its closest relative in the Middle Miocene, before splitting into four distinct varieties, each with a mostly separate range, although all four are formally recognized as composing a single species. Currently, their population is declining, and they face threats from disease and the pet trade. They can be successfully kept in captivity. ## Etymology and taxonomy The species was first scientifically described by German zoologist Heinrich Boie in 1826 as Molge pyrrhogaster, based on specimens brought from Japan to Europe. He compared it to the smooth newt, saying he would have mistaken the former for the latter, had he not known it was from Japan. None of the specimens he studied were fully mature. Pyrrhogaster is derived from Greek, purrhos (lit. 'fire') and gastēr (lit. 'belly'). Salamandra subcristata was described by Coenraad Jacob Temminck and Hermann Schlegel in 1838 and transferred to Cynops later that year by Swiss naturalist Johann Jakob von Tschudi, and in 1850, Cynops subcristata and Molge pyrrhogaster were synomized as Cynops pyrrhogaster by the British zoologist John Edward Gray. A study of mitochondrial DNA in 2001 indicated that its supposed fellow members of Cynops, C. cyanurus and C. wolterstorffi, may belong to a different genus. The Integrated Taxonomic Information System lists sixteen synonyms for Cynops pyrrhogaster. Common names of the species include Japanese fire-bellied newt, red-bellied newt, and Japanese fire-bellied salamander. Studies examining morphological and geographic variation had formerly recognized six races: Tohoku, Kanto, Atsumi, intermediate, Sasayama, and Hiroshima, one of which, the Sasayama, was described as a subspecies in 1969 by Robert Mertens as Triturus pyrrhogaster sasayamae, which is now considered a synonym of C. pyrrhogaster. Modern molecular analysis supports the division of C. pyrrhogaster into four clades instead. In particular, the validity of the Sasayama and intermediate races has never been proven, with one study finding no behavioral differences between the two supposed forms. Cynops pyrrhogaster diverged from its close relative C. ensicauda about 13.75 million years ago (Mya; during the Middle Miocene). The common ancestor of the two species would have lived in an area of the Eurasian mainland which is today the East China Sea and the central Ryukyu Islands. The land that would become the Japanese islands – connected to the mainland at that time – likely had a subtropical climate, which may have caused the Japanese fire-bellied newt's ancestors to migrate northward for desirable habitat. Over time, C. pyrrhogaster split into four clades: northern, southern, western, and central. The northern diverged first, at around 9.68 mya, then the central around 8.23 mya, and finally the southern and western around 4.05 mya. The ranges of all but the southern clade declined during the Last Glacial Period, but expanded again afterwards. The study that identified them concluded that the four clades represent separate taxonomic units, although their exact relationship is unclear. It also noted their extreme genetic differences, unusually large for any one species. The ranges of the central and western varieties meet in Chugoku in western Japan to form a hybrid zone (an area where the two clades interbreed to produce hybrids). The central type has begun to move west, which has caused the hybrid zone to shift. It is expected to eventually cause the genome of the western form to be diluted by increasing hybridization. ## Description On the newt's upper body, the skin is dark brown, approaching black, and covered in wartlike bumps. The underbelly and the underside of its tail are bright red, with black spots. Younger juveniles have creamy coloration instead of red, although most larger juveniles have some red present. Adults from smaller islands tend to have more red on their ventral (belly) regions than those from larger islands, sometimes with extremely small spots or none at all. In general males tend to have more red than females. Males can also be distinguished from females by their flat, wide tails and swelling around the ventral region. An entirely red variant exists: that coloration is believed to be inherited and recessive. This variant is not confined to any single population, but is more common in the western half of Japan overall. The vomeropalatine teeth, a group of teeth in the upper back of the mouth, are arranged in two series. The tongue is relatively small, half the width of the mouth. The nostrils are positioned anteriorly (toward the head), closer to each other than to the eyes and hardly visible when viewed from above. The toes of males are longer than those of females, although the females themselves are longer. The tail is tightly compressed, with fins on both the top and bottom. A smooth ridge runs from their nape to their tail. The full body length of adults is 8 to 15 cm (3.1 to 5.9 in). Snout–vent length can be anywhere between 43.0 and 64.0 mm (1.69 and 2.52 in) for males and 48.5 and 75.0 mm (1.91 and 2.95 in) for females. Populations from more northern and elevated regions tend to be larger than those in southern and lower-altitude regions. Eggs are 2.1 to 2.3 mm (0.083 to 0.091 in) long. ## Distribution and habitat Cynops pyrrhogaster is endemic to Japan, being found on several islands in the archipelago, including Honshu, Shikoku, and Kyushu. It mainly dwells on the larger islands, whereas its relative, C. ensicauda, is found in the Ryukyu Islands. It has the northernmost range of any Cynops species; all other species, besides the aforementioned C. ensicauda, are native to southern China. There is also an introduced population on Hachijō-jima, believed to be descended from individuals from Shikoku. Their introduction is thought to have occurred in the 1970s, although exactly how it happened is unknown. It has been recorded in the United States three times, in Florida and Massachusetts. Every instance was either an escape or deliberate release, and no populations have been established. Of the four clades, the northern is found in the districts of Tohoku and Kanto. This does not overlap with the range of the central clade, which is found in Chubu, northern Kansai, and eastern Chugoku. The central's range has a small amount of overlap with the western, which is found in southern Kinki, western Chugoku, Shikoku, and central Kyushu. The western also has some overlap with the southern clade, which is found in western and southern Kyushu. The newts occur at elevations of 30 to 2,020 m (98 to 6,627 ft). Ecosystems they are found in include forests, grasslands, shrublands, wetlands, lakes, marshes, and cultivated environments. They can also dwell in humanmade bodies of water, such as aquaculture ponds. ## Behavior and ecology ### Reproduction and life cycle Breeding occurs in paddy fields, ponds, brooks, pools, and streams. Females accept male courtship behavior from spring to early summer. Males and females both produce peptide pheromones to attract the opposite sex when ready to mate. Males produce a type known as sodefrin (from the Japanese term sodefuri, lit. 'soliciting'); females have their own variety, named imorin by its discoverers (from the Japanese term imo, lit. 'beloved woman', and rin from sodefrin). These are released from the cloaca, and were the first peptide pheromone to be identified in a vertebrate and first to be identified in a female vertebrate, respectively. Courtship begins when the male approaches the female, sniffing its sides or cloaca. The male then brings its tail to the female and rapidly vibrates it. The female responds by pushing the male's neck with its snout. At this point, the male slowly moves away, undulating its tail, and the female follows, touching the tail with its snout when close enough. The male then deposits two to four spermatophores, one at a time, moving several centimeters after each, which the female attempts to pick up with its cloaca, sometimes unsuccessfully. Females lay eggs separately on underwater objects, such as leaves and submerged grass roots, fertilized one by one from the spermatophores they carry. They can lay up to 40 eggs in one session, and 100 to 400 eggs in a breeding season. The young hatch from their eggs after about three weeks, as swimming, gilled larvae, with dorsal tailfins. They grow around 3 cm (1.2 in) in the first three months of their lives. At between five and six months, they stop eating and undergo metamorphosis, losing their gills and fins, and becoming juveniles. Juveniles cannot remain submerged in water like larvae or they drown. Newts at lower altitudes mature faster than those at higher ones. Male newts of higher-altitude populations tend to live longer after reaching maturity, but their fully grown size is not as large as that of lowland newts. Wild individuals as old as twenty-three have been found. ### Diet In captive settings tadpoles are known to readily eat mosquito larvae, brine shrimp, and earthworms. Juveniles often consume soil-dwelling Collembola (springtails) and Acari (mite) species. Adults at one particular sub-alpine moor in the Azuma Mountains of Fukushima Prefecture were found to like both live prey and carrion. They consume many insect varieties, such as members of Odonata, which include dragonflies and damselflies, whose larvae have been found whole in newt stomachs, but only pieces of adults; Brachycera, a suborder of Diptera (flies); Hymenoptera, which include sawflies, wasps, bees, and ants; and Coleoptera (beetles). They also eat Rhacophorus arboreus tadpoles and the eggs of their own kind. The makeup of their diet varies seasonally and from year to year, suggesting changes in the small animals in and around the ponds that they dwell in. Similar results were found at a pond on the campus of Tokyo Metropolitan University in Hachiōji, Tokyo, the newt stomachs containing insects from many different orders, and again, the eggs of conspecifics. Like before, frog tadpoles were eaten, although these belonged to the species Rhacophorus schlegelii. ### Predators Newts in Mainland Japan have different antipredator behavior than newts on smaller islands. Individuals on smaller islands (for instance, Fukue Island) generally use a maneuver called the unken reflex, where they expose their bright red underbelly to attackers. As their main predators are birds, which are capable of distinguishing the color red, this technique is effective. In Mainland Japan the newts must also avoid mammalian predators, which cannot distinguish colors as well as avian hunters. This leads these populations to use the maneuver less, as it can result in death if attempted. Against snakes, newts from Fukue Island tend to perform tail-wagging displays, designed to bring a predator's attention to their replaceable tail rather than their more vital head; those from Nagasaki Prefecture in Mainland Japan tend simply to flee. Snakes are present in both areas. This behavior difference is likely because newts from the mainland are adapted to escape from mammalian hunters, which are less likely to be repelled by such a display. ### Toxin Wild Japanese fire-bellied newts contain high levels of the neurotoxin tetrodotoxin (TTX). This toxin inhibits the activity of sodium channels in most vertebrates, discouraging predation by both birds and mammals. Experiments have shown the toxin is almost entirely derived from the newt's diet. When raised in captivity with no source of TTX, 36- to 70-week-old juveniles did not contain detectable levels, but wild specimens from the same original habitat had high toxicity. In younger captive-reared newts some TTX was still detected, which was inferred to have been transferred by adult females to their eggs. In a follow-up experiment by the same team, captive-reared newts were given food containing the neurotoxin. They readily consumed TTX-laced bloodworms when offered, not showing any symptoms after ingesting the poison. It was detectable in their bodies afterward, further indicating food to be the source of the toxin. No TTX-producing organisms are known from their habitat, but their existence is likely, and would explain the origin of TTX in wild newts. ## Conservation The International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) has ranked it as near-threatened. This assessment was made in 2020, a shift from 2004 when it was rated least-concern. It successfully reproduces in Australian zoos. One major threat that C. pyrrhogaster faces is collection for the pet trade. The IUCN states that this trade needs to be ended immediately. Their population is decreasing, particularly near areas of human habitation. Japanese fire-bellied newts with mysterious skin lesions at Lake Biwa in Japan's Shiga Prefecture were found to be suffering from infections caused by a single-celled eukaryote in the order Dermocystida. The lesions contained cysts, which were filled with spores. Nearly all the lesions were external, although one was found on the liver. Globally, diseases are one of the causes for declining amphibian populations. There is concern that this affliction could spread to other nearby species, including Zhangixalus arboreus and Hynobius vandenburghi. A variety, believed to be found exclusively on the Atsumi Peninsula, was thought to have become extinct in the 1960s. Then, in 2016, a trio of researchers discovered that newts on the Chita Peninsula were very likely the same variant due to their similar morphological traits. Both groups share a preference for cooler temperature and have smooth and soft bodies, pale dorsal regions, and yellowish undersides. Even if still alive, this form is highly threatened and will soon be wiped out without immediate protection. ## Interactions with humans ### Research Japanese fire-bellied newts serve as a highly useful model organism in laboratory settings, but they become more difficult to care for after metamorphosis. An experiment supported by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science found that thiourea (TU) can prevent this process from occurring, allowing the animals to stay in their pre-metamorphosis form for as long as two years, while still capable of metamorphosizing when removed from the TU solution. This did not have any impact on their regeneration capabilities. Japanese fire-bellied newts produce motilin, a peptide that stimulates gastrointestinal contractions, identified in many vertebrates. It is created in the upper small intestine and pancreas. The discovery of the latter was the first time pancreatic motilin had been observed. The organ also produces insulin. These results represented the first discovery of motilin in amphibians, suggesting that it has a similar role for them as it does for birds and mammals. The existence of pancreatic motilin also indicated another, unknown function. This species, as well as other Urodele amphibians, is capable of regrowing missing body parts, including limbs with functional joints and the lower jaw. When this process occurs, the regenerated tissue tends to mirror intact tissue in form. It is also able to regrow missing lenses, taking thirty days to do so as a larva and eighty days as an adult. The difference in time is purely due to the size of the eye, and regenerative ability does not change; the discovery of this fact contradicted a popular claim that juvenile animals are quicker to regenerate than adults. ### In captivity Cynops pyrrhogaster can be kept in captivity. Doctor of Veterinary Medicine Lianne McLeod described them as "low-maintenance", noting that captive newts enjoy bloodworms, brine shrimp, glass shrimp, Daphnia, and, for larger individuals, guppies.

Haane Manahi

New Zealand Army soldier

Haane Te Rauawa Manahi, DCM (28 September 1913 – 29 March 1986) was a New Zealand Māori soldier during the Second World War whose gallantry during the Tunisian campaign resulted in a recommendation that he be awarded the Victoria Cross (VC). The subsequent award of the Distinguished Conduct Medal (DCM) disappointed his fellow soldiers who, after his death, advocated greater recognition of his valour. This eventually resulted in a special award in 2007 of an altar cloth for use in a local church, ceremonial sword and a personal letter from Queen Elizabeth II in recognition of his gallantry. Born in Ohinemutu, New Zealand, Manahi worked as a labourer when, in November 1939, he volunteered to join the Māori Battalion, newly raised for service in the Second World War. In 1941, he participated in the Battle of Greece and fought in the Battle of Crete during which he was wounded. After recovering from his wounds, he returned to his unit and fought through the Western Desert and Tunisian campaigns, during which he was recommended for a VC for his actions at Takrouna over the period 19–21 April 1943. Despite the support of four generals, his VC nomination was downgraded to an award of a DCM, possibly by the British Chief of the General Staff, General Alan Brooke. In June 1943, he returned to New Zealand on a three-month furlough but when this was completed, was not required to rejoin his battalion. Māori soldiers on furlough were made exempt from active duty. After his discharge from the New Zealand Military Forces in 1946, he was employed as a traffic inspector. After his death in a car crash in 1986, a committee was established to urge the New Zealand Government to make representations to Buckingham Palace for a posthumous award of the VC to Manahi. These efforts were ultimately unsuccessful due to the period of time that had elapsed since the end of the Second World War. ## Early life Haane Te Rauawa Manahi was the son of Manahi Ngākahawai Te Rauawa, a farm worker, and his wife Neti Mariana née Insley. He was born on 28 September 1913 in Ohinemutu, a village near the town of Rotorua in the North Island of New Zealand. A Māori, he was descended from the Te Arawa and Ngāti Raukawa iwi (tribes) on his father's side, while his mother was also of the Te Arawa iwi in addition to having some Scottish heritage. He attended local schools up to secondary school level. After leaving school, he worked in road construction and farm labour. He also spent time in the timber and building industries alongside his paternal uncle, Matiu Te Rauawa, who had served in the New Zealand Pioneer Battalion that was raised for military duty during the First World War. ## Second World War In November 1939, following the outbreak of the Second World War, Manahi was one of the first men to enlist in the newly formed Māori Battalion. The battalion was composed of a headquarters company and four rifle companies, which were organised along tribal lines. Manahi was assigned to B Company, made up largely of other men from Te Arawa. The Māori Battalion was one of ten infantry battalions in the 2nd New Zealand Division and training commenced at Trentham Military Camp in January 1940. Shortly before he departed his home for Trentham, Manahi married Rangiawatea née Te Kiri, the mother of his son, born in 1936. In early May 1940, after Manahi and the rest of his fellow soldiers had two weeks of home leave prior to departing the country, the battalion embarked for the Middle East as part of the second echelon of the division. While in transit, the convoy carrying the second echelon was diverted to England following the entry of Italy into the war on the side of Nazi Germany. In England, the threat of invasion was high following the evacuation of the British Expeditionary Force from France. After a short period of leave in London, the New Zealanders were engaged in further training and defensive duties, with the Māori Battalion based in Kent and then, once the threat of invasion had receded, in Aldershot. Manahi's company was briefly separated and stationed at Waverley Abbey House in Surrey. By late November, it had been decided that the New Zealanders could be sent to the Middle East. The second echelon left for Egypt in early January 1941, with Manahi and the rest of his battalion aboard the Athlone Castle. ### Greece and Crete On 27 March 1941, Manahi's battalion, having spent two months in Egypt, arrived in Greece to assist in its defence against an anticipated German invasion. Subordinate to the 5th Infantry Brigade, it initially took up defensive positions around Olympus Pass, and in the days following the beginning of the invasion on 6 April, rebuffed initial contact by the advancing Germans. The battalion had to withdraw as the flanks of the Allied positions were threatened. B Company was the last of the battalion's units to abandon its positions, and together with the rest of the Allies, withdrew over the following days to Porto Rafti, where it boarded a transport ship for the island of Crete. On Crete, the Allies dug in for the expected airborne attack by German paratroopers. The Māori Battalion was positioned near the town of Platanias, as a reserve for the 5th Infantry Brigade, which was tasked with the defence of Maleme Airfield. On 20 May, the Germans commenced their invasion of the island. Manahi was returning to his trench, having just had breakfast, as planes flew overhead, discharging paratroopers. On 23 May, following the loss of the airfield to the Germans, he received a gunshot wound to the chest. Despite this wound, he remained with his company as it was forced to withdraw to the south-west in the following days and was eventually evacuated from Crete on 31 May and transported to Egypt. ### North Africa By mid-June 1941, after a period of recuperation and leave, Manahi had returned to the Māori Battalion, which had undergone a reorganisation following the campaign in Greece and Crete. It was now training for desert warfare and constructing defensive positions around the Baggush Box, about 150 kilometres (93 mi) west of El Alamein. During this time he participated in a divisional swimming competition, winning the freestyle 50 yards (46 m) race. In November he, along with the rest of the division, participated in Operation Crusader. After crossing the Egyptian border into Libya, this involved near-constant fighting for well over a month, during which Manahi, with two others, captured and commandeered a German tank which had become stuck in B Company's trenches. He drove the tank during an engagement with elements of the 21st Panzer Division on 26 November, helping capture an enemy field gun. In early 1942, the New Zealanders were withdrawn to Syria for a period of rest and garrison duty. In late May 1942, the Panzer Army Africa, commanded by Generaloberst (colonel general) Erwin Rommel, attacked into Libya. The 2nd Division was rushed back from Syria and dug in at Minqar Qaim. Encircled by the Germans during the Battle of Mersa Matruh, the division was forced to break out from Minqar Qaim on 26 June and withdrew to positions around El Alamein in Egypt. Here, suffering regular artillery barrages, it dug in to await an expected attack. By late August, no attack had been launched and it was decided a raid for prisoners would be undertaken by two companies, one of them being Manahi's B Company. This was successfully executed on 26 August, with over 40 enemy soldiers made prisoners of war. The next month, the battalion was taken out of the line for a brief period of rest before returning for the Second Battle of El Alamein. During the fourth stage of the battle, in what was codenamed Operation Supercharge, Manahi and his company were involved in a successful bayonet charge against well dug-in Germans that had resisted a previous attack by another battalion. By now, it was clear that the Germans were in retreat and the Allies pursued them into Libya and Tunisia. After a battle at Tebaga Gap, during which Second Lieutenant Moana-Nui-a-Kiwa Ngarimu of the Māori Battalion's C Company won the Victoria Cross (VC), planning began for a push into Tunis, the capital city of Tunisia. Before this could be achieved, a defensive line around Enfidaville needed to be broken. ### Takrouna By April 1943, the 2nd New Zealand Division had advanced into mountainous country overlooking Enfidaville. Takrouna was a hill, about 1,000 feet (300 m) high, held by soldiers of the Italian Trieste Division's I/66° Battalion, and a German platoon. A village was situated on the summit of the hill with a prominent ledge to one side. The Māori Battalion was tasked by Brigadier Howard Kippenberger, the acting commander of the 2nd New Zealand Division, with the capture of Takrouna. B Company would make the main assault on 19 April, with C and D companies on the flanks. The initial attack petered out due to heavy machine gun fire from the enemy. The battalion's commander, Lieutenant Colonel Charles Bennett, ordered Manahi to take a party of 12 men to make a feint attack while the remainder of B Company linked up with C Company. The party split into two sections, with one under the command of Manahi, newly promoted to lance sergeant. At dawn, they began their attack up a steep and at times near sheer slope and were successfully able to overwhelm the Italians defending the ledge, capturing 60 prisoners. The New Zealanders then dug in and prepared for a counter-attack. Artillery and mortar fire killed half of the platoon, including its commander. This left Manahi, as the senior non-commissioned officer, in charge. With two attempts to contact the battalion having failed, Manahi made his way down Takrouna to locate reinforcements and supplies. Ignoring an officer's advice that he abandon the ledge, he returned with a section from C Company as well as ammunition and stretcher-bearers. A further platoon arrived to help consolidate the position. The expected counter-attack commenced and was successfully beaten off. It was only then, after having been on Takrouna for 16 hours, that Manahi and what was left of his section withdrew, leaving the newly arrived platoon to hold the ledge. Despite reinforcements, a further counter-attack launched by Italian forces on 21 April dislodged the New Zealanders and control of the ledge was lost. Kippenberger ordered the Māori Battalion to send reinforcements to rectify the situation. Manahi was specifically requested to join the effort to recapture the ledge due to his knowledge of the terrain. He went with a group of volunteers to regain the lost position and, with artillery support, the attack was successful. By midday, the ledge was reoccupied by the New Zealanders but the village on the summit remained in the hands of the Italians. Later in the afternoon of 21 April, Manahi led an attacking party of seven soldiers which, working with a group from 21st Battalion, captured the village and took 300 prisoners. After the battle, and with Takrouna secure, he assisted with the recovery of the bodies of his dead comrades. Manahi's exploits quickly became known throughout the 2nd New Zealand Division, and within a few days of his actions, a nomination for the VC had been prepared by the commander of his battalion. Brigadier Ralph Harding, commander of 5th Infantry Brigade, endorsed the nomination as did four senior officers: Kippenberger, Lieutenant General Bernard Freyberg, the acting commander of X Corps, General Bernard Montgomery, the commander of the Eighth Army, and General Harold Alexander, the commander of 18th Army Group. General Henry Maitland Wilson, commander-in-chief of Middle East Command, likewise endorsed the award after considering the evidence. When the nomination reached the Army Council in London, the award was downgraded to an immediate Distinguished Conduct Medal (DCM). Who authorised the downgrade is not clear, but historian Paul Moon notes that it was most likely that only the Chief of the General Staff, General Alan Brooke, had the seniority to do so, given the individuals who had endorsed the VC recommendation. Manahi's DCM was duly gazetted on 22 July 1943. The citation for the DCM read: > On the night of 19–20 April 1943 during the attack upon the Takrouna feature, Tunisia, Lance Sergeant Manahi was in command of a section. The objective of his platoon was the pinnacle, a platform of rock right on top of the feature. By morning the platoon was reduced in strength to ten by heavy mortar and small-arms fire and were pinned to the ground a short way up the feature. The platoon continued towards their objective, Lance Sergeant Manahi leading a party of three up the western side. During this advance, they encountered heavy machine-gun fire from posts on the slope and extensive sniping from the enemy actually on the pinnacle. In order to reach their objective, he and his party had to climb some 500 feet under heavy fire, the last 50 feet being almost sheer. He personally led the party after silencing several machine-gun posts and by climbing hand-over-fist they eventually reached the pinnacle. After a brief fight some sixty enemies, including an artillery observation officer, surrendered. They were then joined by the remainder of the platoon and the pinnacle was captured. > > The area was subjected to intense mortar fire from a considerable enemy force still holding Takrouna Village and the northern and western slopes of the feature and later to heavy and continuous shelling. The Platoon Sergeant was killed and other casualties reduced the party holding the pinnacle to Lance Sergeant Manahi and two Privates. An artillery observation officer who had arrived ordered him to withdraw but he and his men remained and held the feature. This action was confirmed by Brigade Headquarters as soon as communications were established. Late morning found the party short of ammunition, rations and water. Lance Sergeant Manahi himself returned to his Battalion at the foot of the feature and brought back supplies and reinforcements, the whole time being under fire. During the afternoon the enemy counter-attacked in force, some of them gaining a foothold. In the face of grenades and small-arms fire he personally led his men against the attackers. Fierce hand-to-hand fighting ensued but eventually, the attackers were driven off. Shortly after this, the party was relieved. The following morning urgent and immediate reinforcements were required as the enemy had once more gained a foothold and Lance Sergeant Manahi led one of two parties which attacked and drove back the enemy despite concentrated mortar and heavy machine-gun fire. All that day the feature was heavily shelled, mortared and subjected to continual machine-gun fire from in and about Takrouna. Late in the afternoon of 21 April, Lance Sergeant Manahi on his own initiative took two men and moved around the north-western side of the feature. In that area were several enemies machine-gun and mortar posts and two 25-pounder guns operated by the enemy. With cool determination Lance Sergeant Manahi led his party against them, stalking one post after another always under the shell and machine-gun fire. By his skill and daring, he compelled the surrender of the enemy in that area. > > This courageous action undoubtedly led to the ultimate collapse of the enemy defence and the capture of the whole Takrouna feature with over 300 prisoners, two 25-pounder guns, several mortars and seventy-two machine guns. On the night of 21–22 April, Lance Sergeant Manahi remained on the feature assisting in the evacuation of the dead and wounded and refused to return to his Battalion until this task was completed. During that time the area was being heavily and continually shelled. > > Throughout the action, Lance Sergeant Manahi showed the highest qualities of an infantry soldier. He made a supreme contribution to the capture and holding of a feature vital to the success of the operation. The decision to downgrade the VC recommendation to an award of the DCM was a disappointment to many in the 2nd New Zealand Division. Even outside of the division there was some surprise; the British Lieutenant-General Brian Horrocks, who was present during the fighting at Takrouna and visited the site of the action afterwards, expressed his dismay at the downgrade of Manahi's award in his postwar memoirs. Reports that Manahi's men had killed Italians attempting to surrender were thought by some historians to be a factor in the downgrading of his award. The official history of the Māori Battalion, published in 1956, stated that the surrendering soldiers were "shot, bayonetted or thrown over a cliff" but only after an Italian grenade had been thrown into a building in which wounded New Zealanders were sheltering. However, these reports may not have emerged until after the downgrading, and at the time the killings were alleged to have occurred, Manahi himself was reportedly dealing with an advance by Italian soldiers against the ledge. Another factor in the downgrading may have been the recent VC nomination for Ngarimu, just three weeks earlier. The subsequent nomination of Manahi, a Māori like Ngarimu and from the same battalion, may have led to a perception that VCs were being too easily awarded. ### Return to New Zealand The surrender of the Axis forces in Tunisia in May left the Allies in control of North Africa. The 2nd New Zealand Division withdrew to its base in Egypt and it was announced that 6,000 of its personnel would return to New Zealand for a three-month furlough. Manahi, as one of around 180 surviving original members of the Māori Battalion, was among those selected and shipped out on 15 June 1943. He was not to return to the war; after many of those on furlough vocalised their displeasure at the prospect of going back to war while other able-bodied men had yet to serve in the military, the New Zealand Government decided to exempt certain long-serving personnel from a return to duty. Māori soldiers, such as Manahi, would be among those released from service. On returning to Rotorua, Manahi entered a woodworking course and then began working at the local hospital as a carpenter. On 18 December 1945, he was presented with his DCM by Cyril Newall, the Governor-General of New Zealand, in a ceremony at the Auckland Town Hall. He was later selected for the New Zealand Victory Contingent, destined for England to celebrate the Commonwealth's role in the war. As part of the contingent, he participated in the Victory Parade in London on 8 June 1946. This fulfilled his last military obligations, and he was discharged in August. ## Later life Manahi settled back in Rotorua and returned to the workforce. Employed by the Ministry of Works, he became a traffic inspector which involved travelling around the Bay of Plenty. By this time, he had become estranged from his wife, although the couple never divorced. Manahi later had relationships with other women, and fathered another son with one of them. A keen sportsman, he became involved in swimming coaching as well as golf and fishing. When his estranged wife died in 1976, he moved away from Rotorua to nearby Maketu, on the coast. He still commuted to Rotorua to socialise at the local branch of the New Zealand Returned Servicemen's Association (RSA). Following his retirement in 1978, he spent even more time at the RSA in Rotorua. On the evening of 29 March 1986, on the way home to Maketu from the RSA clubrooms, he was involved in a car crash. His car veered over the centre line of the road, hit an oncoming vehicle and flipped. The driver and passenger of the other vehicle went to Manahi's aid. He received severe chest and abdominal injuries and was rushed to Tauranga Hospital, where he died later in the evening. His tangi (funeral) was held at the marae (tribal meeting area) in his home village of Ohinemutu, and was attended by former soldiers of the Māori Battalion. Survived by his two sons, he was buried at Muruika cemetery. ## The Manahi VC Committee The situation regarding Manahi's VC recommendation for his actions at Takrouna still rankled with many members of the Māori Battalion but while he was alive, Manahi's modesty and unwillingness to bring any attention to himself meant that he was not interested in pursuing reconsideration of the award. Following his death, the Manahi VC Committee was established by his former comrades and iwi to lobby for an upgrade to his award. The committee, which felt the downgrade of Manahi's proposed VC award to a DCM was due to him being a Māori, lobbied the New Zealand Government to make representations to Buckingham Palace. It was hoped that Queen Elizabeth II would reconsider the case and make a posthumous grant of the VC to Manahi. This was despite the Queen's father, King George VI, having ruled in 1949 that no further awards from the Second World War ought to be made. The New Zealand Government was reluctant to be officially involved, fearing an outright rejection if formal approaches were made. It favoured a more gradual and casual method to better assess the likely receptiveness of the Palace to the issue and so supported two informal applications made to the Queen in the early 1990s through former Governors-General of New Zealand; these were unsuccessful, with the passage of time since the events of Takrouna cited as a factor. Further agitation by the committee for an official approach to be made to the Queen resulted in a formal application to the Government in late 1993. This was rejected, one reason cited being the alleged conduct of the Māori soldiers towards Italian prisoners at Takrouna. This provoked the committee to collect more evidence in support of its case, including rebuttal evidence regarding the treatment of the Italians. It also stressed the point that the Manahi case was one of rectifying an error made by the military authorities to downgrade the VC to a DCM. It was not a matter of an attempt to see a soldier awarded a medal he had been overlooked for, as was alleged by military historian Christopher Pugsley. Finally, in 1997, the then Prime Minister of New Zealand, Jenny Shipley, formally broached the subject with Buckingham Palace. The feedback indicated the elapsed time since the events of Takrouna was a barrier to awarding Manahi a VC. The campaign to seek redress for Manahi continued and in 2000, his iwi, Te Arawa, lodged a claim with the Waitangi Tribunal and was supported in doing so by the New Zealand RSA. Te Arawa alleged the failure of the New Zealand Government to give full consideration of the award of a VC to Manahi constituted a breach of the Treaty of Waitangi, which required the government to act in good faith regarding grievances of Māori. In December 2005 the tribunal reported that there was no breach of the treaty. While not making any formal conclusions or recommendations, the tribunal suggested that the Manahi VC Committee work with the New Zealand Government in making an approach to Buckingham Palace. In October 2006, after further dialogue with Buckingham Palace, the New Zealand Minister of Defence, Phil Goff, announced that Manahi's bravery at Takrouna would be recognised by the presentation of an altar cloth for use at St. Faith's Church at Ohinemutu, a personal letter from the Queen acknowledging his gallantry, and a ceremonial sword. The award was presented by Prince Andrew to Manahi's sons, Rauawa and Geoffrey, at a ceremony in Rotorua on 17 March 2007. The sword was later presented to the Chief of the New Zealand Defence Force, Lieutenant General Jerry Mateparae, along with a patu (war club) in memory of Haane Manahi.

Albert Bridge, London

Bridge over the River Thames

Albert Bridge is a road bridge over the River Thames connecting Chelsea in Central London on the north bank to Battersea on the south. Designed and built by Rowland Mason Ordish in 1873 as an Ordish–Lefeuvre system modified cable-stayed bridge, it proved to be structurally unsound, so between 1884 and 1887 Sir Joseph Bazalgette incorporated some of the design elements of a suspension bridge. In 1973 the Greater London Council added two concrete piers, which transformed the central span into a simple beam bridge. As a result, today the bridge is an unusual hybrid of three different design styles. It is an English Heritage Grade II\* listed building. Built as a toll bridge, it was commercially unsuccessful. Six years after its opening it was taken into public ownership and the tolls were lifted. The tollbooths remained in place and are the only surviving examples of bridge tollbooths in London. Nicknamed "The Trembling Lady" because of its tendency to vibrate when large numbers of people walked over it, the bridge has signs at its entrances that warn troops to break step whilst crossing the bridge. Incorporating a roadway only 27 feet (8.2 m) wide, and with serious structural weaknesses, the bridge was ill-equipped to cope with the advent of the motor vehicle during the 20th century. Despite many calls for its demolition or pedestrianisation, Albert Bridge has remained open to vehicles throughout its existence, other than for brief spells during repairs. It is one of only two Thames road bridges in central London never to have been replaced (the other is Tower Bridge). The strengthening work carried out by Bazalgette and the Greater London Council did not prevent further deterioration of the bridge's structure. A series of increasingly strict traffic control measures have been introduced to limit its use and thus prolong its life. As a result, it is the second-least busy Thames road bridge in London; only Southwark Bridge carries less traffic. In 1992, Albert Bridge was rewired and painted in an unusual colour scheme designed to make it more conspicuous in poor visibility, and avoid being damaged by ships. At night it is illuminated by 4,000 LEDs, adding to its status as a landmark. ## History The historic industrial town of Chelsea on the north bank of the River Thames about 3 miles (5 km) west of Westminster, and the rich farming village of Battersea, facing Chelsea on the south bank, were linked by the modest wooden Battersea Bridge in 1771. In 1842 the Commission of Woods, Forests, and Land Revenues recommended the construction of an embankment at Chelsea to free land for development, and proposed a new bridge downstream of Battersea Bridge, and the replacement of the latter by a more modern structure. Work on the Victoria Bridge (later renamed Chelsea Bridge), a short distance downstream of Battersea Bridge, began in 1851 and was completed in 1858, with work on the Chelsea Embankment beginning in 1862. Meanwhile, the proposal to demolish Battersea Bridge was abandoned. The wooden Battersea Bridge had become dilapidated by the mid-19th century. It had grown unpopular and was considered unsafe. The newer Victoria Bridge, meanwhile, suffered severe congestion. In 1860, Prince Albert suggested that a new tollbridge built between the two existing bridges would be profitable, and in the early 1860s, the Albert Bridge Company was formed with the aim of building this new crossing. A proposal put forward in 1863 was blocked by strong opposition from the operators of Battersea Bridge, which was less than 500 yards (460 m) from the proposed site of the new bridge and whose owners were consequently concerned over potential loss of custom. A compromise was reached, and in 1864 a new Act of Parliament was passed, authorising the new bridge on condition that it was completed within five years. The Act compelled the Albert Bridge Company to purchase Battersea Bridge once the new bridge opened, and to compensate its owners by paying them £3,000 per annum (about £ in 2023) in the interim. Rowland Mason Ordish was appointed to design the new bridge. Ordish was a leading architectural engineer who had worked on the Royal Albert Hall, St Pancras railway station, the Crystal Palace and Holborn Viaduct. The bridge was built using the Ordish–Lefeuvre system, an early form of cable-stayed bridge design which Ordish had patented in 1858. Ordish's design resembled a conventional suspension bridge in employing a parabolic cable to support the centre of the bridge, but differed in its use of 32 inclined stays to support the remainder of the load. Each stay consisted of a flat wrought iron bar attached to the bridge deck, and a wire rope composed of 1,000 1⁄10-inch (2.5 mm) diameter wires joining the wrought iron bar to one of the four octagonal support columns. ## Construction Although authorised in 1864, work on the bridge was delayed by negotiations over the proposed Chelsea Embankment, since the bridge's design could not be completed until the exact layout of the new roads being built on the north bank of the river had been agreed. While plans for the Chelsea Embankment were debated, Ordish built the Franz Joseph Bridge over the Vltava in Prague to the same design as that intended for the Albert Bridge. In 1869, the time allowed by the 1864 Act to build the bridge expired. Delays caused by the Chelsea Embankment project meant that work on the bridge had not even begun, and a new Act of Parliament was required to extend the time limit. Construction finally got underway in 1870, and it was anticipated that the bridge would be completed in about a year, at a cost of £70,000 (about £ in 2023). In the event, the project ran for over three years, and the final bill came to £200,000 (about £ in 2023). It was intended to open the bridge and the Chelsea Embankment in a joint ceremony in 1874, but the Albert Bridge Company was keen to start recouping the substantially higher than expected costs, and the bridge opened without any formal ceremony on 23 August 1873, almost ten years after its authorisation. As the law demanded, the Albert Bridge Company then bought Battersea Bridge. Ordish's bridge was 41 feet (12 m) wide and 710 feet (220 m) long, with a 384-foot-9-inch (117.27 m) central span. The deck was supported by 32 rigid steel rods suspended from four octagonal cast iron towers, with the towers resting on cast iron piers. The four piers were cast at Battersea and floated down the river into position, at which time they were filled with concrete; at the time they were the largest castings ever made. Unlike most other suspension bridges of the time, the towers were positioned outside the bridge to avoid causing any obstruction to the roadway. At each entrance was a pair of tollbooths with a bar between them, to prevent people entering the bridge without paying. The bridge acquired the nickname of "The Trembling Lady" because of its tendency to vibrate, particularly when used by troops from the nearby Chelsea Barracks. Concerns about the risks of mechanical resonance effects on suspension bridges, following the 1831 collapse of the Broughton Suspension Bridge and the 1850 collapse of Angers Bridge, led to notices being placed at the entrances warning troops to break step (i.e. not to march in rhythm) when crossing the bridge; Although the barracks closed in 2008, the warning signs are still in place. ## Transfer to public ownership Albert Bridge was catastrophically unsuccessful financially. By the time the new bridge opened, the Albert Bridge Company had been paying compensation to the Battersea Bridge Company for nine years, and on completion of the new bridge became liable for the costs of repairing the by then dilapidated and dangerous structure. The cost of subsidising Battersea Bridge drained funds intended for the building of wide approach roads, making the bridge difficult to reach. It was located slightly further from central London than neighbouring Victoria (Chelsea) Bridge, and demand for the new bridge was less than expected. In the first nine months of its operation £2,085 (about £ in 2023) were taken in tolls. In 1877 the Metropolis Toll Bridges Act was passed, which allowed the Metropolitan Board of Works to buy all London bridges between Hammersmith and Waterloo bridges and free them from tolls. In 1879, Albert Bridge, which had cost £200,000 to build, was bought by the Board of Works along with Battersea Bridge for a combined price of £170,000 (about £ in 2023). The tolls were removed from both bridges on 24 May 1879, but the octagonal tollbooths were left in place, and today are the only surviving bridge tollbooths in London. ## Structural weaknesses In 1884 the Board of Works' Chief Engineer Sir Joseph Bazalgette conducted an inspection of the bridge and found that the iron rods were already showing serious signs of corrosion. Over the next three years the staying rods were augmented with steel chains, giving it an appearance more closely resembling a conventional suspension bridge, and a new timber deck was laid, at a total cost of £25,000 (about £ in 2023). Despite these improvements, Bazalgette was still concerned about its structural integrity and a weight limit of five tons was imposed on vehicles using the bridge. With a roadway only 27 feet (8.2 m) wide and subject to weight restrictions from early on, Albert Bridge was ill-suited to the advent of motorised transport in the 20th century. In 1926 the Royal Commission on Cross-River Traffic recommended demolition and rebuilding of the bridge to carry four lanes of traffic, but the plan was not carried out because of a shortage of funds in the Great Depression. It continued to deteriorate, and in 1935 the weight limit was reduced to two tons. Because of its ongoing structural weaknesses, in 1957 the London County Council proposed replacing Albert Bridge with a more conventional design. A protest campaign led by John Betjeman resulted in the withdrawal of the proposal, but serious concerns about the integrity of the bridge continued. In 1964 an experimental tidal flow scheme was introduced, in which only northbound traffic was permitted to use the bridge in the mornings and southbound traffic in the evenings. The bridge's condition continued to deteriorate, however, and in 1970 the Greater London Council (GLC) sought and obtained consent to carry out strengthening work. In April 1972 the bridge was closed for the work to be carried out. ### Pedestrianised park proposal The GLC's solution entailed adding two concrete piers in the middle of the river to support the central span and thus transform the bridge's central section into a beam bridge. The bridge's main girder was also strengthened, and a lightweight replacement deck was laid. The modifications were intended to be a stopgap measure to extend the bridge's life by five years while a replacement was being considered; in the GLC's estimation the work would last for a maximum of 30 years, but the bridge would need to be either closed or replaced well before then. In early 1973, the Architectural Review submitted a proposal to convert Albert Bridge into a landscaped public park and pedestrian footpath across the river. The proposal proved very popular with the area's residents, and a May 1973 campaign led by John Betjeman, Sybil Thorndike and Laurie Lee raised a petition of 2,000 signatures for the bridge to be permanently closed to traffic. Although the GLC reopened the bridge to traffic in July 1973, it also announced its intention to proceed with the Architectural Review scheme once legal matters had been dealt with. The Royal Automobile Club campaigned vigorously against the pedestrianisation proposal. A publicity campaign fronted by actress Diana Dors in favour of reopening the bridge was launched, whilst a lobbying group of local residents led by poet Robert Graves campaigned in support of the GLC's plan. Graves's campaign collected over a thousand signatures in support, but was vigorously attacked by the British Road Federation, who derided the apparent evidence of public support for the scheme as "sending a lot of students around to council flats [where] most people will sign anything without knowing what it is all about". A public inquiry of 1974 recommended that the bridge remain open to avoid congestion on neighbouring bridges, and it remained open to traffic with the tidal flow and 2-ton weight limit in place. ## Present day In 1990, the tidal flow system was abandoned and Albert Bridge was converted back to two-way traffic. A traffic island was installed on the south end of the bridge to prevent larger vehicles from using it. In the early years of the 21st century the Chelsea area experienced a growth in the popularity of large four-wheel drive cars (so-called Chelsea tractors), many of which were over the two-ton weight limit; it was estimated that one third of all vehicles using the bridge were over the weight limit. In July 2006 the 27-foot (8.2 m) wide roadway was narrowed to a single lane in each direction to reduce the load. Red and white plastic barriers have been erected along the roadway in an effort to protect the structure from damage by cars. Between 1905 and 1981, Albert Bridge was painted uniformly green; in 1981 it was repainted yellow. In 1992 it was redecorated and rewired. This has added to its status as a London landmark. The bridge is painted in pink, blue and green to increase visibility in fog and murky light and thus to reduce the risks of ships colliding with the fragile structure during the day. At night, a network of 4,000 low-voltage tungsten-halogen bulbs illuminated the bridge. In 1993 the innovative use of long-life low-energy lighting was commended by Mary Archer, at the time Chairwoman of the National Energy Foundation. Except for Tower Bridge, built in 1894, Albert Bridge is the only Thames road bridge in central London never to have been replaced. Intended as a temporary measure to be removed in 1978, the concrete central piers remain in place, and although in 1974 its lifespan was estimated at a maximum of 30 years, the bridge is still standing and operational. The Albert Bridge was protected as a Grade II\* listed structure in 1975, granting it protection against significant alteration without consultation. It continues to deteriorate. Although proposals have been drawn up by Kensington and Chelsea London Borough Council to repair and rescue it, by March 2008 funds for the repairs were unavailable. As well as structural damage caused by traffic, the timbers underpinning the deck were being seriously rotted by the urine of dogs crossing to and from nearby Battersea Park. With multiple measures in place to reduce traffic flow and prolong the life of the bridge, in 2009 it carried approximately 19,000 vehicles per day, the lowest usage of any Thames road bridge in London other than the little-used Southwark Bridge. ### Refurbishment of 2010–2011 The bridge was closed to motor vehicles on 15 February 2010 for refurbishment and strengthening. It was originally expected to remain closed for approximately 18 months, but after the condition of the bridge was found to be worse than expected, it was closed for 22 months. All of the timber in the decking as well as the footway that had rotted away were replaced, with additional timber added for strengthening. Surfaces at the carriageway and pavement decking were replaced. New steel structures were added to strengthen the bridge. All the lightbulbs were changed to more energy-efficient ones. The tollbooths were refurbished. All twelve layers of paint were stripped down until the bare metal was exposed, which was repaired and treated before three new coats of paint were added. The whole project cost £7.2 million of which the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea provided 25% of the cost and the other 75% was provided by Transport for London. It re-opened on 2 December 2011, when two dogs named Prince and Albert, from nearby Battersea Dogs and Cats Home, walked across the bridge to open it officially. All of the Grade II features were retained. ## In popular culture Its distinctive and striking current appearance has led to its use as a backdrop for numerous films set in the Chelsea area, such as A Clockwork Orange, Absolute Beginners, Sliding Doors, Maybe Baby and Flack. It is also at the centre of a song by The Pogues, "Misty Morning, Albert Bridge" from their Peace and Love album (1989). The bridge appears on the cover of the Thomas Leer and Robert Rental album The Bridge (1979). ## See also - Albert Bridge, Datchet - List of bridges in London - List of crossings of the River Thames

Silent Alarm

Silent Alarm is the debut studio album by English rock band Bloc Party. Recorded in Copenhagen and London in mid-2004 with Paul Epworth as producer, it was released on 2 February 2005, by Wichita Recordings. The album peaked at number three on the UK Albums Chart. In the United States, it entered the Billboard 200 at number 114 and the Billboard Independent Albums at number seven. The double A-side "So Here We Are/Positive Tension", "Banquet" and "The Pioneers" were released as singles. Silent Alarm went on to achieve worldwide sales of over one million copies. Bloc Party aimed to create an album that appealed to followers of different musical genres. Building on the arrangements in their demo songs recorded in 2004, the band members moulded tracks largely through live takes during the Silent Alarm studio sessions. The compositional focus was on rhythm and the drum and bass parts, while lyricist Kele Okereke's writing examined the feelings and hopes of young adults, including views on global politics. Following the album's completion, Bloc Party embarked on promotional tours before its release. Silent Alarm garnered widespread critical acclaim upon release, with praise often centered on its fast tempo and passionate delivery. Later in 2005, it was remixed as Silent Alarm Remixed and was re-released with bonus tracks to coincide with Bloc Party's worldwide touring schedule. The album has received accolades throughout the music industry since its release. ## Background In 2003, Bloc Party consisted of guitarists Kele Okereke and Russell Lissack, and bassist Gordon Moakes. After drummer Matt Tong auditioned and joined the trio, the band members' songwriting evolved and they started crafting tracks for Silent Alarm. Discussing the first demo "She's Hearing Voices", Okereke has stated that it "was really just a drum beat, which was something we couldn't do before because we relied on writing songs only with guitars". Self-recorded in a small, hired space in Acton, London, the song was followed by the May 2004 double A-side single, "Banquet/Staying Fat", produced by Paul Epworth. Bloc Party EP was subsequently released by Moshi Moshi Records in the UK, containing all three previous songs and new material. Following exposure with British magazines and newspapers and a successful performance on BBC Radio 1, Bloc Party received a contract offer from Parlophone. The band members declined the opportunity because they did not want to work for a major record label and instead signed a recording contract with East London indie label Wichita Recordings, chosen because it did not want to stamp its agenda on the conception of records. Frontman and chief writer Okereke wanted Silent Alarm to emphasise the importance of finding pleasure in small mundane things, because "those are the sort of things that can be incredibly touching". The album was born out of "a nagging youthful urgency" and the realisation that responsibility has to be taken for the first time as a young adult. Before recording started, Okereke attended singing lessons to open up his voice. ## Recording In June 2004, Bloc Party convened at Deltalab Studios in Copenhagen to make Silent Alarm with Paul Epworth. The band had already written demo songs to record, but Okereke has noted that "it is a creative process and you have to let yourself be inspired while you're in the studio as well". The Deltalab set-up posed problems, because it included bare mains cables and dated, malfunctioning equipment from the 1960s and 1970s. Bloc Party took three sessions to get acquainted with Epworth's methodology. The producer has called the recording time a "growing process" because Okereke was not wholly comfortable singing in front of people, especially after tonsil problems. Although the band members had preliminary ideas about a track's rhythm, they did not know how songs were going to start or end. Okereke often asked Tong to play something on the drums, which inspired him to mould a track by adding guitar chords to the beat. Bloc Party's priority when recording Silent Alarm was "to give the music more depth, sonically speaking" rather than focus on making a punk funk record. The band believed that 21st-century rock music could only survive if people started "mixing styles that aren't supposed to be together". Okereke has suggested that forward-thinking bands reach a plateau and start to question the boundaries of their medium; this leads to experimentation with elements from other genres. Bloc Party set out to explore the idea of merging different styles in the debut album, rather than in later work. Silent Alarm was crafted to appeal to R&B, electro, and pop fans, on top of the band's core indie rock fanbase. Okereke wanted the album to sound "very rich and full". Preferring live recording takes for better sound authenticity, Epworth's style separated the band's elements by accentuating the bass and by allowing the guitarists space to improvise. The producer meticulously tuned and retuned the components of the drum kit for a specific sound and used ribbon or condenser microphones lined up in an equidistant formation. According to Lissack, the basic idea was to emulate the "optimum audio representation" of songs heard in a club environment by adding guitar lines on top of boosted drum and bass tracks. Epworth advised Bloc Party to shape dynamics "a bit more subtly". As the sessions progressed, the band members started experimenting with distortion pedals to add to their "chiming, clean guitar sound", although they did not listen to the producer about song structure. In the end, 15 tracks were recorded in 22 days in Copenhagen, while the vocal overdubbing was subsequently done at London locations. Throughout the studio sessions, Okereke focused closely on the nuances of songs by often amending "microscopics". Epworth's bass-oriented production was key to creating a universally appealing album and was also used as a musical background to the lyrics. Okereke has explained that the songs were crafted to balance dark lyrics with uplifting melodies. He called the final version of Silent Alarm "technicolour" due to its stylistic choices and indicated that Bloc Party achieved the aim of making the songs sound "better and bigger" when they were recorded in the studio. Moakes later pointed out that the band members were relative novices when they entered the recording sessions, and that for the most part they only did what they were advised; this is an additional reason why the album is disjunct and not focused on any particular musical style. ## Composition ### Music Many of the arrangements on Silent Alarm are strongly percussive. The leading song, "Like Eating Glass", was inspired by a remix of The Smiths' "There Is a Light That Never Goes Out" Okereke heard in 2002. Its drum track was deliberately mixed louder than usual to add emphasis to the album's opening. "Helicopter" has a quick tempo of 171 beats per minute, while "Positive Tension" begins with a solitary bassline and builds up pace, first with a rhythmic drumming pattern, and then with a guitar solo towards its conclusion. "Banquet" involves lead guitar and rhythm guitar playing in syncopation, while "Blue Light" has a slower tempo and a crescendo towards the end. During the studio sessions, the Bloc Party EP version of "She's Hearing Voices" was reworked to include reverberation and stereo separation of the instrumental parts. "This Modern Love" begins minimally with panned vocals before the rhythm section enters the mix and the song intensifies. The second half of Silent Alarm includes more studio effects. "Pioneers" opens with a series of delayed guitar harmonics, while "Price of Gas" is driven by a marching-like sound created by Moakes walking in the studio with planks of wood strapped to his feet. "So Here We Are" is the only track on the album to not include vocal overdubbing. The song contains layered audio tracks of guitar and is followed by "Luno", which begins with 32 bars of bass guitar and drums. "Plans" has a slower tempo and uses a synthesizer and effects such as flanging during the chorus. The final track, "Compliments", incorporates an electronic drum kit and the use of reverberation. ### Lyrics Silent Alarm does not contain a solitary lyrical centre and simply observes people's lives. Okereke wanted to leave individual listeners space to make their own conclusions, but has admitted that the record "operates in the realm of cultural politics". Much of the songwriting is inspired by the style of confessional poetry authors like Anne Sexton and musicians Thom Yorke and Björk. In general, Silent Alarm tries to make clear an existential pointlessness in life. With hindsight, Okereke noted themes of "helplessness and weariness" because of the album's focus on how he was feeling between the ages of 18 and 20. Professor John Sutherland has pointed out literary elements, often similar to Sylvia Plath's work, in the lyricist's writing. Discussing the opening track "Like Eating Glass", he explained, "It strikes me that whoever did the lyrics must have read some of her work. It has the same rather jagged, surprising imagery. It could sit fairly comfortably in a poetry anthology." The recurring line "We've got crosses on our eyes" is inspired by cartoon characters who have crosses on their eyes when they die. Okereke tried to convey the feelings in a failing relationship, "of being completely disorientated", using childhood metaphors. According to Heather Phares of AllMusic, "The Pioneers" and "Price of Gasoline" exemplify the political undercurrent on Silent Alarm, the latter including the explicit chant "War / War / War / War". "Helicopter" focuses in equal measure on America's "red states" and on UK apathy and "the people queueing for the McDonald's by [Okereke's] house". "Positive Tension" concerns boredom and its dangers, focusing on how it "can lead you into dark places", while "Banquet" details "how sex is about power, submission, domination and real rapacious desire". The lyrics in the chorus of "She's Hearing Voices", "Red pill / Blue pill / Milk of amnesia", are in reference to the medications a friend of Okereke's took to relieve the symptoms of schizophrenia. The lyricist has described the moment in "This Modern Love" when the backing vocals enter the mix before the second chorus as "perfect", because it evokes the idea of "two people on the telephone, who can't touch each other, and as the song and the conversation progress, everything amplifies". ## Promotion and release Bloc Party EP was distributed in America in September 2004 by Dim Mak Records, while the band performed several gigs at the end of the year in the US and Canada. The release of Silent Alarm was preceded by the marketing of Little Thoughts EP in Japan in December 2004, containing previous UK singles "Little Thoughts/Tulips" and "Helicopter" and new material. Bloc Party commenced UK promotional touring in January 2005 by performing during the NME Awards Tour. "Tulips" was released from Little Thoughts EP in the US on 25 January. The first single from Silent Alarm, "So Here We Are/Positive Tension", was released on 31 January and peaked at number five on the UK Singles Chart, the band's second highest peaking release on the chart (behind 2007's "The Prayer" which reached number 4). Between 31 January and 4 February, Bloc Party performed after autograph signing sessions in UK HMV stores. The band achieved exposure largely because of word-of-mouth and favourable press reviews. Silent Alarm was released on 2 and 14 February 2005, in Japan and Europe respectively. Chosen because the album has a sense of disquiet, the name comes from an article in New Scientist about an early detection system for earthquakes in Japan, while the cover art is based on a bare winter landscape by freelance photographer Ness Sherry. Bloc Party followed the album's release with a short European promotional tour in early March 2005. Between 17 March and 9 April, the band undertook a first headlining US tour to coincide with the American release of Silent Alarm through Vice Records on 22 March. The US marketing was geared to establish a long-term fan base among "tastemakers and early-adopter rock enthusiasts", rather than a short-term emphasis on radio play. At the time, Okereke stated, "All I’m concerned about is playing live shows here to people who want to see us." ## Reception ### Commercial Silent Alarm entered the UK Albums Chart and the Irish Albums Chart at number three, selling 61,737 copies during the first week in the former country. The album achieved gold certification within 24 hours of its European release. 350,000 copies were shipped worldwide by the first week of March 2005; 20,000 were sent to America, double the record labels' January forecast. In the US, the record entered the Billboard 200 at number 114 and the Billboard Top Independent Albums at number seven. With little radio support, it became the best-selling release in Vice's history as a label. 123,000 copies of Silent Alarm were sold in the US by the end of July 2005. The record was listed at number 75 in the end-of-year UK Album Chart and was certified platinum by the British Phonographic Industry after more than 500,000 copies were sold in the UK during 2005. According to Nielsen SoundScan, 280,000 copies of the album were sold in the US by January 2007. By August 2012 it had sold 379,000 copies in the United States. At least 88,800 copies were sold in France. More than one million copies have been sold worldwide. ### Critical Silent Alarm received critical acclaim from critics; aggregating website Metacritic reports a normalised rating of 82 out of 100 based on 32 reviews which indicates "universal acclaim". Drowned in Sound's Gen Williams described the album as "mature and expansive" and wrote that "the autonomy, creativity and sheer, elastic beauty that spans this debut more than justifies the rapidly accelerating hype". Andrew Romano of Newsweek similarly noted that it "lives up to the hype". Summing the record up as "dance rock, but highly caffeinated", Barry Walters of Rolling Stone explained that the tracks are emotive and rhythmic in equal measure, while Nick Southall of Stylus Magazine thought that every song is "full of thrilling ideas and inspired moments". Johnny Davis of Q labelled Silent Alarm "an arty, confident and exhilarating debut", while Joshua Glazer of URB compared Bloc Party to "every legendary band ever who followed an EP with an even better album and on into greatness". The Guardian's Alexis Petridis was less receptive and commented that the "reedy vocals and lyrical evocations of suburban ennui ... induce a worrying ennui of their own". Heather Phares of AllMusic stated that the record is not perfect, but praised its "passion and polish". Romano and Glazer compared Silent Alarm to U2's early work, while Walters claimed that it distills "twenty-five years of spiky British rock, from The Cure to Blur to hot Scots Franz Ferdinand". Pitchfork's Nitsuh Abebe noted particular similarities between "Banquet" and Franz Ferdinand's second single "Take Me Out", calling both songs "wonderfully tight and energetic—the same kind of spiffy half-dancing rock". Phares suggested that Bloc Party are more comfortable with lyrical proclamations than their contemporaries Franz Ferdinand or The Futureheads, while Imran Ahmed of NME concluded, "Silent Alarm is no Franz Ferdinand. In fact, listen to it with the words 'popular' and 'arty' in mind and its spirit is closer to the Manic Street Preachers' The Holy Bible." ## Tours and supporting releases By the end of April 2005, Silent Alarm had charted in eighteen countries on four continents. Bloc Party toured in Japan with The Rakes at the start of May and completed a headlining tour of the US in June. The band members played their first concerts in Australia in July and spent the whole of August on the European festivals circuit. The remix album Silent Alarm Remixed was released on 29 August 2005 following Bloc Party's headlining slots at the Reading and Leeds Festivals on 26–28 August. The record includes reworked versions of all original tracks by artists such as Ladytron, Death From Above 1979, and Nick Zinner from Yeah Yeah Yeahs. In September 2005, the band members embarked on their second major worldwide tour of the year; they played several gigs in North America between 8 and 24 September. Another headlining UK tour during the whole of October coincided with the release of new single "Two More Years". Silent Alarm was re-released in the UK on 17 October 2005 with "Little Thoughts" and "Two More Years" as bonus tracks. It contained a bonus DVD, God Bless Bloc Party, which included Bloc Party's two June performances and backstage footage at El Rey Theatre, Los Angeles. Dan McIntosh of PopMatters stated that the concert documentary shows the band "can consistently pull off its material live", but concluded that it focuses on Bloc Party "much too intently, far too soon". In March 2018, the band announced they would play the album in full for the first time. The tour would take place in October and November and would travel to Amsterdam, Paris, Berlin, Brussels, Dublin plus dates in the UK, Australia and New Zealand. A subsequent live recording would also be available. ## Accolades and legacy Silent Alarm was shortlisted for the 2005 Mercury Music Prize, but was beaten by Antony and the Johnsons' second album I Am a Bird Now. It was also nominated for the 2005 Shortlist Music Prize, but lost to Sufjan Stevens' fifth album Illinois. The record was named Album of the Year for 2005 by NME ahead of Arcade Fire's debut album Funeral, by Intro in Germany, and by Rumore in Italy. URB included Silent Alarm in its unnumbered shortlist of the best records of 2005. It figured highly in other end-of-year best album lists: at number two by Hot Press and by Stylus Magazine, at number four by Drowned in Sound, at number six by Spin, at number seven by Metacritic's chief editor, and at number nine by The Denver Post. Silent Alarm earned Bloc Party several nominations, including Best Alternative Act at the 2005 MTV Europe Music Awards, Best British Band at the 2006 NME Awards, and Artist of the Year at the 2006 PLUG Awards. The record itself won Indie Rock Album of the Year at the 2006 PLUG Awards. It was also nominated as Best Album at the 2006 NME Awards, and as Album of the Year at the 2006 PLUG Awards. In 2006, NME placed Silent Alarm at number 55 in its list of the 100 Greatest British Albums Ever!, while Drowned in Sound ranked it at number three in its list of the editorial staff's 66 favourite albums of 2000–2006. In 2009, Clash placed the record at number 11 in its list of the 50 Greatest Albums, 2004–2009. The same year, Pitchfork ranked it at number 156 in its list of The Top 200 Albums of the 2000s, while NME included it at number 38 in the list of The Top 100 Greatest Albums of the Decade decided by the publication's staff and music industry members. In 2010, Stylus Magazine placed Silent Alarm at number 31 in its list of the Top Albums of the previous decade. ## Track listing - Tracks 8 and 9 are labled on some album pressings as "Pioneers" and "Price of Gas" respectively. CD hidden track - "Every Time Is the Last Time" – 3:10 – track 0 (pregap) on the UK and US editions and after track 13 on the European edition Vinyl - There were two UK LP copies of Silent Alarm distributed by V2 Records: a standard black vinyl copy, and a limited edition picture disc version which has the album cover printed on Side A and the track listing printed on Side B. - The US LP issue was distributed by Dim Mak Records. It comprises two limited edition 12" records which additionally contain a track listing for "Every Time Is the Last Time" on Side A, the appearance of "Little Thoughts" on Side C, and four bonus remix tracks—two of "Positive Tension" (Jason Clark and Johnny Whitney) and two of "Price of Gas" (Automato and Jus Ske)—on Sides E and F. DVD - A CD with an extra DVD was released in the UK and Europe in February 2005 at the same time as the normal CD version. The DVD portion contains live footage of Bloc Party at Heaven in London. - A new version of the CD with an extra DVD was released in the UK in October 2005. The DVD, titled God Bless Bloc Party, contains a US tour documentary at El Rey Theatre, Los Angeles, live footage of Bloc Party at the 2005 Eurockéennes Festival in Belfort, France, and nine music videos from the band's career. - God Bless Bloc Party was released as a stand-alone DVD in the US by Vice in January 2006, but did not include the music videos. ## Personnel Those involved in the making of Silent Alarm are: Bloc Party - Kele Okereke – lead vocals, rhythm guitar - Russell Lissack – lead guitar - Gordon Moakes – bass, backing vocals, synthesizer - Matt Tong – drums, backing vocals Production - Paul Epworth – Record producer, programming (track 4) - Eliot James – recording (except tracks 4, 13), programming (except track 4), additional production - Mark "Top" Rankin – recording (tracks 4, 13) - Joe Hirst – recording assistant - "Fashion Show" – recording assistant - Rich Costey – mixing Artwork - Ness Sherry – Album cover photograph - Paul Epworth – photography (except Russell, Copenhagen) - Matt Tong – photography (Russell, Copenhagen) ## Chart positions Album Singles "—" denotes releases that did not chart. "X" denotes song not released in a particular country. "=" denotes track not eligible for a particular chart. ## Certifications

Did You Hear What Happened to Charlotte King?

"Did You Hear What Happened to Charlotte King?" is the seventh episode of the fourth season of the American television medical drama Private Practice and the show's 61st episode overall. Written by Shonda Rhimes and directed by Allison Liddi-Brown, the episode was originally broadcast on ABC in the United States on November 4, 2010. Private Practice centers on a group of young doctors working in a private medical practice, and this episode deals with the immediate aftermath of Charlotte King's rape. The episode, written in collaboration with the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN), revolved around KaDee Strickland's character, Charlotte, and was intended to accurately portray a victim's recovery from rape. Nicholas Brendon guest-starred as Lee McHenry, and Blue Deckert appeared as detective Joe Price. "Did You Hear What Happened to Charlotte King?" earned Rhimes, Strickland, and the series several awards and nominations and was well received by critics, with Strickland's character and performance praised. The initial broadcast was viewed by 10.18 million people, received a 3.9/11 Nielsen rating/share in the 18–49 demographic, and had the fifth-highest number of viewers that night. ## Plot The episode opens with St. Ambrose Hospital chief of staff Charlotte King (KaDee Strickland) hiding in a supply closet after being raped in her office. Alternative-medicine specialist Dr. Pete Wilder (Tim Daly) finds and examines her, diagnosing a broken wrist, eye socket and nose and a deep arm laceration, and admits her to the hospital. King lies to Wilder, telling him that she was injured in a mugging. Wilder calls the police; King attempts to contact her boyfriend, Dr. Cooper Freedman (Paul Adelstein), but cannot reach him because he is out drinking with Dr. Amelia Shepherd (Caterina Scorsone) and Dr. Sam Bennett (Taye Diggs). At the police station psychiatrist Sheldon Wallace (Brian Benben) interrogates Lee McHenry (Nicholas Brendon), who was found with blood on his clothes. After nurses photograph King's injuries, Dr. Addison Montgomery (Kate Walsh) realizes that King was raped and offers her a rape kit. During her pelvic examination, King refuses the rape kit and tells Montgomery not to tell anyone else about the rape. Freedman arrives with Shepherd and Bennett, and is surprised at the extent of King's injuries. During the CT scan, King and Shepherd bond over their shared drug addiction when King refuses pain medication. Shepherd admits drinking alcohol again, and King offers to take her to Alcoholics Anonymous meetings. Shepherd sutures King's wounds, which causes King great pain; Freedman feels powerless, unable to protect her. Interviewed by Wallace, McHenry admits being angry after discovering his girlfriend's infidelity but denies that the blood on his clothing is hers. Montgomery tries to convince King to report her rape; King refuses, telling Montgomery that she does not understand what it is like to be raped. Wilder uses alternative medicine to help King deal with her pain. Psychiatrist Violet Turner (Amy Brenneman) refuses to talk to King about the rape because of similarities to the fetal abduction she experienced a year earlier, and wonders if everyone in the practice is cursed. Bennett wants to go home and rest, which angers Montgomery. King attempts to compose a memorandum saying that she was attacked on the hospital grounds, but Freedman suggests that another member of the staff do it for her; she shouts at Freedman when he calls her a victim. After the argument, Freedman goes to King's office and weeps when he sees the aftermath of her assault. McHenry admits raping a woman, assaulting Wallace before he is pulled away by the police. In the ambulance bay, Bennett expresses his confusion about Montgomery's mood swings and suspects that she is hiding something from him; Montgomery asks him to promise never to leave her alone. After Freedman helps her dress, King says that she loves him and wants to go home. McHenry is held by the police for assaulting a police officer during his arrest and Wallace during his interrogation, but detective Joe Price says that McHenry cannot be charged with rape until charges are filed against him. The episode ends with King walking out of the hospital with Freedman's help; flashbacks of the rape reveal that McHenry was the rapist. ## Production The 43-minute episode was written by Shonda Rhimes and directed by Allison Liddi-Brown. Christal A. Khatib edited the music, and Gregory Van Horn was its production designer. Johann Sebastian Bach's Prelude and Fugue in C was played during the opening sequence. Rhimes wrote the episode in collaboration with the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN) to ensure that King's recovery was presented as accurately as possible. She later called it one of her favorites from the series and said, "I feel like I changed as a writer writing that episode." Approached by Rhimes about the concept, Strickland agreed to the storyline on the conditions that it would not be limited to a single episode and would significantly impact the character. She liked the script, describing it as "humanizing the victims and just really creating a legitimate experience for the audience in a way that you may not see on network television". As well as communicating with RAINN representatives, the actress visited the Rape Treatment Center at UCLA Medical Center in Santa Monica and saw a young girl being admitted, which shaped her performance. Strickland also researched reactions to sexual assault by survivors, their friends and families. The decision to portray King's resistance to reporting her rape was reached after consultation with the Rape Treatment Center. Strickland defended the choice, calling it an essential aspect of King's character development. Most of the episode focused on King's psychological response to the rape. According to Strickland, > The nature of that kind of attack is so shocking to a person's system a lot of times that how they respond in those first moments afterwards, it could go six ways to Sunday. For Charlotte, because of the type of person she is, very in control, very direct, very together, I think it really turns her world upside down, and I think she doesn't really know how to even comprehend what has happened to her or how to process it. The actress described the filming of the rape as easier than the scenes depicting its aftermath, which she called "psychologically ... [and] ... physically hard". Strickland and Brendon agreed on a safeword when they filmed the rape, due to its brutality. The scene affected Strickland to the extent that she found it difficult to act on the set on which the rape was shot. The actress called the filming process "intense" and "truthful", but "by no means is any of that even comparable to anything that women and men have had experience with". Brendon was cast against type as McHenry, King's rapist, since he is primarily known for portraying the comedic Xander Harris in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Strickland said that Brendon's character should not be interpreted as crazy, because perpetrators of rape are "people who are around us all the time"; she called Brendon's acceptance of the role "brave". According to Strickland, every character on the show was affected by King's rape. The episode explored Freedman's identity and response as the partner of a rape victim, with Adelstein identifying his character as "a conscious 21st-century male" in his interactions with King. According to Strickland, Montgomery's decision to use the rape kit on King without her knowledge would be a major storyline in the future and Turner would become persistent in getting help for King after learning about the rape since the characters had similar traumatic experiences. A behind-the-scenes feature about the episode and others involving King's rape, "An Inside Look: The Violation of Charlotte King", was included on the fourth-season DVD and Blu-ray releases. ## Reception ### Broadcast "Did You Hear What Happened to Charlotte King?" was originally broadcast on November 4, 2010 in the United States on the ABC network. The episode was viewed by a total of 10.18 million people, and had a 44 percent increase from the previous episode "All in the Family", which earned an average rating of 7.68. Although it was the fifth-highest-rated show that night (behind CBS's The Big Bang Theory, \$#\*! My Dad Says, CSI and The Mentalist), its 3.9/11 Nielsen rating topped the 10:00 Eastern time slot for the rating and share percentages of the 18–49 demographic. The episode was aired with a message encouraging viewer discretion, due to its violence. The following episode "What Happens Next" saw a decrease in ratings, and was viewed by a total of 8.21 million people. ### Critical response The critical response was largely positive, with a TV Guide writer ranking "Did You Hear What Happened to Charlotte King?" one of 2010's top 25 television episodes. Alec Stern of The Michigan Daily cited the episode as an example of the show's improved quality, and The Futon Critic's Brian Ford Sullivan also included it in his list of 50 best episodes of 2010. Strickland's performance received an overwhelmingly positive response after the episode first aired. The reviewer from TV Guide felt that Strickland's performance was worthy of an Emmy, and that the first time Freedman saw King's injuries was "like we weren't even watching TV anymore". A TVLine post later listed Strickland as one of the Emmy Awards' 21 biggest snubs. E! News' Kristin dos Santos also praised Strickland's portrayal of King, writing that she deserved an Emmy nomination, and Winston Mize of SpoilerTV wrote that Strickland was "robbed. of. all. the. awards". TV Fanatic's Steve Marsi liked the episode, saying that its pacing and Strickland's performance immersed the audience despite the difficult subject matter. The treatment of rape in the episode has been widely praised by television critics. SpoilerTV's Winston Mize felt that it was one of Rhimes' best shows, and that it avoided a preachy or excessively-dramatic take on rape. JeromeWetzelTV of Blogcritics found the episode "disturbing, intense, tragic, and moving", with the rape handled delicately and responsibly. E! News''' Jennifer Arrow described the rape scene as "the most realistic depiction of rape in media history" and noted Brendon's casting as an evil character in contrast with his more light-hearted performance as Harris in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. The depiction of King's rape and its aftermath was compared to similar storylines on other shows. Arrow called it part of the "rape-on-TV trend", linking King's rape with those of Gemma Teller Morrow of FX's crime drama Sons of Anarchy and Naomi Clark of the CW teen drama 90210. According to Arrow, all three characters were "strong, no-nonsense ladies who generally dominate their environments" and did not report their rape. She asked if each show's decision for the victim not to report the rape was part of a larger cultural belief that "trusts in women who keep their silence". TV Fanatic's Steve Marsi called the episode reminiscent of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit in its presentation of events in real time and emphasis on character reactions. The Michigan Daily's Alec Stern called sexual assault "a crutch Shonda Rhimes has turned to in all three of her series", writing that the development of King's character was superior to the storyline of Mellie Grant's rape on the ABC drama Scandal. ### Awards and impact The episode was cited at the 2011 Television Academy Honors for exemplifying "Television with a Conscience". The Academy of Television Arts & Sciences praised the episode for "master[ing] the gut-wrenching crime of sexual assault". Private Practice received the award in 2010 for its approach to physician-assisted suicide in the second-season episode, "Nothing to Fear", and a drama-series Women's Image Network Award at the 13th annual WIN awards. "Did You Hear What Happened to Charlotte King?" was a finalist for the Sentinel for Health Award for Primetime Drama (Major Storyline) for its representation of rape, losing to the Parenthood episode "Qualities and Difficulties" (which focused on Asperger syndrome). The show was nominated for the PRISM Award for Drama Series Multi-Episode Storyline (Mental Health) for "Did You Hear What Happened to Charlotte King?" and the following episodes, "What Happens Next" and "Can't Find My Way Back Home", losing to the first two seasons of Parenthood''. Rhimes and Strickland received a RAINN Hope Award in recognition of "their efforts in educating the public about sexual assault prevention". Strickland said that she considered submitting the episode, or the later episodes "Can't Find My Way Home" or "Blind Love," for consideration at the 63rd Primetime Emmy Awards, but she did not receive a nomination. The actress received the Female Performance in a Drama Series Multi-Episode Storyline award at the 2011 PRISM Awards. Rhimes received the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Writing in a Dramatic Series at the 2011 NAACP Awards for her work on the episode. After its broadcast, RAINN had a "500-percent increase in service requests" (which temporarily crashed its website). Strickland participated in a public service announcement to increase awareness of rape and sexual abuse, and said that she had received many emails from survivors of sexual assault. After her work on the episode, RAINN called the actress a "vocal advocate for using DNA evidence in solving rape cases".

Henry Cornelius Burnett

American politician

Henry Cornelius Burnett (October 25, 1825 – October 1, 1866) was an American politician who served as a Confederate States senator from Kentucky from 1862 to 1865. From 1855 to 1861, Burnett served four terms in the United States House of Representatives. A lawyer by profession, Burnett had held only one public office—circuit court clerk—before being elected to Congress. He represented Kentucky's 1st congressional district immediately prior to the Civil War. This district contained the entire Jackson Purchase region of the state, which was more sympathetic to the Confederate cause than any other area of Kentucky. Burnett promised the voters of his district that he would have President Abraham Lincoln arraigned for treason. Unionist newspaper editor George D. Prentice described Burnett as "a big, burly, loud-mouthed fellow who is forever raising points of order and objections, to embarrass the Republicans in the House". Besides championing the secession in Congress, Burnett also worked within Kentucky to bolster the state's support of the Confederacy. He presided over a sovereignty convention in Russellville in 1861 that formed a Confederate government for the state. The delegates to this convention chose Burnett to travel to Richmond, Virginia to secure Kentucky's admission to the Confederacy. Burnett also raised a Confederate regiment at Hopkinsville, Kentucky, and briefly served in the Confederate States Army. Camp Burnett, a Confederate recruiting post two miles west of Clinton in Hickman County, Kentucky, was named after him. Burnett's actions were deemed treasonable by his colleagues in Congress, and he was expelled from the House in 1861. He is one of only five members of the House of Representatives ever to be expelled. Following his expulsion, Burnett served in the Provisional Confederate Congress and the First and Second Confederate Senates. He was indicted for treason after the war, but never tried. He returned to the practice of law, and died of cholera in 1866 at the age of 40. ## Early and family life Henry Cornelius Burnett was born to Dr. Isaac Burnett (1801-1865) and his wife, the former Martha F. Garrett on October 25, 1825, in Essex County, Virginia. In his early childhood, the family moved to Cadiz, Trigg County, Kentucky. Henry was educated privately at an academy in Hopkinsville, the neighboring Christian County government seat. He then read law and was a member of the Cadiz Christian Church. On April 13, 1847, Burnett married Mary A. Terry, the daughter of a prominent Cadiz merchant. They had four children: John, Emeline, Henry, and Terry (who died shortly after birth). The younger Henry C. Burnett (educated at the University of Virginia after his father's death) became a successful lawyer in Paducah and, later, Louisville. ## Early career Admitted to the bar in 1847, Burnett established his legal practice in Cadiz. He also began owning slaves of his own. He owned five slaves in Trigg County in 1850. Ten years later, in 1860, Burnett owned seven slaves in Cadiz, as well as leased three slaves to J.L. Parrish in Christian County. In the first election following the ratification of the Kentucky Constitution of 1850, Trigg County voters elected Burnett clerk of the circuit court; he defeated James E. Thompson. Burnett resigned in 1853 to run for Congress. Later that year, he was elected as a Democrat to the 34th Congress, succeeding Speaker of the House Linn Boyd. He was re-elected to the three succeeding Congresses; during the 35th Congress, he chaired the Committee of Enquiry regarding the sale of Fort Snelling and served on the Committee on the District of Columbia. ## Outset of the Civil War Burnett supported fellow Kentuckian John C. Breckinridge for president in the 1860 presidential election, but Breckinridge lost to Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln had campaigned against the expansion of slavery beyond the states in which it already existed. His victory in the election resulted in seven Southern states declaring their secession from the Union. Despite this, most Americans believed the Union could still be saved. Burnett, however, disagreed. In the January 7, 1861 issue of Paducah's Tri-Weekly Herald, he declared, "There is not the slightest hope of any settlement or adjustment of existing troubles." Despite his pessimism, Burnett endorsed the ill-fated Peace Conference of 1861. Following the rapid secessions of Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas, Congress began preparing the nation for war, including by strengthening the army and navy and raising funds for the treasury. Burnett attempted to circumvent these measures by proposing an amendment stipulating that none of these new appropriations could be used to subdue or make war against any of the southern states, but the amendment was defeated. To avert war then, the Kentucky General Assembly called for a meeting of border states to convene in Frankfort on May 27. Kentucky's twelve delegates to the convention were to be chosen by special election on May 4. However, after the Confederates fired on Fort Sumter on April 12, the secessionist candidates withdrew from the election. Expressing the view of the majority of these delegates, Burnett opined in the Tri-Weekly Herald that the convention would not occur. He was wrong; the convention was held as scheduled, but it failed to accomplish anything of significance. ## Special congressional elections of 1861 President Lincoln called for special congressional elections to be held in Kentucky in June 1861. The voters of the First District's Southern Rights party called a meeting to be held May 29, 1861 at the Graves County courthouse in Mayfield. The purpose of the meeting was ostensibly to re-nominate Burnett for his congressional seat, but some Unionists believed an ulterior motive was in play. George D. Prentice, editor of the Unionist Louisville Journal, wrote on May 21, 1861 that "the object of [the Mayfield Convention], though not officially explained, is believed to be the separation of the First District from Kentucky if Kentucky remains in the Union, and its annexation to Tennessee". Most of the records of the Mayfield Convention were lost, presumably in a fire that destroyed the courthouse in 1864. The most extensive surviving record comes from the notes of James Beadles, a Unionist observer of the proceedings. After a number of speeches were delivered, a majority committee chaired by Paducah circuit judge James Campbell presented a report containing seven resolutions. The resolutions declared the region's sympathy with the South, although it pledged to abide by Kentucky's present policy of neutrality. It condemned President Lincoln for waging an unjust war, and praised Governor Beriah Magoffin for refusing Lincoln's call for troops. The report also condemned the federal government for arming Union sympathizers in the state with so-called "Lincoln guns". A minority committee report was given by Ballard County resident and future U.S. Representative Oscar Turner. This report called Kentucky's neutrality "futile" and "cowardly," promised to fight off any invasion by the North, and recommended calling for aid from Tennessee and the Confederate States in the event of such an invasion. It further warned that if the entire state did not adopt this position, the Purchase region would secede and align itself with Tennessee. Burnett, along with Lyon County's Willis B. Machen and Union County's Benjamin P. Cissell, initially endorsed Campbell's majority report. After some debate, Burnett proposed four resolutions in lieu of both reports. The resolutions condemned President Lincoln for the war against the South and the federal government for the provision of the "Lincoln guns". They also praised Governor Magoffin for rebuffing Lincoln's call for troops and encouraged him to drive away any Union invasion of the state. Burnett's resolutions were passed by large margins in preference to both the majority and minority reports. Finally, the convention turned to the issue of nominating Burnett. Four others, including Turner, Machen, and Cissell, were also offered as nominees. Burnett received 124 of 155 votes on the first ballot and was chosen unanimously on the second ballot. In his acceptance speech, Burnett declared that he was undecided as to whether he would take the oath of office if elected. This statement alluded to an earlier comment by Turner that "no man who is engaged in the cause of the South could go to Congress and take the oath of office without perjuring himself." Burnett promised that if he did assume his seat, he was determined to arraign President Lincoln for treason. In the special elections, Burnett defeated Lawrence Trimble of Paducah. He was the only states' rights candidate elected in the statewide canvass. He won handily in the Jackson Purchase region, which was by far the most pro-Southern area of the state. However, outside the Purchase, he won only his home county of Trigg, and that by a slim margin of 20 votes. (Besides the Purchase counties, the First District also included Caldwell, Crittenden, Hopkins, Livingston, Lyon, Trigg, Union, and Webster counties.) Burnett took his seat in the 37th Congress; sources make no mention of his making good on his threat not to take the oath of office. Just days after the First Battle of Bull Run, Burnett's fellow Kentuckian, John J. Crittenden proposed a resolution blaming the war on the disloyal Southerners and defining the war's aim as preservation of the Union without interference in the rights or institutions of the states. Burnett asked that the question be divided. His request was granted, but he only found one colleague willing to vote with him against blaming Southerners for the war. ## Confederate military service and expulsion After Congress adjourned on August 6, 1861, Burnett returned home to Cadiz and spoke at a number of pro-Southern rallies. On September 4, 1861, Confederate Major General Leonidas Polk violated Kentucky's neutrality by ordering Brigadier General Gideon Johnson Pillow to occupy Columbus. In response, Ulysses S. Grant captured Paducah on September 6, 1861. With neutrality no longer a tenable option, Burnett presided over a conference of Kentucky's Southern sympathizers that occurred at Russellville between October 29 and October 31, 1861. The self-appointed delegates to this conference called for a sovereignty convention on November 18, 1861 for the purpose of establishing a Confederate government for the state. In the interim between the two conventions, Burnett traveled to Hopkinsville, where he and Colonel W.C.P. Breckinridge raised a Confederate regiment dubbed the 8th Kentucky Infantry. On November 11, 1861, Burnett himself enlisted in the Confederate States Army at Camp Alcorn; he was chosen as colonel of the 8th Kentucky, but never took command. The sovereignty convention gathered at the William Forst House in Russellville as scheduled on November 18, 1861. Burnett also presided over this convention. Fearing for the safety of the delegates, he first proposed postponing proceedings until January 8, 1862, but Scott County's George W. Johnson convinced the majority of the delegates to continue. By the third day, the military situation was so tenuous that the entire convention had to be moved to a tower on the campus of Bethel Female College, a now-defunct institution in Russellville. The convention passed an ordinance of secession and established a provisional Confederate government for Kentucky. Burnett, William Preston of Fayette County and William E. Simms of Bourbon County were chosen as commissioners for the provisional government and were dispatched to Richmond, Virginia to negotiate with Confederate President Jefferson Davis to secure Kentucky's admission to the Confederacy. For reasons unexplained by the delegates, Dr. Luke P. Blackburn, a native Kentuckian living in Mississippi, was invited to accompany the commissioners. Despite the fact that Kentucky's elected government in Frankfort had opposed secession, the commissioners convinced Davis to recommend Kentucky's admission to the Confederacy; the Confederate Congress officially admitted Kentucky on December 10, 1861. Following his successful mission to Richmond, Burnett joined the 8th Kentucky at Fort Donelson. On February 16, 1862, Ulysses S. Grant led a combined Federal army-navy attack against the fort. Most of the Confederate garrison was captured, including the 8th Kentucky, but Burnett escaped in General John B. Floyd's retreat following the defeat. This battle ended Burnett's military service. Burnett's subversive activities did not go unnoticed by his colleagues in Congress. He was absent when the body reconvened December 2, 1861. The following day, Indiana representative W. McKee Dunn introduced a resolution to expel Burnett from Congress. The resolution passed easily, removing Burnett from the seat he had occupied continuously since 1855. ## Confederate political service Burnett represented Kentucky in the Provisional Confederate Congress from November 18, 1861 to February 17, 1862, and served as a member of that body's Finance Committee. He was then elected as a senator to the First and Second Confederate Congresses, serving from February 19, 1862 to February 18, 1865. In the Confederate Senate, he served on the Engrossment and Enrollment and Military Affairs Committees. On March 29, Confederate president Jefferson Davis called on the Confederate Congress to pass a conscription bill. The bill would require a three-year term of service for all able-bodied white men between the ages of 18 and 35. At first, the bill was unpopular, but as the military situation grew more desperate for the Confederacy, both houses quickly passed it. Still, the measure caused some to question Davis' military decisions; among them was Burnett, usually one of Davis' staunchest allies. In an April 19, 1862 address to the legislature, Burnett denounced Davis' preference for those who were, like Davis himself, graduates of West Point. The speech drew such a vigorous positive response from the gallery that some of the most zealous had to be removed. Following the conclusion of the Civil War, Burnett sought an audience with President Andrew Johnson, an old congressional colleague, but Johnson told him to go home. Burnett was indicted for treason at Louisville, but released on bond and never prosecuted. He partnered with Judge John R. Grace and resumed the practice of law in Cadiz. He died of cholera in Hopkinsville on September 28, 1866. Initially buried in the Old Cadiz Cemetery, he was moved to the East End Cemetery in Cadiz. His tombstone bears no mention of his Confederate service. ## See also - List of United States representatives expelled, censured, or reprimanded

Into Temptation (film)

2009 film

Into Temptation is a 2009 independent drama film written and directed by Patrick Coyle, and starring Jeremy Sisto, Kristin Chenoweth, Brian Baumgartner, Bruce A. Young and Amy Matthews. It tells the story of a prostitute (Chenoweth) who confesses to a Catholic priest (Sisto) that she plans to kill herself on her birthday. The priest attempts to find and save her, and in doing so plunges himself into a darker side of society. The film was partially inspired by Coyle's father, a kind but belligerent man who had considered becoming a priest in his early life. The script won the McKnight Screenwriting Fellowship from the IFP Minnesota Center for Media Arts. Into Temptation was filmed and set in Coyle's hometown of Minneapolis, Minnesota. Several supporting roles were filled with actors from the Minneapolis – Saint Paul theater area, and Coyle himself performed in a supporting role. It was produced by Ten Ten Films and Farnam Street II, and distributed by First Look International. With a budget of less than \$1 million, filming began in May 2008. Cinematography was provided by David Doyle, Russell Holsapple composed the score, and Lee Percy worked as editor. The film touches on themes of temptation, sin, good and evil, redemption and celibacy, as well as the boundaries between a priest providing counsel and getting personally involved with helping parishioners. Into Temptation was optioned in Hollywood, but talks fell through due to complications from the global recession. The film did not receive a national release but played at theaters in several cities. Although first publicly shown for Coyle's father in December 2008, Into Temptation officially premiered on April 26, 2009, at the Newport Beach Film Festival, where Sisto won the "Outstanding Achievement in Acting" award. The film received generally positive reviews. It was released on DVD on October 27, 2009. ## Plot Father John Buerlein (Jeremy Sisto) is the mild-mannered Catholic priest of a small parish in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Overworked and underpaid, he has grown jaded with the profession and has trouble connecting with his parishioners. During confession, a mysterious and unnamed prostitute (Kristin Chenoweth) confesses to a sin she has not yet committed: she plans to commit suicide on her birthday. Father John is taken aback. The confession ends abruptly, and he is unable to stop the woman before she disappears. He knows only that she wears a crucifix and is an Aries (her birthday is soon). Father John grows obsessed with finding and helping this woman and begins visiting the city's red-light district with the hopes of finding her. On his way home, Father John meets a homeless man named Gus (Gene Larche), but with no money for him, he gives him a rosary instead. Later, he seeks counsel from his friend Father Ralph O'Brien (Brian Baumgartner), who advises him not to become too personally involved. Father John returns to the red-light district and speaks to a prostitute named Miriam (Greta Oglesby), who suggests a powerful pimp named James St. Clair (Ansa Akyea) might know about the woman. As they speak in a bar, the mysterious prostitute enters and solicits a john (Patrick Coyle), who leaves with her immediately. As she goes, Father John catches a glimpse of the crucifix she is wearing and tries to chase her down. She leaves in the john's car before he can catch them, but he writes down the license plate as they drive off. Back at church, his sermons start to grow more unorthodox, and Father Ralph warns him that his unusual church manner and trips to the red-light district have the archbishop concerned. Meanwhile, Father John is contacted by his ex-girlfriend Nadine Brennan (Amy Matthews), who tells him she is divorcing her husband and still harbors romantic feelings for Father John. Father John learns the john's car belongs to an accountant named Steven Miller, who tells Father John the prostitute is Linda, an expensive call girl who is widely considered among the best at her profession. Meanwhile, Linda visits her dying, elderly stepfather Donald Dupree (Tom Carey), who repeatedly raped Linda in her childhood and ultimately set her on the path to prostitution. Linda confronts him about their past, but claims she has forgiven him his sins, even though he continues to deny any wrongdoing. A drunk Nadine goes to talk to Father John in confession about her loneliness and feelings for him. He admits to caring for her as well, but they agree to remain friends. Later, Father John hires Lloyd Montag (Bruce A. Young), an unemployed boxer at his church, to serve as his bodyguard as he talks to St. Clair. The pimp, who knows Lloyd from his boxing days, tells Father John what neighborhood Linda lives in. There, Father John and Lloyd find Zeke (Tony Papenfuss), a taxi driver who knows they are looking for Linda and agrees to take them to her apartment. Zeke explains he had driven her to the church when she first spoke to Father John at confession, and Zeke later visited the church to watch Father John preach. At the apartment, Father John and Lloyd find Linda has moved out, but they discover she had possessed a 12-year-old newspaper clipping about Father John's ordination. Father John offers Lloyd a job helping out at the church, which Lloyd accepts. Father John then returns to his church and cries, fearing he is too late to save Linda. Meanwhile, Linda goes to a bridge and is about to jump off when she encounters Gus, who offers her the rosary he received earlier from Father John. A grateful and emotional Linda hugs Gus. It is not revealed whether she commits suicide or not. In a confession to Father Ralph, Father John expresses guilt he did not absolve Linda before her confession abruptly ended. Father Ralph says that even if Linda is dead, her soul is immortal, and that Father John's penance is to absolve her now. Father John does so. The film ends with a childhood memory of young Linda at church, where a group of boys laugh at her old torn clothes until she is defended by a young John Buerlein, whose act seems to make a strong positive impact upon her. ## Production ### Writing Into Temptation marks the second film by independent filmmaker Patrick Coyle, who wrote and directed the 2003 drama film Detective Fiction. Coyle said Into Temptation was partially inspired by his father, James Patrick Coyle, a kind but belligerent man who had been encouraged by his mother to become a priest. James entered seminary but dropped out before ordination after he was drafted into serving overseas in World War II and met Margaret Mary Quinlan, who would become his wife and Patrick Coyle's mother. Coyle conceived of the script for Into Temptation while imagining what kind of priest his father would have been. His father strongly approved of the project, and told Coyle, "Go make that movie. And tell the truth." Coyle was also partially inspired by his childhood pastor and friend, the Reverend Damian Zuerlein, who performed the marriage ceremony for Coyle and his wife and baptized their children. Coyle said of him, "He's just a young, energetic, competent, committed, devoted man working with a poor parish. And he loves his work. I was inspired by that." Coyle said when writing Into Temptation, he did not intend to make a religious film, and said of protagonist Father John Buerlein, "The character could have been a minister or a rabbi or a public defender. He's a good man trying to do a job the best he can." Ann Luster, the film's producer, helped with the script from the earliest stages, and claimed she and Coyle had a deep understanding of how to handle the characters from the start. The film was set in Minneapolis, Minnesota, where Coyle lived and worked as a writer and actor at the time. The fictional church in the story, St. Mary Magdalen's Downtown Catholic Church, is based in part on the St. Mary Magdalene church in Omaha, Nebraska, where Coyle was raised. However, the real-life church was also very different from the fictional church in that it lacked a shelter and drew very large congregations for weekend mass, compared to the half-empty pews in the fictional church. The fictional church is also based in part on Our Lady of Guadalupe, another Catholic church in south Omaha. The Into Temptation script won the McKnight Screenwriting Fellowship from IFP Minnesota Center for Media Arts, and investors were sought through public readings. After reading the script, Patrick Coyle's wife said, "If you get a good Father John, you'll have a good movie." ### Casting Jeremy Sisto said he was drawn to the script and was excited to take on a different project than his regular role of Detective Cyrus Lupo on the NBC crime drama series Law & Order. Sisto said of working on the show, "For nine months we basically do the same episode over and over. This [Into Tempation script] came out of nowhere." Sisto said of working on Into Temptation: "Having just come off a job where there is little room to find true moments and to create a full character, I felt this respite from the task of trying to force a space where I could express something more personal through my job was no less than a creative life saver." Coyle cold called Kristin Chenoweth's agent and proposed the part, which is different from her usual roles, and her agent said it was the exact part the actress was seeking. In order to film Into Temptation, Chenoweth took a five-day hiatus from her supporting role on the ABC television series Pushing Daisies. Brian Baumgartner, best known for his supporting role as Kevin Malone in the NBC comedy series The Office, was a regular theater performer in the Minneapolis – Saint Paul area before joining that show. While visiting New York City in May 2008 for an upfront presentation, shortly after having finished filming the fourth season of The Office, Baumgartner was offered the Into Temptation script by Coyle, who asked him to consider taking the role of Father Ralph O'Brien. Baumgartner said he enjoyed the script and agreed to the part. Writer and director Patrick Coyle plays Steven Miller, one of Linda's clients. Many of the other minor roles were filled by local Minneapolis actors and community members. Greta Oglesby, who played the street-smart prostitute Miriam, and Isabell Monk O'Connor, who played a librarian who helps Father John, were both veterans of the Minneapolis – Saint Paul theater circuit. Ansa Akyea, who played pimp James St. Clair, and Amy Matthews, who played Father John's ex-girlfriend, were also from the Minneapolis – Saint Paul area. ### Filming Into Temptation was produced by Coyle's production company, Ten Ten Films, and the company Farnam Street II, in association with Cabin 14 Productions. It was distributed by First Look International. About a year before the film was released, Coyle asked Anne Marie Gillen to serve as executive producer. Gillen said she had not responded to a script in such an emotional way since the 1991 drama film Fried Green Tomatoes, which she also produced. Filming, which began in May 2008, took place entirely in Minneapolis. It included several scenes staged in the city's Uptown commercial district, where Coyle lived. In addition to his personal connections to the city, Coyle said filming took place in Minneapolis because it was relatively inexpensive to shoot there and hire local actors. He said, "Shooting in Uptown is a filmmaker's paradise. You've got everything here." Into Tempation was produced and shot on a very low budget of less than \$1 million. Cinematography was provided by David Doyle, who made extensive use of the Red Digital Cinema Camera. The church scenes were filmed at the Incarnation Church in the city. Sisto and Chenoweth both attended mass services at the church as part of their research for the roles. Exterior car scenes were shot in the Uptown district. During one scene in particular, a police car with a siren passed by the actors during a shot. The actors continued uninterrupted, and the final shot was used in the film. Coyle approached Russell Holsapple, a Minneapolis – Saint Paul native and relatively inexperienced composer, to create the score for Into Temptation. Holsapple was given only a few weeks to create the score, which was composed mostly of piano music. Holsapple said Coyle gave him a great deal of artistic freedom and was largely receptive to the themes he wrote. James R. Bakkom worked as production designer on the film, and Deborah Fiscus served as costume designer. Both are natives of the Minneapolis – Saint Paul area. Vanessa Miles was set decorator, while Sarah Jean Kruchowski and Amy Hubbard both worked as art directors. Lee Percy served as editor of the film. He said the final cuts provided to him already contained the actors' strongest performances, but he placed a greater focus on Father John's character in an effort to "help the audience get inside him and connect emotionally". Percy was assisted by editor Scott Ferril. Patrick Coyle's father, Jim, followed production of the film closely, making weekly calls to inquire about it. When his father's health started to decline, Patrick Coyle "worked like hell" to finish the film quickly so his father could see it before he died. The film was finished in December 2008. ## Release ### Distribution Into Temptation was optioned in Hollywood, but Coyle was displeased when industry officials wanted him to change the ending and make the sex scenes more risque. Due to complications from the financial crisis of 2007–2010, the Hollywood discussions eventually collapsed. It did not receive a national release, but played at theaters in New York City, Los Angeles, Fargo, North Dakota, and several cities throughout Minnesota, including Minneapolis and Duluth. Coyle first publicly showed the film on December 26, 2008, at the Omaha hospice where his father Jim was staying for an audience of about 15 people. Jim Coyle, who died a few weeks after the screening, loved the film, describing it as very powerful and truthful. It officially premiered on April 26, 2009, at the Newport Beach Film Festival in Newport Beach, California. During its opening weekend at the Lagoon Cinema in Minneapolis, Into Temptation sold more tickets in three days than any other film during its debut weekend, and sold twice the tickets of such major studio films as Taking Woodstock and Quentin Tarantino's Inglourious Basterds. This resulted in an extended run and strong word-of-mouth that led to exhibitions in other cities. The film earned a total of \$97,457 in gross revenue in the United States. The Into Temptation DVD was released on October 27, 2009, with no bonus features. ### Critical response Into Temptation received generally positive reviews. Variety magazine writer Rob Nelson called it a well-photographed film of "occasionally irreverent wit", and that Coyle "strikes a near-perfect balance between humor and holiness". Nelson said the film "falters only in its hokey characterization" of the Chenoweth character. Colin Covert of the Star Tribune called it a "haunting, carefully crafted movie" with simple "matter-of-fact" direction, a "trim and efficient" screenplay, strong acting and solid characters. Covert said, "This is one of very few American films to deal with religious beliefs about faith and salvation with empathy and insight." OC Weekly writer Matt Coker said Into Temptation had a cohesive script which "strikes just the right cord of reverence for the Catholic faith". He also praised the moments of comic relief with Sisto and Baumgartner, which he said complimented some of the film's heavier moments. L. Kent Wolgamott of the Lincoln Journal Star called Into Temptation a well-made film that "gets the mood right from start to finish". He complimented the performances and said although pornography and prostitution were familiar film topics, "the film's nuanced understanding of the priest and his conflicted role in trying to save Linda adds a new element to the old story." Bob Fischbach of the Omaha World-Herald called the cinematography sharp, the editing crisp, and the acting "uniformly good". He added, "Best of all, the writing is anchored in reality. Coyle lets his film show rather than tell, and lets viewers reach their own conclusions." Lavender magazine writer John Townsend said the film conveyed compassionate views of Christianity and complimented the cinematography. Townsend particularly praised Baumgartner's performance and described the scenes between Sisto and a young boy troubled by his homosexual feelings (John Skelley) as "exquisite". Chelsa Doyle, a writer with the website Blogcritics, called it "a touching and introspective film about faith, hope and choice". Doyle praised the film's quiet tone and the performances of Sisto and Chenoweth, but said it "occasionally gets a little sleepy in the middle", and that the subplot involving Father John's ex-girlfriend could have been cut altogether. Denver Post film critic Lisa Kennedy praised the performances of Sisto and Chenoweth, and complimented Coyle's understanding of the pastoral work of a parish priest. However, she added that the film "doesn't break ground as a story, even one about redemption". Andrea Gronvall of the Chicago Reader called it a "cheesy melodrama", and wrote, "Writer-director Patrick Coyle tackles such weighty issues as child abuse, alcoholism, hypocrisy, celibacy, and Catholic reforms, but the movie's spiritual agenda is belied by its voyeurism." Jeremy Sisto was awarded "Outstanding Achievement in Acting" from the 2009 Newport Beach Film Festival awards. ## Themes Throughout the film, Father John is warned that his role as a priest comes with boundaries, and that he should not become personally involved with the congregants or try to solve their problems except through counseling. However, Father John begins to question those boundaries and reconsider whether the role as priest goes far enough in having a positive, substantive impact on the lives of those in his care, particularly Linda. And, in addition to questioning whether he is helping his congregants, Father John questions whether staying within those boundaries is enough to personally fulfill himself as a priest and provide his own life with meaning. He ultimately crosses over those boundaries and gets personally involved in trying to help Linda by delving into the city's red-light district to seek her. The film takes a modern, liberal approach to the rules and constraints of Catholicism. Even before Father John decides to help Linda, he is questioning the constraints of his religion and calling. While speaking to a prospective mother struggling over whether to raise her daughter within the strict confines of Catholicism, Father John gives her advice beyond the official dogma and encourages her to be flexible, telling her she should "take what works" from the church teachings. Father John also has an unorthodox view of homosexuality compared to the normal views of the church. This is demonstrated in a scene in which the priest comforts a young man who is struggling with his homosexual feelings. In meeting and interacting with the pimps and prostitutes of the red-light district, Into Temptation blurs the lines between good and evil, and between right and wrong. The negative responses Father John encounters from congregants and the church regarding his trips to the red-light district demonstrate the way sex and poverty are often stigmatized in society. As the title suggests, one of the major themes of the film involves the temptations Father John faces to sin and stray from his priestly calling. This is perhaps most strongly manifested in his apparent ambivalence regarding the vow of celibacy required of Catholic priests. As Father John goes deeper into the red-light district and the seedier aspects of Minneapolis, he appears to face temptations from the prostitution and overt sexuality surrounding him. Additionally, it can be interpreted that his interest in Linda is one of physical attraction, as well as a desire to help her. This is further manifested through the sudden reappearance of his former girlfriend, for whom Father John admits to still harboring romantic feelings. The priest demonstrates conflicting emotions when it comes to maintaining his priestly vows and his relationship with Nadine. Into Temptation is also a story of redemption, both for Linda, who is seeking redemption for a life of sin and prostitution, and for Father John, who is seeking redemption for his failure to help Linda and his own doubts about religion and priesthood. At the start of the film, Father John appears to be questioning his duty to the church and its dwindling congregation; this is especially demonstrated when he appears bored during confession and does crossword puzzles to pass the time. Such struggles are not uncommon in priesthood. But after he resists the church boundaries and attempts to help Linda, his faith in the congregation and belief in the profession are restored, and he returns to the church a stronger and more content priest. The film demonstrates the power of compassion and individual kindness, particularly in the way that John's simple act of defending Linda during her childhood was such a profound moment in her life. The film also advocates repentance, and the extent of Linda's victimization can be interpreted as a sign of how catastrophic an unrepentant life can be.

Charles Scott (governor)

Governor of Kentucky from 1808 to 1812

Charles Scott (April 1739 – October 22, 1813) was an American military officer and politician who served as the governor of Kentucky from 1808 to 1812. Orphaned in his teens, Scott enlisted in the Virginia Regiment in October 1755 and served as a scout and escort during the French and Indian War. He quickly rose through the ranks to become a captain. After the war, he married and engaged in agricultural pursuits on land left to him by his father, but he returned to active military service in 1775 as the American Revolution began to grow in intensity. In August 1776, he was promoted to colonel and given command of the 5th Virginia Regiment. The 5th Virginia joined George Washington in New Jersey later that year, serving with him for the duration of the Philadelphia campaign. Scott commanded Washington's light infantry, and by late 1778 was also serving as his chief of intelligence. Furloughed at the end of the Philadelphia campaign, Scott returned to active service in March 1779 and was ordered to South Carolina to assist General Benjamin Lincoln in the southern theater. He arrived in Charleston, South Carolina, just as Henry Clinton had begun his siege of the city. Scott was taken as a prisoner of war when Charleston surrendered. Paroled in March 1781 and exchanged for Lord Rawdon in July 1782, Scott managed to complete a few recruiting assignments before the war ended. After the war, Scott visited the western frontier in 1785 and began to make preparations for a permanent relocation. He resettled near present-day Versailles, Kentucky, in 1787. Confronted by the dangers of Indian raids, Scott raised a company of volunteers in 1790 and joined Josiah Harmar for an expedition against the Indians. After Harmar's Defeat, President Washington ordered Arthur St. Clair to prepare for an invasion of Indian lands in the Northwest Territory. In the meantime, Scott, by now holding the rank of brigadier general in the Virginia militia, was ordered to conduct a series of preliminary raids. In July 1791, he led the most notable and successful of these raids against the village of Ouiatenon. St. Clair's main invasion, conducted later that year, was a failure. Shortly after the separation of Kentucky from Virginia in 1792, the Kentucky General Assembly commissioned Scott as a major general and gave him command of the 2nd Division of the Kentucky militia. Scott's division cooperated with "Mad" Anthony Wayne's Legion of the United States for the rest of the Northwest Indian War, including their decisive victory at the Battle of Fallen Timbers. Having previously served in the Virginia House of Delegates and as a presidential elector, the aging Scott now ran for governor. His 1808 campaign was skillfully managed by his step-son-in-law, Jesse Bledsoe, and he won a convincing victory over John Allen and Green Clay. A fall on the icy steps of the governor's mansion early in his term confined Scott to crutches for the rest of his life, and left him heavily reliant on Bledsoe, whom he appointed Secretary of State. Although he frequently clashed with the state legislature over domestic matters, the primary concern of his administration was the increasing tension between the United States and Great Britain that eventually led to the War of 1812. Scott's decision to appoint William Henry Harrison as brevet major general in the Kentucky militia, although probably in violation of the state constitution as Harrison was not a resident of the state, was nonetheless praised by the state's citizens. After his term expired, Scott returned to his Canewood estate. His health declined rapidly, and he died on October 22, 1813. Scott County, Kentucky, and Scott County, Indiana, are named in his honor, as is the city of Scottsville, Kentucky. ## Early life and family Charles Scott was born in 1739, probably in April, in the part of Goochland County, Virginia, that is now Powhatan County. His father, Samuel Scott, was a farmer and member of the Virginia House of Burgesses. His mother, whose name is not known, died most likely around 1745. Scott had an older brother, John, and three younger siblings, Edward, Joseph, and Martha. He received only a basic education from his parents and in the rural Virginia schools near his home. Shortly after his father died in 1755, Scott was apprenticed to a carpenter. In late July 1755, a local court was preparing to place him with a guardian, but in October, before the court acted, Scott enlisted in the Virginia Regiment. He was assigned to David Bell's company. During the early part of the French and Indian War, he won praise from his superiors as a frontier scout and woodsman. Most of his fellow soldiers were undisciplined and poorly trained, allowing Scott to stand out and quickly rise to the rank of corporal. By June 1756, he had been promoted to sergeant. Many biographies state that Scott served under George Washington in the Braddock Expedition, a failed attempt to capture Fort Duquesne from the French. This, however, is unlikely. There is no record of his claiming participation and his enlistment in the Virginia Regiment occurred after the date of the battle. For most of 1756 and the early part of 1757, he divided his time between Fort Cumberland and Fort Washington, conducting scouting and escort missions. In April 1757, David Bell was relieved of his command as part of a general downsizing of Washington's regiment, and Scott was assigned to Captain Robert McKenzie at Fort Pearsall. In August and September, Washington sent Scott and a small scouting party on two reconnaissance missions to Fort Duquesne in preparation for an assault on that fort, but the party learned little on either mission. In November, Scott was part of the Forbes Expedition that captured the fort. He spent the latter part of the year at Fort Loudoun, where Washington promoted him to ensign. Scott spent most of 1759 conducting escort missions and constructing roads and forts. During this time, Virginia's forces were taken from George Washington and put under the control of Colonel William Byrd. In July 1760, Scott was named the fifth captain of a group of Virginia troops that Byrd led on an expedition against the Cherokee in 1760. Scott's exact role in the campaign is not known. The expedition was a success, and Virginia Governor Francis Fauquier ordered the force disbanded in February 1762; Scott had left the army at some unknown date prior to that. Sometime prior to 1762, Scott's older brother, John, died, leaving Scott to inherit his father's land near the James River and Muddy Creek. Having left the army, he had settled on his inherited farm by late 1761. On February 25, 1762, he married Frances Sweeney from Cumberland County, Virginia. With the help of approximately 10 slaves, Scott engaged in growing tobacco and milling flour on his farm. In July 1766, he was named one of two captains in the local militia. Over the next several years, Scott and his wife had four boys and four or five girls. ## Revolutionary War As the American Revolution intensified in 1775, Scott raised a company of volunteers in Cumberland County. It was the first company formed south of the James River to participate in the Revolution. The company stood ready to aid Patrick Henry in an anticipated clash with Lord Dunmore at Williamsburg, Virginia, in May 1775, but Dunmore abandoned the city in June, and they joined units from the surrounding counties in Williamsburg later that month. In July, the Virginia Convention created two regiments of Virginia troops, one under Patrick Henry and the other under William Woodford. As those leaders departed for Williamsburg, the Conventions acknowledged Scott as temporary commander-in-chief of the volunteers already assembled there. On August 17, 1775, he was elected lieutenant colonel of Woodford's regiment, the 2nd Virginia. His younger brother, Joseph, served as a lieutenant in the regiment. In December, Woodford dispatched Scott and 150 men to Great Bridge, Virginia, to defend a crossing point on the Elizabeth River. Days later, this force played a significant role in the December 9, 1775, Battle of Great Bridge by killing British Captain Charles Fordyce, thereby halting the British advance on the crossing. Following the battle, colonial forces were able to occupy the city of Norfolk, Virginia, and Lord Dunmore eventually departed from Virginia. On February 13, 1776, the 2nd Virginia became a part of the Continental Army; Scott retained his rank of lieutenant colonel during the transition. After spending the winter with part of the 2nd Virginia in Suffolk, Scott was chosen by the Second Continental Congress as colonel of the 5th Virginia Regiment on August 12, 1776; he replaced Colonel William Peachy, who had resigned. The 5th Virginia was stationed in the cities of Hampton and Portsmouth through the end of September. They were then ordered to join George Washington in New Jersey, eventually repairing to the city of Trenton in November. Serving as part of Adam Stephen's brigade, Scott's 5th Virginia Regiment fought in the colonial victory at the December 26 Battle of Trenton. During the subsequent Battle of the Assunpink Creek on January 2, 1777, the 5th Virginia helped slow the advance of a combined force of British light infantry and Hessian mercenaries toward Trenton. Major George Johnston, a member of the 5th Virginia, opined that Scott had "acquired immortal honor" from his performance at Assunpink Creek. Following these battles, Washington's main force prepared to spend the winter at Morristown, New Jersey, while Scott's regiment was based at nearby Chatham. From this base, he led light infantry raids against British foraging parties. In his most notable engagement – the February 1 Battle of Drake's Farm – he performed well against a superior combination of British and Hessian soldiers. He led another notable raid against a large British force of about 2,000 at the February 8 Battle of Quibbletown. ### Philadelphia campaign In March 1777, Scott returned to his Virginia farm, taking his first furlough in more than a year. In recognition of his service with Washington, Congress commissioned him a brigadier general on April 2, 1777. At Washington's request, he returned to Trenton on May 10, 1777. His 4th Virginia Brigade and another brigade under William Woodford constituted the Virginia division, commanded by Adam Stephen, who had been promoted to major general. With Stephen and Brigadier General William Maxwell ill, Scott assumed temporary command of the division between May 19 and 24. Washington spent much of mid-1777 trying to anticipate and counter the moves of British General William Howe, and the lull in the fighting allowed Scott time to file a protest with Congress regarding how his seniority and rank had been calculated. After eight months of deliberation, Congress concurred with Scott's protest, placing him ahead of fellow brigadier general George Weedon in seniority. At the September 11 Battle of Brandywine, the 4th Virginia Brigade stubbornly resisted the advance of General Charles Cornwallis, but was ultimately forced to retreat. Following the British victory, Howe marched toward Philadelphia, stopping briefly at Germantown. Scott persistently advocated for an attack on Howe's position at Germantown, and although he was initially in the minority among Washington's generals, he ultimately prevailed upon Washington to conduct the attack. On October 4, 1777, the 4th Virginia attacked the British in the Battle of Germantown. Because of their circuitous route to the battle, the field was already covered by heavy smoke from muskets and a fire set by the British in a dry buckwheat field when they arrived; they and the other colonial forces were lost in the smoke and retreated. After the defeat at Germantown, Washington's troops took a position in the hills surrounding Whitemarsh, Pennsylvania, about 14 miles (23 km) from Philadelphia. Scott and four other generals initially favored an attack on Philadelphia in December, but after hearing Washington's assessment of the enemy's defenses there, they abandoned the idea. After a series of skirmishes with Howe's men near Whitemarsh, Washington's army camped for the winter at Valley Forge. Scott was afforded the luxury of boarding at the farm of Samuel Jones, about three miles from the camp, but rode out to inspect his brigade daily. Washington granted him a furlough in mid-March 1778, and he returned to Valley Forge on May 20, 1778. When Washington and his men abandoned Valley Forge in mid-June 1778, Scott was ordered to take 1,500 light infantrymen and harass the British forces as they marched across New Jersey. On June 26, the Marquis de Lafayette joined Scott with an additional 1,000 men, in anticipation of a major offensive the next day. General Charles Lee was chosen to command the operation, which was delayed by one day due to inadequate communications and delays in forwarding provisions. Lee shared no battle plan with his generals, later claiming he had insufficient intelligence to form one. On the morning of June 28, Lee launched the attack, beginning the Battle of Monmouth. During the battle, Scott observed American artillerymen retreating. Not realizing that the men had only run out of ammunition, Scott believed the retreat was a sign of the collapse of the American offensive and ordered his men to retreat as well. Lacking a battle plan for guidance, William Maxwell and Anthony Wayne, whose units were fighting adjacent to Scott's men, also ordered a retreat. With such a great number of his men retreating, Lee fell back and eventually aborted the offensive. Although Washington's main force arrived and stopped the British advance, Scott's retreat was partially blamed for giving them control of the battle. Tradition holds that, in the aftermath of the battle, Scott witnessed Washington excoriating Lee in a profanity-laden tirade, but biographer Harry M. Ward considered it unlikely that Scott was present at the meeting. Lee was later court-martialed for the retreat and suspended from command. Following the Battle of Monmouth, the British retreated to New York City. On August 14, Scott was given command of a new light infantry corps organized by Washington. He also served as Washington's chief of intelligence, conducting constant scouting missions from the Americans' new base at White Plains, New York. While Scott's men engaged in a few skirmishes with British scouting parties, neither Washington's army nor the British force at New York City conducted any major operations before Scott was furloughed in November 1778. ### Service in the southern theater and capture A March 1779 letter from Washington to Scott, still on furlough in Virginia, ordered him to recruit volunteers in Virginia and join Washington at Middlebrook on May 1. Men and supplies proved difficult to obtain, delaying Scott's return; during the delay, Washington ordered the recruits to South Carolina to join Benjamin Lincoln, who was in command of the militia forces there. Reports of significant British troop movements toward Georgia had convinced Washington that the enemy was preparing an invasion from the south. Soon after Washington's orders were delivered, a British raiding party under George Collier and Edward Mathew arrived in Virginia to capture or destroy supplies that might otherwise be sent southward to aid the reinforcements going to South Carolina. Scott's orders changed again; the Virginia House of Delegates ordered him to immediately prepare defenses against Collier and Mathew's raids. When it became clear to both the legislature and Washington that Collier and Mathew intended only to raid supplies, not to invade, they concluded that the local militia would be able to sufficiently protect Virginia's interests and that Scott should continue to recruit men to reinforce the south. The legislators presented him with a horse, a firearm, and 500 pounds sterling for his quick response to the threat. Scott's recruiting difficulties in Virginia continued, despite the implementation of a draft by the state legislature. Finally, in October 1779, he forwarded troops sent to him from Washington's Northern Army on to Lincoln in South Carolina, fulfilling his quota. He retained only Abraham Buford's regiment with him in Virginia. In February 1780, about 750 men sent by Washington under William Woodford arrived at Scott's camp in Petersburg, Virginia. Virginia authorities, fearing that the British force to the south under General Henry Clinton would turn north to Virginia, detained Scott and Woodford until it was clear that Clinton's object was Lincoln's position at Charleston, South Carolina. On March 30, 1780, Scott arrived in Charleston just as Clinton was laying siege to the city. He was captured when the city surrendered on May 12, 1780, and was held as a prisoner of war at Haddrell's Point near Charleston. Although he was a prisoner, he was given freedom to move within a six-mile radius and was allowed to correspond and trade with acquaintances in Virginia. With the death of William Woodford on November 13, 1780, he became primarily responsible for the welfare of the Virginia troops at Haddrell's Point. He requested his parole on account of ill health on January 30, 1781, and in late March, Charles Cornwallis granted the request. In July 1782, Scott was exchanged for Lord Rawdon, ending his parole. Washington informed him that he was back on active duty and ordered him to assist General Peter Muhlenberg's recruiting efforts in Virginia, then to report to General Nathanael Greene. Greene wrote that he did not have a command for Scott, and requested that he remain with Muhlenberg in Virginia. The few troops he was able to recruit were sent to a depot at Winchester, Virginia. When the preliminary articles of peace between the United States and Great Britain were signed in March 1783, recruiting stopped altogether. Scott was brevetted to major general on September 30, 1783, just prior to his discharge from the Continental Army. Following the war, he became one of the founding members of the Society of the Cincinnati. ## Settlement in Kentucky and early political career In October 1783, the Virginia Legislature authorized Scott to commission superintendents and surveyors to survey the lands given to soldiers for their service in the Revolutionary War. Enticed by glowing reports of Kentucky by his friend, James Wilkinson, he arranged for a cabin to be built for him near the Kentucky River, although the builder apparently laid only the cornerstone. Scott first visited Kentucky in mid-1785. Traveling with Peyton Short, one of Wilkinson's business partners, he came to Limestone (present-day Maysville, Kentucky) via the Monongahela and Ohio Rivers. Scott and Short then traveled overland to the Kentucky River to examine the land they would later claim. Scott's stay in Kentucky was a short one; he had returned to his farm in Virginia by September 1785. On his return to Virginia, Scott employed Edward Carrington, former quartermaster general of the Southern Army, to set his financial affairs in order in preparation for a move to Kentucky. Carrington purchased Scott's Virginia farm in 1785, but allowed the family to live there until they moved to the frontier. In 1787, Scott settled near the city of Versailles, Kentucky. Between his military claims and those of his children, the Scott family was entitled to 21,035 acres (8,513 ha) in Fayette and Bourbon counties. Scott constructed a two-story log cabin, a stockade, and a tobacco inspection warehouse. In June 1787, Shawnee warriors killed and scalped his son, Samuel, while he was crossing the Ohio River in a canoe; the elder Scott watched helplessly from the riverbank. Although a small party of settlers pursued the Shawnees back across the river, they were not able to overtake them. In volume three of Theodore Roosevelt's The Winning of the West, he stated that Scott "delighted in war" against the Indians after the death of his son. Scott focused on the development of his homestead as a way to deal with the grief of losing his son. The settlement became known as Scott's Landing, and Scott briefly served as a tobacco inspector for the area. Determined to make Scott's Landing the centerpiece of a larger settlement called Petersburg, he began selling lots near the settlement in November 1788. Among those who purchased lots were James Wilkinson, Abraham Buford, Judge George Muter, and future Congressman and Kentucky Governor Christopher Greenup. Scott was one of 37 men who founded the Kentucky Society for the Promotion of Useful Knowledge in 1787. Although he did not participate in any of the ten statehood conventions that sought to separate Kentucky from Virginia, he supported the idea in principle. When Woodford County was formed from the part of Fayette County that included Scott's fledgling settlement, Scott declined appointment as the new county's lieutenant. He consented to be a candidate to represent the county in the Virginia House of Delegates. During his single term, he served on the committee on privileges and election and on several special committees, including one that recommended that President George Washington supply a military guard at Big Bone Lick to facilitate the establishment of a saltworks there. ## Northwest Indian War As tensions mounted between the Indians in the Northwest Territory and settlers on the Kentucky frontier, President Washington began sanctioning joint operations between federal army troops and local frontier militia against the Indians. In April 1790, Scott raised a contingent of volunteers from Bourbon and Fayette counties to join Josiah Harmar in a raid against the Western Confederacy along the Scioto River in what would become the U.S. state of Ohio. The combined force of regulars and militia departed from Limestone on April 18, 1790, crossing the Ohio River and marching to the upper Scioto. From there, they headed south, toward the present-day city of Portsmouth, Ohio, and discovered an abandoned Indian camp. Fresh footprints, including those of a well-known Shawnee warrior – nicknamed Reel Foot because of his two club feet – led away from the camp site. Scott sent a small detachment to follow the tracks; ultimately, they discovered, killed, and scalped four Shawnees, including Reel Foot. Other than this, the expedition accomplished nothing, and it disbanded on April 27, 1790. In June 1790, Harmar and Arthur St. Clair were ordered to lead another expedition against the Indians. Harmar had hoped that Scott, Isaac Shelby, or Benjamin Logan would join the campaign and lead the Kentucky militia, but all three declined. Scott had been elected to represent Woodford County in the Virginia General Assembly, and his legislative duty prevented his service. He believed that the Kentucky militiamen would only serve under Colonel Robert Trotter, a veteran of Logan's earlier Indian fighting campaigns. Ultimately, command of the Kentucky militiamen was given to Major John Hardin, and many militiamen refused to join the campaign, just as Scott had predicted. During the expedition, Scott's son, Merritt, who was serving as a captain in the Woodford County militia, was killed and scalped. The entire expedition was a failure, and it solidified the Kentucky militiamen's strong distrust of Harmar; most vowed never to fight alongside him again. During Harmar's Campaign, Scott was serving in the state legislature in Richmond, Virginia. He was once again appointed to the committee on privileges and election. He also served on the committee on propositions and grievances and several special committees. On December 30, 1790, Virginia Governor Beverley Randolph, possibly acting on a recommendation from Washington, appointed Scott brigadier general in the Virginia militia and gave him command of the entire District of Kentucky. His primary responsibility was overseeing a line of 18 outposts along the Ohio River. In January 1791, President Washington accepted U.S. Senator John Brown's suggestion to appoint a Kentucky Board of War, composed of Brown, Scott, Isaac Shelby, Harry Innes, and Benjamin Logan. The committee was empowered to call out local militia to act in conjunction with federal troops against the Indians. They recommended assembling an army of volunteers to locate and destroy Indian settlements north of the Ohio River. Later that month, Washington approved a plan to invade the Indians' homelands via a raid from Fort Washington (near present-day Cincinnati, Ohio). Most Kentuckians were displeased with Washington's choice of Arthur St. Clair, by then suffering from gout and unable to mount his own horse unassisted, as overall commander of the invasion. Scott was chosen to serve under St. Clair as commander of the 1,000 militiamen who took part in the invasion, about one-third of the total force. ### The Blackberry Campaign Washington ordered Scott to conduct a series of preliminary raids in mid-1791 that would keep the enemy occupied while St. Clair assembled the primary invasion force. Both Isaac Shelby and Benjamin Logan had hoped to lead the campaign, and neither would accept a lesser position. Shelby nevertheless supported the campaign, while Logan actively opposed it. Scott issued a call for volunteers to assemble at Frankfort, Kentucky, on May 15, 1791, to carry out these raids. Kentuckians responded favorably to the idea of an all-militia campaign, and 852 men volunteered for service, although Scott was only authorized to take 750; Senator John Brown was among the volunteers. After a brief delay to learn the fate of a failed diplomatic mission to the Miami tribes in the Northwest Territory, Scott's men departed from Fort Washington on May 24. The militiamen crossed the Ohio toward a clutch of Miami, Kickapoo, Wea, and Potawatomi settlements near the location of present-day Lafayette, Indiana. For eight days, they crossed rugged terrain and were bedraggled by frequent rainstorms. The harsh conditions spoiled the militia's supplies, and they resorted to gathering the blackberries that were growing in the area; for this reason, the expedition earned the nickname the "Blackberry Campaign". As Scott's men reached an open prairie near the Wea settlement of Ouiatenon on June 1, they were discovered by an enemy scout and hurried to attack the villages before the residents could react. When the main force reached the villages, they found the residents hurriedly fleeing across the Wabash River in canoes. Aided by cover fire from a Kickapoo village on the other side of the river, they were able to escape before Scott's men could attack. The river was too wide to ford at Scott's location, so he sent a detachment under James Wilkinson in one direction and a detachment under Thomas Barbee in the other to find a place to ford the river. Wilkinson did not find a suitable location, but located and killed a small band of Indians before returning. Barbee located a crossing and conducted a brief raid against the Indians on the other side before returning to Scott. The next morning, Scott's main force burned the nearby villages and crops, while a detachment under Wilkinson set out for the settlement of Kethtippecannunk. The inhabitants of this village had fled across Eel Creek, and after a brief and ineffective firefight, Wilkinson's men burned the city and returned to Scott. In his official report, Scott noted that many of Kethtippecannunk's residents were French and speculated that it was connected to, perhaps dependent upon, the French settlement of Detroit. Low on supplies, Scott and his men ended their campaign. On the return trip, two men drowned in the White River; these were the only deaths among Scott's men. Five others were wounded but survived. In total, they had killed 38 Indians and taken 57 more prisoner. Scott sent 12 men ahead with the official report for Arthur St. Clair's review; the rest of the men arrived at Fort Steuben (present-day Clarksville, Indiana) on June 15. The next day, they recrossed the Ohio River and received their discharge papers at Louisville, Kentucky. ### St. Clair expedition Scott's Wabash Campaign was well-received both in Kentucky and by the Washington administration. On June 24, 1791, Arthur St. Clair encouraged the Board of War to organize a second expedition into the Wabash region and to remove their outposts along the Ohio River to free up manpower and finances as a prelude to his larger invasion. Scott questioned the wisdom of removing the outposts and convinced his fellow members of the Board of War to retain one at Big Bone Lick and one guarding an ironworks at the mouth of the Kentucky River. His instincts later proved to be right; a month later, Indian raiders tried to deny the frontier settlers access to salt by capturing Big Bone Lick, but they were repelled by the militia stationed at the outpost there. Scott also did not believe that 500 men, St. Clair's requested number for the second Wabash expedition, was sufficient for an effective operation. In July, Scott gave permission to Bourbon County resident John Edwards to lead 300 men against a band of Indians suspected of stealing horses on the Kentucky side of the Ohio River. Although Edwards' expedition almost reached the Sandusky River, they found only deserted villages. Unknown to the volunteers, they narrowly missed being ambushed by the Indians in the area. Many of the men who accompanied Edwards accused him of cowardice. Due to illness, Scott was unable to lead the expedition St. Clair requested; instead, he chose his friend, James Wilkinson, to lead it. Wilkinson's men departed on August 1. During their expedition, they destroyed the evacuated village of Kikiah (also called Kenapocomoco), the rebuilt settlement of Ouiatenon, a small Kickapoo village, and several other small settlements in the area. Returning by the same route that Scott's previous expedition had, Wilkinson's men were back in Kentucky by August 21. Scott's and Wilkinson's campaigns took a heavy toll on the Northwest Indians. In particular, the Weas and Kickapoos signed a peace treaty with the United States the following year, and the Kickapoos migrated farther into Illinois and Missouri. St. Clair continued his preparations for invading the northwest despite the fact that, by now, he admitted he was unfit for combat due to his ill health. Like Harmar, he was also unpopular in Kentucky, and Scott had to conduct a draft to raise the militiamen needed for St. Clair's expedition. He and most other officers in Kentucky claimed they were too ill to lead the men; most actually feared losing the respect of Kentuckians through their association with St. Clair. Colonel William Oldham was the highest-ranking soldier willing to lead the Kentuckians. St. Clair's party left Fort Washington on October 1. On November 3, he ordered his men to make camp on a small tributary of the Wabash River, mistakenly believing they were camping on the St. Marys River. His intent was for the men to construct some protective works the next day, but before sunrise, a combined group of Miami and Canadians attacked the party, routing them and capturing part of their artillery and most of their supplies. Of St. Clair's force of 1,400 men, 600 were killed and 300 captured during the attack. The Kentucky militiamen scattered during the attack, and their leader, Colonel Oldham, was killed. Nevertheless, they and most citizens in Kentucky blamed St. Clair for the entire debacle. St. Clair retreated to Fort Washington, and on November 24, Scott joined him there with 200 mounted volunteers in case the Indians decided to pursue him and invade Kentucky. When it became apparent that no Indian invasion was imminent, Scott's men returned home. As a result of St. Clair's campaign, tribes that had previously been neutral in the conflict – including the Delawares and Wyandots – allied with the Miami and Shawnee against the frontiersmen. ### Service with the Legion of the United States After St. Clair's Defeat, President Washington asked Congress to authorize the formation of the Legion of the United States, a 5,000-man force to fight the Indians in the Northwest. Congress approved the proposal in March 1792, and Scott learned from a friend in Philadelphia that he was being considered as commander of the Legion. Ultimately Washington concluded that he was "of inadequate abilities"; his known vice of drinking too much alcohol also concerned Washington. Instead, Washington chose "Mad" Anthony Wayne to command the Legion. On June 4, 1792 – just days after Kentucky officially gained statehood – the Kentucky General Assembly commissioned Scott and Benjamin Logan as major generals in the state militia. On June 25, Scott was given command of the militia's 2nd Division, which was charged with operating north of the Kentucky River; Logan's 1st Division operated south of the river. The new state legislature had also appointed a five-man committee to select a city to be the new state capital. Scott applied to have Petersburg, still a fledgling settlement, designated as the capital. Other localities – including Frankfort, Lexington, Louisville, and Boonesborough – also applied. Frankfort was eventually chosen, as Scott's failure to secure Petersburg's designation as the state capital contributed more than anything else to the settlement's failure to even become a viable city. Scott's son, Charles, Jr., wrote to his brother Daniel that their father was planning to run for Congress in 1792; although Charles, Jr. expressed confidence that his father would be elected, his campaign apparently never materialized or faltered shortly after it began. He was chosen as a presidential elector in 1793. Wayne originally intended to use Kentucky militiamen in preemptive strikes against the Indians and to conduct the main invasion using only federal troops, but by the time he moved to Fort Washington in mid-1793, he had assembled fewer than 3,000 of the 5,000 troops he had anticipated. He now requested that Scott's and Logan's men join his main force. Logan flatly refused to cooperate with a federal officer, but Scott eventually agreed, and Wayne commissioned him an officer in the federal army on July 1, 1793. He and Governor Isaac Shelby instituted a draft to raise the 1,500 troops he was to command in Wayne's operation. When he joined Wayne at Fort Jefferson on October 21, 1793, he had only been able to raise 1,000 men. On November 4, Wayne ordered Scott's militiamen to destroy a nearby Delaware village. Still resentful and distrustful of federal officers and aware that Wayne would not launch a major offensive so close to winter, the men were not enthusiastic about the mission, which many of them considered trivial. That night, 501 of them deserted their camp, though Wayne noted in his report that he believed Scott and his officers had done all they could do to prevent the desertions. Scott attempted to continue the mission with his remaining men, but inclement weather prevented him from conducting a major offensive. Ultimately, the men were only able to disperse a small hunting camp before continuing on to Fort Washington and mustering out on November 10. Wayne ordered Scott to return with a full quota of troops after the winter. Tensions cooled between Wayne and the Kentuckians over the winter of 1793–94. Wayne noticed that, despite their obstinance, the Kentucky volunteers appeared to be good soldiers. The militiamen, after observing Wayne, concluded that he – unlike Harmar and St. Clair – knew how to combat the Indians. Wayne augmented his popularity in Kentucky by building Fort Recovery over the winter on the site of St. Clair's defeat. The Indians' victory over St. Clair had become a part of their lore and inspired them to continue the fight against the western settlers; Wayne's construction of a fort on this site was a blow to the Indian psyche, and his re-burial of some 600 skulls that the Indians had dug up and scattered across the area was popular with Kentuckians, since many of their own were among the dead. While Scott came to respect Wayne personally, his friend, James Wilkinson, began an anonymous campaign to tarnish Wayne's image, coveting command of the Northwest expedition for himself. Scott, on leave in Philadelphia at the time, wrote to Secretary of War Henry Knox to defend Wayne's reputation, breaching his friendship with Wilkinson. Scott returned to Kentucky from Philadelphia in June 1794, mustered 1,500 militiamen, and joined Wayne at Fort Greeneville on July 27. He and Thomas Barbee led this force in support of Wayne's 1,000 regular troops. The combined force marched quickly and captured the recently evacuated Indian town of Grand Glaize on August 8. Here, Wayne ordered the construction of Fort Defiance, which took approximately a week. Scott was responsible for the naming of the fort; while observing its construction, he declared, "I defy the English, Indians, and all the devils in hell to take it." Based upon intelligence provided by Scott's mounted volunteers, Wayne ordered his force to march toward Fort Miami on August 14, anticipating a battle with a combined British and Indian force of 2,400 there. About 8:45 a.m. on August 20, Major William Price's brigade of volunteers engaged the Indian force near Fort Miami, beginning the Battle of Fallen Timbers. The well-positioned Indian force turned back Price's men, but Wayne ordered his regulars to conduct a vigorous bayonet charge, which routed the Indians. Major William Campbell, the British commander of Fort Miami, refused to open the fort to his Indian allies, and Wayne's force won a decisive victory. Following the battle, Wayne ordered Scott's volunteers to conduct numerous raids within a fifty-mile radius of their position. Due to a lack of pack horses in Wayne's force, the mounted volunteers were also employed transporting supplies between forts throughout September 1794. They eventually grew weary of garrison duty and complained that the use of their personal horses to transport goods had injured the animals. Many threatened to mutiny if not discharged. On October 13, 1794, Wayne finally ordered them home. In a commendation of Wayne issued on December 4, 1794, the U.S. House of Representatives specifically thanked Scott and his men for their service at the Battle of Fallen Timbers. The Treaty of Greenville formally ended the war in mid-1795. ## Later political career In 1795, Scott traveled to Philadelphia to help clarify service records that would determine the final pay of the men who served under him before returning to his farm in Kentucky. He continued to serve, nominally, as major general of the 2nd militia division of the state militia until 1799. Celebrations of Scott's military heroism were held all over Kentucky, sparking his interest in a political career. With the advent of the First Party System, he declared himself a Democratic-Republican, as did most Kentuckians. In 1800, he was chosen as a presidential elector for his district by a vote of 75 to 44 over Caleb Wallace. Scott and his fellow electors all cast their votes for the ticket of Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr. In 1803, Secretary of War Henry Dearborn appointed Scott and Governor James Garrard to evaluate sites in Kentucky on which to construct a replacement for Fort Washington. Garrard, a central Kentucky native, insisted that the fort should be built at Frankfort. Scott disagreed, contending that the fort should not be in the state's interior and that the hilly terrain around Frankfort was unsuitable for constructing a fort. He waited several days for an appointment with Garrard to try and reach an agreement, but when he was unable to secure one, he asked Dearborn for permission to act alone. Dearborn granted the request and accepted Scott's recommendation of a site in Newport, Kentucky. In 1804, Scott was again chosen a presidential elector with minimal opposition. In 1797, Scott's son Daniel, who had settled in Virginia, died. In late 1799 or early 1800, his last son, Charles, Jr., also died. His daughter Martha married future U.S. Senator George M. Bibb in 1799 and moved to Daviess County. Daughter Mary had married and left the farm prior to Scott's return from military service, and youngest daughter Nancy left the farm near the turn of the 19th century, although she never married. After the death of his wife on October 6, 1804, he moved in with his daughter and son-in-law, John and Mary Postlethwait, in Lexington. He sold his farm in Woodford County in October 1805. As tensions between the U.S. and Great Britain escalated in the wake of the June 22, 1807, Chesapeake–Leopard affair, Scott applied to Governor Christopher Greenup to raise a mounted militia unit in anticipation of an outbreak of hostilities. Although Greenup granted the requested authorization, Scott remarried on July 25, 1807, and never assembled the militia unit. His second wife, Judith Cary (Bell) Gist, was the 57-year-old widow of Colonel Nathaniel Gist, who had been a prisoner of war with Scott during the Revolutionary War. After their marriage, they moved to Canewood, Gist's family's plantation in Bourbon and Clark counties. ### Gubernatorial election of 1808 As the celebrations in honor of Scott's military career continued across Kentucky, he began to consider the possibility of running for governor in 1808. By mid-1806, state senator Thomas Posey and Lexington lawyer Thomas Todd had already declared their candidacies. Posey had been chosen speaker pro tem of the state Senate and, with the death of Lieutenant Governor John Caldwell in 1804, had assumed the role of acting lieutenant governor and presiding officer in the Senate. He subsequently lost his senatorial re-election bid, but continued to act as lieutenant governor and preside over the Senate. His opponents claimed that since he was no longer a member of the Senate, he was not qualified to act as lieutenant governor; additionally, they charged that he was sympathetic to the hated Federalist Party, even though he self-identified as a Democratic-Republican. Although he was not successfully unseated as the Senate's presiding officer, the controversy diminished his chances in the 1808 election. In 1807, Todd removed himself from contention as well, accepting Governor Greenup's appointment to the Kentucky Court of Appeals. Posey's diminished candidacy and Todd's exit from the race left only one major impediment to Scott's potential candidacy. A movement began in Kentucky to draft former Governor Isaac Shelby as a candidate for another term. Known as "Old King's Mountain" for his heroic role in the Revolutionary War Battle of King's Mountain, Shelby could match Scott's military appeal, and as a former delegate to Kentucky's statehood and constitutional conventions and a former governor, his political experience far exceeded Scott's. Ultimately Shelby declined to run, and Scott officially declared his candidacy on February 11, 1808. John Allen had by then declared his candidacy and Green Clay's announcement followed Scott's by about a month. Scott's campaign was managed by his stepson-in-law, Jesse Bledsoe, a law professor at Transylvania University. Bledsoe was among the most able politicians in the state, though he preferred the role of "kingmaker" to that of candidate. Allen and Clay, both lawyers by profession, were hurt by a general distrust of lawyers by the Kentucky electorate. Further, Allen had served as general counsel for Aaron Burr, and several anonymous letters to the state's newspapers accused him of being privy to Burr's alleged scheme to create an independent state in the southwest. Henry Clay was among those who vigorously defended Allen from the charges. Scott also frequently spoke in highly complimentary terms of Allen. As a legislator, Green Clay pushed for measures favorable to debtors; he consequently enjoyed strong support from settlers south of the Green River, many of whom were squatters and land speculators who owed substantial debts to the state. To counter Scott's hero image, Clay supporters pointed to his service with George Rogers Clark in a 1782 expedition against the Shawnee, but the impact of this line of campaigning was minimal. As the most senior Revolutionary War officer in Kentucky, Scott became the recognized leader of the state's veterans' lobby. The Independence Day celebrations held around the state just before the August 1 election provided a boost for his campaign. On election day, he garnered 22,050 votes, compared to 8,430 votes for Allen and 5,516 votes for Clay. ### Governorship Among Scott's first acts as governor was appointing Jesse Bledsoe as Secretary of State. Bledsoe delivered Scott's first address to the legislature on December 13, 1808. Later that winter, Scott was injured when he slipped on the icy steps of the governor's mansion; the injury left him confined to crutches for the rest of his life and rendered him even more dependent on Bledsoe to perform many of his official functions. His physical condition continued to worsen throughout his term as governor. In domestic matters, Scott advocated increased salaries for public officials, economic development measures, and heavy punishments for persistent criminals. While he desired a tax code that would preclude the need for the state to borrow money, he encouraged legislators to keep taxes as low as possible. He also urged them to convert the militia into a youth army. The General Assembly routinely ignored his calls for reform but did pass a measure he advocated that allowed debtors a one-year stay on collection of their debts if they provided both bond and security. Scott frequently clashed with the legislature, including once when the Senate refused to confirm the appointment of Dr. Walter Brashear as lieutenant colonel commandant of the state militia's second regiment. The governor refused to nominate anyone else for the position, saying that Brashear was the best person for it, and he assumed the senators would not want to be sent a worse nomination. He employed his gubernatorial veto three times over the course of his tenure, but all three were overridden by the legislature. Measures creating Harrison County and allowing squatters to purchase occupied land on more favorable terms were both vetoed because Scott felt that they had been passed too hastily to allow proper debate. Scott also vetoed the revocation of a pension granted to recently retired Kentucky Court of Appeals justice George Muter, because he felt it undermined citizens' confidence in the promises of their government. Throughout his term, Scott was dogged by rumors of heavy drinking and frequent use of profanity. On one occasion, an unnamed individual believed his reputation had been injured by something Scott had said and challenged him to a duel. He ignored the challenge, after which the challenger threatened to expose him as a coward. Scott was supposed to have replied, "Post and be damned; but if you do, you will only post yourself a damned liar, and everybody else will say so." On another occasion, after reviewing a speech written for him by Bledsoe, the governor was said to have remarked, "Well, Mr. Bledsoe, I know you think you are a damned sight smarter than I am, and so you are in many respects; but this message as it is now, won't do at all; I'll be damned if it will." When Bledsoe asked what was wrong with the speech, he reportedly replied, "Why, damn it to hell, why don't you put a good solemn prayer at the end of it, and talk about Providence, and the protection of Heaven, and all that?" After the governor campaigned for Humphrey Marshall's opponent in the 1809 legislative elections, Marshall published an article in the Western World newspaper that accused him of appearing in front of the court house drunk on election day. For most of Scott's tenure as governor, tensions between the U.S. and Great Britain escalated. Sentiment in favor of a U.S. declaration of war against the British was particularly strong in Kentucky. Most Kentuckians resented the replacement of the Embargo Act of 1807 with the weaker Non-Intercourse Act of 1809 and Macon's Bill Number 2. Kentucky Senator Henry Clay became the acknowledged leader of the war hawks in Congress. During an address to the General Assembly on December 4, 1810, Scott expressed little hope of peacefully resolving U.S. grievances against Great Britain. He reminded the General Assembly that France had also violated the United States' maritime rights and urged equal treatment of the two countries for their offenses. In September 1811, William Henry Harrison, then governor of Indiana Territory, visited Kentucky and directed Colonel Samuel Wells to recruit Kentuckians for a new federal regiment then being formed by the authority of Secretary of War William Eustis. Harrison had not applied to Scott for permission to recruit in the state, and many Kentuckians – from Scott's political enemy, Humphrey Marshall, to his trusted advisor, Jesse Bledsoe – perceived this as a slight to the governor. Ignoring Bledsoe's indignation, Scott refused to make an issue of the faux pas and instead became one of the staunchest supporters of Harrison's rising career. In November 1811, a messenger brought news to Kentucky of former Kentucky Attorney General Joseph Hamilton Daveiss's death at the Battle of Tippecanoe, amplifying Kentuckians' outcry for war with the British and Indians. In anticipation of a federal call for volunteers, Scott published messages in the state's newspapers in February and April 1812 whipping up support for the impending war effort. By the end of July, the state's quota of 5,500 volunteers had been met. On August 14, 1812, Scott greeted two regiments of soldiers at the governor's mansion just prior to their muster at Georgetown. He hobbled among the soldiers with his crutch, then turned and hammered it against the mansion's steps and was heard to mutter "If it hadn't been for you, I could have gone with the boys myself." On August 25, 1812, Scott's last day in office, he appointed Harrison brevet major general over the Kentucky militia. The appointment was made on advice from incoming Governor Isaac Shelby and Henry Clay. The brevet ensured that Harrison, and not James Winchester – who was unpopular in Kentucky and with his own troops – would lead the state's military forces in the war. Biographer Harry M. Ward noted that Harrison's commission was unconstitutional both because he was not a citizen of the state and because the state militia's allotment of major generals had already been filled. Kentucky historian Lowell H. Harrison concurred that the commission was "probably illegal", but further noted that it was "acclaimed across the state". The show of confidence from Scott and his aides influenced President James Madison to appoint Harrison as supreme commander of the Army of the Northwest. ### Death and legacy Following his term as governor, Scott retired to his Canewood estate with his wife and youngest step-daughter, Mary Cecil Gist. Two of his stepdaughters had married during his term as governor. In 1809, Anna Maria Gist married Captain Nathaniel G. S. Hart, who was killed in the River Raisin Massacre in January 1813. Eliza Violet Gist married Francis Preston Blair on July 21, 1812, just prior to the expiration of Scott's term as governor. The governor opined that Blair, who was slightly built, stoop-shouldered, and suffering from tuberculosis, would leave Eliza a widow within six months. Blair survived the tuberculosis and went on to become a trusted advisor to President Andrew Jackson. He outlived Scott's prediction for him by more than sixty years. By mid-1813, Scott's health had begun to fail rapidly. He died on October 22, 1813, and was buried on the grounds of Canewood. At the time of his death, he was one of the last surviving generals of the Revolutionary War. His remains were re-interred at Frankfort Cemetery in 1854. Scott County, Kentucky, and Scott County, Indiana, are named in his honor, as are the cities of Scottsville, Kentucky, and Scottsville, Virginia.

James Wood Bush

American Union Navy sailor of British and Native Hawaiian descent

James Wood Bush (c. 1844–45 – April 24, 1906) was an American Union Navy sailor of British and Native Hawaiian descent. He was among a group of more than one hundred Native Hawaiian and Hawaii-born combatants in the American Civil War, at a time when the Kingdom of Hawaii was still an independent nation. Enlisting in the Union Navy in 1864, Bush served as a sailor aboard USS Vandalia and the captured Confederate vessel USS Beauregard, which maintained the blockade of the ports of the Confederacy. He was discharged from service in 1865 after an injury, which developed into a chronic condition in later life. The impoverished Bush was unable to return to Hawaii for more than a decade, during which time he traveled through New England and much of the Pacific. Back in Hawaii, he worked as a government tax collector and road supervisor for the island of Kauai, where he settled down. In later life, he converted to Mormonism and became an active member of the Hawaiian Mission. After the annexation of Hawaii to the United States, Bush was recognized for his military service, and in 1905 was granted a government pension for the injuries he received in the Navy. He died at his home on Kauai on April 24, 1906. For a long period after the Civil War, the legacy and contributions of Bush and other documented Hawaiian participants were largely forgotten except in the private circles of descendants and historians. There has been a revival of interest, especially through the efforts of his great-grandniece Edna Bush Ellis and others in the Hawaiian community. In 2010, the "Hawaiʻi Sons of the Civil War" were commemorated with a bronze plaque erected along the memorial pathway at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu. ## Early life James Wood Bush was born in Honolulu, on the island of Oahu. The date of his birth is uncertain; sources claim it to be October 1844, 1845, or 1847–1848. The 1900 United States Census records his birth date as November 1845. He was the son of George Henry Bush (1807–1853), a native of Suffolk, England, who settled in Hawaii in 1825, and his Hawaiian wife. Bush was thus of mixed Native Hawaiian and Caucasian descent, known as hapa haole in Hawaiian, although in the United States he was referred to as a "half-caste". His older brother was John Edward Bush, who became a newspaper publisher and politician, serving as royal governor of Kauaʻi and a cabinet minister under the reign of King Kalākaua. Little is known about Bush's life before 1864. Like his brother, he began his career as a sailor working on either merchant or whaling ships in the Pacific. Hawaiian sailors were highly regarded in the 18th- and 19th-century maritime industry. ## American Civil War After the outbreak of the American Civil War, the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi, under King Kamehameha IV, declared its neutrality on August 26, 1861. Some Native Hawaiians and Hawaiian-born Americans (mainly descendants of American missionaries) both abroad and in the islands volunteered to enlist in the military regiments of various states in the Union and the Confederacy. Individual Native Hawaiians had been serving in the United States Navy and Army since the War of 1812, and more served during the Civil War. Many Hawaiians sympathized with the Union because of Hawaiʻi's ties to New England through its missionaries and the whaling industries, and the ideological opposition of many to the institution of slavery. Arriving in New England at the beginning of the war, Bush enlisted at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, for a three-year term as an "ordinary seaman" on September 27, 1864. During his service, he worked on USS Vandalia and later the captured Confederate vessel USS Beauregard, which chased blockade runners off West Florida as part of the squadrons responsible for maintaining the blockade of the ports of the Confederacy. He developed chronic laryngitis and spinal injuries due to his service in the Union Navy and was discharged in September 1865 at the Brooklyn Naval Hospital. When the war ended, the impoverished Bush had no way of returning to Hawaii. For the next decade, he lived in New Bedford, San Francisco, and Tahiti, finally returning to Hawaii in 1877. In 1905, after Hawaii became a US territory, Bush was granted a pension for his service in the Civil War, with back pensions dating from May 8, 1897. ## Later life After returning to Hawaii, Bush settled on the island of Kauai. In 1880, he was listed as the tax collector of Kawaihau, Kauai. In 1882, his older brother, in his capacity as Minister of the Interior, appointed Bush the Road Supervisor for the District of Hanalei to replace Christian Bertlemann, who had resigned. In 1887, Bush converted to Mormonism and was ordained an elder after two years, undertaking missionary work in the islands. He became the bishop of the Latter-day Saints ward in Kealia and hosted Mormon historian Andrew Jenson during his 1895 visit to Kauai. In around 1894, Bush married a young Hawaiian girl named Sarah Kaloaaole Makahi (1879–1963) at Lahaina, traveling to Kona after their marriage. Bush died of heart failure at Kealia, Kauai, on April 24, 1906. In the last years of his life, he was a janitor at the Kealia prison. He was survived by his wife Sarah and son James, Jr. Lorenzo Taylor, writing for the Deseret News shortly after Bush's death, said, "[H]e has taken an active part in the missionary work, doing much good among his fellow men. He has also been very kind to the elders, and his doors were always open to them. He was greatly beloved and respected by all who knew him. His life was a noble example of faithful and untiring devotion to the Gospel." Bush is believed to be buried on Kauai, but the location of his grave is uncertain. According to Anita Manning, an Associate in Cultural Studies at Bishop Museum, "even the family can't find him". ## Legacy After the war, the military service of Hawaiians, including James Wood Bush and many others, was largely forgotten, disappearing from the collective memories of the American Civil War and the history of Hawaii. Hawaiian residents, historians, and descendants of Hawaiian combatants in the conflict have insisted on the need to remember the legacy of the Hawaiians who fought. Renewed interest in the stories of these individuals and this particular period of Hawaiian-American history has inspired efforts to preserve the memories of the Hawaiians who served in the war. Stating that "our boys from Hawaii" should be remembered, Bush's great-grandniece Edna Bush Ellis was influential in reviving interest and in the effort to install a memorial recognizing their legacy. On August 26, 2010, on the anniversary of the signing of the Hawaiian Neutrality Proclamation, a bronze plaque was erected along the memorial pathway at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific in Honolulu recognizing the "Hawaiʻi Sons of the Civil War", the more than one hundred Hawaiians who were documented as serving during the American Civil War for both the Union and the Confederacy. As of 2014, researchers have identified 119 documented Native Hawaiian and Hawaii-born combatants from historical records. The exact number still remains unclear because many Hawaiians enlisted and served under Anglicized names, and little is known about them due to the lack of detailed records. In 2015, the sesquicentennial of the end of the American Civil War, the National Park Service released the publication Asians and Pacific Islanders and the Civil War about the service of the many combatants of Asian and Pacific Islander descent who fought during the war. The history of Hawaii's involvement and the biographies of Bush and others were written by historians Anita Manning, Justin Vance, and others. ## See also - Hawaii and the American Civil War

Lycoperdon echinatum

Species of puffball mushroom

Lycoperdon echinatum, commonly known as the spiny puffball or the spring puffball, is a type of puffball mushroom in the family Agaricaceae. The saprobic species has been found in Africa, Europe, Central America, and North America, where it grows on soil in deciduous woods, glades, and pastures. It has been proposed that North American specimens be considered a separate species, Lycoperdon americanum, but this suggestion has not been followed by most authors. Molecular analysis indicates that L. echinatum is closely related to the puffball genus Handkea. The fruit bodies of L. echinatum are 2–4 cm (0.8–1.6 in) wide by 2–3.5 cm (0.8–1.4 in) tall, supported by a small base, and densely covered with spines that are up to 0.6 cm (0.2 in) long. The spines can fall off in maturity, leaving a net-like pattern of scars on the underlying surface. Initially white in color, the puffballs turn a dark brown as they mature, at the same time changing from nearly round to somewhat flattened. Young specimens of L. echinatum resemble another edible spiny puffball, Lycoperdon pulcherrimum, but the latter species does not turn brown as it ages. The fruit bodies are edible when young, when the interior is white and firm and before it has turned into a powdery brown mass of spores. Laboratory tests have shown that extracts of the fruit bodies can inhibit the growth of several bacteria that are pathogenic to humans. ## Taxonomy and phylogeny The species was first described by Christian Hendrik Persoon in 1797. It was later reduced to a variety of Lycoperdon gemmatum (as L. gemmatum var. echinatum; L. gemmatum is now known as Lycoperdon perlatum) by Elias Magnus Fries, but American mycologist Charles Horton Peck, who extensively studied the North American distribution of the genus, raised it again to species level in 1879. He thought it worthy of status as a species distinct from L. gemmatum because of the different character of its warts, its much spinier appearance, and the smoother surface of the peridium underneath the spines. Miles Joseph Berkeley and Christopher Edmund Broome wrote of the fungus in 1871, but believed their specimen, collected from Reading, Berkshire, by Hoyle, represented a new species, which they called Lycoperdon Hoylei. They wrote that their specimen agreed "exactly with an authentic specimen of Persoon's L. echinatum externally, who could, however, scarcely have overlooked the lilac spores." Despite the apparent difference in spore color, L. Hoylei is currently considered synonymous with L. echinatum. Utraria echinata, named by Lucien Quélet in 1873, is another synonym for L. echinatum. In 1972, Vincent Demoulin described the species Lycoperdon americanum on the basis of a specimen found in North Carolina. Although he believed it to be a unique species, several authors consider it synonymous with L. echinatum. Phylogenetic analysis of the sequence and secondary structure of the ribosomal RNA (rRNA) genes coding for the internal transcribed spacer units suggests that Lycoperdon echinatum forms a clade with the puffball genus Handkea, separate from the type species of Lycoperdon, Lycoperdon perlatum. In previous analyses that used only the rRNA sequences for phylogenetic comparison, L. echinatum formed a clade with L. mammiforme, L. foetidum, and Bovistella radicata (now known as Lycoperdon radicatum), but separate from L. pyriforme. The species is commonly known as the "spiny puffball" or the "spring puffball"; Peck referred to the species as the "echinate puff-ball". The specific epithet echinatum is derived from the Greek word echinos (εχινος) meaning "hedgehog" or "sea-urchin". ## Description The fruit bodies of L. echinatum are 2–4 cm (0.8–1.6 in) wide by 2–3.5 cm (0.8–1.4 in) tall, and are roughly spherical, or pear-shaped. The exterior surface is crowded with spines that may be up to 0.6 cm (0.2 in) long. According to Curtis Gates Lloyd, American specimens have more slender spines than European ones. Initially white and becoming dark brown in maturity, the spines are often joined at the tips in groups of three or four. In this form the puffballs resemble acorn caps of burr oak, with which they may readily be confused. The spines slough off in age, revealing a somewhat net-like or reticulated surface. The fruit body has a small base that is an off-white or purple-gray color, and it may be attached to the growing surface by thin white cords (rhizomorphs). The internal contents of the puffball contain the gleba, a mass of spores and associated spore-producing cells. In young specimens the gleba is white and firm, but as the puffball ages, it turns yellowish and then brown to purple-brown and powdery. Mature specimens develop a pore at the top of the fruit body through which spores are released when hit by falling raindrops. The spores of L. echinatum, roughly spherical with warts on the surface, have diameters between 4 and 6 μm. The capillitia (coarse thick-walled hyphae in the gleba) are elastic, brown in color, contain small pores, and are 5–8 μm thick. The basidia (the spore-bearing cells) may be attached to two to four spores, and the sterigmata (tapered spine-like projections from the basidia that attach the spores) are up to 5 μm long. Like most other puffball species, L. echinatum is edible when still young and while the gleba is still white and firm. Consumption of older specimens with a non-white gleba, or where the gleba has turned into a powdery spore mass, may cause stomach upsets. This species has a mild taste, and no distinguishable odor, although one source describes the smell of dried fruit bodies as similar to "old ham". One source notes that it is "well flavoured and tender when cooked", while another describes the texture (of edible puffballs in general) as "somewhat like French toast". Antonio Carluccio recommends sautéeing puffballs with other mushrooms. To avoid possible confusion with potentially deadly Amanita species, it is recommended to slice young puffballs with a longitudinal cut to ensure that the flesh is devoid of any internal structures. ## Similar species Lycoperdon pulcherrimum closely resembles L. echinatum, but its spines are stouter, do not turn brown in age, and the surface of the fruit body underneath the spines is smooth, not pitted. Alexander H. Smith noted that in youth, they are "difficult if not impossible to distinguish from each other, but this will cause no inconvenience to those collecting for the table, since both are edible." In some areas the two species appear to intergrade, as specimens may be found whose spines turn brown but do not fall off. Young specimens of L. pedicellatum may also be difficult to distinguish from L. echinatum, but the former has a smooth outer surface when mature, and has spores attached to a pedicel (a narrow extension of the basidium on which the sterigmata and spores are formed) that is about 4–5 times as long as the spore. Lycoperdon compactum, found only in New Zealand, also resembles L. echinatum in appearance, but differs in having smaller spores, capillitia that are hyaline (translucent) and septate (with partitions that divide the capillitia into compartments). ## Habitat, distribution, and ecology Lycoperdon echinatum can be found either solitary or in small groups. It typically grows on the ground in deciduous forests and grassy areas, glades and pastures, on moss, humus, or woody debris. The fungus has been noted to have a preference for beech woods. Fruit bodies may make their appearance anytime from the late spring to autumn. Older specimens are more likely to be overlooked, as their brown color blends into the surrounding environment of dead leaves and dead wood. The puffball is used by various species of scuttle flies (family Phoridae) as larval food. This species has been collected from eastern central Africa, China, Costa Rica, Iran, Japan, and Europe (including Britain, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Finland, Germany, Italy, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland). In North America, it is "locally frequent" east of the Rocky Mountains. It is considered a threatened species in Åland (Finland). A study of the species' distribution in Sweden reported that in the 1940s and 50s, it grew in beech woods with broad-leaved grasses and herbs in topsoils with soil pH levels between 5.0 and 6.6, but the populations have since decreased owing to soil acidification during the last several decades. Fruit bodies collected near arsenic-contaminated sites have been shown to bioaccumulate arsenic, largely in the form of arsenobetaine. ## Antimicrobial activity Using a standard laboratory method to determine antimicrobial susceptibility, methanol-based extracts of Lycoperdon umbrinum fruit bodies were shown in a 2005 study to have "significant" antibacterial activity against various human pathogenic bacteria, including Bacillus subtilis, Escherichia coli, Salmonella typhimurium, Staphylococcus aureus, Streptococcus pyogenes, and Mycobacterium smegmatis. An earlier study (2000) had identified weak antibacterial activity against Enterococcus faecium and Staphylococcus aureus. Although the specific compounds responsible for the antimicrobial activity have not been identified, chemical analysis confirms the presence of terpenoids, a class of widely occurring organic chemicals that are being investigated for their potential use as antimicrobial drugs.

Faces (Star Trek: Voyager)

"Faces" is an episode of the American science fiction television series Star Trek: Voyager. Set in the 24th century, the series follows the adventures of the Starfleet and Maquis crew of the starship USS Voyager after they are stranded in the Delta Quadrant, far from the rest of the Federation. The 14th episode of the first season, first broadcast by UPN on May 8, 1995, "Faces", was developed from a story by Jonathan Glassner and Kenneth Biller. Biller also wrote the teleplay, which was directed by Winrich Kolbe. In this episode, a Vidiian scientist named Sulan (Brian Markinson) captures and performs medical experiments on the half-Klingon, half-human B'Elanna Torres (Roxann Dawson). He separates her into a full-blooded Klingon and a full-blooded human to find a cure for a disease, known as the Phage. The Voyager crew rescues Torres and restores her to her original state, while she attempts to reconcile with her identity as a half-human half-Klingon. The episode guest stars Rob LaBelle as an unnamed Talaxian prisoner. Actress Joy Kilpatrick was cast as Dawson's photo double to avoid a reliance on split screen. "Faces" was developed as a character study to further explore Torres' internal struggle with her identity. Dawson was originally resistant to the episode, but later identified it as one of her favorite performances, which deepened her understanding of the character and strengthened her acting. Human Torres and Klingon Torres were treated as two separate characters during the development and filming of the episode. Michael Westmore designed the characters' makeup to emphasize the differences between them. The episode received a Nielsen rating of 6.1/10 ratings share; a drop from the episode broadcast the previous week. "Faces" was generally well received, and Dawson's character and performance were praised. Some critics had a more negative response to the script and the final sequence; fan and reviewers felt Voyager's crew showed a lack of empathy for Torres in the ending. The episode has also been the subject of academic analysis on race. ## Plot Crew members Tom Paris, B'Elanna Torres, and Peter Durst have gone missing on a mission. They have been captured by the Vidiians. Vidiian Chief Surgeon Sulan has conducted a procedure on Torres, changing her from a half-human, half-Klingon hybrid into two bodies (a full-blooded Klingon and a full-blooded human). He infects Klingon Torres with the Phage, a deadly disease that afflicts his species but to which Klingons have a natural immunity, so he can study her genetics. Commander Chakotay, Security Chief Tuvok, and Ensign Harry Kim form a search party but are discovered by the Vidiians and beam back to the USS Voyager. Sulan examines the Klingon Torres while she experiences pain from the Phage. Klingon Torres expresses pride in her Klingon identity, though she remembers hiding her Klingon heritage as a child. Recognizing Sulan's attraction to her, she tries to seduce the scientist and escape, but his desire to find a cure overcomes his lust. The human version of Torres is kept imprisoned with Paris and Durst. Human Torres is characterized as weaker and more timid than her Klingon counterpart, and is deemed too ill to work in the mines. She secretly works on a security console in the barracks in an attempt to contact Voyager but is caught. Meanwhile, Sulan kills Durst and grafts his face over his own to appear more appealing to the Klingon Torres. Klingon Torres escapes from Sulan's laboratory, and rescues her human version. After arguing about their respective weaknesses, and past expulsion from Starfleet Academy, the two halves formulate a plan. Human Torres suggests shutting down the shields for the complex so that Voyager can transport them to the ship, while the Klingon Torres deals with guards. Chakotay, disguised as a Vidiian guard with the help of the Doctor, breaks into the facility at the same time Torres deactivates the shields. Klingon Torres sacrifices herself to protect the rest of the crew members from Sulan. Transported back to Voyager, Klingon Torres refuses medical help to die an honorable death. The Doctor explains that Human Torres would not survive without her Klingon half and restores her to her original self by reintegrating the Klingon DNA. Human Torres admits to feeling incomplete without her Klingon half. After being restored, she realizes that she will spend the rest of her life dealing with her inner conflict. ## Production ### Development "Faces" was pitched by writer Jonathan Glassner, and was later revised by executive story editor Kenneth Biller. In an interview with The Official Star Trek: Voyager Magazine, Biller said that the only similarity between the original pitch and the final copy was that the episode deals with the character B'Elanna Torres being split into two parts. In the episode's first draft, aliens used a machine to separate Torres into human and Klingon halves as part of an experiment attempting to achieve purity within a species. Executive producer Michael Piller described the draft as originally focusing on "somebody's idea that this could be the result of a hideous concentration-camp kind of experiment, that is, genetic demonstration of some sort". Biller and executive producer Jeri Taylor were critical of Glassner's pitch; Biller found it to be "very melodramatic and hokey", and Taylor called it "a tired idea" and "too on the nose for B'Elanna". Producer Brannon Braga explained that the decision to purchase the concept was to do a storyline involving an evil twin in the show's first season, and "get it out of the way". He did feel that the concept could be a mistake, and compared it negatively to a hypothetical storyline in which Star Trek: The Next Generation character Data (Brent Spiner) would be made human. Piller said the episode was almost abandoned, but he believed that the conflict between Torres' human and Klingon halves, and her identity as a woman, would make a worthwhile storyline. ### Writing The series' writing team were concerned that the episode would be compared to two episodes from Star Trek: The Original Series ("The Enemy Within" and "The Alternative Factor"). Piller added: "[w]e knew we could not do the evil-versus-good story that the original Star Trek had done." Biller was assigned to write the script as his second writing assignment for the series; his first had been for "Elogium". Biller attributed his interest in the episode's concept to his personal experiences with his younger, adopted brother's struggle to understand his biracial identity. Even though Biller was initially critical of the pitch's melodrama, he felt that his version had the melodrama expected of a Star Trek episode. The final draft of the script was submitted on February 24, 1995. Biller incorporated the Vidiians into the episode, believing that their technology would present a conceivable method by which Torres could be separated. The Vidiians were featured in an earlier season one episode titled "Phage". Biller explained that Klingons were shown to be more resistant to disease than other species in previous Star Trek installments, and reasoned that a Vidiians scientist would view them as a promising way to discover a cure for the disease. Biller said that he had difficulty writing Sulan as a sympathetic villain. He looked to Gene Roddenberry's approach to portraying antagonists in the Star Trek franchise: "[A]liens should never be patently evil. They may have a set of values that differ from our own, but be careful of making them mustache-twirling villains." Biller viewed the interactions between Sulan and the Klingon version of Torres as being inspired by the fairy tale Beauty and the Beast. He considered a Klingon's strength to be the ideal beauty for a Vidiian, and that Sulan would develop an attraction to Torres. Biller said that the Klingon version of Torres was more manipulative than Beauty from the fairy tale because she uses her sexuality to convince Sulan to follow her demands. Biller believed the episode added more elements of horror to the series, and pointed to the moment when Sulan grafted Durst's face over his own as a "sick moment of inspiration" and a "classic horror movie moment". He felt that Sulan's discomfort with his appearance helped round out his character. ### Casting and filming Brian Markinson was cast as Sulan, the episode's primary antagonist. Owing to the sequence in which Sulan attaches Durst's face to his own, Markinson was also given the role of Durst. The character was introduced in the preceding episode ("Cathexis") so that he would be a familiar face to the viewers. Rob LaBelle, who was a close friend of Biller, was cast as an unnamed Talaxian prisoner but he concealed the connection during his audition to avoid preferential treatment. LaBelle later appeared in the series as the Takarian servant Kafar in "False Profits" and Talaxian settler Oxilon in "Homestead". Because of budgetary concerns, "Faces" was produced near the end of the first season. It was originally going to be set in a jungle, but the location was changed to caves after director Winrich Kolbe calculated that the former idea would exceed the episode's budget. "Faces" was the fourth episode of the series Kolbe directed, and he said that everything ran smoothly despite his lack of familiarity with the story arcs and characters. The sets for the Vidiian mines were constructed on Paramount Stage 18. Materials used to create security consoles in the Vidiian laboratories were previously used for the construction of Klingon starships. The prosthetics and make-up for the Vidiians were handled by make-up supervisor Michael Westmore. The episode (with the rest of the first season) earned a nomination for the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Individual Achievement in Makeup for a Series for the 47th Primetime Emmy Awards, but lost to Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Cast members have commented on their performances in the episode. Robert Beltran, who played Commander Chakotay, said he felt uncomfortable acting in the facial mask worn for his character's Vidiian disguise. He described the prosthetics as "that raw, wounded face, which made me feel very vulnerable as a person", and viewed it as an acting challenge. Garrett Wang, who portrayed Ensign Harry Kim, said that his role in the episode was restricted to technobabble. Robert Picardo, who played the Doctor, appreciated the interactions between Torres and his character as they represented how he was originally "just a functionary doing his job". Picardo added that his scenes showed that it was too soon for his character to understand the importance of his operation on Torres, or to develop any sort of relationship with her. Various bloopers occurred during the filming of the episode. The first take of a scene in which Chakotay, Tuvok, and Kim encounter two Vidiians was interrupted when Beltran forgot his line and improvised a joke about the aliens' appearance. Kolbe was dissatisfied with several of the following takes and told the actors to "put a little acting into this one, please". During another sequence, Nana Visitor, who played Kira Nerys in Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, walked on set by accident. ### Separation of B'Elanna Torres Actress Roxann Dawson was initially doubtful about the script, believing that the concept was occurring too early in the series for her to understand the character well enough to play two separate people. She said that she physically shook when reading the script for the first time, and found the episode an acting challenge that broadened her abilities and deepened her connection with the character. Dawson said: "I was able to delineate these two sides that up until then were just metaphors." She reasoned that the episode provided an opportunity "to personify two aspects of this character". Dawson was given two versions of the script, one labeled "The Klingon" and the other "The Human". The scripts treated the human and Klingon forms of Torres as two separate characters, emphasizing their flaws. Dawson observed that Human Torres lacked strength and courage, while Klingon Torres lacked logic and control. She felt that the Klingon should receive more attention, especially when Torres struggles with that side of her identity throughout the series. She also wanted the episode to capture Klingon Torres' respect for Human Torres. Dawson added that the episode's central theme was "learning to respect the parts of one's self that make up the whole person". "Faces" was noted for establishing Torres' ongoing inability to reconcile her human and Klingon identities, in "the most literal battle". Biller disagreed with the episode's resolution, arguing that Torres should remain human. He felt that the episode should have a longer impact on Torres' character development, and believed: "[w]e couldn't get to the end of the episode and say that Torres has now resolved all her issues and is at peace with herself". This story arc continued in the later episodes "Day of Honor" and "Prophecy", in which Torres eventually accepted her Klingon heritage. Actress Joy Kilpatrick was cast as Dawson's photo double. Dawson described having a great working relationship with her stand-in. Discussing Kilpatrick, she said, "I was about to tell her what I was going to be doing so she could give me the beats that I could react to properly" and found her to be supportive and intuitive. Kilpatrick was not credited for her performance in the episode. Kolbe noted that the episode used a lot of visual effects, specifically to create the illusion of the two versions of Torres. The casting of a photo double allowed Kolbe to avoid relying on split screen. The scheduling was carefully planned to account for the make-up used for both roles. Dawson described the prosthetics for the Klingon version of Torres as "a forehead, nose, and teeth". She felt that the look was not as sophisticated as the character's normal appearance as a half-human/half-Klingon because of the lack of skin tones and nuances of the facial features. While Dawson's make-up typically took two hours to apply, the full Klingon prosthetics took around three hours. To save time reapplying the make-up and prosthetics repeatedly, each day's shooting would concentrate on one of the two characters, and switch the following day. Dawson compared the experience to repertory theatre. Despite the casting of the photo double, and attention to scheduling, Kolbe was disappointed in not being able to shoot more scenes with the two versions of Torres in the cave, but understood the frequent use of the split screen could negatively impact the production cost. After the episode had aired, Dawson called her parents to ask their opinions. They replied: "you were good, but the girl that played that Klingon was really great!" Dawson took their remarks as a compliment. ## Broadcast history and release "Faces" was first broadcast on May 8, 1995, on UPN at 8 pm Eastern Standard Time in the United States. The episode received a Nielsen rating of 6.1/10 ratings share; this placed it in 77th place overall for the week. This marked a drop in viewership compared to the previous episode "Cathexis", which had earned a 6.4 rating. The episode was first released for home media use on VHS in the United Kingdom in 1995 as part of a two-episode collection with "Cathexis". This was followed by a release in the United Kingdom in 1996, which was re-released the following year. It was first released on DVD as part of the first season release on February 24, 2004, in the United States. The episode was also available on numerous streaming video on demand services, such as Amazon Video, iTunes, Hulu, and Netflix. ## Reception ### Cast and crew response The episode was positively received by the cast and crew for its representation of Torres' internal conflict over her half-human, half-Klingon identity. Biller identified the episode as his favorite of the three scripts he wrote for the show's first season; he also wrote "Elogium" and "Jetrel". He viewed the scene depicting Torres' realization that she was human as one of the best from the episode. Dawson described the episode as a "very big step for B'Elanna" and appreciated that the script avoided a cliché ending by leaving room for Torres to deal with her internal identity struggles. Towards the end of Voyager's final season, she looked back on the episode as one of the show's highlights. Taylor and Beltran praised Dawson for her ability to play two contrasting characters; Beltran added that it was a great episode that showcased Dawson's abilities as an actor. While Kolbe initially found Dawson's inquisitiveness and frequent questions during filming to be a challenge, he felt that she did "a hell of a job on that one". He enjoyed the completed version of the episode, but was disappointed with its ending. The producers and writers also commented on the appearance of the Vidiians in the episode. Piller, Braga, and Taylor praised executive producer Rick Berman's decision to reformat Torres' storyline with the inclusion of the Vidiians. Freelance writer Skye Dent, who had helped with the original development of the Vidiians for "Phage" was impressed by the episode's representation of the alien species, and felt it was an improvement over her concepts. Biller highlighted the scene revealing Sulan's transplant of Durst's face onto his own as "my classic moment in Voyager first season". ### Critical reception The critical response for "Faces" was largely positive, Dawson's performance and Torres' characterization being praised as the episode's highlights. Den of Geek!'s Juliette Harrisson and Jamahl Epsicokhan of Jammer's Reviews cited it as one of the first season's highlights. Harrisson praised the episode for having "some fine character work from Roxann Dawson" and appreciated how it helped to establish "Voyager's most successful romantic pairing" (Torres and Paris). Epsicokhan appreciated that the episode was not repeating a story from Star Trek: The Next Generation. He praised Dawson's performance, and was disappointed that the character was frequently restricted to technobabble throughout the rest of the series. Will Nguyen of Treknews.net identified the episode as a positive development for Torres that enabled the audience to better understand her character. Some reviewers were critical of the episode's story. TrekToday'''s Michelle Erica Green praised "Faces" as an effective character study of Torres and felt it showcased Dawson's abilities as an actor. However, Green criticized the plot an unoriginal take on the evil twin trope and said the science was unbelievable in the context of the show. Tor.com's Keith DeCandido identified "Faces" as the worst episode of the first season. Although he enjoyed Kolbe's direction, DeCandido dismissed the script as being "a hoary premise that nonetheless could have been used for good character development". He praised Dawson's "subdued and anxiety-ridden" performance as the Human Torres, but criticized her tendency to over-enunciate her lines as the Klingon Torres, likely due to her prosthetics. Critics and fans responded negatively to the episode's final sequence. Taylor described getting adverse fan mail about the lack of sympathy expressed by Voyager's crew members for Torres in the ending. She clarified that Chakotay's response to Torres was intended to be unresponsive rather than cold, and acknowledged that he should have "put his arm around her and show[n] some warmth" as suggested by fans. Green was surprised that Torres was not given a pep talk by either Captain Kathryn Janeway (Kate Mulgrew) or Chakotay in the final scene. DeCandido was critical of Torres' character development in the episode, and disliked how she "doesn't learn anything except that she'd be happier if she wasn't half-Klingon". He wrote that Captain James T. Kirk had a stronger arc in "The Enemy Within", and viewed "Faces" as inferior to that episode. Epsicokhan, on the other hand, found the lack of answers from Chakotay to be an appropriate ending given the focus on Torres' personal conflicts. ### Racial analysis The character of Torres has been the subject of academic racial analysis. In her article "The Monster Inside: 19th Century Racial Constructs in the 24th Century Mythos of Star Trek", Denise Alessandria Hurd wrote that "Faces" demonstrated that the character of Torres was developed according to the tragic mulatto archetype. Hurd pointed out that Human Torres looked like "a poster child for the cult of white womanhood", while Klingon Torres had more stereotypical African-American features, such as dark skin and kinky hair, although Klingons have always been portrayed with darker skin since their introduction in the original series. Torres' final statement that she will always experience internal conflict was identified as a marker of mental instability by Hurd, who felt such behavior was normalized in hybrid characters. Allen Kwan also cited the episode's final scene as a negative commentary on race in his article "Seeking New Civilizations: Race Normativity in the Star Trek Franchise". He wrote that Torres' desire to be completely human was a "tacit acknowledgement of the racial normativity inherent to Starfleet and the Federation". Susan De Gaia argued in her article "Intergalactic Heroines: Land, Body and Soul in Star Trek: Voyager" that the separation of Torres into her Klingon and human halves positively addressed diversity. De Gaia felt that the episode communicated that "a strong woman is created by incorporating the human with a stronger race, the Klingon, and by affiliation with an independent group". In her book American Science Fiction TV: Star Trek, Stargate and Beyond, Jan Johnson-Smith categorized "Faces" as one instance in which the Star Trek franchise has tackled "[i]ssues of individual difference" and compared it to the combining of Tuvok and Neelix (Ethan Phillips) in the second-season episode "Tuvix". Elisabeth Anne Leonard also discussed Torres' epiphany about her identity in her book Into Darkness Peering: Race and Color in the Fantastic. Leonard wrote that the ending of "Faces" acts as Torres' "acceptance of a Creole self" as opposed to her "incipient destruction of a Creole identity" such as in the episode "Dreadnought". In the chapter "Femme Noire" from the book Goddesses and Monsters: Women, Myth, Power, and Popular Culture, Jane Caputi and Lauri Sagle called "Faces" one of the "more thoughtful Virgin/Cannibal narrative structures"—a literary device that they invented and defined as "push[ing] the envelope of the classic virgin/whore paradigm". Caputi and Sagle approached the episode as a "metaphorical tale of mestiza'' experience and conscious" given Torres' Spanish last name. They connected the character's difficulty with her identity to Gloria E. Anzaldúa's theoretical work, interpreting Torres as crafting a new "inner and outer face" for herself.

Operation Ke

1943 Japanese withdrawal from Guadalcanal in WWII

Operation Ke (ケ号作戦, Ke-gō Sakusen) was the largely successful withdrawal of Japanese forces from Guadalcanal, concluding the Guadalcanal Campaign of World War II. The operation took place between 14 January and 7 February 1943, and involved both Imperial Japanese Army (IJA) and Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) forces under the overall direction of the Japanese Imperial General Headquarters (IGH). Commanders of the operation included Isoroku Yamamoto and Hitoshi Imamura. The Japanese decided to withdraw and concede Guadalcanal to Allied forces for several reasons. All attempts by the IJA to recapture Henderson Field, the airfield on Guadalcanal in use by Allied aircraft, had been repulsed with heavy losses. Japanese ground forces on the island had been reduced from 36,000 to 11,000 through starvation, disease, and battle casualties. IJN forces were also suffering heavy losses attempting to reinforce and resupply the ground forces on the island. These losses, plus the projected resources needed for further attempts to recapture Guadalcanal, were affecting strategic security and operations in other areas of the Japanese Empire. The decision to withdraw was endorsed by Emperor Hirohito on 31 December 1942. The operation began on 14 January 1943 with the delivery of a battalion of infantry troops to Guadalcanal to act as rearguard for the evacuation. Around the same time, IJA and IJN air forces began an air superiority campaign around the Solomon Islands and New Guinea. During the air campaign, a US cruiser was sunk in the Battle of Rennell Island. Two days later, Japanese aircraft sank a US destroyer near Guadalcanal. The withdrawal was carried out on the nights of 1, 4, and 7 February by destroyers. At a cost of one destroyer sunk and three damaged, the Japanese evacuated 10,652 men from Guadalcanal. During the evacuation 600 died and 3,000 more required extensive hospital care. On 9 February, Allied forces realized that the Japanese were gone and declared Guadalcanal secure, ending the six-month campaign for control of the island. ## Background ### Guadalcanal Campaign On 7 August 1942, the US 1st Marine Division landed on Guadalcanal, Tulagi, and Florida Islands in the Solomon Islands. The landings on the islands were meant to deny their use by the Japanese as bases for threatening the supply routes between the US and Australia, and to secure the islands as starting points for a campaign with the eventual goal of capturing or neutralizing the major Japanese base at Rabaul while also supporting the Allied New Guinea campaign. The landings initiated the six-month-long Guadalcanal campaign. Taking the Japanese by surprise, by nightfall on 8 August the Marines secured Tulagi and nearby islands as well as the Japanese airfield under construction at Lunga Point on Guadalcanal. The Allies later renamed it "Henderson Field". Allied aircraft operating out of Henderson were called the "Cactus Air Force" (CAF) after the Allied code name for Guadalcanal. In response to the landings on Guadalcanal, the Japanese Imperial General Headquarters (IGH) assigned the Imperial Japanese Army's (IJA) 17th Army, a corps-sized command headquartered at Rabaul under the command of Lieutenant General Harukichi Hyakutake, the task of retaking Guadalcanal. Because of the threat by CAF aircraft, the Imperial Japanese Navy (IJN) was unable to use large, slow transport ships to deliver troops and supplies to the island. Instead, warships based at Rabaul and the Shortland Islands were used to carry forces to Guadalcanal. The Japanese warships, mainly light cruisers and destroyers from the Eighth Fleet under the command of Vice Admiral Gunichi Mikawa, were usually able to make the round trip down "The Slot" to Guadalcanal and back in a single night, thereby minimizing their exposure to CAF air attack. These high speed warship runs to Guadalcanal occurred throughout the campaign and were later called the "Tokyo Express" by Allied forces and "Rat Transportation" by the Japanese. Using forces delivered to Guadalcanal in this manner, the IJA tried three times to retake Henderson Field, but was defeated each time. After the third failure, an attempt by the IJN to deliver the rest of the IJA 38th Infantry Division and its heavy equipment failed during the Naval Battle of Guadalcanal from 12 to 15 November. Because of this failure, the Japanese cancelled their next planned attempt to recapture Henderson Field. In mid-November, Allied forces attacked the Japanese at Buna-Gona in New Guinea. Japanese Combined Fleet naval leaders, headquartered at Truk and under the overall command of Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, felt Allied advances in New Guinea posed a greater threat to the security of the Japanese Empire than an Allied military presence in the southern Solomons. Therefore, Combined Fleet naval staff officers began to prepare plans for abandoning Guadalcanal and shifting priorities and resources to operations around New Guinea. At this time, the navy did not inform the army of their intentions in this regard. As December began, the Japanese experienced considerable difficulty in keeping their troops on Guadalcanal resupplied because of Allied air and naval attacks on the Japanese supply chain of ships and bases. The few supplies delivered to the island were not enough to sustain Japanese troops who, by 7 December, were losing about 50 men each day to malnutrition, disease, and Allied ground or air attacks. The Japanese had delivered almost 30,000 army troops to Guadalcanal since the campaign began, but by December only about 20,000 of that number were still alive; of those, only around 12,000 remained more or less fit for combat duty, with the rest incapacitated by battle wounds, disease, or malnutrition. The IJN continued to suffer losses and damage to its ships in attempting to keep the Japanese on Guadalcanal resupplied. One destroyer was sunk by American warships at the Battle of Tassafaronga on 30 November. Another destroyer plus a submarine were sunk and two destroyers damaged by American PT boat and CAF air attacks during subsequent resupply missions from 3–12 December. Compounding the navy's frustration, very few of the supplies carried on these missions reached IJA forces on the island. Combined Fleet leaders began telling their army counterparts the losses and damage to warships engaged in the resupply effort threatened future strategic plans for protecting the Japanese Empire. ### Decision to withdraw Throughout November, Japan's top military leaders at the IGH in Tokyo continued to openly support further efforts to retake Guadalcanal from Allied forces. At the same time, lower-ranking staff officers began to discreetly discuss abandoning the island. Takushiro Hattori and Masanobu Tsuji, each of whom had recently visited Guadalcanal, told their colleagues on the staff that any further attempt to retake the island was a lost cause. Ryūzō Sejima reported that the attrition of IJA troop-strength on Guadalcanal was so unexpectedly severe that future operations would be untenable. On 11 December two staff officers, IJN Commander Yuji Yamamoto and IJA Major Takahiko Hayashi, returned to Tokyo from Rabaul and confirmed Hattori's, Tsuji's, and Sejima's reports. They further reported that most of the IJN and IJA officers at Rabaul appeared to support abandoning Guadalcanal. Around this time, Japan's War Ministry informed the IGH that there was insufficient shipping to support both the effort to retake Guadalcanal and transport strategic resources to maintain Japan's economy and military forces. On 19 December, a delegation of IGH staff officers led by IJA Colonel Joichiro Sanada, chief of the IGH's operations section, arrived at Rabaul for discussions about future plans concerning New Guinea and Guadalcanal. Hitoshi Imamura, commander of the 8th Area Army in charge of IJA operations in New Guinea and the Solomons, did not directly recommend a withdrawal from Guadalcanal but openly and clearly described the current difficulties involved with any further attempts to retake the island. Imamura also stated that any decision to withdraw should include plans to evacuate as many of the soldiers from Guadalcanal as possible. Sanada returned to Tokyo on 25 December and recommended to the IGH that Guadalcanal be abandoned immediately and all priority given to the campaign in New Guinea. The IGH's top leaders agreed with Sanada's recommendation on 26 December and ordered their staffs to begin drafting plans for the withdrawal from Guadalcanal and establishment of a new defense line in the central Solomons. On 28 December, General Hajime Sugiyama and Admiral Osami Nagano personally informed Emperor Hirohito of the decision to withdraw from Guadalcanal. On 31 December, the Emperor formally endorsed the decision. ### Plan and forces On 3 January, IGH informed the 8th Area Army and the Combined Fleet of the decision to withdraw from Guadalcanal. By 9 January, the Combined Fleet and 8th Area Army staffs together completed the plan, officially called Operation Ke after a mora in Japanese Kana vocabulary, to execute the evacuation. The plan called for a battalion of IJA infantry to land by destroyer on Guadalcanal around 14 January to act as a rear guard during the evacuation. The 17th Army was to begin withdrawing to the western end of the island about 25 or 26 January. An air superiority campaign around the southern Solomons would begin on 28 January. The 17th Army would be picked up in three lifts by destroyers the first week of February with a target completion date of 10 February. At the same time, Japanese air and naval forces would conduct conspicuous maneuvers and minor attacks around New Guinea and the Marshall Islands along with deceptive radio traffic to try to confuse the Allies as to their intentions. Yamamoto detailed aircraft carriers Jun'yō and Zuihō, battleships Kongō and Haruna – with four heavy cruisers and a destroyer as the screening force – under Nobutake Kondō to provide distant cover for Ke around Ontong Java in the northern Solomons. The evacuation runs were to be carried out by Mikawa's 8th Fleet, consisting of heavy cruisers Chōkai and Kumano, light cruiser Sendai, and 21 destroyers. Mikawa's destroyers were charged with conducting the evacuation. Yamamoto expected that at least half of Mikawa's destroyers would be sunk during the operation. Supporting the air superiority portion of the operation were the IJN's 11th Air Fleet and the IJA's 6th Air Division, based at Rabaul with 212 and 100 aircraft, respectively. 64 aircraft from carrier Zuikaku's air group were also temporarily assigned to Rabaul. An additional 60 floatplanes from the IJN's "R" Area Air Force, based at Rabaul, Bougainville and the Shortland Islands, brought the total number of Japanese aircraft involved in the operation to 436. The combined Japanese warship and naval air units in the area formed the Southeast Area Fleet, commanded by Jinichi Kusaka at Rabaul. Opposing the Japanese and under the command of United States Navy Admiral William Halsey Jr., commander of Allied forces in the South Pacific, were fleet carriers USS Enterprise and USS Saratoga, six escort carriers, three fast battleships, four old battleships, 13 cruisers, and 45 destroyers. In the air, the 13th Air Force numbered 92 fighters and bombers under United States Army Brigadier General Nathan F. Twining and the CAF on Guadalcanal counted 81 aircraft under US Marine Brigadier General Francis P. Mulcahy. Rear Admiral Aubrey Fitch was overall commander of Aircraft South Pacific. The air units of the fleet and escort carriers added another 339 aircraft. In addition, 30 heavy bombers were stationed in New Guinea with sufficient range to conduct missions over the Solomon Islands. In total, the Allies possessed around 539 aircraft available to oppose the Ke operation. By the first week of January, disease, starvation, and battle had reduced Hyakutake's command to about 14,000 troops, with many of them too sick and malnourished to fight. The 17th Army possessed three operable field cannon, with very little ammunition. In contrast, the Allied commander on the island, US Army Major General Alexander Patch, fielded a combined force of US Army and US Marines, designated the XIV Corps, totaling 50,666 men. At Patch's disposal were 167 artillery weapons, including 75 mm (2.95 in), 105 mm (4.13 in), and 155 mm (6.1 in) howitzers, and plentiful stocks of shells. ## Operation ### Preparation On 1 January, the Japanese military changed their radio communication codes, making it more difficult for Allied intelligence, which had previously partially broken Japanese radio ciphers, to divine Japanese intentions and movement. As January progressed, Allied reconnaissance and radio traffic analysis noted the buildup of ships and aircraft at Truk, Rabaul, and the Shortland Islands. Allied analysts determined that the increased radio traffic in the Marshalls was a deception meant to divert attention from an operation about to take place in either New Guinea or the Solomons. Allied intelligence personnel misinterpreted the nature of the operation; on 26 January, the Allied Pacific Command's intelligence section informed Allied forces in the Pacific that the Japanese were preparing for a new offensive, called Ke, in either the Solomons or New Guinea. On 14 January, an Express mission of nine destroyers delivered the Yano Battalion, designated as the rear guard for the Ke evacuation, to Guadalcanal. The battalion, commanded by Major Keiji Yano, consisted of 750 infantry and a battery of mountain guns crewed by another 100 men. Accompanying the battalion was Lieutenant Colonel Kumao Imoto, representing the 8th Area Army, who was to deliver the evacuation order and plan to Hyakutake. The 17th Army had not yet been informed of the decision to withdraw. CAF and 13th Air Force air attacks on the nine destroyers during their return trip damaged destroyers Arashi and Tanikaze and destroyed eight Japanese fighters escorting the convoy. Five American aircraft were shot down. Late on 15 January, Imoto reached 17th Army's headquarters at Kokumbona and informed Hyakutake and his staff of the decision to withdraw from the island. Grudgingly accepting the order on the 16th, the 17th Army staff communicated the Ke evacuation plan to their forces on the 18th. The plan directed the 38th Division, which was currently defending against an American offensive on ridges and hills in the interior of the island, to disengage and withdraw towards Cape Esperance on the western end of Guadalcanal beginning on the 20th. The 38th's retirement would be covered by the 2nd Infantry Division, in place on Guadalcanal since October 1942, and the Yano Battalion, both of which would then follow the 38th westward. Any troops unable to move were encouraged to kill themselves to "uphold the honor of the Imperial Army". ### Withdrawal westward Patch initiated a new offensive just as the 38th Division began to withdraw from the inland ridges and hills that it had occupied. On 20 January, the 25th Infantry Division, under Major General J. Lawton Collins, attacked several hills, designated Hills 87, 88, and 89 by the Americans, that formed a ridge that dominated Kokumbona. Encountering much lighter resistance than anticipated, the Americans seized the three hills by the morning of 22 January. Shifting forces to exploit the unexpected breakthrough, Collins quickly continued the advance and captured the next two hills, 90 and 91, by nightfall, placing the Americans in position to isolate and capture Kokumbona and trap the Japanese 2nd Division. Reacting quickly to the situation, the Japanese hurriedly evacuated Kokumbona and ordered the 2nd Division to retire westward immediately. The Americans captured Kokumbona on 23 January. Although some Japanese units were trapped between the American forces and destroyed, most of the 2nd Division's survivors escaped. Still fearing a renewed and reinforced Japanese offensive, Patch committed the equivalent of only one regiment at a time to attack the Japanese forces west of Kokumbona, keeping the rest near Lunga Point to protect the airfield. The terrain west of Kokumbona favored the Japanese efforts to delay the Americans as the rest of the 17th Army continued its withdrawal towards Cape Esperance. The American advance was hemmed into a corridor only 300–600 yd (270–550 m) wide between the ocean and the thick, inland jungle and steep coral ridges. The ridges, running perpendicular to the coast, paralleled numerous streams and creeks that crossed the corridor with "washboard regularity." On 26 January, a combined US Army and Marine unit called the Composite Army-Marine (CAM) Division advancing westward encountered the Yano Battalion at the Marmura River. Yano's troops temporarily halted the CAM's advance and then slowly withdrew westward over the next three days. On 29 January, the Yano retreated across the Bonegi River, where soldiers from the 2nd Division had constructed another defensive position. The Japanese defenses at the Bonegi held up the American advance for almost three days. On 1 February, with help from a shore bombardment by the destroyers USS Wilson and Anderson, the Americans successfully crossed the river but did not immediately press the advance westward. ### Air campaign The Ke air superiority campaign began in mid-January with nightly harassment attacks on Henderson Field by 3–10 aircraft, causing little damage. On 20 January, a lone Kawanishi H8K bombed Espiritu Santo Naval Base. On 25 January, the IJN sent 58 Zero fighters on a daylight raid to Guadalcanal. In response, the CAF sent aloft eight Wildcat and six P-38 fighters, which shot down four Zeros without loss. A second large raid was conducted on 27 January by nine Kawasaki Ki-48 "Lily" light bombers escorted by 74 Nakajima Ki-43 "Oscar" fighters from the IJA's 6th Air Division from Rabaul. Twelve Wildcats, six P-38s, and 10 P-40s from Henderson met the raid over Guadalcanal. In the resulting action, the Japanese lost six fighters while the CAF lost one Wildcat, four P-40s, and two P-38s. The "Lily"s dropped their bombs on American positions around the Matanikau River, causing little damage. ### Battle of Rennell Island Believing that the Japanese were beginning a major offensive in the southern Solomons aimed at Henderson Field, Halsey responded by sending, beginning on 29 January, a resupply convoy to Guadalcanal supported by most of his warship forces, separated into five task forces. These five task forces included two fleet carriers, two escort carriers, three battleships, 12 cruisers, and 25 destroyers. Screening the approach of the transport convoy was Task Force 18 (TF 18), under Rear Admiral Robert C. Giffen, with three heavy and three light cruisers, two escort carriers, and eight destroyers. A fleet carrier task force, centered on the carrier Enterprise, steamed about 250 mi (220 nmi; 400 km) behind TF 18. In addition to protecting the supply convoy, TF 18 was charged with rendezvousing with a force of four U.S. destroyers, stationed at Tulagi, at 21:00 on 29 January in order to conduct a sweep up "The Slot" north of Guadalcanal the next day to screen the unloading of the transports at Guadalcanal. As the escort carriers were too slow to allow Giffen's force to make the scheduled rendezvous, Giffen left the carriers behind with two destroyers at 14:00 on 29 January and steamed ahead. Giffen's force was being tracked by Japanese submarines, who reported on Giffen's location and movement to their naval headquarters units. Around mid-afternoon, based on the submarine's reports, 16 G4M from the 705 Air Group and 16 Mitsubishi G3M "Nell" bombers from the 701 Air Group took off from Rabaul carrying torpedoes to attack Giffen's force, now located between Rennell Island and Guadalcanal. The torpedo bombers attacked Giffen's ships in two waves between 19:00 and 20:00. Two torpedoes hit the heavy cruiser USS Chicago, causing heavy damage and bringing her to a dead stop. Three of the Japanese aircraft were shot down by anti-aircraft fire from Giffen's ships. In response, Halsey sent a tug to take Chicago under tow and ordered Giffen's task force to return to base the next day. Six destroyers were left behind to escort Chicago and the tugboat. At 16:00 on 30 January, a flight of 11 Mitsubishi torpedo bombers from the 751 Air Group, based at Kavieng and staging through Buka, attacked the force towing Chicago. Fighter aircraft from Enterprise shot down eight of them, but most of the Japanese aircraft were able to release their torpedoes before crashing. One torpedo hit the destroyer USS La Vallette, causing heavy damage. Four more torpedoes hit Chicago, sinking her. The transport convoy reached Guadalcanal and successfully unloaded its cargo on 30–31 January. The rest of Halsey's warships took station in the Coral Sea south of the Solomons to wait for the approach of any Japanese warship forces supporting what the Allies believed to be an imminent offensive. The departure of TF 18 from the Guadalcanal area removed a significant potential threat to the Ke operation. At 18:30 on 29 January, two corvettes from the Royal New Zealand Navy, and , intercepted the Japanese submarine I-1, which was attempting a supply run, off of Kamimbo on Guadalcanal. The two corvettes rammed and sank I-1 after a 90-minute battle (). ### First evacuation run Leaving his cruisers at Kavieng, Mikawa gathered all 21 of his destroyers at the Japanese naval base in the Shortlands on 31 January to begin the evacuation runs. Rear Admiral Shintaro Hashimoto was placed in charge of this group of destroyers, titled the Reinforcement Unit. The "R" Area Air Force's 60 floatplanes were tasked with scouting for the Reinforcement Unit and helping defend against Allied PT boat attacks during the nighttime evacuation runs. Allied B-17 bombers attacked the Shortlands anchorage on the morning of 1 February, causing no damage and losing four aircraft to Japanese fighters. This same day, the IJA's 6th Air Division raided Henderson Field with 23 "Oscar"s and six "Lily"s but caused no damage and suffered the loss of one fighter. Believing that the Japanese might be retreating to the south coast of Guadalcanal, on the morning of 1 February Patch landed a reinforced battalion of army and Marine troops, about 1,500 men under the command of Colonel Alexander George, at Verahue on Guadalcanal's south coast. The U.S. troops were delivered to the landing location by a naval transport force of six landing craft tanks and one transport destroyer (USS Stringham), escorted by four other destroyers (the same destroyers that were to have joined TF 18 three days earlier). A Japanese reconnaissance aircraft spotted the naval landing force. Believing that the force posed a threat to that night's scheduled evacuation run, an airstrike of 13 Aichi D3A2 "Val" dive bombers escorted by 40 Zeros departed Buin, Bougainville to attack the ships. Mistaking the Japanese strike aircraft as friendly, the U.S. destroyers withheld fire until the "Val"s began their attack. Beginning at 14:53, destroyer USS De Haven was rapidly hit by three bombs and sank almost immediately 2 mi (1.7 nmi; 3.2 km) south of Savo Island with the loss of 167 of her crew, including her captain. Destroyer USS Nicholas was damaged by several near-misses. Five "Val"s and three Zeros were lost to anti-aircraft fire and CAF fighters. The CAF lost three Wildcats in the engagement. Hashimoto departed the Shortlands at 11:30 on 1 February with 20 destroyers for the first evacuation run. Eleven destroyers were designated as transports screened by the other nine. The destroyers were attacked in the late afternoon near Vangunu by 92 CAF aircraft in two waves. Makinami, Hashimoto's flagship, was heavily damaged by a near miss. Four CAF aircraft were shot down. Hashimoto transferred to Shirayuki and detached Fumizuki to tow Makinami back to base. Eleven U.S. PT boats awaited Hashimoto's destroyers between Guadalcanal and Savo Island. Beginning at 22:45, Hashimoto's warships and the PT boats engaged in a series of running battles over the next three hours. Hashimoto's destroyers, with help from "R" Area aircraft, sank three of the PT boats. In the meantime, the transport destroyers arrived off of two pick-up locations at Cape Esperance and Kamimbo at 22:40 and 24:00 respectively. Japanese naval personnel ferried the waiting troops out to the destroyers in barges and landing craft. Rear Admiral Tomiji Koyanagi, second-in-command of the Reinforcement Unit, described the evacuees: "They wore only the remains of clothes that were so soiled their physical deterioration was extreme. Probably they were happy but they showed no expression. Their digestive organs were so completely destroyed, we couldn't give them good food, only porridge." Another officer added that, "Their buttocks were so emaciated that their anuses were completely exposed, and on the destroyers that picked them up they suffered from constant and uncontrolled diarrhea." After embarking 4,935 soldiers, mainly from the 38th Division, the transport destroyers ceased loading at 01:58 and prepared to depart for the return trip to the Shortlands. About this time, Makigumo, one of the screening destroyers, was suddenly wracked by a large explosion, caused by either a PT boat torpedo or a naval mine. Informed that Makigumo was immobilized, Hashimoto ordered her abandoned and scuttled (). During the return trip, the Reinforcement Unit was attacked by CAF aircraft at 08:00, but sustained no damage and arrived at the Shortlands without further incident at 12:00 on 2 February. ### Second and third evacuation runs On 4 February, Patch ordered the 161st Infantry Regiment to replace the 147th at the front and resume the advance westward. The Yano battalion retreated to new positions at the Segilau River and troops were sent to block the advance of George's force along the south coast. Meanwhile, Halsey's carrier and battleship task forces remained just beyond Japanese air attack range about 300 mi (260 nmi; 480 km) south of Guadalcanal. Kondō sent two of his force's destroyers, Asagumo and Samidare, to the Shortlands to replace the two destroyers lost in the first evacuation run. Hashimoto led the second evacuation mission with 20 destroyers south toward Guadalcanal at 11:30 on 4 February. The CAF attacked Hashimoto in two waves beginning at 15:50 with a total of 74 aircraft. Bomb near-misses heavily damaged Maikaze, and Hashimoto detached Nagatsuki to tow her back to Shortland. The CAF lost 11 aircraft in the attack while the Japanese lost one Zero. The U.S. PT boats did not sortie to attack Hashimoto's force this night and the loading went uneventfully. The Reinforcement Force embarked Hyakutake, his staff, and 3,921 men, mainly from the 2nd Division, and reached Bougainville without incident by 12:50 on 5 February. A CAF airstrike launched that morning failed to locate Hashimoto's force. Believing that the Japanese operations on 1 and 4 February had been reinforcement, not evacuation missions, the American forces on Guadalcanal proceeded slowly and cautiously, advancing only about 900 yd (820 m) each day. George's force halted on 6 February after advancing to Titi on the south coast. On the north coast, the 161st finally began their attack westward at 10:00 on 6 February and reached the Umasani River the same day. At the same time, the Japanese were withdrawing their remaining 2,000 troops to Kamimbo. On 7 February, the 161st crossed the Umasani and reached Bunina, about 9 mi (7.8 nmi; 14 km) from Cape Esperance. George's force, now commanded by George F. Ferry, advanced from Titi to Marovovo and dug in for the night about 2,000 yd (1,800 m) north of the village. Aware of the presence of Halsey's carriers and other large warships near Guadalcanal, the Japanese considered canceling the third evacuation run, but decided to go ahead as planned. Kondō's force closed to within 550 mi (480 nmi; 890 km) of Guadalcanal from the north to be ready in case Halsey's warships attempted to intervene. Hashimoto departed the Shortlands with 18 destroyers midday of 7 February, this time taking a course south of the Solomons instead of down the Slot. A CAF strike force of 36 aircraft attacked Hashimoto at 17:55, heavily damaging Isokaze with a bomb near miss. Isokaze retired escorted by Kawakaze. The Allies and the Japanese each lost one aircraft in the attack. Arriving off Kamimbo, Hashimoto's force loaded 1,972 soldiers by 00:03 on 8 February, unhindered by the U.S. Navy. For an additional 90 minutes, destroyer crewmen rowed their boats along the shore calling out again and again to make sure no one was left behind. At 01:32, the Reinforcement Group left Guadalcanal in its wake and reached Bougainville without incident at 10:00, completing the operation. ## Aftermath At dawn on 8 February, the U.S. Army forces on both coasts resumed their advances, encountering only a few sick and dying Japanese soldiers. Patch now realized that the Tokyo Express runs over the last week were evacuation, not reinforcement missions. At 16:50 on 9 February, the two American forces met on the west coast at the village of Tenaro. Patch sent a message to Halsey stating, "Total and complete defeat of Japanese forces on Guadalcanal effected 16:25 today...the Tokyo Express no longer has a terminus on Guadalcanal." The Japanese had successfully evacuated a total of 10,652 men from Guadalcanal, about all that remained of the 36,000 total troops sent to the island during the campaign. Six hundred of the evacuees succumbed to their injuries or illnesses before they could receive sufficient medical care. Three thousand more required lengthy hospitalization or recuperation. After receiving word of the completion of the operation, Yamamoto commended all the units involved and ordered Kondō to return to Truk with his warships. The 2nd and 38th Divisions were shipped to Rabaul and partially reconstituted with replacements. The 2nd Division was relocated to the Philippines in March 1943 while the 38th was assigned to defend Rabaul and New Ireland. The 8th Area Army and Southeast Area Fleet reoriented their forces to defend the central Solomons at Kolombangara and New Georgia and prepared to send the reinforcements, mainly consisting of the 51st Infantry Division, originally detailed for Guadalcanal to New Guinea. The 17th Army was rebuilt around the 6th Infantry Division and headquartered on Bougainville. A few Japanese stragglers remained on Guadalcanal, many of whom were killed or captured by Allied patrols. The last known Japanese holdout surrendered in October 1947. In hindsight, historians have faulted the Americans, especially Patch and Halsey, for not taking advantage of their ground, aerial, and naval superiority to prevent the successful Japanese evacuation of most of their surviving forces from Guadalcanal. Said Chester Nimitz, commander of Allied forces in the Pacific, of the success of Operation Ke, "Until the last moment it appeared that the Japanese were attempting a major reinforcement effort. Only the skill in keeping their plans disguised and bold celerity in carrying them out enabled the Japanese to withdraw the remnants of the Guadalcanal garrison. Not until all organized forces had been evacuated on 8 February did we realize the purpose of their air and naval dispositions." Nevertheless, the successful campaign to recapture Guadalcanal from the Japanese was an important strategic victory for the U.S. and its allies. Building on their success at Guadalcanal and elsewhere, the Allies continued their campaign against Japan, ultimately culminating in Japan's defeat and the end of World War II.

The Simpsons

American animated sitcom

The Simpsons is an American animated sitcom created by Matt Groening for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The series is a satirical depiction of American life, epitomized by the Simpson family, which consists of Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa, and Maggie. Set in the fictional town of Springfield, it caricatures society, Western culture, television, and the human condition. The family was conceived by Groening shortly before a solicitation for a series of animated shorts with producer James L. Brooks. He created a dysfunctional family and named the characters after his own family members, substituting Bart for his own name; he thought Simpson was a funny name in that it sounded similar to "simpleton". The shorts became a part of The Tracey Ullman Show on April 19, 1987. After three seasons, the sketch was developed into a half-hour prime time show and became Fox's first series to land in the Top 30 ratings in a season (1989–1990). Since its debut on December 17, 1989, episodes of the show have been broadcast. It is the longest-running American animated series, longest-running American sitcom, and the longest-running American scripted primetime television series, both in terms of seasons and number of episodes. A feature-length film, The Simpsons Movie, was released in theaters worldwide on July 27, 2007, and grossed over \$527 million, with a sequel in development as of 2018. The series has also spawned numerous comic book series, video games, books, and other related media, as well as a billion-dollar merchandising industry. The Simpsons is a joint production by Gracie Films and 20th Television. On March 3, 2021, the series was announced to have been renewed for seasons 33 and 34, which were later confirmed to have 22 episodes each, increasing the episode count from 706 to 750. The thirty-fourth season premiered on September 25, 2022. On January 26, 2023, the series was renewed for its 35th and 36th seasons, taking the show through the 2024-25 television season. Both seasons contain a combined total of 51 episodes. Seven of these episodes are season 34 holdovers, while the other 44 will be produced in the production cycle of the upcoming seasons, bringing the show's overall episode total up to 801. Season 35 is slated to premiere on October 1, 2023. The Simpsons received widespread acclaim throughout its early seasons in the 1990s, which are generally considered its "golden age". Since then, it has been criticized for a perceived decline in quality. Time named it the 20th century's best television series, and Erik Adams of The A.V. Club named it "television's crowning achievement regardless of format". On January 14, 2000, the Simpson family was awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. It has won dozens of awards since it debuted as a series, including 35 Primetime Emmy Awards, 34 Annie Awards, and 2 Peabody Awards. Homer's exclamatory catchphrase of "D'oh!" has been adopted into the English language, while The Simpsons has influenced many other later adult-oriented animated sitcom television series. ## Premise ### Characters The main characters are the Simpson family, who live in a fictional "Middle America" town of Springfield. Homer, the father, works as a safety inspector at the Springfield Nuclear Power Plant, a position at odds with his careless, buffoonish personality. He is married to Marge (née Bouvier), a stereotypical American housewife and mother. They have three children: Bart, a ten-year-old troublemaker and prankster; Lisa, a precocious eight-year-old activist; and Maggie, the baby of the family who rarely speaks, but communicates by sucking on a pacifier. Although the family is dysfunctional, many episodes examine their relationships and bonds with each other and they are often shown to care about one another. Homer's dad Grampa Simpson lives in the Springfield Retirement Home after Homer forced him to sell his house so that his family could buy theirs. Grampa Simpson has had starring roles in several episodes. The family also owns a dog, Santa's Little Helper, and a cat, Snowball II, who is replaced by a cat also called Snowball II in the fifteenth-season episode "I, (Annoyed Grunt)-Bot". Both pets have had starring roles in several episodes. The show includes an array of quirky supporting characters, which include Homer's co-workers (also friends) Lenny Leonard and Carl Carlson, the school principal Seymour Skinner and teachers Edna Krabappel and Elizabeth Hoover, neighbor Ned Flanders, friends Barney Gumble, Apu Nahasapeemapetilon, Moe Szyslak, Milhouse Van Houten, and Nelson Muntz, extended relatives Patty and Selma Bouvier, townspeople such as Mayor Quimby, Chief Clancy Wiggum, local celebrities Krusty the Clown and news reporter Kent Brockman, and tycoon Charles Montgomery Burns, who often serves as the series' antagonist, and his executive assistant Waylon Smithers. The creators originally intended many of these characters as one-time jokes or for fulfilling needed functions in the town. A number of them have gained expanded roles and subsequently starred in their own episodes. According to Matt Groening, the show adopted the concept of a large supporting cast from the comedy show SCTV. ### Continuity and the floating timeline Despite the depiction of yearly milestones such as holidays or birthdays passing, the characters never age between episodes (either physically or in stated age), and generally appear just as they did when the series began. The series uses a floating timeline in which episodes generally take place in the year the episode is produced even though the characters do not age. Flashbacks and flashforwards do occasionally depict the characters at other points in their lives, with the timeline of these depictions also generally floating relative to the year the episode is produced. For example, in the 1991 episode "I Married Marge", Bart (who is always 10 years old) appears to have been born in 1980 or 1981. But in the 1995 episode "And Maggie Makes Three", Maggie (who always appears to be around 1 year old) appears to have been born in 1993 or 1994. In the 1992 episode "Lisa's First Word", Lisa (who is always 8) is shown to have been born in 1984. A canon of the show does exist, although Treehouse of Horror episodes and any fictional story told within the series are typically non-canon. However, continuity is inconsistent and limited in The Simpsons. For example, Krusty the Clown may be able to read in one episode, but not in another. However, it is consistently portrayed that he is Jewish and that his rabbi father has since died. Lessons learned by the family in one episode may be forgotten in the next. Some examples of limited continuity include Sideshow Bob's appearances where Bart and Lisa flash back to all the crimes he committed in Springfield or when the characters try to remember things that happened in previous episodes. ### Setting The Simpsons takes place in a fictional American town called Springfield. Although there are many real settlements in America named Springfield, this one is fictional. The state it's in is not established. In fact, the show is intentionally evasive with regard to Springfield's location. Springfield's geography and that of its surroundings it inconsistent: from one episode to another, it may have coastlines, deserts, vast farmland, mountains, or whatever the story or joke requires. Groening has said that Springfield has much in common with Portland, Oregon, the city where he grew up. Groening has said that he named it after Springfield, Oregon, and the fictitious Springfield which was the setting of the series Father Knows Best. He "figured out that Springfield was one of the most common names for a city in the U.S. In anticipation of the success of the show, I thought, 'This will be cool; everyone will think it's their Springfield.' And they do." ## Production ### Development When producer James L. Brooks was working on the television variety show The Tracey Ullman Show, he decided to include small animated sketches before and after the commercial breaks. Having seen one of cartoonist Matt Groening's Life in Hell comic strips, Brooks asked Groening to pitch an idea for a series of animated shorts. Groening initially intended to present an animated version of his Life in Hell series. However, Groening later realized that animating Life in Hell would require the rescinding of publication rights for his life's work. He therefore chose another approach while waiting in the lobby of Brooks's office for the pitch meeting, hurriedly formulating his version of a dysfunctional family that became the Simpsons. He named the characters after his own family members, substituting "Bart" for his own name, adopting an anagram of the word brat. The Simpson family first appeared as shorts in The Tracey Ullman Show on April 19, 1987. Groening submitted only basic sketches to the animators and assumed that the figures would be cleaned up in production. However, the animators merely re-traced his drawings, which led to the crude appearance of the characters in the initial shorts. The animation was produced domestically at Klasky Csupo, with Wes Archer, David Silverman, and Bill Kopp being animators for the first season. The colorist, "Georgie" Gyorgyi Kovacs Peluce (Kovács Györgyike) made the characters yellow; as Bart, Lisa and Maggie have no hairlines, she felt they would look strange if they were flesh-colored. Groening supported the decision, saying: "Marge is yellow with blue hair? That's hilarious — let's do it!" In 1989, a team of production companies adapted The Simpsons into a half-hour series for the Fox Broadcasting Company. The team included the Klasky Csupo animation house. Brooks negotiated a provision in the contract with the Fox network that prevented Fox from interfering with the show's content. Groening said his goal in creating the show was to offer the audience an alternative to what he called "the mainstream trash" that they were watching. The half-hour series premiered on December 17, 1989, with "Simpsons Roasting on an Open Fire". "Some Enchanted Evening" was the first full-length episode produced, but it did not broadcast until May 1990, as the last episode of the first season, because of animation problems. In 1992, Tracey Ullman filed a lawsuit against Fox, claiming that her show was the source of the series' success. The suit said she should receive a share of the profits of The Simpsons—a claim rejected by the courts. ### Executive producers and showrunners Matt Groening and James L. Brooks have served as executive producers during the show's entire history, and also function as creative consultants. Sam Simon, described by former Simpsons director Brad Bird as "the unsung hero" of the show, served as creative supervisor for the first four seasons. He was constantly at odds with Groening, Brooks and the show's production company Gracie Films and left in 1993. Before leaving, he negotiated a deal that sees him receive a share of the profits every year, and an executive producer credit despite not having worked on the show since 1993, at least until his passing in 2015. A more involved position on the show is the showrunner, who acts as head writer and manages the show's production for an entire season. ### Writing The first team of writers, assembled by Sam Simon, consisted of John Swartzwelder, Jon Vitti, George Meyer, Jeff Martin, Al Jean, Mike Reiss, Jay Kogen and Wallace Wolodarsky. Newer Simpsons' writing teams typically consist of sixteen writers who propose episode ideas at the beginning of each December. The main writer of each episode writes the first draft. Group rewriting sessions develop final scripts by adding or removing jokes, inserting scenes, and calling for re-readings of lines by the show's vocal performers. Until 2004, George Meyer, who had developed the show since the first season, was active in these sessions. According to long-time writer Jon Vitti, Meyer usually invented the best lines in a given episode, even though other writers may receive script credits. Each episode takes six months to produce so the show rarely comments on current events. Credited with sixty episodes, John Swartzwelder is the most prolific writer on The Simpsons. One of the best-known former writers is Conan O'Brien, who contributed to several episodes in the early 1990s before replacing David Letterman as host of the talk show Late Night. English comedian Ricky Gervais wrote the episode "Homer Simpson, This Is Your Wife", becoming the first celebrity to both write and guest star in the same episode. Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, writers of the film Superbad, wrote the episode "Homer the Whopper", with Rogen voicing a character in it. At the end of 2007, the writers of The Simpsons went on strike together with the other members of the Writers Guild of America, East. The show's writers had joined the guild in 1998. In May 2023, the writers of The Simpsons went on strike together with the other members of the Writers Guild of America, East. ### Voice actors The Simpsons has six main cast members: Dan Castellaneta, Julie Kavner, Nancy Cartwright, Yeardley Smith, Hank Azaria, and Harry Shearer. Castellaneta voices Homer Simpson, Grampa Simpson, Krusty the Clown, Groundskeeper Willie, Mayor Quimby, Barney Gumble, and other adult, male characters. Julie Kavner voices Marge Simpson and Patty and Selma, as well as several minor characters. Castellaneta and Kavner had been a part of The Tracey Ullman Show cast and were given the parts so that new actors would not be needed. Cartwright voices Bart Simpson, Nelson Muntz, Ralph Wiggum and other children. Smith, the voice of Lisa Simpson, is the only cast member who regularly voices only one character, although she occasionally plays other episodic characters. The producers decided to hold casting for the roles of Bart and Lisa. Smith had initially been asked to audition for the role of Bart, but casting director Bonita Pietila believed her voice was too high, so she was given the role of Lisa instead. Cartwright was originally brought in to voice Lisa, but upon arriving at the audition, she found that Lisa was simply described as the "middle child" and at the time did not have much personality. Cartwright became more interested in the role of Bart, who was described as "devious, underachieving, school-hating, irreverent, [and] clever". Groening let her try out for the part instead, and upon hearing her read, gave her the job on the spot. Cartwright is the only one of the six main Simpsons cast members who had been professionally trained in voice acting prior to working on the show. Azaria and Shearer do not voice members of the title family, but play a majority of the male townspeople. Azaria, who has been a part of the main voice cast since the second season in one episode "Old Money" and then perpetually part of the regular main voice cast since the third season, voices recurring characters such as Moe Szyslak, Chief Wiggum, Apu Nahasapeemapetilon and Professor Frink. Shearer provides voices for Mr. Burns, Mr. Smithers, Principal Skinner, Ned Flanders, Reverend Lovejoy and formerly Dr. Hibbert. Every main cast member has won a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Voice-Over Performance. With one exception, episode credits list only the voice actors, and not the characters they voice. Both Fox and the production crew wanted to keep their identities secret during the early seasons and, therefore, closed most of the recording sessions while refusing to publish photos of the recording artists. However, the network eventually revealed which roles each actor performed in the episode "Old Money", because the producers said the voice actors should receive credit for their work. In 2003, the cast appeared in an episode of Inside the Actors Studio, doing live performances of their characters' voices. The six main actors were paid \$30,000 per episode until 1998, when they were involved in a pay dispute with Fox. The company threatened to replace them with new actors, even going as far as preparing for casting of new voices, but series creator Groening supported the actors in their action. The issue was soon resolved and, from 1998 to 2004, they were paid \$125,000 per episode. The show's revenue continued to rise through syndication and DVD sales, and in April 2004 the main cast stopped appearing for script readings, demanding they be paid \$360,000 per episode. The strike was resolved a month later and their salaries were increased to something between \$250,000 and \$360,000 per episode. In 2008, production for the twentieth season was put on hold due to new contract negotiations with the voice actors, who wanted a "healthy bump" in salary to an amount close to \$500,000 per episode. The negotiations were soon completed, and the actors' salary was raised to \$400,000 per episode. Three years later, with Fox threatening to cancel the series unless production costs were cut, the cast members accepted a 30 percent pay cut, down to just over \$300,000 per episode. In addition to the main cast, Pamela Hayden, Tress MacNeille, Marcia Wallace, Maggie Roswell, and Russi Taylor voice supporting characters. From 1999 to 2002, Roswell's characters were voiced by Marcia Mitzman Gaven. Karl Wiedergott has also appeared in minor roles, but does not voice any recurring characters. Wiedergott left the show in 2010, and since then Chris Edgerly has appeared regularly to voice minor characters. Repeat "special guest" cast members include Albert Brooks, Phil Hartman, Jon Lovitz, Joe Mantegna, Maurice LaMarche, and Kelsey Grammer. Following Hartman's death in 1998, the characters he voiced (Troy McClure and Lionel Hutz) were retired; Wallace's character of Edna Krabappel was retired as well after her death in 2013. Following Taylor's death in 2019, her characters (including Sherri, Terri, and Martin Prince) are now voiced by Grey Griffin. Episodes will quite often feature guest voices from a wide range of professions, including actors, athletes, authors, bands, musicians and scientists. In the earlier seasons, most of the guest stars voiced characters, but eventually more started appearing as themselves. Tony Bennett was the first guest star to appear as himself, appearing briefly in the season two episode "Dancin' Homer". The Simpsons holds the world record for "Most Guest Stars Featured in a Television Series". The Simpsons has been dubbed into several other languages, including Japanese, German, Spanish, and Portuguese. It is also one of the few programs dubbed in both standard French and Quebec French. The show has been broadcast in Arabic, but due to Islamic customs, numerous aspects of the show have been changed. For example, Homer drinks soda instead of beer and eats Egyptian beef sausages instead of hot dogs. Because of such changes, the Arabized version of the series met with a negative reaction from the lifelong Simpsons fans in the area. ### Animation Several different U.S. and international studios animate The Simpsons. Throughout the run of the animated shorts on The Tracey Ullman Show, the animation was produced domestically at Klasky Csupo. With the debut of the series, because of an increased workload, Fox subcontracted production to several local and foreign studios. These are AKOM, Anivision, Rough Draft Studios, USAnimation, and Toonzone Entertainment. For the first three seasons, Klasky Csupo animated The Simpsons in the United States. In 1992, the show's production company, Gracie Films, switched domestic production to Film Roman, who continued to animate the show until 2016 when they were replaced by Fox Television Animation, which allowed the show to be made more in-house. In Season 14, production switched from traditional cel animation to digital ink and paint. The first episode to experiment with digital coloring was "Radioactive Man" in 1995. Animators used digital ink and paint during production of the season 12 episode "Tennis the Menace", but Gracie Films delayed the regular use of digital ink and paint until two seasons later. The already completed "Tennis the Menace" was broadcast as made. The production staff at the U.S. animation studio, Film Roman, draws storyboards, designs new characters, backgrounds, props and draws character and background layouts, which in turn become animatics to be screened for the writers at Gracie Films for any changes to be made before the work is shipped overseas. The overseas studios then draw the inbetweens, ink and paint, and render the animation to tape before it is shipped back to the United States to be delivered to Fox three to four months later. The series began high-definition production in Season 20; the first episode, "Take My Life, Please", aired February 15, 2009. The move to HDTV included a new opening sequence. Matt Groening called it a complicated change because it affected the timing and composition of animation. ## Themes The Simpsons uses the standard setup of a situational comedy, or sitcom, as its premise. The series centers on a family and their life in a typical American town, serving as a satirical parody of a middle class American lifestyle. However, because of its animated nature, The Simpsons' scope is larger than that of a regular sitcom. The town of Springfield acts as a complete universe in which characters can explore the issues faced by modern society. By having Homer work in a nuclear power plant, the show can comment on the state of the environment. Through Bart and Lisa's days at Springfield Elementary School, the show's writers illustrate pressing or controversial issues in the field of education. The town features a vast array of television channels, which enables the producers to make jokes about the entertainment industry and the press. Some commentators say the show is political in nature and susceptible to a left-wing bias. Al Jean acknowledged in an interview that "We [the show] are of liberal bent." The writers often evince an appreciation for progressive leanings, but the show makes jokes across the political spectrum. The show portrays government and large corporations as evil entities that take advantage of the common worker. Thus, the writers often portray authority figures in an unflattering or negative light. In The Simpsons, politicians are corrupt, ministers such as Reverend Lovejoy are dismissive to churchgoers, and the local police force is incompetent. Religion also figures as a recurring theme. In times of crisis, the family often turns to God, and the show has dealt with most of the major religions. Sexuality is often a source of jokes in the series or serves as the theme of certain episodes. Even though homosexuals are sometimes sources of gags, the series often comments on how American society treats them, with "Homer's Phobia" devoting an entire episode to the family making a gay friend and Homer's initial hostility to him. In 1990 The Simpsons became the first animated early evening show to depict a kiss between two men in "Simpson and Delilah". ## Hallmarks ### Opening sequence The Simpsons' opening sequence is one of the show's most memorable hallmarks. The standard opening has gone through three iterations (a replacement of some shots at the start of the second season, and a brand new sequence when the show switched to high-definition in 2009). Each has the same basic sequence of events: the camera zooms through cumulus clouds, through the show's title towards the town of Springfield. The camera then follows the members of the family on their way home. Upon entering their house, the Simpsons settle down on their couch to watch television. The original opening was created by David Silverman, and was the first task he did when production began on the show. The series' distinctive theme song was composed by musician Danny Elfman in 1989, after Groening approached him requesting a retro-style piece. This piece has been noted by Elfman as the most popular of his career. One of the most distinctive aspects of the opening is that three of its elements change from episode to episode: Bart writes different things on the school chalkboard, Lisa plays different solos on her saxophone (or occasionally a different instrument), and different gags accompany the family as they enter their living room to sit on the couch. ### Halloween episodes The special Halloween episode has become an annual tradition. "Treehouse of Horror" first broadcast in 1990 as part of season two and established the pattern of three separate, self-contained stories in each Halloween episode. These pieces usually involve the family in some horror, science fiction, or supernatural setting and often parody or pay homage to a famous piece of work in those genres. They always take place outside the normal continuity of the show. Although the Treehouse series is meant to be seen on Halloween, this changed by the 2000s (and again in 2020), when new installments have premiered after Halloween due to Fox's current contract with Major League Baseball's World Series. Prior to 2020 (between 2011 and 2019), every Treehouse of Horror episode had aired in October. ### Humor The show's humor turns on cultural references that cover a wide spectrum of society so that viewers from all generations can enjoy the show. Such references, for example, come from movies, television, music, literature, science, and history. The animators also regularly add jokes or sight gags into the show's background via humorous or incongruous bits of text in signs, newspapers, billboards, and elsewhere. The audience may often not notice the visual jokes in a single viewing. Some are so fleeting that they become apparent only by pausing a video recording of the show or viewing it in slow motion. Kristin Thompson argues that The Simpsons uses a "flurry of cultural references, intentionally inconsistent characterization, and considerable self-reflexivity about television conventions and the status of the programme as a television show." One of Bart's early hallmarks was his prank calls to Moe's Tavern owner Moe Szyslak in which Bart calls Moe and asks for a gag name. Moe tries to find that person in the bar, but soon realizes it is a prank call and angrily threatens Bart. These calls were apparently based on a series of prank calls known as the Tube Bar recordings, though Groening has denied any causal connection. Moe was based partly on Tube Bar owner Louis "Red" Deutsch, whose often profane responses inspired Moe's violent side. As the series progressed, it became more difficult for the writers to come up with a fake name and to write Moe's angry response, and the pranks were dropped as a regular joke during the fourth season. The Simpsons also often includes self-referential humor. The most common form is jokes about Fox Broadcasting. For example, the episode "She Used to Be My Girl" included a scene in which a Fox News Channel van drove down the street while displaying a large "Bush Cheney 2004" banner and playing Queen's "We Are the Champions", in reference to the 2004 U.S. presidential election and claims of conservative bias in Fox News. The show uses catchphrases, and most of the primary and secondary characters have at least one each. Notable expressions include Homer's annoyed grunt "D'oh!", Mr. Burns' "Excellent" and Nelson Muntz's "Ha-ha!" Some of Bart's catchphrases, such as "¡Ay, caramba!", "Don't have a cow, man!" and "Eat my shorts!" appeared on T-shirts in the show's early days. However, Bart rarely used the latter two phrases until after they became popular through the merchandising. The use of many of these catchphrases has declined in recent seasons. The episode "Bart Gets Famous" mocks catchphrase-based humor, as Bart achieves fame on the Krusty the Clown Show solely for saying "I didn't do it." #### Purported foreshadowing of actual events The Simpsons has gained notoriety for jokes that appeared to become reality. Perhaps the most famous example comes from the episode "Bart to the Future", which mentions billionaire Donald Trump having been president of the United States at one time and leaving the nation broke. The episode first aired in 2000, sixteen years before Trump (who at the time was exploring a presidential run) was elected. Another episode, "When You Dish Upon a Star", lampooned 20th Century Fox as a division of The Walt Disney Company. Nineteen years later, Disney purchased Fox. Other examples purported as The Simpsons predicting the future include the introduction of the Smartwatch, video chat services, autocorrection technology, Richard Branson's spaceflight, Lady Gaga's acrobatic performance at the Super Bowl LI halftime show and the Titan submersible implosion Fact-checking sources such as Snopes have debunked many of these claims, saying that the show's extensive run means "a lot of jokes, and a lot of opportunities for coincidences to appear" and "most of these 'predictions' have rather simple and mundane explanations". For example, the device shown on The Simpsons with autocorrection is an Apple Newton, a real 1993 device notorious for its poor handwriting recognition. Technologically advanced watches have appeared in numerous works of fiction, decades before The Simpsons. ## Influence and legacy ### Idioms A number of neologisms that originated on The Simpsons have entered popular vernacular. Mark Liberman, director of the Linguistic Data Consortium, remarked, "The Simpsons has apparently taken over from Shakespeare and the Bible as our culture's greatest source of idioms, catchphrases and sundry other textual allusions." The most famous catchphrase is Homer's annoyed grunt: "D'oh!" So ubiquitous is the expression that it is now listed in the Oxford English Dictionary, but without the apostrophe. Dan Castellaneta says he borrowed the phrase from James Finlayson, an actor in many Laurel and Hardy comedies, who pronounced it in a more elongated and whining tone. The staff of The Simpsons told Castellaneta to shorten the noise, and it went on to become the well-known exclamation in the television series. Groundskeeper Willie's description of the French as "cheese-eating surrender monkeys" was used by National Review columnist Jonah Goldberg in 2003, after France's opposition to the proposed invasion of Iraq. The phrase quickly spread to other journalists. "" and "embiggen", words used in "Lisa the Iconoclast", have since appeared in the Dictionary.com's 21st Century Lexicon, and scientific journals respectively. "Kwyjibo", a fake Scrabble word invented by Bart in "Bart the Genius", was used as one of the aliases of the creator of the Melissa worm. "I, for one, welcome our new insect overlords", was used by Kent Brockman in "Deep Space Homer" and has become a snowclone, with variants of the utterance used to express obsequious submission. It has been used in media, such as New Scientist magazine. The dismissive term "Meh", believed to have been popularized by the show, entered the Collins English Dictionary in 2008. Other words credited as stemming from the show include "yoink" and "craptacular". The Oxford Dictionary of Modern Quotations includes several quotations from the show. As well as "cheese-eating surrender monkeys", Homer's lines, "Kids, you tried your best and you failed miserably. The lesson is never try", from "Burns' Heir" (season five, 1994) as well as "Kids are the best, Apu. You can teach them to hate the things you hate. And they practically raise themselves, what with the Internet and all", from "Eight Misbehavin' (season 11, 1999), entered the dictionary in August 2007. Many quotes/scenes have become popular Internet memes, including Jasper Beardley's quote "That's a paddlin'" from "The PTA Disbands" (season 6, 1995) and "Steamed Hams" from "22 Short Films About Springfield" (season 7, 1996). ### Television The Simpsons was the first successful animated program in American prime time since Wait Till Your Father Gets Home in the 1970s. During most of the 1980s, US pundits considered animated shows as appropriate only for children, and animating a show was too expensive to achieve a quality suitable for prime-time television. The Simpsons changed this perception, initially leading to a short period where networks attempted to recreate prime-time cartoon success with shows like Capitol Critters, Fish Police, and Family Dog, which were expensive and unsuccessful. The Simpsons' use of Korean animation studios for tweening, coloring, and filming made the episodes cheaper. The success of The Simpsons and the lower production cost prompted US television networks to take chances on other adult animated series. This development led US producers to a 1990s boom in new, animated prime-time shows for adults, such as Beavis and Butt-Head, South Park, Family Guy, King of the Hill, Futurama (which was created by Matt Groening), and The Critic (which was also produced by Gracie Films). For Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane, "The Simpsons created an audience for prime-time animation that had not been there for many, many years ... As far as I'm concerned, they basically re-invented the wheel. They created what is in many ways—you could classify it as—a wholly new medium." The Simpsons has had crossovers with four other shows. In the episode "A Star Is Burns", Marge invites Jay Sherman, the main character of The Critic, to be a judge for a film festival in Springfield. Matt Groening had his name removed from the episode since he had no involvement with The Critic. South Park later paid homage to The Simpsons with the episode "Simpsons Already Did It". In "Simpsorama", the Planet Express crew from Futurama come to Springfield in the present to prevent the Simpsons from destroying the future. In the Family Guy episode "The Simpsons Guy", the Griffins visit Springfield and meet the Simpsons. The Simpsons has also influenced live-action shows like Malcolm in the Middle, which featured the use of sight gags and did not use a laugh track unlike most sitcoms. Malcolm in the Middle debuted January 9, 2000, in the time slot after The Simpsons. Ricky Gervais called The Simpsons an influence on The Office, and fellow British sitcom Spaced was, according to its director Edgar Wright, "an attempt to do a live-action The Simpsons." In Georgia, the animated television sitcom The Samsonadzes, launched in November 2009, has been noted for its very strong resemblance with The Simpsons, which its creator Shalva Ramishvili has acknowledged. ### LGBT representation The Simpsons has historically been open to portrayals of LGBT characters and settings, and it has routinely challenged heteronormativity. It was one of several animated television shows in the United States that began introducing characters that were LGBT, both openly and implied, in the 1990s. While early episodes involving LGBT characters primarily included them through the use of stereotypes, The Simpsons developed several prominent LGBT characters over its run. Producers of the show, such as Matt Groening and Al Jean, have expressed their opinion that LGBT representation in media is important, and that they seek to actively include it. Some characters, such as Julio, were created with their sexual orientation in mind, with it being central to their character. The show expanded its roster of openly LGBT characters through episodes in which prominent characters Patty Bouvier and Waylon Smithers came out in seasons 16 and 27, respectively. ## Release ### Broadcast ### Syndication The cable television network FXX, a sibling of 20th Television and formerly the Fox network, has exclusive cable and digital syndication rights for The Simpsons. Original contracts had previously stated that syndication rights for The Simpsons would not be sold to cable until the series conclusion, at a time when cable syndication deals were highly rare. The series has been syndicated to local broadcast stations in nearly all markets throughout the United States since September 1994. FXX premiered The Simpsons on their network on August 21, 2014, by starting a twelve-day marathon which featured the first 552 episodes (every single episode that had already been released at the time) aired chronologically, including The Simpsons Movie, which FX Networks had already owned the rights to air. It was the longest continuous marathon in the history of television (until VH1 Classic aired a 433-hour, nineteen-day, marathon of Saturday Night Live in 2015; celebrating that program's 40th anniversary). The first day of the marathon was the highest rated broadcast day in the history of the network so far, the ratings more than tripled those of regular prime time programming for FXX. Ratings during the first six nights of the marathon grew night after night, with the network ranking within the top 5 networks in basic cable each night. In Australia, a marathon of every episode of the show (at the time) aired from December 16, 2019, to January 5, 2020, on Fox8 (a cable network operated on pay TV provider Foxtel and a corporate sibling to the American Fox network). After Disney acquired both 20th Television and FX Networks, it was announced that The Simpsons would air on the company's Freeform channel starting October 2, 2019. ### Streaming and digital sell-through On October 21, 2014, a digital service courtesy of the FXNOW app, called Simpsons World, launched with every episode of the series accessible to authenticated FX subscribers, and is available on game consoles such as Xbox One, streaming devices such as Roku and Apple TV, and online via web browser. There was early criticism of both wrong aspect ratios for earlier episodes and the length of commercial breaks on the streaming service, but that problem was soon amended with fewer commercial breaks during individual episodes. Later it was announced that Simpsons World would now let users watch all of the SD episodes in their original format. Simpsons World was discontinued after the launch of Disney+ on November 12, 2019, where the series streams exclusively. Initially, the series was only available cropped to 16:9 without the option to view the original 4:3 versions, reigniting criticisms of cropping old episodes. In response, Disney announced that "in early 2020, Disney+ will make the first 19 seasons (and some episodes from season 20) of The Simpsons available in their original 4:3 aspect ratio, giving subscribers a choice of how they prefer to view the popular series." On May 28, 2020, Disney+ made the first 19 seasons, along with some episodes from season 20, of The Simpsons available in both 16:9 and the original 4:3 aspect ratio. Season 31 came to Disney+ on October 2, 2020, with Hulu streaming the latest episodes of season 32 the next day. Season 32 came to Disney+ on September 29, 2021. The season 3 premiere "Stark Raving Dad", which features Michael Jackson as the voice of Leon Kompowsky, was pulled out of rotation in 2019 by Matt Groening, James L. Brooks and Al Jean after HBO aired the documentary Leaving Neverland, in which two men share details into how Jackson allegedly abused them as children. It is therefore unavailable on Disney+. However, the episode is still available on The Complete Third Season DVD box set released on August 26, 2003. In July 2017, all episodes from seasons 4 to 19 were made available for purchase on the iTunes Store in Canada. ## Reception and achievements ### Early success The Simpsons was the Fox network's first television series to rank among a season's top 30 highest-rated shows. In 1990, Bart quickly became one of the most popular characters on television in what was termed "Bartmania". He became the most prevalent Simpsons character on memorabilia, such as T-shirts. In the early 1990s, millions of T-shirts featuring Bart were sold; as many as one million were sold on some days. Believing Bart to be a bad role model, several American public schools banned T-shirts featuring Bart next to captions such as "I'm Bart Simpson. Who the hell are you?" and "Underachiever ('And proud of it, man!')". The Simpsons merchandise sold well and generated \$2 billion in revenue during the first 14 months of sales. Because of his popularity, Bart was often the most promoted member of the Simpson family in advertisements for the show, even for episodes in which he was not involved in the main plot. Due to the show's success, over the summer of 1990 the Fox Network decided to switch The Simpsons' time slot from 8:00 p.m. ET on Sunday night to the same time on Thursday, where it competed with The Cosby Show on NBC, the number one show at the time. Through the summer, several news outlets published stories about the supposed "Bill vs. Bart" rivalry. "Bart Gets an 'F' (season two, 1990) was the first episode to air against The Cosby Show, and it received a lower Nielsen ratings, tying for eighth behind The Cosby Show, which had an 18.5 rating. The rating is based on the number of household televisions that were tuned into the show, but Nielsen Media Research estimated that 33.6 million viewers watched the episode, making it the number one show in terms of actual viewers that week. At the time, it was the most watched episode in the history of the Fox Network, and it is still the highest rated episode in the history of The Simpsons. The show moved back to its Sunday slot in 1994 and has remained there ever since. The Simpsons has received overwhelmingly positive reviews from critics, and it has been noted for being described as "the most irreverent and unapologetic show on the air." In a 1990 review of the show, Ken Tucker of Entertainment Weekly described it as "the American family at its most complicated, drawn as simple cartoons. It's this neat paradox that makes millions of people turn away from the three big networks on Sunday nights to concentrate on The Simpsons." Tucker also described the show as a "pop-cultural phenomenon, a prime-time cartoon show that appeals to the entire family." ### Run length achievements On February 9, 1997, The Simpsons surpassed The Flintstones with the episode "The Itchy & Scratchy & Poochie Show" as the longest-running prime-time animated series in the United States. In 2004, The Simpsons replaced The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet (1952 to 1966) as the longest-running sitcom (animated or live action) in the United States in terms of the number of years airing. In 2009, The Simpsons surpassed The Adventures of Ozzie and Harriet's record of 435 episodes and is now recognized by Guinness World Records as the world's longest running sitcom (in terms of episode count). In October 2004, Scooby-Doo briefly overtook The Simpsons as the American animated show with the highest number of episodes (albeit under several different iterations). However, network executives in April 2005 again cancelled Scooby-Doo, which finished with 371 episodes, and The Simpsons reclaimed the title with 378 episodes at the end of their seventeenth season. In May 2007, The Simpsons reached their 400th episode at the end of the eighteenth season. While The Simpsons has the record for the number of episodes by an American animated show, other animated series have surpassed The Simpsons. For example, the Japanese anime series Sazae-san has over 2,000 episodes (7,000+ segments) to its credit. In 2009, Fox began a year-long celebration of the show titled "Best. 20 Years. Ever." to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the premiere of The Simpsons. One of the first parts of the celebration is the "Unleash Your Yellow" contest in which entrants must design a poster for the show. The celebration ended on January 10, 2010 (almost 20 years after "Bart the Genius" aired on January 14, 1990), with The Simpsons 20th Anniversary Special – In 3-D! On Ice!, a documentary special by documentary filmmaker Morgan Spurlock that examines the "cultural phenomenon of The Simpsons". As of the twenty-first season (2009–2010), The Simpsons became the longest-running American scripted primetime television series, having surpassed the 1955–1975 run of Gunsmoke. On April 29, 2018, The Simpsons also surpassed Gunsmoke's 635-episode count with the episode "Forgive and Regret." The Simpsons is both the longest-running and the highest ranking animated series to feature on TV Time's top 50 most followed TV shows ever. On February 6, 2019, it was announced that The Simpsons has been renewed for seasons 31 and 32. On March 3, 2021, it was announced that The Simpsons was renewed for seasons 33 and 34. ### Awards and honors The Simpsons has won dozens of awards since it debuted as a series, including 34 Primetime Emmy Awards, 34 Annie Awards and a Peabody Award. In a 1999 issue celebrating the 20th century's greatest achievements in arts and entertainment, Time named The Simpsons the century's best television series, writing: "Dazzlingly intelligent and unapologetically vulgar, the Simpsons have surpassed the humor, topicality and, yes, humanity of past TV greats." In that same issue, Time included Bart Simpson in the Time 100, the publication's list of the century's 100 most influential people. Bart was the only fictional character on the list. On January 14, 2000, the Simpsons were awarded a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Also in 2000, Entertainment Weekly magazine TV critic Ken Tucker named The Simpsons the greatest television show of the 1990s. Furthermore, viewers of the UK television channel Channel 4 have voted The Simpsons at the top of two polls: 2001's 100 Greatest Kids' TV shows, and 2005's The 100 Greatest Cartoons, with Homer Simpson voted into first place in 2001's 100 Greatest TV Characters. Homer also placed ninth on Entertainment Weekly's list of the "50 Greatest TV icons". In 2002, The Simpsons ranked No. 8 on TV Guide's 50 Greatest TV Shows of All Time, and was ranked the No. 6 cult show in 2004. In 2007, it moved to No. 8 on TV Guide's cult shows list and was included in Time's list of the "100 Best TV Shows of All Time". In 2008 the show was placed in first on Entertainment Weekly's "Top 100 Shows of the Past 25 Years". Empire named it the greatest TV show of all time. In 2010, Entertainment Weekly named Homer "the greatest character of the last 20 years", while in 2013 the Writers Guild of America listed The Simpsons as the 11th "best written" series in television history. In 2013, TV Guide ranked The Simpsons as the greatest TV cartoon of all time and the tenth greatest show of all time. A 2015 The Hollywood Reporter survey of 2,800 actors, producers, directors, and other industry people named it as their No. 10 favorite show. In 2015, British newspaper The Telegraph named The Simpsons as one of the 10 best TV sitcoms of all time. Television critics Alan Sepinwall and Matt Zoller Seitz ranked The Simpsons as the greatest American TV series of all time in their 2016 book TV (The Book). In 2022, Rolling Stone ranked The Simpsons as the second-greatest TV show of all time. ====== #### Controversy Bart's rebellious, bad boy nature, which underlies his misbehavior and rarely leads to any punishment, led some people to characterize him as a poor role model for children. In schools, educators claimed that Bart was a "threat to learning" because of his "underachiever and proud of it" attitude and negative attitude regarding his education. Others described him as "egotistical, aggressive and mean-spirited". In a 1991 interview, Bill Cosby described Bart as a bad role model for children, calling him "angry, confused, frustrated". In response, Matt Groening said, "That sums up Bart, all right. Most people are in a struggle to be normal [and] he thinks normal is very boring, and does things that others just wished they dare do." On January 27, 1992, then-President George H. W. Bush said, "We are going to keep on trying to strengthen the American family, to make American families a lot more like the Waltons and a lot less like the Simpsons." The writers rushed out a tongue-in-cheek reply in the form of a short segment that aired three days later before a rerun of "Stark Raving Dad" in which Bart replied, "Hey, we're just like the Waltons. We're praying for an end to the Depression, too." The show also received criticism from the nuclear power industry in its early years, with its portrayal of the evil boss Mr. Burns and "bungling idiot" employees (including Homer Simpson himself) with their lack of safety and security. In a letter to the nuclear power-backed U.S. Council for Energy Awareness, producer Sam Simon apologized, stating, "I apologize that the Simpsons have offended a lot of people in the energy industry. I agree with you that in real life, Homer Simpson would not be employed at a nuclear power plant. On the other hand, he probably wouldn't be employed anywhere." Various episodes of the show have generated controversy. The Simpsons visit Australia in "Bart vs. Australia" (season six, 1995) and Brazil in "Blame It on Lisa" (season 13, 2002) and both episodes generated controversy and negative reaction in the visited countries. In the latter case, Rio de Janeiro's tourist board—which claimed that the city was portrayed as having rampant street crime, kidnappings, slums, and monkey and rat infestations—went so far as to threaten Fox with legal action. Groening was a fierce and vocal critic of the episode "A Star Is Burns" (season six, 1995), which featured a crossover with The Critic. He felt that it was just an advertisement for The Critic, and that people would incorrectly associate the show with him. When he was unsuccessful in getting the episode pulled, he had his name removed from the credits and went public with his concerns, openly criticizing James L. Brooks and saying the episode "violates the Simpsons' universe." In response, Brooks said, "I am furious with Matt, ... he's allowed his opinion, but airing this publicly in the press is going too far. ... his behavior right now is rotten." "The Principal and the Pauper" (season nine, 1997) is one of the most controversial episodes of The Simpsons. Many fans and critics reacted negatively to the revelation that Seymour Skinner, a recurring character since the first season, was an impostor. The episode has been criticized by Groening and by Harry Shearer, who provides the voice of Skinner. In a 2001 interview, Shearer recalled that after reading the script, he told the writers, "That's so wrong. You're taking something that an audience has built eight years or nine years of investment in and just tossed it in the trash can for no good reason, for a story we've done before with other characters. It's so arbitrary and gratuitous, and it's disrespectful to the audience." #### Bans The show has reportedly been taken off the air in several countries. China banned it from prime-time television in August 2006, "in an effort to protect China's struggling animation studios." In 2008, Venezuela barred the show from airing on morning television as it was deemed "unsuitable for children". The same year, several Russian Pentecostal churches demanded that The Simpsons, South Park and some other Western cartoons be removed from broadcast schedules "for propaganda of various vices" and the broadcaster's license to be revoked. However, a court decision later dismissed this request. #### Perceived decline in quality Critics' reviews of early Simpsons episodes praised the show for its sassy humor, wit, realism, and intelligence. However, in the late 1990s, around the airing of season 10, the tone and emphasis of the show began to change. Some critics started calling the show "tired". By 2000, some long-term fans had become disillusioned with the show, and pointed to its shift from character-driven plots to what they perceived as an overemphasis on zany antics. Jim Schembri of The Sydney Morning Herald attributed the decline in quality to an abandonment of character-driven storylines in favor of celebrity cameo appearances and references to popular culture. Schembri wrote in 2011: "The central tragedy of The Simpsons is that it has gone from commanding attention to merely being attention-seeking. It began by proving that cartoon characters don't have to be caricatures; they can be invested with real emotions. Now the show has in essence fermented into a limp parody of itself. Memorable story arcs have been sacrificed for the sake of celebrity walk-ons and punchline-hungry dialogue." In 2010, the BBC noted "the common consensus is that The Simpsons' golden era ended after season nine", and Todd Leopold of CNN, in an article looking at its perceived decline, stated "for many fans ... the glory days are long past." Similarly, Tyler Wilson of Coeur d'Alene Press has referred to seasons one to nine as the show's "golden age", and Ian Nathan of Empire described the show's classic era as being "say, the first ten seasons". Jon Heacock of LucidWorks stated that "for the first ten years [seasons], the show was consistently at the top of its game", with "so many moments, quotations, and references – both epic and obscure – that helped turn the Simpson family into the cultural icons that they remain to this day". Mike Scully, who was showrunner during seasons nine through twelve, has been the subject of criticism. Chris Suellentrop of Slate wrote that "under Scully's tenure, The Simpsons became, well, a cartoon ... Episodes that once would have ended with Homer and Marge bicycling into the sunset now end with Homer blowing a tranquilizer dart into Marge's neck. The show's still funny, but it hasn't been touching in years." When asked in 2007 how the series' longevity is sustained, Scully joked: "Lower your quality standards. Once you've done that you can go on forever." Al Jean, who was showrunner during seasons thirteen through thirty-three, has also been the subject of criticism, with some arguing that the show has continued to decline in quality under his tenure. Former writers have complained that under Jean, the show is "on auto-pilot", "too sentimental", and the episodes are "just being cranked out". Some critics believe that the show has "entered a steady decline under Jean and is no longer really funny". John Ortved, author of The Simpsons: An Uncensored, Unauthorized History, characterized the Jean era as "toothless", and criticized what he perceived as the show's increase in social and political commentary. Jean responded: "Well, it's possible that we've declined. But honestly, I've been here the whole time and I do remember in season two people saying, 'It's gone downhill.' If we'd listened to that then we would have stopped after episode 13. I'm glad we didn't." In 2004, cast member Harry Shearer criticized what he perceived as the show's declining quality: "I rate the last three seasons as among the worst, so season four looks very good to me now." Cast member Dan Castellaneta responded: "I don't agree, ... I think Harry's issue is that the show isn't as grounded as it was in the first three or four seasons, that it's gotten crazy or a little more madcap. I think it organically changes to stay fresh." Also in 2004 author Douglas Coupland described claims of declining quality in the series as "hogwash", saying "The Simpsons hasn't fumbled the ball in fourteen years, it's hardly likely to fumble it now." In an April 2006 interview, Groening said: "I honestly don't see any end in sight. I think it's possible that the show will get too financially cumbersome ... but right now, the show is creatively, I think, as good or better than it's ever been. The animation is incredibly detailed and imaginative, the stories do things that we haven't done before, so creatively there's no reason to quit." In 2016, popular culture writer Anna Leszkiewicz suggested that even though The Simpsons still holds cultural relevance, "contemporary appeal" is only for the "first ten or so seasons", with recent episodes only garnering mainstream attention when a favorite character from the golden era is killed off, or when new information and shock twists are given for old characters. The series' ratings have also declined; while the first season enjoyed an average of 13.4 million viewing households per episode in the U.S., the twenty-first season had an average of 7.2 million viewers. Alan Sepinwall and Matt Zoller Seitz argued in their 2016 book titled TV (The Book) that the peak of The Simpsons are "roughly seasons 3–12", and that despite the decline, episodes from the later seasons such as "Eternal Moonshine of the Simpson Mind" and "Holidays of Future Passed" could be considered on par with the earlier classic episodes, further stating that "even if you want to call the show today a thin shadow of its former self, think about how mind-boggingly great its former self had to be for so-diminished a version to be watchable at all." In 2020, Uproxx writer Josh Kurp stated that while he agrees with the sentiment that The Simpsons is not as good as it used to be, it is because "it was working at a level of comedy and characterization that no show ever has." He felt there were still many reasons to watch the series, as it was "still capable of quality television, and even the occasional new classic" and the fact that the show was willing to experiment, giving examples such as bringing on guest animators like Don Hertzfeldt and Sylvain Chomet to produce couch gags, and guest writers like Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, Pete Holmes and Megan Amram to write episodes. In the season 32 episode "I, Carumbus", the show itself makes a nod to these concerns in its credits gag where the god Jupiter notes that "It definitely feels like they're wrapping it up ... any day now." In a 2021 interview with NME, Jean was quoted as saying, "To people who say The Simpsons isn't as good as it used to be, I would say I think the world isn't as good as it used to be. But we're declining at a slower rate." #### Race controversy The stereotypical nature of the character Apu Nahasapeemapetilon has been the subject of controversy. Indian-American comedian Hari Kondabolu stated in his 2017 documentary The Problem with Apu that as a child he was a fan of The Simpsons and liked Apu, but he now finds the character's stereotypical nature troublesome. Defenders of the character responded that the show is built on comical stereotypes, with creator Matt Groening saying, "that's the nature of cartooning." He added that he was "proud of what we do on the show", and "it's a time in our culture where people love to pretend they're offended". In response to the controversy, Apu's voice actor, Hank Azaria, said he was willing to step aside from his role as Apu: "The most important thing is to listen to South Asian people, Indian people in this country when they talk about what they feel and how they think about this character." In February 2020, he confirmed that he would no longer voice Apu. Groening stated at the same time that the character would remain in the show. The criticisms were referenced in the season 29 episode "No Good Read Goes Unpunished", when Lisa breaks the fourth wall and addresses the audience by saying, "Something that started decades ago and was applauded and inoffensive is now politically incorrect. What can you do?" to which Marge replies, "Some things will be addressed at a later date." Lisa adds, "If at all." This reference was clarified by the fact that there was a framed photo of Apu with the caption on the photo saying "Don't have a cow, Apu", a play on Bart's catchphrase "Don't have a cow, man," as well as the fact that Hindus do not eat cows as they are considered sacred. In October 2018, it was reported that Apu would be written out of the show, which Groening denied. On June 26, 2020, in light of the various Black Lives Matter protests, Fox announced that recurring characters of color (such as Carl Carlson and Dr. Hibbert, among others) would no longer be voiced by white actors. Beginning with season 32, Carl, a black character originally voiced by Azaria, is now voiced by black actor Alex Désert. In addition, Bumblebee Man, a Spanish-speaking Latino character also originally voiced by Azaria, is now voiced by Mexican-American actor Eric Lopez, and Dr. Hibbert, a black character originally voiced by Harry Shearer, is now voiced by black actor Kevin Michael Richardson. ## Other media ### Comic books Numerous Simpson-related comic books have been released over the years. So far, nine comic book series have been published by Bongo Comics since 1993. The first comic strips based on The Simpsons appeared in 1991 in the magazine Simpsons Illustrated, which was a companion magazine to the show. The comic strips were popular and a one-shot comic book titled Simpsons Comics and Stories, containing four different stories, was released in 1993 for the fans. The book was a success and due to this, the creator of The Simpsons, Matt Groening, and his companions Bill Morrison, Mike Rote, Steve Vance and Cindy Vance created the publishing company Bongo Comics. Issues of Simpsons Comics, Bart Simpson's Treehouse of Horror and Bart Simpson have been collected and reprinted in trade paperbacks in the United States by HarperCollins. ### Film 20th Century Fox and Gracie Films produced The Simpsons Movie, an animated film that was released on July 27, 2007. The film was directed by long-time Simpsons producer David Silverman and written by a team of Simpsons writers comprising Matt Groening, James L. Brooks, Al Jean, George Meyer, Mike Reiss, John Swartzwelder, Jon Vitti, David Mirkin, Mike Scully, Matt Selman, and Ian Maxtone-Graham. Production of the film occurred alongside continued writing of the series despite long-time claims by those involved in the show that a film would enter production only after the series had concluded. There had been talk of a possible feature-length Simpsons film ever since the early seasons of the series. James L. Brooks originally thought that the story of the episode "Kamp Krusty" was suitable for a film, but he encountered difficulties in trying to expand the script to feature-length. For a long time, difficulties such as lack of a suitable story and an already fully engaged crew of writers delayed the project. On August 10, 2018, 20th Century Fox announced that a sequel is in development. ### Music Collections of original music featured in the series have been released on the albums Songs in the Key of Springfield, Go Simpsonic with The Simpsons and The Simpsons: Testify. Several songs have been recorded with the purpose of a single or album release and have not been featured on the show. The album The Simpsons Sing the Blues was released in September 1990 and was a success, peaking at No. 3 on the Billboard 200 and becoming certified 2× platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America. The first single from the album was the pop rap song "Do the Bartman", performed by Nancy Cartwright and released on November 20, 1990. The song was written by Michael Jackson, although he did not receive any credit. The Yellow Album was released in 1998, but received poor reception and did not chart in any country. ### The Simpsons Ride In 2007, it was officially announced that The Simpsons Ride, a simulator ride, would be implemented into the Universal Studios Orlando and Universal Studios Hollywood. It officially opened May 15, 2008, in Florida and May 19, 2008, in Hollywood. In the ride, patrons are introduced to a cartoon theme park called Krustyland built by Krusty the Clown. However, Sideshow Bob is loose from prison to get revenge on Krusty and the Simpson family. It features more than 24 regular characters from The Simpsons and features the voices of the regular cast members, as well as Pamela Hayden, Russi Taylor and Kelsey Grammer. Harry Shearer did not participate in the ride, so none of his characters have vocal parts. ### Video games Numerous video games based on the show have been produced. Some of the early games include Konami's arcade game The Simpsons (1991) and Acclaim Entertainment's The Simpsons: Bart vs. the Space Mutants (1991). More modern games include The Simpsons: Road Rage (2001), The Simpsons: Hit & Run (2003) and The Simpsons Game (2007). Electronic Arts, which produced The Simpsons Game, has owned the exclusive rights to create video games based on the show since 2005. In 2010, they released a game called The Simpsons Arcade for iOS. Another EA-produced mobile game, Tapped Out, was released in 2012 for iOS users, then in 2013 for Android and Kindle users. Two Simpsons pinball machines have been produced: one that was available briefly after the first season, and another in 2007, both out of production. ## Merchandise The popularity of The Simpsons has made it a billion-dollar merchandising industry. The title family and supporting characters appear on everything from T-shirts to posters. The Simpsons has been used as a theme for special editions of well-known board games, including Clue, Scrabble, Monopoly, Operation, and The Game of Life, as well as the trivia games What Would Homer Do? and Simpsons Jeopardy!. Several card games such as trump cards and The Simpsons Trading Card Game have also been released. Many official or unofficial Simpsons books such as episode guides have been published. Many episodes of the show have been released on DVD and VHS over the years. When the first season DVD was released in 2001, it quickly became the best-selling television DVD in history, although it was later overtaken by the first season of Chappelle's Show. In particular, seasons one through seventeen were released on DVD for 13 years between September 2001 to December 2014 in the U.S./Canada (Region 1), Europe (Region 2), and Australia/New Zealand/Latin America (Region 4). However, on April 8, 2015, Al Jean announced that the Season 17 DVD would be the last one ever produced, leaving the collection from Seasons 1 to 17, Season 20 (released out of order in 2010), with Seasons 18, 19, and 21 onwards unreleased. Jean also stated that the deleted scenes and commentaries would try to be released to the Simpsons World app, and that they were pushing for Simpsons World to be expanded outside of the U.S. Two years later, however, on July 22, 2017, it was announced that Season 18 would be released on December 5, 2017, on DVD. Another two years later, on July 20, 2019, it was announced that Season 19 would be released on December 3, 2019, on DVD. In 2003, about 500 companies around the world were licensed to use Simpsons characters in their advertising. As a promotion for The Simpsons Movie, twelve 7-Eleven stores were transformed into Kwik-E-Marts and sold The Simpsons related products. These included "Buzz Cola", "Krusty-O" cereal, pink doughnuts with sprinkles, and "Squishees". In 2008, consumers around the world spent \$750 million on merchandise related to The Simpsons, with half of the amount originating from the United States. By 2009, 20th Century Fox had greatly increased merchandising efforts. On April 9, 2009, the United States Postal Service unveiled a series of five 44-cent stamps featuring Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa and Maggie, to commemorate the show's twentieth anniversary. The Simpsons is the first television series still in production to receive this recognition. The stamps, designed by Matt Groening, were made available for purchase on May 7, 2009. Approximately one billion were printed, but only 318 million were sold, costing the Postal Service \$1.2 million.

Geology of the Grand Canyon area

Aspect of geology

The geology of the Grand Canyon area includes one of the most complete and studied sequences of rock on Earth. The nearly 40 major sedimentary rock layers exposed in the Grand Canyon and in the Grand Canyon National Park area range in age from about 200 million to nearly 2 billion years old. Most were deposited in warm, shallow seas and near ancient, long-gone sea shores in western North America. Both marine and terrestrial sediments are represented, including lithified sand dunes from an extinct desert. There are at least 14 known unconformities in the geologic record found in the Grand Canyon. Uplift of the region started about 75 million years ago during the Laramide orogeny; a mountain-building event that is largely responsible for creating the Rocky Mountains to the east. In total, the Colorado Plateau was uplifted an estimated 2 miles (3.2 km). The adjacent Basin and Range Province to the west started to form about 18 million years ago as the result of crustal stretching. A drainage system that flowed through what is today the eastern Grand Canyon emptied into the now lower Basin and Range province. The opening of the Gulf of California around 6 million years ago enabled a large river to cut its way northeast from the gulf. The new river captured the older drainage to form the ancestral Colorado River, which in turn started to form the Grand Canyon. Wetter climates brought upon by ice ages starting 2 million years ago greatly increased excavation of the Grand Canyon, which was nearly as deep as it is now, 1.2 million years ago. Volcanic activity deposited lava over the area 1.8 million to 500,000 years ago. At least 13 lava dams blocked the Colorado River, forming lakes that were up to 2,000 feet (610 m) deep. The end of the last ice age and subsequent human activity has greatly reduced the ability of the Colorado River to excavate the canyon. Dams in particular have upset patterns of sediment transport and deposition. Controlled floods from Glen Canyon Dam upstream have been conducted to see if they have a restorative effect. Earthquakes and mass-wasting erosive events still affect the region. ## Deposition of sediments ### Vishnu Basement Rocks At about 2.5 and 1.8 billion years ago in Precambrian time, sand, mud, silt, and ash were laid down in a marine basin adjacent to an orogenic belt. From 1.8 to 1.6 billion years ago at least two island arcs collided with the proto-North American continent. This process of plate tectonics compressed and grafted the marine sediments in the basin onto the mainland and uplifted them out of the sea. Later, these rocks were buried 12 miles (19 km) under the surface and pressure-cooked into metamorphic rock. The resulting Granite Gorge Metamorphic Suite, which is part of the Vishnu Basement Rocks, consists of the metasedimentary Vishnu Schist and the metavolcanic Brahma and Rama Schists that were formed 1.75 billion to 1.73 billion years ago. This is the resistant rock now exposed at the bottom of the canyon in the Inner Gorge. As the volcanic islands collided with the mainland around 1.7 billion years ago, blobs of magma rose from the subduction zone and intruded the Granite Gorge Metamorphic Suite. These plutons slowly cooled to form the Zoroaster Granite; part of which would later be metamorphosed into gneiss. This rock unit can be seen as light-colored bands in the darker garnet-studded Vishnu Schist (see 1b in figure 1). The intrusion of the granite occurred in three phases: two during the initial Vishnu metamorphism period, and a third around 1.4 billion years ago. The third phase was accompanied by large-scale faulting, particularly along north–south faults, leading to a partial rifting of the continent. The collision expanded the continent from the Wyoming–Colorado border into Mexico and almost doubled the crust's thickness in the Grand Canyon region. Part of this thickening created the 5-to-6-mile (8 to 10 km) high ancestral Mazatzal Mountains. Subsequent erosion lasting 300 million years stripped much of the exposed sediments and the mountains away. This reduced the very high mountains to small hills a few tens to hundreds of feet (tens of meters) high. Geologist John Wesley Powell called this major gap in the geologic record, which is also seen in other parts of the world, the Great Unconformity. Other sediments may have been added but, if they ever existed, were completely removed by erosion. Such gaps in the geologic record are called unconformities by geologists. The Great Unconformity is one of the best examples of an exposed nonconformity, which is a type of unconformity that has bedded rock units above igneous or metamorphic rocks. ### Grand Canyon Supergroup In late Precambrian time, extension from a large tectonic plate or smaller plates moving away from Laurentia thinned its continental crust, forming large rift basins that would ultimately fail to split the continent. Eventually, this sunken region of Laurentia was flooded with a shallow seaway that extended from at least present-day Lake Superior to Glacier National Park in Montana to the Grand Canyon and the Uinta Mountains. The resulting Grand Canyon Supergroup of sedimentary units is composed of nine varied geologic formations that were laid down from 1.2 billion and 740 million years ago in this sea. Good exposures of the supergroup can be seen in eastern Grand Canyon in the Inner Gorge and from Desert View, Lipan Point and Moran point. The oldest section of the supergroup is the Unkar Group. It accumulated in a variety of fluvial, deltaic, tidal, nearshore marine, and offshore marine environments. The first formation to be laid down in the Unkar Group was the Bass Formation. Fluvial gravels initially accumulated in shallow river valleys. They later lithified into a basal conglomerate that is known as the Hotauta Member of the Bass Formation. The Bass Formation was deposited in a shallow sea near the coast as a mix of limestone, sandstone, and shale. Diagenesis later altered the bulk of the limestone into dolomite. It is 120 to 340 feet (37 to 100 m) thick and grayish in color. Averaging 1250 million years old, this is the oldest layer exposed in the Grand Canyon that contains fossils—stromatolites. Hakatai Shale is made of thin beds of marginal-marine-derived mudstones, sandstones, and shale that, together, are 445 to 985 feet (136 to 300 m) thick. This formation indicates a short-lived regression (retreat) of the seashore in the area that left mud flats. Today it is very bright orange-red and gives the Red Canyon its name. Shinumo Quartzite is a resistant marine sedimentary quartzite that was eroded to form monadnocks that later became islands in Cambrian time. Those islands withstood wave action long enough to become re-buried by other sediments in the Cambrian Period. Dox Formation is over 3,000 feet (910 m) thick and is made of sandstone with some interbedded shale beds and mudstone that were deposited in fluvial and tidal environments. Ripple marks and other features indicate it was close to the shore. Outcrops of this red to orange formation can be seen in the eastern parts of the canyon. Fossils of stromatolites and algae are found in this layer. At 1070 ± 70 million years old, the Cardenas Basalt is the youngest formation in the Unkar Group. It is made of layers of dark brown basaltic rocks that flowed as lava up to 1,000 feet (300 m) thick. Nankoweap Formation is around 1050 million years old and is not part of a group. This rock unit is made of coarse-grained sandstone, and was deposited in a shallow sea on top of the eroded surface of the Cardenas Basalt. The Nankoweap is only exposed in the eastern part of the canyon. A gap in the geologic record, an unconformity, follows the Nankoweap. All formations in the Chuar Group were deposited in coastal and shallow sea environments about 1000 to 700 million years ago. The Galeros Formation is a mainly greenish formation composed of interbedded sandstone, limestone, and shale. Fossilized stromatolites are found in the Galeros. The Kwagunt Formation consists of black shale and red to purple mudstone with some limestone. Isolated pockets of reddish sandstone are also found around Carbon Butte. Stromatolites are found in this layer. About 800 million years ago the supergroup was tilted 15° and block faulted in the Grand Canyon Orogeny. Some of the block units moved down and others moved up while fault movement created north–south-trending fault-block mountain ranges. About 100 million years of erosion took place that washed most of the Chuar Group away along with part of the Unkar Group (exposing the Shinumo Quartzite as previously explained). The mountain ranges were reduced to hills, and in some places, the whole 12,000 feet (3,700 m) of the supergroup were removed entirely, exposing the basement rocks below. Any rocks that were deposited on top of the Grand Canyon Supergroup in the Precambrian were completely removed. This created a major unconformity that represents 460 million years of lost geologic history in the area. ### Tonto Group During the Paleozoic era, the western part of what would become North America was near the equator and on a passive margin. The Cambrian Explosion of life took place over about 15 million years in this part of the world. Climate was warm and invertebrates, such as the trilobites, were abundant. An ocean started to return to the Grand Canyon area from the west about 550 million years ago. As its shoreline moved east, river profiles rose and fluvial sediments accumulated within tectonic basins and coastal plains at first as the Sixtymile Formation, a tan-colored sandstone with some small layers of shale. Later rising sea level resulted in the local accumulation of sediments in paleovalleys as the base of the Tapeat Sandstone. As sea level rose, the ocean flooded the coastal plain causing the concurrent deposition of the Tapeats Sandstone, Bright Angel Shale, Muav Limestone, and Frenchman Mountain Dolostone. Finally, the Frenchman Mountain Dolostone accumulated in beneath shallow seas. Tapeats Sandstone averages 525 million years old and is made of medium- to coarse-grained sand and conglomerate that was deposited on an ancient shore (see 3a in figure 1). Ripple marks are common in the upper members of this dark brown thin-bedded layer. Fossils and imprint trails of trilobites and brachiopods have also been found in the Tapeats. Today it is a cliff-former that is 100 to 325 feet (30 to 100 m) thick. Bright Angel Shale averages 515 million years old and is made of mudstone-derived shale that is interbedded with small sections of sandstone and shaly limestone with a few thin beds of dolomite. It was mostly deposited as mud just offshore and contains brachiopod, trilobite, and worm fossils (see 3b in figure 1). The color of this formation is mostly various shades of green with some brownish-tan to gray parts. It is a slope-former and is 270 to 450 feet (82 to 137 m) thick. Glauconite is responsible for the green coloration of the Bright Angel. Muav Limestone averages 505 million years old and is made of gray, thin-bedded limestone that was deposited farther offshore from calcium carbonate precipitates (see 3c in figure 1). The western part of the canyon has a much thicker sequence of Muav than the eastern part. The Muav is a cliff-former, 136 to 827 feet (41 to 252 m) thick. These three formations were laid down over a period of 30 million years from early-to-middle Cambrian time. Trilobites followed by brachiopods are the most commonly reported fossils in this group but well-preserved fossils are relatively rare. We know that the shoreline was transgressing (advancing onto land) because finer grade material was deposited on top of coarser-grained sediment. Today, the Tonto Group makes up the Tonto Platform seen above and following the Colorado River; the Tapeats Sandstone and Muav Limestone form the platform's cliffs and the Bright Angel Shale forms its slopes. Unlike the Proterozoic units below it, the Tonto Group's beds basically lie in their original horizontal position. The Bright Angel Shale in the group forms an aquiclude (barrier to groundwater seeping down), and thus collects and directs water through the overlying Muav Limestone to feed springs in the Inner Gorge. ### Temple Butte, Redwall, and Surprise Canyon The next two periods of geologic history, the Ordovician and the Silurian, are missing from the Grand Canyon sequence. Geologists do not know if sediments were deposited in these periods and were later removed by erosion or if they were never deposited in the first place. Either way, this break in the geologic history of the area spans about 65 million years. A type of unconformity called a disconformity was formed. Disconformities show erosional features such as valleys, hills and cliffs that are later covered by younger sediments. Geologists do know that deep channels were carved on the top of the Muav Limestone during this time. Streams were the likely cause, but marine scour may be to blame. Either way, these depressions were filled with freshwater limestone about 385 million years ago in the Middle Devonian in a formation that geologists call the Temple Butte Formation (see 4a in figure 1). Marble Canyon in the eastern part of the park displays these filled purplish-colored channels well. Temple Butte Formation is a cliff-former in the western part of the park where it is gray to cream-colored dolomite. Fossils of animals with backbones are found in this formation; bony plates from freshwater fish in the eastern part and numerous marine fish fossils in the western part. Temple Butte Formation is 100 to 450 feet (30 to 137 m) thick; thinner near Grand Canyon Village and thicker in western Grand Canyon. An unconformity representing 40 to 50 million years of lost geologic history marks the top of this formation. The next formation in the Grand Canyon geologic column is the cliff-forming Redwall Limestone, which is 400 to 800 feet (120 to 240 m) thick (see 4b in figure 1). Redwall is composed of thick-bedded, dark brown to bluish gray limestone and dolomite with white chert nodules mixed in. It was laid down in a retreating shallow tropical sea near the equator during 40 million years of the early-to-middle Mississippian. Many fossilized crinoids, brachiopods, bryozoans, horn corals, nautiloids, and sponges, along with other marine organisms such as large and complex trilobites have been found in the Redwall. In late Mississippian time, the Grand Canyon region was slowly uplifted and the Redwall was partly eroded away. A Karst topography consisting of caves, sinkholes, and subterranean river channels resulted but were later filled with more limestone. The exposed surface of Redwall gets its characteristic color from rainwater dripping from the iron-rich redbeds of the Supai and Hermit shale that lie above. Surprise Canyon Formation is a sedimentary layer of purplish-red shale that was laid down in discontinuous beds of sand and lime above the Redwall (see 4c in figure 1). It was created in very late Mississippian and possibly in very earliest Pennsylvanian time as the land subsided and tidal estuaries filled river valleys with sediment. This formation only exists in isolated lenses that are 50 to 400 feet (15 to 122 m) thick. Surprise Canyon was unknown to science until 1973 and can be reached only by helicopter. Fossil logs, other plant material and marine shells are found in this formation. An unconformity marks the top of the Surprise Canyon Formation and in most places this unconformity has entirely removed the Surprise Canyon and exposed the underlying Redwall. ### Supai Group An unconformity of 15 to 20 million years separates the Supai Group from the previously deposited Redwall Formation. Supai Group was deposited in late Mississippian, through the Pennsylvanian and into the Early Permian time, some 320 million to 270 million years ago. Both marine and non-marine deposits of mud, silt, sand and calcareous sediments were laid down on a broad coastal plain similar to the Texas Gulf Coast of today. Around this time, the Ancestral Rocky Mountains rose in Colorado and New Mexico and streams brought eroded sediment from them to the Grand Canyon area. Supai Group formations in the western part of the canyon contain limestone, indicative of a warm, shallow sea, while the eastern part was probably a muddy river delta. This formation consists of red siltstones and shale capped by tan-colored sandstone beds that together reach a thickness of 600 to 700 ft (around 200 m). Shale in the early Permian formations in this group were oxidized to a bright red color. Fossils of amphibian footprints, reptiles, and plentiful plant material are found in the eastern part and increasing numbers of marine fossils are found in the western part. Formations of the Supai Group are from oldest to youngest (an unconformity is present at the top of each): Watahomigi (see 5a in figure 1) is a slope-forming gray limestone with some red chert bands, sandstone, and purple siltstone that is 100 to 300 feet (30 to 90 m) thick. Manakacha (see 5b in figure 1) is a cliff- and slope-forming pale red sandstone and red shale that averages 300 feet (90 m) thick in Grand Canyon. Wescogame (see 5c in figure 1) is a ledge- and slope-forming pale red sandstone and siltstone that is 100 to 200 feet (30 to 60 m) thick. Esplanade (see 5d in figure 1) is a ledge- and cliff-forming pale red sandstone and siltstone that is 200 to 800 feet (60 to 200 m) thick. An unconformity marks the top of the Supai Group. ### Hermit, Coconino, Toroweap, and Kaibab Like the Supai Group below it, the Permian-aged Hermit Formation was probably deposited on a broad coastal plain (see 6a in figure 1). The alternating thin-bedded iron oxide, mud and silt were deposited via freshwater streams in a semiarid environment around 280 million years ago. Fossils of winged insects, cone-bearing plants, and ferns are found in this formation as well as tracks of vertebrate animals. It is a soft, deep red shale and mudstone slope-former that is approximately 100 to 900 feet (30 to 274 m) thick. Slope development will periodically undermine the formations above and car- to house-sized blocks of that rock will cascade down onto the Tonto Platform. An unconformity marks the top of this formation . Coconino Sandstone formed about 275 million years ago as the area dried out and sand dunes made of quartz sand invaded a growing desert (see 6b in figure 1). Some Coconino fills deep mudcracks in the underlying Hermit Shale and the desert that created the Coconino lasted for 5 to 10 million years. Today, the Coconino is a 57 to 600 feet (17 to 183 m) thick golden white to cream-colored cliff-former near the canyon's rim. Cross bedding patterns of the frosted, fine-grained, well-sorted and rounded quartz grains seen in its cliffs is compatible with but does not substantiate conclusively an eolian environment. Also fossilized are tracks from lizard-like creatures and what look like tracks from millipedes and scorpions. An unconformity marks the top of this formation. Next in the geologic column is the 200-foot (60 m)-thick Toroweap Formation (see 6c in figure 1). It consists of red and yellow sandstone and shaly gray limestone interbedded with gypsum. The formation was deposited in a warm, shallow sea as the shoreline transgressed (invaded) and regressed (retreated) over the land. The average age of the rock is about 273 million years. In modern times it is a ledge- and slope-former that contains fossils of brachiopods, corals, and mollusks along with other animals and various terrestrial plants. The Toroweap is divided into the following three members: Seligman is a slope-forming yellowish to reddish sandstone and siltstone. Brady Canyon is a cliff-forming gray limestone with some chert. Wood Ranch is a slope-forming pale red and gray siltstone and dolomitic sandstone. An unconformity marks the top of this formation. One of the highest, and therefore youngest, formations seen in the Grand Canyon area is the Kaibab Limestone (see 6d in figure 1). It erodes into ledgy cliffs that are 300 to 400 feet (90 to 100 m) thick and was laid down in latest early Permian time, about 270 million years ago, by an advancing warm, shallow sea. The formation is typically made of sandy limestone sitting on top of a layer of sandstone. This is the cream to grayish-white rock that park visitors stand on while viewing the canyon from both rims. It is also the surface rock covering much of the Kaibab Plateau just north of the canyon and the Coconino Plateau immediately south. Shark teeth have been found in this formation as well as abundant fossils of marine invertebrates such as brachiopods, corals, mollusks, sea lilies, and worms. An unconformity marks the top of this formation. ### Mesozoic deposition Uplift marked the start of the Mesozoic and streams started to incise the newly dry land. Streams flowing through broad low valleys in Triassic time deposited sediment eroded from nearby uplands, creating the once 1,000-foot (300 m)-thick Moenkopi Formation. The formation is made from sandstone and shale with gypsum layers in between. Moenkopi outcrops are found along the Colorado River in Marble Canyon, on Cedar Mountain (a mesa near the southeastern park border), and in Red Butte (located south of Grand Canyon Village). Remnants of the Shinarump Conglomerate, itself a member of the Chinle Formation, are above the Moenkopi Formation near the top of Red Butte but below a much younger lava flow. Formations totaling over 4,000 to 5,000 feet (1,200 to 1,500 m) in thickness were deposited in the region in the Mesozoic and Cenozoic but were almost entirely removed from the Grand Canyon sequence by subsequent erosion. The geology of the Zion and Kolob canyons area and the geology of the Bryce Canyon area records some of these formations. All these rock units together form a super sequence of rock known as the Grand Staircase. ## Cenozoic regional uplift and erosion of the canyon ### Uplift and nearby extension The Laramide orogeny affected all of western North America by helping to build the American cordillera. The Kaibab Uplift, Monument Upwarp, the Uinta Mountains, San Rafael Swell, and the Rocky Mountains were uplifted, at least in part, by the Laramide orogeny. This major mountain-building event started near the end of the Mesozoic, around 75 million years ago, and continued into the Eocene period of the Cenozoic. It was caused by subduction off the western coast of North America. Major faults that trend north–south and cross the canyon area were reactivated by this uplift. Many of these faults are Precambrian in age and are still active today. Streams draining the Rocky Mountains in early Miocene time terminated in landlocked basins in Utah, Arizona and Nevada but there is no evidence for a major river. Around 18 million years ago, tensional forces started to thin and drop the region to the west, creating the Basin and Range Province. Basins (grabens) dropped down and mountain ranges (horsts) rose up between old and new north–south–trending faults. However, for reasons poorly understood, the beds of the Colorado Plateaus remained mostly horizontal through both events even as they were uplifted about 2 miles (3.2 km) in two pulses. The extreme western part of the canyon ends at one of the Basin and Range faults, the Grand Wash, which also marks the boundary between the two provinces. Uplift from the Laramide orogeny and the creation of the Basin and Range province worked together to steepen the gradient of streams flowing west on the Colorado Plateau. These streams cut deep, eastward-growing, channels into the western edge of the Colorado Plateau and deposited their sediment in the widening Basin and Range region. According to a 2012 study, there is evidence that the western Grand Canyon could be as old as 70 million years. ### Colorado River: origin and development Rifting started to create the Gulf of California far to the south 6 to 10 million years ago. Around the same time, the western edge of the Colorado Plateau may have sagged slightly. Both events changed the direction of many streams toward the sagging region and the increased gradient caused them to downcut much faster. From 5.5 million to 5 million years ago, headward erosion to the north and east consolidated these streams into one major river and associated tributary channels. This river, the ancestral Lower Colorado River, started to fill the northern arm of the gulf, which extended nearly to the site of Hoover Dam, with estuary deposits. At the same time, streams flowed from highlands in central Arizona north and across what is today the western Grand Canyon, possibly feeding a larger river. The mechanism by which the ancestral Lower Colorado River captured this drainage and the drainage from much of the rest of the Colorado Plateau is not known. Possible explanations include headward erosion or a broken natural dam of a lake or river. Whatever the cause, the Lower Colorado probably captured the landlocked Upper Colorado somewhere west of the Kaibab Uplift. The much larger drainage area and yet steeper stream gradient helped to further accelerate downcutting. Ice ages during the Pleistocene brought a cooler and wetter pluvial climate to the region starting 2 to 3 million years ago. The added precipitation increased runoff and the erosive ability of streams (especially from spring melt water and flash floods in summer). With a greatly increased flow volume the Colorado cut faster than ever before and started to quickly excavate the Grand Canyon 2 million years before present, almost reaching the modern depth by 1.2 million years ago. The resulting Grand Canyon of the Colorado River trends roughly east to west for 278 miles (447 km) between Lake Powell and Lake Mead. In that distance, the Colorado River drops 2,000 feet (610 m) and has excavated an estimated 1,000 cubic miles (4,200 km³) of sediment to form the canyon. This part of the river bisects the 9,000-foot (2,700 m)-high Kaibab Uplift and passes seven plateaus (the Kaibab, Kanab, and Shivwits plateaus bound the northern part of the canyon and the Coconino bounds the southern part). Each of these plateaus are bounded by north–south-trending faults and monoclines created or reactivated during the Laramide orogeny. Streams flowing into the Colorado River have since exploited these faults to excavate their own tributary canyons, such as Bright Angel Canyon. ### Volcanic activity in the western canyon Volcanic activity started in Uinkaret volcanic field (in the western Grand Canyon) about 3 million years ago. Over 150 flows of basaltic lava dammed the Colorado River at least 13 times from 725,000 to 100,000 years ago. The dams typically formed in weeks, were 12 to 86 miles (19 to 138 km) long, 150 to 2,000 feet (46 to 610 m) high (thicker upstream and thinner downstream) and had volumes of 0.03 to 1.2 cubic miles (0.13 to 5.00 km³). The longevity of the dams and their ability to hold Colorado River water in large lakes has been debated. In one hypothesis water from the Colorado River backed up behind the dams in large lakes that extended as far as Moab, Utah. Dams were overtopped in short time; those that were 150 to 400 feet (46 to 122 m) high were overtopped by their lakes in 2 to 17 days. At the same time, sediment filled the lakes behind the dams. Sediment would fill a lake behind a 150-foot (46 m)-high dam in 10.33 months, filled a lake behind an 1,150-foot (350 m)-high dam in 345 years, and filled the lake behind the tallest dam in 3000 years. Cascades of water flowed over a dam while waterfalls migrated up-river along it. Most lava dams lasted for around 10,000 to 20,000 years. However others have proposed that the lava dams were much more ephemeral and failed catastrophically before overtopping. In this model dams would fail due to fluid flow through fractures in the dams and around dam abutments, through permeable river deposits and alluvium. Since the demise of these dams the Colorado River has carved a maximum of about 160 feet (49 m) into the rocks of the Colorado Plateau ## Ongoing geology and human impact The end of the Pleistocene ice ages and the start of the Holocene began to change the area's climate from a cool, wet pluvial one to dryer semi-arid conditions similar to that of today. With less water to cut, the erosive ability of the Colorado was greatly reduced. Mass wasting processes thus began to become relatively more important than they were before. Steeper cliffs and further widening the Grand Canyon and its tributary canyon system occurred. An average of two debris flows per year reach the Colorado River from tributary canyons to form or expand rapids. This type of mass wasting is the main way the smaller and steeper side canyons transport sediment but it also plays a major role in excavating the larger canyons. In 1963 Glen Canyon Dam and other dams farther upstream started to regulate the flow of the Colorado River through Grand Canyon. Pre-dam but still historic flows of the Colorado through Grand Canyon ranged from 700 to 100,000 cubic feet (20 to 2,832 m³) per second with at least one late 19th century flood of 300,000 cubic feet (8,500 m³) per second. Discharge from Glen Canyon Dam exceeds 48,200 cubic feet (1,360 m³) per second only when there is danger of overtopping the dam or when the level of Lake Powell otherwise needs to be lowered. An interim conservation measure since 1991 has held maximum flows at 20,000 cubic feet (570 m³) per second even though the dam's power plant can handle 13,200 cubic feet (370 m³) per second more flow. Controlling river flow by use of dams has diminished the river's ability to scour rocks by substantially reducing the amount of sediment it carries. Dams on the Colorado River have also changed the character of the river water. Once both muddy and warm, the river is now clear and averages a 46 °F (8 °C) temperature year-round. Experimental floods approaching the 48,200 cubic feet (1,360 m³) per second level mentioned above have been carried out in 1996 and 2004 to study the effects on sediment erosion and deposition. Grand Canyon lies on the southern end of the Intermountain West seismic belt. At least 35 earthquakes larger than 3.0 on the Richter Scale occurred in the Grand Canyon region in the 20th century. Of these, five registered over 5.0 on the Richter Scale and the largest was a 6.2 quake that occurred in January 1906. Major roughly north–south-trending faults that cross the canyon are (from west to east), the Grand Wash, Hurricane and Toroweap. Major northeast-trending fracture systems of normal faults that intersect the canyon include the West Kaibab and Bright Angel while northwest-trending systems include the Grandview—Phantom. Most earthquakes in the region occur in a narrow northwest-trending band between the Mesa Butte and West Kaibab fracture systems. These events are probably the result of eastward-migrating crustal stretching that may eventually move past the Grand Canyon area. ## Trail of Time and Yavapai Geology Museum The Trail of Time is an outdoor geology exhibit and nature trail on the South Rim of Grand Canyon National Park. Each meter walked on the trail represents one million years of Grand Canyon's geologic history. Bronze markers on the trail mark your location in time. The trail begins at "Today" near the Yavapai Geology Museum, and ends 2 billion years later at Verkamp's Visitor Center. Along the way are samples of the Canyon's rocks, as you would encounter them going from the rim down to the river, and displays explaining the geologic history of the Canyon. The trail opened in late 2010. The Yavapai Geology Museum include three-dimensional models, photographs, and exhibits which allow park visitors to see and understand the complicated geologic story of the area. The museum building, the historic Yavapai Observation Station (built 1928), located one mile (1.6 km) east of Market Plaza, features expansive canyon views. A bookstore offers a variety of materials about the area. ## See also - Geology of the Colorado Plateau - Grand Staircase, for regional stratigraphy ## Notes and timeline

Nil Battey Sannata

2016 film by Ashwiny Iyer Tiwari

Nil Battey Sannata (lit. 'Zero Divided by Zero Equals Nothing'; slang for "Good For Nothing"), released internationally as The New Classmate, is a 2015 Indian Hindi-language comedy drama film directed by Ashwiny Iyer Tiwari in her feature debut. Produced by Aanand L. Rai, Ajay Rai, and Alan McAlex under the banners of Colour Yellow Productions and JAR Pictures, the film was co-written by Iyer, Neeraj Singh, Pranjal Choudhary, and Nitesh Tiwari. Swara Bhaskar starred as Chanda Sahay, a high-school drop-out household maid and single mother of a sullen young girl named Apeksha, played by Riya Shukla. The film's theme is a person's right to dream and change their lives, irrespective of social status. Released in India on 22 April 2016, Nil Battey Sannata was distributed by Eros International and garnered critical and audience acclaim. Reviewers praised most aspects of the production, especially its narrative and realism, and the performances of the cast, Bhaskar's in particular. At the 62nd Filmfare Awards, Iyer won the Filmfare Award for Best Debut Director, while Bhaskar and Shukla won the Screen Awards for Best Actress (Critics) and Best Child Artist respectively. The film did well at the box-office, collecting a total of around ₹69 million (US\$860,000) during its entire theatrical run. The same year, the film was remade in Tamil as Amma Kanakku, with Iyer returning to direct. The following year, it was remade in Malayalam as Udaharanam Sujatha. ## Plot Apeksha "Apu" Shivlal Sahay (Shukla) is an unmotivated student who has managed to reach her SSC year in school despite her lack of interest in studying further. She struggles in mathematics alongside her friends, Sweety (Neha Prajapati) and Pintu (Prashant Tiwari). Her single mother Chanda (Swara Bhaskar), a high-school drop-out, works four different menial jobs, which include working as a maid for Dr. Diwan (Pathak). Troubled by her daughter's indifferent attitude, Chanda narrates her dilemma to Dr. Diwan, who suggests that she hire a math tutor for Apu. Chanda is told that Apu must improve her grades to be eligible for a discount at the tuition. Apu, however, refutes the plan saying that she is destined to work as a maid as her mother cannot afford to pay for higher education anyway. With the encouragement of Dr. Diwan, Chanda enrolls in Apu's school so that she can learn math and tutor Apu herself. This embarrasses Apu, and she continuously ridicules her mother. Chanda befriends her classmates and impresses the teachers with her steady progress. She enlists the help of her shy classmate Amar (Vishal Nath) to understand math and makes use of mind maps on his advice. Apu continues to struggle to get grades and is further angered by her mother's success. Chanda promises to drop out of school if Apu manages to score a better grade than her on their next math test. With Amar's help and constant studying, Apu manages to get a good score. However, Chanda backs out of her promise on seeing that Apu was not committed to continue studying. After allotting more time to school, she is fired from one of her jobs and is forced to pick up a night shift at a restaurant. Apu assumes that Chanda has been soliciting; she steals her savings and spends it on food and new clothes. This devastates Chanda, who becomes depressed when Apu tells her that the money was not hard-earned. Chanda stops attending school and continues to work with the hope that Apu will join the Indian Administrative Service, after she is inspired by a kind District Collector (Sanjay Suri). In the meantime, Amar tells Apu about her mother's new work arrangements at the restaurant which she mistook for soliciting. Remorseful, Apu rekindles her interest in school and begins to treat her mother with respect. She gets Chanda to re-enroll and the two finish their SSC year together. A few years later, Apu attends her Union Public Service Commission Civil Service Examination interview, having passed her examinations successfully. After being asked what inspired her to apply for the IAS, she answers that she is inspired by her mother, who now tutors struggling math students for free and that she doesn't want to be a maid. ## Cast The cast is listed below: - Swara Bhaskar as Chanda Sahay - Riya Shukla as Apeksha "Apu" Shivlal Sahay - Aditi Tailang as Grown up Apeksha - Ratna Pathak Shah as Dr. Diwan - Pankaj Tripathi as Principal Srivastava - Ganesh Kumar as Hindi teacher - Sanjay Suri as District Collector - Neha Prajapati as Sweety - Prashant Tiwari as Pintu - Vishal Nath as Amar ## Production Nil Battey Sannata was directed by Ashwiny Iyer Tiwari in her directorial debut. She conceived the idea for the film while working with Leo Burnett Worldwide, a Chicago-based advertising company, for a Kaun Banega Crorepati promotional video. The screenplay was written by Iyer, Neeraj Singh, Pranjal Choudhary and Nitesh Tiwari. In an interview with The Indian Express, Iyer said that "the story of Nil Battey Sannata is relevant as well as inspiring". The film's title translates to "Zero Divided by Zero Equals Nothing", and is a slang for "Good For Nothing". After going through the script, JAR Pictures' Ajay G. Rai decided to produce the film, and insisted on Iyer to direct it as well. Although initially reluctant, Iyer agreed to direct and learnt the major aspects of cinematography as a part of her preparation. Gavemic U Ary worked as the cinematographer for the film, and Kunal Sharma headed the sound department. The visual effects were provided by Prasad Film Labs, a motion picture post-production studio based in Hyderabad, and the costumes were designed by Sachin Lovalekar. Mukesh Chhabra was the film's casting director. Swara Bhaskar was the first to be cast in the role of Chanda Sahay, a single mother of a 15-year-old girl. Initially sceptical about playing a mother on screen early in her career, she changed her mind after reading the script. To understand the role better, Bhaskar stayed with professional domestic helpers from Agra, Uttar Pradesh, where the film is set. She bought such props as a handbag, a comb, a pocket mirror, and rubber chappals. She also drew guidance from her mother's experiences of handling a teenage daughter. After the film's release, Bhaskar said in an interview with Daily News and Analysis that her friends in the Hindi film industry advised her not to take up the role as they felt it would be a "career suicide" for her. She agreed to participate in the project because "the story stayed in [her] mind". The next role to be cast was that of the 15-year-old daughter of the protagonist. Ria Shukla was selected for the role after auditions in Lucknow. Ratna Pathak and Pankaj Tripathi play supporting roles in the film. A group of around 25 local children played the students at the school. Principal photography for Nil Battey Sannata commenced in May 2014 at Agra, and was completed by the end of November. At several locations in Agra, the crew found it difficult to manage an "over-enthusiastic crowd". The editing process began immediately after, and was supervised by Chandrashekhar Prajapati of the Pixon Studios. The editor's cut was submitted for the Work-in-Progress Lab at the NFDC Film Bazaar. Distributed by Eros International in India, Nil Battey Sannata's final cut ran for a total of 104 minutes. ## Soundtrack The music for Nil Battey Sannata was composed by newcomers Rohan and Vinayak, with Manoj Yadav, Nitesh Tiwari and Shreyas Jain as lyricists for the soundtrack. Joginder Tuteja's mixed review for Bollywood Hungama was largely appreciative of the songs "Murabba" and "Maths Mein Dabba Gul", also acknowledging the soundtrack's "rural flavor". He deemed the overall album to be "strictly situational". The Times of India critic Mohar Basu gave the soundtrack a 3 out 5 star rating, saying that the "album wins you over with its innocence". Praising the pleasant "Murabba" and the catchy "Maths Mein Dabba", he asserted that the film "has music that will touch your heart". ## Release ### Marketing and release The film had its world premiere in the last week of September 2015 at the Silk Road Film Festival, Fuzhou, China. It was released under the title of The New Classmate, as it was at such international film festivals like the Marrakech International Film Festival and the Cleveland International Film Festival. The film then went on to be screened at the BFI London Film Festival (LFF) on 23 October 2015, and was lauded at the event. The release of the first look of the film coincided with the International Women's Day, 8 March. In the poster of the film, a smiling Swara Bhaskar is seen taking a leap with Ria Shukla in a red sari and a blue salwar kameez respectively. The poster was unveiled by the actress Sonam Kapoor, a close friend of Bhaskar. The official trailer was released by Eros productions on 22 March 2016. The launch took place at a media session in a classroom set-up with Bhaskar, Shukla and Pankaj Tripathi. At the event, the film's producer Anand L Rai said, "I associated with Nil Battey Sannata straight from my heart and I'm feeling very proud of the film." The trailer was well received by both critics and audiences. A reviewer for Daily News and Analysis thought of it as "heartwarming". The film had its theatrical release in India on 22 April 2016. ### Box office Nil Battey Sannata released in India on fewer than 300 screens and had an average opening at the box-office. It collected ₹2.5 million (US\$31,000) on its opening, but the figure grew on the second day as a result of positive word of mouth reviews. The film collected ₹6.0 million (US\$75,000) on Saturday and ₹10.5 million (US\$130,000) on Sunday bringing the opening weekend collections to ₹19 million (US\$240,000). The film faced competition from other small-budget Hindi film releases Laal Rang and Santa Banta Pvt Ltd in its opening weekend at the box-office, but was expected to do well because of the positive reviews and good word of mouth. The film collected ₹30 million (US\$380,000) in its opening week. It was declared tax free in the states of Uttar Pradesh and New Delhi by their respective state governments. The film became a commercial success, and continued through the second week, increasing in rural areas of the country. It had an impressive six-week run at the box office and its lifetime collections were around ₹70 million (US\$880,000). ## Reception Nil Battey Sannata opened to critical acclaim, and was positively received by the audiences as well. It received overwhelming praise, chiefly for the direction, and for Bhaskar, Shukla and Tripathi. Kunal Guha of the Mumbai Mirror wrote, "It's rare to come across films that force you to keep aside your yardsticks of what a good film is and dive into the experience". Namrata Thakur of Rediff.com gave the film the highest praise and deemed it "an absolute gem", saying "there is hardly a dull moment in the film". She considered it the feel-good film of the year, comparing it to 2015's Dum Laga Ke Haisha. The Hindu journalist and film critic Namrata Joshi included Nil Battey Sannata in her year-end list of "Hindi films that made a mark in 2016". She thought of it "a warm, feel-good film which offers hope and the promise". The realism in the portrayal of the characters, and the universal theme of the film was widely lauded by critics. Gautaman Bhaskaran of Hindustan Times gave it 4 stars out of 5 and remarked that the film "is a powerful and honest work", and Shubhra Gupta of The Indian Express noted that "the film relies on keeping things real". Mohar Basu in his review at The Times of India described the movie as "unpretentious", saying that "the movie wins you over with its innocence and simplicity". Saibal Chatterjee of NDTV said the film resonated as "a disarmingly simple and heart-warming film". Suparna Sharma of Deccan Chronicle called it a "real film in a real setting about real people that delivers several empowering, powerful messages". The performances of the lead cast were chiefly praised by critics. Joshi, who was particularly impressed with the performances of Tripathi and Shukla, ascribed the film's appeal to its well-etched characters and their relationships which were "brought alive by a nicely put together ensemble cast". The view was shared by Rachit Gupta of Filmfare, who noted that "the actors make this film so memorable". He gave Bhaskar the highest praise, saying that she delivered the "performance of a lifetime", while also praising Shukla's "super", Pathak's "phenomenal" and Tripathi's "masterclass" performances. In his review, News18 film critic Rajeev Masand deemed Bhaskar to be "the heart of the film" noting that with "not one note out of place, she grabs your attention". Udita Jhunjhunwala of Firstpost praised Bhaskar, stating that "This is one of her most nuanced performances and a welcome change", and highlighted Tripathi, calling him the "scene-stealer as the zealous school principal". ## Remakes In November 2015, Iyer agreed terms to direct a remake of the film in Tamil, for producers Dhanush and Anand L Rai. Dhanush had been shown a preview of the film by Rai, during a visit to Mumbai in September 2015 and the duo chose to co-produce the film, with Iyer retained as director. The roles played by Bhaskar, Shukla, Pathak, and Tripathi were essayed by Amala Paul, Yuvasri, Revathi, and Samuthirakani respectively in the remake, titled Amma Kanakku, which released on 24 June 2016. A Malayalam remake, Udaharanam Sujatha, starring Manju Warrier was released in 2017. ## Accolades

Lindow Man

Bog body of an Iron Age man found in England

Lindow Man, also known as Lindow II and (in jest) as Pete Marsh, is the preserved bog body of a man discovered in a peat bog at Lindow Moss near Wilmslow in Cheshire, North West England. The remains were found on 1 August 1984 by commercial peat cutters. Lindow Man is not the only bog body to have been found in the moss; Lindow Woman was discovered the year before, and other body parts have also been recovered. The find was described as "one of the most significant archaeological discoveries of the 1980s" and caused a media sensation. It helped invigorate study of British bog bodies, which had previously been neglected. Dating the body has proven problematic, but it is thought that he was deposited into Lindow Moss, face down, some time between 2 BC and 119 AD, in either the Iron Age or Romano-British period. At the time of death, Lindow Man was a healthy male in his mid-20s, and may have been of high social status as his body shows little evidence of having done heavy or rough physical labour during his lifetime. There has been debate over the reason for his death; his death was violent and perhaps ritualistic. The recovered body has been preserved by freeze-drying and is on permanent display at the British Museum, although it occasionally travels to other venues such as the Manchester Museum. ## Background ### Lindow Moss Lindow Moss is a peat bog in Lindow, an area of Wilmslow, Cheshire, which has been used as common land since the medieval period. It formed after the last ice age, one of many such peat bogs in north-east Cheshire and the Mersey basin that formed in hollows caused by melting ice. Investigations have not yet discovered settlement or agricultural activity around the edge of Lindow Moss that would have been contemporary with Lindow Man; however, analysis of pollen in the peat suggests there was some cultivation in the vicinity. Once covering over 600 hectares (1,500 acres), the bog has now shrunk to a tenth of its original size. It is a dangerous place; an 18th-century writer recorded people drowning there. For centuries the peat from the bog was used as fuel, and it continued to be extracted until the 1980s, by which time the process had been mechanised. Lindow Moss is a lowland raised mire; this type of peat bog often produces the best preserved bog bodies, allowing more detailed analysis. Lowland raised mires occur mainly in northern England and extend south to the Midlands. Lindow Man is one of 27 bodies to be recovered from such areas. ### Preservation of bog bodies The preservation of bog bodies is dependent on a set of specific physical conditions, which can occur in peat bogs. A sphagnum moss bog must have a temperature lower than 4 °C at the time of deposition of the body. The subsequent average annual temperature must be lower than 10 °C. Moisture must be stable in the bog year-round: it cannot dry out. Sphagnum moss affects the chemistry of nearby water, which becomes highly acidic (a pH of roughly 3.3 to 4.5) relative to a more ordinary environment. The concentration of dissolved minerals also tends to be low. Dying moss forms layers of sediment and releases sugars and humic acids which consume oxygen. Since the surface of the water is covered by living moss, water becomes anaerobic. As a result, human tissues buried in the bog tend to tan rather than decay. ### Lindow Woman On 13 May 1983, two peat workers at Lindow Moss, Andy Mould and Stephen Dooley, noticed an unusual object—about the size of a football—on the elevator taking peat to the shredding machine. They removed the object for closer inspection, joking that it was a dinosaur egg. Once the peat had been removed, their discovery turned out to be a decomposing, incomplete human head with one eye and some hair intact. Forensics identified the skull as belonging to a European woman, probably aged 30–50. Police initially thought the skull was that of Malika Reyn-Bardt, who had disappeared in 1960 and was the subject of an ongoing investigation. While in prison on another charge, her husband, Peter Reyn-Bardt, had boasted that he had killed his wife and buried her in the back garden of their bungalow, which was on the edge of the area of mossland where peat was being dug. The garden had been examined but no body was found. When Reyn-Bardt was confronted with the discovery of the skull from Lindow Moss, he confessed to the murder of his wife. The skull was later radiocarbon dated, revealing it to be nearly 2,000 years old. "Lindow Woman", as it became known, dated from around 210 AD. This emerged shortly before Reyn-Bardt went to trial, but he was convicted on the evidence of his confession. ## Discovery A year later, a further discovery was made at Lindow Moss, just 820 feet (250 m) south-west of the Lindow Woman. On 1 August 1984, Andy Mould, who had been involved in the discovery of Lindow Woman, took what he thought was a piece of wood off the elevator of the peat-shredding machine. He threw the object at Eddie Slack, his workmate. When it hit the ground, peat fell off the object and revealed it to be a human foot. The police were called and the foot was taken away for examination. Rick Turner, the Cheshire County Archaeologist, was notified of the discovery and succeeded in finding the rest of the body, which later became known as Lindow Man. Some skin had been exposed and had started to decay, so to prevent further deterioration of the body, it was re-covered with peat. The complete excavation of the block containing the remains was performed on 6 August. Until it could be dated, it was moved to the Macclesfield District General Hospital for storage. As the body of Malika Reyn-Bardt had still not been found, it was initially thought possible the body might be hers, until it was determined to be male, and radiocarbon dated. The owners of the land where Lindow Man was found donated the body to the British Museum, and on 21 August it was transported to London. At the time, the body was dubbed "Pete Marsh" by Middlesex Hospital radiologists, a name subsequently adopted by local journalists, as was the similar "Pete Bogg". The find was announced to the press during the second week of investigation. As the best preserved bog body found in Britain, its discovery caused a domestic media sensation and received global coverage. Sparking excitement in the country's archaeological community, who had long expected such a find, it was hailed as one of the most important archaeological discoveries of the 1980s. A Q.E.D. documentary about Lindow Man broadcast by the BBC in 1985 attracted 10 million viewers. Lindow Man's official name is Lindow II, as there are other finds from the area: Lindow I (Lindow Woman) refers to a human skull, Lindow III to a "fragmented headless body", and Lindow IV to the upper thigh of an adult male, possibly that of Lindow Man. After the discovery of Lindow Man, there were no further archaeological excavations at Lindow Moss until 1987. A large piece of skin was found by workmen on the elevator on 6 February 1987. On this occasion, the police left the investigation to the archaeologists. Over 70 pieces were found, constituting Lindow III. Although the bone was not as well preserved as that of Lindow Man, the other tissues survived in better condition. The final discovery was that of Lindow IV on 14 June 1988. Part of a left leg and buttocks were found on the elevator, from a site just 50 feet (15 m) west of where Lindow Man was found. Nearly three months later, on 12 September, a right thigh was discovered in the peat on the bucket of a digger. The proximity of the discovery sites, coupled with the fact that the remains were shown to come from an adult male, means that Lindow IV is probably part of Lindow Man. ## Remains and investigation Lindow Man marked the first discovery in Britain of a well-preserved bog body; its condition was comparable to that of Grauballe Man and Tollund Man from Denmark. Before Lindow Man was found, it was estimated that 41 bog bodies had been found in England and Wales and 15 in Scotland. Encouraged by the discovery of Lindow Man, a gazetteer was compiled, which revealed a far higher number of bog bodies: over 85 in England and Wales and over 36 in Scotland. Prior to the discovery of the bodies in Lindow Moss, British bog bodies had been a relatively neglected subject compared to European examples. The interest caused by Lindow Man led to more in-depth research of accounts of discoveries in bogs since the 17th century; by 1995, the numbers had changed to 106 in England and Wales and 34 in Scotland. The remains covered a large time frame. In life, Lindow Man would have measured between 5'6" and 5'8" (1.68 and 1.73 m) tall and weighed about 132 pounds (60 kg). It was possible to ascertain that his age at death was around the mid-20s. The body retains a trimmed beard, moustache, and sideburns of brown hair, as well as healthy teeth with no visible cavities, and manicured fingernails, indicating he did little heavy or rough work. Apart from a fox-fur armband, Lindow Man was discovered completely naked. When he died, Lindow Man was suffering from slight osteoarthritis and an infestation of whipworm and maw worm. As a result of decalcification of the bones and pressure from the peat under which Lindow Man was buried, his skull was distorted. While some preserved human remains may contain DNA, peat bogs such as Lindow Moss are generally poor for such a purpose, and it is unlikely that DNA could be recovered from Lindow Man. Lindow Man and Lindow III were found to have elevated levels of copper on their skin. The cause for this was uncertain as there could have been natural causes, although a study by Pyatt et al. proposed that the bodies may have been painted with a copper-based pigment. To test this, skin samples were taken from places likely to be painted and tested against samples from areas where painting was unlikely. It was found that the copper content of the skin of the torso was higher than the control areas, suggesting that the theory of Pyatt et al. may have been correct. However, the conclusion was ambiguous as the overall content was above that expected of a male, and variations across the body may have been due to environmental factors. Similarly, green deposits were found in the hair, originally thought to be a copper-based pigment used for decoration, but it was later found to be the result of a reaction between the keratin in the hair and the acid of the peat bog. Dating Lindow Man is problematic as samples from the body and surrounding peat have produced dates spanning a 900-year period. Although the peat encasing Lindow Man has been radiocarbon dated to about 300 BC, Lindow Man himself has a different date. Early tests at different laboratories returned conflicting dates for the body; later tests suggested a date between 2 BC and 119 AD. There has been a tendency to ascribe the body to the Iron Age period rather than Roman due to the interpretation that Lindow Man's death may have been a ritual sacrifice or execution. Explanations for why the peat in which he was found is much older have been sought. Archaeologist P. C. Buckland suggests that as the stratigraphy of the peat appears undisturbed, Lindow Man may have been deposited into a pool that was already some 300 years old. Geographer K. E. Barber has argued against this hypothesis, saying that pools at Lindow Moss would have been too shallow, and suggests that the peat may have been peeled back to allow the burial and then replaced, leaving the stratigraphy apparently undisturbed. Lindow Man's last meal was preserved in his stomach and intestines and was analysed in some detail. It was hoped that investigations into the contents of the stomach would shed light on the contemporary diet, as was the case with Grauballe Man and Tollund Man in the 1950s. The analysis of the contents of the digestive system of bog bodies had become one of the principal endeavours of investigating such remains. Analysis of the grains present revealed his diet to be mostly of cereals. He probably ate slightly charred bread, although the burning may have had ritual significance rather than being an accident. Some mistletoe pollen was also found in the stomach, indicating that Lindow Man died in March or April. One of the conclusions of the study was that the people buried in Lindow Moss may have had a less varied diet than their European counterparts. According to Jody Joy, curator of the Iron Age collection at the British Museum, the importance of Lindow Man lies more in how he lived rather than how he died, as the circumstances surrounding his demise may never be fully established. ### Cause of death As the peat was cleaned off the body in the laboratory, it became clear that Lindow Man had suffered a violent death. The injuries included a V-shaped, 3.5-centimetre (1.4 in) cut on top of his head; a possible laceration at the back of the head, ligature marks on the neck where a sinew cord was found, a possible wound on the right side of the neck, a possible stab wound in the upper right chest, a broken neck, and a fractured rib. Xeroradiography revealed that the blow on top of the head (causing the V-shaped cut) was caused by a relatively blunt object; it had fractured the skull and driven fragments into the brain. Swelling along the edges of the wound indicated that Lindow Man had lived after being struck. The blow, possibly from a small axe, would have caused unconsciousness, but the victim could have survived for several hours afterwards. The ligature marks on the neck were caused by tightening the sinew cord found around his neck, possibly a garrotte or necklace. It is not possible to confirm whether some injuries took place before or after death, due to the body's state of decay. This is the case for the wound in the upper right chest and the laceration on the back of the skull. The cut on the right of the neck may have been the result of the body becoming bloated, causing the skin to split; however, the straight edges to the wound suggest that it may have been caused by a sharp instrument, such as a knife. The ligature marks on the neck may have occurred after death. In some interpretations of Lindow Man's death, the sinew is a garrotte used to break the victim's neck. However, Robert Connolly, a lecturer in physical anthropology, suggests that the sinew may have been ornamental and that ligature marks may have been caused by the body swelling when submerged. The rib fracture may also have occurred after death, perhaps during the discovery of the body, but is included in some narratives of the Lindow Man's death. The broken neck would have proven the fatal injury, whether caused by the sinew cord tightening around the neck or by blows to the back of the head. After death, Lindow Man was deposited into Lindow Moss face down. ## Hypothesis Archaeologist Don Brothwell considers that many of the older bodies need re-examining with modern techniques, such as those used in the analysis of Lindow Man. The study of bog bodies, including these found in Lindow Moss, has contributed to a wider understanding of well-preserved human remains, helping to develop new methods in analysis and investigation. The use of sophisticated techniques, such as computer tomography (CT) scans, has marked the investigation of the Lindow bodies as particularly important. Such scans allow the reconstruction of the body and internal examination. Of the 27 bodies recovered from lowland raised mires in England and Wales, only those from Lindow Moss and the remains of Worsley Man have survived, together with a shoe from another body. The remains have a date range from the early 1st to the 4th centuries. Investigation into the other bodies relies on contemporary descriptions of the discovery. The physical evidence allows a general reconstruction of how Lindow Man was killed, although some details are debated, but it does not explain why he was killed. In North West England, there is little evidence for religious or ritual activity in the Iron Age period. What evidence does survive is usually in the form of artefacts recovered from peat bogs. Late Iron Age burials in the region often took the form of a crouched inhumation, sometimes with personal ornaments. Although dated to the mid-1st century AD, the type of burial of Lindow Man was more common in the pre-historic period. In the latter half of the 20th century, scholars widely believed that bog bodies demonstrating injuries to the neck or head area were examples of ritual sacrifice. Bog bodies were associated with Germanic and Celtic cultures, specifically relating to head worship. According to Brothwell, Lindow Man is one of the most complex examples of "overkill" in a bog body, and possibly has ritual meaning as it was "extravagant" for a straightforward murder. Archaeologists John Hodgson and Mark Brennand suggest that bog bodies may have been related to religious practice, although there is division in the academic community over this issue. In the case of Lindow Man, scholars debate whether the killing was murder or done as part of ritual. Anne Ross, an expert on Iron Age religion, proposed that the death was an example of human sacrifice and that the "triple death" (throat cut, strangled, and hit on the head) was an offering to several different gods. The wide date range for Lindow Man's death (2 BC to 119 AD) means he may have met his demise after the Romans conquered northern England in the 60s AD. As the Romans outlawed human sacrifice, such timing would open up other possibilities. This conclusion was emphasised by historian Ronald Hutton, who challenged the interpretation of sacrificial death. Connolly suggests that as Lindow Man was found naked, he could have been the victim of a violent robbery. Joy said, "The jury really is still out on these bodies, whether they were aristocrats, priests, criminals, outsiders, whether they went willingly to their deaths or whether they were executed – but Lindow was a very remote place in those days, an unlikely place for an ambush or a murder". According to Anne Ross, a scholar of Celtic history and Don Robins, a chemist at the University of London, Lindow Man was likely a sacrifice victim of extraordinary importance. They identified his stomach contents as including the undigested remains of a partially burned barley griddle cake of a kind used by the ancient Celts to select victims for sacrifice. Such cakes were torn into fragments and placed in a sack, after which all candidates for sacrifice would withdraw a piece, with the one withdrawing the burnt piece being the one who would be sacrificed. They argued that Lindow Man was likely a high-ranking Druid who was sacrificed in a last-ditch effort to call upon the aid of three Celtic gods to stop a Roman offensive against the Celts in AD 60. ## Conservation `Environment and situation are the crucial factors that determine how corpses decay. For instance, corpses will decay differently depending on the weather, the way they are buried, and the medium in which they are buried. Peat slows the decay of corpses. It was feared that, once Lindow Man was removed from that environment, which had preserved the body for nearly 2,000 years, the remains would rapidly start to deteriorate, so steps were taken to ensure preservation. After rejecting methods that had been used to maintain the integrity of other bog bodies, such as the "pit-tanning" used on Grauballe Man, which took a year and a half, scientists settled on freeze-drying. In preparation, the body was covered in a solution of 15% polyethylene glycol 400 and 85% water to prevent its becoming distorted. The body was then frozen solid and the ice vaporised to ensure Lindow Man did not shrink. Afterwards, Lindow Man was put in a specially constructed display case to control the environment, maintaining the temperature at 20 °C (68 °F) and the humidity at 55%.` Lindow Man is held in the British Museum. Before the remains were transferred there, people from North West England launched an unsuccessful campaign to keep the body in Manchester. The bog body has been on temporary display in other venues: at the Manchester Museum on three occasions, April to December 1987, March to September 1991, and April 2008 to April 2009; and at the Great North Museum in Newcastle from August to November 2009. The 2008–09 Manchester display, titled Lindow Man: A Bog Body Mystery Exhibition at the Manchester Museum, won the category "Best Archaeological Innovation" in the 2010 British Archaeological Awards, run by the Council for British Archaeology. Critics have complained that, by museum display of the remains, the body of Lindow Man has been objectified rather than treated with the respect due the dead. This is part of a wider discussion about the scientific treatment of human remains and museum researchers and archaeologists using them as information sources. ## Cultural references British archaeologist and anthropologist Don Brothwell’s The Bog Man and the Archaeology of People provides an account of the modern scientific techniques employed to conserve and analyse Lindow Man. Celtic history, language and lore scholar Anne Ross and archaeological chemist Don Robins's The Life and Death of a Druid Prince provides an account of the circumstances surrounding Lindow Man's life and death, in part hypothesising that he had lived as a highborn, perhaps even as a druid who was sacrificed to the gods at the time of the Menai Massacre and Boudica’s rebellion. ## See also - Haraldskær Woman - List of bog bodies - Ötzi

From the Doctor to My Son Thomas

2014 viral video recorded by actor Peter Capaldi

"From the Doctor to My Son Thomas" is a viral video recorded by actor Peter Capaldi and sent to Thomas Goodall, an autistic nine-year-old boy in England, to console the child over grief from the death of Goodall's grandmother. Capaldi filmed the 42-second video in character as the Twelfth Doctor from the BBC science-fiction series Doctor Who. Capaldi's message had a positive effect on Thomas: he smiled for the first time since learning of his grandmother's death, and gained the courage to go to her funeral. Thomas' father Ross Goodall posted the video to YouTube on 6 November 2014, wanting to make the video available to his family, but had no idea it would become popular online. The video was viewed over 200,000 times in its first 48 hours online, and more than doubled the next day, and less than a week later it had over 900,000 total views, making it a viral video, with the responses becoming a global phenomenon. "From the Doctor to My Son Thomas" was widely praised by critics for its emotional resonance. The Independent wrote that Capaldi displayed a kinder face of his personality by sending the message. It was hailed as Capaldi's best contribution as the character of the Doctor to date, with him making effective use of his Doctor role. The video had a positive impact on those with mental health problems. Peter Harness, writer of the episode "Kill the Moon", said that Capaldi's video was his favourite highlight from ten years of Doctor Who. ## Background The Scottish actor and film director Peter Capaldi was cast in 2013 as the 12th incarnation of the Doctor, in the BBC science-fiction series Doctor Who. His casting was announced on 4 August 2013 in a special BBC programme hosted by Zoë Ball. Capaldi first appeared as the Doctor in a cameo in the 50th anniversary special "The Day of the Doctor", before appearing in the 2013 Christmas special "The Time of the Doctor". A lifelong fan of the series, Capaldi had played Lobus Caecilius in the 2008 episode "The Fires of Pompeii" and a civil servant, John Frobisher, in the 2009 spin-off Torchwood: Children of Earth. Before taking the role, Capaldi said that he had to seriously consider the increased visibility that would come with the part. He said in an interview with Entertainment Weekly that he had been invited to audition for the role of the Eighth Doctor in 1995 before the production of the 1996 TV film, but did not go because he was unsure if he would get the part and did not wish to be part of a large group of actors turned down for the role. Thomas Goodall, from North Baddesley in Hampshire, had been a devoted fan of Doctor Who since the age of two and wrote a letter to Peter Capaldi saying he hoped the actor found success in his new role portraying the Doctor. The Goodall family were all fans of Doctor Who, describing themselves as Whovians. Thomas decorated his home with objects related to the television series. Capaldi wrote back to Thomas thanking him, and sent a note to the child's father saying that he intended to send a video message. Capaldi enclosed guidance to Ross Goodall on how to organise a tour of the production studios for Doctor Who. Ross Goodall subsequently communicated with Capaldi through the actor's agent, to inform him that Thomas's grandmother had died. (Helen, aged 72, died in early October 2014.) He told Capaldi that his son was not dealing well with the grief from his grandmother's death. The family received the subsequent video message to Thomas from Capaldi three weeks after the death of the child's grandmother. ## Video message Capaldi appears in character as the Doctor and addresses Thomas directly, greeting him by name. He expresses his gratitude at receiving the child's letter, saying that it had pleased him. He then speaks to Thomas about grief, mentioning the Doctor's adventures with travelling companion Clara Oswald. He tells Thomas that negative events impact Clara and himself in their journeys through the universe and time travel, and that occasionally they feel depressed too. The Doctor tells Thomas that he is glad the child is supporting him in his adventures. Capaldi concludes the 42 second video message by wishing Thomas to experience joy, and encourages the youth to be well and remain positive. ## Family response and release The family received the video from Capaldi on 3 November 2014. After viewing the video, Thomas felt encouraged to attend his grandmother's funeral. In an interview with The Guardian, Ross Goodall explained that Capaldi's mention of sadness resonated with the child due to his experience of grief over his grandmother's death. He discussed the manner in which Thomas perceived emotions as a strict dichotomy between positive and negative without a middle ground. Thomas interpreted from the video that it was all right to feel happy while simultaneously acknowledging that a sad event had occurred. Ross Goodall told The Guardian that before viewing the video from Capaldi, his son had not wanted to attend the funeral. The boy's mother said that the video had helped him to deal with his depression. After watching Capaldi's message, Ross Goodall stated that his son's behaviour patterns changed markedly. This change included the ability to comfort his sister and step out of his day-to-day routine. Ross Goodall said that after watching the video, his son smiled for the first time since his grandmother's death. The family framed the letter from Capaldi that came before the video message, and Ross Goodall said that Thomas looked at it when he felt distressed. Ross Goodall later uploaded the message from Capaldi to the video-sharing website YouTube on 6 November 2014. He commented at the video's YouTube location that he was surprised at the online response, and that at the time of initial posting was unaware it would become viral. He later explained that he had uploaded it only to share it with family members on completion of the memorial services for Thomas's grandmother. Thomas's father wrote that the video greatly affected his son, and enabled him to cope with grief and feel comforted. He praised Capaldi for his kind act and explained that the video improved his son's mental well-being throughout the ordeal. ## Reception CNN reported that after its appearance on YouTube, the video had over 200,000 views in its first 48 hours of availability. BBC News noted that by the next day, it had received over 500,000 views, and by 10 November 2014 it had over 750,000. The Washington Post noted that by the next day the view count was above 900,000. Multiple publications observed that Capaldi's message had become a viral video. ITV News called online reaction to the video a global phenomenon. By 10 November 2014, total comments by viewers posted below the video on YouTube numbered in the hundreds. The majority of comments were supportive. Visitors to the site wrote favourably of Capaldi's actions to record the video for the child. The Guardian called the recording by Capaldi a touching video tribute. CNN characterised the video similarly, as did Digital Spy, ITV News, TV 3, and publications in Spanish and Dutch. The Barcelona newspaper La Vanguardia wrote that Capaldi's video was an example of bringing joy into someone's life through a small act. The Washington Post called it a touching message. The Daily Dot described the video as inspirational. The Independent contrasted Capaldi's portrayal of the 12th Doctor as one of the darker incarnations of the character with his kinder message as the same character in the video. MTV called Capaldi a most wonderful person for his act, and concluded that the video was quite endearing. The Daily Telegraph described the video as a moving inspiration to a child suffering from grief. The Huffington Post wrote that if they were able to engage in time travel themselves, they would be unable to encounter a kinder tale. Io9 appreciated that Capaldi was using his celebrity status to effect positive change through his portrayal of the character, and praised his use of the fictional role as a force for public good. The South Wales Evening Post noted that Capaldi had appeared in a brief video as himself congratulating a bride on her wedding, and wrote that this video was more impressive than the previous appearance. Metro commented "Just when you thought Peter Capaldi couldn't possibly get any cooler, he's gone and outdone himself with this video." ## Impact International Business Times reported that the video message had a significant impact on the child, in spite of its brevity, and noted in a follow-up piece that Capaldi's video was featured in headlines of multiple newspapers. Digital Spy followed up on its earlier favourable coverage of Capaldi's video, and chose it as the number one entry out of "7 awesome celebrity moments that will melt your heart". Hollywood Life said that their journalists were moved to tears after watching the video. Their review concluded that Capaldi's message was both kind and strong, and that it was intelligent of the actor to compare the grief of Thomas to that encountered by his character on the television programme. Capaldi's actions received favourable coverage from the Autism Daily Newscast, an official Google News website reporting on current events and news of interest to those on the autism spectrum, with site journalist Jo Worgan noting that the actor had devoted himself while on the set of Doctor Who to spending time with an autistic girl who was a fan of the show. The Hollywood Reporter stressed that, while in the context of the Doctor Who program, the Doctor usually protected the entire universe from harm, this video was striking because it showed that the character cared equally about the mental well-being of a single child. In a March 2015 interview with Radio Times, Peter Harness, writer of Doctor Who episode "Kill the Moon", cited the video by Capaldi as his favourite highlight from the last ten years of the television programme. Harness explained his decision, saying that the video demonstrated Capaldi's kind demeanour and illustrated that Doctor Who served to assist youngsters in learning about the travails of greater society. He said that, by extension, it reminded all viewers to act with more compassion towards one another. ## See also - Doctor Who (series 8) - Global perceptions of autism - Societal and cultural aspects of autism - Whoniverse

Dhoby Ghaut MRT station

Mass Rapid Transit station in Singapore

Dhoby Ghaut MRT station is an underground Mass Rapid Transit (MRT) interchange station on the North South, North East and Circle lines in Singapore. Located beneath the eastern end of Orchard Road shopping belt in Dhoby Ghaut, Museum Planning Area, the station is integrated with the commercial development The Atrium@Orchard. The station is near landmarks such as The Istana, the MacDonald House, Plaza Singapura and Dhoby Ghaut Green. Dhoby Ghaut station was part of the early plans for the original MRT network since 1982. It was constructed as part of Phase I of the MRT network which was completed in 1987. Following the network's operational split, the station has been served by the North South line since 1989. To construct the North East line platforms, which were completed in 2003, the Stamford Canal had to be diverted while excavating through part of Mount Sophia. The Circle line platforms opened in 2010 along with Stages 1 and 2 of the line. Dhoby Ghaut station is one of the deepest and largest stations, with five underground levels. Its deepest point is at 28 metres (92 ft) below ground. The station features many forms of artworks, three of them under the Art-in-Transit scheme in the North East line and Circle line stations, a set of Art Seats at the Circle line platforms, and an art piece above the North South line platforms. It is also the first triple-line interchange station on the MRT network. ## History ### North South line (NSL) station Dhoby Ghaut station was included in the early plans of the MRT network in May 1982. It was to be constructed as part of the Phase I MRT segment from the Novena to Outram Park station; this segment was targeted to be completed by December 1987. Phase I, which would be part of the North South line (NSL), was given priority as it passes through areas having a higher demand for public transport, such as the densely populated housing estates of Toa Payoh and Ang Mo Kio and the Central Area. The line was aimed to relieve the traffic congestion on the Thomson–Sembawang road corridor. Before construction began, tenants of Amber Mansions were compelled to relocate; the land had already been marked for acquisition in 1978. Contract 106 for the design and construction of Dhoby Ghaut NSL station was awarded to a joint venture between French contractor Campenon-Bernard and Singapore Piling and Civil Engineering Company Limited. The S\$51.3 million (US\$ million in ) contract, awarded in October 1983, included three kilometres (1.9 mi) of tunnelling works between the Somerset and City Hall stations. Due to the soft marine clay at the station site, jet grouting was used to stabilise the soil. In January 1985, the soft soil led to a tunnel cave-in, which formed a six-metre (20 ft) wide hole near Cathay Cinema. The hole was refilled and the soil was further strengthened by injecting a concrete mixture. On 17 June, an engineer died when a crane fell into the work shaft and crushed him. Investigations revealed that the three pieces of timber intended to support the crane were not properly fastened and inadequate in providing support. The contractor was fined S\$1,000 (US\$ in ) for failing to ensure that the crane was capable of handling the load. Despite the incidents, structural work for the station was completed that September. To help people to become more familiar with the system, the Mass Rapid Transit Corporation (MRTC) organised an open house at the station on 6 December 1987. Train services commenced on 12 December when the line extension to Outram Park station was officially completed. The station was part of a line service that ran continuously from Yishun station in the north to Lakeside station in the west. From 28 October 1989, it began to serve the NSL with the operational split of the MRT system. In September 2000, the Land Transport Authority (LTA) installed lifts to allow barrier-free access to the station. ### North East line (NEL) station Plans were made in 1986 for a new line from Outram Park station via Dhoby Ghaut to Punggol station in the northeast. These were finalised as the North East line (NEL) in January 1996. In August 1997, the LTA awarded Contract C707 for building the NEL station to Obayashi Corporation. The S\$268 million (US\$ million in ) contract included the construction of two commercial buildings above the station. Construction began in 1996, with NEL commencing services on 20 June 2003. Construction difficulties included having to reroute the Stamford Canal, which bisected the station site, to a temporary canal. The old canal box was rebuilt and replaced by a new, larger box, which lies above the second level of the station. The new canal was temporarily supported by steel piles while the NEL station box was being constructed. With the proximity of works near the existing NSL station and tunnels, motion detectors had to be set up to detect any settlement of the NSL tunnels. To facilitate the station's construction, a part of Mount Sophia, the hill above the site, had to be removed. An eight-meter (26 ft) high sheet pile wall, restrained with ground anchors, supported the unaffected parts of the hill. Another construction difficulty was the irregular shapes and varying sizes of the station's five levels bound by space constraints. This made it difficult to install the site's temporary retaining walls because of the many voids in between the station levels. ### Circle line (CCL) station The station box for the Circle line (CCL) had been put in place when the NEL station was being constructed. It was planned for Dhoby Ghaut station to be the terminus of a branch of the Marina line (MRL). The MRL was finalised to serve six stations from this station to Stadium station in November 1999. The station became part of CCL Stage 1 (CCL1) when the MRL plans were incorporated into the CCL plans in 2001. On 7 August 2001, the LTA awarded Contract 825 for the design and construction of the CCL station and associated tunnels to a joint venture among Shanghai Tunnel Engineering Co. (Singapore) Pte Ltd, Woh Hup Pte Ltd and NCC International AB. The S\$343.94 million (US\$ million in ) contract included building the Bras Basah, Esplanade and Promenade stations. During construction, part of Orchard Road had to be realigned for three months from 10 June 2002. The underpass, linking the NEL and NSL platforms, had to be stabilised while construction works took place underneath. Seven caisson piles were installed to enhance the support of the underpass and capping beams were then constructed to form the supporting system. Along with the other stations on CCL1 and 2, the station began operations on 17 April 2010. ## Station details ### Location and name The station is located in the eponymous Dhoby Ghaut along the eastern end of Orchard Road, near the junction of Handy Road and Bras Basah Road. It is on a former Jewish cemetery that was in operation between 1841 and 1983. The station name, Dhoby Ghaut, is a Hindi term referring to the area's past as a traditional Indian open-air laundry (dhoby means "washerman" while ghat means "place or steps along a river"). Landmarks surrounding the station include The Istana, the MacDonald House, the Young Men's Christian Association building, the House of Tan Yeok Nee, Singapore Management University and the National Museum of Singapore. It is underneath retail and commercial developments such as Plaza Singapura shopping mall and The Atrium@Orchard office complex. ### Services The station is served by the NSL, NEL and CCL and is the first triple-line interchange on the MRT network. The official station codes are NS24/NE6/CC1. Dhoby Ghaut station generally operates between 5:30 am and 12:15 am. The first train on the CCL departs from the station at 5:37 am and the last train departs for Kranji station on the NSL at 12:13 am. On the NSL, Dhoby Ghaut station is between the Somerset and City Hall stations, with a headway of 2 to 5 mins in both directions. The station is between the Clarke Quay and Little India stations on the NEL, with a headway of 2.5 to 5 mins in both directions. The station is the terminus of CCL inner spur to the station; the adjacent station is Bras Basah station. During off-peak, train frequency on the line range from 5 to 6 mins, increasing to 2 to 3 mins during peak hours. ### Station design Serving three MRT lines, the five-level underground station is the largest station on the network, with seven entrances connecting to the various developments around the station. The 180-metre (590 ft) long NSL station, designed by French architect Spielman and local partner Chok and Associates, is located at Basement 3 of the station. The NSL station has brown and black geometric patterns that run throughout the station. These patterns guide passengers to the platforms, which has diamond-shaped tiles to indicate the platform screen doors. Initially with three levels, the station expanded to five levels with the NEL platforms. The NEL platforms, constructed 28 metres (92 ft) below ground at Basement 5, were the deepest on the network until 2010 when Bras Basah station on the CCL opened. Dhoby Ghaut station is the first MRT station to feature a set of 55-metre (180 ft) travelators that link the NEL and NSL platforms. The expanded station is integrated with the twin-towered office complex The Atrium@Orchard above the station. The first such integration on the MRT network allows for more efficient land use while improving access to public transport. The station also has retail shops collectively part of SMRT's Dhoby Ghaut XChange. However, these shops are less frequented by commuters, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic, with plans for these shops to be taken over by an anchor tenant. Unlike the other NEL stations, the station itself is not designated as a Civil Defence shelter; an underground car park underneath the ten-storey tower is a designated shelter instead. As a result, the station is more spacious and naturally illuminated with lightwells. The station architecture received an "honourable mention" at the Singapore Institute of Architects Design Awards in 2003. The station is wheelchair accessible. The NSL station, initially without accessible facilities, has been upgraded to include lifts, ramps and dedicated toilets for the disabled. A tactile system, consisting of tiles with rounded or elongated raised studs, guides visually impaired commuters through the station, with dedicated routes that connect the station entrances to the platforms or between the lines. There are wider fare gates that allow easier access for wheelchair users into the station. ## Public art The mobile sculpture Lantern of Music by Tan Ping Chiang is suspended from the ceiling in the NSL concourse. Intended to depict Singapore's multiracial culture, the sculpture resembles three lanterns. The largest "lantern" portrays the traditional and contemporary musical instruments of Singapore's different ethnic groups, while the two smaller lanterns portray the dances of these ethnic groups and opera masks. At the NEL and CCL platforms, four other artworks are displayed as part of the MRT network Art-in-Transit programme, a showcase that integrates public artwork in the MRT network. ### Interchange Milenko and Delia Prvacki's artwork Interchange is displayed across the linkway between the NSL and NEL portions of the interchange. Featured on the walls, columns and the floor, including the floor mosaic at the foot of the escalators and ceramic works on four pillars, the artwork is a combination of Delia's ceramic works with Milenko's earthy mosaics. Seeking to reflect the ethnic‐cultural diversity of Singapore and the region, the Prvackis integrated various local and regional cultural elements such as batik, Peranakan clothing and Chinese ceramics. The station's role as an interchange between the lines, its layout and the cultural history of Singapore inspired the artwork, which was the first major collaborative work between the couple. The artists fused these elements to create modern art "expressed in a marriage of languages" while remaining sensitive to tradition and environment. Delia's ceramics were inspired by Chinese ceramics which she was fascinated by since her first introduction to them by a teacher 30 years ago. In this work, she took the opportunity to renew her passion. Milenko's mosaics are closely related to his life experiences and sense of identity. He explained that, in his home country of Serbia, mosaic is an important art form in Byzantine culture. Unlike many other NEL artworks, the artists hand-crafted the work, with Milenko and his four assistants working on his thousands of miniature mosaic tiles. To emphasise the fusion of the artwork, the artists subtly adapted elements of each other's portions in their works. Delia's porcelains were integrated into Milenko's mosaics while his mosaic patterns were among the various spiral and elliptical shapes of Delia's tiles. Some patterns and colours are repeated so that the different parts of the work share a common theme. Reflecting on the artwork, the Prvackis said that the project was a learning experience for them that required stretching their artistic thinking within the structural requirements while meeting the needs of commuters. Milenko added it was a "rare pleasure" working with his wife on the project. ### Universal Language Another artwork, Universal Language by Sun Yu-Li, consists of 180‐floor tiles with various motifs distributed across the station. These tiles, accompanied by 14 glass plates positioned at various places in the station, act as wayfinding icons and guide commuters through the complex interchange via six different routes. These symbols lead to a large floor mosaic and a glass mural displayed at the centre of the station at Basement 2. The mosaic and mural incorporate the motifs used on the tiles. The artwork, which reflects Sun's background as an architect, was created to address the station's complex layout. Sun also wanted his work to be enjoyable to commuters. Derived from the station's role as a "gateway" for arts and culture in the area, he hoped to explore an "objective" and "pure form of expression" that connected to all cultures. This led Sun to develop a "universal language of symbols" based on prehistoric art. The hunter, dancer, rider, animal, fish and bird were used as different sets of symbols for each of the six routes. The initial concept was for the figures to emerge over time after accumulating dust and dirt. However, to improve the visibility of certain complex shapes, the figures were chemically treated. ### Man and Environment The CCL station features a wall relief, Man and Environment by Baet Yeok Kuan. The work consists of 36 white gypsum sculptures across the three columns supporting the CCL station. These sculptures depict unusual textures the artist captured in the station's vicinity alongside impressions of rocks and plants. The artwork intends to urge commuters to be more perceptive of less evident details while relieving the pressures of commuting through the fast-paced station environment. In creating the artwork, Baet used pencil and paper to sketch rubbings, while using plasticine to capture moulds. These collections of impressions were used as inspiration for the series of organic forms that the artwork uses. The work intends to connect commuters to their immediate surroundings while considering the station's functionality and design. The sculptures are kept in their original white—the colour of the gypsum used to construct the station and artwork—to blend with the orange walls of the station, which signify the CCL's colour. The colour also avoids distracting commuters while making them comfortable. The work was produced over three months. Each of the 1 by 0.9 m (3.3 by 3.0 ft) art pieces was hand-sculpted in clay to create the mould for the actual gypsum sculpture. Baet was closely involved in the process and ensured the work had an organic and smooth texture. The sculptures were installed carefully near the operational area of the station to prevent disruption to commuters. The final touches to the work were moulded by hand, rather than using noisier and dustier power tools. Reflecting on his work, Baet felt he had "served the public" and found the project to be "very meaningful"; he hoped for his work to be relevant to commuters' daily travels. ### Matrix The CCL platforms feature a set of "art seats" entitled Matrix. Though the platform seats are intended to be works of art, they are designed to remain functional and practical. This work by Lui Honfay and Yasmine Chan, along with Rain, was selected through the International Art Seats Design Competition in 2006. Matrix consists of a series of benches engraved with the station name in a dot-matrix style on the seat surface. The dot-matrix system was adopted as it was flexible enough to be mass-produced for use in many stations. The intriguing combination of signage and seat "impressed" the judges who awarded it the top prize.

Battle of Barrosa

1811 battle during the Peninsular War

The Battle of Barrosa (Chiclana, 5 March 1811, also known as the Battle of Chiclana or Battle of Cerro del Puerco) was part of an unsuccessful manoeuvre by an Anglo-Iberian force to break the French siege of Cádiz during the Peninsular War. During the battle, a single British division defeated two French divisions and captured a regimental eagle. Cádiz had been invested by the French in early 1810, leaving it accessible from the sea, but in March of the following year a reduction in the besieging army gave its garrison of British and Spanish troops an opportunity to lift the siege. A large Allied strike force was shipped south from Cádiz to Tarifa, and moved to engage the siege lines from the rear. The French, under the command of Marshal Victor, were aware of the Allied movement and redeployed to prepare a trap. Victor placed one division on the road to Cádiz, blocking the Allied line of march, while his two remaining divisions fell on the single Anglo-Portuguese rearguard division under the command of Sir Thomas Graham. Following a fierce battle on two fronts, the British succeeded in routing the attacking French forces. A lack of support from the larger Spanish contingent prevented an absolute victory, and the French were able to regroup and reoccupy their siege lines. Graham's tactical victory proved to have little strategic effect on the continuing war, to the extent that Victor was able to claim the battle as a French victory since the siege remained in force until finally being lifted on 24 August 1812. ## Background In January 1810, the city of Cádiz, a major Allied harbour and the effective seat of Spanish government since the occupation of Madrid, was besieged by French troops of Marshal Soult's I Corps under the command of Marshal Victor. The city's garrison initially comprised only four battalions of volunteers and recruits, but the Duke of Alburquerque ignored orders from the Cortes of Cádiz – which served as a democratic Regency after Ferdinand VII was deposed – and instead of attacking Victor's superior force, he brought his 10,000 men to reinforce the city. This allowed the city's defences to be fully manned. Under pressure from widespread protests and mob violence the ruling Spanish Junta resigned, and a five-man Regency was established to govern in its place. The Regency, recognising that Spain could only be saved with Allied aid, immediately asked the newly ennobled Arthur Wellesley, Viscount Wellington, to send reinforcements to Cádiz; by mid-February, five Anglo-Portuguese battalions had landed, bringing the garrison up to 17,000 men and making the city effectively impregnable. Additional troops continued to arrive, and by May, the garrison was 26,000 strong, while the besieging French forces had risen to 25,000. Although the siege tied up a large number of Spanish, British and Portuguese troops, Wellington accepted this as part of his strategy since a similar number of French troops were also engaged. However, in January 1811, Victor's position began to deteriorate. Soult ordered Victor to send almost a third of his troops to support Soult's assault on Badajoz, reducing the besieging French army to around 15,000 men. Victor had little chance of making progress against the fortress city with a force of this strength, nor could he withdraw—the garrison of Cádiz, if let loose, was large enough to overrun the whole of Andalusia. ## Order of battle ## Prelude to battle Following Soult's appropriation of many of Victor's troops, the Allies sensed an opportunity to engage Marshal Victor in open battle and raise the siege. To that end, an Anglo-Spanish expedition was sent by sea from Cádiz south to Tarifa, with the intention of marching north to engage the French rear. This force comprised some 8,000 Spanish and 4,000 British troops, with the overall command ceded to the Spanish General Manuel la Peña, a political accommodation since he was widely regarded as incompetent. To coincide with la Peña's assault, it was arranged that General José Pascual de Zayas y Chacón would lead a force of 4,000 Spanish troops in a sally from Cádiz, via a pontoon bridge from the Isla de León. The Anglo-Portuguese contingent—a division commanded by Lieutenant-General Sir Thomas Graham—sailed from Cádiz on 21 February 1811, somewhat later than planned. Graham's forces were unable to land at Tarifa due to bad weather and were forced to sail on to Algeciras, where they disembarked on 23 February. Joined by a composite battalion of flank companies under Colonel Browne, the troops marched to Tarifa on 24 February, where they received further reinforcement from the fortress garrison there. By 27 February, they were joined by la Peña's Spanish troops, who had left Cádiz three days after Graham and, despite encountering similar weather difficulties, had succeeded in landing at Tarifa. To further strengthen the Allied ranks, a force of Spanish irregulars under General Antonio Begines de los Ríos had been ordered to come down from the Ronda mountains by 23 February and join the main Anglo-Portuguese and Spanish force. Unaware of the delays in sailing, Begines had advanced as far as Medina-Sidonia in search of the Allied army; unsupported, and embroiled in skirmishes with Victor's right flank, he returned to the mountains. General Louis Victorin Cassagne, Victor's flank commander, informed the marshal of the developing threat. Victor responded by sending three infantry battalions and a cavalry regiment to reinforce Cassagne, and ordering the fortification of Medina-Sidonia. Having concentrated, the combined Allied force began marching north towards Medina-Sidonia on 28 February, and la Peña now ordered Begines's irregulars to join them at Casas Viejas. Once there, however, Beguines's scouts reported that Medina-Sidonia was held more strongly than had been anticipated. Rather than engaging the French and forcing Victor to weaken his siege by committing more of his troops to the town's defence, la Peña decided that the Allied army should march across country and join the road that ran from Tarifa, through Vejer and Chiclana, to Cádiz. This change of plan, combined with further bad weather and la Peña's insistence on marching only at night, meant the Allied force was now two days behind schedule. La Peña sent a message to Cádiz informing Zayas of the delay, but the dispatch was not received and on 3 March, Zayas launched his sally as arranged. A pontoon bridge was floated across the Santi Petri creek and a battalion sent across to establish a bridgehead prior to the arrival of the main force. Victor could not allow the Cádiz garrison, which still numbered about 13,000 men, to make a sortie against his lines while he was threatened from outside, so on the night of 3–4 March he sent six companies of voltigeurs to storm the bridgehead entrenchments and prevent a breakout. Zayas's battalion was ejected from its positions, with 300 Spanish casualties, and Zayas was forced to float the pontoon bridge back to the island for future use. Marshal Victor had, by now, received intelligence from a squadron of dragoons that had been driven out of Vejer, informing him of the strong Anglo-Portuguese and Spanish force making its way up the western road from Tarifa. In conjunction with the aggressive action of the Cádiz garrison, this led him to conclude that the approaching troops were heading for Cádiz; their line of march was therefore predictable, so he prepared a trap. General Eugène-Casimir Villatte's division was sent to block the neck of the peninsula on which the western road ran, preventing access to the Santi Petri creek and the Isla de Léon. Two other divisions, under the commands of Generals François Amable Ruffin and Jean François Leval, were ordered to conceal themselves in the thick Chiclana forest in position to attack the flank of the Allies as they engaged Villatte's division. After another night march, on 5 March the Allies reached a hill to the southeast of Barrosa, the Cerro del Puerco (also referred to as the Barrosa Ridge). Scouts reported the presence of Villatte's force, and la Peña ordered his vanguard division to advance. With the aid of a fresh sortie of Zayas's troops from Cádiz, and reinforced by a brigade of the Prince of Anglona's division, the Spanish drove Villatte's force across Almanza Creek. La Peña refused his vanguard permission to pursue the retreating French, who were consequently able to regroup on the far side of the creek. Graham's Anglo-Portuguese division had remained behind on the Cerro del Puerco to defend the rear and right flank of la Peña's main force. ## Battle Having opened up the route to Cádiz, la Peña instructed Graham to move his troops forward to Bermeja. However, on Graham's strenuous objections to vacating a position that would result in both an exposed flank and rear, a force of five Spanish battalions and Browne's battalion was left to hold the Barrosa Ridge. In addition, three Spanish and two King's German Legion (KGL) squadrons of cavalry, under the command of Colonel Samuel Whittingham, were sent to flank this rearguard force on the coast track. Graham's division then moved north as ordered—instead of descending from the heights on the coast road, they followed a path through a pine wood to the west of the ridge. This route was shorter and more practical for artillery, but the trees restricted visibility in all directions, meaning that they were effectively marching blind. ### French attack Victor was disappointed that Villatte had failed to block the Cádiz road for longer, but he was still confident that his main force could drive the Allies into the sea. He could see that the bulk of the Spanish troops had taken station opposite Villatte and, on hearing reports that Barrosa Ridge was deserted, realised that here was an opportunity to take this commanding position. Ruffin was ordered to occupy the heights while Leval struck at Graham's troops in the woods, and three squadrons of dragoons were sent around the Cerro to take the coastal track. Victor's plan rapidly developed momentum. Ruffin's advance sufficed to send the five rearguard Spanish battalions running, leaving only Browne's battalion defending the ridge and, confronted by the French dragoons, Whittingham's cavalry decided to retire. Whittingham lent a single squadron of KGL hussars to Browne to cover his retreat; Browne initially positioned his battalion in the ruins of a chapel at the summit but, seeing Whittingham's retreat and spotting six French battalions advancing on his position, he had little choice but to give way and seek Graham's force in the woods. Barrosa Ridge fell unopposed as Victor had intended, and Ruffin emplaced a battery of artillery on the heights. ### Graham's response Meanwhile, midway through his march to join la Peña's Spaniards, Graham received news from Spanish guerrilleros that French soldiers had emerged from the Chiclana forest. Riding to the rear of his marching columns, he witnessed the Spanish battalions retreating from the ridge, Ruffin's division climbing its slopes, and Leval's division approaching from the east. Realizing that the Allied force was in danger of being swamped, Graham disregarded his orders and turned his division to deal with the threats to his flank and rear. He ordered General Dilkes's brigade to retake the ridge while Colonel Wheatley's brigade was sent to see off Leval's force to the east. Because of the time it took to deploy a full brigade into battle formation, Graham knew he needed to delay the French. He therefore ordered Browne, who had rejoined the division, to turn his single "Flankers" battalion of 536 men around and advance up the slope of the Barrosa Ridge against the 4,000 men and artillery of Ruffin's division. Colonel Barnard, who led the light battalion of Wheatley's brigade, and Colonel Bushe, leading two light companies of Portuguese skirmishers, were ordered to attack through the woods to hold up Leval's advance. ### Barrosa Ridge Advancing up the ridge they had just abandoned, Browne's battalion came under intense fire from Ruffin's emplaced infantry and artillery. Within a few salvoes, half the battalion was gone and, unable to continue, Browne's men scattered amongst the cover provided by the slope and returned fire. Despite his success, Ruffin could not descend the hill to brush away the remnants of Browne's battalion, as Dilkes's brigade had by now emerged from the wood and was forming up at the base of the slope. Dilkes, instead of following Browne's route up the slope, advanced to the right where there was more cover and ground not visible to the French. As a result, the French artillery could not be brought to bear, and Dilkes's brigade managed to get near the top of the ridge without suffering serious loss. By this time, though, its formation had become disorganised, so Ruffin deployed four battalion columns in an attempt to sweep both Dilkes and the remaining "Flankers" back down the slope. Contrary to French expectations, the crude British line stopped the attacking columns in their tracks, and the two forces exchanged fire. Marshal Victor, by then himself on the crest of the ridge, brought up his reserve in two battalion columns of grenadiers. These columns were, as with the previous four, subjected to intense musket fire and were brought to a halt just metres from the British line. The first four columns had started to give ground, so Victor tried to disengage his reserves and bring them to their support. However, as the two grenadier columns attempted to move off from their stalled positions, they came under additional fire from the remnants of Browne's battalion, which had renewed its own advance. Prevented from rallying, the entire French force broke and fled to the valley below. ### Leval's advance While Dilkes was moving on Ruffin's position on Barrosa Ridge, Barnard and the light companies advanced through the woods towards Leval's division. Unaware of the impending British assault, the French had taken no precautions and were advancing in two columns of march, with no forward line of voltigeurs. The unexpected appearance of British skirmishers caused such confusion that some French regiments, thinking there were cavalry present, formed square. These were prime targets for shrapnel rounds fired by the ten cannon under Major Duncan which, having made rapid progress through the woods, arrived in time to support the skirmish line. As the situation became clearer, the French organised themselves into their customary attacking formation—the 'column of divisions'—all the time under fire from Barnard's light companies and Duncan's artillery. Finally, with the French now in their fighting columns and beginning their advance, Barnard was forced to draw back. Leval's men then encountered Bushe's companies of the 20th Portuguese, who supported the light battalion's retreat and kept the French engaged until Wheatley's brigade had formed up in line on the edge of the woods. The retreating light companies joined Wheatley's troops; Leval's division of 3,800 men was now marching on an Anglo-Portuguese line of 1,400 men supported by cannon. Although they had the advantage in numbers, the French were under the impression that they were facing a superior force. Having been mauled by Barnard's and Bushe's light companies, and now facing the rolling volleys of the main British line, the French needed time to form from column into line themselves. However, Wheatley attacked as soon as the light companies cleared the field, and only one of Leval's battalions was able to even partially redeploy. The first French column Wheatley engaged broke after a single British volley. The 8th Ligne, part of this column, suffered about 50 percent casualties and lost its eagle. The capture of the eagle—the first to be won in battle by British forces in the Peninsular wars—cost Ensign Keogh of the 87th his life and was finally secured by Sergeant Patrick Masterson (or Masterman, depending on source). As Wheatley's brigade moved forward, it encountered the only French battalion, from the 54th Ligne, that had begun to form line. It took three charges to break this battalion, which eventually fled towards the right where it encountered the remainder of Leval's fleeing division. ### French retreat Ruffin's and Leval's divisions fled towards the Laguna del Puerco, where Victor succeeded in halting their disorganised rout. The Marshal deployed two or three relatively unscathed battalions to cover the reorganisation of his forces and secure their retreat, but Graham had also managed to call his exhausted men to order and he brought them, with Duncan's artillery, against Victor's new position. Morale in the re-formed French ranks was fragile; when a squadron of KGL hussars rounded the Cerro and drove a squadron of French dragoons onto their infantry, the shock was too much to bear for the demoralised soldiers, who retreated in a sudden rush. Throughout the battle, la Peña steadfastly refused to support his Anglo-Portuguese allies. He learnt of the French advance at about the same time as Graham, and decided to entrench his full force on the isthmus defending the approach to the Isla de Léon. Learning of Graham's decision to engage the two French divisions, the Spanish commander was convinced that the French would win the day and so stayed in place; Zayas repeatedly asked for leave to go to Graham's support, but le Peña denied permission each time. On hearing that the British had prevailed, la Peña further declined to pursue the retreating French, again over-riding the continued protestations of Zayas. ## Aftermath Furious at la Peña, the following morning Graham collected his wounded, gathered trophies from the field and marched into Cádiz; snubbed, la Peña would later accuse Graham of losing the campaign for the Allies. It is almost certain that, had the Allies pushed the French positions either immediately after the battle or on the morning of 6 March, the siege would have been broken. Even though Victor had managed to rally his troops at Chiclana, panic was rife in the French lines. Fully expecting a renewed offensive, Victor had made plans to stall any Allied advance just long enough to blow up most of the besieging forts and to allow I Corps to retreat to Seville. Cassagne took temporary control of Villatte's division, since that general was wounded. Victor assigned Cassagne to command the rearguard and instructed him not to retreat until the Allies advanced. Such was the French discomposure that, despite the Allied inactivity, one battery was destroyed without any orders being given. La Peña had determined not to heed plans from Graham and Admiral Keats to make a cautious advance against the French at Chiclana, and he even refused to send out cavalry scouts to find out what Victor was doing. After remaining entrenched at Bermeja during 5–6 March, the Spanish army crossed to the Isla de León the following day, leaving only Beguines's irregulars on the mainland. This force did manage to briefly secure Medina-Sidonia, but then returned to the Ronda mountains. Cassagne's division remained in place since the Allies never threatened it. To Victor's amazement, a cavalry patrol on 7 March found no evidence of Allied forces. By 8 March, just three days after the battle, Victor had reoccupied even the evacuated southern section of his lines and the siege was back in place. It would remain so for another eighteen months, until finally being abandoned on 24 August 1812, when Soult ordered a general French retreat following the Allied victory at Salamanca. Despite the conduct of their commanding general, both the Spanish success at Almanza Creek and Graham's actions at Barrosa Ridge gave a much needed boost to Spanish morale. La Peña was subsequently arraigned for court-martial, mainly for his refusal to pursue the retreating French, where he was acquitted but relieved of command. At a time when Anglo-Spanish relations were already strained, Graham's criticism of his Spanish allies meant that it was no longer politic for him to remain in Cádiz, so he was transferred to Wellington's main army. Both tactically and in terms of the casualties inflicted, the battle was a British victory. Graham's troops had beaten a French force approaching twice their number despite having marched through the previous night and part of that day. The British lost approximately 1,240 men, including Portuguese and German contingents under Graham's command, while Victor lost around 2,380. The Spanish suffered 300–400 casualties. Strategically, however, the failure of the Allies to follow up their victory allowed Victor to reoccupy his siege lines; Cádiz was not relieved and the campaign effectively failed to achieve anything. Victor even claimed the battle as a French victory, since the positions of the opposing sides remained unchanged following the action. ## Legacy In November 1811, the British Prince Regent commanded that a medal be struck to commemorate the "brilliant Victory obtained over the Enemy"; this was awarded to the senior British officers present at the battle. Four Royal Navy ships have taken their names from the battle including HMS Barrosa (1812) launched the year after the battle. An officer in the 4th Dragoons, Lieutenant William Light who later became the Surveyor General of South Australia in the 1830s, named a range of hills in the new colony Barossa Range (home to the modern Barossa Valley (wine) region) in memory of the battle. - Grant, Philip, A Peer Among Princes – the Life of Thomas Graham, Victor at Barrosa, Hero of the Peninsular War, 2019, ## In fiction - Cornwell, Bernard, Sharpe's Fury: Richard Sharpe and the Battle of Barrosa, March 1811, HarperCollins, 2006, .

Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

1967 studio album by the Beatles

Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band is the eighth studio album by the English rock band the Beatles. Released on 26 May 1967, Sgt. Pepper is regarded by musicologists as an early concept album that advanced the roles of sound composition, extended form, psychedelic imagery, record sleeves, and the producer in popular music. The album had an immediate cross-generational impact and was associated with numerous touchstones of the era's youth culture, such as fashion, drugs, mysticism, and a sense of optimism and empowerment. Critics lauded the album for its innovations in songwriting, production and graphic design, for bridging a cultural divide between popular music and high art, and for reflecting the interests of contemporary youth and the counterculture. At the end of August 1966, the Beatles had permanently retired from touring and pursued individual interests for the next three months. During a return flight to London in November, Paul McCartney had an idea for a song involving an Edwardian military band that formed the impetus of the Sgt. Pepper concept. For this project, they continued the technological experimentation marked by their previous album, Revolver, this time without an absolute deadline for completion. Sessions began on 24 November at EMI Studios with compositions inspired by the Beatles' youth, but after pressure from EMI, the songs "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "Penny Lane" were released as a double A-side single in February 1967 and left off the LP. The album was then loosely conceptualised as a performance by the fictional Sgt. Pepper band, an idea that was conceived after recording the title track. A key work of British psychedelia, Sgt. Pepper is considered one of the first art rock LPs and a progenitor to progressive rock. It incorporates a range of stylistic influences, including vaudeville, circus, music hall, avant-garde, and Western and Indian classical music. With assistance from producer George Martin and engineer Geoff Emerick, much of the recordings were coloured with sound effects and tape manipulation, as exemplified on "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds", "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!" and "A Day in the Life". Recording was completed on 21 April. The cover, which depicts the Beatles posing in front of a tableau of celebrities and historical figures, was designed by the pop artists Peter Blake and Jann Haworth. Sgt. Pepper's release was a defining moment in pop culture, heralding the album era and the 1967 Summer of Love, while its reception achieved full cultural legitimisation for pop music and recognition for the medium as a genuine art form. The first Beatles album to be released with the same track listing in both the UK and the US, it spent 27 weeks at number one on the Record Retailer chart in the United Kingdom and 15 weeks at number one on the Billboard Top LPs chart in the United States. In 1968, it won four Grammy Awards, including Album of the Year, the first rock LP to receive this honour; in 2003, it was inducted into the National Recording Registry by the Library of Congress. It has topped several critics' and listeners' polls for the best album of all time, including those published by Rolling Stone magazine and in the book All Time Top 1000 Albums, and the UK's "Music of the Millennium" poll. More than 32 million copies had been sold worldwide as of 2011. It remains one of the best-selling albums of all time and was still, in 2018, the UK's best-selling studio album. A remixed and expanded edition of the album was released in 2017. ## Background By late 1965, the Beatles had grown weary of live performance. In John Lennon's opinion, they could "send out four waxworks ... and that would satisfy the crowds. Beatles concerts are nothing to do with music anymore. They're just bloody tribal rites." In June 1966, two days after finishing the album Revolver, the group set off for a tour that started in West Germany. While in Hamburg they received an anonymous telegram stating: "Do not go to Tokyo. Your life is in danger." The threat was taken seriously in light of the controversy surrounding the tour among Japan's religious and conservative groups, with particular opposition to the Beatles' planned performances at the sacred Nippon Budokan arena. As an added precaution, 35,000 police were mobilised and tasked with protecting the group, who were transported from hotels to concert venues in armoured vehicles. The Beatles then performed in the Philippines, where they were threatened and manhandled by its citizens for not visiting First Lady Imelda Marcos. The group were angry with their manager, Brian Epstein, for insisting on what they regarded as an exhausting and demoralising itinerary. The publication in the US of Lennon's remarks about the Beatles being "more popular than Jesus" then embroiled the band in controversy and protest in America's Bible Belt. A public apology eased tensions, but a US tour in August that was marked by reduced ticket sales, relative to the group's record attendances in 1965, and subpar performances proved to be their last. The author Nicholas Schaffner writes: > To the Beatles, playing such concerts had become a charade so remote from the new directions they were pursuing that not a single tune was attempted from the just-released Revolver LP, whose arrangements were for the most part impossible to reproduce with the limitations imposed by their two-guitars-bass-and-drums stage lineup. On the Beatles' return to England, rumours began to circulate that they had decided to break up. George Harrison informed Epstein that he was leaving the band, but he was persuaded to stay on the assurance that there would be no more tours. The group took a three-month break, during which they focused on individual interests. Harrison travelled to India for six weeks to study the sitar under the instruction of Ravi Shankar and develop his interest in Hindu philosophy. Having been the last of the Beatles to concede that their live performances had become futile, Paul McCartney collaborated with Beatles producer George Martin on the soundtrack for the film The Family Way and holidayed in Kenya with Mal Evans, one of the Beatles' tour managers. Lennon acted in the film How I Won the War and attended art showings, such as one at the Indica Gallery where he met his future wife Yoko Ono. Ringo Starr used the break to spend time with his wife Maureen and son Zak. ## Inspiration and conception While in London without his bandmates, McCartney took the hallucinogenic drug LSD (or "acid") for the first time, having long resisted Lennon and Harrison's insistence that he join them and Starr in experiencing its perception-heightening effects. According to author Jonathan Gould, this initiation into LSD afforded McCartney the "expansive new sense of possibility" that defined the group's next project, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band. Gould adds that McCartney's succumbing to peer pressure allowed Lennon "to play the role of psychedelic guide" to his songwriting partner, thereby facilitating a closer collaboration between the two than had been evident since early in the Beatles' career. For his part, Lennon had turned deeply introspective during the filming of How I Won the War in southern Spain in September 1966. His anxiety over his and the Beatles' future was reflected in "Strawberry Fields Forever", a song that provided the initial theme, regarding a Liverpool childhood, of the new album. On his return to London, Lennon embraced the city's arts culture, of which McCartney was a part, and shared his bandmate's interest in avant-garde and electronic-music composers such as Karlheinz Stockhausen, John Cage and Luciano Berio. In November, during his and Evans' return flight from Kenya, McCartney had an idea for a song that eventually formed the impetus of the Sgt. Pepper concept. His idea involved an Edwardian-era military band, for which Evans invented a name in the style of contemporary San Francisco-based groups such as Big Brother and the Holding Company and Quicksilver Messenger Service. In February 1967, McCartney suggested that the new album should represent a performance by the fictional band. This alter ego group would give them the freedom to experiment musically by releasing them from their image as Beatles. Martin recalled that the concept was not discussed at the start of the sessions, but it subsequently gave the album "a life of its own". Portions of Sgt. Pepper reflect the Beatles' general immersion in the blues, Motown and other American popular musical traditions. The author Ian MacDonald writes that when reviewing their rivals' recent work in late 1966, the Beatles identified the most significant LP as the Beach Boys' Pet Sounds, which Brian Wilson, the band's leader, had created in response to the Beatles' Rubber Soul. McCartney was highly impressed with the "harmonic structures" and choice of instruments used on Pet Sounds, and said that these elements encouraged him to think the Beatles could "get further out" than the Beach Boys had. He identified Pet Sounds as his main musical inspiration for Sgt. Pepper, adding that "[we] nicked a few ideas", although he felt it lacked the avant-garde quality he was seeking. Freak Out! by the Mothers of Invention has also been cited as having influenced Sgt. Pepper. According to the biographer Philip Norman, during the recording sessions McCartney repeatedly stated: "This is our Freak Out!" The music journalist Chet Flippo stated that McCartney was inspired to record a concept album after hearing Freak Out! Indian music was another touchstone on Sgt. Pepper, principally for Lennon and Harrison. In a 1967 interview, Harrison said that the Beatles' ongoing success had encouraged them to continue developing musically and that, given their standing, "We can do things that please us without conforming to the standard pop idea. We are not only involved in pop music, but all music." McCartney envisioned the Beatles' alter egos being able to "do a bit of B.B. King, a bit of Stockhausen, a bit of Albert Ayler, a bit of Ravi Shankar, a bit of Pet Sounds, a bit of the Doors". He saw the group as "pushing frontiers" similar to other composers of the time, even though the Beatles did not "necessarily like what, say, Berio was doing". ## Recording and production ### Recording history Sessions began on 24 November 1966 in Studio Two at EMI Studios (subsequently Abbey Road Studios), marking the first time that the Beatles had come together since September. Afforded the luxury of a nearly limitless recording budget, and with no absolute deadline for completion, the band booked open-ended sessions that started at 7 pm and allowed them to work as late as they wanted. They began with "Strawberry Fields Forever", followed by two other songs that were thematically linked to their childhoods: "When I'm Sixty-Four", the first session for which took place on 6 December, and "Penny Lane". "Strawberry Fields Forever" and "Penny Lane" were subsequently released as a double A-side in February 1967 after EMI and Epstein pressured Martin for a single. When it failed to reach number one in the UK, British press agencies speculated that the group's run of success might have ended, with headlines such as "Beatles Fail to Reach the Top", "First Time in Four Years" and "Has the Bubble Burst?" In keeping with the band's approach to their previously issued singles, the songs were then excluded from Sgt. Pepper. Martin later described the decision to drop these two songs as "the biggest mistake of my professional life". In his judgment, "Strawberry Fields Forever", which he and the band spent an unprecedented 55 hours of studio time recording, "set the agenda for the whole album". He explained: "It was going to be a record ... [with songs that] couldn't be performed live: they were designed to be studio productions and that was the difference." McCartney declared: "Now our performance is that record." According to the musicologist Walter Everett, Sgt. Pepper marks the beginning of McCartney's ascendancy as the Beatles' dominant creative force. He wrote more than half of the album's material while asserting increasing control over the recording of his compositions. In an effort to get the right sound, the Beatles attempted numerous re-takes of McCartney's song "Getting Better". When the decision was made to re-record the basic track, Starr was summoned to the studio, but called off soon afterwards as the focus switched from rhythm to vocal tracking. Much of the bass guitar on the album was mixed upfront. Preferring to overdub his bass part last, McCartney tended to play other instruments when recording a song's backing track. This approach afforded him the time to devise bass lines that were melodically adventurous – one of the qualities he especially admired in Wilson's work on Pet Sounds – and complemented the song's final arrangement. McCartney played keyboard instruments such as piano, grand piano and Lowrey organ, in addition to electric guitar on some songs, while Martin variously contributed on Hohner Pianet, harpsichord and harmonium. Lennon's songs similarly showed a preference for keyboard instruments. Although Harrison's role as lead guitarist was limited during the sessions, Everett considers that "his contribution to the album is strong in several ways." He provided Indian instrumentation in the form of sitar, tambura and swarmandal, and Martin credited him with being the most committed of the Beatles in striving for new sounds. Starr's adoption of loose calfskin heads for his tom-toms ensured his drum kit had a deeper timbre than he had previously achieved with plastic heads. As on Revolver, the Beatles increasingly used session musicians, particularly for classical-inspired arrangements. Norman comments that Lennon's prominent vocal on some of McCartney's songs "hugely enhanced their atmosphere", particularly "Lovely Rita". Within an hour of completing the last overdubs on the album's songs, on 20 April 1967, the group returned to Harrison's "Only a Northern Song", the basic track of which they had taped in February. The Beatles overdubbed random sounds and instrumentation before submitting it as the first of four new songs they were contracted to supply to United Artists for inclusion in the animated film Yellow Submarine. In author Mark Lewisohn's description, it was a "curious" session, but one that demonstrated the Beatles' "tremendous appetite for recording". During the Sgt. Pepper sessions, the band also recorded "Carnival of Light", a McCartney-led experimental piece created for the Million Volt Light and Sound Rave, held at the Roundhouse Theatre on 28 January and 4 February. The album was completed on 21 April with the recording of random noises and voices that were included on the run-out groove, preceded by a high-pitched tone that could be heard by dogs but was inaudible to most human ears. ### Studio ambience and happenings The Beatles sought to inject an atmosphere of celebration into the recording sessions. Weary of the bland look inside EMI, they introduced psychedelic lighting to the studio space, including a device on which five red fluorescent tubes were fixed to a microphone stand, a lava lamp, a red darkroom lamp, and a stroboscope, the last of which they soon abandoned. Harrison later said the studio became the band's clubhouse for Sgt. Pepper; David Crosby, Mick Jagger and Donovan were among the musician friends who visited them there. The band members also dressed up in psychedelic fashions, leading one session trumpeter to wonder whether they were in costume for a new film. Drug-taking was prevalent during the sessions, with Martin later recalling that the group would steal away to "have something". The 10 February session for orchestral overdubs on "A Day in the Life" was staged as a happening typical of the London avant-garde scene. The Beatles invited numerous friends and the session players wore formal dinner-wear augmented with fancy-dress props. Overseen by NEMS employee Tony Bramwell, the proceedings were filmed on seven handheld cameras, with the band doing some of the filming. Following this event, the group considered making a television special based on the album. Each of the songs was to be represented with a clip directed by a different director, but the cost of recording Sgt. Pepper made the idea prohibitive to EMI. For the 15 March session for "Within You Without You", Studio Two was transformed with Indian carpets placed on the walls, dimmed lighting and burning incense to evoke the requisite Indian mood. Lennon described the session as a "great swinging evening" with "400 Indian fellas" among the guests. The Beatles took an acetate disc of the completed album to the flat of American singer Cass Elliot, off King's Road in Chelsea. There, at six in the morning, they played it at full volume with speakers set in open window frames. The group's friend and former press agent, Derek Taylor, remembered that residents of the neighbourhood opened their windows and listened without complaint to what they understood to be unreleased Beatles music. ### Technical aspects In his book on ambient music, The Ambient Century: From Mahler to Moby, Mark Prendergast views Sgt. Pepper as the Beatles' "homage" to Stockhausen and Cage, adding that its "rich, tape-manipulated sound" shows the influence of electronic and experimental composer Pierre Schaeffer. Martin recalled that Sgt. Pepper "grew naturally out of Revolver", marking "an era of almost continuous technological experimentation". The album was recorded using four-track equipment, since eight-track tape recorders were not operational in commercial studios in London until late 1967. As with previous Beatles albums, the Sgt. Pepper recordings made extensive use of reduction mixing, a technique in which one to four tracks from one recorder are mixed and dubbed down onto a master four-track machine, enabling the engineers to give the group a virtual multitrack studio. EMI's Studer J37 four-track machines were well suited to reduction mixing, as the high quality of the recordings that they produced minimised the increased noise associated with the process. When recording the orchestra for "A Day in the Life", Martin synchronised a four-track recorder playing the Beatles' backing track to another one taping the orchestral overdub. The engineer Ken Townsend devised a method for accomplishing this by using a 50 Hz control signal between the two machines. The production on "Strawberry Fields Forever" was especially complex, involving the innovative splicing of two takes that were recorded in different tempos and pitches. Emerick remembers that during the recording of Revolver, "we had got used to being asked to do the impossible, and we knew that the word 'no' didn't exist in the Beatles' vocabulary." A key feature of Sgt. Pepper is Martin and Emerick's liberal use of signal processing to shape the sound of the recording, which included the application of dynamic range compression, reverb and signal limiting. Relatively new modular effects units were used, such as running voices and instruments through a Leslie speaker. Several innovative production techniques feature prominently on the recordings, including direct injection, pitch control and ambiophonics. The bass part on "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" was the first example of the Beatles recording via direct injection (DI), which Townsend devised as a method for plugging electric guitars directly into the recording console. In Kenneth Womack's opinion, the use of DI on the album's title track "afforded McCartney's bass with richer textures and tonal clarity". Some of the mixing employed automatic double tracking (ADT), a system that uses tape recorders to create a simultaneous doubling of a sound. ADT was invented by Townsend during the Revolver sessions in 1966 especially for the Beatles, who regularly expressed a desire for a technical alternative to having to record doubled lead vocals. Another important effect was varispeeding, a technique that the Beatles used extensively on Revolver. Martin cites "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" as having the most variations of tape speed on Sgt. Pepper. During the recording of Lennon's vocals, the tape speed was reduced from 50 cycles per second to 45, which produced a higher and thinner-sounding track when played back at the normal speed. For the album's title track, the recording of Starr's drum kit was enhanced by the use of damping and close-miking. MacDonald credits the new recording technique with creating a "three-dimensional" sound that, along with other Beatles innovations, engineers in the US would soon adopt as standard practice. Artistic experimentation, such as the placement of random gibberish in the run-out groove, became one of the album's defining features. Sgt. Pepper was the first pop album to be mastered without the momentary gaps that are typically placed between tracks as a point of demarcation. It made use of two crossfades that blended songs together, giving the impression of a continuous live performance. Although both stereo and monaural mixes of the album were prepared, the Beatles were minimally involved in what they regarded as the less important stereo mix sessions, leaving the task to Martin and Emerick. Emerick recalls: "We spent three weeks on the mono mixes and maybe three days on the stereo." Most listeners ultimately heard only the stereo version. He estimates that the group spent 700 hours on the LP, more than 30 times that of the first Beatles album, Please Please Me, which cost £400 to produce. The final cost of Sgt. Pepper was approximately £25,000 (). ### Band dynamics Author Robert Rodriguez writes that while Lennon, Harrison and Starr embraced the creative freedom afforded by McCartney's band-within-a-band idea, they "went along with the concept with varying degrees of enthusiasm". Studio personnel recalled that Lennon had "never seemed so happy" as during the Sgt. Pepper sessions. In a 1969 interview with Barry Miles, however, Lennon said he was depressed and that while McCartney was "full of confidence", he was "going through murder". Lennon explained his view of the album's concept: "Paul said, 'Come and see the show', I didn't. I said, 'I read the news today, oh boy.'" Everett describes Starr as having been "largely bored" during the sessions, with the drummer later lamenting: "The biggest memory I have of Sgt. Pepper ... is I learned to play chess". In The Beatles Anthology, Harrison said he had little interest in McCartney's concept of a fictitious group and that, after his experiences in India, "my heart was still out there ... I was losing interest in being 'fab' at that point." Harrison added that, having enjoyed recording Rubber Soul and Revolver, he disliked how the group's approach on Sgt. Pepper became "an assembly process" whereby, "A lot of the time it ended up with just Paul playing the piano and Ringo keeping the tempo, and we weren't allowed to play as a band as much." In Lewisohn's opinion, Sgt. Pepper represents the group's last unified effort, displaying a cohesion that deteriorated immediately following the album's completion and entirely disappeared by the release of The Beatles (also known as the "White Album") in 1968. Martin recalled in 1987 that throughout the making of Sgt. Pepper, "There was a very good spirit at that time between all the Beatles and ourselves. We were all conscious that we were doing something that was great." He said that while McCartney effectively led the project, and sometimes annoyed his bandmates, "Paul appreciated John's contribution on Pepper. In terms of quantity, it wasn't great, but in terms of quality, it was enormous." ## Songs ### Overview Among musicologists, Allan Moore says that Sgt. Pepper is composed mainly of rock and pop music, while Michael Hannan and Naphtali Wagner both see it as an album of various genres; Hannan says it features "a broad variety of musical and theatrical genres". According to Hannan and Wagner, the music incorporates the stylistic influences of rock and roll, vaudeville, big band, piano jazz, blues, chamber, circus, music hall, avant-garde, and Western and Indian classical music. Wagner feels the album's music reconciles the "diametrically opposed aesthetic ideals" of classical and psychedelia, achieving a "psycheclassical synthesis" of the two forms. Musicologist John Covach describes Sgt. Pepper as "proto-progressive". According to author George Case, all of the songs on Sgt. Pepper were perceived by contemporary listeners as being drug-inspired, with 1967 marking the pinnacle of LSD's influence on pop music. Shortly before the album's release, the BBC banned "A Day in the Life" from British radio because of the phrase "I'd love to turn you on"; the BBC stated that it could "encourage a permissive attitude towards drug-taking". Although Lennon and McCartney denied any drug-related interpretation of the song at the time, McCartney later suggested that the line referred to either drugs or sex. The meaning of "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" became the subject of speculation, as many believed that the title was code for LSD. In "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!", the reference to "Henry the Horse" contains two common slang terms for heroin. Fans speculated that Henry the Horse was a drug dealer and "Fixing a Hole" was a reference to heroin use. Others noted lyrics such as "I get high" from "With a Little Help from My Friends", "take some tea" – slang for cannabis use – from "Lovely Rita", and "digging the weeds" from "When I'm Sixty-Four". The author Sheila Whiteley attributes Sgt. Pepper's underlying philosophy not only to the drug culture, but also to metaphysics and the non-violent approach of the flower power movement. The musicologist Oliver Julien views the album as an embodiment of "the social, the musical, and more generally, the cultural changes of the 1960s". The album's primary value, according to Moore, is its ability to "capture, more vividly than almost anything contemporaneous, its own time and place". Whiteley agrees, crediting the album with "provid[ing] a historical snapshot of England during the run-up to the Summer of Love". Several scholars have applied a hermeneutic strategy to their analysis of Sgt. Pepper's lyrics, identifying loss of innocence and the dangers of overindulgence in fantasies or illusions as the most prominent themes. ### Side one #### "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band" Sgt. Pepper opens with the title track, starting with 10 seconds of the combined sounds of a pit orchestra warming up and an audience waiting for a concert, creating the illusion of the album as a live performance. McCartney serves as the master of ceremonies, welcoming the audience to a twentieth-anniversary reunion concert by Sgt. Pepper's band, who, led by Lennon, then sing a message of appreciation for the crowd's warm response. Womack says the lyric bridges the fourth wall between the artist and their audience. He argues that, paradoxically, the lyrics "exemplify the mindless rhetoric of rock concert banter" while "mock[ing] the very notion of a pop album's capacity for engendering authentic interconnection between artist and audience". In his view, the mixed message ironically serves to distance the group from their fans while simultaneously "gesturing toward" them as alter egos. The song's five-bar bridge is filled by a French horn quartet. Womack credits the recording's use of a brass ensemble with distorted electric guitars as an early example of rock fusion. MacDonald agrees, describing the track as an overture rather than a song, and a "fusion of Edwardian variety orchestra" and contemporary hard rock. Hannan describes the track's unorthodox stereo mix as "typical of the album", with the lead vocal in the right speaker during the verses, but in the left during the chorus and middle eight. McCartney returns as the master of ceremonies near the end of the song, announcing the entrance of an alter ego named Billy Shears. #### "With a Little Help from My Friends" The title track segues into "With a Little Help from My Friends" amid the sound of screaming fans recorded during a Beatles concert at the Hollywood Bowl. In his role as Billy Shears, Starr contributes a baritone lead vocal that Womack credits with imparting an element of "earnestness in sharp contrast with the ironic distance of the title track". Written by Lennon and McCartney, the song's lyrics centre on a theme of questions, beginning with Starr asking the audience whether they would leave if he sang out of tune. In the call-and-response style, Lennon, McCartney and Harrison go on to ask their bandmate questions about the meaning of friendship and true love; by the final verse, Starr provides unequivocal answers. In MacDonald's opinion, the lyric is "at once communal and personal ... [and] meant as a gesture of inclusivity; everyone could join in." Everett comments that the track's use of a major key double-plagal cadence became commonplace in pop music following the release of Sgt. Pepper. #### "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" Despite widespread suspicion that the title of "Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds" contained a hidden reference to LSD, Lennon insisted that it was derived from a pastel drawing by his four-year-old son Julian. A hallucinatory chapter from Lewis Carroll's 1871 novel Through the Looking-Glass, a favourite of Lennon's, inspired the song's atmosphere. According to MacDonald, "the lyric explicitly recreates the psychedelic experience". The first verse begins with what Womack characterises as "an invitation in the form of an imperative" through the line: "Picture yourself in a boat on a river", and continues with imaginative imagery, including "tangerine trees", "rocking horse people" and "newspaper taxis". The musical backing includes a phrase played by McCartney on a Lowrey organ, treated with ADT to sound like a celeste, and tambura drone. Harrison also contributed a lead guitar part that doubles Lennon's vocal over the verses in the style of a sarangi player accompanying an Indian khyal singer. The music critic Tim Riley identifies the track as a moment "in the album, [where] the material world is completely clouded in the mythical by both text and musical atmosphere". #### "Getting Better" MacDonald considers "Getting Better" to contain "the most ebullient performance" on Sgt. Pepper. Womack credits the track's "driving rock sound" with distinguishing it from the album's overtly psychedelic material; its lyrics inspire the listener "to usurp the past by living well and flourishing in the present". He cites it as a strong example of Lennon and McCartney's collaborative songwriting, particularly Lennon's addition of the line "It can't get no worse", which serves as a "sarcastic rejoinder" to McCartney's chorus: "It's getting better all the time". Lennon's contribution to the lyric also includes a confessional regarding his having been violent with female companions: "I used to be cruel to my woman". In Womack's opinion, the song encourages the listener to follow the speaker's example and "alter their own angst-ridden ways": "Man I was mean, but I'm changing my scene and I'm doing the best that I can." #### "Fixing a Hole" "Fixing a Hole" deals with McCartney's desire to let his mind wander freely and to express his creativity without the burden of self-conscious insecurities. Womack interprets the lyric as "the speaker's search for identity among the crowd", in particular the "quests for consciousness and connection" that differentiate individuals from society as a whole. MacDonald characterises it as a "distracted and introverted track", during which McCartney forgoes his "usual smooth design" in favour of "something more preoccupied". He cites Harrison's electric guitar solo as serving the track well, capturing its mood by conveying detachment. Womack notes McCartney's adaptation of the lyric "a hole in the roof where the rain leaks in" from Elvis Presley's "We're Gonna Move". #### "She's Leaving Home" In Everett's view, the lyrics to "She's Leaving Home" address the problem of alienation "between disagreeing peoples", particularly those distanced from each other by the generation gap. McCartney's narrative details the plight of a young woman escaping the control of her parents, and was inspired by a piece about teenage runaways published in the Daily Mail. Lennon supplies a supporting vocal that conveys the parents' anguish and confusion. It is the first track on Sgt. Pepper that eschews the use of guitars and drums, featuring only a string nonet with a harp. Music historian Doyle Greene views it as the first of the album's songs to address "the crisis of middle-class life in the late 1960s" and comments on its surprisingly conservative sentiments, given McCartney's absorption in the London avant-garde scene. #### "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!" Lennon adapted the lyrics for "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!" from an 1843 poster for Pablo Fanque's circus that he purchased at an antique shop in Kent on the day of filming the promotional film for "Strawberry Fields Forever". Womack views the track as an effective blending of a print source and music, while MacDonald describes it as "a spontaneous expression of its author's playful hedonism". Tasked by Lennon to evoke a circus atmosphere so vivid that he could "smell the sawdust", Martin and Emerick created a sound collage comprising randomly assembled recordings of harmoniums, harmonicas and calliopes. Everett says that the track's use of Edwardian imagery thematically links it with the album's title song. Gould also views "Mr. Kite!" as a return to the LP's opening motif, albeit that of show business and with the focus now on performers and a show in a radically different setting. ### Side two #### "Within You Without You" Harrison's Hindustani classical music-inspired "Within You Without You" reflects his immersion in the teachings of the Hindu Vedas, while its musical form and Indian instrumentation, such as sitar, tabla, dilrubas and tamburas, recalls the Hindu devotional tradition known as bhajan. Harrison recorded the song with London-based Indian musicians from the Asian Music Circle; none of the other Beatles played on the recording. He and Martin then worked on a Western string arrangement that imitated the slides and bends typical of Indian music. The song's pitch is derived from the eastern Khamaj scale, which is akin to the Mixolydian mode in the West. MacDonald regards "Within You Without You" as "the most distant departure from the staple Beatles sound in their discography", and a work that represents the "conscience" of the LP through the lyrics' rejection of Western materialism. Womack calls it "quite arguably, the album's ethical soul" and views the line "With our love we could save the world" as a concise reflection of the Beatles' idealism that soon inspired the Summer of Love. The track ends with a burst of laughter gleaned from a tape in the EMI archive; some listeners interpreted this as a mockery of the song, but Harrison explained: "It's a release after five minutes of sad music ... You were supposed to hear the audience anyway, as they listen to Sergeant Pepper's Show. That was the style of the album." #### "When I'm Sixty-Four" MacDonald characterises McCartney's "When I'm Sixty-Four" as a song "aimed chiefly at parents", borrowing heavily from the English music hall style of George Formby, while invoking images of the illustrator Donald McGill's seaside postcards. Its sparse arrangement includes clarinets, chimes and piano. Moore views the song as a synthesis of ragtime and pop, adding that its position following "Within You Without You" – a blend of Indian classical music and pop – demonstrates the diversity of the album's material. He says the music hall atmosphere is reinforced by McCartney's vocal delivery and the recording's use of chromaticism, a harmonic pattern that can be traced to Scott Joplin's "The Ragtime Dance" and "The Blue Danube" by Johann Strauss. Varispeeding was used on the track, raising its pitch by a semitone in an attempt to make McCartney sound younger. Everett comments that the lyric's protagonist is sometimes associated with the Lonely Hearts Club Band, but in his opinion the song is thematically unconnected to the others on the album. #### "Lovely Rita" Womack describes "Lovely Rita" as a work of "full-tilt psychedelia" that contrasts sharply with the preceding track. Citing McCartney's recollection that he drew inspiration from learning that the American term for a female traffic warden was a meter maid, Gould deems it a celebration of an encounter that evokes Swinging London and the contemporaneous chic for military-style uniforms. MacDonald regards the song as a "satire on authority" that is "imbued with an exuberant interest in life that lifts the spirits, dispersing self-absorption". The arrangement includes a quartet of comb-and-paper kazoos, a piano solo by Martin, and a coda in which the Beatles indulge in panting, groaning and other vocalised sounds. In Gould's view, the track represents "the show-stopper in the Pepper Band's repertoire: a funny, sexy, extroverted song that comes closer to the spirit of rock 'n' roll than anything else on the album". #### "Good Morning Good Morning" Lennon was inspired to write "Good Morning Good Morning" after watching a television commercial for Kellogg's Corn Flakes, the jingle from which he adapted for the song's refrain. The track uses the bluesy Mixolydian mode in A, which Everett credits with "perfectly express[ing] Lennon's grievance against complacency". According to Greene, the song contrasts sharply with "She's Leaving Home" by providing "the more 'avant-garde' subversive study of suburban life". The time signature varies across 5/4, 3/4 and 4/4, while the arrangement includes a horn section comprising members of Sounds Inc. MacDonald highlights the "rollicking" brass score, Starr's drumming and McCartney's "coruscating pseudo-Indian guitar solo" among the elements that convey a sense of aggression on a track he deems a "disgusted canter through the muck, mayhem, and mundanity of the human farmyard". A series of animal noises appear during the fade-out that are sequenced – at Lennon's request – so that each successive animal could conceivably scare or devour the preceding one. The sound of a chicken clucking overlaps with a stray guitar note at the start of the next track, creating a seamless transition between the two songs. #### "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise)" "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise)" follows as a segue to the album's finale. The hard-rocking song was written after Neil Aspinall, the Beatles' road manager, suggested that since "Sgt. Pepper" opened the album, the fictional band should make an appearance near the end. Sung by all four Beatles, the reprise omits the brass section from the title track and has a faster tempo. With Harrison on lead guitar, it serves as a rare example from the Sgt. Pepper sessions where the group taped a basic track live with their usual stage instrumentation. MacDonald finds the Beatles' excitement tangibly translated on the recording, which is again augmented with ambient crowd noise. #### "A Day in the Life" The last chord of the "Sgt. Pepper" reprise segues amid audience applause to acoustic guitar strumming and the start of what Moore calls "one of the most harrowing songs ever written". "A Day in the Life" consists of four verses by Lennon, a bridge, two aleatoric orchestral crescendos, and an interpolated middle part written and sung by McCartney. The first crescendo serves as a segue between the third verse and the middle part, leading to a bridge known as the "dream sequence". Lennon drew inspiration for the lyrics from a Daily Mail report on potholes in the Lancashire town of Blackburn and an article in the same newspaper relating to the death of Beatles friend and Guinness heir Tara Browne. According to Martin, Lennon and McCartney were equally responsible for the decision to use an orchestra. Martin said that Lennon requested "a tremendous build-up, from nothing up to something absolutely like the end of the world", while McCartney realised this idea by drawing inspiration from Cage and Stockhausen. Womack describes Starr's performance as "one of his most inventive drum parts on record". The thunderous piano chord that concludes the track and the album was produced by recording Lennon, Starr, McCartney and Evans simultaneously sounding an E major chord on three separate pianos; Martin then augmented the sound with a harmonium. Riley characterises the song as a "postlude to the Pepper fantasy ... that sets all the other songs in perspective", while shattering the illusion of "Pepperland" by introducing the "parallel universe of everyday life". MacDonald describes the track as "a song not of disillusionment with life itself, but of disenchantment with the limits of mundane perception". As "A Day in the Life" ends, a 15-kilohertz high-frequency tone is heard; it was added at Lennon's suggestion with the intention that it would annoy dogs. This is followed by the sounds of backwards laughter and random gibberish that were pressed into the record's concentric run-out groove, which loops back into itself endlessly on any record player not equipped with an automatic needle return. Lennon can be heard saying, "Been so high", followed by McCartney's response: "Never could be any other way." ### Concept According to Womack, with Sgt. Pepper's opening song "the Beatles manufacture an artificial textual space in which to stage their art." The reprise of the title song appears on side two, just before the climactic "A Day in the Life", creating a framing device. In Lennon and Starr's view, only the first two songs and the reprise are conceptually connected. In a 1980 interview, Lennon stated that his compositions had nothing to do with the Sgt. Pepper concept, adding: "Sgt. Pepper is called the first concept album, but it doesn't go anywhere ... it works because we said it worked." In MacFarlane's view, the Beatles "chose to employ an overarching thematic concept in an apparent effort to unify individual tracks". Everett contends that the album's "musical unity results ... from motivic relationships between key areas, particularly involving C, E, and G". Moore argues that the recording's "use of common harmonic patterns and falling melodies" contributes to its overall cohesiveness, which he describes as narrative unity, but not necessarily conceptual unity. MacFarlane agrees, suggesting that with the exception of the reprise, the album lacks the melodic and harmonic continuity that is consistent with cyclic form. In a 1995 interview, McCartney recalled that the Liverpool childhood theme behind the first three songs recorded during the Sgt. Pepper sessions was never formalised as an album-wide concept, but he said that it served as a "device" or underlying theme throughout the project. MacDonald identifies allusions to the Beatles' upbringing throughout Sgt. Pepper that are "too persuasive to ignore". These include evocations of the postwar Northern music-hall tradition, references to Northern industrial towns and Liverpool schooldays, Lewis Carroll-inspired imagery (acknowledging Lennon's favourite childhood reading), the use of brass instrumentation in the style of park bandstand performances (familiar to McCartney through his visits to Sefton Park), and the album cover's flower arrangement akin to a floral clock. Norman partly agrees; he says that "In many ways, the album carried on the childhood and Liverpool theme with its circus and fairground effects, its pervading atmosphere of the traditional northern music hall that was in both its main creators' [McCartney and Lennon's] blood." ## Packaging ### Front cover Pop artists Peter Blake and Jann Haworth designed the album cover for Sgt. Pepper. Blake recalled of the concept: "I offered the idea that if they had just played a concert in the park, the cover could be a photograph of the group just after the concert with the crowd who had just watched the concert, watching them." He added, "If we did this by using cardboard cut-outs, it could be a magical crowd of whomever they wanted." According to McCartney, he himself provided the ink drawing on which Blake and Haworth based the design. The cover was art-directed by Robert Fraser and photographed by Michael Cooper. The front of the LP includes a colourful collage featuring the Beatles in costume as Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, standing with a group of life-sized cardboard cut-outs of famous people. Each of the Beatles sports a heavy moustache, after Harrison had first grown one as a disguise during his visit to India. The moustaches reflected the growing influence of hippie style trends, while the group's clothing, in Gould's description, "spoofed the vogue in Britain for military fashions". The centre of the cover depicts the Beatles standing behind a bass drum on which fairground artist Joe Ephgrave painted the words of the album's title. In front of the drum is an arrangement of flowers that spell out "Beatles". The group are dressed in satin day-glo-coloured military-style uniforms that were manufactured by the London theatrical costumer M. Berman Ltd. Next to the Beatles are wax sculptures of the band members in their suits and moptop haircuts from the Beatlemania era, borrowed from Madame Tussauds. Amid the greenery are figurines of the Eastern deities Buddha and Lakshmi. The cover collage includes 57 photographs and nine waxworks. Author Ian Inglis views the tableau "as a guidebook to the cultural topography of the decade" that conveyed the increasing democratisation of society whereby "traditional barriers between 'high' and 'low' culture were being eroded", while Case cites it as the most explicit demonstration of pop culture's "continuity with the avant-gardes of yesteryear". The final grouping included composer Karlheinz Stockhausen, along with singers such as Bob Dylan and Bobby Breen; film stars Marlon Brando, Tyrone Power, Tony Curtis, Marlene Dietrich, Mae West and Marilyn Monroe; artist Aubrey Beardsley; boxer Sonny Liston and footballer Albert Stubbins. Also included were comedians Stan Laurel and Oliver Hardy; writers H.G. Wells, Oscar Wilde, Lewis Carroll, and Dylan Thomas; and the philosophers and scientists Karl Marx, Albert Einstein, Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung. Harrison chose the Self-Realization Fellowship gurus Mahavatar Babaji, Lahiri Mahasaya, Sri Yukteswar and Paramahansa Yogananda. The Rolling Stones are represented by a doll wearing a shirt emblazoned with a message of welcome to the band. Fearing controversy, EMI rejected Lennon's request for images of Adolf Hitler and Jesus Christ and Harrison's for Mahatma Gandhi. When McCartney was asked why the Beatles did not include Elvis Presley among the musical artists, he replied: "Elvis was too important and too far above the rest even to mention." Starr was the only Beatle who offered no suggestions for the collage, telling Blake, "Whatever the others say is fine by me." The final cost for the cover art was nearly £3,000 (), an extravagant sum for a time when album covers would typically cost around £50 (). ### Back cover, gatefold and cut-outs The 30 March 1967 photo session with Cooper also produced the back cover and the inside gatefold, which Inglis describes as conveying "an obvious and immediate warmth ... which distances it from the sterility and artifice typical of such images". McCartney recalled the inner-gatefold image as an example of the Beatles' interest in "eye messages", adding: "So with Michael Cooper's inside photo, we all said, 'Now look into this camera and really say I love you! Really try and feel love; really give love through this!' ... [And] if you look at it you'll see the big effort from the eyes." In Lennon's description, Cooper's photos of the band showed "two people who are flying [on drugs], and two who aren't". The album's lyrics were printed in full on the back cover, the first time this had been done on a rock LP. The record's inner sleeve featured artwork by the Dutch design team the Fool that eschewed for the first time the standard white paper in favour of an abstract pattern of waves of maroon, red, pink and white. Included as a bonus gift was a sheet of cardboard cut-outs designed by Blake and Haworth. These consisted of a postcard-sized portrait of Sgt. Pepper (probably based on a photograph of British Army officer James Melville Babington, but also noted as being similar to a statue from Lennon's house that was used on the front cover), a fake moustache, two sets of sergeant stripes, two lapel badges, and a stand-up cut-out of the band in their satin uniforms. Moore writes that the inclusion of these items helped fans "pretend to be in the band". ## Release ### Radio previews and launch party The album was previewed on the pirate radio station Radio London on 12 May and officially on the BBC Light Programme's show Where It's At, by Kenny Everett, on 20 May. Everett played the entire album apart from "A Day in the Life". The day before Everett's broadcast, Epstein hosted a launch party for music journalists and disc jockeys at his house in Belgravia in central London. The event was a new initiative in pop promotion and furthered the significance of the album's release. Melody Maker's reporter described it as the first "listen-in" and typical of the Beatles' penchant for innovation. The party marked the band's first group interaction with the press in close to a year. Norrie Drummond of the NME wrote that they had been "virtually incommunicado" over that time, leading a national newspaper to complain that the band were "contemplative, secretive and exclusive". Some of the journalists present were shocked by the Beatles' appearance, particularly that of Lennon and Harrison, as the band members' bohemian attire contrasted sharply with their former image. Music journalist Ray Coleman recalled that Lennon looked "haggard, old, ill" and clearly under the influence of drugs. Biographer Howard Sounes likens the Beatles' presence to a gathering of the British royal family and highlights a photo from the event that shows Lennon shaking McCartney's hand "in an exaggeratedly congratulatory way, throwing his head back in sarcastic laughter". On 26 May, Sgt. Pepper was given a rush-release in the UK, ahead of the scheduled date of 1 June. The band's eighth LP, it was the first Beatles album where the track listings were exactly the same for the UK and US versions. The US release took place on 2 June. Capitol Records' advertising for the album emphasised that the Beatles and Sgt. Pepper's band were one and the same. ### Public reaction Sgt. Pepper was widely perceived by listeners as the soundtrack to the Summer of Love, during a year that author Peter Lavezzoli calls "a watershed moment in the West when the search for higher consciousness and an alternative world view had reached critical mass". Rolling Stone magazine's Langdon Winner recalled: > The closest Western Civilization has come to unity since the Congress of Vienna in 1815 was the week the Sgt. Pepper album was released. In every city in Europe and America the radio stations played [it] ... and everyone listened ... For a brief while the irreparable fragmented consciousness of the West was unified, at least in the minds of the young. According to Riley, the album "drew people together through the common experience of pop on a larger scale than ever before". In MacDonald's description, an "almost religious awe surrounded the LP"; he says that its impact was cross-generational, as "Young and old alike were entranced", and era-defining, in that the "psychic shiver" it inspired across the world was "nothing less than a cinematic dissolve from one Zeitgeist to another". In his view, Sgt. Pepper conveyed the psychedelic experience so effectively to listeners unfamiliar with hallucinogenic drugs that "If such a thing as a cultural 'contact high' is possible, it happened here." Music journalist Mark Ellen, a teenager in 1967, recalls listening to part of the album at a friend's house and then hearing the rest playing at the next house he visited as if the record was emanating communally from "one giant Dansette". He says the most remarkable thing was its acceptance by adults who had turned against the Beatles when they became "gaunt and enigmatic", and how the group, recast as polished "masters of ceremony", were now "the very family favourites they'd sought to satirise". Writing in his book Electric Shock, Peter Doggett describes Sgt. Pepper as "the biggest pop happening" to take place between the Beatles' debut on American television in February 1964 and Lennon's murder in December 1980, while Norman writes: "A whole generation, still used to happy landmarks through life, would always remember exactly when and where they first played it ..." The album's impact was felt at the Monterey International Pop Festival, the second event in the Summer of Love, organised by Taylor and held over 16–18 June in county fairgrounds south of San Francisco. Sgt. Pepper was played in kiosks and stands there, and festival staff wore badges carrying Lennon's lyric "A splendid time is guaranteed for all". American radio stations interrupted their regular scheduling, playing the album virtually non-stop, often from start to finish. Emphasising its identity as a self-contained work, none of the songs were issued as singles at the time or available on spin-off EPs. Instead, the Beatles released "All You Need Is Love" as a single in July, after performing the song on the Our World satellite broadcast on 25 June before an audience estimated at 400 million. According to sociomusicologist Simon Frith, the international broadcast served to confirm "the Beatles' evangelical role" amid the public's embrace of Sgt. Pepper. In the UK, Our World also quelled the furore that followed McCartney's repeated admission in mid June that he had taken LSD. In Norman's description, this admission was indicative of how "invulnerable" McCartney felt after Sgt. Pepper; it made the band's drug-taking public knowledge and confirmed the link between the album and drugs. ### Commercial performance Sgt. Pepper topped the Record Retailer albums chart (now the UK Albums Chart) for 23 consecutive weeks from 10 June, with a further four weeks at number one in the period through to February 1968. The record sold 250,000 copies in the UK during its first seven days on sale there. The album held the number one position on the Billboard Top LPs chart in the US for 15 weeks, from 1 July to 13 October 1967, and remained in the top 200 for 113 consecutive weeks. It also topped charts in many other countries. With 2.5 million copies sold within three months of its release, Sgt. Pepper's initial commercial success exceeded that of all previous Beatles albums. In the UK, it was the best-selling album of 1967 and of the decade. According to figures published in 2009 by former Capitol executive David Kronemyer, further to estimates he gave in MuseWire magazine, the album had sold 2,360,423 copies in the US by 31 December 1967 and 3,372,581 copies by the end of the decade. ## Contemporary critical reception The release of Sgt. Pepper coincided with a period when, with the advent of dedicated rock criticism, commentators sought to recognise artistry in pop music, particularly in the Beatles' work, and identify albums as refined artistic statements. In America, this approach had been heightened by the "Strawberry Fields Forever" / "Penny Lane" single, and was also exemplified by Leonard Bernstein's television program Inside Pop: The Rock Revolution, broadcast by CBS in April 1967. Following the release of the Beatles' single, in author Bernard Gendron's description, a "discursive frenzy" ensued as Time, Newsweek and other publications from the cultural mainstream increasingly voiced their "ecstatic approbation toward the Beatles". The vast majority of contemporary reviews of Sgt. Pepper were positive, with the album receiving widespread critical acclaim. Schaffner said that the consensus was aptly summed up by Tom Phillips in The Village Voice, when he called the LP "the most ambitious and most successful record album ever issued". Among Britain's pop press, Peter Jones of Record Mirror said the album was "clever and brilliant, from raucous to poignant and back again", while Disc and Music Echo's reviewer called it "a beautiful and potent record, unique, clever, and stunning". In The Times, William Mann described Sgt. Pepper as a "pop music master-class" and commented that, so considerable were its musical advances, "the only track that would have been conceivable in pop songs five years ago" was "With a Little Help from My Friends". Having been among the first British critics to fully appreciate Revolver, Peter Clayton of Gramophone magazine said that the new album was "like nearly everything the Beatles do, bizarre, wonderful, perverse, beautiful, exciting, provocative, exasperating, compassionate and mocking". He found "plenty of electronic gimmickry on the record" before concluding: "but that isn't the heart of the thing. It's the combination of imagination, cheek and skill that make this such a rewarding LP." Wilfrid Mellers, in his review for New Statesman, praised the album's elevation of pop music to the level of fine art, while Kenneth Tynan, The Times' theatre critic, said it represented "a decisive moment in the history of Western civilisation". Newsweek's Jack Kroll called Sgt. Pepper a "masterpiece" and compared its lyrics with literary works by Edith Sitwell, Harold Pinter and T. S. Eliot, particularly "A Day in the Life", which he likened to Eliot's The Waste Land. The New Yorker paired the Beatles with Duke Ellington, as artists who operated "in that special territory where entertainment slips into art". One of the few well-known American rock critics at the time, and another early champion of Revolver, Richard Goldstein wrote a scathing review in The New York Times. He characterised Sgt. Pepper as a "spoiled" child and "an album of special effects, dazzling but ultimately fraudulent", and was critical of the Beatles for sacrificing their authenticity to become "cloistered composers". Although he admired "A Day in the Life", comparing it to a work by Wagner, Goldstein said that the songs lacked lyrical substance such that "tone overtakes meaning", an aesthetic he blamed on "posturing and put-on" in the form of production effects such as echo and reverb. As a near-lone voice of dissent, he was widely castigated for his views. Four days later, The Village Voice, where Goldstein had become a celebrated columnist since 1966, reacted to the "hornet's nest" of complaints, by publishing Phillips' highly favourable review. According to Schaffner, Goldstein was "kept busy for months" justifying his opinions, which included writing a defence of his review, for the Voice, in July. Among the commentators who responded to Goldstein's critique, composer Ned Rorem, writing in The New York Review of Books, credited the Beatles with possessing a "magic of genius" akin to Mozart and characterised Sgt. Pepper as a harbinger of a "golden Renaissance of Song". Time quoted musicologists and avant-garde composers who equated the standard of the Beatles' songwriting to Schubert and Schumann, and located the band's work to electronic music; the magazine concluded that the album was "a historic departure in the progress of music – any music". Literary critic Richard Poirier wrote a laudatory appreciation of the Beatles in the journal Partisan Review and said that "listening to the Sgt. Pepper album one thinks not simply of the history of popular music but the history of this century." In his December 1967 column for Esquire, Robert Christgau described Sgt. Pepper as "a consolidation, more intricate than Revolver but not more substantial". He suggested that Goldstein had fallen "victim to overanticipation", identifying his primary error as "allow[ing] all the filters and reverbs and orchestral effects and overdubs to deafen him to the stuff underneath, which was pretty nice". ## Sociocultural influence ### Contemporary youth and counterculture In the wake of Sgt. Pepper, the underground and mainstream press widely publicised the Beatles as leaders of youth culture, as well as "lifestyle revolutionaries". In Moore's description, the album "seems to have spoken (in a way no other has) for its generation". An educator referenced in a July 1967 New York Times article was reported to have said on the topic of music studies and its relevance to the day's youth: "If you want to know what youths are thinking and feeling ... you cannot find anyone who speaks for them or to them more clearly than the Beatles." Sgt. Pepper was the focus of much celebration by the counterculture. American Beat poet Allen Ginsberg said of the album: "After the apocalypse of Hitler and the apocalypse of the Bomb, there was here an exclamation of joy, the rediscovery of joy and what it is to be alive." The American psychologist and counterculture figure Timothy Leary labelled the Beatles "avatars of the new world order" and said that the LP "gave a voice to the feeling that the old ways were over" by stressing the need for cultural change based on a peaceful agenda. According to author Michael Frontani, the Beatles "legitimiz[ed] the lifestyle of the counterculture", just as they did popular music, and formed the basis of Jann Wenner's scope on these issues when launching Rolling Stone magazine in late 1967. Further to Lennon wearing an Afghan sheepskin coat at the album launch party, "Afghans" became a popular garment among hippies, and Westerners increasingly sought out the coats on the hippie trail in Afghanistan. McCartney's LSD admission formalised the link between rock music and drugs, and attracted scorn from American religious leaders and conservatives. Vice-president Spiro Agnew contended that the "friends" referred to in "With a Little Help from My Friends" were "assorted drugs". As part of an escalating national debate that triggered an investigation by the US Congress, he launched a campaign in 1970 to address the issue of American youth being "brainwashed" into taking drugs through the music of the Beatles and other rock artists. In the UK, according to historian David Simonelli, the album's obvious drug allusions inspired a hierarchy within the youth movement for the first time, based on listeners' ability to "get" psychedelia and align with the elite notion of Romantic artistry. Harrison was eager to separate the message of "Within You Without You" from the LSD experience, telling an interviewer: "It's nothing to do with pills ... It's just in your own head, the realisation." The Beatles' presentation as Sgt. Pepper's band resonated at a time when many young people in the UK and the US were seeking to redefine their own identity and were drawn to communities that espoused the transformational power of mind-altering drugs. In the Haight-Ashbury district of San Francisco, the recognised centre of the counterculture, Sgt. Pepper was viewed as a "code for life", according to music journalist Alan Clayson, with street people such as the Merry Band of Pranksters offering "Beatle readings". American social activist Abbie Hoffman credited the album as his inspiration for staging the attempted levitation of the Pentagon during the Mobe's anti-Vietnam War rally in October 1967. The Byrds' David Crosby later expressed surprise that by 1970 the album's powerful sentiments had not been enough to stop the Vietnam War. Sgt. Pepper informed Frank Zappa's parody of the counterculture and flower power on the Mothers of Invention's 1968 album We're Only in It for the Money. By 1968, according to music critic Greil Marcus, Sgt. Pepper appeared shallow against the emotional backdrop of the political and social upheavals of American life. Simon Frith, in his overview of 1967 for The History of Rock, said that Sgt. Pepper "defined the year" by conveying the optimism and sense of empowerment at the centre of the youth movement. He added that the Velvet Underground's The Velvet Underground & Nico – an album that contrasted sharply with the Beatles' message by "offer[ing] no escape" – became more relevant in a cultural climate typified by "the Sex Pistols, the new political aggression, the rioting in the streets" during the 1970s. In a 1987 review for Q magazine, Charles Shaar Murray asserted that Sgt. Pepper "remains a central pillar of the mythology and iconography of the late '60s", while Colin Larkin states in his 1989 Encyclopedia of Popular Music: "[it] turned out to be no mere pop album but a cultural icon, embracing the constituent elements of the 60s' youth culture: pop art, garish fashion, drugs, instant mysticism and freedom from parental control." ### Cultural legitimisation of popular music In The Oxford Encyclopedia of British Literature, Kevin Dettmar writes that Sgt. Pepper achieved "a combination of popular success and critical acclaim unequaled in twentieth-century art ... never before had an aesthetic and technical masterpiece enjoyed such popularity." Through the level of attention it received from the rock press and more culturally elite publications, the album achieved full cultural legitimisation for pop music and recognition for the medium as a genuine art form. Riley says that pop had been due this accreditation "at least as early as A Hard Day's Night" in 1964. He adds that the timing of the album's release and its reception ensured that "Sgt. Pepper has attained the kind of populist adoration that renowned works often assume regardless of their larger significance – it's the Beatles' 'Mona Lisa'." At the 10th Annual Grammy Awards in March 1968, Sgt. Pepper won awards in four categories: Album of the Year; Best Contemporary Album; Best Engineered Recording, Non-Classical; and Best Album Cover, Graphic Arts. Its win in the Album of the Year category marked the first time that a rock LP had received this honour. Among the recognised composers who helped legitimise the Beatles as serious musicians at the time were Luciano Berio, Aaron Copland, John Cage, Ned Rorem and Leonard Bernstein. According to Rodriguez, an element of exaggeration accompanied some of the acclaim for Sgt. Pepper, with particularly effusive approbation coming from Rorem, Bernstein and Tynan, "as if every critic was seeking to outdo the other for the most lavish embrace of the Beatles' new direction". In Gendron's view, the cultural approbation represented American "highbrow" commentators (Rorem and Poirier) looking to establish themselves over their "low-middlebrow" equivalent, after Time and Newsweek had led the way in recognising the Beatles' artistry, and over the new discipline of rock criticism. Gendron describes the discourse as one whereby, during a period that lasted for six months, "highbrow" composers and musicologists "jostl[ed] to pen the definitive effusive appraisal of the Beatles". Aside from the attention afforded the album in literary and scholarly journals, the American jazz magazines Down Beat and Jazz both began to cover rock music for the first time, with the latter changing its name to Jazz & Pop as a result. In addition, following Sgt. Pepper, established American publications such as Vogue, Playboy and the San Francisco Chronicle started discussing rock as art, in terms usually reserved for jazz criticism. Writing for Rolling Stone in 1969, Michael Lydon said that reviewers had had to invent "new criticism" to match pop's musical advances, since: "Writing had to be an appropriate response to the music; in writing about, say, Sgt. Pepper, you had to try to write something as good as Sgt. Pepper. Because, of course, what made that record beautiful was the beautiful response it created in you; if your written response was true to your listening response, the writing would stand on its own as a creation on par with the record." Through its acceptance by "serious" composers, according to Schaffner, Sgt. Pepper satisfied the ambitions of a staid, middle-age American audience keen to be seen as in tune with young people's tastes, and every major rock LP was subsequently given the same level of critical analysis. In 1977, the LP won Best British Album at the inaugural Brit Awards, held by the BPI to celebrate the best British music of the last 25 years as part of Elizabeth II's Silver Jubilee. When EMI issued the Beatles' catalogue on CD in 1987, Sgt. Pepper was the only album afforded a dedicated release. EMI marketed it as "the most important record ever released on compact disc". ### Development of popular music #### Industry and market changes Julien describes Sgt. Pepper as a "masterpiece of British psychedelia" and says that it represents the "epitome of the transformation of the recording studio into a compositional tool", marking the moment when "popular music entered the era of phonographic composition". Many acts copied the album's psychedelic sounds and imitated its production techniques, resulting in a rapid expansion of the producer's role. In this regard, Lennon and McCartney complained that Martin had received too much attention for his part in the album's creation, so beginning a feeling of resentment by the Beatles towards their longtime producer. In 1987, Anthony DeCurtis of Rolling Stone described Sgt. Pepper as the album that "revolutionized rock and roll", while music journalists Andy Greene and Scott Plagenhoef credit it with marking the beginning of the album era. For several years following its release, straightforward rock and roll was supplanted by a growing interest in extended form, and for the first time in the history of the music industry, sales of albums outpaced those of singles. In Gould's description, Sgt. Pepper was "the catalyst for an explosion of mass enthusiasm for album-formatted rock that would revolutionize both the aesthetics and the economics of the record business in ways that far out-stripped the earlier pop explosions triggered by the Elvis phenomenon of 1956 and the Beatlemania phenomenon of 1963". The music industry swiftly grew into a billion-dollar enterprise, although record company executives were blindsided by the appeal of new acts who defied established formulas. Music critic Greg Kot said that Sgt. Pepper introduced a template not only for creating album-oriented rock but also for consuming it, "with listeners no longer twisting the night away to an assortment of three-minute singles, but losing themselves in a succession of 20-minute album sides, taking a journey led by the artist". In Moore's view, the album was "pivotal" in heralding "the realignment of rock from its working-class roots to its subsequent place on the college circuit", as students increasingly embraced the genre and record companies launched labels targeted towards this new market. As another result of Sgt. Pepper, US record companies no longer altered the content of albums by major British acts such as the Rolling Stones, the Kinks and Donovan, and their LPs were released in the artists' intended configuration. #### Albums and artistry According to Simonelli, Sgt. Pepper established the standard for rock musicians, particularly British acts, to strive towards in their self-identification as artists rather than pop stars, whereby, as in the Romantic tradition, creative vision dominated at the expense of all commercial concerns. In the US, the album paved the way for British groups such as Pink Floyd and the Incredible String Band, whose work echoed the eclectic, mystical and escapist qualities of Sgt. Pepper. Following the Beatles' example, many acts spent months in the studio creating their albums, focused on an artistic aesthetic and in the hope of winning critical approval. Among the many LPs influenced by Sgt. Pepper were Jefferson Airplane's After Bathing at Baxter's, the Rolling Stones' Their Satanic Majesties Request and the Moody Blues' Days of Future Passed, all released in 1967; and the Zombies' Odessey and Oracle, the Small Faces' Ogdens' Nut Gone Flake and the Pretty Things' S.F. Sorrow, all issued the following year. All rock albums were subsequently measured against Sgt. Pepper. Discussing Their Satanic Majesties Request, Wenner referred to "the post–Sgt. Pepper trap of trying to put out a 'progressive,' 'significant' and 'different' album, as revolutionary as the Beatles. But it couldn't be done, because only the Beatles can put out an album by the Beatles." The Guardian viewed the album's effect on Carla Bley as one of the "50 key events in the history of dance music". Bley spent four years crafting her musical response to Sgt. Pepper – the 1971 avant-jazz triple album Escalator Over the Hill – which combined rock, Indo-jazz fusion and chamber jazz. Roger Waters cited Sgt. Pepper as his influence when Pink Floyd created their 1973 album The Dark Side of the Moon, saying: "I learned from Lennon, McCartney and Harrison that it was OK for us to write about our lives and express what we felt ... More than any other record it gave me and my generation permission to branch out and do whatever we wanted." Over subsequent decades, musical acts referred to their major artistic work as "our Sgt. Pepper". In this regard, Mojo magazine recognises Prince's Around the World in a Day (1985), Tears for Fears' The Seeds of Love (1989), Smashing Pumpkins' Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness (1995), Radiohead's OK Computer (1997), Oasis' Be Here Now (1997) and the Flaming Lips' The Soft Bulletin (1999) as albums that "for better or for worse ... would not have existed" without Sgt. Pepper. Writing for Mojo in 2007, John Harris said that the album's influence resonates in the "identity games" of Gnarls Barkley, in the ambitious song cycle of Green Day's 2004 album American Idiot, in the respect afforded adventurous musicians such as Damon Albarn and Wayne Coyne, and particularly in the audience's expectation that foremost artists will "progress" and perhaps "ascend to a watershed point at which influence, experience and ambition cohere into something that just might blow our minds". #### Stylistic developments Sgt. Pepper was highly influential on bands in the US acid rock (or psychedelic rock) scene. Lavezzoli views it as a key factor in 1967's standing as the "annus mirabilis" for Indian classical music's acceptance in the West, with the genre having been fully absorbed into psychedelic music. Sgt. Pepper is commonly recognised as having originated progressive rock, due to the album's self-conscious lyrics, its studio experimentation, and its efforts to expand the barriers of conventional three-minute tracks. In addition to influencing Pink Floyd records such as Atom Heart Mother, it was a source of inspiration for Robert Fripp when he formed King Crimson. The band's 1969 debut In the Court of the Crimson King was intended as a homage to Sgt. Pepper. MacFarlane writes that, despite concerns regarding its thematic unity, Sgt. Pepper "is widely regarded as the first true concept album in popular music". According to author Martina Elicker, despite earlier examples, it was Sgt. Pepper that familiarised critics and listeners with the notion of a "concept and unified structure underlying a pop album", thus originating the term "concept album". Further to Sgt. Pepper, musicians increasingly explored literary and sociological themes in their concept albums and adopted its anti-establishment sentiments. It also inspired rock opera works such as the Who's double album Tommy and the musical Jesus Christ Superstar. Author Carys Wyn Jones locates Pet Sounds and Sgt. Pepper as the beginning of art rock. Doyle Greene says that Sgt. Pepper provides a "crucial locus in the assemblage of popular music and avant-garde/experimental music", notwithstanding the Beatles' presentation of the latter within formal song structures. He also says that, although the band are usually viewed as modernists, the album "can be heard as a crucial postmodernist moment", through its incorporation of self-conscious artistry, irony and pastiche, and "arguably marked rock music's entry into postmodernism as opposed to high-modernism". During the 1970s, glam rock acts co-opted the Beatles' use of alter ego personas, including David Bowie when he adopted the guise of Ziggy Stardust. #### Graphic design Inglis states that almost every account of the significance of Sgt. Pepper emphasises the cover's "unprecedented correspondence between music and art, time and space". The cover helped to elevate album art as a respected topic for critical analysis whereby the "structures and cultures of popular music" could henceforth justify intellectual discourse in a way that – before Sgt. Pepper – would have seemed like "fanciful conceit". He writes: "[The Sgt. Pepper] cover has been regarded as groundbreaking in its visual and aesthetic properties, congratulated for its innovative and imaginative design, credited with providing an early impetus for the expansion of the graphic design industry into popular music, and perceived as largely responsible for the connections between art and pop to be made explicit." Sgt. Pepper contributed to the popular trend for military-style fashions as adopted by London's boutique shops. Following the LP's release, rock acts afforded cover art greater consideration and increasingly sought to create a thematic link between their album artwork and the record's musical statements. Riley describes the cover as "one of the best-known works that pop art ever produced", while Norman calls it "the most famous album cover of all time". The Beatles' 1968 self-titled double LP became known as the White Album for its plain white sleeve, which the band chose as a contrast with the wave of psychedelic imagery and album covers inspired by Sgt. Pepper. In the late 1990s, the BBC included the Sgt. Pepper cover in its list of British masterpieces of twentieth-century art and design, placing it ahead of the red telephone box, Mary Quant's miniskirt, and the Mini motorcar. ## Retrospective appraisal Although few critics initially agreed with Richard Goldstein's criticism of the album, many came to appreciate his sentiments by the early 1980s. In his 1979 book Stranded: Rock and Roll for a Desert Island, Greil Marcus described Sgt. Pepper as "playful but contrived" and "a Day-Glo tombstone for its time". Marcus believed that the album "strangled on its own conceits" while being "vindicated by world-wide acclaim". Lester Bangs – the so-called "godfather" of punk rock journalism – wrote in 1981 that "Goldstein was right in his much-vilified review ... predicting that this record had the power to almost singlehandedly destroy rock and roll." He added: "In the sixties rock and roll began to think of itself as an 'art form'. Rock and roll is not an 'art form'; rock and roll is a raw wail from the bottom of the guts." In a 1976 article for The Village Voice, Christgau revisited the "supposedly epochal Works of Art" from 1967 and found that Sgt. Pepper appeared "bound to a moment" amid the year's culturally important music that had "dated in the sense that it speaks with unusually specific eloquence of a single point in history". Christgau said of the album's "dozen good songs and true", "Perhaps they're too precisely performed, but I'm not going to complain." In his 1981 assessment, Simon Frith described Sgt. Pepper as "the last great pop album, the last LP ambitious to amuse everyone". Once the Beatles' catalogue became available on CD in 1987, a critical consensus formed around Revolver's standing as the band's best work; the White Album also surpassed Sgt. Pepper in many critics' estimation. In his feature article on Sgt. Pepper's 40th anniversary, for Mojo, John Harris said that, such was its "seismic and universal" impact and subsequent identification with 1967, a "fashion for trashing" the album had become commonplace. He attributed this to iconoclasm, as successive generations identified the album with baby boomers' retreat into "nostalgia-tinged smugness" during the 1970s, combined with a general distaste for McCartney following Lennon's death. Citing its absence from the NME's best-albums list in 1985 after it had topped the magazine's previous poll, in 1974, Harris wrote: > Though by no means universally degraded ... Sgt. Pepper had taken a protracted beating from which it has perhaps yet to fully recover. Regularly challenged and overtaken in the Best Beatle Album stakes ... it suffered more than any Beatles record from the long fall-out after punk, and even the band's Britpop-era revival mysteriously failed to improve its standing. Writing in the 2004 edition of The Rolling Stone Album Guide, Rob Sheffield described Sgt. Pepper as "a revelation of how far artists could go in a recording studio with only four tracks, plenty of imagination, and a drug or two", but also "a masterwork of sonics, not songwriting". In his review for Rough Guides, Chris Ingham said that, while the album's detractors typically bemoan McCartney's dominant role, the reliance on studio innovation, and the unconvincing concept, "as long as there are pairs of ears willing to disappear under headphones for forty minutes ... Sgt. Pepper will continue to cast its considerable spell." Among reviews of the 2009 remastered album, Neil McCormick of The Daily Telegraph wrote: "It is impossible to overstate its impact: from a contemporary Sixties perspective it was utterly mind-blowing and original. Looking back from a point when its sonic innovations have been integrated into the mainstream, it remains a wonky, colourful and wildly improbable pop classic, although a little slighter and less cohesive than it may have seemed at the time." Mark Kemp, writing for Paste, said the album was a "blast of avant-rock genius" but also "one of rock's most overrated albums". According to BBC Music critic Chris Jones, while Sgt. Pepper has long been subsumed under "an avalanche of hyperbole", the album retains an enduring quality "because its sum is greater than its whole ... These guys weren't just recording songs; they were inventing the stuff with which to make this record as they went along." Although the lyrics, particularly McCartney's, were "a far cry from the militancy of their American peers", he continues, "what was revolutionary was the sonic carpet that enveloped the ears and sent the listener spinning into other realms." Stephen Thomas Erlewine of AllMusic considers the album to be a refinement of Revolver's "previously unheard-of level of sophistication and fearless experimentation" and a work that combines a wide range of musical styles yet "Not once does the diversity seem forced". He concludes: "After Sgt. Pepper, there were no rules to follow – rock and pop bands could try anything, for better or worse." ## Legacy ### Further public and critical recognition Sgt. Pepper sustained its immense popularity into the 21st century while breaking numerous sales records. With certified sales of 5.1 million copies in the UK, as of April 2019, Sgt. Pepper is the third-best-selling album in UK chart history and the best-selling studio album there. It is one of the most commercially successful albums in the US, where the RIAA certified sales of 11 million copies in 1997. By 2000, Sgt. Pepper was among the top 20 best-selling albums of all time worldwide. As of 2011, it had sold more than 32 million copies worldwide, making it one of the highest-selling albums of all time. Sgt. Pepper has topped many "best album" lists. It was voted in first place in Paul Gambaccini's 1978 book Critic's Choice: Top 200 Albums, based on submissions from around 50 British and American critics and broadcasters including Christgau and Marcus, and again in the 1987 edition. In the latter year, it also topped Rolling Stone's list of "The 100 Best Albums of the Last Twenty Years". In 1994, it was ranked first in Colin Larkin's All Time Top 1000 Albums. It was voted best album of all time in the 1998 "Music of the Millennium" poll conducted by HMV and Channel 4, and in the following year's expanded survey, which polled 600,000 people across the UK. Among its appearances in other critics' polls, the album was third in Q's 2004 list "The Music That Changed the World" and fifth in the same magazine's 2005 list "The 40 Greatest Psychedelic Albums of All Time". In 1993, Sgt. Pepper was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame, and ten years later it was one of 50 recordings chosen by the Library of Congress to be added to the National Recording Registry, honouring the work as "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". In 2003, Rolling Stone placed it at number one in the magazine's list of the "500 Greatest Albums of All Time", a ranking it retained in the revised list of 2012, and described the album as "the pinnacle of the Beatles' eight years as recording artists". The editors also said that Sgt. Pepper was "the most important rock 'n' roll album ever made", a point to which June Skinner Sawyers adds, in her 2006 collection of essays Read the Beatles: "It has been called the most famous album in the history of popular music. It is certainly among the most written about. It is still being written about." On Rolling Stone's third such list, published in September 2020, Sgt. Pepper appears at number 24. In 2006, Sgt. Pepper was chosen by Time as one of the 100 best albums of all time. Writing that year, Kevin Dettmar described it as "quite simply, the most important and influential rock-and-roll album ever recorded". It is featured in Chris Smith's 2009 book 101 Albums That Changed Popular Music, where Smith highlights the album among the most "obvious" choices for inclusion due to its continued commercial success, the wealth of imitative works it inspired, and its ongoing recognition as "a defining moment in the history of music". In the NME's 2014 article "25 Albums With the Most Incredible Production", Emily Barker described Sgt. Pepper as "kaleidoscopic" and an "orchestral baroque pop masterpiece the likes of which has rarely been matched since". ### Adaptations, tributes and anniversary projects The Sgt. Pepper mythology was reimagined for the plot of Yellow Submarine. In the animated film, the Beatles travel to Pepperland and rescue Sgt. Pepper's band from evildoers, the Blue Meanies. The album inspired the 1974 off-Broadway musical Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band on the Road, directed by Tom O'Horgan, and the 1978 film Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band, produced by Robert Stigwood. In July 2012, athletes donned Sgt. Pepper uniforms to pay tribute to the Beatles' album during the opening ceremony of the London Olympics. Sgt. Pepper has been the subject of many tribute albums, including a multi-artist CD available with the March 2007 issue of Mojo and a 2009 live album, Sgt. Pepper Live, by Cheap Trick. Other tribute recordings include Sgt. Pepper Knew My Father, a multi-artist charity compilation released by the NME in 1988; Big Daddy's 1992 album Sgt. Pepper's, which Moore recognises as "the most audacious" of all the interpretations of the Beatles' LP up to 1997; and the Flaming Lips' With a Little Help from My Fwends, released in 2014. BBC Radio 2 broadcast Sgt. Pepper's 40th Anniversary in June 2007. The programme contained new versions of the songs by artists such as Oasis, the Killers and Kaiser Chiefs, produced by Emerick using EMI's original four-track recording equipment. The 1987 CD release attracted considerable media interest and coincided with a Granada TV documentary, It Was Twenty Years Ago Today, that located the album at the centre of the Summer of Love. The reissue peaked at number three on the UK Albums Chart and topped Billboard's CDs chart. The album's 25th anniversary was observed with The South Bank Show's presentation of Martin's TV documentary The Making of Sgt. Pepper, which included interviews with the three surviving Beatles. Although there was no official campaign for the 30th anniversary, BBC Radio 2 broadcast Pepper Forever in the UK and some 12,000 schools across the US listened to a radio special dedicated to the album on 2 June 1997. Aside from Radio 2's June 2007 project, the 40th anniversary was marked by the University of Leeds hosting a meeting of British and American commentators to debate the extent of the album's social and cultural impact. On 26 May 2017, Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band was reissued for the album's 50th anniversary as a six-disc box set. The first CD contains a new stereo remix of the album, created by Giles Martin using first-generation tapes rather than their subsequent mixdowns. Apple Corps produced the TV documentary Sgt. Pepper's Musical Revolution to commemorate the anniversary, which was also celebrated with posters, billboards and other decorations in cities around the world. In Liverpool, the anniversary was the focus of a three-week cultural festival that included events dedicated to each of the album's thirteen songs. As part of the festival, Mark Morris choreographed Pepperland to four of the songs from Sgt. Pepper and "Penny Lane", arranged by Ethan Iverson, plus six original compositions by Iverson, and a dawn-to-dusk celebration of Indian music was held in recognition of Harrison's absorption in the genre. The 50th anniversary edition of Sgt. Pepper topped the UK Albums Chart. ## Track listing All songs written by Lennon–McCartney, except "Within You Without You" by George Harrison. Track lengths and lead vocals per Mark Lewisohn and Ian MacDonald. ## Personnel According to Mark Lewisohn and Ian MacDonald, except where noted: The Beatles - John Lennon – lead, harmony and background vocals; rhythm, acoustic and lead guitars; Hammond organ, final piano E chord; harmonica, tape loops, sound effects, comb and tissue paper; handclaps, tambourine, maracas, bass guitar on "Fixing a Hole" - Paul McCartney – lead, harmony and background vocals; bass and lead guitars; piano, grand piano, Lowrey and Hammond organs; handclaps; vocalisations, sound effects, comb and tissue paper - George Harrison – harmony and background vocals; lead, rhythm and acoustic guitars; sitar, tambura, swarmandal; harmonica, comb and tissue paper; handclaps, tambourine, maracas; lead vocals on "Within You Without You" - Ringo Starr – drums, congas, tambourine, maracas, handclaps, tubular bells; lead vocals on "With a Little Help from My Friends"; harmonica, comb and tissue paper; final piano E chord Additional musicians and production - Sounds Inc. – saxophones, trombones and French horn on "Good Morning Good Morning" - Neil Aspinall – tambura, harmonica - Geoff Emerick – audio engineering; tape loops, sound effects - Mal Evans – counting, harmonica, alarm clock, final piano E chord - George Martin – producer, mixer; tape loops, sound effects; harpsichord on "Fixing a Hole", harmonium, Lowrey organ, glockenspiel and Mellotron on "Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite!", Hammond organ on "With a Little Help from My Friends", piano on "Getting Better", piano solo on "Lovely Rita"; final harmonium chord. - Session musicians – four French horns on "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band": Neill Sanders, James W. Buck, John Burden, Tony Randall, arranged and conducted by Martin and McCartney; harp, performed by Sheila Bromberg, and string section on "She's Leaving Home", arranged by Mike Leander and conducted by Martin; tabla by Natwar Soni, dilrubas by Anna Joshi and Amrit Gajjar, and tambura by Buddhadev Kansara on "Within You Without You", with eight violins and four cellos arranged and conducted by Harrison and Martin; clarinet trio on "When I'm Sixty-Four": Robert Burns, Henry MacKenzie, Frank Reidy, arranged and conducted by Martin and McCartney; saxophones on "Good Morning Good Morning", arranged and conducted by Martin and Lennon; and forty-piece orchestra, including strings, brass, woodwinds and percussion on "A Day in the Life", arranged by Martin, Lennon and McCartney, and conducted by Martin and McCartney. ## Charts ### Weekly charts ### Year-end charts ### Decade-end charts ## Certifications and sales

Iven Mackay

Australian Army officer (1882–1966)

Lieutenant General Sir Iven Giffard Mackay, KBE, CMG, DSO & Bar, VD (7 April 1882 – 30 September 1966) was a senior Australian Army officer who served in both world wars. Mackay graduated from the University of Sydney in 1904 and taught physics there from 1910 until 1914, when he joined the Australian Imperial Force shortly after the outbreak of the First World War. He served with the 4th Infantry Battalion at Gallipoli, where he distinguished himself in hand-to-hand fighting at the Battle of Lone Pine. In April 1916, he assumed command of the 4th Infantry Battalion on the Western Front and led it at the Battle of Pozières, Battle of Bullecourt and Battle of Broodseinde. He was promoted to brigadier general in June 1918, and led the 1st Infantry Brigade at the Battle of Hazebrouck, the Battle of Amiens and in the attack on the Hindenburg Line. After the war, Mackay studied physics at the University of Cambridge under Ernest Rutherford before returning to Australia and his old job as a lecturer at the University of Sydney. From 1933 to 1940 he was headmaster of Cranbrook School, Sydney. He remained in the Militia between the wars, and was a major general by the time the Second World War broke out. He was selected to command the 6th Division in 1940, and led it through the Australian Army's first battles of the war. Any doubts about his ability soon disappeared with the commitment of the division to the Western Desert Campaign. During the Battle of Bardia in January 1941, the 6th Division captured the fortified town along with 36,000 Italian prisoners. In the Battle of Greece, he became the only Australian general to face the Waffen-SS in battle. He suffered a series of reverses in Greece, but impressed the troops under his command with his courage under fire. He was recalled to Australia in 1941 to serve as General Officer Commanding Home Forces. On 6 April 1942, he assumed command of the Second Army. During 1943 he twice commanded New Guinea Force in the fighting in the New Guinea campaign. His active service ended with his appointment as High Commissioner to India in November 1943. ## Early life and career Iven Giffard Mackay was born in Grafton, New South Wales, on 7 April 1882. The eldest of three children, he was the only son of the Reverend Isaac Mackay, a Presbyterian minister from Armadale, Sutherland, Scotland, and his Canadian wife Emily Frances, née King. Iven was educated at Grafton Superior Public School, Newington College, and the University of Sydney, where he opened the batting for the university's cricket team, and won Blues for rugby union football and rowing. He graduated with his Bachelor of Arts (BA) degree in 1904. Mackay had served in the Newington College cadet unit, reaching the rank of sergeant and winning a trophy in 1899 for being the school's best rifle shot. In 1911, he became a lieutenant in the Cadet Corps. On 20 March 1913, he transferred to the Militia as a lieutenant. In July he became the adjutant of the 26th Infantry Battalion, which was commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Henry MacLaurin. As part of his training, he attended the School of Musketry in Randwick, New South Wales. He was promoted to captain on 1 June 1914. Mackay joined Sydney Church of England Grammar School in 1905, teaching various subjects and coaching the rowing and rugby teams. In 1910 he returned to the University of Sydney to teach physics. From 1913 to 1914, he studied for a Diploma of Military Science course at the University of Sydney. ## First World War Mackay joined the Australian Imperial Force on 27 August 1914 as adjutant of the 4th Infantry Battalion, with the rank of captain. On 4 September 1914, he married his fiancée, Marjorie Eveline Meredith, the daughter of Lieutenant Colonel John Meredith, in a ceremony at St Philip's Church, Sydney. The couple had met while Mackay was on holiday in Paterson, New South Wales, in 1910. In October 1914, Mackay suffered a riding accident and was taken to Royal Prince Alfred Hospital with a punctured lung and broken ribs. The injury forced him to miss the scheduled embarkation of his battalion. He sailed for Egypt with the 1st Reinforcements of the 13th Infantry Battalion, departing Sydney on the transport Berrima on 19 December 1914, arriving at Alexandria on 31 January 1915. He was then posted back to the 4th Infantry Battalion as the Transport Officer. He observed the landing at Gallipoli from the transport SS Lake Michigan, but did not go ashore with the battalion, as his job was to take care of the horses. He re-joined the battalion on shore on 8 May 1915. Heavy casualties in the early fighting had depleted the officer ranks and Mackay was promoted to major on 14 July 1915, and given command of a company in August. ### Gallipoli On 6 August 1915, Mackay was involved in the Battle of Lone Pine. When the attack began, Mackay went over the top at the head of an attack. He ignored the first Turkish trench, taking a direct line to his objective. Firing from the hip, he shot and killed several Turks in the trenches below. Mackay positioned himself at the junction of two trenches, shooting down more enemy troops. When no others appeared, he came to the belief that the trenches were in Australian hands and ran across the junction into a wide bay. The first man who attempted to follow was shot dead, as were the next two after him. The rest decided not to follow. Mackay took up a position on a fire step, a raised part of the trench floor which allows men to fire over the top. Three Turkish soldiers appeared in the trench. Mackay attempted to fire but his magazine was empty. He lunged at the Turks, grazing one and making all three run. Mackay then instructed his party to fortify the position with sandbags. As the barricade was built up, it became possible for the rest of the party to join Mackay. The post became the north eastern corner of the new Australian position at Lone Pine. It was in an exposed position and came under hand grenade attack from Turkish troops. Mackay was slightly injured in one such attack. When Lieutenant Jack Massie was sent to relieve Mackay during the night, Mackay refused to leave the post. By the next day, Mackay realised that the position could not be held. He personally kept the enemy at bay with his rifle while new barricades were constructed. When he was satisfied with the security of the new position he reported to the battalion commander, who sent him to have his wounds dressed. Mackay's injuries were severe enough for him to be evacuated to Malta and then England, and he did not rejoin his battalion until February 1916, by which time it had been withdrawn to Egypt. For his actions at Lone Pine, Mackay was nominated for the Victoria Cross. He was overlooked for the award, although he was later mentioned in despatches. ### Western Front Mackay sailed for France on 20 March 1916 on the transport Minnewaska as part of the Advance Party of the 1st Division. On 18 April 1916, he was promoted to lieutenant colonel and assumed command of the 4th Infantry Battalion. He led it at the Battle of Pozières in July, where it was involved in the capture of the town. Here, a famous incident occurred: > Colonels Stevens and Mackay had left their headquarters and walked forward up Dead Man's Road (the sunken end of the Chalk Pit road) to its junction with the main road for the purpose of making hurried plans for the advance of their men, and instructing the company commanders. As they stood at this desolate corner (the most actively shelled in Pozières), surrounded by shredded tree-trunks and the dead, a panting messenger stumbled up to them with an envelope marked "Urgent and Secret". They hurriedly tore it open. The message read: "A number of cases have lately occurred of men failing to salute the army commander when passing in his car, in spite of the fact that the car carries his flag upon the bonnet. This practice must cease." For his part in the battle, Mackay was mentioned in despatches a second time. He was awarded the Distinguished Service Order for his gallantry at Lone Pine, his part in the capture of Pozières, and his role in repelling a German counterattack at Mouquet Farm, near Pozières. Mackay held the temporary position of commander of the 1st Infantry Brigade in January 1917, for the first of what would be five times totalling 92 days in 1917. He commanded the 4th Infantry Battalion in the advance to the Hindenburg Line, including the capture of the fortified town of Hermies. During the German counter-attack at Lagnicourt in April 1917 his battalion held its positions, repulsing the Germans with heavy casualties. Acting brigade commander again during the Second Battle of Bullecourt in May, Mackay was mentioned in despatches for the third time, and awarded a bar to his Distinguished Service Order. His citation read: > For conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty. While acting as brigadier, when the brigade on the right was broken into by the enemy, the battalion under his orders counter-attacked and assisted to drive out the enemy and restore the position. His action in repelling the counter-attack was of the utmost value, and his prompt action and extreme resolution showed leadership of a high order. Along with Brigadier General H. Gordon Bennett and others, Mackay received personal congratulations from Field Marshal Sir Douglas Haig. He later received his medals from King George V in a ceremony at Buckingham Palace. Mackay led his battalion once more at the Battle of Broodseinde, earning a fourth mention in despatches. In March 1918, the four machine gun companies in each division were grouped into machine gun battalions. Mackay was given command of the 1st Machine Gun Battalion, the 1st Division's new battalion, which he led in the Battle of Hazebrouck. He was given the brevet rank of major in the 26th Infantry Battalion in the AMF back home on 3 June 1918. On 6 June 1918, Mackay was heading on leave to London to visit his wife, who had managed to reach England after a long battle with wartime travel restrictions, when he was stopped and turned back at Boulogne by British military police. He had been appointed to command the 1st Infantry Brigade and had to return at once. He was immediately promoted to colonel and temporary brigadier general. Mackay commanded the 1st Infantry Brigade in the later stages of the fighting around Hazebrouck. In the operations east of there in June and July, his brigade was exceptionally active in the form of minor operations and patrolling that became known as the peaceful penetration. In August, the 1st Division moved south to the Somme sector to participate in the Battle of Amiens and later the attack on the Hindenburg Line. Through his "careful preliminary preparations and sound tactical knowledge", Mackay contributed to the successes of his brigade and was once more mentioned in despatches. For his service as a brigade commander, he was appointed a Companion of the Order of St Michael and St George (CMG) in the 1919 New Year Honours. He was also awarded the French Croix de guerre for his service on the Western Front. ## Between the wars After the end of the war Mackay took advantage of Brigadier General George Long's education scheme to study physics at Emmanuel College at the University of Cambridge under Ernest Rutherford. His first child, Jean Margaret, was born in Cambridge in 1919. Iven and Marjorie later had two more children – a son, Iven John, born in Sydney in 1920, and another daughter, Alison, born in Sydney in 1930. They returned to Australia aboard the transport Mantua, which reached Sydney on 19 February 1920. With the war over, the AIF was demobilised, and Mackay's appointment to the AIF was terminated on 4 April 1920. Mackay returned to lecturing in physics at the University of Sydney. Between 1922 and 1932 he was student adviser. From 1925 he was also faculty secretary. From 1932 to 1940 Mackay also worked evenings as a Commonwealth Film Appeals Censor. In 1933, he was appointed headmaster of Cranbrook School, Sydney. The school's constitution was changed to allow Mackay, a Presbyterian, to hold the post. As a result of a case of mistaken identity following the death of Major General Kenneth Mackay in 1935, Mackay got to read his own obituary in The Times, entitled "Athlete, Soldier and Headmaster". He normally avoided publicity, but this incident brought him to national attention. Mackay remained active in the Militia throughout the inter-war period. He held the rank of honorary brigadier general from 21 January 1920 to late June 1937, when he was promoted to that rank substantively. He commanded the 9th Infantry Brigade from 1 July 1920 to 30 April 1921; the 8th Infantry Brigade from 1 May 1921 to 30 April 1926; and the 5th Infantry Brigade from 1 May 1930 to 31 December 1932. On 24 March 1937 he took command of the 2nd Division. He was promoted to major general on 1 July 1937. Mackay was one of only four Militia officers to be substantively promoted to that rank between 1929 and 1939. His term of office at Cranbrook ended acrimoniously after Justice Kenneth Street and others blamed Mackay for the school's slow recovery from the Great Depression, and the school council voted to remove him on 25 October 1939. Mackay was given twelve months' notice. When, in December 1939, Mackay's daughter Jean married Lieutenant W. H. Travers, the grandson of Major General William Holmes; the reception was held at Cranbrook. ## Second World War At the outbreak of war in 1939, Mackay was ranked seventh on the army's seniority list. Following formation of a second infantry division for the Second Australian Imperial Force in 1940, Lieutenant General Sir Thomas Blamey was elevated to command of the newly created I Corps. Mackay was selected to command the 7th Division on the advice of General Sir Brudenell White but Cabinet, after consulting with Blamey, switched this appointment to the 6th Division. Mackay assumed command on 4 April 1940, receiving the serial number NX363, and sailed from Melbourne for the Middle East on the ocean liner RMS Strathaird on 15 April. The troops nicknamed him "Mr Chips", after the title character of the best-selling 1934 novel Goodbye, Mr. Chips and the subsequent 1939 film, a reference to his peacetime profession, but also to the impression he gave of being cool, reserved and strict. Some of his staff had reservations about him. Colonel Alan Vasey, his assistant adjutant and quartermaster general, asserted that Mackay lacked the ruthlessness to remove Militia officers who were not performing well. Vasey fumed about "that bloody schoolteacher who wants to dot every 'i' and cross every 't'". Many regular officers were embittered by years of slow promotion followed by Prime Minister Robert Menzies ordering that commands in the 6th Division be given to Militia officers. Colonel Frank Berryman considered this "a damn insult to the professional soldier, calculated to split the Army down the centre. We were to be the hewers of wood and the drawers of water. We, the only people who really knew the job, were to assist these Militia fellows". Berryman, who worked closely with Mackay as his chief of staff, held him in high regard. "For moral and physical courage", said Berryman, "few equalled him—none ever surpassed him. He was an educated and most knowledgeable soldier ... and extremely patient". His Commander, Royal Australian Artillery, a reservist, Brigadier Edmund Herring, considered Mackay "a most competent and able commander in North Africa and Greece, but a bit old ... Modest, dignified, shy and scholarly ... In action he never knew the meaning of fear ..." ### Libya His appointment to command the 6th Division meant that Mackay led its—and the Australian Army's—first battles of the war. Doubts about Mackay's ability soon disappeared with the commitment of the division to Operation Compass. During the Battle of Bardia, in Libya in January 1941, the 6th Division captured the fortified town along with 36,000 Italian prisoners. For this success, Mackay was made a Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire (KBE). In a war of rapid movement over long distances, Mackay demonstrated careful planning and recognised the need to reinforce success. He also impressed others with the way he cared for soldiers' lives. "Not only do I want Tobruk quickly", he told his brigadiers before the battle, "but I also want it cheaply". The victory at Bardia was followed by successes at Tobruk, Derna and Benghazi. ### Greece The 6th Division's next campaign was the failed Battle of Greece, a disaster for the British Commonwealth forces sent there. While in Greece, Mackay led a hastily assembled Australian-British-New Zealand-Greek formation known as Mackay Force, defending the Klidi Pass at the Battle of Vevi. The Allies were forced to retreat in a fierce assault by the Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler brigade. Mackay was the only Australian general to face the Waffen-SS in battle. As in Libya, Mackay shared the hardships of living in the field with his men, and impressed them by his coolness during air raids. They watched him sit in the open during attacks; on one such occasion on 19 April 1941, Mackay waited out a two-and-a-half-hour raid when his car was hit and his driver wounded. One staff officer "noticed Mackay moving in front of his tent quite unconcerned about the movement of enemy planes. He neither looked at the planes nor at the men dashing about, but they saw him, and those moving towards shelter stopped, and many of those who had gained shelter returned to their duties. Personal example is the only paying proposition in such circumstances". For his actions in Greece, he was mentioned in despatches a sixth time, and awarded the Greek War Cross (First Class). Casualties in Greece included Mackay's son-in-law, Captain W. H. Travers, who was captured in the Battle of Crete. Mackay resolved to reform the battalions that had been destroyed in Greece, and to rebuild his shattered division from the remnants that had been evacuated to Alexandria. He developed a training program in Syria in which he attempted to apply the lessons of the campaign in Greece. ### Defence of Australia One lesson of Greece was that modern war was a young man's trade. Brigadier Sydney Rowell recommended to Blamey that all generals over the age of 50 be retired. In July 1941, Ernest Turnbull, representing the motion picture industry, approached Menzies and several members of his Cabinet about the possibility of Mackay becoming Chief Commonwealth Film Censor. Menzies had a different post in mind. On 24 July 1941 the War Cabinet decided to appoint a General Officer Commanding Home Forces. In a cable to Blamey, Menzies stipulated that the War Cabinet wanted a high-ranking officer like Mackay with active service in the current war. Blamey replied that he considered "Mackay most suitable for the appointment". On 14 August 1941, Mackay handed over command of the 6th Division to Herring. Mackay departed Cairo for Australia by flying boat on 22 August. En route, he stopped in Singapore to confer with Bennett, now the commander of the 8th Division, which was based there, and had dinner at the Raffles Hotel with his son, Lieutenant Iven Mackay, an officer with the 8th Division's 2/18th Infantry Battalion. Mackay assumed command of Home Forces on 1 September 1941, with the rank of lieutenant general. His task was to prepare the Militia to repel a Japanese invasion. Official historian Dudley McCarthy noted that: > If Mackay had been in any way deceived by the grandiloquence of his new title his illusions were soon dissipated when he assumed command on 1 September. Initially there was reluctance to grant him the substantive promotion he had been promised. He found that his authority did not extend over the forward areas of New Guinea and the Northern Territory; nor was he to be responsible for "the defence of Australia" as such, as this responsibility remained with General Sturdee, the Chief of the General Staff. In short his command was far more circumscribed than he might have expected, with the added disadvantage of calling for a political finesse to the possession of which he laid few claims. He was a gallant and successful soldier, with a long record of distinguished service to his country, and a man of instinctive and unassuming courtesy. But neither his qualities of character and temperament nor the academic seclusion of his life between the wars fitted him well for the role of a senior military adviser to a Cabinet inexperienced in military affairs. With the Fall of Singapore in February 1942, Mackay's son Iven became a prisoner of war of the Japanese. A Japanese invasion of Australia now became a real possibility, so Mackay submitted a contingency plan in which he outlined a defence strategy whereby the army would concentrate on the defence of the most vital areas of eastern and southern Australia. This later gave rise to the controversial but mythical "Brisbane Line". Regular officers took the opportunity to give Mackay petty snubs. Army Headquarters continually addressed him as "major general", although his promotion to lieutenant general had been gazetted, and his pay was only £1,564 compared with Sturdee's £2,269. His AIF serial number was taken away from him and he was sent a new recruit's papers to fill in. The Military Board even attempted to bring him before a medical board to decide his fitness for further service. Only the intervention of the Minister for the Army, Frank Forde, averted this. During a sweeping reorganisation of the army by Blamey, Mackay became commander of the Second Army on 6 April 1942. ### New Guinea When Blamey relieved Rowell of command of I Corps in New Guinea, he nominated Herring as successor. Blamey proposed Mackay as a second choice but preferred Herring as he was much younger, and this was important in the taxing New Guinea climate. When Blamey relinquished command of New Guinea Force on 30 January 1943, he handed over temporary command to Mackay to enable Herring to go on leave. The period was a quiet one, with no major operations being carried out, and Mackay handed back to Herring and returned to command of the Second Army at Parramatta, New South Wales, in May 1943. On 28 August 1943, Mackay once again assumed command of New Guinea Force. This time, important operations were being undertaken in the Battle of Finschhafen and Mackay's period of command was marred by disagreements with General Douglas MacArthur's staff over the reinforcement of Finschhafen. Junior commanders felt that Mackay should have been more forceful, and should have enlisted the help of his superior, Blamey, at an earlier stage. Blamey agreed with them, feeling that his old colleague was slowing down, and no longer possessed the vigour required for the campaign in New Guinea. Mackay left New Guinea in November 1943, handing over command of New Guinea Force to Lieutenant General Sir Leslie Morshead, and on 20 January 1944 Mackay relinquished command of Second Army and New Guinea Force. ### India In November 1943, it was announced that Prime Minister John Curtin, with Blamey's approval, had appointed Mackay as High Commissioner to India. Sir Iven and Lady Mackay sailed from Perth, on SS Tanda on 14 February 1944. Their arrival in Delhi marked the beginning of an Australian diplomatic presence in India. When Lieutenant Iven Mackay was liberated, the Supreme Allied Commander of South East Asia Command, Admiral Lord Louis Mountbatten had him brought to Delhi to be reunited with his family. With the war's end, Mackay retired from the army on 27 February 1946, and the post of High Commissioner gradually became a civilian one. India was not yet independent, but was about to become so, and Mackay met with future leaders Jawaharlal Nehru, Indira Gandhi and Muhammad Ali Jinnah. Mackay and the Minister for External Affairs, Dr H. V. Evatt, supported Indian independence, while expressing the hope that India would remain in the British Commonwealth. Mackay also promoted trade between India and Australia, and fostered a plan for Indian students and technicians to study and train in Australia. His term as high commissioner ended in May 1948. ## Post war Mackay was approached to consider nomination as a Liberal Party of Australia candidate for the Australian Senate, but declined. Instead, he accepted a directorship of Australian Cotton Textile Industries. From 1950 to 1952, he chaired the New South Wales recruiting committee which was set up by the Federal government to increase enlistment in the armed forces. The University of Sydney appointed Mackay an honorary Esquire Bedell in 1950 and awarded him an honorary degree of Doctor of Laws in 1952. When Blamey died in 1951, Mackay rushed to Melbourne to be one of his pallbearers. Mackay visited Greece in 1952 for the unveiling of a memorial to British Commonwealth servicemen who died in the 1941 campaign. In 1961, he returned for the dedication of the Commonwealth War Cemetery at Faliro. This time he also revisited the Gallipoli battlefields, sailing to the Dardanelles on HMY Britannia as a guest of Field Marshal Prince Henry, Duke of Gloucester. Mackay climbed from the beach at ANZAC Cove up to Lone Pine once more. When it became known that he was visiting the United States in 1961, the US Army took him to see Fort Sill. Mackay died at his home in East Lindfield, New South Wales, on 30 September 1966 and was cremated after a service at St Stephen's, Sydney. He was survived by his wife, his son and his two daughters. Veterans lined the streets and he had ten generals for his pallbearers: Herring, Woodward, Stevens, Pulver, Stevenson, Macarthur-Onslow, Dougherty, Harrison, Cullen and Galleghan. Mackay's papers and portraits are held in the Australian War Memorial in Canberra.

Æthelberht, King of Wessex

King of Wessex from 860 to 865

Æthelberht (; also spelled Ethelbert or Aethelberht) was the King of Wessex from 860 until his death in 865. He was the third son of King Æthelwulf by his first wife, Osburh. Æthelberht was first recorded as a witness to a charter in 854. The following year Æthelwulf went on pilgrimage to Rome and appointed his oldest surviving son, Æthelbald, as king of Wessex while Æthelberht became king of the recently conquered territory of Kent. Æthelberht may have surrendered his position to his father when he returned from pilgrimage, but resumed (or kept) the south-eastern kingship when his father died in 858. When Æthelbald died in 860, Æthelberht united both their territories under his rule. He did not appoint a sub-king and Wessex and Kent were fully united for the first time. He appears to have been on good terms with his younger brothers, the future kings Æthelred I and Alfred the Great. The kingdom came under attack from Viking raids during his reign, but these were minor compared with the invasions after his death. Æthelberht died in the autumn of 865 and was buried next to his brother Æthelbald at Sherborne Abbey in Dorset. He was succeeded by Æthelred. ## Background When Æthelberht's grandfather Ecgberht became king of Wessex in 802, it must have seemed very unlikely to contemporaries that he would establish a lasting dynasty. For two hundred years, three families had fought for the West Saxon throne, and no son had followed his father as king. Ecgberht's nearest connection to a previous king of Wessex was as a great-great-grandson of Ingild, brother of King Ine (688–726), but he was believed to be a paternal descendant of Cerdic, the founder of the West Saxon dynasty. This made Ecgberht an ætheling – a prince who had a legitimate claim to the throne. But in the ninth and tenth centuries descent from Cerdic was no longer sufficient to make a man an ætheling: Ecgberht's line controlled the kingdom and all kings were sons of kings. At the beginning of the ninth century, England was almost wholly under the control of the Anglo-Saxons. The Midland kingdom of Mercia dominated southern England, but their supremacy came to an end in 825 when they were decisively defeated by Ecgberht at the Battle of Ellendun. The two kingdoms became allies, which was important in the resistance to Viking attacks. In the same year Ecgberht sent his son Æthelwulf to conquer the Mercian sub-kingdom of Kent (the area of the modern county plus Essex, Surrey and Sussex) and appointed him sub-king. In 835 the Isle of Sheppey was ravaged by Vikings and in the following year they defeated Ecgberht at Carhampton in Somerset, but in 838 he was victorious over an alliance of Cornishmen and Vikings at the Battle of Hingston Down, reducing Cornwall to the status of a client kingdom. He died in 839 and was succeeded by Æthelwulf, who appointed his eldest son Æthelstan as sub-king of Kent. Æthelwulf and Ecgberht may not have intended a permanent union between Wessex and Kent as they both appointed sons as sub-kings and charters in Wessex were attested (witnessed) by West Saxon magnates, while Kentish charters were witnessed by the Kentish elite; both kings kept overall control and the sub-kings were not allowed to issue their own coinage. Viking raids increased in the early 840s on both sides of the English Channel, and in 843 Æthelwulf was defeated by the companies of 35 Danish ships at Carhampton. In 850 Æthelstan defeated a Danish fleet off Sandwich in the first recorded naval battle in English history. In 851 Æthelwulf and his second son Æthelbald defeated the Vikings at the Battle of Aclea and, according to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, "there made the greatest slaughter of a heathen raiding-army that we have heard tell of up to this present day, and there took the victory". ## Family Æthelberht was the third of five sons of Æthelwulf and his first wife Osburh, who died around 855. Æthelstan died in the early 850s, but the four younger brothers were successively kings of Wessex: Æthelbald from 855 to 860, Æthelberht from 860 to 865, Æthelred I from 865 to 871 and Alfred the Great from 871 to 899. Æthelberht had one sister, Æthelswith, who married King Burgred of Mercia in 853. ## Early life Æthelberht was first recorded when he attested charters in 854. In the following year Æthelwulf went on pilgrimage to Rome after appointing his eldest surviving son, Æthelbald, under-king of Wessex and Æthelberht under-king of Kent, Essex, Sussex and Surrey, appointments which suggest that his sons were to succeed to the separate kingdoms whether or not he returned to England. Æthelberht attested charters as dux (ealdorman) in 854 and king in 855. In 856, Æthelwulf returned to England with a new wife, Judith, daughter of Charles the Bald, king of the West Franks. Æthelbald, with the support of Eahlstan, Bishop of Sherborne, and Eanwulf, Ealdorman of Somerset, refused to give up his kingship of Wessex. Æthelwulf compromised to avoid a civil war, but historians disagree how the kingdom was divided. According to Asser, Æthelwulf was assigned the "eastern districts", and most historians assume that Æthelbald kept Wessex while Æthelberht gave up Kent to his father; some others believe that Wessex itself was divided, with Æthelbald ruling the west and Æthelwulf the east, and Æthelberht retaining Kent. Æthelwulf confirmed that he intended a permanent division of his kingdom as he recommended that on his death Æthelbald should be king of Wessex and Æthelberht king of Kent. This proposal was carried out when Æthelwulf died in 858. According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: "And then Æthelwulf's two sons succeeded to the kingdom: Æthelbald to the kingdom of Wessex, and Æthelberht to the kingdom of the inhabitants of Kent and to the kingdom of Essex and to Surrey and to the kingdom of Sussex". Æthelbald was later condemned by Alfred the Great's biographer, Asser, both for his rebellion against his father and because he married his father's widow, but he appears to have been on good terms with Æthelberht. In 858 Æthelbald issued a charter (S 1274) relating to land in Surrey, and thus in his brother's territory, and a charter he issued in 860 (S 326) was witnessed by Æthelberht and Judith. Æthelberht appears to have made significant changes in personnel as a Kentish charter of 858 (S 328) was witnessed by twenty-one thegns, out of whom fourteen did not witness a surviving charter of his father. They include Eastmund, who Æthelberht later appointed ealdorman of Kent. The charter is regarded by historians as important because it clarifies the obligations of folkland. ## Reign The separation of Wessex and Kent was soon reversed as Æthelbald died childless in 860 and Æthelberht succeeded to the whole kingdom of Wessex and Kent. Æthelred and Alfred may have been intended to succeed in Wessex, but they were too young as the preference was for adults as kings, especially when Wessex was under threat from the Vikings. During Æthelberht's rule over the whole kingdom, Wessex and its recent south-eastern conquests became a united kingdom for the first time. Unlike his father and grandfather, Æthelberht did not appoint another member of his family as under-king of Kent. A Kentish charter issued in the first year of his reign (S 327) was the first to include a full complement both of West Saxon and Kentish attesters, although he then returned to locally attested charters. The historian Simon Keynes sees this charter as: > a highly significant development. It is exceptional in naming not only the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Bishop of Rochester (which is all that we might have been led to expect in a Kentish charter), but also the bishops of Sherborne, Winchester, Selsey and (most remarkably) London; it is also exceptional in carrying the attestations of no fewer than ten ealdormen, from both the western and eastern parts of the kingdom. When placed in the context of other ninth-century West Saxon charters, this charter seems to reflect an assembly of a kind not previously seen, and a kind of assembly which itself reflected the new arrangements for the unification of Wessex and the south-east. According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, Æthelberht reigned "in good harmony and in great peace" and "in peace, love and honour". He appears to have been on good terms with his younger brothers and in a charter of 861 (S 330) he granted land to St Augustine's, Canterbury, in return for the abbot's continuing loyalty to him, Æthelred, and Alfred. Some historians believe that the three brothers agreed that each would succeed to the throne in turn. In two charters in 862 and 863 (S 335 and S 336) Æthelred makes grants as king of the West Saxons and Æthelberht is not mentioned. In Keynes's view, Æthelberht may have delegated some power in Wessex, perhaps in his own absence. However, a charter of Æthelberht dated December 863 (S 333) is attested by Æthelred and Alfred as filius regis (king's son). Æthelberht granted immunity from royal and judicial services to Sherborne church in honour of the souls of his father Æthelwulf and his brother Æthelbald. Unlike most charters, which were in Latin, this one is in Old English, and historians disagree whether this reflects a trend towards greater use of the vernacular as better suited to recording legal documents or support for Alfred's later claim that knowledge of Latin had declined disastrously when he came to the throne in 871. Æthelberht's reign began and ended with raids by the Vikings. In 860 a Viking army sailed from the Somme to England and sacked Winchester, but they were then defeated by the men of Hampshire and Berkshire. Probably in the autumn of 864, another Viking army camped on Thanet and were promised money in return for peace, but they broke their promise and ravaged eastern Kent. These attacks were minor compared with events after Æthelberht's death, when the Vikings almost conquered England. ## Coinage In the late eighth and ninth centuries the only denomination of coin produced in southern England was the silver penny. Coins were minted in an unidentified town in Wessex itself, but activity in the mid-ninth century was minimal and no Wessex coins of Æthelberht are known. Kent had mints at Canterbury and Rochester and they produced coins in the name of Æthelwulf until 858 and Æthelberht thereafter. The lack of coins in the name of Æthelbald is evidence that he did not have any status of overlordship over Æthelberht. In the early ninth century the quality of the inscription and the bust of the king on coins declined, but it revived on the Inscribed Cross penny at the end of Æthelwulf's reign and this continued under Æthelberht's, which also saw the introduction of the rare Floreate Cross design in about 862. There was a considerable increase in the number of moneyers: twelve struck Inscribed Cross coins in Æthelwulf's reign and fifty in Æthelberht's. This may have been due to a recoinage starting at the end of Æthelwulf's reign and continuing in Æthelberht's, when old coins were called in and melted down to make new ones. The silver content of his Inscribed Cross issue fell to below 50% and one penny minted in Canterbury has only 30%, but a Floreate Cross coin has 84%, perhaps indicating that it was intended as a recoinage with higher fineness. There was also increasing standardisation of design in the coinage, reflecting greater royal control over currency and minting in the middle of the ninth century. ## Death and reputation Æthelberht died of unknown causes in the autumn of 865. He was buried at Sherborne Abbey in Dorset beside his brother Æthelbald but the tombs had been lost by the sixteenth century. He had no known children and was succeeded by his brother Æthelred. According to Asser, who based his account of events before 887 mainly on the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: "So after governing in peace, love and honour for five years, Æthelberht went the way of all flesh, to the great sorrow of his people; and he lies buried honourably beside his brother, at Sherborne." Asser's view was followed by post-Conquest historians. John of Worcester copied Asser's words, while William of Malmesbury described him as "a vigorous but kindly ruler". The 20th-century historian Alfred Smyth points out that the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, which was first written in Alfred the Great's reign, only recorded two events in Æthelberht's reign, the attacks on Winchester and eastern Kent, and does not associate the king personally with either of them. Smyth argues that this reflected an agenda by Alfred's propagandists to play down the achievements of his brothers to enhance the reputation of Alfred himself.

Strepsirrhini

Suborder of primates

Strepsirrhini or Strepsirhini (/ˌstrɛpsəˈraɪni/ ; STREP-sə-RY-nee) is a suborder of primates that includes the lemuriform primates, which consist of the lemurs of Madagascar, galagos ("bushbabies") and pottos from Africa, and the lorises from India and southeast Asia. Collectively they are referred to as strepsirrhines. Also belonging to the suborder are the extinct adapiform primates which thrived during the Eocene in Europe, North America, and Asia, but disappeared from most of the Northern Hemisphere as the climate cooled. Adapiforms are sometimes referred to as being "lemur-like", although the diversity of both lemurs and adapiforms does not support this comparison. Strepsirrhines are defined by their "wet" (moist) rhinarium (the tip of the snout) – hence the colloquial but inaccurate term "wet-nosed" – similar to the rhinaria of canines and felines. They also have a smaller brain than comparably sized simians, large olfactory lobes for smell, a vomeronasal organ to detect pheromones, and a bicornuate uterus with an epitheliochorial placenta. Their eyes contain a reflective layer to improve their night vision, and their eye sockets include a ring of bone around the eye, but they lack a wall of thin bone behind it. Strepsirrhine primates produce their own vitamin C, whereas haplorhine primates must obtain it from their diets. Lemuriform primates are characterized by a toothcomb, a specialized set of teeth in the front, lower part of the mouth mostly used for combing fur during grooming. Many of today's living strepsirrhines are endangered due to habitat destruction, hunting for bushmeat, and live capture for the exotic pet trade. Both living and extinct strepsirrhines are behaviorally diverse, although all are primarily arboreal (tree-dwelling). Most living lemuriforms are nocturnal, while most adapiforms were diurnal. Both living and extinct groups primarily fed on fruit, leaves, and insects. ## Etymology The taxonomic name Strepsirrhini derives from the Greek στρέψις strepsis "a turning round" and ῥίς rhis "nose, snout, (in pl.) nostrils" (GEN ῥινός rhinos), which refers to the appearance of the sinuous (comma-shaped) nostrils on the rhinarium or wet nose. The name was first used by French naturalist Étienne Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire in 1812 as a subordinal rank comparable to Platyrrhini (New World monkeys) and Catarrhini (Old World monkeys). In his description, he mentioned "Les narines terminales et sinueuses" ("Nostrils terminal and winding"). When British zoologist Reginald Innes Pocock revived Strepsirrhini and defined Haplorhini in 1918, he omitted the second "r" from both ("Strepsirhini" and "Haplorhini" instead of "Strepsirrhini" and "Haplorrhini"), although he did not remove the second "r" from Platyrrhini or Catarrhini, both of which were also named by É. Geoffroy in 1812. Following Pocock, many researchers continued to spell Strepsirrhini with a single "r" until primatologists Paulina Jenkins and Prue Napier pointed out the error in 1987. ## Evolutionary history Strepsirrhines include the extinct adapiforms and the lemuriform primates, which include lemurs and lorisoids (lorises, pottos, and galagos). Strepsirrhines diverged from the haplorhine primates near the beginning of the primate radiation between 55 and 90 mya. Older divergence dates are based on genetic analysis estimates, while younger dates are based on the scarce fossil record. Lemuriform primates may have evolved from either cercamoniines or sivaladapids, both of which were adapiforms that may have originated in Asia. They were once thought to have evolved from adapids, a more specialized and younger branch of adapiform primarily from Europe. Lemurs rafted from Africa to Madagascar between 47 and 54 mya, whereas the lorises split from the African galagos around 40 mya and later colonized Asia. The lemuriforms, and particularly the lemurs of Madagascar, are often portrayed inappropriately as "living fossils" or as examples of "basal", or "inferior" primates. These views have historically hindered the understanding of mammalian evolution and the evolution of strepsirrhine traits, such as their reliance on smell (olfaction), characteristics of their skeletal anatomy, and their brain size, which is relatively small. In the case of lemurs, natural selection has driven this isolated population of primates to diversify significantly and fill a rich variety of ecological niches, despite their smaller and less complex brains compared to simians. ### Unclear origin The divergence between strepsirrhines, simians, and tarsiers likely followed almost immediately after primates first evolved. Although few fossils of living primate groups – lemuriforms, tarsiers, and simians – are known from the Early to Middle Eocene, evidence from genetics and recent fossil finds both suggest they may have been present during the early adaptive radiation. The origin of the earliest primates that the simians and tarsiers both evolved from is a mystery. Both their place of origin and the group from which they emerged are uncertain. Although the fossil record demonstrating their initial radiation across the Northern Hemisphere is very detailed, the fossil record from the tropics (where primates most likely first developed) is very sparse, particularly around the time that primates and other major clades of eutherian mammals first appeared. Lacking detailed tropical fossils, geneticists and primatologists have used genetic analyses to determine the relatedness between primate lineages and the amount of time since they diverged. Using this molecular clock, divergence dates for the major primate lineages have suggested that primates evolved more than 80–90 mya, nearly 40 million years before the first examples appear in the fossil record. The early primates include both nocturnal and diurnal small-bodied species, and all were arboreal, with hands and feet specially adapted for maneuvering on small branches. Plesiadapiforms from the early Paleocene are sometimes considered "archaic primates", because their teeth resembled those of early primates and because they possessed adaptations to living in trees, such as a divergent big toe (hallux). Although plesiadapiforms were closely related to primates, they may represent a paraphyletic group from which primates may or may not have directly evolved, and some genera may have been more closely related to colugos, which are thought to be more closely related to primates. The first true primates (euprimates) do not appear in the fossil record until the early Eocene (\~55 mya), at which point they radiated across the Northern Hemisphere during a brief period of rapid global warming known as the Paleocene–Eocene Thermal Maximum. These first primates included Cantius, Donrussellia, Altanius, and Teilhardina on the northern continents, as well as the more questionable (and fragmentary) fossil Altiatlasius from Paleocene Africa. These earliest fossil primates are often divided into two groups, adapiforms and omomyiforms. Both appeared suddenly in the fossil record without transitional forms to indicate ancestry, and both groups were rich in diversity and were widespread throughout the Eocene. The last branch to develop were the adapiforms, a diverse and widespread group that thrived during the Eocene (56 to 34 million years ago [mya]) in Europe, North America, and Asia. They disappeared from most of the Northern Hemisphere as the climate cooled: The last of the adapiforms died out at the end of the Miocene (\~7 mya). ### Adapiform evolution Adapiform primates are extinct strepsirrhines that shared many anatomical similarities with lemurs. They are sometimes referred to as lemur-like primates, although the diversity of both lemurs and adapiforms do not support this analogy. Like the living strepsirrhines, adapiforms were extremely diverse, with at least 30 genera and 80 species known from the fossil record as of the early 2000s. They diversified across Laurasia during the Eocene, some reaching North America via a land bridge.They were among the most common mammals found in the fossil beds from that time. A few rare species have also been found in northern Africa. The most basal of the adapiforms include the genera Cantius from North America and Europe and Donrussellia from Europe. The latter bears the most ancestral traits, so it is often considered a sister group or stem group of the other adapiforms. Adapiforms are often divided into three major groups: - Adapids were most commonly found in Europe, although the oldest specimens (Adapoides from middle Eocene China) indicate that they most likely evolved in Asia and immigrated. They died out in Europe during the Grande Coupure, part of a significant extinction event at the end of the Eocene. - Notharctids, which most closely resembled some of Madagascar's lemurs, come from Europe and North America. The European branch is often referred to as cercamoniines. The North American branch thrived during the Eocene, but did not survive into the Oligocene. Like the adapids, the European branch were also extinct by the end of the Eocene. - Sivaladapids of southern and eastern Asia are best known from the Miocene, and the only adapiforms to survive past the Eocene/Oligocene boundary (\~34 mya). Their relationship to the other adapiforms remains unclear. They had vanished before the end of the Miocene (\~7 mya). The relationship between adapiform and lemuriform primates has not been clearly demonstrated, so the position of adapiforms as a paraphyletic stem group is questionable. Both molecular clock data and new fossil finds suggest that the lemuriform divergence from the other primates and the subsequent lemur-lorisoid split both predate the appearance of adapiforms in the early Eocene. New calibration methods may reconcile the discrepancies between the molecular clock and the fossil record, favoring more recent divergence dates. The fossil record suggests that the strepsirrhine adapiforms and the haplorhine omomyiforms had been evolving independently before the early Eocene, although their most basal members share enough dental similarities to suggest that they diverged during the Paleocene (66–55 mya). ### Lemuriform evolution Lemuriform origins are unclear and debated. American paleontologist Philip Gingerich proposed that lemuriform primates evolved from one of several genera of European adapids based on similarities between the front lower teeth of adapids and the toothcomb of extant lemuriforms; however, this view is not strongly supported due to a lack of clear transitional fossils. Instead, lemuriforms may be descended from a very early branch of Asian cercamoniines or sivaladapids that migrated to northern Africa. Until discoveries of three 40 million-year-old fossil lorisoids (Karanisia, Saharagalago, and Wadilemur) in the El Fayum deposits of Egypt between 1997 and 2005, the oldest known lemuriforms had come from the early Miocene (\~20 mya) of Kenya and Uganda. These newer finds demonstrate that lemuriform primates were present during the middle Eocene in Afro-Arabia and that the lemuriform lineage and all other strepsirrhine taxa had diverged before then. Djebelemur from Tunisia dates to the late early or early middle Eocene (52 to 46 mya) and has been considered a cercamoniine, but also may have been a stem lemuriform. Azibiids from Algeria date to roughly the same time and may be a sister group of the djebelemurids. Together with Plesiopithecus from the late Eocene Egypt, the three may qualify as the stem lemuriforms from Africa. Molecular clock estimates indicate that lemurs and the lorisoids diverged in Africa during the Paleocene, approximately 62 mya. Between 47 and 54 mya, lemurs dispersed to Madagascar by rafting. In isolation, the lemurs diversified and filled the niches often filled by monkeys and apes today. In Africa, the lorises and galagos diverged during the Eocene, approximately 40 mya. Unlike the lemurs in Madagascar, they have had to compete with monkeys and apes, as well as other mammals. ## History of classification The taxonomy of strepsirrhines is controversial and has a complicated history. Confused taxonomic terminology and oversimplified anatomical comparisons have created misconceptions about primate and strepsirrhine phylogeny, illustrated by the media attention surrounding the single "Ida" fossil in 2009. Strepsirrhine primates were first grouped under the genus Lemur by Swedish taxonomist Carl Linnaeus in the 10th edition of Systema Naturae published in 1758. At the time, only three species were recognized, one of which (the colugo) is no longer recognized as a primate. In 1785, Dutch naturalist Pieter Boddaert divided the genus Lemur into two genera: Prosimia for the lemurs, colugos, and tarsiers and Tardigradus for the lorises. Ten years later, É. Geoffroy and Georges Cuvier grouped the tarsiers and galagos due to similarities in their hindlimb morphology, a view supported by German zoologist Johann Karl Wilhelm Illiger, who placed them in the family Macrotarsi while placing the lemurs and tarsiers in the family Prosimia (Prosimii) in 1811. The use of the tarsier-galago classification continued for many years until 1898, when Dutch zoologist Ambrosius Hubrecht demonstrated two different types of placentation (formation of a placenta) in the two groups. English comparative anatomist William Henry Flower created the suborder Lemuroidea in 1883 to distinguish these primates from the simians, which were grouped under English biologist St. George Jackson Mivart's suborder Anthropoidea (=Simiiformes). According to Flower, the suborder Lemuroidea contained the families Lemuridae (lemurs, lorises, and galagos), Chiromyidae (aye-aye), and Tarsiidae (tarsiers). Lemuroidea was later replaced by Illiger's suborder Prosimii. Many years earlier, in 1812, É. Geoffroy first named the suborder Strepsirrhini, in which he included the tarsiers. This taxonomy went unnoticed until 1918, when Pocock compared the structure of the nose and reinstated the use of the suborder Strepsirrhini, while also moving the tarsiers and the simians into a new suborder, Haplorhini. It was not until 1953, when British anatomist William Charles Osman Hill wrote an entire volume on strepsirrhine anatomy, that Pocock's taxonomic suggestion became noticed and more widely used. Since then, primate taxonomy has shifted between Strepsirrhini-Haplorhini and Prosimii-Anthropoidea multiple times. Most of the academic literature provides a basic framework for primate taxonomy, usually including several potential taxonomic schemes. Although most experts agree upon phylogeny, many disagree about nearly every level of primate classification. ### Controversies The most commonly recurring debate in primatology during the 1970s, 1980s, and early 2000s concerned the phylogenetic position of tarsiers compared to both simians and the other prosimians. Tarsiers are most often placed in either the suborder Haplorhini with the simians or in the suborder Prosimii with the strepsirrhines. Prosimii is one of the two traditional primate suborders and is based on evolutionary grades (groups united by anatomical traits) rather than phylogenetic clades, while the Strepsirrhini-Haplorrhini taxonomy was based on evolutionary relationships. Yet both systems persist because the Prosimii-Anthropoidea taxonomy is familiar and frequently seen in the research literature and textbooks. Strepsirrhines are traditionally characterized by several symplesiomorphic (ancestral) traits not shared with the simians, particularly the rhinarium. Other symplesiomorphies include long snouts, convoluted maxilloturbinals, relatively large olfactory bulbs, and smaller brains. The toothcomb is a synapomorphy (shared, derived trait) seen among lemuriforms, although it is frequently and incorrectly used to define the strepsirrhine clade. Strepsirrhine primates are also united in possessing an epitheliochorial placenta. Unlike the tarsiers and simians, strepsirrhines are capable of producing their own vitamin C and do not need it supplied in their diet. Further genetic evidence for the relationship between tarsiers and simians as a haplorhine clade is the shared possession of three SINE markers. Because of their historically mixed assemblages which included tarsiers and close relatives of primates, both Prosimii and Strepsirrhini have been considered wastebasket taxa for "lower primates". Regardless, the strepsirrhine and haplorrhine clades are generally accepted and viewed as the preferred taxonomic division. Yet tarsiers still closely resemble both strepsirrhines and simians in different ways, and since the early split between strepsirrhines, tarsiers and simians is ancient and hard to resolve, a third taxonomic arrangement with three suborders is sometimes used: Prosimii, Tarsiiformes, and Anthropoidea. More often, the term "prosimian" is no longer used in official taxonomy, but is still used to illustrate the behavioral ecology of tarsiers relative to the other primates. In addition to the controversy over tarsiers, the debate over the origins of simians once called the strepsirrhine clade into question. Arguments for an evolutionary link between adapiforms and simians made by paleontologists Gingerich, Elwyn L. Simons, Tab Rasmussen, and others could have potentially excluded adapiforms from Strepsirrhini. In 1975, Gingerich proposed a new suborder, Simiolemuriformes, to suggest that strepsirrhines are more closely related to simians than tarsiers. However, no clear relationship between the two had been demonstrated by the early 2000s. The idea reemerged briefly in 2009 during the media attention surrounding Darwinius masillae (dubbed "Ida"), a cercamoniine from Germany that was touted as a "missing link between humans and earlier primates" (simians and adapiforms). However, the cladistic analysis was flawed and the phylogenetic inferences and terminology were vague. Although the authors noted that Darwinius was not a "fossil lemur", they did emphasize the absence of a toothcomb, which adapiforms did not possess. ### Infraordinal classification and clade terminology Within Strepsirrhini, two common classifications include either two infraorders (Adapiformes and Lemuriformes) or three infraorders (Adapiformes, Lemuriformes, Lorisiformes). A less common taxonomy places the aye-aye (Daubentoniidae) in its own infraorder, Chiromyiformes. In some cases, plesiadapiforms are included within the order Primates, in which case Euprimates is sometimes treated as a suborder, with Strepsirrhini becoming an infraorder, and the Lemuriformes and others become parvorders. Regardless of the infraordinal taxonomy, Strepsirrhini is composed of three ranked superfamilies and 14 families, seven of which are extinct. Three of these extinct families included the recently extinct giant lemurs of Madagascar, many of which died out within the last 1,000 years following human arrival on the island. When Strepsirrhini is divided into two infraorders, the clade containing all toothcombed primates can be called "lemuriforms". When it is divided into three infraorders, the term "lemuriforms" refers only to Madagascar's lemurs, and the toothcombed primates are referred to as either "crown strepsirrhines" or "extant strepsirrhines". Confusion of this specific terminology with the general term "strepsirrhine", along with oversimplified anatomical comparisons and vague phylogenetic inferences, can lead to misconceptions about primate phylogeny and misunderstandings about primates from the Eocene, as seen with the media coverage of Darwinius. Because the skeletons of adapiforms share strong similarities with those of lemurs and lorises, researchers have often referred to them as "primitive" strepsirrhines, lemur ancestors, or a sister group to the living strepsirrhines. They are included in Strepsirrhini, and are considered basal members of the clade. Although their status as true primates is not questioned, the questionable relationship between adapiforms and other living and fossil primates leads to multiple classifications within Strepsirrhini. Often, adapiforms are placed in their own infraorder due to anatomical differences with lemuriforms and their unclear relationship. When shared traits with lemuriforms (which may or may not be synapomorphic) are emphasized, they are sometimes reduced to families within the infraorder Lemuriformes (or superfamily Lemuroidea). The first fossil primate described was the adapiform Adapis parisiensis by French naturalist Georges Cuvier in 1821, who compared it to a hyrax ("le Daman"), then considered a member of a now obsolete group called pachyderms. It was not recognized as a primate until it was reevaluated in the early 1870s. Originally, adapiforms were all included under the family Adapidae, which was divided into two or three subfamilies: Adapinae, Notharctinae, and sometimes Sivaladapinae. All North American adapiforms were lumped under Notharctinae, while the Old World forms were usually assigned to Adapinae. Around the 1990s, two distinct groups of European "adapids" began to emerge, based on differences in the postcranial skeleton and the teeth. One of these two European forms was identified as cercamoniines, which were allied with the notharctids found mostly in North America, while the other group falls into the traditional adapid classification. The three major adapiform divisions are now typically regarded as three families within Adapiformes (Notharctidae, Adapidae and Sivaladapidae), but other divisions ranging from one to five families are used as well. ## Anatomy and physiology ### Grooming apparatus All lemuriforms possess a specialized dental structure called a "toothcomb", with the exception of the aye-aye, in which the structure has been modified into two continually growing (hypselodont) incisors (or canine teeth), similar to those of rodents. Often, the toothcomb is incorrectly used to characterize all strepsirrhines. Instead, it is unique to lemuriforms and is not seen among adapiforms. Lemuriforms groom orally, and also possess a grooming claw on the second toe of each foot for scratching in areas that are inaccessible to the mouth and tongue. Adapiforms may have had a grooming claw, but there is little evidence of this. The toothcomb consists of either two or four procumbent lower incisors and procumbent lower canine teeth followed by a canine-shaped premolar. It is used to comb the fur during oral grooming. Shed hairs that accumulate between the teeth of the toothcomb are removed by the sublingua or "under-tongue". Adapiforms did not possess a toothcomb. Instead, their lower incisors varied in orientation – from somewhat procumbent to somewhat vertical – and the lower canines were projected upwards and were often prominent. ### Eyes Like all primates, strepsirrhine orbits (eye sockets) have a postorbital bar, a protective ring of bone created by a connection between the frontal and zygomatic bones. Both living and extinct strepsirrhines lack a thin wall of bone behind the eye, referred to as postorbital closure, which is only seen in haplorhine primates. Although the eyes of strepsirrhines point forward, giving stereoscopic vision, the orbits do not face fully forward. Among living strepsirrhines, most or all species are thought to possess a reflective layer behind the retina of the eye, called a tapetum lucidum (consisting of riboflavin crystals), which improves vision in low light, but they lack a fovea, which improves day vision. This differs from tarsiers, which lack a tapetum lucidum but possess a fovea. ### Skull Strepsirrhine primates have a brain relatively comparable to or slightly larger in size than most mammals. Compared to simians, however, they have a relatively small brain-to-body size ratio. Strepsirrhines are also traditionally noted for their unfused mandibular symphysis (two halves of the lower jaw), however, fusion of the mandibular symphysis was common in adapiforms, notably Notharctus. Also, several extinct giant lemurs exhibited a fused mandibular symphysis. ### Ears Many nocturnal species have large, independently movable ears, although there are significant differences in sizes and shapes of the ear between species. The structure of the middle and inner ear of strepsirrhines differs between the lemurs and lorisoids. In lemurs, the tympanic cavity, which surrounds the middle ear, is expanded. This leaves the ectotympanic ring, which supports the eardrum, free within the auditory bulla. This trait is also seen in adapiforms. In lorisoids, however, the tympanic cavity is smaller and the ectotympanic ring becomes attached to the edge of the auditory bulla. The tympanic cavity in lorisoids also has two accessory air spaces, which are not present in lemurs. ### Neck arteries Both lorisoids and cheirogaleid lemurs have replaced the internal carotid artery with an enlarged ascending pharyngeal artery. ### Ankle bones Strepsirrhines also possess distinctive features in their tarsus (ankle bones) that differentiate them from haplorhines, such as a sloping talo-fibular facet (the face where the talus bone and fibula meet) and a difference in the location of the position of the flexor fibularis tendon on the talus. These differences give strepsirrhines the ability to make more complex rotations of the ankle and indicate that their feet are habitually inverted, or turned inward, an adaptation for grasping vertical supports. ### Sex characteristics Sexual dichromatism (different coloration patterns between males and females) can be seen in most brown lemur species, but otherwise lemurs show very little if any difference in body size or weight between sexes. This lack of sexual dimorphism is not characteristic of all strepsirrhines. Some adapiforms were sexually dimorphic, with males bearing a larger sagittal crest (a ridge of bone on the top of the skull to which jaw muscles attach) and canine teeth. Lorisoids exhibit some sexual dimorphism, but males are typically no more than 20 percent larger than females. ### Rhinarium and olfaction Strepsirrhines have a long snout that ends in a moist and touch-sensitive rhinarium, similar to that of dogs and many other mammals. The rhinarium is surrounded by vibrissae that are also sensitive to touch. Convoluted maxilloturbinals on the inside of their nose filter, warm, and moisten the incoming air, while olfactory receptors of the main olfactory system lining the ethmoturbinals detect airborne smells. The olfactory bulbs of lemurs are comparable in size to those of other arboreal mammals. The surface of the rhinarium does not have any olfactory receptors, so it is not used for smell in terms of detecting volatile substances. Instead, it has sensitive touch receptors (Merkel cells). The rhinarium, upper lip, and gums are tightly connected by a fold of mucous membrane called the philtrum, which runs from the tip of the nose to the mouth. The upper lip is constrained by this connection and has fewer nerves to control movement, which leaves it less mobile than the upper lips of simians. The philtrum creates a gap (diastema) between the roots of the first two upper incisors. The strepsirrhine rhinarium can collect relatively non-volatile, fluid-based chemicals (traditionally categorized as pheromones) and transmit them to the vomeronasal organ (VNO), which is located below and in front of the nasal cavity, above the mouth. The VNO is an encased duct-like structure made of cartilage and is isolated from the air passing through the nasal cavity. The VNO is connected to the mouth through nasopalatine ducts (which communicate via the incisive foramen), which pass through the hard palate at the top, front of the mouth. Fluids traveling from the rhinarium to the mouth and then up the nasopalatine ducts to the VNO are detected, and information is relayed to the accessory olfactory bulb, which is relatively large in strepsirrhines. From the accessory olfactory bulb, information is sent to the amygdala, which handles emotions, and then to the hypothalamus, which handles basic body functions and metabolic processes. This neural pathway differs from that used by the main olfactory system. All lemuriforms have a VNO, as do tarsiers and some New World monkeys. Adapiforms exhibit the gap between the upper incisors, which indicates the presence of a VNO, but there is some disagreement over whether or not they possessed a rhinarium. ### Reproductive physiology Extant strepsirrhines have an epitheliochorial placenta, where the maternal blood does not come in direct contact with the fetal chorion like it does in the hemochorial placenta of haplorhines. The strepsirrhine uterus has two distinct chambers (bicornuate). Despite having similar gestation periods to comparably sized haplorhines, fetal growth rates are generally slower in strepsirrhines, which results in newborn offspring that are as little as one-third the size of haplorhine newborns. Extant strepsirrhines also have a lower basal metabolic rate, which elevates in females during gestation, putting greater demands on the mother. Most primates have two mammary glands, but the number and positions vary between species within strepsirrhines. Lorises have two pairs, while others, like the ring-tailed lemur, have one pair on the chest (pectoral). The aye-aye also has two mammary glands, but they are located near the groin (inguinal). In females, the clitoris is sometimes enlarged and pendulous, resembling the male penis, which can make sex identification difficult for human observers. The clitoris may also have a bony structure in it, similar to the baculum (penis bone) in males. Most male primates have a baculum, but it is typically larger in strepsirrhines and usually forked at the tip. ## Behavior Approximately three-quarters of all extant strepsirrhine species are nocturnal, sleeping in nests made from dead leaves or tree hollows during the day. All of the lorisoids from continental Africa and Asia are nocturnal, a circumstance that minimizes their competition with the simian primates of the region, which are diurnal. The lemurs of Madagascar, living in the absence of simians, are more variable in their activity cycles. The aye-aye, mouse lemurs, woolly lemurs, and sportive lemurs are nocturnal, while ring-tailed lemurs and most of their kin, sifakas, and indri are diurnal. Yet some or all of the brown lemurs (Eulemur) are cathemeral, which means that they may be active during the day or night, depending on factors such as temperature and predation. Many extant strepsirrhines are well adapted for nocturnal activity due to their relatively large eyes; large, movable ears; sensitive tactile hairs; strong sense of smell; and the tapetum lucidum behind the retina. Among the adapiforms, most are considered diurnal, with the exception of Pronycticebus and Godinotia from Middle Eocene Europe, both of which had large orbits that suggest nocturnality. Reproduction in most strepsirrhine species tends to be seasonal, particularly in lemurs. Key factors that affect seasonal reproduction include the length of the wet season, subsequent food availability, and the maturation time of the species. Like other primates, strepsirrhines are relatively slow breeders compared to other mammals. Their gestation period and interbirth intervals are usually long, and the young develop slowly, just like in haplorhine primates. Unlike simians, some strepsirrhines produce two or three offspring, although some produce only a single offspring. Those that produce multiple offspring tend to build nests for their young. These two traits are thought to be plesiomorphic (ancestral) for primates. The young are precocial (relatively mature and mobile) at birth, but not as coordinated as ungulates (hoofed mammals). Infant care by the mother is relatively prolonged compared to many other mammals, and in some cases, the infants cling to the mother's fur with their hands and feet. Despite their relatively smaller brains compared to other primates, lemurs have demonstrated levels of technical intelligence in problem solving that are comparable to those seen in simians. However, their social intelligence differs, often emphasizing within-group competition over cooperation, which may be due to adaptations for their unpredictable environment. Although lemurs have not been observed using objects as tools in the wild, they can be trained to use objects as tools in captivity and demonstrate a basic understanding about the functional properties of the objects they are using. ### Social systems and communication The nocturnal strepsirrhines have been traditionally described as "solitary", although this term is no longer favored by the researchers who study them. Many are considered "solitary foragers", but many exhibit complex and diverse social organization, often overlapping home ranges, initiating social contact at night, and sharing sleeping sites during the day. Even the mating systems are variable, as seen in woolly lemurs, which live in monogamous breeding pairs. Because of this social diversity among these solitary but social primates, whose level of social interaction is comparable to that of diurnal simians, alternative classifications have been proposed to emphasize their gregarious, dispersed, or solitary nature. Among extant strepsirrhines, only the diurnal and cathemeral lemurs have evolved to live in multi-male/multi-female groups, comparable to most living simians. This social trait, seen in two extant lemur families (Indriidae and Lemuridae), is thought to have evolved independently. Group sizes are smaller in social lemurs than in simians, and despite the similarities, the community structures differ. Female dominance, which is rare in simians, is fairly common in lemurs. Strepsirrhines spend a considerable amount of time grooming each other (allogrooming). When lemuriform primates groom, they lick the fur and then comb it with their toothcomb. They also use their grooming claw to scratch places they cannot reach with their mouth. Like New World monkeys, strepsirrhines rely on scent marking for much of their communication. This involves smearing secretions from epidermal scent glands on tree branches, along with urine and feces. In some cases, strepsirrhines may anoint themselves with urine (urine washing). Body postures and gestures may be used, although the long snout, non-mobile lips, and reduced facial enervation restrict the use of facial expressions in strepsirrhines. Short-range calls, long-range calls, and alarm calls are also used. Nocturnal species are more constrained by the lack of light, so their communication systems differ from those of diurnal species, often using long-range calls to claim their territory. ### Locomotion Living strepsirrhines are predominantly arboreal, with only the ring-tailed lemur spending considerable time on the ground. Most species move around quadrupedally (on four legs) in the trees, including five genera of smaller, nocturnal lemurs. Galagos, indriids, sportive lemurs, and bamboo lemurs leap from vertical surfaces, and the indriids are highly specialized for vertical clinging and leaping. Lorises are slow-moving, deliberate climbers. Analyses of extinct adapiforms postcranial skeletons suggest a variety of locomotor behavior. The European adapids Adapis, Palaeolemur, and Leptadapis shared adaptations for slow climbing like the lorises, although they may have been quadrupedal runners like small New World monkeys. Both Notharctus and Smilodectes from North America and Europolemur from Europe exhibit limb proportions and joint surfaces comparable to vertical clinging and leaping lemurs, but were not as specialized as indriids for vertical clinging, suggesting that they ran along branches and did not leap as much. Notharctids Cantius and Pronycticebus appear to have been agile arboreal quadrupeds, with adaptations comparable to the brown lemurs. ### Diet Primates primarily feed on fruits (including seeds), leaves (including flowers), and animal prey (arthropods, small vertebrates, and eggs). Diets vary markedly between strepsirrhine species. Like other leaf-eating (folivorous) primates, some strepsirrhines can digest cellulose and hemicellulose. Some strepsirrhines, such as the galagos, slender lorises, and angwantibos, are primarily insectivorous. Other species, such as fork-marked lemurs and needle-clawed bushbabies, specialize on tree gum, while indriids, sportive lemurs, and bamboo lemurs are folivores. Many strepsirrhines are frugivores (fruit eaters), and others, like the ring-tailed lemur and mouse lemurs, are omnivores, eating a mix of fruit, leaves, and animal matter. Among the adapiforms, frugivory seems to have been the most common diet, particularly for medium-sized to large species, such as Cantius, Pelycodus and Cercamonius. Folivory was also common among the medium and large-sized adapiforms, including Smilodectes, Notharctus, Adapis and Leptadapis. Sharp cusps on the teeth of some of the smaller adapiforms, such as Anchomomys and Donrussellia, indicate that they were either partly or primarily insectivorous. ## Distribution and habitat The now extinct adapiform primates were primarily found across North America, Asia, and Europe, with a few species in Africa. They flourished during the Eocene when those regions were more tropical in nature, and they disappeared when the climate became cooler and drier. Today, the lemuriforms are confined in the tropics, ranging between 28° S to 26° N latitude. Lorises are found both in equatorial Africa and Southeast Asia, while the galagos are limited to the forests and woodlands of sub-Saharan Africa. Lemurs are endemic to Madagascar, although much of their diversity and habitat has been lost due to recent human activity. As with nearly all primates, strepsirrhines typically reside in tropical rainforests. These habitats allow strepsirrhines and other primates to evolve diverse communities of sympatric species. In the eastern rainforests of Madagascar, as many as 11 or 12 species share the same forests, and prior to human arrival, some forests had nearly double that diversity. Several species of lemur are found in drier, seasonal forests, including the spiny forest on the southern tip of the island, although the lemur communities in these regions are not as rich. ## Conservation Like all other non-human primates, strepsirrhines face an elevated risk of extinction due to human activity, particularly deforestation in tropical regions. Much of their habitat has been converted for human use, such as agriculture and pasture. The threats facing strepsirrhine primates fall into three main categories: habitat destruction, hunting (for bushmeat or traditional medicine), and live capture for export or local exotic pet trade. Although hunting is often prohibited, the laws protecting them are rarely enforced. In Madagascar, local taboos known as fady sometimes help protect lemur species, although some are still hunted for traditional medicine. In 2012, the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) announced that lemurs were the "most endangered mammals", due largely to elevated illegal logging and hunting following a political crisis in 2009. In Southeast Asia, slow lorises are threatened by the exotic pet trade and traditional medicine, in addition to habitat destruction. Both lemurs and slow lorises are protected from commercial international trade under CITES Appendix I. ## Explanatory notes

Me Too (Meghan Trainor song)

"Me Too" is a song by American singer-songwriter Meghan Trainor from her second major-label studio album, Thank You (2016). Trainor wrote the song with Jacob Kasher Hindlin, Jason Derulo, Peter Svensson, and its producer, Ricky Reed. Epic Records released it as the album's second single on May 5, 2016. An electro and R&B song with a minimalistic musical bed of a synth bassline, finger snaps, and popping mouth sounds, "Me Too"'s lyrics concern self-love, as Trainor asserts confidence in her looks. Music critics found the lyrics of "Me Too" difficult to relate to and Trainor's confidence disingenuous, but some of them praised the track's production. In the United States, the song peaked at number 13 on the Billboard Hot 100 and was certified 3× Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America. It reached the top 10 and received 4× Platinum certifications in Australia and Canada. Hannah Lux Davis directed the music video for "Me Too", depicting Trainor partying in a car and travelling through Los Angeles before joining her backup dancers to film a dance sequence. Shortly after its release, the video was removed after she noticed it had been digitally altered to make her waist look smaller; it was reuploaded the following day. Trainor fell while performing the song on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, drawing accusations of staging a marketing stunt. She reprised "Me Too" on television shows such as Good Morning America and The Today Show, and included it in the set list of her concert tour The Untouchable Tour (2016). ## Background A fan of the music project Wallpaper, Meghan Trainor began co-writing songs with its frontman, producer Ricky Reed, and his frequent collaborator Jacob Kasher Hindlin, for her second major-label studio album, Thank You (2016). She initially recorded doo-wop songs similar to her debut single, "All About That Bass" (2014). L.A. Reid, the chairman of her label Epic Records, encouraged her to write "a song that every other artist wished they had" because she lacked a proper lead single for the project. Trainor, Reed, and Hindlin wrote the song "No". When Reid heard it, he jumped up and said "that's what I'm talkin' about!", playing it 29 times in succession. Ultimately, "No" changed the album's direction, as the three started experimenting with new musical styles and produced six more tracks. Trainor wrote "Me Too" alongside Reed, Hindlin, singer Jason Derulo, and songwriter Peter Svensson. She had previously featured on the track "Painkiller" from Derulo's 2015 album Everything Is 4. He believed Trainor should record "Me Too": "I think that song was perfect for her because it's about loving yourself and not worrying about what haters say. It's just a dope, fun song." Epic Records digitally released "Me Too", as the second single from Thank You, on May 5, 2016. In the United States, the song was serviced to adult contemporary radio stations on May 16, and top 40 radio stations the following day. ## Composition and lyrics "Me Too" is three minutes and one second long. Reed produced and programmed the song. He plays bass, guitar, and keyboards, and Tom Peyton plays drums. Ethan Shumaker engineered it at Reed's studio in Elysian Park, Los Angeles, Chris Gehringer mastered it at Sterling Sound in New York City, and Manny Marroquin mixed it at the Carriage House studio in Nolensville, Tennessee. "Me Too" is an electro and R&B song. The song's verses are set to a minimalistic musical bed consisting of a bassline, finger snaps, and popping mouth sounds, followed by an R&B pre-chorus. It has an elastic synth bassline; Brennan Carley of Spin compared it to "Scream & Shout", a 2012 single by Will.i.am and Britney Spears. "Me Too" features some dubstep-influenced beats, and influences of jazz and funk during the chorus and club music in its verses. "Me Too" is about self-love. In the song's lyrics, Trainor asks herself the question "who's that sexy thing I see over there?", referring to her own reflection in the mirror. She thanks God for waking up with a positive feeling and declares that she cannot help but love herself. In the chorus, Trainor sings: "if I was you, I'd wanna be me too". She pronounces the word "wanna" like "vahna", which PopMatters's Chris Conaton thought sounded like a "faux-Eastern European accent". Trainor proclaims she is a dime piece and sings about how she is considered a VIP at clubs and does not have to pay for her drinks. ## Critical reception Music critics commented on the production of "Me Too", as well as Trainor's performance on it. Spin's Dan Weiss dubbed the song "Will.i.am-goes-Sophie" and compared it to a "vibrant Gap commercial". Jada Yuan of Billboard believed it delicately shifted Trainor's retro image to a more urban R&B style, and she called it "Beyoncé Lite" due to its audacious theme. Writing for MTV News, Hazel Cills opined that the pulsating bass beat of "Me Too" made it well-suited for clubs. Fuse's Shannon Mages wrote that the song would make listeners stomp their feet and head to a dance floor. Conaton thought the minimalistic production in its verses was "quite cool" and contrasted well with its pre-chorus, but he criticized Trainor's affectation during its chorus. Writing for Newsday, Glenn Gamboa compared her performance on "Me Too" to Spears in the 2000s. The lyrics of "Me Too" drew criticism. Alexa Camp of Slant Magazine called the song a "vacant exercise in positivity" and accused it of "confusing delusional self-importance with self-worth". Michael Cragg of The Guardian believed the bragging in its lyrics was misdirected, and Conaton thought it insulted listeners. Knoxville News Sentinel's Chuck Campbell opined that Trainor's sass on "Me Too" felt insincere. The New York Times' Jon Caramanica believed her proclamation of self-love on the song was "awkward". News.com.au writer Cameron Adams called it one of 2016's worst songs due to its galling lyrics and blamed it for Trainor's commercial decline. Others were less critical regarding the lyrics. Isabella Biedenharn of Entertainment Weekly likened it to the album track "I Love Me" and described them as "instant confidence-spikers". MTV News's Madeline Roth admitted all listeners may not fully relate to the lyrics of "Me Too", but "its dance-friendly beat will at least have you on your feet". Erin Jensen of USA Today lauded Trainor's boldness and thought the song's titular lyric would be a good life motto for its audiences. ## Commercial performance "Me Too" debuted at number 39 on the US Billboard Hot 100 issued for June 4, 2016. The song peaked at number 13 on the chart in its 11th week. It reached number 4 on the Digital Songs chart, number 21 on Streaming Songs, and number 28 on Radio Songs. "Me Too" received a 3× Platinum certification from the Recording Industry Association of America. In Canada, the song charted at number nine and Music Canada certified it 4× Platinum. It reached number 84 on the UK Singles Chart and earned a Gold certification from the British Phonographic Industry. In Australia, "Me Too" peaked at number four and received a 6× Platinum certification from the Australian Recording Industry Association in 2023. The song charted within the top 40, at number 1 on Israel's Media Forest TV Airplay Chart, number 2 on Mexico Ingles Airplay, number 8 in Guatemala, number 20 on Mexico's Monitor Latino chart, number 26 in Latvia, number 30 in Hungary, and number 40 in the Czech Republic. It earned a Platinum+Gold certification in Mexico, and Gold in Denmark, France, Germany, and Poland. ## Music video Hannah Lux Davis directed the music video for "Me Too". After Trainor shared several promotional teasers, it was released on May 9, 2016. The video was filmed over a 22-hour period. It has a meta concept, featuring Trainor waking up and preparing to go to a music video shoot. She glances at a Grammy Award kept by her bed and puts on a giraffe onesie in a bathroom. Trainor greets fans and makes her way to a car, in which she parties with her father while drinking a frappuccino and travelling through Los Angeles. This is followed by a dance sequence with her in a blue gown along with backup dancers in teal dresses. In some scenes, Trainor interacts with her entourage in a wardrobe trailer and gets makeup done. A few hours after its release, Twitter users began pointing out that it had been digitally altered to make Trainor's waist look smaller. When she encountered screenshots from the video on social media, she thought the alterations were made by fans before realizing they were present in the official upload too. Trainor called the staff at Vevo and label heads including Reid and Sylvia Rhone, requesting for it to be taken down. She uploaded a clip explaining the video's removal to fans on Snapchat, in which she stated: "they Photoshopped the crap out of me [...] My waist is not that teeny, I had a bomb waist that night, I don't know why they didn't like my waist, but I didn't approve that video and it went out for the world, so I'm embarrassed." Trainor had asked the editors to conceal her mustache and remove her mole hair, but thought reducing her waist size crossed a line. She edited the video with her family and went through all minute details. Trainor approved a new version which was uploaded the following day. Roth lauded her for still adhering to her beliefs and thought the move reaffirmed her anti-Photoshop message in "All About That Bass". Some critics thought it was an attempt to generate publicity. Writing for Vox, Caroline Framke speculated the incident was a calculated move to make Trainor appear more sympathetic to audiences ahead of her album being released to streaming services. Anne T. Donahue of MTV News wondered if it was a stunt but added: "it's genius. I mean, not only does body positivity fall in line with Trainor's mantra, having her pull a finished product and condemn it to video hell makes her look like a complete badass." The Independent's Victoria Hesketh believed it was unlikely the incident was premeditated and considered the swift reupload of the video as a small victory: "It arguably turned what could have been a swift curtain call to fairly brief pop-life, into a move of empowerment." She appreciated the issue of digital alteration of women's bodies in the music industry being brought into popular discourse. In an interview with Billboard in July 2016, Trainor denied the accusations: "Not at all. It did get more press, but it wasn't on purpose. The whole thing is embarrassing." ## Live performances and other usage Trainor promoted "Me Too" with appearances on several television shows. On May 12, 2016, she performed the song in a green and black sequin dress and high heels on The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon. Trainor executed choreography, sang into a decorated microphone, and was accompanied by a backing band. Towards the end, she fell to the ground while trying to grab a hold of the microphone stand. Trainor stayed there in shock for a minute, after which Fallon laid down beside her and joked: "of every single dance move, grabbing the mic is the toughest". She recorded the performance a second time but preferred the one with the fall: "I noticed on the second take my face looked really worried, like, 'Do not fall,' and the performance just wasn't as good. So I told them, 'Take the first one, give them the fall, let 'em have it.'" Trainor began retweeting videos of it soon after it aired, which led The Atlantic's Spencer Kornhaber to speculate that it might be a marketing stunt to generate PR for the release of Thank You. Stereogum's Tom Breihan believed that the fall was probably genuinely accidental due to her ankle-twist, but "she definitely milked it for a minute". Writing for The Independent, Olivia Blair noted Trainor was not the first person to suffer a fall on television, and cited the incidents of Naomi Campbell at the Vivienne Westwood 1993 Fall catwalk and Madonna at the Brit Awards 2015. The "Me Too" performance received positive reviews from some critics: Carley thought Trainor delivered strong vocals, swiftly ameliorating choreography, and handled the fall charismatically; Rolling Stone wrote that she sang with unanticipated ardour and adroit choreography during the performance; Gil Kaufman of Billboard described it as sprightly and praised Trainor for handling the slip-up with grace while smiling and laughing; Maane Khatchatourian of Variety believed the performance was "effortlessly deliver[ed]". Trainor reprised "Me Too" on Good Morning America the following day, while recovering from the incident: "I'm feeling it today. I'm feeling little bruises everywhere." She sang the song at BBC Radio 1's Big Weekend on May 28, 2016. On June 7, 2016, Trainor performed it during a concert for Sunrise. She reprised "Me Too" on The Today Show on June 21. On July 13, 2016, Trainor sang the song on Charts Center. It was part of her setlist for The Untouchable Tour (2016). Trainor performed "Me Too" on November 22, 2018, while wearing a sparkling jersey and blue trousers, at a Dallas Cowboys and Washington Redskins game which launched The Salvation Army's 128th annual Red Kettle Campaign. She reprised the song during her set for the 2018 iHeartRadio Jingle Ball. Trainor sang it while headlining the Philadelphia Welcome America Festival as part of the 2019 Fourth of July celebrations. On September 13, 2019, she performed "Me Too" as part of her setlist on The Today Show'''s Citi concert series. A mother of two children from California released a parody of "Me Too" in July 2016, about her desire to be alone sometimes and the hardships of motherhood. She auctioned roles in the video to raise funds for local schools. On September 18, 2016, Britney Spears posted a clip to Instagram of herself dancing to "Me Too". Within 24 hours, Trainor reposted the clip and described it as a "dream come true". The Laker Girls performed a dance routine to the song at a Los Angeles Lakers game on March 21, 2017, with Trainor in the audience. "Me Too" appeared on the soundtracks for the 2018 film I Feel Pretty and Brazilian telenovela Pega Pega. ## Credits and personnel Credits are adapted from the liner notes of Thank You''. - Ricky Reed – producer, songwriter, programming, bass, guitar, keyboards - Meghan Trainor – songwriter - Jacob Kasher Hindlin – songwriter - Jason Derulo – songwriter - Peter Svensson – songwriter - Tom Peyton – drums - Ethan Shumaker – engineer - Chris Gehringer – mastering - Manny Marroquin – mixing ## Charts ### Weekly charts ### Year-end charts ## Certifications ## Release history

William Hillcourt

Scouting leader

William Hillcourt (August 6, 1900– November 9, 1992), known within the Scouting movement as "Green Bar Bill", was an influential leader in the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) organization from 1927 to 1992. Hillcourt was a prolific writer and teacher in the areas of woodcraft, troop and patrol structure, and training; his written works include three editions of the BSA's official Boy Scout Handbook, with over 12.6 million copies printed, other Scouting-related books and numerous magazine articles. Hillcourt developed and promoted the American adaptation of the Wood Badge adult Scout leader training program. Hillcourt was Danish but moved to the United States as a young adult. From his start in Danish Scouting in 1910 until his death in 1992, he was continuously active in Scouting. He traveled all over the world teaching and training both Scouts and Scouters, earning many of Scouting's highest honors. His legacy and influence can still be seen today in the BSA program and in Scouting training manuals and methods for both youth and adults. ## Personal life Hillcourt was born in 1900 in Aarhus, Denmark and was the youngest of three sons of a building contractor. He was given the name Vilhelm Hans Bjerregaard Jensen. Around 1930, he changed his name by anglicizing "Vilhelm", translating "Bjerregaard" into "Hill-court" and dropping "Jensen". His first published work was a poem about trolls and elves, printed by an Aarhus newspaper when he was nine years old. For Christmas 1910, Hillcourt's brother gave him a Danish translation of Scouting for Boys by Baden-Powell, the founder of the Scout movement. He went on to earn the highest award in Danish Scouting, Knight-Scout in 1918, at age 17. He was selected to represent his troop at the 1st World Scout Jamboree in Olympia in 1920 where he first met Baden-Powell, with whom he was later to work. While Hillcourt studied pharmacy in Copenhagen, he became more involved in Scouting. As a Scout leader, he became a Scoutmaster, national instructor, writer and then the editor for the Danish Scouting journal. He wrote his first book, The Island, recounting his early Scouting experiences. After deciding to experience Scouting around the world and to return home with the best ideas, Hillcourt worked his way through Europe and England and then arrived in the United States in February 1926. He was soon hired by the BSA's national office and worked for the BSA until he retired as a professional Scouter in 1965. In 1933 Hillcourt married Grace Brown, the personal secretary of Chief Scout Executive James E. West. ## Scouting career Hillcourt worked at a BSA camp at Bear Mountain in Harriman State Park, New York, in 1926 where he became an instructor in American Indian dance. He then worked for the BSA Supply Division where he broke his leg when a crate fell on him. He met James West while riding in an elevator at the national office. West solicited Hillcourt's thoughts on Scouting in the U.S. Hillcourt later sent West an 18-page memo detailing issues with the lack of patrol structure and leadership. He recommended that the BSA write a handbook for patrol leaders, and that it needed to be written by someone who had been both a patrol leader and a Scoutmaster. West hired Hillcourt as a writer and editor and was later persuaded to commission Hillcourt to write the first Handbook for Patrol Leaders which was published in 1929. From 1932 until his retirement in 1965, Hillcourt was a major contributor to Boys' Life, the magazine for Scouting youth. Each monthly issue included a page on advancement and Scoutcraft, outdoor Scouting skills, and included his signature superimposed over the two green bars that are the emblem of the patrol leader, which led to his moniker "Green Bar Bill" and its adoption as the logo of his regular Boys' Life column. Hillcourt was tasked to write a new manual for Scoutmasters in 1934 and worked with his good friend and colleague E. Urner Goodman, the national program director of the BSA. He and his wife moved to a house in Mendham Borough, New Jersey, to be near Schiff Scout Reservation, the BSA's national training center, so he could be in place to put his theories to a practical test. In order to do so, he founded Troop 1 of Mendham in 1935 as a unit directly chartered to the National Council of the BSA. As the Scoutmaster, he used Troop 1 to test and validate his work for 16 years. The Baden-Powells visited Schiff in 1935 and began a steadfast friendship with the Hillcourts. Baden-Powell died in 1941. After World War II, Baden-Powell's widow, Olave Baden-Powell, allowed Hillcourt to edit Aids to Scoutmastership into the World Brotherhood Editions to help the Scouting movement recover from the war. She then allowed Hillcourt access to Baden-Powell's letters, diaries and sketchbooks when she and Hillcourt co-authored the narrative biography of Baden-Powell, Baden-Powell: The Two Lives of a Hero. The BSA national office moved from New York City to North Brunswick, New Jersey, in 1954, and the Hillcourts moved with it. He completed the sixth edition of the Boy Scout Handbook in time for the BSA's 50th anniversary in 1960. ### Wood Badge To encourage the creation of Rovering in the U.S., J. S. Wilson travelled from the UK to oversee a Wood Badge course in May 1936 at Schiff. Hillcourt was a participant in that first course and four days later, he was the senior patrol leader for the second course. He received his Wood Badge beads in 1939 and was appointed as the deputy camp director for Wood Badge. After World War II, Wood Badge was revived and Hillcourt was the Scoutmaster for a test course begun on July 31, 1948, at Schiff and the first standard course at Philmont Scout Ranch. As the national director of training, Hillcourt wore five Wood Badge beads, a tradition that has been discontinued in the U.K. Scout Association, however other countries still continue the use of the five Wood Badge Beads and are still worn by the National Volunteer Leader of Wood Badge Training of each country as well as by special decree of Gilwell Park today. In the year before his retirement on August 1, 1965, the national council began a program to update the Wood Badge program and shift its emphasis from teaching Scoutcraft to leadership skills. After he was officially retired, his opinion was still sought after and respected. Dr. John W. Larson, Director of Boy Scout Leader Training for the National Council, was working with Béla H. Bánáthy and Bob Perin, Assistant National Director, Volunteer Training Service, to adapt the leadership competencies of the White Stag Leadership Development Program into a new Wood Badge syllabus. Hillcourt was among the few on the National Staff who strongly resisted the change to the Wood Badge program. He attended the presentation that Larson made to the national Scout committee on the new Wood Badge curriculum. Larson later reported, "He fought us all the way ... He had a vested interest in what had been and resisted every change. I just told him to settle down, everything was going to be all right." Hillcourt presented an alternative to Larson's plan to incorporate leadership into Wood Badge. Chief Scout Executive Joseph Brunton asked Larson to look at Hillcourt's plan, and Larson reported back that it was the same stuff, just reordered and rewritten. Larson's plan for Wood Badge was approved and he moved ahead to begin implementing the proposed changes. ## Later life Hillcourt retired from the BSA on August 1, 1965. In 1971, he and Grace finally completed the world tour he had started in 1926; along the way they attended the 13th World Scout Jamboree in Fujinomiya, Japan. Grace Hillcourt died in 1973. Rather than live alone, Bill moved into the home of his good friends Carson and Martha Buck. The BSA had introduced the "Improved Scouting Program" in 1972, along with a new edition of the Boy Scout Handbook. Many of the changes were intended to expand Scouting to a broader base of youth and to make Scouting more "in tune with the times". Many Scouters, including Hillcourt, were critical of the new program changes, exclaiming that the de-emphasis on traditional outdoor skills had taken the "outing out of Scouting". This change proved to be unsuccessful, deterring existing adherents and attracting relatively few new enrolments. To remedy this situation, Hillcourt convinced Chief Scout Executive Harvey L. Price that a new handbook was needed. Hillcourt then came out of retirement and spent a year writing and editing the 1979 edition of The Official Boy Scout Handbook, returning to the focus of Scoutcraft. In addition, he helped to develop the All Out for Scouting program that launched the return to the old standards. Hillcourt was regarded as a prominent figure and guide in BSA's recovery from its experiment earlier in that decade. Hillcourt was recognized for his service to youth by the BSA with the Distinguished Eagle Scout Award on May 19, 1978. In 1980, the BSA presented Hillcourt with their highest national honor, the Silver Buffalo Award and he was cited as "The Voice of Scouting". The World Scout Committee of the World Organization of the Scout Movement recognized him for exceptional services to world Scouting in 1985 with the Bronze Wolf Award. In the same year, an article in the Scouting magazine proclaimed Hillcourt as "the foremost influence on development of the Boy Scouting program." In the last 12 months of 1985, he traveled to Dallas, Washington, Knoxville, Houston, San Francisco, Cleveland, Los Angeles, and other cities. He also attended the World Conference held for the first time in Germany, an inter-American scout conference in Brazil (with side trips to Argentina and Paraguay). He served as scoutmaster in the Wood Badge program for "South Explorers Leaders and Center –Leadership Course in Troop", He ended his trip to South America in Caracas, Venezuela. He also was Troop Head and Director of the Field-School "Paramacay". To celebrate during the month of August his 85 years of age with his old friends explorers in Copenhagen, Denmark. And then, of course, in the middle of the times, he continued to camp in the different events that took place during his campaign and did not fail to make a presence with his uninterrupted record, with the Jamboree. In 1990 he also became a member of Firecrafter, an American Scouting service organization. Travel and appearances at Scouting events both local and worldwide were part of his routine until he died, for which he was referred to as Scoutmaster to the World. Hillcourt died at the age of 92, in Stockholm, Sweden, while traveling on a Scouting tour with Carson Buck on November 9, 1992. He is buried with his wife Grace in St. Joseph's Cemetery (Row 8, Block I) in Mendham Borough, New Jersey, United States. The grave lies within the geographic scope of the Patriots Path Council near Schiff Scout Reservation at coordinates , where he lived for many years. His legacy in Scouting and his influence continue in the programs and training of Scouting. His writings are still used within the Scouting movement and his material continues to be reprinted in Scouting magazine. The Longhouse Council operates the William Hillcourt Scout Museum and Carson Buck Memorial Library at Camp Woodland in New York to "keep the traditions of Scouting alive" through the preservation of the history that is a foundation for today's Scouting movement. ## Works Hillcourt was one of the BSA's most prolific writers. He wrote numerous articles for Boys' Life and Scouting magazines, including a column aimed at patrol leaders under the by-line of "Patrol Leader Green Bar Bill". At least 12,610,000 copies of his three editions of the Boy Scout Handbook were printed. - \(1925\) The Island - \(1929\) Handbook for Patrol Leaders - \(1933\) The 1933 Scout Jamboree Book with James E. West - \(1936\) Handbook for Scoutmasters, Third edition in two volumes - \(1946\) Aids to Scoutmastership, World Brotherhood Edition, by Baden-Powell, revised by Hillcourt - \(1946\) Scouting for Boys, World Brotherhood Edition, by Baden-Powell, revised by Hillcourt - \(1948\) Scout Fieldbook, First edition, with West - \(1950\) Handbook for Patrol Leaders; World Brotherhood Edition - \(1959\) Boy Scout Handbook, Sixth edition - \(1961\) Field Book of Nature Activities and Conservation: An Indispensable Guide for Nature Lovers - \(1964\) Baden-Powell: The Two Lives of a Hero; biography of Baden-Powell - \(1965\) Boy Scout Handbook, Seventh edition - \(1967\) Handbook for Patrol Leaders, Second edition (heavily edited revision) - \(1967\) Physical Fitness for Boys - \(1967\) Physical Fitness for Girls - \(1968\) Your Guide to Fitness - \(1970\) New Field Book of Nature Activities & Hobbies - \(1970\) Fun With Nature Hobbies - \(1971\) The Golden Book of Camping - \(1975\) Outdoor Things To Do: Year-round Nature Fun for Girls and Boys - \(1977\) Norman Rockwell's World of Scouting; biography of iconic illustrator Norman Rockwell - \(1979\) The Official Boy Scout Handbook, Ninth edition - \(1980\) The Official Patrol Leader Handbook, Third edition ## See also - Scouting memorials

Galerina marginata

Poisonous fungus in the family Hymenogastraceae

Galerina marginata, known colloquially as funeral bell, deadly skullcap, autumn skullcap or deadly galerina, is a species of extremely poisonous mushroom-forming fungus in the family Hymenogastraceae of the order Agaricales. It contains the same deadly amatoxins found in the death cap (Amanita phalloides). Ingestion in toxic amounts causes severe liver damage with vomiting, diarrhea, hypothermia, and eventual death if not treated rapidly. About ten poisonings have been attributed to the species now grouped as G. marginata over the last century. G. marginata is widespread in the Northern Hemisphere, including Europe, North America, and Asia, and has also been found in Australia. It is a wood-rotting fungus that grows predominantly on decaying conifer wood. The fruit bodies of the mushroom have brown to yellow-brown caps that fade in color when drying. The gills are brownish and give a rusty spore print. A well-defined membranous ring is typically seen on the stems of young specimens but often disappears with age. In older fruit bodies, the caps are flatter and the gills and stems browner. The species is a classic "little brown mushroom" – a catchall category that includes all small to medium-sized, hard-to-identify brownish mushrooms, and may be easily confused with several edible species. Before 2001, the species G. autumnalis, G. oregonensis, G. unicolor, and G. venenata were thought to be distinct from G. marginata due to differences in habitat and the viscidity of their caps, but phylogenetic analysis showed that they are all the same species. ## Taxonomy and naming What is now recognized as a single morphologically variable taxon named Galerina marginata was once split into five distinct species. Norwegian mycologist Gro Gulden and colleagues concluded that all five represented the same species after comparing the DNA sequences of the internal transcribed spacer region of ribosomal DNA for various North American and European specimens in Galerina section Naucoriopsis. The results showed no genetic differences between G. marginata and G. autumnalis, G. oregonensis, G. unicolor, and G. venenata, thus reducing all these names to synonymy. The oldest of these names are Agaricus marginatus, described by August Batsch in 1789, and Agaricus unicolor, described by Martin Vahl in 1792. Agaricus autumnalis was described by Charles Horton Peck in 1873, and later moved to Galerina by A. H. Smith and Rolf Singer in their 1962 worldwide monograph on that genus. In the same publication they also introduced the G. autumnalis varieties robusta and angusticystis. Another of the synonymous species, G. oregonensis, was first described in that monograph. Galerina venenata was first identified as a species by Smith in 1953. Since Agaricus marginatus is the oldest validly published name, it has priority according to the rules of botanical nomenclature. Another species analysed in Gulden's 2001 study, Galerina pseudomycenopsis, also could not be distinguished from G. marginata based on ribosomal DNA sequences and restriction fragment length polymorphism analyses. Because of differences in ecology, fruit body color and spore size combined with inadequate sampling, the authors preferred to maintain G. pseudomycenopsis as a distinct species. A 2005 study again failed to separate the two species using molecular methods, but reported that the incompatibility demonstrated in mating experiments suggests that the species are distinct. In the fourth edition (1986) of Singer's comprehensive classification of the Agaricales, G. marginata is the type species of Galerina section Naucoriopsis, a subdivision first defined by French mycologist Robert Kühner in 1935. It includes small brown-spored mushrooms characterized by cap edges initially curved inwards, fruit bodies resembling Pholiota or Naucoria and thin-walled, obtuse or acute-ended pleurocystidia that are not rounded at the top. Within this section, G. autumnalis and G. oregonensis are in stirps Autumnalis, while G. unicolor, G. marginata, and G. venenata are in stirps Marginata. Autumnalis species are characterized by having a viscid to lubricous cap surface while Marginata species lack a gelatinous cap—the surface is moist, "fatty-shining", or matte when wet. However, as Gulden explains, this characteristic is highly variable: "Viscidity is a notoriously difficult character to assess because it varies with the age of the fruitbody and the weather conditions during its development. Varying degrees of viscidity tend to be described differently and applied inconsistently by different persons applying terms such as lubricous, fatty, fatty-shiny, sticky, viscid, glutinous, or (somewhat) slimy." The specific epithet marginata is derived from the Latin word for "margin" or "edge", while autumnalis means "of the autumn". Common names of the species include the "marginate Pholiota" (resulting from its synonymy with Pholiota marginata), "funeral bell", "deadly skullcap", and "deadly Galerina". G. autumnalis was known as the "fall Galerina" or the "autumnal Galerina", while G. venenata was the "deadly lawn Galerina". ## Description The cap ranges from 1 to 4 cm (1⁄2 to 1+1⁄2 in) in diameter. It starts convex, sometimes broadly conical, and has edges (margins) that are curved in against the gills. As the cap grows and expands, it becomes broadly convex and then flattened, sometimes developing a central elevation, or umbo, which may project prominently from the cap surface. Based on the collective descriptions of the five taxa now considered to be G. marginata, the texture of the surface shows significant variation. Smith and Singer give the following descriptions of surface texture: from "viscid" (G. autumnalis), to "shining and viscid to lubricous when moist" (G. oregonensis), to "shining, lubricous to subviscid (particles of dirt adhere to surface) or merely moist, with a fatty appearance although not distinctly viscid", to "moist but not viscid" (G. marginata). The cap surface remains smooth and changes colors with humidity (hygrophanous), pale to dark ochraceous tawny over the disc and yellow-ochraceous on the margin (at least when young), but fading to dull tan or darker when dry. When moist, the cap is somewhat transparent so that the outlines of the gills may be seen as striations. The flesh is pale brownish ochraceous to nearly white, thin and pliant, with an odor and taste varying from very slightly to strongly like flour (farinaceous). The gills are typically narrow and crowded together, with a broadly adnate to nearly decurrent attachment to the stem and convex edges. They are a pallid brown when young, becoming tawny at maturity. Some short gills, called lamellulae, do not extend entirely from the cap edge to the stem, and are intercalated among the longer gills. The stem ranges from 2 to 8 cm (3⁄4 to 3+1⁄8 in) long, 3–9 mm thick at the apex, and stays equal in width throughout or is slightly enlarged downward. Initially solid, it becomes hollow from the bottom up as it matures. The membranous ring is located on the upper half of the stem near the cap, but may be sloughed off and missing in older specimens. Its color is initially whitish or light brown, but usually appears a darker rusty-brown in mature specimens that have dropped spores on it. Above the level of the ring, the stem surface has a very fine whitish powder and is paler than the cap; below the ring it is brown down to the reddish-brown to bistre base. The lower portion of the stem has a thin coating of pallid fibrils which eventually disappear and do not leave any scales. The spore print is rusty-brown. ### Microscopic characteristics The spores measure 8–10 by 5–6 μm, and are slightly inequilateral in profile view, and egg-shaped in face view. Like all Galerina species, the spores have a plage, which has been described as resembling "a slightly wrinkled plastic shrink-wrap covering over the distal end of the spore". The spore surface is warty and full of wrinkles, with a smooth depression where the spore was once attached via the sterigmatum to the basidium (the spore-bearing cell). When in potassium hydroxide (KOH) solution, the spores appear tawny or darker rusty-brown, with an apical callus. The basidia are four-spored (rarely with a very few two-spored ones), roughly cylindrical when producing spores, but with a slightly tapered base, and measure 21–29 by 5–8.4 μm. Cystidia are cells of the fertile hymenium that do not produce spores. These sterile cells, which are structurally distinct from the basidia, are further classified according to their position. In G. marginata, the pleurocystidia (cystidia from the gill sides) are 46–60 by 9–12 μm, thin-walled, and hyaline in KOH, fusoid to ventricose in shape with wavy necks and blunt to subacute apices (3–6 μm diameter near apex). The cheilocystidia (cystidia on the gill edges) are similar in shape but often smaller than the pleurocystidia, abundant, with no club-shaped or abruptly tapering (mucronate) cells present. Clamp connections are present in the hyphae. ### Similar species The deadly Galerina marginata may be mistaken for a few edible mushroom species such as Armillaria mellea and Kuehneromyces mutabilis. Pholiota mutabilis (Kuehneromyces mutabilis) produces fruit bodies roughly similar in appearance and also grows on wood, but may be distinguished from G. marginata by its stems bearing scales up to the level of the ring, and from growing in large clusters (which is not usual of G. marginata). However, the possibility of confusion is such that this good edible species is "not recommended to those lacking considerable experience in the identification of higher fungi." Furthermore, microscopic examination shows smooth spores in Pholiota. One source notes "Often, G. marginata bears an astonishing resemblance to this fungus, and it requires careful and acute powers of observation to distinguish the poisonous one from the edible one." K. mutabilis may be distinguished by the presence of scales on the stem below the ring, the larger cap, which may reach a diameter of 6 cm (2+3⁄8 in), and spicy or aromatic odor of the flesh. The related K. vernalis is a rare species and even more similar in appearance to G. marginata. Examination of microscopic characteristics is typically required to reliably distinguish between the two, revealing smooth spores with a germ pore. Another potential edible lookalike is the "velvet shank", Flammulina velutipes. This species has gills that are white to pale yellow, a white spore print, and spores that are elliptical, smooth, and measure 6.5–9 by 2.5–4 μm. A rough resemblance has also been noted with the edible Hypholoma capnoides, the 'magic' mushroom Psilocybe subaeruginosa, as well as Conocybe filaris, another poisonous amatoxin-containing species. ## Habitat and distribution Galerina marginata is a saprobic fungus, obtaining nutrients by breaking down organic matter. It is known to have most of the major classes of secreted enzymes that dissolve plant cell wall polysaccharides, and has been used as a model saprobe in recent studies of ectomycorrhizal fungi. Because of its variety of enzymes capable of breaking down wood and other lignocellulosic materials, the Department of Energy Joint Genome Institute (JGI) is currently sequencing its genome. The fungus is typically reported to grow on or near the wood of conifers, although it has been observed to grow on hardwoods as well. Fruit bodies may grow solitarily, but more typically in groups or small clusters, and appear in the summer to autumn. Sometimes, they may grow on buried wood and thus appear to be growing on soil. Galerina marginata is widely distributed throughout the Northern Hemisphere, found in North America, Europe, Japan, Iran, continental Asia, and the Caucasus. In North America, it has been collected as far north as the boreal forest of Canada and subarctic and arctic habitats in Labrador, and south to Jalisco, Mexico. It is also found in Australia. ## Toxicity The toxins found in Galerina marginata are known as amatoxins. Amatoxins belong to a family of bicyclic octapeptide derivatives composed of an amino acid ring bridged by a sulfur atom and characterized by differences in their side groups; these compounds are responsible for more than 90% of fatal mushroom poisonings in humans. The amatoxins inhibit the enzyme RNA polymerase II, which copies the genetic code of DNA into messenger RNA molecules. The toxin naturally accumulates in liver cells, and the ensuing disruption of metabolism accounts for the severe liver dysfunction cause by amatoxins. Amatoxins also lead to kidney failure because, as the kidneys attempt to filter out poison, it damages the convoluted tubules and reenters the blood to recirculate and cause more damage. Initial symptoms after ingestion include severe abdominal pain, vomiting, and diarrhea which may last for six to nine hours. Beyond these symptoms, toxins severely affect the liver which results in gastrointestinal bleeding, a coma, kidney failure, or even death, usually within seven days of consumption. Galerina marginata was shown in various studies to contain the amatoxins α-amanitin and γ-amanitin, first as G. venenata, then as G. marginata and G. autumnalis. The ability of the fungus to produce these toxins was confirmed by growing the mycelium as a liquid culture (only trace amounts of β-amanitin were found). G. marginata is thought to be the only species of the amatoxin-producing genera that will produce the toxins while growing in culture. Both amanitins were quantified in G. autumnalis (1.5 mg/g dry weight) and G. marginata (1.1 mg/g dry weight). Later experiments confirmed the occurrence of γ-amanitin and β-amanitin in German specimens of G. autumnalis and G. marginata and revealed the presence of the three amanitins in the fruit bodies of G. unicolor. Although some mushroom field guides claim that the species (as G. autumnalis) also contains phallotoxins (however phallotoxins cannot be absorbed by humans), scientific evidence does not support this contention. A 2004 study determined that the amatoxin content of G. marginata varied from 78.17 to 243.61 μg/g of fresh weight. In this study, the amanitin amounts from certain Galerina specimens were higher than those from some Amanita phalloides, a European fungus generally considered as the richest in amanitins. The authors suggest that "other parameters such as extrinsic factors (environmental conditions) and intrinsic factors (genetic properties) could contribute to the significant variance in amatoxin contents from different specimens." The lethal dose of amatoxins has been estimated to be about 0.1 mg/kg human body weight, or even lower. Based on this value, the ingestion of 10 G. marginata fruit bodies containing about 250 μg of amanitins per gram of fresh tissue could poison a child weighing approximately 20 kilograms (44 lb). However, a 20-year retrospective study of more than 2100 cases of amatoxin poisonings from North American and Europe showed that few cases were due to ingestion of Galerina species. This low frequency may be attributed to the mushroom's nondescript appearance as a "little brown mushroom" leading to it being overlooked by collectors, and by the fact that 21% of amatoxin poisonings were caused by unidentified species. The toxicity of certain Galerina species has been known for a century. In 1912, Charles Horton Peck reported a human poisoning case due to G. autumnalis. In 1954, a poisoning was caused by G. venenata. Between 1978 and 1995, ten cases caused by amatoxin-containing Galerinas were reported in the literature. Three European cases, two from Finland and one from France were attributed to G. marginata and G. unicolor, respectively. Seven North American exposures included two fatalities from Washington due to G. venenata, with five cases reacting positively to treatment; four poisonings were caused by G. autumnalis from Michigan and Kansas, in addition to poisoning caused by an unidentified Galerina species from Ohio. Several poisonings have been attributed to collectors consuming the mushrooms after mistaking them for the hallucinogenic Psilocybe stuntzii. ## See also - List of deadly fungi

USS Constitution

1797 heavy frigate of the U.S. Navy

USS Constitution, also known as Old Ironsides, is a three-masted wooden-hulled heavy frigate of the United States Navy. She is the world's oldest ship still afloat. She was launched in 1797, one of six original frigates authorized for construction by the Naval Act of 1794 and the third constructed. The name "Constitution" was among ten names submitted to President George Washington by Secretary of War Timothy Pickering in March of 1795 for the frigates that were to be constructed. Joshua Humphreys designed the frigates to be the young Navy's capital ships, and so Constitution and her sister ships were larger and more heavily armed and built than standard frigates of the period. She was built at Edmund Hartt's shipyard in the North End of Boston, Massachusetts. Her first duties were to provide protection for American merchant shipping during the Quasi-War with France and to defeat the Barbary pirates in the First Barbary War. Constitution is most noted for her actions during the War of 1812 against the United Kingdom, when she captured numerous merchant ships and defeated five British warships: HMS Guerriere, Java, Pictou, Cyane, and Levant. The battle with Guerriere earned her the nickname "Old Ironsides" and public adoration that has repeatedly saved her from scrapping. She continued to serve as flagship in the Mediterranean and African squadrons, and she circled the world in the 1840s. During the American Civil War, she served as a training ship for the United States Naval Academy. She carried American artwork and industrial displays to the Paris Exposition of 1878. Constitution was retired from active service in 1881 and served as a receiving ship until being designated a museum ship in 1907. In 1934, she completed a three-year, 90-port tour of the nation. She sailed under her own power for her 200th birthday in 1997, and again in August 2012 to commemorate the 200th anniversary of her victory over Guerriere. Constitution's stated mission today is to promote understanding of the Navy's role in war and peace through educational outreach, historical demonstration, and active participation in public events as part of the Naval History and Heritage Command. As she is a fully commissioned Navy ship, her crew of 75 officers and sailors participate in ceremonies, educational programs, and special events while keeping her open to visitors year round and providing free tours. The officers and crew are all active-duty Navy personnel, and the assignment is considered to be special duty. She is usually berthed at Pier 1 of the former Charlestown Navy Yard at one end of Boston's Freedom Trail. ## Construction In 1785, Barbary pirates, most notably from Algiers, began to seize American merchant vessels in the Mediterranean Sea. In 1793 alone, 11 American ships were captured and their crews and stores held for ransom. To combat this problem, proposals were made for warships to protect American shipping, resulting in the Naval Act of 1794. The act provided funds to construct six frigates, but it included a clause that the construction of the ships would be halted if peace terms were agreed to with Algiers. Joshua Humphreys' design was unusual for the time, being deep, long on keel, narrow of beam (width), and mounting very heavy guns. The design called for diagonal riders intended to restrict hogging and sagging while giving the ships extremely heavy planking. This design gave the hull a greater strength than a more lightly built frigate. It was based on Humphrey's realization that the fledgling United States could not match the European states in the size of their navies, so they were designed to overpower any other frigate while escaping from a ship of the line. Her keel was laid down on 1 November 1794 at Edmund Hartt's shipyard in Boston, Massachusetts, under the supervision of Captain Samuel Nicholson, master shipwright Colonel George Claghorn and Foreman Prince Athearn of the Martha's Vineyard Athearns. Constitution's hull was built 21 inches (530 mm) thick and her length between perpendiculars was 175 ft (53 m), with a 204 ft (62 m) length overall and a width of 43 ft 6 in (13.26 m). In total, 60 acres (24 ha) of trees were needed for her construction. Primary materials consisted of pine and oak, including southern live oak which was cut from Gascoigne Bluff and milled near St. Simons Island, Georgia. Enslaved workers were used to harvest the oak used for the ship's construction, and USS Constitution Museum historian Carl Herzog stated that "the forced labor of enslaved people was an expediency that Navy officials and contractors saw as fundamental to the job... enslaved people were essential to the construction of naval warships built to secure the very American freedoms they were denied." A peace accord was announced between the United States and Algiers in March 1796, and construction was halted in accordance with the Naval Act of 1794. After some debate and prompting by President Washington, Congress agreed to continue funding the construction of the three ships nearest to completion: United States, Constellation, and Constitution. Constitution's launching ceremony on 20 September 1797 was attended by President John Adams and Massachusetts Governor Increase Sumner. Upon launch, she slid down the ways only 27 feet (8.2 m) before stopping; her weight had caused the ways to settle into the ground, preventing further movement. An attempt two days later resulted in only 31 feet (9.4 m) of additional travel before the ship again stopped. After a month of rebuilding the ways, Constitution finally slipped into Boston Harbor on 21 October 1797, with Captain James Sever breaking a bottle of Madeira wine on her bowsprit. ### Armament Constitution was rated as a 44-gun frigate, but she often carried more than 50 guns at a time. Ships of this era had no permanent battery of guns such as those of modern Navy ships. The guns and cannons were designed to be completely portable and often were exchanged between ships as situations warranted. Each commanding officer outfitted armaments to his liking, taking into consideration factors such as the overall weight of stores, complement of personnel aboard, and planned routes to be sailed. Consequently, the armaments on ships changed often during their careers, and records of the changes were not generally kept. During the War of 1812, Constitution's battery of guns typically consisted of 30 long 24-pounder (11 kg) cannons, with 15 on each side of the gun deck. Twenty-two more guns were deployed on the spar deck, 11 per side, each a short 32-pounder (15 kg) carronade. Four chase guns were also positioned, two each at the stern and bow. All of the guns aboard Constitution have been replicas since her 1927–1931 restoration. Most were cast in 1930, but two carronades on the spar deck were cast in 1983. A modern 40 mm (1.6 in) saluting gun was hidden inside the forward long gun on each side during her 1973–1976 restoration in order to restore the capability of firing ceremonial salutes. ## Quasi-War President John Adams ordered all Navy ships to sea in late May 1798 to patrol for armed French ships and to free any American ship captured by them. Constitution was still not ready to sail and eventually had to borrow sixteen 18-pound (8.2 kg) cannons from Castle Island before finally being ready. She put to sea on the evening of 22 July 1798 with orders to patrol the Eastern seaboard between New Hampshire and New York. She was patrolling between Chesapeake Bay and Savannah, Georgia, a month later when Nicholson found his first opportunity for capturing a prize. They intercepted Niger off the coast of Charleston, South Carolina, on 8 September, a 24-gun ship sailing with a French crew en route from Jamaica to Philadelphia, claiming to have been under the orders of Great Britain. Nicholson had the crewmen imprisoned, perhaps not understanding his orders correctly. He placed a prize crew aboard Niger and brought her into Norfolk, Virginia. Constitution sailed south again a week later to escort a merchant convoy, but her bowsprit was severely damaged in a gale and she returned to Boston for repairs. In the meantime, Secretary of the Navy Benjamin Stoddert determined that Niger had been operating under the orders of Great Britain as claimed, and the ship and her crew were released to continue their voyage. The American government paid a restitution of \$11,000 () to Great Britain. Constitution departed Boston on 29 December. Nicholson reported to Commodore John Barry, who was flying his flag in United States near the island of Dominica for patrols in the West Indies. On 15 January 1799, Constitution intercepted the English merchantman Spencer, which had been taken prize by the French frigate L'Insurgente a few days prior. Technically, Spencer was a French ship operated by a French prize crew; but Nicholson released the ship and her crew the next morning, perhaps hesitant after the affair with Niger. Upon joining Barry's command, Constitution almost immediately had to put in for repairs to her rigging due to storm damage, and it was not until 1 March that anything of note occurred. On this date, she encountered HMS Santa Margarita, whose captain was an acquaintance of Nicholson's. The two agreed to a sailing duel, which the English captain was confident he would win. But after 11 hours of sailing, Santa Margarita lowered her sails and admitted defeat, paying off the bet with a cask of wine to Nicholson. Resuming her patrols, Constitution managed to recapture the American sloop Neutrality on 27 March and, a few days later, the French ship Carteret. Secretary Stoddert had other plans, however, and recalled Constitution to Boston. She arrived there on 14 May, and Nicholson was relieved of command. ### Change of command Captain Silas Talbot was recalled to duty to command Constitution and serve as Commodore of operations in the West Indies. After repairs and resupply were completed, Constitution departed Boston on 23 July with a destination of Saint-Domingue via Norfolk and a mission to interrupt French shipping. She took the prize Amelia from a French prize crew on 15 September, and Talbot sent the ship back to New York City with an American prize crew. Constitution arrived at Saint-Domingue on 15 October and rendezvoused with Boston, General Greene, and Norfolk. No further incidents occurred over the next six months, as French depredations in the area had declined. Constitution busied herself with routine patrols, and Talbot made diplomatic visits. It was not until April 1800 that Talbot investigated an increase in ship traffic near Puerto Plata, Santo Domingo, and discovered that the French privateer Sandwich had taken refuge there. On 8 May the squadron captured the sloop Sally, and Talbot hatched a plan to capture Sandwich by utilizing the familiarity of Sally to allow the Americans access to the harbor. First Lieutenant Isaac Hull led 90 sailors and Marines into Puerto Plata without challenge on 11 May, capturing Sandwich and spiking the guns of the nearby Spanish fort. However, it was later determined that Sandwich had been captured from a neutral port; she was returned to the French with apologies, and no prize money was awarded to the squadron. Routine patrols again occupied Constitution for the next two months, until 13 July, when the mainmast trouble of a few months before recurred. She put into Cap Français for repairs. With the terms of enlistment soon to expire for the sailors aboard her, she made preparations to return to the United States and was relieved of duty by Constellation on 23 July. Constitution escorted 12 merchantmen to Philadelphia on her return voyage, and on 24 August put in at Boston, where she received new masts, sails, and rigging. Even though peace was imminent between the United States and France, Constitution again sailed for the West Indies on 17 December as squadron flagship, rendezvousing with Congress, Adams, Augusta, Richmond, and Trumbull. Although no longer allowed to pursue French shipping, the squadron was assigned to protect American shipping and continued in that capacity until April 1801, when Herald arrived with orders for the squadron to return to the United States. Constitution returned to Boston, where she lingered; she was finally scheduled for an overhaul in October, but it was later canceled. She was placed in ordinary on 2 July 1802. ## First Barbary War The United States paid tribute to the Barbary States during the Quasi-War to ensure that American merchant ships were not harassed and seized. In 1801, Yusuf Karamanli of Tripoli was dissatisfied that the United States was paying him less than they paid Algiers, and he demanded an immediate payment of \$250,000 (). In response, Thomas Jefferson sent a squadron of frigates to protect American merchant ships in the Mediterranean and to pursue peace with the Barbary States. The first squadron under the command of Richard Dale in President was instructed to escort merchant ships through the Mediterranean and to negotiate with leaders of the Barbary States. A second squadron was assembled under the command of Richard Valentine Morris in Chesapeake. The performance of Morris's squadron was so poor, however, that he was recalled and subsequently dismissed from the Navy in 1803. Captain Edward Preble recommissioned Constitution on 13 May 1803 as his flagship and made preparations to command a new squadron for a third blockade attempt. The copper sheathing on her hull needed to be replaced and Paul Revere supplied the copper sheets necessary for the job. She departed Boston on 14 August, and she encountered an unknown ship in the darkness on 6 September, near the Rock of Gibraltar. Constitution went to general quarters, then ran alongside the unknown ship. Preble hailed her, only to receive a hail in return. He identified his ship as the United States frigate Constitution but received an evasive answer from the other ship. Preble replied: "I am now going to hail you for the last time. If a proper answer is not returned, I will fire a shot into you." The stranger returned, "If you give me a shot, I'll give you a broadside." Preble demanded that the other ship identify herself and the stranger replied, "This is His Britannic Majesty's ship Donegal, 84 guns, Sir Richard Strachan, an English commodore." He then commanded Preble, "Send your boat on board." Preble was now devoid of all patience and exclaimed, "This is United States ship Constitution, 44 guns, Edward Preble, an American commodore, who will be damned before he sends his boat on board of any vessel." And then to his gun crews: "Blow your matches, boys!" Before the incident escalated further, however, a boat arrived from the other ship and a British lieutenant relayed his captain's apologies. The ship was in fact not Donegal but instead HMS Maidstone, a 32-gun frigate. Constitution had come alongside her so quietly that Maidstone had delayed answering with the proper hail while she readied her guns. This act began the strong allegiance between Preble and the officers under his command, known as "Preble's boys", as he had shown that he was willing to defy a presumed ship of the line. Constitution arrived at Gibraltar on 12 September, where Preble waited for the other ships of the squadron. His first order of business was to arrange a treaty with Sultan Slimane of Morocco, who was holding American ships hostage to ensure the return of two vessels that the Americans had captured. Constitution and Nautilus departed Gibraltar on 3 October and arrived at Tangier on the 4th. Adams and New York arrived the next day. With four American warships in his harbor, the Sultan was glad to arrange the transfer of ships between the two nations, and Preble departed with his squadron on 14 October, heading back to Gibraltar. ### Battle of Tripoli Harbor Philadelphia ran aground off Tripoli on 31 October under the command of William Bainbridge while pursuing a Tripoline vessel. The crew was taken prisoner; Philadelphia was refloated by the Tripolines and brought into their harbor. To deprive the Tripolines of their prize, Preble planned to destroy Philadelphia using the captured ship Mastico, which was renamed Intrepid. Intrepid entered Tripoli Harbor on 16 February 1804 under the command of Stephen Decatur, disguised as a merchant ship. Decatur's crew quickly overpowered the Tripoline crew and set Philadelphia ablaze. Preble withdrew the squadron to Syracuse, Sicily, and began planning for a summer attack on Tripoli. He procured a number of smaller gunboats that could move in closer to Tripoli than was feasible for Constitution, given her deep draft. Constitution, Argus, Enterprise, Scourge, Syren, the six gunboats, and two bomb ketches arrived the morning of 3 August and immediately began operations. Twenty-two Tripoline gunboats met them in the harbor; Constitution and her squadron severely damaged or destroyed the Tripoline gunboats in a series of attacks over the coming month, taking their crews prisoner. Constitution primarily provided gunfire support, bombarding the shore batteries of Tripoli—yet Karamanli remained firm in his demand for ransom and tribute, despite his losses. Preble outfitted Intrepid as a "floating volcano" with 100 short tons (91 t) of gunpowder aboard in a final attempt of the season. She was to sail into Tripoli harbor and blow up in the midst of the corsair fleet, close under the walls of the city. Intrepid made her way into the harbor on the evening of 3 September under the command of Richard Somers, but she exploded prematurely, killing Somers and his entire crew of thirteen volunteers. Constellation and President arrived at Tripoli on the 9th with Samuel Barron in command; Preble was forced to relinquish his command of the squadron to Barron, who was senior in rank. Constitution was ordered to Malta on the 11th for repairs and, while en route, captured two Greek vessels attempting to deliver wheat into Tripoli. On the 12th, a collision with President severely damaged Constitution's bow, stern, and figurehead of Hercules. The collision was attributed to an act of God in the form of a sudden change in wind direction. ### Peace treaty Captain John Rodgers assumed command of Constitution on 9 November 1804 while she underwent repairs and resupply in Malta. She resumed the blockade of Tripoli on 5 April 1805, capturing a Tripoline xebec, along with two prizes that the xebec had captured. Meanwhile, Commodore Barron gave William Eaton naval support to bombard Derne, while a detachment of US Marines under the command of Presley O'Bannon was assembled to attack the city by land. They captured it on 27 April. A peace treaty with Tripoli was signed aboard Constitution on 3 June, in which she embarked the crew members of Philadelphia and returned them to Syracuse. She was then dispatched to Tunis and arrived there on 30 July. Seventeen additional American warships had gathered in its harbor by 1 August: Congress, Constellation, Enterprise, Essex, Franklin, Hornet, John Adams, Nautilus, Syren, and eight gunboats. Negotiations went on for several days until a short-term blockade of the harbor finally produced a peace treaty on 14 August. Rodgers remained in command of the squadron, sending warships back to the United States when they were no longer needed. Eventually, all that remained were Constitution, Enterprise, and Hornet. They performed routine patrols and observed the French and Royal Navy operations of the Napoleonic Wars. Rodgers turned over the command of the squadron and Constitution to Captain Hugh G. Campbell on 29 May 1806. James Barron sailed Chesapeake out of Norfolk on 15 May 1807 to replace Constitution as the flagship of the Mediterranean squadron, but he encountered HMS Leopard, resulting in the Chesapeake–Leopard affair and delaying the relief of Constitution. Constitution continued patrols, unaware of the delay. She arrived in late June at Leghorn, where she took aboard the disassembled Tripoli Monument for transport back to the United States. Campbell learned the fate of Chesapeake when he arrived at Málaga, and he immediately began preparing Constitution and Hornet for possible war against Britain. The crew became mutinous upon learning of the delay in their relief and refused to sail any farther unless the destination was the United States. Campbell and his officers threatened to fire a cannon loaded with grapeshot at the crewmen if they did not comply, thereby putting an end to the conflict. Campbell and the squadron were ordered home on 18 August and set sail for Boston on 8 September, arriving there on 14 October. Constitution had been gone for more than four years. ## War of 1812 Constitution was recommissioned in December with Captain John Rodgers again taking command to oversee a major refitting. She was overhauled at a cost just under \$100,000; however, Rodgers inexplicably failed to clean her copper sheathing, leading him to later declare her a "slow sailer". She spent most of the following two years on training runs and ordinary duty. Isaac Hull took command in June 1810, and he immediately recognized that she needed her bottom cleaned. "Ten waggon loads" of barnacles and seaweed were removed. Hull departed for France on 5 August 1811, transporting the new Ambassador Joel Barlow and his family; they arrived on 1 September. Hull remained near France and the Netherlands through the winter months, continually holding sail and gun drills to keep the crew ready for possible hostilities with the British. Tensions were high between the United States and Britain after the events of the Little Belt affair the previous May, and Constitution was shadowed by British frigates while awaiting dispatches from Barlow to carry back to the United States. They arrived home on 18 February 1812. War was declared on 18 June and Hull put to sea on 12 July, attempting to join the five ships of a squadron under the command of Rodgers in President. He sighted five ships off Egg Harbor, New Jersey, on 17 July and at first believed them to be Rodgers' squadron but, by the following morning, the lookouts determined that they were a British squadron out of Halifax: HMS Aeolus, Africa, Belvidera, Guerriere, and Shannon. They had sighted Constitution and were giving chase. Constitution was becalmed and unable to run from the five British ships, but Hull acted on a suggestion from his First Lieutenant Charles Morris. He ordered the crew to put boats over the side to tow the ship out of range, using kedge anchors to draw the ship forward and wetting the sails to take advantage of every breath of wind. The British ships soon imitated the tactic of kedging and remained in pursuit. The resulting 57-hour chase in the July heat forced the crew of Constitution to employ myriad tactics to outrun the squadron, finally pumping overboard 2,300 US gal (8.7 kl) of drinking water. Cannon fire was exchanged several times, though the British attempts fell short or overshot their mark, including an attempted broadside from Belvidera. On 19 July, Constitution pulled far enough ahead of the British that they abandoned the pursuit. Constitution arrived in Boston on 27 July and remained there just long enough to replenish her supplies. Hull sailed without orders on 2 August to avoid being blockaded in port, heading on a northeast route towards the British shipping lanes near Halifax and the Gulf of Saint Lawrence. Constitution captured three British merchantmen, which Hull burned rather than risk taking them back to an American port. On 16 August, he learned of a British frigate 100 nmi (190 km; 120 mi) to the south and sailed in pursuit. ### Constitution vs. Guerriere A frigate was sighted on 19 August and subsequently determined to be HMS Guerriere (38) with the words "Not The Little Belt" painted on her foretopsail. Guerriere opened fire upon entering range of Constitution, doing little damage. After a few exchanges of cannon fire between the ships, Captain Hull maneuvered Constitution into an advantageous position within 25 yards (23 m) of Guerriere. He then ordered a full double-loaded broadside of grape and round shot, which took out Guerriere's mizzenmast. Guerriere's maneuverability decreased with her mizzenmast dragging in the water, and she collided with Constitution, entangling her bowsprit in Constitution's mizzen rigging. This left only Guerriere's bow guns capable of effective fire. Hull's cabin caught fire from the shots, but it was quickly extinguished. With the ships locked together, both captains ordered boarding parties into action, but the sea was heavy and neither party was able to board the opposing ship. At one point, the two ships rotated together counter-clockwise, with Constitution continuing to fire broadsides. When the two ships pulled apart, the force of the bowsprit's extraction sent shock waves through Guerriere's rigging. Her foremast collapsed, and that brought the mainmast down shortly afterward. Guerriere was now a dismasted, unmanageable hulk with close to a third of her crew wounded or killed, while Constitution remained largely intact. The British surrendered. Hull had surprised the British with his heavier broadsides and his ship's sailing ability. Adding to their astonishment, many of the British shots had rebounded harmlessly off Constitution's hull. An American sailor reportedly exclaimed "Huzzah! her sides are made of iron!" and Constitution acquired the nickname "Old Ironsides". The battle left Guerriere so badly damaged that she was not worth towing to port, and Hull ordered her to be burned the next morning, after transferring the British prisoners onto Constitution. Constitution arrived back in Boston on 30 August, where Hull and his crew found that news of their victory had spread fast, and they were hailed as heroes. ### Constitution vs Java William Bainbridge, senior to Hull, took command of "Old Ironsides" on 8 September and prepared her for another mission in British shipping lanes near Brazil, sailing with Hornet on 27 October. They arrived near São Salvador on 13 December, sighting HMS Bonne Citoyenne in the harbor. Bonne Citoyenne was reportedly carrying \$1.6 million in spices to England, and her captain refused to leave the neutral harbor lest he lose his cargo. Constitution sailed offshore in search of prizes, leaving Hornet to await the departure of Bonne Citoyenne. On 29 December, she met with HMS Java under Captain Henry Lambert. At the initial hail from Bainbridge, Java answered with a broadside that severely damaged Constitution's rigging. She was able to recover, however, and returned a series of broadsides to Java. A shot from Java destroyed Constitution's helm (wheel), so Bainbridge directed the crew to steer her manually using the tiller for the remainder of the engagement. Bainbridge was wounded twice during the battle. Java's bowsprit became entangled in Constitution's rigging, as in the battle with Guerriere, allowing Bainbridge to continue raking her with broadsides. Java's foremast collapsed, sending her fighting top crashing down through two decks below. Bainbridge drew off to make emergency repairs and re-approached Java an hour later. She was a shambles, an unmanageable wreck with a badly wounded crew, and she surrendered. Bainbridge determined that Java was far too damaged to retain as a prize and ordered her burned, but not before having her helm salvaged and installed on Constitution. Constitution returned to São Salvador on 1 January 1813 to disembark the prisoners of Java, where she met with Hornet and her two British prizes. Bainbridge ordered Constitution to sail for Boston on 5 January, being far away from a friendly port and needing extensive repairs, leaving Hornet behind to continue waiting for Bonne Citoyenne in the hopes that she would leave the harbor (she did not). Java was the third British warship in three months to be captured by the United States, and Constitution's victory prompted the British Admiralty to order its frigates not to engage the heavier American frigates one-on-one; only British ships of the line or squadrons were permitted to come close enough to attack. Constitution arrived in Boston on 15 February to even greater celebrations than Hull had received a few months earlier. ### Marblehead and blockade Bainbridge determined that Constitution required new spar deck planking and beams, masts, sails, and rigging, as well as replacement of her copper bottom. However, personnel and supplies were being diverted to the Great Lakes, causing shortages that kept her in Boston intermittently with her sister ships Chesapeake, Congress, and President for the majority of the year. Charles Stewart took command on 18 July and struggled to complete the construction and recruitment of a new crew, finally making sail on 31 December. She set course for the West Indies to harass British shipping and had captured five merchant ships and the 14-gun HMS Pictou by late March 1814. She also pursued HMS Columbine and HMS Pique, though both ships escaped after realizing that she was an American frigate. Her mainmast split off the coast of Bermuda on 27 March, requiring immediate repair. Stewart set a course for Boston, where British ships HMS Junon and Tenedos commenced pursuit on 3 April. Stewart ordered drinking water and food to be cast overboard to lighten her load and gain speed, trusting that her mainmast would hold together long enough for her to make her way into Marblehead, Massachusetts. The last item thrown overboard was the supply of spirits. Upon Constitution's arrival in the harbor, the citizens of Marblehead rallied in support, assembling what cannons they possessed at Fort Sewall, and the British called off the pursuit. Two weeks later, Constitution made her way into Boston, where she remained blockaded in port until mid-December. ### HMS Cyane and HMS Levant Captain George Collier of the Royal Navy received command of the 50-gun HMS Leander and was sent to North America to deal with the American frigates that were causing such losses to British shipping. Meanwhile, Charles Stewart saw his chance to escape from Boston Harbor and made it good on the afternoon of 18 December, and Constitution again set course for Bermuda. Collier gathered a squadron consisting of Leander, Newcastle, and Acasta and set off in pursuit, but he was unable to overtake her. On 24 December, Constitution intercepted the merchantman Lord Nelson and placed a prize crew aboard. Constitution had left Boston not fully supplied, but Lord Nelson's stores supplied a Christmas dinner for the crew. Constitution was cruising off Cape Finisterre on 8 February 1815 when Stewart learned that the Treaty of Ghent had been signed. He realized, however, that a state of war still existed until the treaty was ratified, and Constitution captured the British merchantman Susanna on 16 February; her cargo of animal hides was valued at \$75,000. On 20 February, Constitution sighted the small British ships Cyane and Levant sailing in company and gave chase. Cyane and Levant began a series of broadsides against her, but Stewart outmaneuvered both of them and forced Levant to draw off for repairs. He concentrated fire on Cyane, which soon struck her colors. Levant returned to engage Constitution but she turned and attempted to escape when she saw that Cyane had been defeated. Constitution overtook her and, after several more broadsides, she struck her colors. Stewart remained with his new prizes overnight while ordering repairs to all ships. Constitution had suffered little damage in the battle, though it was later discovered that she had twelve 32-pound British cannonballs embedded in her hull, none of which had penetrated. The trio then set a course for the Cape Verde Islands and arrived at Porto Praya on 10 March. The next morning, Collier's squadron was spotted on a course for the harbor, and Stewart ordered all ships to sail immediately; he had been unaware until then of Collier's pursuit. Cyane was able to elude the squadron and make sail for America, where she arrived on 10 April, but Levant was overtaken and recaptured. Collier's squadron was distracted with Levant while Constitution made another escape from overwhelming forces. Constitution set a course towards Guinea and then west towards Brazil, as Stewart had learned from the capture of Susanna that HMS Inconstant was transporting gold bullion back to England, and he wanted her as a prize. Constitution put into Maranhão on 2 April to offload her British prisoners and replenish her drinking water. While there, Stewart learned by rumor that the Treaty of Ghent had been ratified, and set course for America, receiving verification of peace at San Juan, Puerto Rico, on 28 April. He then set course for New York and arrived home on 15 May to large celebrations. Constitution emerged from the war undefeated, though her sister ships Chesapeake and President were not so fortunate, having been captured in 1813 and 1815 respectively. Constitution was moved to Boston and placed in ordinary in January 1816, sitting out the Second Barbary War. ### Mediterranean Squadron Charlestown Navy Yard's commandant Isaac Hull directed a refitting of Constitution to prepare her for duty with the Mediterranean Squadron in April 1820. They removed Joshua Humphreys' diagonal riders to make room for two iron freshwater tanks, and they replaced the copper sheathing and timbers below the waterline. At the direction of Secretary of the Navy Smith Thompson, she was also subjected to an unusual experiment in which manually operated paddle wheels were fitted to her hull. The paddle wheels were designed to propel her at up to 3 knots (5.6 km/h; 3.5 mph) if she was ever becalmed, by the crew using the ship's capstan. Initial testing was successful, but Hull and Constitution's commanding officer Jacob Jones were reportedly unimpressed with paddle wheels on a US Navy ship. Jones had them removed and stowed in the cargo hold before he departed on 13 May 1821 for a three-year tour of duty in the Mediterranean. On 12 April 1823, she collided with the British merchant ship Bicton in the Mediterranean Sea, and Bicton sank with the loss of her captain. Constitution otherwise experienced an uneventful tour, sailing in company with Ontario and Nonsuch, until crew behavior during shore leave gave Jones a reputation as a commodore who was lax in discipline. The Navy grew weary of receiving complaints about the crews' antics while in port and ordered Jones to return. Constitution arrived in Boston on 31 May 1824, and Jones was relieved of command. Thomas Macdonough took command and sailed on 29 October for the Mediterranean under the direction of John Rodgers in North Carolina. With discipline restored, Constitution resumed uneventful duty. Macdonough resigned his command for health reasons on 9 October 1825. Constitution put in for repairs during December and into January 1826, until Daniel Todd Patterson assumed command on 21 February. By August, she had been put into Port Mahon, suffering decay of her spar deck, and she remained there until temporary repairs were completed in March 1827. Constitution returned to Boston on 4 July 1828 and was placed in reserve. ## Old Ironsides Constitution was built in an era when a ship's expected service life was 10 to 15 years. Secretary of the Navy John Branch made a routine order for surveys of ships in the reserve fleet, and commandant of the Charlestown Navy Yard Charles Morris estimated a repair cost of over \$157,000 for Constitution. On 14 September 1830, an article appeared in the Boston Advertiser which erroneously claimed that the Navy intended to scrap Constitution. Two days later, Oliver Wendell Holmes' poem "Old Ironsides" was published in the same paper and later all over the country, igniting public indignation and inciting efforts to save "Old Ironsides" from the scrap yard. Secretary Branch approved the costs, and Constitution began a leisurely repair period while awaiting completion of the dry dock then under construction at the yard. In contrast to the efforts to save Constitution, another round of surveys in 1834 found her sister ship Congress unfit for repair; she was unceremoniously broken up in 1835. On 24 June 1833, Constitution entered dry dock. Captain Jesse Elliott, the new commander of the Navy yard, oversaw her reconstruction. Constitution had 30 in (760 mm) of hog in her keel and remained in dry dock until 21 June 1834. This was the first of many times that souvenirs were made from her old planking; Isaac Hull ordered walking canes, picture frames, and even a phaeton, which was presented to President Andrew Jackson. Meanwhile, Elliot directed the installation of a new figurehead of President Jackson under the bowsprit, which became a subject of much controversy due to Jackson's political unpopularity in Boston at the time. Elliot was a Jacksonian Democrat, and he received death threats. Rumors circulated about the citizens of Boston storming the navy yard to remove the figurehead themselves. A merchant captain named Samuel Dewey accepted a small wager as to whether he could complete the task of removal. Elliot had posted guards on Constitution to ensure the safety of the figurehead, but Dewey crossed the Charles River in a small boat, using the noise of thunderstorms to mask his movements, and managed to saw off most of Jackson's head. The severed head made the rounds between taverns and meeting houses in Boston until Dewey personally returned it to Secretary of the Navy Mahlon Dickerson; it remained on Dickerson's library shelf for many years. The addition of busts to her stern escaped controversy of any kind, depicting Isaac Hull, William Bainbridge, and Charles Stewart; the busts remained in place for the next 40 years. ### Mediterranean and Pacific Squadrons Elliot was appointed captain of Constitution and got underway in March 1835 to New York, where he ordered repairs to the Jackson figurehead, avoiding a second round of controversy. Departing on 16 March Constitution set a course for France to deliver Edward Livingston to his post as Minister. She arrived on 10 April and began the return voyage on 16 May. She arrived back in Boston on 23 June, then sailed on 19 August to take her station as flagship in the Mediterranean, arriving at Port Mahon on 19 September. Her duty over the next two years was uneventful as she and United States made routine patrols and diplomatic visits. From April 1837 into February 1838, Elliot collected various ancient artifacts to carry back to America, adding various livestock during the return voyage. Constitution arrived in Norfolk on 31 July. Elliot was later suspended from duty for transporting livestock on a Navy ship. As the flagship of the Pacific Squadron under the command of Captain Daniel Turner, she began her next voyage on 1 March 1839 with the duty of patrolling the western coast of South America. Often spending months in one port or another, she visited Valparaíso, Callao, Paita, and Puna while her crew amused themselves with the beaches and taverns in each locality. The return voyage found her at Rio de Janeiro, where Emperor Pedro II of Brazil visited her about 29 August 1841. Departing Rio, she returned to Norfolk on 31 October. On 22 June 1842, she was recommissioned under the command of Foxhall Alexander Parker for duty with the Home Squadron. After spending months in port she put to sea for three weeks during December, then was again put in ordinary. ### Around the world In late 1843, she was moored at Norfolk, serving as a receiving ship. Naval Constructor Foster Rhodes calculated that it would require \$70,000 to make her seaworthy. Acting Secretary David Henshaw faced a dilemma. His budget could not support such a cost, yet he could not allow the country's favorite ship to deteriorate. He turned to Captain John Percival, known in the service as "Mad Jack". The captain traveled to Virginia and conducted his own survey of the ship's needs. He reported that the necessary repairs and upgrades could be done at a cost of \$10,000. On 6 November, Henshaw told Percival to proceed without delay, but stay within his projected figure. After several months of labor, Percival reported Constitution ready for "a two or even a three-year cruise." She got underway on 29 May 1844 carrying Ambassador to Brazil Henry A. Wise and his family, arriving at Rio de Janeiro on 2 August after making two port visits along the way. She sailed again on 8 September, making port calls at Madagascar, Mozambique, and Zanzibar, and arriving at Sumatra on 1 January 1845. Many of her crew began to suffer from dysentery and fevers, causing several deaths, which led Percival to set course for Singapore, arriving there 8 February. While in Singapore, Commodore Henry Ducie Chads of HMS Cambrian paid a visit to Constitution, offering what medical assistance his squadron could provide. Chads had been the Lieutenant of Java when she surrendered to William Bainbridge 33 years earlier. The relationship between the United States and Brunei began on 6 April, when she was anchored in Brunei Bay in which a Treaty of Peace, Friendship, Commerce and Navigation was formed. Leaving Singapore, Constitution arrived at Turon, Cochinchina (present-day Da Nang, Vietnam), on 10 May. Not long after, Percival was informed that French missionary Dominique Lefèbvre was being held captive under sentence of death. He went ashore with a squad of Marines to speak with the local Mandarin. Percival demanded the return of Lefèbvre and took three local leaders hostage to ensure that his demands were met. When no communication was forthcoming, he ordered the capture of three junks, which were brought to Constitution. He released the hostages after two days, attempting to show good faith towards the Mandarin, who had demanded their return. During a storm, the three junks escaped upriver; a detachment of Marines pursued and recaptured them. The supply of food and water from shore was stopped, and Percival gave in to another demand for the release of the junks in order to keep his ship supplied, expecting Lefèbvre to be released. He soon realized that no return would be made, however, and Percival ordered Constitution to depart on 26 May. She arrived at Canton, China, on 20 June and spent the next six weeks there, while Percival made shore and diplomatic visits. Again the crew suffered from dysentery due to poor drinking water, resulting in three more deaths by the time that she reached Manila on 18 September, spending a week there preparing to enter the Pacific Ocean. She then sailed on 28 September for the Hawaiian Islands, arriving at Honolulu on 16 November. She found Commodore John D. Sloat and his flagship Savannah there; Sloat informed Percival that Constitution was needed in Mexico, as the United States was preparing for war after the Texas annexation. She provisioned for six months and sailed for Mazatlán, arriving there on 13 January 1846. She sat at anchor for more than three months until she was finally allowed to sail for home on 22 April, rounding Cape Horn on 4 July. Arriving in Rio de Janeiro, the ship's party learned that the Mexican War had begun on 13 May, soon after their departure from Mazatlán. She arrived home in Boston on 27 September and was mothballed on 5 October. ### Mediterranean and African Squadrons Constitution began a refitting in 1847 for duty with the Mediterranean Squadron. The figurehead of Andrew Jackson that caused so much controversy 15 years earlier was replaced with another likeness of Jackson, this time without a top hat and with a more Napoleonic pose. Captain John Gwinn commanded her on this voyage, departing on 9 December 1848 and arriving at Tripoli on 19 January 1849. She received King Ferdinand II and Pope Pius IX on board at Gaeta on 1 August, giving them a 21-gun salute. This was the first time that a Pope set foot on American territory or its equivalent. At Palermo on 1 September, Captain Gwinn died of chronic gastritis and was buried near Lazaretto on the 9th. Captain Thomas Conover assumed command on the 18th and resumed routine patrolling for the rest of the tour, heading home on 1 December 1850. She was involved in a severe collision with the English brig Confidence, cutting her in half, which sank with the loss of her captain. The surviving crew members were carried back to America, where Constitution was put in ordinary once again, this time at the Brooklyn Navy Yard, in January 1851. Constitution was recommissioned on 22 December 1852 under the command of John Rudd. She carried Commodore Isaac Mayo for duty with the African Squadron, departing the yard on 2 March 1853 on a leisurely sail towards Africa and arriving there on 18 June. Mayo made a diplomatic visit in Liberia, arranging a treaty between the Gbarbo and the Grebo tribes. Mayo resorted to firing cannons into the village of the Gbarbo in order to get them to agree to the treaty. About 22 June 1854, he arranged another peace treaty, between the leaders of Grahway and Half Cavally. On 31 July 1854, he arranged a compact with the King of Lagos. Constitution took the American ship H.N. Gambrill as a prize near Angola on 3 November. Gambrill was involved in the slave trade and proved to be Constitution's final capture. The rest of her tour passed uneventfully and she sailed for home on 31 March 1855. She was diverted to Havana, Cuba, arriving there on 16 May and departing on the 24th. She arrived at Portsmouth Navy Yard and was decommissioned on 14 June, ending her last duty on the front lines. ### Civil War Since the formation of the US Naval Academy in 1845, there had been a growing need for quarters in which to house the students (midshipmen). In 1857, Constitution was moved to dry dock at the Portsmouth Navy Yard for conversion into a training ship. Some of the earliest known photographs of her were taken during this refitting, which added classrooms on her spar and gun decks and reduced her armament to only 16 guns. Her rating was changed to a "2nd rate ship". She was recommissioned on 1 August 1860 and moved from Portsmouth to the Naval Academy. At the outbreak of the Civil War in April 1861, Constitution was ordered to relocate farther north after threats had been made against her by Confederate sympathizers. Several companies of Massachusetts volunteer soldiers were stationed aboard for her protection. R. R. Cuyler towed her to New York City, where she arrived on 29 April. She was subsequently relocated, along with the Naval Academy, to Fort Adams in Newport, Rhode Island, for the duration of the war. Her sister ship United States was abandoned by the Union and then captured by Confederate forces at the Gosport Shipyard, leaving Constitution the only remaining frigate of the original six. The Navy launched an ironclad on 10 May 1862 as part of the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron, and they bestowed on her the name New Ironsides to honor Constitution's tradition of service. However, New Ironsides' naval career was short, as she was destroyed by fire on 16 December 1865. In August 1865, Constitution moved back to Annapolis, along with the rest of the Naval Academy. During the voyage, she was allowed to drop her tow lines from the tug and continue alone under wind power. Despite her age, she was recorded running at 9 knots (17 km/h; 10 mph) and arrived at Hampton Roads ten hours ahead of the tug. Andersonville Prisoners- "Thorp and his fellow soldiers were transported to Jacksonville, Fla., then on USS Constitution to "Camp Parole" in Annapolis, Md. There, they were issued rations, clothing and back pay before being sent to their respective regimental headquarters for discharge." As Constitution settled in again at the Academy, a series of upgrades was installed that included steam pipes and radiators to supply heat from shore, along with gas lighting. From June to August each year, she would depart with midshipmen for their summer training cruise and then return to operate for the rest of the year as a classroom. In June 1867, her last known plank owner William Bryant died in Maine. George Dewey assumed command in November; he served as her commanding officer until 1870. In 1871, her condition had deteriorated to the point where she was retired as a training ship, and then towed to the Philadelphia Navy Yard, where she was placed in ordinary on 26 September. ### Paris Exposition Constitution was overhauled beginning in 1873 in order to participate in the centennial celebrations of the United States. Work began slowly and was intermittently delayed by the transition of the Philadelphia Navy Yard to League Island. By late 1875, the Navy opened bids for an outside contractor to complete the work, and Constitution was moved to Wood, Dialogue, and Company in May 1876, where a coal bin and a small boiler for heat were installed. The Andrew Jackson figurehead was removed at this time and given to the Naval Academy Museum, where it remains today. Her construction dragged on during the rest of 1876 until the centennial celebrations had long passed, and the Navy decided that she would be used as a training and school ship for apprentices. Oscar C. Badger took command on 9 January 1878 to prepare her for a voyage to the Paris Exposition of 1878, transporting artwork and industrial displays to France. Three railroad cars were lashed to her spar deck and all but two cannons were removed when she departed on 4 March. While docking at Le Havre, she collided with Ville de Paris, which resulted in Constitution entering dry dock for repairs and remaining in France for the rest of 1878. She got underway for the United States on 16 January 1879, but poor navigation ran her aground the next day near Bollard Head, Dorset, United Kingdom. She was refloated with the assistance of the tugs Commodore, Lightning, Lothair, Royal Albert, Malta and Telegraph. She was towed into the Portsmouth Naval Dockyard, Hampshire, England, where only minor damage was found and repaired. Her problem-plagued voyage continued on 13 February when her rudder was damaged during heavy storms, resulting in a total loss of steering control, with the rudder smashing into the hull at random. Three crewmen went over the stern on ropes and boatswain's chairs and secured it. The next morning, they rigged a temporary steering system. Badger set a course for the nearest port, and she arrived in Lisbon on 18 February. Slow dock services delayed her departure until 11 April and her voyage home did not end until 24 May. Carpenter's Mate Henry Williams, Captain of the Top Joseph Matthews, and Captain of the Top James Horton received the Medal of Honor for their actions in repairing the damaged rudder at sea. Constitution returned to her previous duties of training apprentice boys, and Ship's Corporal James Thayer received a Medal of Honor for saving a fellow crew member from drowning on 16 November. Over the next two years, she continued her training cruises, but it soon became apparent that her overhaul in 1876 had been of poor quality, and in 1881 she was determined to be unfit for service. Funds were lacking for another overhaul, so she was decommissioned, ending her days as an active-duty naval ship. She was moved to the Portsmouth Navy Yard and used as a receiving ship. There, she had a housing structure built over her spar deck, and her condition continued to deteriorate, with only a minimal amount of maintenance performed to keep her afloat. In 1896, Massachusetts Congressman John F. Fitzgerald became aware of her condition and proposed to Congress that funds be appropriated to restore her enough to return to Boston. She arrived at the Charlestown Navy Yard under tow on 21 September 1897 and, after her centennial celebrations in October, she lay there with an uncertain future. ## Museum ship In 1900, Congress authorized the restoration of Constitution but did not appropriate any funds for the project; funding was to be raised privately. The Massachusetts Society of the United Daughters of the War of 1812 spearheaded an effort to raise funds, but they ultimately failed. In 1903, the Massachusetts Historical Society's president Charles Francis Adams requested of Congress that Constitution be rehabilitated and placed back into active service. In 1905, Secretary of the Navy Charles Joseph Bonaparte suggested that Constitution be towed out to sea and used as target practice, after which she would be allowed to sink. Moses H. Gulesian read about this in a Boston newspaper; he was a businessman from Worcester, Massachusetts, and he offered to purchase her for \$10,000. The State Department refused, but Gulesian initiated a public campaign which began from Boston and ultimately "spilled all over the country." The storms of protest from the public prompted Congress to authorize \$100,000 in 1906 for the ship's restoration. First to be removed was the barracks structure on her spar deck, but the limited amount of funds allowed just a partial restoration. By 1907, Constitution began to serve as a museum ship, with tours offered to the public. On 1 December 1917, she was renamed Old Constitution to free her name for a planned new Lexington-class battlecruiser. The name Constitution was originally destined for the lead ship of the class, but was shuffled between hulls until CC-5 was given the name; construction of CC-5 was canceled in 1923 due to the Washington Naval Treaty. The incomplete hull was sold for scrap and Old Constitution was granted the return of her name on 24 July 1925. ### 1925 restoration and tour Admiral Edward Walter Eberle, Chief of Naval Operations, ordered the Board of Inspection and Survey to compile a report on her condition, and the inspection of 19 February 1924 found her in grave condition. Water had to be pumped out of her hold every day just to keep her afloat, and her stern was in danger of falling off. Almost all deck areas and structural components were filled with rot, and she was considered to be on the verge of ruin. Yet the Board recommended that she be thoroughly repaired in order to preserve her as long as possible. The estimated cost of repairs was \$400,000. Secretary of the Navy Curtis D. Wilbur proposed to Congress that the required funds be raised privately, and he was authorized to assemble the committee charged with her restoration. The first effort was sponsored by the national Elks Lodge. Programs presented to schoolchildren about "Old Ironsides" encouraged them to donate pennies towards her restoration, eventually raising \$148,000. In the meantime, the estimates for repair began to climb, eventually reaching over \$745,000 after costs of materials were realized. In September 1926, Wilbur began to sell copies of a painting of Constitution at 50 cents per copy. The silent film Old Ironsides portrayed Constitution during the First Barbary War. It premiered in December and helped spur more contributions to her restoration fund. The final campaign allowed memorabilia to be made of her discarded planking and metal. The committee eventually raised more than \$600,000 after expenses, still short of the required amount, and Congress approved up to \$300,000 to complete the restoration. The final cost of the restoration was \$946,000 (). Lieutenant John A. Lord was selected to oversee the reconstruction project, and work began while fund-raising efforts were still underway. Materials were difficult to find, especially the live oak needed; Lord uncovered a long-forgotten stash of live oak (some 1,500 short tons [1,400 t]) at Naval Air Station Pensacola, Florida, that had been cut sometime in the 1850s for a ship-building program that never began. Constitution entered dry dock with a crowd of 10,000 observers on 16 June 1927. Meanwhile, Charles Francis Adams had been appointed as Secretary of the Navy, and he proposed that Constitution make a tour of the United States upon her completion, as a gift to the nation for its efforts to help restore her. She emerged from dry dock on 15 March 1930; approximately 85 percent of the ship had been "renewed" (i.e. replaced) to make her seaworthy. Many amenities were installed to prepare her for the three-year tour of the country, including water piping throughout, modern toilet and shower facilities, electric lighting to make the interior visible for visitors, and several peloruses for ease of navigation. 40 miles (64,000 m) of rigging was made for Constitution at Charlestown Navy Yard ropewalk. Constitution recommissioned on 1 July 1931 under the command of Louis J. Gulliver with a crew of 60 officers and sailors, 15 Marines, and a pet monkey named Rosie as their mascot. The tour began at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, with much celebration and a 21-gun salute, scheduled to visit 90 port cities along the Atlantic, Gulf, and Pacific coasts. Due to the heavy itinerary, she was towed by the minesweeper Grebe. She went as far north as Bar Harbor, Maine, south and into the Gulf of Mexico, then through the Panama Canal Zone, and north again to Bellingham, Washington, on the Pacific Coast. Constitution returned to her home port of Boston in May 1934 after more than 4.6 million people visited her during the three-year tour. ### 1934 return to Boston Constitution returned to serving as a museum ship, receiving 100,000 visitors per year in Boston. She was maintained by a small crew who were berthed on the ship, requiring more reliable heating. The heating was upgraded to a forced-air system in the 1950s, and a sprinkler system was added that protects her from fire. Constitution broke loose from her dock on 21 September 1938 during the New England Hurricane and was blown into Boston Harbor, where she collided with the destroyer Ralph Talbot; she suffered only minor damage. With limited funds available, she experienced more deterioration over the years, and items began to disappear from the ship as souvenir hunters picked away at the more portable objects. Constitution and USS Constellation were recommissioned in 1940 at the request of President Franklin Roosevelt. In early 1941, Constitution was assigned the hull classification symbol IX-21 and began to serve as a brig for officers awaiting court-martial. The United States Postal Service issued a stamp commemorating Constitution in 1947, and an Act of Congress in 1954 made the Secretary of the Navy responsible for her upkeep. ### Restoration In 1970, another survey was performed on her condition, finding that repairs were required but not as extensively as needed in the 1920s. The US Navy determined that a commander was required as commanding officer—typically someone with about 20 years of seniority; this would ensure the experience to organize the maintenance that she required. Funds were approved in 1972 for her restoration, and she entered dry dock in April 1973, remaining until April 1974. During this period, large quantities of red oak were removed and replaced. The red oak had been added in the 1950s as an experiment to see if it would be more durable than the live oak, but it had mostly rotted away by 1970. ### Bicentennial celebrations Commander Tyrone G. Martin became her captain in August 1974, as preparations began for the upcoming United States Bicentennial celebrations. He set the precedent that all construction work on Constitution was to be aimed towards maintaining her to the 1812 configuration for which she is most noted. In September 1975, her hull classification of IX-21 was officially canceled. The privately run USS Constitution Museum opened on 8 April 1976, and Commander Martin dedicated a tract of land as "Constitution Grove" one month later, located at the Naval Surface Warfare Center in Indiana. The 25,000 acres (100 km²) now supply the majority of the white oak required for repair work. On 10 July, Constitution led the parade of tall ships up Boston Harbor for Operation Sail, firing her guns at one-minute intervals for the first time in approximately 100 years. On 11 July, she rendered a 21-gun salute to Her Majesty's Yacht Britannia, as Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip arrived for a state visit. The royal couple were piped aboard and privately toured the ship for approximately 30 minutes with Commander Martin and Secretary of the Navy J. William Middendorf. Upon their departure, the crew of Constitution rendered three cheers for the Queen. Over 900,000 visitors toured "Old Ironsides" that year. ### 1995 reconstruction Constitution entered dry dock in 1992 for an inspection and minor repair period that turned out to be her most comprehensive structural restoration and repair since she was launched in 1797. Multiple refittings over the 200 years of her career had removed most of her original construction components and design, as her mission changed from a fighting warship to a training ship and eventually to a receiving ship. In 1993, the Naval History & Heritage Command Detachment Boston reviewed Humphreys' original plans and identified five main structural components that were required to prevent hogging of the hull, as Constitution had 13 in (330 mm) of hog at that point. Using a 1:16 scale model of the ship, they were able to determine that restoring the original components would result in a 10% increase in hull stiffness. Three hundred scans were completed on her timbers using radiography to find any hidden problems otherwise undetectable from the outside—technology that was unavailable during previous reconstructions. The repair crew used sound-wave testing, aided by the United States Forest Service's Forest Products Laboratory, to determine the condition of the remaining timbers that might have been rotting from the inside. The 13 in (330 mm) of hog was removed from her keel by allowing the ship to settle naturally while in dry dock. The most difficult task was the procurement of timber in the quantity and sizes needed, as was the case during her 1920s restoration as well. The city of Charleston, South Carolina, donated live-oak trees that had been felled by Hurricane Hugo in 1989, and the International Paper Company donated live oak from its own property. The project continued to reconstruct her to 1812 specifications, even as she remained open to visitors who were allowed to observe the process and converse with workers. The \$12 million project was completed in 1995. ### Sailing on 200th anniversary As early as 1991, Commander David Cashman had suggested that Constitution should sail to celebrate her 200th anniversary in 1997 rather than being towed. The proposal was approved, though it was thought to be a large undertaking since she had not sailed in over 100 years. When she emerged from dry dock in 1995, a more serious effort began to prepare her for sail. As in the 1920s, education programs aimed at school children helped collect pennies to purchase the sails to make the voyage possible. Her six-sail battle configuration consisted of jibs, topsails, and driver. Commander Mike Beck began training the crew for the historic sail using an 1819 Navy sailing manual and several months of practice, including time spent aboard the Coast Guard cutter Eagle. On 20 July, Constitution was towed from her usual berth in Boston to an overnight mooring in Marblehead, Massachusetts. En route, she made her first sail in 116 years, at a recorded 6 knots (11 km/h; 6.9 mph). On 21 July, she was towed 5 nautical miles (9.3 km; 5.8 mi) offshore, where the tow line was dropped and Commander Beck ordered six sails set (jibs, topsails, and spanker). She then sailed for 40 minutes on a south-south-east course with true wind speeds of about 12 kn (22 km/h; 14 mph), attaining a top recorded speed of 4 kn (7.4 km/h; 4.6 mph). Her modern US naval combatant escorts were the guided-missile destroyer Ramage and frigate Halyburton. They rendered passing honors to "Old Ironsides" while she was under sail, and she was overflown by the US Navy Flight Demonstration Squadron, the Blue Angels. Inbound to her permanent berth at Charlestown, she rendered a 21-gun salute to the nation off Fort Independence in Boston Harbor. ## Present day The mission of Constitution is to promote understanding of the Navy's role in war and peace through active participation in public events and education through outreach programs, public access, and historic demonstration. Her crew of approximately 75 US Navy sailors participate in ceremonies, educational programs, and special events while keeping the ship open to visitors year-round and providing free tours. The crewmen are all active-duty members of the US Navy, and the assignment is considered to be special duty. She entered dry dock in May 2015 for a scheduled restoration, before returning to sea. Constitution is berthed at Pier One of the former Charlestown Navy Yard, at the terminus of Boston's Freedom Trail. She is open to the public year-round. The privately run USS Constitution Museum is nearby, located in a restored shipyard building at the foot of Pier Two. Constitution typically makes at least one "turnaround cruise" each year, during which she is towed into Boston Harbor to perform underway demonstrations, including a gun drill; she then returns to her dock in the opposite direction to ensure that she weathers evenly. The "turnaround cruise" is open to the general public based on a "lottery draw" of interested persons each year. The Naval History and Heritage Command Detachment Boston is responsible for planning and performing her maintenance, repair, and restoration, keeping her as close as possible to her 1812 configuration. The detachment estimates that approximately 10–15 percent of the timber in Constitution contains original material installed during her initial construction period in the years 1795–1797. The Navy maintains Constitution Grove at Naval Surface Warfare Center Crane Division near Bloomington, Indiana to ensure a supply of mature white oak. In 2003, the special effects crew from the production of Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World spent several days using Constitution as a computer model for the fictional French frigate Acheron, using stem-to-stern digital image scans of "Old Ironsides". Lieutenant Commander John Scivier of the Royal Navy, commanding officer of HMS Victory, paid a visit to Constitution in November 2007, touring the local facilities with Commander William A. Bullard III. They discussed arranging an exchange program between the two ships. Constitution emerged from a three-year repair period in November 2010. During this time, the entire spar deck was stripped down to the support beams, and the decking overhead was replaced to restore its original curvature, allowing water to drain overboard and not remain standing on the deck. In addition to decking repairs, 50 hull planks and the main hatch were repaired or replaced. The restoration continued the focus toward keeping her appearance of 1812 by replacing her upper sides so that she now resembles what she looked like after her triumph over Guerriere, when she gained her nickname "Old Ironsides". The crew of Constitution under Commander Matt Bonner sailed Constitution under her own power on 19 August 2012, the anniversary of her victory over Guerriere. Bonner was Constitution's 72nd commanding officer. On 18 May 2015, the ship entered Dry Dock 1 in Charlestown Navy Yard to begin a two-year restoration program. The restoration planned to restore the copper sheets on the ship's hull and replace deck boards. The Department of the Navy provided the \$12–15 million expected cost. After the restoration was complete, she was returned to the water on 23 July 2017. In November 2017, Commander Nathaniel R. Shick relieved Commander Robert S. Gerosa Jr., who had spent most of his command while the ship was dry docked, in a ceremony held on board Constitution, to become the ship's 75th commanding officer. On 29 February 2020, Shick was succeeded as commanding officer by Commander John Benda. On 17 January 2022, Billie J. Farrell became the first woman to command Constitution. ### Image gallery ## Commanders Since she was first launched in 1797, there have been 77 commanders of Constitution.

Black honeyeater

Bird in the family Meliphagidae endemic to Australia

The black honeyeater (Sugomel nigrum) is a species of bird in the honeyeater family Meliphagidae. The black honeyeater exhibits sexual dimorphism, with the male being black and white while the female is a speckled grey-brown; immature birds look like the female. The species is endemic to Australia, and ranges widely across the arid areas of the continent, through open woodland and shrubland, particularly in areas where the emu bush and related species occur. A nectar feeder, the black honeyeater has a long curved bill to reach the base of tubular flowers such as those of the emu bush. It also takes insects in the air, and regularly eats ash left behind at campfires. Cup-shaped nests are built in the forks of small trees or shrubs. The male engages in a soaring song flight in the mating season, but contributes little to nest-building or incubating the clutch of two or three eggs. Both sexes feed and care for the young. While the population appears to be decreasing, the black honeyeater is sufficiently numerous and widespread and hence is considered to be of least concern on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN)'s Red List of Endangered species. ## Taxonomy The black honeyeater was first described by English naturalist John Gould in 1838 as Myzomela nigra, using as the specific epithet the Latin adjective niger 'black'. The genus name was derived from the Ancient Greek words myzo 'to suckle' and meli 'honey', and referred to the bird's nectivorous habits. Italian ornithologist Tommaso Salvadori described it as Glyciphila nisoria in 1878, though he incorrectly wrote that it originated in New Guinea. In the 1913 Official Checklist of the Birds of Australia, Australian amateur ornithologist Gregory Mathews placed the black honeyeater in the genus Cissomela with the banded honeyeater. He then placed it in its own genus Sugomel in 1922, the name being derived from the Latin sugo 'suck', and mel 'honey'. In 1967 ornithologist Finn Salomonsen transferred the species from Myzomela to the genus Certhionyx, which also contained the banded honeyeater (Certhionyx pectoralis) and pied honeyeater (Certhionyx variegatus), and later authorities accepted this classification. Australian ornithologists Richard Schodde and Ian J. Mason kept the three in the same genus, but conceded the basis for this was weak and classified each species in its own subgenus—Sugomel for the black honeyeater. In a 2004 genetic study of nuclear and mitochondrial DNA of honeyeaters, the three species classified in the genus Certhionyx were found not to be closely related to one another. Instead, the black honeyeater was closely related to species within Myzomela after all. However, it was an early offshoot and quite divergent genetically, leading study authors Amy Driskell and Les Christidis to recommend it be placed in its own genus rather than returned to Myzomela. It was subsequently moved to the resurrected genus Sugomel. A 2017 genetic study using both mitochondrial and nuclear DNA indicated that the ancestor of the black honeyeater diverged from that of the scaly-crowned honeyeater (Lichmera lombokia at the time, also reclassified into Sugomel in 2022) just under a million years ago, and that the two have some affinities with the genus Myzomela. It is identified as Sugomel niger by the International Ornithological Committee's (IOC) Birdlist. Mathews described two subspecies—Myzomela nigra westralensis from Western Australia on the basis of smaller size and darker plumage, and Myzomela nigra ashbyi from Mount Barker, South Australia, on the basis of larger size and paler plumage—neither of which is regarded as distinct today. DNA analysis has shown the honeyeater family Meliphagidae to be related to the Pardalotidae (pardalotes), Acanthizidae (Australian warblers, scrubwrens, thornbills, etc.), and the Maluridae (Australian fairy-wrens) in a large superfamily Meliphagoidea. The Papuan black myzomela, (Myzomela nigrita), found in Indonesia and Papua New Guinea is also known as the black honeyeater. It is a different but related species. Black honeyeater has been adopted as the official name by the IOC. It is also known as the charcoal bird from collecting ashes after campfires. ## Description The black honeyeater has a long, slender, down-curved bill, a small rounded head and slender neck set on a plump body, and a short, slightly cleft tail. It is between 10 and 13 cm (3.9 and 5.1 in) long, with an average wingspan of around 19 cm (7.5 in) and a weight of 9.5 g (0.34 oz). It has relatively long, pointed wings for a honeyeater, and very long wings for such a small bird, the development of which has been attributed to its feeding behaviour of flying between shrubs and hovering over flowers. The species is strongly sexually dimorphic. Adult males are black and white, with a black head, neck, wings and upperparts, and a black stripe running down from the centre of the chest to the abdomen, and with a white belly, flanks and under-tail coverts. The female's crown, ear coverts and upper parts are buff brown, scalloped paler, with a pale eyebrow, and the chest is speckled grey-brown grading into a dull white belly. In both male and female the iris is dark brown and the bill and legs blackish brown. Immature birds are similar to the adult female; however, the upper breast and throat tend to be more uniform grey-brown and the base of the bill is paler; they are not distinguishable from adult females at a distance. The black honeyeater is quiet when not breeding, but calls before and during the nesting season, often early in the morning. The calls include a soft metallic "chwit, chwit"; a louder note, a "tieee", with a monotonously even pitch and spacing at intervals of several seconds between notes; and a weak "peeee", usually uttered by breeding males. A soft scolding call is given by both sexes after the young hatch, which may be a call to alert the young they have food. The species is also heard making a bill snap when hawking insects. It is constantly on the move, hovering and hawking when feeding, and chasing intruders at food sources. Gould described its flight as "remarkably quick, and performed with zigzag starts". ## Distribution and habitat The black honeyeater is a bird of the dry inland of Australia, being generally widespread though scattered in western Queensland and New South Wales to the South Australian border, and occasionally recorded in the Victorian Mallee and Wimmera regions. In South Australia, it occurs in the south-east and it is widespread in the central and northern regions of Western Australia, with some rare sightings in the south near Kalgoorlie. In the Northern Territory, it is widespread around Alice Springs, with some vagrants to the Top End. It is dependent on the presence of the berrigan emu bush (Eremophila longifolia) and related species. As a result, the black honeyeater is found in open woodlands and shrublands of arid and semi-arid regions, as well as in mulga or mallee woodlands, and it is also found in spinifex savanna where flowering shrubs such as grevilleas and paperbarks occur. It has been noted that the black honeyeater is able to locate emu bushes, even when clumps consist of only two or three and are separated by many kilometres of country, which suggests the importance of this plant–bird association. The black honeyeater is considered to be migratory rather than strictly nomadic, with regular seasonal movements related to flowering of food plants, especially the emu bush. Some move south in the Southern Hemisphere spring and summer, and northwards again in autumn and winter. During severe droughts it has been recorded south of Bendigo and in the Hunter Region. Irruptions (sudden population increases) can occur in some areas after rain or the movement of floodwaters. Breeding has generally been recorded in the drainage basins of Cooper Creek and the Darling River in southwestern Queensland and northwestern New South Wales, as well as in the Pilbara and Gascoyne regions in Western Australia. However, favourable conditions may result in it breeding anywhere during an irruption. ## Behaviour The black honeyeater is usually encountered alone or in pairs, though up to 50 may gather at stands of plants in flower. ### Breeding The breeding season is from July to December (mostly between August and November), or opportunistically after rain. There is apparently some variation based upon location, with birds in Western Australia nesting earlier, whilst those in Queensland breed as late as March. Black honeyeater populations concentrate for breeding wherever the right plants are in flower and there is an abundance of insects, both essential for feeding the young. At the beginning of the mating season, males can be seen soaring in "song flights", which consist of a series of zigzagging movements, high into the air, accompanied by constant calling. The birds appear to stiffen themselves, with wings pointed downward, as they rise, while uttering a two-note call. Black honeyeaters gather into loose groups of up to fifty birds during the breeding season, with only several pairs within the group breeding. The males agonistically defend a small breeding territory against members of their own species as well as other honeyeaters. Both members of the pair seem to be involved in selecting the nest site. The nest is usually low on a dead limb or in a fork of a small tree or shrub, though sometimes fallen timber is chosen as the nest site. The female gathers nesting material close to the nest site, while the male is engaged in song flights, and she builds the shallow, open, cup-shaped nest from fine twigs, grass, and other plant material bound with spiderweb, lining it with grass, roots, fibre, horse hair, flowers, or wool. As the young grow, the nest can become flattened to a saucer shape, and may be an almost flat platform by the time the chicks fledge. The female lays two to three eggs, which are 15 mm (0.6 in) long, 12 mm (0.5 in) wide and have an unusual swollen oval shape. The eggs are slightly lustrous, buffy white in colour and dotted with reddish-brown and grey blotches that often appear in a cloud over the larger end of the eggs. Black honeyeater nests are occasionally parasitised by Horsfield's bronze-cuckoo (Chrysococcyx basalis). The female incubates alone, leaving the eggs exposed for short periods during the day to take insects in the air. When approached, the sitting bird attempts to hide by sinking into the nest and, if unsuccessful in deterring the intruder, will tumble to the ground with outstretched wings, giving weak calls in an effort to lure the intruder away from the nest. While the female is incubating, the male remains on guard at one of several regular vantage points. The incubation period is around sixteen days, and the fledging period approximately eighteen days. On hatching, the young birds' eyes are closed, and they are naked except for tufts of down on the head, nape and back. Both sexes feed and care for the young, taking all the insects for the young birds in the air. At one nest, two small young were fed every ten minutes or so, with the male bringing food three to four times more often than the female. All birds leave the vicinity of the nesting site within a few days of the young fledging. ### Food and feeding The black honeyeater feeds on nectar, probing flowers and foliage with its long, fine bill. It is mainly found in the crowns of eucalypts, at clumps of mistletoe or in shrubs, especially emu bushes (Eremophila). Observations over a twelve-month period in South Australia recorded black honeyeaters visiting the flowers of berrigan emu bush, twin-leaf emu bush (Eremophila oppositifolia), lerp mallee (Eucalyptus incrassata), and holly grevillea (Grevillea ilicifolia). The species was also frequently observed hawking for small insects. The black honeyeater hovers around flowers, feeding briefly at each one. It may sometimes form large mixed flocks at food sources, associating with other birds such as pied honeyeaters and white-browed woodswallows (Artamus superciliosus). Like many other honeyeaters, the black honeyeater catches insects in flight. The male, in particular, flies up to a height of 15 metres (50 ft) to seize an insect in mid-air, and then drops to a regularly used perch. A study of black honeyeaters at seven sites in Western Australia regularly recorded breeding females eating ash from campsite fires and often making repeated visits over a brief period of time. It was noted that the birds seemed attracted to the remote campfire with groups of around six hovering around and landing beside the fire, an activity described as similar to "bees buzzing around a honeypot". After pecking at the ash, some of the females foraged for insects, sallying from the foliage of nearby Wheatbelt wandoos (Eucalyptus capillosa) before returning for more ash. The activity of the females approaching the fire ranged from a single peck to sustained feeding for a minute or more. Male birds occasionally landed near the fire, but none were seen to take ash. Well-developed brood patches on the birds mist netted near the fires, suggest that the females take ash around the time of laying, and throughout the incubation and feeding period. Wood ash is rich in calcium and it was hypothesised that the females were eating ash to form medullary bone before egg-laying or to repair a calcium deficit after laying. When other small birds, such as American hummingbirds, were recorded eating calcium-rich ash, bones or shell, it was suggested that the bones of small species may not be able to store enough calcium for egg production. ## Conservation status Despite the fact that the population trend appears to be decreasing, the decline is not believed to be particularly rapid; the current population seems to be of sufficient numbers, and the species has a sufficiently large range, for the species to be evaluated as a species of least concern by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN). However, biologist Claire A. Runge and colleagues observed that the black honeyeaters' range across inland Australia contracted after years of low rainfall and showed a slow and incomplete recovery even after several years. They added that although nomadic species such as the black honeyeater may have a large distribution, they are often habitat specialists and hence may occupy only a small area within their range. Thus the risk of extinction of these species may be underestimated. The black honeyeater may be adversely affected by the loss of the emu bush due to grazing and weed control by farmers.

Star Trek: The Motion Picture

1979 American science fiction film

Star Trek: The Motion Picture is a 1979 American science fiction film directed by Robert Wise and based on the television series Star Trek created by Gene Roddenberry, who also served as its producer. It is the first installment in the Star Trek film series, and stars the cast of the original television series. In the film, set in the 2270s, a mysterious and immensely powerful alien cloud known as V'Ger approaches Earth, destroying everything in its path. Admiral James T. Kirk (William Shatner) assumes command of the recently refitted Starship USS Enterprise, to lead it on a mission to save the planet and determine V'Ger's origins. When the original television series was canceled in 1969, Roddenberry lobbied Paramount Pictures to continue the franchise through a feature film. The success of the series in syndication convinced the studio to begin work on the film in 1975. A series of writers attempted to craft a "suitably epic" script, but the attempts did not satisfy Paramount, and in 1977, the project was scrapped. Instead, Paramount planned on returning the franchise to its roots, with a new television series titled Star Trek: Phase II. The box office success of Close Encounters of the Third Kind, however, convinced Paramount that science fiction films other than Star Wars could do well, so the studio canceled production of Phase II and resumed its attempts at making a Star Trek film. In March 1978, Paramount assembled the largest press conference held at the studio since the 1950s to announce that Wise would direct a \$15 million film adaptation of the original television series. Filming began that August and concluded the following January. With the cancellation of Phase II, writers rushed to adapt its planned pilot episode, "In Thy Image", into a film script. Constant revisions to the story and the shooting script continued to the extent of hourly script updates on shooting dates. The Enterprise was modified inside and out, costume designer Robert Fletcher provided new uniforms, and production designer Harold Michelson fabricated new sets. Jerry Goldsmith composed the film's score, beginning an association with Star Trek that would continue until 2002. When the original contractors for the optical effects proved unable to complete their tasks in time, effects supervisor Douglas Trumbull was asked to meet the film's December 1979 release date. Wise took the just-completed film to its Washington, D.C., opening, but always felt that the final theatrical version was a rough cut of the film he wanted to make. Released in North America on December 7, 1979, Star Trek: The Motion Picture received mixed reviews, many of which faulted it for a lack of action scenes and over-reliance on special effects. Its final production cost ballooned to approximately \$44 million, and it earned \$139 million worldwide, short of studio expectations but enough for Paramount to propose a less expensive sequel. Roddenberry was forced out of creative control for the sequel, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan (1982). In 2001, Wise oversaw a director's cut for a special DVD release of the film, with remastered audio, tightened and added scenes, and new computer-generated effects. ## Plot In the 23rd century, a Starfleet monitoring station, Epsilon Nine, detects an alien entity, hidden in a massive cloud of energy, moving through space toward Earth. The cloud easily destroys three Klingon warships and Epsilon Nine on its course. On Earth, the starship Enterprise is undergoing a major refit; its former commanding officer, James T. Kirk, has been promoted to Admiral. Starfleet Command assigns Enterprise to intercept the cloud entity, as the ship is the only one within range, requiring its new systems to be tested in transit. Citing his experience, Kirk uses his authority to take command of the ship, angering Captain Willard Decker, who has been overseeing the refit as its new commanding officer. Testing of Enterprise's new systems goes poorly; two officers, including the ship's Vulcan science officer Sonak, are killed by a malfunctioning transporter, and improperly calibrated engines nearly destroy the ship. Kirk's unfamiliarity with the ship's new systems increases the tension between him and Decker, who has been temporarily demoted to commander and first officer. Commander Spock arrives as a replacement science officer, explaining that while on his home world undergoing a ritual to purge himself of emotion, he felt a consciousness that he believes emanates from the cloud, making him unable to complete the ritual because his human half felt an emotional connection to it. Enterprise intercepts the energy cloud and is attacked by an alien vessel within. A probe appears on the bridge, attacks Spock, and abducts the navigator, Ilia. She is replaced by a robotic replica, sent by the entity, which calls itself "V'Ger", to study the "carbon units" on the ship. Decker is distraught over the loss of Ilia, with whom he had a romantic history, and becomes troubled as he attempts to extract information from the doppelgänger, which has Ilia's memories and feelings buried inside. Spock takes an unauthorized spacewalk to the vessel's interior and attempts a telepathic mind meld with it. In doing so, he learns that the entire vessel is V'Ger, a non-biological living machine. At the center of the massive ship, V'Ger is revealed to be Voyager 6, a 20th-century Earth space probe believed lost in a black hole. The damaged probe was found by an alien race of living machines that interpreted its programming as instructions to learn all that can be learned and return that information to its creator. The machines upgraded the probe to fulfill its mission, and on its journey, the probe gathered so much knowledge that it achieved sentience. Spock discovers that V'Ger lacks the ability to give itself a purpose other than its original mission; having learned everything it could on its journey home, it finds its existence meaningless. Before transmitting all its information, V'Ger insists that the "Creator" come in person to finish the sequence. The Enterprise crew realizes humans are the Creator. Decker offers himself to V'Ger; he merges with the Ilia probe and V'Ger, creating a new life form that disappears into space. With Earth saved, Kirk directs Enterprise out to space for future missions. ## Cast - William Shatner as James T. Kirk, the former captain of the USS Enterprise and an Admiral at Starfleet headquarters. When asked during a March 1978 press conference about what it would be like to reprise the role, Shatner said, "An actor brings to a role not only the concept of a character but his own basic personality, things that he is, and both [Leonard Nimoy] and myself have changed over the years, to a degree at any rate, and we will bring that degree of change inadvertently to the role we recreate." - Leonard Nimoy as Spock, the Enterprise's half-Vulcan, half-human science officer. Nimoy had been dissatisfied with unpaid royalties from Star Trek and did not intend to reprise the role, so Spock was left out of the screenplay. Director Robert Wise, having been informed by his daughter and son-in-law that the film "would not be Star Trek" without Nimoy, sent Jeffrey Katzenberg to New York City to meet Nimoy. Describing Star Trek without Nimoy as buying a car without wheels, Katzenberg gave Nimoy a check to make up for his lost royalties, later recalling himself "on my knees begging" the actor during their meeting at a restaurant to join the film; Nimoy attended the March 1978 press conference with the rest of the returning cast. Nimoy was dissatisfied with the script, and his meeting with Katzenberg led to an agreement that the final script would need Nimoy's approval. Financial issues notwithstanding, Nimoy said he was comfortable with being identified as Spock because it had a positive impact on his fame. - DeForest Kelley as Leonard McCoy, the chief medical officer aboard the Enterprise. Kelley had reservations about the script, feeling that the characters and relationships from the series were not in place. Along with Shatner and Nimoy, Kelley lobbied for greater characterization, but their opinions were largely ignored. - James Doohan as Montgomery Scott, the Enterprise's chief engineer. Doohan created the distinctive Klingon vocabulary heard in the film. Linguist Marc Okrand later developed a fully realized Klingon language based on the actor's made-up words. - Walter Koenig as Pavel Chekov, the Enterprise's weapons officer. Koenig noted that the expected sense of camaraderie and euphoria at being assembled for screen tests at the start of the picture was nonexistent. "This may be Star Trek," he wrote, "but it isn't the old Star Trek." The actor was hopeful for the film, but admitted he was disappointed by his character's bit part. - Nichelle Nichols as Uhura, the communications officer aboard the Enterprise. Nichols noted in her autobiography that she was one of the actors most opposed to the new uniforms added for the film because the drab, unisex look "wasn't Uhura". - George Takei as Hikaru Sulu, the Enterprise's helmsman. In his autobiography, Takei described the film's shooting schedule as "astonishingly luxurious", but noted that frequent script rewrites during production "usually favored Bill" [Shatner]. - Persis Khambatta as Ilia, the Deltan navigator of the Enterprise. Khambatta was originally cast in the role when The Motion Picture was a television pilot. She took the role despite Roddenberry warning her that she would have to shave her head completely for filming. - Stephen Collins as Willard Decker, the new captain of the Enterprise. He is temporarily demoted to Commander and First Officer when Kirk takes command of the Enterprise. He was the only actor that Robert Wise cast; Collins recalled that although "every young actor in Hollywood" auditioned he benefited by being completely unfamiliar with the franchise, more interested in meeting the legendary director than in the role. Others advised him after being cast that Star Trek "is going to be in your life your whole life". Kelley's dressing room was next to Collins', and the older actor became his mentor for the production. Collins described filming as akin to "playing with somebody else's bat, ball, and glove" because he was not a part of the franchise's history. He used the feeling of being an "invader" to portray Decker, who is "an outsider who they had to have along". Other actors from the television series who returned included Majel Barrett as Christine Chapel, a doctor aboard the Enterprise, and Grace Lee Whitney as Janice Rand, formerly one of Kirk's yeomen. David Gautreaux, who had been cast as Xon in the aborted second television series, appears as Branch, the commander of the Epsilon 9 communications station. Mark Lenard portrays the Klingon commander in the film's opening sequence; the actor also played Spock's father, Sarek, in the television series and in later feature films. ## Production ### Early development The original Star Trek television series ran for three seasons from 1966 to 1969 on NBC. The show was never a hit with network executives, and due to low Nielsen ratings, the show was cancelled after the third season. After the show's cancellation, owner Paramount Pictures hoped to recoup their production losses by selling the syndication rights. The series went into reruns in the autumn (September/October) of 1969, and by the late 1970s had been sold in over 150 domestic and 60 international markets. The show developed a cult following, and rumors of reviving the franchise began. The series’ creator Gene Roddenberry had first proposed a Star Trek feature at the 1968 World Science Fiction Convention. The movie was to have been set before the television series, showing how the crew of the Enterprise met. The popularity of the syndicated Star Trek caused Paramount and Roddenberry to begin developing the film in May 1975. Roddenberry was allocated \$3 to \$5 million to develop a script. By June 30, he had produced what he considered an acceptable script, but studio executives disagreed. This first draft, The God Thing, featured a grounded Admiral Kirk assembling the old crew on the refitted Enterprise to clash with a godlike entity many miles across, hurtling towards Earth. The object turns out to be a super-advanced computer, the remains of a scheming race who were cast out of their dimension. Kirk wins out, the entity returns to its dimension, and the Enterprise crew resumes their voyages. The basic premise and scenes such as a transporter accident and Spock's Vulcan ritual were discarded, but later returned to the script. The film was postponed until spring (March/April) 1976 while Paramount fielded new scripts for Star Trek II (the working title) from acclaimed writers such as Ray Bradbury, Theodore Sturgeon, and Harlan Ellison. Ellison's story had a snake-like alien race tampering with Earth's history to create a kindred race; Kirk reunites with his old crew, but they are faced with the dilemma of killing off the reptilian race in Earth's prehistory just to maintain humanity's dominance. When Ellison presented his idea, an executive suggested that Ellison read Chariots of the Gods? and include the Maya civilization into his story, which enraged the writer because he knew Maya did not exist at the dawn of time. By October 1976, Robert Silverberg had been signed to work on the screenplay along with a second writer, John D. F. Black, whose treatment featured a black hole that threatened to consume all of existence. Roddenberry teamed up with Jon Povill to write a new story that featured the Enterprise crew setting an altered universe right by time travel; like Black's idea, Paramount did not consider it epic enough. The film was the first major Hollywood adaptation of a television series that had been off the air for nearly a decade to retain its original principal cast. The actors—who had agreed to appear in the new movie, with contracts as-yet unsigned pending script approval—grew anxious about the constant delays, and pragmatically accepted other acting offers while Roddenberry worked with Paramount. The studio decided to turn the project over to the television division, reasoning that since the roots of the franchise lay in television, the writers would be able to develop the right script. A number of screenwriters offered up ideas that were summarily rejected. As Paramount executives' interest in the film waned, Roddenberry, backed by fan letters, applied pressure to the studio. In June 1976, Paramount assigned Jerry Isenberg, a young and active producer, to be executive producer of the project, with the budget expanded to \$8 million. Povill was tasked with finding more writers to develop a script. His list included Edward Anhalt, James Goldman, Francis Ford Coppola, George Lucas, Ernest Lehman, and Robert Bloch. To cap off his list, Povill put as his last recommendation "Jon Povill—almost credit: Star Trek II story (with Roddenberry). Will be a big shot some day. Should be hired now while he is cheap and humble." The result was a list of 34 names, none of whom were chosen to pen the script. Finally, British screenwriters Chris Bryant and Allan Scott, who had penned the Donald Sutherland thriller Don't Look Now, were hired to write a script. Bryant believed he earned the screenwriting assignment because his view of Kirk resembled what Roddenberry modeled him on: "one of Horatio Nelson's captains in the South Pacific, six months away from home and three months away by communication". Povill also wrote up a list of possible directors, including Coppola, Steven Spielberg, Lucas, and Robert Wise, but all were busy at the time (or unwilling to work on the small budget). Philip Kaufman signed on to direct and was given a crash course in the series. Roddenberry screened ten episodes from the original series for him, including the most representative of the show and those he considered most popular: "The City on the Edge of Forever", "The Devil in the Dark", "Amok Time", "Journey to Babel", "Shore Leave", "The Trouble with Tribbles", "The Enemy Within", "The Corbomite Maneuver", "This Side of Paradise", and "A Piece of the Action". Early work was promising, and by the fall of 1976, the project was building momentum. During this time, fans organized a mail campaign that flooded the White House with letters, influencing Gerald Ford to rechristen the Space Shuttle Constitution the Enterprise, and Roddenberry and most of the Star Trek cast were present for its rollout. On October 8, 1976, Bryant and Scott delivered a 20-page treatment, Planet of the Titans, which executives Barry Diller, Jeffrey Katzenberg and Michael Eisner liked. In it, Kirk and his crew encounter beings they believe to be the mythical Titans and travel back millions of years in time, accidentally teaching early man to make fire. Planet of the Titans also explored the concept of the third eye. With the studio's acceptance of this treatment, Roddenberry immediately stopped work on other projects to refocus on Star Trek, and the screenwriters and Isenberg were deluged with grateful fan mail. Isenberg began scouting filming locations and hired designers and illustrators. Key among these were famed production designer Ken Adam, who said, "I was approached by Gene Roddenberry and we got on like a house on fire"; he was employed to design the film. Adam hired artist Ralph McQuarrie, fresh off the yet to be released Star Wars. They worked on designs for planets, planetary and asteroid bases, a black hole "shroud", a crystalline "super brain", and new concepts for the Enterprise, including interiors that Adam later revisited for the film Moonraker and a flat-hulled starship design (frequently credited to McQuarrie, but which McQuarrie's own book identifies as an Adam design). McQuarrie wrote that "there was no script" and that much of the work was "winging it". When that film folded after three months for Adam and "a month and a half" for McQuarrie, their concepts were shelved, although a handful of them were revisited in later productions. The first draft of the completed script was not finished until March 1, 1977, and it was described as "a script by committee" and rejected by the studio a few weeks later. Bryant and Scott had been caught between Roddenberry and Kaufman's conflicting ideas of what the film should be and Paramount's indecision. Feeling it was "physically impossible" to produce a script that satisfied all parties, they left the project by mutual consent on March 18, 1977. "We begged to be fired." Kaufman reconceived the story with Spock as the captain of his own ship and featuring Toshiro Mifune as Spock's Klingon nemesis, but on May 8 Katzenberg informed the director that the film was canceled, less than three weeks before Star Wars was released. ### Phase II and restart Barry Diller had grown concerned by the direction Star Trek had taken in Planet of the Titans, and suggested to Roddenberry that it was time to take the franchise back to its roots as a television series. Diller planned on a new Star Trek series forming the cornerstone for a new television network. Though Paramount was reluctant to abandon its work on the film, Roddenberry wanted to bring many of the production staff from the original series to work on the new show, titled Star Trek: Phase II. Producer Harold Livingston was assigned to find writers for new episodes, while Roddenberry prepared a writers' guide briefing the uninitiated on the franchise canon. Of the original cast, only Leonard Nimoy stated he would not return. To replace Spock, Roddenberry created a logical Vulcan prodigy named Xon. Since Xon was too young to fill the role of first officer, Roddenberry developed Commander William Decker, and later added Ilia. The new series' pilot episode "In Thy Image" was based on a two-page outline by Roddenberry about a NASA probe returning to Earth, having gained sentience. Alan Dean Foster wrote a treatment for the pilot, which Livingston turned into a teleplay. When the script was presented to Michael Eisner, he declared it worthy of a feature film. At the same time, the success of Close Encounters of the Third Kind showed Paramount that the box office success of Star Wars could be repeated. On November 11, just two and a half weeks before production on Phase II was due to start, the studio announced that the television series had been canceled in favor of a new feature film. Cast and crew who had been hired that Monday were laid off by Friday, and construction came to a halt. Production was moved to April 1978 so that the necessary scripts, sets, and wardrobe could be upgraded. On March 28, 1978, Paramount assembled the largest press conference held at the studio since Cecil B. DeMille announced he was making The Ten Commandments. Eisner announced that Academy Award-winning director Robert Wise would direct a film adaptation of the television series titled Star Trek—The Motion Picture. Wise had seen only a few Star Trek episodes, so Paramount gave him about a dozen to watch. The budget was projected at \$15 million. Dennis Clark (Comes a Horseman) was invited to rewrite the script and to include Spock, but he disliked Roddenberry, who demanded sole credit. Livingston returned as writer, and though he also found Roddenberry unreasonable, Wise and Katzenberg convinced him to continue rewriting the script throughout production. The writers began to adapt "In Thy Image" into a film script, but it was not completed until four months after production commenced. Wise felt that the story was sound, but the action and visuals could be made more exciting. As the intended start of filming in late spring 1978 approached, it was clear a new start date was needed. Time was of the essence; Paramount was worried that their science fiction film would appear at the tail end of a cycle, now that every major studio had such a film in the works. Livingston described the writers' issue with the story, calling it "unworkable": > We had a marvelous antagonist, so omnipotent that for us to defeat it or even communicate with it, or have any kind of relationship with it, made the initial concept of the story false. Here's this gigantic machine that's a million years further advanced than we are. Now, how the hell can we possibly deal with this? On what level? As the story developed, everything worked until the very end. How do you resolve this thing? If humans can defeat this marvelous machine, it's really not so great, is it? Or if it really is great, will we like those humans who do defeat it? Should they defeat it? Who is the story's hero anyway? That was the problem. We experimented with all kinds of approaches...we didn't know what to do with the ending. We always ended up against a blank wall. Koenig described the state of the script at the start of filming as a three-act screenplay without a third act. Because of likely changes, actors were at first told to not memorize the last third of the script, which received constant input from actors and producers. Shatner noted, for example, that Kirk would say "Mr. Sulu, take the conn", while Nimoy visited Livingston's home each night to discuss the next day's script. Scenes were rewritten so often it became necessary to note on script pages the hour of the revision. Povill credited Nimoy with the single tear scene, and the discussion of V'Ger's need to evolve. Much of the rewriting had to do with the relationships of Kirk and Spock, Decker and Ilia, and the Enterprise and V'ger. Though changes were constant, the most difficult part of the script was what Shatner described as the "jigsaw puzzle" of the ending. A final draft of the third act was approved in late September 1978, but had it not been for a Penthouse interview where NASA scientist Robert Jastrow said that mechanical forms of life were likely, the ending might not have been approved at all. By March 1979, fewer than 20 pages from the original 150 in the screenplay had been retained. ### Design The first new sets (intended for Phase II) were constructed beginning July 25, 1977. The fabrication was supervised by Joseph Jennings, an art director involved in the original television series, special effects expert Jim Rugg, and former Trek designer Matt Jefferies, on loan as consultant from Little House on the Prairie. When the television series was canceled and plans for a film put into place, new sets were needed for the large 70 mm film format. Wise asked Harold Michelson to be the film's production designer, and Michelson was put to work on finishing the incomplete Phase II sets. He began with the bridge, which had nearly been completed. Michelson first removed Chekov's new weapons station, a semicircular plastic bubble grafted onto one side of the bridge wall. The idea for Phase II was that Chekov would have looked out toward space while cross-hairs in the bubble tracked targets. Wise instead wanted Chekov's station to face the Enterprise's main viewer, a difficult request as the set was primarily circular. Production illustrator Michael Minor created a new look for the station using a flat edge in the corner of the set. The bridge ceiling was redesigned, with Michelson taking structural inspiration from a jet engine fan. Minor built a central bubble for the ceiling to give the bridge a human touch. Ostensibly, the bubble functioned as a piece of sophisticated equipment designed to inform the captain of the ship's attitude. Most of the bridge consoles, designed by Lee Cole, remained from the scrapped television series. Cole remained on the motion picture production and was responsible for much of the visual artwork created. To inform actors and series writers, Lee prepared an Enterprise Flight Manual as a continuity guide to control functions. It was necessary for all the main cast to be familiar with control sequences at their stations as each panel was activated by touch via heat-sensitive plates. The wattage of the light bulbs beneath the plastic console buttons was reduced from 25 watts to 6 watts after the generated heat began melting the controls. The seats were covered in girdle material, used because of its stretching capacity and ability to be easily dyed. For the science station, two consoles were rigged for hydraulic operation so that they could be rolled into the walls when not in use, but the system was disconnected when the crew discovered it would be easier to move them by hand. Aside from control interfaces, the bridge set was populated with monitors looping animations. Each oval monitor was a rear-projection screen on which super 8 mm and 16 mm film sequences looped for each special effect. The production acquired 42 films for this purpose from an Arlington, Virginia-based company, Stowmar Enterprises. Stowmar's footage was exhausted only a few weeks into filming, and it became clear that new monitor films would be needed faster than an outside supplier could deliver them. Cole, Minor, and another production designer, Rick Sternbach, worked together with Povill to devise faster ways of shooting new footage. Cole and Povill rented an oscilloscope for a day and filmed its distortions. Other loops came from Long Beach Hospital, the University of California at San Diego, and experimental computer labs in New Mexico. In all, over 200 pieces of monitor footage were created and cataloged into a seven-page listing. The Enterprise engine room was redesigned while keeping consistent with the theory that the interior appearance had to match the corresponding area visible in exterior views of the starship. Michelson wanted the engine room to seem vast, a difficult effect to achieve on a small sound stage. To create the illusion of depth and long visible distances, the art department staff worked on designs that would utilize forced perspective; set designer Lewis Splittgerber considered the engine room the most difficult set to realize. On film the engine room appeared hundreds of feet long, but the set was actually only 40 feet (12 m) in length. To achieve the proper look, the floor slanted upward and narrowed, while small actors three, four, and five feet in height were used as extras to give the appearance of being far from the camera. For "down shots" of the engineering complex, floor paintings extended the length of the warp core several stories. J.C. Backings Company created these paintings; similar backings were used to extend the length of ship hallways and the rec room set. Redesigning the Enterprise corridors was also Michelson's responsibility. Originally the corridors were of straight plywood construction reminiscent of the original series, which Roddenberry called "Des Moines Holiday Inn Style". To move away from that look, Michelson created a new, bent and angular design. Roddenberry and Wise agreed with Michelson that in 300 years, lighting did not need to be overhead, so they had the lighting radiate upward from the floor. Different lighting schemes were used to simulate different decks of the ship with the same length of corridor. Aluminum panels on the walls outside Kirk's and Ilia's quarters were covered with an orange ultrasuede to represent the living area of the ship. The transporter had originally been developed for the television series as a matter of convenience; it would have been prohibitively expensive to show the Enterprise land on every new planet. For the redesign Michelson felt that the transporter should look and feel more powerful. He added a sealed control room that would protect operators from the powerful forces at work. The space between the transporter platform and the operators was filled with complex machinery, and cinematographer Richard Kline added eerie lighting for atmosphere. After the redesign of the Enterprise sets was complete, Michelson turned his attention to creating the original sets needed for the film. The recreation deck occupied an entire sound-stage, dwarfing the small room built for the planned television series; this was the largest interior in the film. The set was 24 feet (7.3 m) high, decorated with 107 pieces of custom-designed furniture, and packed with 300 people for filming. Below a large viewing screen on one end of the set was a series of art panels containing illustrations of previous ships bearing the name Enterprise. One of the ships was NASA's own Enterprise, added per Roddenberry's request: > Some fans have suggested that our new Enterprise should carry a plaque somewhere which commemorates the fact it was named after the first space shuttle launched from Earth in 1970s. This is an intriguing idea. It also has publicity advantages if properly released at the right time. It won't hurt NASA's feelings either. I'll leave it to you where you want it on the vessel. Another large construction task was the V'ger set, referred to by the production staff as "the Coliseum" or "the microwave wok". The set was designed and fabricated in four and a half weeks, and was filmable from all angles; parts of the set were designed to pull away for better camera access at the center. During production, Star Trek used 11 of Paramount's 32 sound stages, more than any other film done there at the time. To save money, construction coordinator Gene Kelley struck sets with his own crew immediately after filming, lest Paramount charge the production to have the sets dismantled. The final cost for constructing the sets ran at approximately \$1.99 million (equivalent to \$ million in ), not counting additional costs for Phase II fabrication. ### Props and models The first Star Trek movie models constructed were small study models for Planet of the Titans based on designs by Adam and McQuarrie, but these flat-hulled Enterprise concepts were abandoned when that film was cancelled (although one was later used in the space-dock in the movie Star Trek III: The Search for Spock, and another later appeared in the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "The Best of Both Worlds"). When the Phase II series was in development, original series designer Matt Jefferies updated the Enterprise design to feature a larger saucer with twin elevators (turbo-lifts) to the bridge, a wider secondary hull, docking ports, a dedicated photon torpedo weapon assembly at the base of the ship's neck, and angled struts supporting the nacelles. The nacelles themselves were completely changed to less cylindrical shapes and designed to feature glowing grilles on the sides. Likewise, an orbiting dry-dock, space office complex, and V'Ger had been designed by artist Mike Minor. At the time Phase II was cancelled a roughly five foot long model of the Enterprise was under construction by Don Loos of Brick Price Movie Miniatures, and models of the dry-dock and V'Ger were under construction as well. All of these models were abandoned, unfinished (although a Brick Price Enterprise was re-purposed as the exploded Enterprise wreck in Star Trek III: The Search for Spock). When the project became The Motion Picture, Robert Abel and Associates art director Richard Taylor wanted to completely redesign the ship, but Roddenberry insisted on the same shape as designed by Jefferies for Phase II. Taylor focused on the details, giving it a stylization he considered "almost Art Deco". Concept artist Andrew Probert helped refine the redesign. The general shape and proportions of the Phase II ship were retained, but the angles, curves and details refined. Taylor took on the nacelles, and Probert the rest of the ship. Changes included "radiator grill" nacelle caps, a glowing deflector dish, a new impulse engine, new shapes for the aft end and hangar doors of the secondary hull, more docking ports, rounder windows, hatches, and windows for an observation lounge, recreation deck, and arboretum. Probert also replaced the Phase II ship weapons tube with a twin launcher torpedo deck and added elements such as features for a separating saucer and landing pads that were never utilized on any film featuring the model. Most of the models in The Motion Picture were created by Magicam, a Paramount subsidiary. The main Enterprise model was eight feet long, to a scale of 1/120th scale size, or 1 inch (2.5 cm) to 10 feet (3.0 m). It took 14 months and \$150,000 to build. Instead of standard fiberglass used for older models, the new Enterprise was constructed with lightweight plastics, weighing 85 pounds (39 kg). The biggest design issue was making sure that the connective dorsal neck and twin warp nacelle struts were strong enough so that no part of the ship model would sag, bend, or quiver when the model was being moved, which was accomplished via an arc-welded aluminum skeleton. The completed model could be supported at one of five possible points as each photographic angle required. A second, 20-inch (51 cm) model of the ship was used for long shots. While the hull surface was kept smooth, it was treated with a special paint finish that made its surface appear iridescent in certain light. Transparencies of the film's sets were inserted behind some windows, and as jokes, some featured Probert, other production staff members, and Mickey Mouse. The Enterprise was revised again after Abel & Associates were dismissed. Magicam also produced the orbital dry dock seen during the Enterprise's first appearance in the film. Measuring 4 ft × 10 ft × 6 ft (1.2 m × 3.0 m × 1.8 m), its 56 neon panels required 168,000 volts of electricity to operate, with a separate table to support the transformers; the final price for the dock setup was \$200,000. The creation of V'Ger caused problems for the entire production. The crew was dissatisfied with the original four-foot clay model created by the Abel group, which looked like a modernized Nemo's Nautilus submarine. Industrial designer Syd Mead was hired to visualize a new version of the mammoth craft. Mead created a machine that contained organic elements based on input from Wise, Roddenberry, and the effects leads. The final model was 68 feet (21 m) long, built from the rear forward so that the camera crews could shoot footage while the next sections were still being fabricated. The model was built out of a plethora of materials—wood, foam, macramé, Styrofoam cups, incandescent, neon and strobe lights. Dick Rubin handled the film's props, and set up a makeshift office in the corner of stage 9 throughout production. Rubin's philosophy as property master was that nearly every actor or extra ought to have something in their hands. As such, Rubin devised and fabricated about 350 props for the film, 55 of which were used in the San Francisco tram scene alone. Many of the props were updated designs of items previously seen in the television series, such as phasers and handheld communicators. The only prop that remained from the original television series was Uhura's wireless earpiece, which Nichols requested on the first day of shooting (and all the production crew save those who had worked on the television show had forgotten about). The new phaser was entirely self-contained, with its own circuitry, batteries, and four blinking lights. The prop came with a hefty \$4000 price tag; to save money, the lights were dropped, reducing the size of the phaser by a third. A total of 15 of the devices were made for the film. The communicators were radically altered, as by the 1970s the micro-miniaturization of electronics convinced Roddenberry that the bulky handheld devices of the television series were no longer believable. A wrist-based design was decided upon, with the provision that it look far different from the watch Dick Tracy had been using since the 1930s. Two hundred communicators were fashioned, but only a few were the \$3500 top models, used for close-ups of the device in action. Most of the props were made from plastic, as Rubin thought that in the future man-made materials would be used almost exclusively. ### Costumes and makeup Roddenberry firmly believed that throwaway clothes were the future of the industry, and this idea was incorporated into the costumes of The Motion Picture. William Ware Theiss, the designer who created the original television series costumes, was too busy to work on the film. Instead Robert Fletcher, considered one of American theater's most successful costume and scenic designers, was selected to design the new uniforms, suits, and robes for the production. Fletcher eschewed man-made synthetics for natural materials, finding that these fabrics sewed better and lasted longer. As times had changed, the brightly multicolored Starfleet uniforms were revised: the miniskirts worn by women in the original series would now be considered sexist, and Wise and Fletcher deemed the colors garish and working against believability on the big screen. Fletcher's first task was to create new, less conspicuous uniforms. In the original series, divisions in ship assignments were denoted by shirt color; for the movie, these color codes were moved to small patches on each person's uniform. The Starfleet delta symbol was standardized and superimposed over a circle of color indicating area of service. The blue color of previous uniforms was discarded, for fear they might interfere with the blue screens used for optical effects. Three types of uniforms were fabricated: dress uniforms used for special occasions, Class A uniforms for regular duty, and Class B uniforms as an alternative. The Class A designs were double-stitched in gabardine and featured gold braid designating rank. Fletcher designed the Class B uniform as similar to evolved T-shirts, with shoulder boards used to indicate rank and service divisions. Each costume had the shoes built into the pant leg to further the futuristic look. An Italian shoemaker decorated by the Italian government for making Gucci shoes was tasked with creating the futuristic footwear. Combining the shoes and trousers was difficult, time-consuming, and expensive, as each shoe had to be sewn by hand after being fitted to each principal actor. There were difficulties in communication, as the shoemaker spoke limited English and occasionally confused shoe orders due to similar-sounding names. Jumpsuits, serving a more utilitarian function, were the only costumes to have pockets, and were made with a heavyweight spandex that required a special needle to puncture the thick material. A variety of field jackets, leisure wear, and spacesuits were also created; as these parts had to be designed and completed before most of the actors' parts had been cast, many roles were filled by considering how well the actors would fit into existing costumes. For the civilians of San Francisco, Fletcher decided on a greater freedom in dress. Much of the materials for these casual clothes were found in the old storerooms at Paramount, where a large amount of unused or forgotten material lay in storage. One bolt of material had been handpicked by Cecil DeMille in 1939, and was in perfect condition. The red, black, and gold brocade was woven with real gold and silver wrapped around silk thread; the resulting costume was used for a background Betelgeusean ambassador and, at a price of \$10,000 for the fabric alone, was the most expensive costume ever worn by a Hollywood extra. Fletcher also recycled suedes from The Ten Commandments for other costumes. With the approval of Roddenberry, Fletcher fashioned complete backgrounds for the alien races seen in the Earth and recreation deck sequences, describing their appearances and the composition of their costumes. Fred Phillips, the original designer of Spock's Vulcan ears, served as The Motion Picture's makeup artist. He and his staff were responsible for fifty masks and makeup for the aliens seen in the film. The designs were developed by Phillips or from his sketches. In his long association with Star Trek, Phillips produced his 2,000th Spock ear during production of The Motion Picture. Each ear was made of latex and other ingredients blended together in a kitchen mixer, then baked for six hours. Though Phillips had saved the original television series casts used for making the appliances, Nimoy's ears had grown in the decade since and new molds had to be fabricated. While on the small screen the ears could be used up to four times, since nicks and tears did not show up on television, Phillips had to create around three pairs a day for Nimoy during filming. The upswept Vulcan eyebrows needed to be applied hair by hair for proper detail, and it took Nimoy more than two hours to prepare for filming—twice as long as it had for television. Besides developing Vulcan ears and alien masks, Phillips and his assistant Charles Schram applied more routine makeup to the principal actors. Khambatta's head was freshly shaved each day, then given an application of makeup to reduce glare from the hot set lights. Khambatta had no qualms about shaving her head at first, but began worrying if her hair would grow back properly. Roddenberry proposed insuring Khambatta's hair after the actress voiced her concerns, believing it would be good publicity, but legal teams determined such a scheme would be very costly. Instead, Khambatta visited the Georgette Klinger Skin Care Salon in Beverly Hills, where the studio footed the bill for the recommended six facials and scalp treatments during the course of production, as well as a daily scalp treatment routine of cleansers and lotion. Collins described Khambatta as very patient and professional while her scalp was shaved and treated for up to two hours each day. Khambatta spent six months following the regimen, (her hair eventually regrew without issue, though she kept her shaven locks after production had ended.) ### Technical consulting In the decade between the end of the Star Trek television series and the film, many of the futuristic technologies that appeared on the show—electronic doors that open automatically, talking computers, weapons that stun rather than kill, and personal communication devices—had become a reality. Roddenberry had insisted that the technology aboard the Enterprise be grounded in established science and scientific theories. The Motion Picture likewise received technical consultation from NASA, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory at California Institute of Technology, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, as well as individuals such as former astronaut Rusty Schweickart and the science fiction writer Isaac Asimov. The greatest amount of technical advice for the production came from NASA, who provided Trek fan Jesco von Puttkamer as advisor to the film. Roddenberry had known Puttkamer since 1975, when they had been introduced by a mutual friend, the assistant director of astronautics at the Smithsonian Institution. From 1976 until the completion of the film Puttkamer provided the writers, producer, and director with memos on everything technical in the script; the scientist reviewed every line in the script, and was unpaid for his assistance. "Science fiction films, including those of the recent past, have been woefully short of good science advice", he said. "Star Wars [is] really not science fiction. I loved it, but it's a fairy tale of princes and knights in another galaxy. The technology was improbable, the science impossible." During the rewrite of the final scenes, the studio executives clashed with Roddenberry about the script's ending, believing that the concept of a living machine was too far-fetched. The executives consulted Asimov: if the writer decided a sentient machine was plausible, the ending could stay. Asimov loved the ending, but made one small suggestion; he felt that the use of the word "wormhole" was incorrect, and that the anomaly that the Enterprise found itself in would be more accurately called a "temporal tunnel". ### Filming Filming of The Motion Picture began on August 7, 1978. A few small ceremonies were performed before photography began; Roddenberry gave Wise his baseball cap, a gift from the captain of the nuclear carrier Enterprise. Wise and Roddenberry then cracked a breakaway bottle of champagne on the bridge set (with no liquid inside to damage the readied set). The scene planned was the chaotic mess aboard the Enterprise bridge as the crew readies the ship for space travel; Wise directed 15 takes into the late afternoon before he was content with the scene. The first day's shots used 1,650 feet (500 m) of film; 420 feet (130 m) were considered "good", 1,070 feet (330 m) were judged "no good", and 160 feet (49 m) were wasted; only one-and-one-eighth pages had been shot. Alex Weldon was hired to be supervisor of special effects for the film. Weldon was planning on retiring after 42 years of effects work, but his wife urged him to take on Star Trek because she thought he did not have enough to do. When Weldon was hired, many of the effects had already been started or completed by Rugg; it was up to Weldon to complete more complex and higher-budgeted effects for the motion picture. The first step of preparation involved analyzing the script in the number, duration, and type of effects. Before costs could be determined and Weldon could shop for necessary items, he and the other members of the special effects team worked out all possibilities for pulling off the effects in a convincing manner. Richard H. Kline served as the film's cinematographer. Working from sketch artist Maurice Zuberano's concepts, Wise would judge if they were on the right track. Kline and Michelson would then discuss the look they wanted (along with Weldon, if effects were involved). Each sequence was then storyboarded and left to Kline to execute. The cinematographer called his function to "interpret [the] preplanning and make it indelible on film. It's a way of everybody being on the same wavelength." Kline recalled that there was not a single "easy" shot to produce for the picture, as each required special consideration. The bridge, for example, was lit with a low density of light to make the console monitors display better. It was hard to frame shots so that reflections of the crew in monitors or light spilling through floor grilles were not seen in the final print. While Kline was concerned with lighting, print quality, and color, Bonnie Prendergast, the script supervisor, took notes that would be written up after the company had finished for the day. Prendergast's role was to ensure continuity in wardrobe, actor position, and prop placement. Any changes in dialogue or ad-libbed lines were similarly written down. Assistant director Danny McCauley was responsible for collaborating with unit production manager Phil Rawlins to finalize shooting orders and assigning extras. Rawlins, production manager Lindsley Parsons Jr., and Katzenberg were all tasked with keeping things moving as fast as possible and keeping the budget under control; every hour on stage cost the production \$4000. Despite tight security around production, in February 1978 the head of an Orange County, California Star Trek fan group reported to the FBI that a man offered to sell plans of the film set. The seller was convicted of stealing a trade secret, fined \$750, and sentenced to two years' probation. Visitor's badges were created to keep track of guests, and due to the limited number were constantly checked out. Visitors included the press, fan leaders, friends of the cast and crew, and actors such as Clint Eastwood, Tony Curtis, Robin Williams and Mel Brooks. Security swept cars leaving the lots for stolen items; even the principal actors were not spared this inconvenience. New West magazine in March 1979 nonetheless revealed most of the plot, including Spock's arrival on the Enterprise, V'Ger's identity, and its reason for coming to Earth. By August 9, the production was already a full day behind schedule. Despite the delays, Wise refused to shoot more than twelve hours on set, feeling he lost his edge afterwards. He was patient on set; betting pool organizers returned collected money when Wise never lost his cool throughout production. Koenig described working with Wise as a highlight of his career. Katzenberg called Wise the film's savior, using his experience to (as Shatner recalled) subtly make filming "actor-proof". Given his unfamiliarity with the source material Wise relied on the actors, especially Shatner, to ensure that dialogue and characterizations were consistent with the show. Gautreaux was among the actors who had not worked with a chroma key before. Wise had to explain to actors where to look and how to react to things they could not see while filming. While the bridge scenes were shot early, trouble with filming the transporter room scene delayed further work. Crew working on the transporter platform found their footwear melting on the lighted grid while shooting tests. Issues with the wormhole sequences caused further delays. The footage for the scene was filmed two ways; first, at the standard 24 frames per second, and then at the faster 48 frames; the normal footage was a back-up if the slow-motion effect produced by the faster frame speed did not turn out as planned. The shoot dragged on so long that it became a running joke for cast members to try and top each other with wormhole-related puns. The scene was finally completed on August 24, while the transporter scenes were being filmed at the same time on the same soundstage. The planet Vulcan setting was created using a mixture of on-location photography at Minerva Hot Springs in Yellowstone National Park and set recreation. Yellowstone was selected after filming in Turkish ruins proved to be too expensive. Securing permission for filming the scenes was difficult in the middle of the summer tourist season, but the Parks Department acquiesced so long as the crew remained on the boardwalks to prevent damage to geological formations. Zuberano, who had helped select the site for the shoot, traveled to Yellowstone and returned with a number of photos. Minor also made a trip and returned to create a large painting depicting how the scene might look. In consultations with Michelson, the crew decided to use miniatures in the foreground to create the Vulcan temples, combined with the real hot springs in the background. In the film, the bottom third of the frames were composed of miniature stairs, rocks, bits of red glass and a Vulcan statue. The center of the frame contained Nimoy's shots and the park setting, while the final third of the frame was filled with a matte painting. On August 8, the day after production began at Paramount, an 11-person second unit left for Yellowstone. The sequence took three days to shoot. On returning to Paramount, the art department had to recreate parts of Yellowstone in a large "B tank", 110 by 150 feet (34 by 46 m) long. The tank was designed to be flooded with millions of gallons of water to represent large bodies of water. Minor set up miniatures on the tank's floor before construction and made sure that the shadows that fell on Spock at Yellowstone could be properly recreated. A plywood base was built on metal platforms to create stone silhouettes, reinforced with chicken wire. Polyurethane foam was sprayed over the framework under the supervision of the Los Angeles Fire Department. The bottom part of the statue miniature was represented by a 16-foot-high (4.9 m) fiberglass foot. Weldon matched the effects filmed at Yellowstone using dry ice and steam machines. To recreate the appearance of the swirling eddies of water in the real Yellowstone, a combination of evaporated milk, white poster paint, and water was poured into the set's pools. The pressure of the steam channeled into the pools through hidden tubing causes enough movement in the whirlpools to duplicate the location footage. Due to the requirement that the sun be in a specific location for filming and that the environment be bright enough, production fell behind schedule when it was unseasonably cloudy for three days straight. Any further scenes to recreate Vulcan would be impossible, as the set was immediately torn down to serve as a parking lot for the remainder of the summer. The computer console explosion that causes the transporter malfunction was simulated using Brillo Pads. Weldon hid steel wool inside the console and attached an arc welder to operate by remote control when the actor pulled a wire. The welder was designed to create a spark instead of actually welding, causing the steel wool to burn and make sparks; so effective was the setup that the cast members were continually startled by the flare-ups, resulting in additional takes. Various canisters and cargo containers appear to be suspended by anti-gravity throughout the film. These effects were executed by several of Weldon's assistants. The crew built a circular track that had the same shape as the corridor and suspended the antigravity prop on four small wires that connected to the track. The wires were treated with a special acid that oxidized the metal; the reaction tarnished the wires to a dull gray that would not show up in the deep blue corridor lighting. Cargo boxes were made out of light balsa wood so that fine wires could be used as support. As August ended, production continued to slip farther behind schedule. Koenig learned that rather than being released in 14 days after his scenes were completed, his last day would be on October 26—eight weeks later than expected. The next bridge scenes to be filmed after the wormhole sequence, Enterprise's approach to V'Ger and the machine's resulting attack, were postponed for two weeks so that the special effects for the scene could be planned and implemented, and the engine room scenes could be shot. Chekov's burns sustained in V'Ger's attack were difficult to film; though the incident took only minutes on film, Weldon spent hours preparing the effect. A piece of aluminum foil was placed around Koenig's arm, covered by a protective pad and then hidden by the uniform sleeve. Weldon prepared an ammonia and acetic acid solution that was touched to Koenig's sleeve, causing it to smoke. Difficulties resulted in the scene being shot ten times; it was especially uncomfortable for the actor, whose arm was slightly burned when some of the solution leaked through to his arm. Khambatta also faced difficulties during filming. She refused to appear nude as called for in the script during the Ilia probe's appearance. The producers got her to agree to wear a thin skin-colored body stocking, but she caught a cold as a result of the shower mist, created by dropping dry ice into warm water and funneling the vapors into the shower by a hidden tube. Khambatta had to leave the location repeatedly to avoid hypercapnia. One scene required the Ilia probe to slice through a steel door in the sickbay; doors made out of paper, corrugated cardboard covered in aluminum foil, and cork were tested before the proper effect was reached. The illuminated button in the hollow of the probe's throat was a 12-volt light bulb that Khambatta could turn on and off via hidden wires; the bulb's heat eventually caused a slight burn. On January 26, 1979, the film finally wrapped after 125 days. Shatner, Nimoy, and Kelley delivered their final lines at 4:50 pm. Before the crew could go home, a final shot had to be filmed—the climactic fusing of Decker and V'Ger. The script prescribed a heavy emphasis on lighting, with spiraling and blinding white lights. Collins was covered in tiny dabs of cotton glued to his jacket; these highlights were designed to create a body halo. Helicopter lights, 4,000-watt lamps and wind machines were used to create the effect of Decker's fusion with the living machine. The first attempts at filming the scene became a nightmare for the crew. The extreme lighting caused normally invisible dust particles in the air to be illuminated, creating the appearance that the actors were caught in a blizzard. During the retakes throughout the week the crew mopped and dusted the set constantly, and it required later technical work to eliminate the dust in the final print. Two weeks later, the entire cast and crew joined with studio executives for a traditional wrap party. Four hundred people attended the gathering, which spilled over into two restaurants in Beverly Hills. While much of the crew readied for post-production, Wise and Roddenberry were grateful for the opportunity to take a short vacation from the motion picture before returning to work. ### Post-production > I wanted it to be this beautiful, epic, spectacular sequence that had no dialogue, no story, no plot, everything stops, and let the audience just love the Enterprise. I wanted everybody to buy into the beauty of space, and the beauty of their mission, and the beauty of the Enterprise itself, and just have everybody get out of their way and let that happen, which is something I really learned with Kubrick and 2001: Stop talking for a while, and let it all flow. While the cast departed to work on other projects, the post-production team was tasked with finalizing the film in time for a Christmas release; the resulting work would take twice as long as the filming process had taken. Editor Todd Ramsay and assistants spent principal photography syncing film and audio tracks. The resulting rough cuts were used to formulate plans for sound effects, music, and optical effects that would be added later. Roddenberry also provided a large amount of input, sending memos to Ramsay via Wise with ideas for editing. Ramsay tried to cut as much unnecessary footage as he could as long as the film's character and story development were not damaged. One of Roddenberry's ideas was to have the Vulcans speak their own language. Because the original Vulcan scenes had been photographed with actors speaking English, the "language" needed to lip-sync with the actor's lines. After the groundbreaking opticals of Star Wars, Star Trek's producers realized the film required similarly high-quality visuals. Douglas Trumbull, a film director with an excellent reputation in Hollywood who had worked on 2001: A Space Odyssey, was the first choice for director of special effects, but declined the offer. Trumbull was busy on Close Encounters, and was tired of being ignored as a director and having to churn out special effects for someone else's production; after completing the effects work, Trumbull planned on launching his own feature using a new film process. The next choice, John Dykstra, was similarly wrapped up in other projects. Post-production supervisor Paul Rabwin suggested Robert Abel's production company Robert Abel and Associates might be up to the task. The scope and size of the effects grew after the television movie became The Motion Picture. Abel and Associates bid \$4 million for doing the film's effects and Paramount accepted. As new effects were added, Abel increased their bid by \$750,000, and Roddenberry suggested that the effects costs and schedules be reexamined. Rumors surfaced about difficulties regarding the special effects. A year into the production, millions of dollars had been spent but almost no usable footage had been created; Abel and Associates was not experienced in motion picture production and the steep learning curve worried the producers. Effects artist Richard Yuricich acted as a liaison between Abel and Paramount. To speed up the work, Abel passed off miniature and matte painting tasks to Yuricich. Despite being relieved of nearly half the effects work, it became clear by early 1979 that Abel and Associates would not be able to complete the remainder on time. By then Trumbull was supervising effects, greatly reducing Abel's role. (Because of Trumbull's disinterest in only working on special effects, he reportedly received a six-figure salary and the chance to direct his own film.) Creative differences grew between Abel and Associates and the Paramount production team; Wise reportedly became angry during a viewing of Abel's completed effects, of which the studio decided only one was usable. Paramount fired Abel and Associates on February 22, 1979. The studio had spent \$5 million and a year's worth of time with Abel and Associates, although Abel reportedly gained a new production studio filled with equipment using Paramount's money, and allegedly sold other Paramount-funded equipment. Trumbull had completed Close Encounters but his plan for a full feature had been canceled by Paramount, possibly as punishment for passing on Star Trek. With Trumbull now available, primary responsibility for The Motion Picture's optical effects passed on to him. Offering what Trumbull described as "an almost unlimited budget", in March the studio asked Trumbull if he could get the opticals work completed by December, the release date to which Paramount was financially committed (having accepted advances from exhibitors planning on a Christmas delivery). Trumbull was confident that he could get the work done without a loss of quality despite a reputation for missing deadlines because of his perfectionism. Paramount assigned a studio executive to Trumbull to make sure he would meet the release date, and together with Yuricich the effects team rushed to finish. The effects budget climbed to \$10 million. Trumbull recalled that Wise "trusted me implicitly" as a fellow director to complete the effects and "fix this for him". Yuricich's previous work had been as Director of Photography for Photographic Effects on Close Encounters, and he and Trumbull reassembled the crew and equipment from the feature, adding more personnel and space. Time, not money, was the main issue; Trumbull had to deliver in nine months as many effects as in Star Wars or Close Encounters combined, which had taken years to complete. The Glencoe-based facilities the teams had used for Close Encounters were deemed insufficient, and a nearby facility was rented and outfitted with five more stages equipped with camera tracks and systems. Dykstra and his 60-person production house Apogee Company were subcontracted to Trumbull. Crews worked in three shifts a day, 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Trumbull and Dykstra found the Magicam models problematic. The Klingon cruiser's lighting was so dim that there was no way to make them bright enough on film. As Trumbull also felt the Enterprise's lights were ill-suited for his needs, he rewired both models. He thought that Enterprise should self-illuminate when traveling years from any source of light. Instead of having the ship completely dark save for viewports, Trumbull devised a system of self-illumination; he pictured the ship as something like an oceanliner, "a grand lady of the seas at night". A similar method was used on the Klingon cruiser model, but he made it less well-lit to convey a different look than the clean visuals of the Federation—the cruiser was meant to evoke "an enemy submarine in World War II that's been out at sea for too long". Trumbull wished that the Enterprise model were larger; a special periscope lens system was needed for close-up film angles. The models were filmed in multiple passes and composited together in post-production; multiple passes with only the model's lighting running were added to the original pass for the final look. The Klingon cruiser sequence was developed to avoid an opening similar to Star Wars, with one model used for all three seen in the film. While Dykstra's team handled the ships, the V'Ger cloud was developed by Trumbull. Trumbull wanted the cloud to have a specific shape to it—"it couldn't just be a blob of cotton," he said, "it had to have some shape that you could get camera angles on." A special camera support track was built that could pan and focus over a 40-by-80-foot (12 by 24 m) piece of art, with the light strobed to provide depth. While the team planned on compositing multiple passes to provide physical movement to the cloud shots, Trumbull felt that it detracted from the sense of scale, and so small animations were subtly introduced in the final product. The torpedo effects were simulated by shooting a laser through a piece of crystal mounted on a rotating rod after experiments with Tesla coils proved insufficient. The same effect was recolored and used for the Klingons and the Enterprise; the aliens' torpedoes glowed red while the "good guys" had blue-colored weaponry. V'Ger's destruction of the ships was created using scanning lasers, with the multiple laser passes composited onto the moving model to create the final effect. Trumbull wanted the scene of Kirk and Scott approaching the Enterprise in drydock without dialogue to "let the audience just love the Enterprise". Its two pages of script needed 45 different shots—averaging one a day—for the travel pod containing Kirk to make its flight from the space office complex to the docking ring. Double shifts around the clock were required to finish the effect on time. For close shots of the pod traveling to the Enterprise, close-ups of Shatner and Doohan were composited into the model, while in long shots lookalike puppets were used. Dykstra and Apogee created three models to stand in for the Epsilon 9 station. A 6-by-3.5-foot (1.8 by 1.1 m) model was used for distance shots, while an isolated 5-by-6-foot (1.5 by 1.8 m) panel was used for closer shots. The station control tower was replicated with rear-projection screens to add the people inside. A 2 ft model spaceman created for the shot was used in the drydock sequence and Spock's spacewalk. Unique destruction effects for the station had to be discarded due to time constraints. V'Ger itself was filmed in a hazy, smoky room, in part to convey depth and also to hide the parts of the ship still under construction. The multiple passes were largely based on guesswork, as every single available camera was in use and the effects had to be generated without the aid of a bluescreen. Even after the change in effects companies, Yuricich continued to provide many of the matte paintings used in the film, having previously worked on The Day the Earth Stood Still, Ben-Hur, North by Northwest and Logan's Run. The paintings were combined with live action after a selected area of the frame was matted out; the blue Earth sky over Yellowstone, for example was replaced with a red-hued Vulcan landscape. More than 100 such paintings were used. Trumbull said that Wise and the studio gave him "a tremendous amount of creative freedom" despite being hired after the completion of nearly all the principal photography. The Spock spacewalk sequence, for example, was radically changed from the Abel version. The original plan was for Kirk to follow Spock in a spacesuit and come under attack from a mass of sensor-type organisms. Spock would save his friend, and the two would proceed through V'ger. Wise, Kline, and Abel had been unable to agree on how to photograph the sequence, and the result was a poorly designed and ungainly effect that Trumbull was convinced was disruptive to the plot and would have cost millions to fix. Instead, he recommended a stripped-down sequence that omitted Kirk entirely and would be simple and easy to shoot; Robert McCall, known for designing the original posters to 2001, provided Trumbull with concept art to inform the new event. Post-production was so late that Paramount obtained an entire MGM sound stage to store 3,000 large metal containers for each theater around the country. Each final film reel was taken while wet from the film studio and put into a container with other reels, then taken to airplanes waiting on tarmacs. By the time The Motion Picture was finished, \$26 million was spent on the film itself, while \$18 million had been spent on sets for the undeveloped Phase II series, much of which were not used for the film itself, which brought the total cost of the movie to \$44 million. ### Music The score for Star Trek: The Motion Picture was predominantly written by Jerry Goldsmith, beginning a long association with scoring Star Trek film and television. Gene Roddenberry had originally wanted Goldsmith to score Star Trek's pilot episode, "The Cage", but he was unavailable. When Wise signed on to direct, Paramount asked if he had any objection to using Goldsmith. Wise, who had worked with Goldsmith on The Sand Pebbles, replied "Hell, no. He's great!" Wise later considered his work with Goldsmith one of the best relationships he ever had with a composer. Goldsmith was influenced by the style of the romantic, sweeping music of Star Wars. "When you stop and think about it, space is a very romantic thought. It is, to me, like the Old West, we're up in the universe. It's about discovery and new life [...] it's really the basic premise of Star Trek", he said. Goldsmith's initial bombastic main theme reminded Ramsay and Wise of sailing ships. Unable to articulate what he felt was wrong with the piece, Wise recommended writing an entirely different piece. Although irked by the rejection, Goldsmith consented to rework his initial ideas. The rewriting of the theme required changes to several sequences Goldsmith had scored without writing a main title piece. The approach of Kirk and Scott to the drydocked Enterprise by shuttle lasted a ponderous five minutes due to the effect shots coming in late and unedited, requiring Goldsmith to maintain interest with a revised and developed cue. Star Trek: The Motion Picture is the only Star Trek film to have a true overture, using "Ilia's Theme" (later re-recorded, as a lyrical version, by Shaun Cassidy as "A Star Beyond Time" with lyrics by Larry Kusik) in this role, most noticeably in the "Director's Edition" DVD release. Star Trek and The Black Hole were the only feature films to use an overture from the end of 1979 until 2000 (with Lars von Trier's Dancer in the Dark). Much of the recording equipment used to create the movie's intricately complicated sound effects was, at the time, extremely cutting-edge. Among these pieces of equipment was the ADS (Advanced Digital Synthesizer) 11, manufactured by Pasadena, California custom synthesizer manufacturer Con Brio, Inc. The movie provided major publicity and was used to advertise the synthesizer, though no price was given. The film's soundtrack also provided a debut for the Blaster Beam, an electronic instrument 12 to 15 feet (3.7 to 4.6 m) long. It was created by musician Craig Huxley, who played a small role in an episode of the original television series. The Blaster had steel wires connected to amplifiers fitted to the main piece of aluminum; the device was played with an artillery shell. Goldsmith heard it and immediately decided to use it for V'Ger's cues. Several state-of-the-art synthesizers were used as musical instruments, notably the Yamaha CS-80, ARP 2600, Oberheim OB-X, and Serge synthesizer. An enormous pipe organ first plays the V'Ger theme on the Enterprise's approach, a literal indication of the machine's power. Goldsmith scored The Motion Picture over a period of three to four months, a relatively relaxed schedule compared to typical production, but time pressures resulted in Goldsmith bringing on colleagues to assist in the work. Alexander Courage, composer of the original Star Trek theme, provided arrangements to accompany Kirk's log entries, while Fred Steiner wrote 11 cues of additional music, notably the music to accompany the Enterprise achieving warp speed and first meeting V'Ger. The rush to finish the rest of the film impacted the score. The final recording session finished at 2:00 am on December 1, only five days before the film's release. A soundtrack featuring the film's music was released by Columbia Records in 1979 together with the film debut, and was one of Goldsmith's best-selling scores. Sony's Legacy Recordings released an expanded two-disc edition of the soundtrack on November 10, 1998. The album added an additional 21 minutes of music to supplement the original track list, and was resequenced to reflect the story line of the film. The first disc features as much of the score as can fit onto a 78-minute disc, while the second contains "Inside Star Trek", a spoken word documentary from the 1970s. In 2012, the score was released yet again via La-La Land Records in association with Sony Music. This 3-CD set contains the complete score for the first time, plus unreleased alternate and unused cues, in addition to the remastered original 1979 album. The score to Star Trek: The Motion Picture went on to garner Goldsmith nominations for the Oscars, Golden Globe and Saturn awards. It is often regarded as one of the composer's greatest scores, and was also one of the American Film Institute's 250 nominated scores for their top 25 American film scores. ### Sound effects Sound designer Frank Serafine, a longtime Star Trek fan, was invited to create the sound effects for the picture. Given access to state-of-the-art audio equipment, Serafine saw the picture as the chance to modernize outdated motion picture sound techniques with digital technology. Owing to background noise such as camera operation, much of the ambient noise or dialogue captured on set was unusable; it was Serafine's job to create or recreate sounds to mix back into the scenes. As all the sound elements such as dubbed lines or background noise came together, they were classified into three divisions: A Effects, B Effects, and C Effects. A Effects were synthesized or acoustic sounds that were important and integral to the picture—the sound of V'Ger's weapon (partly done with the blaster beam instrument) for example, or Spock's mind meld, as well as transporters, explosions, and the warp speed sound effect. B Effects consisted of minor sounds such as the clicks of switches, beeps or chimes. C Effects were subliminal sounds that set moods—crowd chatter and ambient noise. All the elements were mixed as "predubs" to speed integration into the final sound mix. When The Motion Picture was announced, many synthesizer artists submitted demo tapes to Paramount. Ramsay and Wise consulted and decided that the film should have a unique audio style; they were particularly concerned to avoid sounds that had become pervasive and cliché from repetitive use in other science-fiction movies. Events such as Enterprise bridge viewscreen activation were kept silent to provide a more comfortable atmosphere. In contrast, almost every action on the Klingon bridge made noise to reflect the aliens' harsh aesthetic While much of the effects were created using digital synthesizers, acoustic recordings were used as well. The wormhole's sucking sounds were created by slowing down and reversing old Paramount stock footage of a cowboy fight, while the warp acceleration "stretch" sound was built on a slowed-down cymbal crash. The crew encountered difficulty in transferring the quarter-inch (0.64 cm) tapes used for creating the sounds to the 35 mm film used for the final prints; while the film was to be released with Dolby sound, Serafine found it was easier to mix the sounds without regard to format and add the specific format after, during the later transfer to 35 mm. ## Themes According to Michele and Duncan Barrett, Roddenberry had a decidedly negative view of religion that was reflected in the Star Trek television series episodes; in the episode "Who Mourns for Adonais?", for example, the god Apollo is revealed to be a fraud, an alien rather than a divine being from Earth's past. When Apollo suggests that humans need a new pantheon of gods, Kirk dismisses the idea with the words, "We find the one quite sufficient." In comparison, religious scholar Ross Kraemer says that Roddenberry "pulled his punches" regarding religion and in the television show religion was not absent but highly private. Barrett suggests that with the Star Trek feature films this attitude of not addressing religious issues shifted. In the television series, little time was spent pondering the fate of the dead. In The Motion Picture, meanwhile, Decker is apparently killed in merging with V'Ger, but Kirk wonders if they have seen the creation of a new life form. Decker and Ilia are listed as "missing" rather than dead, and the lighting and effects created as a result of the merge have been described as "quasimystical" and "pseudo-religious". The discussion of a new birth is framed in a reverential way. While V'Ger is a machine of near omnipotence, according to Robert Asa, the film (along with its successor, Star Trek V: The Final Frontier) "implicitly protest[s] against classical theism". Tor.com reviewer Dan Persons noted the film features a number of characters on their own voyages of self discovery, with each defining their concept of fulfillment differently. Persons notes that the result of individual pursuits of fulfillment are damaging or pyrrhic; meaning is only satisfactorily found through interpersonal relationships. ## Release ### Theatrical release To coincide with the film's release, Pocket Books published a novelization written by Roddenberry. The only Star Trek novel Roddenberry wrote, the book adds back story and elements that did not appear in the movie; for example, the novelization mentions that Willard Decker is the son of Commodore Matt Decker from the original series episode "The Doomsday Machine"—a plot element intended for the Phase II television series. The novel also has a different opening scene to introduce Vejur and Kirk, concentrates in sections on Kirk's struggle with confidence in taking command of the Enterprise again and expands on Ilia and Decker's relationship. The Vejur spelling for the "intruder's" name was used exclusively in the novel Roddenberry authored, from its first appearance on page 179 of the first paperback edition of the novelization through to the account on the novel's page 241 of Kirk reading the undamaged "V-G-E-R" letters on the fictional "Voyager 6" space probe's nameplate. In addition to the novel, Star Trek printed media included a coloring book, ship blueprints, a starship "history book," a sticker book of graphics, a home costume how-to book and a comic book adaptation published by Marvel Comics as Marvel Super Special \#15 (Dec. 1979). Toys included action figures, ship models, and a variety of watches, phaser mockups and communicators. McDonald's sold specially designed Star Trek Happy Meals. The marketing was part of a coordinated approach by Paramount and its parent conglomerate Gulf+Western to create a sustained Star Trek product line. The Motion Picture novel started Pocket Books' Star Trek book franchise, which produced 18 consecutive bestsellers within a decade. Owing to the rush to complete the film, The Motion Picture was never screened before test audiences, something Wise later regretted. The director carried the fresh print of the film to the world premiere, held at the K-B MacArthur Theater in Washington, D.C. Roddenberry, Wise, and the principal cast attended the function, which also served as an invitational benefit for the scholarship and youth education fund of the National Space Club. While thousands of fans were expected to attend, rain reduced fan turnout to around 300. The premiere was followed by a black-tie reception at the National Air and Space Museum. More than 500 people—consisting of the cast and crew, working members of the space community, and the few "hardcore Trekkies" who could afford the \$100 admission price—filled the museum. ### Home media Paramount Home Entertainment released the film on VHS, Betamax, LaserDisc, and CED videodisc in 1980 in its original theatrical version. In 1983, an extended cut premiered on the ABC television network. It added roughly 12 minutes to the film. The added footage was largely unfinished, and cobbled together for the network premiere; Wise had not wanted some of the footage to be included in the final cut of the film. This "Special Longer Version" was released on VHS, Betamax and LaserDisc by Paramount in 1983 in pan and scan format. Two members of Wise's production company, David C. Fein and Michael Matessino, approached Wise and Paramount and persuaded them to release a revised version of the film on video; Paramount released the updated Director's Edition of the film on VHS and DVD on November 6, 2001. Wise, who had considered the theatrical presentation of the film a "rough cut", was given the opportunity to re-edit the film to be more consistent with his original vision. The production team used the original script, surviving sequence storyboards, memos, and the director's recollections. In addition to cuts in some sequences, 90 new and redesigned computer-generated images were created. Care was taken that the effects meshed seamlessly with the old footage. The edition runs 136 minutes, about four minutes longer than the original release. Included among the special features are the deleted scenes which had been part of the television cut. Aside from the effects, the soundtrack was remixed. Ambient noise such as the buzz of bridge controls were added to enhance certain scenes. Goldsmith had always suspected that some overly long cues could be shortened, so he made the cues repetitive. Although no new scenes were added, the MPAA rated the revised edition PG in contrast to the G rating of the original release. Fein attributed the rating change to the more "intense" sound mix that made scenes such as the central part of V'Ger "more menacing". The Director's Edition was far better received by critics than the original 1979 release, with some considering the edit to have subsequently turned the film into one of the series' best. The DVD Journal's Mark Bourne said it showcased "a brisker, more attractive version of the movie" that was "as good as it might have been in 1979. Even better maybe." Complaints included the edition's 2.17:1 aspect ratio, as opposed to the original 2.40:1 Panavision. Jeremy Conrad of IGN felt that despite the changes, the pacing might still be too slow for some viewers. The film's original theatrical cut was released on Blu-ray Disc in May 2009 to coincide with the new Star Trek feature, packaged with the five following features as the Star Trek: Original Motion Picture Collection. The Motion Picture was remastered in 1080p high definition. All six films in the set have 7.1 Dolby TrueHD audio. The disc features a new commentary track by Star Trek authors and contributors Michael and Denise Okuda, Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens, and Daren Dochterman. A 4K Ultra HD Blu-ray of the film was released in 2021 to commemorate the franchise's 55th anniversary. A 4K version of the directors cut was released on the Paramount+ streaming service and to physical media in 2022. ## Reception ### Box office Star Trek: The Motion Picture opened in the United States and Canada on December 7, 1979, in 857 theaters and set a box office record for the highest opening weekend gross, making \$11,926,421 in its first weekend. The film beat the 3-day weekend record set by Superman (1978) of \$10.4 million in its third weekend (but not its 4-day weekend gross of \$13.1 million) and the opening weekend gross of the 1978 reissue of Star Wars of \$10.1 million. The Motion Picture earned \$17 million within a week. At its widest domestic distribution, the film was shown in 1,002 theaters; it grossed \$82,258,456 in the United States, making it the fifth-highest-grossing film of 1979 in that country. Overall, the film grossed \$139 million worldwide. The Motion Picture was nominated for three Academy Awards: Best Art Direction (Harold Michelson, Joseph R. Jennings, Leon Harris, John Vallone and Linda DeScenna), Best Visual Effects, and Best Original Score. In the United States, the film sold the most tickets of any film in the franchise until Star Trek (2009), and it remains the highest-grossing film of the franchise worldwide adjusted for inflation, but Paramount considered its gross disappointing compared to expectations and marketing. The Motion Picture's budget of \$44 million, which included the costs incurred during Phase II production, was the largest for any film made within the United States up to that time. David Gerrold estimated before its release that the film would have to gross two to three times its budget to be profitable for Paramount. Gautreaux believed that Roddenberry had not wanted Wise as director but Paramount wanted his experience, and that the two powerful men's differing visions hurt the film. The studio faulted Roddenberry's script rewrites and creative direction for the plodding pace and disappointing gross. While the performance of The Motion Picture convinced the studio to back a (cheaper) sequel, Roddenberry was forced out of its creative control. Harve Bennett and Nicholas Meyer would produce and direct Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan, which received better reviews (becoming a fan favorite) and continued the franchise. With the successful revival of the Star Trek brand on the big screen setting an example, Hollywood increasingly turned to 1960s television series for material. ### Critical reception The Motion Picture was met with mixed reviews from critics; a 2001 retrospective for the BBC described the film as a critical failure. The film holds a 53% rating on Rotten Tomatoes based on 55 contemporary and modern reviews. Roger Ebert, reviewing the film on Sneak Previews, liked it, calling it "fun" and "a good time". Judith Martin of The Washington Post felt that the plot was too thin to support the length of the film, although Martin felt that compared to such science-fiction films as 2001, Star Wars, and Alien, The Motion Picture's premise was "slightly cleverer". Time magazine's Richard Schickel wrote that the film consisted of spaceships that "take an unconscionable amount of time to get anywhere, and nothing of dramatic or human interest happens along the way". Schickel also lamented the lack of "boldly characterized" antagonists and battle scenes that made Star Wars fun; instead, viewers were presented with much talk, "much of it in impenetrable spaceflight jargon". David Denby of New York magazine, wrote that the slow movement of ships through space was "no longer surprising and elegant" after films such as 2001, and that much of the action consisted of the crew's reacting to things occurring on the viewscreen, which he considered to be "like watching someone else watch television". Variety, disagreed, calling the film "a search-and-destroy thriller that includes all of the ingredients the TV show's fans thrive on: the philosophical dilemma wrapped in a scenario of mind control, troubles with the space ship, the dependable and understanding Kirk, the ever-logical Spock, and suspenseful take with twist ending". Scott Bukatman reviewed the film in Ares magazine \#1, and commented that "With Star Trek, Roddenberry's trick has been to wear the mask of the humanist as he plays with his Erector set. The scale of the television series arrested his vision at a comfortable and still interesting level, but the new film has finally removed the mask." The characters and acting received a mixed reception. Stephen Godfrey of The Globe and Mail rated their performances highly: "time has cemented Leonard Nimoy's look of inscrutability as Mr. Spock [...] DeForest Kelley as Dr. McCoy is as feisty as ever, and James Doohan as Scotty still splutters about his engineering woes. At a basic level, their exchanges are those of an odd assortment of grumpy, middle-aged men bickering about office politics. They are a relief from the stars, and a delight." Godfrey's only concern was that the reunion of the old cast threatened to make casual viewers who had never seen Star Trek feel like uninvited guests. Martin considered the characters more likable than those in comparable science fiction films. Conversely, Arnold felt that the acting of the main cast (Shatner in particular) was poor; "Shatner portrays Kirk as such a supercilious old twit that one rather wishes he'd been left behind that desk", he wrote. "Shatner has perhaps the least impressive movie physique since Rod Steiger, and his acting style has begun to recall the worst of Richard Burton." Vincent Canby of The New York Times wrote that the actors did not have much to do in the effects-driven film, and were "limited to the exchanging of meaningful glances or staring intently at television monitors, usually in disbelief". Stephen Collins and Persis Khambatta were more favorably received. Gene Siskel felt the film "teeter[ed] towards being a crashing bore" whenever Khambatta was not on screen,and Jack Kroll of Newsweek felt that she had the most memorable entrance in the film. "[Khambatta] is sympathetic enough to make one hope she'll have a chance to show less skin and more hair in future films", Godfrey wrote. Many critics felt that the special effects overshadowed other elements of the film. Canby wrote that the film "owes more to [Trumbull, Dykstra and Michelson] than it does to the director, the writers or even the producer". Livingston felt that Trumbull and Dykstra's work on the film was not as impressive as on Star Wars and Close Encounters due to the limited amount of production time. Godfrey called the effects "stunning", but conceded that they threatened to overpower the story two-thirds of the way into the film. Kroll, Martin, and Arnold agreed that the effects were not able to carry the film or gloss over its other deficiencies: "I'm not sure that Trumbull & Co. have succeeded in pulling the philosophic chestnuts of Roddenberry and his co-writers out of the fire", Arnold wrote. James Berardinelli, reviewing the film in 1996, felt that the pace dragged and the plot bore too close a resemblance to the original series episode "The Changeling", but considered the start and end of the film to be strong. Terry Lee Rioux, Kelley's biographer, noted that the film proved "that it was the character-driven play that made all the difference in Star Trek". The slow pacing, extended reaction shots, and lack of action scenes led fans and critics to give the film a variety of nicknames, including The Slow Motion Picture, The Motion Sickness, and Where Nomad [the probe in "The Changeling"] Has Gone Before. ### Accolades The film is recognized by American Film Institute in these lists: - 2003: AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes & Villains: - James T. Kirk – Nominated Hero - 2005: AFI's 100 Years of Film Scores – Nominated ## See also - List of films featuring extraterrestrials - List of films featuring space stations - Star Trek (film franchise)

Blackwater Fire of 1937

Fire in Shoshone National Forest

On August 18, 1937, a lightning strike started the Blackwater Fire in Shoshone National Forest, approximately 35 miles (56 km) west of Cody, Wyoming, United States. Fifteen firefighters were killed by the forest fire when a dry weather front caused the winds to suddenly increase and change direction. The fire quickly spread into dense forest, creating spot fires that trapped some of the firefighters in a firestorm. Nine firefighters died during the fire and six more died shortly thereafter from severe burns and respiratory complications. Another 38 firefighters were injured. The fire killed more professional wildland firefighters in the U.S. than any other in the 103 years between the Great Fire of 1910 and the Yarnell Hill Fire in 2013. The Blackwater Fire consumed 1,700 acres (690 ha) of old-growth forest dominated by Douglas fir trees on the west slopes of Clayton Mountain. At the time the firestorm occurred, the temperatures were about 90 °F (32 °C) and the relative humidity was only 6 percent. Though most of the firefighters consisted of Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) employees, they were led by more experienced United States Forest Service (USFS) fire managers. Firefighters in the first half of the 20th century used mostly hand tools to suppress wildfires, and all gear was carried by the firefighters or by pack animals. Weather forecasting and radio communication were generally poor or nonexistent. Investigations and analysis of the event led the USFS to develop better ways to provide a more immediate response to combat fires; one of them was the development of the smokejumper program in 1939. Additionally, the Ten Standard Firefighting Orders, a standardized set of wildland firefighting principles, were developed in 1957. A year after the tragedy, survivors and their fellow employees constructed several memorials at the scene of the incident. ## Geographical setting Blackwater Creek originates on the north slope of Sheep Mesa at an altitude of 11,400 feet (3,500 m) in Shoshone National Forest and flows north through Blackwater Canyon. The creek is 12 mi (19 km) long and descends a steep gradient before it empties into the North Fork Shoshone River, across from U.S. Routes 14/16/20 immediately west of Mummy Cave and 15 mi (24 km) east of the border of Yellowstone National Park. The firestorm deaths occurred on the west slopes of Clayton Mountain, approximately 5 mi (8.0 km) south by trail into the canyon. The canyon consists of numerous ravines and small ridges, which form a washboard landscape shaped by extensive erosion of the volcanic igneous rock that constitutes the Absaroka Range. The canyon has moderate to steep slopes with a gradient of 20 to 60 percent. The regional flora is an upper montane mixed-conifer forest dominated by Douglas fir trees. When the fire swept through the area the forest was dense and mature with heavy fuel loads from dead trees, which also had dead limbs extending to the ground, providing a fuel ladder for fire to easily spread into the tree tops. ## Early 20th-century firefighting In 1937, firefighters did not have portable radios for rapid on-scene communication or helicopters to bring supplies and provide water drops. Firefighters had some access to gas-powered portable water pumps (two were set up on the Blackwater Fire), but most used backpack pumps that were manually operated and held limited water. Firelines were dug by handcrews using shovels, axes and pulaskis (a tool that could be used as either an axe or a hoe). Most firefighters wore cotton and wool clothing, which provided poor protection from flames. Additionally, they did not have fire shelters, which first became available in the 1960s but were not mandatory until 1977. Later researchers believe the use of shelters might have saved lives depending on where the firefighters were when the firestorm occurred. The steepness and ruggedness of the terrain in Blackwater Canyon meant firefighters had to access the fire on foot, carrying all their supplies. On the Blackwater Fire, pack horses were used to ferry supplies from the access roads to an upper base camp. Many of the firefighters were employed by the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) and had limited training in wildfire suppression and behavior, as the CCC was mainly engaged in construction projects. After a series of severe and deadly forest fire events in the early 20th century, officials established the 10 am rule in 1935, which recommended aggressive attack on all fires and to have them controlled by 10 am, the day after they are first detected. This was intended to prevent fires from remaining active into the afternoon when the rising temperatures and more turbulent air caused fires to expand and become more erratic. A scientific publication about fire behavior that could be used for widespread training of firefighters first became available in 1951. ## Fighting the Blackwater Fire ### Detection and firefighter response The Blackwater Fire was started by a lightning strike on August 18, 1937, but it remained undetected until early August 20, at which time it was estimated to be about 2 acres (0.8 ha) in size. By the evening, it had expanded to 200 acres (80 ha), and 65 firefighters from the United States Forest Service (USFS), which included CCC company 1852 from the Wapiti Ranger District of Shoshone National Forest and employees of the Bureau of Public Roads (BPR), were constructing fire lines along two flanks of the fire. A gas-powered portable pump was delivered and set up using water from Blackwater Creek by midnight. Another pump arrived after that and firefighters installed 2,000 ft (600 m) of hose line on the north flank of the fire and another 5,000 ft (1,500 m) on the west flank. CCC workers from the National Park Service arrived at 2:30 am on August 21 and started construction of fire line along the north flank of the fire. Meanwhile, increasing winds had begun expanding the fire to the east. Fire officials believed they needed more manpower, so CCC crews from Bighorn National Forest, 165 mi (266 km) to the east, and other districts of Shoshone National Forest started responding by the morning of August 21. By 12:30 pm, more than 200 firefighters were on duty and involved in digging fire line or in support of the firefighting effort. Along one of the small creeks flowing into Blackwater Creek, a small dam was constructed to pocket water supplies for use in backpack water pumps. Due to a long overnight journey, the CCC members from the Tensleep District of Bighorn National Forest did not commence response to the fire until after noon on August 21. As they arrived, the Tensleep CCC unit were told to relieve the Wapiti CCC unit that had been fighting the fire since the previous evening. More than 50 firefighters commenced construction of a new fire line along Clayton Creek and Clayton Gulch, a ravine extending east from Blackwater Creek. The construction was led by USFS Rangers Alfred Clayton and Urban Post, and their crews consisted mainly of the Tensleep CCC camp and some from other entities. Radio transmissions from Idaho to a weather service office in Riverton, Wyoming, indicated a dry weather front had pushed through and was heading east. It is believed that forest managers at the Wapiti ranger station received this information, but it did not reach the men on the fire lines because of a lack of radio lines. The USFS did have spotters in an aircraft providing aerial observation of the fire behavior that was radioed to the Wapiti ranger station. At 12:40 pm on August 21, several spot fires were reported near the fire lines by aerial observers. At 1 pm, the weather at Wapiti was 90 °F (32 °C) with an extremely low relative humidity of 6 percent. Winds blowing generally from the southwest increased to 30 miles per hour (48 km/h) as the dry front approached at 3:30 pm. At 3:45 pm, they shifted abruptly from southwest to west, causing increased crowning and spot fires over the fire lines. Convectional winds also increased and the fire front started up the drainage heading east. ### Firefighters trapped by firestorm USFS fire manager Urban Post was leading the Tensleep CCC crews in and passed USFS fire crew boss Alfred Clayton, who had only one firefighter with him. Post left six men to assist Clayton and the other firefighter so they could help suppress small fires that were spotting over the fire lines. Post then led his crews east up a ridge but saw more spot fires below where Clayton and his crew were. Clayton also saw the spot fires and moved to suppress them. At 4 pm, the spot fires started to crown and Clayton sent a handwritten note to Post requesting additional manpower. By the time the note reached Post, the firestorm commenced, racing east up the ravines and gullies and trapping Clayton and his crew near the dam they had built. There, Clayton and six others died. The eighth firefighter in his crew was rescued but died later in the hospital. Post led more than 40 firefighters, consisting of USFS, CCC, and BPR employees, up the ridge seeking an opening in the forest to take refuge. Spot fires blew ahead of Post and his crews preventing them from advancing further up the ridge, but they found a rocky outcropping and lay prone on the ground as the fire engulfed them. Crammed together on the outcropping, Post's men moved around to avoid the flames and USFS employee Paul Tyrrell (who later died) used his own body to keep several CCC firefighters from panicking and to shield them from the fire. The flames and heat nevertheless drove five firefighters to charge the flames in an attempt to escape to the other side of the firefront, but only one of them survived. A total of nine firefighters were killed on the fire lines and six more died later from their burns, while another 38 suffered various injuries. The Blackwater Fire is tied for fourth involving the greatest loss of life by firefighters on a wildfire in U.S. history. It killed more professional wildland firefighters in the U.S. than any other in the 103 years between the Great Fire of 1910 and the Yarnell Hill Fire in 2013. ### Rescue and body recovery News of the deaths and injuries started reaching the fire camps by 6 pm on August 21; by then the fire had calmed down as the dry front had passed and the wind decreased. Post led his party down through the burned area and calls went out for medical assistance. By that night, another 150 firefighters and rescue personnel had reached the fire. Rescue efforts commenced as soon as reports arrived and by the morning of August 22, almost 500 firefighters and rescue workers were on scene. The fire consumed 1,700 acres (690 ha) but was not fully controlled until August 24. After 7 pm on August 21, the first fatalities were discovered by a team led by Paul Krueger of the USFS. They came upon a surviving member of Clayton's crew, finding him badly burned. Before succumbing to his injuries, he was able to direct rescuers to where Clayton and the other crew members were last seen. Post informed the rescue team that two of his party would have to be carried out and his men were too weary to do so; these two also died at the hospital. The following morning, the bodies of two other members of Post's crew that had tried to run through the flames were found. The rugged terrain made it necessary for the deceased to be carried out on either stretchers or slung over pack horses. The procession of pack horses carrying the recovered bodies passed through the fire camps where other firefighters were preparing to combat the fire. ## Aftermath ### Fire investigation and results The fatalities on the Blackwater Fire led the federal government to initiate their earliest rigorous investigation on such an event. The USFS investigation of the Blackwater fire incident was led by David Godwin, Assistant Chief of Fire Control for the USFS. His conclusions were that the firefighters were in good physical condition and most had some experience fighting forest fires. Godwin also determined that the managers on the incident were all fully trained and experienced firefighting professionals. Godwin stated that no fault should be assigned to the fire managers as the situation was beyond their control. He indicated that because of the distances involved in getting enough manpower to combat the fire while it was still relatively small (the Tensleep CCC crews had to travel 165 mi (266 km)), the fire was not contained enough to prevent the rapid spread that occurred when the weather front approached. Godwin's findings indicated that rapid deployment of firefighters was critical to successful fire suppression. These findings were reinforced by A. A. Brown, head of the Division of Fire Control in the Forest Service's Rocky Mountain Region, who studied the fire behavior and the responses to the Blackwater fire. In an era when all fire was considered detrimental and with limited studies that documented the important ecological role of fire, immediate suppression using aggressive attack was considered the best way to protect the forests. Godwin believed that parachuting firefighters from airplanes as soon as fires were detected and as near to the fire as possible would provide the fastest way to get firefighters in place before a fire raged out of control. Consequently, by 1939 the first stages of the parachuting smokejumper program were initiated at Winthrop, Washington, and at two locations in Montana. A later review of 16 fatal fires, from the Blackwater Fire in 1937 through 1956, led managers of the USFS to implement the Ten Standard Firefighting Orders in 1957, which were later changed to FIREORDERS in 1987, with each letter designating one of the ten orders. Not long after the Ten Standard Firefighting Orders were implemented, 18 Watchout Situations were also developed to increase firefighter safety. Decades after the Blackwater Fire, forest managers had developed a better understanding of the ecological role of fire. Consequently, in 1977, the USFS dropped the 10 am rule from their firefighting strategic planning, and shifted their emphasis away from wildfire suppression to wildfire management. ### Memorials In 1938, several monuments were erected by members of the CCC to honor those killed and injured during the Blackwater Fire. The largest and most accessible is along U.S. Route 14/16/20. Another memorial was erected the same year near the location where Alfred Clayton and his crew perished. A third memorial was placed where Urban Post and his crews waited out the firestorm on the rocky ledge that was later named Post Point. Clayton also had several geographic locations named in his honor, including Clayton Mountain. Though only the roadside monument can be reached by car, the other two monuments can be visited by trail, which is a 10-mile (16 km) round-trip hike. The James T. Saban Lookout is a fire lookout tower renamed in 2015 in honor of one of the fallen firefighters. ## See also - List of the deadliest firefighter disasters in the United States

1689 Boston revolt

1689 popular uprising in colonial New England against Governor Edmund Andros

The 1689 Boston revolt was a popular uprising on April 18, 1689 against the rule of Sir Edmund Andros, the governor of the Dominion of New England. A well-organized "mob" of provincial militia and citizens formed in the town of Boston, the capital of the dominion, and arrested dominion officials. Members of the Church of England were also taken into custody if they were believed to sympathize with the administration of the dominion. Neither faction sustained casualties during the revolt. Leaders of the former Massachusetts Bay Colony then reclaimed control of the government. In other colonies, members of governments displaced by the dominion were returned to power. Andros was commissioned governor of New England in 1686. He had earned the enmity of the populace by enforcing the restrictive Navigation Acts, denying the validity of existing land titles, restricting town meetings, and appointing unpopular regular officers to lead colonial militia, among other actions. Furthermore, he had infuriated Puritans in Boston by promoting the Church of England, which was rejected by many nonconformist New England colonists. ## Background In the early 1680s, King Charles II of England sought to streamline the administration of the American colonies and bring them more closely under crown control. He revoked the charter of the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1684, after its leaders refused to act on his demands for reforms in the colony. Charles died in 1685, but Roman Catholic James II continued the efforts, culminating in his creation of the Dominion of New England. He appointed former New York governor Sir Edmund Andros as dominion governor in 1686. The dominion was composed of the territories of the Massachusetts Bay Colony, Plymouth Colony, Connecticut Colony, the Province of New Hampshire, and the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. In 1688, its jurisdiction was expanded to include New York, East Jersey, and West Jersey. Andros's rule was extremely unpopular in New England. He disregarded local representation, denied the validity of existing land titles in Massachusetts (which had been dependent on the old charter), restricted town meetings, and forced the Church of England into largely Puritan regions. He also enforced the Navigation Acts which threatened the existence of certain trading practices of New England. The royal troops stationed in Boston were often mistreated by their officers, who were supporters of the governor and often either Anglican or Roman Catholic. Meanwhile, King James became increasingly unpopular in England. He alienated otherwise supportive Tories with his attempts to relax the Penal Laws, and he issued the Declaration of Indulgence in 1687 which established some freedom of religion, a move opposed by the Anglican church hierarchy. He increased the power of the regular army, an action seen by many Parliamentarians as a threat to their authority, and placed Catholics in important military positions. James also attempted to place sympathizers in Parliament who he hoped would repeal the Test Act which required a strict Anglican religious test for many civil offices. Some Whigs and Tories set aside their political differences when his son and potential successor James was born in June 1688, and they conspired to replace him with his Protestant son-in-law William, Prince of Orange. The Dutch prince had tried unsuccessfully to get James to reconsider his policies; he agreed to an invasion, and the nearly bloodless revolution that followed in November and December 1688 established William and his wife Mary as co-rulers. The religious leaders of Massachusetts were led by Cotton and Increase Mather. They were opposed to the rule of Andros, and they organized dissent targeted to influence the court in London. Increase Mather sent an appreciation letter to the king regarding the Declaration of Indulgence, and he suggested to other Massachusetts pastors that they also express gratitude to him as a means to gain favor and influence. Ten pastors agreed to do so, and they sent Increase Mather to England to press their case against Andros. Dominion secretary Edward Randolph repeatedly attempted to stop him, including pressing criminal charges, but Mather clandestinely boarded a ship bound for England in April 1688. He and other Massachusetts agents were received by King James in October 1688, who promised that the colony's concerns would be addressed. The events of the revolution, however, halted this attempt to gain redress. The Massachusetts agents then petitioned the new monarchs and the Lords of Trade (predecessors to the Board of Trade that oversaw colonial affairs) for restoration of the Massachusetts charter. Mather furthermore convinced the Lords of Trade to delay notifying Andros of the revolution. He had already dispatched a letter to previous colonial governor Simon Bradstreet containing news of a report (prepared before the revolution) that the annulment of the Massachusetts charter had been illegal, and he urged the magistrates to "prepare the minds of the people for a change". Rumors of the revolution apparently reached some individuals in Boston before official news arrived. Boston merchant John Nelson wrote of the events in a letter dated late March, and the letter prompted a meeting of senior anti-Andros political and religious leaders in Massachusetts. Andros first received a warning of the impending revolt against his control while leading an expedition to fortify Pemaquid (Bristol, Maine), intending to protect the area against French and Indian attacks. In early January 1688/9, he received a letter from King James describing the Dutch military buildup. On January 10, he issued a proclamation warning against Protestant agitation and prohibiting an uprising against the dominion. The military force that he led in Maine was composed of British regulars and militia from Massachusetts and Maine. The militia companies were commanded by regulars who imposed harsh discipline that alienated the militiamen from their officers. Andros was alerted to the meetings in Boston and also received unofficial reports of the revolution, and he returned to Boston in mid-March. A rumor circulated that he had taken the militia to Maine as part of a so-called "popish plot;" the Maine militia mutinied, and those from Massachusetts began to make their way home. A proclamation reached Boston in early April announcing the revolution; Andros had the messenger arrested, but his news was distributed, emboldening the people. Andros wrote to his commander at Pemaquid on April 16 that "there is a general buzzing among the people, great with expectation of their old charter", even as he prepared to have the returning deserters arrested and shipped back to Maine. The threat of arrests by their own colonial militia increased tensions between the people of Boston and the dominion government. ## Revolt in Boston At about 5 a.m. on April 18, militia companies began gathering outside Boston at Charlestown just across the Charles River, and at Roxbury, located at the far end of the neck connecting Boston to the mainland. At about 8 a.m., the Charlestown companies boarded boats and crossed the river while the Roxbury companies marched down the neck and into the city. Simultaneously, men from the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company entered the homes of the regimental drummers in the city, confiscating their equipment. The militia companies met at about 8:30, joined by a growing crowd, and began arresting dominion and regimental leaders. They eventually surrounded Fort Mary where Andros was quartered. Among the first to be arrested was Captain John George of HMS Rose who came ashore between 9 and 10 a.m., only to be met by a platoon of militia and the ship's carpenter who had joined the Americans. George demanded to see an arrest warrant, and the militiamen drew their swords and took him into custody. By 10 a.m., most of the dominion and military officials had either been arrested or had fled to the safety of Castle Island or other fortified outposts. Boston Anglicans were rounded up by the people, including a church warden and an apothecary. Sometime before noon, an orange flag was raised on Beacon Hill signaling another 1,500 militiamen to enter the city. These troops formed up in the market square, where a declaration was read which supported "the noble Undertaking of the Prince of Orange", calling the people to rise up because of a "horrid Popish Plot" that had been uncovered. The Massachusetts colonial leadership headed by ex-governor Simon Bradstreet then urged Governor Andros to surrender for his own safety. He refused and tried to escape to Rose, but the militia intercepted a boat that came ashore from Rose, and Andros was forced back into Fort Mary. Negotiations ensued and Andros agreed to leave the fort to meet with the council. He was promised safe conduct and marched under guard to the townhouse where the council had assembled. There he was told that "they must and would have the Government in their own hands", as an anonymous account describes it, and that he was under arrest. Daniel Fisher grabbed him by the collar and took him to the home of dominion official John Usher and held him under close watch. Rose and Fort William on Castle Island refused to surrender initially. On the 19th, however, the crew aboard Rose was told that the captain had planned to take the ship to France to join the exiled King James. A struggle ensued, and the Protestants among the crew took down the ship's rigging. The troops on Castle Island saw this and surrendered. ## Aftermath Fort Mary surrendered on the 19th, and Andros was moved there from Usher's house. He was confined with Joseph Dudley and other dominion officials until June 7, when he was transferred to Castle Island. A story circulated widely that he had attempted an escape dressed in women's clothing. This was disputed by Boston's Anglican minister Robert Ratcliff, who claimed that such stories had "not the least foundation of Truth" but were "falsehoods and lies" propagated to "render the Governour odious to his people". Andros did make a successful escape from Castle Island on August 2 after his servant bribed the sentries with liquor. He managed to flee to Rhode Island but was recaptured soon after and kept in what was virtually solitary confinement. He and others arrested in the wake of the revolt were held for 10 months before being sent to England for trial. Massachusetts agents in London refused to sign the documents listing the charges against Andros, so he was summarily acquitted and released. He later served as governor of Virginia and Maryland. ## Dissolution of the dominion The other New England colonies in the dominion were informed of the overthrow of Andros, and colonial authorities moved to restore the governmental structures which had been in place prior to the dominion's enforcement. Rhode Island and Connecticut resumed governance under their earlier charters, and Massachusetts resumed governance according to its vacated charter after being temporarily governed by a committee composed of magistrates, Massachusetts Bay officials, and a majority of Andros's council. New Hampshire was temporarily left without formal government and was controlled by Massachusetts and its governor Simon Bradstreet, who served as de facto ruler of the northern colony. Plymouth Colony also resumed its previous form of governance. During his captivity, Andros had been able to send a message to Francis Nicholson, his New York-based lieutenant governor. Nicholson received the request for assistance in mid-May, but most of his troops had been sent to Maine and he was unable to take any effective action because tensions were also rising in New York. Nicholson himself was overthrown by a faction led by Jacob Leisler, and he fled to England. Leisler governed New York until 1691 when a detachment of troops arrived followed by Henry Sloughter, commissioned governor by William and Mary. Sloughter had Leisler tried on charges of high treason; he was convicted and executed. No further effort was made by English officials to restore the shattered dominion after the suppression of Leisler's Rebellion and the reinstatement of colonial governments in New England. Once Andros' arrest was known, the discussion in London turned to dealing with Massachusetts and its revoked charter. This led to formation of the Province of Massachusetts Bay in 1691, merging Massachusetts with Plymouth Colony and territories previously belonging to New York, including Nantucket, Martha's Vineyard, the Elizabeth Islands, and parts of Maine. Increase Mather was unsuccessful in his attempts to restore the old Puritan rule; the new charter called for an appointed governor and religious toleration. ## See also - Leisler's Rebellion, a similar 1689 rebellion against the pro-Anglican governor of the Province of New York in the wake of the revolt - Gove's Rebellion

Réunion swamphen

Hypothetical extinct species of bird

The Réunion swamphen (Porphyrio caerulescens), also known as the Réunion gallinule or oiseau bleu (French for "blue bird"), is a hypothetical extinct species of rail that was endemic to the Mascarene island of Réunion. While only known from 17th- and 18th-century accounts by visitors to the island, it was scientifically named in 1848, based on the 1674 account by Sieur Dubois. A considerable literature was subsequently devoted to its possible affinities, with current researchers agreeing it was derived from the swamphen genus Porphyrio. It has been considered mysterious and enigmatic due to the lack of any physical evidence of its existence. This bird was described as entirely blue in plumage with a red beak and legs. It was said to be the size of a Réunion ibis or chicken, which could mean 65–70 cm (26–28 in) in length, and it may have been similar to the takahē. While easily hunted, it was a fast runner and able to fly, though it did so reluctantly. It may have fed on plant matter and invertebrates, as do other swamphens, and was said to nest among grasses and aquatic ferns. It was only found on the Plaine des Cafres plateau, to which it may have retreated during the latter part of its existence, whereas other swamphens inhabit lowland swamps. While the last unequivocal account is from 1730, it may have survived until 1763, but overhunting and the introduction of cats likely drove it to extinction. ## Taxonomy Visitors to the Mascarene island of Réunion during the 17th and 18th centuries reported blue birds (oiseaux bleus in French). The first such account is that of the French traveller Sieur Dubois, who was on Réunion from 1669 to 1672, which was published in 1674. The British naturalist Hugh Edwin Strickland stated in 1848 that he would have thought Dubois' account referred to a member of the swamphen genus Porphyrio if not for its large size and other features (and noted the term oiseau bleu had also been erroneously used for bats on Réunion in an old account). Strickland expressed hope that remains of this and other extinct Mascarene birds would be found there. Responding to Strickland's book later that year, the Belgian scientist Edmond de Sélys Longchamps coined the scientific name Apterornis coerulescens based on Dubois' account. The specific name is Latin for "bluish, becoming blue". Sélys Longchamps also included two other Mascarene birds, at the time only known from contemporary accounts, in the genus Apterornis: the Réunion ibis (now Threskiornis solitarius); and the red rail (now Aphanapteryx bonasia). He thought them related to the dodo and Rodrigues solitaire, due to their shared rudimentary wings, tail, and the disposition of their digits. The name Apterornis had already been used for a different extinct bird genus from New Zealand (originally spelled Aptornis, the adzebills) by the British biologist Richard Owen earlier in 1848, and the French biologist Charles Lucien Bonaparte coined the new binomial Cyanornis erythrorhynchus for the oiseau bleu in 1857. The same year, the German ornithologist Hermann Schlegel moved the species to the genus Porphyrio, as P. (Notornis) caerulescens, indicating an affinity with the takahē (now called Porphyrio hochstetteri, then also referred to as Notornis by some authors) of New Zealand. Schlegel argued that the discovery of the takahē showed that members of Porphyrio could be large, thereby disproving Strickland's earlier doubts based on size. The British ornithologist Richard Bowdler Sharpe simply used the name Porphyrio caerulescens in 1894. The British zoologist Walter Rothschild retained the name Apterornis for the bird in 1907, and considered it similar to Aptornis and the takahē, believing Dubois's account indicated it was related to those birds. The Japanese ornithologist Masauji Hachisuka used the new combination Cyanornis coerulescens for the bird in 1953 (with the specific name misspelled), also considering it related to the takahē due to its size. Throughout the 20th century the bird was usually considered a member of Porphyrio or Notornis, and the latter genus was eventually itself considered a junior synonym of Porphyrio. Some writers equated the bird with extant swamphens, including African swamphens by the French ornithologist Jacques Berlioz in 1946, and western swamphens by the French ornithologist Nicolas Barré in 1996, despite their different habitat. The French ornithologist Philippe Milon doubted the Porphyrio affiliation in 1951, since Dubois's account stated the Réunion bird was palatable, while extant swamphens are not. In 1967, the American ornithologist James Greenway stated that the bird "must remain mysterious" until Porphyrio bones are one day uncovered. In 1974, an attempt was made to find fossil localities on the Plaine des Cafres plateau, where the bird was said to have lived. No caves, which might contain kitchen middens where early settlers discarded bones of local birds, were found, and it was determined that a more careful study of the area was needed before excavations could be made. In 1977, the American ornithologist Storrs L. Olson found the old accounts consistent with an endemic derivative of Porphyrio, and considered it a probable species whose remains might one day be discovered. The British ecologist Anthony S. Cheke considered previous arguments about the bird's affinities in 1987, and supported it being a Porphyrio relative, while noting that there were two further contemporary accounts. The same year, the British writer Errol Fuller listed the bird as a hypothetical species, and expressed puzzlement as to how a considerable literature had been derived from such "flimsy material". The French palaeontologist Cécile Mourer-Chauviré and colleagues listed the bird as Cyanornis (?=Porphyrio) caerulescens in 2006, indicating the uncertainty of its classification. They stated the cause of the scarcity of its fossil remains was probably that it did not live in the parts of Réunion where fossils might have been preserved. Cheke and the British palaeontologist Julian P. Hume stated in 2008 that, since the mystery of the "Réunion solitaire" had been solved after it was identified with ibis remains, the Réunion swamphen remains the most enigmatic of the Mascarene birds from the old accounts. In his 2012 book about extinct birds and his 2019 monograph about extinct Mascarene rails, Hume stated that the Réunion swamphen had been mentioned by trustworthy observers, but was "perhaps the most enigmatic of all rails" with no evidence to resolve its taxonomy. He thought there was no doubt that it was a derivative of Porphyrio, as the all-blue colouration is only found in that genus among rails. While it may have been derived from Africa or Madagascar, genetic studies have shown that other rails have dispersed to unexpectedly great distances from their closest relatives, making alternative explanations possible. ## Description The Réunion swamphen was described as having entirely blue plumage with a red beak and legs, and is generally agreed to have been a large, terrestrial swamphen, with features indicative of reduced flight capability, such as larger size and more robust legs. There has been disagreement over the size of the bird, as Dubois' account compared its size with that of a Réunion ibis while that of the French engineer Jean Feuilley from 1704 compared it to a domestic chicken. Cheke stated in 1987 that Feuilley's account would indicate the bird was not unusually large, perhaps the size of a swamphen. Hume pointed out in 2019 that the Réunion ibis would have been 65–68 cm (26–27 in) at most, similar to the extant African sacred ibis (including the tail), while chickens could be 65–70 cm (26–28 in) in length (the size of their ancestor, the wild red junglefowl), and there was therefore no contradiction. The Réunion swamphen would thereby have been about the same size as the takahē. The first description of the Réunion swamphen is that of Dubois from 1674: > As big as the solitaires [Réunion ibis]; their plumage is entirely blue, the beak and the feet red and made like those of hens; they do not fly, but run extremely quickly, so that a dog has difficulty catching them in a chase; they are very good [to eat]. The last definite account of the bird is that of the priest Father Brown from around 1730 (expanded from a 1717 account by Le Gentil): > Towards the east of the island there is a little plateau up a high mountain called the Plaine des Cafres where one finds a large blue bird whose colour is very striking. It resembles a wood-pigeon. It flies but rarely and always barely above the ground, but it walks with surprising speed. The inhabitants have never called it anything other than oiseau bleu; its flesh is quite good and keeps well. Olson stated the comparison to a "wood pigeon" was a reference to the common wood pigeon, implying that Brown described it as smaller than Dubois did, while Hume suggested it could be the extinct Réunion blue pigeon. The 1708 account of Hébert does not add much information, though he qualified its colouration as "dark blue". While the bird is only known from written accounts, reconstructions of it appear in Rothschild's 1907 book Extinct Birds, and Hachisuka's 1953 book The Dodo and Kindred Birds. Rothschild stated he had the Dutch artist John Gerrard Keulemans depict it as intermediate between the takahē and Aptornis, which he thought its closest relatives. Fuller found Frohawk's illustration to be a well-produced work, though almost entirely conjectural in depicting it like a slimmed-down takahē. ## Behaviour and ecology Little is known about the ecology of the Réunion swamphen; it was easily caught and killed, unlike other swamphens (which avoid predators by flying or hiding), though it was able to run fast. While some early researchers thought the bird to be flightless, Brown's account states it could fly, and it is thought to have been a reluctant flier. Hume suggested it may have fed on plant matter and invertebrates, as other swamphens do. At least in the latter part of its existence, it appears to have been confined to mountains (retreating there between the 1670s and 1705), in particular to the Plaine des Cafres plateau, situated at an altitude of about 1,600–1,800 m (5,200–5,900 ft) in south-central Réunion. The environment of this area consists of open woodland in a subalpine forest steppe, and has marshy pools. The Réunion swamphen was termed a land-bird by Dubois, while other swamphens inhabit lowland swamps. This is similar to the Réunion ibis, which lived in forest rather than wetlands, which is otherwise typical ibis habitat. Cheke and Hume proposed that the ancestors of these birds colonised Réunion before swamps had developed, and had therefore become adapted to the available habitats. They were perhaps prevented from colonising Mauritius as well due to the presence of red rails there, which may have occupied a similar ecological niche. Feuilley described some characteristics of the bird in 1704: > The Oiseaux bleuff live in the plaines on top of the mountains, and especially on the Plaine des Cafres. They are the size of a large capon, blue in colour. Those that are old are worth nothing to eat because they are so tough, but when they are young they are excellent. Hunting them is not difficult because one kills them with sticks or with stones. The only account of its nesting behaviour is that of La Roque from 1708: > One sees there [the Plaines de Cafres] a great number of oiseaux bleus which nest among grasses and aquatic ferns. Many other endemic species on Réunion became extinct after the arrival of humans and the resulting disruption of the island's ecosystem. The Réunion swamphen lived alongside other now-extinct birds, such as the Réunion ibis, the Mascarene parrot, the Hoopoe starling, the Réunion parakeet, the Réunion scops owl, the Réunion night heron, and the Réunion pink pigeon. Extinct Réunion reptiles include the Réunion giant tortoise and an undescribed Leiolopisma skink. The small Mauritian flying fox and the snail Tropidophora carinata lived on Réunion and Mauritius before vanishing from both islands. ## Extinction Many terrestrial rails are flightless, and island populations are particularly vulnerable to man-made changes; as a result, rails have suffered more extinctions than any other family of birds. All six endemic species of Mascarene rails are extinct, all caused by human activities. Overhunting was the main cause of the Réunion swamphen's extinction (it was considered good game and was easy to catch), but according to Cheke and Hume, the introduction of cats at the end of the 17th century could have contributed to the elimination of the bird once these became feral and reached its habitat. Today, cats are still a serious threat to native birds, in particular Barau's petrel, since they occur all over Réunion, including the most remote and high peaks. The eggs and chicks would also have been vulnerable to rats after their accidental introduction in 1676. On the other hand, the Réunion swamphen and other birds of the island appear to have successfully survived feral pigs. Cattle grazing on Plaine des Cafres was promoted by the French explorer Jean-Baptiste Charles Bouvet de Lozier in the 1750s, which may have also had an impact on the bird. While the last unequivocal account of the Réunion swamphen is from 1730, an anonymous account from 1763, possibly by the British Brigadier-General Richard Smith, may be the last mention of this bird, though no description of it was provided, and it might refer to another species. It is also impossible to say whether this writer saw the bird himself. It gives a contemporary impression of the Réunion swamphen's habitat, Plaine des Cafres, and of how birds were hunted there: > The plain des Caffres, is formed by the summits of mountains at a very considerable elevation above the sea: it is said to be twenty miles in extent, and is very flat, and without stones. The access to it is very difficult in certain places, though it may be ascended on horseback. The air is very pure, but as cold as winter's day in England. When the clouds pass over the surface of the plain, they have all the effect of a gentle rain. A brook runs through the middle of it, which is broad but shallow, has a sandy bottom, and freezes in the winter.... There are also some curious birds, which never descend to the sea-side, and who are so little accustomed to, or alarmed at, the sight of man, that they suffer themselves to be killed by the stroke of a walking stick. If the Réunion swamphen survived until 1763 this would be far longer than many other extinct birds of Réunion. If so, its survival was likely because of the remoteness of its habitat. ## See also - List of extinct animals of Réunion

Piano Concerto No. 24 (Mozart)

Concertante work by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

The Piano Concerto No. 24 in C minor, K. 491, is a concerto composed by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart for keyboard (usually a piano or fortepiano) and orchestra. Mozart composed the concerto in the winter of 1785–1786, finishing it on 24 March 1786, three weeks after completing his Piano Concerto No. 23 in A major. As he intended to perform the work himself, Mozart did not write out the soloist's part in full. The premiere was in early April 1786 at the Burgtheater in Vienna. Chronologically, the work is the twentieth of Mozart's 23 original piano concertos. The work is one of only two minor-key piano concertos that Mozart composed, the other being the No. 20 in D minor. None of Mozart's other piano concertos features a larger array of instruments: the work is scored for strings, woodwinds, horns, trumpets and timpani. The first of its three movements, Allegro, is in sonata form and is longer than any opening movement of Mozart's earlier concertos. The second movement, Larghetto, in E major—the relative major of C minor—features a strikingly simple principal theme. The final movement, Allegretto, is a theme and eight variations in C minor. The work is one of Mozart's most advanced compositions in the concerto genre. Its early admirers included Ludwig van Beethoven and Johannes Brahms. Musicologist Arthur Hutchings declared it to be, taken as a whole, Mozart's greatest piano concerto. ## Background Mozart composed the concerto in the winter of 1785–86, during his fourth season in Vienna. It was the third in a set of three concertos composed in quick succession, the others being No. 22 in E major and No. 23 in A major. Mozart finished composing the No. 24 shortly before the premiere of his comic opera The Marriage of Figaro; the two works are assigned adjacent numbers of 491 and 492 in the Köchel catalogue. Although composed at the same time, the two works contrast greatly: the opera is almost entirely in major keys while the concerto is one of Mozart's few minor-key works. The pianist and musicologist Robert D. Levin suggests that the concerto, along with the two concertos that precede it, may have served as an outlet for a darker aspect of Mozart's creativity at the time he was composing the comic opera. The premiere of the concerto was on either 3 or 7 April 1786 at the Burgtheater in Vienna; Mozart featured as the soloist and conducted the orchestra from the keyboard. In 1800, Mozart's widow Constanze sold the original score of the work to the publisher Johann Anton André of Offenbach am Main. It passed through several private hands during the nineteenth century before Sir George Donaldson, a Scottish philanthropist, donated it to the Royal College of Music in 1894. The College still houses the manuscript today. The original score contains no tempo markings; the tempo for each movement is known only from the entries Mozart made into his catalogue. The orchestral parts in the original score are written in a clear manner. The solo part, on the other hand, is often incomplete: on many occasions in the score Mozart notated only the outer parts of passages of scales or broken chords. This suggests that Mozart improvised much of the solo part when performing the work. The score also contains late additions, including that of the second subject of the first movement's orchestral exposition. There is the occasional notation error in the score, which musicologist Friedrich Blume attributed to Mozart having "obviously written in great haste and under internal strain". ## Music ### Overview The concerto is divided into the following three movements: The concerto is scored for one flute, two oboes, two clarinets, two bassoons, two horns, two trumpets, timpani and strings. This is the largest array of instruments for which Mozart composed any of his concertos. It is one of only two of Mozart's piano concertos that are scored for both oboes and clarinets (the other, his concerto for two pianos, has clarinets only in the revised version). The clarinet was not at the time a conventional orchestral instrument. Robert D. Levin writes: "The richness of wind sonority, due to the inclusion of oboes and clarinets, is the central timbral characteristic of [the concerto]: time and again in all three movements the winds push the strings completely to the side." The solo instrument for the concerto is scored as a "cembalo". This term often denotes a harpsichord, but in this concerto, Mozart used it as a generic term that encompassed the fortepiano, an eighteenth-century predecessor of the modern piano that among other things was more dynamically capable than the harpsichord. ### I. Allegro The first movement is longer and more complex than any that Mozart had previously composed in the concerto genre. It is in ; among Mozart's 27 piano concertos, No. 4 in G Major, No. 11 in F major and No. 14 in E major are the only others to commence in triple metre. The first movement follows the standard outline of a sonata form concerto movement of the Classical period. It begins with an orchestral exposition, which is followed by a solo exposition, a development section, a recapitulation, a cadenza and a coda. Within this conventional outline, Mozart engages in extensive structural innovation. #### Exposition The orchestral exposition, 99 measures long, presents two groups of thematic material, one primary and one secondary, both in the tonic of C minor. The orchestra opens the principal theme in unison, but not powerfully: the dynamic marking is piano. The theme is tonally ambiguous, not asserting the home key of C minor until its final cadence in the thirteenth measure. It is also highly chromatic: in its 13 measures, it utilises all 12 notes of the chromatic scale. The solo exposition follows its orchestral counterpart, and it is here that convention is discarded from the outset: the piano does not enter with the principal theme. Instead, it has an 18-measure solo passage. It is only after this passage that the principal theme appears, carried by the orchestra. The piano then picks up the theme from its seventh measure. Another departure from convention is that the solo exposition does not re-state the secondary theme from the orchestral exposition. Instead, a succession of new secondary thematic material appears. Musicologist Donald Tovey considered this introduction of new material to be "utterly subversive of the doctrine that the function of the opening tutti [the orchestral exposition] was to predict what the solo had to say." One hundred measures into the solo exposition, which is now in the relative major of E, the piano plays a cadential trill, leading the orchestra from the dominant seventh to the tonic. This suggests to the listener that the solo exposition has reached an end, but Mozart instead gives the woodwinds a new theme. The exposition continues for another 60 or so measures, before another cadential trill brings about the real conclusion, prompting a ritornello that connects the exposition with the development. The pianist and musicologist Charles Rosen argues that Mozart thus created a "double exposition". Rosen also suggests that this explains why Mozart made substantial elongations to the orchestral exposition during the composition process; he needed a longer orchestral exposition to balance its "double" solo counterpart. #### Development The development begins with the piano repeating its entry to the solo exposition, this time in the relative major of E. The Concerto No. 20 is the only other of Mozart's concertos in which the solo exposition and the development commence with the same material. In the Concerto No. 24, the material unfolds in the development in a manner different from the solo exposition: the opening solo motif, with its half cadence, is repeated four times, with one intervention from the woodwinds, as if asking question after question. The final question is asked in C minor and is answered by a descending scale from the piano that leads to an orchestral statement, in F minor, of the movement's principal theme. The orchestral theme is then developed: the motif of the theme's fourth and fifth measures descends through the circle of fifths, accompanied by an elaborate piano figuration. After this, the development proceeds to a stormy exchange between the piano and the orchestra, which the twentieth-century Mozart scholar Cuthbert Girdlestone describes as "one of the few [occasions] in Mozart where passion seems really unchained", and which Tovey describes as a passage of "fine, severe massiveness". The exchange resolves to a passage in which the piano plays a treble line of sixteenth notes, over which the winds add echoes of the main theme. This transitional passage ultimately modulates to the home key of C minor, bringing about the start of the recapitulation with the conventional re-statement, by the orchestra, of the movement's principal theme. #### Recapitulation, cadenza and coda The wide range of thematic material presented in the orchestral and solo expositions poses a challenge for the recapitulation. Mozart manages to recapitulate all of the themes in the home key of C minor. The themes are necessarily compressed, are presented in a different order, and in their restated form, contain few virtuosic moments for the soloist. The last theme to be recapitulated is the secondary theme of the orchestral exposition, which has not been heard for some 400 measures and is now adorned by a passage of triplets from the piano. The recapitulation concludes with the piano playing arpeggiated sixteenths before a cadential trill leads into a ritornello. The ritornello in turn leads into a fermata that prompts the soloist's cadenza. Mozart did not write down a cadenza for the movement, or at least there is no evidence of him having done so. Many later composers and performers, including Johannes Brahms, Ferruccio Busoni, Alfred Schnittke and Gabriel Fauré, have composed their own. Uniquely among Mozart's concertos, the score does not direct the soloist to end the cadenza with a cadential trill. The omission of the customary trill is likely to have been deliberate, with Mozart choosing to have the cadenza connect directly to the coda without one. The conventional Mozartian coda concludes with an orchestral tutti and no written-out part for the soloist. In this movement, Mozart breaks with convention: the soloist interrupts the tutti with a virtuosic passage of sixteenth notes and accompanies the orchestra through to the final pianissimo C-minor chords. ### II. Larghetto Alfred Einstein said of the concerto's second movement that it "moves in regions of the purest and most moving tranquility, and has a transcendent simplicity of expression". Marked Larghetto, the movement is in E major and cut common time. The trumpets and timpani play no part; they return for the third movement. The movement opens with the soloist playing the four-measure principal theme alone; it is then repeated by the orchestra. This theme is, in the words of Michael Steinberg, one of "extreme simplicity". Donald Tovey refers to the fourth bar, extremely bare and lacking any ornamentation, as "naive", but considers that Mozart intended for it to be so. Mozart's first sketch of the movement was much more complex. He likely simplified the theme to provide a greater contrast with the dark intensity of the first movement. After the orchestra repeats the principal theme, there is a very simple bridge or transitional passage that Girdlestone calls "but a sketch" to be ornamented by the soloist, arguing that "to play it as printed is to betray the memory of Mozart". Following the bridge passage, the soloist plays the initial four-measure theme for a second time, before the orchestra commences a new section of the movement, in C minor. A brief return of the principal theme, its rhythm altered, separates the C minor section from a section in A major. After this new section, the principal theme returns to mark the end of the movement, its rhythm altered yet again. Now, the theme is played twice by the soloist, the two appearances being connected by the same simple bridge passage from the beginning of the movement. Girdlestone argues that here "the soloist will have to draw on his imagination to adorn [the simple bridge passage] a second time". The overall structure of the movement is thus ABACA, making the movement in rondo form. In the middle statement of the principal theme (between the C minor and A major sections), there is a notational error which, in a literal performance of the score, causes a harmonic clash between the piano and the winds. Mozart probably wrote the piano and wind parts at different times, resulting in an oversight by the composer. Alfred Brendel, who has recorded the concerto on multiple occasions, argues that performers should not follow the score literally but correct Mozart's error. Brendel further argues that the time signature for the whole movement is another notational error: played in cut common time, which calls for two beats per bar rather than four, the movement is, in his view, too fast. The form of the movement is nearly identical to that of the second movement of Mozart's Piano Sonata in B major, K. 570. ### III. Allegretto The third movement features a theme in C minor followed by eight variations upon it. Hutchings considered it "both Mozart's finest essay in variation form and also his best concerto finale." The tempo marking for the movement is Allegretto. Rosen opines that this calls for a march-like speed and argues that the movement is "generally taken too fast under the delusion that a quick tempo will give it a power commensurate with that of the opening movement." Pianist Angela Hewitt sees in the movement not a march but a "sinister dance". The movement opens with the first violins stating the theme over a string and wind accompaniment. This theme consists of two eight-measure phrases, each repeated: the first phrase modulates from C minor to the dominant, G minor; the second phrase modulates back to C minor. The soloist does not play any part in the statement of the theme, entering only in Variation I. Here, the piano ornaments the theme over an austere string accompaniment. Variations II to VI are what Girdlestone and Hutchings independently describe as "double" variations. Within each variation, each of the eight-measure phrases from the theme is further varied upon its repeat (A_XA_YB_XB_Y). Variations IV and VI are in major keys. Tovey refers to the former (in A) as "cheerful" and the latter (in C) as "graceful". Between the two major-key variations, Variation V returns to C minor; Girdlestone describes this variation as "one of the most moving". Variation VII is half the length of the preceding variations, as it omits the repeat of each eight-measure phrase. This variation concludes with an extra three-measure passage that culminates in a dominant chord, announcing the arrival of a cadenza. After the cadenza, the soloist opens the eighth and final variation alone, with the orchestra joining after 19 measures. The arrival of the final variation also brings a change in metre: from cut common time to compound duple time. Both the final variation and the coda which follows contain numerous neapolitan-sixth chords. Girdlestone referred to the "haunting" effect of these chords and stated that the coda ultimately "proclaims with desperation the triumph of the minor mode". ## Critical reception Ludwig van Beethoven admired the concerto and it may have influenced his Piano Concerto No. 3, also in C minor. After hearing the work in a rehearsal, Beethoven reportedly remarked to a colleague that "[w]e shall never be able to do anything like that." Johannes Brahms also admired the concerto, encouraging Clara Schumann to play it, and wrote his own cadenza for the first movement. Brahms referred to the work as a "masterpiece of art and full of inspired ideas." Among modern and twentieth-century scholars, Cuthbert Girdlestone states that the concerto "is in all respects one of [Mozart's] greatest; we would fain say: the greatest, were it not impossible to choose between four or five of them." Referring to the "dark, tragic and passionate" nature of the concerto, Alfred Einstein states that "it is hard to imagine the expression on the faces of the Viennese public" when Mozart premiered the work. The musicologist Simon P. Keefe, in an exegesis of all of Mozart's piano concertos, writes that the No. 24 is "a climactic and culminating work in Mozart's piano concerto oeuvre, firmly linked to its predecessors, yet decisively transcending them at the same time." The verdict of the Mozart scholar Alexander Hyatt King is that the concerto is "not only the most sublime of the whole series but also one of the greatest pianoforte concertos ever composed". Arthur Hutchings's view is that "whatever value we put upon any single movement from the Mozart concertos, we shall find no work greater as a concerto than this K. 491, for Mozart never wrote a work whose parts were so surely those of 'one stupendous whole'." ## Notes, references and sources

Myriostoma

Genus of fungi

Myriostoma is a fungal genus in the family Geastraceae. Basidiocarps resemble earthstars, but the spore sac is supported by multiple columns (instead of a single column) and has multiple ostioles instead of a single, apical ostiole. Until 2017, the genus was thought to be monotypic with a single, widespread species, Myriostoma coliforme. Recent research has, however, shown that at least six species occur worldwide. ## Taxonomy and phylogeny Nicaise Auguste Desvaux first defined and published the genus Myriostoma in 1809, with the single species Myriostoma anglicum (an illegitimate renaming of James Dickson's original Lycoperdon coliforme). In 1821 Samuel Frederick Gray described the superfluous genus Polystoma for it. Myriostoma was classified in the family Geastraceae until 1973, when British mycologist Donald Dring placed it in the Astraeaceae based on the presence of trabeculae (stout columns that extend from the peridium to the central core of the fruit body) in the gleba, and the absence of a true hymenium. In his 1989 monograph, Stellan Sunhede returned it to the Geastraceae. Molecular analysis of DNA sequences has confirmed the traditional belief that Myriostoma and Geastrum are closely related. Recent molecular research, based on cladistic analysis of DNA sequences, has shown that the genus, previously thought to be monotypic, comprises at least six species worldwide. ## Etymology The generic name is from the Greek words μυρίος, meaning "countless" and στόμα, meaning "mouth" (the source of the technical term stoma). ## Description The fruit bodies start their development underground or buried in leaf debris, linked to a strand of mycelium at the base. As they mature, the exoperidium (the outer tissue layer of the peridium) splits open into 7 to 14 rays which curve backward; this pushes the fruit body above the substrate. Fully opened specimens can reach dimensions of 2–12 cm (0.8–4.7 in) from ray tip to tip. The rays are of unequal size, with tips that often roll back inward. They comprise three distinct layers of tissue. The inner pseudoparenchymatous layer (so named for the resemblance to the tightly packed cells of plant parenchyma) is fleshy and thick when fresh, and initially pale beige but darkening to yellow or brown as it matures, often cracking and peeling off in the process. The exterior mycelial layer, often matted with fine leaf debris or dirt, usually cracks to reveal a middle fibrous layer, which is made of densely packed hyphae. The base of the fruit body is concave to vaulted in shape, and often covered with adhering dirt. The roughly spherical spore sac (endoperidium) is supported by a cluster of short columns shaped like flattened spheres. It is grey-brown and often minutely roughened with small warts. There are several to many evenly dispersed mouths, the ostioles, mainly on the upper half of the endoperidium. They are roughly circular with fimbriate edges. Like earthstars, Myriostoma species use the force of falling raindrops to help disperse the spores, which are ejected in little bursts when objects (such as rain) strike the outer wall of the spore sac. The gleba has a cotton-like texture that, when compressed, allows the endoperidium to flex quickly and create a puff of air that is forced out through the ostioles. This generates a cloud of spores that can then be carried by the wind. There are columellae (sterile structures that start at the base of the gleba and extend through it), which are usually not evident in the mature gleba, but apparent at the base of the spore sac. The columellae are not connected to the ostioles, but rather, terminate within the gleba at some distance from them. The capillitia (sterile strands within the gleba) are long, slender, free, tapering, and unbranched. The spores are spherical, nonamyloid, and are ornamented with irregularly shaped flaring protuberances. ## Habitat and distribution Myriostoma species are saprotrophic, deriving nutrients from decomposing organic matter. Fruit bodies grow grouped in well-drained or sandy soil, often in the partial shade of trees. Typical habitats include deciduous forests and mixed forests, gardens, along hedges and grassy road banks, and grazed grasslands. Species have been described from Europe, Australia, Africa, South America, and Mexico; they are also known from North America and Asia.

Jesus College Boat Club (Oxford)

British rowing club

Jesus College Boat Club is a rowing club for members of Jesus College, Oxford, one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford. The club was formed in 1835, but rowing at the college predates the club's foundation: a boat from the college was involved in the earliest recorded races between college crews at Oxford in 1815, when it competed against Brasenose College. In the early years of rowing at Oxford, Jesus was one of the few colleges that participated in races. Neither the men's nor the women's 1st VIIIs have earned the title of "Head of the River", which is gained by winning Eights Week—the main inter-college rowing competition at Oxford. A number of college members have rowed for the university against Cambridge University in the Boat Race and the Women's Boat Race. Barney Williams, a Canadian rower who studied at the college, won a silver medal in rowing at the 2004 Summer Olympics, and participated in the Boat Race in 2005 and 2006. Other students who rowed while at the college have achieved success in other fields, including John Sankey, who became Lord Chancellor, Alwyn Williams, who became Bishop of Durham, and Maurice Jones, who became Principal of St David's College, Lampeter. Another college rower, James Page, was appointed Secretary of the Amateur Rowing Association and coached both the Oxford and Cambridge University boat clubs. The college boathouse, which is shared with the boat club of Keble College, is in Christ Church Meadow, on the Isis (as the River Thames is called in Oxford). It dates from 1964 and replaced a moored barge used by spectators and crew-members. The last college barge had been purchased from one of the Livery Companies of the City of London in 1911. It is now a floating restaurant further down the Thames at Richmond, and for some years was painted in the college colours of green and white. ## History The early records of the club have been lost, but there are references to a Jesus College boat in material that survives from the early 19th century. There are references to "pleasure boating" at Oxford in letters and poems written in the late 18th century, but races between crews from different colleges did not start until the early 19th century. Rowing in eights (boats with eight oarsmen, each pulling one oar, and steered by a coxswain) began at Eton, where there is a record of the school owning three eights by 1811, and then progressed to Oxford. The first record of an inter-college race, between eights from Jesus College and Brasenose College, dates from 1815. These may have been the only two colleges who had boats racing at that time, and the Brasenose boat was usually victorious. There were few rowers, and races between fours (boats with four oarsmen and a coxswain) tended to attract more interest than races between eights. Students would row to the inn at Sandford-on-Thames, a few miles south of Oxford, and race each other on the way back. The races would start at Iffley Lock and finish at King's Barge, off Christ Church Meadow. Flags hoisted on the barge would indicate the finishing order of the crews. Crews would set off one behind the other, the trailing boat(s) trying to catch, or "bump", the boat ahead. The bumped boat and the bumping boat would then drop out and the bumping boat would start the next day's race ahead of the bumped boat. The aim was to become the lead boat, known as Head of the River. For identification, crews wore college colours and emblazoned the rudder of the boat with the college coat of arms. Crews from Jesus College painted leeks (an emblem of Wales) on their oars for further distinction. In early races, some rowers wore high hats while others, including the Jesus crews, wore Tam o'shanters in college colours (green with a white band for Jesus); crews from Jesus College wore these until at least 1847. In 1822, crews from Jesus and Brasenose raced each other to become Head of the River. One Brasenose rower apparently "caught a crab", slowing the boat. The Brasenose boat was bumped by the Jesus boat, but rowed on regardless and claimed that it was still Head of the River. Jesus and Brasenose men competed over which college's flag should be hoisted to denote the winning boat. One of the Brasenose crew ended the dispute by saying "Quot homines tot sententiae, different men have different opinions, some like leeks and some like onions", referring to the emblem on the Jesus oars, and it was agreed to row the race again. The Brasenose crew won the rematch. The incident has been said to be shown in an 1822 picture, the earliest depiction of an eights race at Oxford, painted by I. T. Serres (Marine Painter to George IV). However, the print was published on 1 March 1822 and it would have taken several months to prepare and engrave. It also shows a summer scene. Both of these points suggest that the print depicts either an imaginary scene or an unrecorded event from 1821. Races gradually became more formalised, and regulations were introduced prohibiting colleges from using professional rowers or members of other colleges. A race for the colleges' second boats (Torpids) was introduced in 1826, and eventually boats with less than eight oars were excluded from the races. During the late 1820s and early 1830s, Jesus did not take part in races, but the college was mentioned as having a second boat by 1836. The formal foundation of the club dates from 1835, and official records of inter-college races begin in 1837. The Jesus College 1st VIII started the competition that year in second position, behind the Christ Church 1st VIII, but after being bumped on successive nights by Exeter, Balliol and Queen's colleges, Jesus took no further part in that year's competition. In 1838, the Jesus College boat rowed in last place on one evening, but did not participate in the races again until 1844. The club's fortunes varied in the years thereafter. In 1859, the eight achieved an unusual "overbump" (catching the crew that had started three places ahead of them, after the boat immediately ahead of it had bumped the boat it was chasing) and so went up three positions in one race. However, the college boat did not compete in 1860 and it finished in last place in 1864. From 1864 onwards, said Ernest Hardy (in his 1899 history of the college), "the boating record of the College has not been good" – the college did not take part in the races in many years, and it seldom improved its position by more than one or two places when it did participate. The college resumed regular participation in the races in 1882; although it was in last place in 1889, the college improved its position, and went up by nine places between 1894 and 1896. Hardy also commented that the 1896 Jesus College boat had a reputation of being one of the faster boats in the university. The crew entered for the Ladies' Challenge Plate at the Henley Regatta, but lost to Eton, the eventual winners. By 1930, the college 1st VIII had reached its highest position on the river for thirty years. In 1947, the college chaplain Leslie Cross presented a new set of oars to the club. He retired that year, and the college magazine, noting that Cross had been a particularly generous supporter of the club, stated that the oars had already been used to good purpose. The 1st VIII progressed further in the 1950s, making five bumps in 1951 and four in 1952 to reach the first division, with a high point of seventh in 1957. It later returned to the second division, before re-entering the first division in 1970. Its highest position in recent years was seventh in the first division in 2000; it has been back in the second division since 2004, and finished eighth in the second division in 2011. Women were first admitted to Jesus College in 1974; the college was one of the first five men's colleges to do so. The women's 1st VIII was Head of the River in Torpids between 1980 and 1983. In 1993, the women's 1st VIII won their "blades" in the first divisions of both Torpids and Eights Week, an achievement that led to the crew being described in the Jesus College Record as vying "not just for the College team of the decade, but perhaps for the team of the last three decades", in any sport. The same crew also won the Novices' Trophy at the Wallingford Regatta in the same year. The women's 1st VIII has not maintained its position since then. After some years in the third division, it ended the 2011 Eights Week in twelfth place in the second division, winning blades in the process. ## Club structure and finance All members of the college who have coxed or rowed in a JCBC boat are Ordinary Members of the Boat Club, a status that they retain until one month after leaving the college. The club is run by a committee, consisting of a President, the Men's and Women's Captains of Boats, Men's and Women's Vice-Captains of Boats, Captain of Coxes, Treasurer, Secretary, Boathouse Safety Officer, Kit Officer, and two Social Secretaries. Members of the committee hold office for one year, starting on Sunday of the sixth week of Trinity Term – the day after the last day of Eights Week. The Senior Member of the club is Peter Mirfield, a Fellow and Tutor in Law at the college. The college uses a proportion of student fees to fund social and sporting activity. The allocation for sport, including rowing, is overseen by the Committee of Amalgamated Clubs, which has representatives from the Junior and Middle Common Rooms (for undergraduates and postgraduates) as well as from the college's sport clubs. Old Members of the college who rowed when they were students can join the Cadwallader Club. The club, which was revitalised in 1974 and organises an annual dinner for members, also receives contributions for the Cadwallader Trust; this has been a registered charity since December 1982 and supports rowing at the college both with capital expenditure and training costs. In the year ending 5 April 2022, the trust's expenditure was £1,300. Members of the Cadwallader Club have helped to provide new boats and blades for the men's and the women's 1st VIIIs, and on the Saturday of Eights Week 2008, the trust presented the boat club with a new coxed four, named Cadwallader. Cadwallader Club members are also non-voting members of the boat club. ## Rowers D. W. Griffith, the stroke of the Jesus College boat, was present at the inaugural meeting of the Oxford University Boat Club on 23 April 1839. However, Jesus College oarsmen played an infrequent part in university rowing in the 19th century. No Jesus College student served on the OUBC committee between 1839 and 1899, the last year for which Sherwood gives records. Two students from the college (W. S. Thompson and E. W. Davies (cox)) were part of the losing Oxford crew in the second Oxford–Cambridge boat race in 1836. Between 1858 and 1899, seven others trialled, unsuccessfully, for places in the Oxford University crew. Since then, college representation in the Boat Race has been more frequent: M. L. Thomas and D. R. Glynne Jones (1952) and M.L. Thomas (President, 1953); Boris Mavra (1992, 1993 and 1995); the Canadian 2004 Olympic rowing silver medallist Barney Williams (2005 and 2006); and Brodie Buckland (2007). Justin Hutchinson rowed for Oxford's reserve crew, known as Isis, in the 2002 and 2003 Boat Races, as did Tim Farquharson and Tom Commins, both undergraduates studying Engineering Science in 2009 and 2015 respectively. Various women have won their "Blue" for competing in the Women's Boat Race against Cambridge: Anna Bean and Ann Bevitt (1989); Louise Sanford (1997); Claire Weaver (1998); and Sarah Marshall (2023). Some prominent individuals rowed while they were students at the college. The historian Albert Pollard was Captain of Boats in 1890, having rowed in the boat that was last on the river in 1889. Alwyn Williams (later Bishop of Durham), who was a student from 1906 to 1911, was captain of the Boat Club, as was James Page ("Freddie"), who went on to become secretary of the Amateur Rowing Association from 1952 to 1972 and a rowing coach for both Oxford and Cambridge Boat Clubs. Maurice Jones (later Principal of St David's College, Lampeter) was a cox, as were Gordon Roe (later Bishop of Huntingdon) and the chemist Frank Greenaway. John Sankey (later Lord Chancellor) rowed in a Torpid boat that went down four places, whilst the boat in which the baritone David Ffrangcon Davies rowed went up five places in Torpids and four in Eights Week. Angus Buchanan, who won the Victoria Cross in 1916 during the First World War, rowed in a college four in 1919, despite having been blinded in 1917. Anton Muttukumaru (later Commander of the Ceylon Army) rowed at bow in a college four. ## College barges Colleges began to keep barges moored on the side of the river on Christ Church Meadow from 1839; these would be used for crews to change, for spectators to watch the races and for social functions. Jesus shared a barge with New, St John's and Pembroke after 1857. In 1911, Jesus purchased their own barge from Salters, at a cost of £940.14s.8d (approximately £ as of 2023). It had previously been owned by one of the Livery Companies of the City of London and had been used in the days when the Lord Mayor's Show took place on the River Thames in London rather than through the streets. After sinking in 1955, it was salvaged and restored. In 1964, the college replaced the barge with a boathouse, which is shared with the boat club of Keble College). The barge was moved to Maidenhead where it was later restored. It returned to Oxford in 1987, but was badly damaged by fire in January 1988. After further restoration, it was moved to Richmond-upon-Thames, where it is moored alongside Richmond Bridge and used as a restaurant. The barge was decorated for some years in the college colours of green and white, with a Welsh red dragon on the prow; by 2009, however, it had been repainted with blue instead of green. ## See also - University rowing (UK)

Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House

Building in Manhattan, New York

The Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House (originally the New York Custom House) is a government building, museum, and former custom house at 1 Bowling Green, near the southern end of Manhattan in New York City, New York, United States. Designed by Cass Gilbert in the Beaux-Arts style, it was erected from 1902 to 1907 by the government of the United States as a headquarters for the Port of New York's duty collection operations. The building contains the George Gustav Heye Center museum, the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York, and the New York regional offices of the National Archives. The facade and part of the interior are New York City designated landmarks, and the building is listed on both the New York State Register of Historic Places and the National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) as a National Historic Landmark. It is also a contributing property to the Wall Street Historic District, listed on the NRHP. The Custom House is a seven-story steel-framed structure with a stone facade and elaborate interiors. The exterior is decorated with nautical motifs and sculptures by twelve artists. The second through fourth stories contain colonnades with Corinthian columns. The main entrance consists of a grand staircase flanked by Four Continents, a set of four statues by Daniel Chester French. The second-story entrance vestibule leads to a transverse lobby, a rotunda, and offices. The rotunda includes a skylight and ceiling murals by Reginald Marsh. The George Gustav Heye Center, a branch of the National Museum of the American Indian, operates on the ground and second stories, while the upper stories contain U.S. government offices. The building was proposed in 1889 as a replacement for the previous New York Custom House at 55 Wall Street. Because of various disagreements, the Bowling Green Custom House was not approved until 1899; Gilbert was selected as architect following a competition. The building opened in 1907, and the murals in the rotunda were added in 1938 during a Works Progress Administration project. The United States Customs Service moved out of the building in 1974, and it remained vacant for over a decade until renovations in the late 1980s. The Custom House was renamed in 1990 to commemorate Alexander Hamilton, one of the Founding Fathers of the United States and its first Secretary of the Treasury. The Heye Center opened in 1994. ## Site The Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House occupies a trapezoidal plot bounded by Bowling Green to the north, Whitehall Street to the east, Bridge Street to the south, and State Street to the west. The Whitehall Street and State Street elevations are 300 feet (90 m) wide; the main elevation on Bowling Green is 200 feet (60 m) wide; and the rear elevation on Bridge Street is 290 feet (88 m) wide. Nearby buildings include the International Mercantile Marine Company Building and the Bowling Green Offices Building to the northwest, 26 Broadway to the northeast, 2 Broadway to the east, and One Battery Park Plaza to the south. There are entrances to two New York City Subway stations immediately outside the Custom House. An entrance to the Whitehall Street station is adjacent to the eastern side of the building, while an entrance to the Bowling Green station is to the north. The building occupies the site of Fort Amsterdam, constructed by the Dutch West India Company to defend their operations in the Hudson Valley. The Dutch colony of New Amsterdam, the precursor to modern-day New York City, was developed around the fort. Bowling Green, immediately to the north, is the oldest park in New York City. The Government House occupied the site in the late 18th century before its demolition in 1815. The houses of several wealthy New Yorkers were subsequently developed at that location. ## Architecture The Alexander Hamilton U.S. Custom House is seven stories high with a stone facade and an interior steel frame. It was designed by Cass Gilbert in the Beaux-Arts style. The design is similar to those of previous custom houses in New York City, namely Ithiel Town's Federal Hall at 26 Wall Street and Isaiah Rogers's Merchants' Exchange building at 55 Wall Street. The building's design incorporates Beaux-Arts and City Beautiful planning principles, combining architecture, engineering, and fine arts. Gilbert had written in 1900 about his plans for a wide-ranging, site-specific decorative program, which would "illustrate the commerce of ancient and modern times, both by land and sea". Sculptures, paintings, and decorations by well-known artists of the time, such as Daniel Chester French, Karl Bitter, Louis Saint-Gaudens, and Albert Jaegers, embellish various portions of the interior and exterior. ### Facade Unlike most custom houses, which face the waterfront, the Alexander Hamilton Custom House faces inland toward Bowling Green. Its main entrance is on the northern facade, the only side that does not overlook the Lower Manhattan waterfront. The exterior is decorated throughout with nautical motifs such as dolphins and waves, interspersed with classical icons such as acanthus leaves and urns. The first-floor facade is composed of rusticated blocks and is 20 feet (6.1 m) tall. There are six entrances to the building. The main entrance is on the northern elevation, where a wide stairway leads to the second floor. Under the main entrance arch is a carving of the municipal arms of the city of New York. The keystone at the top of the arch depicts the head of Columbia, the female personification of the United States, and was designed by Vicenzo Albani. Andrew O'Connor created a cartouche for the space above the main entrance. The lintel above the main entrance, quarried in Maine, weighed 50 short tons (45 metric tons) and measured 30 by 8 feet (9.1 by 2.4 m). The second through fourth stories contain engaged columns in the Corinthian style; some of these columns are paired while the others are single. There are 44 columns in total: twelve each on the north, east, and west elevations and eight on the south elevation. The second story is the piano nobile; the windows on this story are flanked by brackets and capped by enclosed pediments, with carved heads above them (see ). The third- and fourth-story windows, conversely, are less ornately decorated; this was normal for Beaux-Arts buildings, which generally had greater detailing on the more visible lower levels. The lintels above the third-story windows are decorated with wave motifs, while those above the fourth floor depict shells. The center portion of the Bridge Street facade reaches only to the third story. The fifth-story facade consists of a full-story entablature with a frieze and short rectangular windows. The sixth story is directly above it, while the seventh story consists of a red-slate mansard roof with dormer windows and copper cresting. The mansard roof is extremely steep, allowing the seventh-story attic to be designed as a full floor of usable space. #### Sculptures Twelve sculptors were hired to create the figural groups on the exterior. The major work flanking the front steps, the Four Continents, was contracted to Daniel Chester French, who designed the sculptures with associate Adolph A. Weinman. The work was made of marble and sculpted by the Piccirilli Brothers; each sculptural group cost \$13,500 (). The sculptures were produced at the Piccirilli Brothers' studio in the Bronx. From east to west, the statues depict larger-than-life-size personifications of Asia, America, Europe, and Africa. The primary figure of each group is a woman and is flanked by smaller human figures. In addition, Asia's figure is paired with a tiger, and Africa's figure is paired with a lion. The capitals of each of the 44 columns are decorated with carved heads depicting Hermes, the Greek god of commerce. The windows on the main facade are topped by eight keystones, which contain carved heads with depictions of eight human races. One source described the keystones as representing "Caucasian, Hindu, Latin, Celt and Mongol, Italian, African, Eskimo, and even the Coureur de Bois". Above the main cornice are a group of standing sculptures that personify seafaring nations. There are twelve such statues, which depict commercial hubs through both ancient and modern history. Each sculpture is 11 feet (3.4 m) tall and weighs 20 short tons (18 metric tons). These sculptures are arranged in chronological sequence from east to west, or from left to right as seen from directly in front of the building. The easternmost sculptures are of ancient Greece and Rome, while the westernmost sculptures are of the more recent French and British empires. Eight sculptors were commissioned for this work. One of these sculptures, Germania by Albert Jaegers, was modified in 1918 to display Belgian insignia rather than German insignia. Bitter created a cartouche of the United States' coat of arms for the roof. ### Interior A barrel-vaulted entrance vestibule, supported by marble columns and decorated with multicolored mosaics, is just inside the entrance. Behind bronze gates is a passageway to the Great Hall. At the center of the building is a double-height rotunda, rising to the third story. On and above the third story, the building is arranged as a hollow quadrilateral, surrounding the rotunda. This creates a light court above the rotunda, which measures 80 feet (24 m) wide on its north end, 120 feet (37 m) wide on its south end, and 200 feet (61 m) deep. Stairways, made of marble with iron handrails, connect the interior spaces. There are elevators in each corner; the southwestern and southeastern banks contain two elevators each, while the northwestern and northeastern banks have three elevators apiece. The northwestern and northeastern elevators were originally open cages but were replaced with enclosed cabs in 1935. Because the original appropriation was limited in scope, decorative elements in the initial construction were limited to several important rooms, including the rotundas, hallways, lobby, and collector's office. The walls of these spaces are clad with marble in multiple hues, and there are nautical motifs in numerous locations. #### Second floor The second-floor ceiling is generally 23 feet (7.0 m) tall. This floor consists of the former office spaces in the front and rear, the transverse lobby, and the rotunda. Gilbert planned the Custom House's interior so "all entrances, corridors, stairways and passages [were] arranged on the most direct and simple axial lines". The second-floor space, including the former offices, is almost entirely occupied by the Heye Center of the National Museum of the American Indian. ##### Transverse lobby The transverse lobby spans the northern end of the second floor from west to east. Generally, the more important offices were positioned north of the lobby, while divisions dealing in more routine work were relegated to the south. Following the conversion of the second floor into the Heye Center, the former back offices have been occupied by various exhibition galleries; the cashier's office houses the museum store; and a café occupies the Northwest office adjacent to the main entrance. Membrane arches divide the lobby into five bays. The floors are decorated in marble mosaic patterns. An entablature runs around the top of the lobby, with galleries on the third story. There are two doorways on the walls, each topped by carved architraves with nautical symbols. The doors from the lobby to the former offices are made of varnished oak and stippled glass. At the center of the lobby is a three-bay-wide foyer with a pair of round arches to the north and south, which are supplemented by green Doric-style marble columns with white capitals. The bays of the foyer are separated by marble piers. Three bronze lanterns are suspended from the vaulted ceiling, hanging above a red-marble disc on the floor. Elmer E. Garnsey designed murals for the ceiling. Semicircular staircases, with bronze railings and marble stair treads, flank the lobby. The stairs do not have any metal support structures and are composed entirely of flat, hard-burned clay tiles. Under each stair are timbrel vaults, which connect each landing. The stairs rise to the seventh floor, which contains a skylight that is meant to evoke the design of a ship's cabin. Only the western stair between the first and second floors is open to the public. The elevator doors in the lobby are topped by bronze transom grilles that depict a caravel or sailing ship. There are two additional stairs at the rear, or southern, end of the building. ##### Offices and rotunda The collector's office is at the northwestern corner of the second floor. The office contains elaborate hardwood floors and oak wainscoting designed by Tiffany Studios; the wainscoting measures 10 feet (3.0 m) high. Garnsey painted ten oil paintings, which are installed above the wainscoting. Each painting has a gold frame and depicts a Dutch or English port in the New World. The office also included a stone fireplace mantel with a plaque referencing Fort Amsterdam and the Government House. The coffered plaster ceiling has molded decorations, including a motif of the collector's monogram. Fourteen lighting fixtures, covered in gold leaf, hang from the ceiling. The room is normally closed to the public but can be rented for events. The manager's office is next to the collector's office and is decorated with plain plaster walls, topped by a cornice in the Ionic order. The northeastern corner housed the cashier's office, which featured a white-marble countertop with a bronze screen. The southern half of the cashier's room has white-marble walls and was originally where members of the public conducted their transactions. The northern half, where the cashiers themselves worked, has plaster walls. The ornate plasterwork ceiling is decorated to resemble Renaissance "boxed beams", while the marble floor has a geometric border. The former cashier's office has been incorporated into the Heye Center's museum store. The elliptical rotunda, within the building's interior courtyard, measures 85 by 135 feet (26 by 41 m) and rises to the third story. The walls and floors are composed of geometric marble tiles in several hues. The ceiling is self-supporting, without any interior metal structure; it uses the Guastavino tile arch system created by Spanish architect Rafael Guastavino. It consists of numerous layers of fireproof tiles, each of which measures 6 by 12 inches (15 cm × 30 cm) across and 1 inch (2.5 cm) thick. The tiles and layers are bonded using Portland cement. The center of the ceiling is occupied by a 140-short-ton (130-metric-ton) oval skylight. The underside of the ceiling bears eight trapezoidal panels, as well as eight long, narrow panels between them. The panels contain fresco-secco murals, which were painted in 1937 by Reginald Marsh and eight assistants as part of the Treasury Relief Art Project. The larger murals portray shipping activity in the Port of New York and New Jersey, while the smaller murals depict notable explorers of the New World and the Port of New York. Several shipping companies bought lunch for Marsh while he was painting the murals; as such, the murals depict these companies' ships. The rotunda can be rented for special events. When the Heye Center opened within the building in 1994, it built several permanent galleries around the rotunda. #### Other stories The ground story is 20 feet (6.1 m) tall. It originally had six entrances: two on the front and two each on State and Whitehall Streets. The Bowling Green post office, operated by the United States Postal Service, was formerly near the building's south end. The post office was located around a west-east corridor accessed by both State and Whitehall Streets. There are also two ramps for delivery vehicles. The floor surface, wainscoting, and pilasters are made of marble, and the ceilings are 17 feet (5.2 m) high. In the early 1990s, a 350-seat auditorium was built on the ground story. About 6,000 square feet (560 m²) of storage space on the ground floor, under the rotunda, was converted into the George Gustav Heye Center's Diker Pavilion for Native Arts and Cultures in 2006. This pavilion consists of a slightly-sloped circular space seating 400 people, surrounding a maple dance floor. The Custom House's trapezoidal site was excavated to an average depth of 25 feet (7.6 m). Two stories were placed beneath the ground level. The first basement was just above sea level and had a 13-foot-high (4.0 m) ceiling, while the second basement had a waterproof asphalt-and-tar floor. When the post office was in operation, mail arrived through the delivery docks and was sorted in the basement. The upper stories contain office space. The outer portion of the fifth story was initially used for document storage; the windows are small apertures within the entablature, making that story unsuitable for office use. The ceilings of the upper stories are between 12 and 16 feet (3.7 and 4.9 m) tall. Some of the offices on the upper stories were ornately decorated. In particular, the Naval Commander of the Port's office at the northwest corner of the third floor was decorated in dark oak. The Treasury Secretary's office at the northeast corner of the seventh floor was finished in quartered oak and contained Circassian-walnut furniture. ## History The United States Customs Service had been formed in 1789 with the passage of the Tariff Act, which authorized the collection of duties on imported goods. The Port of New York was the primary port of entry for goods reaching the United States in the 19th century and, as such, the New York Custom House was the country's most profitable custom house. Import taxes were a major revenue stream for the federal government before a national income tax was implemented in 1913 with the passage of the 16th Amendment. The New York Custom House had supplied two-thirds of the federal government's revenue at one point. Because the salary of the collector was tied to the custom house's revenue, the New York Custom House's collector earned more than the U.S. president, and the position was extremely powerful. The New York Custom House had occupied several sites in Lower Manhattan before the Alexander Hamilton Custom House was built. The first such house was established in 1790 at South William Street. The custom house moved to the Government House on the site of Fort Amsterdam in 1799. The customs service relocated numerous times in the 19th century before opening an office at 55 Wall Street in 1862. The Wall Street location had been optimal during the mid-19th century because it was close to the Subtreasury at 26 Wall Street, thereby making it easy to transport gold. ### Planning and construction In February 1888, William J. Fryer Jr., superintendent of repairs of New York City's federal government buildings, wrote to the United States Department of the Treasury's Supervising Architect about the "old, damp, ill-lighted, badly ventilated" quarters at 55 Wall Street. Architecture and Building magazine called the letter "worthy of thoughtful investigation". The 55 Wall Street building's proximity to the Subtreasury was no longer advantageous, as it was easier to use a check or certificate to make payments on revenue. On September 14, 1888, Congress passed an act that would allow site selection for a new custom house and appraiser's warehouse. Soon after, Fryer presented his report to the New York State Chamber of Commerce. The Chamber said in 1889: "We have not seriously considered the removal of the present Custom House proper, since it is well located, and, if found inadequate, can easily be easily be enlarged to meet all the wants of the Government for an indefinite time to come." #### Site selection Fryer recommended Bowling Green as his first preference for a new custom house, followed by a site immediately south, along State Street north of Battery Park. The U.S. House and Senate both passed a bill in March 1889, appropriating \$750,000 () for a new custom house in the vicinity of Bowling Green. That September, Treasury secretary William Windom selected Bowling Green as the new site of the custom house and appraiser's warehouse. Almost immediately, Windom was accused of exceeding his authority in selecting the new site. In addition, many local businessmen opposed moving the custom house, and a judge ruled in 1891 that the federal government could not take the Bowling Green site by eminent domain as it had proposed to do. Both houses of the U.S. Congress passed a bill to acquire land for a new custom house in New York City, and to sell the old building, in March 1891. The federal government appointed three commissioners to appraise the cost of acquiring land at Bowling Green; in July 1892, the appraisers estimated that the site would cost \$1.96 million (about \$ million in ). Still, in January 1893, there was not enough money to purchase the lots at Bowling Green. The lessees and landowners were supposed to receive \$2.1 million (equivalent to \$ million in ), but there was only \$1.5 million on hand (equivalent to \$ million in ). The 1891 bill had allowed up to \$2 million for land acquisition and had required that the previous building be sold for at least \$4 million. Members of Congress voted against a bill in March 1893 to appropriate an additional \$800,000 for the site. Because of a lack of funding, the planned custom house at Bowling Green was abandoned at the end of that month. The project did not proceed further until January 1897, when bills for the acquisition of the Bowling Green site were introduced in both houses of Congress. Federal legislators proposed further appropriations, but the Treasury retained the disbursements that would have gone to the landowners. The federal government chose an alternate site for the appraiser's warehouse in the West Village of Manhattan. #### Competition and site acquisition Architectural writer Donald Reynolds stated that the new custom house was to be as modern as possible, with "an architectural style that embodied the tradition of the customs service, the federal government, and the United States with the latest building technology". The Tarsney Act, passed in 1893, permitted the Supervising Architect to host a competition to hire private architects to design federal-government buildings. The act did not take effect until Treasury secretary Lyman J. Gage took office in 1897. Furthermore, it was difficult for the federal government to sell the old building for the required price of \$4 million (about \$ million in ). The new New York Custom House was only the fourth building to be built under the Tarsney Act. Republican Party officials wished to have complete control over spending for the new custom house building. Originally, the Chamber of Commerce and many business interests advocated for erecting a new custom house on the Wall Street site, even though it was less than half the size of the proposed Bowling Green site. In 1897, Senator Thomas C. Platt and Representative Lemuel E. Quigg, both Republicans, proposed bills in the United States Senate and House of Representatives for building a new custom house at Wall Street, with Platt's bill calling for a five-person commission to oversee the process. The bills died at the end of the 54th United States Congress in March 1897. During the 55th Congress in February 1898, legislation for the acquisition of the Bowling Green site was again proposed in the U.S. House and Senate, providing \$5 million (about \$ million in ) for land acquisition and construction. The U.S. House and Senate passed the Bowling Green bills the next year. At the time, most of the structures on the site were three-story houses used by steamship offices; by April, agreements had been made with most of the sixteen landowners. The federal government disbursed \$2.2 million (about \$ million in ) to landowners at the Bowling Green site that July. The next month, the old Custom House was sold for \$3.21 million (about \$ million in ). Twenty firms were invited in May 1899 to submit designs to the competition under the terms of the Tarsney Act; according to The New York Times, the federal government took "great care" in selecting the architects who were to be invited. The government stipulated that any plan include a ground-level basement and up to six stories, as well as a southward-facing light court above the third story. A committee of three men was appointed to look over the submissions. By September 1899, there were two finalists: architecture firm Carrere & Hastings and architect Cass Gilbert. After a plan for the two finalists to collaborate failed, Supervising Architect James Knox Taylor picked Gilbert, who had been his partner at the Gilbert & Taylor architecture firm in St. Paul, Minnesota. The selection of Gilbert was controversial, drawing opposition from Platt and several groups. Some of the opposition centered around the fact that Gilbert was a "westerner" who had just moved from Minnesota to New York City, and several opponents raised doubts about the jury's competence. After Gage certified Gilbert's selection in November 1899, opposition to his selection decreased significantly. #### Construction and opening Demolition of existing buildings on the site began in February 1900, and demolition contractor Seagrist & Co. had cleared the site by that July. The next month, workers drilled test bores for the new Custom House's foundations. Contracts for the building's foundations and structural steel were delayed because the federal government had received several bids, whose estimated completion dates differed significantly. Isaac A. Hopper was contracted to excavate the site that December. The collector of the Port of New York, George R. Bidwell, claimed the contract should have been awarded to the next highest bidder, Charles T. Wills, who like Bidwell was a Republican. The site was excavated to a depth of 25 feet (7.6 m), and some 2.2 million cubic feet (62,000 m³) of dirt was removed. The New-York Tribune called the site "the biggest hole that was ever made in this city over which to erect a building". In December 1901, the federal government accepted contractor John Peirce's bid to erect the Custom House building's first floor. Pending further appropriations, the rest of the building would also be built by Peirce. At the time, there was only \$3 million budgeted toward the Custom House's completion (equal to \$ million in ). The following November, Peirce was authorized to complete the remaining stories after another \$1.5 million (equal to \$ million in ) was allocated. The cornerstone of the building was laid on October 7, 1902, in a ceremony attended by Treasury secretary Leslie M. Shaw. After a ticker tape parade down Broadway, the cornerstone, filled with contemporary souvenirs and artifacts, was placed at the northeast corner of the site. The new Custom House's construction lagged due to government bureaucracy, while work on comparable private buildings nearby proceeded more quickly. The slow construction was attributed to various reasons, such as concurrent jobs being undertaken by the building's contractors, money shortages, and lack of supplies. Nonetheless, the building's imminent completion sparked the development of other nearby sites. The Custom House was reportedly 70 percent complete by February 1905, according to Peirce. That September, J. C. Robinson was contracted to furnish the interior of the building, while New-York Steam Fitting was hired to install the mechanical equipment. The building's first tenant was a United States Post Office Department station, which opened on the Bridge Street side of the building's ground floor in July 1906. The same year, an additional \$465,000 was allocated for the building's completion (equivalent to \$ million in ). By September 1907, the Custom House was ready to open. The general contractors turned the building over to the federal government on October 1, 1907, after they had completed all major construction. At the time, many of the interior furnishings had not been added. The U.S. Customs Service moved its offices to Bowling Green on November 4, 1907. With a proposed final cost of \$4.5 million (approximately \$ million in ), it would be more expensive than any other public building in New York City except for the Tweed Courthouse. ### Use by U.S. Customs Service #### 1900s to 1930s Following the Customs Service's relocation to the Custom House, other government agencies with offices in New York City, such as the Weather Bureau, also moved to the Bowling Green Custom House. By 1908, the Custom House was fully occupied by these other agencies, as the Treasury's chief architect had assigned space to other departments without consulting with the collector. The next year, the House of Representatives approved the installation of a pneumatic-tube system so the post office and custom house could send packages to the appraiser's warehouse. A bronze tablet, marking the historical site of a Native American gathering place, was dedicated at the Custom House's main entrance in 1909. Another tablet was dedicated at the Custom House in 1912, marking the site of the first mass in New York City, which had taken place in 1683. The Consular Bureau opened an office at the Custom House in 1910. A regional tax office, where companies and residents in Manhattan south of 23rd Street paid taxes, opened at the Bowling Green Custom House in 1914. Following the U.S. entry into World War I in 1917, "individuals and patriotic societies" objected to the presence of Germany from the Custom House's sculptures, since Germany was one of the Central Powers against which the United States was fighting. Federal officials determined that it was not feasible to remove the Germania statue, which weighed 5 short tons (4.5 long tons; 4.5 t). Instead, in September 1918, Gilbert was directed to remove the German insignia on the entablature's Germania statue and replace them with Belgian insignia. The U.S. Passport Agency moved to the Custom House building the next year. The U.S. government proposed relocating the Customs Service's administrative offices in 1927 to the Appraiser's Stores Building, but shipping companies spoke out against the move. A plaque honoring Richard Nicolls, the first colonial governor of the Province of New York, was dedicated at the Custom House in 1931. Large amounts of dirt had accumulated on the facade over the years, and workers steam-cleaned the facade and refurbished the interior in 1934. During the Great Depression, in April 1937, collector Harry M. Durning commissioned Reginald Marsh to paint murals in the main rotunda as part of the Treasury Relief Art Project, with funds and assistance from the Works Progress Administration (WPA). Marsh accepted the commission for \$1,560 (), less than five percent of what he would have normally charged. The ceiling of the rotunda had been undecorated white plaster when the building was erected. The installation of the murals was delayed for several months because of what Marsh described as red tape; the murals were completed by February 1938. The Bureau of Foreign and Domestic Commerce also relocated from the building in late 1937. #### 1940s to early 1970s U.S. president Franklin D. Roosevelt requested in May 1939 that Congress appropriate \$190,000 to renovate the Custom House. Congress approved the appropriation but later reduced it by \$90,000. Durning asked Congress in 1940 to restore the appropriation, saying that "men [were] falling out of ancient chairs, and [...] our valuable records and current papers stacked on desks and improperly filed in decrepit cabinets and bookshelves". At the time, the building had 1,865 employees, of which 847 worked for the Customs Service; according to Durning, the New York Custom House handled half of the United States' customs business. The building also housed the Bureau of Internal Revenue, the U.S. Post Office, the Commerce Department, and eight other agencies of the U.S. government. The Custom House's regional tax office began serving additional taxpayers in Staten Island and Midtown Manhattan in 1951. The offices of the Taxpayer Assistance Program, which helped residents file their taxes, relocated from the Custom House to Lafayette Street in 1955; the tax office itself relocated to Houston Street the next year. Although the Port of New York remained the United States' busiest port after World War II, it had begun to decline in importance by the 1950s because of several factors. These included increasing cargo-handling and trucking costs; the decline of local railroads; the rapid growth of the southern and southwestern United States and the development of ports in these regions; and the opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway in Canada, which allowed ships to deliver cargo directly to the Upper Midwest. As early as 1964, the U.S. Customs Service was considering moving to the World Trade Center, which was under construction. The building's other tenants at the time included the United States Coast Guard, whose Third District Search and Rescue Command was headquartered on the sixth floor. As a money-saving measure, in 1965, the Custom House began using a computerized system to record ships' arrivals. The Public Buildings Service, an agency of the federal government, conducted a study of the Custom House in 1967, finding that the building needed at least \$8 million in renovations. By the early 1970s, the facade was extremely dirty, and the front steps had been shuttered for several years because of security concerns. The Customs Service leased space at Six World Trade Center from the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey in 1970. That year, the New York City Planning Commission considered transferring the site's unused air rights across the street to 1 Broadway, where the Walter Kidde Company planned to build a 50-story skyscraper. In exchange, the Walter Kidde Company would have been required to help preserve the Custom House. When the Customs Service moved out during 1973, the building had 1,375 employees, and the land under the building was estimated to be worth between \$15 million and \$20 million (about \$– million in ). The General Services Administration (GSA) acquired the Bowling Green Custom House after the Customs Service relocated. ### Abandonment and restoration proposals #### 1970s plans Several lawyers and businessmen had formed the nonprofit Custom House Institute in late 1973. With assistance from several organizations and the city government's Office of Lower Manhattan Development, the institute raised \$40,000 to conduct a feasibility study of proposals for the Custom House. In March 1974, the institute recommended a proposal by architect I. M. Pei, who suggested converting the upper floors into office space, keeping the second-floor rotunda open, and converting the first floor to commercial use. The next year, the federal government declared the building "surplus" property, making it available to the city government. Pei's proposal was not carried out, as the GSA found the proposal to be impractical. Instead, the GSA cleaned the facade during the mid-1970s. From 1974 on, the Custom House was largely vacant. The building's primary occupant was the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York, which occupied two stories; the Custom House Institute occupied the first floor. The other floors remained unused and were seldom open to the public except for special events. These included the bicentennial of the United States in 1976, a summer arts program in 1977, and another arts exhibition in 1979. Different parts of the building fell into various states of disrepair. Marsh's ceiling murals and the commissioner's room remained relatively intact, but there was peeling paint in other offices, and weeds were growing from the statues outside. The GSA announced a plan in 1977 to convert the building into federal offices for \$20 million, but there was no progress for a year. The agency indicated in January 1979 that it would spend \$25 million on renovating the Bowling Green Custom House (about \$ million in ). U.S. senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan gave U.S. House representatives a tour of the building to convince them to fund its renovation. In September 1979, in part because of his advocacy, Congress approved \$26.5 million for the renovation, including the restoration of Marsh's murals. The GSA decided to host a competition for the Custom House's restoration and reuse. The entrance and rotunda were to be refurbished; the upper stories would contain upgraded offices for the federal government, while the lower stories would host a public institution. #### 1980s plans A joint venture of Marcel Breuer Associates, James Stewart Polshek Associates, Stewart Daniel Hoban and Associates, and Goldman-Sokolow-Copeland was selected in January 1980 to restore the building. The joint venture planned to restore the rotunda in a way that would allow the space to be used by a variety of tenants, rather than tailoring it for a specific use. Under this proposal, four 45-foot-high (14 m) atriums would have been built around the rotunda on the upper floors. In addition, the space beneath the rotunda would have been renovated, and a subway entrance would have been added. This proposal was never carried out because of bureaucratic delays. The federal government contemplated declaring the building surplus property in February 1983, allowing federal officials to sell it to a private owner, but Moynihan intervened and convinced federal officials to keep the building. The GSA opened a request for proposals in November 1983, soliciting tenants for 77,000 square feet (7,200 m²) at the Custom House. Six plans were presented to Manhattan Community Board 1 in August 1984. The GSA gave the most consideration to two plans: one for a Holocaust museum and the other for a cultural and educational center with an ocean liner museum, restaurants, and theaters. The community board's members were overwhelmingly in favor of the cultural and educational center, while Jewish groups preferred the Holocaust museum. The Holocaust museum proposal was selected in October 1984, prompting objections from preservationists who thought it was "inappropriate" for a Holocaust museum to be located in the Custom House. New York governor Mario Cuomo proposed an alternate site in nearby Battery Park City for the museum (later known as the Museum of Jewish Heritage), and the museum agreed in 1986 to open in Battery Park City instead. An \$18.3 million renovation (equivalent to \$ million in ) began in August 1984. Ehrenkrantz and Eckstut Architects conducted the renovation. They cleaned, restored, and conserved exterior and ceremonial interior spaces. The restoration architects renovated old office space into federal courtrooms and ancillary offices; rental offices and meeting rooms; and a 350-seat auditorium. The building's fire-safety, security, telecommunications, and heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems were also upgraded. ### Museum of the American Indian operation #### Agreement and renovation By early 1987, Moynihan was proposing legislation that would turn over the building to the Museum of the American Indian (later the George Gustav Heye Center). The museum had outgrown its existing headquarters at Audubon Terrace in Upper Manhattan, and it was considering either relocating to Texas or merging with the American Museum of Natural History. The American Indian Community House, which wished to occupy a part of the Custom House, argued against giving the building to the Museum of the American Indian because the museum was run mostly by non-Indians. At the time, the Museum of the American Indian wished to relocate because its Upper Manhattan facility was insufficient, and the Custom House was being offered as an alternative for the museum's possible relocation to Washington, D.C. U.S. Senator Daniel Inouye introduced the National Museum of the American Indian Act the next month, which would have brought the collection to Washington, D.C., instead. A compromise was reached in 1988, in which the Smithsonian would build the National Museum of the American Indian in Washington, D.C. The Smithsonian would also acquire the Heye collection and operate a satellite location of the museum at the Custom House. The museum would only occupy the lowest floors of the Custom House; the fifth through seventh floors would be reserved for the Bankruptcy Court. City officials and museum officials agreed to this compromise in January 1989, and the National Museum of the American Indian Act was passed that November. The architecture firm Ehrenkrantz Eckstut & Whitelaw was hired in May 1990 to renovate the building. The same year, the building was officially renamed after Alexander Hamilton, the first Secretary of the Treasury, by act of Congress. The building's renovation included constructing an auditorium on the ground level; converting the cashiers' office into a visitor center; and adding gallery space, two gift shops, a theater, offices, and classrooms. The renovation cost \$24 million in total. #### Opening and 21st century The George Gustav Heye Center's space in the Custom House opened for previews in November 1992. The galleries to the west, south, and east of the rotunda formally opened on October 30, 1994. At that time, most of the space had been closed for 20 years. The Heye Center was housed in the three lower stories, while the Bankruptcy Court occupied two additional stories. One of the Bankruptcy Court's rooms on the fifth floor, known as the Eastern Airlines Room, had been renovated to accommodate bankruptcy hearings for large companies such as Eastern Air Lines. The other two stories were vacant and had not been renovated, but the GSA planned to refurbish these stories. The museum and building were mostly undamaged by the September 11 attacks in 2001, but airborne debris from the collapse of the World Trade Center had to be cleared from some of the interior spaces. The Heye Center's exhibition and public access areas originally totaled about 20,000 square feet (1,900 m²). The museum expanded into part of the ground floor in 2006. Six years later, the National Archives and Records Administration offices in New York moved to the Custom House. As of 2022, U.S. Customs and Border Protection owns the Custom House. In addition, the building contains the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York and offices for the United States Department of Transportation. ## Impact ### Reception Gilbert stated that, during the design process, a tall dome was suggested in order to make the building into a "landmark" but that "this would wholly destroy the proportions of the building per se, and as a matter of plan, seriously impair its practical usefulness". Gilbert said a 400-foot (120 m) storage tower would be more appropriate if a "landmark" was necessitated, but he believed such a tower "would add considerably to the cost". From the start, the Alexander Hamilton Custom House was architecturally distinguished from other buildings in the area. The New York Times said in 1906 that "it is the unity of idea embodied in the new Custom House and enforced by the wealth of sculpture with which it is embellished, more than its mere costliness, that gives to the edifice its unique value". A Times editorial the same year said that, despite the federal government's initial reluctance to decorate the Custom House lavishly, "few recall the money sunk into stone, bricks and mortar; they enjoy the final touches inside on which millions were not squandered". The Crockery & Glass Journal stated in 1907 that the building's quality was derived from its "proportion, with rich simplicity—the Roman recipe". The same year, Charles DeKay wrote for Century magazine that "at least something has been done to blunt the reproof that New York, a city by the sea, great through the ocean and our magnificent waterways, rarely remembers the sources of her wealth and greatness". The Wall Street Journal wrote in 1914 that the Custom House "represents the national Government in its economic bases and financial life". Acclaim for the building continued in the decades after its completion. Architectural writer Henry Hope Reed Jr. regarded the Custom House in 1964 as "the finest public building in New York". When the U.S. Customs Service relocated in 1973, Ada Louise Huxtable wrote that 6 World Trade Center's "functional, featureless grid" contrasted with the "splendor" of the Alexander Hamilton Custom House. Architectural writer Robert A. M. Stern and his co-authors, in the 1983 book New York 1900, said that the Custom House and the Ellis Island immigration station were the two structures that reinforced New York City's role as "the leading American metropolis, representative of America's role in the world". After the lower floors were converted into the Heye Center, Benjamin Forgey of The Washington Post wrote that the galleries were "conceived as neutral containers, a sequence of vaulted rooms ingeniously constructed within the old building frame in order not to damage (or indeed even to touch) the original walls". A writer for USA Today called the building "itself a sight to see". Stern and his co-authors wrote in the 2006 book New York 2000 that the building, which had been one of the Financial District's "most distinguished white elephants", became a "destination spot" once the Heye Center moved in. Several critics wrote about the juxtaposition of the Custom House's classical architecture and the Heye Center's focus on Native American culture, which, according to Stern and his co-authors, was largely characterized as "a culturally and stylistically inconsistent mix". A writer for The Wall Street Journal believed that the museum clashed with "the Custom House itself, which with its newly cleaned ceiling murals depicting ferries and ships seems a bizarre venue for looking at Indian art". ### Landmark designations The Custom House was one of the earliest designations of the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission, becoming an official exterior landmark in October 1965, six months after the commission's founding. At the time of the exterior designation, the commission said that "At some time in the future this building may be in jeopardy", since the federal government had doubted whether the Custom House should be made a city landmark. The Custom House's interior was also designated as a city landmark in January 1979. The building was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1972, the designation covering both its exterior and public interior spaces. The site was also declared a National Historic Landmark in 1976 and was added to the New York State Register of Historic Places in 1980. In 2007, it was designated as a contributing property to the Wall Street Historic District, an NRHP district. ## See also - List of New York City Designated Landmarks in Manhattan below 14th Street - National Historic Landmarks in New York City - National Register of Historic Places listings in Manhattan below 14th Street

Inaccessible Island rail

Small flightless bird in the family Rallidae endemic to an island in the Tristan Archipelago

The Inaccessible Island rail (Laterallus rogersi) is a small bird of the rail family, Rallidae. Endemic to Inaccessible Island in the Tristan Archipelago in the isolated south Atlantic, it is the smallest extant flightless bird in the world. The species was described by physician Percy Lowe in 1923 but had first come to the attention of scientists 50 years earlier. The Inaccessible Island rail's affinities and origin were a long-standing mystery; in 2018 its closest relative was identified as the South American dot-winged crake (Porzana spiloptera), and it was proposed that both species should be nested within the genus Laterallus. A small species, the Inaccessible Island rail has brown plumage, black bill and feet, and adults have a red eye. It occupies most habitats on Inaccessible Island, from the beaches to the central plateau, feeding on a variety of small invertebrates and also some plant matter. Pairs are territorial and monogamous, with both parents being responsible for incubating the eggs and raising the chicks. Its adaptations to living on a tiny island at high densities include low base metabolic rates, small clutch sizes, and flightlessness. Unlike many other oceanic islands, Inaccessible Island has remained free from introduced predators, allowing this species to flourish while many other flightless birds, particularly flightless rails, have gone extinct. The species is nevertheless considered vulnerable by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN), due to its single small population, which would be threatened by the accidental introduction of mammalian predators such as rats or cats. ## Discovery Although the Inaccessible Island rail may have been known to the Tristan Islanders who visited the island annually to hunt seals, the species first came to the attention of scientists during the Challenger expedition of 1872–1876. When the expedition visited the island in October 1873, Sir Charles Wyville Thomson learned of the species and recorded observations made by two German brothers, the Stoltenhoffs, who had been living on the island for the last two years. Thomson was unable to collect a specimen, much to his regret. Another attempt was made to collect a specimen by Lord Crawford on his yacht Valhalla in 1905. A final attempt was made during the Shackleton–Rowett Expedition, which passed by in April 1922 on its way back to Britain. This visit also failed, but members of the expedition left collecting material with a Rev. H. M. C. Rogers, then chaplain on Tristan da Cunha. The following year two study skins arrived in the Natural History Museum, London, followed soon after by another skin and a specimen in spirits. Physician Percy Lowe was then able to use the skins to describe the species. He did so, briefly, at a meeting of the British Ornithologists' Club, in 1923. ## Evolution and taxonomy Prior to its collection it had been assumed by Thomson that the species was close to the other "island hens" known in the Atlantic, possibly a gallinule, but on examination Lowe felt "compelled to refer it to a new genus". The generic name Atlantisia was named for the mythical island of Atlantis, destroyed by a volcano. The specific name rogersi honours the Rev. Rogers, who collected and sent the first specimens of the species to Lowe. In his 1928 paper on the species, Lowe thought the Inaccessible Island rail was the descendant of flightless ancestors which had reached Inaccessible Island via a land bridge or sunken continent such as Lemuria. Land bridges were commonly invoked to explain biogeographical distribution patterns before the development and acceptance of plate tectonics. By 1955 it was understood that the rail was the descendant of ancestors that had flown to Inaccessible Island. It was also presumed that like most other land birds of the Tristan Archipelago (except the Tristan moorhen Gallinula nesiotis and the Gough moorhen G. comeri), it had probably reached the island from ancestors in South America. The position of the Inaccessible Island rail in the larger rail family (Rallidae) has long been a source of uncertainty. Lowe thought that its closest relatives may have been black crake of Africa, or perhaps an early offshoot of the genus Porphyrio (swamphens), a conclusion based mostly on similarities of plumage. He did concede that it was difficult to assign the rail to any relatives. American paleontologist Storrs Olson suggested in 1973 that it was related to the "Rallus assemblage", which included the genera Rallus and Hypotaenidia (now lumped with Gallirallus), based on the structure of the skeleton. In particular he suggested it was part of a pro-Rallus group that included the Indian Ocean genus Dryolimnas, and the Australasian Lewinia. Olson suggested the pro-Rallus rails have a relict distribution and would have been present in Africa and South America, where the ancestors of the Inaccessible Island rail came from. The most recent comparative morphological study to include the genus, in 1998, placed it in a subtribe Crecina of the crakes. Its exact position could not be determined, but it was suggested to perhaps be the sister taxon to the genus Laterallus, a genus of small crakes found mostly in South America. Two extinct flightless species of rail were at one time placed in the genus Atlantisia with the Inaccessible Island rail. The Ascension crake (Mundia elpenor) and the Saint Helena swamphen (Aphanocrex podarces) were once considered congeners of A. rogersi. The Ascension crake disappeared some time before 1700 but was briefly mentioned and described by traveller and hobby naturalist Peter Mundy in 1656. The Saint Helena swamphen disappeared before 1600 and has never been encountered alive by scientists. In 1973 Olson synonymised the genus Aphanocrex with the genus Atlantisia, and described the Ascension crake as being congeneric. Today they are considered to have evolved independently (with A. podarces probably not even being closely related), and in 2003 the genus Mundia was erected and the Saint Helena swamphen moved back to Aphanocrex, leaving the Inaccessible Island rail the only species in the genus Atlantisia. Both the Ascension crake and the Saint Helena swamphen became extinct due to predation by introduced species, mainly cats and rats. Stervander et al. (2019) resolved the taxonomic affinity and evolutionary history of the Inaccessible Island rail by phylogenetic analyses of the DNA sequence of its full mitochondrial genome and a handful mitochondrial and nuclear genetic markers. According to this study, the Inaccessible Island rail belongs to a clade comprising its sister species, the dot-winged crake, the black rail (Laterallus jamaicensis) in America, and most likely the Galápagos crake (Laterallus spilonota), therefore suggested referring the Inaccessible Island rail to the genus Laterallus. It colonized Inaccessible Island from South America c. 1.5 million years ago. ## Morphology The Inaccessible Island rail is the smallest living flightless bird in the world, measuring 13 to 15.5 cm (5.1–6.1 in). Males are larger and heavier than females, weighing 35–49 g (1.2–1.7 oz), average 40.5 g (1.43 oz), compared to 34–42 g (1.2–1.5 oz), average 37 g (1.3 oz), in females. It is dark chestnut-brown above and dark grey on the head and below, with degraded white barring on the flanks and belly, and adults have a red eye. The female is similar to the male but with paler grey and a faint brown wash on the underparts. It has a black bill, which is shorter than the head. The feathers of the Inaccessible Island rail are almost hair-like, and in particular the flight feathers are degenerate, as the barbules on many of the feathers (but not all, as has sometimes been reported) fail to interlock, giving the feathers a ragged appearance. The wings are reduced and weak, and smaller than same-sized flying relatives, as is the sternum. The tail is short, 3.5 cm (1.4 in) in length, and the and are nearly as long as the tail . The Inaccessible Island rail has a low basal metabolic rate (BMR), measured in 1989 at around 60–68% the rate expected for a bird of its weight. The scientists responsible for the study speculated that the low BMR was not as a result of flightlessness, which does not have this effect in other bird species, but was instead the result of the rail's island lifestyle. The island lacks predators and other competitors, and as such can be expected to be at full carrying capacity for rails. This in turn would favour energy conservation by the rails, resulting in small body size, low BMR and flightlessness. A comparison of flighted and flightless rails, including the Inaccessible Island rail, found that rails that lose the ability to fly also have low BMRs. ## Distribution and habitat The Inaccessible rail is endemic to the uninhabited Inaccessible Island in the Tristan da Cunha group in the mid-Atlantic Ocean. The island is 14 km² (5.4 sq mi) in area and has a temperate wet oceanic climate with high rainfall, limited sunshine and persistent westerly winds. The rail is found in almost all habitats on the island and at all altitudes, from sea-level to 449 m (1,473 ft). It reaches its highest densities in fields of tussock grass (Spartina arundinacea), with 10 birds per hectare, and in tussock grass mixed with ferns (Blechnum penna-marina) and sedges, with 15 birds per hectare. This habitat is found close to the shore and surrounds most of the island on the steep cliffs. The Inaccessible Island rail can also be found in upland fern-bush heath, dominated by wind-stunted tree-ferns (Blechnum palmiforme) and in the island forest in the central plateau which is dominated by Island Cape myrtle (Phylica arborea)—which can reach 5 m (16 ft) where sheltered—and Blechnum palmiforme. In both these habitats the population is estimated to be two birds per hectare. It will also forage among boulders on the beaches, but has not been found in the short dry grasses on the cinder cones (the scientists making the observations cautioned that this does not mean that they never use the habitat). It frequently uses natural cavities among boulders or tunnels through grasses created by frequent use to move around while concealed. ## Behavior The Inaccessible Island rail is territorial, and the territories they defend are tiny. The territories in the tussock grass habitats around Blenden Hall, where the population densities are highest, extend to 100–400 m² (1,100–4,300 sq ft). The small size of the territories makes encounters between families and individuals frequent, and confrontations and territorial calling are common. On meeting, confrontations start with loud trills or twittering, then birds may face off, standing very close to each other and displaying ritually with their heads lowered and their bills pointed towards the ground. They may circle, and continue displaying until one bird slowly retreats or a quick skirmish ensues and one bird is driven off. ### Diet and feeding The foraging method used by the Inaccessible Island rail is slow and deliberate and has been compared to that of a mouse, and the bird occupies a similar ecological niche. They feed on a range of invertebrates, including earthworms, amphipods, isopods, mites and a range of insects such as beetles, flies, moths and caterpillars. Centipedes are taken as well, and an introduced species of centipede forms an important part of their diet. Along with animal prey they will take the berries of Empetrum and Nertera as well as the seeds of the dock Rumex. Unlike the Tristan thrush they do not feed on carrion or dead fish. ### Calls The Inaccessible Island rail is a highly vocal species, calling frequently. This may be because of the dense vegetation the species lives in, making calls the best way to communicate, and pairs and families frequently while feeding. Calls used include a long trill used when pairs meet and when confronting a rival. Rivals also make a long twitter "keekeekeekeekee" which can be long and short and end in a "keekeechitrrrr". After skirmishes between rivals the victorious bird may make a "weechup weechup" call. Birds may make a monotonous "tchik tchik tchok tchik" while hunting for prey, and the alarm call when predators are around is a short and hard "chip". They also make a variety of trilling calls while incubating, particularly when pairs swap places during incubation. Before changing places the incubating bird may make a "chip chip chip", but they fall silent when Tristan thrushes approach the nest. ### Breeding The Inaccessible Island rail is a seasonal breeder, laying between October and January. They are monogamous, forming permanent pair-bonds. The nests are situated at the base of ferns with tussock grass, tussock grass clumps, or in tufts of sedges. The nests are domed and oval or pear shaped, with the entrances near the narrow end of the nest and linked by a track or tunnel that can go up to half a metre away. The nests are typically built entirely of the same material the nest is found in; for example, tussock grass or sedges. Where the construction material is tussock grass, larger leaves are used on the outside and finer material lines the nest. There are a few reports of other material being used as lining, such as the leaves of introduced Malus domestica (apple) or Salix babylonica (willow). The clutch size is two eggs, which is low for such small rails. The eggs are greyish milk white dotted with brown-rufous spots and lavender-mauve spots that are concentrated around the apex of the egg. They are large for the size of the mother compared to other rails, and resemble the eggs of the corn crake. The incubation period for the species is not known, but both sexes incubate the clutch, although the males incubated for longer in the observations that have been made. Both sexes bring food to their partner that is incubating, which is either consumed on the nest or close to the nest. Changeovers of incubation details are preceded by "chip chip chip" calls, which become louder and more frequent the longer its takes the partner to respond. The eggs hatch within between 23 and 32 hours of each other and can be preceded by the chick in the egg calling for up to 45 hours before hatching. One hatching was recorded as taking 15 hours to complete. Newly hatched chicks are covered by downy black plumage, the legs, feet and bill are black, and the mouth is silvery. ## Ecology Lowe speculated in his 1927 paper that, in the absence of mammalian predators on the island, the brown skua would be the Inaccessible Island rail's only predator. A study of the diet of brown skuas on Inaccessible Island confirmed this, but found that although skuas do eat adults of this species, the rail and other landbirds formed only a small part of the diet of that seabird, especially compared to their abundance on the island. They noted that the landbirds alarm-called when brown skuas were seen. After hearing another rail make an alarm call, adult Inaccessible Island rails become alert, while chicks fall silent. Adults are rarely preyed upon, but the mortality of chicks is high and predation by Tristan thrushes is a major cause of death. Two species of chewing lice have been found on Inaccessible Island rails, Pscudomenopon scopulacorne and Rallicola (Parricola) zumpti. R. zumpti has not been described on any other species of bird from Inaccessible Island. P. scopulacorne found on the Inaccessible Island rail were originally described as a new species, P. rowani (Keler, 1951), but were later lumped into the widespread species in 1974. ## Threats and conservation The Inaccessible Island rail has a tiny global range with a single population. Though still common within its tiny range, with around 5,600 adult birds in the world, the species is considered to be vulnerable if an invasive species were to reach Inaccessible Island. Insular rails, particularly flightless species, are vulnerable to extinction. House mice, feral cats and brown rats, all of which would be a serious threat to this species, are not present on the island, nor have they ever been, but are present on nearby Tristan da Cunha, and could reach the islands via fishing vessels or other boats visiting the island (mice have been found on boats visiting the neighbouring Nightingale Island). Because of this vulnerability, this species is rated as vulnerable by the IUCN Red List. Fires of tussock grass, which were recorded in 1872 and 1909, are assumed to have killed large numbers of rails, but have not occurred since. In the 1950s, they were highly sought after for scientific collections, but permits to do so were rarely granted. Several conservation measures have been undertaken or proposed to protect this species. Inaccessible Island was once suggested as a site for agriculture for Tristan Islanders, which would have reduced habitat and risked the introduction of invasive species. However the island was declared a nature reserve by the Tristan da Cunha Island Council in 1994. Access to the island is restricted now, although Tristan Islanders are still permitted to visit the island to collect firewood and guano. Introduced New Zealand flax has been removed from the island, and the island now has a management plan. Other suggestions for securing this species' future include increased education on biosecurity for the local community, and potentially setting up a captive population. It has also been suggested that backup populations be established on other secure islands, for example Nightingale Island, in case predators reached Inaccessible Island, but this may have negative impacts on the endemic invertebrate faunas of these islands.

Paxillus involutus

Species of fungus

Paxillus involutus, commonly known as the brown roll-rim, common roll-rim is a basidiomycete fungus that is widely distributed across the Northern Hemisphere. It has been inadvertently introduced to Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, and South America, probably transported in soil with European trees. Various shades of brown in colour, the fruit body grows up to 6 cm (2+3⁄8 in) high and has a funnel-shaped cap up to 12 cm (4+3⁄4 in) wide with a distinctive inrolled rim and decurrent gills that may be pore-like close to the stipe. Although it has gills, it is more closely related to the pored boletes than to typical gilled mushrooms. It was first described by Pierre Bulliard in 1785, and was given its current binomial name by Elias Magnus Fries in 1838. Genetic testing suggests that Paxillus involutus may be a species complex rather than a single species. A common mushroom of deciduous and coniferous woods and grassy areas in late summer and autumn, Paxillus involutus forms ectomycorrhizal relationships with a broad range of tree species. These benefit from the symbiosis as the fungus reduces their intake of heavy metals and increases resistance to pathogens such as Fusarium oxysporum. Previously considered edible and eaten widely in Eastern and Central Europe, it has since been found to be dangerously poisonous, after being responsible for the death of German mycologist Julius Schäffer in 1944. It had been recognized as causing gastric upsets when eaten raw, but was more recently found to cause potentially fatal autoimmune hemolysis, even in those who had consumed the mushroom for years without any other ill effects. An antigen in the mushroom triggers the immune system to attack red blood cells. Serious and commonly fatal complications include acute kidney injury, shock, acute respiratory failure, and disseminated intravascular coagulation. ## Taxonomy and naming The brown roll-rim was described by French mycologist Pierre Bulliard in 1785 as Agaricus contiguus, although the 1786 combination Agaricus involutus of August Batsch is taken as the first valid description. James Bolton published a description of what he called Agaricus adscendibus in 1788; the taxonomical authority Index Fungorum considers this to be synonymous with P. involutus. Additional synonyms include Omphalia involuta described by Samuel Frederick Gray in 1821, and Rhymovis involuta, published by Gottlob Ludwig Rabenhorst in 1844. The species gained its current binomial name in 1838 when the 'father of mycology', Swedish naturalist Elias Magnus Fries erected the genus Paxillus, and set it as the type species. The starting date of fungal taxonomy had been set as January 1, 1821, to coincide with the date of Fries' works, which meant that names coined earlier than this date required sanction by Fries (indicated in the name by a colon) to be considered valid. It was thus written Paxillus involutus (Batsch:Fr.) Fr. A 1987 revision of the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature set the starting date at May 1, 1753, the date of publication of Linnaeus' seminal work, the Species Plantarum. Hence the name no longer requires the ratification of Fries' authority. The genus was later placed in a new family, Paxillaceae, by French mycologist René Maire who held it to be related to both agarics and boletes. Although it has gills rather than pores, it has long been recognised as belonging to the pored mushrooms of the order Boletales rather than the traditional agarics. The generic name is derived from the Latin for 'peg' or 'plug', and the specific epithet involutus, 'inrolled', refers to the cap margin. Common names include the naked brimcap, poison paxillus, inrolled pax, poison pax, common roll-rim, brown roll-rim, and brown chanterelle. Gray called it the "involved navel-stool" in his 1821 compendium of British flora. Studies of the ecology and genetics of Paxillus involutus indicate that it may form a complex of multiple similar-looking species. In a field study near Uppsala, Sweden, conducted from 1981 to 1983, mycologist Nils Fries found that there were three populations of P. involutus unable to breed with each other. One was found under conifers and mixed woodlands, while the other two were found in parklands, associated with nearby birch trees. He found that the first group tended to produce single isolated fruit bodies which had a thinner stipe and cap which was less inrolled at the margins, while the fruit bodies of the other two populations tended to appear in groups, and have thicker stipes, and caps with more inrolled and sometimes undulating margins. There were only general tendencies and he was unable to detect any consistent macroscopic or microscopic features that firmly differentiate them. A molecular study comparing the DNA sequences of specimens of Paxillus involutus collected from various habitats in Bavaria found that those collected from parks and gardens showed a close relationship with the North American species P. vernalis, while those from forests were allied with P. filamentosus. The authors suggested the park populations may have been introduced from North America. A multi-gene analysis of European isolates showed that P. involutus sensu lato (in the loose sense) could be separated into four distinct, genetically isolated lineages corresponding to P. obscurosporus, P. involutus sensu stricto (in the strict sense), P. validus, and a fourth species that has not yet been identified. Changes in host range have occurred frequently and independently among strains within this species complex. ## Description Resembling a brown wooden top, the epigeous (aboveground) fruit body may be up to 6 cm (2+3⁄8 in) high. The cap, initially convex then more funnel-shaped (infundibuliform) with a depressed centre and rolled rim (hence the common name), may be reddish-, yellowish- or olive-brown in colour and typically 4–12 cm (1+5⁄8–4+3⁄4 in) wide; the cap diameter does not get larger than 15 cm (5+7⁄8 in). The cap surface is initially downy and later smooth, becoming sticky when wet. The cap and cap margin initially serve to protect the gills of young fruit bodies: this is termed pilangiocarpic development. The narrow brownish yellow gills are decurrent and forked, and can be peeled easily from the flesh (as is the case with the pores of boletes). Gills further down toward the stipe become more irregular and anastomose, and can even resemble the pores of bolete-type fungi. The fungus darkens when bruised and older specimens may have darkish patches. The juicy yellowish flesh has a mild to faintly sour or sharp odor and taste, and has been described as well-flavored upon cooking. Of similar colour to the cap, the short stipe measures some 3–6 cm tall and 1–3 wide, can be crooked, and tapers toward the base. The spore print is brown, and the dimensions of the ellipsoid (oval-shaped) spores are 7.5–9 by 5–6 μm. The hymenium has cystidia both on the gill edge and face (cheilo- and pleurocystidia respectively), which are slender and filament-like, typically measuring 40–65 by 8–10.5 μm. ### Similar species The brownish colour and funnel-like shape of P. involutus can lead to its confusion with several species of Lactarius, many of which have some degree of toxicity themselves. The lack of a milky exudate distinguishes it from any milk cap. One of the more similar is L. turpis, which presents a darker olive colouration. The related North American Paxillus vernalis has a darker spore print, thicker stipe and is found under aspen, whereas the closer relative P. filamentosus is more similar in appearance to P. involutus. A rare species that grows only in association with alder, P. filamentosus can be distinguished from it by the pressed-down scales on the cap surface that point towards the cap margin, a light yellow flesh that bruises only slightly brown, and deep yellow-ochre gills that do not change colour upon injury The most similar species are two once thought to be part of P. involutus in Europe. Paxillus obscurisporus (originally obscurosporus) has larger fruit bodies than P. involutus, with caps up to 40 cm (16 in) wide whose margins tend to unroll and flatten with age, and a layer of cream-coloured mycelia covering the base of its tapered stipe. P. validus, also known only from Europe, has caps up to 20 cm (7+7⁄8 in) wide with a stipe that is more or less equal in width throughout its length. Found under broadleaved trees in parks, it can be reliably distinguished from P. involutus (and other Paxillus species) by the presence of crystals up to 2.5 μm long in the rhizomorphs, as the crystals found in rhizomorphs of other Paxillus species do not exceed 0.5 μm long. Other similar species include Phylloporus arenicola, Tapinella atrotomentosa, and Tapinella panuoides. ## Ecology, distribution and habitat Paxillus involutus forms ectomycorrhizal relationships with a number of coniferous and deciduous tree species. Because the fungus has somewhat unspecialized nutrient requirements and a relatively broad host specificity, it has been frequently used in research and seedling inoculation programs. There is evidence of the benefit to trees of this arrangement: in one experiment where P. involutus was cultivated on the root exudate of red pine (Pinus resinosa), the root showed markedly increased resistance to pathogenic strains of the ubiquitous soil fungus Fusarium oxysporum. Seedlings inoculated with P. involutus also showed increased resistance to Fusarium. Thus P. involutus may be producing antifungal compounds which protect the host plants from root rot. Paxillus involutus also decreases the uptake of certain toxic elements, acting as a buffer against heavy metal toxicity in the host plant. For example, the fungus decreased the toxicity of cadmium and zinc to Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris) seedlings: even though cadmium itself inhibits ectomycorrhiza formation in seedlings, colonization with P. involutus decreases cadmium and zinc transport to the plant shoots and alters the ratio of zinc transported to the roots and shoots, causing more cadmium to be retained in the roots of the seedlings rather than distributed through its entire metabolism. Evidence suggests that the mechanism for this detoxification involves the cadmium binding to the fungal cell walls, as well as accumulating in the vacuolar compartments. Further, ectomycorrhizal hyphae exposed to copper or cadmium drastically increase production of a metallothionein—a low molecular weight protein that binds metals. The presence of Paxillus involutus is related to much reduced numbers of bacteria associated with the roots of Pinus sylvestris. Instead bacteria are found on the external mycelium. The types of bacteria change as well; a Finnish study published in 1997 found that bacterial communities under P. sylvestris without mycorrhizae metabolised organic and amino acids, while communities among P. involutus metabolised the sugar fructose. Paxillus involutus benefits from the presence of some species of bacteria in the soil it grows in. As the fungus grows it excretes polyphenols, waste products that are toxic to itself and impede its growth, but these compounds are metabolised by some bacteria, resulting in increased fungal growth. Bacteria also produce certain compounds such as citric and malic acid, which stimulate P. involutus. Highly abundant, the brown roll-rim is found across the Northern Hemisphere, Europe and Asia, with records from India, China, Japan, Iran, and Turkey's eastern Anatolia. It is equally widely distributed across northern North America, extending north to Alaska, where it has been collected from tundra near Coldfoot in the interior of the state. In southwestern Greenland, P. involutus has been recorded under the birch species Betula nana, B. pubescens and B. glandulosa. The mushroom is more common in coniferous woods in Europe, but is also closely associated with birch (Betula pendula). Within woodland, it prefers wet places or boggy ground, and avoids calcareous (chalky) soils. It has been noted to grow alongside Boletus badius in Europe, and Leccinum scabrum and Lactarius plumbeus in the Pacific Northwest region of North America. There it is found in both deciduous and coniferous woodland, commonly under plantings of white birch (Betula papyrifera) in urban areas. It is one of a small number of fungal species which thrive in Pinus radiata plantations planted outside their natural range. A study of polluted Scots pine forest around Oulu in northern Finland found that P. involutus became more abundant in more polluted areas while other species declined. Emissions from pulp mills, fertiliser, heating and traffic were responsible for the pollution, which was measured by sulfur levels in the pine needles. Paxillus involutus can be found growing on lawns and old meadows throughout its distribution. Fruit bodies are generally terrestrial, though they may be found on woody material around tree stumps. They generally appear in autumn and late summer. In California, David Arora discerned a larger form associated with oak and pine which appears in late autumn and winter, as well as the typical form that is associated with birch plantings and appears in autumn. Several species of flies and beetles have been recorded using the fruit bodies to rear their young. The mushroom can be infected by Hypomyces chrysospermus, or bolete eater, a mould species that parasitises Boletales members. Infection results in the appearance of a whitish powder that first manifests on the pores, then spreads over the surface of the mushroom, becoming golden yellow to reddish-brown in maturity. Australian mycologist John Burton Cleland noted it occurring under larch (Larix), oak, pine, birch and other introduced trees in South Australia in 1934, and it has subsequently been recorded in New South Wales, Victoria (where it was found near Betula and Populus) and Western Australia. It has been recorded under introduced birch (Betula) and hazel (Corylus) in New Zealand. Mycologist Rolf Singer reported a similar situation in South America, with the species recorded under introduced trees in Chile. It is likely to have been transported to those countries in the soil of imported European trees. ## Toxicity Paxillus involutus was widely eaten in Central and Eastern Europe until World War II, although English guidebooks did not recommend it. In Poland, the mushroom was often eaten after pickling or salting. It was known to be a gastrointestinal irritant when ingested raw but had been presumed edible after cooking. Questions were first raised about its toxicity after German mycologist Julius Schäffer died after eating it in October 1944. About an hour after he and his wife ate a meal prepared with the mushrooms, Schäffer developed vomiting, diarrhea, and fever. His condition worsened to the point where he was admitted to hospital the following day and developed kidney failure, perishing after 17 days. In the mid-1980s, Swiss physician René Flammer discovered an antigen within the mushroom that stimulates an autoimmune reaction causing the body's immune cells to consider its own red blood cells as foreign and attack them. Despite this, it was not until 1990 that guidebooks firmly warned against eating P. involutus, and one Italian guidebook recommended it as late as 1998. The relatively rare immunohemolytic syndrome occurs following the repeated ingestion of Paxillus mushrooms. Most commonly it arises when the person has ingested the mushroom for a long period of time, sometimes for many years, and has shown mild gastrointestinal symptoms on previous occasions. The Paxillus syndrome is better classed as a hypersensitivity reaction than a toxicological reaction as it is caused not by a genuinely poisonous substance but by the antigen in the mushroom. The antigen is still of unknown structure but it stimulates the formation of IgG antibodies in the blood serum. In the course of subsequent meals, antigen-antibody complexes are formed; these complexes attach to the surface of blood cells and eventually lead to their breakdown. Poisoning symptoms are rapid in onset, consisting initially of vomiting, diarrhea, abdominal pain, and associated decreased blood volume. Shortly after these initial symptoms appear, hemolysis develops, resulting in reduced urine output, hemoglobin in the urine or outright absence of urine formation, and anemia. Medical laboratory tests consist of testing for the presence of increasing bilirubin and free hemoglobin, and falling haptoglobins. Hemolysis may lead to numerous complications including acute kidney injury, shock, acute respiratory failure, and disseminated intravascular coagulation. These complications can cause significant morbidity with fatalities having been reported. There is no antidote for poisoning, only supportive treatment consisting of monitoring complete blood count, renal function, blood pressure, and fluid and electrolyte balance and correcting abnormalities. The use of corticosteroids may be a useful adjunct in treatment, as they protect blood cells against hemolysis, thereby reducing complications. Plasmapheresis reduces the circulating immune complexes in the blood which cause the hemolysis, and may be beneficial in improving the outcome. Additionally, hemodialysis can be used for patients with compromised kidney function or kidney failure. Paxillus involutus also contains agents which appear to damage chromosomes; it is unclear whether these have carcinogenic or mutagenic potential. Two compounds that have been identified are the phenols involutone and involutin; the latter is responsible for the brownish discolouration upon bruising. ## See also - List of deadly fungi

Nelson Mandela

President of South Africa from 1994 to 1999

Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela (/mænˈdɛlə/; ; 18 July 1918 – 5 December 2013) was a South African anti-apartheid activist and politician who served as the first president of South Africa from 1994 to 1999. He was the country's first black head of state and the first elected in a fully representative democratic election. His government focused on dismantling the legacy of apartheid by fostering racial reconciliation. Ideologically an African nationalist and socialist, he served as the president of the African National Congress (ANC) party from 1991 to 1997. A Xhosa, Mandela was born into the Thembu royal family in Mvezo, South Africa. He studied law at the University of Fort Hare and the University of Witwatersrand before working as a lawyer in Johannesburg. There he became involved in anti-colonial and African nationalist politics, joining the ANC in 1943 and co-founding its Youth League in 1944. After the National Party's white-only government established apartheid, a system of racial segregation that privileged whites, Mandela and the ANC committed themselves to its overthrow. He was appointed president of the ANC's Transvaal branch, rising to prominence for his involvement in the 1952 Defiance Campaign and the 1955 Congress of the People. He was repeatedly arrested for seditious activities and was unsuccessfully prosecuted in the 1956 Treason Trial. Influenced by Marxism, he secretly joined the banned South African Communist Party (SACP). Although initially committed to non-violent protest, in association with the SACP he co-founded the militant uMkhonto we Sizwe in 1961 and led a sabotage campaign against the government. He was arrested and imprisoned in 1962, and, following the Rivonia Trial, was sentenced to life imprisonment for conspiring to overthrow the state. Mandela served 27 years in prison, split between Robben Island, Pollsmoor Prison and Victor Verster Prison. Amid growing domestic and international pressure and fears of racial civil war, President F. W. de Klerk released him in 1990. Mandela and de Klerk led efforts to negotiate an end to apartheid, which resulted in the 1994 multiracial general election in which Mandela led the ANC to victory and became president. Leading a broad coalition government which promulgated a new constitution, Mandela emphasised reconciliation between the country's racial groups and created the Truth and Reconciliation Commission to investigate past human rights abuses. Economically, his administration retained its predecessor's liberal framework despite his own socialist beliefs, also introducing measures to encourage land reform, combat poverty and expand healthcare services. Internationally, Mandela acted as mediator in the Pan Am Flight 103 bombing trial and served as secretary-general of the Non-Aligned Movement from 1998 to 1999. He declined a second presidential term and was succeeded by his deputy, Thabo Mbeki. Mandela became an elder statesman and focused on combating poverty and HIV/AIDS through the charitable Nelson Mandela Foundation. Mandela was a controversial figure for much of his life. Although critics on the right denounced him as a communist terrorist and those on the far left deemed him too eager to negotiate and reconcile with apartheid's supporters, he gained international acclaim for his activism. Globally regarded as an icon of democracy and social justice, he received more than 250 honours, including the Nobel Peace Prize. He is held in deep respect within South Africa, where he is often referred to by his Thembu clan name, Madiba, and described as the "Father of the Nation". ## Life ### Early life #### Childhood: 1918–1934 Mandela was born on 18 July 1918 in the village of Mvezo in Umtata, then part of South Africa's Cape Province. Given the forename Rolihlahla, a Xhosa term colloquially meaning "troublemaker", in later years he became known by his clan name, Madiba. His patrilineal great-grandfather, Ngubengcuka, was ruler of the Thembu Kingdom in the Transkeian Territories of South Africa's modern Eastern Cape province. One of Ngubengcuka's sons, named Mandela, was Nelson's grandfather and the source of his surname. Because Mandela was the king's child by a wife of the Ixhiba clan, a so-called "Left-Hand House", the descendants of his cadet branch of the royal family were morganatic, ineligible to inherit the throne but recognised as hereditary royal councillors. Nelson Mandela's father, Gadla Henry Mphakanyiswa Mandela (1880–1928), was a local chief and councillor to the monarch; he was appointed to the position in 1915, after his predecessor was accused of corruption by a governing white magistrate. In 1926, Gadla was also sacked for corruption, but Nelson was told that his father had lost his job for standing up to the magistrate's unreasonable demands. A devotee of the god Qamata, Gadla was a polygamist with four wives, four sons and nine daughters, who lived in different villages. Nelson's mother was Gadla's third wife, Nosekeni Fanny, daughter of Nkedama of the Right Hand House and a member of the amaMpemvu clan of the Xhosa. Mandela later stated that his early life was dominated by traditional Xhosa custom and taboo. He grew up with two sisters in his mother's kraal in the village of Qunu, where he tended herds as a cattle-boy and spent much time outside with other boys. Both his parents were illiterate, but his mother, being a devout Christian, sent him to a local Methodist school when he was about seven. Baptised a Methodist, Mandela was given the English forename of "Nelson" by his teacher. When Mandela was about nine, his father came to stay at Qunu, where he died of an undiagnosed ailment that Mandela believed to be lung disease. Feeling "cut adrift", he later said that he inherited his father's "proud rebelliousness" and "stubborn sense of fairness". Mandela's mother took him to the "Great Place" palace at Mqhekezweni, where he was entrusted to the guardianship of the Thembu regent, Chief Jongintaba Dalindyebo. Although he did not see his mother again for many years, Mandela felt that Jongintaba and his wife Noengland treated him as their own child, raising him alongside their son, Justice, and daughter, Nomafu. As Mandela attended church services every Sunday with his guardians, Christianity became a significant part of his life. He attended a Methodist mission school located next to the palace, where he studied English, Xhosa, history and geography. He developed a love of African history, listening to the tales told by elderly visitors to the palace, and was influenced by the anti-imperialist rhetoric of a visiting chief, Joyi. Nevertheless, at the time he considered the European colonizers not as oppressors but as benefactors who had brought education and other benefits to southern Africa. Aged 16, he, Justice and several other boys travelled to Tyhalarha to undergo the ulwaluko circumcision ritual that symbolically marked their transition from boys to men; afterwards he was given the name Dalibunga. #### Clarkebury, Healdtown, and Fort Hare: 1934–1940 Intending to gain skills needed to become a privy councillor for the Thembu royal house, Mandela began his secondary education in 1933 at Clarkebury Methodist High School in Engcobo, a Western-style institution that was the largest school for black Africans in Thembuland. Made to socialise with other students on an equal basis, he claimed that he lost his "stuck up" attitude, becoming best friends with a girl for the first time; he began playing sports and developed his lifelong love of gardening. He completed his Junior Certificate in two years, and in 1937 he moved to Healdtown, the Methodist college in Fort Beaufort attended by most Thembu royalty, including Justice. The headmaster emphasised the superiority of European culture and government, but Mandela became increasingly interested in native African culture, making his first non-Xhosa friend, a speaker of Sotho, and coming under the influence of one of his favourite teachers, a Xhosa who broke taboo by marrying a Sotho. Mandela spent much of his spare time at Healdtown as a long-distance runner and boxer, and in his second year he became a prefect. In 1939, with Jongintaba's backing, Mandela began work on a BA degree at the University of Fort Hare, an elite black institution of approximately 150 students in Alice, Eastern Cape. He studied English, anthropology, politics, "native administration", and Roman Dutch law in his first year, desiring to become an interpreter or clerk in the Native Affairs Department. Mandela stayed in the Wesley House dormitory, befriending his own kinsman, K. D. Matanzima, as well as Oliver Tambo, who became a close friend and comrade for decades to come. He took up ballroom dancing, performed in a drama society play about Abraham Lincoln, and gave Bible classes in the local community as part of the Student Christian Association. Although he had friends who held connections to the African National Congress (ANC) who wanted South Africa to be independent of the British Empire, Mandela avoided any involvement with the nascent movement, and became a vocal supporter of the British war effort when the Second World War broke out. He helped establish a first-year students' house committee which challenged the dominance of the second-years, and at the end of his first year became involved in a students' representative council (SRC) boycott against the quality of food, for which he was suspended from the university; he never returned to complete his degree. #### Arriving in Johannesburg: 1941–1943 Returning to Mqhekezweni in December 1940, Mandela found that Jongintaba had arranged marriages for him and Justice; dismayed, they fled to Johannesburg via Queenstown, arriving in April 1941. Mandela found work as a night watchman at Crown Mines, his "first sight of South African capitalism in action", but was fired when the induna (headman) discovered that he was a runaway. He stayed with a cousin in George Goch Township, who introduced Mandela to realtor and ANC activist Walter Sisulu. The latter secured Mandela a job as an articled clerk at the law firm of Witkin, Sidelsky and Eidelman, a company run by Lazar Sidelsky, a liberal Jew sympathetic to the ANC's cause. At the firm, Mandela befriended Gaur Radebe—a Hlubi member of the ANC and Communist Party—and Nat Bregman, a Jewish communist who became his first white friend. Mandela attended Communist Party gatherings, where he was impressed that Europeans, Africans, Indians, and Coloureds mixed as equals. He later stated that he did not join the party because its atheism conflicted with his Christian faith, and because he saw the South African struggle as being racially based rather than as class warfare. To continue his higher education, Mandela signed up to a University of South Africa correspondence course, working on his bachelor's degree at night. Earning a small wage, Mandela rented a room in the house of the Xhoma family in the Alexandra township; despite being rife with poverty, crime and pollution, Alexandra always remained a special place for him. Although embarrassed by his poverty, he briefly dated a Swazi woman before unsuccessfully courting his landlord's daughter. To save money and be closer to downtown Johannesburg, Mandela moved into the compound of the Witwatersrand Native Labour Association, living among miners of various tribes; as the compound was visited by various chiefs, he once met the Queen Regent of Basutoland. In late 1941, Jongintaba visited Johannesburg—there forgiving Mandela for running away—before returning to Thembuland, where he died in the winter of 1942. Mandela and Justice arrived a day late for the funeral. After he passed his BA exams in early 1943, Mandela returned to Johannesburg to follow a political path as a lawyer rather than become a privy councillor in Thembuland. He later stated that he experienced no epiphany, but that he "simply found [himself] doing so, and could not do otherwise." ### Revolutionary activity #### Law studies and the ANC Youth League: 1943–1949 Mandela began studying law at the University of the Witwatersrand, where he was the only black African student and faced racism. There, he befriended liberal and communist European, Jewish and Indian students, among them Joe Slovo and Ruth First. Becoming increasingly politicised, Mandela marched in August 1943 in support of a successful bus boycott to reverse fare rises. Joining the ANC, he was increasingly influenced by Sisulu, spending time with other activists at Sisulu's Orlando house, including his old friend Oliver Tambo. In 1943, Mandela met Anton Lembede, an ANC member affiliated with the "Africanist" branch of African nationalism, which was virulently opposed to a racially united front against colonialism and imperialism or to an alliance with the communists. Despite his friendships with non-blacks and communists, Mandela embraced Lembede's views, believing that black Africans should be entirely independent in their struggle for political self-determination. Deciding on the need for a youth wing to mass-mobilise Africans in opposition to their subjugation, Mandela was among a delegation that approached ANC president Alfred Bitini Xuma on the subject at his home in Sophiatown; the African National Congress Youth League (ANCYL) was founded on Easter Sunday 1944 in the Bantu Men's Social Centre, with Lembede as president and Mandela as a member of its executive committee. At Sisulu's house, Mandela met Evelyn Mase, a trainee nurse and ANC activist from Engcobo, Transkei. Entering a relationship and marrying in October 1944, they initially lived with her relatives until moving into a rented house in the township of Orlando in early 1946. Their first child, Madiba "Thembi" Thembekile, was born in February 1945; a daughter, Makaziwe, was born in 1947 but died of meningitis nine months later. Mandela enjoyed home life, welcoming his mother and his sister, Leabie, to stay with him. In early 1947, his three years of articles ended at Witkin, Sidelsky and Eidelman, and he decided to become a full-time student, subsisting on loans from the Bantu Welfare Trust. In July 1947, Mandela rushed Lembede, who was ill, to hospital, where he died; he was succeeded as ANCYL president by the more moderate Peter Mda, who agreed to co-operate with communists and non-blacks, appointing Mandela ANCYL secretary. Mandela disagreed with Mda's approach, and in December 1947 supported an unsuccessful measure to expel communists from the ANCYL, considering their ideology un-African. In 1947, Mandela was elected to the executive committee of the ANC's Transvaal Province branch, serving under regional president C. S. Ramohanoe. When Ramohanoe acted against the wishes of the committee by co-operating with Indians and communists, Mandela was one of those who forced his resignation. In the South African general election in 1948, in which only whites were permitted to vote, the Afrikaner-dominated Herenigde Nasionale Party under Daniel François Malan took power, soon uniting with the Afrikaner Party to form the National Party. Openly racialist, the party codified and expanded racial segregation with new apartheid legislation. Gaining increasing influence in the ANC, Mandela and his party cadre allies began advocating direct action against apartheid, such as boycotts and strikes, influenced by the tactics already employed by South Africa's Indian community. Xuma did not support these measures and was removed from the presidency in a vote of no confidence, replaced by James Moroka and a more militant executive committee containing Sisulu, Mda, Tambo and Godfrey Pitje. Mandela later related that he and his colleagues had "guided the ANC to a more radical and revolutionary path." Having devoted his time to politics, Mandela failed his final year at Witwatersrand three times; he was ultimately denied his degree in December 1949. #### Defiance Campaign and Transvaal ANC Presidency: 1950–1954 Mandela took Xuma's place on the ANC national executive in March 1950, and that same year was elected national president of the ANCYL. In March, the Defend Free Speech Convention was held in Johannesburg, bringing together African, Indian and communist activists to call a May Day general strike in protest against apartheid and white minority rule. Mandela opposed the strike because it was multi-racial and not ANC-led, but a majority of black workers took part, resulting in increased police repression and the introduction of the Suppression of Communism Act, 1950, affecting the actions of all protest groups. At the ANC national conference of December 1951, he continued arguing against a racially united front, but was outvoted. Thereafter, Mandela rejected Lembede's Africanism and embraced the idea of a multi-racial front against apartheid. Influenced by friends like Moses Kotane and by the Soviet Union's support for wars of national liberation, his mistrust of communism broke down and he began reading literature by Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin, and Mao Zedong, eventually embracing the Marxist philosophy of dialectical materialism. Commenting on communism, he later stated that he "found [himself] strongly drawn to the idea of a classless society which, to [his] mind, was similar to traditional African culture where life was shared and communal." In April 1952, Mandela began work at the H.M. Basner law firm, which was owned by a communist, although his increasing commitment to work and activism meant he spent less time with his family. In 1952, the ANC began preparation for a joint Defiance Campaign against apartheid with Indian and communist groups, founding a National Voluntary Board to recruit volunteers. The campaign was designed to follow the path of nonviolent resistance influenced by Mahatma Gandhi; some supported this for ethical reasons, but Mandela instead considered it pragmatic. At a Durban rally on 22 June, Mandela addressed an assembled crowd of 10,000 people, initiating the campaign protests for which he was arrested and briefly interned in Marshall Square prison. These events established Mandela as one of the best-known black political figures in South Africa. With further protests, the ANC's membership grew from 20,000 to 100,000 members; the government responded with mass arrests and introduced the Public Safety Act, 1953 to permit martial law. In May, authorities banned Transvaal ANC president J. B. Marks from making public appearances; unable to maintain his position, he recommended Mandela as his successor. Although Africanists opposed his candidacy, Mandela was elected to be regional president in October. In July 1952, Mandela was arrested under the Suppression of Communism Act and stood trial as one of the 21 accused—among them Moroka, Sisulu and Yusuf Dadoo—in Johannesburg. Found guilty of "statutory communism", a term that the government used to describe most opposition to apartheid, their sentence of nine months' hard labour was suspended for two years. In December, Mandela was given a six-month ban from attending meetings or talking to more than one individual at a time, making his Transvaal ANC presidency impractical, and during this period the Defiance Campaign petered out. In September 1953, Andrew Kunene read out Mandela's "No Easy Walk to Freedom" speech at a Transvaal ANC meeting; the title was taken from a quote by Indian independence leader Jawaharlal Nehru, a seminal influence on Mandela's thought. The speech laid out a contingency plan for a scenario in which the ANC was banned. This Mandela Plan, or M-Plan, involved dividing the organisation into a cell structure with a more centralised leadership. Mandela obtained work as an attorney for the firm Terblanche and Briggish, before moving to the liberal-run Helman and Michel, passing qualification exams to become a full-fledged attorney. In August 1953, Mandela and Tambo opened their own law firm, Mandela and Tambo, operating in downtown Johannesburg. The only African-run law firm in the country, it was popular with aggrieved black people, often dealing with cases of police brutality. Disliked by the authorities, the firm was forced to relocate to a remote location after their office permit was removed under the Group Areas Act; as a result, their clientele dwindled. As a lawyer of aristocratic heritage, Mandela was part of Johannesburg's elite black middle-class, and accorded much respect from the black community. Although a second daughter, Makaziwe Phumia, was born in May 1954, Mandela's relationship with Evelyn became strained, and she accused him of adultery. He may have had affairs with ANC member Lillian Ngoyi and secretary Ruth Mompati; various individuals close to Mandela in this period have stated that the latter bore him a child. Disgusted by her son's behaviour, Nosekeni returned to Transkei, while Evelyn embraced the Jehovah's Witnesses and rejected Mandela's preoccupation with politics. #### Congress of the People and the Treason Trial: 1955–1961 After taking part in the unsuccessful protest to prevent the forced relocation of all black people from the Sophiatown suburb of Johannesburg in February 1955, Mandela concluded that violent action would prove necessary to end apartheid and white minority rule. On his advice, Sisulu requested weaponry from the People's Republic of China, which was denied. Although the Chinese government supported the anti-apartheid struggle, they believed the movement insufficiently prepared for guerrilla warfare. With the involvement of the South African Indian Congress, the Coloured People's Congress, the South African Congress of Trade Unions and the Congress of Democrats, the ANC planned a Congress of the People, calling on all South Africans to send in proposals for a post-apartheid era. Based on the responses, a Freedom Charter was drafted by Rusty Bernstein, calling for the creation of a democratic, non-racialist state with the nationalisation of major industry. The charter was adopted at a June 1955 conference in Kliptown; 3,000 delegates attended the event, which was forcibly closed down by police. The tenets of the Freedom Charter remained important for Mandela, and in 1956 he described it as "an inspiration to the people of South Africa". Following the end of a second ban in September 1955, Mandela went on a working holiday to Transkei to discuss the implications of the Bantu Authorities Act, 1951 with local Xhosa chiefs, also visiting his mother and Noengland before proceeding to Cape Town. In March 1956, he received his third ban on public appearances, restricting him to Johannesburg for five years, but he often defied it. Mandela's marriage broke down and Evelyn left him, taking their children to live with her brother. Initiating divorce proceedings in May 1956, she claimed that Mandela had physically abused her; he denied the allegations, and fought for custody of their children. She withdrew her petition of separation in November, but Mandela filed for divorce in January 1958; the divorce was finalised in March, with the children placed in Evelyn's care. During the divorce proceedings, he began courting a social worker, Winnie Madikizela, whom he married in Bizana in June 1958. She later became involved in ANC activities, spending several weeks in prison. Together they had two children: Zenani, born in February 1959, and Zindziswa (1960–2020). In December 1956, Mandela was arrested alongside most of the ANC national executive, and accused of "high treason" against the state. Held in Johannesburg Prison amid mass protests, they underwent a preparatory examination before being granted bail. The defence's refutation began in January 1957, overseen by defence lawyer Vernon Berrangé, and continued until the case was adjourned in September. In January 1958, Oswald Pirow was appointed to prosecute the case, and in February the judge ruled that there was "sufficient reason" for the defendants to go on trial in the Transvaal Supreme Court. The formal Treason Trial began in Pretoria in August 1958, with the defendants successfully applying to have the three judges—all linked to the governing National Party—replaced. In August, one charge was dropped, and in October the prosecution withdrew its indictment, submitting a reformulated version in November which argued that the ANC leadership committed high treason by advocating violent revolution, a charge the defendants denied. In April 1959, Africanists dissatisfied with the ANC's united front approach founded the Pan-Africanist Congress (PAC); Mandela disagreed with the PAC's racially exclusionary views, describing them as "immature" and "naïve". Both parties took part in an anti-pass campaign in early 1960, in which Africans burned the passes that they were legally obliged to carry. One of the PAC-organised demonstrations was fired upon by police, resulting in the deaths of 69 protesters in the Sharpeville massacre. The incident brought international condemnation of the government and resulted in rioting throughout South Africa, with Mandela publicly burning his pass in solidarity. Responding to the unrest, the government implemented state of emergency measures, declaring martial law and banning the ANC and PAC; in March, they arrested Mandela and other activists, imprisoning them for five months without charge in the unsanitary conditions of the Pretoria Local prison. Imprisonment caused problems for Mandela and his co-defendants in the Treason Trial; their lawyers could not reach them, and so it was decided that the lawyers would withdraw in protest until the accused were freed from prison when the state of emergency was lifted in late August 1960. Over the following months, Mandela used his free time to organise an All-In African Conference near Pietermaritzburg, Natal, in March 1961, at which 1,400 anti-apartheid delegates met, agreeing on a stay-at-home strike to mark 31 May, the day South Africa became a republic. On 29 March 1961, six years after the Treason Trial began, the judges produced a verdict of not guilty, ruling that there was insufficient evidence to convict the accused of "high treason", since they had advocated neither communism nor violent revolution; the outcome embarrassed the government. #### MK, the SACP, and African tour: 1961–62 Disguised as a chauffeur, Mandela travelled around the country incognito, organising the ANC's new cell structure and the planned mass stay-at-home strike. Referred to as the "Black Pimpernel" in the press—a reference to Emma Orczy's 1905 novel The Scarlet Pimpernel—a warrant for his arrest was put out by the police. Mandela held secret meetings with reporters, and after the government failed to prevent the strike, he warned them that many anti-apartheid activists would soon resort to violence through groups like the PAC's Poqo. He believed that the ANC should form an armed group to channel some of this violence in a controlled direction, convincing both ANC leader Albert Luthuli—who was morally opposed to violence—and allied activist groups of its necessity. Inspired by the actions of Fidel Castro's 26th of July Movement in the Cuban Revolution, in 1961 Mandela, Sisulu and Slovo co-founded Umkhonto we Sizwe ("Spear of the Nation", abbreviated MK). Becoming chairman of the militant group, Mandela gained ideas from literature on guerrilla warfare by Marxist militants Mao and Che Guevara as well as from the military theorist Carl von Clausewitz. Although initially declared officially separate from the ANC so as not to taint the latter's reputation, MK was later widely recognised as the party's armed wing. Most early MK members were white members of the SACP, who were able to conceal Mandela in their homes. After hiding in communist Wolfie Kodesh's flat in Berea, Mandela moved to Liliesleaf Farm in Rivonia (which had been purchased by Arthur Goldreich and Harold Wolpe with SACP funds, for use as a safe house for ANC activists). He was joined there joined by Raymond Mhlaba, Slovo and Bernstein, who put together the MK constitution. Although in later life Mandela denied, for political reasons, ever being a member of the Communist Party, historical research published in 2011 strongly suggested that he had joined in the late 1950s or early 1960s. This was confirmed by both the SACP and the ANC after Mandela's death. According to the SACP, he was not only a member of the party, but also served on its Central Committee. Operating through a cell structure, MK planned to carry out acts of sabotage that would exert maximum pressure on the government with minimum casualties; they sought to bomb military installations, power plants, telephone lines, and transport links at night, when civilians were not present. Mandela stated that they chose sabotage because it was the least harmful action, did not involve killing, and offered the best hope for racial reconciliation afterwards; he nevertheless acknowledged that should this have failed then guerrilla warfare might have been necessary. Soon after ANC leader Luthuli was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, MK publicly announced its existence with 57 bombings on Dingane's Day (16 December) 1961, followed by further attacks on New Year's Eve. The ANC decided to send Mandela as a delegate to the February 1962 meeting of the Pan-African Freedom Movement for East, Central and Southern Africa (PAFMECSA) in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. Leaving South Africa in secret via Bechuanaland, on his way Mandela visited Tanganyika and met with its president, Julius Nyerere. Arriving in Ethiopia, Mandela met with Emperor Haile Selassie I, and gave his speech after Selassie's at the conference. After the symposium, he travelled to Cairo, Egypt, admiring the political reforms of President Gamal Abdel Nasser, and in April 1962 he went to Morocco where asked El Khatib to meet the king to ask him to give him £5,000. The next day he got the £5,000 along with some weapons and training to Mandels's soldier, and then went to Tunis, Tunisia, where President Habib Bourguiba gave him £5,000 for weaponry. He proceeded to Morocco, Mali, Guinea, Sierra Leone, Liberia and Senegal, receiving funds from Liberian president William Tubman and Guinean president Ahmed Sékou Touré. He left Africa for London, England, where he met anti-apartheid activists, reporters and prominent politicians. Upon returning to Ethiopia, he began a six-month course in guerrilla warfare, but completed only two months before being recalled to South Africa by the ANC's leadership. ### Imprisonment #### Arrest and Rivonia trial: 1962–1964 On 5 August 1962, police captured Mandela along with fellow activist Cecil Williams near Howick. Many MK members suspected that the authorities had been tipped off with regard to Mandela's whereabouts, although Mandela himself gave these ideas little credence. In later years, Donald Rickard, a former American diplomat, revealed that the Central Intelligence Agency, which feared Mandela's associations with communists, had informed the South African police of his location. Jailed in Johannesburg's Marshall Square prison, Mandela was charged with inciting workers' strikes and leaving the country without permission. Representing himself with Slovo as legal advisor, Mandela intended to use the trial to showcase "the ANC's moral opposition to racism" while supporters demonstrated outside the court. Moved to Pretoria, where Winnie could visit him, he began correspondence studies for a Bachelor of Laws (LLB) degree from the University of London International Programmes. His hearing began in October, but he disrupted proceedings by wearing a traditional kaross, refusing to call any witnesses, and turning his plea of mitigation into a political speech. Found guilty, he was sentenced to five years' imprisonment; as he left the courtroom, supporters sang "Nkosi Sikelel iAfrika". On 11 July 1963, police raided Liliesleaf Farm, arresting those that they found there and uncovering paperwork documenting MK's activities, some of which mentioned Mandela. The Rivonia Trial began at Pretoria Supreme Court in October, with Mandela and his comrades charged with four counts of sabotage and conspiracy to violently overthrow the government; their chief prosecutor was Percy Yutar. Judge Quartus de Wet soon threw out the prosecution's case for insufficient evidence, but Yutar reformulated the charges, presenting his new case from December 1963 until February 1964, calling 173 witnesses and bringing thousands of documents and photographs to the trial. Although four of the accused denied involvement with MK, Mandela and the other five accused admitted sabotage but denied that they had ever agreed to initiate guerrilla war against the government. They used the trial to highlight their political cause; at the opening of the defence's proceedings, Mandela gave his three-hour "I Am Prepared to Die" speech. That speech—which was inspired by Castro's "History Will Absolve Me"—was widely reported in the press despite official censorship. The trial gained international attention; there were global calls for the release of the accused from the United Nations and World Peace Council, while the University of London Union voted Mandela to its presidency. On 12 June 1964, justice De Wet found Mandela and two of his co-accused guilty on all four charges; although the prosecution had called for the death sentence to be applied, the judge instead condemned them to life imprisonment. #### Robben Island: 1964–1982 In 1964, Mandela and his co-accused were transferred from Pretoria to the prison on Robben Island, remaining there for the next 18 years. Isolated from non-political prisoners in Section B, Mandela was imprisoned in a damp concrete cell measuring 8 feet (2.4 m) by 7 feet (2.1 m), with a straw mat on which to sleep. Verbally and physically harassed by several white prison wardens, the Rivonia Trial prisoners spent their days breaking rocks into gravel, until being reassigned in January 1965 to work in a lime quarry. Mandela was initially forbidden to wear sunglasses, and the glare from the lime permanently damaged his eyesight. At night, he worked on his LLB degree, which he was obtaining from the University of London through a correspondence course with Wolsey Hall, Oxford, but newspapers were forbidden, and he was locked in solitary confinement on several occasions for the possession of smuggled news clippings. He was initially classified as the lowest grade of prisoner, Class D, meaning that he was permitted one visit and one letter every six months, although all mail was heavily censored. The political prisoners took part in work and hunger strikes—the latter considered largely ineffective by Mandela—to improve prison conditions, viewing this as a microcosm of the anti-apartheid struggle. ANC prisoners elected him to their four-man "High Organ" along with Sisulu, Govan Mbeki and Raymond Mhlaba, and he involved himself in a group, named Ulundi, that represented all political prisoners (including Eddie Daniels) on the island, through which he forged links with PAC and Yu Chi Chan Club members. Initiating the "University of Robben Island", whereby prisoners lectured on their own areas of expertise, he debated socio-political topics with his comrades. Though attending Christian Sunday services, Mandela studied Islam. He also studied Afrikaans, hoping to build a mutual respect with the warders and convert them to his cause. Various official visitors met with Mandela, most significantly the liberal parliamentary representative Helen Suzman of the Progressive Party, who championed Mandela's cause outside of prison. In September 1970, he met British Labour Party politician Denis Healey. South African Minister of Justice Jimmy Kruger visited in December 1974, but he and Mandela did not get along with each other. His mother visited in 1968, dying shortly after, and his firstborn son Thembi died in a car accident the following year; Mandela was forbidden from attending either funeral. His wife was rarely able to see him, being regularly imprisoned for political activity, and his daughters first visited in December 1975. Winnie was released from prison in 1977 but was forcibly settled in Brandfort and remained unable to see him. From 1967 onwards, prison conditions improved. Black prisoners were given trousers rather than shorts, games were permitted, and the standard of their food was raised. In 1969, an escape plan for Mandela was developed by Gordon Bruce, but it was abandoned after the conspiracy was infiltrated by an agent of the South African Bureau of State Security (BOSS), who hoped to see Mandela shot during the escape. In 1970, Commander Piet Badenhorst became commanding officer. Mandela, seeing an increase in the physical and mental abuse of prisoners, complained to visiting judges, who had Badenhorst reassigned. He was replaced by Commander Willie Willemse, who developed a co-operative relationship with Mandela and was keen to improve prison standards. By 1975, Mandela had become a Class A prisoner, which allowed him greater numbers of visits and letters. He corresponded with anti-apartheid activists like Mangosuthu Buthelezi and Desmond Tutu. That year, he began his autobiography, which was smuggled to London, but remained unpublished at the time; prison authorities discovered several pages, and his LLB study privileges were revoked for four years. Instead, he devoted his spare time to gardening and reading until the authorities permitted him to resume his LLB degree studies in 1980. By the late 1960s, Mandela's fame had been eclipsed by Steve Biko and the Black Consciousness Movement (BCM). Seeing the ANC as ineffectual, the BCM called for militant action, but, following the Soweto uprising of 1976, many BCM activists were imprisoned on Robben Island. Mandela tried to build a relationship with these young radicals, although he was critical of their racialism and contempt for white anti-apartheid activists. Renewed international interest in his plight came in July 1978, when he celebrated his 60th birthday. He was awarded an honorary doctorate in Lesotho, the Jawaharlal Nehru Award for International Understanding in India in 1979, and the Freedom of the City of Glasgow, Scotland in 1981. In March 1980, the slogan "Free Mandela!" was developed by journalist Percy Qoboza, sparking an international campaign that led the UN Security Council to call for his release. Despite increasing foreign pressure, the government refused, relying on its Cold War allies US president Ronald Reagan and British prime minister Margaret Thatcher; both considered Mandela's ANC a terrorist organisation sympathetic to communism and supported its suppression. #### Pollsmoor Prison: 1982–1988 In April 1982, Mandela was transferred to Pollsmoor Prison in Tokai, Cape Town, along with senior ANC leaders Walter Sisulu, Andrew Mlangeni, Ahmed Kathrada and Raymond Mhlaba; they believed that they were being isolated to remove their influence on younger activists at Robben Island. Conditions at Pollsmoor were better than at Robben Island, although Mandela missed the camaraderie and scenery of the island. Getting on well with Pollsmoor's commanding officer, Brigadier Munro, Mandela was permitted to create a roof garden; he also read voraciously and corresponded widely, now being permitted 52 letters a year. He was appointed patron of the multi-racial United Democratic Front (UDF), founded to combat reforms implemented by South African president P. W. Botha. Botha's National Party government had permitted Coloured and Indian citizens to vote for their own parliaments, which had control over education, health and housing, but black Africans were excluded from the system. Like Mandela, the UDF saw this as an attempt to divide the anti-apartheid movement on racial lines. The early 1980s witnessed an escalation of violence across the country, and many predicted civil war. This was accompanied by economic stagnation as various multinational banks—under pressure from an international lobby—had stopped investing in South Africa. Numerous banks and Thatcher asked Botha to release Mandela—then at the height of his international fame—to defuse the volatile situation. Although considering Mandela a dangerous "arch-Marxist", Botha offered him, in February 1985, a release from prison if he "unconditionally rejected violence as a political weapon". Mandela spurned the offer, releasing a statement through his daughter Zindzi stating, "What freedom am I being offered while the organisation of the people [ANC] remains banned? Only free men can negotiate. A prisoner cannot enter into contracts." In 1985, Mandela underwent surgery on an enlarged prostate gland before being given new solitary quarters on the ground floor. He was met by "seven eminent persons", an international delegation sent to negotiate a settlement, but Botha's government refused to co-operate, calling a state of emergency in June and initiating a police crackdown on unrest. The anti-apartheid resistance fought back, with the ANC committing 231 attacks in 1986 and 235 in 1987. The violence escalated as the government used the army and police to combat the resistance and provided covert support for vigilante groups and the Zulu nationalist movement Inkatha, which was involved in an increasingly violent struggle with the ANC. Mandela requested talks with Botha but was denied, instead secretly meeting with Minister of Justice Kobie Coetsee in 1987, and having a further 11 meetings over the next three years. Coetsee organised negotiations between Mandela and a team of four government figures starting in May 1988; the team agreed to the release of political prisoners and the legalisation of the ANC on the condition that they permanently renounce violence, break links with the Communist Party, and not insist on majority rule. Mandela rejected these conditions, insisting that the ANC would end its armed activities only when the government renounced violence. Mandela's 70th birthday in July 1988 attracted international attention, including a tribute concert at London's Wembley Stadium that was televised and watched by an estimated 200 million viewers. Although presented globally as a heroic figure, he faced personal problems when ANC leaders informed him that Winnie had set herself up as head of a gang, the "Mandela United Football Club", which had been responsible for torturing and killing opponents—including children—in Soweto. Though some encouraged him to divorce her, he decided to remain loyal until she was found guilty by trial. #### Victor Verster Prison and release: 1988–1990 Recovering from tuberculosis exacerbated by the damp conditions in his cell, Mandela was moved to Victor Verster Prison, near Paarl, in December 1988. He was housed in the relative comfort of a warder's house with a personal cook, and he used the time to complete his LLB degree. While there, he was permitted many visitors and organised secret communications with exiled ANC leader Oliver Tambo. In 1989, Botha suffered a stroke; although he would retain the state presidency, he stepped down as leader of the National Party, to be replaced by F. W. de Klerk. In a surprise move, Botha invited Mandela to a meeting over tea in July 1989, an invitation Mandela considered genial. Botha was replaced as state president by de Klerk six weeks later; the new president believed that apartheid was unsustainable and released a number of ANC prisoners. Following the fall of the Berlin Wall in November 1989, de Klerk called his cabinet together to debate legalising the ANC and freeing Mandela. Although some were deeply opposed to his plans, de Klerk met with Mandela in December to discuss the situation, a meeting both men considered friendly, before legalising all formerly banned political parties in February 1990 and announcing Mandela's unconditional release. Shortly thereafter, for the first time in 20 years, photographs of Mandela were allowed to be published in South Africa. Leaving Victor Verster Prison on 11 February, Mandela held Winnie's hand in front of amassed crowds and the press; the event was broadcast live across the world. Driven to Cape Town's City Hall through crowds, he gave a speech declaring his commitment to peace and reconciliation with the white minority, but he made it clear that the ANC's armed struggle was not over and would continue as "a purely defensive action against the violence of apartheid". He expressed hope that the government would agree to negotiations, so that "there may no longer be the need for the armed struggle", and insisted that his main focus was to bring peace to the black majority and give them the right to vote in national and local elections. Staying at Tutu's home, in the following days Mandela met with friends, activists, and press, giving a speech to an estimated 100,000 people at Johannesburg's FNB Stadium. ### End of apartheid #### Early negotiations: 1990–91 Mandela proceeded on an African tour, meeting supporters and politicians in Zambia, Zimbabwe, Namibia, Libya and Algeria, and continuing to Sweden, where he was reunited with Tambo, and London, where he appeared at the Nelson Mandela: An International Tribute for a Free South Africa concert at Wembley Stadium. Encouraging foreign countries to support sanctions against the apartheid government, he met President François Mitterrand in France, Pope John Paul II in the Vatican, and Thatcher in the United Kingdom. In the United States, he met President George H. W. Bush, addressed both Houses of Congress and visited eight cities, being particularly popular among the African-American community. In Cuba, he became friends with President Castro, whom he had long admired. He met President R. Venkataraman in India, President Suharto in Indonesia, Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad in Malaysia, and Prime Minister Bob Hawke in Australia. He visited Japan, but not the Soviet Union, a longtime ANC supporter. In May 1990, Mandela led a multiracial ANC delegation into preliminary negotiations with a government delegation of 11 Afrikaner men. Mandela impressed them with his discussions of Afrikaner history, and the negotiations led to the Groot Schuur Minute, in which the government lifted the state of emergency. In August, Mandela—recognising the ANC's severe military disadvantage—offered a ceasefire, the Pretoria Minute, for which he was widely criticised by MK activists. He spent much time trying to unify and build the ANC, appearing at a Johannesburg conference in December attended by 1,600 delegates, many of whom found him more moderate than expected. At the ANC's July 1991 national conference in Durban, Mandela admitted that the party had faults and announced his aim to build a "strong and well-oiled task force" for securing majority rule. At the conference, he was elected ANC President, replacing the ailing Tambo, and a 50-strong multiracial, mixed gendered national executive was elected. Mandela was given an office in the newly purchased ANC headquarters at Shell House, Johannesburg, and moved into Winnie's large Soweto home. Their marriage was increasingly strained as he learned of her affair with Dali Mpofu, but he supported her during her trial for kidnapping and assault. He gained funding for her defence from the International Defence and Aid Fund for Southern Africa and from Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi, but, in June 1991, she was found guilty and sentenced to six years in prison, reduced to two on appeal. On 13 April 1992, Mandela publicly announced his separation from Winnie. The ANC forced her to step down from the national executive for misappropriating ANC funds; Mandela moved into the mostly white Johannesburg suburb of Houghton. Mandela's prospects for a peaceful transition were further damaged by an increase in "black-on-black" violence, particularly between ANC and Inkatha supporters in KwaZulu-Natal, which resulted in thousands of deaths. Mandela met with Inkatha leader Buthelezi, but the ANC prevented further negotiations on the issue. Mandela argued that there was a "third force" within the state intelligence services fuelling the "slaughter of the people" and openly blamed de Klerk—whom he increasingly distrusted—for the Sebokeng massacre. In September 1991, a national peace conference was held in Johannesburg at which Mandela, Buthelezi and de Klerk signed a peace accord, though the violence continued. #### CODESA talks: 1991–92 The Convention for a Democratic South Africa (CODESA) began in December 1991 at the Johannesburg World Trade Centre, attended by 228 delegates from 19 political parties. Although Cyril Ramaphosa led the ANC's delegation, Mandela remained a key figure. After de Klerk used the closing speech to condemn the ANC's violence, Mandela took to the stage to denounce de Klerk as the "head of an illegitimate, discredited minority regime". Dominated by the National Party and ANC, little negotiation was achieved. CODESA 2 was held in May 1992, at which de Klerk insisted that post-apartheid South Africa must use a federal system with a rotating presidency to ensure the protection of ethnic minorities; Mandela opposed this, demanding a unitary system governed by majority rule. Following the Boipatong massacre of ANC activists by government-aided Inkatha militants, Mandela called off the negotiations, before attending a meeting of the Organisation of African Unity in Senegal, at which he called for a special session of the UN Security Council and proposed that a UN peacekeeping force be stationed in South Africa to prevent "state terrorism". Calling for domestic mass action, in August the ANC organised the largest-ever strike in South African history, and supporters marched on Pretoria. Following the Bisho massacre, in which 28 ANC supporters and one soldier were shot dead by the Ciskei Defence Force during a protest march, Mandela realised that mass action was leading to further violence and resumed negotiations in September. He agreed to do so on the conditions that all political prisoners be released, that Zulu traditional weapons be banned, and that Zulu hostels would be fenced off, the latter two measures intended to prevent further Inkatha attacks; de Klerk reluctantly agreed. The negotiations agreed that a multiracial general election would be held, resulting in a five-year coalition government of national unity and a constitutional assembly that gave the National Party continuing influence. The ANC also conceded to safeguarding the jobs of white civil servants; such concessions brought fierce internal criticism. The duo agreed on an interim constitution based on a liberal democratic model, guaranteeing separation of powers, creating a constitutional court, and including a US-style bill of rights; it also divided the country into nine provinces, each with its own premier and civil service, a concession between de Klerk's desire for federalism and Mandela's for unitary government. The democratic process was threatened by the Concerned South Africans Group (COSAG), an alliance of black ethnic-secessionist groups like Inkatha and far-right Afrikaner parties; in June 1993, one of the latter—the Afrikaner Weerstandsbeweging (AWB)—attacked the Kempton Park World Trade Centre. Following the murder of ANC activist Chris Hani, Mandela made a publicised speech to calm rioting, soon after appearing at a mass funeral in Soweto for Tambo, who had died of a stroke. In July 1993, both Mandela and de Klerk visited the United States, independently meeting President Bill Clinton, and each receiving the Liberty Medal. Soon after, Mandela and de Klerk were jointly awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in Norway. Influenced by Thabo Mbeki, Mandela began meeting with big business figures, and he played down his support for nationalisation, fearing that he would scare away much-needed foreign investment. Although criticised by socialist ANC members, he had been encouraged to embrace private enterprise by members of the Chinese and Vietnamese Communist parties at the January 1992 World Economic Forum in Switzerland. #### General election: 1994 With the election set for 27 April 1994, the ANC began campaigning, opening 100 election offices and orchestrating People's Forums across the country at which Mandela could appear, as a popular figure with great status among black South Africans. The ANC campaigned on a Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP) to build a million houses in five years, introduce universal free education and extend access to water and electricity. The party's slogan was "a better life for all", although it was not explained how this development would be funded. With the exception of the Weekly Mail and the New Nation, South Africa's press opposed Mandela's election, fearing continued ethnic strife, instead supporting the National or Democratic Party. Mandela devoted much time to fundraising for the ANC, touring North America, Europe and Asia to meet wealthy donors, including former supporters of the apartheid regime. He also urged a reduction in the voting age from 18 to 14; rejected by the ANC, this policy became the subject of ridicule. Concerned that COSAG would undermine the election, particularly in the wake of the conflict in Bophuthatswana and the Shell House massacre—incidents of violence involving the AWB and Inkatha, respectively—Mandela met with Afrikaner politicians and generals, including P. W. Botha, Pik Botha and Constand Viljoen, persuading many to work within the democratic system. With de Klerk, he also convinced Inkatha's Buthelezi to enter the elections rather than launch a war of secession. As leaders of the two major parties, de Klerk and Mandela appeared on a televised debate; although de Klerk was widely considered the better speaker at the event, Mandela's offer to shake his hand surprised him, leading some commentators to deem it a victory for Mandela. The election went ahead with little violence, although an AWB cell killed 20 with car bombs. As widely expected, the ANC won a sweeping victory, taking 63% of the vote, just short of the two-thirds majority needed to unilaterally change the constitution. The ANC was also victorious in seven provinces, with Inkatha and the National Party each taking one. Mandela voted at the Ohlange High School in Durban, and though the ANC's victory assured his election as president, he publicly accepted that the election had been marred by instances of fraud and sabotage. ### Presidency of South Africa: 1994–1999 The newly elected National Assembly's first act was to formally elect Mandela as South Africa's first black chief executive. His inauguration took place in Pretoria on 10 May 1994, televised to a billion viewers globally. The event was attended by four thousand guests, including world leaders from a wide range of geographic and ideological backgrounds. Mandela headed a Government of National Unity dominated by the ANC—which had no experience of governing by itself—but containing representatives from the National Party and Inkatha. Under the Interim Constitution, Inkatha and the National Party were entitled to seats in the government by virtue of winning at least 20 seats. In keeping with earlier agreements, both de Klerk and Thabo Mbeki were given the position of Deputy President. Although Mbeki had not been his first choice for the job, Mandela grew to rely heavily on him throughout his presidency, allowing him to shape policy details. Moving into the presidential office at Tuynhuys in Cape Town, Mandela allowed de Klerk to retain the presidential residence in the Groote Schuur estate, instead settling into the nearby Westbrooke manor, which he renamed "Genadendal", meaning "Valley of Mercy" in Afrikaans. Retaining his Houghton home, he also had a house built in his home village of Qunu, which he visited regularly, walking around the area, meeting with locals, and judging tribal disputes. Aged 76, he faced various ailments, and although exhibiting continued energy, he felt isolated and lonely. He often entertained celebrities, such as Michael Jackson, Whoopi Goldberg and the Spice Girls, and befriended ultra-rich businessmen, like Harry Oppenheimer of Anglo American. He also met with Queen Elizabeth II on her March 1995 state visit to South Africa, which earned him strong criticism from ANC anti-capitalists. Despite his opulent surroundings, Mandela lived simply, donating a third of his R 552,000 annual income to the Nelson Mandela Children's Fund, which he had founded in 1995. Although dismantling press censorship, speaking out in favour of freedom of the press and befriending many journalists, Mandela was critical of much of the country's media, noting that it was overwhelmingly owned and run by middle-class whites and believing that it focused too heavily on scaremongering about crime. In December 1994, Mandela published Long Walk to Freedom, an autobiography based around a manuscript he had written in prison, augmented by interviews conducted with American journalist Richard Stengel. In late 1994, he attended the 49th conference of the ANC in Bloemfontein, at which a more militant national executive was elected, among them Winnie Mandela; although she expressed an interest in reconciling, Nelson initiated divorce proceedings in August 1995. By 1995, he had entered into a relationship with Graça Machel, a Mozambican political activist 27 years his junior who was the widow of former president Samora Machel. They had first met in July 1990 when she was still in mourning, but their friendship grew into a partnership, with Machel accompanying him on many of his foreign visits. She turned down Mandela's first marriage proposal, wanting to retain some independence and dividing her time between Mozambique and Johannesburg. #### National reconciliation Presiding over the transition from apartheid minority rule to a multicultural democracy, Mandela saw national reconciliation as the primary task of his presidency. Having seen other post-colonial African economies damaged by the departure of white elites, Mandela worked to reassure South Africa's white population that they were protected and represented in "the Rainbow Nation". Although his Government of National Unity would be dominated by the ANC, he attempted to create a broad coalition by appointing de Klerk as Deputy President and appointing other National Party officials as ministers for Agriculture, Environment, and Minerals and Energy, as well as naming Buthelezi as Minister for Home Affairs. The other cabinet positions were taken by ANC members, many of whom—like Joe Modise, Alfred Nzo, Joe Slovo, Mac Maharaj and Dullah Omar—had long been comrades of Mandela, although others, such as Tito Mboweni and Jeff Radebe, were far younger. Mandela's relationship with de Klerk was strained; Mandela thought that de Klerk was intentionally provocative, and de Klerk felt that he was being intentionally humiliated by the president. In January 1995, Mandela heavily chastised de Klerk for awarding amnesty to 3,500 police officers just before the election, and later criticised him for defending former Minister of Defence Magnus Malan when the latter was charged with murder. Mandela personally met with senior figures of the apartheid regime, including lawyer Percy Yutar and Hendrik Verwoerd's widow, Betsie Schoombie, also laying a wreath by the statue of Afrikaner hero Daniel Theron. Emphasising personal forgiveness and reconciliation, he announced that "courageous people do not fear forgiving, for the sake of peace." He encouraged black South Africans to get behind the previously hated national rugby team, the Springboks, as South Africa hosted the 1995 Rugby World Cup. Mandela wore a Springbok shirt at the final against New Zealand, and after the Springboks won the match, Mandela presented the trophy to captain Francois Pienaar, an Afrikaner. This was widely seen as a major step in the reconciliation of white and black South Africans; as de Klerk later put it, "Mandela won the hearts of millions of white rugby fans." Mandela's efforts at reconciliation assuaged the fears of white people, but also drew criticism from more militant black people. Among the latter was his estranged wife, Winnie, who accused the ANC of being more interested in appeasing the white community than in helping the black majority. Mandela oversaw the formation of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission to investigate crimes committed under apartheid by both the government and the ANC, appointing Tutu as its chair. To prevent the creation of martyrs, the commission granted individual amnesties in exchange for testimony of crimes committed during the apartheid era. Dedicated in February 1996, it held two years of hearings detailing rapes, torture, bombings and assassinations before issuing its final report in October 1998. Both de Klerk and Mbeki appealed to have parts of the report suppressed, though only de Klerk's appeal was successful. Mandela praised the commission's work, stating that it "had helped us move away from the past to concentrate on the present and the future". #### Domestic programmes Mandela's administration inherited a country with a huge disparity in wealth and services between white and black communities. Of a population of 40 million, around 23 million lacked electricity or adequate sanitation, and 12 million lacked clean water supplies, with 2 million children not in school and a third of the population illiterate. There was 33% unemployment, and just under half of the population lived below the poverty line. Government financial reserves were nearly depleted, with a fifth of the national budget being spent on debt repayment, meaning that the extent of the promised Reconstruction and Development Programme (RDP) was scaled back, with none of the proposed nationalisation or job creation. In 1996, the RDP was replaced with a new policy, Growth, Employment and Redistribution (GEAR), which maintained South Africa's mixed economy but placed an emphasis on economic growth through a framework of market economics and the encouragement of foreign investment; many in the ANC derided it as a neo-liberal policy that did not address social inequality, no matter how Mandela defended it. In adopting this approach, Mandela's government adhered to the "Washington consensus" advocated by the World Bank and International Monetary Fund. Under Mandela's presidency, welfare spending increased by 13% in 1996/97, 13% in 1997/98, and 7% in 1998/99. The government introduced parity in grants for communities, including disability grants, child maintenance grants and old-age pensions, which had previously been set at different levels for South Africa's different racial groups. In 1994, free healthcare was introduced for children under six and pregnant women, a provision extended to all those using primary level public sector health care services in 1996. By the 1999 election, the ANC could boast that due to their policies, 3 million people were connected to telephone lines, 1.5 million children were brought into the education system, 500 clinics were upgraded or constructed, 2 million people were connected to the electricity grid, water access was extended to 3 million people, and 750,000 houses were constructed, housing nearly 3 million people. The Land Reform Act 3 of 1996 safeguarded the rights of labour tenants living on farms where they grew crops or grazed livestock. This legislation ensured that such tenants could not be evicted without a court order or if they were over the age of 65. Recognising that arms manufacturing was a key industry for the South African economy, Mandela endorsed the trade in weapons but brought in tighter regulations surrounding Armscor to ensure that South African weaponry was not sold to authoritarian regimes. Under Mandela's administration, tourism was increasingly promoted, becoming a major sector of the South African economy. Critics like Edwin Cameron accused Mandela's government of doing little to stem the HIV/AIDS pandemic in the country; by 1999, 10% of South Africa's population were HIV positive. Mandela later admitted that he had personally neglected the issue, in part due to public reticence in discussing issues surrounding sex in South Africa, and that he had instead left the issue for Mbeki to deal with. Mandela also received criticism for failing to sufficiently combat crime; South Africa had one of the world's highest crime rates, and the activities of international crime syndicates in the country grew significantly throughout the decade. Mandela's administration was also perceived as having failed to deal with the problem of corruption. Further problems were caused by the exodus of thousands of skilled white South Africans from the country, who were escaping the increasing crime rates, higher taxes and the impact of positive discrimination toward black people in employment. This exodus resulted in a brain drain, and Mandela criticised those who left. At the same time, South Africa experienced an influx of millions of illegal migrants from poorer parts of Africa; although public opinion toward these illegal immigrants was generally unfavourable, characterising them as disease-spreading criminals who were a drain on resources, Mandela called on South Africans to embrace them as "brothers and sisters". #### Foreign affairs Mandela expressed the view that "South Africa's future foreign relations [should] be based on our belief that human rights should be the core of international relations". Following the South African example, Mandela encouraged other nations to resolve conflicts through diplomacy and reconciliation. In September 1998, Mandela was appointed secretary-general of the Non-Aligned Movement, who held their annual conference in Durban. He used the event to criticise the "narrow, chauvinistic interests" of the Israeli government in stalling negotiations to end the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and urged India and Pakistan to negotiate to end the Kashmir conflict, for which he was criticised by both Israel and India. Inspired by the region's economic boom, Mandela sought greater economic relations with East Asia, in particular with Malaysia, although this was prevented by the 1997 Asian financial crisis. He extended diplomatic recognition to the People's Republic of China (PRC), who were growing as an economic force, and initially also to Taiwan, who were already longstanding investors in the South African economy. However, under pressure from the PRC, he cut recognition of Taiwan in November 1996, and he paid an official visit to Beijing in May 1999. Mandela attracted controversy for his close relationship with Indonesian president Suharto, whose regime was responsible for mass human rights abuses, although on a July 1997 visit to Indonesia he privately urged Suharto to withdraw from the occupation of East Timor. He also faced similar criticism from the West for his government's trade links to Syria, Cuba and Libya and for his personal friendships with Castro and Gaddafi. Castro visited South Africa in 1998 to widespread popular acclaim, and Mandela met Gaddafi in Libya to award him the Order of Good Hope. When Western governments and media criticised these visits, Mandela lambasted such criticism as having racist undertones, and stated that "the enemies of countries in the West are not our enemies." Mandela hoped to resolve the long-running dispute between Libya and the United States and Britain over bringing to trial the two Libyans, Abdelbaset al-Megrahi and Lamin Khalifah Fhimah, who were indicted in November 1991 and accused of sabotaging Pan Am Flight 103. Mandela proposed that they be tried in a third country, which was agreed to by all parties; governed by Scots law, the trial was held at Camp Zeist in the Netherlands in April 1999, and found one of the two men guilty. Mandela echoed Mbeki's calls for an "African Renaissance", and he was greatly concerned with issues on the continent. He took a soft diplomatic approach to removing Sani Abacha's military junta in Nigeria but later became a leading figure in calling for sanctions when Abacha's regime increased human rights violations. In 1996, he was appointed chairman of the Southern African Development Community (SADC) and initiated unsuccessful negotiations to end the First Congo War in Zaire. He also played a key role as a mediator in the ethnic conflict between Tutsi and Hutu political groups in the Burundian Civil War, helping to initiate a settlement which brought increased stability to the country but did not end the ethnic violence. In South Africa's first post-apartheid military operation, troops were ordered into Lesotho in September 1998 to protect the government of Prime Minister Pakalitha Mosisili after a disputed election had prompted opposition uprisings. The action was not authorised by Mandela himself, who was out of the country at the time, but by Buthelezi, who was serving as acting president during Mandela's absence, with the approval of Mandela and Mbeki. #### Withdrawing from politics The new Constitution of South Africa was agreed upon by parliament in May 1996, enshrining a series of institutions to place checks on political and administrative authority within a constitutional democracy. De Klerk opposed the implementation of this constitution, and that month he and the National Party withdrew from the coalition government in protest, claiming that the ANC were not treating them as equals. The ANC took over the cabinet positions formerly held by the Nationals, with Mbeki becoming sole Deputy President. Inkatha remained part of the coalition, and when both Mandela and Mbeki were out of the country in September 1998, Buthelezi was appointed "Acting President", marking an improvement in his relationship with Mandela. Although Mandela had often governed decisively in his first two years as president, he had subsequently increasingly delegated duties to Mbeki, retaining only a close personal supervision of intelligence and security measures. During a 1997 visit to London, he said that "the ruler of South Africa, the de facto ruler, is Thabo Mbeki" and that he was "shifting everything to him". Mandela stepped down as ANC President at the party's December 1997 conference. He hoped that Ramaphosa would succeed him, believing Mbeki to be too inflexible and intolerant of criticism, but the ANC elected Mbeki regardless. Mandela and the Executive supported Jacob Zuma, a Zulu who had been imprisoned on Robben Island, as Mbeki's replacement for Deputy President. Zuma's candidacy was challenged by Winnie, whose populist rhetoric had gained her a strong following within the party, although Zuma defeated her in a landslide victory vote at the election. Mandela's relationship with Machel had intensified; in February 1998, he publicly stated that he was "in love with a remarkable lady", and under pressure from Tutu, who urged him to set an example for young people, he organised a wedding for his 80th birthday, in July that year. The following day, he held a grand party with many foreign dignitaries. Although the 1996 constitution allowed the president to serve two consecutive five-year terms, Mandela had never planned to stand for a second term in office. He gave his farewell speech to Parliament on 29 March 1999 when it adjourned prior to the 1999 general elections, after which he retired. Although opinion polls in South Africa showed wavering support for both the ANC and the government, Mandela himself remained highly popular, with 80% of South Africans polled in 1999 expressing satisfaction with his performance as president. ### Retirement #### Continued activism and philanthropy: 1999–2004 Retiring in June 1999, Mandela aimed to lead a quiet family life, divided between Johannesburg and Qunu. Although he set about authoring a sequel to his first autobiography, to be titled The Presidential Years, it remained unfinished and was only published posthumously in 2017. Mandela found such seclusion difficult and reverted to a busy public life involving a daily programme of tasks, meetings with world leaders and celebrities, and—when in Johannesburg—working with the Nelson Mandela Foundation, founded in 1999 to focus on rural development, school construction, and combating HIV/AIDS. Although he had been heavily criticised for failing to do enough to fight the HIV/AIDS pandemic during his presidency, he devoted much of his time to the issue following his retirement, describing it as "a war" that had killed more than "all previous wars"; affiliating himself with the Treatment Action Campaign, he urged Mbeki's government to ensure that HIV-positive South Africans had access to anti-retrovirals. Meanwhile, Mandela was successfully treated for prostate cancer in July 2001. In 2002, Mandela inaugurated the Nelson Mandela Annual Lecture, and in 2003 the Mandela Rhodes Foundation was created at Rhodes House, University of Oxford, to provide postgraduate scholarships to African students. These projects were followed by the Nelson Mandela Centre of Memory and the 46664 campaign against HIV/AIDS. He gave the closing address at the XIII International AIDS Conference in Durban in 2000, and in 2004, spoke at the XV International AIDS Conference in Bangkok, Thailand, calling for greater measures to tackle tuberculosis as well as HIV/AIDS. Mandela publicised AIDS as the cause of his son Makgatho's death in January 2005, to defy the stigma about discussing the disease. Publicly, Mandela became more vocal in criticising Western powers. He strongly opposed the 1999 NATO intervention in Kosovo and called it an attempt by the world's powerful nations to police the entire world. In 2003, he spoke out against the plans for the United States to launch a war in Iraq, describing it as "a tragedy" and lambasting US president George W. Bush and British prime minister Tony Blair (whom he referred to as an "American foreign minister") for undermining the UN, saying, "All that (Mr. Bush) wants is Iraqi oil". He attacked the United States more generally, asserting that "If there is a country that has committed unspeakable atrocities in the world, it is the United States of America", citing the atomic bombing of Japan; this attracted international controversy, although he later improved his relationship with Bush. Retaining an interest in the Lockerbie suspect, he visited Megrahi in Barlinnie prison and spoke out against the conditions of his treatment, referring to them as "psychological persecution". #### "Retiring from retirement": 2004–2013 In June 2004, aged 85 and amid failing health, Mandela announced that he was "retiring from retirement" and retreating from public life, remarking, "Don't call me, I will call you." Although continuing to meet with close friends and family, the foundation discouraged invitations for him to appear at public events and denied most interview requests. He retained some involvement in international affairs. In 2005, he founded the Nelson Mandela Legacy Trust, travelling to the United States to speak before the Brookings Institution and the NAACP on the need for economic assistance to Africa. He spoke with US senator Hillary Clinton and President George W. Bush and first met the then-senator Barack Obama. Mandela also encouraged Zimbabwean president Robert Mugabe to resign over growing human rights abuses in the country. When this proved ineffective, he spoke out publicly against Mugabe in 2007, asking him to step down "with residual respect and a modicum of dignity." That year, Mandela, Machel and Desmond Tutu convened a group of world leaders in Johannesburg to contribute their wisdom and independent leadership to some of the world's toughest problems. Mandela announced the formation of this new group, The Elders, in a speech delivered on his 89th birthday. Mandela's 90th birthday was marked across the country on 18 July 2008, with the main celebrations held at Qunu, and a concert in his honour in Hyde Park, London. In a speech marking the event, Mandela called for the rich to help the poor across the world. Throughout Mbeki's presidency, Mandela continued to support the ANC, usually overshadowing Mbeki at any public events that the two attended. Mandela was more at ease with Mbeki's successor, Zuma, although the Nelson Mandela Foundation was upset when his grandson, Mandla Mandela, flew him out to the Eastern Cape to attend a pro-Zuma rally in the midst of a storm in 2009. In 2004, Mandela successfully campaigned for South Africa to host the 2010 FIFA World Cup, declaring that there would be "few better gifts for us" in the year marking a decade since the fall of apartheid. Despite maintaining a low profile during the event due to ill health, Mandela made his final public appearance during the World Cup closing ceremony, where he received much applause. Between 2005 and 2013, Mandela, and later his family, were embroiled in a series of legal disputes regarding money held in family trusts for the benefit of his descendants. In mid-2013, as Mandela was hospitalised for a lung infection in Pretoria, his descendants were involved in an intra-family legal dispute relating to the burial place of Mandela's children, and ultimately Mandela himself. #### Illness and death: 2011–2013 In February 2011, Mandela was briefly hospitalised with a respiratory infection, attracting international attention, before being re-admitted for a lung infection and gallstone removal in December 2012. After a successful medical procedure in early March 2013, his lung infection recurred and he was briefly hospitalised in Pretoria. In June 2013, his lung infection worsened and he was readmitted to a Pretoria hospital in serious condition. The Archbishop of Cape Town Thabo Makgoba visited Mandela at the hospital and prayed with Machel, while Zuma cancelled a trip to Mozambique to visit him the following day. In September 2013, Mandela was discharged from hospital, although his condition remained unstable. After suffering from a prolonged respiratory infection, Mandela died on 5 December 2013 at the age of 95, at around 20:50 local time at his home in Houghton, surrounded by his family. Zuma publicly announced his death on television, proclaiming ten days of national mourning, a memorial service held at Johannesburg's FNB Stadium on 10 December 2013, and 8 December as a national day of prayer and reflection. Mandela's body lay in state from 11 to 13 December at the Union Buildings in Pretoria and a state funeral was held on 15 December in Qunu. Approximately 90 representatives of foreign states travelled to South Africa to attend memorial events. It was later revealed that 300 million rand (about 20 million dollars) originally earmarked for humanitarian development projects had been redirected to finance the funeral. The media was awash with tributes and reminiscences, while images of tributes to Mandela proliferated across social media. His US\$4.1 million estate was left to his widow, other family members, staff, and educational institutions. ## Political ideology Mandela identified as both an African nationalist, an ideological position he held since joining the ANC, and as a socialist. He was a practical politician, rather than an intellectual scholar or political theorist. According to biographer Tom Lodge, "for Mandela, politics has always been primarily about enacting stories, about making narratives, primarily about morally exemplary conduct, and only secondarily about ideological vision, more about means rather than ends." The historian Sabelo J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni described Mandela as a "liberal African nationalist–decolonial humanist", while political analyst Raymond Suttner cautioned against labelling Mandela a liberal and stated that Mandela displayed a "hybrid socio-political make-up". Mandela adopted some of his political ideas from other thinkers—among them Indian independence leaders like Gandhi and Nehru, African-American civil rights activists, and African nationalists like Nkrumah—and applied them to the South African situation. At the same time he rejected other aspects of their thought, such as the anti-white sentiment of many African nationalists. In doing so he synthesised both counter-cultural and hegemonic views, for instance by drawing upon ideas from the then-dominant Afrikaner nationalism in promoting his anti-apartheid vision. His political development was strongly influenced by his legal training and practice, in particular his hope to achieve change not through violence but through "legal revolution". Over the course of his life, he began by advocating a path of non-violence, later embracing violence, and then adopting a non-violent approach to negotiation and reconciliation. When endorsing violence, he did so because he saw no alternative, and was always pragmatic about it, perceiving it as a means to get his opponent to the negotiating table. He sought to target symbols of white supremacy and racist oppression rather than white people as individuals, and was anxious not to inaugurate a race war in South Africa. This willingness to use violence distinguishes Mandela from the ideology of Gandhism, with which some commentators have sought to associate him. ### Democracy Although he presented himself in an autocratic manner in several speeches, Mandela was a devout believer in democracy and abided by majority decisions even when deeply disagreeing with them. He had exhibited a commitment to the values of democracy and human rights since at least the 1960s. He held a conviction that "inclusivity, accountability and freedom of speech" were the fundamentals of democracy, and was driven by a belief in natural and human rights. Suttner argued that there were "two modes of leadership" that Mandela adopted. On one side he adhered to ideas about collective leadership, although on the other believed that there were scenarios in which a leader had to be decisive and act without consultation to achieve a particular objective. According to Lodge, Mandela's political thought reflected tensions between his support for liberal democracy and pre-colonial African forms of consensus decision making. He was an admirer of British-style parliamentary democracy, stating that "I regard the British Parliament as the most democratic institution in the world, and the independence and impartiality of its judiciary never fail to arouse my admiration." In this he has been described as being committed to "the Euro-North American modernist project of emancipation", something which distinguishes him from other African nationalist and socialist leaders like Nyerere who were concerned about embracing styles of democratic governance that were Western, rather than African, in origin. Mandela nevertheless also expressed admiration for what he deemed to be indigenous forms of democracy, describing Xhosa traditional society's mode of governance as "democracy in its purest form". He also spoke of an influential African ethical tenet, Ubuntu, which is a Ngnuni term meaning "A person is a person through other persons" or "I am because we are." ### Socialism and Marxism Mandela advocated the ultimate establishment of a classless society, with Sampson describing him as being "openly opposed to capitalism, private land-ownership and the power of big money". Mandela was influenced by Marxism, and during the revolution he advocated scientific socialism. He said that "I should tie myself to no particular system of society other than of socialism". He denied being a communist at the Treason Trial, and maintained this stance both when later talking to journalists, and in his autobiography, where he outlined that the cooperation with the SACP was pragmatic, asking rhetorically, "who is to say that we were not using them?" According to the sociologist Craig Soudien, "sympathetic as Mandela was to socialism, a communist he was not." Conversely, the biographer David Jones Smith stated that Mandela "embraced communism and communists" in the late 1950s and early 1960s, while the historian Stephen Ellis commented that Mandela had assimilated much of the Marxist–Leninist ideology by 1960. Mandela recalls in his autobiography 'Long Walk to Freedom' that "I subscribed to Marx's basic dictum, which has the simplicity and generosity of the Golden Rule: "From each according to his ability to each according to his need". He further says that he was "stimulated" by The Communist Manifesto and attracted to dialectical materialism. Ellis also found evidence that Mandela had been an active member of the South African Communist Party (SACP) during the late 1950s and early 1960s, something that was confirmed after his death by both the ANC and the SACP, the latter of which claimed that he was not only a member of the party, but also served on its Central Committee. His membership had been hidden by the ANC, aware that knowledge of Mandela's former SACP involvement might have been detrimental to his attempts to attract support from Western countries. Photo documentation exists of Nelson Mandela openly attending a SACP rally in 1990, on stage alongside his partner Winnie Madikizela-Mandela and SACP leader Joe Slovo. Mandela's view of these Western governments differed from those of Marxist–Leninists, for he did not believe that they were anti-democratic or reactionary and remained committed to democratic systems of governance. The 1955 Freedom Charter, which Mandela had helped create, called for the nationalisation of banks, gold mines and land, to ensure equal distribution of wealth. Despite these beliefs, Mandela initiated a programme of privatisation during his presidency in line with trends in other countries of the time. It has been repeatedly suggested that Mandela would have preferred to develop a social democratic economy in South Africa but that this was not feasible as a result of the international political and economic situation during the early 1990s. This decision was in part influenced by the fall of the socialist states in the Soviet Union and Eastern Bloc during the early 1990s. ## Personality and personal life Mandela was widely considered a charismatic leader, described by biographer Mary Benson as "a born mass leader who could not help magnetizing people". He was highly image conscious and throughout his life always sought out fine quality clothes, with many commentators believing that he carried himself in a regal manner. His aristocratic heritage was repeatedly emphasised by supporters, thus contributing to his "charismatic power". While living in Johannesburg in the 1950s, he cultivated the image of the "African gentleman", having "the pressed clothes, correct manners, and modulated public speech" associated with such a position. In doing so, Lodge argued that Mandela became "one of the first media politicians ... embodying a glamour and a style that projected visually a brave new African world of modernity and freedom". Mandela was known to change his clothes several times a day, and he became so associated with highly coloured Batik shirts after assuming the presidency that they came to be known as "Madiba shirts". For political scientists Betty Glad and Robert Blanton, Mandela was an "exceptionally intelligent, shrewd, and loyal leader". His official biographer, Anthony Sampson, commented that he was a "master of imagery and performance", excelling at presenting himself well in press photographs and producing sound bites. His public speeches were presented in a formal, stiff manner, and often consisted of clichéd set phrases. He typically spoke slowly, and carefully chose his words. Although he was not considered a great orator, his speeches conveyed "his personal commitment, charm and humour". Mandela was a private person who often concealed his emotions and confided in very few people. Privately, he lived an austere life, refusing to drink alcohol or smoke, and even as president made his own bed. Renowned for his mischievous sense of humour, he was known for being both stubborn and loyal, and at times exhibited a quick temper. He was typically friendly and welcoming, and appeared relaxed in conversation with everyone, including his opponents. A self-described Anglophile, he claimed to have lived by the "trappings of British style and manners". Constantly polite and courteous, he was attentive to all, irrespective of their age or status, and often talked to children or servants. He was known for his ability to find common ground with very different communities. In later life, he always looked for the best in people, even defending political opponents to his allies, who sometimes thought him too trusting of others. He was fond of Indian cuisine, and had a lifelong interest in archaeology and boxing. He was raised in the Methodist denomination of Christianity; the Methodist Church of Southern Africa claimed that he retained his allegiance to them throughout his life. On analysing Mandela's writings, the theologian Dion Forster described him as a Christian humanist, although added that his thought relied to a greater extent on the Southern African concept of Ubuntu than on Christian theology. According to Sampson, Mandela never had "a strong religious faith" however, while Elleke Boehmer stated that Mandela's religious belief was "never robust". Mandela was very self-conscious about being a man and regularly made references to manhood. He was heterosexual, and biographer Fatima Meer said that he was "easily tempted" by women. Another biographer, Martin Meredith, characterised him as being "by nature a romantic", highlighting that he had relationships with various women. Mandela was married three times, fathered six children, and had seventeen grandchildren and at least seventeen great-grandchildren. He could be stern and demanding of his children, although he was more affectionate with his grandchildren. His first marriage was to Evelyn Ntoko Mase in October 1944; they divorced in March 1958 under the multiple strains of his adultery and constant absences, devotion to revolutionary agitation, and the fact that she was a Jehovah's Witness, a religion requiring political neutrality. Mandela's second wife was the social worker Winnie Madikizela-Mandela, whom he married in June 1958. They divorced in March 1996. Mandela married his third wife, Graça Machel, on his 80th birthday in July 1998. ## Reception and legacy By the time of his death, within South Africa Mandela was widely considered both "the father of the nation" and "the founding father of democracy". Outside of South Africa, he was a "global icon", with the scholar of South African studies Rita Barnard describing him as "one of the most revered figures of our time". One biographer considered him "a modern democratic hero". Some have portrayed Mandela in messianic terms, in contrast to his own statement that "I was not a messiah, but an ordinary man who had become a leader because of extraordinary circumstances." He is often cited alongside Mahatma Gandhi and Martin Luther King Jr. as one of the 20th century's exemplary anti-racist and anti-colonial leaders. Boehmer described him as "a totem of the totemic values of our age: toleration and liberal democracy" and "a universal symbol of social justice". Mandela's international fame emerged during his incarceration in the 1980s, when he became the world's most famous political prisoner, a symbol of the anti-apartheid cause, and an icon for millions who embraced the ideal of human equality. In 1986, Mandela's biographer characterised him as "the embodiment of the struggle for liberation" in South Africa. Meredith stated that in becoming "a potent symbol of resistance" to apartheid during the 1980s, he had gained "mythical status" internationally. Sampson commented that even during his life, this myth had become "so powerful that it blurs the realities", converting Mandela into "a secular saint". Within a decade of the end of his presidency, Mandela's era was widely thought of as "a golden age of hope and harmony", with much nostalgia being expressed for it. His name was often invoked by those criticising his successors like Mbeki and Zuma. Across the world, Mandela earned international acclaim for his activism in overcoming apartheid and fostering racial reconciliation, coming to be viewed as "a moral authority" with a great "concern for truth". Mandela's iconic status has been blamed for concealing the complexities of his life. Mandela generated controversy throughout his career as an activist and politician, having detractors on both the right and the radical left. During the 1980s, Mandela was widely labelled a terrorist by prominent political figures in the Western world for his embrace of political violence. According to Thatcher, for instance, the ANC was "a typical terrorist organisation". The US government's State and Defense departments officially designated the ANC as a terrorist organisation, resulting in Mandela remaining on their terrorism watch-list until 2008. On the left, some voices in the ANC—among them Frank B. Wilderson III—accused him of selling out for agreeing to enter negotiations with the apartheid government and for not implementing the reforms of the Freedom Charter during his presidency. According to Barnard, "there is also a sense in which his chiefly bearing and mode of conduct, the very respect and authority he accrued in representing his nation in his own person, went against the spirit of democracy", and concerns were similarly expressed that he placed his own status and celebrity above the transformation of his country. His government would be criticised for its failure to deal with both the HIV/AIDS pandemic and the high levels of poverty in South Africa. Mandela was also criticised for his friendship with political leaders such as Fidel Castro and Muammar Gaddafi, who had supported the struggle against apartheid but were deemed dictators by critics. ### Orders, decorations, monuments, and honours Over the course of his life, Mandela was given over 250 awards, accolades, prizes, honorary degrees and citizenships in recognition of his political achievements. Among his awards were the Nobel Peace Prize, the US Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Soviet Union's Lenin Peace Prize, and the Libyan Al-Gaddafi International Prize for Human Rights. In 1990, India awarded him the Bharat Ratna, and in 1992 Pakistan gave him their Nishan-e-Pakistan. The same year, he was awarded the Atatürk Peace Award by Turkey; he at first refused the award, citing human rights violations committed by Turkey at the time, but later accepted the award in 1999. He was given the Fulbright Prize for International Understanding by the Fulbright Association in 1993. He was appointed to the Order of Isabella the Catholic and the Order of Canada, and was the first living person to be made an honorary Canadian citizen. Queen Elizabeth II appointed him as a Bailiff Grand Cross of the Order of St. John and granted him membership in the Order of Merit. In 2004, Johannesburg granted Mandela the Freedom of the City, and in 2008 a Mandela statue was unveiled at the spot where Mandela was released from prison. On the Day of Reconciliation 2013, a bronze statue of Mandela was unveiled at Pretoria's Union Buildings. In November 2009, the United Nations General Assembly proclaimed Mandela's birthday, 18 July, as "Mandela Day", marking his contribution to the anti-apartheid struggle. It called on individuals to donate 67 minutes to doing something for others, commemorating the 67 years that Mandela had been a part of the movement. In 2015 the UN General Assembly named the amended Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners as "the Mandela Rules" to honour his legacy. Subsequently, the years 2019 to 2028 were also designated the United Nations Nelson Mandela Decade of Peace. ### Biographies and popular media The first biography of Mandela was authored by Mary Benson, based on brief interviews with him that she had conducted in the 1960s. Two authorised biographies were later produced by friends of Mandela. The first was Fatima Meer's Higher Than Hope, which was heavily influenced by Winnie and thus placed great emphasis on Mandela's family. The second was Anthony Sampson's Mandela, published in 1999. Other biographies included Martin Meredith's Mandela, first published in 1997, and Tom Lodge's Mandela, brought out in 2006. Since the late 1980s, Mandela's image began to appear on a proliferation of items, among them "photographs, paintings, drawings, statues, public murals, buttons, t-shirts, refrigerator magnets, and more", items that have been characterised as "Mandela kitsch". In the 1980s he was the subject of several songs, such as The Specials' "Free Nelson Mandela", Hugh Masekela's "Bring Him Back Home (Nelson Mandela)", and Johnny Clegg's "Asimbonanga (Mandela)", which helped to bring awareness of his imprisonment to an international audience. Mandela has also been depicted in films on multiple occasions. Some of these, such as the 2013 feature film Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom, the 2017 miniseries Madiba and the 1996 documentary Mandela, have focused on covering his adult life in entirety or until his inaugural as president. Others, such as the 2009 feature film Invictus and the 2010 documentary The 16th Man, have focused on specific events in his life. Lukhele has argued that in Invictus and other films, "the America film industry" has played a significant part in "the crafting of Mandela's global image". ## See also - List of peace activists - Mandela effect

Siege of Constantinople (674–678)

Major conflict of the Arab–Byzantine Wars

The first Arab siege of Constantinople in 674–678 was a major conflict of the Arab–Byzantine wars, and the first culmination of the Umayyad Caliphate's expansionist strategy towards the Byzantine Empire, led by Caliph Mu'awiya I. Mu'awiya, who had emerged in 661 as the ruler of the Muslim Arab empire following a civil war, renewed aggressive warfare against Byzantium after a lapse of some years and hoped to deliver a lethal blow by capturing the Byzantine capital, Constantinople. As reported by the Byzantine chronicler Theophanes the Confessor, the Arab attack was methodical: in 672–673 Arab fleets secured bases along the coasts of Asia Minor, and then proceeded to install a loose blockade around Constantinople. They used the peninsula of Cyzicus near the city as a base to spend the winter, and returned every spring to launch attacks against the city's fortifications. Finally, the Byzantines, under Emperor Constantine IV, managed to destroy the Arab navy using a new invention, the liquid incendiary substance known as Greek fire. The Byzantines also defeated the Arab land army in Asia Minor, forcing them to lift the siege. The Byzantine victory was of major importance for the survival of the Byzantine state, as the Arab threat receded for a time. A peace treaty was signed soon after, and following the outbreak of another Muslim civil war, the Byzantines even experienced a period of ascendancy over the Caliphate. The siege left several traces in the legends of the nascent Muslim world, although it is conflated with accounts of another expedition against the city in 669, led by Mu'awiya's son and future caliph, Yazid. As a result, the veracity of Theophanes's account was questioned in 2010 by Oxford scholar James Howard-Johnston, and more recently by Marek Jankowiak. Their analyses have placed more emphasis on the Arabic and Syriac sources, but have drawn different conclusions about the dating and existence of the siege. On the other hand, echoes of a large-scale siege of Constantinople and a subsequent peace treaty reached China, where they were recorded in later histories of the Tang dynasty. ## Background Following the disastrous Battle of the Yarmuk in 636, the Byzantine Empire withdrew the bulk of its remaining forces from the Levant into Asia Minor, which was shielded from the Muslim expansion by the Taurus Mountains. This left the field open for the warriors of the nascent Rashidun Caliphate to complete their conquest of Syria, with Egypt too falling shortly after. Muslim raids against the Cilician frontier zone and deep into Asia Minor began as early as 640, and continued under Mu'awiya, then governor of the Levant. Mu'awiya also spearheaded the development of a Muslim navy, which within a few years grew sufficiently strong to occupy Cyprus and raid as far as Kos, Rhodes and Crete in the Aegean Sea. Finally, the young Muslim navy scored a crushing victory over its Byzantine counterpart in the Battle of Phoenix in 655. Following the murder of Caliph Uthman and the outbreak of the First Muslim Civil War, Arab attacks against Byzantium stopped. In 659, Mu'awiya even concluded a truce with Byzantium, including payment of tribute to the Empire. The peace lasted until the end of the Muslim civil war in 661, from which Mu'awiya and his clan emerged victorious, establishing the Umayyad Caliphate. From the next year, Muslim attacks recommenced, with pressure mounting as Muslim armies began wintering on Byzantine soil west of the Taurus range, maximizing the disruption caused to the Byzantine economy. These land expeditions were sometimes coupled with naval raids against the coasts of southern Asia Minor. In 668, the Arabs sent aid to Saborios, strategos of the Armeniac Theme, who had rebelled and proclaimed himself emperor. The Arab troops under Fadala ibn Ubayd arrived too late to assist Saborios, who had died after falling from his horse, and they spent the winter in the Hexapolis around Melitene awaiting reinforcements. In spring 669, after receiving additional troops, Fadala entered Asia Minor and advanced as far as Chalcedon, on the Asian shore of the Bosporus across from the Byzantine capital, Constantinople. The Arab attacks on Chalcedon were repelled, and the Arab army was decimated by famine and disease. Mu'awiya dispatched another army, led by his son (and future Caliph) Yazid, to Fadala's aid. Accounts of what followed differ. The Byzantine chronicler Theophanes the Confessor reports that the Arabs remained before Chalcedon for a while before returning to Syria, and that on their way they captured and garrisoned Amorium. This was the first time the Arabs tried to hold a captured fortress in the interior of Asia Minor beyond the campaigning season, and probably meant that the Arabs intended to return next year and use the town as their base, but Amorium was retaken by the Byzantines during the subsequent winter. Arab sources on the other hand report that the Muslims crossed over into Europe and launched an unsuccessful attack on Constantinople itself, before returning to Syria. Given the lack of any mention of such an assault in Byzantine sources, it is most probable that the Arab chroniclers—taking account of Yazid's presence and the fact that Chalcedon is a suburb of Constantinople—"upgraded" the attack on Chalcedon to an attack on the Byzantine capital itself. ## Opening moves: the campaigns of 672 and 673 The campaign of 669 clearly demonstrated to the Arabs the possibility of a direct strike at Constantinople, as well as the necessity of having a supply base in the region. This was found in the peninsula of Cyzicus on the southern shore of the Sea of Marmara, where a raiding fleet under Fadhala ibn 'Ubayd wintered in 670 or 671. Mu'awiya now began preparing his final assault on the Byzantine capital. In contrast to Yazid's expedition, Mu'awiya intended to take a coastal route to Constantinople. The undertaking followed a careful, phased approach: first the Muslims had to secure strongpoints and bases along the coast, and then, with Cyzicus as a base, Constantinople would be blockaded by land and sea and cut off from the agrarian hinterland that supplied its food. Accordingly, in 672 three great Muslim fleets were dispatched to secure the sea lanes and establish bases between Syria and the Aegean. Muhammad ibn Abdallah's fleet wintered at Smyrna, a fleet under a certain Qays (perhaps Abdallah ibn Qais) wintered in Lycia and Cilicia, and a third fleet, under Khalid, joined them later. According to the report of Theophanes, the Emperor Constantine IV (r. 661–685), upon learning of the Arab fleets' approach, began equipping his own fleet for war. Constantine's armament included siphon-bearing ships intended for the deployment of a newly developed incendiary substance, Greek fire. In 673, another Arab fleet, under Junada ibn Abi Umayya, captured Tarsus in Cilicia, as well as Rhodes. The latter, midway between Syria and Constantinople, was converted into a forward supply base and centre for Muslim naval raids. Its garrison of 12,000 men was regularly rotated back to Syria, a small fleet was attached to it for defence and raiding, and the Arabs even sowed wheat and brought along animals to graze on the island. The Byzantines attempted to obstruct the Arab plans with a naval attack on Egypt, but it was unsuccessful. Throughout this period, overland raids into Asia Minor continued, and the Arab troops wintered on Byzantine soil. ## Arab attacks and related expeditions in 674–678 In 674, the Arab fleet sailed from its bases in the eastern Aegean and entered the Sea of Marmara. According to the account of Theophanes, they landed on the Thracian shore near Hebdomon in April, and until September were engaged in constant clashes with the Byzantine troops. As the Byzantine chronicler reports, "Every day there was a military engagement from morning until evening, between the outworks of the Golden Gate and the Kyklobion, with thrust and counter-thrust". Then the Arabs departed and made for Cyzicus, which they captured and converted into a fortified camp to spend the winter. This set the pattern that continued throughout the siege: each spring, the Arabs crossed the Marmara and assaulted Constantinople, withdrawing to Cyzicus for the winter. In fact, the "siege" of Constantinople was a series of engagements around the city, which may even be stretched to include Yazid's 669 attack. Both Byzantine and Arab chroniclers record the siege as lasting for seven years instead of five. This can be reconciled either by including the opening campaigns of 672–673, or by counting the years until the final withdrawal of the Arab troops from their forward bases, in 680. The details of the clashes around Constantinople are unclear, as Theophanes condenses the siege in his account of the first year, and the Arab chroniclers do not mention the siege at all but merely provide the names of leaders of unspecified expeditions into Byzantine territory. Thus from the Arab sources it is only known that Abdallah ibn Qays and Fadhala ibn 'Ubayd raided Crete and wintered there in 675, while in the same year Malik ibn Abdallah led a raid into Asia Minor. The Arab historians Ibn Wadih and al-Tabari report that Yazid was dispatched by Mu'awiya with reinforcements to Constantinople in 676, and record that Abdallah ibn Qays led a campaign in 677, the target of which is unknown. At the same time, the preoccupation with the Arab threat had reduced Byzantium's ability to respond to threats elsewhere: in Italy, the Lombards used the opportunity to conquer most of Calabria, including Tarentum and Brundisium, while in the Balkans, a coalition of Slavic tribes attacked the city of Thessalonica and launched seaborne raids in the Aegean, even penetrating into the Sea of Marmara. Finally, in autumn 677 or early 678 Constantine IV resolved to confront the Arab besiegers in a head-on engagement. His fleet, equipped with Greek fire, routed the Arab fleet. It is probable that the death of admiral Yazid ibn Shagara, reported by Arab chroniclers for 677/678, is related to this defeat. At about the same time, the Muslim army in Asia Minor, under the command of Sufyan ibn 'Awf, was defeated by the Byzantine army under the generals Phloros, Petron and Cyprian, losing 30,000 men according to Theophanes. These defeats forced the Arabs to abandon the siege in 678. On its way back to Syria, the Arab fleet was almost annihilated in a storm off Syllaion. The essential outline of Theophanes' account may be corroborated by the only near-contemporary Byzantine reference to the siege, a celebratory poem by the otherwise unknown Theodosius Grammaticus, which was earlier believed to refer to the second Arab siege of 717–718. Theodosius' poem commemorates a decisive naval victory before the walls of the city—with the interesting detail that the Arab fleet too possessed fire-throwing ships—and makes a reference to "the fear of their returning shadows", which may be interpreted as confirming the recurring Arab attacks each spring from their base in Cyzicus. ## Importance and aftermath Constantinople was the nerve centre of the Byzantine state. Had it fallen, the empire's remaining provinces would have been unlikely to hold together and thus become easy prey for the Arabs. At the same time, the failure of the Arab attack on Constantinople was a momentous event in itself. It marked the culmination of Mu'awiya's campaign of attrition, which had been pursued steadily since 661. Immense resources were poured into the undertaking, including the creation of a huge fleet. Its failure had similarly important repercussions and represented a major blow to the Caliph's prestige. Conversely, Byzantine prestige reached new heights, especially in the West. Constantine IV received envoys from the Avars and the Balkan Slavs, who bore gifts and congratulations and acknowledging Byzantine supremacy. The subsequent peace also gave a much-needed respite from constant raiding to Asia Minor and allowed the Byzantine state to recover its balance and consolidate itself after the cataclysmic changes of the previous decades. The failure of the Arabs before Constantinople coincided with the increased activity of the Mardaites, a Christian group living in the mountains of Syria that resisted Muslim control and raided the lowlands. Faced with the new threat and after the immense losses suffered against the Byzantines, Mu'awiya began negotiations for a truce, with embassies exchanged between the two courts. They were drawn out until 679, which gave the Arabs time for a last raid into Asia Minor under 'Amr ibn Murra, perhaps intended to put pressure on the Byzantines. The peace treaty, of a nominal 30-year duration, provided that Caliph would pay an annual tribute of 300,000 nomismata, 50 horses and 50 slaves. The Arab garrisons were withdrawn from their bases on the Byzantine coastlands, including Rhodes, in 679–680. Soon after the Arab retreat from his capital, Constantine IV quickly sent an expedition against the Slavs in the area of Thessalonica, curtailed their piracy, relieved the city and restored imperial control over the city's surroundings. After the conclusion of peace, he moved against the mounting Bulgar menace in the Balkans, but his huge army, comprising all the available forces of the empire, was decisively beaten, which opened the way for the establishment of a Bulgar state in the northeastern Balkans. In the Muslim world, after the death of Mu'awiya in 680, the various forces of opposition within the Caliphate manifested themselves. The Caliphate's division during the Second Muslim Civil War allowed Byzantium to achieve not only peace but also a position of predominance on its eastern frontier. Armenia and Iberia reverted for a time to Byzantine control, and Cyprus became a condominium between Byzantium and the Caliphate. The peace lasted until Constantine IV's son and successor, Justinian II (r. 685–695, 705–711), broke it in 693, with devastating consequences since the Byzantines were defeated, Justinian was deposed and a twenty-year period of anarchy followed. Muslim incursions intensified, leading to a second Arab attempt at conquering Constantinople in 717–718, which also proved unsuccessful. ## Cultural impact Later Arab sources dwell extensively on the events of Yazid's 669 expedition and supposed attack on Constantinople, including various mythical anecdotes, which are taken by modern scholarship to refer to the events of the 674–678 siege. Several important personalities of early Islam are mentioned as taking part, such as Ibn Abbas, Ibn Umar and Ibn al-Zubayr. The most prominent among them in later tradition is Abu Ayyub al-Ansari, one of the early companions (Anṣār) and standard-bearer of Muhammad, who died of illness before the city walls during the siege and was buried there. According to Muslim tradition, Constantine IV threatened to destroy his tomb, but the Caliph warned that if he did so, the Christians under Muslim rule would suffer. Thus the tomb was left in peace, and even became a site of veneration by the Byzantines, who prayed there in times of drought. The tomb was "rediscovered" after the Fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Turks in 1453 by the dervish Sheikh Ak Shams al-Din, and Sultan Mehmed II (r. 1444–1446, 1451–1481) ordered the construction of a marble tomb and a mosque adjacent to it. It became a tradition that Ottoman sultans were girt with the Sword of Osman at the Eyüp mosque upon their accession. Today it remains one of the holiest Muslim shrines in Istanbul. This siege is even mentioned in the Chinese dynastic histories of the Old Book of Tang and New Book of Tang. They record that the large, well-fortified capital city of Fu lin (拂菻, i.e. Byzantium) was besieged by the Da shi (大食, i.e. the Umayyad Arabs) and their commander "Mo-yi" (Chinese: 摩拽伐之, Pinyin: Mó zhuāi fá zhī), who Friedrich Hirth has identified as Mu'awiya. The Chinese histories then explain that the Arabs forced the Byzantines to pay tribute afterwards as part of a peace settlement. In these Chinese sources, Fu lin was directly related to the earlier Daqin, which is now considered by modern sinologists as the Roman Empire. Henry Yule remarked with some surprise the accuracy of the account in Chinese sources, which even named the negotiator of the peace settlement as 'Yenyo', or Ioannes Pitzigaudes, the unnamed envoy sent to Damascus in Edward Gibbon's account in which he mentions an augmentation of tributary payments a few years later due to the Umayyads facing some financial troubles. ## Modern reassessment of events The narrative of the siege accepted by modern historians relies largely on Theophanes' account, while the Arab and Syriac sources do not mention any siege but rather individual campaigns, only a few of which reached as far as Constantinople. Thus the capture of an island named Arwad "in the sea of Kustantiniyya" is recorded for 673/674, but it is unclear if it refers to the Sea of Marmara or the Aegean, and Yazid's 676 expedition is also said to have reached Constantinople. The Syriac chroniclers also disagree with Theophanes in placing the decisive battle and destruction of the Arab fleet by Greek fire in 674 during an Arab expedition against the coasts of Lycia and Cilicia, rather than Constantinople. That was followed by the landing of Byzantine forces in Syria in 677/678, which began the Mardaite uprising that threatened the Caliphate's grip on Syria enough to result in the peace agreement of 678/679. Constantin Zuckerman believes that an obscure passage in Cosmas of Jerusalem's commentary on Gregory of Nazianzus, written in the early eighth century, must refer to the Arab blockade of Constantinople. It mentions how Constantine IV had ships driven (probably on wheels) across the Thracian Chersonese from the Aegean to the Sea of Marmara, a major undertaking for imperial navy ships that makes sense only if the Dardanelles was blocked by the Arabs at Cyzicus. Based on a re-evaluation of the original sources used by the medieval historians, the Oxford scholar James Howard-Johnston, in his 2010 book Witnesses to a World Crisis: Historians and Histories of the Middle East in the Seventh Century, rejects the traditional interpretation of events, based on Theophanes, in favour of the Syriac chroniclers' version. Howard-Johnston asserts that no siege actually took place because of not only its absence in the eastern sources but also the logistical impossibility of such an undertaking for the duration reported. Instead, he believes that the reference to a siege was a later interpolation, influenced by the events of the second Arab siege of 717–718, by an anonymous source that was later used by Theophanes. According to Howard-Johnston, "The blockade of Constantinople in the 670s is a myth which has been allowed to mask the very real success achieved by the Byzantines in the last decade of Mu'awiya’s caliphate, first by sea off Lycia and then on land, through an insurgency which, before long, aroused deep anxiety among the Arabs, conscious as they were that they had merely coated the Middle East with their power". On the other hand, the historian Marek Jankowiak argues that a major Arab siege occurred but that Theophanes (writing about 140 years after the events, based on an anonymous source, which was itself written about 50 years after the events) misdated and garbled the events and that the proper dating of the siege should be 667–669, with the spring of 668 having the major attack.

1983 Atlantic hurricane season

Hurricane season in the Atlantic Ocean

The 1983 Atlantic hurricane season was the least active Atlantic hurricane season since 1930. The season officially began on June 1, 1983, and lasted until November 30, 1983. These dates conventionally delimit the period of each year when most storms form in the Atlantic basin. The season had very little activity, with only seven tropical depressions, four of which reached tropical storm strength or higher. This led to the lowest accumulated cyclone energy count since 1977, but not since 1914. The season began later than normal; the first tropical depression formed on July 23 and the second on July 27. Neither tropical depressions strengthened and they dissipated soon thereafter. Hurricane Alicia formed as Tropical Depression Three on August 15, quickly intensified into a hurricane on August 16 and made landfall in Texas on August 18. Alicia caused \$3 billion in damage in Texas. Hurricane Barry formed on August 25, crossed Florida and strengthened into a hurricane. Barry made landfall near the Mexico–United States border, and dissipated over land on August 30. Hurricane Chantal, the third and final hurricane in 1983, formed on September 10. It strengthened into a hurricane, but stayed out at sea, and was absorbed by a frontal system on September 15. Tropical Depression Six formed on September 18 and caused heavy rains in the Caribbean before degenerating into a wave on September 20. Tropical Storm Dean was the final storm of the season, forming on September 26. It originally tracked to the north, peaking at 65 mph (105 km/h) winds, and made landfall in the Delmarva Peninsula on September 29. It dissipated over the coast of Virginia on the following day. ## Seasonal forecasts Forecasts of hurricane activity are issued before each hurricane season by noted hurricane experts such as Dr. William M. Gray and his associates at Colorado State University (CSU). A normal season, as defined by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) in the period from 1981 to 2010, has approximately 12 named storms, with 6 of those reaching hurricane status. About 3 hurricane strengthen into major hurricanes, which are tropical cyclones that reach at least Category 3 intensity on the Saffir–Simpson scale. The July 23, 1983, forecasters at CSU predicted that after the slow start to the season, a total of eight tropical storms would develop, and five of the storms would reach hurricane status. The forecast did not specify how many of the hurricanes would reach major hurricane status. CSU based this prediction on an ongoing El Niño event, sea-level pressures, and wind currents. However, the prediction issued by CSU proved to be too high, with only four named storms forming by the end of the season and three of those reaching hurricane status. The CSU attributed the overforecast to the El Niño event being stronger and more persistent than they expected. ## Seasonal summary The season, which began on June 1 and ended on November 30, was very inactive because of strong upper-level wind shear. The wind shear was unusually strong throughout the Caribbean and open Atlantic, and disrupted convection in areas of disturbed weather so they could not develop. Over 60 African systems had formed and made it westward, but when they reached the Lesser Antilles, they were dissolved easily. The only area where the shear was minimal—a region encompassing the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic north of the Bahamas and east of Florida—was where the four named storms developed. Another contributing factor to the low number of storms may have been the decaying 1982–83 El Niño event. The season total of four named storms was the fewest in the satellite era, while the 1983 season was the least active since 1930, which had only three storms. This season and the previous became the first example of two consecutive years to have no storms form in the Caribbean since reliable record began. Additionally, the 1983 season was the first on record in which a system did not reach tropical storm intensity south of 25°N latitude. The National Hurricane Center also issued numeric landfall probabilities for the first time in 1983. Probabilities had been calculated for prior storms for use in the issuing of hurricane watches and warnings, but this was the first time the raw numeric probabilities were released to the public. The probabilities issued were accurate during Alicia, indicating that Galveston and surrounding portions of the upper Texas coast were the most likely area to be struck. Tropical cyclogenesis began on July 23, when Tropical Depression One formed over the deep Atlantic. After crossing the Windward Islands, the depression dissipated over the eastern Caribbean on July 28. As the previous system moved across the Caribbean, another depression formed on July 27 to the southwest of the Cape Verde Islands. The depression traversed the Atlantic in a west-northwestward direction and also failed to reach tropical storm intensity before dissipating near the northern Leeward Islands on August 2. Later in August, hurricanes Alicia and Barry developed. The former also became the most intense tropical cyclone of the season, peaking as a Category 3 hurricane with maximum sustained winds of 115 mph (185 km/h). Alicia caused 21 fatalities and approximately \$3 billion in damage, mostly in Texas. Three tropical cyclones formed in September – Hurricane Chantal, Tropical Depression Six, and Tropical Storm Dean. The dissipation of Dean on September 30 marked the end of tropical cyclone activity. The season's activity was reflected with a very low cumulative accumulated cyclone energy (ACE) rating of 17, one of the lowest on record, which is classified as "below normal". ACE is a metric used to express the energy used by a tropical cyclone during its lifetime. Therefore, storms that last a long time, as well as particularly strong hurricanes, have high ACEs. It is only calculated for full advisories on tropical systems at or exceeding 39 mph (63 km/h), which is the threshold for tropical storm intensity. ## Systems ### Tropical Depression One Tropical Depression One developed about halfway between French Guiana and the Cape Verde Islands on July 23. The National Hurricane Center indicated the possibility of the depression strengthening into a tropical storm in media reports, but upper-level wind shear inhibited any development. The depression dissipated over the eastern Caribbean late on July 28. ### Tropical Depression Two An area of disturbed weather organized into a tropical depression southwest of the Cape Verde Islands on July 27. The depression moved generally west-northwestward across the deep Atlantic for several days, but failed to strengthened significantly due to strong upper-level wind shear. The depression dissipated near the northern Leeward Islands on August 2. ### Hurricane Alicia The system that would become Hurricane Alicia originated from the western end of a frontal trough that stretched from New England to the Gulf of Mexico. Satellite pictures showed a meso-scale low-pressure area that had moved off the Alabama and Mississippi coasts near the trough and was possibly the precursor system to Alicia. Pressures in the Gulf of Mexico were high and stayed high during the early development stages. On August 15, a ship recorded a minimal pressure of 1015 millibars (29.99 inHg), when the system was upgraded into Tropical Storm Alicia. With high environmental pressures around it, Alicia remained a small system. Steering currents above Alicia remained weak during the storm's lifetime. However, a ridge was well formed to the north of the developing storms. With fluctuations in the pressures, Alicia began to drift to west on August 16. This was short-lived, as Alicia turned to the northwest towards Texas. During the period of August 16 to August 18, an anticyclone had formed over Alicia and along with slow movement over warm waters, caused Alicia to intensify rapidly. The pressure in Alicia decreased one millibar an hour in the 40 hours before landfall. Alicia peaked at 115 mph (185 km/h) in winds and 962 millibars (28.4 inHg) in pressure on August 18. Alicia made landfall near Galveston on August 18 as a Category 3 hurricane. Alicia weakened quickly over land and accelerated over the Midwest, before dissipating over Nebraska on August 21. As Alicia moved northward, the remnants caused moderate to heavy rainfall in several states. Houston suffered heavy damage, including thousands of shattered glass panes from downtown skyscrapers. Overall, Alicia killed 21 people and caused \$3 billion (1983 USD) in damage. ### Hurricane Barry Hurricane Barry originated from a tropical disturbance that left the Northwestern African coast on August 13. Most of the season, the northwestern tropical Atlantic Ocean had upper-level wind shear, which had inhibited development of systems. Due to these conditions, the disturbance was unable to strengthen until August 22 as it was approaching the Bahamas. A weak trough moved the disturbance into an area of low wind shear, and the disturbance intensified into Tropical Depression Four on the evening of August 23. The depression was just to the northeast of the northern Bahamian Islands where it strengthened into Tropical Storm Barry on the morning of August 24. Tropical Storm Barry subsequently turned to the west into an area of increased wind shear and weakened rapidly. It was able to make landfall near Melbourne, Florida, on the morning of August 25 as a 45 mph tropical storm, before weakening to a tropical depression over Florida. After Tropical Depression Barry emerged from central Florida, it was still under pressure from high-level winds. The depression entered the central Gulf of Mexico, and after meandering west for a day or so, returned to tropical storm strength. Just off the coast of Mexico, Barry rapidly intensified into a hurricane on August 28, just before making landfall near Matamoros that afternoon. Before landfall, Barry peaked with 80 mph (130 km/h) winds and a pressure of 986 millibars (29.11 inHg). The remnants quickly dissipated over the Sierra Madre Oriental on August 29. ### Hurricane Chantal The precursor low to Chantal originated from a large envelope of low pressure on the morning of September 10. The disturbed weather, nested off the coast of Bermuda, was one of the remnants of an old frontal trough that had extended from Hispaniola to the central north Atlantic Ocean. This particular area of disturbed weather become part of the northeast portion of a low-pressure system. On September 10, a reconnaissance aircraft found sustained winds of 30 mph (50 km/h) and a 1010 millibar (29.83 inHg) pressure reading, indicating development into a tropical depression. The depression moved to within 100 miles (160 kilometers) of Bermuda and slowly intensified. Late that afternoon, Tropical Depression Five had intensified into a 40 mph (65 km/h) storm and was named Chantal. Chantal intensified rapidly, intensifying to hurricane status late on September 11. It then turned to the east and gained a weak upper-level cirrus-cloud outflow. The structure of the system changed little over the next 24 hours, before Chantal lost organization and was downgraded to a tropical storm on the night of the 12th. Overnight, all convection in Chantal dissipated, and its forward speed decreased as it headed north. A frontal system attracted and absorbed the remnants of Chantal by the night of September 14. Effects on Bermuda were minimal, with the island getting winds only up to 20 mph (30 km/h) and a few thundershowers. However, Chantal generated swells of 30–40 ft (9.1–12.2 m) offshore. ### Tropical Depression Six Tropical Depression Six formed on September 18 from a tropical wave. The depression caused heavy rainfall in the Lesser Antilles, before degenerating into an open tropical wave on September 20 near the Dominican Republic. ### Tropical Storm Dean Tropical Storm Dean originated from inside a frontal cloud band, which had moved off the Eastern Coast of the United States on September 22. During the next few days, the band became stationary from the Bahamas to beyond Bermuda. During this period, a 1035 millibar (30.56 inHg) high pressure cell had become settled over the northeastern United States. This resulted in a strong pressure gradient and winds near gale force along the eastern coast. A low-level circulation formed from the frontal cloud band on September 26 about 460 miles (740 km) east of central Florida. Dean was first identified on the afternoon of September 26 as a subtropical storm. An Air Force reconnaissance flight was sent to Dean on September 27 and only reported winds of 35 mph (55 km/h) at 23 miles (37 kilometres) from the center. A pressure of 999 millibars (29.5 inHg) indicated that Dean was strengthening as it headed northward. Additionally, satellite pictures showed that the subtropical cyclone was emerging from the cloud. This data also showed that the storm was gaining tropical characteristics and was given the name Dean on the afternoon of September 27. Dean's winds peaked at 65 mph (105 km/h) on September 28 as it headed northward. Dean's circulation turned to the northwest on September 29 then made landfall in the Delmarva Peninsula and dissipated over land on September 30. Gale warnings were from North Carolina to Rhode Island in association with Dean. Dean produced rainfall spreading from the North Carolina/Virginia border all the way to New England. Virginia reported rains of 1 inch (25 mm) with 3 inches (76 mm) at the border. Rains peaked at 4.62 inches (117 mm) at Cockaponset Ranger Station in Connecticut. Damage was limited to minor beach erosion and flooding along the portion of Mid-Atlantic coast states. ## Storm names The following list of names was used for named storms that formed in the North Atlantic in 1983. The names not retired from this list were used again in the 1989 season. This year marked the first usage for this list of names in the North Atlantic basin. The names Alicia, Barry, Chantal, and Dean were used for the first (and only, in the case of Alicia) time this year. ### Retirement In the spring of 1984, at the 6th session of the RA IV hurricane committee, the World Meteorological Organization retired the name Alicia from its rotating name lists due to the amount of damage and deaths it caused, and it will not be used again for another Atlantic hurricane. Alicia was replaced with Allison for the 1989 season. ## Season effects This is a table of the storms in 1983 and their landfall(s), if any. Deaths in parentheses are additional and indirect (an example of an indirect death would be a traffic accident), but are still storm-related. Damage and deaths include totals while the storm was extratropical or a wave or low. \|- \| One \|\| \|\| bgcolor=#\| \|\| \|\| \|\| \|\| \|\| \|\| \|- \| Two \|\| \|\| bgcolor=#\| \|\| \|\| \|\| \|\| \|\| \|\| \|- \| Alicia \|\| \|\| bgcolor=#\|Category 3 hurricane \|\| \|\| \|\| Eastern Texas, Central United States \|\| \|\| \|\| \|- \| Barry \|\| August 23–29 \|\| bgcolor=#\| \|\| \|\| \|\| Florida, United States Gulf Coast, Mexico \|\| \|\| \|\| \|- \| Chantal \|\| September 10–15 \|\| bgcolor=#\| \|\| \|\| \|\| Bermuda \|\| \|\| \|\| \|- \| Six \|\| \|\| bgcolor=#\| \|\| \|\| \|\| None \|\| \|\| \|\| \|- \| Dean \|\| \|\| bgcolor=#\| \|\| \|\| \|\| Mid-Atlantic, New England, North Carolina, Virginia \|\| \|\| \|\| \|- ## See also - 1983 Pacific hurricane season - 1983 Pacific typhoon season - 1983 North Indian Ocean cyclone season - Australian cyclone seasons: 1982–83, 1983–84 - South Pacific cyclone seasons: 1982–83, 1983–84 - South-West Indian Ocean cyclone seasons: 1982–83, 1983–84 - South Atlantic tropical cyclone - Mediterranean tropical-like cyclone

Michael Collins (astronaut)

American astronaut (1930–2021)

Michael Collins (October 31, 1930 – April 28, 2021) was an American astronaut who flew the Apollo 11 command module Columbia around the Moon in 1969 while his crewmates, Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin, made the first crewed landing on the surface. He was also a test pilot and major general in the U.S. Air Force Reserve. Born in Rome, Italy, where his father was serving as the U.S. military attaché, Collins graduated in the Class of 1952 from the United States Military Academy. He followed his father, brother, uncle, and cousin into the military. He joined the United States Air Force, and flew F-86 Sabre fighters at Chambley-Bussières Air Base, France. He was accepted into the U.S. Air Force Experimental Flight Test Pilot School at Edwards Air Force Base in 1960, also graduating from the Aerospace Research Pilot School (Class III). Selected as part of NASA's third group of 14 astronauts in 1963, Collins flew in space twice. His first spaceflight was on Gemini 10 in 1966, in which he and Command Pilot John Young performed orbital rendezvous with two spacecraft and undertook two extravehicular activities (EVAs, also known as spacewalks). On the 1969 Apollo 11 mission, he became one of 24 people to fly to the Moon, which he orbited thirty times. He was the fourth person (and third American) to perform a spacewalk, the first person to have performed more than one spacewalk, and, after Young, who flew the command module on Apollo 10, the second person to orbit the Moon alone. After retiring from NASA in 1970, Collins took a job in the Department of State as Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs. A year later, he became the director of the National Air and Space Museum, and held this position until 1978, when he stepped down to become undersecretary of the Smithsonian Institution. In 1980, he took a job as vice president of LTV Aerospace. He resigned in 1985 to start his own consulting firm. Along with his Apollo 11 crewmates, Collins was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 1969 and the Congressional Gold Medal in 2011. ## Early life Collins was born on October 31, 1930, in Rome, Italy. He was the second son of James Lawton Collins, a career U.S. Army officer, who was the U.S. military attaché there from 1928 to 1932, and Virginia C. Collins (née Stewart. Collins had an older brother, James Lawton Collins Jr. and two older sisters, Virginia and Agnes. Collins' mother was of British descent, and his father's family hailed from Ireland. For the first 17 years of his life, Collins lived in many places as the Army posted his father to different locations: Rome; Oklahoma; Governors Island, New York; Fort Hoyle (near Baltimore, Maryland); Fort Hayes (near Columbus, Ohio); Puerto Rico; San Antonio, Texas; and Alexandria, Virginia. He took his first plane ride in Puerto Rico aboard a Grumman Widgeon; the pilot allowed him to fly it for a portion of the flight. He wanted to fly again, but since World War II started soon after, he was unable. He studied for two years in the Academia del Perpetuo Socorro in San Juan, Puerto Rico. After the United States entered World War II, the family moved to Washington, D.C., where Collins attended St. Albans School and graduated in 1948. His mother wanted him to enter the diplomatic service, but he decided to follow his father, two uncles, brother, and cousin into the armed services. He received an appointment to the United States Military Academy at West Point, New York, from which his father and his older brother had graduated in 1907 and 1939 respectively. He graduated on June 3, 1952, with a Bachelor of Science degree in military science, finishing 185th of 527 cadets in the class, which included future fellow astronaut Ed White. Collins' decision to join the United States Air Force (USAF) was motivated by both the wonder of what the next fifty years might bring in aeronautics, and to avoid accusations of nepotism had he joined the Army—where his brother was already a colonel, his father had reached the rank of major general and his uncle, General J. Lawton Collins (1896–1987), was the Chief of Staff of the United States Army. The Air Force Academy, still under construction, would not graduate its first class for several years. In the interim, graduates of the Military Academy were eligible for Air Force commissions. Promotion was slower in the Air Force than in the Army, due to the large number of young officers who had been commissioned and promoted during World War II. ## Military service ### Fighter pilot Collins began basic flight training in the T-6 Texan at Columbus Air Force Base in Columbus, Mississippi, in August 1952, then moved on to San Marcos Air Force Base in Texas to learn instrument and formation flying, and finally to James Connally Air Force Base in Waco, Texas, for training in jet aircraft. Flying came easily to him, and unlike many of his colleagues, he had little fear of failure. He was awarded his wings upon completion of the course at Waco, and in September 1953, he was chosen for advanced day-fighter training at Nellis Air Force Base, Nevada, flying F-86 Sabres. The training was dangerous; eleven people were killed in accidents during the 22 weeks he was there. This was followed by an assignment in January 1954 to the 21st Fighter-Bomber Wing at George Air Force Base, California, where he learned ground attack and nuclear weapons delivery techniques in the F-86. He moved with the 21st to Chambley-Bussières Air Base, France, in December 1954. He won first prize in a 1956 gunnery competition. During a NATO exercise that year, he was forced to eject from an F-86, near Chaumont-Semoutiers AB, after a fire started aft of the cockpit. Collins met his future wife, Patricia Mary Finnegan from Boston, Massachusetts, in an officers' mess. A graduate of Emmanuel College, where she majored in English, she was a social worker, dealing mainly with single mothers. To see more of the world, she was working for the Air Force service club. After getting engaged, they had to overcome a difference in religion. Collins was nominally Episcopalian, while Finnegan came from a staunchly Roman Catholic family. After seeking permission to marry from Finnegan's father, and delaying their wedding when Collins was redeployed to West Germany during the 1956 Hungarian Revolution, they married in 1957. They had a daughter, actress Kate Collins, in 1959, a second daughter, Ann, in 1961 and a son, Michael, in 1963. After Collins returned to the United States in late 1957, he attended an aircraft maintenance officer course at Chanute Air Force Base, Illinois. He would later describe this school as "dismal" in his autobiography; he found the classwork boring, flying time scarce, and the equipment outdated. Upon completing the course, he commanded a Mobile Training Detachment (MTD) and traveled to air bases around the world. The detachment trained mechanics on the servicing of new aircraft, and pilots how to fly them. He later became the first commander of a Field Training Detachment (FTD 523) back at Nellis AFB, which was a similar kind of unit, except that the students traveled to him. ### Test pilot Collins' MTD posting allowed him to accumulate over 1,500 flying hours, the minimum required for admission to the USAF Experimental Flight Test Pilot School at Edwards Air Force Base, California. His application was successful, and on August 29, 1960, he became a member of Class 60C, which included Frank Borman, Jim Irwin and Tom Stafford, who later became astronauts. Military test pilot instruction started with the North American T-28 Trojan, and proceeded through the high performance F-86 Sabre, B-57 Canberra, T-33 Shooting Star, and the F-104 Starfighter. Collins was a heavy smoker, but quit in 1962 after suffering a particularly bad hangover. The next day, he spent what he described as the worst four hours of his life in the co-pilot's seat of a B-52 Stratofortress while going through the initial stages of nicotine withdrawal. The inspiration for Collins in his decision to become a NASA astronaut was the Mercury Atlas 6 flight of John Glenn on February 20, 1962, and the thought of being able to circle the Earth in 90 minutes. Collins applied for the second group of astronauts that year. To raise the numbers of Air Force pilots selected, the Air Force sent their best applicants to a "charm school". Medical and psychiatric examinations at Brooks Air Force Base, Texas, and interviews at the Manned Spacecraft Center (MSC) in Houston followed. In mid-September, he found out he had not been accepted. It was a blow even though he did not expect to be selected. Collins rated the second group of nine as better than the Mercury Seven who preceded them, or the five groups that followed, including his own. That year the USAF Experimental Flight Test Pilot School became the USAF Aerospace Research Pilot School (ARPS), as the Air Force tried to enter into space research through the X-15 and X-20 programs. Collins applied for a new postgraduate course offered into the basics of spaceflight. He was accepted into the third class on October 22, 1962. Other students in his eleven-member class included three future astronauts: Charles Bassett, Edward Givens and Joe Engle. Along with classwork, they also flew up to about 90,000 feet (27,000 m) in F-104 Starfighters. As they passed through the top of their arc, they would experience a brief period of weightlessness. On finishing this course he returned to fighter operations in May 1963. At the start of June, NASA once again called for astronaut applications. Collins went through the same process as with his first application, though he did not take the psychiatric evaluation. He was at Randolph Air Force Base, Texas, on October 14 when Deke Slayton, the Chief of the Astronaut Office at NASA, called and asked if he was still interested in becoming an astronaut. Charles Bassett was also accepted. By this time Collins had flown over 3,000 hours, of which 2,700 were in jet aircraft. ## Space program Compared with the first two groups of astronauts, the third group of fourteen astronauts, which included Collins, was younger, with an average age of 31—the first two groups had an average age of 34.5 and 32.5 at their time of selection—and was better educated, with an average of 5.6 years of tertiary education; but they had fewer flying hours—2,300 on average compared with 3,500 and 2,800 for the first two groups, and only eight of the fourteen were test pilots. Of the thirty astronauts selected in the first three groups, only Collins and his third group colleague William Anders were born outside the United States, and Collins was the only one with an older brother; all the rest were the eldest or only sons in their families. Training began with a 240-hour course on the basics of spaceflight. Fifty-eight hours of this was devoted to geology, something Collins did not readily understand and in which he never became very interested. At the end, Alan Shepard, the Chief of the Astronaut Office, asked the fourteen to rank their fellow astronauts in the order they would want to fly with them in space. Collins picked David Scott in the number one position. ### Project Gemini #### Crew assignments After this basic training, the third group was assigned specializations. Collins received his first choice: pressure suits and extravehicular activities (EVAs, also known as spacewalks). His job was to monitor development and act as a liaison between the Astronaut Office and contractors. He was disturbed by the secretive planning of Ed White's EVA on Gemini 4, because he was not involved despite being the person with the greatest knowledge of the subject. In late June 1965, Collins received his first crew assignment: the backup pilot for Gemini 7, with his West Point classmate Ed White named as the backup mission commander. Collins was the first of the fourteen to receive a crew assignment, but the first to fly was Scott on Gemini 8, and Charles Bassett was assigned to Gemini 9. Under the system of crew rotation established by Slayton, being on the backup crew of Gemini 7 set Collins up to pilot Gemini 10. Gemini 7 was commanded by Borman, whom Collins knew well from their days at Edwards, with Jim Lovell as the pilot. Collins made a point of providing a daily briefing to their wives, Susan Borman and Marilyn Lovell, on the progress of the two-week Gemini 7 mission. After the successful completion of Gemini 7 on January 24, 1966, Collins was assigned to the prime crew of Gemini 10, but with John Young as mission commander, as White moved on to the Apollo program. Jim Lovell and Buzz Aldrin were designated as the backup commander and pilot respectively. The arrangements were disturbed on February 28 by the deaths of the Gemini 9 crew, Charles Bassett and Elliot See, in the 1966 NASA T-38 crash. They were replaced on Gemini 9 by their backups, Stafford and Gene Cernan. Cernan was the second of the fourteen to fly in space. Lovell and Aldrin became their backups, and Alan Bean and C.C. Williams took their place as the Gemini 10 backup crew. Collins would be the seventeenth American, and third member of his group, to fly in space. Training for Gemini 10 was interrupted in March when Slayton diverted Young, Collins and Williams to represent their respective services on a panel to select another group of astronauts, along with himself, Shepard, spacecraft designer Max Faget, and astronaut training officer Warren J. North. Young protested the loss of a week's training to no avail. Applying strict criteria for age, flying experience and education reduced the number of applicants to 35. The panel interviewed each for an hour, and rated nineteen as qualified. Collins was surprised when Slayton elected to take them all. Slayton later admitted that he too had doubts; he already had enough astronauts for Project Apollo as far as the first Moon landing, but post-Apollo plans were for up to 30 missions. Such a large intake therefore seemed prudent. Ten of the nineteen had test pilot experience, and seven were graduates of the ARPS. #### Gemini 10 Fifteen scientific experiments were carried on Gemini 10—more than any other Gemini mission except the two-week-long Gemini 7. After Gemini 9's EVA ran into problems, the remaining Gemini objectives had to be completed on the last three flights. While the overall number of objectives increased, the difficulty of Collins' EVA was scaled significantly back. There was no backpack or astronaut maneuvering unit (AMU), as there had been on Gemini 8. Their three-day mission called for them to rendezvous with two Agena Target Vehicles, undertake two EVAs, and perform 15 different experiments. The training went smoothly, as the crew learned the intricacies of orbital rendezvous, controlling the Agena and, for Collins, the EVA. For what was to be the fourth ever EVA, underwater training was not performed, mostly because Collins did not have the time. To train to use the nitrogen gun he would use for propulsion, a smooth metal surface about the size of a boxing ring was set up. He would stand on a circular pad that used gas jets to raise itself off the surface. Using the nitrogen gun he would practice propelling himself across the "slippery table". Gemini 10 lifted off from Launch Complex 19 at Cape Canaveral at 05:20 local time on July 18, 1966. Upon reaching orbit, it was about 860 nautical miles (1,600 km) behind the Agena target vehicle, which had been launched 100 minutes earlier. A rendezvous was achieved on Gemini 10's fourth orbit at 10:43, followed by docking at 11:13. The mission plan called for multiple dockings with the Agena target, but an error by Collins in using the sextant caused them to burn valuable propellant, resulting in Mission Control calling off this objective to conserve propellant. Once docked, the Agena 10 propulsion system was activated to boost the astronauts to a new altitude record, 475 miles (764 km) above the Earth, breaking the previous record of 295 miles (475 km) set by Voskhod 2. A second burn of the Agena 10 engine at 03:58 on July 19 put them into the same orbit as Agena 8, which had been launched for the Gemini 8 mission on March 16. For his first EVA Collins did not leave the Gemini capsule, but stood up through the hatch with an ultraviolet camera. After he took the ultraviolet photos, Collins took photos of a plate they brought with them. They were used to compare photos taken in space with those taken in a laboratory. In his biography he said he felt at that moment like a Roman god riding the skies in his chariot. The EVA started on the dark side of the Earth so Collins could take photos of the Milky Way. Collins' and Young's eyes began to water, forcing an early end to the EVA. Lithium hydroxide, which was normally used to remove exhaled carbon dioxide from the cabin, had accidentally been fed into the astronauts' space suits. The compressor causing the problem was switched off, and a high oxygen flow was used to purge the environmental control system. Prior to Collins' second EVA, the Agena 10 spacecraft was jettisoned. Young positioned the capsule close enough to Agena 8 for Collins to get to it while attached to his 49-foot (15 m) umbilical. Collins became the first person to perform two spacewalks in the same mission. He found it took much longer to complete tasks than he expected, something Cernan also experienced during his spacewalk on Gemini 9. He removed a micrometeorite experiment from the exterior of the spacecraft, and configured his nitrogen maneuvering thruster. Collins had difficulty reentering the spacecraft, and needed Young to pull him back in with the umbilical. The duo activated the retrorockets on their 43rd orbit, and they splashed down in the Atlantic at 04:06 on July 21, 3.5 nautical miles (6.5 km) from the recovery vessel, the amphibious assault ship USS Guadalcanal, and were picked up by helicopter. Collins and Young completed nearly all the major objectives of the flight. The docking practice and the landmark measurement experiment were cancelled in order to conserve propellant, and the micrometeorite collector was lost when it drifted out of the spacecraft. ### Apollo program Shortly after Gemini 10, Collins was assigned to the backup crew for the second crewed Apollo flight, with Borman as commander (CDR), Stafford as command module pilot (CMP), and Collins as lunar module pilot (LMP). Along with learning the new Apollo command and service module (CSM) and the Apollo Lunar Module (LM), Collins received helicopter training, as these were thought to be the best way to simulate the landing approach of the LM. After the completion of Project Gemini, it was decided to cancel the Apollo 2 flight, since it would just repeat the Apollo 1 flight. Stafford was given his own crew, and Anders was assigned to Borman's crew. Slayton had decided an Apollo mission commander should be an experienced astronaut who had already flown a mission, and that on flights with a LM, the CMP should also have some spaceflight experience, something Anders did not yet have, since the CMP would have to fly the CM alone. Collins was therefore moved to the CMP position on the Apollo 8 prime crew, and Anders became the LMP. The practice became that the CMP would be the next most senior member of the crew, and that they would go on to command later Apollo flights. Staff meetings were always held on Fridays in the Astronaut Office, and it was here that Collins found himself on January 27, 1967. Don Gregory was running the meeting in the absence of Shepard and so it was he who answered the red phone to be informed there had been a fire in the Apollo 1 CM, and that the three astronauts, Gus Grissom, Ed White and Roger Chaffee were dead. When the enormity of the situation was ascertained, it fell on Collins to go to the Chaffee household to inform Martha Chaffee that her husband had died. The Astronaut Office had learned to be proactive in informing astronauts' families of a death quickly, because of the death of Theodore Freeman in an aircraft crash in 1964, when a newspaper reporter was the first to his house. Collins and Scott were sent by NASA to the Paris Air Show in May 1967. There they met cosmonauts Pavel Belyayev and Konstantin Feoktistov, with whom they drank vodka on the Soviets' Tupolev Tu-134. Collins found it interesting that some cosmonauts were doing helicopter training like their American counterparts, and Belyayev said he hoped to make a circumlunar flight soon. The astronauts' wives had accompanied them on the trip, and Collins and his wife Pat were compelled by NASA and their friends to travel to Metz, where they had been married ten years before. There, they found a third wedding ceremony had been arranged for them (ten years previously they had already had civil and religious ceremonies), so they could renew their vows. During 1968, Collins noticed his legs were not working as they should, first during handball games, then as he walked down stairs. His knee would almost give way, and his left leg had unusual sensations when in hot and cold water. Reluctantly he sought medical advice and the diagnosis was a cervical disc herniation, requiring two vertebrae to be fused. The surgery was performed at Wilford Hall Hospital at Lackland Air Force Base, Texas. The planned recuperation time was three to six months. Collins spent three months in a neck brace. As a result, he was removed from the prime crew of Apollo 9 and his backup, Jim Lovell, replaced him as CMP. When the Apollo 8 mission was changed from a CSM/LM mission in high Earth orbit to a CSM-only flight around the Moon, both prime and backup crews for Apollo 8 and 9 swapped places. #### Apollo 8 Having trained for the flight, Collins was made a capsule communicator (CAPCOM), an astronaut stationed at Mission Control responsible for communicating directly with the crew during a mission. As part of the Green Team, he covered the launch phase up to translunar injection, the rocket burn that sent Apollo 8 to the Moon. The successful completion of the first crewed circumlunar flight was followed by the announcement of the Apollo 11 crew of Armstrong, Aldrin, and Collins. At that time, in January 1969, it was uncertain this would be the lunar landing mission; this depended on the success of Apollo 9 and Apollo 10 testing the LM. #### Apollo 11 As CMP, Collins' training was completely different from the LM and lunar EVA, and was sometimes done without Armstrong or Aldrin being present. Along with simulators, there were measurements for pressure suits, centrifuge training to simulate the reentry, and practicing docking with a huge rig at NASA Langley Research Center, Hampton, Virginia. Since he would be the active participant in the rendezvous with the LM, Collins compiled a book of 18 different rendezvous schemes for various scenarios including ones where the LM did not land, or it launched too early or too late. This book ran for 117 pages. The mission patch of Apollo 11 was the creation of Collins. Jim Lovell, the backup commander, mentioned the idea of eagles, a symbol of the United States. Collins liked the idea and found a painting by artist Walter A. Weber in a National Geographic Society book, Water, Prey, and Game Birds of North America, traced it and added the lunar surface below and Earth in the background. The idea of an olive branch, a symbol of peace, came from a computer expert at the simulators. The call sign Columbia for the CSM came from Julian Scheer, the NASA Assistant Administrator for Public Affairs. He mentioned the idea to Collins in a conversation and Collins could not think of anything better. During the training for Apollo 11, Slayton offered to get Collins back into the crew sequence after the flight. Collins would most likely have been the backup commander of Apollo 14, followed by commander of Apollo 17, but he told Slayton he did not want to travel to space again if Apollo 11 was successful. The difficult schedule of an astronaut strained his family life. He wanted to help achieve John F. Kennedy's goal of landing on the Moon within the decade and had no interest in further exploration of the Moon once the goal was achieved. The assignment was given to Cernan. An estimated one million spectators watched the launch of Apollo 11 from the highways and beaches in the vicinity of the launch site. The launch was televised live in 33 countries, with an estimated 25 million viewers in the United States alone. Millions more listened to radio broadcasts. Propelled by a giant Saturn V rocket, Apollo 11 lifted off from Launch Complex 39A at the Kennedy Space Center on July 16, 1969, at 13:32 UTC (09:32 EDT), and entered Earth orbit twelve minutes later. After one and a half orbits, the S-IVB third-stage engine pushed the spacecraft onto its trajectory toward the Moon. About 30 minutes later, Collins performed the transposition, docking, and extraction maneuver. This involved separating Columbia from the spent S-IVB stage, turning around, and docking with the Lunar Module Eagle. After it was extracted, the combined spacecraft headed for the Moon, while the rocket stage flew on a trajectory past it. On July 19 at 17:21:50 UTC, Apollo 11 passed behind the Moon and fired its service propulsion engine to enter lunar orbit. In the thirty orbits that followed, the crew saw passing views of their landing site in the southern Sea of Tranquillity about 12 miles (19 km) southwest of the crater Sabine D. At 12:52:00 UTC on July 20, Aldrin and Armstrong entered Eagle and began the final preparations for lunar descent. At 17:44:00 Eagle separated from Columbia. Collins, alone aboard Columbia, inspected Eagle as it rotated before him to ensure the craft was not damaged and that the landing gear had correctly deployed before heading for the surface. During his day flying solo around the Moon, Collins never felt lonely. Although it has been said "not since Adam has any human known such solitude", Collins felt very much a part of the mission. In his autobiography he wrote "this venture has been structured for three men, and I consider my third to be as necessary as either of the other two". In the 48 minutes of each orbit when he was out of radio contact with the Earth while Columbia passed round the far side of the Moon, the feeling he reported was not fear or loneliness, but rather "awareness, anticipation, satisfaction, confidence, almost exultation". One of Collins' first tasks was to identify the lunar module on the ground. To give Collins an idea where to look, Mission Control radioed that they believed the lunar module landed about four miles off target. Each time he passed over the suspected landing site, he tried in vain to find the lunar module. On his first two orbits on the far side of the Moon, Collins performed maintenance activities such as dumping excess water produced by the fuel cells and preparing the cabin for Armstrong and Aldrin to return. Columbia orbited the Moon thirty times. Just before he reached the far side on the third orbit, Mission Control informed Collins there was a problem with the temperature of the coolant. If it became too cold, parts of Columbia might freeze. Mission Control advised him to assume manual control and implement Environmental Control System Malfunction Procedure 17. Instead, Collins flicked the switch on the offending system from automatic to manual and back to automatic again, and carried on with normal housekeeping chores, while keeping an eye on the temperature. When Columbia came back around to the near side of the Moon again, he was able to report that the problem had been resolved. For the next couple of orbits, he described his time on the far side of the Moon as "relaxing". After Aldrin and Armstrong completed their EVA, Collins slept so he could be rested for the rendezvous. While the flight plan called for Eagle to meet up with Columbia, Collins was prepared for certain contingencies in which he would fly Columbia down to meet Eagle. After spending so much time with the CSM, he felt compelled to leave his mark on it, so during the second night following their return from the Moon, he went to the lower equipment bay of the CM and wrote: "Spacecraft 107 – alias Apollo 11 – alias Columbia. The best ship to come down the line. God Bless Her. Michael Collins, CMP" In a July 2009 interview with The Guardian, Collins said that he was very worried about Armstrong and Aldrin's safety. He was also concerned in the event of their deaths on the Moon, he would be forced to return to Earth alone and, as the mission's sole survivor, be regarded as "a marked man for life". At 17:54 UTC on July 21, Eagle lifted off from the Moon to rejoin Collins aboard Columbia in lunar orbit. After rendezvous with Columbia, the ascent stage was jettisoned into lunar orbit, and Columbia made its way back to Earth. Columbia splashed down in the Pacific 1,440 nmi (2,660 km) east of Wake Island at 16:50 UTC (05:50 local time) on July 24. The total mission duration was eight days, three hours, 18 minutes, and thirty-five seconds. Divers passed biological isolation garments (BIGs) to the astronauts, and assisted them into the life raft. Though the chance of bringing back pathogens from the lunar surface was believed to be remote, it was still considered a possibility. The astronauts were winched on board the recovery helicopter, and flown to the aircraft carrier USS Hornet, where they spent the first part of the Earth-based portion of 21 days of quarantine (time in space was also counted), before moving on to Houston. On August 13, the three astronauts rode in parades in their honor in New York and Chicago, with about six million attendees. On the same evening in Los Angeles there was an official state dinner to celebrate the flight, attended by members of Congress, 44 governors, the Chief Justice of the United States, and ambassadors from 83 nations at the Century Plaza Hotel. In September, the astronauts embarked on a 38-day world tour that brought them to 22 foreign countries and included visits with world leaders. ## Post-NASA activities ### Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs NASA Administrator Thomas O. Paine told Collins that Secretary of State William P. Rogers was interested in appointing Collins to the position of Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs. After the crew returned to the U.S. in November, Collins sat down with Rogers and accepted the position on the urgings of President Nixon. He was an unusual choice for the role, as he was neither a journalist nor a career diplomat. Nor, unlike some of his predecessors, did he act as the department spokesperson. Instead, as the head of the State Department's Bureau of Public Affairs, his role was that of managing relations with the public at large. He had a staff of 115 and a budget of \$2.5 million, but this was small compared with the 6,000 public affairs staff at the United States Department of Defense. Collins was appointed to the position on December 15, 1969, and began his work on January 6, 1970. He took over at a very difficult time. The Vietnam War was going badly, and the invasion of Cambodia and the Kent State shootings had triggered a wave of protests and unrest across the country. He had no illusions about his ability to change minds, but attempted to engage with the public all the same, playing on his Apollo 11 fame. He attributed part of the nation's problems to insularity. In a 1970 commencement speech at Saint Michael's College in Vermont, he told his audience that "Farmers speak to farmers, students to students, business leaders to other business leaders, but this intramural talk serves mainly to mirror one's beliefs, to reinforce existing prejudices, to lock out opposing views". Collins realized he was not enjoying the job, and secured President Nixon's permission to become the Director of the National Air and Space Museum. His departure was officially announced on February 22, 1971, and his term as Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs ended on April 11, 1971. The position remained vacant until Carol Laise succeeded him in October 1973. ### Director of the National Air and Space Museum On August 12, 1946, Congress passed an authorization bill for a National Air Museum, to be administered by the Smithsonian Institution, and located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C. Under the U.S. legislative system, authorization is insufficient; Congress also has to pass an appropriation bill allocating funding. Since this was not done, there was no money for the museum building. The 1957 Sputnik crisis and the resulting Space Race led to a surge of public interest in space exploration. The Freedom 7 and Friendship 7 Project Mercury spacecraft were donated to the Smithsonian, and 2,670,000 visitors descended on the Arts and Industries Building when they were put on display in 1963. The museum was renamed the National Air and Space Museum in 1966, but there was still no funding to build it. Apollo 11 created another surge of interest in space. An exhibition of a Moon rock attracted 200,000 visitors in one month. On May 19, 1970, Senator Barry Goldwater, a retired USAF major general, gave an impassioned speech in the Senate for funding of a museum building. The job had a clearly defined and tangible goal: to obtain Congressional funding, and to build the museum. Collins lobbied hard for the new museum. With the help of Goldwater in particular, Congress relented, and on August 10, 1972, approved \$13 million and contract authority of \$27 million for its construction. The \$40 million budget was lower than he had hoped for, and the building had to be scaled back and some economies made. In addition to cost pressure, there was also severe time pressure, as the museum was scheduled to open on July 4, 1976, as part of celebrations of the upcoming United States Bicentennial. The design by architect Gyo Obata of the St. Louis firm Hellmuth Obata & Kassabaumof aimed to harmonize the new museum with the other ones on the National Mall, so the exteriors were faced with Tennessee marble to match the façade of the National Gallery of Art. Gilbane Building Company was awarded the construction contract. Everything was fast-tracked. Contracts were awarded as soon as each component of the design was complete. This allowed the first contract to be awarded within five months of the start of design. The design was completed in just nine months, and all contracts were awarded within a year of the start of design. Ground was broken on the new museum on November 20, 1972. The building was built horizontally rather than vertically, as is the norm, so that work on the interiors could proceed concurrently. Overseeing construction was but a part of Collins' task: he also had to hire museum staff, oversee the creation of exhibits, and launch the Museum's Center for Earth and Planetary Studies, a new division devoted to research and analysis of lunar and planetary spacecraft data. Collins described the project as "a monumental effort" in which "individual creativity combined with dedicated teamwork and plain hard work". The museum was completed on budget, and opened three days ahead of schedule on July 1, 1976. President Gerald Ford presided over the formal opening ceremony. Over one million visitors passed through its doors in the first month, and it quickly established itself as one of the world's most popular museums, averaging between eight and nine million visitors per annum over the next two decades. Visitors entering saw Columbia in the Milestones of Flight Hall, along with the Wright Flyer, the Spirit of St. Louis and Glamorous Glennis. Collins held the directorship until 1978, when he stepped down to become undersecretary of the Smithsonian Institution. During this time, although no longer an active-duty USAF officer after he joined the State Department in 1970, he remained in the U.S. Air Force Reserve. He attained the rank of major general in 1976, and retired in 1982. ### Other activities Collins completed the Harvard Business School's Advanced Management Program in 1974, and in 1980 became vice president of LTV Aerospace in Arlington, Virginia. He resigned in 1985 to start his own consulting firm, Michael Collins Associates. He wrote an autobiography in 1974 entitled Carrying the Fire: An Astronaut's Journeys. The New York Times writer John Wilford wrote that it is "generally regarded as the best account of what it is like to be an astronaut." Collins has also written Liftoff: The Story of America's Adventure in Space (1988), a history of the American space program, Mission to Mars (1990), a non-fiction book on human spaceflight to Mars, and Flying to the Moon and Other Strange Places (1976), revised and re-released as Flying to the Moon: An Astronaut's Story (1994), a children's book on his experiences. Along with his writing, he has painted watercolors, mostly of the Florida Everglades or aircraft he has flown; they are rarely space-related. He did not initially sign his paintings to avoid them increasing in price just because they had his autograph on them. Collins lived with his wife, Pat, in Marco Island, Florida, and Avon, North Carolina, until her death in April 2014. ## Death On April 28, 2021, Collins died of cancer at his home in Naples, Florida, at the age of 90. Buzz Aldrin, who became the last survivor of Apollo 11, said that "wherever [Collins has] been or will be, you will always have the Fire to Carry us deftly to new heights and the future." On January 30, 2023, Collins’ ashes were interred in Arlington National Cemetery. ## Honors and awards Collins was a long-time trustee of the National Geographic Society and served as Trustee Emeritus. He was also a fellow of the Society of Experimental Test Pilots and the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics. Collins was inducted into four halls of fame: the International Air & Space Hall of Fame (1971), the International Space Hall of Fame (1977), the U.S. Astronaut Hall of Fame (1993), and the National Aviation Hall of Fame (1985). In 2008 he was inducted into the Aerospace Walk of Honor in Lancaster, California. The International Astronomical Union honored him by naming an asteroid after him, 6471 Collins. Also, like the other two Apollo 11 crew members, he has a lunar crater named after him. Collins was awarded the Air Force Distinguished Flying Cross in 1966 for his work in the Gemini Project. He was also awarded Air Force Command Pilot Astronaut Wings. Deputy NASA Administrator Robert Seamans pinned the NASA Exceptional Service Medal on Collins and Young in 1966 for their role in the Gemini 10 mission. For the Apollo Project, he was awarded the Air Force Distinguished Service Medal, and the NASA Distinguished Service Medal. He was awarded the Legion of Merit in 1977. Along with the rest of the Apollo 11 crew, he was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom with Distinction by President Nixon in 1969 at the state dinner in their honor. The three were awarded the Collier Trophy and the General Thomas D. White USAF Space Trophy in 1969. The National Aeronautic Association president awarded a duplicate trophy to Collins and Aldrin at a ceremony. The trio received the international Harmon Trophy for aviators in 1970, conferred to them by Vice President Spiro Agnew in 1971. Agnew also presented them the Hubbard Medal of the National Geographic Society in 1970. He told them, "You've won a place alongside Christopher Columbus in American history". Collins also received the Iven C. Kincheloe Award from the Society of Experimental Test Pilots (SETP) in 1970. In 1989, some of his personal papers were transferred to Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University. In 1999, while celebrating the 30th anniversary of the lunar landing, Vice President Al Gore, who was also the vice chancellor of the Smithsonian Institution's Board of Regents, presented the Apollo 11 crew with the Smithsonian's Langley Gold Medal for aviation. After the ceremony, the crew went to the White House and presented President Bill Clinton with an encased Moon rock. The crew was awarded the New Frontier Congressional Gold Medal in the Capitol Rotunda in 2011. It is the highest civilian award that can be received in the United States. During the ceremony, NASA administrator Charles Bolden said, "Those of us who have had the privilege to fly in space followed the trail they forged." ## In popular culture Collins is one of the astronauts featured in the 2007 documentary In the Shadow of the Moon. He had a small part as "Old Man" in the 2009 movie Youth in Revolt. In the 1996 TV movie Apollo 11, he was played by Jim Metzler, and in the 1998 HBO miniseries From the Earth to the Moon, he was played by Cary Elwes. In the 2009 TV movie Moon Shot, he was played by Andrew Lincoln. In the 2018 film First Man, he was portrayed by Lukas Haas, and he is featured in the 2019 documentary film Apollo 11. For contributions to the television industry, the Apollo 11 astronauts were honored with round plaques on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. In For All Mankind he is portrayed by Ryan Kennedy. In The Crown he is portrayed by Andrew-Lee Potts. English prog rock group Jethro Tull recorded a song "For Michael Collins, Jeffrey and Me", which appears on the Benefit album from 1970. The song compares the feelings of misfitting from vocalist Ian Anderson (and friend Jeffrey Hammond) with the astronaut's own, as he is left behind by the ones who had the privilege of walking on the surface of the Moon. In 2013, indie pop group The Boy Least Likely To released the song "Michael Collins" on the album The Great Perhaps. The song uses Collins' feeling that he was blessed to have the type of solitude of being truly separated from all other human contact in contrast with modern society's lack of perspective. American folk artist John Craigie recorded a song titled "Michael Collins" for his 2017 album No Rain, No Rose. The song embraces his role as an integral part of the Apollo 11 mission with the chorus, "Sometimes you take the fame, sometimes you sit back stage, but if it weren't for me them boys would still be there." Collins provided narration for the Google Doodle that commemorated the 50th anniversary of Apollo 11's 1969 mission to the Moon. ## Works ## See also - Apollo 11 in popular culture - List of spaceflight records

Hurricane Carol

Category 3 Atlantic hurricane in 1954

Hurricane Carol was among the worst tropical cyclones on record to affect the states of Connecticut and Rhode Island in the United States. It developed from a tropical wave near the Bahamas on August 25, 1954, and slowly strengthened as it moved northwestward. On August 27, Carol intensified to reach winds of 105 mph (169 km/h), but weakened as its motion turned to a northwest drift. A strong trough of low pressure turned the hurricane northeastward, and Carol later intensified into a major hurricane. While paralleling the Mid-Atlantic and Southeastern United States, the storm produced strong winds and rough seas that caused minor coastal flooding and slight damage to houses in North Carolina, Virginia, Washington, D.C., Delaware, and New Jersey. The well-organized hurricane accelerated north-northeastward and made landfall on eastern Long Island, New York, and then over eastern Connecticut on August 31 with sustained winds estimated at 110-mph and a barometric pressure near 956 mb. Carol later transitioned into an extratropical cyclone over New Hampshire, on August 31, 1954. In New York, strong winds on Long Island damaged about 1,000 houses, left 275,000 people without electricity, downed many trees, and resulted in heavy crop losses. Storm surge flooded LaGuardia Airport and inundated the Montauk Highway, which left the eastern portion of Long Island isolated. Carol also brought strong winds and rough seas to coastal Connecticut, Rhode Island, and southeastern Massachusetts. Throughout the region, about 150,000 people were left without electricity and telephone service. 1,545 houses were destroyed and another 9,720 were damaged. Approximately 3,500 cars and 3,000 boats were destroyed. There were 65 deaths and 1,000 injuries in New England. The storm caused an additional \$1 million in damage in Canada as well as two deaths. Overall, Carol caused 72 fatalities and damage totaled \$462 million (1954 USD), making it the costliest hurricane in the history of the United States, at the time. Following the storm, the name "Carol" was used once more for a 1965 hurricane that remained far out in the Atlantic, then was permanently retired. ## Meteorological history A tropical wave spawned a tropical depression over the northeastern Bahamas on August 25. It moved to the north-northwest and intensified into a tropical storm early on August 26. Receiving the name Carol, the storm gradually turned to the north, and strengthened under generally favorable conditions. On August 26, the Hurricane Hunters reported an eye, 23 miles (37 km) in diameter despite Carol being a tropical storm. The next day, Carol strengthened to attain hurricane status while located about 345 miles (555 km) east of Cape Canaveral, Florida. With a large anticyclone persisting across the southeastern United States, the motion of Carol turned to a northwest drift. The hurricane continued to strengthen, and Carol reached an initial peak intensity of 105 mph (169 km/h) on August 28. By that time, it was a small hurricane, and the radius of maximum winds was smaller than normal for its latitude and central pressure. After maintaining peak intensity for 30 hours and moving a distance of about 75 miles (121 km), Carol weakened slightly off the coast of Georgia. An eastward moving deep-wave trough intensified as it moved through the eastern United States. This caused Carol to accelerate as it turned to the north and north-northeast. On August 30, the hurricane again strengthened to reach Category 2 status while located 180 miles (290 km) east of Savannah, Georgia. Early on August 31, Carol passed very near Cape Hatteras, North Carolina with reconnaissance aircraft intensity estimates from 75–125 mph (121–201 km/h). The hurricane continued north-northeastward with a forward motion of up to 39 mph (63 km/h), and Carol intensified further to make landfall on eastern Long Island a Category 3 hurricane with peak winds of 115 mph (185 km/h). After quickly crossing Long Island Sound, the hurricane made landfall again near Groton, Connecticut,. Carol had maintained its small structure and well-defined eye, and observers on both eastern Long Island and Groton, Connecticut reported blue skies and light winds as the eye passed overhead, followed by strong hurricane-force winds. The landfall intensity was based on a pressure of 957 mbar (28.3 inHg) recorded in Groton, Connecticut. Ninety percent of homes in the Groton Long Point area were destroyed by the storm surge and winds in Hurricane Carol. Carol quickly lost tropical characteristics while crossing into inland eastern Massachusetts, and became extratropical over southwestern New Hampshire, late on August 31. The powerful extratropical storm continued northward, before losing its identity after entering Canada, over southern Quebec. ## Impact ### Mid-Atlantic Before affecting North Carolina, the threat of Carol prompted a hurricane warning from Wilmington to Manteo. Storm warnings were issued southward to Charleston. Residents evacuated north of Wilmington along the ocean. While passing by the state, the strongest winds remained to the east of Hurricane Carol, though winds of 90 to 100 mph (140 to 160 km/h) were reported at Cape Hatteras. Further inland, the hurricane produced a wind gust of 55 mph (89 km/h) in Wilmington and 65 mph (105 km/h) in Cherry Point. The winds resulted in agricultural damage to the corn and soy bean crop. High winds caused minor damage to roofs and houses, and also downed some trees and power lines. Near the coast, waves from the storm damaged fishing piers, and flooding was reported in New Bern. High waves also damaged coastal roadways. Damage in the state totaled to around \$228,000. Carol passed 100 miles (160 km) to the east of Virginia, and produced 40 mph (64 km/h) winds in Virginia Beach. The hurricane produced 4 inches (100 mm) of rain in Norfolk. Further to the northwest, rainfall from the system alleviated drought conditions in the Washington, D.C. area. Damage was minor from Virginia to Delaware, where light rains fell. Precipitation also extended into Pennsylvania. In New Jersey, high winds downed power lines, which killed two people. Along the coast, high waves damaged boardwalks and caused flooding. In neighboring Pennsylvania, Carol caused a tractor to crash into a train, resulting in two deaths. Damage in the state was estimated at \$250,000. On eastern Long Island near where Carol made landfall, a pressure of 960 mbar (28 inHg) was recorded. Winds on the island gusted to 125 mph (200 km/h), leaving thousands of homes without power. The winds downed many trees, and left heavy crop damage to various fruits. High winds damaged widespread homes, boats, and cars. About 1,000 houses were damaged on the island, and 275,000 people lost power. The hurricane's storm surge covered the Montauk Highway in Montauk, effectively isolating eastern Long Island for a period of time. Flooding also affected LaGuardia Airport. Due to the compact nature of the storm, areas west of Fire Island were largely unaffected by the hurricane. There were power outages in New York City, but little damage. Damage was estimated at \$5 million in the state, and one death was reported, after thousands of people evacuated. ### New England and Canada Hurricane Carol produced hurricane and gale-force winds across New England. Strong winds from Hurricane Carol destroyed nearly 40% of the apple, corn, peach, and tomato crops from eastern Connecticut to Cape Cod. Overall crop damage was estimated at \$22.25 million. The hurricane destroyed several thousand homes in New England, many of which were destroyed from the waters or the powerful winds. Overall, 11,785 families were directly impacted by the hurricane, including 9,720 houses that were damaged and 1,545 that were destroyed. High winds left over 150,000 people without power in New England, potentially as many as one-third of all of New England, and many residents also lost phone service. The hurricane also destroyed 3,500 cars and 3,000 boats in the region. Heavy rainfall from the storm caused traffic accidents, but only minor flooding. Throughout the United States, Hurricane Carol caused \$461 million in damage, mostly in New England, making it the costliest Atlantic hurricane at the time. There were 65 deaths in New England, and about 1,000 injured people. Despite the high damage, advance warning allowed for many fewer deaths than the total of 488 fatalities during the 1938 New England hurricane, which affected the same area with similar strength. However, some areas did not receive advance warning, due to power outages preventing people from receiving Weather Bureau warnings ahead of the storm. Hurricane Carol struck Connecticut shortly after high tide, and its combination with 10 to 15 feet (3.0 to 4.6 m) storm surges from New London eastward produced widespread tidal flooding. About 2,000 people were stranded when a rail line between New Haven and Rhode Island was flooded. The heaviest rainfall associated with the passage of the storm occurred in New London, where up to 6 inches (150 mm) fell and wind blew off a portion of the city hall roof. These strong winds left much of the eastern portion of the state without power. Near the coast, the combination of strong winds and the storm surge damaged or destroyed thousands of buildings, including 100 destroyed houses. Many other homes in Eastern Connecticut were damaged by falling trees. Thousands had evacuated before the storm reached the area, and one person died in the state. Due to the compact nature of the storm, western Connecticut experienced little effects from Carol. Overall damage in the state was estimated at \$50 million. The hurricane produced a record-high wind gust of 135 mph (217 km/h) at Block Island, while on mainland Rhode Island, sustained winds peaked at 90 mph (140 km/h) in Warwick with gusts to 105 mph (169 km/h). Upon making landfall around high tide, Carol produced a storm surge of up to 14.4 feet (4.4 m) in Narragansett Bay, surpassing that of the New England Hurricane of 1938. The resulting storm surge flooded downtown Providence with 12 feet (3.7 m) of water. News reports indicated that the floods covered the area with 4 feet (1.2 m) in about an hour. The winds downed two broadcasting towers in the city. Westerly was also flooded, where 200 homes were washed away. There was also heavy damage in Newport, where the Newport Casino was damaged. Some entire coastal communities were nearly destroyed, and 620 houses and 83 other buildings were destroyed in the state. The winds destroyed the roofs of hundreds of buildings, forcing many to evacuate to shelters during the passage of the storm. The powerful winds also downed thousands of trees and power lines, blacking out the entire state and interrupting 95 percent of phone service. Damage in the state totaled about \$200 million, and there were at least 17 deaths in Rhode Island. Before Carol affected the area, 20,000 people evacuated from Cape Cod. In Massachusetts, the hurricane produced winds between 80 and 110 mph (130 and 180 km/h) across much of the eastern part of the state. Gusts reached 80 mph (130 km/h) at Blue Hill Meteorological Observatory, and the highest gusts in the state were around 125 mph (201 km/h). The winds downed about 50 million board feet of trees in the state, many of which fell onto power lines; much of eastern Massachusetts lost power during the storm. Carol left about \$15 million in crop damage in the state. The winds destroyed much of the corn crop, about half of the peach crop, and about 1.5 million bushels of apples. Heavy damage was reported throughout Boston, where high winds destroyed the spire of the Old North Church, the location of the hung lanterns during Paul Revere's ride. It was a replacement spire, after a hurricane in 1804 destroyed the original. In Wareham, about 1,500 people were left homeless. Statewide, 3,350 homes were damaged to some degree, and another 800 were destroyed. The hurricane destroyed another 213 buildings and severely damaged. Near the coast, strong storm surges were reported, and a 20 feet (6.1 m) storm tide was reported at New Bedford, setting a record. At least 15 deaths were reported in the state, and damage was estimated at \$175 million. In Dedham, Massachusetts, the hurricane knocked down the 80-foot bell tower on the East Dedham firehouse, today the oldest wooden firehouse in the country. The tower flew across the station and landed on 219 Bussey St, the house next door, where Louise Guerrio was feeding her one-year-old son, Joseph. It also crushed three cars parked on Bussey St. Carol maintained its intensity as it moved inland, and its winds were strong enough to knock down trees and power lines in New Hampshire. One tree fell onto a car, killing a person, and there were three deaths overall in the state, along with \$3 million in damage. There was also a death in neighboring Vermont. Carol produced winds of up to 80 mph (130 km/h) in Augusta, Maine. Throughout the state, the winds downed hundreds of trees, some of which damaged houses, wrecked cars, destroyed one building, or fell onto power lines. Fallen trees blocked highways, and one person was injured by a falling tree limb. Downed power lines left several counties without power or telephone services. The winds flattened hundreds of acres of corn in North Livermore, and throughout the state, there was heavy damage to the apple crop. Damage to the apple crop amounted to \$1.7 million. While moving west of Maine, the hurricane dropped heavy rainfall, including a report of 2.15 inches (55 mm) in 12 hours. Along the coast, high waves damaged boats. In Maine, the hurricane killed three people, injured at least eight, and caused \$10 million in damage, the costliest natural disaster in the state's history. Carol lost this distinction 10 days later when Hurricane Edna caused \$15 million in damage in the state. Rainfall in Canada peaked at 4.27 inches (108 mm) in Quebec. In Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, wind gusts peaked at 47 mph (76 km/h). In Quebec, the extratropical remnants of Carol downed trees and power lines in Montreal from wind gusts as high as 55 mph (89 km/h). Widespread power outages were reported in New Brunswick and Quebec, and downed trees struck three cars in Saint John, New Brunswick. The storm caused flights to be canceled, trees and power lines came down in Montreal due to 60 m.p.h. wind gusts, and road underpasses were flooded. Damage there totaled about \$1 million (1954 CAD, US\$980,000). Two people were killed, one of whom due to drowning on a sunken barge in Quebec City. ## Aftermath Governor of Rhode Island Dennis J. Roberts declared martial law for the state after Carol caused heavy damage. In Massachusetts, the National Guard were deployed to six towns to prevent looting. National Guardsmen flew a plane of dry ice from Newark, New Jersey to Boston to assist the widespread areas without power and refrigeration. Widespread areas were without power for days, and in some areas for up to a week, until crews could repair downed lines. Spoiled food due to lack of refrigeration resulted in about \$1 million in losses. Power crews from elsewhere in the United States arrived to assist in the restoration. Workers quickly removed trees from highways. Damaged factories in Rhode Island prevented employees from working for three weeks after the storm. The steeple of the Old North Church in Boston was rebuilt in 1955, after residents throughout the country provided \$150,000 in donations. Governor of Maine Burton M. Cross declared a state of emergency for the state. The Small Business Administration declared six counties in Maine as disaster areas. In the days after the storm, President of the United States Dwight Eisenhower declared Massachusetts and Rhode Island as federal disaster areas. The federal government provided financial aid, amounting to \$1.5 million in Massachusetts. The president ordered for troops to assist in the aftermath. The American Red Cross quickly deployed teams to the most affected areas, feeding hundreds of families. About 12 days after Carol struck New England, Hurricane Edna struck eastern Massachusetts, causing an additional \$40 million in damage and 20 deaths. More disaster aid was provided after the second hurricane. The high damage caused by Hurricane Carol and other hurricanes in 1954 prompted the United States government to devote research to set up the National Hurricane Research Project. Hurricane Hunters and the Weather Bureau collected data on subsequent hurricanes to determine their structure, as well as attempted to weaken storms with silver iodide via Project Stormfury. Due to the high damage, the name Carol was removed from the naming list for 10 years. The name was reused in the 1965 season, but was retroactively retired, and it will never again be used for an Atlantic hurricane. Carol was the first Atlantic hurricane name in history to be retired. It was replaced with Camille for the first and only time in 1969. ## See also - List of North Carolina hurricanes - Hurricane Bob – A storm with similar track and intensity in 1991 - Hurricane Irene – Another significant storm that made landfall in New England in 2011. - Hurricane Sandy - A hurricane that in 2012, ultimately broke many of Carol's records, including the costliest hurricane in New England.

Constantine (son of Basil I)

Byzantine emperor from 868 to 879

Constantine (Greek: Κωνσταντῖνος; born between 855 and c. 865, died 3 September 879) was a junior Byzantine emperor, alongside Basil I as the senior emperor, from January 868 to 3 September 879. His parentage is a matter of debate, but historians generally assume him to be the son of Emperor Basil I (r. 867–886) and his first wife Maria or second wife Eudokia Ingerina; other theories include him being the son of Emperor Michael III (r. 842–867) and Eudokia. Constantine was made co-emperor by Basil in c. January 868. He was engaged to Ermengard of Italy, the daughter of Holy Roman Emperor Louis II, in 870/871, but it is not known if he married her; some sources suggest he did, and others argue that there is no concrete evidence. Constantine was the intended heir of Basil and as such received much attention from him and accompanied him on military campaigns, including one in Syria, for which he shared a triumph. In comparison, his younger brother, Leo VI (r. 886–912), was made co-emperor merely to secure the imperial lineage and bolster legitimacy. However, Constantine died of fever on 3 September 879, before his father. After his death, Leo became the primary heir, and another brother, Alexander (r. 912–913), was raised to co-emperor. ## Life ### Parentage According to Nicholas Adontz, Constantine was born c. 855, although the historian Shaun Tougher posits a birthdate of 864 or after. Constantine's parentage is heavily disputed, but Byzantine emperor Basil I (r. 867–886) was nominally his father. Basil had been born into a well-off peasant family, before gaining the notice of Emperor Michael III (r. 842–867), and subsequently became his confidant and Parakoimomenos (chief minister). Sources state that Basil had been married to Maria before he became emperor, and produced at least one child, Anastasia, and possibly Constantine himself, before being ordered by Michael III to divorce her and marry Eudokia Ingerina (r. 866–882), which he did. Eudokia is reported by some sources to have been the mistress of Michael III, and to have remained so even after marrying Basil. The exact date of the wedding is unknown, but the marriage of Basil to Eudokia has been traditionally dated to c. 865, based upon the timeline of the 10th-century Pseudo-Symeon; although historians such as Romilly Jenkins and Patricia Karlin-Hayter have questioned the validity of this timeline. Jenkins also points to the "chronological incongruities" of Symeon Logothete's narrative of Michael's reign, casting further doubt on the marriage date of Basil and Eudokia. Cyril Mango contends that Constantine was the child of Basil and Maria, along with Anastasia, a view shared by George Ostrogorsky. The British byzantinist Judith Herrin posits a different date for the marriage of Basil and Eudokia, which would make Eudokia the mother of Constantine. Leo Grammaticus, a 10th-century historian, suggests that Constantine was the son of Michael and Eudokia. The historians Lynda Garland and Shaun Tougher do not take a position in their 2007 work but admit that any of the three are possible. Some sources hostile to the Macedonian dynasty, which was founded by Basil, have suggested that other sons of Basil were not his own. These sources claim that Eudokia was Michael's mistress, and that the marriage between Basil and Eudokia was intended to be in name only. Accordingly, the parentage of both Leo VI (r. 886–912) and Stephen I of Constantinople, has been questioned, leaving Alexander (r. 912–913) as Basil's only legitimate son. Most modern scholars doubt the accuracy of such claims, considering Leo as the legitimate son of Basil and Eudokia. In his 1994 Ph.D. thesis, Tougher supports the theory that Constantine was the son of Eudokia. In his later 1997 work, he debates much of the reasoning behind considering Constantine to be Maria's son, and states that "there is no reason to believe that he was not a son of Eudokia", but does not definitively identify a mother for Constantine. In his 1994 work, he points out that many Byzantine chroniclers consider Constantine to be the son of Basil, and that many historians use an argument that Constantine was Maria's son as a way to explain why Leo, but not Constantine, was said to be hated by Basil, as Basil would therefore consider Constantine his true son. He also posits that Alexander, who could not possibly be Michael's son, by virtue of being born after his death, was not elevated in place of Constantine and Leo, suggesting that either Basil believed them both to be his own sons, or else was not bothered by them not being such, and that Michael does not seem to have viewed Leo in any paternal way. Tougher questions the arguments that preclude Constantine from being the son of Eudokia, by arguing that if he was born after the marriage of Eudokia and Basil, he would have been too young to campaign with his father in 878; he states that, given the issues related to the chronology of the marriage of Basil and Eudokia, it is possible that Constantine would be of fighting age. Arnold J. Toynbee puts forth the argument that parents may have different feelings for sons, and the difference of personality is as likely as different mothers to explain why Basil preferred Constantine to Leo. In his 1997 work, Tougher points out that Mango's reconstruction is ingenious, but convoluted, arguing that Michael could simply have adopted Constantine, rather than enacting a conspiracy to have his child, whom he could not have known would be male, born in the purple. This is reinforced by the fact that Alexander was only made emperor in 879, after Constantine's death. Tougher also points out that Leo VI advocated bringing the son of noblemen, called "noble whelps", on campaigns in his Tactica, the same term that the Life of Basil uses for Constantine in its narrative of the 878 campaign; Constantine may have been 13/14 at the time, and therefore it is possible he was the son of Eudokia. Adontz's contention that Constantine must have been born around 855, and therefore the son of Maria, is based on Contantine's engagement to Ermengard of Italy, the daughter of Holy Roman Emperor Louis II (r. 844–875); Tougher considers that this was more of a child's engagement than a true marriage and that, given that many Byzantine men were married at age 15, this may point to him being younger. Pro-Macedonian sources such as Leo VI and his son Constantine VII, as well as Joseph Genesius, exclude information regarding Basil's first marriage to Maria. Constantine VII states that all of his aunts and uncles were the legitimate children of Basil and Eudokia, and Leo goes further, stating that Basil and Eudokia produced children before being married to each other. Constantine VII gives an idealized version of Basil's reign, stating that when Basil was crowned at the Hagia Sophia, he was followed by a chariot containing Eudokia, Constantine, and Leo, and that both Constantine and Leo were crowned at the same time as Basil, in 867, with which no other source agrees. Anti-Macedonian sources, such as Symeon Logothete, usually assume that Constantine was the son of Eudokia, and provide information regarding the alleged infidelity of Eudokia, and the arrangement between Michael and Basil. ### Later life Basil rose to co-emperor by convincing Michael that his uncle Bardas was plotting against him and, after slaying Bardas with Michael's blessing, was crowned on 26 May 866. Tensions between Basil and Michael built up, and Basil feared that he would be replaced, as Michael had threatened to make the patrikios Basiliskianos emperor instead. Therefore, on the night of 23/24 September 867, Basil and his conspirators murdered Michael in his bed, making Basil the sole emperor. Constantine, along with the rest of his brothers, was educated by Photios, later the Patriarch of Constantinople; Photios may also have been Constantine's godfather although some sources, such as Tougher, believe Photios was the godfather of Leo, rather than Constantine. Constantine is thought by historians to have received more direct education and attention from Basil, whereas his other brothers may have been accompanied by court eunuchs. Constantine was made co-emperor by Basil in c. January 868, and was his intended heir. Some historians date the coronation to 6 January 868, the Feast of Epiphany, but there is no certainty of this; the ceremony could also have taken place on 25 December 867. Although Leo was raised to co-emperor on 6 January 870, Tougher views it likely that although Leo technically shared in imperial status, he was intended to live a life of obscurity, existing only to secure the imperial succession, much as Alexander would later under Leo himself. Constantine was engaged to Ermengard of Italy, the daughter of Holy Roman Emperor Louis II, in 870/871. The historians Charles Previté-Orton and Werner Ohnsorge take the position that they married, but Tougher (1994) argues that there is no evidence of this. Constantine served in military campaigns alongside his father, to prepare him to be a military leader, including a campaign in Syria, for which he shared a triumph in Constantinople with his father in 878. In January 879, Constantine and his father campaigned in the region of Germanicia, to great success. That summer, they returned and plundered Germanicia and Adata, and raided northern Mesopotamia. Constantine is mentioned as Emperor in The Acts of the Eighth Ecumenical Council. He also appears, bearing the title basileus, on several coins, alongside Basil and other members of his family. #### Death Constantine died unexpectedly of fever on 3 September 879, leaving Leo as the primary heir. Basil was severely affected by Constantine's death, and declared a period of mourning, possibly lasting up to six months, until 3 March 880. Much of the coinage made after Constantine's death focuses upon him. Jenkins says that after Constantine's death "Basil went out of mind, and continued during the next seven years to be subject to fits of derangement", and relates that Basil became violent and contemptuous toward Leo, whom he "had never cared for", despising his "bookish youth"; Tougher considers this "at best, an overstatement". Tougher does concede that pro-Macedonian sources have an obvious bias in declaring that Basil recovered "manfully, inspired by the example of Job", but believes Basil's shock was due more to the loss of an heir whom Basil had trained well, and expected to succeed him, rather than true favoritism. Basil also had Constantine declared a saint by Photios I, the Patriarch of Constantinople, confirmed by the Synaxarion of Constantinople. The Life of Ignatios states that Basil had numerous churches and monasteries built in honor of Constantine, including one at a location where Bishop Theodore Santabarenos was supposedly able to summon the ghost of Constantine for Basil. After Constantine's death, Basil focused on securing his dynasty by marrying Leo to Theophano Martinakia, so they could produce heirs, and Tougher (1994) remarks that Basil may have become overprotective, shielding his remaining children from warfare. Alexander is believed to have been crowned emperor following Constantine's death, in 879. Basil imprisoned Leo and stripped him of imperial rank in 883, allegedly for his plans to usurp him, whereafter Alexander appears to have become the heir, until July 886, when Leo was released and restored as emperor. Just a month later, on 29 August 886, Basil died of wounds from a hunting trip, and Leo succeeded him.

Cane toad

World's largest true toad

The cane toad (Rhinella marina), also known as the giant neotropical toad or marine toad, is a large, terrestrial true toad native to South and mainland Central America, but which has been introduced to various islands throughout Oceania and the Caribbean, as well as Northern Australia. It is a member of the genus Rhinella, which includes many true toad species found throughout Central and South America, but it was formerly assigned to the genus Bufo. The cane toad is an old species. A fossil toad (specimen UCMP 41159) from the La Venta fauna of the late Miocene in Colombia is indistinguishable from modern cane toads from northern South America. It was discovered in a floodplain deposit, which suggests the R. marina habitat preferences have long been for open areas. The cane toad is a prolific breeder; females lay single-clump spawns with thousands of eggs. Its reproductive success is partly because of opportunistic feeding: it has a diet, unusual among anurans, of both dead and living matter. Adults average 10–15 cm (4–6 in) in length; the largest recorded specimen had a snout-vent length of 24 cm (9.4 in). The cane toad has poison glands, and the tadpoles are highly toxic to most animals if ingested. Its toxic skin can kill many animals, both wild and domesticated, and cane toads are particularly dangerous to dogs. Because of its voracious appetite, the cane toad has been introduced to many regions of the Pacific and the Caribbean islands as a method of agricultural pest control. The common name of the species is derived from its use against the cane beetle (Dermolepida albohirtum), which damages sugar cane. The cane toad is now considered a pest and an invasive species in many of its introduced regions. The 1988 film Cane Toads: An Unnatural History documented the trials and tribulations of the introduction of cane toads in Australia. ## Taxonomy Historically, the cane toads were used to eradicate pests from sugarcane, giving rise to their common name. The cane toad has many other common names, including "giant toad" and "marine toad"; the former refers to its size, and the latter to the binomial name, R. marina. It was one of many species described by Carl Linnaeus in his 18th-century work Systema Naturae (1758). Linnaeus based the specific epithet marina on an illustration by Dutch zoologist Albertus Seba, who mistakenly believed the cane toad to inhabit both terrestrial and marine environments. Other common names include "giant neotropical toad", "Dominican toad", "giant marine toad", and "South American cane toad". In Trinidadian English, they are commonly called crapaud, the French word for toad. The genus Rhinella is considered to constitute a distinct genus of its own, thus changing the scientific name of the cane toad. In this case, the specific name marinus (masculine) changes to marina (feminine) to conform with the rules of gender agreement as set out by the International Code of Zoological Nomenclature, changing the binomial name from Bufo marinus to Rhinella marina; the binomial Rhinella marinus was subsequently introduced as a synonym through misspelling by Pramuk, Robertson, Sites, and Noonan (2008). Though controversial (with many traditional herpetologists still using Bufo marinus) the binomial Rhinella marina is gaining in acceptance with such bodies as the IUCN, Encyclopaedia of Life, Amphibian Species of the World and increasing numbers of scientific publications adopting its usage. Since 2016, cane toad populations native to Mesoamerica and northwestern South America are sometimes considered to be a separate species, Rhinella horribilis. In Australia, the adults may be confused with large native frogs from the genera Limnodynastes, Cyclorana, and Mixophyes. These species can be distinguished from the cane toad by the absence of large parotoid glands behind their eyes and the lack of a ridge between the nostril and the eye. Cane toads have been confused with the giant burrowing frog (Heleioporus australiacus), because both are large and warty in appearance; however, the latter can be readily distinguished from the former by its vertical pupils and its silver-grey (as opposed to gold) irises. Juvenile cane toads may be confused with species of the genus Uperoleia, but their adult colleagues can be distinguished by the lack of bright colouring on the groin and thighs. In the United States, the cane toad closely resembles many bufonid species. In particular, it could be confused with the southern toad (Bufo terrestris), which can be distinguished by the presence of two bulbs in front of the parotoid glands. ### Taxonomy and evolution The cane toad genome has been sequenced and certain Australian academics believe this will help in understanding how the toad can quickly evolve to adapt to new environments, the workings of its infamous toxin, and hopefully provide new options for halting this species' march across Australia and other places it has spread as an invasive pest. Studies of the genome confirm its evolutionary origins in northern part of South America and its close genetic relation to Rhinella diptycha and other similar species of the genus. Recent studies suggest that R. marina diverged between 2.75 and 9.40 million years ago. A recent split in the species into further subspecies may have occurred approximately 2.7 million years ago following the isolation of population groups by the rising Venezuelan Andes. ## Description Considered the largest species in the Bufonidae, the cane toad is very large; the females are significantly longer than males, reaching a typical length of 10–15 cm (4–6 in), with a maximum of 24 cm (9.4 in). Larger toads tend to be found in areas of lower population density. They have a life expectancy of 10 to 15 years in the wild, and can live considerably longer in captivity, with one specimen reportedly surviving for 35 years. The skin of the cane toad is dry and warty. Distinct ridges above the eyes run down the snout. Individual cane toads can be grey, yellowish, red-brown, or olive-brown, with varying patterns. A large parotoid gland lies behind each eye. The ventral surface is cream-coloured and may have blotches in shades of black or brown. The pupils are horizontal and the irises golden. The toes have a fleshy webbing at their base, and the fingers are free of webbing. Typically, juvenile cane toads have smooth, dark skin, although some specimens have a red wash. Juveniles lack the adults' large parotoid glands, so they are usually less poisonous. The tadpoles are small and uniformly black, and are bottom-dwellers, tending to form schools. Tadpoles range from 10 to 25 mm (0.4 to 1.0 in) in length. ## Ecology, behaviour and life history The common name "marine toad" and the scientific name Rhinella marina suggest a link to marine life, but cane toads do not live in the sea. However, laboratory experiments suggest that tadpoles can tolerate salt concentrations equivalent to 15% of seawater (\~5.4‰), and recent field observations found living tadpoles and toadlets at salinities of 27.5‰ on Coiba Island, Panama. The cane toad inhabits open grassland and woodland, and has displayed a "distinct preference" for areas modified by humans, such as gardens and drainage ditches. In their native habitats, the toads can be found in subtropical forests, although dense foliage tends to limit their dispersal. The cane toad begins life as an egg, which is laid as part of long strings of jelly in water. A female lays 8,000–25,000 eggs at once and the strings can stretch up to 20 m (66 ft) in length. The black eggs are covered by a membrane and their diameter is about 1.7–2.0 mm (0.067–0.079 in). The rate at which an egg grows into a tadpole increases with temperature. Tadpoles typically hatch within 48 hours, but the period can vary from 14 hours to almost a week. This process usually involves thousands of tadpoles—which are small, black, and have short tails—forming into groups. Between 12 and 60 days are needed for the tadpoles to develop into juveniles, with four weeks being typical. Similarly to their adult counterparts, eggs and tadpoles are toxic to many animals. When they emerge, toadlets typically are about 10–11 mm (0.39–0.43 in) in length, and grow rapidly. While the rate of growth varies by region, time of year, and gender, an average initial growth rate of 0.647 mm (0.0255 in) per day is seen, followed by an average rate of 0.373 mm (0.0147 in) per day. Growth typically slows once the toads reach sexual maturity. This rapid growth is important for their survival; in the period between metamorphosis and subadulthood, the young toads lose the toxicity that protected them as eggs and tadpoles, but have yet to fully develop the parotoid glands that produce bufotoxin. Only an estimated 0.5% of cane toads reach adulthood, in part because they lack this key defense—but also due to tadpole cannibalism. Although cannibalism does occur in the native population in South America, the rapid evolution occurring in the unnaturally large population in Australia has produced tadpoles 30x more likely to be interested in cannibalising their siblings, and 2.6x more likely to actually do so. They have also evolved to shorten their tadpole phase in response to the presence of older tadpoles. These changes are likely genetic, although no genetic basis has been determined. As with rates of growth, the point at which the toads become sexually mature varies across different regions. In New Guinea, sexual maturity is reached by female toads with a snout–vent length between 70 and 80 mm (2.8 and 3.1 in), while toads in Panama achieve maturity when they are between 90 and 100 mm (3.5 and 3.9 in) in length. In tropical regions, such as their native habitats, breeding occurs throughout the year, but in subtropical areas, breeding occurs only during warmer periods that coincide with the onset of the wet season. The cane toad is estimated to have a critical thermal maximum of 40–42 °C (104–108 °F) and a minimum of around 10–15 °C (50–59 °F). The ranges can change due to adaptation to the local environment. Cane toads from some populations can adjust their thermal tolerance within a few hours of encountering low temperatures. The toad is able to rapidly acclimate to the cold using physiological plasticity, though there is also evidence that more northerly populations of cane toads in the United States are better cold-adapted than more southerly populations. These adaptations have allowed the cane toad to establish invasive populations across the world. The toad's ability to rapidly acclimate to thermal changes suggests that current models may underestimate the potential range of habitats that the toad can populate. The cane toad has a high tolerance to water loss; some can withstand a 52.6% loss of body water, allowing them to survive outside tropical environments. ### Diet Most frogs identify prey by movement, and vision appears to be the primary method by which the cane toad detects prey; however, it can also locate food using its sense of smell. They eat a wide range of material; in addition to the normal prey of small rodents, other small mammals, reptiles, other amphibians, birds, and even bats and a range of invertebrates (such as ants, beetles, earwigs, dragonflies, grasshoppers, true bugs, crustaceans, and gastropods), they also eat plants, dog food, cat food, feces, and household refuse. ### Defences The skin of the adult cane toad is toxic, as well as the enlarged parotoid glands behind the eyes, and other glands across its back. When the toad is threatened, its glands secrete a milky-white fluid known as bufotoxin. Components of bufotoxin are toxic to many animals; even human deaths have been recorded due to the consumption of cane toads. Dogs are especially prone to be poisoned by licking or biting toads. Pets showing excessive drooling, extremely red gums, head-shaking, crying, loss of coordination, and/or convulsions require immediate veterinary attention. Bufotenin, one of the chemicals excreted by the cane toad, is classified as a schedule 9 drug under Australian law, alongside heroin and LSD. The effects of bufotenin are thought to be similar to those of mild poisoning; the stimulation, which includes mild hallucinations, lasts less than an hour. As the cane toad excretes bufotenin in small amounts, and other toxins in relatively large quantities, toad licking could result in serious illness or death. In addition to releasing toxin, the cane toad is capable of inflating its lungs, puffing up, and lifting its body off the ground to appear taller and larger to a potential predator. Since 2011, experimenters in the Kimberley region of Western Australia have used poisonous sausages containing toad meat in an attempt to protect native animals from cane toads' deadly impact. The Western Australian Department of Environment and Conservation, along with the University of Sydney, developed these sausage-shaped baits as a tool in order to train native animals not to eat the toads. By blending bits of toad with a nausea-inducing chemical, the baits train the animals to stay away from the amphibians. ### Predators Many species prey on the cane toad and its tadpoles in its native habitat, including the broad-snouted caiman (Caiman latirostris), the banded cat-eyed snake (Leptodeira annulata), eels (family Anguillidae), various species of killifish, the rock flagtail (Kuhlia rupestris), some species of catfish (order Siluriformes), some species of ibis (subfamily Threskiornithinae), and Paraponera clavata (bullet ants). Predators outside the cane toad's native range include the whistling kite (Haliastur sphenurus), the rakali (Hydromys chrysogaster), the black rat (Rattus rattus) and the water monitor (Varanus salvator). The tawny frogmouth (Podargus strigoides) and the Papuan frogmouth (Podargus papuensis) have been reported as feeding on cane toads; some Australian crows (Corvus spp.) have also learned strategies allowing them to feed on cane toads, such as using their beak to flip toads onto their backs. Opossums of the genus Didelphis likely can eat cane toads with impunity. Meat ants are unaffected by the cane toads' toxins, so are able to kill them. The cane toad's normal response to attack is to stand still and let its toxin kill the attacker, which allows the ants to attack and eat the toad. Saw-shelled turtles have also been seen successfully and safely eating cane toads. ## Distribution The cane toad is native to the Americas, and its range stretches from the Rio Grande Valley in South Texas to the central Amazon and southeastern Peru, and some of the continental islands near Venezuela (such as Trinidad and Tobago). This area encompasses both tropical and semiarid environments. The density of the cane toad is significantly lower within its native distribution than in places where it has been introduced. In South America, the density was recorded to be 20 adults per 100 m (110 yd) of shoreline, 1 to 2% of the density in Australia. ### As an introduced species The cane toad has been introduced to many regions of the world—particularly the Pacific—for the biological control of agricultural pests. These introductions have generally been well documented, and the cane toad may be one of the most studied of any introduced species. Before the early 1840s, the cane toad had been introduced into Martinique and Barbados, from French Guiana and Guyana. An introduction to Jamaica was made in 1844 in an attempt to reduce the rat population. Despite its failure to control the rodents, the cane toad was introduced to Puerto Rico in the early 20th century in the hope that it would counter a beetle infestation ravaging the sugarcane plantations. The Puerto Rican scheme was successful and halted the economic damage caused by the beetles, prompting scientists in the 1930s to promote it as an ideal solution to agricultural pests. As a result, many countries in the Pacific region emulated the lead of Puerto Rico and introduced the toad in the 1930s. Introduced populations are in Australia, Florida, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, the Ogasawara, Ishigaki Island and the Daitō Islands of Japan, Taiwan Nantou Caotun, most Caribbean islands, Fiji and many other Pacific islands, including Hawaii. Since then, the cane toad has become a pest in many host countries, and poses a serious threat to native animals. ### Australia Following the apparent success of the cane toad in eating the beetles threatening the sugarcane plantations of Puerto Rico, and the fruitful introductions into Hawaii and the Philippines, a strong push was made for the cane toad to be released in Australia to negate the pests ravaging the Queensland cane fields. As a result, 102 toads were collected from Hawaii and brought to Australia. Queensland's sugar scientists released the toad into cane fields in August 1935. After this initial release, the Commonwealth Department of Health decided to ban future introductions until a study was conducted into the feeding habits of the toad. The study was completed in 1936 and the ban lifted, when large-scale releases were undertaken; by March 1937, 62,000 toadlets had been released into the wild. The toads became firmly established in Queensland, increasing exponentially in number and extending their range into the Northern Territory and New South Wales. In 2010, one was found on the far western coast in Broome, Western Australia. However, the toad was generally unsuccessful in reducing the targeted grey-backed cane beetles (Dermolepida albohirtum), in part because the cane fields provided insufficient shelter for the predators during the day, and in part because the beetles live at the tops of sugar cane—and cane toads are not good climbers. Since its original introduction, the cane toad has had a particularly marked effect on Australian biodiversity. The population of a number of native predatory reptiles has declined, such as the varanid lizards Varanus mertensi, V. mitchelli, and V. panoptes, the land snakes Pseudechis australis and Acanthophis antarcticus, and the crocodile species Crocodylus johnstoni; in contrast, the population of the agamid lizard Amphibolurus gilberti—known to be a prey item of V. panoptes—has increased. Meat ants, however, are able to kill cane toads. The cane toad has also been linked to decreases in northern quolls in the southern region of Kakadu National Park and even their local extinction. ### Caribbean The cane toad was introduced to various Caribbean islands to counter a number of pests infesting local crops. While it was able to establish itself on some islands, such as Barbados, Jamaica, Hispaniola and Puerto Rico, other introductions, such as in Cuba before 1900 and in 1946, and on the islands of Dominica and Grand Cayman, were unsuccessful. The earliest recorded introductions were to Barbados and Martinique. The Barbados introductions were focused on the biological control of pests damaging the sugarcane crops, and while the toads became abundant, they have done even less to control the pests than in Australia. The toad was introduced to Martinique from French Guiana before 1944 and became established. Today, they reduce the mosquito and mole cricket populations. A third introduction to the region occurred in 1884, when toads appeared in Jamaica, reportedly imported from Barbados to help control the rodent population. While they had no significant effect on the rats, they nevertheless became well established. Other introductions include the release on Antigua—possibly before 1916, although this initial population may have died out by 1934 and been reintroduced at a later date—and Montserrat, which had an introduction before 1879 that led to the establishment of a solid population, which was apparently sufficient to survive the Soufrière Hills volcano eruption in 1995. In 1920, the cane toad was introduced into Puerto Rico to control the populations of white grub (Phyllophaga spp.), a sugarcane pest. Before this, the pests were manually collected by humans, so the introduction of the toad eliminated labor costs. A second group of toads was imported in 1923, and by 1932, the cane toad was well established. The population of white grubs dramatically decreased, and this was attributed to the cane toad at the annual meeting of the International Sugar Cane Technologists in Puerto Rico. However, there may have been other factors. The six-year period after 1931—when the cane toad was most prolific, and the white grub had a dramatic decline—had the highest-ever rainfall for Puerto Rico. Nevertheless, the cane toad was assumed to have controlled the white grub; this view was reinforced by a Nature article titled "Toads save sugar crop", and this led to large-scale introductions throughout many parts of the Pacific. The cane toad has been spotted in Carriacou and Dominica, the latter appearance occurring in spite of the failure of the earlier introductions. On September 8, 2013, the cane toad was also discovered on the island of New Providence in the Bahamas. ### The Philippines The cane toad was first introduced deliberately into the Philippines in 1930 as a biological control agent of pests in sugarcane plantations, after the success of the experimental introductions into Puerto Rico. It subsequently became the most ubiquitous amphibian in the islands. It still retains the common name of bakî or kamprag in the Visayan languages, a corruption of 'American frog', referring to its origins. It is also commonly known as "bullfrog" in Philippine English. ### Fiji The cane toad was introduced into Fiji to combat insects that infested sugarcane plantations. The introduction of the cane toad to the region was first suggested in 1933, following the successes in Puerto Rico and Hawaii. After considering the possible side effects, the national government of Fiji decided to release the toad in 1953, and 67 specimens were subsequently imported from Hawaii. Once the toads were established, a 1963 study concluded, as the toad's diet included both harmful and beneficial invertebrates, it was considered "economically neutral". Today, the cane toad can be found on all major islands in Fiji, although they tend to be smaller than their counterparts in other regions. ### New Guinea The cane toad was introduced into New Guinea to control the hawk moth larvae eating sweet potato crops. The first release occurred in 1937 using toads imported from Hawaii, with a second release the same year using specimens from the Australian mainland. Evidence suggests a third release in 1938, consisting of toads being used for human pregnancy tests—many species of toad were found to be effective for this task, and were employed for about 20 years after the discovery was announced in 1948. Initial reports argued the toads were effective in reducing the levels of cutworms and sweet potato yields were thought to be improving. As a result, these first releases were followed by further distributions across much of the region, although their effectiveness on other crops, such as cabbages, has been questioned; when the toads were released at Wau, the cabbages provided insufficient shelter and the toads rapidly left the immediate area for the superior shelter offered by the forest. A similar situation had previously arisen in the Australian cane fields, but this experience was either unknown or ignored in New Guinea. The cane toad has since become abundant in rural and urban areas. ### United States The cane toad naturally exists in South Texas, but attempts (both deliberate and accidental) have been made to introduce the species to other parts of the country. These include introductions to Florida and to the islands of Hawaii, as well as largely unsuccessful introductions to Louisiana. Initial releases into Florida failed. Attempted introductions before 1936 and 1944, intended to control sugarcane pests, were unsuccessful as the toads failed to proliferate. Later attempts failed in the same way. However, the toad gained a foothold in the state after an accidental release by an importer at Miami International Airport in 1957, and deliberate releases by animal dealers in 1963 and 1964 established the toad in other parts of Florida. Today, the cane toad is well established in the state, from the Keys to north of Tampa, and they are gradually extending further northward. In Florida, the toad is a regarded as a threat to native species and pets; so much so, the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission recommends residents to kill them. Around 150 cane toads were introduced to Oahu in Hawaii in 1932, and the population swelled to 105,517 after 17 months. The toads were sent to the other islands, and more than 100,000 toads were distributed by July 1934; eventually over 600,000 were transported. ## Uses Other than the use as a biological control for pests, the cane toad has been employed in a number of commercial and noncommercial applications. Traditionally, within the toad's natural range in South America, the Embera-Wounaan would "milk" the toads for their toxin, which was then employed as an arrow poison. The toxins may have been used as an entheogen by the Olmec people. The toad has been hunted as a food source in parts of Peru, and eaten after the careful removal of the skin and parotoid glands. When properly prepared, the meat of the toad is considered healthy and as a source of omega-3 fatty acids. More recently, the toad's toxins have been used in a number of new ways: bufotenin has been used in Japan as an aphrodisiac and a hair restorer, and in cardiac surgery in China to lower the heart rates of patients. New research has suggested that the cane toad's poison may have some applications in treating prostate cancer. Other modern applications of the cane toad include pregnancy testing, as pets, laboratory research, and the production of leather goods. Pregnancy testing was conducted in the mid-20th century by injecting urine from a woman into a male toad's lymph sacs, and if spermatozoa appeared in the toad's urine, the patient was deemed to be pregnant. The tests using toads were faster than those employing mammals; the toads were easier to raise, and, although the initial 1948 discovery employed Bufo arenarum for the tests, it soon became clear that a variety of anuran species were suitable, including the cane toad. As a result, toads were employed in this task for around 20 years. As a laboratory animal, the cane toad has numerous advantages: they are plentiful, and easy and inexpensive to maintain and handle. The use of the cane toad in experiments started in the 1950s, and by the end of the 1960s, large numbers were being collected and exported to high schools and universities. Since then, a number of Australian states have introduced or tightened importation regulations. There are several commercial uses for dead cane toads. Cane toad skin is made into leather and novelty items. Stuffed cane toads, posed and accessorised, are merchandised at souvenir shops for tourists. Attempts have been made to produce fertiliser from toad carcasses.

Capitol Loop

State highway in Lansing, Ingham County, Michigan, United States

The Capitol Loop is a state trunkline highway running through Lansing, Michigan, in the United States that was commissioned on October 13, 1989. It forms a loop route off Interstate 496 (I-496) through downtown near the Michigan State Capitol complex, home of the state legislature and several state departments. The Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT) has labeled it as Capitol Loop I-496 or CL I-496 on some maps, similar to the Business Loop Interstate nomenclature. However, unlike other business loops in Michigan, it has unique reassurance markers—the signs that serve as regular reminders of the name and number of the highway. It is known internally at MDOT as Connector 496 for inventory purposes. The route follows a series of one-way and two-way streets through downtown Lansing, directing traffic downtown to the State Capitol and other government buildings. Unlike the other streets downtown, the seven streets comprising the Capitol Loop are under state maintenance and jurisdiction. The loop was originally proposed in 1986 as part of a downtown revitalization effort. Almost from the beginning before the highway was commissioned in 1989, it was affected by controversial proposals. Several suggestions by community leaders to rename city streets in honor of Martin Luther King Jr. were rejected. In the end, Logan Street was given a second name, Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, and the original name was eventually dropped. Meetings beginning in 1999 dealt with rebuilding the streets as part of a downtown beautification project. The project was delayed to accommodate replacing the sewer system under the roadway at the same time as the streetscaping. The downtown business community protested the original scope of construction, and the Lansing City Council threatened to cancel the project in response to the controversy. Instead of losing the investment in the downtown area, the scope of the project was reduced in scale, and the project was completed in 2005, three months ahead of schedule. In 2010, additional controversies surfaced regarding the posting and enforcement of speed limits on city streets in Michigan, including the streets that make up the Capitol Loop. The newest controversy over speed limits is related to compliance with a 2006 state law aimed at eliminating speed traps. ## Route description The Capitol Loop serves as a connection between the other state highways in Lansing and the Michigan State Capitol complex. The trunkline starts at the northern end of M-99 at exit 5 on I-496. It runs north on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, where the street is divided into north- and south-bound sections, each three lanes wide, separated by the Union Missionary Baptist Church off St. Joseph Street. A block north of the church, the sections of the street are divided by a central median north of Lenawee Street. At Allegan Street, the Capitol Loop becomes a one-way pair. Eastbound traffic continues on Allegan Street, passing to the south of the Hall of Justice, home to the Michigan Supreme Court. Westbound traffic is carried on Ottawa Street, one block to the north of Allegan Street. The Hall faces Butler Boulevard, which provides access from Allegan and Ottawa streets. Past Butler Boulevard, traffic passes the north side of the Library of Michigan and Historical Center complex. Between Pine Street and Capitol Avenue, Allegan Street continues south of the Michigan State Capitol. Allegan Street ends at a one-way street, Grand Avenue, and eastbound Capitol Loop turns north on this three-lane street. The two directions of traffic on the Capitol Loop are reunited at the two-way Michigan Avenue. Eastbound traffic turns east along Michigan Avenue; westbound traffic turns north off Michigan onto Grand Avenue. Michigan Avenue runs with two lanes in each direction and a center turn lane, crossing the Grand River. East of the river, it approaches a complex of museums on Museum Drive, including the Michigan Museum of Surveying, R.E. Olds Transportation Museum (named for Oldsmobile founder, R.E. Olds) and the Impression Five Science Museum south of Riverwalk Park. The Capitol Loop meets the one-way pairing of Cedar and Larch streets on Michigan Avenue near Cooley Law School Stadium, home of the Lansing Lugnuts minor league baseball team. Cedar and Larch carry Business Loop Interstate 96 (BL I-96). The two highway designations merge and run concurrently along the pair of streets. Eastbound Capitol Loop and eastbound BL I-96 follow Cedar Street southerly; westbound Capitol Loop and westbound BL I-96 are routed northerly on Larch Street. Cedar Street runs southeasterly along the Grand River angling toward Larch Street. The two streets merge where they meet I-496. This interchange at exit 7 along I-496 marks the eastern end of the Capitol Loop, but BL I-96 continues south of I-496 on Cedar Street. No part of the Capitol Loop is included on the National Highway System, a system of roads important to the country's economy, defense, and mobility. ### Traffic counts In 2009, MDOT conducted one of its annual surveys to measure the traffic levels on Michigan trunklines. These surveys calculate the average annual daily traffic (AADT), which is a computation of the average traffic levels for a segment of roadway on any given day of the year. Along the Capitol Loop, the highest traffic counts were measured on Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard. A daily average of 25,513 vehicles used that section of the route. This figure included an AADT of 619 commercial vehicles. Traffic volume drops along Allegan and Ottawa streets, where 2,687 and 1,499 vehicles used those streets, respectively. The second highest traffic counts were on the section concurrent with BL I-96 on Cedar and Larch streets. There, 17,682 vehicles and 547 trucks used the streets. ## History ### Proposal and creation MDOT proposed the Capitol Loop in 1986. The highway designation was part of a partnership between the State of Michigan and the City of Lansing to revitalize the downtown area. The designation of this highway provided drivers with a signed route to various attractions in the downtown Lansing area. MDOT started implementing plans for the Capitol Loop in May 1986 with improvements to Michigan Avenue. This project included an initial \$80,000 investment (equivalent to \$ in ) to streetscaping between the State Capitol and the Grand River. The City of Lansing transferred jurisdiction over the streets involved to MDOT on October 13, 1989, allowing the state to commission the trunkline. The route serves the Capitol Park, which was created by an act of the Michigan Legislature in 1984 with the boundaries of Ottawa, Allegan and Logan streets. The fourth side is the vacated section of Sycamore Street between Ottawa and Allegan. The current Library of Michigan building was opened in 1989. The State Capitol, previously listed on the National Register of Historic Places on January 25, 1971, was renovated as part of this revitalization effort. The extensive, three-year renovation of the Capitol was completed in 1992, the same year in which it was designated as a National Historic Landmark. The Hall of Justice was opened in October 2002, giving the Michigan Supreme Court a permanent home for the first time since the court had vacated the Capitol in 1970. ### Street name changes Various proposals to honor Martin Luther King Jr. in Lansing were floated around 1986. The Pastor's Conference of Lansing put forward renaming Logan Street in honor of the civil rights leader, but residents were not supportive of this idea at the time. Another proposal in October 1988 would have renamed Allegan Street because it was shorter and would affect fewer residents. Allegan Street also passes through the city's black community. Residents objected because the city's east–west streets were all named for the counties in the state when the city was platted in 1847. The last failed proposal would have renamed the entire Capitol Loop in King's honor. This idea failed because the route's unique markers had already been designed, made and were about to be installed. The conference proposed renaming Logan Street again in 1989. This time residents objected over the \$32,000 (equivalent to \$ in ) to replace the signs. Logan Street was already named for Gen. John A. Logan, who served as a colonel with a Michigan regiment and later as a general in the American Civil War. A compromise by the mayor was adopted by the city council on April 24, 1989, to allow both names to be used on the street. This dual-naming arrangement was dropped by the city council on March 28, 1994, removing the "Logan Street" name from the street after two years of debate. ### Reconstruction controversy Officials from the City of Lansing and MDOT announced a two-year, \$22 million project (in 2003, equivalent to \$ in ) to reconstruct the Capitol Loop on May 22, 2003. The project would have closed downtown streets in 2004 and 2005 after preparatory work in late 2003. MDOT was seeking to rebuild the streets to improve the downtown area around the State Capitol, adding decorative sidewalks, lighting and planting new trees. The city planned to upgrade the sewer system at the same time as part of a 30-year project to separate the storm and sanitary sewers. MDOT stated that the project would completely close streets along the loop, with the exception of one lane of traffic in each direction along Michigan Avenue. The project was called the "most ambitious since the Interstate 496 construction project in 2001" by the Lansing State Journal. In the weeks leading up to the November 3, 2003, Lansing City Council meeting, businesses that would be affected by the project raised objections to the scope of the project. One business owner circulated a petition signed by 23 businesses asking the city to delay part of the overall project. The project was nicknamed in the press "Lansing's 'Big Dig'" because the sewer and utility work required 30-foot (9.14 m) excavations in the streets downtown. Some initial opposition was based on a false assumption that the project would close the entire length of the streets at once, instead of in stages. MDOT's original beautification project was delayed five years, and the city's mandated sewer separation project was fast-tracked. This combined project, planned for 2004–2005, was planned to prevent digging up the same streets twice within 10–15 years. Most of the business owners expressed concerns that at the end of the project their businesses might not survive to enjoy the benefits of the downtown beautification. The mayor attempted to get the city council to postpone a vote to stop the issuance of bonds for the city's portion of the overall project. City council members criticized MDOT's "[inflexibility] about changing the plans to accommodate businesses." MDOT replied that the contract bids were already out and that it was too late to change the scope of the project. The city council tabled the project, postponing a final decision on approving it until the businesses' concerns could be addressed. City officials stated a need to redesign the project to accommodate the business community downtown. The project was originally planned in 1999 with votes and hearings by the city council starting in 2001. The city did not kill the project outright which would have risked the city losing the investment in the downtown infrastructure. Instead, the final decision was delayed for two weeks. Had the project been killed outright, MDOT could have reallocated the funding to any project elsewhere in the state. After the decision to delay the project, Mayor Tony Benavides appointed a task force to work with the businesses to address their concerns. Even the local papers pushed all parties concerned to solve the issues and salvage the project. The city announced a revised plan on November 19, 2003, to move parts of the sewer project to a separate timeline so that they would take 16 years to complete. The original 2004–2005 project was scaled down to encompass the sewer and water main work with the beautification project on Ottawa, Allegan, Pine and Walnut streets with additional work possible on Capitol Avenue. The revised plan drew praise from members of the business community. The revised project, now budgeted at \$12 million (in 2003, equivalent to \$ in ) involved work on 14 fewer blocks of the downtown area. The project was approved on December 13, 2004. The bids on the contract work were opened on January 21, 2004, with the bid awarded to E.T. MacKenzie Company of Grand Ledge. ### Reconstruction project Work on the scaled-down Capitol Loop reconstruction project started on April 5, 2004. Area businesses prepared in advance of the project for disruptions. The Michigan Supreme Court distributed color-coded brochures to alert employees of changes as a result of the project. The Central Methodist Church at the corner of Capitol Avenue and Ottawa Street lost access to its parking lot, but the city reserved on-street parking for parishioners. The initial stage of the project closed Ottawa Avenue in stages and converted adjacent one-way streets to two-way traffic to accommodate state employees working next to the construction zone. Several sidewalks were closed on one side of affected streets, while the opposite sidewalks remained open. The revised project earned praise in newspaper editorials after construction started. This praise was tempered with caution to motorists and the officials in charge of the project. The former were advised to remember that the scaled-down project was redesigned to accommodate them; the latter were reminded to get the job done as soon as practical. Business reported that the project did not affect them as much as they had feared before the project. Minor inconveniences were reported, with some commuters recounting only minor delays in trips downtown. The noise was cited as the worst side effect of the project by several residents in media reports. The work on Allegan Street that was originally planned for 2005 was scheduled by MDOT for the 2004 construction season. The project wrapped up for the year in November. Construction resumed on the remaining sections of the project on March 14, 2005. This phase included the remaining work on Allegan and Walnut streets. By May, the affected streets were reduced to gravel and completed streets had been reopened. Additional work scheduled for 2005 included streetscaping improvements to Cedar and Larch streets. The project wrapped up three months ahead of the original October completion date. The project cost MDOT \$15.4 million (in 2005, equivalent to \$ in ) with an additional \$5.6 million paid by the City of Lansing for the sewer work (in 2003, equivalent to \$ in ). Lansing's share of the costs included the reconstruction costs for Walnut and Pine streets, since those streets are not part of the state trunkline system. The completion of the project was marked with a ribbon-cutting ceremony to open the streets to traffic on June 30, 2005. ### Speed limit controversy A 2006 Michigan law was enacted to reform how cities in the state set speed limits. Under this law, the streets that comprise the Capitol Loop were mismarked according to the Michigan State Police (MSP). The law was designed to eliminate speed traps in the state by basing the determination of speed limits on scientific criteria. Unless a roadway is in a downtown business district or subdivision, the limit is based on the number of access points, either cross streets or driveways, along the roadway. Exceptions to these classifications can be made based on a technical study by traffic engineers. Lansing city officials stated in March 2009 that by adopting the Uniform Vehicle Code instead of the state's Motor Vehicle Code, Lansing is immune from the change in law and can enforce the 25-mile-per-hour (40 km/h) limits. The Lansing city attorney was dismissing speeding tickets issued on the Capitol Loop in June 2010. The loop was not signed with speed-limit signs, making the tickets unenforceable. The city cannot install the signs on its own because of the state trunkline status of the streets that make up the Capitol Loop; the MSP and MDOT are in charge of setting and signing the speed limits on state trunklines in Michigan. City Attorney Brig Smith stated that until the state agencies complete the speed study and erect the signs, he cannot enforce any tickets for speeding on the Capitol Loop. MSP and MDOT officials stated that the study is complete and the new signs are on order. The limits were raised from 25 to 30 mph (40 to 48 km/h) on the eastern half of the loop and 35 mph (56 km/h) on the western half as a result of the MDOT and MSP speed studies. State Representative Rick Jones from Grand Ledge has been pushing for scientifically set speed limits in the state to limit speed traps, and he has proposed new legislation to force cities to comply with the 2006 law, ending any loopholes used by cities to set lower limits. As Jones explained to reporters, the current situation is one where "... streets are artificially posted too low for the purpose of writing tickets." ## Major intersections The entire highway is in Lansing, Ingham County. Eastbound Westbound ## See also - List of state trunkline highways in Michigan § Connectors for other signed connector routes in the state

John Mowbray, 3rd Duke of Norfolk

English magnate and nobleman

John Mowbray, 3rd Duke of Norfolk, KG, Earl Marshal (12 September 1415 – 6 November 1461) was a fifteenth-century English magnate who, despite having a relatively short political career, played a significant role in the early years of the Wars of the Roses. Mowbray was born in 1415, the only son and heir of John de Mowbray, 2nd Duke of Norfolk, and Katherine Neville. He inherited his titles upon his father's death in 1432. As a minor he became a ward of King Henry VI and was placed under the protection of Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, alongside whom Mowbray would later campaign in France. He seems to have had an unruly and rebellious youth. Although the details of his misconduct are unknown, they were severe enough for the King to place strictures upon him and separate him from his followers. Mowbray's early career was spent in the military, where he held the wartime office of Earl Marshal. Later he led the defence of England's possessions in Normandy during the Hundred Years' War. He fought in Calais in 1436, and during 1437–38 served as Warden of the Eastern March on the Anglo-Scottish border, before returning to Calais. Mowbray's marriage to Eleanor Bourchier in the early 1430s drew him into the highly partisan and complex politics of East Anglia, and he became the bitter rival of William de la Pole, Earl (later Duke) of Suffolk. Mowbray prosecuted his feuds with vigour, often taking the law into his own hands. This often violent approach drew the disapproving attention of the Crown, and he was bound over for massive sums and imprisoned twice in the Tower of London. His enemies, particularly de la Pole, also resorted to violent tactics. As a result, the local gentry looked to Mowbray for leadership, but often in vain; de la Pole was a powerful local force and a favourite of the King, while Mowbray was neither. As law and order collapsed in eastern England, national politics became increasingly factional, with popular revolts against the King's councillors. Richard, Duke of York, who by the 1450s felt excluded from government, grew belligerent. He rebelled twice, and both times Mowbray defended King Henry. Eventually, Mowbray drifted towards York, with whom he shared enmity towards de la Pole. For much of the decade, Mowbray was able to evade direct involvement in the fractious political climate, and aligned with York early in 1460 until York's death later that year. In March 1461, Mowbray was instrumental in Edward's victory at the Battle of Towton, bringing reinforcements late in the combat. He was rewarded by the new regime but did not live to enjoy it. He died in November 1461, and was succeeded as Duke of Norfolk by his only son, John. ## Background and youth John Mowbray was the only son of John de Mowbray, 2nd Duke of Norfolk, and his wife Katherine Neville, who was a daughter of Ralph Neville, 1st Earl of Westmorland, a powerful magnate in northern England. The younger Mowbray was born on 12 September 1415 while his father was in France campaigning with Henry V. Mowbray was seventeen at his father's death and still legally a minor. During his minority, his estates were granted by Henry VI to Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester for a farm of 2000 marks (approximately £1,667). Until his majority, the Mowbray lands were administered by the English exchequer to the benefit of the crown, at a time when the government was in dire need of cash, due to the Hundred Years' War. Mowbray's wardship, and the right to arrange his marriage, was sold to Anne of Gloucester, Countess of Stafford for £2,000. By March 1434, Anne had arranged for Mowbray's marriage to her daughter Eleanor Bourchier. As a young adult, Mowbray appears to have been raucous and troublesome, and surrounded himself with equally unruly followers. This seems to have drawn the King's attention: Mowbray had only recently—with the other lords—sworn an oath in parliament not to recruit or welcome villains and wrong-doers into his affinity, nor to maintain them. He was summoned before the King and his council. Mowbray was instructed in how to conduct himself henceforth, and a precise regimen was imposed upon him. Exactly which aspects of Mowbray's behaviour were viewed as problematic is unknown, but since it resulted in unprecedented council-imposed restrictions upon him, his conduct must have been viewed as "abnormal". The ordinances not only dictated the time he should go to bed at night and rise in the morning, but the conditions addressed his demeanour also. His unruly followers were dismissed and replaced with those deemed suitable by Henry VI. Their stated role was to turn Mowbray towards "good reule and good governaunce," and they were not just to guide Mowbray but to report any disobedience of the council's instructions back to that body. ### Inheritance On his father's death in 1432, Mowbray inherited the office of Earl Marshal, but not yet his father's lands or titles. Mowbray's father lacked full control of his estates, as they were encumbered by two Mowbray dowagers, the elder Mowbray's mother Elizabeth Fitzalan (until her death in 1425), and his sister-in-law, Constance Holland. They each held a third of the inheritance as their dower, a situation which repeated itself on the elder Mowbray's death in 1432, leaving Constance and Katherine as the two dowagers. Constance died in 1437, but Mowbray's mother survived until around 1483. Because of this, the historian Rowena Archer—who made one of the few full-length studies of the Mowbray family—described Mowbray as inheriting a "hopeless" and "onerous" legacy. It also had political consequences for the future. As he never held much property in the counties where his inheritance was (only holding, for example, seven of the twenty-six manors held by the Mowbrays in Norfolk and Suffolk), his influence was thus restricted there. Immediately after his father's death, Mowbray made claim to the earldom of Arundel, setting him against John, Lord Maltravers, who had also made claim. This was an old dispute. Mowbray's father and grandfather had also sought the earldom, blocking Maltravers' father's claim. Mowbray based his right through his grandmother Elizabeth Fitzalan, Duchess of Norfolk; Maltravers through his great-grandfather Richard FitzAlan, 11th Earl of Arundel. In July 1433 Mowbray presented a petition to Parliament (receiving special permission to attend as a minor). Mowbray—"in a rather remarkable decision," says Archer—lost the case. Maltravers, though, died in May 1435 and so was never summoned to parliament under his new title. Mowbray's ancestors had been largely Midlands magnates based around Lincolnshire estates. Even his father—after he became duke of Norfolk and inherited his mother's East Anglian dower lands—was often an absentee lord. Mowbray's father was thus never able to establish a sizeable (or "particularly coherent") regional following there, and this was the situation Mowbray inherited. ## Royal service In August 1436 Mowbray accompanied the Duke of Gloucester on a campaign to relieve Calais, then under siege by Philip the Good, Duke of Burgundy. The expedition, in which Mowbray provided a contingent, was "one of the largest English armies assembled during the fifteenth century." The campaign was a success, and Burgundy was forced to withdraw. On 13 September that year, Mowbray received livery of his inheritance, and immediately began a busy period devoted to royal service. In 1437, possibly because of Gloucester's patronage, Mowbray was appointed Warden of the Eastern March for a one-year term. He had little experience of the north of England, yet was paid wartime wages of £5,000 to campaign against the Scots. Mowbray returned to Calais and Guînes in 1438, leading an expedition to strengthen their defences as Burgundy still presented a threat. Although he shortly after returned to England, in June 1439 he was again back in Calais, at Oye, escorting Archbishop John Kemp's diplomatic mission to the peace conference. Possibly Mowbray disapproved of royal foreign policy, which was then aimed at making peace with the French. ## Feud with William de la Pole For much of the 1430s, Mowbray had problems in East Anglia, where the bulk of his estates now lay. William de la Pole become increasingly powerful, both at court and in the region, and was Mowbray's biggest rival. Mowbray had enough political clout in the 1430s to control parliamentary representation in Suffolk, but the local importance of the duke weakened his grasp. Mowbray clashed with de la Pole, and committed many illegalities doing so. These included damaging property of rivals, assaults, false allegations of outlawry (with confiscation of goods), and even murder. For Mowbray, East Anglia as the focus of his landed authority was forced upon him since this was where the majority of his estates were located: much of his Lincolnshire inheritance was held by his mother as dower. He was then a newcomer to political society in the region, and had to share influence with others. By the time of his majority, de la Pole—with his links to central government and the King—was an established power in the region. He hindered Mowbray's attempts at regional domination for over a decade, leading to a feud that stretched from the moment Mowbray became Duke of Norfolk to the murder of de la Pole in 1450. The feud was often violent, and led to fighting between their followers. In 1435, Robert Wingfield, Mowbray's steward of Framlingham, led a group of Mowbray retainers who murdered James Andrew, one of de la Pole's men. When local aldermen attempted to arrest Wingfield's party, the latter rained arrow fire upon the aldermen, but Mowbray secured royal pardons for those responsible. By 1440, de la Pole was a royal favourite. He instigated Mowbray's imprisonment on at least two occasions: in 1440 and in 1448. The first saw him bound over for the significant amount of £10,000, and confined to living within the royal Household, preventing him from returning to seek revenge in East Anglia. Likewise, apart from an appointment to commissions of oyer and terminer in Norwich in 1443 (after the suppression of Gladman's Insurrection), he received no other significant offices or patronage from the crown. A recent biographer of Mowbray's, the historian Colin Richmond, has described this as Mowbray's "eclipse". Richmond suggests that soon after his last imprisonment in 1449, Mowbray undertook a pilgrimage to Rome; a licence for him to do so had been granted three years earlier. De la Pole fought back with what one contemporary labelled "greet hevyng an shoving." He was successful in doing so. Within a couple of years, Mowbray could not protect his retainers as he had previously done. A Paston letter tells how Robert Wingfield, who was involved in a bitter dispute with one Robert Lyston, "procured and exited the wurthi prince the Duke of Norffolk to putte oute ageyn the seid Robert Lyston" from the latter's Suffolk manors. Lyston, with de la Pole's support, repeatedly sued Wingfield until in 1441 Wingfield was imprisoned in the Tower of London. In 1440, Mowbray was able to influence the Exchequer to quash Wingfield's fines; but Mowbray's success was fleeting. Mowbray was more successful in his support of John Fastolf—in one of the latter's many lawsuits 1441, and was able to impose an advantageous settlement (for Fastolf) in Chancery. Generally, though, says Helen Castor, Mowbray's influence "proved woefully inadequate" to protect and defend his retainers and tenants to the degree they could reasonably expect from their lord. It was his supporters' misfortune, one historian has said, that "Norfolk's power never matched the status attributed to him". Mowbray's personal and political situation did not improve over the following decade. Between 1440 and 1441 he was imprisoned in the Tower following a dispute with John Heydon, who was close to de la Pole. Mowbray was bound over on 2 July 1440 for the "enormous" sum of 10,000 marks, had to reside in the King's household, while swearing no further harm to Heydon. ### Crime and disorder in East Anglia In 1443 Mowbray and Wingfield fell out over Hoo manor. Wingfield had received Hoo from Mowbray's father, but Mowbray wanted it returned. The dispute fell into violence; R. L. Storey described Mowbray's "methods of argument" as exceptionally belligerent. According to Storey the duke "brought a force of men, with cannon and other siege engines, battered Wingfield's house at Letheringham, forced an entry, ransacked the building and removed valuables amounting to nearly £5,000." Wingfield deserted Mowbray in light of the continuing attacks over Hoo, and offered a bounty of 500 marks for the head of a Mowbray retainer. In November 1443, Mowbray was bound over for £2,000 to keep the peace with Wingfield and instructed to appear before the royal council the following April. The council ordered them to seek arbitration. This found against Mowbray, who had to pay Wingfield 3,500 marks as compensation for the damage the duke caused to Letheringham. He also had to recompense Wingfield for Hoo before he could get it back. It was presumably as part of these proceedings that Mowbray suffered his second bout of imprisonment in the Tower, which commenced on 28 August 1444; he was released six days later. In June 1446 Henry Howard, one of Mowbray's father's retainer, was murdered. He was visiting his sister-in-law (and Mowbray's aunt), Margaret Mowbray, at the time, as her house was only five miles (8.0 km) away. Howard's killers appear to have been retainers of John, Baron Scrope of Masham; who may have actively abetted the killing. On 18 June 1446 Mowbray oversaw the presentment of an Ipswich jury to examine the murder, but the case stalled. Scrope petitioned the King on the basis that Mowbray's proceedings were "inaccurate and inherently malicious," and as a result, the King ordered that proceedings against Scrope's men cease. At least five of the thirteen jurors were Mowbray retainers. This may have been the only occasion on which Mowbray personally sat on a local King's Bench commission as the hearing J.P. The arbitration did not resolve their feud, and in 1447 Wingfield returned to the attack. Along with another ex-Mowbray retainer, William Brandon, he assaulted, robbed and threatened Mowbray's staff. Mowbray—as Justice of the Peace for Suffolk—ordered him to keep the King's peace but was ignored. Wingfield was then committed to Melton gaol, but three hours later Brandon broke him out of prison. Mowbray successfully applied to Chancery for letters patent ordering Brandon and Wingfield to not come within 7 miles (11 km) of Mowbray. This order too was ignored, and they stayed at Letheringham (only five miles from Mowbray's castle at Framlingham), and started breaking into Mowbray's retainers' houses in the area. Mowbray requested that a commission of oyer and terminer be organised to investigate Wingfield and Brandon, which was issued in late December 1447. By the early 1450s, Mowbray believed that East Anglia was his to rule, and described himself as the "princypall rewle and governance throw all this schir" (i.e. that his was the "principal rule and governance through all this shire"). In the late 1440s, John de Vere, the Earl of Oxford, another enemy of de la Pole, sought Mowbray's "good Lordship". In 1451 Mowbray and de Vere collaborated in the county of Suffolk while investigating suspected participants in Jack Cade's Rebellion, which had broken out the previous year. The region continued to experience disorder, and Mowbray's men were responsible for much of it. The unrest included the destruction of properties belonging to Alice Chaucer, Duchess of Suffolk. The Duke of Suffolk himself fell from power and was murdered in April 1450. In the following years, Mowbray's affinity, according to Richmond, committed "one outrage after another [and] the duke was either unable to control them, or chose not to do so". Mowbray used any means to defeat his opponents, including charging them with outlawry in another county without their knowledge, and then seizing their goods as forfeited to himself. Mowbray also forced the gaoler of Bury St Edmunds to release a man charged with murder into Mowbray's custody. According to the gaoler's later report, he had done so but only out of "fear and terror" of the Duke of Norfolk. Mowbray spent much of the early 1450s hunting down de la Pole's affinity. The removal of de la Pole did not advance Mowbray's power in East Anglia. He still had rivals in the region with wealth and court connections. The Earl of Oxford in particular wished to extend his landholdings from Essex into Suffolk, while Lord Scales had been granted the remnants of de la Pole's affinity by Queen Margaret. It was this lack of political connections (specifically, his exclusion from the King's council) that led to his defeat against de la Pole. Mowbray was unsuccessful in influencing local commissions and in nominating parliamentary candidates for shire elections. In any case, the county of Norfolk already possessed a strong and relatively independent layer of wealthy gentry, including the Pastons, the Howards and those around John Fastolf. They were eager to augment their positions at the expense of a neighbour, even if a lord. ## Later career and political crisis During the 1450s, English politics become increasingly partisan and factional, with intermittent rises in violence and local disorder. Jack Cade's rebellion in 1450—directly aimed at royal favourites like de la Pole—explicitly named Mowbray as one of the King's "natural counsellors" necessary to reform the realm. Even so, Mowbray was part of a major royal army which eventually defeated the rebels. During the next crisis—the near-rebellion of Richard of York in Autumn 1450—Mowbray took York's side against the new royal favourite, Edmund Beaufort, Duke of Somerset. York canvassed Mowbray for support, as he was one of the few nobles openly critical of the court. For the former, this was a logical alliance as Mowbray was as bitter an enemy of Somerset as York was. Mowbray gathered his forces at Ipswich on 8 November (having ordered John Paston to meet him there "with as many clenly people as ye may get"), and may have travelled into London with York, who had also recruited locally. Thus, when he arrived for the parliament it was with a large, heavily armed force. Mowbray was appointed, with the Duke of York and Earl of Devon, to maintain law and order in the City of London for the duration of the parliament, though his retinue caused as much trouble as it prevented. On 1 December, they joined with York's force and attacked Somerset's house in Blackfriars. The battle led to the beleaguered duke seeking refuge in the Tower of London in for his own protection. Two days later the King and his magnates rode through London with up to 10,000 men; Mowbray rode ahead with a force of 3,000. The display was carefully designed to quell any remnants of support for Cade's rebels. Mowbray's alliance with York was intermittent. York again rebelled in 1452, confronting a royal army at Dartford when Mowbray was with the King. For his service, he received £200 and a gold cup. York may have abandoned the alliance because of his objection to Mowbray's violent behaviour in East Anglia at a time when York was presenting himself as a candidate of law and order. Mowbray's campaign against Somerset, meanwhile, continued unabated. In 1453, with the King incapacitated and York protector, Mowbray presented charges against Somerset in parliament, attacking his failure to prevent the loss of the "two so noble Duchies of Normandy and Guyenne" in France. Somerset was imprisoned in the Tower for the next year. In April 1454, Mowbray was asked to join the York's regency council, and although he swore loyalty to York's government, claimed to be too ill to attend. The King recovered his health early in 1455 and the protectorate came to an end. Somerset was released from the Tower and as a result, according to historian Ralph Griffiths, Mowbray may have ("quite rightly" he says) feared for his own safety. ### Wars of the Roses Following the collapse of the 1454–55 protectorate, the Yorkist lords retreated to their estates, and Mowbray distanced himself from factional politics. An uneasy peace existed between the court and the Yorkists until April 1455, when the King summoned a Great Council to meet at Leicester the following month. The Duke of York feared that the purpose of this council was to destroy him; several chroniclers of the day suggest that Somerset was poisoning the King's mind against York. The duke and his Neville allies proceeded to raise an army from their northern estates. The King and a small force left London on 20 May; the Yorkists approached from the north with a speed calculated to surprise. In a pre-emptive strike, York and his allies intercepted the King at the first Battle of St Albans. Mowbray managed to avoid involvement in the fighting, even though, as Earl Marshal, his heralds were used during negotiations between the two camps. It is uncertain at what point Mowbray joined the battle, or if he even reached the King in time to take part. The fighting lasted only a short time, and though there were very few fatalities among the soldiery, Henry Percy, the 2nd Earl of Northumberland, (father of the 3rd Earl of Northumberland), the Duke of Somerset and Lord Clifford were killed. They were not only three of the King's most loyal supporters, but Percy and Somerset at least were bitter enemies of the Nevilles and York. After the battle, Mowbray threatened to hang the Royal Standard bearer, Sir Philip Wentworth, on hearing that Wentworth "cast it down and fled" the battlefield. Whatever part, if any, Mowbray played in the fighting, by now contemporaries viewed him as being sympathetic to York. It is likely that Mowbray was deliberately vacillating. He did not attend York's victory parliament in 1455, and might have gone on pilgrimage: he is known to have walked to Walsingham in 1456, and over the next two years may have travelled to Amiens, Rome or even Jerusalem. After four years of peace, the civil war resumed in September 1459 when the Yorkist Earl of Salisbury fought off a royal ambush at the Battle of Blore Heath. Salisbury won that battle but was defeated soon after with the Duke of York at the Battle of Ludford. The Yorkists escaped into exile. Mowbray had taken neither side, but with the Yorkists exiled, when a parliament was called at Coventry, Mowbray attended. Here the Yorkists were attainted, and on 11 December 1459 Mowbray took an oath of loyalty to keep Henry VI on the throne. He received several royal commissions in the final months of Lancastrian rule. The Nevilles and Earl of March spent their exile in Calais, while York and his other son, Edmund, Earl of Rutland, retired to Dublin. The Nevilles returned to England in June 1460. They were admitted into London, where they could plan an assault on the King's army, then based in Northampton. On 10 July the Yorkist army under Warwick and March defeated the royalist army at the Battle of Northampton, and once again the King was captured. Colin Richmond describes Mowbray as "more likely to have observed from a safe distance than participated" in it. York returned from exile in October 1460, and much to the frustration of his allies, made claim to the throne. Mowbray's reaction is uncertain as the chroniclers omit mention of him, but some historians note how Mowbray sided with them during the Yorkists' return from exile. The exact cause of his change of loyalty is unknown. Colin Richmond argues that the Lancastrian defeat at Northampton in June 1460 was fundamental, and Mowbray lost friends and colleagues. It is possible that King Henry's capture there encouraged him to desert the King. Christine Carpenter puts it down almost solely to Mowbray's failure to improve his position in Norfolk under Henry, while Castor points to the October 1460 Yorkist parliament being the turning point for Mowbray: possibly he believed that the attempted settlement contained in the Act of Accord was the best possible outcome. The King and Queen still had the support of much of the nobility and withdrew to the north to commence a campaign of ravaging York and the Nevilles' estates. This forced York, Salisbury and Rutland, to move north on 9 December to suppress the Lancastrians. Mowbray remained in London with Salisbury's and York's sons, the Earls of Warwick and March. York and Salisbury's expedition ended in disaster. Choosing to engage a Lancastrian army outside the duke's castle at Sandal, the Yorkists were crushed at the Battle of Wakefield on 30 December. York, Rutland and Salisbury, died in or soon after the battle. The Queen's army made its way south towards London. Mowbray, Warwick and his brother John Neville, Lord Montagu, marched north to intercept the approaching Lancastrians. Mowbray brought King Henry with them. The armies clashed on 17 February 1461 outside St Albans, where the Yorkists were defeated. Mowbray and Warwick abandoned the King to his wife and her supporters, and retreated to London before the victorious Lancastrian army could reach the city. ### Battle of Towton The Lancastrian army marched on London, but were refused entry. On 3 March 1461 Mowbray attended a great council at Baynard's Castle, organised a small group of Yorkist loyalists, and agreed to offer Edward, Earl of March the throne. The following day—indicating the urgency for resolution felt by the Yorkists by this stage—Mowbray was sent to East Anglia to "prepare for the war on the party of King Edward". The Lancastrian army had returned to the north where, on 29 March 1461, York and Lancaster met at the Battle of Towton. It was to be one of the longest and bloodiest battles fought on British soil, and "fought in bitter Yorkshire weather and no less bitter spirit", according to historian Charles Ross. On Mowbray's advice, Edward followed the Lancastrian army north with a new army. Mowbray seems to have recruited successfully; one of the Paston letters mentions that "every town hath waged and sent forth." He left East Anglia via Cambridge on 17 March 1461, where Sir John Howard, his cousin and retainer, and his forces joined Mowbray's. Mowbray's army may have constituted elements of the Yorkist rearguard, as such not part of the main army, and were intending to join with it later. He was still not with Warwick's and March's council of war at Doncaster in late March. There are different explanations for the delay. He may have faced difficulty in mustering troops; the army recently raised to fight at St Alban's had been dispersed and this would require re-mustering. It is likely that—since he died only a few months later—Mowbray was too ill to keep up with the main Yorkist force. At Pontefract Mowbray transferred command to Howard, knowing that time was of the essence for the Yorkists and while he was with them, his soldiers could only march as quickly as he could. If Mowbray was ill, then it is unlikely that he fought personally; Boardman observed that "a sick man would never have survived such a strength-sapping ordeal, especially a noble in armour-plate." If his contingent was tasked with bringing up Yorkist artillery, which would have further slowed them down and they may have abandoned armoury en route to increase their speed. Mowbray arrived late but at a crucial point of the battle. His prolonged absence after a day's bitter fighting must have been a worry for the Yorkists, especially as they may have thought him up to a day's march away. Mowbray's absence presented an acute problem for them; Philip A. Haigh describes them, by four o'clock in the afternoon, as doomed without him. There must have been much messaging between Edward and Mowbray throughout the day, but battle fatigue had almost certainly set in on both sides by the time Mowbray's troops arrived on the eastern edge of the battlefield. A contemporary chronicler described the situation thus > And about four o'clock at night [i.e., 4 am] the two battles joined and fought all night till on the morrow in the afternoon. About noon the aforesaid John, Duke of Norfolk, with a fresh band of good men of war came to the aid of the newly elected King Edward .... Mowbray launched a decisive attack on the Lancastrian flank, turning them left. His arrival both reinvigorated the Yorkist army and crushed Lancastrian morale with his surprise attack and led rapidly to a Lancastrian rout to give the victory to Edward IV. ## Under the Yorkists The Earl Marshals played an important role in coronations. Like his predecessors, as Earl Marshal Mowbray officiated the coronation of Edward IV on 28 June 1461. Within two months he received several lucrative offices. Public order was a problem from the beginning of the King's reign, and East Anglia was no exception. Mobs rampaged during that year's parliamentary elections. Norfolk may have encouraged this; he is certainly a candidate for ordering the murder of coroner Thomas Denys that August. Even though Mowbray supported the Yorkist regime, he met with strong opposition from the East Anglian gentry in the first year of the reign. This was despite the support of the King, and the backing of John Howard in the shires. Howard was by now one of Mowbray's senior retainers—described as Mowbray's "right well-beloved cousin and servant"—and Sheriff of Norfolk. By November, however, he had been arrested by the new Yorkist regime. ### Death Mowbray did not live long enough to benefit from the Yorkist victory. He died on 6 November 1461, aged 45, and was buried at Thetford Priory. He was succeeded by his only son, John. His mother, Katherine Duchess of Norfolk lived until 1483. She had already taken two more husbands during Mowbray's lifetime, and, after Mowbray's death, took a fourth husband, the much younger John Woodville, a younger brother of Queen Elizabeth Woodville. ## Marriage and issue Mowbray married Eleanor Bourchier, daughter of William Bourchier, Count of Eu, and Anne of Gloucester, Countess of Buckingham. Eleanor was the sister of his successor as Justice in Eyre, Henry Bourchier. The couple appears to have shared a close bond: while travelling in 1451, Mowbray supposedly dispensed with his retinue to enjoy, according to Colin Richmond, "a private tryst" with his wife. The couple had one child, also John, who in 1448 married Elizabeth, daughter of John Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury. The son was seventeen when his father died in 1461, and inherited the estate four years later. ## Character and legacy Ralph Griffiths has suggested that when Archbishop John Kemp died in 1453, it may have been in part because of the bullying and threats he had been subjected to, most "notably by Norfolk himself". One modern historian has attributed much of Suffolk's success in the region, which antagonised Mowbray, to Mowbray's "crass incompetence" and that he was "ineffectual" in assisting those who expected to rely on the protection of a lord of his stature. J. R. Lander described Mowbray as a "disreputable thug", while Richmond concludes that he was "cavalier with the rights of others to a safe life and a secure livelihood". Richmond writes that while "many medieval aristocrats were irresponsible men ... Mowbray's individuality lay in the thoroughness of his irresponsibility." In contrast, Michael Hicks believes that honour was clearly important to Mowbray, as his pursuit of Somerset (for that duke's abject performance in France) shows. Likewise, as Earl Marshal, he must have possessed a firm understanding of chivalry and its application, as it was fundamental to the office. ## Cultural depictions Mowbray, as "Duke of Norfolk", is a minor figure in the play King Henry VI, Part 3 by William Shakespeare. He appears in act I, scene I, and act II, scene II as a supporter of the Duke of York; the first time just after the Battle of St Albans, and is portrayed "conspicuously associated with opposition." This is ahistorical, as Mowbray was still loyal to King Henry at this point. His second appearance in the play is at the Battle of Towton. The play has been adapted for the screen several times. In the 1960 BBC TV serial An Age of Kings, the character appears in the episode "Henry VI: The Morning's War" portrayed by Jeffry Wickham. In 1965 the BBC again adapted the history plays for television, this time based on the 1963 theatre production The Wars of the Roses. Mowbray appears in the episode "Edward IV" portrayed by David Hargreaves. In the Elizabethan play The Merry Devil of Edmonton, Mowbray does not appear as a character on stage, but the comical figure Blague repeatedly claims that: "I serve the good Duke of Norfolk." Exactly what period the play is set is the subject debate among scholars. Suggestions range from the reign of King Henry VI (1421–1471) to the 1580s (in Queen Elizabeth I's reign). The 20th-century Shakespeare scholar W. W. Greg places it in the reign of Henry VI, basing his conclusion in part on Thomas Fuller's posthumously published History of the Worthies of England (1662). If this is the case then the "Duke of Norfolk" referred to in the play would be Mowbray. According to J. M. Bromley, the play evokes "the similarities between poaching and treason", and the anonymous author deliberately links this Duke of Norfolk to both. Rudolph Fiehler noted how Blague's service to the duke was very much based upon the unsavoury characteristics of "cowardice, poaching and thievery". It has further been suggested that his comic catchphrase was deliberately intended to invoke Sir John Falstaff, one of Shakespeare's best-known characters, for the audience. In Shakespeare's Henry IV, Part 2, Justice Shallow refers to Falstaff as having once been a page to "Thomas Mowbray, Duke of Norfolk", Mowbray's grandfather. Falstaff is commonly considered to be a fictional representation of either Sir John Oldcastle or Sir John Fastolf—or possibly an amalgamation of the two—both of whom are variously associated with Mowbray.

Weardale campaign

1327 battle of the First War of Scottish Independence

The Weardale campaign, part of the First War of Scottish Independence, occurred during July and August 1327 in Weardale, England. A Scottish force under James, Lord of Douglas, and the earls of Moray and Mar faced an English army commanded by Roger, Lord Mortimer of Wigmore, accompanied by the newly crowned Edward III. In 1326 the English king Edward II was deposed by a rebellion led by his wife, Isabella, and her lover, Mortimer. England had been at war with Scotland for 30 years and the Scots took advantage of the chaotic situation to launch large raids into England. Seeing opposition to the Scots as a way of legitimising their position, Isabella and Mortimer prepared a large army to oppose them. In July 1327 this set off from York to trap the Scots and force them to battle. After two weeks of poor supplies and bad weather the English confronted the Scots when the latter deliberately gave away their position. The Scots occupied an unassailable position immediately north of the River Wear. The English declined to attack it and the Scots declined to fight in the open. After three days the Scots moved overnight to an even stronger position. The English followed them and, that night, a Scottish force crossed the river and successfully raided the English camp, penetrating as far as the royal pavilion. The English believed that they had the Scots surrounded and were starving them out, but on the night of 6 August the Scottish army escaped and marched back to Scotland. The campaign was ruinously expensive for the English. Isabella and Mortimer were forced to negotiate with the Scots and in 1328 the Treaty of Edinburgh–Northampton was signed, recognising Scottish sovereignty. ## Background The First War of Scottish Independence between England and Scotland began in March 1296, when Edward I of England (r. 1272–1307) stormed and sacked the Scottish border town of Berwick as a prelude to his invasion of Scotland. By 1323 the English, now ruled by Edward II, had been completely expelled from Scotland. Robert Bruce was securely on the Scottish throne and had carried out several major raids deep into England. In May a 13-year truce was agreed. Despite this, Scottish raids continued, as did English piracy against Scottish shipping. To add to Edward II's embarrassments, when an Anglo-French war broke out in Aquitaine in 1323 the English were defeated and forced to agree a humiliating peace in 1325. By February 1326, it was clear that Edward II's wife, Isabella, had taken the exiled Roger Mortimer as a lover. Living in Paris, and encouraged by the French court, they became the centre of English opposition to Edward II. In April the Scots agreed a military alliance with the French. In September Isabella, Mortimer and the heir to the throne – thirteen-year-old Prince Edward – landed in Suffolk. Edward II's authority collapsed, Isabella's faction took over the administration with the support of the Church, and Edward II was taken prisoner in November. Edward II's treasurer, Walter de Stapledon, was killed by a mob in St Paul's Cathedral; his main counsellor, Hugh Despenser, was declared a traitor and sentenced to be drawn, hanged, disembowelled, castrated and quartered – his head was displayed at one of London's gates; Robert Baldock, his chancellor, died in prison; and the Earl of Arundel was beheaded. Under threat of having his son disinherited, Edward II abdicated in January 1327. A few days later Prince Edward was crowned as Edward III. It was understood that his mother and her lover intended the young Edward to be their puppet. With Edward II deposed, Isabella and Mortimer lacked legitimacy and popular support. The Scots saw opportunity in the chaos south of the border; as Edward III was being crowned a Scottish force was besieging the English-held border castle of Norham. Edward II had refused to recognise Robert Bruce as king of Scotland, and the Scottish raids were intended to exert pressure on the English to acknowledge his kingship. Ending the devastating Scottish raids by defeating the Scots in battle would aid in legitimising Isabella and Mortimer's de facto rule. For Bruce, demonstrating that the English were unable to end the raids would potentially put the Scottish king in a position to dictate a peace. Under these pressures, the truce collapsed and both sides prepared for full-scale war. ## Prelude Bruce was immobilised with an unspecified illness during 1327. This did not prevent the Scots from maintaining the pressure on England. On 15 June a large Scottish force raided across the border. In July a Scottish army re-entered England. It is reported to have consisted of 10,000 mounted men and it was led by Donald, Earl of Mar, Thomas, Earl of Moray, and James, Lord of Douglas. It had little in the way of supply or baggage trains, instead dispersing over a wide area to forage. This was contrary to the normal military practice of the time, which stressed the benefits of concentration. These factors gave the Scots an unusual degree of operational mobility. Their scattered formation, which enabled them to advance on a front of 70 miles (110 km) or more, also made it difficult for opponents to identify their numbers, centre of operations and even direction of travel. They plundered and burnt their way south and by 5 July they had penetrated as far as Appleby. The English had assembled an army at York, stronger and better-equipped than the Scots. This army included 780 Hainault mercenary men-at-arms. While assembling, the Hainaulters fell out with the English infantry and engaged in a running battle through York. Both suffered significant losses. The English positioned a large force of Welsh troops at Carlisle and a strong contingent of men-at-arms at Newcastle upon Tyne; it was assumed that the presence of these forces on their flanks and the difficulty of the terrain would hinder any Scottish attempt at retreat sufficiently for the main English army to force the Scots to battle. The English army at York set out on 1 July, reaching Durham on 15 July. Edward III accompanied the army as nominal commander, but exercised no authority; that was reserved for Mortimer. Isabella remained in York. From Durham the sight of smoke from burning farms indicated that at least some of the Scots were nearby. ## Campaign On 16 July the English set off in battle formation and headed towards the freshest smoke plumes. No contact with the Scots was made. The procedure was repeated on 17 July with the same result. The English realised that the Scots could plunder and burn the villages while still moving faster than the English across terrain described in le Bel's eyewitness account as "savage wastes". The English instead formulated a plan to cut off the Scots. They set off well before dawn on 20 July: the men-at-arms moved mounted, as fast as they could. The baggage train was left behind and the infantry straggled after the cavalry, falling well behind. The vanguard forded the River Tyne at Haydon as night fell. The English stood-to-arms all night, anticipating a desperate Scottish assault. This did not materialise and the next morning the English were in a difficult situation. They had outrun their supplies and no food was available locally. It was also raining heavily; this continued for several days and made the Tyne unfordable. After a week the English were complaining, states le Bel, of their "discomfort and poverty" and their commanders developed a new plan. The English sent out scouts and moved 9 miles (14 km) west to Haltwhistle, where the Tyne was fordable. The Scots were some way south of the English; they had been aware of the English army but unable to locate it. One of the English scouts was captured by the Scots, but released with a message for Edward III that the Scots were eager for battle. The freed scout then led the English army to the Scottish army's position, probably on 31 July. The Scots had established themselves in a position on the north bank of the River Wear, close to Stanhope Park. Their spearmen adopted their traditional schiltrons – tightly packed pike formations with little mobility but capable of all-round defence. They occupied rocky heights immediately overlooking the fast-flowing river. An attack on this position would be all but hopeless. The English formed up in battle order, were addressed by Edward III and advanced slowly, hoping that the Scots would come down to fight them on the flood plain. They declined to, and Douglas declared that it was not unchivalrous for a smaller force to make the most of what advantages it had. After scouting the Scottish position, a body of English longbowmen forded the Wear upstream and began firing into the Scots from long range, hoping to make their position untenable. They were chased off by Scottish cavalry. The English then sent heralds, inviting the Scots to abandon their positions and engage in a fair and open battle. The Scots replied that they were content where they were and if the English King and his council were unhappy with the situation, the onus was on them to do something about it. The English in turn declined to attack, and remained on the south bank of the Wear, facing the Scottish positions, hoping to starve them out. This stand-off lasted for three days. On the night of 2/3 August the Scots decamped, moving a short way to an even stronger position, within Stanhope Park proper. The English in turn shifted camp to again face the Scots, still on the south side of the river; they feared that if they attempted a crossing in force the Scots would attack the vanguard once it was across and defeat it in detail. While the Scots' position was strong enough that a direct English assault would be obviously suicidal, the English were less secure. On the night of 3/4 August, Douglas led a night attack on the English camp, cutting guy ropes and creating panic. They penetrated to the centre of the English camp and collapsed the King's tent with a terrified Edward III inside. The Scots successfully retreated to their camp. The English were convinced that this had been an attempt by the starving Scots to cut their way out of the trap they found themselves in. On 6 August a prisoner interrogation revealed that the Scots were preparing to move their entire army that night. The English slept fully armoured and in battle order in anticipation of a Scottish assault, with large bonfires burning to illuminate the field. The Scots, who were indeed out of food, picked their way through the swamp to the north of their position, which the English had considered impassable. With daylight they retreated north to Scotland with their plunder. Edward III wept tears of frustration at their escape. The outwitted English marched slowly back to Durham – their horses were worn out – where they were reunited with their supply wagons on 10 August. The Hainaulters were paid off and returned home. ## Aftermath Contemporary English opinion of the campaign considered it "to the great shame, dishonour, and scorn of all England". The north of England was so thoroughly looted that extensive tax exemptions had to be granted. The campaign had been hugely expensive for the English: 70,000 pounds; the 780 Hainaulters alone submitted a bill for 41,000 pounds. For context, the English crown's total income each year was about 30,000 pounds. The Scottish army was reinforced later in the year and crossed the border to devastate Northumbria again. The siege of Norham Castle continued into late 1327 and the main English force in the region was unable to venture out of its base at Alnwick. If the Scots were to invade again in 1328, the English lacked the finances to raise troops to oppose them, and so Isabella and Mortimer were forced to negotiate. Edward II died in September under suspicious circumstances. In October the victorious Bruce laid out his terms. Chief among them was the recognition of Scotland as a fully sovereign nation, with him as its king. Negotiations took place over the winter. Edward III was excluded from them, but made his objections to the process and its outcome clear. The Treaty of Edinburgh–Northampton was agreed, more or less on the terms Robert had demanded. The treaty was signed in Edinburgh by Bruce on 17 March 1328 and was ratified by the English Parliament at Northampton on 1 May. The treaty was resented in England and was widely referred to as turpis pax, the shameful peace. It ended the First Scottish War of Independence after 32 years. Robert Bruce died in 1329, leaving as his heir the five-year-old David II (r. 1329–1371). Edward III was never reconciled to the treaty. In 1330 he seized Mortimer, had him executed and established his personal rule. England and Scotland were soon at war again: in August 1332 Edward Balliol and his English supporters, backed by Edward III, won the Battle of Dupplin Moor; this marked the beginning of the Second War of Scottish Independence. ## Notes, citations and sources

1919–20 Gillingham F.C. season

During the 1919–20 English football season, Gillingham F.C. played in the Southern League Division One. It was the 22nd season in which the club competed in the Southern League, and the 21st in Division One; prior to the season, the club had been inactive for over four years due to the First World War. George Collins was appointed as the club's new manager, and most of the players were new; the club struggled to find a settled team during the season, fielding nearly 40 players, including six goalkeepers. The team's results included a run of 14 league games, from October to February, without a win. Gillingham finished bottom of the league table but nonetheless gained entry to the national Football League when it absorbed the entirety of the Southern League Division One. Gillingham also competed in the FA Cup, requiring three replays to progress from the sixth qualifying round before losing in the first round proper. The team played 47 competitive matches, winning 11, drawing 10, and losing 26. Arthur Wood was the team's top goalscorer, with 12 goals in the league and 14 in total. Tom Leslie made the most appearances, playing 40 times. The highest attendance recorded at the club's home ground, Priestfield Road, was approximately 10,000 for league games against Swindon Town and Brighton & Hove Albion and an FA Cup match against Swansea Town. ## Background and pre-season Gillingham, founded in 1893 and known as New Brompton until 1912, had played in the Southern League since the competition's formation in 1894. The team had been promoted from Division Two in 1895 and remained in Division One ever since but with minimal success, rarely finishing in the top half of the league table. The 1919–20 season was the first time the Southern League operated after the First World War; Gillingham had not played a competitive match since the 1914–15 season, when they had finished bottom of the table. Although the formal English football league system had yet to develop, the Southern League was seen as being at a level immediately below the national Football League. In July, George Collins was appointed as Gillingham's new manager in place of Sam Gilligan, who did not return to the club after the war. As was the norm at the time, Collins had responsibility for team tactics and training, but other tasks associated with a modern manager, such as the signing of new players, were the responsibility of the club's secretary, William Ironside Groombridge. Most of the Gillingham players from the final season before the war did not return, and the club signed a host of new players to take their place. The new signings included Arthur Wood, a forward who had last played for Fulham of the Football League Second Division; he was able to resume his career despite having suffered an injury while fighting in the war which necessitated the insertion of a metal plate into his forehead and limited his ability to head the ball. Other new players to join Gillingham included Bobby Beale, a goalkeeper born in nearby Maidstone who had previously played over a hundred Football League games for Manchester United, and David Chalmers, a Scottish forward who had also seen active service during the war. The team reverted to wearing a kit of black-and-white striped shirts, white shorts, and black socks, which had been the club's colours from its formation until shortly before the war when a blue and red kit was adopted. ## Southern League Division One ### August–December Gillingham's first match of the season was at their own home ground, Priestfield Road, against Watford, the Southern League champions in the final season before the war. Tom Leslie and Jack Mahon were the only players in the Gillingham team who had represented the club before the hostilities. The match ended in a 0–0 draw; the correspondent for The Daily Telegraph noted that Gillingham's forwards played well and that Watford had their full-backs to thank for the fact that Gillingham could not manage to score a goal. Gillingham lost two days later away to Luton Town, but then gained their first win of the season, beating Swansea Town with a goal from W. Savage; Abel Lee, another pre-war Gillingham player, made his return in the victory. The team followed this with a home win against Luton on 10 September; Wood scored both goals. Following this game, Gillingham failed to score in their remaining four matches in September, which resulted in one draw and three defeats. The run included a 5–0 loss away to Cardiff City, in which the Cardiff-based Western Mail contended that Gillingham's defence, prior to this game one of the best in the league, had experienced a "sensational collapse" and that the home team's goalkeeper was "practically a spectator". The team's run of consecutive defeats continued in October, with a 5–2 defeat away to Swindon Town and a 2–0 loss at home to Plymouth Argyle. Full-back Bill Cartwright made his debut against Swindon. Gillingham ended their losing run with a 2–0 victory at home to Millwall on 11 October; Wood again scored twice. The Daily Herald's reporter praised Millwall's goalkeeper and said that the team were fortunate to concede only two goals. Beale played his last game for the club in a 3–1 defeat away to Newport County on 25 October; over the next seven games, the team used four different goalkeepers, none of whom played more than twice. Changes continued to be made to the team; forward Alex Redpath made his debut against Newport and half-back A. Harris and forwards Harry Dawson and C. Denny all played for the first time against Northampton Town on 8 November. Denny never made another appearance and Dawson and Harris both played only once more. Gillingham ended November with two more defeats, losing 4–1 to Crystal Palace and 5–0 to Norwich City; the Sunday Mercury said that in the former game Crystal Palace were "easily superior" and that in the latter Norwich "toyed with their opponents". Another new forward, H. Kelly, debuted against Norwich, as did half-backs Alex Steel and Jimmy Kennedy, signed from Southend United and Watford respectively. The team began December with two further defeats, losing 2–0 at home to Brentford and 4–0 away to Merthyr Town; Steel's brother Bobby, a new signing from Tottenham Hotspur, made his debut in the latter game as the team's latest new forward. Gillingham's final three league games of 1919 took place on consecutive days beginning on Christmas Day when they lost 2–1 at home to Reading. Against the same opponents the following day, goalkeeper Jack Branfield, who had played twice for Gillingham in 1915, made his return as his team lost 3–0; he would remain first-choice goalkeeper for the remainder of the season, missing only one match. The team's last league game of the year took place on 27 December and resulted in a 1–1 draw away to Bristol Rovers, meaning that Gillingham had gone 11 league games without a victory. ### January–May Gillingham played only two league games in January and their winless run continued as they lost away to Watford and Exeter City. Following a goalless draw with Queens Park Rangers, Gillingham beat Swindon Town on 14 February to end a run of 14 league games without a victory stretching back to October; Harry Lee scored twice in the victory. The team lost their next two games, away to Millwall and at home to Brighton & Hove Albion, and ended February bottom of the league table, five points below 21st-placed Northampton. Gillingham's total of 18 goals scored in 28 games was by far the lowest in the division; no other team had scored fewer than 30. The team began March with a third consecutive defeat, losing 4–0 away to Newport County, but then achieved a goalless draw at home to Portsmouth, who were top of the table; Branfield saved a Portsmouth penalty kick. The Chatham Observer praised Abel Lee and the Steel brothers for keeping the Portsmouth forwards in check, and criticised the league leaders for their aggressive style of play. The Weekly Dispatch described it as a "rough game" and said that at one point players came to blows. Gillingham next played another team challenging for the league championship, Cardiff City, and after taking the lead after just two minutes went on to win 3–0, only the second time during the season that they had scored three goals in a league game. After two more defeats, Gillingham ended March with a 2–0 win over Southampton. Full-back Jock Robertson made his debut in a 1–0 victory over Southend United on 3 April. He would go on to play for the club until 1933 and make over 350 appearances in the Football League after Gillingham joined that competition in 1920, setting a club record which would stand for over 30 years. Gillingham beat Norwich City and Brentford on 10 and 17 April respectively, the first time the team had won two consecutive games since the previous September. Both Steel brothers, who had been regulars in the team since joining Gillingham, were absent from the team for the next game against Swansea Town; despite having to play the whole of the second half with only ten men after one of their players was injured, Swansea won 1–0. There were further changes to the team for the next game at home to Merthyr Town: half-back Joseph Griffiths made his debut and Len Ramsell played for the first time since January in place of Wood. Gillingham fell behind to a goal in the first half but scored three times to record their third victory in four games; the Western Mail stated that Merthyr were "very easily beaten". The team's final match of the season was a 2–2 draw at home to Bristol Rovers. Gillingham finished the season bottom of the league table; although they did not have the worst defence in the division, they had scored only 34 goals during the season, more than 10 fewer than any other team. Such had been the turnover of players during the season that only Leslie and Mahon were in the team for both the first and last matches of the campaign. ### League match details Key - In the result column, Gillingham's score is shown first - H = Home match - A = Away match - pen. = Penalty kick - o.g. = Own goal Results ### Partial league table ## FA Cup Gillingham entered the 1919–20 FA Cup at the sixth and final qualifying round stage, where they were paired with fellow Southern League Division One team Swansea Town. The initial match took place at Priestfield Road; Leslie scored with a penalty kick in a game that finished in a 1–1 draw, necessitating a replay. Gillingham made four team changes for the second game, including bringing in Ramsell, who scored in another 1–1 draw. The second replay took place at a neutral venue, Ninian Park in Cardiff, and ended goalless. The third replay was held at Chelsea's Stamford Bridge stadium; Gillingham took a 2–0 lead in the first half through Bobby Steel and Wood, and finally progressed to the next round, winning the game 3–1; The Daily Telegraph wrote that Gillingham were "the superior side" and that "to beat so decisively the team standing seventh in [the Southern League Division One] was a praiseworthy performance". In the first round proper, Gillingham played away to West Stanley of the North Eastern League; unlike Gillingham, West Stanley had never previously progressed beyond the qualifying rounds of the competition. After conceding a goal early on, Gillingham drew level before half time. In the second half, however, they played poorly and West Stanley scored twice more to win the match and eliminate Gillingham from the competition. West Stanley's local newspaper called the result a "sensation" and said it would go down in the history of the mining village. ### Cup match details - In the result column, Gillingham's score is shown first - H = Home match - A = Away match - N = Match played at neutral venue - pen. = Penalty kick - o.g. = Own goal Results ## Players During the season, 39 players made at least one appearance for Gillingham. Leslie made the most, playing 40 times; Mahon, Wood, and Abel Lee all made more than 30 appearances. The instability of the team during the season resulted in 12 players each making fewer than five appearances. Three of these, C. Denny, W. Hunter, and T. Turner, each played only once and never made another appearance for the Gillingham first team. Fifteen players scored at least one goal during the season. Wood was the team's top scorer, with 12 goals in the league and two in the FA Cup; no other player scored more than five times. ## Aftermath Collins left his position as Gillingham manager at the end of the season and was replaced by Robert Brown. At the annual general meeting (AGM) of the Football League on 31 May 1920, the clubs in the existing two divisions voted to admit those in the Southern League's top division en masse to form the new Third Division. Initially it was unclear if Gillingham, by virtue of their last-place finish, would be relegated to the Southern League Division Two before this took effect and thus miss out on a place in the Football League; at the club's own AGM on 3 June, angry supporters demanded to know what the club's status would be for the coming season, but the board of directors was unable to give an answer. Shortly afterwards, it was confirmed that Gillingham would indeed be entering the Football League. In their first season in the Third Division, the team again finished bottom of the league table.

Gilbert du Motier, Marquis de Lafayette

French general and politician (1757–1834)

Marie-Joseph Paul Yves Roch Gilbert du Motier de La Fayette, Marquis de La Fayette (6 September 1757 – 20 May 1834), known in the United States as Lafayette (/ˌlɑːfiːˈɛt, ˌlæf-/, ), was a French aristocrat, freemason, and military officer who volunteered to join the Continental Army, led by General George Washington, in the American Revolutionary War. Lafayette was ultimately permitted to command Continental Army troops in the decisive Siege of Yorktown in 1781, the Revolutionary War's final major battle that secured American independence. After returning to France, Lafayette became a key figure in the French Revolution of 1789 and the July Revolution of 1830 and continues to be celebrated as a hero in both France and the United States. Lafayette was born into a wealthy land-owning family in Chavaniac in the province of Auvergne in south central France. He followed the family's martial tradition and was commissioned an officer at age 13. He became convinced that the American revolutionary cause was noble, and he traveled to the New World seeking glory in it. He was made a major general at age 19, but he was initially not given American troops to command. He was wounded during the Battle of Brandywine but still managed to organize an orderly retreat, and he served with distinction in the Battle of Rhode Island. In the middle of the war, he sailed for home to lobby for an increase in French support. He returned to America in 1780 and was given senior positions in the Continental Army. In 1781, troops under his command in Virginia blocked forces led by Cornwallis until other American and French forces could position themselves for the decisive Siege of Yorktown. Lafayette returned to France and was appointed to the Assembly of Notables in 1787, convened in response to the fiscal crisis. He was elected a member of the Estates General of 1789, where representatives met from the three traditional orders of French society: the clergy, the nobility, and the commoners. After the National Constituent Assembly was formed, he helped to write the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen with Thomas Jefferson's assistance. This document was inspired by the United States Declaration of Independence, which was authored primarily by Jefferson, and invoked natural law to establish basic principles of the democratic nation-state. He also advocated the end of slavery, in keeping with the philosophy of natural rights. After the storming of the Bastille, he was appointed commander-in-chief of France's National Guard and tried to steer a middle course through the years of revolution. In August 1792, radical factions ordered his arrest, and he fled to the Austrian Netherlands. He was captured by Austrian troops and spent more than five years in prison. Lafayette returned to France after Napoleon Bonaparte secured his release in 1797, though he refused to participate in Napoleon's government. After the Bourbon Restoration of 1814, he became a liberal member of the Chamber of Deputies, a position which he held for most of the remainder of his life. In 1824, President James Monroe invited him to the United States as the nation's guest, where he visited all 24 states in the union and met a rapturous reception. During France's July Revolution of 1830, he declined an offer to become the French dictator. Instead, he supported Louis-Philippe as king, but turned against him when the monarch became autocratic. He died on 20 May 1834 and is buried in Picpus Cemetery in Paris, under soil from Bunker Hill. He is sometimes known as "The Hero of the Two Worlds" for his accomplishments in the service of both France and the United States. ## Early life Lafayette was born on 6 September 1757 to Michel Louis Christophe Roch Gilbert Paulette du Motier, Marquis de La Fayette, colonel of grenadiers, and Marie Louise Jolie de La Rivière, at the Château de Chavaniac, in Chavaniac-Lafayette, near Le Puy-en-Velay, in the province of Auvergne (now Haute-Loire). Lafayette's lineage was likely one of the oldest and most distinguished in Auvergne and, perhaps, in all of France. Males of the Lafayette family enjoyed a reputation for courage and chivalry and were noted for their contempt for danger. One of Lafayette's early ancestors, Gilbert de Lafayette III, a Marshal of France, had been a companion-at-arms of Joan of Arc's army during the Siege of Orléans in 1429. According to legend, another ancestor acquired the crown of thorns during the Sixth Crusade. His non-Lafayette ancestors are also notable; his great-grandfather (his mother's maternal grandfather) was the Comte de La Rivière, until his death in 1770 commander of the Mousquetaires du Roi, or "Black Musketeers", King Louis XV's personal horse guard. Lafayette's paternal uncle Jacques-Roch died on 18 January 1734 while fighting the Austrians at Milan in the War of the Polish Succession; upon his death, the title of marquis passed to his brother Michel. Lafayette's father likewise died on the battlefield. On 1 August 1759, Michel de Lafayette was struck by a cannonball while fighting a British-led coalition at the Battle of Minden in Westphalia. Lafayette became marquis and Lord of Chavaniac, but the estate went to his mother. Perhaps devastated by the loss of her husband, she went to live in Paris with her father and grandfather, leaving Lafayette to be raised in Chavaniac-Lafayette by his paternal grandmother, Mme de Chavaniac, who had brought the château into the family with her dowry. In 1768, when Lafayette was 11, he was summoned to Paris to live with his mother and great-grandfather at the comte's apartments in Luxembourg Palace. The boy was sent to school at the Collège du Plessis, part of the University of Paris, and it was decided that he would carry on the family martial tradition. The comte, the boy's great-grandfather, enrolled the boy in a program to train future Musketeers. Lafayette's mother and grandfather died, on 3 and 24 April 1770 respectively, leaving Lafayette an income of 25,000 livres. Upon the death of an uncle, the 12-year-old Lafayette inherited a handsome yearly income of 120,000 livres. In May 1771, aged less than 14, Lafayette was commissioned an officer in the Musketeers, with the rank of sous-lieutenant. His duties, which included marching in military parades and presenting himself to King Louis, were mostly ceremonial and he continued his studies as usual. At this time, Jean-Paul-François de Noailles, Duc d'Ayen was looking to marry off some of his five daughters. The young Lafayette, aged 14, seemed a good match for his 12-year-old daughter, Marie Adrienne Françoise, and the duke spoke to the boy's guardian (Lafayette's uncle, the new comte) to negotiate a deal. However, the arranged marriage was opposed by the duke's wife, who felt the couple, and especially her daughter, were too young. The matter was settled by agreeing not to mention the marriage plans for two years, during which time the two spouses-to-be would meet from time to time in casual settings and get to know each other better. The scheme worked; the two fell in love, and were happy together from the time of their marriage in 1774 until her death in 1807. ## Departure from France ### Finding a cause After the marriage contract was signed in 1773, Lafayette lived with his young wife in his father-in-law's house in Versailles. He continued his education, both at the riding school of Versailles (his fellow students included the future Charles X) and at the prestigious Académie de Versailles. He was given a commission as a lieutenant in the Noailles Dragoons in April 1773, the transfer from the royal regiment being done at the request of Lafayette's father-in-law. In 1775, Lafayette took part in his unit's annual training in Metz, where he met Charles François de Broglie, Marquis of Ruffec, the Army of the East's commander. At dinner, both men discussed the ongoing revolt against British rule by Britain's North American colonies. One historiographical perspective suggests that the marquis was disposed to hate the British for killing his father, and felt that a British defeat would diminish that nation's stature internationally. Another notes that the marquis had recently become a Freemason, and talk of the rebellion "fired his chivalric—and now Masonic—imagination with descriptions of Americans as 'people fighting for liberty'". In September 1775, when Lafayette turned 18, he returned to Paris and received the captaincy in the Dragoons he had been promised as a wedding present. In December, his first child, Henriette, was born. During these months, Lafayette became convinced that the American Revolution reflected his own beliefs, saying "My heart was dedicated." The year 1776 saw delicate negotiations between American agents, including Silas Deane, and Louis XVI and his foreign minister, Comte Charles de Vergennes. The king and his minister hoped that by supplying the Americans with arms and officers, they might restore French influence in North America, and exact revenge against Britain for the loss in the Seven Years' War. When Lafayette heard that French officers were being sent to America, he demanded to be among them. He met Deane, and gained inclusion despite his youth. On 7 December 1776, Deane enlisted Lafayette as a major general. The plan to send French officers (as well as other aid) to America came to nothing when the British heard of it and threatened war. Lafayette's father-in-law, de Noailles, scolded the young man and told him to go to London and visit the Marquis de Noailles, the ambassador to Britain and Lafayette's uncle by marriage, which he did in February 1777. In the interim, he did not abandon his plans to go to America. Lafayette was presented to George III, and spent three weeks in London society. On his return to France, he went into hiding from his father-in-law (and superior officer), writing to him that he was planning to go to America. De Noailles was furious, and convinced Louis to issue a decree forbidding French officers from serving in America, specifically naming Lafayette. Vergennes may have persuaded the king to order Lafayette's arrest, though this is uncertain. ### Departure for America Lafayette learned that the Continental Congress lacked funds for his voyage, so he bought the sailing ship Victoire with his own money for 112,000 pounds. He journeyed to Bordeaux, where Victoire was being prepared for her trip, and he sent word asking for information on his family's reaction. The response threw him into emotional turmoil, including letters from his wife and other relatives. Soon after departure, he ordered the ship turned around and returned to Bordeaux, to the frustration of the officers traveling with him. The army commander there ordered Lafayette to report to his father-in-law's regiment in Marseilles. De Broglie hoped to become a military and political leader in America, and he met Lafayette in Bordeaux and convinced him that the government actually wanted him to go. This was not true, though there was considerable public support for Lafayette in Paris, where the American cause was popular. Lafayette wanted to believe it, and pretended to comply with the order to report to Marseilles, going only a few kilometres east before turning around and returning to his ship. Victoire set sail out of Pauillac on the shores of the Gironde on 25 March 1777. However, Lafayette was not on board in order to avoid being identified by English spies and the king of France; the vessel moored in Pasaia on the Basque coast, and was supplied with 5,000 rifles and ammunition from the factories in Gipuzkoa. He joined the Victoire, departing to America on 26 April 1777. The two-month journey to the New World was marked by seasickness and boredom. The ship's captain Lebourcier intended to stop in the West Indies to sell cargo, but Lafayette was fearful of arrest, so he bought the cargo to avoid docking at the islands. He landed on North Island near Georgetown, South Carolina on 13 June 1777. ## American Revolution On arrival, Lafayette met Major Benjamin Huger, a wealthy landowner, with whom he stayed for two weeks before going to Philadelphia. The Second Continental Congress had been overwhelmed by French officers recruited by Deane, many of whom could not speak English or lacked military experience. Lafayette had learned some English en route (he became fluent within a year of his arrival), and his Masonic membership opened many doors in Philadelphia. After Lafayette offered to serve without pay, Congress commissioned him a major general on 31 July 1777. Lafayette's advocates included the recently arrived American envoy to France, Benjamin Franklin, who by letter urged Congress to accommodate the young Frenchman. General George Washington, commander in chief of the Continental Army, came to Philadelphia to brief Congress on military affairs. Lafayette met him at a dinner on 5 August 1777; according to Leepson, "the two men bonded almost immediately." Washington was impressed by the young man's enthusiasm and was inclined to think well of a fellow Mason; Lafayette was simply in awe of the commanding general. General Washington took the Frenchman to view his military camp; when Washington expressed embarrassment at its state and that of the troops, Lafayette responded, "I am here to learn, not to teach." He became a member of Washington's staff, although confusion existed regarding his status. Congress regarded his commission as honorary, while he considered himself a full-fledged commander who would be given control of a division when Washington deemed him prepared. Washington told Lafayette that a division would not be possible as he was of foreign birth, but that he would be happy to hold him in confidence as "friend and father". ### Brandywine, Valley Forge, and Albany Lafayette's first battle was at Brandywine on 11 September 1777. The British commanding general, General Sir William Howe, planned to take Philadelphia by moving troops south by ship to Chesapeake Bay (rather than the heavily defended Delaware Bay) and bringing them overland to the rebel capital. After the British outflanked the Americans, Washington sent Lafayette to join General John Sullivan. Upon his arrival, Lafayette went with the Third Pennsylvania Brigade, under Brigadier Thomas Conway, and attempted to rally the unit to face the attack. The British and Hessian forces continued to advance with their superior forces, and Lafayette was shot in the leg. During the American retreat, Lafayette rallied the troops, allowing a more orderly pullback, before being treated for his wound. After the battle, Washington cited him for "bravery and military ardour" and recommended him for the command of a division in a letter to Congress, which was hastily evacuating, as the British took Philadelphia later that month. Lafayette returned to the field in November after two months of recuperation in the Moravian settlement of Bethlehem, and received command of the division previously led by Major General Adam Stephen. He assisted General Nathanael Greene in reconnaissance of British positions in New Jersey; with 300 soldiers, he defeated a numerically superior Hessian force in Gloucester, on 24 November 1777. Lafayette stayed at Washington's encampment at Valley Forge in the winter of 1777–78, and shared the hardship of his troops. There, the Board of War, led by Horatio Gates, asked Lafayette to prepare an invasion of Quebec from Albany, New York. When Lafayette arrived in Albany, he found too few men to mount an invasion. He wrote to Washington of the situation, and made plans to return to Valley Forge. Before departing, he recruited the Oneida tribe to the American side. The Oneida referred to Lafayette as Kayewla (fearsome horseman). In Valley Forge, he criticized the board's decision to attempt an invasion of Quebec in winter. The Continental Congress agreed, and Gates left the board. Meanwhile, treaties signed by America and France were made public in March 1778, and France formally recognized American independence. ### Barren Hill, Monmouth, and Rhode Island Faced with the prospect of French intervention, the British sought to concentrate their land and naval forces in New York City, and they began to evacuate Philadelphia in May 1778. Washington dispatched Lafayette with a 2,200-man force on 18 May to reconnoiter near Barren Hill, Pennsylvania. The next day, the British heard that he had made camp nearby and sent 5,000 men to capture him. General Howe led a further 6,000 soldiers on 20 May and ordered an attack on his left flank. The flank scattered, and Lafayette organized a retreat while the British remained indecisive. To feign numerical superiority, Lafayette ordered men to appear from the woods on an outcropping (now Lafayette Hill, Pennsylvania) and to fire upon the British periodically. His troops simultaneously escaped via a sunken road, and he was then able to cross Matson's Ford with the remainder of his force. The British then marched from Philadelphia toward New York. The Continental Army followed and finally attacked at Monmouth Courthouse in central New Jersey. Washington appointed General Charles Lee to lead the attacking force at the Battle of Monmouth, and Lee moved against the British flank on 28 June. However, he gave conflicting orders soon after fighting began, causing chaos in the American ranks. Lafayette sent a message to Washington to urge him to the front; upon his arrival, he found Lee's men in retreat. Washington relieved Lee, took command, and rallied the American force. After suffering significant casualties at Monmouth, the British withdrew in the night and successfully reached New York. The French fleet arrived at Delaware Bay on 8 July 1778 under Admiral d'Estaing, with whom General Washington planned to attack Newport, Rhode Island, the other major British base in the north. Lafayette and General Greene were sent with a 3,000-man force to participate in the attack. Lafayette wanted to control a joint Franco-American force but was rebuffed by the admiral. On 9 August, the American land force attacked the British without consulting d'Estaing. The Americans asked d'Estaing to place his ships in Narragansett Bay, but he refused and sought to defeat the British fleet at sea. The fighting was inconclusive as a storm scattered and damaged both fleets. D'Estaing moved his ships north to Boston for repairs, where it faced an angry demonstration from Bostonians who considered the French departure from Newport to be a desertion. John Hancock and Lafayette were dispatched to calm the situation, and Lafayette then returned to Rhode Island to prepare the retreat made necessary by d'Estaing's departure. For these actions, he was cited by the Continental Congress for "gallantry, skill, and prudence". He wanted to expand the war to fight the British elsewhere in America and even in Europe under the French flag, but he found little interest in his proposals. In October 1778, he requested permission from Washington and Congress to go home on leave. They agreed, with Congress voting to give him a ceremonial sword to be presented to him in France. His departure was delayed by illness, and he sailed for France in January 1779. ### Return to France Lafayette reached Paris in February 1779 where he was placed under house arrest for eight days for disobeying the king by going to America. This was merely face-saving by Louis XVI; Lafayette was given a hero's welcome and was soon invited to hunt with the king. The American envoy was ill, so Benjamin Franklin's grandson William Temple Franklin presented Lafayette with the gold-encrusted sword commissioned by the Continental Congress. Lafayette pushed for an invasion of Britain, with himself to have a major command in the French forces. Spain was now France's ally against Britain and sent ships to the English Channel in support. The Spanish ships did not arrive until August 1779 and were met by a faster squadron of British ships that the combined French and Spanish fleet could not catch. In September, the invasion was abandoned, and Lafayette turned his hopes toward returning to America. In December 1779, Adrienne gave birth to Georges Washington Lafayette. Lafayette worked with Benjamin Franklin to secure the promise of 6,000 soldiers to be sent to America, commanded by General Jean-Baptiste de Rochambeau. Lafayette would resume his position as a major general of American forces, serving as liaison between Rochambeau and Washington, who would be in command of both nations' forces. In March 1780, he departed from Rochefort for America aboard the frigate Hermione, arriving in Boston on 27 April 1780. ### Second voyage to America On his return, Lafayette found the American cause at a low ebb, rocked by several military defeats, especially in the south. Lafayette was greeted in Boston with enthusiasm, seen as "a knight in shining armor from the chivalric past, come to save the nation". He journeyed southwest and on 10 May 1780 had a joyous reunion with Washington at Morristown, New Jersey. The general and his officers were delighted to hear that the large French force promised to Lafayette would be coming to their aid. Washington, aware of Lafayette's popularity, had him write (with Alexander Hamilton to correct his spelling) to state officials to urge them to provide more troops and provisions to the Continental Army. This bore fruit in the coming months, as Lafayette awaited the arrival of the French fleet. However, when the fleet arrived, there were fewer men and supplies than expected, and Rochambeau decided to wait for reinforcements before seeking battle with the British. This was unsatisfactory to Lafayette, who proposed a grandiose schemes for the taking of New York City and other areas, and Rochambeau briefly refused to receive Lafayette until the young man apologized. Washington counseled the marquis to be patient. That summer Washington placed Lafayette in charge of a division of troops. The marquis spent lavishly on his command, which patrolled Northern New Jersey and adjacent New York State. Lafayette saw no significant action, and in November, Washington disbanded the division, sending the soldiers back to their state regiments. The war continued badly for the Americans, with most battles in the south going against them, and General Benedict Arnold abandoning them for the British side. Lafayette spent the first part of the winter of 1780–81 in Philadelphia, where the American Philosophical Society elected him its first foreign member. Congress asked him to return to France to lobby for more men and supplies, but Lafayette refused, sending letters instead. After the Continental victory at the Battle of Cowpens in South Carolina in January 1781, Washington ordered Lafayette to re-form his force in Philadelphia and go south to Virginia to link up with troops commanded by Baron von Steuben. The combined force was to try to trap British forces commanded by Benedict Arnold, with French ships preventing his escape by sea. If Lafayette was successful, Arnold was to be summarily hanged. British command of the seas prevented the plan, though Lafayette and a small part of his force (the rest left behind in Annapolis) was able to reach von Steuben in Yorktown, Virginia. Von Steuben sent a plan to Washington, proposing to use land forces and French ships to trap the main British force under Lord Cornwallis. When he received no new orders from Washington, Lafayette began to move his troops north toward Philadelphia, only to be ordered to Virginia to assume military command there. An outraged Lafayette assumed he was being abandoned in a backwater while decisive battles took place elsewhere, and objected to his orders in vain. He also sent letters to the Chevalier de la Luzerne, French ambassador in Philadelphia, describing how ill-supplied his troops were. As Lafayette hoped, la Luzerne sent his letter on to France with a recommendation of massive French aid, which, after being approved by the king, would play a crucial part in the battles to come. Washington, fearing a letter might be captured by the British, could not tell Lafayette that he planned to trap Cornwallis in a decisive campaign. ### Virginia and Yorktown Lafayette evaded Cornwallis' attempts to capture him in Richmond. In June 1781, Cornwallis received orders from London to proceed to the Chesapeake Bay and to oversee construction of a port, in preparation for an overland attack on Philadelphia. As the British column traveled, Lafayette sent small squads that would appear unexpectedly, attacking the rear guard or foraging parties, and giving the impression that his forces were larger than they were. On 4 July, the British left Williamsburg and prepared to cross the James River. Cornwallis sent only an advance guard to the south side of the river, hiding many of his other troops in the forest on the north side, hoping to ambush Lafayette. On 6 July, Lafayette ordered General "Mad" Anthony Wayne to strike British troops on the north side with roughly 800 soldiers. Wayne found himself vastly outnumbered, and, instead of retreating, led a bayonet charge. The charge bought time for the Americans, and the British did not pursue. The Battle of Green Spring was a victory for Cornwallis, but the American army was bolstered by the display of courage by the men. By August, Cornwallis had established the British at Yorktown, and Lafayette took up position on Malvern Hill, stationing artillery surrounding the British, who were close to the York River, and who had orders to construct fortifications to protect the British ships in Hampton Roads. Lafayette's containment trapped the British when the French fleet arrived and won the Battle of the Virginia Capes, depriving Cornwallis of naval protection. On 14 September 1781, Washington's forces joined Lafayette's. On 28 September, with the French fleet blockading the British, the combined forces laid siege to Yorktown. On 14 October, Lafayette's 400 men on the American right took Redoubt 9 after Alexander Hamilton’s forces had charged Redoubt 10 in hand-to-hand combat. These two redoubts were key to breaking the British defenses. After a failed British counter-attack, Cornwallis surrendered on 19 October 1781. ## Hero of two worlds Yorktown was the last major land battle of the American Revolution, but the British still held several major port cities. Lafayette wanted to lead expeditions to capture them, but Washington felt that he would be more useful seeking additional naval support from France. Congress appointed him its advisor to America's envoys in Europe, Benjamin Franklin in Paris, John Jay in Madrid, and John Adams in The Hague, instructing them "to communicate and agree on everything with him". Congress also sent Louis XVI an official letter of commendation on the marquis's behalf. Lafayette left Boston for France on 18 December 1781 where he was welcomed as a hero, and he was received at the Palace of Versailles on 22 January 1782. He witnessed the birth of his daughter, whom he named Marie-Antoinette Virginie upon Thomas Jefferson's recommendation. He was promoted to maréchal de camp, skipping numerous ranks, and he was made a Knight of the Order of Saint Louis. He worked on a combined French and Spanish expedition against the British West Indies in 1782, as no formal peace treaty had yet been signed. The Treaty of Paris was signed between Great Britain and the United States in 1783, which made the expedition unnecessary; Lafayette took part in those negotiations. Lafayette worked with Jefferson to establish trade agreements between the United States and France which aimed to reduce America's debt to France. He joined the French abolitionist group Society of the Friends of the Blacks which advocated the end of the slave trade and equal rights for free blacks. He urged the emancipation of slaves and their establishment as tenant farmers in a 1783 letter to Washington, who was a slave owner. Washington declined to free his slaves, though he expressed interest in the young man's ideas, and Lafayette purchased a plantation in French Guiana to house the project. Lafayette visited America in 1784–1785 where he enjoyed an enthusiastic welcome, visiting all the states. The trip included a visit to Washington's farm at Mount Vernon on 17 August. He addressed the Virginia House of Delegates where he called for "liberty of all mankind" and urged emancipation of slaves, and he urged the Pennsylvania Legislature to help form a federal union (the states were then bound by the Articles of Confederation). He visited the Mohawk Valley in New York to participate in peace negotiations with the Iroquois, some of whom he had met in 1778. He received an honorary degree from Harvard University, a portrait of Washington from the city of Boston, and a bust from the state of Virginia. Maryland's legislature honored him by making him and his male heirs "natural born Citizens" of the state, which made him a natural-born citizen of the United States after the 1789 ratification of the Constitution. Lafayette later boasted that he had become an American citizen before the concept of French citizenship existed. Connecticut, Massachusetts, and Virginia also granted him citizenship. Lafayette made the Hôtel de La Fayette in Paris's rue de Bourbon an important meeting place for Americans there. Benjamin Franklin, John and Sarah Jay, and John and Abigail Adams met there every Monday and dined in company with Lafayette's family and the liberal nobility, including Clermont-Tonnerre and Madame de Staël. Lafayette continued to work on lowering trade barriers in France to American goods, and on assisting Franklin and Jefferson in seeking treaties of amity and commerce with European nations. He also sought to correct the injustices that Huguenots in France had endured since the revocation of the Edict of Nantes a century before. ## French Revolution ### Assembly of Notables and Estates-General On 29 December 1786, King Louis XVI called an Assembly of Notables, in response to France's fiscal crisis. The king appointed Lafayette to the body, which convened on 22 February 1787. In speeches, Lafayette decried those with connections at court who had profited from advance knowledge of government land purchases; he advocated reform. He called for a "truly national assembly", which represented the whole of France. Instead, the king chose to summon an Estates General, to convene in 1789. Lafayette was elected as a representative of the nobility (the Second Estate) from Riom. The Estates General, traditionally, cast one vote for each of the three Estates: clergy, nobility, and commons, meaning the much larger commons was generally outvoted. The Estates General convened on 5 May 1789; debate began on whether the delegates should vote by head or by Estate. If by Estate, then the nobility and clergy would be able to outvote the commons; if by head, then the larger Third Estate could dominate. Before the meeting, as a member of the "Committee of Thirty", Lafayette agitated for voting by head, rather than estate. He could not get a majority of his own Estate to agree, but the clergy was willing to join with the commons, and on the 17th, the group declared itself the National Assembly. The loyalist response was to lock out the group, including Lafayette, while those who had not supported the Assembly met inside. This action led to the Tennis Court Oath, where the excluded members swore not to separate until a constitution was established. The Assembly continued to meet, and on 11 July 1789, Lafayette presented a draft of the "Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen" to the Assembly, written by himself in consultation with Jefferson. The next day, after the dismissal of Finance Minister Jacques Necker (who was seen as a reformer), lawyer Camille Desmoulins assembled between 700 and 1000 armed insurgents. The king had the royal army under the duc de Broglie surround Paris. On 14 July, the fortress known as the Bastille was stormed by the insurgents. ### National Guard, Versailles, and Day of Daggers On 15 July, Lafayette was acclaimed commander-in-chief of the Parisian National Guard, an armed force established to maintain order under the control of the Assembly military service as well as policing, traffic control, sanitization, lighting, among other matters of local administration. Lafayette proposed the name and the symbol of the group: a blue, white, and red cockade. This combined the red and blue colors of the city of Paris with the royal white, and originated the French tricolor. He faced a difficult task as head of the Guard; the king and many loyalists considered him and his supporters to be little better than revolutionaries, whereas many commoners felt that he was helping the king to keep power via this position. The National Assembly approved the Declaration on 26 August, but the king rejected it on 2 October. Three days later, a Parisian crowd led by women fishmongers marched to Versailles in response to the scarcity of bread. Members of the National Guard followed the march, with Lafayette reluctantly leading them. At Versailles, the king accepted the Assembly's votes on the Declaration, but refused requests to go to Paris, and the crowd broke into the palace at dawn. Lafayette took the royal family onto the palace balcony and attempted to restore order, but the crowd insisted that the king and his family move to Paris and the Tuileries Palace. The king came onto the balcony and the crowd started chanting "Vive le Roi!" Marie Antoinette then appeared with her children, but she was told to send the children back in. She returned alone and people shouted to shoot her, but she stood her ground and no one opened fire. Lafayette kissed her hand, leading to cheers from the crowd. Lafayette would later initiate an investigation within the National Assembly on the now declared October Days, which led to the production of the Procédure Criminelle by Jean-Baptiste-Charles Chabroud, a 688-page document accumulating evidence and analysis on the exact events and procedures of the March on Versailles, hoping to condemn those inciting the mob (in his mind being Mirabeau and the Duc d'Orléans). However, the National Assembly thought condemning two significant revolutionaries would hurt the progress and public reception of the revolutionary administration. As leader of the National Guard, Lafayette attempted to maintain order and steer a middle ground, even as the radicals gained increasing influence. He and Paris' mayor Jean Sylvain Bailly instituted a political club on 12 May 1790 called the Society of 1789 whose intention was to provide balance to the influence of the radical Jacobins. Lafayette helped organize and lead the assembly at the Fête de la Fédération on 14 July 1790 where he, alongside the National Guard and the king, took the civic oath on the Champs de Mars on 14 July 1790 vowing to "be ever faithful to the nation, to the law, and to the king; to support with our utmost power the constitution decreed by the National Assembly, and accepted by the king." In the eyes of the royalist factions, Lafayette took a large risk holding a largely undisciplined group at the Champs de Mars in fear for the safety of the king, whereas for Jacobins this solidified in their eyes Lafayette's royalist tendencies and an encouragement of the common people's support of the monarchy. Lafayette continued to work for order in the coming months. He and part of the National Guard left the Tuileries on 28 February 1791 to handle a conflict in Vincennes, and hundreds of armed nobles arrived at the Tuileries to defend the king while he was gone. However, there were rumors that these nobles had come to take the king away and place him at the head of a counter-revolution. Lafayette quickly returned to the Tuileries and disarmed the nobles after a brief standoff. The event came to be known as the Day of Daggers, and it boosted Lafayette's popularity with the French people for his quick actions to protect the king. Nonetheless, the royal family were increasingly prisoners in their palace. The National Guard disobeyed Lafayette on 18 April and prevented the king from leaving for Saint-Cloud where he planned to attend Mass. ### Flight to Varennes A plot known as the Flight to Varennes almost enabled the king to escape from France on 20 June 1791. The king and queen had escaped from the Tuileries Palace, essentially under the watch of Lafayette and the National Guard. Being notified of their escape, Lafayette sent the Guard out in a multitude of directions in order to retrieve the escapee monarchs. Five days later, Lafayette and the National Guard led the royal carriage back into Paris amidst a crowding mob calling for the heads of the monarchs as well as Lafayette. Lafayette had been responsible for the royal family's custody as leader of the National Guard, and he was thus blamed by extremists such as Georges Danton, declaring in a speech directed towards Lafayette "You swore that the king would not leave. Either you sold out your country or you are stupid for having made a promise for a person whom you could not trust.... France can be free without you." He was further called a traitor to the people by Maximilien Robespierre. These accusations made Lafayette appear a royalist, damaged his reputation in the eyes of the public, and strengthened the hands of the Jacobins and other radicals in opposition to him. He continued to urge the constitutional rule of law, but he was drowned out by the mob and its leaders. ### Champs de Mars massacre Lafayette's public standing continued to decline through the latter half of 1791. The radical Cordeliers organized an event at the Champ de Mars on 17 July to gather signatures on a petition to the National Assembly that it either abolish the monarchy or allow its fate to be decided in a referendum. The assembled crowd was estimated to be anywhere from 10,000 to 50,000 people. The protesters, finding two men hiding under an altar at the event, accused of being either spies or of potentially planting explosives, eventually hung the men from lampposts and placed their heads on the ends of pikes. Lafayette rode into the Champ de Mars at the head of his troops to restore order, but they were met with the throwing of stones from the crowd. Indeed, an assassination attempt was made on Lafayette, however the gunman's pistol misfired at close range. The soldiers began to first fire above the crowd in order to intimidate and disperse them, which only led to retaliation and eventually the death of two volunteer chasseurs. Inevitably, the National Guard was ordered to fire on the crowd, wounding and killing an unknown amount. Accounts from those close to Lafayette claim that around ten citizens were killed in the event, whereas other accounts propose fifty-four, and the sensational newspaper publisher Jean-Paul Marat claimed over four hundred bodies had been disposed of into the river later that night. Martial law was declared, and the leaders of the mob fled and went into hiding, such as Danton and Marat. Lafayette's reputation among many political clubs decreased dramatically, especially with articles in the press, such as the Revolutions de Paris describing the event at the Champ de Mars as "Men, Women, and Children were massacred on the altar of the nation on the Field of the Federation". Immediately after the massacre, a crowd of rioters attacked Lafayette's home and attempted to harm his wife. The Assembly finalized a constitution in September, and Lafayette resigned from the National Guard in early October, with a semblance of constitutional law restored. ### Conflict and exile Lafayette returned to his home province of Auvergne in October 1791. France declared war on Austria on 20 April 1792, and preparations to invade the Austrian Netherlands (today's Belgium) began. Lafayette, who had been promoted to Lieutenant General on 30 June 1791, received command of one of the three armies, the Army of the Centre, based at Metz, on 14 December 1791. Lafayette did his best to mold inductees and National Guardsmen into a cohesive fighting force, but found that many of his troops were Jacobin sympathizers and hated their superior officers. On 23 April 1792 Robespierre demanded that Lafayette step down. This emotion was common in the army, as demonstrated after the Battle of Marquain, when the routed French troops dragged their commander Théobald Dillon to Lille, where he was torn to pieces by the mob. One of the army commanders, Rochambeau, resigned. Lafayette, along with the third commander, Nicolas Luckner, asked the Assembly to begin peace talks, concerned at what might happen if the troops saw another battle. In June 1792, Lafayette criticized the growing influence of the radicals through a letter to the Assembly from his field post, and ended his letter by calling for their parties to be "closed down by force". He misjudged his timing, for the radicals were in full control in Paris. Lafayette went there, and on 28 June delivered a fiery speech before the Assembly denouncing the Jacobins and other radical groups. He was instead accused of deserting his troops. Lafayette called for volunteers to counteract the Jacobins; when only a few people showed up, he understood the public mood and hastily left Paris. Robespierre called him a traitor and the mob burned him in effigy. He was transferred to command of the Army of the North on 12 July 1792. The 25 July Brunswick Manifesto, which warned that Paris would be destroyed by the Austrians and Prussians if the king was harmed, led to the downfall of Lafayette, and of the royal family. A mob attacked the Tuileries on 10 August, and the king and queen were imprisoned at the Assembly, then taken to the Temple. The Assembly abolished the monarchy—the king and queen would be beheaded in the coming months. On 14 August, the minister of justice, Danton, put out a warrant for Lafayette's arrest. Hoping to travel to the United States, Lafayette entered the Austrian Netherlands. ## Prisoner Lafayette was taken prisoner by the Austrians near Rochefort when another former French officer, Jean-Xavier Bureau de Pusy, asked for rights of transit through Austrian territory on behalf of a group of French officers. This was initially granted, as it had been for others fleeing France, but was revoked when the famous Lafayette was recognized. Frederick William II of Prussia, Austria's ally against France, had once received Lafayette, but that was before the French Revolution—the king now saw him as a dangerous fomenter of rebellion, to be interned to prevent him from overthrowing other monarchies. Lafayette was held at Nivelles, then transferred to Luxembourg where a coalition military tribunal declared him, de Pusy, and two others to be prisoners of state for their roles in the Revolution. The tribunal ordered them held until a restored French king could render final judgment on them. On 12 September 1792, pursuant to the tribunal's order, the prisoners were transferred to Prussian custody. The party traveled to the Prussian fortress-city of Wesel, where the Frenchmen remained in verminous individual cells in the central citadel from 19 September to 22 December 1792. When victorious French revolutionary troops began to threaten the Rhineland, King Frederick William II transferred the prisoners east to the citadel at Magdeburg, where they remained an entire year, from 4 January 1793 to 4 January 1794. Frederick William decided that he could gain little by continuing to battle the unexpectedly successful French forces, and that there were easier pickings for his army in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Accordingly, he stopped armed hostilities with the Republic and turned the state prisoners back over to his erstwhile coalition partner, the Habsburg Austrian monarch Francis II, Holy Roman Emperor. Lafayette and his companions were initially sent to Neisse (today Nysa, Poland) in Silesia. On 17 May 1794, they were taken across the Austrian border, where a military unit was waiting to receive them. The next day, the Austrians delivered their captives to a barracks-prison, formerly a college of the Jesuits, in the fortress-city of Olmütz, Moravia (today Olomouc in the Czech Republic). Lafayette, when captured, had tried to use the American citizenship he had been granted to secure his release, and contacted William Short, United States minister in The Hague. Although Short and other U.S. envoys very much wanted to succor Lafayette for his services to their country, they knew that his status as a French officer took precedence over any claim to American citizenship. Washington, who was by then president, had instructed the envoys to avoid actions that entangled the country in European affairs, and the U.S. did not have diplomatic relations with either Prussia or Austria. They did send money for the use of Lafayette, and for his wife, whom the French had imprisoned. Secretary of State Jefferson found a loophole allowing Lafayette to be paid, with interest, for his services as a major general from 1777 to 1783. An act was rushed through Congress and signed by President Washington. These funds allowed both Lafayettes privileges in their captivity. A more direct means of aiding the former general was an escape attempt sponsored by Alexander Hamilton's sister-in-law Angelica Schuyler Church and her husband John Barker Church, a British Member of Parliament who had served in the Continental Army. They hired as agent a young Hanoverian physician, Justus Erich Bollmann, who acquired an assistant, a South Carolinian medical student named Francis Kinloch Huger. This was the son of Benjamin Huger, whom Lafayette had stayed with upon his first arrival in America. With their help, Lafayette managed to escape from an escorted carriage drive in the countryside outside Olmütz, but he lost his way and was recaptured. Once Adrienne was released from prison in France, she, with the help of U.S. Minister to France James Monroe, obtained passports for her and her daughters from Connecticut, which had granted the entire Lafayette family citizenship. Her son Georges Washington had been smuggled out of France and taken to the United States. Adrienne and her two daughters journeyed to Vienna for an audience with Emperor Francis, who granted permission for the three women to live with Lafayette in captivity. Lafayette, who had endured harsh solitary confinement since his escape attempt a year before, was astounded when soldiers opened his prison door to usher in his wife and daughters on 15 October 1795. The family spent the next two years in confinement together. Through diplomacy, the press, and personal appeals, Lafayette's sympathizers on both sides of the Atlantic made their influence felt, most importantly on the post-Reign of Terror French government. A young, victorious general, Napoleon Bonaparte, negotiated the release of the state prisoners at Olmütz, as a result of the Treaty of Campo Formio. Lafayette's captivity of over five years thus came to an end. The Lafayette family and their comrades in captivity left Olmütz under Austrian escort early on the morning of 19 September 1797, crossed the Bohemian-Saxon border north of Prague, and were officially turned over to the American consul in Hamburg on 4 October. From Hamburg, Lafayette sent a note of thanks to General Bonaparte. The French government, the Directory, was unwilling to have Lafayette return unless he swore allegiance, which he was not willing to do, as he believed it had come to power by unconstitutional means. As revenge, it had his remaining properties sold, leaving him a pauper. The family, soon joined by Georges Washington, who had returned from America, recuperated on a property near Hamburg belonging to Adrienne's aunt. Due to conflict between the United States and France, Lafayette could not go to America as he had hoped, making him a man without a country. Adrienne was able to go to Paris, and attempted to secure her husband's repatriation, flattering Bonaparte, who had returned to France after more victories. After Bonaparte's coup d'état of 18 Brumaire (9 November 1799), Lafayette used the confusion caused by the change of regime to slip into France with a passport in the name of "Motier". Bonaparte expressed rage, but Adrienne was convinced he was simply posing, and proposed to him that Lafayette would pledge his support, then would retire from public life to a property she had reclaimed, La Grange. France's new ruler allowed Lafayette to remain, though originally without citizenship and subject to summary arrest if he engaged in politics, with the promise of eventual restoration of civil rights. Lafayette remained quietly at La Grange, and when Bonaparte held a memorial service in Paris for Washington, who had died in December 1799, Lafayette, though he had expected to be asked to deliver the eulogy, was not invited, nor was his name mentioned. ## Retreat from politics Bonaparte restored Lafayette's citizenship on 1 March 1800 and he was able to recover some of his properties. After Marengo, the First Consul offered him the post of French minister to the United States, but Lafayette declined, saying he was too attached to America to act in relation to it as a foreign envoy. In 1802, he was part of the tiny minority that voted no in the referendum that made Bonaparte consul for life. A seat in the Senate and the Legion of Honor were repeatedly offered by Bonaparte, but Lafayette again declined— though stating that he would gladly have accepted the honours from a democratic government. In 1804, Bonaparte was crowned the Emperor Napoleon after a plebiscite in which Lafayette did not participate. The retired general remained relatively quiet, although he made Bastille Day addresses. After the Louisiana Purchase, President Jefferson asked him if he would be interested in the governorship, but Lafayette declined, citing personal problems and his desire to work for liberty in France. During a trip to Auvergne in 1807, Adrienne became ill, suffering from complications stemming from her time in prison. She became delirious but recovered enough on Christmas Eve to gather the family around her bed and to say to Lafayette: "Je suis toute à vous" ("I am all yours"). She died the next day. In the years after her death, Lafayette mostly remained quietly at La Grange, as Napoleon's power in Europe waxed and then waned. Many influential people and members of the public visited him, especially Americans. He wrote many letters, especially to Jefferson, and exchanged gifts as he had once done with Washington. ## Bourbon restoration In 1814, the coalition that opposed Napoleon invaded France and restored the monarchy; the comte de Provence (brother of the executed Louis XVI) took the throne as Louis XVIII. Lafayette was received by the new king, but the staunch republican opposed the new, highly restrictive franchise for the Chamber of Deputies that granted the vote to only 90,000 men in a nation of 25 million. Lafayette did not stand for election in 1814, remaining at La Grange. There was discontent in France among demobilized soldiers and others. Napoleon had been exiled only as far as Elba, an island in the Tuscan archipelago; seeing an opportunity, he landed at Cannes on 1 March 1815 with a few hundred followers. Frenchmen flocked to his banner, and he took Paris later that month, causing Louis to flee to Ghent. Lafayette refused Napoleon's call to serve in the new government, but accepted election to the new Chamber of Representatives under the Charter of 1815. There, after Napoleon's defeat at the Battle of Waterloo, Lafayette called for his abdication. Responding to the emperor's brother Lucien, Lafayette argued: > By what right do you dare accuse the nation of ... want of perseverance in the emperor's interest? The nation has followed him on the fields of Italy, across the sands of Egypt and the plains of Germany, across the frozen deserts of Russia. ... The nation has followed him in fifty battles, in his defeats and in his victories, and in doing so we have to mourn the blood of three million Frenchmen. On 22 June 1815, four days after Waterloo, Napoleon abdicated. Lafayette arranged for the former emperor's passage to America, but the British prevented this, and Napoleon ended his days on the island of Saint Helena. The Chamber of Representatives, before it dissolved, appointed Lafayette to a peace commission that was ignored by the victorious allies who occupied much of France, with the Prussians taking over La Grange as a headquarters. Once the Prussians left in late 1815, Lafayette returned to his house, a private citizen again. Lafayette's homes, both in Paris and at La Grange, were open to any Americans who wished to meet the hero of their Revolution, and to many other people besides. Among those whom Irish novelist Sydney, Lady Morgan met at table during her month-long stay at La Grange in 1818 were the Dutch painter Ary Scheffer and the historian Augustin Thierry, who sat alongside American tourists. Others who visited included philosopher Jeremy Bentham, American scholar George Ticknor, and writer Fanny Wright. During the first decade of the Bourbon Restoration, Lafayette lent his support to a number of conspiracies in France and other European countries, all of which came to nothing. He was involved in the various Charbonnier plots, and agreed to go to the city of Belfort, where there was a garrison of French troops, and assume a major role in the revolutionary government. Warned that the royal government had found out about the conspiracy, he turned back on the road to Belfort, avoiding overt involvement. More successfully, he supported the Greek Revolution beginning in 1821, and by letter attempted to persuade American officials to ally with the Greeks. Louis' government considered arresting both Lafayette and Georges Washington, who was also involved in the Greek efforts, but were wary of the political ramifications if they did. Lafayette remained a member of the restored Chamber of Deputies until 1823, when new plural voting rules helped defeat his bid for re-election. ## Grand tour of the United States President James Monroe and Congress invited Lafayette to visit the United States in 1824, in part to celebrate the nation's upcoming 50th anniversary. Monroe intended to have Lafayette travel on an American warship, but Lafayette felt that having such a vessel as transport was undemocratic and booked passage on the merchant packet Cadmus. Louis XVIII did not approve of the trip and had troops disperse the crowd that gathered at Le Havre to see him off. Lafayette arrived at New York on 15 August 1824, accompanied by his son Georges Washington and his secretary Auguste Levasseur. He was greeted by a group of Revolutionary War veterans who had fought alongside him many years before. New York erupted for four continuous days and nights of celebration. He then departed for what he thought would be a restful trip to Boston but instead found the route lined by cheering citizens, with welcomes organized in every town along the way. According to Unger, "It was a mystical experience they would relate to their heirs through generations to come. Lafayette had materialized from a distant age, the last leader and hero at the nation's defining moment. They knew they and the world would never see his kind again." New York, Boston, and Philadelphia did their best to outdo one another in the celebrations honoring Lafayette. Philadelphia renovated the Old State House (today Independence Hall) which might otherwise have been torn down, because they needed a location for a reception for him. Until that point, it had not been usual in the United States to build monuments, but Lafayette's visit set off a wave of construction—usually with him laying the cornerstone himself, in his capacity as mason. The arts benefited by his visit, as well, as many cities commissioned portraits for their civic buildings, and the likenesses were seen on innumerable souvenirs. Lafayette had intended to visit only the original 13 states during a four-month visit, but the stay stretched to 16 months as he visited all 24 states. The towns and cities that he visited gave him enthusiastic welcomes, including Fayetteville, North Carolina, the first city named in his honor. He visited the capital in Washington City, and was surprised by the simple clothing worn by President Monroe and the lack of any guards around the White House. He went to Mount Vernon in Virginia as he had 40 years before, this time viewing Washington's grave. He was at Yorktown on 19 October 1824 for the anniversary of Cornwallis's surrender, then journeyed to Monticello to meet with his old friend Jefferson—and Jefferson's successor James Madison, who arrived unexpectedly. He had also dined with 89-year-old John Adams, the other living former president, at Peacefield, his home near Boston. With the roads becoming impassable, Lafayette stayed in Washington City for the winter of 1824–25, and thus was there for the climax of the hotly contested 1824 election in which no presidential candidate was able to secure a majority of the Electoral College, throwing the decision to the House of Representatives. On 9 February 1825, the House selected Secretary of State John Quincy Adams as president; that evening, runner-up General Andrew Jackson shook hands with Adams at the White House as Lafayette looked on. In March 1825, Lafayette began to tour the southern and western states. The general pattern of the trip was that he would be escorted between cities by the state militia, and he would enter each town through specially constructed arches to be welcomed by local politicians or dignitaries, all eager to be seen with him. There would be special events, visits to battlefields and historic sites, celebratory dinners, and time set aside for the public to meet the legendary hero of the Revolution. Lafayette visited General Jackson at his home The Hermitage in Tennessee. He was traveling up the Ohio River by steamboat when the vessel sank beneath him, and he was put in a lifeboat by his son and secretary, then taken to the Kentucky shore and rescued by another steamboat that was going in the other direction. Its captain insisted on turning around, however, and taking Lafayette to Louisville, Kentucky. From there, he went generally northeast, viewing Niagara Falls and taking the Erie Canal to Albany, considered a modern marvel. He laid the cornerstone of the Bunker Hill Monument in Massachusetts in June 1825 after hearing an oration by Daniel Webster. He also took some soil from Bunker Hill to be sprinkled on his grave. After Bunker Hill, Lafayette went to Maine and Vermont, thus visiting all of the states. He met again with John Adams, then went back to New York and then to Brooklyn, where he laid the cornerstone for its public library. He celebrated his 68th birthday on 6 September at a reception with President John Quincy Adams at the White House, and departed the next day. He took gifts with him, besides the soil to be placed on his grave. Congress had voted him \$200,000 (equal to \$ today) in gratitude for his services to the country at President Monroe's request, along with a large tract of public lands in Florida. He returned to France aboard a ship that was originally called the Susquehanna but was renamed the USS Brandywine in honor of the battle where he shed his blood for the United States. ## Revolution of 1830 When Lafayette arrived in France, Louis XVIII had been dead about a year and Charles X was on the throne. As king, Charles intended to restore the absolute rule of the monarch, and his decrees had already prompted protest by the time Lafayette arrived. Lafayette was the most prominent of those who opposed the king. In the elections of 1827, the 70-year-old Lafayette was elected to the Chamber of Deputies again. Unhappy at the outcome, Charles dissolved the Chamber, and ordered a new election: Lafayette again won his seat. Lafayette remained outspoken against Charles' restrictions on civil liberties and the newly introduced censorship of the press. He made fiery speeches in the Chamber, denouncing the new decrees and advocating American-style representative government. He hosted dinners at La Grange, for Americans, Frenchmen, and others; all came to hear his speeches on politics, freedom, rights, and liberty. He was popular enough that Charles felt he could not be safely arrested, but Charles' spies were thorough: one government agent noted "his [Lafayette's] seditious toasts ... in honor of American liberty". On 25 July 1830, the king signed the Ordinances of Saint-Cloud, removing the franchise from the middle class and dissolving the Chamber of Deputies. The decrees were published the following day. On 27 July, Parisians erected barricades throughout the city, and riots erupted. In defiance, the Chamber continued to meet. When Lafayette, who was at La Grange, heard what was going on, he raced into the city, and was acclaimed as a leader of the revolution. When his fellow deputies were indecisive, Lafayette went to the barricades, and soon the royalist troops were routed. Fearful that the excesses of the 1789 revolution were about to be repeated, deputies made Lafayette head of a restored National Guard, and charged him with keeping order. The Chamber was willing to proclaim him as ruler, but he refused a grant of power he deemed unconstitutional. He also refused to deal with Charles, who abdicated on 2 August. Many young revolutionaries sought a republic, but Lafayette felt this would lead to civil war, and chose to offer the throne to the duc d'Orleans, Louis-Philippe, who had lived in America and had far more of a common touch than did Charles. Lafayette secured the agreement of Louis-Philippe, who accepted the throne, to various reforms. The general remained as commander of the National Guard. This did not last long—the brief concord at the king's accession soon faded, and the conservative majority in the Chamber voted to abolish Lafayette's National Guard post on 24 December 1830. Lafayette went back into retirement, expressing his willingness to do so. ## Final years and death Lafayette grew increasingly disillusioned with Louis-Phillippe, who backtracked on reforms and denied his promises to make them. The retired general angrily broke with his king, a breach which widened when the government used force to suppress a strike in Lyon. Lafayette used his seat in the Chamber to promote liberal proposals, and his neighbors elected him mayor of the village of La Grange and to the council of the département of Seine-et-Marne in 1831. The following year, he served as a pallbearer and spoke at the funeral of General Jean Maximilien Lamarque, another opponent of Louis-Phillippe. He pleaded for calm, but there were riots in the streets and a barricade was erected at the Place de la Bastille. The king forcefully crushed this June Rebellion, to Lafayette's outrage. He returned to La Grange until the Chamber met in November 1832, when he condemned Louis-Phillippe for introducing censorship, as Charles X had. Lafayette spoke publicly for the last time in the Chamber of Deputies on 3 January 1834. The next month, he collapsed at a funeral from pneumonia. He recovered, but the following May was wet, and he became bedridden after being caught in a thunderstorm. He died at age 76 on 20 May 1834 on 6 rue d'Anjou-Saint-Honoré in Paris (now 8 rue d'Anjou in the 8th arrondissement of Paris). He was buried next to his wife at the Picpus Cemetery under soil from Bunker Hill, which his son Georges Washington sprinkled upon him. King Louis-Philippe ordered a military funeral in order to keep the public from attending, and crowds formed to protest their exclusion. In the United States, President Jackson ordered that Lafayette receive the same memorial honors that had been bestowed on Washington at his death in December 1799. Both Houses of Congress were draped in black bunting for 30 days, and members wore mourning badges. Congress urged Americans to follow similar mourning practices. Later that year, former president John Quincy Adams gave a eulogy of Lafayette that lasted three hours, calling him "high on the list of the pure and disinterested benefactors of mankind". ## Beliefs Lafayette was a firm believer in a constitutional monarchy. He believed that traditional and revolutionary ideals could be melded together by having a democratic National Assembly work with a monarch, as France always had. His close relationships to American Founding Fathers such as George Washington and Thomas Jefferson gave him the ability to witness the implementation of a democratic system. His views on potential government structures for France were directly influenced by the American form of government, which was in turn influenced by the British form of government. For example, Lafayette believed in a bicameral legislature, as the United States had. The Jacobins detested the idea of a monarchy in France, which led the National Assembly to vote against it. This idea contributed to his fall from favor, especially when Maximilien Robespierre took power. Lafayette was the author of the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen in 1789 and a staunch opponent of slavery. His work never specifically mentioned slavery, but he made his position clear on the controversial topic through letters addressed to friends and colleagues such as Washington and Jefferson. He proposed that slaves not be owned but rather work as free tenants on the land of plantation owners, and he bought a plantation in the French colony of Cayenne in 1785 to put his ideas into practice, ordering that no slaves be bought or sold. He spent his lifetime as an abolitionist, proposing that slaves be emancipated slowly and recognizing the crucial role that slavery played in many economies. Lafayette hoped that his ideas would be adopted by Washington to free slaves in the United States and spread from there. Washington eventually began implementing those practices on his own plantation in Mount Vernon, but he kept slaves until the day he died. In a letter to Matthew Clarkson, the Mayor of Philadelphia, Lafayette wrote, "I would never have drawn my sword in the cause of America, if I could have conceived that thereby I was founding a land of Slavery." ## Assessment Throughout his life, Lafayette was an exponent of the ideals of the Age of Enlightenment, especially on human rights and civic nationalism, and his views were taken very seriously by intellectuals and others on both sides of the Atlantic. His image in the United States was derived from his "disinterestedness" in fighting without pay for the freedom of a country that was not his own. Samuel Adams praised him for "foregoing the pleasures of Enjoyment of domestick Life and exposing himself to the Hardship and Dangers" of war when he fought "in the glorious cause of freedom". This view was shared by many contemporaries, establishing an image of Lafayette seeking to advance the freedom of all mankind rather than the interests of just one nation. During the French Revolution, Americans viewed him as an advocate for American ideals, seeking to transport them from New World to Old. This was reinforced by his position as surrogate son and disciple of George Washington, who was deemed the Father of His Country and the embodiment of American ideals. Novelist James Fenimore Cooper befriended Lafayette during his time in Paris in the 1820s. He admired his patrician liberalism and eulogized him as a man who "dedicated youth, person, and fortune to the principles of liberty." Lafayette became an American icon in part because he was not associated with any particular region of the country; he was of foreign birth, did not live in America, and had fought in New England, the mid-Atlantic states, and the South, making him a unifying figure. His role in the French Revolution enhanced this popularity, as Americans saw him steering a middle course. Americans were naturally sympathetic to a republican cause, but also remembered Louis XVI as an early friend of the United States. When Lafayette fell from power in 1792, Americans tended to blame factionalism for the ouster of a man who was above such things in their eyes. In 1824, Lafayette returned to the United States at a time when Americans were questioning the success of the republic in view of the disastrous economic Panic of 1819 and the sectional conflict resulting in the Missouri Compromise. Lafayette's hosts considered him a judge of how successful independence had become. According to cultural historian Lloyd Kramer, Lafayette "provided foreign confirmations of the self-image that shaped America's national identity in the early nineteenth century and that has remained a dominant theme in the national ideology ever since: the belief that America's Founding Fathers, institutions, and freedom created the most democratic, egalitarian, and prosperous society in the world". Historian Gilbert Chinard wrote in 1936: "Lafayette became a legendary figure and a symbol so early in his life, and successive generations have so willingly accepted the myth, that any attempt to deprive the young hero of his republican halo will probably be considered as little short of iconoclastic and sacrilegious." That legend has been used politically; the name and image of Lafayette were repeatedly invoked in 1917 to gain popular support for America's entry into World War I, culminating with Charles E. Stanton's famous statement "Lafayette, we are here". This occurred at some cost to Lafayette's image in America; veterans returned from the front singing "We've paid our debt to Lafayette, who the hell do we owe now?" According to Anne C. Loveland, "Lafayette no longer served as a national hero-symbol" by the end of the war. In 2002, however, Congress voted to grant him honorary citizenship. Lafayette's reputation in France is more problematic. Thomas Gaines notes that the response to Lafayette's death was far more muted in France than in America, and suggested that this may have been because Lafayette was the last surviving hero of America's only revolution, whereas the changes in the French government had been far more chaotic. Lafayette's roles created a more nuanced picture of him in French historiography, especially in the French Revolution. 19th-century historian Jules Michelet describes him as a "mediocre idol", lifted by the mob far beyond what his talents deserved. Jean Tulard, Jean-François Fayard, and Alfred Fierro note Napoleon's deathbed comment about Lafayette in their Histoire et dictionnaire de la Révolution française; he stated that "the king would still be sitting on his throne" if Napoleon had Lafayette's place during the French Revolution. They deemed Lafayette "an empty-headed political dwarf" and "one of the people most responsible for the destruction of the French monarchy". Gaines disagreed and noted that liberal and Marxist historians have also dissented from that view. Lloyd Kramer related 57 percent of the French deemed Lafayette the figure from the Revolution whom they most admired, in a survey taken just before the Revolution's bicentennial in 1989. Lafayette "clearly had more French supporters in the early 1990s than he could muster in the early 1790s". Marc Leepson concluded his study of Lafayette's life: > The Marquis de Lafayette was far from perfect. He was sometimes vain, naive, immature, and egocentric. But he consistently stuck to his ideals, even when doing so endangered his life and fortune. Those ideals proved to be the founding principles of two of the world's most enduring nations, the United States and France. That is a legacy that few military leaders, politicians, or statesmen can match. ## See also - List of places named for the Marquis de Lafayette - LaFayette Motors - Hermione (2014), a replica of the Hermione of 1779, currently in service - Hero of Two Worlds: The Marquis de Lafayette in the Age of Revolution, a 2021 biography

Gregor MacGregor

Scottish soldier, adventurer, and confidence trickster (1786–1845)

General Gregor MacGregor (24 December 1786 – 4 December 1845) was a Scottish soldier, adventurer, and confidence trickster who attempted from 1821 to 1837 to draw British and French investors and settlers to "Poyais", a fictional Central American territory that he claimed to rule as "Cazique". Hundreds invested their savings in supposed Poyaisian government bonds and land certificates, while about 250 emigrated to MacGregor's invented country in 1822–23 to find only an untouched jungle; more than half of them died. Seen as a contributory factor to the "Panic of 1825", MacGregor's Poyais scheme has been called one of the most brazen confidence tricks in history. From the Clan Gregor, MacGregor was an officer in the British Army from 1803 to 1810; he served in the Peninsular War. He joined the republican side in the Venezuelan War of Independence in 1812, quickly became a general and, over the next four years, operated against the Spanish on behalf of both Venezuela and its neighbour New Granada. His successes included a difficult month-long fighting retreat through northern Venezuela in 1816. He captured Amelia Island in 1817 under a mandate from revolutionary agents to conquer Florida from the Spanish, and there proclaimed a short-lived "Republic of the Floridas". He then oversaw two calamitous operations in New Granada during 1819 that each ended with his abandoning British volunteer troops under his command. On his return to Britain in 1821, MacGregor claimed that King George Frederic Augustus of the Mosquito Coast in the Gulf of Honduras had created him Cazique of Poyais, which he described as a developed colony with a community of British settlers. When the British press reported on MacGregor's deception following the return of fewer than 50 survivors in late 1823, some of his victims leaped to his defence, insisting that the general had been let down by those whom he had put in charge of the emigration party. A French court tried MacGregor and three others for fraud in 1826 after he attempted a variation on the scheme there, but convicted only one of his associates. Acquitted, MacGregor attempted lesser Poyais schemes in London over the next decade. In 1838, he moved to Venezuela, where he was welcomed back as a hero. He died in Caracas in 1845, aged 58, and was buried with full military honours in Caracas Cathedral. ## Early life ### Family and childhood Gregor MacGregor was born on Christmas Eve 1786 at his family's ancestral home of Glengyle, on the north shore of Loch Katrine in Stirlingshire, Scotland, the son of Daniel MacGregor, an East India Company sea captain, and his wife Ann (née Austin). The family was Roman Catholic and part of the Clan Gregor, whose proscription by King James VI and I in 1604 had been repealed only in 1774. During the proscription the MacGregors had been legally ostracised to the extent that they were forbidden to use their own surname—many of them, including Gregor's celebrated great-great-uncle Rob Roy, had participated in the Jacobite risings of 1715 and 1745. MacGregor would assert in adulthood that a direct ancestor of his had survived the Darien scheme of 1698, the ill-fated Scottish attempt to colonise the Isthmus of Panama. Gregor's grandfather, also called Gregor and nicknamed "the Beautiful", served with distinction in the British Army under the surname Drummond, and subsequently played an important role in the clan's restoration and rehabilitation into society. Little is recorded of MacGregor's childhood. After his father's death in 1794, he and his two sisters were raised primarily by his mother with the help of various relatives. MacGregor's biographer David Sinclair speculates that he would probably have spoken mainly Gaelic during his early childhood, and learned English only after starting school around the age of five-and-a-half. MacGregor would claim in later life to have studied at the University of Edinburgh between 1802 and 1803; records of this do not survive as he did not take a degree, but Sinclair considers it plausible, citing MacGregor's apparent sophistication and his mother's connections in Edinburgh. ### British Army MacGregor joined the British Army at 16, the youngest age it was possible for him to do so, in April 1803. His family purchased him a commission as an ensign in the 57th (West Middlesex) Regiment of Foot, probably for around £450. MacGregor's entrance to the military coincided with the start of the Napoleonic Wars following the breakdown of the Treaty of Amiens. Southern England was fortified to defend against a possible French invasion; the 57th Foot was at Ashford, Kent. In February 1804, after less than a year in training, MacGregor was promoted without purchase to lieutenant—an advancement that usually took up to three years. Later that year, after MacGregor had spent some months in Guernsey with the regiment's 1st Battalion, the 57th Foot was posted to Gibraltar. MacGregor was introduced to Maria Bowater, the daughter of a Royal Navy admiral, around 1804. Maria commanded a substantial dowry and, apart from her by-now-deceased father, was related to two generals, a member of parliament and the botanist Aylmer Bourke Lambert. Gregor and Maria married at St Margaret's Church, Westminster in June 1805 and set up home in London, at the residence of the bride's aunt. Two months later, having rejoined the 57th Foot in Gibraltar, MacGregor bought the rank of captain for about £900, choosing not to wait the seven years such a promotion might take without purchase. The 57th Foot remained in Gibraltar between 1805 and 1809. During this time MacGregor developed an obsession with dress, rank insignia and medals that made him unpopular in the regiment; he forbade any enlisted man or non-commissioned officer to leave his quarters in anything less than full dress uniform. In 1809 the 57th Foot was sent to Portugal as reinforcements for the Anglo-Portuguese Army under the Duke of Wellington, during his second attempt to drive the French out of Spain during the Peninsular War. MacGregor's regiment disembarked at Lisbon about three months into the campaign, on 15 July. By September it was garrisoning Elvas, near the frontier with Spain. Soon thereafter MacGregor was seconded to the 8th Line Battalion of the Portuguese Army, where he served with the rank of major from October 1809 to April 1810. According to Michael Rafter, author of a highly critical 1820 biography of MacGregor, this secondment came after a disagreement between MacGregor and a superior officer, "originally of a trivial nature", that intensified to such an extent that the young captain was forced to request discharge. This was promptly granted. MacGregor formally retired from the British service on 24 May 1810, receiving back the £1,350 he had paid for the ranks of ensign and captain, and returned to Britain. The 57th Foot's actions at the Battle of Albuera on 16 May 1811 would earn it considerable prestige and the nickname "the Die-Hards"; MacGregor would thereafter make much of his association—despite having left the regiment one year prior. ### Edinburgh to Caracas On his return to Britain the 23-year-old MacGregor and his wife moved into a house rented by his mother in Edinburgh. There he assumed the title of "Colonel", wore the badge of a Portuguese knightly order and toured the city in an extravagant and brightly-coloured coach. After failing to attain high social status in Edinburgh, MacGregor moved back to London in 1811 and began styling himself "Sir Gregor MacGregor, Bart.", falsely claiming to have succeeded to the MacGregor clan chieftainship; he also alluded to family ties with a selection of dukes, earls and barons. This had little bearing on reality but MacGregor nevertheless created an air of credible respectability for himself in London society. In December 1811, Maria MacGregor died. At a stroke MacGregor lost his main source of income and the support of the influential Bowater family. His options were, Sinclair suggests, limited: announcing his engagement to another heiress so soon after Maria's death might draw embarrassing public protests from the Bowaters, and returning home to farm the MacGregor lands in Scotland would be in his mind unacceptably dull. His only real experience was military, but the manner of his exit from the British Army would make a return there awkward at best. MacGregor's interest was aroused by the colonial revolts against Spanish rule in Latin America, particularly Venezuela, where seven of the ten provinces had declared themselves an independent republic in July 1811, starting the Venezuelan War of Independence. The Venezuelan revolutionary General Francisco de Miranda had been feted in London society during his recent visit, and may have met MacGregor. Noting the treatment London's highest circles gave to Miranda, MacGregor formed the idea that exotic adventures in the New World might earn him similar celebrity on his homecoming. He sold the small Scottish estate he had inherited from his father and grandfather and sailed for South America in early 1812. On the way he stopped in Jamaica, where according to Rafter he was tempted to settle among the planters and traders, but "having no introductory letters to that place, he was not received into society". After a comfortable sojourn in Kingston, he sailed for Venezuela and disembarked there in April 1812. ## South America ### Venezuela, under Miranda MacGregor arrived in the Venezuelan capital Caracas a fortnight after much of the city had been destroyed by an earthquake. With swathes of the country under the control of advancing royalist armies, the revolutionary government was losing support and starting to fracture. MacGregor dropped his pretended Scottish baronetcy, reasoning that it might undermine the republican credentials he hoped to establish, but continued to style himself "Sir Gregor" on the basis that he was, he claimed, a knight of the Portuguese Order of Christ. He offered his services directly to Miranda in Caracas. As a former British Army officer—from the famous "Die-Hards", no less—he was received with alacrity and given command of a cavalry battalion with the rank of colonel. In his first action, MacGregor and his cavalry routed a royalist force west of Maracay, between Valencia and Caracas. Subsequent engagements were less successful, but the republican leaders were still pleased with the glamour they perceived this dashing Scottish officer to give their cause. MacGregor married Doña Josefa Antonia Andrea Aristeguieta y Lovera, daughter of a prominent Caracas family and a cousin of the revolutionary Simón Bolívar, in Maracay on 10 June 1812. By the end of that month Miranda had promoted MacGregor to brigadier-general, but the revolutionary cause was failing; in July, after the royalists took the key port of Puerto Cabello from Bolívar, the republic capitulated. In the chaos that ensued Miranda was captured by the Spanish while the remnants of the republican leadership, including MacGregor with Josefa in tow, were evacuated to the Dutch island of Curaçao aboard a British brig, the Sapphire. Bolívar joined them there later in the year. ### New Granada; defence of Cartagena With Miranda imprisoned in Spain, Bolívar emerged as the new leader of the Venezuelan independence movement. He resolved that they would have to take some time to prepare before returning to the mainland. Growing bored in Curaçao, MacGregor decided to offer his services to General Antonio Nariño's republican armies in Venezuela's western neighbour, New Granada. He escorted Josefa to lodgings in Jamaica, then travelled to Nariño's base at Tunja in the eastern Andes. Miranda's name won the Scotsman a fresh commission in the service of New Granada, with command of 1,200 men in the Socorro district near the border with Venezuela. There was little action in this sector; Nariño's forces were mainly engaged around Popayán in the south-west, where the Spanish had a large garrison. Rafter reports positively on MacGregor's conduct in Socorro, writing that "by the introduction of the European system of tactics, [he] considerably improved the discipline of the troops", but some under his command disliked him. An official in Cúcuta, the district capital, expressed utter contempt for MacGregor in a letter to a friend: "I am sick and tired of this bluffer, or Quixote, or the devil knows what. This man can hardly serve us in New Granada without heaping ten thousand embarrassments upon us." While MacGregor was in the New Granadian service, Bolívar raised a force of Venezuelan exiles and local troops in the port of Cartagena, and captured Caracas on 4 August 1813. The royalists quickly rallied and crushed Bolívar's second republic in mid-1814. Nariño's New Granadian nationalists surrendered around the same time. MacGregor withdrew to Cartagena, which was still in revolutionary hands, and at the head of native troops destroyed hamlets, local infrastructure and produce to prevent the Spanish from using them. A Spanish force of about 6,000 landed in late August 1815 and, after repeatedly failing to overcome the 5,000 defenders, deployed to subdue the fortress by blockade. Sinclair records that MacGregor played an "honourable, though not conspicuous" part in the defence. By November there remained in Cartagena only a few hundred men capable of fighting. The defenders resolved to use the dozen gunboats they had to break through the Spanish fleet to the open sea, abandoning the city to the royalists; MacGregor was chosen as one of the three commanders of this operation. On the night of 5 December 1815 the gunboats sailed out into the bay, blasted their way through the smaller Spanish vessels and, avoiding the frigates, made for Jamaica. All the gunboats escaped. ### Venezuela, under Bolívar The British merchant class in Jamaica that had shunned MacGregor on his first arrival in 1812 now welcomed him as a hero. The Scotsman entertained many dinner parties with embellished accounts of his part in the Cartagena siege, leading some to understand that he had personally headed the city's defence. One Englishman toasted the "Hannibal of modern Carthage". Around New Year 1816, MacGregor and his wife made their way to Santo Domingo (today the Dominican Republic), where Bolívar was raising a new army. Bolívar received MacGregor back into the Venezuelan Army with the rank of brigadier-general, and included him in an expeditionary force that left Aux Cayes (now Les Cayes) on 30 April 1816. MacGregor took part in the capture of the port town of Carúpano as second-in-command of Manuel Piar's column, but is not mentioned in the record of the battle prepared by Bolívar's staff. After the Spanish were driven from many central Venezuelan towns, MacGregor was sent to the coast west of Caracas to recruit native tribesmen in July 1816. On 18 July, eight days after the numerically superior royalists countered and broke Bolívar's main force at La Cabrera, MacGregor resolved to retreat hundreds of miles east to Barcelona. Two pursuing royalist armies harried MacGregor constantly as he retreated across country, but failed to break his rearguard. With no carts and only a handful of horses, the Scotsman was forced to leave his wounded where they fell. Late on 27 July, MacGregor's way east was obstructed by a royalist force at Chaguaramas, south of Caracas and about a third of the distance to Barcelona. MacGregor led his men in a furious charge that prompted a Spanish retreat back into Chaguaramas, then continued towards Barcelona. The Spanish remained in the town until 30 July, giving MacGregor two days' head start, and caught up with him only on 10 August. The Scotsman deployed his 1,200 men, mostly native archers, behind a marsh and a stream—the Spanish cavalry were bogged down in the marsh, while the archers repelled the infantry with volleys of arrows. After three hours MacGregor charged and routed the royalists. MacGregor's party was helped the rest of the way east to Barcelona by elements of the main revolutionary army. They arrived on 20 August 1816, after 34 days' march. In Rafter's view, this marked "the zenith of MacGregor's celebrity" in South America. He had, according to his biographer Frank Griffith Dawson, "led his troops with brilliant success"; Sinclair agrees, calling the march a "remarkable feat" demonstrating "genuine military skill". With Bolívar back in Aux Cayes, overall command of the republican armies in Venezuela had been given to Piar. On 26 September, Piar and MacGregor defeated the Spanish army commanded by Francisco Tomás Morales at El Juncal. But MacGregor and Piar had several disagreements over the strategic conduct of the war—according to the American historian David Bushnell, the Scottish general probably "r[an] afoul of personal and factional rivalries within the patriot camp". In early October 1816, MacGregor left with Josefa for Margarita Island, about 24 miles (39 km) off eastern Venezuela, where he hoped to enter the service of General Juan Bautista Arismendi. Soon afterwards, he received an acclamatory letter from Bolívar: "The retreat which you had the honour to conduct is in my opinion superior to the conquest of an empire ... Please accept my congratulations for the prodigious services you have rendered my country". MacGregor's march to Barcelona would remain prominent in the South American revolutionary narrative for years. The retreat also earned him the title of "Xenophon of the Americas" (Spanish: Jenofonte de América). ### Florida republic; Amelia Island affair Arismendi proposed to MacGregor that capturing one of the ports in East or West Florida, which were then Spanish colonies, might provide an excellent springboard for republican operations elsewhere in Latin America. MacGregor liked the idea and, after an abortive attempt to recruit in Haiti, sailed with Josefa to the United States to raise money and volunteers. Soon after he left in early 1817, a further congratulatory letter arrived in Margarita from Bolívar, promoting MacGregor to divisional general, awarding him the Orden de los Libertadores (Order of the Liberators), and asking him to return to Venezuela. MacGregor remained ignorant of this for two years. On 31 March 1817 in Philadelphia, MacGregor received a document from Lino de Clemente, Pedro Gual, and Martin Thompson, each of whom claimed to speak for one or more of the Latin American republics. They called themselves the "deputies of free America" and called upon MacGregor to take possession of "both the Floridas, East and West" as soon as possible. Florida's proposed fate was not specified; MacGregor presumed that the Floridians would seek US annexation, as they were mostly of non-Spanish origin, and that the US would quickly comply. He thus expected at least covert support from the US government. MacGregor raised several hundred armed men for this enterprise in the Mid-Atlantic states, South Carolina, and particularly Savannah, Georgia. He also raised \$160,000 by the sale of "scripts" to investors, promising them fertile acres in Florida or their money back with interest. He determined to first attack Fernandina, a small settlement with a fine harbor at the very northern tip of Amelia Island, which contained about 40% of East Florida's population (recorded as 3,729 in 1815). He expected little to no resistance from the tiny Spanish garrison there. MacGregor left Charleston in a ship with fewer than 80 men, mostly US citizens. He led the landing party personally on 29 June 1817 with the words: "I shall sleep either in hell or Amelia tonight!" The Spanish commander at Fort San Carlos, with 51 men and several cannon, vastly overestimated the size of MacGregor's force and surrendered without either side firing a shot. Few of Amelia's residents came out to support MacGregor but, at the same time, there was little resistance; most simply left for mainland Florida or Georgia. MacGregor raised a flag showing a green cross on a white field—the "Green Cross of Florida"—and issued a proclamation on 30 June urging the island's inhabitants to return and support him. This was largely ignored, as was a second proclamation in which MacGregor congratulated his men on their victory and exhorted them to "free the whole of the Floridas from Tyranny and oppression". MacGregor announced a "Republic of the Floridas" under a government headed by himself. He attempted to tax the local pirates' booty at an "admiralty court", and tried to raise money by seizing and selling dozens of slaves found on the island. Morale among the troops plummeted when he prohibited looting. Most of his recruits were still in the US; American authorities prevented most of them from leaving port, and MacGregor was able to muster only 200 on Amelia. His officers clamoured for an invasion of mainland Florida, but he insisted that they did not have enough men, arms, or supplies. Bushnell suggests that MacGregor's backers in the US may have promised him more support in these regards than they ultimately provided. Eighteen men sent to reconnoitre around St Augustine in late July 1817 were variously killed, wounded, or captured by the Spanish. Discipline disintegrated among MacGregor's troops, who were paid first in "Amelia dollars" that he had printed, and later not at all. Spanish forces congregated on the mainland opposite Amelia, and MacGregor and most of his officers decided on 3 September 1817 that the situation was hopeless and that they would abandon the venture. MacGregor announced to the men that he was leaving, explaining vaguely that he had been "deceived by my friends." He turned over the command to one of his subordinates, a former Pennsylvania congressman named Jared Irwin, and he boarded the Morgiana with his wife on 4 September 1817 with an angry crowd looking on and hurling insults at him. He waited offshore for a few days, then left on the schooner Venus on 8 September. Two weeks later, the MacGregors arrived at Nassau in the Bahamas, where he arranged to have commemorative medallions struck bearing the Green Cross motif and the Latin inscriptions Amalia Veni Vidi Vici ("Amelia, I Came, I Saw, I Conquered") and Duce Mac Gregorio Libertas Floridarium ("Liberty for the Floridas under the leadership of MacGregor"). He made no attempt to repay those who had funded the Amelia expedition. Irwin's troops defeated two Spanish assaults and were then joined by 300 men under Louis-Michel Aury, who held Amelia for three months before surrendering to American forces, who held the island "in trust for Spain" until the Florida Purchase in 1819. Press reports of the Amelia Island affair were wildly inaccurate, partly because of misinformation disseminated by MacGregor himself. His sudden departure, he claimed, was because he had sold the island to Aury for \$50,000. Josefa gave birth to their first child in Nassau on 9 November 1817, a boy named Gregorio. The owner of the Venus was an ex-captain of the British Corps of Colonial Marines named George Woodbine. He drew MacGregor's attention to the British Legions being raised by the Latin American revolutionaries in London, and suggested that he could recruit and command such a force himself. MacGregor was excited by the idea of leading British troops again after years in command of colonials, tribesmen, and miscellaneous adventurers. He sailed for home with Josefa and Gregorio and landed in Dublin on 21 September 1818, and from there made his way back to London. ### Porto Bello The third Venezuelan republic's envoy in the British capital borrowed £1,000 for MacGregor to engage and transport British troops for service in Venezuela, but the Scotsman squandered these funds within a few weeks. A London financier, an old friend of MacGregor's called Thomas Newte, took responsibility for the envoy's debt on the condition that the general instead take troops to New Granada. MacGregor funded his expedition through the sale of commissions at rates cheaper than those offered by the British Army, and assembled enlisted men through a network of recruiters across the British Isles, offering volunteers huge financial incentives. MacGregor sailed for South America on 18 November 1818 aboard a former Royal Navy brigantine, renamed the Hero; 50 officers and over 500 troops, many of them Irish, followed the next month. They were critically under-equipped, having virtually no arms or munitions. The men came close to mutiny at Aux Cayes in February 1819 when MacGregor failed to produce the 80 silver dollars per man on arrival promised by his recruiters. MacGregor persuaded South American merchants in Haiti to support him with funds, weapons and ammunition, but then procrastinated and gave the order to sail for the island of San Andrés, off the Spanish-controlled Isthmus of Panama, only on 10 March. Going first to Jamaica to arrange accommodation for Josefa and Gregorio, MacGregor was almost arrested there on charges of gun-running. He joined his troops on San Andrés on 4 April. The delay had led to renewed dissension in the ranks that the stand-in commander Colonel William Rafter had difficulty containing. MacGregor restored morale by announcing that they would set out to attack Porto Bello on the New Granadian mainland the following day. Colonel Rafter disembarked with 200 men near Porto Bello on 9 April, outflanked a roughly equal force of Spanish defenders during the night, and marched into Porto Bello without a fight on 10 April. MacGregor, watching from one of the ships with Woodbine—to whom he had given the rank of colonel—quickly came ashore when he sighted Rafter's signal of victory, and, as usual, issued a flowery proclamation: "Soldiers! Our first conquest has been glorious, it has opened the road to future and additional fame." Rafter urged MacGregor to march on Panama City, but MacGregor did not make much in the way of plans to continue the campaign. He devoted most of his attention to the particulars of a new chivalric order of his design, the emblem of which would be a Green Cross. The troops became mutinous again after more promised money failed to materialise—MacGregor eventually paid each man \$20, but this did little to restore discipline. The lack of patrolling by MacGregor's troops allowed the Spanish to march straight into Porto Bello early on 30 April 1819. MacGregor was still in bed when the Spaniards found his riflemen drilling in the main square and opened fire. Awoken by the noise, MacGregor threw his bed and blankets from the window onto the beach below and jumped out after them, then attempted to paddle out to his ships on a log. He passed out and would probably have drowned had he not been picked up and brought aboard the Hero by one of his naval officers. MacGregor would claim that on regaining consciousness he immediately raised his standard over the Hero, then despatched runners to Rafter ordering him not to surrender. The version of events favoured by Sinclair is that Rafter received orders to this effect only after he had himself contacted MacGregor on the Hero. Rafter, in the fort with 200 men, kept up a steady barrage and waited for his commander to fire on the royalists from the ships—but to the colonel's astonishment MacGregor instead ordered his fleet to turn about and made for the high seas. Abandoned, Colonel Rafter and the remnants of MacGregor's army had no choice but to surrender; most of the surviving officers and troops entered miserable existences in captivity. Rafter was ultimately shot with 11 other officers for conspiring to escape. ### Rio de la Hacha Making his way first to San Andrés, then Haiti, MacGregor conferred invented decorations and titles on his officers and planned an expedition to Rio de la Hacha in northern New Granada. He was briefly delayed in Haiti by a falling-out with his naval commander, an officer called Hudson. When the naval officer fell ill, MacGregor had him put ashore, seized the Hero—which Hudson owned—and renamed her El MacGregor, explaining to the Haitian authorities that "drunkenness, insanity and mutiny" by his captain had forced him to take the ship. MacGregor steered the hijacked brigantine to Aux Cayes, then sold her after she was found to be unseaworthy. Waiting for him in Aux Cayes were 500 officers and enlisted men, courtesy of recruiters in Ireland and London, but he had no ships to carry them and little in the way of equipment. This was remedied during July and August 1819, first by the arrival of his Irish recruiter Colonel Thomas Eyre with 400 men and two ships—MacGregor gave him the rank of general and the Order of the Green Cross—and then by the appearance of war materiel from London, sent by Thomas Newte on a schooner named Amelia. MacGregor bombastically announced his intention to liberate New Granada, but then hesitated. The lack of action, rations or pay for weeks prompted most of the British volunteers to go home. MacGregor's force, which had comprised 900 men at its peak (including officers), had dwindled to no more than 250 by the time he directed the Amelia and two other vessels to Rio de la Hacha on 29 September 1819. His remaining officers included Lieutenant-Colonel Michael Rafter, who had bought a commission with the hope of rescuing his brother William. After being driven away from Rio de la Hacha harbour by cannon on 4 October, MacGregor ordered a night landing west of the town and said that he would take personal command once the troops were ashore. Lieutenant-Colonel William Norcott led the men onto the beach and waited there two hours for MacGregor to arrive, but the general failed to appear. Attacked by a larger Spanish force, Norcott countered and captured the town. MacGregor still refused to leave the ships, convinced that the flag flying over the fort must be a trick; even when Norcott rowed out to tell him to come into port, MacGregor would not step ashore for over a day. When he did appear, many of his soldiers swore and spat at him. He issued another lofty proclamation, recalled by Rafter as an "aberration of human intellect", at the foot of which MacGregor identified himself as "His Majesty the Inca of New Granada". Events went largely as they had done earlier in the year at Porto Bello. MacGregor abstained from command in all but name, and the troops descended into a state of confused drunkenness. "General MacGregor displayed so palpable a want of the requisite qualities which should distinguish the commander of such an expedition," Rafter wrote, "that universal astonishment prevailed amongst his followers at the reputation he had for some time maintained." As Spanish forces gathered around the town, Norcott and Rafter decided the situation was hopeless and left on a captured Spanish schooner on 10 October 1819, taking with them five officers and 27 soldiers and sailors. MacGregor convened his remaining officers the next day and, giving them promotions and Green Cross decorations, exhorted them to help him lead the defence. Immediately afterwards he went to the port, ostensibly to escort Eyre's wife and two children to safety on a ship. After putting the Eyres on the Lovely Ann, he boarded the Amelia and ordered the ships out to sea just as the Spanish attacked. General Eyre and the troops left behind were all killed. MacGregor reached Aux Cayes to find news of this latest debacle had preceded him, and he was shunned. A friend in Jamaica, Thomas Higson, informed him through letters that Josefa and Gregorio had been evicted, and until Higson's intervention had sought sanctuary in a slave's hut. MacGregor was wanted in Jamaica for piracy and so could not join his family there. He similarly could not go back to Bolívar, who was so outraged by MacGregor's recent conduct that he accused the Scotsman of treason and ordered his death by hanging if he ever set foot on the South American mainland again. MacGregor's whereabouts for the half year following October 1819 are unknown. Back in London in June 1820, Michael Rafter published his highly censorious account of MacGregor's adventures, Memoirs of Gregor M'Gregor, dedicating the book to his brother Colonel William Rafter and the troops abandoned at Porto Bello and Rio de la Hacha. In his summary Rafter speculated that following the latter episode MacGregor was "politically, though not naturally dead"—"to suppose", he wrote, "that any person could be induced again to join him in his desperate projects, would be to conceive a degree of madness and folly of which human nature, however fallen, is incapable". ## Poyais scheme ### Cazique of Poyais MacGregor's next known location is at the court of King George Frederic Augustus of the Mosquito Coast, at Cape Gracias a Dios on the Gulf of Honduras in April 1820. The Miskito people, descendants of shipwrecked African slaves and indigenous people, shared the historic British antipathy towards Spain, and the British authorities in the region had crowned their most powerful chieftains as "kings" since the 17th century. These were kings in little more than name, with no effective control over the country they ostensibly led; Britain crowned and protected them simply so they could declare the area to be under Mosquito sovereignty and thereby obstruct Spanish claims. There had been a modest British settlement on the coast around the Black River (now the Río Sico), but this had been evacuated following the Anglo-Spanish Convention of 1786. By the 1820s the most visible sign of prior colonisation was a small graveyard overgrown by the jungle. On 29 April 1820, George Frederic Augustus signed a document granting MacGregor and his heirs a substantial swathe of Mosquito territory—8,000,000 acres (12,500 square miles; 32,375 square kilometres), an area larger than Wales—in exchange for rum and jewellery. The land was pleasing to the eye but unfit for cultivation and could sustain little in the way of livestock. Its area was roughly a triangle with corners at Cape Gracias a Dios, Cape Camarón and the Black River's headwaters. MacGregor dubbed this area "Poyais" after the natives of the highlands around the Black River's source, the Paya or "Poyer" people (today called the Pech), and in mid-1821 appeared back in London calling himself the Cazique of Poyais—"Cazique", a Spanish-American word for a native chief, being equivalent in MacGregor's usage to "Prince". He claimed to have been created such by the Mosquito king, but in fact both the title and Poyais were of his own invention. Despite Rafter's book, London society remained largely unaware of MacGregor's failures over the past few years, but remembered successes such as his march to Barcelona; similarly his association with the "Die-Hards" of the 57th Foot was recalled, but his dubious early discharge was not. In this climate of a constantly shifting Latin America, where governments rose, fell, and adopted new names from year to year, it did not seem so implausible that there might be a country called Poyais or that a decorated general like MacGregor might be its leader. The Cazique became "a great adornment for the dinner tables and ballrooms of sophisticated London", Sinclair writes—rumours abounded that he was partially descended from indigenous royalty. His exotic appeal was enhanced by the arrival of the striking "Princess of Poyais", Josefa, who had given birth to a girl named Josefa Anna Gregoria at MacGregor's sister's home in Ireland. The MacGregors received countless social invitations, including an official reception at Guildhall from the Lord Mayor of London. MacGregor said that he had come to London to attend King George IV's coronation on the Poyers' behalf, and to seek investment and immigrants for Poyais. He claimed to have inherited a democratic system of government there, with a basic civil service and military. To those interested MacGregor showed what he said was a copy of a printed proclamation he had issued to the Poyers on 13 April 1821. He therein announced the 1820 land grant, his departure for Europe to seek investors and colonists—"religious and moral instructors ... and persons to guide and assist you"—and the appointment of Brigadier-General George Woodbine to be "Vice-Cazique" during his absence. "POYERS!", the document concluded, "I now bid you farewell for a while ... I trust, that through the kindness of Almighty Providence, I shall be again enabled to return amongst you, and that then it will be my pleasing duty to hail you as affectionate friends, and yours to receive me as your faithful Cazique and Father." There is no evidence that such a statement was ever actually distributed on the Mosquito Coast. So began what has been called one of the most brazen confidence tricks in history—the Poyais scheme. MacGregor devised a tricameral parliament and other convoluted constitutional arrangements for Poyais, drew up commercial and banking mechanisms, and designed distinctive uniforms for each regiment of the Poyaisian Army. His imaginary country had an honours system, landed titles, a coat of arms—doubly supported by Poyers and unicorns—and the same Green Cross flag he had used in Florida. By the end of 1821 Major William John Richardson had not only accepted MacGregor's fantasy as true but had become an active ally, providing his attractive estate at Oak Hall, Wanstead to be a British base for the supposed Poyaisian royal family. MacGregor gave Richardson the Order of the Green Cross, commissioned him into the Poyaisian "Royal Regiment of Horse Guards" and appointed him chargé d'affaires of the Poyaisian legation at Dowgate Hill in the City of London—the top representative of Poyais in Britain. Richardson's letter of credence from "Gregor the First, Sovereign Prince of the State of Poyais" was presented to George IV. MacGregor had Poyaisian offices set up in London, Edinburgh and Glasgow to sell impressive-looking land certificates—initially hand-written, but later printed—to the general public, and to co-ordinate prospective emigrants. ### Land of opportunity The consensus among MacGregor's biographers is that Britain in the early 1820s could hardly have suited him and his Poyais scheme better. Amid a general growth in the British economy following the Battle of Waterloo and the end of the Napoleonic Wars, interest rates were dropping and the British government bond, the "consol", offered rates of only 3% per annum on the London Stock Exchange. Those wanting a higher return invested in more risky foreign debt. After continental European bonds were popular in the immediate post-Waterloo years, the Latin American revolutions brought a raft of new alternatives to the London market, starting with the £2 million loan issued for Gran Colombia (incorporating both New Granada and Venezuela) in March 1822. Bonds from Colombia, Peru, Chile and others, offering interest rates as high as 6% per annum, made Latin American securities extremely popular on the London market—a trend on which a nation like the Poyais described by MacGregor would be ideally positioned to capitalise. MacGregor mounted an aggressive sales campaign. He gave interviews in the national newspapers, engaged publicists to write advertisements and leaflets, and had Poyais-related ballads composed and sung on the streets of London, Edinburgh and Glasgow. His proclamation to the Poyers was distributed in handbill form. In mid-1822 there appeared in Edinburgh and London a 355-page guidebook "chiefly intended for the use of settlers", Sketch of the Mosquito Shore, Including the Territory of Poyais—ostensibly the work of a "Captain Thomas Strangeways", aide-de-camp to the Cazique, but actually written either by MacGregor himself or by accomplices. The Sketch mostly comprised long, reprinted tracts from older works on the Mosquito Coast and other parts of the region. The original material ranged from misleading to outright made up. MacGregor's publicists described the Poyaisian climate as "remarkably healthy ... agree[ing] admirably with the constitution of Europeans"—it was supposedly a spa destination for sick colonists from the Caribbean. The soil was so fertile that a farmer could have three maize harvests a year, or grow cash crops such as sugar or tobacco without hardship; detailed projections at the Sketch's end forecast profits of millions of dollars. Fish and game were so plentiful that a man could hunt or fish for a single day and bring back enough to feed his family for a week. The natives were not just co-operative but intensely pro-British. The capital was St Joseph, a flourishing seaside town of wide paved boulevards, colonnaded buildings and mansions, inhabited by as many as 20,000. St Joseph had a theatre, an opera house and a domed cathedral; there was also the Bank of Poyais, the Poyaisian houses of parliament and a royal palace. Reference was made to a "projected Hebrew colony". The Sketch went so far as to claim the rivers of Poyais contained "globules of pure gold". This was almost all fiction, but MacGregor's calculation that official-looking documents and the printed word would convince many people proved correct. The meticulous detail in the leather-bound Sketch, and the cost of having it printed, did much to dispel lingering doubts. Poyaisian land certificates at two shillings and threepence per acre, roughly equivalent to a working man's daily wage at the time, were perceived by many as an attractive investment opportunity. There was enough demand for the certificates that MacGregor was able to raise the price to two shillings and sixpence per acre in July 1822, then gradually to four shillings per acre, without diminishing sales; according to MacGregor, about 500 had bought Poyaisian land by early 1823. The buyers included many who invested their life savings. MacGregor became, to quote one 21st-century financial analyst, the "founding father of securities fraud". Alongside the land certificate sales, MacGregor spent several months organising the issue of a Poyaisian government loan on the London Stock Exchange. As a precursor to this he registered his 1820 land grant at the Court of Chancery on 14 October 1822. Sir John Perring, Shaw, Barber & Co., a London bank with a fine reputation, underwrote a £200,000 loan—secured on "all the revenues of the Government of Poyais" including the sale of land—and offered provisional certificates or "scrip" for the Poyaisian bonds on 23 October. The bonds were in denominations of £100, £200 and £500, and offered at a marked-down purchase price of 80%. The certificate could be acquired for 15%, with the rest due over two installments on 17 January and 14 February 1823. The interest rate was 6% per annum. If the Poyaisian issue successfully emulated its Colombian, Peruvian and Chilean counterparts, MacGregor stood to amass a fortune. ### Eager settlers For settlers, MacGregor deliberately targeted his fellow Scots, assuming that they would be more likely to trust him, as a Scotsman himself. Their emigration served to reassure potential investors in the Poyaisian bonds and land certificates firstly that the country was real, and secondly that it was being developed and would provide monetary returns. In Sinclair's assessment, this aspect of the scheme "turn[ed] what would have been an inspired hoax into a cruel and deadly one". Tamar Frankel posits in her analysis that, at least to some degree, MacGregor "probably believed his own story" and genuinely hoped to forge these people into a Poyaisian society. MacGregor told his would-be colonists that he wished to see Poyais populated with Scots as they possessed the necessary hardiness and character to develop the new country. Alluding to the rivalry with England and the Darien episode—which, he stressed, had involved a direct ancestor of his—MacGregor suggested that in Poyais they might right this historic wrong and salvage Scottish pride. Skilled tradesmen and artisans were promised free passage to Poyais, supplies, and lucrative government contracts. Hundreds, mostly Scots, signed up to emigrate—enough to fill seven ships. They included a City of London banker named Mauger (who was to head the Bank of Poyais), doctors, civil servants, young men whose families had bought them commissions in the Poyaisian Army and Navy, and an Edinburgh cobbler who accepted the post of Official Shoemaker to the Princess of Poyais. Leadership of the Cazique's first emigration party was given to an ex-British Army officer, Hector Hall, who was commissioned into the Poyaisian "2nd Native Regiment of Foot" with the rank of lieutenant-colonel, and created "Baron Tinto" with a supposed 12,800-acre (20-square-mile; 52-square-kilometre) estate. Hall would sail with 70 emigrants on Honduras Packet, a vessel MacGregor had encountered in South America. MacGregor saw them off from London on 10 September 1822, entrusting to Mauger 5,000 Bank of Poyais dollar notes produced by the Bank of Scotland's official printer. "The new world of their dreams suddenly became a very real world as the men accepted the Cazique's dollar notes," Sinclair writes. "The people who had bought land, and who had planned to take their savings with them in coin, were also delighted to exchange their gold for the legal currency of Poyais." After MacGregor spoke briefly to each of the settlers to wish them luck, he and Hall exchanged salutes and the Honduras Packet set sail, flying the Green Cross flag. A second emigrant ship—Kennersley Castle, a merchantman docked at Leith, near Edinburgh—was hired by MacGregor in October 1822, and left Leith on 22 January 1823 with almost 200 emigrants aboard. MacGregor again saw the settlers off, coming aboard to see that they were well quartered; to their delight, he announced that since this was the maiden emigrant voyage from Scotland to Poyais, all the women and children would sail free of charge. The Cazique was rowed back to shore to rousing cheers from his colonists. The ship's captain Henry Crouch fired a six-gun broadside salute, hoisted the supposed flag of Poyais, then steered the ship out of port. While claiming royal status as Cazique, MacGregor attempted to dissociate himself from the Latin American republican movement and his former comrades there, and from late 1822 made discreet overtures towards the Spanish government regarding co-operation in Central America. The Spanish paid him little notice. The Poyaisian bonds' price remained fairly steady until they were crippled by developments elsewhere in the market during November and December 1822. Amid the general instability in South America, the Colombian government suggested that its London agent might have exceeded his authority when he arranged the £2 million loan. When this representative suddenly died, the frantic buying of South American securities was abruptly replaced by equally restless selling. The Cazique's cash flow was all but wiped out when most of those who had bought the Poyaisian scrip did not make the payments due in January. While the price of the Colombian bonds steadied and eventually rose again, the Poyaisian securities never recovered; by late 1823 they were traded for less than 10% of their face value. ### Disappointment Honduras Packet reached the Black River in November 1822. Bemused to find a country rather different from the Sketch's descriptions, and no sign of St Joseph, the emigrants set up camp on the shore, assuming that the Poyaisian authorities would soon contact them. They sent numerous search parties inland; one, guided by natives who recognised the name St Joseph, found some long-forgotten foundations and rubble. Hall quickly came to the private conclusion that MacGregor must have duped them, but reasoned that announcing such concerns prematurely would only demoralise the party and cause chaos. A few weeks after their arrival, the captain of the Honduras Packet abruptly and unilaterally sailed away amid a fierce storm; the emigrants found themselves alone apart from the natives and two American hermits. Comforting the settlers with vague assurances that the Poyaisian government would find them if they just stayed where they were, Hall set out for Cape Gracias a Dios, hoping to make contact with the Mosquito king or find another ship. Most of the emigrants found it impossible to believe that the Cazique had deliberately misled them, and posited that blame must lie elsewhere, or that there must have been some terrible misunderstanding. The second set of colonists disembarked from the Kennersley Castle in late March 1823. Their optimism was quickly extinguished. Hall returned in April with disheartening news: he had found no ship that could help and, far from considering them any responsibility of his, King George Frederic Augustus had not even been aware of their presence. The Kennersley Castle having sailed, MacGregor's victims could count on no assistance in the near future. The emigrants had brought ample provisions with them, including medicines, and had two doctors among them, so they were not in a totally hopeless situation, but apart from Hall none of the military officers, government officials or civil servants appointed by MacGregor made any serious attempt to organise the party. Hall returned to Cape Gracias a Dios several times to seek help, but did not explain his constant absences to the settlers—this exacerbated the general confusion and anger, particularly when he refused to pay the wages promised to those supposedly on Poyaisian government contracts. With the coming of the rainy season insects infested the camp, diseases such as malaria and yellow fever took hold, and the emigrants sank into utter despair. James Hastie, a Scottish sawyer who had brought his wife and three children with him, later wrote: "It seemed to be the will of Providence that every circumstance should combine for our destruction." Another settler, the would-be royal shoemaker, who had left a family in Edinburgh, shot himself. The schooner Mexican Eagle, from British Honduras carrying the Chief Magistrate of Belize, Marshal Bennet, to the Mosquito king's court, discovered the settlers in early May 1823. Seven men and three children had died, and many more were sick. Bennet informed them that Poyais did not exist and that he had never heard of this Cazique they spoke of. He advised them to return with him to British Honduras, as they would surely die if they stayed where they were. The majority preferred to wait for Hall to come back, hopefully with news of passage back to Britain. About half a week later Hall returned with the Mosquito king, who announced that MacGregor's land grant was revoked forthwith. He had never granted MacGregor the title of Cazique, he said, nor given him the right to sell land or raise loans against it; the emigrants were in fact in George Frederic Augustus's territory illegally and would have to leave unless they pledged allegiance to him. All the settlers left except for about 40 who were too weakened by disease to make the journey. Transported aboard the cramped Mexican Eagle—the lack of space necessitated three trips—the emigrants were in miserable shape when they reached Belize, and in most cases had to be carried from the ship. The weather in British Honduras was even worse than that at the Black River, and the colony's authorities and doctors could do little to help the new arrivals. Disease spread rapidly among the settlers and most of them died. The colony's superintendent, Major-General Edward Codd, opened an official investigation to "lay open the true situation of the imaginary State of Poyais and ... the unfortunate emigrants", and sent word to Britain of the Poyais settlers' fate. By the time the warning reached London, MacGregor had five more emigrant ships on the way; the Royal Navy intercepted them. A third vessel—Skene, carrying 105 more Scottish emigrants—arrived at the Black River, but on seeing the abandoned colony the master Captain John Wilson sailed on to Belize and disembarked his passengers there. The fourth and last ship to arrive was Albion, which arrived at Belize in November 1823, but which was carrying provisions, arms, and stores and not passengers. The cargo was sold locally at auction. The surviving colonists variously settled in the United States, remained in British Honduras, or sailed for home aboard the Ocean, a British vessel that left Belize on 1 August 1823. Some died during the journey back across the Atlantic. Of the roughly 250 who had sailed on Honduras Packet and Kennersley Castle, at least 180 had perished. Fewer than 50 ever returned to Britain. ### Poyais scheme in France MacGregor left London shortly before the small party of Poyais survivors arrived home on 12 October 1823—he told Richardson that he was taking Josefa to winter in Italy for the sake of her health, but in fact his destination was Paris. The London press reported extensively on the Poyais scandal over the following weeks and months, stressing the colonists' travails and charging that MacGregor had orchestrated a massive fraud. Six of the survivors—including Hastie, who had lost two of his children during the ordeal—claimed that they were misquoted in these articles, and on 22 October signed an affidavit insisting that blame lay not with MacGregor but with Hall and other members of the emigrant party. "[W]e believe that Sir Gregor MacGregor has been worse used by Colonel Hall and his other agents than was ever a man before," they declared, "and that had they have done their duty by Sir Gregor and by us, things would have turned out very differently at Poyais". MacGregor asserted that he himself had been defrauded, alleged embezzlement by some of his agents, and claimed that covetous merchants in British Honduras were deliberately undermining the development of Poyais as it threatened their profits. Richardson attempted to console the Poyais survivors, vigorously denied the press claims that the country did not exist, and issued libel writs against some of the British newspapers on MacGregor's behalf. In Paris, MacGregor persuaded the Compagnie de la Nouvelle Neustrie, a firm of traders that aspired to prominence in South America, to seek investors and settlers for Poyais in France. He concurrently intensified his efforts towards King Ferdinand VII of Spain—in a November 1823 letter the Cazique proposed to make Poyais a Spanish protectorate. Four months later he offered to lead a Spanish campaign to reconquer Guatemala, using Poyais as a base. Spain took no action. MacGregor's "moment of greatest hubris", Matthew Brown suggests in his biographical portrait, came in December 1824 when, in a letter to the King of Spain, he claimed to be himself "descendent of the ancient Kings of Scotland". Around this time Josefa gave birth to the third and final MacGregor child, Constantino, at their home in the Champs-Élysées. Gustavus Butler Hippisley, a friend of Major Richardson and fellow veteran of the British Legions in Latin America, accepted the Poyais fantasy as true and entered MacGregor's employ in March 1825. Hippisley wrote back to Britain refuting "the bare-faced calumnies of a hireling press"; in particular he admonished a journalist who had called MacGregor a "penniless adventurer". With Hippisley's help, MacGregor negotiated with the Nouvelle Neustrie company, whose managing director was a Frenchman called Lehuby, and agreed to sell the French company up to 500,000 acres (781 square miles; 2,023 square kilometres) in Poyais for its own settlement scheme; "a very clever way of distancing himself", Sinclair comments, as this time he would be able to say honestly that others were responsible and that he had merely made the land available. Lehuby's company readied a ship at Le Havre and began to gather French emigrants, of whom about 30 obtained passports to travel to Poyais. Discarding the idea of co-operation with Spain, MacGregor published a new Poyaisian constitution in Paris in August 1825, this time describing it as a republic—he remained head of state, with the title Cazique—and on 18 August raised a new £300,000 loan through Thomas Jenkins & Company, an obscure London bank, offering 2.5% interest per annum. No evidence survives to suggest that the relevant bonds were issued. The Sketch was condensed and republished as a 40-page booklet called Some Account of the Poyais Country. French government officials became suspicious when an additional 30 people requested passports to travel to this country they had never heard of, and ordered the Nouvelle Neustrie company's ship to be kept in port. Some of the would-be emigrants became concerned themselves and made complaints to the police, which led to the arrest of Hippisley and MacGregor's secretary Thomas Irving in Paris in the early hours on 4 September 1825. Lehuby's ship never left Le Havre, and his colonists gradually dispersed. ### 1826 acquittal of fraud MacGregor went into hiding in the French provinces, while Lehuby fled to the southern Netherlands. Hippisley and Irving were informed on 6 September that they were being investigated for conspiracy to defraud and sell titles to land they did not own. Both insisted that they were innocent. They were taken that evening to La Force Prison. MacGregor was arrested after three months and brought to La Force on 7 December 1825. He speculated to his confederates that the charges against them must be the result of some abrupt change of policy by France, or of some Spanish intrigue calculated to undermine Poyaisian independence. The three men remained imprisoned without trial while the French attempted to extradite Lehuby from the Netherlands. Attempting to re-associate himself and Poyais with the republican movement in Latin America, MacGregor issued a French-language declaration from his prison cell on 10 January 1826, claiming that he was "contrary to human rights, held prisoner ... for reasons of which he is not aware" and "suffering as one of the founders of independence in the New World". This attempt to convince the French that he might have some kind of diplomatic immunity did not work. The French government and police ignored the announcement. The three Britons were brought to trial on 6 April 1826. Lehuby, still in the Netherlands, was tried in absentia. The Crown prosecution's case was seriously hampered by his absence, particularly because many key documents were with him in the Netherlands. The prosecutor alleged a complex conspiracy between MacGregor, Lehuby and their associates to profit personally from a fraudulent land concession and loan prospectus. MacGregor's lawyer, a Frenchman called Merilhou, asserted that if anything untoward had occurred, the missing managing director should be held culpable; there was no proof of a conspiracy, he said, and MacGregor could have been himself defrauded by Lehuby. The prosecutor conceded that there was insufficient evidence to prove his case, complimented MacGregor for co-operating with the investigation fairly and openly, and withdrew the charges. The three judges confirmed the defendants' release—"a full and perfect acquittal", Hippisley would write—but days later the French authorities succeeded in having Lehuby extradited, and the three men learned they would have to stand trial again. The fresh trial, scheduled for 20 May, was postponed when the prosecutor announced that he was not ready. The delay gave MacGregor and Merilhou time to prepare an elaborate, largely fictional 5,000-word statement purporting to describe the Scotsman's background, activities in the Americas, and total innocence of any endeavour to defraud. When the trial finally began on 10 July 1826, Merilhou was present not as MacGregor's defence counsel but as a witness for the prosecution, having been called as such because of his links with the Nouvelle Neustrie company. Merilhou entrusted MacGregor's defence to a colleague called Berville, who read the 5,000-word submission in full before the court. "Maître Merilhou, as the author of the address the court had heard, and Maître Berville, as the actor who read the script, had done their work extremely well," Sinclair writes; Lehuby was convicted of making false representations regarding the sale of shares, and sentenced to 13 months' imprisonment, but the Cazique was found not guilty on all charges, while the imputations against Hippisley and Irving were stricken from the record. ### Return to Britain; lesser Poyais schemes MacGregor quickly moved his family back to London, where the furore following the Poyais survivors' return had died down. In the midst of a serious economic downturn, some investors had subscribed to the £300,000 Poyais loan issued by Thomas Jenkins & Company—apparently believing the assertion of the Cazique's publicists that the previous loans had defaulted only because of embezzlement by one of his agents. MacGregor was arrested soon after his arrival back in Britain, and held at Tothill Fields Bridewell in Westminster for about a week before being released without charge. He initiated a new, less ornate version of the Poyais scheme, describing himself simply as the "Cacique of the Republic of Poyais". The new Poyaisian office at 23 Threadneedle Street made none of the claims to diplomatic status the old Poyaisian legation at Dowgate Hill had done. MacGregor persuaded Thomas Jenkins & Company to act as brokers for an £800,000 loan, issued on 20-year bonds at 3% interest, in mid-1827. The bonds, produced at nominal values of £250, £500 and £1,000, did not become popular. An anonymous handbill was circulated in the City of London, describing the previous Poyais loans and warning readers to "Take Care of your Pockets—Another Poyais Humbug". The loan's poor performance compelled MacGregor to pass most of the unsold certificates to a consortium of speculators for a small sum. Sinclair stresses that the Poyais bonds were perceived as "humbug" not because MacGregor's hoax had been fully unravelled, but simply because the prior securities had failed to deliver profitable returns. "Nobody thought to question the legitimacy of Poyais itself", he elaborates. "Some investors had begun to understand that they were being fleeced, but almost none realised how comprehensively." Other variants on the Poyais scheme were similarly unsuccessful. In 1828 MacGregor began to sell certificates entitling the holders to "land in Poyais Proper" at five shillings per acre. Two years later King Robert Charles Frederic, who had succeeded his brother George Frederic Augustus in 1824, issued thousands of certificates covering the same territory and offered them to lumber companies in London, directly competing with MacGregor. When the original investors demanded their long-overdue interest, MacGregor could only pay with more certificates. Other charlatans soon caught on and set up their own rival "Poyaisian offices" in London, offering land debentures in competition with both MacGregor and the Mosquito king. By 1834 MacGregor was back in Scotland and living in Edinburgh. He paid some unredeemed securities by issuing yet another series of Poyaisian land certificates. Two years later he published a constitution for a smaller Poyaisian republic, centred on the region surrounding the Black River, and headed by himself as President. It was clear, however, that "Poyais had had its day," as Sinclair puts it. An attempt by MacGregor to sell some land certificates in 1837 marks the last record of any Poyais scheme. ## Return to Venezuela and death Josefa MacGregor died at Burghmuirhead, near Edinburgh, on 4 May 1838. MacGregor almost immediately left for Venezuela, where he resettled in Caracas and in October 1838 applied for citizenship and restoration to his former rank in the Venezuelan Army, with back pay and a pension. He stressed his travails on Venezuela's behalf two decades earlier and asserted that Bolívar, who had died in 1830, had effectively deported him; he described several unsuccessful requests to return and being "[forced to] remain outside the Republic ... by causes and obstacles out of my control" while losing his wife, two children and "the best years of my life and all my fortune". The Defence Minister Rafael Urdaneta, who had served alongside MacGregor during the Aux Cayes expedition of 1816, asked the Senate to look upon the Scotsman's application favourably as he had "enlisted in our ranks from the very start of the War of Independence, and ran the same risks as all the patriots of that disastrous time, meriting promotions and respect because of his excellent personal conduct"—MacGregor's contributions had been "heroic with immense results". President José Antonio Páez, another former revolutionary comrade, approved the application in March 1839. MacGregor was duly confirmed as a Venezuelan citizen and divisional general in the Venezuelan Army, with a pension of one-third of his salary. He settled in the capital and became a respected member of the local community. After his death at home in Caracas on 4 December 1845, he was buried with full military honours in Caracas Cathedral, with President Carlos Soublette, Cabinet ministers and the military chiefs of Venezuela marching behind his coffin. Obituaries in the Caracas press extolled General MacGregor's "heroic and triumphant retreat" to Barcelona in 1816 and described him as "a valiant champion of independence". "There was not a word about Amelia Island, Porto Bello or Rio de la Hacha, and there was no reference to the Cazique of Poyais," Sinclair concludes. The part of today's Honduras that was supposedly called Poyais remains undeveloped in the 21st century. Back in Scotland, at the MacGregor graveyard near Loch Katrine, the clan memorial stones make no mention of Gregor MacGregor or the country he invented. ## See also - British Legions British and Irish volunteer legions in the South American wars for independence

Sacrifice (video game)

2000 real-time strategy video game

Sacrifice is a real-time strategy video game published by Interplay Entertainment in 2000 for Microsoft Windows platform. Developed by Shiny Entertainment, the game features elements of action and other genres. Players control wizards who fight each other with spells and summoned creatures. The game was ported to Mac OS 9.2 in 2001. Unlike many of its contemporary real-time strategy games, Sacrifice places little emphasis on resource gathering and management. There is no system of workers; the players' wizards collect souls to summon creatures, and their mana—energy for casting spells—constantly regenerates. Players customize their attacks by choosing from spells and creatures aligned to five gods. To defeat an opponent, the player's wizard sacrifices a friendly unit at the opposing wizard's altar, thereby desecrating it and banishing the enemy wizard. Aside from a single-player campaign, Sacrifice offers a multiplayer mode, in which up to four players can play against each other over computer networks. Sacrifice was created by a small team of developers; most of the work was done by four key personnel. The graphic engine of the game uses tesselation: thousands of polygons are used to display an object and as lesser details are needed, the number of polygons is reduced. By adjusting the required level of detail, Sacrifice can be run on various machines with the highest possible quality of graphics. Complementing the graphics of the game were the voice work of professional actors, such as Tim Curry, and the musical compositions of Kevin Manthei. Sacrifice was praised by reviewers for the novel designs of its creatures and for its humorous content. The high level of attention needed to manage its frenetic combat was mentioned as a flaw. Despite winning several awards, Sacrifice was not a commercial success. ## Gameplay In Sacrifice, players control wizards, looking over their characters from behind. Each match starts the player with a wizard and an altar. Using the keyboard and mouse, players move their wizards around a virtual world, directing armies and casting spells to eliminate their opponents. A player's wizard defeats an opponent by desecrating his or her altar through the magical "sacrifice" of a friendly unit. Wizards can cast spells that harm opponents (combat spells), heal damage taken, or summon creatures. More advanced combat spells affect large areas of the battlefield, taking the form of tornadoes and volcanoes. Casting spells requires energy, which the game represents in the form of mana. Recovery of mana is slow, but a wizard accelerates the process by staying close to his or her altar. Close proximity to one of several fountains of mana scattered across the world increases his or her recovery rate as well. A wizard can monopolize a mana fountain by erecting a structure known as a manalith over it. Because mana can always be regained, it is an infinite resource. Souls are the other type of resource in this game; they are used, along with mana, to summon creatures, who form the mainstay of the players' offensive capability. Unlike mana, souls are limited in quantity. Players start with a few souls and increase their resources by locating unclaimed souls, or by converting the souls of unfriendly creatures their wizards have killed. Summoned creatures are mainly classified into three classes: melee, ranged, and air (flyers). In a rock-paper-scissors manner, each class is a counter to another. Melee creatures inflict more damage to their ranged opponents, but cannot retaliate against flyers, which in turn are vulnerable to those who can attack at range. Several creatures also have special abilities, such as creating protective magical barriers, becoming invisible, or immobilizing their opponents. Two units, manahoars and sac doctors, have special purposes. Manahoars help to recharge their summoner's mana by channeling energy from manaliths to him or her. Sac doctors are summoned to extract the souls of fallen opponents and bring them back to the altar for conversion. These units are also summoned to hold the sacrificial rituals required for desecrating enemy altars; killing a sac doctor disrupts the process. The spells and abilities of the creatures are designed along the ethos of five gods. Persephone, the Great Healer, bestows her followers with powers of regeneration and nature. Her counterpart, Charnel, God of Strife, celebrates death and decay; his creatures are undead and his spells drains the life of others. The other three gods—James, Stratos, and Pyro—govern natural elements, granting their followers abilities associated with earth, air, and fire, respectively. Unlike other real-time strategy games released in or before 2000, Sacrifice's gameplay is not focused on large-scale management of resources and bases. Instead, the game emphasizes micromanagement of the players' units; success in the game is linked to meticulous control of individuals or small groups to overcome enemies. Players order their armies to assume formations by pressing an assigned key or navigating through a pop-up menu. The order can also be given by moving the mouse in specific patterns without waiting for the menu to appear. ### Single-player campaign Sacrifice's single-player campaign begins with a meeting between the protagonist Eldred and the blind seer Mithras on a war-torn world. Through voiceovers and cut scenes rendered by the game engine, Eldred recounts to Mithras his background and the events that led to the world's current state. Eldred was a tyrannical emperor who ruled over the world of Jhera. However, his days of rule were numbered: his subjects were rebelling, and his enemies gathered at the borders of his realm. Turning to the mystical arts for a solution, Eldred summoned a demon, Marduk, to eliminate opposition to his rule. Marduk proved uncontrollable and ravaged Jhera. Eldred fled to the world that he and Mithras stand on. The world—having suffered a past cataclysm—was riven into a collection of five floating islands. A god rules over each realm, seeking to impose his or her own agenda. The rivalries among the gods are aggravated by Mithras's prophecy of a traitor amongst them. Sensing the opportunity for a new lease on life, Eldred offers his service to the gods. The campaign spans ten missions. In each mission, the player chooses a god for Eldred to champion, receiving creatures and spells from that god. The player can build up a selection of units and spells from different gods by changing Eldred's allegiance between missions; the selections are used in later missions or multiplayer sessions. As the game progresses, the player's choices align Eldred with one god. Aside from the stated goals in each mission, there are secret objectives that if accomplished bestow bonuses to Eldred's attributes (magical and physical resistance, more mana, etc.). Midway through the campaign, Eldred encounters Marduk again. The demon taunts the wizard and announces that this world will suffer the same fate as Jhera. Eldred warns the gods; they believe one of them supports the demon and fall upon each other to eliminate the traitor. By the last stage of the campaign, Eldred has helped one god to kill the others. After the end of the wizard's narration, Mithras reveals himself as Marduk. Stratos, the traitor, had planned for the demon to appear on this world and deliver the prophecy to the gods. Marduk berates Eldred for his naivety and starts the final battle. After defeating the demon, the player chooses one of two endings for Eldred: stay and help the last god rule the world, or leave and seek his destiny in other worlds. ### Multiplayer Sacrifice features the capability for players to play matches against each other over computer networks; up to four players (human- or computer-controlled) can participate in a multiplayer match. Four modes of play are available: Skirmish, Slaughter, Soul Harvest, and Domination. Skirmish's gameplay is similar to that of the single-player mode; a player wins the match by banishing the others' wizards. The winner of Domination is the wizard who controls a certain number of manaliths. The goal in Slaughter is to amass the most kills, while wizards in Soul Harvest have to collect the most souls. Initially, the multiplayer games could only be played over small-area networks of computers (local area networks), or over the internet through an integrated matchmaking service. Later software patches added online rankings and the capability to connect computers via Internet Protocol Suite (TCP/IP), allowing play over the internet without the matchmaking service. The Macintosh version's matchmaking, handled by GameRanger, had to be installed through a patch. Multiplayer matches cannot be played between different computer platforms. ## Development Sacrifice's development started in August 1997. The game's lead programmer, Martin Brownlow, was inspired by Chaos: The Battle of Wizards, which was released in 1985 for the ZX Spectrum computer. In the old game, players take turns to control wizards, summoning creatures and casting spells to eliminate each other. Shiny desired to avoid repeating the bad experience of marketing their last product Messiah. Released in March 2000, the game was extravagantly promoted by Shiny during its development, and the resulting heavy scrutiny from the media greatly stressed the team who worked on the game. FiringSquad claimed that until the year of its release, no one outside the company knew of the game. However, Electronic Gaming Monthly printed a number of details about the game in an issue cover dated December 1997, and Eurogamer reported that Sacrifice "has been hyped almost incessantly in the press, and if you placed every screenshot of the game which has been posted on the web end to end, they would easily reach to the moon and back." According to Brownlow, his team was able to concentrate on developing the game without the media or "fan base questioning every decision that gets made along the way". The bulk of the work was done by a small team. Game designer Eric Flannum, formerly of Blizzard Entertainment, recalls that there were only three other key personnel: two programmers and an animator. As more game features were developed, the team expanded. Flannum was tasked to lead four level designers, and Jon Gwyn joined Joby Otero on the art team. After the basic features of the game had been completed, James Phinney, lead designer and producer of Blizzard's 1998 real-time strategy game StarCraft, was hired to write the plot for the single-player campaign. His first draft was used as the script for recording placeholder voiceovers, which helped the team to judge the atmosphere in the game. Later, Shiny employed professional actors, such as Tim Curry and Brad Garrett, and various voice artists, such as Jennifer Hale, to record the final voices for the game's characters. Audio filters altered the voices for the gods, giving them a supernatural edge appropriate to their roles. The game had three voice directors: Ginny McSwain, Art Currim and Chris Borders with Margaret Tang providing VO coordination. For background music, Shiny hired Kevin Manthei, who had composed many scores for video games and big- and small-screen entertainment, such as Scream 3 and Buffy the Vampire Slayer. His compositions for Sacrifice were played by an orchestra of 25 instruments. Shiny's founder, David Perry, was so busy with the game's development that he passed over the opportunity to create a video game for the science-fiction movie The Matrix. ### Graphics Sacrifice's graphics engine was developed from Messiah's. The older game renders its characters by tesselation, using thousands of polygons to make up character models and decreasing the number of polygons when lesser details are required, such as drawing the object at a distance. A typical object in Sacrifice comprises 200 to 2,500 polygons. Shiny expanded the technology's application to the game's virtual world. The environment is not decorated with grass, flowers, and rocks by overlaying two-dimensional images of such objects on the terrain model. Instead, many tiny models of these terrain features litter the landscape. Objects in the game are composed of isosceles right triangles, each of which is infinitely divisible into two smaller isosceles right triangles. The array of infinite triangles derived from these divisions is stored in a binary triangle tree data structure, and the simplicity of the division and its data management algorithms frees up the graphic processor for other duties, allowing more resources to be spent on managing the level of detail. Sacrifice's spell effects are composed of parametric surfaces, which also can be broken down into triangles, facilitating tessellation. In early 2000, the computer industry released the first video graphics cards capable of processing transform, clipping, and lighting (T&L) instructions. With the appropriate software, these new cards took over the burden of T&L processing from the computer's processor, allowing more detailed graphics and smoother animation. Shiny capitalized on the breakthrough, spending a few weeks to rewrite a portion of Sacrifice's software. Brownlow and his team refined and improved the game's graphics, increasing the number of polygons per model and setting the software to scan through scenes a few more times to determine what objects to render and how to display them. Sacrifice was acknowledged as the first game on the market to make full use of the new graphic cards (the GeForce 2 and Radeon series). Because of the adopted technology, animation in the game was smooth, without the jerkiness associated with overstressed graphical engines. For the character models, Otero and his team eschewed conventional designs inspired by The Lord of the Rings and other fantasies. Otero's ideal was that of "form follows function", by which a creature's capabilities or purposes are readily apparent from its appearance. In his opinion, a creature designed to kill enemies by exploding itself would simply be a "cartoon-ish bomb with feet". Otero's simple designs were expanded and fleshed out in detail by Gwyn, who was also responsible for creating Eldred's model. The artists' incorporation of humor in their work did not escape the video game industry's notice; many pointed out the quirky allusion of James, God of Earth, to Earthworm Jim, star of Shiny's previous games. ### Release By June, the major features of the game had been implemented, and Shiny proceeded to the next stage of development. It selected a thousand members of the public to participate in a beta test of Sacrifice's multiplayer modes, receiving feedback on software bugs, performance issues, and possible improvements. The game's publisher, Interplay Entertainment, assigned its quality assurance department to test the single-player mode. Perry promoted the game by visiting professional game reviewers, such as FiringSquad, and giving copies of the beta version to them. On November 17, 2000, Interplay released the game for the Windows platform. Shiny packaged a level editor, Scapex, with the finished product, allowing gamers to create their own levels. The tool displays the user's changes as they are added to the level. Users have total control over the positioning of models and scripting of events, although the tool does not provide the capability to create new spells or creatures. User-created maps can be shared with other players during the connection phase of multiplayer games. Earlier in the same month, Macintosh software publisher MacPlay announced that it was porting Sacrifice to the Apple computers. It took the company several months to adapt the source code to the Macintosh architecture, and on December 14, 2001, the Macintosh version of the game was released. It has almost the same features as the original version; however, Scapex was excluded from the port. Another feature left out was multiplayer mode, which MacPlay added through a software patch. ## Reception The game received "generally favorable reviews" according to the review aggregation website Metacritic. Initial reactions were favorable. Sacrifice's art was a point of focus for reviewers: the fantasy creatures' novel designs made deep impressions on the industry. The designs were so unconventional that gaming journalist Michael Eilers remarked, "It is as if Salvador Dalí and H. R. Giger got together and played around with 3D Studio Max for a few weeks with a cooler full of Bass Ale between them." To fellow journalist Kieron Gillen, Sacrifice resembled a version of the strategy game Command and Conquer as designed by Renaissance painter Hieronymus Bosch. Aside from being impressed by the details in the graphics, GameSpy's Lee Haumersen found the creatures' movements fluid and believable, remarking, "flying dragons heave their bodies through the air reminiscent of Draco in the movie Dragonheart." Tom Chick of Computer Gaming World summed up the weird experience of seeing his wizard at the head of "a troop of flapping, crawling, loping, whirling, hopping things" as the essence of "what gaming is all about." The game's spell effects also elicited positive reactions. NextGen's Samuel Bass called them "awe-inspiring", while it was "positively breathtaking" for Eurogamer's John Bye to see "flaming missiles raining down on the battlefield, tornados lifting [his] men up into the sky, or the ground swelling up beneath [his wizard's] feet". Although such effects were implemented in other games, as Gillen pointed out, it was a vastly different experience to watch them from the first person perspective. Previewers of FiringSquad and PC Gamer UK were equally overwhelmed by the stunning visual effects. Despite filling the screen with "winged, fully animated demons" and "multiple gigantic twisters spiraling gorgeously into the clouds", Sacrifice performed smoothly on the previewers' machines, impressing the staff of Edge. Aside from the visuals, the game's audio attracted comments. GameSpot's staff enjoyed listening to the story unfold through the recorded voices. They found that the voice actors did not overact their roles despite the extravagant appearances of the characters. Instead, the actors' performance conveyed an extra depth to the personalities of these characters. Haumersen noted a few flaws in the game's vocal presentation: the character models' lip movements did not match their speech, and they had a limited number of gestures to accompany the words. Michael L. House of AllGame was not altogether impressed, finding the voice acting to be "spotty[,] ... ranging from hilarious to obnoxious." To several reviewers, Sacrifice was flawed in its handling of combat. They found that the game's interface—which presented a viewpoint that looked over the wizard from behind—hindered them from having a clear picture of their characters' surroundings. The game's fast-paced combat ensured that fights tended to be messy affairs, where aside from picking out their units from a chaotic mass to issue commands, players had to see to their wizards' safety, and cast spells to support their army. Reviewers commented that once a player had lost a number of early battles, his or her army could never recover from its losses to win the match. Sacrifice's multiplayer games, as GameSpot's Sam Parker observed, tended to be long-drawn stalemates until the wizards obtained more powerful spells. PC Zone's Keith Pullin was disappointed that the game was not designed to reward tactics; in his experience, he achieved victory by continually summoning groups of creatures to attack the enemy. Bass agreed that the game was lacking in tactical play, but other aspects impressed him enough to downplay this failing in his assessment. The intensity and excitement generated by the frenetic gameplay pleased IGN's Dan Adams, but Bye was so frustrated by his experience that he claimed to have suffered a massive increase in blood pressure. The game's heavy demand for micromanagement convinced Maximum PC to name Sacrifice the "best argument for gamers [to grow] a third hand", an opinion in line with Chick's comment that the interface "[seemed] to have been designed for one of the game's 13-fingered beasts". Sacrifice's gameplay had its supporters; the staff at Edge, impressed with the game's controls and visual perspective, named it one of the "few titles [that took] strategy into the third dimension and convincingly used the extra plane for more than a dazzling 3D makeover". Sacrifice was developed and released during a period of growth for the video games market; the amount United States consumers spent on video games increased from US\$3.2 billion in 1995 to \$6.0 billion in 2000. "Solid" real-time strategy games could sell more than 100,000 copies, and those that sold less than 75,000 units were considered commercial failures by the publishers. Many real-time strategy game developers concentrated on enhancing their game's visuals without concern for innovations in gameplay. Shiny was recognized by the industry for its unconventional games, which exhibited humorous content and unique artistic designs. When it became known that the company was developing Sacrifice as its first real-time strategy game, several industry observers were keen to see whether it could deliver a quality product. No sales figures were released for Sacrifice, but several members of the video game industry acknowledged the game did not sell well. James Bell, Infogrames's Senior Vice President of Creative Development, said that Sacrifice, although an excellent game, suffered poor sales because it was badly marketed and released at the wrong time. Another reason, offered by Gillen, for Sacrifice's commercial failure was the small size of its development team. Based mostly on the efforts of four people, the game was built around their gaming preferences, failing to take into account the opinions of a wider variety; hence, the game became a niche product. ### Awards and legacy Impressing IGN with its "wonderful land full of character and imagination", Sacrifice was the gaming site's choice for the best strategy game of 2000 in its Best of 2000 Awards (but a runner-up for Readers' Choice), and was a runner-up for "Best Graphics" in both Editors' Choice and Readers' Choice. It was honored in the same year by European Computer Trade Show as the Best PC Game of the Show. During the 4th Annual Interactive Achievement Awards, the game was nominated for the "PC Strategy", "Computer Innovation", "PC Game of the Year", and "Game of the Year" awards, all of which went to Age of Empires II: The Conquerors, Deus Ex, and Diablo II (latter two), respectively. The game won the award for Strategy Game at Computer Gaming World's 2001 Premier Awards. It won the award for the RTS Game of the Year at the CNET Gamecenter Computer Game Awards for 2000, and was nominated for the Best Multiplayer Game award, which went to Earth 2150. It also won the award for "Best Graphics, Artistic" at GameSpot's Best and Worst of 2000 Awards, and was nominated for the "Best Sound" award, which went to The Sims. It was a runner-up for GameSpy's "2000 Strategy Game of the Year" award, which also went to The Sims. The staff called it "a strategy game at heart [...] with resource management and troop building playing a major part." The game did win the award for "Genre-Bender", though. The staff of Computer Games Magazine nominated it for their 2000 "Real-time Strategy Game of the Year" award, whose winner remains unknown. Since its release, Sacrifice had been one of PC Gamer UK's Top 100 Games for at least eight consecutive years. Looking back at the history of real-time strategy gaming, Geryk pointed out that Sacrifice's "depth and originality" was unparalleled in the genre and often overlooked in favor of its graphics. The staff of gaming site UGO shared a similar opinion, naming the game in 2010 as its eighteenth top strategy game of all time. Although Sacrifice was honored as a quality game, industry observers pointed out that its qualities were forgotten by most people; the staff of GamesRadar+ said the game was "practically invisible to the gaming public", and according to Gillen, few remembered Sacrifice as the pioneer of the mouse-gesture control system, which was praised as revolutionary in Peter Molyneux's later game Black & White. Gillen further lamented that Sacrifice's release heralded the end of Shiny's forays into creative game development, as the company switched to producing more mainstream products, such as Enter the Matrix. Despite receiving numerous calls for a sequel, Shiny said in 2002 that it would not produce one. Years later, GamesRadar+ repeated the call for a sequel while proclaiming Sacrifice "one of the most underappreciated games of all time".

Brandenburg-class battleship

Battleship class of the German Imperial Navy

The Brandenburg class consisted of four pre-dreadnought battleships built for the German Kaiserliche Marine (Imperial Navy), the first modern battleships of the fleet. The four ships of the class—Brandenburg, Wörth, Weissenburg, and Kurfürst Friedrich Wilhelm—were the first ocean-going capital ships built for the German fleet in nearly two decades, owing to reluctance in the Reichstag (Imperial Diet) to fund large projects. They followed a series of small coastal defense ships, and though in retrospect they anticipated the buildup that created the High Seas Fleet, they were ordered as part of a construction program that reflected the strategic and tactical confusion that affected many navies in the 1880s. The design process that resulted in the Brandenburg class was very lengthy, with proposals that ranged from outdated casemate ships to versions with two twin-gun turrets placed side by side. The designers ultimately settled on ships that were armed with an unusual main battery of six 28 cm (11 in) guns at a time when all foreign battleships were built with four or fewer heavy guns. All four ships served with I Squadron of the German fleet for the first several years of their careers, with Kurfürst Friedrich Wilhelm the squadron flagship. During this period, they conducted routine training exercises and visited foreign countries, frequently in company with Kaiser Wilhelm II aboard his yacht. In 1900, they were deployed to China to help combat the Boxer Uprising, but they arrived after the bulk of the fighting was over and thus saw little action there. After returning to Germany they were modernized beginning in 1902, thereafter resuming their peacetime activities. Brandenburg and Wörth remained in service with the German fleet until 1912, when they were laid up. In 1910, Kurfürst Friedrich Wilhelm and Weissenburg were sold to the Ottoman Navy and were renamed Barbaros Hayreddin and Turgut Reis. The now-Ottoman ships saw extensive service during the First Balkan War, providing fire support to Ottoman ground forces fighting in Thrace, as well as engaging the Greek fleet at the Battles of Elli and Lemnos in December 1912 and January 1913, respectively. Following the outbreak of World War I, the German ships were reactivated for use as guard ships protecting the German North Sea coast. The Ottoman vessels meanwhile were used to support the fortresses guarding the Dardanelles during the Dardanelles campaign against British and French forces. Barbaros Hayreddin was torpedoed and sunk by the British submarine HMS E11 in April 1915, though the other members of the class survived the war. Brandenburg and Wörth were disarmed and reduced to secondary duties, eventually being broken up in 1919, while Turgut Reis lingered on as a training ship until 1933. She became a barracks ship until 1950 when she was sold for scrap, and was slowly dismantled over the following decade. ## Background In March 1883, General Leo von Caprivi became the Chef der Admiralität (Chief of the Admiralty) following Albrecht von Stosch's resignation. Caprivi was required to submit a memorandum to the Reichstag on his plans by March 1884. A general of the Imperial German Army, he was inexperienced in naval matters and he convened a council with senior naval officers on 16 January 1884 to gather opinions on future naval construction programs. At the time, he was constrained by the fleet plan of 1873 that had been created under Stosch's direction and had been approved by the Reichstag. The plan governed the size and composition of the German fleet, calling for fourteen ocean-going ironclad warships, a total that was reached with the launching of the casemate ship Oldenburg in 1884. The nominal completion of the 1873 plan further restrained Caprivi, as in the view of many members of the Reichstag, naval budgets could be reduced, since no new ships would be needed until the oldest ironclads began to reach thirty years of age in the mid-1890s. At the January council meeting, Caprivi emphasized the need for careful consideration of new designs, noting that the navy could not afford "the luxury of failed experiments", owing to parliamentary refusal to authorize funding for new ships. Concerns with a two-front war against France and Russia dominated Caprivi's thinking, which resulted in his decision to opt for a strategy of coastal defense in the memorandum; he noted that without a powerful battle fleet, the sea-going ironclads would have little utility against the numerically superior French fleet. He also pointed out that at the time, shell designers and armor manufacturers were competing to defeat each other, which necessitated spiraling costs for navies that attempted to keep pace with the latest technological developments. He also saw that the torpedo could be used to easily sink large armored warships and would be an effective weapon for coastal defense. As a result of these considerations, Caprivi recommended building a large number of smaller coastal defense ships and torpedo boats to defend Germany's coastline in the event of war. Aware of parliamentary objections to increased naval spending, he avoided plans for the construction of expensive battleships. Coincidentally, the French Navy, then at the height of the dominance of the Jeune École (Young School), came to the same conclusions with respect to their competition with the British Royal Navy. Indeed, the 1870s and 1880s marked a period of tactical and strategic confusion in naval thinking in the world's major navies for the same reasons that Caprivi had highlighted in his memorandum. Despite the memorandum submitted to the Reichstag that eschewed capital ship construction, Caprivi secretly discussed new ironclads at length with senior naval officers. He instructed Konteradmiral (KAdm—Rear Admiral) Max von der Goltz, then the Director of the Admiralty's Naval Department, to prepare a list of thirteen questions concerning the characteristics of a new capital ship and then to circulate them among naval officers to gather views on the topic. The questions included requirements for speed, cruising radius, maximum draft, whether sailing rigs should be included, the number, type, and arrangement of main battery guns, and the armor type and layout. Goltz met with several other officers, including Hans von Koester, August von Thomsen, Hans Sack, Wilhelm Büchsel, Carl Barandon, Conrad von Bodenhausen, Gustav Schmidt, and Curt von Maltzahn on 20 October 1885 to discuss the questions. They settled on a ship armed with four 30.5 cm (12 in) guns arranged in the lozenge pattern favored by contemporary French capital ship designers, a thick armored belt and armored deck, and an ability to steam for 5,000 nautical miles (9,300 km; 5,800 mi). Other questions, including the speed and crew size, were left unanswered. At the same time, Caprivi requested design proposals from the Naval Construction Office, which submitted plans for ships that ranged in size from small 2,500 t (2,500-long-ton) coastal defense ships armed with a battery of two 21 cm (8.3 in) guns to heavily-armed 10,000 t (9,800-long-ton) ocean-going battleships equipped with seven 30.5 cm guns. The Reichstag still refused to authorize expensive new ships, especially in light of the cost of creating the Kaiser Wilhelm Canal, though Caprivi was able to convince enough members that the entrances of the canal would be vulnerable to attack and that coastal defense ships would be necessary to guard them. The Reichstag accordingly approved funds for ten such vessels, which ultimately became the six Siegfried- and two Odin-class coastal defense ships; the last two vessels were later cancelled in 1893. The first ship, SMS Siegfried, was authorized for the 1887–1888 budget year. In early 1887, Kapitän zur See (Captain at Sea) Friedrich von Hollmann, who was now Caprivi's chief of staff, presented plans for the 1889–1890 budget year that included the construction of one of the sea-going battleships requested by Goltz's committee, with a second vessel scheduled for the 1892–1893 year. Caprivi replied that funding would have to be approved by the Reichstag, and that there was still testing necessary to determine what type of armor they should carry. In 1888, Kaiser Wilhelm I died and his successor, the terminally ill Kaiser Friedrich III, remained on the throne for just 99 days before passing away as well. The new Kaiser, Wilhelm II, was an ardent supporter of the navy, which was to have profound impacts on the future of the service. Shortly thereafter, Caprivi resigned and was replaced by Vizeadmiral (Vice Admiral) Alexander von Monts in July; in March 1889, Wilhelm II reorganized the naval command structure, creating the Reichsmarineamt (RMA), which was now in control of naval construction. The navy initially requested a pair of battleships in line with Hollmann's projected budget, but Wilhelm II intervened to demand four new ships for the 1889–1890 budget. German Chancellor Otto von Bismarck secured funding for the ships through the larger army expansion bill, though the Reichstag delayed funding for the latter three members of the class. ## Design The design for what was to become the Brandenburg class was prepared by Chief Constructor Alfred Dietrich; he originally used Oldenburg as a starting point. In his first memorandum on the project, he noted that the Oldenburg design would have to be enlarged to provide room for more powerful propulsion machinery and increased coal storage, and armor would have to be strengthened, among other changes. Displacement was originally fixed at 8,500 t (8,400 long tons). In a subsequent memorandum dated 8 August 1888, Dietrich raised the possibility of increasing the caliber of the main battery from 24 cm (9.4 in) to 26 cm (10 in). Dietrich met with Monts on 15 August, who requested that the new ship be armed with four 28 cm (11 in) guns, since the 26 cm guns were perceived to be too small to effectively engage the latest Russian ships being built. This version was submitted two days later to Wilhelm II, who approved it. Dietrich initially considered the latest Russian battleships being built—the Ekaterina II and the Imperator Aleksandr II classes—which arranged their main battery to emphasize end-on fire. He briefly examined the possibility of mounting two gun turrets forward, similar to the Ekaterina II design, but the beam necessary to accommodate guns of that size along with the hull armor would have made the ship too large to be docked in most German dry docks. Variants with four to six single-gun turrets were also prepared, as was a version with two twin turrets and two single-gun wing turrets. By this time, the displacement limit had been raised to 10,000 t (9,800 long tons), though the RMA agreed to allow an increase to 11,400 t (11,200 long tons), as that was the maximum displacement that could be accommodated by existing infrastructure. As Dietrich continued to work on the plans, he examined other foreign contemporaries, including the French Amiral Baudin-class ironclad battleships that carried three main battery guns in individual barbette mounts, all on the centerline. He proposed an armament of six heavy guns in three two-gun turrets in the same arrangement. While this would reduce the end-on fire capability, the RMA determined that the heavier broadside outweighed the reduction in firing arcs ahead or astern. The ships were to have carried a uniform battery of six 28 cm MRK L/35 guns, but during construction a longer 40-caliber version, the MRK L/40 variant, became available. The fore and aft turrets received the longer guns, but the center turret did not have enough space to fit them owing to the closeness of the aft superstructure, so the shorter guns were retained. The Brandenburgs were the first ocean-going capital ships to be built for the German fleet in almost twenty years. Their construction caused significant concern in Russia, which was a possible naval opponent in the Baltic Sea; the Russians decided to strengthen their Baltic Fleet with as many as ten new battleships, though funding proved to be insufficient and the program was significantly pared down. The Brandenburg class was significantly smaller and less powerful than the contemporary British Royal Sovereign class, but roughly equal with the series of French battleships begun with Charles Martel and with the Russian Navarin (the French ships being faster but much less heavily armed and the Russian ship being slower but armed with heavier main guns). Though they were the first modern battleships built in Germany, presaging the Tirpitz-era High Seas Fleet, the authorization for the ships came as part of a construction program that reflected the strategic and tactical confusion of the 1880s caused by theories like the Jeune École. ### General characteristics The ships of the Brandenburg class were 108 m (354 ft 4 in) long between perpendiculars, 113.9 m (373 ft 8 in) long at the waterline, and 115.7 m (379 ft 7 in) long overall. They had a beam of 19.5 m (64 ft) which was increased to 19.74 m (64 ft 9 in) with the addition of torpedo nets, and had a draft of 7.6 m (24 ft 11 in) forward and 7.9 m (25 ft 11 in) aft. The Brandenburgs displaced 10,013 t (9,855 long tons) at their designed weight, and up to 10,670 t (10,500 long tons) at full load. As was the standard for German warships of the period, the hulls of the Brandenburg-class ships were constructed from both transverse and longitudinal steel frames, over which the steel side plates were riveted. The vessels had thirteen watertight compartments and a double bottom that ran for 48% of the length of the hull. Their hulls featured a tumblehome shape above the main deck, and as was common for warships of the era, a ram bow. The ships had a raised forecastle deck that extended to the aft funnel, thereafter reducing to the main deck level. The German navy regarded the ships as excellent sea-boats and the Brandenburgs had easy motion. They were also responsive to commands from the bridge and had a moderate turning circle. Despite their generally positive handling characteristics, the ships were "wet" at high speeds despite the forecastle deck and suffered from severe pitching. The ships lost up to 30% of their speed at hard rudder. Their metacentric height was 1.05 m (3 ft 5 in), and their maximum stability moment was 31.5 degrees. The ships' crew numbered 38 officers and 530 enlisted men, though while serving as the squadron flagship the standard crew was augmented by an additional 9 officers and 54 men. After their refits, their standard crew consisted of 30 officers and 561 enlisted sailors, with an additional 9 officers and 48 enlisted men as flagships. They carried a number of small boats, including a pair of picket boats, two launches, one pinnace, two cutters, two yawls, and two dinghies. ### Machinery The ships' propulsion system consisted of two 3-cylinder triple-expansion engines with steam provided by twelve coal-fired, transverse Scotch marine boilers. The engines each had their own engine rooms and drove two 3-bladed screw propellers that were 5 m (16 ft) in diameter. The boilers were also split into two boiler rooms and they were ducted into a pair of funnels. Electrical power was provided by three generators. The equipment varied from ship to ship; power output ranged from 72.6 to 96.5 kilowatts at 67 volts. The ships each had a single rudder. The engines were rated at 10,000 metric horsepower (9,900 ihp) for a top speed of 16.5 knots (30.6 km/h; 19.0 mph), though in service the ships varied in both power and speed. Kurfürst Friedrich Wilhelm, the vessel with the lowest power, 9,686 PS (9,553 ihp), nevertheless reached 16.9 knots (31.3 km/h; 19.4 mph), the same speed as Wörth, the vessel with the highest power output, 10,228 PS (10,088 ihp). Brandenburg was the slowest member of the class, falling short of the designed speed at 16.3 knots (30.2 km/h; 18.8 mph). Coal storage amounted to 650 t (640 long tons) under peacetime conditions, but additional hull spaces could be used to increase capacity to 1,050 t (1,030 long tons) in time of war. The ships had a cruising radius of 4,500 nautical miles (8,300 km; 5,200 mi) at a cruising speed of 10 knots (19 km/h; 12 mph). ### Armament #### Main battery The Brandenburg-class battleships carried a battery of six 28 cm guns of two different calibers; the forward and aft turrets mounted 40-caliber guns while the amidships turret required the use of shorter 35-caliber guns to allow the turret to rotate. The turrets consisted of a rotating platform that held the guns, protected by an armored barbette on all sides. An armored hood with curved sides above the barbette protected the guns and crews, but the curved shape of the front of the hood necessitated large openings through which to raise and depress the guns, which proved to be a liability since enemy shells could enter through them, as happened to Barbaros Hayreddin (ex-Kurfürst Friedrich Wilhelm) in 1913. The 35-caliber guns had a muzzle velocity of 685 m/s (2,250 ft/s), while the longer guns had a velocity of 715 m/s (2,350 ft/s); the differing velocities produced different ballistics, but the designers were not concerned with the problem, owing to the short ranges at which the ships were expected to fight and the primitive state of fire control in the 1880s. Propellant charges consisted of brown powder. Both types of guns used the same C/92 barbette mount that allowed for depression to −4 degrees and elevation to 25 degrees. The 35-caliber guns had a maximum range of 11,450 m (37,570 ft), while the higher velocity of the longer guns increased their range to 15,090 m (49,510 ft). The turrets were hydraulically operated and required the rotating gun houses to return to the centerline to reload the guns. In their original configuration, the guns had a rate of fire of one shot every three minutes, but after their refits in the early 1900s, the ships' loading equipment was modernized to improve the rate to one shot per minute. Ammunition magazines stored a total of 352 shells; these were 240 kg (530 lb) projectiles that had a 56.6 kg (125 lb) bursting charge. #### Secondary and tertiary guns The Brandenburg class's secondary armament initially consisted of six 10.5 cm (4.1 in) SK L/35 quick-firing guns in individual casemates arranged in an armored battery below the forward superstructure. These guns had recently been adapted by Krupp from existing guns to employ quick-firing technology. The guns were in MPL C/91 pivot mounts that allowed elevation to 30.3 degrees, for a maximum range of 10,800 m (35,400 ft). Their rate of fire was theoretically 10 rounds per minute, but in practice it was limited to 7.5 shots per minute. Muzzle velocity was 600 m/s (2,000 ft/s), though with the C/07 shells introduced in 1907, this increased to 620 m/s (2,000 ft/s). During their modernization, another pair of guns was added and ammunition storage increased from 600 rounds to 1,184 shells, which were a mixture of armor piercing and high explosive (HE) rounds. For close-range defense against torpedo boats, the ships also carried eight 8.8 cm (3.5 in) SK L/30 quick-firing guns. These were also mounted in casemates, four in sponsons abreast the forward main battery turret and four in the rear superstructure. They were carried in MPL C/89 mounts with an elevation range of −10 to 20 degrees; at maximum elevation, the guns could reach targets at 7,300 m (24,000 ft). Muzzle velocity was 590 m/s (1,900 ft/s). These guns were supplied with a total of 2,000 shells, though as with the 10.5 cm guns, ammunition storage was increased during the modernization, to 2,384 rounds. These were originally all C/83 common shells, though they were replaced by C/01 semi-armor-piercing (SAP) shells in 1901, and C/07 shells in 1907, which came in HE and SAP varieties. Rate of fire was theoretically fourteen shots per minute, but in practice it was limited to ten rounds per minute. #### Torpedo tubes In the 1880s, naval tacticians assumed most battles would devolve into a close-range melee, where torpedoes would become the decisive weapon, since they could damage a heavily armored ship below the waterline where the belt armor did not protect it. While the ships were under construction, Hollmann argued in a February 1891 memorandum that the original torpedo armament was not sufficient. He suggested that two torpedo tubes should be installed in the bow below the waterline to increase the forward firepower in the expected melee. There was no room in the bow to fit two torpedo tubes, however, so they were fitted in above-water mounts. At the same time, many foreign navies were adopting larger torpedoes, including the Royal Navy, which had shifted from its standard 35.6 cm (14 in) torpedo to a 45 cm (17.7 in) version. The Germans followed suit; the older 35 cm (14 in) C/84 torpedo was replaced with a much more powerful 45 cm C/91 version. The ships received six 45 cm torpedo tubes, four of which were mounted on the sides of the ship in above-water swivel mounts. The other two were in the bow, also above the waterline. The tubes were supplied with a total of 16 torpedoes, which carried a 87.5 kg (193 lb) warhead. They had a top speed of 32 knots (59 km/h; 37 mph) compared to the 24-knot (44 km/h; 28 mph) speed of the C/84 torpedoes; this allowed the torpedoes to travel 400 m (1,300 ft) in 24 seconds instead of the 30 seconds it would have taken the older torpedoes, making aiming at moving targets significantly easier. Their maximum range at 32 knots was 500 m (1,600 ft); when set to 26 knots (48 km/h; 30 mph), their range increased to 800 m (2,600 ft). ### Armor The first two ships, Brandenburg and Wörth, received compound armor, then the standard type of steel armor, manufactured by Dillinger Hütte, but at the time, Krupp was experimenting with a new nickel-steel armor that was ordered for Weissenburg and Kurfürst Friedrich Wilhelm. The compound armor was constructed by welding hardened steel together with more flexible wrought iron plates to take advantage of the hardness of steel and the greater flexibility of wrought iron to break up and then contain incoming shells. Krupp's nickel steel armor was based on the Harvey process, which enriched the upper layers of the steel with carbon. The process hardened the outer layer while retaining greater flexibility at the back of the plate; the fact that the new armor plate consisted of a single forging instead of multiple plates welded together gave it greater strength. This allowed the use of thinner (and thus lighter) armor belts that provided the same level of protection, which in turn permitted more comprehensive protection for the same weight of armor. Some portions of Brandenburg did receive the new Krupp armor, including the barbettes that held the fore and center main battery turrets. All four ships retained teak backing to their armor belts. The teak was used to help absorb the shock of a torpedo or naval mine detonation. The side protection system followed the so-called "French principle", using a narrow, full-length armored belt to protect the hull, rather than a shorter citadel system that only protected a ship's ammunition magazines and propulsion machinery spaces. The belt extended from 0.8 m (2 ft 7 in) above the waterline to 1.6 m (5 ft 3 in) below, though toward the bow it was extended further down to reinforce the ram. Above the waterline, the armored belt was 300 mm (11.8 in) forward and as the belt moved further aft, it stepped up to 330 mm (13 in), then to 380 mm (15 in), and finally to 400 mm (15.7 in) in the central portion of the ship where it protected the magazines and machinery spaces. Further aft, it tapered to 350 mm (13.8 in) and then to 300 mm toward the stern. Below the waterline, the armored belt was significantly thinner; like the upper belt, it tapered toward the ends. It started at 150 mm (5.9 in) at the bow, increasing to 180 mm (7.1 in), then to 190 mm (7.5 in), and then to 200 mm (7.9 in) thick amidships, and tapered down to 180 mm (7.1 in) on the aft end of the belt. The teak backing for the belt amounted to 200 mm, and the whole assembly was bolted together. The Brandenburgs had an armored deck 60 mm (2.4 in) thick that was connected to the upper edge of the belt; it was effective only at deflecting short-range shells and could not have resisted plunging fire or a shell that detonated on impact. The forward conning tower had 300 mm sides and a 30 mm (1.2 in) roof. The barbettes for the main battery turrets were 300 mm thick and backed with 210 mm (8.3 in) of teak. The gun houses for the main battery had 50 mm (2 in) roofs and sides that consisted of three 40 mm (1.6 in) layers, for a total of 120 mm (4.7 in). The 10.5 cm and 8.8 cm guns received gun shields that consisted of two plates of steel bolted together; each shield consisted of a 20 mm (0.79 in) plate and a 22 mm (0.87 in) plate. ### Modifications Over the course of their careers, the ships underwent a series of modifications. After entering service in 1894–1895, the vessels had their funnels increased in height by 1.5 to 3 m (4 ft 11 in to 9 ft 10 in) to reduce smoke interference with the mainmast spotting top. Beginning in 1896, the German navy began to acquire 3.7 cm (1.5 in) Maxim guns to supplement the 8.8 cm guns in anti-torpedo-boat defense. Though these were very light weapons, firing a 0.66 kg (1.5 lb) projectile, the Germans believed that a hail of fire would prevent torpedo boat crews from approaching close enough to launch their torpedoes. The guns had a maximum rate of fire of 100 rounds per minute, but using deliberate fire the rate was 33 shots per minute. Four of these guns were installed in the fighting tops of the ships' masts. Before their deployment to East Asia in 1900, all four ships received wireless telegraphy sets, making them the first ships of the German fleet to carry radio sets. Between 1902 and 1904, the four ships were extensively modified. During the modernization, a second, armored conning tower was added in the aft superstructure, along with a gangway. The new tower had sides 120 mm (4.7 in) thick and a 20 mm (0.79 in) roof. The work included increasing the ship's coal storage capacity and adding another pair of 10.5 cm guns. The plans had initially called for the center 28 cm turret to be replaced with an armored battery of medium-caliber guns, but this proved to be prohibitively expensive. The ships' torpedo armament was significantly reduced; two of the broadside tubes were removed, as were both bow tubes, while one above-water tube was installed in the stern in a trainable mounting. Total torpedo storage amounted to five torpedoes. Their masts had their searchlight platforms removed. The refit reduced the ships' displacement by 500 to 700 t (490 to 690 long tons). Later in her career, Wörth received two searchlights mounted on the roof of the fighting top of her foremast, along with a third on the roof of her aft bridge. An enclosed spotting top was installed in 1915. Both she and Brandenburg were disarmed in 1916 after they were removed from active service. ## Construction As the members of the class entered service in late 1893, they conducted sea trials that lasted into 1894. Kurfürst Friedrich Wilhelm's tests revealed problems with her propulsion machinery that required lengthy repairs for much of 1894. Brandenburg suffered a boiler explosion during sea trials on 16 February 1894 that killed forty-four men: twenty-five crew members, eighteen shipyard workers, and one from the commission evaluating the trials. The accident had been caused by an incorrectly manufactured valve in the starboard engine. The four ships were among the last German vessels to undergo builder's trials before formal acceptance by the Kaiserliche Marine; after Wörth, most German capital ships underwent testing after commissioning. ## Service history ### Early career As the members of the class entered service beginning in 1894, they were assigned to I Division of I Squadron, and Kurfürst Friedrich Wilhelm became the squadron flagship. Throughout the rest of the 1890s, the ships conducted routine training exercises, visits to foreign countries, and training cruises. Maneuvers included tactical training, shooting practice, and joint operations with Imperial German Army units to practice coastal defense. The ships were involved in a number of accidents: Brandenburg collided with the aviso Jagd in August 1896 and in November 1899, Wörth struck a submerged rock and was badly damaged. As the largest warships of the German fleet, they frequently escorted Wilhelm II's yacht Hohenzollern on state visits or to sailing regattas, most notably Cowes Week in Britain. During the Boxer Uprising in 1900, Chinese nationalists laid siege to the foreign embassies in Beijing and murdered Baron Clemens von Ketteler, the German minister. The widespread violence against westerners in China led to an alliance between Germany and seven other Great Powers: the United Kingdom, Italy, Russia, Austria-Hungary, the United States, France, and Japan. The allied forces in the country were insufficient to defeat the Boxers, so the Kaiser ordered an expeditionary force, which consisted of the four Brandenburgs, six cruisers, 10 freighters, three torpedo boats, and six regiments of marines, under the command of Generalfeldmarschall (Field Marshal) Alfred von Waldersee, to deploy to China. By the time the German fleet had arrived in late August 1900, the siege of Beijing had already been lifted by forces from other members of the Eight-Nation Alliance that had formed to deal with the Boxers. As a result, the task force suppressed local uprisings around Jiaozhou Bay, where Germany maintained the Jiaozhou Bay Leased Territory. In the end, the operation cost the German government more than 100 million marks. On 26 May 1901, the German high command recalled the expeditionary force to Germany, arriving in mid-August. After returning from China, the ships resumed their typical peacetime routine. By this time, the Kaiser Friedrich III and Wittelsbach classes of battleships had begun to enter service, so the four Brandenburgs were decommissioned to be modernized. By late 1907, all four members of the class were reduced to the Reserve Squadron, with Kurfürst Friedrich Wilhelm again serving as the flagship. The ships operated together there for the following three years before Kurfürst Friedrich Wilhelm and Weissenburg were sold to the Ottoman Empire in September 1910. ### Brandenburg and Wörth Brandenburg and Wörth remained in the Reserve Squadron through 1911, being periodically reactivated to participate in annual fleet maneuvers in III Squadron. Brandenburg briefly served with the Training and Experimental Ships Unit in mid-1911. At the end of the year, they were decommissioned once again, their place in the unit being taken by other battleships as the latest dreadnought battleships entered service. They were allocated to the Marinestation der Ostsee (Baltic Sea Naval Station) and laid up in Kiel. They were mobilized in August 1914 following the outbreak of World War I. They were assigned to V Battle Squadron, which was tasked with coastal defense in the North Sea to guard against attacks by the British Royal Navy. V Squadron was moved to the Baltic in September to support an amphibious assault against Russian forces in Windau, but a shortage of transports led to the cancellation of the operation. Crew shortages forced the navy to decommission the V Squadron ships in Kiel in early 1915, but after German forces seized the port of Libau, Brandenburg and Wörth were reactivated and moved there to guard the harbor. Brandenburg was then converted into a water distillation and barracks ship and her guns were removed. Wörth remained in commission as the flagship of KAdm Alfred Begas, the commander of V Squadron, but she saw no action in Libau. V Squadron was disbanded in January 1916, and Wörth steamed to Danzig where she was decommissioned and converted into a barracks ship. She, too, was disarmed, and her guns were rebuilt into "Kurfürst" railroad guns. Brandenburg's guns were intended to be sent to the Ottoman Empire as spares for Turgut Reis, but there is no evidence they were actually sent. She was to be converted into a target ship, but the war ended before work could be completed. Owing to the severe shortage of merchant shipping after the war, plans were proposed to rebuild Wörth into a freighter, but the plans came to nothing. Both ships were struck from the naval register on 13 May 1919 and sold to ship breakers, both vessels being dismantled in Danzig. ### Barbaros Hayreddin and Turgut Reis On entering service with the Ottoman Navy, Kurfürst Friedrich Wilhelm and Weissenburg became Barbaros Hayreddin and Turgut Reis, respectively. After entering service with the Ottoman fleet, the ships suffered from chronic machinery problems, as their crews were not trained to properly maintain their propulsion systems, which reduced their speed to 8 to 10 knots (15 to 19 km/h; 9 to 12 mph). At the outbreak of the Italo-Turkish War in September 1911, the Ottoman fleet withdrew into the safety of the Dardanelles to avoid confrontation with the much stronger Italian Regia Marina (Royal Navy). Having been neglected by their crews during the conflict, they were in even worse condition by the end of the war in October 1912, with their telephone systems out of service and many of their watertight doors unable to close. Their rangefinders and the ammunition hoists for their main battery guns had been removed. With the Italo-Turkish War all but over by early October, the Balkan League declared war on the Ottomans, having been encouraged by Italy's easy victory. Both ships were pressed into action, initially to support Ottoman forces defending against the advance of Bulgarian troops in Thrace. In December, the fleet was reorganized to challenge the Greek Royal Hellenic Navy in the Aegean Sea; Barbaros Hayreddin was the flagship of the armored division. The division sortied to attack the Greek fleet in December, leading to the Battle of Elli, where the Greek armored cruiser Georgios Averof used her superior speed to outmaneuver the Ottoman squadron, placing it in a cross-fire between Georgios Averof on one side and the three Hydra-class ironclads on the other. The Ottomans retreated back to the Dardanelles in disorder. A second attempt to break the Greek blockade of the Dardanelles occurred on 18 January 1913, resulting in the Battle of Lemnos. Barbaros Hayreddin and Turgut Reis were both hit several times but suffered relatively minor damage before withdrawing once again to the Dardanelles. The Ottoman fleet spent the rest of the war operating in the Sea of Marmora and the Black Sea against Bulgarian forces, helping to protect the Çatalca garrison through March. In August 1914, when World War I broke out in Europe, the Ottomans initially remained neutral, but they entered the war on the side of the Central Powers in November. Barbaros Hayreddin and Turgut Reis were partially disarmed in late 1914 and early 1915 to improve the defenses in the Dardanelles, though they retained their main batteries so they could be used as floating batteries to support the Dardanelles fortresses during the Dardanelles campaign. By March 1915, the Ottoman command had decided to keep only one vessel on station at a time so vessels could be withdrawn for maintenance and resupply. In April, the British and French fleets launched the Gallipoli campaign. The British submarine HMS E11 torpedoed and sank Barbaros Hayreddin on 8 August as she moved into position to bombard Allied forces fighting at Gallipoli. The sinking caused the Ottomans to withdraw Turgut Reis, and she remained out of service until January 1918 when she was reactivated to tow the battlecruiser Yavuz Sultan Selim, which had run aground after the Battle of Imbros. Turgut Reis was again decommissioned in October and remained out of service until she underwent a refit in 1924–1925, thereafter serving as a training ship, by this time with only one of her main battery turrets aboard the vessel. Decommissioned for the final time in 1933, she spent the next seventeen years as a barracks ship, ultimately being slowly broken up between 1950 and 1957.

History of American football

American football history

The history of American football can be traced to early versions of rugby football and association football. Both games have their origin in multiple varieties of football played in the United Kingdom in the mid-19th century, in which a football is kicked at a goal or kicked over a line, which in turn were based on the varieties of English public school football games descending from medieval ball games. American football resulted from several major divergences from association football and rugby football. Most notably the rule changes were instituted by Walter Camp, a Yale University athlete and coach who is considered to be the "Father of American Football". Among these important changes were the introduction of the line of scrimmage, of down-and-distance rules, and of the legalization of forward pass and blocking. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries, gameplay developments by college coaches such as Eddie Cochems, Amos Alonzo Stagg, Parke H. Davis, Knute Rockne, and Glenn "Pop" Warner helped take advantage of the newly introduced forward pass. The popularity of college football grew as it became the dominant version of the sport in the United States for the first half of the 20th century. Bowl games, a college football tradition, attracted a national audience for college teams. Boosted by fierce rivalries and colorful traditions, college football still holds widespread appeal in the United States. The origin of professional football can be traced back to 1892, with Pudge Heffelfinger's \$500 (\$ in dollars) contract to play in a game for the Allegheny Athletic Association against the Pittsburgh Athletic Club. In 1920 the American Professional Football Association was formed. This league changed its name to the National Football League (NFL) two years later, and eventually became the major league of American football. Beginning primarily as a sport of Midwestern industrial towns in the United States, professional football eventually became a national phenomenon. The modern era of American football can be considered to have begun after the 1932 NFL Playoff game, which was the first indoor championship game since 1902 and the first American football game to feature hash marks, forward passes anywhere behind the line of scrimmage, and the movement of the goalposts back to the goal line. Other innovations to occur immediately after 1932 were the introduction of the AP Poll in 1934, the tapering of the ends of the football in 1934, the awarding of the first Heisman Trophy in 1935, the first NFL draft in 1936 and the first televised game in 1939. Another important event was the American football game at the 1932 Summer Olympics, which combined with a similar demonstration game at 1933 World's Fair, led to the first College All-Star Game in 1934, which in turn was an important factor in the growth of professional football in the United States. American football's explosion in popularity during the second half of the 20th century can be traced to the 1958 NFL Championship Game, a contest that has been dubbed the "Greatest Game Ever Played". A rival league to the NFL, the American Football League (AFL), began play in 1960; the pressure it put on the senior league led to a merger between the two leagues and the creation of the Super Bowl, which has become the most watched television event in the United States on an annual basis. ## History of American football before 1869 ### Predecessors In Ancient Greece, men played a similar sport called Episkyros where they tried to throw a ball over a scrimmage while avoiding tackles. Forms of traditional football may have been played throughout Europe and beyond since antiquity. Many of these may have involved handling of the ball, and scrummage-like formations. These archaic forms of football, typically classified as mob football, could be played between neighboring towns and villages, involving an unlimited number of players on opposing teams, who could clash in a heaving mass of people struggling to drag an inflated pig's bladder by any means possible to markers at each end of a town. By some accounts, in some such events any means could be used to move the ball towards the goal, as long as it did not lead to manslaughter or murder. These antiquated games went into sharp decline in the 19th century when the Highway Act 1835 was passed banning the playing of football on public highways. ### Football in America Although there are some mentions of Native Americans playing football-like games, modern American football has its origins in the traditional football games played in the cities, villages and schools of Europe for many centuries before America was settled by Europeans. Early games appear to have had much in common with the traditional "mob football" played in England. The games remained largely unorganized until the 18th century, when intramural games of football began to be played. Organized varieties of football began to take form in 19th century in English public schools. According to legend, William Webb Ellis picked up the ball and ran with it during a school football match in 1823, thus creating a new style of play in which running with the ball predominated instead of kicking. Football soon began to be played at colleges and universities in the United States. Each school played its own variety of football. Princeton University students played a game called "ballown" as early as 1820. A Harvard tradition known as "Bloody Monday" began in 1827, which consisted of a mass ballgame between the freshman and sophomore classes, played at The Delta, the space where Memorial Hall now stands. (A poem, "The Battle of the Delta," was written about the first match: "The Freshmen's wrath, to Sophs the direful spring / Of shins unnumbered bruised, great goddess sing!") In 1860, both the town police and the college authorities agreed that Bloody Monday had to go. The Harvard students responded by going into mourning for a mock figure called "Football Fightum", for whom they conducted funeral rites. The authorities held firm and it was a dozen years before football was once again played at Harvard. Dartmouth played its own version called "Old division football", the rules of which were first published in 1871, though the game dates to at least the 1830s. All of these games, and others, shared certain commonalities. They remained largely "mob" style games, with huge numbers of players attempting to advance the ball into a goal area, often by any means necessary. Rules were simple, and violence and injury were common. The violence of these mob-style games led to widespread protests and a decision to abandon them. Yale, under pressure from the city of New Haven, banned the play of all forms of football in 1860. The game began to return to college campuses by the late 1860s. Yale, Princeton, Rutgers University, and Brown University began playing the popular "kicking" game during this time. In 1867, Princeton used rules based on those of the London Football Association. A "running game", resembling rugby football, was taken up by the Montreal Football Club in Canada in 1868. While the game between Rutgers and Brown is commonly considered the first American football game, several years prior in 1862, the Oneida Football Club formed as the oldest known football club in the United States. The team consisted of graduates of Boston's elite preparatory schools and played from 1862 to 1865. ## Intercollegiate football (1869–present) ### Pioneer period (1869–1875) On November 6, 1869, Rutgers University faced Princeton University (then known as the College of New Jersey) in a game that was played with a round ball and used a set of rules suggested by Rutgers captain William J. Leggett, based on the Football Association's first set of rules, which were an early attempt by the former pupils of England's public schools to unify the rules of their public schools games and create a universal and standardized set of rules for the game of football and bore little resemblance to the American game which would be developed in the following decades. It is still usually regarded as the first game of intercollegiate American football. The game was played at a Rutgers field. Two teams of 25 players attempted to score by kicking the ball into the opposing team's goal. Throwing or carrying the ball was not allowed, but there was plenty of physical contact between players. The first team to reach six goals was declared the winner. Rutgers won by a score of six to four. A rematch was played at Princeton a week later under Princeton's own set of rules (one notable difference was the awarding of a "free kick" to any player that caught the ball on the fly, which was a feature adopted from the Football Association's rules; the fair catch kick rule has survived through to modern American game). Princeton won that game by a score of 8–0. Columbia joined the series in 1870, and by 1872 several schools were fielding intercollegiate teams, including Yale and Stevens Institute of Technology. Rutgers was first to extend the reach of the game. An intercollegiate game was first played in the state of New York when Rutgers played Columbia on November 2, 1872. It was also the first scoreless tie in the history of the fledgling sport. Yale football started the same year and had its first match against Columbia, the nearest college to play football. It took place at Hamilton Park in New Haven and was the first game in New England. The game used a set of rules based on association football with 20-man sides, played on a field 400 by 250 feet. Yale won 3–0, Tommy Sherman scoring the first goal and Lew Irwin the other two. By 1873, the college students playing football had made significant efforts to standardize their fledgling game. Teams had been scaled down from 25 players to 20. The only way to score was still to bat or kick the ball through the opposing team's goal, and the game was played in two 45 minute halves on fields 140 yards long and 70 yards wide. On October 20, 1873, representatives from Yale, Columbia, Princeton, and Rutgers met at the Fifth Avenue Hotel in New York City to codify the first set of intercollegiate football rules. Before this meeting, each school had its own set of rules and games were usually played using the home team's own particular code. At this meeting, a list of rules, based more on the Football Association's rules than the rules of the recently founded Rugby Football Union, was drawn up for intercollegiate football games. Harvard refused to attend the rules conference organized by the other schools and continued to play under its own code, known as the "Boston game". While Harvard's decision to maintain its code made it hard for them to schedule games against other American universities, it agreed to play McGill University, from Montreal, in a two-game series in 1874. Harvard won the first game, in which its rules were used, 3–0. The second game, which was played under rugby regulations, did not have a winner as neither team managed to score. Harvard quickly took a liking to the rugby game, and its use of the try which, until that time, was not used in American football. The try would later evolve into the score known as the touchdown. On June 4, 1875, Harvard faced Tufts University in the first game between two American colleges played under rules similar to the McGill/Harvard contest, which was won by Tufts. The rules included each side fielding 11 men at any given time, the ball was advanced by kicking or carrying it, and tackles of the ball carrier stopped play. Further elated by the excitement of McGill's version of football, Harvard challenged its closest rival, Yale, to which the Bulldogs accepted. The two teams agreed to play under a set of rules called the "Concessionary Rules", which involved Harvard conceding something to Yale's soccer and Yale conceding a great deal to Harvard's rugby. They decided to play with 15 players on each team. On November 13, 1875, Yale and Harvard played each other for the first time ever, where Harvard won 4–0. At the first The Game—the annual contest between Harvard and Yale, among the 2000 spectators attending the game that day, was the future "father of American football" Walter Camp. Walter, who would enroll at Yale the next year, was torn between an admiration for Harvard's style of play and the misery of the Yale defeat and became determined to avenge Yale's defeat. Spectators from Princeton admired this type of game and it became the most popular version of football there. ### Walter Camp: Father of American football Walter Camp is widely considered to be the most important figure in the development of American football. As a youth, he excelled in sports like track, baseball, and association football, and after enrolling at Yale in 1876, he earned varsity honors in every sport the school offered. Following the introduction of rugby-style rules to American football, Camp became a fixture at the Massasoit House conventions where rules were debated and changed. Dissatisfied with what seemed to him to be a disorganized mob, he proposed his first rule change at the first meeting he attended in 1878: a reduction from fifteen players to eleven. The motion was rejected at that time but passed in 1880. The effect was to open up the game and emphasize speed over strength. Camp's most famous change, the establishment of the line of scrimmage and the snap from center to quarterback, was also passed in 1880. Originally, the snap was executed with the foot of the center. Later changes made it possible to snap the ball with the hands, either through the air or by a direct hand-to-hand pass. Camp's new scrimmage rules revolutionized the game, though not always as intended. Princeton, in particular, used scrimmage play to slow the game, making incremental progress towards the end zone during each down. Rather than increase scoring, which had been Camp's original intent, the rule was exploited to maintain control of the ball for the entire game, resulting in slow, unexciting contests. At the 1882 rules meeting, Camp proposed that a team be required to advance the ball a minimum of five yards within three downs. These down-and-distance rules, combined with the establishment of the line of scrimmage and forward pass, transformed the game from a variation of rugby football into the distinct sport and football code of American football. Camp was central to several more significant rule changes that came to define American football. In 1881, the field was reduced in size to 110 by 531⁄3 yards (100.6 by 48.8 meters). Several times in 1883, Camp tinkered with the scoring rules, finally arriving at four points for a touchdown, two points for kicks after touchdowns, two points for safeties, and five for field goals. Camp's innovations in the area of point scoring influenced rugby union's move to point scoring in 1890. In 1887, game time was set at two halves of 45 minutes each. Also in 1887, two paid officials—a referee and an umpire—were mandated for each game. A year later, the rules were changed to allow tackling below the waist, and in 1889, the officials were given whistles and stopwatches. The last, and arguably most important innovation, which would at last make American football uniquely "American", was the legalization of interference, or blocking, a tactic which was highly illegal under the rugby-style rules. Interference remains strictly illegal in both rugby codes. The prohibition of interference in the rugby game stems from the game's strict enforcement of its offside rule, which prohibited any player on the team with possession of the ball to loiter between the ball and the goal. At first, American players would find creative ways of aiding the runner by pretending to accidentally knock into defenders trying to tackle the runner. When Walter Camp witnessed this tactic being employed against his Yale team, he was at first appalled, but the next year had adopted the blocking tactics for his own team. During the 1880s and 1890s, teams developed increasingly complex blocking tactics including the interlocking interference technique known as the Flying wedge or "V-trick formation", which was developed by Lorin F. Deland and first introduced by Harvard in a collegiate game against Yale in 1892. Despite its effectiveness, it was outlawed two seasons later in 1894 through the efforts of the rule committee led by Parke H. Davis, because of its contribution to serious injury. After his playing career at Yale ended in 1882, Camp was employed by the New Haven Clock Company until his death in 1925. Though no longer a player, he remained a fixture at annual rules meetings for most of his life, and he personally selected an annual All-American team every year from 1889 through 1924. The Walter Camp Football Foundation continues to select All-American teams in his honor. ### Scoring table ### Period of the American Intercollegiate Football Association (1876–1893) On November 23, 1876, representatives from Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and Columbia met at the Massasoit House hotel in Springfield, Massachusetts to standardize a new code of rules based on the rugby game first introduced to Harvard by McGill University in 1874. The rules were based largely on the Rugby Football Union's code from England, though one important difference was the replacement of a kicked goal with a touchdown as the primary means of scoring (a change that would later occur in rugby itself, favoring the try as the main scoring event). Three of the schools—Harvard, Columbia, and Princeton—formed the Intercollegiate Football Association, as a result of the meeting. Yale did not join the group until 1879, because of an early disagreement about the number of players per team. The first game where one team scored over 100 points happened on October 25, 1884 when Yale routed Dartmouth 113–0. It was also the first time one team scored over 100 points and the opposing team was shut out. The next week, Princeton outscored Lafayette by 140 to 0. The University of Michigan became the first school west of Pennsylvania to establish a college football team. On May 30, 1879 Michigan beat Racine College 1–0 in a game played in Chicago. The Chicago Daily Tribune called it "the first rugby-football game to be played west of the Alleghenies." Other Midwestern schools soon followed suit, including the University of Chicago, Northwestern University, and the University of Minnesota. The first western team to travel east was the 1881 Michigan team, which played at Harvard, Yale and Princeton. The nation's first college football league, the Intercollegiate Conference of Faculty Representatives (also known as the Western Conference), a precursor to the Big Ten Conference, was founded in 1895. On April 9, 1880 at Stoll Field, Transylvania University (then called Kentucky University) beat Centre College by the score of 13+3⁄4–0 in what is often considered the first recorded game played in the South. The first game of "scientific football" in the South was the first instance of the Victory Bell rivalry between North Carolina and Duke (then known as Trinity College) held on Thanksgiving Day, 1888, at the Raleigh, North Carolina Athletic Park. On November 13, 1887 the Virginia Cavaliers and Pantops Academy fought to a scoreless tie in the first organized football game in the state of Virginia. Students at UVA were playing pickup games of the kicking-style of football as early as 1870, and some accounts even claim that some industrious ones organized a game against Washington and Lee College in 1871, just two years after Rutgers and Princeton's historic first game in 1869. But no record has been found of the score of this contest. Washington and Lee also claims a 4 to 2 win over VMI in 1873. Washington and Lee won 4–2. Some industrious students of the two schools organized a game for October 23, 1869 – but it was rained out. College football expanded greatly during the last two decades of the 19th century. Several major rivalries date from this time period. November 1890 was an active time in the sport. In Baldwin City, Kansas, on November 22, 1890, college football was first played in the state of Kansas. Baker beat Kansas 22–9. On the 27th, Vanderbilt played Nashville (Peabody) at Athletic Park and won 40–0. It was the first time organized football played in the state of Tennessee. The 29th also saw the first instance of the Army–Navy Game. Navy won 24–0. The first nighttime football game was played in Mansfield, Pennsylvania on September 28, 1892 between Mansfield State Normal and Wyoming Seminary and ended at halftime in a 0–0 tie. The Army-Navy game of 1893 saw the first documented use of a football helmet by a player in a game. Joseph M. Reeves had a crude leather helmet made by a shoemaker in Annapolis and wore it in the game after being warned by his doctor that he risked death if he continued to play football after suffering an earlier kick to the head. ### Period of Rules Committees and Conference (1894–1932) The beginnings of the contemporary Southeastern Conference and Atlantic Coast Conference started in 1892. Upon organizing the first Auburn football team in that year, George Petrie arranged for the team to play the University of Georgia team at Piedmont Park in Atlanta, Georgia. Auburn won the game, 10–0, in front of 2,000 spectators. The game inaugurated what is known to college football fans as the Deep South's Oldest Rivalry. It was in 1894 the Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association (SIAA) was founded on December 21, 1894, by Dr. William Dudley, a chemistry professor at Vanderbilt. The original members were Alabama, Auburn, Georgia, Georgia Tech, North Carolina, Sewanee, and Vanderbilt. Clemson, Cumberland, Kentucky, LSU, Mercer, Mississippi, Mississippi A&M (Mississippi State), Southwestern Presbyterian University, Tennessee, Texas, Tulane, and the University of Nashville joined the following year in 1895 as invited charter members. The conference was originally formed for "the development and purification of college athletics throughout the South". It is thought that the first forward pass in football occurred on October 26, 1895 in a game between Georgia and North Carolina when, out of desperation, the ball was thrown by the North Carolina back Joel Whitaker instead of punted and George Stephens caught the ball. On November 9, 1895 John Heisman executed a hidden ball trick utilizing quarterback Reynolds Tichenor to get Auburn's only touchdown in a 6 to 9 loss to Vanderbilt. It was the first game in the south decided by a field goal. Heisman later used the trick against Pop Warner's Georgia team. Warner picked up the trick and later used it at Cornell against Penn State in 1897. He then used it in 1903 at Carlisle against Harvard and garnered national attention, the play was soon made illegal. The 1899 Sewanee Tigers are one of the all-time great teams of the early sport. The team went 12–0, outscoring opponents 322 to 10. Known as the "Iron Men", with just 13 men they had a six-day road trip with five shutout wins over Texas A&M; Texas; Tulane; LSU; and Ole Miss. It is recalled memorably with the phrase "... and on the seventh day they rested." Grantland Rice called them "the most durable football team I ever saw." The first college football game in Oklahoma Territory occurred on November 7, 1895 when the 'Oklahoma City Terrors' defeated the Oklahoma Sooners 34 to 0. The Terrors were a mix of Methodist college students and high schoolers. The Sooners did not manage a single first down. By next season, Oklahoma coach John A. Harts had left to prospect for gold in the Arctic. Organized football was first played in the territory on November 29, 1894 between the Oklahoma City Terrors and Oklahoma City High School. The high school won 24 to 0. In 1891, the first Stanford football team was hastily organized and played a four-game season beginning in January 1892 with no official head coach. Following the season, Stanford captain John Whittemore wrote to Yale coach Walter Camp asking him to recommend a coach for Stanford. To Whittemore's surprise, Camp agreed to coach the team himself, on the condition that he finish the season at Yale first. As a result of Camp's late arrival, Stanford played just three official games, against San Francisco's Olympic Club and rival California. The team also played exhibition games against two Los Angeles area teams that Stanford does not include in official results. Camp returned to the East Coast following the season, but coached Stanford for two further years from 1894–1895. USC first fielded an American football team in 1888. Playing its first game on November 14 of that year against the Alliance Athletic Club, in which USC gained a 16–0 victory. Frank Suffel and Henry H. Goddard were playing coaches for the first team which was put together by quarterback Arthur Carroll; who in turn volunteered to make the pants for the team and later became a tailor. USC faced its first collegiate opponent the following year in fall 1889, playing St. Vincent's College to a 40–0 victory. In 1893, USC joined the Intercollegiate Football Association of Southern California (the forerunner of the SCIAC), which was composed of USC, Occidental College, Throop Polytechnic Institute (Cal Tech), and Chaffey College. Pomona College was invited to enter, but declined to do so. An invitation was also extended to Los Angeles High School. The Big Game between Stanford and California is the oldest college football rivalry in the West. The first game was played on San Francisco's Haight Street Grounds on March 19, 1892 with Stanford winning 14–10. The term "Big Game" was first used in 1900, when it was played on Thanksgiving Day in San Francisco. During that game, a large group of men and boys, who were observing from the roof of the nearby S.F. and Pacific Glass Works, fell into the fiery interior of the building when the roof collapsed, resulting in 13 dead and 78 injured. On December 4, 1900, the last victim of the disaster (Fred Lilly) died, bringing the death toll to 22; the "Thanksgiving Day Disaster" remains the deadliest accident to kill spectators at a U.S. sporting event. In May 1900, Fielding H. Yost was hired as the football coach at Stanford University, and, after traveling home to West Virginia, he arrived in Palo Alto, California, on August 21, 1900. Yost led the 1900 Stanford team to a 7–2–1 record, outscoring opponents 154 to 20. The next year in 1901, Yost was hired by Charles A. Baird as the head football coach for the Michigan Wolverines football team. Led by Yost, Michigan became the first "western" national power. From 1901 to 1905, Michigan had a 56-game undefeated streak that included a 1902 trip to play in the first college football bowl game, which later became the Rose Bowl Game. During this streak, Michigan scored 2,831 points while allowing only 40. In 1906, citing concerns about the violence in American Football, universities on the West Coast, led by California and Stanford, replaced the sport with rugby union. At the time, the future of American football was very much in doubt and these schools believed that rugby union would eventually be adopted nationwide. Other schools followed suit and also made the switch included Nevada, St. Mary's, Santa Clara, and USC (in 1911). However, due to the perception that West Coast football was inferior to the game played on the East Coast anyway, East Coast and Midwest teams shrugged off the loss of the teams and continued playing American football. With no nationwide movement, the available pool of rugby teams to play remained small. The schools scheduled games against local club teams and reached out to rugby union powers in Australia, New Zealand, and especially, due to its proximity, Canada. The annual Big Game between Stanford and California continued as rugby, with the winner invited by the British Columbia Rugby Union to a tournament in Vancouver over the Christmas holidays, with the winner of that tournament receiving the Cooper Keith Trophy. #### Violence and controversy (1905) From its earliest days as a mob game, football was a very violent sport. The 1894 Harvard-Yale game, known as the "Hampden Park Blood Bath", resulted in crippling injuries for four players; the contest was suspended until 1897. The annual Army-Navy game was suspended from 1894 to 1898 for similar reasons. One of the major problems was the popularity of mass-formations like the flying wedge, in which a large number of offensive players charged as a unit against a similarly arranged defense. The resultant collisions often led to serious injuries and sometimes even death. Georgia fullback Richard Von Albade Gammon died on the field from a concussion received against Virginia in 1897, causing some southern universities to temporarily stop their football programs. In 1905 there were 19 fatalities nationwide. President Theodore Roosevelt reportedly threatened to shut down the game if drastic changes were not made. However, though he lectured on eliminating and reducing injuries, and held a meeting of football representatives from Harvard, Yale, and Princeton on October 9, 1905, he never threatened to completely ban football. He lacked the authority to abolish the game and was actually a fan who wanted to preserve it. The President's sons were playing football at the college and secondary levels at the time. Meanwhile, John H. Outland held an experimental game in Wichita, Kansas that reduced the number of scrimmage plays to earn a first down from four to three in an attempt to reduce injuries. The Los Angeles Times reported an increase in punts and considered the game much safer than regular play but that the new rule was not "conducive to the sport". Finally, on December 28, 1905, 62 schools met in New York City to discuss rule changes to make the game safer. As a result of this meeting, the Intercollegiate Athletic Association of the United States, later named the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), was formed. One rule change introduced in 1906, devised to open up the game and reduce injury, was the introduction of the legal forward pass. Though it was underutilized for years, this proved to be one of the most important rule changes in the establishment of the modern game. As a result of the 1905–1906 reforms, mass formation plays became illegal and forward passes legal. Bradbury Robinson, playing for visionary coach Eddie Cochems at St. Louis University, threw the first legal pass in a September 5, 1906, game against Carroll College at Waukesha. Other important changes, formally adopted in 1910, were the requirements that at least seven offensive players be on the line of scrimmage at the time of the snap, that there be no pushing or pulling, and that interlocking interference (arms linked or hands on belts and uniforms) was not allowed. These changes greatly reduced the potential for collision injuries. Several coaches emerged who took advantage of these sweeping changes. Amos Alonzo Stagg introduced such innovations as the huddle, the tackling dummy, and the pre-snap shift. Other coaches, such as Pop Warner and Knute Rockne, introduced new strategies that still remain part of the game. Besides these coaching innovations, several rules changes during the first third of the 20th century had a profound impact on the game, mostly in opening up the passing game. In 1914, the first roughing-the-passer penalty was implemented. In 1918, the rules on eligible receivers were loosened to allow eligible players to catch the ball anywhere on the field—previously strict rules were in place only allowing passes to certain areas of the field. Scoring rules also changed during this time: field goals were lowered to three points in 1909 and touchdowns raised to six points in 1912. In addition, 1912 saw the introduction of the 10-yard long end zone at each end of the field, thus reducing the size of the main field from 110 to 100 yards, and a fourth down was added, among other rule changes. Star players that emerged in the early 20th century include Jim Thorpe, Red Grange, and Bronko Nagurski; these three made the transition to the fledgling NFL and helped turn it into a successful league. Sportswriter Grantland Rice helped popularize the sport with his poetic descriptions of games and colorful nicknames for the game's biggest players, including Notre Dame's "Four Horsemen" backfield and Fordham University's linemen, known as the "Seven Blocks of Granite". In 1907 at Champaign, Illinois Chicago and Illinois played in the first game to have a halftime show featuring a marching band. Chicago won 42–6. On November 25, 1911 Kansas and Missouri played the first homecoming football game. The game was "broadcast" play-by-play over telegraph to at least 1,000 fans in Lawrence, Kansas. It ended in a 3–3 tie. The game between West Virginia and Pittsburgh on October 8, 1921, saw the first live radio broadcast of a college football game when Harold W. Arlin announced that year's Backyard Brawl played at Forbes Field on KDKA. Pitt won 21–13. On October 28, 1922, Princeton and Chicago played the first game to be nationally broadcast on radio. Princeton won 21–18 in a hotly contested game which had Princeton dubbed the "Team of Destiny." #### Notable intersectional games In 1906 Vanderbilt defeated Carlisle 4–0, the result of a Bob Blake field goal. In 1907 Vanderbilt fought Navy to a 6–6 tie. In 1910 Vanderbilt held defending national champion Yale to a scoreless tie. Helping Georgia Tech's claim to a title in 1917, the Auburn Tigers held undefeated, Chic Harley led Big Ten champion Ohio State to a scoreless tie the week before Georgia Tech beat the Tigers 68–7. The next season, with many players gone due to World War I, a game was finally scheduled at Forbes Field with Pittsburgh. The Panthers, led by halfback Tom Davies, defeated Georgia Tech 32–0. 1917 saw the rise of another Southern team in Centre of Danville, Kentucky. In 1921 Bo McMillin led Centre upset defending national champion Harvard 6–0 in what is widely considered one of the greatest upsets in college football history. The next year Vanderbilt fought Michigan to a scoreless tie at the inaugural game on Dudley Field, the first stadium in the South made exclusively for college football. Michigan coach Fielding Yost and Vanderbilt coach Dan McGugin were brothers-in-law, and the latter the protege of the former. The game featured the season's two best defenses and included a goal line stand by Vanderbilt to preserve the tie. Its result was "a great surprise to the sporting world". Commodore fans celebrated by throwing some 3,000 seat cushions onto the field. The game features prominently in Vanderbilt's history. That same year, Alabama upset Penn 9–7. Vanderbilt's line coach then was Wallace Wade, who in 1925 coached Alabama to the south's first Rose Bowl victory. This game is commonly referred to as "the game that changed the south". Wade followed up the next season with an undefeated record and Rose Bowl tie. ### Modernization of intercollegiate American football (1933–1969) In the early 1930s, the college game continued to grow, particularly in the South, bolstered by fierce rivalries such as the "South's Oldest Rivalry", between Virginia and North Carolina and the "Deep South's Oldest Rivalry", between Georgia and Auburn. Although before the mid-1920s most national powers came from the Northeast or the Midwest, the trend changed when several teams from the South and the West Coast achieved national success. Wallace William Wade's 1925 Alabama team won the 1926 Rose Bowl after receiving its first national title and William Alexander's 1928 Georgia Tech team defeated California in the 1929 Rose Bowl. College football quickly became the most popular spectator sport in the South. Several major modern college football conferences rose to prominence during this time period. The Southwest Athletic Conference had been founded in 1915. Consisting mostly of schools from Texas, the conference saw back-to-back national champions with Texas Christian University (TCU) in 1938 and Texas A&M in 1939. The Pacific Coast Conference (PCC), a precursor to the Pac-12 Conference (Pac-12), had its own back-to-back champion in the University of Southern California which was awarded the title in 1931 and 1932. The Southeastern Conference (SEC) formed in 1932 and consisted mostly of schools in the Deep South. As in previous decades, the Big Ten continued to dominate in the 1930s and 1940s, with Minnesota winning 5 titles between 1934 and 1941, and Michigan (1933, 1947, and 1948) and Ohio State (1942) also winning titles. As it grew beyond its regional affiliations in the 1930s, college football garnered increased national attention. Four new bowl games were created: the Orange Bowl, Sugar Bowl, the Sun Bowl in 1935, and the Cotton Bowl in 1937. In lieu of an actual national championship, these bowl games, along with the earlier Rose Bowl, provided a way to match up teams from distant regions of the country that did not otherwise play. In 1936, the Associated Press began its weekly poll of prominent sports writers, ranking all of the nation's college football teams. Since there was no national championship game, the final version of the AP poll was used to determine who was crowned the National Champion of college football. The 1930s saw growth in the passing game. Though some coaches, such as General Robert Neyland at Tennessee, continued to eschew its use and was the last college team to produce an undefeated, untied and unscored upon season in 1939. Several rules changes to the game had a profound effect on teams' ability to throw the ball. In 1934, the rules committee removed two major penalties—a loss of five yards for a second incomplete pass in any series of downs and a loss of possession for an incomplete pass in the end zone—and shrunk the circumference of the ball, making it easier to grip and throw. Players who became famous for taking advantage of the easier passing game included Alabama end Don Hutson and TCU passer "Slingin" Sammy Baugh. In 1935, New York City's Downtown Athletic Club awarded the first Heisman Trophy to University of Chicago halfback Jay Berwanger, who was also the first ever NFL Draft pick in 1936. The trophy was designed by sculptor Frank Eliscu and modeled after New York University player Ed Smith. The trophy recognizes the nation's "most outstanding" college football player and has become one of the most coveted awards in all of American sports. During World War II, college football players enlisted in the armed forces, some playing in Europe during the war. As most of these players had eligibility left on their college careers, some of them returned to college at West Point, bringing Army back-to-back national titles in 1944 and 1945 under coach Red Blaik. Doc Blanchard (known as "Mr. Inside") and Glenn Davis (known as "Mr. Outside") both won the Heisman Trophy, in 1945 and 1946 respectively. On the coaching staff of those 1944–1946 Army teams was future Pro Football Hall of Fame coach Vince Lombardi. The 1950s saw the rise of yet more dynasties and power programs. Oklahoma, under coach Bud Wilkinson, won three national titles (1950, 1955, 1956) and all ten Big Eight Conference championships in the decade while building a record 47-game winning streak. Woody Hayes led Ohio State to two national titles, in 1954 and 1957, and dominated the Big Ten conference, winning three Big Ten titles—more than any other school. Wilkinson and Hayes, along with Robert Neyland of Tennessee, oversaw a revival of the running game in the 1950s. Passing numbers dropped from an average of 18.9 attempts in 1951 to 13.6 attempts in 1955, while teams averaged just shy of 50 running plays per game. Nine out of ten Heisman trophy winners in the 1950s were runners. Notre Dame, one of the biggest passing teams of the decade, saw a substantial decline in success; the 1950s were the only decade between 1920 and 1990 when the team did not win at least a share of the national title. Paul Hornung, Notre Dame quarterback, did, however, win the Heisman in 1956, becoming the only player from a losing team ever to do so. In January of 1956, Bobby Grier became the first black player to participate in the Sugar Bowl. He is also regarded as the first black player to compete at a bowl game in the Deep South, though others such as Wallace Triplett had played in games like the 1948 Cotton Bowl in Dallas. Grier's team, the Pittsburgh Panthers, was set to play against the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets. However, Georgia's Governor Marvin Griffin beseeched Georgia Tech to not participate in this racially integrated game. Griffin was widely criticized by news media leading up to the game, and protests were held at his mansion by Georgia Tech students. Despite the governor's objections, Georgia Tech upheld the contract and proceeded to compete in the bowl. In the game's first quarter, a pass interference call against Grier ultimately resulted in Yellow Jackets' 7-0 victory. Grier stated that he has mostly positive memories about the experience, including the support from teammates and letters from all over the world. ### Modern intercollegiate football (1970–present) Following the enormous success of the National Football League's 1958 championship game, college football no longer enjoyed the same popularity as the NFL, at least on a national level. While both games benefited from the advent of television, since the late 1950s, the NFL has become a nationally popular sport while college football has maintained strong regional ties. As professional football became a national television phenomenon, college football did as well. In the 1950s, Notre Dame, which had a large national following, formed its own network to broadcast its games, but by and large the sport still retained a mostly regional following. In 1952, the NCAA claimed all television broadcasting rights for the games of its member institutions, and it alone negotiated television rights. This situation continued until 1984, when several schools brought a suit under the Sherman Antitrust Act; the Supreme Court ruled against the NCAA and schools are now free to negotiate their own television deals. ABC Sports began broadcasting a national Game of the Week in 1966, bringing key matchups and rivalries to a national audience for the first time. New formations and play sets continued to be developed. Emory Bellard, an assistant coach under Darrell Royal at the University of Texas, developed a three-back option style offense known as the wishbone. The wishbone is a run-heavy offense that depends on the quarterback making last second decisions on when and to whom to hand or pitch the ball to. Royal went on to teach the offense to other coaches, including Bear Bryant at Alabama, Chuck Fairbanks at Oklahoma and Pepper Rodgers at UCLA; who all adapted and developed it to their own tastes. The strategic opposite of the wishbone is the spread offense, developed by professional and college coaches throughout the 1960s and 1970s. Though some schools play a run-based version of the spread, its most common use is as a passing offense designed to "spread" the field both horizontally and vertically. Some teams have managed to adapt with the times to keep winning consistently. In the rankings of the most victorious programs, Michigan, Notre Dame, and Texas are ranked first, second, and third in total wins. #### Growth of bowl games In 1940, for the highest level of college football, there were only five bowl games (Rose, Orange, Sugar, Sun, and Cotton). By 1950, three more had joined that number and in 1970, there were still only eight major college bowl games. The number grew to eleven in 1976. At the birth of cable television and cable sports networks like ESPN, there were fifteen bowls in 1980. With more national venues and increased available revenue, the bowls saw an explosive growth throughout the 1980s and 1990s. In the thirty years from 1950 to 1980, seven bowl games were added to the schedule. From 1980 to 2010, an additional 20 bowl games were added to the schedule. Some have criticized this growth, claiming that the increased number of games has diluted the significance of playing in a bowl game. Yet others have countered that the increased number of games has increased exposure and revenue for a greater number of schools, and see it as a positive development. With the growth of bowl games, it became difficult to determine a national champion in a fair and equitable manner. As conferences became contractually bound to certain bowl games (a situation known as a tie-in), match-ups that guaranteed a consensus national champion became increasingly rare. In 1992, seven conferences and independent Notre Dame formed the Bowl Coalition, which attempted to arrange an annual No. 1 versus No. 2 matchup based on the final AP poll standings. The Coalition lasted for three years; however, several scheduling issues prevented much success; tie-ins still took precedence in several cases. For example, the Big Eight and SEC champions could never meet, since they were contractually bound to different bowl games. The coalition also excluded the Rose Bowl, arguably the most prestigious game in the nation, and two major conferences—the Pac-10 and Big Ten—meaning that it had limited success. In 1995, the Coalition was replaced by the Bowl Alliance, which reduced the number of bowl games to host a national championship game to three—the Fiesta, Sugar, and Orange Bowls—and the participating conferences to five—the ACC, SEC, Southwest, Big Eight, and Big East. It was agreed that the No. 1 and No. 2 ranked teams gave up their prior bowl tie-ins and were guaranteed to meet in the national championship game, which rotated between the three participating bowls. The system still did not include the Big Ten, Pac-10, or the Rose Bowl, and thus still lacked the legitimacy of a true national championship. #### Bowl Championship Series In 1998, a new system was put into place called the Bowl Championship Series. For the first time, it included all major conferences (ACC, Big East, Big 12, Big Ten, Pac-10, and SEC) and all four major bowl games (Rose, Orange, Sugar and Fiesta). The champions of these six conferences, along with two "at-large" selections, were invited to play in the four bowl games. Each year, one of the four bowl games served as a national championship game. Also, a complex system of human polls, computer rankings, and strength of schedule calculations was instituted to rank schools. Based on this ranking system, the No. 1 and No. 2 teams met each year in the national championship game. Traditional tie-ins were maintained for schools and bowls not part of the national championship. For example, in years when not a part of the national championship, the Rose Bowl still hosted the Big Ten and Pac-10 champions. The system continued to change, as the formula for ranking teams was tweaked from year to year. At-large teams could be chosen from any of the Division I conferences, though only one selection—Utah in 2005—came from a BCS non-AQ conference. Starting with the 2006 season, a fifth game—simply called the BCS National Championship Game—was added to the schedule, to be played at the site of one of the four BCS bowl games on a rotating basis, one week after the regular bowl game. This opened up the BCS to two additional at-large teams. Also, rules were changed to add the champions of five additional conferences (Conference USA, the Mid-American Conference, the Mountain West Conference, the Sun Belt Conference and the Western Athletic Conference), provided that said champion ranked in the top twelve in the final BCS rankings, or was within the top 16 of the BCS rankings and ranked higher than the champion of at least one of the "BCS conferences" (also known as "AQ" conferences, for Automatic Qualifying). Several times after this rule change was implemented, schools from non-AQ conferences played in BCS bowl games, most notably Boise State in the 2007 Fiesta Bowl, in which they upset Oklahoma in overtime. In 2009, Boise State played TCU in the Fiesta Bowl, the first time two schools from BCS non-AQ conferences played each other in a BCS bowl game. The last team from the non-AQ ranks to reach a BCS bowl game was Northern Illinois in 2012, which played in (and lost) the 2013 Orange Bowl. #### College Football Playoff Due to the intensification of the college football playoff debate after nearly a decade of the sometimes disputable results of the BCS, the conference commissioners and Notre Dame's president voted to implement a Plus-One system which was to be called the 'College Football Playoff'. The College Football Playoff is the annual postseason tournament for the NCAA Division I Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) and just as its predecessors, has failed to receive sanctioning from the NCAA. The playoff began with the 2014 NCAA Division I FBS football season. Four teams play in two semifinal games, and the winners advance to the College Football Playoff National Championship game. The first season of the new system was not without controversy, however, after TCU and Baylor (both with only one loss) both failed to receive the support of the College Football Playoff selection committee. After the first season, the playoff has been dominated by two teams, Alabama and Clemson. At least one of them has appeared in every championship game except the first, and they have combined to win five of the seven games through 2021; include three times when they played each other. ## Professional football (1892–present) ### Early players, teams, and leagues (1892–1919) In the early 20th century, football began to catch on in the general population of the United States and was the subject of intense competition and rivalry, albeit of a localized nature. Although payments to players were considered unsporting and dishonorable at the time, a Pittsburgh area club, the Allegheny Athletic Association, of the unofficial western Pennsylvania football circuit, surreptitiously hired former Yale All-American guard Pudge Heffelfinger. On November 12, 1892, Heffelfinger became the first known professional football player. He was paid \$500 to play in a game against the Pittsburgh Athletic Club. Heffelfinger picked up a Pittsburgh fumble and ran 35 yards for a touchdown, winning the game 4–0 for Allegheny. Although observers held suspicions, the payment remained a secret for years. On September 3, 1895 the first wholly professional game was played, in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, between the Latrobe Athletic Association and the Jeannette Athletic Club. Latrobe won the contest 12–0. During this game, Latrobe's quarterback, John Brallier became the first player to openly admit to being paid to play football. He was paid \$10 plus expenses to play. In 1897, the Latrobe Athletic Association paid all of its players for the whole season, becoming the first fully professional football team. In 1898, William Chase Temple took over the team payments for the Duquesne Country and Athletic Club, a professional football team based in Pittsburgh from 1895 until 1900, becoming the first known individual football club owner. Later that year, the Morgan Athletic Club, on the South Side of Chicago, was founded. This team later became the Chicago Cardinals, then the St. Louis Cardinals and now is known as the Arizona Cardinals, making them the oldest continuously operating professional football team. The first known professional football league, known as the National Football League (not the same as the modern league) began play in 1902 when several baseball clubs formed football teams to play in the league, including the Philadelphia Athletics, Pittsburgh Pirates and the Philadelphia Phillies. The Pirates' team the Pittsburgh Stars were awarded the league championship. However, the Philadelphia Football Athletics and Philadelphia Football Phillies also claimed the title. A five-team tournament, known as the World Series of Football was organized by Tom O'Rouke, the manager of Madison Square Garden. The event featured the first-ever indoor pro football games. The first professional indoor game came on December 29, 1902, when the Syracuse Athletic Club defeated the "New York team" 5–0. Syracuse would go on to win the 1902 Series, while the Franklin Athletic Club won the Series in 1903. The World Series only lasted two seasons. The first black person to be paid for his play in football games is thought to be two-sport athlete Charles Follis, A member of the Shelby Steamfitters for five years starting in 1902, Follis turned professional in 1904. The game moved west into Ohio, which became the center of professional football during the early decades of the 20th century. Small towns such as Massillon, Akron, Portsmouth, and Canton all supported professional teams in a loose coalition known as the "Ohio League", the direct predecessor to today's National Football League. In 1906 the Canton Bulldogs–Massillon Tigers betting scandal became the first major scandal in professional football in the United States. It was the first known case of professional gamblers attempting to fix a professional sport. Although the Massillon Tigers could not prove that the Canton Bulldogs had thrown the second game, the scandal tarnished the Bulldogs' name and helped ruin professional football in Ohio until the mid-1910s. In 1915, the reformed Canton Bulldogs signed former Olympian and Carlisle Indian School standout Jim Thorpe to a contract. Thorpe became the face of professional football for the next several years and was present at the founding of the National Football League five years later. ### Early years of the NFL (1920–1932) #### Formation In 1920, the American Professional Football Association (APFA) was founded, in a meeting at a Hupmobile car dealership in Canton, Ohio. Jim Thorpe was elected the league's first president. After several more meetings, the league's membership was formalized. The original teams were: In its early years the league was little more than a formal agreement between teams to play each other and to declare a champion at season's end. Teams were still permitted to play non-league members. The 1920 season saw several teams drop out and fail to play through their schedule. Only four teams: Akron, Buffalo, Canton, and Decatur, finished the schedule. Akron claimed the first league champion, with the only undefeated record among the remaining teams. The APFA, which became the National Football League (NFL) in 1922, had a limited number of black players. In the league's first seven years, nine African-Americans played in the APFA/NFL. Two black players took part in the league's inaugural season: Fritz Pollard and Bobby Marshall. In 1921, Pollard coached in the league, becoming the first African-American to do so. #### Expansion In 1921, several more teams joined the league, increasing the membership to 22 teams. Among the new additions were the Green Bay Packers, which now has the record for longest use of an unchanged team name. Also in 1921, A. E. Staley, the owner of the Decatur Staleys, sold the team to player-coach George Halas, who went on to become one of the most important figures in the first half century of the NFL. In 1921, Halas moved the team to Chicago, but retained the Staleys nickname. In 1922 the team was renamed the Chicago Bears. The Staleys won the 1921 AFPA Championship, over the Buffalo All-Americans in an event later referred to as the "Staley Swindle". By the mid-1920s, NFL membership had grown to 25 teams, and a rival league known as the American Football League was formed. The rival AFL folded after a single season, but it symbolized a growing interest in the professional game. Several college stars joined the NFL, most notably Red Grange from the University of Illinois, who was taken on a famous barnstorming tour in 1925 by the Chicago Bears. Another scandal that season centered on a 1925 game between the Chicago Cardinals and the Milwaukee Badgers. The scandal involved a Chicago player, Art Folz, hiring a group of high school football players to play for the Milwaukee Badgers, against the Cardinals. This would ensure an inferior opponent for Chicago. The game was used to help prop up their win–loss percentage and as a chance of wrestling away the 1925 Championship away from the first place Pottsville Maroons. All parties were severely punished initially; however, a few months later the punishments were rescinded. Also that year a controversial dispute stripped the NFL title from the Maroons and awarded it to the Cardinals. #### 1932 NFL playoff game At the end of the 1932 season, the Chicago Bears and the Portsmouth Spartans were tied with the best regular-season records. To determine the champion, the league voted to hold its first playoff game. Because of cold weather, the game was held indoors at Chicago Stadium, which forced some temporary rule changes. Chicago won, 9–0. The playoff proved so popular that the league reorganized into two divisions for the 1933 season, with the winners advancing to a scheduled championship game. A number of new rule changes were also instituted: the goal posts were moved forward to the goal line, every play started from between the hash marks, and forward passes could originate from anywhere behind the line of scrimmage (instead of the previous five yards behind). In 1936, the NFL instituted the first draft of college players. With the first ever draft selection, the Philadelphia Eagles picked Heisman Trophy winner Jay Berwanger, but he declined to play professionally. Also in that year, another AFL formed, but it also lasted only two seasons. ### Stability and growth of the NFL (1933–1969) The 1930s represented an important time of transition for the NFL. League membership was fluid prior to the mid-1930s. In 1933, the Pittsburgh Steelers and Philadelphia Eagles were founded. 1936 was the first year where there were no franchise moves, prior to that year 51 teams had gone defunct. In 1941, the NFL named its first Commissioner, Elmer Layden. The new office replaced that of President. Layden held the job for five years, before being replaced by Philadelphia Eagles co-owner Bert Bell in 1946. During World War II, a player shortage led to a shrinking of the league as several teams folded and others merged. Among the short-lived merged teams were the Steagles (Pittsburgh and Philadelphia) in 1943, the Card-Pitts (Chicago Cardinals and Pittsburgh) in 1944, and a team formed from the merger of the Brooklyn Dodgers and the Boston Yanks in 1945. 1946 was an important year in the history of professional football, as that was the year when the league reintegrated. The Los Angeles Rams signed two African American players, Kenny Washington and Woody Strode. Also that year, a competing league, the All-America Football Conference (AAFC), began operation. During the 1950s, additional teams entered the league. In 1950, the AAFC folded, and three teams from that league were absorbed into the NFL: the Cleveland Browns (who had won the AAFC Championship every year of the league's existence), the San Francisco 49ers, and the Baltimore Colts (not the same as the modern franchise, this version folded after one year). The remaining players were chosen by the now 13 NFL teams in a dispersal draft. Also in 1950, the Los Angeles Rams became the first team to televise its entire schedule, marking the beginning of an important relationship between television and professional football. In 1952, the Dallas Texans went defunct, becoming the last NFL franchise to do so. The following year a new Baltimore Colts franchise formed to take over the assets of the Texans. The players' union, known as the NFL Players Association, formed in 1956. #### The Greatest Game Ever Played At the conclusion of the 1958 NFL season, the Baltimore Colts and the New York Giants met at Yankee Stadium to determine the league champion. Tied after 60 minutes of play, it became the first NFL game to go into sudden death overtime. The final score was Colts 23, Giants 17. The game has since become widely known as "the Greatest Game Ever Played". It was carried live on the NBC television network, and the national exposure it provided the league has been cited as a watershed moment in professional football history, helping propel the NFL to become one of the most popular sports leagues in the United States. Journalist Tex Maule said of the contest, "This, for the first time, was a truly epic game which inflamed the imagination of a national audience." #### American Football League and merger In 1959, longtime NFL commissioner Bert Bell died of a heart attack while attending an Eagles/Steelers game at Franklin Field. That same year, Dallas businessman Lamar Hunt led the formation of the rival American Football League, the fourth such league to bear that name, with war hero and former South Dakota Governor Joe Foss as its first Commissioner. Unlike the earlier rival leagues, and bolstered by television exposure, the AFL posed a significant threat to NFL dominance of the professional football world. With the exception of Los Angeles and New York, the AFL avoided placing teams in markets where they directly competed with established NFL franchises. In 1960, the AFL began play with eight teams and a double round-robin schedule of fourteen games. New NFL commissioner Pete Rozelle took office the same year. The AFL became a viable alternative to the NFL as it made a concerted effort to attract established talent away from the NFL, signing half of the NFL's first-round draft choices in 1960. The AFL worked hard to secure top college players, many from sources virtually untapped by the established league: small colleges and predominantly black colleges. Two of the eight coaches of the Original Eight AFL franchises, Hank Stram (Texans/Chiefs) and Sid Gillman (Chargers) eventually were inducted to the Hall of Fame. Led by Oakland Raiders owner and AFL commissioner Al Davis, the AFL established a "war chest" to entice top talent with higher pay than they got from the NFL. Former Green Bay Packers quarterback Babe Parilli became a star for the Boston Patriots during the early years of the AFL, and University of Alabama passer Joe Namath rejected the NFL to play for the New York Jets. Namath became the face of the league as it reached its height of popularity in the mid-1960s. Davis's methods worked, and in 1966, the junior league forced a partial merger with the NFL. The two leagues agreed to have a common draft and play in a common season-ending championship game, known as the AFL-NFL World Championship. Two years later, the game's name was changed to the Super Bowl. AFL teams won the next two Super Bowls, and in 1970, the two leagues completed their merger to form a new 26-team league. The resulting newly expanded NFL eventually incorporated some of the innovations that led to the AFL's success, such as including names on player's jerseys, official scoreboard clocks, national television contracts (the addition of Monday Night Football gave the NFL broadcast rights on all of the Big Three television networks), and sharing of gate and broadcasting revenues between home and visiting teams. ### Modern, post-merger NFL (1970–present) The NFL continued to grow, eventually adopting some innovations of the AFL, including the two-point conversion. It has expanded several times to its current 32-team membership, and the Super Bowl has become a cultural phenomena across the United States. One of the most popular televised events annually in the United States, it has become a major source of advertising revenue for the television networks that have carried it and it serves as a means for advertisers to debut elaborate and expensive commercials for their products. The NFL has grown to become the most popular spectator sports league in the United States. One of the things that have marked the modern NFL as different from other major professional sports leagues is the apparent parity between its 32 teams. While from time to time, dominant teams have arisen, the league has been cited as one of the few where every team has a realistic chance of winning the championship from year to year. The league's complex labor agreement with its players' union, which mandates a hard salary cap and revenue sharing between its clubs, prevents the richest teams from stockpiling the best players and gives even teams in smaller cities such as Green Bay and New Orleans the opportunity to compete for the Super Bowl. One of the chief architects of this labor agreement was former NFL commissioner Paul Tagliabue, who presided over the league from 1989 to 2006. In addition to providing parity between the clubs, the current labor contract, established in 1993 and renewed in 1998 and 2006, has kept player salaries low—the lowest among the four major league sports in the United States— and has helped make the NFL the only major American professional sports league since 1993 not to suffer any player strike or work stoppage. Since taking over as commissioner before the 2006 season, Roger Goodell has made player conduct a priority of his office. Since taking office, several high-profile players have experienced trouble with the law, from Adam "Pacman" Jones to Michael Vick. In these and other cases, Commissioner Goodell has mandated lengthy suspensions for players who fall outside acceptable conduct limits. Goodell, however, has remained a largely unpopular figure to many of the league's fans, who perceive him attempting to change the NFL's identity and haphazardly damage the sport. #### Other professional leagues Minor professional leagues such as the original United Football League, Atlantic Coast Football League (ACFL), Seaboard Football League and Continental Football League existed in abundance in the 1960s and early 1970s, to varying degrees of success. In 1970, Patricia Barzi Palinkas became the first woman to ever play on a men's semipro football team when she joined the Orlando Panthers of the ACFL. Several other professional football leagues have been formed since the AFL–NFL merger, though none have had the success of the AFL. In 1974, the World Football League formed and was able to attract such stars as Larry Csonka away from the NFL with lucrative contracts. However, most of the WFL franchises were insolvent and the league, despite having finished out its 1974 season, shut down late it its second season in 1975. In 1982, the original United States Football League formed as a spring league (starting play in 1983), and enjoyed moderate success during its first two seasons behind such stars as Jim Kelly and Herschel Walker. In 1985, the league, which lost a considerable amount of money due to overspending on players, opted to gamble on moving its schedule to fall in 1986 (thus competing with the NFL and college/high school football) and filing a billion-dollar antitrust lawsuit against the NFL in an effort to stay afloat. When the lawsuit only drew a three-dollar judgment, the first USFL folded. A second incarnation of the USFL, connected in name only to the original, started play in 2022. The NFL founded a developmental league known as the World League of American Football with teams based in the United States, Canada, and Europe. The WLAF ran for two years as an intercontential league, in 1991 and 1992. After a two-year hiatus, the league (which would eventually become NFL Europe [League] and later NFL Europa) returned in 1995 as a purely European league, operating until 2007. In 2001, the original XFL was formed as a joint venture between the World Wrestling Federation (now World Wrestling Entertainment [WWE]) and the NBC television network. It folded after one season in the face of rapidly declining fan interest and a poor reputation. However, XFL stars such as Tommy Maddox and Rod "He Hate Me" Smart later saw success in the NFL. In 2020, a new XFL began play. The league, owned by Vince McMahon in its first season is vastly different from the original incarnation; after going on hiatus due to COVID-19 pandemic midway through its first season, the league returned to play in 2023 under new management of a consortium led by former WWE wrestler Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, Dany Garcia, and Gerry Cardinale (through Cardinale's fund RedBird Capital Partners). ## Youth and high school football Football is a popular participatory sport among youth. One of the earliest youth football organizations was founded in Philadelphia, in 1929, as the Junior Football Conference. Organizer Joe Tomlin started the league to provide activities and guidance for teenage boys who were vandalizing the factory he owned. The original four-team league expanded to sixteen teams in 1933 when Pop Warner, who had just been hired as the new coach of the Temple University football team, agreed to give a lecture to the boys in the league. In his honor, the league was renamed the Pop Warner Conference. Today, Pop Warner Little Scholars—as the program is now known—enrolls over 300,000 young boys and girls ages 5–16 in over 5000 football and cheerleading squads, and has affiliate programs in Mexico and Japan. Other organizations, such as the Police Athletic League, Upward, and the National Football League's NFL Youth Football Program also manage various youth football leagues. Football is a popular sport for high schools in the United States. The National Federation of State High School Associations (NFHS) was founded in 1920 as an umbrella organization for state-level organizations that manage high school sports, including high school football. The NFHS publishes the rules followed by most local high school football associations. More than 13,000 high schools participate in football, and in some places high school teams play in stadiums that rival college-level facilities. For example, the school district serving the Houston suburb of Katy, Texas opened a 12,000-seat stadium in 2017 that cost over \$70 million to host the district's eight high school teams. The growth of high school football and its impact on small town communities has been documented by landmark non-fiction works such as the 1990 book Friday Night Lights and the subsequent fictionalized film and television series. ## American football outside the United States American football has been played outside the US since the 1920s and accelerated in popularity after World War II, especially in countries with large numbers of U.S. military personnel, who often formed a substantial proportion of the players and spectators. In 1998, the International Federation of American Football, was formed to coordinate international amateur competition. At present, 45 associations from the Americas, Europe, Asia and Oceania are organized within the IFAF, which claims to represent 23 million amateur athletes. The IFAF, which is based in La Courneuve, France, organizes the quadrennial World Championship of American Football. A long-term goal of the IFAF is for American football to be accepted by the International Olympic Committee as an Olympic sport. The only time that the sport was played was at the 1932 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, but as a demonstration sport. Among the various problems the IFAF has to solve in order to be accepted by the IOC are building a competitive women's division, expanding the sport into Africa, and overcoming the current worldwide competitive imbalance that is in favor of American teams. ## Similar codes of football Other codes of football share a common history with American football. Canadian football is a form of the game that evolved parallel to American football. While both games share a common history, there are some important differences between the two. A more modern sport that derives from American football is Arena football, designed to be played indoors inside of ice hockey or basketball arenas. The game was invented in 1981 by Jim Foster and the Arena Football League was founded in 1987 as the first major professional league to play the sport. Several other indoor football leagues have since been founded and continue to play today. American football's parent sport of rugby continued to evolve. Today, two distinct codes known as rugby union and rugby league are played throughout the world. Since the two codes split following a schism on how the sport should be managed in 1895, the history of rugby league and the history of rugby union have evolved separately. Both codes have adopted innovations parallel to the American game; the rugby union scoring system is almost identical to the American game, while rugby league uses a gridiron-style field and a six-tackle rule similar to the system of downs in American Football. Another game that can trace it history to English public school football games is the Australian rules football, which was first played in Melbourne, Victoria in 1858. The game, also known as Australian football or Aussie rules, is played between teams of 18 players on an oval field, often a modified cricket ground. Points are scored by kicking the oval ball between the middle goal posts (worth six points) or between a goal and behind post (worth one point). The Melbourne Football Club published the first laws of Australian football in May 1859, which predates American football by at least 10 years, and making it the oldest of the world's major football codes. Gaelic football is an Irish-specific sport, that can also trace its roots to the early days of football. The game is played between two teams of 15 players on a rectangular grass pitch. The objective of the sport is to score by kicking or punching the ball into the other team's goals (3 points) or between two upright posts above the goals and over a crossbar 2.5 metres (8.2 ft) above the ground (1 point). Unlike other similar football codes, the game ball is round (a spherical leather ball resembling a volleyball), and players advance it up the field with a combination of carrying, bouncing, kicking, hand-passing, and soloing (dropping the ball and then toe-kicking the ball upward into the hands). The game playing code was formally arranged by the Gaelic Athletic Association (GAA) in 1885, and was played in the 1904 Summer Olympics as a demonstration sport. ## See also - American football rules - Comparison of American football and rugby league - Comparison of American football and rugby union - Comparison of Canadian and American football - Gridiron football - History of American football positions - Homosexuality in American football - History of association football - History of the football helmet - List of historically significant college football games - Timeline of college football in Kansas

Stanley Goble

Royal Australian Air Force chief

Air Vice Marshal Stanley James (Jimmy) Goble, CBE, DSO, DSC (21 August 1891 – 24 July 1948) was a senior commander in the Royal Australian Air Force (RAAF). He served three terms as Chief of the Air Staff, alternating with Wing Commander (later Air Marshal Sir) Richard Williams. Goble came to national attention in 1924 when he and fellow RAAF pilot Ivor McIntyre became the first men to circumnavigate Australia by air, journeying 8,450 miles (13,600 km) in a single-engined floatplane. During World War I, Goble flew fighters on the Western Front with the British Royal Naval Air Service. He became an ace with ten victories, commanded No. 5 Squadron (later No. 205 Squadron RAF), and was awarded the Distinguished Service Order and the Distinguished Service Cross. Returning to Australia, Goble assisted in the formation of the RAAF as an independent branch of the Australian armed forces. On an exchange posting to Britain in the 1930s, he led No. 2 (Bomber) Group RAF. As Chief of the Air Staff at the onset of World War II, Goble clashed with the Federal Government over implementation of the Empire Air Training Scheme, which he believed would be detrimental to the defence of Australia. He stepped down as leader of the RAAF in early 1940, and spent the rest of the war in Ottawa as Air Liaison Officer to Canada. Goble died in 1948 at the age of fifty-six, two years after retiring from the military. ## Early career Born in Croydon, Victoria, Stanley James Goble was one of four sons to an Australian father, George, and an English mother, Ann. He apparently received little schooling, and began his working life as a clerk with the Victorian Railways at the age of sixteen. By twenty-three he was, like his father, a stationmaster, and a footballer with Brunswick in the Victorian Football Association. Goble was prevented from joining the Australian Imperial Force at the beginning of World War I after failing the stringent medical criteria; he wrote later that "only applicants of the finest physiques were considered suitable for the first contingent of Australian troops". With his three brothers already on active service, he decided to travel to England at his own expense and enlist in the British armed forces. ## World War I Goble was accepted for flying training with the Royal Naval Air Service (RNAS) in July 1915. After graduating as a flight sub-lieutenant on 20 October 1915, he became a test pilot and undertook anti-submarine patrols out of Dover. Goble commenced operations with only three hours' solo flying experience. Towards the end of the year he was posted across the Channel to Dunkirk, flying Caudron reconnaissance-bombers and Sopwith Pup fighters. Goble was a founding member of No. 8 Squadron RNAS in 1916, during the latter part of the Battle of the Somme, where he flew both Pups and Nieuport fighters. He earned the Distinguished Service Cross for his actions on 24 September 1916, when he engaged two enemy fighters near Ghistelles in West Flanders, "and brought one of them down on fire in a spiral nose-dive", according to the citation in The London Gazette. This victory was the first confirmed "kill" achieved by an Allied pilot flying the Pup. Goble was promoted to flight lieutenant on 1 October, and won the French Croix de Guerre later that month. On 17 February 1917, Goble was awarded the Distinguished Service Order (DSO) for his "conspicuous bravery and skill" in three separate actions while operating with No. 8 Squadron: on 7 November 1916 when he forced a hostile fighter down in a field, where it crashed attempting to land; on 27 November when he engaged four enemy aircraft, destroying one; and on 4 December when, in repeated combats while escorting Allied bombers, he helped drive off attacking fighters and shot down one of them. The same month that he was awarded the DSO, Goble was posted to No. 5 Squadron RNAS at Petite-Synthe near the Franco-Belgian border, flying Airco DH.4 two-seat light bombers. Goble was promoted twice in 1917, to flight commander in June, then squadron commander in December. He led No. 5 Squadron for the latter part of the year and into 1918. His unit supported the British Fifth Army as it bore the brunt of the German spring offensive, and he had to evacuate his airfield when it was shelled by advancing enemy artillery. Relocating twice to other landing grounds, he kept his squadron on the attack, and was subsequently recognised by a commendation circulated to all RNAS combat units. When the RNAS merged with the British Army's Royal Flying Corps on 1 April 1918, Goble became a major in the newly formed Royal Air Force. Twice mentioned in despatches, he finished the war an ace, with ten victories. Although himself forced to crash land on two occasions, he had avoided any injury during his active service. ## Inter-war years ### Establishment of the Royal Australian Air Force Goble returned to Australia on HT Gaika in November 1918. He was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in the 1919 New Year Honours, and made an acting lieutenant colonel in May that year. He received a permanent commission as a squadron leader and honorary wing commander in the RAF on 1 August 1919, and was seconded to the Royal Australian Navy. When a temporary Air Board was set up to examine the feasibility of an Australian Air Force (AAF), Goble was assigned as a Navy representative, and Lieutenant Colonel Richard Williams, an Australian Flying Corps veteran of World War I, acted as an Army spokesman. The permanent Australian Air Board was established on 9 November 1920, and recommended creation of the AAF as an independent branch of the armed services. The AAF came into being on 31 March 1921—the 'Royal' prefix being granted five months later—and Goble resigned his commission in the RAF the same day to transfer to the new service as a wing commander. The Navy had nominated Goble as First Air Member (later Chief of the Air Staff), but Williams took the post and Goble became Second Air Member and Director of Personnel and Training. Williams and Goble would serve as Chief of the Air Staff (CAS) three times each between 1922 and 1940. One motive suggested for the rotation was a ploy by Army and Navy interests to limit Williams' autonomy. Instead, according to RAAF historian Alan Stephens, the arrangement "almost inevitably fostered an unproductive rivalry" between the two officers, which was "exacerbated by the personality differences between the pedantic, autocratic Williams and the cheerful, easy-going Goble". Although in a legal sense the Air Board led the RAAF rather than the CAS alone, Williams dominated the board to such an extent that Goble would later complain that his colleague appeared to consider the Air Force his personal command. ### Chief of the Air Staff The rivalry between Goble and Williams was such that it was later alleged that government practice was to ensure that they were never in the country at the same time. In October 1921, Goble was posted to Britain for a naval co-operation course; his place on the Air Board was taken by Squadron Leader Bill Anderson. Goble married Kathleen Wodehouse in London on Anzac Day, 1922, and returned to Australia later that year. His first term as CAS began when Williams left the country in December 1922 for study in England. Goble developed a plan to establish a small seaplane base at Rushcutters Bay in Sydney, but Williams cancelled this shortly after he returned to Australia in February 1925 to resume the position of CAS. Goble's suggestion of a separate Fleet Air Arm fostered suspicions that he was too closely aligned with naval interests. He departed for England to undertake study at the British Army Staff College in Camberley and RAF Staff College, Andover, as Williams had done two years before. Goble also served as Air Liaison Officer with the Australian High Commission in London from May 1926 to September 1927. He was promoted to group captain on 1 April 1928. Raised to temporary air commodore, Goble took over as CAS for the second time between December 1932 and June 1934, while Williams attended the Imperial Defence College in London. On secondment to the RAF from 1935 to 1937, Goble was attached to the British Air Ministry as Deputy Director of Air Operations. In this capacity he attended a conference in 1936 to examine a Commonwealth-wide air training plan, a concept that would be revived in World War II as the Empire Air Training Scheme. Continuing his exchange posting, on 1 September Goble took over as Air Officer Commanding No. 2 (Bomber) Group, based in Hampshire. The group comprised fifteen squadrons, putting him in charge of a force stronger than the entire RAAF. On 28 February 1937, Goble was raised to temporary air vice marshal. He succeeded Williams as Chief of the Air Staff for the last time in February 1939, when the latter was dismissed from his position in the aftermath of the Ellington Report criticising the standards of training and air safety observed by the RAAF. When he replaced Williams, Goble was Air Member for Personnel and might therefore have been considered more closely responsible for such standards; he maintained that Williams had personally overseen the service's air training since 1934. ### Circumnavigation of Australia The young air force was a small, close-knit organisation comparable to a flying club, although several pioneering flights were undertaken by its members. One of the most notable was made by Goble and Flying Officer (later Flight Lieutenant) Ivor McIntyre in 1924, when they became the first men to circumnavigate Australia by air, in a single-engined Fairey IIID floatplane. The English-born McIntyre, who was lead pilot while Goble acted as commander and navigator, was also a World War I veteran of the Royal Naval Air Service. The purpose of the flight was to survey the northern coastline of Australia for defence planning, and to test the capabilities of the Fairey IIID. Goble and McIntyre took off from Point Cook, Victoria, on 6 April 1924 and flew 8,450 miles (13,600 km) in 44 days, in often arduous conditions. Though well-prepared with fuel stocks and spare parts pre-positioned along the intended route, they had to contend with illness and tropical storms, as well as mid-air engine trouble and fuel leaks. Their journey took them anticlockwise around the continent, along the Eastern Australian coast through Sydney, Southport, Townsville and Thursday Island, crossing the Gulf of Carpentaria to Darwin, and then continuing along the coast through Broome, Carnarvon, Perth, Albany and Port Lincoln, before arriving back in Victoria. As they flew above Point Cook, twelve RAAF aircraft took to the air to escort them to their landing place at St Kilda Beach, where they were welcomed by a crowd of 10,000 people. Prime Minister Stanley Bruce called the expedition "one of the most wonderful accomplishments in the history of aviation", his government presenting Goble with a gift of £500, and £250 to McIntyre. The British Royal Aero Club awarded them the annual Britannia Trophy, and they were appointed Commanders of the Order of the British Empire in the King's Birthday Honours. Though the flight is still acknowledged as one of the most important in Australian aviation, the necessity for the Air Force chief to personally command such a journey has been questioned, suggesting that it was motivated by the one-upmanship that characterised the Williams-Goble relationship. Two years later Williams would make a three-month, 10,000-mile (16,000 km) round trip from Point Cook to the Pacific Islands, the first international flight undertaken by an RAAF plane and crew, amid similar suspicions. ## World War II As Chief of the Air Staff at the outbreak of World War II, Goble planned the expansion and decentralisation of the RAAF to meet the needs of home defence and Australia's obligations in Europe, which included the transfer of No. 10 Squadron to Britain. The Federal Government abandoned his concept of an autonomous Air Expeditionary Force in favour of full commitment to the Empire Air Training Scheme, which Goble considered detrimental to local defence. His proposal to organise the RAAF along functional lines, with Home Defence, Training, and Maintenance Commands, was similarly rejected. Goble also came into conflict with his deputy, Air Commodore John Russell, an RAF officer on exchange in Australia. These issues led to Goble tendering his resignation as CAS, which took effect in January 1940. The Argus in Melbourne reported that "Goble wishes to resign 'on a matter of high principle'. It is known that he has been dissatisfied for some time with his relations with the Federal Government." Prime Minister Robert Menzies had in any case been looking for a British officer to head the RAAF and confided to the UK High Commissioner, Sir Geoffrey Whiskard, that Goble's resignation was "undoubtedly very convenient". Following the interim appointment of Air Commodore Anderson, the Royal Air Force's Air Chief Marshal Sir Charles Burnett became Chief of the Air Staff; among other things, Burnett proceeded to reorganise the Air Force into a geographically based "area" system of command and control. Goble had offered to submit his resignation from the RAAF as well as from the position of CAS, and was considering a return to Britain for service with the RAF. Menzies persuaded him to remain and take on the role of Australian Air Liaison Officer to Canada, based in Ottawa. Raised to substantive air vice marshal, Goble stayed at this post for the duration of the war and was the RAAF's representative at the Ottawa Conference in May–June 1942 that negotiated the Joint Commonwealth Air Training Plan. ## Retirement and legacy In January 1946, Goble presided over the court-martial of Australia's top-scoring fighter ace, Group Captain Clive Caldwell. Charged with alcohol trafficking on the island of Morotai in 1945, Caldwell was found guilty and reduced to the rank of flight lieutenant; he left the Air Force soon after. Goble was himself forced into retirement in February 1946, despite being five years below the mandatory age of sixty. The Chief of the Air Staff, Air Vice Marshal George Jones, in recommending Goble's dismissal, wrote that "this officer has a sound Service knowledge and an alert mind, but suffers from certain nervous characteristics which make continuous application to a task impossible". Other senior RAAF commanders who were veterans of World War I, including Richard Williams, were also retired at this time, ostensibly to make way for the advancement of younger officers. Goble suffered from hypertensive cerebrovascular disease and died in Heidelberg, Victoria, on 24 July 1948. He was cremated, leaving his wife Kathleen, and three sons. His son John (born 1923) joined the Royal Australian Navy and qualified as a pilot in the Fleet Air Arm, rising to the rank of commodore and commanding 817 Squadron, the naval air station HMAS Albatross, and the aircraft carrier HMAS Melbourne. Goble Street in Hughes, Australian Capital Territory, was named for Jimmy Goble. In 1994 he and Ivor McIntyre were honoured with the issue of a postage stamp by Australia Post, in a series depicting Australian aviators that also included Freda Thompson, Lawrence Hargrave, and Sir Keith and Sir Ross Macpherson Smith.

Yugoslav monitor Sava

Austro-Hungarian then Yugoslav riverine naval ship

The Yugoslav monitor Sava is a Temes-class river monitor that was built for the Austro-Hungarian Navy as SMS Bodrog. She fired the first shots of World War I just after 01:00 on 29 July 1914, when she and two other monitors shelled Serbian defences near Belgrade. She was part of the Danube Flotilla, and fought the Serbian and Romanian armies from Belgrade to the mouth of the Danube. In the closing stages of the war, she was the last monitor to withdraw towards Budapest, but was captured by the Serbs when she grounded on a sandbank downstream from Belgrade. After the war, she was transferred to the newly created Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (later Yugoslavia), and renamed Sava. She remained in service throughout the interwar period, although budget restrictions meant she was not always in full commission. During the German-led Axis invasion of Yugoslavia in April 1941, Sava served with the 1st Monitor Division. Along with her fellow monitor Vardar, she laid mines in the Danube near the Romanian border during the first few days of the invasion. The two monitors fought off several attacks by the Luftwaffe, but were forced to withdraw to Belgrade. Due to high river levels and low bridges, navigation was difficult, and Sava was scuttled on 11 April. Some of her crew tried to escape cross-country towards the southern Adriatic coast, but all were captured prior to the Yugoslav surrender. The vessel was later raised by the navy of the Axis puppet state known as the Independent State of Croatia and continued to serve as Sava until the night of 8 September 1944 when she was again scuttled. Following World War II, Sava was raised once again, and was refurbished to serve in the Yugoslav Navy from 1952 to 1962. She was then transferred to a state-owned company that was eventually privatised. In 2005, the government of Serbia granted her limited heritage protection after citizens demanded that she be preserved as a floating museum, but little else was done to restore her at the time. In 2015, the Serbian Ministry of Defence and Belgrade's Military Museum acquired the ship. She was restored by early 2019 and opened as a floating museum in November 2021. ## Description and construction A Temes-class river monitor, the ship was built for the Austro-Hungarian Navy by H. Schönichen, and designed by Austrian naval architect Josef Thiel. Originally named SMS Bodrog, she was laid down at Neupest on 14 February 1903. Like her sister ship SMS Temes, she had an overall length of 57.7 m (189 ft 4 in), a beam of 9.5 m (31 ft 2 in), and a normal draught of 1.2 m (3 ft 11 in). Her standard displacement was 440 tonnes (430 long tons), and her crew consisted of 86 officers and enlisted men. Bodrog had two triple-expansion steam engines, each driving a single propeller shaft. Steam was provided by two Yarrow water-tube boilers, and her engines were rated at 1,400 indicated horsepower (1,000 kW). As designed, she had a maximum speed of 13 knots (24 km/h; 15 mph), and carried 62 tonnes (61 long tons) of coal. Bodrog was armed with two 120 mm (4.7 in)L/35 guns in single gun turrets, a single 120 mm (4.7 in)L/10 howitzer in a central pivot mount, and two 37 mm (1.5 in) guns. The maximum range of her Škoda 120 mm guns was 10 kilometres (6.2 mi), and her howitzer could fire its 20 kg (44 lb) shells a maximum of 6.2 km (3.9 mi). Her armour consisted of belt, bulkheads and gun turrets 40 mm (1.6 in) thick, and deck armour 25 mm (0.98 in) thick. The armour on her conning tower was 75 mm (3.0 in) thick. Bodrog was launched on 12 April 1904, commissioned on 2 August 1904, and completed on 10 November 1904. ## Career ### World War I #### Serbian campaign Bodrog was part of the Danube Flotilla, and at the start of World War I she was based in Zemun, just upstream from Belgrade on the Danube, under the command of Linienschiffsleutnant (LSL) Paul Ekl. She shared the base with three other monitors and three patrol boats. Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia on 28 July 1914, and a little after 01:00 on the following day, Bodrog and two other monitors fired the first shots of the war against Serb fortifications on the Zemun–Belgrade railway bridge over the Sava river and on Topčider Hill. The Serbs were outgunned by the monitors, and by August began to receive assistance from the Russians. This support included the supply and emplacement of naval guns and the establishment of river obstacles and mines. On 8 September, the Austro-Hungarian base at Zemun was evacuated in the face of a Serbian counterattack. Bodrog and the minesweeper Andor conducted a deception operation towards Pančevo on 19 September, and six days later, Bodrog bombarded Serb positions on the bank of the Sava near Belgrade. On 28 September, she rendezvoused with the monitor SMS Szamos at Banovci, and the following day the two monitors targeted the Belgrade Fortress and conducted a reconnaissance of Zemun. On 1 October, Bodrog sailed to Budapest, where she was placed in dry dock for two weeks. She returned to the flotilla on 15 October. By November, French artillery support had arrived in Belgrade, endangering the monitor's anchorage, and on 12 November, Ekl was replaced by LSL Olaf Wulff. The stalemate continued until the following month, when the Serbs evacuated Belgrade in the face of an Austro-Hungarian assault. On 1 December, Bodrog and the newly commissioned monitor SMS Enns engaged the retreating Serbs. After less than two weeks, the Austro-Hungarians retreated from Belgrade, and it was soon recaptured by the Serbs with Russian and French support. Bodrog continued in action against Serbia and her allies at Belgrade until December, when her base was withdrawn to Petrovaradin, near Novi Sad, for the winter. The Germans and Austro-Hungarians wanted to transport munitions down the Danube to the Ottoman Empire, so on 24 December 1914, Bodrog and the minesweeper Almos escorted the steamer Trinitas loaded with munitions, the patrol boat b and two tugs from Zemun past Belgrade towards the Iron Gates gorge on the Serbian–Romanian border. The convoy ran the gauntlet of the Belgrade defences unharmed, but when it reached Smederevo it received information that the Russians had established a minefield and log barrier just south of the Iron Gates. It turned back under heavy fire, and withdrew as far as Pančevo without serious damage to any vessel. Bodrog returned to base, and the monitor SMS Inn was sent to guard the munitions and escort the convoy back to Petrovaradin. In January 1915, British artillery arrived in Belgrade, further bolstering its defences, and Bodrog spent the first months of the year at Zemun. On 23 February, LSL Kosimus Böhm took command. On 1 March, Bodrog and several other vessels including the monitor SMS Körös were relocated to Petrovaradin. After the commencement of the Gallipoli campaign, munitions supply to the Ottomans became critical, so another attempt was planned. On 30 March, the steamer Belgrad left Zemun, escorted by Bodrog and Enns. The convoy was undetected as it sailed past Belgrade at night during a storm, but after the monitors returned to base, Belgrad struck a mine near Vinča, and after coming under heavy artillery fire, exploded near Ritopek. On 22 April 1915, a British picket boat that had been brought overland by rail from Salonika was used to attack the Danube Flotilla anchorage at Zemun, firing two torpedoes without success. In September 1915, the Central Powers were joined by Bulgaria, and the Serbian Army soon faced an overwhelming Austro-Hungarian, German and Bulgarian ground invasion. In early October, the Austro-Hungarian 3rd Army attacked Belgrade, and Bodrog, along with the majority of the flotilla, was heavily engaged in support of crossings near the Belgrade Fortress and the island of Ada Ciganlija. #### Romanian campaign Following the capture of Belgrade on 11 October and the initial clearance of mines and other obstacles, the flotilla sailed downstream to Orșova near the Hungarian–Romanian border and waited for the lower Danube to be swept for mines. Commencing on 30 October 1915, they escorted a series of munitions convoys down the Danube to Lom where the munitions were transferred to the Bulgarian railway system for shipment to the Ottoman Empire. In November 1915, Bodrog and the other monitors were assembled at Rustschuk, Bulgaria. The Central Powers were aware that the Romanians were negotiating to enter the war on the side of the Entente, so the flotilla established a sheltered base in the Belene Canal to protect the 480-kilometre (300 mi) Danube border between Romania and Bulgaria. During 1915, the 37 mm (1.5 in) guns on the Bodrog were replaced with a single 66 mm (2.6 in)L/18 gun, and three machine guns were also fitted. When the Romanians entered the war on 27 August 1916, the monitors were again at Rustschuk, and were immediately attacked by three improvised torpedo boats operating out of the Romanian river port of Giurgiu. The torpedoes that were fired missed the monitors but struck a lighter loaded with fuel. Tasked with shelling Giurgiu the following day, the Second Monitor Division, consisting of Bodrog and three other monitors, set fire to oil storage tanks, the railway station and magazines, and sank several Romanian lighters. While the attack was underway, the First Monitor Division escorted supply ships back to the Belene anchorage. Bodrog and her companions then destroyed two Romanian patrol boats and an improvised minelayer on their way back to Belene. This was followed by forays of the Division both east and west of Belene, during which both Turnu Măgurele and Zimnicea were shelled. On 2 October 1916, Bodrog and Körös attacked a Romanian pontoon bridge being established across the Danube at Oryahovo, obtaining five direct hits, thus contributing to the defeat of the Romanian Flămânda Offensive. This was followed by action supporting the crossing of Generalfeldmarschall August von Mackensen's Austro-Hungarian Third Army at Sistow. Bodrog then wintered at Turnu Severin. From 21 February 1917, Bodrog and Körös were deployed as guardships at Brăila. On 1 March, Bodrog became stuck in ice at nearby Măcin. LSL Guido Taschler took command of Bodrog in 1918. That year's spring thaw saw Bodrog, Körös, Szamos, Bosna and several other vessels sent through the mouth of the Danube into the Black Sea as part of Flottenabteilung Wulff (Fleet Division Wulff) under the command of Flottenkapitän (Fleet Captain) Olav Wulff, arriving in Odessa on 12 April. On 15 July, she and Bosna sailed to the port of Nikolaev, and from 5 August, Bodrog was stationed at Cherson. On 12 September, she returned to Brăila along with other vessels. Bodrog was sent to Reni near the mouth of the Danube to protect withdrawing Austro-Hungarian troops, arriving there on 1 October. She then sailed upstream, reaching Rustschuk on 11 October, and Giurgiu two days later. On 14 October, she was deployed at Lom. She was the last Austro-Hungarian monitor to withdraw towards Budapest and was the only one that failed to reach the city. On 31 October 1918, Bodrog collided with a sand bank while navigating through heavy fog near Vinča. She was later captured by the Serbian Army. ### Interwar period and World War II From the Armistice to September 1919, Bodrog was crewed by sailors of the newly created Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (Serbo-Croatian: Kraljevina Srba, Hrvata i Slovenaca, KSCS; later the Kingdom of Yugoslavia). Under the terms of the Treaty of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Bodrog was transferred to the KSCS along with a range of other vessels, including three other river monitors, but was not officially handed over to the KSCS Navy and renamed Sava until 15 April 1920. Her sister ship Temes was transferred to Romania and renamed Ardeal. In 1925–26, Sava was refitted, but by the following year only two of the four river monitors of the KSCS Navy were being retained in full commission at any time. In 1932, the British naval attaché reported that Yugoslav ships were engaging in little gunnery training, and few exercises or manoeuvres, due to reduced budgets. Sava was based at Dubovac when the German-led Axis invasion of Yugoslavia began on 6 April 1941. She was assigned to the 1st Monitor Division, and was responsible for the Romanian border on the Danube, under the operational control of the 3rd Infantry Division Dunavska. Her commander was Poručnik bojnog broda S. Rojos. On that day, Sava and her fellow monitor Vardar fought off several attacks by individual Luftwaffe aircraft on their base. Over the next three days, the two monitors laid mines in the Danube near the Romanian border. On 11 April, they were forced to withdraw from Dubovac towards Belgrade. During their withdrawal, they came under repeated attacks by Junkers Ju 87 Stuka dive bombers. Sava and her fellow monitor were undamaged, and anchored at the confluence of the Danube and Sava near Belgrade at about 20:00, where they were joined by the Morava. The three captains conferred, and decided to scuttle their vessels due to the high water levels in the rivers and low bridges, which meant there was insufficient clearance for the monitors to navigate freely. The crews of the monitors were then transshipped to two tugboats, but when one of the tugs was passing under a railway bridge, charges on the bridge accidentally exploded and the bridge fell onto the tug. Of the 110 officers and men aboard the vessel, 95 were killed. After the scuttling of the monitors, around 450 officers and men from the Sava and various other riverine vessels gathered at Obrenovac. Armed only with personal weapons and some machine guns stripped from the scuttled vessels, the crews started towards the Bay of Kotor in the southern Adriatic in two groups. The smaller of the two groups reached its objective, but the larger group only made it as far as Sarajevo by 14 April before they were obliged to surrender. The remainder made their way to the Bay of Kotor, which was captured by the Italian XVII Corps on 17 April. Sava was raised and repaired by the navy of the Axis puppet state the Independent State of Croatia, and served alongside her fellow monitor Morava, which was raised, repaired, and renamed Bosna. Along with six captured motorboats and ten auxiliary vessels, they made up the riverine police force of the Croatian state. Sava was part of the 1st Patrol Group of the River Flotilla Command, headquartered at Zemun. Her crew scuttled her near Slavonski Brod on the night of 8 September 1944 and defected to the Yugoslav Partisans. ### Post-war period Sava was again raised and refurbished after World War II. Armed with two single 105 mm (4.1 in) gun turrets, three single 40 mm (1.6 in) gun mounts and six 20 mm (0.79 in) weapons, she served in the Yugoslav Navy from 1952 to 1962. Afterwards, she was placed into the hands of a state-owned company, which was privatised after the breakup of Yugoslavia. In 2005, the government of Serbia granted her limited heritage protection after citizens demanded that she be preserved as a floating museum, though little else had been done to restore her as of 2014, by which time she was serving as a gravel barge. In December 2015, Sava was acquired by the Serbian Ministry of Defence and Belgrade's Military Museum, which planned on restoring her. The ship is one of only two surviving Austro-Hungarian river monitors that served during World War I. The other is SMS Leitha, a much older monitor, which has been a museum ship anchored alongside the Hungarian Parliament Building in Budapest since 2014. By early 2019, Sava had been restored. She was inaugurated as a floating museum along the Sava River in Belgrade in November 2021.

We Are the World

1985 charity single by USA for Africa

"We Are the World" is a charity single originally recorded by the supergroup USA for Africa in 1985. It was written by Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie and produced by Quincy Jones and Michael Omartian for the album We Are the World. With sales in excess of 20 million copies, it is the eighth-best-selling physical single of all time. Soon after the UK-based group Band Aid released "Do They Know It's Christmas?" in December 1984, the musician and activist Harry Belafonte began to think about an American benefit single for African famine relief. He enlisted fundraiser Ken Kragen to help bring the vision to reality. The duo contacted several musicians, and enlisted Jackson and Richie to write the song; they completed the writing seven weeks after the release of "Do They Know It's Christmas?", and only one night before "We Are the World"'s first recording session, on January 21, 1985. The historic event brought together some of the era's best-known musicians. The song was released on March 7, 1985, as the first single from the album by Columbia Records. A worldwide commercial success, it topped music charts throughout the world and became the fastest-selling U.S. pop single in history. "We Are the World" received a Quadruple Platinum certification by the Recording Industry Association of America, becoming the first single to be certified multi-platinum. Awarded numerous honors—including four Grammy Awards, one American Music Award, and a People's Choice Award—the song was promoted with a music video, a VHS, a special edition magazine, a simulcast, and several books, posters, and shirts. The promotion and merchandise helped "We Are the World" raise more than \$63 million (\$ million today) for humanitarian aid in Africa and the United States. In January 2010, a magnitude 7.0 M earthquake devastated Haiti, leading another all-star cast of singers to remake the song. Titled "We Are the World 25 for Haiti", it was released as a single on February 12, 2010; proceeds from the record aided survivors in the impoverished country. In March 2020, Richie suggested that a third version should be made to communicate a message of global solidarity during the COVID-19 pandemic and raise funds for aid efforts. ## Background and writing Inspired by Band Aid's "Do They Know It's Christmas?" project in the UK American entertainer and social activist Harry Belafonte had the idea to organize the recording of a song including all the generation's best-known music artists. He planned to have the proceeds donated to a new organization called United Support of Artists for Africa (USA for Africa). The non-profit foundation would then provide food and relief aid to starving people in Africa, specifically Ethiopia, where a 1983–1985 famine raged. The famine ultimately killed about one million people. Belafonte also planned to set aside money to help eliminate hunger in the United States of America. He contacted entertainment manager and fellow fundraiser Ken Kragen, who asked his clients Lionel Richie and Kenny Rogers to participate. Kragen and the two musicians agreed to help Belafonte, and in turn, enlisted the cooperation of Stevie Wonder, to add more "name value" to their project. Quincy Jones was drafted to co-produce the song, taking time out from his work on the film The Color Purple. Jones also telephoned Michael Jackson, who had released Thriller in 1982, and just concluded a tour with his brothers. Jackson told Richie that he not only wanted to sing the song, but to help write it as well. The songwriting team originally included Wonder, but his time was constrained by his song-writing for the film The Woman in Red. So Jackson and Richie wrote "We Are the World" themselves at Hayvenhurst, the Jackson family home in Encino, California. They sought to write a song that would be easy to sing and memorable, yet still an anthem. For a week, the two spent every night working on lyrics and melodies in Jackson's bedroom. Jackson's older sister La Toya recounted the process in an interview with the U.S. celebrity news magazine People: "I'd go into the room while they were writing and it would be very quiet, which is odd, since Michael's usually very cheery when he works. It was very emotional for them." She also later said that Jackson wrote most of the lyrics "but he's never felt it necessary to say that". Richie had recorded two melodies for "We Are the World", which Jackson took, adding music and words to the song on the same day. Jackson said, "I love working quickly. I went ahead without even Lionel knowing. I couldn't wait. I went in and came out the same night with the song completed: drums, piano, strings, and words to the chorus." Jackson then presented his demo to Richie and Jones, who were both shocked; they did not expect the pop star to see the structure of the song so quickly. The next meetings between Jackson and Richie were unfruitful; the pair produced no additional vocals and got no work done. It was not until the night of January 21, 1985, that Richie and Jackson completed the lyrics and melody of "We Are the World" within two and a half hours, one night before the song's first recording session. ## Recording sessions The first night of recording, January 22, 1985, had tight security on hand, as Richie, Jackson, Wonder, and Jones started work on "We Are the World" at Kenny Rogers' Lion Share Recording Studio. The studio, on Beverly Boulevard in Los Angeles, was filled with session musicians, technicians, video crews, retinue, assistants, and organizers as the celebrity musicians entered. Jones hired session musicians to lay down the backing tracks: John "JR" Robinson on drums, Louis Johnson on bass, and pianist Greg Phillinganes. (These three first played together on "Don't Stop 'Til You Get Enough" produced by Jones for Jackson.) Richie sat down at the piano to teach everyone the song. When it was time to roll tape, Robinson cleared the room of non-musicians, and the backing tracks were recorded. After this, a vocal guide of "We Are the World" was recorded by Richie and Jackson, mixed with the instrumental tracks, and duplicated on tape for each of the invited performers. The guide was recorded on the sixth take, as Jones felt that there was too much "thought" in the previous versions. Following their work on the vocal guide, Jackson and Jones began thinking of alternatives for the line "There's a chance we're taking, we're taking our own lives": the pair was concerned that the latter part of the line would be considered a reference to suicide. As the group listened to a playback of the chorus, Richie declared that the last part of the line should be changed to "We're 'saving' our own lives". Jones also suggested altering the former part of the line. "One thing we don't want to do, especially with this group, is look like we're patting ourselves on the back. So it's really: 'There's a choice we're making.'" Around 1:30 am, the four musicians ended the night by finishing a chorus of melodic vocalizations, including the sound "sha-lum sha-lin-gay". Jones told the group that they were not to add anything else to the tape. "If we get too good, someone's gonna start playing it on the radio", he announced. On January 24, 1985, after a day of rest, Jones shipped Richie and Jackson's vocal guide to all of the artists who would be involved in "We Are the World"'s recording. Enclosed in the package was a letter from Jones, addressed to "My Fellow Artists": > The cassettes are numbered, and I can't express how important it is not to let this material out of your hands. Please do not make copies, and return this cassette the night of the 28th. In the years to come, when your children ask, 'What did mommy and daddy do for the war against world famine?', you can say proudly, this was your contribution. Ken Kragen chaired a production meeting at a bungalow off Sunset Boulevard on January 25, 1985. There, Kragen and his team discussed where the recording sessions with the supergroup of musicians should take place. He said, "The single most damaging piece of information is where we're doing this. If that shows up anywhere, we've got a chaotic situation that could totally destroy the project. The moment a Prince, a Michael Jackson, a Bob Dylan—I guarantee you!—drives up and sees a mob around that studio, he will never come in." On the same night, Quincy Jones' associate producer and vocal arranger, Tom Bahler, was given the task of matching each solo line with the right voice. Bahler said, "It's like vocal arranging in a perfect world." Jones disagreed, saying that the task was like "putting a watermelon in a Coke bottle". The following evening, Lionel Richie held a "choreography" session at his home, where it was decided who would stand where. The final night of recording was held on January 28, 1985, at A&M Recording Studios in Hollywood. Michael Jackson arrived at 8 p.m., earlier than the other artists, to record his solo section and record a vocal chorus by himself. He was subsequently joined in the recording studio by the remaining USA for Africa artists, who included Ray Charles, Billy Joel, Diana Ross, Cyndi Lauper, Bruce Springsteen, and Tina Turner. Also in attendance were five of Jackson's siblings: Jackie, La Toya, Marlon, Randy, and Tito. Many of the participants came straight from an American Music Awards ceremony that had been held that same night. Prince, who would have had a part in which he and Michael Jackson sang to each other, did not attend the recording session. The reason given for his absence has varied. One newspaper claimed that Prince did not want to record with other acts. Another report, from the time of "We Are the World"'s recording, suggested that the musician did not want to partake in the session because organizer Bob Geldof called him a "creep". Prince did, however, donate an exclusive track, "4 the Tears in Your Eyes", for the We Are the World album. Wonder asked Eddie Murphy to participate, but Murphy demurred, busy recording "Party All the Time". Murphy later said after he "realized what it was, [he] felt like an idiot." In all, more than 45 of America's top musicians participated in the recording, and another 50 had to be turned away. Upon entering the recording studio, the musicians were greeted by a sign pinned to the door that read, "Please check your egos at the door." They were also greeted by Stevie Wonder, who proclaimed that if the recording was not completed in one take, he and Ray Charles, two blind men, would drive everybody home. Each of the performers took their position at around 10:30 p.m. and began to sing. Several hours passed before Stevie Wonder announced that he would like to substitute a line in Swahili for the "sha-lum sha-lin-gay" sound. At this point, Waylon Jennings left the recording studio for a short time when it was suggested by some that the song be sung in Swahili. A heated debate ensued, in which several artists also rejected the suggestion. The "sha-lum sha-lin-gay" sound ran into opposition as well and was subsequently removed from the song. Jennings returned to the studio and participated in the recording, which bears his name in the end credits. The participants eventually decided to sing something meaningful in English. They chose to sing the new line "One world, Our children", which most of the participants enjoyed. In the early hours of the morning, two Ethiopian women, guests of Stevie Wonder, were brought into the recording studio. They thanked the singers on behalf of their country, bringing several artists to tears, before being led from the room. Wonder attempted to lighten the mood, by joking that the recording session gave him a chance to "see" fellow blind musician Ray Charles. "We just sort of bumped into each other!" The solo parts of the song were recorded without any problems. The final version of "We Are the World" was completed at 8 a.m. ## Music and vocal arrangements "We Are the World" is sung from a first-person viewpoint, allowing the audience to "internalize" the message by singing the word we together. It has been described as "an appeal to human compassion". The first lines in the song's repetitive chorus proclaim, "We are the world, we are the children, we are the ones who make a brighter day, so let's start giving". "We Are the World" opens with Lionel Richie, Stevie Wonder, Paul Simon, Kenny Rogers, James Ingram, Tina Turner, and Billy Joel singing the first verse. Michael Jackson and Diana Ross follow, completing the first chorus together. Dionne Warwick, Willie Nelson, and Al Jarreau sing the second verse, before Bruce Springsteen, Kenny Loggins, Steve Perry, and Daryl Hall go through the second chorus. Co-writer Jackson, Huey Lewis, Cyndi Lauper, and Kim Carnes follow with the song's bridge. This structuring of the song is said to "create a sense of continuous surprise and emotional buildup". "We Are the World" concludes with Bob Dylan and Ray Charles singing a full chorus, Wonder and Springsteen duetting, and ad libs from Charles and Ingram. The following people sang in the chorus: Dan Aykroyd, Harry Belafonte, Lindsey Buckingham, Mario Cipollina, Johnny Colla, Sheila E., Bob Geldof, Bill Gibson, Chris Hayes, Sean Hopper, Jackie Jackson, La Toya Jackson, Marlon Jackson, Randy Jackson, Tito Jackson, Waylon Jennings, Bette Midler, John Oates, Jeffrey Osborne, Anita Pointer, June Pointer, Ruth Pointer and Smokey Robinson. ## USA for Africa musicians ## Release On March 7, 1985, "We Are the World" was released as a single, in both 7-inch and 12-inch formats. The song was the only one released from the We Are the World album and became a chart success around the world. In the U.S., it was a number-one hit on the R&B singles chart, the Hot Adult Contemporary Tracks chart, and the Billboard Hot 100, where it remained for a month. The single had debuted at number 21 on the Hot 100, the highest entry since Michael Jackson's "Thriller" entered the charts at number 20 the year before. It took four weeks for the song to claim the number one spot, half the time a single would normally have taken to reach its charting peak. On the Hot 100, the song moved from 21 to 5 to 2 and then number 1. "We Are the World" might have reached the top of the Hot 100 chart sooner, were it not for the success of Phil Collins' "One More Night", which received support from both pop and rock listeners. "We Are the World" also entered Billboards Top Rock Tracks and Hot Country Singles charts, where it peaked at numbers 27 and 76 respectively. The song became the first single since the Beatles' "Let It Be" to enter Billboard's Top 5 within two weeks of release. Outside the U.S., the single reached number one in Australia, France, Ireland, New Zealand, The Netherlands, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK. The song peaked at number 2 in two countries: Germany and Austria. The single was also a commercial success: the initial shipment of 800,000 "We Are the World" records sold out within three days of release. The record became the fastest-selling American pop single in history. At Tower Records in West Hollywood, 1,000 copies of the song were sold in two days. Store worker Richard Petitpas commented, "A number one single sells about 100 to 125 copies a week. This is absolutely unheard of." By the end of 1985, "We Are the World" had become the year's best-selling single. Five years later it was revealed that the song had become the biggest single of the 1980s. "We Are the World" was eventually cited as the best-selling single in U.S. and pop music history. The song became the first single to be certified multi-platinum; it received a 4× certification by the Recording Industry Association of America. The estimated global sales of "We Are the World" are said to be 20 million. ## Reception Despite the song's commercial success, "We Are the World" received mixed reviews from journalists and music critics at the time. American journalist Greil Marcus felt that the song sounded like a Pepsi jingle. He wrote that "the constant repetition of 'There's a choice we're making' conflates with Pepsi's trademarked 'The choice of a new generation' in a way that, on the part of Pepsi-contracted song writers Michael Jackson and Lionel Richie, is certainly not intentional, and even more certainly beyond the realm of serendipity." Marcus added, "In the realm of contextualization, 'We Are the World' says less about Ethiopia than it does about Pepsi—and the true result will likely be less that certain Ethiopian individuals will live, or anyway live a bit longer than they otherwise would have, than that Pepsi will get the catch phrase of its advertising campaign sung for free by Ray Charles, Stevie Wonder, Bruce Springsteen, and all the rest." Professor and activist Reebee Garofalo agreed, calling the line "We're saving our own lives" a "distasteful element of self-indulgence". He asserted that the artists of USA for Africa were proclaiming "their own salvation for singing about an issue they will never experience on behalf of a people most of them will never encounter". In contrast, Stephen Holden of The New York Times praised the phrase "There's a choice we're making, We're saving our own lives". He wrote that the line assumed "an extra emotional dimension when sung by people with superstar mystiques". Holden wrote that the song was "an artistic triumph that transcends its official nature". He noted that unlike Band Aid's "Do They Know It's Christmas", the vocals on "We Are the World" were "artfully interwoven" and emphasized the individuality of each singer. Holden concluded that "We Are the World" was "a simple, eloquent ballad" and a "fully-realized pop statement that would sound outstanding even if it weren't recorded by stars". The song proved popular with both young and old listeners. People in Columbia, Missouri, reported they bought more than one copy of the single, some buying up to five copies of the record at one time. According to music critic and Bruce Springsteen biographer Dave Marsh, "We Are the World" was not widely accepted within the rock music community. The author revealed that the song was "despised" for what it was not: "a rock record, a critique of the political policies that created the famine, a way of finding out how and why famines occur, an all-inclusive representation of the entire worldwide spectrum of post-Presley popular music". Marsh revealed that he felt some of the criticisms were right, while others were silly. He claimed that despite the sentimentality of the song, "We Are the World" was a large-scale pop event with serious political overtones. "We Are the World" was recognized with several awards following its release. At the 1986 Grammy Awards, the song and its accompanying music video won four awards: Record of the Year, Song of the Year, Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal and Best Music Video, Short Form. The music video was awarded two honors at the 1985 MTV Video Music Awards. It collected the awards for Best Group Video and Viewer's Choice. People's Choice Awards recognized "We Are the World" with the Favorite New Song award in 1986. In the same year, the American Music Awards named "We Are the World" "Song of the Year", and honored organizer Harry Belafonte with the Award of Appreciation. Collecting his award, Belafonte thanked Ken Kragen, Quincy Jones, and "the two artists who, without their great gift would not have inspired us in quite the same way as we were inspired, Mr. Lionel Richie and Mr. Michael Jackson". Following the speech, the majority of USA for Africa reunited on stage, closing the ceremony with "We Are the World". ## Track listing ### Vinyl single 1. "We Are the World" (USA for Africa) – 7:14 2. "Grace" (Quincy Jones) – 4:56 ## Marketing and promotion "We Are the World" was promoted with a music video, a video cassette, and several other items made available to the public, including books, posters, shirts and buttons. All proceeds from the sale of official USA for Africa merchandise went directly to the famine relief fund. All of the merchandise sold well; the video cassette—titled We Are the World: The Video Event—documented the making of the song, and became the ninth-best-selling video of 1985. All of the video elements were produced by Howard G. Malley and Craig B. Golin along with April Lee Grebb as the production supervisor. The music video showed the recording of "We Are the World", and drew criticism from some. Michael Jackson was reported to have joked before filming, "People will know it's me as soon as they see the socks. Try taking footage of Bruce Springsteen's socks and see if anyone knows who they belong to." The song was also promoted with a special edition of the American magazine Life. The publication had been the only media outlet permitted inside A&M Recording Studios on the night of January 28, 1985. All other press organizations were barred from reporting the events leading up to and during "We Are the World"'s recording. Life ran a cover story of the recording session in its April 1985 edition of the monthly magazine. Seven members of USA for Africa were pictured on the cover: Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, Cyndi Lauper, Lionel Richie, Michael Jackson, Tina Turner and Willie Nelson. Inside the magazine were photographs of the "We Are the World" participants working and taking breaks. "We Are the World" received worldwide radio coverage in the form of an international simultaneous broadcast later that year. Upon spinning the song on their local stations, Georgia radio disc jockeys Bob Wolf and Don Briscar came up with the idea for a worldwide simulcast. They called hundreds of radio and satellite stations asking them to participate. On the morning of April 5, 1985 (Good Friday of that year) at 3:50 pm GMT, over 8,000 radio stations simultaneously broadcast the song around the world. As the song was broadcast, hundreds of people sang along on the steps of St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York. A year later, on March 28, 1986 (Good Friday of that year), the simultaneous radio broadcast of "We Are the World" was repeated over 6,000 radio stations worldwide. "We Are the World" gained further promotion and coverage on May 25, 1986, when it was played during a major benefit event held throughout the US. Hands Across America—USA for Africa's follow-up project—was an event in which millions of people formed a human chain across the US. The event was held to draw attention to hunger and homelessness in the United States. "We Are the World"'s co-writer, Michael Jackson, had wanted his song to be the official theme for the event. The other board members of USA for Africa outvoted him, and it was instead decided that a new song would be created and released for the event, titled "Hands Across America". When released, the new song did not achieve the level of success that "We Are the World" did, and the decision to use it as the official theme for the event led to Jackson—who co-owned the publishing rights to "We Are the World"—resigning from the board of directors of USA for Africa. ## Humanitarian aid Four months after the release of "We Are the World", USA for Africa had taken in almost \$10.8 million (equivalent to \$ million today). The majority of the money came from record sales within the US. Members of the public also donated money—almost \$1.3 million within the same time period. In May 1985, USA for Africa officials estimated that they had sold between \$45 million and \$47 million worth of official merchandise around the world. Organizer Ken Kragen announced that they would not be distributing all of the money at once. Instead, he revealed that the foundation would be looking into finding a long-term solution for Africa's problems. "We could go out and spend it all in one shot. Maybe we'd save some lives in the short term but it would be like putting a Band-Aid over a serious wound." Kragen noted that experts had predicted that it would take at least 10 to 20 years to make a slight difference to Africa's long-term problems. In June 1985, the first USA for Africa cargo jet carrying food, medicine, and clothing departed for Ethiopia and Sudan. It stopped en route in New York, where 15,000 T-shirts were added to the cargo. Included in the supplies were high-protein biscuits, high-protein vitamins, medicine, tents, blankets and refrigeration equipment. Harry Belafonte, representing the USA for Africa musicians, visited Sudan in the same month. The trip was his last stop on a four-nation tour of Africa. Tanzanian Prime Minister Salim Ahmed Salim greeted and praised Belafonte, telling him, "I personally and the people of Tanzania are moved by this tremendous example of human solidarity." One year after the release of "We Are the World", organizers noted that \$44.5 million had been raised for USA for Africa's humanitarian fund. They stated that they were confident that they would reach an initial set target of \$50 million (equivalent to \$ million in 2023). By October 1986, it was revealed that their \$50 million target had been met and exceeded; CBS Records gave USA for Africa a check for \$2.5 million, drawing the total amount of money to \$51.2 million. USA for Africa's Hands Across America event had also raised a significant amount of money—approximately \$24.5 million for the hungry in the US. Since its release, "We Are the World" has raised over \$63 million (equivalent to \$ million today) for humanitarian causes. Ninety percent of the money was pledged to African relief, both long and short term. The long-term initiative included efforts in birth control and food production. The remaining 10 percent of funds was earmarked for domestic hunger and homeless programs in the US. From the African fund, over 70 recovery and development projects were launched in seven African nations. Such projects included aid in agriculture, fishing, water management, manufacturing and reforestation. Training programs were also developed in the African countries of Mozambique, Senegal, Chad, Mauritania, Burkina Faso, and Mali. Following Jackson's death in 2009, Elias Kifle Maraim Beyene, who grew up in Ethiopia and was a beneficiary of the aid provided by the single, related: > I won't ever forget Michael Jackson because his contribution to the song We are the World had a very significant effect on my life. I am 50 now but 25 years ago I was living in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, which at that time was suffering from a long drought and famine. It was a terrible situation. Lots of people became sick and many more died. Around one million people in all were killed by the famine. In 1984 Michael Jackson, along with a number of other leading musicians, made the song We are the World to raise money for Africa. We received a lot of aid from the world and I was one of those who directly benefitted from it. The wheat flour that was distributed to the famine victims was different to the usual cereal we bought at the market. We baked a special bread from it. The local people named the bread after the great artist and it became known as Michael Bread. It was soft and delicious. > > When you have been through such hard times you never forget events like this. If you speak to anyone who was in Addis Ababa at that time they will all know what Michael Bread is and I know I will remember it for the rest of my life. ## Notable live performances "We Are the World" has been performed live by members of USA for Africa on several occasions both together and individually. One of the earliest such performances came in 1985, during the rock music concert Live Aid, which ended with more than 100 musicians singing the song on stage. Harry Belafonte and Lionel Richie made surprise appearances for the live rendition of the song. Michael Jackson would have joined the artists, but was "working around the clock in the studio on a project that he's made a major commitment to", according to his press agent, Norman Winter. An inaugural celebration was held for US President-elect Bill Clinton in January 1993. The event was staged by Clinton's Hollywood friends at the Lincoln Memorial and drew hundreds of thousands of people. Aretha Franklin, LL Cool J, Michael Bolton and Tony Bennett were among some of the musicians in attendance. Said Jones, "I've never seen so many great performers come together with so much love and selflessness." The celebration included a performance of "We Are the World", which involved Clinton, his daughter Chelsea, and his wife Hillary singing the song along with USA for Africa's Kenny Rogers, Diana Ross and Michael Jackson. The New York Times' Edward Rothstein commented on the event, stating, "The most enduring image may be of Mr. Clinton singing along in 'We Are the World', the first President to aspire, however futilely, to hipness." As a prelude to his song "Heal the World", "We Are the World" was performed as an interlude during two of Michael Jackson's tours, the Dangerous World Tour (1992–1993) and the HIStory World Tour (1996–1997), as well as Jackson's performance at the Super Bowl XXVII halftime show in 1993. Jackson briefly performed the song with a chorus at the 2006 World Music Awards in London, which marked his last live public performance. Jackson planned to use the song for his This Is It comeback concerts at The O2 Arena in London from 2009 to 2010, but the shows were cancelled due to his sudden death. Michael Jackson died in June 2009, after suffering a cardiac arrest. His memorial service was held several days later on July 7, and was reported to have been viewed by more than one billion people. The finale of the event featured group renditions of the Jackson anthems "We Are the World" and "Heal the World". The singalong of "We Are the World" was led by Darryl Phinnessee, who had worked with Jackson since the late 1980s. It also featured co-writer Lionel Richie and Jackson's family, including his children. Following the performance, "We Are the World" re-entered the US charts for the first time since its 1985 release. The song debuted at number 50 on Billboard's Hot Digital Songs chart. ## 25 for Haiti On January 12, 2010, a magnitude-7.0 earthquake struck Haiti, the island's most severe earthquake in over 200 years. The epicenter of the quake was just outside the Haitian capital Port-au-Prince. The Haitian government confirmed the deaths of over 230,000 civilians because of the disaster and the injuries of around 300,000. Approximately 1.2 million people were homeless and the lack of temporary shelter may have led to the outbreak of disease. To raise money for earthquake victims, a new celebrity version of "We Are the World" was recorded on February 1, 2010, and released on February 12, 2010. Over 75 musicians were involved in the remake, which was recorded in the same studio as the 1985 original. The new version features revised lyrics as well as a rap part pertaining to Haiti. Michael Jackson's younger sister Janet duets with her late brother on the track, as per a request from their mother Katherine. In the video and on the track, archival material of Michael Jackson is used from the original 1985 recording. This version is also infamous for the way Wyclef sings towards the end of the song, fluctuating his voice in a manner that sounds like, as a music writer for the San Francisco Chronicle called it, "Not unlike a cross between a fire siren and the sound of Wyclef giving himself a hernia." On February 20, 2010, a non-celebrity remake, "We Are the World 25 for Haiti (YouTube edition)", was posted to the video sharing website YouTube. Internet personality and singer-songwriter Lisa Lavie conceived and organized the Internet collaboration of 57 unsigned or independent YouTube musicians geographically distributed around the world. Lavie's 2010 YouTube version, a cover of the 1985 original, excludes the rap segment and minimizes the Auto-tune that characterizes the 2010 celebrity remake. Another 2010 remake of the original is the Spanish-language "Somos El Mundo". It was written by Emilio Estefan and his wife Gloria Estefan, and produced by Emilio, Quincy Jones and Univision Communications, the company that funded the project. ## Legacy "We Are the World" has been recognized as a politically important song, which "affected an international focus on Africa that was simply unprecedented". It has been credited with creating a climate in which musicians from around the world felt inclined to follow. According to The New York Times' Stephen Holden, since the release of "We Are the World", it has been noted that movement has been made within popular music to create songs that address humanitarian concerns. "We Are the World" was also influential in subverting the way music and meaning were produced, showing that musically and racially diverse musicians could work together both productively and creatively. Ebony described the January 28 recording session, in which Quincy Jones brought together a multi-racial group, as being "a major moment in world music that showed we can change the world". "We Are the World", along with Live Aid and Farm Aid, demonstrated that rock music had become more than entertainment, but a political and social movement. Journalist Robert Palmer noted that such songs and events had the ability to reach people around the world, send them a message, and then get results. Since the release of "We Are the World", and the Band Aid single that influenced it, numerous songs have been recorded in a similar fashion, with the intent to aid disaster victims throughout the world. One such example involved a supergroup of Latin musicians billed as "Hermanos del Tercer Mundo", or "Brothers of the Third World". Among the supergroup of 62 recording artists were Julio Iglesias, José Feliciano, and Sérgio Mendes. Their famine relief song was recorded in the same studio as "We Are the World". Half of the profits raised from the charity single was pledged to USA for Africa. The rest of the money was to be used for impoverished Latin American countries. Other notable examples include the 1989 cover of the Deep Purple song "Smoke on the Water" by a supergroup of hard rock, prog rock, and heavy metal musicians collaborating as Rock Aid Armenia to raise money for victims of the devastating 1988 Armenian earthquake and the 1986 all-star OPM single "Handog ng Pilipino sa Mundo", which talked about the optimism the Filipinos needed after the People Power Revolution. The 20th anniversary of "We Are the World" was celebrated in 2005. Radio stations around the world paid homage to USA for Africa's creation by simultaneously broadcasting the charity song. In addition to the simulcast, the milestone was marked by the release of a two-disc DVD called We Are the World: The Story Behind the Song. Ken Kragen asserted that the reason behind the simulcast and DVD release was not for USA for Africa to praise themselves for doing a good job, but to "use it to do some more good [for the original charity]. That's all we care about accomplishing." Harry Belafonte also commented on the 20th anniversary of the song. He acknowledged that "We Are the World" had "stood the test of time"; anyone old enough to remember it can still at least hum along. ### Parodies "We Are the World" has been the subject of numerous parodies over the years. Notable examples include: - The Filipino comedy film I Have Three Hands, released in September 1985, featured a parody of the music video towards the end, where characters perform a song titled "Maid in the Philippines". - The British Satire television program Spitting Image aired a skit where puppet caricatures of celebrities sang the song "We're Scared of Bob", in which they claim to be participating out of fear of Bob Geldof. Some of the puppets portray members of USA for Africa, among other celebrities. - Johnson and Tofte released a parody called "We are the Worms" which speaks of worms making the choice to leave their underground homes when rain saturates the ground, only to be squished on the sidewalk when they emerge. - A 1988 issue of MAD Magazine had a piece called "Bad News" about corruption in the world. One fake story was about 60,000 tons of acid sludge shipped to Africa, and a song "We are the Worst" to note this act of shame. - In 1992, sketch show In Living Color ran a skit called "Career Aid", parodying the fact that many artists to feature on "We Are the World" seemed to do so at a point where their own careers were struggling. Actor Jamie Foxx featured as Lionel Richie. - Also in 1992, the Married... with Children episode "Rock of Ages" featured the Bundy family performing "We Are the Old" in a music video with Spencer Davis, Richie Havens, Robby Krieger, Mark Lindsay, Peter Noone, and John Sebastian. - The thirteenth episode of The Simpsons' third season, "Radio Bart", sees the residents of Springfield team up with musician Sting to produce a charity single "We're Sending Our Love Down the Well", based on "We Are the World", to offer support to a boy they believe is trapped down a well. - The sketch "Famous Helping People" on an early episode of Late Night with Conan O'Brien has Sting as the only performer to show up for a session arranged by Conan O'Brien, Andy Richter, and Max Weinberg, but the group can not decide which charity to record the song for. - In the season finale of the third season of the American television comedy series 30 Rock, "Kidney Now!", musicians including Clay Aiken, Elvis Costello, Mary J. Blige, Sheryl Crow, the Beastie Boys (Mike D and Ad Rock), Steve Earle, Adam Levine, Sara Bareilles, Wyclef Jean, Norah Jones, Talib Kweli, Michael McDonald, Rhett Miller, Moby, Robert Randolph, Rachael Yamagata and Cyndi Lauper produced a charity single to help Jack Donaghy's long-lost father get a new kidney. - A 1991 episode of Saturday Night Live featured the song 'Musicians For Free-Range Chickens', purporting to be an event organized by Lenny Kravitz and Whoopi Goldberg railing against the use of battery hens. The SNL cast impersonate many popular musicians of the day, and the episode's musical guest, Michael Bolton, plays himself. - A Les Guignols sketch that aired on May 4, 2001, parodied the song and retitled it "We Fuck the World". Sung by puppets based on George W. Bush and Sylvester Stallone, the song criticizes America's isolationism and capitalism, USA for Africa renamed USA for USA. - A 2010 Saturday Night Live sketch parodied the negative critical response to "We Are the World 25 for Haiti", with impersonators pretending to come together to record the single "We Are the World 3: Raising Awareness of the 'We Are the World 2' Disaster." - During the 5th anniversary episode of Banana Split aired on ABS-CBN on November 23, 2013, the cast sang a special version of the song entitled "5 and Still Alive" with the lyrics discussing the past cast members, sketches and segments of the show during its early years. - The final episode of American late-night comedy talk show Chelsea Lately concluded with celebrities including Dave Grohl, Sammy Hagar, Gwen Stefani and Fergie singing a parody version of the song, with the lyrics altered to be a farewell to host comedian Chelsea Handler. - Controversial anti-LGBT church Westboro Baptist Church (WBC), known for their musical parodies, produced a parody of "We Are the World" titled "God Hates the World". In 2007, Warner Chappell Music unsuccessfully tried to prevent WBC from circulating the video on grounds of copyright infringement. - The South Park episode, "Put It Down", features the titular song played at the end of the episode where it appears to be a parody of "We Are the World". ## Charts ### Weekly charts ### Year-end charts ## Certifications and sales ## See also - Band Aid (band) - Tears Are Not Enough - Hear 'n Aid - Cantaré, cantarás - We Are One (global collaboration song) - Music for UNICEF Concert - Chiquitita an ABBA song, sales of which benefit humanitarian relief for children - We Con the World

United States v. Progressive, Inc.

1979 court case

United States of America v. Progressive, Inc., Erwin Knoll, Samuel Day, Jr., and Howard Morland, 467 F. Supp. 990 (W.D. Wis. 1979), was a lawsuit brought against The Progressive magazine by the United States Department of Energy (DOE) in 1979. A temporary injunction was granted against The Progressive to prevent the publication of an article written by activist Howard Morland that purported to reveal the "secret" of the hydrogen bomb. Though the information had been compiled from publicly available sources, the DOE claimed that it fell under the "born secret" clause of the Atomic Energy Act of 1954. Although the case was filed in the Western District of Wisconsin, the judge there recused himself as a friend of the magazine. The case was therefore brought before Judge Robert W. Warren, a judge in the Eastern District of Wisconsin. Because of the sensitive nature of information at stake in the trial, two separate hearings were conducted, one in public, and the other in camera. The defendants, Morland and the editors of The Progressive, would not accept security clearances, as they would have had to sign non-disclosure agreements that would have put restraints on their free speech (including, significantly, in written form), and so were not present at the in camera hearings. Their lawyers did obtain clearances so that they could participate, but were forbidden from conveying anything they heard there to their clients. The article was eventually published after the government lawyers dropped their case during the appeals process, calling it moot after other information was independently published. Despite its indecisive conclusion, law students still study the case, which "could have been a law school hypothetical designed to test the limits of the presumption of unconstitutionality attached to prior restraints". ## Background ### Secrecy and disclosure The first atomic bombs were developed by the wartime Manhattan Project. This was carried out in secret, lest its discovery induce the Axis powers, particularly Germany, to accelerate their own nuclear projects, or undertake covert operations against the project. The military and scientific leaders of the Manhattan Project anticipated a need to release details of their wartime accomplishments, principally as a form of recognition for the participants who had labored in secrecy. Press releases were prepared in advance of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and an official account, known as the Smyth Report after its author, the physicist Henry DeWolf Smyth, was commissioned in April 1944 to provide a history of the project for public release. The Director of the Manhattan Project, Major General Leslie Groves, his scientific adviser, Richard Tolman, and Smyth agreed that information could be publicly released if it was essential for an understanding of the project, or was already generally known or deducible, or had no significance to the production of atomic bombs. The first copies went on sale on August 12, 1945. In its October 8, 1945, issue, The New Republic took the position, emphasized with italics, that "there is no secret to be kept": the knowledge of how to build an atomic bomb had been "the common property of scientists throughout the world for the last five years". President Harry S. Truman took a similar line in his first speech to Congress on nuclear matters that month, proclaiming that "the essential theoretical knowledge upon which the discovery is based is already widely known." In November 1945, Groves instructed Tolman to draw up a policy for the declassification of the Manhattan Project's documents. Tolman assembled a committee, which took a list of the Manhattan Project's activities and assigned each a classification. Four reviewers assessed the documents and declassified about 500 of them by the end of the year. ### Atomic Energy Act If there was no secret, then there was no reason for security. The scientists, in particular, chafed under the wartime controls, which were not lifted with the surrender of Japan. On September 1, 1945, Samuel K. Allison used the occasion of the announcement of the founding of the Institute for Nuclear Studies to call for freedom to research and develop atomic energy. He told the press that if controls were not removed, nuclear scientists might turn to the study of the color of butterfly wings. Enrico Fermi warned that "unless research is free and outside of control, the United States will lose its superiority in scientific pursuit". The War Department envisaged that the Manhattan Project would be superseded by a statutory authority. Legislation to create it was drafted by two War Department lawyers, Kenneth C. Royall and William L. Marbury. Their draft bill ran into strong opposition, particularly from the influential Senator Arthur H. Vandenberg. On December 20, 1945, Senator Brien McMahon introduced an alternative bill on atomic energy, which quickly became known as the McMahon bill. This was initially a very liberal bill towards the control of scientific research, and was broadly supported by scientists. McMahon framed the controversy as a question of military versus civilian control of atomic energy, although the May-Johnson bill also provided for civilian control. Section 10 assigned the patent for any invention related to atomic energy to the commission. While the bill was being debated, the news broke on February 16, 1946, of the defection of Igor Gouzenko in Canada, and the subsequent arrest of 22 people. The members of Congress debating the bill feared that "atomic secrets" were being systematically stolen by Soviet atomic spies. McMahon convened an executive session at which Federal Bureau of Investigation Director J. Edgar Hoover, Secretary of State James F. Byrnes and Groves were called to appear. Groves revealed that the British physicist Alan Nunn May had passed information about the Manhattan Project to Soviet agents. The more conservative elements in Congress now moved to toughen the act. Section 10, which was formerly titled "Dissemination of Information", now became "Control of Information". Representative Helen Gahagan Douglas, who sponsored the McMahon bill in the House, vigorously defended the section against counterarguments. She dismissed objections that it would "give away the secret of the bomb", asserting that America's advantage in nuclear weapons could only be temporary, whereas the bill could perpetuate the U.S. lead in scientific research. Truman signed the compromise bill into law as the Atomic Energy Act of 1946. It established the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC) as the controlling body for atomic energy. ### Hydrogen bomb The Manhattan Project had been a crash program to produce a nuclear weapon. Along the way, promising ideas had been set aside. Norris Bradbury, who replaced J. Robert Oppenheimer as director of the Los Alamos National Laboratory in late 1945, revived such projects in order to entice scientists to remain at, or return to, Los Alamos. One of these projects was the "Super", a nuclear weapon using nuclear fusion, which Edward Teller's F-1 group had worked on under Fermi's direction. The technical problem was figuring out a way to get a fusion reaction to initiate and propagate, which required temperatures attainable only with a fission bomb. The hydrodynamic calculations involved were daunting, and ENIAC was used to run a computer simulation of the Super in December 1945 and January 1946. The Polish mathematician Stanislaw Ulam, his wife Francoise Ulam, who performed the calculations, and their collaborator, Cornelius Everett, worked on the Super design through 1949. There was no push from the military for the weapon, because the AEC regarded it as too secret to inform either its own Military Liaison Committee or the Armed Forces Special Weapons Project about it. In September 1949, the Soviet Union detonated a nuclear device. It fell to Oppenheimer, as chairman of the AEC General Advisory Committee (GAC), to decide whether the United States should develop the Super in response. The Super design used large quantities of tritium, which could only be manufactured in a reactor, and therefore at the expense of plutonium production for smaller weapons, so the GAC advised against it. Nonetheless, Truman approved the Super on January 31, 1950. Because of the secrecy surrounding the decision, accounts published in the 1950s incorrectly portrayed Oppenheimer as obstructing its development on political grounds, and this was a factor in the Oppenheimer security hearing in 1954. Ulam still only gave the design a "50–50 chance" of success in February 1950. At the end of March, he reported that it would not work at all. Scientists like Hans Bethe and George Gamow felt that Teller had committed the nation to an expensive crash program on the basis of a model that he knew was flawed. However, in February 1951, Ulam had a new idea, in which the shock wave from an atomic bomb "primary" stage, through an arrangement he called "hydrodynamic lensing", would compress a "secondary" stage of deuterium fusion fuel wrapped around a plutonium rod or "spark plug". On being informed, Teller immediately grasped the potential for using the X-rays produced by the primary explosion for hydrodynamic lensing. This arrangement, which made thermonuclear weapons possible, is now known as the Teller–Ulam design. Although it was not what Truman had approved, the design did work, and was capable of producing multi-megaton explosions. "Rarely in the history of technology", wrote Howard Morland, "has such a seemingly daunting problem turned out to have such a nifty solution." In 1950, the Atomic Energy Commission asked Scientific American not to publish an article by Bethe that it claimed revealed classified information about the hydrogen bomb. Scientific American reluctantly agreed to stop the presses and make changes in the article, and to recall and burn the 3,000 copies that had already been printed. The 1951 arrest of Klaus Fuchs, Harry Gold, David Greenglass, Morton Sobell and Julius and Ethel Rosenberg who, according to FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, "stole the basic secrets of nuclear fission", caused great concern. President Dwight D. Eisenhower denied the Rosenbergs clemency on the grounds that their actions "could well result in the deaths of many, many thousands of innocent citizens", and they were executed. After the Soviet Union detonated Joe 4 in August 1953, newspapers proclaimed that the Soviets had tested a hydrogen bomb. In fact it was only a boosted fission device, but the veil of secrecy covering the thermonuclear program prevented scientists from informing the public. ### Prior restraint Prior restraint has generally been regarded by U.S. courts, particularly the U.S. Supreme Court, as being "the most serious and least tolerable" of restrictions on the First Amendment. The Blackstone Commentaries defined freedom of the press as "laying no previous restraints upon publication, and not in freedom from censure for criminal matter when published." The Supreme Court had however never held that prior restraint was unconstitutional. On the contrary, in Near v. Minnesota 283 U.S. 697 (1931), Chief Justice Charles E. Hughes remarked that in wartime, "no one would question but that a government might prevent actual obstruction to its recruiting service or the publication of the sailing dates of transports or the number and location of troops." He further suggested that obscenity or incitement to insurrection would be similar grounds for prior restraint. The court subsequently upheld free speech exceptions such as restrictions on demonstrations in Cox v. New Hampshire, 312 U.S. 569 (1941), and censorship of motion pictures in Times Film Corp. v. City of Chicago, 365 U.S. 43 (1961). In New York Times Co. v. United States 403 U.S. 713 (1971)—better known as the Pentagon Papers case—the government had sought to prevent the publication of classified material by The New York Times. In this case, the Supreme Court ruled 6–3 that the government had not reached the standard required by Near to justify prior restraint, but the concurring justices gave differing opinions about where the line should be drawn. In his opinion, Justice Potter Stewart wrote that while publication of The Pentagon Papers would likely harm the national interest, it would not result in "direct, immediate or irreparable harm to our Nation or its people". Failure to provide a clear line inevitably meant that the court had to deal with prior restraint on a case-by-case basis. In Nebraska Press Association v. Stuart, 427 U.S. 539 (1976), the court was called upon to decide whether news reportage of a lurid mass murder case in a small town in Nebraska would justify prior restraint in order to protect the defendant's right to a fair trial. In this case, the court ruled unanimously that it would not. Most of the justices viewed Near as providing the only grounds for prior restraint, and declined to expand its scope any further. ## Trial ### Morland's research The Progressive was a left-wing American monthly magazine of politics, culture and opinion with a circulation of around 40,000. In 1978, its managing editor, Sam Day Jr., a former editor of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, and its editor, Erwin Knoll, commissioned freelance journalist Howard Morland to write an article on the secrecy surrounding nuclear weapons production in America. In October 1978, Morland got Representative Ronald V. Dellums to submit a series of questions about plutonium production to the Department of Energy (DOE), the successor to the AEC. The DOE responded by classifying the questions. In September and October 1978, the House Armed Services Committee held hearings on the proposed Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty. There was widespread public ignorance of issues surrounding nuclear weapons, and associated environmental concerns. Day and Morland hoped that by demystifying nuclear weapons, they would promote more critical public debate, and improve the prospects for nuclear disarmament. Morland claimed that "I am precisely the type of person the First Amendment was intended to protect: a political advocate whose ideas are unpopular with the general public and threatening to the government." Over a period of six months, Morland systematically pieced together a design for a hydrogen bomb. He visited a number of nuclear weapons facilities and interviewed government employees, with the permission of the DOE, usually identifying himself and his purpose. He did not have a security clearance, and had never had any access to classified nuclear weapons documents, although it is possible that some classified information or ideas were accidentally or deliberately leaked to him. His scientific background was minimal; he had taken five undergraduate courses in physics and chemistry as part of his Bachelor of Arts degree in economics at Emory University. Morland identified the features of the Teller–Ulam design as staging, with a fission primary and a fusion secondary inside opposite ends of a hollow container, and the use of radiation from the exploding primary to compress, or implode, the secondary. "The notion that X-rays could move solid objects with the force of thousands of tons of dynamite," noted Morland, "was beyond the grasp of the science fiction writers of the time." Day sent draft copies of Morland's article out to reviewers in late 1978 and early 1979, including Ron Siegel, a graduate student at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Siegel gave his draft copy to George Rathjens, a professor of political science there in February 1979. For many years, Rathjens had issued a challenge to his graduate students to produce a workable design for a hydrogen bomb, but no one had ever succeeded. Rathjens phoned The Progressive and urged that the article not be published. When the editors dismissed his suggestion, he sent the draft to the DOE. "Apparently," wrote Morland, "I had earned a passing grade on the Rathjens challenge". ### Legal arguments In March 1979, the editors sent a final draft to the DOE for comment. DOE officials, first in phone calls and then in person, attempted to dissuade The Progressive from publishing the article on the grounds that it contained "secret restricted data" as defined by the Atomic Energy Act. The Progressive's editors were not persuaded, and told the officials that they intended to proceed with publishing Morland's article. The DOE filed a motion to suppress the article with the United States District Court for the Western District of Wisconsin in Madison on March 8, 1979. There was only one judge in the Western District of Wisconsin at the time, Judge James Edward Doyle, but he recused himself as a friend of the magazine. The case was therefore brought before Judge Robert W. Warren, a judge in the Eastern District of Wisconsin, and heard by Warren in Milwaukee. Lawyers for The Progressive voluntarily underwent security reviews and were granted Q clearances that allowed them to access restricted nuclear information. Morland and The Progressive's editors declined to obtain clearances, as they would have had to sign non-disclosure agreements that would have prevented them from publishing the article. This resulted in the lawyers being restricted in their communications with their clients. In seeking a temporary restraining order, government lawyers argued that The Progressive was about to break the law, causing irreparable harm. The data in the article was born classified, so it did not matter that it was an original work of the author. They noted that prior restraint had been upheld by the courts before in matters of national security, and argued that the Pentagon Papers decision did not apply as the Atomic Energy Act specifically allowed for injunctive relief. Moreover, the Pentagon Papers were historical, whereas the hydrogen bomb was a current military weapon. Finally, they pointed out that the government had obligations under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty not to assist non-nuclear states in acquiring nuclear weapons. In granting the temporary restraining order on March 9, Warren said that he would have "to think long and hard before I gave the hydrogen bomb to Idi Amin." James R. Schlesinger, the Secretary of Energy, telephoned leading newspapers and warned them not to support The Progressive. This was probably unnecessary, for the media were supportive of the government's case. Fred Graham, the New York Times's legal correspondent, predicted that the government would win the case. In an editorial on March 11, 1979, The Washington Post wrote that The Progressive case, "as a press-versus-government First Amendment contest, is John Mitchell's dream case—the one the Nixon Administration was never lucky enough to get: a real First Amendment loser." The newspaper called on The Progressive to "forget about publishing it". In the Pentagon Papers case, Professor Alexander Bickel, an expert on the United States Constitution, when asked hypothetically if prior restraint could ever be justified, had told the court that he would draw the line at the hydrogen bomb. Daniel Ellsberg, who had leaked the Pentagon Papers, told Morland that he believed that nuclear weapon designs should be kept secret. Because of the horrific nature of thermonuclear weapons, and the expectation that The Progressive would probably lose the case, mainstream media organizations feared that the result would be an erosion of freedom of the press. However, the court's role was to rule on whether publication was legal, not whether it was wise. In keeping with the usual practice of keeping a temporary restraining order in effect for as short a time as possible, Warren ordered that hearings be held on a preliminary injunction one week after the March 9 temporary restraining order. On March 16, the Progressive's attorneys filed an affidavit from Theodore Postol, an employee of the Department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory, stating that the information contained in the Morland article could be derived by any competent physicist from Teller's article on the hydrogen bomb in the Encyclopedia Americana. At the request of both parties, the hearing was postponed to March 26 so they would have more time to file their briefs and affidavits. The parties were therefore back in court again on March 26 for a hearing on the government's request for a preliminary injunction. Warren decided not to hold an evidentiary hearing at which the opposing teams of experts could be cross examined. He also declined a suggestion by the Federation of American Scientists in its amicus curiae brief that a panel of experts be charged with examining the issue. The case relied on written affidavits and briefs, and the opposing counsels' oral arguments. Testimony was introduced entirely in the form of sworn affidavits, the most important of which were deemed classified and presented to the court in camera. The government affiants included classification officers, weapon lab scientists, the Secretaries of Energy, State, and Defense, and Nobel physics laureate Hans Bethe, whom Judge Warren cited as the star witness for the plaintiff. The defense side had no experts with direct knowledge of nuclear weapon design, until the unexpected appearance of Ray Kidder, a nuclear weapon designer at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. One of Kidder's jobs in 1962 had been to evaluate designs of the 29 thermonuclear devices tested in Operation Dominic. Kidder was able to credibly dispute government arguments in the battle of affidavits, leveling the technical playing field. Because of the importance of radiation implosion in civilian fusion research, Kidder had been quietly waging a campaign to declassify it for some years prior to the Progressive case. The Progressive's legal team argued that the government had not established a case sufficient "to overcome the First Amendment's presumption against prior restraint". The article was based upon information in the public domain, and was therefore neither a threat to national security nor covered by the Atomic Energy Act, which in any case did not authorize prior restraint, or was unconstitutional if it did. In this, counsel relied on the United States v. Heine decision, in which Judge Learned Hand ruled that information in the public domain could not be covered by the Espionage Act of 1917. The government's lawyers argued, on the contrary, that there was sensitive information in the article, which was not in the public domain, and which, if published, would harm arms control efforts. In attempting to apply the Near and Pentagon Papers standards, the court was concerned about the prospect of publication causing the proliferation of nuclear weapons, and potentially a global nuclear holocaust. The government did not go so far as to claim that publication might pose an immediate or inevitable danger, only that it "would substantially increase the risk that thermonuclear weapons would become available or available at an earlier date to those who do not now have them. If this should occur, it would undermine our nonproliferation policy, irreparably impair the national security of the United States, and pose a threat to the peace and security of the world." However, the court still found that "a mistake in ruling against the United States could pave the way for thermonuclear annihilation for us all. In that event, our right to life is extinguished and the right to publish becomes moot", and that publication could indeed cause "grave, direct, immediate and irreparable harm to the United States", thereby meeting the test the Supreme Court had enunciated in the Pentagon Papers case. The preliminary injunction was therefore granted. Lawyers for The Progressive filed a motion to vacate the decision on the grounds that the information contained in Morland's article was already in the public domain. The basis for this claim was two reports from the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory UCRL-4725, "Weapons Development During June 1956", and UCRL-5280, "Weapons Development During June 1958", which contained detailed information on thermonuclear weapon design. One of them, UCRL-4725, gave details about Bassoon, a three-stage thermonuclear device tested during Operation Redwing in 1956. It was found on the shelves of the Los Alamos library by Dmitri Rotow, a researcher for the American Civil Liberties Union. According to the government, the reports had been inadvertently declassified. On June 15, Warren therefore denied the motion on the grounds that such an error did not place the documents in the public domain. The appellants immediately appealed to the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago, claiming that the two documents had been on the shelves for a considerable period of time. The government now advanced the argument that "technical data" was not protected by the First Amendment. The motions for an expedited review were denied because the magazine's lawyers had waived that right—something Morland and The Progressive editors discovered only from the court. The preliminary injunction therefore remained in effect for six months. ### Case dropped On April 25, 1979, a group of scientists who worked at the Argonne National Laboratory wrote to Senator John Glenn, the Chairman of the United States Senate Subcommittee on Energy, Nuclear Proliferation and Federal Services. They were concerned about information being leaked, in particular by the government's tacit acknowledgement that Morland's bomb design was substantially correct, something that could not otherwise have been deduced from unclassified information. These included the affidavits by the United States Secretary of Defense Harold Brown and government expert witness Jack Rosengren. Copies of the letter were sent to major newspapers, but with a cover note explaining that it was for background information and not publication. After about four weeks, the Glenn subcommittee forwarded it to the DOE, which classified it. Unaware of this, Hugh DeWitt, a physicist at the Lawrence Livermore nuclear weapons laboratory, forwarded a copy to Chuck Hansen. Hansen was a computer programmer from Mountain View, California, who collected information about nuclear weapons as a hobby. He had run a competition to design an H-bomb, the winner of which would be the first person to have their design classified by the DOE. It now began to occur to him that his hobby might not be legal. On August 27, he wrote a letter to Senator Charles H. Percy detailing how much information he had deduced from publicly available sources. This included his own design, one not as good as Morland's, which Hansen had not seen. Hansen further charged that government scientists—including Edward Teller, Ted Taylor, and George Rathjens—had leaked sensitive information about thermonuclear weapons, for which no action had been taken. In this, Hansen was mistaken: Taylor had indeed been reprimanded, and Teller was not the source of the information that Hansen attributed to him. Hansen made copies of his letter available to several newspapers. When The Daily Californian (the student-run college newspaper of the University of California at Berkeley), published excerpts from the Argonne letter on June 11, the DOE obtained a court order to prevent further publication. Undeterred, The Daily Californian published the Argonne letter in its entirety on June 13. In September, the DOE declared the Hansen letter to be classified and obtained a temporary restraining order prohibiting The Daily Californian from publishing it, but the Hansen letter was published by the Madison Press Connection on September 16. The government then moved to dismiss their cases against both The Progressive and The Daily Californian as moot. ## Legacy Morland's article was published in the November 1979 issue of The Progressive. A month later he published an erratum in The Progressive with updates based on information that he had gathered during the trial from UCRL-4725, Chuck Hansen's letter and other sources. In Morland's opinion, the article contributed to a wave of anti-nuclear activism in the late 1970s and early 1980s that resulted in, amongst other things, the closure of the Rocky Flats Plant near Denver. Chuck Hansen went on to publish a book, U.S. Nuclear Weapons: The Secret History, in 1988. This was subsequently expanded to a self-published five volume work entitled Swords of Armageddon. However, many mainstream media organizations still remained reluctant to test the law by publishing. On September 30, 1980, the Justice Department issued a statement that it would not prosecute alleged violations of the Atomic Energy Act during the Daily Californian or The Progressive cases. Hearings on the case were held by Glenn's subcommittee and by the House Subcommittee on Government Information and Individual Rights. The subcommittees looked into the implications of the decision with regards to nuclear proliferation. They also examined the doctrine of "classified at birth", but did not decide to amend the Atomic Energy Act to remove such provisions. Thus far, fears of thermonuclear proliferation have not proven founded; whether any country has successfully developed a hydrogen bomb since 1979 is disputed. From a legal standpoint, the case "proved to be a victory for no one", due to the indecisive nature of its conclusion. Yet it remains a celebrated case nonetheless. In 2004, the 25th anniversary of the decision was commemorated with an academic conference at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, attended by many of the participants, at which papers were presented. Law students still study the case, which "could have been a law school hypothetical designed to test the limits of the presumption of unconstitutionality attached to prior restraints."

Shackleton–Rowett Expedition

1921–22 expedition to Antarctica

The Shackleton–Rowett Expedition (1921–22) was Sir Ernest Shackleton's last Antarctic project, and the final episode in the Heroic Age of Antarctic Exploration. The venture, financed by John Quiller Rowett, is sometimes referred to as the Quest Expedition after its ship Quest, a converted Norwegian sealer. Shackleton had originally intended to go to the Arctic and explore the Beaufort Sea, but this plan was abandoned when the Canadian government withheld financial support; Shackleton thereupon switched his attention to the Antarctic. Quest, smaller than any recent Antarctic exploration vessel, soon proved inadequate for its task, and progress south was delayed by its poor sailing performance and by frequent engine problems. Before the expedition's work could properly begin, Shackleton died on board the ship, just after its arrival at the sub-Antarctic island of South Georgia. The major part of the subsequent attenuated expedition was a three-month cruise to the eastern Antarctic, under the leadership of the party's second-in-command, Frank Wild. The shortcomings of Quest were soon in evidence: slow speed, heavy fuel consumption, a tendency to roll in heavy seas, and a steady leak. The ship was unable to proceed further than longitude 20°E, well short of its easterly target, and its engine's low power coupled with its unsuitable bows was insufficient for it to penetrate southward through the pack ice. Following several fruitless attempts, Wild returned the ship to South Georgia, on the way visiting Elephant Island where he and 21 others had been stranded after the sinking of the ship Endurance, during Shackleton's Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition six years earlier. Wild had thoughts of a second, more productive season in the ice, and took the ship to Cape Town for a refit. Here, in June 1922, he received a message from Rowett ordering the ship home to England, so the expedition ended quietly. The Quest voyage is not greatly regarded in the histories of polar exploration, due to the event that defines it in public memory, overshadowing its other activities: Shackleton's untimely death. ## Background ### Shackleton after the Endurance Shackleton returned to Britain from the Endurance expedition in late May 1917, while World War I was under way. Many of his men enlisted promptly upon their return. Too old to enlist, Shackleton nevertheless sought an active role in the war effort, and eventually departed for Murmansk with the temporary army rank of major, as part of the North Russia intervention. Shackleton expressed his dissatisfaction with this role in letters home: "I feel I am no use to anyone unless I am outfacing the storm in wild lands." He returned to England in February 1919 and began plans to set up a company that would, with the cooperation of the North Russian Government, develop the natural resources of the region. This scheme came to nothing, as the Red Army took control of that part of Russia during the Russian Civil War; to provide himself with an income, Shackleton had to rely on the lecture circuit. During the winter of 1919–20 he lectured twice a day, six days a week, for five months. ### Canadian proposal Despite the large debts still outstanding from the Endurance expedition, Shackleton's mind turned towards another exploration venture. He decided to turn away from the Antarctic, go northwards and, as he put it, "fill in this great blank now called the Beaufort Sea". This area of the Arctic Ocean, to the north of Alaska and west of the Canadian Arctic Archipelago, was largely unexplored; Shackleton believed, on the basis of tidal records, that it contained large undiscovered land masses that "would be of the greatest scientific interest to the world, apart from the possible economic value". Shackleton also hoped to reach the northern pole of inaccessibility, the most remote point in the Arctic regions. In March 1920, his plans received the general approval of the Royal Geographical Society and were supported by the Canadian government. On this basis Shackleton set about acquiring the necessary funding, which he estimated at £50,000. Later that year, Shackleton met by chance an old school-friend, John Quiller Rowett, who agreed to put up a nucleus of cash to get Shackleton started. With this money, in January 1921, Shackleton purchased the wooden Norwegian whaler Foca I together with other equipment, and began the process of hiring of a crew. In May 1921, the policy of the Canadian government towards Arctic expeditions changed with the advent of a new prime minister, Arthur Meighen, who withdrew support from Shackleton's proposal. Shackleton was required to rethink his plans, and decided to sail for the Antarctic instead. A varied programme of exploration, coastal mapping, mineral prospecting and oceanographic research in the Southern Ocean would replace the abandoned Beaufort Sea venture. ## Antarctic preparation ### Objectives Even before his problems with the Canadian government, Shackleton had been considering a southern expedition as a possible alternative to the Beaufort Sea. According to the RGS librarian Hugh Robert Mill, as early as March 1920 Shackleton had talked about two possible schemes – the Beaufort Sea exploration, and "an oceanographical expedition with the object of visiting all the little-known islands of the South Atlantic and South Pacific". By June 1921, the latter plan had expanded to include a circumnavigation of the Antarctic continent and the mapping of around 2,000 miles (3,200 km) of uncharted coastline. It would also encompass a search for "lost" or wrongly charted sub-Antarctic islands (including Dougherty Island, Tuanaki, and the Nimrod Islands), and would investigate possible mineral resources to be exploited in these rediscovered lands. A scientific research program would include a visit to Gough Island, and an investigation of a possible "underwater continental connection between Africa and America." Shackleton's biographer Margery Fisher calls the plan "diffuse", and "far too comprehensive for one small body of men to tackle within two years", while according to Roland Huntford, the expedition had no obvious goal and was "only too clearly a piece of improvisation, a pretext [for Shackleton] to get away". Fisher describes the expedition as representing "the dividing line between what has become known as the Heroic Age of Antarctic exploration and the Mechanical Age". Shackleton called the voyage "pioneering", referring specifically to the aeroplane that was taken (but ultimately not used) on the expedition. In fact this was only one of the technological "firsts" that marked the venture; there were gadgets in profusion. The ship's crow's nest was electrically heated; there were heated overalls for the lookouts, a wireless set, and a device called an odograph which could trace and chart the ship's route automatically. Photography was to figure prominently, and "a large and expensive outfit of cameras, cinematographical machines and general photographic appliances [was] acquired". Among the oceanographical research equipment was a Lucas deep-sea sounding machine. This ample provision arose from the sponsorship of Rowett, who had extended his original gift of seed money to an undertaking to cover the costs of the entire expedition. The extent of Rowett's contribution is not recorded; in an (undated) prospectus for the southern expedition Shackleton had estimated the total cost as "about £100,000". Whatever the total, Rowett appears to have funded the lion's share, enabling Frank Wild to record later that, unique among Antarctic expeditions of the era, this one returned home without any outstanding debt. According to Wild, without Rowett's actions the expedition would have been impossible: "His generous attitude is the more remarkable in that he knew there was no prospect of financial return, and what he did was in the interest of scientific research and from friendship with Shackleton." His only recognition was the attachment of his name to the title of the expedition. Rowett was, according to Huntford, "a stodgy, prosaic looking" businessman, who was, in 1920, a co-founder and principal contributor to an animal nutrition research institute in Aberdeen known as the Rowett Research Institute (now part of the University of Aberdeen). He had also endowed dental research work at the Middlesex Hospital. ### Quest In March 1921, Shackleton renamed his expedition vessel Quest. She was a small ship, 125 tons according to Huntford, with sail and auxiliary engine power purportedly capable of making eight knots, but in fact rarely making more than five-and-a-half. Huntford describes her as "straight-stemmed", with an awkward square rig, and a tendency to wallow in heavy seas. Fisher reports that she was built in 1917, weighed 204 tons, and had a large and spacious deck. Although she had some modern facilities, such as electric lights in the cabins, she was unsuited to long oceanic voyages; Shackleton, on the first day out, observed that "in no way are we shipshape or fitted to ignore even the mildest storm". Leif Mills, in his biography of Frank Wild, says that had the ship been taken to the Beaufort Sea in accordance with Shackleton's original plans, she would probably have been crushed in the Arctic pack ice. On her voyage south she suffered frequent damage and breakdowns, requiring repairs at every port of call. ### Personnel The Times had reported that Shackleton planned to take a dozen men to the Arctic, "chiefly those who had accompanied him on earlier expeditions". In fact, Quest left London for the south with 20 men, of whom eight were old Endurance comrades; another, James Dell, was a veteran from the Discovery, 20 years previously. Some of the Endurance hands had not been fully paid from the earlier expedition, but were prepared to join Shackleton again out of personal loyalty. Another Shackleton loyalist, Ernest Joyce, had fallen out with Shackleton over the money he claimed was owed to him, and was not invited to join the expedition. Frank Wild, on his fourth trip with Shackleton, filled the second-in-command post as he had on the Endurance expedition. Frank Worsley, Endurance's former captain, became captain of Quest. Other old comrades included surgeons Alexander Macklin and James McIlroy, meteorologist Leonard Hussey, engineer Alexander Kerr, seaman Tom McLeod and cook Charles Green. Shackleton had assumed that Tom Crean would sign up, and had assigned him duties "in charge of boats", but Crean had retired from the navy to start a family back home in County Kerry, and declined Shackleton's invitation. Of the newcomers, Roderick Carr, a New Zealand-born Royal Air Force pilot, was hired to fly the expedition's aeroplane, an Avro Baby modified as a seaplane with an 80-horsepower engine. He had met Shackleton in north Russia, and had recently been serving as chief of staff to the Lithuanian Air Force. Due to some missing parts, the aeroplane was not used during the expedition and Carr assisted with the general scientific work. Scientific staff included Australian biologist Hubert Wilkins, who had Arctic experience, and Canadian geologist Vibert Douglas, who had initially signed for the aborted Beaufort Sea expedition. The recruits who caught the most public attention were two members of The Boy Scouts Association, Norman Mooney and James Marr. As the result of publicity organised by the Daily Mail newspaper, these two had been selected to join the expedition out of around 1,700 Scouts who had applied to go. Mooney, who was from the Orkney Islands, dropped out during the voyage south, leaving the ship at Madeira after suffering chronic seasickness. Marr, an 18-year-old from Aberdeen, remained throughout, winning plaudits from Shackleton and Wild for his application to the tasks at hand. After being put to work in the ship's coal bunkers, according to Wild, Marr "came out of the trial very well, showing an amount of hardihood and endurance that was remarkable". ## Expedition ### Voyage south Quest sailed from St Katharine Docks, London, on 17 September 1921, after inspection by King George V. Large crowds gathered on the banks of the river and on the bridges, to witness the event. Marr wrote in his diary that it was as though "all London had conspired together to bid us a heartening farewell". Shackleton's original intention was to sail down to Cape Town, visiting the main South Atlantic islands on the way. From Cape Town, Quest would head for the Enderby Land coast of Antarctica where, once in the ice, it would explore the coastline towards Coats Land in the Weddell Sea. At the end of the summer season the ship would visit South Georgia before returning to Cape Town for refitting and preparation for the second year's work. The ship's performance in the early stages of the voyage disrupted this schedule. Serious problems with the engine necessitated a week's stay in Lisbon, and further stops in Madeira and the Cape Verde Islands. These delays and the slow speed of the ship led Shackleton to decide that it would be necessary to sacrifice entirely the visits to the South Atlantic islands, and instead he turned the ship towards Rio de Janeiro, where the engine could receive a thorough overhaul. Quest reached Rio on 22 November 1921. The engine overhaul, and the replacement of a damaged topmast, delayed the party in Rio for four weeks. This meant that it was no longer practical to proceed to Cape Town and then on to the ice. Shackleton decided to sail directly to Grytviken harbour in South Georgia. Equipment and stores that had been sent on to Cape Town would have to be sacrificed, but Shackleton hoped that this shortfall could be made up in South Georgia. He was vague about the direction the expedition should take after South Georgia; Macklin wrote in his diary, "The Boss says...quite frankly that he does not know what he will do." ### Death of Shackleton On 17 December 1921, the day before Quest was due to leave Rio, Shackleton fell ill. He may have suffered a heart attack; Macklin was called, but Shackleton refused to be examined and declared himself "better" the next morning. On the ensuing voyage to South Georgia he was, from the accounts of his shipmates, unusually subdued and listless. He also began drinking champagne each morning, "to deaden the pain", contrary to his normal rule of not allowing liquor at sea. A severe storm ruined the expedition's proposed Christmas celebrations, and a new problem with the engine's steam furnace slowed progress and caused Shackleton further stress. By 1 January 1922, the weather had abated: "Rest and calm after the storm – the year has begun kindly for us", wrote Shackleton in his diary. On 4 January, South Georgia was sighted, and late that morning Quest anchored at Grytviken. After visiting the whaling establishment ashore, Shackleton returned to the ship apparently refreshed. He told Frank Wild that they would celebrate their deferred Christmas the next day, and retired to his cabin to write his diary. "The old smell of dead whale permeates everything", he wrote. "It is a strange and curious place ... A wonderful evening. In the darkening twilight I saw a lone star hover, gem like above the bay." Later he slept and was heard snoring by the surgeon McIlroy, who had just finished his watch-keeping duty. Shortly after 02:00 on the morning of 5 January, Macklin, who had taken over the watch, was summoned to Shackleton's cabin. He found Shackleton complaining of back pains and severe facial neuralgia, and asking for a painkilling drug. In a brief discussion, Macklin told his leader that he had been overdoing things, and needed to lead a more regular life. Macklin records Shackleton as saying: "You're always wanting me to give up things, what is it I ought to give up?" Macklin replied, "Chiefly alcohol, Boss, I don't think it agrees with you." Immediately afterwards Shackleton "had a very severe paroxysm, during which he died". The death certificate, signed by Macklin, gave the cause as "Atheroma of the Coronary arteries and Heart failure" – in modern terms, coronary thrombosis. Later that morning, Wild, now in command, gave the news to the shocked crew, and told them that the expedition would carry on. The body was taken ashore for embalming before its return to England. On 19 January, Leonard Hussey accompanied the body on board a steamer bound for Montevideo, but on arrival there he found a message from Emily Shackleton, requesting that the body be returned to South Georgia for burial. Hussey took the body back to Grytviken, where Shackleton was buried on 5 March in the Norwegian cemetery. Quest had meantime sailed, so only Hussey of Shackleton's former comrades was present at the interment. A rough cross marked the burial site, until it was replaced by a tall granite column six years later. ### Voyage to the ice As leader, Wild had to arrange where the expedition should now go. Kerr reported that a longstanding problem with the ship's furnace was manageable and, after supplementing stores and equipment, Wild decided to proceed generally in accordance with Shackleton's original intentions. He would take the ship eastward towards Bouvet Island and then beyond, before turning south to enter the ice as close as possible to Enderby Land, and begin coastal survey work there. The expedition would also investigate an appearance of land in the mouth of the Weddell Sea, reported by James Clark Ross in 1842, but not seen since. Ultimately, progress would depend on weather, ice conditions, and the capabilities of the ship. Quest left South Georgia on 18 January, heading south-east towards the South Sandwich Islands. There was a heavy swell, such that the overladen ship frequently dipped its gunwales below the waves, filling the waist with water. As they proceeded, Wild wrote that Quest rolled like a log, leaked and required regular pumping, was heavy on coal consumption, and was slow. All these factors led him to change his plan at the end of January. Bouvet Island was abandoned in favour of a more southerly course that brought them to the edge of the pack ice on 4 February. "Now the little Quest can really try her mettle", wrote Wild, as the ship entered the loose pack. He noted that Quest was the smallest ship ever to attempt to penetrate the heavy Antarctic ice, and pondered on the fate of others. "Shall we escape, or will the Quest join the ships in Davy Jones's Locker?" During the days that followed, as they moved southward in falling temperatures, the ice thickened. On 12 February, they reached the most southerly latitude they would attain, 69°17'S, and their most easterly longitude, 17°9'E, well short of Enderby Land. Noting the state of the sea ice and fearing being frozen in, Wild retreated to the north and west. He still hoped to tackle the heavy ice, and if possible, break through to the hidden land beyond. On 18 February, he turned the ship south again for another try, but was no more successful than before. On 24 February, after a series of further efforts had failed, Wild set a course westward across the mouth of the Weddell Sea towards Elephant Island, where Wild and 21 others had been stranded during Shackleton's Imperial Trans-Antarctic Expedition six years earlier. They would then return to South Georgia before the onset of winter. For the most part, the long passage across the Weddell Sea proceeded uneventfully. There was a growing level of unrest among the crew, perhaps provoked by disappointment with the apparent aimlessness of the voyage; Worsley in particular was critical of Wild's leadership. Wild, in his own account, dealt with this discontent by the threat of "the most drastic treatment". On 12 March, they reached 64°11'S, 46°4'W, which was the area where Ross had recorded an appearance of land in 1842, but there was no sign of it, and a depth sounding of over 2,300 fathoms (13,800 ft; 4,200 m) indicated no likelihood of land nearby. From 15 to 21 March, Quest was frozen into the ice, and the shortage of coal became a major concern. Wild hoped that the diminished fuel supply could be supplemented by blubber from the seals at Elephant Island. On 25 March, the island was sighted. Wild wanted if possible to revisit Cape Wild, the site of the old Endurance expedition camp, but bad weather prevented this. They viewed the site through binoculars, picking out the old landmarks, before landing on the western coast to hunt for elephant seals. They were able to obtain sufficient blubber to mix with the coal so that, aided by a favourable wind, they reached South Georgia on 6 April. ### Return Quest remained in South Georgia for a month, during which time Shackleton's old comrades erected a memorial cairn to their former leader, on a headland overlooking the entrance to Grytviken harbour. On 8 May 1922, Quest sailed for Cape Town, where Wild hoped to arrange a refit in preparation for a more productive second season in the ice. The first port of call was Tristan da Cunha, a remote inhabited island to the west and south of Cape Town. After a rough crossing of the "Roaring Forties", Quest arrived there on 20 May. Following orders from Robert Baden-Powell, Marr presented a flag to the local Scout Troop. During the five-day stay, with the help of some of the islanders, the expedition made brief landings on the small Inaccessible Island, 20 miles (32 km) south-west of Tristan, and visited the even smaller Nightingale Island, collecting specimens. Wild's impressions of the stay at Tristan were not altogether favourable. He noted the appalling squalor and poverty, and said of the population: "They are ignorant, shut off almost completely from the world, horribly limited in outlook." After the Scout parade and flag presentation, Quest sailed on to Gough Island, 200 miles (320 km) to the east, where members of the expedition took geological and botanical samples. They arrived at Cape Town on 18 June, to be greeted by enthusiastic crowds. South African Prime Minister Jan Smuts gave an official reception, and they were honoured at dinners and lunches by local organisations. They were also met by Rowett's agent, with the message that they should return to England. Wild wrote: "I should have liked one more season in the Enderby Quadrant ... much might be accomplished by making Cape Town our starting point and setting out early in the season." On 19 July, they left Cape Town and sailed north. Their final visits were to Saint Helena, Ascension Island and São Vicente. On 16 September, one year after departure, they arrived at Plymouth harbour. ## Aftermath ### Assessment According to Wild, the expedition ended quietly, although his biographer Leif Mills writes of enthusiastic crowds in Plymouth Sound. At the end of his account, Wild expressed the hope that the information they had brought back might "prove of value in helping to solve the great natural problems that still beset us". These results were summarised in five brief appendices to Wild's book. The summaries reflected the efforts of the scientific staff to collect data and specimens at each port of call, and the geological and survey work carried out by Carr and Douglas on South Georgia, before the southern voyage. Eventually a few scientific papers and articles were developed from this material, but it was, in Leif Mills's words, "little enough to show for a year's work". The lack of a clear, defined expedition objective was aggravated by the failure to call at Cape Town on the way south, which meant that important equipment was not picked up. On South Georgia, Wild found little that could make up for this loss – there were no dogs on the island, so no sledging work could be carried out, which eliminated Wild's preferred choice of a revised expedition goal, an exploration of Graham Land on the Antarctic Peninsula. The death of Shackleton before the beginning of serious work was a heavy blow, and questions were raised about the adequacy of Wild as his replacement. Some reports imply that Wild drank heavily – "practically an alcoholic", according to Huntford. Mills suggests that even if Shackleton had lived to complete the expedition, it is arguable whether under the circumstances it could have achieved more than it did under Wild's command. The non-use of the aeroplane was a disappointment; Shackleton had hoped to pioneer the use of air transport in Antarctic waters, and had discussed this issue with the British Air Ministry. According to Fisher's account, essential aeroplane parts had been sent on to Cape Town, but remained uncollected. The long-range, 220-volt wireless equipment did not work properly, and was abandoned early on. The smaller, 110-volt equipment worked only within a range of 250 miles (400 km). During the Tristan visit, Wild attempted to install a new wireless apparatus with the help of a local missionary, but this was also unsuccessful. ### End of an era An Antarctic hiatus followed the return of Quest, with no significant expeditions to the region for seven years. The expeditions that then followed were of a different character from their predecessors, belonging to the "mechanical age" that succeeded the Heroic Age. At the end of his narrative of the Quest expedition, Wild wrote of the Antarctic: "I think that my work there is done"; he never returned, closing a career which, like Shackleton's, had bracketed the entire Heroic Age. In 1923, he emigrated to the Union of South Africa, where, after a series of business failures and dogged by ill health, he was employed in a succession of low-paid jobs. In March 1939, British authorities awarded him an annual pension of £170; Wild commented: "I don't want to grumble, but I think it might have been made big enough for the poor old hero and his wife to live on". Wild died on 19 August 1939, aged 66. The cause of death recorded was pneumonia and diabetes mellitus. None of the other Endurance veterans returned to the Antarctic, although Worsley made one voyage to the Arctic in 1925. Of the other crew and staff of Quest, Australian naturalist Hubert Wilkins became a pioneer aviator in both the Arctic and Antarctic, and flew from Point Barrow, Alaska, to Spitsbergen in 1928. He also made several unsuccessful attempts during the 1930s, in collaboration with American adventurer Lincoln Ellsworth, to fly to the South Pole. James Marr also became an Antarctic regular after qualifying as a marine biologist, and joined several Australian expeditions in the late 1920s and 1930s. Roderick Carr became an Air Marshal in the Royal Air Force and deputy chief of staff to the Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force in 1945.

The Boat Race 2019

Cambridge vs Oxford rowing race, April 2019

The Boat Race 2019 took place on 7 April 2019. Held annually, The Boat Race is a side-by-side rowing race between crews from the universities of Oxford and Cambridge along a 4.2-mile (6.8 km) tidal stretch of the River Thames in south-west London. This was the 74th women's race and the 165th men's race, and, for the fourth time in the history of the event, the men's, women's and both reserves' races were all held on the Tideway on the same day. The women's race was the first event of the day, and saw Cambridge lead from the start, eventually winning by a considerable margin. It was their third consecutive victory, taking the overall record in the Women's Boat Race to 44–30 in their favour. The men's race was the final event of the day and completed a second consecutive whitewash as Cambridge won; it was their third victory in four years, taking the overall record to 84–80 in their favour. In the women's reserve race, Cambridge's Blondie defeated Oxford's Osiris, their fourth consecutive victory. The men's reserve race was won by Cambridge's Goldie, who defeated Oxford's Isis. The races were watched live by thousands of spectators lining the banks of the Thames. They were also live-streamed on YouTube and by multiple media organisations around the world, including in Germany, South Africa and China. ## Background The Boat Race is a side-by-side rowing competition between the University of Oxford (sometimes referred to as the "Dark Blues") and the University of Cambridge (sometimes referred to as the "Light Blues"). First held in 1829, the race takes place on the 4.2-mile (6.8 km) Championship Course, between Putney and Mortlake on the River Thames in south-west London. The rivalry is a major point of honour between the two universities; the race is followed throughout the United Kingdom and broadcast worldwide. Cambridge went into the race as champions, having won the 2018 race by a margin of three lengths, and led overall with 83 victories to Oxford's 80 (excluding the 1877 race, a dead heat). It was the fourth time in the history of The Boat Race that all four senior races – the men's, women's, men's reserves' and women's reserves' – were held on the same day and on the same course along the Tideway. Before 2015, the women's race, which first took place in 1927, was usually held at the Henley Boat Races along the 2,000-metre (2,200 yd) course. However, on at least two occasions in the interwar period, the women competed on the Thames between Chiswick and Kew. Cambridge's women went into the race as reigning champions, having won the 2018 race by seven lengths, and led 43–30 overall. The autumn reception, where the previous year's losing team challenges the winners to a rematch the next spring, was held at the Guildhall in London on 8 November 2018. As Cambridge's women had won the previous year's race, it was Oxford's responsibility to offer the traditional challenge to the Cambridge University Women's Boat Club (CUWBC). To that end, Eleanor Shearer, President of Oxford University Women's Boat Club (OUWBC), laid down the gauntlet to Abigail Parker, her Cambridge counterpart. Cambridge's victory in the men's race meant that Felix Drinkall, President of Oxford University Boat Club (OUBC), challenged Dara Alizadeh, President of Cambridge University Boat Club (CUBC). The 74th women's race was umpired by Richard Phelps, a former rower who successfully represented Cambridge in the 1993, 1994 and 1995 races. He had previously umpired the men's race once, in 2014. The 165th men's race was umpired by Rob Clegg, who rowed for the Dark Blues in the 1994, 1995 and 1996 races. He umpired the women's race in 2016. The women's reserve race was overseen by Tony Reynolds, while the men's reserve race was umpired by multiple Olympic gold-medallist Matthew Pinsent. As well as rowing for Oxford in the 1990, 1991 and 1993 races, he was assistant umpire in the 2012 race before umpiring the 2013 men's race and the 2018 women's race. On 30 January 2019, the Royal National Lifeboat Institution was announced as the official charity partner for the event. The event was broadcast live in the United Kingdom on the BBC. Numerous broadcasters worldwide also showed the main races, including SuperSport across Africa, the EBU across Europe and CCTV-5 in China. It was also streamed live on BBC Online and YouTube. ## Coaches The Cambridge men's crew coaching team was led by their chief coach, Rob Baker, who had previously coached CUWBC to victories in both the 2017 and 2018 races. He was assisted by Richard Chambers, silver medallist in the men's lightweight coxless four at the 2012 Summer Olympics. Donald Legget, who rowed for the Light Blues in the 1963 and 1964 races acted as a supporting coach, along with coxing coach Henry Fieldman (who steered Cambridge in the 2013 race) and the medical officer Simon Owens. Sean Bowden was chief coach for Oxford, having been responsible for the senior men's crew since 1997, winning 12 from 19 races. He is a former Great Britain Olympic coach and coached the Light Blues in the 1993 and 1994 Boat Races. His assistant coach was Brendan Gliddon. Cambridge women's chief coach was Robert Weber, who joined Cambridge University from Hamilton College in New York, where he was Head Rowing Coach and Associate Professor of Physical Education. He was assisted by Paddy Ryan and Astrid Cohnen. Oxford women's chief coach was the former OUBC assistant coach Andy Nelder, who previously worked with Bowden for eleven years. He was assisted by James Powell. ## Trials Dates for the trials, where crews are able to simulate the race proper on the Championship Course, were announced on 23 November 2018. ### Women Oxford's women's trial took place on the Championship Course on 7 December, between Blitzen and Comet, named after two of Santa Claus's reindeer. Comet, coxed by the OUWBC president Eleanor Shearer, took an early lead and held a length's advantage by Craven Cottage. Extending their lead to two lengths by Hammersmith Bridge, Comet moved across Blitzen to control the remainder of the race. In deteriorating conditions, Comet coped better and won by three lengths. Cambridge's trial race was held on the Championship Course on 10 December, between Curie and Suttner, named after Nobel Prize winners Marie Curie and Bertha von Suttner. Suttner won the toss and elected to start from the Surrey station. Curie held an early lead but a push from Suttner towards Hammersmith Bridge levelled the race, umpire Richard Phelps having to warn both crews for encroachment. A clash of blades halfway down Chiswick Eyot resulted in Suttner's bow rower being unseated; Curie took advantage and rowed several lengths clear before the umpire halted the race. After the restart from Chiswick Pier, Curie held a slight lead at Barnes Bridge and took advantage of the bend of the river to pass the finishing line with a clear-water advantage. ### Men Oxford's trial race was held on the Championship Course on 7 December, between Reggie and Flea, named in commemoration of Second Lieutenant Reginald Fletcher, who rowed for OUBC in the 1914 race, and Lieutenant Colonel William Fletcher, a member of the Dark Blue crew in four consecutive races between 1890 and 1893. The trial took place without Oxford's president, Felix Drinkall, who was absent due to injury. After a close start and in windy, wet conditions, Flea took a slight advantage while Reggie was warned for encroachment. More aggressive steering from Reggie around the Hammersmith bend saw them take a half-length lead which they maintained past St Paul's School. Flea pushed along Chiswick Eyot and in calmer waters re-took the lead and were a length ahead as they rowed away from Barnes Bridge. They increased their lead to pass the finishing line nearly two lengths ahead of Reggie. Cambridge's men's trial took place on the Championship Course on 10 December, between Roger and Lancelot, named in honour of two alumni killed in action during the First World War. Lieutenant Colonel Roger Kerrison had rowed in the 1893 and 1894 races while Lieutenant Lancelot Ridley coxed in both the 1913 and 1914 races. Roger won the toss and elected to start from the Surrey station, with the race taking place in "testing conditions". Following warnings from the umpire Rob Clegg, Roger was forced to steer off-course, allowing Lancelot to take advantage, and hold a lead of more than a length by Hammersmith Bridge. They continued to dominate the race and crossed the finishing line several lengths ahead of Roger. ## Buildup The official fixtures to be raced in advance of The Boat Race were announced on 11 February 2019. ### Women On 23 February 2019, CUWBC faced a crew from Nereus Rowing Club in two races along sections of the Championship Course. In good weather conditions, the first piece saw Nereus take an early lead, the Dutch crew holding a length's lead by Fulham Wall. CUWBC's cox steered a wide course into slower water allowing Nereus to extend their lead to three lengths by the Mile Post. Although CUWBC reduced the deficit by a length on the approach to the Harrods Furniture Depository, the race concluded at Chiswick Steps with Nereus two lengths ahead. The second race, from Chiswick Eyot to the finishing post, started well for Cambridge, who held a slender lead until Barnes Bridge whereupon Nereus drew level, and following a push, crossed the finishing line a quarter of a length ahead. Two days later, OUWBC raced in a three-piece set of five-minute races along the Championship Course against Imperial College, umpired by Richard Phelps. Starting from Putney Bridge, the first race saw Oxford take an early lead which they extended with ease to pass the winning line at Harrods by four lengths. Imperial started the second race, commencing from St Paul's School, with a length's head start. Oxford were level within two minutes and despite being warned for steering infringements, went on to win the race by three lengths. The third piece started with a half-length head start to Imperial, and once again, although Oxford were warned for aggressive steering, they closed the gap quickly and had clear water advantage with two minutes of the race remaining. They won the race by three and a half lengths. CUWBC raced their final fixture on 3 March 2019 against Oxford Brookes University Boat Club (OBUBC) in three pieces. Taking place in poor and worsening conditions, the first race, from the start to the Mile Post, was close throughout, but Cambridge led from the outset and passed the finish line half a length ahead. The second piece, from Harrods to Chiswick Steps, once again saw Cambridge take the lead and with OBUBC's cox steering to avoid windy conditions, CUWBC pulled away to a clear win. The final race, from the Bandstand to the finishing post, was dominated again by Cambridge, who coped with the difficult conditions better than their opposition, to win by three and a half lengths. OUWBC faced a crew from Molesey in a two-piece set along the Championship Course on 23 March 2019. In the first race, from Putney to Chiswick Eyot, Molesey took an early lead, but with the course of the river in the Dark Blues' favour, OUWBC drew level by Craven Cottage, on the straight towards Hammersmith Bridge. OUWBC continued to press and extended their lead out to one and a half lengths before passing the finish line at Chiswick. The second piece, between Chiswick and the finishing post, saw Molesey take the lead once again before Oxford redressed the balance by Barnes Bridge. A hard-fought race ended with OUWBC passing the finishing line a quarter of a length ahead. ### Men OUBC were scheduled to race against OBUBC on 10 March 2019, but the fixture was postponed as a result of poor weather conditions. The fixture was reorganised and took place on 17 March 2019, in two pieces. The first race was from Chiswick Steps to Beverley Brook, and despite OUBC winning the toss and taking the more favourable Surrey side of the river, it was Oxford Brookes who took the early lead. By Hammersmith Bridge, OBUBC had a clear water advantage over the Dark Blues, finishing the race well ahead. The second piece, along the same section of the Championship Course, saw the crews switch starting stations, but a similar outcome. OUBC made a good start but OBUBC quickly overtook them and pulled away to win comfortably. On 23 March 2019, OUBC raced against Leander Club from the Championship Course start line to Chiswick Steps. From the start, it was a close fixture with neither boat showing real dominance and the umpire Rob Clegg having to issue multiple warnings as both crews infringed each other's racing line. Oxford held a slight lead by the Mile Post but Leander responded to draw level as the crews passed Harrods, and took the lead at Chiswick Eyot. Warned once again by the umpire, Leander course correction allowed the Dark Blues into faster water, and into a canvas lead which they held to the conclusion of the race. The fixture between CUBC and OBUBC was due to be held on 13 March 2019 but was postponed because of adverse weather. Instead, it was held on 24 March. The OBUBC crew included World Champion gold medallist Matthew Tarrant and former Dark Blue Josh Bugajski. In the first of two pieces, CUBC took early advantage and were ahead at the Mile Post, but Oxford Brookes responded at Harrods with a push to see them move ahead. With the bend in the river against the Light Blues, OBUBC extended their lead to three-quarters of a length along Chiswick Eyot and winning the race. The second piece once again saw CUBC take the lead, almost out to a length, before a clash of oars resulted in one of the CUBC oarsmen catching a crab. OBUBC moved past Cambridge and despite efforts to row with a broken backstay, CUBC ended the race nearly a length behind their opponents. ## Crews The official weigh-in for the crews took place at City Hall, London, on 14 March 2019, and was hosted by BBC broadcaster Andrew Cotter. ### Women The Cambridge crew weighed an average of 72.3 kilograms (159 lb), 1.2 kilograms (2.6 lb) more per rower than their opponents, and stand at an average height of , 1.8 centimetres (0.71 in) taller than Oxford. OUWBC saw two former Blues return from last year's crew, in Renée Koolschijn and Beth Bridgman, while Cambridge's crew contained just one rower with Boat Race experience: Tricia Smith was a member of the victorious 2018 Light Blue boat. ### Men The Oxford crew weighed an average of 90.0 kg (198.4 lb), just 0.2 kg (0.4 lb) more than their opponents, while the average height of rowers in each crew was identical, at . The Dark Blues included two rowers who had participated in the previous year's race in the OUBC president Felix Drinkall and Benedict Aldous. Cambridge also included two former Blues, Dara Alizadeh and Freddie Davidson (who had also rowed in the 2017 race), and Matthew Holland, who had coxed CUWBC to victory in 2017. The Light Blue crew also contained two-time Olympic champion James Cracknell who, at the age of 46, became the oldest competitor to take part in the Boat Race. ## Races The OUBC crew presented at the official introduction at City Hall was modified before the race. Charlie Buchanan replaced Benedict Aldous, and rowed in the seven seat, while cox Anna Carbery was replaced by Toby de Mendonca. The races were held on 7 April 2019 in overcast conditions. At around 3:30 p.m., police dispersed a protest by "Cambridge Zero Carbon" and "Oxford Climate Justice Campaign" on Hammersmith Bridge. Both organisations were protesting against investments by both universities in fossil fuels. ### Reserves Cambridge's Blondie and Goldie won the women's and men's reserve races by five lengths and one length respectively. ### Women's CUWBC won the toss and elected to start from the Surrey side of the river, handing the Middlesex side to Oxford. Weather conditions for the race, which started at 2:14 p.m. Greenwich Mean Time (GMT), were 11 °C (52 °F), overcast but calm. The Light Blues took an early lead and by Craven Cottage were a length ahead. They continued to extend their advantage, and eventually passed the finishing post in a time of 18 minutes 47 seconds, five lengths ahead of their opponents. It was Cambridge's third consecutive victory but only their fourth win in twelve years, and took the overall record in the event to 44–30 in their favour. ### Men's CUBC won the toss and elected to start from the Surrey side of the river, leaving Oxford with the Middlesex side. The race started at 3:12 p.m. GMT and the Light Blues were quickly ahead, taking a half a length advantage within thirty seconds. Despite several warnings from the umpire, an oar clash followed but eventually CUBC steered wider to avoid further sanction. By Hammersmith Bridge, OUBC were four seconds behind, but began to recover some of the gap as the crews passed Chiswick Steps. The Light Blues maintained their lead and passed the finishing post in a time of 16 minutes 57 seconds, 28 seconds slower than the course record, but 2 seconds and 1 length ahead of their opponents. The Oxford cox raised a protest, but it was declined. It was Cambridge's third victory in the last four years, and took the overall record in the event to 84–80 in their favour. ## Reaction After the victory, Cracknell's former Olympic team-mate Matthew Pinsent described his colleague's achievement as "off the scale". CUWBC stroke Lily Lindsay said that despite having featured in international rowing for the United States, rowing in the Boat Race was incomparable, and "training alongside my team-mates has been unbelievable. It's been a pleasure".

Zodiac (film)

2007 American film by David Fincher

Zodiac is a 2007 American neo-noir mystery thriller film directed by David Fincher from a screenplay by James Vanderbilt, based on the non-fiction books by Robert Graysmith, Zodiac (1986) and Zodiac Unmasked (2002). The film stars Jake Gyllenhaal, Mark Ruffalo, and Robert Downey Jr. with Anthony Edwards, Brian Cox, Elias Koteas, Donal Logue, John Carroll Lynch, Chloë Sevigny, Philip Baker Hall and Dermot Mulroney in supporting roles. The film tells the story of the manhunt for the Zodiac Killer, a serial murderer who terrorized the San Francisco Bay Area during the late 1960s and early 1970s, taunting police with letters, bloodstained clothing, and ciphers mailed to newspapers. The case remains one of the United States' most infamous unsolved crimes. Fincher, Vanderbilt, and producer Bradley J. Fischer spent 18 months conducting their own investigation and research into the Zodiac murders. Fincher employed the digital Thomson Viper FilmStream Camera to photograph most of the film, with traditional high-speed film cameras used for slow-motion murder sequences. Zodiac was released by Paramount Pictures in North America and Warner Bros. Pictures in international markets on March 2, 2007, and received largely positive reviews, with praise for its writing, directing, acting, and historical accuracy. The film was nominated for several awards, including the Saturn Award for Best Action, Adventure or Thriller Film. It grossed over \$84.7 million worldwide on a production budget of \$65 million. In a 2016 critics' poll conducted by the BBC, Zodiac was voted the 12th greatest film of the 21st century. ## Plot On July 4, 1969, an unknown man attacks Darlene Ferrin and Mike Mageau with a handgun at a lovers' lane in Vallejo, California. Only Mike survives. One month later, the San Francisco Chronicle receives encrypted letters written by the killer calling himself "Zodiac," who threatens to kill a dozen people unless his coded message containing his identity is published. Political cartoonist Robert Graysmith, who correctly guesses that his identity is not in the message, is not taken seriously by crime reporter Paul Avery or the editors and is excluded from the initial details about the killings. When the newspaper publishes the letters, a married couple deciphers one. In September, the killer stabs law student Bryan Hartnell and Cecelia Shepard at Lake Berryessa in Napa County; Cecelia dies two days later. At the office, Avery makes fun of Graysmith before they discuss the coded letters. Graysmith interprets the letter, which Avery finds helpful, and he begins sharing information. One of Graysmith's insights about the letters is that Zodiac's reference to man as "the most dangerous animal of them all" is a reference to the film The Most Dangerous Game, which features the villainous Count Zaroff, a man who hunts live human prey. Two weeks later, San Francisco taxicab driver Paul Stine is shot and killed in the city's Presidio Heights district. The Zodiac killer mails pieces of Stine's bloodstained shirt to the Chronicle along with a taunting letter. San Francisco police inspectors Dave Toschi and his partner Bill Armstrong are assigned to the case by Captain Marty Lee and work closely with Vallejo's Jack Mulanax and Captain Ken Narlow in Napa. Someone claiming to be Zodiac continues to send taunting letters and speaks on the phone with lawyer Melvin Belli on the KGO-TV morning talk show hosted by Jim Dunbar. In 1971, Detectives Toschi, Armstrong, and Mulanax question Arthur Leigh Allen, a suspect in the Vallejo case. They notice that he wears a Zodiac wristwatch, with the same logo used by the killer, and Toschi thinks he is the killer. However, a handwriting expert insists that Allen did not write the Zodiac letters, even though Allen is said to be ambidextrous. Avery receives a letter threatening his life; becoming paranoid, he turns to drugs and alcohol. He shares information with the Riverside Police Department that the killer might have been active before the initial killings, angering Toschi and Armstrong. The case's notoriety weighs on Toschi, who cannot sit through a Hollywood film, Dirty Harry, loosely based on the Zodiac case. By 1978, Avery has moved to the Sacramento Bee. Graysmith persistently contacts Toschi about the Zodiac murders and eventually impresses him with his knowledge of the case. While Toschi cannot directly give Graysmith access to the evidence, he provides names in other police departments where Zodiac murders occurred. Armstrong transfers from the San Francisco Police homicide division, and Toschi is demoted for supposedly forging a Zodiac letter. Graysmith continues his own investigation, profiled in the Chronicle, and gives a television interview about the book he is writing on the case. He begins receiving phone calls from someone breathing heavily. As his obsession deepens, Graysmith loses his job, and his wife Melanie leaves him, taking their children. Graysmith learns that Allen lived close to Ferrin and probably knew her and that his birthday matches the one Zodiac gave when he spoke to one of Melvin Belli's maids. While circumstantial evidence seems to indicate his guilt, the physical evidence, such as fingerprints and handwriting samples, do not implicate him. In 1983, Graysmith tracks Allen to a Vallejo Ace Hardware store, where he is employed as a sales clerk; they stare at each other before Graysmith leaves. Eight years later, after Graysmith's book, Zodiac, has become a bestseller, Mike Mageau identifies Allen from a police mugshot. A textual epilogue indicates that Allen died before police could question him and that the case remains open. ## Cast - Jake Gyllenhaal as Robert Graysmith - Mark Ruffalo as Inspector Dave Toschi - Robert Downey Jr. as Paul Avery - Anthony Edwards as Inspector Bill Armstrong - Brian Cox as Melvin Belli - Elias Koteas as Sergeant Jack Mulanax - Donal Logue as Captain Ken Narlow - John Carroll Lynch as Arthur Leigh Allen - Dermot Mulroney as Captain Marty Lee - Chloë Sevigny as Melanie Graysmith - John Terry as Charles Thieriot - Philip Baker Hall as Sherwood Morrill - June Diane Raphael as Carol Toschi - Ciara Moriarty as Darlene Ferrin - Adam Goldberg as Duffy Jennings - Tom Verica as Jim Dunbar - Lee Norris as Mike Mageau - Jimmi Simpson as Older Mike Mageau - Zach Grenier as Mel Nicolai - Joel Bissonnette as Inspector Kracke - James LeGros as Detective George Bawart - John Getz as Templeton Peck - John Mahon as Captain Gillette - Matt Winston as John Allen - Jules Bruff as Catherine Allen - John Ennis as Terry Pascoe - Patrick Scott Lewis as Bryan Hartnell - Pell James as Cecilia Shepard - Charles Fleischer as Bob Vaughn - Clea DuVall as Linda del Buono - Zachary Sauers as Aaron Graysmith - Micah Sauers as David Graysmith - Paul Schulze as Sandy Panzarella - John Hemphill as Donald Cheney - Ed Setrakian as Al Hyman - Richmond Arquette as Zodiac 1 / Zodiac 2 - Bob Stephenson as Zodiac 3 - John Lacy as Zodiac 4 - Ione Skye as Kathleen Johns (uncredited) ## Production ### Development Robert Graysmith first sold the film rights to his true crime book Zodiac to Shane Salerno, with whom he had established a close relationship. Salerno managed to make a deal with Ricardo Mestres of Great Oaks Entertainment to co-produce and write the film for Touchstone Pictures. According to Stuart Hazeldine, who was pitched to rewrite it, the script would have been about the Zodiac killer resurfacing in Los Angeles. James Vanderbilt had read Robert Graysmith's book Zodiac while in high school. Years later, after becoming a screenwriter, he got the opportunity to meet Graysmith, and became fascinated by the folklore surrounding the Zodiac killer. He decided to try to translate the story into a script. Vanderbilt had endured bad experiences in the past in which the endings of his scripts had been changed, and wanted to have more control over the material this time. He pitched his adaptation of Zodiac to Mike Medavoy and Bradley J. Fischer from Phoenix Pictures, agreeing to write a spec script if he could have more creative control over it. Graysmith met Fischer and Vanderbilt at the premiere of Paul Schrader's film Auto Focus, based on Graysmith's 1991 book about the life and death of actor Bob Crane. A deal was made and they optioned the rights to Zodiac and Zodiac Unmasked when they became available after languishing at another studio for nearly a decade. David Fincher was their first choice to direct based on his work on Seven. Originally, he was going to direct an adaptation of James Ellroy's novel The Black Dahlia (later filmed by Brian De Palma), and envisioned a five-hour, \$80 million mini-series with film stars. When that failed to materialize, Fincher left that project and moved on to Zodiac. For the young Fincher, he was drawn to the Zodiac story because he spent much of his childhood in San Anselmo in Marin County during the initial murders; he thought the killer "was the ultimate boogeyman". The director was also drawn to the unresolved ending of Vanderbilt's screenplay because it felt true to real life, as cases are not always solved. Fincher felt his job was to dispel the enduring mythic stature of the case by clearly defining what was fact and what was fiction. He told Vanderbilt that he wanted the screenplay rewritten with research done from the original police reports. Fincher found that there was much speculation and hearsay and, therefore, wanted to interview people who were directly involved in the case in-person to see if their stories were believable. He did this because he felt a burden of responsibility in making a film that convicted someone posthumously. Fincher, Fischer and Vanderbilt spent months interviewing witnesses, family members of suspects, retired and current investigators, the two surviving victims, and the mayors of San Francisco and Vallejo. Fincher said, "Even when we did our own interviews, we would talk to two people. One would confirm some aspects of it and another would deny it. Plus, so much time had passed, memories are affected and the different telling of the stories would change perception. So when there was any doubt we always went with the police reports." During the course of their research, Fincher and Fischer hired Gerald McMenamin, a forensic linguistics expert and professor of linguistics at California State University Fresno, to analyze the Zodiac's letters. Unlike document examiners in the 1970s, he focused on the language of the Zodiac and how he formed his sentences in terms of structure and spelling.Fincher and Fischer approached Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer to finance the film but talks fell through because the studio wanted the running time fixed at two hours and fifteen minutes. Warner Bros. and Paramount Pictures agreed to share the production costs and were more flexible about the running time. The executives were concerned about the large amount of dialogue, lack of action scenes, and inconclusive ending. When Dave Toschi met Fincher, Fischer and Vanderbilt, Fincher told him that he was not going to make another Dirty Harry (which is loosely based on the Zodiac case). Toschi was impressed with their knowledge of the case and realized that he had learned from them. Toschi watched Zodiac several times and said "I thought Ruffalo did a good job," but also that the film reminded him of old frustrations that the case was never closed. The Zodiac's surviving victims, Mike Mageau and Bryan Hartnell, were consultants on the film. Alan J. Pakula's film All the President's Men was the template for Zodiac as Fincher felt that it was also "the story of a reporter determined to get the story at any cost and one who was new to being an investigative reporter. It was all about his obsession to know the truth." Like in that film, he did not want to spend time telling the back story of any of the characters, focusing, instead, on what they did in regards to the case." Vanderbilt was drawn to the notion that Graysmith went from a cartoonist to one of the most significant investigators of the case. He pitched the story as: "What if Garry Trudeau woke up one morning and tried to solve the Son of Sam"? As he worked on the script, he became friends with Graysmith. The filmmakers secured the cooperation of the Vallejo Police Department (one of the key investigators at the time) because they hoped that the film would inspire someone to come forward with information that might help solve the cold case. ### Casting One of Fincher's earliest conversations on the film's casting was with Jennifer Aniston. She talked about actors she had enjoyed working with; they were Gyllenhaal (The Good Girl) and Mark Ruffalo (Rumor Has It). While researching the film, Fincher considered Jake Gyllenhaal to play Robert Graysmith. According to the director, "I really liked him in Donnie Darko and I thought, 'He's an interesting double-sided coin. He can do that naive thing but he can also do possessed.'" In preparation for his role Gyllenhaal met Graysmith, and videotaped him to study his mannerisms and behavior. Initially, Mark Ruffalo was not interested in the project but Fincher wanted him to play David Toschi. He met with the actor and told him that he was rewriting the screenplay. "I loved what he was saying and loved where he was going with it", the actor remembers. For research, he read every report on the case and read all the books on the subject. Ruffalo met Toschi and found out that he had "perfect recall of the details and what happened when, where, who was there, what he was wearing. He always knew what he was wearing. I think it is seared into who he is and it was a big deal for him." Fincher thought of Anthony Edwards for the role of Inspector William Armstrong, saying "I knew I needed the most decent person I could find, because he would be the balance of the movie. In a weird way, this movie wouldn't exist without Bill Armstrong. Everything we know about the Zodiac case, we know because of his notes. So in casting the part, I wanted to get someone who is totally reliable." Originally, Gary Oldman was to play Melvin Belli but "he went to a lot of trouble, they had appliances, but just physically it wasn't going to work, he just didn't have the girth", Graysmith said. Brian Cox was cast instead. Lee Norris played the 1969 Mike Mageau, and Jimmi Simpson played the character's older version. ### Principal photography Fincher decided to use the digital Thomson Viper FilmStream Camera to shoot the film. He had previously used the Thomson Viper over the past three years on commercials for Nike, Hewlett-Packard, Heineken and Lexus, which allowed him to get used to and experiment with the equipment. He was able to use inexpensive desktop software like Final Cut Pro to edit Zodiac. Fincher remarked in an interview, "Dailies almost always end up being disappointing, like the veil is pierced and you look at it for the first time and think, 'Oh my god, this is what I really have to work with.' But when you can see what you have as it's gathered, it can be a much less neurotic process." Contrary to belief, Zodiac was not shot entirely digitally. Traditional high-speed film cameras were used for slow-motion murder sequences. Michael Mann's Miami Vice, as well as his previous effort, Collateral (a co-production of Paramount and its current sister studio DreamWorks, and which also starred Mark Ruffalo), were also shot with the camera but mixed in other formats. Once shot on the Viper camera, the files were converted to DVCPro HD 1080i and edited in Final Cut Pro. This was for editorial decisions only. During the later stages of editing the original uncompressed 1080p 4:4:4 RAW digital source footage was assembled automatically to maintain an up-to-date digital "negative" of the film. Other digital productions like Superman Returns or Apocalypto recorded to the HDCAM tape format. Fincher had previously worked with director of photography Harris Savides on Seven (he shot the opening credits) and The Game. Savides loved the script but realized, "there was so much exposition, just people talking on the phone or having conversations. It was difficult to imagine how it could be done in a visual way." Fincher and Savides did not want to repeat the look of Seven. The director's approach to Zodiac was to create a look mundane enough that audiences would accept that what they were watching was the truth. The filmmakers also did not want to glamorize the killer or tell the story through his eyes. "That would have turned the story into a first-person-shooter video game. We didn't want to make the sort of movie that serial killers would want to own," Fincher said. Savides' first experience with the Viper Filmstream camera was shooting a Motorola commercial with Fincher. From there, he used it on Zodiac. Fincher wanted to make sure that the camera was more inclined towards film production so that the studio would be more comfortable about using it on a project with a large budget. To familiarize himself with the camera, he "did as many things 'wrong' as I possibly could. I went against everything I was supposed to do with the camera." Savides felt comfortable with the camera despite its certain limitations. Fincher and Savides used the photographs of William Eggleston, Stephen Shore's work from the early Seventies, and actual photos from the Zodiac police files. The two men worked hard to capture the look and feel of the period as Fincher admitted, "I suppose there could have been more VW bugs but I think what we show is a pretty good representation of the time. It is not technically perfect. There are some flaws but some are intended." The San Francisco Chronicle was built in the old post office in the Terminal Annex Building in downtown Los Angeles. A building on nearby Spring Street subbed for the Hall of Justice and the San Francisco Police Department. Principal photography began on September 12, 2005. The filmmakers shot for five weeks in the San Francisco Bay Area and the rest of the time in Los Angeles, bringing the film in under budget, wrapping in February 2006. The film took 115 days to shoot. Some of the cast was not happy with Fincher's exacting ways and perfectionism. Some scenes required upward of 70 takes. Gyllenhaal was frustrated by the director's methods and commented in an interview, "You get a take, 5 takes, 10 takes. Some places, 90 takes. But there is a stopping point. There's a point at which you go, 'That's what we have to work with.' But we would reshoot things. So there came a point where I would say, well, what do I do? Where's the risk?" Downey said, "I just decided, aside from several times I wanted to garrote him, that I was going to give him what he wanted. I think I'm a perfect person to work for him, because I understand gulags". Fincher responded, "If an actor is going to let the role come to them, they can't resent the fact that I'm willing to wait as long as that takes. You know, the first day of production in San Francisco we shot 56 takes of Mark and Jake – and it's the 56th take that's in the movie". Ruffalo also defended his director's methods when he said, "The way I see it is, you enter into someone else's world as an actor. You can put your expectations aside and have an experience that's new and pushes and changes you, or hold on to what you think it should be and have a stubborn, immovable journey that's filled with disappointment and anger." ### Visual effects Digital Domain handled most of the film's 200+ effects shots, including pools of blood and bloody fingerprints found at crime scenes. For the murder of Cecelia Shepard at Lake Berryessa, blood seepage and clothing stains were added in post-production. Fincher did not want to shoot the blood with practical effects because cleaning the costumes after every take would take too long, so the murder sequences were done with computer-generated (CG) blood. CG was also used to recreate the San Francisco neighborhood at Washington and Cherry Streets where cab driver Paul Stine was killed. The area had changed significantly over the years and residents did not want the murder to be recreated in their neighborhood, so Fincher shot the sequence on a bluescreen stage. Production designer Donald Burt gave the visual effects team detailed drawings of the intersection as it was in 1969. Photographs of every possible angle of the area were shot with a high-resolution digital camera, allowing the effects crew to build computer-based geometric models of homes that were then textured with period facades. 3D vintage police motorcycles, squad cars, a firetruck and street lights were added to the final shot. Several of the film's establishing shots of the 1970s-era Bay Area were created by the Marin County effects house Matte World Digital (MWD). The "helicopter shots" of the fireworks-laden sky over Vallejo, the San Francisco waterfront, and the overhead shot of the cab driving through San Francisco were CG, as was the shot looking down at traffic from the tower of the Golden Gate Bridge. A time-lapse sequence of the construction of the Transamerica Pyramid was a hybrid of 2D and 3D matte painting, created using reference photos of the Pyramid taken from the rooftop of Francis Ford Coppola's Sentinel Building. MWD visual effects supervisor Craig Barron researched the Pyramid's construction for accuracy. ## Soundtrack Originally, Fincher envisioned the film's soundtrack to be composed of 40 cues of vintage music spanning the nearly three decades of the Zodiac story. Fincher and music supervisor George Drakoulias searched for pop songs that reflected the era, including Three Dog Night's cover of "Easy to Be Hard". Fincher did not plan an original score for the film, but rather a tapestry of sound design, vintage songs of the period, sound bites and clips of KFRC and advertisements for "Mathews Top of the Hill Daly City" (a prominent local consumer electronics dealership of the time). He told the studio that he did not need a composer and would purchase various songs instead. They agreed, but as the film developed, sound designer Ren Klyce felt there were some scenes that could have used music. Klyce inserted music from one of his favorite soundtracks, David Shire's score for The Conversation. Klyce contacted film and sound editor Walter Murch who worked on The Conversation, and he connected Klyce with Shire. Fincher sent Shire a copy of the script and flew him in to Los Angeles for a meeting. Fincher only wanted 15–20 minutes of score and based solely on piano. Shire worked on it and incorporated textures of a Charles Ives piece called "The Unanswered Question" and Conversation-based cues, he found that he had 37 minutes of original music. The orchestra Shire assembled consisted of musicians from the San Francisco Opera and San Francisco Ballet. Shire said, "There are 12 signs of the Zodiac and there is a way of using atonal and tonal music. So we used 12 tones, never repeating any of them but manipulating them". He used specific instruments to represent the characters: the trumpet for Toschi, the solo piano for Graysmith and the dissonant strings for the Zodiac killer. ## Release An early version of Zodiac ran three hours and eight minutes. It was supposed to be released in time for Academy Award consideration but Paramount felt that the film ran too long and asked Fincher to make changes. Contractually, he had final cut and once he reached a length he felt was right, the director refused to make any further cuts. To trim down the film to its official runtime, he had to cut a two-minute blackout montage of "hit songs signaling the passage of time from Joni Mitchell to Donna Summer." It was replaced with a title card that reads, "Four years later." Another cut scene that test screening audiences did not like involved "three guys talking into a speakerphone" to get a search warrant as Toschi and Armstrong talk to SFPD Capt. Marty Lee (Dermot Mulroney) about their case against suspect Arthur Leigh Allen. Fincher said that this scene would probably be put back on the DVD. To promote Zodiac, Paramount posted on light-poles in major cities original sketches of the actual Zodiac killer with the words, "In theaters March 2nd," at the bottom. The film was screened in competition at the 2007 Cannes Film Festival on May 17, 2007, with Fincher and Gyllenhaal participating in a press conference afterwards. The director's cut of Zodiac was given a rare screening at the Walter Reade Theater in New York City on November 19, 2007, with Fincher being interviewed by film critic Kent Jones afterwards. ### Home media The DVD for Zodiac was released on July 24, 2007, and is available widescreen or fullscreen, presented in anamorphic widescreen, and an English Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround track. The initial DVD version of Zodiac contained only a few special features. According to producer David Prior, Fincher agreed to release it as Prior needed more time to prepare bonus material. In its first week, rentals for the DVD earned \$6.7 million. The two-disc director's cut DVD and HD DVD were released on January 8, 2008, with its UK release on Blu-ray and DVD announced for September 29, 2008. Disc 1 contains, in addition to a longer cut of the film, audio commentaries by Fincher and Gyllenhaal, Downey, Fischer, Vanderbilt, and author James Ellroy. Disc 2 includes a trailer, a "Zodiac Deciphered" documentary, previsualization split-screen comparisons for the Blue Rock Springs, Lake Berryessa, and San Francisco murder sequences, and three video features: "Visual Effects of Zodiac", "This is the Zodiac Speaking", and a "His Name Was Arthur Leigh Allen". Other extras originally intended for the set, including TV spots and features on "Digital Workflow", "Linguistic Analysis", "Jeopardy Surface: Geographic Profiling" (Dr. Kim Rossmo's geographic profile of the Zodiac), and "The Psychology of Aggression: Behavioral Profiling" (Special Agent Sharon Pagaling-Hagan's behavioral profile of the Zodiac) were omitted. However, the latter three features were made available on the film's website. For Academy Awards contention, Paramount distributed the director's cut DVD to the Producers Guild of America, the Writers Guild of America and the Screen Actors Guild, instead of the official release version; the first time that the studio had done this. ## Reception ### Box office Opening in 2,362 theaters on March 2, 2007, the film grossed US\$13.3 million in its opening weekend, placing second and posting a per-theater average of \$5,671. The film was outgrossed by fellow opener Wild Hogs and saw a decline of over 50% in its second weekend, losing out to the record-breaking 300. It grossed \$33 million in North America and \$51 million in the rest of the world, bringing its current total to \$84 million. In an interview with Sight & Sound magazine, Fincher addressed the film's low gross at the North American box office: "Even with the box office being what it is, I still think there's an audience out there for this movie. Everyone has a different idea about marketing, but my philosophy is that if you market a movie to 16-year-old boys and don't deliver Saw or Seven, they're going to be the most vociferous ones coming out of the screening saying 'This movie sucks.' And you're saying goodbye to the audience who would get it because they're going to look at the ads and say, 'I don't want to see some slasher movie.'" ### Critical response On review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating of 90% based on 261 reviews, with an average rating of 7.70/10. The site's critical consensus reads: "A quiet, dialogue-driven thriller that delivers with scene after scene of gut-wrenching anxiety. David Fincher also spends more time illustrating nuances of his characters and recreating the mood of the 70s than he does on gory details of murder." At Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 78 out of 100, based on 40 critics, indicating "generally favorable reviews". Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B−" on an A+ to F scale. Entertainment Weekly critic Owen Gleiberman awarded the film an "A" grade, hailing the film as a "procedural thriller for the information age" that "spins your head in a new way, luring you into a vortex and then deeper still." Nathan Lee in his review for The Village Voice wrote that director Fincher's "very lack of pretense, coupled with a determination to get the facts down with maximum economy and objectivity, gives Zodiac its hard, bright integrity. As a crime saga, newspaper drama, and period piece, it works just fine. As an allegory of life in the information age, it blew my mind." Todd McCarthy's review in Variety magazine praised the film's "almost unerringly accurate evocation of the workaday San Francisco of 35–40 years ago. Forget the distorted emphasis on hippies and flower-power that many such films indulge in: this is the city as it was experienced by most people who lived and worked there." David Ansen, in his review for Newsweek magazine, wrote, "Zodiac is meticulously crafted – Harris Savides's state-of-the-art digital cinematography has a richness indistinguishable from film – and it runs almost two hours and 40 minutes. Still, the movie holds you in its grip from start to finish. Fincher boldly (and some may think perversely) withholds the emotional and forensic payoff we're conditioned to expect from a big studio movie." Roger Ebert gave the film a maximum of 4 stars, writing: "The film is a police procedural crossed with a newspaper movie but free of most of the cliches of either. Its most impressive accomplishment is to gather a bewildering labyrinth of facts and suspicions over a period of years and make the journey through this maze frightening and suspenseful." Ebert also praised the ensemble cast and, as a longtime columnist for The Chicago Sun-Times, asserted Zodiac was "intriguing in its accuracy" in showing the operation of a major newspaper. Time Out magazine wrote, "Zodiac isn't a puzzle film in quite that way, instead its subject is the compulsion to solve puzzles and its coup is the creeping recognition, quite contrary to the flow of crime cinema, of how fruitless that compulsion can be." Peter Bradshaw in his review for The Guardian commended the film for its "sheer cinematic virility," and gave it four stars out of five. In his review for Empire magazine, Kim Newman gave the film 4 out of 5 stars and wrote, "You'll need patience with the film's approach, which follows its main characters by poring over details, and be prepared to put up with a couple of rote family arguments and weary cop conversations, but this gripping character study becomes more agonisingly suspenseful as it gets closer to an answer that can't be confirmed." Graham Fuller in Sight & Sound magazine wrote, "the tone is pleasingly flat and mundane, evoking the demoralising grind of police work in a pre-feminist, pre-technological era. As such, Zodiac is considerably more adult than both Seven, which salivates over the macabre cat-and-mouse game it plays with the audience, and the macho brinkmanship of Fight Club." Some critics expressed disappointment with the film's long running time and lack of action scenes. "The film gets mired in the inevitable red tape of police investigations," wrote Bob Longino of The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, who also felt the film "stumbles to a rather unfulfilling conclusion" and "seems to last as long as the Oscars." Andrew Sarris of The New York Observer felt that "Mr. Fincher's flair for casting is the major asset of his curiously attenuated return to the serial-killer genre. I keep saying 'curiously' with regard to Mr. Fincher, because I can't really figure out what he is up to in Zodiac – with its two-hour-and-37-minute running time for what struck me as a shaggy-dog narrative." Christy Lemire wrote in the San Francisco Chronicle that "Jake Gyllenhaal is both the central figure and the weakest link... But he's never fleshed out sufficiently to make you believe that he'd sacrifice his safety and that of his family to find the truth. We are told repeatedly that the former Eagle Scout is just a genuinely good guy but that's not enough." David Thompson of The Guardian felt that in relation to the rest of Fincher's career, Zodiac was "the worst yet, a terrible disappointment in which an ingenious and deserving all-American serial killer nearly gets lost in the meandering treatment of cops and journalists obsessed with the case." In France, Le Monde newspaper praised Fincher for having "obtained a maturity that impresses by his mastery of form," while Libération described the film as "a thriller of elegance magnificently photographed by the great Harry Savides." However, Le Figaro wrote, "No audacity, no invention, nothing but a plot which intrigues without captivating, disturbs without terrifying, interests without exciting." #### Top ten lists Only two 2007 films (No Country for Old Men and There Will Be Blood) appeared on more critics' top ten lists than Zodiac. Some of the notable top-ten list appearances are: In the British Film Institute's 2012 Sight & Sound polls of the greatest movies ever made, three critics and one director, Bong Joon-ho, named Zodiac one of their 10 favorite films. In a 2016 critics' poll conducted by the BBC, Zodiac was ranked at 12th place in a list of the 21st century's greatest films. ### Accolades ## See also - List of films based on crime books

Jean-François de Surville

18th-century French explorer and merchant captain

Jean-François Marie de Surville (18 January 1717 – 8 April 1770) was a merchant captain with the French East India Company. He commanded a voyage of exploration to the Pacific in 1769–70. Born in Brittany, France, Surville joined the French East India Company in 1727 at the age of 10. For the next several years he sailed on voyages in Indian and Chinese waters. In 1740 he joined the French Navy; he fought in the War of the Austrian Succession and the Seven Years' War, twice becoming a prisoner of war. After his military career he rejoined the French East India Company. In 1769, in command of Saint Jean-Baptiste, he sailed from India on an expedition to the Pacific looking for trading opportunities. He explored the seas around the Solomon Islands and New Zealand before proceeding eastward across the South Pacific towards South America. Part of his route around New Zealand overlapped that of James Cook in Endeavour, which had preceded him by only a few days. De Surville drowned off the coast of Peru on 8 April 1770 while seeking help for his scurvy-afflicted crew. ## Early life Born on 18 January 1717, Jean-François Marie de Surville was the son of Jean de Surville, a government official at Port-Louis, Brittany, and his wife, Françoise Mariteau de Roscadec, the daughter of a ship owner. One of nine children, Surville left home at the age of 10 and joined the French East India Company. There were existing family connections to the company; an older brother was already in its service and his mother was a niece of one of the company's directors. Surville's employer was a commercial enterprise supported by the French government and established several years previously to trade in the East Indies, and he sailed on trading voyages around India and China. By 1740 he held the rank of second ensign. ## Naval career Following the outbreak of the War of the Austrian Succession in 1740, Surville joined the French Navy, and fought in that conflict. He sailed aboard Hercule as an ensign and became a prisoner of war in 1745, when the ship was captured by the Royal Navy off Sumatra. After his release in 1746, he served aboard Duc de Chartres, which shipped goods from France to West Africa, where it collected slaves for transportation to the Caribbean, and then molasses from the Caribbean to France, a process known as triangular trade. In 1747, Surville was given command of Bagatelle and a letter of marque, which entitled him to sail as a privateer for France. While on one of his sorties on Bagatelle, he was again captured by the Royal Navy and taken to England as a prisoner of war. Released in 1748, Surville returned to the French East India Company as a first lieutenant aboard Duc de Béthune, a 40-gun merchantman that traversed the trading route to China. Returning to France in 1750, he married Marie Jouaneaulx at Nantes. The couple had two sons, who later joined the French Army. He spent the next few years on trading voyages around the French ports in the Indian Ocean and during this time, acquired a farm on the island of Réunion. By 1753, Surville was commander of Renommée and had made the acquaintance of Marion Dufresne, who would later become known for his voyages to the Pacific. During the Seven Years' War, which began in August 1756, Surville returned to active duty with the French Navy and sailed with the Comte d'Aché's naval fleet in the Indian Ocean as commander of Duc de Orleans. He was looked upon favourably by his superiors for his seamanship and leadership, and was made an "officer of the blue", a title used for non-aristocratic officers. Surville was present at the Battle of Cuddalore in 1758 and was wounded the following year at the Battle of Pondicherry. He was awarded the Cross of Saint Louis for his conduct during the fighting. He ended the Seven Years' War as commander of La Fortuné, a 64-gun warship. While transporting soldiers back to France, he encountered bad weather off the coast of South Africa. The ship developed leaks and was wrecked near Cape Town. Surville was able to get all the crew and passengers safely to shore and on to Cape Town. This delayed his return to France until early 1764. ## French India Surville resumed service with the French East India Company in 1765 and later that year commanded Duc de Praslin on its voyage transporting the new governor of Pondicherry, Jean Law de Lauriston, to India. Afterwards, together with Lauriston and Jean-Baptiste Chevalier, the governor of Chandernagore – which, like Pondicherry, was a French settlement on the east coast of India – Surville set up a venture to pursue trading in the Indian Ocean. Returning to France in 1766, Surville gained the approval of the French East India Company for his commercial plans. Needing a ship for his venture, he supervised the construction of Saint Jean-Baptiste, a large merchantman armed with 36 guns, at Port-Louis. He sailed her to India in June 1767. Over the next several months, Surville made a series of trading voyages along the Indian coast. He also served as deputy governor of Pondicherry. By late 1768, the French East India Company was undergoing severe financial difficulties, and its monopoly on trade in the East Indies was threatened with revocation. Surville and his business associates recognised that this would represent new opportunities for their syndicate and were planning a commercial expedition to the Philippines. At about this time, they became aware of rumours of a recent British discovery of land in the South Pacific, believed to be the fabulously wealthy island of Davis Land. These rumours were based on HMS Dolphin'''s reports of Tahiti. Davis Land represented a potentially important trading possibility for Surville's syndicate, but it was also necessary to establish a French foothold in the South Pacific before the British did, lest they be locked out of the region. Consequently, it was decided that Surville would mount an expedition to the South Pacific. The plan was for Surville to sail Saint Jean-Baptiste to Malacca, and then on to the South China Sea and the Philippines. He was then to traverse the north and south latitudes of the Pacific, searching for Davis Land. The latter objective was to be kept secret, even from the officers of the expedition. On his return, Surville was to stop at Manila and Batavia. To avoid British suspicion as to the purpose of the expedition, the official destinations of the Saint Jean-Baptiste were Manila and Canton. After more than two months of preparation, Surville departed from Chandernagore aboard Saint Jean-Baptiste on 3 March 1769, carrying a mixture of trading goods as cargo. These goods, if not able to be traded to the Jewish merchants believed to live on Davis Land, were to be sold at Manila on the expedition's return voyage, to improve its profitability. Also on board were several charts and narratives of voyages to the Pacific, including an account of Abel Tasman's 1642 journey to New Zealand. After visits to French settlements along the Indian coast to pick up provisions, Surville made his last stop at Pondicherry, where he added some grenadiers to the expedition's complement. The expedition, now numbering 172 men, departed on 22 June 1769. ## Exploring the Pacific Surville sailed first to the Nicobar Islands to try to verify the presence of a Danish colony but encountered adverse winds by the time the islands were in sight. Rather than spend time maneuvering into a more favourable position for the wind, he proceeded to Malacca, arriving on 29 June 1769. An initially warm welcome from the Dutch governor soon cooled when another ship, a British vessel, arrived with allegations that the French were headed to the East Indies, where the Dutch had a monopoly. Surville promptly left, sailing to Terengganu on the Malay Peninsula and then to the islands of the Bashi Channel, between Taiwan and the Philippines, where he stocked up on water and food. Several of his crew deserted and, unable to locate them, Surville kidnapped some of the Bashi islanders as replacements for the missing men. To the surprise of the majority of the expedition, Surville then sailed to the southeast, away from the ship's official destination of Canton, in accordance with his secret instructions to locate Davis Land. Proceeding to the Solomon Islands, which had not been sighted by Europeans since their discovery in 1568, the expedition's company began to suffer from scurvy. They reached the coast of Santa Isabel, in the Solomons, on 7 October 1769. At their first anchorage, which Surville named "Port Praslin", they received a hostile reception. Hoping to find fresh food to help those afflicted with scurvy, a party went ashore but was attacked by the locals. Several French were wounded, one fatally, and over 35 islanders were killed. The expedition then tried for another anchorage, but were unable to conduct any trade or resupply their ship without being attacked by hostile islanders. By this time, Saint Jean-Baptiste was short of fresh food and many of Surville's crew had died from scurvy. Morale was low, not helped by the poor condition of the ship, which was leaking. Surville was forced to find a safe anchorage, but was unwilling to risk stopping at the Solomon Islands again. Instead, after consulting Tasman's charts, in mid-November he headed for New Zealand. To avoid missing landfall due to errors in longitude, he first sailed southwest across the Coral Sea, before turning eastwards at the latitude of northern New Zealand. For much of his course to the south, he was roughly parallel with the coast of Australia and, before turning to the east, it is likely that he came close to reaching and discovering the coast of what is now New South Wales. Several birds were seen and his crew reported that they could smell land, but he continued with his change of course regardless. ### New Zealand On 12 December 1769 at 11:15 am, Saint Jean-Baptiste sighted the coast of New Zealand and sailed to just off Hokianga, on the west coast of the northern part of the North Island. Finding the shore inhospitable, Surville sailed northwards. On 16 December, the ship rounded North Cape and, heading south, passed through the area that James Cook's Endeavour had traversed one or two days earlier. Surville and Cook were the first Europeans to navigate New Zealand waters since Abel Tasman's voyage 127 years earlier. Sailing down the east coast, Surville reached what he called "Lauriston Bay" on 17 December 1769. Cook had already named it "Doubtless Bay" when he sailed past it less than two weeks earlier. Māori in canoes went out to Saint Jean-Baptiste and engaged in some trading for fresh fish, allaying fears of the crew who were aware Tasman had experienced a hostile welcome on his arrival in New Zealand. Surville then took his ship deeper into the bay, anchoring late in the day off Tokerau Beach near Whatuwhiwhi. Surville, along with some sailors and soldiers, went ashore the next day. The party was greeted by a Māori chief, who showed them to a source of water, and gave them cresses and celery. Over the next several days, the fresh food gathered or traded from the Māori helped the majority of the sick among the expedition to recover from their scurvy. It is likely that Father Paul-Antoine Léonard de Villefeix, the chaplain on Saint Jean-Baptiste, conducted the first Christian service in New Zealand and may have celebrated mass on Christmas Day 1769. If so, this would predate Reverend Samuel Marsden's service of Christmas Day in 1814, generally held to be the first religious service in New Zealand. Some actions of the French may have caused offence to the Māori. Surville attached a white ostrich feather to a chief's head, considered highly tapu. The bodies of those who died from scurvy in the bay were thrown overboard, which would have contaminated the fishery, leading to the Māori (if they were aware) placing a rāhui or temporary prohibition on fishing in the area. The Māori may have been concerned about the amount of food that the French were taking and, in consequence, trading for fish and celery soon ceased. This led to a deterioration of relations between the French and Māori. Surville, having initially taken care to be as congenial as possible towards the Māori, was becoming increasingly frustrated. On 27 December, a storm stranded a party of men on shore at Whatuwhiwhi, where they were treated hospitably by the Māori. In the same storm, the ship dragged her anchors, which had to be cut on Surville's orders. He and part of the crew spent several hours trying to bring the Saint Jean-Baptiste to a more sheltered anchorage. The ship's yawl, which was in tow, struck rocks and had to be cut free. After the storm passed, the stranded party returned to the ship, which had suffered a broken tiller. Surville, distressed by the loss of the anchors and the yawl, which jeopardised plans for further exploration of the area, went ashore with a party of two officers and some sailors to fish on 30 December. The party was invited to a village by a local chief and shared a meal before returning to the ship. The following day, 31 December, an officer spotted the yawl ashore on Tokerau Beach surrounded by Māori, and an armed party set off from Saint Jean-Baptiste to retrieve it. Surville considered the yawl to have been stolen; by tradition, any flotsam washed ashore belonged to the chief of the area. Reaching the beach, the French party found a group of Māori carrying spears, but there was no sign of the yawl. Their chief, Ranginui, approached Surville carrying a twig of green leaves, a sign of peace in Māori culture. His patience exhausted, Surville arrested Ranginui for the theft of his yawl. His party burned about 30 huts, destroyed a canoe filled with nets, and confiscated another canoe. They brought Ranginui back to their ship, where the crew members who had been stranded during the storm identified him as the chief who had been hospitable to them. Surville was determined to keep his captive, and Saint Jean-Baptiste departed eastwards that day with Ranginui on board. ### Voyage to South America Surville, after having consulted with his officers and considering the poor condition of his ship and crew, rejected sailing north to the Philippines or the Dutch East Indies, and instead decided to sail eastwards for South America. This route took advantage of favourable winds, and offered the lucrative prospect of discovering previously unknown lands as they moved eastwards. Surville privately remained hopeful of locating Davis Land. The Spanish considered their ports along the Pacific coast of South America off limits to other nations and there was a risk the French would be imprisoned upon arrival. It was hoped that the existing alliance between France and Spain and an appeal on humanitarian grounds would avert that possibility. Initially sailing along the southern latitudes of 34° and 35°, the expedition continued to suffer losses to scurvy, with the first death since departing New Zealand occurring on 19 February 1770. Surville soon turned his ship towards 27° south, the latitude on which Davis Land was believed to lie. Early the following month, with water supplies low, Surville conceded defeat in his quest for the island and set course for Peru after consulting with his officers. On 24 March, as the ship approached the Juan Fernández Islands, Ranginui died of scurvy. Although initially distressed at being kidnapped, he had been well treated and had regularly dined with Surville. Rather than stop at the Juan Fernández Islands for supplies, Surville chose to continue to Peru, only 400 miles (640 kilometres) away. Saint Jean-Baptiste reached the settlement of Chilca, on the Peruvian coast, on 7 April. An attempt to land a party was made that afternoon, but the sea conditions were too hazardous. The next day, Surville, in full ceremonial dress, and three crew members departed in a small boat to seek help from the Spanish viceroy at Chilca. In poor conditions, the boat capsized and Surville and two others were drowned. His body was found by locals and was buried at Chilca. In the meantime, Saint Jean-Baptiste had been sailed north to the port of Callao, in accordance with Surville's instructions in the event he not return to the ship. Surville's uniform, Cross of Saint Louis, and a lock of his hair were handed over to Guillaume Labè, the ship's first officer. The Spanish authorities impounded Saint Jean-Baptiste and detained her surviving crew for over two years before allowing them to return to France. On 20 August 1773, when the ship arrived at Port-Louis, only 66 of the original complement of 173 men had completed Surville's expedition; 79 had died through sickness or attacks by hostile islanders, and another 28 had deserted. Saint Jean-Baptiste still carried the goods it had taken on board at Pondicherry, and these were sold to allow the expedition's investors to recover some of their contributions. Surville's widow was granted a pension by the King of France, Louis XV. She also received Surville's possessions, handed over by Labè. ## Legacy Despite being commercially unsuccessful, Surville's voyage allowed geographers of the time to confirm the size of the Solomon Islands and New Caledonia, and the likely non-existence of Davis Land. It provided further evidence that there was no Terra Australis to be found in the South Pacific, and also contributed more knowledge of New Zealand and its inhabitants. Surville and his men were the first Europeans to cross the Coral Sea and make a west–east traverse of the temperate zone of the South Pacific, an important route for future explorers in the area. A street in Surville's home town of Port-Louis is named for him. He is remembered in New Zealand through the naming of the Surville Cliffs, the northernmost point of mainland New Zealand. Cap Surville was the original name for what is now known as North Cape. A plaque commemorating Surville's visit to the area 200 years earlier was laid at Whatuwhiwhi in 1969. Two of the anchors of Saint Jean-Baptiste'' that were lost at Doubtless Bay were discovered in 1974 and are displayed at the Far North Regional Museum at Kaitaia and the Museum of New Zealand Te Papa Tongarewa in Wellington respectively.

1924 Rose Bowl

The 1924 Rose Bowl was a postseason American college football bowl game played between the independent Navy Midshipmen and the Washington Huskies, a member of the Pacific Coast Conference (PCC). The game took place on January 1, 1924, at the Rose Bowl stadium in Pasadena, California, closing the 1923 college football season. The game opened in front of approximately 40,000 people and ended in a 14–14 tie. It was the first post-season bowl game for both teams. The 1924 game was the tenth edition of the Rose Bowl, which had first been played in 1902. Following the inaugural game's blowout score, football was replaced with chariot races until 1916. The Rose Bowl stadium had been constructed in 1923, making this edition the second game played in the arena. The game's organizers had previously selected a team from the East Coast and the West Coast, and asked the Washington Huskies to represent the West Coast. Washington requested that the Navy Midshipmen be their opponents, and Navy accepted. Washington selected Navy in favor of several teams from the east which had amassed better records. Both teams had suffered only a single loss during the season, but Washington had won eight games compared with Navy's five, although Navy had also amassed two ties. Predictions gave Washington a slight advantage in the game due to the weight difference between the teams: the Washington players were on average 10 pounds (4.5 kg) heavier than those of Navy. The game kicked off in the afternoon; heavy rain showers had fallen the day before, causing a slight delay. The first quarter was scoreless, but Navy scored a touchdown on the first play of the second quarter. Washington answered Navy with a 23-yard touchdown run on the next drive. Near the end of the second quarter, Navy scored a touchdown on a two-yard run, giving them a 14–7 halftime lead. The third quarter was a defensive stalemate as neither team scored. Navy fumbled the ball on their own ten-yard line late in the quarter. Four plays afterward, Washington tied the game on a 12-yard touchdown pass. Navy threw an interception at midfield, and Washington drove down to the Navy 20-yard line before attempting a game-winning field goal. The kick missed and the game ended shortly afterwards. For his performance in the game, Navy quarterback Ira McKee was named the Most Valuable Player. Navy led in nearly every statistical aspect of the contest. Washington returned to the Rose Bowl at the end of the 1925 season, falling to the Alabama Crimson Tide 20–19. Navy did not participate in another bowl game until 1955, when their squad, nicknamed the "team named desire", upset the Ole Miss Rebels in the Sugar Bowl. Since the 1924 Rose Bowl, Navy and Washington have met five more times; the Huskies won three of the games. ## Team selection The Rose Bowl game was first played in 1902, as a way to help fund the Rose Parade. Because of the first contest's lopsided score, a football game was not played again until 1916, having been replaced by chariot races. Between 1902 and 1947, the Rose Bowl was played between a team from the East Coast and a team from the West Coast. Until the construction of the Rose Bowl stadium, which began hosting the game in 1923, it was called the "Tournament East–West football game". Because the Pacific Coast Conference (PCC) was the only conference with teams located in the Western United States, a school from the conference had been chosen for every Rose Bowl game. The tournament committee invited the University of Washington Huskies to participate in the 1924 game, and they accepted. Washington was then allowed by the organization to select its opponent for the game—the first time a team was allowed to do so. Washington chose the Navy Midshipmen based on a suggestion from the committee, and Navy accepted the invitation. ### Navy The Navy Midshipmen entered the Rose Bowl under coach Bob Folwell with five wins, one loss, and two ties (5–1–2). Navy's sole loss in the 1923 season came in their annual game against Penn State, which they lost 21–3. All five of Navy's wins came against eastern teams, including Colgate and William and Mary, and two of Navy's wins were shutouts, against Colgate and Saint Xavier. Navy tied 0–0 with Army in the 1923 Army–Navy Game, the last game of the season, played on November 23 in front of nearly 70,000 spectators—including high-ranking military officials. Their other tie was a 3–3 game against Princeton. Navy was selected by Washington to participate in the Rose Bowl, although several teams with better records were eligible. Both Cornell and Yale finished the season with an undefeated 8–0 record. Eleven teams finished with only one loss, including Furman (10–1), Notre Dame (9–1), and the Virginia Military Institute (VMI) (9–1). ### Washington The Washington Huskies entered the 1924 Rose Bowl with a record of eight wins and one loss (8–1) under coach Enoch Bagshaw. Washington opened their season with victories over teams from the battleships Mississippi and New York; because these teams did not represent colleges, they were not considered an official part of Washington's schedule. Washington's first official game ended with a 34–0 shutout of Willamette, which was followed by four more shutouts. Washington's next game was a 26–14 victory over PCC opponent Montana—the first points Washington allowed all season. The squad's following game was their sole loss: a 9–0 shutout by conference opponent California. Washington finished the regular season with two straight wins over conference opponents, including a victory in the Apple Cup over Washington State. ## Pre-game buildup The 1924 Rose Bowl was the first meeting between Navy and Washington, and was the first bowl game that either team participated in. The competitors were announced on November 30, 1923, and the teams arrived for the bowl in mid-December, holding practices until the evening before the game. Heavy rain fell the night before the competition; Bagshaw said, "Wet weather will not bother us", and Folwell said, "My men will know what to do in the mud and will be there doing it". However, because of the wet conditions, several football critics predicted that Washington would have a slight advantage in the game due to their larger size. It was estimated that 52,000 people would attend the game. For the first time, the participating teams were responsible for ticket sales, and as a result only 40,000 people actually attended; a large number of tickets were sold to a navy fleet which was called to service on December 31, the day before the game. The competition was the first Rose Bowl to be broadcast on radio, and was aired by a local Pasadena station. ### Navy During the 1923 football season, the Navy Midshipmen outscored their opponents 133–43, led by quarterback Ira McKee, who threw several touchdown passes throughout the year. Navy's other offensive strong point was running back Carl Cullen, who ran for several hundred yards during the season. The Navy defense was considered weak by football critics, with an average player weight 10 pounds (4.5 kg) less than that of Washington. Navy's defense had stopped running plays successfully during the regular season, but had trouble defending pass plays. Navy's special teams were considered by critics to be decent, about even with those of Washington. ### Washington The Washington Huskies had outscored their opponents 203–37 during the regular season, excluding the games against New York and Mississippi. Washington's running backs, George "Wildcat" Wilson and Elmer Tesreau, led their offense during the season, each gaining several hundred rushing yards. However, Tesreau was suffering from boils on his knee, and his coaches urged him to not play in the Rose Bowl. The Washington defense was considered superior to that of Navy, being much larger on average. Washington's defense had been very effective during the regular season, holding five teams scoreless and allowing more than ten points to be scored against them only once. Washington's special teams were considered to be average. ## Game summary The kickoff for the Rose Bowl was originally scheduled for 2:00 p.m. on January 1, 1924, but the night before the game, a meeting of the Rose Bowl organization rescheduled the kickoff time to 2:16 p.m. the same day. This was likely due to poor field conditions caused by the previous night's rain. The opening ceremonies were the most elaborate of any bowl game up to that time, with numerous events held. Navy admiral Samuel Shelburne Robison received an admiral's salute from Navy's band when he took his seat. The Navy band and the color guard of the marines performed the National Anthem, then the marine color guard hoisted the U.S. flag over the field. Both teams' mascots were walked around the field before the kickoff. The Tournament of Roses predicted that tickets would be sold out by the day of the game, but actual ticket sales were much lower than they had hoped. Still, sales were higher than those of several previous competitions. ### First half The game began at the rescheduled time, with a temperature of 52 °F (11 °C) and the field still wet. Because of the playing conditions, running plays were ineffective, which caused problems for the Washington offense. Navy instead used passing plays, which the Washington defense had trouble stopping. Navy was driving down to the 22-yard line of Washington when the first quarter ended. Navy controlled the first quarter, completing all six passing attempts and holding the Washington offense to under 100 yards gained. On their first play of the second quarter, Navy scored a touchdown on a pass play from Ira McKee to Carl Cullen. McKee kicked the extra point for Navy, giving them a 7–0 lead. In an attempt to trick Washington, Navy tried an onside kick on the next play, but Washington recovered the ball. After two short running plays, Washington quarterback Fred Abel completed a 23-yard pass to running back Kinsley Dubois, bringing Washington inside the 25-yard line. On the next play, running back George Wilson ran the ball 23 yards for a touchdown. Washington's kicker converted the extra point to tie the game at 7–7. After several drives from each team that did not result in further scoring, Navy completed a 57-yard pass down to the Washington eight-yard line. Two plays later, Ira McKee ran the ball in from two yards out for a touchdown, then afterward converted the extra point. The first half ended with Navy leading by 14–7, having completed all 11 passes they attempted. ### Second half Both teams' defenses controlled the third quarter, allowing no points to be scored. Navy's McKee completed three more pass plays before his first incompletion, which came on his fourteenth attempt. Washington's offense had little success in the third quarter, being held to only a few yards gained and turning the ball over once. In the fourth quarter, after several unsuccessful drives by each team, Navy made a major error. After being stopped on their own 26-yard line, Navy improperly lined up in a punt formation, and the center snapped the ball over the punter's head. The ball was recovered by Washington on the Navy ten-yard line. Washington lost two yards in three plays, and faced a fourth down from the Navy 12-yard line. Washington stacked their offensive line, allowing their left guard, James Bryan, to become an eligible receiver. Fred Abel passed the ball to Bryan, who caught it just short of the goal line and walked into the end zone for the touchdown. Washington's kicker then converted the extra point, tying the game at 14. Navy received the ball from Washington and began to throw it erratically. After gaining several yards, Ira McKee threw an interception near midfield. On the next play, Fred Abel threw a long pass to George Wilson, who was tackled on the Navy 20-yard line after gaining 30 yards. Washington brought out their placekicker, Leonard Ziel, to kick a 32-yard field goal, which would have won them the game. Ziel kicked the ball about a yard short of the right upright, giving the ball back to Navy with the game still tied. A few plays later the game ended in a 14–14 tie. ## Statistical summary For his performance in the 1924 Rose Bowl, Navy quarterback Ira McKee was awarded Most Valuable Player (MVP) honors. McKee completed 16 of 20 passes for a total of 175 yards, including one pass for a touchdown. McKee also had 85 rushing yards on twelve attempts. Washington running back Elmer Tesreau was given the game's Ironman Award, though he had little effect on the game. Against the urging of his coaches, Tesreau had played with boils completely covering one knee. He left near the end of the game, and was later discovered to have broken his previously unaffected leg in multiple places. Navy's McKee threw for a perfect 11 of 11 passes during the first half, but completed just five of nine attempts during the second half. Two of these incompletions were interceptions. McKee outthrew Washington's Fred Abel by 110 yards. Carl Cullen was McKee's main receiver for the game, catching ten passes from him, one of which was taken for a touchdown. The other six passes were caught by other receivers. On the ground, Cullen rushed for the most yards of any player, gaining 102 throughout the course of the game. McKee was Navy's key runner, gaining 85 yards. Cullen, McKee, fullback Alan Shapley, and other team members rushed for a total of 187 yards during the game. McKee completed both extra point attempts, and the squad's punter kicked five times, for an average distance of 33.8 yards. Abel attempted eight passes during the game, and completed just three for a total of 65 yards. Of Abel's five incompletions, two were interceptions. Kinsley Dubois caught two of Abel's completed passes, amassing 53 receiving yards. Guard James Bryan caught the other, a 12-yard touchdown pass. George Wilson led Washington in rushing yards, gaining 87 over the course of the game, and scoring Washington's only rushing touchdown. Kinsley Dubois came next, gaining 30 yards, followed by Abel, with 20. The remainder of the team's 137 rushing yards were amassed by others, including Tesreau. Washington's kicker Leonard Zeil was two for two on extra points, but missed his only field goal attempt. Washington punted nine times, averaging 33 yards per attempt. ## Aftermath The tie gave Washington an 8–1–1 record for the 1923 season, the second best in school history up to that point. It remained behind the 1916 season, when the squad went 6–0–1. Navy's record went to 5–1–3, a slight improvement from the previous year, when the team went 5–2. It became Navy's eighth straight winning season. Washington went 8–1–1 in the 1924 season, remaining under the direction of coach Enoch Bagshaw. The team was invited to the 1926 Rose Bowl after completing an undefeated 11–0–1 1925 season. They lost the game to the Alabama Crimson Tide by a score of 20–19. Washington finished the 1920s with an overall record of 65–26–6; Bagshaw coached the team for every season except 1920, when they were under the leadership of Stub Allison. Navy finished the 1924 season with a 2–6 record, ending their number of consecutive winning seasons at eight. The Navy football team was not invited to participate in another bowl game until 1955, when the "team named desire", so named due to coach Eddie Erdelatz comparing the squad to the play A Streetcar Named Desire, defeated the Ole Miss Rebels in the Sugar Bowl 21–0. Navy finished the 1920s with a record of 55–22–8; nine of the ten seasons ended in winning records. Navy's coach, Bob Folwell, left the team after the 1924 season, to be replaced by Jack Owsley. Navy and Washington have since met five times, with Washington currently leading the series 3–2–1. Because the 1924 Rose Bowl and several later Rose Bowls had very high ticket sales, the Tournament of Roses Association decided to close off the southern end of the Rose Bowl stadium and expand the seating from a horseshoe design to one that surrounded the entire field. The 1924 game was the first in which the Tournament of Roses made participating schools responsible for ticket sales. The strategy has been used since, with only a small number of tickets allocated to Tournament officials for each yearly edition.

Banksia aquilonia

Tree in the family Proteaceae native to north Queensland

Banksia aquilonia, commonly known as the northern banksia and jingana, is a tree in the family Proteaceae and is endemic to north Queensland on Australia's northeastern coastline. With an average height of 8 m (26 ft), it has narrow glossy green leaves up to 20 cm (7.9 in) long and 6 to 10 cm (2.4 to 3.9 in) high pale yellow flower spikes, known as inflorescences, appearing in autumn. As the spikes age, their flowers fall off and they develop up to 50 follicles, each of which contains two seeds. Alex George described the plant in his 1981 monograph of the genus Banksia as a variety of Banksia integrifolia, but later reclassified it as a separate species. Genetic studies show it to be related to Banksia plagiocarpa, Banksia oblongifolia and Banksia robur. The species is found in wet sclerophyll forest and rainforest margins on sandy soils. Banksia aquilonia regenerates after bushfire by regrowing from epicormic buds under its bark. It is rarely cultivated. ## Description Banksia aquilonia grows as a tall shrub or small tree up to 8 m (26 ft) high, though plants up to 15 m (49 ft) have been recorded. It has hard, fissured, grey bark, and narrow elliptic or lanceolate leaves measuring 5–20 cm (2.0–7.9 in) long by 0.6–1.2 cm (0.2–0.5 in) wide with entire (straight) margins and acute tips. They are a smooth shiny green above and white below with a prominent midrib covered in red-brown hair. The brownish new growth appears in summer. The plant is in bloom from March to June. Flowers occur in Banksia's characteristic vertical flower spike, an inflorescence made up of hundreds of pairs of flowers densely packed in a spiral around a woody axis. B. aquilonia's flower spike is a pale yellow colour, roughly cylindrical, 6–10 cm (2.4–3.9 in) high, and up to 6 cm (2.4 in) in diameter. The tubular perianths of the individual flowers are 2.5–2.9 cm (0.98–1.14 in) long. These open at maturity (anthesis) to release the styles. All old flower parts fall away as up to 50 oval follicles develop on the bare woody spike. The follicles measure 0.8–1.2 cm (0.3–0.5 in) long, 0.5–0.9 cm (0.20–0.35 in) high, and 0.4–0.5 cm (0.16–0.20 in) wide. Furry at first, they become smooth with age and open when ripe, and their two half-oval valves split to release the one or two seeds they contain. The obovate dark grey-brown to black seeds sandwich a woody separator. Measuring 1.4–1.6 cm (0.6–0.6 in) long, they are made up of a wedge-shaped seed body, 0.8–1 cm (0.3–0.4 in) long by 0.2–0.3 cm (0.08–0.1 in) wide. The woody separator is the same shape as the seed, with an impression where the seed body lies next to it. Seedlings have bright obovate green cotyledons around 1 cm (0.39 in) long. Juvenile leaves are narrower, measuring 7–24 cm (2.8–9.4 in) long and 0.6–2.1 cm (0.2–0.8 in) wide, and often have serrate (toothed) margins. Although the inflorescences of Banksia aquilonia are similar to B. integrifolia, the leaves are marked in their differences—the midrib on the leaves' undersides is distinctively covered in short reddish-brown hairs and the leaves are spirally arranged on the branches rather than in whorls as in all B. integrifolia subspecies. It was these differences that George felt were distinctive enough for it to be separate it as a full species from B. integrifolia. The overall habit of a Banksia aquilonia tree resembles that of B. integrifolia, though is generally smaller. The southernmost populations of B. aquilonia are separated from the northernmost B. integrifolia occurrence by 200 km (120 mi), hence location is helpful in identification. ### Variants Field volunteers for The Banksia Atlas recorded plants with large adult and juvenile leaves up to 38 cm (15 in) long along the Tully to Mission Beach Road, and a population of smaller shrub-sized plants to 3 m (10 ft) high with small narrow leaves 13 cm (5.1 in) long and 0.4 cm (0.2 in) wide at Coronation Lookout in Wooroonooran National Park, plants with normal morphology occurring further down the mountain. ## Taxonomy Banksia aquilonia was first described by Alex George in 1981 as a variety of Banksia integrifolia (coast banksia), from a specimen collected at Witts Lookout in Crystal Creek National Park south of Ingham on 12 April 1975. The species name is the Latin adjective aquilonius, meaning "northern", as it was the most northerly form of B. integrifolia. In 1996 Kevin Thiele and Pauline Ladiges published a cladistic analysis of Banksia based on morphology, in which this taxon stood out as the only member of B. integrifolia to be both morphologically and geographically distinct from other infraspecific taxa. They also noted that there were no intermediate plants between what was then known as B. integrifolia var. aquilonia and other populations of B. integrifolia. On this basis they would have liked to promote it to species rank, but did not because their inferred phylogeny suggested that this taxon arose from within B. integrifolia. They were unwilling to render B. integrifolia paraphyletic by elevating this taxon to species rank, and they were equally unwilling to elevate all four varieties to species rank, since the others all had significant overlaps in distribution and morphology. Therefore, they simply promoted all four to subspecies rank. This example has since been held up as an interesting case study on how the concept of species should be defined, as it presents the problem of "a monophyletic group comprising a paraphyletic basal group of incompletely differentiated geographic forms within which is nested at least one divergent, autapomorphic taxon that invites treatment as a species." George promoted it to species rank on the basis of its distinctive leaf arrangement and midrib in 1996. Thus its full name with author citation is "Banksia aquilonia (A.S.George) A.S.George". It is placed in subgenus Banksia, section Banksia and series Salicinae. Its placement within Banksia may be summarised as follows: Genus Banksia : Subgenus Banksia : : Section Banksia : : : Series Salicinae : : : : Banksia dentata - Banksia aquilonia - Banksia integrifolia - Banksia plagiocarpa - Banksia oblongifolia - Banksia robur - Banksia conferta - Banksia paludosa - Banksia marginata - Banksia canei - Banksia saxicola : : : Series Grandes : : : Series Banksia : : : Series Crocinae : : : Series Prostratae : : : Series Cyrtostylis : : : Series Tetragonae : : : Series Bauerinae : : : Series Quercinae : : Section Coccinea : : Section Oncostylis' : Subgenus Isostylis Despite initially assigning Banksia aquilonia to be variety of B. integrifolia, George noted that it had affinities with the then newly described species Banksia plagiocarpa, with which it co-occurs on and near Hinchinbrook Island in north Queensland. Since 1998, American botanist Austin Mast and co-authors have been publishing results of ongoing cladistic analyses of DNA sequence data for Banksia and Dryandra. Their analyses suggest a phylogeny that differs greatly from George's taxonomic arrangement. Banksia aquilonia formed a clade with B. plagiocarpa, B. oblongifolia and B. robur, rather than B. integrifolia. Early in 2007, Mast and Thiele rearranged the genus Banksia by merging Dryandra into it, and published B. subg. Spathulatae for the taxa having spoon-shaped cotyledons; thus B. subg. Banksia was redefined as encompassing taxa lacking spoon-shaped cotyledons. They foreshadowed publishing a full arrangement once DNA sampling of Dryandra was complete; in the meantime, if Mast and Thiele's nomenclatural changes are taken as an interim arrangement, then B. aquilonia is placed in B. subg. Spathulatae. Common names include northern banksia, white banksia, honeysuckle or white bottlebrush. A local aboriginal name is jingana, in the Jirrbal and Girramay languages. ## Distribution and habitat Banksia aquilonia occurs in coastal areas of northern Queensland from the Cedar Bay National Park to Paluma Range National Park, in areas with an annual rainfall of 1,000 to 4,000 mm (39 to 157 in). It occurs from near sea level to an altitude of 1,000 m (3,300 ft), in a variety of habitats and aspects. It grows in wet sclerophyll forest or rainforest margins, on plateaus, ridges, slopes and low-lying swampy areas on sandy or rocky soils, generally of granitic origin, or sometimes clay. It commonly grows with tree species such as the pink bloodwood (Corymbia intermedia), forest red gum (Eucalyptus tereticornis), swamp turpentine (Lophostemon suaveolens), forest oak (Allocasuarina torulosa), and black sheoak (A. littoralis), and understorey species such as coin spot wattle (Acacia cincinnata) and yellow wattle (A. flavescens). Much of its lowland habitat in the Wet Tropics has been degraded or fragmented. Although the range overlaps with B. dentata, the two species are not known to occur together. ## Ecology Banksia aquilonia regenerates after bushfire by regrowing from epicormic buds under its bark. Regeneration from root suckers has also been recorded. Unlike many banksia species which release their seed after bushfires, Banksia aquilonia sets seed when the follicles mature. Banksia inflorescences are energy-rich sources of food, and B. aquilonia nectar is a likely food item of the endangered mahogany glider (Petaurus gracilis), as well as many other mammals and birds. Avian species observed visiting the flower spikes include the bridled honeyeater, white-cheeked honeyeater, eastern spinebill and rainbow lorikeet. ## Cultivation Banksia aquilonia'' adapts readily to cultivation in humid or temperate climates, but is rarely cultivated. A fast-growing plant, it can grow in acidic soils from pH 3.5 to 6.5. Propagation is generally by seed, and plants flower at four to six years of age. Vegetative propagation is possible from semi-hardened cuttings of pencil thickness. The flower spikes attract birds to the garden. It can also be grown in a pot, with its branches heavily pruned to keep foliage dense.

Everglades National Park

National park in Florida (US)

Everglades National Park is an American national park that protects the southern twenty percent of the original Everglades in Florida. The park is the largest tropical wilderness in the United States and the largest wilderness of any kind east of the Mississippi River. An average of one million people visit the park each year. Everglades is the third-largest national park in the contiguous United States after Death Valley and Yellowstone. UNESCO declared the Everglades & Dry Tortugas Biosphere Reserve in 1976 and listed the park as a World Heritage Site in 1979, and the Ramsar Convention included the park on its list of Wetlands of International Importance in 1987. Everglades is one of only three locations in the world to appear on all three lists. Most national parks preserve unique geographic features; Everglades National Park was the first created to protect a fragile ecosystem. The Everglades are a network of wetlands and forests fed by a river flowing 0.25 miles (0.40 km) per day out of Lake Okeechobee, southwest into Florida Bay. The park is the most significant breeding ground for tropical wading birds in North America and contains the largest mangrove ecosystem in the Western Hemisphere. Thirty-six threatened or protected species inhabit the park, including the Florida panther, the American crocodile, and the West Indian manatee, along with 350 species of birds, 300 species of fresh and saltwater fish, 40 species of mammals, and 50 species of reptiles. The majority of South Florida's fresh water, which is stored in the Biscayne Aquifer, is recharged in the park. Humans have lived for thousands of years in or around the Everglades. Plans arose in 1882 to drain the wetlands and develop the land for agricultural and residential use. As the 20th century progressed, water flow from Lake Okeechobee was increasingly controlled and diverted to enable explosive growth of the Miami metropolitan area. The park was established in 1934, to protect the quickly vanishing Everglades, and dedicated in 1947, as major canal-building projects were initiated across South Florida. The ecosystems in Everglades National Park have suffered significantly from human activity, and restoration of the Everglades is a politically charged issue in South Florida. ## Geography Everglades National Park covers 1,508,976 acres (2,357.8 sq mi; 6,106.6 km²), throughout Dade, Monroe, and Collier counties in Florida, at the southern tip of the Atlantic coastal plain. The elevation typically ranges from 0 to 8 feet (2.4 m) above sea level, but a Calusa-built shell mound on the Gulf Coast rises 20 feet (6.1 m) above sea level. ## Geology The terrain of South Florida is relatively and consistently flat. The limestone that underlies the Everglades is integral to the diverse ecosystems within the park. Florida was once part of the African portion of the supercontinent Gondwana. After it separated, conditions allowed a shallow marine environment to deposit calcium carbonate in sand, shells, and coral to be converted into limestone. Tiny bits of shell, sand, and bryozoans compressed over multiple layers forming structures in the limestone called ooids, which created permeable conditions that hold water. The Florida peninsula appeared above sea level between 100,000 and 150,000 years ago. As sea levels rose at the end of the Wisconsin ice age, the water table appeared closer to land. Lake Okeechobee began to flood, and convection thunderstorms were created. Vast peat deposits south of Lake Okeechobee indicate that regular flooding had occurred about 5,000 years ago. Plants began to migrate, subtropical ones from the northern part of Florida, and tropicals carried as seeds by birds from islands in the Caribbean. The limestone shelf appears to be flat, but there are slight rises—called pinnacles—and depressions caused by the erosion of limestone by the acidic properties of the water. The amount of time throughout the year that water is present in a location in the Everglades determines the type of soil, of which there only two in the Everglades: peat, created by many years of decomposing plant matter, and marl, the result of dried periphyton, or chunks of algae and microorganisms that create a grayish mud. Portions of the Everglades that remain flooded for more than nine months out of the year are usually covered by peat. Areas that are flooded for six months or less are covered by marl. Plant communities are determined by the type of soil and the amount of water present. ## Climate According to the Köppen climate classification system, Royal Palm at Everglades National Park has a tropical monsoon climate (Am). Summers are long, hot, and very wet and winters are warm and dry. ## Hydrography While they are common in the northern portion of Florida, no underground springs feed water into the Everglades system. An underground reservoir called the Floridan aquifer lies about 1,000 feet (300 m) below the surface of South Florida. The Everglades has an immense capacity for water storage, owing to the permeable limestone beneath the exposed land. Most of the water arrives in the form of rainfall, and a significant amount is stored in the limestone. Water evaporating from the Everglades becomes rain over metropolitan areas, providing the fresh water supply for the region. Water also flows into the park after falling as rain to the north onto the watersheds of the Kissimmee River and other sources of Lake Okeechobee, to appear in the Everglades days later. Water overflows Lake Okeechobee into a river 40 to 70 miles (64 to 113 km) wide, which moves almost imperceptibly. ## Ecosystems At the turn of the 20th century, common concepts of what should be protected in national parks invariably included formidable geologic features like mountains, geysers, or canyons. As Florida's population began to grow significantly and urban areas near the Everglades were developed, proponents of the park's establishment faced difficulty in persuading the federal government and the people of Florida that the subtle and constantly shifting ecosystems in the Everglades were just as worthy of protection. When the park was established in 1947, it became the first area within the U.S. to protect flora and fauna native to a region as opposed to geologic scenery. The National Park Service recognizes nine distinct interdependent ecosystems within the park that constantly shift in size owing to the amount of water present and other environmental factors. ### Freshwater sloughs and marl prairies Freshwater sloughs are perhaps the most common ecosystem associated with Everglades National Park. These drainage channels are characterized by low-lying areas covered in fresh water, flowing at an almost imperceptible 100 feet (30 m) per day. Shark River Slough and Taylor Slough are significant features of the park. Sawgrass growing to a height of 6 feet (1.8 m) or more, and broad-leafed marsh plants, are so prominent in this region that they gave the Everglades its nickname "River of Grass", cemented in the public imagination in the title for Marjory Stoneman Douglas's book (1947), which culminated years of her advocacy for considering the Everglades ecosystem as more than a "swamp". Excellent feeding locations for birds, sloughs in the Everglades attract a great variety of waders such as herons, egrets, roseate spoonbills (Platalea ajaja), ibises and brown pelicans (Pelecanus occidentalis), as well as limpkins (Aramus guarauna) and snail kites that eat apple snails, which in turn feed on the sawgrass. The sloughs' availability of fish, amphibians, and young birds attract a variety of freshwater turtles, alligator (Alligator mississippiensis), water moccasin (Agkistrodon piscivorus conanti), and eastern diamondback rattlesnake (Crotalus adamanteus). Freshwater marl prairies are similar to sloughs but lack the slow movement of surface water; instead, water seeps through a calcitic mud called marl. Algae and other microscopic organisms form periphyton, which attaches to limestone. When it dries it turns into a gray mud. Sawgrass and other water plants grow shorter in freshwater marl than they do in peat, the other type of soil in the Everglades which is found where water remains present longer throughout the year. Marl prairies are usually under water from three to seven months of the year, whereas sloughs may remain submerged for longer than nine months and sometimes remain under water from one year to the next. Sawgrass may dominate sloughs, creating a monoculture. Other grasses, such as muhly grass (Muhlenbergia sericea) and broad-leafed water plants can be found in marl prairies. Animals living in the freshwater sloughs also inhabit marl prairies. Marl prairies may go dry in some parts of the year; alligators play a vital role in maintaining life in remote parts of the Everglades by burrowing in the mud during the dry season, creating pools of water where fish and amphibians survive from one year to the next. Alligator holes also attract other animals who congregate to feed on smaller prey. When the region floods again during the wet season, the fish and amphibians which were sustained in the alligator holes then repopulate freshwater marl prairies. ### Tropical hardwood hammocks Hammocks are often the only dry land within the park. They rise several inches above the grass-covered river and are dominated by diverse plant life consisting of subtropical and tropical trees, such as large southern live oaks (Quercus virginiana). Trees often form canopies under which animals thrive amongst scrub bushes of wild coffee (Psychotria), white indigoberry (Randia aculeata), poisonwood (Metopium toxiferum) and saw palmetto (Serenoa repens). The park features thousands of these tree islands amid sloughs—which often form the shape of a teardrop when seen from above (see park map) because of the slowly moving water around them—but they can also be found in pineland and mangroves. Trees in the Everglades, including wild tamarind (Lysiloma latisiliquum) and gumbo-limbo (Bursera simaruba), rarely grow higher than 50 feet (15 m) because of wind, fire, and climate. The plant growth around the hammock base is nearly impenetrable; beneath the canopy hammocks is an ideal habitat for animals. Reptiles (such as various species of snake and anole) and amphibians (such as the American green tree frog, Hyla cinerea), live in the hardwood hammocks. Birds such as barred owls (Strix varia), woodpeckers, northern cardinals (Cardinalis cardinalis), and southern bald eagles (Haliaeetus leucocephalus leucocephalus) nest in hammock trees. Mammal species living in hardwood hammocks include Florida black bears (Ursus americanus floridanus), red foxes (Vulpes vulpes), minks (Neogale vison), marsh rabbits (Sylvilagus palustris), gray foxes (Urocyon cinereoargenteus), white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus), and the rare, critically endangered Florida panther (Puma concolor couguar). ### Pineland Miami-Dade County was once covered in 186,000 acres (290.6 sq mi; 752.7 km²) of pine rockland forests, but most of it was harvested by the lumber industry. Pineland ecosystems (or pine rocklands) are characterized by shallow, dry sandy loam over a limestone substrate covered almost exclusively by slash pines (Pinus elliottii var. densa). Trees in this ecosystem grow in solution holes, where the soft limestone has worn away and filled with soil, allowing plants to take hold. Pinelands require regular maintenance by fire to ensure their existence. South Florida slash pines are uniquely adapted to promote fire by dropping a large amount of dried pine needles and shedding dry bark. Pine cones require heat from fires to open, allowing seeds to disperse and take hold. The trunks and roots of slash pines are resistant to fire. Prescribed burns in these areas take place every three to seven years; without regular fires, hardwood trees begin to grow in this region, and pinelands become recategorized as mixed swamp forests. Most plants in the area bloom about 16 weeks after a fire. Nearly all pinelands have an understory of palm shrubs and a diverse ground covering of wild herbs. Pine rocklands are considered one of the most threatened habitats in Florida; less than 4,000 acres (6.3 sq mi; 16.2 km²) of pineland exist outside the park. Within the park, 20,000 acres (31.3 sq mi; 80.9 km²) of pineland are protected. A variety of animal species meet their needs for food, shelter, nesting, and rooking in pine rocklands. Woodpeckers, eastern meadowlarks (Sturnella magna), loggerhead shrikes (Lanius ludovicianus), grackles, and northern mockingbirds (Mimus polyglottos) are commonly found in pinelands. Black bears and Florida panthers also live in this habitat. ### Cypress and mangrove Cypress trees are conifers that are adapted to live in standing fresh water. They grow in compact structures called cypress domes and in long strands over limestone. Water levels may fluctuate dramatically around cypress domes and strands, so cypresses develop "knees" that protrude from the water at high levels to provide oxygen for the root systems. Dwarf cypress trees grow in drier areas with poorer soil. Epiphytes, such as bromeliads, Spanish moss (Tillandsia usneoides), orchids and ferns grow on the branches and trunks of cypress trees. Everglades National Park features twenty-five species of orchids. Tall cypress trees provide excellent nesting areas for birds including wild turkey (Meleagris gallopavo), ibis, herons, egrets, anhingas (Anhinga anhinga), and belted kingfisher (Megaceryle alcyon). Mammals in cypress regions include white-tailed deer, squirrels, raccoons, opossums, skunks, swamp rabbits, river otters (Lontra canadensis), and bobcats, as well as small rodents. Mangrove trees cover the coastlines of South Florida, sometimes growing inland depending on the amount of salt water present within the Everglades ecosystems. During drier years when less fresh water flows to the coast, mangroves will appear among fresh water plants. When rain is abundant, sawgrass and other fresh water plants may be found closer to the coast. Three species of mangrove trees—red (Rhizophora mangle), black (Avicennia germinans), and white (Laguncularia racemosa)—can be found in the Everglades. With a high tolerance of salt water, winds, extreme tides, high temperatures, and muddy soils, mangrove trees are uniquely adapted to extreme conditions. They act as nurseries for many marine and bird species. They are also Florida's first defense against the destructive forces of hurricanes, absorbing flood waters and preventing coastal erosion. The mangrove system in Everglades National Park is the largest continuous system of mangroves in the world. Within the Florida mangrove systems live 220 species of fish, and a variety of crabs, crayfish, shrimp, mollusks, and other invertebrates, which serve as the main source of food for many birds. Dozens of bird species use mangroves as nurseries and food stores, including pelicans, grebes, tricolored herons (Egretta tricolor), gulls, terns, hawks and kites, and arboreal birds like mangrove cuckoos (Coccyzus minor), yellow warblers (Dendroica petechia), and white-crowned pigeons (Patagioenas leucocephala). The mangroves also support 24 species of amphibians and reptiles, and 18 species of mammals, including the endangered green turtle (Chelonia mydas), hawksbill turtle (Eretmochelys imbricata), and West Indian manatee (Trichechus manatus). ### Coastal lowlands Coastal lowlands, or wet prairies, are salt water marshes that absorb marine water when it gets high or fresh water when rains are heavy. Floods occur during hurricane and tropical storm surges when ocean water can rise several feet over the land. Heavy wet seasons also cause floods when rain from the north flows into the Everglades. Few trees can survive in the conditions of this region, but plants—succulents like saltwort and glasswort—tolerate salt, brackish water, and desert conditions. Animal life in this zone is dependent upon the amount of water present, but commonly found animals include Cape Sable seaside sparrow (Ammodramus maritimus mirabilis), Everglades snail kite (Rostrhamus sociabilis), wood stork (Mycteria americana), eastern indigo snake (Drymarchon couperi), and small mammals such as rats, mice, and rabbits. ### Marine and estuarine The largest body of water within the park is Florida Bay, which extends from the mangrove swamps of the mainland's southern tip to the Florida Keys. Over 800 square miles (2,100 km²) of marine ecosystem lies in this range. Coral, sponges, and seagrasses serve as shelter and food for crustaceans and mollusks, which in turn are the primary food source for larger marine animals. Sharks, stingrays, and barracudas also live in this ecosystem. Pelicans, shorebirds, terns, and black skimmers (Rynchops niger) are among the birds frequenting park shorelines. The bay also has its own resident population of bottlenose dolphin (Tursiops truncatus). The bay's many basins are broken up by sandbanks that serve as plentiful recreational fishing grounds for snook (Centropomus undecimalis), redfish (Sciaenops ocellatus), spotted seatrout (Cynoscion nebulosus), tarpon (Megaflops atlanticus), bonefish (Albula vulpes), and permit (Trichinous falcatus), as well as snapper (Lutjanus campechanus), bluegill (Lepomis macrochirus), and bass. Wading birds such as roseate spoonbills (Platalea ajaja), reddish egrets (Egretta rufescens), and great white herons (Ardea herodias occidentalis) have unique subpopulations that are largely restricted to Florida Bay. Other bird species include bald eagles, cormorants, and ospreys. Mammals along the shoreline include raccoons, opossums, bobcats, and fox squirrels. ## Human history ### Native peoples Humans likely first inhabited the South Florida region 10,000 to 20,000 years ago. Two tribes of Native Americans developed on the peninsula's southern tip: the Tequesta lived on the eastern side and the Calusa, greater in numbers, on the western side. The Everglades served as a natural boundary between them. The Tequesta lived in a single large community near the mouth of the Miami River, while the Calusa lived in 30 villages. Both groups traveled through the Everglades but rarely lived within them, remaining mostly along the coast. The diets of both groups consisted mostly of shellfish and fish, small mammals, game, and wild plants. Having access only to soft limestone, most of the tools fashioned by Native Americans in the region were made of shell, bone, wood, and animal teeth; shark teeth were used as cutting blades, and sharpened reeds became arrows and spears. Shell mounds still exist today within the park, giving archaeologists and anthropologists evidence of the raw materials available to the indigenous people for tool construction. Spanish explorers estimated the number of Tequesta at first contact to be around 800, and Calusa at 2,000; the National Park Service reports there were probably about 20,000 natives living in or near the Everglades when the Spanish established contact in the late 16th century. The Calusa lived in social strata and were able to create canals, earthworks, and shellworks. The Calusa were also able to resist Spanish attempts at conquest. The Spanish had contact with these societies and established missions further north, near Lake Okeechobee. In the 18th century, invading Creeks incorporated the dwindling numbers of the Tequesta into their own. Neither the Tequesta nor Calusa tribe existed by 1800. Disease, warfare, and capture for slavery were the reasons for the eradication of both groups. The only evidence of their existence within the park boundaries is a series of shell mounds that were built by the Calusa. In the early 19th century, Creeks, escaped African slaves, and other Indians from northern Florida displaced by the Creek War, formed the area's Seminole nation. After the end of the Seminole Wars in 1842, the Seminoles faced relocation to Indian territory near Oklahoma. A few hundred Seminole hunters and scouts settled within what is today Big Cypress National Preserve, to escape the forced emigration to the west. From 1859 to about 1930, the Seminoles and Miccosukee, a similar but linguistically unique tribe, lived in relative isolation, making their living by trading. In 1928, surveying and construction began on the Tamiami Trail, along the northern border of Everglades National Park. The road bisected the Everglades, introducing a steady, if small, traffic of white settlers into the Everglades. Some members of the Miccosukee and Seminole tribes continue to live within park boundaries. Management of the park includes approval of new policies and procedures by tribal representatives "in such a manner that they do not conflict with the park purpose". ### American settlements Following the end of the Seminole Wars, Americans began settling at isolated points along the coast in what is now the park, from the Ten Thousand Islands to Cape Sable. Communities developed on the two largest pieces of dry ground in the area, on Chokoloskee Island and at Flamingo on Cape Sable, both of which established post offices in the early 1890s. Chokoloskee Island is a shell mound, a midden built roughly 20 feet (6 m) high over thousands of years of occupation by the Calusa. The settlements in Chokoloskee and Flamingo served as trading centers for small populations of farmers, fishermen, and charcoal burners settled in the Ten Thousand Islands. Both settlements and the more isolated homesteads could only be reached by boat until well into the 20th century. Everglades City, on the mainland near Chokoloskee, enjoyed a brief period of prosperity when, beginning in 1920, it served as the headquarters for the construction of the Tamiami Trail. A dirt road from Florida City reached Flamingo in 1922, while a causeway finally connected Chokoloskee to the mainland's Everglades City in 1956. After the park was established, private property in the Flamingo area was claimed by eminent domain, and the site was incorporated into the park as a visitor center. ### Land development and conservation Several attempts were made to drain and develop the Everglades in the 1880s. The first canals built in the Everglades did little harm to the ecosystem, as they were unable to drain much of it. Napoleon Bonaparte Broward based the majority of his 1904 campaign for governor on how drainage would create "The Empire of the Everglades". Broward ordered the drainage that took place between 1905 and 1910, and it was successful enough that land developers sold tracts for \$30 per acre, settling the town of Davie, and developing regions in Lee and Dade counties. The canals also cleared water that made way for agricultural fields growing sugarcane. In the 1920s, a population boom in South Florida created the Florida land boom, which was described by author Michael Grunwald as "insanity". Land was sold before any homes or structures were built on it and in some cases before any plans for construction were in place. New landowners, eager to make good on their investments, hastily constructed homes and small towns on recently drained land. Mangrove trees on the coasts were taken down for better views and replaced with shallow-rooted palm trees. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers began construction on larger canals to control the rising waters in the Everglades. Nevertheless, Lake Okeechobee continued to rise and fall, the region was covered with rain, and city planners continued to battle the water. The 1926 Miami Hurricane caused Lake Okeechobee levees to fail; hundreds of people south of the lake drowned. Two years later, the 1928 Okeechobee Hurricane claimed 2,500 lives when Lake Okeechobee once again surged over its levees. Politicians who declared the Everglades uninhabitable were silenced when a four-story wall, the Herbert Hoover Dike, was built around Lake Okeechobee. This wall effectively cut off the water source from the Everglades. Following the wall's construction, South Florida endured a drought severe enough to cause serious wildfires in 1939. The influx of humans had a detrimental effect on the plants and animals of the region when melaleuca trees (Melaleuca quinquenervia) were introduced to help with drainage, along with Australian pines brought in by developers as windbreaks. The region's timber was devastated for lumber supplies. Alligators, birds, frogs, and fish were hunted on a large scale. Entire rookeries of wading birds were shot to collect their plumes, which were used in women's hats in the early 20th century. The largest impact people had on the region was the diversion of water away from the Everglades. Canals were deepened and widened, and water levels fell dramatically, causing chaos in food webs. Salt water replaced fresh water in the canals, and by 1997 scientists noticed that salt water was seeping into the Biscayne Aquifer, South Florida's water source. In the 1940s, Marjory Stoneman Douglas, a freelance writer and former reporter for The Miami Herald, began to research the Everglades for an assignment about the Miami River. She studied the land and water for five years and published The Everglades: River of Grass in 1947, describing the area in great detail, including a chapter on its disappearance. She wrote: "What had been a river of grass and sweet water that had given meaning and life and uniqueness to this enormous geography through centuries in which man had no place here was made, in one chaotic gesture of greed and ignorance and folly, a river of fire." The book has sold 500,000 copies since its publication, and Douglas's continued dedication to ecology conservation earned her the nicknames "Grand Dame of the Everglades", "Grandmother of the Everglades" and "the anti-Christ" for her singular focus at the expense of some political interests. She founded and served as president for an organization called Friends of the Everglades, initially intended to protest the construction of a proposed Big Cypress jetport in 1968. Successful in that confrontation, the organization has grown to over 4,000 members, committed to the preservation of the Everglades. She wrote and spoke about the importance of the Everglades until her death at age 108 in 1998. ## Park history Floridians hoping to preserve at least part of the Everglades began to express their concern over diminishing resources in the early 20th century. Royal Palm State Park was created in 1916 and protected Paradise Key; it included several trails and a visitor center several miles from Homestead. Miami-based naturalists first proposed that the area become a national park in 1923. Five years later, the Florida state legislature established the Tropical Everglades National Park Commission to study the formation of a protected area. The commission was led by Ernest F. Coe, a land developer turned conservationist, who was eventually nicknamed Father of Everglades National Park. Coe's original plan for the park included more than 2,000,000 acres (3,125.0 sq mi; 8,093.7 km²) including Key Largo and Big Cypress, and his unwillingness to compromise almost prevented the park's creation. Various other interests, including land developers and sport hunters, demanded that the size of the park be decreased. The commission was also tasked with proposing a method to raise the money to purchase the land. The search coincided with the arrival of the Great Depression in the United States, and money for land purchase was scarce. The U.S. House of Representatives authorized the creation of the new national park on May 30, 1934, but the Act (HR 2837), which permanently reserved lands donated by public or private donation as wilderness, passed only with a rider that ensured no money would be allotted to the project for at least five years. Coe's passion and U.S. Senator Spessard Holland's politicking helped to fully establish the park, after Holland was able to negotiate 1,300,000 acres (2,031.2 sq mi; 5,260.9 km²) of the park, leaving out Big Cypress, Key Largo, the Turner River area, and a 22,000-acre (34.4 sq mi; 89.0 km²) tract of land called "The Hole in the Donut" that was too highly valued for agriculture. Miami Herald editor John Pennekamp was instrumental in pushing the Florida Legislature to raise \$2 million to purchase the private land inside the park boundaries. It was dedicated by President Harry Truman on December 6, 1947, one month after Marjory Stoneman Douglas's book The Everglades: River of Grass was released. The same year, several tropical storms struck South Florida, prompting the construction of 1,400 miles (2,300 km) of canals, sending water unwanted by farmers and residents to the ocean. The Central and Southern Florida Flood Control Project (C&SF) was authorized by Congress to construct more than one thousand miles of canals and flood control structures across South Florida. The C&SF, run by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, established an agricultural area directly south of Lake Okeechobee, and three water conservation areas, all bordered by canals that diverted excess water either to urban areas or into the Atlantic Ocean, Gulf of Mexico or Florida Bay. South of these manmade regions was Everglades National Park, which had been effectively cut off from its water supply. By the 1960s, the park was visibly suffering. The C&SF was directed to provide enough water to sustain the park; it did not follow through. A proposed airport that would have dire environmental effects on Everglades National Park became the center of a battle that helped to initiate the environmental movement into local and national politics. The airport proposal was eventually abandoned, and in 1972 a bill was introduced to curb development in South Florida and ensure the national park would receive the amount of water it needed. Efforts turned to repairing the damage wrought by decades of mismanagement: the Army Corps of Engineers changed its focus in 1990 from constructing dams and canals to constructing "purely environmental projects". Regions originally included in Ernest Coe's vision for a national park were slowly added over the years to the park or incorporated into other protected areas: Biscayne National Park, Big Cypress National Preserve, John Pennekamp Coral Reef State Park on Key Largo, Ten Thousand Islands National Wildlife Refuge, and Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary were all protected after the park's opening in 1947. Everglades National Park was designated an International Biosphere Reserve on October 26, 1976. On November 10, 1978, 1,296,500 acres (2,025.8 sq mi; 5,246.7 km²), about 86% of the park, was declared a wilderness area. It was renamed the Marjory Stoneman Douglas Wilderness in 1997. It was listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site on October 24, 1979, and as a Wetland of International Importance on June 4, 1987. It was placed on the List of World Heritage in Danger from 1993 until 2007 and then again in 2010. The park was added again due to the continued degradation of the set causing significant indications of eutrophication (for example algal blooms) negatively impacting the marine life causing the US government to request UNESCO and IUCN for assistance in development. ### Restoration efforts President George H. W. Bush signed the Everglades National Park Protection and Expansion Act on December 13, 1989, that added 109,506 acres (171.1 sq mi; 443.2 km²) to the eastern side of the park, closed the park to airboats, directed the Department of the Army to restore water to improve the ecosystems within Everglades National Park, and "Direct(ed) the Secretary of the Interior to manage the Park in order to maintain the natural abundance, diversity, and ecological integrity of native plants and animals, as well as the behavior of native animals, as part of their ecosystem." Bush remarked in his statement when signing the act, "Through this legislation that river of grass may now be restored to its natural flow of water". In 2000, Congress approved the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP), a federal effort to restore the Everglades with the objectives of "restoration, preservation and protection of the south Florida ecosystem while providing for other water-related needs of the region", and claiming to be the largest environmental restoration in history. It was a controversial plan; detractors worried that it "relies on uncertain technologies, overlooks water quality, subsidizes damaging growth and delays its environmental benefits". Supporters of the plan included the National Audubon Society, who were accused by Friends of the Everglades and the Biodiversity Legal Foundation of prioritizing agricultural and business interests. CERP projects are designed to capture 1.7 billion US gallons (6,400,000 m³) of fresh water every day, store it in underground reservoirs, and release the water to areas within 16 counties in South Florida. Approximately 35,600 acres (55.6 sq mi; 144.1 km²) of man-made wetlands are to be constructed to confine contaminated water before it is released to the Everglades, and 240 miles (390 km) of canals that divert water away from the Everglades are to be destroyed. During the first five years of implementation, CERP was responsible for the purchase of 207,000 acres (323.4 sq mi; 837.7 km²) of land at a cost of \$1 billion. The plan aims to spend \$10.5 billion over 30 years, combining 50 different projects and giving them 5-year timelines. Everglades National Park was directly hit by Hurricanes Katrina, Wilma, and Rita in 2005. Such storms are a natural part of the park's ecosystem; 1960's Hurricane Donna left nothing in the mangroves but "standing dead snags" several miles wide, but 30 years later the area had completely recovered. Predictably, what suffered the most in the park from the 2005 hurricanes were man-made structures. In 2009 the visitor center and lodge at Flamingo were irreparably damaged by 125 mph (201 km/h) winds and an 8 ft (2.4 m) storm surge; the lodge had been functioning for 50 years when it was torn down; nothing is slated to replace it. ### Park economics Everglades National Park reported in 2005 a budget of over \$28 million. Of that, \$14.8 million was granted from the National Park Service and \$13.5 million from various sources including CERP, donations, and other grants. The entry fee for private vehicles in 2021 is \$30. Of the nearly one million visitors to Everglades National Park in 2006, more than 38,000 were overnight campers, paying \$16 a night or \$10 a night for backcountry permits. Visitors spent \$2.6 million within the park and \$48 million in local economies. More than 900 jobs were sustained or created within or by the park, and the park added value of \$35 million to local economies. ### Leadership and administration Everglades National Park has had 19 superintendents since it was dedicated in 1947. The park's first superintendent, Daniel Beard (1947-1958), was also its longest-serving. After Superintendent Beard, Warren F. Hamilton served between 1958 and 1963, followed by Stanley C. Joseph (1963-1966), Roger W. Allin (1966-1968), John C. Raftery (1968-1970), Joseph Brown (1970-1971), Jack E. Stark (1971-1976), John M. Good (1976-1980), John M. Morehead (1980-1986), Marueen E. Finnerty (Acting Superintendent, 1986), Michael V. Finley (1986-1989), Robert L. Arnberger (Acting Superintendent, 1989), Robert S. Chandler (1989-1992), Dick Ring (1992-2000), Marueen E. Finnerty (2000-2003), Dan Kimball (2004-2014), Shawn Benge (Acting Superintendent, 2014), Bob Krumenaker (Acting Superintendent, 2014-2015), and finally Pedro Ramos, who was appointed in 2015 and continues to serve. The park was placed into Administrative Region I in 1937, when the regions were first established. Region I was retitled the Southeast Region in 1962, which was restructured into the Southeast Area in 1995. The reorganized unified Interior regions put it in the new Region 2. ## Activities The busiest season for visitors is from December to March, when temperatures are lowest and mosquitoes are least active. The park features five visitor centers: on the Tamiami Trail (part of U.S. Route 41) directly west of Miami is the Shark Valley Visitor Center. A fifteen-mile (24 km) round trip path leads from this center to a two-story observation tower. Tram tours are available during the busy season. Closest to Homestead on State Road 9336 is the Ernest F. Coe Visitor Center, where a 38-mile (61 km) road begins, winding through pine rockland, cypress, freshwater marl prairie, coastal prairie, and mangrove ecosystems. Various hiking trails are accessible from the road, which runs to the Flamingo Visitor Center and marina, open and staffed during the busier time of the year. The Gulf Coast Visitor Center is closest to Everglades City on State Road 29 along the west coast. The Gulf Coast Visitor Center gives canoers access to the Wilderness Waterway, a 99-mile (160 km) canoe trail that extends to the Flamingo Visitor Center. The former Royal Palm State Park was the site of the first Everglades National Park visitor center and later became the Royal Palm Visitor Center within the park. The western coast of the park and the Ten Thousand Islands and the various key islands in Florida Bay are accessible only by boat. ### Trails Several walking trails in the park vary in hiking difficulty on Pine Island, where visitors can cross hardwood hammocks, pinelands, and freshwater sloughs. Starting at the Royal Palm Visitor Center, the Anhinga Trail is a half-mile self-guided tour through a sawgrass marsh where visitors can see alligators, marsh and wading birds, turtles, and bromeliads. Its proximity to Homestead and its accessibility make it one of the most visited sites in the park. The nearby Gumbo Limbo Trail is also self-guided, at half-mile long. It loops through a canopy of hardwood hammocks that include gumbo limbo (Bursera simaruba), royal palms (Roystonea), strangler figs (Ficus aurea), and a variety of epiphytes. Twenty-eight miles (45 km) of trails start near the Long Pine Key campgrounds and wind through Long Pine Key, well-suited for offroad cycling through the pine rocklands in the Marjory Stoneman Douglas Wilderness Area. Two boardwalks allow visitors to walk through a cypress forest at Pa-Hay-O-Kee, which also features a two-story overlook, and another at Mahogany Hammock (referring to Swietenia mahagoni) that takes hikers through a dense forest in the middle of a freshwater marl prairie. Closer to Flamingo, more rugged trails take visitors through mangrove swamps, along Florida Bay. Christian Point Trail, Snake Bight Trail, Rowdy Bend Trail and Coastal Prairie Trail allow viewing of shorebirds and wading birds among the mangroves. Portions of the trails may be impassable depending on the time of year, because of mosquitoes and water levels. Ranger-led tours take place in the busier season only. ### Camping and recreation Camping is available year-round in Everglades National Park. Camping with some services is available at Long Pine Key, close to the Ernest F. Coe Visitor Center, where 108 sites are accessible by car. Near Flamingo, 234 campsites with some services are also available. Recreational vehicle camping is available at these sites, but not with all necessary services. Back-country permits are required for campsites along the Wilderness Waterway, Gulf Coast sites, and sites in the various keys. Several back-country sites are chickees; others are beach and ground sites. Low-powered motorboats are allowed in the park; the majority of salt water areas are no-wake zones to protect manatees and other marine animals from harm. Jet skis, airboats, and other motorized personal watercraft are prohibited. Many trails allow kayaks and canoes. A state license is required for fishing. Fresh water licenses are not sold in the park, but a salt water license may be available. Swimming is not recommended within the park boundaries; water moccasins, snapping turtles (Chelydra serpentina), alligators, and crocodiles thrive in fresh water. Sharks, barracuda, and sharp dangerous coral are plentiful in salt water. Visibility is low in both salt water and fresh water areas. Everglades National Park is an important part of the Great Florida Birding Trail. It has great biodiversity and many species of birds for bird watching and bird photography also. ### Dark skies site Portions of Everglades National Park are ideal for dark sky observations in South Florida. The best viewing locations are in the remote southern and western areas of the Everglades, such as Flamingo and the Ten Thousand Islands. The Milky Way appears brightest when looking south, toward the least light-polluted areas. ## Threats to the park and ecology ### Diversion and quality of water Less than 50 percent of the Everglades which existed prior to drainage attempts remains intact today. Populations of wading birds dwindled 90 percent from their original numbers between the 1940s and 2000s. The diversion of water to South Florida's still-growing metropolitan areas is the Everglades National Park's number one threat. In the 1950s and 1960s, 1,400 miles (2,300 km) of canals and levees, 150 gates and spillways, and 16 pumping stations were constructed to direct water toward cities and away from the Everglades. Low levels of water leave fish vulnerable to reptiles and birds, and as sawgrass dries it can burn or die off, which in turn kills apple snails and other animals that wading birds feed upon. Populations of birds fluctuate; in 2009, the South Florida Water Management District claimed wading birds across South Florida increased by 335 percent. Following three years of increasing numbers, The Miami Herald reported in 2009 that populations of wading birds within the park decreased by 29 percent. Cities along the west coast of Florida rely on desalinization for fresh water; the quantity demanded is too great for the land to provide. Nitrates in the underground water system and high levels of mercury also impact the quality of fresh water the park receives. In 1998, a Florida panther was found dead in Shark Water Slough, with levels of mercury high enough to kill a human. Increased occurrences of algal blooms and red tide in Biscayne Bay and Florida Bay have been traced to the amounts of controlled water released from Lake Okeechobee. The brochure given to visitors at Everglades National Park includes a statement that reads, "Freshwater flowing into the park is engineered. With the help of pumps, floodgates, and retention ponds along the park's boundary, the Everglades is presently on life support, alive but diminished." ### Urban encroachment A series of levees on the park's eastern border marks the line between urban and protected areas, but development into these areas threatens the park system. Florida still attracts nearly a thousand new residents every day, and building residential, commercial and industrial zones near Everglades National Park stresses the water balance and ecosystems within the park. On the park's western border, Fort Myers, Naples, and Cape Coral are expanding, but no system of levees exists to mark that border. National Geographic rated both Everglades National Park and Big Cypress National Preserve the lowest-scoring parks in North America, at 32 out of 100. Their scoring system rated 55 parks by their sustainable tourism, destination quality, and park management. The experts who compiled the results justified the score by stating: "Encroachment by housing and retail development has thrown the precious ecosystem into a tailspin, and if humankind doesn't back off, there will be nothing left of one of this country's most amazing treasures". ### Endangered and threatened animals Thirty-six federally protected animals live in the park, some of which face grave threats to their survival. In the United States, the American crocodile's only habitat is within South Florida. They were once overhunted for their hides. They are protected today from hunting but are still threatened by habitat destruction and injury from vehicle collisions when crossing roads to reach waterways. About 2,000 crocodiles live in Florida, and there are roughly 100 nests in the Everglades and Biscayne National Parks. Crocodiles populations in South Florida have increased as has the number of alligators. Crocodiles were reclassified from "endangered" to "threatened" in the United States in 2007. The Florida panther is one of the most endangered mammals on earth. About 230 live in the wild, primarily in the Everglades and the Big Cypress Swamp. The biggest threats to the panther include habitat destruction from human development, vehicle collisions, inbreeding due to their limited gene pool, parasites, diseases, and mercury poisoning. Four Everglade species of sea turtle including the Atlantic green sea turtle, the Atlantic hawksbill, the Atlantic loggerhead (Caretta caretta), and the Atlantic ridley (Lepidochelys kempii) are endangered. Also, the leatherback sea turtle (Dermochelys coriacea) is threatened. Numbers are difficult to determine, since males and juveniles do not return to their birthplace; females lay eggs in the same location every year. Habitat loss, illegal poaching, and destructive fishing practices are the biggest threats to these animals. The range of the Cape Sable seaside sparrow is restricted to Everglades National Park and the Big Cypress Swamp. In 1981 6,656 Cape Sable seaside sparrows were reported in park boundaries, but surveys over 10 years documented a decline to an estimated 2,624 birds by 2002. Attempts to return natural levels of water to the park have been controversial; Cape Sable seaside sparrows nest about a foot off the ground, and rising water levels may harm future populations, as well as threaten the locally endangered snail kite. The Everglades snail kite eats apple snails almost exclusively, and the Everglades is the only location in the United States where this bird of prey exists. There is some evidence that the population may be increasing, but the loss of habitat and food sources keep the estimated number of these birds at several hundred. The West Indian manatee has been upgraded from endangered to threatened. Collisions with boats and habitat loss are still its biggest threats. ### Drought, fire, and rising sea levels Fire naturally occurs after lightning storms but takes its heaviest toll when water levels are low. Hardwood hammock and cypress trees are susceptible to heavy damage from fire, and some may take decades to grow back. Peat built up over centuries in the marsh can cause fires to burn deep scars in the soil. In 2007, Fred Sklar of the South Florida Water Management District said: "An extreme drought can be viewed (as) almost as catastrophic as a volcano. It can reshape the entire landscape. It can take 1,000 years to produce two inches of peat, and you can lose those couple of inches in a week." Rising sea levels caused by global warming are another threat to the future of the park. Since 1932, ocean levels at Key West have steadily risen over 0.7 feet (0.2 m), which could have disastrous consequences for land so close to the ocean. It is estimated that within 500 years freshwater habitats in the Everglades National Park will be obliterated by salt water, leaving only the northernmost portion of the Everglades. Cost estimates for raising or replacing the Tamiami Trail and Alligator Alley with bridges are in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Through Trump Administration, The Florida Department of Transportation, and Everglades National Park, there are plans to execute and complete the Next Steps project to help fix these various water issues, along with other parts of the park. This completion plan was announced in September 2020, will begin November 2020, and should be done by the end of 2024. ### Non-native species The introduction of non-native species into South Florida is a considerable problem for the park. Many of the biological controls such as weather, disease, and consumers who naturally limit plants in their native environments do not exist in the Everglades, causing many to grow larger and multiply far beyond their average numbers in their native habitats. Approximately 26 percent of all fish, reptiles, birds, and mammal species in South Florida are exotic—more than in any other part of the U.S.—and the region hosts one of the highest numbers of exotic plant species in the world. Species that adapt the most aggressively to conditions in the Everglades, by spreading quickly or competing with native species that sometimes are threatened or endangered, are called "invasive". Thousands of exotic plant species have been observed in South Florida, usually introduced as ornamental landscaping, but park staff must eradicate such invasive plants as melaleuca tree (Melaleuca quinquenervia), Brazilian pepper (Schinus terebinthifolius), and Old World climbing fern (Lygodium microphyllum). Similarly, animals often do not find the predators or natural barriers to reproduction in the Everglades as they do where they originate, thus they often reproduce more quickly and efficiently. Lobate lac scale insects (Paratachardina pseudolobata) kill shrubs and other plants in hardwood hammocks. Bromeliad beetles (Metamasius callizona) destroy bromeliads and the ecosystems they host. Walking catfish (Clarias batrachus) can deplete aquaculture stocks and they carry enteric septicemia. The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission (FWC) listed eight "Reptiles of Concern", including the Burmese python (Python molurus bivittatus), focusing on them for their large sizes and aggressive natures, allowing licensed hunters to kill any listed animals in protected areas and sell their meat and hides. Burmese pythons, two subspecies of African rock pythons (Python sebae; northern and southern), and yellow anacondas (Eunectes notaeus) were banned from import into the U.S. in 2012. United States Secretary of the Interior Ken Salazar announced the inclusion of these reptiles at Everglades National Park. Exotic species control falls under the management of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, which has been compiling and disseminating information about invasive species since 1994. Control of invasive species costs \$500 million per year, but 1,700,000 acres (2,656.2 sq mi; 6,879.7 km²) of land in South Florida remains infested. ## See also - List of birds of Everglades National Park - List of national parks of the United States - Dry Tortugas National Park - Environmental Impact of the Big Cypress Swamp Jetport - Nike Missile Site HM-69 - World Heritage Sites in Danger

White-eyed river martin

Species of bird

The white-eyed river martin (Pseudochelidon sirintarae) is a passerine bird, one of only two members of the river martin subfamily of the swallows. Since it has significant differences from its closest relative, the African river martin, it is sometimes placed in its own genus, Eurochelidon. First found in 1968, it is known only from a single wintering site in Thailand, and may be extinct, since it has not been seen since 1980 despite targeted surveys in Thailand and neighbouring Cambodia. It may possibly still breed in China or Southeast Asia, but a Chinese painting initially thought to depict this species was later reassessed as showing pratincoles. The adult white-eyed river martin is a medium-sized swallow, with mainly glossy greenish-black plumage, a white rump, and a tail which has two elongated slender central tail feathers, each widening to a racket-shape at the tip. It has a white eye ring and a broad, bright greenish-yellow bill. The sexes are similar in appearance, but the juvenile lacks the tail ornaments and is generally browner than the adult. Little is known of the behaviour or breeding habitat of this martin, although like other swallows it feeds on insects caught in flight, and its wide bill suggests that it may take relatively large species. It roosts in reed beds in winter, and may nest in river sandbanks, probably in April or May before the summer rains. It may have been overlooked prior to its discovery because it tended to feed at dawn or dusk rather than during the day. The martin's apparent demise may have been hastened by trapping, loss of habitat and the construction of dams. The winter swallow roosts at the only known location of this martin have greatly reduced in numbers, and birds breeding at river habitats have declined throughout the region. The white-eyed river martin is one of only two birds endemic to Thailand, and the country's government has noted this through the issues of a stamp and a high-value commemorative coin. ## Taxonomy Within the swallow family, the white-eyed river martin is one of only two members of the river martin subfamily Pseudochelidoninae, the other being the African river martin Pseudochelidon eurystomina of the Congo Basin in Africa. These two species possess a number of distinctive features which mark them out from other swallows and martins, including their robust legs and feet, and stout bills. The extent of their differences from other swallows and the wide geographical separation of the two martins suggest that they are relict populations of a group of species that diverged from the main swallow lineage early in its evolution. The separation of this subfamily is supported by genetic evidence, and their habit of nesting in burrows is thought to be characteristic of the earliest members of the swallow family. The white-eyed river martin was discovered in 1968 by Thai ornithologist Kitti Thonglongya, who gave the bird its current binomial name. The genus name Pseudochelidon (Hartlaub, 1861) comes from the Ancient Greek prefix ψευδο/pseudo "false" and χελιδον/chelidôn, "swallow", and the species name sirintarae commemorates Princess Maha Chakri Sirindhorn of Thailand. The African and Asian Pseudochelidon species differ markedly in the size of their bills and eyes, suggesting that they have different feeding ecologies, with the white-eyed river martin probably able to take much larger prey. The Thai species also has a swollen, hard gape (fleshy interior of the bill) unlike the softer, fleshier, and much less prominent gape of the African river martin. Thonglongya estimated the bill of the Thai species to be 17.6% wider than that of the African bird, but a later estimate, using specimens preserved in alcohol instead of dried skins (to avoid shrinkage), gave a difference of 22.5% between the bills of the two swallows. Following a suggestion by Kitti in his original paper, Richard Brooke proposed in 1972 that the white-eyed river martin was sufficiently different from the African species to be placed in a separate monotypic genus Eurochelidon, but this was contested by other authorities. The new genus was not subsequently widely adopted by other authors, although BirdLife International uses Eurochelidon. ## Description The adult white-eyed river martin is a medium-sized swallow, 18 cm (7 in) long, with mainly silky black plumage and a white rump. The back is green-glossed black, and is separated from the similarly coloured upper tail by a narrow bright white rump band. The head is darker than the back, with a velvet-black chin leading to blue-green glossed black underparts. The wings are black, with brown inner edges to the flight feathers, and the tail is green-glossed black with two elongated, slender, central tail feathers, up to 9 cm (3.5 in) long. These expand slightly at the tips to give narrow racquets 4.9–8.5 cm (1.9–3.3 in) long. The wing length averages 11.5 cm (4.5 in), the tail is 10.7 cm (4.2 in) long, and the tarsus averages 1.1 cm (0.43 in). The iris and eyelid are white, giving the appearance of a white eye ring, and the broad, bright greenish-yellow bill has a black hooked tip to the upper mandible. The large, strong feet and legs are flesh-coloured. This species is silent when wintering, and its breeding vocalisations are unknown. The sexes are similar, but the juvenile lacks the tail racquets, has a brown head and chin, and is generally browner than the adult. Juveniles taken in January and February were moulting their body feathers. The original Thai name for the Pseudochelidon, only known to local people in Bueng Boraphet, was นกตาพอง (nok ta phong) which may be roughly translated as "bird with enlarged eyes". After its official discovery in 1968, it was named เจ้าฟ้าหญิงสิรินธร (nok chaofa ying sirinthon, "Princess Sirindhorn bird"). ## Distribution and habitat The white-eyed river martin was discovered in 1968 by Kitti Thonglongya, who obtained nine specimens netted by professional bird-hunters as part of a migratory bird survey at a night-time roost at Thailand's largest freshwater lake, Bueng Boraphet, in Nakhon Sawan Province. It was first seen in the wild by ornithologists at the same wintering site in 1977. The species has only been seen at the lake, always between the months of November and February, and the wintering habitat is assumed to be in the vicinity of open fresh water for feeding, with reed beds for the night-time roost. The white-eyed river martin may be migratory, and if the breeding habitat resembles that of the African river martin, it is likely to be the forested valleys of large rivers; these can provide sandbars and islands for nesting, and woodland over which the birds can catch insect prey. The breeding grounds and habitat are unknown, although river valleys in northern Thailand or southwestern China are possibilities. A claimed depiction of this species in a Chinese scroll painting initially appeared to support the possibility of the martin breeding in China. The bird in the painting had a similarly shaped head and bill, a white eye and a long tail, although it lacked the white rump, did not show the correct bill colour, and elongated the outer, rather than central, tail feathers. Painted before 1970, it pre-dated the publication of pictures of the Thai bird, so it must have been painted from life. It is now thought more likely that the scroll shows Oriental pratincoles (Glareola maldivarum). Cambodia and Myanmar have also been suggested as possible refuges for the martin, but there has also been speculation on whether it is migratory at all. ## Behaviour Since its breeding grounds are undiscovered, nothing is known about the white-eyed river martin's breeding biology, although it is suggested that it may nest in burrows in river sandbars, probably in April or May before the monsoon rain raises water levels. However, distinct differences in foot and toe morphology from its African relative have led some authorities to speculate that even the assumption that it nests in burrows could be incorrect. In winter, it roosts with barn swallows in reed beds. Like other swallows, the white-eyed river martin feeds on insects, including beetles, which are caught on the wing. Given its size and unusual mouth structure, it may well take larger insects than other swallows. This species is described as graceful and buoyant in flight, and, like its African relative, appears reluctant to use perches, behaviour that, together with its unusual toe-shape and the fact that mud was found on the toes of one of the first specimens, suggest that this species may be relatively terrestrial. Pamela C. Rasmussen suggested that, given its unusually large eyes, the species might be nocturnal or at least crepuscular, a factor that could make it very inconspicuous, and thus partly explain how it remained undetected for so long. Although the fact that the first specimens were supposedly collected roosting at night in reedbeds might appear to contradict this theory, it is possible that the birds might not have been caught at the roost. Alternatively, they might be capable of both diurnal and nocturnal behaviour, or be crepuscular, depending on the season or circumstance. ## Status The white-eyed river martin was seen in Thailand in 1972, 1977 and 1980, but not definitely since, although there is an unconfirmed sighting from Thailand from 1986. The only colour photographs of a living bird are of one individual captured and ringed by Elliott McClure in 1968. It is classified as Critically Endangered, which is the highest risk category assigned by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN) for wild species. The designation means that a species' numbers have decreased, or will decrease, by 80% within three generations. The IUCN does not consider a species extinct until extensive targeted surveys have been conducted, but the white-eyed river martin may well no longer exist in the wild, and was probably always rare. There has been a drastic decline in the Bueng Boraphet swallow population from the hundreds of thousands reported to roost around 1970 to maximum counts of 8,000 made in the winter of 1980–1981, although it is not certain if this represents a real decline or a shift in site in response to hunting. Other potential causes for the martin's decline include the disturbance of sand bars in the rivers, and the construction of dams (which flood the area upstream and change the water flow downstream), deforestation, and increasing conversion of its habitat to agriculture. Other Southeast Asian species using riverine sand bars have also been adversely affected by disturbance and habitat degradation. Very few swallows of any kind now roost in the Bueng Boraphet reedbeds, preferring sugarcane plantations, and, despite searching, the white-eyed river martin has not been found in other nearby large swallow roosts. The martin is legally protected under Appendix 1 (the highest category) of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (CITES) agreement, and is one of 15 "Reserved Species" in Thailand which, under the provisions of the Wild Animal Reservation and Protection Act, BE 2535, cannot be legally hunted, collected, or kept in captivity under any circumstances. Despite official protection, the martin was captured by locals along with other swallows for sale as food or for release by devout Buddhists, and following its discovery by ornithologists, trappers were reported to have caught as many as 120 individuals and sold them to the director of the Nakhon Sawan Fisheries Station who was unable to keep them alive in captivity. Two birds sent to Bangkok Zoo in 1971 also soon died. The small population may therefore have become non-viable. Bueng Boraphet has been declared a Non-Hunting Area in an effort to protect the species, but surveys to find this martin have been unsuccessful. These include several searches at the main site, a 1969 survey of the Nan, Yom and Wang Rivers of northern Thailand, and a 1996 survey of rivers in northern Laos. A possible sighting was made in Cambodia in 2004, but a 2008 investigation using speedboat surveys and interviews with villagers in Cambodia near the location of the claimed sighting failed to find any positive evidence, and noted that the habitat was in poor condition. Nevertheless, animals as large as the saola have been rediscovered in Southeast Asia, so it is conceivable that a small population of the martin survives. Despite the lack of records from China, a 2000 field guide covering the region included this species, since it is the mostly likely breeding area outside Thailand, although it is omitted from the 2008 Birds of East Asia. The white-eyed river martin and the Deignan's babbler (Stachyridopsis rodolphei), are the only bird species endemic to Thailand, and the martin has attracted sufficient interest to be featured on a 75 satang postage stamp in 1975, as one of a set of four depicting Thai birds, and on a 5,000 Thai baht conservation issue gold coin in 1974. ## Cited texts